Mutton

I don't know why they think 35 wounds is going to stand up to much in this game. Magic and mortals are the meta and a single unit of competent horde infantry can bring a mega down in 2 combat phases. I think most games with SoB are going to end by the third battle round, usually with the gargants getting whomped by combined arms. Any kind of shrug would have helped immensely. Either that or they'll just get mucked up with crappy 5-man units. I'm really hoping their Longshanks lets them walk away from combat (but I doubt it will).

Suddenly Krakeneater moves to the top of the list. I can't believe they decided not to preview an awesome ability like that.

They're all junk save for the cestus. Cowl - Rerolling 1s to wound against heroes and all wounds against the general...this is nothing. Too specific. Why isn't this just flat rerolling wounds??? You know, like almost every other artifact in the game will do for you. When the enemy knows you have this he's just going to keep heroes away from the dude. You don't have many models, so it won't be hard to do. MogJaws - Rerolling 1 hit, wound, or save die per phase isn't going to affect anything enough to be significant. Almost nothing gained. Lantern - So you can make a giant a level 1 wizard with no unique spells. Okay? To what end? So you can maybe mystic shield or arcane bolt something? Half of the other wizards in the game are going to easily unbind you---some automatically. It's a good premise for an artifact, but unless it's giving him multiple casts, bonuses to cast, etc...it's effectively useless.

Maybe we can hope they only chose to preview the worst artifacts?

I'm hoping Man Who Reads Book was given a review copy of the battletome this time around. I'm eager to see those artifacts and such.

There are plenty of miniatures manufacturers out there that won't bend you over the barrel. I'd recommend looking for third-party alternatives for units that are too pricey or have miserably old sculpts (Kings of War, Frostgrave miniatures, Creature Caster, etc). You can even find some awesome looking miniatures from board games on places like ebay.

Fellow corporate malcontents you and I. I'm glad someone else sees the wolf through its clothing. At this point I'm simply buying third-party models to use in my armies---it costs half as much and looks just as good (if not better in scattered cases).

I'm hoping that the Mega Gargants' warscrolls are strong enough on their own (without their allegiance abilities) to be worth taking outside of the Sons. I worry because GW doesn't have a great track record designing non-hero monsters.

I'd like to see some real gameplay before I raise my hopes for this. But if it turns out to be the AoS version of DoW...

A reminder for GW rules writers: Statistically Blood Stalkers will do an average of only 2 damage in the shooting phase. Also maybe the blood wyrm should do something other than nothing. Suggestion on how to fix them: Give them 2 attacks each. Unmodified mortals on 6's to hit IN ADDITION to normal damage. Give them the same crystal touch attacks the Blood Sisters have. Turn the blood wyrm into some kind of debuff ability affecting a unit within their missile range (24").

Even now I can hear the gusts of wind blowing through DoK players' wallets.

Back in the old days when squigs went wild they would bounce around the whole battlefield, chomping on anyone they ran into. That was fun. As for something more modern, as others have mentioned the Warcry initiative roll is brilliant and I wish they'd implement something similar into AoS proper.

It's also telling that DoK is one of the least played armies. I'm certain 90% of that is due to how expensive they are to collect. #Put20aelvesinabox

Give me some kind of Castlevania-themed army and I'll finally be in on Death.

I've gone into some deep discussion on this topic before, so I'll just reiterate some points. A huge problem with battleshock is that it's a mechanic of the game that's unevenly littered throughout the factions. The worst performing factions often have extremely low or modest Bravery with seemingly nothing to make up for it (now whether or not low Bravery is the sole reason they're under-performing is unlikely, but everything contributes). From what I've gathered, Bravery as a characteristic is low priority when it comes to arbitrating the "value" of warscrolls. Looking at various warscrolls throughout the game, it often feels quite arbitrary and exclusively lore-specific that some units have nigh-unbreakable Bravery 10, or are slapped with crippling 4's, 5's, and 6's. I see people saying that we take away Inspiring Presence...but the second you do that, all of the low tier factions with Bravery issues are suddenly dead in the water. They RELY on it. Battleshock is a design issue where there are simultaneously too many ways to ignore it, so most of the game doesn't even play in that space, but there are still some factions that absolutely need the ability to ignore it. I don't know how to solve it. You bend one way and Bravery doesn't matter at all and it becomes the vestigial hand of AoS (close to where we are now), or you bend the other way and chop the legs off of everyone who isn't undead or a daemon.

Log Entry Day 196: Still no AoS news. Things are dire. I'm starting to forget how the Activation Wars work and the names of all the Fyreslayer units...

I'd like to see Morathi and Malerion join an uneasy alliance to form a single (more complete) faction.

Putting them on 32's would actually give YOU a disadvantage since a marauder's 1" attack can go over 25mm bases, but not 32's. For friendly, casual games, you'll likely find a mix of people who will or will not care too much about base size. In tournaments it's expected that everything is on its proper legal base. It might be more of a pain, but I'd just go with what GW recommends and save yourself the trouble and having to explain yourself every time you go for a match. There's always the chance base sizes change in the future, but who can say when?

Carry on my wayward Sons.

1) This doesn't change anything about bases, except it gives larger bases more of a chance to hold an objective. Currently, it's so easy to pile in 30 25mm dudes onto an objective and automatically hold it for 1-2 turns, even if you have say, 10 32mm guys on there. It only helps larger based models (which already need the help due to the inherent detriment of being on large bases, such as weapon range and model pile-in). 3) Unit strength already exists in the game. Battleplans and Mawtribes already do this. Saying "Monsters count as 5 guys" is no different than saying "Mawtribes monsters count as 10 guys." I'm not sure how this can be considered a complicated, "extraneous" rule. Non-hero monsters already suck in this game, and this is a way to give them some kind of holding power on objectives. Otherwise, we continue to run into the situation where an enormous Ghorgon is sitting on an objective, but oh no, two goblins are there too, so I guess the goblins get it. 4) What? How exactly? Counting units instead of models actually HELPS elite armies. As said before, it means giant hordes of 30 models can't rush in and stand on an objective forever. It means elite armies, which tend to have smaller sized units, but more of them, can compete. The game already benefits hordes in many ways, from model count on objectives to warscroll bonuses and max-sized point discounts. Counting whole units as one brings hordes back down to everyone else's level for winning games.

A couple of different suggestions on making non-horde units more viable for winning objective-based battle plans (aside from rewriting warscrolls). 1) A cap on the number of models that count towards capturing an objective. For instance, you could say, a maximum of 10 models count towards capturing an objective. This would create more situations where smaller numbered units can contest hordes. 2) You could say that an objective can't be captured if it has any enemy models also in range (I've never liked the idea that even though we have dudes still fighting, you have one or two more dudes, therefore you "capture" the point). 3) Monsters count as 5 models (This would lift up their usefulness and wouldn't step on Mawtribes' toes). 4) Count units instead of models in range.

Thundertusks still have bad warscrolls, so nothing changes. Bring the Huskard down to 240 and we'll talk. Though the big bummer is no drops for Gutbusters. Tyrants, Butchers, Firebellies, Ironguts, Leadbelchers, Ironblasters, and even Gluttons themselves can all afford to come down.

What's important about the Petrifex change is that now Bonereapers have to choose between a +1 save with Katakros OR their Bludgeon CA. Having both ultra defense and ultra offense was the real issue. Also, it's a crime that Kroak remains at 320.

It is a bit insulting that 'Ardboyz are better elite troops than Chaos Warriors. Seriously, all they needed was some rend. I think GW continues to forget that just because it's on a 32mm base with 2 wounds, doesn't mean it's automatically good.

In the U.S., I'd expect a long period of waiting depending on where you live. It's a cluster here, always has been. Places are reopening, only to immediately shut back down. Some states are reaching their peak infection levels. Government is lying to folks in order to jump start the economy. I don't anticipate any (trustworthy) tournaments here for a hot minute.