The Cities of Sigmar march in the name of the God-King in the shadow of mighty Cogforts and gate wielding Gargants as they look to reclaim the Mortal Realms from the forces that oppose them. The brand new 4th Edition battletome is up for pre order today, and alongside it are a whole host of new kits! In this full review we’ll be checking out the new book, seeing what has changed and taking a look at all the new and updated units to see what they can do on the battlefield!

This isn’t the only Cities of Sigmar content we’ve got up on the site today, as we’ve also got full written reviews of the new second wave of kits and the mighty Cogfort (along with a painting guide)!

Massive thanks to Games Workshop for sending us these over to check out on the site. If you would like to support the site then why not order your Cities of Sigmar goodies through our affiliate Element Games and save yourself some money too?

We’ve also got some video unboxings of the new kits which you can see just below or over on YouTube

So let’s check out what is new in the Cities of Sigmar Battletome (2026)

Cities of Sigmar (2026) Battletome Review

A new Battletome is always an exciting time, but especially so when it lands alongside a large range refresh with some awesome new kits. Cities were a bit of a weird army when they first got released – Essentially it was a way of using the Warhammer Fantasy armies that didn’t really have a home. At the outset of Age of Sigmar, these armies were splintered into a number of different subfactions, but the Cities of Sigmar allowed them to be used together as a coherent army.

As cool as that was, the range didn’t really gel visually with the growing Age of Sigmar range. This became even more obvious when we got the first wave of AOS specific models – these kits were phenomenal looking with their own distinct identity, leaving the remaining kits in the range looking a little out of place visually compared to the new ones.

With the rise of Warhammer The Old World, we’ve seen a lot of old Warhammer Fantasy kits transition from Age of Sigmar back to the Old World, and I think for a lot of people the question was when not if the rest of the old Cities of Sigmar range would move back.

In this new Battletome we get our answer, as this is now an army made up of just brand new AOS kits with all the old Fantasy kits being retired (The existing Old World kits are still playable with their Legends rules until next summer if you do have any still in your collection)

While this may be a shame to some existing collectors, I do think this is a positive thing for the army, as it finally gives the army that consistent identity it badly needed.

This also makes the Cities of Sigmar now a Human faction, which is something I feel we’ve been missing a little with the old mixed cities approach.

Before we dive into the rules side of things, the Cities of Sigmar battletome deserves a shout out for the deep lore it has though. One big advantage of a range refresh is the fact that we get a lot of new lore to support the new models. We’ve had mentions of Cogforts in the lore for a while now, but the new Battletome gives them a huge focus. There’s some brilliant diagrams, schematics and lore snippets about them that really gets the creative juices flowing. There’s also some hints here to what we might see in the future too – there’s talk here of Cogforts with Luminark arrays mounted on the top, Cogforts in the form of massive mausoleums crewed by Priests, Specialist Cogforts with Harpoon guns designed for hunting monsters and even Winged Cogforts with propellers that can fly… I fully expect Games Workshop to take a similar approach to the Knights and Mega Gargants and introduce some new variants over the years to come

We also get a deep dive into the colleges of magic, the priest cults and the leadership of the Cities of Sigmar – With all those old hero models removed from the range, the new heroes and named characters introduced in this wave get some room to breath with some nice new background about them, something again I’m sure that will be expanded in future

As ever this edition, we get a nice section covering each and every unit in the army with background, stories and model shots – something I feel that has been a real win to the format of books this edition.

The Rules

Like the Sylvaneth book before it, this is a Battletome that has had a lot of changes since the Faction Pack – But these changes are positive. Replacing the old Officer’s Orders system is “Form Up” – This allows you to pick any Cities of Sigmar unit plus two different units that are within 12″ at the start of the Battle Round to be placed under orders. As they all have to be different (as in, have different names on their warscroll) this actually encourages you to have a variety of units rather than just spam the best ones – something I think is beneficial to the look of the army.

Once these units are Under Orders they remain so for the rest of the Battle Round. I really wish you still got token sheets included with Warscroll cards, as I really feel it would be beneficial here! What’s really cool is that nothing removes that “under orders” status until the end of the battle round, so the same unit can be under the effect of multiple different rules that key off this.

There’s also a few characters in the book that can place additional units under orders too on top of these 3

There’s 4 main once per turn abilities that can be given to units under orders. Take Aim is a simple one that adds +1 to hit for shooting attacks, something that works really nicely on a Cogfort for example but also is great on any of your ranged units.

Sound the Attack! is used when you charge and let’s you swap the lowest dice in the charge roll to match the highest one – making your charges much more reliable.

Into Them, You Dogs! is also used in the Combat Phase and has a few more moving parts, but essentially you pick a hero under orders and then up to 2 other non-hero units under orders – these three units get to fight one after the other, making this very powerful in potentially removing a dangerous enemy before it can strike. Don’t forget that units are under orders for the entire Battle Round, so you can use this in your opponent’s turn too…

Finally, Hurl Them Back gives a unit that has been charged +1 rend on their weapons (and of course that same unit could also be under the affect of Into Them, You Dogs in order to strike out of sequence too…

I really like these abilities, though I think I’m going to have to make some tokens to make keeping track of these a little easier.

Battle Formations

With the core Cities of Sigmar rules changing, the Battle Formations are also very different to how they used to be.

To The Last is a very nice one that allows units Under Orders to roll an extra 3 dice on a rally roll – Brilliant on infantry units, but also really good on something like a Cogfort to keep it ticking over.

Zealous Hordes actually comboes really nicely with Hurl Them Back – Once per turn when an enemy declares a fight you can opt to give a unit +1 to wound. Interestingly this doesn’t have to be a unit under orders too, so you get a lot of scope for making whatever unit is best suited to get that buff each turn – just make sure you make the enemy attack first so you can trigger this ability.

Masters of the Arcane gives your Wizards under orders +1 to banishment and manipulation rolls. Manipulation is a new ability on your casters that basically allows them to have increased spell effects (extra range for example) if they make a target roll. I think I like the other Battle Formations over this one to be honest.

Finally, Dawnbringer Crusade allows you to pick an infantry unit in each of your Hero Phases and move it 6″. You can even do this if the unit is in combat to move it out of combat. I can see this being a good one for doing some sneaky moves to score battle tactics.

Heroic Traits

There’s 3 new Heroic Traits in the new Cities of Sigmar Battletome. Stentorian General is a very good one – While any enemy unit is in combat with one of your units that is under orders and within 12″ of the hero have -1 to Ward Saves. Now this includes shooting too – the only condition is that they are in combat with a unit under orders. Throw a cheap reinforced unit of steelhelms into combat with whatever you want to shoot with your Cogfort and use this to reduce the ward saves, leaving your special ammo to let you do something else.

Beloved Leader turns off any negative hit or wound modifiers for units under orders within 12″, which is very nice!

Finally Grizzled Drillmaster gives friendly units under orders within 12″ a 6+ ward save – while priests can do this to units on objectives, this is nice to protect units that are on the move between objectives.

Artefacts

We also get 3 artefacts – The Last Blade of Embergard is a nice one that gives any non-companion weapon +2 attacks and +2 rend, something that can make a lot of your heroes very nasty indeed!

The Bones of Saint Ignifus gives the bearer a 12″ bubble that adds 1 to casting or chanting rolls for friendly units that are under orders – very good if you go magic or priest heavy.

Finally, the Sphere Celestial is a really good one for dancing units around the battlefield. In the hero phase you pick any point on the battlefield and then pick another hero – The bearer teleports next to the selected hero, and then the selected hero teleports to the target point. There’s lots of fun stuff you can do with this…

Ironweld Innovations

Cogforts are not left out with upgrades though, we get a choice of 3 Ironweld Innovations that can be given to them. Prototype Arco-Combuster Uninhibator can be used once per battle and increases the Cogfort’s movement by 3 while also allowing it to retreat and shoot with no Mortal Damage inflicted. You can do this by overcharging the engine, but this is a safer way of doing it if you do end up with a Cogfort in trouble.

Emergency Bellows is a solid pick, this let’s you remove a heat token at the end of each turn (So this will trigger in both your turn and your opponant’s)

Finally, Grapple Net Launcher reduces the attacks of a target that charges the cogfort by 1 for the rest of the turn, which is handy if something like a big block of Varanguard hits you…

Spell Lore

We get 3 new and updated spells in the new Lore. Speed of the Twin Tailed Comet returns, but in a different form. This now gives all non-Warmachine units +3 to their move while they are within 12″ of the Wizard, which is brilliant for a spell that goes off on a 6! What’s more, it has the Unlimited keyword too if you want to spread this across your entire army.

Curse of Scorched Metal is a nice charge deterrent – you cast it on an enemy unit and every time they make a hit roll of “1” while in combat they take 1 mortal damage.

High Star’s Light is another nice one, simply adds 1 to the attacks of a target unit, cast this on the wielder of The Last Blade to really buff them up!

Prayer Lore

Finally we get 3 prayers too, which are also all different than their previous iterations. We start with another Unlimited one, Holy Aegis, which allows the target to ignore the first point of damage they take each phase – this is really nice and if it goes off on a 7+ you can stick it on two targets – but given it’s Unlimited and the base version goes of on a 3, you can get this off across the battlefield pretty reliably.

Reckoning of Sinners is an interesting one – basically if you stick it on a unit, whoever unit they are in combat with has a maximum control of 1, again stick on a tough unit like Gallants and make it really hard for the enemy to take any objective off you

Benediction of the High Heavens is another really useful one, this heads the target D3 wounds, but if it goes off on a 7+ it heals EVERY Cities of Sigmar model within 12″ D3 wounds. Very good and handy for keeping Cogforts topped up.

Cities of Sigmar Warscrolls

So let’s take a look at the Warscrolls in the new Cities of Sigmar Battletome and check out what has changed – As mentioned earlier all of the old Warhammer Fantasy units have been removed!

Tahlia Vedra

Starting off with the Lioness of the Parch, she sees a couple of decent tweaks to her profile – she now has a 3+ save and the Scorpid Stinger now does Crit Mortals but is only rend 2. Speaking of the Scorpid, the paralysing sting now reduces the targets wound rolls by 1 if you roll under their wounds characteristic, making her good at making monsters less lethal against her. Her lead from the front is very good now too – Once per battle as long as she is in combat friendly units in 12″ get +1 to hit and wound rolls in combat too! This will apply to herself too, giving her a once per game punch in combat. Finally in the enemy hero phase she gets to pick an infantry unit, and that unit can make a normal move and is Under Orders too!

Pontifex Zenestra

The Matriarch of the Great Wheel also gets some tweaks. She now causes slain Sigmarite models within 12″ to roll a number of dice equal to their wounds, with them causing mortals on a 6+. Vessel of Sigmar has changed a little, the big one being she can reroll a 1 when chanting it! The buffs it causes have changed too, one makes enemy units that charge within 9″ Strike Last, one adds 1 to your Mortal wound damage rolls from the above rule, and the final still does mortals to every enemy priest and wizard on the battlefield.

Freeguild Cavalier-Marshal

This guy now works much like the mounted Vampire Lord – when you declare counter charge with him you can allow a nearby unit of Cavalry to also charge! In addition, when he charges he picks up to 2 nearby cav units to make a Pile in Move and also cause Mortal Damage to whoever they are piling into.

Freeguild Marshal

This guy has had some brilliant changes. From a bloat point of view he now has a single weapon with 5 attacks at damage 2 (again something that can be buffed further with the Artefact blade). The Envoy places the unit it is given to Under Orders, and for a command point once per battle it can make the unit with it fight twice in a combat phase, which would be amazing on the new Gargants.

Jorvam Kreel

We’ve seen this chap previously in Spearhead, and he has much the same role here. His ash panther does Mortal Damage to a target, but on top of this, while a unit has the panther next to it the unit can never score Critical Hits, which is very good! On top of this, every time him or a non hero infantry within 12″ is picked to fight they get to teleport to a point within 6″ of him immediately after the fight. This works really well combined with the order to make 2 units fight after him, and would essentially let you do a load of damage and then blip them into safety!

Mallus Forgepriest

This guy is another new addition, and he’s got some decent utility. As well as being a 1 chant priest, he can also be used to “Consecrate” objectives. This gives all War Machines wholely within 6 a 6+ ward, and all other units a 5+ ward. The bonus lasts until an enemy unit takes the objective, making it very handy!

Erasmus Zonn

We have a new named character in the book who hails from the city of Settler’s Gain – This guy is a really quick wizard with a decent ranged attack and gets one of 4 different buffs if he is within 9″ of a corner in the hero phase – This can include giving his range attack more shots and damage, increasing his wizard level, making Cities of Sigmar units invisible to units further than 6″ away for increasing his Arcane Manipulation roll by 2 – Speaking of, his Arcane Manipulation is an ability rather than a spell, and so can be used in addition to casting. It’s an amazing ability – you pick an enemy manifestation and if you roll over the banishment value then you banish the spell AND get to bring your own Endless spell in. Amazingly good and I expect to see him brought in a lot of armies.

Alchemite Warforger

Not many changes here – he now gains an Arcane Manipulation Ability which gives a target unit Crit Mortals on a roll of 3+, which is pretty good!

Amethyst Knellmage

The next new Wizard is a 1 cast Death mage who has a unique spell that stops a target unit in 12″ from being able to use Commands. His Arcane Manipulation increases the range to 18″ on a 3+

Aqshian Pyrocaster

The final new wizard is a Fire Mage who can basically set light to a unit within 12″ dealing some mortal wounds. Target the same unit a second time and you instead deal 3 damage points that bypass any saves including wards – Very nice to taking out support heroes. Like with the last one, his Arcane Maniplation increases the range of this spell.

Galen and Doralia Ven Denst

The Ven Densts return as a single warscroll covering both models. There’s some tweaks here such as more attacks across the board, but they lose Strikes First – While under orders they get +1 damage against Wizards, Priests and Manifestations rather than the flat double damage they got all the time.

Caliis & Toll and Companions

There’s a couple of tweaks here, the main being that at the start of the battle round you pick a unit as your Mark with this giving you double damage against that target with Caliis and Toll.

Freeguild Command Corps

This was always a bit of a messy Warscroll given how many ablities it tried to cram in – this time round in the Cities of Sigmar Battletome the unit has actually been split into 3 different warscrolls. The Adjutants are the Arch Knight, Herald and Mascot (who now have 3 attacks each with damage 2) and are used to increase the control of a friendly unit by 5. The Auxiliaries are the Soul Shepherd and War Surgeon – The Shephard is amazing and basically locks down a target unit so models cannot be returned to it! The Field Surgeon can be used to return D3 models to infantry units, 1 model to Cav or heal D3 on heroes or monsters – again really handy! Finally the Whisperblade is a combat blender that does crit mortals and cannot be targeted himself if in combat range of a unit with 3 or more models.

These guys are all separate units but are 3 regiment slots for 200 points. What’s nice is that they can all operate independantly too meaning you can send your Auxiliaries after your Cogfort to heal it up and stop whatever it’s shooting from rallying.

Freeguild Steelhelms

Your Steelhelms now have a very different role in the army – basically they tank for your other units. On a roll of 4+ any unit in combat with them HAS to attack them over other targets. If the unit is Under Orders you do not even have to roll, the ability is always on them! Really nice and annoying, especially with your ample healing and model returning abilities in a big reenforced unit.

Freeguild Cavaliers

These are now a little better in combat hitting on 3s rather than 4s, they also can allow both themselves and a friendly Cav Marshal to charge even when in combat. They have to end up in combat with the unit they started next to, but could use it to instead tag something behind them as long as they are also in combat with the first unit. Of course this will also trigger the Cav Marshal’s charge abilities too.

Freeguild Gallants

This is an interesting unit, 2 wounds each with a 3+ save makes them pretty defensive, but when they get charged they get an extra attack each. On top of that while Under Orders all friendly units in 12″ get Anti-Charge +1 too!

Freeguild Grenadiers

The other new unit from City of Ash, and I think this one is gong to be popular. They have a decent 2 rend shooting attack, but also have 2 attacks and damage 2 with 1 rend on their melee weapons too. On top of that they can do Mortal Damage to enemy units who are also on a terrain feature or objective they are contesting. You can’t reinforce these, but I can see a couple of units being worth taking.

Fusil-Major on Ogor Warhulk

This one has had quite a few changes. The fun gets one less shot now, but wounds on a 2 and has rend 2 (on top of keeping anti hero +1 rend) making it a decent character sniper. His ability now has you select a unit and all friendly units under orders +1 to hit. Oh and as it’s a hero, technically you can give it the Blade Artefact to increase the Ogre’s attacks and Damage!

Ironweld Great Cannon

This has been reworked quite a lot. For starters it now only has 6 health and it has lost it’s grapeshot ability. Instead, the number of shots from the great cannon has increased and on a 3+ you reduce the charge and run rolls for the target it targets (It doesn’t even need to hit for this to trigger!) to represent them taking cover from the incoming fire.

Freeguild Fusiliers

Another unit with quite a rework. The two modes of fire are gone, instead it always gets 1 shot at 18″ but this is now wounding on a 2 and rend 2 making it more reliable. When under orders it can shoot in combat and reduces the rend of incoming attacks. Finally you can spend the Squire in order to increase the rend of their weapons by 1!

Wildercorps Hunters

Like the last few units these have also had a big rework. The unit now has the ability to bring themselves and two other friendly units on from reserves in the movement phase – first you pop the hunters within 9 of a board edge, and then your units being escorted on can be placed within 12″ of the hunters – essentially letting you bring in two units up to 21″ from any board edge!

Cannonade Cogfort

Now we get to the centrepiece of this wave, the Cogforts! the Cannonade is your big artillery piece – it gets 4 attacks that only hit on 4s, but can be buffed to hit on 3s with orders, these wound on 2s and deal 4 damage, but you can load it with special ammo to increase the rend to 3. On top of this it also has two other guns that deal 6 shots each at 12″ range – has the potential of dealing a lot of damage but you’re going to want to get it close to the target. The Special Ammo can only be loaded when it’s under orders, and it only triggers on a 3+ but if you dont want to increase rend you can instead make it reduce Ward saves by 1 or instead deal D3 Mortals to every other unit in combat range at the end of its shooting. You are able to overcharge these to get some additional abilities such as rerolling hits and wounds of 1, increasing movement or allowing it to fall back and shoot (Though there are a couple of easier ways to do this in the Cities of Sigmar Battletome). You gain a number of Heat tokens for doing this, which have a chance of dealing Mortal Damage to the Cogfort, so you can’t afford to be too silly with this. It does have 25 health though – but without a priest you’ve not got a ward save on it either…

Conqueror Cogfort

The other flavour of Cogfort is the Conqueror, and this trades in the big guns for a massive flamer that does 6D6 shots that hit on twos. This cogfort has a slightly different Full Charge chart, giving you options of things such as the flamer getting 22 shots rather than having to roll.
It’s also a transport of sorts. At deployment you can place a hero and an infantry unit into it, and deploy those units out of it during the charge phase (and those units can be placed into combat if you want to too). There’s an overcharge ability to give the units that charge out of it this way +1 damage too (which is very nice on Grenadiers) and those units also count as being Under Orders too!

Gate Gargants

Another amazing new unit in the new book, the Gate Gargants come as a pair of 10 health 3+ save 6+ wars Gargants armed with both decent shooting and melee attacks. Their main gimmick is their gates, this allows up to 3 friendly units to retreat and still charge or shoot with no damage taken (And seems a no brainer to use on a Cogfort rather than the overcharge ability)

In addition, they can make a friendly Cities of Sigmar unit gain +2 to charges.

Dawner’s Triumph

Finally, the Cities of Sigmar also get a new terrain piece (but no new Endless Spells sadly!)

This is dragged along by friendly units and can be used to pick a target enemy unit, and on a 3+ (or automatically if its in combat) give them Crit Autowound, which is very nice (especially on things with multiple high damage attacks such as Grenadiers)

Cities of Sigmar – Spearhead

There’s a new Spearhead in the box, this one containing Zenestra, a unit of Steelhelms, a Marshal and the various Command Corps units (in Spearhead the Command Corps all become one unit and the Whisperblade a seperate unit.) This is another decent value Spearhead as you get £144.50 worth of models here!

The Spearhead itself looks fun, with the Marshal able to give units +1 to wound and the Pontifex handing out ward Saves. these combo with the really hard hitting Command Corps who amazingly can use a command off a card and then return the card to your hand!

Path to Glory

As ever, we also get some nice Anvil of Apotheosis content, and this time allows you to make a combat, priest or wizard character who can be on foot, horse or on a pulled platform – essentially allowing you to use your old Luminarcs for example! It’s a shame here we dont get any other mount options, but theres some interesting things you can do from a conversion point of view such as making your hero a priest who worships Alarielle for example! Faith in the Everqueen heals your hero 3 wounds at the end of every turn!

There’s two new paths listed here too, the Path of the Commander for heroes and the Path of the Castelite for non heroes.

Armies and Regiments of Renown

We get a couple of interesting Armies of Renown in the new Cities of Sigmar Battletome. The first is the Iron March, and this is made up of an army of Cogforts (with supporting Forgepriests and Gallants).

This gets some unique Cogfort varients that are turret swaps of the basic ones – so for example the Immolator Cogfort has the Flame Cannon and Breacher Cannon, while the Linebreaker has the Godbreaker Cannon but the Transport ability. Honestly I’m not so sure about this Army of Renown as there’s nothing to stop you taking an all Cogfort army in a standard list, but you do get access to some cool varients. It wouldn’t surprise me if these became available to the main list in the future

The other Army of Renown is the Allies of the Free Cities. This allows you to do an old school mixed army of Humans, Aelves and Duardin! For every one Sigmarite unit you take you can also take a unit from the Fyreslayers and the Lumineth, with Hearthguard, Flameseekers, Wardens and Sentinals available to pick from.

This is a nice change to the standard list and gives you some awesome bonuses if you have an Aelf, a Sigmarite and a Duardin unit all within 12″ of each other – they all gain a 5+ ward against shooting, their control increases by 3 and they are +1 to wound which is pretty tasty! This actually makes a decent Cogfort list too, as that can be gaining a 5+ ward off this trio rule…

There’s 4 regiments of renown in the Cities of Sigmar list, and ones I think that will turn a lot of heads are the Rogue Engine and Cogfort Raiders that allows any army in the game to take an Outlaw Cogfort…

These are the same base profile as the Cities of Sigmar ones, but with some tweaks – The Cannonade Cogfort for example loses all it’s special ammo and overcharge abilities but instead can hand out different buffs to nearby units in the hero phase – this can be rerolling runs, increasing charges, stopping units from being shot, adding 1 to wound or even increasing control by 10! The Conqueror still has it’s ability to carry units, but unfortunately they cannot disembark into combat and must be 9″ away from enemy units. They do get Charge +1 Dam though. I think the Cannonade would be my choice for an allied one…

Finally we get a couple of regular Regiments of Renown. Ven Denst’s Hounds has the Ven Densts and a unit of Hunters, and this has an ability that stops Manifestations from being set up within 12″ of them

The second is pretty good, it consists of a Fusil major on Warhulk, a unit of Fusiliers and a Great Cannon, and this makes the non heros add 1 to hits if the other non hero unit slays any units, and in addition if the units are within combat range of the Warhulk they count as being under orders.

Summary

If you’re still with me for the last 30 minutes then you’ll know I’m a big fan of the new Cities of Sigmar Battletome. I love that they have their own identity and theme now, and there’s lots of cool interactions and and supporting abilities that makes the army fun to play. Yes a Cities of Sigmar army is a challenge to paint, but it’s well worth the effort when you have a gorgeous looking force on the table!

People who have lost the removed units may be upset, but I think the writing has been on the wall for any Warhammer Fantasy units that still exist in Warhammer Age of Sigmar, and I would not be surprised at all if we see the last few vanish over the next year or so too. The new additions to the range more than make up for it, and are some of the coolest looking Age of Sigmar models we’ve seen in a while.

I’m looking forward to expanding the army out further and seeing what tricks they can pull on the battlefield!

The new Cities of Sigmar Battletome is up for pre order today and is released Saturday 30th September.

Games Workshop provided Sprues & Brews with free copies for review purposes.