Intro
Sequitors are the God-King Sigmar’s battleline troops of the Sacrosanct Chamber, trained to fight against foes both physical and immaterial. While many of the troops from this Chamber were recalled to Azyr in recent times, Ironsoul’s Condemners remain on the battlefield, seeking to wipe out Sigmar’s foes with Aetheric might and Sigmarite plate armor. Gwynne Ironsoul leads Brodus Blightbane and Tavian through Embergard, let’s see how they fare against foes both new and old.
Warscroll
Inspire
First, we see their Inspire condition. A fighter in this warband inspires when they roll a Crit to either Attack or Defend. This is nice and simple, though you don’t have much control over it in the long run. Luckily, as we’ll see later, the Uninspired stats on your Fighters are pretty solid, though they get better when they Inspire. You can try to influence it by taking Cards that give extra dice or rerolls, but we all know there’s no way to guarantee a Crit. Either way, you can’t really control this, so just keep it in mind and try to roll as best you can!
Bulwark Against the Dark
The Condemners get one passive Ability, Bulwark Against the Dark, which prevents them from being Driven Back when they have no Move or Charge tokens. This is a solid ability, as it will keep you in a good spot early in the turn to set up counterpunches or stand on Treasure. Simple, effective, and something you can plan around as you set up a slightly slower approach down the board.
Punishing Blow
The first active ability is pretty interesting, as Punishing Blow only affects Brodus. Brodus is your fighter that starts with an Uninspired Damage 3 attack (well, damage 2 Grievous), which is fairly uncommon in this edition of the game, and it makes it more accurate. Obviously this gets better the longer you wait to use it, but if you wait too long, either Brodus can die, or the opponent can start tossing on Great Strength, etc. I think it’s optimal to try and use this in Battle Round 2, where you’re getting solid power out of it but also that Damage 3 will be still quite impactful and Brodus is likely still kicking around, but if you can hold onto it until Round 3, it’ll nearly guarantee a big hit to close out the game. Very cool, though keep an eye on his health.
Aetherically Charged Shield
Aetherically Charged Shield, however, affects your other two fighters, and Brodus couldn’t be bothered to carry a Shield into combat (big hammer is too big). Turning off Weapon Abilities is pretty huge, negating Grievous helps you survive longer, and negating Cleave turns off a big point of accuracy. Obviously I don’t think you should really use this on a Damage 1 Cleave attack, but you should consider what the scariest attacks are on the enemy team and look at the breakpoints available for them to kill your fighters. Turning off Great Strength for a turn can completely reshape the flow of battle, for instance. I think this is a really, really great ability, but you have to be pretty precise in how you use it.
Aetherically Charged Maul
The final ability is Aetherically Charged Maul, which is also only for Gwynne and Tavian. +1 Range is a really, really interesting Ability, especially if you can slap on Great Strength for a 3 Hammer, 3 Damage attack at Range 2. Like the previous ability, you have to read the battlefield a bit and decide when it’s proper to use this. Boosted Range will sometimes allow you to make an attack without Charging, which is awesome, though sometimes that Charge is fine. It’s a finite resource, and I think one has to be fairly analytical as to when and where you utilize it. However, it’s absolutely a game changer in terms of positioning, especially alongside Bulwark Against Darkness.
Altogether, this is a very solid Warscroll. There’s no flashy abilities that teleport you or Raise fighters or deal Area damage, but you have four solid, utilitarian abilities that will be used in every game (I guess unless the opponent doesn’t have any Cleave, Grievous, or Grapple), and honestly that is power in and of itself. Solid abilities for solid fighters. Speaking of which, let’s take a look at those fighters now.
Fighters
Gwynne Ironsoul is your leader, and she’s nice and well rounded. Accurate melee attack, 5 Health, Shield defense. What more could you ask for? Well, Inspiring to 2 Shields and Cleave is nice! And a 3 dice Attack has fairly good odds of Inspiring you when you make it regularly, so she’s just kinda good all around. Unfortunately there’s not much to say – moderate move with high health and a good attack is solid but not particularly “interesting”. She’ll do work every game.
Tavian of Sarnassus has a very familiar fighter card. It is, in fact, identical to Ironsoul, except he inspires to have Stagger instead of Cleave. That’s significantly worse into Shield teams, but better into Dodge teams, so it kinda comes out to the same thing. He works as a good setup piece when Inspired, but Uninspired he’s basically the same. Solid but lacks any sort of utility or shenanigans.
And finally, we have Brodus Blightbane. The only fighter in the warband not toting a Shield, he hits harder than his allies. Being able to pop out 3 damage early, and potentially very accurately when burning Punishing Blow, makes him a terror for your opponent, even if they’re 5 Health elites as a 3 damage hit will set up for a kill from the other fighters. Interestingly, he Inspires to have 4 Move and a very accurate 3 Hammer attack, though with only 1 Shield and 2 Hammers while Uninspired you’ll be fishing for those Crits pretty hard. But if you do get an early Crit to Inspire… well, expect your opponent to be absolutely terrified of this piece.
Conclusion
And that’s it! Ironsoul’s Condemners are a warband that I would label as solid. They’re not flashy, they’re not tech-y, but they are strong, hard as nails, and will punch back with power and reliability. I think this warband really does want to play Strike focused, though Bulwark Against Darkness does give them the capability to play somewhat Flex and make shifting them off Tokens very difficult. I would say to look for cards that boost their mobility through Pushes, and potentially try to snag some Guard to really lean into being terribly hard to hurt and move.
What do you think of our Sacrosanct Chamber warband? Do they strike your fancy as a slow, brutal team? Are you expecting to see them across the board? Leave a comment and let us know how you feel about Gwynne and her friends.
Best of luck on your Path to Glory!
