Introductions, introductions...

[Rogue Explorator]

So hi there, Lurker passing into poster territory here.

 

I've already posted a thread/poll over in general discussion, which was my impetus for joining, and thought introducing myself would be the courteous thing to do, there being a specific subforum for it and all.

 

Who am I, as gamer?

 

My older brother brought home the first White Dwarf released in German and then lost interest. I, on the other hand was hooked, I got that 2nd edition Warhammer 40k starter set with the legendary cardboard Deffdread, and from there GW products, mostly 40k, had an essential hand in raising me.

I got out of the hobby at about 16. Not that I turned my back on tabletop gaming, I just went from wargaming to roleplaying games, focusing on D&D, but dabbling in all sorts of systems.

I've since been sliding in and out of the periphery of the hobby, following developments and releasing, getting a box of minis here and there, a bit of occasional painting (until I no longer had working paints) but never seriously collecting or playing.

 

Recently, I was fully intending to finally get back into 40k, drawn by some amazing releases, like mechanicus, but then, after my initial dismissal, gave Age of Sigmar another look and was, in almost every way, deeply impressed.

The rules hit close to my preferences, combining a simple base game with exception based abilities, lacking USR, making good use of keywords. Even more so the design philosophy speaks to me, with its continued support for narrative play, an impressive diversity of scenarios/battleplans and the extreme swinginess of changing turns. I follow a philosophy of "emergent narrative" in tabletop gaming, by which I mean that the random chance inherent to such games brings out the best and most interesting stories. So unlike many competition oriented players, to a swingier game is a better game.

 

The minis are of course, wonderful. Miniature production has made leaps and bounds since my active time and I very much feel that GW is very much at the very top of design, underlying IP and technology, so it goes without saying, that, to me, the minis are stunning. Age of Sigmar, with the bigger scale and more loose unit composition showcases this better, but in the end, it wasn't the minis that drew me to the game. In fact, I am still awaiting a full new release that actually hits my taste. I expect this to happen when Arcanites, Rotbringers, New Beastmen (whatever faction) or something new for Death gets released. You can probably guess that I am praying for multipart, battleline Tzaangor to come with Arcanites.

 

But what truly hooked me in, to my grand surprise, is the setting. At a cursory glance, I expected the setting to bore me, at best. But I absolutely ended up loving it. It might be because I am among those who never really found the Old World all that impressive. I liked all those specifically Warhammer elements, but I found it drowned out by the generic gritty old world elements that tended to take center stage and dominance. The books had illustrations of surreal twisted impossible Chaos fortresses that set your mind aflame. But then you read the accompanying text and realized that those illustration would only exist in the real of chaos or incredibly close to the great portal. And that wouldn't be where the game plays, no, that would be in the woodlands and hills of the old world, that looked like, you know, woodlands and hills with some medieval/renaissance buildings.

Now Age of Sigmar is high magic and usually I don't like high magic settings. It makes me think of worlds like Warcraft, kitchen sinks where magic is a predictable tool. And I think that is where Age of Sigmar graps me. It may be high magic, but it is also still Warhammer, in the sense that all GW IP, from 40k, through 30k and blood bowl to the Old World are. And Warhammer gets Magic right in the sense that it is antithetical to predictability and reason. And this makes the world so wild and trippy, since it is completely unashamed to say this happens solely because it is Chaos/Magic, and also because just thought it up. It is stories like the fight against Puppa Grotesse, the battle over the silver falls toward the eldritch fortress or Allarielle fleeing over a frozen sea because of a dying Jotunberg that wouldn't be possible without that additude.

Age of Sigmar is the setting where I can take those insane illustrations that have been in every book on Chaos since the original "Slaves to Darkness" and "The Lost and the Damned" and build a battleboard inspired by that and say "Yep, that's definitely a part of the setting".

 

So here I am.

[TerrorPenguin]

Welcome!

I also tried to get back via 40K but it is a mess. I do love how easy to learn but complex to master AOS is and agree with you about the magic - it's always felt fairly unpredictable unlike other settings where 'I am magic so I win' can become prevalent at high levels.