[The Rumour Thread]

Two very different things, with very different ethical and legal considerations:

1) Loot crate for $80 with an amount of random stuff in it worth $160 (and maybe even the box is always the same so the first time someone buys one and posts online you know exactly what's in it).

2) Loot crate for $80 with an amount of random stuff in it that could vary from $40 to $4,000 based on increasingly unlikely odds.

1) is fine.  2) is very questionable. 

["Battleshock needs an overhaul" discussion]

I reckon this is the thing I'd like to see change the most in whatever AoS3 looks like. 

As a system, battleshock/bravery is almost entirely independent of the mechanics of the game - you could do almost anything with it and the rest could stay the same.

And I agree with most of the commentary above, that as it is the system just doesn't work.  You could eliminate the Battleshock Phase from the game entirely and it wouldn't substantively impact 70% of the games I've played.  You can't say that for any of the other phases.

[The Anvil of Apotheosis - Post your creation]

I mean...  for all that ethereal and shields don't play nice, they otherwise did a pretty good job of it.  Everything else you can do is a little bit too expensive (points-wise) and can't really break the game.  A much preferred outcome to the opposite, where if things were too cheap or good we'd just shelve the whole system and never see it again.  This way, it might actually get used and tweaked and improved!  I'd love to see the in the next revision of this: the one page of hero upgrades expanded to 3 or 5 pages, and include the options for more keywords, etc.

[The Rumour Thread]

5 minutes ago, The World Tree said:

Good memory! Though the models for those already existed

If they hadn't been my active project at the time I would never have remembered hahahaha

[The Rumour Thread]

8 hours ago, The World Tree said:

I think it is clear that we were due to have Sons before the GHB - the point are in there after all.

On this point, it has happened before in the pre-pandemic/pre-delayed timeline days.  There were points for Bonesplitters in a GHB before the first Bonesplitters battletome came out a month or so later (whichever year that was - 2017?).

[The Anvil of Apotheosis - Post your creation]

Good chance to recreate Duardin King on Shieldbearers.  I built one on paper to 20DP/200 points that does a good job of recreating the one I used in the early days of AoS.  Have to get it in scroll form at some point...

[The Anvil of Apotheosis - Post your creation]

The more I look at this, the more I'm seeing great fun value in the 12-20 DP range for support heroes.  Especially of the +1 to hit bubble variety.  Recreating the Battle Standard Bearer.

[Now what?]

I think there will be dramatic regional variance for this.  Even within the same country.

One of my clubs is planning a 50 player event for the last weekend in August (in a playing area normally large enough to host 100 players).  I'm not going.

My other club is allowing drop-in/casual play on Thursdays, with masks and a signed waiver.  I'm not going.

There are many places in the world where either of those would not be allowed.

[State of AoS: Your +'s and -'s?]

9 hours ago, zilberfrid said:

- Unclear wording between wound roll, mortal wounds, wounds taken and wound characteristic, together with damage characteristic and damage inflicted. This is a mess, and English has enough words to be able to write that better.

This was going to be my minus as well.  It's a bit nitpicky, but the core of it is the design choice to preserve the wording of "to wound" from previous editions, when the actual mechanic is "to damage" because if your "to wound" roll is successful you don't do "wounds" you do "damage" (which then become wounds later on in the sequence).  This unclear wording is the core of many players thinking they understand the attack sequence when in reality very few players really understand the attack sequence.

 

Otherwise I'm a sea of pluses, as I love this game.

[The Anvil of Apotheosis - Post your creation]

Shields in AoS don't universally do the same thing.  Some shields add 1 to saves, some shields let you reroll 1s to save, some shields let you reroll saves, some shields give a 5+ to ignore mortal wounds, etc.

[So how does everyone feel about Age of Sigmar?]

Strictly lore-wise, it's been brought up a couple times, but WFB and AoS are extreme opposites.

In WFB, everything you do MATTERS, but you can't do anything interesting or new because the setting is locked down.

In AoS, you can do ANYTHING, but nothing can you do really matters because the setting is so open and undefined.

Both have strengths, both have weaknesses, and it's completely subjective which you prefer.  Again as was referenced above, when I was a younger more passionate man, I preferred the MATTERS of WFB, but now as a more mellow oldtimer, I'm entranced by the ANYTHING of AoS.  I genuinely think that 25 year old me would have liked WFB over AoS by the same margin that 45 year old me likes AoS over WFB.

 

[The Anvil of Apotheosis - Post your creation]

Loving all of these creations.  I've looked closely at every one, and enjoyed each.

[Future of AoS Application]

I am happy to pay $1.35 CDN per month for the current AoS app, even in this time where I haven't played a game in over 4 months and I'm not likely to play another one for at least a few months.

I would be less happy to pay $7.99 CDN (for models at least, price in $CDN is usually exactly double the price in £) per month for a game I'm not playing.

[How will Games Workshop push diversity in AoS?]

I am not aiming this at any specific person...

 

If someone is pushed out of the hobby by the manufacturer's mandate to increase diversity, I will be glad to see them gone.  They can't leave soon enough.  I would rather they leave now, forever, than to stick around and moan about it.

[General's Handbook - Is it good enough?]

5 minutes ago, Kasper said:

Actually I do believe your post is the perfect example of todays "internet"; Pick a sentence out of context and make a useless comment that contributes zero to a discussion. Literally the next sentence (that you didnt put in your quote, how odd) was the entire premise for my post/thread. You obviously can not comment on the GHB20 unless you have followed leaks etc. I have personally already read GHB20.

I'm not excited about this year's GH, will only buy electronic to keep the battleplans up to date on my phone.  Haven't been excited for one, really, since the first one.  It might be good, it might be bad, it might be somewhere in the "dull zone" in between.  Other than updated battleplans and points, I didn't get a whole lot of mileage out of the last couple.

"It's not out yet but it sucks" is *classic* warhammer internet, going back to even before there was proper internet.  Even if you surround it with caveats like "it's not out yet but the leaks have let us read a lot of it" or "it's not out yet but my friend who works at GW has told me all about it" or even "it's not out yet but I somehow have an advanced copy and have read it from page 1 to the end but the rest of you haven't".  It's peak warhammer internet.  Whether the specific criticisms are valid or invalid; on-target or off-target, in context or out of context.  It's still an old classic.

[How will Games Workshop push diversity in AoS?]

It is worth noting who feels like they are being slighted or attacked by veeery vague sentiments like this.

[General's Handbook - Is it good enough?]

3 hours ago, Kasper said:

Is anyone else kind of disappointed with the General's Handbook yet again? I realize it still isnt out yet 

Warhammer internet, in a nutshell.

[How will Games Workshop push diversity in AoS?]

9 minutes ago, Jefferson Skarsnik said:

Nappy wearing dwarfs who burn magical gold into their own skin because they believe it to be the fragments of their shattered god: Yes. Good

Elves who refashion themselves into the peak of mental acuity and martial perfection by using crystals to drain out their negative emotions, while using a particular class of magic user to torpedo the leftover bad emotion slurry at their enemies: great. Go on. Keep em comin

Trans people: no

 

Ladies in the army: Heck no.

 

lol

 

Any analysis of Warhammer races, even humans, that includes the word "historical" or "real world" might as well be white text on a white background - I'm just not interested.

[How will Games Workshop push diversity in AoS?]

Speaking from my pulpit as a straight white dude, I am in no way pushed aside by the occasional, and by occasional I mean up to and including going over 50%, diverse miniature.  And I'm reasonably upset at the suggestion that I might be so fragile that I would be bothered by increased diversity.

What should they do?  Lots. More.  So much more.  Significant percentages of female models for any races that have sexual dimorphism.

What should they avoid?  Yet another army of buff dudes.  Anything that smacks of stereotypes or exaggerated racial features of RL groups.

[The Rumour Thread]

5 hours ago, Raptor_Jesues said:

same here, a tournament is just 5 games to me. I also usually get stomped from those lists but since i really dont care mutch abount winning i just try to be as annoying as possible and try to make them score as little points as i can 
all of this in game ofc, im always very polite and playful

I think there might be an issue of unrealistic expectations for some people.  I know that I have to be vigilant to avoid falling into this trap:

 

1) I want to bring an army that I enjoy for various reasons such as: I have it painted and want to show it off; there is a single neat synergy that is fun; other people aren't using it so it stands out; I enjoy the lore surrounding the characters and units.

2) I want to have a good chance to actually win, not just to play some games.

 

These two goals are, mostly, incompatible.  Unless the sub-reasons in 1) end up aligning by chance with the current trends of the game in the local area (here, for @Sleboda I will avoid using the m-word).  Which happily occurred for me for a few months with Flesheater Courts - that was entirely a fluke, as I had a 1) army ready to go based on the previous terrible battletome, that was just an Arch-Regent away from what settled down to be the FEC netlist while it ruled the roost.

If you are writing a list based on 1), you cannot reasonably expect 2).  As a "chump", I always end up leaning toward 1), and have to force myself to accept that 2) just ain't gonna happen.

 

 

(ETA:  For me, the one time I tried to chase 2) deliberately it was a hot mess.  I went for shooty Stormcast right at the start of the Sacrosanct Chamber, that we all thought was overpowered for the first 5 seconds that the battletome was out but quickly realized was not actually all that great.)

[The Rumour Thread]

20 minutes ago, Gistradagis said:

Not having much around people playing might be the explanation, then. Many people aren't particularly happy with the direction Seraphon and Lumineth have taken (other than their players), and people fear we're seeing the rise of a meta of hero-sniping and factions with overwhelming control over the Hero phase. With Seraphon especially, it's the first time in my time with AoS where I've consistently seen people go "lfg AoS 2k (no seraphon)" so much.

While some things are fixed with a simple rule introduction (hero protection similar to 40k), it is true that the last year or so has seen some impressive power creep. Perhaps that makes people hope for AoS 3.0 to be at least in the works already.

This is definitely possible. 

Do people expect that edition-level changes would fix battletome-level problems?  I mean, AoS2 as an edition could be good indefinitely if all the battletomes were more like Gloomspite Gitz or Slaves to Darkness or Stormcast or Nighthaunt (or any of the low- to mid-tier armies) in power level.  It seems like 90% or more of what dissatisfaction there is around the current game is based around battletome complaints.

[The Rumour Thread]

I know that this has to be subjective, but at this point of AoS1 we were already prepared for, begging for, AoS2.    I don't think we are there yet with AoS2.  I could be wrong - I haven't been hanging around with gamers much lately other than here - but it seems like there is relative contentment with the current game.

[The Rumour Thread]

7 hours ago, Beastmaster said:

More and more I begin to think that this whole Hype thing is just overrated. Sure, with the first pictures everyone (me included) thinks „New! Shiny!“, but does that generate sales? Until the new miniatures are available, that first hype is long gone, and anyone not completely new to miniatures knows that building an army is a long-term project anyway. So, maybe for most the decision for or against an army is more of a long-term process, too. Guided by a comparison of all the armies available, and it doesn’t matter so much how old or new they are.

 

This is a very old argument, with people passionately on both sides.  Does massive long-term pre-hype help more with sales, or do surprise releases help more with sales?

I think there is a lot of regional or cultural variance here.  Some people are convinced (whether by observation or by being or talking with a FLGS owner who tracks things) that a healthy pre-release information dump helps with sales as people get excited and save up to buy on release day.  Some people in the same circumstances (observation or FLGS info) are convinced that a healthy pre-release information dump hampers sales as people get most excited long before release day, and then forget about it and are already looking at the next thing when release day finally comes.

Both of these can simultaneously be true in different stores, in different regions, in different countries.

In aggregate, which dominates?  I think that answer is beyond us, without access to proprietary sales data.

[Powercreep Illusion - Petrifex]

Wait, aren't we early?  I thought @Sleboda's next rant against "meta" wasn't scheduled until July.  Hahahaha

[Playtesting - an advantage or disadvantage for competitive play?]

14 hours ago, ChrisT said:

Caveat - if the internet did not exisit then i would change this opinion.  One of my fav things was to go to a tournament our group of 5-6 players would have theorised lists etc, but before all these forums existed we were in our own bubble, you attended a GT and boom 100 players and lots of new tactics and choices were found.  That was the internet forum of the day, so back then a PT would have had an advantage as they had longer to find that combo and although lots of bubbles may have found it the internet was not as it is today with the hive mind of sharing.   However, after 1 GT this was out in the world and so people then copied it.

 

 

This is where I come down as well.  I think the advantage of seeing a version of the book within a small circle of people for a month is likely to be close enough to the advantage of seeing the real book with the combined input of hundreds of keeners on the internet for a week.  For people who are already in the top tier of players, I mean.

 

Side note:  making an argument like "I say X; prove me wrong" is pretty cheap.  A good argument is "I say X, and here is my evidence. Counter my evidence if you dare."