The Rumour Thread

[Snarff]

I much prefer the gods being active, it's part of what makes the setting so unique. It's like a living and evolving mythology where things can actually radically chamge rather than a stagnant setting with no stakes like TOW.

In the old world, (with notable exception of the end times) nothing could actually change in a meaningful way out of fear of changing the status quo. In AoS, Anvilgard has fallen, a character ascended to godhood, Slaanesh is getting empowered, a new god awoke, Nagash got crippled pretty hard and Arkhan was destroyed etc. And that was just during Broken Realms. Who knows what happens next, Azyr being breached and other major events are a legitimate possibility, which is very exciting!

And it's not like gods doing their thing limits the amount of heroes there are. I think there's only one or two books at all in BL that are from the perspective of a god, the rest is all focused on people in the realms. Important Stormcast are being fleshed out (Neave, Yndrasta, Bastian), the CoS are getting a renewed focus (Tahlia, Calis, Toll, Zenestra, Zane, etc) and more and more factions are getting characters with novel series (Drekki, Cado, the Ven Densts).

The only times the gods really make moves is during campaigns, which makes perfect sense as a way to shake up the setting. The Necroquake, Morathi's apotheosis and the Rite of Life are super fun to read the consequences of in BL books. It's what's keeping the setting fresh. Just like primarchs do in 40K, who are basically the equivalent of Order gods.

Edited December 19, 2023 by Snarff

[Tonhel]

2 minutes ago, Snarff said:

I much prefer the gods being active, it's part of what makes the setting so unique. It's like a living and evolving mythology where things can actually radically chamge rather than a stagnant setting with no stakes like TOW.

In the old world, (with notable exception of the end times) nothing could actually change in a meaningful way. In AoS, Anvilgard has fallen, a character ascended to godhood, Slaanesh is getting empowered, a new god awoke, Nagash got crippled pretty hard and Arkhan was destroyed etc. And that was just during Broken Realms. Who knows what happens next, Azyr being breached and other major events are a legitimate possibility, which is very exciting!

And it's not like gods doing their thing limits the amount of heroes there are. I think there's only one or two books at all in BL that are from the perspective of a god, the rest is all focused on people in the realms. Important Stormcast are being fleshed out (Neave, Yndrasta, Bastian), the CoS are getting a renewed focus (Tahlia, Calis, Toll, Zenestra, Zane, etc) and more and more factions are getting characters with novel series (Drekki, Cado, the Ven Densts).

The only times the gods really make moves is during campaigns, which makes perfect sense as a way to shake up the setting. The Necroquake, Morathi's apotheosis and the Rite of Life are super fun to read the consequences of in BL books. It's what's keeping the setting fresh. Just like primarchs do in 40K, who are basically the equivalent of Order gods.

The AoS system is huge, all the gods could become silent from 4th edition onwards and still a lot of things could happen and new things could be introduced. It would even be quite cool. How would stormcast react and etc.. without having a direct line with Sigmar. How would Lumineth change when Teclis/Tyrion became silent and etc.. . 

[Snarff]

Just now, Tonhel said:

The AoS system is huge, all the gods could become silent from 4th edition onwards and still a lot of things could happen and new things could be introduced. It would even be quite cool. How would stormcast react and etc.. without having a direct line with Sigmar. How would Lumineth change when Teclis/Tyrion became silent and etc.. . 

I don't think that's in any way more exciting than occasionally (for most gods less than once an edition) actually making a move. Why have all these gods if you're not using them anyway?

Besides, what you describe is also actually happening already. Nagash's setback has lead to Soulblight taking more power, Ossiarch being left to their own devices, and Ushoran coming back (most probably).

FS show what happens to a faction when a god falls. KO reject gods outright. DoK are divided and the crones refuse to acknowledge or follow Morathi.

Or just look at Godeater's Son in its entirety if you want an amazing novel about rejecting order gods.

All those things are already happening everywhere in lore.

 

[CommissarRotke]

39 minutes ago, Tonhel said:

I thought they mentioned that Planet Zoo and Jurassic World were succeses and they will go back to their roots. I read (if I remember correctly) that Planet Zoo had a return of 10x it's investment. So if Frontier games has financiel problems its because of RoR and not because of Planet zoo and etc.. .

Right, their "CMS portfolio" is doing fine but RoR is the last in a line of launch failures for Frontier trying to branch out. Just because RoR is their most recent launch doesn't mean it is SOLELY at fault for shares dropping.

The meat of the article makes it pretty clear the studio was expecting this since late 2022... they had already done layoffs/closures before RoR's launch soured.

 

[Vasshpit]

As soon as I have a rig that'll handle realms of ruin I'll be all over it. 

Looks like it plays similar to dawn of War 2 and I LOVED that game! Also it has Kruleboyz! 🤘🤩🤘

[Freemeta]

this alchemist could be a futur chaos dawnbringer book 5 hero.

[Ejecutor]

41 minutes ago, Snarff said:

I much prefer the gods being active, it's part of what makes the setting so unique. It's like a living and evolving mythology where things can actually radically chamge rather than a stagnant setting with no stakes like TOW.

In the old world, (with notable exception of the end times) nothing could actually change in a meaningful way out of fear of changing the status quo. In AoS, Anvilgard has fallen, a character ascended to godhood, Slaanesh is getting empowered, a new god awoke, Nagash got crippled pretty hard and Arkhan was destroyed etc. And that was just during Broken Realms. Who knows what happens next, Azyr being breached and other major events are a legitimate possibility, which is very exciting!

And it's not like gods doing their thing limits the amount of heroes there are. I think there's only one or two books at all in BL that are from the perspective of a god, the rest is all focused on people in the realms. Important Stormcast are being fleshed out (Neave, Yndrasta, Bastian), the CoS are getting a renewed focus (Tahlia, Calis, Toll, Zenestra, Zane, etc) and more and more factions are getting characters with novel series (Drekki, Cado, the Ven Densts).

The only times the gods really make moves is during campaigns, which makes perfect sense as a way to shake up the setting. The Necroquake, Morathi's apotheosis and the Rite of Life are super fun to read the consequences of in BL books. It's what's keeping the setting fresh. Just like primarchs do in 40K, who are basically the equivalent of Order gods.

There's plenty of books that are selling a lot of copies with gods playing around, like Malazan Book of the Fallen.

Imo is not about having the gods wandering around or not, it is just matter of time for us to get used to it, as we come from its predecesor that was not giving us this kind of situations so often.

[Ganigumo]

5 hours ago, Mutton said:

Nurgle is also one of those factions that already has five thousand heroes to choose from. They need units, not another single model sorcerer or whatever. I would like to see something akin to Plague Toads reimagined and in plastic.

having a nice non-unique monster would be nice, with hero and non-hero variants. A giant plague toad would be a cool fit for it.

[Satyrical Sophist]

38 minutes ago, Ganigumo said:

having a nice non-unique monster would be nice, with hero and non-hero variants. A giant plague toad would be a cool fit for it.

I kind of wish there was a generic maggoth rider, feels like a missing thing. It’s kind of weird that lord of affliction is the only option for a non unique foot hero who isn’t a small foot hero.

[Tonhel]

1 hour ago, Snarff said:

I don't think that's in any way more exciting than occasionally (for most gods less than once an edition) actually making a move. Why have all these gods if you're not using them anyway?

Besides, what you describe is also actually happening already. Nagash's setback has lead to Soulblight taking more power, Ossiarch being left to their own devices, and Ushoran coming back (most probably).

FS show what happens to a faction when a god falls. KO reject gods outright. DoK are divided and the crones refuse to acknowledge or follow Morathi.

Or just look at Godeater's Son in its entirety if you want an amazing novel about rejecting order gods.

All those things are already happening everywhere in lore.

 

The nagash plot is a reharsh of what he did a couple thousand years during Warhammer. 😄

It's for me not only the background, but also the actual use of those gods on the battlefield. Anyway  we have different preferences and that's fine. Imo how heroes are handled in game is a bit problematic. They are either a bit bland, a bit useless and fragile or they are uber beings.

 

[MitGas]

1 hour ago, Ejecutor said:

There's plenty of books that are selling a lot of copies with gods playing around, like Malazan Book of the Fallen.

Imo is not about having the gods wandering around or not, it is just matter of time for us to get used to it, as we come from its predecesor that was not giving us this kind of situations so often.

It‘s less the gods themselves but how the setting uses them/godhood and it‘s a difficult position regardless imo. While I find eldritch gods more interesting and thus will always prefer outer gods such as the chaos ones who are basically enablers that never directly intervene (at least in the sense of not standing on the battlefield themselves), I think the problem lies more in god X feeling like s/he‘s always there and will succeed. It makes it less special to see those gods and even worse, it makes it hard for other characters to establish themselves. I vastly prefer „demi-gods“ to real gods in the direct storytelling as they‘re closer to us and thus provide better drama, even if GW follows the greek pantheon‘s way of having flawed gods - demi-god‘s powers are more strictly defined and limited, it gives something to work with. 
 

i think there‘s a good reason why the God-Emperor is just a vague bit-player and the primarchs are the demi-gods we read most of, similarly the chaos gods and their champions. Imagine a stupid scenario like hero X coming across a cursed place or deadly-sick man… if a god like Sigmar couldn‘t heal them or lift the curse, he‘d feel impotent to the reader and if can mind-battle Nurgle over the poor soul‘s sickness and win, it feels a bit cheap too - if our super-strong hero can‘t do it and has to do something to make it happen, we suddenly got an adventure! I‘m no writer obviously and a lot of personal preference swings into it from either side but I shall repeat what I‘ve been told in script-writing classes: „ultimately what we really care about are the people‘s relationships with each other, not the action, not the effects. You take the human component away and it might be cool from a technical POV but it will never pique your interest in the long run and make you wish to see it over and over.“ the best sci-fi movies etc. have a lot of „normal“ drama in them. 

[flying_dutchman]

4 hours ago, Satyrical Sophist said:

I kind of wish there was a generic maggoth rider, feels like a missing thing. It’s kind of weird that lord of affliction is the only option for a non unique foot hero who isn’t a small foot hero.

Harbingers of decay?

[JackStreicher]

[Vasshpit]

Fresh daemon prince of Sig-mair?... 🤔

[Xil]

1 hour ago, JackStreicher said:

She looks like one of those girls walking around the train stations at night.

So better ignore her or you will get StD (or S2D xD)

[Beliman]

To be honest, the way AoS is presented for most people is completely diferent than any campaign supplement or any Black Library book.

Hatchet fascicles and any AoS advertising presents a shallow setting. Where Gods (that came from Fantasy btw) do everything, and nobody remember any named character. Even factions/civilizations don't have any background besides a few blurry lines ("Kharadrons are dwarfs that live on the skies of Mortal Realms, mining a unique mineral called Breath of Gungni". No, that's not how a civilization is presented).

Don't get me wrong, every faction has a background in AOS, but you need to scratch the surface to love them. Most armies have 2 lines, and with a weird setting that has woods with permanent fire (how is this possible?) and rivers of melted minerals, it's hard to understand what's going on. For a newcomer, that "is magic", and that's not satisfactory.

Another point is the scale of power, as @MitGassaid above and how it's translated on the table and the story.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Beliman

[Nezzhil]

I am going to discard every suggestion of new Cities models, outside BL characters, for a while.

I would not discard that a new Warhammer Quest is coming.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Nezzhil

[BarakUrbaz]

I think the primary flaw with marketing Age of Sigmar is that its a setting that's hard to describe in a simple and quick way.

Warhammer Fantasy is easy to grasp, its essentially "Renaissance Earth but with Fantasy races and everything's kind of ******". 40k as well, its "A tyrannical space empire of Catholic Space ****** fights against aliens and demons who are even more evil". Age of Sigmar? Best I can come up with is "Gods and their worshippers fight over control of 8 elemental planes except they aren't really the classical set of elements everyone knows.", and even that feels like its not really an accurate description of the setting. 

Edited December 20, 2023 by BarakUrbaz

[Ejecutor]

2 minutes ago, Nezzhil said:

I am going to discard every suggestion of new Cities models, outside BL characters, for a while.

I would not discard that a new Warhammer Quest is coming.

That's a good point! It wouldn't be rare to get a new quest game. Specially a 40k one.

[MitGas]

4 minutes ago, Ejecutor said:

That's a good point! It wouldn't be rare to get a new quest game. Specially a 40k one.

Loving the idea as well - I'd like for them to stick to one though (and would prefer an AoS one)... make it a long-lasting thing over many years/supplements, not a game supported for a year and then it's over like Black Fortress or Silver Tower. I think everyone knows lots of people (who are not necessarily into Warhammer) that loved HeroQuest for example! 👌

[Chikout]

I always struggle with the fact that people struggle with the setting of AoS. It's basically Norse mythology with mostly less confusing realms. The gods are active and flawed in much the way the likes of Thor and co  are. Are realm gates so much more confusing than the bifrost? 

Diablo may as well be set in the realm of death. There are lots of other examples of settings similar to AoS.

As for weird stuff in the setting we have most of it right here on earth. 

 

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2116536-molten-iron-river-discovered-speeding-beneath-russia-and-canada/

https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2017/10/13/hollow-tree-fire-california-orig-trnd-lab.cnn

[Beliman]

9 hours ago, Chikout said:

I always struggle with the fact that people struggle with the setting of AoS. It's basically Norse mythology with mostly less confusing realms. The gods are active and flawed in much the way the likes of Thor and co  are. Are realm gates so much more confusing than the bifrost?

That's exactly my point.

You can't present the whole setting saying that two giants had two sons: a wolf and a snake because POTATO. What you need to do is talk about the great Heroes and their struggles with that entities. With time, the reader will know that the big bad wolf with that sword on it's mouth is the Son of Loki.

What I'm trying to say (sorry for my english), is that most people will not know what a "bifrost" is. But everyone knows what a river, mountain or even a space ship with lasers are. That's your starting point, move from there.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Beliman

[Gitzdee]

1 hour ago, Nezzhil said:

I would not discard that a new Warhammer Quest is coming.

Good call. Its about time for another one of those. Cursed city sold out almost instantly. Maybe another for AoS?

[Nezzhil]

5 minutes ago, Gitzdee said:

Good call. Its about time for another one of those. Cursed city sold out almost instantly. Maybe another for AoS?

Cursed City Sold Out by problems with the external provider. Cursed City was not a succesful product for GW

[Draznak]

1 hour ago, Nezzhil said:

I would not discard that a new Warhammer Quest is coming.

Adventurers from the Mortal Realms through the Nurgle's garden.

You read it here first. 👀