Age of Sigmar: Next General’s Handbook Looks Like A Pain In The ICE
We’re leaving Gallet and moving to the icy tundras of Andtor with the next General’s Handbook for Age of Sigmar!
There’s going to be some major shake-ups with the next General’s Handbook for Pitched Battles in the 2023-24 season. Not only are we getting an update on locations but we’re also going to be using this GHB for an entire year. Oh — and this time the focus is on Wizards.
We have emerged from the claustrophobic tunnels of Gallet into the icy tundras of Andtor, where sorcery runs rampant. In this inhospitable waste, frozen landmasses crack and reform, revealing locuses of amber magic to harness, realmgates to seize, and resources to harvest.
The General’s Handbook Pitched Battles 2023-24 concentrates on the wizards who seek to profit from the primeval magic that suffuses Andtor, as well as those who hunt them down by using nullstone artefacts to weather their empowered and unbridled spellcasting.
General’s Handbook 2023-24
Not only are we getting a new icy theme this season but there will be even more big changes with the updated GHB. Let’s check out some of the new rules and then we’ll go over what the new year-long GHB means.
New Battlepack, New Focus
In this battlepack, your WIZARD HEROES with a Wounds characteristic of 9 or less, and who are not Unique, gain the ANDTORIAN LOCUS keyword. Each round, the player with the second turn can pick one HERO to take advantage of the swelling magic in Andtor with Optimal Focus. If they’re an ANDTORIAN LOCUS, they can cast and unbind an extra spell that round – otherwise, they gain a free command point for issuing commands.
This is really going to boost up the spell-slinging across the board. If you weren’t packing a Wizard in your list you’re probably going to want to look at that option when the new battlepack hits. It’s not just Optimal Focus either.
Wizards will be able to tap into the Primal Magic of Andtor and even use a special dice for boosting casting, unbinding, and dispel rolls. But there will be some risk involved which we don’t know about yet.
Just like previous seasons there will also be some additional spells you can cast from the battlepack. Hoarfrost can really boost the damage output of a unit by making them hit, wound, or rend much better.
And even if you’re not slinging spells there’s going to be some extra defensive options for you. With the Hand-Carved Nullstone Icon you might even be able to shut out an enemy wizard with repeat unbinds!
On top of this, there are 12 brand new battleplans and everything else you’d expect from a General’s Handbook, providing you with a whole year’s worth of content for competitive play. As with previous General’s Handbooks, you’ll also find the core rules and up-to-date profiles for universal endless spells.
One General’s Handbook For An Entire Year?
So yeah, it’s going to be a complete update for the game-changing GHB once again. And it’s going to last for an entire year. This is a big change as AoS players have gotten used to a new GHB update every 6 months or so. Those updates help to keep the game feeling fresh and can have some huge impacts on the meta as well. When the missions change and the battlepack focus shifts from one type of unit to another those changes can really elevate specific armies.
Hopefully this year-long GHB season won’t feel stale a couple months in. There is some good news though if you’re worried about the long season:
This book will be the go-to matched play resource for twice and long – all the way through to summer next year. You can still look forward to quarterly balance updates, to ensure that the metagame remains as balanced as possible.
I think this shows that GW is at least aware that those issues do exist within the seasonal GHB formats. Their quarterly balance updates do seem to help out as well and tend to tweak the meta enough to keep things interesting.
We’ll have to wait and see what the missions look like and what other changes are ahead. The General’s Handbook for 2023-24 is coming soon!
Here’s hoping the missions are a lot of fun because we’re about to use them for a whole year…
