Just an interesting thing about the 40k "End Times"

Take it how you will:

I don't think this will be enough to convine some people here

Oh, reminds me of:


I know, I've already posted it, but it is too hilarious not to post a second time.

They can say whatever they want, but experience is a powerful teacher. Let's look at what they've done and where the game stands:

1: The new direction of the company is a steady release schedule with rules/formations/box sets to move under-performing model kits as well as introduce new model lines.

2: This new direction focuses on high quality, difficult to reproduce models, making those models marketable to a broader consumer base, and lowering barriers to entry.

3: They've already done The End Times once before, which removed a rules-bloated and high barrier to entry game and replaced it with a simplified, lower cost skirmish game.

4: 40k is currently bloated with rules, particularly compared to Age of Sigmar. It also has an inherently high barrier to entry with most games taking place at the 1500+ points level, and the scale has increased with GMCs and Superheavies becoming more commonplace.

The logical step forward would be to change the system to reduce the scale of the game, simplify the rules, and combine multiple factions so that more models are more applicable to more players. By the story, this might not be the End Times. By the direction the actual game itself is headed, this could be what we get.

TeenageAngst wrote:

They can say whatever they want, but experience is a powerful teacher. Let's look at what they've done and where the game stands:

1: The new direction of the company is a steady release schedule with rules/formations/box sets to move under-performing model kits as well as introduce new model lines.

2: This new direction focuses on high quality, difficult to reproduce models, making those models marketable to a broader consumer base, and lowering barriers to entry.

3: They've already done The End Times once before, which removed a rules-bloated and high barrier to entry game and replaced it with a simplified, lower cost skirmish game.

4: 40k is currently bloated with rules, particularly compared to Age of Sigmar. It also has an inherently high barrier to entry with most games taking place at the 1500+ points level, and the scale has increased with GMCs and Superheavies becoming more commonplace.

The logical step forward would be to change the system to reduce the scale of the game, simplify the rules, and combine multiple factions so that more models are more applicable to more players. By the story, this might not be the End Times. By the direction the actual game itself is headed, this could be what we get.

I agree with quite a bit of this but two things. First, games of 40K and Sigmar are both scalable and you can get going at small points values quite easily, it's just that most gaming groups seem to gravitate towards the 1500pts+ size games for both systems.

Second is that Fantasy was a failing game, it was accounting for a very tiny portion of the company's profits so 8th was axed for AoS. Given that AoS did not get out of the gate to well and that 40K is very much the companies main cash cow, I think it should stand to reason that GW know's it can't afford to hit the reset button on 40K, at least not in the same way.

GW is not going to do a hard reset on 40k. They are going to do a soft reset, with 8th edition morphing the game very closely to AoS in terms of rules, army building, and gameplay, while not doing anything too earth-shattering to the fluff.

You know it won't be the first time that GW would have "slimmed" down the rules for 40k and you have to admit that the game has become extremely bloated since the last rule trimming.

I'm entirely for a slimming of the rules to something more manageable. Maybe not to the extent of AoS but slimmer yes. I even don't mind the whole collection of factions into overfactions so long as the individual factions maintain their own separate, independent, and unique fluff. But after being introduced to the factions and play system of AoS today, I can say that a lot of the units are too homogenized and lack flavor because that slimming down of the rules seems to have also applied to the army entries. There was no functional difference between a High Aelf 4+ troop and a Dark Aelf 4+ troop. There wasn't really any difference between my High Aelf archers and the Dark Aelf archers. I don't want to see that happen to the armies in 40k.

Id love to hear what some old timers from 2nd and 3rd edition have to say about all this.

Well, what exactly can they trim?

Assuming they want to keep current books playable, and this was the case most of the new editions, most of the rules bloating come from codexes and different sources.

They kinda already tried cleaning as much as possible rules from codexes, for example our codex now, chaos codex 5th edition. Its ends usually not so well, and whats worse, they soon forget about this practice leaving those codexes "bland edition" to compete with creative ones.

@Betraytheworld I once thought you were a negative doom sayer. But I have to apologize. Now I know you're not.

TeenageAngst wrote:

I'm entirely for a slimming of the rules to something more manageable. Maybe not to the extent of AoS but slimmer yes. I even don't mind the whole collection of factions into overfactions so long as the individual factions maintain their own separate, independent, and unique fluff. But after being introduced to the factions and play system of AoS today, I can say that a lot of the units are too homogenized and lack flavor because that slimming down of the rules seems to have also applied to the army entries. There was no functional difference between a High Aelf 4+ troop and a Dark Aelf 4+ troop. There wasn't really any difference between my High Aelf archers and the Dark Aelf archers. I don't want to see that happen to the armies in 40k.

Yeah, with the older armies that were just carried over some of their most basic units can be very identikit between factions. What I have found is that synergy is very important to how an army works and what those buffs are and how they stack tends to determine how the army plays more than anything.

Barrywise wrote:

Id love to hear what some old timers from 2nd and 3rd edition have to say about all this.

I've seen it referred to as the "Blandening" before, at least initially before the codexes started getting released instead of relying on the army lists in the BRB.

That said, my understanding is that 3rd was really rushed due to the higher ups enforcing a last minute change of direction for the rules. I've read that 3rd was effectively written in 6 months which is why it felt so bare bones in comparison to 2nd.

CptMetal wrote:

@Betraytheworld I once thought you were a negative doom sayer. But I have to apologize. Now I know you're not.

Haha, thanks, I guess. I just tell it like it is now. I don't try to sap your hope for the future.

BetrayTheWorld wrote:

CptMetal wrote:

@Betraytheworld I once thought you were a negative doom sayer. But I have to apologize. Now I know you're not.

Haha, thanks, I guess. I just tell it like it is now. I don't try to sap your hope for the future.

I second CptMetal. :-D

Honestly, the main reason I try to let everyone know just how many nerfs we got from last edition is my own futile hope that by making sure everyone, including the brand new guy, is aware, GW will somehow be made aware also, and fix them.

So what other people viewed as being negative was really my way of just making sure everyone remembered to get the message to GW that we want ALL these things fixed. Too many people tend to say we only need X and Y fixed, as if 1 or 2 minor changes will make DE competitive. They won't. We need a LOT of attention and thought put into our next release, and I feel like every time a person oversimplifies it like that, it leads us one step further to getting a bland release that doesn't fix much. It's entirely possible THAT thread is the one thread a GW researcher uses to gauge the feelings of the community on current DE power level, and I don't want that to be the case, is all.

@BetrayTheWorld Well you certainly helped me. Back when I was first starting out you were mentioning our weaknesses and were helping out people with their lists. Which helped me learn about Dark Eldar, how they played, and what I needed to do (You helped with tactics quite a bit as I'd look over what you recommended to others)

So as one of the new guys you helped, thanks!

Glad I could help! I appreciate the thanks.