If a unit of troops ends the game in possession of an enemy standard then it has proven its mettle in the heat of battle - the unit has become 'elite'.

The elite regiment is given an appropriate title - 'Dwarf Bashers', 'Scourge of the Elves', 'Orc Bane', 'Man Crusher' and so on. It can be fun inventing a name for your new elites, especially a name that will always act as a reminder of your opponent's humiliation!

An elite unit is allowed to re-roll all of its 'to hit' dice rolls once per battle either for hand-to-hand combat or for shooting. The unit must re-roll all of its dice (not just the failures) and must abide by the second result.

For example, a unit of 6 elite Knights rolls 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, and 6 scoring only 1 hit - fairly miserable stuff from such a powerful unit. The player decides to use his elite bonus and re-rolls the dice scoring 2, 3, 4, 4, 5 and 6 which equals, for the sake of argument, 5 hits... much better! Of course, the player risks the possibility of rolling an even worse set of scores and so must use his bonus carefully.

Unless players agree otherwise before the game, elite bonuses can be used when playing an opponent from your own group or club regardless of whether the status was earned fighting a particular player or not. When playing someone who is not part of your regular gaming group you must decide whether to allow these bonuses or not.