Warhammer Fantasy is Having an Apocalyptic Meltdown

[direkiller]

40k has 7 factions?

1. Marines
2. Guard (and the Ordos units)
3. Orks
4. Eldar
5. Dark Eldar (though they keep trying to feed them into a woodchipper)
6. Chaos (Daemons and Chaos Marines)
7. Tau
8. 'Nids (with gene stealers)
9. Necrons

...maybe Eldar and Dark Eldar should be grouped together? But that one seems weird to me.

I would add Inquisition, and separate Chaos into Deamons and Chaos Marines.
Deamons have very diffident rules to CSM. And the Inquisition is not quite SM(Gray knights) and not quite Guardsmen(Storm troopers)+ Inquisitors .

There are the Sister of Battle(or the Astatie Sorority or whatever stupid name they came up with) too, but if Dark eldar are going in the wood chipper, SOB are already mulch.

 

[jimthepocket]

Gheghe. Why do people believe these rumours? At the very best, this is going to be a new edition of Mordheim. They'd be total idiots for removing one of the more popular armies.

The first two End Times supplements have been out for a while (though I think they've sold out now), and the third is out on Saturday. It isn't a rumour, it's canon.

Joe also seems to have made a few mistakes (The Phoenix King is dead, it's Malekith vs Tyrion) and missed a few things.

I'll not spoil it, but there's a good run down on http://1d4chan.org/wiki/The_End_Times

Those who click that link should beware, spoilers abound.

So what you're saying is that the old Wood Elf army I've had for 15 years is no longer going to be legal, and they're going to use this as an excuse to pump up what is already the single most overpriced hobby franchise in history to even more ludicrous levels.

I'll keep staying away.

You can still take a completely Wood Elf list if you want to. You just have the option to use High and Dark Elf units as well, which helps the Wood Elves quite a bit.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

I know this is anecdotal, but I spend time at both my local GW store and a Fantasy shop. Between the two stores, I'd say upwards of 30+ players(at least that I've met) come and go. And sadly between the two stores, there is 1 Fantasy player. I'm sure there's another one I haven't met, but the point is Fantasy is just not played that much anymore.
Even compared to 40k its too expensive and the rulebook is an impenetrable block of text and needless rules. There are no 'new' Fantasy players. Everyone is an older player with maybe 3+ editions of experience going on. I even asked my GW store manager if I should look into playing Fantasy and he told me not to bother, its basically dead(He joked he'd happily sell me models, but couldn't guarantee any matches whatsoever). No one plays it, no one buys it. He didn't say so directly, but I got the impression GW is gearing up to just end Fantasy all together in a few years or so.

 

[Mangod]

"You know, the biggest problem with Warhammer is that there are just too many armies to choose between," said no one ever.

Really stupid. So now Elves and Empire/Dwarves will either have billions of models to choose from and balance, or they'll wipe out 50% of existing models and piss off all the players who've kept their old armies for a decade or two.

Games Workshop has really gone full retard lately. This is why I don't waste money on them anymore, and why everyone else I used to play Warhammer with is switching to Warmachine.

Call me a cynic, but I get the feeling that, if GW is consolidating its armies into "core armies", then we'll see expansion books for each individual race. Instead of just buying the Warhammer Core Rulebook and Army Book: Dwarfs, you'd now have to buy the Core Rulebook, Empire Core Army Book, and the Empire Armies: Dwarfs "subfaction" book.

I know, worst case scenario... but when you look at stuff like [URL:http://thegoodthebadtheinsulting.blogspot.se/2013/11/clan-raukaan-part-1-lore-warhammer.html]the Clan Raukaan supplement codex[/URL], can you blame me?

 

[Zykon TheLich_v1legacy]

So, what do you think of the rumors so far? Do you think any of the rumored changes are more likely than others? What changes would you like to see in the new edition of Warhammer Fantasy Battle, if any at all?

I'll give you my 3rd edition when you pry it from my cold, dead hands. COLD, DEAD HANDS!!!

I still ignore the existence of Sylvania/Vampire counts, Nagash, all that Archaon bullshit, basically I'm stuck in 1st ed WHFRP fluiff wise.

When I grognard, I grognard hard, and I'm grognarding on this.

Captcha: Slippery slope. No captcha, this is a sheer cliff.

 

[Thunderous Cacophony]

"You know, the biggest problem with Warhammer is that there are just too many armies to choose between," said no one ever.

Really stupid. So now Elves and Empire/Dwarves will either have billions of models to choose from and balance, or they'll wipe out 50% of existing models and piss off all the players who've kept their old armies for a decade or two.

Games Workshop has really gone full retard lately. This is why I don't waste money on them anymore, and why everyone else I used to play Warhammer with is switching to Warmachine.

Call me a cynic, but I get the feeling that, if GW is consolidating its armies into "core armies", then we'll see expansion books for each individual race. Instead of just buying the Warhammer Core Rulebook and Army Book: Dwarfs, you'd now have to buy the Core Rulebook, Empire Core Army Book, and the Empire Armies: Dwarfs "subfaction" book.

I know, worst case scenario... but when you look at stuff like [URL:http://thegoodthebadtheinsulting.blogspot.se/2013/11/clan-raukaan-part-1-lore-warhammer.html]the Clan Raukaan supplement codex[/URL], can you blame me?

Well, right now the Khaine book is divided into three different flavours of Elf army; current speculation is that only one will survive into core 9th, but it would not surprise me in the least to see the other two (or their successors) being released in smaller splats, with the other armies following suit. They're trying to take so much variety and flavour and squash it down into pellets that it's inevitably going to leak out the sides.

Also, I just realised that WF already has super soldiers: the Ogres! They were one of the more fun armies around, but they may be getting written out almost entirely, as GW had a volcano wipe out their home and most of the rest seem to be heading down to become mercenaries or joining the Orcs.

 

[Alleged_Alec]

Gheghe. Why do people believe these rumours? At the very best, this is going to be a new edition of Mordheim. They'd be total idiots for removing one of the more popular armies.

The first two End Times supplements have been out for a while (though I think they've sold out now), and the third is out on Saturday. It isn't a rumour, it's canon.

Joe also seems to have made a few mistakes (The Phoenix King is dead, it's Malekith vs Tyrion) and missed a few things.

I'll not spoil it, but there's a good run down on http://1d4chan.org/wiki/The_End_Times

That's why I said the rumours. That the end times stuff is happening, sure. However, I don't believe for a second they'll do such radical changes to an established game.

 

[D3s_ToD3s]

Well. Fantasy Warhammer has some Races that COULD be in the Same book.
I think of All the Undeads. All Chaos factions. All Humans. All Elves
That said, if that were the case, all those factions should still have unique models, rules and so on.

Wait a second!
Didn't THEY redo Chaos into 3 Books or something?

 

[Mangod]

Well. Fantasy Warhammer has some Races that COULD be in the Same book.
I think of All the Undeads. All Chaos factions. All Humans. All Elves
That said, if that were the case, all those factions should still have unique models, rules and so on.

Wait a second!
Didn't THEY redo Chaos into 3 Books or something?

Well, first they split up into Warriors of Chaos and Beasts of Chaos (Vikings and Furries, basically), then they split off the Daemons from those two to form Daemons of Chaos. So yes, yes they did.

 

[Thunderous Cacophony]

Gheghe. Why do people believe these rumours? At the very best, this is going to be a new edition of Mordheim. They'd be total idiots for removing one of the more popular armies.

The first two End Times supplements have been out for a while (though I think they've sold out now), and the third is out on Saturday. It isn't a rumour, it's canon.

Joe also seems to have made a few mistakes (The Phoenix King is dead, it's Malekith vs Tyrion) and missed a few things.

I'll not spoil it, but there's a good run down on http://1d4chan.org/wiki/The_End_Times

That's why I said the rumours. That the end times stuff is happening, sure. However, I don't believe for a second they'll do such radical changes to an established game.

Well, they've already done the sweeping changes to canon (though I think there's a couple books left in the End Times), so stuff like the new God-Emperor is going to stick around. Mechanically, they've already made all the Undead one canon army (Nagash is now baked into vanilla), and they've done books that make all of Chaos is one army, and all the Elves as one army, and though they have not yet announced that those two are going to be vanilla, they've said that if anyone at an official event has one of those books the event has to be played according to those rules, so it seems to be less of a rumour more than the blatantly obvious thing GW is doing. Given that GW just nuked every Human nation besides the Empire and Bretonnia, and those two just made a new alliance, it seems like a reasonable guess to say that they'll be blended, cutting the number of armies down further.

 

[Alleged_Alec]

Gheghe. Why do people believe these rumours? At the very best, this is going to be a new edition of Mordheim. They'd be total idiots for removing one of the more popular armies.

The first two End Times supplements have been out for a while (though I think they've sold out now), and the third is out on Saturday. It isn't a rumour, it's canon.

Joe also seems to have made a few mistakes (The Phoenix King is dead, it's Malekith vs Tyrion) and missed a few things.

I'll not spoil it, but there's a good run down on http://1d4chan.org/wiki/The_End_Times

That's why I said the rumours. That the end times stuff is happening, sure. However, I don't believe for a second they'll do such radical changes to an established game.

Well, they've already done the sweeping changes to canon (though I think there's a couple books left in the End Times), so stuff like the new God-Emperor is going to stick around. Mechanically, they've already made all the Undead one canon army (Nagash is now baked into vanilla), and they've done books that make all of Chaos is one army, and all the Elves as one army, and though they have not yet announced that those two are going to be vanilla, they've said that if anyone at an official event has one of those books the event has to be played according to those rules, so it seems to be less of a rumour more than the blatantly obvious thing GW is doing. Given that GW just nuked every Human nation besides the Empire and Bretonnia, and those two just made a new alliance, it seems like a reasonable guess to say that they'll be blended, cutting the number of armies down.

I'm sure they might merge something. They're stupid enough to do that. However, they won't do it as stupidly as this. They just released a lot of new kits of Lizardmen and as an army, they're one of the more popular ones. They'd be better off putting Skaven in the Chaos camp, since they're already pretty much Beastmen. Not only that, but adding a new race while cutting one of the old ones is so mindbogglingly stupid I'm going crosseyed just thinking about it.
Further stuff: I'll believe the limited kits. They're money-grabbing dickbags enough to do that sort of shit. As for fucking over the setting: eh, they could. I hope they don't, since the balls of reality is quite stupid and the Old World is a cool setting.

What I think about the factions:
Chaos Core- Okay, back to roots. I'll buy this.
Elves Core- Even if it's currently in-game, I just can't see Darkies and High elves working together.
Human Core- Blegh. Adding 4 books together is just stupid beyond reproach. Dwarves and Ogres don't fit into this at all.
Undead Core- They don't fit together at all imho and if they do go on with this, much of the flavour will be lost.
Orcs and Goblins- Sure.
Skaven- If they go with the insane 6+1, it's moronic to make Skaven a solitary army. They fit in pretty decently with chaos background-wise (being horribly mutated people and whatnot).

So, yeah. I really don't put much credence to some of the details of these rumours. I've seen no credible source for them whatsoever.

 

[Dimitriov]

This is the most retarded shit I've ever read. Really Games Workshop? FUCKING REALLY?! The Elves are all joining together?

Yeah, no just shit all over your own stuff. Whatever.

 

[Thunderous Cacophony]

Gheghe. Why do people believe these rumours? At the very best, this is going to be a new edition of Mordheim. They'd be total idiots for removing one of the more popular armies.

The first two End Times supplements have been out for a while (though I think they've sold out now), and the third is out on Saturday. It isn't a rumour, it's canon.

Joe also seems to have made a few mistakes (The Phoenix King is dead, it's Malekith vs Tyrion) and missed a few things.

I'll not spoil it, but there's a good run down on http://1d4chan.org/wiki/The_End_Times

That's why I said the rumours. That the end times stuff is happening, sure. However, I don't believe for a second they'll do such radical changes to an established game.

Well, they've already done the sweeping changes to canon (though I think there's a couple books left in the End Times), so stuff like the new God-Emperor is going to stick around. Mechanically, they've already made all the Undead one canon army (Nagash is now baked into vanilla), and they've done books that make all of Chaos is one army, and all the Elves as one army, and though they have not yet announced that those two are going to be vanilla, they've said that if anyone at an official event has one of those books the event has to be played according to those rules, so it seems to be less of a rumour more than the blatantly obvious thing GW is doing. Given that GW just nuked every Human nation besides the Empire and Bretonnia, and those two just made a new alliance, it seems like a reasonable guess to say that they'll be blended, cutting the number of armies down.

I'm sure they might merge something. They're stupid enough to do that. However, they won't do it as stupidly as this. They just released a lot of new kits of Lizardmen and as an army, they're one of the more popular ones. They'd be better off putting Skaven in the Chaos camp, since they're already pretty much Beastmen. Not only that, but adding a new race while cutting one of the old ones is so mindbogglingly stupid I'm going crosseyed just thinking about it.
Further stuff: I'll believe the limited kits. They're money-grabbing dickbags enough to do that sort of shit. As for fucking over the setting: eh, they could. I hope they don't, since the balls of reality is quite stupid and the Old World is a cool setting.

What I think about the factions:
Chaos Core- Okay, back to roots. I'll buy this.
Elves Core- Even if it's currently in-game, I just can't see Darkies and High elves working together.
Human Core- Blegh. Adding 4 books together is just stupid beyond reproach. Dwarves and Ogres don't fit into this at all.
Undead Core- They don't fit together at all imho and if they do go on with this, much of the flavour will be lost.
Orcs and Goblins- Sure.
Skaven- If they go with the insane 6+1, it's moronic to make Skaven a solitary army. They fit in pretty decently with chaos background-wise (being horribly mutated people and whatnot).

So, yeah. I really don't put much credence to some of the details of these rumours. I've seen no credible source for them whatsoever.

Skaven are almost certainly going to be a standalone army; in fact, there's a Skaven book coming out in a few days with a bunch of new HQ choices and Skaven Daemons (as the Horned Rat is getting set up as a full Chaos God in opposition to the others). Getting rid of the Lizardmen would be stupid, but it's literally being said in the End Times books that they got their ass kicked and are currently powering up the Chariots of the Gods to leave the planet, and possibly universe, so them sticking around is increasingly an outside bet. That said, if there's any other "rumours" you would like a source-check on, I'll see if I can dig up something.

The only good thing that the End Times is doing is building in the "alternate universe" escape hatch, so it can be tossed in the trash in a couple years once they've finished the $500 book series.

 

[DaViller]

Why are ditching the lizardmen? I haven't been into warhammer for ages but they where my favorite.

Also, if your gonna get rid of such cool ass race make it so that they died in a cool way, maybe they tryed to stop an never before seen orc waagh or chaos invasion and got wiped out making a last stand. Instead they came up with the worst possible story for it apparently. They got theyr asses kicked by the skaven and then went "Screw you guys, I'm going home!", how lame is that.

 

[Alleged_Alec]

Gheghe. Why do people believe these rumours? At the very best, this is going to be a new edition of Mordheim. They'd be total idiots for removing one of the more popular armies.

The first two End Times supplements have been out for a while (though I think they've sold out now), and the third is out on Saturday. It isn't a rumour, it's canon.

Joe also seems to have made a few mistakes (The Phoenix King is dead, it's Malekith vs Tyrion) and missed a few things.

I'll not spoil it, but there's a good run down on http://1d4chan.org/wiki/The_End_Times

That's why I said the rumours. That the end times stuff is happening, sure. However, I don't believe for a second they'll do such radical changes to an established game.

Well, they've already done the sweeping changes to canon (though I think there's a couple books left in the End Times), so stuff like the new God-Emperor is going to stick around. Mechanically, they've already made all the Undead one canon army (Nagash is now baked into vanilla), and they've done books that make all of Chaos is one army, and all the Elves as one army, and though they have not yet announced that those two are going to be vanilla, they've said that if anyone at an official event has one of those books the event has to be played according to those rules, so it seems to be less of a rumour more than the blatantly obvious thing GW is doing. Given that GW just nuked every Human nation besides the Empire and Bretonnia, and those two just made a new alliance, it seems like a reasonable guess to say that they'll be blended, cutting the number of armies down.

I'm sure they might merge something. They're stupid enough to do that. However, they won't do it as stupidly as this. They just released a lot of new kits of Lizardmen and as an army, they're one of the more popular ones. They'd be better off putting Skaven in the Chaos camp, since they're already pretty much Beastmen. Not only that, but adding a new race while cutting one of the old ones is so mindbogglingly stupid I'm going crosseyed just thinking about it.
Further stuff: I'll believe the limited kits. They're money-grabbing dickbags enough to do that sort of shit. As for fucking over the setting: eh, they could. I hope they don't, since the balls of reality is quite stupid and the Old World is a cool setting.

What I think about the factions:
Chaos Core- Okay, back to roots. I'll buy this.
Elves Core- Even if it's currently in-game, I just can't see Darkies and High elves working together.
Human Core- Blegh. Adding 4 books together is just stupid beyond reproach. Dwarves and Ogres don't fit into this at all.
Undead Core- They don't fit together at all imho and if they do go on with this, much of the flavour will be lost.
Orcs and Goblins- Sure.
Skaven- If they go with the insane 6+1, it's moronic to make Skaven a solitary army. They fit in pretty decently with chaos background-wise (being horribly mutated people and whatnot).

So, yeah. I really don't put much credence to some of the details of these rumours. I've seen no credible source for them whatsoever.

Skaven are almost certainly going to be a standalone army; in fact, there's a Skaven book coming out in a few days with a bunch of new HQ choices and Skaven Daemons (as the Horned Rat is getting set up as a full Chaos God in opposition to the others). Getting rid of the Lizardmen would be stupid, but it's literally being said in the End Times books that they got their ass kicked and are currently powering up the Chariots of the Gods to leave the planet, and possibly universe, so them sticking around is increasingly an outside bet. That said, if there's any other "rumours" you would like a source-check on, I'll see if I can dig up something.

The only good thing that the End Times is doing is building in the "alternate universe" escape hatch, so it can be tossed in the trash in a couple years once they've finished the $500 book series.

Okay, apparently I've been out for too long. I stopped playing a bit before End Times started happening due to the players in my local gaming scene being a bunch of power-playing howler monkeys. I can't argue with you on lore, so I'll just stick to my hopes that even Games Workshop can't be this stupid, despite all the evidence pointing towards that fact.

Also: is it a new tactic for GW to make the half life of huge models a week or two by making them incredibly large and having about two thousand long, thin protruding bits?

 

[Oroboros]

Looks like they are going full D&D Forgotten Realms 4th edition on Warhammer....not a good thing IMO.

Also: is it a new tactic for GW to make the half life of huge models a week or two by making them incredibly large and having about two thousand long, thin protruding bits?

Seriously, some of the new army centerpiece models look super fragile.

Some folks might be interested in this though:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?677233-Total-War-WARHAMMER-officially-revealed

Looks like there's a New Total War game coming out, and it's warhammer fantasy themed. No idea if it's pre-or post 'End times' though.

 

[SocialistSaxon]

I'm entirely unhappy with just about everything suggested in this article. I always enjoyed the scale of WHFB, and i loved the variety and diversity of factions. I've been waiting years for a new Bretonnia book and now they're disappearing entirely and being merged into a bastard child of a faction with empire and dwarfs? And as for the dark elves suddenly being all nicey-nicey not-sick-twisted-fuckers-who-serve-a-chaos-god-by-committing-unspeakable-acts-of-torture and ending two thousand years of deep loathing... with hugs, i guess?
The game of tactics where you manoeuvre regiments of soldiers with precise movements and cunning is dead. The interesting, grounded and engaging lore behind it is dead. Long live Warhammer Fantasy, may we remember the game it once was, not the thing it became in the end.

 

[SocialistSaxon]

Some folks might be interested in this though:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?677233-Total-War-WARHAMMER-officially-revealed

Looks like there's a New Total War game coming out, and it's warhammer fantasy themed. No idea if it's pre-or post 'End times' though.

I dearly hope it's pre. Total war has always been about tactics and strategy, not "whoever bought the biggest most expensive model wins"