The Gaming Den

Story wise the old world was sorta destroyed by Chaos so in this new world of 7 realms Chaos reigns but Sigmar's stormhost (the space marine gold guys) have just emerged to fight against chaos:



More info here:
http://www.pdf-archive.com/2015/06/30/s ... an0004.pdf

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"Blood Warriors wield goreaxes and gorefists, buckler like blades that are more like weapon than protection"
-actual descrption of a Blood Warrior with goreaxe and gorefist

Comparative charts have been removed, now "to hit" and "to wound" is a set number. It seems like instead of having variable toughness they've instead given tougher units more wounds.

So those space marine dudes all have at least two wounds. I imagine a lowly goblin would have one.

40K started as kinda of a spinoff parody of Warhammer Fantasy (you think the setting is too grimdark? We're gonna show you just how much of a grimdark setting we can make! IN SPACE!)

Now the cycle is completed.

It's a setting that is *so* grimdark, I'm not sure how it would even generate a functional plot.

Can you do intrigue? Everyone is either brain-melted by ultimate evil, or they are crusading for righteousness. WF(RP) was grimderp but it has cities and merchants and industry and secret corruption, so as a setting for telling stories it has legs. That's WFRP has been successful in spite of mechanics that border on unplayable, because WFRP does let you tell some low-fantasy scrappy early-renaissance stuff that legitimates a certain amount of grimderp. This matters less for WF, of course, but if setting matters for miniatures wargaming at all (and GW's entire business model is premised on the notion that it does), this looks ruinously dull.

Why would you care about spying? The world is a giant lava-lamp anyway.

I think this is a setting that will work poorly, even for a war game.

GW have been consistently losing both money and players, and are pretty much at the "fling shit at the wall and see what sticks" stage. They still have some time before they collapse, so they can afford to churn things out and hope one of them is a Hail Mary.

Remember what happened with NWoD and D&D 4e? Games Workshop doesn't.

Ordinarily, I'd be the first to applaud a willingness to try something new, especially from a company as hidebound as GW. Warhammer Fantasy has long been ready to benefit from some bottom-up redesign. The problem, of course, is that this doesn't appear to be something new; it's just 40K in Fantasy drag.

I can't imagine what their motivation could have been for this. I mean, their motivation is always cynical cash-grubbing, but I don't have any idea how they thought this could work for them. Like half my local players have said they won't be playing the new edition, and that's a big enough hit that I'll be recommending that we not carry the line.

angelfromanotherpin wrote:I can't imagine what their motivation could have been for this. I mean, their motivation is always cynical cash-grubbing, but I don't have any idea how they thought this could work for them.

Well, 40k benefited with rushing out 6th and then 7th Edition. I mean seriously, it wasn't that long ago that I was making fun of d6 edition, and it hadn't been out for long when I was doing that. And now 7Ed has been out for long enough that we know the pattern of what codices are going to be like. And as much as it pissed people off, it kind of worked because ultimately, even though they continued to lose players, the ones who stayed just bought all the new stuff and went along with it. And got excited about Codex: Harlequins (with box sets of plastic Harlequins), and both branches of Codex: Adeptus Mechanicus, and all the Imperial Knights.

So presumably they figured "Do an edition change!" for WHFB, except unlike 40k, the story at least makes some steps forwards in that. So they decided it has to go somewhere (a good move), and it went... bad places (a bad move). But if they don't lose too many players over it, then the remaining ones buy new books and stuff such that, at least in the short term, it looks like a win and they have time and money to grasp at the next straw.

Big Purple suggests that they're trying to go for smaller armies so new players can join. As it is WFB needs hundreds and hundreds of bucks of minis to play, which is a significant barrier to entry for anyone who's just starting out.

Isn't that the same for 40K as well?

Stahlseele wrote:Isn't that the same for 40K as well?

40k decided "We will make our existing players buy jets and titans"

If they wanted small skirmish scale I imagine another shot at a Mordheim style game would've made more sense. But instead of just being one ruined city it's more all encompasing like "mysterious portals to chaotic realm of cool loot and dungeons open up, adventurers of all factions are drawn in"

Then you can introduce sigmar marines as some weird mysterious force that shows up mysteriously in adventurer world without disrupting the regular plot of Warhammer Fantasy.

Warhammer has never been as big a money spinner for GW as 40K. GW has a history of ditching everything but the absolute biggest selling lines regardless of fan interest (see Blood Bowl, Battlefleet Gothic, Warmaster and all their other Specialist Games lines). It was only a matter of time before they decided to axe Warhammer and try to make it into another 40K. The timing seems strange seeing as they just announced Total Warhammer which seems like it will be using the old background. Way to alienate fans and waste a potentially huge cross marketing campaign!

GW has been creatively bankrupt for a long time now. They've definitely fallen a long way from their 90's position of dominance where having a branded games store was the best way to muscle out the competition. What with the LOTR license debacle and their rabid attempts to screw fans over causing an internet shitstorm they haven't weathered the 2000's very well at all.

I predict this will flop within a year and GW will strip down to ALL 40K, FINAL DESTINATION. It's the way they've been heading for a while.

Red_Rob wrote:Warhammer has never been as big a money spinner for GW as 40K. GW has a history of ditching everything but the absolute biggest selling lines regardless of fan interest (see Blood Bowl, Battlefleet Gothic, Warmaster and all their other Specialist Games lines). It was only a matter of time before they decided to axe Warhammer and try to make it into another 40K. The timing seems strange seeing as they just announced Total Warhammer which seems like it will be using the old background. Way to alienate fans and waste a potentially huge cross marketing campaign!

To be a bit fair, Total Warhammer has probably been in the works for years now, while Sigmar Marines is a desesperate last-minute move. The video game designers probably had no idea there would be such a retcon and GW never cared much about what video games do with their lore.

Or must I point out Dawn of War where you get to sacrifice necron souls to gain the favor of a greater daemon?

Or Dawn of War 2 Retribution where half a dozen orks can bring to ruin a whole chapter?

Red_Rob wrote: GW has been always creatively bankrupt for a long time now.

Fixed that for you. They were never creactive, they just glued things together (fantasy+guns, then fantasy+guns+IN SPACE) and hoped it sticked together.

Red_Rob wrote: I predict this will flop within a year and GW will strip down to ALL 40K SPEECH MERINES, FINAL DESTINATION. It's the way they've been heading for a while.

Fixed that for you as well. After the loyalist SM got to wield daemon weapons and summon daemons no problem and their own cost-efficient titans, I predict it's only a matter of time until the other factions stolen from some from other media "created" by GW are assimilated into speech merines of one kind of another.

-Speech merines riding carnifexes and squigoths.
-Speech merines wielding Skaven arcanotech.
-Speech merines with superior living metal armor.
-Speech merines riding giant eagles and summoning forest spirits.
-Speech merines with soulstones and ancient eldar weapons.
-Speech merines commanding the unholy legions of the dead.
-Speech merines inside speech merines-Wait, they already did that as well.

Age of Sigmar appears to be just a lame ragnarok tie in. Like, they are literally attempting to cash in on Thor 3.

Either that or they are just radically scaling back the number of armies they want to support. Having just Aesir Marines and Chaos Marines means that they don't have to do sculpts for less popular factions like Lizardfolk and Dark Elves.

But honestly, Warhammer is like literally the last place I look to find an unironic "army of heaven" who are "totally the good guys." So maybe the project lead is just super tired of all this shades of black shit, got religion, and now wants to do a game about good fighting evil?

It's all very puzzling. Age of Sigmar is such an obvious fail that I don't know why it exists.

-Username17

the LOTR license debacle

what happened with that?

How to paint your Sigmar Marines.

A neat point of fluff though, the 40k Emperor's first warriors were called "Thunder Warriors"

Here's scans of the release:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Warhammer/comm ... full_scan/

Here's a dead guy armed with a hammer and smaller dead guy

Rawbeard wrote:

the LOTR license debacle

what happened with that?

They paid a lot of money for the license to make a miniatures game based on Lord of the Rings, only to discover that most people thought Warhammer Fantasy Battle already was a miniatures game based on Lord of the Rings and they got very few additional customers.

-Username17

Also the licensing deal required that they stock the full range of LotR stuff for a specific length of time (rather than basically releasing a set of limited edition minis) and it didn't occur to them that there would only be three LotR films and interest would wane after that. The bit where regular toy stores would actually stock some of this GW stuff and there were pamphlets/flyers for LotR merchandise that also suggested people tjeck out Games Workshop wasn't bad for them. But... overall it didn't work out so well.

I understand that the setting needed a reboot, and don't find the new one super stupid. I understand they want some sort of army counterpart to Warriors of Chaos. Even though the Empire was a much better choice fluffwise.

I understand that they want to attract new players, and simplify the ruleset. To make money they also don't want necessarily support the old range.

What I don't understand is why they used such a piss poor ruleset.

What I don't understand is why they used such a piss poor ruleset.

Because it's Games Workshop, and they're not good with rules. You'll find the evidence pretty much speaks for itself there.

maglag wrote: -Speech merines inside speech merines-Wait, they already did that as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_2nM1GEllg

Skip to 1:20 if you want.

So my brother was taking a look at the game and...

... well it seems bugfuck insane. Here's a selection of the special abilities from the free army books:

You can re-roll any failed hit rolls when attacking with the Runefang so long as you have a bigger and more impressive moustache than your opponent.

If, during your hero phase, you pretend to ride an imaginary horse, you can re-roll failed hit rolls for the Averland Runefang until your next hero phase. If you actually talk to your imaginary horse you can re-roll failed wound rolls as well.

You can re-roll any hit dice when this Warboss attacks, but only if you are either wearing a hood or you can beat your opponent in a staring contest before rolling the dice (first one to blink or look away loses).

What the hell is this? Does GW think the future of wargames is performing stupid actions for in game benefits?

I know they have always chased the younger end of the market but this seems determined to drive the older established fanbase away. Literally winning or losing the game by pretending to ride an imaginary horse seems insane. I can't wait to see the emerging "moustache meta" regarding optimum moustache length!

The rules and corresponding Battlescrolls (unit information cards) are online, and well ... It's the bearworld of tabletops. Half the rules are bizzare and shitty, and the other half doesn't exist. Units gain +1-boni or rerolls for outgame-actions like "look in the mirror" or "say shitty stuff" (not making that up), and the rule for army building is "put whatever you want on the table" (again, not making that up).

Edit: ninja'ed by Red Rob.

Dead Gentlemen Productions or Zombie Orpheus or Whoever has THE GAMERS IP should make a new movie/series about this, as soon as these rules are in play. Would not even need actors, just go to some place where it is played and film O.o

Given that GW has the utter contempt for their constituents as any good, British fascist/totalitarians, those rules are probably deliberate middle fingers to the players disguised as "fun".

Reminds me of when I was a kid playing Warhammer Fantasy back in the bad old days (not all that much different from the bad new ones or the bad in between ones).

Guy rocks up, plays dwarfs, has dwarf codex, claims dwarfs get all sorts of special crazy super powers, claims the dwarf codex is secret and we don't get to check his increasingly insane and bizarre game breaking claims.

He actually makes us phone up the official local GW branch to confirm that yes, he can say whatever shit he wants about his totes real top secret rules and we aren't even allowed to check them.

Official GW store rep totally agrees with him.

With, I think the (reluctant) proviso that hey, if we didn't like any given rule dwarf guy seemingly makes up, regardless of whether it is real, we can do the whole stupid "roll off" coin flip to decide if it is real, potentially coinflipping fake rules into existence, real rules out of existence, and the entire game into a series of insane claims and denials followed by endless coinflip disputes because at that point why the fuck not?

Apparently GW genuinely recruits and indoctrinates for some pretty bat shit ideas and has since it started.