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 Sotahullu wrote:
https://www.warhammer-community.com/2024/01/02/old-world-almanack-designer-round-table-on-how-the-new-old-lore-was-written/

Lore! Mighty Lore!

Urgh. That article has really put me off TOW as a game in its own right. I'm honestly not too bothered about their narrative structure at this point, I'm happy to keep playing games set in the WFB sandbox as it once was. I'm more than happy to just see models back on sale.

What the H-E-double hockey sticks are they saying when they talk about running the narrative 'sequentially' or maybe 'hopping around'. It honestly sounds like they have no plan, so why even bother with a sequential narrative. This was always my biggest gripe about AoS, you can't run a sequential narrative where the status quo has to be returned to at the end anyway AND have it mean anything overall. If you are instead going to bounce around the timeline of the narrative, there is no reason to have excluded many of the armies they did for not being part of the direct story. Just release DE, Lizardmen, ogres etc as part of this hopping around.

I'd rather they be brutally honest and say they had a budget to bring the game back and removing armies was the only way to stick to it. All these fluff reasons defy any real logic one they introduce this bouncing around the timeline.

I do think its funny they are excluding the magic based empire models (nice big empire centre piece models at that) but are quick to inform us that steam tanks were all the rage and we can expect to see the WFB rendition of the Battle of Kursk. Surprised about the bit that might hint things like flagellants are going to be less commonly seen (possibly. Hard to tell with GW and these sort of articles. People tend to read into them too much, so could be what I'm doing here)

Garrac wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

Garrac wrote:
The "strong rumours" about a skaven range refresh are just a bunch of vague favs from Whitefang in the AoS forum. There's nothing else, nothing, negative, zero patatero, just copium from despertate fans thinking that GW will care about skavens for 2 goddamn minutes. Too many years waiting for them to deliver to raise my hype up and not think that skavens are the new bretonians.

Stop saying "this is most likely to happen" because I can promise you no one on the fanbase knows, theres no data nor more rumours about this, and youre fooling either other por despertate skaven fans, or yourselves. Until a literal trailer/camera potato isnt shown, there are no ratmen under Altdorf...

Ah. Whitefang has just been incredibly lucky guessing correctly before?

I mean you DO know whitefang's track record right? Surely you wouldn't claim whitefang is wrong without at least having slight clue about his track record like some noob would you?

Do you also know how vague are the original likes, right? How LITTLE information do they hold? How its not the first time the skaven fans get their hype up for whitefang gossiping for then GW to deliver only the bare minimum like some noob, would you?

Whitefang can be liking for a whole range refresh with 20 kits, a warcry warband, or another underworlds band, or just a lord mini. It wouldnt be the first time.

I won't run into desperation, neither consume copium for this time. Trailer or nothing.

The last skaven thing Whitefang liked was that 4th edition would be Skaven Vs Stormcast. Whitefang has the best track record of any Warhammer rumour monger. They have never been wrong.
On the AoS front there is detailed description of normal life in the RPG books.
.I'm interested to see what they do with the dwarfs. They're the one faction where the really old metals absolutely hold up. I'd love to see gw do a made to order of some of the classic marauder dwarves like this.

Welp now I've gotta build a Kursk of Steam Tanks.

 Mallo wrote:

 Sotahullu wrote:
https://www.warhammer-community.com/2024/01/02/old-world-almanack-designer-round-table-on-how-the-new-old-lore-was-written/

Lore! Mighty Lore!

Urgh. That article has really put me off TOW as a game in its own right. I'm honestly not too bothered about their narrative structure at this point, I'm happy to keep playing games set in the WFB sandbox as it once was. I'm more than happy to just see models back on sale.

What the H-E-double hockey sticks are they saying when they talk about running the narrative 'sequentially' or maybe 'hopping around'. It honestly sounds like they have no plan, so why even bother with a sequential narrative. This was always my biggest gripe about AoS, you can't run a sequential narrative where the status quo has to be returned to at the end anyway AND have it mean anything overall. If you are instead going to bounce around the timeline of the narrative, there is no reason to have excluded many of the armies they did for not being part of the direct story. Just release DE, Lizardmen, ogres etc as part of this hopping around.

I'd rather they be brutally honest and say they had a budget to bring the game back and removing armies was the only way to stick to it. All these fluff reasons defy any real logic one they introduce this bouncing around the timeline.

I do think its funny they are excluding the magic based empire models (nice big empire centre piece models at that) but are quick to inform us that steam tanks were all the rage and we can expect to see the WFB rendition of the Battle of Kursk. Surprised about the bit that might hint things like flagellants are going to be less commonly seen (possibly. Hard to tell with GW and these sort of articles. People tend to read into them too much, so could be what I'm doing here)

You seem to have completely misunderstood what they're talking about and what they are planning. The games narrative is set between 2201 and 2304-ish in one specific part of the planet that was the WHFB setting. During that 100 year period, the skaven are underground, vampires are dead or hiding, Ogres, dark elves, lizardmen, chaos dwarves can't be bothered, and the powers of Chaos aren't strong enough to manifest Daemons. The start of the game is set in 2276 in the vicinity of the Border princes. After they tell the opening narrative in 2276 Border Princes, they may then start telling story in 2277 or 2278 in kislev or the moot, but they may also jump back to 2201 in bretonnia when King Louen declared the wrra try Crusade against the greenskins, or 2297 when Maldred of Mousillon imprisons the Fey Enchantress and caused the Affair of the False Grail. Regardless of how they proceed, the point us that they are only hopping around between 2201 and 2304-ish, during which time there are no dark elves, lizardmen, ogres, skaven, etc.

Definitely has nothing to do woth budget, most of the factions they cut have complete model ranges in active production today, only thing they need is a different colored box to sell them in. Entirely to do with those factions being core to AoS identity and being more valuable to the AoS IP than TOW.

Chikout wrote:
Whitefang has the best track record of any Warhammer rumour monger. They have never been wrong.

That is not 100% true, there was that Spider Incarnate with the Gallet book that never happened. But there is likely something that happened in the background for that one since we even have a rumour engine for it so so idea if it was originally planned for the gallet book and changed for some reason or if that was wrong.

He still has the best track record anyway and even Valrak (who also has a very good track record) who normally never says anything about AoS, said Skaven would be in the 4th starter

IIRC we got a separate rumor that the box w the first incarnate sold like crap and there was negative feedback about the concept and all that. Seems probable GW gak canned it or delayed it to rework the concept.

 Matrindur wrote:


He still has the best track record anyway and even Valrak (who also has a very good track record) who normally never says anything about AoS, said Skaven would be in the 4th starter

Valrak has said something about skavens that is from his source? Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmm, link? Then Ill be able to trust it all a little bit more, but not very much.

Like, went from 0% hype to 1%. Still trailer or nothing further.

Take the AoS chat to the AoS thread please, this is for TOW.

Chopstick wrote:
What are those curves on the oversized poleaxe ? Did they let Orc forge their weapons now.

No kidding. Those things aren't halberds. They'd break under their own weight.

That was one of the reasons I LIKED the Bret aesthetic. The weapons were generally realistic, not Orc-stupid-big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Shakalooloo wrote:

 Gert wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
Only metal dwarf minis left are the Cogsmith, Runelord, and Warden King.

None of those Dwarf minis are metal, they're all plastic.

The Warden King is also Belegar Ironhammer, who unless I am mistaken, isn't around at this point. At least not in as the Exile King of Eight Peaks.

chaos0xomega wrote:
-Some stuff about the logic and rationale of Tomb Kings being evil, and how the community and/or fluff distorted the perception of what the Tomb Kings were over the years due to their opposition to chaos. Can't say I disagree with their take, once they explain it I have to agree the Tomb Kings certainly sound pretty much like the definition of what evil means in a practical sense.

Indeed and I totally agree with the analysis of the TKs as well. It's the same kind of idea that presents Nagash as a "good" guy because he opposes Chaos, when the reality is Nagash opposes Chaos because he wants to rule everything and force everyone to worship him.

Now, if only they could un-retcon Malekith's 'always destiend to be king' nonsense.

Well, at this point in the lore, he's still just the King of the Dark Elves (regardless of what he claims) and someone else is the King of the High Elves...

 MalusCalibur wrote:

Tallonian4th wrote:
Any glaring red flags experienced players are seeing?

GW wrote it.
They are releasing ancient plastic kits at a markup.
The rules follow 40k's model (multiple overpriced books rendered obsolete in short order).

It's as obvious a minimum effort nostalgia cash-grab as one can get. Don't fall for it.

Well for some of us that only care about rules and not minis, it seems top quality: well thought rules with the best from each edition (something that they should have done with Legions Imperialis but they didn't).

I would not be surprised if part of the High Elf lore is referencing how he is the true King and that the near future will proof this

Reading the article again, sleeping over it and now I just hope that the lore that is written in the books is better and not End Times level of writing to justify why certain things happen

and if the have not learned and reference the End Times ever so often in the new books as they do on the articles, this won't end up well

People don't like the EndTimes, not just because it blew up the world but also because of the bad writing that already started with 8th Edi army books, and a lot here were excited for TOW and the setting because they can ignore it.

I have the feeling the people there don't know why Warhammer Fantasy was liked in the first place and start building a world upon the stuff no one wants

Has it been established that you need ravenous hordes book on top of the tomb kings arcane journal, to play a tomb kings army? Same for the bretonians as well?(with the other book).

jube2763 wrote:
Has it been established that you need ravenous hordes book on top of the tomb kings arcane journal, to play a tomb kings army? Same for the bretonians as well?(with the other book).

if you do its something of an insult to peoples goodwill

I think so. The arcane journal is an appendix that contains special characters, magic items and alternative army compositions. It does not contain the core army list.

There was an image of the contents page floating around, I'll see if I can find it...

the Journal are the optional rules, you need the ravenous hordes book to play the army and the Journal if you want to use the "optional" army specific magic items

the grand army rules are not coming in the Journal as it is not a full army book

jube2763 wrote:
Has it been established that you need ravenous hordes book on top of the tomb kings arcane journal, to play a tomb kings army? Same for the bretonians as well?(with the other book).

Devotees of the Lady of the Lake can supplement the Grand Army list in Forces of Fantasy with Arcane Journal: Kingdom of Bretonnia.

This very much sounds like you need the big books and the arcane journals are just if you want more rules and specific themes.

 MalusCalibur wrote:


The rules follow 40k's model (multiple overpriced books rendered obsolete in short order).

Not so sure about this one. Looks more like the MESBG model. 1 big rule book. 2 army books for the vast majority of armies and units. Then additional supplements with extra rules regularly.

Like the "Armies of Lord of the Rings" and "Armies of the Hobbit" were released in 2018 and are still being used. They did update the 2018 core rule book in 2022 but you can still use the old book without much problem if you just have the old errata and FAQ pdfs on your phone.

Since this and mesbg are both specialist games and have some overlap in staff I wouldn't be surprised if it will be similar in how useful and how much value you get out of the books.

I won't buy any books for the Old World at release though since I want to wait and see for a while what model they will use long term. If it is more like 40k I won't buy a single book but it if it is like MESBG and I like the game I will most likely buy all that are relevant for my armies if not all books (part of a gaming club so I sometimes get books for others to use to make my favourite games more accessible so I get more players) like I have done for MESBG. Haven't bought a single 40k book for 3 editions now but I have almost all the released books for mesbg (not just this edition but since 2001)

 Matrindur wrote:

jube2763 wrote:
Has it been established that you need ravenous hordes book on top of the tomb kings arcane journal, to play a tomb kings army? Same for the bretonians as well?(with the other book).

Devotees of the Lady of the Lake can supplement the Grand Army list in Forces of Fantasy with Arcane Journal: Kingdom of Bretonnia.

This very much sounds like you need the big books and the arcane journals are just if you want more rules and specific themes.

This is my reading of it, we’ve seen the index for the Bret AJ as well and it seems it does just come with two variant lists, 3 special characters, some magic items and a couple of unique units for the variant lists like the bombard (plus lore obviously). So it seems you only really need it if you want to use those characters or variants.

It’s not even like you’ll be that short changed on magic items either, since there are apparently 56 common ones plus potentially more in the compendia (they contain magic items, but not clear if they just repeat the common ones or have army specific ones).

WarCom wrote:Each has profiles for every unit in the army, plus special rules for that faction, unique spells, magic items, and more

The only thing I do fear is Lore of Nehekhara being in the TK AJ, since Waaagh! Magic is in the Rulebook not RH but LoNehekhara is not.

Klickor wrote:

 MalusCalibur wrote:


The rules follow 40k's model (multiple overpriced books rendered obsolete in short order).

Not so sure about this one. Looks more like the MESBG model. 1 big rule book. 2 army books for the vast majority of armies and units. Then additional supplements with extra rules regularly.

Like the "Armies of Lord of the Rings" and "Armies of the Hobbit" were released in 2018 and are still being used. They did update the 2018 core rule book in 2022 but you can still use the old book without much problem if you just have the old errata and FAQ pdfs on your phone.

Since this and mesbg are both specialist games and have some overlap in staff I wouldn't be surprised if it will be similar in how useful and how much value you get out of the books.

I won't buy any books for the Old World at release though since I want to wait and see for a while what model they will use long term. If it is more like 40k I won't buy a single book but it if it is like MESBG and I like the game I will most likely buy all that are relevant for my armies if not all books (part of a gaming club so I sometimes get books for others to use to make my favourite games more accessible so I get more players) like I have done for MESBG. Haven't bought a single 40k book for 3 editions now but I have almost all the released books for mesbg (not just this edition but since 2001)

yes very MESBG like

Dead of Dunharrow for example needing:
- core rulebook, that everyone needs
- "Armies of Lord of the Rings" for the main army list
- "Gondor at War" for one single page that provides the character you need to make the king actually work

and at this point I've basically lost interest in TOW, I have the armies for it, but not interested in this method of play that requires this many books at that cost, essentially because I know its going to mean few others locally bother

Depends how glass half empty or full you want to be.

I have the armies of the lord of the rings books and that covers 7+ armies I have for Mesbg in one and I don't feel the need to buy anything else.

I may have misunderstood. So Ravening Hordes and the good army version are not just tie you over compendiums until you get a supplement? If so that has re-engaged my interest in picking up the books now. I had decided to wait and see how things develop.

MESBG is my 'main' game and the model works for me. Three core books, likely only needing two of those since Hobbit armies are not as numerous, and then additional supplements adding flavour to specific battles/stories etc.

The last few pages of this thread have been a good read with some interesting posts, thanks.

Something that concerns me about the new Lore Article (and i'm clearly not unique) is just how much of the discussion revolved around the End Times. Couldn't we just ignore it for the purposes of the article and big up what they've got. Also what i found very interesting is there is a line in there where one of the panellists openly criticises End Times, saying something to the effect (by my reading) of 'It could have been handled better', bit weird haha.

Also, again like some others, i don't really like that they take this opportunity to low-key prohibit the fielding of VC, Skaven, and other armies lore wise. Just like before couldn't they have just bigged up what they had and left hints that the other armies will be coming when they had something special ready for them? (even if they don't haha).

Finally something that irritated me is that on the one hand they clarified an obvious point; Don't count on your Special Characters showing up, which was good. On the other hand they plunged a more important point into total mystery, right before release, by stating that some Empire units, and by implication other armies' units, won't be (or worse might not be, like Flagellants) showing up, and waffling about how far along the tech tree the Old World is.

Lord Zarkov wrote:


The only thing I do fear is Lore of Nehekhara being in the TK AJ, since Waaagh! Magic is in the Rulebook not RH but LoNehekhara is not.

It says the following in the TK article:

Arcane Journal: Tomb Kings of Khemri provides the Nehekharan Royal Host and the Mortuary Cults

Replicant253 wrote:
I may have misunderstood. So Ravening Hordes and the good army version are not just tie you over compendiums until you get a supplement? If so that has re-engaged my interest in picking up the books now. I had decided to wait and see how things develop.

MESBG is my 'main' game and the model works for me. Three core books and then additional supplements adding flavour to specific battles/stories etc.

Correct, that’s what GW have said on WarComm - the complete* army is in the applicable compendium, the AJs are apparently just optional extras.

So e.g. if you play a mainstream Bret list you don’t need the AJ unless you want to field the Green Knight or the new Special Character Prophetess (or the exile guy, but he might be exiles list only).

*other than Special Characters it seems.

jube2763 wrote:
Has it been established that you need ravenous hordes book on top of the tomb kings arcane journal, to play a tomb kings army? Same for the bretonians as well?(with the other book).

Do you want special characters, spell lores, armies of infamy and magic items? Then you need arcane journal.

Just journal gets you very short. No core list, no core units...Good luck playing with just special characters

 Perkustin wrote:
Also, again like some others, i don't really like that they take this opportunity to low-key prohibit the fielding of VC, Skaven, and other armies lore wise. Just like before couldn't they have just bigged up what they had and left hints that the other armies will be coming when they had something special ready for them? (even if they don't haha).

I don't agree with chaos0xomega's view of "this is TOW's setting, if in 2055 we are on the 10th edition of TOW, GW are still never bringing VC/ Skaven/DE into it". GW don't plan that far ahead.
But I think its more honest to say - at least for this wave (so, 3-5 years?) - there's no VC/Skaven/DE etc.

Mainly because I remember the Bret players going "maybe this year?" for around a decade. I don't think it was good.

 Perkustin wrote:
The last few pages of this thread have been a good read with some interesting posts, thanks.

Something that concerns me about the new Lore Article (and i'm clearly not unique) is just how much of the discussion revolved around the End Times. Couldn't we just ignore it for the purposes of the article and big up what they've got. Also what i found very interesting is there is a line in there where one of the panellists openly criticises End Times, saying something to the effect (by my reading) of 'It could have been handled better', bit weird haha.

Also, again like some others, i don't really like that they take this opportunity to low-key prohibit the fielding of VC, Skaven, and other armies lore wise. Just like before couldn't they have just bigged up what they had and left hints that the other armies will be coming when they had something special ready for them? (even if they don't haha).

Finally something that irritated me is that on the one hand they clarified an obvious point; Don't count on your Special Characters showing up, which was good. On the other hand they plunged a more important point into total mystery, right before release, by stating that some Empire units, and by implication other armies' units, won't be (or worse might not be, like Flagellants) showing up, and waffling about how far along the tech tree the Old World is.

There are some stuff like the Colleges of Magic stuff that generally don’t make sense in the new timeframe, they seemed to be pretty clear though that the technological stuff should all be about though. I’m hoping the cryptic comment on flagellants means they’re in but like rare or even rare and restricted (like the Bret trebuchet).
Though I might be concerned about some of the units new in 8th that feature in AoS still like the iron drakes.

I’m hoping they play it like HH where there’s the main book then a ‘units of legend’ pdf (or ‘units of the future’ ) for those that don’t fit the timeframe.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

tneva82 wrote:

jube2763 wrote:
Has it been established that you need ravenous hordes book on top of the tomb kings arcane journal, to play a tomb kings army? Same for the bretonians as well?(with the other book).

Do you want special characters, spell lores, armies of infamy and magic items? Then you need arcane journal.

Just journal gets you very short. No core list, no core units...Good luck playing with just special characters

There’s 56 common magic items apparently, and perhaps more in the compendia. So even there the AJ only gives you a small subset.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Matrindur wrote:

Lord Zarkov wrote:


The only thing I do fear is Lore of Nehekhara being in the TK AJ, since Waaagh! Magic is in the Rulebook not RH but LoNehekhara is not.

It says the following in the TK article:

Arcane Journal: Tomb Kings of Khemri provides the Nehekharan Royal Host and the Mortuary Cults

One of the earlier articles says the AJs come with spells. We’ll find out in a week I guess.

Replicant253 wrote:
I may have misunderstood. So Ravening Hordes and the good army version are not just tie you over compendiums until you get a supplement? If so that has re-engaged my interest in picking up the books now. I had decided to wait and see how things develop.

MESBG is my 'main' game and the model works for me. Three core books, likely only needing two of those since Hobbit armies are not as numerous, and then additional supplements adding flavour to specific battles/stories etc.

I don't think they've made a definitive statement about their model for The Old World, but my read on it is that they aren't going for a codex/cyclical redundancy model as they have for their main games and instead that the forces of fantasy/ravening hordes books are more of a one-and-done affair like the libers in Heresy. Instead we'll see a supplement for each faction which adds additional army structures, magic items and special characters but doesn't replace the main forces books.

Of course there are no guarantees they won't decide to redo the core lists in a few years time to add units or fix balance issues or switch to a different model, but the vibe I'm getting is more heresy than 40k and it makes sense they don't want to give the same level of "support" (or cyclical change for changes sake) for a specialist game as they do for their core games.

 MalusCalibur wrote:
The rules follow 40k's model (multiple overpriced books rendered obsolete in short order).

What proof is there of this?

 MalusCalibur wrote:
It's as obvious a minimum effort nostalgia cash-grab as one can get. Don't fall for it.

And like most cash grabs, it's taken literal years of work to get it to print.

Wait...

 Unknown_Lifeform wrote:

Replicant253 wrote:
I may have misunderstood. So Ravening Hordes and the good army version are not just tie you over compendiums until you get a supplement? If so that has re-engaged my interest in picking up the books now. I had decided to wait and see how things develop.

MESBG is my 'main' game and the model works for me. Three core books, likely only needing two of those since Hobbit armies are not as numerous, and then additional supplements adding flavour to specific battles/stories etc.

I don't think they've made a definitive statement about their model for The Old World, but my read on it is that they aren't going for a codex/cyclical redundancy model as they have for their main games and instead that the forces of fantasy/ravening hordes books are more of a one-and-done affair like the libers in Heresy. Instead we'll see a supplement for each faction which adds additional army structures, magic items and special characters but doesn't replace the main forces books.

Of course there are no guarantees they won't decide to redo the core lists in a few years time to add units or fix balance issues or switch to a different model, but the vibe I'm getting is more heresy than 40k and it makes sense they don't want to give the same level of "support" (or cyclical change for changes sake) for a specialist game as they do for their core games.

My assumption is once the first 9 AJs are out they’ll periodically release more AJs and/or campaign books with different slices of the story.

E.g. maybe they’ll cover the circumstances of the death of Louen / coronation of Jules le Just with a Royal Host variant and rules for one or both of them?

Or Something relating to the Affair of the False Grail seems a certainty given how they’ve bugged up Maldred on the map. (Though I note they’ve changed his heraldry- perhaps the classic black on yellow has been retconned to Merovech?)