Scurvydog

So disappointing there is no way to fit him into a SoB army either in any meaningful way, he is just way way over costed... Guess it is better for the sanity to just ignore this book and get on the 3.0 train instead

The difference is also how quickly a META is formed and how the game is covered. Instead of metas formed in small forums, clubs and stores, information spreads very fast, and rules are picked apart quickly and "netlists" are formed, youtubers provide the "hot takes" and battle reports etc put them to the test. As such any design flaw is exposed and potentially exploited much quicker than ever before. BR Kragnos is not even seen yet, but we already pretty much know what to expect and judged the viability of different things. Also the very prevalent disappointment already going around is telling, it seems many, myself included, lost all interest in preordering Kragnos based on the terrible rules and point costs and the model is not even up for preorder yet. How GW can be oblivious to this is baffling. You can even go to Facebook for example and see the community articles about Kragnos preorders and you will also easily find negative feedback. It boggles the mind at times how GW can have so little insight into how their players perceive the game and what they present to them. The community has on many occasions identified something as broken the second the rules are available, yet GW apparently never picked up on that and keeps it that way for months and months, upsetting the balance of the game (looking at you spell in a bottle and Tzeentch!).

I see the good vs bad as a matter of effort most of the time, but also thought put into how much can be done with an army, not just how powerful or balanced it is. I will go straight to some examples (just my personal choices). Sublime tomes: LRL: This is clearly a "upper tier" book. So much effort has been put into the warscroll and to make them unique and do all kinds of stuff. We see new unique mechanics everywhere, not just a few, but nearly anything is new, with many varied sub factions with unique battleline options, characters with never before seen mechanics. All in all rules that for good and bad forces a LOT of choices to be made both with list making and in game. Unfortunately they also have a lot of NPE rules that make them quite horrid to play against in competitive settings, but you can do so much more than that with the army though. They also got the full terrain + spells treatment. DoK: This is a book with a limited model range but with a lot of mileage in each of those available units. Many playstyles are available and viable. Interesting sub factions, spells, prayers and artifacts to make an army your own. Tzeentch/KO: I will just bunch these together, they are top meta for a reason, but that they are more than just cookie cutter meta armies. They have tons of unique mechanics only seen in their books and make clever use of the core game rules to do something quite different. They have some broken outliers but that seems to be due to "over enthusiastic" choices, rather than neglect or lack of effort. Disappointing tomes: Gravelords: I don't even play them, although I did play some LoG but sold my nighthaunt army in the end. Usually with new tomes and new model ranges I get some kind of tingle in the back of my head to try it out, with ideas like "would this and that not be cool!?". I got none of that here, the new models I find cool, but the rules entirely underwhelming and worst of all uninspired and outright boring. They barely got changed from LoN and frankly got more boring in many ways. They have few aspects that really stand out and it can be hard to nail down what they are supposed to do really well. Traditionally this would be THE attrition army, but so many armies just survive better now, magic is meh, they got no shooting and no wizards with significant modifiers, so they will be bullied out or not participate in almost all phases of the game. Orruk Warclans: This is most likely a bit controversial to put here, but I really think this is an example of lack of effort from GW as a whole, not just bin vs sin. As an Ironjawz player this was so incredibly disappointing to me. Is my army strong? Yes. Do I sometimes just destroy my opponent turn 1? Yes. Is it fun? well... not always. No new models were added, no endless spells/prayers or whatever and no terrain. This was even 2 battletomes before, baked into 1 book with basically only half the choice and subfactions afforded other armies, where the compensation is supposed to be an amalgam allegiance, that has hardly any synergies between the 2 types of orruks due to keyword conflicts. So much wasted potential and every Ironjawz army play almost entirely the same. While not meta either, just look at FeC how to make some variation with very few kits. Every single Ironjawz list is based on Warchanters every time. Some will surely disagree with this, but I can't help but just lament would could have been. Stormcast: This must be the current golden standard of a Bin tome. It is just filled with nonsense, terrible internal balance even at the time of release. They somehow managed to write over 30 battalions for this allegiance where people use just about 0 of them on regular basis. That must be some kind of award worthy achievement for failing to write useful and engaging rules. They even chose to go the route of stormhosts and customization, yet every single unique hero kit is tied to the same "default" Hammers of Sigmar keyword. Hoping for better times in AoS 3.0 but for AoS 2.0 they really got the short end of the stick. We see the same pattern in 40k for marines, the first new edition book is always marines, they get a power bump, but quickly creep sets in and marines only use a few gimmick lists. Then they get a new Codex later in the edition and they sit comfortably well until a new edition rolls out. Stormcast started with this, but never got the followup book and has just been in a sad state outside some gimmick builds. Honorable mention here is also the Nighthaunt book released at the same time, what an absolute Bin book too.

760 pts with only 18 wounds and no save to mitigate mortal wounds etc is insanely bad. Who in their right mind could consider that balanced at all. He has no synergies or allegiance abilities and his only really unique rule is to have a chart to see if he cries when hurt... I am just mindblown at how bad this turned out. Not even any other new rules for anything destruction related... guess this is just in the bin and wait for AoS 3.0

Kroak "fixed" by taking him above 400 pts so he can't ally anywhere. Slightly more expensive but all in all a bit better with +2 cast/unbind baseline, even if his insta death rule is a bit wonky, it is per phase and not turn, so needs a fair amount of pressure to get him off the board like that. Kragnos is just going to be a never ever pick, 760 points for an 18 wound behemoth with no synergies or allegiance abilities that cries when he gets hurt, wow GW!

I don't think that is needed, this rule basically states something only happens at the end of a phase if he is not dead. If he has taken 18 wounds or more, or slain in some other way, like archaons sword, he is not alive by the end of the phase for the rule to kick in anyway. It is a rather meh rule, if he takes 9 damage he will be at a 50/50 risk of just dying. With his old Warscroll he had a 4+ ignore wounds save, so in the same scenario you would have a frog at 4-5 wounds left at no risk, instead of sweating like a beast rolling your 3d6 at the end of the phase. Basically he became a bit more complicated with his survivability, in many ways worse, however he now has +2 to cast. Everything else is almost the same basically. GW seems to be rather lazy with the rules for BR Kragnos.

I don't know what they were thinking with that Warscroll, he brings nothing to the forces around him except +1 bravery, and even that is compromised by the fact he might damage ANYONE near him if he takes in damage in a phase. Unless you want your boyz or gargants to suffer mortal wounds after Kragnos eats some MW spamming X archers fire, then he requires some awkward 6" bubble clear around him, but within 12" if you need that +1 bravery. That is basically the only rules he has, and they conflict with each other! His charge damage is strong, but as everything is just beatstick stuff, he is just defined by the point cost at that point, there is no force multiplier in him, which is the entire purpose of all the other god level characters. They define their armies, he does not at all. Also the god of earthquakes makes no earthquakes at all, super boring. At least it saves me 125 EUR...

Not only will Kragnos easily get killed, his 10" move with no flying for what is most likely a massive point investment is a huge problem. He will face all the same problems Gotrek does, while most likely being more expensive and dying even more easily to mortal wounds (24 average vs 18). A god getting plinked to death at range, while his whines pops the eardrums of your own guys nearby sounds rather pathetic. I was so hyped to get this model as something fresh for my destruction armies, but everything about him seems incredibly poor and not worth even replacing a Maw Krusha or Mega Gargant for in Orruk/SoB lists.

I was so disappointed by the Kragnos Warscroll reveal, he is nothing but a beatstick and provides nothing a Mawkrusha or Mega Gargant do not do better in their own allegiances. If he is even close to 700 pts I can not see him ever being worth that cost, unlike similar size models such as Archaon or Nagash, he has no synergies, no real board presence or anything at all, he just charges stuff good. If he was costed around 500-600 he might be able to be squeezed into a Sons of Behemat instead of a Mega and possibly 1 small gargant, that might be worth the "firepower", but his total lack of ignore dmg mechanics will just have him melt to any MW output as discussed. His only abilities are also only to provide more bravery in a bubble (destro often needs this though) but if he takes any dmg he might hurt anything in a bubble as well... yikes... The other "gods" all have interesting abilities and mechanics that really differentiate the army when they are on the table, they ARE the core of the army. This guy seems to simply just be "there", like a Gotrek with horse legs, but quite possibly worse than Gotrek.

At least going away from battalions as a whole will be good for SCE. There are 31 battalions for SCE on warscroll builder and somehow GW managed to make them all terrible, that is quite a feat! I must admit even though I painted up a bunch of Liberators and Judicators, I still look forward to the new models. I know they might label them as different, but we all know this is sort of a visual retcon and we will probably see this more medieval and lean look for stormcasts moving forward. I have decided to just look forward to them as an entirely new army project, as I do not think the more cartoony scheme with extreme highlights I am using right now, will work as well on this more "realistic" approach.

Fairly certain it is something like Spiderfang at this point, all those eyes...

The new design is great. Many complained about the "fat" stormcast and Sigmarines, but this looks more grounded and medieval, can't wait to get my hands on them!

Expect disappointment. At least for the game media it has been very lackluster, that AoS auto battler mobile game just proved that the focus is entirely off center for them. There is so much to explore in the universe they have created, so many genres that could be used, but they keep insisting to release the most boring games possible, like auto battlers, card games, some cheap looking VR stuff and weird turn based stuff that does not play like warhammer at all. I'd even settle for a half decent RPG, as they are working with Focus Home after all we cant expect AAA, but something like the Creedfall game set in the cursed city or something could be cool, and they would not be able to sell out the digital copies in 5 minutes for that either (sorry). Anyway the mysterious reveal, seeing 40k already got 2 days of previews, could very well be AoS 3.0, with leaks and talks going around it would seem to close in on the time to announce that, if the Kragnos book is the last Broken Realms, that would make sense.

Nice the next article is probably a step by step guide on how to best sell your destruction army or possibly convert Savage orruks into progressive witch aelves

Hard to keep hype going with 0 releases for weeks to come and even the previous releases being extremely limited/unavailable. I thought about picking up a Belakor, but nah, now I will just hold off on that, it was not available for preorder anymore after like 5 minutes due to limited stock. I for one will not support or reward poor management like that and I have friends who are outright furious. We had planned a Cursed City playthrough weekend but none of us could even get a copy, which makes all these youtuber and influencer reviews, paint tutorials etc sting a LOT. Perhaps they had some cursed city fun articles in the pipeline but realized that would just be salt in the wound now?

Is this it, is this how we enter the 300+ Gnoblars meta?

More model previews is kind of pointless when we got so many things yet to release. Right now the Admech Codex, Sisters, Soulblight Gravelords etc are all in the pipeline, we also got shown a new Kroak and other stuff. Hopefully they use the time to sort out the complete failures of the past releases, most in my community are outright mad at GW for the Cursed City thing, we could not even get a game for our entire gaming club, ridiculous and no more in print. I also tried to preorder a Belakor, but nope, the few sites still actually attempting preorders got sold out before you could refresh the page and all of them report about very low supply, so seems GW sent out 1-2 to each store... There is no point to all this marketing and hype if you cant buy the product at all.

I was surprised to see his terrible Warscroll. If he was at least a 3+ save as the regular Lord Celestant it would feel less crappy, and if his once per game ability was not for heroes only, then it would begin being cool. His primary weapon should at least also be dmg 2, why are Stormcasts hitting like wet noodles compared to any other "regular" heroes? Still him having a worse save than a basic version seems like a total lack of quality control and really poor effort from someone who does not care at all and wants to write more crazy aelf warscrolls... Yes that was salty

Really want to know what army Belakor will fit into. He is of course currently part of StD, but they show him with demons of all kinds. If he is not part of StD anymore, no reason to get hyped for me Feels strange they are not even dropping a hint about where he fits in basically. Normally you would expect a remake to be part of the tome they are currently in, but everything seems to point to Belakor now being hard locked into some demon mix army only people with Wrath of the Everchosen might have cared about. How many sit on a Chaos Ascended army right now? If Belakor only fits into that, it seems like a limited market... I love the model, but I only play StD and do not plan to buy a bunch of ugly as sin bloodletters and demonettes etc to play this dude. So who can actually take him (not just as ally) is an important factor if I wish to preorder...

Kroak is getting an entirely new model and warscroll, so guess they just held off on that, knowing he was going to change. I will guess he is going to be a completely different beast to the regular Slann now, instead of just a no brainer upgrade of the same thing, probably putting him somewhere in the Teclis ballpark perhaps. Seraphon is dropping a bit otherwise, but only due to the other big contenders, their power is a very fine balance right now and a single change could blow them up, such as a change to the skink priest MW buff. Nobody complains about Saurus In general there are way too many archers with mortal wound output now, seems it is the new hotness that the "good" tomes need, easy access to high volume mortal wound firepower. Regarding Archaon GW has put balancing in a hard place with a 800 pts model that can fit into many different allegiances, that is bound to create problems. I feel he is very well balanced in the StD book and the legion designed specifically for him, notice how all competitive builds do not use the book where he is on the cover...

Really want to know what army Belakor will fit into. He is of course currently part of StD, but they show him with demons of all kinds. If he is not part of StD anymore, no reason to get hyped for me Feels strange they are not even dropping a hint about where he fits in basically

I still cant get over that the battalion in broken realms is made of the exact same models as a Kavalos lance battalion. The Liege must have both the terrible stalliarch lords artifact (worst artifact in the entire game possibly) and trait. He is named but gains nothing else, so unique rules despite all these limitations. The only effect is to regain 1 RDP on a 4+ when doing the stalliarch command... Why ever take that, the Kavalos lance is more flexible, has the same units and it gives 1 free use of the deathrider wedge once per turn and also gives retreat and charge for free within 12" of the Liege. For any subfaction too. Even without the last part, I think I'd rather just have 1 free wedge ability for sure, than the 50/50 chance when doing a retreat move. The FeC battalion is also equally terrible. I guess the write really likes their aelves and hates death...

Might be to burst a target, healing targets etc where chip damage is not that useful

Most of the new stuff seems pretty chill, with the other added benefits the air/wind units get, they certainly fill a different role. Thinking of competitive play the standout is the Loreseeker. There was some complaining about how to deal with gargants capping points, there ya go, problem solved, sit this guy on a point and it can not be capped unless he is dead. I can see some battle plans where he can really be a pain as you can set him just on a border of the territory on an objective, then 1st turn go and protect him, why not make him the general with goading arrogance as well A ballista or two might be handy for their once per game -1 to hit debuff, just to ensure the enemy does absolutely nothing hitting those shining companies with -1 to hit already, throw that fox in there to add -1 more for the heck of it. Guess we will see how it adds up, if nothing else the terrain alone is a strong buff for any armylist. For the rest I dont really know if it is needed instead of wardens, sentinels and dawnriders and what they can already do well.

Yea just disappointed our new stuff is doubling down on the most pointless thing I could have come up with. OBR has now been part of Wrath of the Everchosen and got nothing there and now BR Teclis, we are not likely to see OBR take center stage anytime soon, so this was the chance to get something interesting to mix things up. Most of all I had hoped for battleline options, as my lists end up so samey as mortek and kavalos eat up so many points...