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two_heads_talking wrote:

LunaHound wrote:@two_heads_talking

Read my post , i made a perfect explanation for Fire Warrior's knife , i even include a pic!
bottom of page !

/shakes head.. I'm not buying it.. lol

Which part about Fire Warrior Ceremonial knife doesnt look like Tan To ?

The looks = 100% same , they both arnt meant for actual battle ( PS i dont really want to
post comparison here there are complaints + a new thread made for it )

After learning about them, I hope its the return of the Fimir!

STOP HIJACKING MY MONKEY MAN THREAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I started another thread! Go to that one!

MOD'S = SHUT THIS THING DOWN.

I don't give a crap about Tau and Anime.

Uriels_Flame wrote:STOP HIJACKING MY MONKEY MAN THREAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I started another thread! Go to that one!

MOD'S = SHUT THIS THING DOWN.

I don't give a crap about Tau and Anime.

1) Ageofego started this thread, dont ask to close other person's stuff
2) There is no confirmed army , thus everything is still speculation / discussion
3) If its just me , i would understand your agitated state , but half of the poster in the thread are discussing it.
So i dont see it bothering the rest.

Ok - I'll fix that.

This thread has turned into a s*it storm of "I like Anime" and "I don't like Anime"

It's like the worst version of Jeremy Kyle ever.


No overstatement.

Mod:

OK everyone, this thread is supposed to be about Fantasy rumours, so let's keep on topic.

I entirely agree with you. It is ludicrous to think that someone will buy an army just because it shares superficial elements with their own culture.

Actually it really, really, really isn't. Brand culturalization and regioning of products has been standard practice for hundreds of years. Every top selling xbox game in the east has been a japanese produced game. Anime, television shows, books and movies all commonly have regional identities, names, and often times plots changed to better suit their target audience when they are redistributed overseas. Toy lines generally make exceptions for action figures so that there is more familiarity on the shelf in the target region. Auto makers for decades made regional alterations to vehicles sold overseas to better compete with the more familiar local markets.

Familiarity sells a product and a level of familiarity helps to introduce products to a new audience. It's not ludicrous, it's pretty basic business practice. GW was not successful with the tau, the japanese are already inundated with sci fi settings and games related. 40k itself has tanked in japan, the Tau weren't going to change that. There is a fast growing market in china though, with relatively little competition. Having a product that is distinctly asian/chinese could help immensely in regard to growing a fan base.

Hey, where's the picture of the new army concept?

I know very few of the asian cultures, but IMHO, I wouldn't buy an Estalian army just for being spanish. The army would have to be really cool. Aniway, if I choose a human army for WFB, it will be the Empire (Averland themed).

ShumaGorath wrote:Brand culturalization and regioning of products has been standard practice for hundreds of years.

GW was not successful with the tau,

There is a fast growing market in china though, with relatively little competition. Having a product that is distinctly asian/chinese could help immensely in regard to growing a fan base.

Done well, by locals / natives, sure. Bad translations and stereotypes have also been around for hundreds of years.

Actually, my understanding is that the Tau release was very successful. Hence, Tau Empire as a followup, rather than, say, a Dark Eldar relaunch.

If the product is distinctively (i.e. not offensively) asian/chinese, then yeah, it could do well. If GW releases asians / chinese as clearly worse than Empire / Brets, that will be a real problem.


But really, I'd much rather see a native Chinese group pick up the reins using a GW-like engine, a la Flames, and do Cathay / Nippon / Siam / Ind / Persia / Araby. At least you avoid the overt East vs West issues.

Actually, my understanding is that the Tau release was very successful. Hence, Tau Empire as a followup, rather than, say, a Dark Eldar relaunch.

In the west they were pretty popular. The kids from the anime and manga half of the game store had something to do once that army came out. The hobby started to serve the whole of nerddom. I was under the impression that the army had no major impact in japanese sales.

Given how ugly and blocky the Tau Battlesuits are, along with the gracelessness of their Grav-Tanks, I'm not surprised the Japanese wouldn't take to them.

They have far better stuff produced natively, so why would they buy a lower-grade knock-off?


And that presumes that Tau are even notionally Japanese.

K I'll i want to hear about is the supposed fantasy army not whether tau were based off of japan and if so who cares.

What new army??

Brimstone wrote:What new army??

Chaos Mecha Ninja Transexual Fimir Monkey-Fishmen Monks of Lesser not China riding Zoats of Doom.

ShumaGorath wrote:

I entirely agree with you. It is ludicrous to think that someone will buy an army just because it shares superficial elements with their own culture.

Actually it really, really, really isn't. Brand culturalization and regioning of products has been standard practice for hundreds of years. Every top selling xbox game in the east has been a japanese produced game. Anime, television shows, books and movies all commonly have regional identities, names, and often times plots changed to better suit their target audience when they are redistributed overseas. Toy lines generally make exceptions for action figures so that there is more familiarity on the shelf in the target region. Auto makers for decades made regional alterations to vehicles sold overseas to better compete with the more familiar local markets.

Familiarity sells a product and a level of familiarity helps to introduce products to a new audience. It's not ludicrous, it's pretty basic business practice. GW was not successful with the tau, the japanese are already inundated with sci fi settings and games related. 40k itself has tanked in japan, the Tau weren't going to change that. There is a fast growing market in china though, with relatively little competition. Having a product that is distinctly asian/chinese could help immensely in regard to growing a fan base.

Cultural rebranding is a standard and useful practise but it takes significantly more skill and understanding than "this is a bit chinese, so the chinese must like it."

Cultural rebranding works by taking an existing product and altering it to fit the tastes and needs of your target market. Nothing wrong there. But the product needs to be something that is fundamentally wanted in that market. Cultural rebranding can make a product that there may be an audience for more likely to buy your product but it can't sell a product that there is no audience for.

As a westerner living in Japan I'm subject to examples of this kind of regionalising everyday. Kit Kat and Starbucks are particularly prominent examples of western products that formulate new flavours, products and advertising copy that will appeal to the Japanese market. You don't see many mathca lattes or kinako kit-kats back home. But what they've done there is taken a product with an existing market (chocolate bar, cafe) and altered the product to fit regional tastes and preferences. What they didn't do was slap a new more Japanese name on it and hope that made it sell, they had to actually alter their product.

As you yourself said, every top selling x-box game was produced in the east. Not necessarily ABOUT the east but produced there. The product reflects regional demand for certain game features and mechanics not necessarily a demand to see the east in computer game form.

Giving the Tau an anime theme was not necessarily a bad idea. GW (according to this theory) identified features that are popular in Japan and altered their product to include these features. The problem GW has it that in Japan and China (afaik) there really isn't a comparable home grown product to warhammer and so no existing market for them to copy. In fact there simply may not be a market for this kind of game. Kudos for trying but it didn't work.

In fact from anecdotal evidence most of the Japanese players I know have space marine armies and enjoy the elements of 40k that are unique to 40k. The gothic in space, the religious imagery (gothic religious imagery is surprisingly popular in Japan actually) and the baroque overdetailed nature of the models. If GW wants to appeal to Japan then altering its product to match Japanese tastes is a good idea but it doesn't need to alter its aesthetics but rather its business model, the kind of plastic it uses, where it sells kits, reduce the amount of metal figures, produce properly translated codecii, etc. In fact it may want to even try an entirely new game.

To give another example from the world of gaming Magic the Gathering Portal: 3 Kingdoms was a version of that game produced entirely for the asian market. It had translated cards in Japanese, S-Chinese and T-Chinese, a setting that evoked the romance of the three kingdoms and every card featured an asian artist.

It tanked hard. And Magic was in a better position as there was and is a market for ccg's in asia INCLUDING the standard version of Magic. This just proves that changing the aesthetics of your game to reflect the country your aiming for's culture won't necessarily have a positive effect.

So while making an army that is visually chinese might help drive sales I am highly sceptical that it will do so. If there is a growing market for warhammer in China then GW needs to go to China, ask players what they like and don't like about the product and look at any comparable chinese products (if they exist) before carrying out any kind of regional re-brand.

Don't forget 'Pirate'

I really hope it is a Cathay army...but not monkeys.

What I imagine is an army who has a background story based on balance of the elements and ancestral worship. I can see the army playing out as elemental wizards/sorcerers and using necromancy to call on the power of long dead heroes.

Ninjas and samurai are a Japanese based in origins so I don't think we would see them, if they are basing it off of the actual Cathay = China in WHFB formula. But if they want to use Cathay as a representative of all of Asia then I could see ninjas and samurai in it. What I think we might see are Shaolin monk fighters since they are based in China and could be a good source of fighting power for an army.

But all-in-all I have been waiting for Cathay for a long time and hope it really is them.

Also, some rumors I have read/heard...Is it really legal to worship Tzneetch in Cathay? If so then this could be an interesting twist to the army. An army that is a balance between chaos and order. Sort of what the Empire or Chaos would be if they just were a little more/less of one thing.

ProtoClone wrote:
What I imagine is an army who has a background story based on balance of the elements and ancestral worship. I can see the army playing out as elemental wizards/sorcerers and using necromancy to call on the power of long dead heroes.

If an undead element was present in this army I'd bet on them only having an Invocation of Nehek like spell just for their zombies, maybe a single piece of wargear that might raise the ability to keep a unit of zombies alive. I don't think one would be able to base the entire army on it and it'd probably end up being a pretty fluffy but not very effective unit/groups of units.

ProtoClone wrote:Ninjas and samurai are a Japanese based in origins so I don't think we would see them, if they are basing it off of the actual Cathay = China in WHFB formula. But if they want to use Cathay as a representative of all of Asia then I could see ninjas and samurai in it. What I think we might see are Shaolin monk fighters since they are based in China and could be a good source of fighting power for an army.

I've never asked, but do Cathay and Nippon have any kind of cannon alliance going on? I could see something like Nipponese warriors in a special slot that are basically samurai or Nipponese infiltrators that amount to ninjas. If it is Cathay, I definitely think they will have monks that specialize in demon slaying or something of the like. Demons need a solid counter from somewhere.

ProtoClone wrote:Also, some rumors I have read/heard...Is it really legal to worship Tzneetch in Cathay? If so then this could be an interesting twist to the army. An army that is a balance between chaos and order. Sort of what the Empire or Chaos would be if they just were a little more/less of one thing.

I think that would be pretty interesting myself. Maybe they'll have some solidly Tzeentch aligned wizards that can just be super beefy at spellcasting.

But regardless of how awesome Cathay would be... I fear it will be Chaos Dwarves.

Typeline wrote:

ProtoClone wrote:
What I imagine is an army who has a background story based on balance of the elements and ancestral worship. I can see the army playing out as elemental wizards/sorcerers and using necromancy to call on the power of long dead heroes.

If an undead element was present in this army I'd bet on them only having an Invocation of Nehek like spell just for their zombies, maybe a single piece of wargear that might raise the ability to keep a unit of zombies alive. I don't think one would be able to base the entire army on it and it'd probably end up being a pretty fluffy but not very effective unit/groups of units.

ProtoClone wrote:Ninjas and samurai are a Japanese based in origins so I don't think we would see them, if they are basing it off of the actual Cathay = China in WHFB formula. But if they want to use Cathay as a representative of all of Asia then I could see ninjas and samurai in it. What I think we might see are Shaolin monk fighters since they are based in China and could be a good source of fighting power for an army.

I've never asked, but do Cathay and Nippon have any kind of cannon alliance going on? I could see something like Nipponese warriors in a special slot that are basically samurai or Nipponese infiltrators that amount to ninjas. If it is Cathay, I definitely think they will have monks that specialize in demon slaying or something of the like. Demons need a solid counter from somewhere.

ProtoClone wrote:Also, some rumors I have read/heard...Is it really legal to worship Tzneetch in Cathay? If so then this could be an interesting twist to the army. An army that is a balance between chaos and order. Sort of what the Empire or Chaos would be if they just were a little more/less of one thing.

I think that would be pretty interesting myself. Maybe they'll have some solidly Tzeentch aligned wizards that can just be super beefy at spellcasting.

But regardless of how awesome Cathay would be... I fear it will be Chaos Dwarves.

Well I wasn't thinking having an entirely dead feel to the army. Actually I could see the use of calling the power of long dead heroes to assist, or buff, their lords and/or heroes to be more on par with opponents they have to face. This wouldn't be something that I would imagine you could switch up mid game, you would have to apply it when you build the army list and hope you chose right. You also couldn't apply it to more then one lord or hero at a time.

ProtoClone wrote:
Well I wasn't thinking having an entirely dead feel to the army. Actually I could see the use of calling the power of long dead heroes to assist, or buff, their lords and/or heroes to be more on par with opponents they have to face. This wouldn't be something that I would imagine you could switch up mid game, you would have to apply it when you build the army list and hope you chose right. You also couldn't apply it to more then one lord or hero at a time.

I could see some hero upgrades actually. Something like 'The Blood of my Ancestors', could be a characters dead ancestors guiding his hand in battle giving him hatred in every round of combat. Flavorful upgrades like that would be pretty awesome. Or a spell called 'Ancestral Might' could be a stays in play spell that raises a units strength score. I'm a little obsessed with the word ancestor in these things. But something akin to that would be pretty boss. I don't know if the people of Cathay are that okay with the undead though.

Typeline wrote:I've never asked, but do Cathay and Nippon have any kind of cannon alliance going on?

No moreso than The Empire and Bretonnia have had, from a RL historical analogue or WFB pseudohistory.

But Western gaming companies have an unfortunate, ignorant tendency to lump everything East of Arabia and south of Russia into a single pile, which is why Chinese Shaolin Monks tend to get mixed in with Japanese Samurai and Ninjas, along with Indian Elephants for good measure.

Maybe its Kislev? I would absolutely love to see a fleshed out current edition Kislev army! Mongolian-Russians here we come!

Ah, return of the bear-riding drunks.

Ratbarf wrote:Maybe its Kislev? I would absolutely love to see a fleshed out current edition Kislev army! Mongolian-Russians here we come!

I've only ever seen a couple of Kislev miniatures (never an army book or any stats) and yeah they were drunks riding bears, what would an army book for them look like?

Typeline wrote:

Ratbarf wrote:Maybe its Kislev? I would absolutely love to see a fleshed out current edition Kislev army! Mongolian-Russians here we come!

I've only ever seen a couple of Kislev miniatures (never an army book or any stats) and yeah they were drunks riding bears, what would an army book for them look like?

The cover would probably have a drunk riding a bear. Inside, lots of pictures of inebriated ursus cavalry. Also, a veiled reference to Stephen Colbert.

Balance wrote:
The cover would probably have a drunk riding a bear. Inside, lots of pictures of inebriated ursus cavalry. Also, a veiled reference to Stephen Colbert.

I'd buy that. All of it

As much as I'd love to relive the Wizard of Oz and flying Monkeys - the only Warmaster army not included in Fantasy at this time is the Araby - which get's my vote as the most likely to be released as a full fantasy army.

However, Warmaster doesn't have Ogres - but general consensus is they suck so take it for what it's worth.

It appears to contain Elephants, Hero's, Djinni, Camel Cav, and flying carpets.

I want to say they had Kislev army for Warmaster too, but I don't see it on the list atm.

Uriels_Flame wrote:It appears to contain Elephants, Hero's, Djinni, Camel Cav, and flying carpets.

How racist is this to people in the real world?

I'm only sensitive to racism against blacks and all varieties of Asiatic peoples.