EccentricCircle

Yeah, definitely. It felt as though I had to learn everything, before I could figure out what I actually wanted/needed to use. With AoS, its obvious what bits of rules you need to learn, and you can gradually build up a familiarity with it. I find it easier to focus in short bursts as well, so being able to read the whole rulebook in one go, rather than over several days of study and revision definitely helped!

Thus my point that Idoneth must use an exotic material which wasn't available on medieval Earth.

Isn't the main issue that a regular bow string doesn't maintain its tension when wet? Clearly there are modern materials that can, as your video shows, but I'm not sure that was true in the past. Clearly Idoneth must use some sort of waterproof allopex gut for their bows!

I got into warhammer fantasy around the transition to 8e, having played 40k and Lotr previously. I immediately loved the lore ( although I knew a fair bit of it already, it must be admitted) and I didn't have too much trouble with units, which i really enjoyed painting. However to this day I still haven't actually played 8e wfb, because I could never find the energy to work out all the rules. I got into Aos largely because of its simplicity. I'm not sure what it was about that big red book that i struggled with. I'd been playing other gw games for years. I play multiple rpgs, including D&D 3.5 with its hundreds of rulebooks. But 8e warhammer I just couldn't crack despite loving the setting and reading everything I could find about the lore.

That must be it! I'd dispute that the old world is based on Tolkien. I'd argue that it is based on the "standard fantasy setting", now for sure Tolkien originated many of the concepts that go into that, but D&D codified them, and created the interpretations which Warhammer then subverted and deconstructed. These days it can look like a bit of a Lord of the Rings ripoff, because being older than a lot of modern fantasy settings, it is closer to that paradigm. However I think if you want to sell the setting in todays crowded fantasy market then its defintiely the pseudohistorical grimdark stuff that is the selling point, not the (at first glance) stereotypical elves, dwarves etc. You really need to lean into the Moorcock inspired Chaos Stuff, the crumbling dysfunctional empire, and the counterpart culture nature of a lot of the factions, because that is what the setting became known for in the end. In some ways I feel like The Old World and Age of Sigmar have the opposite problems. Original Warhammer was a not especially original setting, which was executed perfectly. Over 30 years the lore built from a fairly uninspired set of fantasy counterpart cultures, to really examine and parody all of those classic fantasy tropes. The result is one of the best fantasy settings of all time, and one which is always going to be a classic, just because of the mould breaking position it holds in the history of created worlds. Conversely Age of Sigmar is arguably a much more interesting and ambitious setting, which has a scope and freedom to it that old school warhammer never could. However it is still early days, and not everything they've written for it yet has been golden. It definitely has a lot of potential, and there is a lot of really good stuff that is gradually making it a very compelling world. However it will always be in the shadow of its predecessor, and to and extent that may hold it back from being all that it can and should be. It can never quite capture the same anarchic energy or satirical sophistication of old warhammer, because its not being made in the same way, or in the same time. However it has the potential to rise beyond that and become something truly great in its own way, in much the same way that 40K escaped the gravity of its predecessor, and became the more popular setting overall. In some ways having both games being supported simultaneously could be great, as it would allow AoS to go in whatever direction it wants, rather than trying to balance the grittyness of the old world, with the superpowered heroics of its stormcast stories etc. We shall have to see I guess.

I guess that must be it!

In fact armour is worn over several layers of cloth, including a padded jacket, there can be a layer of chainmail, and then there is an air space between the body and the armour. Someone with a large chest just needs a slightly larger size of armour, and enough padding to make it fit. The outer shape of the armour should not change, as the domed shape which slopes off to the side evolved over many centuries to be the best shape to deflect incoming blows. Interestingly modern male beauty standards weren't a thing back in medieval times, so armour was usually shaped to show off a narrow waist, and didn't put a lot of focus on the chest and shoulders. A wasp waist and a big codpiece was what was seen as attractive in men. In earlier eras you get Muscular Cuirasses, where the chest is sculpted on the armour. This was usually worn by generals and nobles who wanted to look good but were less likely to get hit by an actual spear. A female general or Empress would, I'm sure, want a muscular cuirass which reflected female beauty standards rather than male ones. Boobplate armour is thus plausible in that context, but there is no reason to think that an ancient culture's beauty standards would be the same as ours,much less those of a fantasy world. On another note I'm glad I'm not the only one to think that Primaris would have been the perfect opportunity to bring in female space marines. Its such a missed opportunity, as they could have told the anti-female-marine crowd: "You are quite right, there have never been female marines, but now there are going to be!" and had a good lore reason to back that up.

My main concern about the Idoneth is that they are all wearing heavy armoured boots. I know that is part of the classic Aelven look, but it can't be very practical for swimming! I need to come up with a coral armour paint scheme for mine, but its been a bit tricky to get looking good.

That is a lovely conversion! It really shows how much potential there is to give things a different aesthetic twist. It certainly has me glacing at my Tomb Kings bits box to wonder if I could do something similar. It wouldn't be easy certainly, some of the bits that have gone into that model are not easy to come by any more (such as the herald's banner, and the Tomb King models used as the attaches. Great project though! Hopefully there will be some information on how he converted it.

Here's an interesting thought. If it does take three years to develop, then it would potentially be coming out to coincide with the 40th anniversary of Warhammer. I think we're most likely to get Hero figures, and some conversion kits to make your Age of Sigmar models more "old worldy". I would love a Tomb Kings vs Bretonnians starter though, and those are factions which would be hard to do via conversion kits, since so much is missing from the iconic lineup of both ranges.

Nice! I'll check them out!

Very good points! GW still have a way to go on acheiving parity, so one good thing to discuss might be good sources of compatible 3rd party models. I've seen Frostgrave Soldiers brought up, and didn't know they did an all female kit, so I'll have to check them out! I play the game, but tend to use lord of the rings models, so I should probably see what they have to offer. I know that raging heroes is a thing, and while their sculpts are amazingly dynamic, and you have to admire their artistry, I find the overly skimpy attire of their figures off putting. I don't want to say that there is anything inherently wrong with that, but it certainly isn't for me. Obviously the big RPG lines do plenty of female models. I've got a lot of heroes from Reaper and Wizkids, who sometimes get used as leaders, or unit champions. What else would people suggest? If we want more female models, then a good way to get them is to show the various companies making them that we're willing to buy the kits!

My head canon is that any empire soldier without a massive moustache is a woman who dressed as a man to join the army, but that only really works for the mire historical old world setting. For freeguild in aos, there should just be ladies in the rank and file. One option is to do a few all female kits, lets have some dwarven shield maidens, or chaos ladies in the style of the warqueen. If they have the same stats, then you can mix and match or segregate your units to your heart's content.

Precisely.

There definitely need to be more female models. Its slowly getting better, and I have no doubt will continue to do so, but we could definitely use more women among the human models. If free peoples had similar diversity to later stormcast and nighthaunt kits then that would be great. At the moment its kind of weird that the only ladies in city armies are elves. Let's have a mixed gender witch Hunter kit to better reflect the novels, or a lady wizard kit to complement the all male one. I'm fine with a few factions being one gender, clearly Daughters of Khaine are a predominantly female army, which is great. Likewise we don't necessarily need female orks or skaven, given their background. That said i think some beastwomen would be cool when they come to update that range. There is no good reason why any section of the gor herd wouldn't fight. Fhn note: my tablet tried to auto correct gor herd to government...

I can arrange my collection into fully armed and operational armies for Lizardmen, Dwarfs, Chaos Dwarfs, Tomb Kings, Vampire Counts, Night Goblins, and all three flavours of Elves (just about) so hopefully all or most of those will get support. Tomb Kings would naturally be my first pick for what to play, just because of how awkward it is to play them in Age of Sigmar. Classic Dwarfs and High elves would also be close contenders for similar reasons. The only classic Old World faction which I don't have a single miniature for is Chaos Daemons, everything else I've got at least a couple of heros for RPGs and painting projects! If it ends up being Empire centric then I can probably just about scrape together a force of that using the human bits of my Cities of Sigmar army, but it wouldn't be the best empire army really as half of them are Brettonians, and most of the rest are quite wizard heavy! Maybe the empire troop kits are something to work on in the next 3 years!

Definitely. If you have people sharing a space, and watching each other's games it makes it easier to cross promote one system to players who might otherwise want to stick to the one they play. One major challenge in my mind is that people always want to use their own minis. I know a lot of gamers who only, or mainly have 40K figures, so for them the idea of playing AoS isn't worth the effort. In theory all of GW's fantasy based games interact, but unless you are a Daemon player the rift between fantasy of whichever stripe, and 40K seems to be the gulf that's hardest to cross.

I'd disagree, my thread went off topic quicker, but reading your OP, it is precisely what I wanted to create a discussion space for, so merge away!

I entirely agree. If a new system increases the numebr of people participating in the hobby as a whole, then that has major advantages for everyone, regardless of what system they are playing. The problem can be when a group wants to brand itself as an Age of Sigmar group (or a 40K group or whatever).

I guess the main question for debate is: Do multiple competing game systems have to be a zero sum game? I feel like they really shouldn't. The more people playing in total, the more chance there should be for any given game to get more players. However people are rightly fearing that everyone only has so much time, money and energy to spend on a given game, and the more games their attention is split between, the less they are going to be able to play any one of them. This is clearly an issue that is causing a lot of concern, but there must be ways to ensure that everyone gets to play the games they want to, even if it is as simple as taking note of what the favourite games of your gaming friends are, and being willing to compromise, and play them from time to time, even if they are not your favourite. If one person is always the one compromising, then that's less fun for them, and they are more likely to drop out of the club. If everyone plays their favourite game some of the time, and is willing to try everyone else's favourites, then that has to be healthier in the long run!

For sure, the lord of the rings casts a huge shadow over the entire fantasy genre. That said its interesting that a lot of Gygax's inspiration with D&D seems to have come from older pulp writers like Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith, and C.L. Moore. Some of the stuff I've read suggests that he put the Tolkien stuff in because he knew it was going to be popular, but that earlier generation of fantasy writers are the ones to look to as the foundation of fantasy gaming. Warhammer also draws a lot of inspiration from the sort of fantasy counterculture of writers like Michael Moorcock, so I think that if you really want to understand the literary foundation of warhammer, you both need to read Tolkien, and read beyond Tolkien! (This is all massively off topic, of course, maybe there should be some sort of Fantasy Book club thread to track where all our favourity high fantasy tropes come from!)

Very good points. Definitely having more systems to choose from shouldn't be a Zero Sum Game, but there definitely seem to be communities where it is a legitimate concern. I've started another thread to talk about ways to grow gaming groups, and try to ensure that more options bring in more people, and cater to more tastes, rather than just creating smaller cliques and edition wars.

That's and interesting take, and I definitely agree that building a group from people you already get along with can be less stressful than finding people who already play the game. I am partially sighted, so have never found "pick up games" at clubs of stores to be much fun. Even if the lighting is good enough for me to be able to play at all, I'll still have to start by explaining my disabilities to complete strangers, and hope that they accept that things are going to take longer, and that I'm not going to be able to read dice rolls from across the table, or necessarily recognise which units are which without going and looking. Its much more enjoyable to go into the game with people who know that to start with. Gjnoronh: I've always found the cyclical nature of the Hobby's origins to be fascinating. D&D evolves out of historical wargaming via Chainmail, and then warhammer evolves out of Citadel Miniatures, many intended for D&D. Plus you have Fighting Fantasy books thrown into the mix as well, effectively three completely different genres of gaming all coming out of that early RP boom.

I'd argue That they still are, it's just that sigmar likes them, and the gryphound sanctuary has a good PR team, so their chaotic nature gets overlooked. it helps that they are fluffy. If people wanted Jabberslythe puppies for Sigmar-mas instead then it would be a whole different situatuon.

The magmadroth proves that they could do some amazing dragons if they wanted too! Definitely an area that needs improvement!