Clan's Cynic

Sounds like a dual release weekend then?

Eldar pre-orders next week. Nothing for AoS. Looks like Fyreslayers/IDK will be fresh off the price hike then.

With 3 being the last game, I fully expect they'll milk as much from the cow as they possibly can. Considering Warmaster had models for Araby and GW seems far more open for OCDonutSteal content on CA's part, I would be very surprised if we don't see Araby added at some point - even if that's later on in the games life cycle. I don't think they're going to let a thing like "3's story campaign focuses on the north of the world" stop them when there's money to be made, particularly when it's no secret the vast majority of people play Mortal Empires anyway.

Today's the day.

Some interesting data from Goonhammer. Take it with a large grain of salt, since their readers obviously skew into the competitive. Off the top of my head though, nothing seems too out of place beyond the surprisingly low placement of Lumineth, given they seem very popular both casually and competitive in my experience. Sauce.

With the resale value of AoS stuff - particularly Dominion contents - being so low, I'll probably skip this one and just pick up individual issues.

Just in time for the price hike no doubt. Sad!

Well this one's interesting.

Assuming the Rumour Thread post was missed, the Swampcalla Shaman sculpt from LVO is this year's Event Exclusive.

This year's event exclusive is the Swampcalla Shaman from LVO. Oh and a Primaris for 40k if you care about that. Nice touch on the Ossiarch bones lining the tips of the staff.

There was a post by ADB somewhere - might've been Reddit or B&C - where I believe he said the only BL books that really sell are about Space Marines and that if BL cared only about sheer profit, they'd never release anything but Horus Heresy and Marine books covering the big three Chapters. Even Inquisition, Imperial Guard and Chaos books don't seem to shift too well. With BL being the only arm of GW that's been losing money or barely making a profit, I guess it's not too much of a surprise the focus is overwhelmingly on 40k.

Of the current authors, anything by Peter Fehervari, though he's only written for 40k. Abnett in second place. The rest I've never been dazzled by.

Just Black Library Celebration next week. Guess there's the Kragnos book, but that's about it for AoS. Tangentially the Witch Hunter re-print. Oh and the Blood Bowl Goblin specials.

Hike for the Flamekeeper if he is a <Priest>. Hearthguard Berzerkers up another 10pts. That'll be it.

Honestly it's probably a way to just stealth kill Firstborn. "They're not being squatted, they're being taken out of rotation haha."

GW tried with 40k in 8th. They set the standard to 1750 and the community rioted. Some tournaments did capitulate out of a desire to toe the party line, but the norm returning to 2000pts in 9th suggests they listened to that brief outrage. The only way I see it moving is if GW radically increase points across the board and 'the community' don't just raise the norm to say... 2500 to accommodate. I think people like 2000pts because 1) Familiarity. GW fans are typically anything if not adverse to change and 2) It's a good point range to allow everybody to bring all their shiny toys. Personally I'd be over the moon to see the average point battle drop to 1500 points or so, largely because I hate seeing boards where things are awkwardly crammed up like somebody poured a bucket of Army Men out over it, but I don't see that changing unless GW themselves push for it.

I wouldn't count on this weekend with the Black Library Celebration stuff. Be a nice surprise, but next week seems more likely.

T-they're painting Fyreslayers up too... r-right? ...Right?

Grimnir's Sacrifice When a Fyreslayer <Hero> suffers a wound, on the roll of a 6+ any Fyreslayer non-Hero model within 1" is removed from play and the wound on the Hero ignored. This ability can only be used by a unit once per battle and a Hero can only ignore a wound this way once. "A huge improvement for the survivability of Fyreslayer champions!" - Warhammer Community, probably.

They're not great, admittedly. A buff to be sure - unless FS Bravery is going down, which seems unlikely - but nothing that's going to set the meta alight, let alone make up for the warscroll nerfs. The Heroic Action in particular seems pretty meh considering you're probably still going to be using Their Finest Hour on someone and whilst getting an enhanced rune is nice, it's rarely that big of a deal even when it's army wide, let alone on a single Hero.

Battletome previews are starting.

Looks like we're getting Fyreslayer 'tome previews.

GW have risen their prices in some form every year even pre-pandemic and that's before getting into the 'slow crawl' of new kits costing more (Lumineth and the Underworlds boxes come to mind). This time they can put up their hands and go, "oh it's totally the pandemic guys, costs are going up everywhere, it's totally not our fault..." Unfortunately across the 'net there seem to be more people happy to swallow this line and defend them than not, so very few camels are going to have their backs broken and ultimately nothing will change. See you in next year's price rise thread.

EG is quite bad about not removing OOP items. The Fyreslayer dice, Warscrolls and even the 1.0 Battletome are still listed despite not having been in print for 3/4 years now.

This. GW has a very high profit margin compared to the majority of companies. They could absorb the cost if they wanted to, but they know their fanatic fanbase will happily eat it instead and any falloff from people being priced out will be carried by those willing to pay more.