A day late and a dollar short, here we are with our review of 2025. We’ll be handing out our unasked-for awards, apparently sucking up to the people we recognize and starting accidental blood vendettas with the people we didn’t bother mentioning.
2025 hasn’t been the easiest year for a lot of people and for a lot of reasons, but if we chucked in the towel every time things got tough, we’d be batting for England instead of blogging, wouldn’t we? So today let’s celebrate what we consider the Best of AOS in 2025 by handing out our annual awards, The Plazzies1.
Ready? Let’s go.
Blog Article of the Year: The AOS Meta Stats Series, Woehammer
Geez they do a good job, don’t they? GW have stopped publishing their own Metawatch articles, presumably out of embarrassment at Kruleboyz spending 90% of their life cycle in The Destruction Zone at the bottom of the win rate table.
Well we’re lucky that we’ve got The Mighty Woe, aren’t we? Consistent and consistently excellent, this is the article I look forward to the most on any other blog out there. Bravo, ladies and gents đź‘Ź
YouTube Channel of the Year: MossDog
Game recognises game, and this man loves his Orruks.
It’s a delight to have a channel so dedicated to Team Green: MossDog is just happy talkin’ orcs all day, every day. One highlight from the channel in 2025 was this interview with Aaron Newbom, who ripped it up at the LVO with his Ironjawz:
Love your work mate – looking forward to seeing you keep that green flag flying high in 2026 and beyond.
YouTube Channel Runner-Up: Irongustman
Stuart “Irongutsman” McCowan is a deadset genius and his videos are a Day 1 Watch for me every time. In fact that’s my only complaint – that he doesn’t upload more often – but the upside is that it does feel special every time you get that notification.
Probably my favourite video of Irongutsman’s is this one from November 2024. Get around it.
Art of the Year: Winner and Runner Up
There’s a certain type of nerd who looks forward to new armies for the burst of new art they bring with them, and I was super keen for the Helsmiths of Hashut book for exactly that reason. It did not disappoint.
Runner Up: Daemonsmithing by Russel Marks
I’m always a sucker for any art that shows the factions of the Mortal Realms going about their business away from the battlefield. There’s a very faint purple tinge to that crackle of magic offsetting the turquoise, while the fiery glow illuminating the Smith’s face draws your eye straight to the front corner of the image, inviting you to explore backwards from there.
The return of those signature beard ringlets are one of the best design choices in Helsmiths, and here they are showcased right up front – as they should be.
Winner: Daemon Engine Forge by Catherine O’Connor
We’ve got a bull titan storming into action, we’ve got purple and green, we’ve got a winner.
The attractive pastel colours here bely the industrial fury that’s taking place. The vivid action on the right hand side of this piece draw your eye, so it’s interesting to reflect that the smoke-hazed impressionistic left hand side takes up almost half the canvas.
And if you just ate breakfast, I counsel against googling how these bull titan things are fueled and activated.
Most Broken List of the Year: Gorechosen
Well I guess in its own way, this was quite the achievement: players have wanted foot heroes to be good at fighting in Age of Sigmar for over a decade at this point, so giving the people what they wanted while making them instantly hate it really took some doing.
Great idea, but comically overtuned. The only thing as funny as the broken rules was the lame attempt by a handful of Khorne players to claim that the army was fine2. It was not fine, and it got swiftly adjusted, but I mainly hope that Gorechosen’s legacy is not to make GW abandon the concept of occasional MSU Foot Heroes builds in other armies. Those little fellas running around taking scalps should be the coolest thing ever – if it’s done right.
Coolest List of the Year: Chris Riley
Chris poured his heart and soul into this army, and pulled off a 5-0 with it very shortly after this write-up was published.
Sadly, very shortly after that, GW nerfed the army. Apparently being in the Fat Middle is unacceptable for any Destruction army, and they need to be stamped into the shit at the earliest opportunity. Well don’t allow the cataclysmic failure of the Dec ’25 Battlescroll diminish Chris’s achievements with Gitmob: it was pure artistry, and too beautiful for this world.
A Personal Highlight
One thing I really enjoyed in 2025 was running Secrets of the Agloraxi, the first Plastic Craic Global Campaign:
Perhaps the thing I’m looking forward to most this year from a blogging point of view is the 2026 Campaign. We’ve teased a few details here, and it will be pretty ambitious in scope. Can’t wait.
Thanks to everyone for reading and sharing the articles in 2025 – and especially to our Patrons. I would have chucked in the towel long ago without your support, so here’s wishing you all a safe and prosperous 2026. Much love.
If you’d like to help us continue our work, we’d love to have your support. All Patreon Tiers include Discord access, exclusive articles and regular contests. Our Tiers are priced to be within everyone’s reach, so please click here to join us today!
- No trophy, but if you got a mention and you see me out and about, I’ll be you a beer. Come to The Vine in Bendigo, we’ll have a fucking blast. ↩︎
- Hey look, it’s not just people we didn’t mention that we can make enemies with. ↩︎
Plastic Craic 
Thanks for the Plazzie! We’re absolutely chuffed, everyone at Woe Towers has a lot of love for PlasticCraic. Legends!
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