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No, he is saying he doesn't like it because it's not Warhammer. He doesn't like how it is different from Warhammer.

It appears AoS is okay because despite being different from WHFB it is still Warhammer. Serious brand loyalty!

I don't even get why this comparison is a thing. KoW and AoS are two totally different types of game. It's like asking is dominos or Legos better.

It's because both games are competing for fans of WHFB. Some people will go to KoW and decry how AoS is a tactically shallow and bare bones game. Some people will go to AoS and say that KoW has no brand identity of it's own and terrible models. It's just the way of things with nerds. They have to compare their interests against each other to see who is best. Check out the "TIE/in Interceptor vs Colonial viper for a friendlier example of this.

Smellingsalts wrote:
Before WFB went away, Fantasy sales were a rare occurrence. After AOS my fantasy sales are much much better. Lower bar for entry, rules that you may find simple, but that appeal to a larger section of the total population (not just gamers).

Does it? I haven't seen anything at all to suggest that it's drawing in people who didn't play wargames before (unless you mean collectors and so forth, but really, there's no reason for WFB to NOT appeal to collectors if AoS does.)

And about KoW and their lack of insistence on using 'official' figures - yeah, we're disagreeing on that I love the customization that brings, the lack of a GW-style 'You HAVE to use this or you're doing it wrong' mentality. It feels very liberating and opens a lot of creative doors. I have an alternate miniature goblin project waiting in the wings that I think is going to look incredible, and yeah, I could have done that with Warhammer, I'm hardly a tournament player and I've never set foot in an official Games Workshop store, but it always would have felt a little weird and it's nice to see the hobbyist side of the people behind the game come to the forefront.

AOS does not say in the rules that you need official gw minis... this has been spoken about before.

Sales are higher. Most of it is because you don't need to spend hundreds to play. Another selling point is someone can buy their favorite characters and play with just them (even if they are from different factions). Want to use Archaon, Crom, a Carstein or two, and use a reaper mini as a empire wizard? Yes you can

Oh, I never said you couldn't - but try doing that in a GW store and see what happens. It's just part of the corporate culture, and I'm not sure that it's something I can fault them on except for the extremes, but it's refreshing to see a company come right out and say 'Hey! You like that cool-looking troll model on Kickstarter? Sure, use him, he looks awesome!"

And I don't see the second thing as a selling point so much as an issue with suspension of disbelief. WHY are Archaon, Crom, a couple of von Carsteins, and an Empire Wizard teaming up to take on a common enemy? Yeah, you can come up with something, but does it really make sense for Archaon to work with an Empire Wizard? Or the von Carsteins, for that matter? I've got absolutely no problem with creative narrative, it's the lifeblood of these sort of games as far as I'm concerned, but you need to jump through some serious hoops for that particular All-Stars team to make sense

Does kings of war have any associated fiction? I never really looked at the game until recently the models, particularly the orcs are great.

No, you are putting words in my mouth. I don't like the rules in KOW period. I'm not saying there simple. I'm saying they are vanilla. Nor did I say that AOS rules are simple. Other people have.

I believe salt when he says he has a store, but I also am convinced due to my personal experiences that his situation is a local situation, the truth in my metro area is if I dont go to GW I cannot get a game of AoS. IT is not popular here, and GW treats our local FLGS like crap. I like playing AoS, but its a very crappy attempt at a game, it is not quality. It is a fun little time filler but not some award winning revolution in gaming. I enjoy it for what it is, quick and to the point. I dont think KoW is gonna be what kills AoS, GW will do that. It will get nickel and dimed to death by all the quality kickstarter games and be toppled by just better companies making better products. I also play KoW, but I do it with my WHFB models because i thoroughly dislike mantics models.

thekingofkings wrote:
I also play KoW, but I do it with my WHFB models because i thoroughly dislike mantics models.

I honestly think there is a ton of this going on, and I do not know how Mantic is going to grow to match their increased playerbase. Maybe through another kickstarter? I guess their costs are low... but GW makes its money selling models, not rules, so even if everyone transitions to KoW... as long as we are still playing with GW models they probably could not care less.

A few people definitely prefer mantic's models, but they definitely appear to be the minority. I wonder how much Mantic will continue to appreciate and support their playerbase when their new playerbase never actually buys anything from them...

Their models are getting a lot better... plus according to mighty ape here Mantic models do sell (more than GW).

Also their kick starters being so successful also go to show people throw money at it.

From people who own Mantic models the most common thing I hear is how bad the elves are... but apparently they said they are gonna fix the elves.

Smellingsalts wrote:
No, you are putting words in my mouth. I don't like the rules in KOW period. I'm not saying there simple. I'm saying they are vanilla. Nor did I say that AOS rules are simple. Other people have.

Okay, that's fair enough. So, in the interest of a fair discussion what is your opinion on Age of Sigmar?

 Swastakowey wrote:
Their models are getting a lot better... plus according to mighty ape here Mantic models do sell (more than GW).

I agree, apart from their Enforcers I think almost every release by Mantic in the past year has been excellent, they just need to go back and retool all the release from when they were starting out.

I prefer AOS but as said above why not both?

 Kenshinzo 7 wrote:
I prefer AOS but as said above why not both?

If after reading through all of this you still haven't understood the reason why.... well...

The cool thing is that, along with FrostGrave, they're all baseless.

You can do an entire campaign with three different games. A small expedition with FrostGrave that leads to a KoW mass battle and then a heroic mass skirmish with AoS as your Generals and their remaining forces square off.

It's a good time to be a hobbyist.

FrostGrave skirmish leading into a KoW mass battle is a great idea, Baron!

 Knockagh wrote:
Does kings of war have any associated fiction? I never really looked at the game until recently the models, particularly the orcs are great.

Sure. But it's a barebones, half-arsed effort to keep away GW big legal stick (see, our elves are in Mantica, a world of our own creation, nothing to do with any other elves around).

Of course, nothing stops you from using KoW rules in GW narrative. That's what most people are doing anyway.

Neither KoW or AoS work for me, though. I enjoyed 8th, so I keep playing 8th edition, with an eye open on what the 9th age team is doing.

KoW do seem to slowly be making an effort to differentiate themselves. If you have a world with elves, it's going to be derivative of something no matter what. Elves are derivative.

Baron Klatz wrote:
The cool thing is that, along with FrostGrave, they're all baseless.

You can do an entire campaign with three different games. A small expedition with FrostGrave that leads to a KoW mass battle and then a heroic mass skirmish with AoS as your Generals and their remaining forces square off.

It's a good time to be a hobbyist.

Exalted for this.

As long as you get rid of "brand loyalty", you really have a lot of choice for games using miniatures nowadays. You can make cool campaigns using different game systems and a huge variety of miniatures - especially when you're not limited by the bases.

This is a Golden Age for games with miniatures, I tell ya! Once you understand GW isn't alone in quality and interesting games, a whole new world is ready to welcome you.

jouso wrote:

 Knockagh wrote:
Does kings of war have any associated fiction? I never really looked at the game until recently the models, particularly the orcs are great.

Sure. But it's a barebones, half-arsed effort to keep away GW big legal stick (see, our elves are in Mantica, a world of our own creation, nothing to do with any other elves around).

Of course, nothing stops you from using KoW rules in GW narrative. That's what most people are doing anyway.

Neither KoW or AoS work for me, though. I enjoyed 8th, so I keep playing 8th edition, with an eye open on what the 9th age team is doing.

This is really quite an unfair characterisation.

Firstly, elves were invented in their nowadays common form and fashion by Tolkien. GW elves are as much derivative of Tolkienian elves as Mantic elves are - in fact, both have taken a rather different take on this very very old trope, so I wouldn't even accuse Mantic of copying the particular GW type of elves, be it in lore or miniatures (in fact, many deride the technically high quality elf sculpts for their "weird" aesthetics simply because they are NOT like GW elves!)

Secondly, why half-arsed ? The game hasn't been around for particularly long and nonetheless it already has a hardback with a nice amount of fluff, a novella, a couple of campaign books with extra lore stuff, is going to get a lot of extra fluff from the DS compendium, and game adventure books and two fluff heavy army-list expansion are planned /almost completed. If you don't like some of the fluff, fair enough. But don't complain that a young company doesn't have hundreds of novels written about their fluff just yet.

VicVox wrote:

Secondly, why half-arsed ? The game hasn't been around for particularly long and nonetheless it already has a hardback with a nice amount of fluff, a novella, a couple of campaign books with extra lore stuff, is going to get a lot of extra fluff from the DS compendium, and game adventure books and two fluff heavy army-list expansion are planned /almost completed. If you don't like some of the fluff, fair enough. But don't complain that a young company doesn't have hundreds of novels written about their fluff just yet.

It's not about word count. It's the quality.

Early warhammer had no qualms about publicly heralding the generic fantasy tropes they were butchering. Early warhammer fluff was horrendously written, but at least it was funny, lots of puns. This gave it a texture that eventually grow into a more serious (grimdark, for those 40k-inclined), coherent work. Most of it was a basic template (every army had the best, baddest, dragon-slaying character and the best fighters) but it worked.

Mantica is so bland, grey and generic it might come from a textbook rather than a fantasy story. AoW's warthrone seems a Tolkien masterpiece in comparison using 1/10th or word count (only in Spanish, though).

It feels as something they HAVE to do in order to make minis, not something that grows from a concept that develops into a story that at some point has some new characters in it. Hence half-arsed.

That's definitely how it started out, but it's getting pretty good, I think. It's no worse than, say, Forgotten Realms.

jouso wrote:

VicVox wrote:

Secondly, why half-arsed ? The game hasn't been around for particularly long and nonetheless it already has a hardback with a nice amount of fluff, a novella, a couple of campaign books with extra lore stuff, is going to get a lot of extra fluff from the DS compendium, and game adventure books and two fluff heavy army-list expansion are planned /almost completed. If you don't like some of the fluff, fair enough. But don't complain that a young company doesn't have hundreds of novels written about their fluff just yet.

It's not about word count. It's the quality.

Early warhammer had no qualms about publicly heralding the generic fantasy tropes they were butchering. Early warhammer fluff was horrendously written, but at least it was funny, lots of puns. This gave it a texture that eventually grow into a more serious (grimdark, for those 40k-inclined), coherent work. Most of it was a basic template (every army had the best, baddest, dragon-slaying character and the best fighters) but it worked.

Mantica is so bland, grey and generic it might come from a textbook rather than a fantasy story. AoW's warthrone seems a Tolkien masterpiece in comparison using 1/10th or word count (only in Spanish, though).

It feels as something they HAVE to do in order to make minis, not something that grows from a concept that develops into a story that at some point has some new characters in it. Hence half-arsed.

Yes, when they started out in first edition, it was very, say, bare bones. And I am by no means a Mantic fan boy. I do cringe when reading some of the writing they put out ... but no more than when reading the horrid end times GW writing. None of these guys is going to win a literary prize, that is clear.

I feel that by now Mantica has become LESS generic than GW's world despite not 1% of the number of pages filled out. Neither GW nor Mantic have shied away from the beaten-to-death horse of waning decaying dying elven kingdoms, but I guess that is just the easiest way to keep a superhuman race semi interesting. On the other hand, Mantic has done some good moves by letting Mantica start not 1min to midnight but AFTER the great fall, with a very late roman /byzantine empire struggling against (the novelty! its sad to say this is novel but it really is in generic fantasy-land) rising dwarves! usually those guys are waning right alongside their elven brethren.

Anyway, I am not here to be "right", I just feel that many people still bash Mantic for their very first works, ignoring the recent and very encouraging developments.

VicVox wrote:
On the other hand, Mantic has done some good moves by letting Mantica start not 1min to midnight but AFTER the great fall,

This is one of the things I like about the AoS fluff. The WFB world couldn't 'go' anywhere other than annihilation.
With the new 'order ascendant' setting, it allows for far more ebb and flow.
Time will tell if it can achieve the same gravity that events in the Old Warhammer World did.

I just pair the Kings of War rulebook with the Old World setting. Best of both worlds.

If you're comparing KoW to AoS fluff be fair and compare it to AoS fluff, not WHFB fluff.

KoW has better elf fluff imo because GW won't tell me crap all about my elves in AoS, the fluff just keeps following the sigmarines around.

RoperPG wrote:

VicVox wrote:
On the other hand, Mantic has done some good moves by letting Mantica start not 1min to midnight but AFTER the great fall,

This is one of the things I like about the AoS fluff. The WFB world couldn't 'go' anywhere other than annihilation.
With the new 'order ascendant' setting, it allows for far more ebb and flow.
Time will tell if it can achieve the same gravity that events in the Old Warhammer World did.

I can think of a lot of directions they could have advanced the story instead of blowing the world up.

Oh boy, looks like we're heading down the "they should've done this" path.

Anyway, I'm loving the potential of the new AoS fluff. Indeed they are focusing on the Stormcasts right now but they just want their new models to get the spotlight and become popular. (Certainly worked on me with the Hallowed knights)

Just give them time. There's massive amounts of potential in the setting that GW can make into a glorious game.

Same goes with KoW's fluff as well. Just give it time. As long as there's a dedicated company behind it the game can only improve in both story and gameplay.

 jonolikespie wrote:
If you're comparing KoW to AoS fluff be fair and compare it to AoS fluff, not WHFB fluff.

For those of us still playing WHFB yes, it does

Yes, when they started out in first edition, it was very, say, bare bones. And I am by no means a Mantic fan boy. I do cringe when reading some of the writing they put out ... but no more than when reading the horrid end times GW writing. None of these guys is going to win a literary prize, that is clear.

I meant the 2nd edition book. I preordered and tried to have a thorough read for 2-3 days, then gave up and mostly skimmed it.

It might just be the case that while I've been gradually immersing myself in WHFB lore back when I was a tender teenager over 20 years ago and now nostalgia makes up for bad writing.

Honestly most of it is tripe. I'd rather keep my battles in the old world (which is what most KoW players in my area do).

jouso wrote:
For those of us still playing WHFB yes, it does

The problem is that this thread is KoW vs AoS.
Not WHFB vs AoS;
or WHFB vs KoW;
or the tables and ladders match KoW vs AoS vs WHFB.