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I have only been paying 40K for about 5-6 years now... (but have been wargaming since 1985). ANd recently i have seen on here and on facebook, just slamming this guy, And i have wanted to ask WHY or WHAT he has done that made people mad. And i want to ask that WITHOUT people yelling or screamign at ME for asking it!

Overpowered rules with fluff that is just painful to read. Matt Ward embodies the worst fanboy stereotypes, except that somehow he managed to get a job writing official material instead of just fanfiction.

Actually for me it's the waistcoat and smarmy grin, but also the above mentioned.

The guy can't write fluff to save his life, and his hard-on for marines (and Necrons - his other army) is a tad too obvious

To speak with a certain degree of (biased) detail, Matt Ward writes what we in the writing biz call "Mary Sue Literature." That is to say, he has a habit of making characters that are grossly overpowered lore wise (Draigo and Calgar come to mind), without any major character flaws or failings to counter balance it. He has a not-so-subtle preference for Ultramarines which is especially visible in the Vanilla codex on page 24. According to Master Ward, every chapter that isn't an Ultramarine wishes they were Ultramarines, or is otherwise genetically flawed. Chapters that do not follow Rowboat Girlymans Codex Astartes to the T are abherrants, apparently.

Furthemore, he has a way of.....not...paying attention to existing lore. This can be good or bad. While up for debate, the Necrons got a much needed new coat of paint lore wise. I don't know enough about the other codices he's written to be able to comment further on that though.

Also, he has some real issues with the Sisters of Battle for some reason. Every chance he gets, someone is killing them or wearing them as scarves....even other Imperials (actually, especially other Imperials).

His codices typically come out pretty powerful and borderline the overpowered. There's always plenty of room for cheese in it and they quickly become the Flavor of the Month army. Necrons went from "Who the hell plays 'crons?" to "Holy hell, I'm tired of playing necrons" in like a month.

He's gotten better as time has passed, I believe. But yeah, so there you have the grievances with the one we call Ward

To speak with a certain degree of detail, no one author is responsible for each book.

To speak with a certain degree of (biased) detail, Matt Ward writes what we in the writing biz call "Mary Sue Literature." That is to say, he has a habit of making characters that are grossly overpowered lore wise (Draigo and Calgar come to mind), w

The problem is, I don't understand why the other two get no issues from this.

Kelly wrote Vect in this exact same way, never doing wrong, always pulling off perfection, everything's never done wrong, killing people with BLACK HOLES.

Kelly wrote the 4th Edition Eldar, which at the time with Skimmerspam was the most powerful army ingame bar none, then wrote space wolves later on. He's probably the best of the lot, but that aint saying much because his internal costs for units in general are crap, sure they'll be balanced or OP, but the other half of the book will be useless, or they'll be better than everything (Space Wolves)

Robert Cruddance Wrote IG, the original OP book of 5th edition, then nids, underpowered, then SoB, which had everything cut from it nearly and has horrible costs. He's the worst writer overall when it comes to balance, whether internal, external. His wargear costs are probably the WORST of the the three.

Nobody calls Space Marines an OP codex, blood angels was just marines +1, but it wasn't OP. All the hate generally started from overall space marine fans who disliked his fluff, and came up with more reasons over time, sure GK was OP, and necrons are quite above tier, but those came long after the already sizable hatedom for Ward.

Honestly, I don't have a whole lot of beef with him. I find the hate train somewhat funny. I'm fairly happy with what he's done with Necrons and think the Blood Angels dex is pretty good. That said, I think it's the fact his stuff is coming up in a time when little details like GKs slaughtering Sisters for their blood and all the Spiritual liege nonsense spreads like wildfire. 40k has some truly absurd lore going around, much it dating back quite a while, so it's not really that these things are particularly absurd or out of left field, it's just that they are so obviously so. Moreover, he did 4 codices in 3 years....as well as BRBs. He's getting a lot of facetime, which means a lot of time for people to notice trends and habits.

Superficially, he dresses like a victorian giggalo.

Mainly because Kelly and Cruddace have done it on occasion.

OP units , once in a while. OT fluff occasionally.


For Ward it's the default.

Vect, for example, isn't perfect. He is a bit OT fluffwise, but then he is the ruler of the entire DE race. He'd better be OT. He does have flaws though. He is becoming more and more erratic, and is losing his grip on Commoragh, not wandering the warp b-slapping greater daemons and turning them into holy weapons with his bare hands On the table he's decidedly meh, especially when you compare him to some of the other SC out there..

Cruddace is erratic. as mentioned above. Some of his codexes are a bit powerful and some of the fluff is a bit gonzoed. What he was thinking with the Vendetta pts cost (beyond 'this should make those kits sell' ) is anyone's guess..

For me the SM codex was solid. 2+ 3++ termies were a bit much when they first hit, since a SS used to only give a 4+ inv against one target in CC, but hey. The Tardis LR that could suddenly magically hold more men and the UM Forever fluff wasn't THAT bad, though it grated on non-UM SM players.

The BA codex was a bit more OP, but still bearable in an annoying kind of way. Couple of OP units, some bad fluff blown way out of proportion by the gaming community. An AV 12 meltaproof fast skimmer landraider that can carry dreads and infantry and Blenderdreads that could mince an entire boyz mob without them getting to swing were a bit much, and Mephiston was cheesy as hell, but whatever,

GK in 5th were dirty cheesy, and the fluff stank on ice. In 6th they are less abusively cheesy, slightly, but the fluff is godsawful still.

Necrons - well yeah... plenty of threads on those guys. Massive fluff rewrite that PO'd a lot of Necron players, and in 6th the flyerspam cheese is unreal...

Ward's principal problem lies in power level, both in lore and in rules.

That being said, his codexes have offered a great deal of modularity; there's the optimum lists where you use his "favourite" units which are a tad powerful, but aside from them, they've got solid internal balance and lots of choice.

And I'd say that as far as balance goes, his biggest problem is characters; they're incredibly powerful and perform well beyond their cost. Mephiston is a rape train, as is Draigo, and Imhotek. Without these key units (and the flyerspam of doom from the 'crons, though I don't think that's Ward's fault, more of GW wanting to sell expensive fliers), his codexes are pretty solid.

If they'd just keep him the feth away from the lore and ICs, I wouldn't have a problem with him. Besides, if you're playing with friends, how hard is to just avoid the one or two cheese units per army, and enjoy what are otherwise enjoyable codexes? I've got a mate who runs a great oldschool Daemonhunters list using the Grey Knights codex; lots of henchmen, specialist troops, and usually only a single unit of standard termies. We've got a bunch of 'Cron players, and the most croissants I've ever seen on the table is 3, which is hardly game-breaking.

For the friendly crowd, his rules aren't a huge deal, though the fluff remains irritating, but his armies really have screwed up the competitive scene. GK-Necron tourney lists get tiresome after the 7th round.

 Kanluwen wrote:
To speak with a certain degree of detail, no one author is responsible for each book.

They're the one with their names on the book as the author, they're the ones that are interviewed in WD as the sole authors, etc. Mat Ward had enough autonomy when he wrote C:SM that nobody noticed the drop pod and land raider transport capacity changes until it had already gone to the printers and couldn't change it back.

Ward's problem is that he writes fluff like you'd expect from bad internet fanfiction and makes super gimmicky rules, while some people are all into that, it *really* honks off others in a way that no other author has yet managed. Yes, other authors have made their mistakes, but it's not out of nowhere or for no reason that Ward has the reputation he does.

What I don't get is how every week or so, someone posts a thread with more or less this title. They then warn us that we're jerks if we give them a hard time... And we give them the exact same answers, again.

It's not the Ward haters or apologists that get me, it's the same tired question coming up again and again and again.

 Lobukia wrote:
What I don't get is how every week or so, someone posts a thread with more or less this title. They then warn us that we're jerks if we give them a hard time... And we give them the exact same answers, again.

It's not the Ward haters or apologists that get me, it's the same tired question coming up again and again and again.

A lot of Dakka thread topics are just rehashes of old ones, I'm afraid. You can chalk it up to the steady influx of newbies.

 Lobukia wrote:
What I don't get is how every week or so, someone posts a thread with more or less this title. They then warn us that we're jerks if we give them a hard time... And we give them the exact same answers, again.

It's not the Ward haters or apologists that get me, it's the same tired question coming up again and again and again.

Well like i said in my opening statement, i just started playing 40K a couple years ago, and have recently been seeing his face on facebook pages and on here, and had NO IDEA what people were talking about,, Maybe OTHER people are like me and that is whyyou see these questions oer and over again. But for me I DID NOT see any explantions like you guys are doing a good job of!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

TheCustomLime wrote:

 Lobukia wrote:
What I don't get is how every week or so, someone posts a thread with more or less this title. They then warn us that we're jerks if we give them a hard time... And we give them the exact same answers, again.

It's not the Ward haters or apologists that get me, it's the same tired question coming up again and again and again.

A lot of Dakka thread topics are just rehashes of old ones, I'm afraid. You can chalk it up to the steady influx of newbies.

UGh hate that term newbies. I am SORT of new to 40K onlybeen playing about 5-6 years. but i have been platying tabletop war games for over 30 years...so i am hardly a newb mate!

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
To speak with a certain degree of detail, no one author is responsible for each book.

They're the one with their names on the book as the author, they're the ones that are interviewed in WD as the sole authors, etc. Mat Ward had enough autonomy when he wrote C:SM that nobody noticed the drop pod and land raider transport capacity changes until it had already gone to the printers and couldn't change it back.

Ward's problem is that he writes fluff like you'd expect from bad internet fanfiction and makes super gimmicky rules, while some people are all into that, it *really* honks off others in a way that no other author has yet managed. Yes, other authors have made their mistakes, but it's not out of nowhere or for no reason that Ward has the reputation he does.

Ward's problem is that people see his name on it and start crying foul. The author of the rules is generally not the one doing the fluff.

See the fluff i can see why it angers people. I have been play Dungeons and Dragons since 1985. About as long as i have been playing table top war games...And 4th edition was HoRRENDOUS to me.. MAJOR fluff.... 3 and 3.5 were a little better but still had fluff. So i can understand why people get mad. I also hate it when people dont respect estalished storylines. JOE QUESADA the fat douche from Marvel Comics along with BRIAN MIACHEL BENDIS have single handedly destroyed marvel with making crappy comics and ignoring established storylines or canon. I have roughly 25-26,000 comics. Been Collecting since 1977. And i hate too much fluff, and ignoring canon, or not respecting the source material

NAme me over powered Ward units.
Please.

I'll open with Mephiston

Daemon Prince stats travel-sized for your convenience to a marine sized package.

Even at his admittedly high points cost, he's still OP.

My orks would like to put in an honorable mention for Cleansing Flame as an OP ability. Orks charge in. Half of them just die, GK then swing first and kill the rest.

Yes i know you can shoot them instead, but even so it's a touch much...

Shuntquake autokilling entire Daemon armies on turn one, no save.

Blenderdreads with near-infinite CC attacks if you are rolling well... Other units by other authors that garner additional attacks stipulate that these extra attacks don't generate more additional attacks IIRC

Some of these are less OP depending on the army you play. Cleansing Flame isn't that big a deal if you are playing Marines, for example, but not everyone plays Marines.

Necron death rays- mounted on fliers (hard to shoot down) with S 10 AP 2 (or is it one) lines they can draw behind the flier...

Don't know much about GK, but Mephistion is NOT overpowered. He is 250 pts. Just bait him or focus fire, and he is gone.

Everytime someone complains about Ward a cute little puppy dies. Let's see if that will work.

Because it's what the kids think is cool these days.

Le epic Mat Ward thread lol XD
omg matt ward suxx lol xD
hey guise i think ward sucks am i col yet xP

Repeat ad nauseum

You can pour a whole army into him to kill him, sure. Better kill him turn 1 though, because after that he'll be in CC wiping whole units on his tod. This also assumes that he is visible to be shot before he flies over and mauls whatever unit he has a hard-on for.

Not everyone has S6 or better, AP 2 up the wazoo. Sure, he can be killed. You'll likely lose more than 250 pts doing it though, unless you are lucky enough to have the right tools in range to deal with him.

If you think the guy's rules/fluff are all perfectly reasonable, it likely follows that you play one of his codexes or the folk you fight don't run their ward-dexes cheesy

There's an excess of puppies in the world, but i'd rather a TFG died each time instead. Puppies are cuter.

They feel that they gotta nuke something.

There are legitimate complaints against him. His fluff is god-awful and his rulesets often spawn overpowered armies.

 thenoobbomb wrote:
Don't know much about GK, but Mephistion is NOT overpowered. He is 250 pts. Just bait him or focus fire, and he is gone.

No, he's pretty silly. Yeah, he's 250pts. He's got a statline second only to those of a Primarch, the speed of jump infantry with a psychic power, and can hide behind/in almost anything to avoid fire, not to mention being one of the most potent psykers in the game.


Digging through 5 T6 2+sv wounds is not easy for most armies. If he dives headlong into an IG veteran gunline with 12 plasma guns or a full unit of TH/SS termi's, yeah, he'll die. If your opponent isn't playing an IG gunline, chances are they can't focus enough firepower to bring him down in a reasonable manner.

Peolle whine about Mat Wadd for lack of anything intelligent to complain about. In the Dark Angels rumor thread, a sidetrack started when, after the author had been revealed, an idiot still jumped on the Ward bandwagon (as the previous rumors had conjectured) and stayed on even after being informed of his error otherwise.

Best advice, so jump on the Ward bandwagon.

I has a hat!

Me and my friend make Ward jokes as he plays Necrons, but it's light-hearted. If I ever actually met the guy I'd probably buy him a beer, even if I'd give him crap over some stuff I've seen from him.

Two codexes - Grey Knights and Blood angels - had models and rules that were simply more powerful versions of ones found in other armies, for no apparent reason. This is what people find irritating.

Blood Angels in 5th were a bastard to play against. Basically everything the vanilla marines get, plus Furious Charge and Feel No Pain and Fast vehicles, all more or less for free. Things like this irritate people.

 SoloFalcon1138 wrote:
Peolle whine about Mat Wadd for lack of anything intelligent to complain about.

Or...get this... it could be that there are in fact legitimate issues with his work.

The hate didn't come from nowhere

 Vaktathi wrote:

 SoloFalcon1138 wrote:
Peolle whine about Mat Wadd for lack of anything intelligent to complain about.

Or...get this... it could be that there are in fact legitimate issues with his work.

The hate didn't come from nowhere

Except he's gotten hate every since it became popular to hate on him. Despite the other two providing poor, if not just as bad examples as he could.

Didn't read the thread. But I've always wanted to post this!

Inb4lock

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 SoloFalcon1138 wrote:
Peolle whine about Mat Wadd for lack of anything intelligent to complain about.

Or...get this... it could be that there are in fact legitimate issues with his work.

The hate didn't come from nowhere

Except he's gotten hate every since it became popular to hate on him. Despite the other two providing poor, if not just as bad examples as he could.

It's become practically a meme at this point.