Stormbringer is a weekly hobby magazine from Hachette Partworks introducing players to Warhammer: Age of Sigmar. In this 80-week series, our intrepid magazine-receiver will be reviewing each individual issue, its included models, and gaming materials. A Premium US subscription was provided to Goonhammer for review purposes. 

We’re at the end of the road, folks. What goodies will we get this week? What knowledge will we gain? Will the end of this article be roughly 300 words of navel gazing? Find out all this and more, just ahead!

The Narrative Materials

Our narrative section plays the same trick our past few issues did – recapping the narrative of Stormbringer from one faction’s point of view. This recap – The Last Stand – charts the story from a more or less detached viewpoint, though it clearly sides with the forces of Order. It begins with a little Dawnbringer crusade venturing out, its brave mortal soldiers (not included) establishing a City of Sigmar, building it up out of nothing, and protecting it from Orruk attack. With no help in sight, the city’s Stormcast Eternals ventured out, gathering help from Sylvaneth and Kharadron allies. Meanwhile, the gathering hordes of Destruction also swelled in size and variety, with Gloomspite Gitz and Ironjawz joining the Kruleboyz. The city has grown, the armies have grown, and now a climactic battle will see the fate of the city decided – it will either stand as a beacon of Sigmarite strength and culture, or will tumble into dust like so many others. There’s a little worldbuilding on the sides, establishing the Mortal Realms as a setting full of ancient grudges settled by mortals generations removed from their originators (haha fantasy is so crazy!). It’s curious how the story is so human-focused and we’ve only gotten gilded ubermenschen from planet heaven to represent them, but the Cities of Sigmar aren’t on the poster and were still Warhammer Fantasy models when this magazine started. Maybe they’re more on my mind than normal since I’m halfway through just the shields on a squad of Freeguild Fusiliers and it’s taking longer than an entire regiment of Stormcast would.

The Hobby Materials

We get to put the cherry on top of our collection, gaining the second half of Skumdrekk and the knowledge of how to paint him. I think the guide undersells how tedious it can be to highlight all that wood grain, but it certainly makes for a stronger impression than just drybrushing it. The rest of the painting guide utilizes the bulk of techniques we’ve learned over the last year and a half, with edge highlights, glazing, drybrushing, and more. It also contains the hot tip of scraping paint off our subassemblies using sprue instead of the harsh metal scraper we received so early in the magazine. It’s not what I’d call ergonomic, but I don’t hate the crustpunk approach to hobby supplies. I wrung my hands a bit over this guy being our final model because, let’s be honest, did you even know he was a special character? It’s an impressive model for sure, but doesn’t have the narrative weight of say, Bastian Carthalos or Krondys. However, as a final exam for the paint techniques we’ve learned, he absolutely works. In other words, even as a Stormpilled Sigmaxxer, I can admit I was wrong.

The Gaming Materials

It’s time for The Last Stand. You could listen to Sabaton’s The Last Stand while you play it out, but I really wish nerds would listen to a single band that wasn’t Sabaton. Seriously, Trench Crusade fans especially, find a second band. They can still be Swedish, I don’t care.

The mission is a fitting sendoff to our narrative, pitting two large armies against each other, with extra units from the players’ collections arriving each turn. The forces of Order have busted out the gates of their City of Sigmar in an effort to break the siege of their city, while the forces of Destruction are just as eager to get to the fight – they’re running out of food too, and the longer they mill about, the more likely it is that they break down and fight each other. The scenario itself is simple, but is affected by the outcomes of our last nine games, often giving players priority in specific turns, letting them recycle dead units, or gain bonus command points. With this many little bonuses to track (all of which are outlined in the scenario card) it pays to have a pretty standard “hold one, hold two, hold more” mission with symmetrical deployment. I’ve played tons of games like this over the years, and they’re always a good way to represent a larger scale battle without starting with 3000 points on the table.

Final (Final?) Verdict

This particular issue didn’t need to do much – simply delivering part two of Skumdrekk and a mission to bash our toys together would be enough. Said mission is straightforward but a fitting send off to the narrative, and while it was a little repetitive, I liked reading the story reaching its conclusion from multiple points of view over the last few issues. It’s no Rashomon, but highlighting how different factions see the same conflict is a great way to gain perspective on the story. The painting tutorial is solid, and invites us to compare our latest model to the beast we just completed. It’s a comforting way to show how far we’ve come, and-BA GAWD IT’S THE RATMEN WITH A STEEL CHAIR

The final page of the magazine teases the arrival of the Skaven to Aqshy and the coming of the Vermindoom, replete with some art from 4th edition and the Skaventide box. There’s the promise of more adventures in the Mortal Realms, but whether that means more partworks magazines or just a general call to action for Age of Sigmar is unclear. It wouldn’t shock me in the slightest if a Spearhead-themed series called, I dunno, Spearhead, found its way into mailboxes the world over, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Bonus Round: On Reviewing 170+ Magazines Primarily Intended for 12 Year Olds

So that’s it – the last entry in this 80+ week journey that began back in November 2023. On a more personal level, I’ve been writing these weekly (sometimes twice weekly when there was overlap) magazine articles since the start of 2022, which would seem like a lifetime ago even if the past six months of my life and yours had only been a third as dramatic. While my watch is ended, the weekly partworks magazine beat will be covered for the foreseeable future by my capable coworker Kevin Stillman and his reporting on Combat Patrol, the most recent series of weekly Warhammer goodness from Hachette Partworks.

If you’ve been following along for the whole series, thank you, I would like to give you a high five. If you’ve been following along since Imperium, then I would like to high five you with both hands. Finding the time and energy to write about high fantasy hoplites stabbing green jerks in the face could come easy, or it could be the umpteenth damn thing I had to knock out while handling the vagaries of real life. Sometimes a packet came in and I would be delighted with the addition of a great kit I’ve always wanted, or I’d have to scramble and find which guy in my gaming group would trade me a sixer for some sky dwarfs. It’s given me a greater appreciation for Age of Sigmar than I had before, and at time of writing I’m happily getting in those carefree, low-stress games of Warhammer I’ve been jonesing for. I won’t be so Pollyannaish as to say that we’re living in a time of wine and roses, but tuning the background noise out for a couple hours to roll dice and tell stories with my pals is a reminder that we’re not alone. Today’s game store rando who you only know by their army can be tomorrow’s confidant and the next day’s comrade. It’s a pattern that I’ve been lucky enough to repeat for much of my life, and I intend to do so for as long as these hands can roll dice and build tiny plastic supersoldiers.

See you around, warhams.

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