Forge World Pre-Orders

[Arendious]

Yay, redheaded step-planes! (I love/hate the Avenger, so I'll be getting a box...)

 

I can't quite wrap my head around the idea of putting pictures of the non-punisher Vulture on the Punisher-carrying version's page - but then not releasing the other variants simultaneously.

 

The skystrike cradles obviously exist, they're in the photos. Could be they're holding off to release them alongside resin Remoras? Mold or production issues?

[klisof]

I'd forgotten the Avenger was going to be a plastic kit rather than a FW resin kit.

 

I would have preferred the avenger to be resin and vulture to be plastic (or both plastic tbh).

The vulture feels like an interesting option while when I look at the avenger rules it doesn't look worth taking over the thunderbolt even with the points increase in the T-bolt.

 

I'm not convinced by the avengers looks either

Edited August 16, 2020 by klisof

[Mandragola]

Not sure I need Avengers either, and four would be particularly difficult to justify. They might make useful strafing run markers for AT (as I believe the design was used in the heresy). The wings already look half way to being orky in my opinion, so I guess some looted conversions might be fun.

[Arendious]

I'll get a box, partially to show support for the system, but also because I envision painting them up like A-10s as RESCORT for my CSAR Valks.

(Technically, you might get away with just a pair, since some of the reason CSAR Warthogs fly in fours is to divide the radio workload. Avengers have the tactical trunk monkey to help out...)

[Fajita Fan]

For a long time I thought those and Lightnings were different patterns of the same plane.

 

Out of curiosity why so many imperial planes instead of starting the Marine planes? I feel like that should be an obvious faction to get out there.

[General Zodd]

I guess the main reason they wanted to go back to Imperial Navy/Guard was that with effectively only two Chassis in the first wave they had no decent option for transport. Without the Valkyries they struggle to compete in those missions where picking up or dropping off troops is a victory condition. Plus, marine flyers aren’t that pretty IMHO!

[duz_]

I imagine it's more to do with the idea of mimicking WW2 aerial battles

The Imperial Navy has that in spades and already has a good amount of FW kits to go by

 

The Space Marines flyers are more limited in range and aesthetic

Plus from a Lore perspective I don't see Space Marines getting pulled into a protracted air superiority fight

 

Although seeing plastic Xiphons and Interceptors would be neat

 

Let's see what happens

[General Zodd]

Oh, they’ll definitely do them, if the game (hopefully, touch wood) lasts long enough to get to them. But I agree they’re not the poster boys for Aeronautica that they are for 40k. Personally I’d prefer to see some more Xenos before I see Marines.

[Mandragola]

I think the reason they haven't done marine flyers for AI is that they're made by GW rather than FW. There appears to be a pretty strong desire from FW to make small versions of their own models, rather than GW plastics, whenever they can. I think the reason they've gone first with the Imperial, Ork and Tau lines is that those are the ones with lots of existing FW designs they can use. So far the only 28mm plastics that have been made for AI are the dakkajet (without the other 3 options that can be made into in 40k) and valkyrie - which was originally FW resin (and the vendetta still requires a FW upgrade kit).

 

For now there's no sign of the Tau getting the sun shark or razor shark, which are their only GW designs. This actually leaves the Tau with no ground attack weapons, meaning that technically you can't pick a legal Tau force for any of the missions that require you to bomb stuff. In reality they can strafe fairly well and they've got a great transport in the Tiger Shark despite the Orca not making it into the game.

 

For marines FW would have a tricky time if they wanted to only use their own designs. Most of their marine stuff is old heresy designs so while you might see one or two of them still, whole squadrons wouldn't make much sense. Thunderhawks are their only design for a plane currently in production for marines, I think. There's nothing stopping them making stormravens, hawks or talons, and they'd be pretty cool, but that doesn't seem to be their approach.

 

I could definitely be proven wrong about this stuff of course, but this does appear to be the pattern in both AI and AT.

[Robbienw]

They did the regular questoris knight for AT, an entirely GW designed 40k model.

 

I’m sure they’ll do the full range of 40k flyers for Space Marines, both FW and Studio produced, as AI is set in the 40K era. It wouldn’t make sense otherwise. They will have the studio digital files available to debigulate :)

[Sparika]

Well for Space Marines, they could release a pretty decent force with thunderhawk, xiphon, and fire raptor.

[Mandragola]

They did the regular questoris knight for AT, an entirely GW designed 40k model.

 

I’m sure they’ll do the full range of 40k flyers for Space Marines, both FW and Studio produced, as AI is set in the 40K era. It wouldn’t make sense otherwise. They will have the studio digital files available to debigulate :)

They could hardly aboid doing the standard questoris knight for AT. They haven’t done the dominus or Acastus chassis though.

 

It looks to me as if they only do GW designs when they have no alternative. They had to do the dakkajet and questoris knights. Every other model so far for both games is a FW design.

 

I expect we’ll get a Eldar soon because they’ve got a few FW-designed planes. I’d be surprised if hey did a crimson hunter or hemlock though, as those kind of overlap with the function of the night wing. They might be up against chaos. That’s a way they could potentially introduce a thunderhawk, as otherwise chaos won’t have a transport.

[Robbienw]

They really have no alternative to doing the mainline space marine fighters when they release marines for AI, it really wouldn’t make sense not to have them. They have had no problem when necessary using 40k studio designs.

 

I expect when SM are released, probably across more than one wave, we will see the Thunderhawk, Storm Raven, Storm Hawk, Storm Talon, Xiphon and the Storm Eagle.

 

I’d like the Nephilim and Dark Talon as well, but maybe they will leave them as they are chapter specific, guess it depends how well AI does in the long run.

[Fajita Fan]

Don’t FW make a Marine 40k fighter jet? Also who here would not buy an AI scale Thunderhawk (or like three)?

[Robbienw]

Don’t FW make a Marine 40k fighter jet? Also who here would not buy an AI scale Thunderhawk (or like three)?

They make the Xiphon, which is primarily a 30k model, but also has 40k rules. IIRC it was stated in the fluff that it was fairly rare in 40k, but had seen recent use by some marine chapters, particularly first founding chapters.

[klisof]

If they do make the 40k SM fliers I hope they rescale them a bit to fit alongside existing kits. They are a lot smaller than the Xiphon.

 

The Xiphon kit has a wingspan of 235mm and length of about 190mm.

I think this is smaller than the Lightning or dakkajet kits, but I don't have those available to measure.

 

The Stormhawk has a wingspan of 150mm and length of just over 140mm (excluding weapon barrels) which contributes to it feeling a lot less graceful than the Xiphon