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Lots of talk of how they could make plastic Aspect Warriors are going on in the CWE Rumors thread. I figured I'd try to move it here.

It was stated that Guardians/DAs/Scorpions/FireDragons and more should all share a kit. I disagree.

Guardians and DAs are *not* the same armor. Guardians are less ornamental, and substantially lighter. Guardians vs Scoprions/FDs are even more different. Scorpions and FDs wear much heavier armor.

Windrider bodies and Shining Spear bodies should be different, Both by rules and fluff. But they never really have been (mine are - but i kitbashed). However, the kit would need multiple heads (3 Aspect Warrior heads, 1 Exarch head) minimum on top of the Windrider heads (that's critical for both fluff and model). It needs 3 laser lances, 1 Star Lance, and 1 Sword (although they'd probably just change the rules to fit different loadouts if they added/removed weapons). It could be done, but a little more required than suggested. I'd love to see it.

While each Aspect is unique, some could share.

Possibly Scorpions/Fire Dragons, although I'd rather not (their poses should be *very* different). You'd need 5 heads of each Aspect Warrior, and 1 head for each Exarch. You'd also need arms for each aspect (pistol/CC vs two-handed gun tend to not use the same arms). Plus Exarch weapons. Doable, but the pose thing still makes me want to say no.

Scorpions/Reapers/Incubi would be a cool kit. All the 'dark' heavy-armored aspects. But to do it right, it'd take quite a bit of plastic. Possibly even throw in Warp Spiders. You'd need the basic heavy armor sprues for torsos/backs/legs. Then you'd need 5 heads per aspect plus 1 Exarch head per aspect. Both arms and all weapons would be different. And more sprue for weapons options. Plus, you'd need some Aspect-specific bits, such as Warp Generators, Dark Reaper loin"cloths", Reaper Exarch shoulder, etc. You might get some dual use out of some skulls between Reapers/Incubi. And some dual use between some poses/thematics between Scorpions and Incubi. I can't see Fire Dragons really working in this kit, unless you don't care about poses, though. And you'd have to change how Fire Dragons look.

To do a DA/Banshee/Hawk kit, you'd need a lot of additional sprues. You'd have the primary torso/back/legs as always. But Banshees would need a different torso. All 3 would need different backs. Then you'd need wings and grenade packs for the Hawks. Targetters and loincloths for the DAs. All the different arms/weapons/heads. That's a lot of kit. You could get away with the same 5 poses for all 3, but it wouldn't be ideal.

My dream - which would never happen - is to take a page out of how they do SM.

Tac and Dev kits are interchangeable (albeit different poses). ASM can mix in too, but they have a little more variation. For instance, you could take Dev legs, Tac torso, and put on an ASM jetpack. Then take weapons/head from any kit. And now you have an ASM.

The plastic Space Marine kits interchangeable nature is a modellers dream. The basic construction of a lot of the DE plastic kits I've been working with lately allows for similar freedom, even when including the Sylvaneth parts I've used in places, but the designs are obviously different enough that it's still easy to identify the donor kits for most pieces. That I can live with though.

I'm trying to go all plastic, with a few metal pieces in my Aeldari, and definitely having to use some creative license and pulling in AOS kits to get the variety. Plastic Aspect Warriors is an admirable dream, but no way it would work as a single kit. Even a squad of 5 would end up ridiculously expensive with all the options. Best I could see us getting is one box for 2 different Aspects, like a lot of the AOS kits can pull double duty as differing units.

Speaking of the SM kits though, they could do something along the lines of the Chapter upgrade sprues. The BA and DA add-ons are a little more straightforward than the Eldar ones would be, but a £20 box of more basic Aspect Warriors that can do one or two choices with an £8-10 add on kit depending on the different shrines could be workable. I'd be mostly weapons, maybe a few heads and some ornamentation. They could also sell Warp Spider and Swooping Hawk backpacks like they do the SM Jump-packs on the webstore, probably at a higher cost than those though.

The guardian/DA thing is because the last kit they had (in 3rd edition) they literally shared the same body. In fact the only things they had different was the Exarch's arms, DA helmets and Tabbards. It's not that hard to include some extra trinkets on the sprue designated for DA, especially since some other kits (like the Assault Marines, who do not even have a second alternate build) have basically two sets of models in the same kit, separated only by the fact that they only give you one set of legs.

So there's not only a precedent for kits with similar interchangeability, but an actual precedent for the same kit. Same could go for the Shining Spears as an add-on sprue for the Windriders, since the majority of the bulk is on the jetbikes, and attaching a few extra trinkets to them is easier than making completely new bikes.

That said. I'd rather see Guardians get their own box set, being able to make Storm Guardians and Defender Guardians. I'd rather see the DA share a box with the Fire Dragons, as they both wear ornate aspect armor, which are more similar than, say, Scorpions vs Banshee armor. Then it just leaves their guns being different (they don't even need different arms). That would make much more sense as a combo kit.

I can see Warp Spiders and Scorpions sharing a kit, as they both have an arachnid motif and stooped stance. It would be the hardest to fit on a sprue though, as they need two sets of arms and two sets of heads, as well as the backpack for the Warp Spiders.

Dark Reapers would be harder to share a kit with anything, since the only ones that share their heavy armor are the Warp Spiders and Scorpions (who have a different pose to them) and the way their arms hold the reaper launchers makes it hard to be able to be repurposes for other gun types.But it is still possible for them to share a kit with Scorpions or Fire Dragons.

Banshees and Hawks can theoretically share a kit since they both have the same stance, but they shouldn't since the only thing they will have in common are their legs; everything above the waist would have to be different due to the lore and weapons behind the two.

I could see DAs and FDs. It seems wrong because, per rules, FDs have much heavier armor. But I think it'd look right.

@Craggy - A lot of the DE kits are not on the SM level, but still quite awesome for their kitbashability. One of my favorite kits ever is the Scourge kit. I think I've had 3 or 4 boxes of them, but only 5 Scourges - used all the bits on other things.

Mixing in Dark Elves and High Elves has also worked reasonably, although not all kits work well, and it takes some additional care.

GW does seem to do a great job in this regard across most of their plastic kits, but not their clampacks. Two major letdowns I've had are:
(1) when they discontinued the SM Commander and replaced with clampacks. That and Tacs are athe only kits I'd say were better than scourges
(2) the plastic Guardian kit. They tried. Miles better than finecast. But no options, really.

I'd love to see a new Guardian kit with more options, even if they didn't have rules. Dreaming (again), but a Kalabite-compatible Guardian kit with Storm and Defender options included would be beautiful. If they added LasBlasters, I'd be beside myself.

I thought FD had the lighter armor? I remember them having the 4+ and only Spiders, Scorpions and Reapers had 3+ armor (other than exarchs).

I don't have my codexes with me, will double check when I get home.

This would be very do-able, but you would have to bend some of the aesthetic expectations.

You could do a lot with optional heads, arms, tabards, and backpack/wings. Bodies could be shared between a couple different Aspects (and definitely Guardians/Dire Avengers). Add in a buttload of Eldar bits and you'd be good to go. That being said it would also not be impossible to make a single Aspect plastic kit for each - considering the number of units we've seen released for other factions. Shining Spears could easily be a tiny add-in sprue included with Jetbikes or sold at a bumped cost (add $5 for the additional sprue etc.).

Very possible, but also a simple plastic kit each could be just as feasible.

Fire Dragons are 3+ and always have been - they're one of the four heavy armour ones: Reapers, Scorpions, Spiders, Dragons (not counting Shining Spears but they're 3+ too). Everyone else is 4+ --- though Hawks used to be 5+ a long time ago I think.

The 6E codex gave FDs a 3+ (wouldn't change much if they were a 4+).

The 7E codex took Heavy Aspect Armor away from Exarchs (in non-Heavy squads). They don't have a 3+ anymore.

To envision the kits, you'd have to let go of current thoughts with existing models. Dual kits seem like the best option. Hawks and banshees together. Dynamic movement, more graceful poses.
Dragons and reapers could work due to firing stances. Additional armour plating add ons for reapers.
Spiders and scorpions could share armour, just need different arms, heads and backpack for spider.

Very doable IMHO

The idea that I had was three boxes in all, split up roughly by armor save in order to get bodies that were similar in construction. Each is set up akin to the Ork Burna/Loota box, with enough bodies to make a unit of five but spare arms in order to go with one of two options. There'd either be five, or six, models in each. I'd prefer six, but I'd lay odds that five would be the GW tally.

BOX A -- Swooping Banshees
The Howling Banshees and Swooping Hawks have a similar 'leaping" pose dynamic and light armor, making the two physically compatible. There's the additional bonus that the Banshee gear is slender, with power swords and heads, while the Hawks have big wings that will take up a ton of space. The two should fit together on a set of sprues better than a different combination, but it'll be close. This box might require a third sprue set and have a higher cost due to it. I hope not, but, seriously, it'll be a tight fit unless the wings are redesigned for a smaller footprint.

BOX B -- Fire Scorpions
The Fire Dragons and Striking Scorpions share the second box, having a thicker armor design and being set for a more aggressive, body-leaning-to-tackle style of posing. Scorpion helmets have heft bulk, but weapon options are small, as are Fire Dragon options (save the Fire Pike) ... this could be a good box to include some small extra items for conversion work and certainly trim. Heck, you could redesign the Fire Dragons to be more, well, "draconic" with fancier helmets and some kind of belt/tabard attachment. Have some fun here!

BOX C -- Warp Avengers
The heavy, foot-planted Aspects share the last box, with both Warp Spiders and Dire Avengers being "We can barely move this stuff is so heavy ugh" models whose bodies are fairly trim but who have MASSIVE GUNS that take up huge volume of the models. These would be the most static of the aspects, but the larger guns provide the bulk of the kit.

Since each set will have plenty of leftovers from the 'other' Aspect, you can quickly assemble a nice selection of Autarch Parts, letting you build a few of your own as you gather spare bodies.

This'd be my basic plan/layout. It isn't perfect (you might have to swap Box B and C to fit the bigger weapons into two boxes, not sure), but it should be doable and the general feel of each grouping clicks pretty well.

With this, bulking the Dire Avengers box back up to ten models and charging the same for all four Aspect Boxes should get everything into a nice rotation.

3 easy kits with dual options:

- Banshees / Hawks: both are in "leaping" stances and lighter armour so the bodies would be the same. Head and weapon swaps and alternate back torso half for the wings
- Dragons / Reapers: both are a firm-footed stance with two-handed guns and heavier armour. Head and weapon swaps. done
- Scorpion / Spiders: both can be firm-footed or crouching or running, so can have the same variety of bodies. Head and weapon swaps and alternate back torso half for the jump pack.

Each kit only needs 5 bodies, 2 sets of heads, 2 sets of arms and only 1 set of "larger" bits. (wings, reaper guns, jump pack respectively). All other bits are small weapons, guns, etc.
Each kit can be around $40-50.

If you match any Aspect with anything other than the pairings I have listed, you create a pricing imbalance. For example, Hawks and Spiders should not share the same kit as you need to add both Wings and Jump packs, thus more plastic needed. A Hawks/Spiders kit would therefore need to cost more that a Banshee/Scorpion kit, which does even need seperate arms (but wouldn't match stances or armour type)

The problem with Banshees with any other aspect is that their torsos are suppose to be female. Ignoring the debate on whether or not "Boobplates" are acceptable (that is one for another time), Banshees would basically require a different torso entirely since the Hawk wings would require a different torso back. Since they also don't share arms or heads, this only leaves the legs. And it's much easier to make 2 sets with the same legs than try to cram essentially 2 sets of miniatures on one frame for the sake of one set of legs.

People complay about Homogeneization and you want to mix dark and normal eldar? Thats insane

Is there any specific reason why banshee and hawk arms need to be unique? If most of an aspect’s character/identity comes from helmets and torsos then multi boxes could be done, if everyone wants them head to toe unique then the idea is an exercise in futility.

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
The problem with Banshees with any other aspect is that their torsos are suppose to be female. Ignoring the debate on whether or not "Boobplates" are acceptable (that is one for another time), Banshees would basically require a different torso entirely since the Hawk wings would require a different torso back. Since they also don't share arms or heads, this only leaves the legs. And it's much easier to make 2 sets with the same legs than try to cram essentially 2 sets of miniatures on one frame for the sake of one set of legs.

There are 2 really easy fixes for this. A) Male Banshees exist in the fluff B) Swooping Hawks can be female too. Think Dark Eldar Wyches
You could make the kit have 4 female torso halves and 3 males torso haves and be done. You could also make the wings attach to the back torso half in a way that does not require double back halves. If the kit only has 5 back halves, then you can only make 5 full torsos no matter how many front halves are in the kit.

Bremon wrote:
Is there any specific reason why banshee and hawk arms need to be unique?

Hawks hold their weapon with both hands. Banshees have a sword in one hand, pistol in the other. They only way to make this look good is to have separate arms for each.

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Shining Spears could be added to Windriders with the addition of spears. Maybe some new heads.

Dire Avengers, Guardians, Storm Guardians, Striking Scorpions and Fire Dragons all basically use the same body. Yes some are more ornate than others but - essentially - they are the same.The biggest differences are the heads and arms/guns. Leave Guardians as is, then make a Striking Scorpions/Storm Guardians box and a Fire Dragons/Dire Avenger box. You could make 10 different chest pieces and only 5 backs, if you really wanted to differentiate the units.

Warp Spiders and Dark Reapers, could go together. They have similar poses (dudes holding a fatty weapon). The big issue is how large the Spiders' backpack is.

That really only leaves Banshees and Swooping Hawks. They might be able to go together. Or GW could just make a new all female unit (maybe something shooty) and another flying unit (maybe a melee one).

 Galef wrote:

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
The problem with Banshees with any other aspect is that their torsos are suppose to be female. Ignoring the debate on whether or not "Boobplates" are acceptable (that is one for another time), Banshees would basically require a different torso entirely since the Hawk wings would require a different torso back. Since they also don't share arms or heads, this only leaves the legs. And it's much easier to make 2 sets with the same legs than try to cram essentially 2 sets of miniatures on one frame for the sake of one set of legs.

There are 2 really easy fixes for this. A) Male Banshees exist in the fluff B) Swooping Hawks can be female too. Think Dark Eldar Wyches
You could make the kit have 4 female torso halves and 3 males torso haves and be done. You could also make the wings attach to the back torso half in a way that does not require double back halves. If the kit only has 5 back halves, then you can only make 5 full torsos no matter how many front halves are in the kit.

Bremon wrote:
Is there any specific reason why banshee and hawk arms need to be unique?

Hawks hold their weapon with both hands. Banshees have a sword in one hand, pistol in the other. They only way to make this look good is to have separate arms for each.

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Thing is we're already with different heads, arms, weapons, exarch wargear and backs. And the fronts might be debatable. This leaves really only 5 pairs of legs that they can share. At that point it's easier to just make two separate sets.

It's like saying Reivers and Hellblasters can share the same kit if you just tweaked the torso a bit. Theoretically yes, but they'd be better off as two separate kits.

And yes, I am aware that business wise it's easier to justify a dual kit than two singular kits, but GW finally got off that train and it's not really friendly to the consumers (you're essentially being forced to buy 2/3rds of another kit you had no intention of buying) so I would not like to encourage that.

There is a combination of factors that really force certain pairs to make the most sense: pose/stance, armour and space on a sprue.

Pose/Stance: We know GW doesn't like to put more legs or bodies than the minimum of a unit. Otherwise you could get more than 5 models out of a box and thus GW would sell less.
A box of leaping/running legs makes the most sense for Banshees/Hawks. Firm-footed, both feet on the ground makes sense for both Dragons and Reapers.
A mixed set of legs, possible with some crouching legs, only makes sense for Scorpions/Spiders

Armour: Most Eldar armour looks the same with subtle differences. The obvious pairing here is Banshees /Hawks again b/c they are the only ones with 4+ (aside from Aveners, but those are already plastic).
Scorpions, Dragons, Reapers and Spiders all have 3+ Aspect armour, so their pairs then fall under the pose/stance pairs above.

Space on the sprue: If GW does all 3 of these kits at the same time, they will likely want to make all 3 kit the same cost. This means they all need to be the same size and amount of plastic.
Each unit is a T3 squishy Eldar with 5 models. The legs, torso and head will all be relatively the same size. What is different is the weapon. Fusion guns, Lasblasters, Chainswords, Power swords and Pistol arms are all about the same size.
The Wings, Jump packs, Death spinners and Reaper launchers are a bit bigger, thus none of these should be placed in the same kit as that would skew the sprue space needed (aside for Jump Packs and Death spinners, obviously)

If you address all three of these factors, the obvious pairings are:
Banshees / Hawks
Scorpions / Spiders
Dragons / Reapers

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:

Thing is we're already with different heads, arms, weapons, exarch wargear and backs. And the fronts might be debatable. This leaves really only 5 pairs of legs that they can share. At that point it's easier to just make two separate sets.

I'd like you to check out the Necron range. particularly the Immortal/Deathmark kit and the Preatorian/Lych guard kit. In both cases the only thing the kits share is the legs and front-torso bits. Completely different heads, arms, weapons (even alternate weapons for the same unit) and backs. And the Preatorian/Lych guard kit technically has 4 total builds since each unit has 2 different sets of wargear.
These are very successful kits for GW as it increases the likelihood that a player will be interested in one of the builds.

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If you think different heads are a maybe for Shining Spears, you might want to look at the models, fluff, and army asethetic more deeply. Every Aspect has a different helmet style for reasons.

@Galas - I meant make them compatible, so you could take a Kalabite sword and use it in place of the DA sword if you thought it looked cooler. Or kitbashed a Jain Zar with some CWE some DE bits.

The only cross-faction kit I think would make sense is Incubi/Scorpions. I'd rather they were seperate kits, but they're more similar than Scorpions and anything else in CWE or Incubi and anything else in DE.

For a Banshee/Hawk box, you could do 5 female front-torsos and 2 or 3 male front-torsos.

Making Banshees no longer adopt the guise of the Banshee would be like deciding SM Scouts are regular IG dudes but with boltguns. Crazy. By some fluff, guys can walk the Path of the Banshee, but as I recall, the armor is still in the form of a Banshee.

Also, making all Hawks female seems like it would look odd. Much like how it's weird that all IG troopers are male.

Striking Scoprions and Storm Guardians actually only share the Shuriken Pistol.

Tau Firewarriors and Crisis Suits share the same bodies, but wear different gear. You couldn't make a dual kit of them. Pathfiders and Fire Warriors might be a more similar analogy though. Or Crisis Suits and Broadsides.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Limiting the number of models you can build by legs makes the most sense. If you try to vary what limits what kit, people will get more out of the disperate limiting factors. And legs are the bit that would vary least in options.

 Galef wrote:

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:

Thing is we're already with different heads, arms, weapons, exarch wargear and backs. And the fronts might be debatable. This leaves really only 5 pairs of legs that they can share. At that point it's easier to just make two separate sets.

I'd like you to check out the Necron range. particularly the Immortal/Death guard kit and the Preatorian/Lych guard kit. In both cases the only thing the kits share is the legs and front-torso bits. Completely different heads, arms, weapons and backs.
These are very successful kits for GW.

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There are also Breachers/Fire Warriors, Crypt Horrors/Vargheists and even the Daemon Prince (technically not a dual kit, but enough to make two if you just had the legs). Most of those kits sold well because one half was a desirable unit while the other was just along for the ride. The deathMARK kit especially since there are numerous articles on how to make use of the massive spare parts you get from that one, since most people just wanted the Immortals.

Like I pointed out, is a horrible business tactic and not one I'd like to encourage, especially since Rountree-era GW seems to be getting out of that mindset. Dualkits like the Executioner/Black Guard kits work because, aside from some arms and a head, they are largely the same model. Even the Sisters of Avelorn/Shadow Warrior kit is a better example, and that does do the whole "one half is female the other is male" since they share arms, legs and I think the back of the torsos. Also the Necron kits, if I remember, do not have to have parts for individual squad leaders, which Aspect Warriors do (and exarchs have a lot of options).

Well, I was just "Theorycrafting MULTI-kit Aspects" like the thread title says.
GW very well could make one-unit only kits for each Aspect, but that would be 6 kits needed instead of only 3. And it also increases the chance that some kits don't get sold as much. We are hurting enough as it is for plastic Aspects, so the easier it is for GW to make, the better.

Dual kits may not have always been a great idea in the past (often leading to the creation of a unit that didn't exist before just to sell the kit) but in the case of the Aspects, it is obviously a good idea, SHOULD be easy to do, and quite surprising the GW has yet to do so despite SEVERAL Eldar release windows in the past few years.

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I move to agree to disagree, since I feel like Aspect Warriors in general should get their own kits each, as their armors usually have a distinct flavour each. However I do recognize that it would basically be financial suicide to do so, as most people would buy one box, maybe two, tops, rather than the 6-10 rhinos you'd sell to the average marine player.

However this would be a good time to introduce new aspect warriors, maybe ones that would pair better with the spares rather than try to put them together.

I think we seem to mostly be on the same page.

I can't think of any pairings that'd make for a great dual kit. That's what I was trying to find.

Breachers/FW work well as a dual kit. My only problem with that kit is the quasi-retconning of Tau counting systems and it's effect on unit sizes.

I think GW should dualkit where it makes sense (same bodies, different loadout), but hope they don't mangle the fluff or models in an attempt to shoehorn dualkits where they don't fit.

I can agree to disagree, but I'd like to add that most of the "flavor" in the armour has to do with paint job and the wargear (which is solely on the helm and in their hands). The only real differences are in the extra plates of armour that Banshees/Hawks do not have and possible the "ridges" on the Scorpion armour (although these are on Dragons too, so).
But all of those armour differences are either so insignificant that they can be ignored, or redesigned slightly to match the armour of their "pairing"

Sadly I feel like all this discussion is pointless since GW won't be doing Aspects any time this edition
I got tired of waiting and just made my own plastic aspects: http://glennsgwmodels.blogspot.com/2016/07/children-of-khaine.html

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 Galef wrote:

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
The problem with Banshees with any other aspect is that their torsos are suppose to be female. Ignoring the debate on whether or not "Boobplates" are acceptable (that is one for another time), Banshees would basically require a different torso entirely since the Hawk wings would require a different torso back. Since they also don't share arms or heads, this only leaves the legs. And it's much easier to make 2 sets with the same legs than try to cram essentially 2 sets of miniatures on one frame for the sake of one set of legs.

There are 2 really easy fixes for this. A) Male Banshees exist in the fluff B) Swooping Hawks can be female too. Think Dark Eldar Wyches
You could make the kit have 4 female torso halves and 3 males torso haves and be done. You could also make the wings attach to the back torso half in a way that does not require double back halves. If the kit only has 5 back halves, then you can only make 5 full torsos no matter how many front halves are in the kit.

They've actually established that male Banshees do exist in the fluff. The armor is the armor though, so it doesn't matter if it is a man or a woman wearing it--the same goes for the other Aspects.

Bremon wrote:
Is there any specific reason why banshee and hawk arms need to be unique?

Hawks hold their weapon with both hands. Banshees have a sword in one hand, pistol in the other. They only way to make this look good is to have separate arms for each.
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Actually I can kind of see where they're going with this. You could do a slight redesign to the Lasblaster to make it so that it would look 'right' one-handed or even be arm mounted like the Grey Knight Storm Bolters.

What I would do is this:

Scorpions and Banshees--the "sneaking" aspect of the Scorpions can be portrayed in a manner similar to the Banshees' "furiously charging to go raaaaaaaawr" bit. Rocks as launching points for the models, weapons held at the ready down low, etc.

Reapers and Fire Dragons--Both strike me as kind of an "implacably advancing and firing" pose for the models. The Fire Dragons can have a bit more dynamic nature to them thanks to their smaller weapons and their ability to have grenades and stuff like that compared to the Dark Reapers. The Reapers can have their weapons held low and ready while the Dragons actually can be posed as 'aiming' and a bit more active.

Spiders and Swooping Hawks--Both have their weapons held in two hands with the possibility for poses that are a bit more active and the like. They also lend themselves towards having scenery as part of their poses, things like rock outcroppings and wrecked Craftworld bits etc. Think of them as patiently waiting for the strike before launching themselves in thanks to their backpacks.

I really cant see aspect warriors sharing a kit.

they have different enough armor and general look to warrant individual kits.

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:

Like I pointed out, is a horrible business tactic and not one I'd like to encourage, especially since Rountree-era GW seems to be getting out of that mindset. Dualkits like the Executioner/Black Guard kits work because, aside from some arms and a head, they are largely the same model. Even the Sisters of Avelorn/Shadow Warrior kit is a better example, and that does do the whole "one half is female the other is male" since they share arms, legs and I think the back of the torsos. Also the Necron kits, if I remember, do not have to have parts for individual squad leaders, which Aspect Warriors do (and exarchs have a lot of options).

Sisters of the Watch and Shadow Warriors have different arms for each type.

The only things shared are the legs and the back of the torsos(which have the capes molded on).
The Sisters have their front torso with the arms attached and paired with specific bows.

They were different pre-4th edition, but the 4th edition sculpts have moved them closer to "modified guardian armor" as part of GW's then-plan to give each faction a unified visual theme, so I can see some of them sharing a kit.

Ideally though it's still better to give them each their own kit so you can have the designers go hog-wild rather than constantly trying to marry two styles into one.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Scorpions and Banshees

Reapers and Fire Dragons

Spiders and Swooping Hawks.

This would be my second choice for pairs just because, as you mention, you wouldn't need extra arms since all the pairings are either two-handed gun or melee weapon/pistol.
But the stances and armour for the Banshees/Scoprions and Spider/Hawks is all wrong. And the Spider/Hawk box would have too many large extra bits.

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
They were different pre-4th edition, but the 4th edition sculpts have moved them closer to "modified guardian armor" as part of GW's then-plan to give each faction a unified visual theme, so I can see some of them sharing a kit.

I think this is the main reason we disagree. I didn't start playing until 4th ed, so to me Aspects hae always been designed to have similar armour. Even some of the recent drawing of them look like they draw a Guardian, then traced over it with any extras the Aspect would have.

EDIT: For Example:


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 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
They were different pre-4th edition, but the 4th edition sculpts have moved them closer to "modified guardian armor" as part of GW's then-plan to give each faction a unified visual theme, so I can see some of them sharing a kit.

Ideally though it's still better to give them each their own kit so you can have the designers go hog-wild rather than constantly trying to marry two styles into one.

I'd say that it would depend on how unique they wanted each model to be.

If they wanted each variant to be able to be posed uniquely and things like that? Yeah, no way I'd expect dual kits.
If they were okay with relatively static poses and the like, it'd be dual kit compatible.

 Galef wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

Scorpions and Banshees

Reapers and Fire Dragons

Spiders and Swooping Hawks.

This would be my second choice for pairs just because, as you mention, you wouldn't need extra arms since all the pairings are either two-handed gun or melee weapon/pistol.
But the stances and armour for the Banshees/Scoprions and Spider/Hawks is all wrong. And the Spider/Hawk box would have too many large extra bits.

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
They were different pre-4th edition, but the 4th edition sculpts have moved them closer to "modified guardian armor" as part of GW's then-plan to give each faction a unified visual theme, so I can see some of them sharing a kit.

I think this is the main reason we disagree. I didn't start playing until 4th ed, so to me Aspects hae always been designed to have similar armour. Even some of the recent drawing of them look like they draw a Guardian, then traced over it with any extras the Aspect would have.

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I can actually see Spiders and Hawks sharing a kit; just modify their backpacks so that it either accepts a pair of wings or some widgets on the side to bulk it out to spider-size (or alternatively shrink the packbacks). Stance wise, a running Spider can look like a swooping hawk.

As for the sculpts, I think I saw the prototype of one of the aspect warriors (forgot which since it was literally a decade ago) that was literally a reposed guardian with more stuff on it.