Sisters of Sigmar - Nuns with an attitude

• Heroes: Keep the Sigmarite Matriarch surrounded by the rest of the warband. She should be in the centre of the warband, to have maximum coverage for her leadership ability. Keep her back, so she cannot be charged or targeted, provide her Leadership support and yet close enough to the front-line to charge into hand to hand (H-to-H) combat if necessary.
  
  The Augur is best kept safe, or you can keep her aside for a special missions, taking advantage of her characteristic re-roll.
  
• Fighting Style: Start by loosely making a front of the normal close-combat warriors: Sisters with Sigmarite war hammers, hired swords,... Place the Sisters Superiors directly behind that front, so they can't be charged directly. Then place the Matriarch.
  
  Position the sisters with steel whips about 1" behind their sisters. Try to form groups here: at least 2 close combat sisters to tie up the enemy, so the steel whip sister can flay them from a distance. Place the novices in skirmish-style in front of the whole group, screening the rest from missiles and early charges.
  
  When approaching a missile-abundant warband, make as much use of cover as possible, however, try to keep your groups together: don't let your Augur, Matriarch or steel whip armed Sisters wander off, unless you intend them to. Keep in mind that your Sisters are slow: they can't outrun any army (except Dwarfs), and are slow in approaching. It would be poor tactic to charge straight across open terrain towards a band of Reiklanders.
  
  You may even want to flank the battlefield to get to archers on higher levels; however, that will weaken your main force, and once everyone is in close combat, the shooters can't hit you anyway.
  
  Once you manage to get close enough to shooters, you should be able to handle them with your weaker warriors in close combat. Try to get in close combat fast, or stay in cover so they can't shoot you. Advanced augurs and steel whips are good for handling archers on higher levels: augurs can climb better because they can re-roll the initiative test, and steel whips should be able to reach up to the second floor easily without having to climb!
  
  When engaging a close combat oriented warband, there are several good options. Again, the main disadvantage is the lack of speed. Faster armies will try to move up to a distance from where they can charge you, but cannot be charged. One option is to build a front in fairly open space, and as the enemy approaches, shower him with your slings; that way, you may cause some early casualties, break his charge by getting warriors down, or forcing him into cover. Another option is to carefully select a position where you can take full cover. Placing your warband out of sight may force your enemy to get within 4" in order to charge you; at least this may even up the chances.
  
  As always, try to get multiple warriors to attack single targets. Engage the enemy warrior with war hammers, but leave a little space for your steel whips, who can then move up close enough (or back-up a bit) and flay them. Once in melee, keep your Novices close to important heroes, stopping your enemy from charging them.
  
• Campaign Tactics: Remember that in the first battles, your slings will make you a better shooting warband than most. Form a barraging front, take cover at windows... Against undead or possessed, put those hammers in action ASAP. Keep your Matriarch and Augur away from the heaviest fighting; surviving is more important than getting a couple of experience points: they'll contribute to the exploration and are certain to fight another day. Remember that slings will become too weak as opponent warbands improve; adjust your tactics accordingly.
  
  You shouldn't fight experienced warbands with a your starting band; there's no fun in getting slaughtered. If you do get into a situation where you're badly outmatched, take the easy way out: sacrifice a couple of novices, and make a voluntary route; as the underdog, you might even get more out of it than your opponent.
  
• Skills: The Sisters of Sigmar have access to more skills than most warbands; all standard heroes have access to all skill-lists except for shooting, and the Augur cannot get strength-skill; and on top of that, they have their own unique special skill-list. This compensates a bit for the lack of diversity in the warband, as you can evolve heroes in different disciplines this way.

Considering they don't have any aptitude for shooting at all, you should not invest in anything related to shooting. When you have a choice between upgrading WS or BS, always take the first. Better BS makes sense early in the campaign, but will be wasted later-on. Adding some speed to your warband will come in handy for those search missions and such. Sprint and Leap will get you up to 18" further in a single turn! You may want to add Dodge and Jump up to that, to keep your opponent's archers from downing your race-rat. The Augur is a fine could be a fine choice here.

Sisters with war hammers get into enemy contact often, so I recommend getting these skills: Combat Master, Step Aside, Strike to Injure (combo with concussion will always get your opponent Stunned, or worse, if wounded), Jump Up (combines nicely with helmets) and Lightning Reflexes (if Initiative is high enough). For dedicated chargers, I recommend getting Sprint and Unstoppable Charge. From the special skill-list, Sign of Sigmar and Righteous Fury are good if you fight the appropriate warband types often.

Sisters with steel whips may want the Fearsome skill, to keep from being charged, and will appreciate many speed-skills, to change position easily. For the Matriarch the Fearsome-skill for the same reason, and as much defensive skills as possible: Step Aside, Resilient, Dodge, Jump Up and Lightning Reflexes.

Battle Tongue is interesting only if her Ld becomes 9. Of the special skill-list, Protection of Sigmar and Utter Determination are particularly useful. Try to acquire the most important prayers, but don't let your Matriarch become a softy by spending all skill-choices on prayers.

Sisters must be the only warband where all heroes can get the Wyrdstone Hunter skill; a must if gold is your priority! Remark: the Augur rolls 2 dice in the exploration phase, so she can still get the re-roll.

Skills that are not very useful for the sisters: Expert Swordsman and Weapons Training (because steel whips and war hammers are about the best weapons you can get anyway) and all the spell casting related skills (obviously).

Warband's Tactics Development Progression

Designer Notes