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Who originally came up with the Warhammer 40k universe and who is the lead designer? Could someone enlighten me please?

The first is a tricky question. 1st edition had Rick Priestley's name on the front cover and he wrote a lot of early articles, but a lot of thematic elements were inherited from Laserburn by Brian Ansell (founder of Citadel Miniatures).

Current Lead designer, no clue.

40k was originally formulated when Rick Priestly, Andy Chambers, Jervis Johnson and Gavin Thorpe decided to glue guns to their Warhammer Fantasy (Rick Priestly, Bryan Ansell and Richard Hailliwell) miniatures.

Priestly left in 2010, Johnson is still with the company, and Chambers left in 2008 (and now works for Blizzard). Thorpe also left in 2008 and is now a freelance novelist.

Andy Chambers and Gav Thorpe were The Next Generation, 40k had been out for years before they joined GW.

Johnson is credited in the RT rulebook as "Development Manager", but its buried way down the bottom of the credits rather than being up in the "This person did X" section.

Well, I'll admit that the list was put together as a result of a five minute google search. ^^;

So is it just me or does GW like to keep silence regarding the current company leaders? As a company they dont seem to be too interested in revealing themselves to the fans. Only the WD writers regularly address the community, and of course we also get some insight into the men who design the codexes.

GW does not have a single "Lead Designer", apparently. Based on their press releases and the like, they assign a Lead Designer for individual projects, rather than an entire IP.

 Sir Arun wrote:
So is it just me or does GW like to keep silence regarding the current company leaders? As a company they dont seem to be too interested in revealing themselves to the fans. Only the WD writers regularly address the community, and of course we also get some insight into the men who design the codexes.

Tom Kirby is the current chairman and acting CEO (acting for more than a year now, apparently) of GW The Company, but I'm fairly sure he is just a suit (and a little bit of a nutty one at that if look as some of his official statements).

 Psienesis wrote:
GW does not have a single "Lead Designer", apparently. Based on their press releases and the like, they assign a Lead Designer for individual projects, rather than an entire IP.

Well, that . . . that explains a lot.

 Pendix wrote:

 Sir Arun wrote:
So is it just me or does GW like to keep silence regarding the current company leaders? As a company they dont seem to be too interested in revealing themselves to the fans. Only the WD writers regularly address the community, and of course we also get some insight into the men who design the codexes.

Tom Kirby is the current chairman and acting CEO (acting for more than a year now, apparently) of GW The Company, but I'm fairly sure he is just a suit (and a little bit of a nutty one at that if look as some of his official statements).

 Psienesis wrote:
GW does not have a single "Lead Designer", apparently. Based on their press releases and the like, they assign a Lead Designer for individual projects, rather than an entire IP.

Well, that . . . that explains a lot.

it does doesn't it?