In the same way that you can make a model a battlestandard bearer which excludes them from being the general, adding an item that makes it so your character can't pick from lore of vampires would stop him from being eligible for being the general.
In the same way that you can make a model a battlestandard bearer which excludes them from being the general, adding an item that makes it so your character can't pick from lore of vampires would stop him from being eligible for being the general.
The rules says he must be a wizard and that said wizard must use the lore of vampires if he can choose a lore.Originally Posted by woodster17
Emphasis mine
It clearly states that he must be a wizard but only has to use the Lore of the Vampires if he is able to choose a spell lore, taking the wizarding hat prevents him from choosing a spell lore, this means he can't choose a lore and therefore must not use the Lore of the Vampires. Forbidden Lore does not prevent him from choosing a lore (he may choose any of the BRB except life) and thus he must choose the lore of the Vampires (even though it is not a lore he could otherwise choose).
Compare the wording for vampire counts generals with that for Tomb Kings Hierophants.
Emphasis mine
A Tomb Kings Hierophant must be a wizard using the Lore of Nehekara, a vampire counts General must be a wizard who, if given a choice, must use the Lore of the Vampires.
There aint nowt a cannon can do that a determined dwarf with a hammer can´t achive.-Old Redmane
Visit my dwarfs at http://kazad-grund.webs.com/
IMO choosing a spell lore starts at list creation. Your choice to put a wizard hat on him is you choosing to take a lore other than lore of vampires. This would immediately eliminate them as a possible choice for your general, as they are choosing not to take the lore of vampires.
The wording in, "If he is able to choose a spell lore he must use the Lore of the Vampires (see page 60)." fits just fine with this logic. You are building a character who has access to more than one lore of magic. If you want him to be your general, then you must give him the lore of vampires
Except a Wizarding Hat is not a requirement, it's an optional item. So by taking it on your only Vampire Lord, you're breaking the rule that he must take the Lore of the Vampires (as a Vampire Lord, in and of itself, can choose a lore).
Dark Lancers Renegade Astartes Chapter, Chaos Space Marines - 7,000pts
The Undead Scourge, Vampire Counts - 2,500pts [log]
Averland State Army, Empire - 3,000pts [log]
Still need one more Zombie Dragon/Terrorgheist rider (the Blood Dragon, not Ghoul King)? PM me for much £££s!
Warhammer 40k or Fantasy player in North Wales? PM me!
Not at all, I usually hate overly literal reading of the rules. The general must be a wizard who takes the Lore of Vampires, the Wizarding Hat does not allow him to do that. What piece of evidence can you offer which suggests that my interpretation wouldn't be the case?
Awake O Dead, for there can be no rest for ye beneath the earth. Let the splintered bones burrow from the grave pall. Let cold fingers grip time-worn blades, and unseeing eyes survey the fields of slaughter. For your time has come once more. And the dead shall walk.
Then why not just use the same wording as in the tombkings book, ie the general must use the lore of the vampires.
I guess it hardly matters as using the wizarding hat on your general in a vampire counts army is an obviously horrendous choice due to several strategic factors and even if it would be ruleswise illegal the only players who would use it are people who are either inexperienced or just want it as a fun fluff thing for their vampire (for example, "he is a mad and unpredictable wizard, I know the option sucks but I wanted to represent it.") so it is hardly a shifty rulesabuse case. But still I find that the wizarding hat would interfere with the "able choose a magic lore" part and make sure that he instead randomizes one while still allowed to be the (very fragile and overpriced) general.
There aint nowt a cannon can do that a determined dwarf with a hammer can´t achive.-Old Redmane
Visit my dwarfs at http://kazad-grund.webs.com/
Is this debate still going on? Rule technicalities aside, I'd be delighted if my opponent wanted to take this item on his vampire lord. In fact I would make it my personal mission to ensure they were allowed to field it as frequently as possible.
So if the guy wants to field it and we would all love for him to field it, should he not field it?
Case closed.
Agreed, it's not an optimal item at all on a VL. No idea why you would want to choose Lore of Life above Lore of Vampires at all. Lore of Vampires is aimed at boosting your units abilities to win specifically.
Leogun, your interpretation is fine, but my interpretation would be that choosing a Lore is non optional, you have to do it while taking the Hat is optional. The wording in an FAQ may be more specific but the general of the VC army can't really get around having to use Lore of Vampires, nor should he, it's the best lore for him to take.
Awake O Dead, for there can be no rest for ye beneath the earth. Let the splintered bones burrow from the grave pall. Let cold fingers grip time-worn blades, and unseeing eyes survey the fields of slaughter. For your time has come once more. And the dead shall walk.
I'm just talking pure-rules here. If we're going down the casual route, I'd let you take Stupidity and make you randomly choose your Lore for free.
Dark Lancers Renegade Astartes Chapter, Chaos Space Marines - 7,000pts
The Undead Scourge, Vampire Counts - 2,500pts [log]
Averland State Army, Empire - 3,000pts [log]
Still need one more Zombie Dragon/Terrorgheist rider (the Blood Dragon, not Ghoul King)? PM me for much £££s!
Warhammer 40k or Fantasy player in North Wales? PM me!
I just don't see the point in arguing the pure rules here. It would be like if before a game your opponent said:
"I'd like to play all of my Dwarves with T3 this game. Is that cool?"
There's nothing in the rules allowing it, but I'll bet you let him do it.
Sure, it's something that probably wouldn't come up as an issue during play, this means that it's mostly an argument for arguments sake, which can sometimes be enjoyable in itself.
Though I think it's falling in that department too now as most of the discussing parties seem able to understand the others interpretation and none can show more solid proof than different interpretations of the rules.
There aint nowt a cannon can do that a determined dwarf with a hammer can´t achive.-Old Redmane
Visit my dwarfs at http://kazad-grund.webs.com/
Now what happens if the wizards hat is destroyed during the battle? Will the vampire gain his original levels and spells. Must he pick vampire lore?
What happens if the vampire loose two levels from a miscast and then has his hat destroyed?
All these things could be good to know...
LOL
the word god speaks
Clearly - and intentional by Design or not - if the Vampire Lord is allowed to pick the Wizarding Hat then that means you can circumvent the general requirement of choosing your army's general.
Your character next in line (in terms of Leadership) able to choose the Lore of Vampires would 'step up' and assume the role of General.
It is RAW.
The whole notion of the Wizarding Hat (a Magic Item) being optional is mixing apples and oranges.
The Character wearing it can't choose his Lore and thus can't be the Army's General.
Not particularly good of course, this 'tactic', but let's not succumb to such diplomatic nonsense as saying there's not a correct [RAW] answer to this issue.
But again, if he can select it, this flies in the face of both the VC and rulebook rules. VC rules state 'Your army's general must be a wizard'. If he is able to choose a spell lore, he must use the Lore of the Vampires'. The rulebook explicitly states that the general must be the highest leadership character in the army. Hence, the highest level character must choose the LoV and therefore cannot select the hat as it could circumvent leadership requirements.
The only ambiguity I can see, and I absolutely can see people's arguments in this regard, is the language 'able to choose a spell lore' which is confusing. However, I would argue that the character in question has the choice of either taking the LoV or selecting the Wizarding Hat for a random lore so he is in fact 'able to choose a spell lore' and therefore must take the LoV. You could debate that the VC rules don't 100% explicitly state that you must take the LoV because of the wording (I imagine this will get FAQ'ed) but it's heavily implied that you must and I would counter argue that just because the Wizarding Hat isn't lore specific, you are still 'choosing' to select a random lore that isn't the LoV, which you are not able to do.
Awake O Dead, for there can be no rest for ye beneath the earth. Let the splintered bones burrow from the grave pall. Let cold fingers grip time-worn blades, and unseeing eyes survey the fields of slaughter. For your time has come once more. And the dead shall walk.
I don't have the BRB with me, but I'm almost positive the wording is something along the lines of "highest leadership among those eligible".
@ Woodster17: You just can't mix up the idea of 'choosing a Magic Item' and 'choosing a Magic Lore'. You just can't. Those are two different steps of list-building.
That being said, I'm gonna take the next chance I get to read the relevant section in the VC book to make up my mind about this one.
On the other hand the wording "If he is able to choose a spell lore" implies that sometimes he is not able to choose a spell lore but can still be general. Since all wizards in the VC list can pick lore of vampires out of the box, the exception implied is only possible with the option of using items such as.... the wizards hat.
Based on that it seems you can buy an item that will limit your vampire from being able to choose a spell lore.
Last edited by Smogg; 05-07-2012 at 11:22.
So, what we have discerned so far is that the VC general must be a Wizard. That is not open to debate I think.
Furthermore, the VC book requires him to use Lore of Vampires if he can choose Lores. It does not state anything for the case that he can't choose Lores. From the book alone it would seem that, in that case, he would obviously use Lore of Vampires as a default. This is pretty clear.
What is not covered is a case where the Wizard has no choice but also has no access to Lore of Vampires (a very strange case). In this case it would seem acceptable for him to run a different Lore.
Now the question is, does the Wizarding Hat let the wearer choose his Lores? Well at least not in the classical sense. And another question is if the Character can still choose Lore of Vampires when the choice conferred to it by the item does not actually list this Lore as a valid choice. At least in that case I can see the point made that all Wizards in the VC book have Lore of Vampires as an 'innate' choice so this could be used to actually force use of this Lore on Wizards.
By the way, an easy example of a Wizard General that cannot choose a Lore is the Strigoi Ghoul King. You don't need to resort to Magic Items to have this in the list.
Also I think that the rule's wording is unnecessarily convoluted; They could just have stated that the General has to be a Wizard with Lore of Vampires (as clearly this is what they intended).
Last edited by Ultimate Life Form; 05-07-2012 at 12:02.
Or it could mean the Strigoi Ghoul King, who cannot choose a Lore. Incidentally, this could mean a SGK could take the Wizarding Hat, as the "choose a Lore" clause does not apply.
I've still yet to see a counter-argument to the fact that a Vampire Lord can choose the Lore of the Vampires. Magic items and destroyed levels are not relevant, the simple fact is that he can pick it, and if he is to be the General, he must.
Dark Lancers Renegade Astartes Chapter, Chaos Space Marines - 7,000pts
The Undead Scourge, Vampire Counts - 2,500pts [log]
Averland State Army, Empire - 3,000pts [log]
Still need one more Zombie Dragon/Terrorgheist rider (the Blood Dragon, not Ghoul King)? PM me for much £££s!
Warhammer 40k or Fantasy player in North Wales? PM me!
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote