The Red King

Taurok Gorefeast is a doombull (or sometimes demon prince) dedicated to khorne. After slaying a demon prince of khorne on the field of battle and devouring his heart, Taurok found his dreams filled with visions of the blood god, of iron discipline and endless bloodshed. So Taurok began doing something his tribe had never seen, he trained. He didn't just pick up his weapon and hack at his enemies but instead he could be found practicing different forms that were seared into his simple mind by the remnants of the Prince's soul. He accepted others, mostly more bullgor, to his training and those that brayed with laughter at their precise movements made excellent demonstrations of the lethality of this new method of slaughter. Over time he found himself the unintended leader of a small cult to the great brass beast Khorne. The beastlord of the tribe, Ungal blackhorn, goaded by the insidious whispers of the bray shamans who had a distinct interest in curbing the influence of Khorne amongst the herd, goaded Taurok into challenging him, just as Blackhorn intended. He called Taurok unworthy to face him due to his weakness evidenced by his civilized training and obedience to one of the four, and demanded he prove himself in the blood pits, facing down numerous foes to show his ways were worthy of dueling Ungal himself. His satisfaction with the scheme faded quickly however as he watched Taurok cut down scores of his best gors, hacking away until his axe splintered and he was seemingly overwhelmed in a mass of blackhorn's most relentless followers. Even as Taurok struggled to hold them at bay, their blades finding purchase in his thick hide between the plates of metal he had crudely fashioned as armor he refused to call out for aid from his dark god. Instead resolved to let his blood in glorious battle he cried out "Blood for the Blood Beast!" And let them pour over him, "Skulls for his throne!". Though his brothers think little of the beasts, seeing them as mere fodder, Khorne cares not from where the blood flows and between the fire in Taurok and the spark of the Blood God's own princes soul still lodged in his heart, Khorne turned his eyes to the battle and he was pleased. He blessed his newest champion, the blood of the slain searing his armor plates to serrated spike covered brass, filling his muscles with rage fueled strength with which Taurok impaled the skulls of his many foes upon the freshly freshly formed spikes. Not even the most foolhardy or desperate for dared approach Taurok as he set into the slain feasting on their hearts with blind tearing rage. He only looked up when Ungal declared he had proved himself and that Blackhorn would give him one night to rest so that none would doubt who was the stronger when Ungal slew him in the ring. Ungal secretly needed time to devise some way to escape the battle for he knew he stood no chance against the blood blessed bull. His advisors spoke all at once, sibiliant, sussurating, or rasping; assassination, deceit, poison. With the guidance of the shamans Ungal determined to slay Taurok in his sleep. He tasked his own son Mazarak with performing the deed, unknowing that the herd hears all the gods, not just those his seers exalted. Mazarak stole into Taurok's tent in the night with poisoned blade and stood poised to strike it into his heart, but before he could he was assailed with visions of what could be. Cloven ones clad in solid steel, moving with direction as they encircled the enemy before crashing into them with a coordination Mazarak had never seen in his kin. Under and over it alll however they were still the children of chaos, directed but not tamed, they laid into their foes with furious abandon tearing great chunks of meat from their dying prey, devouring their hearts before their eyes unde the approving gaze of a great brass bull. Mazarak came too with a slump that alerted Taurok who lunged for the Bestigor, lifting him by his throat and preparing to squeeze the life from him. He glanced down at the blade slick with vile poison and snorted with derision. "Weakling" he spat at the gor flailing in his grasp. As Mazarak felt his life ebbing he locked eyes with the bullgor and even as one eye clouded red with his own blood he managed to strangle out a defiant "Blood... for the.... blood god!" Taurok let the Gor slump to the floor of the tent and reached for his axe. Raising it menacingly he looked down at Mazarak who was recovering his breath, though his eye was a lost cause. "Speak or die." Taurok said and Mazarak spoke. "Ungal weak, Ungal forget ways of the herd. He send me to slay you as you sleep, like coward. I will not follow Blackhorn, I follow the Brazen Bull." With that he lowered his horns in deference to the great Doombull and Taurok knew what he must do. So it was that Mazarak was the only one of Blackhorns sons not to have his horns adorn the armor of Taurok that night as the Gorefeaster led those given over to the lord of skulls in a massacre that would devastate the blackhorn tribe leaving only the strongest and most brutal of beasts, stained permanently red with the blood of their kin and filled with an unholy rage. Thus was born the Gorefeast Skullfray, led by the ferocious Taurok Gorefeast, clad in blessed brass armor and dedicated to bringing murder and ruin to the mortal realms in the name of their dark god.

What people? GW is a company and as the above person questioned; does anyone actually think "bin guy" is a single dude at GW wearing a dunce cap and writing rulebooks in crayon? "Sin and bin guy" aren't people, they are a term to personify and categorize the quality of the work done by the rules writing team. If the rules writing team feels personally attacked by their work being fairly universally panned (or at least regularly panned) then as the other guy said "do better" is a fair request from a consumer.

I always see this sentiment which really doesn't address anything no offense. "It isnt an easy army but you can win if you play well and your opponent plays poorly" is John Madden "to win the game you've got to score more points" levels of commentary. I played Dark Eldar from 5th edition, heck I play Beasts and Khorne. I know the benefits of playing a weaker army and the joys of winning with it, but that never once invalidated the criticism that it was incredibly poorly balanced. (Mind you I quit 40k in 7th.. 8th? when they were vastly improved but before they became even better). Bad books arent bad because they can never win they're bad because they demand so much of the player that they can only ever be enjoyed by the best players and while I appreciate the reward of mastering something difficult I dont think armies should be off limits to casual players just to make me feel good when I win with them.

So due to not getting a test measure I ended up with an awesome 3d printed basilisk I intended to use for a cockatrice but the size is just too big. So what do we think of Chimera? They seem really swingy, is there anyway to capitalize on them?

You'll be sad when you find out there aren't any more but the Spear of Shadows book is basically a normal adventuring group in the mortal realms novel. I felt like the cities book should have had a city that can coalition each army. Har kuron= DoK Living city= sylvaneth Tempest eye= Duardin Settlers gain= lumineth Misthaven= Idoneth One more for Seraphon. Maybe exclesis in the realm of beasts due to its attachment to the old world and the whole thing about Kroak showing up to fight Kragnos and they stuck around leading to more jungle forming around the city? It makes for some wonderful themed armies and provides a perfect jumping off point to lure people into AoS armies "proper".

That elf screams DoK to me based mostly on the strap/sash coming off her waist. It matches up exactly with the witch aelves.

I don't think we can devolve this conversation any further but muscle women are in fact feasible in a setting where they are fighting amalgam bone golems and on a separate note I can't imagine being so scared of femininity that you want GW to ignore literally half of the dwarven race.

An unarmored Soulrender and a masked naked dwarf ought to solve those ranges. I also love how they announced a new space marine foot model on the same day because all 3 of these factions are definitely equally in need of attention and space marine player would... get upset? If someone gets a new toy and they dont? Like geez GW even I dont think that poorly of your poster fans.

Oh good maybe that will translate to the lore and we'll use all that newfound power and success to resurrect another primarch or something because there's certainly nobody on our side who might be nice to have back. That's not a jab at you, just the rules dont mean much to me. I quit dark eldar when they were the strongest theyd ever been because GW just shows time and again that everyone not in ultramarines blue is a side character which could be excused but this isn't an hour long movie, they're allowed to not have a "main character" in a galaxy spanning space epic and they are choosing to have one anyway.

I love this hobby and the world it exists in but quitting an under served army (Eldar) in 40k only to play an ignored army (beasts) in an under served game is really disheartening. I mean we dont get an FAQ we werent in the starter guide, we werent in something else I cant remember. Why do I always love what GW doesnt want me to love?

A few nerfs to some of the strongest armies. No nerfs to others, randomly breaking a few things and "buffing" any bad army by making them into a horde faction. Games workshop never change...

They ignored me asking where the rest of the FAQ were on Facebook (thought it would be a softball question to say "they're coming soon!" If they were) and they've already updated the app which is really cool that they moved that fast on it and I appreciate it (though it's possible they delayed the update until it was ready to go live on the app) but that also means there are probably no more FAQ coming for many armies that really really need it.

Do we have any actual indication that there are more FAQs coming? Like we literally only got 5 armies? I asked on facebook and they didn't reply.

Careful words like that will make them delay the rules updates in the future to ensure it doesnt stop you from making bad purchases.

They are never going to put in the work required to balance individual units across multiple factions but that's a problem imo. Lore and rule wise it would better to have access to more units across multiple books. It just opens up options and that's always a plus. If it gets abused they can fix it but their current model is: make it an option, it's not strong (except Archaon so maybe fix archaon), then take the option away to "balance" something that isnt broken while not giving anything in return. Personally I think they should just put some units in multiple books and point them accordingly. Bulks out armies and gives more options to the players while also making lore sense. Nobody benefits from less options except GW.

Ah got you. I just wanted to make sure it wasnt that exact wording because as it stands now coalition units CAN still take artifacts and the like if they have the proper keywords because (at least in khorne) they only applied keyword restrictions to blood tithe and subfactions.

Question about this. Does that mean that, say, a Slaves to Darkness Daemon prince with the mark of Slaanesh can't be given a Hedonites command trait? Or is this just allegiance abilities? TBH I'm disappointed with how much GW has discouraged taking BoC/StD in mono-god armies. They struck a good balance in AoS 2.0, where allegiance abilities worked with the god mark but most command abilities required Hedonites/Maggotkin etc. I should get more synergy from a unit of Slaaneshi chaos warriors in a Hedonites army than just allying in some Plaguebearers, but the only difference is I'm not limited to 400 points with the former. It's a bad change. Where is your qoute from? Is that the exact wording in the FAQ somewhere I missed?

I get not wanting to be "Archaon in red" the book, but that's an Archaon problem not a blades if khorne or slaves to darkness problem. There is no sensible reason why blades of khorne shouldn't have access to a demon prince of khorne. A lord of khorne ascends to princedom annnnnnnd they kick him out of the army? There is no reason why a bullgor marked with khorne and fighting in a blades of khorne army shouldn't be affected by blood tithe.

Wait what was the benefit to the prince really? He can still grab an artifact cause all they changed was the blood tithe and subfaction keywords so hes still worth it for blood skick ground.

Coalition units no longer gain your khorne armies sub faction keyword and they are also not eligible for any buffs or effects from blood tithe. They still currently benefit from things that affect keyword KHORNE such as bloodsecrator and mark of the slayer but that was already the case so it's just a flat nerf to using the coalition rules that, to my knowledge, were not impacting competitive play and definitely not by beasts. It's less about power level to me and more about the blatant snubbing. I made my whole army off the 2nd edition skullfray batallion. GW said heres some awesome lore to fall in love with and some nice little rules to represent that lore go nuts! So I lovingly build, convert, and paint an army for them to go SIKE! No more batallion. Heres some coalition rules that do a poor job replacing it and forces you to run out of a different book but hey at least you can still get your mark of khorne and finagle a few buffs our of the other army despite it actively trying to prevent it (MORTAL KHORNE only buffs mostly). But hey I built and painted and loved this army so I'll make it work. And then "Haha loser we're gonna also remove as many rules interactions that benefit you as we can because even though we sold you the lore, fantasy, and RUELS of god marked beasts we dont want you to actually USE them." We didn't even get a FAQ for crying out loud. It's this kind of passive aggressive "we'll sell you the option to play this way but constantly remove any incentive to do so" attitude that drove me out of 40k.

They can't benefit from slaughterhosts (niche issue where they were getting some bonuses such as Khul giving them rerolls in goretide) and more importantly a block of bullgor can no longer fight in the hero phase or fight on death due to blood tithe. They still currently benefit from Mark of the slayer, bloodsecrator, wrathmonger, blood blessings, etc. But I expect that to change when khorne gets an actual book. It's less about power level and more about them just not being willing to say "we don't know how to balance this thing that isnt broken so please stop trying to play it" Dont take away our batallions to god mark and replace them with worse coalition rules if they dont even want us to use coalition rules.

Even better they made big nerfs to beasts if you use the coalition rules that GW themselves invented. "Here's rules for a different way to play! But you shouldn't."

Don't worry there was a balance change for beasts if you run them as coaliton units in a god marked army. Thankfully they nerfed the terrible rules abuse that saw god marked beasts taking all the top tables by removing it entirely!

Well the rules change I so eagerly awaited instead guts my army. Khorne marked beasts as a coalition unit gain no benefit for being taken in blades of khorne. Thank god GW stopped the terrible rules abuse that was beasts of chaos...

I'm not trying to be negative but the last big FAQ required an FAQ (that they did provide fairly quickly in all fairness) so maybe it's just hoping to avoid a similar snafu but it also doesn't inspire any confidence from me.