The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread

[Momotaro]

For the goodies - do a search on Blood Angels Sanguinary Guard for the general style, but imagine them in more fantasy armour with hand weapons and shields.  Some of them do indeed have wings and are flying.  So yeah, basically fantasied-up Space Marines.

For the Chaos baddies - same old same old with more bits and spikes and muscles.  A LOT more...

And round bases!

"Space Marine on the shitter" may be the pithiest summary...

BolS WFB rumour thread pages 107-108 for anyone who's interested.

[nic-e]

Beasts of war has posted a link to the picture of the sigmarites .
Also, apparently a leak from gw says that they will make the rules and starter kit army lists FREE to download. If that's true then the old world really is dead.

[3 fingers]

Mars Alpha Pattern Warlord Titan up for pre-order at ForgeWorld

The thing is massive, but I suppose the logic is that if you can afford it, you can afford a table big enough to hold it.

£1240.00 resin kit. But, hey, at least it's not limited edition 

Yeah,but you get free delivery,

[Vermis]

Mars Alpha Pattern Warlord Titan up for pre-order at ForgeWorld

The thing is massive, but I suppose the logic is that if you can afford it, you can afford a table big enough to hold it.

£1240.00 resin kit. But, hey, at least it's not limited edition  

Pretty, but ludicroumongous.

Looked for the Age of Sigmar pics on Dakka. Blimey, they really are just fantasy Space Marines! I mean, I've heard the rumours for ages, but the pic really (helden)hammers it home.

[Argonor]

New stuff looks very... 40K meets Warmahordes... to me.

Wondering if there is going to be some 'extinct' armies up for sale later this or next year.

[Dolmot]

40k is nowadays 30k.

FB is now 10k.

Both already use round bases. I can see where this is going.

[beefcake]

age of Sigmar. Looks crap if those pics are real, which I tend to believe. If I was into GW these days I would be seriously p'd off. If I wanted 40k I would buy 40k, not age of Sigmar which is looking like 40k but with more of a melee focus.

[matthais-mouse]

My immediate reaction to those images are 'oh look new space marine assault squad'.
They best continue the current range of warhammer models as otherwise it's the end of the line.
Maybe clan Eshin should send out one of their best assassins to see to the heads of the company...

[Nord]

In association with Fisher Price ..... it's HordesHammer.

Sad times. End of an era. 

[Tactalvanic]

age of Sigmar. Looks crap if those pics are real, which I tend to believe. If I was into GW these days I would be seriously p'd off. If I wanted 40k I would buy 40k, not age of Sigmar which is looking like 40k but with more of a melee focus.

I think beefys bile is pretty spot on

Absolutely - spot on.

Expect the the GW website blurb to now mention "XXX multipart boxed set makes x many troops" and "all parts are compatible with 40K minis to enable GW hobbyists to buy both and customise" ....

Still if it fails they can stick a backpack sprue in the box and call them Space Sigmarines.

The chaos stuff will be just fine as is.

Well done GW you now only do Warhammer

[Tactalvanic]

Pretty much agree there Scurv.

Its sad to see it go down the specialist game chute.

Still, the old rules are still going to be around regardless what they do.

Now a Force of bright blue Sigmarines... that's  an idea - with gold trim, Bolter-Hammers and big shields... But can I afford them?

[affun]

what really killed warhammer though?

I suspect it was the fact they could not protect their very generic IP warhammer IP from the hordes of imitators. Same deal with all the new look 40k being bought in to further buffer that IP.

The stupid pricing just added fuel to that particular fire as well as the imitators goods were often cheaper despite not having the mass manufacturing capability of GW.

Death by underpriced 'not' figures in my opinion.

My opinion is that it is a result of long periods of neglect and awful rules writing. Army doesn't sell because its rules are awful and old, doesn't get updated because it doesn't sell. Etc.
I don't think its fair to "blame" imitators for the "failure" of fantasy; if GW had (did) provide a competitive product, people would probably buy it. GW doesn't, in my opinion, even though they definitely have the capital to do.
What killed fantasy for me? I find the game incredibly noisy and boring. "Roll this fistful of 34 dice, remove these 20 figures. You cant do that because rule x says that y". It grew too focused on spectacle, and its market focus shifted to something I just did not like. I remember reading a blurb with a GW designer saying that "rolling dice is fun, rolling LOTS of dice is LOTS of fun", and that is the core of the systems problems to me.

Along with this shift of the system, their miniatures have gotten more and more overdesigned as the years go by, as if the amount of detail had to justify the price. Plastic Nagash was hideous, but these new ones 
There's too much crap on gw minis, and I hate painting them for that reason. They are like a colouring book in miniature form: Fill in the colours, but no space to do you own stuff. And it takes ages to finish to a decent standard, which is not good when you need ridiculous amounts of miniatures to play.

I think that the notion that fantasy "failed" is a bit weird, though. Fantasy failed, in the eyes of the company (We guess), because it wasn't making enough profit. 'enough' being the keyword. So they go and rebrand and redesign. The problem is that their redesign is so incredible inept, and unnecessary. As of now, it likes like yet another company not understanding what the good parts of their product were, and thus emphasizing the wrong ones.

I used to like warhammer because when my opponent showed up with a dragon, I had an army of poor bastards with halberds, cannons and grit to fight it. I guess you can say that it had a certain grounded-ness to its fantastical side. A grounded-ness it was easier to identify with, and create stories about. Now its all about big huge heroes fighting big huge monsters. The problem with spectactle though, is that it looses its effect if everything is spectacular.

I remain curious to see the new ruleset - if nothing else, then because I've been basing my fantasy-miniatures on round bases for a long time now - but I do not expect much.

[Vanvlak]

It's sad, though.
Warhammer was my second wargame, but the first I ever played, and the one I am most familiar with. 3 or 4 editions back I loved it to bits, took part in tournaments, and collected all the races barring Ogre Kingdoms. All these are now obsolete - well, not really, as I can still use them with my rule sets or with alternative rules. But even though I had long since given up keeping up with rulesbooks and editions, it's sad to know it's official development and support have been stopped.
It went out with a whimper in the end.

[Modhail]

I think that the notion that fantasy "failed" is a bit weird, though. Fantasy failed, in the eyes of the company (We guess), because it wasn't making enough profit. 'enough' being the keyword. So they go and rebrand and redesign. The problem is that their redesign is so incredible inept, and unnecessary. As of now, it likes like yet another company not understanding what the good parts of their product were, and thus emphasizing the wrong ones.

I used to like warhammer because when my opponent showed up with a dragon, I had an army of poor bastards with halberds, cannons and grit to fight it. I guess you can say that it had a certain grounded-ness to its fantastical side. A grounded-ness it was easier to identify with, and create stories about. Now its all about big huge heroes fighting big huge monsters. The problem with spectactle though, is that it looses its effect if everything is spectacular.

Weird that Warhammer Fantasy "failed", while Oldhammer is going from strength to strength, isn't it? I guess people will just play what they enjoy, despite a company's wishes or desires. People don't need to be told what they want, they already know, it's up to the company to provide it, if they wish to make a buck.

I have to agree on the grounded-ness being the appeal, I loved the fact that near-historical humans had to contend with all those monsters and belligerent fantasy races on their doorstep.
This new design is like wallpapering your walls, floor and ceiling with Heavy Metal album covers and then upholstering your rococo furniture with 2000A.D. cover art. Total overload.

"Welcome to GW, we have Warhammer 40K, 40K Out-of-Ammo edition, and don't mind that Hobbit bleeding out in the corner..."  

This...This..this Age of SigMarines just proved GW's statement in the last investor report is true, they don't do market research.

I want humans in my fantasy, not gold-plated roid-apes.

[Brummie]

Well this does look like it will be disappointing after all. And they may as well be Space Marines, given the mention of 'God King'. They're pulling that one again then things are bound to get dull.

I think the original problem as has been mentioned, with Warhammer was its generic IP. I think that's the problem with a lot of fantasy overall; it rarely deviates from the norm, I.E Orcs, Goblins, Elves etc or even attempt to impose characteristics on those races that are unusual. Or alternatively things are made far too unusual that no one can relate to the content and it gets off putting. My biggest complaint with most fantasy backgrounds is the lack of variety or the presence of a considerable 'grey' area.

Fantasy also suffers from a certain level of prejudice that Science Fiction has managed to largely relieve itself from. Fantasy is still seen as the domain of the stereotypical nerd, with few exceptions; Game of Thrones made fantasy far more acceptable as it very readily introduced themes that people don't generally expect from a fantasy genre.

However of course with tabletop gaming, unless you attach say a game to a particular world that did what GoT did (admittedly GoT is pretty tame in the monsters department, but they may have added to its success) people are just going to see it as being pretty unexciting stuff.

Maybe with the upcoming release of Warhammer: Total War, more interest would have been generated in the franchise, but we won't now know as they're clearly scrapping it