[The Rumour Thread]

Those are fantastic. Honestly the first models GW have revealed in a long time that have blown me away the first time I'm looking at them! Not at all cluttered, striking poses and nice chunky details for ease of painting! Even the tactile rocks look decent and plausible for a battlefield!

I love those 'hand' cannons. I can just imagine him up in the gunsmiths just going 'NO BIGGER!' to everything on offer until he is all but wheeling about small dwarven cannons! 🤣

I do hope this is part of the battleline set and not some €50 character kit. There is no way I am going to be able to choose between any of the poses shown here and its begging for more customisation on top! I'm hoping there is an easy way to get a bundle of these! (Or hopefully its the one kit they throw in every battleforce/vanguard/start collecting set so it becomes easy to end up with plenty of them anyway!!)

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, willange said:

Instead of a zoo manager, they should make a tabletop tournament organizer game.  
Instead of creating exhibits, you make premade tables.
Instead of adopting animals, you allow various flavors of nerd into your rented convention center space.
instead of dealing with escapes and animal illness, you resolve rules disputes, clean up flipped tables and distribute Mountain Dew.

If you play the London GT campaign, you'd also have to have to buy the zero day DLC for access to any terrain. 😅

[General Hobby Chatter!]

I've just built my first Cygor for beasts of chaos. I love the model, it looks so cool and I love how the alternative versions look so different from each other (unlike some other multi version kits!) so I was excited to finally getting around to making one for myself!

It is the single worst kit I've ever built in my life! The thing is a huge pain in the butt! Many of the bits of hair, spikes, horns etc are extremely fragile and have snapped off more than once! Its necklace has tiny connection points that don't line up on both side at the same time!

The instructions are dire! So many pieces are misnumbered, I spent a good quarter of an hour trying to work out why an arm didn't fit at the elbow before realising that its also misnumbered, possibly more than once as it looks likes its used in the alternative build as well!

What's worse is that I have ended up with three more of these kits to have to build.....😅

On 11/12/2022 at 6:47 AM, JackStreicher said:

Recently I finished more multi-level terrain ( 2 1/2 Goblin Town boxes)

I love the smattering of greenish blue here! Really gives some life to what could otherwise just be 'brown wood'! Great stuff!

 

[AoS abandoned by my gaming group. Would like to see more QoL improvments for the game!]

On 11/9/2022 at 10:38 AM, Enoby said:

The local group around my area has dried up too, unfortunately. A lot of that was due to drama, according to the remaining member, but they've really struggled to get the game running again unfortunately. 

I've no doubt that this is partially due to the residue drama - I'm not sure what happened, but it was a big schism in the end. But even from those who played afterwards didn't seem too into continuing.

If I were to hazard a guess why, and to relay my own experiences, it's because AoS currently seems to be a competitively geared game without the mechanics needed to feel satisfying. I've played AoS, 40k, and Malifaux. Out of those, Malifaux is by far the most tactically demanding but it suits it as it's a skirmish game very focussed around scoring points over killing things. 40k, when I played it, was very lethal and there were a lot of hard counters, but you felt more in control as you have lots of options when building lists - though balance was rubbish, it had a strong illusion of choice. In AoS, I've found the game to retain the high lethality but with fewer options so you feel less in control, even if the balance is actually much better than 40k.

For example, I had a game of Slaanesh vs Ironjawz. Despite my best efforts screening, by turn 2 the Ironjawz had wiped out a good 3/4 of my army. We played again, the Ironjawz player failed the charge, and I counter charged leaving them with only about 1/3 of their army left. Technically a 50% win rate, but it didn't feel satisfying to play in either case. It felt quite similar in a tournament I was in; I came second with a S2D Archaon list, but most games were just slaughterfests as soon as bases touched. Definitely a part of playing Archaon lists, but it seemed to also be the case with Squigs vs Ossiarchs on another table. 

To cut it short, the recent AoS games I've had and watched seemed to be so lethal you hardly had the chance to appreciate the models on the table. There wasn't much back and forth in a unit, but rather watching things dissapear once charged (unless they save stacked, which usually happened on models with high damage output), which can be tactical but I wouldn't say enjoyable for most. I doubt 40k is much different in this regard, but I think all of the options and better cover rules give people more of a sense of control. 

To add to this, though, I think Grand Strategies and Battle Tactics haven't gelled well with AoS's 'simple' gameplay. Unlike Malifaux, which has models directly built around their schemes and strategies, the GS and BT are tacked on to the AoS rule set. While they do add to strategy, they feel like busywork in a game that started out with a focus on pure casual play. I think they're a good idea in a way - making matched play it's own thing - but their implementation leaves me feeling more fussed when playing. 

The healthiest I've ever seen an AoS community was in a local GW at the beginning of AoS. People came in to play against strangers in drop in games where they'd make their own battleplans (or just run up and kill) with agreed upon lists, usually with a silly narrative focus. The casual atmosphere helped the game grow and retain players.

That's not to say AoS should drop points and battletomes, but rather I think the rise in more competitive oriented rules has likely seen these casual players feel alienated. While it would have brought in competitive players, in my experience it was the casual players who gave life into the community. 

Another issue, which was more the beginning of AoS 2 than 3e itself, is that the narrative took a nosedive at the end of broken realms. Likely due to a rush, but the initial three Broken Realms books seemed to be pushing the narrative in a strong way, really shaking things up - indeed, they were considered much stronger books from a story perspective than Psychic Awakening as things actually happened. However the fourth book, Kragnos, was a big dissapointment for many. Whereas the ascension of Morathi and Belekor's boiling skies drew a lot of excitement, the Seige of Excellis was met with a resounding "meh" as little was achieved and plot points seemed covered over or forgotten about. It felt like it was written in a rush, and instead of triumphantly heralding 3e, it started on a damp squib. 

The releases have, for many, been an issue. While I only buy a specific set of armies, I think releases for any faction help make the game feel alive. I think there's almost a psychic scarring from the End Times - a knowledge in the back of the mind that AoS could be ended if it doesn't do well enough. Realistically, AoS is likely doing fine financially (though not compared to 40k), but the lack of releases turns attention to the idea of "what if AoS isn't doing as well anymore? Is this the new normal?".

As mentioned by a few people, battletome quality has turned a few people away. I think most agree that the 3e Battletomes are better balanced and more thought out, but I think some people are dissapointed that some battletomes feel like small balance patches. It shouldn't be ignored that Battletomes are £30, so you can understand dissapointment when the changes can amount to minor tweaks to some problem abilities and warscrolls. From a balance and game health perspective, these sorts of changes make sense, but from a hype perspective they're just not that interesting - nor do they feel worth the money. 

I'm hoping this is just a lull, and I do think that many of the above are easily reversible (e.g. lack of releases), but it does seem AoS 3 has lost momentum and it's hurting the player base in some areas. 

This was really well written, thank you. It sums up nicely many of the issues I have been seeing myself.

I've seen posts online which tell of a huge increase in drama across groups, its a shame to be seeing more and more stories like these cropping up on groups. Whilst its easier to ignore for someone whos already invested into the game heavily, it must be making it harder to convince new players to invest heavily (both in money & in hobby time) in a game that is drawing negative attention.

The 'mashing of units' in the current game is why I love (and have tried to stick with) playing the original skirmish over the main game. The main game always seems to end up being about how quickly you can pile all the models into the centre and then watch as handfuls are deleted off the tabletop. I've not managed to sit through a youtube battle report for third edition as the ones I have tried have all become like this. At least with skirmish, the games were quick enough that if you ended up loosing your models a bit to quickly you'd have time to throw down some more terrain, reshuffle your deployment and play again.

I've never been much for the rules, I've always been more about making cool models and just wanting to see them run about on the tabletop. All the extra rules and strategies just bogged down what I want to get out of the game. I understand that a complex game can be fun, but AoS (main rules) doesn't feel complex, just bloated with extra things to remember. Its a bizarre mixture, it feels GW wants to cash in on the tournament scene, appeal to narrative players and only give the rules enough attention to sell (more) models. 

I also remember that the start of AoS being the best time for the game. I loved how folk were just having a blast, coming up with new narratives, crazy conversions and paint schemes, and getting stuff on tabletops as quickly as they could. I get why GW would add points and battletomes, but I still think the community would have carried on forming their own balancing versions for tournaments or pick up games and would have done a better job of it. It would have worked well, leaving GW to push narrative events and new models and let the more competitive players build a points system that they actually enjoyed using (and probably balanced it better!)

I've actually yet to read BR Kragnos, but you are not the first person I've heard mention the ending flop. Again, I think this is one of the biggest issues with the game over all. Its in an odd place where GW both want to move the narrative on AND still be able to continue selling character models at a huge mark up without them being invalidated. It makes for difficult story telling, there is no drama when your main characters are protected by plastic armour (Its like plot armour, but it protects GW ability to keep selling models!) 🤣 I also still stand by my decision that bringing Gotrek back & getting rid of Josh Reynolds were overall damaging to the game/setting as a whole. 

The game definitely needs a decent release schedule to keep it feeling alive, but I agree that this version does just feel like its slapping on a new red cover (side note: I'm a HUGE fan of the red/gold version they have now gone with, and do have a twinge of regret that I brought almost every book for 2nd edition and sticking with that era only! The red and gold are so much more warhammer than the sterile white covers/boxes previously used!) and releasing what is amounting to little more than a 'balance patch'. 3 year edition cycles are dumb and its change for changes sake (and profit of course). Its definitely amounted to a feeling in my group that they are just treading water until they release the old world, just to see if they can continue with AoS as a 'main game'. No one here wants to buy into the lore and books if they are all going to be 'End Timesed' in a year or two. (and yes, battletomes are now €42.50 here, which is insane for a rulebook you might only get a few months out of before they release some new game version & zero day errata)

We've also noticed they have dropped the amount of the LE battletomes down to around 700 per release and some are still sitting on the store weeks after release. Again, not a healthy sign and not a good one for anyone toying with the idea of playing AoS but who was already aware that GW LE books sell out often 5 minutes prior to the actual release time! Coupled with the possibility of the old world replacing AoS (How ever slight that notion might actually be), its going to bring in less new players. Which means less money, causing them to consider loosing AoS altogether. Its a cycle GW don't seem to bothered by (not going by their pro

I also hope that it is just a lull, and hope that we the first big release of next year brings in a new wave of AoS excitement. But I can't shake that notion at the back of my mind that arranging anything for AoS this time next year might be a waste of time right now!

 

On 11/10/2022 at 11:53 AM, Greyshadow said:

@RexHavoc, sometimes our mates drift off to other games for a whole host of reasons. If you still have a passion for Age of Sigmar, I think seek out some nice folks who feel the same way.

Compliments for your original post. This is good feedback for the next edition of the game.

Thankfully, my gaming group is pretty chill. Whilst we have all kind of abandoned AoS right now, I've been itching to get back to playing. My main opponent is never too bothered about what we play, they are just as happy playing MtG, board games, Video games, oathmark or WFB. They are not a hobbyist at all (I paint all their armies) and they are just content playing games.

The issue is, we all pretty much feel the same way about AoS right now and even I'm having a hard time getting that excitement levels up and keeping them there.

Its been easier to engage with other games so much more recently. Being able to watch themed shows, battlereports, converse with people online about models or campaigns and basically engage in the hobby outside the actual hobby itself does help keep excitement for projects up.

I think the only reason we have all drifted towards other games recently is the wave of 'whats the point' with AoS, when it seems a very uncertain game to be playing right now. Not that GW can ever take away the game/setting now its out there. Same as with WFB.

On 11/11/2022 at 7:51 AM, RuneBrush said:

Completely agree with this.  I think the play modes need to be updated to reflect how people actually play rather than three arbitrary ideas.  For most people the default way of playing is a matched play structured army, but with a casual approach.

I also agree and I do wish they would change the names of the game modes! One of the biggest issues I've run into is when I've had with conversations on groups (outside of this forum that it) about game styles, I've then seen the argument that match play is the 'standard' that everyone follows and anything outside of that is the oddity!

Sure, its probably the most common and it will be the easiest to find pick up games for, but I've seen opinions on how people play everything from 'narrative is just match play but you named your commander' to 'Open play is just for people that want to smash their biggest toys together'! There is such a weird atmosphere with the AoS crowd right now, that play modes are set in stone and that everything should be spoonfed (lest you are deemed a cheat and be caught playing outside the sandbox!)

Personally, I've never understood the need for so much competitive focus on a game that demands so much imagination and creativity prior to even getting on to the tabletop! Also never understood the need for so many to require the game to be balanced (points wise & rules) to be able to play. Its understandable for pick up games, but outside of that so many seem to come into the hobby with this idea is the standard and anything outside that box is the oddity! I'd like to know which real life battle came with equal armies and had a fair chance of either side winning!

=================================================================================

One other issue I've had with AoS recently is that after 7 years, we still have such an odd disparity between the lore and the actual model ranges. The lore is this magnificent, ridiculous over the top imagery which is quite often lovecraftian in the level of cosmic horror. Whilst some models convey this, due to so many things being ported over from WFB we are left with a model range that is surprisingly bog standard. Even some of the more recent releases have been closer to the Euro Grim dark style of WFB/LotR than what is displayed in the lore & art. Range updates are so sporadic. Some getting just a random new hero and others getting nothing. I know we are getting a big CoS overhaul soon, I think what ever they do here will make or break the future of the setting!

One last point, I wish GW put as much effort into their books as cubical 7 does. I brought several bits from them for WFB (not for the roleplaying rules, just for the lore & art) and the quality is fantastic.  I've taken a quick flick though a couple of the soulbound books and they look amazing. I'll be adding some of the reference books to my shelf for sure! I know that a lot of the old lore for WFB was built upon heavily from the earlier WFRP game, and clearly Cubical 7 are doing the same for AoS now. It just irks me somewhat, as I have no real interest in the game itself and have to pay the parts of the book that will never get used! But their source books are just so good.

 

[The Rumour Thread]

15 minutes ago, EntMan said:

Or, the intern doing the AoS socials knows as much as us.

Ah the good old GW socials. Know less than we do and still manages to stir up more wonderings than what we started with.🤣

Im taking the CoS refresh to mean we will loose the remains of the wfb helfs, delfs, welfs and dwelfs.. I mean dwarves 😅

 

I'd better start adding in some extra odds n ends to orders over the next few months just in case. 

[The Rumour Thread]

47 minutes ago, Public Universal Duardin said:

At least their PRICES are premium 😛

I know, I know, it's lame that I've been gone from TGA a couple months and return to be a Negative Nancy, but as recently as today I was looking at Votann models and had to do a spit take at the prices. 42.50€ for a codex alone!

And even if I've been saying that for years, I wish I'd collected an army when I first joined this forum - I've since then transitioned (Heh) from poor uni student to working, but that includes Real Grownup Problems™ like rising living costs, the current housing crisis, energy prices...to the point I feel like I've finally been priced out of the hobby.

And although video games are also a luxury hobby, it's far easier in this day and age convince someone to, let's say, download Fortnite, Apex Legends, Overwatch 2 or any myriad of cross-platform free-to-play games (that, for the record, have predatory monetisation but at least the core gameplay loop is free) than to tell your mate "Yeah sure we can do something next weekend, just buy a 1500pt army for 300€ and glue them together". It's far easier to say "Hey, should we try this f2p game? It can apparently run on any potato and has cross-platform play".

I don't want to derail into pricing talk (and summon sleeping mods) but I've been buying new in boxed/sealed WFH boxes for cheaper than their AoS counterparts. (Except those sealed metal blood dragon knights, they did bad things to my wallet!😭)

I've had an easier time buying random bits for a Tomb Kings army for my misses, than I have trying to fill gaps in AoS armies I already own part of! Rising costs & things being out of stock constantly (or removed from ranges completely) makes it impossible to encourage someone in my group to pick up a new AoS project.

Thing is, I don't mind paying higher prices if the service/quality matched the higher cost. Its harder to get people here buying as well as most of my group feel that an AoS army has to be an 'all-in purchase' now, rather than building it in stages, on the grounds that the model range could be removed/out of stock/replaced at any random point before we had a chance to finish it.

Anyway, that's enough derailing from me. I have a windmill to go and fight.
 

[The Rumour Thread]

12 minutes ago, JerekKruger said:

If he surprised if Slaves get their new releases this side of Christmas. I dare say there's time for it, but it just feels like the sort of thing they'll keep till early next year. Or perhaps that's just me going they will because I don't have the money to buy any more minis before Christmas 😄

I'd assumed later into the new year. The article did say something on the lines that it would be a long time before we saw the warscrolls from the set released separately. I doubt we would see them get the other models before xmas, only for the standard battletome etc to come out in X amount of months time. Under the assumption we won't see either until the first AoS release of the new year.

[AoS abandoned by my gaming group. Would like to see more QoL improvments for the game!]

Wow, lot of responses to the thread. I'd worried that it would be seen as too negative! I don't have enough reactions to respond to all! 😅

 

On 11/7/2022 at 5:14 PM, Vicar in a tutu said:

I've been painting Age of Sigmar since 2015. Switched this year to 40k and chaos space marines. The moment I did I found tons more people at the local store who were interested in what I was doing, enthusiastically asking me questions and engaging in hobby and lore talk. I knew 40k was much larger than AoS, but the magnitude at my local scene surprised me. The other reason I switched was the AoS release schedule. The new Slaves to Darkness box is great, but other than that it's been crumbs. I think I read somewhere on the rumour thread here on TGA that Necromunda got more releases in 2022 than AoS.  

Yeah, there is another local club to me but they are entirely 40k focused, with zero interest in AoS. I'm not against playing 40k, its just I own a ridiculous amount of Epic 40k (and I do mean ridiculous) and almost all the issues I have with AoS exist in the current 40k rules as well!

I'm ok with the model range seeing less releases but it still feels jarring to know the game got less design time that a 'side game' (A side game GW didn't even have confidence in on first release!)

22 hours ago, Beliman said:

I'm thinking about this post
I understand that half of this hobby is about the community, and the shortest way to follow it is using internet and social network. But it seems that it's not working for your and your gaming group, and the perception you take is completely the opposite of what you want... so, my take is to ignore them, try to make your own hobby, ignore people on facebook (I didn't know people are still using it!), reddit, discord, twitch, etc... and ignore GW (that's important).

My suggetion is to look for what you (and your gaming group) like and copy it: Play games, talk about lore (youtube has some good reviews, and there are some TGA users that have their own blog with more GW stuff), make your own "beer&pretzel" time (that's important) and use a fancy bar if needed (remember: beers and snacks!). If your gaming group follows your plan and understand that this hobby is not something that needs to be "followed", maybe it will change their gaming perception. Try to switch that "GW hate AoS" for "We don't care about GW". 

Btw, I completely understand the FOMO policy, it's horrible. We need to deal with it (****** Black Library books...). You will be always be prepared to buy their stuff, but it's up to them to make it easy for you. If not, maybe look at other companies (or 3D prints) to make your point clear with your wallet.

Yeah this has definitely been a factor in saving the hobby for myself in the past year. I've removed all the official GW accounts from any social media I use. It felt pointless (any news get reposted right away anyway and better pics always appear within minutes of any promotional post!) Though the other groups I kept are just reposting the GW info, removing GW pages tricked me in being less negative overall. I'm no longer tempted to write comments on GW pages under the misunderstanding that GW were actually listening or interacting, and that mind set has thankfully bled over to the rest of the hobby. There is just no point writing comments like 'price is too high', 'these rules suck/are wrong/too good' or 'why can't you make enough stock'.

Yeah the BL fomo is ridiculous. I've cut back from buying most releases- though in too deep with the standard hardback HH siege books so resided to complete that before banning all new 40k books. I was pleased to know that the last book was on its way- until they announced it was being split into two 😡

20 hours ago, CommissarRotke said:

This can definitely be more of an issue of the spaces you've chosen or find to talk about AOS. I find myself talking more about lore or the business side of GW more than AOS metas for the same reason. Overall agree with your post, it's very frustrating being an AOS fan right now and being unsure if we've lost the momentum of 3.0's release!

However if you're not already into it, I don't think buying into 40k is ever the answer for being frustrated with AOS. At the very least, it is exactly what GW wants you to do--instead of finding another game or using a different ruleset you're stuck with them.

Yeah it could be, I find it odd that the biggest AoS groups have very little interest in battle reports, conversions, painting and the biggest conversations are always meta/rules/rumours. I know its whats get the most people excited. Even here and on dakkadakka, painting logs etc are surprisingly quiet. Warseer used to have a buzzing painting log forum for WFB stuff. AoS never seems to have picked up a home for painting.
 

11 hours ago, zilberfrid said:

I'd use a different system with the same models. Something like Onepage rules or Oathmark.

If there's a new edition that fixes all your grievances, your models are ready for it. AoS is a great setting, and most models are great as well.

I've thought about this, most of us are happy sticking with 1st edition/skirmish. We just can't get the buzz going for the game. One of my main opponents couldn't care less what rules we use, they are happy out playing just about anything. I love oathmark, we have been planning a huge LotR game using oathmark as the basis. Used to play Fubar a lot for 6mm (which are the rules that onepage built their game from). I don't particularly feel that swapping out the rules would change some of the issues we are having. If anything, we want to spend more money on 'Official' AoS, we just don't want it to be money spent on edition cycles- we want to buy new campaign books, new models, new terrain. We'd like to actually be able to order models as well- not scrap about at a weekend on the off chance that there is stock left at the actual time pre-orders go live or not rush to buy something just on the off chance it will sell out and never be seen again! GW are making it too hard to give them my cash!

10 hours ago, Gitzdee said:

I also think that Thondia and similar rules updates/ addons are really just that. It is there just to spice things up in case u get bored. No need to buy all this unless u want to go meta heavy gaming. There is this thing about this hobby that nobody tells u about. U dont have to do or buy everything GW wants u to. Lots of things are completely optional. I am in this hobby since 8th edition whfb and i never really needed anything more than the base rules and a tome. 

Same thing with terrain. They are just limited runs u can buy if u want to and are completely optional. I made my own terrain by buying some simple trees in a modeltrain store and cutting up some foam, works just as good as any GW terrain. And with X-mas coming up i want to try and find some cheap snow and pine trees. And i do buy some GW terrain from time to time but i dont want to go and collect everything because i would be broke if i did.

 

Edit2 : Nice models !

As I've said above, they might only be addons but we WANT to give them our money and buy addons. Its just become a minefield or a case of 'buy everything now, regret it later' and hope picking that buying a huge kit for one bit of terrain isn't then repackaged a month later. GW gives more attention to MESGB terrain than it does for AoS! (And I am broke from buying that! 🤣)

9 hours ago, RuneBrush said:

I've seen a similar reduction in my local group with the odd exception.  The pandemic killed off all of the random games that we'd normally play across all systems and now we've started to come back to a bit of gaming, we're choosing to mostly play skirmish sized games such as Necromunda and Aeronautica.  The thought of playing a 3 hour game just doesn't appeal to most of us at the present time, when we also want to catch up from a social aspect too.

I would agree that the release schedule is brutal from GW and I'd love to see it being spread out a bit more.  5 years between editions of the game rather than 3 and put a bit more into each army revision rather that one model and a new book.  However I cannot see that changing.  What I am hoping is that when 4th edition appears we see a lot of the chaff being removed and a general streamlining of the rules.  The joy of 1st edition and to a certain extent 2nd edition was that it wasn't a difficult game to learn, the core rules were short, concise and although some bits were open to interpretation, generally you could have an enjoyable and pretty quick game.

What has recently inspired a few of us is doing smaller path to glory style forces.  Although it's super impressive to play a massive game with huge monsters, there's something appealing about a lightweight army that doesn't have those powerhouses in.

I see this more as a supply issue rather than anything else.  I've long been of the opinion that once the initial stock of a new release is sold out, that product needs to go into a made to order phase for the rest of the pre-order period.  You shouldn't lose out on a product because you weren't quick enough in the queue.

I'd also like to see 5-6 year cycles. I'd not have half the issues with GW as I have right now if we were not in a 3 year cycle. We stuck with the early rules as all of us here are sick of books being outdated within months/less than 2 years.

The supply issue is awful. My misses orders a huge order every xmas for club gifts. Whilst we except the pandemic made things bad, the issue we had with GW is their stock control was zero. Last few years, she'd order the big order which was almost always older items (not limit stock or new hype items) and one thing would go out of stock. She'd order in November and we were chasing them January for it. (During the pandemic, it got as far as end of February before the November order was on its way) We'd finally chase them and they would say 'Oh sorry item X was out of stock. It will be back in stock next week and we will send the order out'. The next week still not sent, item X back in store. Contact them again 'Item X back in stock, but Oh sorry items YZ are now out of stock'. They don't put items aside once ordered/paid for and they don't ever contact customers with order issues until we chase (and we always gave them weeks before doing so)

Its happened every year, even before lockdowns started. Now we get around it by breaking EVER order up into the smallest lots we can to get bundles into the free postage values (€25) and not have one big order tied up with one item going out of stock.

Its not a good practice, but better than chasing orders week after they due. You can only imagine what its like on delivery day when multiple units of MESBG MTOs are all showing up in small, €25 value boxes  🤣

 

7 hours ago, zilberfrid said:

Oh, and if you can't get anyone to play, Both Frostgrave and Stargrave have solo campaigns, and Rangers of Shadowdeep is even built for that.

I love oathmark and stargrave. I picked up both frostgrave & shadowdeep but no had a chance to play them yet. Didn't know Frostgrave had a solo campaign, I'm still missing quite a few of the books for it, so I will have to pick them up. I got stargrave so I could play solo 'not-romunda' when nothing else was planned!

7 hours ago, MitGas said:

I’ve got the sinking feeling that 3rd edition rules definitely hurt it a lot over here. 
 

Before 3rd edition we had a lot more activity in the local discord group. Last post regarding AoS was ages ago.  Meanwhile 40k has so many posts you can‘t keep up despite crappy rules. 40k can afford weak rules, AoS cannot. GW need to hire better rule writers IMO. The minis are certainly not the problem, even if the releases slowed down. 

I don't mind the model releases slowing down (I'm a very slow painter!) I just think it would be nice that AoS had the level of attention that 40k side games are getting!

6 hours ago, Flippy said:

But the lack of GW's attention is. This is less of an issue once you have a solid gaming community, but still. They are updating the army books - a mandatory exercise not really connected with any coherent story and rarely stirring any emotions.

 

A moving narrative is all I ever wanted for the game (after all, if it moves past a point you are not keen on, you can always keep setting your games in the past) but agree there isn't enough emotion stirring on the whole! I do wish that they would go all out on the narrative- I get they won't want to kill off a model that is selling for €110 as then people wouldn't buy them as much!

I think the lack of W+ content shows just how little GW put their trust in AoS narrative.

4 hours ago, MitGas said:

I really liked the IMO clever argument that the constant tease of the Old World likely doesn‘t help the overall mood regarding AoS either.  I think a few more definite statements regarding TOW would help as currently people are torn between those settings. I loved the Old World’s mood and setting but now am invested in the new stuff. Playing „historic stuff“ is less interesting to me as we know the ultimate outcome. I‘d rather just read about it. Frankly, with a bit of luck, I could use my Chaos stuff in both settings but I‘m basically just looking for a decent game to play with my friends. 
 

We still play WFB. The issue we have is that some here are less willing to spend big on AoS on the change GW could kill it off (proven by their removal of WFB). Its also been super easy (until the last three months when people have convinced them selves the old world is coming next year for sure!) to buy WFB models for less than new units cost for AoS. I brought some new in box tomb kings for less than the equivalent bonereapers costs direct. Whilst most of us are happy to use models in any settings without issue, again its harder to convince people here to spend money on new AoS models when there is the possibility that they can't be used in the old world (if we happen to decide to switch from WFB to the new version. You never know, it could be the best game ever made!) and every purchase has become a count of how many games can we squeeze this model into', which can take away from just buying a new AoS model just because its cool!

2 hours ago, Lich King said:

We’ve completely quit as well. Moved over to OPR’s Age of Fantasy for a much more sound and tactical (and fun ) experience . I couldn’t imagine myself going back to a GW game with all these books and now you guys have GHBs every 6 months?! Insane…

it wasn’t Covid which hurt AOS because other game systems are far more alive - especially 40K ( also poor rules system ). So there’s something wrong with the community - maybe too many people split over things like meta chasers , then Narrative guys over there - then hobby/ casual guys over there. It’s not focused and it never had the appeal of Fantasy - so when that re releases i fear it will have an even more negative impact on AOS. 
as a former fantasy guy myself I may try TOW but it won’t replace Age of Fantasy or Age of Fantasy Regiments due to GW always incorporating sales into their rules which destroys their games.

Sad to see we are not alone. I'd not fault anyone for liking the game in a different way, but it does feel like narrative players are expected to segregate themselves away from the main hobby sites just because some would rather buy new models/convert/write lore than get constant rules updates and point adjustments.

24 minutes ago, CommissarRotke said:

Maybe we can narrow this down even more then: if the people moving into AOS from 40k are only doing so to act competitively, then it'll completely F over an organic AOS group happening in that area.

edit to finish thought: not a catch all, just another idea as to why AOS interest would falter. AOS-only players focusing on comp and meta will also drive out new people. However I can see 40k players coming to AOS only for comp and meta reasons, if that's what is tying together 40k groups in the same area.

It's not focused because GW keeps putting all its secondary media weight behind 40k... I love AOS and I'm tired of being continuously frustrated by GW hemming and hawing about their decision for 7 years. (or at the least, it is not any more unfocused than GW's other rules are)

I agree with you. I do feel that sometime around 2nd, GW started making changes to the game to bring back in the more competitive crowd and then we saw a huge upsurge other players being told we were playing the game wrong.

I understand that 40k is their big money maker, but in two years we could have seen something more than one W+ cartoon. But then I'm still bitter about them not letting Josh Reynolds finish the eight lamentations (only to recently bring out godsbane, which the blurb could have been the same book just with stormcast plastered on top!)

[The Rumour Thread]

1 hour ago, Gitzdee said:

Could put a Dankhold Troggoth in there, it has some spiders in the kit :).

Edit: I am also wondering how long it will take for the next warcry box to be revealed. Another 3 months?

Isn't the next one due to come out in december? There was a road map posted in this thread a few pages back I'm sure (I Just can't find it now! haha)

[AoS abandoned by my gaming group. Would like to see more QoL improvments for the game!]

Preface to the post before I start: I wanted to avoid any negativity and have tried to stick to being as constructive as I can with the issues I'm facing with the game. I mostly wanted to vent a bit and get the ideas floating in my head out (Mostly so I can get back to painting!)

My group have pretty much moved away from being interested in playing AoS. This is mostly due to a few factors, some of the more obvious ones (which I will avoid discussing on the forum) and the lockdowns did not help. A lot of the 'AoS resentments' have come from the release schedule and the like, which GW could possibly improve.

In short, there are a few problems with the quality of life of the game that I'd love to see GW address going forward.

1. Release schedule. Most of my group have gotten sick of the release schedule, whilst we are all aware that GW need to release content regularly to keep the cash flow coming in there are a few things they could do to improve the QoL for buyers. For instance, AoS books are very hit or miss if they will remain in stock pass the pre-order window. I personally hate the rush to get online to order an AoS book just because its releasing alongside a 40k LE, or that it might even sell out instantly itself.
   
   It would be nice if they released AoS books or other 'in demand' or short print run items away from other huge game releases.
    
2. Review embargoes. For example this weekend- the chaos set. The reviews appeared from the third party chaps, just as the local store sold out of the set. It would be nice if GW allowed the reviews to appear before the set has been put out for release (and potentially sold out). I wanted a more independent review of this set (not GWs BUY BEST SET EVER promotion) to see if the models would really be worth adding to my force (as its massively converted)
   
   Same thing with their books. GW will send an email out promoting the books release- usually about half an hour after the book is already sold out and never to be reprinted.
    
3. Thondia. Whilst I'm not keen on 'season of war' as being a thing, campaign books are my jam and are something I wish they did a lot more of. However, thondia had a really bizarre release and the big terrain set was off putting (I know technically you don't need it, but if they are releasing a campaign book with a new model, it would have been nice that the new model wasn't behind a €200 paywall at release) We did toy with the idea of splitting the bundle, but after trying to hash out who would get what (or what would be left with me to paint for the group gaming table) interest just kind of fizzled out.
    
4. Terrain. AoS terrain is weird. They seem to bring out a new building, release it in multiple sets and then it gets scrubbed from the store almost instantly or only available in much larger sets. It would be nice if we could go back to having a terrain range that was available all the time (or just go full on back to white dwarf articles encouraging people to scratch build again!) or provided more lore friendly terrain. (Where is the AoS housing & shops?)
    
5. I've seen more than one post around that 3rd edition isn't doing as well as people would like to see, which can be off putting when trying to get people into playing. Things like Dominion (hyped to be a 'buy now or forever miss out', but now sat on store shelves discounted) or the old world is coming...soon...one day...maybe...sometime. None of this helps GW promote that AoS is going to be around a long time (even if they have been clear that the old world is just going to be a side game, it doesn't seem to have been taken in!)
   
   AoS needs something like a long term road map, or more promotion of the long term (not just showing a random mini part once a month!)
    
6. Underworld/beastgrave etc warbands. Probably some of the best models GW are putting out, but they are so flakey when it comes to availability. I'd much rather buy them without the cards, but never know if and when they are being moved over to the main range.
   
   The costing also doesn't make much sense, you can buy the 4/5 models in a warband for slightly more than the cost of an individual character from the main range. Its an odd thing to do when warband is often moved to the main range alongside the same range character (For example, the kharardon overlord set is utterly bizarre. Thundrik's Profiteers which has a khemist sculpt is €2 less than the Aether-Khemist alone) It would be excellent if there were more consistency to these sets being moved over to the main AoS range once they are done with their run of underworlds.
    
7. Warhammer+ content. Happy to be corrected if wrong- I dislike W+ massively so don't have it. But where is the AoS content? We are into the 2nd year of W+ and other than one hammer & bolter episode, where is the AoS series? Whilst I'm well aware that 40k massively out profits AoS, GW doesn't seem to want to put any effort into the lore/non-hobby side of the game. This reads to me that GW are not confident with the setting.
   
   I'd certainly have gotten over my W+ issues a lot quicker and brought in to it this year had some actual AoS/fantasy content been there.
    
8. Warhammer community has gone back to reading like a business newsletter (which I know first and foremost it is!). I'd really like to see more staff models and the like. I total get that its just their advertising space and not really for 'hobby content'. But I'd be more tempted by so many more new models or projects if we saw a bigger range of painting on show.
    
9. 'Community policing'. This isn't something that GW has any control over, so this isn't anything they can resolve but I've seen some pretty bad practices in the last 24 months (and thus venting!). I've had one person in my group buy into AoS, only to drop the game due to having been booted off a facebook group after some from that community (including a fairly well known content creator) dog-piled into them for wrong doing (in short- they brought more than one copy of the hachette magazine and thus the logic was they were "stopping new children getting into the game"). They lost all interest after seeing what the community was like and went back to playing older games. The facebook moderator removed them for defending their purchases, citing that it was more trouble to moderate the rude people than removing the one person completely.
   
   In addition, after seeing someone else being told by a stranger they were ruining the game for using plastic dinosaurs for their seraphon army, and not a week later the same complainer was posting pictures of the unpainted 3d printed models they were taking to a tournament.  The jump in logic was mind boggling!
   
   Discussion online of AoS have shifted in the last 12 months or so to more and more of the rules talk, meta chasing, complaints on how others enjoy the hobby. I don't think its anything anyone can control but its a strange shift and I know some narrative only players feel pushed out of the spaces made for AoS conversation. (Discord seems to have a ton of narrative groups, but very few seem to cross post to here any more)
   
   Anyway, that's me having vented! To brighten the thread up a bit, here's my WiP Slaanesh mortals army. (Yes, they are based on squares as they are going to be pulling double duty as a a 6th Ed WFB army). I've been slowly pulling apart last years battleforce to make more conversions for the Slaanesh-cast warriors! I am not looking forward to the cleanup of the daemon chariots! Those wheel spikes are horrid! 😅
   
   
   

 

[The Rumour Thread]

I suspect the boxes will see a far higher price tag than normal seeing there are placing in two huge characters models in the chaos ones. If they do that with the AoS ones, most of the big models are €100+ these days.

I'm not complaining about the price, they will still have some good value in there I'm sure. I just think this is another barrier for getting people playing AoS, the christmas boxes were good the first couple of years and it was great too see so many people pick up a set or three to start new projects or start playing. (My local store still has some of the AoS battleforces from last year- not a good sign!)

Though thankfully, the only big model from the AoS range I have that I'd not want more than one of is Morathi, so if they do the same with our battleforces I'll still pick one or two sets up for sure.

[Warhammer Age of Sigmar Soulbound is now LIVE!]

I always hate a good Cubic 7 thread!

They put out some amazing art work and their attention to detail in their stuff is fantastic. These threads always makes me want to buy their books, but I just can't do it as it feels a waste as I'd never play an RPG. (I did buy one of the WFRP books and some of their WFB maps and the quality was amazing but the cost of them is high for not having an interest in the core of the book)

Sometimes I wish they were in charge of putting out more books on the miniatures side of the universe as well.
 

[The "mortals redesign" Discussion]

I suspect that what they really mean by "quite unlike anything you’ve seen before", is something very similar to the current chaos warcry humans but with the pictured sigmar bits replacing the chaos symbols/skulls/yokes that those minis current have.

The "Quite unlike" bit will just mean they will be the larger 'heroic' scale we are used to seeing from them now (which 'stops' people mixing in stuff like from frostgrave & fireforge etc) and will have the more dynamic style poses, with arms flailing about every where and everyone on at least one tree trunk and four tactical rocks (which makes it harder to use the models in square based unit games)

I loved the mortal artwork designs in the 2nd ed rulebook, the 'undead' human was amazing and deserved to have been a kit two years ago or more. Its very late in the games life to suddenly be bringing back in 'new' mortal designs when they have been retconning old WFB kits into CoS, letting people buy up big collections to now risk bringing in a whole new model design for mortal units.

Personally I'm using Victrix kits for almost every human based army I do nowadays, just got another huge batch of kits to make some rather stylish looking Slaanesh mortals and sloppy Nurgle war elephants. I got bored waiting for GW to bring mortals to the Mortal Realms and would only buy new human/mortal kits once they come in a battleforce deal or cheap set so I could use just one or two models per kit as champions for mortal units.

[What kind of Box would u like?]

I like the Vs boxes, but then I usually can find use for both sides of the box. The ones I haven't brought are the couple that I've just had no use for or already owned all the models. I never bother selling halfs of boxes, they either go towards club armies or into the conversion pile. I wish they wouldn't paywall new heroes/units in these big boxes, but then so far none of the sets I've brought have had items in that I can't make a use off so its yet to bother me directly.

I really like most of the underworld sets, I think the sets are really good for the most part and seems to be a good way for the design team to get some more unique sculpts into the world without having to design and gamble on a whole range. I do think they shine a bad light on GWs pricing though, they can release a set of 4-5 minis all of which are unique sculpts but then a standard non-name AoS character can cost the same as one of these sets (The vampire lord/crimson court baffles me for example)
I just wish they would put them out at launch without the cards in them. The cards just end up in the bin and its such a waste.

I love the start collecting sets and have brought hundreds (maybe not, but feels like it!) but sad to see them being replaced with the new vanguard type sets. which I'm not so keen on.  They were obviously better when they first came out but even with the price increases, most of them had some good value in them especially if you were creative with the bits, left overs and use of the models.

The Christmas battleforces were good, but I do feel they took a bit of a nose dive last year. I only brought the Slaanesh one because I'd guessed that we might see one and I wanted to get the Myrmidesh kit to bulk out my Slaanesh-stormcast models (and they should have plenty of left overs to convert even more of the cheap stormcast models) but had held off buying them on release. Other years I've brought multiple sets, as they were a great way to stock up on models and parts.

I really liked the Broken Realm sets, though more for the art on the boxes than the contents of the sets themselves. The art looked really nice on the shelves and a lot less clinical than the rows of white boxes that AoS has had (at least up to dominion era red & gold boxes).

I would like to see something more like the old WFB regiment sets make a return for new boxes. An affordable set of minis that come with an entire unit in the set, with spare parts to make banners, heroes, general etc. I'd like to see them make more sets interchangeable between boxes as well. Like how Oathmark sets, the parts work between both foot troops & rider sets. GW love making their complex sculpts and all plastic is convertible, I just miss the ease of being able to mix and match heads and weapons with out the extra chopping. 

[Rumours on low Dominion sales - discussion]

GW who never do sales, who put out a twitch stream egging people to queue in a virtual queue and buy dominion immediately on release as it was limited & was going to sell out quickly even with all the copies they made, with characters models that would not be available anywhere else (possible for ever, possible for 6 months, who knows with them), with a brand new orc army with a strong WFB aesthetic and with enough FOMO advertising and hype to rival kill team, all with it coming off the release of the FOMO & panic over the botched cursed city release. And yet here we are.

I'm sure some people will still try to defend this as them over estimating stock levels by a small amount or that not everyone wanted more stormcast in a big set or that some didn't want the full rule book and 2 new armies so have the smaller sets or perhaps people didn't want the big collections edition rulebook over the bog standard art (as if people don't try to collect every other limited edition book)

But clearly AoS is not selling in the amounts that they wanted/expected it too.

Its not a good sign for the life of the game, for those that want the game to remain supported.
 

[Unpopular opinion thread]

1 hour ago, Neverchosen said:

I think that people's obsession with lore prevents them from enjoying many aspects of the hobby. I already mentioned the adherence to colour schemes but I think this also effects list building and modelling. I know this because it even impacts myself I have mentioned that despite not liking Space Marines I am interested in making a hybrid Space Marine/Chaos Space Marine army but I am already annoyed by the comments of heresy and other tired jokes. Similarly, I am trying to incorporate a way of conveying the immortal aspect of Stormcast into my scheme when in reality I just want to paint some classical knights with some ancient styled helmets.  

I will take this a step further and state this is actually where I think the fun in developing the lore for your army stands. In finding places in which you can juxtapose or deconstruct the established canon of your army. Make your Idoneth a band trying to atone for stealing souls even if it cost them their lives, have your Dwarves have no love of gold and give generously from their craft putting a target on their back from profiteers and merchants, maybe your Flesh Eater Courts do not see them selves as the gentry but rather peasants locked in a perpetual moral revolution unwittingly taking the phrase eat the rich a little too literally, create an army of Orruks or Beasts of Chaos who wish only for peace and quite but are pursued for being mutants, or make a free guild army that are unwittingly agents of chaos.

I've always been lore/narrative over anything else. I love making up new lore for myself (I never expect people to like it, but I don't need them too) But I was once told I was ruining 40k as I was playing Skaven as a chaos force, for Epic 40k, when epic hadn't been been sold by GW for almost 10 years. I was surprised I was doing so much damage to the entire hobby, but hey! Here we are! 😁 *

Same guff from folk when I posted my slaanesh-cast, mostly because they are on squares (because we still play WFB & like oathmark) but also because people were so caught up with it being against 'lore'. (I never even tried to claim they were stormcast, fallen or otherwise. I just like the armour for them over the usual spikey & skull stuff of chaos)

My chaosdin overlords have mostly been left alone, but then they are mostly just dwarves with big shoulder pads, as I never got too far into the painting (Painting the Ironclad destroyed my soul- far too many buttons and dials and readouts which had I know there were so many before starting to paint them, I'd have left them alone in the first place!)

I gave up posting my timeline for my AoS campaign as there were complaints- some people thought it was too WFB and shouldn't be in AoS, and some people thought it was too AoS to be incorporating so much from WFB.


* I did have the last laugh. A couple of my space skaven models were featured as part of another article in a very popular warhammer fan magazine. I take great pride in my accomplishment, I single handedly ruined the entire 40k hobby. 



 

[Unpopular opinion thread]

2 hours ago, EccentricCircle said:

Not sure how unpopular this one will be, but Hype is a bad thing.

We're all sat here, waiting for the adverts to be released, so that we can overanalyse them and obsess over wanting the things.

I'm sure this isn't how its supposed to work, but I have no idea how to disengage. They've some how made the speculation fun, and so you want to play "the rumour game", but in doing so you expose yourself to all of their FOMO based pressure marketing.

 

I've been removing as much 'official' content from my social media and alert feeds that I can. Got sick to death of FOMO advertising. Not only that but people repost GW 'news' the second its out anyway. Getting rid of so many 'Hype' posts has really improved my hobby and my stress levels.

I much preferred it when I could go online when I wanted at any day of the week, browse through GWs store and buy anything that caught my eye- new or old. I spent a lot more money then. All this FOMO stuff 'QUICK BUY IT NOW THIS SATURDAY ONLY' makes me save my money in case something better is coming a week or two later. One of many reasons I didn't bother buying into 3rd Ed. And I know I'm not the only one.

GW were so busy trying to get everyone to spend their money recklessly on every new release, they have pushed people away from spending anything at all. 

I've spent a hell of a lot of money on other games and products simply because I had money burning a hole in my pocket that week and the batch of releases were so hyped up and I had no interest in sitting in a virtual queue* for an hour to buy some product that would be forgotten about the week after.

*sidenote, the virtual queue was stupid. I figured out how to exploit it the first day it was up as did many others. I did inform GW and refused to use the system but I know that people that did exploit it to buy multiple copies of various item. The queue system did nothing but punish regular users, it didn't stop scalpers at all.

[The End of Free Warscrolls]

Its still not reasonable to lock things behind the app. This isn't a digital hobby, even if digital products can be used within the hobby.

If they lock things behind paywalls and apps, they will only encourage other means of getting rules for those that don't want to use apps.

The game already appears to be declining in popularity. The old world will further divide peoples money/attention. Putting warscrolls behind paywalls or apps only is only going to further push people to play games without these hurdles.

[The End of Free Warscrolls]

1 hour ago, madmac said:

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

Well thats a terrible blow to the ease of introduction to the game or for people that are happy with older editions but might want to add newer models to their games (and don't want to write their own stats)

Either GW are so sure that this is going to encourage more people to buy battletomes (Perhaps their profit margins on tomes are huge) or they know that they make so many errors and updates with rules that they can't be bothered with people complaining that the warscroll in the boxes are wrong every time something is updated.

[Unpopular opinion thread]

1 hour ago, Iksdee said:

I cant help but feel like The Old World will be epic scale or something similar. It just seems too good to be true. I want a Kislev army for AoS so bad but dont want to get my hopes up.

They've already confirmed that it won't be Epic scale or anything other than the standard. They don't really use a consistent scale so they can't really come out and say that it is 28 or 32mm but they've confirmed that it will around the scale we have now.

[The Rumour Thread]

6 hours ago, Sleboda said:

To their credit, yes, they did.

Yeah, I wasn't sure. I certainly didn't see anything but then I find the warhammer community page a mess to navigate and I've removed almost ever 'official' GW source from my feeds, I just didn't see the point in following them for news.(*) So fair enough, I did wonder if they were clear about it.

I still don't like that they put out three books for a single army, even if you could pick and choose which two of them you needed. But if they were clear about it, at least it wasn't sneaky.

Thanks for update.

*As for not following them for news, this is totally off topic, but I removed their social media accounts as they don't have anything of value to add. They only have scripted answers to ANY question and any news is posted ad nauseam across hobby pages (Including non-warhammer/AoS groups) that there is just no need to actively follow both hobby groups and GW pages. I wanted to keep the hobby groups as there is good stuff posted there, so might as well condense getting my news from them too. So I do now miss the odd thing- like information on the books, but overall its helped remove some of the negativity from the hobby.

[The Rumour Thread]

I'm normally pretty sceptical about 'rumours' like this, but I believe the part about dominion not selling well at all. After all their 'FOMO QUICK BUY IT QUICK ON RELEASE DAY OR MISS OUT' stream hype and advertising, and its still available pretty much everywhere. I don't think a limited release set still being sold almost 6 months on can be seen anything but a failed release. 

The rest is stuff we pretty much know anyway or is the most credible guesses at what can be expected (warcry, nighthaunt)
 

[The Rumour Thread]

51 minutes ago, Ledgington said:

I’m still not sure why people are so salty about the second Lumineth release. Broken Realms: Teclis was more like a supplement to the first tome and includes a bunch of new lore and cool extras like the Settler’s Gain rules. It didn’t replace the first fully, it just added two nations and a spell lore, the warscrolls were available online, frankly so were the nations and spell lore if you knew where to look. Plus all the rules are on the app now which is currently free, at least for beta.

My issue with is it feels like GW has only just finally cottoned on to the fact that our models last forever and to keep selling the same kits over and over (especially to people that might already own enough models) the only other way to do it is to keep invalidating rules and releasing new books.
(Though as I point out below, I'm aware that this issue with multiple books isn't new at all)

I also don't think they made it very clear that if you had the first book, you only needed the 2nd if you didn't have the Broken Realm books. (I may be wrong about this though- maybe they announced it pretty clearly, but I had already removed a lot of the GW new feeds by then as I'd gotten sick of their behaviour. So maybe I missed it)

I also don't think that it makes it alright because rules are on a app- free or behind the W+ paywall. I've zero interest in using apps for games, hardly anyone in my group uses them. The majority of us are all in IT and spend enough time behind a screen. Games are an escape from screens and quite honestly even if I wasn't in IT, I don't want to be checking my phone all the time when playing a board game.

There's also the inconstancy with releases- GW will release multiple waves of minis and books for one army, but could go years without a single new model for others. It hasn't always bothered me- I buy and use what I like and don't care for what GW want to be selling at the time, but I can imagine its rough on players who's hobby does centre around them playing the most up to date rules. If GW keep this trend up there will have been more editions of Lumineth battletome than there has been of the game itself.

(And yes this has happened before- armies have gotten 3 army books within a single edition of WFB, in very much the same way. I don't think people were that happy with it back then either (the books were a tad cheaper after taking inflation in to account but not by enough to argue that they were cheaper and could get away with it back then))

I do think GW need to have more goodwill when it comes with AoS and it wouldn't take much. How about a Necromunda style roadmap, instead of crappy rumour engine pics of bits of models. Let players have an informed choice on what armies to collect and play and allow them to plan their games and hobbies around an actual release schedule. All this FOMO sales and hiding releases in fear of delays (or whatever other excuse they want to hide behind) is actually just saying that the consumers are too dumb to make purchases without being scared into missing out. Instead, they could do a 12 month roadmap (divided in the quarters so they dont' have to give exact dates) and be like 'Hey you have 6 months to finish painting up your Orcs, cause then you can buy the new chaos dwarves'. Its still advertising but its a far more positive (and healthy) way of selling the hobby.

[Unpopular opinion thread]

3 hours ago, CommissarRotke said:

Working my way through this thread and this is exactly it: WHF got expanded through a ton of supplements, including WFRP. I haven't really seen Soulbound talked about here at all, and I really think it solves a lot of issues people have with AOS lore/narrative.

C7 do amazing stuff. I have some of their Old worlds maps and the empire cities book. However, the problem i have is as amazing as their products are, I shouldn't have to go and buy RPG books to get decent lore for a game I actually like. I'm not a fan of RPGS in the slightest, never really played one and never intend to. I brought the cities book as I skimmed through a PDF version and it was chock full of lore and art and actually very few rules.

But a lot of the other books they do are designed to be games books, with hundreds of pages of rules and character profiles. And as I have no use for those parts of the books, I'm paying a fair whack for a handful of pages. (That said, being in the same country as C7s office & warehouse I do get things cheaper than trying to buy anything from the UK now, so whilst its not a saving, its a saving in comparison!)

I'd like to buy more C7 books, but I just feel they are expensive for the handful of pages that I'd actually enjoy.

[Unpopular opinion thread]

1 hour ago, Bosskelot said:

Not just ruleswise but design/aesthetics too. The SBGL refresh is just straight up Vampire Counts; nothing there would look out of place in WHFB. Same with Cursed City. The Lumineth have some out there designs, but are a clear play to get all the High Elf lovers back. Witch Hunters are back now too.

I have it through good 2nd hand info that the SBGL release was one of the most successful ones for AOS in its history. Y'know, the release that basically just stuck to WHFB design principles and didn't try and re-invent the wheel in an effort to be more "unique." I wonder how that will influence the design studio's work going forward.

I've said it before here and repetitively elsewhere. If we follow GW logic as true, then we didn't start seeing anything 'new' for AoS until either just before the soul wars stuff or until the year after.

GW have always stood firm that it takes 3 years + to design a range and have it made and released. Its been rumoured for years that 9th Ed was being worked on/ready to replace 8th when they were told to scrap WFB for AoS. Stormcast were being rumoured as being the clockwork soldiers of the empire that were meant to have come out with 9th- Harry the rumourmonger was posting about them long before AoS rumours back on warseers days. We know forgeworld were about to release 'battle for blackfire pass', the follow up to Tamurkhan, which would have featured Dwarves Vs Orcs which is likely too have included things like Airships and other models that matched the 8th Ed dwarf releases. KO were released, a year and a smidge after 1st Ed AoS (so not long enough to have been part of the three year + life cycle of release) I still suspect that the models from that campaign would have been repurposed for KOs. They even fit in perfectly with the 8th Ed dwarf kits in scale and design.

The Idoneth were in WFB lore from years back- even if it was a tiny little text box that only hinted at them.

The idea that most of the stuff done for AoS is 'ridiculous' and 'wouldn't have fit in with WFB' is a ridiculous argument from those that dislike AoS. Releases do not match the timeline GW give at all- which they made a huge deal about with the SoB release for 40k. They would have repurposed everything they could to have gotten AoS its rushed and out the door release.

Sure, they made the AoS lore & style more bombastic, but there is no chance that a lot of what we see now wouldn't have been the direction 9th Ed would have taken. Just look at the range of End Times models to see how they were going with the overall design. 'down to earth gritty Euro Fantasy' would have been replaced either way.
 

24 minutes ago, EccentricCircle said:

Yep, the online community is in no way representative of players as a whole. We are the most obsessed gamers, painters, collectors etc. Thinking that what we think is even a blip on the radar is just asking to be disappointed. 

Yeap, the hobby is so much bigger than just the people that post online.

Even my own small gaming group, I am the only one posting about the hobby online. I've a mate that doesn't even follow GW and only knows about things coming out that he is interested in because I either mention it to him at work or he sees what I post in our friends (unrelated to wargaming) group chat. He's a huge 40k fan but hasn't a clue about warhammer outside of the Horus Heresy books and models. Its so utterly bizarre to me, but there are people that do just treat the hobby as someone might treat a TV shows they only watch sometimes or those that only watch the big team sports events etc.

We are the most likely to be the folk glued to news and rumours, always checking for updates and pouring over old books and model collections and can remember the price of every model off by heart.