Month: May 2021

May retrospective

Hey everybody,
Well this has soon come round again, hasn’t it? Doesn’t seem like five minutes since the last retrospective blog, does it now?! I’ve not actually been posting all that much on here throughout May, unfortunately, and I doubt that June will be very busy at all, given that we’re eagerly awaiting the birth of baby number two, but I hope that I’ll be able to do something. At any rate – it’s not the time to look forward right now, it’s time to look back!

May has seen the temporary culmination of my Ossiarch Bonereapers army, with three heroes joining the ranks of the rest of the models that I’ve painted up for the army. Arch-Kavalos Zandtos, Vokmortian, and the Mortisan Soulreaper have been a nice way to finish things off, I think!

I’ve got somewhere in the realm of 1400 points painted up now, which is very exciting, though I do think I need to get more basic troops done before I can call this army done. I’m hoping that the new edition of Age of Sigmar will bring us some more models, as I’d really like to get a unit of those archers, if nothing else!

So the start of the month was almost consumed with Age of Sigmar and getting the Bonereapers into shape. I’ve also got some more games of Warhammer Underworlds in, which has been really nice, including with the original Shadespire set.

It’s been really nice getting to play the game, and I’m hoping that I can pick up some of the Direchasm expansions when the world returns to normal and they’re actually available to buy again… fingers crossed!

It’s not all about the Mortal Realms, though, as I’ve also made a return to the grim darkness of the far future. Specifically, with the Sisters!

Sisters of Battle

It’s been far too long, of course, but I’m really glad to have finally made an effort with these ladies. I’ve gone for a custom scheme, though intend to play them as Order of the Sacred Rose – I’ve written at length on my plans for the army, here and here, so please do check those blogs out!

I very nearly had a game of 40k the other week, though my buddy JP had a drunken night and figuring out the rules for a system we’ve barely played was not to be! I’ve got a game of Necromunda lined up with James next weekend, which should be good because I’ve only ever played it solo up to now! So gaming is slowly coming back on the radar, even if it will be curtailed while I look after a newborn again!

Jemma and I have started to watch the MCU again, working our way through Phase One during May. There’s probably a lot more to talk about with these things, although at the same time I feel like there isn’t really a great deal that I can add that has already been said. Two Iron Man films, Thor, Captain America, and the Avengers movie. I do find origin films to get a bit same-y after a while, and this is very true of the MCU, where you get to feel like they’re just giving us yet another superhero who comes into his or her power (actually, I guess they’re just male) and fights the bad guys, gets beaten down, comes back stronger and saves the day.

There is a definite élan to the first Iron Man, which updates the action from Communist China to Afghanistan during the War on Terror superbly well. Indeed, that’s one of the great things we see during the series as a whole, the way that they’re updated and made relevant, almost. For sure, they all exist as pure escapism, and they’re all just great adventures that you can sit back and bask in the effects without needing to really think. But I do find it quite fun to watch the development of Iron Man, the one that started it all.

The Avengers is also an amazing film for the fact it managed to pull together so many A-list stars and not feel like it favoured one too heavily. It was nice that we’d been having hints and shadows of SHIELD since the very beginning, but that film very definitely exists in a SHIELD world. It’s almost ten years old, and I still can’t quite believe they managed to pull it off!

Phase One has got some great stuff in there, though. I think it’s possibly because of the fact that they’re starting off, and so all the big names are being established. Things are definitely getting more niche in some of the post-Infinity Saga stuff that we’re hearing about! There’s a lot to enjoy in this first act, I found myself in particular enjoying Captain America more than I remember, and Jemma was appreciative of Thor as a sort of classic fantasy movie merged with the conspiracy-theory stuff based here on Earth. Things definitely began to get unwieldy after this, although I do think Phase Two managed to keep a fairly decent lid on things until it all seemed to go nuts in Phase Three. But that’ll be for another blog!

Now then. I was up in the attic recently, trying to choose my next book, and I came across a stack of unsorted Magic cards, which seem to have been my last purchase from maybe 12-18 months ago? Feels like it might be longer, though I’m not 100% sure. Anyway, it brought back a lot of memories, and I have been doing a bit of tinkering with some things, in the hope that – as I said before – real-life gaming may well be on the cards once again.

They’re mostly from Ikoria, though some M20 in there as well. I need to get to grips with what I’ve missed since I was last interested in all this stuff. Was it War of the Spark, last time I paid attention? Can’t remember… It’s been a long time, anyway, though seeing these things, and flicking through them, and even the smell – it’s all triggering those fond memories, and it’s got me wanting to build decks again! Let’s hope that it won’t all be for nothing, though…

I think it’s a pretty safe bet that you can expect to see some more Magic blogs here, as I attempt to catch up with what I’ve missed!

Age of Sigmar: Dominion

The new box set has been previewed! This thing is choc-full of interesting goodies, featuring Stormcast vs a new breed of Orruks, the Kruleboyz. We’re firmly in the realm of beasts, and we have some swanky new Stormcast models, the first (I think) since Soul Wars updated the range a few years ago.

The new Stormcast look like they’re a tougher breed than the wizards we had last time, but this addition has got to be making their battletome really quite bloated. Interesting.

The new Stormcast do look nice, of course, and I really like this character, as I think I have mentioned before:

She looks utterly amazing, don’t you think?

However, these are what has got me most interested in the box. The Kruleboyz have got a cunning look about them, and seem much more intelligent than the regular greenskins. I’m intrigued because it’s always nice to see a new race involved in these games, and there is an element of world-building that will be interesting to explore.

The big hero miniature is quite something, for sure, and I love the dynamism of the pose, with his big battle cat leaping down off the ruin. The draping filth off these things is really evocative of the swamp, and these guys are just brimming with character!

The sorcerer chap looks particularly funky, with his sous-chef assistant there.

There is a very interesting mix of guys, although of course they all follow the established pattern of having some leaders, a heavy group of warriors and a larger mob of more runty chaps.

This doesn’t seem to be all that’s coming though, as we’ve seen previews for a few more units for each force, including a Stormcast chariot (like the olden days! Chariots for all!) and this for the Kruleboyz:

It’s a wonderful piece of artillery, though they’re also getting a very angry troll:

The Mirebrute Troggoth looks wonderful, and I can’t imagine being able to resist this dude when he is released into the wild!

However, I’m finding it very hard to get excited for this box, because of the paragraphs towards the end of the article. It’s up for pre-order in June, but it’s another of these “while stocks last” thing. I don’t understand it. I was able to pick up Soul Wars about six months after the launch, but this is the same language as Indomitus, and that box disappeared at a rate of knots. Given the way things have been with the big boxsets of late, as well, I really have no faith in the Dominion box being any different – it’ll be available for pre-order for maybe 20 minutes, and then it’ll disappear. Which will no doubt make for good reading for the shareholders, but is disappointing because the odds are it won’t be available for the people at whom it’s intended.

But lets not end this on a downer. The new Orruks look wonderful, and it’ll be interesting to see how third edition changes the game – and whether we’re in for any more new races!

The Adepta Sororitas

Hey everybody,
Welcome back to the second part of my Codex deep-dive into the Sisters of Battle, this time looking across the wider suite of rules n the book and seeing what I can make with the models that I have.

Last time, I was looking at the army-wide rules and how they all fit in with what the army is trying to accomplish. Now, I’ve started to re-work my list ideas into something that I will have to aim for, without trying to get too far ahead of myself, of course! There’s always the danger of running away with myself when doing this sort of thing – building a load of models up, and then feeling overwhelmed by it all! I’ve moved away from the initial list that I had made,

I’m aiming for 1500 points, though I don’t want to worry just yet about how I will fill all of this. I mean, I’m pretty sure that I’ll be getting more troops, of course, and with the new releases on their way I want to keep my options open for what new stuff I’ll be sprinkling in.

I’m playing Order of the Sacred Rose, as I’ve said before. The rules for this Order Conviction are:
– no more than one model can flee when a Morale test is failed;
– regain one Miracle die on a 5+ after performing an Act of Faith;
– Overwatch attacks hit on a 5 or 6.

In addition to the usual relics and warlord traits on offer, there is a stratagem for the Order that allows for hit rolls of 6 during Overwatch to score 1 additional hit. Wonderful stuff!

Let’s start at the top, anyway, with the Canoness. The warlord trait that I have chosen is Light of the Emperor, the Sacred Rose specific trait that allows for the warlord to gain one Miracle die after performing an Act of Faith, with no roll needed. The relic she has merely improves the damage output of the blessed blade from D3 to a flat 3. I’m not really sure how to use the model yet though, as I’m always a bit wary of throwing my warlord into the thick of things, but there are a number of stratagems that can protect characters – and even bring them back from the dead, if need be!

I’m intending to run the Canoness around with her bodyguard unit of Celestians, anyway. The squad has a slightly better stat line than the basic Sisters squad, though both units can equip one heavy weapon and one special weapon, or two special weapons. They have a better WS, and more attacks, which could be seen as making the case for equipping the Celestian Superior with a fancier weapon, but the chainsword is always a solid option for granting one additional attack! I’m going for a general theme of having my Sisters preferring melta weaponry, so the squad has a meltagun and an inferno pistol in there. However, there is also the heavy flamer, and three bolt guns, meaning that it is a viable target for the Holy Trinity stratagem, which gives +1 to wound if flamer, melta and bolt weaponry all fire at the same target. In addition, Celestians can re-roll hit rolls while within 6″ of a character model, so I think it’ll be good to keep them close to the Canoness!

Let’s talk about close combat now. I said before that I’m planning to have the core of the army reflective of the launch box for the new army, so I’ve worked in the squad of Sisters Repentia with the Repentia Superior to chivvy them along. The elite slot is really heavy in a Sisters army, though the Repentia Superior doesn’t count in it while she comes alongside a group of penitents. However, when I start wanting to expand into the Dialogus et al, I think I’m going to need a new detachment!

The Repentia can re-roll wound rolls of 1 when within 6″ of the Superior. They also have the Zealot rule, which allows them to re-roll hit rolls if they charged or were charged that phase. So there are definitely options to improve their accuracy. 8 attacks in the squad, at S6 AP-3 and 2 damage each, togged up with these re-rolls, should be quite nice! The Repentia also have their own stratagem, Final Redemption – when the unit is being attacked, each time a model is destroyed, you get to inflict a mortal wound on the attacking unit on a 4+. There is also the option, for 3CP, to get the unit to fight again at the end of the fight phase, which may also be useful!

The arco-flagellants are one of the ecclesiarchy battle conclave units that are allowed in the army. They also have the Zealot rule, and have a unique stratagem, Extremis Trigger Word. This one is interesting, because the regular group of three – two flagellants and an endurant – has a base 7 attacks. However, for each attack, you make D3 hit rolls, and the stratagem makes that a flat 3. So 7 attacks, making three hit rolls each – 21 dice, at S5 AP-1 and 1 damage each… oh yes! The only downside to this is that you must then roll a D6 for each model, and on a 6, they die.

The group of Retributors that I’ve recently put together is made up of a pair each of multi-meltas and heavy bolters, with the Retributor Superior has a combi-plasma and power maul. I’m still not a big fan of the Superior’s pose, it looks incredibly awkward somehow, but anyway. Retributor Squads also have a unique stratagem, which costs 2CP and allows you to choose an effect depending on the weapon load out – +1 to hit for a heavy bolter OR re-roll the wound roll for a heavy flamer OR +12″ to the range of all multi-meltas and +1 damage for a multi-melta. Having a pair of multi-meltas, I think I’ll probably be using it for them, as the range increase will mean the melta effect will kick in within 18″, but will still give them the same range of the heavy bolters.

I’ve got the Penitent Engine in here for some added threat – it’s not a particularly big model, if I’m honest, though it’s bigger than anything else in this line-up, armed with a pair of heavy flamers and capable of 5 S8 attacks at AP-3. Very nice, but I do worry about it getting stuck in with only being T5 at 5 wounds. There’s very little to bolster it, being an Adeptus Ministorum unit, though the same 3CP stratagem as the Repentia have does apply to the Engines as well, allowing them to fight twice.

Something that I’ve been backwards and forwards on multiple times, though, is the Dominion squad. The purpose of these girls has eluded me for a while, flicking casually through the Codex, but it’s clear that their intended purpose is to move up the board as quickly as possible to maximise on positioning, and then either objective-camp with their fancy weapons, or aggressively go after a choice target. They really are a special weapon showcase, being able to take four of them per squad. On the competitive scene, the go-to load-out seems to be four storm bolters, to use the Blessed Bolts stratagem. For 1CP, you can make storm bolters AP-2 and D2 each. That’s pretty good, although I find it a bit boring to equip the squad entirely the same, you know? So I’ve added in some meltagun girls because they’re going to be moving significantly, anyway – the melta effect comes into play at 6″, but even at their maximum range of 12″, that’ll put the storm bolters into rapid fire range for some serious threat.

I would just like to point out, as well, that the Battle Sisters box, which can also be used to build Dominions and Celestians, comes with four of each special weapon, so you don’t get shafted if you’re trying to build them as Dominions. Excellent stuff, there!

Of course, as with a lot of the ranged units in the force, there are a few targets for specific stratagems that I’ve mentioned; the Sacred Rose-specific The Emperor’s Judgement allowing for exploding hits on 6s in Overwatch will be useful for a variety of units, after all. Blessed Bolts can be used by the regular Battle Sisters, one of whom has a storm bolter, etc.

I think this is going to be a good start to the army, though of course with a new Codex on the way, who knows how any of this will hold over? Yesterday, I was reading the latest Battle Sister Bulletin that began to tease new rules for the army, giving us six battle hymns that we can have a priest sing at the start of the turn. It reminded me a lot of Canticles of the Omnissiah for the Adeptus Mechanicus, though I suppose the Prayers to the Dark Gods from the Heretic Astartes might be more appropriate. These priests can provide some very nice aura effects, such as causing auto-hits on 6s for bolt weapons fired by a unit within 6″, or to shut down any psykers attempting to manifest powers at a nearby unit. Very powerful, that one, and what I find more interesting is that the Dialogus is now seemingly classed as a priest, herself – as well as the new Dogmata model.

I know not everybody likes the new model, but I can certainly see a place for her with these hymns being on the horizon!

At any rate, I’ve got plenty to be getting along with here, so hopefully I can make a concerted effort to get painting these models next! We’ve got a long weekend coming up, and it’ll soon be time for my May retrospective, so keep an eye out for some progress on the Battle Sisters, soon!!

The Adepta Sororitas!

Hey everybody,
It seems to have been a while! Real life has, sadly, been intruding once more, as we count down the weeks until the birth of my second-born, and with just 5 weeks to go, I suppose it’s inevitable that I won’t have the time to do as much on the blog here! For the last couple of weeks, though, I’ve been looking at my Adepta Sororitas army, the Sisters of Battle that I was initially very excited about getting my hands on, only to then flounder a bit with my search for a colour scheme. I’ve gone from wanting something like the Deathwing colours, to a traditional Order of the Sacred Rose, to now coming up with something that is pretty much entirely my own. I’m not turning into one of these folks who comes up with the lore for them, though – they’re definitely being played as Order of the Sacred Rose (unless the 9th Edition Codex changes my ideas!) but I wanted a colour scheme that I could replicate across a lot of models without much fuss.

I mean, what kind of masochist wants to paint an all-white army?!

The scheme that I’ve chosen is a pale blue, with all-grey robes and then red gun casings. I’d initially attempted green casings, but I think the red is definitely a better spot-colour for these guys. They’re still very much a work in progress for the time being, but I am finally enjoying myself working on them – much more than I was in the past!

Sisters of Battle

For the time being, I’m still working towards the list that I’d outlined back when I set out my hobby goals for 2021, though I really think it could be time for a change, especially when the second wave of new releases comes out this summer! For those of you who didn’t click the link, though, this was my first attempt at building a Sisters army:

There is a lot here that I’m probably going to change. In particular, I think I may swap out the Immolator for the new Castigator, as I do love that model. While I have both Celestians and Dominions in this list, I’ve actually been at work building the Retributor box, after having built up a solitary heavy bolter girl before leaving the rest of the box. Eventually, of course, my plan is to have the core of the army made up from the contents of the launch box from back in the day, as I think the combination of Battle Sisters and Seraphim is just a glorious one!

The Rules
Lately, though, I’ve also been spending some time trying to figure out the army rules. I’d say the 8th edition ruleset from their Codex was fairly baffling to me, when I first picked it up, due to the fact that it feels very much like 7th edition and the need for a separate rules glossary to make sense of it all. This blog will form the first of a two-part look at the army rules, as I try to get to grips with everything that is available to the Sisters.

There are three rules that almost all Adepta Sororitas units from the army have access to, which are referenced elsewhere in the book: Acts of Faith, Shield of Faith, and Sacred Rites. Acts of Faith in particular is quite the lynchpin of a lot of the force, and it has a lot of influence on other stuff like warlord traits and stratagems.

Acts of Faith is a mechanic that uses Miracle Dice, of which you gain one at the start of each battle round. In addition, there are four other ways to gain Miracle Dice at the end of a phase – one of your units destroys an enemy unit; a CHARACTER unit from your army is destroyed; a psychic power is resisted by a unit from your army, and rolling an unmodified 1 for a Morale test. Splendid!

Miracle Dice form a pool that lasts until they are used – when you gain one, you roll a D6 and its result is the value of that dice. When you come to perform an Act of Faith, rather than rolling a dice you instead substitute it for one of your Miracle Dice, so it’s like you’re pre-selecting your dice results. You can do this for Advance rolls, Charge rolls, Deny the Witch tests, Hit rolls, Wound rolls, Saving throws, Damage rolls, or Morale tests. Importantly, if you perform an Act of Faith on a Deny the Witch test, for example, you wouldn’t then gain a Miracle Dice if the psychic power was successfully resisted. Also importantly, if you then re-roll the dice, you do not re-roll the Miracle Dice used for your Act of Faith; so it’s important to differentiate which dice are which.

You can only perform one Act of Faith in each phase – so you couldn’t substitute Miracle Dice in for the hit, wound and damage rolls in a single shooting phase, for instance. However, there are a bevy of rules that do interact with this stuff, such as the Simulacrum (standard-bearer) model in a unit allowing you to perform an Act of Faith even if you’ve already done so in that phase. Several units come with Incensor Cherubs, which allow you to gain one Miracle Dice but roll 2D6 and choose which one you want. My chosen Order, the Order of the Sacred Rose, as the ability to regain Miracle Dice on a 5+ once a unit has performed an Act of Faith. It’s quite the integral mechanic for the army, and it had been bothering me that I had been getting a bit confused by how it works until I recently sat down and properly drilled down into the Codex at last!

This is massively different from the last rendition of the rule, which was a bit like a suite of Psychic Powers, where there were different Acts with different effects, and you had to roll a dice to see if it goes off. You could attempt to perform these Acts by spending “Faith points”, the number of which was based on the number of units in the army.

Shield of Faith is a rule that grants a 6+ invuln save, but also turns each unit with the ability into an anti-psyker unit, allowing them to take Deny the Witch tests. They only roll a single D6, though, rather than 2D6, so if an enemy psyker rolled 6+ on their psychic power roll, it’s not going to do anything. However, the Battle Sisters have got undying faith in the Emperor, so they aren’t so easy to overcome! There is a stratagem that allows the unit to resist the psychic power on a 4+, regardless.

Sacred Rites is an additional army-wide rule that grants one of six effects for the whole battle. At the start of the battle, you can either choose one or roll 2D6 for two random ones, and they’re in effect until the end. There is a stratagem for 1CP to change the rite, as well, giving some control over it. Similar to the Space Marines combat doctrines (although it makes me think most of the Grey Knight Tides).

The effects of these Sacred Rites are not particularly overwhelming, but can be extremely useful based on the type of army that you’re running. One allows you to add 1 to advance and charge rolls; one grants an auto-hit for a melee weapon on an unmodified roll of 6, etc. Interestingly, though, it’s the “Aegis of the Emperor” effect that has my attention: add 3 to Deny the Witch test rolls. So Shield of Faith will now only be useless if the psychic test roll was 9+. And they still have the stratagem to fall back on.

As an interesting aside, the Sacred Rites are based largely on the older Acts of Faith from earlier editions.

I imagine a Sisters army to be quite the thing to behold, when it is working in perfect sync. They have access to a lot of firepower, and although the models are only S3, they have enough tricks up their voluminous sleeves that they shouldn’t be wiped off the table without a fight.

Of course, the Codex does feel a little bit like two books in one, because there are a number of Adeptus Ministorum units folded in that feel a little bit like they’re an afterthought. When the range was re-done in plastic, these hangars-on were, for the most part, left. So Death Cult Assassins, Crusaders, Missionaries and Preachers are all still in metal, sadly. Of course, Blackstone Fortress gave us a plastic Preacher and Crusader, and Rogue Trader gave us a plastic Death Cult Assassin, but it is a shame that they’ve been left out, to some extent.

The only non-Sisters plastic re-make was the Arco-Flagellants box, which has the Adeptus Ministorum keyword, but can still be included in a Sisters army thanks to having the Ecclesiarchy Battle Conclave keyword, one of which units can be included without losing the Order Conviction for your overall army. It feels a bit like they should either have also re-done these oddball units, or maybe just forgotten about them entirely?

Anyway, I should probably stop rambling now, and go paint some more Sisters! Make sure to come back later in the week for part two though, when I continue to delve into the Codex and look at how I can start to build out my army. I’ll also try to bring further updates to my painting adventures as I get further along with the army, so stay tuned!!

Warhammer Fest 2021

Hey everybody,
Warhammer Fest 2021 has been and gone, and there have been some fairly mixed reviews on the internet overall, with a lot of people seemingly disappointed with the fact that the hyped 6 days of previews didn’t live up to expectations. While that is perhaps true, and the event didn’t really have the usual feel of these preview events as being ground-shaking, there’s still a lot to talk about here! So let’s get to it!

Warhammer 40,000
To start with, let’s talk 40k. Over the six days, there were two devoted specifically to 40k, the first seeing a collation of the various Adepta Sororitas previews that we’ve had over the past few weeks and months, plus a few extras of course. Looks like the warsuit thing is coming in a squad of three, and there will be the new Celestian squad with the maces and shields.

The weird thing about all of this is, we’re getting a High Lord of Terra! Weird, right? Well, I guess anything is possible.

It’s always exciting when an army gets new stuff though, isn’t it? So however weird these things are, let’s just enjoy the fact that the Sisters range didn’t just get a plastic overhaul back in 2019; they’re now being fully developed as a faction.

Sisters will be getting their Codex soon, and the next chapter in War Zone Charadon is on its way, and will come with rules for Be’lakor in the 41st millennium, which is pretty exciting, and it’ll be coming out alongside a terrain expansion that seems to have all of the Sector Mechanicus stuff that has been hard to find for quite some time now!

The second day for 40k reveals came on day five, and we’ve got more Orks coming, those squig-riding things and a couple of new characters.

In addition, there is going to be a reboxing of Cadian Shock Troopers to give them more diversity, more faces and the like.

Not a new kit, though, which everybody has been clamouring for for years. Ah well! But we have also seen this little teaser:

I must admit, I’ve been turning away from the light of the Emperor of late, and preparing to embrace the fact that I’m a xenos player through and through. However, now that we’re seeing some Grey Knights on the horizon, however distant that may be, I’m thinking I need to wait and see what’s coming before I do anything too hasty!

That wasn’t all for the 41st millennium though, as day three brought us a bit of a surprise (for me, at least!) – Gaunt’s Ghosts are getting new miniatures!

I did not expect this! There are another raft of novels on the way, including two more Warhammer Crime anthologies! I’m a little disappointed to find out that they’re anthologies – although one apparently had a novella in there – but it’s still very good to have more of this stuff! Grim Repast, “a Quillon Drask novel”, sounds like it should be good though. I just hope that we see Black Library make good on these books that are sold as “a (character) novel” and give us more of that same character in future books.

Boxed Games
Day four was all about boxed games, and we saw some upcoming stuff for Direchasm, Necromunda and Aeronautica Imperialis. The latter doesn’t really interest me, though I do think it’s kinda funny that it’s being marketed as the plastic thunderhawk that people have been asking for for years.

Necromunda previews consist of the House of Shadows, and the Delaque specialists. I am very excited about this particular release, as they really have become my preferred gang! The new models are just as weird as I’d hoped they’d be, with a couple of gribblies such as that weird flying brain thing. Definitely the sort of thing that I’d expected from Delaque!

For Direchasm, we’re getting the Idoneth Deepkin warband, though everyone has been going crazy for the crab mini!

Which brings us nicely on to…

Age of Sigmar
I’ve saved this until last because it was probably the biggest part of the week of previews – outside of the crab, of course. Day One saw the remaining previews of the Soulblight Gravelords miniatures, which look truly like the stuff of nightmares:

These models tie in quite strongly with Warhammer Quest: Cursed City, which is quite sad because that game has disappeared entirely in a whimper that wholly belies the ceremony and hype that had been lavished upon it prior to release! A lot of people – myself included – had hoped there would be some kind of official word on this game coming from one of the days, but despite hundreds of comments in the twitch chat asking about it, no mention has been made whatsoever. Shame.

The fourth Mortal Realms book has also been announced: Kragnos is a huge Beastman-type, and the book will be coming with all those cool new models that have been shown off, such as the flying Slaaneshi thing, the new Lord Kroak and more. Mortal Realms then draws a line underneath Age of Sigmar 2nd edition, as the Sixth and Final Day of previews has given us the big news (that so many people had already guessed) – third edition is on its way!

This model is just wonderful, and I won’t lie, it’s got me pondering starting a Stormcast army!

She’s a new type of Lord-Celestant, or something – I didn’t really watch the stream, although I caught bits of this one as I was putting my daughter to bed. The interesting thing, for me, is that the lore has the armies of Order finally reclaiming the lands lost to Chaos and creating outpost cities. I find this fascinating because it feels like we may actually be seeing something akin to the Old World, and the network of cities and whatnot. Of course, there’s still the potential for them to all have daft names, but even so!

The article makes mention of a new narrative play style, which I guess is Crusade from 40k by another name, so we can expect to get updated battletomes for all factions to include those new rules. So long as the Ossiarch Bonereapers get their Mortek Archers and the mace-wielding guys, I’ll be happy!

And that was it! Big news was Age of Sigmar v3, and we have supplemental ranges of Sisters and Orks to look forward to. I think everything else was decidedly of a lower rung of colossal really, though I’m trying not to follow the rest of the internet with complaining too much. New stuff is nice, for sure, but I think this time around, it was definitely over-hyped, and with having everything spread over six days, it meant that individually each live stream was a little disappointing. But we’ve got the promise of more previews to come in May, which may bring us further news of what’s coming – hopefully they won’t be quite so universally decried…

Star Wars: Light of the Jedi (a review)

Hey everybody,
Happy Star Wars day! Yes, we’re just about still on May 4th here in the UK, so what better way to celebrate than with a look at the first novel in the High Republic series, Light of the Jedi? What better way, indeed.

The High Republic era is a new departure for Star Wars storytelling, taking place in the centuries prior to The Phantom Menace. Crucially, this time period is now the oldest canon storytelling there is – forget about Knights of the Old Republic, forget about Tales of the Jedi, forget about the Darth Bane trilogy. None of that happened. The oldest we go now is here, 232 years before the Battle of Yavin. It’s a point that I need to reiterate, as it’s something that I constantly had to remind myself of while reading it.

The story is basically quite straightforward, following a group of marauders from the Outer Rim, the Nihil, who are able to travel through hyperspace using random “paths” as opposed to the established hyperlanes. It turns out that these paths are divined by an elderly member of the San Tekka clan, who is somehow able to see her way through hyperspace from one destination to another. She is kept alive for the express purpose of furthering the reaving of the Nihil, and her efforts are put to such devious uses by Marchion Ro, the so-called Eye of the Nihil.

During a raid, one of the Nihil ships gets in the way of the freighter Legacy Run, and the two collide; the Legacy Run, already an old vessel, breaks apart, and random parts of the ship come out of hyperspace, mostly over the agri-world of Hetzal Prime. A group of Jedi are nearby, seeing to the final preparations for the opening of the Starlight Beacon, an effort by Supreme Chancellor Lina Soh to reach out to the Outer Rim Territories and provide aid and cultural support. The Jedi begin a rescue operation to make sure the people of Hetzal Prime are safe, and launch an investigation into what happened.

The basic plot plays out much as you’d expect, with political infighting among the Nihil as Marchion Ro consolidates his power, and the Jedi managing to save the day with getting to the bottom of what happened, helping to defeat a portion of the Nihil fleet (though everyone involved thinks the Nihil were wiped out in their entirety). In some respects, it’s quite a “safe” plotline – there’s a disaster, but the Jedi help to save they day, although the big baddie hasn’t been completely vanquished so that we have fodder for more in the series. It’s a tried-and-tested formula for Star Wars (and others) to use.

I think what impressed me most about this book was the feel of it, though. It was a constant gripe for me about the Darth Bane novels taking place 1000 years before A New Hope, and yet they felt no different in time to the prequel trilogy. Light of the Jedi feels like it is a story that is set decades before The Phantom Menace, maybe even the centuries that it actually purports to be. The Outer Rim is an unknown, frontier section of the galaxy, and there are still people going out there as prospectors, to escape the drudgery of the Core and strike out on their own. The Starlight Beacon is an attempt to make the Territories feel a part of the Republic, something that – even though Shmi basically says as much in Episode I – I’d never thought would be needed.

The importance of hyperspace, and the idea of finding new routes to connect worlds, is a big part of the story, and I was a little bit overjoyed when it turned out that the San Tekkas are involved here. Lor San Tekka is, of course, quite an enigmatic figure in the lore, considering such a brief appearance at the start of Episode VII, and clearly his family has something of a celebrity standing in the galaxy, based on their history of hyperspace prospecting. The scions of the dynasty here are Marlowe and Vellis, a gay couple that doesn’t entirely feel forced into the narrative – I mean, why wouldn’t they be? They live on Naboo, in the Lake Country, so there are tantalizing glimpses here of a link to Padmé, and thus Leia – something so small, for sure, but I really hope that we can explore this link in greater depth as the canon is fleshed out further.

The Jedi are sort of informally led by Avar Kriss, the blonde front-and-centre on the cover. She’s an intriguing character, said to experience the Force as a song. Her friend Elzar Mann sees it as a bottomless ocean. The way that the Jedi are said to feel, and use, the Force throughout the book does put that sort of distance between this and the movies, as it feels like an age of experimentation and so on. The Jedi Council is a thing, and the Temple on Coruscant is there, but it just feels older, somehow. Elzar Mann is renowned among the Jedi for his unorthodox uses of the Force, as he attempts to discover new ways and techniques. It’s a bit vague, though he is credited with coming up with the Jedi Mind Trick (referred to as the Mind Touch in the book). It’s intriguing, as it seems like the Jedi are still learning the depths of their powers.

However, it’s not all new though. Yarael Poof has a fairly big role as a diplomat in the book, and both Oppo Rancisis and Yoda have speaking parts. Of course, Yoda would be a sprightly 600 year old here, and he’s currently on a sabbatical from the Temple, so I guess things are wide open on what we can expect to see here as the series continues!

As the first book in the multi-platform High Republic series, I thought this was a truly great introduction to the era. There is a lot going on, and it’s very interesting to see how things are different, and yet not that far away from the Star Wars that we know. We do have some establishment of what’s going on in the galaxy, but I think this has a lot of potential to be grown as time goes on. There are novels across the adult, young adult and younger readers branches, as well as an ongoing comics series that I’m aware of so far, and they apparently all intersect with one another to varying degrees. The YA novel Into the Dark features the padawan Raeth Silas, who is mentioned in passing by his master Jora Malli in this book. The Jedi “prodigy” Vernestra Rwoh shows up for the Starlight Beacon dedication ceremony, fresh from her adventures in A Test of Courage, the middle grade novel. All of these books came out in January, and it seems to be the case that July is the next major cavalcade of novels is due, including the sequel to this, The Rising Storm.

I cannot wait!