Age of Sigmar: ‘Path To Glory’ Rules Return With Tweaks In The New Edition
Are you looking to build an army in the new edition of Warhammer: Age of Sigmar? Path To Glory does it in the most narrative way possible.
Spearhead will have you playing games fast and frequently against balanced armies. Matched Play and the new General’s Handbook will test your mettle against the competitive scene. And Path To Glory games will allow you to create and grow an army that’s telling it’s own story.
“In the new edition, Path to Glory is returning to its roots in the Core Book with a Path to Glory: Ascension battlepack which focuses on your WARLORD and their retinue. These rules will string together their heroic battles, embellishing their personal story as they fight for victory and renown across the Mortal Realms.”
Path To Glory – Forge Your Own Path
The Path To Glory game mode is going to bring its own battlepack and with that it’s own set of modular rules to use. As you play games with your core army it will grow and change as the units gain ranks. These ranks are determined by the renown points those units earn in battle. These ranks allow for your units to choose various upgrades as they advance on their chosen Paths.
“When a unit gains its first rank, you can choose a Path for it to follow. There are six paths in total – four for your mighty HEROES, and two for every other unit. The Path of the Warrior transforms your leaders into combat monsters that can fight whole units and win, while troops who walk the Path of the Defender become immovable anvils that your enemy’s charges will break on.”
As you can see from the two examples above there are lots of solid upgrades for their respective units. There are lots of different types of abilities from Passives, once per turn, end of turn, and more. These can really alter the performance of a unit on the battlefield.
There are more abilities to unlock as well based on the types of units they are. For example, a Priest can gain the ability to resurrect a Hero if they gain enough ranks.
With the refocus on the Warlord, it’s worth noting that they will start with a Rank already unlocked as well. They will be allowed to full participate in the Path To Glory system and will walk their own path as you play, too.
Path To Glory Twists Changes
Because the Path To Glory system is using its own subset of rules from the Battlepack, it doesn’t use the Battle Tactics rules module. Instead, you’ll be using a set of six different narrative battleplans. Some of these are new while some are returning favorites. All of them have been worked on by the Warhammer Studio and updated for the new edition. With these new narrative style battleplans also comes a new set of Twists to play with as well. These can add even more story and challenge to your games.
“The driving force behind this dynamic is the inclusion of a Twist table on every battleplan, introducing dramatic and unpredictable shifts each battle round that leverage the new underdog mechanic to great effect. For example, The Ritual, a favourite of narrative players, returns with a Twist table that gives the underdog a number of ways to chip away at the winner’s lead.”
One last thing to mention about the Path To Glory system is that there’s a lot more planned. Each new Battletome released will also feature additional Path To Glory rules for their respective army. Furthermore, each army will also have their very own Anvil of Apotheosis where you can build and customize your own custom characters for use in Path To Glory games. That sounds like it could be quite the narrative you’re going to get to play.
Personally, I think that the Path To Glory system has always had a lot of potential. If you’re in a gaming community that supports it, Path To Glory can be a wonderful experience and some of the coolest stories will develop while you play. I know that GW has attempted to make Path To Glory armies compatible with Matched Play in the past. However, using a Path To Glory army vs a standard Matched Play army could be a little off. That’s why you would always want to check with your opponent first before doing it.
Then again, when two Path To Glory armies fight things could also be imbalanced — that was the nature of the game mode. One army might be further along on it’s journey than another. That had its own set of boons and barriers though. I’m curious to see the full rules for Path To Glory regardless. It’s still a fun way to build out an army and a really great way to gather like-minded players for a full on campaign.
Are you brave enough to walk the Path To Glory?
