Aelves - where do they go next??

[Jamopower]

I think that having few heroes with nice buffs for keyword "aelf", along the lines of bloodsecrator and bloodstoker, would go for a long way. 

[ChaosUnited]

I can't see a new aelven faction being like dark/high/wood elves of old. This will be the case for all the races, what gw did with the dwarves will just continue. And in my opinion it's for the best. 

We'll have the dispossessed/wanderers/freepeoples still of course, but gw seem to be going for uniqueness in the new factions they create. 

[Aeryenn]

To be honest, if they had just brought all the aelves into one big faction, that would be the last day of AoS for me.

[ChaosUnited]

3 minutes ago, Aryann said:

To be honest, if they had just brought all the aelves into one big faction, that would be the last day of AoS for me.

I can imagine there being at least a steampunk faction and some sort of a zealot faction. 

[Aeryenn]

Just now, ChaosUnited said:

I can imagine there being at least a steampunk pirate faction and some sort of a zealot faction. 

Exactly. Bringing them altogether either makes them a pack of weirdose none matching the other (both fluff and looks) or a boring generic lord of the rings style elves. Both ways are a step back from what AoS has showed us so far. 

[Menkeroth]

18 minutes ago, Aryann said:

To be honest, if they had just brought all the aelves into one big faction, that would be the last day of AoS for me.

Seconding on that. On the one hand, some sub-factions could be merged together for they are too many (and mostly too small) but no more. On the other, GW already has expanded and developed some small factions like FEC or BCR, so I hope it will the case for the elves too.

P.S. Although now comes Killax and preaches about that one big book of all is the only way and other nonsense, apparently he didn't read FB armybooks which does not surprise me (in which the fluff was about 90% of the book).

[Yeled]

43 minutes ago, Aryann said:

Exactly. Bringing them altogether either makes them a pack of weirdose none matching the other (both fluff and looks) or a boring generic lord of the rings style elves. Both ways are a step back from what AoS has showed us so far. 

I agree with this to an extent. I hope and strongly suspect there will be an entirely new aelf faction...maybe more than one. On the other hand, they've really left the legacy factions to shrivel on the vine. They are too small and separated. None of them, even the largest like Wanderers and Darkling Covens, amount to a full army. And as a result many players who want to play them feel frustrated and left behind.

It would have been easy enough to create larger factions without them looking out of place. There's no reason Order Serpentus and Darkling Covens couldn't be one faction. Shadowblades should have been thrown in to another faction for sure. Same with some of the high aelves. Combining them so there were maybe two dark aelf factions, two high aelf factions, and the Wanderers (with a slightly larger roster) would have made them all a lot more playable.

[Aeryenn]

I must agree some people might feel abandond. In my opinion they made a mistake by creating too many tiny factions. Examples you give confirm it. Personally, i'd leave high elves as they were, split dark elves into max 2 smaller factions and then create brand new aelves in a way Fyreslayers and Kharadrons were created. Thematic, new, unique elves we haven't seen before. 

[Tiger]

I feel there will be two elven factions. Dark and light elves are rather classical and when looking at the new dwarfs, GW developed two concepts that were already present and added a bit of "what if?!". 

[Morglum StormBasha]

i guess they broke the army into so many factions to help it feels different to the old world but I wish they'd been more daring. Moving sisters of the watch to wanderers was a good start but I would have moved lion rangers and shadow warrior too.

daughters of khaine I'd have moved to blades of khorne to give chaos some female models and greater variety.

serpentis and draconis should absolutely have been one faction.

arcane and eldritch should have been one faction.

[Morglum StormBasha]

For new I'm more excited by light elves than shadows in (although I think we'll get shadow kin first) .

in having light elves and dark elves in their own realms we basically have left Tolkien and d and d behind and gone back to Norse and old English mythology where alfheim was home to the light elves and scartelheim home to dark.

id quite like them to double down on the light theme and have blinding effects. Or disorientating effects on enemy units. There is quite a lot of swan iconography in early folklore which they could integrate in a new way.

alternatively they could go fey or fairy which would be something new for warhammer.

unlike duardin where fyreslayers and khradron both had source fantasy battle units/concepts I'd like them to be entirely original here as I don't see a template unit to build from.

[Tidings]

I just hope if they do "light" aelves they are something completely different from high elves. I never liked cone heads and the 210356 gems on every model. Wood Elves were not original per say, but they were classy. They had a simple aesthetic that was neither too civilized or feral. They didn't look like barbarians, but they looked a bit more wild and well, fey. Plus the lore for them was pretty dark. They were ruthlessly violent to any non-wood elf who entered their home. Loved them, miss them. I really doubt that any new elf faction will resonate with me the way old Wood Elves did.

[Tiger]

The themes that were used in designing the high elves are intriguing, they've used parts from Celts, Norse, Greco - Romano Byzantine, Persia, India and some China. Due to wide specter of themes, they cannot be boring to me. Restraining yourself to only Norse and adding potentially light shows and arcane tomes seems going back for quite a lot. What I hope they'll do, is picking a compromise, taking the ideas of what they think the core of high/dark elves is and modified it to fit in the new setting.

This way the lovers of old aesthetics will still see something that attracted them in the first place and will feel motivated to be involved with the hobby, while at the same time offering something new. It's quite possible that the mindset of the new elves is going to be different from the old setting. This is acceptable, as  Swifthawks from Tempest's Eye should be slightly different from Swifthawks from Hammerhal.

The carriers of the old civilizations that made it through on the other side are Malekith/Marelion and Tyrion - Teclis (or is he dun, dun, duuun) and I think once we get more concrete picture of them we'll know in what way will the re-design go. It'd be odd to think on Sigmar without his ruling hammer and heavy armour, dressed in robes, wearing glasses and having a shaky hand while his warriors portrayed as they are. Same reasoning for Grimnir, a bit odd to have a dwarf in full armour while his followers are running almost naked (they do inhale some powerful stuff). The flying dwarfs are unburdened by the presence of their gods (haven't read the battle tome) and restraining dogmas of the Guilds and it allowed them to go places.

Going back to the elves, we do know that:

• Souls of deceased elves were absent from the afterlife, which horrified Tyrion - Teclis.
• Tyrion - Teclis broke from Sigmar's alliance and went looking for them.
• Slaneesh feasted on the elven souls.
• Malerion - shadowkin relationship?

This has number of possible outcomes, some of them don't require divine guidance, others do. If Tyrion can find and break the Slaanesh pinata he'd all the souls he'd need to re-form the civilization that'd mimic his image. It's possible that GW can add the taint of Slaanesh into all this, however that feels going a tad too far. Other scenarios would simply imply that elves managed to survive on their own and that's rather open idea with what to do with it. If the latter is what shadowkin are, I very doubt it that the same principle of survival will be or has been chosen for light elves as well.

7 hours ago, Morglum StormBasha said:

For new I'm more excited by light elves than shadows in (although I think we'll get shadow kin first) .

As am I, although I think if we want to go with "light" theme, the gems are a strong possibility. As light is energy, it'd be really useful if you can store it. Gems of all colours and warmth mesh well together in a fantasy setting. After you've picked your source of energy the image and how the society uses it almost writes itself.

[Twitch of Izalith]

I think there is a lot of Scope for continuing some sort of Khaine allegiance with the Aelves. Khaine is still kicking around in the 40K universe after all and is more heavily part of GW original IP - as much as anything is really original in the fantasy/sci-fi genre.

The fact the Daughters of Khaine got nothing in the GH2017 could mean there is something on the way as part of the whole shadowkin thing or it could mean they are going the way of the tomb kings - or maybe they just didn't have space...

I can't honestly see them dropping those kits - they were arguably some of the best they had made at the time and are relatively new mini's - maybe thats just wishful thinking since I have spent a lot of money on them in the last few months. They need to do something with it though because although it plays well at 1000 points, a 2000 point list is just exactly the same models x2.

They need to come up with a way of fitting elven warriors of whatever sort into the meta in general because 1 wound models with minimal rend and armor who at the same time have high points costs just dont do well in AoS. 10 sisters of slaughter and 3 Goregruntas both cost 140 points but I have never once killed more than 1 pig before my unit gets wiped out.

[Yeled]

4 hours ago, Twitch of Izalith said:

They need to come up with a way of fitting elven warriors of whatever sort into the meta in general because 1 wound models with minimal rend and armor who at the same time have high points costs just dont do well in AoS. 10 sisters of slaughter and 3 Goregruntas both cost 140 points but I have never once killed more than 1 pig before my unit gets wiped out.

This has been an issue that has taken up a lot of discussion in some of the Wanderers threads, but you are exactly right that it pertains to all aelves. The issue is that in WFB 1 wound was the standard and aelves represented the elite. Now we have a bunch of heavily armored, 2 wound units with stats just as good as the aelves, and our former elites are just average and not very tough.

One way to deal with this is clever rules that make it easier for aelves to avoid unwanted conflict. The Wanderers allegiance abilities are great examples (though we're not sure if any archers will survive a round of combat to "Melt Away"). So are the rules for Tenebrael Shard and, to a lessor extent, Mistweaver Saih. I think this will be the way the Shadowkin are set up, but it would be nice if they got way more clever with the legacy aelves than they are currently.

[Twitch of Izalith]

3 minutes ago, Yeled said:

This has been an issue that has taken up a lot of discussion in some of the Wanderers threads, but you are exactly right that it pertains to all aelves. The issue is that in WFB 1 wound was the standard and aelves represented the elite. Now we have a bunch of heavily armored, 2 wound units with stats just as good as the aelves, and our former elites are just average and not very tough.

One way to deal with this is clever rules that make it easier for aelves to avoid unwanted conflict. The Wanderers allegiance abilities are great examples (though we're not sure if any archers will survive a round of combat to "Melt Away"). So are the rules for Tenebrael Shard and, to a lessor extent, Mistweaver Saih. I think this will be the way the Shadowkin are set up, but it would be nice if they got way more clever with the legacy aelves than they are currently.

Yeah I would like to see them play out as a finesse army for sure. Maybe backed up by some ward saves on a few units but mostly dependent on using avoidance and hit and run tactics.

I had a wood elf army back in fantasy and have played a few games of AoS with the models - they do ok until you come up against multi wound high damage armies like Ironjaws, or Beastclaw and its even worse against S t D or stormcast. pretty much the same with my DoK or DC

[Tidings]

6 hours ago, Twitch of Izalith said:

The fact the Daughters of Khaine got nothing in the GH2017 could mean there is something on the way as part of the whole shadowkin thing or it could mean they are going the way of the tomb kings - or maybe they just didn't have space...

They need to come up with a way of fitting elven warriors of whatever sort into the meta in general because 1 wound models with minimal rend and armor who at the same time have high points costs just dont do well in AoS. 10 sisters of slaughter and 3 Goregruntas both cost 140 points but I have never once killed more than 1 pig before my unit gets wiped out.

GW said in some interview that the allegiance abilities in GHB 2017 were for stuff NOT getting support any time soon, so you're probably right that Daughters of Khaine are getting something in the nearish future. 

Sisters of Slaughter are amazing, but extremely finicky to positioning and matchup. Anyone with lots of shooting or mortal wounds will just wipe them out. But I ran a unit in my list for the tournament I was just in, and they held their position every game. They got wiped out in only one game, but they did waaaaaaay more damage than either my opponents or I expected in every game. 

[Twitch of Izalith]

13 minutes ago, Tidings said:

GW said in some interview that the allegiance abilities in GHB 2017 were for stuff NOT getting support any time soon, so you're probably right that Daughters of Khaine are getting something in the nearish future. 

Sisters of Slaughter are amazing, but extremely finicky to positioning and matchup. Anyone with lots of shooting or mortal wounds will just wipe them out. But I ran a unit in my list for the tournament I was just in, and they held their position every game. They got wiped out in only one game, but they did waaaaaaay more damage than either my opponents or I expected in every game. 

Yeah I have done well with them against some things - I seem to come unstuck against stuff like Brutes, chaos warriors, liberators and the like. 

Are you running them in 20's? I'm using 2 units of ten so far - thinking I might do better with a bigger unit.

[Tidings]

@Twitch of Izalith I only used a single unit of 10 as an objective holder to compliment my very shooty army. They were fantastic in cover with Mystic Shield on them. Not sure how often I'll play them though since they are easily countered by high rending, mortal wounds, any ranged, etc. Against Brutes and Black Orcs they were fantastic though!

[Davariel]

I think GW has certainly dropped the ball in how they've handled the aelves so far. The tiny subfactions are just too fragmented and offer too little both in terms of gaming and collecting. I don't think we'll be seeing major updates for any of them like we got for Sylvaneth or Ironjawz since the armies are mostly too traditional; instead it seems like a given that we'll get entirely new, self-contained factions like the new duardin.

It's certainly not too late to merge some of the existing factions back together to create more robust armies though! Shadowblades could easily merge with Darkling Covens, Lion Rangers have no reason to exist as a standalone faction and could probably just slot into Swifthawks, and so on. The biggest thing GW could do is communicate what the plans for the aelves actually are, though. Just letting us know that, say, 2-3 factions will get updates of some sort in the next year, the rest will be consolidated a bit, and new aelves are on the horizon would be huge considering how little aelf players have had to get excited about.

And as far as the new factions that are (probably...) coming go... I'm both excited and a little apprehensive. Things have already been moving in a more 40k style direction with the aelves all more or less on the same side, and some of the design cues on the Silver Tower aelves have a bit of an Eldar vibe. With AoS the possibilites are wide open, and GW could do anything they want; retreading ground already covered by 40k seems like a waste. Of course I could be completely wrong about this - will have to wait and see!

[Nubgan]

I personally think they have dug the grave already on the current Elve factions, to change how the models fit into sub factions now would be a bit too late in my eyes and only admits to the problem it has caused.  These factions have glaring errors that could be fixed by moving some models, but they may as well just put everything back together again at that stage.

I finished 8th Edition End Times with a force of Wood Elves and Dark Elves led by Malekith. I persisted at the start of AoS with a Wood Elf force that was really hard to play with because everyone was using things like Stormcast which were a buggar to fight. I got so bored of waiting for new Elf models that I started painting the Stormcast from the AoS starter box and have been just adding to that ever since.

I really don't feel like adding to what Elves I have because of the rebasing situation. I am quite sad that in 3 years they haven't done an elf faction, but whatever ends up hitting the shelves I will be all over like a tramp on chips. But given the references and Saih and the Shard from Silver Tower, surely to god they have at least the one idea to roll with for Elves and should be releasing them soon? Give me my freakin' Shadow Dragon nonsense!

[Tiger]

The rough designs should have been chosen by now, unless GW really put this task at the bottom of the desk drawer and completely forgot about it. They've been focused on the new Space Marines, Stormcast and Chaos. Slaneesh is probably going to get a battletome before we're going to see something for the elves. Having a new elven models before the AoS campaign would be cool.

[TheNotebookGM]

I just realized I'd never actually looked at Mistweaver Saih or Tenebrael Shard

I feel like these are good templates for what high aelves and dark aelves will end up looking like, am I crazy? Where/why are those models from? What's the lore around them?

[Menkeroth]

27 minutes ago, TheNotebookGM said:

I just realized I'd never actually looked at Mistweaver Saih or Tenebrael Shard

You should. They both come from the Silver Towe box and are elves from Ulgu, although little in fact is known of them apart that they are very skillful warriors. Mistweaver is a mage of mists and illusions, and Shard is a killer of superlative mastery. In the game he can even teleport around battlefield. 

[Gecktron]

25 minutes ago, TheNotebookGM said:

I just realized I'd never actually looked at Mistweaver Saih or Tenebrael Shard

I feel like these are good templates for what high aelves and dark aelves will end up looking like, am I crazy? Where/why are those models from? What's the lore around them?

They were part of the Silver Tower Box. 

We don't know much about them. The only things we know are that they both work together (or are part of the same faction?) and that they don't hesitate to kill their allies if its necessary. 

I think both will be part of the Shadowkin elven from Ulgu. 

In regards to their design, the Tenebrael Shard is clearly a evolution of the Witch Elves design, combined with a bit Dark Eldar aesthetic from 40K. The Mistweaver Saih also has a interesting mix of dark and high elven motives. Prominent is the crescent moon, associated with Lileath, the goddess of dreams/illusions and magic in the world-that-was.