Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Too late, they have dragons and magic. I assume their defintion of low fantasy is "poorly-equipped humans stabbing other poorly-equipped humans or mindless monsters in the mud".

Love me some Mud Stabbing Goblins. Wonderful stuff. Couple of dozen beleaguered Empire spearmen with a half dozen archers fighting to defend a middle-of-nowhere village against 30-odd beastmen. Great!

Also quite like massive demented dragons getting into fights with Greater Daemons on flying ships above a Chaos wasteland made of floating, bleeding skulls.

I think the trick with Warhammer is that there has to be some room for both. Having the Greater Daemon turning up for every raid on Nameless Reikwald Village is just daft. Expecting the Mud Stabbing Goblins to achieve anything of worth in the battle of Floating Bleeding Skulls is equally daft, unless they group up with a couple of hundred of their mates.

Also think that a big bit of Warhammer should be that while the Floating Bleeding Skull battles definitely happen, they shouldn't be so common that everyone just regards that as "Tuesday". Empire soldiers should be looking around muttering "Sigmar almighty, this is a bit crazy, isn't it?"

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
I do wonder just why TOW project has Cathay. I can understand making some parts of the lore a bit less obscure as they're going back to the setting, but to design the whole faction as if they were coming to the tabletop seems quite a bit more than I expected? The way they worded it sort of implies they aren't intended to be for the game, but they did it just because.

I think it also settles the whole "The Old World is referring to just that part of the continent" thing and shows they're just using that term to refer to the setting.

could also be the other way around, because all the models for TW were designed after the concepts for tabletop miniatures, it might have been easier/better/ to keep them compatible with the look of the other factions by doing the same

and just because there are designs for minis does not mean they will ever be made

 Londinium wrote:
Leaving aside the usual arguments that pop up everytime anything TOW is discussed (looking forwards to 10mm!). I actually rather liked the Cathay content, my only criticism of it is that it doesn't look grimdark enough, a bit too clean, not enough skulls etc.

I'm sure that GW have learned their lesson from 3e Tau and the fluff around Cathay will be suitably grimdark and morally compromised. The fact that we have a human realm being ruled by some ancient non human powers bodes well for that. I can't imagine they're 100% benevolent.

Also Dragon Lady's cry of "I demand sacrifice"

I mean. Is Cathay.

I really, really don't understand how people says that stuff has to be all grimdark and have skulls everywhere to be proper warhammer when you had stuff like High Elves.

The grimdarkness comes from the fluff and the contrast not by having everything being the same aesthetically, and if you believe Cathay won't be a land of corruption and internal conflict... I mean ,Tzeentch has a great presence in cathay for a reason, Emperor dragon or not.

Some people just can't stand any altruism in their grimdark. It's why I hate the 6th Ed. Brettonia book, well besides castrating the peasant troops.

 Graphite wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Too late, they have dragons and magic. I assume their defintion of low fantasy is "poorly-equipped humans stabbing other poorly-equipped humans or mindless monsters in the mud".

Love me some Mud Stabbing Goblins. Wonderful stuff. Couple of dozen beleaguered Empire spearmen with a half dozen archers fighting to defend a middle-of-nowhere village against 30-odd beastmen. Great!

Also quite like massive demented dragons getting into fights with Greater Daemons on flying ships above a Chaos wasteland made of floating, bleeding skulls.

I think the trick with Warhammer is that there has to be some room for both. Having the Greater Daemon turning up for every raid on Nameless Reikwald Village is just daft. Expecting the Mud Stabbing Goblins to achieve anything of worth in the battle of Floating Bleeding Skulls is equally daft, unless they group up with a couple of hundred of their mates.

Also think that a big bit of Warhammer should be that while the Floating Bleeding Skull battles definitely happen, they shouldn't be so common that everyone just regards that as "Tuesday". Empire soldiers should be looking around muttering "Sigmar almighty, this is a bit crazy, isn't it?"

You earned an Exalt for this.

 Graphite wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Too late, they have dragons and magic. I assume their defintion of low fantasy is "poorly-equipped humans stabbing other poorly-equipped humans or mindless monsters in the mud".

Love me some Mud Stabbing Goblins. Wonderful stuff. Couple of dozen beleaguered Empire spearmen with a half dozen archers fighting to defend a middle-of-nowhere village against 30-odd beastmen. Great!

Also quite like massive demented dragons getting into fights with Greater Daemons on flying ships above a Chaos wasteland made of floating, bleeding skulls.

I think the trick with Warhammer is that there has to be some room for both. Having the Greater Daemon turning up for every raid on Nameless Reikwald Village is just daft. Expecting the Mud Stabbing Goblins to achieve anything of worth in the battle of Floating Bleeding Skulls is equally daft, unless they group up with a couple of hundred of their mates.

Also think that a big bit of Warhammer should be that while the Floating Bleeding Skull battles definitely happen, they shouldn't be so common that everyone just regards that as "Tuesday". Empire soldiers should be looking around muttering "Sigmar almighty, this is a bit crazy, isn't it?"

Well put. You pretty much nailed it.

Also dang, "Mud Stabbing Goblin" would make for a nice ranking.

Can anyone confirm if there is any issue with the new character names?

Miao Ying, Zhao Ming, Celestial Dragon Emperor and his wife, the Moon Empress.

Sound cool -even if the Miao is a bit caty?

Probably better than:

https://whfb.lexicanum.com/wiki/Gossippa_Lotta

Hey, Gossippa Lotta is a great pun! It is so over the top that no one can honestly find it offensive.

I mean... doesn't this high/low debate kind of ignore that our real world, despite not having magic or monsters, had dramatically different economies and societies at the same time? If you looked at a sourcebook for historical earth set at say, 1400, you'd see everything from hunter gatherers, to stone age empires in the Mayans, to fully armored knights, the last gasp of the classical empires in Byzantium, and the efficient, well ordered Ming dynasty. Day to day life for a person was highly dependent on where they lived.

That whole 5th Ed Dogs of War Army book is a stereotype wrapped in a pastiche wrapped in a tongue-in-cheek veneer of older Warhammer silliness.

It's utterly ridiculous and I love it.

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
I do wonder just why TOW project has Cathay. I can understand making some parts of the lore a bit less obscure as they're going back to the setting, but to design the whole faction as if they were coming to the tabletop seems quite a bit more than I expected? The way they worded it sort of implies they aren't intended to be for the game, but they did it just because.

.


Cathay, Araby and the others were always part of the Old World setting. "Old World" was honestly not used all that much as a term either until it died and Age of Sigmar game on the scene, it was just Warhammer or Warhammer Fantasy.
It's just that GW never got around to actually making the army, just like how they reference things like Eldar Exodites in 40K. The settings have always been bigger than GW could support, which is intentional as that leaves them room to grow. AoS is just an extreme example of that these days.


In the end Warhammer Total War has the advantage that they can add new armies because they don't have to rely on the "army" itself selling itself in the same way. And they've got a licence for the whole setting and the team behind it clearly love the era and want to work on more stuff and give fans things that were perhaps only concept art and lore theory up until now. They did the Vampire Pirates and Norsca along similar lines. Sure GW central is overseeing things and many of these designs might well one day appear as models through the Old World game that's coming back at some stage. However they might still never reach that point. If they do or don't it doesn't really matter for the TW Game; its its own thing and being able to take us to new places and see things and get bits of lore and such that might otherwise have remaind in the vaults of GW - is fantastic.

If somebody asked me to reboot WFB (which, while GW has been overly coy about it, what TOW seemingly is), the obvious first choice is to play the hits. Empire, High Elves, Dwarves, O&G, Chaos, Undead.

But...

Then you remember that all of those armies are widely in circulation and most of them have perfectly good plastic kits that could be put back into production.

The big brain play is to create all new armies, so people buy new stuff. Kislev, Cathay, hell maybe we'll see some Tilea or Araby.

 Polonius wrote:
I mean... doesn't this high/low debate kind of ignore that our real world, despite not having magic or monsters, had dramatically different economies and societies at the same time? If you looked at a sourcebook for historical earth set at say, 1400, you'd see everything from hunter gatherers, to stone age empires in the Mayans, to fully armored knights, the last gasp of the classical empires in Byzantium, and the efficient, well ordered Ming dynasty. Day to day life for a person was highly dependent on where they lived.

this is usually the problem with any Hollywood setting in the Mediaval time period, ignoring what was already available and know but mixing in stuff that just looks old so that people get it is in the past

a director of a BBC Dark Age documentery once said that they have a ratio of 20% facts and 80% fiction for all productions as people would not believe anything else

so we got stone age wheels, bronze age cloths, dark age weapons, renaissance armour and modern conspiracy theories to describe High Middle Ages

 Polonius wrote:
If somebody asked me to reboot WFB (which, while GW has been overly coy about it, what TOW seemingly is), the obvious first choice is to play the hits. Empire, High Elves, Dwarves, O&G, Chaos, Undead.

But...

Then you remember that all of those armies are widely in circulation and most of them have perfectly good plastic kits that could be put back into production.

The big brain play is to create all new armies, so people buy new stuff. Kislev, Cathay, hell maybe we'll see some Tilea or Araby.

My initial guess was that they will rather release thematic armies. Rather than High Elves and their entire roster, it'll be Lord Solinar (insert your elvish name here) and his sea patrol. Reasons being the ease of the production as new kits are introduced, I am highly sceptical we want 6ed spearman and archers, quicker update to multiple armies, greater control of what you put in the game as nowhere you are obliged to keep the old roster intact, reasons for old fans something to buy. I'll be surprised if Cathay is one of the first armies, along with Empire and Kislev, that's a lot of human factions.

I really hope they don't shunt all the Old World production to Forge World and have it unfold 30k style: eye-watering prices for lazy production/casting processes.

 Gregor Samsa wrote:
I really hope they don't shunt all the Old World production to Forge World and have it unfold 30k style: eye-watering prices for lazy production/casting processes.

30 British pounds for 5 Empire Swordsmen without arms. 20 British pounds for their arms (only sold seperately).

Ohman wrote:
Why can't GW just tell us if they are planning to release all this video game stuff for W:TOW? They suggest they might, when they write about how all the work was done by the same team and brand the images with the W:TOW logo. But they don't tell us anything about the actual game or what the plans for it are.

I know the game is a long way off but why even announce it if they can't talk about it yet? The first announcement was made 22 months ago and so far all we know for sure is that we will be able to use our old models and that they are working on a new map.

Or it could be that they thought saying that the faction artwork was done by The Old World team and they were statted up for tabletop play** (**using 8th edition rules) is enough of a confirmation that they are, in fact, coming to tabletop that they didn't need to explicitly mention or discuss it any further. After all, not everyone is as anal and pedantic as some of the fans in this community seem to be.

What would happen if Warhammer ever got an MMORPG, if only...

Been there, done that, got the collectors edition, wasn't much good.

I'm not so convinced that's a bad thing.
I mean, what's wrong with fun names and homages?
One of their leaders is giant frog called "Kroak". Kroq-Gar rides a giant not-T-Rex, so of course they called that "Grymloq" as a reference to Grimlock the Autobot. Tiktaq'to is a clever use of pseudo-Aztec spelling to take something we know and turn it into a name.
If I'm not mistaken they even put in Itzi-Bitzi and Teenie Weenie (not the right spelling) as a reference to this song from 1960. It's fun! Why can't we have fun?

Theres a line between "fun" and "insult", and which side of that line you fall on often depends on your existing relationship. History can become a hard obstacle, especially when theres a lengthy history of bad blood between the two parties (to put things mildly). Its kind of like how those within the black community can refer to one another using the n-word without harm, and those within the gay commuinity can refer to eachother by the f-word (not sure if that one is word-blocked on dakka) but its automatically seen as an insult when used outside of it. Or how a good friend of yours can refer to you using some colorful vocabulary, but if a total stranger on the street said the same you would get a flash of anger and have to restrain yourself from physically assaulting them.

Its important that when you're "having fun" the "fun" be "fun" for both parties. A schoolyard bully calling you mocking names or punching you in the gut is certainly having fun - but are you?

They're not real!!!
It's fiction, and not some grand statement from GW that they think the ancient Aztecs were akin to "lizard people".

Great. If they aren't real then they can abandon the references to real world cultures, languages, and aesthetics and invent their own unique unreal culture, language and aesthetics to use instead. On the other hand, if they are going to base the Lizardmen on a real world culture, language, and aesthetic then they need to be respectful of it. "They're not real" is not a justification to do otherwise, the real world references there are painfully obvious and by using them you are tying them to something real.

Rihgu wrote:
Tiktaq'to is exactly as clever and exactly as offensive as Sum Ting Wong for a "Chinese" name.

Why? Who exactly are they offending?

They are offending every Chinese guy who was unpleasantly mocked by an english speaker using that "joke" (and others like it) on the basis of that persons race or language. By extension, it offends the entirety of that race/language/culture simply on the basis that its an attack rooted in a stereotype and directed against the culture/race/language, etc. as a whole. "Sum Ting Wong" (and similar such things) is not an attack against an individual, even if it is only used to refer to one person - its an attack rooted in an element of shared identity and therefore attacks all people who share that identity simultaneously.

 Theophony wrote:
It’s not limited to just the lizard men, GW is an equal opportunity offender.

I've yet to see GW refer to any of its white characters as redneck, bogan, trash, gammon, honky, hick, hillbilly, peckerwood, etc.

Mag irk thrakka (however he is spelled) was making fun of Margret Thatcher

myth, confirmed untrue by the person who created the character (want to say it was Rick Priestley or Andy Chambers but I can't remember, theres an interview out there).

I think it also settles the whole "The Old World is referring to just that part of the continent" thing and shows they're just using that term to refer to the setting.

And yet, the only references to The Old World setting are always accompanied by a map which depicts only The Old World continent and the areas immediately adjacent to it.

The more offensive and hilarious the better.

I'm sure theres something which someone could say to you which they would find hilarious and you would find offensive. Everyone has their trigger points and things they will clutch their pearls over, even if you want to pretend otherwise.

And until that day let's say feth it and bring it on, the more offensive the better.

chaos0xomega wrote:
Great. If they aren't real then they can abandon the references to real world cultures, languages, and aesthetics and invent their own unique unreal culture, language and aesthetics to use instead.

So you can't do a pastiche of any culture?

Necrons and 1KSons have to lose their Egyptian motifs. Say good bye to any Viking aspects of Space Wolves. I guess the Brets can't have any aspects of French history to them, right?

Aren't the Brets a pastiche of British culture, including badly spoken/pronounced French for the upper classes because it was the fashion of the time?

Portraying the "Viking" cultures as drunken, belligerent super soldiers isn't perhaps the most sensitive way to treat them, so sure we can say good bye to that. At least they aren't also rapists and pillagers!

I'm not seeing anything super offensive or insensitive about Necrons or 1KSons, though. Don't see why we'd have to do away with that.

edit: If one has a difficult time seeing the difference between "this Meso-American inspired character is named Tiktaq'to", or "This Chinese character is Sum Ting Wong" and "These characters have Egyptian motifs" I'm not really sure what to say. assuming they're being authentic and not intentionally missing the point.

See if you can spot the difference in sensitivity towards a culture between these two characters

chaos0xomega wrote:
Or it could be that they thought saying that the faction artwork was done by The Old World team and they were statted up for tabletop play** (**using 8th edition rules) is enough of a confirmation that they are, in fact, coming to tabletop that they didn't need to explicitly mention or discuss it any further. After all, not everyone is as anal and pedantic as some of the fans in this community seem to be

Could be... All I'm saying is that the return of WHFB raises a lot questions and it would be nice if GW told us a little more about it. I'm not convinced that Cathay is getting a miniature-release because I don't know anything about the upcoming game or what to expect from it.

I feel people are really reaching in their attempts to feel offended. As a chinese person myself, I don't give a rat's arse if a character was called Sum Ting Wong. Could be called "Ching chong, ping pong" for all I care, most Chinese names when romanized sound pretty silly, my father's side of the family's surname is called Hor, and we have personally made fun of how we come from a family of "Hors". Don't be offended on our behalf, us East Asians can be pretty racist anyways and unless you're the CCP, we usually don't bother pulling off the victim card/mentality. I've played Sleeping Dogs and I've heard the song "Ling Ting Tong" playing in the background through the in-game radio and I didn't mind it at all. If you're going to get your knickers in a twist over any callback to any kind of culture, I don't see how you can even go into any form of entertainment. You do realize everything mankind has made is based off some sort of cultural influence or inspiration right?

Rihgu wrote:
Aren't the Brets a pastiche of British culture, including badly spoken/pronounced French for the upper classes because it was the fashion of the time?

the upper class was French by that time, and the lower class a mix of Germans and Scandinavians and the British that were left lived in Brittany

but more serious, Bretonnia as the French/English Kingdom during the 100 years war mixed in with some modern romanticized versions of King Arthur

 Grimskul wrote:
If you're going to get your knickers in a twist over any callback to any kind of culture, I don't see how you can even go into any form of entertainment. You do realize everything mankind has made is based off some sort of cultural influence or inspiration right?

Nobody is doing this lol.

 Graphite wrote:

Also think that a big bit of Warhammer should be that while the Floating Bleeding Skull battles definitely happen, they shouldn't be so common that everyone just regards that as "Tuesday". Empire soldiers should be looking around muttering "Sigmar almighty, this is a bit crazy, isn't it?"

Empire soldiers, absolutely. Lizardmen? For them it IS just another tuesday. Empire soldier may see a magic sword from half a battlefield away, once in a lifetime. A bretonnian knight may know someone whose uncle has one. High Elf peasant? His plow is made from discarded Elven Doomed Hero Swords of Destiny.

 Grimskul wrote:
I feel people are really reaching in their attempts to feel offended. As a chinese person myself, I don't give a rat's arse if a character was called Sum Ting Wong. Could be called "Ching chong, ping pong" for all I care, most Chinese names when romanized sound pretty silly, my father's side of the family's surname is called Hor, and we have personally made fun of how we come from a family of "Hors". Don't be offended on our behalf, us East Asians can be pretty racist anyways and unless you're the CCP, we usually don't bother pulling off the victim card/mentality. I've played Sleeping Dogs and I've heard the song "Ling Ting Tong" playing in the background through the in-game radio and I didn't mind it at all. If you're going to get your knickers in a twist over any callback to any kind of culture, I don't see how you can even go into any form of entertainment. You do realize everything mankind has made is based off some sort of cultural influence or inspiration right?

As a Chinese person myself, I am offended by Sum Ting Wong.

I'm not actually Chinese, nor am I offended by it, but I hope you see the point being made. There were jewish and homosexual Nazis, there are Black people who are opposed to BLM, gay Mormon pastors who have married women despite being out and gay in order to live a wholesom life as Jesus/God intended, etc. Your personal feelings of non-offense are great for you, but doesn't change anything given that there are countless others who personally are actually offended by it, especially those who have been personally attacked using that exact slur/joke/insult, etc.

Rihgu wrote:

 Grimskul wrote:
If you're going to get your knickers in a twist over any callback to any kind of culture, I don't see how you can even go into any form of entertainment. You do realize everything mankind has made is based off some sort of cultural influence or inspiration right?

Nobody is doing this lol.

I mean there are people in this thread are saying that naming a vaguely Aztecian style Lizard person being called Tik-Tak-To is somehow an attack on the Aztec culture/(I assume Mexican?) people in general, who no longer exist as an entity as they were back then and is just a tongue-in-cheek pun and not even a reference to any kind of derogatory term that is widely known.

I'm pretty sure the vast majority of people who are Latin American/Mexican have way more things to worry about than some Lizard character in a niche hobby whose name is a pun.

 Galas wrote:
After the initial shock for seeing and army for the first time and the total war models beeing very much three kingdoms inspired... I like it.

If theres a land of magic in warhammer fantasy is proper is cathay with their monkey beastmen and terracota armies and dragon emperor that summoned a demon-meteorite to kill all the ogres.


Bringing it up here from the previous page:




https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/09/14/watch-grand-cathay-come-to-life-in-an-epic-collaboration-for-total-war-warhammer-iii/

To heck with Cathay. Dem disc riders...

chaos0xomega wrote:

Ohman wrote:

I think it also settles the whole "The Old World is referring to just that part of the continent" thing and shows they're just using that term to refer to the setting.

And yet, the only references to The Old World setting are always accompanied by a map which depicts only The Old World continent and the areas immediately adjacent to it.

Except no, they aren't. There have been multiple instances of them using the term "The Old World" to refer to the setting as a whole, both for this project and elsewhere. It is not just a term used to refer to that specific area of the map.

Like how the faction we're discussing now is a brand new faction made for the TOW project, yet has absolutely no relevance to that area of the map.