I thought I�?Td put a report together for those that didn�?Tt go/couldn�?Tt attend and keep all the pictures in one place for reference. So here it is.
Gia and I got there at about 8:15 and were having a good old chat with the people around us in the line for Golden Daemon. They actually let us in at about 9AM to submit our entries and then we were waiting once again to be let into the main arena.
The Golden Daemon/Armies on Parade area was in a sports hall on a different floor so there were a lot of stairs to go from the main arena and back again.
Once we got into the main arena we made a bee line for the Forge World Design stand, grabbed a couple of seminar tickets and then headed for a chat with Trish Carden and Steve Whitehead. The highlight of the day for both Gia and I was Trish giving Gia a plush toy to represent the Lobster that was sculpted onto the base. She once again went out of her way and spent time encouraging Gia saying there needs to be more girls and women in the hobby. Trish is currently the only sculptor working on Warhammer Forge stuff as almost the entire design team is working on Heresy as it is such a big seller. Her latest project is the Dread Saurian from the Monstrous Arcanum book. It is huge. It took up a whole shelf in a cabinet to its self and is almost complete. Trish said that she now needs to cut it up ready for moulding so should be passed over to production soon. I know all the Lizzardmen collectors (and I�?Tm looking at you skink) will be really happy but dreading the price tag
Steve said that the K�?TDaai is not yet finished and as it is both a freelance project and a big kit it keeps getting pushed back in the production schedule. There is still more work to be done on the model as well but as he has recently become a Dad his free time is a bit limited at the moment. His current projects are Night Lord legion �?oNight Raptor Assault Marines�?� which look awesome and there were a bunch of Alpha Legion doors and shoulder pads. He said that the goal is for each legion to have at least two specialist legion specific squads.
After these two chats we braced ourselves and headed into the Sales area. There were two lines one for Forge World and one for everything else. It was the best organised I�?Tve ever seen the sales areas at one of these events and despite the number of people queuing up it was pretty quick and we were soon at the front grabbing what we wanted from the Forge World stand the way out from the Forge World stand then led into the rest of the sales area and finally into the tills to pay.
Tony Cottrel and Alan Bligh were the presenters. They rattled through all the slides pretty quickly with the idea that there would be more time for Q&A at the end. The first two slides were for Warhammer Forge and showed the Troll Hag and the new Dread Saurian, and that was it for WFB. Next they talked about 40K which was Imperial Armour Volume 2 second edition with rules for all current Space Marine Forge World stuff including Heresy stuff like the Sicaran Battle tank. They then showed a slide of the new Tau battle suit that we had the preview pictures of before Games Day, before moving on to the Horus Heresy.
This was about 90% of the formal presentation. I think most of us know most of the stuff presented so I�?Tll try to be brief. Book 2 Massacre part 1. Iron Hands, Salamanders, Word Bearers Night Lords. History and rules for all four legions including Special Units, Special Characters and Primarchs.
The First new model on the slides was the Sicaran Venator described as an anti tank version of the Sicaran and looks like this.
They also showed some Mechanicum troops, a work in progress thrall
And some Heavy support infantry called Myrmidons which �?oTower over terminators and come armed with all sorts of nasty weapons�?�
They showed the Kharybdis Assault Claw (Drop pod) which a painted up version was on display breaching the side of a space ship as part of the battle of Phall display
They also showed images of Iron Hands Legion �?oMedusan Immortals Breacher Marines�?�, Death Guard Legion �?oGrave Warden Terminators�?�, the Night Lords �?oNight Raptors Assault Marines�?�
The big thing though was Lorgar
And of course Horus The only model in the presentation that was not on display on the studio stand
They then went on to talk about Book 3 (not due Easter time and not Christmas). It contains Isstvan V part 2, Battle of Phall and the First Battle of Paramar. If anyone know what the battle of Paramar is I�?Td be grateful for a quick breakdown. Legions incuded are Alpha Legion, Raven Guard, Imperial Fists and Iron Warriors. After that the next three books will be Prospero (including Thousand Sons Space Wolves Custodes and Sisters of Silence) Signus (Blood Angels, Dark Angels and Daemons) and Calth (Ultra Marines, Word Bearers and traitor guard)
I�?Tll put as much as I remember down but if you want any more then ask and I�?Tll do my best to fill in the gaps but as best as I can recall in the order the questions were asked.
Salamanders specialist squads are on the list and should be out in the new year.
They will probably do more battle suit variants including riptide variants but not for a while.
Heresy book 3 March Book 4 (Prospero) late 2014
Warhammer Forge Blackfire Pass book late 2014 K�?TDaai may be January or February. Tony did say that these are postponed because of Heresy because the Heresy models are the biggest selling range Forge World have ever done.
There will be accessory packs for all the legions over the coming months.
Mortarion has not yet been started but will be fairly soon. Possibly Primarch number 6 or 7.
Iron Warriors special units are currently pencilled in as Heavy Support Terminators (lots of cyclone launchers) and Siege versions of Heavy Support infantry (the birth of the Havoc squads)
They will not be doing Heresy era Aliens. At the beginning of the Heresy all Aliens are either dead or in hiding after the rapid expansion of the Human Empire. Their time will come during �?oThe Scouring�?� if they ever get that far.
Imperial Fists will be getting a full list including Sigismund and Rogal Dorn despite them not being present at the Battle of Phall.
Warlord in a couple of years, look for it when the Mars Book comes out.
The Golden Daemon cabinets seemed a lot emptier this year than in previous years. I think the all the usual suspects were in evidence and that the quality of the winners was even better than ever but a lot of the �?oAlso Rans�?� were missing so the cabinets were not as full. I guess dropping from 9000 to 4000 attendees will do that
One thing Gia and I were both disappointed at was the lack of the conversion competition and the scenery workshops. The arena was given over to the design studios and the sales stands. There were no other GW activities at all. There were some participation games being run by Fantast Flight but these were all the card games which neither Gia nor I were interested in. The classic hall full of mad participation games with scratch built Imperators and Gargants was nowhere to be seen which was a shame.
The Forge World design studio stand was once again the highlight of the show. They were the only people showing what they were working on and what was coming up. The GW design section was only showing already released marines and the imminent Dark Elfs which we had already seen in White Dwarf. Nothing from next month�?Ts alleged Dark Elf releases that I could see though I may have missed them.
Not Games Workshop�?Ts issue but after the catering we�?Tve got used to at the NEC the NIA was shocking. When we got to the �?oFood Village�?� (about 12:30) they had run out of everything apart from some Vegetable and cheese pies. We hung around for about 20 minutes and they eventually brought up some pasties and meat pies from the kitchen which we decided to give a try and they were awful. If they hold it there again I�?Tm taking a pack up.
Overall a good day out and Gia was totally worn out by the drive home but they have really cut back on a lot of the peripheral stuff that made games days what they were.
