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CadianSgtBob wrote:

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
and you think it'll effectively be just a rules update along the lines of going from 8th to 9th edition, that they won't really make new models for (despite them designing entire new armies), and therefore it's taking too long even though the release timeframe for just a basic model is 2-3 years let alone a full game, and think that it's just a stopgap passion project basically no one wanted to do? That's utterly absurd.

No, I think they could release the game itself initially and add more models in following waves. Obviously they're going to add more models but that isn't a reason to hold up the rest of the game.

Of course that's a reason. What a terrible idea it would be to return to a beloved setting people have been wanting to see more of and then just go "Here's just the book! Wait at least a few months if you want a handful of new models". That would have a big detrimental effect on the overall launch, disappoint some people and just be a poor move that doesn't capitalize on the games release. It's like you're basically saying that making it a more substantial initial release to get peoples attention better and get them invested with both a new game and new models isn't a good reason. This isn't just about "the game" you know.

30k isn't "fully compatible" with 40k, there are plenty of things limited to just that that you can't swap over

Virtually everything in the 30k marine range, the overwhelming majority of 30k, has 40k rules in some form. You may not be able to use every squad exactly 1:1 with its 30k configuration but pretty much every model can be used as at least an aesthetic alternative to a 40k model. And we know that a lot of 30k kits are bought by 40k marine players.

Knights are exactly equivalent to 40k, every 30k knight has 40k rules.

Militia have no model range at all.

Admech were intended to have 40k rules until GW decided to cancel the book for no apparent reason.

The only 30k faction that doesn't have 40k rules and never had a plan for them is solar auxilia, a dead product line (the sculptor left GW) with hardly any players.

Being able to proxy something doesn't mean it's "fully compatible"....

but it's even more baffling that you're claimnig that WHFB models aren't comparable and think there's "completely different aesthetic" when a significant chunk of the AoS range is still made up of WHFB models.

First of all, square bases vs. round bases is a compatibility issue. Second, yes, AoS still has some legacy WHFB products included but GW seems to intend to replace them. And those replacements aren't really a good aesthetic match with WHFB. You aren't going to have nearly as much of the "40k marine players buying 30k shoulder pads for their 40k armies" effect with a new WHFB release.

CadianSgtBob wrote:
With a rank and file game there's a minimum point level to get proper infantry blocks on the table. And there's a lot less room for creativity to keep people engaged as they build up to a full army. With a skirmish-style game like 40k or AoS your models stand on their own and you can customize them as much as you like. With a rank and file game you're slogging through a bunch of effectively identical models that will barely be seen in the middle of the block and have severe limits on customization because they need to fit neatly into the movement tray.

And you can say all you like that it shouldn't be a problem but the reality is that it was a common complaint I heard back then from people who decided not to pick up WHFB.

Another problem was unit footprint. With the base ruleset and expected move values etc. on a 6x4 table there are limits to unit footprint before things start to break down. That was fine back in the day of 3rd but the more model, more sales, rules to encourage more models and sales progressively broke that manoeuvre element of the game. Which actually was the game. In common with a lot of other rank and file games with that sort of unit footprint.

 Sim-Life wrote:

 Overread wrote:

GW could have just said that the End Times failed and the world continued on but after the huge events many of the races unlocked new powers, ancient technologies and the setting shifts from one where mages are super rare and most humans live mundane lives where skaven can be lies; to one where they are on the front lines fighting skaven every day and where the well of magic is unleashed and wizards are more common.

Honestly the only thing that doesn't fit into The Old World would be Sigmar being a physical presence and Stormcast (even then they'd be terrible in terms of fluff but you could make them work if you squinted). Literally every other part of the AoS setting could be easily explained or placed within the Old World with little to no disruption of the setting. I have no idea why GW decided to trash it all.

Thing is Sigmar doesn't even have a model in the setting, he's about the only God who doesn't along with the Chaos Gods who, whlist they will never have a model, are at least semi-represented by their greater demons.

So even Sigmar being physical isn't a huge change. Stormcast would indeed be a bit of a hard sell, but you could downsize them and just have them as an elite army plucked from the best of humanity across the known world. Heck even advancing the time line past the End Times by a few hundred years. Enough that a new Stormcast Kingdom could arise; the Dwarves could reinvent many of their technologies and that magic would surge in the world. Sure you might have lost a few named heroes along the way, but you could easily keep a few around through various means (way easier than the AoS angle where the setting is technically already thousands upon thousands of years after the end of the Old World and is likely comparable to a dinosaur managing to wrangle its way back to life in the world we live in)

 Sim-Life wrote:
Honestly the only thing that doesn't fit into The Old World would be Sigmar being a physical presence and Stormcast (even then they'd be terrible in terms of fluff but you could make them work if you squinted). Literally every other part of the AoS setting could be easily explained or placed within the Old World with little to no disruption of the setting. I have no idea why GW decided to trash it all.

Realms with an infinite capacity are better for creative freedom than a single planet.

 Gert wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:
Honestly the only thing that doesn't fit into The Old World would be Sigmar being a physical presence and Stormcast (even then they'd be terrible in terms of fluff but you could make them work if you squinted). Literally every other part of the AoS setting could be easily explained or placed within the Old World with little to no disruption of the setting. I have no idea why GW decided to trash it all.

Realms with an infinite capacity are better for creative freedom than a single planet.

Actually I'd argue yes and no.

On the one hand the AoS setting is almost devoid of creative restriction. You can have almost anything you want.
However at the same time it also means that because anything is possible and everything is so vast, it becomes hard to actually cover it in a meaningful way. You can't as easily have maps, or regions or concepts of terrain and factions. You have so many creative choices that trying to satisfy that with product becomes nearly impossible. The setting itself is actually very hard to get to grips with lore wise because everything is so mindbogglingly vast. Is that Kingdom of Dwarves important, or is it ultimately so tiny that it is insignificant.

This is a huge area that AoS struggles with even before we hit issues such as the lack of an effective dating and timeline system or the fact that some realms are so wildly fantasy that working out how they work is hard (eg the metal realm - how the freaking heck does it work. Food production, how do you actually live with rust storms that should scour your lungs and leave you probably dead and if not crippled with lung and breathing problems) .



Plus its not as if we'd even covered half the races and factions in Old World. You could easily have added several undersea factions from merpeople to a full on Idoneth style army. Araby, Cathay, Nippon - several major factions that were never touched. Kislev beingfleshed out from an addon to other factions to its own faction. There are vast areas of the Chaos wastes ripe for adding new Chaos factions and forces. There were armies of Valkyries and various other nations nestled away in the world. Wood Elves splintering into the living elf side with a few trees and a full on tree force. There's the Sylvaneth appearing in Old World without any issues at all and some potential for a cross over force of both sides allied together or fully separate forces allied only in lore
GW could easily have had island peoples isolated from the world coming to the fore and just take major lands from others etc...
Old World might not be so totally free that you can have a realm where even the beasts are a mix of machine and organics; but it had a huge amount of creative potential still within it. Heck I'd argue most of the AoS races could easily have appeared there



One world like Old World has benefits in that whilst you are restricted, you are also able to use those restrictions as guides for creative content. It helps to bridge gaps between factions - oh look the Empire has a cannon unit inspired by Dwarven technology. Lore wise its also much easier to have maps and story and for characters and nations to have an impact on the world.

In AoS if a city falls - meh. Actually where the freaking heck is it
In Old World if Nuln fell - freaking heck that's a massive story point. Maps are redrawn, lines adjusted.



Restrictions might limit creativity but they also help to shape and give it structure. It's very hard for a free-form system to achieve similar; especially when it has no overarching creator directing things to a universal series of standards and styles.

 Gert wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:
Honestly the only thing that doesn't fit into The Old World would be Sigmar being a physical presence and Stormcast (even then they'd be terrible in terms of fluff but you could make them work if you squinted). Literally every other part of the AoS setting could be easily explained or placed within the Old World with little to no disruption of the setting. I have no idea why GW decided to trash it all.

Realms with an infinite capacity are better for creative freedom than a single planet.

Overread basically stated everything I would say on the matter. The Old World works for me BECAUSE its small. The stakes are higher and the losses more personal. Even 40k is just too big for me to form any sort of attachment to. Whole star systems are killed off in a one sentence bit of blurb in a codex and it effects nothing. The millions of people who died? Just a big number. Who cares? Entire chapters of space marines and craftworld ships just cease existing to make things seem cool and there is no repercussions because everything is BIG.

Expand this to the "infinite" realms of AoS and it just expounds the problem.

Oddly I find 40K works but a big part of that is the the number of factions is very heavily constricted. The big names that have models are basically the only major players. Other races are out there, but they are nearly always on the fringes. Even if they are powerful within their region. So for 40K it works.

Also whilst the setting is vast GW have given it dates and maps. Yes the Imperium can lose a thousand worlds and its nothing, but at the same time within that choke points; key worlds and such have all arisen which act as nodal points for major events within the setting.

Plus within those worlds things run in a logical "real world" way - barring Chaos worlds of course. So again we can envision how the Imperium works quite easily. Either they are growing food in soil or vats; or they are shipping it in from vast agri worlds and such. We can understand how a world rich in metal will trade with worlds rich in foods to sustain themsleves etc..


AoS is harder. It's so open and infinite. Meanwhile trade is heavily restricted between realms due to the Realmgates. How does a whole realm of metal survive when cut off from trade; how do you conduct trade when everyone has to go through the same very limited number of major realmgates. The realms themselves run on different logic.
There's a few, like Ghur, which are fairly close to reality; then you've got a realm of Death where everyone who ever dies ends up unless they were pledged to chaos or stolen by sigmar.

 Gert wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:
Honestly the only thing that doesn't fit into The Old World would be Sigmar being a physical presence and Stormcast (even then they'd be terrible in terms of fluff but you could make them work if you squinted). Literally every other part of the AoS setting could be easily explained or placed within the Old World with little to no disruption of the setting. I have no idea why GW decided to trash it all.

Realms with an infinite capacity are better for creative freedom than a single planet.

Creativity on an infinite blank slate is substantially less impressive than creativity within an existing structured world.

What we've seen for Cathay, for example, is more interesting than any of the new AOS factions due to how it needs to be integrated into the existing Old World framework.

 Dysartes wrote:

 Gert wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:
Honestly the only thing that doesn't fit into The Old World would be Sigmar being a physical presence and Stormcast (even then they'd be terrible in terms of fluff but you could make them work if you squinted). Literally every other part of the AoS setting could be easily explained or placed within the Old World with little to no disruption of the setting. I have no idea why GW decided to trash it all.

Realms with an infinite capacity are better for creative freedom than a single planet.

Creativity on an infinite blank slate is substantially less impressive than creativity within an existing structured world.

What we've seen for Cathay, for example, is more interesting than any of the new AOS factions due to how it needs to be integrated into the existing Old World framework.

For you, maybe. Trying to shove not-china, yet another human faction into the setting is about as eye-rollingly boring as it could possibly be.

Cathay is not entirely composed of humans. And it’s not like they can’t add other, less human forces to the Old World.

Cathay is the biggest human empire in the setting, vastly different in form and function to the Empire, and an aesthetic has been ridiculously underserved in tabletop war gaming.

It really didn't need a 4th huiman faction. There's so many other options that could have been gone with. The tiger-headed beastmen of Ind for example. A totally different type with no idea if they're chaos based or something completely different. It's just incredibly dull to go with yet another human faction.

Same issue with Squats coming back. A galaxy full of interesting alien choices and it's just the imperium at its core again. But short.

but that is the point, 90% being just different human factions works for 40k
so GW will do the same again, not doing any risky exotic stuff that is really something new, but the boring humans agains because they sell for sure

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
Of course that's a reason. What a terrible idea it would be to return to a beloved setting people have been wanting to see more of and then just go "Here's just the book! Wait at least a few months if you want a handful of new models". That would have a big detrimental effect on the overall launch, disappoint some people and just be a poor move that doesn't capitalize on the games release. It's like you're basically saying that making it a more substantial initial release to get peoples attention better and get them invested with both a new game and new models isn't a good reason. This isn't just about "the game" you know.

You aren't releasing just a book with no game, you're releasing the book alongside an existing model range that people can start playing with on day one. And remember that WHFB isn't like 30k, where 95% of the players have the army in the starter box as their only force. WHFB had a much more even split between factions and there's a large market of players that will have zero interest in the faction(s) in a new starter box.

Being able to proxy something doesn't mean it's "fully compatible"....

Using your 10-man lascannon squad as two 5-man devastator squads and a couple of tactical squad heavy weapons is not proxying, it's just a different use for the models. And 40k players absolutely will buy that box of heavy weapons to use on their 40k models, just like 40k players bought the previous plastic 30k starter sets to get a bunch of tactical marines and terminators for their 40k armies.

The bases are an issue, but outside of that you said the product line and and aesthetic. The models that have been replaced haven't really been some complete aesthetic style change as you're making out and even some of the new armies aren't really that different to the point they couldn't fit.

Really? Because when I look at them I see a completely different aesthetic. WHFB had a fairly subdued and realistic style with restrained poses (needed so the models fit into movement trays), AoS has gone a lot more in the high-magic fantasy direction with dramatic posing, magical effects everywhere, giant centerpiece diorama scenes, etc. Put a space marine stormcast kit next to a WHFB armored knight and the different is obvious IMO.

 kodos wrote:
but that is the point, 90% being just different human factions works for 40k
so GW will do the same again, not doing any risky exotic stuff that is really something new, but the boring humans agains because they sell for sure

Does it though? It's Space Marines that sell for 40K, not the guard. It's the super human side that's the massive seller, guard are a fraction of that. If the space marine players end up going to 30k, i think you would see a lot more diversity in the armies played throughout 40k

CadianSgtBob wrote:


Really? Because when I look at them I see a completely different aesthetic. WHFB had a fairly subdued and realistic style with restrained poses (needed so the models fit into movement trays), AoS has gone a lot more in the high-magic fantasy direction with dramatic posing, magical effects everywhere, giant centerpiece diorama scenes, etc. Put a space marine stormcast kit next to a WHFB armored knight and the different is obvious IMO.

Some of it is restrained pose because of rank and file and some is just because a lot of fantasy models are a lot older.
Look at the Witch Aelves for Daughters of Khaine. Those are pretty dynamic and they were designed for rank and file. The core army models for Lumineth are archers, spearmen and light cavalry - each of which can again rank up pretty well (spearmen perhaps slightly less well due to the angle of their spears and not much more).


Endless Spells are pretty new, but the Old World had just as many magical elements and the concept could very easily have been ported over into the setting. Heck you can argue that the Wood Elves have been doing it for years with their summonable woodland. It's the same as how faction terrain became a think (which is arguably closer ot what Wood Elves were doing for years).

Giant Centerpiece models started with Old World when GW updated the Greater Demons to knight their current much larger forms - heck they are now Forgeworld sized.


Again all these things are more the evolution of GW's design philosophy, technology, investment, plastic skill etc... Rather than inherent things that could "never work" in the original game. Heck looking at the artwork for Old World the Empire could have easily had a huge marching religious ceremony in the middle of the battlefield much like the Sisters of Battle have their huge walking reliquary diorama.



In many ways the total freedom of AoS has not really been unlocked as yet. Much of what we have model wise is still pretty much Old World compatible and would easily fit into the setting - which is understandable. A lot of it likely IS drawn from concept art, dreams and ideas of staff who were working for 30 years on the Old World setting. The lore for AoS goes further, some impossible (walking behemoths with cities on their backs) some very possible - eg the Metal Realm has animals and beasts that are a fusion of machine parts and living organics without being chaos. The Cities of Sigmar should, in theory, be a full steam punk style army at their human core. Not just a little steam, but full on walking robots style steam punk the like of which, in the Old World, would only have been touched upon by the Dwarves.



I think we will start to see these things as the setting establishes itself and as it progresses.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
It really didn't need a 4th huiman faction. There's so many other options that could have been gone with. The tiger-headed beastmen of Ind for example. A totally different type with no idea if they're chaos based or something completely different. It's just incredibly dull to go with yet another human faction.

Same issue with Squats coming back. A galaxy full of interesting alien choices and it's just the imperium at its core again. But short.

Considering GW’s attempts to fight its image as fostering a toxic fanbase, I think they would have been ill-advised to deepen their Europeans=humans, non-Europeans=monsters tradition.

Besides, GW is pumping out new boxes every month. They could release Cathay one month and then Tiger People a couple months later. Acting like WHFB releases are a zero sum game was part of what killed the game.

There's nothing specifically linking the beastmen to actual India. It's just the region they're from. Same way you don't link regular Beastmen to the Empire, despite that's where a massive number of them come from.

And despite the boxes they pump out, actual new armies are quite rare. The Squats are what, the first brand new army since the cults?

We don’t link beastmen to the Empire because we have all kinds of background about the humans who make up the Empire. If all we ever meet from Ind are the Beastmen, then we will associate Ind with beastmen.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
New armies: Squats, Sisters, Cults, Admech, AOS undead dudes, fish dudes, all kinds of weird chaos subfactions, cow elves, spider goblins, worse Orcs, probably others. I haven’t paid close attention.

If GW wanted to make the Old World new again, their best bet would be to introduce new factions and generate new interest while selling the extant old factions the old players already love. Which appears to be what they are doing.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
Of course that's a reason. What a terrible idea it would be to return to a beloved setting people have been wanting to see more of and then just go "Here's just the book! Wait at least a few months if you want a handful of new models". That would have a big detrimental effect on the overall launch, disappoint some people and just be a poor move that doesn't capitalize on the games release. It's like you're basically saying that making it a more substantial initial release to get peoples attention better and get them invested with both a new game and new models isn't a good reason. This isn't just about "the game" you know.

You aren't releasing just a book with no game, you're releasing the book alongside an existing model range that people can start playing with on day one. And remember that WHFB isn't like 30k, where 95% of the players have the army in the starter box as their only force. WHFB had a much more even split between factions and there's a large market of players that will have zero interest in the faction(s) in a new starter box.

And again, releasing it without any new miniatures would be a terrible idea that wouldn't capitalize on peoples hype for the project. Impatiently releasing just the game side because you don't want to wait for the models alongside it to make it a bigger release that'll get more people interested at the start is not a good move.

[quote

Being able to proxy something doesn't mean it's "fully compatible"....

Using your 10-man lascannon squad as two 5-man devastator squads and a couple of tactical squad heavy weapons is not proxying, it's just a different use for the models. And 40k players absolutely will buy that box of heavy weapons to use on their 40k models, just like 40k players bought the previous plastic 30k starter sets to get a bunch of tactical marines and terminators for their 40k armies.

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
And again, releasing it without any new miniatures would be a terrible idea that wouldn't capitalize on peoples hype for the project. Impatiently releasing just the game side because you don't want to wait for the models alongside it to make it a bigger release that'll get more people interested at the start is not a good move.

You're again ignoring the difference in faction splits between WHFB and 30k. Holding the 30k box until the full plastic line is ready makes sense because 95% of your players are using only the faction in the starter box. Holding the WHFB release until the new kits are ready is a bad strategy because most players are going to shrug and say "not my faction", with their sole interest being in getting the new rulebook to play with their existing factions (and maybe buy some new models from the existing product lines).

No. I'm not talking about the units that actually do have a counterpart in 40k and can therefore find a use. The ones that you claimed are an "aesthetic alternative" i.e. don't have an actual 40k thing, are proxies.

Which units are those? Assuming you're willing to use volkite weapons as plasma (an obvious choice since volkite already looks like plasma) there's what, a handful of special character models that don't have 40k equivalents with their exact weapon options? The vast majority of 30k marine models are fully WYSIWYG with a 40k model, and the non-marine stuff is barely relevant in 30k.

Just what do you think wouldn't fit aesthically?

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Lumineth-Realm-lords-Sevireth-Lord-of-the-Seventh-Wind-2021

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Kharadron-Overlords-Arkanaut-Ironclad-2017

Can you adapt the lore to fit them? Maybe. But I don't think someone who loved WHFB as it was and wants to continue playing WHFB will have much interest in those models.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
And again, releasing it without any new miniatures would be a terrible idea that wouldn't capitalize on peoples hype for the project. Impatiently releasing just the game side because you don't want to wait for the models alongside it to make it a bigger release that'll get more people interested at the start is not a good move.

You're again ignoring the difference in faction splits between WHFB and 30k. Holding the 30k box until the full plastic line is ready makes sense because 95% of your players are using only the faction in the starter box. Holding the WHFB release until the new kits are ready is a bad strategy because most players are going to shrug and say "not my faction", with their sole interest being in getting the new rulebook to play with their existing factions (and maybe buy some new models from the existing product lines).

No. I'm not talking about the units that actually do have a counterpart in 40k and can therefore find a use. The ones that you claimed are an "aesthetic alternative" i.e. don't have an actual 40k thing, are proxies.

Which units are those? Assuming you're willing to use volkite weapons as plasma (an obvious choice since volkite already looks like plasma) there's what, a handful of special character models that don't have 40k equivalents with their exact weapon options? The vast majority of 30k marine models are fully WYSIWYG with a 40k model, and the non-marine stuff is barely relevant in 30k.

Just what do you think wouldn't fit aesthically?

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Lumineth-Realm-lords-Sevireth-Lord-of-the-Seventh-Wind-2021

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Kharadron-Overlords-Arkanaut-Ironclad-2017

Can you adapt the lore to fit them? Maybe. But I don't think someone who loved WHFB as it was and wants to continue playing WHFB will have much interest in those models.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

 Mentlegen324 wrote:
And again, releasing it without any new miniatures would be a terrible idea that wouldn't capitalize on peoples hype for the project. Impatiently releasing just the game side because you don't want to wait for the models alongside it to make it a bigger release that'll get more people interested at the start is not a good move.

You're again ignoring the difference in faction splits between WHFB and 30k. Holding the 30k box until the full plastic line is ready makes sense because 95% of your players are using only the faction in the starter box. Holding the WHFB release until the new kits are ready is a bad strategy because most players are going to shrug and say "not my faction", with their sole interest being in getting the new rulebook to play with their existing factions (and maybe buy some new models from the existing product lines).

New miniatures would appeal to people interested in that army, new players and people who just like those models. That they wouldn't appeal to everyone doesn't mean it's pointless.

Which units are those? Assuming you're willing to use volkite weapons as plasma (an obvious choice since volkite already looks like plasma) there's what, a handful of special character models that don't have 40k equivalents with their exact weapon options? The vast majority of 30k marine models are fully WYSIWYG with a 40k model, and the non-marine stuff is barely relevant in 30k.

Seriously? It's absurd how you give an example of proxying Volkite as an aesthetic alternative to Plasma, choose to discredit the rest, and then act as if there isn't anything. Reminder that your original claim was that 30k is "fully compatible". It evidently isn't based on your own post there.

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Lumineth-Realm-lords-Sevireth-Lord-of-the-Seventh-Wind-2021

https://www.games-workshop.com/en-US/Kharadron-Overlords-Arkanaut-Ironclad-2017

Can you adapt the lore to fit them? Maybe. But I don't think someone who loved WHFB as it was and wants to continue playing WHFB will have much interest in those models.

...A dwarf airship and a magic Antlope archer is unfitting aesthetically for a setting that had Dwarf Airships, Steamtanks, Ironclad battleships etc and all sorts of mystical fantasy creatures? Nothing about those designs would be entirely out of place with the setting.

 Overread wrote:
I think he was just an accountant who wound up running a firm and wasn't really trained nor skilled in that role. So his early days where he most certainly cut costs and improved GW's overall financial health worked well. Because that was all numbers.

However when it came to managing the firm and carrying it forward; to community engagement; recruiting; product focus; market research and all. I feel that he just didn't have the right skill set. Aided by having staff under him who were more yes-men who also had weak points in sklil (their legal guy wasn't trained in copyright/IP law or anything) and you've a setup for an echo-chamber team that didn't take the company to its full potential.

Like you said Kirby was a accountant who somehow ended up as CEO for one of two reasons 1) noone else wanted it or 2) he knew how to play the politics game at GWHQ.

The real poison in GW at that time was Alan Merrett the so called 'lore keeper'. The person who said "Genestealer cults and Squats will NEVER be armies as long as im around."
Notice how fast he was kicked out the door once his front man Kirby was given his golden para-shoot. I worked at GW right before the 1man stores came into being and they where canning people for any old reason to reduce costs especially full timers.

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." I had some damn good fun there working for GW but man the crap from HQ we had to put up with was crazy. It was even worse as I worked in Canada so it went from nottingham to GW Canada HQ then twisted to suit the regional managers then filtered down to us in the stores.

 FabricatorGeneralMike wrote:

The real poison in GW at that time was Alan Merrett the so called 'lore keeper'. The person who said "Genestealer cults and Squats will NEVER be armies as long as im around."
Notice how fast he was kicked out the door once his front man Kirby was given his golden para-shoot. I worked at GW right before the 1man stores came into being and they where canning people for any old reason to reduce costs especially full timers.

Was he also the one who'd fire staff almost at random where managers would hide up staff and such if he was around the main site just to avoid having their staff cut from under them and such? I do certainly recall more than few stories floating around that there was at least one middle/lower tier manager who was a bane of many staff.

Also there's the guy (might be same guy?) who was the one the design team for AoS was trying to appease which resulted in the whole total mess of launch. I know Kirby gets a lot of the blame for everything, when in reality it was him and his management team under him. Not all, but enough to cause trouble.

 FabricatorGeneralMike wrote:


The real poison in GW at that time was Alan Merrett the so called 'lore keeper'. The person who said "Genestealer cults and Squats will NEVER be armies as long as im around."

Interesting.

Now someone find out who said that the Inquisition should not be a 40k faction!

For anybody saying another faction in fantasy that was human would be boring should seriously look at the state of all the human factions in 40k. More than half of the forces in 40k are human as about half are all belonging to the imperium. That fact alone is pretty absurd.

Ofc i agree too many human factions in a fantasy world is boring which is why in 8th ed fantasy when they suggested a type of ocean faction with needle fanged teeth i was getting hyped for some sort of cthulu, fish pirates or some sort of invertebrate faction of ocean raiders. Yeah i suppose dark elves somewhat fit the bill but still it could've been interesting.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
It really didn't need a 4th huiman faction. There's so many other options that could have been gone with. The tiger-headed beastmen of Ind for example. A totally different type with no idea if they're chaos based or something completely different. It's just incredibly dull to go with yet another human faction.

Same issue with Squats coming back. A galaxy full of interesting alien choices and it's just the imperium at its core again. But short.

Considering GW’s attempts to fight its image as fostering a toxic fanbase, I think they would have been ill-advised to deepen their Europeans=humans, non-Europeans=monsters tradition.

Besides, GW is pumping out new boxes every month. They could release Cathay one month and then Tiger People a couple months later. Acting like WHFB releases are a zero sum game was part of what killed the game.

Actually if i recall Warhammer Fantasy was more a fantastical fantasy version of the real world as a bunch of superstitious old world europeans would've seen it. The rats of the plagues being skaven, the lizardmen sorta being aztecs but also predicting the end of the world where the dinos go extinct, etc. I mean if what you say is true they find american colonies to sorta be a bunch of deviant slavers and yes i know it might take a jab at the americas but it's just a game. JUST A GAME! I'm american and i don't care. Sheesh. I suppose we should get rid of orks in 40k being a joke on football hooligans.

First of all, I didn’t say they should get rid of anything. I suggested that adding a colorful new human faction representing a people not yet seen in the game is better than introducing new monsters representing a people not yet seen in the game.

Second, “Just a game!” isn’t really an excuse for everything, otherwise you should demand they bring the pygmies back. “It’s just a game!”

Third, I’m going to need a quote or something on the idea that the setting was consciously designed to represent the world according to old European superstitions. It seems plausible, but I would like to know who pushed for this and when, because….

Fourth, as you yourself pointed out, mesoamerican lizard people don’t really fit in with that schema. If that was the original intent behind the Okd World setting, GW clearly abandoned it by 5th edition, probably much sooner.

Fifth, you can have both monsters and people outside of Europe. It is not a zero sum game where everything east of Kislev and south of Araby has to be monsters or you won’t get your Estalian mercenaries. If you only choose to have monsters everywhere else, you are sending a message, whether you mean to or not.

 Overread wrote:
Actually I'd argue yes and no.

On the one hand the AoS setting is almost devoid of creative restriction. You can have almost anything you want.
However at the same time it also means that because anything is possible and everything is so vast, it becomes hard to actually cover it in a meaningful way. You can't as easily have maps, or regions or concepts of terrain and factions. You have so many creative choices that trying to satisfy that with product becomes nearly impossible. The setting itself is actually very hard to get to grips with lore wise because everything is so mindbogglingly vast. Is that Kingdom of Dwarves important, or is it ultimately so tiny that it is insignificant.

The big map on my wall says otherwise. GW very much created focuses for the specific eras of AoS so far and those regions have been fleshed out pretty well. We've got the big important Free Cities (the fate of which isn't set in stone as we have seen with both Excelsis and Anvilgard) and quite a few named regions within the Realms. I disagree that the scale means nothing is ever important when the setting is vast and I think AoS is a much more event-driven setting compared to 40k or WHFB.

You talk about how you don't understand how certain Realms work and if you literally just read the AoS core book it tells you that the Realms aren't consistent in design. They have hallmarks but just because Aqshy is the Realm of Fire, doesn't mean the whole thing is volcanoes. It's not like Minecraft biomes where one minute it's a jungle and the next icebergs but there are still different climates, landmasses, oceans, and stuff. Likewise, the Realm of Death isn't just dead things because death is only part of the cycle, even Bone Daddy himself knows that.
Could some of the AoS armies have been in WHFB? Sure, but there's still not as much space as the Realms which is the important part. My counter to the bit about the importance of locations is sort of similar to yours. On paper Sigmar losing Anvilgard to Morathi means little for the entirety of the Mortal Realms, of course, it means loads of the Khainites and the Sigmar's alliance but for the players, they can still use the armies they've built because they aren't confined to one area.

I think a lot of your problems come from the fact you don't have any investment when things happen. You aren't interested in the setting and as such don't understand why events are important.


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 Dysartes wrote:
Creativity on an infinite blank slate is substantially less impressive than creativity within an existing structured world.

Sometimes. WHFB had a fairly rigid definition of its world with the only real unexplored parts being Cathay, Ind, and the Japan mirror that uses a term that comes dangerously close to a racial slur.

What we've seen for Cathay, for example, is more interesting than any of the new AOS factions due to how it needs to be integrated into the existing Old World framework.

That's subjective.

Nippon is a normal word. The slur is derived from that word, but the word itself is not a slur.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Nippon is a normal word. The slur is derived from that word, but the word itself is not a slur.

It is in fact the Japanese word for Japan.

Anyway, I personally find well-developed humans more interesting than monsters. Monsters tend to either end up one-dimensional or just humans in fancy dress (Aztec lizardmen, Samurai Klingons, etc). So why not just use humans?

Humans are interesting! I'm human! So are most of my friends!

I think it depends how the lore evolves as to how interesting a faction is. In the past with things like Old World some races, eg Orks, were kind of left out being the "big bad" always rolled out as rough and ready to raid, attack or be used anywhere that needed blunt brute force and a simple opponent.

It's kind of plagued them and I think its why AoS orks are slowly turning more into 40K ones, which whilst they've had even fewer books of their own; are at least fairly well fleshed out with personality of their own.



In the end most alien and fantasy races take on human qualities and elements and even if they don't, the nature of storytelling often imparts them onto them so that we can easily engage with the stories.

I think the real element is if GW wants and does focus lore, stories, adventures, heroes and such on the faction rather than anything inherent to the faction such as race or species.