Dipping Into Age of Sigmar with Tzeentch

Hi, guys. It's been a while I know. I have been neglecting my blogging duties here, but that is not to say because I've been idle. I have been very busy over the past few months organizing our Come the Apocalypse GT for 40k as well as getting an army ready for a GT I'm attending myself in June; the Gulf Coast Wargaming Alliance GT.

I've been working on some Tzeentch allies to run with my Magnus list for that event, and in the process of doing so, I've managed to get quite a bit of Tzeentch daemons painted up and realized, hey, I have enough stuff here to play Age of Sigmar! So I decided to give it a go.

I have played AoS before, shortly after it launched initially. As most can remember, 2 years ago when it hit, Fantasy players were railing against it because the game was streamlined down to a very simple level, and there were no points for building armies. You just threw down models on the table until it looked right. Then, last year GW released the General's Handbook and everything changed. Points and scenarios for matched play were introduced and since then the game has really taken off.

After talking to a few people in our group we all came to realize that a bunch of us had AoS armies either old holdovers from Fantasy or models that were compatible with both 40k and AoS. So, last night I went to my local club and we decided to throw down in a 1000 point game.

Here was my army and list for the game.

1000 Point Tzeentch       Grand Alliance: Chaos   Allegience: Tzeentch

Leader/Behemoth:

Lord of Change (General) - 300

- Command Trait: Aether Tether: Can re-roll failed saves of 1

- Artefact/Gift: Aspect of Tzeentch: Each time use a destiny dice, roll a dice. On a 6 roll another dice and add that dice to your destiny pool

- Lore of Change spell: Fold Reality - 7 casting value. Pick unit within 18" and roll a dice. On a 2+ restore that many slain models to the unit. On roll of a 1, the unit is wiped out.

Leader:

Herald on Disc - 120

Lore of Change spell: Bolt of Tzeentch - 8 Casting value. Pick enemy unit within 18". That unit suffers d6 mortal wounds

Battle line:

10 Pink Horrors - 140

Lore of Change spell: Bolt of Tzeentch - 8 Casting value. Pick enemy unit within 18". That unit suffers d6 mortal wounds

10 Pink Horrors - 140

Lore of Change spell: Bolt of Tzeentch - 8 Casting value. Pick enemy unit within 18". That unit suffers d6 mortal wounds

Other units

Burning Chariot - 160

3 Screamers - 140

Total: 1000

My opponent was playing a Gutbusters army with all Ogors. I didn't get a pic of it specifically or the list itself but he had a couple of the basic Ogor battlelines, some Leadbelchers, another killy Ogor melee unit and a Butcher for his leader.

We played the Take and Hold scenario from General's Handbook which is one objective in each table side and the game can be won by having 5 models within 6" of both and none of the enemy's models within 6". 

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We took turns deploying units until everyone was down. He finished first so elected to take turn one.  Basically this turn was spent trying to move his troops closer to get me in melee. On my own turn 1 I fired some magic into some of his units taking out a few models and casting Mystic Shield on my Lord of Change to offer him some protection. I moved my Screamers onto the far right flank to try and get him to devote a unit to come to me, or allow me to get into his backfield later for scoring his objective.  He decided it was best to go after the screamers and devoted a unit of Ogors to the task.

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He wins initiative and moves some things into position on turn 2. He charges one squad of pink horrors and my screamers. He manages to wipe out the screamers quite easily, but has some lackluster rolling on the pink horrors and only kills 3 of them. On my turn 2, I activated the Lord of Change's command ability allowing me to add 1 to all casting rolls for daemon wizards within 18" of him. This was helpful as it made the difference between a couple of spells going off. I managed to cast several spells to force mortal wounds and the Ogors started to drop fast. I focused on killing the ogors in combat with my pinks as I got lucky on the first round and honestly didn't want to face a second round of melee with them as they hit quite hard. I managed to kill the squad off between magic and shooting.

On his turn 2, he moves up but fails some key charges. Since my force relies mostly on ranged spell and shooting attacks I wanted to stay out of combat as much as possible to prevent him from hitting my lines and crushing me in assault.

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On turn 3 I won initiative and this ended up being the deal breaker as I managed to finish him off between mortal wounds from spells and shooting then the Lord of Change charging into his ogors. At the end of the game, I had managed to table him entirely while only losing 3 pink horrors and my screamers. A definite major victory for the forces of Tzeentch.

This was my first time playing this army in AoS and while I had studied the battletome extensively I wasn't sure how it would play out in the game. One thing I can say is that the amount of ranged mortal wounds that Tzeentch is able to throw out there with magic is very strong. Combine that with decent shooting attacks as well and it makes for a very formidable army.  My opponent had a very elite force with only a few models in each unit but with a decent amount of wounds per model and some ability to hit hard in combat. He didn't have much in the way of ranged attacks however with only the single squad of leadbelchers which I managed to kill by turn 2.  We both learned a lot as it was his first time really playing since the General's Handbook as well. It was a fun game.

I'm working now on getting a Changeling and some Tzaangor Skyfires as well working towards my 2000 point force. I plan on trying out the Changehost battalion as it is pretty devastating. Tzeentch seems incredibly strong to me in Age of Sigmar, especially the Lord of Change. For 300 points he is an amazing force multiplier and has some devastating magic. I ran him with the Aether Tether gift in this game to give him the ability to re-roll 1s for saves. Combined with the shield he was running around with a 3+ save with a re-roll, which made him quite durable and formidable.

Overall I really enjoyed Age of Sigmar and am looking forward to getting deeper into the game. It is fun and easy to learn, but has some nuances that can make it challenging for players as well. Can't wait to throw some more dice!​