EccentricCircle

I'm also more familiar with King Brodd from the forums than from realmgate wars lore, so it really does feel as though one of us just got an official model! I wonder whether the sculptor was aware of the forum and our monarch's love for all things gigantic or whether they just looked at the older books!

The big question in my mind is: will this be the first year with out a brand new faction which doesn't build off existing models in the range? Because so far we had: 2015, stormcast, 2016, fyreslayers, 2017, Kharadrons, 2018, Idoneth, 2019, Ossiarchs, 2020: Lumineth, 2021, Kruleboyzs. While the latest is functionaly part of war clans, it is conceptually a new faction. They all pretty much came out of the blue, rather than expanding something existing like gitz, soulbli ght or the chaos armies. So id we're going to get something similar this year, they are running out of time to preview it. Naturally I'd love chaos dwarves, as it seems as though they are coming. Equally, maybe they have enough factions now, and aren't going to continue that trend. As I said back in 2020, From what we know about their design timeline, we should expect a lull this year and into next, due to the delays of the 2020 lockdowns working their way through the production pipelines. That could we push 2022s new army back into next year. We shall see I guess!

Necromunda has the advantage that its one of the major forge world games, and they preview new stuff far more regularly and sporadically than the main studio games. Forge world have basically stopped supporting AoS and our side games don't get FW models. So we're not likely to see much until Old World comes out and they start caring about fantasy warhammer again... And while the new stuff i for kill team... I for one certainly want to make a rogue trader led bounty hunter game for necromunda now those models are coming back!

No problem at all.

They have no direct stats, but can easily be used as the generic loonboss and madcap shaman profiles (if they're the models I'm thinking of anyway, its been a long time since I saw the skull pass lore, though I'm sure i have quite a lot of goblins from it among by gloomspite

Hi, The good news is that yes they can. Take a look at the Gloomspite Gitz faction. Basically the old Skull pass goblins are the same as the stabbers and shooters. Spider riders are still largely unchanged, as is the troll.

I reckon there are three sets, three more Chaos Gods, and three other grand alliances to pit them against. I'd bet Tzeentch vs Seraphon, Khorne vs destruction, and Slaanesh vs Death.

The legion of Azgorh actually do fit the old bug hat aesthetic quite well, they don't have as cartoonish proportions as the 90's chaos dwarves, so their hats are smaller, but all the sorcerers, engineers and daemonsmiths have them, and they don't look out of place at all. its really just the line troops who don't, but lore wise that wasn't an update, rather they were a penal legion of dishonoured soldiers, much like slayers in regular Dawi armies. They had lost the right to wear the big hats, instead having the iron masks.m I think a new update would likely give us the proper immortals again.

If the last few years are any indication we'll get more focus next year. There is big fanfare when a new edition comes out, but as we've just seen with AoS they'll then focus on updating codexes, while minimal minis. This happened with both AoS 3 and 40k 9, so it seems daft to worry about post edition slowdown, while assuming a new 40k edition won't see the same thing. That said... No I don't think the two systems are on an even footing. I don't think we will necessarily get as much stuff overall as 40k does, but only because of the insane level of support for space marines. I still expect AoS to solidly be the second flagship, with more stuff than non-space marine 40k releases get.

This is true, but I think the more realistic art style of LoTR makes a big difference here. Old wfb models look dated because they were always very stylised and kind of cartoonish. Tastes have changed. The new trend is for hyperdetailed models, still with exaggerated proportions, but in a way which takes advantage of higher quality casting. But that pus h for higher quality started with LoTR 20 years ago, and even then the technology was good enough to make pretty high fidelity art that matched the look of the films, and even the actors. they looked worlds better than 90s warhammer not because they could, but because t hey wanted to. There have been incremental improvements to LoTR adding more dynamism, but even the old moria goblins and warriors of the last alliance don't look bad in the way that old skaven do. As to them scrapping generic models completely... I don't think they will. I'm sure GW would love for everyone who buys warhammer to be part of their ecosystem, and not play anything else, but that isn't really the case. With D&D in particular the last thing they should want is for a new DM to go into a GW store and ask for a box of skeletons please, only to be told "we don't make them, either convert to playing AoS and buy ossiarchs, or get lost and don give us £30!" if I were in charge I'd always want to be able to make that first sale, and keep that rpg player coming back for their orcs, their elves, then maybe some skaven, and oh look they are now going to give AoS a try. The generic models are a gateway into the ecosystem for the people who aren't already hooked on it. But that does assume that upper management have thought that through, and aren't arrogamt enough to assume that their ecosystem is the end all and be all. I wouldn't put it past them to decide it's not worth catering to generic tastes, its hard to know how much of a bubble they are in...

That kill team space hulk looks grand. Kroot are always awesome and the others would be great for necromunda as would the terrain... they note it the article that its perfect for the "worlds best sci fi skirmish game " good of them to acknowledge that it will be a great haul of minis and terrain for Stargrave too!

Khorne's followers must leak all the time, since he cares not for whence the blood flows... As to when they'll update the old stuff, I think its clear at this point that they update cycle didn't have a hard reset when AoS 1 came out. Seraphon haven't seen anything new because Lizardmen got a sizable update in 8th edition, right before the end of the world. Going by what we've seen before, that will have pushed them back to the bottom of the pile, and it will have been at least two or three years before they started looking at them again. I'd say that means that with a 3 year development cycle we're definitely getting to the point where we're due an update, but I'm not at all surprised we've not seen one yet. Likewise, while I'd love new dwarves, the Dwarf book for 8th added all the kits that survive as dispossessed today, and the first few years of AoS led with two major dwarf expansions. All indications are that they consider that dwarven "phase space" explored for the time being, and its only just getting to the point where they are due an expansion. Skaven have some insanely old models, but they did get the newer Skyre update. I thus think that the only factions which are egregiously due something are probably the beastmen, and perhaps the ogres.

Yeah, I picked up soulbound's Bestiary a few days ago, and its serviceable, but is mainly stat blocks and reused battle tome art. I think I read most of the fun bits on my medium length train journey and haven't been in a huge rush to pick it up again since getting home. Basic industry standard but it definitely relies on love of the wargame to make you care about the creatures.

The Old World Bestiary for wfrp 2e is one of the best monster books ever written, for any game. Its worth noting that one of the experts they quote in the Scholars View is a skaven deathmaster who just tells you what poisons to use to kill them. It just oozes character, and gives you such a sense not just if the world, hut how it all fits together. That hasn't been done many other times. A few other books have used the in character style ( thondia did it recently, al mos certainly as an homage to the 2e book, the Monsternomicon books for Iron Kingdoms are also great) but few have the same depth as the wfrp one.

Thanks for the recommendation, I've got an audible credit spare...

Well once upon a time "khaine" was just the elvish name for Khorne... So arguably there has never been a non Chaos warband for warcy.

For sure. And you're doing a great job telling us stuff from all the books you've read. I'm just finding it frustrating that I can't keep up.

Precisely, it's not a question of whether the lore exists. It does. But it isn't accessible to a casual player, and that is the issue.

I think the worry is two fold. Firstly the lore of AoS is very dispersed, and not easily accessible. The cost and number of battletomes and campaign books mean that only the most dedicated or obsessive fans will want to read them all, and even for many of us who love the lore, cost is prohibitive. Then there has always historically been a drop off in attention when it comes to BL books and the rpgs. Those are often the in depth books, but fewer people are aware of that lore. I am really keen on reading lore, but even using audible I can't actually keep uo with BL, I can't afford every battletome ( in terms of space as much as money), ans while I love soulbound, they are taking forever to release the books in print, so I'm behind on that too. And I care, and am actually trying to keep up. Most don't, and we can't really expect them too. The second issue is that GWs attitudes to aos lore has historically been quite inconsistent. we know from interviews how things get developed and it isn't a lore first system. The money people say what sells, the designers design models, these are given rules, and then the lore writers write lore for them. Only the last step has any requirements to observe canon, and only that last step has any guarantee of being done by people who keep up with their own lore. I think there isquite a high likelyhood that the model designers and rules writers do not read BL or soulbound and are likely unaware of the lore unless directed to consult it. GW is notorious for the right hand not knowing what the left is doing, ans that means in short that past lo re is not guarantee of what is to come. The lore writers will do a valiant effort to make ir all fit, but they have to work w ith what they are given...

There isn't much necromunda left to come. I think they've done the first wave of ash wastes. There will be more vehicle kits for the classic warbands down the line, but nothing imminent. I think 40K is most likely after a few "filler weeks" but warcry is a definite possibility. They've really been pushing it this last week, which seems to happen when they preview a box late, or release it early. A mainline AoS week seems less likely, but not beyond the (mortal) realms of possibility!

I'm torn. I love the warcry terrain so far, and the new set looks amazing too. Its definitely my favorite game on the fantasy side, and so far I've been collecting it quite religiously. This is probably a good format for Warcry, as it gives you a lot to play with out of the box. But I kind of wish they'd stop with the big box releases. There is basically a £100 plus set every few weeks these days, for one system or another, and while I love the ones that I've picked up this year, I can't keep buying them. Still I guess that's just telling me to focus on the systems I care most about rather than trying to split my resources across too many games. I kind of wish you could go into games workshop and buy a blister pack of metal orcs for a fiver still though. I didn't know that pocket money priced warhammer was the good old days until they were gone!

Go for it! Trolls are a long way down my list of army projects (right after, actually finishing painting a hundred or so goblins who need my love more...) An army of big, lumbering monster trainers is much more your shtick than mine in any event! I look forward to seeing the results.

Glad you approve! I think, even if it doesn't come to pass it would be easy enough to convert and proxy. There are so many sources of cool monster out there that kitbashing them with trolls, and doing a coherent base and colour might be the simplest way to realise the idea. I really don't need a new army project at the moment... But maybe one day!

If I were doing troggs, I'd build on the mollog's mob idea. Have lumbering trolls, but as beast masters with manageries of weird squigs, rabid wolves, hulking swamp monsters, killer sand worm riders, and basically the most weird and wonderful monsters of destruction they can think of.

For each grand alliance: Order, naturally lizardmen would be a good fit, but warcry kits basically don't just update an existing archetypes so I don't expect new saurus or the like. As with chaos marauders we'll get something similar, but which doesn't quite fill the same role. I'd like to see some wardancers, as that's a classic warhammer archetype we've not seen in a while. They could be Kurnothi, wood elves, or even sylvaneth dryads.I The other option would be militia and mercenaries, get some of that classic dogs of war feel. Death: some sort of mortal death cultists would fit the bill, as would ghouls of course. Again I wouldn't expect them to be from a specific faction and echo it's roster. But rather something which is its own unique thing, but fits in somewhere after the fact. For chaos I only really want chaos dwarves, but I suspect that what we'll actually get are a season of god specific warbands. That could be cool if they keep pairing a major god with a minor one. They are pitting Hashut against nurgle, so why not warbands for necoho and zuvassin, maybe even Malal if they've somehow cleared up the rights issues. Destruction: You can do anything with this alliance, and they should. New monsters, new mercs, new weird ogor bands, insane goblin cults, human gorkamorka worshippers... Really the sky is the limit and they should make the most of that as they did for chaos last year. I suspect the chaos gid themed bands are most likely to actually happen, but I just want non humans. I don't care what as the models will be great regardless. But throw a bit more diversity in there. Not every dwarf needs to be aligned with KO, FS or cities. Nit every Orruk needs to be an ironjaw. Lets just see sime weird stuff that doesn't quite fit. That's what warcry does best!