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The Aelves have "a glut of factions" because they divided 3 middling sized armies into even smaller portions. At least one of them(Swifthawk Agents) can't actually purchase a few of their Battleline or Hero options at the moment.

Free People had it good by comparison.

That all said, it really isn't a surprise that stuff didn't get rolled together like you're suggesting. Idoneth live under the sea--Privateers don't. They both raid but one is raiding for profit and one is raiding for survival.

Shadowblades honestly need to be expanded or turned into an "Assassins" styled Allies faction. Because that's what they're fluffed as.

 Da Boss wrote:
I am pretty skeptical. The game has been out for ages now, we have had loads of battletomes done, some factions are on their second battletome. GW have had ample chance to do something with normal humans, but they have done nothing with them. That to me suggests a lack of interest.

In my 20 years or so paying attention to GW, a lack of interest from the Design Studio is the kiss of death for an army. That is what happened to Brets - no interest in them in the design studio, so no one bothered to update them after 6th edition Fantasy despite them being pretty popular. They have done the same with various factions tonnes of time, because the design studio is very ill disciplined and sloppy. Never seen a game company so unprofessional when it comes to supporting stuff.

So Free Peoples not getting an update in the first edition of the game to me reeks of "we do not care about this, none of us are excited about it". Having normal humans in books and so on is just a function of the need for a relatable narrative, but does not mean they will definitely keep the Free Peoples as they are. They might, but it is just as likely that they scrap the Free Peoples as they are (a bunch of Holy Roman Empire knock offs) and do something different when someone in the Studio has a lightbulb moment.

Again, I would be happy to be proven wrong. I hate it when factions are squatted (another example of a faction where no one in the Studio had any enthusiasm for them, so they just had them unceremoniously eaten by the Tyranids between editions).

And again, my point is that they have had novel focus. Recent novel focus too. You don't put the time and money into writing books about a faction you're intending to kill off.

AoS has had a messy life. Straight out the door no one got books nor points; then they rallied behind the Generals Handbook 1 and started releasing tomes, but they were pretty quick affairs with just warscrolls and nothing more. Some 1.0 versions then got out and then AoS 2.0 launched and that's really taken off with proper Battletomes.

Some armies, like Khorne have wound up with 3 battletomes, whilst others - eg Free Peoples haven't even had one yet. Lets not forget most of Skaven never had a tome; Slaanesh never had a Tome; Beastmen etc... so a lack of Tome I don't think is the same death nail that it once was because AoS has just been darn messy until 2.0 landed.


Even if the design team isn't wowed with free peoples, GW has put way too many resources into lore, fluff, artwork and background; not to mention that otherwise AoS simply won't have a single human faction within it if they don't do Free Peoples. Of all the "no battletome" forces they are one of the safest.

Josh Reynolds is at least confirmed to be writing a fluff piece for a battletome for Free Peoples, so we know they're being worked on.

Well, I hope you are right. I never would have expected them to get rid of basic Orcs and Goblins, to my mind one of the most iconic Warhamer races and a key part of the majority of starter sets. Empire and Orcs and Goblins used to be the first ones out the gate or near enough with army books in the old days, so the fact that they can squat O&G so unceremoniously says to me that they do not really care for the old stuff.

Basic humans may continue, but will they still use the Empire kits? If they don't, and if they undergo a drastic change in background an aesthetic I would argue they are then an entirely new faction and the old faction has been squatted. It would make sense, there really is no point in keeping the Empire in the new game, it clashes with the background as it is.

It's funny you say that because...


The 'basic' Orcs are there in that art.

I think that you need to accept that The Empire is dead. I'm honestly a bit disappointed that they kept them with the Empire aesthetic as long as they have, but at the very least one can make an argument that the Freeguild looking the way they are is because it's a kind of mercenary outfit traveling the Realms rather than stuck in one specific place.

Looks like an Ironjaws Weirdnob Shaman top left and a Warchanter bottom center.

But yeah the rest look like plain old orruks.

Empire and Brets as armies are dead, though Empire sort of appears in some stories about the end of the Mythic Age. However their models and core concepts are not dead. Empire persists through Free Peoples, though it might well go through some major changes.

Brets might or might not reappear as a concept -the idea of a knightly order riding mythical mounts and ruling kingdoms in the Realms is very possible to happen. It really depends if GW want to make it happen; it would be godo to give at least one more human faction to the game and a knightly order would be a neat way to craft it - an injection of classic fantasy with a high magic twist .

I agree that they should not keep the Empire miniatures for Age of Sigmar. The most disappointing thing about AoS background is how they kept the background linked to the Old World with characters like Morthai and so on. It would be a lot cooler if it was totally different. Having these very German looking distintively Empire humans as your basic dudes is another aspect of this.

So I expect the Empire stuff to disappear, and be replaced by another human faction that suits the new setting better. They might be really cool and I might well buy some. Deepkin for example are pretty sweet minis and have cool background. But keeping the Empire stuff "in the game" tricks new people into thinking they have a future when the Studio actually likely has no plans to do anything with them. It is a bit like starting Brets in 8th edition thinking it might get a new book soon and then...

 Da Boss wrote:
I expect Free Peoples, Aelves and Dispossessed to go the same way as the Greenskins. They have Stormcast as the moar awesomer version of humans, daughters of khaine and deepkin as moar awesomer elves, and fyreslayers and overlords as moar awesomer dwarves. Ironjawz are their version of moar awesomer Orcs, and so normal Orcs had no place in the game and were removed. I figure they will just stagger it to reduce fan backlash.

Very happy to be proved wrong.

I find this to be a strange assessment. DoK and Deepkin are just different flavors of aelf, they have never been presented as being 'bigger and better' than other aelf armies. Ditto for fyreslayers and kharadron. Greenskinz lost some very old kits, as did gitmob, both are clearly not going away (especially the latter). They are even in the GW survey.

 Da Boss wrote:
I agree that they should not keep the Empire miniatures for Age of Sigmar. The most disappointing thing about AoS background is how they kept the background linked to the Old World with characters like Morthai and so on. It would be a lot cooler if it was totally different. Having these very German looking distintively Empire humans as your basic dudes is another aspect of this.

So I expect the Empire stuff to disappear, and be replaced by another human faction that suits the new setting better. They might be really cool and I might well buy some. Deepkin for example are pretty sweet minis and have cool background. But keeping the Empire stuff "in the game" tricks new people into thinking they have a future when the Studio actually likely has no plans to do anything with them. It is a bit like starting Brets in 8th edition thinking it might get a new book soon and then...

I'd argue it's nothing like that. Brettonia and Tomb Kings got squatted half a year after the release of Age of Sigmar. Yet Tomb Kings got an army book in 8th ed along with a halfhearted model update (in 2013, two years before AoS got released). My take is that Tomb Kings were redone prior to or early enough in the planning of Age of Sigmar that they had yet to decide to squat them. Bretonnia would have followed later in the update queue (and really, they redid Wood Elves - if they hadn't pulled the plug, I expect 8th ed would have seen a complete army book update, even Brettonia). Starting Brettonia in Fantasy and then getting squatted in Age of Sigmar is very likely bad timing combined with GW's reluctance to communicate.

Humans with Empire aesthetic may or may not stick around, but GW has gone to some lengths to integrate the former setting into the current one. You especially see this with Nagash. The number of times Nehekhara is mentioned is staggering, especially considering the army associated with Nehekhara was squatted. As such, with all the memories of the old world and Sigmar being given the role of bringer of civilization, I doubt that GW plans to actively invalidate the currently available models. They can easily be fluffed (and probably are) as what Sigmar taught them or how people imagine Sigmar wants them to look, puffy sleeves and all.

I share your view that it would have been good to have cultures based on the Mortal Realms instead of a setting that is marginalized and without much value anymore. I dimly remember the rulebook having some drawings along those lines, showing what a human from each Realm might look like. I'm undecided whether we'll see this in time, when Order humans get their own line of AoS models, or if the Empire style is largely retained. The former has practical limits because GW would have to make so many kits for to represent the different Realms, so while I'm generally of the opinion that GW wants to make new models that are their own thing, I think in the case of humans a baseline of loyal subjects of Sigmar might be the practical choice for GW. Especially considering how many (or rather few) 40k Imperial Guard regiments we have in plastic. GW seems fine with the idea on a Skirmish level, though, as (possibly, let's see what Warhammer Fest brings) evidenced by Warcry.

Also, I think you look at this too much from a veteran player perspective. Someone who didn't care about or doesn't even know the old Empire may well pick up the current models, and happily also buy new ones made in different style because they don't have the association with the culture of the Empire. Instead, they may just see different expressions of humans in the Mortal Realms, which are many and varied and can coexist happily in their continent and Realm spanning cities.

I think the bigger issue will be that new human models will be beefier and a head taller than the current ones. Not the end of the world, but much more of a consideration that the style of their clothing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Da Boss wrote:
I expect Free Peoples, Aelves and Dispossessed to go the same way as the Greenskins. They have Stormcast as the moar awesomer version of humans, daughters of khaine and deepkin as moar awesomer elves, and fyreslayers and overlords as moar awesomer dwarves. Ironjawz are their version of moar awesomer Orcs, and so normal Orcs had no place in the game and were removed. I figure they will just stagger it to reduce fan backlash.

Very happy to be proved wrong.

I find this to be a strange assessment. DoK and Deepkin are just different flavors of aelf, they have never been presented as being 'bigger and better' than other aelf armies. Ditto for fyreslayers and kharadron. Greenskinz lost some very old kits, as did gitmob, both are clearly not going away (especially the latter). They are even in the GW survey.

On Deepkin specifically, they're super buff and ride sharks. That's the definition of bigger and better. You can't top that.

 obsidiankatana wrote:
Looks like an Ironjaws Weirdnob Shaman top left and a Warchanter bottom center.

But yeah the rest look like plain old orruks.

Makes me curious if when Ironjawz gets its second edition book, Greenskinz will get wrapped up into that, consolidating all together.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

 obsidiankatana wrote:
Looks like an Ironjaws Weirdnob Shaman top left and a Warchanter bottom center.

But yeah the rest look like plain old orruks.

Makes me curious if when Ironjawz gets its second edition book, Greenskinz will get wrapped up into that, consolidating all together.

That's what I'm expecting.

I will be happy if you guys are right. I was surprised by how sad I was about common orcs and goblins going. They were my main WFB army for a really long time. I do not like Ironjawz at all.

 Geifer wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Da Boss wrote:
I expect Free Peoples, Aelves and Dispossessed to go the same way as the Greenskins. They have Stormcast as the moar awesomer version of humans, daughters of khaine and deepkin as moar awesomer elves, and fyreslayers and overlords as moar awesomer dwarves. Ironjawz are their version of moar awesomer Orcs, and so normal Orcs had no place in the game and were removed. I figure they will just stagger it to reduce fan backlash.

Very happy to be proved wrong.

I find this to be a strange assessment. DoK and Deepkin are just different flavors of aelf, they have never been presented as being 'bigger and better' than other aelf armies. Ditto for fyreslayers and kharadron. Greenskinz lost some very old kits, as did gitmob, both are clearly not going away (especially the latter). They are even in the GW survey.

On Deepkin specifically, they're super buff and ride sharks. That's the definition of bigger and better. You can't top that.

I... I cannot contradict that argument. It's too valid.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

 obsidiankatana wrote:
Looks like an Ironjaws Weirdnob Shaman top left and a Warchanter bottom center.

But yeah the rest look like plain old orruks.

Makes me curious if when Ironjawz gets its second edition book, Greenskinz will get wrapped up into that, consolidating all together.

That's what I'm expecting.

My money is on gone for good, but then I see that the Zombie kit is still on sale and I don't know what the feth to think.

 nels1031 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

 obsidiankatana wrote:
Looks like an Ironjaws Weirdnob Shaman top left and a Warchanter bottom center.

But yeah the rest look like plain old orruks.

Makes me curious if when Ironjawz gets its second edition book, Greenskinz will get wrapped up into that, consolidating all together.

That's what I'm expecting.

My money is on gone for good, but then I see that the Zombie kit is still on sale and I don't know what the feth to think.

I'm actually thinking that Zombies will get an updated kit when we see a dedicated release that involves them and Necromancers.

That said, one of the biggest issues with Ironjawz has been that it lacks a 'fodder' unit--the old Orcs and/or Goblins would be perfect for that.

Honestly I can see GW merging the two ork factions and the two ogor factions into single Battletomes.

Almost certainly for gutbusters and beastclaws since the BCR share the same visual design and basically only have one kit; GW can merge them and then just have a subfaction or even battlegroup that focuses on using more cavalry.

 Overread wrote:
Honestly I can see GW merging the two ork factions and the two ogor factions into single Battletomes.

Yeah, I think that's the future.

I really never would have guessed they'd put the Spiderfang with Moonclan and essentially rebrand that combined sub-faction as Gloomspite Gitz and add some fluff that makes it make sense. Well, as much sense as shroom/poison addicted goblins working together can make.

There is also the possibility that they commissioned the artwork before the decision to squat Greenskins was made, and then decided they're just orruks, so might as well keep the art they paid for already. I'm not saying this is how it went, but it seems more likely than completely removing a "faction" of five or six very outdated kits from sales only to reintroduce them later when Ironjawz and Bonesplitters fill out their niche already.

Given the ancient nature of most of those kits I simply doubt they had any meaningful sales at this point. When they sold out they figured it wasn't worth another production run with the new ones coming out soonish.

 Geifer wrote:

 Da Boss wrote:
I agree that they should not keep the Empire miniatures for Age of Sigmar. The most disappointing thing about AoS background is how they kept the background linked to the Old World with characters like Morthai and so on. It would be a lot cooler if it was totally different. Having these very German looking distintively Empire humans as your basic dudes is another aspect of this.

So I expect the Empire stuff to disappear, and be replaced by another human faction that suits the new setting better. They might be really cool and I might well buy some. Deepkin for example are pretty sweet minis and have cool background. But keeping the Empire stuff "in the game" tricks new people into thinking they have a future when the Studio actually likely has no plans to do anything with them. It is a bit like starting Brets in 8th edition thinking it might get a new book soon and then...

I'd argue it's nothing like that. Brettonia and Tomb Kings got squatted half a year after the release of Age of Sigmar. Yet Tomb Kings got an army book in 8th ed along with a halfhearted model update (in 2013, two years before AoS got released). My take is that Tomb Kings were redone prior to or early enough in the planning of Age of Sigmar that they had yet to decide to squat them. Bretonnia would have followed later in the update queue (and really, they redid Wood Elves - if they hadn't pulled the plug, I expect 8th ed would have seen a complete army book update, even Brettonia). Starting Brettonia in Fantasy and then getting squatted in Age of Sigmar is very likely bad timing combined with GW's reluctance to communicate.

Humans with Empire aesthetic may or may not stick around, but GW has gone to some lengths to integrate the former setting into the current one. You especially see this with Nagash. The number of times Nehekhara is mentioned is staggering, especially considering the army associated with Nehekhara was squatted. As such, with all the memories of the old world and Sigmar being given the role of bringer of civilization, I doubt that GW plans to actively invalidate the currently available models. They can easily be fluffed (and probably are) as what Sigmar taught them or how people imagine Sigmar wants them to look, puffy sleeves and all.

I share your view that it would have been good to have cultures based on the Mortal Realms instead of a setting that is marginalized and without much value anymore. I dimly remember the rulebook having some drawings along those lines, showing what a human from each Realm might look like. I'm undecided whether we'll see this in time, when Order humans get their own line of AoS models, or if the Empire style is largely retained. The former has practical limits because GW would have to make so many kits for to represent the different Realms, so while I'm generally of the opinion that GW wants to make new models that are their own thing, I think in the case of humans a baseline of loyal subjects of Sigmar might be the practical choice for GW. Especially considering how many (or rather few) 40k Imperial Guard regiments we have in plastic. GW seems fine with the idea on a Skirmish level, though, as (possibly, let's see what Warhammer Fest brings) evidenced by Warcry.

Also, I think you look at this too much from a veteran player perspective. Someone who didn't care about or doesn't even know the old Empire may well pick up the current models, and happily also buy new ones made in different style because they don't have the association with the culture of the Empire. Instead, they may just see different expressions of humans in the Mortal Realms, which are many and varied and can coexist happily in their continent and Realm spanning cities.

I think the bigger issue will be that new human models will be beefier and a head taller than the current ones. Not the end of the world, but much more of a consideration that the style of their clothing.

The problem is that people associate Free Peoples with the Empire models because that was the only thing that they had. There were no other models under that faction other than Empires. I think that people, and to the larger extent GW will always link the Empire models with the Free Peoples or whatever they call that group.

Thread updated with the two new tomes from the Warhammer event today - note I'm not sure what specific aelves are included and are not included in the new free cities so I've left the aelves tab up incase it doesn't include them all.

Well look at that my prediction the free people book would combine humans and dwarves was spot on.

 auticus wrote:
Well look at that my prediction the free people book would combine humans and dwarves was spot on.

To be fair, most people have been suggesting that we'll see a "Cities" oriented book for the Order factions for quite some time.

When ive suggested it ive gotten a fair amount of backlash for that idea. I was exactly today years old when i heard cities book with a mlx of races being a serious idea for a battletome.

Or maybe it was just people still hate the idea of mixing races and want battletomes to remain “pure”.

I don't mean to get excited over the stuff from Open Day, but could "Tithe of Bones" possibly mean tomb kings? Or is my thinking way too off

Whatever makes slaves to darkness have to wait longer to not be garbage is the answer.

Pages 142-143 of the AoS 2.0 Core Rulebook specifically includes lore for most of the old High Elf model ranges. Specific model types are called out by name, such as Swordmasters and the White Lions. I don't see the same for old school orcs and gobbos. I don't put it by GW to simply ignore old lore, but to recently put out a Core Rulebook with fluff points concerning elf/aelves that could be dropped or summarised without specifics and then potentially drop things like White Lions, which I've seen some be wary of, doesn't make sense. Just throwing that out there. I certainly don't know what's on GW's mind.

Also, some have said that kits like White Lions are already off the webstore. They are off the UK store, which might mean rebranding/rebasing. They are not off the US store. Just purchased a kit.

My suspicions are that the Isle of Blood/Spire of Dawn warscrolls without proper kits might be moved to legends and that's what that reference is about. Again, I'm no seer.

If they remove the Isle of Blood HE stuff, it kills the Swifthawk Agents as a faction.

Currently the faction is:
-Skywarden(Skycutter mounted Hero--which is annoying because the guy can be built on foot as well)
-Skycutter
-High Warden on Griffon
-Shadow Warriors
-Spireguard
-Reavers
-Chariot

Out of those 7 units, only 3(Skywarden/Skycutter are the same kit) are currently able to even be purchased!