Age of Sigmar: But Wait, There’s More! Subfactions of the Stormcast!
Ask not for whom the thunder rolls… It rolls for you. Let’s talk Stormcast Eternals sub-factions.
The Stormcast Eternals continue to thunder across the battlefields of the Realms in their shiny new armor with their fantastic new book (though unfortunately, the rest of their new models are still stuck in Azyr). For an army as vast as the Stormcast, you expect several varying styles of combat and command, and the new book delivers with eight awesome subfactions, representing the most prolific Stormhosts patrolling the Realms. We covered the first four last weekend, so today, we’re coming around full circle to finish the final four and see how they might play on the tabletop.
Knights Excelsior
Warriors who prize justice above all things and view the world as either good or evil with no shades of grey, the shining Knights Excelsior are Sigmar’s finest executioners, committed to rooting out evil in the Realms, no matter how slight. They favor swift and decisive justice over lengthy planning, and they equip themselves with the heaviest weapons available to finish their foes with ruthless efficiency, even if they are woefully outnumbered.
On the tabletop, this subfaction allows you to select one engaged Paladin unit every combat phase and add 1 to their hit and wound rolls so long as their opposing unit has more models. Considering that all the units with the Paladin keyword have relatively small unit sizes, this will almost always be the case, and it is possible that with the boosts, the Paladins will eliminate their target in a single turn. To make things even scarier, the Knights can take Paladin units like Annihilators as Battleline, letting you bring some of the punchiest punch to the battlefield in greater numbers, and sweep your foes aside with righteous might.
Celestial Warbringers
A Stormhost wholly without fear and possessing almost supernatural good luck, the Celestial Warbringers have all foreseen their own deaths, similar to the Phoenix Guard. Because of this knowledge, they throw themselves into almost impossible situations, either confident that they will survive the encounter or giving in to the certainty that they will fail. This manifests on the tabletop as the ability to reroll a single hit, wound, or save roll per phase, cheating fate to make sure you are successful. They don’t have any special battleline, but the ability to change a roll to suit your needs is still worth considering.
Tempest Lords
Formed of noble warriors of Hysh, the Tempest Lords carry themselves with the air of rulers, and they favor to take to the field of battle on the wing rather than on foot. They are one of the primary leaders of the Dawnbringer Crusades, hoping to restore some of the kingdoms they lost during the Age of Chaos. On the battlefield, whenever a unit that can fly charges, you can reroll one of the dice, which is nice but sounds extremely limiting. However, Tempest Lords make Prosecutors battleline, so you can take to war on vengeful wings to reclaim the lands Chaos stole from you and pave the way for the noble followers of Sigmar. Make your enemies fear the beating of wings with this airborne subfaction.
Astral Templars
Hailing from the bestial realm of Ghur, the Astral Templars are Sigmar’s finest monster hunters, and rightly feared by the enemies of Order for their savage ferocity. They are far more comfortable in the wilds than in the trappings of civilization, and they take to battle adorned in the pelts of the beasts they’ve taken down. They are all immune to monstrous rampages, making them one of the best subfacs in the pro-Monster 3.0, as they get all the benefits of the Hunters in the Hinterlands battalion without the restrictions. In addition, they get to take Vanguard-Hunters and Vanguard-Palladors as battleline, meaning you’ll have a highly mobile army that can square off with whatever terrible beasties your opponent can unleash and run circles around their slower units.
If you want to learn more about the other Stormhosts, check out all the Stormcast lore here.
Which subfactions will you be using?
