This page will hold the current GW Warhammer Tournament rules, to the best of my knowledge. I accept no responsibility for anyone using these rules! If you want the very latest, you'll have to check with the GW reps and officials in your country. These rules are simply the latest version that I know of, and will be updated as often as I can, given sporadic contact with GW US.
The current rules are set for Baltimore, but I don't have a hard copy of them. When I
get my packet for Seattle, I'll know for sure and I will post corrections to this page. As
far as I know, it goes like this:
Armies must be 2,000 points or less.
No allies may be taken, save for Chaos taking allies from within the Chaos army lists.
No fifth level wizards are allowed, by any means.
Total Power is barred; draw a replacement.
A "Veto Rule" is in effect.
a "Big Guy" modification to the veto rule is also used (see below).
Use your own spell deck; no sharing decks if you both use battle magic for example.
The "VP100" system will be used (see below).
Special characters with two (2) wounds or less _are_ allowed.
Players will be judged on painting, army composition, battles fought, sportsmanship and
game rules knowledge.
There will be a five minute "warm up" period before anything else at the start
of each round. During that time, you go over your opponents army list and hash out all the
rules questions you can before the game; get to know one another.
The GTs will be six rounds long, with the games going four turns. Four games Saturday, two
games Sunday. Rounds will be 2 hours long.
Chaos Gifts will not be used.
No greater Daemons are allowed.
Stegadons may not be formed into units.
The WD222 magic item restrictions by character level will be used. If there is a question
about how many points of magic a character may carry, ask the judges before you do your
army.
The WD222 modifications to magic items will be used.
Before deployment and before spells are chosen, both players (having seen their opponent's army list) may choose up to two items and render them useless. Runic items are vetoed all-or-nothing. Brertonnian virtues can be vetoed, as can Daemonic rewards (exception: Master of Sorcery). Magic items specific to special characters are not eligible for veto. Veto costs 50 points plus the cost of the item/runes/virtues vetoed, in victory points. So (for example) if you just can't allow the Black Gem in your opponents army. You can start the game 75 points down and remove it from his list. The character carrying the item is now worth fewer points for VP calculations. Veto of any item leaves you with a non-magic version of the item, so The Bow of Loren would become a normal longbow if it were vetoed.
Each "Big Guy" in your army after the first removes one veto. A big guy is any hero, creature or monster with more than 3 wounds. The army general is also always a big guy. So if you had an Orc army with a black orc general and a giant, you would only have one veto available to use rather than two.
Under this victory point system, each unit or character or war machine is worth as many VP as it cost to include it in the army. All other VP awards are worth 100 times their normal value; so killing the enemy general (for example) is worth his point value, plus 100 points.
The GT will be six rounds. After round one, the players will be ranked by their accumulated score and paired in that order. So #1 plays #2, and so on. This is a "Swiss" system tournament. Victory is calculated as follows: If one player beats another by 500 or more points, it's a victory. A battle with a margin of less than 500 points is a draw. Players will earn (I think; this is the most uncertain part) 12 points for a win, 8 for a draw and 4 for a loss. I think you will also get +1 point for each game your opponent has won so far, and -1 for every game they have lost. You will also lose a point per battle if you have three or more big guys or war machines in your army. Sometime (probably after the last round) the sportsmanship, painting and army comp. Scores will be folded in, and the guy with the most points wins. Not sure how the painting and comp. Scores will work this year, but the money is on 20-30 points per category.