Baron Klatz

That's brilliant. Excellent idea to show the gargants shouldn't be under-estimated. (Especially in a setting where the buildings and scenery move around on their own anyway ) Also great to see you overcame your concerns of doing the Stormcast pauldrons. Good work all round!

Must have got it on loan from a certain architect in Greywater.

Yeah, my bets are it's 40k with AoS getting some new Stormcasts and then Ossiarchs for Warcry. Also absolutely love the community converted Whirlwind's Edge shown off today with all that science fantasy goodness and the technology side of the CoS tome utilized to the max. https://www.warhammer-community.com/2020/04/17/vince-venturellas-cities-of-sigmar-armygw-homepage-post-4/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Facebook&utm_campaign=AOS&utm_content=AOSvinceventurellacitiesofsigmararmy-WarcomlinkAPR17 Awesome models, amazing army background and timed well with how well the Final Fantasy 7 remake has been received to ignite people's imaginations on fantastical tech armies in the realms.

Nice, the ethereal perils of Glymmsforge will both be a fun change and great examples for players to make future haunted scenarios. Maybe an Order twist too with unforged Stormcast geists that escaped from the Sigmaron or Starborne Seraphon that are guarding ruins with their starlight dinos passing through the walls.

Haha, even if you played fantasy you'd probably never hear of them. They were pretty obscure as some minor chaos dwarf underlings with Mongol vibes(thus the backstabbing). That aside this brings up a good notion that insect races would be great for Destruction and AoS as a whole with the Spider clan having a strong theme already set and Order's insects with the Sylvaneth. (Death and Chaos could certainly amp up the creepy factor with their own giant insects though) Edit: whoops, I forgot Papa Nurgle has the chaos insect stuff on hand. Apologies with extra phlegm. We need undead praying mantis people then! Your prayers to the death god or your head!

So more fluffy narrative fun focused armies instead of the crunch the Ossiarchs already flex hard on. Definitely sounds alright to me. I'd love to play the 4000 point one and recreate a battle in Eight-points from the campaign, that's narratively a nice touch. Especially since there were people wanting a way to ally the two together after Katakros & the Lady of grief worked together.

100% agreed with Swarm of Seals. Try going Ossiarch Bonereapers, Legions of Nagash Deathrattle or Fyreslayers. Lots of great playstyles with a few things you can tweak for an echo of nostalgia, start collecting boxes & warbands to save you money and they're fully supported with bright futures ahead which you can enjoy in AoS, Skirmish, Underworlds and Warcry for a variety of fantastic games in the Mortal Realms. Plus you can hold on to some cash this way and buy the super expensive oop models you like and proxy a few of them down the road.

More insectoid grots like the spider clans who've mutated into spiderling hybrids would be interesting. I wouldn't exactly base them after the old hobgobbos but they were hated by other greenskins and were such backstabbers that they grew bone plates on their backs. You could take those principles and crank them up to 12 in AoS fashion by having a splinter faction mutated by chaos residue in the realms (same to how Silver Tower mutated it's spiderlings) to grow exoskeletons & wings and become a new culture of buzzgrots that worship Gorkamorka as a hive builder by clearing out lands for their nests and Da Bad Moon as a giant wasp nest whose larvae has yet to birth and swarm the realms. Add the natural hostility between spiders and wasps and you can have them battle with spider clans on who claims nests in the forests and mountains of the realms with them either losing and being eaten by spiderlings who use their fungroid honey insides to enhance their own mutations and breed more magically-adept spiders that become their gods or if the buzzgrots win they lay eggs in the giant spiders with a goal to do the same to titanic spiders worshipped as gods who they make nests out of afterwards.

Haha, "Sons peak" works both ways for me since I want both Sons gargants and more mountain Peak Lumineth news.(Stormcast is a cherry on top) I really want a world-shaker army of mountain spirits backed up by gargant mercenaries. Bovine brethren & Hysh tremor tyrants that control and move the islands. Just like an over-excited gargant. (Peak means mountain top. Peek means a look-see)

I remember something along those lines for the early God-beast rules that the players could act out their abilities since they were the only things to that scale. Because to those wondering how big Behemet was, when he slept his body made up several mountain ranges and Archaon was going to use the green torc continent to collar and control him. I can't wait for more epic scale lore like this when the Sons land and shake the realms once more. Also big yes on Stormcasts getting some Warscrolls buffs. Just some new celestial battalions that let their Liberators go Dark Souls and hurl lightning bolts to fell dragon and titans(hint hint) would be grand to contributing to such an awesome faction.

I really like this Hammerhal poster for it. There's an idea too of a scenario of corraling the Troggoth king's headless rampaging body... Edit: Idea, if he's in the Aqshy portion of Hammerhal then your can light fires to drive the body away from escape routes while in Ghyran Hammerhal it's "angler mandrake" whose prey-like vibrations lure it towards traps.

Haha, the controversy before Lumineth helms. Spooky bone golem noses. Hashtag bone golems have a right to bear noses! (Plus I love the unique oni mask look the noses give them ) Regardless, i'd say you nailed the undead warrior look with or without them. No bones about it!

Nice. I like to think that's Nagash's personal punishment for worshippers and underlings that displeased him. (Also they must be on a smelly assignment to have removed their noses like that. )

That's certainly a way to beat the isolation madness. Best of luck on that big project. Great to hear! It's also very nice to see your friendly conversations again, it's certainly been a while. Here's hoping the best of fortune to you and yours, stay safe!

Double post but a lot of stuff I wanted to show. First, belated Happy Easter sketch from the Lofnir Lodge I did because I loved the Mortal Realms egg art. Then "Da Skybasha" custom Kharadron army was finished: Continuing the realm of metal, you don't get more metal than this: "Eat Bray Love on Twitter. Apr 11 Meet Goaty Iommi, lead guitarist for the band Black Shaggoth⁠—known for such hits as "Iron Golem", "War Squigs" and "Nagash is Dead?". Coming to you live from the Realm of Metal! \m/ " And finally Corthaen native arctic magma Ogor of the realm of fire:

It leads to Azyr, it was opened in the Age of Hope where artisans from the realm of heaven came pouring out to build the new cities in Seeds of Hope. So not a direct path to Hysh but you can always make a "celestial tram" service your city's Azyr nobility exclusively booked with their connections so your people have a indirect route by Azyrheim privately ferrying light spreading Hyshites to you while your city higher ups enjoy the privilege of the shining paradise islands and solar seas for their exotic & eldritch catches. Another route is bribing the Idoneth Deepkin there to allow your city to use their underwater portals they used to escape the realm of light. Could make an interesting arrangement on how your city meets their deals so you have exclusive passage to Hysh and magic resources Greywater would invest in. Indeed, a major one is the Silver Way in the realm of metal made by duardin in the Age of Myth. It can build pathways to any realm. Justifying your city to have one by say hiring skilled duardin architects(for a crippling price) or one acquired from a opened Stormvault and hidden from Azyrite eyes would be fun twists.

Ironweld Freeguild duardin with clockwork cavalry, cannons mounted on spider-leg vehicles/mini cogforts, gyrocopters replaced with aether drills which are flying drill machines with a mix of steampunk and magic to make fly that harvest the sky islands of their resources and smog duardin wizards who perfected the city's smoke magic and even use a form of coal runes to make the choking smoke clouds of the clanking mechanical armies lethal to foes. Some gholemkin Chamon native allies would be nice. For realm-based i'd want barbaric duardin of the realm of beasts who are bone masons that build their holds in mountains of monster bones or in the skeletons of ancient oaks since that realm is short on minerals and are big on monster tamers & bone weapons. (Edit: Forgot to mention the bone theme plays into them being in the realm of death too where they make pilgrimages to either honor the spirits of the dead beasts that make their homes from (spirit monster allies) or even to find evil monsters again in the underworlds and slay them once more so their vile souls can reincarnate.) Realm of heavens dawi gifted by the six demigod smiths of Azyrheim to have star-metal gleaming armor and lightining hammers they throw, meteor launchers and aetheric architects that construct small realmgates for quick battlefield movements, summons and on a bigger scale of carrying out Sigmar and Grungni's plans to better connect the infinite realms and bring order. And of course Ghyran's Rootkings for magic druid duardin (druidin) of the forests: https://sometimesminis.wordpress.com/2017/12/05/root-king-duardin-concepts/ Oh, did you ever see this AoS facebook post on that? Some chaos duardin fans got a great start out there.

That's what i'm thinking, a new Sacrosanct hero. The chamber tease seems too early with so many big releases yet to even be ready while more badass celestial wizard paladins makes a nice stop-gap release while buffing Order as a whole. Likely in preparation for what's going down at Excelsis. Also yeah, pure speculation right now. All we know is Gordrakk has his sights on the city with his new God-beast battering ram. That can range from anything from another "Wrath of the Everchosen" campaign to a full blown Global campaign next year to open up a new map of the realm of beasts. Only time will tell. There's a lot of mentions of dark pacts and arcane contracts in the article so maybe way more magical bents like Ossiarch infantry becoming more sacrificial to empower their leaders while ensorcelled heroic duels are used to claim their tithe? I remember back in 2017 the logister chamber was mentioned as a new chamber in response to the Age of Intrigue and the logistics to better move troops and supplies around to combat the Tzeentch forces infesting the new cities and burgeoning civilizations. So likely support Stormcast wizards that improve summons and command point abilities.

Or so their aelven/Hyshian arrogance would say. I got a feeling that with these insanely vast continents they won't control as much as they believe they do.

Can you imagine how insanely huge those central mountains must be to be prominently visible on the realm plane? It's gotta be the size of a planet! Aqshy had towering mountains that rivaled the chained down god-beast used as a sun and it's mostly flat looking regardless. No wonder the sigmirites live there, it must remind them of the Azyr in the heavens it soars so high into the aether. I also really like the description for the edges: "Hysh is ringed by a continent known as Haixiah. Lying beyond a sea of liquid light, Haixiah is a freakishly perfect place, where even the fjords are rimmed with precise fractal shapes. Even further towards the edge of the realm lie regions which appear only as pencil sketches, dots of light, or waves of thought." With the realms always expanding it could one day even reach those eldritch regions as new inner lands.

My two favorite parts are Ulgu looking like a extra tease but still shrouded by it's mists and the Hysh moon being named after Celennar, there must be an interesting connection there for Teclis the moon god to have the spirit from there. Makes me wonder just how high in the sky the Zenith sub-faction will be? Indeed and looking at the ship sail rumor tease being a mix of elegant and rickety i'm expecting the humans to be our first Ghyran native models which would also work since Behemat is a realm of life God-beast (it was waking and being driven mad by seeing what Chaos had done to his beloved life realm that caused Sigmar to put him down with a Great Bolt afterall) The gargant mercenary part's interesting. I wonder if it'll build on the Grugg brother mercs? https://www.warhammer-community.com/2019/06/10/the-generals-handbook-2019-mercenary-companiesgw-homepage-post-2/

Likely but we do still need to see their abilities. There might be a twist that their sun spears have a magic attack that can give the illusion of a pike with a better reach than a regular pole-arm. Also I'm in awe at the artwork. The bull helms look just as badass as I imagined they would and are awesome on the cover, the bits of the Hysh wall Endless Spell around them is a fantastic touch to show off the realm of light and that it empowers them, the otherworldly explanation and self-created light in shadows is brilliant(light pun intended) and they showed off the name and art of the beautiful veiled aelf. Scinari Cathaller This tome is already an epic win in my eyes. God-king willing people's theories on that giant vertical ram/spiked pillar tease being a new King Brodd model will be true for a fifth confirmation since none of the gargant concepts had it. "That could also be King Brodd himself, the leader of the Sons of Behemat warscroll battalion. He's known for using a big granite pillar as a weapon."

I could see it, I mentioned before on the adepticon thread of all the different gargants, titans, jotunn, gigantic monsters and spirits of God-beasts mentioned in the Mortal Realms lore. If they wanted they could include everything from fiery armored titans from Aqshy's steppe khanate to gargants in Chamon that wrangled sky krakens into servitude like the mercenary chaos gargant menagerie does for a mix of sizes. However I could see this being just a handful of models as well. A 2.0 version of the Beastclaw Raiders as another easy to get into Destruction faction with a few massive models to have fun with as crush your enemy and stomp on objectives. Easy and fun to play but hard to master while also allowing a ton of Destruction forces as allies or new armies to naturally build into and keep the hobby and gameplay fresh. In the end I'm just happy Age of Sigmar has another unique faction to it's already amazing roster and our King Brodd is doing cartwheels for it. That's what I'm hoping for with the chamber hint. Seems too early for something like Ruination Chamber so it's likely new heroes bolting in. Hopefully for Beastgrave or even Warcry(maybe alongside the recent teaser for Ossiarchs too since they're invading Eight-points? ).

The art? From the Flesh-Eater Courts battletome. (Rule of thumb is just go by which side is winning to know the faction tome source. ) Also on the grand alliance thing, I won't deny I loved early AoS' "just do what you want" system and all the crazy awesome combinations it allowed but I respect the need for better regulation. It makes a fun proxy challenge at least, want a Ghurian army of Deepkin and Bonesplitterz that joined together to hunt powerful monster souls? Either go Order and proxy Fyreslayer rules so you can have axe-throwing orruks armed with magic hand-cannons that shoot sticky amber (to simulate their magma) or go Destruction and have Deepkin use Gloomspite rules for flying cavalry and to show the monster soul diet has driven them wild and more unpredictable than their kin. Plus the mercenaries really help add flavor for those combinations.

Indeed, and in "A Dirge of Dust and Steel" Shyish duardin worshipping a death diety are able to bring him back through faith to drag a Slaanesh daemon into the underworld even though their Stormcast allies noted Nagash had long since devoured their god. Their response was "What is death to a god? Dust and less than dust." So being devoured by Nagash isn't permanent as long as faith remains to have those death gods manifest in some way even though it may be as a assimilated aspect of the Undying King himself. That's really an important thing to remember with the Mortal Realms gods, it's actually more that they're the realms themselves but can use avatars to physically appear and through different faiths can spawn different ones for different followers like God-king Sigmar as a golden god for most Azyrites while the Crawling City made a Sigmar worm god aspect and the Vurm-tai raiders of the amber steppes worship him as wraithful storm god Zig-mah who helps them capture merchants and prey. Nagash has a great list as an example: He has a number of aspects for like Sigmar he contains multitudes - All are one in Nagash and Nagash is all. Black Priest: He who gives succour to those whose deaths are too painful to be borne. Nagash-Mor: Calm and silent, he weighs the hearts of dead souls against a feather Nagash unbound: A titan of death who strides across a field of corpses and wherever his shadow falls the dead rise and walk, ravening for the flesh of the living. The Forlorn Child: He leads those who die before their allotted time to gentle slumber. The Undying King: He leads the nine hundred and ninety-nine legions to war and walks in every man’s shadow and wades in every man's blood. The one who draws up the bodies of the enemy and hurls them back at their allies and who will not rest until the realm of death is scoured clean of false life. And then there's this art of Grimnir's aspect being warped by Flesh Eater faith. "No, it's just that in this particular image, he is witness to a battle where the Fireslayers are losing. Since the Gods are powered and shaped by belief, the death of the Fireslayers, who picture him as a giant flaming dwarf, is slowly being replaced by the picture of him as whatever the Flesh Eaters might see him as. On the other hand, if it was Nagash who was witness to this battle, and the Fireslayers were winning instead of losing, Nagash might appear as a giant, burning skeleton." Two final notes. One, Gorkamorka does already split into Gork and Mork when they begin to argue, it's been that way even since Sigmar saved them in the Age of Myth from the original god-beast of Ghur (a great blob of sentient amber) and after being saved Gorkamorka punched out Dracothion and fought Sigmar whose blow split them in twain but when they're in agreement and ready to unleash waaaghs they become Gorkamorka. Also, Taal was mentioned in "Sacrosanct and other stories", he was a minor diety that was worshipped by tribal kingdoms in the realm of beasts among several other deities that were also forgotten in the Age of Chaos which saw the kingdoms destroyed and things like their sentient mammoth allies they traded labor for food with corrupted into mindless monsters. Some may still worship them but many had to go to stronger faiths to protect them from Chaos like Sigmar or Nagash. Two, I think Nagash is fine for now as he does unify the faction and his aspects cover the death god bases enough. I'd say wait until much after the Soul Wars before having Nagash take a step back and other death gods carve out their places in the underworlds but with the ever looming threat of Nagash regaining his momentum and pulling them back into him. Him as a god of death juggernaut that's making chaos think twice is really good for the current plot and adding variety to the wars. I will say I want more God-beasts but it's looking like that's in the cards with the Lumineth spirits getting more attention and the Sons in the near future. Definitely more of that and the original dieties of the realms before Sigmar and his pantheon arrived.