Well, with Ankaur's ability hitting the streets before Kari gets any kind of Latari reinforcements, I guess its time to address the following questions:

• When a non-faction, non-unique unit is included, can it take any of its faction's restricted upgrades?
• What about unit-specific upgrades? (i think all of these are tied to faction, so the first question is more relevant)
• Can the non-faction unit take the army's faction restricted upgrades?

In the Army Building section, it says faction specific cards may only used to upgrade faction units in their faction's army, so I think the answer to all of these is NO.

This would mean that the list-building with Ankaur and Kari's passive is rather limited in scope, but not necessarily in the diversity it brings to a list. Your Kari list can take a unit of Deepwood Archers, but not add an Support Aymhelin Scion, a Verdant Sorceress, or Hunter's Guile.

Kari's ability is going to be limited at first. She can basically just choose Deepwood Archers, though perhaps more will be released next year, extending her options. These will have access to any of the general upgrades, but will lack several key Latari-restricted upgrades like Hunter's Guile, so they will not be able to specialize to the extent they could in a Latari Army. I worry this is one of those abilities that it will be hard to build around, and really more supplements the army.

Ankaur's ability is neat, and gives him a wide choice of units to add to a Waiqar force, until you realize that two Blight tokens will either eat up a turn of Rally, or make their first few attacks worthless. However, if you team this unit up with the War Crier upgrade, you have a way to give any unit the ability to hurl blight twice at the beginning of the battle, turning what seems like a rough selection into an asset! However, you would be limited to choosing from the following (revealed) units if you wanted to do this: Oathsworn Cavalry, Spearmen, Leonx Riders, Heavy Crossbowmen (Deepwood Archers? I haven't seen the back to this card revealed yet). Of these, I would see Oathsworn as a neat option for their mobility. Leonx Riders have their special on yellow, which doesn't allow them to do anything but through blight. I think I would rather have a March+Blight default than a Blight+Rotate option. Spearmen and Crossbowmen might struggle to hold at range 1-3 long enough to unload all of the blight.

What do you all think?

Based on the current rules it looks like the faction that matters for upgrades is the faction of the army, not the faction of the unit.

I think that's where the interesting stuff will happen. The Derpwood Archers that Kari brings into a Daqan army are going to play differently than they do in a Latari army because you are potentially equipping them with Daqan upgrades, and not Latari upgrades.

The same goes for Daqan units that get used with Ankaur Maru. For example, Speamen with Ankaur and Ardus will allow you to include Heavy upgrades in a 3x2 formation.

RRG, pg. 20:
'88.6 Upgrade cards that have a unit-type icon can only be equipped to a unit matching that type.
88.7 Upgrade cards that have a faction icon can only be equipped in armies of that faction.'

If you were planning on taking Ankaur and Ardus you can drop in a 2x1 group of Spearmen for a cheap Champion unit.

Whaaaaat? It's been about an hour and this thread hasn't exploded yet?

15 hours ago, drkpnthr said:

Ankaur's ability is neat, and gives him a wide choice of units to add to a Waiqar force, until you realize that two Blight tokens will either eat up two turns of Rally , or make their first few attacks worthless.

It won't take two turns. The Rally action clears all banes and readies all upgrades.

Woops! Yes, thanks for the correction. Edited op.

@WWHSD The army building sections specifies that faction restricted cards may only be on faction units in a faction army. So they imply Kari's Deepwood Archers -can't- equip Daqan-only upgrades because they are a Latari unit in a Daqan army.

21 minutes ago, drkpnthr said:

The army building sections specifies that faction restricted cards may only be on faction units in a faction army.

No it doesn't. It specifies that the faction of the upgrade card needs to match the faction of the army and that the unit type on the the upgrade card needs to match the unit type of the unit to which it is equipped. There's two spots in the RRG that say this.

Unit faction is used to determine into which faction's army you are allowed to include the unit and is referenced by some abilities. I haven't seen anything that even suggests that the faction of an upgrade must match the faction of the unit to which it is equipped.

Please let me know if you see anything in the rules that actually says that upgrades and units need to have matching factions.

Units need to match their army.

RRG, pg. 3:
'An army can include any number of units of any types from the same faction.'



Upgrades need to match the faction of the army and the unit type of the unit to which they are equipped.

RRG, pg. 3:
'Upgrade cards are equipped to units in an army. However, some upgrade cards have a unit type or faction icon, denoting that these cards can only be equipped to a unit of the matching type in an army of the matching faction.'

RRG, pg. 20:
'88.6 Upgrade cards that have a unit-type icon can only be equipped to a unit matching that type.
88.7 Upgrade cards that have a faction icon can only be equipped in armies of that faction.'

Unit Type is siege, cavalry, or infantry. Nothing to do with faction is included in it:

RRG, pg. 20:
'87.1 Each unit has a unit type icon in the lower-left of its unit card. This icon indicates the unit’s type and is used to determine what type of trays to use. There are three unit types: infantry, cavalry, and seige.'

This will all hopefully be resolved in the near future with an official ruling. I think what's written in the RRG is tainted by the fact that it all flows from that first part you've quoted: "An army can include any number of units of any types from the same faction." without any consideration for the out-of-faction options that are out there, even when there is technically one in the Core Set, albeit not one we can use until the Elves come out.

My take is that when you sit down to army build, the first step is deciding which faction you want, which determines the army's faction . So I decide I want to build an army around Kari Wraithstalker... I'm now building a Daqan army and can only use units from the Daqan roster. But then of course we run into Kari's army building ability and I have the option to include a non-unique infantry unit from the Latari (currently just Deepwood Archers).

I decide to add in a unit of Deepwood Archers and look over the available upgrades... and have to rule out the Latari upgrades as my army's faction is Daqan, but I could put in Daqan upgrades so long as they're infantry ones. So Kari's Deepwood Archers could include a Greyhaven Channeler or Front Line Rune Golem, but not a Storm Sorceress or Scion.

3 minutes ago, Daverman said:

I think what's written in the RRG is tainted by the fact that it all flows from that first part you've quoted: "An army can include any number of units of any types from the same faction." without any consideration for the out-of-faction options that are out there, even when there is technically one in the Core Set, albeit not one we can use until the Elves come out..

That bit is true. It's just that the nature of the army building abilities of heroes outright change the rules about army building. To me that seems like complaining that Maegan's abilty to allow unit's to include an Sorcereress is in violation of this section of the army building rules:

'Each tray configuration has its own “Available Upgrades” entry, which indicates the type of upgrades that a unit with that tray configuration can equip. For each icon shown in an entry, a unit with the corresponding configuration can equip one upgrade card that has a matching icon.'

I think that the wording FFG used in the rules took into consideration out of faction units that could be included in an army. They included rules that allow you to clearly determine what should happen. The only way it could have been more clear is if they had added "Upgrade card factions icons do not need to match the faction of the unit to which they are equipped". While that would add clarity it would be redundant.

@WWHSD I totally agree with you about the RAW, I think I see where I missed some keywords in what you wrote (I was reading your post too fast).

For reference, what I'm looking at is the summary on page 3 of the RRG, under the 'Upgrades' heading: "Upgrade cards are equipped to units in an army. However, some upgrade cards have a unit type or faction icon, denoting that these cards can only be equipped to a unit of the matching type in an army of the matching faction ."

So my new understanding is: if you have a Kari army that includes Deepwood Archers, they are a Latari INFANTRY unit (unit type) in a DAQAN army (army faction). They would be able to use any upgrade card that matches the slots for their unit size that has: No restrictions, Infantry only, Daqan only, or Daqan Infantry only. For instance, if they allow a Champion figure upgrade, you could include a Greyhaven Channeler (Daqan Infantry only) in their unit.

New thing to discuss: If you have an Ankaur army that includes Spearmen, they are a Daqan INFANTRY unit in a WAIQAR army.

• For an upgrade, this means they would be able to add a FLCL but not FLRG. If Ardus is in the army, it allows them to take the heavy upgrade at 6-tray configuration rather than at the normal 9-tray, right? His ability just says "each unit in your army" and never mentions unit type or army faction.
• If the Spearmen drop down to five trays, can Ankaur target them with his special ability? It says "to a Waiqar infantry unit". I think the answer would be no? They are a Daqan INFANTRY unit in a WAIQAR army still right? This is where my mind was reaching when I was trying to parse what others were saying earlier. I would think his ability does not work because the unit's original faction is different. It hasn't changed factions or unit type, just what faction army it is included in?

4 minutes ago, drkpnthr said:

• If the Spearmen drop down to five trays, can Ankaur target them with his special ability? It says "to a Waiqar infantry unit". I think the answer would be no? They are a Daqan INFANTRY unit in a WAIQAR army still right? This is where my mind was reaching when I was trying to parse what others were saying earlier. I would think his ability does not work because the unit's original faction is different. It hasn't changed factions or unit type, just what faction army it is included in?

Well, um... err... mayb... I dunno...

Joking aside, I agree it's a Daqan unit in a Waiqar army and not a valid target.

7 minutes ago, drkpnthr said:

New thing to discuss: If you have an Ankaur army that includes Spearmen, they are a Daqan INFANTRY unit in a WAIQAR army.

• For an upgrade, this means they would be able to add a FLCL but not FLRG. If Ardus is in the army, it allows them to take the heavy upgrade at 6-tray configuration rather than at the normal 9-tray, right? His ability just says "each unit in your army" and never mentions unit type or army faction.
• If the Spearmen drop down to five trays, can Ankaur target them with his special ability? It says "to a Waiqar infantry unit". I think the answer would be no? They are a Daqan INFANTRY unit in a WAIQAR army still right? This is where my mind was reaching when I was trying to parse what others were saying earlier. I would think his ability does not work because the unit's original faction is different. It hasn't changed factions or unit type, just what faction army it is included in?

That's consistent with my understanding of the rules. Anything that actually checks the faction of the unit will use the original faction of the unit. There's nothing in the rules (at this point) that tells you to treat the faction of the unit as being the same as the faction of the army.

The Heavy upgrades available to them would be the Lancer upgrades and they would not be able to equip the Rune Golem upgrades.

Ardus affects all units in his army, there's no check for faction.

Ankaur would not be able to add trays to the Spearman unit because that ability specifies that the target unit must be both a Waiqar unit and an Infantry unit.

I think the ruling will be: Neutral upgrades only. Otherwise it would probably limit designspace too much due to high risk of over powered combos. For instance Leonx Riders with Combat Ingenuity in an Ankaur led army, perhaps with Ardus as well, looks pretty good

It would have been neat if the specified why Ankaur could field an outside unit. By flavor, it would have suggest that they are undead instead of just joining for some other reason. FF sort of dropped the ball here.

35 minutes ago, SoldanPrime said:

It would have been neat if the specified why Ankaur could field an outside unit. By flavor, it would have suggest that they are undead instead of just joining for some other reason. FF sort of dropped the ball here.

I don't think they really needed to tell us that. Like you said, the obvious answer is that the included unit has been brought back from the dead. However, you could come up with other reasons. Ankaur was one of the students at Greyhaven. He began dabbling in the dark arts when he visited Nerekhall. If he is recruiting a Daqan unit, it could be that these were men he knew when he lived in the baronies, before his exile. Perhaps he lured them in with promises of power, or perhaps used some sort of dark persuasion to influence his former associates.

On 8/12/2017 at 9:12 PM, SoldanPrime said:

It would have been neat if the specified why Ankaur could field an outside unit. By flavor, it would have suggest that they are undead instead of just joining for some other reason. FF sort of dropped the ball here.

I think the fact that they enter play with two blight tokens strongly hints that they have just been brought back from the dead. Still, @Budgernaut 's idea is entirely plausible. In fact, I think the idea that he lured away warriors from other factions is more strongly supported by the name: "Hidden Lore of the Shadow Council." That implies to me that there is a secret council that his its tendrils reaching deep into each faction.

Of course, it could totally be both: he lures them away with the promise of riches/power, then kills them and raises them up. That's sinister.

On 8/12/2017 at 11:12 PM, SoldanPrime said:

It would have been neat if the specified why Ankaur could field an outside unit. By flavor, it would have suggest that they are undead instead of just joining for some other reason. FF sort of dropped the ball here.

They did.

He can field them due to the "Forbidden Lore of the Shadow Council" which could include anything from reanimation to mind control to glamour to straight up bribery/promises.

We already know Waiqar leverages offers of vampiric immortality to human lords.