Horus Heresy: Massacre

From Loken over at Apocalypse 40K Blog:  http://apocalypse40k.blogspot.com/2013/08/horus-heresy-book-ii-iii-rumors.html

Volume II - Massacre (The Dropzone Landings) Release Date: "Imminent"

Iron Hands
Salamanders
Night Lords
Word Bearers
 via Forge World
... hot on the heels of the Primarchs Angron and Fulgrim, Simon Egan will be unveiling the third in this series of mighty warriors of legend at UK Games Day 2013!

...Keith Robertson has been working hard on a brand new unit of Death Guard which you will be able to see for the very first time at Games Day.

via DrLove42
The Ferrus Primarch and Fulgrim Primarch models will have a diorama of their duel....the two models fit together

via warseer's Lorenzen
...As for death guard unless Alan changed his plans from the weekender they are to my knowledge getting a terminator squad armed with a lot of chem/rad weapons as he felt the chemical warfare aspect of the death guard hadnt been expanded on much in book 1.

As was said, my talk with Alan was at the weekender and about new units, the Deathshroud do have chem rounds for their hand flamers, but thats it as far as the entire death guard armies "chemical weapons" go.. a couple of extra special rules on flamers. they dont have any kind of rad/chem grenades, that honour lies with Mortarion, Moritats, Seige Breakers and Destroyers.. (3/4 being available to everyone)

the other new units mentioned were the reavers, gorgon terminator squads, medusan immortals (special boarding marines), the kakophony, phoenix guard, the ashen circle (destroyer unit), proto storm shield termies for salamanders, pyroclasts (flame gauntlets), murder terror squads and proto raptors
  
 Volume III - Battle of Phall

 Release Date: Christmas pre-order shipping in January

Raven Guard
Alpha Legion
Iron Warriors
Imperial Fists (Battle of Phall for the last two)

via Warseer's Pushkin
I spoke to Alan at the open day and just had a general chat about book 2 &3. He confirmed the plan is to release the two books this year. He also mentioned that the idea was to get all the legions done in some form as quickly as possible and that whilst prospero, calth etc would be done, they don't plan to follow the same order as the black library novels.

This was a very specific point. They don't want to be the model and rules arm of the HH and specifically said that whilst they will include the larger characters I.e. first captains, wh40k surviving characters, they don't want to make All e black library characters or even cover the black library territory.

Another point he made is that they will be doing other battles to ensure other legions are covered sooner, he specifically mentioned the imperial fists. He also made the point that what makes a good novel, e.g. Narrow character focus, doesn't necessarily make for a good campaign book. He specifically talked about looking at known conflicts in a different way (I was eaves dropping at this point to him responding to someone else's question).

What I read into this was battles like Calth, whilst will be included it will be in the scheme of either a broader campaign or looking at a specific aspect e.g. The underground war. They are not going to verbatim copy know no fear - for example.

Also spoke to alfonso who designs sons of horus. The contemptor is coming as is more legion specific units e.g. Command squads and that this is generally happening for all the legions. There were some very cool sketches in his note book. Sons of horus are going to be more involved than in HH novels.

Finally chatting to all the guys, the general idea was that HH book 1 was a bigger success than they planned and they had recruited LOTS of staff of the back of it. Talking to Alan he was saying that whilst the outcome of the heresey is set in stone, what they d explore isn't.
  

Volumes IV-V-VI Prospero, Calth, Signus Prime

 Release Date: 2014 +

Prospero
Thousand Sons
Space Wolves
Adeptus Custodes
Sisters of Silence

Calth
Ultramarines
Word Bearers (assumed)
Imperial Army
Renegade Army

Signus Prime
Blood Angels
Chaos Daemons

Later Volumes
Release Date: on the horizon...

Mars - Dealing with the Mechanicum and titans
Enough Mechanicus units planned to make an entire army list

Future Models Planned

Stormbird: 2 versions planned - bigger than Thunderhawk, but still mailable.
Warlord Titan: Warlord and at least 1 new titan not seen before (not the Imperator)
New Dreadclaw (replacing current model)
Kharibdyis Assault Claw
New Legion flyer (in addition to the Stormbird)

 

Of course I'm really interesting in finding out whats coming out for the Mechanicus.  The trickle release of Mechanicus units isn't as hard on my wallet.  I'm hoping the new Titan will be somewhere between a Warhound and a Reaver mostly so it will be somewhat affordable.  Perhaps it will be the first of the Knight Titans?

 

My Legion is the Death Guard and I'm happy that they are not stopping with the Death Shroud Terminators.  I do hope we will see Mortarion soon.