Age of Sigmar: Second Edition

[Trayanee]

19 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. 

People, who already play the game and are fed up by SC are not the audience of this box. Its meant to get new people in and stormcast do the job best for many reasons.

[Aeryenn]

5 minutes ago, Trayanee said:

People, who already play the game and are fed up by SC are not the audience of this box. Its meant to get new people in and stormcast do the job best for many reasons.

How Stormcasts are the best choice for newcomers and even if they are, don't AoS have many alike? If it's about difficulty of play I can think of few other armies that aren't necessarily glass canons or skill heavy ones. 

[Enoby]

I'm not a fan of SCE, but I think there is a marketing positive for including the poster boy faction in each starter box (or pseudo-starter box), as well as pushing them more. 

Here's my reasoning:

If they push SC enough that 70% of people have at least a small SC force, then a new SC release will be already 'applicable' to 70% of players thus making for a safe release. In addition to the safe release, it provides exposure for other factions. This means that they can release SC in a multibox with a faction that they are less sure about, hoping that the SC models will attract the large player base of existing SC players who may consider starting the opposing army as well. 

However, there's something to be said about the negative fan reaction to SC releases. It's not always negative, but it's obvious that out of all the factions in AoS, they're the only one that a decent chunk of people believe have had too many releases. At the end of the day, I don't know if this has any impact on sales (and if it doesn't, GW won't care) but it certainly causes contention amongst fans. 

[Tip4Tap]

6 minutes ago, Aryann said:

How Stormcasts are the best choice for newcomers and even if they are, don't AoS have many alike? If it's about difficulty of play I can think of few other armies that aren't necessarily glass canons or skill heavy ones. 

Is there a faction as easy to play for a new player as SCE?

[Jamopower]

28 minutes ago, Tip4Tap said:

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.

I believe fantasy sold still relatively well back in 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th edition (at least around here it was more or less equally popular to 40k back then) and the skaven vs high elves starterbox that they re-released year or two ago sold also very well (was out of stock for most of the time it was on sale). Of course the absolute sales are now higher than ever, but in relation to 40k, it was closer back in the day.

I don't believe that people would be any less excited for the new starter set if it contained a new Orc force against Tyrion's "new high elves" than they are for the wizard stormcast and nighthaunts.

 

The reason why WHFB fell is a separate topic, but in addition to the cost and number of models needed, I think it's also a matter of new generation of gamers, that are used to different kind of games. The WHFB is essentially a historical miniature game with simplified rules and addition of fantasy. I believe that it's not exactly what sells today for the younger generation. Funnily when I have grown older, my interest on historicals has increased. In fact, my pre-order money didn't go to Aos2, but it went to 15mm Polish army for 17th century gaming  

[michu]

@Aryann Stormcast are easy to paint: Retributor spray, Reikland Fleshshade wash, Stormhost silver drybrush and you are almost finished. They have many flat surfaces and not too many details (at least basic infantry like liberators and judicators). They are also the most versatile army, easy to learn, but hard to master - perfect for begginers. 

[GeneralZero]

2 minutes ago, Tip4Tap said:

Is there a faction as easy to play for a new player as SCE?

SCE offers many advantages:

- indeed easy to play as is for new comers

- easy identification in real world: they are kinda bright Knights (and that's clear for young people)

- Elite army: don't need horde like units to buy/paint/play with : that does NOT scare new commers.

- Most developped army: you can play it the way you want with many units and versatile choices. And for veteran players, this is the greatest part.

So, nice move GW. Even as a SCE player, I find many new things (and some redondant) in the new box/battletome/units

[Aginor]

I think we all agree that SCE have loads of advantages, both for GW and the players.
I don't hate them, hell, I would probably play some myself if I wasn't too fed up by their ubiquity.

IMO it is still fair to say that GW is probably overdoing it.

[Jamopower]

1 hour ago, Bloodmaster said:

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.

 

I agree, but there are a lot of real world constraints. Having realm specific free city folk would be awesome, but would require 8 model kits to make it happen, thus it's easier to have the basic fantasy men, elves and dwarfs that they already have the molds for and then leave the customization for the players and focus on other stuff. That's why it would be nice to have at least the expanded rules to serve as inspiration for the building of the armies. The firestorm campaign book is my favourite expansion to AoS beause of that, but it's very light in the content. Having that book expanded to full battletome would be a dream come true.

It's also good to note that the first new armies they released for AoS have been pretty realm specific. So they have expanded the world and made new models at the same time.

 

Edit: Having a free city battletome wouldn't of course rule out new models. It would be easy to tie-in new "Cogfort guard" or "Aqshy archers" or whatever with the release. Some of these units could even have multiple races present which could be awesome.

[AlphaKennyThing]

3 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.

They are pretty popular, aye! In addition to that, they're far from bad, too. I played a game of 2nd Ed AoS (Matched Play army construction, Open War cards mission) which was my Battletome-equipped Stormcast against an Aelf Soup army and I got utterly spanked.

People very often forget that an army not being tournament top-table competitive in no way makes them bad full stop. I've played more games now that are a narrative throw-down games using MP points and army construction than I have straight up competitive games, and the games are all really fun. Even using my Slaves to Darkness army that is pure fluff puts up a decent fight against most things. 

Despite us all chatting on here about Matched Play woes, I'm pretty sure that GW makes most of its AoS sales in the Open War/Narrative sphere, where the disparity between factions is significantly less, regardless of battletomes. People just buy the models they like, and have a game. AoS lends itself beautifully to this type of play, and I really like it for that - it's fairly hard to have an unenjoyable game of AoS outside of Matched Play. 

I for one love Matched Play, I think it's great fun, and I can understand totally power imbalances in a competitive environment. The cynic in me thinks it may not be Games Workshop's overall priority when it comes to the game, even though they put out the GHB.

[Aeryenn]

After all maybe you are right with Stormcasts being easy (or less hard) then most factions in terms of painting and playing. Still, putting them in each and every dual-faction box is an overkill. Let them start s new edition with their favourite poster boys but from now on they should restrain a bit. Blightwar box would have been much more interesting with Sylvaneth in place of Stormcasts and Idoneth vs Nighthaunt also would make it right to keep the same theme. 

[Aginor]

I know I am not a moderator or anything, but I feel responsible for the discussion drifting a bit off since I kinda started the derailing.

So I'd like to suggest to come back to the more general topic of AoS2:
What do y'all think will be the coolest part of the 24hours Live Global Launch?

[Jamopower]

26 minutes ago, AlphaKennyThing said:

Despite us all chatting on here about Matched Play woes, I'm pretty sure that GW makes most of its AoS sales in the Open War/Narrative sphere, where the disparity between factions is significantly less, regardless of battletomes. People just buy the models they like, and have a game. AoS lends itself beautifully to this type of play, and I really like it for that - it's fairly hard to have an unenjoyable game of AoS outside of Matched Play. 

I have a feeling that pretty big part of GW sales is for models that don't see any sort of gaming at all. Everyone knows people that have massive stashes of unbuilt/half built kits at their closets. In fact pretty many of us are those people, at least I am.

[GeneralZero]

1 hour ago, Aginor said:

IMO it is still fair to say that GW is probably overdoing it.

I don't think so. Why? It is their main. So, they need to update them asap, read FIRST. Then....we know that everything coming next will be NOT SCE!!! And that's good to know. We can bet on many other factions like rumors on Slanesh and greenz...

[GeneralZero]

18 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

I have a feeling that pretty big part of GW sales is for models that don't see any sort of gaming at all. Everyone knows people that have massive stashes of unbuilt/half built kits at their closets. In fact pretty many of us are those people, at least I am.

I plead GUILTY 

So bad I'm plastik junky 

[CDM]

1 hour ago, Jamopower said:

Edit: Having a free city battletome wouldn't of course rule out new models. It would be easy to tie-in new "Cogfort guard" or "Aqshy archers" or whatever with the release. Some of these units could even have multiple races present which could be awesome.

I have been banging on about this for ages! Best way to use the old human,aelves and duardin factions is to dump them all in a free cities battle tome.

Like they did with firestorm have loads of free cities listed with access to certain  factions and providing city allegiance abilities. You could even include the faction specific ones in as well if you went with mono lists.

I would include all of the human,aelven and duardin factions apart from all the battletome factions and wanderes, who have enough scope to be there own thing

[GeneralZero]

This is not rules relative but there will be a challenge on the 06/30 "We’ve also set Peachy and Duncan a very special challenge – can our two expert painters get a complete Soul Wars set tabletop ready in a day? "

 

So guys, what do you think?  For me, with my parkinson talented painter skills, it is feasible only if I wanted a picasso like army

[Aginor]

2 minutes ago, GeneralZero said:

This is not rules relative but there will be a challenge on the 06/30 "We’ve also set Peachy and Duncan a very special challenge – can our two expert painters get a complete Soul Wars set tabletop ready in a day? "

 

So guys, what do you think?  For me, with my parkinson talented painter skills, it is feasible only if I wanted a picasso like army

Same here.

The small SCE hero alone would take me a day.

Speed painting the Nighthaunt part could work reasonably well I think, but for the SCE..  I haven't painted many of them but I tend to paint the details, and even if you can paint four times as fast as I cannot imagine how that should work for the whole box.

So yeah, curious how they will look in the end.

[bsharitt]

2 minutes ago, GeneralZero said:

This is not rules relative but there will be a challenge on the 06/30 "We’ve also set Peachy and Duncan a very special challenge – can our two expert painters get a complete Soul Wars set tabletop ready in a day? "

 

So guys, what do you think?  For me, with my parkinson talented painter skills, it is feasible only if I wanted a picasso like army

I lack the fine dexterity to get super detailed on my models so I've honed my painting skills for speed, but still end up with pretty decent tabletop quality paint jobs. I'm pretty sure I could get the Nighthaunt half done in a day to a decent tabletop quality. An equivalent amount of "original" Stormcast would be doable, but I think all those tabards and cloth would make it tricky, but if I started off first thing in the morning, I might be able to get it done, but I'd have to skimp on details more than usual. I'm hoping to have the soul wars box today or tomorrow and plan to have the Nighthaunt half on the table Friday night and that's just doing them after work in the evenings.

[RuneBrush]

4 minutes ago, GeneralZero said:

This is not rules relative but there will be a challenge on the 06/30 "We’ve also set Peachy and Duncan a very special challenge – can our two expert painters get a complete Soul Wars set tabletop ready in a day? "

 

So guys, what do you think?  For me, with my parkinson talented painter skills, it is feasible only if I wanted a picasso like army

For those two I reckon they'll achieve it or get very close.  They've a lot of years experience of optimising how they paint, but it'll depend on how they tackle the time as 24-hours solid painting could kill a normal person.  Assembly and undercoating will probably take under 3 hours between them.  Possibly grab a few hours sleep whilst the undercoat properly cures and then then crack into it.  I think the benefit is that they can be very formulaic with the army - gold undercoat, wash, drybrush would be fine for the Stormcast and white undercoat and new technical paints for the Nighthaunt would get the bulk of the colours done.

Looking forward to watching them on Saturday though!

[GeneralZero]

I'd be glad to see a painting tuto with those 2 new technical paints for NightHaunt

[Erdemo86]

28 minutes ago, GeneralZero said:

I'd be glad to see a painting tuto with those 2 new technical paints for NightHaunt

Where?

[Orsino]

4 hours 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!

But people don't necessarily know what they're buying into. New players have no reason to suspect the shiny army GW is happy to sell them is actually a broken remnant.

[Bloodmaster]

32 minutes ago, Orsino said:

But people don't necessarily know what they're buying into. New players have no reason to suspect the shiny army GW is happy to sell them is actually a broken remnant.

If a shiny army has no book to support it, both with rules and background, one should be a bit sceptical if it is truly that shiny and a good choice. Furthermore there should be someone around to warn you, either an experienced player or a salesman - the later will most of the time push you to an army with better support or a starter box (with supported armies) either due to being a good person or simply because both options make him more money than a broken faction without a book.

[Erdemo86]

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/06/26/26th-june-preview-new-heroes-of-the-stormcast-eternalsgw-homepage-post-2/

warscrolls for 2 new heroes.