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RedSarge wrote:Lurker here. So we get two years out of each Edition with modern GW? Then, buy the rulebook, codices and supplements all over again?

I'm seeing stacks of hardback books on the used market for like $5...

Vermis wrote:
Well, for once GW's planned obsolescence is working in my favour. The fluff in old codexes comes with considerably less plastic cement and acrylic paint clogging up all the details.

Darn.. that actually stresses me out.

Aecus Decimus wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
On the one hand... good? You presumably signed an NDA to become a playtester or get other early access material, so stick to the NDA.

Nah, people should break GW's NDA as often as possible. As long as playtesters are permitted to continue participating in competitive play all of GW's playtest material needs to be public.

Encouraging people to violate a legally-binding document is NOT a good look.

Guesshe wants playtesting be removed entirely

 Manfred von Drakken wrote:

Aecus Decimus wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
On the one hand... good? You presumably signed an NDA to become a playtester or get other early access material, so stick to the NDA.

Nah, people should break GW's NDA as often as possible. As long as playtesters are permitted to continue participating in competitive play all of GW's playtest material needs to be public.

Encouraging people to violate a legally-binding document is NOT a good look.

I think the club fisted, barely communicated point under that is that if the playtesters are comp players (they are), they shouldn't be in a position to withhold information that gives them and unfair advantage in the competitive realm.

I, a non-player, thought the inference there was clear.

JWBS wrote:
I, a non-player, thought the inference there was clear.

Same, I think phrasing it as "rip up NDA's and leak stuff" comes across a little petulant and entitled, but there was a relevant message there other missed.

Alternative is no playtesters. That's good idea.

Well as is gw already cut off extnrnal playtesting due to leaks.

the way GW use and listens to playtesters, not much difference if they are there or not
just that without testing they can speed up releases

Except it doesn't speed up. Playtesting doesn't take timn over production and they don't cram more releases anyway.

really?

going with a draft to testers, waiting for them to test the rules, than adjust them and go to the printer is not taking more time than going directly with the draft to the printer?

wow

 kodos wrote:
really?

going with a draft to testers, waiting for them to test the rules, than adjust them and go to the printer is not taking more time than going directly with the draft to the printer?

wow

By the time books hit us as players, that time has all be made up for. They would need to be behind weeks on every book due to play testers to even mess with the release schedule. As books are probably sitting ready and printing a month or two before release.

Apple fox wrote:

 kodos wrote:
really?

going with a draft to testers, waiting for them to test the rules, than adjust them and go to the printer is not taking more time than going directly with the draft to the printer?

wow

By the time books hit us as players, that time has all be made up for. They would need to be behind weeks on every book due to play testers to even mess with the release schedule. As books are probably sitting ready and printing a month or two before release.

Probably longer, depending on worldwide delivery times and stuff. A container to/from china took 60 days on average before the pandemic, and now it's more like 4 months - travel times to e.g. Oceania are similar. Also, publications have significant lead times due to photography, editing, translations and so on, so the point when any changes in content need to be locked down needs to be somewhat earlier, a couple of months before you even start printing, and that is at least a couple of weeks before you accept orders. If you print inhouse or at multiple locations, you can cut the travel time down, but content-lock probably still needs to be months before release.

tneva82 wrote:
Alternative is no playtesters.

As though GW used their suggestions to begin with.

Apple fox wrote:

 kodos wrote:
really?

going with a draft to testers, waiting for them to test the rules, than adjust them and go to the printer is not taking more time than going directly with the draft to the printer?

wow

By the time books hit us as players, that time has all be made up for. They would need to be behind weeks on every book due to play testers to even mess with the release schedule. As books are probably sitting ready and printing a month or two before release.

we are talking about playtesters, those people who get the rules before they want to the printer, not after

so if GW is actually doing playtesting, this should add at least a month or two from the point the rules are done, before they went to the printer

playtesting after they are printed is not playtesting, and if the testing period is shorter than a month, or the testers don't get the full rules, you can skip it anyway as this is not "testing"

printing and worldwide distribution takes ~6 months, so the books are finished half a year before release
but if proper playtesting is done, this needs to happen before, hence a book would need to be finished 8-10 months before release and those 2-4 months is time GW would save

and by what results we get from GW's testing, they can skip it anyway

PS: this also means of rumours tell that armies are being tested now, this means that they are 8 months minimum away from release which is September for the first Codex

Honestly having played a game yesterday without using secondaries and unintentionally ignoring most stratagems and army special rules like doctrines, I can safely say that I felt the game played a lot better and was still very enjoyable without all of that additional bloat. So while it's doubtful it's my hope that they gut All of that superfluous crap and dial the game back to how it was in a simpler time where you didn't have all of that nonsense but the games were still very enjoyable. You don't need a ton of extra rules and options spread around multiple books to make a game fun

On the subject of play testing I question whether or not they're actually doing it in any decent capacity given how the rules are It seems to be more just for show especially since most of their playtesters tend to be the competitive players who don't really care about having a balanced game as long as they can jump to whatever the cheese du jour is.

Dudeface wrote:

JWBS wrote:
I, a non-player, thought the inference there was clear.

Same, I think phrasing it as "rip up NDA's and leak stuff" comes across a little petulant and entitled, but there was a relevant message there other missed.

There's a more relevant message that should be the one that was made:

GW should make the playtesters be known as playtesters, and encourage events to DQ them from winning or prizes.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

JWBS wrote:
I, a non-player, thought the inference there was clear.

Same, I think phrasing it as "rip up NDA's and leak stuff" comes across a little petulant and entitled, but there was a relevant message there other missed.

There's a more relevant message that should be the one that was made:

GW should make the playtesters be known as playtesters, and encourage events to DQ them from winning or prizes.

I disagree, naming them opens a multitude of cans of worms that's bad for everyone involved. We know full well there's some real immature donkey-caves in the community that send death threats etc, never mind the fact those people would forever be spammed for leaks or harassed about changes.

Dudeface wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

JWBS wrote:
I, a non-player, thought the inference there was clear.

Same, I think phrasing it as "rip up NDA's and leak stuff" comes across a little petulant and entitled, but there was a relevant message there other missed.

There's a more relevant message that should be the one that was made:

GW should make the playtesters be known as playtesters, and encourage events to DQ them from winning or prizes.

I disagree, naming them opens a multitude of cans of worms that's bad for everyone involved. We know full well there's some real immature donkey-caves in the community that send death threats etc, never mind the fact those people would forever be spammed for leaks or harassed about changes.

Many of the people that were playtesters are already well-known in the community. Tabletop Tactics folks, Liam Dempsey admitted to playtesting Narrative stuff, basically any of the Youtubers that got free stuff to review from GW were likely also playtesters. Others were those big in the community, TOs and such. People with proven track records within the warhammer community.

Did they get things as extreme as death threads and such? I dunno, I feel like if they did we would have heard about it.

Should they be removed from competitive play for having access to rules early? Eh, I think you're putting the cart before the horse. Remember that many competitive events don't even allow new material like codexes or tournament packs until the community has had more time to digest the changes and FAQs have had a chance to come out for immediate issues. There's also the fact that playtesters are often playtesting an incomplete copy of the rules, which change by the time of actual release. It's not like they're always playing the 100% straight-to-print rules all the time, so any advantage they'd have from 'knowing the rules ahead of time' is minor since the rules could change between their playtesting and the actual print.

So maybe let's put the pitchforks down. If this was a legitimate issue, it would have been brought up by the competitive circuit a LONG time ago.

drbored wrote:

So maybe let's put the pitchforks down. If this was a legitimate issue, it would have been brought up by the competitive circuit a LONG time ago.

Why would those benefitting most bring it up as a problem? That's kinds the point.

But are they benefitting most?

How good do you think they can be playing one set of rules at the highest level while playtesting another set of rules? How quickly can they adjust to each new rules release, which adds even more complexity to the rules?

Remember, they are probably play testing 6+ months before release and don't know the final form of the rules until they are published. So they get a tiny leg up on where to look for advantages that may have made it into the final version that was published.

So I don't see the point in banning them from competition or winning prizes. Good players win because they are good and study all the rules, not because they know something in advance of other players.

And ultimately it's about non-competive beer&pretzel game. Whatever. Don't overthink about it and you will be happier.

It's not like what's good is hard to figure out. Elementary school kid sees op army by first reading. Gw would have poor marketing strategy if players wouldn't get the memo what to buy next.

 alextroy wrote:
But are they benefitting most?

How good do you think they can be playing one set of rules at the highest level while playtesting another set of rules? How quickly can they adjust to each new rules release, which adds even more complexity to the rules?

Remember, they are probably play testing 6+ months before release and don't know the final form of the rules until they are published. So they get a tiny leg up on where to look for advantages that may have made it into the final version that was published.

So I don't see the point in banning them from competition or winning prizes. Good players win because they are good and study all the rules, not because they know something in advance of other players.

You had competitive players leaking the AoO points changes as close as a couple of weeks out. Even 2 weeks in this hobby is a fair volume of time to get a heads up on purchase and painting leads.

The point is no matter how minor, they shouldn't have an unfair leg up at all.

I am curious. For the side saying that the testers have an unfair advantage, have any of you played them? If so, how did you loose.

Why do I have the feeling people are complaining for nothing. I mean when was the last time you played against a beta tester?

Could the playtest discussion be moved to another thread please?

 Eldarsif wrote:
Could the playtest discussion be moved to another thread please?

That would be a good idea

This latest set of rumors (on the previous page to this one) seems less like reliable rumors or even wishlisting and more like deliberate trolling.

That latest set of rumours seems the "worst" one yet. So the most likely. Sounds a lot closer to what GW would do. Completely separate profiles and junk for gt play? Over reliance on the app? Yeah, I could see that.

Hopefully not though, that kind 9f shakeup wouldn't be well received I think.

Wayniac wrote:
That latest set of rumours seems the "worst" one yet. So the most likely. Sounds a lot closer to what GW would do. Completely separate profiles and junk for gt play? Over reliance on the app? Yeah, I could see that

While I get that GW's been "balancing" the game towards GT play, there's ZERO evidence to suggest that they would actually create a separate list of profiles and/or weapon options for it. And at the risk of looking extremely foolish later, I have to think that even GW can't do something that stupid.

 Manfred von Drakken wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
That latest set of rumours seems the "worst" one yet. So the most likely. Sounds a lot closer to what GW would do. Completely separate profiles and junk for gt play? Over reliance on the app? Yeah, I could see that

While I get that GW's been "balancing" the game towards GT play, there's ZERO evidence to suggest that they would actually create a separate list of profiles and/or weapon options for it. And at the risk of looking extremely foolish later, I have to think that even GW can't do something that stupid.

On one hand, the rules part of the 'Warhammer hobby' as GW perceives it has always been the aspect they'd care least about, and probably only to the extent that it produced marketable books and supplements or helped to sell miniatures, so maintaining two parallel, and in many aspects concurrent rulesets seems like something they would not do.

On the other, they're now having aspirations at a 'serious' tournament scene, with their 'Grand Narrative' tournaments and the upcoming 'World Championship of Warhammer' and whatnot, so who even knows anymore...

Yeah the focus on trying to turn Warhammer into a "sport" is one of the worst things I've ever seen