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Those start collecting boxes are mostly nice, but the ones could use the most are lacking in comparison. If the Orcs had that spider or teolls instead of thosr ugly plastic chars, oh my. The Clan Pestilens box is tempting as well, but my metal plague monks won't make the plastic monks less hideous in comparison, rather the reverse. New plastic censer bearers and monks are desperatly needed. And gutter runners. And Ratogres. And giant rats. And Poison Wind Globardiers. Sigh.

Maybe the boardgame should be Defenders of Humanity (Sigmarines, Not-Empir and Not-Bretons) against Blight Kings, Zombies and Pestilens. Everyone agrees, rightv

GW skeletons seem pretty great to me... I'll be picking up one of the skeleton horde sets.

I like the precedent of two start collecting boxes in the same faction too

Kilkrazy wrote:GW have a strong policy of not dropping their prices. Instead, they have started to offer bundles and cheap versions.

For example, upping the price of 40K codexes from £15 to £30, on the basis of the hardback version, caused a significant fall in sales, so GW have re-introduced softback versions for some armies, at the reduced price of only £25.

Sorta reminds me of the supermarket trick of announcing their price drops... after putting the prices up, first.

The Seraphon bundle with the Carnosaur, eight cavalry and 12 infantry for £50 is an extreme example, because the Carnosaur by itself is £50 so you're getting all the extra models for free.

I still don't think that's good enough. They'd have to pay me to use those cold ones.

Instead, GW will allow inflation to gradually make the current prices seem reasonable.

GW - the only wargames company that bases their business strategy around recession.

Chikout wrote:am impatiently waiting to see what the elves have turned into

Yup.

I actually think the amount of support for Aos has been impressive.

Assuming the rumours are correct, within the first year of Aos, we will have had new miniatures for 6 factions, 2 big box sets (I am super curious about the contents of the board game. Sad Panda?), some kind of rule book for 9 factions, 3 or possibly 4 campaign books, 12 novels or short story compilations and 5 scenery pieces.
Back in the day we were lucky if we got 6 army books a year total across fantasy and 40k.

They certainly provide a lot of things (to buy) to play AoS with. But I think it still boils down to whether you want to play AoS in the first place.

Kilkrazy wrote:I think Sigmarine cavalry could be mounted on large Shire horses bulked up with late mediaeval style gold armour plate like the Sigmarines themselves.

Not sure if serious, but sigmarines are almost the size of (scale) shire horses themselves. Much as I'm bored of of fantasy producers and modellers sticking cavalry on any kind of kooky kreature rather than a good, solid horse, I think it might be the only route for hypothetical sigmarine cav.

Joyboozer wrote:
I don't think he was deliberately suggesting the design team were huffing gold spray paint when they created the Stormcast.

Yup.

Any can would have done.

Chikout wrote:
Are mods allowed to troll? Regarding the upcoming Stormcast release, this picture looks interesting. The extremis chamber is the cavalry. That leaves the ruination, sacrosanct and auxiliary chambers which have not been detailed in the fluff so far (as far I am aware). I wonder if they will get models too.

Yeah, it was a very obvious set up for these. Forget the exact wording, but it was essentially "Sigmar hasn't seen fit to deploy forces from these chambers yet."
My money for Stormcast Cavalry would be Dracoth Paladins, approximately the same power level as Varanguard at most.
I don't think horses would look right, no matter how big!
Someone mentioned Stormcast scouts; I can see the appeal, but I don't think that's happen - no point having Liberators established as a combat baseline and then introduce something more fragile; for all their parallels with Space Marines, Stormcast come out of the reforging process as Marines, there's no intermediate phase.
Still, wait and see I guess.

The Skeleton horde is a good deal, but I also didn't like the model count compared to other sets. I feel like they should have skipped the big model and gone with a more troopy box set.. though it still is a nice savings if you want the big model and don't mind the extra stuff.. kinda like the seraphon one.

Maybe this will be Sigmarine demigryphs but if they are then naturally they will come with new sculpts for the Siggies to ride.

Any of the BL fic throw in a passing mention or description of what they ride, if it's even ben touched on at all. New BL book up for preorder Friday and dramas at the end of March. I'm not gonna lie, I'm excited to see where it goes, especially since I'm not a SE player and thus immune to THIS impulse buy.

RoperPG wrote:

Chikout wrote:
Are mods allowed to troll? Regarding the upcoming Stormcast release, this picture looks interesting. The extremis chamber is the cavalry. That leaves the ruination, sacrosanct and auxiliary chambers which have not been detailed in the fluff so far (as far I am aware). I wonder if they will get models too.

Yeah, it was a very obvious set up for these. Forget the exact wording, but it was essentially "Sigmar hasn't seen fit to deploy forces from these chambers yet."
My money for Stormcast Cavalry would be Dracoth Paladins, approximately the same power level as Varanguard at most.
I don't think horses would look right, no matter how big!

The gentleman in the AoS big box was described as being one of the first to have a Dracoth, so I think Dracoth Knights are a given at this point.

Someone mentioned Stormcast scouts; I can see the appeal, but I don't think that's happen - no point having Liberators established as a combat baseline and then introduce something more fragile; for all their parallels with Space Marines, Stormcast come out of the reforging process as Marines, there's no intermediate phase.
Still, wait and see I guess.

Stormcast come out of the reforging process as Liberators. But Stormcast are not the only people living in Sigmar's city.

Vampire Counts Skeletons are the best on the market in my opinion. Show me better.

- the Stormcast Battletome is already out of date as soon as they get new units. I wonder if they'll keep selling it, or revise it with the new units?

 Bottle wrote:
Vampire Counts Skeletons are the best on the market in my opinion. Show me better.

- the Stormcast Battletome is already out of date as soon as they get new units. I wonder if they'll keep selling it, or revise it with the new units?

Not that it'd matter- the model's rules are free to download.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Stormcast come out of the reforging process as Liberators. But Stormcast are not the only people living in Sigmar's city.

True, but they aren't Stormcast, and we've seen nothing yet to indicate that anyone other than Stormcast make up the various chambers.

Sad Panda wrote:
Excitement usually greater for 40K-stuff (and 30K-stuff), but as I've said in the past, 2016 is first and foremost the year of AoS (for GW).

Overall, AoS will get the most weekly releases, the most new models, the most books, etc...

Out of interest, have your sources revealed any of the thinking behind that course of action to you? Like, did GW believe AoS was going to be a huge runaway success and locked-in a long and heavy release cycle in anticipation of that? Or did they anticipate the slow start and believe that really pushing the new stuff like Sigmarines in that first year will turn it around?

 Bottle wrote:
Vampire Counts Skeletons are the best on the market in my opinion. Show me better.

- the Stormcast Battletome is already out of date as soon as they get new units. I wonder if they'll keep selling it, or revise it with the new units?

They're the best plastics, I'd still give overall "best" to Otherworld's.

I visited my local gw and they were painting a lot of TK stuff, don't know if it means anything.

 VeteranNoob wrote:

Any of the BL fic throw in a passing mention or description of what they ride, if it's even ben touched on at all.

They appeared in one, Ghal Maraz, I think (during the expedition in Chamon). Sideways mention, they were bashing Chaos people a little way from the main line of battle.

 Kirasu wrote:
It's beyond me why anyone would want to *buy* GW skeletons.. they're so old and terrible looking, but whatever, to each their own.

The Vampire Counts skeletons (which these are) are damn good, they don't look old at all. Are you thinking of the Tomb Kings ones? I'd agree with you there.

Love the new boxes, cannot wait when they get around O&G since the first one is IMO the worst.

 Yodhrin wrote:

Out of interest, have your sources revealed any of the thinking behind that course of action to you? Like, did GW believe AoS was going to be a huge runaway success and locked-in a long and heavy release cycle in anticipation of that? Or did they anticipate the slow start and believe that really pushing the new stuff like Sigmarines in that first year will turn it around?

No.

I get glimpses of what's in the pipeline. Not why things are in the pipeline.

Your guesses are as good as mine.

MongooseMatt wrote:

 VeteranNoob wrote:

Any of the BL fic throw in a passing mention or description of what they ride, if it's even ben touched on at all.

They appeared in one, Ghal Maraz, I think (during the expedition in Chamon). Sideways mention, they were bashing Chaos people a little way from the main line of battle.

@Mongoose, sorry, one more question. Do you happen to know which author wrote that specific mention? I ask because I'm interviewing more BL authors next week and I'm wondering what nuggets I can pop out during the interview to get an idea for these type of things. There's a lot in the fiction since the models drive the fiction and in AoS being so new the fiction is coming out quick and rapidly fleshing out the world, though it has very very very far to go.

I think most people forget that GW's releases are planned up to three-four years in advance but usually at least two years, if you think about it the End Times and Age of Sigmar would have already had their models and stories ready in 2013-2014. There might be some exceptions to this rule but it essentially means that we won't be seeing the effects of our feedback to Age of Sigmar for at least a year I would imagine.

Of course, as I said earlier I don't buy into the Age of Sigmar bashing many seem fond of performing. I know someone from GW warehousing in Australia and they said that Age of Sigmar was outselling 40K in Australia for at least a good while, probably due to the new starter set. Regardless of surrounding factors, that's still bloody impressive given that Space Marines (as in the vanilla codex stuff, not Space Wolves/Dark Angels/etc) supposedly make up half of GW's total sales by themselves.

As to the Stormcast release itself, it really does sound like it will be Dracoth riders which will give the starter sets' Lord Celestant some buddies to hang with. Makes the most sense for a Stormcast Eternal cavalry unit based on established narrative and models. However, I wonder what the rest of the release will be as I highly doubt it will be just a single new kit. Still, I'm more intrigued by the Orc stuff as, unless I am mistaken, they are the first of the old world factions to get new models since Age of Sigmar started (unless you count the Chaos stuff that isn't Khorne Bloodbound, i.e. Archaon and the Varanguard).

@Sad Panda, as always, cheers for the information mate. Any ideas as to how big the Stormcast release is?

EDIT: Before anyone asks, no, I don't get any release info from the warehousing guy. He's a friend of a friend and basically told me the Age of Sigmar sales thing when we were having a discussion about the reception to the game.

That Skeleton box is quite tempting.

I've been wanting a Mortarch anyways, and I seem to have acquired a fair amount of undead in the last few weeks.

Of course, if the Skaven set includes all the optional parts for the bell and catapult, that's even more tempting. I'd hoped for a Skyre set with a lightning cannon and stormfiends first, but I can settle for this.

What would be nice would be a revisit to Moulder's gorillas and all the Eshin monkeys. They're rats, not simians!

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
That Skeleton box is quite tempting.

I've been wanting a Mortarch anyways, and I seem to have acquired a fair amount of undead in the last few weeks.

Of course, if the Skaven set includes all the optional parts for the bell and catapult, that's even more tempting. I'd hoped for a Skyre set with a lightning cannon and stormfiends first, but I can settle for this.

What would be nice would be a revisit to Moulder's gorillas and all the Eshin monkeys. They're rats, not simians!

I'm with you on the Skelly box. Been meaning to get a Mortarch basically since they were released.

And the skaven one will come with all the parts to make everything.

I would be tempted by the Mortarch box if I literally didn't just see my Tomb Kings get squatted. Do I have the heart (dust?) in me to return to the Undead for AoS?

 Charles Rampant wrote:
I would be tempted by the Mortarch box if I literally didn't just see my Tomb Kings get squatted. Do I have the heart (dust?) in me to return to the Undead for AoS?

Your army is still valid in games - you have full rules support - and you'll probably find people still selling either new or used Tomb Kings on eBay for a good long while if you want to expand them. Don't lose heart!

 VeteranNoob wrote:


@Mongoose, sorry, one more question. Do you happen to know which author wrote that specific mention?

I am afraid don't have the book to hand - there were two authors on that book, and it was the second one that wrote it... best I can do, sorry!

 Kirasu wrote:
It's beyond me why anyone would want to *buy* GW skeletons.. they're so old and terrible looking, but whatever, to each their own.

GW current skeletons are beautiful, I think you missed a redesign.

Vorian wrote:
GW skeletons seem pretty great to me... I'll be picking up one of the skeleton horde sets.

I like the precedent of two start collecting boxes in the same faction too

Me too, I just wish they had more in the box.

I need a lot of skeletons.
Anyone know a company that has a box with a lot of them?

That box of cheaper black knights and skeletons, I'd buy 10 if it wasn't for that awful, awful videogamey mortarch there. I'm not paying for that ever, it sticks out like a sigmarine between cool models. It really was meant for AoS and next to a black knight is a great showcase of what happened to GW fantasy designs lately.

Plumbumbarum wrote:

 Kirasu wrote:
It's beyond me why anyone would want to *buy* GW skeletons.. they're so old and terrible looking, but whatever, to each their own.

GW current skeletons are beautiful, I think you missed a redesign.

The old ones have serious Undertale vibes.

RoperPG wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

Stormcast come out of the reforging process as Liberators. But Stormcast are not the only people living in Sigmar's city.

True, but they aren't Stormcast, and we've seen nothing yet to indicate that anyone other than Stormcast make up the various chambers.

I didn't say that they had to be part of the Chambers.

Release schedules are pretty much set in stone, arent they? Even if AoS is flopping they still have to release the models they have already sculpted

a shame, 2016 looks like it will be a terrible year

hopefully we get at least some demons that can be used in 40k

MongooseMatt wrote:

 VeteranNoob wrote:


@Mongoose, sorry, one more question. Do you happen to know which author wrote that specific mention?

I am afraid don't have the book to hand - there were two authors on that book, and it was the second one that wrote it... best I can do, sorry!

No, that's fine, I can work with that. Thanks.