Warhammer: The Old World – Arcane Journal: The War of Settra’s Fury

“Onward , my warriors! Bring me the mountains, that I may see the heavens laid before me!” – Settra the Imperishable, Eternal King of Nehekhara.

Shiny New Book

Hot on the heels of the Dawn of the Storm Dragon, we have the next Arcane Journal for Warhammer: The Old World. Thanks as always to Games Workshop for sending us a copy to review to give you the details as pre-orders go live. As we’ve come to expect, the Journal begins by dishing out new lore for the region the book is exploring and furthers the narratives we first witnessed in Arcane Journal: Tomb Kings and Arcane Journal: Bretonnia. This stuff is, once again, outstanding. Little did I know how much of a stan I was for Gastonne the Wyrmslayer given the small blurb he received in the Brets book, but now I’m totally on board with the guy. Alongside that, we are also blessed with a couple of new Armies of Infamy, a new set of single-use magic items for the Tomb Kings, and a brand new game format for The Old World in “Battle March”.

Battle March

This is Games Workshop’s smaller game variant for The Old World, and after the success of Spearhead in Age of Sigmar and Combat Patrol in Warhammer 40,000, it was really a matter of time before this approach spread to the before times as well. This smaller format is intended to be played using standard rulebook/arcane journal rules and for games ranging between 500-750pts.

Due to the highly restrictive game size, Battle Marches recommends a number of  changes to the army construction rules found in the main rulebook and indeed suggests that TOs and players should consider applying these changes when building allied forces in larger formats. The changes are that you have to include two non-character units which aren’t Swarms or War Beasts rather than the usual three (warmachines do count for your drops in this format) and that you may only spend 25% of your points on any single character (so no having a Dragon flying around toasting these tiny raiding parties). In addition to this restriction, you can only ever spend 35% on a single core unit, 30% on a single special unit and up to 25% on a single rare or mercenary unit. This ensures there aren’t any all-powerful “Death Star” units roaming around and leaving you with 3-4 ‘drops’ at the bare minimum when putting your army down. In addition, the grouping of rare and mercenary units feels nice and thematic, mercenaries being just a key part of the feel of this publication also means it fits nicely in the overall feel of the book. The final adjustment to army composition is that you’re allowed to include a single “0-X per 1000pts” option in the army. This applies both to units and their upgrades. You could choose to give a unit of Goblin Wolf Riders Reserve Move or allow yourself a single unit of Jade Lancers in core for your Cathay or alternatively you could take a Grand Cannon in your empire list which you normally wouldn’t be allowed to do at these smaller point levels. I like this as it allows you an extra bit of flair when designing your Battle Marches lists.

Battle Marches also contains a really nice little breakdown of potential scenarios you can play in this game with randomized objective placements allowing for an expansion into the matched play guide when the time comes and you choose to build out your lists to higher point values and new deployment maps so you don’t just end up playing the old style Battleline deployments in each game. Also included are different values for Victory Points which scale far better into the size of game you’ll be playing. I’ve been lucky enough to spend a few hours playing a handful of games following this ruleset with both my Cathay and Chaos armies and it’s been a blast; even my nine-year-old has been able to cope with the games lasting about 30-40 minutes, which has been great and it’s almost certainly going to be his gateway into the game over the coming years as I follow through on my plan to grow my own doubles partner for future events.

Tomb King Updates

Before we get to the Armies of Infamy, we’ve got updates to Tomb Kings in the form of a new mount option for some of their characters, a new(ish) monster and the dread Incantations. The Barded Skeletal Steed is joining the ranks of the Nehekharan undead for +16pts. This is in addition to the normal steed they’ve already got access to and seems mostly built just to have a unit more representative of the beautiful sculpt GW is releasing alongside this journal. It will come as no surprise that this is just a normal Skeletal Steed with the addition of Barding. A cost of 4pts for that small save and a 1 point reduction in movement speed might be worth it on a priest in a pinch, but on the King, Prince or Heralds who can all wear armour, you’ve got the ability to now up their save by another point when mounted — so you might see people try and make mounted Tomb Princes in units of Skeletal Horsemen work moving forward. The key word here is certainly “try,” though, as it really isn’t anything particularly inspiring when there are perfectly good Bone Dragons and Chariots lying around.

We also have a new unit for the Tomb Kings forces in the form of the Winged Warsphinx, and this is exactly what you’d expect as well. It’s a Warsphinx with the Howdah removed and wings in its place, in effect building a new unit out of two halves of existing kits (Falcon: And somehow worse than both). It is a shame that we couldn’t get a new kit that somehow let us have both a howdah AND wings since that might actually be cool. This unit sets you back 180pts, in effect costing you the crew and 5pts for that shiny new set of wings. I think the model for this will look great in the armies on the table (as I prefer the Warsphinx front half anyway) and will add a little variety to the Tomb Kings lists we see on the table. Not sure you’ll see people buying the Fiery Roar or Envenomed Sting upgrades lots and just keeping this cheap at 180pts it my initial gut feeling to the unit.

Falcon: I will disagree and say I am not sure this will actually see play outside of hobbyists or very high point games, to be honest, as the Necrosphinx is just better all around. For a savings of 15 points you lose a pair of stomps, Killing Blow and the singular Super Saiyan slayer attack and get just counter charge in return, a rule that generally won’t help you against most units. These can be taken in the Grand Army or the Mortuary Cult lists at 0-1 per 1000pts. It DOES conveniently fit in the 750pt Battle March limit so there is that.

The last section of updates for the Tomb Kings are the Incantations (scrolls) of the Lich Priests. Here the high priests of Nehekh have empowered scrolls with ancient necromantic words that once read will cast a spell, in effect making their own slightly different version of bound spell items. Different characters can purchase different amounts of scrolls in your lists, with High Priests being allowed 3, Mortuary Priests 2, and Necrotects only allowed a single one. Instead of “casting” the spell in the normal way, you make a Leadership test (using your own Leadership) and if passed, you cast the spell at it’s printed casting value. As soon as that last word is spoken, the scroll disintegrates and can not be used again. What is cool here is that if you fail the Leadership test, the book states it doesn’t count as having been read and you may attempt it again in future rounds; this makes it different from other one-use items we’ve seen in the game up until now, which go away whether they succeed or not. It’s also worth pointing out that these are dispelled just like all other spell casting attempts in the game, where you have to beat the casting value for the scroll to stop it taking effect. Because the Incantation has been cast before the dispel roll is made, please be aware that if your opponent dispels the attempt, then the scroll still can’t be used again.

There are six of these scrolls ranging from 50pts through to 10pts at the other end of the spectrum. As with the magic items from previous Arcane Journals, we’re not going to break them all down, but instead just pick out our favourites from amongst the scrolls.

Scroll of Urgency: For 30pts with a casting value of 7+ but an outstanding range of 21″ you can move a unit again so long as they have not failed a charge roll this turn. When you get to shove a Winged Warsphinx or Bone Dragon 36″ up the board on T1 so it’s behind your opponent’s lines what’s not to love?

Scroll of Righteous Smiting: At just 10pts, this is the cheapest of the scrolls currently available. This is a Remains in Play enchantment with a range of self and a casting value of 7. All warmachines within the equipped unit’s command range may reroll a single artillery dice or scatter dice every turn. While Screaming Skull catapults are not massively popular at a competitive level right now, having a 10pts option for an engineer effect that could last for the entire game is pretty decent value if you’re running any number of these damage dealers.

Renegade Crowns

Without a doubt this is one of the biggest selling points for people waiting in anticipation of this Army of Infamy, and while it hits some good points it’s going to appeal vastly to some gamers and not at all to others. It’s weird to explain, but this is, in effect, an Empire army which has been pushed south due to their Lord no longer being allowed to reside where they did before. In doing so, they’ve taken a bunch of funds with them and now sell themselves as a force of mercenaries fighting for whoever is willing to pay coin. Made up for exiled Bretonnians, denounced nobles, and outlaws, these armies have the solid core of their old retainers with the added value of mercenaries who flock to them once they recognize the banners of some of the old houses they remembered from their youths in the Empire or simply for more money and protection.

I personally think that this army will have some people make incredibly outstanding armies from a hobby perspective that pull in models from different era’s and games that will be beautiful to see on the table. What I doubt we’ll see here though, are many of these at the top tables, as it does feel that it’s a slightly modified generic Empire Army, and while the Mercenaries section might expand over the coming years, at the moment you aren’t pulling in anything outstanding into the list.

Falcon: Yeah, there are some really cool options here that can make for a potentially potent mid-table army but the price of most of the upgrades in this book and the lack of hard hitting monsters or engineers to smooth out the warmachine output hurts its hammer potential and forces you into a positional grind game.

Army Composition

In Renegade Crowns, you’re allowed 0-1 Renegade Prince per 1000pts. These represent the leaders of the army and are essentially a cross between an Empire General and Bretonnian Paladin in terms of stat line but with the addition of the coveted Warband special rule. In addition, you’re allowed any number of Renegade Captains (essentially Empire Captains with Warband) and Outcast Wizards (as found in the Bretonnian Exiles Army of Infamy) to round out your hero selection.

Falcon: I should note here that the book really pushes Gastonne the Wyrmslayer as a big part of this force in the lore and it is kind of disappointing that he isn’t included as an option in the army list. They even show you how to paint the army in his colors! It’s not like he is an incredibly powerful piece and it would have been a cool addition.

The Core of Renegade Crowns armies are made up of 0-1 unit of Veteran Sellswords per 1000pts along with unlimited Sellsword Infantry, Freeblade Knights and Hireling Outriders which are all new units for this Army. Sellswords are highly customizable empire state troops that can take any combination of armour, melee and/or ranged weapon you can find in the Empire book (for a price) and feature the Horde and Warband rules making them a fantastic potential build-around unit when combined with the synergies some of the unique character upgrades this Army of Infamy can bring. Freeblade Knights are essentially just Empire Knights with the option to ride naked into battle if you’re trying to save points, and Hireling Outriders and Outriders that have lost the ability to take repeater handguns but have replaced those ingenious inventions with a myriad of options ranging from heavy armour and shields, to short bows, to spears, etc. Finally you can take Free Company Militia and Empire Archers as found in the Empire Grand Army to round out your list.

In special, which may only make up 33% of the army, we only have two options, Veteran Freeblades and Border Prince Mortars which are 0-2 per 1000pts. Veteran Freeblades are essentially Inner Circle Knights from the Empire book but without the ability to reroll 1st to wound, while the mortars are an exact copy of those found there but for 5 less points and entrusted with the Levies special rule. Rare (25%) see’s Border Prince Brigands return from the Exiles list along with 0-1 warmachines per 1000pts with Border Prince Organ Guns and Border Princes Bombards being the options you have. Really just underlining that this is the Empire’s version of the Bretonnian Exiles army list. Finally, we have Mercenaries which can be up to 33% of the list and allows you to include any “Dogs of War” tagged unit like Badlands Ogres, Imperial Dwarfs or Dwarfen Doomseekers meaning you can really pull in some fun stuff for brilliant conversions or army schemes if you want.

These brilliantly converted and themed armies get a bunch of rules allowing you to theme the region of the Empire your Prince originally came from, and both these characters and the units in their armies gain specialized upgrades as a result. To represent this, you may purchase an Infamous Origin for any or all of your characters, at which point your units can take (limited) upgrades a result. As the Renegade Crowns are considered to be a hodge podge of different allegiances, there is no restriction on how many of each Infamous Origin you may take within your army list.

First up, we have the great state of Tilea. Leaders from this land gain The Might of Miragliano. Coming in at 25pts, this gives your character +1Ld, Stubborn and Tilean Stoicism. Stoicism is a rule that allows you to join units and convey your Stubborn ability onto them while inside said unit, so long as they have yet to take a Break test that game. Great for holding a particular piece of ground knowing you aren’t going to be running away. Additionally, for every character in your army with the Might of Miragliano you gain:

The Mercenary Hosts – Units of Sellswords or Veteran Sellswords may purches the Phalanx ability for a flat 10pts which upgrades them to be Heavy Infantry and shifts how marching column works. Now, these units maintain their ranks so long as the unit is at or above their minimum rank size (which for heavy infantry is 4 models). This allows you take take units that are 4+ models wide and make them as deep as you want to fully take advantage of the Horde rule where normally they would be more restricted. However, if you wish to take advantage of the Marching Column rule and triple your movement speed, you now have to drop down below that minimum rank size and get extra thin.

Exiled from the Realm

The Renegade Knight is our next potential upgrade – Also at 25pts, this grants +1WS and Str (which are both great) to you model, lets you purchase Magic Items from the Bretonnian Armoury for this character, and gives you the Noble Distain and Veteran special rules. Noble Disdain reads that when mounted on a horse you do not have to take Panic Tests when an infantry unit is destroyed within 6″ or when infantry runs through it. Additionally, each Renegade Knight in your list unlocks:

Outcast Knights – Each character with the Renegade Knight upgrade allows you to upgrade 0-1 unit of Freeblade Knights or Veteran Freeblade Knights to have the Lance Formation and Noble Distain special rules at +2pts a model. Nice and theme-y for sure, and fits in with those Renegade Crowns which have detachments from Bretonnia.

Highway Men

Next up is The Noble Outlaw – For 20pts you get +1Bs and +1Ld. You gain the Hold the Line special rule normally reserved for Captains of the Empire and can purchase magic items from the Empire of Man Armoury. You also gain 5 ranged weapons options to choose from, and the ability to buy either the Ambushers or Scouts special rule for the character in question. Falcon: The big draw here will be the Empire magic items. Giving your Outcast Wizards access to some of the awesome Empire arcane items will make for some potentially exciting combos for your lists. Noble Outlaws also unlock:

The Outlaw & Renegade – This rule allows the character to upgrade a unit of Hireling Outriders to have the Ambushers special rule for +1pts per model.

Water Dancers of Estalia

The Wandering Diestro: For 20pts the model in question gets +2Ws which is a fantastic upgrade, slipping them into a space where anything they’re up against won’t be able to hit them on 3s and many units will have to hit them on 5s, as models with this upgrade will end up at WS8/7 respectfully. They also gain the Feint & Dodge special rule. This is a little weird as the copy of the publication we’ve been supplied with finishes mid sentence, but once per game you’ll get (what I presume) is some kind of defensive buff against being hit, owing to the characters dueling proficiency. We believe it matches the rules later conveyed on Border Prince Brigands in this list and that it will be rerolling successful to hit rolls against the model, but we cannot be sure. In addition, Tiestros cannot take a weapon with the Strike Last rule (no one ever won a speed based duel by striking after they were already stabbed) but can buy an additional hand weapon for +3pts instead.

The Wandering Duelists: For each character with the Wandering Diestro upgrade in your army, you can upgrade 0-1 unit of Border Princes Brigands to have +1Ws for +2pts per model. In addition, once per game, they can make all enemy models that hit them in the combat phase re-roll successful rolls, in effect against their (now Ws5) models will about half the amount of hits they take in any given combat phase.

So, what do these new units actually do? Renegade Lords are fairly cheap human characters. They have a bunch of upgrades available with 4 melee and 4 ranged ones as standard. There are options to stick with the light or add in heavy or full plate armour. They can also be mounted on a Barded Warhorse. The key bits here are Rallying Cry, Veteran and Warband. This means that most of the time you’ll be able to project a Ld10 bubble for your army to use, for next to no points investment. A Shield and Heavy Armour on a Captain set you back 40pts and that’s reasonable in any book. You can of course upgrade a Prince to be Ws8 and go fight stuff but they’re still only a 3A character and that’s not going to get them very far. Their strength comes from the upgrades and how that ties into army building and the force you want to put on the table rather than it’s outright power level.

Sellsword infantry (both types) share the same profile with the exception of the bonus +1Ws and Veteran for the pricey sum of +1pts per model. With this in mind you’re mostly going to be taking the Veteran option for those models which are aiming to be in combat and the standard ones for the ranged options where possible. The key things around here are that they’re really low Ld with a base of 5, 6 on the unit champion. This is generally offset with Warband being one of their special rules, but be aware that if they ever lose their rank bonus, they’re running about as quickly as Night Goblins or Chaos Warhounds! The strength of this unit comes from it’s wealth of options. They come with a Hand Weapon and Light Armour but can take Thrusting Spears, Halberds, Great Weapons, Crossbows, Handguns, Shields, Heavy Armour or Plate Armour (Veterans only). In addition Veterans can also have a 50pt Magic Standard or gain the Drilled upgrade. They’re not the best unit ever but they’re very versatile and I’m sure they’ll be a few standard builds which start to appear particularly when paired with the Might of Miragliano.

I’m a big fan of the basic objective holder, which is a normal Sellsword with a shield and a Crossbow. At 7pts a model you get something which can get into position on T1 for the backfield objectives and just be slightly hard to shift while still contributing a little over the game. At the other end of the scale you can have Veteran Sellswords with Full Plate, Great Weapons and Shields, these set you back 12pts a model but have a 3+ save against shooting and hit at Ws4/S5 and pack enough of a punch (for infantry) that you’ll want to get into combat.

The Cavalry comes in two forms, the first of which are the Freeblade Knights and their Veteran counterparts. These are very similar to the Sellswords in terms of options and upgrades. They are all Ws4 but the point of stat difference here is that the Veteran units have S4 instead of S3. They also gain the Veteran special rule as you’d expect, I mean, the clue’s in the name. Unlike the foot troops however, this upgrade is +4pts per model, so not cheap (but Str 4/6 is an important breakpoint so it is understandable). Both can have Lancers or Great Weapons and can buy Shields. In addition they can upgrade their basic Warhorse to be Barded at +3pts per model. Veterans may also upgrade their Heavy Armour to Plates with an associated points cost. In terms of the unit cost it’s massively polarizing. A normal unit with a shield (no other items) costs 19pts where as a fully upgraded Veteran is 31pts, so not a small difference.

Hireling Outriders are the other Cav type open to the force and these are cheap to start but can get very expensive. They come with just a hand weapon, but can pick up a Cavalry Spear, Shortbow, Pistol or Brace of Pistols, Light Armour, Heavy Armour and/or Shields. In addition, there are a host of special rules available to the unit with Feigned Flight, Reserve Move and/or Vanguard all being purchasable for a point a piece. In addition, they can also pick up a Magic Banner for +50pts. This all adds up to the unit either being the equivalent of Goblin Wolf Riders or High Elven Reavers, depending on your desires fulfilling both ends of the spectrum.

We also have two new warmachines in the form of the Border Princes Organ Gun and the Border Princes Mortars. I’m not going to really go through these at all, they have the Levies special rules and they’re what the Rulebook says they are, though they somehow have Ld7 making them two points better than the Warband powered Sellswords.

I know I might have sounded down on this list earlier and I don’t want to be. I do think this army has real give if you embrace it, and I’ll almost certainly be trying to build, maybe a 750pt force for the “Battle March” format, fully embrace it and see where it ends. What it isn’t, is something which is going to take the tournament scene by storm, and, this next point is important, is that not everything has to be. We’re allowed to have lists which are great in terms of theme and this (at least on the surface) appears to be one of those such lists.

Falcon: I agree. The beauty of this list to me is how it will look on the table, though it is plenty possible that with its vast customizability someone will crack the code and make a very good 4 and 1 list with it. Being able to access magic items from both the Bretonnia and Empire army books does potentially open up some combos I’d love to see and it’s very possible there is more juice in the tank here than Liam and I are giving it credit for. Off the cuff, here is a potential list that I think does just enough of everything to give a number of armies some trouble:

Sample Renegade Crowns Army List

So this list is trying to shore your army with the big block of warband and daemonology fueled pseudo-greatswords. Turns in which you get off your big buffs and steed of shadows will leave your opponents reeling while the units of outriders guided by The Summoning spamming Outcast Wizards pepper them while they weave in and around their slower moving pieces. Bombards and Mortars hope to wear down targets from afar. The units of Veteran Freeblades is probably the weak link here and could be downgraded to shave points but I like having the option of a handful of strength 6 attacks in the list. You could also forego the Armour of Tarnus on the foot wizard and make him a Renegade to juice up the knights with the Lance Formation for extra mobility.

Warriors of Grimnir

The Dwarfen Mountain Holds Slayer Host army is finally here! After all the hope we were going to get one in the first Arcane Journal (Falcon: and we kind of did though with some heavy taxes) it’s really nice to see this fleshed out in its entirety here. This army comes with a small host of special rules. From the Wilds allows 0-1 unit of Slayers with Unit Strength of 10 of less to have the Ambush and Skirmish rules for +1pts per model. “Look Snorri, Trolls!” means that after deployment, but before deploying Scouts or making Vanguard moves, all slayer units in the army can make a “free” move of up to D3″+1, which can then be combined with ample use of the Strollaz’ Rune to get those tiny legs moving very fast before the game begins. It’s not loads, but any additional yardage you can make up before the game begins is a blessing.

They don’t stop there, though; Troll Hunters lets you upgrade 0-1 character per 1000pts (not Ungrim though, he’s not a fan of the stealthy approach) to have the Scouts special rule for +10pts which is really cute on a kitted out Doomseeker. Wards of Grimnir is the most important rule in the army. Any units with a Standard Bearer in them can purchase a 6+ ward save (against non-magical shooting attacks) for +1pts per model. It’s a great upgrade even if it is a bit lacklustre and you’re probably going to be buying it on every unit you can without question outside of those you plan on protecting with the Stromni banner. The final rule is Worst Among Equals which relates to the command structure of your force. If you include Ungrim in your army, he has to be the general. If not, you have to pick a Daemon Slayer or Dragon Slayer to be the general (even though they’ve got the loner rule). If you choose to do this over Ungrim, then because Slayers make for poor leaders, they do not gain the Inspiring Presence special rule.

The Army Composition is pretty much what you’d expect. In Characters we have Ungrim, 0-1 Daemon Slayers per 1000pts and 0-2 Dragon Slayers per unit of actual Slayers. In core (which is only 20%!) are Slayers. Special, which can be up to 50% of your list, includes 0-1 Brotherhood of Grimnir the new unit you’ll probably always be taking, and 0-4 Doomseekers per Daemon Slayer or Dragon Slayer in your army, which while cool does force you to take a variety of slayers in your force. Rare units are 0-1 Goblin-Hewers per 1000pts and 0-1 Dwarf Cart (only the Bugman’s variety) per 1000pts. Finally, you can include a unit of Rangers as Mercenaries to flesh out your force and provide a little bit of something that isn’t naked and shouty with orange hair.

Falcon: I just want to say that the studio had a real chance to do something special with this army list and let us have Slayer Gyrocopters. How awesome would that have been!?! Just remove their guns and make them flying chariots with badass depressed murderbois inside! I would have run as many as humanly possible and kitbashed the living bejesus out of them!

The Brotherhood of Grimnir unit is the new shiny toy the Dwarfs have, and I imagine that there’ll be a lot of Fyreslayers getting picked up by Dwarf players as a result of this new unit. These are an elite melee unit which suffers from being a dwarf and from being a slayer. Movement 3 and a refusal to wear armour don’t usually mix with units which want to get into combat and fight stuff. However, what they lack in staying power they do make up a little for in damage, with 2 Attacks each along with Gromril Weapons and Motley Crew working in tandem with Additional Hand Weapons and Great Weapons being options. Coupled with the 1.5.1 infantry rules, I get the feeling these could end up being a good unit, just hopefully they get into melee and get the chance to flex a little. In addition to all of that they have a 2W Shine Keeper leading the unit which acts as some kind of Priest to do Anti-Magic stuff. They can dispel at 21″ with a +1 modifier, this means you can now dispel stuff multiple times per turn, which is needed for the list to function. They’re clearly going to be big glue which holds the list together and hopefully we’ll see a bunch of cool conversions for these. Falcon: These guys are pretty decent, though I am not that insanely high on them as they are mostly just Giant Slayers for 1 more point per model with Gromril Weapons. Getting access to the effectively dirt cheap rune priest in the unit champion and access to a 100 point magic banner(!) are the real selling points here.

Falcon: I think this list has some real competitive gas if you’re in an event that does not put unit restrictions in play. It is a very real possibility that you can run 8-12 naked Doomseekers (or say 6 Nakie boys and 2 fully kitted turbokillers) in your list and then abuse character targeting and the way they do not give up points when killed to really frustrate opponents’ plans. That you can have a pretty expensive Daemonslayer General and Dragonslayer BSB that only give up their respective points for being the general and bsb and not their actual point costs takes the strategy to a whole other level. Outside of that kind of build, this list is a beautifully flavorful one that fans of the game will just enjoy anyway and who can argue with that.

Final Thoughts

There we have it, the whole book top to bottom. In my opinion it’s a very interesting book with two armies which will appeal to certain individuals along with updates to one of the most popular armies we see out in the wild. I imagine this is going to be the formula of Arcane Journal we see until we get either a new faction or an expanded range for Cathay for a while and I’m all here for it. The “Battle March” format has been something I’ve seen similar versions for being championed by the community but it’s nice to see GW working on their own version of these smaller games to attract new players into our game as you always need new lifeblood.

Falcon: While I think there are some real misses in this book especially in terms of the Tomb Kings side of things (getting solely a barded mount option and a fudged sphinx feels lazy when there are so many great options they could have slipped in as well and most of the incantations are too expensive for what they do), I think this book has some real merit. I will always wish the design team thinks bigger when it comes to these Armies of Infamy and competitively the ‘Dogs of War’ army does feel like a bit of a wash, while the Slayer one is more of a meme. That said, the customization options for the Renegade Crowns are really cool from an army design perspective, as is the general overall theme of the Slayer Host and that can be exciting in and of itself.

Anyway, if you need me I’ll be looking through different Age of Sigmar ranges on the website trying to work out which model is best to represent my Wandering Diestro Renegade Prince. Until next time all.

Have any questions or feedback? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com. Want articles like this linked in your inbox every Monday morning? Sign up for our newsletter. And don’t forget that you can support us on Patreon for backer rewards like early video content, Administratum access, an ad-free experience on our website and more.