Fingers crossed for Ruination Chamber! 🤞

True the whole idea of the Lighting Golem has been teased for years now in the lore. I could see them including like a lighting Giest unit as an expendable frontal assault unit. Probably lore wise they are Stormcast that are too defective to reforge so just sent out into the front lines to meet a final end and take as many enemies with them.

Well that’s the curse of immortality. They can’t really meet a “final end”, their souls are too physical like those of vampires so they’re doomed to never be able to rest in an afterlife. If you’re Stormcast your final fate is either to be reforged forever and battle for eternity, be snatched up by NightHaunt or death gods and tormented in the underworlds, get captured by chaos powers(like chaos shrines or cursed skies) and tortured forever by the warp or you run into a god-killer weapon that obliterates your soul entirely taking you out of existence. So likely the golem suits would just jettison them back up to Azyr so their damaged souls can be put into another suit or else the lightning gheists would just rampage through Azyr seeking a body.

@@ce4879 There are also essentially assisted suicide methods as well. Case in point Star-bridges that help stormcast souls beat through the cursed skies are powered by the willing sacrifice of Stormcast who after too many reforgings wish to experience a permanent end and have their souls power the devices. However this effectively drained the souls until they are reduced to nothing and destroyed so it isn't an afterlife either. After that your getting into the "Great Beyond" concept of AoS of where destroyed souls go where some believe a soul destroyed either though violence or their afterlife being destroyed go to a place known as the Great beyond, though we'll likely never know if that is even a real thing.

Yeah, at best Grungni theorizes that obliterated souls become cosmic particles that settle in the deepest depths of Shyish where reincarnation happen thus creating a new soul. But regardless the “Dreadnought” golems can’t just blow up and leave the Stormcast soul/Lightning gheist as it needs somewhere to go and out of it’s connection to Azyr will force it’s way back there. That’s why they’re contained in statues in the first place, angry Lightning gheist IS the final end. So likely Grungni would just do what he did for Thunderstrike and make the golems explode harder to send the damaged souls back safer for a new golem to house them in. Basically making it a dynamite tank.

I can give a pass to them wanting to do new units for 3rd instead of redoing older units right away. Gave time for people to adjust to the new style and grab up what they suspect may be going by next edition.(I know I bought a ton of older hero units, like Heraldor, and sets in case the hammer dropped on them wrong) Basically AoS3 is the deep breath before the plunge into the overhauls. I’m hopeful that neo-Liberators will get defense boost abilities to keep differentiating themselves from the others. That way all the melee battleline have a place. Liberators defenders & duelists, Vanguards versatile & fast ranger infantry, Sequitors magic boosting attackers & defenders, Vanquishers horde slayers and Vindictors for masters-of-none generalists.

(Though I wouldn’t mind if they upgraded Vindictor Warscrolls for a chance to cause Chain Lightning when they get charged to go with their lore that they electrify their shields too. Would up their deadliness and work nicely with people liking to deepstrike them behind enemy lines to fence opponents in)

Yes I think GW themselves are starting to realize something has got to give. Next edition will probably be the first true culling of Stormcast Eternals units. The Hero options especially. As for Vindictors they almost feel like they should have been the new Liberators, as at least Sequitors when they came out performed a role as a cheapish offensive unit that also hard-countered resurrection. Vindictors literally stepped right on the toes of the Liberators role and were just flat better. Heck even taking their place as the front-line troops in artwork and expanded material. Liberators at this point can't just skim on being the "cheap" option they need a reason to exist again and I really only see a model update doing it.

@@ce4879That's exactly the problem with too many units in Stormcast. The Battleline and Heroes especially. They haven't done an adequate job differentiating them enough. Too many units just do the same thing, but either better or worse than competition. All these battleline can work, they just need more obvious divisions with their rules and abilities.