Nos

I think the release schedule has made it seem a bit indecent but I dont think BR and the new were intended to have such a contracted release period. Certainly more than a week apart of announcement at any rate I think. Likewise there probably was the intent to let things percolate a bit but after a year of pandemic affected buisness planning the commercial focus has to be to the fore

The lore is *always* just the engine to sell new models though. I mean that's the definition of the GW template, certainly since AOS at least. Sigmar is always going to have to make new Stormcast. Chaos is always going to have its next renaissance after its last defeat. Other factions are going to try and supersede the position of those two and some will manage it for a bit but fail when the next edition comes along etc.

Sigmar's eugenic experiments to create a super human less rubbish than a regular man or Goblin on TT now onto its third stage Look forward to the 50 existing Stormcast units being even less effective

GW make disproportionate numbers of marines, Stormcast etc for the same reason McDonalds makes far more burgers than salads. GW dont care about fairness and equality among their range, they care about selling the most of whatever it is they can. Besides Stormcast and Chaos, GW's very distinct development of elven archetypes and their centrality to the fiction is AOS' biggest USP.

Ruination Chamber? Is that still an option or was that revealed as something else?

I think it depends on the nature of how the army was collected though If someone buys an army over time that gets a boost from new rules etc, that's different from someone who buys an army solely because its strong in the meta. And even then, a Seraphon player can easily tailor a list to still be strong without being egregious. I remember at launch of 2nd ed when Sequitors and Gav Bomb were stupidly obnoxious, I stopped using them pretty quickly. I wasnt winning on account of anything besides exploiting something which was neither fun for me or my opponent. Someone who makes a single list which clings to the strongest meta safety blanket unerringly, without the slightest experimentation or attempts to get inside the theory of it, who just plats a list, esse totally, who then has that pointed out to them, I think that's fair enough. It's their prerogative to do that if they want but it's also inarguably what they're doing. Its not a case of superior skills, it's a case of effective execution of an established system that somebody better and more creative at AOS than them created. Which is also fine and a skill in itself. But it's not a mark of being good at AOS and it's not why those who are good at AOS suceeed and develop their skills

Balance is too diffuse a word. When I say balance I mean I want a game which is principally balanced towards both players being involved and enjoying themselves with what they have. This is something which most mini games have as their ethos. The rules of things like Oathmark, Saga, Kings of Wrar etc are designed around this. Hardly any games are designed around the ethos that every instance is 50/50. Thats why Chess Is a stand out. The core of most strategy games in any form is not balance in chances of winning, but balance through transparency. The Rock Paper Scissors abalogy is the obvious example. This does this. This means this. This is good at this. This is bad at this. That's basically what warscrolls are meant to convey, and the shift to objective gameplay. The idea with strategy games is that experience and grasping the basics are the currency of how to win, and then different factions have different ways to interact with these. But AOS is nonetheless *attrocious* on this front otherwise. As is 40k, as was Warhammer. GW are in general. Bit thus is because GW principally sell their lore. People for the most part collect GW armies because they want to invest in the models and the whole experience of following them through the lore. There is more flavour in GW factions. People love their army like they love their sports teams. They get excited for new releases like they want new players to sign for their club. With the historical wargames I play, which are vastly more elegant systems on the table, there is nothing like that degree of enthusiasm off it. I think the issue with balance is that GW dont know how to/don't care about translating the character of factions onto the table *with restraint*. Sylvaneth are my favourite AOS faction because they combine beautiful models with thematic rules. The problem is they have clearly been designed with close adherence to the core mechanics. You have to play the game well to utilise their powers. You get the basics wrong, you're not going to be able to use your army effectivley. I love that because it makes them a very involved experience Whereas the strongest factions tend to get rules with supersede those of the core mechanics, either through exploit or deliberately. The abundance of MW and Ward Saves is the most obvious case in point. These were originally designed to be rare, powerful supplements to combat. Now they're just routine components for the strongest factions while being largely unavailable to others. With the strong factions, you can play badly and still win just by virtue of having the tabletop equivalent of an atomic bomb. You just need to detonate it. In that scenario you could have someone who plays the basics much better stil lose to someone who makes multiple basic errors but is able to exploit a gimmick. And learning how to beat that gimmick isnt really about learning to play the game better- it's about learning how to stop one very particular contrivance. Basically if GW actually stuck to the core rules of AOS as rigid, and worked out how to acce that the character ter of each da tion within those, rather than inventing new ways for every new army to effectivley ignore some of them, it would be more fun and no less competitive.

Ahhh I was reading CC as Crimson Court, not Cursed City. Apologies. Too many CC's. Yeah the fact the Cursed City models dont have SGL keyword is another confirmation to me they were intended as a primer to Ulfenkarn lore etc, as part of a separate game. The lote of Ulfenkarn is shared across Cursed City and SGL, but I think they are two different productions and were always intended to be. Now that SGL been properly previewed, I've seen literally no evidence despite shared lore- which commercially speaking is basically irrelevant- to suggest SGL has cabbinalised any of CC, or vice versa.

I could be wrong but I think all Underworld Warbands have to be fielded as a group. They're not designed for AOS. Their war scrolls are just a bonus. There's nothing to stop people proxying models if both players agree. Radukar the Wolf as keyword rather suggests that Radukar the Beast was always intended as a separate entity. I dont think it's a Morarhi scenario. I think Radukar was designed for a different game, which has warscrolls as a bonus. I dont think he as Wolf will be in SGL. Also if you look at The Beast- he bears a lot of resemblance to the new AOS diorama/vignette style Lord, who have warscrolls that account for all the dudes on the base. Whereas in CC every unit is an individual with an individual profile.

As above- the things you're mentioning which are re-boxed are marketed as beginner friendly. The cost of repackaging them is easily met by the value they being by getting new hobbyists through the doors Notably re CC, the repackaging of Escalation figures and Underworld warbands is minus the card components. This to me confirms the pretty well established fact that GW does not have as much financial control over those components. Add to that the fact that there is a global shortage of card production right now due to the unprecedented consumption of it last year, something GW are unlikely to have foreseen when initially designing CC, and a similarly massive jump in the cost of importing it, it is my *opinion*- note that word- that CC is not going to be able to justify its costs in the present climate. Whereas as I've said, repackaging minis GW can easily produce and use to bring in new consumers is eminently cost effective. GW is a FTSE 250 company. Everything they do is based on profit and commercial sustainability. Thats it. You dont need to read the rules or look deep. They thrive and profit because they make good, ruthless business decisions. They arent sentimental. The only thing that will determine CC's viability is if it can justify making money. And there is very good reason at present to deduce from the wider economic climate and GW's behaviour around the whole thing that it's not something they are commercially interested or invested in at this present time.

That was a way of ensuring that models designed to get people into the hobby- a gateway drug, if you will- were still available That's also why other models from Starter sets get bundled into smaller releases, or the Mortal Realms magazine. If wee Jimmy or Julie are in the shop with mum or dad, it's much easier to convince their parents to part with £30 than £100. But GW know those models will repay themselves many times over by bringing someone into the hobby. It's the cornerstone of how GW shop staff are measured- how much starter stuff did you sell. As a result, masses of those models are produced. They're designed to be pushed and the output of them meets that. That's why Mortal Realns and the 40k equivalent exist. It is a completely different commercial approach to the rest of their products.

They wont be Why would GW release the same model twice, just in different packaging? That increases the price for *them* for no reason at all

Cheap at 200 pounds plus Books Hell of a hobby

Knew I'd seen Kragnos somewhere before

So you can imagine a world where Traffic Lights were really weird

Reckon SGL will get Endless Spells? Or have GW moved away from those at faction release? Be cool to see like, just a Massive Furry Hat

Malerion will be a big deal and I think GW are holding him back for a while because if it. Even from the release at AOS 2.0 I always thought he'd not be revealed until the start of 3.0 at the earliest. Now I reckon he'll be introduced at the half way point, similar to the Ossiarch event, quite possibly even later though.

As a Sylvaneth player, I dont see Kurnothi coming until Sylvaneth get a new tome, and I don't see that happening for a year at least. Alarielle and co are just not involved with the narrative at all at present. Obvs we're getting our toot man with BR Kragnos abd a new warscroll but I think that's just an aside. I made my own Kurnothi to keep me going

Heh the Wight Lord for SGL looks completely out of place now. Like a Metal Fan at a New Romantics Concert or something.

Dont think this holds up. If they're not in the SGL book I would agree it's highly suspect, but they almost certainly will be. In which case they're not going to have frantically reprinted the book and added several expansions worth of lore in the space of a fortnight. Most likely explanation for me: Prior to pandemic CC was intended for Halloween release, with SGL to come a few months later. CC would serve as promo for new faction and a sort of narrative palette cleanser before BR kicked off. Ulfenkarn was intended as the new Sylvania, a pivotal location within the lore going forward. I expect much of SHL still to coalesce around this. Especially with Nagashs fall, there needs to be a new locus for Death's narrative. CC fell foul of production issues and a hostile international shipping clinate but had to get CC released asap to recoup what it could. SGL had to get released much closer to CC and BR than intended due to the delays of 2020. This means that the lore around Ulfenkarn looks exclusively CC related as it's basically new to us, but CC was only ever intended to introduce it as a place, not keep it in a vacuum as with Shadespire, for example. It completely makes sense, for example, that Radukar the Beast is a lord in an *army* sized game, but in a skirmish simulation of 4 dudes hes just like a buff Cossack

Vampires got one today

They wouldnt want to make expansions for something that didn't sell either

I highly doubt they would have pushed it as they did for weeks beforehand if that was the case. These were shown before all the Warhammer TV videos etc.

That's it he survives 18 MWs that most of the top tier armies can put out without issue

It probably will be for years before Kurnothi are a thing, if ever Underworlds is explicitly a chance for designers to play with concepts and try something different, the designers have said that numerous times. It's not part of the same production line of full factions.