Age of Sigmar/4th Edition Tactics/General Tactics

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This is the general tactics page for the 4th Edition of Age of Sigmar. The general tactics for 3rd Edition is here.

So What's Changed?[edit]

  • The changes are so drastic that every army's gonna start over with free rules until battletomes start coming out like 10th Ed did for 40K.
    • Among the Squatted are the Beasts of Chaos and Bonesplitterz, though swathes of the Stormcast Eternals and the original Warcry teams are also getting thrown out too, to some concern.
    • To less significant alarm, all the Warhammer Underworlds teams are also tasting the axe of Legends. Nobody really cares though, as these teams were all 0-1 and were usually too niche to be of any use. However, the Skaven Battletome turned the Pestilens team into a generic unit to keep it playable, so other similar cases may happen in the future.
  • Each GHB will now contain more organized Battlepacks, each of which contain different Battleplans (Scenarios) for play. Each one will also include new rules (Similar to how last edition had unique enhancements) and new Battle Tactics.
    • Battleplans now come with twists that give an advantage for underdog players at a disadvantage.
  • Command Points are apparently a lot harder to hoard due to generating less frequently.
  • Reinforcement caps are gone. If you can afford it, you can reinforce it. You can only reinforce units one time though, so you can't have a 60-strong tide of Clanrats.
    • For some reason, none of your Warcry units can ever be reinforced, an annoying similarity to how 40K treats the Kill-Team only units.
  • All regiments deploy one at a time instead of only some being able to.
  • Initiative has been reworked a little. On the first round, the player who has his army set up first gets to go first. On every subsequent turn both sides need to roll off for initiative, with a tie allowing the player who went first to pick whether or not he wants to go first.
  • Warscrolls got reworked too, following 40K a little more. Wounds are now called Health, Bravery is now irrelevant and replaced with Control (as in how many models one model counts as for controlling an objective, same as 40K's Objective Control), and all special rules will now be color-coded to tell which phase it applies to alongside symbols to tell what sort of power it is.
    • The Wizard keyword now has a number on it, determining how many times one can cast/unbind/banish endless spells in a turn, as do Priests . Similarly, Ward saves are now a keyword, which sounds quite dumb considering how 40K just put it on the statline up top.
    • The Cities of Sigmar preview showed that there's also going to be keywords for Command Squads (Champions, Musicians and Standard Bearers), with the numbers for how many out of the squad can be assigned that role. Champions get +1 attack to their weapons, Musicians roll +1d6 when using Rally, Standard Bearers add +1 to Control.
  • While 40K tried to minimalize keyword bloat with USRs and fewer stratagems, AOS seems to want to go the opposite direction despite cutting down the subfaction bloat. Even basic actions now have their own goddamn keywords now, just in case someone's too smooth-brained to realize what the fuck counts as a Move or an Attack.
  • Melee weapons no longer have ranges to them. Anywhere within 3" of a model is deemed engagement range. It also has infinite height so you can totally lock down someone from a higher level.
    • Cohesion range, on the other hand, got cut down to 1/2" unless otherwise listed, likely to limit the wide bubble wrap mobs.
  • Like 40K, all natural 6s to hit are considered critical hits. However, they have nothing for Critical Wounds.
  • How wounds are allocated will receive an overhaul. Each one now allocates to the unit as a whole instead of the model that got hit. Oh, how those fools about forgot the days of musical wound allocation on Nobz...
    • Wards are now taken after saves, making them like Feel No Pain. However, these rolls need to be taken for every point of damage made, which is pretty inconvenient.
  • Shooting got redone. Ranges for guns got reined in significantly while firing in combat became impossible without the appropriate keyword.
    • Hiding heroes in blocks now does something without needing unit-unique rules. A non-Monster/Warmachine hero gets -1 to be hit when within combat range of a non-hero unit while Infantry heroes can't be shot at all by enemies over 12" away. Mad helpful for backline heroes like Freeguild Marshals.
  • Retreating will now cause mortal damage on the unit leaving combat. This makes it far more deadly for characters and low model count units.
  • All your wizards and priests now know every spell from a chosen lore (Usually the one with their tome). However, each spell/prayer can only be cast once per turn unless it has the Unlimited keyword.
  • Priests conversely need to build up their pools of ritual points before casting their prayers, now unable to be unbound. On a roll of 2+ you get however many Ritual Points you roll, rolling a 1 sacrifices Ritual Points. If this gives you a number equal to or higher to the required RP for the prayer, it goes off immediately.
    • Prayers incidentally have their own overcast rules, though it's rather difficult to get that considering that all RP get sacrificed the moment it gets cast.
  • Endless Spells are now grouped into Manifestation Lores. While all the Battletome-restricted ones will likely stay where they are, the universal ones from Malign Magic and Forbidden Power will be thrown into their own groupings that you can use for summoning.
    • Mobile Endless Spells can only be deployed at least 9" away from everyone and can fight anyone within 1/2" of them. Static ones can be deployed anywhere but obviously can't go anywhere once deployed and enemies can walk away from them if they so choose.
    • Endless Spells are limited on what they can do, being restricted to either universal abilities or what's on their scrolls. They also can't cap anything (and thus their Control stat is replaced with a Banishment stat) and never count as deaths for any battle tactics or powers.
    • Endless Spells are now tied to the caster who summoned them, meaning that they also vanish if the wizard who summoned them dies.
    • As of the September 2024 Errata, you also can't have multiple wizards try to summon the same spell if the first one fails. The errata also gives you a bonus to banish endless spells if the enemy has multiple spells on the board.
  • Similar to 40K's Combat Patrols, AOS will be making use of their Vanguard sets and turn them into the Spearhead system, a stripped-down version of the game with armies in only one box. Spells and Prayers are now slapped onto the unit's battlescroll rather than needing a whole new supplement for it.
    • Among the edits the mode implements is the addition of the Reinforcements keyword on certain disposable troops. When one such unit is wiped, each one has the ability to deploy an identical squad within 6" of a table edge once per game.
    • Generic battle tactics (with attached commands) are now drawn from a deck of cards, while a second deck comes with twists that give the underdog some sort of comeback mechanic for the turn. That second deck comes in multiple realm-theamed varieties.

Model Updates[edit]

Skaven
  • Coming with the Skaventide box are some overdue revamps for the good ol' Clanrats, Rat Ogors (with a new warpfire gun for one model), Warplock Jezzails, Grey Seer and Warlock Engineer. This also introduces the Ratling Warpblaster (a souped-up Ratling Gun that's now a full artillery piece) and a Clawlord on a rotting wolf-sized rat called a Gnaw-Beast.
  • As the winners of the Slaughter at Hel Crown campaign that kicked off the edition, the ratmen won the right to reveal a bunch more models. Getting refreshes are the acolyte globadiers, the Doom-Flayers and the Warp Grinders (Now much bigger emplacements that probably can't fit in a squad of clanrats), the Master Moulder and the Arch-Warlock. A new sort of Warlock Engineer also got introduced in the Galvaneer, which apparently can help as well as harm. Also announced are some new named characters for the new era: Vizzik Skour (A new Verminlord replacing Skreech Verminking's place as super-special rat-daemon because he was made when the Horned Rat managed to join the big boy's table of Chaos) and Krittok Foulblade (A warlord with tactical acumen that might inspire jealousy from Queek Head-Taker and has a cursed blade housing a very irate verminlord)
Stormcast Eternals
  • Perhaps came with the most significant revamps for the range, taking everything into the Thunderstrike pattern. Coming in the Skaventide box are new liberators, prosecutors (though only in hammer-mode), the Knight-Questor and Lord-Veritant. It also includes the brand new Lord-Vigilant, who rides on a crow-like Gryph-Stalker, the imposing-looking Lord-Terminos and the Ruination Chamber's foot soldiers, the Reclusians. Also announced around there was a revised Knight-Azyros with an alt-build for Tornus the Redeemed (that one ex-Chaos guy who turned into a Lord-Azyros and never had a model until now)
  • Got their new stuff revealed later as they lost the Hel Crown campaign with the Lord-Vigilant's monster mount the Morrgryph (A massive emo-griffon) with an alt-build for Idrian the Witness (a scholarly folk who's been cursed with knowing the only way to perma-kill Stormcast and now adds mercy-killer to their repertoire). The Lord-Celestant, Lord-Relictor, and Lord-Terminos (who only had the model in Skaventide) all get new models. The Reclusians are confirmed to have an alternate loadout with big mauls. New to the codex are the Stormstrike-Palladors (regular cavalry for the Warrior Chamber seeing as the other variant chambers got their cavalry years ago) and the Stormreach Portal (a setpiece portal to give more reliable arrival tactics and possibly redeployment)

USRs[edit]

Like in 40K, Universal Special Rules are back in vogue.

  • Anti-Charge (+1 Rend): Improves the weapon's Rend if an enemy charges the wielders.
  • Anti-X (+1 Rend): Improves the weapon's Rend if attacking an enemy with the marked Keyword.
  • Charge (+1 Damage): Adds damage to the weapon if the unit charges.
  • Companion: Similar to Extra Attacks in 40K, where you get these alongside any other attacks a model makes.
  • Crit (X): Extra rules on a critical hit.
    • 2 Hits: One critical hit becomes two hits.
    • Mortal: Crits make the hit deal mortal damage, making it bypass armor and wards. This also automatically wounds.
    • Auto-Wound: Crits will automatically wound.
  • Shoot in Combat: Pretty self explanatory. A ranged weapon can only shoot in combat range if it has this ability.
  • Strike-First: Same as before, you always get to fight first.
    • Strike-Last: The opposite.
  • Fly: As before, it's a keyword that lets models ignore terrain and other blokes when moving.
  • Ward: Now works after failed saves like Feel No Pain. However, you need to roll a Ward for each point of damage allotted.
  • Warmaster: A keyword that essentially forces this named character to be the General. Always found on your big centerpiece heroes.

Modular Rules[edit]

So the big pitch for this edition is that everything's gonna be modular, so that people can pick and choose what they want to apply to their games. Of course, GW's still gonna like to ask you to get GHBs just to have those seasonal perks. However, if you're just gonna run with the barebones Vanguard boxes, all you'll need is the core rules.

  • Core Rules: All the essentials. Movement, attacking, coherency and objectives.
  • Optional:
    • Commands: Command Points got a hefty bit of reworking in the previous edition to work across all turns, so this will likely keep to that.
    • Terrain: Will likely just have various rules for terrain to use, but it might have rules for full-on setpieces too.
    • Magic: Uncertain if Prayers will be included.
    • Army Composition: Where the Regiments will likely reside.
    • Command Models: Will Enhancements be thrown in here?
    • Battle Tactics: For those that don't remember, these were little secondary objectives that you can accomplish.

Commands[edit]

Commands have been pretty pivotal to the game and last edition took steps to ensure that they were always viable no matter the phase or turn. However, they've also had to trim down on CP hoarding.

  • Each player gets 4 CP per round.
    • The player with fewer VPs gets an extra +1 CP per round.
    • The player with fewer Auxiliary units gets an extra +1 CP per round.
  • You can only use one command each phase. Expect to have some hero circumvent this.
    • Each command can only be used once. Expect to have some hero circumvent this too.
  • All-Out Attack (1 CP): Triggered by a unit attacking. All attacks get +1 to hit, including Companion weapons (presumably for pets, making this like 40K's Extra Attacks USR).
  • All-Out Defense (1 CP): Triggered by an enemy attacking a unit. All models get +1 to their save rolls for the phase.
  • At the Double (1 CP): Triggered by a unit running. This essentially makes the unit auto-roll a 6 for running.
  • Counter Charge (1 CP): During the enemy charge phase, you can have a unit immediately charge afterwards.
  • Covering Fire (1 CP): During the enemy Shooting phase, one unengaged unit can shoot the nearest enemy they can find, but at a -1 penalty to hit. Useful to either return fire on an aggressor or to thin a unit in combat.
    • Anyone trying to use this as a shortcut around All-Out Defense will be disappointed as the September 2024 errata closed that loophole.
  • Forward to Victory (1 CP): Triggered by a unit charging. This lets you re-roll the charge.
  • Magical Intervention (1 CP): During the enemy Hero phase, one Wizard/Priest unit can immediately cast a spell of their own, but at a -1 penalty to any casting rolls.
  • Power Through (1 CP): At the end of any turn, a unit that's engaged with an enemy that's got less HP can force themselves through, dealing d3 MD before walking away.
  • Rally (1 CP): Back again for restoration. During any Hero phase, you can roll 6d6 for one model that's unengaged. Each 4+ is then pooled up to either spend on Heal (Apparently a new rule because saying "Restore Wounds to a model" is too many words) or to spend on resurrecting slain models.
  • Redeploy (1 CP): During the enemy movement phase, you can use this to move a unit d6" in response to any enemy movements.

Regiments & Battle Formations[edit]

Rather than the big battalions that could essentially encompass the entire army last edition, 4th Edition is working on including smaller Regiments, each of which can be set up at once rather than being a perk of a particular battalion. They're more or less an extension of prior editions, where a choice in hero now determines what units can join their regiment instead of just determining what becomes Battleline.

There are also "Battle Formations", which essentially take the place of last edition's subfactions except now generalized on certain types of units, and "Armies of Renown", alternate army lists with their own special rules.

  • Formation: 1 Hero, 1-3 non-hero units, with an additional generic unit if this regiment houses your general. It seems to be that also you can only reinforce units that come in a regiment as well. You can deploy an entire regiment at the same time when setting up the board.
    • Some heroes can also take other heroes in their regiments, though those secondary heroes will likely only take up a normal slot.
  • Auxiliary Unit: Stuff from outside of a regiment without any limits. This comes at a cost as the player with fewer auxiliaries on that turn gets +1 CP each turn.

Battle Tactics[edit]

As ever, Battle Tactics remain as mini-objectives you can carry out during the midst of battle. While you can swap them out on the start of a turn, you can't try pulling off two different tactics if you're taking a double-turn.

  • Attack on Two Fronts: Score by capping 2+ objectives, with one of them being controlled by the enemy before this turn.
  • Do Not Waver: Score by having 2+ units fight and lose nobody on this turn.
  • Seize the Centre: Score by getting 2+ unengaged units within 3" of the board center.
  • Slay the Entourage: The simplest one. Just mark one unit in the enemy general's regiment and kill them.
  • Take the Flanks: Score by placing a unit within 6" of each short edge of the table so long as these units aren't in friendly territory or unit that just dropped in.
    • Depending on how the board's set up, you're probably going to only consider this based on the battleplan.
  • Take Their Land: Pick a piece of terrain at least partially within the enemy DZ. You score by controlling it.

Manifestation Lores[edit]

So as mentioned above, your universal living spells are now grouped into unique lists of spells you can summon from.

All Death-themed, all from the same book.

  • Horrorghast (CV 6): While its melee prowess isn't too strong and its durability is lacking, its ranged power is better suited for managing mobs and occasionally take down stronger goons thanks to Anti-Infantry (+1 Rend). On top of this, that shooting can also shut down commands if you roll a d6 and roll under the number of models you kill with that shooting.
  • Lauchon the Soulseeker (CV 7): For 1 HP, you can use this ferryman to carry a nearby Infantry Wizard Hero along with him. After that, he can then wail away with his oar.
  • Shards of Valagharr (CV 6): Two fragments meant only for denial, as nobody can fly within 6" of either part of it and can't deep strike anywhere within 9" of either part, so it provides a pretty wide deadzone. Even better, it can sorta move by having one part moving around each other. If you're worried about deep-strike heavy armies like the BoC or Stormcast, this can shut them down.
  • Soulscream Bridge (CV 6): A giant two-part gateway that allows a nearby unit to jump from one end to another. A necessity depending on your army.

Death Lore 2.

  • Malevolent Maelstrom (CV 6): A ticking time bomb that can occasionally lash out on whoever is near it. Whenever anyone dies or casts a spell within 12" of it, it builds up its charges until it explodes at 6 charges, hitting everyone within 12" of d6 MD before vanishing itself.
  • Purple Sun of Shyish (CV 8): Difficult to cast, but it's pretty durable at 10 HP with 5+/6++ and only lose 6 HP when someone banishes it. It's...still somewhat powerful with a lot of attacks with Crit (Mortal), but its bigger threat was its ability to deal -1 to all saves to anyone nearby it, something that you'll absolutely want to utilize to overwhelm with stronger weapons. A shame that it can't pull down big threats on its own.
  • Soulsnare Shackles (CV 6): A three-part trap. Anyone near one part of them can suffer 2 or 3 MD and lose that much in Movement. Crippling for your already slow clods, meaningless for mobs.
  • Suffocating Gravetide (CV 7): A horde of bones that collides into anything it runs into and can even hit anyone it flies over, rolling a d6 for each model and dealing MD for each 5+.
  • Aethervoid Pendulum (CV 6): Your swinging glass scythe that must move in a straight line. Does mortal wounds to up to 3 units that is passed across, fortunately ignoring the whole attack sequence.
  • Chronomatic Cogs (CV 6): Lets your wizards pick one of two effects that can affect units within 12" of these floating cogs. Choose between re-rolling charges friendly units or -1 to hit against your wizards. The former will likely be what you focus on considering the very broad application.
  • Quicksilver Swords (CV 6): Pretty nimble but fairly fragile with 6 HP and a 5+/6++ save. Then again, they're not here to defend. They're here to throw a fuckton of attacks at the nearest thing that pissed you off, each one doing 3+/3+/1/1 with Crit (Mortal) and the ability to negate wards so you can gut the undead and daemons like a hot knife through butter.
  • Burning Head (CV 5): Very brittle, but it packs quite a lot of random attacks with Anti-War Machine (+1 Rend) both in melee and at range. The shooting isn't very advisable as more than an emergency measure, seeing as each use of that deals MD. That...well, will scare you from using it.
  • Emerald Lifeswarm (CV 6): Incredibly flimsy at 5 HP, but it's not meant to fight anyways. It's meant to heal whoever it flies over for 3 HP. If it manages to survive one round of shooting, it can heal 3 HP.
  • Ravenak's Gnashing Jaws (CV 6): Alarmingly mobile with a 3d6" movement and durable with 10 HP that can survive one banishment attempt. It's not exactly mighty, but it comes with a lot of bites with extra damage on the charge and then deals another round of MD by rolling 10d6 and rolling 5+s.

The Ulgu-Hysh Combo

  • Geminids of Uhl-Gysh (CV 7): Two parts of magic that always stay 9" apart from each other, even when lashing those they come across. Luckily, each part shuts down Commands from being used near it.
  • Prismatic Palisade (CV 7): A giant wall that blocks LOS for anyone shooting through it. It can't be shot at either, so you'll need to either throw dudes at it (and at 8 HP and a 4+/6++ save, you'll need it) or banish it on a 7+.
  • Umbral Spellportals (CV 7): Deploys two portals 9" of each other. A nearby wizard can then sit in one portal and can use the other as the origin for any spells they may cast, which is a great way for boosting your casting range. However, it's a little easier to banish at a 6+.
  • Krondspine Incarnate of Beasts (CV 8): A very hefty spell with 12 HP and a 4+/6++ save. This monstrosity is so powerful that it can't die outright, instead suffering 6 MD when someone tries to banish it. Its central role is to hunt down other endless spells with attacks that will rip through any armor thanks to Anti-Manifestation (+1 Rend). Once it does, it can then heal 6 HP.


Age of Sigmar Tactics Articles
General Tactics
Order
Chaos
Death
Destruction
Age of Sigmar Tactics Articles
General Tactics
Order
Chaos
Death
Destruction
Others
Age of Sigmar Tactics Articles
Order
Chaos
Death
Destruction
Compendiums
Others
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