PlasticCraic

@Bayul yep, that's a pretty standard competitive build. I've personally taken Alvagr over Skullshards (although I do like both), and I run 3x minimum Mournfang instead of a 4, but that's just personal preference. It's a really strong army, and great fun to play too.

Thanks @zilberfrid - and of those, do you know which ones have female heads (without a helmet) please?

My daughter (aged 7) has expressed an interest in AOS, and she likes Stormcast, but I don't know that much about the range. I'd love to show her some female representation on the tabletop, so my question is, please can you point me towards which kits have female models? Neave Blacktalon is one that I'm aware of, and one of the original Shadespire warbands was a woman too (I have that model because I played a fair bit of Shadespire). Are there any others, particularly as options within regular troops kits? Thanks for your help! PS I know that anyone with a helmet "could" be a woman, and I'm sure that a lot of my daughter's will be, but it would be nice to have some explicitly female representation too.

I did a write-up on the new Trogg rules for anyone interested, I've got 7 games in now with these rules (6 at time of writing) and a really fun list that has been holding its own: https://plasticcraic.blog/2020/11/06/gloggs-megamob-white-dwarf-review/

I think it's just meant to be a little bit of compensation for situations where you basically can't use your Crushing Grip. Although 3" isn't terrible for these kinds of abilities, so you might occasionally reach over the top of a screen and get both. I definitely agree that they need some help though.

The hands are "naked" so you'd probably want to chop them off.

Interesting! And as you said, smart.

Bonesplitterz shields can work too, if you like the wood or bone look?

Yup, the examples I cited were from the UK and Australia (which are the markets I know). Could well be the case that your experience is true of one place and time, but doesn't necessarily translate to another place and time. For example, one potential cultural difference is that the FLGS is more of a community hub in the USA (in line with your "full service" comment), whereas in Australia people play more in their gaming clubs or friendship groups, and retail is highly commoditized and mostly online. There are of course exceptions, but that does seem to be the trend - I'm sure somebody will read this who loves playing at Emerald Games, and I envy them, but that's not why they're shifting pallets every week. That's mostly going out around the country in little brown boxes.

Agreed with the first point, but the second point is a little trickier. Officially, they do align their prices: RRP is the same in a trade or GW store. The issue is that you have to allow your distributors (FLGS) some kind of margin, otherwise they obviously don't have a business. So you sell to trade customers below what you sell for in your own retail store. It's then largely up to the retailer how much margin they take for themselves, and how much they pass on to their customers. I have heard suggestions that there is a cap on how much discount they are allowed to offer in some countries, in order to prevent a race to the bottom and 3rd parties competing themselves out of business, but I can't confirm that (maybe someone else can). If GW dropped their prices 20%, you're back in the same situation, but deflated. You still have to support your distributors if you want them to sell this stuff for you, and that still means selling to them at prices below what you sell to the public. The only way to fully align prices would be to force 3rd party sellers to charge full retail (and keep all the margin for themselves), but that's problematic in terms of legality / restrictive practices (would vary by territory).

Bit of a sweeping statement there. Emerald (Australia) and Element (UK) seem to do very well for themselves, amongst others. I'm not aware of any full-price, 3rd-party retailer here in Australia that is thriving, whereas Emerald have just moved into new (much larger) premises and are moving literally pallets upon pallets of stock every week.

You could even live the actual dream, and capture objectives with a single Ogor against each of Nagash and Katakros, counting as 2 models to 1 on both objectives. That'll annoy em 🤣

What else is in the army - not much? What will you be running? Generally, I'd be looking to fight everything else and ignore / play objectives around the two big ones.

Savage Orruks are better because they get a generous horde discount, have 2" range (important on 32mm bases) and can stack saves Morrboys still have their uses, mainly as minimum skirmishing / blocking chaff units within Kopp Rukk to get your drops right down (since it wraps up all your wizards in a Battalion)

@erasercrumbs @swarmofseals there are a few from Mierce that may be worth a look I used Queefus as a Maniank Weirdnob because he fits nicely on a boar, but as shown in the image he can just as easily be doing a little dance: https://mierce-miniatures.com/index.php?act=pro&pre=mrm_blg_bnl_cha_050_000 I've picked up a Shazham too, he also fits the scale: https://mierce-miniatures.com/index.php?act=pro&pre=mrm_blg_bnl_cha_048_000 Finally, I haven't bought this one, but he could also fit the bill: https://mierce-miniatures.com/index.php?act=pro&pre=mrm_blg_bnl_cha_011_000

Also here's a pretty cool review with AOS Coach and Stuart Hodges: Plus a written review by Stuart: https://thedankhold.wordpress.com/2020/10/13/troggs-of-da-realms/ I really enjoyed both.

Rockies and Fellies are both good, but I tend to have more of the latter in my lists. I think one thing to consider is that Rockguts roll very few dice per model, so units of 3 have a pretty high probability of doing nothing at all. Whereas stinky trolls are rolling loads of dice even in a min unit, 15 attacks including the shooting. So for that reason I like to run a unit or two of minimum Fellwaters kinda like cavalary. They can run up the flanks and then knock chaff off an objective, stand up front and take a charge before you counter punch, and so on. If you went 6-3-3 Fellies on top of what you have there, I think that puts you 1810 which leaves room for either a couple of Grot wizards, or one wizard plus an Endless Spell and triumph bid? TL:DR don't sleep on Fellwaters!

That's almost true, but the Forbidden Power rules are officially still current, which adds in Fyreslayers and FEC as Mercs. One interesting option could be the Arch Regent, for a 2-spell wizard who comes with 20 "free" Ghouls.

Yeah for sure. My own comments were more in relation to taking "your own" artefacts in someone else's Tribe, which is what I think @Ganigumo was asking about (e.g. can a Warstomper in Takers Tribe use a Warstomper artefact) . But what you're saying is correct too.

Yup all good points I'm not sure you'll be able to afford to keep your two Megas bunched up once your Mancrushers start dropping, but there is at least the option.

With the exception that he can't use any CAs on himself, which is a huge deal. Can't make a run 6", can't reroll a charge. It's very poor from a quality of life perspective, but unfortunately it's also pretty clear.

I think the point of this question was whether you could take a Warstomper in Breakers Tribe (for example), and give your one artefact to the Warstomper (which would of course have to be one of the Warstomper artefacts). The answer to the best of my knowledge is no. The Core Rules state that you might gain access to artefacts through allegiance abilities - there's no native right to take artefacts. The allegiance abilities for this army give you access to the Tribes (with page references), and the Tribes contain the artefacts. So there's no actual pathway to the Warstomper artefacts (for example) when you take another Tribe.

I'd push back a little on the 11 missions to 1 aspect: there are quite a few where Sons can score quickly through good keywords / kicking objectives / both. I cover some of them in my Takers Tribe review, but just as an example, kicking objectives on Battle for the Pass can be game-breaking. I know what you mean though, I reckon at least 70% of the games that I've seen people reporting are Focal Points. Seems like quite the coincidence 🤣 Takers article for anyone interested: https://plasticcraic.blog/2020/10/15/takers-tribe-kicking-for-goal/

Excellent analysis @Reuben Parker! I'm currently doing my own write up on Breakers and I agree with almost every word you've written. Let us know how you get on if you run this army? Would love to hear some batreps.

And a follow-up, with some cool minis that other people have suggested too! https://plasticcraic.blog/2020/10/09/third-party-giants-biggerer-and-betterer/