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GW renamed Imperial Guard to Astra Militarum, supposedly to ensure protection of their IP given the outcome of the Chapterhouse litigation and the idea that generic terms wouldn't stand up to the standard required by law. Orc and goblin are both generic and previously used by Tolkien, AD&D, and currently by Blizzard Entertainment. Given what is happening over in 40k land, I wonder what will be done with army names like "Orks & Goblins", "Ogre Kingdoms" and nearly every fantasy army currently produced by GW? Still, they didn't rename Wood Elves, did they?

Considering how generic Orcs are used are and the fact their style is a little different from other Orcs, I doubt they'll drop the name anytime soon. That would probably involve changing Dwarves and Elves into something else too as there are an awful lot of Dwarf and /Elf incarnations in many fantasy settings. If they do change it, I'm guessing it will be something like Orkz and will try to make the 40k and Fantasy Orcs more similar.

Then again, this is just an assumption.

Orkz and Goblinz.

Misspelled thing are trademarkable, I believe.

I thought they renamed it over a lawsuit with Disney. Besides, GW doesn't own fantasy, Fantasy Flight Games does, right?

 Hive Fleet Cerberus wrote:
I thought they renamed it over a lawsuit with Disney. Besides, GW doesn't own fantasy, Fantasy Flight Games does, right?

Uh no. GW does.

But Warhammer Fantasy is based on what is known as popular culture as "Fantasy", which is a huge array of creatures and races that everyone dabbles into but no-one owns. Everyone knows what an "Elf" or an "Orc" is, even if certain elements of popular culture have put their own little twist on it. It would be impossible for anyone to "own" such terms and so, although I know little about Law, I don't think they'll be any such disputes.

The only grey area I can think of is "Lizardmen". While not a staple in popular culture fantasy, the term is somewhat self explanatory, and hence open to abuse. It would be easy for another company to use the term Lizardmen without too much threat from GW's legal team, especially if they hyphenated it or something.

If this was the case it would be Army Book Asrai or Athel Loren, not Wood Elves.

Why they renamed the Imperial Guard? No idea.

 The Shadow wrote:
The only grey area I can think of is "Lizardmen". While not a staple in popular culture fantasy, the term is somewhat self explanatory, and hence open to abuse. It would be easy for another company to use the term Lizardmen without too much threat from GW's legal team, especially if they hyphenated it or something.

Didn't Dungeons and Dragons have Lizardmen? They look kind of similar with the Aztec aesthetic. Not a lot of fluff on the guys. Then again, D&D's more focussed on the person running the game to create the setting so it could probably get away with that.

They'll likely just make it Latin, which Google translate tells me would be "Orci et larvae"

 Col. Tartleton wrote:
If this was the case it would be Army Book Asrai or Athel Loren, not Wood Elves.

Why they renamed the Imperial Guard? No idea.

Just my idea on why the changed the name of Imperial Guard is so when you look on the games workshop website or looking up army lists, Astra Millitaruim is the first on the list, Above chaos and chaos demons. Plus as of right now i would say those are there two most sold models. Dont have numbers on that but just my thought because of new models and recently new.

Greenskins!

KeyserSoze wrote:
Greenskins!

That would be racist, you would see them picketing around everywhere.

The other thing about Astra Militarum is it allowed them to do more "High Gothic" in their imperial armies like Adeptus Sororitus, Militarum Tempestus. In fantasy I don't think they have as much opportunity to abuse the latin language.

Fondlesnots.

Gribblies and Grobblies

Astra Orcianatum.

What will Skaven be renamed to?! You say Skaven is original enough sounding, but there's no guarantees! A year from now, Buttsniffer Minatures will make a model line, copyright the name Skaven, and GW will have to rename them!

I think GW already has the copyright on Skaven.

 Breotan wrote:
I think GW already has the copyright on Skaven.

You don't really believe those lies do you? No one is safe!

 Wilytank wrote:
What will Skaven be renamed to?! You say Skaven is original enough sounding, but there's no guarantees! A year from now, Buttsniffer Minatures will make a model line, copyright the name Skaven, and GW will have to rename them!

In the spirit of the thread, Astra Skavenium.