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So, we all know that 8th is strongly rumoured to drop Q2 2017 and best guess is that it will be less complex than it is right now, but more complex than AoS.

What is interesting me at this point, though, is what route GW will go down with regards to what and how they publish?

The current AoS format can be summarised as:

Campaign books (including original big book) - Core rules, Fluff, Unit Stats, Formations, Scenarios
5x Books and counting...
Grand Alliance books - Core Rules, Unit Stats, Formations
4x Books (assumed to be getting revised on a regular basis, but may be dropped in favour of Battletomes)
Battletomes - Core Rules, Fluff, Unit Stats, Formations, Scenarios
60x Books (eventually assuming all factions get one)
General's Handbook - Core Rules, Optional Rules, Points, Scenarios
1x Book (with rumours of a supplement or possible revision)

The current 40k format can be summarised as:

BRB - Core Rules, Fluff, Scenarios
1x Book
Rules Supplements - Optional Rules, Scenarios
6x Books (being reduced to 4)
Codices - Fluff, Unit Stats, Formations, Points
22 Books (with nothing currently published for SoB, Inquisition or Assassins)
Codex Supplements - Fluff, Unit Stats, Formations, Points
6x Books
Campaign Books - Optional Rules, Fluff, Formations, Scenarios
Lost count, at least 8 with some OOP...


Both of these have one huge problem - BLOAT. To stay across all the rules to play the game with just one army requires a number of books with rules, formations and points scattered across them. 40k has an additional problem - BALANCE. AoS needs to change one book to fix over/undercosted units, 40 needs to potentially change 28 or more...


I believe GW will probably use a very similar model to AoS for the 40k release but is this the best option? If I was CEO for the day I would do the following:

The Rules: 1 Book containing all the core and optional rules (Core rules available as free download)
The Fluff: 1 Book comprising the fluff sections of the BRB and all codices
The Codices: 9 Books* similar to the AoS GA books with unit stats and basic fluff
General's Handbook: 1 Book containing army selection rules, formations, points and a revised allies chart
Campaign Books: 2 Books/Year, focusing on different armies each time

*Imperium (IG, Ad Mech, Knights); Astartes (all flavours); Inquisition (Inquisitors, Assassins, GK, SoB, DW); Eldar (Craftworld, Exodites, Harlies, DEldar); Chaos (Legions, Renegades, Daemons); Tyranids (Nids & GSC); Tau Empire (Tau, Kroot, Vespid, Gue'Vesa, Demiurg); Orks; Necrons

This would mean a new player would need only a free download and the relevant codex to start playing and the 40k General's Handbook for points.


What do you think GW will actually do, and what's your dream scenario??

I'm a huge fan of AoS, both for the rules simplicity with twists and the way GW engaged the rules.
For AoS, you really only need to buy 1 book for point-based games. Every other needed rules are free. The rest of the books are compilations (Grand Alliance books) or campaigns/scenarios/fluff/formations (campaign books and Battletomes).

For the 40k 8th edition, I think this is the way to go. Even with simplification, 40k will probably have more than 4 rule pages, so I think free core rules are out of the question. But if GW slims it down to a small book and includes it in the Start Collecting! boxes or something similiar? Additionally, make an annual book like the General's Handbook with points, scenarios, campaign rules, etc.
Get rid of the codexes, easier to fix things on the go and make the unit rules free. I really only bought the last SM codex because of the updated profiles and points. The fluff, I have read several times before, artwork was mostly recycled. I don't need something like this again every few years.

I would like to see a proper living ruleset but I don't believe they'd ever take a step that big.

Publish the books on A4 paper, hole punched, codexes etc have three parts - rules, fluff and pictures, they come with a hard cover wrap round with the summary sheets on the inside.

Sell ring binders, maybe use three hole just to be awkward - also sell dividers, build your rule book over time.

Or have a subscription service for e-rules for tablets as an option

You forgot about all the digital publishing GW has done with 7th.

I mean, there is an entire digital eBook dedicated to Bolters!

Dream scenario? One rulebook containing core rules, scenarios, variant formats, et cetera. Nine large faction books (Guard, Marines, minor Imperial armies, Chaos, Eldar, Necrons, Tau, Tyranids, Orks) containing multiple army lists each. Further expansions released as campaign books with content for multiple armies at once, variant lists updated at the same time.

Likely scenario? Exactly what we've got now.

Dream Scenario?

They release 8th Edition with brand new updated Codex books for all factions on the same day. No errata stop-gaps, no FAQ bodging to get by. Everything becomes 8th at the same time.

Wish-upon-a-star fairyland lala dream scenario?

Forgeworld release updated 8th edition rules for all their stuff within 1 year of release of 8th. Actual books I mean, not Errata.

Loopstah wrote:
Dream Scenario?

They release 8th Edition with brand new updated Codex books for all factions on the same day. No errata stop-gaps, no FAQ bodging to get by. Everything becomes 8th at the same time.

Wish-upon-a-star fairyland lala dream scenario?

Forgeworld release updated 8th edition rules for all their stuff within 1 year of release of 8th. Actual books I mean, not Errata.

They did it for AoS, it's a possibility

Have an option of a 30-50 USD core rule book. Then whatever else sets of rule books and fluffs they want as well, but don't limit us to buying either a kit with unwanted models in it to get the mini book or make us buy the 80-100 USD book set.

I'm hoping for something akin to AoS. It's infinitely accessible, and the key a good game is getting a good core of players playing it. The more who can play the better for the game.

People will still buy codices and rule books as they clearly do for AoS, so it shouldn't need to be that much different than things are now deep down.

You all do realize that Warhammer Fantasy was a dying game with less yearly sales than 40K Tactical Marine box sets ?

They could get away with scrapping Warhammer Fantasy because no one was buying it. 40K on the other hand much more successful and would alienate a much larger portion of the active customer base if they hard rebooted the rules.

 adamsouza wrote:
You all do realize that Warhammer Fantasy was a dying game with less yearly sales than 40K Tactical Marine box sets ?

They could get away with scrapping Warhammer Fantasy because no one was buying it. 40K on the other hand much more successful and would alienate a much larger portion of the active customer base if they hard rebooted the rules.

The problem is without rebooting the rules and the codex's you are going to have the same issue as before.

If you think rebooting will eliminate that, you are mistaken, as it will simply generate different problems. GW Staff are not wizards every edition has interactions that cause problems.

Invalidating 25+ codexes is a problem.
The dumbed down abridged lists they would give us, until new codexes could be released would be a problem.
The imbalance between armies that had a proper codex and those using an abridged list, would be a problem.
The changes between the abridged lists and the proper codex would be a problem.
There would still be something that would be better than something else, and it would be a problem.
Space Marines and Eldar would still be better than most of the other armies, because they have always been.

It makes ZERO sense to hard reboot 40K with 8th edition. The only people it would please are the people who abandoned 40K years ago, but still like to complain about it online.

So we leave problems as is and keep everything going full speed ahead? Because clearly they keep adding, adding, adding new rules ontop of things that were fine before.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
So we leave problems as is and keep everything going full speed ahead? Because clearly they keep adding, adding, adding new rules ontop of things that were fine before.

You mean like they have been doing for the past 25 years and past 4 editions ?

There has never been a perfect edition of 40K. There will likely never be a perfect edition of 40K. Scrapping everything on the hope they will be get everything right is overly optimistic at best.

 adamsouza wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
So we leave problems as is and keep everything going full speed ahead? Because clearly they keep adding, adding, adding new rules ontop of things that were fine before.

You mean like they have been doing for the past 25 years and past 4 editions ?

There has never been a perfect edition of 40K. There will likely never be a perfect edition of 40K. Scrapping everything on the hope they will be get everything right is overly optimistic at best.

They completely rebooted the game for 3rd edition, and 5th edition came pretty close towards being one of the best editions. Aside from Codex Balance of course, but certain editions had some major issues with the rules, 4th edition's skimmers and easy ability to trash transports and entire units inside them, 3rd editions ability to ping pong one's powerful assault unit throughout the enemy's entire army without them once taking a turn..

5th edition and 3rd after all the Chapter Approved articles were published were my favorite editions. I play 7th on rare occasions now with a couple guys and we always keep the comp level pretty tame. (No Lords of War, Forge World, Flyers, Fortifications, and using a single detachment)

Starting with 6th and into 7th editions, the gloves came off for what you can do and it basically brought Apocalypse games down to the 40k level. Most people want a hard re-boot of the system, because the game isn't designed with tournaments in mind anymore and it's up to the community to keep the army comp under control.

What I think you'll see with 8th edition isn't a hard re-boot like AoS, but instead a set of streamlined rules like the AoS General's Handbook that will have structure for 40k players to play at different levels. I think you'll see a tournament format for detachments, a narrative format for formations, and an unbound format for people who just want to bring whatever they want. I really think that set type of structure is what the community has really been wanting.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
So we leave problems as is and keep everything going full speed ahead? Because clearly they keep adding, adding, adding new rules ontop of things that were fine before.

You mean like they have been doing for the past 25 years and past 4 editions ?

There has never been a perfect edition of 40K. There will likely never be a perfect edition of 40K. Scrapping everything on the hope they will be get everything right is overly optimistic at best.

They completely rebooted the game for 3rd edition, and 5th edition came pretty close towards being one of the best editions. Aside from Codex Balance of course, but certain editions had some major issues with the rules, 4th edition's skimmers and easy ability to trash transports and entire units inside them, 3rd editions ability to ping pong one's powerful assault unit throughout the enemy's entire army without them once taking a turn..

You are kind of making my point here. You think 5th was the best, but the last reboot gave us 3rd. Stream lined or not, 8th edition is going to include all the things 6th and 7th added (flyers, super heavies, formation, etc...)

 adamsouza wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
So we leave problems as is and keep everything going full speed ahead? Because clearly they keep adding, adding, adding new rules ontop of things that were fine before.

You mean like they have been doing for the past 25 years and past 4 editions ?

There has never been a perfect edition of 40K. There will likely never be a perfect edition of 40K. Scrapping everything on the hope they will be get everything right is overly optimistic at best.

They completely rebooted the game for 3rd edition, and 5th edition came pretty close towards being one of the best editions. Aside from Codex Balance of course, but certain editions had some major issues with the rules, 4th edition's skimmers and easy ability to trash transports and entire units inside them, 3rd editions ability to ping pong one's powerful assault unit throughout the enemy's entire army without them once taking a turn..

You are kind of making my point here. You think 5th was the best, but the last reboot gave us 3rd. Stream lined or not, 8th edition is going to include all the things 6th and 7th added (flyers, super heavies, formation, etc...)

I'm not one of those who dislikes any measure of those, but I believe we could do away with Psychic Phase or a serious change that doesn't make it have all the flaws from Warhammer Fantasy's magic system at least.

And Although it took rebooting to get to 5th, after-all 2nd edition had far more rules that were cut as a result of being far more skirmish oriented, sometimes it takes a bit of trimming down so that one can get to a proper position to do things, the problem being that they won't so I know it's futile.

 General Kroll wrote:
I'm hoping for something akin to AoS. It's infinitely accessible, and the key a good game is getting a good core of players playing it. The more who can play the better for the game.

People will still buy codices and rule books as they clearly do for AoS, so it shouldn't need to be that much different than things are now deep down.

For me this would mean stop spending money on GW products outside of ebay for some painting project. On a definitive way.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 General Kroll wrote:
I'm hoping for something akin to AoS. It's infinitely accessible, and the key a good game is getting a good core of players playing it. The more who can play the better for the game.

People will still buy codices and rule books as they clearly do for AoS, so it shouldn't need to be that much different than things are now deep down.

For me this would mean stop spending money on GW products outside of ebay for some painting project. On a definitive way.

What, simply because they moved the way the published the rules to a free model where you can download pdfs of unit and army rules you'd stop buying their products?

Are you in the printers union or something?

I wasn't suggesting they mirror the ruleset of AoS, this topic is about how those rules are delivered to us the users, not the rules themselves.

No one is suggesting that they scrap the rules like they did for AOS they are suggesting that the publishing methodology used by AOS(which is infinitely superior). A single book for points/rules that can be updated yearly for balance and then a couple of big codexes for the main factions maybe 10 total books.

 General Kroll wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 General Kroll wrote:
I'm hoping for something akin to AoS. It's infinitely accessible, and the key a good game is getting a good core of players playing it. The more who can play the better for the game.

People will still buy codices and rule books as they clearly do for AoS, so it shouldn't need to be that much different than things are now deep down.

For me this would mean stop spending money on GW products outside of ebay for some painting project. On a definitive way.

What, simply because they moved the way the published the rules to a free model where you can download pdfs of unit and army rules you'd stop buying their products?

Are you in the printers union or something?

I wasn't suggesting they mirror the ruleset of AoS, this topic is about how those rules are delivered to us the users, not the rules themselves.

YOU GOT ME *shakes fist*

I misunderstood you, I thought you meant "like AoS" in a different way. It was my fault in extrapolating the wrong context. My apologies.

Still, I hope not free rules written like they did (moustaches rules and so on).

Other then condensing 20+ codexes into 10 new ones, I don't see how this is any different than any other edition of 40K.

I would need to buy codexes all over again for the stats, and then consult a BRB everytime for points values ?

How is this superior, to anyone other than GW's sales dept ?

 adamsouza wrote:
Other then condensing 20+ codexes into 10 new ones, I don't see how this is any different than any other edition of 40K.

I would need to buy codexes all over again for the stats, and then consult a BRB everytime for points values ?

How is this superior, to anyone other than GW's sales dept ?

Because AoS puts the units stats online with extra stuff within the Battletomes. (Extra spells, formations, some new artifacts)

 adamsouza wrote:
Other then condensing 20+ codexes into 10 new ones, I don't see how this is any different than any other edition of 40K.

I would need to buy codexes all over again for the stats, and then consult a BRB everytime for points values ?

How is this superior, to anyone other than GW's sales dept ?

Because no one ever consults their codex for points anyway so don't give me that and THEY COULD UPDATE ALL POINTS FOR EVERY FACTION EVERY YEAR! Come on, how great would it be to have all of 40k get a balance tuning at the same time! Sure CSM might not get any new models or wargear or anything meaningful outside of one psyker formation and 1 new model for years, but hot damn the new generals handbook dropped everything in the codex except for sorcerers 10-15%. We can't keep the system they have now of 'well we'll do like 4 codexes every 2 years and and the first 4 we do will be completely useless to the next 4 and some factions can just go screw themselves and deal with 4th ed point costing until their model sales dry up enough that we can just drop the whole line altogether.

Used to be, when a new rulebook dropped, we got summary stats for the units in the back, so you had an idea of what changed. I think that stopped with 6th.

I *hope* they drop a slimmed down "fast-play" ruleset for free to urge folks to try it out. It would be nice if they dropped free quick-converted army rules for the existing codexes (I mean, you still have to have the models...) - it would at least get all the armies more or less off on the same foot.

They could then produce printed books for the armies as they got feedback on the initial rules.

And for God's sake, I wish they'd put together cards with the unit stats - drop a lot of the unneeded options, build each unit one of two ways (card for each direction) and move on with that.

I guess the problem of making a fully balanced system is np-hard. Like finding a minimal through all 1100 cities of the US.

Since I found AoS to be rather entertaining, I wouldn't mind if they go the route of AoSification. As it is, 40k is unplayable at a global scale.

You're whole theory of this being a superior method is contingent on GW regualrly updating the points, by churning out new editions and core rulebooks, based solely on AoS getting a single core ruelbook, which has never been, and may never be, updated.

They could just as easily print new codexes, with updated rules regulary, only invalidating a single codex at a time, instead of curb stomping every single codex in a fell swoop.