Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

While Jervis Johnson does seem a little full-of-himself(to say the least), I have to say that I agree with keeping the rules system of 40k "stuck in the eighties". This is because I personally prefer a game of 40k played in the back of my LFGS with a couple of friends and a Dr. Pepper in my hand. As for the rules being unclear, I usually go by "if a rule does not specify you can't do something, you're good". On the rare occasion I find a Standard Bearer that I like, but a lot of times it kind of comes across as being an advertisement for how "wise and venerable" Johnson must be.

I'll say Positive. Bloodbowl.

i want him dead, i hate the kinda peole who toot thier own horn like he does,

He changed from how he use to be. He was much more of a gamer long time ago and I don't care him anymore. Its time for him to retire.

He murdered the Squats! how can you not hate him? the only thing he could do worse is bring them back lol

I respect the man.

I enjoyed "Standard Bearer" when he was writing it.

Love the guy

For young punks he sets expectations regarding luck and ettiquette

No one likes games of WAAC where the guy swears at dice and throws models. In that regard Jervis is the grandfather of the hobby, a necessary role IMHO

Tough gig as many will call him a tall poppie, however he does it well

I met Jervis once down in Nottingham, and his voice terrified me; he would have made an excellent Darth Vader. I'm afraid I don't think much of him though, mainly because I can't read his WD column without wanting to scream "Corporate sell-out!". Perhaps his columns have always been thinly veiled advertising, but ever since September 2008 (where his column was 2 pages of praise for the Assault on Black Reach set), I've been totally unable to read it as anything else, which is a shame, as I used to really enjoy Standard Bearer. I suspect that the column is indicative of his approach to the hobby in general.

automatonsleuth wrote:I met Jervis once down in Nottingham, and his voice terrified me; he would have made an excellent Darth Vader. I'm afraid I don't think much of him though, mainly because I can't read his WD column without wanting to scream "Corporate sell-out!". Perhaps his columns have always been thinly veiled advertising, but ever since September 2008 (where his column was 2 pages of praise for the Assault on Black Reach set), I've been totally unable to read it as anything else, which is a shame, as I used to really enjoy Standard Bearer. I suspect that the column is indicative of his approach to the hobby in general.

QFT. Met both Johnson and Chambers (before he got his gig at Blizzard). JJ is no Andy Chambers by any stretch.

Give him credit when credit is due. He did good with the specialist games. But those games are not truly supported by GW as they once was.

I can not forgive him for what he did to the Dark Angels. Besides writing articles for WD what has he done lately?

Adam LongWalker wrote:I can not forgive him for what he did to the Dark Angels. Besides writing articles for WD what has he done lately?

What did he do to the Dark Angels? I know that the codex is underpowered by today's standards, but at the time it introduced combat squads, a playabe Deathwing and Ravenwing, etc. I always thought that the crappiness that was the DA's codex stemmed more from the uberness of the vanilla marine codices that followed.

Just wondering.

-MightyG

Flashman wrote:Neutral really. I have fond memories of the JJ and Andy Chambers days of WD where it was all about the hobby, but I now find his state the obvious ramblings in standard bearer kind of irritating.

This for me. He seems out of place in the company today. Andy Chambers was awesome.

I don't know why people hate on them, he's been with GW for a really long time, even since rogue trader if I've heard correctly

Squat Kid wrote:He murdered the Squats! how can you not hate him? the only thing he could do worse is bring them back lol

That's not actually correct. He was actually the only person to bother to tell the fans why they had not received a proper update in 2nd edition, beyond a massively condescending reply to a letter that was printed in WD.

To be honest I'm getting more than a little irritated that this topic keeps raising it's head, chiefly by people who haven't been in the hobby for long enough, or simply don't understand what he has done for so many of the games we like. Don't like the standard bearer article? Then turn the page, and take a look at the advertising spiel either side of it (or don't buy the magazine at all ).

So, for those who are unaware:
- He was one of the main designers of Blood Bowl. He was also involved and is credited with being involved with: Battlefleet Gothic, Epic, Gorkamorka, Mordheim, Necromunda, Warmaster, Mordheim, and Space Hulk as well as of course the core games from GW (no doubt others I have missed). Right there, I would say he is synonymous (in terms of the games he has helped develop) with some of GW's most loved games.
- Back during the 're-structuring' of the company, company higher-ups wanted the 'Specialist games' (as they had then become) to be completely removed from the company line. He offered to take all of specialist games completely under his own wing, be responsible for maintaining that side of the company, and even posting the rules online for free. Although they are a margin of the hobby experience as GW would have you have it, the reason they are available at all is because of Jervis. I had it on good authority that this was done in an entirely voluntary capacity, in addition to the other work he was doing for the company.
- The DA codex was unpopular - but, I will accept this penalty on behalf of DA players in light of the wonderful experiences he has given to tens if not hundreds of thousands of gamers who have played and enjoyed the games listed in point 1. I think that it's important to look at the bigger picture, or it's the equivalent of saying you hate Neil Young and everything he has done because of that awful Trans album he made, or all of Metallica because of St. Anger.
- Finally, he provided many of us years of entertainment during the 'golden era' of WD, where he played whipping-boy to Andy Chambers, month after month in the battle reports section.

So, kick him out ? He is one of the last of the old guard, as far as I know with a couple of exceptions everyone else has moved on. Personally I and many other veteran gamers have to be grateful for the years of entertainment his systems have provided us with. At a time when the games were created to be simply enjoyed, rather than compromised by people from sales asking for alterations of rules in order to sell more kits, often leading to the compromise of the system itself.

Pacific wrote:

Squat Kid wrote:He murdered the Squats! how can you not hate him? the only thing he could do worse is bring them back lol

Stuff about Jervis Johnson

What I got out of that:
-Helped to create and support Blood Bowl
-Helped to preserve specialist games

He also helped to write Black Powder.

It looks like I'm going to have to change my entry from 'Positive' to 'Very Positive'!

He should stay the hell away from the main games and tournaments. Throne of skulls is like playing T-ball with no score, if you win the thing it doesnt mean you're the best player, it just means you're the best at giving/getting job scores.

infinite_array wrote:

Pacific wrote:

Squat Kid wrote:He murdered the Squats! how can you not hate him? the only thing he could do worse is bring them back lol

He also helped to write Black Powder.

It looks like I'm going to have to change my entry from 'Positive' to 'Very Positive'!

Yes sorry, I missed that he was responsible for the Warhammer Historicals stuff (never played it myself, but it seems to have been quite popular in clubs I have played in in the past)

10 months in to the hobby, I haven't developed any negative feelings to JJ. He churns out frequently incredible model designs, and I enjoy standard bearer.

As a noob I've seen nothing negative about him, so I voted very positive.

Legend. Enough Said.

I dont really play necromunda, blood bowl, or Epic 40k so I cant say I completely know his material, but he's obviously very creative.

I believe he did the Battle Missions expansion and I enjoyed that quite a bit so I would say positive.

Positive, his Marines got me into the game and when i was ready to give it up his Dark Eldar gave the kiss of life to my enthusiasm, for that I'm grateful. Some of the rest of what he's done I'm less happy about, hence positive not very positive.

Voted neutral; don't know/care enough about him either way to form an opinion.

Honestly have no idea who this person is...

I only started playing about a year ago and dont know much about the history of the game, and had never heard of Mr Johnson till now.
So I am sorry if this idea offends anyone, all of this is an impression and response to/from reading through the comments about Warhammer in this thread.

The rules will stay broken as long as it sells more models. A balanced game means balanced buying habits. Does GW seem like thats what they want?
A basement game is between logical adults and can be played with ANYTHING! I could use B1 bombers as models if I wanted to. I dont believe for a second that GW sees that as a sustainable business model.
Store/tourney play demands you purchase things from GW, but Mr johnson says that they want to discourage that?? ...ok
If you can look through a codex and predict the next big seller, It should occur to you thats exactly what occurred to them right before they did it. The books tell you what to buy next and in what number.
Example: a 50$ to 60$ valkyrie/vendetta is now owned 3 or 4 times over by every IG player I know. This in an army that was previously based on buying tanks.

He's a REALLY old GW designer, and I like him a lot, along with Jes Goodwin. The rest, I know little about. But I do like jervis.

SoloFalcon hit the nail on the head in his earlier posts. Far too many people get worked up about plastic soldiers.
I can count on 2 fingers the number of times in the last 10 years where I had to haggle over a rule interpretation. Just play the game.
Since I've switched to FOW, I've been critical of GW's prices, but when it comes to rules testing/designing, how many people on this site could do better/have done better/or even tried to write rules. Very few I should imagine. When it comes to the hobby, some people can't wipe their own noses without GW's say so.
Jervis is not perfect ditto Thorpe, Chambers etc
But in my experience when it comes to a new codex or army book, there will always be somebody ready to moan.
Rant over.

The mans work on Bloodbowl in the early nineties was so good he won an award (yes it is that good, start playing it)

His imagination and leadership has driven Warhammer 40,000 from it's very beginning as an obscure hobby to the worldwide phenomena it is today and he has helped shaped the rules, storyline and appearance of so many of the different armies involved.

Not to mention his crowning glory, Necromunda, possibly Games Workshop's greatest ever game (admittedly co-written with the other game design heavy weights back then)

I met him once at a convention in Ireland around 10 years ago and for hours he sat around a couple of pool tables we were using as battlefields and talked to us about whatever we wanted to know about, taking questions, telling stories, talking about future releases, ideas, games etc.

For all this I gave very positive. I think most of the people who dislike him the most is purely because of his work on 40k in the last 5 years which is quite a limited view to have.

In that sense however I think it could be time for a change of guard and get some new game designers in under the supervision of long time creators like Jervis to help write the rules for the modern day 40k game as it's clear the game is changing and could use some fresh ideas to help create a system we all love.

Im afraid I don't really know what he does. I know he is top dog but I dont really know what decisions he makes or anything.

Probably because I havnt read White Dwarf?

I know this is an old thread but I just found it, and thought I would say a few things.

Jervis is without a doubt, the most influential person who has affecting my interest in games, after Gary Gynax. In my early years I mostly played role playing games, but was never crazy about playing them although I loved day dreaming about the worlds they were set in. One day I discovered an ad for Rogue Trader in Dragon magazine, and fell in love with Space Marines. But it wasnt 40k that got me into gaming; it was Epic. While looking over the Epic Space Marine v2 stuff, someone offered to sell me their Adeptus Titanicus and Space Marine v1 stuff, which I went ahead and bought, and it changed my life. I was living up north at the time, and my friends and I played the hell out of this game during the cold winters. It was the game I had waited my whole life for and didnt know it.

I eventually got into 40k 2nd edition and loved that too, which then led on to Man O War, Necromunda, and just about every other GW game, AND non GW game. I had so many games at one point, but my favorite was Epic. Eventually we moved to Space Marine/Titan Legions and played the hell out of that too. We did of course, reject Epic 40,000 like everyone else, but later on I did get into it, and realized that game was pretty cool too, its just not what fans wanted.

I kind of got out of gaming, but kept up with what GW was doing every now and then, and one day read up on Jervis opening up the development for the new rules for Epic Armageddon by involving the fans. So I decided to send him an email detailing what I thought was the pros and cons of every version of Epic to date, and what I think should be in the new game. I honeslty thought as I hit send, that it would just end up in his spam box, but to my surprise, I got a reply back from him a couple of days later, in which he stated not only did he enjoy talking to players, but especially Epic players.

I couldnt believe it. I mean, this guy was practically single handedly responsible for 1000s of hours of my life spent reading, building, painting, and playing my favorite table top game, in a universe I loved. Nevertheless, we exchanged a few emails and I joined the Epic Playtesting team. To my surprise, some of the suggestions I had given him in those emails he put right into the rules.

** One I am refering to is how formations are bought, with Upgrade Options. That was me. Although it went kind of overboard **

Needless to say, I hated were Epic A was going, and predicting its demise. Now I am still involved in Epic (I play SM2/TL regularly still), but as far as a game is concerned its strictly fan supported stuff.

I was really angry with the decisions Jervis made during that time, as I wanted Epic to be huge again, when Epic was one of GWs core games, but I also know Specialist Games just didnt have the resources its parent had too. He was too ambitious I think, but most of all, I think he was out of touch.

Jervis wanted to develop a family of Epic games, one of which was that Aeronautica whatever game. This was announced too when he said rules and minis for Epic Chaos, Tau, and Necorns wouldnt be available for years. I just couldnt believe it. He was basically making players wait years for their armies to come out while he went off and developed games no one was going to play. Sorry, there might be 12 people who played that Aeronautica game. Meanwhile, the deviation of attention on that and other things that was desperately needed on Epic only quicked its demise. He also mentioned another Titan only game, and I was like, "JUST FOCUS ON EPIC!!! Its got everything! Or should..."

I got the feeling from the whole experience that at the end of the day, Jervis was going to do what Jervis wanted and that was that. The result was my least favorite Epic edition.

I also would like to add, that his least favorite version of Epic is Space Marine v2, which he developed with Rick Priestly. Regardless of its simplicity, and probably due to it, that version of Epic was by far the most successful. I dont know how much credit Rick deserves, but people loved that version. If I was Jervis, I would have gone back to those roots, but he was convinced that the direction he took with Epic 40,000 was more the way to go and continued down that road. Keep in mind, I do think that Epic 40k is severly UNDERRATED, however, it isnt what fans wanted either. I honestly think if GW just re-released Space Marine v2 as was all over again, it would have been far more popular than Epic A could have been.

I guess as a game designer you are constantly dreaming up new ways to play with the same miniatures, but to me the most successful games have relatively simple mechanics and not abstract. I guess that can be boring too.

I am thankful to Jervis tho. Just cant forgive him for some of the things he did lol.

BTW I did reach out to Andy Chambers too after he left GW and talked about Epic for a bit. I know Andy got a lot of attention back in the day, but I honestly think Jervis was a far better game developer than Andy was.

Gavin, Pete, all those other former GW developers I knew of are gone, and I have no idea who is involved with game developed at GW now. I stopped reading White Dwarf when it started sucking AGES ago.

Anyway, gave Jervis a positive, but its leaning towards neutral.

What do I think of Jervis Johnson.
One word (GENIUS)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
What I think of Jervis Johnson.
One word (GENIUS)

Can someone tell me how too contact Jervis Johnson.
I'm doing research for an movie about the WH 40K Universe.

 bigmek35 wrote:
i want him dead, i hate the kinda peole who toot thier own horn like he does,

Please tell me this is just a bad joke.