Enoby

I've been in a Path to Glory game for a while and though the group has enjoyed it a lot, there are a few little annoyances we've had. One of which is that heroes, especially the warlord, don't become much stronger - this is especially true in the case for the few subfactions that grant all heroes command traits off the bat. What that means is renown is almost always better given to units rather than heroes for their veteran abilities. Considering that a Path to Glory is usually about a Warlord's rise to power, it seems odd that the Warlord themselves rarely gets more powerful unless they change their model (which isn't always desired or possible). One of the houserules we're wanting to try is that heroes can gain those same veteran abilities every 15 renown after 15 up to three (so 30, 45, 60). While I can see this getting very strong on some heroes (like Mawkrushas or Zombie Dragons), the abilities are once per battle and can already be given to very strong units like Goregruntas and Blood Knights. I'm not sure if anyone else has experienced otherwise? Are there any other house rules you've used to improve Path To Glory games?

Yeah, Sigvald and Slickblades shouldn't both whiff (hopefully) and will attack one after the other after Sigvald charges. As long as you have a spare command point for their battleshock, an All Out Attack on the Slickblades should mean they get most of their hits through at least. Sigvald is usually tanky enough to survive a round with most things at 1k points, and they're both damaging enough to take out any scalpel parts of the opponent's army.

I've played something like this in Lurid Haze and it did decently well, though I used a Lord of Pain over a Shardspeaker and Twinsouls over Hellstriders for some extra punch. It worked well when Sigvald went into the same thing as the Slickblades (whatever their nastiest thing is). Was a fun list to use though

Unfortunately I think a lot of people treat narrative and open play as "the distraction game", and matched play as the "real" game. Taking away the big centerpiece model from what a large chunk of the community views as the "proper" game wouldn't be taken well. I do agree that it's very hard to balance god models. A compromise would be for the matched play versions to be called "shades" and to be considerably weaker (and cheaper to compensate), and to leave the full fat versions in open and narrative to have fun with. That said, as an aside, for those who haven't played narrative lately, Path to Glory 3e is very similar to matched play - to the point where it more feels like you're building a matched play army slowly. It is more balanced than old P2G but it's not particularly narrative either.

I've been playing a lot of narrative recently at 600 points and I've really enjoyed it more than a lot of recent 2000 point games. However, there is one big caveat, and that's that 600 points only really works when people bring fun fluffy lists. We've had a few people bring stronger units and it falls apart pretty quickly as the lower the points the less can be done to counter the strongest thing on the board, so if the strongest unit the opponent has kills your strongest unit, you've had it. I'd recommend people trying small fun games at 500~pts, but I'd not recommend lower point competitive tournaments. Also, I've noticed that it's the newest players who seem the most desperate to get to 2,000 points. A lot of the more experienced players prefer the lower points lower tier games, but the newer players want the opportunity to use all of their coolest stuff.

Every time I think of Slaangors, I get more frustrated. It's a nice buff in BoC, but even then, they don't benefit from the breyherd stuff so no one would ever take them; they're basically worse minotaurs. I am just baffled by the idea that the rules writers okay'd their rules. Like, surely someone must have noticed how poor they were? Even if you give them +1 rend and damage (putting them at 3 4/3/-2/2), they're about as good as (non-buffed) minotaurs, which aren't considered good. It's baffling.

It sounds good until you see the damage potential of most BoK warscrolls 🥲

I'm really happy about the update, though I do wonder if the monstrous action to destroy scenery may become a bit of a silver bullet. Hopefully not, but a lot of the nicest stuff goes away when a monster gets too close and rolls a 3+. On the other hand, there's a lot of good in here and I'm hoping it continues to when you get a battletome.

I'm really glad the changes they made for BoC are significant. Especially when comparing them to their Broken Realms counterpart, these changes help a lot - maybe we'll even see more regular success in tournaments. -2 rend on mass bestigors is pretty great.

While I've not taught kids AoS, when teaching new players I can concur that the double turn tends to raise the most complaints and has put people off should it happen at a bad moment. While "play around it" can work for experienced players, new players (especially kids) won't know how to and so their first experiences (likely their most important experiences) are going to be tainted. It's close to impossible to prove the majority consensus of all players, especially players who left/didn't start the game. But from anecdotal evidence it has put some people off. If we assume you can play around the double turn (which I believe you can), and that poorer players struggle to plan around it (which can happen), then new players who will almost always be poor players (due to lack of experience) will likely not be able to play around it and so more likely to experience the worst case scenario double turn. One bad experience in the beginning can turn someone off a system for life.

I do hope, if it is a quiet year for AoS, we have a longer time until 4th edition. I know it's unlikely but 3e seems to have a lot of potential to make small improvements to.

Just a little thing if it helps anyone, one of my friends is trans and she used Gender GP in the UK to get her meds in a few weeks It is private so it does cost (can't remember the amount but not utterly unaffordable iirc - maybe £200?), but it helped them so much quicker than what was on the NHS. I know how important it can be to get medicine, so I thought it was worth mentioning for those on the years-long waiting lists

I'm not sure if this would fall under 'gaping power difference', and it was 40K, but at the beginning of 8th edition I had a game of Chaos Knights vs Orks. Neither had a codex at this point. The knights have very long ranged guns, and the orks at the time had very bad shooting without the codex rules to help. There were some turns that I knew the orks couldn't get me, so I knew I'd be safe for even more shooting as I moved further away. I went first and destroyed their transport, leaving them slow, and they spent their turn playing catch up. I spent second turn shooting more and moving away (being much faster than orks), and they spent second turn playing catch up. I think it was either 3rd or 4th turn they caught up, and by that point they were too injured to do all that much. This situation is unlikely in AoS as there aren't many units with very good shooting and most armies are very fast. So I'm not using that particular situation to argue for double turns, but the experience itself of knowing I was safe for two or three turns did warm me up to the double turn more. While the vast majority of armies in AoS now can't be outpaced by a retreating opponent, there are a few (e.g. Nurgle) that can. In these cases you can create very safe turns for yourself with a single screen where your opponent knows their turn is going to be mostly wasted, and there's no risk of them moving immediately after destroying the screen. Of course you can double screen in preparation for a double turn, but that's a lot more resources, especially for some armies. I wouldn't call them solved games, but I would call them solved turns. Some would argue that these are fine and show greater tactical acumen, others would say it gives too much advantage to the first turn player to command the flow of battle. The question is whether the lack of 'solved turns' is worth the double turn.

I may be misremembering, but I think Blades of Khorne AoS 0 and AoS 2 both used the same/very similar covers of Korgus Khul too. Edit: No, I'm incorrect, Khorne warriors just all look identical to me It was a Blood Warrior on the first tome.

Nice to see a roadmap Though as others have said, the reused covers are a bit questionable - I doubt it has much baring on what's in the book, but it does suggest that less care went into it. Of course, that may well not be true, and Nighthaunt are reusing art despite having multiple new models, but it does make the book somehow seem of a lesser quality.

I think everyone who reads their scroll gets a pang of hope with that rule, thinking that they may have some sort of use as horde killers, only for that hope to be crushed on a second reading.

As someone who plays a lot of God-marked S2D, I wouldn't actually mind this with two major caveats: - All currently markable units were available in the god books, and all of them could benefit from allegiance abilities. - There was a minor faction (like Legion of the First Prince) that allowed mixed armies, but it wasn't the focus of an entire army book. I think S2D feel a bit confused as a faction; part of their allegiance ability feels like it wants you to run "Grand Alliance: Chaos Mortals", part of it wants you to run mono-mark thanks to the hero needed for Aura of Chaos, part of it wants cultists to be a key part to the army despite (for a long time until a few months ago) not benefitting from marks, and part of it is focused on narrative rules with Eye of the Gods. It's overall a cool book that feels like it bit off more than it could chew, and many warscrolls that leave a lot to be desired. Having a mixed mark army should still be possible for those who've created one and like the idea of all mortals gathering under Archaon's banner, but the core S2D book needs a look at. It's held back by trying to be so many things at once but never really feeling like it achieves its goal of simulating a grand host of unstoppable Chaos Warriors.

Yeah, I'm glad the info's been shared but I'm a little worried it might just be another battlebox. Let's hope it's a more substantial update, at least for modernising some Skaven.

To try answer the question from my own perspective, I think Malifaux (which is more of a skirmish than a wargame) is better designed, though it's hard to make a 1:1 comparison. Importantly, they use alternative activations - with certain abilities you can 'double turn' (as in have two friendly models act without interruption) but because each activation is much less impactful this doesn't feel bad (and usually lets your opponent do the same later on in the round). Malifaux is much more based on objectives and less on killing, which often means the opponent can answer activations in kind (as in, they'll not have their models wiped off the bored so the game is much more back and forth). The double turn is much more controversial because you get to do everything again, which can overwhelm an opponent. Personally I'm mixed on the rule. I do see the advantages of ensuring that one person can't guarantee their win, and to give another layer of tactical depth. I don't tend to lose much to the double turn as I can negate most advantages it gives (and will occasionally allow myself to be double turned). However, I do see some glaring issues: - I've heard people say "if you lose to the double turn, you'd lose anyway", and while this can be true, I think what's more likely is that it totally skews the balance of 60/40 games. If you're the army on 60% left and you go again, reducing the 40% to only 20%, then they likely have no chance of winning what could have been a close game. I think this is where the "ruining games" idea comes from - when what looks to be a balanced battle becomes irreparably skewed because of a double turn. - To link to the above, others have said that it's fine because 'winning faster' is a good thing, but I'd disagree. In theory in sounds sensible - if you're going to lose, why drag it out? But in addition to the above on skewing close games, it isn't fun to be tabled without doing much besides moving. For example, in a casual game, imagine someone getting first turn and simply moving up their 2000pt list up to capture objectives. Yes, they likely made tactical mistakes, but this is a very normal move in casual games. Then player 2 comes along and charges them with the bulk of their army, wiping off 30% of their models with a nasty charge. Player 2 then wins the roll off and goes again, this time getting everything that wants to be in, in and wiping off another 40%. Player 1 is left with their support models and no chance to come back. They moved their army once before having to pack it all away again, probably feeling pretty bad about the game. Tactical errors or not from Player 1, that's not a good reason to have a mechanic that can wipe away an army without the opposing player getting to do much interaction at all. Granted, AoS 3 has helped this a bit, damage is still so high in AoS that you need to seriously invest in defences to tank, and this isn't guaranteed in casual games. - I think my main issue is just how long you can be sat there waiting for your opponent's turns to finish. Maybe I just play with slow people, but it can easily take 30 mins or more for them to finish their turn, so having to stand there for an hour with minimal interaction is pretty boring - and can be quite frustrating when most of the interaction is being told how many mortal wounds are being taken. - Finally, close to every opponent I've had has enjoyed the game less once they've been double turned. Whether that's because they've been wiped off the board, have to wait longer to play, or just don't enjoy the feeling of helplessness, I've only had a handful of games that have been made more enjoyable by the rule. Most of the time it sours the rest of the game - or at least that turn. I don't particularly like my opponents feeling bad, so I feel pretty guilty about taking a double turn against some people. --- I know I've given a lot of negatives but I'm not on the side of 'remove the double turn', but rather 'reform the double turn'. While it wouldn't help the time issue, more defensive advantages when being made (not choosing) to go second would help everything but the time issue. Alternatively, alternating activations would be a big boon to the system (but would need some pretty huge changes to the game). For now, the double turn is important as a competitive or semi-competitive level where set turns would lead to obvious strategies. In a casual sense, it can help bring people back from the edge, but from my experience it usually just frustrates them.

I do agree that GW's rules writing is inconsistent, though I don't think "sin/bin guy" is super useful for a few reasons: - It creates an imaginary scapegoat for "bin guy" whenever there's a bad book (e.g. "this book is bad so it must have been written by bin guy") when in reality rules writers write a mix of bad and good books (the first Slaanesh book and the second were written by the same person, but they're totally different ends of the power curve), so the discussion often turns into "who let bin guy write another book" and that's based on a false premise. - Because of the above, blame can turn to the wrong direction - if someone can write a great book and a terrible book, maybe it's not their skill but rather time constraints, mismanagement, miscommunication, or upper level pressure that's causing them to write sub-par rules. If a writer gets a day to write 10 warscrolls, then those warscrolls will likely be poor quality, but the fault lies with the person who set the deadline. - It creates an 'us vs them' when a writer feels as if they're being insulted, and as well as that just not being a nice feeling for the writer, it may also make them less willing to work with the community. Don't get me wrong, I do think GW can and has produced some shoddy rules and I think it's quite telling when people are nervous rather than excited about a new battletome. Someone, likely more than one person, looked at the Slaangor rules and said it was okay - some decisions are truly baffling. The rules team can definitely be wrong, but it's not as if there's some terrible writer who's managed to cling onto their job, there's a good chance it's a collection of mistakes and pressures that can cause even the most esteemed writer to create something rubbish. I get "bin guy" almost describes a phenomena rather than a person, but seeing how it's discussed in the wider online community, some people do seem to be under the impression that there's two groups of writers - the ones who write books they like, and the ones that write books that suck. TL;DR - GW produces some poor rules, but it's not the fault of one person and acting as such detracts from what is likely a larger issue in the company (and is just not that nice for the writer to read).

On the bright side, loads of times the battle box rules are especially temporary - sometimes only lasting a month or so. No clue why they do it like this (maybe these are beta rules), but hopefully this isn't the final product for Fyreslayer warscrolls.

If it offers any hope, Daemonettes were changed for a very brief time when Wrath and Rapture came out, so let's hope Namarti get a change too despite not being a new model.

It should also be noted that current narrative play is very similar to matched play in that you use points and the unit restrictions are quite similar to the matched play restrictions. I'd say current Path to Glory is a lot more complex than most matched play games due to all of the steps after a game. I imagine, as @Neil Arthur Hotep said, when people say that most AoS games are narrative and that the devs play narrative, I think what they mean is that most games aren't cutting edge competitive or designed to be. The game is very likely mostly played at a 'build a 1k-2k point army you like the look of' level, and designed around that philosophy which is why so much can slip through (as well as time constraints and other pressures). It's not a 'narrative' game to make a story about Sir Ethal Brightshield, Lord Castellant and his 100% liberator retinue if it's played using matched play rules. It's a matched play list with a story and a theme, which from my experience is the most common way to play. Narrative, in a AoS design sense, is synonymous with Path to Glory, which is rarely played from my experience (though I do play it). While the argument might be "the people playing narrative styled matched play lists" don't care about balance, I don't think this is necessarily true. They may not play the most powerful thing, but they'll not enjoy it if their themed faction they've put a lot of love and care into gets obliterated turn 2. TL;DR - 'true' competitive is likely a minority, as is 'true' P2G narrative, but casual matched play with a theme is likely the most common.

I agree. Not to get too much into other games, but you're right that AoS is a wargame with objectives but doesn't really have units that interact with them (besides a few specific examples like SoB and Brutes). For those who don't know, in Malifaux, to score an objective it's very likely you'll need to do something active, and objectives are randomised per game (you get a set of 5 schemes and 1 strategy). You choose what you're playing after finding this out, and tailor your list to be the best at the given schemes (choosing 2 of 5) and strategy, as well as who can deny them. I'll try not to go too deep into the mechanics, but some schemes will have you run around to the opponent's side and actively use (using 1 of the maximum 10 per game) actions to put down a marker. Other schemes just need you to stand still in the middle and not die, while making sure no one else is near you. So you could have a very expensive, tough to kill, very damaging, fast model that's great in one situation but very poor in another. This gets even more complex with counter scheming. What this ends up meaning is, in general, most crews look different every time they are played - or at least different in small ways. In Age of Sigmar, usually when a unit is good, it's good in every situation because objectives are captured passively or battle tactics are won doing things you'd probably do anyway. For example, Broken Ranks requires you (preferably using a monster) to destroy a battleline unit. So long as you pick this at the right time, there's no downside to trying to go for this. Units that are already good at killing will be good at this, in the same way that units which are good at killing will be good at clearing and objective and taking that. In Malifaux, Outflank requires you to drop two markers using two models at the side of the board. This will often require three actions per model (so six overall). This means that cheap models have an advantage over stronger models because you can take more of them and each of their actions is 'worth' less compared to your general action count. On the downside, these models will be low impact in damage and often a lot easier to kill, and so would be much worse at a scheme like Assassinate (try to kill the opposing leader). To try and bring this back on the topic of Stormcast and their dragons, I think the homogenisation of what makes a good scroll in AoS is what makes Stormcast so hard to balance for as they have so many warscrolls. The Dragons, regardless of if they're "OP" or not, seem to have the overall best stats for their points in the book and fullfill the "best unit" role best. However I don't really see a solution to fixing this without a big rules overhall as it's quite fundamental to AoS's current design; even upping the points of the dragons won't solve the fundamental issue that SCE players face of a lot of their book being overshadowed by the next best unit. (Note, I should add that the Malifaux design isn't necessarily perfect and it can be very new/unskilled player unfriendly, whereas AoS is much more open and inviting as a game regardless of skill level. Skill certainly does matter in AoS, but the skill floor is much lower.)

Mostly to generate DP, but can be okay if you have a spare artifact on a KoS (or just want to take a MW on a summoned KoS who didn't get in the turn they were summomed). It's a pretty good scenery piece, and being able to summon from it helps a lot (especially as you don't really need it close if you don't care much about the +1 to hit so you can keep it tucked away). It's also easy to transport as it's pretty flat, which is great.