Warhammer Weekly Special — We Couldn't Wait Until Sunday

Normally, our Warhammer news round-ups run Sunday to Sunday.

That was the plan this week too.

Then Games Workshop apparently looked at the calendar, decided patience was overrated, and dropped enough news in a few days to fill an entire article.

So, yes — it's Saturday.

And we're doing the roundup early.

Between a huge Autumn Preview, a completely reworked Adeptus Custodes army, the return of the Legion of the Damned, an entirely new Age of Sigmar faction, new Tomb Kings plastics, 150 new paints and what feels like half the Space Marine range arriving at once...

What a week this has been.

The Big Autumn Preview Absolutely Delivered

Friday night's Big Autumn Warhammer Preview is responsible for a frankly unreasonable amount of this week's news.

Games Workshop had promised reveals covering Warhammer 40,000, Age of Sigmar, Kill Team, The Old World, Necromunda, Blood Bowl, Horus Heresy, Warhammer Quest and Warhammer+.

For once, "big preview" wasn't marketing optimism.

It was actually big.

See all of the Big Autumn Preview reveals

Custodes Are Becoming Proper Custodes

Let's start with what could be one of the biggest Warhammer 40,000 changes announced this week.

Codex: Adeptus Custodes is coming, accompanied by new plastic Aquilon Terminators and a new Combat Patrol.

But the interesting bit isn't simply another Codex.

Games Workshop says Custodes datasheets have been fundamentally rescaled to better represent the near-mythical warriors they're supposed to be in the lore. Even a basic Custodian is being positioned at a level above most Space Marine heroes, with squad sizes and points changing accordingly.

That could mean considerably fewer golden bodies on the table — but each of those bodies should feel much more like an actual Custodian.

And frankly, that's exactly what Custodes should be.

If the bloke guarding the Emperor's front door feels like "Space Marine, but slightly better", something has probably gone wrong.

The new Aquilon Terminators can also be used in both Warhammer 40,000 and Horus Heresy, while a substantial number of existing Custodes kits are being repackaged for use across both systems.

See the new Custodes and Aquilon Terminators

The Legion of the Damned Are Back

Now this was one we weren't expecting to be writing.

The Legion of the Damned are properly returning to Warhammer 40,000, entering Kill Team in a new box set against an elite Ork Nobz Mob.

Covered in skeletal details and supernatural flames, the mysterious spectral Space Marines are finally getting modern miniatures after spending years largely confined to Warhammer history and the occasional whispered reference.

Their Kill Team rules will apparently reflect their ghostly nature too, with the Legionnaires strengthening their connection to the material world as the battle progresses.

This is exactly the sort of thing Kill Team is brilliant for.

Bring back something strange, niche and beloved without having to immediately create an entire 40-unit army around it.

And the Legion of the Damned definitely qualify as strange.

See the Legion of the Damned Kill Team reveal

Age of Sigmar Has an Entirely New Faction

Possibly the biggest reveal of the entire preview came from Age of Sigmar.

Meet the Khazalite Holds.

This is a completely new duardin faction, emerging from vast underground holds with heavily armoured warriors, rune-powered artillery and enormous stone constructs known as Gholems.

The faction will launch with an Army Set, led by Hjulda Drakkblud and supported by infantry, an Oathkeeper Cannon and one particularly substantial Gholem of Gazul.

What's especially interesting is that the accompanying Battletome: Khazalite Holds will also include the Fyreslayers, bringing the two duardin forces together within the same battletome.

Between the traditional armour, enormous beards, runes, cannons and walking stone constructs, GW appears to have remembered that sometimes people who like dwarfs simply want their dwarfs to be extremely dwarfy.

We're absolutely fine with this.

Meet the new Khazalite Holds faction

And Seraphon Aren't Being Left Behind

Age of Sigmar wasn't finished there.

A new Battletome: Seraphon is also on the way, accompanied by Blessed Tetaxi, Prophet of Tepok.

Tetaxi rides the enormous flying reptile Ma'toq and has been plagued by visions warning of a coming catastrophe known as the Great Fall — something GW says could alter reality itself.

That's the sort of wording that usually means somebody in the Mortal Realms should probably start worrying.

The miniature itself is spectacular: essentially take the idea of a Skink prophet riding a Terradon and keep turning the size slider up until somebody tells you to stop.

Apparently nobody did.

See Blessed Tetaxi and the new Seraphon Battletome

Space Marines Have Had Quite a Week Too

Even before Friday's preview, Space Marines had already spent most of this week occupying Warhammer Community.

Pre-orders for the new Codex: Space Marines open today alongside the new multipart Intercessors and Vanguard Veterans, Captain on Bike, updated Outriders, Kaius Konorius and standalone releases for several units originally found in the Armageddon box.

And yes, that includes the Land Speeder returning with a new kit.

The new Codex itself is a substantial 232-page book, while the army is moving over to its new Combat Doctrines system.

GW also spent the week going through how the changes affect the other Marine Chapters.

Blood Angels and Dark Angels were first, followed by Space Wolves, Black Templars and Deathwatch, before Salamanders, Raven Guard, Imperial Fists and the other more Codex-compliant Chapters got their turn.

So if you play Space Marines and felt that your rules changed every time you checked your phone this week...

They probably did.

See this week's Space Marine pre-orders

Games Workshop Just Announced 150 New Paints

This one deserves considerably more attention than it might initially sound like.

Games Workshop revealed Warhammer Tone Pro, an entirely new range consisting of 30 colours, each available in five tones.

That's 150 new paints.

The system runs from Tone 1, the darkest shade, through to Tone 5, the lightest, making it much easier to build shadows, midtones and highlights without having to work out which three completely unrelated Citadel names are supposed to work together.

GW says the new formula is designed for strong coverage and vivid pigmentation while being usable for basecoating, layering, glazing, highlighting and drybrushing.

There are also new Shading and Blending mediums alongside four new drybrushes.

The range will begin appearing in Warhammer stores and independent retailers from Saturday 26 September.

From a hobby point of view, this might quietly be one of the most significant reveals of the whole weekend.

From a retailer point of view...

150 paints.

We're going to need a bigger paint rack.

See the full Warhammer Tone Pro reveal

Tomb Kings Finally Get New Core Plastics

The Old World also got an announcement people have been waiting a very long time for.

The Tomb Kings of Khemri are receiving new plastic Skeleton Warriors, Skeleton Archers and Skeleton Chariots.

And these aren't simply another reboxing of very old kits.

The new Host of Nehekhara Army Reinforcement Set contains 78 brand-new plastic miniatures: 36 Skeleton Warriors, 36 Skeleton Archers and six Chariots.

Alongside them comes Arcane Journal: River of Bones, featuring new Tomb Kings rules including the Barrow Kingdoms Army of Infamy.

For anyone who loves Tomb Kings but wasn't quite ready to pretend the old skeletons hadn't aged, your patience has finally been rewarded.

See the new Tomb Kings plastics

Necromunda Is Becoming an RPG

This might be one of the most interesting announcements simply because it wasn't what most people expected.

Necromunda Roleplay is a new, fully fledged miniatures-driven roleplaying game set in the underhive.

Players take the roles of bounty-hunting Venators while an Arbitrator acts as the games master, running jobs and creating an ongoing narrative around the group.

It will be compatible with the wider Necromunda miniature range and launches with new characters of its own.

Considering Necromunda has spent decades building an absurdly detailed setting where the actual gang fighting sometimes feels like only half the story, turning it into a proper RPG makes a ridiculous amount of sense.

Your ganger can now presumably miss every shot in an entirely new genre.

Read about Necromunda Roleplay

Astartes II Is Coming in December

We also finally got another proper look at Astartes II.

The new teaser shows Deathwatch and Terminators in what looks suspiciously like a Space Hulk-style environment, and GW has confirmed that the sequel will be significantly longer than the original Astartes.

More importantly, we finally have a release window.

Astartes II arrives on Warhammer TV this December.

Considering how influential the original Astartes became within the Warhammer community, expectations for this are going to be absolutely enormous.

No pressure, then.

Watch the new Astartes II teaser

Kharadron Overlords Are Getting Their Own Animation

Warhammer+ also revealed Arkanaut, the first 3D-animated series focused on the Kharadron Overlords.

The three-part series follows the struggling crew of the Therodoson, an Arkanaut Frigate from Barak-Zilfin, and will finally put Kharadron skyvessels properly onto the screen.

The first episode is due on Warhammer TV in October.

See the first Arkanaut trailer

And Somehow We're Still Not Finished

Blood Bowl is getting a Night Goblin team complete with Squigs, Warhammer Quest: Darkwater is receiving its first expansion with Agents of the Order Azyr, and Horus Heresy is heading back to the Signus Cluster with a new Journal Tactica bringing Daemons of Slaanesh into the Age of Darkness.

That's three announcements which, during a quieter week, could comfortably have had entire sections to themselves.

This was not a quieter week.

That's All For This Week... Probably

Remember at the beginning when we said our news roundups normally run Sunday to Sunday?

We're writing this on Saturday.

That should tell you everything.

In the space of a few days we've had a major Space Marine release, sweeping Chapter rules updates, a dramatically reworked Custodes army, plastic Aquilon Terminators, the return of the Legion of the Damned, an entirely new Age of Sigmar faction, new Seraphon, new Tomb Kings plastics, Necromunda becoming an RPG, two new Warhammer animations and 150 new paints.

And Sunday hasn't even happened yet.

So rather than attempt to pretend this has been a normal week, we're calling this one early.

If Games Workshop announces something enormous tomorrow, we'll deal with that problem when we get there.

For now, it's safe to say:

What a week for Warhammer.

Build. Paint. Play.

— The Game Foundry