The Ironjawz are the biggest and baddest orruks in all the Mortal Realms. Irrepressible and endlessly destructive, they are forever seeking bigger opponents to krump down to size. With a range already populated by hefty armoured Brutes, and shaggy Gore-gruntas, how could the Warhammer Studio possibly add more fightiness ?
The answer? Even bigger gruntas and even more heavy infantry. Warhammer Community caught up with the designers, to find out what was on their mind when they were cooking up these ded tuff new additions to the Waaagh!
Warhammer Community: What decisions went into choosing which miniatures to update and add to the Ironjawz range?
Sam: The main driving force behind all of the new miniatures was further fleshing out Ironjawz hierarchy and society. We wanted to create a sense of a wider world for the orruks, while also harking back to some classic Warhammer archetypes.
A lot of this hinged on the Maw-grunta, which as an animal is essentially a perfect embodiment of orruk culture. Warhammer Age of Sigmar is full of gigantic creatures and living gods that walk the Mortal Realms, and this massive boar is a real atavistic focal point for the Ironjawz culture.
We didn’t want to steal the limelight from Maw-krushas, so we chose to create a miniature with multiple options and in-game uses, each of which tie into the primal element of the orruks, and match the tusk motif found across the range.
Maxime: Gore-gruntas are already big, and the Maw-grunta is even bigger. It leaves you thinking: what if there were something even bigger out there? We wanted to create the kind of mount an orruk would really respect, so it had to be bigger and badder than even the nastiest Gore-grunta, but still leave room for the Maw-krusha at the top of the hierarchy for Ironjawz beasts.
WarCom: How did you approach refreshing Ardboys?
Sam: There were two parts to this – one was providing an evolution of classic Warhammer orcs, that particular brand of brutality that is extremely prevalent in Ironjawz orruks. The other was to give players and hobbyists more posing and options, so they could happily create lots of distinct mobs.
Maxime: Ironjawz previously had quite a small range, without much visual diversity. The new Ardboys give us a look at the martial Ironjawz society from a different angle.. These are the smallest Ironjawz who typically see battle, but they’re still very big. As they’ve yet to prove themselves, Ardboys are actually more heavily armoured than Brutes – they’re also more regimented, bullied into rough formations by their leaders, while Brutes are the elites.
Sam: The shields especially suggest a more coherent martial culture, with the Ardboy Big Boss able to coordinate these unruly orruks and force them into regiments that act with some modicum of order. Until they get into battle, of course, because then even their shields can be used as violent weapons.
Maxime: We had this idea that they’d form up against a charging monster like a regular shield wall… and then still lunge forward before receiving the charge. They’re orruks, they just can’t help themselves!
The fact they need to be so heavily armoured puts them further down in Ironjawz society – as they grow bigger and tougher, their status increases too. To make themselves look more fearsome and compensate for their lack of maturity, they craft masks to tie themselves closer to the pugnacious gruntas. It also acts as a nice little callback to the silhouettes of the Black Orcs from Warhammer Fantasy, which are the origin point for this line of orruks.
Sitting above the Ardboys in this hierarchy is the Ardboy Big Boss – a new hero who exemplifies the martial nature of the Ironjawz. The Megaboss is a pure and brutish fighter whose sheer presence naturally encourages those around him to fight all the harder.* By contrast, the Big Boss is posed in a more deliberately commanding way, bellowing out orders and keeping the battleline in order.
WarCom: Zogrokk Anvilsmasha is the second Ironjawz named character to have his own model and rules – how did he come about?Paolo: He is a bit of a new archetype for the Ironjawz. The biggest Ironjawz use their fists to batter their armour into shape, but there were always elements that suggested there was more to Ironjawz metalworking than this. Zogrokk is a smith, one of those rare orruks with the skills to craft crude yet powerful weapons.
We decided we wanted him to have a bunch of tools for working on weapons – but an anvil didn’t feel very practical for a character who wants to be in the thick of the fight. To solve that problem, we returned to some earlier discussions about bringing a new type of squig into the range, one which Maxime had designed. The two ended up fitting together perfectly – Klonk is essentially a mobile anvil!
Maxime: Zogrokk continues to reinforce this idea that Ironjawz society isn’t just complete anarchy. On some level it’s quite militaristic, with a defined hierarchy and roles. He gives another look at how this society functions – and thanks to Klonk freeing up the model from being stood at a literal anvil, Zogrokk sort of acts like a vignette and a warrior at the same time.
WarCom: The final piece of the puzzle are the Brute Ragerz and Wierdbrute Wrekkaz – what inspired this kit?
Paolo: The main focus was to really hone in on the hulking anatomy of the orruks, showing off the rippling muscles with a sense of dynamism which isn’t present in their more cumbersome armoured allies. We wanted weapons that matched this increased scale, really crude and terrifying hunks of metal. We finished some initial concepts… and then we realised they needed to be bigger.
Maxime: These are Ironjawz that have gone too far with their claims and boasts, or have just absorbed too much Waaagh! energy and become uncontrollable. There are hints on the models to suggest that they might need to be chained up between battles, due to their sheer ferocity, only released and booted towards enemies when they’re needed.
Paolo: It was a particularly interesting challenge to convey the ridiculous muscle mass of the orruks, together with the very dynamic, violent movements they’re making. We wanted to push their anatomy further and further, right up to the edge of believability, but still keep it looking just real enough to be engaging.
A bodybuilder with muscles this size simply wouldn’t be able to move like this – jumping and leaping and twisting with huge two-handed weapons. Orruks can, of course. They can do anything they put their mind to!Thank you to everyone for taking the time to talk about Ironjawz! Battletome Supplement: Ironjawz is available to download right now, and all of the brand new miniatures can be pre-ordered from Saturday the 16th of September. Now go forth, and create the greatest Waaagh! ever.
* Or should that be “all the ‘arder”?