Stormbringer is a weekly hobby magazine from Hachette Partworks introducing players to Warhammer: Age of Sigmar. In this 80-week series, our intrepid magazine-receiver will be reviewing each individual issue, its included models, and gaming materials. A Premium US subscription was provided to Goonhammer for review purposes. If you want to follow along at home, US Customers can check out Stormbringer here.
At time of writing, the results of the battle for Hel Crown have just been announced, and it was an overwhelming victory for the Skaven. The Stormcast and Sigmarite defenders have been overrun, and the city is in ruins. As someone looking to purchase a condo in Hel Crown, I’m devastated.
The Narrative Materials
Credit: AoS Coach
We start with another piece from our delightfully conceited (and yet unnamed) wizardly guide to magic and mysticism. This article, Endless Spells and how to Hunt Them largely boils down to “you yokels shouldn’t touch this stuff, and let your betters (IE: me) do it.” It details a few spells between the digs at the reader, and, as always, this article series delights.
Next is Blood in the Snow, a story chronicling a battle between the Iron Thanes Stormcast Eternals and Ogor Mawtribes in the valleys of Ramhut’s Spine in Ghur. That name stuck out to me in Issue 9, so clearly some worldbuilding lodged in my brain. This story has a bunch of Stormcast with snow-themed names form a shield wall and stop an Ogor charge, killing their Frostlord, reforming, and pursuing the Ogors. It’s not particularly memorable but it’s written well enough.
It’s time for more models and more Battle Records. We get our second unit of Stormcast Eternal Vindictors, and a smidge more detail on their heraldry. Turns out the banners they carry aren’t bearing Sigmar’s face, but the diamond-rune of Grungi, the Duardin smith god. He’s pretty important in the whole forging process, so that makes sense, but I never knew. There’s some new tables to roll on, so off we go!
Jana Blackhammer hefted his Stormspear, casting his mind back to a mortal life once lived. He’d died holding a pitchfork just the same, fending off a horned invader from his farm. If only he’d seen the second Chaos barbarian behind him, he might not have met Sigmar so early. His reverie was broken when a pack of Orruks skulked over the rolling hill before him. “Purifiers!” he shouted to his assembled Vindictors. The other 4 Stormcast stood at attention. They’d arrived at the Garagevale alfalfa fields well before the rest of their Stormhost, volunteering for advance guard duty. “Set to defend!” With that order, the assembled Stormcast formed a loose shield wall, ready to meet their attackers.
The Hobby Materials
We get a second group of Vindictors this week, forming a second squad of five or rounding out our previous squad from issue 03 to ten models. My issue also came with a 6th, bonus 40mm base. Score. I can only imagine this is the folded up fiver discreetly handed to a valet so they take good care of your car. Buddy, don’t you worry, I’ll be taking good care of these Stormcast. As I’ve said before, these are genuinely lovely models, and their high fantasy hoplite aesthetic is cool as hell. They’re not quite as iconic as the Stormcast Liberator (especially post-Thunderstrike glowup) but they’re a distinctive and easy to read unit on the tabletop. The instructions on how to build them are identical to the last time, as they’re push-fit models without many options, save for the excellent bare heads and command upgrades. There’s a standard painting guide to keep them in line with the other Hammers of Sigmar we’ve painted so far, but in a first for Stormbringer, we get a second guide with an alternate scheme. This tutorial shows how to paint a squad in the colors of the Iron Thanes, stars of this issue’s short story and Stormbringer: The Mug. This tutorial goes beyond what we’ve learned so far, with more colors, shading, Contrast paints, drybrushing, and edge highlighting. The scheme always read as more burgundy than true red to me, but it’s a handy tutorial and shows readers keeping pace with the magazine just how much their skills will grow throughout Stormbringer‘s run.
The Gaming Materials
We get a new double sided mat this week, with one side showing a pretty standard “red sand with skulls and rocks” like you’d see in the third edition starter sets, and another that’s got more of a cave/river/shipwreck theme. There are a pair of tactics pages bulking out this section, with some basic analysis of Praetors and Xandire’s Truthseekers. Both units are small but elite, with Praetors serving as excellent bodyguards for your characters and the Truthseekers serving as self-sufficient skirmishers. Of the two, we only use the Praetors in this week’s mission, Raging Blizzard. Continuing the snow theme from the narrative section, our intrepid Stormhost has chased down a Kruleboyz raiding party and now the two fight in a raging blizzard. The Kruleboyz deploy in a huddle in the center while the Stormcast can effectively surround them. Whoever kills the most units wins. The twist is that every unit (except, curiously, Hobgrots and Vindictors) has to roll a d6 at the end of each battle round, and on a 4+ they suffer a mortal wound. It’s kind of toothless as far as twists go, but I like the deployment map and how the mission ties in with the narrative laid out.
Final Verdict:
It’s a strong issue this week, with an ever-useful unit of infantry, fun narrative section, expansive hobby materials, and even some good stuff for gaming. Vindictors are $60 for 10 models right now, so you’re looking at a $30 value in this issue’s $13.99 cover price. They’re also going to be a bit harder to find for cheap as AoS3 starter sets continue to disappear from store shelves and stockrooms.
See you next issue, warhams.
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