Take a look at all the big changes in the brand new Warhammer: The Old World January 2026 FAQ.
Well it’s finally here, the January 2026 FAQ has dropped! This is the biggest change we’ve seen to the game in sixish months. Unlike the massive 1.5 FAQ it doesn’t radically change the game. But there are still a ton of changes in this FAQ. Overall I think the FAQ is pretty good, though there are a few head scratchers. So today lets dig in and take at look at what I think are the biggest changes in this raft of FAQs.
Cathay Lantern Nerfs
OK, so right off the bat this is what everyone was waiting for! The Cathay Sky Lantern to get nerfed. And yeah, it does get nerfed, but I’m not really sure it’s enough. The two biggest changes here are that the Lantern goes down to T4 from T5 and loses Unbreakable. Both those changes make the Lantern easier to kill and are substantial nerfs. It also loses the champion (just turning into a regular dude with better BS. This takes away some of the dumb tricks it could pull. Lastly Sky Lantern Bombs go to once a game, making them a lot less deadly there. Dragon Fire Bombs also drop from S4 to S3 which does end up nerfing them a bit more.
On the flip side Disengage no longer requires a LD test to use, though of course you do have to take a break and be able to give ground first. Oh, they also gave Lanterns flammable, which uh… does nothing since they don’t have Regen. (Yes, you could mount a Grand Magistrate on one and give them the Blade of the Great Fleet and then happen to get hit by flaming attacks it would have an effect… but that’s real corner case.)
So overall the Lantern is nerfed. But I still think it’s a really strong unit. The changes really mostly impact the up close builds. However the long range Crane Gun version didn’t really get hit much other than the Toughness hit. We will have to see how thinks shake out, but I’m not sure the nerfs are enough here.
Other Cathay Changes
Cathay also got some other changes that overall act as nerfs. They confirmed that the cannon’s -1 to movement doesn’t stack (thank Sigmar!). They also made Ring of Jet no longer super common and made both it and Alchemists Mask harder to cast. Ogre Loaders are no longer a character, which has its own host of issues actually. There are a few other minor changes. Outsider of taking down the Jet spam build I’m not sure these add up to really nerfing the army, but it does bring it more in line.
Core Rule Book Changes
The core rule book got some changes but most of these aren’t all that big. In fact the majority of them are just cleaning up issues/mistakes from the LAST FAQ. For instance mounts no longer get +1 attack from Frenzy, Regen can’t be used by Undead (though Deamons still can RAQ) on losses from Unstable, and poison only add +2 to wound to that attack, not any of the attacks in the that batch. You also can’t pull models from the 2nd fighting rank first (thus keeping models in base to base alive longer). They swapped back to the rule book wording of having to be fully on a hill to fire in two ranks, which is good. They also made Baggage Trains Impassable terrain, which is bad. I’ll go into this more in a later article, but getting to place Impassable terrain can easily be abused.
Forces of Fantasy Changes
The “good” guys also got some changes. The biggest is likely that the Royal Pegasus got changed to a Monstrous Creature. Now look, I think it probably needed some nerf, but I think this is a bad move. Overall this just means that no one is going to use the Royal Pegasus competitively, which is a real shame as its a pretty model.
Some other good guy units got minor point drops. Empire got some some LD buffs on Priests and Flagellants got T4. Strangely High Elves had 0 changes made to them. I don’t think any of these are going to shake up the meta, but they might make a few lists slightly more viable.
That’s Going In The BOOK!
GW also decided to just kind of randomly nerf Slayers with some kind of non-sensical changes. The first big one is changing it so Doom Seekers are not characters. This really makes them almost unplayable. It now means they can just be shot and not get any lone character protection. Give that they are T4 with 2 whole wounds and don’t have save they aren’t going to last very long. It also means they can’t challenge. That limits their usefullness and is also pretty silly given that they have a Tattoo that only works in a challenge.
They also opted to nerf the Goblin Hewer, which was already a bad unit no one took. In the book it gets an extra d3 shots for each rank the enemy has. This is super clear and no one that I know questioned that. For some reason they decided to ask that question in an FAQ and then answer that it only ever gets +1 d3 and not actually one per rank or file (they also made several typeos in this FAQ). I’m not sure why they did this and why its an FAQ and not an errata. I guess just F Slayers.
Ravening Hordes Changes
Ravening Hordes also got some changes, but I don’t think most of them are super impactful. A few units got some points adjustments. Viletide went up to a 9+ to cast, which is a good change. Quell Impetuosity changes to a re-roll on impetuous instead of ignore it, which is bad to me since it just means you’ll now have to roll a lot of dice but with a lot of these units have high LD thanks to Warband I doubt there will be a ton of effect.
One big change is them letting you resurrect models in a unit of skirmishers. RAW This wasn’t allowed before and they didn’t tell you where you could place those models. Now you can. There are a lot of ways this can be abused, but I’ll have to save that to talk about in its own article. Overall though, I think thats about it. Nothing really ground breaking here.
Let us know what you think of all these changes, down in the comments!
Don’t Miss:
Abe is that rare thing, an Austin local born and raised here. Though he keeps on moving around, DC, Japan, ETC., he always seems to find his way back eventually. Abe has decades of experience with a wide range of tabletop and RPG games, from historicals, to Star Wars to D&D and 40K. He has been contributing to BOLS since almost the start, back when he worked at and then owned a local gaming store. He used to be big into the competitive Warhammer tournament scene but age has mellowed him and he now appreciates a good casual match. He currently covers Warhammer: The Old World, as well as all things Star Wars, with occasional dabbling in other topics. Abe mourned over loss of WFB for its entire hiatus, but has been reborn like a gaming phoenix with Warhammer: The Old World.
Read more at this site