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From Taco Bell of Lost Souls, so take with an XXL grain of salt:

GW will be returning to Organized Play!

Details of the Organized Play program are sketchy, and I’m sure the full program will be rolled out over the next few months. But here are the broad brushstrokes of what was reported from the seminar:
•The Program will include Organized Play Systems for both Warhammer 40,000 and Age of Sigmar.
•There will be a “campaign system” for each game.
•Prize support is a part of the system.
•The system will engage players at the Store, FLGS, and Convention level.

and the big one….
•The Age of Sigmar campaign will include some type of “points” system!

This is HUGE NEWS! Games Workshop slowly but surely pulled out of the organized play scene over a handful of years roughly 5-6 years back leaving FLGSs and the entire tournament scene to fend for themselves. Their absence has been keenly felt in an industry with all other major manufacturers pushing forward full steam ahead on the Organized Play front. Privateer Press has a fantastic system up and running with new exciting annual league rules, unique prizes and evolving styles of play. FFG is charging in like a bull with organized play systems for all of their growing systems with lavish prize support (remember Massing at Sullust). Outfits like WizKids do the same with exclusive Organized Play models released each year.

There are a lot of directions GW can go in rolling out an Organized Play system, but it looks after years wandering in the desert that they are coming home – and with a points system for Age of Sigmar!

The new event pack for the doubles at Warhammwr World's quite interesting.

15 models a side, uses the martial strength rules again, but timetable also includes 15 minutes before each game go discuss forces with your opponent - including the option of adding more minis to one side or another of both sides agree...

Taco Bell of Lost Souls...genius!

gak just got real!

Intriguing...

 VeteranNoob wrote:
Taco Bell of Lost Souls...genius!

Not mine, and is probably one of the nicer nicknames for them

 Ghaz wrote:

 VeteranNoob wrote:
Taco Bell of Lost Souls...genius!

Not mine, and is probably one of the nicer nicknames for them

Claim credit for that gak anyway

I have to say that AOS seems like it could be fun if you played it with regular people (a given) and devised your own thematic scenarios and situations where not having points isn't a big deal. Something along the lines of old historical gaming where you could have unbalanced scenarios with specific victory conditions to balance it out.

Thats what the campaign books basically are. They have scenarios in them with different victory conditions.

Now this is interesting, and has me wondering if I should pick up a small dark elf or khornite warband. Only thing stopping me now is I don't want to go and paint 30 models to a good standard and have what I think is an army only to later be told I have a quarter of the points GW expects me to play with.

Wel, that and the fluff. But hey, I'm excited to see where this goes.

Is it too early to start pointing out people will simply complain about this too?

 jonolikespie wrote:
Now this is interesting, and has me wondering if I should pick up a small dark elf or khornite warband. Only thing stopping me now is I don't want to go and paint 30 models to a good standard and have what I think is an army only to later be told I have a quarter of the points GW expects me to play with.

Wel, that and the fluff. But hey, I'm excited to see where this goes.

I think you should be fine mate, no matter how many models GW try and show an army consisting of - there is a very real limit on how many models you can play with in AoS and complete the game in a reasonable time. The four page rules already state a 100 model game will take an entire evening to complete. If you want to finish games in 2 hours you are looking at 30-50 models. :-)

Man, GW must have gotten a horrendous amount of negative feedback if they actually listen and make a points system.

 TheWaspinator wrote:
Man, GW must have gotten a horrendous amount of negative feedback if they actually listen and make a points system.

Well or the new CEO is a man of reason - They are taking steps to rectify the years of mistakes they've done (specialist games returning, more boardgames, finally launching a 30k plastic range, etc.) as well as seeing what works for their competitors. I think they're finally realizing that they cannot just make cool models, if they don't support the scene for where you use them.

They are being run over by their new competitors in one scene; The competitive scene. If they want to keep the throne, I think they're starting to realize that they have to take this scene seriously.

I will watch with much anticipation and pray that they open their eyes. If they do, I will let out a cry of joy.

We all say that DakkaDakka is a minority opinion of all wargamers but it's clear that as many people loathe AoS as love it. Perhaps the sample on DakkaDakka is not unrepresentative of the wider wargame world. Perhaps AoS actually hasn't been too successful and that shows in sales, and maybe GW really think an official points system will help.

This would be a remarkable U turn not least because where does it leave everyone who likes AoS because it doesn't have points.

The implication is that the points system will be an expansion of some sort, which would mean no points as standard, with points is optional. Covers all bases, caters to everyone's tastes, fixes the PUG issue. Providing the lack of points is the only problem you have with it, obviously!

Lots of claims of backpedalling, but part of me is wondering if GW intentionally wanted to do things this way to see how balance-by-eye was a viable option. I think the evidence is that it certainly is for a number of people, but it hinders just as many if not more.

Also wondering if this will be a list of "Liberators cost X points for 5 + Y for each extra", or if it'll be a mechanism along the lines of " Multiply wounds by attacks and add bravery to get the model's points value".

RoperPG wrote:

Also wondering if this will be a list of "Liberators cost X points for 5 + Y for each extra", or if it'll be a mechanism along the lines of " Multiply wounds by attacks and add bravery to get the model's points value".

I am hoping something like the latter, and I am hoping it is very much divorced from the rest of AoS, perhaps with its own Battleplans and Time of War. Really don't want points to invade all AoS games

^^ That's what I mean about the possibility that bring in points will actually annoy as many people as it satisfies.

It's pretty obvious that if there is a points system it will have to consist basically of points values for each war scroll. It then makes good sense to publish revised war scrolls with the points values on them.

To create and sell two separate lines of books, one with points, one without, seems like a complicated and confusing way to do business.

It dosn't matter if they list points as an optional expansion, where I am it will be THE default and getting people off of that will be insanely impossible.

Thats good if the point system is actually reasonable, and quite horrible if its what GW typically does with points.

MongooseMatt wrote:

RoperPG wrote:

Also wondering if this will be a list of "Liberators cost X points for 5 + Y for each extra", or if it'll be a mechanism along the lines of " Multiply wounds by attacks and add bravery to get the model's points value".

I am hoping something like the latter, and I am hoping it is very much divorced from the rest of AoS, perhaps with its own Battleplans and Time of War. Really don't want points to invade all AoS games

I agree. It sounds to me more like a separate campaign/event/store document.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
We all say that DakkaDakka is a minority opinion of all wargamers but it's clear that as many people loathe AoS as love it. Perhaps the sample on DakkaDakka is not unrepresentative of the wider wargame world. Perhaps AoS actually hasn't been too successful and that shows in sales, and maybe GW really think an official points system will help.

They are also adding an organized play system to 40k. I think this is just a generalized move to be more inclusive of that play style, rather than a tacit admission that AoS was a failed experiment. Even then, I'd be surprised if GW embraced organized play to quite the extreme that a lot of people around here would like. I expect stuff like the Warhammer World tournament packets.

This would be a remarkable U turn not least because where does it leave everyone who likes AoS because it doesn't have points.

If it becomes like Warmachine, where the tournament skirmishes are all that anyone is willing to play, I'd be rather upset. But I don't think GW is committing the game itself to tournament play, just providing that option while continuing AoS in the direction it has been from the start.

It is only speculation on my part, based on the fact that WHFB and 40K went into obvious decline after GW stopped the "organised play" events they had been doing between the mid-1980s and the late 2000s.

 Sqorgar wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
We all say that DakkaDakka is a minority opinion of all wargamers but it's clear that as many people loathe AoS as love it. Perhaps the sample on DakkaDakka is not unrepresentative of the wider wargame world. Perhaps AoS actually hasn't been too successful and that shows in sales, and maybe GW really think an official points system will help.

They are also adding an organized play system to 40k. I think this is just a generalized move to be more inclusive of that play style, rather than a tacit admission that AoS was a failed experiment. Even then, I'd be surprised if GW embraced organized play to quite the extreme that a lot of people around here would like. I expect stuff like the Warhammer World tournament packets.

This would be a remarkable U turn not least because where does it leave everyone who likes AoS because it doesn't have points.

If it becomes like Warmachine, where the tournament skirmishes are all that anyone is willing to play, I'd be rather upset. But I don't think GW is committing the game itself to tournament play, just providing that option while continuing AoS in the direction it has been from the start.

You hit on a great point I share WMH is a great game and I have fun but at home it was hard to get a non-tourney prep game and since I've been overseas the large group here naturally plays with a PP scenario. That's fine, and I don't care about points anyway, just having a good scrum, but to have a "try things out game" we had fun armies of Pigs or Gators but still with a scenario beyond assassination. So I can totally see your point. AoS shines with scenarios and I just want to keep trying more, not just one of the Clash Comps or other event scenarios. If it's optional finding that balance of still playing the game we enjoy might be tricky at times.

I went back playing AoS after being disgusted by it when it first hit because I missed playing fantasy but after trying to pick it up I just found that it wasn't for me. I think a point system could help but I think the fact that the ruleset is pathetic is a more pressing issue, being honest GW doesn't do points systems well, but they could have put some effort into writing decent rules

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It is only speculation on my part, based on the fact that WHFB and 40K went into obvious decline after GW stopped the "organised play" events they had been doing between the mid-1980s and the late 2000s.

I don't know. That could be a case of confirmation bias on your part. GW has made a LOT of mistakes in the last few years, like their absurd online store policy, continuous price hikes, or killing specialists games, which have made it more difficult for new players to find a way into the game, and for old players to continue to find and afford the game. There's also been a drastic uptick in competition due to 3D printers and Kickstarter (not to mention FFG's Star Wars miniature games). So if there is a drop in GW fandom, and I don't doubt there has been, I don't think you can just single out the lack of organized play and say, "There! That's the straw which broke the camel's back!"

In fact, if you look at the efforts they've made recently towards restoring faith, AoS being a simpler game to get into, attending trade shows, sales on their online store, start collecting boxes, restoring specialist games, new paint-and-play entry level products, even opening a facebook account to communicate with customers, GW has been making serious attempts at making up for past mistakes (fix the online policy). Organized play is just another one to add on to the list, and it wasn't even the first one. I'd also remind people not to put too much into this organized play effort because it won't be as extensive or all encompassing as they probably are expecting. The products themselves are still moving in a direction away from tournament level skirmishes.

 Sqorgar wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It is only speculation on my part, based on the fact that WHFB and 40K went into obvious decline after GW stopped the "organised play" events they had been doing between the mid-1980s and the late 2000s.

I don't know. That could be a case of confirmation bias on your part. GW has made a LOT of mistakes in the last few years, like their absurd online store policy, continuous price hikes, or killing specialists games, which have made it more difficult for new players to find a way into the game, and for old players to continue to find and afford the game. There's also been a drastic uptick in competition due to 3D printers and Kickstarter (not to mention FFG's Star Wars miniature games). So if there is a drop in GW fandom, and I don't doubt there has been, I don't think you can just single out the lack of organized play and say, "There! That's the straw which broke the camel's back!"

In fact, if you look at the efforts they've made recently towards restoring faith, AoS being a simpler game to get into, attending trade shows, sales on their online store, start collecting boxes, restoring specialist games, new paint-and-play entry level products, even opening a facebook account to communicate with customers, GW has been making serious attempts at making up for past mistakes (fix the online policy). Organized play is just another one to add on to the list, and it wasn't even the first one. I'd also remind people not to put too much into this organized play effort because it won't be as extensive or all encompassing as they probably are expecting. The products themselves are still moving in a direction away from tournament level skirmishes.

I'm not saying the decline of those games was caused only by lack of tournaments. I strongly believe that doubling the price of rulebooks was the worst mistake, and second was fething up all the rules. But I do think that the canning of tournaments played a part, and GW recognise that, and that is why they are bringing them back. (If the rumour is true.) It'as all part of the strategy to reverse many things they did in the past 10 years that were unpopular, which you note in your post.

I think going by the most recent WW event pack for AoS, the term 'non-competitive' is repeated so many times that I'm prepared to bet that points will not be retconned and will be separate to the main/default rules; GW know what sort of experience they want a game of AoS to be.
(Replies of "expensive" or "rubbish" need not apply...)

What I'm really hoping for is just a reasonably good (ie better than 40k) points system that just takes some of the eyeballing and guesswork out of coming up with a fun game.

I'm deeply uninterested in a WMH/X-Wing type scene (but I understand it sells well and LOTS of people like it), but I want reasonably balanced PUGging. I don't really know if it's possible to split the difference between hyper competitive meta-gaming and completely narrative playing-with-your-pals.

Basically, I think there's nothing wrong with narrative gaming, and there's nothing wrong with competitive gaming, but my experience of working at an FLGS where WM/H was big was that it just became the case that everyone was either practicing for a steamroller with deathclocks or just not playing. It's not anybody's fault - but with the internet we're all in touch with other gamers constantly, and bigger-than-local metas are things everyone's aware of. AoS seems to go too far in the other direction as it stands - trying to push casual play so much that there's no semblance of balance within the game.

All of that's leaving aside the death of the old world, but that's a separate issue. Still, if GW can get a somewhat balanced but still easy to play gaming scene going, I've got Lizardmen and Wood Elves ready to go for that - luckily for me I didn't multibase for Kings of War, I just have regiment trays for that, so I can play both.

Longstrider wrote:
I don't really know if it's possible to split the difference between hyper competitive meta-gaming and completely narrative playing-with-your-pals.

It is, as long as points remain the optional rules.

Points are always optional if you agree to ignore them. The argument is that people on the whole don't agree to ignore chunks of official core rules, so once implemented, people always use them.

Perhaps GW could issue a massive spreadsheet of all the units in the war scrolls, with points values, and option sheets for scenarios, with points values.

The other option that I can see, is for GW to issue special scenario packs for tournaments and competition use, that would have specified army setups. This obviously removes the spontaneity of using whatever troops you like, but at least it doesn't make any points values available.