madmac

Mechanically and aesthetically it seems like a pretty lame IDK hero, I agree. Aesthetically just a combination of existing elements and Mechanically...we've already got the Soulrender and the almighty Lotann as dedicated infantry support heroes, and uh...no one uses those guys either. Still, you never know, there might be more for IDK. Just adding a new, tougher infantry unit could do a lot to open up alternate playstyles.

Yeah, I think even for people who are initially interested in a new Eldar release (like me) this gets boring fast. If you already know the answer to "I wonder what today's rumor engine will be about?" even checking the new images starts to feel unnecessary after day 8 or 9 of the same thing. Sure, you can use them to speculate about exactly what Eldar models are getting updated, but that's already quite far removed from what normally makes rumor engines entertaining. That's true of themed rumor engines generally I think, but at least with say the Thondia previews, there was still rampant speculation regarding what the KB were even going to be or look like at the time, so there was at least some interest. Eldar by contrast are not a new army, their aesthetics are quite well understood and so on. Perhaps excessively so, given how little their look has diverged from 2nd or 3rd edition 40k or whatever.

Unlikely. You can't easily just leave the saddle off Magmadroths they have a huge hole in their backs where it's supposed to plug in.

If nothing else I'm 100% certain all the advent REs are Eldar now, because they wouldn't have to resort to 12 pictures of the same model otherwise.

Will they though? I'm not trying to be cynical here, but I don't remember any 40k announcements or previews for Christmas Day when they announced Aether War, or Gloomspite Gits. This Advent seems to be clearly leading up to an announcement of some kind of Eldar Box, maybe an Eldar vs X faction box, I don't really see them squeezing in a random AoS teaser at the same time.

Yeah this is the main thing for me. It's not that I need new models right this second, I just want news. I want to have even the vaguest idea of what is coming out for AoS in 2022 and so far we've got 12 heaping helpings of nada.

Sadly yeah. I was hoping we'd get the Jan/Feb big release slot next year, but it looks like AoS is still going to be slumbertown for the forseeable future.

There are a lot of factors going into how the release schedule played out for sure, but I think most of the boredom/desperation at this point for AoS fans is just the fact that we'll all been waiting almost 7 months at this point to see what 3rd edition has on offer past the initial SC/KB release and we still know basically nothing about what is coming after Nurgle, which is itself just a speedbump release. That said, I genuinely don't think this years advent calendar is going to be all Eldar. 24 rumor engines is a LOT to put out for one release, even a massive one.

Definitely Fyreslayers. Those are Fyreslayer runes being heated in the Brazier, along with what looks like an Axe, and the overall shape of everything fits perfectly with their aesthetic.

This is just rewriting history. We were getting Kislev updates from the Old World team for ages before they were announced by CA for TWW3. Literally the first couple previews we got for the Old World were just Kislev and a map. It's what makes me doubt these rumors so hard, "ignore the thing the literally started doing Old World Previews with, it doesn't mean anything" feels like pure wishlisting.

Exactly. "Ignore everything they've previewed and shown so far! Obviously they'll lead with the fan-favorite stuff they've barely mentioned!" The Old World hasn't actually been in development that long, and literally the first thing they chose to preview was Kislev. Cathay coming a little later I can see, but I can't see them having extensive new model ranges ready to go ahead of the one that they had far enough along to show off a few months after the whole thing was announced. Also, if we're talking business, ToW is partially marketing towards long time fans, who likely already have armies for Empire, Chaos, etc. The financial benefit of putting out Kislev and Cathay or anything else new is that no one is going to pass on it just because they've already got 5000 points of Kislev and Cathay laying around.

I think it'll be like Soul Wars, where most of the actual Nagash/Shyish focus came in the lead-up and launch of 2nd Edition and the first year or so (Forbidden Power, definitely) after that, and then the rest of the edition it kind of drifted out of focus outside of the new battletomes having an obligatory "post-necroquake changes" lore section and what have-you, as overall we started to explore less-known settings like 8-points, Hysh, and Ghur in the lead-up to the launch of Warcry, LRL, Beastgrave/Direchasm, SoB, , etc and finally Broken Realms and Dominion. It's still kind of a three year cycle, it just a cycle that doesn't strictly exist inside the bounds of edition changes.

I don't play Nurgle, but I don't think it's excessively negative to look at the last two released battletomes as a sign of what is to come. Many many units and heroes in those books lost special abilities and of course all of the command abilities, and most of those didn't get anything new to compensate for that or make them more interesting in any way. Maybe a -5 point adjustment for losing their only purpose of being played, maybe a pity replacement like "Use a specific generic command ability on a specific target for free once per game" Wait for the rules, sure, but I don't think it's realistic to pretend there's no cause for concern.

Gitz took a lot of hits from all directions. Removing all warscroll battalions right after patching their weakest subfactions with special warscroll battalions didn't help them either, though that's one of my gripes with the edition change in general.

I don't at all consider the 2nd edition Tome Celestial updates, and the 3rd Edition ones, which are explictly noted as being official 3rd edition updates to certain battletomes as being at all equivalent. We can agree to disagree, but I stand my ground on that point.

I don't think it's Pessimism, just rational. Sons got the very first Tome Celestial update for 3rd edition, and there's just realistically nowhere else to go with them unless they get new models, and I don't think anyone expects them to get new models soon. LRL OTOH I would normally also put in the "no-update" column for this edition, except that it seems very likely still that they have more models that haven't been released yet. Basically, IMO, I don't expect new tomes until very late 3rd or not at all for any armies that either released this year or got a Tome Celestial update unless they get new models. So Slaanesh, DoK, Gravelords, STD, SoB, Seraphon are all on my personal "unlikely to see a new book in the next year or two" list. LRL are a probable exception to the rule, and I do think there might be something to the idea that Seraphon will eventually see a big update, between Kroak and the Underworlds band there is what looks like a consistent design shift nailed down for them. We can also of course cross out SC, Orcs, and now Nurgle, which leaves Cities, Fyreslayers, KO, Sylvaneth, IDK, Gits, Mawtribes, FEC, Nighthaunt, OBR, BoC, Skaven, Khorne, and Tzeentch, plus any new armies. Merged Dwarves, maybe with new models/new subfaction seems inevitable at this point even though I don't like it, I wouldn't be surprised to see it sometime next year. Sylvaneth also appears set up for some kind of update, but no one seems to know what or when, or especially when this whole Kurnouth/Kurnothi direction is finally going to pay off. Cities is hard to judge, they're a major point of focus in both BR and the new lore, but no real rumors of an update yet I don't think? I'd like to see Devoted make a big comeback with new models, but we'll see. IDK I can see updated pretty much anytime with just a new hero and we do have a rumor for that courtesy of Whitefang. Gits just need a book mostly, I can see them fitting in basically anytime there's a slot for them. Ogors late edition with new models also feels like a decent guess but not based on any real rumors. I think Nighthaunt and FEC and OBR have all been set up in BR, (Elf Bones! Stormcast Souls!) Rumor Engines, etc to see potentially a couple new models each, and we'll probably see one of them soon updated soon. Chaos for now I think is mostly in the book/obligatory hero model territory for 3rd edition, with the exception of rumored Chorfs, and the quite aged model lines for Skaven and BoC. Between the two, I feel like BoC are slightly more likely to see new models than Skaven, but it's just a gut feeling, I've got nothing to back it up. Realistically more likely both will get a few old models replaced but not a huge wave for either.

That would be a big no, GW has purposely removed the full warscrolls from kit instructions.

Eh, in a sense Order is the least bloated GA. Chaos is largely just one old army, or two if you prefer (Chaos Warriors+Chaos Demons) blown up into five different armies, plus Skaven and BoC. GA Death is really just an entire GA of Vampire Counts spinoffs+OBR as a spiritual TK successor. GA Destruction is an entire GA based on the old Greenskins army, plus Ogre Kingdoms. GA Order inherited the literal armies and/or spiritual successors for Empire, Brettonia, (Arguable, but I put SC here. It's all non-chaos human factions in any case) Lizardmen, Dwarfs, High Elves, Wood Elves, and Dark Elves. It's only the largest GA because it's composed of at least two or three times the actual old fantasy armybooks of any of the other GAs, with by far the least splitting and bloating involved.

True, plus there was never one elf army in old Warhammer, there were three. In a game where many old singular armies were expanded into 3-5 different armies, it's not actually that shocking that three elf armies got turned into 4-5.

Reading carefully, it looks like only the Dragon Princes are confirmed for December? No word specifically on the smaller dragons.

Right, but that's still only six. Normal underworlds seasons have 8.

Yeah, it deserves to be said, whether Bonesplittas for example have a future or not, chucking them into the neglected corner of a soup tome (twice now) has done nothing to reassure most players about their chances of sticking around. If your army isn't getting anything it isn't getting anything, and getting 1/3rd of a book instead of a full book isn't really a big improvement in that regard. That's not to say that I think all souped factions are doomed or anything, but I do think it's hard to spin as a positive development if you are a fan of a specific subfaction who is just getting thrown in with other more popular armies and not getting any new models or anything out of the deal. Even just from a rules perspective, it's often a step down in terms of support.

That is almost certainly a Maneater. Notice the cloth is very worn, typical for Ogors, and no human has that much junk in the trunk, as it were.

I could very easily see GW doing something for Eshin similar to the new kill teams. Effectively a new unit kit and warband all in one box,

Not only that, that rumor list is very light on 40k stuff for January, which is also a traditional slot for big AoS releases.