Travis Perkins is back on the Bits with his take on the Wrath of the Everchosen book. See why he thinks it’s great, but not that great…
I recently finished going through the Wrath of the Everchosen book and while I personally think it is a great book, it might not be for you. Let’s break it down in a spoiler-free review.
Lore & Story:
I love that this book is pushing the narrative forward for the Age of Sigmar Universe which is a good thing. Pushing forward a story is a great way to keep things fresh in a world and introduce new armies, rules, etc. Basically keep changing it up every year to keep people playing. This is also why I love the yearly Generals Handbook and the summer expansions (even though last year’s expansion wasn’t great).
This book pits the two baddies against each other Archaon and Katakros in what is a great story involving the deadly invasion of the All Points. It has some great inner stories and battles between some new and old characters. It also breathes some life into what the All Points looks like in its twisted chaos madness.
Seriously half this book 50 of the pages are artwork and lore so it is pretty meaty in terms of driving the narrative forward. Overall if you like the lore and artwork I personally think this is a great book to add to your collection.
Additional Rules:
There are a lot of additional rules in this book and it could be a lot of fun to introduce them into your narrative or local games set in All Point (I think for matched play you will keep them out). The roaming endless spells and monsters are great ways to get a lot of those models on the tabletop that you might otherwise. It’s a great addition in that they add another random element to the game that can swing in any player’s favor and gives you something else to have to consider.
The roaming monsters follow a behavior table based on what you roll with a D6 so they could end up running away as quickly as charging your own line. For the Endless Spells along with their normal warscroll, they also have a behavior table to see what happens with a chance of having to roll on the unleased power table which can do a variety of effects.
It also adds the realm All Points into the game with its own realm scape features, unique spells, etc. While I love that they did this unless they put it in the general’s handbook I don’t see it lasting as it would be asking a lot for players to bring along this book to tournaments just for one page.
Still, the All Points are a chaotic realm full of magic and weird landscapes, roaming monsters, and rouge endless spells. The command ability and unique spell allow the player to interact with those even further.
Finally, they added some siege rules which are pretty neat adding a little bit of a guessing game pre-battle. Both the attacker and the defender choose one of three options and based on what each one chooses it can help or hinder the attacker. There are some additional command abilities for the attacker and defender like boiling oil, blast powder charges, etc. which makes for some fun additional rules. Finally, each individual army has a unique rule for being either the attacker or defender which adds a little individual flair to each army.
It’s a lot to add to tournament or matched play where you are under a clock to finish your game, but I think these could add a lot of fun to your home games over a beverage or two.
Painting Guide and Battleplans:
In the painting guides, it is helpful for the chaos player as they touch on colors for every type of chaos god (minus skaven) so you can get some good recipes. Given they use a lot of contrast paints in this guide so if you are not a fan of those paints this won’t be of much use to you. For the Death side of things, it only touches on the Bone Tithe Nexus, so you won’t gain much from it as a death player which is a shame.
The battle plans are pretty cool as it follows a series of 8 battles that the lore covers, and they are all pretty unique. They go from sieges to city fighting, crazy monsters, etc. they remind me of the battleplans GW was releasing when Age of Sigmar first came out that had some great unique battles. Given they are not always fair as some can be one-sided, but those games are some of the best are I have ever played.
Overall for a chaos player, you could get some good tips from the painting guide, and the battle plans are fun and interesting but you won’t see them in any sort of tournaments.
Warscrolls & New rules:
This book contains a ton of rules that a chaos player can use in matched play, for the daemon armies you add them to your books special rules, while they also have Legion of Chaos Ascendant and Knights of the Empty Throne as their own allegiances.
- Legion of Chaos Ascendant: is all about combining all the daemons of Chaos into one army, and giving your heroes a chance to summon in more daemons every turn. They have their own unique spells, artifacts, and heroes. There are also a few battalions unique to this army that combine the daemons but make them more unique to one god or another.
- Knights of Empty Throne: is all about bringing your Varanguard units without Archaon. They all become heroes along with unique command traits. It also includes some spells, artifacts, etc. as well.
- The Flayed (Blades of Khorne army): All about mortals of Khorne, letting you add to save rolls of your army (if you kill a hero or monster) as well as a command ability allowing you to add 1 to their hit rolls. Then a command train that lets you re-roll prayer rolls and an artifact that adds 2 to charge rolls.
- Baleful Lords (Blades of Khorne army): Lets you add an additional bloodthirster to your army. The unique ability lets you use a bloodthirsters damage table as if they have suffered 0 wounds. The general adds 1 to charge rolls, and the artifact adds 1 to save rolls.
- Unbound Flux (Disciples of Tzeentch): Add 1 mortal wound to spell damage on a 4+, and the unique ability will let you add 1 to casting roll to a single unbound daemon wizard. The command ability makes you immune to battleshock tests, and the artifact makes hit rolls of 6 deal D3 mortal wounds.
- Cult of Thousand Eyes (Disciples of Tzeentch): Before the battle begins, roll D3 and pick that many friendly mortal units. You can re-roll melee hit rolls with those units. Command Ability lets you pick a friendly unit that can ignore cover of your opponent. The command trait is every time you spend command point you can heal D3 wounds, and the artifact is add 1 to save rolls.
- Munificent Wanders (Maggotkin of Nurgle): Reduce the rend of enemy weapons by 1 while within 3” of your units. Command ability lets you deal D3 mortal wounds to enemy units that charge you. The general gets an aura that makes your opponent deal mortal wounds to themselves on hit rolls of 6. The artifact adds 1 to hit rolls against heroes.
- Droning Guard (Maggotkin of Nurgle): reduce rend of enemy units by 1 while they are within 3” of your units. You can use command ability to add 1 to disgustingly resilient rolls. Before battle begins you can move plague drones 4” and the artifact subtracts 1 from hit rolls that target the bearer.
- Blessed Sons (Maggotkin of Nurgle): On a 2+ when a Rotbringer dies the attacking unit suffers 1 mortal wound. Once per turn you can use At the Double without using a CP. The command ability lets you pick a Rotbringer unit and if it dealt any wounds to an enemy unit and it is larger than their bravery they suffer 3 mortal wounds. Their artifact lets you re-roll save rolls.
- Drowned men (Maggotkin of Nurgle): On a 2+ when a Rotbringer dies the attacking unit suffers 1 mortal wound. Re-roll charge rolls for friendly Pusgoyle Blightlords within 14” of general. They have command ability to pick Pusgoyle Blightlords unit where wound rolls of 6 have an additional Rend. The artifact adds 1 to wounds.
- Lurid Haze (Hedonites of Slannesh): Must be invader host. Allows you to set up D3 units in reserve. You can re-roll run rolls of units within 12” general. Command Ability one per turn that lets you add 1 to save rolls to that unit. The artifact adds 1 to the wounds of the bearer.
- Faultless Blades (Hedonites of Slannesh): Must be pretenders host. Add 1 to hit rolls for attacks with melee weapons that target a hero if they charged. Units within 12” of general can pile in an additional 3”. The Command Ability lets you ignore 2 wounds dealt to a unit in the combat phase. The artifact adds 1 to wound roll for a melee weapon that target a hero.
- Scarlet Cavalcade (Hedonites of Slannesh): Must be crusaders host. 2 friendly units within 6” of each other with more than 10 models can make 1 roll to determine their charge distance. Command ability lets you pick one unit that made a charge roll and one save rolls of 6 they deal a mortal wound back. You can re-roll battleshock tests while within 12” of general, and the artifact adds 1 to Bravery while within 12” of bearer.
- Legion of the First Prince (Everchosen): Re-roll his and wound rolls for Be’Lakor while within 8” of a bloodletter, horror, plaguebearer, or daemonette unit. In addition, every time Be’Lakor is dealt a wound or mortal wound on a 4+ he can pass it onto the unit. Command ability lets you roll a dice for every bloodletter, horror, plaguebearer, or daemonette unit on the board and on a 3+ return D3 models to that unit. Each wizard gets a unique spell called Master’s Command: Casting Value 7, pick 1 bloodletter, horror, plaguebearer, or daemonette unit wholly within 12” if it is slain from melee weapon, this model can fight before it is removed from play.
Whew! That’s a lot of new things to mess around with for the chaos player. Personally, I really like the Knights of the Empty Throne, Cult of Thousand Eyes, and the Baleful Lords battalions. There could be some fun lists using the Legion of the First Prince as well.
Final Verdict:
If you are interested in the lore or want additional army choices for your chaos factions, you should pick this book up. If you are not a chaos player and have very little interest in the lore, then you should pass on this book.
To be honest none of these additional army choices are that great (IMO) so if you are a chaos player with no interest in the lore then you could safely pass on this book as well. Though some of these do seem pretty fun to mess around with…
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About the Author: Travis Perkins
