Is there space for a '40k Classic' ?

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**AnomanderRake**

Pacific wrote:
...If you look at every other big entertainment format it has a space for 'retro'.
Companies like Marvel regularly mine their classic stories and materials and re-release it, they know there is a market for that type of stuff.

Yes, but GW does that by bringing back old stuff in the current rules as stratagems, not by paying any attention to the people who liked the older rules.

**The Warp Forge**

Jidmah wrote:
The Warp Forge wrote:
Eh, I know when I'm bored I tinker with making rules for new units to put into 5th edition.

I like to call my project "5th edition reforged!" Since older rules are basically sandbox now, I want to make all factions as strong as the strongest factions were at the time and implement the new units into the rules, as well as new rules to make the armies still characterful.

I'm not doing it because I dislike 9th edition. I enjoy it as a fun time with folks, but I remember my fondest experiences growing up with essentially my first edition and I feel that with the current and updating models range and the 5th edition rules, I could cobble something together to make it the best edition I could make.

Sounds great. Make sure to share it when you have something done

Will do! Once I cobble it all together. There's a FB group for fandex's that I'm gonna post up on there first, then once I've made any changes (typos, glaring balance issues, ect) then I'll post up here somewhere

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Pacific wrote:

@The Warp Forge has made an interesting point about 5th being their first edition and it therefore having a nostalgic value attached to it.
That version would still have had its arguments on message boards (I remember people complaining about marines going from T3 to T4, before there was an internet to argue about it! Instead the arguments were in gaming stores ) , but it's the place these miniatures, rules, game and background etc. hold in our memories.

I remember Dakka back in those days. Ah! The Nostalgia! Back then it was constant griping of Mat Ward (and in fairness there was a point there, but that built momentum to hyperbolic exaggerative proportions), the main issue really was that it was clear that the Codex writers never sat down together and planned the balance of an edition, like say how the BL Authors met up to sit down a define what will happen during the Seige of Terra series for HH. It wasn't just Ward that blew the bell but also Kelly for Wolves Long Fang Spam, DE and such. Cruddace for Leafblower lists, etc. Meanwhile you had severely underpowered factions like CSM. A faction, from what I understood, where severely gutted from their time as 3.5 ed. Ward was just most prolific as he made the most codex's.

**A.T.**

The Warp Forge wrote:
Meanwhile you had severely underpowered factions like CSM. A faction, from what I understood, where severely gutted from their time as 3.5 ed. Ward was just most prolific as he made the most codex's.

4e CSM came at a very conservative phase of codex writing (and lost its daemons at the same time), very straightforward compared to the vast wargear and rules lists, build your own superman, and rampant shenanigans of 3.5, and also very clearly outdone in 'newness' next to the 5e marine book.

I'd always rate my chances playing 4e CSM vs 5e Marines (never lost that match up in 5th in fact), but it wasn't far into 5th that space wolves rolled onto the table with a very much 'better than CSM in all ways' kind of look to them, and as the edition rolled on the 5e Marines found better traction against the other new releases than CSM (as well as a deluge of poorly thought out forgeworld releases).

Neither the wolves nor guard were Wards fault. He did break WHFB and write the grey knights, and perhaps his greatest achievement was the 5e necrons where he snuck in pre-emptive cheese that looked mundane until you later read the book under the 6e rules and discovered how much more powerful they became. Cruddace got the flip-side of the hate train with the guard followed by phoning in the books he didn't care for while Kelly is 50/50 for fairly well written Dark Eldar book in his favour and then the space wolves book that broke tyranids.

**The Warp Forge**

A.T. wrote:

Neither the wolves nor guard were Wards fault. He did break WHFB and write the grey knights, and perhaps his greatest achievement was the 5e necrons where he snuck in pre-emptive cheese that looked mundane until you later read the book under the 6e rules and discovered how much more powerful they became. Cruddace got the flip-side of the hate train with the guard followed by phoning in the books he didn't care for while Kelly is 50/50 for fairly well written Dark Eldar book in his favour and then the space wolves book that broke tyranids.

You're right, they weren't written by Ward but it does emphasise my point that none of them sat down at a table to talk about consistent balance. Again there were valid points to critique Ward however you cannot deny that momentum bubbled and built up, to where the critique became outrage which then became just plain vitriol in a lot of cases. It's why we don't see Authors names in the codex anymore.

**Hellebore**

I can't see much in the way of a classic because the current game isn't much different to older versions.

With the WFB resurrection, it will create a distinctly different, regiment-based game that will stand along side AoS.

GW have pumped out a lot of versions of 40k (Combat Patrol, Kill Team, Apocalypse etc) alongside the core version.

But I'm not sure you could find a version so distinct that it would stand alone from an identity perspective.

RT was a lot smaller, more like Killteam. 2nd ed was more like combat patrol/kill team.

The only angle you could go down is the nostalgia for a specific version of 40k, but that's a lot thinner than the difference between AoS and WFB.

**Pacific**

Am I allowed to unearth this thread?

Not quite a re-release of classic rules or new 'GW Retro Special' line, but the release of these miniatures has definitely got some of the oldhammer communities talking about it. With some saying they will buy even though they have no interest in the minis, just to help prompt GW to do more along these lines! Will be interesting if this is a 'one and done' or we get more releases plumbing the depths of retro.

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/warhammer-40000-3rd-ed-miniatures-box-mto-2021

**stroller**

I smiled when I saw this release, but it appears to be only the minis (no old rules), and I still have them from first time around. Nice nostalgia trip, but, for me, that's all.

**vict0988**

I don't think there is much profit to be made selling old minis and reprinting old rules or creating more support for 4th edition in terms of errata/FAQ or supplements. I feel like this is something you have to pursue yourself and GW should just let people do it on their own. But GW seems to think otherwise since they started reprinting old SM and Drukhari models that have since had updated kits, if it goes well GW might expand into republishing rules and stuff like that. They could do print on demand and outsource it to other companies, better to earn a pittance than letting people re-use old materials even if the latter is better for the environment.

If I was going to play 4th I would do it with updated miniatures.

I have the beginnings of a plan for creating a 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th edition Necron codex. The third and fourth edition versions would be expansions of the 3rd edition Necron Codex, rebalanced for the end of each respective edition and including all new units. Fifth and sixth would be expanded and rebalanced versions of the 5th edition codex. 7th would be an expanded and rebalanced version of the 7th edition codex.

It is my theory that each edition mainly fails in the codexes, 6th and 7th kind of break that mold with summoning, invisibility and D weapons. But you could have increased pts costs depending on what lore you get or at least give every army things that allow them to compete if not with S-tier then with A-tier.

**Strg Alt**

Pacific wrote:
Hey guys

"World of Warcraft: classic servers" - a place where fans of the original concept and game can play the game, without the numerous additions and evolutions that have come since.

Got me thinking - the core concept and 'feel' of 40k has changed so much with the most recent versions, is there room for a similar kind of within 40k?
The game itself - if you took a photo of a 40k game now, with Knights and Super Heavies, it would be almost unrecognisable from a photo of perhaps 2nd through to 5th edition - the rules too.
The design of the miniatures - Centurions, giant wolves, Primaris Invader, hovering tanks etc have evolved massively from the low-fi, (less heroic?) miniatures of the past.
The background - Primaris, The Great Rift/Cawl, Primarchs etc. it has changed more in the most recent edition than the previous 20yrs combined.

I've deliberately left any judgements of old vs. new out of this, but just left my comments about how much the game setting, and everything around it, has changed over the past few years (which hopefully is a fairly neutral observation to make)

In the same way that Age of Sigmar saw the destruction of the old Fantasy world, I think in recent years we have seen something perhaps less dramatic (no one is burning their old armies, as far as I know!) but perhaps almost as far reaching within 40k.

So is there any space for a 'Classic 40k' (complete with retro style logo of course) where some kind of rough division was drawn, and would you buy/play such a thing if it existed?
- Rules based on platoon level combat and smaller model count of around 2nd to 5/6th edition, vehicles are present but no super heavies, knights/titans with pie-plate weapons, v. limited fliers.
- Background set in stone back to the 2nd through to 7th(?) edition i.e. Cadian Gate still stands, no Cawl/Primaris etc
- Needs some kind of deeply subjective judgement on 'no vehicles that look like they should fire spring-loaded plastic missiles'

I'm kind of expecting a few "go play 2nd ed grognard" (which is probably a fair comment!) but would anyone have an interest in this kind of thing, especially now as 40k has changed so much for those of us who have been around to see the transition?

This sounds almost like my thread named "Custom Edition" which was discussed here in General less than one month ago.

**vict0988**

This thread is 2 years old, Pacific revived it to talk about the new Drukhari/SM box.

**Strg Alt**

Yikes! Vile thread necromancy! Put it down, put it down!

**Da Boss**

Interesting to read where I was with this topic a while ago. I'm basically in the same place, but I can't understand why GW don't sell pdfs of old editions digitally. Requires no printing, not much labour apart from scanning the old books, and i would happily pay for good quality scans. WOTC does this with old editions of D&D and it does them no harm at all and costs next to nothing. I reckon they'd make a decent chunk of profit off of this and I can't see any negatives.

**Strg Alt**

Da Boss wrote:
Interesting to read where I was with this topic a while ago. I'm basically in the same place, but I can't understand why GW don't sell pdfs of old editions digitally. Requires no printing, not much labour apart from scanning the old books, and i would happily pay for good quality scans. WOTC does this with old editions of D&D and it does them no harm at all and costs next to nothing. I reckon they'd make a decent chunk of profit off of this and I can't see any negatives.

2nd is thoroughly reviled in GW HQ. Why? Because you can play it comfortably with about twenty models which makes it almost comparable to Blood Bowl!

**Jidmah**

Most of the time when I'm playing 9th, it's with roughly 20 models as well, so I doubt that is the issue.

It's more likely that GW either doesn't actually have those books anymore, or that they don't own the rights to publish them (or art in them) anymore.

**Da Boss**

That could be the case, though the old books wotc is printing used to be owned by an entirely different company (tsr) and they've managed, so I'd be interested to know what the differences are between the two.

**Just Tony**

Strg Alt wrote:
Pacific wrote:
Hey guys

"World of Warcraft: classic servers" - a place where fans of the original concept and game can play the game, without the numerous additions and evolutions that have come since.

Got me thinking - the core concept and 'feel' of 40k has changed so much with the most recent versions, is there room for a similar kind of within 40k?
The game itself - if you took a photo of a 40k game now, with Knights and Super Heavies, it would be almost unrecognisable from a photo of perhaps 2nd through to 5th edition - the rules too.
The design of the miniatures - Centurions, giant wolves, Primaris Invader, hovering tanks etc have evolved massively from the low-fi, (less heroic?) miniatures of the past.
The background - Primaris, The Great Rift/Cawl, Primarchs etc. it has changed more in the most recent edition than the previous 20yrs combined.

I've deliberately left any judgements of old vs. new out of this, but just left my comments about how much the game setting, and everything around it, has changed over the past few years (which hopefully is a fairly neutral observation to make)

In the same way that Age of Sigmar saw the destruction of the old Fantasy world, I think in recent years we have seen something perhaps less dramatic (no one is burning their old armies, as far as I know!) but perhaps almost as far reaching within 40k.

So is there any space for a 'Classic 40k' (complete with retro style logo of course) where some kind of rough division was drawn, and would you buy/play such a thing if it existed?
- Rules based on platoon level combat and smaller model count of around 2nd to 5/6th edition, vehicles are present but no super heavies, knights/titans with pie-plate weapons, v. limited fliers.
- Background set in stone back to the 2nd through to 7th(?) edition i.e. Cadian Gate still stands, no Cawl/Primaris etc
- Needs some kind of deeply subjective judgement on 'no vehicles that look like they should fire spring-loaded plastic missiles'

I'm kind of expecting a few "go play 2nd ed grognard" (which is probably a fair comment!) but would anyone have an interest in this kind of thing, especially now as 40k has changed so much for those of us who have been around to see the transition?

This sounds almost like my thread named "Custom Edition" which was discussed here in General less than one month ago.

It's really not.

I know I'n not alone in this sentiment but I'd rather play a reprinted obsolete edition than someone's homebrew imbalanced hackjob.

**tauist**

This is an interesting idea. GW should also release "Ultimate edition" versions where all FAQ and errata is already overwritten in relevant parts of the rules. They'd just need access to their archives and someone passionate about a certain edition to do the work of compiling and proofreading all the data.

I'd be all over a "Rogue Trader Ultimate Edition" along with compilations of all the material ever written for it in WDs and expansion books. Rogue Trader had a lot of ways to generate new stuff into the game, using them you could even add support for new models and such.

Considering just how much GW loves doing "one and done" production runs, it's a good fit for their current MO actually. They'd only need to do the work once for each game edition, and the work could then be resold indefinitely.

**Pacific**

Jidmah wrote:

It's more likely that GW either doesn't actually have those books anymore, or that they don't own the rights to publish them (or art in them) anymore.

I wondered if that was the case also, especially as a lot of the art was done on a commission basis back then. Although, they seem to have re-used other old art at other times with impunity (sometimes to the bemusement of the artists involved).

It might just be that so much time has passed, there is no-one left from the old guard that was involved in those projects - if you think JJ has now gone, assuming Andy Chambers hasn't returned think he was the last rules writer in the book credits that was still around?