Thanks to Games Workshop for sending us these rules and the Skaventide box set for review. Over the coming weeks, we will be having experts provide insight into how they are building and running lists with each faction in Age of Sigmar. For this overview, we’re looking at what stands out for each faction, how much has changed, and how we might approach some key challenges on the tabletop.
Now this is a very fun faction. And weird. In the best way. I started Gitz only back in November and have had maybe the most fun building, painting, and playing Age of Sigmar in a long time with them. If you want an army full of crazed loonatics that just can’t get enough mushrooms and love to worship the moon then that’s a pretty weird thing to just want, but hey you’ve found it!
There’s really four armies in one here and the best part is that they pretty seamlessly mix together in a lot of ways, too, so you’re not stuck just leaning hard into one sub-sect. You’ve got your “normal” goblins which are pretty minor overall consisting of a couple wizards, some dudes with spears or bows, two variations of fanatic, and classic wolf riders. Then theres’ the squigs from the humble squigherd of goblins attempting to shepherd them around to goblins riding squigs in two variations and massive mangler squigs which should hardly work but maybe that’s what makes them so fun? It’s hard to dislike a squig. Of course there’s the spider portion of the army with spider riders and giant arachnids roaming the tables by themselves or with howdahs strapped to their backs full of goblins. Lastly is my personal favourite: troggs. If you’re new to wargaming or just coming in to AoS then these would be “trolls” to you but here they’re troggs. And they rule.
You can pretty happily pick a couple units of each of these and run them in an army together, or lean on one or two of them to fill out your roster, it’s really up to you. Some of the keywords only affect certain kinds of units so you’ll want some level of combinations to really make them kick off but generally it’s just a very solid, very fun, faction. From flingling wild spells, surprise fanatic attacks, incredibly hard-to-kill troggs, and pretty much anything else you’d want from a goblin-based army.
Army Rules
Returning players will recognise the army’s core faction ability: The Bad Moon. You place a moon token in one quarter of the battlefield at the start of the game; it lights up that portion of the table so long as it’s there.
As the game goes on it has the chance to move to the middle, affecting the entire table, and then moving onwards and finally off the board. While under the light of the Bad Moon units gain an ability depending on what they are:
- Troggs get +1 save
- Moonclan (not squigs) get +3 control score
- Squigs get re-rolls on their random move
- Spiderfang deal critical hits on 5+ instead of 6’s
Troggs and Spiderfang benefit from the light of the Bad Moon by far the most so plan ahead and keep them under that light or else they start to fall apart and deal much less damage. The others are a bit more situational, squigs re-rolling their random move is nice especially in the early game but are generally fast enough that it doesn’t matter later on and Moonclan units getting a middling amount of extra control score won’t make a difference in most situations.
Battle Formations
Like every other faction pack you get four to choose from during list construction and each leans a bit into one of the four varieties of Gitz so pick the one that benefits your collection the most!
Squigalanche
Or just pick this one for the name, it’s fantastic. All of your Squig units get +1 attack on their mouth-based attacks when they charge. For a unit of reinforced squigherd that’s an extra 20 attacks! Nuts.
Moonclan Skrap
At the end of each of your own turns you pick 3 non-squig Moonclan units that are in combat, pile in with them (not attack, just pile in) and then deal mortal damage on a 2+ on D3. Nice for a little extra damage but it assumes that your Moonclan units survived combat to even use it. If you don’t have any Squig, Trogg, or Spiderfang units that’s the only time you’re taking it.
Spiderfang Stalktribe
When a Skiterstrand Arachnarok uses “Realmweb Lurker” another Spiderfang unit can also use the ability; that’s any Spiderfang unit, even if they don’t normally have it, which allows them to be set up in reserve to arrive on the table later in the game.
Troggherd
Every single time a Troggoth unit uses a Fight ability it heals D3 after it resolves. Beautiful. Amazing. Give me that extra healing. Troggs already heal every hero phase so getting extra healing after fighting just keeps them going that much longer. Returning players will notice that this is always D3 health healed so Dankholds and Trugg who normally heal D6 aren’t bringing back as many wounds just for fighting. That’s probably fair, too.
Heroic Traits
These are not restricted in any way to keywords on your heroes so it doesn’t matter if its a Dankhold Troggboss, Loonboss, etc etc you can take it!
The Clammy Hand
When a Gloomspite Gitz unit Rallies nearby you get to roll an additional 3 dice. That pumps it up to 9 dice, or 10 if the unit has a banner. That’s a lot of wounds healed or gitz back and even gives you a solid chance at resurrecting a trogg!
Loontouched
A Loontouched Wizard gets +1 to all casting rolls or a non-Wizard becomes Wizard (1). The +1 to cast pairs very nicely with the cauldron manifestation which gives a second cast to the wizard. Solid since spells are generally harder to cast this edition.
Fight Another Day
If in combat then on a 3+ it can immediately Retreat without suffering mortal damage. Amusing paired with a Loonboss on Mangler Squig to get in, do some hitting, and retreat out ready to charge or counter-charge in the next turn.
Troglodytic Treasures
Despite the name sounding like these are fun toys for just-troggs that’s not the case and again can be give to any hero you like.
The Clammy Cowl
Pair with the Clammy Hand and you have an incredibly clammy hero on your…hands. Simply subtract 1 from all attacks that target this hero. Very simple and also very good. This works great on a Dankhold Troggboss or equally big-guy to keep them on the table a bit longer.
Backstabber’s Blade
A once-per-game dagger that hits an enemy hero in combat rolling a 2+ and dealing that amount of mortal damage. That’s on a D6 to be clear, so could do a lot or could do nothing! I don’t care for these types of once per game effects and either of the other two are just better.
Leering Gitshield
A difficult choice between this or the Clammy Cowl on one of your big guys, actually, with every unmodified hit of 1 against the model deals 1 mortal damage back to the attacking unit. I assumed at a glance that this was melee-only but it’s actually not which makes it hilarious against shooting heavy armies trying to remove your model at range and just taking mortal damage back from across the table because the shield…is hideous? Incredible energy.
Lore of the Clammy Dank
Each of these cast on a 7+ which makes them all nice and simple casting at about a 58% average. Not great. Take the +1 cast ability, I beg of you. That said, this is pretty in line with where spells are this edition; don’t rely on magic!
Sneaky Distraction
The army’s unlimited spell that gives off a 12” aura for enemies wholly-within to suffer -1 to hit rolls. Needing enemies to be wholly within 12” of what is typically a very squishy wizard is a bit rough, especially since historically auras that effect enemies are not wholly-within but just within. Nice to be able to dot around a few places but be very mindful of where your wizards are!!
The Hand of Gork
The hand of gork comes down from the skies, picks up a unit, and puts it back down very safe and sound someplace else. The unit has to be wholly within 12” of the caster and then has to be set up wholly within 24” of the caster while being 9” away from enemies. That can be rough place depending on the state of the board but something that lets you remove units out of combat without retreat is real good.
Spore Maws
Three enemy units within 12” each suffer mortal damage on a 2+ D3 roll. No notes.
Manifestation Lore
Given the choice between this lore or one of the generic ones, I’m actually a pretty big fan of these overall even if only three would be useful to you at a given time. Manifestations are one of those things that might seem easy to kill, since they can be, but also that’s a whole bunch of attacks that aren’t going into your other units then…
Each of them casts on a 6 or a 7, so fairly easyish as far as manifestations can go to put on the table. They do also all have a ward of 6+ which helps since they only have saves of 6+ to start with, except the cauldron with 5+ save because it’s part metal…I guess…?
Mork’s Mighty Mushroom
Honestly whenever I look at my pile of plastic-that-I-need-to-paint in the cubby next to my desk, at eye level so it can shame me, I think “fuck, that’s a big endless spell” except now it’s a “manifestation” instead. It doesn’t move but in each shooting phase releases a big spore cloud hitting nearby units for mortal wounds, more mortals for each model within the short 6” range. Since it has a move value of ‘-’ enemy units don’t treat it as a unit so can walk right up next to it, don’t have to retreat from it, etc etc etc meaning you might hit a decent horde with that spore cloud.
Malevolent Moon
The flying crazy moon is great to get on the table giving you another source of Bad Moonlight wholly within 12” and a move of 12” with Fly. A great tool to summon, especially before charging in with a bunch of spiders to spike more mortal wounds.
Scuttletide
It’s a quick little thing and a very wide base to boot with an 8” move and 8 attacks with Crit (Mortals) in combat. It gains a 4+ ward while wholly within 12” of an Arachnkarok spider. It’s free, is a very wide base to block off movement and be annoying for your opponent, and might spike some mortals. Solid.
Arachnacauldron
This little guy is just wonderful really. The model is the best of the bunch and it’s also good giving a friendly Wizard within 1” +1 to its Power Level in your hero phase until your next turn. That’s an additional cast and additional dispel every single turn of the game!
The Loonshrine
This is one of the largest pieces of faction terrain in the game. (I believe the Ossiarch one is bigger…?) But it’s a good thing that it’s huge because it gives off a nice massive aura of Bad Moonlight. Between this and the Bad Moon itself you’re easily covering your whole army in your first turn keeping your troggs nice and safe from danger. The other ability has changed significantly for returning Gitz players. It’s now a command so will cost you a point but doesn’t rely on rolling any dice any more at least! You get to pick a non-monster, non-war machine, non-hero unit that was killed during the game and setup a replacement with half its models rounding up. This is fantastic for snagging objectives with some annoying little goblins or bringing back some rockguts to keep smashing through enemy ranks if you somehow lost a unit. Unfortunately Dankhold Troggs are monsters so you can’t bring them back.
Warscroll Spotlights
Since this is already getting quite lengthy I’m limiting myself to just three warscrolls that Warhammer Community has not shown to talk about.
First up we have the Webspinner Shaman on Arachnarok Spider which is honestly just a very good wizard and unit to have on the table, it does a bit of everything. The shrine on its back has 12” aura giving Spiderfang Wizards +1 to their cast rolls, which effects itself, so give it Loontouched, summon the Arachnacauldron, and that’s a 2 cast wizard with +2 to all casting rolls. Solid. You get 10 just-ok shooting attacks and then the spider rampages to cause Strike Last on enemy unit before hitting with 4 damage 3 Crit (Mortal) attacks and a smattering of less-good attacks.
Next is Trugg because this guy has seen an overall improvement, in my very humble opinion. He heals D6 just like a Troggboss does and has a unique rampage to auto-kill a model within 1” each combat phase by rolling equal to or higher than its wounds characteristic. The best part however is his Malfunctioning Leystone. Roll 3 dice and pick an effect, 1 dice if he’s suffered 10 points of damage (of 16 total) and pick an effect between suffering D3 mortal wounds, getting +1 attack, +1 rend, gain Wizard (1) for an unbind but not cast, -1 from shooting attacks, or to gain a 5+ ward since he doesn’t have one. A lot of those are the same as his third edition leystone but the big thing is that the +1 attack, +1 rend, and -1 shooting hit rolls effects all troggoths wholly within 12” of him instead of only himself. I love this. He also hits like a freight train with 4 damage 4 attacks and 2 damage D3+3 attacks, all at Rend 2.
Last pick is tough but has to go to more troggs because I just love them so much, and this is my article, so why not? The Dankhold Troggboss who is just generally pretty solid all around. A monster with control of 5, 12 wounds, 4+ save hitting with 5 attacks of D6 damage can spike high or roll low, as it goes. What makes him special is the Shepherd of Destruction rule in combat; roll a 3+ and all other Troggoth units within combat range get +1 attack. Send him in with some Rockguts and watch them simply remove whatever was standing there a few seconds before. Simply roll a 3+, easy!
Ok fine the real last one is a quick note on the Rabble-Rowza who still gives a Monster run and charge so long as it ends closer to the Rowza but now the Rowza gets to be set up in a secret tunnel and be placed on the table more than 9” from any enemy unit making it so much easier to actually use this ability.
Clammy Battle Tactics
This is one of those armies where you don’t really need to think too hard about battle tactics. The two Destruction ones want you hitting stuff and being in combat which is where most of this army also wants to be. You’ve got quick units like Snarlfang or Spider Riders to go and do side quests around the table and not be in combat too.
The Underdank Goes On
Overall this is a very solid faction with a lot of choices to really play however you like. I’m very glad that troggs (the majority of my collection) continue to be good at what they do: hit things, not die, and then heal anyway. Spiders look like a lot of fun too solid magic to help keep them alive and easy ways to get better mortal damage. Regular goblins still have a great place in the army too helping you take objectives and just generally being very annoying!
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