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I have a hard time seeing how 10 more books are sustainable, let alone 15 or 20. It'd require a 10 to 20 year plan and a solid base of customers willing to stick it out that long.

Yeah, as much as the HH is a cool section of the setting, and as much as they seem like they've actually managed to make it pretty epic, the sheer volume of material they're putting out on a million variations on Marines is a bit overwhelming for a prospective player, and, with that many more coming out, I'll pass. The sprawl is just too much.

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
Yeah, as much as the HH is a cool section of the setting, and as much as they seem like they've actually managed to make it pretty epic, the sheer volume of material they're putting out on a million variations on Marines is a bit overwhelming for a prospective player, and, with that many more coming out, I'll pass. The sprawl is just too much.

I do not understand your post?

The sheer volume of material coming out? You find it difficult to keep up with 1 black book - which only includes units and rules for a handful of the overall available forces - coming out every 12 months (at best)? How do you cope with the volume of material GW pumps out for 40k, where we get multiple factions updated each and every year in the form of multiple campaign books and codexes? If 30k's sprawl is too much to cope with, then 40k's must be bewildering.

 gorgon wrote:
I have a hard time seeing how 10 more books are sustainable, let alone 15 or 20. It'd require a 10 to 20 year plan and a solid base of customers willing to stick it out that long.

Why would it be hard to think of 30k going on for 10 years? Warhammer 40k has been going on for 30+ years. The market and the company are not going anywhere.

Why does the fact that there is a known end to the story curb your enthusiasm for future products? Do you look at the Vigilus campaign book and complain to GW that they need to wrap this story up? No. Why do you want the same for Heresy?

I meant to try to catch up with such a sprawling storyline.

The way I "cope" with 40k is that I only vaguely pay attention to the areas outside my preferred factions. As far as I'm concerned, the 40k setting is so nebulous that I don't especially care, while the HH stuff appeals to me more as a multivolume campaign book.

Start playing siege of Terra by the year 2040. Thanks, but no

Also, there's an opportunity cost in FW becoming "the Heresy Company" - they might be having issues making content for 40K because of Studio intransigence, but there are a lot of other "historical" settings I'd love to see covered. The Unification Wars, the Nova Terra Interregnum, Vandire's Apostasy, the Sabbat Crusade - depending on how close to "modern day" 40K they can get without triggering the folk at GWHQ pushing 8th & the Rowboat Narrative there are loads of interesting and epic periods to explore.

If they drag the Heresy on for another 20 years as their main product though, I'll probably be dead before anything else gets a look in.

 Yodhrin wrote:

If they drag the Heresy on for another 20 years as their main product though, I'll probably be dead before anything else gets a look in.

Well, there is a roughly 1/12 chance of that doing a quick 5 second highly *UN*scientific simple addition of the deathrates of those above 40 for the next 20 years based on 2015 rates.

https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html

 gorgon wrote:
I have a hard time seeing how 10 more books are sustainable, let alone 15 or 20. It'd require a 10 to 20 year plan and a solid base of customers willing to stick it out that long.

Forge World? Having a plan? lol

But more seriously, I do expect that many more books. Book 9 will introduce the last couple of factions to the war and cover their early campaigns. The Martian Civil War hasn’t been covered yet - if it gets a campaign book, that’ll be a tenth set in the chronological beginning of the Heresy. That’s kind of crazy. But what’s the advantage to starting to skip ahead after that?

I assume we’ll get revised rules after book 9. Then, maybe the Martian Civil War for new Mechanicum units, like Skitarii. Tallarn for a tank-based Imperial Army list. A couple of books reflecting the traitor legions’ increasing corruption. Imperium Secundus might need a book, otherwise the Blood Angels will only have been covered at Signus and then at Terra, which feels wrong. The White Scars’ coverage in Malevolence won’t cover their second action of the Heresy when they fought themselves to determine which side they’d be on. I think that’d be great - a small-scale callback to book 1 with its brother-on-brother savagery. Later in the Heresy, I’d like to see the Anvillus campaign, a great place to introduce a million Land Raider variants.

Between those and the Siege of Terra, I can easily picture 10 books, not including the ones for Adeptus Titanicus.

If the Heresy sells well (and I think some changes might be necessary for that to happen), FW should be able to expand their staff and their focus. They might end up in charge of all the old Space Marine stuff once GW drops the non-Primaris infantry and vehicles. That’d be a really big universe to maintain.

 Yodhrin wrote:
Also, there's an opportunity cost in FW becoming "the Heresy Company" - they might be having issues making content for 40K because of Studio intransigence, but there are a lot of other "historical" settings I'd love to see covered. The Unification Wars, the Nova Terra Interregnum, Vandire's Apostasy, the Sabbat Crusade - depending on how close to "modern day" 40K they can get without triggering the folk at GWHQ pushing 8th & the Rowboat Narrative there are loads of interesting and epic periods to explore.

If they drag the Heresy on for another 20 years as their main product though, I'll probably be dead before anything else gets a look in.

I never really thought about it but the Nova Terra Interregnum ends, like, 200 years before the Ange of Apostasy begins.

I think that is probably the latest they would be allowed to go (M35/M36), given how fiercely GW seems to be protecting 40k lately...

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
I meant to try to catch up with such a sprawling storyline.

The way I "cope" with 40k is that I only vaguely pay attention to the areas outside my preferred factions. As far as I'm concerned, the 40k setting is so nebulous that I don't especially care, while the HH stuff appeals to me more as a multivolume campaign book.

I misunderstood, my bad

It seems so bizarre that GW would be "protecting" 40K from... themselves. Why are FW treated like an adversary or competitor?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
It seems so bizarre that GW would be "protecting" 40K from... themselves. Why are FW treated like an adversary or competitor?

Because GW.

Personal egos, probably.

Two things.

1. Unification Wars would be an awesome setting for a game.

2. I find it highly amusing that folks are calculating the likelihood of them dying before the Siege of Terra gets covered

I would LOVE for them to do some Great Crusade books.

Back when the Primarchs and their Legions were all...er...good guys, and it would be a great way to introduce Xenos into 30K.

It would be awesome I tell ya, awesome!

That's their long, long term goal Alpha. For the Forge World of the 2100's.

 Alpharius wrote:
I would LOVE for them to do some Great Crusade books.

Back when the Primarchs and their Legions were all...er...good guys, and it would be a great way to introduce Xenos into 30K.

It would be awesome I tell ya, awesome!

Just think of all the new Rhino doors to be had with emblems from The War Dogs, The Imperial Heralds, The Dusk Warriors and the rest .

25 books? Even that seems like an excruciating number, especially at the speed and price they're making them.

25 books (or any large number - tens of books, as the report said), to me at least, equals I stop buying them altogether, or only pick up the "important" ones.

People rightly lambaste the BL Horus Heresy series for spinning its wheels with endless story filler and whole novels about "Minor Skirmish 7-A". The last thing we want to see is massively expensive and super-slow releases from FW to cover minor skirmishes so they can sell a new set of shoulder pads, Rhino doors and a few new Consuls. It'd make every book like the second book of the Vraks trilogy, which basically boiled down to "Look we made a Reaver! We'd very much like it if you purchased a Reaver! Did we mention the Reaver Titan we made? REAVER!!!".

IMO it says a lot that when FW consolidated the entire Vraks trilogy into a single book for the second edition update it didn't really feel like anything was lost. Not exactly a promising sign for 30k...

 gorgon wrote:
Uuuh while book a year would be nice wouldn't this basically mean decades before they get to siege of terra? Tens of books, 1 per year...With BL getting to Siege of terra in few months seems like long wait.

IIRC, their stated plan before AB's passing was for up to 25 books. So maybe not much change there. I don't think it's sustainable, of course. They've always been a passionate team whose reach perpetually seems to exceed its grasp.

Regarding FW possibly being 'done' with 40K, that was what I was alluding to after the recent custodes beta rules release. My Spidey-Sense was tingling that it might be a rules dump and dusting of hands in place of a Talons book release. Maybe it still has life though...we'll see.

The plan as stated by the rules team at the 2018 Weekender was finish the legions with book 9, then look to reboot the ruleset with either 8th, further update 7th, or develop a new set of rules. That would then lead into a new version of HH with all new books leading directly to the SoT (which was stated at the 2019 weekender when asked as being about 3 books). We'd have seen way less than the near 30 books they are looking to now produce.

This is FW having its wings clipped and them only having the one setting to play with for 28mm for the short and medium term.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
It seems so bizarre that GW would be "protecting" 40K from... themselves. Why are FW treated like an adversary or competitor?

This felt like GW trying to keep 40k balanced (as funny as the reality of that is) and avoiding GW having to manage the FW rules writing process for 40k units.

To be fair, FW doesn't have a large enough team needed to produce enough models for HH and 40k and Specalist Games at the same time.

 Looky Likey wrote:
This felt like GW trying to keep 40k balanced (as funny as the reality of that is) and avoiding GW having to manage the FW rules writing process for 40k units.

To be fair, FW doesn't have a large enough team needed to produce enough models for HH and 40k and Specalist Games at the same time.

Yeah that's rather funny goal seeing GW is the one doing most unbalancing to the game. The less GW gets involved with 40k the better it is for balance.

 Moopy wrote:
Was there any hint of a special Blood Angel jump pack unit?

Making sure there isn't before I order Mk 4 jumpers.

From Garro on FB:

Garro wrote:you’re three units are the dawnguard, crimson Paladins, the ‘something’ tears, and the new contemptor-Incaendius; with 1st captain Raldoron and a new guy as your characters.

The Dawnguard are an elite jump pack unit with spears, they’re described as being a bit fragile but hitting hard and fast, so these are your glass cannon assault unit. worth noting that taking Sanguinius himself makes these troops.

Crimson Paladins are the guardians of Sanguinius’s halls rather than the birdman himself. they’re a tanky unit, designed to hold down the enemy while the faster and more fragile units close in, these are the ‘hard place’ to the Dawnguard’s ‘hammer’.

The ‘tears’, can’t remember the other bit of the name, but theses are a unit of destoryer like marines. they’ve have twin volkite serpenta’s and access to other nasty weapons of destruction. Sanguinius considers this role so horrible that marines are rotated around, and were sliver death masks and taking on new identities while with the units, not unlike Aeldari and the aspect warriors.

 Looky Likey wrote:
The plan as stated by the rules team at the 2018 Weekender was finish the legions with book 9, then look to reboot the ruleset with either 8th, further update 7th, or develop a new set of rules. That would then lead into a new version of HH with all new books leading directly to the SoT (which was stated at the 2019 weekender when asked as being about 3 books). We'd have seen way less than the near 30 books they are looking to now produce.

This is FW having its wings clipped and them only having the one setting to play with for 28mm for the short and medium term.

Well, I find that saddening. Not sure why they feel the need to hobble Forgeworld as, for a long time, it was the only department showing growth.

 zedmeister wrote:
Well, I find that saddening. Not sure why they feel the need to hobble Forgeworld as, for a long time, it was the only department showing growth.

Its similar to all outbound announcements, release info and now downloads having to go via Community now so Community can make sure its to "brand standards", "on message", and via their Community website to drive people to said website. Its why the majority of new stuff from the weekender was on the Community website before it was shown at the weekender as Community wants to be first breaking the news rather than a 3rd party at the event and potentially losing page views. Rules being owned by one team is just another version of this. As long as it is successful (and GW have done nothing but grow since they rebooted themselves) it will just reenforce that this is the right approach.

If GW is doing the rules for 40k now, they really need to look at the FW indexes and update them. Especially Titans of all sorts.

 Alpharius wrote:
I would LOVE for them to do some Great Crusade books.

Back when the Primarchs and their Legions were all...er...good guys, and it would be a great way to introduce Xenos into 30K.

It would be awesome I tell ya, awesome!

Agreed!

As a long time 40k player I've known how this ends for decades now.

I'm really really interested in finding out what happens right AFTER.

How do the traitors extricate themselves off Terra? How are they hounded and where do they go?

That would be The Scourging, which while interesting, still doesn't hold a candle to the great good fun that a Great Crusade setting would give us!

But odds are we will see The Scourging, but not the Great Crusade, sadly...

The great crusade won't take off because there is no scope for traitor legions, and people like traitor legions.

And they'd have to make other adversaries, like the Mega-Arachnids and other things.

It is highly unlikely they'd go Great Crusade. If they do, it'll take someone with Alan Bligh's talent to really pull it off and they'd most likely focus on the most apocalyptic war - the Rangdan Xenocide. They wouldn't do Murder as that is, frankly, a backwater in comparison.

 Looky Likey wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
Uuuh while book a year would be nice wouldn't this basically mean decades before they get to siege of terra? Tens of books, 1 per year...With BL getting to Siege of terra in few months seems like long wait.

IIRC, their stated plan before AB's passing was for up to 25 books. So maybe not much change there. I don't think it's sustainable, of course. They've always been a passionate team whose reach perpetually seems to exceed its grasp.

Regarding FW possibly being 'done' with 40K, that was what I was alluding to after the recent custodes beta rules release. My Spidey-Sense was tingling that it might be a rules dump and dusting of hands in place of a Talons book release. Maybe it still has life though...we'll see.

The plan as stated by the rules team at the 2018 Weekender was finish the legions with book 9, then look to reboot the ruleset with either 8th, further update 7th, or develop a new set of rules. That would then lead into a new version of HH with all new books leading directly to the SoT (which was stated at the 2019 weekender when asked as being about 3 books). We'd have seen way less than the near 30 books they are looking to now produce.

This is FW having its wings clipped and them only having the one setting to play with for 28mm for the short and medium term.

I believe they said 15-20 or 15-25 at the 2017 Weekender.

And this is why a 20, 25 or 30 book plan isn't remotely sustainable. Both external and internal conditions can change yearly or even quarterly. And they're going to knock out a book a year uninterrupted for the next TWENTY YEARS?

Business plans shouldn't be fairy tales.