[Archive] New Beastmen rumours

Archive [Archive] Wargame News and Discussion
61

Hashut’s Blessing:

The Brain, I agree that they should focus less ont he beastmen worshipping the Chaos gods, I don’t think that they possess the intelligence to really understand it in the sense that would make them perform specific rites for each god (they’d likely just offer food, sacrifices and skulls regardless of their deity), but that they should definitely be kept as close to the other Chaos armies as possible. They are the pawns of the gods, they are made because of Chaos. They are a race born of it: the only more Chaos-y being that I can currently think of, would be Daemons because they are literally MADE of it, lol :stuck_out_tongue:

However, as AGPO said, if they are to remove a race from the Chaos armies, it should certainly be the Norse. Often, people refer to marauders as Norsemen, but they aren’t all Norsemen, nor are all Norsemen marauders. In percentage of Chaos worshippers to non-Chaos worshippers, I would imagine that they are similar to Kislevites. That’s just my view.

62

Gar Shadowfame:

WoC book clearly says that norsmen worship chaos gods

63

AGPO:

@ Gar - True, at the moment the focus is definately on the Norse worshiping Chaos. The reason I mentioned it is because during the last edition there was a move to give the Norse a cuture of their own. The Chaos gods were merely a fact of life living in the far north - they were undoubtably great powers and the North their territory. The Norse were not simply the guys in spikey armour who rampaged through the south every now and then. They seem to have regressed back to ‘generic evil badies number four’ since then, and I think that is sad.

64

AGPO:

Sorry for the double post but this deserves to be seperate:

General info
Release is February 2010, after Tyranids, with advance orders starting January 4th.
Was to be written by Andy Hoare, but he has since quit Games Workshop.

Rules
Army-wide Special Rules and Magic Items. Ambush is supposedly staying much the same, though it has been suggested that it will no longer be dependant on the General. No news on Unruly.

Alongside Magic Items, “Mutations” will be available in the same way as WoC Gifts or Vampire Powers, operating on the same budgetary lines. Bonuses, like Scaly Skin, extra Strength and Movement are expected, as well as more esoteric abilities like Breath Weapons. Multiples of the same Mutation are expected to be allowed.

Marks are no longer limited throughout the army. No news on their exact rules, though they are assumed to be similar to, if not the same as, the WoC marks.

Note, army-list slots are representative only until more solid rumours appear

Lords & Heroes
Beastlord/Wargor �?" May take Chaos Armour. May be accompanied by a ‘pet’ US3 Beast Spawn.
Great Bray-Shaman/Bray-Shaman �?" May be able to take a Herdstone, in the same manner as an Anvil/Casket. Beast Spawn as above.
Doombull�?" No news yet; it is assumed that the Doombull will still allow Minotaurs as Core.
Centigor Hero - Aside from the Centigor Special Character, it has been rumoured that there will be a Centigor character available as a standard Hero choice. However, this may be a mutation rather than a seperate choice.
Daemon Prince? - Believed to still be in the list, though different to the WoC incarnation.

Core
Beast Herds - No new models are expected. Ranking issues to be fixed. Supposedly the champion will no longer provide +1Ld. Some sort of Scout option is believed to be available.
Bestigor Herds �?" New Plastic Models.
Warhounds - Varieties of Warhounds allowed through upgrades - Hunting, Guarding, etc.
Centigor? �?" Rumoured to be moved to Core. Fast Cavalry. Supposedly armour options will be available.

Special
Tuskgor Chariots �?" May be only one per special.
Minotaurs �?" New plastic models. Believed to still be Core with Doombull.
Dragon Ogres? - Possibly dropped. On the one hand, they are thought not to ‘fit’ with the new Beasts ‘feel’. On the other, plastic Dragon Ogres are also rumoured.
Chaos Trolls? - Very possibly dropped.
Harpies/Gargoyles/Gorgoyles - Flying infantry, replacing Furies.

Rare
Chaos Giant �?" As in WoC book.
Spawn �?" Assumed to be in WoC book. Possibility of slight changes.
Dragon Ogre Shaggoth? - Possibly dropped. Even less likely than the Dragon Ogres.
Gorgon �?" A new monster. Supposedly on a chariot-base, with Movement 8 and stats in the 5s, with Impact Hits and a Breathweapon. Model is probable, but unconfirmed.
Herdstone? �?" In the same vein as a Corpse Cart, Warshrine, and Screaming Bell, a Herdstone with the ability to buff nearby units is expected. However, it may be an upgrade/“mount” for the Bray-Shaman.

Special Characters
All the Special Characters from the last book are believed to in this one. New ones talked about include:
- A Daemon Prince. May have Bloodthirster-style stats. Possibly Nurgle/Slaanesh marked.
- A Minotaur character dragging a Herdstone (as seen in the Rare and Bray-Shaman entries). May be a Champion upgrade.
- A Foe-Render character with the +1Ld of the old book, among other things.
- The Thing From The Woods, a giant Warhound/Spawn from Mordheim.
- A Centigor character with special Drunken rules and a magical Great Weapon.
- A Tzeentchian Bray-Shaman with a raven’s head.

Models and Army Book
No pics yet. Work by Aly Morrison and Mark Harrison. New models rumoured are:
- Beastlord and Bray-Shaman
- Plastic Bestigors
- Plastic Minotaurs, sculpted by Mark Harrison
- Plastic Gorgon
- Plastic Dragon Ogres?
- Presumably new Special Characters

Other Thoughts
It seems strange that, after all the new units of recent books (Warshrine & Forsaken / Razordon & Engine / Corpse Cart & Blood Knights & Varghulf / Doomwheel & Verminlord & Abomination & Plague Furnace & Mortar & so on) Beasts of Chaos, an army list that’s lost quite a bit in the Chaos Split, would only gain the new Gorgon and maybe Harpies/Gargoyles. I, for one, expect a few more shiny new units to be popping their heads from between the dark trees of the rumour-forest as the release date draws closer.
A “giant evil tree/corrupt treeman” has been suggested, “dark heart of the forest” style.

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New models

Gors
- plastic box for £15 containing 10 guys
- essentially the same models, with a bit more variation in pose and gear
- same equipment options as now
Ungor
- plastic box for £15 containing 10 guys
- again essentially the same, though now come with spears, hand weapons, shields and short bows, in addition to command options
Note: This means that compared to the current box, you will be paying £12(!) more to swap 2 Gor for 2 Ungor.
Bestigor
- plastic box for £25 containing 10 guys
Minotaurs
- plastic box for £27 containing 3 guys
- options for two hand weapons, hand weapons & shields and great weapons, in addition to full command options
Razorgor
- metal box for £15
- supposedly a laughably bad sculpt
Doombull
- metal box for £25
Malagor the Dark Omen (Bray Shaman special character)
- has cloak of feathers (but not the head of a raven or any other kind of bird)
- otherwise a fairly generic model (this may be intentional since the other generic shaman models are very old)
Ghorros Warhoof (Centigor special character)
- also fairly generic (again possibly intentional)
- as the name suggests he has hooves and not claws like the current Centigor have

Battalion box cost £55 and contains:
-20 Gor
-10 Ungor
-10 Bestigor
It is worth noting that in the current prices that adds up to £54 and you’re trading 2 Ungor for Gor. It is only a “saving” in the new prices because the Gor and Ungor get 67%(!) more expensive. This makes this the least cost-effective battalion in the entire history of battalion boxes.

In addition, the Centigor, Chariot and Gorthor boxes are apparently getting repackaged (for some unknown reason)

The following models are being withdrawn at the moment, which suggests that they might get resculpted or repackaged:
- Bestigor (and variants)
- Minotaurs
- Centigor
- Chaos Ogres
- Dragon Ogres
- Chaos Trolls
Note that these units might not all be appearing in the list

If it is true that the number of crossover units between this army and the Warriors of Chaos one will be quite low, there will necessarily have to be some new ones added in to compensate.

Background
The GW newsletter speaks of Beastmen as being the original inhabitants of the Old World, which is nonsense according to the current background material, which has Beastmen being humans mutated by the fall of the polar warp gates. Either the person writing this didn’t know the background or it heralds a significant shift in the background material.

Magic
The GW newsletter has stated that there will be an all new magic Lore for Beastmen. This could mean that this new Beastmen Lore replaces the three old god-specific Lores (most likely) or that they get new Lore in addition to having the three old Lores for Slaanesh, Tzeentch and Nurgle (less likely).

Marks of Chaos
It is not known whether Beastmen get a wider or more limited access to Marks. It is possible that Marks will be available to more units like in the Warriors of Chaos book (where you could Mark Marauders and Ogres, which you could not do previously) or the book might drop Marks completely in favour of something else.

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Other rumours include a special type of spawn that can be taken as an upgrade to accompany a character. There are also rmours of ‘demonkin’ and an evil treeman

65

Hashut’s Blessing:

Gar Shadowfame: in more than one source, the Norsemen are noted as being just Norsemen and some of the tribes are generally Chaos-worshipping (Krugan, the Hung etc).

AGPO: Excellent compendium. It’s outrageous, but not wholly unexpected that the beastherds have had a 67% price rise. If they had kept with the same £12 for 10 models pricing, I would’ve thought it was a good offer (by GW’s standards) and been likely to actually buy some: it’s still a rise of £6 and 2 Gor are “downgraded” into Ungor.

I get the impression that Dragon ogres and Shaggoths won’t be in the list, but there could always be some DO plastics come out for WoC.

With mutations: I wonder if the mutations will start gearing to what we were talking of earlier, so they obtain attributes of specific animals, such as one may be a fishman and gain the “Aquatic” rule, etc… Very interesting.

Magic and marks: I seriously doubt the marks will be involved, based upon a lot of the decisions that seem to have been made. As a result, I doubt that the 3 god lores shall appear. If the marks do exist, they will probably be less powerful (and cheaper) than WoC ones and the lores will be less refined and slightly different. At a guess.

The special characters sound like they have the potential to be quite cool, but then the model descriptions makes them sound bland and uninteresting visually.

66

Gar Shadowfame:

Not exacly, normen are worshipping chaos gods, but they are not madmen, or mutated freaks. They just worship them, only few are good enough to be marked blessed or whatever. It was mentioned earlier that for norse poople to worship is more to venerate and occasionaly sacrifice something (in sense of offering) that to be a cultist.

67

Baggronor:

The Norse were not simply the guys in spikey armour who rampaged through the south every now and then. They seem to have regressed back to 'generic evil badies number four' since then, and I think that is sad.
I was hoping they would do this for all the tribes (Kurgan, Hung and Norse) for the WoC book. But its GW and I suppose that would have been too interesting... far too much effort so they just stuck with the 2D spikey baddies image.
Magic and marks: I seriously doubt the marks will be involved, based upon a lot of the decisions that seem to have been made. As a result, I doubt that the 3 god lores shall appear. If the marks do exist, they will probably be less powerful (and cheaper) than WoC ones and the lores will be less refined and slightly different. At a guess.
Seems likely. I assume the Beasts spell lore would contain spells that could be construed as aid from any of the 3 magic using gods, plus some 'Beastman Charge' kind of spells.

Evil Treeman ftw! Time for some of your own medicine, Woodies! :)
68

Bassman:

Evil Treeman ftw! Time for some of your own medicine, Woodies! :)

Baggronor
as long as it is flammable..... Black hammer anyone? LOL :D
69

Baggronor:

as long as it is flammable..... Black hammer anyone? LOL
If it eats WEs and dies to CDs, then its 100% success :)
70

AGPO:

@ HB - the prices are indeed horrific right across the Beastmen range. Expect a price hike on e-bay now this info is out. The Bestigor are the worst - £25 for ten core models!? That’s actually more than we’re paying for metal atm! Likewise the minotours - at £27 they’re £7 more than ogres for half the models. The only good thing about this is we’ll be seeing a lot more indie sculpts of minos in the not too distant future.

I’m thinking of starting to sculpt my own beasts range for casting. Minotours and heavily armoured Glorantha style ‘Bru’ would make a good sub for bestigors.

However, there is talk of having gors and ungors in seperate units, or that there will be a return for ungor skirmisher units which can take missile weapons. Certainly it is confirmed that there will be new weapons options for ungors. Also, as for the ‘downgrade’ of two models I think most beasts players would prefer that. Excess gors are actually no use if they’re not in the front rank as they actually cost you attacks in combat. The ungors have spears and can thus ‘fight through’ if they are in the second rank, which gors cannot. As ungors die first from missiles and spells if you have too many gors in the unit you effectively downgrade ungors to ablative armour for your gors. Thus the new balance would be welcome. I’m off to Warhammer World tomorrow to see what I can find out.

71

Baggronor:

£25 for ten core models
This means that compared to the current box, you will be paying £12(!) more to swap 2 Gor for 2 Ungor.
Minotaurs
- plastic box for £27 containing 3 guys
I didn't notice the prices earlier...
Mighty christ, £2.50 each for plastics? Plastic Minotaurs nearly a tenner each? :o Ye gods, I imagine many people will just convert Gors and Ogres...
72

AGPO:

Yup, I’m going to be ordering a LOT of beast herds between now and february.

For the sake of anyone else here thinking of starting a beasts army, this is how I’ll be converting the expansion to mine:

Beast herds - Buying current boxed sets (total saving £12 per unit)

Bestigor - current beastherd box with converted marauder flails, or simply reposing and extending the hand weapons into great weapons. GS chainmail (total saving £32 per unt of twenty)

Centigor - Marauder horsemen converted into centaurs - these were part of the beastman army up to and including 5th edition. (total saving - £23 per unit)

Mintours - I’m going to sculpt these myself then cast them. Total cost of casting materials - £26 for enough to produce approx 15 minotours. Total cost of sculpting materials approx £6. (Total saving approx £19 per unit)

Bray Shamens - Tau ethereals with plastic beastman heads and bitz box bray staffs. (Total saving - none as far as I know, but the shamens will look far cooler.)

Tuskgor chariots - Scratch built from sprue and plasticard with mutant plastic boars and spare gors/ungors as crew (total cost approx £28 for 5 chariots, total saving £62, or £12.40 per unit)

Spawn - bitz box conversions - spawn can be anything you like (total saving £18 for a box of 2)

Dragon ogres Dark elf cold ones with black orc torsos (total cost - £39 for ten, total saving £81, or £8.10 per model)

With borrowing the hounds and giant from my chaos warriors army, I reckon that should save me a pretty packet when building my forces.

73

Bloodfire:

AGPO, that money saving plan of yours is fantastic! When my Snakemen come out of their concept sketch stage (which wont be anytime soon) I might have to follow a plan similar to yours :hat off

74

AGPO:

Bloodfire - I’m looking forward to seeing your snakemen when they make it out of the concept stage! Unfortunately, players such as myself on a low income have had to get used to money saving schemes when it comes to new armies…

EDIT: I also found this on The Herdstone:

75

Hashut’s Blessing:

Gar Shadowfame: they don’t ALL actively worship them and it’s entirely likely that they simply try to appease them, much like the Naggarothi did before the Sundering with the unmentionable gods.

AGPO: I agree that the downgrade will certainly be useful, but I was more complaining about the whole price increase thing. I always got annoyed that I had 12 Gor and 8 Ungor, bt such is life :smiley:

The prices are purely beyond a joke and I doubt I will buy ANY of them…

That standard bearer looks nice and definitely in keeping with the current models, but I get the impression that it’s a little too “static” for a member of an army that usually is meant for running forwards. I do like that it has been painted a little less “man with beast head” and more like a manbeast.

76

AGPO:

You’d have thought they’d have given us a more interesting picture though…

77

AGPO:

Over at warseer, Gabacho MK II said.

"Gors are/will be a ranked Core unit, by themselves.

Ungors are still skirmishers. [I have no idea concerning weapons, such as the speculated bows, etc]

You can also take a skirmishing Gor and Ungor unit (much like the Krox-led-Skink units), as Core.

Skirmishing units can infiltrate. [as stated]

One last bit:
I overheard that the Beastmen army will be "very flexible." Now, is that a description of the armylist or some underlying thought as to how the final army will play like? I lean toward the possibility of several 'new' unit types in the armylist (in the Core, Special and Rare slots), and by this is what is meant that the army will be very flexible.
A watered down "brown Orc" armylist I don't see and can't imagine.

"The book is already written.
From several sources
78

Baggronor:

Gors are/will be a ranked Core unit,
5th ed style, eh?
such as the speculated bows
Ye Gods, bows?! In a Chaos army?!
79

cornixt:

Someone doesn’t know about the old rules for BS6 Chaos Warriors with bows

80

Baggronor:

Wasn’t it Chaos Thugs with bows? I do have a vague recollection (I was about 7 at the time I think) :slight_smile: