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It also probably never helped that is first 40k book was the 5E SM codex, which was a huge book with all sorts of new stuff and some new fluff right after the tail end 4E "Austerity" books like Dark Angels and Chaos Space Marines, making it seem even more...extravagant, than it otherwise might have been, starting his reputation.

 Vaktathi wrote:
It also probably never helped that is first 40k book was the 5E SM codex, which was a huge book with all sorts of new stuff and some new fluff right after the tail end 4E "Austerity" books like Dark Angels and Chaos Space Marines, making it seem even more...extravagant, than it otherwise might have been, starting his reputation.

This nails it quite well.

 Fezman wrote:
Well, what I don't understand is why, by the logic of the anti-Ward set, no designer has had such a reaction in the past. Plenty of people like to moan about individual units like Vendettas and Heldrakes, or about how apparently the entire Tau book revolves around shooting you off the table without you having a chance to do anything about it, but I don't see the names Kelly, Cruddace or Vetock being used in the same way as Ward, i.e. as a catch-all shorthand for bad design.

I haven't read much about the other two's work, but I think bug players were ready to lynch Cruddace after the most recent bug dex was found to have so many rules that actually don't function. And that was not too long after the book came out too.

While people were already moaning about Ward getting to write "their" codices, the real hate started when the GK codex came out. Honestly, before all the death threats to him because of GK butchering SoB, Draigo carving is name into some uber-daemon, Paladins, Purifieres and Dread Knights, I didn't even know (or care) about who Matt Ward was.

 Lynata wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:There is a very big difference between C.S. Goto(an individual who wrote novels and had seemingly had no oversight beyond an editor reading the grammatical side of the book) versus Matthew Ward--an individual who is part of part of the Codex writing team. It has been known for quite a long time that the Codex/Army Book authors are not working in a vacuum. They get contributions from the other authors as well as their own contributions.

If you'd read the previous post carefully, you would see that I was talking about the "bandwagon" theory rather than how these people work.

And if you read my post, I think that you do not really understand why there was a "bandwagon" about C.S. Goto and his shenanigans.

The man went out of his way to make it very clear that he does not give one crap about 40k. He regarded it as a paycheck and that was it.

Ward is someone who started out interning at GW while Andy Chambers was still there and worked his way up the ladder to be where he is now. Now he's the target that people point to whenever they want to bitch about something that amounts to them not getting something they want in their own way.
We saw it just this week with a cartoon strip of stick figures of Robin Cruddace walking away from a "completed" Codex: Space Marines and Ward sneaking in to make changes to the Ultramarines.

Kanluwen wrote:To pretend that Ward "overstepped" the boundaries of what the neckbeards can deal with is stupid, considering that long before Ward ever started in the Design Studio you would find ridiculous nonsense in the codices/army books.

And yet it is only this author who is regarded as that controversial, so what is your theory for this phenomenon?

The "theory" is nerds trying to find someone to pin their hate on and internet anonymity.

Ward is one of the designers who receives a lot of spotlight time simply due to the fact that a large number of books--and rulesets!--have been done by him. When nerds get ranty, they pick a target and stick to it even if it has been shown time and time again that their target does not have as much control over whatever it is that they choose to focus in on.

Thanks for the condescending and insulting attitude, though.

If you think that is condescension, I do not know what to tell you.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
It also probably never helped that is first 40k book was the 5E SM codex, which was a huge book with all sorts of new stuff and some new fluff right after the tail end 4E "Austerity" books like Dark Angels and Chaos Space Marines, making it seem even more...extravagant, than it otherwise might have been, starting his reputation.

It also probably does not help that the 40k community is one of the whiniest bunch of people I have ever seen outside of the Warcraft forums following class balancing.

Why do we hate ward?

Same damn reason the reasonable people out there think most (some say all, and can argue it with evidence supporting them) of the codex writers at GW right now are morons.

Nobody_Holme wrote:
Why do we hate ward?

Same damn reason the reasonable people out there think most (some say all, and can argue it with evidence supporting them) of the codex writers at GW right now are morons.

So put out some reasons.

Show us exactly what the "reasonable people" think, enlighten us heathens who think that Ward actually is not a bad person at all--nor a "moron".

Hate Ward?
Strong words, disliking how he does his work.. yes.

Nutshell: Does not seem to approach things with a "big picture" in mind. How an army works as a whole, compare to others, "flavor" of the army or lore. He seems to pick one thing and run with it. Pick some choice units that he is all excited about, give them stat and lore love and muddle his way through the rest of the army.

I REALLY would like to see how much play testing is done and editor comparison of prior lore versus his new stuff.

Forget it, it is that huge grin he always has that has turned me on him. Like "I get paid for this!!!!"

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
It also probably never helped that is first 40k book was the 5E SM codex, which was a huge book with all sorts of new stuff and some new fluff right after the tail end 4E "Austerity" books like Dark Angels and Chaos Space Marines, making it seem even more...extravagant, than it otherwise might have been, starting his reputation.

It also probably does not help that the 40k community is one of the whiniest bunch of people I have ever seen outside of the Warcraft forums following class balancing.

Eh, not really any moreso than any other community with a dedicated following, especially those with expansive backgrounds. You should see Dr.Who fan conversations, Star Wars game forums, etc. 40k playerbases are surprisingly civil by comparison.

Best fluff ever written in the 40k universe is the Necron-Blood Angels bro fist event!

You can thank Matt Ward for that awesomeness that can barely be contained in the Blood Angels codex.

Kanluwen wrote:And if you read my post, I think that you do not really understand why there was a "bandwagon" about C.S. Goto and his shenanigans.

And if you read my post, I think that it should have been clear that it doesn't matter at all why there was a bandwagon for Goto, just that this phenomenon exists in the fanbase (you're even pointing it out yourself!), and that this is what connects both writers. That was the entire point of this comparison. Backgrounds are irrelevant here..

You can go on and complain about why these bandwagons are unfair, but that obviously doesn't change their existence.

Kanluwen wrote:The man went out of his way to make it very clear that he does not give one crap about 40k. He regarded it as a paycheck and that was it.

I think you should read a couple of his interviews, because you're portraying him in a rather unfair light right now.

Kanluwen wrote:The "theory" is nerds trying to find someone to pin their hate on and internet anonymity.

Because all these things clearly didn't exist before Matt Ward started writing codices.

I think Vaktathi provides a much better theory in that it was an issue of timing. Or rather, I now think it was a combination of several factors - the timing, as well as Mr. Ward's interpretation of the setting and how it affects the studio consensus. It could also be further aggravated by an evolving playerbase with changing expectations and a greater affinity to blow things our of proportion, as well as Mr. Ward not enjoying the same "status of veneration" that many of the older designers have - whose material was largely judged by a playerbase that did not have access to much in the way of social media. In this at least you may have a point regarding the factor of "internet anonymity".

Vaktathi wrote:Eh, not really any moreso than any other community with a dedicated following, especially those with expansive backgrounds. You should see Dr.Who fan conversations, Star Wars game forums, etc. 40k playerbases are surprisingly civil by comparison.

Bioware Social Network springs to mind. So much drama.

Let's not forget that "fan" comes from "fanatic". A certain amount of ... let's call it dedication is part of the job description.

I hate his idiotic 'rock/paper/scissors focused' design style as it simply revolves around constant one-upmanship and near-unwinnable match-ups.
Right now for example, if you're Daemon player in Fantasy and you come up against High Elves, if they have their moronic SkillBanner and you don't have a specific set of units to attempt to deal with it, there's 0 point in even playing the game.

He also tends to go overboard on rules and/or just comes across as wanting his latest rules to be +1 compared to the last guy's rules...
For example, one of the biggest complaints in Fantasy right now is the magic phase, mainly due to the infamous #6 spells which can delete entire units in one go. Or how if you compare the two, Blood Angels are really just a 'Codex Vanilla Marines +1' when it comes down to it.
Or just look at what happened to 7th ed Fantasy... HE's got army-wide ASF and then VC's got a rather obnoxious pts denial game, but both were overall manageable. Then Ward brought us Daemons of Chaos which turned the entire game on it's head so badly, that the next slew of books, DE's, WoC, Lizzies & Skaven were purposely made OP just so they could compete with Daemons! (though admittedly, Gav's DE's became the naughtiest army, but likely wouldn't have been quite so bad had Daemons not ramped things up to a "It's Over 9000!!!!" levels of OP'ness...)


Add to this his seemingly arrogant attitude towards the player base.
Such as the infamous answer he gave when questioned by Fantasy players why Daemons were so seemingly over-powered last edition, his reply was to basically shrug his shoulders and say, "well they're daemons - they should be overpowered."
Or how he let his own dislike of O&G's prominently show through in their book, which was so laughably bad that not only has it been hailed as the single weakest army book GW has ever produced, but was so bad even hardcore O&G players shelves their armies! (when greenskin players are shelving their army saying it's not fun, you know you f**ked-up big time!)

Sure the other authors have had their gaffs, but they at least come off as trying to listen to the player base and/or tend to apologise for putting out a substandard product.
Kelly for example has admitted that SW's wasn't his best effort and that he knows he could improve big time on it.
Cruddace admitted he's a huge IG nutter and that his personal bias likely filtered a bit too much into certain aspects of the codex.

Ward's attitude basically comes off as just telling us to 'suck it up & deal with it.'

I actually like his Necron Codex. They needed reworking.
There's a difference between internet whining and actual criticism. He deserves actual criticism for his fluff. He writes with the maturity of my 12 year old nephew. "Wow! My guy's the biggest and bestest! You can't beat him!" His GK codex was ridiculous and the fluff in it was so over the top, pants on head stupid that I don't know how he still has a job there. Many of the criticisms are very justified. His obvious favoritism and dislike of codexs he writes is unprofessional and should have been stopped. I'm an author and his fluff makes me cringe.

That said, I believe he might be getting better. I certainly hope so.

Because its the internet and we NEED a person we can complain about.

 MWHistorian wrote:
I actually like his Necron Codex. They needed reworking.
There's a difference between internet whining and actual criticism. He deserves actual criticism for his fluff. He writes with the maturity of my 12 year old nephew. "Wow! My guy's the biggest and bestest! You can't beat him!" His GK codex was ridiculous and the fluff in it was so over the top, pants on head stupid that I don't know how he still has a job there. Many of the criticisms are very justified. His obvious favoritism and dislike of codexs he writes is unprofessional and should have been stopped. I'm an author and his fluff makes me cringe.

That said, I believe he might be getting better. I certainly hope so.

Well, the recent Daemons & High Elf books kinda put a huge damper on that theory...

Experiment 626 wrote:

 MWHistorian wrote:
I actually like his Necron Codex. They needed reworking.
There's a difference between internet whining and actual criticism. He deserves actual criticism for his fluff. He writes with the maturity of my 12 year old nephew. "Wow! My guy's the biggest and bestest! You can't beat him!" His GK codex was ridiculous and the fluff in it was so over the top, pants on head stupid that I don't know how he still has a job there. Many of the criticisms are very justified. His obvious favoritism and dislike of codexs he writes is unprofessional and should have been stopped. I'm an author and his fluff makes me cringe.

That said, I believe he might be getting better. I certainly hope so.

Well, the recent Daemons & High Elf books kinda put a huge damper on that theory...

I didn't say it was a logical hope.

I like his rules, and believe he is currently one, if not the best writer on the GW team. However, his fluff is sub par and beyond poor. I chose to ignore it, as I believe should others. I also don't really understand the praise for Phil Kelly, who's Chaos codex was the pinnacle of disappointing, though his fluff is excellent. I do understand that Ward must of had some sort of fever or drug problem with Warhammer Armies: Daemons of Chaos.

He does have a cool voice though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HI47d9KDifs

 Lynata wrote:
Something not yet mentioned in this thread: Matt Ward also had his hand on the 5E SoB "Codex" with its horribly nerfed wargear selection and certain unappreciated changes to existing fluff.

I've heard it was Cruddance that did the rules, Ward was on fluff. And to be fair to the guy, while the Praxedes story was made worse, the rest of it is actually pretty good.

Troike wrote:I've heard it was Cruddance that did the rules, Ward was on fluff. And to be fair to the guy, while the Praxedes story was made worse, the rest of it is actually pretty good.

I dunno, the majority of the fluff was just a rehash of what was already there. The only really new stuff was the bits in the timeline, and those were largely "bland standard" with a few hits (the Seraphim that melta'd the Eldar Farseer's face) and misses (Praxedes). The San Leor incident had potential, but fails to deliver on account of missing detail.

Props for the Daemon World bit, though. I did like the idea of a bunch of Sisters descending onto a daemon-infested planet to search it for holy relics, fighting through mazes full of horrors and losing members left and right, then the few survivors make it out again and the Canoness is all satisfied and proud because "LO, WE HAVE RECOVERED A THIGH BONE OF SAINT WHATSHISNAME"
That's the kind of crazy I want to see from the Sisters.

... and then the Grey Knights are like "u done now? *nuke the planet*"

 Lynata wrote:
and the Canoness is all satisfied and proud because "LO, WE HAVE RECOVERED A THIGH BONE OF SAINT WHATSHISNAME"

Oi, they also got three pages from some holy book. Make no mistake, that raid was a major victory!

 Lynata wrote:
Seraphim that melta'd the Eldar Farseer's face) and misses (Praxedes).

Farseer gets shot with a bolt pistol, actually. Still awesome though, since it was a headshot and the Seraphim walked through torrents of psychic lightning to do it.

And let's not forget the team up with the Salamanders. Probably my favourite piece of fluff in the codex.

People hate ward because while his codexes are internally balanced, externally they are as unbalanced as an elephant against a baby on a seesaw

I play WHFB, and his daemons codex is the very first codex to break a game. If you haven't played fantasy during this time, you may think you have an idea of what this is like. Perhaps Gk or necrons, but better.

That is not even close.

You literally (and yes, I mean literally) could not beat a demons army no matter what you did with most armies. Dark elves, skaven, vampire counts...all just rolled over and died to them, and those were the strongest armies around.

GK and necrons were arguably the strongest codexes we had seen in a while in 40k. While people have had OP builds in 40k, (siren bomb, IW warriors, skimmer spam, fish of fury) this was the case for individual builds or a few units, and not nearly the entire army across the board. Even now, with the release of tau, Eldar, and chaos, necron's bakery is still held as the gold standard to this game.

In 5th, GK had a new topic every week that went on for 5+ pages about how broken they were.

His weak codexes aren't just slightly weak, they are crap. O&G went from a fun, if not top tier, army to a boring army that just auto piloted 1/3rd of the time, and not in a good way.


While other writers have duds and op codexes (CSM and wolves for Kelly, Nids and guard for cruddance) the pendulum simply doesn't swing that far for them. No other writer has flat out broke the game before, and hopefully no one will

I can sum it up pretty easily, this one line tells why people

hate him. "alone, and without aid" insert that line in several

of his Dexes, and that "alone, and without aid" is reason

enough.

He's also like a bull in a china shop when it comes to rules,

he likes to break them.

Mephiston, Draigo, Marneus, when they all came out were

broken for their time, as well as

THSS termies,

the Fantasy demons dex, and all the 5th ed GK

shenanigans you could do. Now, it's Crons,

any wonder why a Ward dex written with 6th edition in mind

is uber-powerful? Well, it's because he wrote it....

 Imposter101 wrote:
I like his rules, and believe he is currently one, if not the best writer on the GW team. However, his fluff is sub par and beyond poor. I chose to ignore it, as I believe should others. I also don't really understand the praise for Phil Kelly, who's Chaos codex was the pinnacle of disappointing, though his fluff is excellent. I do understand that Ward must of had some sort of fever or drug problem with Warhammer Armies: Daemons of Chaos.

Kelly's 'bad' books:
- 5th ed SW's for being OTT
- 6th ed CSM's which needs to be the same size as Codex Marines in all fairness...

Kelly's 'good' books:
- 4th ed Orks, still relevant & fun despite being two editions old
- 5th ed Dark Eldar likely the best balanced book of 5th, though somewhat undone by 6th ed changes
- 6th Chaos Daemons
- 6th Eldar
- 8th Vampire Counts is pretty much tied with Empire as being the top balanced books of Fantasy.


Ward's 'bad' books:
- 6th ed Wood Elves were obnoxious until 7th & 8th especially screwed them over
- 7th ed O&G's hailed as the 'weakest army of all time', even by the standards of Greenskin players!
- 7th ed Daemons of Chaos which simply broke the game... (they were blaitently OP and forced each subsequent book to be equally stupid)
- 5th ed Blood Angels which is really just 'Codex: Marines +1' in every way.
- 5th ed Grey Knights hailed as '7th ed Daemons of 40k'
- 8th ed Daemons of Chaos, aka 'the 7th ed O&Gs of 8th edition!'
- 8th ed High Elves which to Daemons players are simply 'Grey Knights all over again...'
- 6th ed Necrons who like to ignore half the basic game mechanics...

Ward's 'good' books:
- 5th ed Codex Marines which is right up there with Dark Eldar as one of the best books of 5th overall.
- 5th ed Necrons actually rather tame... at least until 6th hit, then, yeah...


I'd also give him props for writing the rules for the failed War of the Ring game though... mechanically it's probably one of GW's best written games ever... then he wrote the army lists and guess what?!
"Here we go again" is a phrase that springs to mind.

Seriously, unless you pretty much limit every army to just 0-1 named characters, the game is beyond unplayable thanks to all the stupid shenanigans you can easily get up to without even trying!
Imagine an Elf army that can gun down 3 Mumak's in a single turn? (and that's tame compared to the stunts you can pull with Ringwraith combos...)

Troike wrote:Farseer gets shot with a bolt pistol, actually. Still awesome though, since it was a headshot and the Seraphim walked through torrents of psychic lightning to do it.

My bad, thought it was an inferno pistol. It's been some time. Bolt pistol works just as nicely, though.

Troike wrote:And let's not forget the team up with the Salamanders. Probably my favourite piece of fluff in the codex.

Really? But Sisters teaming up with Marines isn't anything new. Plus that piece is heavily focused on Celestine, and whilst I like the idea of her legend, I kind of dislike seeing that character pushed to the front. Her presence practically makes the Sisters and the Marines seem like extras in some movie's background.

[edit] Of course, I suppose that does mean I'm somewhat biased against Celestine in the first place. She's no "proper" SoB and I have little appreciation for non-ambiguous miracles (you'd wonder how the Marines still think the Emperor isn't a god ), so perhaps I'm judging the material unfairly.

Experiment 626 wrote:
- 5th ed SW's for being OTT

Not sure about this. Fluff seems reasonable for what each codex backgrounds are: biased, almost propaganda. It seems like the appropriate mix of marines and Norse, and their fluff is ok. Although this seems like C:SM +1, more so than Blood Angels, that fact that you get terminators in tac squads, cheap longfang spam, the grey hunters being much, better, and cheaper than tac marines.

Experiment 626 wrote:
- 5th ed Blood Angels which is really just 'Codex: Marines +1' in every way.

Not really, just seems like Vampire marines with faster tanks. Basically the awesome points were shifted from the C:SM's good stuff and given to C:BA's good stuff. Space Wolves are 'C:SM +1'

Experiment 626 wrote:
- 6th ed Necrons who like to ignore half the basic game mechanics...

Not his doing, Its the transition from 5th to 6th that made the Newcrons OMG OP in the early 6th edition. Not sure if Ward had a big part in 6th edition's rules, but blaming him for 6th edition Newcrons as OP is absurd.

Experiment 626 wrote:
Ward's 'good' books:
- 5th ed Codex Marines which is right up there with Dark Eldar as one of the best books of 5th overall.
- 5th ed Necrons actually rather tame... at least until 6th hit, then, yeah...

I absolutely love the 5th Edition SM dex. And your point on 5th edition Newcrons, that's the new rules fault, not Ward's. I also liked the fluff in this one; the Zanhedrec (I don't know the correct spelling) story w/ Khan and Illiac seems silly, but in 40k, anything is possible really so I would'nt say its outside the realm of possibility.

 ace101 wrote:
Not sure about this. Fluff seems reasonable for what each codex backgrounds are: biased, almost propaganda. It seems like the appropriate mix of marines and Norse, and their fluff is ok. Although this seems like C:SM +1, more so than Blood Angels, that fact that you get terminators in tac squads, cheap longfang spam, the grey hunters being much, better, and cheaper than tac marines.

BA's are generally regarded as 'Codex: Marines +1' because they are by nature still a codex army with bells & whistles.
The comparison between Grey Hunters vs Tac marines is flawed at best since one is meant to be always be used as an aggressive unit more akin to CSM's, while the other is meant to be flexible and capable of doing anything.

A better comparison is how BA's get Assault Marines as Troops with the added cavet of gaining Meltas & Plasma guns AND a cheaper dedicated Transport that is a 'fast vehicle'.
Tactical Marines are utterly redundant because MSU Assault Marines in fast razorbacks do exactly the same things but far more efficient. All that needed doing to balance the situation would have been to leave off the Melta/Plasma options, which even Codex Marine Assault squads don't get to begin with!

Also things like BA's getting a 3W Chappy, the ability to take Apothecary equivalents as IC's to gain army-wide FnP, their best Predator variant being a Fast Attack choice for no real reason... Hence why most Vanilla Marine players ended up sticking to either Biker or Vulkan or Pedro lists or else just going with SW or BA 'counts as'.

 ace101 wrote:
Not his doing, Its the transition from 5th to 6th that made the Newcrons OMG OP in the early 6th edition. Not sure if Ward had a big part in 6th edition's rules, but blaming him for 6th edition Newcrons as OP is absurd.

Ward was one of the main authors for 6th ed. (Vetock being the other main writer)
It's almost a certainty that Ward was writing Necrons as 6th ed was being developed and would have been aware of a lot of the changes.

What's the old saying? "Where there's smoke there's fire"
Too many little co-incidences to think that Ward didn't have advanced knowledge of numerous changes.

As a LOTR player I have to say:sorry.We tried to control him and keep him busy with supplements but...He was good once but now he's a monster.

Kelly's 'bad' books:
- 5th ed SW's for being OTT
- 6th ed CSM's which needs to be the same size as Codex Marines in all fairness...

Kelly's 'good' books:
- 4th ed Orks, still relevant & fun despite being two editions old
- 5th ed Dark Eldar likely the best balanced book of 5th, though somewhat undone by 6th ed changes
- 6th Chaos Daemons
- 6th Eldar
- 8th Vampire Counts is pretty much tied with Empire as being the top balanced books of Fantasy.

How did you forget 4th edition Skimmerspam Eldar? The ones that would never die, can't die, and would beat most armies in a straight out fight.

I'm slightly amused this is coming up, since I've seen more people take pot shots at kelly in the past few months than I have at Ward.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Kelly's 'bad' books:
- 5th ed SW's for being OTT
- 6th ed CSM's which needs to be the same size as Codex Marines in all fairness...

Kelly's 'good' books:
- 4th ed Orks, still relevant & fun despite being two editions old
- 5th ed Dark Eldar likely the best balanced book of 5th, though somewhat undone by 6th ed changes
- 6th Chaos Daemons
- 6th Eldar
- 8th Vampire Counts is pretty much tied with Empire as being the top balanced books of Fantasy.

How did you forget 4th edition Skimmerspam Eldar? The ones that would never die, can't die, and would beat most armies in a straight out fight.

Interestingly enough we've returned to that paradigm, with 3+ cover save wave serpents and 2+ ignores-pen shields on AV12 skimmers

Though vehicles are so easy to kill now that few seem particularly perturbed about it