Let's have a GW rumors and sneak peeks thread!

[The Other Dave]

Ooh, a Crusade mission pack coming out! It's "set" within the Pariah Nexus, whatever that is, but has missions, relics and what-not that are narratively connected to that. Seems a cool idea. Looks like they're planning, or leaving things open for, similar mission packs set in various warzones - so in 8th edition we might have gotten a Vigilus campaign pack and what have you.

New WarCry box set, flame guys plus shadow elves.

The new Underworlds season core set (Direchasm) will me Lumineth vs Slaanesh, which is nice. Plus one of the expansion warbands is confirmed as lizardmen.

[Jye Nicolson]

Ooh, a Crusade mission pack coming out! It's "set" within the Pariah Nexus, whatever that is, but has missions, relics and what-not that are narratively connected to that. Seems a cool idea. Looks like they're planning, or leaving things open for, similar mission packs set in various warzones - so in 8th edition we might have gotten a Vigilus campaign pack and what have you.

Good, we'll need more missions and more stuff pretty fast. Also we have a fairly enthusiastic Necron player now so the Pariah Nexus is narratively appropriate!

New WarCry box set, flame guys plus shadow elves.

WarCry Arena should be really fun, I very much enjoyed the Kill Team version. Also good for those of us who don't want to carry too much terrain If there's holding doors closed shenanigans like in KT though the fast and teleporting teams will have a field day.

[The Other Dave]

WarCry Arena should be really fun, I very much enjoyed the Kill Team version. Also good for those of us who don't want to carry too much terrain If there's holding doors closed shenanigans like in KT though the fast and teleporting teams will have a field day.

The set looks like a really good deal too - you get not-quite all the terrain that came in the original core set, plus the doors and bridges and stuff for Lava Dungeons. Hell, it's tempting to pick it up just to have a full Combat Patrol sized board with nice feudal world ruins for 40K. It helps that I like the look of the fire guys too.

[Karantu]

++++++++RANT INCOMING++++++++

Please skip this post if you don't like negativity and don't want to have to deal with my failure to see if the bright side of things.



Firstly, the new book for Crusade and Matched Play both feel a bit weird to me.

They weren't clear about how the new campaign expansion would work with existing Crusades but it sounds like they're adding more tables of all sorts for games played in the new "zone". It feels very much like DLC given the type and amount of content it seems to contain. Which means that if they price it appropriately its not too bad but this is GW who we're talking about.

The Matched Play book on the other hand is very questionable. It's obvious that they're coming from the standpoint of trying to push more terrain kits but this could have so many implications for both gameplay and the hobby. If it becomes a norm for GW stores/hobby stores to require people to bring their own terrain it's going to make the barrier to entry that much higher. Additionally, since GW hates people denying them sales, they might ban non-GW terrain at GW stores and events. The majority of the terrain market is non-GW at the moment so from a corporate standpoint I see what they're going for if that is their plan, but the hobby side of making terrain is all about DIY and stuff so I'd hate it if they tried to kill that and force everyone to buy their terrain instead.

In terms of gameplay things are pretty weird too. So far in 9th, given how some rules have changed and the boards have gotten smaller, terrain has become a lot more important than it was in 9th. Over the last week or so we've been struggling to find fair terrain layouts that provide benefits and challenges to all armies without favoring any particular play style and it hasn't been the easiest job. Depending on how the rules work for players placing their terrain, and the limitations and/or regulations on the types and amounts of terrain you are allowed to bring to a game, things could get out of hand really fast. It will throw a wrench into the current balance of the game in the favour of really gimmicky mechanics and will feel extremely game-y. The only way I see this working is with extremely strict fixed layouts that you have to pick from which aren't horribly cheesy but even then I feel like it's another layer of complexity that GW will struggle with and fail to balance to a satisfactory level.

Meanwhile, in the Mortal Realms filled with immortals with plot armour, they announced a new series of books. From their explanation, it sounds like Psychic Awakening but for AoS so its going to throw it a lot more things to keep track of to be able to play AoS up-to-date. New content is good but piecemeal content can be annoying. Especially given that it's still mostly a physical format. At least the AoS app is superior to the 40k dumpster fire of an app.

They've also gotten really good at recycling concepts with their product lines which makes things really feel like they've been devised in a room full of brainstorming interns. In addition to Psychic Awakening: AoS edition there's also a new boxset coming along with it which again locks new character models behind a boxset full of old models.
Arena for Warcry (with a new boxset which has one questionably flat battleground and one terrain light battleground) which seems like a terrible entryway into Warcry and the hobby since it's going to cost an arm and a leg. The verticality is usually a big appeal of skirmish games so their implementation of the the unique elements of the setting will greatly influence whether or not the subterranean board will be a fun experience.
A new season of Underworlds, which even though I don't play I'm getting concerned about their capacity to balance that many factions. Also I'm not a huge fan of the direction they might be going with the new Lizardman from just seeing that Chameleon Skink.

Overall, I feel like GW has figured out how profitable it is to hire more "rules" "writers" and "editors" to pump out "content" in the form of books which they can print for peanuts in China and sell them an a criminally high markup while easily being able to scale production and therefore products without having to invest much into it or having to take any significant risks. Especially with narrative play (i.e. Crusade) the only quality they need in that product is variety and theme since they can hand wave any terribly written rules or horribly balance issues as it being narrative play. As much as I am looking forward to more content their approach to its delivery as well as the sort of content is leaving me feeling anxious. The Psychic awakening series and now the new book series for AoS are also probably part of this business model and it feels really gross to me deep down inside.



I'm sorry if I ruined anyone's experience of the hobby but I'm only complaining this much because of how much I'm into the hobby. Unfortunately at the end of the day its all plastic toys and GW is a corporation who's main goal is to make more money and that's just how the world works.

[The Other Dave]

As for terrain, we won't know how it ends up in the real world until everything shakes out of course, but the ad copy certainly reads like "this is an option for TOs who don't have a huge pile of terrain" more than "all 40K tournaments from here on in will require players to bring terrain". I'm reading it as a way for those TOs to get players to bring terrain and still (as much as possible*) end up with board setups that are more or less fair to everyone. LVO and similar big tourneys that can and do provide ITC-sanctioned terrain for all 150 tables they have can continue to do so. And TBQH creating a standard of "all players should bring some terrain along" is... not a bad thing at all just in general.

*OFC, it remains to be seen how good the rules end up being, but eh. I've opined about the brass ring of perfectly fair terrain setups elsewhere.

[The Other Dave]

Speaking of - not GW, but obviously directly related. Some clever folks are kickstartering a set of pop-up terrain. Clever, and looks nice:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBQk-8Nkn3c

A bit sparse right out of the box, but it would be easy enough to supplement with some scatter stuff. A KS to keep an eye on, to be sure.

[Jye Nicolson]

Glass half full side:

I'm happy for Crusade DLC. Only one person needs it for the missions, and assuming there's Battle Honours etc in there, good to have more generically available stuff rather than being core book or waiting for the Codex.

The terrain book I'm not planning on buying. For gaming in Nagoya we're already bringing our own terrain, for tournaments in general I might *maybe* go to a Tokyo tournament some time when that seems like a reasonable idea, and will cross that bridge when I come to it. For better or worse feels like limited applicability to our situation.

Warcry I don't see any reason to assume it'll be more than a "normal" core? It's wouldn't be surprised if they snuck in a small price rise but seems like a similar amount of plastic (possibly less without the Chaotic Beasts) and slightly more rules? I think I'll probably buy because on top of everything else a second bell tower means I can make a second ruin Obscuring for 40k

As for Underworlds they can't balance that many teams but the competitive side balances around everyone owning everything (or at least for the current and previous season) so in practice players don't usually get stranded the way a wargame faction waiting for a rebalance can be.

[The Other Dave]

Warcry I don't see any reason to assume it'll be more than a "normal" core? It's wouldn't be surprised if they snuck in a small price rise but seems like a similar amount of plastic (possibly less without the Chaotic Beasts) and slightly more rules? I think I'll probably buy because on top of everything else a second bell tower means I can make a second ruin Obscuring for 40k

This point is the biggest temptation for me TBH - the main thing is actually just that I'm not especially interested in the elves. (OTOH, I really like the fire guys...)

As for Underworlds they can't balance that many teams but the competitive side balances around everyone owning everything (or at least for the current and previous season) so in practice players don't usually get stranded the way a wargame faction waiting for a rebalance can be.

Also TBH I think balance is in a very good place right now, despite their being, what, 26 warbands? There are definitely "tiers" when you look at top-level play, but they actively work to keep balance in check, and just added another balance tool to their toolkit with limits on in-faction cards. You see YouTubers beating Beastgrave warbands with, like, Skaven or the Eyes of the Nine - I think that for 99% of players, player skill and how the dice roll will trump warband power level in most cases.

[The Other Dave]

In sneak peaks news: Aaargh, my wallet! The final Blackstone expansion is dropping next week.

[me_in_japan]

You think you guys have troubles? You should see the release schedule for MtG these days. It used to be 3 sets a year, plus a core set of reprints. Nowadays, we’ve got Core Set 21 (last month), Jumpstart (last month), double masters (this month), Zendikar (next month), Commander Green (not a set, but a collection of some very good cards) and Commander Legends in December. Prices of these vary but are 1man or more each. And that’s just for a box. God help you if you want the complete set.

And I also play Underworlds.

Pity me, brethren, pity me...