Abusing of the understrength unit rule

In the FAQ, it state you no longer have to pay for the full unit if you use an understrength unit. You only pay for the model you actually takes. It open a whole new field for abusions, and I can't think of all of them. But I have thought of somes:

-2-man trueborn, with dark lance.

-mass 2 wyches squads. 1 with weapon and the hekatrix

-only keeps the hekatrix in the unit, give her the blast pistol and make full "squads" in raider

-lone klaivex

I'm sure there are a lot of others tricks.

I'm actually wondering what you do if you show up to a tournament and your opponent has ten visible models in his/her bag and only brings out seven. As per the rule... he/she has the models, so then the understrength rule shouldn't apply.

I kind of wish this rule wasn't in the Matched Play section.

Ahh, a topic with my name on it :3

Keep in mind this only works once per unit type. That is, only one undermanned unit of Warriors, Wyches, Trueborn, Scourges, etc is allowed per army.

That being said, it would be tremendously useful for things like squeezing an extra couple lances into a vehicle or idk actually fitting some Incubi guards in with your Archon aboard a Venom. You could also do something like put 2 Darklance Trueborn and 3 Darklance Scourges in a single Bunker (afaik they can actually fit Scourges still).

TeenageAngst wrote:

Ahh, a topic with my name on it :3

Keep in mind this only works once per unit type. That is, only one undermanned unit of Warriors, Wyches, Trueborn, Scourges, etc is allowed per army.

That being said, it would be tremendously useful for things like squeezing an extra couple lances into a vehicle or idk actually fitting some Incubi guards in with your Archon aboard a Venom. You could also do something like put 2 Darklance Trueborn and 3 Darklance Scourges in a single Bunker (afaik they can actually fit Scourges still).

Well, I'm not sure, but I think we could fit some more if very very sadly and unexpectedly, you only own trueborn equipped with dark lance. As all tournaments always have stated, all your models MUST be WYSIWYG. So, you CAN'T have a full unit, because you don't own the rightful model to play a normal full unit.

example abusive list:

battalion(or whatever the 6 cp one is.):

HQ
archon w/cheapest setup

Elites
2 trueborn w/2 DL
1 nightfiend
5 mandrakes

Troops
1 kabalite
1 wrack
1 wych
5 kabalites
5 kabalites
5 kabalites

FA
4 scourge w/4 DLs
5 scourge
5 scourge
5 scourge
5 scourge
5 scourge

Heavy support
dl ravager
dl ravager
dl ravager
dl ravager
dl ravager
dl ravager

transports
8 venoms

@wormfromhell the list is illegal because you can't have any other unit that is the same type as the one you're taking an understrength unit for. So the night fiend, single kabalite and Scourges are illegal. You could probably still make it work somehow.

I'm pretty sure it would work so long as there is only 1 understrength unit of each type.

I'm pretty sure it states that you can only have one unit of that type in your army. Not one understrength unit of that type, one type. Because while you don't have the models for two legal 5 man mandrake squads You have the models for a 6 man unit which is completely legal.

The part that no one is reading:

Each unit’s datasheet will describe how many models
make up that unit. Sometimes you may find that you
do not have enough models to field a minimum-sized
unit; if this is the case, you can still include one unit
of that type in your army with as many models as you
have available.

Remember, that says one unit of that type.

That rule was obviously made for casual beginner plays, and i doubt tournaments will allow it.
They might even search your bag/your house/your banking history ( ), and if they find the missing models, you're screwed, since the rule ONLY applies in the case you don't own enough models.
So to use it to fit 4 incubi and an Archon in a Venom, you have to throw the last incubi to the trashcan. If not, you're cheating. Great rule design right there.

It's part of the advanced rules though, isn't it? So surely it's tournament legal? I'd really like it to be because it benefits us, as it means we don't automatically need to take a Raider if we want a HQ alongside anything other than court models.

Technically, as written it is fully in the rules as totally legal, and intended us such for tournaments too.

I've been speaking to some other tournament organizers about how we feel with 8th moving forward, and we've had input from a GW HQ staffer who told us that the rules were apparently designed so that comping should be necessary, and this is a very purposeful addition.
The feeling amongst we organizers though, is that after seeing how a few more events run, the general consensus will probably be to ban understrength units.