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Mr Mystery
01-19-2016, 02:23 PM
How do?

Fancied raising this topic for a while, but wanted to wait until we'd seen more.

Title has it all really!

For me? Well, main one is on its way, namely information and understanding of what Reforging costs a Stormcast. Just what is the price for their immortality? As mentioned this is currently unfolding in the Bladestorm series.

So one down, so many more to go.

Wishlist the first
Better definition of the Realms. Right now, they've made it pretty clear they're truly vast. And I'm cool with that. But surely each one is going to have its tactically important areas, chunks we can get to know better and fix in our minds. Perhaps areas broadly representative, but not definitive, giving us the room to create our own kingdoms and that? Kind of like The Empire and The Border Princes in The World That Was, for a rough comparrisson.

Wishlist the second
What comes after the Realmgate Wars? Powerful as his forces are, I'm not convinced Archaon can maintain his current stranglehold, simply because the Stormcast have the Cylon Advantage, in so far as reforging, so far, doesn't seem to take away their combat prowess nor, importantly, their combat experience. Some form of victory for Order in his war seems fairly certain....

Is Sigmar headed for a Pyrrhic victory?
This is something I speculated on the AoS Facebook group that got people thinking. Take the two above points, and think beyond 'the now'

See, the Stormcast Eternals are, functionally, unstoppable as long as Azyr holds out - and going one the background just now, it's Chaos on the backfoot. Whilst Sigmar needs to keep Azyr secure, Archaon needs to keep The Allpoints secure. The latter, to my. Ind, is a much harder prospect. Sigmar has shut off Azyr before, so it's arguable he could do so again. But The Allpoints? That's how Archaon has dominated the other realms - and that means it has far more Realmgates to defend than Azyr....it is the nexus after all.

And this is where the Pyrrhic victory threatens to occur. In short, having re-established some semblance of order and civilisation, the Stormcast Eternals are bound to at least attempt to retake The Allpoints. Archaon undoubtedly has the numerical advantage, but that means little when your for just keeps coming back, seemingly at will. But.....at what cost?

I'll avoid spoilers, but we're starting to see the impact that can have. Assuming the Stormcast can actually take and hold the Allpoints, their casualties will be horrific. So many will go through multiple reforging, it's going to erode their humanity - they're at the very real risk of losing that which they fight for. Who knows what Sigmar will do if that happens? What role would the Stormcast play in the reclaimed Realms if they no longer relate to the inhabitants?

But that's not the only possible outcome...in fact it's possibly the least tragic. See, thanks to Daemons being Daemons, and Chaos caring not one jot for the natural way of things....the battle for The Allpoints could become an eternal stalemate. Archaon can never truly defeat the Stormcast - as long as Azyr endures, so do they, and Archaon can't currently strike at Azyr in any meaningful way because of the Stormcast pushing him back on all fronts. But as we know, Chaos itself cannot be defeated. Sure the Stormcast could blockade The Allpoints, tying up Archaon's best and brightest. But going on the description in Book Six of The Call of Archaon? I don't think they have the numbers or opportunity to really permanently take The Allpoints.

So that's some food for thought. Over to anyone else who wants to chip in with their ha'penny worth.

eldargal
01-20-2016, 08:30 AM
My wishlist:

More wimmins.
Less mins

Mr Mystery
01-20-2016, 09:18 AM
The mortal human survivors have quite a few warrior women, and often leading them (Realms of Fire, Metal and Beasts so far...)

And Death, come to think of it.

Could be an interesting device to make Sigmar look like an old fashioned God compared to the dynamics of necessity found in the mortal realms.

Erik Setzer
01-20-2016, 10:53 AM
But are said women showing up in the game? Let's see... Stormcasts? Nope, all designed to look like men. (I don't care about the claim there could be a woman in a suit disguising herself as a man, that makes it WORSE.) Khorne releases? Nope, all men. Fyreslayers? All men.

So, yeah, they're still WAY behind the curve on representing them in the miniatures line.



My own wishlist...

1. Give a clearer explanation of what the flip happened. I want to know how we got from End Times to here.

2. Why are all these old characters alive again? And why did Malekith forget his name?

3. Why did all the races change their names, when they pretty much seem to have come back as-is?

4. What the heck are the realms? Are they real? Are they a figment of someone's imagination? How exactly do they fit into the universe at large?

5. Why aren't we seeing the rest of the universe? Some of the fluff's hinted at a universe-wide battle, so why are we limited to eight floating chunks of land?

6. How did the core of the "world-that-was" grow back into a rather significant size? And what are they doing with it?

7. Retcon the story so Chaos only recently "won," rather than an unbelievable centuries of Chaos winning when we just saw that when they win they destroy everything.

8. What are the Empire and Bretonnian soldiers? The Elves who are fighting? All those people. Are they ghosts like the Lizardmen? Or are people just playing armies that don't exist in the game universe?

9. Some new characters. It's nice to have the Greatest Hits of Warhammer Fantasy Battles parading around, but Nagash, Archaon, Malekith, Tyrion, Teclis, the Mortarchs, Ungrim, etc. all got wiped out, and having them show back up in immortal form seems like their sacrifice meant nothing and cheapens the story. Take risks and build new characters.

Okay, this is going to go on forever...

TOP WISH LIST ITEM:

Stop writing story of any kind - in game books or novels - until you have your team sit down and talk to each other and figure out a cohesive story that answers things in a manner that makes sense.

But I think I'm expecting too much there. I strongly suspect AoS's "background" was wedged together to try to excuse them selling a lot of the same old stuff while making up new stuff, and leaving it open-ended to do whatever they want, but in a way that means hardly anything is defined. There were ways to do that better, but would have to involve retconning a good chunk of the story. Which, honestly, will have to happen at some point anyway.

The good news there is that GW's got experience with that, because Rogue Trader's fluff was retconned in places to make a more coherent story.



Since we're on the wishing track, here's my rough draft of a better (IMO, of course) story:

The End Times happened. A lot of people died. But before they did, the Slann got in touch with others of their kind and managed to "save" backups of the world's people, especially notable strong warriors plucked from the Warp. The world blew up, but Sigmar saved the last bit of it, because he felt it might be important. Maybe a key to a secret weapon against the forces of Chaos?

The world-that-was was connected to basically a gateway terminal (I might be using the wrong words here?). Effectively, a nexus of connections to various locations. Eight main gates, one connecting to varying "realms" that are, themselves, connections out to more "realms." Many of those realms are other worlds where the Old Ones and Chaos do battle.

Chaos is taking advantage of the mess left by the death of the Warhammer world to launch an assault on the nexus (the "All-Points"), where they can then launch further assaults into the other realms. They've succeeded in assaulting and capturing various regions, but Sigmar decides to fight back, using technol- er, magic from the Old Ones. Meanwhile, peoples are being recruited from various "realms" (worlds) for the fight, and the Slann are trying to bring back some of history's greatest warriors (which they managed with Sigmar).

So that's kind of the general gist of it. How does this work for game and background terms?

1. Unlimited worlds means unlimited potential for new races and factions.
2. Bringing back dead heroes (and armies) explains not just why various heroes (and villains) are back, but also gives room for adding more new heroes and villains, including some historical ones.
3. Chaos hasn't "won" all-out, or even close to it, just made big strides, which Sigmar is leading the fight to push back.

If/when I get significantly bored, I might actually try fleshing that out more. I think it'd make more sense and help tie things together better (and let people with older armies feel like they're not out of place).

Crazy thoughts, I know. But hey, at least I'm not just complaining mindlessly.

grimmas
01-20-2016, 01:10 PM
Star Wars Stormtrooper armour is sculpted with pecs not boobs and they've got women inside as well don't see why Stormcasts can't be the same.

I'm well behind on my AoS reading still only half way through my call of Archaon subscription but I hope it continues on the same lines of developing the setting and advancing through the story line. I'm very much hoping the Realmgate wars are a way to introduce and create the setting I'm really liking the use of a narrative rather than a description to introduce the new setting.

Also intrigued by the Stormcast losing there humanity line I'm wondering if it's to allow the creation of some altogether darker faction maybe Nagash will provide them something to fill the void.

Mr Mystery
01-20-2016, 01:13 PM
The two audiobooks I've not got yet involve Nagash, and the Stormcast seeking him out.

I can tell you he's not at all pleased at losing out on dead souls, so looking forward to hearing the rest and seeing what he makes of Stormcast'

Erik Setzer
01-20-2016, 01:18 PM
Star Wars Stormtrooper armour is sculpted with pecs not boobs and they've got women inside as well don't see why Stormcasts can't be the same.

Stormtrooper armor is designed to be as generic as possible. (In their case, removing as many traces of humanity as possible seems to be an end goal.)

Stormcast armor has not only a male sculpted torso (pretty detailed, too), but also has a helmet designed to resemble a male face.

You can't equate the two.

There might be women in those male sets of armor, but I still think it'd be worse if they were forcing women to look like they're men.

Path Walker
01-20-2016, 01:24 PM
I'd imagine that it would help to familiarise yourself with the background before making a wishlist of things to add to it, or you might end up wishing for a lot of things that already exist. Erik.

grimmas
01-20-2016, 02:45 PM
Stormtrooper armor is designed to be as generic as possible. (In their case, removing as many traces of humanity as possible seems to be an end goal.)

Stormcast armor has not only a male sculpted torso (pretty detailed, too), but also has a helmet designed to resemble a male face.

You can't equate the two.

There might be women in those male sets of armor, but I still think it'd be worse if they were forcing women to look like they're men.

Yeah I can. They both got pecs. Which is the only really male or female thing about either. Stormcast masks are androgynous you've just decided they're male there's no male features to them. Now as far as I'm aware no statement on the fact has been made they're just reforged Heros so they may or may not be all male. However their armour is no more or less "male" than Star Wars Stormtroopers.

Mr Mystery
01-20-2016, 02:58 PM
There's nothing concrete either way.

However, we're several Stormcast Centric stories in, and no named female Stormcast.

The legions themselves are referred to as 'men', but nothing to say that's more than just common military parlance.

Asymmetrical Xeno
01-20-2016, 04:07 PM
I'd rather they introduces valkyries that are all-women personally, something like the Claymores from eh, Claymore. Clare was badass.

Haighus
01-20-2016, 04:10 PM
I'd rather they introduces valkyries that are all-women personally, something like the Claymores from eh, Claymore. Clare was badass.
That could be interesting if they play the inner-daemon thingy angle too. I enjoyed that anime.

Mr Mystery
01-20-2016, 04:11 PM
I think they missed a trick with the Prosecutors. They're damned near Valkyries anyway. At least to my mind.

But there is a decent Trans/Non-Binary character in one of the Slaaneshi stories from the Christmas Advent.

grimmas
01-20-2016, 04:36 PM
I'd also like to see the Wood elves who escaped to the sanctuary turn up. I know they lost contact with them but it would be a nice link.

Very interested how the meet between Nagash and the Stormcast goes especially considering Sigmar and his history.

Mr Mystery
01-20-2016, 04:38 PM
Indeed.

Just want the next major instalment of the Realmgate Wars now.

eldargal
01-21-2016, 05:50 AM
I think they missed a trick with the Prosecutors. They're damned near Valkyries anyway. At least to my mind.

But there is a decent Trans/Non-Binary character in one of the Slaaneshi stories from the Christmas Advent.

Yep which is good, the problem is they need more or they are just falling into the 'trans/nonbinary peeps/etc. are deviant and probably evil' trope.

and it's all very well to say Stormcast could be female, the fact is they aren't. I'd be more than happy to have them include women but until they are said to be its fanon, and if they don't start getting characters then its no better than the eldar '50/50 gender split in lore, 90/10 in reality' situation.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 06:15 AM
The Chaos stories so far have actually changed the tone a fair bit. Whilst they still commit horrific acts, their motivations are explored more.

In Call of Archaon, for instance a Khornate champion trode that path so he could achieve Daemonhood, and then take revenge on Khorne. Sure we'd think it's a bad, bad plan - but still far superior to 'I rly lke sklls' we're used to

But wimmins Stormcast - fair enough. All it would take is a single named female character for them, and a line about how she knows anyone could be a Stormcast, and is proud of all her warriors etc. At least for me. Other opinions are just as valid etc.

eldargal
01-21-2016, 06:25 AM
That's the problem with GW and inclusive representation in a nutshell though, it wouldn't take much for them to do very well, they just don't bother.

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What I'd love to see also is more of the Vampire women come back instead of the men. Bring back Neferata, Wossname the ex-elf and Ulrika and then maybe Vlad, Konrad and Isabella von Carstein and screw the rest.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 06:28 AM
Indeed.

Consider the tiny background bit about Phasma in the visual dictionary. It's emphatic, but beautifully understated. That's all it takes.

I wouldn't mind seeing specifically female Stormcast unit in the future either - as I mentioned earlier on, the human survivors of the Age of Chaos seem to quite often be lead by women, so perhaps we'll see it at some point. A poor alternative to just saying 'yeah, gender has nowt to do with it. The armour is made to resemble Sigmar, not blokes in general'

grimmas
01-21-2016, 06:40 AM
The Chaos being "evil" is very much being explored as a perspective thing like they were doing with the vampires In what I've read so far.

The Eldar thing only exists because they created unecessary boob torsos. First why do they have to be mammals there aliens. Secondly the "male" torso were perfectly fine for representing female (from a humans perspective) in full combat armour. The same goes for Tau and Cadians. In fact Im beginning to think the helmeted head for cadians are fine as female you can't see the jaw line because of the chin strap and at that size with the absence of make up or facial hair would we be able to really tell anyway?

Background wise yes no explicit mention of previously female Sormcast (they arent really human after the reforging) but seeing as though they do wear masks to conceal their identity and most don't have memory of who they were why would they start issuing armour proclaim their previous gender when they don't need it. Still I'd agree it wouldn't hurt or take much effort to stick out a story that mentions it and a named Warscroll character and just let people decide for themselves

eldargal
01-21-2016, 06:47 AM
Which is an improvement but doesn't negate the fact they were the go-to pure evil faction of the past 30 years.

Yep but the boobs came in the Rogue Trader era so its not like its a recent stuff up. The male torsos might be acceptable, but the heads are not. No one can seriously argue they could be mistaken for women.

Just look at how Star Wars did it:
Stated they recruit men and women as Stormtroopers
Mentioned a few unnamed Stormtroopers were women
Introduced a named female Stormtrooper in TFA
Has a couple of voiced female stormtroopers in TFA

No big effort or statement, but it had the effect of making the setting much more female friendly because now you don't know if you're looking at a male or female Stormtrooper when you look at one. It wouldn't be hard at all for GW to do that, easier in fact because they don't have to worry about voices or unmasked appearance. They just don't seem to even think about it.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 06:52 AM
Think I might write in to 'Grombrindal' about that.

Seems daft that Chaos is the equal opportunities employer compared to The Good Guys....

grimmas
01-21-2016, 07:16 AM
I rather like it. I've always found absolutely good and evil characters a bit tiresome I like when there's more nuance to them. It was something they really got into during the End Tines and I'm glad it's continuing

Alaric
01-21-2016, 08:26 AM
That's the problem with GW and inclusive representation in a nutshell though, it wouldn't take much for them to do very well, they just don't bother.

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What I'd love to see also is more of the Vampire women come back instead of the men. Bring back Neferata, Wossname the ex-elf and Ulrika and then maybe Vlad, Konrad and Isabella von Carstein and screw the rest.

When there are just as many females playing as men then you will get your wish. Until then, they dont bother Cuz there is no point. Its a game aboot jacked up space men. Just be happy that in the books there are many females that are not pushovers nor "women in distress" In my experience the females portrayed in the books are pretty badass actually.
Theres no women in the game Cuz there isnt many women that play. I know you don't like it when I inject reality in, but it is the truth.
So maybe you could stop holding it against them as it's just a game and nothing to condemn a company over. I know you just can't help yourself so, neither can I.

Morgrim
01-21-2016, 08:33 AM
When there are just as many females playing as men then you will get your wish. Until then, they dont bother Cuz there is no point. Its a game aboot jacked up space men. Just be happy that in the books there are many females that are not pushovers nor "women in distress" In my experience the females portrayed in the books are pretty badass actually.
Theres no women in the game Cuz there isnt many women that play. I know you don't like it when I inject reality in, but it is the truth.
So maybe you could stop holding it against them as it's just a game and nothing to condemn a company over. I know you just can't help yourself so, neither can I.

In my area a quarter of the players are women. By your logic, that means a quarter of the models should be female. They aren't.

If you don't see many women playing, have you considered that the local conditions in your area may be hostile?

Alaric
01-21-2016, 08:59 AM
In my area a quarter of the players are women. By your logic, that means a quarter of the models should be female. They aren't.

If you don't see many women playing, have you considered that the local conditions in your area may be hostile?

Very doubtful. And I know of course many people will not want to read this but a large majority of the guys I have met that played the game would be simply happy to have a female in their presence lol. For real. And I can just picture their faces if said female actually started talking about the game they love in a way they understand.
So I definitely do not think hostility has anything to do with it.

And my logic has nothing to do with how you say although I see what you mean. I'm talking dollars and cents because that is really what rules everything. As an once I see half the people on the floor that paid for the game and happened to be female I just can't see them making that jump unless its just lip service to the gender.
She makes a really good point about Star Wars. I do not disagree with any of that assessment but I personally if I were female would be very offended by the fact that they just say the storm troopers are women but do nothing to actually further that look. I dunno if it was just me in my thoughts actually mattered to that company I would want females to look like females. I would want them to have female influences present and apparent. Instead they give you tokenism and apparently that is enough. I guess that's just me.
All I'm trying to do is give you the reality of the situation its not like I agree with it or anything I would love women and everything I do because I'd rather look at a girl than a guy any day of the week. As long as they don't treat it like Jennifer Tilly treats poker I like boobs but there's a time and a place.

Erik Setzer
01-21-2016, 09:19 AM
But there is a decent Trans/Non-Binary character in one of the Slaaneshi stories from the Christmas Advent.

Yeah, but think about that... Slaanesh is a god whose synonymous with perversion and deviancy. The first time we see an LGBT character is in relation to Slaanesh?

But hey, I'm not surprised, given that they still don't seem to want to admit women exist, especially with the models.

grimmas
01-21-2016, 09:22 AM
Ahh well it was was nice to be talking about AoS if only for a while

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 09:22 AM
I don't know that Slaanesh is about deviancy etc, so much as pushing your own boundaries and experience. More tasting everything than deliberately setting out to outrage societal decency. Could be an Epicurean, could be Art, Drama, War, Problem Solving etc. All that matters beyond expanding your experience is that you enjoy it. The whole 'gurd of buurbs' is long overdue an in-game challenge in terms of interpretation :)

The way the character is written is very sober. Description of the armour, but not the wearer. It explains that terms of gender don't mean much to her anymore, but she feels like a she.

Granted being me means I'm not best placed to judge with any real accuracy, but that to me seems a very sympathetic description, and leaves a lot up to the reader.

grimmas
01-21-2016, 09:26 AM
I don't know that Slaanesh is about deviancy etc, so much as pushing your own boundaries and experience.

The way the character is written is very sober. Description of the armour, but not the wearer. It explains that terms of gender don't mean much to her anymore, but she feels like a she.

Granted being me means I'm not best placed to judge with any real accuracy, but that to me seems a very sympathetic description, and leaves a lot up to the reader.

Slaanesh is about sensation and pleasure. Deviancy is a moralistic stance and the Choas gods really don't care about morality, certainly not from a human perspective.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 09:26 AM
Ahh well it was was nice to be talking about AoS if only for a while

Just pop them on ignore.

But give Erik a chance. He's a bit wordy (Sorry dude, but you are quite verbose) but he's far from unpleasant.

Erik Setzer
01-21-2016, 09:26 AM
Seems daft that Chaos is the equal opportunities employer compared to The Good Guys....

But is it, though? I mean, I suppose in the fluff it is, but with the figures released so far, has there been even a single female model created for AoS? I don't mean rereleases. I mean in the models released since AoS was put in the market.

And when Chaos is the one with women and LGBT folks, they usually end up being evil or deviant, which doesn't send a great message.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 09:27 AM
Slaanesh is about sensation and pleasure. Deviancy is a moralistic stance and the Choas gods really don't care about morality, certainly not from a human perspective.

Indeed, yet the common misconception is that it's all about hopping on the good foot and doing the bad thing to anything with anything.

grimmas
01-21-2016, 09:33 AM
True. It nice to see they're tying to change that and evolve the background. I hope more people will jump on board because it's going to add a great deal of depth to the characterisations. Which can only be good for the narative.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 09:36 AM
But is it, though? I mean, I suppose in the fluff it is, but with the figures released so far, has there been even a single female model created for AoS? I don't mean rereleases. I mean in the models released since AoS was put in the market.

And when Chaos is the one with women and LGBT folks, they usually end up being evil or deviant, which doesn't send a great message.

Model? Not as yet.

But read the background stories. From memory, on Nurgle is yet to have female warriors explicitly within his forces - and even then its not actively ruled out :)

Erik Setzer
01-21-2016, 09:42 AM
When there are just as many females playing as men then you will get your wish. Until then, they dont bother Cuz there is no point. Its a game aboot jacked up space men. Just be happy that in the books there are many females that are not pushovers nor "women in distress" In my experience the females portrayed in the books are pretty badass actually.
Theres no women in the game Cuz there isnt many women that play. I know you don't like it when I inject reality in, but it is the truth.
So maybe you could stop holding it against them as it's just a game and nothing to condemn a company over. I know you just can't help yourself so, neither can I.

I'm sorry, but that's bollocks. (I want to say stronger, but I'll overload the censorship.)

I'm a guy. I like good female characters. I enjoyed Rey and Phasma in Star Wars. I like seeing female characters in other games. Loaded up Wasteland 2 to give it a go last night, built a half-and-half squad.

I'm not some weird anomaly. Tomb Raider sold well with the new version that didn't over-sexualize Lara Croft. Other games with a female protagonist are doing well.

Other miniatures game companies include more female models. Other than when it's, say, a historical game, in an era that didn't really include female soldiers.

So what are we saying here? That Games Workshop's current player base is comprised almost entirely of boys who feel their masculinity challenged by the sight of a female miniature? That seems to be who they're marketing to with all of that. You're not going to draw in more women with an exclusive game. Designing a game to feel like women aren't welcome and then saying "Well, it's designed this way because you won't join the club!" is just insane.

There are even third party companies making bits to convert, say, female Cadians, and they're able to sell those because there IS a demand.

GW just doesn't do it because they're stuck in their own little bunker unaware of how the world works, and the boys inside that bunker all think women are "yucky" and can't be strong enough to be heroes. And while they do that, I don't blame women for looking elsewhere (which, of course, then gets used as an excuse to continue excluding them).

But heck, even just thinking about myself, I want some more variety in my models. If/when I do an IG army, I'm totally getting some of those conversion bits, and maybe even grabbing a proper female Commissar (though I'll be forced to use Commissar Corset when playing in a GW store). But hey, I'm comfortable with my masculinity, I don't feel it threatened at all by playing with female toy soldiers. (Or, for example, playing a female character in Fallout 4, where my characters are 50/50 right now.)

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I don't know that Slaanesh is about deviancy etc, so much as pushing your own boundaries and experience. More tasting everything than deliberately setting out to outrage societal decency.

Yes, but "tasting everything" is seen my most people to be perversion and deviancy. Otherwise, maybe we wouldn't have so many laws about who could marry who, what you can eat, drink, smoke, or swallow, and what you can do to your own body (i.e. tattoos, piercings, stuff like that). Ditto for the treatment of anyone who's had multiple partners (never mind that the majority of people have) as some kind of, ah, impolite name which I shall not repeat here.

And given that they've never showed Slaanesh as a libertarian but more as focusing on the more shocking stuff, that's the impression people have when they think of Slaanesh and its followers.

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Just pop them on ignore.

But give Erik a chance. He's a bit wordy (Sorry dude, but you are quite verbose) but he's far from unpleasant.

I blame my education. They taught me to explain my points as well as possible. :p

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Model? Not as yet.

But read the background stories. From memory, on Nurgle is yet to have female warriors explicitly within his forces - and even then its not actively ruled out :)

Yeah, but most people are only really going to see the models, so that's where work needs done.

I mean, yeah, we're talking background wishlisting here, but it's nice to see the background reflected in the models, right?

Alaric
01-21-2016, 09:54 AM
Its aboot money Erik. That's all. I agree with all your sentiments, variety would be nice....and where the hell are my SoB!?! That's my first army right there and I haven't seen em get any love.
I hold by to what I said though. Until more women spend money on the game, can't see them spending a red cent. And again. I don't agree with that, just telling it the way I see it.

Asymmetrical Xeno
01-21-2016, 09:55 AM
Gotta agree with Erik on this one. I like AoS but I want female model representation and I don't really identify with male fighters anyway. I want female valkyrie stormcasts and a battletome for Witch Elves. I'd like to see females when they finally do a human army too, but I am pessimistic that they would do any of that after how poorly the Sisters of battle have been treated. I think only the Dark eldar range in 40k has really managed to get any semblance of balance. Sadly this isn't even a problem unique to GW but the wider "toy industry" : http://www.hypable.com/star-wars-toymakers-specifically-directed-to-exclude-rey/

grimmas
01-21-2016, 12:11 PM
You'll never get Valkyrie models it's an existing fantasy trope and GW and definitely trying to produce something new with AoS. However this is probably going to be the thing that's going to give you what you want (or something like it). As Mystery says there are female characters popping up. In fact the first and I think only named Human In Gates of Azyr (and that was the first story released) is a woman I think the early indications are quite positive for you.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 01:29 PM
Yup.

Positive as long as we get models :)

Saturday gets the Stunty Book and the Stunty Army Book. I'm excite for both!

Erik Setzer
01-21-2016, 01:30 PM
Oh? They won't use any ideas that already exist? Like Greek style armor, soldiers covered entirely in gold, spiritual warriors in armor, magma lizards, stuff like that? All these things I can go to Google, type in, and see so many existing variations of?

Just because they slapped stupid names on everything to trademark them (screw you, G-Dub, Dwarfs are Dwarfs and Orcs are Orcs and Ogres are Ogres, I'm not using your ridiculous new names) doesn't mean they actually have new ideas for everything.

grimmas
01-21-2016, 02:38 PM
Actually all this talk has got me thinking.

I remember there was a rumour about Orcs becoming taller and rangier and matriarchal. Well that's pretty much the Fimir may be someone has seen something and thought "well they're green they must be orcs".

Maybe Erik but I'd suggest there's a world of difference between having gold armour and a specific named character and or unit.

Mr Mystery
01-21-2016, 02:43 PM
Interesting point indeed.

The description of Orruks in the latest story shows they're still big green gorilla types, definitely not tall and rangey.

Though.....there could be new breeds of Orcs?

Path Walker
01-21-2016, 04:36 PM
I'm interested in seeing what direction they go in with the Duradin, I know they're a ways off, but I got a box of Ironbreakers on a whim last week and now I want more!

Asymmetrical Xeno
01-21-2016, 05:26 PM
You'll never get Valkyrie models it's an existing fantasy trope and GW and definitely trying to produce something new with AoS. However this is probably going to be the thing that's going to give you what you want (or something like it). As Mystery says there are female characters popping up. In fact the first and I think only named Human In Gates of Azyr (and that was the first story released) is a woman I think the early indications are quite positive for you.

I meant in a general sense - I previously suggested them being inspired by Claymore (the anime)

grimmas
01-22-2016, 04:06 AM
I meant in a general sense - I previously suggested them being inspired by Claymore (the anime)

Fair enough. To be honest anime references go right over my head. After watching legend of the overfiend I tend to give that stuff a wide berth of course manga and anime may not even be the same thing as far as I know. Besides Sigmar sending out Valkyrie like warriors to recruit mighty mortal Heroes to join his Stormcast would be quite cool

Mr Mystery
01-22-2016, 04:46 AM
That is a cool mental image :)

After all, I don't think there's anything preventing him forging future Stormcast :)

From a background point of view, AoS and Episode VII have me as giddy as a kid again, because I don't know everything about their settings. Which of course means much reading is in my future!

grimmas
01-22-2016, 06:23 AM
I'm not so giddy about Star Wars 😝. The AoS developing story line has definitely got the old juicies flowing though.

Slowly catching up it's quite nice to see that the Old World and the events that occurred are not entirely forgotten. Just read a bit with a Stormcast expressing his surprise that Sigmar was just a man and not a god at one point and with the mention of their old pact with chaos in the Stormscorn description it's nice to see that even with its destruction the Old World and all that happened has not been erased.

Mr Mystery
01-22-2016, 06:40 AM
Yup.

The more I see, the more I'm intrigued.

The kick off was perhaps too Stomcast heavy. Whilst I understand the necessity (sales of new toys), I think it allowed those who were never going to give it a chance all they needed to make up nonsense about whole armies being dropped etc.

It's been out for 7 or so months now, and the pace of the background has been decent enough - shifting away from how awesome Stormcast are etc to exploring the Realms and that.

Erik Setzer
01-22-2016, 08:58 AM
I'm not so giddy about Star Wars 😝. The AoS developing story line has definitely got the old juicies flowing though.

Eh... On my end, the more I read of Star Wars background, the more it makes sense, whereas with AoS, the more I read, the more I feel they didn't have a coherent plan in place and are some day going to wake up with the realization there's a lot they'll have to retcon because they're already being contradictory.

Part of the problem with including the events of the "world-that-was" is that it brings up more questions. Like if these guys remember what was done to them, why don't they remember what they're called? How did all of these races get recreated exactly as they are, but can't remember who they are? Why are all these heroes alive again and seemingly immortal? Why did Archaon's motivations shift? How the heck do you bring a daemon back after it was destroyed to summon another daemon?

The naming thing just comes off as more ridiculous the more they try to tie in the old fluff (and it was just stupid to start with... there is no other word for it, it was a fit of stupidity by a group of morons wanting to trademark names for fantasy tropes because they seem to like paying lawyers). And the whole deal with bringing back all the dead people? Suddenly all the sacrifices were meaningless. The emotional impact of those deaths is negated. They meant nothing. And after the Skaven advanced quite a good bit in a short period of time, they've been stuck with absolutely no technological advancements for thousands of years, with the Stormfiends still being the pinnacle? There's nothing to explain these problems, because there was no central plan.

Sure, they have all these stories for the Golden Armor Brigade, but for those of us who find an army of people who all look the same and are meant to be Fantasy Space Marines to be boring, that's not helping that the rest of the fluff is largely a mess, and they're not showing the slightest concern in fixing it (probably because they don't think it's worth the money or time invested).

Asymmetrical Xeno
01-22-2016, 10:09 AM
fair point Erik, you aren't wrong - it has plenty of holes, but I htink that's more cos it's a "new world" and backround, hopefully they will iron out details and retcon/change things over time to improve it, sort of like how rogue trader developed into the 40k world we have today. Personally though I find that something to look forward to/interest me, but I can see where your coming from. Speaking personally, developing my own fictional universe has taken a lot of work over the past 5 years and I still find things I want to change or people point out various things that don't make sense I may of missed, allthough the GW team is a lot larger than just me.

grimmas
01-22-2016, 10:19 AM
Eh... On my end, the more I read of Star Wars background, the more it makes sense, whereas with AoS, the more I read, the more I feel they didn't have a coherent plan in place and are some day going to wake up with the realization there's a lot they'll have to retcon because they're already being contradictory.

Part of the problem with including the events of the "world-that-was" is that it brings up more questions. Like if these guys remember what was done to them, why don't they remember what they're called? How did all of these races get recreated exactly as they are, but can't remember who they are? Why are all these heroes alive again and seemingly immortal? Why did Archaon's motivations shift? How the heck do you bring a daemon back after it was destroyed to summon another daemon?

The naming thing just comes off as more ridiculous the more they try to tie in the old fluff (and it was just stupid to start with... there is no other word for it, it was a fit of stupidity by a group of morons wanting to trademark names for fantasy tropes because they seem to like paying lawyers). And the whole deal with bringing back all the dead people? Suddenly all the sacrifices were meaningless. The emotional impact of those deaths is negated. They meant nothing. And after the Skaven advanced quite a good bit in a short period of time, they've been stuck with absolutely no technological advancements for thousands of years, with the Stormfiends still being the pinnacle? There's nothing to explain these problems, because there was no central plan.

Sure, they have all these stories for the Golden Armor Brigade, but for those of us who find an army of people who all look the same and are meant to be Fantasy Space Marines to be boring, that's not helping that the rest of the fluff is largely a mess, and they're not showing the slightest concern in fixing it (probably because they don't think it's worth the money or time invested).

Horses for courses old boy. I feel that Star Wars suffers from the no central plan and it continuity is poor doesn't stop it being good fun. We've only really heard the Stormcast and Chaos stories so far it's no suprise there's questions pending although having read the End Times stuff it's fairly obvious how Tyrion et al "survived". As to the names well language changes over time The English spoken by my ancestors was very different to what we speak today I don't see a problem also Archaon is still after the same thing.

Still you don't have to like it I find it a great tale but if you don't that's fine.

Erik Setzer
01-22-2016, 11:52 AM
The messed up continuity actually made me not enjoy some things in the old Star Wars EU as much as I might have, like what KOTOR and SWTOR did to the universe shown in Tales of the Jedi, or the mess made of things with Dark Empire, which was kind of fun, but when you try to think about it in the general story line, it makes no sense and is impossible to fit in there. Coruscant gets lost by the New Republic just a couple of years after they take it in the first place? And then there's the fact that the Lusankya shows up in a comic set just a year later, meaning the NR had the resources to completely rebuild a Super Star Destroyer (and it was only maybe 3-4 years after it got practically destroyed). In the Dark Empire comics, the NR is a Rebel Alliance again on the run with barely any fleet and only two ISDs, but in the stories that ended up placed before that, they put together a good sized fleet and had multiple ISDs, not just two they captured at Endor. That's just one example of where things get mind-bogglingly out of shape, and it became a necessity that the storyline be blown up and started over.

Yeah, it's not just a GW thing with me, I prefer a cohesive story with anything.

Age of Sigmar's problem isn't just that it's new. It's that they wanted to completely replace the existing setting and change names and stuff, but didn't have a plan in place to explain it. A lot of it feels like they rushed things at the last minute, and by now I'm really convinced that's what they did. I don't think they're really that concerned with a coherent story, the story is just something for people to maybe read when they aren't longingly looking at their Citadel Miniatures Collection on their shelves. Then to get more money quicker, they throw out as many stories as they can and rush out a bunch of books (battle tomes and such) that add more to the mess without really being checked against each other. They dare not slow down, in case interest wanes...

They could have done it so much better. As it is, they're going to hit a point, in the not-too-distant future, where they'll be forced to do a large-scale retcon to make sense of things. It'd be preferable if they'd just stop until they sorted out the story, even if it means they already retcon a large chunk of it to present a better groundwork.

And no, the End Times don't give room for guys "surviving." They get literally erased from existence. Their return isn't explained anywhere, nor is Malekith forgetting his own name (which yeah, is just because Marvel has a leader of the Dark Elves named Malekith... I feel bad for Tyrion when they get around to watching/reading Game of Thrones). The only possible explanations are that someone was so insanely powerful they could bring them back into existence (at which point you're left wondering why this insanely powerful being isn't helping to fight Chaos), or this is all a fever dream Sigmar is having as he floats through the void trying desperately to believe he didn't really just watch the whole world get destroyed because he failed. (Actually, the dream thing makes sense, because Sigmar somehow increased his power by a massive amount.)

grimmas
01-22-2016, 02:44 PM
Short answer they weren't killed they were sucked into a wrap rift whilst the incarnates of various winds magic. Their spirits became trapped In their respective winds just as Sigmar did before Ayzr became bound to Karl Franz and Sigmar came back after he died during the siege of Altdorf. That's how they became immortal and "survived". It's all there. There can be a longer answer but I don't have the time or inclination. Re read or just read the End Times it's all there odds on favourite this is what happened.

Oh I'm not taking about the EU the films don't really add up.

Morgrim
01-23-2016, 05:33 AM
With the Seraphon the name change is easy to explain: "Lizardmen" was always a derogatory term applied to them by humans. It's easy to say that 'seraphon' is simply the best transcription of their native word for "servants of the old gods".

One could argue that Duarden (is that correct?) is similar for the Dwarves, or a word in their tongue that means something appropriate for the ones currently using it.

I doubt Malekith completely forgot his name. Much more likely that he took up a new one to symbolise his new path, having effectively been proven right all along about the Phoenix Throne. He'd hardly be the first elf to do so either.

grimmas
01-23-2016, 08:01 AM
Very good point Morgrim.

There's a fair precedent for that sort of thing in real life too. Its not that a far out thing to occur.

Asymmetrical Xeno
01-23-2016, 08:38 AM
Also agreed with Morgrim's post there. I actually like Seraphon and Duradin more than "lizardmen" and "dwarfs" personally. That said Aelves is pretty uninspired/boring though...

Erik Setzer
01-23-2016, 08:20 PM
Short answer they weren't killed they were sucked into a wrap rift whilst the incarnates of various winds magic. Their spirits became trapped In their respective winds just as Sigmar did before Ayzr became bound to Karl Franz and Sigmar came back after he died during the siege of Altdorf. That's how they became immortal and "survived". It's all there. There can be a longer answer but I don't have the time or inclination. Re read or just read the End Times it's all there odds on favourite this is what happened.

I read the End Times. It's pretty clear on what happened. They didn't get sucked into somewhere to be saved. They got completely obliterated. Now they come back as gods.

It's also insulting if you claim they were that powerful but couldn't stop Chaos destroying the Warhammer world, but were powerful enough to avoid being destroyed and come back as gods, but don't even have to work at it, because Chaos won't ever complete its victory now. They established things in End Times that they managed to completely contradict right out of the gates in Age of Sigmar.

I was excited for End Times. I wanted to see where Warhammer Fantasy Battles was going to go next. I know the End Times fluff. That's why I'm pissed off they brought people back. If they didn't want to deal with not being able to sell their expensive character models, they shouldn't have made them, or they should have held off and called them something else.

You need to reread or just read End Times yourself. Malekith's very essence is stripped away while he's being wiped out. It's all played up to suggest noble sacrifices fighting for an impossible goal, and now all of that means nothing. The whole story is cheapened because their deaths got retconned immediately.

It would make more sense to suggest the Old Ones decided to create new versions using "backups" they'd created, which were corrupted in some cases (hence Teclis is blind and Malekith merged his name with his dragon's). That would fit the narrative. But they didn't put thought into it. They got lazy.

Erik Setzer
01-23-2016, 09:09 PM
With the Seraphon the name change is easy to explain: "Lizardmen" was always a derogatory term applied to them by humans. It's easy to say that 'seraphon' is simply the best transcription of their native word for "servants of the old gods".

One could argue that Duarden (is that correct?) is similar for the Dwarves, or a word in their tongue that means something appropriate for the ones currently using it.

I doubt Malekith completely forgot his name. Much more likely that he took up a new one to symbolise his new path, having effectively been proven right all along about the Phoenix Throne. He'd hardly be the first elf to do so either.

Except:

1. Seraphon was the name of Malekith's black dragon. I doubt it would be the "true name" of the Lizardmen. They never had a name for themselves as a group because they didn't need it. The Slann were the Slann, all others were their slaves, their pet creations - Saurus, Skinks, etc. - that didn't merit a name as a whole. They only had a name because the people around them had to call them that.

2. Okay, you've explained those, but now what about Orruks, Troggoths, Gargants, Grots, etc.? Why did EVERYTHING change?

3. Well, since Malekith forgot who he even was as all memory of him was wiped from existence right before he physically was destroyed, one could understand him doing that. But if he was going to make some new name for his "new path," then why not other characters? Especially as the whole Phoenix King thing effectively doesn't matter, especially as the Elves (renamed Aelves because someone accidentally slipped an extra letter on there) are all eaten by Slaanesh and have been digesting in its stomach longer than the Sarlacc's victims are said to suffer (a few thousand years, I believe it's been). Even if he suddenly remembered all of that, why would it matter any more? There is no Phoenix King. The title means nothing. Their gods are gone, their home is gone, their world is gone, their people are currently gone.

The real answer is trademarks... And Malekith was too close to Marvel's Dark Elf leader Malekith. It's utterly stupid, but hey, that's what happens when a game company trades in its soul for attempts to make maximum short-term profit for a Board and shareholders.

Digging out my copy of ET: Archaon to remind people who forgot, a few choice passages from the end of the book:

"'Where would we go?' Tyrion replied grimly. 'This is the Rhana Dandra, the end of all things. There is no outrunning it.'"
"Alarielle turned back to gaze down at Malekith, a sudden strength back in her voice. 'It is not yours to wield. Our chance was lost, and our time is over.'"
...and a big one...
"The air was both scalding hot and freezing cold at the same time. Malekith could feel daemonic voices inside his skull, gnawing at what little remained of his sanity. Then the edge of the rift swept over him also, and with it a deep and impenetrable darkness.
"Malevolent laughter echoed about Malekith. Memories from the past danced before his eyes like phantoms: recollections of a father's coldness, and a mother's cruel love. In an instant, Malekith relived every betrayal, every malicious deed, and every failure.
"Suddenly, the memories were gone, cut away as if by a knight. The creature that had once been Malekith felt a moment of panic, for he found that he could not even recall his own name."

And the description of said rift's effects on the world:

"And so the mortal world fell away into oblivioun.
"The gnawing rift at the heart of mankind's domain devoured reality.
"...
"The Oak of Ages was swallowed last of all. Mournful dryad-song echoed under livid skies as Athel Loren perished. With its destruction, the Weave that bound time and space together thinned and stretched. Twisted by unnatural energies, it dissolved entirely into nothingness."

So there you have it. The rift wasn't some magical device spiriting them off to safety. It was a thing of pure destructive Chaos force, wiping out reality itself. (And if Malekith did survive, well, I suppose he *did* forget his own name there, so there's that.)

But we're not just talking the return of the Incarnates, nope. We've seen Thanquol still stomping around after thousands of years, which is pretty much impossible for a Skaven. We see the Mortarchs back in their exact same form. And it's selective, too. Grimgor was an incarnate, but instead of him, we get the "We can't remember what we said they were" Gorkamorka mess. Ungrim's nowhere around, but Grungni and Grimnir are suddenly back, and seem to be rolling with the fire aspect that Ungrim had used until he died. So that's some gods showing up, despite being destroyed, whereas other gods aren't showing up. Some Incarnates, some not. Some people showing up who are mortal now being immortal, some characters who can't exist are back around. And there's no explanation for it. (Nor is there any explanation on why Tyrion is a god but needs to see through Teclis, or where Malerion comes from, or if he's even Malekith, or why Tyrion heads off with Malerion but not Teclis despite needing Teclis to be able to see. Bonus points for the elves remembering the world before, and setting off to try to get revenge for it, despite not having a clear idea of what the heck's going on.)

Then there's the weird way they seem to portray characters different between books... In the first AoS book, Alarielle is clearly the old Everqueen who's still upset about what happened to the world. But then in The Quest for Ghal-Maraz, it says "Alarielle has existed in one form or another for aeons." So it's been aeons since the world died? Or are they changing her background on the fly?

And wait, why *is* Ghal-Maraz holding so much of Sigmar's power that he can't win a fight without it? And if it's that much of his power, why did he hand it to someone else? Can they explain why the heck his old Dwarf-made hammer is back (even if he survived, being some kind of ancient God from the Machine, that doesn't explain a basic magic weapon surviving), or why it's so much of his power? Did he decide to create some new facsimile of his old hammer and transfer a large portion of his power into it just because... um... reasons? The McGuffin Hammer just makes no sense, and yet there's a whole book about getting it back.

My ultimate wish is that they just stop writing, and take however long they need - six months, a year, two years - to make the story cohesive, figure out what exactly they want AoS to be, and then retcon what's been written and make a better story.

Not gonna happen, but these are wishes, not predictions.

grimmas
01-24-2016, 04:09 AM
The rift didn't spirit then off to safety you're being obstuse I didn't say that did I? Their link to the Wind of magic saved them (not necessarily completely).

The rift didn't destroy everything did it? It never did its right there in the End Time you can try to manipulate quotes to justify what you want but it's right there. But notice you can't find one that says Malkieth died because it doesn't, it says he (like Tyrion ,Nagash and others) were engulfed by the rift. They obviously didn't get totally destroyed just because you assumed they did doesn't the make it so.

Also the rift machine clearly had some unforeseen side effects. The destruction of the old world created the Realms it says so in the opening paragraph of AoS, to be honest sonething that could be used to explain anything you'd like, *Magic* it is fantasy after all.

Grimgor and Ungirm were dead before the Rift opened (Ungrim quite a while before there was even another incarnate after him). Alarielle existed in different forms on the Old Workd as well that's quite an important bit of the story line aeons is fine. Grimnir is covered in Slayer. Tyrions perspective on things before he was engulfed is hardly evidence of anything (although quite understandable).

Yeah stuff hasn't all been explained yet that's what a narrative is all about the story unfolds. But seriously dude it sounds like you are deliberately trying to find fault. Almost suspiciously so.

I respect your right not to like it but youre just ignoring the answers that are right there in front of you. Not in all cases because there are as yet unexplained things going on but you are on some quite major things.

We may need to agree to differ on this one I think we've played it out as far as it will go.

Erik Setzer
01-25-2016, 10:52 AM
Not ignoring the answers. I've read the stuff. Also not trying to find fault just to find fault. I could be a LOT pickier if I wanted to go that route. (And then I could also be just as insulting and claim you're trying to read things that aren't there and explain what isn't explained. Just as silly.)

I think there's potential, but they didn't plot it out, which is clear, and it's leading to contradictions and problems. Ditto for them attempting to continue selling certain models.

You're explaining away the Incarnates. But that still leaves the Mortarchs, who died, and weren't tied to the Winds of Magic. And if we can claim the Winds of Magic saved certain Incarnates, why couldn't they save Grimgor? See, that doesn't work.

They can explain these things, but they'd have to go retcon some of what they've written. Not really a huge deal because they're already doing it in some places. (Heck, they have to do it just to have any human factions in the game, given that all the human kingdoms and empires fell to Chaos, so, assuming people survived, they certainly don't have an army.)

This is a "wish list." So I'm just expressing my wish for them to slow down, stop trying to flood the marketing with fiction and background, and actually take the time to make sure it's all flowing together properly.

Also, yeah, if I was just finding fault just because I "hate" AoS (which seems like a fallback claim to use against anyone who isn't 100% positive), then that means I "hate" Star Wars given what I said about the old EU and how messy and contradictory and full of bad stories it got. Which is kind of funny given all the Star Wars stuff throughout my home (and even on my desk at work). But hey, the Age of Sigmar books I have, ebooks on my Kindle, and masses of GW figures are surely themselves just signs of my irrational hatred for GW and inability to know what I'm discussing.

I feel I should apologize because this seems to be getting to borderline hostile, but I'm just so tired of people answering any criticism with claims that people "hate" AoS or GW and don't play the games or spend money on the stuff and thus aren't allowed to have opinions. (Which is especially peculiar in a topic that is supposed to be about opinions.)

Mr Mystery
01-25-2016, 11:05 AM
But we don't know what happened to Grimgor.

We know from End Times the Orcs regarded him as Mork incarnate, and many Gobbos thought of Skarsnik as Gork incarnate.

We also know there's now a two headed Greenskin God called Gorkamorka, who can split into Gork and Mork when they fancy - that could well be Grimgor and Skarsnik reincarnated.

grimmas
01-25-2016, 11:15 AM
He did get his head chopped off by Archaon a very sad moment but he did get the best line in the whole series.

"Grimgor says shut up and die!"

Pithy, to the point and refers to himself in the third person as a good action quote should. I believe Archaon was being particularly irritating at the time as well.

I want him back stick that on my wishlist. I'm already chuckling at the GorkaMorka you describe.

Erik Setzer
01-25-2016, 12:10 PM
Given that Archaon seems to have his eye back, which IIRC Grimgor broke in the fight, that fight's either been retconned, or at least part of history can be "undone" when it suits the gods' need. (It's a copout, but eh, I'll roll with it if it means Grimgor's alive.)

I like when Malekith directed Grimgor at Archaon by saying something like, "How can you be the best if the world ends at someone else's hands?" Kind of helps show Grimgor's mentality.

It'd be easy to fluff off Grimgor being gone as just not wanting to continue on with resin character models, but Tyrion, Teclis, and Alarielle all had resin models rather than plastic. And Malekith/Malerion can't use the old model because he lost Seraphon. So while the models in existence are having some weird effects on the background, the absence of a plastic figure, or even an appropriate figure at all, doesn't mean a character is absent from the background.

Mr Mystery
01-29-2016, 07:23 AM
It was reforged - it's in his Battletome.

Reet, I've now read the Fyreslayers novel, and I'm intrigued.

Stunties largely remain Stunties - social structure, habits, attitude etc, but there are a few differences. They're not portrayed as being quite as dour, but given their entire race isn't in decline, that's not necessarily jarring. Indeed, they're comparatively dynamic - new Lodges being established/founded is no great shakes. Perhaps not common (tends to occur with the death of a Runefather from what these say) but far from unheard of.

So far, so good - and remember, this is just one type of Stunty, there's at least one other (Steamhead).

This makes me want to know more about how the other races have evolved and developed, particularly Elves, given we've had three distinct flavours since the get go of Warhammer.

My wishlist here? The old styles of the races still exist, but there's scope for blurring the lines and introducing new styles as your own take on the army (Wood Dwelling Murder Fanatics etc)

Erik Setzer
01-29-2016, 08:52 AM
It was reforged - it's in his Battletome.

Yeah, I caught that when looking back through the book, but that then makes Grimgor's death feel cheap and meaningless, especially as he hasn't showed up again. He was the guy who actually took on Archaon and, having killed him once in a universe that got wiped out and rebooted, fought him again and actually hurt the bringer of the apocalypse in a meaningful way before getting killed. Now that damage is completely undone. Poor Grimgor's death is so cheap now.

I'd hope for more NEW heroes, instead of all this "bringing back all the old heroes from the dead" stuff. But if we're going to do the old heroes, bring Grimgor back. He deserves another go-round.

Mr Mystery
01-29-2016, 08:57 AM
I think there'll always be a Grimgor - not necessarily Grimgor, but someone like him.

Heck, this time, we might have Seven of the big green blighters (I would say 8, but Azyr is meant to have been cleansed of Orcses entirely), one for each Realm.

And that is a seven sided punch up to be Da Biggest I'd like to see :)

Add it to my wishlist!

malisteen
01-30-2016, 11:48 AM
My wishlist:

More wimmins.
Less mins

I would like to strongly echo this sentiment. Thus far 'Age of Sigmar' might as well have been titled 'Party of Sausage'. There are a few female movers and shakers in the outskirts of the background, but they really don't seem to be getting much focus so far, and we're 6 months of new releases into the game and not a single female model among them (not counting round base re-packs).

Hopefully Neferata can make a good showing in Balance of Power, but after her garbage-tier treatment in the End Times campaign I'm not exactly hopeful.


As a Death player, I would like to see:

Neferata and Khalida - re-imagined as a mortarch in her own right - as a dynamic duo. Having left the bitter emnity of their blood feud behind in the wreckage of the old world, their rivalry would still strong, but now more friendly, as they rule the twin capitals of a new Nehekhara.

Isabella, after being saved by Vlad's sacrifice, this time choosing to honor that sacrifice by living for his memory rather than giving in to grief. I would like to see her as the new mortarch of shadow, and the founder and ruler of a new nation in the realm of Shyish modeled after her old home of Sylvania. I picture her as the unquestioned matriarch of a new line of Von Carstein vampires who rule over and protect their flock of human subjects/livestock, and as a figure uniquely positioned to be an intermediary between the living and the dead, her alliance courted by followers of both Sigmar and Nagash.

if I had my way, these characters would show up in a second triple-mortarch kit - same monster but with three new riders: Isabella (wearing Vlad's armor and carrying his sword and ring), Khalida, and Krell (who's been a good boy and deserves a treat in the form of a new plastic model).


At least, that's the kind of thing I'd like to see for the Death faction ladies. But I don't hold out a lot of hope, given how terrified GW's development and marketing teams seem to be of the girl cooties.