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.

With the first Gathering Storm book giving us combined forces that span across all IOM armies and part 2 giving us combined Eldar forces, I think its safe to say that the game is headed to AOS style grand alliances.

So how do the rest of the Xenos get allied up? I'm thinking the company is game to release new models and sub factions so that could shore up the lack of real alliances available to some of the Xenos Races.

Forces of Chaos - CSM and Demons

Forces of Death - Nids broken down into various hive fleet rules and Genestealers - perhaps different rules for different planets they've taken.

Forces of Destruction - Orks broken down into various clan rules & adding the Khrave, a dangerous species of psychically-gifted xenos that act like slavers and have been plaguing the human race since the earliest days of the Great Crusade. All accounts of their human encounters with them emphasise the Khrave’s psychic abilities and their dreadful technology. The Khrave are psychic leeches, feeding on the minds and souls of subjugated human worlds they infiltrate and subdue. The Khrave also seem to possess some kind of natural affinity with the Warp as their preferred weapons are so-called warp-glamours, blades forged from solidified matter of the Immaterium, easily able to cleave through Power Armour. The oldest and strongest Khrave encountered by the Imperium are said to have been able to rival a Primarch in bulk, although these exemplars are thankfully rare.
- Taken from the 40k Wiki-
--Could see them teaming with orks or overpowering orks and giving orks some new angles

The Grand Xenos Alliance - Tau broken down into various sept world rules, Farsight, Kroot, Deimurg, Galg, Nicassar, Tarellians, Vespid

The Techno Scourge - Necrons broken down into various dynasty rules , Rak'Gol - If the void dragon is captured by the necrons again, they could be lured as necron allies because of their love of cybernetic augmentation

How could you see GW build up these alliances?

But that's what we don't want.

 Whitebeard wrote:
But that's what we don't want.

Speak for yourself. I'd love to mix CSM with Deamons with added bonuses for doing so. JuggerLords escorted by Flesh Hounds? Yes please!

I think it's a little too soon to jump to this conclusion.

Oh sorry, I meant I just don't want to see Eldar and Marines as a single cohesive force (or any Xenos).

The community opened the door for such silliness the second it remained silent on allowing allies.

Unbound followed.

Will this come to fruition? I do not know.

But blame the community for it. GW would not do it, if the community did not buy it.

Zothos wrote:
The community opened the door for such silliness the second it remained silent on allowing allies.

Unbound followed.

Will this come to fruition? I do not know.

But blame the community for it. GW would not do it, if the community did not buy it.

I think, and I know I'll get flak for this, it's blame the WAAC/competitive people. Those are the ones who ally together 4-5 different armies in little pieces just to eke out a tiny bit of power. Allies in some regards make sense, but not the way it's used currently, where it's basically a powergamer's wet dream where they can take Eldar (scatbikes and wraithknight of course) alongside Space Wolves (Thunderwolf), White Scars (bikers) and throw in Inquisitor Coteaz and an Imperial Knight just for gaks and giggles.

I'm still just not seeing this working for 40k. Some of the faction fit into nice, neat little alliances, but what about Necron, Orks, Tau, and Tyranids? Do you really think Guilliman is just going to go along with the crap the High Lords of Terra have been pulling for the past 10k years? The allied formation could easily just be for the Gathering Storm campaign. We didn't see them in Wrath of Magnus or the Deathwatch or Genestealer Cult codices.

Eh, until they actually say that is happening these books are just more formations.

 troa wrote:
Eh, until they actually say that is happening these books are just more formations.

Agreed. Until I see Grand Alliance: Imperium, this is all speculation.

You can already do all that will ally rules and formations...

If anything, dividing armies into Grand Alliances and saying you can only ally with other forces in your Grand Alliance will restore some normalcy to the game.

Anyway,

Imperium
Aeldari
NecroTau
Tyranids/GSC
Chaos and Daemons
Orks

Though with the fluff about the Orks and Tyranids fighting each other but emerging stronger for it, Tyranorks might be possible. Alternatively, Ork mercenaries could be bought by anyone except Tyranids. (Or both and Orks can fight with anyone against anyone, since that's what they do.)

I tend to agree grand alliances don't make much sense in 40k, the factions are too differant. now rules allowing greater intergration of IoM and elder units seems fine, as those factions really are built for it

This kinda happened with 7th edition declaring all Imperial forces under the one banner of "Armies of the Imperium". Making Grand Alliances at this point is a mere formality for that faction (although consolidating all those rules into one book would be nice).

Chaos I would totally go for. They use to be one book and sorely needs to be one book again.

I can see the alliances working out to these:

Grand Alliance: Imperium (this should be very obvious who's in it)

Grand Alliance: Chaos (again pretty obvious)

Grand Alliance: *nice* Xenos (Aeldari, Tau)

Grand Alliance: Destruction Xenos (Orks, Necrons, Tyranids, GSC)

The Imperial Guard would be left as the odd-one out and probably have themselves copied into the Tau, GSC and Chaos to fulfill Gue'Vesa, Cult Troopers, and Traitor Guardsmen respectively.

I think the OPs list shows the problems of doing this in 40k. Sure, you can merge the Imperium, Chaos and Eldar into their own factions by combining a bunch of books but Necrons, Orks, Tau, Nids are all a bit too dissimilar to effectively merge. The list is effectively just those armies with more expanded options rather than the AoS style Grand Alliance.

Sure, you could call Necrons, Nids and Orks the Forces of Destruction but there's not really anything that binds them together other than being enemies of the Imperium. Also, I find a lot of the AoS attempts to make distinctive factions within the main armies to be seriously forced. Ironjawz are a good example (as well as being a good example of GW's terrible attempts at naming things). Do we really need a faction consisting of 3-4 units as opposed to a larger army?

The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

Slipspace wrote:
The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

Except that all the rules in Age of Sigmar are in one place - the app. No need to look at multiple books when you can just reference all the rules for your army on your tablet.

Zothos wrote:
The community opened the door for such silliness the second it remained silent on allowing allies.

Unbound followed.

Will this come to fruition? I do not know.

But blame the community for it. GW would not do it, if the community did not buy it.

Remained silent? Are you high? There has been crying about it since day one. GW just doesn't care. What are you promoting, that we should picket GW headquarters? Burn the cars of their CEOs?

Currently I think my last 5 games have been against mixed faction armies anyway, so it won't really change for me.

Either way, you rarely play against a pure force anymore, it's always XYZ + friends.

Allowing joint factions isn't too far of a step.



I do feel however some changes will need to be made.
Certain armies will get left in the cold otherwise.

Slipspace wrote:
I think the OPs list shows the problems of doing this in 40k. Sure, you can merge the Imperium, Chaos and Eldar into their own factions by combining a bunch of books but Necrons, Orks, Tau, Nids are all a bit too dissimilar to effectively merge. The list is effectively just those armies with more expanded options rather than the AoS style Grand Alliance.

Sure, you could call Necrons, Nids and Orks the Forces of Destruction but there's not really anything that binds them together other than being enemies of the Imperium. Also, I find a lot of the AoS attempts to make distinctive factions within the main armies to be seriously forced. Ironjawz are a good example (as well as being a good example of GW's terrible attempts at naming things). Do we really need a faction consisting of 3-4 units as opposed to a larger army?

The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

Honestly I don't see a "Grand alliances" so much as this is GW's simply taking the next, logical step forward with allies, I've been saying for a long time, that eventually people will start saying "I play Imperium of Man" rather then "I play space marines"

As much as I would like to say the sky is falling in my typically cynical manner... ehhh.

The vast majority of people play an Imperial army and were allying some sort of Knight, Trivumviate character, Inquisition and/or Assassin anyway. This really isn't too huge of a change when you think about it.

I'd be happier with Grand Alliances if it means we can trim the fat off the non-faction allies chart and put in much harsher restrictions for allies who are not part of said Grand Alliance... but then looking at the Fall of Cadia lore it seems we're more likely to go in the opposite direction.

Xenos armies who aren't some sort of Eldar also get screwed over, but I wouldn't put it pass GW to just not give a damn.

I disagree.

What we've instead got are additional Detachment types.

Grand Convocation for Mehanicus is just an amalgam.

Main Imperial one is again just an amalgam, not a replacement - one to be used to represent mixed forces.

Ynnari - It's an additional faction from what I've seen (I've purposefully avoided spoilers though, so I may have missed something rules wise in that effort).

Dark Eldar, Harlequins and Craftworld all remain - they're not replace by Ynnari.

I can still field Cult Mechanicus and Skitarii Maniples as separate forces (and having done some list tinkering, unless you can max out the Grand Convocation, that's definitely the way to do it!*).


*Have you seen it? It's awful unless maxed out! Sure, my vehicles get It Will Not Die and Power of the Machine Spirit. But when the vehicles open to you don't have multiple weapon systems, and have to give up Scout, it's not worth it. If I max it out, the Skitarii get their Doctrina Imperatives (adjusting your WS and BS) and Canticles (making them more accurate, more hitty, strongerer, tougherer) as well - that....that is when the fun begins. Shame it's like a bajillion points and useless outside of really big games!

I would have liked to see each army getting a different twist on the force org chart rather than formations; to help reflect their playstyles but without the free special rules and marketing push feel the formations have.

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
Grand Alliance: *nice* Xenos (Aeldari, Tau)

Please not again.

Slipspace wrote:

The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

But the Campaign books don't have rules for matched play (points) in AoS, all the rules you typically need are the Generals handbook, and either free online rules or Battletome (the codex equivalent) with the campaign rules and formations being without points rules.

Slipspace wrote:
I think the OPs list shows the problems of doing this in 40k. Sure, you can merge the Imperium, Chaos and Eldar into their own factions by combining a bunch of books but Necrons, Orks, Tau, Nids are all a bit too dissimilar to effectively merge. The list is effectively just those armies with more expanded options rather than the AoS style Grand Alliance.

Sure, you could call Necrons, Nids and Orks the Forces of Destruction but there's not really anything that binds them together other than being enemies of the Imperium. Also, I find a lot of the AoS attempts to make distinctive factions within the main armies to be seriously forced. Ironjawz are a good example (as well as being a good example of GW's terrible attempts at naming things). Do we really need a faction consisting of 3-4 units as opposed to a larger army?

The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

Not really. Basic rules are available online. Both the game as a whole and unit specific. Points are in GHB. So you need at best two sources, one of which is almost secondary for playing (you'd only need GHB for choosing the mission and then forget about it). As for batallions, the campaign book batallions generally don't have points, most of the available batallions being in army books, which are generally a one per army deal and costs generally 20 euros, better than 40k codexii.

Some folks in AAT believe Necrons and Tau will be lumped together

 Vector Strike wrote:
Some folks in AAT believe Necrons and Tau will be lumped together

Team Soulless!

Oh yeah i have been saying it since AoS, they are going to roll things into grand orders.

Its gonna be
IoM
Eldar Empire
Forces of chaos
then the remaining factions are going to be their own thing since they cant really team up.

If Necrons and Tau team up, its because e Necrons ahve decided the Tau would make good host bodies.

i doubt there will be AOS style grand alliances, though - i would expect there will be more, smaller fsction splash releases that go along/ally with certain factions. Kroot/Auxiliaries would be a good Xenos/Tau release, for example.

Then again, maybe they will actually go full Crazy, and make Ynnead actually be the Emperor reborn, since the Emperor is currently the Corpse God! The Imperium and Eldar wil unite into a super faction, forcing the more destruction inclined to work with Chaos (Orks).

Then it will turn out that the Tyranid Hive Mind is actually a Chaos God, and will join up with Archao- er, i mean, Abaddons Black Crusade, leading to a climactic battle on Terra where the Emperor Reborn wrestles with Abaddon in a font of power.

The Necrons and Tau will do nothing off screen, because GW wont figure out a way to shoe horn them in between the Primarchs.

i doubt there will be AOS style grand alliances, though - i would expect there will be more, smaller fsction splash releases that go along/ally with certain factions. Kroot/Auxiliaries would be a good Xenos/Tau release, for example.

I feel it would be a mix, Grand Alliance Death: Was basically Vampire Counts split apart.

Oh gathering storms has already set the stage for all the eldar factions to be rolled into a single dex.

At this point there is no reason for IoM not to be in a single dex.

There is probably gonna be some lore mumbo jumbo to justify a "Grand alliance death" like codex that has necrons and nids. Probably some gak about how since the necrons want to consume all life, the and the nids cant eat them they sort of just ignore each other and kill reguardless and let the necrons do the work and the nids gobble up the remains or some stuff.

Ork and tau will be their own.

ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Slipspace wrote:

The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

But the Campaign books don't have rules for matched play (points) in AoS, all the rules you typically need are the Generals handbook, and either free online rules or Battletome (the codex equivalent) with the campaign rules and formations being without points rules.

I'd assume GW would not repeat the same mistakes they made with AoS and we'll have points from the start. Therefore the AoS distinction between matched play and other styles won't apply. If they stick to the same style they have for AoS expansions we will therefore see the rules split up across multiple books, much as they have already started doing with the campaign books, and those rules will be needed to play the game because there won't be the points/no points distinction we have in AoS. That's my worry.

RuneGrey wrote:

Slipspace wrote:
The one thing I'm dreading with 8th Edition is GW going down the AoS route of scrapping a single main Codex for each army and having the rules spread out over a whole bunch of campaign books. It's been happening in 40k recently and it's an absolute PITA to keep track of everything right now. Removing the Codices completely would be horrible.

Except that all the rules in Age of Sigmar are in one place - the app. No need to look at multiple books when you can just reference all the rules for your army on your tablet.

It was my understanding that the unit scrolls were in the app for free but you don't get free access to the formation-style rules in the app. Perhaps I'm incorrect.