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tneva82 wrote:

 Overread wrote:
It would at least make some sense in the setting. Honestly I think the issue with AoS is that there's no overall "master" of the setting creating it. It's really a cobbled together case of "this seems cool" from writers and creators - each one creating basically small self contained pockets of lore and info and development; but without that sense of thinking beyond the story they write in the moment.

So you get really wild and crazy things going on; but no one is pausing to go "so wait how DO they farm" or "so just how do they trade" or even "so just what does the average person live like?"

So as soon as you start asking those questions things get a bit iffy. Like how it can be said that realms are the most variable in certain areas and less so in others; but that only means that those living in calm areas might have it easier and those in more wild areas still have no argument for how they survive or why they'd even move there.


I suspect in the fullness of time we might get these answers, but I'd wager they'd come with some ret-cons or some "and then Nagash did a thing and something stopped happening and things settled down"

Well we know realms aren't all same. Realm of fire isnt all firestorm. Water, farmable land etc are there.

Wd had nice article about that.

There was a whole series of them, as I recall. They were easy to miss, though. They didn't really make it clear what they were for and the other lore sections of AoS books don't illustrate what normal life looks like in the Mortal Realms very well.

It doesn't help that a lot of GW's direct fiction often focuses on wars/battles/major events.

Personally I felt like the Novellas that they started doing way back at the start of AoS actually did a lot of good as they tended to be smaller stories and actually focused on a lot of what I consider good worldbuilding elements.

The bigger stories I find tend to get hooked on the big things going on which leaves the small person/small group behind

If you want smaller, more personal stories, the horror novels lean into that.

Yeah I've been meaning to get into those! Though I've a feeling I'll be distracted by Brets for a while so will likely end up picking up their Chronicle Omnibus book after I get through the newest one.

 Scottywan82 wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Overread wrote:
It would at least make some sense in the setting. Honestly I think the issue with AoS is that there's no overall "master" of the setting creating it. It's really a cobbled together case of "this seems cool" from writers and creators - each one creating basically small self contained pockets of lore and info and development; but without that sense of thinking beyond the story they write in the moment.

So you get really wild and crazy things going on; but no one is pausing to go "so wait how DO they farm" or "so just how do they trade" or even "so just what does the average person live like?"

So as soon as you start asking those questions things get a bit iffy. Like how it can be said that realms are the most variable in certain areas and less so in others; but that only means that those living in calm areas might have it easier and those in more wild areas still have no argument for how they survive or why they'd even move there.


I suspect in the fullness of time we might get these answers, but I'd wager they'd come with some ret-cons or some "and then Nagash did a thing and something stopped happening and things settled down"

Is there a list of what white dwarves they are in?

Well we know realms aren't all same. Realm of fire isnt all firestorm. Water, farmable land etc are there.

Wd had nice article about that.

There was a whole series of them, as I recall. They were easy to miss, though. They didn't really make it clear what they were for and the other lore sections of AoS books don't illustrate what normal life looks like in the Mortal Realms very well.

I'm not sure how GW can fix the misinformation problem with AoS. A lot of the questions that people are asking are answered in both the 3rd edition core book and the Soulbound core book.
There is an AoS lore master. Phil Kelly is in overall charge of the lore of AoS and there is a lore bible. He wrote several articles answering these kinds of questions about AoS (which repeats material that can be found in the core books).
The realms are more normal at their centre and more magical at the edge except the realm of death which Nagash messed up.
The problem is that during the age of chaos a lot of the 'normal' parts of the realms were corrupted by chaos. The centre of the realm of metal used to be a beautiful place shaped by Grunge, but then Tzeentch came along and shattered everything into crazy magical fragments.

The normal People survive thanks to Aqua Gyranis which is the currency and also a super fertiliser. The cities are like someone said. Groups of flagellents are sent out from the cities to purify the land with their blood, making it suitable for farming.
Travel is extremely dangerous, as most of the realms is still controlled by chaos. That's why every nation can't just get what they want. They rely on the KO for long distance trade.
The realmgates are a bit like warp travel. Someone who travels through one may arrive instantly or weeks later.
This means that there's probably a bit of an interstellar effect going on.

As for the time line, I think part of the problem with the end of Warhammer Fantasy was that it was set in a particular year. So 7th edition would come out, you'd have all sorts of campaigns and battles and the 8th edition would come out and it would still be exactly the same year, with all the same characters doing the same thing. This didn't really allow for the players to have any effect on the setting. I think that's why they've continued to avoid dates this time round despite answering a lot of the other questions people have about the setting.

Chikout wrote:


As for the time line, I think part of the problem with the end of Warhammer Fantasy was that it was set in a particular year. So 7th edition would come out, you'd have all sorts of campaigns and battles and the 8th edition would come out and it would still be exactly the same year, with all the same characters doing the same thing. This didn't really allow for the players to have any effect on the setting. I think that's why they've continued to avoid dates this time round despite answering a lot of the other questions people have about the setting.

That's not a problem with having timelines at all. Having a timeline doesn't mean you have to remain in the same year or date period with the game. In fact having a timeline means you CAN advance the timeline and people understand that "edition 2 is the next 100 years" or so of story. That things have moved on, taken a step forward and so forth. AoS does this, but we don't know how big a step is taken - was it 20 years or 200 or 400 or a week? We don't really know we have to infer and that's complicated unless you keep up with every scrap of lore published by GW. You end up with a situation like the Marvel films, where to keep up you've got to digest and hunt down everything published to keep up with just one continuity. Yes it can work, but its insanely messy and its super easy to fall off the waggon and get lost.


The issue with Old World not advancing is more linked to the writers, but also marketing and models. When you introduce a named human character you are bound to a period of time for that character to be alive in. Yes you can fudge it a bit with magic and so forth, but in general you can't do that for all of them (at least not without it appearing insanely tacky). So you keep your named hero model and named character that markets so well around. This means you are bound to a limited span of time to use them within.

Honestly the fix there is what GW are doing right now with leader models. You keep to named heroes now and then and just rotate them as the setting advances. Bob the Warlord has his 50 years of battle, war and stories. His unique model on the table and everything. Then the timeline advances and Bob retires or gets killed or dies in a blazing glory. His model becomes "Generic hero 101" that GW can keep around or retire and a new hero, Dave, arises from the story to propel it forward.

GW are producing enough leader models now that they could easily adopt that strategy. Heck Fyreslayers have had almost nothing but leader models released. It would also solve the leader-bloat that GW have going on right now because those heroic leaders could just step back as alternative sculpts for generic ones. So instead of dozens of leaders with slightly different profiles; you have a few core ones and then rotating named ones.


Instead GW took the angle of telling the story around Gods and long lived races. This left humans out of the running, but its also left normal story telling out of the running because most of the Gods and God characters don't age. So generations of humans (the race many many many people wlil most associate and understand) come and go like nothing.



Again having a date system isn't a problem, esp with AoS as its not bound to a single millennium like 40K is with marketing; nor is it bound to an "end times" mechanic. AoS bound to an Age and that can last for as long as GW want it too. It has no "End Times" on the horizon; in fact its horizon is at the polar opposite end of the spectrum. It HAD its End Times (Age of Chaos) and is coming out the other end. AoS could have dates easily and advance its own storyline very simply in a logical fashion that could allow for much easier following of its story and characters.

Agreed with Overread.

Personally I think GW is avoiding dates for the same reason they avoided maps at the start - they don't really know themselves and they are afraid to do so now because it will likely have ot ret-con some stuff.

Honestly I'd be ok with the stories having an element of "And then we added dates and all the stories that came before work, but their timelines are a bit wriggly because the characters in the setting didn't have good records and date/time measurement systems and such".

It even fits with Sigmar's general move toward imposing Order on the Realms. You cannot have me believe that the God who is the named one on the Age, whose whole thing is order and structure - wouldn't have maps and time as huge backbones of his Order.

Also I'm pretty sure the Khadorans would have clocks - you can't expect me to believe they wouldn't have the means to measure time so they can charge the correct fee for services rendered; or a fine for those who are late!

 Overread wrote:



Instead GW took the angle of telling the story around Gods and long lived races. This left humans out of the running, but its also left normal story telling out of the running because most of the Gods and God characters don't age. So generations of humans (the race many many many people wlil most associate and understand) come and go like nothing.

I think this is why Godsbane worked as a novel. It not only introduced a way to kill off God level characters(albeit one that perpetuates a cycle), it was also an opportunity to show that a fairly significant portion of the Mortal Realms is also tired of the future of the realms being dictated by the gods.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Overread wrote:



Instead GW took the angle of telling the story around Gods and long lived races. This left humans out of the running, but its also left normal story telling out of the running because most of the Gods and God characters don't age. So generations of humans (the race many many many people wlil most associate and understand) come and go like nothing.

I think this is why Godsbane worked as a novel. It not only introduced a way to kill off God level characters(albeit one that perpetuates a cycle), it was also an opportunity to show that a fairly significant portion of the Mortal Realms is also tired of the future of the realms being dictated by the gods.

GW keeps teasing us with Gotrek doing it though he keeps getting distracted!

 Overread wrote:

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Overread wrote:



Instead GW took the angle of telling the story around Gods and long lived races. This left humans out of the running, but its also left normal story telling out of the running because most of the Gods and God characters don't age. So generations of humans (the race many many many people wlil most associate and understand) come and go like nothing.

I think this is why Godsbane worked as a novel. It not only introduced a way to kill off God level characters(albeit one that perpetuates a cycle), it was also an opportunity to show that a fairly significant portion of the Mortal Realms is also tired of the future of the realms being dictated by the gods.

GW keeps teasing us with Gotrek doing it though he keeps getting distracted!

As a Living Ancestor, Gotrek killing a god is no different from Teclis killing Nagash, though.

I was thinking about how the style of AoS has changed wth the latest edition. First up the orruks made as a totally different, gritty more realistically scary kind of greenskins. and the gritty cursed city that set the theme for the vampiers.
Now we have finally seen regular humans in a grim crusade, grunts dying face down in the mud far from the glory of sigmars greatest cities. And also the deranged nightmare canibals crawling out of murky graveyards.

Feels like they try to change the meta of the narrative, away from the superfantastic "we got giant flying turtles and gods walking the battlefield" style.
Even the stormcast got new armour that looks more like "realistic" fantasy full plate armour.

I think I agree with that. Its still very much a mythic fantasy setting, but they are handling it in a grittier and more grounded manner than they were at the start when it was all "Gods and Generals and Killer Angels" and very focused on armies of demigods and bands of heroes rather than armies of "poor bloody infantry" type folk.

These days the setting is becoming more "Gods and Mortals" and theres a greater emphasis on characters who are maybe not "everyman's" but are more recognizable as being closer to "baseline" for their respective factions, and *their interactions* with the heroes, demigods, and gods with the setting. Its a different perspective that really helps make the setting a bit more approachable.

 Fayric wrote:
I was thinking about how the style of AoS has changed wth the latest edition. First up the orruks made as a totally different, gritty more realistically scary kind of greenskins. and the gritty cursed city that set the theme for the vampiers.
Now we have finally seen regular humans in a grim crusade, grunts dying face down in the mud far from the glory of sigmars greatest cities. And also the deranged nightmare canibals crawling out of murky graveyards.

Feels like they try to change the meta of the narrative, away from the superfantastic "we got giant flying turtles and gods walking the battlefield" style.
Even the stormcast got new armour that looks more like "realistic" fantasy full plate armour.

The very beginning of the first AoS novel is half starved nobodies running away from gangs of Khorne worshipping cannibals. So no, it's the same as it every was.

JSG wrote:

 Fayric wrote:
I was thinking about how the style of AoS has changed wth the latest edition. First up the orruks made as a totally different, gritty more realistically scary kind of greenskins. and the gritty cursed city that set the theme for the vampiers.
Now we have finally seen regular humans in a grim crusade, grunts dying face down in the mud far from the glory of sigmars greatest cities. And also the deranged nightmare canibals crawling out of murky graveyards.

Feels like they try to change the meta of the narrative, away from the superfantastic "we got giant flying turtles and gods walking the battlefield" style.
Even the stormcast got new armour that looks more like "realistic" fantasy full plate armour.

The very beginning of the first AoS novel is half starved nobodies running away from gangs of Khorne worshipping cannibals. So no, it's the same as it every was.

That's basically the first paragraph or so - the entire rest is Stormcast being impossibly awesome maching for days on end through Chaos Wastelands; climbing volcanoes; battling over quicksilver; charging through festering forests so plagued with poison that nothing normal can live there etc.... Yes humans WERE there at the very beginning and they were doing their best to survive; but the real action and meat of the Realmwars is STORMCAST.

Today on AoS facebook page where they linked the Meta-watch article, they(GW) said in the comments that the Battlescroll update is coming next week.

That was a good result for the LVO. Don't see many games where it's almost a different army for every player. Especially seing KB's in the quarters.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2024/01/26/dawnbringer-chronicles-xviii-the-mechanisms-of-ruin/

Conspiracy theory is saying Skaven focus story would be a good lead in to 4th

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Conspiracy theory is saying Skaven focus story would be a good lead in to 4th

It's been more or less an open secret that Skaven are supposed to be the starter opponent.

Skaven vs Chaos Dwarfs!

Give-give me all the Skryre!

Giant rat men living under the cities? That’s some real crazy conspiracy talk there.

Only if you've never been to New York

GW really missed an opportunity to not have the Skaven capital in Naggaroth

The king has finally returned:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2024/01/28/sunday-preview-rotting-pennants-fly-high-for-the-flesh-eater-courts/?utm_source=CUSTOMERS&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=WH_28th_January_Preview_&utm_content=&utm_term=

Fangs of the Blood Queen is a really nice one.

Agreed that set has me very tempted - always room for more bats and wolves in a vampire force!

Also Ork Choppa Bottle Opener is really tempting to have.

The choppa bottle opener looks really impractical since you'd be holding onto a tiny round haft that has no texture.

I'm wondering if it was originally intended to just be a keychain and someone thought they could add a feature.