Warhammer: Why I’m moving from 40k to Age Of Sigmar.

…and you should too!

First of all, I just want to say that this is not a rant or a hate post. I still absolutely love Warhammer 40k and always will do. My Chaos Daemons, Chaos Knights, Death Guard and Ork armies will always have a special place in my heart.

Also, while I have your attention, a big thank you to everyone who read my last post about Why Every Child Should Grow Up Playing Warhammer. The positivity I received from the community was incredibly touching.

We all know our Warhammer community. We are a miserable lot at times and there is always something to complain about. Even the best of us have a niggle in the game which drives us absolutely crazy but after reading a few Battletome’s from Age Of Sigmar, I’ve realised how far 40k has drifted from why I started playing in the first place.

There are just too many ever growing niggles which are slowly starting to consume the hobby and so many things which Age Of Sigmar is getting right to stop me making the plunge.

Here are 5 examples which are turning me to Sigmar’s side.

1. 40k isn’t fun anymore.

40k takes itself far too seriously and reading Age Of Sigmar has made me realise this.

Reading the Age Of Sigmar Battletome’s I have been laughing my head off throughout. There are so many imaginative and silly rules that made me realise how little fun I’m having fun in 40k

Too many times I hear people on social media say that a fun rules has been changed because it was OP or unfair due to X, Y, and Z. That’s all well and good but for each rule being changed is now being replaced with something with less character.

Here are some of the rules I’ve read in Age Of Sigmar Battletome’s which really popped for me and I know would never be allowed in 40k.

Nagash’s “Hand Of Dust" rule: This gives a 50/50 chance for killing any model in close combat.

“Hand of Dust has a casting value of 8. If

successfully cast, pick 1 enemy model within 3"

the caster. Then, take a dice and hide it in one

of your hands. Your opponent must pick one of

your hands. If they pick the one holding the dice,

the spell has no effect. If they pick the empty

hand, the enemy model is slain.”

I mean, how fun is that? There is even direct interaction between yourself and your opponent and it’s very fluffy for the lord of death. You just wouldn’t get that in 40k as they would never allow you to kill someone like Mortarion in one shot.

Or what about the Sons Of Behemat rule where you can literally kick the strategic points across the board?

Or their rule where they can just pick up a model and stick it in their pocket?

The Orks also have their Megaboss on Maw-krusha with it’s fantastic “On The Rampage" attack which lets you charge and attack…then charge and attack…and charge and attack forever in a chain reaction of untold destruction. As long as it kills everything after each attack it will go on indefinitely. Very fluffy, very fun, very WARGHHH!

2. The bloat…THE BLOAT!

How many books do you need to play 40k? The last time I played my Chaos Daemons codex I was carrying around a rule book, codex, Engine War, Forgeworld rule book, and now there are going to be season book for matched play which would need to be purchased several times a year. Some armies are having to use White Dwarf magazines and supplements too. Don’t forget the faqs and chapter approved!

With Age Of Sigmar I only need the rule book and my Battletome. That’s it. Simple, easy, and pure.

3. A loss of character.

This goes into my first point about 40k not being fun anymore. I know there are some 9th edition codex’s which have done a great job of making armies fluffy and play like they should. Death Guard is a great example of this by being able to vomit on points to infect it and their contagion rule which give a -1 toughness aura due to their disease and famine. This is exactly the kind of imagination I was expecting across the addition for other armies but instead Death Guard ended up being the exception rather than the rule.

After reading my new Chaos Knights codex I was incredibly disheartened after reading the rules and playing the army. The entire idea of running an army of 60ft rampaging daemonic nightmares was so I could rock up and weather untold destruction on anything I faced without even having to be careful, as, after all…we are giant killing machines!

Instead, I find that due to not having an invulnerable save on 400+ point models in close combat (in an edition where invulnerable saves are on nearly everything) I’m having to tip toe around trying to avoid nearly every model 1/4 my size. Age Of Sigmar has a similar army called Sons Of Behemat which have fun rules where I can knock down buildings and has enough wounds to survive an attack from an elite unit without having to worry. After all, it’s a giant!

The new Chaos Daemons codex has also sucked all the character and personality out of my mono Slaanesh list. Here are a few examples which really made me feel like Slaanesh has lost her temptation.

• Forbidden Gem used to hypnotise the enemy for a phase, gone.
• Slaanesh, known for their speed, are now slower. Their “fight first “ rule is also now army wide.
• And all the anti fall back rules which were incredibly fluffy due to Slaanesh’s alluring musk and temptation have now been handed…to Khorne?

Meanwhile, Age Of Sigmar have an entire depravity point system for Slaanesh which not only makes summoning powerful (which is an entire other post in itself) but is incredibly fluffy and fits into the personality of She Who Thirsts.

Whether or not the new rules are better or worse, the character is gone. I know numerous other people in my groups which feel the same.

While we are on the subject, Slaanesh in Age Of Sigmar get rules for Dexcessa and Synessa but in 40k we don’t? (Ok, maybe I’m getting a little ranty now but it’s another thing AOS has and 40k doesn’t).

4. Stratagems.

I’ve been hearing a lot of complaints about stratagems lately and the more I think about it the more I think the complaints are absolutely right.

I quite like the idea of stratagems as a concept but there are far too many, most you’ll never use, and having them separate to the models rules in the back of the book mean you make more mistakes. Maybe I’m just a little slow but maybe it should be…less complicated?

Even Games Workshop have to back track constantly with their key word mistakes on stratagems and have to FAQ a codex 3 months after releasing it as they’ve made an error. This has often frustrated me as I’ve bought a codex and it’s automatically out of date as the keywords change, points tweaked, and things out right nerfed.

I will turn up to a club to play and be told mid battle that “I can’t do the anymore" because some update online came out a few days earlier. That’s great and all but I may have planned my entire list around it and I do not have time to keep checking on all these updates. I have paid £25 for a codex 3 months ago which should be good for at least a year.

Where Age Of Sigmar gets it right is that each model has a rule or two within its own rules which makes it unique or gives it some sort of character. They are much simpler to manage and you don’t have to faff around with key words. It’s all on the same page of the model you are using so when you look up the unit, the rule is there.

5. Unit deleting.

One thing which has always bothered me about 40k is getting an expensive new model, spending a week panting it up, then putting it on the table and having it blown off the table in the first turn because you misplaced it by half an inch. You can blame this on my lacklustre playing style if you like but if you are honest with yourself, you will admit that everything is hyper up to 110% in 40k and you are pretty much exchanging blows unit-for-unit, like a game of chess.

In Age Of Sigmar this does happen of course but it is not as prevalent. Units can’t spend a couple of rounds slugging it out giving you the chance to actually use them before they win or die.

I have started painting a Soulblight army and my son and I are thinking of starting a Sons Of Behemat list and it happened so organically. I only bought a few Battletome’s to read and the next thing I know I’m building up an army.

Everything in Age Of Sigmar seems easier, more fun, and pure. There is an undercurrent of stress and negativity with 40k which I’m not going to miss. These issues get magnified when you have a son or daughter who is involved in the hobby as it is even harder for them to keep up with ever changing rules, dozens of rules and books, and overly complicated keywords and list building mechanics. With all this complexity, the accessibility gets worse.

Maybe I’m alone in how I feel or maybe this is a wider issue which has been bubbling for a while now, I have certainly heard a lot of people at my local club on the same page as me…so please let me know what you think!

Thanks for reading.