The "mortals redesign" Discussion

[Draznak]

1 hour ago, Pariah7echo said:

And honestly of the models in Cities, the humans are probably the oldest and worst looking of the bunch, so them getting an update first is fine.

I agree.

So far, Empire plastic kits are the WHB references that match the least to the AoS "style" (imho). And that's one of the reasons, I think, the Cities of Sigmar revamp is potentially the biggest release in AoS history.

 

1 hour ago, Pariah7echo said:

Kinda hoping Cities stays multi-racial. 

If I had to bet, I would say that we will have a few multi-racial characters (duardins, aelves...) a bit like Cursed City heroes and all the troops will be human-centered.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

5 minutes ago, Draznak said:

If I had to bet, I would say that we will have a few multi-racial characters (duardins, aelves...) a bit like Cursed City heroes and all the troops will be human-centered.

I don't really see a reason to believe that wanderers, dispossessed or all the various dark elves will actually get removed, though. It seems like it would be a huge and unnecessary change to the established lore.

[Pariah7echo]

20 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I don't really see a reason to believe that wanderers, dispossessed or all the various dark elves will actually get removed, though. It seems like it would be a huge and unnecessary change to the established lore.

Yea that part. Like yes they could rewrite it all, but at a certain point that just becomes more trouble than its worth. I could see a slow purge of units as they redo them though. Like combining black guard/executioners/phoenix guard/wildwood rangers into one elven elite unit multi-kit. And doing the same with the eternal guard/darkshards/bleakswords/dreadspears. Just cleaning up some of the duplicates could go a long way to simplifying the roster.

[Draznak]

37 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I don't really see a reason to believe that wanderers, dispossessed or all the various dark elves will actually get removed, though. It seems like it would be a huge and unnecessary change to the established lore.

Ok I must admit that I am very human-centric because I liked Empire at WHB (and above all, I'm a big fan of the grimdark aesthetic, specific to the GW universe) and they remain the reference around which we can dive back into the AoS lore (one of the main criticisms that I hear around me, about AoS, is that there are no humans "made in" AoS).

For me it would always be weird to offer a new strongly human range and to make it cohabit with dwarf or elven references, very marked WHB. The mix of WHB/AoS minis that has been a problem for me since the beginning of AoS (more or less depending on the factions).

Cities of Sigmar revamp is a huge opportunity to fix this (at the expense of other races, I still admit).

[RyantheFett]

8 hours ago, Pariah7echo said:

Yea that part. Like yes they could rewrite it all, but at a certain point that just becomes more trouble than its worth. I could see a slow purge of units as they redo them though. Like combining black guard/executioners/phoenix guard/wildwood rangers into one elven elite unit multi-kit. And doing the same with the eternal guard/darkshards/bleakswords/dreadspears. Just cleaning up some of the duplicates could go a long way to simplifying the roster.

I have read several AOS books and the amount of retcon needed to remove the other races would be insane. In game it looks good on paper. Redo the patchwork army and boost the other Order armies that really would love a few units. In practice would be a nightmare and really bad PR. A lot of people would end up with units for 4 or 5 factions and not enough points to play any of them. 

Funny enough I also mix and match my Cities units based off of the weapons and going thought the list it is crazy how much overlap/redundancy they have in faction. Don't remember exactly, but I went thought the list and you could pretty much combine a 1/3 to a 1/2 of the faction in the way you listed without anything good being lost.

8 hours ago, Draznak said:

Ok I must admit that I am very human-centric because I liked Empire at WHB (and above all, I'm a big fan of the grimdark aesthetic, specific to the GW universe) and they remain the reference around which we can dive back into the AoS lore (one of the main criticisms that I hear around me, about AoS, is that there are no humans "made in" AoS).

For me it would always be weird to offer a new strongly human range and to make it cohabit with dwarf or elven references, very marked WHB. The mix of WHB/AoS minis that has been a problem for me since the beginning of AoS (more or less depending on the factions).

Cities of Sigmar revamp is a huge opportunity to fix this (at the expense of other races, I still admit).

The leaks/rumors we got point more towards Cities staying the same, but a rework of just the humans right now. Will be interesting to see how they handle the old units if this turns out to be true.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

16 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I don't really see a reason to believe that wanderers, dispossessed or all the various dark elves will actually get removed, though. It seems like it would be a huge and unnecessary change to the established lore.

Sad Whitefang react.

People with mixed forces:

[Draznak]

46 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Sad Whitefang react.

... and laugh at me -_-'

I guess I'll humbly retire and wait patiently for what happens next... Predictions are for wise prophets, not mortal people ^^.

[CommissarRotke]

22 hours ago, Draznak said:

For me it would always be weird to offer a new strongly human range and to make it cohabit with dwarf or elven references, very marked WHB. The mix of WHB/AoS minis that has been a problem for me since the beginning of AoS (more or less depending on the factions).

It wouldn't be that weird though--WHF always had... pockets? I guess we can call them? Of cohabitation like Marienburg or Border Princes. One of the best choices AOS made was to leave the racial grudges like dwarf vs elf in WHF. It would be a major shame if any Cities rework decided to split up such a solid lore foundation now. Heck, I'd even love to see more one-off characters like Brutogg who don't belong to an "Order faction" but have been accepted into a City regardless.

I can agree that the mix of miniatures specifically is weird, which is why I'm in the camp of hoping City duardin and aelves get their due after humans do.

[RyantheFett]

8 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Sad Whitefang react.

People with mixed forces:

Based off of his likes and reacts the non human races will just be mixed together. The sad face could just be the fact that they may end up with only one or two units for each race now?

Which is still a win-win for everyone? GW does not ****** off fans by destroying an entire faction/lore, they still gets to sell everything, and they have fewer units to balance in a faction that has a lot of bad units. Players get to keep on using their City armies, buy new humans (which are easily the worse looking units), and dust off units that have never seen play for cooler looking mix armies.

Just a quick glace and we could combine:

• Hammerers/Longbeards - Duaruin elite
• Gyrobomber/Gyrocopter- Duaruin air machine
• Shadow Warriors/Sisters of the Watch- Aelf scouts
• Frostheart Phoenix/Flamespyre Phoenix- Anointed Phoenix

And that is just stuff that comes together and looks very similar. The Aelfs races have a lot of overlap with both spear and cavalry units.

Edit:

Or not lol. I'll join the wait and see camp now and stop trying to guess.

Edited September 7, 2022 by RyantheFett

[Pariah7echo]

1 hour ago, RyantheFett said:

Based off of his likes and reacts the non human races will just be mixed together. The sad face could just be the fact that they may end up with only one or two units for each race now?

Which is still a win-win for everyone? GW does not ****** off fans by destroying an entire faction/lore, they still gets to sell everything, and they have fewer units to balance in a faction that has a lot of bad units. Players get to keep on using their City armies, buy new humans (which are easily the worse looking units), and dust off units that have never seen play for cooler looking mix armies.

Just a quick glace and we could combine:

• Hammerers/Longbeards - Duaruin elite
• Gyrobomber/Gyrocopter- Duaruin air machine
• Shadow Warriors/Sisters of the Watch- Aelf scouts
• Frostheart Phoenix/Flamespyre Phoenix- Anointed Phoenix

And that is just stuff that comes together and looks very similar. The Aelfs races have a lot of overlap with both spear and cavalry units.

Edit:

Or not lol. I'll join the wait and see camp now and stop trying to guess.

I think it could also be you just picked units that were already dual kits/actually have different roles. If they're gonna get rid of units/consolidate, picking units that are already a single mold doesn't help. I mean does cities really need freeguild guard and the dreadspears and eternal guard? They're all variations on 'standard infantry' left over from fantasy. If you combined them into a new mixed unit called 'city guard' (name pending) a player could mix and match their dreadspears/freeguild/eternal guard freely, or buy the new kit.

[Chikout]

Speculation time!

From looking into the scrying stone that is the likes of @Whitefang plus the lore and what's available from gw now I think it's possible to make a few suppositions about the upcoming release. 

1- Most if not all of the current freeguild kits wil be going away. It's possible that something like the demigryph Knights might stay but they may clash with the new aesthetic.

2- The new release will only contain humans but could possibly contain an absolute minimum of non humans. 

3- Some non human kits will be cut. 

4- it's a cities of Sigmar refresh not a Dawnbreaker Crusades book. 

5- In the lore there are some Duardin and Aelf factions that are mentioned regularly but some that are barely touched upon. 

There has been plenty of mention of Dispossessed and Wanderers but I can't remember a single time outside of the cities battletome that Darkshards get mentioned for example. 

Some of the kits still don't have round bases. 

Based on this, I'm going to guess that a lot of the non pirate Dark Aelves are going away: Darkshards, Executioners, assassins (DoK fills that niche now) Cold one Knights, maybe even the chariots. I always thought it was a bit weird that a pirate faction would have chariots.  The Shadow warriors/ sisters of the watch are another set that I haven't seen mentioned in the lore. I could see them going away. 

The phoenix guard are still on squares, and are, in my opinion, ugly models but they have a city named after them so it would be a surprise to see them go. 

It's really the Dispossessed and the Wanderers that are a worry for me. They both have a major part of the lore in fact one of this year's black library novels stars a Wanderer, and another features a Dispossessed Duardin in a major role. I really hope they stay part of the book even if they don't get any new models. 

 

Edited September 8, 2022 by Chikout

[EntMan]

16 minutes ago, Chikout said:

fact one of this year's black library novels stars a Wanderer, and another features a Dispossessed Duardin in a major role.

This gave me hope.

[Asbestress]

2 hours ago, Chikout said:

Speculation time!

From looking into the scrying stone that is the likes of @Whitefang plus the lore and what's available from gw now I think it's possible to make a few suppositions about the upcoming release. 

1- Most if not all of the current freeguild kits wil be going away. It's possible that something like the demigryph Knights might stay but they may clash with the new aesthetic.

2- The new release will only contain humans but could possibly contain an absolute minimum of non humans. 

3- Some non human kits will be cut. 

4- it's a cities of Sigmar refresh not a Dawnbreaker Crusades book. 

5- In the lore there are some Duardin and Aelf factions that are mentioned regularly but some that are barely touched upon. 

There has been plenty of mention of Dispossessed and Wanderers but I can't remember a single time outside of the cities battletome that Darkshards get mentioned for example. 

Some of the kits still don't have round bases. 

Based on this, I'm going to guess that a lot of the non pirate Dark Aelves are going away: Darkshards, Executioners, assassins (DoK fills that niche now) Cold one Knights, maybe even the chariots. I always thought it was a bit weird that a pirate faction would have chariots.  The Shadow warriors/ sisters of the watch are another set that I haven't seen mentioned in the lore. I could see them going away. 

The phoenix guard are still on squares, and are, in my opinion, ugly models but they have a city named after them so it would be a surprise to see them go. 

It's really the Dispossessed and the Wanderers that are a worry for me. They both have a major part of the lore in fact one of this year's black library novels stars a Wanderer, and another features a Dispossessed Duardin in a major role. I really hope they stay part of the book even if they don't get any new models. 

 

Oh, I really hope this is what happens.
Dispossessed have been consistently described as core parts of the cities (many times with alongside the Ironweld), due to the fact that they are the main builders of them. If they get cut, I could see them giving this role purely to the Ironweld, but I think my Irondrakes have a fair chance of staying 😛 

Wanderers are also semi-major parts of the lore of the Sylvaneth, with them abandoning Ghyran and such during the Age of Chaos,  and now fighting to retake it to atone for that.

Phoenix Guard and Black Ark stuff will probably be staying, due to both of them being integral to the existence of major Cities (Phoenicium and Misthavn respectively), but those are in a bit more of a limbo alongside their Cities imo.

Edited September 8, 2022 by Asbestress

[Pariah7echo]

6 hours ago, Chikout said:

Based on this, I'm going to guess that a lot of the non pirate Dark Aelves are going away: Darkshards, Executioners, assassins (DoK fills that niche now) Cold one Knights, maybe even the chariots. I always thought it was a bit weird that a pirate faction would have chariots.  The Shadow warriors/ sisters of the watch are another set that I haven't seen mentioned in the lore. I could see them going away.

I won't lie, your argument makes all of the sense. And I could honestly see it being true. But this bit makes me sad as the Dark elves are my favorite. Granted if they took Darkling covens and order serpentis and redid them for Malerion's army and added the Shadowblades back to DOK (or both since shadowblades were a gift to Sigmar from Malerion as I recall) it would be ok. It would leave the chariots and the monster kits in a weird place, but that could be addressed when they inevitably expand scourge privateers.

 

EDIT: I've had a thought on the shadowblades bit. It never occurred to me that perhaps they named the shadowstalkers as 'Khainite' because they planned on there being two versions. One for each of the shadow gods. Would make sense if they were the middle ground between Malerion's more armored 'phalanx' army and the more 'barbaric' witch elves.

Edited September 8, 2022 by Pariah7echo

[Chikout]

1 hour ago, Pariah7echo said:

I won't lie, your argument makes all of the sense. And I could honestly see it being true. But this bit makes me sad as the Dark elves are my favorite. Granted if they took Darkling covens and order serpentis and redid them for Malerion's army and added the Shadowblades back to DOK (or both since shadowblades were a gift to Sigmar from Malerion as I recall) it would be ok. It would leave the chariots and the monster kits in a weird place, but that could be addressed when they inevitably expand scourge privateers.

The first Warhammer fantasy army I took to 2000 points was the old Chris Fitzpatrick Dark Elves so I absolutely have a fondness for them, but wiping the slate clean in preparation for the  arrival of Malerion (hopefully coming some time in the next 5 years)  seems like a good idea. 

[RyantheFett]

9 hours ago, Chikout said:

Speculation time!

From looking into the scrying stone that is the likes of @Whitefang plus the lore and what's available from gw now I think it's possible to make a few suppositions about the upcoming release. 

1- Most if not all of the current freeguild kits wil be going away. It's possible that something like the demigryph Knights might stay but they may clash with the new aesthetic.

2- The new release will only contain humans but could possibly contain an absolute minimum of non humans. 

3- Some non human kits will be cut. 

4- it's a cities of Sigmar refresh not a Dawnbreaker Crusades book. 

5- In the lore there are some Duardin and Aelf factions that are mentioned regularly but some that are barely touched upon. 

There has been plenty of mention of Dispossessed and Wanderers but I can't remember a single time outside of the cities battletome that Darkshards get mentioned for example. 

Some of the kits still don't have round bases. 

Based on this, I'm going to guess that a lot of the non pirate Dark Aelves are going away: Darkshards, Executioners, assassins (DoK fills that niche now) Cold one Knights, maybe even the chariots. I always thought it was a bit weird that a pirate faction would have chariots.  The Shadow warriors/ sisters of the watch are another set that I haven't seen mentioned in the lore. I could see them going away. 

The phoenix guard are still on squares, and are, in my opinion, ugly models but they have a city named after them so it would be a surprise to see them go. 

It's really the Dispossessed and the Wanderers that are a worry for me. They both have a major part of the lore in fact one of this year's black library novels stars a Wanderer, and another features a Dispossessed Duardin in a major role. I really hope they stay part of the book even if they don't get any new models. 

 

This is my favorite theory now lol.

Removing Darkling Covens, Order Serpentis, and maybe even Shadowblades makes a lot of sense if we are getting a new faction. And the lore always felt off to me. Would 100% work better with shadow elves since that faction would be all about the backstabbing, murder, and crazy dark magic.

On the other hand, I would like to think that the Dispossessed and Wanderes are in the safe category with the pirates. Would give a nice options to City players that you really can't get from the other Order factions and the models still hold up.............. and I mean something has to carry over in the faction? Right??????

The real issue with the Phoenix Guard is that LRL are like right there lol! I would argue for the Sisters of the Watch and the pirate chariot lol.

So that would give us

5 sub factions/races would be removed/remade:

• Freeguild
• Order Serpentis
• Darkling Covens,
• Shadowblades
• Ironweld Arsenal

3 (maybe 4) would stay in:

• Dispossed
• Wanderes
• Scourge Privateers
• Phoenix Temple

Would be interested to see what other people think how much gets cut from the faction or stays with this theory.

Edit: 

Or not lol. That is why I don't gamble or offer advice!!

Edited September 8, 2022 by RyantheFett

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

15 minutes ago, RyantheFett said:

On the other hand, I would like to think that the Dispossessed and Wanderes are in the safe category with the pirates. Would give a nice options to City players that you really can't get from the other Order factions and the models still hold up.............. and I mean something has to carry over in the faction? Right??????

If I am reading the entrails (Whitefang reactions) right, then there could be a chance that Wanderers and Dispossessed get attention in their own way, maybe by becoming real armies of their own. I believe there were some hints about Kurnothi and new Dwarves in the past that have yet to go anywhere.

In any case, if Cities keep their current coalition rules and is able to take dwarves and wanderers as coalition, basically nothing would change in terms of units anyway.

[novakai]

3 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

If I am reading the entrails (Whitefang reactions) right, then there could be a chance that Wanderers and Dispossessed get attention in their own way, maybe by becoming real armies of their own. I believe there were some hints about Kurnothi and new Dwarves in the past that have yet to go anywhere.

In any case, if Cities keep their current coalition rules and is able to take dwarves and wanderers as coalition, basically nothing would change in terms of units anyway.

i am assuming their coalition rules will change in some way or another to match other current coalition rules 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

13 minutes ago, novakai said:

i am assuming their coalition rules will change in some way or another to match other current coalition rules 

Hard to say, it's not like coalition rules are very unified at the moment. I think GW might keep them different for different armies, depending on how closely they work together in the lore.

[novakai]

1 minute ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Hard to say, it's not like coalition rules are very unified at the moment. I think GW might keep them different for different armies, depending on how closely they work together in the lore.

at least i think anything not in your pitch battle profile but is coalition-able will not get Keywords or any synergy from your allegiance ability. That feels like the general direction they are heading 

[Draznak]

28 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

If I am reading the entrails (Whitefang reactions) right, then there could be a chance that Wanderers and Dispossessed get attention in their own way, maybe by becoming real armies of their own.

Does GW want to add a new independent army or two to AoS?

Currently 24 factions is already a lot and we see that they are forced to make minimal releases (battletome + 1 miniature hero) to cover all the armies in time before there is a new edition. And that's not to mention 40k (26 factions counting SM supplements) and all their other games to cover. GW has too big a catalog of games/miniatures to handle with this stupid rule of changing editions every 3 years (far too short a time in my opinion).

On the other hand concerning the future of the Cities of Sigmar sub-factions, I would see the dark elves joining the army of Malerion as well as the Daughters of Khaine: a kind of battletome covering all the dark elves, whoever they are.

But before that, I want the grimdark human with AoS sauce 😛

[RyantheFett]

1 hour ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

If I am reading the entrails (Whitefang reactions) right, then there could be a chance that Wanderers and Dispossessed get attention in their own way, maybe by becoming real armies of their own. I believe there were some hints about Kurnothi and new Dwarves in the past that have yet to go anywhere.

In any case, if Cities keep their current coalition rules and is able to take dwarves and wanderers as coalition, basically nothing would change in terms of units anyway.

I could see them doing something like that. The only issue would be that they have a lot of small factions already that are struggling and adding two to three more to the mix would seem like a risk? And at least from this forum it seems they have several that could use some love.

Of course I am new to GW so not really sure how crazy they are when it comes to redoing factions, retconning years of lore, and removing models.

I would like to think 30+ models and removing the diversity angle from a faction in favor of just humans (which we all know will sell very well) would be too extreme with high risk of negative PR, but I don't know.

Edited September 8, 2022 by RyantheFett

[novakai]

2 minutes ago, RyantheFett said:

I could see them doing something like that. The only issue would be that they have a lot of small factions already that are struggling and adding two to three more to the mix would seem like a risk? And at least from this forum it seems they have several that could use some love.

Of course I am new to GW so not really sure how crazy they are when it comes to redoing factions, retconning years of lore, and removing models.

I would like to think 30+ models and removing the diversity angel from a faction in favor of just humans (which we all know will sell very well) would be too extreme with high risk of negative PR, but I don't know.

They don't seem to flinch too much when it comes to negative PR I find, at least not when it comes to retiring models as that is more a natural retail trend than something major. they have ridden out Warhammer Plus, their NDA form debacle, and other things with only minor course correction at best.

[Lich King]

Yeah I mean - do you really think GW care about bad PA? They’re the kings of the miniature hobby. Does anyone remember the destruction of the Old World just a few years ago ? That was terrible - and AOS absolutely sucked back then didn’t even have any cohesive play system ( some still argue there isn’t). So I think they’re not afraid of just pulling plugs or switching things around. 
 

    As for the Cities debacle : they had a chance to put Dispossessed into a united Dwarf book but didn’t. Same thing with Sylvaneth. Didn’t put wanderers back in or new Kurnothi or anything. So unfortunately , to my disliking , seems like only humans are being redone but they may in fact keep some of the other races together.

[Twisted Firaun]

42 minutes ago, Lich King said:

Yeah I mean - do you really think GW care about bad PA? They’re the kings of the miniature hobby. Does anyone remember the destruction of the Old World just a few years ago ? That was terrible - and AOS absolutely sucked back then didn’t even have any cohesive play system ( some still argue there isn’t). So I think they’re not afraid of just pulling plugs or switching things around. 
 

    As for the Cities debacle : they had a chance to put Dispossessed into a united Dwarf book but didn’t. Same thing with Sylvaneth. Didn’t put wanderers back in or new Kurnothi or anything. So unfortunately , to my disliking , seems like only humans are being redone but they may in fact keep some of the other races together.

In my personal opinion, I think the only kits that should be redone are any that are not from 8th edition of Warhammer Fantasy. Those kits were the last bit of the Old World before AOS and therefore kinda laid the groundwork for what was to come.