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There are a lot of gw gamers that don't actually play any other games, so that will heavily limit the discussion and ability to understand that other options exist.

It's unfortunate as I think it mimics how gw also operates, IE from an ivory tower devoid of different viewpoints

 Thairne wrote:
It doesn't make it pointless.
The new shiny stuff includes things like gathering user feedback on the next General's Handbook. That is significant.

You entirely disregard that. The point and question asked however "Has GW improved" and not "Has GW improved the rules".
If it was the latter, there would be no argument. Because they didn't. Because they CAN'T.

Factually, they have improved. You deny that by saying "they didn't do X" and ignore the rest. Ignoring the rest, not conceding the point that these facts exist, is bad discussion culture.
It may not mean anything to you, but they have improved. Denying that makes you look bitter.

Or, in other words... let me ask you a question.

Do you deny that
- Return of specialist games
- Return/Introduction of armies highly anticipated
- Hugely discounted bundles/ Start Collecting Boxes
- Warhammer TV / Warhammer Live
was in existance before? Does their existance now not conduct an improvement to times before they existed?

If you answer "no" this discussion is done. Because then you are so focused on the rules that nothing else will be seen.

They've improved a lot, but its still polishing a turd.

You can't polish a turd, but you can however roll it in glitter...

Ruin wrote:
You can't polish a turd, but you can however roll it in glitter...

You can polish a turd actually. But it'll still be feces behind the shiny exterior.

 Zywus wrote:

Ruin wrote:
You can't polish a turd, but you can however roll it in glitter...

You can polish a turd actually. But it'll still be feces behind the shiny exterior.

Yes yes, we've all seen the Mythbusters episode in question.

This thread feels oddly familiar... oh yes, the AoS threads from the latter half of 2015.

 Mymearan wrote:
This thread feels oddly familiar... oh yes, the AoS threads from the latter half of 2015.

Turdology is a large field.

 Mymearan wrote:
This thread feels oddly familiar... oh yes, the AoS threads from the latter half of 2015.

Everything is written under the light of Dakkadakka's boards.

So we have our answer, apparently all those products that slap a new and improved graphic on their packaging are automatically better because they have made change.

 Talizvar wrote:


The day I become a "white knight" is if they actually get serous about cleaning up the rules.
They are a frightful mess in need of a flow-chart and a pruning down to the stump.
There was a time I would have been afraid of an Age of Sigmar treatment, not so much now.

Just want to point out that you will probably see more balancing and development on the AoS side right now than 40k. The rule designers working on AoS are current and active tournament players. Ben Johnson who was featured in the November WD just won a 40 man AoS tournament. We can keep talking about turd polishing, but I am optimistic that it is heading in a much better direction than it was when launched. They are doing a lot of right things there (free unit rules, changing broken unit rules, active FAQ, requests for feedback, living point values) which hopefully can be applied to 40k. The negatives like silly rules have been left with the legacy characters and rules which reprint some of those characters have the silly rules removed (the dancing with the Masque is gone and replaced by a conditional bonus).

Thairne wrote:Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.
Noone can argue against the simple fact that the rules plain suck tyranid balls, because they do.
Creating a new ruleset takes time, as long as you don't want it to be 6th/7th level of copy&paste.

Rules are bad. Fact.

Still GW improved vastly on customer support, customer interaction, additional services, additional product etc.

That still qualifies as "better".
You CAN NOT deny they have improved.
That improvement didn't reach the core game mechanics yet.

You can drum on that fact like a gorilla with rabbies on bongos, still does not change the fact that we now have a GW that is as open as not seen this decade and possibly the last (not around for that long). Both sides are right.
Yet one side keeps repeating that GW did not improve at all and this is what rattles the other side.

Very well said. and agreed. Maybe we should be saying this then. GW hasn't gotten better for me. Why? They took the closed the closest GW store and opened it another one further away from me. So made it harder to buy their product. Then when I did find closer gaming stores, it was the prices. Ok I can understand paying a high price if it's WORTH it but sadly, this is where GW hasn't changed.

As was said before, rules are crap. We can see with the latest Chaos releases it's still the same GW bad rules that make the high prices not worth it. I don't care for Twitch or YouTube or the new White Dwarf, or the "Community pages" or anything on the internet. What matters most for me, is buying new minis and having more fun playing where GW has actually gotten worse than better.

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

What, you don't describe the GW hobby as a messy rule system with overpriced miniatures, but other than that they're better than they were, and have new players that can't wait to start?
Thairne is completely justified.
Now which smiley is it that represents spewing sarcasm from every offifice?

Has GW improved? Sure. Enough to make me open my wallet? No. Fix your rules then maybe your model prices don't look so bad.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

Yeah... GW exclusively equals WH 40K...

Do you ignore the title on purpose?

SKR.HH wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

Yeah... GW exclusively equals WH 40K...

Do you ignore the title on purpose?

AoS is a no-no for me (I will never buy the game they killed WHFB for, never, ever).
I buy Lotr on ebay and the new hobbit rules have additional, pointless stupidity, or ignores former design paradigm. No need to go on.
No interest in boxed games.
Blood bowl suffers the new mini design (and they will eventually add changes for the sake of it, ruiningin it), if I want to build a team of orcs is better use bits and convert.

40k is or was the biggest beast. So yes, is the most relevant thing for people because is the only one that makes them interested in the first place.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

SKR.HH wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

Yeah... GW exclusively equals WH 40K...

Do you ignore the title on purpose?

AoS is a no-no for me (I will never buy the game they killed WHFB for, never, ever).
I buy Lotr on ebay and the new hobbit rules have additional, pointless stupidity, or ignores former design paradigm. No need to go on.
No interest in boxed games.
Blood bowl suffers the new mini design (and they will eventually add changes for the sake of it, ruiningin it), if I want to build a team of orcs is better use bits and convert.

40k is or was the biggest beast. So yes, is the most relevant thing for people because is the only one that makes them interested in the first place.

And still quite a lot of the points I already mentioned multiple times are affecting 40K as well..


Alas... AS LONG AS THE PRICES yadda-yadda-yadda

SKR.HH wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

SKR.HH wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

Yeah... GW exclusively equals WH 40K...

Do you ignore the title on purpose?

AoS is a no-no for me (I will never buy the game they killed WHFB for, never, ever).
I buy Lotr on ebay and the new hobbit rules have additional, pointless stupidity, or ignores former design paradigm. No need to go on.
No interest in boxed games.
Blood bowl suffers the new mini design (and they will eventually add changes for the sake of it, ruiningin it), if I want to build a team of orcs is better use bits and convert.

40k is or was the biggest beast. So yes, is the most relevant thing for people because is the only one that makes them interested in the first place.

And still quite a lot of the points I already mentioned multiple times are affecting 40K as well..


Alas... AS LONG AS THE PRICES yadda-yadda-yadda

For me, the price are a least concern. But in any case, since this stuff is paid with money and is really pricey, I think you should be concerned a company you care about (for any reason) risks to price itself out of the market.

People want quality for an high price. GW sells an hobby, and an hobby is made of components like game, models, paints, etc. If you sell a whole package, quality must be good. For every component.
GW rules are now currently like GW glue: bad quality due to cut corners.

Your points are irrelevant. Keep repeating they are does not conceal the truth. Less blabla, more quality. Until then, no relevant GW improvement. End of discussion.

I tell you when they will improve: when they will fire en masse the design team. Every single one of them.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

SKR.HH wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

SKR.HH wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Thairne wrote:
Much vitriol in this thread comes from the simple fact that some consider the rules and prices to be the end all.

He said, like that wanting good rules in a game you play with rules was somehow an absurd or minor complaint.


The feth... ?

Yeah... GW exclusively equals WH 40K...

Do you ignore the title on purpose?

AoS is a no-no for me (I will never buy the game they killed WHFB for, never, ever).
I buy Lotr on ebay and the new hobbit rules have additional, pointless stupidity, or ignores former design paradigm. No need to go on.
No interest in boxed games.
Blood bowl suffers the new mini design (and they will eventually add changes for the sake of it, ruiningin it), if I want to build a team of orcs is better use bits and convert.

40k is or was the biggest beast. So yes, is the most relevant thing for people because is the only one that makes them interested in the first place.

And still quite a lot of the points I already mentioned multiple times are affecting 40K as well..


Alas... AS LONG AS THE PRICES yadda-yadda-yadda

For me, the price are a least concern. But in any case, since this stuff is paid with money and is really pricey, I think you should be concerned a company you care about (for any reason) risks to price itself out of the market.

People want quality for an high price. GW sells an hobby, and an hobby is made of components like game, models, paints, etc. If you sell a whole package, quality must be good. For every component.
GW rules are now currently like GW glue: bad quality due to cut corners.

Your points are irrelevant. Keep repeating they are does not conceal the truth. Less blabla, more quality. Until then, no relevant GW improvement. End of discussion.

I tell you when they will improve: when they will fire en masse the design team. Every single one of them.

And once more I disagree. Things like Kill Team and introduction of new factions keep me exiceted... Besides that I do like AoS.

SKR.HH wrote:


And once more I disagree. Things like Kill Team and introduction of new factions keep me exiceted... Besides that I do like AoS.

Kill team can be very fun, but is severely unprofessional in the way has been conceived. It looks more like a good homebrew, improvised ruleset from a bunch of young guys with good potential than the work of a professional studio.
They do not take in account too many factors that can make the game wonky and skewed, they do not consider that some models pay points in their profile that cannot spend in KT, is all a bit of a mess. OK for an homebrew system, but you would expect a walkthrough and at least some quick fix from the designers. And KT is one of the best stuff along with Combat Patrol, because you avoid the biggest ridiculousness.

GW designer suffer:

- Math problems: is more than clear that many people in the team do not grasp probability and statistics. Many monsters are underpriced because the designer did not get the basic math behind the chance to hit, wound, and saves. Think about the Riptide. Jeremy Vetock cannot do math, full stop. He has to go back. In school.

- Overdesign: they introduced rules that added no true value to the game, but are something new to remember. Think about Salvo, that is ignored or worked around with relentless platforms.

- Love for randumb: the number of rolls added since 3rd edition is huge. Most of these rolls are not desired by the player base (like the introduction of WHFB-like psionics in 7th, or the Chaos Boon Table. That table is an example of something that hit the mark of everything wrong in design. It looks fake for how bad it is. Kelly is an hack).

- Bookeeping out of control: stuff like Soul Blaze should not exist. I see you like DoT in videogames but keeping track of this on the tabletop is a nightmare. And this adds up to all sort of other rolls.

- Sloppy design: small armies like the Tempestus would have benefited immensely from a small point reduction of vehicles and a better order system (most of these orders were already in the IG book). Is not even creating stuff, is copying the right ones. The lack of care and allegedly of playtest is disconcerting. They even added "gets hot" on the already dubious Volley Guns. They errataed that soon, but even thinking about adding that rule means that you did not playtest.

- Pet armies: some armies are treated "better" because they belong to a designer. Space Wolves and Eldar for Phil Kelly. Cruddace, on the other hand, ruined Tyranids forever. Orks? Who cares. This led too, to the increase of stupidly powerful weapons, high rate of fire, creation of stuff against the fluff, and the decline of iconic units like the tactical squad because they had to push each his own special snowflake.

- General lack of vision: they do not know which army should be better at what, they do not know the scale of the game and how to integrate small infantry and big super heavy. Point cost is all over the place. Dumb units are fixed with formation, that leads to Spamhammer and barrier entry for newbies.

These people are absolutely terrible at their job and a good part for the frustration of the player base is because they, every time, address the wrong problems in the game (to an extreme, see AoS for WHFB after that abomination of 8th edition).

 Kaiyanwang wrote:
- Pet armies: some armies are treated "better" because they belong to a designer. Space Wolves and Eldar for Phil Kelly. Cruddace, on the other hand, ruined Tyranids forever. Orks? Who cares. This led too, to the increase of stupidly powerful weapons, high rate of fire, creation of stuff against the fluff, and the decline of iconic units like the tactical squad because they had to push each his own special snowflake.

This is a huge problem, and arguably it's been for quite a while. Basically, outside of marketing powerhouses like Spess Mehreens, armies get attention and love if there happens to be a designer truly interested in them. When there is not, said army is pretty much doomed to receive half-assed updates. CSM could be used as a perfect example for this. In 2nd edition they had a great codex because Chambers, the guy behind it, was a huge fan of the Chaos theme in general. Then came the simplification of 3rd edition, and one of the dullest codices ever for Chaos, courtesy of Jervis (someone who looks like a pretty decent chap and has really nice ideas from time to time, but who simply does not have the right mind to be a professional games designer). Pete Haines was mostly responsible for the 3.5 codex, a work of true love for the army, even if he overdid a few things... that would have been easy to fix and adjust, but Cavatore and Thorpe just didn't care, and the massacre of the 4th edition codex happened. Phil Kelly cared even less, and the great changes from 5th to 6th edition meant that a codex clearly designed for 4th/5th play was quickly rendered obsolete in the 6th/7th scheme of things.

And some armies have had it even worse. It seems nobody truly cared for Fantasy's Chaos Dwarves outside of Priestly, and the army was left to rot until he could give them another go at Forgeworld. Same for Sisters of Battle (as silly as these things sometimes sound like, a woman or two could have done a lot of good in that studio). Nobody cared much for Squats, and we know what happened. Theirs was actually the case that should have set off all the alarms: a fully functional army with a complete model range (as complete as model ranges were at the time), abandoned and forgotten just because noone at the studio gave two pennies about them. Jervis' excuses are almost painful to read.

The GW studio guys may be quite enthusiastic geeks, but are certainly not a professional bunch.

 Korinov wrote:


And some armies have had it even worse. It seems nobody truly cared for Fantasy's Chaos Dwarves outside of Priestly, and the army was left to rot until he could give them another go at Forgeworld.

And still FW made an half-arsed job. Then decided to abandon them (albeit they are back with AoS) wondering why and half-finished army would not sell.

Sometimes I wonder if they all have some condition that makes them oblivious to social clues, hints, and norms.
This would explain the AoS scrolls debacle.

EDIT: Also, if you think about it, they are going to do it on the whole setting. They will shift the focus of 8th edition on the returning primarchs, so Xenos and minor empire faction will fade to the background with more sloppy updates, if any.
This because 30k is successful, but they did not get WHY is successful - the primarch themselves are just one component, and they work well... in 30k.

Time to quit.

Quit? Its not even happened yet. At least wait until it does before pulling a sulk and burning yr miniatures.

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:
Quit? Its not even happened yet. At least wait until it does before pulling a sulk and burning yr miniatures.

Nah, I would just play older editions with my friends

But 0 support for GW. Is already abysmally low, mind it.

Or, time for savage homebrew. I mean, one cannot do worse than those hack frauds, right?

 Korinov wrote:
. In 2nd edition they had a great codex because Chambers, the guy behind it, was a huge fan of the Chaos theme in general. Then came the simplification of 3rd edition, and one of the dullest codices ever for Chaos, courtesy of Jervis (someone who looks like a pretty decent chap and has really nice ideas from time to time, but who simply does not have the right mind to be a professional games designer).

Second Edition Chaos codex was by Andy Chambers and Jervis Johnson.

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:

 Korinov wrote:
. In 2nd edition they had a great codex because Chambers, the guy behind it, was a huge fan of the Chaos theme in general. Then came the simplification of 3rd edition, and one of the dullest codices ever for Chaos, courtesy of Jervis (someone who looks like a pretty decent chap and has really nice ideas from time to time, but who simply does not have the right mind to be a professional games designer).

Second Edition Chaos codex was by Andy Chambers and Jervis Johnson.

How much of the rules did Jervis write, though? Because he strikes me as a fluff guy rather than a crunch guy.

But to get back to the OP; yes, I do believe GW has improved - communicating with customers, the return of Specialist Games, the Generals Handbook for AoS; all of these are improvements.

The issue is that, while these are improvements, it's like replacing the wornout tassels, bells and paint on a bike - sure, it makes a difference, but it's all a little pointless while the busted wheels (rules and prices) are left unattended.

And when you have to hold up "communicating with your customers and fanbase" as an improvement, well, it shows how utterly dire the situation was.

 Mangod wrote:

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:

 Korinov wrote:
. In 2nd edition they had a great codex because Chambers, the guy behind it, was a huge fan of the Chaos theme in general. Then came the simplification of 3rd edition, and one of the dullest codices ever for Chaos, courtesy of Jervis (someone who looks like a pretty decent chap and has really nice ideas from time to time, but who simply does not have the right mind to be a professional games designer).

Second Edition Chaos codex was by Andy Chambers and Jervis Johnson.

How much of the rules did Jervis write, though? Because he strikes me as a fluff guy rather than a crunch guy.

Knew that was coming, due to the Anti Jervis sentiment this forum has. He could have written 99.9% for all we know and Andy Chambers chipping in with fluff ideas and writing the designers notes as a favour. Theres no indication.

Jervis also wrote Blood Bowl and Epic:A, two very solid rulesets and co-wrote Black Powder - another good ruleset.

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:

 Mangod wrote:

 Fenrir Kitsune wrote:

 Korinov wrote:
. In 2nd edition they had a great codex because Chambers, the guy behind it, was a huge fan of the Chaos theme in general. Then came the simplification of 3rd edition, and one of the dullest codices ever for Chaos, courtesy of Jervis (someone who looks like a pretty decent chap and has really nice ideas from time to time, but who simply does not have the right mind to be a professional games designer).

Second Edition Chaos codex was by Andy Chambers and Jervis Johnson.

How much of the rules did Jervis write, though? Because he strikes me as a fluff guy rather than a crunch guy.

Knew that was coming, due to the Anti Jervis sentiment this forum has. He could have written 99.9% for all we know and Andy Chambers chipping in with fluff ideas and writing the designers notes as a favour. Theres no indication.

Jervis also wrote Blood Bowl and Epic:A, two very solid rulesets and co-wrote Black Powder - another good ruleset.

Well, we can look at the codex which Chambers helped write and the one which came after which he didn't. If Jervis was the person pushing for the rules in the Chambers/Jervis codex then surely some of those rules and style would have carried over into the one which Chambers didn't do?

Okay, there has been a lot of discussion here, some good, some not so much. Some I agree with, some not so much!

I guess the question is, will 8th edition fix all the screw ups and be a solid rules set? Oh, and how many Codex will need to be tweaked to work with this edition?

I gave up on buying anything from them over 4 years ago. I like the game, house ruled what we didn't like and play fairly regular. Our group is happy and has a few more $ towards drinks to assist in the enjoyment!

T...