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While commenting on another thread I made a joke about GW's relentless exploitation of its back catalogue, which is funny because I've been in the hobby for about 25 years, right sort of at the nadir of stripping 40k down to the core. This was 3rd edition, which had cut squats and GSC from the game entirely, cut harlequins from Eldar, made psychic powers unit specific abilities, and greatly simplified the game. Some things have changed, as all of those armies and more are back, while others have swung back and forth, as psychic powers exploded back into complexity before once again, in 10th, being datasheet abilities.

Still, what's really, really amazing is that after the last few years, with the return of Old World and Hellsmiths of Heshut, there really isn't much left that GW hasn't brought back. I remember when Kid Kyoto would make his predictions for new starter boxes in past editions "squats vs. GSC" and while that wont' happen, it could happen now, which is wild.

Squats: back, with a full army range.
Genestealer Cult: amazing models, cool play style, full army
Harelequins: really only sat out one edition as they came back in the 4th edition codex, but have been a playable army on their own off and on for a decade
Ad Mech: never really fleshed out in the past, they're a full army now. Stuff only sketched out in Codex Imperialis has plastic kits
Chaos Dwarfs: back!
Brettonians" back
Tomb Kings" back

WFB: back, with new units and a whole new army
Bloodbowl: back with all plastic teams
Necromunda: back, with plastic gangs, terrain, and vehicles
Epic: sort of back
LOTR: still going, with new plastics being released
Warhammer Quest: back many times, including in SPACE

Going through the old 2004 citadel catalog on Stuff of Legends, this is the stuff that's not made or playable now:
Battlefleet Gothic
Mordheim
Warmaster
WFB Dogs of War
WFB Kislev
Inquisitor

Of that list, it seems inevitable that Old World gets Kislev, and the Renegade Crowns rules do allow for a DOW style list. But, if we're being strict, DOW are the only army in a GW main game that had an army book/codex and now has neither models nor rules in any game.

Inquisitor and Warmaster were both flops, although both have dedicated fanbases keeping them alive. People love the rules of warmaster, and the.. vibe (?) of inquisitor. I wouldn't hold my breath on either.

BFG is a game in the most cursed of genres: spaceship combat. I think even GW isn't sure if they can make this one work.

Mordheim is probably the most popular, likely to be successful game that GW hasn't rereleased. So, we'll see!

I think that if you went back to say, 2009, when nearly everything on this list was long gone, it would be shocking. OTOH, if you also told me in 2009 that the last really original 40k army would be the Tau, I'd also be surprised. AOS had a more intersting run early on, with armies like Kharadron and Idoneth really exploring some of the weirder new aspects of the world. I feel like even AOS has gone back to a steady diet of member-berries. They've tried some brand new games, with only kill team being a major success and even Kill Team now being mostly 40k squads instead of the more bespoke stuff we saw earlier on. Warcry (a great game, btw) never caught on and Underworlds continues to put out amazing sculpts for a game I haven't seen played in 8 years.

So.. what's left for them to dig up? GW has plenty of armies in both major games to update (Orks, Dark Eldar, Ogors, non-human cities) or expand (EC, WE, 1k Sons, Harlies, Custodes, Fireslayers, Orruks, OBR). There are also still some ancient kits rattling around, including a bunch that are old enough to rent a car: chaos bikers, Catachans, Vyper, Falcon, gutter Runners, and amazingly, the basic landraider and rhino. But what from the vaults do you think GW can still put out?

Man O' War, for one thing. A traditional version of Warhammer Quest, for another.

The Chaos Toilet, for sure.

How could you forget Space Hulk?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Polonius wrote:
BFG is a game in the most cursed of genres: spaceship combat. I think even GW isn't sure if they can make this one work.

DropFleet Commander is doing OK, but that's technically orbital combat rather than pure spaceship combat (although some people do play pure spaceship combat). My concern with BFG is they'd go 30k and have everyone using the same ships (and excluding Xenos).

Dysartes wrote:Man O' War, for one thing. A traditional version of Warhammer Quest, for another.

okay, spaceship combat is the second most cursed genre after regular naval combat. It would be really cool to see an AOS version though, since they're so much more high fantasy.

And I'm trying to avoid "no true Scotsman" style exclusions. You might not like the product, but you can walk into a GW right now and buy a box of warhammer quest!

beast_gts wrote:How could you forget Space Hulk?

The OG came out before I came into the hobby, so it's one that I tend to forget. Prior to the recent shift in board game economics, it was the most obvious candidate for an evergreen box to sell in mass market board game stores.

 Polonius wrote:
BFG is a game in the most cursed of genres: spaceship combat. I think even GW isn't sure if they can make this one work.

DropFleet Commander is doing OK, but that's technically orbital combat rather than pure spaceship combat (although some people do play pure spaceship combat). My concern with BFG is they'd go 30k and have everyone using the same ships (and excluding Xenos).

I’m not 100% sure if GW own it, but Dark Future is a possibility. However I’m aware whilst niche, there are alternatives. And given Dark Future itself is something of a GW Oddity, it may simply be too high risk to try to see how deep that niche goes.

But they certainly are making solid use of their 50 years of history as a company.

For my money? AoS has a more interesting background potential than The Old World. Not just because it’s new and crafted to be expandable, but because we know so little about the preceding Age of Myth and Age of Chaos.

Horus Heresy has gone from a literal page filler to two popular games and who knows how many books.

40K? OK, I preferred it as just a setting as opposed to the ongoing grand narrative. But part of that is said grand narrative not really getting the attention it deserves. I mean, The Lion returned, partially reunited The Fallen and then…nowt, rien, zilch, sod all. The Pariah Nexus, a warp calmed region of space occurred and then….nowt, rien, zilch, sod all. The Ynarri? New Eldar God on the brew, just coming up to a steady soul simmer before boiling over and the …nowt, rien, zilch, sod all.

That needs addressing. These things are happening, but apparently have no impact. That doesn’t sit right with me. I’m not asking for it to become a sequel setting in terms of shake ups. Just…follow through better. Weave it into the narrative.

They’ve proven they can do that with the Leagues of Votann, who dovetailed pretty damned seamlessly for an reimagined but otherwise all new galactic power.

Going forward?

The Lost and the Damned, i.e. the overwhelming majority of Chaos forces really needs to be explored and brought to the table top as a functional, stand alone army in its own right. GSC show such a ragtag force can work, just needs adaptation to prevent GSC Just With Spikes In Different Places.

Perhaps give us an ongoing campaign per edition of the game. Granted it’s not always organic when it’s everyone, and some don’t really have much reason to be there (for instance, Tau farting around in the Pariah Nexus).

On the upside? They’ve widened options on how you can cause mayhem and big death thanks to Kill Team and Combat Patrol. Certainly if I was to return to 40K in a meaningful way? I think I’d go Kill Team.

Also? FFS GIVE US PROPER PROPER EPIC. I love LI. Well, as I’m still to get a game in (very much a me, not a community issue there) I love the LI Models.

But to explore war on that scale in modern 40K’s galaxy would be a joy,

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Horus Heresy has gone from a literal page filler to two popular games

And also Legions Imperialis

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Going forward?

The Lost and the Damned, i.e. the overwhelming majority of Chaos forces really needs to be explored and brought to the table top as a functional, stand alone army in its own right. GSC show such a ragtag force can work, just needs adaptation to prevent GSC Just With Spikes In Different Places.

Perhaps give us an ongoing campaign per edition of the game. Granted it’s not always organic when it’s everyone, and some don’t really have much reason to be there (for instance, Tau farting around in the Pariah Nexus).

On the upside? They’ve widened options on how you can cause mayhem and big death thanks to Kill Team and Combat Patrol. Certainly if I was to return to 40K in a meaningful way? I think I’d go Kill Team.

Also? FFS GIVE US PROPER PROPER EPIC. I love LI. Well, as I’m still to get a game in (very much a me, not a community issue there) I love the LI Models.

But to explore war on that scale in modern 40K’s galaxy would be a joy,

Proper Epic is the obvious thing to do really, it's the only scale where stuff like flyers and titans are at least plausible, if not sensible, to say nothing of the feasibility of things like transports, scouts, strategic mobility and so forth on tables that look increasingly like parking lots...

Another confusing thing is that GW never managed to get a "mainline" 40k RPG off the ground - all the bits and pieces they'd need are here, and there have been all sorts of attempts, both with and without miniatures, and communities like the various INQ28-offshoots are alive and well to this day, and yet GW seems to be content with licensing 3rd-party efforts, letting them lapse after rather short-is tenures. I suppose there are business reasons for it, but overall it's just galling somehow.

Oh, and they should redo Mordheim, that's another no-brainer.

I think a re-done Mordheim could be in the cards. Saw a museum exhibit of it at a local "gaming museum" and it was the only GW game on display there. Text on the display said Mordheim's anniversary is coming up, whic would be adequate timing

Mordheim could be a nice bridging game between different Old World Eras.

I mean, we now know exactly what flattened the city (it was Be’lakor, who fell from his former prison on Morrislieb). And we know its sudden reserves of Warp/Wyrdstone influenced other plans and events.

So delve back into the background, fleshing it out as necessary? And there’s your narrative bridge.

 Polonius wrote:
And I'm trying to avoid "no true Scotsman" style exclusions. You might not like the product, but you can walk into a GW right now and buy a box of warhammer quest!

I have no issues with the games released under the logo in and of themselves (aside from the Cursed City initial debacle), but they aren't the experience I look for when I think Warhammer Quest. If you're tying to tickle people's nostalgia, not achieving that is a fail.

I’m with Dysartes.

Classic Quest wasn’t a story based game. It was an RPG setting.

The core box came with a Bestiary which allowed people to create and populate a dungeon not just with most (possibly all?) the monsters and nasties in your army? But on general release.

The new Quest games lack that tool, which I still consider to be a fundamental part of the original Warhammer Quest Experience.

It doesn’t make them bad games. They stand on their own two feet well enough. But they just aren’t equivalent.

When we look back, particularly at BSF which had a great time introducing and reintroducing oddities (Ambulls! Zoats! Killer Constructs! Man of Iron!), we see that even if GW did such a Bestiary? They don’t lack the creative or manufacturing resources to add even more “oh my, I definitely want that set” stuff to drive specific sales.

The original Quest kinda had that with Lair of the Orc Lord and the Undead one (Catacomb of Terror). But, and I don’t mean to be controversial here? BSF did expansions better.

So there is the chance for GW, and us, to have our cake and eat it there.

I would say GW does not currently have the skillset anywhere in the studio to produce the sort of emergent narrative framework a "real" Quest, or Mordheim, would require.

That’s the thing though.

Warhammer Quest itself didn’t worry too much about providing a narrative. It provided the sandpit. We provided the narrative.

Speaking of Nostalghia, what I'd like to see return is the Original "Mighty Empires" in more or less its original form. Well, with modern miniatures of course, but with the same rules. And with plastic hex map tiles, obvs

Seems a no-brainer since we also have Old World now. So you could totally re-introduce the WHFB link to the hexmap game, just like in the original.

In my Heart Of Hearts, I'm dreaming of a comparable system for 40K.

If you never played og Mighty Empires, take a look! In it, you not only fought WHFB battles in a Campaign setting, but also had to keep your armies fed and in supplies, something which became a lot harder during winter times.. I have very fond memories of the one single campaign we managed to play it as kids

 lord_blackfang wrote:
I would say GW does not currently have the skillset anywhere in the studio to produce the sort of emergent narrative framework a "real" Quest, or Mordheim, would require.

I wouldn't be so sure of that. GW likely has lots of people with skills that are not demonstrated much externally, because they are constrained by what GW is willing to put out - which is only games that can have pretty wide appeal, as nothing else is worth the effort for such a large company. Even the small specialist games are bigger than most non-GW games.

Speaking of old armies that haven't come back, pygmies are still not around... and probably won't be coming back. I suppose you could view the Lizardmen as updated pygmies, of course.

I still think there is a good chance of BFG coming back as Armada Imperialis, with a level of investment roughly similar to what they put into AT. You don't need to make many models to have mirror matches between loyalist and traitor fleets. LI is largely a polished version of Space Marine 2nd edition, and a hypothetical AI could just be a polished BFG - the rules were (and are) well regarded. I think it is a lot more likely than Man-o-War, at least.

Gorkamorka

With Orks rumoured as new main opponent in 11th edition I can see them pull off a small box game using the current buggies and a new version of trukk and battlewagon It will be nowhere near as evocative or customizable, but they might do a fun little one-off game with orks and buggies shooting each other and call it Gorkamorka 2026 (I know there was a speed freaks boxed game when they released the buggies, but it didn't get any traction, right?).

Thinking on GW Nostalgia?

It appears to be genuine nostalgia. The games mentioned above were all genuinely enjoyed by those active in their relevant era.

Sure, during my teenage years my gaming group at home and in-store was a very welcome respite from endless crap at school. So for me at least (though I suspect others too), there is an element of Rose Tinted Glasses.

Yet the enjoyment of the games is genuine. I get warm and fuzzies whenever I crack open a book from my Oldhammer Collection, most of all 2nd Ed 40K and Space Marine, because those were the games I played the most. But even stuff that preceded me holds genuine fascination and affection. For any kid with an interest in AD&D type settings? I’m willing to bet that, even if the rules are gobbledygook outside of wider context? The background and art in Realm of. Chaos remains incredibly evocative.

Would I like to go and play Rogue Trader? Despite a complete set of books? Probably not, for it was a gloriously messy system. Also a complete set of books doesn’t equal a complete set of rules, adding to the fun of “but how does it actually work?”.

What I do get a kick out of are the now many YouTube Interviews with those responsible for creating the games and the company. Because those show I wasn’t alone in how much those gaming and general hobby sessions meant to me. A day in the shop when you had stuff to paint and a game to play were incredible, arguably life changing experiences.

On and off between 2001ish and 2009ish? I consider a privilege to have been store staff passing on that torch. As I’ve mentioned before? Sometimes, like three or four a year? You’d get a complete newbie who’d finally found their people, and with it a respite from being bullied and picked on for Not Enjoying Popular Thing. Some didn’t have great social skills to begin with, and I’m not gonna pretend that was always a pleasant experience. But, with patience and encouragement? Those skills, as well as other skills relevant to the hobby soon came to them. And you’d see this young person start to relax and grow more confident and indeed happy.

Even for someone with the parenting instincts of a block of polystyrene? That’s a very cool experience. And of course a very rewarding one.

Dysartes wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
And I'm trying to avoid "no true Scotsman" style exclusions. You might not like the product, but you can walk into a GW right now and buy a box of warhammer quest!

I have no issues with the games released under the logo in and of themselves (aside from the Cursed City initial debacle), but they aren't the experience I look for when I think Warhammer Quest. If you're tying to tickle people's nostalgia, not achieving that is a fail.

Yeah, I wasn't very clear in my OP, but what I think is most fascinating is that, this isn't the snake eating its own tail type of nostalgia. this isn't kickstarters for modern versions of 80s action figures. GW is mining it's old ideas for stuff that becomes very popular with people who have no connection to the old stuff. The OG WHQ stopped production 27 years ago, which means a lot of Darkwaters buyers weren't even alive when it was sold.

lord_blackfang wrote:I would say GW does not currently have the skillset anywhere in the studio to produce the sort of emergent narrative framework a "real" Quest, or Mordheim, would require.

I'm not really familiar with them, but in my experience campaign play quickly becomes like pho: even the experts know to provide plenty of options to doctor it up to taste.

 Polonius wrote:
The OG WHQ stopped production 27 years ago, which means a lot of Darkwaters buyers weren't even alive when it was sold.

Neither were Darkwater's designers

To paraphrase Ash from GMG a little and develop this thought further

Darkwater is so far removed from WHQ because the current stable of designers at GW were recruited from tourney grinders of the 2000s-2010s and are too young to have even played WHQ, in fact GW didn't sell a single narrative product during most of their formative gaming years and this is why we are where we are. They are trying but they simply don't know how such a game is supposed to make you feel. At best they can read the old stuff and emulate the format but they didn't experience any of that in situ when they were 16 and it shows.