The Rumour Thread

[ElectricPaladin]

I saw something funny on the Internet.

People Who Don't Know Anything About Linguistics: stop changing language, words have meaning, language doesn't change! protect language purity stop making up words and pronouns

Linguists: all words are made up, nothing is real, everything is imaginary, chaos and anarchy, invent your own pronouns IDGAF

[Skabnoze]

19 minutes ago, HollowHills said:

I'm being reasonable when I say we're all against that. It's the kind of snobbery that shouldn't exist. You're completely in the wrong. 

In addition, many (maybe most) native speakers of english don't have a sophisticated enough understanding & mastery of the language to adhere to that.  And then there are non-native speakers to consider.  There is no educational bar required to post on the forums aside from some basic level of literacy and we don't need one.  People seem to be able to communicate their points well enough most of the time.

Edited May 31, 2019 by Skabnoze

[Skabnoze]

10 minutes ago, Kugane said:

If only these were eshin skaven instead. Missed opportunity.

GW already makes a Skaven Eshin boxed set right here:  Eshin boxed set

Edited May 31, 2019 by Skabnoze

[Aelfric]

I have no idea what E-Prime stands for; could someone offer a definition please?

[S133arcanite]

@Kugane I found this: 

 

[Kugane]

14 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

GW already makes a Skaven Eshin boxed set right here:  Eshin boxed set

Oh my. They are gorgeous! Quite cheap as well!

[Kugane]

8 minutes ago, S133arcanite said:

@Kugane I found this: 

 

Thats a cool video! The karasu tengu in the video are the type of tengu those ninjas used to imitate. It's not sure if the yokai story of karasu tengu origin from encounters with these ninja or the ninja disguise was based around the story though. A lot of japanese folk lore is based around phenomina that they couldnt explain and thus it must be magic, lol.  Regardless, considering that most warriors back then were 12 to 16 years of age it wasnt strange they would easily get scared or tricked.

These new miniatures will be great as conversion pieces regardless :).

[Sleboda]

2 hours ago, willange said:

Essentially, I'm no closer to deciding whether or not to buy Warcry now than I was before because they didn't address any actual questions I have concerning the game itself.

Fair point. I'm in the same boat. I want to be hyped about the game, but at the moment it's all flash and little substance.

[Skabnoze]

11 minutes ago, Kugane said:

Oh my. They are gorgeous! Quite cheap as well!

I agree.  I picked them up a while ago but I am having a really hard time deciding how I want to paint them...

[Sleboda]

34 minutes ago, HollowHills said:

I'm being reasonable when I say we're all against that. It's the kind of snobbery that shouldn't exist. You're completely in the wrong. 

Whereas I am in favor of any sort of method to increase clarity and understanding in forums.  I had not head of E-prime until five minutes ago, and although it would be a challenge to adopt,  I support it.  It does not seem at all like snobbery to want to bring everyone together through clear and precise language usage.

Anyway, I know we won't be doing it, but I wanted to say that I think it's a marvelous idea at its heart.

On topic: I don't know about this new warband.  I think I like some of the models, but my first impression of the group as a whole is ... um, well, yeah, ok, sure.

[HollowHills]

I wonder if this is the most off topic we've ever been... 

Anyway, GW business model over the last few years seems to be built on hype. Generally they announce the next big release for a game then continue to hype this until it releases. The cycle then repeats with the next Announcement. 

Presumably the fear is that announcing another battletome would dilute sylvaneth sales before that product even releases. 

[sandlemad]

1 hour ago, JPjr said:

I suggest that this message board unilaterally adopts E-Prime. 

Never came across before thanks for bringing it up. Fascinating stuff, very interesting to think with in general, would be an absolute disaster implemented here.

To return to Warcry, what I really like is not just how the warbands have an identity and aesthetic distinct from the four powers, but also how each could be interestingly adapted to a particular god.

Corvus Cabal

• Tzeentch: most obvious, the Raven God, seeking to emulate birds as observers of all, in the air (a changeable element), gatherers of knowledge; also they're literally called a cabal!
• Slaanesh: the joy of demonstrating skill through elegant stealth takedowns, striving towards avian perfection
• Khorne: the blood gods care not from whence the blood flows, and if that's from slitting the throats of those left for the crows... the God of Battle's End
• Nurgle: the crow as bringer of disease, the knife bringing a slow decay from a festering wound; the Crow God

Iron Golems

• Tzeentch: the arcane wisdom of the fire (He Whose Voice Is The Flame), the changeability of ore into flowing metal, the craft of magic weapons
• Slaanesh: avarice, greedily taking metal from the earth and forging it into exquisite weapons, perfectly crafted to be sold at a high price; maybe go full on Greasus Goldtooth and have elements of gold in the armour?
• Khorne: fire, forges, strength: all classically Khornate, linking with the blacksmith stuff in the daemons/Bloodbound
• Nurgle: making good use of the things left behind... the rust in the soul but taking what others scorn reforging it into something of use; the unfeeling strength of armour as a metaphor for the uncaring endurance in the Grandfather's name. Also singing while you work! Nurgle as the Jolly Foreman

Splintered Fang

• Tzeentch: the aesthetic of scalemail and such is vaguely Tzeentchian; scholar-warriors with a deep interest in alchemy and thus poisons
• Slaanesh: sibilant sensuous serpents; the exquisite agony of good drugs and drawing out a foe's death with just the right poison; the Lord of Serpents
• Khorne: there's room for a mode of worship of the god of war who appreciates the cunning murder, maybe even blurring Khaine and Khorne considering the presence of a chaos elf; or gladiators, always a solidly Khornate approach
• Nurgle: the Grandfather can have subtle poisons that rot a man from the inside out but also they're from Ghyran and could shine as examples of the twisted new life that has grown from His influence

Untamed Beasts

• Tzeentch: there's probably something there about consuming/transmigrating the souls of the great beasts, of embracing a changeable nomadic lifestyle that's even less constrained by rules than most of their fellows, of interpreting the Changer's wisdom through the wind in the long grass or the patterns in the clouds or in the organs of the beasts you slay
• Slaanesh: the thrill of the hunt (see House Devine in 30k) but also that fur, those rippling pecs, the opulence of an oiled warlord slumped on a throne in an incense-filled yurt, feasting on the most exquisite meats and wearing the rarest and most dazzling furs
• Khorne: he likes skulls, he probably  likes bigger skulls from predatory monsters even more. Slay the beasts, eat their flesh, grow strong, kill more for the God of the Bloody Feast
• Nurgle: it's the ciiiiircle of liiiiiife

I'm excited to see the other warbands.

[Skabnoze]

Just now, HollowHills said:

I wonder if this is the most off topic we've ever been... 

Anyway, GW business model over the last few years seems to be built on hype. Generally they announce the next big release for a game then continue to hype this until it releases. The cycle then repeats with the next Announcement. 

Presumably the fear is that announcing another battletome would dilute sylvaneth sales before that product even releases. 

They do seem to heavily operate in that mode and I find it a bit funny.  I have only ever met a very rare group of people that have to buy every shiny thing that is hyped for a game and also have the money to do that.  I have known a few that would sell their existing army and jump onto the brand new release hype for a game - but those  are ultra-rare also.  And I have been playing miniature games since the 80s...

Most people don't have enough time or money to significantly invest in more than 2-3 factions and so the idea that your customers won't buy the thing you put out now because you showed them something coming a bit further down the line is silly.  Those customers were likely to only buy one of those things anyways and probably will when the one they want releases.  If they end up buying both of those things then they probably would have done that if you showed them both.

[Saiken]

I really think the Warcry models are fantastic so far. As much for what they are, as for the fantastic conversion potential they hold.

However, I'm pretty annoyed personally because the way GW communicates currently makes it really hard to a know what to buy and what to focus on. 

I think that we are experiencing a great period in terms of hobby, but it lacks clarity in terms of what is going to be released/supported and when ... I don't want to invest time and money on something that is not coming or something that might not get rules soon etc ...

The slaves to darkness are a good example. I really hesitated to buy the battleforce, however the whole lack of knowledge about the future of those models makes it a no-go for me. 

[madmac]

I agree, I think there's a lot of people out there holding out on buying the army/models they love but have no idea what form it will eventually take, or when.  Or the regret of splurging for  older plastic or finecasts model and realizing that they may have spent a lot of valuable hobby time  painting something that will just get removed or replaced when the armybook finally comes.

It's less people being entitled/demanding more new stuff constantly than it is people being on edge waiting to take the plunge on a currently unsupported army or nervous to see if the next update makes their bottom tier army playable again, IMO.

[RexHavoc]

1 hour ago, Skabnoze said:

When Warcry was announced I thought the narrative concept was cool, but I was not terribly interested because I wanted a broader skirmish game for AoS than just chaos.  I have been a chaos player in 40k since the 90s and have dipped my toe into Warhammer Fantasy Chaos a bit - but WFB never really delivered the sort of chaos that I wanted.  AoS really did not either from the beginning, but the early DarkOath models easily caught my eye since I am a huge fan of Frank Frazetta's Fantasy artwork (especially Conan) and this stuff really screams that look.  But as a general fan of skirmish games on the whole, and as someone who really likes the faction diversity in AoS, I was disappointed at the initial announcement of it being focused on Chaos.  I also did not really care for the first warband models they showed off with the weird helmets.

And then they announced it will incorporate rules for other races, even if they don't make new warband modes for those races in wave 1,  and I was MUCH more on board.  And since then they have been showcasing new warbands that I really like.  I like the models shown for each of the warbands with the exception of the first one revealed.  I love the barbarian group from the realm of beasts.  The snake crew with Retiarii gladiator weapons (net & trident) are great.  And this new tengu crew with the crow skull masks also look really neat to me.  And the more that I look at the original crew the more I think a different paint job and head-swaps would improve them a lot for me.  The only thing I really don't like about them are the helmets and I can easily replace those.

I understand and sympathize that some people are not interested in this game and don't like how they have advertised it - but there are others of us who do.  I started out with this game pretty low on my radar and each new teaser has really bumped up my desire for it.  At this point I will definitely buy the box set with the rules on day-1, and I am likely to buy all of the factions they have shown so far.  If the next few teasers look as neat to me as these have then I will get those also.  This is probably the GW product that will kill my wallet more than anything else they do all year since I don't purchase every army they release.

Trouble is, I'm not interested in this game but I WANT to be, but between poor past experiences with their 'universe' games and them having not shown anything of the game that really grabs my attention (chaos models are nice and all, but there is a limit to how many chaos warbands I will want to buy, not to mention I expect the warbands themselves to be pricey- though the kill team sets are nice and good value, their price point makes in impractical to buy all the releases and I suspect we wil see a similar warband/terrain sets for these chaos chaps as they sold so well for kill team) Juts over a month or so till the games release and we've had nothing of real substance. While GW have gotten better at showing things off, there was a time were we got to see a game designed before it was released. Watching mordheim grow from some rules in white dwarf to become a full game is what they should have done with warcry. The 'get me by' skirmish rules in white dwarf should have been a warcry test rules, allowing for people to play with what they had and GW to make changes to the game as needed (such as adding in the additional non chaos warbands)

16 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

They do seem to heavily operate in that mode and I find it a bit funny.  I have only ever met a very rare group of people that have to buy every shiny thing that is hyped for a game and also have the money to do that.  I have known a few that would sell their existing army and jump onto the brand new release hype for a game - but those  are ultra-rare also.  And I have been playing miniature games since the 80s...

Most people don't have enough time or money to significantly invest in more than 2-3 factions and so the idea that your customers won't buy the thing you put out now because you showed them something coming a bit further down the line is silly.  Those customers were likely to only buy one of those things anyways and probably will when the one they want releases.  If they end up buying both of those things then they probably would have done that if you showed them both.

Yeah, I have never understood there logic in this. I know people do buy each release and flog the last one to pay for the next new thing, which I'm sure GW count on this tactic working on those folks, but for everyone else, most people seem to know what battletomes they are likely to buy long before they are even announced, its only the odd new release that might catch people. I guess they still think that if we knew High elves were due in late summer, we are less likely to buy sylvaneth on release as a 'this will do until my real favourite elven army comes out'.  Silly thing is, I'm sure people would still buy it as a get-me-by even if they knew someone else was coming. People know that sisters are battle are coming (and have done for a while) yet they are still selling space marines well enough.

At this point of AoS they really should have put a list out of battletomes they are at least working on. I know that this could be risky for them- if they say they are doing a freeguild one, due in 12 months but its canned before release (for what ever reason) they would have to deal with the people shouting online about having spent money on freeguild models during the wait.

I'm currently happy to buy  75% of the battletomes they are putting out (the other 25% I'm likely to buy once they become old edition/2nd hand) I made the decision a while back that this would be the last version of warhammer I'd ever buy and therefore happy to spend the additional money buying everything I like for this edition . I've never been a fan of the edition overhalls GW do. I would have been happy to stick with AoS1, but sticking with AoS2 made more sense due to the battletome quality being so good, as well as GW mentioning that they aim to give all factions that will remain in the game a battletome in the next two years or so. I don't think we have ever had an edition where so many battletomes/rules will have lined up to the same edition. 
I'd mostly like to know when/what is coming out over the next two years so I can plan which order I'm going to paint everything in. I'd also be less likely to spend money with other companies, as I'd need to 'save' for up for the upcoming battletomes.

[Kugane]

26 minutes ago, madmac said:

I agree, I think there's a lot of people out there holding out on buying the army/models they love but have no idea what form it will eventually take, or when.  Or the regret of splurging for  older plastic or finecasts model and realizing that they may have spent a lot of valuable hobby time  painting something that will just get removed or replaced when the armybook finally comes.

It's less people being entitled/demanding more new stuff constantly than it is people being on edge waiting to take the plunge on a currently unsupported army or nervous to see if the next update makes their bottom tier army playable again, IMO.

Its a returning problem.

Nowadays I can paint quite fast and can do around 5 miniatures per hour if needed, but I still recall when I rejoined the hobby 4 years ago and just finished a unit of 30 miniatures after like 2 months of painting only to have the army rules changed and everything being too weak to compete and some units (sayl the faithless) being useless in the army. The same when I invested into tomb kings and the entire range being scrapped. Also in 40k, recently I heavily invested in genestealer cults because I loved the vehicles, but vehicle armies are too weak to compete competitively. It just gets blown to pieces by flyers.

I think it can be quite demotivating for newer players to deal with this, especially when not knowing there is such a large unbalance not only in rules of units, but when calculated, even baseline damage can be significantly different on a damage per points basis.  

Evocators vs palladors for example in case of stormcast. Evocators seem superior in every way. A new player wont know this and might buy into vanguard only to have a huge disadvantage straight out of the box.

Maybe there should be a community that handles adapting/tuning rules and points for overal game balance. And using these tweaks as a supplement to the core game instead of waiting years for GW to do it. A lot of stuff can be easily fixed by tuning the statlines of a unit to reflect its cost, or its cost to reflect its rules and statlines. 

Every time I bring up balance on forums or even my local game group, it gets slaughtered by the "imbalance makes games more fun. Balance is boring" statement. But who is it more fun to? "That guy" who tables the new players? XD

I think win % of an army should at least sit between 40 to 60% average win chance. Not 25 to 75% as it is right now (I personally can win about 1 in 4 games with bottom tier armies, But a more skilled player might do better of course.)

Edited May 31, 2019 by Kugane

[Skabnoze]

31 minutes ago, RexHavoc said:

Trouble is, I'm not interested in this game but I WANT to be, but between poor past experiences with their 'universe' games and them having not shown anything of the game that really grabs my attention (chaos models are nice and all, but there is a limit to how many chaos warbands I will want to buy, not to mention I expect the warbands themselves to be pricey- though the kill team sets are nice and good value, their price point makes in impractical to buy all the releases and I suspect we wil see a similar warband/terrain sets for these chaos chaps as they sold so well for kill team) Juts over a month or so till the games release and we've had nothing of real substance. While GW have gotten better at showing things off, there was a time were we got to see a game designed before it was released. Watching mordheim grow from some rules in white dwarf to become a full game is what they should have done with warcry. The 'get me by' skirmish rules in white dwarf should have been a warcry test rules, allowing for people to play with what they had and GW to make changes to the game as needed (such as adding in the additional non chaos warbands)

I don't disagree that I would like to see some of the "meat" of the game in regards to mechanics.  I don't fault you at all for your opinion.  Everyone is different in regards to what they want and what excites them.  My post was meant to push back a bit and say that for some the hype that GW has been doing has been working.  I understand that for some people their excitement has gone down or never even taken off - but for others it has gone up.  Not every ad/hype campaign will work on everyone - or is even meant to.

I have played every skirmish game that GW has released (I'm old...), and on the whole I like most of them.  So for me they get a bit of good-will in regards to skirmish games.  They usually make a decent game - but historically have poor support for them.

However, I will say that if I made my purchases solely on game mechanics then I probably would not have purchased any GW games over the last 15+ years.  Collecting and reading game rulebooks is somewhat of a hobby of mine and I have a pretty decent sized collection.  I'll usually not hesitate to pull the trigger on purchasing a rulebook for a game, and I will say that I have played most of the games that I own the rules for at least a few times.  In my opinion there are far better games in terms of mechanics than most GW games.  But on the flip side it can be very hard to find a group for many of those games and GW games also have the advantage of relatively broad and easy to find (comparatively) player groups.

At the end of the day my personal opinion is that GW excels at making interesting game worlds and truly outstanding miniatures.  In my opinion they have only got better at this on average over time (current 40k world is back-sliding in regards to a lot of what I enjoy - but the rest of the products are getting better).  So when I evaluate whether I will invest in a game then I look at the type of game (army vs skirmish, fantasy vs future, figure scale, etc), the likely price point, how likely I can find other players, what the miniatures look like, and what the mechanics of the game are.  Mechanics are a big deal for me, but when it comes specifically to GW games I expect the mechanics to probably be mediocre and I hope that the models are great.  So far in my opinion the Warcry models have only got better and better as they have been shown off and so my interest has gone up.

Your mileage may vary.  I am not saying that anyone is wrong in their personal opinion.

Edited May 31, 2019 by Skabnoze

[Skabnoze]

14 minutes ago, RexHavoc said:

I'm currently happy to buy  75% of the battletomes they are putting out (the other 25% I'm likely to buy once they become old edition/2nd hand) I made the decision a while back that this would be the last version of warhammer I'd ever buy and therefore happy to spend the additional money buying everything I like for this edition . I've never been a fan of the edition overhalls GW do. I would have been happy to stick with AoS1, but sticking with AoS2 made more sense due to the battletome quality being so good, as well as GW mentioning that they aim to give all factions that will remain in the game a battletome in the next two years or so. I don't think we have ever had an edition where so many battletomes/rules will have lined up to the same edition. 

To be fair, they kind of have to.  I am not a huge fan of it either, but having watched many games develop over the last couple of decades it has become obvious to me that long-lived games need to have multiple editions in order for the business to thrive.  The games themselves don't always need it, but the businesses need to sell products to thrive and grow.  They can expand a game, but eventually so much is stapled on that the game needs a reset and an edition change is necessary.  Games that just continually add new stuff and expand eventually become overly bloated messes.  They could potentially lock down a game, not expand it anymore, and just sell the same products - but eventually people will get bored and the game will begin to diminish. 

GWs strategy of doing new editions fairly often can be quite annoying - I won't argue with that.  But from a business point of view it allows them to sell customers the same thing over again.  And for all the customers that are turned off by the process it seems that at least as many, if not more, are generally excited by edition revamps as most of these games continue to grow.

For me, the biggest problem comes when a game makes an edition change that makes existing collections simply unusable.  I can deal with when existing stuff is less useful than newer options.  That is very annoying, but when an edition change makes your models no longer able to be used it is rage enducing.  That happened in 40k from 2nd to 3rd edition and I have seen it happen in other games as well.  Thankfully GW usually makes collections still useable for a pretty long period of time in their games.

I hope that at some point someone stumbles into a better long-term business model, but I have yet to see one.

[Skabnoze]

30 minutes ago, RexHavoc said:

Yeah, I have never understood there logic in this. I know people do buy each release and flog the last one to pay for the next new thing, which I'm sure GW count on this tactic working on those folks, but for everyone else, most people seem to know what battletomes they are likely to buy long before they are even announced, its only the odd new release that might catch people. I guess they still think that if we knew High elves were due in late summer, we are less likely to buy sylvaneth on release as a 'this will do until my real favourite elven army comes out'.  Silly thing is, I'm sure people would still buy it as a get-me-by even if they knew someone else was coming. People know that sisters are battle are coming (and have done for a while) yet they are still selling space marines well enough.

At this point of AoS they really should have put a list out of battletomes they are at least working on. I know that this could be risky for them- if they say they are doing a freeguild one, due in 12 months but its canned before release (for what ever reason) they would have to deal with the people shouting online about having spent money on freeguild models during the wait.

I'm currently happy to buy  75% of the battletomes they are putting out (the other 25% I'm likely to buy once they become old edition/2nd hand) 

I would really like GW to get AoS out of the state where we have so many factions without real rules.  Every faction needs to be contained in a real battletome or retired from the game.  AoS has it's warts, all games do, but on the whole it is one of the more excellent games that GW has ever produced in my opinion.  However, it needs to get out of the weird state it lives in with regards to the factions.  Thankfully they seem to have been doing just this.  Hopefully they continue heavily on this path until they get rules for everyone.  They managed that with 40k for 8th and for AoS to truly shine they need to do it here also.  And old legacy battletomes are not good enough either - everyone meant to be in this game needs a 2.0 battletome.

I want to see new interesting factions as much as anyone, but more than anything I want the existing old-school & AoS 1.0 messes cleaned up first.

To the Games Workshop Age of Sigmar Dev Team:  Do your homework & chores and then you can go outside and play.

Edited May 31, 2019 by Skabnoze

[Kugane]

2 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

To be fair, they kind of have to.  I am not a huge fan of it either, but having watched many games develop over the last couple of decades it has become obvious to me that long-lived games need to have multiple editions in order for the business to thrive.  The games themselves don't always need it, but the businesses need to sell products to thrive and grow.  They can expand a game, but eventually so much is stapled on that the game needs a reset and an edition change is necessary.  Games that just continually add new stuff and expand eventually become overly bloated messes.  They could potentially lock down a game, not expand it anymore, and just sell the same products - but eventually people will get bored and the game will begin to diminish. 

GWs strategy of doing new editions fairly often can be quite annoying - I won't argue with that.  But from a business point of view it allows them to sell customers the same thing over again.  And for all the customers that are turned off by the process it seems that at least as many, if not more, are generally excited by edition revamps as most of these games continue to grow.

For me, the biggest problem comes when a game makes an edition change that makes existing collections simply unusable.  I can deal with when existing stuff is less useful than newer options.  That is very annoying, but when an edition change makes your models no longer able to be used it is rage enducing.  That happened in 40k from 2nd to 3rd edition and I have seen it happen in other games as well.  Thankfully GW usually makes collections still useable for a pretty long period of time in their games.

I hope that at some point someone stumbles into a better long-term business model, but I have yet to see one.

It would probably be less damaging if the ammount of work that goes into an army is less. I am not sure what others feel, But to me personally it makes little difference if an army has 30 miniatures or 80 miniatures. The game is equally enjoyable in my opinion. It does make a huge difference if you painted 30 vs 80 models (or even converted them) and seeing weeks of work being for nothing other than having new display pieces when your 80 soldiers are now useless.

 

[ElectricPaladin]

2 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

I would really like GW to get AoS out of the state where we have so many factions without real rules.  Every faction needs to be contained in a real battletome or retired from the game.

Do we know that every faction is going to be a grown-up faction? I feel like some of them might be doomed to languish in this way forever. Are Arcane Council or Devoted of Sigmar really ever going to get battletomes? Or do they exist to be allies and for narrative play?

[Kugane]

We should probably switch back to rumors before we upset the TGA gods (mods) =P

[Skabnoze]

2 minutes ago, Kugane said:

It would probably be less damaging if the ammount of work that goes into an army is less. I am not sure what others feel, But to me personally it makes little difference if an army has 30 miniatures or 80 miniatures. The game is equally enjoyable in my opinion. It does make a huge difference if you painted 30 vs 80 models (or even converted them) and seeing weeks of work being for nothing other than having new display pieces when your 80 soldiers are now useless.

 

You won't get an argument from me - except to say that I hate having any useless models in my collection (and I have a lot...).  In the case of smaller games it is at least easier to modify/repurpose those models for another edition, but I still don't like it.  If I can still field the same units, even if they are subpar, then I am much happier when an edition changes.

This is a hobby where I expect to be spending some amount of money over time.  I don't expect to have a couple of purchases and be done forever.  I don't mind buying new stuff - I just mind when old stuff is relegated through the shelf not because of competitive concerns but simply because they no longer function in the game.

[Skabnoze]

3 minutes ago, ElectricPaladin said:

Do we know that every faction is going to be a grown-up faction? I feel like some of them might be doomed to languish in this way forever. Are Arcane Council or Devoted of Sigmar really ever going to get battletomes? Or do they exist to be allies and for narrative play?

I can deal with stuff like that - but GW needs to make these things explicit in my opinion.  I fully expect more kits or even small allegiances to drop off - just like Gitmob and Greenskinz seem to have, but GW needs to get this stuff out of the way.  If there are allegiances & kits that they want to just stick around just as allies and continue to sell the models then they need to make players aware of this so that people don't heavily invest in these forces without knowing explicitly what they are doing.  This is simply allowing customers to make better informed decisions.  There are people who will still make entire large collections out of niche forces and know exactly what they are doing.  I have played an all Night Goblin (now Gloomspite Moonclan) army since the mid-90s and I knew exactly what I was doing the whole time.  In fact, I am still a bit surprised and in shock that they actually are a full army with their own Battletome now.  I honestly never thought that would ever come to pass.  But there are still a number of potential purchase pitfalls that people can make with this game and GW should be doing as much as they can to minimize that.