Upcoming BL Stuff - 2022

[Lord Marshal]

Lack of a Votann novel was a big surprise. You'd think they'd have one of their regulars penning at least a quick churn book if nothing else. 

 

Dawn of Fire, more like Dawn of Kindling amirite? Big disappointment that's what the Sisters of Silence tease was seemingly leading up to, particularly when it largely seems to be about a Knightworld. Who wants to bet the purple spikes leads to the antagonists being Genestealer Cultists taking the wind out of the potentially interesting Imperial vs Imperial side of things?

 

Nothing we didn't already know about The End And The Death save for the cover art, moving on.

 

The AoS books are... what they are.

 

First Founding is... Marine art, sure, whatever. 

 

The expected Creed Jr tie-in but surprisingly it's not Justin Hill penning it. Could be nothing, could be decent, will have to wait and see. Blerb reads like a lot of "I am not my father!" angle and beating the now familiar "What does it mean to be Cadian without Cadia?" drum. Awful cover.

 

Pilgrims of Fire's blerb doesn't really excite me. It feels like every post-Rift Sister story has had similar setups. Not saying it won't be good, but it'll be on the "wait for the reviews" pile.

 

Cypher: Lord of the Fallen was probably the most interesting reveal there. Whilst I think John French is great, I am wary from the interview there's going to be a lot of, "dohohoh don't believe the unreliable narrator winkwink" that will make my eyes roll to the back of my head faster than you can say "I am Alpharius."

 

All in all, pretty disappointing (don't get me started on the model). Nothing for Horror was expected since we're on the wrong side of the year for that but I did hope for just a crumb of Crime. More AoS than I'd expected but nothing that I'll bother picking up. No Chaos, let alone Xenos, which isn't too surprising but still a let down - at least the Word Bearer omnibus looks pretty but if the Gotrek one is any indication I'm not paying £95 for it. 

 

Sometimes if you listen at night you can hear the cries of the SoT Garro novella lost in the Warp.

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by Lord Marshal

[theSpirea]

Here's my short review of the preview. The hosts were pretty bad/terrible and the whole structure of the preview unfortunate. I was hoping for the new DoF novel but not that happy it's Kyme writing it. They have so many talented new authors. With Kyme I already know the best I will get is average if I'm lucky. Oh well...

 

Next SoT, still no word how many volumes. Well, that's half the preview time wasted on two novels.

 

Bad Loon Rising - awesome cover and high expectations after Gloomspite. And we're basically almost at the end of the preview

First Founding - not really interested

Cyper - yes please. Since BL hasn't done any audio drama in ages, it was bound to happen the original audio drama box set was abandoned

The Last Volari - so far enjoyed Kloster's stories, might consider getting it

Pilgrims of Fire - happy someone else instead of Danie Ware is writing about SoB. I just can't get into her writing. Her books put me to sleep

Blightslayer - I was secretly hoping Strachan or Guymer would continue with Gotrek since Hinks announced he's no writing the next one. I hope Strachan crazy output isn't going to hurt the quality

Creed - this is a contender for the ugliest BL cover

Word Bearers box set, Armageddon - it was expected they would continue with reprint of old books in overpriced editions. It's easy cash after all.

 

So, nothing for Necromunda (guess they are done with BL novels for that setting), and nothing for Crime and Horror.

 

The AoS stuff saved it for me as the rest is rather mediocre. I'd give it 3/10 for the preview and 6/10 for the announced books.

[System Sound]

4 minutes ago, theSpirea said:

Next SoT, still no word how many volumes. Well, that's half the preview time wasted on two novels.

 

 

I'm starting to think that either they're still not done with editing and have no clue how many more "volumes" there will be. Or they do know but don't want to reveal it, because they know it's gonna stir a :cuss: storm. Either way the Siege stands as testament of how poorly it was planned, that the LAST book is not actually a LAST book!

 

8 minutes ago, theSpirea said:

So, nothing for Necromunda (guess they are done with BL novels for that setting), and nothing for Crime and Horror.

Can some one make a page were it lists all the series BL has dropped? Like that page were it's shows the graveyard of stuff that Google killed off.

[Lord Nord in Gravis Armour]

I was so excited for this that I managed to forget all about it until around fifteen minutes ago...

 

The DoF #5 announcement manages to both confirm that the series will be continuing on a somewhat regular schedule and that any expectations story-wise should be tempered.

 

What really stands out for me is that even with five years and change to work on Cypher, right out of the gate they're spitting in the face of Wraight's continuity. Up until now, they'd made the effort to keep Dawn of Fire consistent with Wraight's novels (although I still think they're going to wreck that by eventually mentioning the Hexarchy crisis as a contemporary event in a novel set five-plus years into the Crusade, whereas it obviously took place no more than a few months after Guilliman left Terra).

 

But with Cypher, they mention a few times that the Rift opens after Guilliman returns (to the Sol system, not to life) and indeed even after Cypher is imprisoned and escapes.

 

Problem: The Rift had been open for some time before Guilliman returned in The Emperor's Legion. There's no wiggle room.

 

Again. FIVE YEARS they've had to get this right. But apparently as with so many shared universes these days, basic continuity doesn't matter.

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by Lord Nord
Gilly

[System Sound]

11 minutes ago, Lord Nord said:

Again. FIVE YEARS they've had to get this right. But apparently as with so many shared universes these days, basic continuity doesn't matter.

 

Continuity errors will continue till morale improves!

[Tymell]

On 12/3/2022 at 12:02 AM, skylerboodie said:

The contents of Heirs of the Emperor is now showing on GW (NZ site) and it's not the expected five short stories, the listing includes the following:

 

Grandfather's Gift	Guy Haley
The Atonement of Fire	David Annandale
A Lesson in Iron	David Guymer
Lantern's Light	James Swallow
Will of the Legion	Andy Clark
Embers of Extinction	Brandon Easton

 

So, Ghost of Nuceria is missing, but also weirdly Prince of Blood by L J Goulding that was in the original anthology Sons of the Emperor is also missing; both Angron stories, so perhaps being saved back for a tie-in release when his model comes? Even if so, I still don't think they should have been left out here.

 

 

 

That's bizarre. When announced about a week ago, it was 27 stories. Now it's dropped to 26, leaving out a single short from the three previous anthologies that this one is supposed to be collecting together. I can only assume/hope that it's a typo in the list to leave out Prince of Blood, and that the tallied number followed this.

 

Well, if it isn't a typo, I'm damn well counting Prince of Blood as "in" for the purposes of my HH bookcase collection!

Edited December 4, 2022 by Tymell

[Roomsky]

I haven't watched any of the interviews yet so I'm just commenting on the reveals. As someone pretty inured to "little and less" when it comes to Black Library articles from WHC lately, I'm actually pleasantly surprised by most of this.

 

The Iron Kingdom - Dawn of Fire has so far given me enjoyable novels from Thorpe, Clark, and Haley, 3 authors I would normally skip by default. Volpone Glory was surprisingly good so I'm actually genuinely excited for this. I'm also relieved that DoF is still going, and that it doesn't appear to be shrinking in scope or wrapping up any time soon.

The End and the Death - My only real disappointment, that sure doesn't look like the cover of the last Heresy novel. Like, this isn't the :cuss:ing Winds of Winter, guys. If Abnett had to write something this long, the Siege series was more mishandled than we thought. I will forgive it if Volume 3 begins with the fateful duel and deals with the fallout for the remainder of the book, however.

First Founding - Without watching the stream WHC doesn't really tell me what this is. 

SKARSNIK WON *STOMP STOMP*

Angels of Darkness Anniversary Edition - An actual classic, glad it's getting a hardcover. Still waiting on Lord of the Night.

Cypher - Is this the audio drama rejigged into a novel or brand new? Either way, stoked for it, the Dark Angels always need new blood penning them.

Pilgrims of Fire - More Sisters is an unambiguous good. Not sure how well Hill's terse style will fit them, but I'm optimistic.

Creed - Hilarious cover aside, actually excited for this. I haven't been following the going's on with Creed Jr. but Reid left a good impression with her intro short in Vorbis

Armageddon SE - Appears to include Blood and Fire, so that's almost tempting

 

Overall, this was far more than I expected. Execution of the event appears sketchy, but at least we have something approaching communication for once. Surprised no McNeill.

 

[Silent Observant]

Overall pretty whelming and agree with most of the sentiment here, especially on the votaan book, feel they need to add some more characters viewpoints to add some perspective on the army and drive some progression. I anticipated we weren’t going to get any black legion or emperors spears books but I was hopeful.

 

A couple things I noticed/wonder. 

 

1. No titles from Guy Haley, I figured there would be at least one novel from him knowing his speed and being a main driver for BL

 

2. Wonder if they announced all they had in the short term Q1/Mid Q2 minus a few surprises or already know titles (Angron). Because they are gearing up for the rumored 10th edition, adding some lore tie ins around the release they can’t discuss due to not leaking anything for the new edition. Just a theory but could also be what a few authors are working on.

 

Theory aside was hoping for more, should have kept with my, not watch the preview and look at warcomm after procedure but couldn’t help myself. Here’s hoping warhammer fest may reveal some mid year titles.

[Lord Nord in Gravis Armour]

It's cute that they're trying to pretend that the Hand of Abaddon storyline has actually been a slowly-building mystery rather than a complete joke.

 

Again:

 

Book 1: Set up as an important thing. WHO IS the Hand of Abaddon?

Book 2: Spoiled in the Dramatis Personae, not even mentioned in the story.

Book 3: Completely unmentioned.

Book 4: Attempt at resurrection made by stating that the character identified as the Hand of Abaddon in the Dramatis Personae for Book 2 is actually NOT the Hand of Abaddon.

 

Compelling stuff.

[System Sound]

10 minutes ago, Lord Nord said:

It's cute that they're trying to pretend that the Hand of Abaddon storyline has actually been a slowly-building mystery rather than a complete joke.

 

Again:

 

Book 1: Set up as an important thing. WHO IS the Hand of Abaddon?

Book 2: Spoiled in the Dramatis Personae, not even mentioned in the story.

Book 3: Completely unmentioned.

Book 4: Attempt at resurrection made by stating that the character identified as the Hand of Abaddon in the Dramatis Personae for Book 2 is actually NOT the Hand of Abaddon.

 

Compelling stuff.

Well the issue here is that the hand of Abaddon is still atached to Abaddon. Its an easy mistake to make. We've all been there, I'm sure.

[Lord Nord in Gravis Armour]

Yeesh - and as if we needed more proof that they hit fast-forward on the DoF storyline on top of all of the indicators in The Wolftime (which was clearly originally planned to take place no more than a couple of weeks or months after Book 2 but was rewritten to take place years later)...

 

So one of the story points in Book 5 is about Battle Group Praxis returning the body of the Heir of the Queen of Kamidar.

 

She died in BOOK TWO! Unless they try to handwave Kamidar as somehow being unreachable, then she's been on ice for several years at this point. And keep in mind, they are trying to maintain good relations with this queen.

 

Just... better things to do, I guess? Nah, no reason for the queen to be insulted by that...

 

Again, might have made sense if this story were set to take place several months at most after Book 2. But three years out? At that point, you're begging the Queen to declare independence.

 

I swear, I'm not TRYING to nitpick, but they make it so hard not to when they insist on gaffing this extremely and this frequently. I could swear I've heard the term "Editor" thrown around by various Black Library authors in the past. Was I hallucinating or is that person just not very good at their job?

[cheywood]

From today’s Sunday preview: 

Quote

Meanwhile on Warhammer Community there will be miniature reveals, the last Age of Sigmar Metawatch of 2022, more exciting Black Library news, and all that other good stuff.

We’re already getting more BL news this Wednesday. That is why the preview was relatively small compared to past years. The new model is dripping out an announcement every week or two on WarCom with the preview basically serving as a big promo for the BL Celebration.  Personally I’m entirely okay with this, but it would’ve been nice if GW decided to manage expectations instead of building undeserved hype for once. 

[Kelborn]

Was it officially stated that all DoF books are occurring linear/ one after another or is there a "strict" timeline? Haven't seen one while scrolling through the introduction pages of each book. There's only the galaxy map which progresses as far as I'm not mistaken here.

 

I'm just guessing 'cause I just started reading it but perhaps certain story threads happen simultaneously?

[StrangerOrders]

Anyone else have a horrifying feeling with seeing the Volume count on the last Siege book that Abnett is going to make it like 60%+ Perpetual nonsense?

[Lord Nord in Gravis Armour]

22 minutes ago, Kelborn said:

Was it officially stated that all DoF books are occurring linear/ one after another or is there a "strict" timeline? Haven't seen one while scrolling through the introduction pages of each book. There's only the galaxy map which progresses as far as I'm not mistaken here.

 

I'm just guessing 'cause I just started reading it but perhaps certain story threads happen simultaneously?

 

Good luck with that. I remember what it was like to still have hope.

[darkhorse0607]

Did I miss something? Why the big Sisters of Silence promotional image for this?

[cheywood]

6 minutes ago, darkhorse0607 said:

Did I miss something? Why the big Sisters of Silence promotional image for this?

DoF 5 features a Sister of Silence as a main character. Not exactly the most obvious connection, but it’s there. 

[Ubiquitous1984]

1 hour ago, darkhorse0607 said:

Did I miss something? Why the big Sisters of Silence promotional image for this?

Didn’t they sneak in a SoS onto a previous DoF cover, only to kill her off within the space of a few chapters?  Let’s hope the latest random SoS lasts a bit longer!  I was really hoping for a SoS novel but alas.  

 

The Cypher novel is what I’m looking forward to most.  Can’t wait for that one.  

 

Am I the only one who didn’t clock at first that it was Golden Boy and not the Emperor on the front cover on volume 2?!  

 

I’ve got to say the presenters weren’t up to the job.  It’s a tough job to do and they did as well as can be expected when they clearly aren’t big BL fans.  But how hard is it for Games Workshop to find two employees/contractors who can do the presenting and actually come across as subject-matter experts instead of just winging-it?  As soon as one of the presenters said he was behind on the SoT and DoF series my heart sank.  The nutters tuning in on a Sunday afternoon to watch a BL stream are all going to be pretty bloody hardcore.  Show them some respect please GW by having like-minded people doing the presenting.  

 

PS I’m pretty certain I’ve had the same complaint with every online BL reveal.  Bring back the BL Weekender!  

Edited December 4, 2022 by Ubiquitous1984

[Taliesin]

It was a very underwhelming preview. I got a nasty feeling about it when they were 45 minutes in and were still just chatting about the already announced End and the Death volume 1. We already knew that comes out in February. It was interesting that they are letting us know they have split Abnett's last book into 3 volumes rather than 2 , which I am sure was the most anyone was possibly expecting before this preview.

 

And yes....its very obvious that this is now a trilogy, because:

 

1) the cover of book 2 being Sanguinius vs Horus definitely suggests that there will be another one where the cover will be Horus vs The Master of Mankind, no way that would the cover on the final volume as there is much left to cover after that.

2) They did not say book 2 was the final book and you can be sure that if it was, they would have mentioned that to get people off their back.

3) Making it a trilogy means its a 10 book Siege of Terra series which I suspect they like the sound of.

 

Limited edition buyers who still have a full set may be less enthused. Personally I do love that cover for book 2 a lot and hope they release that book soon too. Summer I suspect.

 

Other than that, shockingly little revealed. And that is in part due to the very limited nature of this year's preview. They only cover stuff that comes out early 2023. Previews from the Weekender and also last 2 years'  online previews covered ground up to the middle of the next year, this was a much shorter window.

 

BTW kind of weird that they did not mention the Guymer Angron novel ha? That is expected next month and a pretty big deal, the return of Angron to 40k. Not even mention it?

 

The thing is, people wouldnt be annoyed by the waffling as much if there were decent reveals to back it up. But there werent, and thats not the presenters fault obviously. Abnett clearly is a long way away from Pandemonium as I expected, but hearing nothing from ABD was a bummer. Chris Wraight has just released 2 books in 2022  but it would not have been odd if he had something else lined up already. Guy Haley has oddly gone from releasing on average 3- 4 books a year to 1 book , for the last 2 years consecutively. 

 

Cypher short novel sounds good.

 

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by Taliesin

[Nagashsnee]

2 hours ago, StrangerOrders said:

Anyone else have a horrifying feeling with seeing the Volume count on the last Siege book that Abnett is going to make it like 60%+ Perpetual nonsense?

This. His insistence on 'suprises' and cramming in new abnett lore coupled with BL editorial being a joke makes it 99% likely. 

[Taliesin]

6 hours ago, DarkChaplain said:

....lol, they're already coming to the end of the preview. After 3 new announcements.

 

 

Chat isn't having it. Lots of cynicism, people asking for the Blockbusters they were promised, calling GW clowns and so forth. Not amused about the lack of World Eaters content, or Black Legion, or basically anything they were hoping for.

 

Gotta say I did crack up at the end of the preview when they turned to chat for input on what they liked and very clearly people are just left wondering and interested in the other stuff that was not mentioned in the preview :D

 

Which is a lot, because the preview didnt cover a lot about ongoing series we are awaiting next volumes for.

 

And fair point to chat on the blockbusters, there were none, so why promise several? Bizarre. 

 

 

5 hours ago, System Sound said:

If they would stop waffling for so God damn long about nothing, maybe, just maybe , they would have more time to show more books!? Oh but I forget it's BL we're talking about. There's probably nothing else ready yet... Or the "intern" is on holiday again so he didn't have the time to make more slides.
Another reveals stream, another disappointment. Could have just made post on the community site and be done with it. What a waste of everyone's time...

 

It was definitely a more limited preview than the last few years. Consdering this was the only preview they did this year, I thought they would have more to show. 

I suspect they would though, if they had material ready to show.

 

[Scribe]

2 hours ago, StrangerOrders said:

Anyone else have a horrifying feeling with seeing the Volume count on the last Siege book that Abnett is going to make it like 60%+ Perpetual nonsense?

 

Yeah its not great and the longer I think about it the worse it is.

[Felix Antipodes]

To be fair, I don’t expect much from GW/BL previews.  All hype and no punch usually.  This one must surely rate as one of their worst though.  The poor bastards they had presenting it were like deer in the headlights and, to make matters worse, were obviously not BL subject matter experts.  You would think if you were lumbered with the role a bit of research and/or crammed reading would be on the cards.

 

The previews themselves were only average, with only Cypher being a ‘yay’ moment.  I’m assuming it is a reworking of the planned audiobook series previously announced.

DoF 5 sounds interesting but for a series that has both an editor and a show runner there doesn’t appear to be a strong hand on the continuity tiller.

First Founding could either be great or a disaster depending where they go with it.  I expect a Chaos version sooner rather than later, followed by a Second Founding edition once they get into the Scouring era.

Really happy with the choices for special editions this time round, especially the Word Bearers box set.  They can’t have many more ADB books to give the SE treatment?  Who will be their next golden goose?

The books that cannot be mentioned (AoS) all seem interesting.  Too bad I’ve never been able to get into that setting.  Will wait for the return of WFB.

New books from Justin D Hill and a first from promising up & comer Jude Reid will keep me happy and reading.

 

Disappointments were the lack of depth of the coverage.  I don’t think we saw anything post February release.  I was also disappointed that there wasn’t anything set in the Leagues of Votann setting or the World Eaters.  Possibly held back for post 10th edition?

[Knockagh]

Would rather Justin had stuck to the Cadia series. Sisters books have so far been pretty disappointing. 
Looking forward to Cypher but I’m not much of a John French fan. So in my gut I’m expecting a disappointment.

Its getting harder to get me excited about BL and this big reveal did very little to stimulate my interest.

[chevalierdulys]

Good books coming out - at least Cypher, The End and the Death (Doesn't make much sense the title does it?) which now are three books... Are they all written? I remember hearing about two books and not three.

So they annouced all of these, but they've been annoucing others and don't mention them like all horror stuff, Traitor by Deed; Black Eyed Saint, Bonereapers, Godeater's Son, Angron Red Angel enfim.. Don't understand their logic

 

Btw, in other stuff, I order the new gotrek gurnisson and in my order on view order details says "no longer avaiable online" . Is this normal? I am bit afraid because I also bought last month shadowsun and after two days they cancelled with no information given.

 

Thanks in advance

 

The Gotrek Gurnisson Collection No Longer Available Online	0	1	EUR130
Hammers of Sigmar: First Forged (Hardback) Pre-order product that will be delivered from 12/10/2022.	0	1	EUR22