Cèsar de Quart

Yes, but it's been established many times over that warp entities are begotten by belief. If enough people believe in a divine concept, it becomes real. It may have many shapes depending on who looks, kinda like the shape of the Vorlon in Babylon 5. The Chaos gods function in this way. The problem here is that we have the Incarnates, who don't seem to be dependant on this, and then a myriad of other beings. Are they also like Sigmar and Alarielle, people from a bygone era? Or are they manifestations of people's belief in them? We know Sigmar and Nagash and the rest, while they may not be the same beings they had been before, retain the memories and consciousness of their old selfs (selves?). But what about Morghur, whose soul may have survived and become a being of power, a minor god? If so, then what about Kurnoth, who should be dead? Is he a manifestation in the Warp? This dychotomy makes it difficult to speculate about this. My take is that the Incarnates are different because of their condition as embodiements of a specific wind of magic. So much warp energy was wrapped in their insides that they simply became massive warp hurricanes of their own. When the world ended, they remained as Warp entities, maybe manifest in the void, maybe not. So, someone like Sigmar has many different faces depending on who worships him (Nagash is stated to be exactly so, which makes it difficult to treat him as a character, but very interesting to have as a worldbuilding device). Sigmar can be seen and known as the old Sigmar we know of, the Heldenhammer, the God-King, the god of statecraft and war, of thunder and big hammers, essentially the god of ordered, hyerarchical civilization, or as, I don't know, Asir the Victorious to the Aesjing, Asimir Hammerhand to the Semnones, Bellon the Great in the Evercity of Mirmas, all war gods; Father Or among the Red Head Tribes of Var-Ghur, Mighty Thyl in the old Lantic Empire and Romal the Everking to the peoples of Rhodania, gods of rulership and sources political legitimacy, maybe seen as glorious ancestors, kinda like the Anglosaxon heptarchic dynasties saw Wotan as their ultimate ancestor; as The Thunder of Glory and the Praised Lightning in the lands of Ös, as Tunans the Roaring in the Tarsennic Realms, as Sagamar the Sky Father among the Mereyt, gods of the storm, lightning and violence, or father gods in the vein of Zeus and Odin, or maybe he is seen as Tien-Li within the Golden Walls of Da-Yin-Jing in the Ghurlands, and Yan-Mir the Golden Dragon among the subjects of the Jade Tiger Throne, protector gods of civilization as opposed to the wilderness and savage outside, that scary world of pure Nature (and there is a lot of pure deadly nature in Ghur and Ghyran) I made all this up, but you get my point: The Age of Sigmar setting, so far, lacks consistent rules for magic and divine entities, so Gods, for now, will be whatever the writers will want them to be. Sometimes they need worship, sometimes not, sometimes they have multiple facets, sometimes they are definite characters with quirks and agendas, and sometimes the writers will bring back a crowd favourite from the Old World and make him into a minor god or major player (Morathi, for instance. Settra will not be far behind).

My thoughts exactly. It's like the Total War people, "we'll release a new scenario with fraking VOLKMAR and... Helman who?" Especially when Total Warhammer sells on two points: being a good Total War game, and showing you the armies you've always wanted to see fight in hi-res virtual glory, led by the people you always have wanted to see leading them. Teclis, Louen, Archaon, Grimgor, Skarsnik, Malekith, Kroq-Gar, and even that guy who's prince AND emperor! And then they give us Helman fraking Ghorst. I mean Anyway, many people say it could be Settra, but the guy in the video yaps and yaps about his master, and you know there is one thing Settra does not do...

That little hat, those feathers and the flaps on the pantaloons made me happier than any warcry necromunda kill team they could have released. Granted, it's the happiness one feels when your kidnapper allows you to see sunlight for the first time in months... but it's a form of happiness nonetheless. I don't think we'll see new Freeguild models anytime soon, but a man can dream about some motherlocking Imperial cavalry. Come on, even the Bretonnian line had better horses! EDIT: In all seriousness, like some people have said, this cover seem aimed very clearly at people who are nostalgic of the Empire and want Empire 2.0. If there were serious plans about changing the Freeguild aesthetic to something more classical or steampunk (moreso than the original Empire), then they wouldn't have commissioned art which reinforces the "Fret not, the Empire lives!" vibe. At least, that's what I think. I'm all for a more steampunk, industrialised Empire look, like the creations and conversions by Melcavuk, but I don't think I'll see this in years.

"I'm getting to know Blender"... man, call the Pope and tell them we need a new patron saint of modesty. The 3D model is bloody fantastic. I can't wait to see it printed and painted. Also, I really enjoyed your take on a Slaanesh-themed city.

Such a beautiful little model. The pose, the composition, the character, all in all a special miniature. I'll have to try very hard not to replicate your style from now on...

Looks good! I like the skin tone and it contrasts nicely with the dark steel of the armour, which is also a great addition. The choice of yellow for the glow is also great, good complimentary color choice. Maybe you could add some more dark, mute red details to complete the color triad. Perhaps the loincloth, the straps or some markings on his armour? Rust, maybe? I've always thought that GW made a crass mistake when painting their AoS orcs bright yellow. It doesn't look like a paintjob, it looks like some orcs had found Space Marine armour and welded into a new thing, which makes zero sense.

I was taking a look at the troops coming with the Rogue Trader 40k kit and, I must say, they look neat, and we could use them to portray officers in the Cogfort military machine (pardon the pun).

They will become very popular in the future, maybe Titan-level of popularity in AoS... if we ever see them. But really, I think that, in keeping with the "anything goes" attitude seen in AoS, it makes sense that cogforts can be whatever you want. Just like some Titans in 40k probably don't look like the "official" ones, moreso in AoS.

Thanks. That's an interesting notion for sure.

That's very cool! Well designed map and nice ideas on them.

I always think that the GW team don't develop the corrupting nature of Chaos enough. That there's not a lot of organic stories of how one falls into Chaos. It's always barbarians at the gates, cannibals, degenerates... The mirror of noble emotions concept is one that I've always liked. Khorne being the subversion of the noble, honourable knight, Slaanesh that of the perfectionist, Tzeentch that of the curious wise man and Nurgle that of the caring healer. Of all those, Nurgle is the one that feels the hardest to be convinced of. Khorne promises strength, Slaanesh promises perfection, Tzeentch, occult wisdom, and Nurgle... disease? He offers a cure, but the cure is more disease, and unless this works like Mr Burns' overbooking of diseases with counter one another from that Simpsons episode, I really don't see the point. He may offer eternal life, but so do the others. As for Nagash... can't he be corrupted?

I agree with both Jamie the Jasper and Eccentric Circle. The "cog" must be there, but the cog, unprotected, is a pretty visible weak point. Building a fort out of only cogs means that you're making a Death Star with just exhaust ports as surface features. The cogforts will be whatever GW decides them to be (I don't think they know it at this point, and if they're watching, hello, make up your mind as soon as possible please), but until then, we all have our own set of ideas. Let this thread be a melting pot, but to me, there are a couple of elements that can't be missing: - A semblance of plausibility in the inner workings of the design. - A usefulness of the desing itself. I need to see a cogfort and believe that yes, this is really a game-changing, necessary aspect of warfare. If it's just unprotected cogs and wheels and brass tubes, well.... as a Skaven, an Ork or a Chaos warrior, I'll know what to shoot at pretty easily. If it's all stone, I'll wonder how the hell does this move. To me, it's cheaper and easier to have engines and coal and mechanisms than wizards being focused all the time in moving golem legs (although, who know, Navigators in 40k are essentially this for the ships). So there's a fine line between "that's too cool to be true" and "that's just a moving fortress". That's where the cogforts should stand. I'm not sure GW know what they were making up when someone published the first reference to a cogfort (I think it was in some of the Malign Portents stories), but, at least to me, it has become one of the most compelling ideas in AoS lore. So much that my free city has become a cogfort legion due to some cataclism (I lost a campaign, and I thought, hey, cogforts are cool... why not?).

It does convey the idea of a dwarf fotress. With something so stut I'm curious to see how you've designed the feet. That's, to me, the most difficult part of the whole cogfort idea. Wheels won't cut it, and spider legs seem too goofy and incapable of sustaining the enourmous weight of the fort.

That would be neat. This is what's cool about AoS; there's so much room for imagination.

Thanks for the praise! As for the "freeguild" influence, in theory, freeguild can be anything we want. Arab-like freecities may build "genie cuisers", giant landships powered by the might and mystics of bottled genies. Slavic-themed civs may build giant golems. In this case, I did go with a very Empire-like structure and architecture for the Heart Perseverant, but the Pyrophrast had a bit more of an Azyrite flair to it. Also, there's a giant Stormcast face on one of the forts, the Pyrophrast, yes. But it's also what's on the flag of Hammerhal, the greatest free city and probably the biggest source of freeguild soldiers around. It's not far-fetched. You're right on the count of dwarves being the ones who are doing a great deal of the working on these forts, but... I'm first and foremost an Empire player, so I'll always be biased towards them.

No one dies forever in AoS, though. Your spirit lives another life. This doesn't change how people act or live, after all, humanity has believed in afterlives since we built the first dolmens and buried the first corpses instead of eating them, probably even before. But in a universe where death is not the end (for real), embracing the finality of death and getting something out of it (more than eternal wandering through Hell) sounds like a nice option. Doesn't it? I mean, Sigmar's Valhalla is only for the brave and the courageous. Sigmar has no "regular heaven" for everyone, most people will live out their lives, die and go to Shyish, where they'll linger eternally. It would be cool to see Tyrion and Teclis trying to create a circle of rebirth and reincarnation (natural, instead of artifical like the Deepkin do) tied to the magic of Hyish and Ghyran. Of course, this sounds very much like Eldar territory, but why let a good concept escape. The Eldar were a very well established and conceptually solid faction. Nagash, of course, would hate the twins for that. Eternally robbing him of HIS souls.

There you go, two for the price of one: I've got to say, I'm a bit opposed to implausibility, even if a design is outlandish at ita core, dress it up with plausible elements and it becomes easy to accept. Age of Sigmar is stretching a bit too much my suspension of disbelief... so for me, cogforts are made of different metals and shaped to look like actual buildings of fortresses because that's what they know how to do. I also wanted a Renaissance feel, so I went with fluted armour as a reference for what the metal plates should look like. Also, I always imagine these forts as built around a central pillar or structure, in my mind housing the generator (be it mechanical or magical), but there's no reason why there couldn't be wolf-shaped cogforts, griffin-shaped air fortresses with lighter-than-air compartments separated to minimise risk forming the feathers of the wings... some could be snake-like (as in John Carter). I like that the possibilites be endless as they are.

I like the concept very much. But just like the Kharadron Overlords have a great design marred by one giant round big ball of a flaw (those metal bubbles look god-darn awful. Matter of taste, I know, but they look terrible to me; I'd rather had the ships have some measure of sails to catch the aetheric winds, or maybe aetheric engines, but just not metallic bubbles), cogforts made of wood and stucco... I don't know, I imagine the stucco crumbling at the first step. I also prefer irregularity when it comes to the general shape of the fort. Or maybe not "irregularity", just not having i as a square. This is a world with a lot of projectiles (cannonball, magic, etc), so looking at what was done to defend against cannonfire makes sense. Vauban starforts:

Man, that's such a nice looking mini! I'm loving the color scheme as well. Teal and orange but with a solid reason: rust. Very nice thinking. I agree with Oath Stoned, though, in that it seems complicated to ride the fine line between 40k's retro-futurism and AoS' realmpunk. One step too much and they'll look like Ventrillians: One step too little and they'll look just like Adeptus Mechanicus. I'd swap their legs with Imperial legs, and maybe use Imperial Archer bodies more profusely. Maybe even get some of these: ANVIL industries have very, very nice bits (including these Gothic void armour and Medieval armor torsos) that you can use in an army of this capacity. I'd stick to Imperial heads though. Imperial knights, greatswords, etc.

The Iron Cohorts of Ursberg , the Defiant, the blackened heart of civilization in Ghur. Led by Archmarshal Teumalleus Mann, called Tedy, the Cohorts are formed by a Cogfort and its accompanying walking towers and mobile fastnesses, as well as its regiments of handgunners, skyhopers and companies of artillery. A fearsome sight to behold, as the ground trembles and the sky darkens. This is the Steel Faithful, the oldest of the Ursberger cogforts, in which the mighty ubercannon Ulric's Laughter was baptised with oil and fire.

Thanks, this is the first drawing of this kind that I've done. I was inspired by your discussion about cogforts, really. The Freeguild faction seem to be the one which is getting the most background development -- in the backstage. No army book, no red book with lore... but they're building a ton of traction for them and there are a lot of crazy ideas out there for them.

I have drawn what I think a cogfort may look like. From inside another cogfort. I tried to convey a steelworks gothic feel with a spritz of Renaissance. Sorry for the image being sideways.