WHFB 9th - Rules Speculation

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.

**Platuan4th**

Stoupe wrote:

I honestly don't see an ally system working in the lore of WHFB either.

Put simply: You're wrong. Allies has actually been part of the game longer than it hasn't been. 1st through 5th all had Allies in some form, 1st and 2nd by having no real army construction restrictions and 3rd, 4th, and 5th by actually having Allies allocations, which by the way, were determined by who the army had ties to/alliances with by the fluff. Hell, even 8th has an Alliance system based on fluff.

Allies have actually been a HUGE part of Warhammer lore over the years(the Empire and Dwarf kingdoms actually have a pact to help each other in times of need, for example).

**Stoupe**

I love how people address the subject sentences rather than reading my posts.

**Sigvatr**

Does anyone in here remember the General's Compendium? It had some pretty darn awesome allies rules in it with regards to the fluff (!) e.g. Lizardmen being unsure allies with everyone they can ally with because of their mysterious attitude and the lack of trust people, even good armies, engage them.

I'll see if I can find it on my netbook and will upload the chart. It also had really well-working allies / multiplayer rules.

**Jayo'r**

Stoupe wrote:
I love how people address the subject sentences rather than reading my posts.

We do read the posts we just take the important bits for the quotes

**Platuan4th**

Jayo'r wrote:
Stoupe wrote:
I love how people address the subject sentences rather than reading my posts.

We do read the posts we just take the important bits for the quotes

Exactly.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Mr Morden wrote:

Oh and skaven do have mass transit systems as well !

The Dwarves have trains, at least in the WaR alt timeline.

**JWhex**

Credible rumours suggest that whfb 9 will not be "8.5" but may indeed be a dramatic change. WHFB sales are not very good and it seems likely that GW management is inclined to do something drastic. Personally I hope for an evolution not revolution in the rules.

I can foresee GW doing something significant because it is very hard to recruit new players into whfb compared to 40k or warmahordes. Also GW currently is marketing mainly to the 11-15 year old age range and whfb just does not have a lot of appeal to that group. 40K has a lot of appeal to older and younger players, whfb not so much.

Allies: I think you can rely on this as part of standard games in 9th. In 3rd there were rules for allied contingents and the separate mercenary contingents as well.

Terrain: We already have purchasable terrain in the "Folding Fortress" magic item and the new demon book has a magic item that deploys as a barricade and can turn into a building on a high roll of the dice. Wood elves have long been able to deploy a free woods terrain . I expect more purchasable terrain in 9th if not sooner.

If you are going to speculate on rules for 9th, you may as well try and make your guess on what GW marketing thinks will sell models. I dont mean just "powerful units" but dramatically changing the game to make it more appealing to their target audience (11-15 year old boys).

**Hargus56**

JWhex wrote:
Credible rumours suggest that whfb 9 will not be "8.5" but may indeed be a dramatic change. WHFB sales are not very good and it seems likely that GW management is inclined to do something drastic. Personally I hope for an evolution not revolution in the rules.

I can foresee GW doing something significant because it is very hard to recruit new players into whfb compared to 40k or warmahordes. Also GW currently is marketing mainly to the 11-15 year old age range and whfb just does not have a lot of appeal to that group. 40K has a lot of appeal to older and younger players, whfb not so much.

I dunno about that from what I hear Fantasy is bigger in Europe and that 40k is bigger in the US. I know my local GW is huge into 40k since 6th and there are dullards that only play 40k, however last year we had a fantasy league with a dozen members. At the major local yearly tournament that is mix of 40k, fantasy and warmahordes about 10% of the tables is warmahordes 30% is fantasy and the rest are 40k, 30% isn't bad.

**Sigvatr**

Hargus56 wrote:
JWhex wrote:
Credible rumours suggest that whfb 9 will not be "8.5" but may indeed be a dramatic change. WHFB sales are not very good and it seems likely that GW management is inclined to do something drastic. Personally I hope for an evolution not revolution in the rules.

I can foresee GW doing something significant because it is very hard to recruit new players into whfb compared to 40k or warmahordes. Also GW currently is marketing mainly to the 11-15 year old age range and whfb just does not have a lot of appeal to that group. 40K has a lot of appeal to older and younger players, whfb not so much.

I dunno about that from what I hear Fantasy is bigger in Europe and that 40k is bigger in the US. I know my local GW is huge into 40k since 6th and there are dullards that only play 40k, however last year we had a fantasy league with a dozen members. At the major local yearly tournament that is mix of 40k, fantasy and warmahordes about 10% of the tables is warmahordes 30% is fantasy and the rest are 40k, 30% isn't bad.

WHFB is more popular than it is in the US, but 40k still clearly outmatches WHFB.

**JWhex**

Hargus56 wrote:
JWhex wrote:

I dunno about that from what I hear Fantasy is bigger in Europe and that 40k is bigger in the US. I know my local GW is huge into 40k since 6th and there are dullards that only play 40k, however last year we had a fantasy league with a dozen members. At the major local yearly tournament that is mix of 40k, fantasy and warmahordes about 10% of the tables is warmahordes 30% is fantasy and the rest are 40k, 30% isn't bad.

The space marine armies alone sell more than all the fantasy armies combined. WHFB does appear to be more popular in UK/Europe than the US but I am certain 40k outsells whfb everywhere. This is no surprise because the genre of sci fi is just more popular than fantasy and 40k is much easier to start up than fantasy.

8th edition got off to a very rocky start and GW didnt help matters by waiting so long to start updating the army books. I do not want to see a major reboot of fantasy because I think it will just cripple the player base with lots of people rage quitting.

**Mr Morden**

Jayo'r wrote:
Stoupe wrote:
I love how people address the subject sentences rather than reading my posts.

We do read the posts we just take the important bits for the quotes

Indeed, which bit of your post did I not address in my fairly extensive reply?

**DukeRustfield**

There is always a reason for armies to fight each other and there's always a reason for them to be allies. There really is. Lizardmen and Daemons team up to fight HE and DE. You just have to stretch why they would.

There is a sliding scale of role playing that games fall on that goes something like:

11: Believing you're really a vampire like for real. Working at a used record store for life.
10: LARPing. Getting beat up.
9. Actor's Studio diceless RPG. But at least there are hot actresses there.
4-8. Generic roleplay games. There's always the guy with the pizza next to the guy trying to speak only in Klingon.
3. Warhammer. Other miniature battle games. Tactical games. Anyone dresses like Hitler playing a WWII game will likely get his ass kicked.
2. Monopoly banker. Making a free toaster joke the first three times you make change.
1. Online MMOs. /dance

It's cool you got a backstory for your army. But WHFB is primarily a strategy game.

**Tangent**

Stoupe wrote:
Tangent wrote:
You're basically writing your own story and then wanting the game, which already has a story, to conform to you. That doesn't seem reasonable to me.

Your missing the point. I'm not asking the game to conform to me. I'm asking to not be restricted. There are alot of players like me, who convert and change their armies to write their own stories. This is part of the fun for players. They take bits and pieces of lore that has been written. In my case, its a combination of the lore written behind The Great War of Chaos, the lore behind Archaon (as the Everchosen is rumored to be a former warrior priest), and the formerly supported Chaotic God of Malal. But the story behind my army is not the point. The fact that there is a story behind my army is. Many players like to do the same thing as me and theme their army around a certain time period or story in the lore

The problem with the allies system is it removes all creativity. X army can only work with Y army because the main lore supports it. It creates it more difficult to theme armies together behind a larger story. A lot of beautiful armies done in this manor becomes obsolete. Perhaps you've designed your good army to be evil, or perhaps you've designed your evil army to have turned good. The problem with this type of system is that it is one which restricts a lot of creative ideas in a hobby that prides itself on being creative.

I honestly don't see an ally system working in the lore of WHFB either. Think about it. There is no mass travel in our world. There are a few battles here and there where factions worked together, but on the most part it was too difficult. Why? Because travel takes months or years to reach across oceans and many miles. The only reason Dwarves and Empire worked well is because they're in the same general locale. High Elves rarely, stepped in to help out because it would take months to get to them, months to get back, and by then the battle would be over. Lizardmen hardly allies with anyone due to the insular nature of both their culture and their terrain. 40k allies work, because these armies have had a history of working together, and because of the mass transit available in the lore. Here, It does not.

Nah man, it's you who is really missing the point. You ARE asking the game to conform to you by asking the game to do something that it is not designed to do. You didn't make the game, but you, personally, want it to be different - you want it to conform to YOUR expectations and standards (in this case, standards of creativity, or creative license). You're asking to not be restricted in a restrictive game that you didn't create - that's wanting it to conform to your expectations. And it isn't reasonable, for two reasons:

1) You didn't design the game - you just play it as it is designed.
2) I forgot the second reason.

There are a lot of players like you who want the game to be different - I get it. And IF it were different, it would add to the fun for those players - I get that, too. But it ISN'T different, it ISN'T what you want it to be. Honestly, you want to play Dungeons and Dragons, and that's cool. I like D&D and I've played it for years. That game is inherently designed with the creativity that you want out of WHFB in mind.

But trying to add aspects of D&D to WHFB won't work in every case. Actually, you would probably end up better off if you did this in reverse - tried to add aspects of wargames to D&D.

Also, lol, just because something is in the main rules (in this case, allies as you mention) doesn't mean it's not creative.

**Charles Rampant**

From speaking to a FLGS manager, he said that sales have gone noticeably down since 8th ed came out. While I don't agree with his complaints about the game (though TLoS is a bit of a pain), I can definitely see GW wanting to radically change things up to try and bring customers back. What would that mean? Hopefully nothing too expensive!

Though I'd love to do a siege someday.

**Tangent**

Charles Rampant wrote:

Though I'd love to do a siege someday.

Me too!

**Jayo'r**

A siege would be awesome

**Platuan4th**

Sieges were fun with the 5th and 6th ed rules for them. Haven't tried out the Blood in the Badlands rules, yet.

**captain collius**

Platuan4th wrote:
Sieges were fun with the 5th and 6th ed rules for them. Haven't tried out the Blood in the Badlands rules, yet.

Plan for a lot of time. they take a while.

**Vulcan**

JWhex wrote:
Credible rumours suggest that whfb 9 will not be "8.5" but may indeed be a dramatic change. WHFB sales are not very good and it seems likely that GW management is inclined to do something drastic. Personally I hope for an evolution not revolution in the rules.

GW sales are soft for the same reason revenues are down everywhere - the economy is in the toilet and there's less money to spend. Has nothing to do with the quality of the game or the minis.

One could argue the ever-increasing price of entry to be a factor in GW's revenue loss as well, but that's not 100% confirmed.

**Charles Rampant**

Vulcan wrote:
JWhex wrote:
Credible rumours suggest that whfb 9 will not be "8.5" but may indeed be a dramatic change. WHFB sales are not very good and it seems likely that GW management is inclined to do something drastic. Personally I hope for an evolution not revolution in the rules.

GW sales are soft for the same reason revenues are down everywhere - the economy is in the toilet and there's less money to spend. Has nothing to do with the quality of the game or the minis.

One could argue the ever-increasing price of entry to be a factor in GW's revenue loss as well, but that's not 100% confirmed.

I'm not sure that I buy this; Kingdom Death is considerably more luxury (even within the hobby) than Warhammer, and yet it made megabucks.

**Sigvatr**

GW also has a pretty bad rep right now due to their price increases, public hate vs. gamers and sub-par mini releases.

There, here you go, the allies chart from 7th, from the Book "General'S Compendium". I can only recommend this book to everyone, it oozes with gaming love GW customers nowadays will not know. It's one of the best books GW has ever released.

Y = yes

n = no

m = maybe, aka you get some disadvantages under certain circumstances

**DukeRustfield**

Warhammer is a miniature game in the internet age. Frankly, I'm amazed they do as well as they do.

There used to be all kinds of generic "hobby stores" when I was growing up. With paper roleplaying games of all sorts. MMOs basically destroyed that. The number of gaming conventions has probably been cut by 90% over the last 20 years. There used to be a major one a month somewhere. And by major I mean thousands of people. TSR, the great grandfather of many, was bought out by the guys who made Magic: The Gathering a card game. There's been massive consolidation in that industry because they simply couldn't survive any more.

Computer games make more than Hollywood. Miniature games probably make more than a single indie movie with C-list celebrities about the cocaine addiction of dolphins.

**Sigvatr**

DukeRustfield wrote:
Warhammer is a miniature game in the internet age. Frankly, I'm amazed they do as well as they do.

There used to be all kinds of generic "hobby stores" when I was growing up. With paper roleplaying games of all sorts. MMOs basically destroyed that. The number of gaming conventions has probably been cut by 90% over the last 20 years. There used to be a major one a month somewhere. And by major I mean thousands of people. TSR, the great grandfather of many, was bought out by the guys who made Magic: The Gathering a card game. There's been massive consolidation in that industry because they simply couldn't survive any more.

Great, Duke, now I'm sad.

**JWhex**

DukeRustfield wrote:
Warhammer is a miniature game in the internet age. Frankly, I'm amazed they do as well as they do.

There used to be all kinds of generic "hobby stores" when I was growing up. With paper roleplaying games of all sorts. MMOs basically destroyed that. The number of gaming conventions has probably been cut by 90% over the last 20 years. There used to be a major one a month somewhere. And by major I mean thousands of people. TSR, the great grandfather of many, was bought out by the guys who made Magic: The Gathering a card game. There's been massive consolidation in that industry because they simply couldn't survive any more.

Computer games make more than Hollywood. Miniature games probably make more than a single indie movie with C-list celebrities about the cocaine addiction of dolphins.

There is always massive consolidation after the genesis of a completely new industry. There were once over 100 car manufacturers in the USA and in the early 80s there was a huge number of computer companies.

There may be fewer gaming conventions but there are plenty of mid to large sized warmahordes and warhammer tournaments. The question is, how healthy is non-computer gaming? It seems very healthy to me. MtG is huge, there are more adult boardgames than ever and there are more miniature companies world wide than ever before. Perhaps RPGs are on the decline but gaming not counting computer games appears to be very healthy and is probably helped by the internet more than hurt by it.

**Grey Templar**

Sigvatr wrote:
GW also has a pretty bad rep right now due to their price increases, public hate vs. gamers and sub-par mini releases.

There, here you go, the allies chart from 7th, from the Book "General'S Compendium". I can only recommend this book to everyone, it oozes with gaming love GW customers nowadays will not know. It's one of the best books GW has ever released.

Y = yes

n = no

m = maybe, aka you get some disadvantages under certain circumstances

What does the cross mean?

**DukeRustfield**

JWhex wrote:
MtG is huge, there are more adult boardgames than ever and there are more miniature companies world wide than ever before. Perhaps RPGs are on the decline but gaming not counting computer games appears to be very healthy and is probably helped by the internet more than hurt by it.

There are about a billionth as many "adult boardgames" as there used to be. They thrived 20 years ago because there were no computer alternatives. Adults tend to have adult responsibilities. Being able to play online gave them vastly more time and almost completely wiped out the post-college gaming community. I'm not talking about Jenga and the stuff you play with preppy people when you're drinking wine at a house party.

I played Shogun and Axis and Allies and Battletech and Diplomacy and Titan and countless others in pick-up games at conventions. That's how popular and omnipresent they were. You can play them for free online now. Why would someone drive 3 hours, rent a hotel, pay for overpriced meals, just to play a board game they can start online in 5 minutes?

I don't mean to be an old fuddy-duddy, but those days are gone. I don't think it's necessarily for the worse, it's just different.

**jonolikespie**

Vulcan wrote:
JWhex wrote:
Credible rumours suggest that whfb 9 will not be "8.5" but may indeed be a dramatic change. WHFB sales are not very good and it seems likely that GW management is inclined to do something drastic. Personally I hope for an evolution not revolution in the rules.

GW sales are soft for the same reason revenues are down everywhere - the economy is in the toilet and there's less money to spend. Has nothing to do with the quality of the game or the minis.

One could argue the ever-increasing price of entry to be a factor in GW's revenue loss as well, but that's not 100% confirmed.

Everyone else in the industry seems to be doing fine though, that's the thing. GW still have highest sales volume but it is dropping. PP, Corvus Belli, Spartan Games, Mantic, they are all doing fine right now though.

**DukeRustfield**

Unless you have their internal sales charts, which you don't, you can't say how a private company is doing or not doing. GW is public and has to disclose at least some info.

**Sigvatr**

Grey Templar wrote:

What does the cross mean?

It's a special rule for Chaos. If the armies got the same god, the cross counts as a "y", if not, it's "m".

Small correction: it's from 6th, not 7th.

The book clearly shows the change of GW from a hobby company that really has the gamers in mind (the book 25$!!!!) to a money-greedy, souless company that hates gamers from the heart. The General's Compendium just oozes love for the hobby. It's such an awesome book. Man, what has GW become in the last 10 years? So sad :(

**jonolikespie**

DukeRustfield wrote:
Unless you have their internal sales charts, which you don't, you can't say how a private company is doing or not doing. GW is public and has to disclose at least some info.

True but we have the GW ones and they are breaking even or losing ground while other companies seem to be thriving. Spartan games have gone from 3 game systems to 6 recently, they are clearly growing despite the economy while GW have stagnated.

**Mr Morden**

I have spent a lot of money with Spartan - great models - althought they do soend alot of time tweeking the rules and realsing new editons...........

I think they have just dropped Uncharted Seas sadly :( just when were starting up fleets at our local club :(