White Dwarf #86 Review - Is Age of Sigmar "Khorne-y"? HaHa

... well the pun had to be made, especially after what seems like 12 months of Age of Sigmar releases that alternate between the Stormcast and Khorne - gold and red are getting a massive run at the moment!
This week's White Dwarf has not only two new Khorne miniatures, but also a 'codex' of sorts centering on the human followers of Khorne, "Khorne Bloodbound".
With rumours surrounding the upcoming October release of new Tau miniatures, there is also the first official look at the absolutely enormous Forge World KX139 Ta'unar Supremacy Armour, it's scale more like a titan than an Imperial Knight and probably in line with other massive Tau releases from Forge World like the Manta, Tiger Shark and Barracuda. It's not like the Tau are afraid to go big, we just don't see it as much.
Also this week are a few books, one of which takes a really interesting spin on the Word Bearers as they hunt down the perennially boring Ultramarines!
So is this week's issue any good?
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So these are the two miniature releases for next week - the Slaughterpriest and Skullgrinder. Both of these models are the standard Age of Sigmar pattern, so no weapon options and little or no poseability. Those who say Games Workshop just want to be a miniatures company and ignore the games part  of the Games Workshop tag are obviously not looking at the trend to turn the miniatures into nothing more than pre-posed chess pieces.
The Slaughtpriest is a great looking model, is certainly a fair bit bigger than his compatriots and less squat than the recent Khrone releases which are becoming so out of proportion they almost look like Dwarves.
The Skullgrinder could have come out of any of the recent plastic boxed sets and carries on that squat, wide almost cartoony look. I'm not even going to mention the price for risk of sounding like a broken record.

The Battletomes continue with the "Khorne Bloodbound" codex which concentrates on the human followers of Khorne. I notice in the write up here they don't mention a model showcase or anything about the hobby angle at all. The miniatures sections were always such a great part of the old ones...
There is of course a deluxe version, which for all intents and purposes comes with a poster! Wooo!!
Meanwhile, something that might be worth the rainforest it came from would be "The Purge" novel looking at the extermination of the Ultramarines by the Word Bearers - it seems that not all followed quite so blindly. This sounds quite cool, and I may pick it up next week! The other novel next week is "Sons of Titan" which collects four Grey Knights stories.
There's also an Age of Sigmar audio drama with "The Prisoner of the Black Sun".  

After the page recapping the recent Khorne releases and repackaged product is the mighty Forge Wolrd KX139 Ta'unar Supremacy Armour. It's really quite enormous, certainly put into perspective by the Forge World XV81 Crisis Suit just in front of it. As not a real follower of Forge World, that XV81 Crisis Suit is really quite cool! Be interesting to see what the new Crisis Suits will look like.

Nice to see another lengthy article on an army, this time the Mechanicus forces of Ben Greaves, winner of the Best Army at the Throne of Skulls event in June. There's a good amount of room here for him to explain his army and also see some great shots, including this great one of his Knight (right). 

Armies on Parade, the year-long army building challenge continues with a look at this Nagash force (above) and a Grey Knights force. Armies on Parade finishes on October 24th, so hopefully we will get a really good look at those completed forces.

There's an overview of the Bloodbound, which is pretty much what we've already read about in terms of Khorne. If you're a Khorne person then this may be interesting but otherwise it's a bit same-old same-old.

Warscrolls...

In the back of this issue there is also this cool shot of The Iron Horde, Khorne followers who have rejected the usual red garb because it's just SO two years ago! Black and metallic, cutting edge. No pun intended!

Verdict

This is not a bad issue, rescued by the look at the Mechanicus force frankly. That sort of depth for an army interview is not only good to read, but also gives us a good chance to really see the army!
As far as value, this issue is okay - certainly don't reject it - but it's not compulsory.

Soundtrack For This Review

This is the new album from Japanese band Crossfaith. Get past the first track for some stellar tunes.