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 godardc wrote:
Maybe they are casual because, you know, 40k IS a casual game ?
I never understood why some people try to play it "competitively", when the only interests of this game are the miniatures and the background, and then complaint because it is "unbalanced".

There's a big difference between casual and shoddy rules. You're mixing the two up.


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 BBAP wrote:
The core rules are as competent as they always were. The supplementary materials are as inconsistent as ever, except they're now far more numerous and include Forgeworld nonsense as well as everything else. Expect to pay upwards of £300 for a full set of game rules including the rules for all the armies, plus all the other game-legal gak. I'm not convinced Codex creep is an issue, since the top armies (Eldar, Tau, Daemons) are all using relatively old Codexes.

In terms of character I think the fatigue and disinterest in GW creative is starting to show. They're defaulting to Spess Mehrens a lot more than they used to; they've always been the stars of the setting, but now they seem to have gone from hyper-competent elites to the backbone of the Imperium's military. it sucks.

Forgeworld: "if you really want to win you can pay 4 times as much $$$ for units that are more powerful in every way." Forgeworld is the most obvious pay to win scheme ever.

 GreaterGood? wrote:
So, a close friend of mine just started 40k, he tells me he's been watching GW for a while, and they have made vast improvements over the last year, in terms of more customer friendly policies, and better balance. I'm highly skeptical, GW was Riding the nuke down waving their cowboy hat when I last checked. Has anything actually changed?

i hear the CEO was replaced by an actual gamer, and that balance is better, and that GW has acknowledged thier problems and are starting to correct them, bringing back tournaments, etc.. Is this all wishful thinking? Is balance still decided by dart board and codex creep? Do they still intentionally churn and burn new customers just to get cash? Still invalidate armies and army options in order to force you to buy new versions? etc?

Is there any hope?

Who's on top balance wise? Are there any actual tactics to the game now? or still just throw buckets of dice with shooting and hope to go first?

If they have made improvements, what have they- are they doing?

Policies are better, balance is worse. If you're just building a new force, buy and paint till 8th.

So, do they still prohibit other companies from selling their products online? Is Finecast still a thing? Do people still need to houserule what you can and cannot play in tournaments?

It sounds like they are still the GW I remember. Especially if a new edition is coming, and they haven't actually made any public announcements or apologies.

7th edition predates Roundtree, it falling apart into the convoluted mess it is now predates him as well. It is not reasonable to expect anything GW had spent so much time doing to just stop, change or switch tac the moment he came to power, it has a bit of a turning radius.

I don't believe I've heard he was a gamer before... but we do know Roundtree has a marketing background and that that much has been reflected in the changes we've seen in GW since he came to power:

Before: Webstore exclusive bundles that cost the same as the model boxes bought separately. The 'deal' being they put them in one spot for you.
Now: New bundles with different unit combinations with price differences that are easy for store staff to illustrate to a customer. (Typically in a "And you effectively get those guys on that part of the picture for free!" sort of way)

Before: Reacting to alienation of the consumer base by cutting off avenues of contact. Not releasing FAQs, avoiding social media presence, allegedly not doing market research at all.
Now: Actively promoting their products outside of the existing consumer base, communicating to their fanbase via social media and backing it up by initiating an FAQ collection campaign and following through. They set the community on fire by making a funny little video of a guy hiding in a garbage bin saying he'd found plastic sisters of battle inside.

Before: generally disregarding the tabletop games and the manner in which they were developing. Famously captured in the claim that the hobby was 'buying Games Workshop models'
Now: Actively engaging in the development of the games driving the model range and the hobby, thus far, between the general's handbook, the 40k-ish way they handle relics in faction books, and overall the content of those books, it's clear they're trying to take corrective action on AoS and give it the legs it needs to last, while on the 40k side they're riding out the bloated mess of 7th edition with a big campaign event - to what end, who knows...

Broadly, I would say yeah, GW has gotten better, in a distinct and measurable way. It's not great, but it is getting better,and I attribute that to Roundtree.


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 GreaterGood? wrote:
So, do they still prohibit other companies from selling their products online?

No idea, probably?

 GreaterGood? wrote:
Is Finecast still a thing?

Yes and no, they've gotten better at it, but they've recognized that the Finecast brand was a disaster and only call it resin now, they don't seem to be making new models for it anymore, and high-profile ones like the Tau commander were completely redone in plastic.

 GreaterGood? wrote:
Do people still need to houserule what you can and cannot play in tournaments?

They always have and always will. We do have a huge collection of general and faction specific rule corrections though.

Some things are better. Some are the same. Some are worse. Different people will have different opinions on each item.

Online prohibition? Yes. Unless you buy something on eBay or Amazon, then you can totally buy them online. Or you can buy something online from several more stores, if you're willing to use email and paypal. So, no, they don't prohibit people from online sales. Except they do.

Finecast? Nothing new is coming out in Finecast, but there are still Finecast kits. It's considerably better than it used to be, about on par with Forge World, but Forge World isn't all that stellar either. So, I don't know, maybe Finecast is a thing? (Oh, one exception. The new Sister of Battle model, Canoness Veridyan, came out as a resin kit, not metal or plastic.)

Yes, there are still additional rules for 40k in tournaments. Then again, when I played in an Infinity tournament it had special rules. Magic: The Gathering has several sets of tournament-specific rule additions. I think the Blood Bowl tournament I had a few special rules.

So, really, it depends on what 'the same' means to you. Or 'better'. There are still plenty of people that will never get their undies untwisted about Games Workshop. Some people never stopped liking them. I had gotten fed up with them, but I'm mostly okay with them now. That said, I'm not a terribly competitive or cut-throat player and I have more hobby money than hobby time, so the switch from 'Kinda dicks' to 'Mostly friendly' is about all that it took to bring me back.

 GreaterGood? wrote:
So, a close friend of mine just started 40k, he tells me he's been watching GW for a while, and they have made vast improvements over the last year, in terms of more customer friendly policies, and better balance. I'm highly skeptical, GW was Riding the nuke down waving their cowboy hat when I last checked. Has anything actually changed?

i hear the CEO was replaced by an actual gamer, and that balance is better, and that GW has acknowledged thier problems and are starting to correct them, bringing back tournaments, etc.. Is this all wishful thinking? Is balance still decided by dart board and codex creep? Do they still intentionally churn and burn new customers just to get cash? Still invalidate armies and army options in order to force you to buy new versions? etc?

Is there any hope?

Who's on top balance wise? Are there any actual tactics to the game now? or still just throw buckets of dice with shooting and hope to go first?

If they have made improvements, what have they- are they doing?

In terms of balance the game is dramatically worse in 7E, probably worse than ever. Every tournament is having to run a mini-rulebook of changes, houserules, FAQ, etc that wasn't anywhere near as necessary in older editions. Everything from Titans dripping with D weaponry to armies of Eldar summoning Slaanesh Daemons allied with Orks are perfectly legal and far worse, and its every bit the mess it would seem.

We'll see for 8E, but no, 7E is a mess that takes all of the issues you quit over and has ramped them up to 11.

My big concern regarding houserules is that I want to play the same game regardless of who i'm playing with, or what store I happen to go to. I got real sick of playing joes version of 40k on friday, and then bob's version at the saturday tournament.

For reference I left for a game that can be played that way, warmachine. If a game can't be played competitively I have literally zero interest in it. There are too many good, fun well balanced mini's games on the market right now for me to settle. I'll play guildball, or warmachine, or xwing, etc.

I just wanted to check in since I haven't heard anything in over 4 years, and my friend is convinced that everything has changed. I even went halfsies with him on the Killteam box... I'm already regretting that.. I looks liek I need to go out and buy the tau codex to actually play is that right? That seems fairly typical of GW too me.


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 Vaktathi wrote:
In terms of balance the game is dramatically worse in 7E, probably worse than ever. Every tournament is having to run a mini-rulebook of changes, houserules, FAQ, etc that wasn't anywhere near as necessary in older editions. Everything from Titans dripping with D weaponry to armies of Eldar summoning Slaanesh Daemons allied with Orks are perfectly legal and far worse, and its every bit the mess it would seem.

We'll see for 8E, but no, 7E is a mess that takes all of the issues you quit over and has ramped them up to 11.

Thanks, that's sad to hear actually.. Maybe one day GW will become a game company again.

Are they still treating the shops and distributors like the enemy?

 GreaterGood? wrote:
My big concern regarding houserules is that I want to play the same game regardless of who i'm playing with, or what store I happen to go to. I got real sick of playing joes version of 40k on friday, and then bob's version at the saturday tournament.

For reference I left for a game that can be played that way, warmachine. If a game can't be played competitively I have literally zero interest in it. There are too many good, fun well balanced mini's games on the market right now for me to settle. I'll play guildball, or warmachine, or xwing, etc.

I just wanted to check in since I haven't heard anything in over 4 years, and my friend is convinced that everything has changed. I even went halfsies with him on the Killteam box... I'm already regretting that.. I looks liek I need to go out and buy the tau codex to actually play is that right? That seems fairly typical of GW too me.


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 Vaktathi wrote:
In terms of balance the game is dramatically worse in 7E, probably worse than ever. Every tournament is having to run a mini-rulebook of changes, houserules, FAQ, etc that wasn't anywhere near as necessary in older editions. Everything from Titans dripping with D weaponry to armies of Eldar summoning Slaanesh Daemons allied with Orks are perfectly legal and far worse, and its every bit the mess it would seem.

We'll see for 8E, but no, 7E is a mess that takes all of the issues you quit over and has ramped them up to 11.

Thanks, that's sad to hear actually.. Maybe one day GW will become a game company again.

Essentially they don't see themselves as a game company, the see themselves as a company that makes high end models for hobby enthusiasts, not a game development studio, and they say as much in their yearly shareholder reports. They're in it for making expensive models, not for making games.

Literally 7 of us started recently, having never played 40k before. It was 6, we just recruited another friend.

1. You can get started for cheap. Get started boxes can be obtained on amazon or ebay for half of the retail price. So, for $40 (not including model tools like cutters/paint/glue) you can get a roughly 500 point army in pretty much any faction. Or, if you wanted 2 armies you could buy dark vengeance, and it comes with a rulebook. This is also cheap. Most of the "get started" or "battleforce" boxes end up saving you a LOT of money if you were to buy things individually. Additionally there are other ways to acquire units for cheap that aren't a force or an army. Two of us recently split "faith and heresy" because I wanted a stormtalon and the other wanted the helldrake. We saved a good $30 and that's paying games workshop retail.

2. There will always be imbalances in any game. After doing some research I found a way to create a nigh-invincible captain for very cheap, which would be a fantastic human shield for my most powerful units. I'm not running it. Why? Because that's broken. Just because something is broken doesn't mean you should use it. Do you have people you like, that you can play with, where playing is more important than winning? That right there means the balance doesn't matter.

3. There's a lot of supplements. We're ignoring most of them. Angels of Death? Nah. BRB + base codex is enough to play; and if you know the rules well enough you don't even need a BRB, although you can get it for like $30 as an ebook. I use my ipad as my BRB. You do need to buy a codex though, although they're not exactly hard to find.

4. If you're a competitive, tournament style player, and you want a totally balanced game, learn chess, and bring painted miniatures as the chess pieces. 40k is not balanced, and it never will be. There will *always* be a most efficient way to spend your points. That is the nature of these games. Generally games like these are only as good as the people you play with, anyway.

5. Ignore the general attitude of hopeless negativism. You will read about problems on here that you'll probably never experience.

Cheers!

 Marmatag wrote:

2. There will always be imbalances in any game. After doing some research I found a way to create a nigh-invincible captain for very cheap, which would be a fantastic human shield for my most powerful units. I'm not running it. Why? Because that's broken. Just because something is broken doesn't mean you should use it. Do you have people you like, that you can play with, where playing is more important than winning? That right there means the balance doesn't matter.

Thank you for your response. Really, It's very helpful. This statement is what I had come to expect from 40k players. It's fine you guys want to play a game that you need to self correct the rules of. I don't. I want to take any legal option and have it be fine to play with or against anyone. The people I play with are more important than any game, but since I'm playing a game it has to meet certain basic standards. Sounds like nothing about 40k or the the expectations of the community have really changed.

If I'm playing with someone and they start complaining to me about how broken something is, it means one of two things. We're playing a bad game, or they are being a sore loser. I avoid the sore losers, and I don't play bad games.

While there are imbalances in any game, good games have a very close ratio of balance between different factions. One army will better at one thing, but worse at another, and then you exploit that weakness.

I'm not a fluffy casual gamer, never have been, never will be. I do thank you for your advice though, it tells me a lot about how things are probably the same as when I left.

Well, yes, if you play with a small like minded group of people who run with a large array of house rules and restrictions (implicit or explicit), the game can work. But then, you're also playing your own version of 40k at that point.

If you don't have such a group, and rely more on pickup games or your group just has a much wider array of personalities into different things or the only gaming you can get in is store leagues and tournaments or play in many different places and locations, then it doesn't work. It never worked perfectly for these things, but it's a whole lot worse if you have to deal with these things than it used to be in say, 4E or 5E.

 GreaterGood? wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:

2. There will always be imbalances in any game. After doing some research I found a way to create a nigh-invincible captain for very cheap, which would be a fantastic human shield for my most powerful units. I'm not running it. Why? Because that's broken. Just because something is broken doesn't mean you should use it. Do you have people you like, that you can play with, where playing is more important than winning? That right there means the balance doesn't matter.

Thank you for your response. Really, It's very helpful. This statement is what I had come to expect from 40k players. It's fine you guys want to play a game that you need to self correct the rules of. I don't. I want to take any legal option and have it be fine to play with or against anyone. The people I play with are more important than any game, but since I'm playing a game it has to meet certain basic standards. Sounds like nothing about 40k or the the expectations of the community have really changed.

If I'm playing with someone and they start complaining to me about how broken something is, it means one of two things. We're playing a bad game, or they are being a sore loser. I avoid the sore losers, and I don't play bad games.

While there are imbalances in any game, good games have a very close ratio of balance between different factions. One army will better at one thing, but worse at another, and then you exploit that weakness.

I'm not a fluffy casual gamer, never have been, never will be. I do thank you for your advice though, it tells me a lot about how things are probably the same as when I left.

Well, glad I could help.

Hope you find a good game for you!

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, yes, if you play with a small like minded group of people who run with a large array of house rules and restrictions (implicit or explicit), the game can work. But then, you're also playing your own version of 40k at that point.

If you don't have such a group, and rely more on pickup games or your group just has a much wider array of personalities into different things or the only gaming you can get in is store leagues and tournaments or play in many different places and locations, then it doesn't work. It never worked perfectly for these things, but it's a whole lot worse if you have to deal with these things than it used to be in say, 4E or 5E.

This makes total sense. I can't imagine showing up to a tournament and having a guy sitting there across from me with 5 books and 2 supplements with an army that's been cheesed to the max.

And for reference the captain i mentioned would have required the angels of death supplement, and i'm fairly certain that's not ITC legal anyway.

If i was going to sponsor a tournament will a small store credit prize, i'd make it base codex + BRB only, no forgeworld, 1000 points, with a 250 point side board. There's still some broken or imbalanced stuff, but it's much more difficult to be broken at 1000 points with those restrictions.

 Brutallica wrote:
Im a an old 5th ed player.

I quit i 5th, because my space wolves sucked ass, and i got wrecked hard usually... I just lost interest, i had no options and i couldnt play the units/models i liked because they were point waste.

Now i can take units i like, and then add in some: allies, formation, detachment, forgeworld. To make up for my Terminator spam (wich sucks nowadays)

I dont play hard, i play so both can have a game, and IF players have the mindset for that...Then its a GREAT game. If they like to win win win and you dont share view of the game... Well, then its a piece of gak game, and might aswell go elsewere. I have nice freinds and family to play against. So i love it

I read that correctly? Space Wolves sucked? I thought they were top tier army in 5th edition.


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GreaterGood? wrote:So, do they still prohibit other companies from selling their products online? Is Finecast still a thing? Do people still need to houserule what you can and cannot play in tournaments?

It sounds like they are still the GW I remember. Especially if a new edition is coming, and they haven't actually made any public announcements or apologies.

It has actually gotten worse 2 years ago with the restrictions that GW did. Mind you that was under Kirby's regime. I don't recall with the new CEO Kevin Roundtree changing it, so they are still in effect. Maybe game store owners can comment if it has gotten better or not.

Fenrir Kitsune wrote:Are they still treating the shops and distributors like the enemy?

Said it above. I believe so.

Marmatag wrote:5. Ignore the general attitude of hopeless negativism. You will read about problems on here that you'll probably never experience.

Yes ignore the stuff that he is asking for, we say it's still around but ignore us because we are being negative? I still buy GW products. How am I being negative? We are not being negative. We are telling the truth. Yes GW has done a lot of good, but when it comes to it, money, rules, balance and GW attitude, there is nothing being negative here. I don't think anyone in this thread is being negative and saying anything false.

Just because you think differently than us, don't say we are being negative. We are not. Just telling the truth. I guess the truth hurts eh? Please don't give false hope when this is not what he wants.

Davor wrote:

Marmatag wrote:5. Ignore the general attitude of hopeless negativism. You will read about problems on here that you'll probably never experience.

Yes ignore the stuff that he is asking for, we say it's still around but ignore us because we are being negative? I still buy GW products. How am I being negative? We are not being negative. We are telling the truth. Yes GW has done a lot of good, but when it comes to it, money, rules, balance and GW attitude, there is nothing being negative here. I don't think anyone in this thread is being negative and saying anything false.

Just because you think differently than us, don't say we are being negative. We are not. Just telling the truth. I guess the truth hurts eh? Please don't give false hope when this is not what he wants.

I was referring to comments made outside this thread, such as "the game is dying," or "just compare lists and decide the winner."

I respect your opinion and everyone else who values a competitive landscape. While I do believe you can achieve that in 40k, it's just not there as low hanging fruit. You'll notice I acknowledge in a follow up that the game is most likely not for him.

 Marmatag wrote:
I was referring to comments made outside this thread, such as "the game is dying," or "just compare lists and decide the winner."

I respect your opinion and everyone else who values a competitive landscape. While I do believe you can achieve that in 40k, it's just not there as low hanging fruit. You'll notice I acknowledge in a follow up that the game is most likely not for him.

My apologies, I missed the part where you said it wasn't for him. I do agree, while 40K is a huge mess, with the right people or play group 40K can still be fun.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 BBAP wrote:
The core rules are as competent as they always were.

With the current rules, is easier to Snipe with a Mortar than with a Sniper Rifle.

So what? It's easier to kill a huge tank in CC than it is with shooting. Unrealistic doesn't mean bad.

Also, Salvo. Psychic Phase.

Don't see a problem with Salvo myself. The increased prominence of psykers is also horses for courses; I don't mind it, partly because there are counters and partly because it's random.

Random rolls everywhere.

Charge and Run distances, Warlord traits, psychic powers and Warp dice pools are the only random rolls in the core rules. Move distance rolls I could live without but they hardly ruin the game, Warlord traits are irrelevant 90% of the time, and the psychic stuff being random is fine.

Davor wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
I was referring to comments made outside this thread, such as "the game is dying," or "just compare lists and decide the winner."

I respect your opinion and everyone else who values a competitive landscape. While I do believe you can achieve that in 40k, it's just not there as low hanging fruit. You'll notice I acknowledge in a follow up that the game is most likely not for him.

My apologies, I missed the part where you said it wasn't for him. I do agree, while 40K is a huge mess, with the right people or play group 40K can still be fun.

Cheers mate! same page here i think

 BBAP wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 BBAP wrote:
The core rules are as competent as they always were.

With the current rules, is easier to Snipe with a Mortar than with a Sniper Rifle.

So what? It's easier to kill a huge tank in CC than it is with shooting. Unrealistic doesn't mean bad.

Hrm, in most of these cases however, they are bad, particularly as many of these kinds of things are unintentional by byproducts of other mechanics (such as mortars attempting to represent a blast landing around a unit as opposed to direct fire coming from a specific direction).

I know this goes against the competitive landscape, but I like psychic powers being random.

You have tools in your bag that you might not always take. It is built in variance. If you could pick them, wouldn't you get tired of seeing invisibility, gate, etc every game?

Marmatag wrote:I know this goes against the competitive landscape, but I like psychic powers being random.

You have tools in your bag that you might not always take. It is built in variance. If you could pick them, wouldn't you get tired of seeing invisibility, gate, etc every game?

While I agree, another side of me, disagrees. For me, it's another reason why to get rid of allies then. Reason we had bad units in a codex was to compensate for the great units in a codex. Now we can just cherry pick what units you want. If going this way, we should go all out then. We should be able to choose our psychic powers as well.

Too many dice rolls and way to many random rolls in the game. For me it's not adding fun at all.

 Marmatag wrote:
I know this goes against the competitive landscape, but I like psychic powers being random.

You have tools in your bag that you might not always take. It is built in variance. If you could pick them, wouldn't you get tired of seeing invisibility, gate, etc every game?

The issue here is not the variety of the tools but their usefulness. If better balance was designed into the abilities you wouldn't always see the same ones being used. So to compensate for sub-par rules, GW makes it 'fair' by forcing a random element.

Which is lousy game design.

From a balance perspective there are 7 competitive factions, which is more than I remember at any time in the past. Power creep peaked at Tau and eldar (late 2015 early 2016), and with new factions (death watch and GSC) being more in line with the general 40k population. The best gauge as to how you will feel about this editions balance scheme will depend on how you feel about formations, with the people that think this edition is the worst firmly in the Hate camp.

The rules are in a rough spot, as rules bloat has made the game ponderous, even more than usual. I saw a quote I believe that said the FAQ for the main 40K rulebook has more pages than there are pages of rules in the entire warmachine rule book.

 Marmatag wrote:
I know this goes against the competitive landscape, but I like psychic powers being random.

You have tools in your bag that you might not always take. It is built in variance. If you could pick them, wouldn't you get tired of seeing invisibility, gate, etc every game?

If different abilities were actually thoughtfully developed to be worth taking, you wouldn't have to get tired of invisibility and gate, since they wouldn't be the only ones people actually sought to use.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Hrm, in most of these cases however, they are bad, particularly as many of these kinds of things are unintentional by byproducts of other mechanics (such as mortars attempting to represent a blast landing around a unit as opposed to direct fire coming from a specific direction).

I agree it's a pretty egregious case of unrealistic representation, which is bad for immersion, but its overall effect on game balance and flow is nil. Mortars aren't suddenly awesome because you can snipe with them, and sniper rifles aren't suddenly useless because they're not as good at sniping as mortars are.

 BBAP wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Hrm, in most of these cases however, they are bad, particularly as many of these kinds of things are unintentional by byproducts of other mechanics (such as mortars attempting to represent a blast landing around a unit as opposed to direct fire coming from a specific direction).

I agree it's a pretty egregious case of unrealistic representation, which is bad for immersion, but its overall effect on game balance and flow is nil. Mortars aren't suddenly awesome because you can snipe with them, and sniper rifles aren't suddenly useless because they're not as good at sniping as mortars are.

In those examples, sure, the issues are pretty minimal and I'd take sniper rifles over mortars most of the time, but when we get into things like Wyverns, Thunderfire Cannons, Thudd Guns, artillery batteries, etc vs entire squads of snipers, the issues become very noticeable indeed, which kinda dovetails into the whole scale issue 40k has going on as well.

I actually think MOST Forgeworld isn't too bad. But things like the Tau Super Suits or Eldar Anything are of course broken. But none of my Necron stuff is, and you don't see anyone running most Forgeworld stuff but when I do run into it, it's almost always the most broken things.

 Vaktathi wrote:
In those examples, sure, the issues are pretty minimal and I'd take sniper rifles over mortars most of the time, but when we get into things like Wyverns, Thunderfire Cannons, Thudd Guns, artillery batteries, etc vs entire squads of snipers, the issues become very noticeable indeed, which kinda dovetails into the whole scale issue 40k has going on as well.

... but again, the overall effect on the game system is negligible. Nobody's complaining about OP Wyverns sniping their characters or lamenting the obsolescence of snipers.

FireSkullz2 wrote:
I actually think MOST Forgeworld isn't too bad. But things like the Tau Super Suits or Eldar Anything are of course broken. But none of my Necron stuff is, and you don't see anyone running most Forgeworld stuff but when I do run into it, it's almost always the most broken things.

Most of the Forgeworld stuff I've seen isn't broken. Almost all of it was designed by a prurient fanboy munchkin trying to wishlist up the most "ossom" unit ever. They're largely noobhammers - but the thing about noobhammers is they're very powerful when people aren't prepared to face them or don't know what they can do, which brings us to the real problem I have with Forgeworld stuff in the core game. It costs something like 250 quid to buy all the supplementary FW materials, which you need to do if you want to get a handle on how FW units operate. If you don't, then someone can drop a FW unit on you and smash you with it purely because you've never seen it before, and now the gak is game-legal there's nothing you can do about it except refuse to play against that person in the first place. Given that so few people play this game, turning down challenges to avoid ass-pull bs seems like a bad place to be at.

The anti-consumer GW policies GW ran (under Kirby) all peaked with the killing of warhammer fantasy and the introduction of Age of Sigmar. They basically had us all play and pay a couple hundred dollars for a campaign where the plot advanced and characters were dying left and right. Then they murdered the whole world and everybody in it. The more hopeful among us thought that we'd get to play slightly before the world ended even though it had. Then after months later with teasers of 'age of sigmar' with 'it's coming!' we thought this was 9th edition. Turns out they were about to screw us over in the most insane way possible alienating a whole bunch of Fantasy players and treating us as bad guys. Considering the 2 armies that died even with Roundtree turning things around i have trouble seeing this game as being more popular than Fantasy. I think the end result of the death of Fantasy and rise of AoS saw Kirby being canned. You can tell just how bad it was with that event alone.

Now did roundtree turn things around with this? Not for Fantasy players. We still can't play Warhammer Fantasy in their stores. They won't allow it anymore in a lot of them. I heard it's up to the store manager and of the 2 stores in my state the local one says no. Dunno what the other store owner says but i don't want to go out that far just to find out with the local one being a few minutes away.

Honestly most of the GW complaints to me were peanuts until they killed our game and released AoS instead which at the time compared to children's humor and just garbage. It was specifically a 40k player's game and most Fantasy players left. Roundtree at least added basic rules to the game (4 page rules are you kidding) and added some semblance of order but i still can't stand it. I tried it and was disgusted with it. Fantasy wasn't perfect in 8th and was too complicated but it's not our fault GW don't know how to make games and products anymore.

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Now honestly i'm sorta hopeful but only a bit. They brought back blood bowl and specialist games as well as some new sisters of battle models. He even added the General's Handbook for AoS to add a semblance of balance to the game whereas before there was no points system and only a "don't be a ****" as the one balancing rule as if that ever stopped people in 40k or Fantasy. Sure the prices are nuts but at least they're listening more to the customer base.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Essentially they don't see themselves as a game company, the see themselves as a company that makes high end models for hobby enthusiasts, not a game development studio, and they say as much in their yearly shareholder reports. They're in it for making expensive models, not for making games.

I've never understood this logic. Its entirely in Games Workshop's best interest to make the rules for the tabletop as balanced/competitive as possible, yet they keep acting as if it has no impact on sales. Perhaps my inner circle and community isn't indicative of the 40k community at large but the power creep has gotten so out of control that pickup games are basically impossible at this point. 1/2 the armies aren't even viable in a competitive format. Point cost disparities between codices have been ignored entirely while there has been a push towards "formations" which have not resolved any of the balance issues but in most cases have made them worse.

I've said this for years but...I don't understand why they can't just hire an outside gaming company or elite players within the community and come up with a balanced/competitive ruleset. I'm not talking about AoSing 40k, but just going through the main rulebook eliminating redundancy/bloat and then going through every single codex, creating some sort of formula for point costs and then plugging in every unit into said formula to determine what everything should cost.