Overread

So unless you happen to live in Nottingham and rub shoulders with some GW staffer who drops you some big leaks that are authentic - there is no way to tell if the Green Knight will or won't get a made to order reprint in the future. GW keeps most of hteir stuff so its possible, but its impossible to know. The best way would be to buy one secondhand, that said do check out facebook trading groups as well ; a good portion of 3rd party trading has shifted from just ebay to also using facebook.

A solid list of reveals! Vashtorr steals the show in 40K, but I like the AoS stuff. Solid releases and its nice to see gitz getting their wolf riders back! Kinda a shame that Beastmen didn't get a little more (unless GW are holding back). Would have been nice to see one or two updated or a few new models, but very good to see a new lord to stride the battlefield! Next year also looks to be chock full of battletomes, I'm a little cautious that this means smaller releases unless GW is going to go nuts with updates, but still even a few new models here and there is good and the updated tomes will be most welcome.

Halflings are fundamentally different to Dwarves. Heck they traditionally (Old World) didn't even trust nor like each other at all.

That is some awesome work on your zombie dragon!! Also time for some lore chatter as I just finished reading A Dynasty of Monsters which I found an enjoyable read. I do get the feeling that the author perhaps got a partial photo or description of the Lauka Vai and her kind if just because it sounds like they've got 4 legs, wings and their human arms; or at least the author doesn't really identify the forelegs as wings as such. It puts a nice twist in the story and whilst its not earth shattering its a good display of how these vampires are quite unlike their more humanoid kind. SPOILER

I'm very tempted to get that mounted sorcerer to run as a mounted necromancer for a Death Army and the Archon model might be tempting too at the right price. Just as a straight lord on mount. I think the only downside is that some models - esp the chaos lord on mount, might seem "small" by many modern counterparts so it might be a case of finding a spot to fit them in.

Remove double turn from matched play and hide it in open play or just straight remove it from the game entirely! Moving on from that: 1) I'd like to see Cavalry become its own distinct thing. Accepting that it would likely include things that are not mounted units (eg chariots, monsters, medusa etc... would also likely count). Right now the "Troops" section feels lazy and bloated so I'd like to see at least the idea of cavalry units broken out and perhaps get a few special rules/operations of their own to make them something different from just another infantry model; which is basically what they are now. 2) Split leaders up as well. I'm almost at the point where I feel like we need two or three tiers of leaders. Perhaps Named Heroes; Leaders; support command. This might not be that critical but it could be an interesting split, esp splitting out named heroes and perhaps introducing game modes that don't allow them etc... Just because they can be 500-1K monsters that very visually and mechanically dominate the game. 3) Lose the reinforcements system. I totally get on multiple fronts why GW have gone for this, but I think that its trying to push AoS toward something its not. It's kind of trying to push it into a bracket between wargame and skirmish game. Whilst this can create more validity for things like elite units and erodes the dominance that 2.0 had with big infantry blocks; at the same time its shutting down big infantry as an option. It also feels clunky/complex in operation. 4) 1 leader, 1 banner, 1 musician per unit. It feels utterly daft with the current upset where you technically take one of each (barring the leader) per "box" of models. This can mean that a unit can end up with very wonky appearances. Technically Seekers of Slaanesh at a 20model "full" unit would have 13 command units and 7 troops. This just feels really silly to me and is visually odd when there's so few "troops" for so many command on the table. I'd rather see GW introduce a simple system of one of each per unit, then either having it that if you lose one you lose the bonus or (for banners/musicians etc...) simply introduce a swap system. So if your banner is shot down you remove the model and then instantly can swap it for another regular model in the unit. Representing someone picking the banner up etc... Heck GW could even introduce a pick-up roll if they wanted - 1-4 success 5-6 its broken/dropped/lost in the heat of battle. 5) Artillery - this is kind of more model side than rules side, but I'd like to see more focus on them from GW model wise. A lot of armies have nothing in the artillery slot. It feels a waste having 4 divisions and 1 of them is almost entirely unused by most armies. Most armies have a monster at the very least (some have more than one) but artillery is almost utterly absent.

It's kinda hard to say that when Slaves to Darkness are getting a big update in the super near future - the only thing missing from it are new Marauders and honestly you can just use one of the dozen or more Warcry Warbands that fit the same kind of unit slot and are way prettier model wise and have their own rules. Plus we know Cities of Sigmar are at least getting a human update at some point next year and likely in the first half of the year. Granted there's strong hints next year is 10th edition for 40K so we know the middle of the year will be dominated by that (though honestly I wish GW could adopt a 5 year edition cycle - 3 years is too darn short, esp the last one where over half was lost to corona)

I think its pretty much proven that first and second waves for new armies really really help them sell better. One and done kind of works, but forever ends up with people wanting more. Just look at AoS for a case study in this!

Nurgle is surprising as they've got some nice toys in AoS and some fairly modern plastics that could easily make a good battleforce up for Christmas. Flesheaters don't have one because you already get the army in a bundle box. You don't "need" a christmas bundle when your army is already pretty much only sold in cheap battleforce sets. Fyreslayers are almost in the same boat, though they've at least a few more leader models that could make it more than just getting-started sets. Cities of Sigmar I can see why because its messy and I get the feeling that GW isn't even quite sure what they are doing with bits of it - eg there's almost the entire Dark Elf army in there; tiny bits of wood and light elves; a smattering of random humans nad dwarves. Beasts of Chaos might not have all the fancy new stuff, but you could certainly put a boxed set together. I think they suffer as the black-sheep of the Chaos Grand Alliance right now. Heck enough so that the most recent centaur model went to Slaves to Darkness and the second most recent went to Destruction. Then again with all 4 gods now pretty well done with a big chunky update and with Slaves to Darkness soon to be done, that means the only ones "left" in Chaos are Skaven who just need modernising but otherwise have a diverse roster; and Beasts of Chaos.

I'm SAFE!! Totally utterly SAFE* from GW Christmas Boxes this year! Which is not to say that any are bad, though I'd argue that the AOS ones are visually more eye catching than the 40K ones. Just that I don't need/want any of them right now. The DoK one is actually really good, its just the only thing I need are sisters of slaughter, I don't need any of the rest; meanwhile the others just don't grab me. Now if there'd been a soulblight box that would have been different. * I just have to avoid any and all media relating to Sisters of Battle and Ad Mech

Oh I'm sorely waiting for Tyranids/Eldar to appear in AT! I seriously want to at the very least see them do Chaos Titans! The Imperial titans are utterly amazing and I really really really want to see the other factions appear!

I just hope Necromunda doing really well eventually gives GW the green light to do more with Warcry and build it into even more of a "Necromunda for AoS". We are already seeing a slow turn and hopefully we'll get more squads for other factions - I think Chaos has more than enough (fantastic as they all are!) Time for everyone to get a Warcry Warband. Or GW goes full Mordhiem for AoS with kits as customisable and varied as Necromunda ones with their own designs and styles that aren't pat of the core AoS game. Letting them really go wild with designs!

Now if only Warcry could get a marauders warband or GW could just retire those models and let the Warcry Warbands fully fill that slot.

Flesheaters getting a range update would be awesome. Half of their getting started set getting an update would also be an update for Soulblight as well. So its a pretty neat way to update two armies at once. We might lose the super affordable zombie dragon in getting started set, but might gain with an awesome model improvement.

In theory as the first Warhammer Quest was 40K and then we had AoS it should return to 40K. However CC has shown that we really have no clue how to predict things when it comes to the Quest line as CC has basically proven impossible to predict what GW would do with it at any stage.

Careful! That means new zombie dragon and terrorgiest and some of us really like zombie dragons! You tempt fate with such statements if they prove false

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Gremlins purged the site returns! Also that new STD box looks super good! Heck the new prince is an amazing replacement model. At some point I'll have to get one to slip into my Slaanesh force.

I really hope if there is a new Ossiarch Tome that it comes with several new models. I'd love to see them get a monstrous creature (dragon or dragonish thing) and some more infantry models (eg archers). I feel like a second wave of models would really do them some good, even if it means that their points costs come down a bit and they lose some of the elite style feel just so that they can fit more models on the tabletop. Flesheaters 100% need updated and new models. A new Getting Started set with an update to the zombie dragon kit and all would work wonders (and double as an update for Vampires). And with the feral elements of the Soulblight kicking around now there's elements GW could easily share between the two forces as shared models or as optional halves of a duel kit.

Whelp TK news is going to send the fans nuts!!

I forget which is which but one of those elves is basically a bolt-on accessory for a cool sphinx model anyway

In a way I like it and in a way I don't. On the one hand it makes it easier to build a box of models. On the other it kind of means that optional weapons in kits might become a thing of the past because why include sprue space and plastic for options that don't matter. I makes me wonderif GW's plan is to have two or three cavalry models with different weapons and appearances in the future whilst in the past you'd have 1 kit with 3 different weapon options in the box. Another angle is that it means AoS has reduced its number of tactical niches and I already feel its oversimplified on that front; lack of niches means lack of slots to fit models into with their own reason to be there. That means you can easily end up with an army with lots of model types, but where there are few actual choices to make in army composition because the best model is the best model and there are no/few niches for others to really have their own area to excel in.

This is a pattern for AoS 3.0. GW has gone the path of all weapon options on troops being broadly/exactly the same stats. It will be interesting to see if they keep this for 4.0 or if its just one of those random edition changes that never comes around again. On the one hand it makes it easier to get into the game; on the other hand it kind of takes some fun out when a single unit can change its focus and performance. That said on many units, because of weapon reach ranges, spears were often always the superior choice because you could get more of your guys into combat to do damage. When it was rank and file it wasn't as much of an issue because what got into combat was always a fixed number of ranks in the block.

Out of interest how are the Warcry Warbands in the new leaks?

I don't mind them not costing points, it does make them rather a no-brainer purchase; but the game has plenty of those already. You need troops and a leader to play so those are also forced purchases and such. That's the nature of a miniatures wargame. If anything done right I'm all for terrain that's more involved in the game. My issue is more that some factions got them and some didn't and that some of them are fairly tactically dull. Eg the Gnawhole is tactically interesting because you have to think about where to place them in the game and they have a good impact. Many others are more of a "this appears and does something that affects the whole army/battlefield" so it doesn't matter where you place them. Which to me is just a bit tactically dull on something in the game and on the table. But the biggest issue was, well, the size issue some had. Huge bits of terrain that chocked up segments of the board. Thematic yes, but so big that they are just not practical.