Forrix

Very much agree. The Warhammer Community site team in particular seems out of the loop. I remember when their AOS 2 rules preview for Fyreslayers wound up being directly contradicted by the day 1 FAQ (they later undid it). Not to mention a single article going up the day before or the day of the big cull stating stuff like "We know its sad for duardin players to see dispossessed warriors go but here's a sneak peak at a duardin army built using COS rules" would have done wonders. Of course that would also be a disaster if it turns out the army they preview isn't actually legal by COS rules.

I doubt we'll see new sculpts but I definitely agree with the lack of information being a problem. I had originally assumed when the cull happened we'd see COS announced that Sunday. It would make sense to explain to players how their duardin armies will operate considering they lost their main battleline option or Wanderer players now that they have 1 character left. The weeks of silence that have followed, and possibly more (now that it looks like Beastgrave will be the next pre-order) I feel is turning this into one of AOS's major PR fails.

Looks like Beastgrave is up next based on the new Hammerhal Herald. Gives me time to paint up my Warcry and Gloomspites though it would really be nice to know more about COS at this point.

We really haven't had a major army release since Gloomspite Gitz, I think we're due for one. Slaanesh was really just a handful of character kits, one unit, and then the terrain and endless spells. I'm thinking we'll see at least 6 new kits for the army (Gloomspite had 9 not counting terrain/spells and the later loonboss on cave squig).

I've had plenty of games where I was down but in a position to make a come back. Then my opponent got the double turn and everything went to hell. Really, the double turn just injects more randomness for the sake of randomness into an already pretty random game. The main tactical effects in my experience being that it encourages slightly more defensive play if your opponent is up for a potential double turn or giving your opponent a double turn if you're in a good position with all you buffs up.

Yeah, besides some special store opening single sculpts. It got me thinking though, there was a time when Stormcast Eternals had about as many kits as Grand Alliance Death or Grand Alliance Destruction. They are still the largest single faction kit wise though, going off the webstore, with 59 kits*. Legions of Nagash is number 2 with 43 and Skaven number 3 with 42. Pretty impressive considering that every single Stormcast model has been released since the AoS launch. I think they were trying to strong arm a space marine phenomenon with them. In other news, I'm really expecting Cities of Sigmar to be announced for pre-order this Sunday. They need to throw a bone to people who have had kits retired and assuming we're getting 4 more battletomes (CoS, Orruk Warclans, Ogors, New Death) this year, with none in December (usually the case) they only have a little over 3 months to release those tomes. Plus there's the Underworlds stuff, and bound to be some more 40k releases too. I suppose we could see double releases like Skaven/FEC but in the case of the Ogors/New Death box I would think a completely new faction would get its own release week or even two. Now that I think of it, it makes pairing Ogors with a new army in a box set kinda weird. I know they did that with Soul Wars but both of those factions had all new models in the box and it was for the launch of a new edition. *I get some store items are books and dice for an army but I don't feel like sorting that all out.

I really like that they're incorporating set terrain into their scenario layouts but yeah, I think they kinda fudged it up for this. Doesn't sound like it would be a big deal to alter the terrain set-up a bit though (or just make up your own).

If you're okay going outside of Maggotkin then your best bet is Bestigors and Plague monks. Plague monks have the nurgle keyword and Bestigors can get it through the pestilent throng warband. Otherwise, sticking with what you listing, I'd say Plague Drones backed up with a GUO are your best bet. A unit of 6 to 9 has a ton of wounds, decent saves, and an insane bucket of attacks thanks to the GUO's command ability and it triggering the Plague Drones' locus. That said, other AoS 2 battletomes will still pound you into the dirt (FEC, Fyreslayers, Skaven Plague Monks if they get the charge, ect).

Just my thoughts We don't use realm rules but I wouldn't mind them as long as they're announced in advanced and the ones used don't ****** over certain armies. We used to have it where an army could pick which realm its from and then take realm spells in lieu of allegiance spells (if they had them) on their wizards. We've been moving away from this due to everyone taking inferno blades all the time though. Scenery rules-we don't use them beyond basic cover, los stuff but I wish we did. I like the idea of having a couple of pieces of special terrain that is put on the boards by TOs. From playing regular games I think rolling for the all terrain makes the board too busy for my liking and most of the special rules won't actually matter due to some combination of the terrain special rule, terrain placement, size, objectives, ect. We don't have painting requirements for regular tournaments (3 games, 1 day) but have a 3 base minimum for grand tournaments (5 games, 2 days). Personally, I don't like painting rules. I'm an avid painter and hobbyist myself but I understand that people play the game for different reasons. A tournament is ultimately about deciding who the best player is tactically (well, to be honest the army picked and luck are huge factors but you get the idea). I think painting requirements can also hamper newer or more casual players if they find out their chosen army is extremely weak competively as it creates a major barrier to switching armies which might just motivate less invested players to quit. Side note on painting stuff. I like prize support for hobby stuff like best painted, best display board ect. but as an enthusiastic hobbyist of middling skill it is incredibly frustrating to have to compete against commissioned armies. Its demoralizing losing to a guy who doesn't know which end of a brush to hold but just dumped buckets of money on a pro-painted army.

I wasn't thinking about elf and duardin keywords outside of Cities of Sigmar. I think the wanderer and possibly dispossessed keywords will be going away. 1.) There will be a new keyword for aelves/duardin specific to Cities of Sigmar (for duardin this could just be dispossessed). 2.) The allegiance abilities for aelves/duardin will only be active in a Cities of Sigmar army but will effect aelves/duardin outside of that allegiance if taken in a Cities of Sigmar army (aka allies). I like this option more but it will be harder to balance. It would allow a smoother integration of KO into Tempest's Eye (the city we know can also take KO in allegiance).

I strongly think the old faction keywords (dispossessed, wander, ect) will be gone. We'll have Aelf, Duardin, and Free People (or something like human) keywords instead. The aelfs still have a lot of unit kits left but are pretty lacking in heroes if you look at the subfactions (only 1 hero for Wanderer left). It would make sense if they just merge them together. I think Aelves, Duardin, and Free People will each have a minor allegiance ability like the skaven clans then the Seven Free Cities will each have their own major allegiance ability that supports a certain play style or emphasis taking Aelves, Duardin, or Free People.

I am seriously hoping for a new saurus kit and some characters at absolute minimum. The modern kits I in that line are excellent but enough of them show their age to turn me away currently.

I'm really hoping for a way to incorporate Humans, Elves, and Duardin into a coherent 2k point army list. If they push sub-factions too hard in this book then I'll probably due a big elf army. There's been a lot of different elf kits I've been eyeing since 8th edition. I really hope they make Wild Riders hit like a truck again.

As much as I think people are over reacting to this culling if GW released a battletome then discontinued the army in 6 months I'd be on my way out. Anything that winds up in CoS is going to be safe for the foreseeable future.

They got dumped into Last Chance to Buy or just straight up dropped with no warning (I can't remember exactly). The fact that they gave early warning about model kits being retired this time was a big flag as its normal for kits to be retired when their armies get a battletome for the first time.

While its never fun to see an army to go and I am surprised at some of the high elf models being retired it isn't realistic to expect all armies to be supported indefinitely. A customer who bought an army 10+ years ago and then never buys anything else and quits when that army gets retired isn't a real lose to GW. The only real mistake I see GW making in this is repacking the Isle of Blood as Spire of Dawn as I would expect models in a starter set to be supported for some time after I brought that kit. Though I can't imagine many people would take offense to proxing Swordmasters as Executioners when Cities of Sigmar hits. Edit: I hate being a GW apologist but come on, people rage quitting over this are being ridiculous. It sucks when stuff gets retired but there's no way GW can continue to produce new products if they have to support all their products indefinitely.

For the most part yes. On the whole I'm not surprised with things like Thunderers and only surprised about warriors because they were reboxed. That said, there were a handful of pretty modern plastic kits getting cut like Dragon Blades and the Skycutter. I think repacking the Isle of Blood for AoS as the Spire of Dawn was a mistake. It was full of modern plastic sculpts that being a starter set would attract new players who would expect the models and armies in it to continue to supported for some time.

I'm not surprised there's a lot being discontinued. They've been removing some of the older kits whenever they update an old 8th edition fantasy army. The fact that they announced in advanced that they'd be retiring kits this time, is in hindsight, a sign it was going to be a massacre. Edit: Dragon Blades being discontinued is a surprise for me. They're a very good plastic kit.

The Darkoath would like a word with you....

Pretty much my and the other Fyreslayer player's experience in my local meta through replace shooting with fast flying units and magic. Fyreslayers are a high tier army for sure (especially for scenarios that don't have a lot of objectives) but only broken when people make up hypothetical lists that can't actually exist due to points limits and combining multiple lodge abilities.

Does in anyone have links to in-depth lore articles about the different free cities? I'm having trouble finding anything beyond pretty simple one or two paragraph explanations.

Omg, that would hilarious! I want them to do that just to see the reaction on the forums here.

Because its a popular game in my area with excellent models and otherwise pretty good rules. I've had plenty of games were the double turn didn't come into play either due to priority rolls or there not being an opportunity to capitalize on it. I've also had enough games were its turned a close game into a one sided slaughter fest or prevented a come back to detest it. I wouldn't call it a key feature anyways, endless spells aside, the game plays fine without it.

Okay.... Well I guess my personal experience has been the opposite of yours.

Here we go again... My short answer: absolutely hate it. Slightly longer answer: Yes it can provide opportunities for tactical judgements (taking the double when you win the roll is not the correct answer 100% of the time) but it doesn't justify how badly it can swing games and make you or your opponent stand around waiting for a chance to react for ages. Answer nobody seems to care about: This is the #1 thing that turns off potential new players when I talk to them about AOS. On forums dedicated to AOS you will find a skew towards either favoring it or being neutral to it since if its a deal breaker they don't play the game and don't hang out on forums dedicated to it.