Scouring the Shire sourcebook: "Archers are armed with long knives (daggers) and short bow."
Ruin of Arnor sourcebook: "...carries a short bow but is otherwise unarmed."

The daggers are on the models. Other hobbit profiles are listed in Ruin of Arnor, so it is not as if, "When with an Arnor army, hobbit archers have forgotten to bring thier daggers...with a Shire army, they remembered them." No, this seems like a contradiction, and I can't find a FAQ correction.

Anyone know? This little point can significantly change how I use them.

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"make me lunch... worthy of Mordor"

well dont take my word as law cause im actually not too sure about this either ...but if, as you say, you can see the dagger on the model then going with the WYSIWYG rule that most people abide by then yes, they do have a hand weapon

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The enemy? His sense of duty was no less than yours, I deem. - Faramir

I believe Ruin of Arnor came after Scouring of the Shire, therefore they do not have hand weapons.

To add to that, WYSIWIG is generally only applied to upgrades or options added to the model, not the baseline equipment.

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Studio gaarew; Gaming armies, by gamers, for gamers.

ahhh... well good to know

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The enemy? His sense of duty was no less than yours, I deem. - Faramir

In tournies its more about if you stick to one book no one moans

This assumes that disarming Hobbit Archers is intentional, not a mistake--and that they are disarmed only in the Arnor list..? Or does it supersede Scouring the Shire, therefore ALL Hobbit Archers, in both army lists, are officially nerfed? I love those little guys: so cheap and accurate...but that is a huge compromise. Is this the common way changes are made, or is there some other confirming note of it somewhere--like when wargs got thier attack? The real question: any chance at all this is a mistake, not an intentional nerfing? Or even that it can be held in question? I won't lie about stats, even if I could get away with it...but I'll take the daggers if there is a genuine question.

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"make me lunch... worthy of Mordor"

I checked the FAQ for Ruin of Arnor, and it says nothing about the hobbits, so I assume it's accurate.

I'm not 100% sure about this, but I believe that Scouring of the Shire came out after the Return of the King rule book (not to be confused with the Return of the King *journeybook*), but before the One Ring rule book. In Return of the King rules, a dagger meant -1 to the Fight roll, just like unarmed does in the One Ring book. So they've probably always been at -1 in combat, and the profile was changed in Ruin of Arnor to conform to the One Ring version of the rules.

Bummer. That leaves only enough doubt to ask for clarafication at the tournement itself, and hope for the best. I take it the -1 to the Fight roll for daggers has been dropped, at least....replaced with -1 for unarmed?

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"make me lunch... worthy of Mordor"

Yes, daggers have no penalty

As whafrog says when the Scouring the Shire came out the current rulebook was the old "return of the king". In that rulebook someone fighting with a dagger had a -1 penalty, the same as someone unarmed according to the present rules.
When the ORB came out the ruling changed and daggers became hand weapons with no penalty. If you check the Hobbit Archer profile in ORB you 'll see that it says that he is armed with a knife and counts as unarmed.
In conclusion, nothing has really changed in the ruling apart from the wording...

Ruin of arnor was the last book with hobbit archers:

And they say that hobbit archers are unarmed is that so hard?

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"There are only 4 things you need in life: Lasagna, beer, a girlfriend and of course a gondor army."