The Rumour Thread

[Chikout]

12 minutes ago, novakai said:

It probably to revitalize them and make up for the neglected like with Sisters of battle. Eldar in recent year have really fell off in popularity compare to other Xeno armies despite being one of the cornerstone armies in 40K. Arguably both Tau and Necrons have risen above them while Orks have also remain strong because of their playerbase

granted Sister of battle also had a lot of articles just spread out over a whole year

I went back and checked. The battle sister bulletin had 19 articles across 9 months. Path of the preview has had 27 articles in less than 2 months. 

The weird part is that it's not even that big a release. It's only 10 kits. Gloomspite Gitz, OBR, IDK, KO, Soulblight and Nighthaunt all had more. 

 

[Doko]

Yes its a bit tiring every day check warcomunity and everyday see one or two eldars articles,heck even tau codex  week got less articles than eldars that week and also is a joke see how fyreslayers and idk are supposed to be incoming and only got as one article showing stats that we allready know of the last battlebox.

But i preffer see any xeno before more marines

Edited February 23, 2022 by Doko

[Noserenda]

I suspect a lot of the extra articles are down to padding out the release schedule a bit due to more delays behind the scenes but it is also a big relaunch of a somewhat neglected cornerstone of 40k and part of the methodical big xeno relaunches they have been working through the last few years, once thats done id hope some of that energy goes on a similar project for AoS, blowing off the dust and replacing super old plastic core kits.

[Grimrock]

11 minutes ago, Noserenda said:

I suspect a lot of the extra articles are down to padding out the release schedule a bit due to more delays behind the scenes but it is also a big relaunch of a somewhat neglected cornerstone of 40k and part of the methodical big xeno relaunches they have been working through the last few years, once thats done id hope some of that energy goes on a similar project for AoS, blowing off the dust and replacing super old plastic core kits.

Yeah I'm not really holding out much hope for more focus on AoS from the community team. Nurgle got held back a few months and they didn't pad anything out, they just straight up ignored it. I think we got one or two rules articles and a lore article and that was it. Not only was it the first post-launch book but it also constituted a huge re-imagining of the faction with an absolutely massive number of changes, and yet it was almost like it didn't exist on warhammer community. Instead the site was flooded with articles for 40k factions that wouldn't release for months. 

Edited February 23, 2022 by Grimrock

[novakai]

Don’t know if it going to get better soon. Tyranids are coming out right after this and CSM is most likely the next big release on the schedule given the rumors and that probably the next shift in the marketing focus.

probably should hope that the summer battletomes are more meaty releases at this point in time or the drought may be real lol

[KingBrodd]

3 hours ago, Chikout said:

Gw really are banging the Aeldari drum hard. They've had 40 previews in February. That's more than AoS has had this year including the comics. It's comfortably the most previews they've done for any faction. 

So far there have been a grand total of 3 Fyreslayer previews. 

 

2 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I'm not usually one to complain about this kind of stuff, but I am getting really bored by all the Eldar coverage. Would be nice if we could at least get a bit more significant coverage of the upcoming Fyreslayer and IDK tomes. We still know next to nothing about them, while it feels like we get an in-depth look at every single Eldar unit.

 

1 hour ago, Grimrock said:

Yeah I'm not really holding out much hope for more focus on AoS from the community team. Nurgle got held back a few months and they didn't pad anything out, they just straight up ignored it. I think we got one or two rules articles and a lore article and that was it. Not only was it the first post-launch book but it also constituted a huge re-imagining of the faction with an absolutely massive number of changes, and yet it was almost like it didn't exist on warhammer community. Instead the site was flooded with articles for 40k factions that wouldn't release for months. 

 

1 hour ago, novakai said:

Don’t know if it going to get better soon. Tyranids are coming out right after this and CSM is most likely the next big release on the schedule given the rumors and that probably the next shift in the marketing focus.

probably should hope that the summer battletomes are more meaty releases at this point in time or the drought may be real lol

I'm generally a pretty damn positive bloke but at this point I'm going to assume that the rest of 22' for AOS will be Battletome releases alongside a Single Model. I understand the backlog and it's a smart choice to keep stock pumping but damn if I am not sick of all the 40K articles and it's only February.

Nurgle and now IDK and Fyreslayers are almost being straight up ignored at this point. 

I hope this rectifies at some point and we have a massive time of AOS on Community and in releases because Era of the Beast so far hasnt been much at all and being a Destruction/Monster fan I need my time to shine before Chaos does something evil!! 

[Lord Krungharr]

Perhaps because I've been solely in the Mortal Realms for like 4 years now it doesn't seem like it to me, but is 40k even that popular anymore?  The AoS crowds I've seen are always large in my parts with very few 40k games going on and they are almost always mostly unpainted, suggesting new players.  Guess just my locality, and I'm good with that.  40k seems terribad these days, and much much worse with the new Eldar book.

[Enoby]

22 minutes ago, KingBrodd said:

Nurgle and now IDK and Fyreslayers are almost being straight up ignored at this point. 

While, like you, I do understand the focus on 40k when it comes to releases, it's very disappointing that AoS hardly holds a candle to the number of 40k articles. Of course, you could argue that more releases should mean more writing, but that doesn't really excuse the minimal number of articles on Nurgle, Fyreslayers, and Deepkin - it makes it seem like they're unimportant.  

I will admit I am personally biased against 40k, but even if 40k wasn't getting anything, it feels like AoS 3 has been shoved on the backburner in all regards  

[novakai]

7 minutes ago, Lord Krungharr said:

Perhaps because I've been solely in the Mortal Realms for like 4 years now it doesn't seem like it to me, but is 40k even that popular anymore?  The AoS crowds I've seen are always large in my parts with very few 40k games going on and they are almost always mostly unpainted, suggesting new players.  Guess just my locality, and I'm good with that.  40k seems terribad these days, and much much worse with the new Eldar book.

I pretty sure it still massively popular on the global scale, if the recent Indomitus sale out means anything.

The IP itself it also really recognizable that they have side stuff like video games consistently coming out like Darktide, chaosgate, and Space Marine 2. (Even if quality is not always there)

[novakai]

Just a thought, maybe Warcom feels that AoS rules are just harder to drum up excitement over for compare to 40K.

if a Magmadroth doesn’t have a 36 inch range attack that does auto 9 MW and can potentially one shot a Megagargant at max damage like the Tau hammerhead does it not worth writing about lol ( disclaimer I don’t remember what the Tau hammerhead does but it was definitely spicy and dreadful depending on who you talk to)

[Flippy]

I’m not into 40k, but these are the Space Elves. Take Lumineth, strip them of the silly stuff (cows, hats), turn up to eleven - and we still not even close.

[Noserenda]

3 hours ago, Grimrock said:

Yeah I'm not really holding out much hope for more focus on AoS from the community team. Nurgle got held back a few months and they didn't pad anything out, they just straight up ignored it. I think we got one or two rules articles and a lore article and that was it. Not only was it the first post-launch book but it also constituted a huge re-imagining of the faction with an absolutely massive number of changes, and yet it was almost like it didn't exist on warhammer community. Instead the site was flooded with articles for 40k factions that wouldn't release for months. 

Pretty sure the nurgle release ran into the same thing as its 40k peers, the delays being less telegraphed and December being a common time for less staff in the office. Some of the Eldar plan was clearly premeditated but the last dozen or so have been super fillery articles.

I think the other choices are also relevant here, IDK and FS are pretty solidly the least popular AOS armies, i think someone may just be playing the numbers

1 hour ago, Lord Krungharr said:

Perhaps because I've been solely in the Mortal Realms for like 4 years now it doesn't seem like it to me, but is 40k even that popular anymore?  The AoS crowds I've seen are always large in my parts with very few 40k games going on and they are almost always mostly unpainted, suggesting new players.  Guess just my locality, and I'm good with that.  40k seems terribad these days, and much much worse with the new Eldar book.

40k still wildly outsells AoS though id heard its shifting a bit. 40k being ****** right now is certainly why our group has refocused more on AoS so anecdotally im sure thats not uncommon.

That said most of our group is still buying 40k minis to some degree even if we arent planning to play with them any time soon.

1 hour ago, KingBrodd said:

 

 

 

I'm generally a pretty damn positive bloke but at this point I'm going to assume that the rest of 22' for AOS will be Battletome releases alongside a Single Model. I understand the backlog and it's a smart choice to keep stock pumping but damn if I am not sick of all the 40K articles and it's only February.

 

Might be copium but rumours seem to indicate Sylvaneth and/or Skaven getting a bit more on the release schedule, perhaps with Tyranids rumoured to be a Codex + Hero release the DoK and NH will get more focus in the coming months too? 

[Ragest]

A guy that leaked a pair of legit things in BR era said that this year is full of filling for aos, with just small releases and 0 attention from gw.

[novakai]

I put some Hopium on Nighthaunt only because of some rumor engines and that they got a new unit in the boxset and that more stuff be revealed at Adepticon but that really about it.

granted NH getting two heroes and a new unit post their first battletome is pretty good already

[Grimrock]

14 minutes ago, Noserenda said:

Pretty sure the nurgle release ran into the same thing as its 40k peers, the delays being less telegraphed and December being a common time for less staff in the office. Some of the Eldar plan was clearly premeditated but the last dozen or so have been super fillery articles.

I think the other choices are also relevant here, IDK and FS are pretty solidly the least popular AOS armies, i think someone may just be playing the numbers

What I meant was since Nurgle was delayed two months (October to December) the community site could/should have been padding out the time between with articles to build or maintain at least a semblance of hype for the book. I could absolutely see them not having the time in December, but the articles should have been ready for the October release and they had November to make more. Easy ones would have been an analysis of the massive changes to the wheel, subtle but important changes to summoning, and the hugely improved maggoth lords. Or a piece written by a playtester examining the new book and talking through how the army's natural resistance and automatic healing make it an excellent choice to deal with ranged mortal wounds. So many good options. Plus the timing of releases didn't seem to affect their articles for GSC or Custodes, each of them got far more articles than Nurgle even though their release dates came a few weeks after.

1 hour ago, novakai said:

Just a thought, maybe Warcom feels that AoS rules are just harder to drum up excitement over for compare to 40K.

if a Magmadroth doesn’t have a 36 inch range attack that does auto 9 MW and can potentially one shot a Megagargant at max damage like the Tau hammerhead does it not worth writing about lol ( disclaimer I don’t remember what the Tau hammerhead does but it was definitely spicy and dreadful depending on who you talk to)

I'd agree with this to an extent. The changes to AoS certainly haven't been nearly as flashy as 40k so it's probably a lot tougher to make an exciting sounding article. I think the trick is that an experienced AoS player could absolutely understand what parts of a new book are exciting and relay those changes to other players, even if it isn't so exciting for people who don't already play the faction. Maybe the issue is the community team has lost the people that really understood AoS and therefore can't comfortably write articles without the concern of making mistakes or misinterpreting rules. The lack of articles could easily just be a staffing issue instead of a conscious decision on the part of GW to ignore it in favor of 40k.

[KingBrodd]

2 hours ago, Enoby said:

While, like you, I do understand the focus on 40k when it comes to releases, it's very disappointing that AoS hardly holds a candle to the number of 40k articles. Of course, you could argue that more releases should mean more writing, but that doesn't really excuse the minimal number of articles on Nurgle, Fyreslayers, and Deepkin - it makes it seem like they're unimportant.  

I will admit I am personally biased against 40k, but even if 40k wasn't getting anything, it feels like AoS 3 has been shoved on the backburner in all regards  

100% agree with you mate.

52 minutes ago, Ragest said:

A guy that leaked a pair of legit things in BR era said that this year is full of filling for aos, with just small releases and 0 attention from gw.

I would believe that. I've no doubt that this year is just Tomes and Heroes. 

[mojojojo101]

I think we're averaging about 1 AoS article (not including comics, sunday previews or warcry stuff) a week this year over on WarComm compared to 5 Aeldari articles just this week (one is a cosplay thing though) and its only Wednesday.

I get that there are shipping delays and other difficult circumstances to work around but it really feels like GW could be putting in significantly more effort in to AoS.

[Maogrim]

20 minutes ago, KingBrodd said:

100% agree with you mate.

I would believe that. I've no doubt that this year is just Tomes and Heroes. 

We had our big release. We had the Era of the Beast. Dragons and new armour type for Stormcast Eternals. Kruleboyz as a new type of Orruks with awesome minis. Kragnos as god of destruction. That'll be it till Broken Realms cycle 2: Malerion boogaloo. 

However... T'au Empire got almost no new models, but what they got was a codex that seems fun to play and lets things be good which are supposed to be good. So something like that maybe in the cards for AOS as well.

[EccentricCircle]

My worry is that up to now the coverage and support for AoS has been conspicuously on parr with that of 40k. They've spent the last five or so years really pushing the game, and !making it clear that it's their big fantasy system, and on an equal footing with their primary game. 

But now it kind of feels like that may have changed. All evidence suggests that 40k is bigger and more popular by a substantial margin, and I wonder if covid has made them stop and reconsider the focus they give AoS. If resources are stretched then something has to give, and its not going to be space marines...

In short we know that we've been punching above our weight. Maybe this is what proportional coverage looks like.

Edited February 23, 2022 by EccentricCircle

[novakai]

37 minutes ago, Maogrim said:

We had our big release. We had the Era of the Beast. Dragons and new armour type for Stormcast Eternals. Kruleboyz as a new type of Orruks with awesome minis. Kragnos as god of destruction. That'll be it till Broken Realms cycle 2: Malerion boogaloo. 

However... T'au Empire got almost no new models, but what they got was a codex that seems fun to play and lets things be good which are supposed to be good. So something like that maybe in the cards for AOS as well.

Not sure about that but if you compare to the soul war cycle at this point in time  outside of SCE and NH, we had gloomspite gitz already and later in the year we had Slaanesh, OBR, and S2D release while the battletome train was rolling. for 40K 9th edition they where going on into the Sister of battle second wave and Orks later coming out.

Pretty sure in normal times content and miniature release usually flip between the two system pretty evenly with 40K being slightly favored.

If anything, plans for AoS are push back rather then our load already being out and finish

Edited February 23, 2022 by novakai

[novakai]

36 minutes ago, EccentricCircle said:

My worry is that up to now the coverage and support for AoS has been conspicuously on parr with that of 40k. They've spent the last five or so years really pushing the game, and !making it clear that it's their big fantasy system, and on an equal footing with their primary game. 

But now it kind of feels like that may have changed. All evidence suggests that 40k is bigger and more popular by a substantial margin, and I wonder if covid has made them stop and reconsider the focus they give AoS. If resources are stretched then something has to give, and its not going to be space marines...

In short we know that we've been punching above our weight. Maybe this is what proportional coverage looks like.

It hard to tell, it more possible that 40K is so behind because of AoS 3.0 that they have to make up ground this year for tenth edition to release on time.

Nothing has been suggested that they broken away from the 3 year edition cycle

[madmac]

10 minutes ago, novakai said:

It hard to tell, it more possible that 40K is so behind because of AoS 3.0 that they have to make up ground this year for tenth edition to release on time.

Nothing has been suggested that they broken away from the 3 year edition cycle

The thing is, 40K can't possibly be that far off schedule. We got that huge 40K leak forever ago, almost a year now, with release dates and those have pretty much all been bang on. The only notable slip was GSC/Custodes slipping from Late Dec to Early Jan.

Heck, when I originally read that leak, I assumed that the huge Eldar wave, CSM, Tyranids/Guard and such were much further out, since they didn't have dates, and Tau being a small Jan release left a nice opening for a real AoS release, as is traditional for us. So I thought.

Instead, 40K has just been release after release with barely enough time in between to catch it's breath, while every AoS release feels like it's been delayed at least 2-3 months from it's original target. Nurgle slipping from Oct to Dec, Tome of Champions 2021 released two months into 2022, etc. It's not just that AoS releases are coming late, and that WHC has virtually dropped coverage of the system, but there's also apparently no attempt being made at catch up or course correction, AoS releases are all separated by months at this point, no matter how late they are. When 40K gets slightly off track, they get 3 codex releases in a single month.  The treatment between the systems just isn't balanced at all, and hasn't been more than half a year now.

[Enoby]

47 minutes ago, EccentricCircle said:

My worry is that up to now the coverage and support for AoS has been conspicuously on parr with that of 40k. They've spent the last five or so years really pushing the game, and !making it clear that it's their big fantasy system, and on an equal footing with their primary game. 

Yeah, this is sort of where my worry lies as well. I don't think they're going to scrap AoS or something like that, but I do think it's ended up proving itself significantly less popular than 40k. That's not a surprise at all considering how much history 40k has behind it, but I worry it'll end up with big releases always leaning 40k and AoS getting less support over time.

That said, I do remember last year (maybe around this time last year with Broken Realms) the discussion was in the other direction; in fact I think I remember saying "maybe AoS is growing faster than 40k and that's why it's getting so many more releases". It could well be an issue of warped perspective when it comes to releases.

Whether either or neither of these are true, I do think that the quality of AoS website content has decreased. Not necessarily in a linear way, but a while ago (maybe mid AoS 2) it felt as if every battletome had a proper hype week at least about it, going over loads of rules and design thoughts in detail. While we have had some rules articles for the newer battletomes, Slaanesh 2, Nurgle, Fyreslayers and I think Soulblight to an extent had very sparse 'hype weeks'. I distinctly remember how poor the Slaanesh 2 'hype week' was, with a single rules preview (after the battletome was leaked) and a couple of 'look at these pictures and models' articles. Compared to Slaanesh 1's 'hype week', they redecorated the website, had a in depth talk about what Slaanesh means to the designers (with a neat little spider diagram talking about each part), a neat video with the fiends, a look over at the new allegiance abilities, and a look at the new warscrolls. This is despite the second release being bigger and more people seemed hyped about it. I'm not sure the reason for the change; maybe the social team just prefers 40k, maybe the orders come from data and 40k articles just get more clicks, maybe someone left their position and they're struggling to find an AoS writer. It could be any number of reasons, but I have noticed it. 

The end isn't nigh for AoS, but I do think things have changed slightly. Back in my day, in the Age of Myth known as AoS 1, getting a battletome was a big and exciting event. This was mostly because loads of armies had no allegiance abilities at all, and so getting something was a huge change to their playstyle and thus really exciting. Now, getting a battletome can be a worrying time, compounded by strange rules previews that read as if they have something to hide. We can't really go back to the time of AoS 1 without removing all allegiance abilities from the game and starting from scratch, but I think AoS needs to go a bit further with the battletomes. Quite a few of them feel as if they don't make changes meaningful enough to warrant a new book. 

I mention this because, compounded with the release drought, there seems to be a general lack of hype around AoS at the moment. New models are sparse and battletomes don't always drum up excitement (besides of the anxious kind). I'm hoping things improve in the future - it's still a really fun game, but the breaks have really been hit. 

[novakai]

@madmacI get the frustration but one could also said they bum rush Slaanesh, DoK, LRL, BR, Cursed City, Kragnos and SBGL over releasing Hexfire and shadow throne earlier in order to release AoS 3.0  on time last year too. It wasn’t like there was that great of coverage for Death guard to Grey knights either

Edit: wooops I reply to Enoby post instead of madmac lol

Edited February 23, 2022 by novakai

[Enoby]

18 minutes ago, novakai said:

@madmacI get the frustration but one could also said they bum rush Slaanesh, DoK, LRL, BR, Cursed City, Kragnos and SBGL over releasing Hexfire and shadow throne earlier in order to release AoS 3.0  on time last year too. It wasn’t like there was that great of coverage for Death guard to Grey knights either

Edit: wooops I reply to Enoby post instead of madmac lol

Yeah, that's what I meant by "That said, I do remember last year (maybe around this time last year with Broken Realms) the discussion was in the other direction; in fact I think I remember saying "maybe AoS is growing faster than 40k and that's why it's getting so many more releases". It could well be an issue of warped perspective when it comes to releases"

 

We do likely have a bias for AoS here, considering the forum we're on, so lack of 40k is hardly on the radar. I'd happily admit to likely being wrong about the release state of 40k! 

 

My main point was more looking at AoS in its own bubble, compared to previous AoS, it seems like there's less online effort and less hype. If this turns around, I would be overjoyed to be incorrect - but at the moment it seems like hype is low and that the discussions on battletomes are more poor compared to early AoS 2.