[The Rumour Thread]

10 minutes ago, Caladancid said:

No. I do play Death, and have played Death since it was Tomb Kings and Vampire Counts. Your tone, needs some work.

My point was that if new units are coming soon, those should be in a book that is also coming soon. That would make the most sense.

The hopeful half of me also thinks that there is NO way GW would focus on Soulblight like this, when there  are only two different units which are available in store, the rest being website only.

I think we are looking at two very different kinds of soon.

Legions of Nagash is "right around the corner" soon. It seems to have all the support to play Death as it is right now. It comes first to make GA:Death, basically, playable at all in the current enviroment, so people have reason to go into Malign Portents with a Death army at all.

 

Meanwhile, it is likely new models are in the "sometime this year" soon cathegory, by all we know. That they do not come with LoN tells us that they likely come as part of one or more traditional release wave for AoS, meaning a bundle of miniatures and battletome for a specific faction within GA:Death.

 

Another way to put it: LoN sets a framework for GA:Death that all GA:Death players will need (since the current one does not really work), then later releases can "slot" into this framework, but the release itself will likely fokus on using them standalone or with a more narrow line (depending on wether they are something entirely new or an update for, most likely, Deathrattle).

5 minutes ago, Burf said:

I highly doubt any new models are coming with this book. The NEXT book is likely to have a maggotkin+ size release of an entirely new faction.

I don't think Deathrattle or Nighthaunt or Soulblight are going to be getting a full update, though they may recieve some ancillary crossover units.

I think we can rule out Soulblight, since it is stated they get an Update to their GHB 2017 allegiance in LoN. Nighthaunt are unlikely this year as well, having got GHB 2017 support. I think GW did not expect them to catch as much attention as they did (I think they may be the most popular standalone for Death).

However, Deathrattle seem to persistently portrayed as the most common kind of Undead in AoS so far, both as the backbone (pun intended) of combined forces and as standalone forces of Sepulchral Kingdoms throughout the Realms. It would be odd to keep them in their current state and personally I feel they are the best candidate for a first "proper" Death release (and I do not just say this because I collect them). Also, GW had a lot of rather iconic designs on Skeletons throughout its history, which is something they really like to play with in AoS.

I think we will see Deathrattle and one entirely new thing this year. Though maybe its two entirely new releases minus Deathrattle or just one release instead.

 

Later on I expect some developement for Nighthaunt as they offer huge design space, have a very interesting background with the various Underworlds, are very popular as said, and are a real power according to lore, one even Nagash is careful in dealing with. New Vampires and Zombies one dayare likely as well (though not necessarily Soulblight Vampires and Corpsewalker Zombies, as they are to iconic to ignore, and an update to FEC one day as well (possibly spearheaded by Ushoran himself?). But all that is stuff I expect GW has only started developing at best, so well over 2 two years in the future at least.

One thing is certain, this year will bring new stuff for Death, wether during Malign Portents or after it. But I suspect thereafter its another draught for deathplayers, as GW propably wants to get new Aelves, Slaanesh and some more Destruction out of they way to sort of "complete" a basic roster of original to AoS factions.

 

1 minute ago, bsharitt said:

It sounds like the 4 "leader" allegiances are the factions everyone has been hoping for that mix and match existing death stuff, so I think they will see some crossover. It is interesting that they specifically callout soulblight as having rules in the new book since they were in the GHB2017. I wonder what they could have done there that's so different?

Give them Spell lores is what comes to my mind. Maybe specific commander skills and artefacts for bloodlines as well. Maybe they even give the bloodlines a role in the Warscrolls (like marks are used for Slaves to Darkness)

[The Rumour Thread]

At first the Battletome:Legions of Nagash announcement was a real bummer for me.

To me it spelled the cementing of GA:Death in its current state as setting displaced Vampire Counts army , which is sadly exactly what I have no interest in. It is one thing to say Death is more Monolitic than the other GAs, this would put Death as entirely Monolithic until further notice.

 

However, this is propably mostly a stopgap to support those who already collect and/or play Death as a Grand Alliance force for Malign Portents, and ultimately just represents one way of playing Death. This would mean seperate faction Battletomes for Death may still be as likely to come out as before. Since I am mostly interested in standalone Deathrattle and Nighthaunt (or something entirely new) I have to wait for this. I still sit on a heap of open questions, though I will propably get the book for the lore alone.

 

 

I really have to wonder why GW took so long to update Death if this was something they had planned all along though. They could have put out a Battletome bundling Death by leadership without new releases at pretty much any time. My only explanation is that they took a wait and see stance, so hopefully they now really made book that allows Death as a whole at least stand up well rule wise. We might also be looking at a serious reshuffeling of keywords here.

 

This may be good news for Skaven fans, as there now is a precedent that allows for a Battletome:Children of the Horned Rat supporting all Skaven factions without necessarily precluding releases for individual clan armies. Quite possible that Free Cities/Free Peoples develope along similar lines eventually, as they tend to be mostly represented by wildly mixing the various smaller Order Factions and Firestorm already took them halfway there.

 

[The Rumour Thread]

5 minutes ago, Captain Marius said:

This is a concern for me, theyre teasing stuff so far in advance im losing interest before its released (cases in point, Magnus the Red, Kharadron Overlords and Shadespire). The Rumour Engines are so vague I pay them no attention any more.

However I really like the preview articles on the Community site, especially the 'Coming next week' ones on a sunday - i think 2 weeks is the sweet spot for me when it comes to reveals.

I must say im impressed with the effort behind the malign portents promotion - i hope they can deliver something worthy of their hype!

I, on the other hand could really do with better info on the release schedule.

I am on a tight budget for my hobby purchases and those two week notices are way to short for me to plan out such purchases. I would propably spend more on miniatures if had a better idea what is coming when at which pricing and could plan accordingly, also because I am far more likely to buy older stuff if I know how it relates to opcoming releases.

As things are right now, I mostly hold of on purchases since I never know if not something I like better or have more use for is right around the corner within the same budget window.

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, Kugane said:

I'm really getting a oriental vibe from the design personally, especially with the video's music, the monk and such. Wearing mala (beads) is a common thing in eastern mythology for important figures. Perhaps thats what they were going for? I personally think that there should be at least one asia themed army in Age of Sigmar, or a subfaction - I'm aware most of warhammer is based around nordic mythology, but branching out into other parts of mythology would only get more people interrested in the game. 

I'm not sure if GW is willing to take such  a risk though, I am actually quite surprised how innovative they are lately despite being a multi million company. Most companies don't dare to take such risks. Like in the videogame industry many of the 'top' branches become repetitive because of this very reason. They got a formula that works, and spending money on stuff that potentially becomes a flop is super risky after all ><.

Really, while much of the lore might be very loosely based on the Norse mythology, the visual design really has not been particularly based on any specific source. GW has so far been blending elements and objects from all over the world and history for their AoS miniatures (perticularly many weapons are very much not medieval central European, some of the free cities artwork shows decidedly non European building styles, including one mostly pagodas), but so far they have stayed far away from making straight up counterpart cultures or straight transplants with any new creation (of course many of the pre-endtimes miniatures still carry the look of their Old World origin, which used counterpart/transplant cultures a lot).

I am all for GW continuing down the road they have taken so far in their designs with AoS, including not feeling bound to an European look. I feel that including any sort of clear counterpart faction would be a massive departure from the path taken so far and it is an approach riddled with easy pitfalls I would rather see GW avoid.

[The Rumour Thread]

4 minutes ago, HorticulusTGA said:

So if this video is "Episode 1", will it be one episode each day until Thursday when the MP countdown ends ?

My guess is one video for every herald.

My guess is the Knights of the Shroud come last.

They are the servants of Nagash, who will propably play Big Bad.

They propably know best what is going on, while the Ordinators may very well know the least, as it seems Sigmar is almost entirely blindsided about Nagashs maneuvers so far.

They are the heralds we know the least about and the ones whose nature is likely most pivotal.

[The Rumour Thread]

4 hours ago, Inqy said:

To be metaphorically precise, Nurgle is Entropy. Which is why he's simultaneously about both life/change and eventual annihilation in the heat-death-of-the-universe sense.

But yeah, this is the rumour thread so rumours: Seems like Malign Portents is either going to focus on Nurgle vs Death or else they're at least tying in all the released together. On the other hand we know the incoming Black Library books focus on "soul wars" which suggests a conflict with Order, since that's Nagash's whole beef with Sigmar, that he's supposedly 'poaching' souls due to Nagash to make Stormcasts. 

The second option seems more likely to me and would not exactly be new. I think if the upcoming Malign Portents/Soul Wars story arc, however it is otherwhise played out and presented, takes anything from the Realmgate Wars, it is propably that all releases during the arcs run will tie into it and play their own part.

 

[The Rumour Thread]

13 minutes ago, Still-young said:

Isn’t stagnation part of Nurgles thing? That’s why Tzeentch and Nurgle are opposed. 

I think the lore on that has changed a bit, Nurgle=stagnation has been the word in a lot of older sources, but I have not really seen it around lately. Newer background shows Nurgle more as a "Circle of Life" kind of guy, propably to differentiate him more from forces like Death in AoS or Necron and the Imperium in wh40k (there is some focus on the derogation of the "Corpse God" in the Deatguard lore).

I really think this is a good change, since the circular creation process meshes much better with Nurgles other qualities (like his joyfulness, industrious energy, the fatherly portrayal) and the nature of Chaos (overwhelming emotion, constant change and mutation).

I think the contrast with Tzeentch is kept well intact this way.

Nurgles way is at once predictable (always death and decay, follow by new, more fecund life) and directionless (Nurgle just wants his love, his children and his garden spread everywhere).

Meantime Tzeentch is the most unpredictable of the Chaos gods, but he always seeks some sort of specific end in the influence he excerts (no matter how pointless those ends might be).

[The Rumour Thread]

I think someone in this thread predicted destruction  herald = grot with pet. And this guy has three (the Mushroom for brains clearly counts as pet). Congrats.

 

That is the first herald not from a GHB 2017 allegiance, so thoughts that he might be followed by some friends might be somewhat realistic. I think a Moonclan release would be very nice for AoS in general, Night Goblins where always very popular and might draw attention from gamers left cold by most releases for AoS so far. Propably quite some way of though, I would not expect them before Q3.

 

Edit: Forgot about the wrapped surprised. I would be shocked if it was no GUO. Warhammer 40k 8th edition has some recent artwork featuring GUOs to go along with the Deathguard and those have longer legs than all GUO released so far and would fit the silhouette of the wrapping. Plus Codex Daemons 40k is very likely the first army update of 2018, focusing on Nurgle most likely.

[The Rumour Thread]

I am really meh about this glut of Special Characters. Why not just make a generic Sword and Shield Celestant, to give players at least some customization of their characters?

Seriously, the lack of equipment customization on characters is one thing I dislike about AoS. And I never liked special characters anyway (remember when Vandus Hammerhand had just the same rules as any other Lord Celestant? I miss that)

 

Bit of topic, but I am very glad so many Tomb Kings units make it into TW:Warhammer. By my count, only the Necrolith Colossus, Ushabti with Bow and Tomb Herald seem to be missing. And the Hierotitan looks ace and I think not a lot of people where expecting it. All in all, looking really good.

[The Rumour Thread]

2 hours ago, Blood&skulls said:

I don't like to sound negative and I know this is the rumour page but allot of these ideas make it sound like you want AOS  to be 40k with a different aesthetic. 

i get that AOS should be different to WHF and a chance to go nuts with design elements but can't we have SOME fantasy elements retained in the new design aesthetics. 

 

Each to their own but this is just my preference.

Meaning by "fantasy" the classic medieval themes?

I do not think one needs to fear that going away.

All the big crazy needs something to contrast with to make an impact. I do not think  anyone here is eager to see classic knight, free people facing all those terrors with nothing but guts and a blade or the simple grot with a pointy stick dissapearing into obscurity.

[The Rumour Thread]

3 hours ago, Killax said:

I really think all kinds of engines and ships could work for practically every army. It was even true for WFB, the downside of WFB was that it did require some aquatic areas to be believable but for Age of Sigmar something like that doesn't really matter.

Better put a flying chariot for Stormcast, a flying Warship for Vulkites and Bloodbound and Zeppelin for Orruks would work amazingly well in my mind. For Death obviously such design is even easier justified by a dozen orso banshee's carrying it like they do with the Necromancer engine.

One of the reasons as to why I believe 40K is also so massively popular is because of vehicles of all kinds. In this epic Age of Sigmar I think it would be very great to not only consider something similar but even improve onto it. 

Examples of epic fantasy vehicles:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

So yeah, I just hope GW continues to turn up AoS to 11. 

If they ever get around to Deadwalkers, Zombie driven Vehicles are a must, imo. Huge ramshackle constructions, filled to the brimm with Chained up Zombies doing a single monotonous task in eternity (esentially, they are binary switches, since you can turn them on or off, but they can't undertake more complex tasks). Bonus points if they are clearly just some ordinary structure uprooted and modified, like a crawling siege tower that was clearly a Windmill.

GW needs to give them something with a unrotten brain for leadership for that, but they propably already need to, somebody must have build those Fleshcarts. Really, I think they should have kept Deathmages and Deathwalkers as one faction, the fleshcart is already a blend from both and I think World-that-was style petty Necromancers belong with the Zombies.

This would have also forced the Mortis Engine into Nighthaunt along with a slight Lore rewrite, keeping another host of issues at bay. But then again, it is always easy to have a better idea as an outsider reviewing a decission long after the fact.

 

But yeah, AoS is really closer to a mass compatible variant of psychedelic gonzo fantasy than classic high or epic fantasy and that opens up a whole new world of potential war engines, with the surface barely scratched with the likes of the Kharadon Ironclad.

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, angrycontra said:

I would be very careful not to overhype regarding this malign portents release. I suspect it will mostly be some new campaign/realmwars/firestorm-esque release with the 4 heroes (1 for each grand alliance) being the center focus. Now there might be new death announcement but I strongly believe that nurgle is the next in line to be released and I don't think gw wants 2 releases to clash with each other (unless ofcourse this is a surprise new aos edition (with new logo and all) with a new starter set for nurgle and death but I doubt that).

There might be no direct releases for Malign Portents itself other than the four heroes, but going by the artwork, MP seems highly Death focused and it would be weird to run a big hyped up event like that with only the current range of models to go on. Because of this I think there is good cause to at least expect a release of its own as a tie in around the event.

On the other hand, GW also managed to run a Death Guard focused Campaign event before the actual Deathguard Codex and army release and Nurgle got not a single release to tie in with Realmgate Wars despite being one of the biggest players.

 

Then again, so far only Shadespire and WH40K 8th edition have gotten a similar amount of buildup from the Community Team, so it is logical many expect there is more to it than what little we have been told so far.

 

In the end, all bets are off, since we do not even know for certain what Malign Portents exactly will be, since its only ever been called an "event" as far as I recall. Could be a worldwide campaign like Fate of Konor, could be a year spanning background Campaign with all other releases as tie ins, like the Realmgate Wars was, could be just a small splash like Blightwar (remember how many of thought Blightwar would be the followup on Realmgate Wars?) or it could be something unlike all we've seen before.

Right now, all we have to go on is two shown Minis, confirmation of two more, and a lot of hype (going back all the way to Q2 2017 iirc). In this situation speculation and ultimately disapointment seem inevitable.

[The Rumour Thread]

So, just a little thing about those teaser vids I've noticed:

 

When the "The Field" video ends and the "Malign Portents" logo shows you can see a single skeleton in the lower right corner. At the end of "the ship" you can see more of the picture, including a second skeleton and I also think its a bit clearer. The Original Malign Portents teaser showed none of this artwork. So I guess they'll reveal more and more of the artwork with each "Omen" teaser and I think the actual hint of what is to come may actually be in the artwork and the "Omen" bits before are actually more atmosphere and distraction from the actual reveal playing right under our nose.

I think the redisigned Age of Sigmar logo is similar, it is slightly more zoomed out in "The Ship" than it is in "The Field", though there are no discernible shapes in the sorrounding artwork so far.

I've only just noticed now, since I sort of zoned out when logo played, taking for granted that it is all the same everytime anyway.

 

So, anyway, if I am onto something here, they are actually showing is some sort of box or bookcover design bit by bit each time the Logos play, while we look at the animations shorts in between scrambling for clues. In which case, well played, social media team.

[The Rumour Thread]

2 hours ago, Greasygeek said:

That would be so very extremely megacallifratilistic awesome! But that is not happening. It would be the first time ever for GW to not include a good vs evil battle in a starterbox. It would also mean a box without stormcast.. so well.. I doubt it.

It is some way back by now, but there once was a Lizardmen vs. Bretonnia starter set, so not exactly good vs. not exactly good, so it would not be the first time ever.

 

I sure would love a Death vs. Nurgle boxset, especially if it was say, easy to build skeletons vs. mostly deamons (skeletons are the only thing I can think of that I would want loads of mostly the same looking minis of and nurgle deamons I can use in 40k with deathguard). Not that I believe that is what is coming mind you.

The way GW is rolling out Malign Portents I think its a new approach to doing a storyline/campaign. If that is what happens, then I think most new releases for at least the first half of 2018 will ty in with Malign Portents, but the heralds will be the only miniatures actually released as part of Malign Portents.

[The Rumour Thread]

20 minutes ago, Sennyo said:

i can only think of one image that is order vs order and that is in the Sylaneth book. It's Drycha fighting against some skinks, however i dont think that is a single image or stormcast fighting agaisnt order forces.

Plenty of Lore though. Multiple mentions of the Knights Excelsior "purging" Order factions, is what comes to my mind.

 

All in all GA infighting has been kept low though. I can not think of any instances of Death vs Death and there no prominent Story or any artwork og Destruction vs. Destruction I can spontanously think of either.

 

We should also keep in mind that it looks a lot like we will have a High Elves/Dark Elves split in AoS (though most propably eventually renamed and redesigned), there does not seem to be any particular enemity between the two groups so far. All mentions we have of Tyrion and Malerion date back to the Age of Myth and have them working together at least decently. Possible they got back to being enemies in their disappearance during the Age of Chaos, but for all we know, they could be the best of buddies when they reemerge.

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, mumperpa said:

Looks a bit like the hair from the wild riders/sisters of the thorn kit, minus the leaves. Wishful thinking? I just got the models so it would be great if a new things with the same aesthetic came out.

Mistweaver Sai is simmilar as well. At this point there has been a lot of unresolved "elfy" engine picks, but nothing concrete apart from the armdragon.

[The Rumour Thread]

18 hours ago, SaJeel said:

All speculation****

So i'd imagine that the Malign Portents is goingto have a major release for each faction indicated by the heroes, For death it will be Night Haunt with the Herlad of Shroud paving the way for them along with a sweet black coach, Chaos will get full DarkOath release, after Nurgle in Feb of course. Order I'm not sure, it might be Aleves, but i could see them pushing them out as the conclusion to the Event, before them, i could see us getting some updates to Freeguild with a new freeguild hero as per the rumor engine, Destruction i have no clue 

I doubt the heralds will come with full army releases for their respective faction or subfaction, as we know the Generals Handbook 2017  only gave allegiance abilities for factions that won't get their own battletome anytime soon and both Nighthaunt and Slaves to Darkness where in it.

I think the Heralds will be like most of the Silver Tower heroes, a token representative of planned factions not to be released for some time, to show that GW plans to get to them eventually and preview what direction they are likely to take them.

I am curious to see the order representative, if he is really Free Peoples (likely, given fitting Rumor Mill pictures and Free Guild being in the GHB 2017), since I want to know if he is also Freeguild. We can see from the two Darkoath characters that GW seems to plan taking Slaves to Darkness towards "Chaos Barbarians without Marks", which is quite the departure from previous Slaves to Darkness units that can be "slotted" into any monogod army via marks, essentially meaning there are two very different subfactions within Slaves to Darkness that might not have much synergy with each other. Since I always wondered why Free Peoples are called that when obviously all members of the faction are Freeguild, I think Free People might get a similar treatment, with no future release for them being Freeguild, even though that is all there is to the faction right now.

On the other hand, I have noticed the Darkoath Chieftain is not listed as a Slaves to Darkness unit in the Webstore even though that is his faction, so maybe him being Slaves to Darkness is just a placeholder until Darkoath becomes its own faction, just as "Aelf" propably won't stay the Mistweaver and Shards faction forever. Or its just and oversight.

 

Since we are speculating on next year and Malign Portents, I'll throw my speculation on Death in:

 

I think the next year will see two Death releases, not directly part of Malign Portents, but as part of the likely story developements around the event.

One, and I think the first release for Death will be Deathrattle, propably after the 40k daemons release, but I think even before a possible AoS Nurgle release, so quite early in the year. I think Deathrattle being the first Shadespire release for an unupdated faction is a pretty strong indicator towards this. It also really makes sense that Deathrattle would be strong contender for the first Death release, most GA:Death players are likely to already have a bunch of them already and are likely to pick up more even if they don't plan on playing pure Deathrattle. Judging by Shadespire, GW seems to want Deathrattle to stay rather generic in style and appearance. I've speculated before that we will propably see reinterpretations or redesigns of many of the skeletal units that where removed with Tomb Kings (namely, marksmen both mounted and on foot, the screaming skull catapult, skeleton chariots) since those units are classics of Warhammer and predate Tomb Kings by many years and revitalising and reimagining their classics seems to be something GW really likes to do with AoS. This would make Deathrattle actually the most conventional army with releases for AoS, consisting of large blocks of infantry, supported by traditional cavalry, marksmen and artillery (and maybe some sort of skeletal warbeast). This seems fitting, when we consider Deathrattle being the reanimated remnants of a bygone age.

I also think Deathrattle represent the force Nagash can most reliably and numerously mobilise as per the status quo Malign Portents will start at, so it makes sense to release them on the initial steps of a Storyarc, that is likely Death fokused initially. Which brings us to why I think there will be a second Death release and what it might be.

For all their charm and appeal, a horde of Skeletons just doesn't have that "Wow-Factor" GW tends to go for with AoS. We also know from what little Lore we got on Death in AoS that Nagash is planning something major and this being a Warhammer setting it would be odd if that didn't turn out to be an army. Sekeletons are great for rank and file, but If Nagash wants to get back to being a major player, he needs a force that can go toe to toe with the likes of Stormcast, Ironjaws or the Monogod armies. Morghast are neither numerous, nor varied enough to fill that spot, while we know that Nagash finds Vampires just to unreliable to serve as his spearhead elites.

So it seems likely that at the high point of the Death part of the Malign Portent Storyarc, Nagash releases his big ploy. Determining what exactly that will be, apart from being bigger and more fantasic is hard to say. It could be the literal "Corrupted Death Stormcast" many seem to speculate on, though I think that would be the worst (since least inspired) possible variant. Whatever it is, it will propably involve a corruption or copy of the Stormcast creation process and Nagashs syphoning of Stormacast Souls, but the important question is in what form will he bind and incorporate that power? This could an improved version of previously known Undead, maybe a better kind of Vampire over the old Soulblight Bloodlines or some kind of very fancy Mummy.  But of course, I have my own pet theory: What better use is there for stolen and empowered Soulstuff than sticking it into an undying body of nekromantic infused Stone?

Nagash propably still knows the old tricks of Golem creation from Khemri and the Ushabti, Sphynxes and company where propably the most unique aspect of the old Tomb Kings. What those things lacked was smarts, personality and independent though, but all Nagash is shown to be doing (syphoning Stormcast Souls, meddling with Shardglass) seems perfectly suited to solving that issue. We know from Firestorm that Age of Myth era civilisation had some pretty advanced golems and war collossi. While the undefeatable colossi from Firestorm seem to be almost Godbeast level (i.e. out of tabletop scope), this is a nice setup for armies of unused vessels for the creation of Ushabti like constructs sitting in the crypts and ruins from the age of myth.

It all going down somewhat like this would tick a number of boxes I would expect GW to tick in an initial update for GA:Death. It would explain and soften the full removal of the Tomb Kings range, since the two biggest components of that range (hordes of skeletons and constructs) would be the first Death units to be redesigned and released, leaving only the small lead element of Tomb Kings (Mummies) in limbo. It would implement a larger than life, easily trademarkable and unique to AoS faction that is still anchored in old lore and models. It would give Death players two very different directions to choose from (one a very classical army of wide but generic appeal and one more out there and spectacular, but also of a more narrow appeal, as well as one horde and one elite army). It would also allow GW to pick up some oldies of the genre and their own range and give them on the other side an almost entirely clean slate of a faction to experiment and freewheel on.

 

This is all very unlike to go down exactly like this, but I am pretty confident in these parts of my speculation:

-Deathrattle are first for Death

-They will be quite conventional by AoS standart

-Nagashs big masterplan results in an entirely new faction

-We will see a return of Nekro Constucts at some point, though not necessarily next year or as a standalone faction

4 hours ago, Cerlin said:

I dont see why they do not release mod kits for old armies. Armor, shoulderpads, heads, and weapons in the new style to glue on older model lines. 

I would buy this.

AoS upgrade kits for older kits would be great and I see a lot of space for such kits: Monogod themed Upgrades for Slaves to Darkness, Free City kits for Order, Upgrade sprues for the kitbash units in Flesheater Courts, Bonesplittaz and Beastclaw Raiders. Personally, I would buy a kit to make Skeletons less Vampire Counts looking in a heartbeat, I'm sure there is much more. GW does seem to currently favor Upgrade sprues for wh40k, so there is hoping, though I am afraid the reason they have not done such kits is that they don't expect sufficient demand.

[The Rumour Thread]

33 minutes ago, Spiky Norman said:

Well, it is 40k Open Day.*

So that can't come as too much of a disappointment.

*I know some Necromunda and 30k was also revealed, but those are all in-universe games.

Ok, I have to admit that I managed to utterly miss that its "40k Open Day" and not generic "Open Day". Serves me right for not looking at the headers.

 

On the bright side, the Orlocks look like they are very easy to convert into generic Humans for both AoS and 40k, since they don't have many specific gubbins and a widely usable style (that we do not really have on any existing plastic kits).

[The Rumour Thread]

Open Day reveals are posted at Warhammer Community, without so much as a mention of AoS:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2017/11/25/all-the-latest-from-the-warhammer-40000-open-day-nov-25gw-homepage-post-1/

 

Says "that's it" at the end, so I don't think there is more coming from Open Day. Looks like we won't get any news on AoS until 2018, barring maybe a New Years Teaser like they did at the end of 2016.

[The Rumour Thread]

4 hours ago, Sennyo said:

rumor engine time

 

First think that came to my mind:

So yeah, together with the cute drake way back when, I think we have reached a point where either Scourge Privateers or a suspiciously similar new Aelf faction can be reasonably expected.

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, Frozenbeast said:

 

Any idea on this? It looks snake-y to me.....anyone? 

May be part of a big beasty (been some time since we last got one) or some sort of armor design, either way I think Aelven, Aeldari (Ynnari?) or Slaanesh are the likeliest fit.

 

For lack of a better idea I will just claim it is Malerion again.

[The Rumour Thread]

That tail in the rumor engine really reminds me of the tails and tentakles on horrors, but the rest does not really look like a Tzeentchian base design. Still, might be a tease of Shadespire Tzeentch? Other than that, I say Malerion, just because.

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, Killax said:

In terms of Brayherds, Warherds and Monsters of Chaos this is also exactly what I was hinting at!

What I believe to date is that Age of Sigmar was a check to see if the Warhammer Fantasy line if at all could generate the same sales numbers as Warhammer 40.000. Since the succes of GH2016 I believe the creators have archieved what they wanted to with Age of Sigmar, however the initial design of Age of Sigmar really incorporated the idea of 4 massive Factions, being the Grand Allegiances (in order to have the possible player give an extreme wide ammount of buyers choice).

Since that inception Age of Sigmar has catched on enough to have several lines carry themselves as sub-Factions, e.g. Stormcast and Blades of Khorne and in my opinion one of the reasons as to why Desciples of Tzeentch was perhaps pushed in competitive design might also have something to do with making them as interesting as possible as a sub-Faction. To the point, where if I recall correctly, they where the first Battletome that contained their own Battle Trait, Command Traits, Artefacts and double Spell Lores.

That was then, now is now however and I hope that GW too sees the potential that is gained in more players catching on the game. I absolutely wouldn't want the Grand Allegiances to dissapear but I do believe that more functional Allegiances (by incorporating more models into them) is another push for the game leading to a great game.

As someone who's played WFB and initially found Age of Sigmar lacking in some of the more "creational aspects" of the game I have been finally able to come back on that due to the excistance of multiple Allegiances. To the point where Age of Sigmar has now actually surpassed Warhammer Fantasy 8th edition in it's competative and creational diversity. With this I mean that Age of Sigmar shows more diverse Tournament results and shows more diverse army builds per 'Faction'.

I'll try to push the topic back onto track though, Death and general Age of Sigmar discussion again has little to nothing to do with Rumours. My apologies.

Well, Monogod armies are special in so far, that they are only full allegiances that are smaller than a GA that can include miniatures from multiple factions, so they do not necessarily need the range of units Stormcast, Bloodbound or Seraphon offer on their own to have the appeal of a "collectable" force. There are a few places where such "Superfactions" are thinkable but not realized, most noticably Skaven and I am also thinking free peoples should qualify (with the current free people renamed Freeguild and Free People added to various human and maybe aelf and dispossed units), but more importantly, I think it would be nice to have more units that, like Slave to Darkness units, qualify for full inclusion in multiple factions via their keywords (I am mostly thinking of the Mortarchs, Masterclan units and various big monsters).

 

In the end, army composition rules are still my biggest beef with AoS, even if they only affect matched play, since even though I am most interested in narrative play, I still want to ensure I can field a matched play force should I need to and the many inflexibilities are really holding me back, especially compared to the ellegance and width of choice of the army composition rules offered to Tyranid (and GSC), Aeldari, Chaos and Imperium armies by 40k, even though they are so simmilar to GAs.

 

One correction though, DoT certainly was not the first battletome to get the allegiance package of abilities, spells and artefacts, Beastclaw Raiders, Sylvaneth and Bonesplitters all came earlier, with, iirc, Sylvaneth being the first. DoT was new insofar that it offered multiple tables of artifacts, spells and command traits depending on the individual units keywords and not just the armies allegiance.

[The Rumour Thread]

While GW had a very full release schedule this year, there have been only 5 full army/wave releases of miniatures, of which the greater part of three was for AoS. While Primaris and DG each where arguably larger than any of the AoS ones and the Tzeentch daemons supported both systems, I would still say that put in relation and considering all the other stuff released for the AoS system and setting one can not say that AoS was treated badly this year.

But that still leaves the matter of the total number of armies supported with new miniatures being extremely thin by GWs standart. This was hardly even noticable in 40k, where there is a large amount of already very well supported armies, but I think this was not so great for AoS, that has a lot of very small factions, but only very few really collectible armies with a lot of choices. Hopefully this means that there has been a fair amount of miniature releases pushed back, that we might see in 2018 instead, and not that there is a big policy shift towards fewer army releases per year.

 

As for this weeks rumor egine, I am utterly lost, I can not place those embelishements at all. I want to think Death, but my brain tells me it is more likely to be Ynnari or Adeptus Ministorum.

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, Killax said:

Pirates or Ninja's ?!  

Well, Scourge Privateers and the Tenebrael Shard are the most hook loving guys in AoS I can think of, but then again the rumor mill tends to turn out "not aelf, even though you really thought so" hints at a shocking rate.