Lexington

Psh! Pre-8th? You think too small! If we’re talking full rollbacks like that, I’d say pre-4th at the very least, preferably pre-EoT campaign. Maybe the Third War for Armageddon sticks around, if we’re feeling generous. There’s a homebrew 40K setting living in the back of my mind that squares this circle by making the Necrons into the C’Tan’s heralds, a colonizing force that’s pacifying what they can of the galaxy before their masters’ imminent re-awakening. As before, individual Necron Houses and Dynasties all serve one of the surviving C’Tan, and the models we now call “C’Tan Shards” are Lords that’ve been granted a mote of their liege’s power in the form of a Necrodermis. There’s still animosity and occasional war between the vassals of the different C’Tan, and even internecine conflicts as individual Lords jockey for relative power within the Hosts of their masters’ forces, but they’re all united in their goal of bringing the other races to heel.

I dunno, they're...fine? Nothing special. Their poses are kinda compromised by the dual-purpose assembly, and the musculature is a hair bulkier than it probably needs to be, but they're perfectly cromulent Golden Marine Bois, IMO. Solid B. The old Sanguinary Guard, on the other hand...man. It's hard to find the words. Just one of the single ugliest Marine kits ever released, a comedy of errors in every millimeter. Awkward, confused, garish, indistinguishable lumps of nonsense that have been blessedly put to pasture.

I've long felt like the modern Ultramarines collect all of GW's gaudiest and least legible design tendencies into one unfortunate place, and this...continues to be true. Kind of a shame, the Gravis Calgar managed to depart from that and look like a humanoid form in armor, rather than an indistinguishable pile of bling. Helmet on that dual-wielding Champion looks neat, tho.

I haven’t played much Kill Team, but “Behavioral Directives” sounds distinctly like board game AI/PvE-mode stuff. Like a wandering monster or boss battle, rather than a player-controlled model that’s part of a Roster.

I kind of agree with this, tho I also saw that new Nightbringer and loudly swore in surprise. It’s pretty impressive in a lot of ways. Surprised and disappointed that the new Raptors/Warp Talons didn’t end up taking more design cues from the old 3.5 versions, tho. They had style.

Often it's a compilation of what's at events and such - there's a lot of stats out there for such things, so you can at least get an idea of what's being played. Which, of course, isn't going to render an exact match of sales figures, but it's probably the best data we're going to get. Otherwise, it's just general observations. What you see locally, what you see people talking about on the internet, what you see people playing in YouTube battle reports and things like that. That doesn't add up to much more than vibes, but it's not the worst barometer imaginable. You also occasionally get bits and bobs from people who are or recently have been involved with the company and are privy to The Secret Information, but it's rarely that surprising. Space Marines sell a ton. Genestealer Cults don't. Everything else falls between there, but there's a wide gulf on either side.

I've come to the conclusion over the last few years that GW's modern style of both rules and background writing simply aren't for me anymore. There's other systems that fit my perspective more, and crafting one's own spinoff version of the 40K universe isn't all that hard. Part of the way through writing up my own homebrew set of rules as well. It's freeing.

Define “good.”

Really dig Grimnar. This is, IIRC, his third model so far, and every single one's been a winner*. Everything else is varying shades of solid. Real nice release for the Wolf fans out there. * Well, the actual Grimnar part, anyway. The less said about that damn sled, the better.

That helmet, man. So good.

I am always very surprised to remember that W+ still exists, and am even more surprised at what they pass off as a big addition to the service.

Bare head seems like it’s maybe a slightly-sanitized version of this old Adrian Smith classic. Good selection.

I dunno. To me, anyway, the visual homogenization of 40K has been a real bummer. Having everything look "strange" in, typically, the exact same way, all fighting in the exact same set of GW-produced terrain, written up in fiction with the exact same tone has not been kind to the place. I miss when you had whole branches of GW kind of doing their own thing and using the setting in completely different ways. It felt like a big place. Now it feels like a market-tested product line. Which it is, I guess, but it doesn't feel like anything more, and it used to.

What an amazing bit of work on those Aspects. Bra-vo, GW. Maybe my only note is that I wish they'd kept Asurmen's grimace face, but eh. Hard to feel anything but elation for the Eldar players among us.

It's kinda crazy how the claws just ruin those cavalry models, they look great otherwise.