As the build up to Apocalypse continues, GW are letting us save our pennies (as we'll spend WAY too much when that comes out) by having a second week of little stuff - not necessarily a bad thing, just not too exciting.
Some will however be excited by Plague War Limited Edition (left) that has been released! Telling the story of the clash between the newly resurrected Rowboat Girly-man and Death Guard Primarch, Mortarion, this is the next part of the Dark Imperium series. Very nice presentation of this book in keeping with the Solar War Limited Edition - but this one taking part in the 41st millennium, not the Heresy. Age of $igmar, about to be eclipsed by Apocalypse in the next few weeks, have thrown the Power Unbound cards out there, an expansion for Warhammer Underworlds which expand your chosen warband with 3 cards for each. 
In books we have the Gloomspite novel and and audio drama Death's Mercy which is the next part of Gav Thorpe's exploration of the Harlequin aspects.

So here's a story - the very first time Apocalypse came around Games Workshop released a Space Marine Company box. 106 multi-part Space Marines and 9 Rhinos - it's a beast of a set! Full of excitement I bought this box. Yes well... Suffice to say - who doesn't like a big army box? 
The preview of these sets buzzed through Beardy Hammer HQ as we zoomed in on images to see the contents, slavering madly in excitement.
These sets are split up across most of the factions (interestingly missing Drukhari so far) and then into role, so you will see Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines get Battalion Detachments, Mechanicus (OMG a box of Kastelans!!), Tau and Eldar get Vanguard Detachments, Imperial Guard, Orks and Tyranids get Spearhead Detachments, Necrons get an Outrider Detachment (guess this is what the Drukhari would get too) and then there's a Super-Heavy Detachment for Imperial Knights (and you would assume the Chaos Knights would get released for Apocalypse so there's probably one for them too).
The Space Marines ones seem to be a mix of multi-part and snap-fit minis, giving you a tonne of dudes. The Mechanicus one, depending on the price-point could be a solid saving on what is, in Australia at least, a pricey kit, while the Tau one is a flavour we've seen in various incarnations - swapping out the Ghostkeel for a Riptide. The Eldar Detachment, like the Mechanicus, could be a good cost saving too - also a great set which could look striking on the field. The Imperial Guard Detachment is the only one with a transport in it which makes sense with all the tanks, while the Ork walkers and Tyranids are great force builders is nothing else BUT it is curious not seeing a horde option for Tyranids in here. The Necron Outrider Detachment will likely outflank anything and if the Drukhari get a set like this, it would make perfect sense. The Imperial Knights sets speaks for itself, but curious if there are weapons options for the Helverins to make the Warglaives.
Now we've seen these, but I wonder if there might be a Space Marine Spearhead one coming with Predators or Land Raiders, or a Craftworld Outrider with Jetbikes (or maybe that will be a Harlequin allied set?), or an Ork Battallion set with Nobz and Boyz galore. Lots of possibilites, either way a good way to army build and save some money.
We'll leave you with this observation though - that Apocalypse Space Marine Company set I got back in 2007 I told you about earlier was to build an Apocalypse force - how do you think that went? Spend wisely. 

The last Age of $igmar's General's Handbook added a number of cool elements to Ao$, so it will be interesting to see what else can be introduced or tweaked in the new ​General's Handbook 2019 on pre-order this week. They promise expanded rules for urban combat, a new Raids and Ambushe mechanic, and soemthing that really tickles our fancy - Mercenary Companies, as I've been building one for some time! What is curious and sad is the section on a code of conduct for players designed to encourage sportsmanship and good play for all gamers - what's going on out there? There is also a Warlord Edition - webstore exclusive - with some extra bibs and bobs if that is your want and desire. Unfortunately nothing in terms of miniatures which is a bit of a shame - some Made To Order old school Generals could have worked nicely!
Speaking of niche, Middle-Earth fills the "we don't have much this week" void with Ranger Captains: Faramir, Madril & Damrod, Warriors of the Fiefdoms, The Lords of Umbar, hapless Balin, King of Moria and Flói Stonehand, Army of the Dead Banner Bearer (in the shiniest chainmail a dead person has ever worn), the beautiful Cave Drake and Radagast the Brown (played in the movies by my favourite Doctor Who, Sylvester McCoy!). These are all webstore exclusives, so the shelves are going to be pretty bare next Saturday!
In books there's a new Astra Militarum Omnibus - Shield of the Emperor and for Ao$, Soul Wars makes it's paperback debut.
Next week will see White Dwarf too, with June 2019 going on sale. No one will care, but there it is!
​Watch this get a relaunch/ refit/ digital only change in the next 4-6 months

As you would no doubt have heard, Games Workshop have relaunched their paint range to not only include the 34 brand new Contrast paints, but also 16 new Base paints, 8 new Layer paints, 26 new Air paints (we think giving further evidence GW will bring out an airbrush very soon), and 4 new Technical paints.
Excitingly, the 16 new Base paints include the old Forge World Horus Heresy colours - Phoenician Purple, Death Korps Drab, Gal Vorbak Red, Night Lords Blue, Nocturne Green, Corvus Black, Lupercal Green, Iron Hands Steel, Grey Knights Steel, and Iron Warriors.
There's actually a lot to take in here, instead of listing every new paint, it's probably easier to tell you about the bundles - you can get the ​All The New Paints bundle (left), the Contrast Paint Collection, the Base Paint Collection or the Air Paint Collection. There is also two new sprays, Grey Seer and Wraithbone, especially designed to give a smooth application to assist with the paint flow of the new Contrast paints. You will notice that the green and yellow spray are no longer there, being replaced by the Air Range equivalent.

Now a really cool feature of the new paints is an update to the way the Shades are displayed (see below).
When you click across the colours in the Shade range, it brings up examples of how to use them to create certain effects. When you then click on that effect, it brings up the colours needed and a way to add those colours to your shopping cart. There's also the option to get do it the simple Battle Ready way or to add extra steps and have them Parade Ready.  This is a really nice tool using existing data from the Citadel Paint App and make it one thing on the webstore portal.

Interesting changes by Games Workshop. Having been through many many changes to the paint range over the past 30 years, this does get a bit tiresome, but it's generally a good thing after some initial pain!

You may have seen some of my Technocracy force before - loyal subjects to Hierophant Keltis Crannax, Mortus Pultii of the Fluvian Cluster, Protector Ultimus, Master of Man. Although updates here have been slow, there's actually quite a force growing now - this weekend topped off by the addition of a Kastelan Robot, an ancient relic of a time long lost.
The Kastelan Robot is reasonably common in the Mechanicus forces of Mars and served with the Emperor's forces in the Great Crusade and with many sides during the Unification Wars on Terra. They have been around for well over 10,000 years, some say 20 or even 30,000 years, making them likely to be amongst the far-flung worlds who lost contact with Terra tens of thousands of years ago. This is how this particular machine is found in the forces of the Heirophant.

As you can see, the standard Mechanicus Kastelan is not what we have here. Centuries of innovation and design upgrades have made it an entirely different beast. In fact although the Mechanicus and the forces of Terra barely know how to use the Kastelan, having to use a Tech-Priest to guide it and with limited flexibility, the Heirophant's forces are using a robot entirely able to function by the means of Terran-outlawed AI. It possesses new weapons, plus vastly updated sensors and control systems in a new cranial control surface. The power system is also entirely different - swapping out whatever the original power core was (the Mechanicus one is not the original either)  for something built from native tech. This is not the plodding mindless robot of the Imperium, this is something much closer to its original functions seen so many thousands of years ago.

This miniature really was a triumph of the bitz box - using a combination of the original Kastelan Robot kit and adding bitz from the Kharadron Arkanaut Ironclad and Thundrik's Profiteers. As this is not piece of technology from an age before the arcane crafts of Adeptus Mechanicus, I wanted to use as few pieces from that range as possible and go for something a bit more Steampunk - far away from the traditional grimdark look - so the Kharadrons came to mind.
The head started as the backpack from the Thundrik's Profiteers with added Skitarii and Kharadron bitz. This wasn't meant to look like the torture droid from the Death Star in Star Wars, but maybe it's so ingrained in my consciousness it just came out! The torso was an interesting challenge as it's quite large and bulbous, and very Adeptus Mechanicus looking. In fact the front of the torso actually has the control surface from the Adeptus Mechanicus Tech-Priest on it (alluding to the idea that you don't actually need a Tech-Priest to run it at all) with a Skitarii backpack and the front of a Kharardon helmet, echoing back to the first Heirophant troops I did. The back of the torso was quite a bit of fiddly work, removing almost all trace of the original power pack and adding various Kharadron backpack, tubes and pipes pieces. I'm very happy with this part actually, and may revisit the paint job later on.
The arms are pretty stock standard, but cut off at the elbows and new elbow joints added from cut up sprue to give added movement to the pose. The weapons needed to be something totally different from the Imperium but also work in with the look i'd already started - so I cut down the front gun from the Arkanaut Ironclad, added some pipes and a cut-down sensor from the a Skitarii backpack as well as another form the top of a Skitarii gun. The second weapon is my favourite and based on a Gundam Acguy missile pod arm. It's actually two re-purposed parts off the Arkanaut Ironclad engine with holes drilled into it to make the launch tubes. The magazine underneath is a Cadian grenade launcher cut up and re-positioned. The legs are pretty standard, just using the groin armour from a Space Marine Centurion cut down to fit. The bottom of the legs were then given stretched sprue around the front armour plates to be echo the MKIII armour used on the legs of the infantry. The toes also got some love, with trigger guards from Skitarii guns used to create these upturned toe decorations, sort of Byzantine looking - an echo back to another Empire from the past.

So there he is - a fearsome adversary for the forces of the Great Crusade to come across as they expand throughout the old dominions of Man.

Well after months of bumper releases, we've finally come to that time where it slows down. Now it could be slowing down in preparation for something big, like maybe Warcry or the next Blackstone Fortress expansion Escalation - but this week all we get is books. Those books however, are pretty damn cool!
The seminal Liber Chaotica is back in print. This is a core book exploring all the current Chaos Gods (minus Malal). The only real issue with this book is it's written in the first person, and it does get hard to read at times. However, this is a core book with a tonne of info if you're into Chaos, or fighting Chaos.  The other exciting book is the Space Wolf: 20th Anniversary Edition which is the hardback collection of William King's novels around Ragnar Blackmane. Also next week is the Gotrek & Felix Third Omnibus and the paperback version of the Horus Heresy Book 47: Old Earth revolving around the Salamanders and Vulkan.

Games Workshop have unveiled a bevy of new minis at UK Games Day 2019 - some filling in some holes in the current roster, some brand new additions to new ranges.
Necromunda gangs are about to get a rude shock, because The Law are in town, with the Palanite Enforcers.
Despite the expectation on these, have to say these aren't as exciting as we'd hoped. There's just something not quite right? Scale? Poses? Is it the helmets?
Another Specialist Games to get reinforcements is Blood Bowl, with the much-anticipated Wood Elves team. Really dynamic poses make these really interesting.
The new game Warcry, has another excellent looking Chaos force, the raven-themed Corvus Cabal force. More excellent miniatures for this game which is probably going to be huge, if the buzz around the miniatures continues!
Finally we finally have new Chaos Cultists in the form of the second half of the new Blackstone Fortress expansion, Escalation. This new force, the Servants of the Abyss, are what we were looking for in the recent Warhammer 40K Chaos releases. A nice mix of Imperial Guard elements, with the usual spiky Chaos bits to make things interesting.
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With no release dates on these, we'll be sure to see them trickle out sooner rather than later.

Blood Bowl are slowly getting more and more teams and this week sees the Halflings get a look in. Long a  fan favourite, this new plastic kit is packed with the sort of detail Forge World promises, but it seems Games Workshop is now delivering in spades with the new Greenfield Grasshuggers kit. As with most team releases, there is a themed Halfling Pitch, a Halfling Team Card Pack and Halfling Team Dice. plus issue #5 of Spike is also out, themed around Halflings. If you're a nostalgic Halfling, then the very old Treeman and Halfling Hot-Pot have also been rereleased as Made To Order.
Despite being poorly serviced and ignored on most Games Workshop store shelves, Necromunda still manages to plod along, this week with the new Necromunda: The Book of Peril supplement out plus the very first plastic characters for Necrmunda, Kal Jericho and Scabs. There's also new Badzone Environments & Events Cards and card sleeves.
In book news, we see the mainstream release of Angron: Slave of Nuceria - which we bought on release for the limited editon to get more info on the War Hounds Legion and how they fought, so have already read it. It's a hard book to review, but maybe we'll write it up to give you an idea of the contents.

When we first saw them, the new Age of $igmar terrain seemed just too large to be real - but here we are just a few months later and it turns out they are all too real. The Enduring Stormvault, for example, is a large three-part base with multiple other smaller pieces. In reality it would take up the vast majority of space on a gaming table. Even the Sigmarite Dais and Shattered Temple are large pieces in themselves. If you're not into large terrain pieces, there's a very cool set of pieces in the Timeworn Ruins. Oddly there's an icon very similar to the Crux Terminatus present on Terminators in 40K (left). Age of $igmar is getting even more of a pump next week with the new Soul Wars: Forbidden Power set with some new Endless Spells minis - check the Nagash influences and there's also the new Forbidden Power Warscroll Cards.
Now if Age of $igmar is your thing - then we also have new books - the Myths & Revenants in hardcover, Skaven Wars: The Black Plague, Rulers of the Dead and Genevieve Undead. For 40K peeps, the paperback version of the Rise of the Ynnari: Wild Rider book is also out. Poor old Ynnari haven't had much of a run since their emergence on the scene. 

Warhammer Fest was this weekend and there've been some pretty big surprised come out of it! Lets have a look at a few of the big things we haven't seen before. Unfortunately Necromunda offered nothing this time and maybe shows that their very lacklustre release schedule for the products has shown a dip in sales. Not having them in store is a massive mistake on GW's part! Blood Bowl, for it's part had a new team and a preview of the Wood Elf team, but again a lacklustre release schedule and no in-store sales will prove the death knell for this line within the next year or so.

In terms of miniatures 2018/19 has been a huge year for Age of $igmar, so this time we only got a preview of the new Warcry game set in that universe. We've seen a number of teams so far, and now we get to see more of the diversity of Chaos with the ​Splintered Fang. Themed around snakes, these guys and girls would make awesome additions to many an army especially as elite troops. there was also the preview of this lion creature which you would think could be aligned to the Witch Elves by it's look, but not colours! Curious...

While it's been a quieter year for Warhammer 40K, Warhammer Fest brought some interesting things for the universe - namely vehicles - which is interesting timing for the new version of Apocalypse.
The Adeptus Mechanicus have some amazing miniatures, but apart from some Forge World offerings, how do they get around? Pretty sure Uber would not be able to help them out... Well this weekend we saw a very cool combi-kit; the Skorpius Dunerider transport/ Skorpius Disintegrator tank. using what looks like hover power, this super-thematic look fits really nicely with the Mechanicus.
The Space Marines usually get some nice toy, and this time it's the Repulsor Executioner - the tank version of the Repulsor transport. With Adeptus Titanicus being a very real thing in the Community, the interest in Knights has gone up and what do we have here? Chaos Knights! The Knight Rampager/ Knight Despoiler combi-kit looks truly amazing. Hot tip - expect there to be a Chaos Knight Upgrade Sprue on the way too so you can convert your smaller and larger Knights already in the range. We also got to see more of tghe Sisters of Battle with a painted version of the model floating around, but don't look too closely or you'll see the low-res printing on her Bolter! There's also a sprue image from Garro's Facebook showing this mini - notice no alternate head.

As mentioned above, Adeptus Titanicus continues to grow - with the addition of a new Titan, weapon upgrades and scenery. The new Titan is the Acastus Knight which has existed in 40K scale for years, but makes its hefty presence known in this laces very soon (thanks to Battle Bunnies for the extra pics of this cool little guy). The weapon upgrades have been mentioned as Forge World, but from what we saw this weekend they seem to be plastic, so that's a sign of how popular this range is - to delve into the expensive world of plastic production is a good sign. We also have new scenery and buildings on the way, which if you have played the game you realise is all-important for some form of cover. We also wonder if these smaller buildings may see the introduction of support vehicles soon.

The Horus Heresy books are winding up, and Forge World may have butchered their range of Heresy miniatures, but they have been pumping out new ones of late, mainly themed around the new Black Book Malevolence. We have new units for White Scars and Blood Angels plus the naff-looking Ares Gunship. Of real interest are the new Daemons of the Ruinstorm Brutes. These look very cool!

It's been a pretty surprising weekend, and out of all of these releases all I really want it this...