So today we’re going to take about the leaks. Yeah, those leaks. The ones which people are equal parts ambivalent, scared of, or excited by (gut feeling, I’m not here for the stats… That’s Peter). Before we start… as a reminder, this classic article exists from 2022 and is still completely relevant except for missing something about using AI to make the images shitty.

Edit: This was a standard ramble of mine… so it’s turned into a bit of a recap of the leaks we’ve seen so far, some thoughts on them, and what I hope to see in 5^th. If I feel inspired, I’ll update as we get to see more stuff along the journey to 5^th.

Obviously: SPOILER ALERT, don’t read on if you want to avoid spoilers.

I was trying to get back to my roots of the whole Fittsy’s Foughts concept and wanted to sit down and throw some words on the paper about what I’m thinking about. Right now, that’s battleplan analysis and matchup assessments but my favourite enemy Dirk keeps reading my articles and thought he could use that against me. We’re paired up in the league at the moment so you get this article instead! Before I get into this, a little shoutout to all my homies out at the Raccoon Rumble this weekend past. I wish I could have been there! While I write this… I’m watching the replay of the final from this afternoon and I don’t know the result yet… It’s at 38 to 37 end of the 3^rd round and looks like it’ll be a good watch.

Update: I did watch to the end… you should do the same!

Shout-out to Dario over at Age of Coaching who was playing on the top table (not unexpectedly).

What are the Leaks?

A bunch of stuff commented or posted on The Grand Alliance (and old school forum) by reliable “leakers” about Age of Sigmar 5^th Edition which should come mid 2027. The biggest and most important of which has since been deleted but we’ve also had other bits and pieces dropped here and there on TGA and Reddit.

They revolve around two major points at the moment and I’ll try to touch on both of them a little.

1. A massive lore shake-up
2. Models linked with the lore shake-up being retired
3. New human and/or elf models

A Merging of the Realms

The big rumour (which is mostly a big rumour due to its irony) is that there is a massive showdown between Archaon and Sigmar which results in the separate realms being merged into a single planet called “The Last World”. For those who don’t know, this echoes a little what happened when the predecessor of AoS, Warhammer Fantasy came to an end.

In this fight, Archaon kills Sigmar which means the Stormcast can’t reforge anymore. For whatever reason, then the game world jumps ahead 1000 years apparently bringing us to a “darker” AoS world. One of the bits of evidence is meant to be this:

Which is blurry as hell and honestly looks like it could be a part of a normal current AoS map. The theory goes that this has the Great Parch from Aqshy and the Spiral Crux from Chamon.

I hope that regardless of all of this that we get to keep the Realmgates, for me, this one small part of the lore makes a huge difference for the smaller narratives we build with our own armies and campaigns. It doesn’t really matter where I am or where my army comes from, it’s clear we can all meet together and fight over a corner of the realms together. I like that part of AoS and I hope we keep it or something similar.

Models Phasing out from the Range

I never like seeing other people’s models being taken out of rotation… especially when there’s no good proxy to replace that with. The models that are rumoured to be disappearing are things such as the god models and named characters.

A lot of named characters disappearing due to the time jump makes some sense. At this point, it’s hard to tell the rumours from the hearsay but at least apparently (and what sounds like it makes sense) is that those named characters will become generic versions of themselves. If this is true, we’re losing something but getting something in return. Pinging back to the lore side though is that it would feel like a shame to lose some of those character’s history.

On the other hand, the god models would be quite the hit. There really are very few proxies for which those beautifully painted centrepiece models can be used for. Fingers crossed we don’t see any or many of them drop out.

New Human Models / Factions?

We’ve seen a couple of bits of artwork (also blurry as hell) with some AoS humans apparently depicted on them. These are meant to be tied to the Human Civilisations, up until now largely represented by the Cities of Sigmar, who would now be broken up and less centrally coordinated than before. There is a list of 5 separate factions or groups… which apparently won’t be armies at the start but may be introduced as it goes along. I mean I’ve been really digging what they did with Cathay so this could become something interesting!

How am I Feeling About All of This?

A little nervous… I’m trying to reflect a little and work out why that’s the case. I do really like where AoS is at right now. I’m more into the gameplay side of things and it does fee like the best Age of Sigmar we’ve ever had especially with this GHB giving us interesting battleplans. The balance in 4^th has been more stable than any prior edition and despite some swings from time to time, the additional effort the designers have put in has shown.

I still like to keep an ear/eye on the lore too and I particularly like the short stories that we’ve gotten along the way especially towards the end of each edition. I’ve really liked the separated realms with some of the really crazy fantasy aspects they’ve been able to weave in between these worlds. Ack, I don’t really want the realms or the realmgates to go away to be honest.

This sounds a bit negative… I don’t think I really feel negative about it all but it’s been interesting to realise that I care more for the lore than I expected.

I am very interested to see if we get some news about the rules. I do like 4^th and I hope it stays relatively similar… I’d happily keep playing in this ruleset for another 3 years.

How do I Hope it All Works out in the End?

I hope we have a soft switch into the new edition gameplay wise… we’ve just gotten some really interesting books and I hope we get to see play with them for a little while longer!

If the worlds have to come together, I hope we keep a narrative hook for bringing armies together for campaigns. This probably means I hope we keep realmgates.

I hope you all are ok with these changes. It’s easy enough to say it’s just a game but this is a game we sink so many hours into and for which a lot of us are really passionate about. Look after yourselves. If this feels like it hits hard, reach out to someone and have a chat about it. If you don’t have someone nearby you feel like you can talk to, you can also look online to where there are many great and supportive communities.

And on the flipside, if you’re excited about these changes. Embrace it. I know I’m going to be gobbling up every little morsel of a rumour just like a hungry Ogor. Bring it on!

More than anything else, I hope we don’t see the current players feel abandoned or turned away by the game and I hope we see many new players getting on board!