Jstove is back, and today he’s talking about Age of Sigmar 2: Sigmarine Boogaloo. The thing he loves most about Age of Sigmar is that it’s not Warhammer Fantasy battle. Shots fired.
Do you know what I miss about old Fantasy? Not a lot.
Why? Because I’m staring at my shelf, where my unemployed Orc and Goblin army is sitting, and I am not interested at all in traying up a 50 model brick of Orcs, a 30 model brick of Black Orcs, and a 100 model brick of Night Gobbos. There’s no game in the world that makes me want to haul all the boys down to the shop and put them on the table.
And speaking of tables, there’s this tragedy.
Days of Fantasy
If you thought Age of Sigmar was the worst thing to ever happen to Fantasy, then you never tried to play a game of Fantasy on this thing. The hills are janky, the plastic bounces rolling dice in the most awful way imaginable, and God help you if you brought a horde army…
Oh and by the way, in 7th edition Fantasy, every army was a horde army, you didn’t take any core infantry in bricks of less than 40 because you wanted that steadfast and those bonus fighting ranks from going 10 wide.
Armies Used to be Cheap
A long time ago, there was an easy, cheap way to get Warhammer armies. It happened when armies were still pewter. Once or twice a year at Games Day, Games Workshop had a booth that would sell you pewter by the pound. You didn’t buy models individually, you bought them by weight on a scale. Want a whole regiment of minotaurs or trolls? 9.99 each?
No, not likely! Buy them by the pound, it’s cheaper! 40 Black Orcs? Elven Bowmen? Chaos Marauders? Throw it on the scale, pay the man, walk away with an army. Easy money.
Then plastic happened, and we all thought we were saved. Well, you were if your army was in the starter box, because starter boxes were cheap. But how about a unit of 50 Bloodletters. Those come 10 in a box for 29 bucks. That means you needed to spend $145 just to put on troop on the table.
Do you know what else costs $145?
This Daemon Primarch Mortarion.
Why Fantasy Ended
So real talk- Playing Warhammer Fantasy wasn’t great. Getting new people into the game, unless they wanted to be one of the races in Isle of Blood or Skull Pass, was tough.
The game itself was great. I think the last edition of Warhammer before Sigmar was pretty phenomenal. I loved throwing my Greenskins into meat grinders and watching the bodies fly, or dumping a Mangler Squig or a couple Fanatics into a unit of charging Chaos Knights and watch them get deleted off the table by a puffed up cartoon character with a wrecking ball.
Vortex spells were also cool, and watching the Bad Moon tear ass across my opponent’s line while a comet blew up my goblins was hilarious.
But the game had absolutely no way to get new blood, and that was how it bled out.
And that was how Fantasy died and Age of Sigmar became a thing.
Because one day, at a Games Workshop shareholder meeting, everyone got together around the table and said, “You know it’s a shame, Bretonnia pretty much has the coolest models ever, but nobody actually wants to buy 50 peasants with halberds and paint them and put them on the table. So screw you Louen Leoncoeur, you’re a Sigmarine now!”
And then, there were exactly 3 people who read this article that missed him. Everyone else said, “Yea the buy-in cost for fantasy sucked. Who was Louen Leoncoeur?”
Fragile Models
You know what else I don’t miss about the 50 unemployed Orcs and 100 unemployed Night Goblins that live on my shelf?
Taking them anywhere. Foam sucks and I hate it.
You want to know what my favorite part about 40k and Sigmar armies is?
This bad boy right here.
This is a cantilever toolbox. It’s the best of all miniature carriers. You magnetize all the bases in your army, throw them in one of these, and then life seems so easy. Putting my models in toolboxes was the best thing I ever did for myself. I’ve got one of these for all my Necromunda stuff, it holds all my Goliaths, Eschers, Orlocks, and all the bulkheads, objectives, and scatter terrain. I’ve got one for my Tyranids.
There’s a tray for Gaunts, a tray for Genestealers, a tray for Sporemines, ‘Vores, and Hiveguard, and the Carnifexes and Mawlocs live in the bottom. Nobody ever breaks and I never dread taking anything anywhere, I’ve got 3,000 points of bugs in one box and I can grab these babies with free shipping on amazon prime for less than 30 bucks.
But I could never fit a Fantasy army into one of these things, and I’m not going back. If the army doesn’t fit in a toolbox, I don’t want it. Life is too good now, it’s like the gaming equivalent of losing 20 pounds after you quit drinking soda, you never go back because life is better when your pants fit.
So is Age of Sigmar 2.0 going to be a great game?
Yes.
Because the only people that liked Warhammer Fantasy Battle already owned every model and didn’t have to buy anything.
For everyone who actually likes building and painting new plastic fantasy toys, Age of Sigmar is the answer.
What do you think the new Age of Sigmar will be like? Do you miss the old days of Fantasy? Let us know over on Facebook!
About the Author: Jack Stover
