Age of Sigmar update from Games Workshop

If you not noticed yet, Games Workshop have released their long awaited update to the Age of Sigmar battlefields today… and it looks like they’ve made some proper changes. The article is here and explains their reasoning for each of the changes made.

They’ve also clarified that the previous Battlescroll has been replaced, but they’ve added the ‘old’ Battlescroll rules where appropriate with changes in Magenta.

Points, Points, Points!

This doesn’t mean that points are necessarily easy to follow and you’ll need your favourite army’s FAQ. Any previously announced points changes are still in the game, but not listed here – check our Warhammer App, Warscroll Builder or the FAQ for them. May get a bit confusing, but I’m sure we’ll all get used to it.

Rule Changes

It’s Sunny Out There

As regular readers of Warhammer Community will know they have made a change to the Purple Sun to stop it killing big Monsters in one go. I did this in a game at Swords and Boards… to a MawKrusha so I’m glad it’s no longer possible.

It still has the additional rend, but now is limited to D6+6 wounds… makes it better against Gargants as well! Still pretty good and I’ll still definitely consider it for my Squigs and Gitz.

Primordial Beasts

Readers of our Top Three AoS list articles will know that Beasts of Chaos have been doing well since their White Dwarf update… very well.

This is a small tweek which may slow down Primodial points (used for summoning) and not make it quite so reliable. Worth noting though that you don’t have to be in combat to use this… just the start of the phase. So make sure you do this twice per Battleround with a monster. It’s still good.

Poisons and Spells?!

Skink Priests can use warscroll abilities and pray and so Swampcalla Shaman’s can now do both actions on their warscrolls.

This is a simple change but one which will have a good impact. A lot of Kruleboyz players don’t even look at their spell-lore unless they have Gobsprakk, and this effectively gives 1 or 2 ‘free’ wizards that weren’t being used for spells before… and everyone likes free stuff. This may even tempt me to put them in a Big Waaagh list now.

Spiders in the Woods

We all know Spiders are great… and the Arachnarok’s are great fun. But in an Age where a lot of armies can run Battleline Monsters they’ve been left behind. No longer.

This is also another elegant solution and rule. It’s already in other armies so its not ‘rules-bloat’ but Spiders needed the help. The only problem is I don’t know how many Gitz players have one of these as most are built as Shrines! Ah well — time to get a fifth one.

Points Changes

Sure the rules are a fun change and will make some difference (particularly the Swampcalla) but we’ve all come here for the points… so what have they done? Well first up – and hold onto your hats here – they have put the points change on the Battlescroll. Hurrah! Success! Secondly they appear to have paid attention to my last Battlescroll review (way back in Winter last year) and gone a little more adventurous with the reductions. Well done GW.

Points Reductions

Many Battletomes get point reductions including Cities of Sigmar, Hedonites and Slaanesh, Stormcast Eternals, Skaven, FEC, Bonereapers, and Soulblight Gravelords. Check out the Battlescroll to see for yourself what’s changed.

But… here at Woehammer we have some biases and mine is for Gitz. Given that last time I complained about the lack of adventure look at this:

20 point reductions all over the place including on 2 of the Battleline units that Gitz players the world over use consistently. There’s a reduction for the Webspinner – common in many armies – and for Skragrott. Maybe he’ll see play.

The stand our for me is Squig Herd at 140… but that’s because I love my Squigs. However the key takeaway for me here (and it’s repeated on the other discounts) is that they are making bold moves. This will save real points and has real potential to get another unit into the army. Sure, they could have reduced the whole book and poor Trogg generals might feel a little hard done by – but this is a great start. More of the same please GW.

A Bit of Both

Two armies get increases and decreases. The first to help change what a Seraphon list looks like and the second to help the Kruleboyz… but hit the Bonesplitters a bit.

It’s great to see some of the common units get increases and characters get big increases. This is important because if you’ve only got one in your list a 5 point adjustment will make no difference. Also the Skink Priest is slowly reaching where he needs to be… although I do think the Kroak increase is a little harsh. He’s a superb model, but I think that has more to do with his inclusion than it being the best build for Seraphon.

After appearing as the poster-boy enemies of the Stormcast – and then being the whipping boys in tournaments – it’s good to see reductions… and Gitrippaz are finally at the point at which the Orruk Warclans chat may even decide to take them. I’d be tempted as 20 wounds for 160 isn’t bad. Especially if you make them expert conquerors and lurk at the back. It’ll take a proper unit to shift them and not a small teleport.

Meanwhile it’s a little strange to see Bonesplitterz hit. Sure the Wurrgog was having fun and appeared in a lot of lists and I’m not really surprised to see his points go up, but Big Stabbas?? Is this because of a few lists with loads of them and not many games… so it’s all skewed. Seems a tad early to be making changes here.

Bad Boys… Bad Boys… What Ya Going Do?

So we’ve seen the good guys get reductions, and the middle get changes… who was bad and is on Santa’s naught list?

And I don’t think anyone reading our Top Three Lists will be suprised here. Dragon Ogres are in almost every winning Beast List now (and there’s a lot of 4-1s and some 5-0s) and Cockatrice’s have suffered in a similar way as Big Stabbas. Perhaps a bit harsh as the Cock-Army never seems to get into the top 3 but this is a disadvantage of the ‘overused’ warscroll syndrome.

The second Bad Boy is Maggotkin… and this will be making a difference. There’s a lot of flies out there and Games Workshop may be about to see their sales drastically drop off, but a 10% increase is significant and promises to affect the armies – perhaps losing 1 or 2 Blightlords. They are already a small army (albeit packing a punch) and this may be enough for them to fall down a few rungs. That’s not to say I think they’ll be no more 5-0s — there’s some good players using this list.

And finally the generic or universal warscrolls and top of the Bad Boy list is the Krondspine… and my only reaction is ‘good’. I know everyone can take it but that doesn’t make it fair or good – hopefully there’ll be fewer of them now. Only time will tell.

Conclusions

My last review of the Winter FAQ gave GW a failing grade. Not enough changes, and not big enough. I think they’ve significantly improved here and although everyone will want their favourite warscroll to be a little cheaper I think there’s a good balance here. Of course only time will tell, but this is a much improved Battlescroll with some brave decisions on points. And I hope the community will welcome it as an improvement to the Age of Sigmar.

Most importantly – what do you think?

— Declan & Eeyore