The Rumour Thread

[Ogregut]

21 minutes ago, Ejecutor said:

What about Tirion and Malerion stopping the Skavens?

As a life long dark elf player I can't wait for Malerion the rightful and one true Phoenix King to take his place as ruler of the realms, but I'll love for Nagash to finally get some revenge on the Skaven and stop their diabolical plans for once. 

[Beliman]

I have a hard time following AoS story. It has some epic moments, but most of the time, it feels like there is too much bloat and factions and characters come and go without finishing their plots, schemes or any agenda. I'm starting to think that most of this side-characters are hollow, they don't have anything for the reader, they are there because the story demanda a villain (maybe for new rules, or maybe for a new model).

[Ejecutor]

13 minutes ago, Beliman said:

I have a hard time following AoS story. It has some epic moments, but most of the time, it feels like there is too much bloat and factions and characters come and go without finishing their plots, schemes or any agenda. I'm starting to think that most of this side-characters are hollow, they don't have anything for the reader, they are there because the story demanda a villain (maybe for new rules, or maybe for a new model).

I could miss some other examples, but from the top of my head, Kragnos is the only one that really vanished, right? At least all the other characters are still around and could take their appearance slot one day, like Reikenor.

[Baron Klatz]

2 hours ago, Ejecutor said:

Shouldn't be also removed from the game for the time being? 😅

He’s still a god so his worshippers can manifest his immaterial presence to fight alongside them.

We see this constantly with Nagash right now and many times with Archaon astral projecting himself to oversee his forces across the Realms, god-Teclis both doing that and using a aspect of himself as a decoy and even a piece that showed Grimnir’s essence supporting his Fyreslayer warriors(though the FEC madness was making him slightly manifest as a ghoulish god as well thanks to the Death energies in the battle)

 

2 hours ago, Ejecutor said:

Can you elaborate?

That was part of the Broken Realms plot. Belakor tricked the Seraphon to blast a Silver Tower out of space and collide with a Realmgate with that mixed energy that caused a chain reaction detonating many realmgates in the Spiral Crux and tearing a hole in reality open that unleashed the Cursed Skies.

However this seemed to be mostly the central gates on that continent and the important ones on the edges that lead to other realms, such as at Vindicarum & the Greyfyrd Lodge’s multiple nexus realmgates that let’s them merc across the realms, were untouched.(probably why the chain reaction happened since it was the purely Chamon portals linked to eachother)

It had the worse effect on the free cities in the Crux having lost their travel & trade routes, however the 2022 WD issue noted this need caused a rush of ingenuity and they got around this by constructing new railroads and train stations to make up for the lack of gateways to move important goods quickly across the continent.

(I’m hoping they remember that for a set-up in Chamon down the line with some conductor city-duardin CoS heroes and some train robbery orruk & gitmob raider/Grotbag pirate shenanigans 🚂)

Edited June 8 by Baron Klatz

[Ejecutor]

1 minute ago, Baron Klatz said:

He’s still a god so his worshippers can manifest his immaterial presence to fight alongside them.

We see this constantly with Nagash right now and many times with Archaon astral projecting himself to oversee his forces across the Realms, god-Teclis both doing that and using a aspect of himself as a decoy and even a piece that showed Grimnir’s essence supporting his Fyreslayer warriors(though the FEC madness was making him slightly manifest as a ghoulish god as well thanks to the Death energies in the battle)

 

That was part of the Broken Realms plot. Belakor tricked the Seraphon to blast a Silver Tower out of space and collide with a Realmgate with that mixed energy that caused a chain reaction detonating many realmgates in the Spiral Crux and tearing a hole in reality open that unleashed the Cursed Skies.

However this seemed to be mostly the central gates on that continent and important ones on the edges, such as at Vindicarum & the Greyfyrd Lodge’s multiple nexus realmgates that let’s them merc across the realms, were mostly untouched.

It had the worse effect on the free cities in the Crux having lost their travel & trade routes, however the 2022 WD issue noted this need caused a rush of ingenuity and they got around this by constructing new railroads and train stations to make up for the lack of gateways to move important goods quickly across the continent.

(I’m hoping they remember that for a set-up in Chamon down the line with some conductor city-duardin CoS heroes and some train robbery orruk & gitmob raider/Grotbag pirate shenanigans 🚂)

I can clearly see an AoS version of Thomas the Train now.

[Baron Klatz]

1 minute ago, Ejecutor said:

I can clearly see an AoS version of Thomas the Train now.

The ultimate showdown for the Realm of Metal on the ground floor of the Realmscapes.

CoS armored Thomas trains vs Chuardin daemon trains.

[cyrus]

38 minutes ago, Ogregut said:

As a life long dark elf player I can't wait for Malerion the rightful and one true Phoenix King to take his place as ruler of the realms, but I'll love for Nagash to finally get some revenge on the Skaven and stop their diabolical plans for once. 

Yes , and we had the hint from Whitefang about Death to be main protagonist in 4th edition.

[Tonhel]

5 hours ago, Sception said:

This is true, and they do deserve some slack, but it's frustrating that it feels like none of the big events & narrative threads going into 3e got any real follow up.  Kragnos's rampage?  petered out.  Belakor's rebellion against Archaon?  Naver happened.  Grand alliance order breaking up over Morathi's betrayal?  Nah they're all still fine.  Shyish falling into civil war between Mannfred & Neferata as soon as Nagash & Arkhan are off the table?  Well, that's supposedly happening, but we never get to see it   Hunt for slaanesh?  On hiatus.  Archaon v Katakros in the 8 points?  Well Archaon did assault Katakros's fortress, but not to any appreciable effect on the map.  Olynder allying with Belakor?  is that even still a thing?  Belakor's cloud shrouding the realms in perpetual storms & darkness?  that was just an excuse for new stormcast armor, no actual effect on the people, setting, or story.  Chamon cut off from the other realms?  We hardly even looked at any realms other than ghur, so it hardly mattered to anything we actually got to see.

like, I get that their plans & production schefule got disrupted, but it hardly seems like they had any plans at all, any now we're just rushing forward with new plot threads and all the old ones will just be left unresolved entirely.

GW always used it backgroud as a tool to sell mini's, but with AoS they dialed it up to 11. There is no coherency, maybe it's because the AoS universe is so immense and there is so much to cover. I don't know. But it all feels shallow and meaningless.

Edit: I love the AoS mini's and looking forward to playing AoS 4th edition, but the world/background never managed to lure me in.

Edited June 8 by Tonhel

[Beliman]

1 hour ago, Ejecutor said:

I could miss some other examples, but from the top of my head, Kragnos is the only one that really vanished, right? At least all the other characters are still around and could take their appearance slot one day, like Reikenor.

I wasn't talking about a "physical vanishing" from the setting. I don't know, even if the Crusade is the main driver of the narrative, all other character seems to be just special guests instead of players in the same board.

15 minutes ago, Tonhel said:

GW always used it backgroud as a tool to sell mini's, but with AoS they dialed it up to 11. There is no coherency, maybe it's because the AoS universe is so immense and there is so much to cover. I don't know. But it all feels shallow and meaningless.

Not sure about that. 40k seems to be the same size (or bigger) and have stories that I'm a bit jealous. I would pray to Sigmar, Nagash or even Gorkamorka for a badab war like campaign for AoS. 

Edited June 8 by Beliman

[Chikout]

I don't think AoS is shallow at all. Weirdly I think the problems with the narrative are caused by AoS getting deeper and in particular the introduction of the cities of Sigmar named characters. There's always a conflict between GW as company that writes narratives and a company that makes miniatures. This isn't a new problem. You always knew that Thanquol and Gotrek would survive their novels because they had minis. In the early days of AoS GW avoided this problem by not making models for the likes of Thostos. The immortal Stormcast and the many gods  also allowed gw to make big time jumps without leaving their characters behind. 

Now they have characters like Tahlia and Callis and Toll. If they do another time jump, those characters will be dead. A lot of the ongoing narratives that people want to see resolved are blocked by the slowing down of the narrative. It's no coincidence that we've moved from the Era of the Beast to the Hour of Ruin.

Also I think the majority of the novels after the realmgate wars are simply more interesting than almost anything from Warhammer Fantasy. 

[Beliman]

4 minutes ago, Chikout said:

Now they have characters like Tahlia and Callis and Toll.

Not sure about that. We had miniatures and rules to play dead characters. That was never a problem before.

Arkhan, Nagash, Huron Blackheart at the same time of Luft Huron or more recently, both versions of Tycho.

Imho, the problem is not the setting or characters.

[Sarouan]

19 minutes ago, Beliman said:

Not sure about that. 40k seems to be the same size (or bigger) and have stories that I'm a bit jealous. I would pray to Sigmar, Nagash or even Gorkamorka for a badab war like campaign for AoS. 

It's not a secret 40k gets more attention and ressources from 40k designers / storytellers, because it's their biggest selling IP from far.

That's why they are much more careful about removing miniatures from the store in comparison to AoS / other games (and why you can still buy old "regular" Space Marines instead of only Primaris, while Stormcast Edition got a really big cut recently). That's also the reason they never dared blowing up 40k universe to make a new game like they did with Battle.

Would be great to have also other derivative games in AoS like a naval game or a 10mm scale massive wargame (and they don't have to work hard on their rules, they already have the basis written for them with Man O' War and Warmaster ), while GW made Aeronautica Imperialis, Titanicus and Legion Imperialis in the 40k universe (I know, some are more focused on Horus Heresy time period, but it's just the past of 40k, it's still the same IP). But it's very clear that's not their priority, given what happened with the Old World project and quite "low key releases" they went with in comparison to Horus Heresy that got a lot more of new models in full plastic from the start.

They can afford to release such games like Legion Imperialis with the 40k IP, but apparently they can't with the AoS one. It's sad, but it seems like that's just what things are at the moment.

[Chikout]

21 minutes ago, Beliman said:

Not sure about that. We had miniatures and rules to play dead characters. That was never a problem before.

Arkhan, Nagash, Huron Blackheart at the same time of Luft Huron or more recently, both versions of Tycho.

Imho, the problem is not the setting or characters.

Those are all bad examples. Nagash and Arkhan are literally undead characters who can be killed any time. Lugft Huron was a historical character made by forge world and Tycho is a perfect example of the problem. He was a character that got killed off, but the playerbase got so mad, they had to bring him back. The same thing is happening with Yarrick right now. He wasn't in the most recent codex. The playerbase got mad and now GW are teasing a return. 

In 40k GW realised they moved the timeline on too quickly and had to retcon everything to reset it. 

 

[Vagard]

15 hours ago, Ejecutor said:

Hum? Did we? I gotta see that!

 

18 hours ago, HorticulusTGA said:

Do you mean new models like the ones that came with Dominion ? 

 

Those 4 round objectives, the battle mat also had a "warhammer" logo on it

Edited June 8 by Vagard

[Ragest]

Broken Realms was a fantastic campaign and an amazing trip for the Mortal Realms, but three years later, just look like a complete scam

And I don’t really think that COVID and such are valid excuses for that, we had Thondia, and was a light campaing with nothing about the past events.

For me, the problem was that they focused all 3rd lore about presenting more names in a hurry instead of developing old ones.

Skragrott was having problems with Tzeentch in Broken Realms, so Gloomspite already had a plot, Trugg doing nothing but RAMPAGE was unneccessary, and now Skragrott is facing Skaven instead. 
Lumineth were facing Idoneth and Daughters at the end of Broken Realms, but now their plot is just about Phoenicum. Why? Because they have to introduce a new character.

Belakor was plotting against Stormcast with Olynder, now is plotting against Archaon, but Archaon doesn't care about, because he’s there just to introduce the new big bad of 4th. And what about Katakros? Nothing at all. Slaanesh? Good joke.

Morathi just declare a war against Stormcast and Lumineth, where that go? Well, Morathi was chasing his snake avatar (wtf????) until a new character appears, so she just forgot about her previous agenda to focus in the new miniature, because it seems like in the Mortals Realms, even the most atrocius decisions have not consecuences at all.

Those are just some examples, I'm pretty sure you can find more plots without and end and chages of agendas everywhere in the books.

My fear is that they keep this way to write the lore, so we will find themselves into a mess where the new miniatures are the epicentre of everything and all characters suffer some kind of amnesia that forces them to just focus in that new player in the Mortal Realms.

[Beliman]

11 minutes ago, Chikout said:

Those are all bad examples. Nagash and Arkhan are literally undead characters who can be killed any time. Lugft Huron was a historical character made by forge world and Tycho is a perfect example of the problem. He was a character that got killed off, but the playerbase got so mad, they had to bring him back. The same thing is happening with Yarrick right now. He wasn't in the most recent codex. The playerbase got mad and now GW are teasing a return. 

But we are talking about models that were killed/ vanished/ whatever but still have rules to play with. All of them are perfect examples for that specific case, even if some of them have an excuse (or not) to return later. The point is that GW can kill Callis&Toll and it will not be a problem for players if they can still use their miniatures (I find a bigger problem when they retire an entire army).

[The Lost Sigmarite]

GW casually dropping a new Skaven named character in yesterday's DB short was not what I was expecting, but I'm here for it.

[Crypt]

3 hours ago, Ogregut said:

As a life long dark elf player I can't wait for Malerion the rightful and one true Phoenix King to take his place as ruler of the realms, but I'll love for Nagash to finally get some revenge on the Skaven and stop their diabolical plans for once. 

#notmypheonixking 

[ArcLight]

2 hours ago, Ejecutor said:

I can clearly see an AoS version of Thomas the Train now.

Thomas the cogfort?

[JackStreicher]

2 hours ago, Baron Klatz said:

 

[Baron Klatz]

38 minutes ago, Beliman said:

The point is that GW can kill Callis&Toll

Probably not the best example since those two are AoS’ Gotrek & Felix with now being on the introduction animations too and going to be from their perspectives a lot of lore in the new Corebook since they’re the mortal eyes to it all.

A better example would be Galen & Doralia ven Densts as expendable characters to a degree. 
 

But I feel Chikout’s point still stands. With the changing viewpoints of the lore to more in-depth mortal eyes at times it’s just gonna get messy when we go from train speed of gods to a crawl speed of people on the ground they need us to invest in.

At least when compared to Wfb’s & 40k’s transitions from their 3rd to 4th editions AoS is still far less crazy, we just have some sidelined characters instead of entire nations & planets retconned into vastly different things that barely resemble the past lore.😄

1 hour ago, Chikout said:

Now they have characters like Tahlia and Callis and Toll. If they do another time jump, those characters will be dead. A lot of the ongoing narratives that people want to see resolved are blocked by the slowing down of the narrative. It's no coincidence that we've moved from the Era of the Beast to the Hour of Ruin.

At least they were smart to give themselves some breathing room with Aqua Ghyranis which can extend their lifespans to over a century.

 

But yeah, with the newer named mortal focus having shorter timeframes and juggling between people on the ground looking at the lore with magnifying glasses and jumping out to the gods with telescopes & century long plans, things are gonna get interesting with the pacing. 
 

End of the day it’s more worlds-building for the glorious Mortal Realms and getting to explore its characters and bizarre shifting realmscapes as maps expand, cities rise & fall and new monstrous continents arise/appear/erupt/transmogrify 

So I’m excited! 🤩

Also really liked this tweet, gimme Moar Lore:

Edited June 8 by Baron Klatz

[Ejecutor]

3 hours ago, Tonhel said:

GW always used it backgroud as a tool to sell mini's, but with AoS they dialed it up to 11. There is no coherency, maybe it's because the AoS universe is so immense and there is so much to cover. I don't know. But it all feels shallow and meaningless.

Edit: I love the AoS mini's and looking forward to playing AoS 4th edition, but the world/background never managed to lure me in.

I think the root of the problem is that we are still setting the pillars of the game. I know, it sounds weird after almost 10 years, but that's the truth.

[Tonhel]

1 minute ago, Ejecutor said:

I think the root of the problem is that we are still setting the pillars of the game. I know, it sounds weird after almost 10 years, but that's the truth.

They lost me already with the AoS universe, another 10 years will not fix this. ;-). But this isn't a problem. The AoS mini's are cool and 4th edition seems to be a good ruleset, that will be fun to play.

[Ejecutor]

2 hours ago, Chikout said:

I don't think AoS is shallow at all. Weirdly I think the problems with the narrative are caused by AoS getting deeper and in particular the introduction of the cities of Sigmar named characters. There's always a conflict between GW as company that writes narratives and a company that makes miniatures. This isn't a new problem. You always knew that Thanquol and Gotrek would survive their novels because they had minis. In the early days of AoS GW avoided this problem by not making models for the likes of Thostos. The immortal Stormcast and the many gods  also allowed gw to make big time jumps without leaving their characters behind. 

Now they have characters like Tahlia and Callis and Toll. If they do another time jump, those characters will be dead. A lot of the ongoing narratives that people want to see resolved are blocked by the slowing down of the narrative. It's no coincidence that we've moved from the Era of the Beast to the Hour of Ruin.

Also I think the majority of the novels after the realmgate wars are simply more interesting than almost anything from Warhammer Fantasy. 

That's not true. GW can make as many time jumps as they want and justify mortals life length thanks to Aqua Ghyranis.

That said, they relocated the Callis and Toll novels frame so they weren't that old.

[Ejecutor]

2 hours ago, Sarouan said:

It's not a secret 40k gets more attention and ressources from 40k designers / storytellers, because it's their biggest selling IP from far.

That's why they are much more careful about removing miniatures from the store in comparison to AoS / other games (and why you can still buy old "regular" Space Marines instead of only Primaris, while Stormcast Edition got a really big cut recently). That's also the reason they never dared blowing up 40k universe to make a new game like they did with Battle.

Would be great to have also other derivative games in AoS like a naval game or a 10mm scale massive wargame (and they don't have to work hard on their rules, they already have the basis written for them with Man O' War and Warmaster ), while GW made Aeronautica Imperialis, Titanicus and Legion Imperialis in the 40k universe (I know, some are more focused on Horus Heresy time period, but it's just the past of 40k, it's still the same IP). But it's very clear that's not their priority, given what happened with the Old World project and quite "low key releases" they went with in comparison to Horus Heresy that got a lot more of new models in full plastic from the start.

They can afford to release such games like Legion Imperialis with the 40k IP, but apparently they can't with the AoS one. It's sad, but it seems like that's just what things are at the moment.

Don't forget that 30k got most of their new plastic kits since the second edition. Before it was like TOW.