Age of Sigmar: Second Edition

[Bloodmaster]

8 hours ago, Aginor said:

I still don't like that they are making endless spells that are faction specific.

It began well and now they make it bad again. Really sad. I don't understand why that is necessary. If they were at least Grand Order specific, or available to wizards with certain keywords (celestial/death/chaos/waagh-energy spells for example) but no...

Damn, your pessimistic...

Concerning the endless spells, yes, true in parts. But who said that we won't see more for existing factions?! It actually is quite easy for GW to put out stuff for "older" armies over the next few weeks. We don't know what will come next for AoS. Only thing that might help is something like, lets say an Open day or another Warhammer fest - oh, wait, thats right, there is one THIS WEEKEND and a fest in August. But I guess no instant release for every army at day one is another good reason for a falling sky scenario.

 

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IMO it is just another kick in the nuts for all armies without a current battletome. Especially since some armies probably will never get one in this edition.

Also: there are over 40 factions. There are ~20 battletomes. Three of them are SCE. Do they really need a fourth battletome more urgently than Goblins or Beastmen their first?

Ye know, thats the beauty of the current Battletome and GHB structure. Where in the past some armies where nearly unplayable with a new edition now GW can simply put out one book for everyone RIGHT ON RELEASE DAY and fix major issues. No need to wait till you get your turn for several years. Furthermore, with every new box they can add the needed rules for magic, units and stuff. No need to wait for new toys till you get a major rules and model line overhaul. And yes SCE have the most BTs right now, but guess what, the new one will fold them all into one, reduction of books requiered for SCE players and more shelf space for everyone else.And yes Gobbos and beastman would be a nice BT treat, but I'd rather have them take thier time and flush out a new and intersting concept for both armies than having just a BT for an otherwise untouched army, that is just a quick fix and a broken up faction - looking at you flesh eaters and various oger flavours.

 

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This is becoming less and less fun.

(Not even fun for SCE players. This is slowly getting into 40k territory where half of the matches are Space Marines vs. Space Marines. Not to mention that they have to buy and learn new books and models all the time.)

No, right now its becoming more and more fun. New Rules, new toys, new factions to explore! If you don#t get exited by THAT you really should concider your hobby choices ? ?

 

[Aginor]

7 hours ago, Ar-Pharazôn said:

If I had said to you a year ago that Nighthaunt and Daughters of Khaine were getting massive releases and battletomes, would you have believed me?

That's a good question. I honestly can't tell you. I think the omission of Nighthaunt from the LoN Battletome pretty much gave away that we would be getting a Nighthaunt Battletome soon. Still happy about that.

In general I think something Aelvish was to be expected, and that's what we got (The rumours about Ctulhu Aelves turned out to be Deepkin)

DoK was a surprise for me though. Dark Elves were a bit expected by some, but honestly I thought they would roll up all the factions into one, which they didn't.

 

I still don't think there will be a Battletome Firebellies anytime soon. I also think that Swifthawk Agents, Lion Rangers, Thunderscorn, Troggoths, Maneaters, Aleguzzler Gargants, Order Serpentis, and Order Draconis will never get Battletomes, even though I think that some Aelves "soup army" (all mixed together) are more likely than some of the others.

Mayyyybe they will also roll the Ogors factions back together like they did for LoN to a certain degree, or the Beastmen factions. I really hope they do. But I don't expect them to be getting new models and Battletomes in their existing form, no.

Just like it was to be expected for Deathrattle to not get a Battletome, and that's what happened. I am happy with how LoN did it though, no question.

I fear that in two years or so we will still have a dozen armies that have not received any new stuff (books or models) except perhaps a few tweaked allegiance abilities in a GHB like they did for Seraphon for example.
Those are way better than nothing and they helped, but I'd still like to have a spell lore or traits for mounts, or prayers, the stuff that is in the newer Battletomes, for everyone.  The early Battletomes (IIRC Seraphon, Ironjawz, FEC, and one or two more) lack most of the nice stuff.

I just cannot imagine that those will come for everyone anytime soon. And the longer those armies wait for their first battletomes, the less I will understand when existing faction who have all that stuff already get even more books.

Of course  I will be VERY happy to be wrong there.

[Jamopower]

13 minutes ago, Bloodmaster said:

Ye know, thats the beauty of the current Battletome and GHB structure. Where in the past some armies where nearly unplayable with a new edition now GW can simply put out one book for everyone RIGHT ON RELEASE DAY and fix major issues. No need to wait till you get your turn for several years. Furthermore, with every new box they can add the needed rules for magic, units and stuff. No need to wait for new toys till you get a major rules and model line overhaul. And yes SCE have the most BTs right now, but guess what, the new one will fold them all into one, reduction of books requiered for SCE players and more shelf space for everyone else.And yes Gobbos and beastman would be a nice BT treat, but I'd rather have them take thier time and flush out a new and intersting concept for both armies than having just a BT for an otherwise untouched army, that is just a quick fix and a broken up faction - looking at you flesh eaters and various oger flavours.

 

I sort of agree, but lets also be honest, an army such as Freeguild is nowhere near equally supported to army such as Daughters of Khaine, or even army such as Sylvaneth and even Daughters have lots more of toys than Sylvaneth. It's the way things have always gone and will always go. The yearly updates are nice, but they only go to certain extent. There are lots of units in the game for example, that would need a complete rewriting to make them "viable", such as almost all of the chariots in the game. You can reduce the cost only to a certain degree.

Also it's a fact that there will be new stuff in new battletomes, for which the older ones are left out. In the beginning there were the allegiance abilities, traits and artefacts, the spell lists, later prayer lists, bonuses from your "place of origin" and now the endless spells. Fixing every new idea to all of the old ones doesn't seem plausible as that would slow down the progress (beside of course the Stormcast), so we just have to go along with what we have and don't worry too much about the balance or the amount of choice that the new releases are bound to get.

[Aginor]

26 minutes ago, Bloodmaster said:

Damn, your pessimistic...

Concerning the endless spells, yes, true in parts. But who said that we won't see more for existing factions?! It actually is quite easy for GW to put out stuff for "older" armies over the next few weeks. We don't know what will come next for AoS. Only thing that might help is something like, lets say an Open day or another Warhammer fest - oh, wait, thats right, there is one THIS WEEKEND and a fest in August. But I guess no instant release for every army at day one is another good reason for a falling sky scenario.

 

Ye know, thats the beauty of the current Battletome and GHB structure. Where in the past some armies where nearly unplayable with a new edition now GW can simply put out one book for everyone RIGHT ON RELEASE DAY and fix major issues. No need to wait till you get your turn for several years. Furthermore, with every new box they can add the needed rules for magic, units and stuff. No need to wait for new toys till you get a major rules and model line overhaul. And yes SCE have the most BTs right now, but guess what, the new one will fold them all into one, reduction of books requiered for SCE players and more shelf space for everyone else.And yes Gobbos and beastman would be a nice BT treat, but I'd rather have them take thier time and flush out a new and intersting concept for both armies than having just a BT for an otherwise untouched army, that is just a quick fix and a broken up faction - looking at you flesh eaters and various oger flavours.

 

No, right now its becoming more and more fun. New Rules, new toys, new factions to explore! If you don#t get exited by THAT you really should concider your hobby choices ? ?

 

 

I do agree with you in many points, and my post above sounds probably way more negative than I actually am, but yeah, the few bits everyone gets is just not the same as a Battletome. The GHB stuff didn't make Maneaters or Brayherd any more viable than they were 2015, while in the same time frame SCE got three Battletomes.

My own army didn't even get errata. We are still stuck with warscrolls that contain typos and strange keywords.

[Bloodmaster]

3 minutes ago, Aginor said:

The GHB stuff didn't make Maneaters or Brayherd any more viable than they were 2015,

And you know why?! Because they are fractured factions, leftovers from an world that was, just a menas to have a flushed out faction roster from day one. Is that a good thing? Certainly not, and was a stupid move by old GW. New GW does thier best to keep them at least a version of playable, and probably will fold at least some into biger factions again, as seen with faction focus Elves. And you should be glad, that there are no battle tomes for thos left-over factions, as this offers GW room to reimagine and overhaul them, as seen with DoK.

If someone realy chooses a faction without a battletome right now as a new project, he/she should know what ones buying into!

[Mayple]

53 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

But if the reasoning behind the non-battletome armies getting better is to get access to new spells, then leaving magic aside should make the non-battletome armies actually worse than before, as the armies with access to good wizards get better (or at least have more choice)?

To be honest, I don't think wizards are going to be helped very much by the endless spells if they don't have any sort of casting buffs or other synergies. Having a say collegiate arcane wizard in you army and pay the increased cost, pay the endless spell and then try to cast it without it getting dispelled from across the board, is not going to give you very good returns.

My own reasoning behind non-battletome armies getting better this edition has very little to do with the endless spells, and more to do with the new game mechanics, artifacts and command abilities. Things that were unplayable is no longer so, and the viability of half-decent armies have been bumped quite a bit. To put it differently: Those with no tools have received a bucketload of them. Sure, everyone else got that too, but 'more options than..' does not always correlate to 'better than..' 

Endless spells are a factor, sure, but not a neccesity. 

On that note, do we know if the realm artifacts are available to matched play? That's a sizeable chunk of my reasoning, so good to make sure.

[Aginor]

7 minutes ago, Bloodmaster said:

And you know why?! Because they are fractured factions, leftovers from an world that was, just a menas to have a flushed out faction roster from day one. Is that a good thing? Certainly not, and was a stupid move by old GW. New GW does thier best to keep them at least a version of playable, and probably will fold at least some into biger factions again, as seen with faction focus Elves. And you should be glad, that there are no battle tomes for thos left-over factions, as this offers GW room to reimagine and overhaul them, as seen with DoK.

If someone realy chooses a faction without a battletome right now as a new project, he/she should know what ones buying into!

I fully understand why that is the case and I don't blame "new GW" for "old GW"s screwup.

I do think they could maybe have done that necessary cleaning up at some point between 2015 and now, instead of using half their resources for SCE and the other half for everyone else, because that's how it looks right now (even though it might not be the case).

[michu]

I think that Free Cities Battletome similar to LoN would be the best for Order factions. Same goes for Greenskinz and other small Destruction factions. Battletome Waaagh! with option to build varied hordes full of Orruks, Grots and Ogors - how not to like it?

[Bloodmaster]

10 minutes ago, Aginor said:

I fully understand why that is the case and I don't blame "new GW" for "old GW"s screwup.

I do think they could maybe have done that necessary cleaning up at some point between 2015 and now, instead of using half their resources for SCE and the other half for everyone else, because that's how it looks right now (even though it might not be the case).

a very narrowed view. this year alone we got, what, Battletome and minis for Nurgle, a battletome legion of Nagash as a overhaul for the dead, a battletome and reworked version of daugthers of kain including new models in high quality, two new factions with Nighhaunters and Idoneth, one of which is a major expansion and reworking of a minor faction (a title hardly deserved till now) the other being a compleatly new concept, both having new and clever designes. And what did SCE get? A single model so far, and an upcoming new chamber as well as a battletome that folds in the existing ones. And we got new rules, new spells with models, a fricking campaign with a hugh narrative for everyone and probably another army or two coming in the second half of 2018.

Thats very little resources infested in what is the poster childs of AoS. The later's something that appears to be forgotten far to often. Yes they are probably the larges faction right now, but took up very little space in the last 12 months or so.

5 minutes ago, michu said:

I think that Free Cities Battletome similar to LoN would be the best for Order factions. Same goes for Greenskinz and other small Destruction factions. Battletome Waaagh! with option to build varied hordes full of Orruks, Grots and Ogors - how not to like it?

Please don't do this GW. Don't give us a simple compilation and some shiny artefacts and spells. Rework and more important reimagine stuff for all factions. Let the old minifactions die and phase out. Be creative and push certain existing designe elements further, but please don't keep stuff like old Empire lineman around simply because of nostalgia and that they already exist (since freaking forever, same for the beloved but ancient Chaos Warriors or zombies (#newkhornezerkers2018 btw, thats a thing now!))

 

 

[Aginor]

18 minutes ago, Bloodmaster said:

a very narrowed view. this year alone we got, what, Battletome and minis for Nurgle, a battletome legion of Nagash as a overhaul for the dead, a battletome and reworked version of daugthers of kain including new models in high quality, two new factions with Nighhaunters and Idoneth, one of which is a major expansion and reworking of a minor faction (a title hardly deserved till now) the other being a compleatly new concept, both having new and clever designes. And what did SCE get? A single model so far, and an upcoming new chamber as well as a battletome that folds in the existing ones. And we got new rules, new spells with models, a fricking campaign with a hugh narrative for everyone and probably another army or two coming in the second half of 2018.

Thats very little resources infested in what is the poster childs of AoS. The later's something that appears to be forgotten far to often. Yes they are probably the larges faction right now, but took up very little space in the last 12 months or so.

Not sure if that is quite accurate. Sure, if you cut in January, then yeah. Things are getting better and I am ready to acknowledge that.

But look at a full year.  The Malign Portents Order hero was an SCE of course. Blightwar contained one new SCE hero, Soul Wars contains new SCE as well. This year we will get _at least_ three new SCE heroes (The dude on the giant Gryph-Hound,  the wizard chick, the exorcist guy) and then we get the ballista, Evocators, Castigators and Sequitors. They opened a whole new chamber. SCE are of course among the first who get their exclusive endless spells.
That alone is more models than most armies have in AoS. And that's on top of what was already the biggest faction before.

[Gecktron]

4 minutes ago, Aginor said:

Not sure if that is quite accurate. Sure, if you cut in January, then yeah. Things are getting better and I am ready to acknowledge that.

But look at a full year.  The Malign Portents Order hero was an SCE of course. Blightwar contained new SCE (including several new models), Soul Wars contains new SCE as well. This year we will get _at least_ three new SCE heroes (The dude on the giant Gryph-Hound,  the wizard chick, the exorcist guy) and then we get the ballista, Evocators, Castigators and Sequitors. They opened a whole new chamber. SCE are of course among the first who get their exclusive endless spells.
That alone is more models than most armies have in AoS. And that's on top of what was already the biggest faction before.

Blight Wars only had Neave and Horticolus as new models. 

The Vanguard Stormcasts were released in early 2017 in between the Tzeentch and Khorne Battletomes.

[Aginor]

Just now, Gecktron said:

Blight Wars only had Neave and Horticolus as new models. 

The Vanguard Stormcasts were released in early 2017 in between the Tzeentch and Khorne Battletomes.

You are right, I mixed that up. Thanks for the correction!

[Raviv]

Regarding the new army specific endless spells, do you think we'll need to have the Malign Sorcery expansion in order to use them, or will they come with the full required rules?

[Tip4Tap]

I agree with @Aginor I don’t think GW should rework or revamp old minis. I honestly feel like they need to keep moving forward. The models coming out of GW this year have been some of the best ever. I want to see more of that, more creativity. 

Sort of mini rant/speech inc. SCE are the poster boys for AoS they are the space marines. GW wants to push them hard as a ‘get into’ AoS army. That’s why they will always get more releases than any other army. However, in my experience as a player (I have a SCE army and an Ironjawz army) being one of the first battletome armies in any new edition sucks! From a competitive view point SCE are not a top tier army and neither are Ironjawz but both got book releases near the start of editions. Of course they were going to release a SCE book at the start of AoS 2, this is the army they want to draw in new players.

Anyways that’s that over don’t know where I was going with it really. 

I guess if you look at 40k for a comparison they are releasing books like crazy, hopefully AoS gets the same treatment.

[Kamose]

1 hour ago, Bloodmaster said:

No, right now its becoming more and more fun. New Rules, new toys, new factions to explore! If you don#t get exited by THAT you really should concider your hobby choices ? ?

Cheer up Aginor! You just got a kiss from someone named Bloodmaster! How can that not brighten your day? ?

[Jamopower]

22 minutes ago, Bloodmaster said:

Please don't do this GW. Don't give us a simple compilation and some shiny artefacts and spells. Rework and more important reimagine stuff for all factions. Let the old minifactions die and phase out. Be creative and push certain existing designe elements further, but please don't keep stuff like old Empire lineman around simply because of nostalgia and that they already exist (since freaking forever, same for the beloved but ancient Chaos Warriors or zombies (#newkhornezerkers2018 btw, thats a thing now!))

I don't have numbers, but I have a feeling that armies such as Wanderers and Dispossessed are surprisingly popular. They are constantly seen in the social media as people are painting and collecting them. Good indicator for what's popular and what's not are the repackaging to rounds. The square based red boxes are probably still existing stock made years ago. 

My view on the all of the small sub factions has been, and it's already been confirmed in to some extent, that they are sort of place holders for GW to expand. Similarly to Daughters of Khaine, Ironjawz, Nighthaunt, Sylvaneth, etc, It's easy to imagine that at some point they could make a new Freeguild army or say Devoted of Sigmar army, that utilizes some of the old kits and expands from there to higher fantasy designs. Even in an army such as Chaos Gargants or Firebellies, there is clearly this kind of potential. 

In any case, regular dudes such as Dispossed or Freeguild are compulsory for the game world to have any sort of relatability. It has always been the main critique of the Stormcast that they don't feel very interesting.

[Aginor]

Yeah this isn't about power, I want to mention that as well.

I like how the Non-Battletome or Old-Battletome armies get better, that's a good step forward but not even the most important thing for me.
And if GW really continues to produce Battletomes (let's say 4 more this year?) without making the new armies OP or the old ones really bad I am all for it and I won't even care that much about more SCE.

This is about balance of armies and play styles, it is about the game and having fun. There will always be different power levels, but each army should have enough stuff to make them interesting. And that means that sometimes the newly reworked army should get some of the coolest stuff. A starter box doesn'T have to contain SCE every time. Let's make it "Beast battles" next time, containing Ogors riding beasts vs. Brayherd. I'm all for it.

[michu]

Forgebane shows that GW can make a 40k box without marines (of course some people still complained that it contained Imperium faction). However it wasn't a starter set - starter sets are made to introduce new players to the game and will always contain main factions like ScE and SM. But if GW will make another box like Blightwar there's a chance it will have non-ScE factions (small idea - Moonclan Grots vs Deathrattle or Darkoath  )

And @Bloodmaster Legions of Nagash battletome doesn't exclude possibility of Deathrattle and Soulblight books. It helped Death become competitive faction so I think that similar books for Order and Destruction won't hurt. For sure Allegiance Abilities for that mixes would be better than GA ones and in the future we still could see separate battletomes for Gitmobs, Greenskinz, Gutbusters, Swifthawks and others.

[Aeryenn]

Honestly, if Soul Wars contained Nighthaunt vs ANY OTHER FACTION THAN SC it would be an auto buy not only for me but my buddy as well. ANY. I'm just tired with this "main faction" nonsense. Still satisfied with number of other releases this year though. I'm almost sure I will order Soul Wars just for the book, Nighthaunt and dice. Will probably throw SC part into the drawer just in case I feel one day in need of stormcasts. 

[Bloodmaster]

35 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

I don't have numbers, but I have a feeling that armies such as Wanderers and Dispossessed are surprisingly popular. They are constantly seen in the social media as people are painting and collecting them. Good indicator for what's popular and what's not are the repackaging to rounds. The square based red boxes are probably still existing stock made years ago. 

My view on the all of the small sub factions has been, and it's already been confirmed in to some extent, that they are sort of place holders for GW to expand. Similarly to Daughters of Khaine, Ironjawz, Nighthaunt, Sylvaneth, etc, It's easy to imagine that at some point they could make a new Freeguild army or say Devoted of Sigmar army, that utilizes some of the old kits and expands from there to higher fantasy designs. Even in an army such as Chaos Gargants or Firebellies, there is clearly this kind of potential. 

In any case, regular dudes such as Dispossed or Freeguild are compulsory for the game world to have any sort of relatability. It has always been the main critique of the Stormcast that they don't feel very interesting.

Which is near exactly what I pruposed. But please don't make simple compilations as LoN putting together existing minifactions without a redesign simply to give them get-by rules. Hell, don't even expand Free guild and Dispossesd in a way that simply continues thier existing line, also both factions are direly needed, as you so fittingly pointed out. Take certain aspects, expand and push them further and get rid of the rest. What are free guild doing best? Push that nad loose the puffy old 16th century garments. Loss the Empire look and givve us something to make them a bit more realm specific. Same with "generic" dwarfs. Loss the smale tank/ball of iron aspect, push thier machenical talents. Maybe make it so, that pure dwarven, human and 08/15 elven Factions exist and function, but that they each are missing certain curcial roles on the battelfield, flaws that are fixed through allying with "generic" dwarfs, elves and humans, thus representing the free cities in the mortal realms loyal to sigmar and the Order pantheon in whole, not a race/godspecific faction liek DoK or Idoneth. Wanderers could loss the "Woodelves look" and push the normadic elves aspect with a mixture of designes representing the travels through all mortal relams, maybe allow them to allie cross-allieance, symbolising that they are liked and far travveld folks with connections to everyone, but limit it, so that only on Alliance at a time can be an ally and only in a minor limited way.

There is so much potential here, more creativity is needed, both with models and rules/ways factions play - Idoneth and Nighhaunts where really intersting steps in a right direction, but even thos where a bit tame, IMO.

 

31 minutes ago, Aginor said:

 A starter box doesn'T have to contain SCE every time. Let's make it "Beast battles" next time, containing Ogors riding beasts vs. Brayherd. I'm all for it.

I agree with you on this, but I can't see it happen any time soon (and not only because the next edition for both AoS and 40k should be a long long way out, the current structre hinting more on constant minor tweeks than a shorter lifecycle as seen with privious editions). SCE and Marines are THE poster boys and marketing icons of GW. They are the ones that creat interst in one of the main traget groups, and they are relativly easy to play due to thier versatility and soild performance in every aspect, though they don't excell in a single field as other armies do, at least in thier vanilla format.

 

16 minutes ago, michu said:

And @Bloodmaster Legions of Nagash battletome doesn't exclude possibility of Deathrattle and Soulblight books. It helped Death become competitive faction so I think that similar books for Order and Destruction won't hurt. For sure Allegiance Abilities for that mixes would be better than GA ones and in the future we still could see separate battletomes for Gitmobs, Greenskinz, Gutbusters, Swifthawks and others.

While certainly true, LoN and other similar GA books tie down resources and cement certain factions and thier current playstile for at least  a certain time. Sure they can be changed and expanded, but it gets harder the longer the GA-book is sold and certain conceptes crystalise. Skip that step for other factions and focus on giving them individual and new forms and designs.
Take Lizardmen as an example: the whole seraphon renaming as well as thier concept of existance is horribly executed. GW took an solid concept of humanoid lizards, renamend them to something suggesting angelic beings, non of the range coming close to that concept, and made it so that they are either manifested idears and dreams or pyhsicaly existing, individuals. The whole concept needs and deserves a thourough re-design, but by including them in a GA-Book, you solidify the exisiting concept, thus making it harder to cange and rebuild it later one. Explain tiny timmy, that his pseudo-heavenly dream lizards now have to look different, to be more fitting to the (crappy) name or that they are no longer demans of the good guys. Try explaining that to verrant-Bob, that saw a beloved lizard army become a dreamforce only to change to something more apropriate after he just adjusted to the new concept.

[Jamopower]

13 minutes ago, michu said:

Forgebane shows that GW can make a 40k box without marines (of course some people still complained that it contained Imperium faction). However it wasn't a starter set - starter sets are made to introduce new players to the game and will always contain main factions like ScE and SM. But if GW will make another box like Blightwar there's a chance it will have non-ScE factions (small idea - Moonclan Grots vs Deathrattle or Darkoath  )

 

Well in WHFB we had:

Elves vs Goblins

Lizardmen vs Bretonnia

Empire vs Orcs

Dwarfs vs Goblins

High Elves vs Skaven,

so it's not so strange that the players of the "heir" of the WHFB would like to have bit more diversity in their starter set factions. 

[Tip4Tap]

6 minutes ago, Aryann said:

Honestly, if Soul Wars contained Nighthaunt vs ANY OTHER FACTION THAN SC it would be an auto buy not only for me but my buddy as well. ANY. I'm just tired with this "main faction" nonsense. Still satisfied with number of other releases this year though. I'm almost sure I will order Soul Wars just for the book, Nighthaunt and dice. Will probably throw SC part into the drawer just in case I feel one day in need of stormcasts. 

I guess from a business perspective SCE sell so to include them in the starter set makes sense. 

[Jamopower]

1 minute ago, Tip4Tap said:

I guess from a business perspective SCE sell so to include them in the starter set makes sense. 

But do they sell because they are interesting, or because they are in the starter set. I'd guess part of both, which would apply on very many other factions as well.

[Tip4Tap]

5 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

Well in WHFB we had:

Elves vs Goblins

Lizardmen vs Bretonnia

Empire vs Orcs

Dwarfs vs Goblins

High Elves vs Skaven,

so it's not so strange that the players of the "heir" of the WHFB would like to have bit more diversity in their starter set factions. 

Ok this this might come across harsh and if it does I’m sorry. Part of the reason for AoS was that people were not buying into fantasy. So yes there was diversity in those boxes but if people aren’t buying them from a GW point of view who cares, they have to make money at the end of the day.

[Tip4Tap]

1 minute ago, Jamopower said:

But do they sell because they are interesting, or because they are in the starter set. I'd guess part of both, which would apply on very many other factions as well.

I think they sell because they are easy to use, easy to paint and kids like them.