What no Wood Elves ! It seems that the Woodies and Bretonnians have finished each other off or simply had to retreat further into their own realms because... here comes Emperor Karl Franz !
Games Workshop are following in their "big is best" policy (following on from the success, I presume, of their Vampire Counts range) with the new Empire range of miniatures.It's going to be a field day for the thousands of Empire army collectors who are into modelling and painting. I reckon that The Empire must be one of the most popular armies in the Warhammer world which, I guess, explains why they are getting a release before the poor "old" Wood Elves and noble Horse Lords.
Anyway, providing you're an Empire player I think you'll be fairly pleased with the new range. I have no idea what the army book is like so hopefully the new models will be fairly optional for those who prefer standard rank of file troopers in favour of weird and wonderful war machines and massive monsters.
Here are some of my favourite new models, you'll find the rest in the Empire section of GW's website.
First up is Volkmar the Grim on The War Altar of Sigmar.
Awesome ! One minor complaint, I'd prefer a Griffon with slightly thicker more solid looking hind legs in a static "I cannot be moved" pose. It's a minor quibble because overall it's a superb model and decent value for money as well (given it's size and modelling satisfaction!)
Second, the Warrior Priest with 2 hammers (in Finecast). They've always done a good job with Empire foot soldiers, the scale is usually good and the poses are interesting with lots of variety to suit the kind of army you're looking to field.
The Witch Hunter is brilliant and I expect to see a lot of him in painting competitions and Golden Demon awards. He just looks the part and is very charismatic.
Last but not least, check this out for something a bit different it's named the Celestial Hurricanum. It comes as a kit that you can also assemble into a Doctor Who looking machine called the Luminark of Hysh (which I'm less keen on because it looks slightly too 40k for me).
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