The Comm Guild Maelstrom's Edge

Work is continuing behind the scenes on the second edition of the Maelstrom's Edge rulebook, and the end is in sight. We're all super excited to get the book out into the world, and we've had feedback from players equally keen to get their hands on the new rules in their final form. To help tide everyone over in the interim, this week we have released an updated Beta version each of the existing Faction Rules documents.


The updated Beta Faction Rules Documents

These documents are considerably further along in the design process than the original Beta release, and incorporate a number of updates based on player feedback and our own internal playtesting. The biggest changes are:

• Cosmetic and format updates - This version is much prettier than the bare-bones first Beta release, and we have tweaked the layout of the unit pages slightly for better legibility. Also included is a spread at the end of the document showing the different weapons and equipment options available to each faction.
• New units - There are a number of new units included, for models we currently have in the production queue. We have included them in this release so players can get a better feel for how the factions will look overall, particularly in the case of the Remnant where the small number of starting units was a little limiting. Feel free to convert or proxy as appropriate if you want to try out these new units in the meantime.
• Remnant Rebalancing - Artarian Remnant forces proved to be a little underpowered, and struggled against the other factions with their much larger model count. As a result, we have made some changes across the faction, reducing unit costs and boosting the power of their weaponry. To go along with this, while we haven't updated the main rulebook Beta document, in the final V2 rules Large model units will count as 2 units for the purposes of calculated mission objectives. This makes it a little easier for low-model-count Remnant forces to score from objectives, while also making them more valuable targets for an enemy with a Kill objective.

A Remnant Fire Team faces off against an Epirian Foundation force.

Smaller changes to unit rules include:

• The 'Human' and 'Xenos' designators have been removed, replaced with the 'Organic', 'Inorganic' and new 'Armored' designators.
• The 'Kill Mission' and 'Support Mission' abilities did the same thing, so have been rolled into a new 'Mission Specialist' ability.
• 'Mission Specialist' added to the Broken Gnolti and Pa'ku. They had the 'Kill Mission' ability through being Behemoths in V1, but this was missed from the initial Beta release.
• Karist Minnow's 'Cybel Frenzy' has been updated.
• The 'Slowed' and 'Frozen' abilities have been updated.
• Broken Sniper 'Glue round' has been renamed to 'Tether round'.
• Broken Sniper 'Shadow Strike' ability has been replaced with a new 'Shadow Stalker' ability.
• Broken 'Shadow Strike' ability has been updated to remove the wild fire requirement on the turn a unit arrives on the table.
• Broken Pa'ku Artillery's 'Coordinated Barrage' ability has been updated.
• Journeyman Bot Handler's 'Push the Machines' ability has been revised to only work on units composed entirely of Bots. The prevents it from being used on Spider Drone units with an Apprentice Handler, but also removes a potential exploit where multiple Journeymen attached to Bot units could endlessly reactivate each other.
• SecDef Tactical and Annihilator teams have extra weapon options
• Hakoyu Grand Master and Mature Angel melee weapons corrected from PEN+2 to PEN5.

Try out the revised rules by grabbing the PDFs from the Trial Rules section of the Maelstrom's Edge website here, and grab your models from the Maelstrom's Edge webstore here! Free shipping applies to qualifying orders - check your cart for details.

You can also find a series of articles looking at different aspects of the V2 game here.

If you have any questions on the V2 rules, the model range, or any other aspect of the Maelstrom's Edge game, feel free to pop in to the Comm Guild Facebook group here.