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An (in-universe) account of Ciaphas Cain's exploits managed to get published in M42.147. I suppose it could be possible that since the Imperium is in good enough shape that printing presses (or whatever its equivalent is in the far flung future) haven't been melted down for materiel for war-time production that either one of two things have happened:

1. The 13th Black Crusade was stopped.

-Or-, more likely in my book...

2. Has stalled into a near century and a half-long stalemate.

 AegisGrimm wrote:
The only bummer about fleshing out the years between the heresy and the "current date" with storied from conflicts in those times is that it plays hell with Tau and current Necron players. You basically have to go back to what existed in 2nd edition. So Tau didn't exist as a race, and Necrons were horrors that attacked out of the night in very, very small numbers like the bogeyman, and even that's quite recent.

The Tau have around 6000 years of history to play with from first contact with the Imperium.

And while the Necrons as a race have only arisen in the late 41st millenium, there's no saying that there was no contact at all with them prior to that. It could just not be widely known about.

I would love to see more campaign books, about things going on in the galaxy. Perhaps Crusade of Fire is a sign of things to come?

There is plenty to do in the current timeline, no need to really go forward, when there is so much more to explore in this rich setting.

Personally, I agree with most.

YES, chaning 40k's theme from the open universe and advancing it, even a little might anger playerbase. That is why I suggested a spin-off OR just a separate series of books or something.
And YES, it would probably be better if GW decided to run more into the past, and make things clear there.

WHAT IF, these both could be done with the same spin-off?

Add bitz from the lost legions, maybe a homeworld or something.

Well, we already know how the story ends and IOM players would be MAD if they'd be reduced to the Nightbringer's food...again.

This notion that moving forward the timeline is bad because it will hurt some of the fanbase' feelings is moronic and indicative of a lack of creativity.

You can add fluff that takes place in the new timeline without gaking on any of the factions.

For example, one of the most disappointing aspects of the 6E CSM codex to me was the lack of any fluff regarding the actual battles of the 13th Black Crusade. I was expecting to see some short-stories regarding Chaos marines kicking ass in the Crusade; got exactly nothing.

It wouldn't be game-breaking if GW released, say, an anthology of short-stories regarding specific, new battles that take place during the Black Crusade, in M42. Introduce new characters, new storylines, etc.

40K isn't "a setting". It's whatever it needs to be to make money. The days of the table-top being GW's bread and butter are gone. The 40K fluff is almost, if not more popular than the table-top game itself. If they released content that took place in M.42, people will buy the gak out of it.

Counter question: Would you like Mat Ward to advance the storyline?

why bother...it would make no difference to the game anyway
,how could it as its bloody well all made up!!!!!!!!
like those big campaigns for different systems GW done years ago...done nothing to the hobby

 Kroothawk wrote:
Counter question: Would you like Mat Ward to advance the storyline?

Yes.

BlaxicanX wrote:
This notion that moving forward the timeline is bad because it will hurt some of the fanbase' feelings is moronic and indicative of a lack of creativity.

The notion that moving the timeline forward would be good, for any reason, is idiotic and indicative of shortsightedness and wishful thinking.

Gee, that was fun!

The timeline was moving forward steadily right up til the 13th Black Crusade, at a rate of about 1 game year per real life year. This didn't destroy the setting and there is no reason why a similar slow crawl forward would suddenly destroy the setting. People keep acting as if moving the timeline forward were some dangerous never before tried thing, when in reality, it was the standard case until the last few editions. People also make the error of equating timeline advancement with stupendous overturning change such as the Emperor dying or Primarchs returning, when nothing of the sort needs to happen. The slow steady incremental advancement of the timeline in past editions did not involve this, and there is no reason rolling over into M42 could not do this incremental movement.

Not only did the setting not explode when the timeline moved forward in the past, but the advancement allowed for the advancement of individual character stories, even though the larger universe stayed largely status quo. For example, only when there was movement was Tycho able to evolve as a character, from a generic BA captain, to being disfigured as a result of being felled by a Weirdboy in a battle report, to then the masked Tycho, and finally to his death. Similarly, Yarrick developed through his defeat on Golgotha (an Epic Squat/Imperial vs. Ork battle report), heightening the rivalry between him and Ghazghkull. A lot of the background which gets taken for granted today did not spring up unchanging and set in stone, but developed in gradual steps as a result of timeline movement. Some people might question what is the point of incremental advancement if the larger picture is not radically changed, and the answer is it allows for individual stories to change and progress.

There have already been mentions in a couple of BL books, such as Cadian Blood, which take place in M42, and the Imperium hasn't fallen apart. Also as another poster has said, not every faction has ten thousand years of history to play around with, which is why simply limiting things to the Imperium's past is not good as it leaves these players out permanently. The Tau were not a technological race until recently. When they were first encountered by the Imperium 6000 years ago they were stone age hunters, which is hardly suitable for a 40K game. The Tyranids did not really arrive on the scene til Behemoth. The Necrons did not really become more active until recently. Sure one can try to handwave it as an isolated tomb world or a splinter fleet that conveniently disappears again, but then you also relegate these to effectively never making any impact whatsoever on the background if they are forced to somehow be forgotten about or be made to go inactive again (so that the Imperium can be surprised when the Necrons or Tyranids really show up in late M41). Players usually like to play their armies as what their armies actually are, not handwaved "stand-in" armies or have deus ex machina negate any impact they might make on background.

The current static background creates problems with expansion of the armies. For example, the Tau have only been active and technological for a short period of time. Some of their weapons in their Codex are recent additions, such as the rail rifle. This creates problems for GW if more additions are added in future editions, as ever more stuff gets crammed into a narrow unchanging window of time. One thing GW has done is try to retcon stuff further back, such as the Tau's Custodian class carrier ship, but that only goes so far because it still runs into the barrier of when the Tau actually became a technological spacefaring race, and also creates problems with continuity. This is because the Tau are explicitly described as having inferior space forces in the Damocles Crusade, and the Custodian was part of a Tau naval expansion and modernization as a result of shortcomings uncovered during that Crusade. Retcon things too far back and you overturn the reason for the Custodian's existence. Don't retcon enough and you run into the barrier of the Damocles Crusade as the earliest time when one can even think about a Custodian class carrier existing, even if just on the drawing board. It also strains ever more suspension of disbelief if the Tau are shown as taking over more worlds or sectors given the small size of their empire and their limited resources.

Constrained by the existing timeline, the background of the Tau and certain other races is inherently limited to the last few centuries, something that might not be apparent for Imperial only players. Retcon has its limits and ultimately strains suspension of disbelief or creates more conflict with existing background. The only solution lies in one early M3 leader's catchphrase, "Forward"

 Kaldor wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
This notion that moving forward the timeline is bad because it will hurt some of the fanbase' feelings is moronic and indicative of a lack of creativity.

The notion that moving the timeline forward would be good, for any reason, is idiotic and indicative of shortsightedness and wishful thinking.

Gee, that was fun!

Calm out butthurt, sir. You didn't do it right; your declarative statement has to be correct, like mine was.

Iracundus wrote:
The timeline was moving forward steadily right up til the 13th Black Crusade, at a rate of about 1 game year per real life year. This didn't destroy the setting and there is no reason why a similar slow crawl forward would suddenly destroy the setting. People keep acting as if moving the timeline forward were some dangerous never before tried thing, when in reality, it was the standard case until the last few editions. People also make the error of equating timeline advancement with stupendous overturning change such as the Emperor dying or Primarchs returning, when nothing of the sort needs to happen. The slow steady incremental advancement of the timeline in past editions did not involve this, and there is no reason rolling over into M42 could not do this incremental movement.

Not only did the setting not explode when the timeline moved forward in the past, but the advancement allowed for the advancement of individual character stories, even though the larger universe stayed largely status quo. For example, only when there was movement was Tycho able to evolve as a character, from a generic BA captain, to being disfigured as a result of being felled by a Weirdboy in a battle report, to then the masked Tycho, and finally to his death. Similarly, Yarrick developed through his defeat on Golgotha (an Epic Squat/Imperial vs. Ork battle report), heightening the rivalry between him and Ghazghkull. A lot of the background which gets taken for granted today did not spring up unchanging and set in stone, but developed in gradual steps as a result of timeline movement. Some people might question what is the point of incremental advancement if the larger picture is not radically changed, and the answer is it allows for individual stories to change and progress.

There have already been mentions in a couple of BL books, such as Cadian Blood, which take place in M42, and the Imperium hasn't fallen apart. Also as another poster has said, not every faction has ten thousand years of history to play around with, which is why simply limiting things to the Imperium's past is not good as it leaves these players out permanently. The Tau were not a technological race until recently. When they were first encountered by the Imperium 6000 years ago they were stone age hunters, which is hardly suitable for a 40K game. The Tyranids did not really arrive on the scene til Behemoth. The Necrons did not really become more active until recently. Sure one can try to handwave it as an isolated tomb world or a splinter fleet that conveniently disappears again, but then you also relegate these to effectively never making any impact whatsoever on the background if they are forced to somehow be forgotten about or be made to go inactive again (so that the Imperium can be surprised when the Necrons or Tyranids really show up in late M41). Players usually like to play their armies as what their armies actually are, not handwaved "stand-in" armies or have deus ex machina negate any impact they might make on background.

The current static background creates problems with expansion of the armies. For example, the Tau have only been active and technological for a short period of time. Some of their weapons in their Codex are recent additions, such as the rail rifle. This creates problems for GW if more additions are added in future editions, as ever more stuff gets crammed into a narrow unchanging window of time. One thing GW has done is try to retcon stuff further back, such as the Tau's Custodian class carrier ship, but that only goes so far because it still runs into the barrier of when the Tau actually became a technological spacefaring race, and also creates problems with continuity. This is because the Tau are explicitly described as having inferior space forces in the Damocles Crusade, and the Custodian was part of a Tau naval expansion and modernization as a result of shortcomings uncovered during that Crusade. Retcon things too far back and you overturn the reason for the Custodian's existence. Don't retcon enough and you run into the barrier of the Damocles Crusade as the earliest time when one can even think about a Custodian class carrier existing, even if just on the drawing board. It also strains ever more suspension of disbelief if the Tau are shown as taking over more worlds or sectors given the small size of their empire and their limited resources.

Constrained by the existing timeline, the background of the Tau and certain other races is inherently limited to the last few centuries, something that might not be apparent for Imperial only players. Retcon has its limits and ultimately strains suspension of disbelief or creates more conflict with existing background. The only solution lies in one early M3 leader's catchphrase, "Forward"

+1

Rationality. It's... it's such a beauty to behold.

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Kaldor wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
This notion that moving forward the timeline is bad because it will hurt some of the fanbase' feelings is moronic and indicative of a lack of creativity.

The notion that moving the timeline forward would be good, for any reason, is idiotic and indicative of shortsightedness and wishful thinking.

Gee, that was fun!

Calm out butthurt, sir. You didn't do it right; your declarative statement has to be correct, like mine was.

Except it isn't necessarily correct.

The "fanbase" you speak of is actually what is referred to as a "customer base", and ensuring the highest overall satisfaction with the product is Games Workshop's highest priority.

Sometimes people forget that Games Workshop is a business, motivated by profits that allow it to continue being a business. That's why certain factions don't get new models. It's why the game rules change every so often to push people to buy new types of models.

Keeping the setting more or less static is part of the 40K appeal. It's a setting where everyone is at war, and you can buy an army of plastic toy soldiers and fight other armies of plastic toy soldiers. There is no "timeline". All of that is just fluffy bits for you to buy books about. Otherwise, the setting stays put so you're always in that grim darkness of the far future where there is only war. If the timeline "moves" it will be inches forward, to accommodate for some new battle. Nothing will change about the setting.

 Kroothawk wrote:
Counter question: Would you like Mat Ward to advance the storyline?

Oh yes, the butthurt and nerdrage would definitely brighten up my mood.

 insaniak wrote:

 AegisGrimm wrote:
The only bummer about fleshing out the years between the heresy and the "current date" with storied from conflicts in those times is that it plays hell with Tau and current Necron players. You basically have to go back to what existed in 2nd edition. So Tau didn't exist as a race, and Necrons were horrors that attacked out of the night in very, very small numbers like the bogeyman, and even that's quite recent.

The Tau have around 6000 years of history to play with from first contact with the Imperium.

And while the Necrons as a race have only arisen in the late 41st millenium, there's no saying that there was no contact at all with them prior to that. It could just not be widely known about.

What about the Tyranid? They've only been around for like the last 250 years.

Yes, I think they should advance the overall story a few hundred years, but not go deeper in to thehorus heresy. Horus heresy sucks anyway.

As has been mentioned, the stories of M42 are told on our table tops. The armies of M42 are assembled by us. We invent its heroes and villains.

For those who prefer to play established characters and events, there are 10,000 years' worth of the "historicals" I mentioned.

Iracundus wrote:
The timeline was moving forward steadily right up til the 13th Black Crusade, at a rate of about 1 game year per real life year. This didn't destroy the setting and there is no reason why a similar slow crawl forward would suddenly destroy the setting. People keep acting as if moving the timeline forward were some dangerous never before tried thing, when in reality, it was the standard case until the last few editions. People also make the error of equating timeline advancement with stupendous overturning change such as the Emperor dying or Primarchs returning, when nothing of the sort needs to happen. The slow steady incremental advancement of the timeline in past editions did not involve this, and there is no reason rolling over into M42 could not do this incremental movement.

Not only did the setting not explode when the timeline moved forward in the past, but the advancement allowed for the advancement of individual character stories, even though the larger universe stayed largely status quo. For example, only when there was movement was Tycho able to evolve as a character, from a generic BA captain, to being disfigured as a result of being felled by a Weirdboy in a battle report, to then the masked Tycho, and finally to his death. Similarly, Yarrick developed through his defeat on Golgotha (an Epic Squat/Imperial vs. Ork battle report), heightening the rivalry between him and Ghazghkull. A lot of the background which gets taken for granted today did not spring up unchanging and set in stone, but developed in gradual steps as a result of timeline movement. Some people might question what is the point of incremental advancement if the larger picture is not radically changed, and the answer is it allows for individual stories to change and progress.

There have already been mentions in a couple of BL books, such as Cadian Blood, which take place in M42, and the Imperium hasn't fallen apart. Also as another poster has said, not every faction has ten thousand years of history to play around with, which is why simply limiting things to the Imperium's past is not good as it leaves these players out permanently. The Tau were not a technological race until recently. When they were first encountered by the Imperium 6000 years ago they were stone age hunters, which is hardly suitable for a 40K game. The Tyranids did not really arrive on the scene til Behemoth. The Necrons did not really become more active until recently. Sure one can try to handwave it as an isolated tomb world or a splinter fleet that conveniently disappears again, but then you also relegate these to effectively never making any impact whatsoever on the background if they are forced to somehow be forgotten about or be made to go inactive again (so that the Imperium can be surprised when the Necrons or Tyranids really show up in late M41). Players usually like to play their armies as what their armies actually are, not handwaved "stand-in" armies or have deus ex machina negate any impact they might make on background.

The current static background creates problems with expansion of the armies. For example, the Tau have only been active and technological for a short period of time. Some of their weapons in their Codex are recent additions, such as the rail rifle. This creates problems for GW if more additions are added in future editions, as ever more stuff gets crammed into a narrow unchanging window of time. One thing GW has done is try to retcon stuff further back, such as the Tau's Custodian class carrier ship, but that only goes so far because it still runs into the barrier of when the Tau actually became a technological spacefaring race, and also creates problems with continuity. This is because the Tau are explicitly described as having inferior space forces in the Damocles Crusade, and the Custodian was part of a Tau naval expansion and modernization as a result of shortcomings uncovered during that Crusade. Retcon things too far back and you overturn the reason for the Custodian's existence. Don't retcon enough and you run into the barrier of the Damocles Crusade as the earliest time when one can even think about a Custodian class carrier existing, even if just on the drawing board. It also strains ever more suspension of disbelief if the Tau are shown as taking over more worlds or sectors given the small size of their empire and their limited resources.

Constrained by the existing timeline, the background of the Tau and certain other races is inherently limited to the last few centuries, something that might not be apparent for Imperial only players. Retcon has its limits and ultimately strains suspension of disbelief or creates more conflict with existing background. The only solution lies in one early M3 leader's catchphrase, "Forward"

THANK YOU SIR! This guy right here, is the first person that thoroughly explained what he thinks. I did not mean to start any sort of a flamewar. As it was probably obvious that one would come up, PLEASE see reason and quit insulting others that disagree with you. I know not all of us here may be grown ups (like me, I'm not), but let us all act like WE ACTUALLY KNOW WHAT THE WHOLE WORD MEANS.

Please, I've had enough of posts like these:



Please, keep the arguments rational and polite. Do not start throwing virtual ball punches at others.

Only if they want to kill their property.

It's been this way for 20 years. Advancing it now would break the fan-base.

They gave people decades to imagine what-if scenarios. Destroying the "what might happen" is far worse than doing nothing.

I enter the Star Wars prequels and fan-reaction as evidence.

Iracundus wrote:
The timeline was moving forward steadily right up til the 13th Black Crusade, at a rate of about 1 game year per real life year. This didn't destroy the setting and there is no reason why a similar slow crawl forward would suddenly destroy the setting. People keep acting as if moving the timeline forward were some dangerous never before tried thing, when in reality, it was the standard case until the last few editions. People also make the error of equating timeline advancement with stupendous overturning change such as the Emperor dying or Primarchs returning, when nothing of the sort needs to happen. The slow steady incremental advancement of the timeline in past editions did not involve this, and there is no reason rolling over into M42 could not do this incremental movement.

Not only did the setting not explode when the timeline moved forward in the past, but the advancement allowed for the advancement of individual character stories, even though the larger universe stayed largely status quo. For example, only when there was movement was Tycho able to evolve as a character, from a generic BA captain, to being disfigured as a result of being felled by a Weirdboy in a battle report, to then the masked Tycho, and finally to his death. Similarly, Yarrick developed through his defeat on Golgotha (an Epic Squat/Imperial vs. Ork battle report), heightening the rivalry between him and Ghazghkull. A lot of the background which gets taken for granted today did not spring up unchanging and set in stone, but developed in gradual steps as a result of timeline movement. Some people might question what is the point of incremental advancement if the larger picture is not radically changed, and the answer is it allows for individual stories to change and progress.

There have already been mentions in a couple of BL books, such as Cadian Blood, which take place in M42, and the Imperium hasn't fallen apart. Also as another poster has said, not every faction has ten thousand years of history to play around with, which is why simply limiting things to the Imperium's past is not good as it leaves these players out permanently. The Tau were not a technological race until recently. When they were first encountered by the Imperium 6000 years ago they were stone age hunters, which is hardly suitable for a 40K game. The Tyranids did not really arrive on the scene til Behemoth. The Necrons did not really become more active until recently. Sure one can try to handwave it as an isolated tomb world or a splinter fleet that conveniently disappears again, but then you also relegate these to effectively never making any impact whatsoever on the background if they are forced to somehow be forgotten about or be made to go inactive again (so that the Imperium can be surprised when the Necrons or Tyranids really show up in late M41). Players usually like to play their armies as what their armies actually are, not handwaved "stand-in" armies or have deus ex machina negate any impact they might make on background.

The current static background creates problems with expansion of the armies. For example, the Tau have only been active and technological for a short period of time. Some of their weapons in their Codex are recent additions, such as the rail rifle. This creates problems for GW if more additions are added in future editions, as ever more stuff gets crammed into a narrow unchanging window of time. One thing GW has done is try to retcon stuff further back, such as the Tau's Custodian class carrier ship, but that only goes so far because it still runs into the barrier of when the Tau actually became a technological spacefaring race, and also creates problems with continuity. This is because the Tau are explicitly described as having inferior space forces in the Damocles Crusade, and the Custodian was part of a Tau naval expansion and modernization as a result of shortcomings uncovered during that Crusade. Retcon things too far back and you overturn the reason for the Custodian's existence. Don't retcon enough and you run into the barrier of the Damocles Crusade as the earliest time when one can even think about a Custodian class carrier existing, even if just on the drawing board. It also strains ever more suspension of disbelief if the Tau are shown as taking over more worlds or sectors given the small size of their empire and their limited resources.

Constrained by the existing timeline, the background of the Tau and certain other races is inherently limited to the last few centuries, something that might not be apparent for Imperial only players. Retcon has its limits and ultimately strains suspension of disbelief or creates more conflict with existing background. The only solution lies in one early M3 leader's catchphrase, "Forward"

This is very reasonable. Hell they don't even need to advance the storyline 1 year for every 1 real life year. Just 1 year every edition would be fine with me! That way each edition would have some new table scraps of fluff for us to lap up.
I swear to God the only reason they don't move it forward 1 year is because the game is called Warhammer 40,000!

 KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Iracundus wrote:
The timeline was moving forward steadily right up til the 13th Black Crusade, at a rate of about 1 game year per real life year. This didn't destroy the setting and there is no reason why a similar slow crawl forward would suddenly destroy the setting. People keep acting as if moving the timeline forward were some dangerous never before tried thing, when in reality, it was the standard case until the last few editions. People also make the error of equating timeline advancement with stupendous overturning change such as the Emperor dying or Primarchs returning, when nothing of the sort needs to happen. The slow steady incremental advancement of the timeline in past editions did not involve this, and there is no reason rolling over into M42 could not do this incremental movement.

Not only did the setting not explode when the timeline moved forward in the past, but the advancement allowed for the advancement of individual character stories, even though the larger universe stayed largely status quo. For example, only when there was movement was Tycho able to evolve as a character, from a generic BA captain, to being disfigured as a result of being felled by a Weirdboy in a battle report, to then the masked Tycho, and finally to his death. Similarly, Yarrick developed through his defeat on Golgotha (an Epic Squat/Imperial vs. Ork battle report), heightening the rivalry between him and Ghazghkull. A lot of the background which gets taken for granted today did not spring up unchanging and set in stone, but developed in gradual steps as a result of timeline movement. Some people might question what is the point of incremental advancement if the larger picture is not radically changed, and the answer is it allows for individual stories to change and progress.

There have already been mentions in a couple of BL books, such as Cadian Blood, which take place in M42, and the Imperium hasn't fallen apart. Also as another poster has said, not every faction has ten thousand years of history to play around with, which is why simply limiting things to the Imperium's past is not good as it leaves these players out permanently. The Tau were not a technological race until recently. When they were first encountered by the Imperium 6000 years ago they were stone age hunters, which is hardly suitable for a 40K game. The Tyranids did not really arrive on the scene til Behemoth. The Necrons did not really become more active until recently. Sure one can try to handwave it as an isolated tomb world or a splinter fleet that conveniently disappears again, but then you also relegate these to effectively never making any impact whatsoever on the background if they are forced to somehow be forgotten about or be made to go inactive again (so that the Imperium can be surprised when the Necrons or Tyranids really show up in late M41). Players usually like to play their armies as what their armies actually are, not handwaved "stand-in" armies or have deus ex machina negate any impact they might make on background.

The current static background creates problems with expansion of the armies. For example, the Tau have only been active and technological for a short period of time. Some of their weapons in their Codex are recent additions, such as the rail rifle. This creates problems for GW if more additions are added in future editions, as ever more stuff gets crammed into a narrow unchanging window of time. One thing GW has done is try to retcon stuff further back, such as the Tau's Custodian class carrier ship, but that only goes so far because it still runs into the barrier of when the Tau actually became a technological spacefaring race, and also creates problems with continuity. This is because the Tau are explicitly described as having inferior space forces in the Damocles Crusade, and the Custodian was part of a Tau naval expansion and modernization as a result of shortcomings uncovered during that Crusade. Retcon things too far back and you overturn the reason for the Custodian's existence. Don't retcon enough and you run into the barrier of the Damocles Crusade as the earliest time when one can even think about a Custodian class carrier existing, even if just on the drawing board. It also strains ever more suspension of disbelief if the Tau are shown as taking over more worlds or sectors given the small size of their empire and their limited resources.

Constrained by the existing timeline, the background of the Tau and certain other races is inherently limited to the last few centuries, something that might not be apparent for Imperial only players. Retcon has its limits and ultimately strains suspension of disbelief or creates more conflict with existing background. The only solution lies in one early M3 leader's catchphrase, "Forward"

This is very reasonable. Hell they don't even need to advance the storyline 1 year for every 1 real life year. Just 1 year every edition would be fine with me! That way each edition would have some new table scraps of fluff for us to lap up.
I swear to God the only reason they don't move it forward 1 year is because the game is called Warhammer 40,000!

I agree. But I believe that just adding 1 year each edition may not add enough options and new gak for races like Tau, as mentioned already. If advanced from now, it would become WH41k and that would also change things. What I already SAID was that it wouldn't need to make straight changes to the main game itself, but instead a new expansion might work. GW could create a (really fething huge) campaign, where players could simply play out from a wide array of missions and the battle outcomes would carry the story onwards, players would choose the faction (+ ally) they wish to play through the campaign with.

Example:
Player A decides to take his Space Marines, painted as Salamanders. The campaign forces him to play his tyranid-fielding friend and the outcome of that battle would affect the storyline in a predefined way. This means that for every playable race (Salamander NOT as a differnet faction, but vanilla marines as an independent one).
If something like this was made, it wouldn't affect the basic player base, but those willing could get their wanted continuation to the 40k fluff.

Everyone is happy, GW makes money.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Kaldor wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
This notion that moving forward the timeline is bad because it will hurt some of the fanbase' feelings is moronic and indicative of a lack of creativity.

The notion that moving the timeline forward would be good, for any reason, is idiotic and indicative of shortsightedness and wishful thinking.

Gee, that was fun!

Calm out butthurt, sir. You didn't do it right; your declarative statement has to be correct, like mine was.

Except it isn't necessarily correct.

The "fanbase" you speak of is actually what is referred to as a "customer base", and ensuring the highest overall satisfaction with the product is Games Workshop's highest priority.

Sometimes people forget that Games Workshop is a business, motivated by profits that allow it to continue being a business. That's why certain factions don't get new models. It's why the game rules change every so often to push people to buy new types of models.

It's absolutely correct, because moving forward the timeline absolutely will not dissatisfy the customer base. It will in fact make GW more money than it's making now.

If they advanced the story line, I don't see it turning out well.

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:

 Kaldor wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
This notion that moving forward the timeline is bad because it will hurt some of the fanbase' feelings is moronic and indicative of a lack of creativity.

The notion that moving the timeline forward would be good, for any reason, is idiotic and indicative of shortsightedness and wishful thinking.

Gee, that was fun!

Calm out butthurt, sir. You didn't do it right; your declarative statement has to be correct, like mine was.

Except it isn't necessarily correct.

The "fanbase" you speak of is actually what is referred to as a "customer base", and ensuring the highest overall satisfaction with the product is Games Workshop's highest priority.

Sometimes people forget that Games Workshop is a business, motivated by profits that allow it to continue being a business. That's why certain factions don't get new models. It's why the game rules change every so often to push people to buy new types of models.

It's absolutely correct, because moving forward the timeline absolutely will not dissatisfy the customer base. It will in fact make GW more money than it's making now.

WHAT DID I JUST SAY EARLIER IN THESE COMMENTS? QUIT flaming. PLEASE. We are all civilized human beings here. ...I think...

BlaxicanX wrote:
It's absolutely correct, because moving forward the timeline absolutely will not dissatisfy the customer base. It will in fact make GW more money than it's making now.

It's absolutely wrong, because moving it forward will dissatisfy huge swathes of the customer base and lose GW a lot of customers.

Golly, this just doesn't get old!

That is if people who obsessed over fluff debates equaled the majority of Games Workshop's consumers. Which they don't.

Fluff obsessed folk like us are the minority. We are the EU fans to the common Star Wars fan. Most people simply won't care what happens with the setting, since they're already having fun either playing with their own imagination or just not caring altogether.

I'd like to see the setting move forward, and I'd like to see a new Global campaign to kick things off. We haven't really had a major conflict since the Medusa V campaign.

And anyways, Fluff focused material is already moving forwards. Codex entries and GW writers work is saying one thing, while Relic and Black Library are doing their own stuff.

 Kaldor wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
It's absolutely correct, because moving forward the timeline absolutely will not dissatisfy the customer base. It will in fact make GW more money than it's making now.

It's absolutely wrong, because moving it forward will dissatisfy huge swathes of the customer base and lose GW a lot of customers.

Golly, this just doesn't get old!

Except it won't, because no one except the fluff-extremists, who are the minority anyway, are going to stop buying 40K if we get twenty new fluff excerpts regarding Chaos and the Imperium beating each other up in the Black Crusade in M.42.

Say more incorrect things. I'm assuming you're going for some kind of wrong record.

BlaxicanX wrote:
if we get twenty new fluff excerpts regarding Chaos and the Imperium beating each other up in the Black Crusade in M.42.

Remind me again what the point of moving the fluff forward is if it's just more of the exact same thing. Plus, if fluff nutters are the minority and the minority doesn't matter, then who (among the customers who count, in your view) will be left to positively receive these twenty excerpts of more of the same?

I think Kaldor's point is that you are making declarative statements rather than arguments. I don't agree with him but I would say that your arguments are based on arbitrary and at least party contradictory declarative statements.

I'm on the fence about it, mostly because they have a hardon for massively epic Imperial victories at the moment. Which isn't the way the overall fluff is going. Basically, the setting was written by different people in a different time. The guys they have now mostly take the fluff in a different direction - I wouldn't be surprised at all, if it wa progressed, to see the Orks driven off Armageddon, Chaos spanked back into the warp, Tyranids beaten back to the fringes of the galaxy, etc.

Different people, different times.