Back in 4 or 5 ed it was known, who made particular codex.
But, due some harsh backfire from playerbase (I heard there even was a rude personal mails), GW decided to hide the actual author's names.

So now we have no ideas who is making our armybooks. And I have a wierd feelings, that those who made it don't know the rules, or simply do not play the game. Actually I really don't know, maybe in 8ed with the "new GW" the authors is known again, and I just miss it somewhere.
But just look at the rules they made. It looks like they are throwing spaghetti on the wall. They have no idea how it should work and making pretty random rules. Some of them works good or ok, but really many of them make ones scratch the head with "whoa, wtf?".
It feels like they are made by some BL authors, who know the background, but not the actual game. Lets take the tau as example. The BL author will know, that the kroots a melee oriented xeno guys, so lets give them strategem to reroll charge with hound combo. Sounds good lore-wise, but anyone who actually play the game will say "hey, wtf, kroots are not hth unit, no way I'll charge with this guys, especially with CP burst". If I was told to make a strategem for melee kroots, it could be something that actually improve their hth abilities, like +1str, maybe some AP, something that will work.

Or pathfinder's "go recon". They are scouts lore-wise, so lets give them strategem for additional 1d6 run, for exchange of shooting. Fluffy, I guess, but those who play the game know, that pathfinders are stationary weapon platform, either markers/ion/railguns. They are not used to grab obj. They are not troops, have not obj sec, and have different role game-wise, they do not need this strategem, better give it to regular FW strike team. It's obvious to those who play the game, but not for the codex designer. There lots of other examples, just use those to make my idea clear. It's really easy to make good or useful strategems and rules, if you are at least familiar with game.

Have anyone similar feelings? Oh, and this is not about how bad the tau are(and if they), just use them as good example.

They tend to go with fluffy rules. These are then good or bad at random. Having an author who imagines the faction in a powerful way usually helps (although points mistakes can be sorted faster than once every four years now) but thats no guarantee they will make in game sense.

Given some of the comments made by the designers on streams from the GW GT heats I think it's pretty clear they're not exactly high-level players. What's more worrying is their attitude towards the sort of tactics used in tournament games is borderline disdainful, which isn't a healthy attitude to have when you're the one in control of the rules.

It's one thing to have tournament players on your playtest team but you need to have a robust mechanism for listening to feedback and acting on it as well. I don't think GW have that at all.

I've said this before but GW simply doesn't pay enough to attract and keep good rules designers.

Anyone they get that becomes good leaves for more money elsewhere.

Hopefully this will change now that management are starting to understand the importance of a quality ruleset.

Basically, GW designers have never been good at the game. Ever. Even back in 2nd and 3rd edition, they played the game in a very loose and relaxed manner, not serious business cutthroat competitive level. The difference then was that their designers seemed to actually understand that you have to strike a balance between "cool" and "good". The current crop of designers seem to be basically CAAC (I hate that term, but it's suitable) types who don't care how something plays as long as it looks good. This is fine for "cool" but doesn't help "good" when the people writing the rules really don't know how things end up, and basically refuse to acknowledge that good rules benefit both fluffy and competitive players because the fluffy players won't feel like they aren't able to play a fluffy army without getting their teeth kicked in, and the competitive players know that the codex rules are solid enough that maybe, just maybe, there is a chance for out-of-the-box thinking when creating a new list.

Look at basically any battle report they have done since 8th. The armies are all woefully inefficient. Every single battle report except one (Custodes vs. Necrons) used power level instead of points and were typically at least 150 PL or higher (the lowest was like 122 I think), with a difference of about 4 PL between the armies (exceptions: One had like 11 PL between, one had a whopping 20 something if I recall, and one was a planetstrike mission where the attacker specifically had 25 PL more than the defender). Even the custodes vs. Necrons battle report was some silly number like 3,400 points because as they stated in the article, that was what the studio Custodes army totaled up to and they wanted to use everything available.

That's not good design at all. The biggest problem is that the current designers operate in a bubble. They feel everyone plays the way they do (very loose/relaxed, no problem if your opponent wants to do something that sounds cool but isn't technically allowed, come up with ad-hoc scenarios on the fly, etc) and design for that. You didn't see this issue with the previous generation of designers; it is very telling that out of the "good" designers from GW's past (Chambers, Priestly, Cavatore, et all) they all work for companies that now compete with GW and, while they might not be at GW's level for miniatures (YMMV due to aesthetics) they blow GW out of the water when it comes to rules that are both thematic of the army and well-balanced.

Silver144 wrote:
Back in 4 or 5 ed it was known, who made particular codex.
But, due some harsh backfire from playerbase (I heard there even was a rude personal mails), GW decided to hide the actual author's names.

So now we have no ideas who is making our armybooks. And I have a wierd feelings, that those who made it don't know the rules, or simply do not play the game. Actually I really don't know, maybe in 8ed with the "new GW" the authors is known again, and I just miss it somewhere.
But just look at the rules they made. It looks like they are throwing spaghetti on the wall. They have no idea how it should work and making pretty random rules. Some of them works good or ok, but really many of them make ones scratch the head with "whoa, wtf?".
It feels like they are made by some BL authors, who know the background, but not the actual game. Lets take the tau as example. The BL author will know, that the kroots a melee oriented xeno guys, so lets give them strategem to reroll charge with hound combo. Sounds good lore-wise, but anyone who actually play the game will say "hey, wtf, kroots are not hth unit, no way I'll charge with this guys, especially with CP burst". If I was told to make a strategem for melee kroots, it could be something that actually improve their hth abilities, like +1str, maybe some AP, something that will work.

Or pathfinder's "go recon". They are scouts lore-wise, so lets give them strategem for additional 1d6 run, for exchange of shooting. Fluffy, I guess, but those who play the game know, that pathfinders are stationary weapon platform, either markers/ion/railguns. They are not used to grab obj. They are not troops, have not obj sec, and have different role game-wise, they do not need this strategem, better give it to regular FW strike team. It's obvious to those who play the game, but not for the codex designer. There lots of other examples, just use those to make my idea clear. It's really easy to make good or useful strategems and rules, if you are at least familiar with game.

Have anyone similar feelings? Oh, and this is not about how bad the tau are(and if they), just use them as good example.

I wholly disagree with your examples.

Stratagems that allow a unit to do something that is not in line with it's role, are good stratagems.
Stratagems that make a unit straight up better at it's role, are bad stratagems.

I don't think this is something specific to Games Workshop. After all, the role of a games designer is not simply to play the game over and over again using the same army and ruleset. By the nature of the job, they're doing something new all the time.

Once a new codex is published, they're onto a new project, so it's not surprising that tournament players will have more experience using that army, as they're concentrating on that army, not having to remember what it does because they've not played it in months.

Wayniac, you're assuming the battle reports are supposed to be using equal forces. The game is pretty clear that unequal force levels are OK, and there are various rules that only kick in if the PL is different (the Ruse and Sudden Death cards in the Open War deck, for example). It's not that they tried and failed to demonstrate an equal-PL game, but that they deliberately showed off that an unequal game is possible. Even the "we used this many points because that's all we had" BR is a teaching tool - it shows that a game like that is perfectly acceptable for players starting out. I've played dozens of games like that across many systems; "let me know how many points you've got, and I'll match it".

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I don't think this is something specific to Games Workshop. After all, the role of a games designer is not simply to play the game over and over again using the same army and ruleset. By the nature of the job, they're doing something new all the time.

Once a new codex is published, they're onto a new project, so it's not surprising that tournament players will have more experience using that army, as they're concentrating on that army, not having to remember what it does because they've not played it in months.

The problem I mention is not about balance, but the rules itself. It seems like they just don't know how the game works and how the armys plays. Like I already said, they give pathfinders extra move, assuming this is scout unit, but in reality this is stationary heavy weaon unit, that punish you if you decide to move.

Silver144 wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I don't think this is something specific to Games Workshop. After all, the role of a games designer is not simply to play the game over and over again using the same army and ruleset. By the nature of the job, they're doing something new all the time.

Once a new codex is published, they're onto a new project, so it's not surprising that tournament players will have more experience using that army, as they're concentrating on that army, not having to remember what it does because they've not played it in months.

The problem I mention is not about balance, but the rules itself. It seems like they just don't know how the game works and how the armys plays. Like I already said, they give pathfinders extra move, assuming this is scout unit, but in reality this is stationary heavy weaon unit, that punish you if you decide to move.

However, this brings up a question: Are they a stationary heavy weapon unit? Or are players just using them that way? Pathfinders have always been scouting (hell in my day they used to REQUIRE a Devilfish). I think this is part of that disconnect. GW decides Pathfinders should be a scouting unit. Players look at the stats/options and decide it's a heavy weapon unit and then gripe that the rules don't match that, when in fact they are using Pathfinders in a way GW didn't envision them.

Of course, you can't force people to play a certain way (not without severely limiting the options) but I think this is more a case of players coloring outside GW's admittedly narrow box.

Wayniac wrote:

Silver144 wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I don't think this is something specific to Games Workshop. After all, the role of a games designer is not simply to play the game over and over again using the same army and ruleset. By the nature of the job, they're doing something new all the time.

Once a new codex is published, they're onto a new project, so it's not surprising that tournament players will have more experience using that army, as they're concentrating on that army, not having to remember what it does because they've not played it in months.

The problem I mention is not about balance, but the rules itself. It seems like they just don't know how the game works and how the armys plays. Like I already said, they give pathfinders extra move, assuming this is scout unit, but in reality this is stationary heavy weaon unit, that punish you if you decide to move.

However, this brings up a question: Are they a stationary heavy weapon unit? Or are players just using them that way? Pathfinders have always been scouting (hell in my day they used to REQUIRE a Devilfish). I think this is part of that disconnect. GW decides Pathfinders should be a scouting unit. Players look at the stats/options and decide it's a heavy weapon unit and then gripe that the rules don't match that, when in fact they are using Pathfinders in a way GW didn't envision them.

Of course, you can't force people to play a certain way (not without severely limiting the options) but I think this is more a case of players coloring outside GW's admittedly narrow box.

No problem, GW could go that way. Then move them to troops (or just give them obsec), and allow them to NOT take markerlights, just carbins. Then no problem, they are scout units. But right now they have no obsec, forced to take heavy weapon. You are not supposed to ignore that. If they think, that pathfinders are scout unit, but still force players to buy heavy weapon for them, then this is bad game design. Especially when players have regular strike team, who can effectively grab objectives and you do not need extra overcosted unit for that role.

GW designers play a version of the game likely only played at GW HQ. I think they understand that game well enough. It's just not the game GW's customers want and thus not the game they sell.

Wayniac wrote:

Silver144 wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I don't think this is something specific to Games Workshop. After all, the role of a games designer is not simply to play the game over and over again using the same army and ruleset. By the nature of the job, they're doing something new all the time.

Once a new codex is published, they're onto a new project, so it's not surprising that tournament players will have more experience using that army, as they're concentrating on that army, not having to remember what it does because they've not played it in months.

The problem I mention is not about balance, but the rules itself. It seems like they just don't know how the game works and how the armys plays. Like I already said, they give pathfinders extra move, assuming this is scout unit, but in reality this is stationary heavy weaon unit, that punish you if you decide to move.

However, this brings up a question: Are they a stationary heavy weapon unit? Or are players just using them that way? Pathfinders have always been scouting (hell in my day they used to REQUIRE a Devilfish). I think this is part of that disconnect. GW decides Pathfinders should be a scouting unit. Players look at the stats/options and decide it's a heavy weapon unit and then gripe that the rules don't match that, when in fact they are using Pathfinders in a way GW didn't envision them.

Of course, you can't force people to play a certain way (not without severely limiting the options) but I think this is more a case of players coloring outside GW's admittedly narrow box.

Pathfinders used to be effectively the only source of marker lights, which were heavy and thus move or shoot. Pathfinders have always been spotters, not scouts, and the inclusion of special weapons didn't change that. Pulse carbines used to be available to Fire Warriors as well, just like the Devilfish. One assumes GW envisioned a dual role for them, but never made the scouting side appealing enough to begin to compete with the utility of marker lights.

Slipspace wrote:
Given some of the comments made by the designers on streams from the GW GT heats I think it's pretty clear they're not exactly high-level players. What's more worrying is their attitude towards the sort of tactics used in tournament games is borderline disdainful, which isn't a healthy attitude to have when you're the one in control of the rules.

It's one thing to have tournament players on your playtest team but you need to have a robust mechanism for listening to feedback and acting on it as well. I don't think GW have that at all.

Why? The games was never designed for tournament play and tournament players use scummy tactics like min/maxing soup lists and spamming stormravens.

Their jobs is to make the game fun for the casual players who play games in their garage with their friends for an evening with models they like, not cater to the hardcore WAAC crowd who insist on using the most optimal lists possible.

There is only one constant among the GW designers: Phil Kelly gets to write Eldar and that's that.
The others scramble every edition for different codexes

A lot of people seems to forget pathfinders can pack some really nasty rapid-fire guns, have decent deployment options and a lot of utility tools. and they all pack a carbine by default, who may not be a pulse rifle, but its still pretty nice.

Yea, they CAN be pure marker support-but they really don't have to be.


But yes, the Tau codex defiantly feels like they don't know their own game somewhat.

The coldstar got buffed beyond all reason-meanwhile, commanders gets restricted?

Guns nobody bothers with for several editions now are still left behind, the go-to gun for two editions now gets buffed though.

A support system that was hardly ever taken gets nerfed AND increased costs.

A model can have "can advance and shoot without penalty" from five different sources at once if you dedicate yourself to it. (some only to assault weapons, but still).
At the same liue, a LOT of sources to reroll ones to hit in shooting, and a few to reroll all hits.
SO MUCH OVERLAP!

Shadowsun, a tiny sneaky girl with fusion blasters somehow has a warlord trait that let her reroll hits when standing still?
And one of her special abilities is another trigger of kayoun, who is ALSO rerolling hits when standing still. (though as a 6" aura this time)

Battlesuits can be made to be better at overwatch than at their regular shooting.


Etc, etc.
The codex is riddled with nonsense and overlaps.

 BoomWolf wrote:
A lot of people seems to forget pathfinders can pack some really nasty rapid-fire guns, have decent deployment options and a lot of utility tools. and they all pack a carbine by default, who may not be a pulse rifle, but its still pretty nice.

Sure, but they're still a shooting unit. There are very few situations where you would consider moving instead of shooting with them, and even fewer where you'd pay CP to do it. But stratagems were an idiotic idea in the first place, so I suppose having terrible ones is to be expected.

 Sim-Life wrote:
Why? The games was never designed for tournament play and tournament players use scummy tactics like min/maxing soup lists and spamming stormravens.

Their jobs is to make the game fun for the casual players who play games in their garage with their friends for an evening with models they like, not cater to the hardcore WAAC crowd who insist on using the most optimal lists possible.

Are you saying that the game isn't for everyone? Is it just for those non-scummy, non-soup extra fluffy players only? GW's job is to sell models and games to as many people as they can. That means all types of players. I'd be willing to guess that those scummy WAAC tournament players spend as much, if not more, money then casual gamers. This is based on the WAAC guys all needing to have the latest "hot stuff".

Wayniac wrote:
while they might not be at GW's level for miniatures (YMMV due to aesthetics) they blow GW out of the water when it comes to rules that are both thematic of the army and well-balanced.

This myth needs to die a painful death. Name me one game right now that doesn't suffer from that at all. Chess? GO?

My five year old can play 8th edition. We played last night. Dropfleet? Nope. Dropzone? Hahaha. X-wing? Don't get me started. Armada? Death by tokens. Dreadball? yawn.

Games live and die by fluff and rules. It takes a fantastic amount of work to balance both.

This stupid rage that people have over the Tau and Necrons codices is getting out of hand, the game isn't supposed to get broke by new codices remember? Your codex should NOT be overpowered. Maybe the way YOU want to use the unit you bought is not the way the game designer wants you to use it.

The game is more balanced then it's ever been, yet people still find a way to complain. Boo hoo, go play another game system and let me know how that works out for you when you find out it's not perfect either.

 Sim-Life wrote:
Why? The games was never designed for tournament play and tournament players use scummy tactics like min/maxing soup lists and spamming stormravens.

Ah yes, the classic "if you don't have fun the same way that I have fun you're a bad person" argument. It's still a terrible argument.

Their jobs is to make the game fun for the casual players who play games in their garage with their friends for an evening with models they like, not cater to the hardcore WAAC crowd who insist on using the most optimal lists possible.

No, their job is to make the game fun for everyone. It just happens to be a fortunate coincidence that the same balance improvements that make the game fun for tournament players also make it better for everyone else. "Casual" and "competitive" design are only opposed because of CAAC ideology and virtue signalling about how "casual" certain players are because they love poor design.

 BoomWolf wrote:
A lot of people seems to forget pathfinders can pack some really nasty rapid-fire guns, have decent deployment options and a lot of utility tools. and they all pack a carbine by default, who may not be a pulse rifle, but its still pretty nice.

Yea, they CAN be pure marker support-but they really don't have to be.

But this strategem restrict you from shooting this turn. So if you spend point on nasty guns, then there are even less reasons to use it.

 Sim-Life wrote:

Their jobs is to make the game fun for the casual players who play games in their garage with their friends for an evening with models they like, not cater to the hardcore WAAC crowd who insist on using the most optimal lists possible.

Are you suggesting that well written and well balanced rules are somehow bad for those players? A tight ruleset benefits everybody.

 Sim-Life wrote:

Slipspace wrote:
Given some of the comments made by the designers on streams from the GW GT heats I think it's pretty clear they're not exactly high-level players. What's more worrying is their attitude towards the sort of tactics used in tournament games is borderline disdainful, which isn't a healthy attitude to have when you're the one in control of the rules.

It's one thing to have tournament players on your playtest team but you need to have a robust mechanism for listening to feedback and acting on it as well. I don't think GW have that at all.

Why? The games was never designed for tournament play and tournament players use scummy tactics like min/maxing soup lists and spamming stormravens.

Their jobs is to make the game fun for the casual players who play games in their garage with their friends for an evening with models they like, not cater to the hardcore WAAC crowd who insist on using the most optimal lists possible.

Good designers can and should make games that are balanced for competitive play without reducing the ability of players to play fun, casual, narrative games. That's their job. Having well-written, balanced rules benefits everyone. Ignoring that in favour of making stuff "fun" has a detrimental effect on people who want a more competitive style of game. If GW had come out and said "40k is not a competitive game, we only designed it to enable narrative-style or casual gaming" then I wouldn't have so much of a problem. But they're running tournaments and have a section of the rules dedicated to Matched Play so they need to actually create rules that enable that style of play.

If you as a game designer think soup lists and spamming units are scummy you write rules that prevent those options. It's unprofessional to sit there and criticise people for using the options you provided in ways you hadn't expected.

I also play X-Wing and their World Championships are streamed each year, with commentary from the designers. The level of knowledge those designers show, both of the rules of the game and the state of the meta-game (as well as their attitude towards that meta-game), is night and day compared to GW. X-Wing is by no means perfect, and there have been plenty of mis-steps in the design but the designers at least show a level of professionalism and knowledge that gives you some faith in their skills and ability to fix things.

Most other game designers seem to know their game in a way that they can commentate on competitive games and not sound silly. GW is, as usual, the exception. Now I agree that metagame things like "bubblewrap" and "daisychaining" feels wrong in 40k, but I also get why those things are valid tactics. GW designers seem to dislike/hate that sort of thing, yet they allow it in the rules. That's where the disconnect is. However I notice the AOS team (even if there is some overlap) seems to have more modern/competitive minded players, which might explain why the AOS rules seem more straightforward for tournament play (they still have issues, but those issues are not nearly as prevalent as in 40k). However none of the current crop of 40k designers seem to know or care about tournament play, just laid back "Sure mate that sounds good" type of lackadaisical play with friends, which is fine, but clouds their design.

If they want the game to be taken seriously as a competitive game, they need to understand competitive play and know what is needed for competitive play, while also making sure the rules are balanced enough to facilitate casual and narrative play.

Even when pathfinders had to pay the devilfish tax no-one used them the way GW assumed you would. Giving a scout a heavy weapon markerlight made them static scouts. If they want them to feel more scout like give them infiltrate.
The problem is something that has been said over and over on dakka fluff vrs crunch and untill GW starts designing crunch to mimic fluff units will always be played the way that is most beneficial to the player to heck with how GW thinks.
Also IRCC one of the play testers said the play testing wasn't done with here is a codex find the broken stuff it was here is two fixed army lists do they sort of feel about the same power.

Ice_can wrote:
Even when pathfinders had to pay the devilfish tax no-one used them the way GW assumed you would. Giving a scout a heavy weapon markerlight made them static scouts. If they want them to feel more scout like give them infiltrate.

Or, they could just make them faster, lower range and make markerlights assault weapons. That way they would have to act like scouts to provide their benefit to the army.

DISCLAIMER: I am in no way advocating that this is actually good for tau on the tabletop, just for the "feel" of a unit.

You get my point though, your building rules that match the way you believe the unit should be played. So the players are much more likely to play the unit that way.

Something that GW designers seam confused about when they watch players. Much like why don't you have X unit? becuase Y can do kill Z anyway aswell as A,B&C. Example reapers.

Silver144 wrote:
But, due some harsh backfire from playerbase (I heard there even was a rude personal mails)

"rude personal mails" - no, there were death threats.

And, almost a year old but still relevant:

Who is this person or who is this a response from/by?

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Who is this person or who is this a response from/by?

Aaron Dembski-Bowden is a BL author, and has held several other positions at GW.

Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

 Farseer_V2 wrote:
Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

Very recently... How long ago do you think Kirby was in charge?

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:
Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

Very recently... How long ago do you think Kirby was in charge?

Pre 2015. And it isn't as if as soon as Rountree took over they immediately began moving into things like research, community outreach, etc.

Now I might be making this up but wasn't there a statement or something from a former GW person saying that they expected players to just like whatever was put out therefore no research was needed?

Prior to the Rountree era that was effectively their mantra. They did no market research and their customers were interested in their models only.

Most GW rules go to print without seeing the table once.

 sfshilo wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
while they might not be at GW's level for miniatures (YMMV due to aesthetics) they blow GW out of the water when it comes to rules that are both thematic of the army and well-balanced.

This myth needs to die a painful death. Name me one game right now that doesn't suffer from that at all. Chess? GO?

My five year old can play 8th edition. We played last night. Dropfleet? Nope. Dropzone? Hahaha. X-wing? Don't get me started. Armada? Death by tokens. Dreadball? yawn.

Games live and die by fluff and rules. It takes a fantastic amount of work to balance both.

This stupid rage that people have over the Tau and Necrons codices is getting out of hand, the game isn't supposed to get broke by new codices remember? Your codex should NOT be overpowered. Maybe the way YOU want to use the unit you bought is not the way the game designer wants you to use it.

The game is more balanced then it's ever been, yet people still find a way to complain. Boo hoo, go play another game system and let me know how that works out for you when you find out it's not perfect either.

The game is just as broken as its ever been, just in different areas, no one is asking for broken but people ARE asking for flavour, something 8th is severely lacking in, lastly, you seem to be the one raging lol

beast_gts wrote:

Silver144 wrote:
But, due some harsh backfire from playerbase (I heard there even was a rude personal mails)

"rude personal mails" - no, there were death threats.

And, almost a year old but still relevant:

Not much truth there - think about in cities there will always be some tourney players.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Most GW rules go to print without seeing the table once.

Can you offer any proof?

Tournament VS Causal:
Tuomas Pirinen:
We not only paid attention, we ran the Grand Tournaments ourselves! We really wanted to see what worked, and what the top players in the world were doing. Both me and Alessio were also Tournament players, and wanted to see what army compositions players came up with. This helped us to balance the armies.

 Primark G wrote:

Can you offer any proof?

James Hewitt:
When I first started, playtesting was a bit of a dirty word; there was a real disdain for "balance" among the higher echelons of management. Silver Tower, for example, was playtested almost entirely in my own time, unpaid, using unpaid volunteers

others said similar things, first rules draft was printed in the books because the management did not want to waste more time and point costs were based on the amount of models they wanted to sell per army

What you said - the two things - they conflict with each other.

I have known some people who play tested for GW (40k). I am not going to comment on the quality of their work or it had any major affect on the actual rules but over the course of the game rules have been externally tested.

 kodos wrote:
Tournament VS Causal:
Tuomas Pirinen:
We not only paid attention, we ran the Grand Tournaments ourselves! We really wanted to see what worked, and what the top players in the world were doing. Both me and Alessio were also Tournament players, and wanted to see what army compositions players came up with. This helped us to balance the armies.

Note that neither of these individuals work for GW anymore, and at least one (Alessio; not sure what Tuomas is up to these days) works for their competitors. IIRC both of them left prior to 6th edition, so right around GW's desire to be a "toy company" and not a game company.

 Primark G wrote:

Can you offer any proof?

James Hewitt:
When I first started, playtesting was a bit of a dirty word; there was a real disdain for "balance" among the higher echelons of management. Silver Tower, for example, was playtested almost entirely in my own time, unpaid, using unpaid volunteers

others said similar things, first rules draft was printed in the books because the management did not want to waste more time and point costs were based on the amount of models they wanted to sell per army

I don't expect playtesters to catch everything and TBH this is overall a very tight ruleset. Most belly aching is in regards to army(s) power level(s).

 Primark G wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Most GW rules go to print without seeing the table once.

Can you offer any proof?

I will offer up the Flash Gitz formation in 7th as strong evidence that no sane person has every played out a shooting phase with that 21 Flash Git unit before putting it to print. Its a unit of 21 gitz armed with mastercrafted snazzguns (assault 3, each weapon can reroll 1 miss). That means your rolling 21 sets of 3 dice and able to rerolling 1 miss for each weapon.

Never remenber anyone ever running it.

@Wayniac
I know, but my point was that the Designer themselves said that tournaments helped to balance tha factions
So people arguing that tournaments in general are bad for balance is just wrong
It is only bad for the game if the designer take the wrong conclusions from tournament. Don't blame the event but the designer/company for bad balance


@playtest
It is different now, but it is also something new for GW and how to test a game to get the information you need is not straight forward.
eg, if the feedback from playtesting is like "unit x is too cheap, and unit b need better buffs" it is useless, as those should be the conclusion the designers make from several battle reports.


I don't know how exactly the process work and what possibilities are there to change stuff but looking at the Codex release, GW is not able to stick to a concept and you say a learning curve between 2 books which also means they did not know how 40k should look like at the time they wrote the core rules.

 Primark G wrote:
Never remenber anyone ever running it.

And why do you think that is?

 Primark G wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Most GW rules go to print without seeing the table once.

Can you offer any proof?

I have another few:
- The storm boyz formation that was a unit of minimum 46 models (up to 91) which could only arrive via deep strike.
- The stikkbomb chukka upgrade for vehicles in 7th which gave stikkbombs to units charging out of transports - despite every single model in the codex already being equipped with stikkbombs, except for the weird boy.
- The Council of da Waaagh!, which gave Thrakka three additional warlord traits from a table which only had two with any effect on him.
- 'Naut Transport capacitiy.
- 7th edition Mob rule on exploding transports.

Actually, scratch that. I'd argue the entire 7th edition ork codex and the supplement that shall not be named have not seen play before going to print.

GW staff regularly attend UK tournaments, often times doing very well. Ben Johnson for example is a famous tournament player who did very very well in tournaments prior to joining GW. People like Jeremy Vetock have also done well in tournaments.

Also we know for a fact that rules are playtested currently*. There are clearly a lot of uninformed people.

*Whether their process for doing so is the most effective is a different question.

Last I checked Ben Johnson was on the AOS team not the 40K team. And funnily enough AOS seems to be better balanced than 40K

 Jidmah wrote:

 Primark G wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Most GW rules go to print without seeing the table once.

Can you offer any proof?

I have another few:
- The storm boyz formation that was a unit of minimum 46 models (up to 91) which could only arrive via deep strike.
- The stikkbomb chukka upgrade for vehicles in 7th which gave stikkbombs to units charging out of transports - despite every single model in the codex already being equipped with stikkbombs, except for the weird boy.
- The Council of da Waaagh!, which gave Thrakka three additional warlord traits from a table which only had two with any effect on him.
- 'Naut Transport capacitiy.
- 7th edition Mob rule on exploding transports.

Actually, scratch that. I'd argue the entire 7th edition ork codex and the supplement that shall not be named have not seen play before going to print.

The only thing I could nitpick is that the Stikkbomb Chukka also gave the vehicle Stikkbombs, so you could throw a baby blast from a Trukk. You could honestly do far worse for 5 points.

-In 6th edition, Codex: Legion of the Damned required the entire army to start in Reserves. The only problem? Having no units on the table was an auto-lose.
-From Traitor Legions, one of the Warlord traits for Iron Warriors was Fearless. This was despite the Chaos Lord (most common Chaos Warlord) being Fearless by default. Another Warlord Trait gave all nearby vehicles IWND, despite all Daemonforge vehicles already having it by default. One of their artifacts gave a Warpsmith situational Instant Death in challenges (why are you putting a Warpsmith in a challenge?), while one of the artifacts let you "give" a Chaos vehicle Daemonic Possession (which as written could debatably be 'downgrade'). Likewise, the Iron Warriors Grand Company (Decurion analogue) let all Ordnance and Barrage weapons in it reroll to hit. The punchline of course is that Chaos Space Marines didn't have any Barrage Weapons besides Forgeworld options, and the Grand Company was codex-units only.
-Siphon Magic from Wrath of Magnus had hilariously bad RAW. The spell was a blessing, cast on the Psyker. Anytime a friendly Psyker within 18" of the Psyker successfully cast a spell, that Psyker gained a die on a 2+ which could be spent "like an additional Warp Charge." As written, the spell was potentially useless for level 1 Psykers, since it would be their only power for the turn. RAW, it was unclear if Siphon Magic worked for the Caster's own spells (or even if it came into play immediately upon being cast), it could "multiply," (3 Sorcerers have Siphon Magic up. A fourth Sorcerer casts Psychic Shriek; each of the Sorcerers rolls to see if it gets a token), and you could argue that the power could store dice across multiple turns (since it wasn't "a Warp Charge that could only be spent by the Psyker," similar to what Yvraine and Neurothropes got, but "a die that can be spent like a Warp Charge," and 40k has no standardized rules for how tokens work). All in all, it was a really sloppily-written rule.
-If you took Typhus in your army, you could upgrade any Cultists to Plague Zombies for free. They couldn't take any other options, except upping their unit size. The problem? Death Guard required all models that could to take the Mark of Nurgle. RAW, Typhus wouldn't be able to actually make Zombies for his own legion, since the "must" takes precedence over "may." However, you could ally Typhus alongside a detachment of another Legion (say, Alpha Legion) to get sneaky ninja-zombies.
-In 8th edition, Flamers don't work as an assault deterrent, despite GW hyping them up. The problem is you can assault from DS, you DS from > 9" away, and flamers have range 8".
-There are many assorted oddities about 8th, from the FAQ contradicting itself, to the usage of the Scunthorpe Problem to determine how abilities and stratagems work (so that Horrors of Tzeentch can plug themselves into a fuel relay), to oddities like Tau Focused Fire working best when you don't focus.

GW probably just doesn't play with any degree of rigor, or they forget their own rules. Case in point, in the twitch game for Wrath of Magnus, they let Space Wolves assault from their Rhinos and even after said Rhinos moved, but the Thousand Sons got tabled in three turns, leaving about 45 minutes of awkward silence for the whole event ("uhh...that's luck of the dice I guess.")

 Vector Strike wrote:
There is only one constant among the GW designers: Phil Kelly gets to write Eldar and that's that.
The others scramble every edition for different codexes

Wouldn't it just make the most sense that the same person/persons write all the codex?

I see a lot of nit picking here this morning.

The designers arnt WAAC players... I don't see anything wrong with this? 40k is and always will be a none competitive game no matter how much people push it as competitive. What gw rule designers do get wrong is making every unit in a force playable. Even in narrative games I would like to play different forces and units and still give the opponent a challenge (even if as DM i want them to win).

The competitive players sit there and tell you that the game should be for everybody but then start yelling a hypocritical rant about how their version of the game is good for everybody. They're the definition of the Imperium going up to a random friendly planet and saying "Nah, you way of life sucks... Exterminartos!". They are exsactly how that comment says. They think they are better and know what is good for everybody but really have no clue. Seriously, if gw made all your armies unplayable then sell them and go to another game... it's that simple. There is difference between complaints and what I have seen over the last few days... just a bunch of spoilt brats who never grew up from the looks of it.

Why does a designer need to be a WAAC player to write good rules?

 kodos wrote:
Why does a designer need to be a WAAC player to write good rules?

Because they have to understand the cheese in the first place to write it out.

Martel732 wrote:

 kodos wrote:
Why does a designer need to be a WAAC player to write good rules?

Because they have to understand the cheese in the first place to write it out.

They dont have to be a Waac to understand Waac

But they should try to understand waac to defeat waac because nothing is funnier than a waac that cant waac and goes wack

Martel732 wrote:

 kodos wrote:
Why does a designer need to be a WAAC player to write good rules?

Because they have to understand the cheese in the first place to write it out.

Is that an opinion or a fact based on actual studies of all the games ever created? I'm pretty sure monopoly was created by someone who was super against monopolies.

 Desubot wrote:
But they should try to understand waac to defeat waac because nothing is funnier than a waac that cant waac and goes wack

Once you've gone WAAC...

Not being a total dunce is about all that is required to write legitimate/relevant rules.

The numbskull that decided to make an ultramarines stratagem that allows a unit to reroll 1's when standing next to a dreadnought is just asinine. Outside of Guilliman/Calgar how give even better buffs even a standard captain does reroll 1's. The same can be seen in the tau codex with countless methods to reroll 1's. These are examples of complete idiots writing rules. How dumb do you have to be to keep repeating the same rule over and over - and it's useless rule to boot.

If they don't understand what is good or bad in the game, how can they balance it?

Martel732 wrote:
If they don't understand what is good or bad in the game, how can they balance it?

Whether they care for balance is one thing. its clear its not top priority.

even if they do it doesn't mean they can. there are definitely other factors that prevent the devs from actually doing their jobs. to start you cant forget that pretty much all books are done and are sent to be printed well ahead of release some times years. often times people cant fix gak because bean counters push out the books because a book that isnt published isnt making them money. all the demand for free free free codexes isnt actually making these dinosauric upper management any money so they dont actually care for it. especially considering 40k its one of their BIGGEST IP vs Aos.

There are diminishing returns to fully balanced games according to some gw rules writer on an reddit AMA where the difference between 50% to 75% balanced is pretty significant while 75 to 90% wont be noticed nearlly as much. its a good chance that this is one of the internal policies to keep gak from getting delayed.

 Xenomancers wrote:
Not being a total dunce is about all that is required to write legitimate/relevant rules.

The numbskull that decided to make an ultramarines stratagem that allows a unit to reroll 1's when standing next to a dreadnought is just asinine. Outside of Guilliman/Calgar how give even better buffs even a standard captain does reroll 1's. The same can be seen in the tau codex with countless methods to reroll 1's. These are examples of complete idiots writing rules. How dumb do you have to be to keep repeating the same rule over and over - and it's useless rule to boot.

I use the stratagem to rerrolls 1's with my Dreadnoughts all the time... is very usefull with my venerable dreadnought with heavy plasma cannon, that normally walks towards the enemy deployment zone from one of the sides of the battle alongside a tac squad with 2 plasmas. It allows me to overcharge, with Azrael and my actual company master doing other things in other parts of the battlefield.

 Desubot wrote:
Whether they care for balance is one thing. its clear its not top priority.

Here's the thing about the current release schedule, rules, and what little we know of future plans. At their current pace, all codices will be out before the end of the year (at least those covered by indices).

I think it's safe to assume they're not rolling out 9th edition next year.

I think it's also safe to assume that they will have to add to existing armies or find new factions to build out. I suspect it may end up being a bit of both. This gives them the wiggle room for incremental balance passes through rules clarifications and the addition of new units over time.

I suspect a lot of what we're seeing is the rush to get everyone out of the indices as much as possible, at which point they can actually start collecting really viable data about balance and the needs of various armies in relation to that.

Of course, this is all conjecture ultimately.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 Desubot wrote:
Whether they care for balance is one thing. its clear its not top priority.

Here's the thing about the current release schedule, rules, and what little we know of future plans. At their current pace, all codices will be out before the end of the year (at least those covered by indices).

I think it's safe to assume they're not rolling out 9th edition next year.

I think it's also safe to assume that they will have to add to existing armies or find new factions to build out. I suspect it may end up being a bit of both. This gives them the wiggle room for incremental balance passes through rules clarifications and the addition of new units over time.

I suspect a lot of what we're seeing is the rush to get everyone out of the indices as much as possible, at which point they can actually start collecting really viable data about balance and the needs of various armies in relation to that.

Of course, this is all conjecture ultimately.

It makes sense.

they can throw out a bunch of dexs make some cash off of that then as Tourny players burn through it doing far more play testing for them then they would be capable of, then half a year later they can throw out a patch and repeat the cycle.

they dont lose anything from it so it makes all the sense.

assuming they follow through.

My only criticism is that it should be all free online pdfs or be a subscription. If that was the case then they might have to actually try to write everything good... no way to sell the next codex if you're happy with your current one.

Martel732 wrote:

 kodos wrote:
Why does a designer need to be a WAAC player to write good rules?

Because they have to understand the cheese in the first place to write it out.

You don't need to be WAAC to see something is OP. I can tell you scatterbikes were massively OP and I don't care about win or lose much at all.

I asked on fb a few months ago and they told me every dev worked on every codex equally. There was no head for each codex. This was when I asked who was doing the Ork codex.

 lolman1c wrote:
The designers arnt WAAC players... I don't see anything wrong with this?

Oh, you don't need to be total cut-throat player to understand the game mechanics. That's what people are asking for. You need to understand your game mechanics even if you're writing a RPG system,
Take the examples from the old ork codex above - none of them are actually related to competitive gaming, math-wise the Flash Git formation wasn't haven that bad.
The bad part about it was that you were forced to roll the shooting for 21 models one by one to make sure you would be using your master-crafted re-rolls and ammo runts on the correct weapons. If anyone at the studio would have bothered as much as putting those models down in a game and play them once, they would have realized that the putting master-crafted on a unit with 20 Assault 3 guns was an idiotic idea.
Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics.

40k is and always will be a none competitive game no matter how much people push it as competitive. What gw rule designers do get wrong is making every unit in a force playable. Even in narrative games I would like to play different forces and units and still give the opponent a challenge (even if as DM i want them to win).

Most competitive games are also looking for challenge. You'll get your wish fulfilled at the same time they get theirs.

The competitive players sit there and tell you that the game should be for everybody but then start yelling a hypocritical rant about how their version of the game is good for everybody. They're the definition of the Imperium going up to a random friendly planet and saying "Nah, you way of life sucks... Exterminartos!". They are exsactly how that comment says. They think they are better and know what is good for everybody but really have no clue. Seriously, if gw made all your armies unplayable then sell them and go to another game... it's that simple. There is difference between complaints and what I have seen over the last few days... just a bunch of spoilt brats who never grew up from the looks of it.

And yet, here you are on your very own hypocritical rant about players not playing the way you prefer
When you are insulting a large group of people, chances are very high that you are in fact wrong, and no better than the few which you actually have a problem with.
I assure you, the percentage of idiots is just as high among narrative players as it is among competitive players.

 Jidmah wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
The designers arnt WAAC players... I don't see anything wrong with this?

Oh, you don't need to be total cut-throat player to understand the game mechanics. That's what people are asking for. You need to understand your game mechanics even if you're writing a RPG system,
Take the examples from the old ork codex above - none of them are actually related to competitive gaming, math-wise the Flash Git formation wasn't haven that bad.
The bad part about it was that you were forced to roll the shooting for 21 models one by one to make sure you would be using your master-crafted re-rolls and ammo runts on the correct weapons. If anyone at the studio would have bothered as much as putting those models down in a game and play them once, they would have realized that the putting master-crafted on a unit with 20 Assault 3 guns was an idiotic idea.
Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics.

40k is and always will be a none competitive game no matter how much people push it as competitive. What gw rule designers do get wrong is making every unit in a force playable. Even in narrative games I would like to play different forces and units and still give the opponent a challenge (even if as DM i want them to win).

Most competitive games are also looking for challenge. You'll get your wish fulfilled at the same time they get theirs.

The competitive players sit there and tell you that the game should be for everybody but then start yelling a hypocritical rant about how their version of the game is good for everybody. They're the definition of the Imperium going up to a random friendly planet and saying "Nah, you way of life sucks... Exterminartos!". They are exsactly how that comment says. They think they are better and know what is good for everybody but really have no clue. Seriously, if gw made all your armies unplayable then sell them and go to another game... it's that simple. There is difference between complaints and what I have seen over the last few days... just a bunch of spoilt brats who never grew up from the looks of it.

And yet, here you are on your very own hypocritical rant about players not playing the way you prefer
When you are insulting a large group of people, chances are very high that you are in fact wrong, and no better than the few which you actually have a problem with.
I assure you, the percentage of idiots is just as high among narrative players as it is among competitive players.

What? When did I say I want people to stop playing at tournaments? I even say I want every unit to be useful (and im sure many competitive players would love this). I geuss if anything you could interpret me saying I want people to stop asking for 1 turn winning armies (WAAC players). I even say I'm okay with people complaining but WAAC players can seriously GTFO. Just because I said 40k isn't competitive, and I get angry at competitive players telling me how to play, doesn't mean I want people to stop having tournaments and fun... If you're bending my arm then sure... If I could I would kick out all WAAC players from the hobby. I wouldn't kick out competitive players... they can do what they want as long as they don't push for a more competitive game over a fun narrative game (needs to be balance there) WAAC players though destroy 40k like they have to many games before 40k. I don't even care if that's hypocritical... seriously screw WAAC players! I'm happy to exclude a small minority of players so everyone else can have a good time "for the greater good".

Seriously though... if we're going down this "everyone deserves equality" route then we might as well start changing entire rules because timmy down the road is the only person in the world who dislikes something about something. In my eyes this has been happening for years... gw is moving away from the majority to please the minority. They make easily exploitable boring bland units for competitive players to grab and it's obvious. Same thing happened to games I used to play... were fun cool casual games but then he devs listened to competitive players and started to actually take out features to make the game simpler for them. Eventually the game lost the majority of the audience and the playervase rapidly dwindled. Not saying this will happen to 40k but i'm getting flashbacks. This is probably what happened with stratagems. They've gone for simple rather than fluffy.

Then you start going on about me being wrong or something because I'm listening to large groups of people? No idea what that is on about... anyway you'll just twist my words and say you're not twisting them, in a response, blah blah.... *typical dakka dakka nerd argument about plastic figures goes here*. I mean you're argument in the first place is paradoxical. By saying i am wrong you're a hypocrite, meaning I'm a hypocrite if I say you're wrong, meaning you're a hypocrite because saying my method is wrong while yours is good... erghhh... but seriously screw WAAC players. I don't even care if people say I'm a hypocrite! I'll wear that badge with pride if I have too!

One doesn't need to be an artist to appreciate good art, one doesn't need to be a musician to know good music.

I don't need to be a games designer to understand good design, look at space marines tactical, they have been overcosted for several editions now but because they have always been between 14-18pts each, they still are, a good designer looks at them in a vacuum and in comparison to other units and adjusts them accordingly, a bad one sticks to tradition and leaves them as is, a good games designer would see they are failing at there task on the table and rework them from the ground up if needed, a bad one just leaves them as is

 Formosa wrote:
One doesn't need to be an artist to appreciate good art, one doesn't need to be a musician to know good music.

I don't need to be a games designer to understand good design, look at space marines tactical, they have been overcosted for several editions now but because they have always been between 14-18pts each, they still are, a good designer looks at them in a vacuum and in comparison to other units and adjusts them accordingly, a bad one sticks to tradition and leaves them as is, a good games designer would see they are failing at there task on the table and rework them from the ground up if needed, a bad one just leaves them as is

Exsactly this! I know it might be me pushing the perfect way to play a game but seriously... if every unit was at least viable (not OP) then things would probably work out for everyone. But I seriously was talking to a tau player today and he was upset that in this edition he can't 1 shot a tank or knight... to me that's not balance... that's just someone who wants to win without trying... a WAAC player....

The devs don't need to be competitive they just need to sit back and look at every single ujit. It's time consuming but it's how things need to be. Like with code... i remember in my dev team we were handed a game from another dev team who just gave up and produced thismess of a bugy game. We sat down and said "no short cuts" and went through every single line of code and ironed out all the crap. (Who ever coded that thing was a madd man!). We then got a spread sheet up and looked at every single unit. We suck at playing games but once you put all the numbers up on a spreadsheet you can work out balance and what needs adjustment. Again, not saying you can do this for 40k but anybody can make a fun balanced game. You just have to have the patience to sit down and go through everything... might take a whole year of none stop work but I bet you even a memeber of this community could do it! This just makes it seems the dev team is either lazy or rushed by gw. I think HoC is a good example of what even fans can do with enough time.

 Jidmah wrote:

]Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics. 

My Salamanders would disagree w this.

But I think GW pandering to WAACs is hurting the vast majority of players who could give 2 scheiss about competition. I'm perfectly fine playing against an unbalanced list. Cuz war is not fair! Some of the most fun games I've played were 3 or 400pts handicapped (one way or another). i understand that they're selling more models based on how "broke" they may be. I'm fine with that as others have stated, in as much as the rules for specific units are roughly equal with some being better at a specific task than others.

whether or not the small % of players pushing competitive play into the bulk of the game, makes me wish GW would have a separate ruleset and stats for competitive play (more so than matched currently does). Power level should be pushed more for everything not competitive and vice-versa. but the likelihood of that is a snowballs chance in hell it'd happen. I just hope that people talking about competitive should stick to a competitive venue. You won't see me going on and on in the tournament section about blah blah this and OP that.

I don't believe there should be separate rulesets per se, so much as GW needs to learn technical writing, and not create rules that occasionally become Literally Unplayable.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
I don't believe there should be separate rulesets per se, so much as GW needs to learn technical writing, and not create rules that occasionally become Literally Unplayable.

Well, yes. they do need to be a little better. I don't think anyone has ever accused GW of having the best rules, models yes, rules no.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
I don't believe there should be separate rulesets per se, so much as GW needs to learn technical writing, and not create rules that occasionally become Literally Unplayable.

I can agree they should probably not be writing in a way that is intended only for their own boarders. dang Brits

I think in a perfect universe, it's true that a well-written, well-researched, well-built game system could offer a wide variety of units, playstyles, and viable builds within a single army, thus allowing casuals and tournament players to come together in harmony.

But consider that Overwatch, the Blizzard game, launched with 21 heroes. For the last four seasons of competitive play, the healer Mercy has been a must-take. Blizzard has nerfed her repeatedly in an attempt to balance things out, even changing out her ultimate ability. It took almost two years, in an environment where every hero has three abilities and performs a single battlefield role, where all the statistics from every game are saved and recorded, for Blizzard to get her back in line with the rest of the heroes.

40K has almost as many factions as Overwatch has heroes. A tiny fraction of games featuring a tiny range of possible builds are recorded. Your principle feedback comes from people on forums saying, "In my local meta, the only army anyone plays is Goff Rockers and Squigs, please fix."

I hope GW continues to balance, especially in the wake of the LVO, but balance is a difficult thing - especially when you're considering the lore, the players, and the notoriously fickle meta. As a new player pouring over battle reports and codices, I'm pretty impressed with what they've managed to pull off with the new edition.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

Help Us Choose An Army!

At AdeptiCon, a combined squad of the Warhammer Studio and Warhammer Community teams will be taking part in the world’s biggest Warhammer 40,000 event – the legendary AdeptiCon Team Tournament.

We pondered long and hard about what army we’d bring, until we finally came to a decision:

We’re really bad at choosing armies.

So, we’ve decided to enlist your help in picking our forces from the following 4:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Let us know your choice by Thursday (We’ll need a couple of days to pack our stuff and get it shipped over to the US). Who knows – in a week, you could well be facing us at AdeptiCon!

 Jidmah wrote:

Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics.

On the contrary, Raven Guard is actually the first time in awhile that it has reflected the fluff.

They don't just jump troop at you all willynilly. That's Blood Angels. They spring ambushes, they hit and fade, they use cover and concealment. The geneseed flaw that sometimes manifested as a kind of pseudo "jedi mind trick"("you will not notice me...") is apparently, fluffwise, also starting to manifest itself again.

TLDR; there's quite a few that people feel "don't line up" but that's because they never understood the fluff to begin with.

It appears that the studio team members must use the studio's minis and not their personal armies. They are saying that they're limited in their choices by only having 4K points in those 4 armies. So it isn't really a choice for them.

I wonder what they would take if they had their druthers.

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
It appears that the studio team members must use the studio's minis and not their personal armies. They are saying that they're limited in their choices by only having 4K points in those 4 armies. So it isn't really a choice for them.

Where are they saying that?

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics.

On the contrary, Raven Guard is actually the first time in awhile that it has reflected the fluff.

They don't just jump troop at you all willynilly. That's Blood Angels. They spring ambushes, they hit and fade, they use cover and concealment. The geneseed flaw that sometimes manifested as a kind of pseudo "jedi mind trick"("you will not notice me...") is apparently, fluffwise, also starting to manifest itself again.

TLDR; there's quite a few that people feel "don't line up" but that's because they never understood the fluff to begin with.

So apparently, devastators and dreads are the mainstay of "hide and fade" tactics.
"You will not notice me" said the black colored venerable dreadnought after firing a twin lascannon and stomped behind a bush, with no one being the wiser.

 sfshilo wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
while they might not be at GW's level for miniatures (YMMV due to aesthetics) they blow GW out of the water when it comes to rules that are both thematic of the army and well-balanced.

This myth needs to die a painful death. Name me one game right now that doesn't suffer from that at all. Chess? GO?

My five year old can play 8th edition. We played last night. Dropfleet? Nope. Dropzone? Hahaha. X-wing? Don't get me started. Armada? Death by tokens. Dreadball? yawn.

Games live and die by fluff and rules. It takes a fantastic amount of work to balance both.

This stupid rage that people have over the Tau and Necrons codices is getting out of hand, the game isn't supposed to get broke by new codices remember? Your codex should NOT be overpowered. Maybe the way YOU want to use the unit you bought is not the way the game designer wants you to use it.

The game is more balanced then it's ever been, yet people still find a way to complain. Boo hoo, go play another game system and let me know how that works out for you when you find out it's not perfect either.

Most of us aren't interested in playing 40k with 5 year olds.
Not a bonus, not for most people,
well, who aren't 5 years old.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

The only real choice is nidz.
Why bother with the poll?
Girlyman and Muerty?
I feel like I have seen this movie before...

beast_gts wrote:

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
It appears that the studio team members must use the studio's minis and not their personal armies. They are saying that they're limited in their choices by only having 4K points in those 4 armies. So it isn't really a choice for them.

Where are they saying that?

They keep stating that on their facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/Warhammer-40000-1575682476085719/?hc_ref=ARTNK7_fmj8D-Ehy0jNCWw13ADaxTB9F3vsQbXFsnAnVTfUk9a-jVh_23hU5nVHM4aU&fref=nf

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

I noticed they only picked some of the most competitive armies... where was the option for Orks?!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 jeff white wrote:

 sfshilo wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
while they might not be at GW's level for miniatures (YMMV due to aesthetics) they blow GW out of the water when it comes to rules that are both thematic of the army and well-balanced.

This myth needs to die a painful death. Name me one game right now that doesn't suffer from that at all. Chess? GO?

My five year old can play 8th edition. We played last night. Dropfleet? Nope. Dropzone? Hahaha. X-wing? Don't get me started. Armada? Death by tokens. Dreadball? yawn.

Games live and die by fluff and rules. It takes a fantastic amount of work to balance both.

This stupid rage that people have over the Tau and Necrons codices is getting out of hand, the game isn't supposed to get broke by new codices remember? Your codex should NOT be overpowered. Maybe the way YOU want to use the unit you bought is not the way the game designer wants you to use it.

The game is more balanced then it's ever been, yet people still find a way to complain. Boo hoo, go play another game system and let me know how that works out for you when you find out it's not perfect either.

Most of us aren't interested in playing 40k with 5 year olds.

Dude... it's 40k. 90% of us have the minds and act like 5 year olds.

 Jidmah wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics.

On the contrary, Raven Guard is actually the first time in awhile that it has reflected the fluff.

They don't just jump troop at you all willynilly. That's Blood Angels. They spring ambushes, they hit and fade, they use cover and concealment. The geneseed flaw that sometimes manifested as a kind of pseudo "jedi mind trick"("you will not notice me...") is apparently, fluffwise, also starting to manifest itself again.

TLDR; there's quite a few that people feel "don't line up" but that's because they never understood the fluff to begin with.

So apparently, devastators and dreads are the mainstay of "hide and fade" tactics.
"You will not notice me" said the black colored venerable dreadnought after firing a twin lascannon and stomped behind a bush, with no one being the wiser.

You'd have a point if the Raven Guard trait was + to cover saves; it's literally just they're harder to hit.

Also yeah, Devastators can be a big part of 'hit and fade' tactics. You hit them at long range, and leave before the enemy gets to you.

 lolman1c wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

I noticed they only picked some of the most competitive armies... where was the option for Orks?!

The explanation is on their facebook page. They claim that the only armies that studio has at 4K points are the 4 armies listed.

 jeff white wrote:

Most of us aren't interested in playing 40k with 5 year olds.
Not a bonus, not for most people,
well, who aren't 5 years old.
.

You seem to be discounting all the gamer parents out there, which is likely significant considering the age of 40k.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

Most of the current "chapter tactics" across all armies are another testament to this. Very few of them actually benefit the "chapters" preferred tactics from the fluff. A White Scars army tactic should encourage fielding bikes, Raven Guard should encourage jump troops, and so on. The failed for almost every sub-faction so far, because they don't understand game mechanics.

On the contrary, Raven Guard is actually the first time in awhile that it has reflected the fluff.

They don't just jump troop at you all willynilly. That's Blood Angels. They spring ambushes, they hit and fade, they use cover and concealment. The geneseed flaw that sometimes manifested as a kind of pseudo "jedi mind trick"("you will not notice me...") is apparently, fluffwise, also starting to manifest itself again.

TLDR; there's quite a few that people feel "don't line up" but that's because they never understood the fluff to begin with.

I dunno, the Raven Guard as a whole in 7th ed seemed rather well-reflected in their chapter tactics, warlord traits, relics, and formations. From Turn 1 Shrouding, being able to choose to end the game a turn early, Scouts being able to grant Ignore Cover to nearby squads, etc. their army really seemed to emphasize their surgical nature.

Ironically though, such traits could also ironically be a case of GW arguably not playing their own game. For example, choosing to end the game early is a theoretical benefit in a game where most tournament games did not make it past turn 3 due to time. Turn 1 Shrouding worked unless your opponent did a Betastrike, ran a Deathstar, or played Tau. As a whole though, it was debably fluffier to run them combined-arms as opposed to maximal Devestators/Gundreads.

And of course, Raven Guard tactics bring up "plasma" as a counterpoint.

Well Im sure Gw didnt specific design anything to be specificly played with in tournements. wether that is a good or bad thing is probably maybe sort of OT

But Raven guards whole shtick is pretty dang well represented in their rules.

I think smurfs are fine

I think my only point of contention (though because im bias) would be the imperial fist ones.

not that ignore cover is bad. it almost fits the fists siege warfare thing in that puny enemy attempts at utlizing fortified positions wound be pointless against the yellow bois. but their fluff justification from what i recall involved them being sooo good at close quarters city fights. which makes no sense when they are fighting in the woods or shooting through daemonic fart clouds.

Bolter drill probably should of been their primary CT. since they are bland and that is one of their shticks.

 ikeulhu wrote:

You seem to be discounting all the gamer parents out there, which is likely significant considering the age of 40k.

I would never teach or play 40k with my kids
they may get into it later as I have enough armies at home for them, but there are better games out there to play with the kids

Leo_the_Rat wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

I noticed they only picked some of the most competitive armies... where was the option for Orks?!

The explanation is on their facebook page. They claim that the only armies that studio has at 4K points are the 4 armies listed.

They're freaking GW and they don't even own 4k worth of Orks?! This says a lot... but really... it's the main gw studio... they could make 4k worth of any army in a week if they had too!

 lolman1c wrote:

Leo_the_Rat wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

I noticed they only picked some of the most competitive armies... where was the option for Orks?!

The explanation is on their facebook page. They claim that the only armies that studio has at 4K points are the 4 armies listed.

They're freaking GW and they don't even own 4k worth of Orks?! This says a lot... but really... it's the main gw studio... they could make 4k worth of any army in a week if they had too!

Studio painted and ready to go?

how many people do you think that would take to get it done in a week.

There is a good chance they cant use the display stuff in whw and studio stuff is from various book photo shoots which kinda make sense since smurfs are in a lot of those books, morty was recent, yanari i dunno maybe its leftovers from the craftworld codex. and nids are in everything.

dunno about orks in recent publications.

 kodos wrote:

 ikeulhu wrote:

You seem to be discounting all the gamer parents out there, which is likely significant considering the age of 40k.

I would never teach or play 40k with my kids
they may get into it later as I have enough armies at home for them, but there are better games out there to play with the kids

I made a rule set based on bolt action 2ed for use with my 40k minis and my kids; it’s awesome and fun to play. I thought about switching to 8th ed when it came out but I’m glad I didn’t. IMO the game has too many layers of rules combined with a slow tempo (caused primarily by the often mind numbing amount of dice being rolled and re rolled), somewhat counter intuitive rules, and games last too long to be great for kids. My youngest, whom I absolutely do not trust to not break every mini that comes within 2feet of the little tike, is the official puller of order dice and keeper of the round counter.

I actually enjoy 8th ed. 40k but I wouldn’t want to play it with kids.

They literally said that they only had a week to get everything ready. They also had an army caveat that the models had to be a cohesive force. (As a GK player I'd love to have a cohesive force so don't get me started.)
I agree that it's strange that they can't do Orks but maybe they only have 1 unit of each type of Ork and it just doesn't add to 4K.

dosiere wrote:

I made a rule set based on bolt action 2ed for use with my 40k minis and my kids; it’s awesome and fun to play. I thought about switching to 8th ed when it came out but I’m glad I didn’t. IMO the game has too many layers of rules combined with a slow tempo (caused primarily by the often mind numbing amount of dice being rolled and re rolled), somewhat counter intuitive rules, and games last too long to be great for kids. My youngest, whom I absolutely do not trust to not break every mini that comes within 2feet of the little tike, is the official puller of order dice and keeper of the round counter.

I actually enjoy 8th ed. 40k but I wouldn’t want to play it with kids.

It is definitely far from perfect, but it is also much more manageable than in previous editions. I would certainly be interested in a rule set such as you described, as the main draw for both myself and my son is the lore and fluff as opposed to the actual game play of 40k.

 Desubot wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:

Leo_the_Rat wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

I noticed they only picked some of the most competitive armies... where was the option for Orks?!

The explanation is on their facebook page. They claim that the only armies that studio has at 4K points are the 4 armies listed.

They're freaking GW and they don't even own 4k worth of Orks?! This says a lot... but really... it's the main gw studio... they could make 4k worth of any army in a week if they had too!

Studio painted and ready to go?

how many people do you think that would take to get it done in a week.

There is a good chance they cant use the display stuff in whw and studio stuff is from various book photo shoots which kinda make sense since smurfs are in a lot of those books, morty was recent, yanari i dunno maybe its leftovers from the craftworld codex. and nids are in everything.

dunno about orks in recent publications.

My mate painted 2k points pretty well in a week... i'm sure they could get 3 of their painters to work together and paint 4k orks. Get some big forge world stuff and a sto pa and that's half you points right there done in a day.

Nevertheless, they still didn't have 4k worth of orks already painted? I still stand by my case that this says a lot about gw... they just happen to have all the powerful poster boyz ready.... either that or they're lying.

Pretty sure in 1 of the pictures in index shows like a billion points... let me go check and calculate them.

 lolman1c wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:

Leo_the_Rat wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2018/03/13/help-us-choose-an-army/

I noticed they only picked some of the most competitive armies... where was the option for Orks?!

The explanation is on their facebook page. They claim that the only armies that studio has at 4K points are the 4 armies listed.

They're freaking GW and they don't even own 4k worth of Orks?! This says a lot... but really... it's the main gw studio... they could make 4k worth of any army in a week if they had too!

Studio painted and ready to go?

how many people do you think that would take to get it done in a week.

There is a good chance they cant use the display stuff in whw and studio stuff is from various book photo shoots which kinda make sense since smurfs are in a lot of those books, morty was recent, yanari i dunno maybe its leftovers from the craftworld codex. and nids are in everything.

dunno about orks in recent publications.

My mate painted 2k points pretty well in a week... i'm sure they could get 3 of their painters to work together and paint 4k orks. Get some big forge world stuff and a sto pa and that's half you points right there done in a day.

Nevertheless, they still didn't have 4k worth of orks already painted? I still stand by my case that this says a lot about gw... they just happen to have all the powerful poster boyz ready.... either that or they're lying.

Pretty sure in 1 of the pictures in index shows like a billion points... let me go check and calculate them.

But to their studio standard? They are representing their company. good enough isnt good enough. at least thats my take on it and what i would be concerned with if i was them.

Yeah its a bit weird that the orks arent available. its possible the studio army ran off to some other GW store or even possibly was sent to the warhammer cafe as a display we really dont know.

So this is just from 2 images in the index and I'm already on 4300+ points... so this doesn't even include all the separate units painted.

But to their studio standard?

4 guys painting 8-12 hours a day?
for sure they can

 kodos wrote:

But to their studio standard?

4 guys painting 8-12 hours a day?
for sure they can

On top of their own work.. probably not. good chance they are already well into whatever release is coming up next.

on top of that i highly doubt gw would want 2 ork armies sitting around.

my guess is still that it was sent out for some other project or location.

 kodos wrote:

But to their studio standard?

4 guys painting 8-12 hours a day?
for sure they can

Yes, but then those 4 guys aren't painting the new armies GW's cranking our for 8-12 hours a day . Allocation of resources.

Or someone could go to their Facebook page and ask them why no Orks and ask for a specific reason.

There's no guarantee of an answer or the answer may have to do with the fact that there is something going on with the Ork codex and that they don't want to give anything away.

I don't know and am purely speculating.

I've already seen like 3 people ask on the page. But no seriously... we all know the real reason is they don't want to show how embarrassingly unbalanced Orks are. XD

In other words they have like a 100k points worth of orks probably but don't want to play 4k points worth of boyz (or don't have 4k boyz)

Not sure what they get paid now but 2 or 3 years ago i had a friend who worked in the studio and got paid only min wage and worked super hard (he had cuts in his hands from building so much... but everyone was super huge fan boys who used to sit in the room and say they would work for free if they could. Not sure if it is still like that as he has not worked there for years but if it is then I'm sure those over worked underpaid painter could be whipped into making 4k troops in like 2 days.

 lolman1c wrote:
I've already seen like 3 people ask on the page. But no seriously... we all know the real reason is they don't want to show how embarrassingly unbalanced Orks are. XD

Possibly, it could also be that they're also required to play using models from the current model line, which may slow things up. I'd bet if you really dug around, they probably have thousands of points of Orks, but many of them are probably old, OOP models that they don't want to use in tournament. After all, whatever they play needs to showcase the current model line.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
I've already seen like 3 people ask on the page. But no seriously... we all know the real reason is they don't want to show how embarrassingly unbalanced Orks are. XD

Possibly, it could also be that they're also required to play using models from the current model line, which may slow things up. I'd bet if you really dug around, they probably have thousands of points of Orks, but many of them are probably old, OOP models that they don't want to use in tournament. After all, whatever they play needs to showcase the current model line.

Old OOP models? You mean the current line of models? This is why orks should be on the vote even more! It's laughable! They still sell the old 2nd edition models for full price! But not seriously... i'm up to like 6k points on the index. All fully modern new models.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
This was their reply to a fb comment asking for orks btw:

"Yo! It's genuinely is because the studio Ork army is not 4,000 points! No conspiracy theory here - that's the truth! We do love Orks too... trust us!"

Don't know if the kid believed them but I certainly don't!

Not convinced they could paint 4000 points in a week to studio standard unless they really cut down. Its a fair question whether say 300 boys all need to have three highlights and a good base, but I'd be surprised if they could get down to 30 minutes a boy and not look obviously bad. An hour seems more likely.

Thats 150-300 hours alone before you look at anything else.

Really though I can believe the studio doesn't have sufficient duplicates to do 4k and have an army that looks vaguely sensible.

 lolman1c wrote:
I've already seen like 3 people ask on the page. But no seriously... we all know the real reason is they don't want to show how embarrassingly unbalanced Orks are. XD

In other words they have like a 100k points worth of orks probably but don't want to play 4k points worth of boyz (or don't have 4k boyz)

Not sure what they get paid now but 2 or 3 years ago i had a friend who worked in the studio and got paid only min wage and worked super hard (he had cuts in his hands from building so much... but everyone was super huge fan boys who used to sit in the room and say they would work for free if they could. Not sure if it is still like that as he has not worked there for years but if it is then I'm sure those over worked underpaid painter could be whipped into making 4k troops in like 2 days.

That seems to be the GW business model - underpay people because they're getting to work at GW. I went for a writing job there a few years back and didn't get it but I did find out what the salary was and it was, quite frankly, pitiful. So low, in fact, that I wouldn't have accepted the job had it been offered (they don't tell you the salary until you get to the interview stage). Getting back to the original question, that definitely has an effect on the quality of work they produce. If you don't pay enough for professional standards you shouldn't expect them. Having said that, there have been similar discussions about design positions in other companies and it seems the industry as a whole relies on "the fanboy factor" when it comes to salaries. And yet other companies do a better job than GW on balance, so pay isn't the only factor in producing good rules. It's definitely a factor in retaining any good people you do manage to find though.

GW themselves are not going to take an Index army to a major tournament. Full stop.

Would be a completely ridiculous thing to do.

 Silentz wrote:
GW themselves are not going to take an Index army to a major tournament. Full stop.

Would be a completely ridiculous thing to do.

Then they should say that and not lie to us...

Why are You determined to be insulted about this. What army they take to AdeptiCon doesn't matter. It affects such a small group of people it shouldn't even register as a thing.

People are running out of things to be insulted about.

 Jidmah wrote:
People are running out of things to be insulted about.

Boy are YOU wrong!

I feel orks are underrepresented by GW. Would have been nice to have the option to vote for them or any other underrepresented army...(even though they would have never won). The fact they didn't even put up an illusion means they couldn't care less... it's not just this though... this is just another brick on the mountains of bricks...

I think you're overthinking this. The only reason for GW to send employees to attend am event as players is marketing.
Currently there is nothing to do for orks, so they are simply bringing an army that they think will represent the game they aim for well.
Getting tabled with whatever orks are seen in the dioramas or playing a 4k point green tide would not be good for marketing at all.

If they had put Orks as an option it would have been chosen by the community.

But really why would they take an Index army?

 Farseer_V2 wrote:
Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

As much as I despise ADB's retcons to even dumber retcons to fluff - I'd hardly call internal sales data GW must have 'headcanon'. His post also doesn't seem all that unreasonable, if the competitive players insist unit X is garbage yet unit Y is OP, but both sell about the same, then either their conclusions are plainly wrong, or are right but so insignificant in the grand scheme of things it's better to pay attention to guys who are buying unit X despite its weakness to figure out why there is demand for it.

 Xenomancers wrote:
Not being a total dunce is about all that is required to write legitimate/relevant rules.

The numbskull that decided to make an ultramarines stratagem that allows a unit to reroll 1's when standing next to a dreadnought is just asinine. Outside of Guilliman/Calgar how give even better buffs even a standard captain does reroll 1's. The same can be seen in the tau codex with countless methods to reroll 1's. These are examples of complete idiots writing rules. How dumb do you have to be to keep repeating the same rule over and over - and it's useless rule to boot.

Thanks for best possible proof writing rules based on dumb WAAC rants would be a hopeless endeavour.

That 'even a standard captain' can't be everywhere at once, can be sniped, or otherwise blocked from granting buff in a number of ways. Then, being able to buff your gunline from that venerable dreadnought (who also, I might add, has a much larger base so buff range) hanging out with them is sure an useless thing, eh? Redundancy, what's that?

I saw a lot of angry rants on everything GW does but whining they give players more options is really taking the cake...

 Jidmah wrote:
I think you're overthinking this. The only reason for GW to send employees to attend am event as players is marketing.
Currently there is nothing to do for orks, so they are simply bringing an army that they think will represent the game they aim for well.
Getting tabled with whatever orks are seen in the dioramas or playing a 4k point green tide would not be good for marketing at all.

Your probably right but its not going to stop people wanting to see GW get bogged down playing green tide or fall flat on their face playing anything else from the Ork faction in order to maybe a send the message that "This mess needs fixing". For the less cynical players I think seeing Orks on the tabletop would be a welcome relief from the overabundance of Eldar, Space Marine, and Chaos Space Marine content they keep shoveling out (not just kits but narrative, art, and marketing focus content).

 Vankraken wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
I think you're overthinking this. The only reason for GW to send employees to attend am event as players is marketing.
Currently there is nothing to do for orks, so they are simply bringing an army that they think will represent the game they aim for well.
Getting tabled with whatever orks are seen in the dioramas or playing a 4k point green tide would not be good for marketing at all.

Your probably right but its not going to stop people wanting to see GW get bogged down playing green tide or fall flat on their face playing anything else from the Ork faction in order to maybe a send the message that "This mess needs fixing". For the less cynical players I think seeing Orks on the tabletop would be a welcome relief from the overabundance of Eldar, Space Marine, and Chaos Space Marine content they keep shoveling out (not just kits but narrative, art, and marketing focus content).

You can't tell me that it's a coincidence that the only armies then own over 4K points are the top armies in tournaments?! Funny how IG isn't on that list though.... but that's probably because GW has big nerfs coming for them because they realised they actually made them good for once.

 Farseer_V2 wrote:
Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

Maybe, but with access to sales data he can see that "good" kits didn't outsell "bad" kits, which says a lot.

Edit...late to the party!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 lolman1c wrote:


You can't tell me that it's a coincidence that the only armies then own over 4K points are the top armies in tournaments?! Funny how IG isn't on that list though.... but that's probably because GW has big nerfs coming for them because they realised they actually made them good for once.

Who knows. It's all speculation for us anyway. There could be other reasons we're not privy to as to why those armies aren't available and they just didn't want to get into it.

 Irbis wrote:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:
Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

As much as I despise ADB's retcons to even dumber retcons to fluff - I'd hardly call internal sales data GW must have 'headcanon'. His post also doesn't seem all that unreasonable, if the competitive players insist unit X is garbage yet unit Y is OP, but both sell about the same, then either their conclusions are plainly wrong, or are right but so insignificant in the grand scheme of things it's better to pay attention to guys who are buying unit X despite its weakness to figure out why there is demand for it.

Sales data he wouldn't have had access to at any point? Sales data that is heavily skewed by their trade sales numbers? GW isn't a fantastic datametrics company at all, so I both doubt that information exists in any parse-able format and that ADB would have ever seen it (given that he never worked in accounting, trade, or manufacturing/forecasting).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:
Which makes it even funnier that he typed that because up until very recently GW has done 0 market research on its own customer base so has had no knowledge of the make-up of competitive vs. basement group players. So effectively he was (like nearly everything he writes) inserting his own headcannon into the situation.

Maybe, but with access to sales data he can see that "good" kits didn't outsell "bad" kits, which says a lot.

Edit...late to the party!

See above - ADB would have never been in a position to have access to that kind of information. Source - I worked for GW for 9 years in the Memphis facility in both a forecasting and manufacturing role.

 Irbis wrote:
His post also doesn't seem all that unreasonable, if the competitive players insist unit X is garbage yet unit Y is OP, but both sell about the same, then either their conclusions are plainly wrong, or are right but so insignificant in the grand scheme of things it's better to pay attention to guys who are buying unit X despite its weakness to figure out why there is demand for it.

You're overlooking the fact that this is a hobby with a significant painting and modeling component. For example, let's say competitive players say tactical squads are trash but sternguard squads are awesome. But yet tactical squad boxes continue to sell. It must be a case of the competitive players being wrong, right? Not necessarily. What if tactical squad sales are driven by people who love painting space marines? What if most of those tactical squad boxes are being used to represent sternguard on the table? What if lots of boxes of tactical marines are being sold to small children who are ignorant of the game beyond "SPACE MARINES ARE SO COOL MOMMY BUY ME ONE". Those sales don't contradict the idea that the tactical squad rules are bad and need to be fixed.

You're also overlooking things like third-party sales. A unit with powerful rules that can be represented by old models is going to be a big target for third-party sales. For example, people playing conscript hordes at the start of 8th probably didn't buy new boxes of guardsmen, most of them just ebayed the cheapest old models they could get their hands on. So conscripts may in fact be selling extremely well, but with GW only seeing a small part of that revenue.