So, last night I finished the Tyrion campaign for Total War: Warhammer 2. It’s an awesome game, and I totally had a blast. It reminded me of when I started trying to get into Warhammer Fantasy with High Elves during 8th Edition. However, that never got off the ground because of the cost of entry into the game at the time; trying to build a 2500-point WHFB army when it’s a secondary game for you is daunting. It didn’t help that as awesome as the Island of Blood box was, it didn’t give you a playable (or even legal) army.
Now, we’re two years into Age of Sigmar, and TW:WH2 has rekindled an interest in playing High Elves. I mean, even the game launcher has an ad – “Play the game, now buy the models!” Sadly, though, High Elves are probably the least playable Order faction in AoS. It’s been split into 5 separate factions (6 if you include the remnants in the High Elf PDF), only one of which has enough options to really be playable. That faction – Swifthawk Agents – only works because it got a boost from Spire of Dawn, the rerelease of Island of Blood.
I could just play them as a generic Order army – and I probably will – but thanks to the Matched Play army building rules, I only have two Battleline units unless I go more specific. Of course, then my other options just evaporate. Oh, and those two Battleline units? Highborn Spearmen are OOP and need to be hunted down on eBay, and Reavers are only in Spire of Dawn.
This doesn’t even get into the the issues with the new Allies system (Highborn don’t get any) or the Allegiance system and rules (none of the High Elf subfactions get any). It just seems like GW has completely overlooked them (as opposed to Dwarves and Dark Elves, which get some attention and workable factions).
It’s frustrating; I’d really like to make this army work. Why won’t GW let it work?