New Blood Angel stuff- character sculpts, upgrade sprue, and rules?

[tychobi]

So no more hiding the fangs eh? Full vamp all the way!  The heads are pretty cool but it does seem strange the Inquisition has failed to notice 

[DemonGSides]

1 hour ago, Blindhamster said:

I don’t see any more varied iconography on DA set than the BA one frankly. Sure that DA one has a different chapter icon for ravenwing and deathwing, but that’s an actual different chapter emblem. So feels like comparing apples to oranges 

 

There's Deathwing, Ravening and Greenwing on one upgrade sprue.

 

We got snarling bare heads and tear drops. These things are not at all equal.

 

1 hour ago, Blindhamster said:

one of the belt details is a chalice. It’s a little light on the ground, but not sure what you hoped for? Chalice on shoulder pads? Personally I’m happier getting a full assortment of chapter icons on shoulder pads. A chalice on the storm bolter housing might have been cool though.

 

 This is a conversation; mentioned the singular chalice keychain before. We used to have awesome bespoke shoulder pads and tilt plates and backpack adornments that weren't just "embossed blood drop".

 

1 hour ago, Blindhamster said:

the DC not was always too noisy for me, I usually had to spread the parts over a lot of models as many of the pieces were too busy, and as a result no longer elegant, excess is the realm of emperors children, rather than blood angels. So yeah, mileage may vary but for some this isn’t a downgrade in the way it is for you. But I can totally understand the frustration and it’s a shame there isn’t an actual full kit coming too - the upgrade kit was never going to compare to a full kit sadly though. 

 

Right, which is why I am bummed; it's a straight downgrade.

 

Also,  BA are known for their artistry, it's how they help combat the thirst and the rage. It's all gone now, and apparently we just slam blood drops onto our keychains and go to battle.  It's a boring devolution of our faction identity.

 

1 hour ago, Blindhamster said:

interestingly, my first thought was “I love the tacticus power sword” it has a pretty distinctive blade design and I liked the less over the top hilt (though yes, I’d have loved a winged blood drop hilt too, I’m hoping for such a bit in the captain kit when it comes). Regardless, I thought the swords were nice, and I liked the small variation with the chainsword too. Plus us getting eviscerators as a unique weapon is cool.

 

It's just boring. I can accomplish the tacticus sword with literally any sword and any of a million blood drops that have come from any million BA kits. The upgrade sprue should have interesting, flavorful upgrades. Like the BT getting chained wrists and swords, like the DA getting three completely different examples of their chapter icon, whereas we got: blood drop, or blood drop with Laurel. Such variety!

 

It's just all so boring and plain for what our faction is; artisanal vampires who are known for their bespoke wargear.  I was hoping with how good the DA/BT upgrade sprues are that we would get something at least on par. We did not. We got a slightly more expanded version of the old Primaris Upgrade Sprue.

 

Seriously.  Go look at the Primaris upgrade sprue from 2019 or whatever. It's the exact same helmet and heads (just fewer), most of the exact same shoulder pads, the exact same keychain tchochkes.  It's just super disappointing.

 

The chains word is even basically exactly the same. They couldn't even put a blood drop on that thing lol.

 

It just feels lazy. "Here's some snarling heads, here's some blood drops, here's a few shoulder pads.". All just plain as hell.  And throwing one of our main faction identity units onto the upgrade sprue is just brutal. Deathwing Terminators got half shafted here, but at least they got Deathwing Knights and ICC. We are gonna get Sanguinary Guard and told to shut up and enjoy it. 

Sorry, i'm not trying to be snippy or short.  I just had high hopes for this upgrade sprue.  If they give us good Sanguinary Guard, and then eventually give us a Blood Angels Intercessor kit like we had with Tacticals, that'd probably solve like 99% of my problems as I'm happy to convert and kitbash (Despite admonitions from you brother hamster, that I don't know how to use glue :P) when possible, but this upgrade sprue just provides so few avenues of interest.

If I was REALLY into blood drops, I too would absolutely be thrilled :P

Edited July 30 by DemonGSides

[ThaneOfTas]

59 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

If they give us good Sanguinary Guard

Considering what we've heard about the Sang Guard kit I wouldn't hold your breath.

[DemonGSides]

I'm not married to the wings of the Sanguinary guard, so i'm not as worried there.  I'm just worried they're gonna look plain if this upgrade sprue is any indication, and I want my Divergent units to be as unique as possible.

Astorath has some big ass wings, so they're not averse to them.  We shall see!

[Helias_Tancred]

Does anyone know for sure if the new Lemartes miniature denotes him as a primaris marine, or is he still fitstborn?

 

 

Ditto for Astorath.

[Morticon]

I think they're moving away from the primaris distinction. I think they're slowly starting to retcon this distinction.

[Morticon]

Anyone notice mephy is now LO and 4+++ ?

 

Also, Dantes axe is looking like it's D1, which lends weightntoy hunch about BA getting +1Dam. 

 

Thoughts there?

[The Unseen]

1 hour ago, Morticon said:

Anyone notice mephy is now LO and 4+++ ?

 

Also, Dantes axe is looking like it's D1, which lends weightntoy hunch about BA getting +1Dam. 

 

Thoughts there?

That would be awful.

[Adorondak]

5 hours ago, Helias_Tancred said:

Does anyone know for sure if the new Lemartes miniature denotes him as a primaris marine, or is he still fitstborn?

 

 

Ditto for Astorath.

Astoraths armour is too fancy for me to tell, but lemartes is wearing tacticus boots and knee pads. Whether he actually went primaris in the lore or not, he looks the part now.

[Blindhamster]

4 hours ago, Morticon said:

Anyone notice mephy is now LO and 4+++ ?

 

Also, Dantes axe is looking like it's D1, which lends weightntoy hunch about BA getting +1Dam. 

 

Thoughts there?

I don’t think it looks like a 1 in the image?

[Karhedron]

5 hours ago, Morticon said:

Anyone notice mephy is now LO and 4+++ ?

 

Also, Dantes axe is looking like it's D1, which lends weightntoy hunch about BA getting +1Dam. 

 

Mephy is interesting as he is now basically a guided missile. However he is still only 7" Move (unless he gets an original version of Wings back). The 4+++ is really good considering how many Hazardous attacks he can make. My concern is that he now competes somewhat with the Sanguinor who has his pop-up attack and a Jump Pack for M12". Interesting though.

 

Dante's axe still looks like 2D to me but it is hard to tell. One change I can see is that he now give +1" to Advance as well as Charge (was just Charge previously). Nice to have but not amazing as I think he is still the weakest of the Chapter Master Characters. 

[Karhedron]

On the subject of the upgrade sprue, I think I have worked out why I am so disappointed. Previously we had a huge array of spare parts distributed across the DC, Tactical Squad and Assault Terminator boxes. Compared to the existing Assault Termies, the one torso provided on the sprue is pretty underwhelming. I knew that we would never get all that duplicated into Primaris straight away but it has now been 7 years (2 and a half editions) since Primaris Marines arrived and the fact that all we have got is 2 small and lacklustre upgrade sprues fuels my frustration. We know GW can do better because they have done it before. I want Primaris versions of the assorted decorated helmets that came with the old BA Tactical squad. I want bling with wings that I can fit to various squads, not just shoulder pads and keyrings. I want whole squads with winged blood drops on their chest plates, not just one Terminator.

 

That is why I am disappointed. GW could have done better and should have done better. I was looking forward to this box but frankly I don't think I will bother as right now the only thing I really want in there are the data cards.

 

Right, rant over. I have got that off my chest and will try to focus on the positives like the fun idea of running Mephiston solo up a flank to wreak havoc.

[Blindhamster]

I like that the little belt details cover a number of our common imagery:

 

- skull and crossbones is a classic one for us going back to 2nd ed commonly used on classic death company

- blood drop and crossbones is similarly classic for death company

- chalice 

- a couple of new design reliquary like the ones from the current primaris kits (little doors that open)

- a blood vial

- a couple of basic blood drops

- small book 

 

The backpack toppers are alright, I prefer the smaller blood drop and laurel from the BA tactical kit but that one is fine. The winged blood drop is also fine, but again a bit larger than I’d like.

4 different designs for the vehicle icons is decent, again we have the classic winged blood drop that will be nice for any of our vehicles and we have the skull and crossbones for DC ones. The laurel and blood drop and scrolll and blood drop are both nice little alternatives.

 

 

im pondering what I’d have liked as alternative/extra helmet designs honestly. Probably not a death mask in this set, it would have been of very limited use, but perhaps a helm with built in laurel would have been nice, or maybe a small “frill” like the sanguinary guard have.

 

weapons I think are good for regular squads,  but I’m definitely hopeful that the rumour of a character is true and it has more ornate stuff

 

 

 

[DemonGSides]

1 hour ago, Blindhamster said:

im pondering what I’d have liked as alternative/extra helmet designs honestly.

 

BA tac sprue knocked this out of the park 10 years ago;

 

Keychains could've just been anything more visually interesting. I just think throwing more keychains at the Marines is weaksauce when DA got biker upgrades, terminator upgrades, a whole freaking book, varied power pack toppers. Just a lot more visually interesting than 9 blood drop designs, one chalice, and thats it. 

[Blindhamster]

Tbh, most of the heads were just “variant mk7 head with a blood drop” but there are some nice ones.

 

we got almost as many terminator bits as dark angels, all we really missed was the hip guards. Which are fairly basic anyway. The book is kinda “eh” imo. And we got power pack toppers too (more than DA actually, that got a single design). They got bike stuff, because bikes are a big part of DA (even then, they only really got one interesting bit for ravenwing) Maybe we should have got a couple of jump pack grav wing things or something. 
 

but yeah, you and I won’t agree here. I think our upgrade is good, and it’s easily as good as dark angels. You don’t, and that’s totally fair

Edited July 31 by Blindhamster

[DemonGSides]

16 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

Tbh, most of the heads were just “variant mk7 head with a blood drop” but there are some nice ones.

 

I mean, what else are the options?  I want helmeted heads and my options are... 1.  That sucks, full stop.

 

17 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

we got almost as many terminator bits as dark angels, all we really missed was the hip guards. Which are fairly basic anyway.

 

Almost is less.

 

9 keychains is about as basic as it gets, especially when 6 of them are just Blood Drop But Slightly Different.

 

18 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

And we got power pack toppers too (more than DA actually, that got a single design).

 

I'm seeing two, and we didn't get any with Angel iconography, JUST blood drops.

 

19 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

They got bike stuff, because bikes are a big part of DA (even then, they only really got one interesting bit for ravenwing)

 

So you're saying DA got bits for a part of their faction identity?  Interesting, that's exactly what I am asking for!  Also the book is part of the ravenwing aesthetic idk why I'm not a DA player, I'm assuming it's book of grudges, dwarf style lol

 

20 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

Maybe we should have got a couple of jump pack grav wing things or something. 

 

Like, literally anything that wasn't just "Here's some blood drops".

 

 

[Blindhamster]

I should stop, I know I should.. but..

 

8 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

I mean, what else are the options?  I want helmeted heads and my options are... 1.  That sucks, full stop.

I’m not sure how it sucks more than the ones you showed, honestly. I wanted bare heads as to me, nice hair and to some extent fangs is part of faction identity for blood angels. I assume you’d have preferred all helmets or mostly helmets? Which would have left players like me unhappy. The ratio in the dark angels kit sucks, but also dark angels don’t have defining physical characteristics like blood angels or space wolves do.

 

12 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

Almost is less.

Yes and we got more non terminator bits. So same is true of dark angels, but in reverse. Frankly id have been shocked if we had as much terminator or bike representation.

 

14 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

9 keychains is about as basic as it gets, especially when 6 of them are just Blood Drop But Slightly Different.

No. Just no. There are two that are “just blood drops”. The blood drop and bones / skull and cross bones is a nod to some classic blood angels from 2nd Ed. Sorry that doesn’t appeal to you, but I loved it. There are two reliquary that use a blood drop image, one of which looks to be above a skull shaped cup (it has a flat top). I just don’t think there’s any point in you and I arguing the keychains at this point. We have 100% different views and nothing that either of us will say will sway the other. 
 

21 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

I'm seeing two, and we didn't get any with Angel iconography, JUST blood drops.

Even if they have two, you’re changing goalposts. You said they had more, they don’t. We didn’t get one with an angel on it, I’m not sure we have ever had one like that? The tactical squad had a blood drop

with laurel, blood drop in a halo and chalice with wings.

 

26 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

So you're saying DA got bits for a part of their faction identity?  Interesting, that's exactly what I am asking for!

but I’d argue that the bare heads were important to the chapter identity, when part of their identity has always been the red thirst (I.e. vampirism). What precisely would you expect to be there that was important to the chapter identity as a whole (keeping in mind, the shoulder pads were and should always have been the chapter insignia, as that’s key to all marines).

 

29 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

Like, literally anything that wasn't just "Here's some blood drops"

But blood drops are a key image of blood angels. Stuff like chalices are very much secondary and we did still get a bit of chalice imagery.

 

honestly I feel like you’re just trying to compare to full kits like the death company kit or the tactical squad kit. This is an upgrade kit so will always have fewer bits, relatively speaking. For you, that’s a downgrade, that’s fine. But I’m sure

we will end up with at least some of the bits you hope for (chalice and angel imagery) covered in the sanguinary guard and supposed captain kits.

 

for me, this upgrade sprue does what it mostly needed to do, which was to give us chapter pads for most unit types, give us some little details we can dot around and give us some form of unique chapter weapons. Plus they clearly wanted to give us heads that looked more inline with the art for blood angels. Which I’m here for. Sorry the bare heads aren’t to your liking though. 

 

 

[Jolemai]

[Cenobite Terminator]

I really like the upgrade sprue and am seriously considering starting a new army.

[Blindhamster]

4 minutes ago, Jolemai said:

Sorry lord chaplain, I’m trying to be polite and civil but still engage in debate 

[DemonGSides]

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

honestly I feel like you’re just trying to compare to full kits like the death company kit or the tactical squad kit. This is an upgrade kit so will always have fewer bits, relatively speaking. For you, that’s a downgrade, that’s fine.

 

I'm quite literally comparing the DA and BT upgrades to the BA one and coming away disappointed.

 

We haven't even discussed how much it hurts to lose such a good, stylized kit and it get "upgraded" to a plain marine kit+ paint job.

 

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

assume you’d have preferred all helmets or mostly helmets?

 

Literally an even split would've been fine.  Regular Marines come with plain heads, BA sprue could be 4 mk10 helmets with stylized BA iconography and 4 snarling vamp heads and we are both happy.

 

Instead you go assuming. Smh.

 

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

Yes and we got more non terminator bits. So same is true of dark angels, but in reverse. Frankly id have been shocked if we had as much terminator or bike representation.

 

Ignoring context for dunking on terminators and bikes. It would've been nice to get some of OUR other faction identities, such as flamers (we had heavy flamers in our tac squads until 8th), or chalices (literally the blood rite that every BA marine goes through, reduced here to a keychain), or the angels (0 Angel iconography, despite, y'know, our primarch), of even anything to do with a Jump Pack.

 

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

No. Just no. There are two that are “just blood drops”. The blood drop and bones / skull and cross bones is a nod to some classic blood angels from 2nd Ed. Sorry that doesn’t appeal to you, but I loved it. There are two reliquary that use a blood drop image, one of which looks to be above a skull shaped cup (it has a flat top). I just don’t think there’s any point in you and I arguing the keychains at this point. We have 100% different views and nothing that either of us will say will sway the other.

 

 

Dude... There's 6 keychains that have a main focus of a blood drop, one book, one blood vial, one chalice.  These are viewable.

 

I like blood drops!  I just also like other things.  Variety is literally the spice of life!

 

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

Even if they have two, you’re changing goalposts. You said they had more, they don’t. We didn’t get one with an angel on it, I’m not sure we have ever had one like that? The tactical squad had a blood drop

with laurel, blood drop in a halo and chalice with wings.

 

Brother man, we've had all sorts of toppers that aren't "Blood Drop" or "blood drop with Laurel". You may make a distinction between those two, but they are basically the same. We've had chalices, we've had Angels, we've had sunbursts.  That's my point; all imagery has been reduced to "Blood Drop on other things" and we were so much more than that previously.

 

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

but I’d argue that the bare heads were important to the chapter identity, when part of their identity has always been the red thirst (I.e. vampirism). What precisely would you expect to be there that was important to the chapter identity as a whole (keeping in mind, the shoulder pads were and should always have been the chapter insignia, as that’s key to all marines).

 

Sure!  But so are helmets. And I want more helmets, even if they are literally just slightly blinged out Mk 10!  That's all I want and you castigate it like it's ridiculous.

 

I'm not sure what your question is asking but I'm positive I've already answered it.

 

38 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

for me, this upgrade sprue does what it mostly needed to do, which was to give us chapter pads for most unit types,

 

We had that already. I just hoped for more.

 

36 minutes ago, Jolemai said:

 

Was a rule broken?  I know Hamster has made some shots at me but I didn't consider them serious.   Honestly, let me know if you think anything is leaning into personal attack territory, otherwise I think this has been a good discussion of what we all think about BA.

Edited July 31 by DemonGSides

[Blindhamster]

22 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

we had heavy flamers in our tac squads until 8th

Not disputing necessarily , but fun fact:

that happened because the person designing the sprue thought it would be cool. Realistically the salamanders deserve that more than us though. 
 

source: a friend that was working in the studio back then. 
 

p.s. no “shots were made at you” :) 

 

p.p.s. I’d obviously have liked more

on the upgrade sprue, but I’m just not unhappy with what I got either (we didn’t have chapter pads for most units till now, so I’m happy we’re do, and I love bare heads so happy there too, I wouldn’t have complained at more nice helms though). I’m fairly hopeful that sanguinary guard will be a decent source of extra blood angels bling, much like the last version.

 

 

Edited July 31 by Blindhamster

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

34 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

 

I'm quite literally comparing the DA and BT upgrades to the BA one and coming away disappointed.

 

We haven't even discussed how much it hurts to lose such a good, stylized kit and it get "upgraded" to a plain marine kit+ paint job.

 

 

Literally an even split would've been fine.  Regular Marines come with plain heads, BA sprue could be 4 mk10 helmets with stylized BA iconography and 4 snarling vamp heads and we are both happy.

 

Instead you go assuming. Smh.

 

 

Ignoring context for dunking on terminators and bikes. It would've been nice to get some of OUR other faction identities, such as flamers (we had heavy flamers in our tac squads until 8th), or chalices (literally the blood rite that every BA marine goes through, reduced here to a keychain), or the angels (0 Angel iconography, despite, y'know, our primarch), of even anything to do with a Jump Pack.

 

 

 

Dude... There's 6 keychains that have a main focus of a blood drop, one book, one blood vial, one chalice.  These are viewable.

 

I like blood drops!  I just also like other things.  Variety is literally the spice of life!

 

 

Brother man, we've had all sorts of toppers that aren't "Blood Drop" or "blood drop with Laurel". You may make a distinction between those two, but they are basically the same. We've had chalices, we've had Angels, we've had sunbursts.  That's my point; all imagery has been reduced to "Blood Drop on other things" and we were so much more than that previously.

 

 

Sure!  But so are helmets. And I want more helmets, even if they are literally just slightly blinged out Mk 10!  That's all I want and you castigate it like it's ridiculous.

 

I'm not sure what your question is asking but I'm positive I've already answered it.

 

 

We had that already. I just hoped for more.

 

 

Was a rule broken?  I know Hamster has made some shots at me but I didn't consider them serious.   Honestly, let me know if you think anything is leaning into personal attack territory, otherwise I think this has been a good discussion of what we all think about BA.

GW has been dumbing chapter themes for a while now.

8th and 9th we were blood drops, angel wings, DC, and jump packs.

now we’re just blood drops, DC, and jump packs.

 

we were the first marines to get inferno pistols, the first to get hand flamers, first (only?) to get heavy flamers in tac squads, had OC engines for transports, but when GW started fleshing out other chapters we had to lose things that made us stand apart.

im not sure if this wave is now part of some :cuss:ty attempt to ‘streamline’ themes or what.

[DemonGSides]

24 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

p.s. no “shots were made at you” :) 

 

You quite literally talked down to me about how to glue bits onto models but whatever, let's move on, I don't want Jolemai to shut down the thread.

 

25 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

we didn’t have chapter pads for most units till now, so I’m happy we’re do,

 

We did. The OG primaris sprue has every type of pad besides phobos, but also the shoulder pads are about the only great thing about this upgrade sprue, as I mentioned multiple times. I would've liked more bespoke shoulder pads instead of just embossed blood drop, but it is at least something.  My problem is that the only other thing we really got on this sprue is 7 unhelmeted heads, and then a bunch of keychains. The other bits are mostly set aside for turning one unit into another. That sucks; those units should have their own bits and these upgrade sprues should be all about maximizing flavor.

 

27 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

I’m fairly hopeful that sanguinary guard will be a decent source of extra blood angels bling, much like the last version

 

Eh, the previous version had pretty bespoke shoulder pads for half their options that don't make a ton of sense elsewhere. The heads were similar; the regular heads are usable elsewhere but a death mask doesn't make much sense outside of the SG.

 

We aren't gonna get generalized BA bits until they release a BA Intercessor kit, and that ain't happening any time soon. 

 

 

 

[Blindhamster]

12 minutes ago, DemonGSides said:

You quite literally talked down to me about how to glue bits onto models but whatever, let's move on, I don't want Jolemai to shut down the thread.

Apologies, that was actually legitimate advice as I’ve not had issues with them falling off. Didn’t mean for that to come across as talking down.