BadDice0809

A 100 times this. The 'it takes so much more time!!' argument is tiresome. This is a wargame. Its not a match on [insert popular online shooter here]. If you are going to play, you set aside a morning, an afternoon or an evening. Taking a bit more time (if it even does, nothing is ever given in support of the claim anyway), one would think, is worth it for better pacing and more engaging game play. The only subset who would care is tournament players (or those claiming to be them). Frankly, tournament players are not the largest portion of the hobby anyway, and there are easy fixes- play smaller games, use movement aids, and frankly adapting, whether by playing faster or building a smaller army. With the way AoS 3.0 books have trended, where armies generally cost more and there are less models, it feels like now is the time to hammer out true AA rules.

It comes down to managing the expectations of the person you play against. For hilariously unbalanced games, like every single GW mainstream game (honestly just about every GW game), if you want to avoid NPE have a conversation with your opponent before the game. If they want a no holds bar tournament game, then bring the most WAAC, net list thing you can make. If they (or you! You have a say too!) want a more casual game, tone the list down accordingly. There isn't a set formula.

I mean it does. GW doesnt have infinite time or money for molds and casting. Who gets a model release is 100% a zero sum game.

GW bought then out to ensure this never happens again. And since the ITC now has the 'official' stamp of GW expect ETC and the other competing competitive 40k formats to die off. But at least in Blood Bowl you are told up front (at least now) that you are playing an underdog or stuntie team in the rating system the game itself tells you about. Nothing like that exists in AoS, a game with a MUCH higher investment in time and money. Nothing in AoS tells a new player that BoK or BoC are nowhere near the strength of literally any aelf army or LotFP or whatever. Caveat emptor isn't a good philosophy if you want to keep people in your game or if you want it accessible for growth BEYOND the initial starter set buy in. Then again, since starter set sales apparently the main metric GW store sales are measured in... maybe they don't care.

The buzz for it died when they stopped supporting it. Also, it needed fine tuning. I get they wanted to make sure the custom characters were incredibly points inefficient but... if you you restrict it to PtG anyway, it's not really an issue (at least in my mind). My biggest problem with battletomes is right now they do 3 different things and all of them at a mediocre or horrible level. For rules, they get invalidated within 3 months (points change or rules change). All the scrolls are on the app, which gets somewhat regularly updated. A copy of the physical book even unlocks all the 'hidden' info in the app. Zero point in having the book for a rules reference. For fluff the books have largely been reprints of first edition lore with barely anything added. I doubt it takes them more than a day to throw together the 4 additional paragraphs of lore for 'the age of the beast' every tome. The narrative sections are ok, but kinda thin. 1st edition battletomes did this correctly (unique battleplans) and it needs to be folded over into more PtG content then they currently provide. Ultimately, it doesn't seem like anyone is getting a good deal out of the contents of the battletomes except GW, who gets to charge $55 for mostly recycled content.

I think you are grossly overstating the importance of Rob and his T sport gang. How well did his super series idea catch on? Hell if we go by his subscribers numbers the vast majority of AoS players don't know who he is.

I wish they would put the points in the app, and make the battletomes pure narrative and fluff. Include all the PtG stuff in the battletome and really expand on it (I want faction specific Anvil tables for PtG); include short stories, give units more than 3 paragraphs of lore; show off studio members armies like in the Core Rulebook. Codices and battletomes make them money they arent going to stop making them I just wish they would pivot the focus. To be brutally honest, and I think GW isn't being honest with themselves on this, people who just care about the points and rules aren't buying the battletomes anyway. Everything is free online if they spend maybe 5 minutes searching. Yet they still dance this dance, selling us $55 dollar books, for the purpose of rules, that are invalidated with 3 months.

Do you guys use the missions out of the GHB or do you try to mix it up? I'm curious about how well the battleplans scale (my guess is... not too well?)

I blame the GHB for the 2k de facto standard. Interestingly, the core rulebook mentions 1.5k as it's own battlesize. Then, suddenly, in the GHB, all mention of 1.5 disappears. All the battle plans are assumed to fit 2k games, and use the standard 2k board size metrics. Further, unlike in the 40k equilivalent, there are not any separate missions for 1k games in the GHB. Its like whoever wrote the Core Rules wanted to leave open the possibility for expansion in smaller level games (in the similar 'matched play' format). Then... whoever gave input in the GHB (I'd assume playtesters) promptly removed it from contention. I wish AoS had something like 'Incursion' sized missions to legitimize lower point match play style games. Frankly, meeting engagements was a complete mess. From the 'just hang the model off the base,' to the not!Warcry deployment... I dont know how that idea got through any feedback.

Would you? Yes. Would they be any good? No. Would a list with two or three be annoying as hell to play? For some armies (mostly lower tier ones that already get stomped by LRL) yeah. In an army full of NPE and "no you can't do that" multiple loreseekers could make it so armies whose only chance against LRL is playing the objectives can't even do that. Like much of the LRL army, he suffers from writers with too little self control just piling too much into him. Maybe if he didn't get a pregame deploy literally anywhere outside of 3" of enemies. Or didn't autotake an objective he deployed next to (provided no enemies). The unique tag was the lazy alternative to just pruning his stupidly written scroll.

This isn't talked about enough. The drop Mechanic for first turn priority 100% needs to go. They dropped it from 40k. It's not even in the core rulebook- they tacked it into the GHB. From what I recall of some 40k playtesters discussion, I'm not sure how much input playtesters get in feedback on the core rules (Tabletop Tactics discussion). That makes me feel this was feedback from the playtest group that threw that garbage back in. Next GHB needs to throw it right back out. As was mentioned, powerful armies that can get to/shoot/cast what and where they need to on turn one, who also control priority, is far too much.

This leak isn't potato cam. It looks pretty good. Frankly I wish AoS got the leak treatment 40k gets. 40k leaks let them have an idea of what's coming down the pipeline for the next year. Meanwhile, AoS gets what? Long silence only broken when the self appointed arbiters of AoS leaks deigns to post some "cryptic" pic (could literally just say what's next but no... where's the fun in that? ). If potato cam leaks force their hand I'm all for them.

I honestly thought the Fyreslayer Runes ability was interesting and well implemented. 6 bluffs, choose the 5 you want per game, in the order as you needed them, with a slight chance of a super buff. Not buffs on top of buffs on to of buffs that build on each other (DoK or LRL). I only wish the Lodges had 'favored' runes that gave them better than a 1/6 chances of 'super' activating. However, I suppose there is no point in pretending that FS players were doing anything other than Hermdar with doubling activating HGB blobs until 3rd killed that combo...

Funny they are pricing it this high when the "Special Warhammer Day Not!Sale" shows they couldn't move catacombs and are trying to shift the stock...

I dont know about you but there is an ad banner for movement trays on my web page right now.... movement trays are already back.