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So, I'm just going to toss this idea out there and see.

With the success of board games that GW has been having these last three years, a stand alone, simple release board game featuring Thunder Warriors, the Emperor and Techno Barbarians would be awesome to see! And I think that the stand alone board game set is the prefect place to put these models.

So: Do you think something like this would sell? And if so, would it actually be played?

Please note that when I say board game, I mean something akin to Space Hulk. The way I envision it is you get

The Emperor of Mankind, one finely detailed multi-part plastic model
10 Thunder Warriors, finely detailed multi-part plastic models.
1 Terran Warlord
1 Terran Psyker-Mutant
20 Techno-Barbarians

Dice, rules, game board, small terrain (Walls, Sandbags, etc)

This would be a great way to make models for things that people obviously want, but that don't really fit into 40K. I think that if you spent a lot of time actually developing a great board game experience, that would only add to the demand, and then combine with amazing models that GW is known for and you'll have the strictly model side of the hobby interested as well!

Anyone like this idea? Is it too far out there?

I don't see them doing it because it's not directly a gateway to 40k. I could see them doing something in the 40k setting though along the lines of warhammer quest.

20k seems a bit early. Didn't Empy not really expand until just before the Fall?

I hope they never do it or something like that

Nope.

The HH was too far. There are some things that should not be explored in depth and just left to the individual's imagination.

 Grimtuff wrote:
Nope.

The HH was too far. There are some things that should not be explored in depth and just left to the individual's imagination.

The game HH is pretty good IMO. The novels are the issue.

Why would you bother putting any other model besides the Emperor on the board? The rest would be cannon fodder in a miniatures game.

If it was more a Risk-like game, where you are all Thunder Warrior (or Primarchs) under the Emperor on a crusade to reunite humanity, that would probably be a better game. Each of the players plays one General/Primarch with specific worlds/goals to achieve and attempting to get the Emperor’s favor. Cards or other actions can allow you to get the Emperor to aid directly in your cause, which gives you a big boost to the chance of success.

And, of course, one player may be the “Traitor”, whose aim is thwart the Crusade in it’s entirety....

I think a game about the war between the Men of Iron and the Terran Confederacy would be interesting. However, it would also remove much of the mystique of the DAoT. On the other hand, much of the mystique surrounding the Horus Heresy is gone, and no one seems to mind.

Point of note, the Thunder Warriors were around the 30k timeline, not 20k, having been culled before the Primarch project.

As above nothing before 30K makes any sense as there are no marines, recognizable tech, or really anything that puts it appropriate in the 40k setting. It would just be another wasteland style game which gets a big no from me.

 Bloviator wrote:
I think a game about the war between the Men of Iron and the Terran Confederacy would be interesting. However, it would also remove much of the mystique of the DAoT. On the other hand, much of the mystique surrounding the Horus Heresy is gone, and no one seems to mind.

You missed all the complaints about exactly that?

 Stormonu wrote:
Why would you bother putting any other model besides the Emperor on the board? The rest would be cannon fodder in a miniatures game.

If it was more a Risk-like game, where you are all Thunder Warrior (or Primarchs) under the Emperor on a crusade to reunite humanity, that would probably be a better game. Each of the players plays one General/Primarch with specific worlds/goals to achieve and attempting to get the Emperor’s favor. Cards or other actions can allow you to get the Emperor to aid directly in your cause, which gives you a big boost to the chance of success.

And, of course, one player may be the “Traitor”, whose aim is thwart the Crusade in it’s entirety....

Because in the story, he had companions, and traveled Terra with them doing great deeds?

Sure, it might not be a gateway to 40K unless the emperor became a playable model for imperial players. But I don't see what they would stop you from having the game. Look at AT, it's not a gateway into 40K at all, yet it appears to be selling well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 buddha wrote:
Point of note, the Thunder Warriors were around the 30k timeline, not 20k, having been culled before the Primarch project.

As above nothing before 30K makes any sense as there are no marines, recognizable tech, or really anything that puts it appropriate in the 40k setting. It would just be another wasteland style game which gets a big no from me.

Yet I am sure we could dig up a 1000 people willing to invest and play it. Opinions are subjective, something I might like, will be something someone elsewhere undoubtedly doesn't like.

If "20K" is a big problem, change it I guess. I'm not sure it matters what you call it, only that you would be able to get miniatures out to the market a lot of people want, but don't want mucking up their 40K games.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
20k seems a bit early. Didn't Empy not really expand until just before the Fall?

I'm not sure when the emperor began trying to rebuild terra, but I believe it was sometime after M28, which would be part of the "20K" setting. Again, I feel like the name can be whatever the company wants, that's really a non-issue.

Nice idea. I really like the idea and I wouldn't mind it being fleshed out more. Games Workshop never had to advance the time line in 40K but could have fleshed out the era's of 40K that were never told. Heck they can do both.

I wouldn't want it to go on like the not so good HH series but why not a trilogy of box sets. Beginning, middle end or a beginning and end if not doing a trilogy. One a year?

Also it doesn't have to be just imperium but for other races as well. Stories can be told for the Elder and have their fall, or have Fall from Heaven story lines for Elder and Necrons. Be nice to see the beginings of Tau and something different for Tyranids. Would love to see what the Tyranids are running away from, or what they have fought earlier just like 20 000 would be.

pm713 wrote:

 Bloviator wrote:
I think a game about the war between the Men of Iron and the Terran Confederacy would be interesting. However, it would also remove much of the mystique of the DAoT. On the other hand, much of the mystique surrounding the Horus Heresy is gone, and no one seems to mind.

You missed all the complaints about exactly that?

I guess I did.

I stopped reading the Horus Heresy novels around book 10, it just felt like it was fleshing out what should be legend, mystery, and folk lore. Mapping it out blow by blow robbed it of the unknown charm it had.

The game however is said to be rather good, so far I have only played Betrayal at Calth.

Also, the Horus Heresy book series has become a bit of a cash grab, we have heard that the last book is coming out soon, book 50 I think, and now another series in the story is going to be dragged out over a series of books... I am willing to bet that this series also reaches roughly 50 books.

So no, the lore and Mythos needs to be left to be that, something that players can speculate about. That has been a big part of the appeal to the setting.

TL/DR. Somethings should remain a mystery, it is fun to speculate.

 stonehorse wrote:
I stopped reading the Horus Heresy novels around book 10, it just felt like it was fleshing out what should be legend, mystery, and folk lore. Mapping it out blow by blow robbed it of the unknown charm it had.

The game however is said to be rather good, so far I have only played Betrayal at Calth.

Also, the Horus Heresy book series has become a bit of a cash grab, we have heard that the last book is coming out soon, book 50 I think, and now another series in the story is going to be dragged out over a series of books... I am willing to bet that this series also reaches roughly 50 books.

So no, the lore and Mythos needs to be left to be that, something that players can speculate about. That has been a big part of the appeal to the setting.

TL/DR. Somethings should remain a mystery, it is fun to speculate.

Okay... And those of us who have the opposite view? Are we to just up stick and sit in a corner?

Making this product wouldn't affect you in the slightest.

 Togusa wrote:


Okay... And those of us who have the opposite view? Are we to just up stick and sit in a corner?

Making this product wouldn't affect you in the slightest.

The lore and mythos of 40k is vast and rich, how about GW release the races for this setting before going further back into it's history?

It is to do with over saturation of a franchise. It reaches a point where it is an obvious cash grab.

How about GW doing the following:

Pre-fall Eldar game.
Pre-Etheral Tau game.
Tyranid conquest of a previous Galaxy.
The war in heaven between the Necrontyr and Old Ones.

Each complete with a bloated 50+ book series. It erodes the mystery, a lot of the history was written to be just that, a mystery. Spelling it out blow by blow is boardering on disrespect for the original source material. As 40k has developed over the years the original writers have left, what we have now are people who want to put their stamp on it, and they do that by explaining the mysteries. It just rubs me the wrong way.

Example, the Horus Heresy was initially a short paragraph in Rogue Trader. The authors had no real intention to flesh it out to what it is now.

I totally see your points. But I still like the bloated 50 book HH series. ADB wrote some pretty cool moments. The models are also awesome. I wouldn't mind Warhammer 20k if they somehow found a way to make the models playable in 40k like they did with some of the HH stuff.

I'd like to see a Rock em Sock em Primarchs Fighting Game TM.

GW could sell the ring and rules plus two Primarchs in a box set for $600 and you could buy 'blind' boxes to get the other 16 for $125 a pop. Ofc they would be multipart plastic kits so you could mix and match for the Missing Two and do cool gak like beef up the punchy arm springs. Combine it with a rotating card set that lets you do super cool stuff like 'once per battle you may put your Primarchs head back on if it pops off'. That'd be like a 3cp one though...

Personally, I think that the unification of Terra would probably work as a board game kind of like Scythe. You could come up with some unique factions with special abilities based on tidbits GW has already floated. The Emperor might get bonuses for being massively psychic and having thunder warriors while another might get a type of psychic troop and bonuses from rediscovered genetic tech that helped produce all those psychers. I think it could be a fun premise for a game. Hell, I think if GW went to the makers of Scythe to license Scythe 30K: the Unification of Terra, it would probably sell.

I would like a 20k game too, with the main fight being between the MoI and humans, pre-fall Eldar who might show up with an army just for the literal lols, and maybe Ork mercenaries run by actual brain boyz. I honestly think creating a new setting is better than what GW is doing with Primarchs, Primaris, and Custodes. It seems like over saturation to me. I also hate that 30K ignores the GC so 80% to 90% is just SM vs SM fighting and no cool Xenos armies. 20K would let you have important touch stones like humans in PA, Eldar, Orks, etc but still have a largely blank canvas to experiment with and it has a hard stop in the form of the Fall. No matter what you do, it can easily never make the jump from 20K to 30 - 40K because the Eldar screwed up the entire galaxy.

TBH I would prefer a game like BaC but set in the great crusade period, get some awesome xenos Miniatures vs Imperial army dudes, and use it as a gateway into FWs new ruleset To got with age of darkness (Great Crusade era) Use all of your legion Miniatures in a whole new game and your Xenos buddies can join in as well!

Although tbh I would love some plastic Thunder Warriors to use as a counts as blackshield army in 30k

I wouldn't be very ebthusiastic about a 20k game because of the lore. I'm not at all offended by the hh being fleshed out -actually it is such a crucial moment that it deserves it's own branch-, but the Unification od Terra on the other hands could be compared really to our prehistoric status: it shouldn't be unveiled in my opinion, to preserve the feeling if ignorance that 40k, trying to be grimdark and stuff, conveys. That'd be too far into time.

Now if there were a game, I would not like for the same reason to have the emperor as a model: he ought to remain forever that supposedly majestic yet absent and mysterious being, whose deeds are litlle more than tales in the 40k detting that remember remains the prevailing setting. On the other hand some kind of grand strategy game could be nice, but i'd rather have it set elsewhere - why not among the early taus?

I'd just love to have some Thunder Warrior models

I think some Unification of Terra models would be cool. They could tie it into 40k by having some renegades find some stasis pods with thunder warriors in them. Techno barbarians and all that sort of stuff could find their home in a 40k era renegades/sort of chaos type army. So I think they could do it without distracting from 40k as long as they put some thought into it.

20k is right in the middle of the dark age of technology. Humans are still expanding across the galaxy and the Emperor is about 5,000 years from making himself known and 10,000 years from reuniting Terra.

Do you mean Star Trek?

Its a bloody great idea. its a side game that I might actually buy as the only side game I ever bought was Gorkamorka and Epic.

As for the lore, there doesn't need to be. You don't have to go into the lore at all for the game. We know of thunderwarriors, we know of custodes, we know of technobarbarians all the lore you need is the description of one battle. Plus we'd get an amazing Emperor model and I think we'd all love painting that and putting it on our mantle pieces. Plus lots of converting possibilities. I'm all for it.

 stonehorse wrote:

 Togusa wrote:


Okay... And those of us who have the opposite view? Are we to just up stick and sit in a corner?

Making this product wouldn't affect you in the slightest.

The lore and mythos of 40k is vast and rich, how about GW release the races for this setting before going further back into it's history?

It is to do with over saturation of a franchise. It reaches a point where it is an obvious cash grab.

How about GW doing the following:

Pre-fall Eldar game.
Pre-Etheral Tau game.
Tyranid conquest of a previous Galaxy.
The war in heaven between the Necrontyr and Old Ones.

Each complete with a bloated 50+ book series. It erodes the mystery, a lot of the history was written to be just that, a mystery. Spelling it out blow by blow is boardering on disrespect for the original source material. As 40k has developed over the years the original writers have left, what we have now are people who want to put their stamp on it, and they do that by explaining the mysteries. It just rubs me the wrong way.

Example, the Horus Heresy was initially a short paragraph in Rogue Trader. The authors had no real intention to flesh it out to what it is now.

It's a great opinion. More power to you, but I disagree. It's just a game to me, and I like my games. Where is the middle ground?

 Togusa wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:

 Togusa wrote:


Okay... And those of us who have the opposite view? Are we to just up stick and sit in a corner?

Making this product wouldn't affect you in the slightest.

The lore and mythos of 40k is vast and rich, how about GW release the races for this setting before going further back into it's history?

It is to do with over saturation of a franchise. It reaches a point where it is an obvious cash grab.

How about GW doing the following:

Pre-fall Eldar game.
Pre-Etheral Tau game.
Tyranid conquest of a previous Galaxy.
The war in heaven between the Necrontyr and Old Ones.

Each complete with a bloated 50+ book series. It erodes the mystery, a lot of the history was written to be just that, a mystery. Spelling it out blow by blow is boardering on disrespect for the original source material. As 40k has developed over the years the original writers have left, what we have now are people who want to put their stamp on it, and they do that by explaining the mysteries. It just rubs me the wrong way.

Example, the Horus Heresy was initially a short paragraph in Rogue Trader. The authors had no real intention to flesh it out to what it is now.

It's a great opinion. More power to you, but I disagree. It's just a game to me, and I like my games. Where is the middle ground?

There isn't one. GW have long gone past the point where things that should remain a mystery are described in almost pornographic detail. There is 10,000 years between the HH and present day 40k. This is longer than recorded human history so far. It is utterly absurd that we know everything in exact detail of what exactly happened in a time when things should be wrapped in myth and legend. Things should be left good alone. The HH was far better when it was (quite literally) a story passed down from gamer to gamer, with embellishments added along the way, as oral history is wont to do.

Tuomas Pirinen did an AMA on Reddit a few months back and he said a lot of these things are simply supposed to be unexplored. They're referred to as "closed doors" that are there for the viewer to explore themselves and create their own plot hooks out of.

All the mystery is taken out. I loved it when Garro's ultimate fate was left unknown. He was first mentioned in Index Astartes Death Guard as a boxout and it left you with several possible fates for him, one that we have now and one where he fell into damnation and became "The Lord of the Flies" in the Eye. That there is a closed door. The universe is big enough you can explore this (And I did, Garro was my Chaos Lord for a time.) and not disrupt the canon.