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There is a video on the community page showing everything :

We'll get :
- A small Core rules booklet
- A Start here intro booklet
- A Battles for Glymmsforge narrative intro booklet
- A builing instruction guide booklet
- the full 320 pages Corebook

Out of interest have they mentioned about the permenant spells being solo castings or if the same side in an army can cast the same one more than once - ergo meaning you'd ideally want two spell boxed sets?

Why did they make a handle for the Malign Sorcery box

Maybe its internal design lets it act as a carry-case? Since its an expansion rather than a "core" function in theory the idea that its shipping box could double as a box to hold assembled models and rules would be a neat twist.

Even if many a gamer might well replace it with a different container; plus I'm hoping that even though its designed as an expansion it will rise to become part of the normal gameplay (ergo an expansion practically everyone uses)

Now with the arrival of the Soul Wars set, 2nd edition, malign sorcery, think we can say that AoS has recovered the glory of WHFB past? It no longer seems like a tacked on rushed expansion from WHFB, their expansion on the lore seems to be fleshing out the world more, I think AoS is now coming into it's own properly.

The AoS lore was always fairly solid imo, it just needed time and book releases to be fleshed out.

Looks like anyone complaining that 40k had too many books to carry around is going to have even more issue with Sigmar now. Rulebook, battletome, general's handbook, sorcery book, and all the FAQs after the fact of course.

Aren73 wrote:
Now with the arrival of the Soul Wars set, 2nd edition, malign sorcery, think we can say that AoS has recovered the glory of WHFB past? It no longer seems like a tacked on rushed expansion from WHFB, their expansion on the lore seems to be fleshing out the world more, I think AoS is now coming into it's own properly.

It looks like it might start coming into its own.

'Recapturing the glory' is... more difficult. While it has more setting detail now (and strikes me as going back to Moorcockian roots, a blank map slowly filled in with weird and horrible wonders cropping up for the next installment), there is still a sense of detachment and lack of identifiable motivation. The focus on grand designs and realm shattering quakes still lacks a sense of reasonable people with understandable motivations, something the old world did fairly well at times.

I think the biggest reasonable world building element I've seen so far was from the Dispossessed faction focus article. Which amounts to, yeah, the Actual Dwarfs are still around and they built the big cities post Sigmarine Assault.

 mmzero252 wrote:
Looks like anyone complaining that 40k had too many books to carry around is going to have even more issue with Sigmar now. Rulebook, battletome, general's handbook, sorcery book, and all the FAQs after the fact of course.

Technically you don't need the Sorcery book as that's an optional expansion. It might also be that just using the spells normally you might only need the datacards and the book only offers more varied/campaign/scripted use of the spells.

Also chances are the mini-rulebook will include all the core rules - the big rule book is over half lore and fluff and not-needed day to game for gaming.

Also FAQ's are mostly just a few sheets of paper rather than a whole book.

In terms of books - it's all pretty much for reference. How much of a GHB are you really using in a game, 4 pages? You'll need your battletome and the rules booklet to look at more regularly, everything else is just a reference should something come up.

It is somewhat of a concern as it can slow a game down, but hopefully they'll release more of those handy profile cards, so that really you only need to get the rules out in case of a query and not for minute to minute use.

@Voss - well it's becoming all quite 40k ish. There is a grand narrative, a sort of high resolution faction goals and global events, that are taking place in a pretty low resolution world where the places and people are more generic. The Old World had a beautifully crafted map that you could enjoy saying "this event is taking place here and here is what the people there are like and this is the history of the place"

AoS however, isn't place driven it is very much character and narrative driven. For all we care it could be taking place in the sugarplum kingdom in candy land, but the events of the nurgle invasions and now Nagash resurgent, all of those help to build a narrative to give your games meaning. The new realm rules also help to give your battles a bit more unique feeling.

I think it will be very difficult to give places meaning in AoS, really the better known places are what, Hammerhal and Shadespire maybe? They'd have to give places important functions, like for example a city keeping a realmgate open or the last stormcast foothold in a specific realm, to give any meaning to fighting over them.

Anyway, sorry that was somewhat of a ramble, I'm just really excited and getting the feeling that AoS is and will continue to keep getting better, more polished, better fleshed out, that GW know what they're doing and they're doing it competently. It's taken them a few tries definitely, but I think this is it.

 Overread wrote:

 mmzero252 wrote:
Looks like anyone complaining that 40k had too many books to carry around is going to have even more issue with Sigmar now. Rulebook, battletome, general's handbook, sorcery book, and all the FAQs after the fact of course.

Technically you don't need the Sorcery book as that's an optional expansion. It might also be that just using the spells normally you might only need the datacards and the book only offers more varied/campaign/scripted use of the spells.

Also chances are the mini-rulebook will include all the core rules - the big rule book is over half lore and fluff and not-needed day to game for gaming.

Also FAQ's are mostly just a few sheets of paper rather than a whole book.

The sorcery book also has a bunch of magical items to use as well as pitched battles. So it's got uses beyond those endless spells. I included the FAQs bit because that always seems to come up when people complain about carrying so many books. "Oh the humanity I have to carry five pieces of paper!"..but it's still there all the time. From a game that used to have free rules and the ability to just carry around your phone for the free warscrolls, AoS 2.0 VERY rapidly became a game where a book back might be a good investment. Even more so if you play multiple armies.

Also to note, that the profile cards are a great and simplifying edition to the game..but they are only for the free profiles you can have on your phone already. They never include the useful information like allegiance abilities, artifacts, spells, prayers, battalions, etc. So you still need the books to reference those rules. Some of those are then also changed in the general's handbook. Now some of those are also in both the sorcery book and the main rulebook. Sure you don't NEED all of that in a casual game, but there's plenty of stores that heavily frown on you not owning the books if you're going to use things from them.

Cheap reference cards would be a really good product for...pretty much everything really. Spells, unit profiles, allegiance abilities, artefacts, with the added benefit that you can just make a "deck" of the ones you'll be using in the battle and nothing else.

Reference cards are perfect for games that require 3+ books and would be a good business initiative too as they are so convenient it would be a bad idea to not buy them.

Well, that's my AoS shopping list sorted. The new core set, Malign Sorcery, the General's Handbook, and the two pushfit kits for Nighthaunts. Maybe the objectives?

Aren73 wrote:
In terms of books - it's all pretty much for reference. How much of a GHB are you really using in a game, 4 pages? You'll need your battletome and the rules booklet to look at more regularly, everything else is just a reference should something come up.

It is somewhat of a concern as it can slow a game down, but hopefully they'll release more of those handy profile cards, so that really you only need to get the rules out in case of a query and not for minute to minute use.

@Voss - well it's becoming all quite 40k ish. There is a grand narrative, a sort of high resolution faction goals and global events, that are taking place in a pretty low resolution world where the places and people are more generic. The Old World had a beautifully crafted map that you could enjoy saying "this event is taking place here and here is what the people there are like and this is the history of the place"

AoS however, isn't place driven it is very much character and narrative driven. For all we care it could be taking place in the sugarplum kingdom in candy land, but the events of the nurgle invasions and now Nagash resurgent, all of those help to build a narrative to give your games meaning. The new realm rules also help to give your battles a bit more unique feeling.

I think it will be very difficult to give places meaning in AoS, really the better known places are what, Hammerhal and Shadespire maybe? They'd have to give places important functions, like for example a city keeping a realmgate open or the last stormcast foothold in a specific realm, to give any meaning to fighting over them.

Anyway, sorry that was somewhat of a ramble, I'm just really excited and getting the feeling that AoS is and will continue to keep getting better, more polished, better fleshed out, that GW know what they're doing and they're doing it competently. It's taken them a few tries definitely, but I think this is it.

See, i don't find it character or narrative driven. The only characters of note are god versions of old world characters, largely stripped of their driving (motivational) character traits. To me, AoS is Event driven, and that's hard to connect to. By the time I find out about an event and get around to sort of catching up on it, its time for the next one. I still don't know what 'Firestorm' was, and four hero models wasn't any kind of a inducement to pay attention to malign portents.

For it to be character driven it needs protagonists and antagonists running around real landscapes interacting with each other and normal people. A Felix or Orfeo or Malus or anyone off a giant list, even the random teenage apprentices from various short stories who get in way over their heads.

There is absolutely room to tell stories about a young couple that get entangled in the web of a Tzeentch Cult in Hammerhal, or an expedition to find a legendary treasure in Aqshy, and that's the kind of grounded character story that they need to reinvent the glory days.

End of june is going to be expensive. I'm at least in for the starter, the other night haunt units, and the GHB 2018. I'm also going to try and trade the stormcast for more ghosts but we'll see how that works out.

I don't know if I'll get the starter. I'll be using nighthaunts in my Legion of Blood army but not on their own and I'm not that excited abut their battleline. So I'll probably cherrypick one or two of their units I like. I'm all about those spells though.

As for character driven, I don't know it's a bit of both, because Mannfred, Neferata, Arkhan all pop up and have their own stories, it's a mix, though I can see where some if not most armies are lacking active memorable heroes with meaningful arcs.

Faction Focus: Nighthaunt, part 2 from Warhammer Community:

Has the summonable keyword always been there?

In Stormcast.005, they show the contents of the box, including a double-sized, folding warscroll card (I was wondering how they'd fit certain models on that)

Voss wrote:

Aren73 wrote:
In terms of books - it's all pretty much for reference. How much of a GHB are you really using in a game, 4 pages? You'll need your battletome and the rules booklet to look at more regularly, everything else is just a reference should something come up.

It is somewhat of a concern as it can slow a game down, but hopefully they'll release more of those handy profile cards, so that really you only need to get the rules out in case of a query and not for minute to minute use.

@Voss - well it's becoming all quite 40k ish. There is a grand narrative, a sort of high resolution faction goals and global events, that are taking place in a pretty low resolution world where the places and people are more generic. The Old World had a beautifully crafted map that you could enjoy saying "this event is taking place here and here is what the people there are like and this is the history of the place"

AoS however, isn't place driven it is very much character and narrative driven. For all we care it could be taking place in the sugarplum kingdom in candy land, but the events of the nurgle invasions and now Nagash resurgent, all of those help to build a narrative to give your games meaning. The new realm rules also help to give your battles a bit more unique feeling.

I think it will be very difficult to give places meaning in AoS, really the better known places are what, Hammerhal and Shadespire maybe? They'd have to give places important functions, like for example a city keeping a realmgate open or the last stormcast foothold in a specific realm, to give any meaning to fighting over them.

Anyway, sorry that was somewhat of a ramble, I'm just really excited and getting the feeling that AoS is and will continue to keep getting better, more polished, better fleshed out, that GW know what they're doing and they're doing it competently. It's taken them a few tries definitely, but I think this is it.

See, i don't find it character or narrative driven. The only characters of note are god versions of old world characters, largely stripped of their driving (motivational) character traits. To me, AoS is Event driven, and that's hard to connect to. By the time I find out about an event and get around to sort of catching up on it, its time for the next one. I still don't know what 'Firestorm' was, and four hero models wasn't any kind of a inducement to pay attention to malign portents.

For it to be character driven it needs protagonists and antagonists running around real landscapes interacting with each other and normal people. A Felix or Orfeo or Malus or anyone off a giant list, even the random teenage apprentices from various short stories who get in way over their heads.

There is absolutely room to tell stories about a young couple that get entangled in the web of a Tzeentch Cult in Hammerhal, or an expedition to find a legendary treasure in Aqshy, and that's the kind of grounded character story that they need to reinvent the glory days.

Have you read Spear of Shadows - its a great adventure with a rather fine cast (and virtually no stormcast)

 Sqorgar wrote:
In Stormcast.005, they show the contents of the box, including a double-sized, folding warscroll card (I was wondering how they'd fit certain models on that)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtwXKH3ucCY

@Mr Morden - when someone puts fine and cast in a sentence and you're immediately triggered

Aren73 wrote:
@Mr Morden - when someone puts fine and cast in a sentence and you're immediately triggered

It's a great way of saying the story is badly cast and full of holes.

Wow that's a ton of stuff coming with the new edition! I'm very, very excited.

Also really hope Bottle was in on that new skirmish bit.

Looking at the URL for the new Myrmourn Banshees it looks like they are going to be push-fit models...

So who is the lady Stormcast Eternal that is on the front of the rulebook and featured in all the 2.0 art. Is she a character from the novel?

It looks like she's just a generic Stormcast. It was the same with AOS proper, they used a generic Liberator rather than the Lord-Celestant(who was on Dracoth) as key art opposing Khul.

Looks like a very nice release.

You don't need to look at the URL.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/06/05/soul-wars-announced/

If Soul Wars has you hungry for even MORE of the new Stormcast Eternals and Nighthaunt models – well, rest assured, there’s plenty more cool stuff on the way. On the release weekend, meanwhile, you’ll be able to grab a range of push fit kits to bolster your forces from Soul Wars.

Yes, I did miss that. Still it's worth mentioning that push-fits can be such impressive and beautiful models.