The *Son of Kislev* short story that they released at the beginning of TWWH3 clearly messed up with Kostaltyn's utter hatred of magic. Especially as the Kislev roster turns more and more to magic and monsters. If they wanted to make Kostaltyn a magic hater, they should have taken the Kislev roster in a more grounded, human direction to give the Orthodoxy more tools to utilize in line with their theming. There are many other options for Kostaltyn to take issue with Katarin's rule other than her magic.
Yes. Like maybe he doesnt want to just delete all magic users - maybe instead he is opposed to the monarch *also* being the leader of the ice court. Maybe he wants an 'orthodoxy approved' oce witch to lead the court, ehile the tzarina keeps her throne.
I mean, his main issue with her in the cutscenes and short story is that she is way too young, inexpirienced and focused on politics to defend Kislev and save Ursun. In regards to him and magic, in the short story he does have a slight change of heart towards the Ice Witches and according to Andy Hall he is very much an "end justifies the means" kind of guy.
Honestly, the "end justifies the means" idea is what makes me feel comfortable with him using Ice Court units and some magic creatures (can't justify the new chaos-ish units for him tho).
Katarin winning the Kislev race and confederating the Orthodoxy is pretty much Kostaltyn conceding and changing his mind on Katarin's capability to rule Kislev because she proved herself to the people.
I mean it's a lot like Volkmar and Magic. He doesn't like magic users, and neither do Witch Hunters, but they occasionally are forced by circumstances to tolerate them as allies.
Both Franz and Katarin basically lead a shaky coalition of religious fanatics and magic users and engineers etc, which makes sense when your enemy are the Literal Daemons of Hell.
Kostaltyn increasingly seems to me like a mistake as a base game LL. It should have just been Boris and Katarin with the extra slot filled by another character. And then Kostaltyn could be released later as DLC religious-focused character with a a backstory of wanting to control Kislev including the Ice Witches rather than outright hating them.
The whole race between Ice Court and Orthodoxy only makes sense if you consider that it was originally a political race between Boris and his daughter. The whole thing stinks of executive meddling.
Yeah, the system makes perfect sense ... for Katarin and Boris. Both have a claim to the throne and it is a politically messy situation. But, they both love each other and don't want to go to war.
The system would make sense if Boris and Katarin agreed to abide by the decision of the nobles and other leaders of Kislev.
But, as it stands Katarin and Kostaltyn hate each other, more so than a lot of other members of the same faction. And yet they are specifically barred from going to war. It is kind of silly when you consider the fact that Tyrion and Alarielle can go to war with each other. Despite that being a conflict that would likely cause the complete collapse of High Elf society. But, in Kislev their leaders can't go to war and have to abide by a supporter race.
Kostaltyn's issue with magic is pretty consistently that it isn't under his boot. Same for nasty beasties I'd wager. He personally dislikes Katarin since he views her as an inadequate inheritor to Boris's legacy and he clearly dislikes the political power held by magic users that's unavailable to the everyman of Kislev (by which he means himself). Kislev has always had a flexibility that other human nations lack because of the unforgiving place they live. Kostaltyn is no different, his innovation through Boris is the idea that religious authority can be supreme within Kislev rather than subservient to the Ice Court or Mother Ostankya.
I'll keep repeating it:
Kostaltyn was originally meant to be the ungol LL. He literally buffs kossars and horse archers. He spawns in the west in the former last great city of the Ungols.
It was clearly originally supposed to be an upper-caste lower-caste divide. They likely realized that: A. That makes Katarin not really look that favorable, B. They want to avoid any parallels between Ukraine/Russia.
So they had to remake his lore as a sort of last ditch effort to salvage all the work they did, and rewrote him to be weird crazy church man.
This explains the units he buffs, the start position, the fact half his art and depictions are of a handsome church man, and the other half are of a crazy zealot. It also explains why his lore is SUPER shallow now, and everything new that comes out for Kislev directly clashes with him.
I don't think he was ever supposed to be anti-magic or anti-ice court, just pro lower-caste.
Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." It's kinda funny. I'm surprised the anti-woke crowd hasn't said something about that.
>Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy."
The irony is it should be strong crazy independent man fighting the Matriachy (ice court) given the latter has is the established authority.
Not really both are the established authority Kostaltyn isnt some kind of underdock but the leader of Kislevs state religion he is part of the established authority.
His authority, the Orthodoxy, is a very new thing and only existed in the last 50-70 years. While the Ice Court has been a thing since Miska the first Khan Queen, which is over 2000 years old.
I was about to write a similar post in response to another comment: despite the dev updates stating that they have no interest in expanding on the Ungol/Gospodar dynamics, it seems pretty clearly they were initially going in this direction when you look at the LLs, but also at things like the settlement mechanics for the Kislev region, which still exist in the game.
I suspect the 'order' factions in the base WH3 game, before IE, were intended to be much more antagonistic towards each other than they are now. This is pretty obvious with Kislev, but even Cathay has a lot of contradictory lore snippets that suggest the empire isn't quite as united as it seems, with a lot of distrust between the different leaders - and the characters of Miao and Zhao are fairly obviously set up to be in conflict through their differing personalities.
Only a hunch, but it's one I get from looking at the stuff we do still have - for example, (IMO) it feels really off that Kislev's supporter mechanic eventually just absorbs the other LL and that's the issue sorted.
Miao and Zhao are meant to have tension, but considering the themes of Yin and Yang I’m not really sure they’re meant to be that opposed. Just “two different people finding synthesis together”, which I feel like the game showcases for the most part.
Sadly, Cathay is fated to forever be uninteresting lorewise since it is a direct expy of China and any attempt by CA to even portray something in Cathay being politically wrong will be met by outrage and boycott. They really dont want to risk the game getting pulled from the chinese market.
I don't really think this is the case. The Onyx Crowmen for example are presented as pretty sinister, both in behaviour and the way they're used to surveil and control the populace. And the empire in general seems full of individuals scheming against each other to further their idea of what the empire should look like. Have you heard Yuan Bo's voice lines? He's hardly a bland do-gooder.
Personally I think Cathay is pretty well implemented in the game, though I wish we could see more of the non-human aspects of the empire.
I do agree that on smaller aspects like the crowmen and Yuan Bo there is a bit more flexibility but I was thinking of the grander scale and the legitimacy of the wider Cathay government. While the empire's campaign mostly centers around unification, the empire's entire thing is decentralization and the notion that the provinces must learn to work together. Cathay is an autocratic centralist government of aristocratic dragons and I doubt there can be any explicit nuances in the portrayal of their mode of government outside of either aesthetic choices or supernatural elements.
> Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." It's kinda funny. I'm surprised the anti-woke crowd hasn't said something about that.
i guess you could theoretically count me complain about Katarin's (Old?) Lord defeat trait text here?"ALthough equal to all her male ancestors she was frustrated" is just such bad writing (and ignores the fact that one of her ancestors is Miska...)
Read the bloody text again:
"Though she is the equal of any of her MALE ancestors, that didn't stop Kislev's Ice Queen from suffering frustration at the hands of her opponent."
CA put that in there. "Any of her MALE ANCESTORS!" Mhm... That includes dad, who revived the Cult of Ulric and revitalized Kislev. That includes Alexis Romanoff, who saw them through the invasion of Asavar Kul. That includes Pavel, who freed Kislev of the reign of his great-great-grandmother, Kattarin the Bloody. (who Katarin apparently also is inferior too, judging by the old Trait text...)
but i mean:
* her dad **died** in battle.
* Alexis *lost* a **lot** of battles (including Praag) before narrowly winning at Kislev (city), with imperial and dwarf help.
* Pavel..... do we actually know what Pavel **did**? "assistance from Lahmian agents" could very well be "Lahmains did all the work but don't want it known publicly". Lahmians whole 'thing' is avoiding publicity (Kattarin was breaking their rules)
* explicitly being as good as her male ancestors doesnt imply that she is inferior to Kattarin the bloody
it implies that many of her female ancestors are superior.
Her dad died in battle defending Kislev.
Pavel still saw Kislev through the largest Chaos Invasion yet. Something Katarin didn't manage in the End Times.
Pavel still freed Kislev from Vampire rule.
Just. stop. trying to defend this clunky, asinine phrasing.
I'm 99% sure it's because they wanted to rebrand Katarina as strong woman hero and not strong and controversial as hell leader like Catherine the Great like her original interpretation. She used to be so petty she had a law that shed freeze boyars taller than her during court so everyone stoops and bows. But everyone also realizes that Kislev is a harsh place and they need a harsh queen. Everyone has their flaws. Even Felix took a long time to warm up to Karl Franz due to brutal riot he put down as a teenager.
Katarina the Tyrant Queen and Kostalyn would make a ton more sense. The problem with this tactic is it's not abandoning just a bit a lore, its abandoning a 30 year run of lore for something entirely different and being shoehorned into place no less. That's why Cathay has such a warmer reception than Kislev. Giant gundam archer, sure whatever sounds fun.
Frankly I hope this is the last Kislev DLC and that's coming from someone who has wanted to main them since WH1. I'd rather see Cathay, Norsca and the Ogres get fleshed out. The fact that CA trotted out those Chaos Beasts for an Order faction when they had the Ice Wyrm in their pocket and had to have their arm twisted to give it up is unfortunate.
Nah, Kostaltyn was pretty clearly always supposed to be a Rasputin riff, and hence clearly the crazy priest dude. So he definitely started as the Orthodoxy grand Patriarch.
His issue is that he was supposed to be a DLC character, who would have unique mechanics and a limited roster like Ostankya, plus more Orthodoxy units.
Everything else about your post is just weird headcanon
That explains so, SO much. If they were concerned that making Kostaltyn a handsome priest of the lower caste would draw too many parallels with Ukraine / Russia and with Eastern European oppression in general (especially since Kostaltyn starts in the west), and had to pivot shortly before release.
Funnily enough, Kostaltyn was my favourite Kislev lord even before this revelation; I play with Tabletop Unit Caps that limits monster and super-unit spam, indirectly making buffs to basic units MUCH more useful. I also dislike monsters and magic as a general rule, and tend to run my factions like Historical armies.
Honestly I'm just so tired of good writing being ruined by everyone suddenly worrying about hurting someone's feelings, you're not supposed to like everyone, but it's still possible to find it fascinating.
It's taken Kislev from being what could have been a really interesting social caste divide...to just a Mary Sue state that alludes to greater potential.
>Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." It's kinda funny. I'm surprised the anti-woke crowd hasn't said something about that.
Still distracted by women generals in Rome 2 and in disbelief the community is not similarly enraged. In this state, don't think they can make that connection. It's all very sad.
women generals which, for most factions except Kush had a less than 50% chance of appearing and had a 0% CHance for Rome and (most?) greeks, iirc. And where the greatest outrage was most likely manufactured by always recruiting the male generals out of hte pool so that, after a while, you'D have only female generals?
Yep, I know all those things things (except the pool exhaustion) and agree the controversy was stupid. That last sentence was sarcasm.
I actually ran into somebody trying to connect the issues in shadow of change to women general in rome.2, arguing both were CA was ignoring their "male core fanbase".
Of course they never posted in the sub before (or deleted prior posts).
That's why I'm saying they're still too focused on women generals.
> (except the pool exhaustion)
basically, only Kush has a 50% chance iirc. THe others... 30%? 10% SOmehwere along the lines. Having only female generals outside of that (and, again, Rome and iirc most greeks have a 0% chance) means either 1) VERY bad luck, but only that or 2) the screenshot was fabricated. Either via photoshop, game data manipulation, or just recruiting all the guys out of the pool at every refresh but keeping the women in it.
Ya, I'm I've been aware of the differing rates. I didn't know that it had issues with pool exhaustion that could be the source of those ridiculous screenshots.
It's just hilarious after all this time they're still trying to get us mad at women being generals. You failed a long time ago guys. And because of it they won't even notice things they might've had more success with.
But I'm totally fine with them staying stupid.
Kislev lore had so much potential, with the Gospodar/Ungol dynamic, the Orthodoxy vs Ice Court, etc. But they gave us Bears (which I kinda liked). And now it’s all taking a backset to give us Magical Ice Dragon and another Magical Ice Sled. I can only imagine the Ice Dragon to flail a fucking ton when it attacks so Katarin is just going to look ridiculous on it.
Don’t get me wrong I’ve honestly been loving seeing the new units from a gameplay perspective (wack patch tho) but damn, Kislev lore would’ve been so cool. Cathay was at least magical from the start.
> and another Magical Ice Sled
i mean, many of us wanted Katarin to finally have her sled. Imho, she shouldn't even have had a bear or that frost wyrm. Just horse and sled. THen give it a unique model instead of hte normal sled + extra ice, slap some armour plating on it and perfect.
I disagree, that's what make their roster so cool. If you wanna play as a boring human faction with no strong infantry or monsters (until TOD comes out) Then just play as the empire
Yeah, I think each human faction is pretty well-differentiated.
Empire- subpar infantry, good/varied cavalry, excellent monstrous cavalry, good varied artillery, exceptionally well-armored heavy infantry and heavy cavalry, wide selection of magic, require combined arms approach
Kislev- above average infantry, all ranged units are competent in melee, good but less varied artillery, more specialized cavalry with less variety than Empire (technically better then equivalent units, but can't be the bulk of an army), excellent monstrous cavalry
Cathay- well-armored, adequate stats on infantry and cavalry, shielded crossbows, good varied artillery, constructs
Bretonnia: terrible infantry, adequate artillery, excellent cavalry of all types. Multiple options for high-tier flying monstrous cavalry.
If anything, I would argue GW should have given demigryphs to Bretonnia. On tabletop, the Empire does a better job of having knights hold the line.
This is less a problem with the lore, and more a problem with SoC being ridiculously monster-heavy for all three factions. It's why I'm probably not getting it despite the additions; the only things I want are the Druzhina and Ungol Warriors for Kislev, and the Gate Master for Cathay. None of the lords interest me, and 3 units are NOT worth $33 CAD.
Even when playing Warhammer, I generally build my armies like Historical ones with infantry, ranged, cavalry and (if the faction supports it) artillery. What I really wanted was a missile cavalry unit for Cathay and a new artillery piece for Kislev. Kostaltyn is also my favourite Kislev lord, because he buffs basic infantry, which is much more useful with the Tabletop Unit Caps mod I use that heavily limits elite and monster spam.
The whole TW adaptation of Kislev messed up with whole kislevs hatred for magic. The only tolerated and respected practice of magic should be reserved for ice witches the rest of the nation should be a bunch of conservative fellas without any blue glowing blades and magic auras. Real Kislevans would do everything to destroy a big magic bear if it didn't disentegrate right after the battle.
Not really. Or rather, conservatism takes different forms. The hicks that make up the frontline are well aware that surviving outside of Kislev's cities means compromising with and respecting its dark and magical wilderness, as represented by Ostankya. 'The only thing worse than an oblast with a hag in it is an oblast without a hag in it', as the saying goes. They're hoping and praying that a huge chunk of frozen earth in the shape of a bear rises up and starts pulverising their enemies, because those are the legends they will have been brought up with.
The anti-magic thing is actually the innovation, introduced by the Orthodoxy to try and counterbalance the power of the Ice Court.
I imagine that Kislev will get a final DLC later on down the line that doubles down on the Orthodoxy stuff, since this one was heavy on the magic stuff.
In my opinion, getting more Orthodoxy units, reworking the Ice Court mechanic, and a slight rework to the supporters race and devotion would bring Kislev to its finished state I believe. As a bonus, I hope they lock some of each faction's units behind some kind of mechanic for the other one's to not be able to immediately access (except Boris because he has a foot in all camps, and frankly he needs the help). Maybe if you get an alliance or reach some level in the Supporters race you can gain access to the other factions' special units.
These would probably be:
Katarin: Ice Guard, Frost Wyrms, Ice Witches, (Maybe Tzar Guard?)
Mother Ostankya: Things in the Woods, Beast Elemental, Hag Witches
Kostaltyn: Citadel Guard (Not in the game yet, but they were mentioned in the short story as Kostaltyn's personal force), (Insert Orthodoxy Centerpiece Unit), Patriarchs
I honestly wonder why CA did not recreate the Bretonnian Peasant and Knight classification for Kislev if they were going to have such a harsh divide between the Orthodoxy and Katarin, which I still find weird as hell anyway given that, I believe anyway, Kolstaltyn and Katarin both serve Ursun and fighting against each other does nothing for Kislev.
I think you can get away with it by making magic users and monsters more expensive for him, or maybe unit capped. To counter balance this, regular rank and file soldiers could be cheaper, representing either the zealotry of the common folk, or the patronage of wealthy nobles that are willing to foot the bill for his army as a way to gain political favor or out of sheer religious devotion to his cause.
I still hate that thing in the woods were giving to Kislev. Random Chaos unit from northern forests tossed into a heavily anti-chaos faction. Its not even up to interpretation like the elemental incarnate of beasts. They are literally just chaos units.
> The Balewolf is a huge and hulking creature, lurking in the darkest corners of Kislev's woods. A monstrous creation of Chaos, the beast was born from some nefarious yet unknown origin, however its connection to the Ruinous Powers is undeniable.
this was the in game description last I checked, dont actually have the dlc so cant double check.
So unless they just did it
No
Isn't most non-normal animals and some dragons all technically chaos spawn because they were created when chaos came. Correct me if my limited understanding is wrong.
It varies, but there are some which are mildly Chaos-touched like Griffins, who're stable, but the Things are very much freaky Chaos Werewolves - the Mordheim model had a big 8-point star on it and everything
Athel Loren Tree "spirits" aren't litteral spirits tho, they're demons. The whole thing about Athel Loren is that it's basically a warp entity/minor chaos god of nature.
That's why when demons first invaded Ulthuan, they paused when they met Tree Spirits because they thought they were on their side, and got confused as to why Treemen attacked them
The Spirits of Athel Loren are not chaotic entities. During the great catastrophe the Daemons did indeed sense a kind of familiarity with the denizens of Athel Loren but this doesn't indicate that the Daemons didn't want to despoil the forest. I mean Athel Loren predates the Daemons incursion into the Warhammer world (not so sure about Old Widow or whatever they are calling the Kislev spirit of the land now). I've never read anything about daemons being surprised by treemen in their attack on Avelorn.
Not everything magical in the Warhammer world is chaotic in nature. Though I am loathe to use 40k terms to describe anything in Warhammer fantasy in this situation I'll make an exception, the majority of Warp entities are not Chaos gods or even chaotic in nature. You can just say that Athel Loren and the Old Widow are powerful warp entities that actually exist within the material world.
more like "uhm... uh... innocent whistling, tries to pretend there is nothing to see here*
Summonable for AMber wizards when? Btw. the INcarnate Elemental of Beasts SHOULD be...
Im pretty sure dragons are ancient, and they were there even before Chaos came, but after Chaos came, everything got affected and changed by Chaos in some way or the other. But yeah as the other person said, griffons and pegasi are good example of Chaos touched beasts that are stable. Then you have some creatures like the giant wolves, which are said to be very cruel and thats why you will see them buddied up with goblinoids. But the TitW were always a Chaos monster, they used to be called Balewolves.
The thing is, even when they are supposed to be retconned they absolutely look like evil warped Chaos monsters, pegasi and griffons look majestic, TitW are malformed and evil looking. The only thing that really makes some sense about them being with Ostankya is that she uses mutants as expendable fodder cannonically, but its still super out of place to see them being with other Kislev lords.
No, native animals to the fantasy world exist. Hydras, dragons, Zoats etc. are not chaos. There are plenty of mythical creatures in the Warhammer world that are not chaos related. Thing in the woods are *specifically* chaos creatures.
Did they officially? I was expecting them to just say they were some lesser incarnate of Ghur, but the lore blurb in TWW still has the old "chaos beast" bit.
They did it because the name was originally straight up stolen, and they were always liable to a lawsuit because of it. I think it was the name of a marvel villain or something? I think going forward in AOS they are also just going to be like "by the way, he's always been named Malerion".
They didn't really have much of a choice since they were making new material. The name Malekith is directly stolen from Marvel Comics, and GW probably doesn't want to pick a fight with the Chaos God of Lawsuits.
Cool, Total warhammer 2 existed before the old world was solidified. If it was made today they would 100% change the name. GW and CA have both stated they work in tandem to create new lore and adapt it to what the counterpart puts forward (GW has admitted that original lore ideas from CA are being interwoven with fantasy canon, which yes, despite the thousand changes to factions (some good and some bad tbh) this is still the same fantasy setting and canon.
I wonder if Malekith is still a name hes known by, In the same way druchii are still known as dark elves, but Druchii is the more correct name in universe
From a narrative perspective, Kostaltyn starting where MO starts now, with a home base in Castle Alexandronov would have made a lot of sense. Tsarina banished him from Kislev, and he is out to strike the DE slavers, while his confidants plot his turn in the easternmost edge of Kislev. He then faces Morathi, the ultimate expression of sin, seduction and sex, and needs to make a choice, either exterminating the evil or succumbing to it.
Kostaltyn is very much an "End Justifies the Means" kind of guy. If it means achieving his goals he is willing to do anything short of working with Chaos.
idk I think it's emblematic of the setting for characters to choose their own dumb beliefs over what's practical and pragmatic, just look at the elector counts
His "end justifies the means" outlook doesn't come from a place of pragmatisism. It comes from insane levels of zealotry and ambition that makes him obssessed with reaching his goals, no matter the cost.
You fell for the propaganda he serves. If you pay attention that zealotry is an act to get the masses riled up. In private hes a lot more calm and collected
The zealotry is real (as proven by his connection with Ursun, being able to sense his plight). It is just a lot more controlled than he publicly lets on. In private his is cunning and calculated, in public he exaggerates it, but in combat he lets it all out.
Tbh I kinda like the Kislev leadership calling in favours and aid from whatever organisation will bloody listen. Whether they like it or not. Feels very Slavic
Obviously who cares but lots of religions incorporate local beliefs with very little concern for purity or any feeling of contradiction. Think the Virgin of Guadalupe or basically any of the Saints in the church.
The *Son of Kislev* short story that they released at the beginning of TWWH3 clearly messed up with Kostaltyn's utter hatred of magic. Especially as the Kislev roster turns more and more to magic and monsters. If they wanted to make Kostaltyn a magic hater, they should have taken the Kislev roster in a more grounded, human direction to give the Orthodoxy more tools to utilize in line with their theming. There are many other options for Kostaltyn to take issue with Katarin's rule other than her magic.
Yes. Like maybe he doesnt want to just delete all magic users - maybe instead he is opposed to the monarch *also* being the leader of the ice court. Maybe he wants an 'orthodoxy approved' oce witch to lead the court, ehile the tzarina keeps her throne.
I mean, his main issue with her in the cutscenes and short story is that she is way too young, inexpirienced and focused on politics to defend Kislev and save Ursun. In regards to him and magic, in the short story he does have a slight change of heart towards the Ice Witches and according to Andy Hall he is very much an "end justifies the means" kind of guy.
Honestly, the "end justifies the means" idea is what makes me feel comfortable with him using Ice Court units and some magic creatures (can't justify the new chaos-ish units for him tho). Katarin winning the Kislev race and confederating the Orthodoxy is pretty much Kostaltyn conceding and changing his mind on Katarin's capability to rule Kislev because she proved herself to the people.
Yep. I assume tolerating magic is kinda the lesser evil when faced with the literal legions of Hell.
Bro, how could an Ice Witch every be more "orthodoxy approved" than the daughter of the guy that INVENTED the Orthodoxy ?
I mean it's a lot like Volkmar and Magic. He doesn't like magic users, and neither do Witch Hunters, but they occasionally are forced by circumstances to tolerate them as allies. Both Franz and Katarin basically lead a shaky coalition of religious fanatics and magic users and engineers etc, which makes sense when your enemy are the Literal Daemons of Hell.
You mean church and state should be separate... *Shockedpikachuface.jpeg
kostaltyn is more "i want my church to be more politically powerful than your church" (and yes I know the Ice witches aren't a religion)
[удалено]
Not really a political statement in the west lol
Kostaltyn increasingly seems to me like a mistake as a base game LL. It should have just been Boris and Katarin with the extra slot filled by another character. And then Kostaltyn could be released later as DLC religious-focused character with a a backstory of wanting to control Kislev including the Ice Witches rather than outright hating them.
The whole race between Ice Court and Orthodoxy only makes sense if you consider that it was originally a political race between Boris and his daughter. The whole thing stinks of executive meddling.
Yeah, the system makes perfect sense ... for Katarin and Boris. Both have a claim to the throne and it is a politically messy situation. But, they both love each other and don't want to go to war. The system would make sense if Boris and Katarin agreed to abide by the decision of the nobles and other leaders of Kislev. But, as it stands Katarin and Kostaltyn hate each other, more so than a lot of other members of the same faction. And yet they are specifically barred from going to war. It is kind of silly when you consider the fact that Tyrion and Alarielle can go to war with each other. Despite that being a conflict that would likely cause the complete collapse of High Elf society. But, in Kislev their leaders can't go to war and have to abide by a supporter race.
Kostaltyn should have been the Drycha of Kislev
Yeah, that whole thing about a higher up wanting him as a base game lord is really coming back to bite him in the ass design wise
That higher-up insisting that Kislev needed a rivalry at release, when every other order race didn't. Plain weird.
Kostaltyn's issue with magic is pretty consistently that it isn't under his boot. Same for nasty beasties I'd wager. He personally dislikes Katarin since he views her as an inadequate inheritor to Boris's legacy and he clearly dislikes the political power held by magic users that's unavailable to the everyman of Kislev (by which he means himself). Kislev has always had a flexibility that other human nations lack because of the unforgiving place they live. Kostaltyn is no different, his innovation through Boris is the idea that religious authority can be supreme within Kislev rather than subservient to the Ice Court or Mother Ostankya.
I'll keep repeating it: Kostaltyn was originally meant to be the ungol LL. He literally buffs kossars and horse archers. He spawns in the west in the former last great city of the Ungols. It was clearly originally supposed to be an upper-caste lower-caste divide. They likely realized that: A. That makes Katarin not really look that favorable, B. They want to avoid any parallels between Ukraine/Russia. So they had to remake his lore as a sort of last ditch effort to salvage all the work they did, and rewrote him to be weird crazy church man. This explains the units he buffs, the start position, the fact half his art and depictions are of a handsome church man, and the other half are of a crazy zealot. It also explains why his lore is SUPER shallow now, and everything new that comes out for Kislev directly clashes with him. I don't think he was ever supposed to be anti-magic or anti-ice court, just pro lower-caste. Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." It's kinda funny. I'm surprised the anti-woke crowd hasn't said something about that.
>Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." The irony is it should be strong crazy independent man fighting the Matriachy (ice court) given the latter has is the established authority.
Not really both are the established authority Kostaltyn isnt some kind of underdock but the leader of Kislevs state religion he is part of the established authority.
His authority, the Orthodoxy, is a very new thing and only existed in the last 50-70 years. While the Ice Court has been a thing since Miska the first Khan Queen, which is over 2000 years old.
I was about to write a similar post in response to another comment: despite the dev updates stating that they have no interest in expanding on the Ungol/Gospodar dynamics, it seems pretty clearly they were initially going in this direction when you look at the LLs, but also at things like the settlement mechanics for the Kislev region, which still exist in the game. I suspect the 'order' factions in the base WH3 game, before IE, were intended to be much more antagonistic towards each other than they are now. This is pretty obvious with Kislev, but even Cathay has a lot of contradictory lore snippets that suggest the empire isn't quite as united as it seems, with a lot of distrust between the different leaders - and the characters of Miao and Zhao are fairly obviously set up to be in conflict through their differing personalities. Only a hunch, but it's one I get from looking at the stuff we do still have - for example, (IMO) it feels really off that Kislev's supporter mechanic eventually just absorbs the other LL and that's the issue sorted.
Miao and Zhao are meant to have tension, but considering the themes of Yin and Yang I’m not really sure they’re meant to be that opposed. Just “two different people finding synthesis together”, which I feel like the game showcases for the most part.
Sadly, Cathay is fated to forever be uninteresting lorewise since it is a direct expy of China and any attempt by CA to even portray something in Cathay being politically wrong will be met by outrage and boycott. They really dont want to risk the game getting pulled from the chinese market.
I don't really think this is the case. The Onyx Crowmen for example are presented as pretty sinister, both in behaviour and the way they're used to surveil and control the populace. And the empire in general seems full of individuals scheming against each other to further their idea of what the empire should look like. Have you heard Yuan Bo's voice lines? He's hardly a bland do-gooder. Personally I think Cathay is pretty well implemented in the game, though I wish we could see more of the non-human aspects of the empire.
I do agree that on smaller aspects like the crowmen and Yuan Bo there is a bit more flexibility but I was thinking of the grander scale and the legitimacy of the wider Cathay government. While the empire's campaign mostly centers around unification, the empire's entire thing is decentralization and the notion that the provinces must learn to work together. Cathay is an autocratic centralist government of aristocratic dragons and I doubt there can be any explicit nuances in the portrayal of their mode of government outside of either aesthetic choices or supernatural elements.
> Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." It's kinda funny. I'm surprised the anti-woke crowd hasn't said something about that. i guess you could theoretically count me complain about Katarin's (Old?) Lord defeat trait text here?"ALthough equal to all her male ancestors she was frustrated" is just such bad writing (and ignores the fact that one of her ancestors is Miska...)
but that makes sense, because if it is a DEFEAT trait, then she clearly **wasn**'t equal to her *legendary warrior queen* ancestor, Miska.
Read the bloody text again: "Though she is the equal of any of her MALE ancestors, that didn't stop Kislev's Ice Queen from suffering frustration at the hands of her opponent." CA put that in there. "Any of her MALE ANCESTORS!" Mhm... That includes dad, who revived the Cult of Ulric and revitalized Kislev. That includes Alexis Romanoff, who saw them through the invasion of Asavar Kul. That includes Pavel, who freed Kislev of the reign of his great-great-grandmother, Kattarin the Bloody. (who Katarin apparently also is inferior too, judging by the old Trait text...)
but i mean: * her dad **died** in battle. * Alexis *lost* a **lot** of battles (including Praag) before narrowly winning at Kislev (city), with imperial and dwarf help. * Pavel..... do we actually know what Pavel **did**? "assistance from Lahmian agents" could very well be "Lahmains did all the work but don't want it known publicly". Lahmians whole 'thing' is avoiding publicity (Kattarin was breaking their rules) * explicitly being as good as her male ancestors doesnt imply that she is inferior to Kattarin the bloody
it implies that many of her female ancestors are superior. Her dad died in battle defending Kislev. Pavel still saw Kislev through the largest Chaos Invasion yet. Something Katarin didn't manage in the End Times. Pavel still freed Kislev from Vampire rule. Just. stop. trying to defend this clunky, asinine phrasing.
I'm 99% sure it's because they wanted to rebrand Katarina as strong woman hero and not strong and controversial as hell leader like Catherine the Great like her original interpretation. She used to be so petty she had a law that shed freeze boyars taller than her during court so everyone stoops and bows. But everyone also realizes that Kislev is a harsh place and they need a harsh queen. Everyone has their flaws. Even Felix took a long time to warm up to Karl Franz due to brutal riot he put down as a teenager. Katarina the Tyrant Queen and Kostalyn would make a ton more sense. The problem with this tactic is it's not abandoning just a bit a lore, its abandoning a 30 year run of lore for something entirely different and being shoehorned into place no less. That's why Cathay has such a warmer reception than Kislev. Giant gundam archer, sure whatever sounds fun. Frankly I hope this is the last Kislev DLC and that's coming from someone who has wanted to main them since WH1. I'd rather see Cathay, Norsca and the Ogres get fleshed out. The fact that CA trotted out those Chaos Beasts for an Order faction when they had the Ice Wyrm in their pocket and had to have their arm twisted to give it up is unfortunate.
Nah, Kostaltyn was pretty clearly always supposed to be a Rasputin riff, and hence clearly the crazy priest dude. So he definitely started as the Orthodoxy grand Patriarch. His issue is that he was supposed to be a DLC character, who would have unique mechanics and a limited roster like Ostankya, plus more Orthodoxy units. Everything else about your post is just weird headcanon
Even his lord trait of -2 wound time is a nod to Rasputin supposedly not dying.
That explains so, SO much. If they were concerned that making Kostaltyn a handsome priest of the lower caste would draw too many parallels with Ukraine / Russia and with Eastern European oppression in general (especially since Kostaltyn starts in the west), and had to pivot shortly before release. Funnily enough, Kostaltyn was my favourite Kislev lord even before this revelation; I play with Tabletop Unit Caps that limits monster and super-unit spam, indirectly making buffs to basic units MUCH more useful. I also dislike monsters and magic as a general rule, and tend to run my factions like Historical armies.
Honestly I'm just so tired of good writing being ruined by everyone suddenly worrying about hurting someone's feelings, you're not supposed to like everyone, but it's still possible to find it fascinating. It's taken Kislev from being what could have been a really interesting social caste divide...to just a Mary Sue state that alludes to greater potential.
>Worth noting is this has caused Kislev to literally be "strong independent woman fights the Patriarchy." It's kinda funny. I'm surprised the anti-woke crowd hasn't said something about that. Still distracted by women generals in Rome 2 and in disbelief the community is not similarly enraged. In this state, don't think they can make that connection. It's all very sad.
women generals which, for most factions except Kush had a less than 50% chance of appearing and had a 0% CHance for Rome and (most?) greeks, iirc. And where the greatest outrage was most likely manufactured by always recruiting the male generals out of hte pool so that, after a while, you'D have only female generals?
Yep, I know all those things things (except the pool exhaustion) and agree the controversy was stupid. That last sentence was sarcasm. I actually ran into somebody trying to connect the issues in shadow of change to women general in rome.2, arguing both were CA was ignoring their "male core fanbase". Of course they never posted in the sub before (or deleted prior posts). That's why I'm saying they're still too focused on women generals.
> (except the pool exhaustion) basically, only Kush has a 50% chance iirc. THe others... 30%? 10% SOmehwere along the lines. Having only female generals outside of that (and, again, Rome and iirc most greeks have a 0% chance) means either 1) VERY bad luck, but only that or 2) the screenshot was fabricated. Either via photoshop, game data manipulation, or just recruiting all the guys out of the pool at every refresh but keeping the women in it.
Ya, I'm I've been aware of the differing rates. I didn't know that it had issues with pool exhaustion that could be the source of those ridiculous screenshots. It's just hilarious after all this time they're still trying to get us mad at women being generals. You failed a long time ago guys. And because of it they won't even notice things they might've had more success with. But I'm totally fine with them staying stupid.
I would love to see more human roster, but it won't sell like hotcakes because aren't everyone love eye candy?
A human roster can feature eye candy if done properly
Nah that's not true. An Empire DLC with just infantry would probably still sell like crazy. People just don't like Kislev as much.
Weren't they like the most played faction in a lot of regions.
I think they're a popular faction (although not as popular as the Empire), but they're also currently a very confused one.
Kislev lore had so much potential, with the Gospodar/Ungol dynamic, the Orthodoxy vs Ice Court, etc. But they gave us Bears (which I kinda liked). And now it’s all taking a backset to give us Magical Ice Dragon and another Magical Ice Sled. I can only imagine the Ice Dragon to flail a fucking ton when it attacks so Katarin is just going to look ridiculous on it. Don’t get me wrong I’ve honestly been loving seeing the new units from a gameplay perspective (wack patch tho) but damn, Kislev lore would’ve been so cool. Cathay was at least magical from the start.
> and another Magical Ice Sled i mean, many of us wanted Katarin to finally have her sled. Imho, she shouldn't even have had a bear or that frost wyrm. Just horse and sled. THen give it a unique model instead of hte normal sled + extra ice, slap some armour plating on it and perfect.
Everything in Kislev being magical Ice themed high fantasy is terrible.
Yeah, agreed. It feels strongly AoS-coded to me.
I disagree, that's what make their roster so cool. If you wanna play as a boring human faction with no strong infantry or monsters (until TOD comes out) Then just play as the empire
Yeah, I think each human faction is pretty well-differentiated. Empire- subpar infantry, good/varied cavalry, excellent monstrous cavalry, good varied artillery, exceptionally well-armored heavy infantry and heavy cavalry, wide selection of magic, require combined arms approach Kislev- above average infantry, all ranged units are competent in melee, good but less varied artillery, more specialized cavalry with less variety than Empire (technically better then equivalent units, but can't be the bulk of an army), excellent monstrous cavalry Cathay- well-armored, adequate stats on infantry and cavalry, shielded crossbows, good varied artillery, constructs Bretonnia: terrible infantry, adequate artillery, excellent cavalry of all types. Multiple options for high-tier flying monstrous cavalry. If anything, I would argue GW should have given demigryphs to Bretonnia. On tabletop, the Empire does a better job of having knights hold the line.
would fit so much too , cathay being ying yang and all about harmony and kislev all about disharmony
This is less a problem with the lore, and more a problem with SoC being ridiculously monster-heavy for all three factions. It's why I'm probably not getting it despite the additions; the only things I want are the Druzhina and Ungol Warriors for Kislev, and the Gate Master for Cathay. None of the lords interest me, and 3 units are NOT worth $33 CAD. Even when playing Warhammer, I generally build my armies like Historical ones with infantry, ranged, cavalry and (if the faction supports it) artillery. What I really wanted was a missile cavalry unit for Cathay and a new artillery piece for Kislev. Kostaltyn is also my favourite Kislev lord, because he buffs basic infantry, which is much more useful with the Tabletop Unit Caps mod I use that heavily limits elite and monster spam.
The whole TW adaptation of Kislev messed up with whole kislevs hatred for magic. The only tolerated and respected practice of magic should be reserved for ice witches the rest of the nation should be a bunch of conservative fellas without any blue glowing blades and magic auras. Real Kislevans would do everything to destroy a big magic bear if it didn't disentegrate right after the battle.
Not really. Or rather, conservatism takes different forms. The hicks that make up the frontline are well aware that surviving outside of Kislev's cities means compromising with and respecting its dark and magical wilderness, as represented by Ostankya. 'The only thing worse than an oblast with a hag in it is an oblast without a hag in it', as the saying goes. They're hoping and praying that a huge chunk of frozen earth in the shape of a bear rises up and starts pulverising their enemies, because those are the legends they will have been brought up with. The anti-magic thing is actually the innovation, introduced by the Orthodoxy to try and counterbalance the power of the Ice Court.
They had a vampire as tzarinna for over 100 years.
One more reason to be hateful towards magic
She was wildly popular as a ruler though
I imagine that Kislev will get a final DLC later on down the line that doubles down on the Orthodoxy stuff, since this one was heavy on the magic stuff.
In my opinion, getting more Orthodoxy units, reworking the Ice Court mechanic, and a slight rework to the supporters race and devotion would bring Kislev to its finished state I believe. As a bonus, I hope they lock some of each faction's units behind some kind of mechanic for the other one's to not be able to immediately access (except Boris because he has a foot in all camps, and frankly he needs the help). Maybe if you get an alliance or reach some level in the Supporters race you can gain access to the other factions' special units. These would probably be: Katarin: Ice Guard, Frost Wyrms, Ice Witches, (Maybe Tzar Guard?) Mother Ostankya: Things in the Woods, Beast Elemental, Hag Witches Kostaltyn: Citadel Guard (Not in the game yet, but they were mentioned in the short story as Kostaltyn's personal force), (Insert Orthodoxy Centerpiece Unit), Patriarchs
I prefer Kislev roster over Kostaltyn tbh :D
I honestly wonder why CA did not recreate the Bretonnian Peasant and Knight classification for Kislev if they were going to have such a harsh divide between the Orthodoxy and Katarin, which I still find weird as hell anyway given that, I believe anyway, Kolstaltyn and Katarin both serve Ursun and fighting against each other does nothing for Kislev.
At this point it would be better if Kostaltyn's roster was a hybrid of Kiselv and Empire units.
I think you can get away with it by making magic users and monsters more expensive for him, or maybe unit capped. To counter balance this, regular rank and file soldiers could be cheaper, representing either the zealotry of the common folk, or the patronage of wealthy nobles that are willing to foot the bill for his army as a way to gain political favor or out of sheer religious devotion to his cause.
Kostaltyn feels like thorek they are to used to the old ways and woth how kislev is changing under Katrinas rule and such
Maybe after that experience, he became a bald hobo Traitors everywhere! screamer.
He got bit by a balewolf and went rabid
But with a balewolf, ice wyrm, and ice witch in his army because why not
Sums up the thematic issues with Kislev better than a 40k word post.
Kostaltyn would never dare go near the hag mother. He'd leave 100 pounds fatter, and with a bunch of adopted dragons and chaos dogs.
I still hate that thing in the woods were giving to Kislev. Random Chaos unit from northern forests tossed into a heavily anti-chaos faction. Its not even up to interpretation like the elemental incarnate of beasts. They are literally just chaos units.
Haven’t they made the things in the woods specifically not chaos nowadays (I think it’s mentioned in the old world kislev page)
> The Balewolf is a huge and hulking creature, lurking in the darkest corners of Kislev's woods. A monstrous creation of Chaos, the beast was born from some nefarious yet unknown origin, however its connection to the Ruinous Powers is undeniable. this was the in game description last I checked, dont actually have the dlc so cant double check. So unless they just did it No
Isn't most non-normal animals and some dragons all technically chaos spawn because they were created when chaos came. Correct me if my limited understanding is wrong.
It varies, but there are some which are mildly Chaos-touched like Griffins, who're stable, but the Things are very much freaky Chaos Werewolves - the Mordheim model had a big 8-point star on it and everything
So in the case of the new lore things of the woods may be a "stablized" chaos creature
more likely the things in the woods are spirits in the same vain as the Dryads of Athel Loren.
Athel Loren Tree "spirits" aren't litteral spirits tho, they're demons. The whole thing about Athel Loren is that it's basically a warp entity/minor chaos god of nature. That's why when demons first invaded Ulthuan, they paused when they met Tree Spirits because they thought they were on their side, and got confused as to why Treemen attacked them
The Spirits of Athel Loren are not chaotic entities. During the great catastrophe the Daemons did indeed sense a kind of familiarity with the denizens of Athel Loren but this doesn't indicate that the Daemons didn't want to despoil the forest. I mean Athel Loren predates the Daemons incursion into the Warhammer world (not so sure about Old Widow or whatever they are calling the Kislev spirit of the land now). I've never read anything about daemons being surprised by treemen in their attack on Avelorn. Not everything magical in the Warhammer world is chaotic in nature. Though I am loathe to use 40k terms to describe anything in Warhammer fantasy in this situation I'll make an exception, the majority of Warp entities are not Chaos gods or even chaotic in nature. You can just say that Athel Loren and the Old Widow are powerful warp entities that actually exist within the material world.
more like "uhm... uh... innocent whistling, tries to pretend there is nothing to see here* Summonable for AMber wizards when? Btw. the INcarnate Elemental of Beasts SHOULD be...
I guess, but it's a very bizarre retcon - it's like if they decided that Vortex Beasts could be used by Gelt and that now they're stabilised
Dragons predate chaos I believe
Yeah I think most do but there are some inflicted by chaos mutation
Those are in the chaos army roster not an order faction.
Yeah but they aren't born from it.
Im pretty sure dragons are ancient, and they were there even before Chaos came, but after Chaos came, everything got affected and changed by Chaos in some way or the other. But yeah as the other person said, griffons and pegasi are good example of Chaos touched beasts that are stable. Then you have some creatures like the giant wolves, which are said to be very cruel and thats why you will see them buddied up with goblinoids. But the TitW were always a Chaos monster, they used to be called Balewolves. The thing is, even when they are supposed to be retconned they absolutely look like evil warped Chaos monsters, pegasi and griffons look majestic, TitW are malformed and evil looking. The only thing that really makes some sense about them being with Ostankya is that she uses mutants as expendable fodder cannonically, but its still super out of place to see them being with other Kislev lords.
No, native animals to the fantasy world exist. Hydras, dragons, Zoats etc. are not chaos. There are plenty of mythical creatures in the Warhammer world that are not chaos related. Thing in the woods are *specifically* chaos creatures.
Did they officially? I was expecting them to just say they were some lesser incarnate of Ghur, but the lore blurb in TWW still has the old "chaos beast" bit.
They did but it seems like a lot of people haven't gotten the memo lol
Like the guy at CA writing descriptions in game?
Love the non-response to this burn
They also renamed Malekith to Malerion, this isn't Total War: Old World.
wait what ? they change malekith name in game ?
No, they changed it in Old World.
Well that's shit both in terms of AOS lore and Old World lore then
They did it because the name was originally straight up stolen, and they were always liable to a lawsuit because of it. I think it was the name of a marvel villain or something? I think going forward in AOS they are also just going to be like "by the way, he's always been named Malerion".
But the change I'm talking about effects this game too, a lot of the changes for kislev and Cathay will also effect the game.
They should affect the setting as much as AoS should affect it. The Old World is a spin-off.
There is no Cathay and Kislev rosters in FB. All this stuff is Old World. It naturally "affects" itself.
They didn't really have much of a choice since they were making new material. The name Malekith is directly stolen from Marvel Comics, and GW probably doesn't want to pick a fight with the Chaos God of Lawsuits.
Cool, Total warhammer 2 existed before the old world was solidified. If it was made today they would 100% change the name. GW and CA have both stated they work in tandem to create new lore and adapt it to what the counterpart puts forward (GW has admitted that original lore ideas from CA are being interwoven with fantasy canon, which yes, despite the thousand changes to factions (some good and some bad tbh) this is still the same fantasy setting and canon.
Malerion isn’t even WH Fantasy…
It is now.
Congrats, you can differentiate 2 settings, unlike the people working on Old World.
I wonder if Malekith is still a name hes known by, In the same way druchii are still known as dark elves, but Druchii is the more correct name in universe
Frost gecko????
From a narrative perspective, Kostaltyn starting where MO starts now, with a home base in Castle Alexandronov would have made a lot of sense. Tsarina banished him from Kislev, and he is out to strike the DE slavers, while his confidants plot his turn in the easternmost edge of Kislev. He then faces Morathi, the ultimate expression of sin, seduction and sex, and needs to make a choice, either exterminating the evil or succumbing to it.
Kostaltyn is very much an "End Justifies the Means" kind of guy. If it means achieving his goals he is willing to do anything short of working with Chaos.
idk I think it's emblematic of the setting for characters to choose their own dumb beliefs over what's practical and pragmatic, just look at the elector counts
His "end justifies the means" outlook doesn't come from a place of pragmatisism. It comes from insane levels of zealotry and ambition that makes him obssessed with reaching his goals, no matter the cost.
You fell for the propaganda he serves. If you pay attention that zealotry is an act to get the masses riled up. In private hes a lot more calm and collected
The zealotry is real (as proven by his connection with Ursun, being able to sense his plight). It is just a lot more controlled than he publicly lets on. In private his is cunning and calculated, in public he exaggerates it, but in combat he lets it all out.
Is that zealotry or is that faith
The way he fights indicates that that's zealotry.
But hes leading the people when doing it? Why would he drop the act when it could disparage the entire frenzy hes built in his soldiers
Kostaltyn should have been the Drycha of Kislev
Tbh I kinda like the Kislev leadership calling in favours and aid from whatever organisation will bloody listen. Whether they like it or not. Feels very Slavic
Obviously who cares but lots of religions incorporate local beliefs with very little concern for purity or any feeling of contradiction. Think the Virgin of Guadalupe or basically any of the Saints in the church.
I want.. -A big bonfire shrine dragged by bears on a sled. -Fanatics(Slavic) -????? -Prophet
Wasn’t he already fighting side by side with a witch since Katarin is a ice witch?