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Didn't see this posted as news or in Discussions, so...if this is a duplicate or old news I apologize.

Okay, I don't typically like starting threads, but I saw this posted on um...a certain website...okay fine, get the collective groan out of the way now: http://yesthetruthhurts.com/2012/07/another-one-bites-the-dust/

Stelek posted this a while ago and it kinda made me do a double-take. I'm quoting from the site in case you don't feel like reading it there, but just to make it clear, this isn't my rumor and I'm not trying to take credit for this at all:

I guess even Phil Kelly couldn’t survive the debacle that was Beastmen, Dreadfleet, the Dark Eldar…well, the list of failures is rather impressive really.

Or he just got tired of writing for GW, I dunno.

Maybe GW is just getting rid of everyone from the old school (so, Jervis is next?) and using the new kids on the block to write Codices is yet another cost cutting measure.

Who knows.

So, any truth to this? I’ve put a call in to GW UK but all I’ve gotten are no comments. =|

Stelek seems under the impression that Phil Kelly was either fired, let go, chose to move on, whatever you want to call it. Personally I find that kind of shocking because the guy's been around forever, even though I agree with Stelek and the comments below that his work wasn't exactly the best...the Dark Eldar codex in particular really pissed me off, I know that much. The entire line gets revamped, I waste hundreds collecting the new models because they look awesome, and I buy with relative confidence because I figure GW wouldn't be stupid enough to produce a gakky codex for them after investing so much money into overhauling the entire range...OOPS, turns out the new codex sucks and the only trick we have is venom spam, and now that 6th edition has hit DE as their own army are pretty much boned, better served as a mercenary force for another army instead, and mainly only because flyers are boss now.

I'd call that a pretty big failure (as well as Dreadfleet, never played it myself but I've not heard good things about it), but I didn't think it would be big enough for him to lose his job over. Anyone know if this is true?

Dark Eldar was a failure? I felt like it was one of the most successful and complete series of releases GW has done to date. Dreadfleet? That's arguable. It might not have sold out like they wanted but people genuinely seem to enjoy the game.

Maybe he got seduced by Mantic?

I wouldn't call DE a failure at all, at least in my are they sold like crazy and afaik that is the only criteria GW cares about.

Okay I have heard Stelek say that he has talked with Jervis. how he gets these people on the phone I don't know they GW don't do media(Yes even Blogs) of any kind and wont talk to anyone. So I wouldn't believe Stelek at all.

It must have been very recent as he was in some of the 6th edition videos put out by GW only a week ago.

Videos will have been recorded some time ago. The FAQs were weeks old, so it'll have been made ready for a while.

Didn't Mat Ward fail at 8th edition fantasy? You'd think that would be a bigger flop than dreadfleet.

This...worries me, as he supposedly wrote the new CSM book.

But until someone can provide a source that isn't hearsay from YTTH, I'm calling shenanigans.

The DE is a almost army. Stated that when it came out. Stand by the comment still. Could have been better however let us get one thing straight.

Games Workshop is a company that sells models. They are not a company that sells balanced codexes. When you understand that codexes(and rule systems) are now marketing rags that are made to sell certain particular models that the corporation has heavily invested R&D in (or are incredibly popular such as space marines), then you will understand why Codexes are built in a certain way.

Game designers in that company (I believe) are given orders by Marketing.

If Phil Kelly has been given the sack, I believe it is due to cost cutting revenue streaming measures, .

If not Eh go figure the source.

Adam LongWalker wrote:The DE is a almost army. Stated that when it came out. Stand by the comment still.

What? Explain this, please.

Perhaps Dark Eldar sales have fallen dramatically since their initial release? I have to agree with the above, the book is very poorly written. The fluff, in my opinion, is awful. The rules, especially in 6th, have left them pretty much in the same place they were since 3rd edition with a flying army of ranged weaponry with piss-poor assault options.

And Dreadfleets problem was it should have been man o' war, or a direct copy of BFG for fantasy with actual fleets and options. I played it once and just couldn't get into it. And I still own the original Man of War and still play BFG with friends.

Now that said, he was working with a pile of [censored] to begin with and maybe it was just too much for him to handle. Almost like they were setting him up to fail.

I don't think writers are evaluated on how "powerful" their codexes are/are not when an edition change comes out. I think they're evaluated on sales of the book and the accompanying line. Frankly, I don't think GW cares how "strong" the internet thinks any codex is.

I really really hope this is untrue, IMO Kelly is the best codex writer GW have at the moment (that doesn't mean that he makes the moset competitive however).

I don't know where you're getting the impression that DE was a failure from though, They are probably the most common non-imperial army I've seen in recent months (until people realise how hot 'Crons are in 6th at least )

I do have to disagree with the DE comments Sid. I found them to be a very strong army that did not need to stand on Venom Spam to work well. Maybe my meta couldn't adapt to them, but I found the book as a whole to be highly successful. It had a number of faults, but those were forced on us by the meta than anything else (WWP especially.) As the book came out in 09 I totally buy the fact that he had no inkling of what 6e was going to be like. And no amount of prep for that can allow you to consciously remove such an iconic unit from the book as Wyches just because in 3 years they're going to be terrible.

TL;DR The book was good, the 5e core rules were not what made VS required, but rather the meta, while the 6e core rules force us to go VS.

As far as Kelly's skills are concerned, well... Dreadfleet sold poorly (GW's fault) and Beastmen were terrible in an Edition where if you didn't write your book to be as potent as DE, VC, or CD, you were going to fail. Period. Beastmen are actually really good in 8e, but no one is giving them a chance. So much the better for those hard core Beastmen out there.

Dreadfleet was 100% GW's fault. From those who have played it I have heard it was really fun, but GW made a game that stood alone, only tangentally connected to their core games and incompatable with any of them. Not to mention it was all new and thus had no nostalgia factor for any older players. Better to reprint Spacehulk than that. Though, maybe GW didn't force him to create that mismatched fleet... no matter. No pre-advertising + no nostalgia draw equals dead game.

If true, good luck to Phil.

When do you ever believe anything by this guy? He is chronic at living and its his m.o. I would move on and ignore it.

If true, isn't GW down to Cruddace, Ward, some fantasy-only guy and whoever they recruited a few months ago?

Darkwynn wrote:When do you ever believe anything by this guy? He is chronic at living and its his m.o. I would move on and ignore it.

Agreed, the less Stelek BS the better! Annoyed there was even a link to his blog here.

Isn't he listed as one of the guests for Games Day Chicago?! And that's what, in only a few weeks time or so?
Guess that'll be the proof as to how true this rumor is...

Cerebrium wrote:

Adam LongWalker wrote:The DE is a almost army. Stated that when it came out. Stand by the comment still.

What? Explain this, please.

I own 5000 points of DE. Played all combinations with that army. If there was one fatal flaw it is the modification of the WWB rules in the recent codex. Crippling that one aspect to me nullified that army as a true tier one army that would kick the crap out any other tier one army if played to its meta. Yes you can win with it. Even in tournaments. But when I go to a hard core tournament that involves lots of money. I take my Space Wolves, or GK henchmen army instead as I know I have a better chance against those other hard core players.

Bty how did you like 6th and what they did to these two armies in question? These armies that I still use are still in tact that I have been using playing in 6th ED.

And will the Ally rules are even more brutal than before.

With my DE army, it has been mostly shelved and only played in casual games now. I sort of miss it though I understand what GW is doing now.

Cerebrium wrote:This...worries me, as he supposedly wrote the new CSM book.

But until someone can provide a source that isn't hearsay from YTTH, I'm calling shenanigans.

Hence this thread. Obviously I'm not just taking Stelek's word for it, but chances are whoever told him has probably told others so that's what I'm trying to find out, because this is interesting news to me. I thought Phil Kelly, kinda like Jervis, was one of those guys that was practically "untouchable", so if he got gak-canned I find that highly amusing. If it's true then GW is desperate to save money and no one is safe anymore.

I didn't know that he was the one who supposedly wrote CSM, though. I'm sure my brother probably won't find that news very comforting...he's losing interest in 40k and banking on the new Chaos codex to be pretty damn amazing to keep his interest.

This was posted on "whats new today" on the GW site yesterday, stating Phil will be doing talks at the open day on the 14th. So I doubt they'd schedule that if they were letting him go.

So far as Dreadfleet goes, I'm very much in agreement with Jake Thornton's (he of Necromunda and Mordheim for GW, now author of excellent neo-Space Hulk Project Pandora for Mantic) assessment: it is actually the worst game GW have ever released. I certainly wish Phil Kelly no personal ill-will (despite occasional remarks about defenestrating him for 15pt Grey Hunters), but if ever a piece of work was likely to end a man's career, it was Dreadfleet, a terrible game with no audience.

Jake on Dreadfleet: worse than Trolls in the Pantry!

In addition, I seriously doubt GW would take a call from a random person to confirm that someone has been fired...

Kirasu wrote:

Darkwynn wrote:When do you ever believe anything by this guy? He is chronic at living and its his m.o. I would move on and ignore it.

Agreed, the less Stelek BS the better! Annoyed there was even a link to his blog here.

Oh, I think you'll live. I quoted the relevant bit in my post anyway so you didn't need to navigate there if you didn't want to.

I only did it because I thought it was an interesting rumor, one that kinda just came out of nowhere, and since I don't browse many forums other than Dakka I was curious to see if anyone more "reputable" knew anything about it. If he's still set to appear at Games Day Chicago then I dunno, he could be "retiring" or something and not necessarily getting canned, who knows.

SoloFalcon1138 wrote:In addition, I seriously doubt GW would take a call from a random person to confirm that someone has been fired...

Yeah, I thought that was weird, too...

I doubt it is true to be honest - the Games Day seminar jobby posted above seems to confirm he is around.

However, I did notice he doesn't feature in any of the pictures of cheery GW employees playing 40K in the new rulebook - that job seems to have been given almost exclusively to Mat Ward and Adam Troke.

It would be like GW to fire their only decent writer (codex SW notwithstanding..) and keep their terrible ones (YMMV, feel free to disagree, but lets not turn it into a Ward vs Kelly flamewar )


I don't see him getting canned. Quitting over GW's moronic decisions, or over 'creative differences', maybe..

English Assassin wrote:Jake on Dreadfleet: worse than Trolls in the Pantry!

Ha, I saw that some time ago, thought it was a funny review. "Worst ever", damn that's harsh. I read several reviews that said pretty much the same exact thing...even the whole "drained and demoralized" part, funnily enough. "Random to the point of farce" seems to be a GW thing though...my biggest problem with WHF, and one of my worst fears about 40k 6th (which I've still yet to see if that's fully come true or not).

Ascalam wrote:It would be like GW to fire their only decent writer (codex SW notwithstanding..) and keep their terrible ones (YMMV, feel free to disagree, but lets not turn it into a Ward vs Kelly flamewar )

Depending on who you ask it's Codex: Space Wolves that's probably his better work, and the others that are terrible in comparison. Ward in my opinion is decent at writing rules (though Grey Knights, not so much...), it's mainly Ward fluff that I don't like. That and some of the naming conventions for his codices aren't too creative, infamous Blood Angels wargear coming to mind.

Ascalam wrote:I don't see him getting canned. Quitting over GW's moronic decisions, or over 'creative differences', maybe..

I could see that. If Dreadfleet was his baby he could probably be upset with GW that it turned into kind of a flop...though if the rules and gameplay are as good as I've heard it's not entirely their fault.

GW needs to stop putting rules AND fluff on the back of one writer. I mean it is no wonder why the codexes are all gacked up.

filbert wrote:However, I did notice he doesn't feature in any of the pictures of cheery GW employees playing 40K in the new rulebook - that job seems to have been given almost exclusively to Mat Ward and Adam Troke.

Hey, Matt Ward had to make pocket change to finance his next codex somehow...

SickSix wrote:GW needs to stop putting rules AND fluff on the back of one writer. I mean it is no wonder why the codexes are all gacked up.

They need to do what WoTC does, and build a multiyear plan complete with intensive and extensive testing to make sure things balance out.

Or ya know, continue to do what they always have done.

WarOne wrote:They need to do what WoTC does, and build a multiyear plan complete with intensive and extensive testing to make sure things balance out.

Or ya know, continue to do what they always have done.

...I think I'd prefer the former.