Agreed, and my concern is that, for me, there is more likely to be more of the former and less of the latter if insufficient guidance is provided. Personally, I felt that the Old World map offered a significant amount of opportunity to develop narrative scenarios within the map based environment which was created. AoS is clearly different, but I do not believe that having a more mapped out world would detract from player freedom when it comes to devising narrative based campaigns and scenarios.
Regardless, the book is a welcome development and I will be interested to see if any further developments arise in its wake, especially regarding mapping.