James M Hewitt AMA:

[Galas]

James M Hewitt was a GW designer, responsible for games like Silver Tower, Gorechosen, Betrayal at Calth, etc... and he has done an AMA on Reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Warhammer/comments/7k1tp0/im_james_m_hewitt_freelance_tabletop_games/

Theres a ton of questions and answers. Many directed to BloodBowl, Warhammer40k, GW in general, etc...

Some of my favourites are things like:

Quote

Hi James! How early on were you involved in Age Of Sigmar? How much freedom was there going that and how much did the spectre of wfb bear down on it? Was there an overarching goal?

 

Hello!

When I joined the Citadel Rules Team, Age of Sigmar (or "Project Stanley", as it was called, because codenames are a thing) had been in development for about eighteen months. I wasn't involved in the core design work, but I was part of a four-man team, so we all mucked in. I did a lot of work on the Warscroll Compendiums, for example, and wrote the rules for the first(ish) five Battletomes (Stormcast, Gorechosen Bloodbound, Fyreslayers, Seraphon, Everchosen). I did a fair bit of playtesting, and we had constant discussions about rules and ideas and things.

Regarding freedom... I've never known a project with quite so much managerial scrutiny. Any project you do in an environment like GW has to meet a lot of different criteria (as I explained here, but this was something else. There were certain people higher up the chain, people who have since left the company, who were insistent on what the game needed to be. Unfortunately, this kept changing. We tried very hard to fight the battles we could and make the game satisfying from a rules point of view, but if we'd had more control I think a lot of the initial drama could have been avoided.

As for an overarching goal, I think AoS came from a desire to really shake things up. The geography of the Old World, for example, was seen as a lead weight; it was seen as difficult to tell new stories when, for example, the Elves were over on one side of a massive ocean, and the Tomb Kings were way down in the south, and so on (anyone remember the Nemesis Crown campaign, with Settra's "reclaim the family knick-knacks" tour up the Reik?).

I'm not convinced it was handled well, initially - there was a real lack of information for players, especially when the last End Times book came out and there was no news about what was happening next for several months - but more than anything else in GW's recent history, lessons were learned and things are different now. I mean, look at 40k 8th edition. That's been a masterful release. And AoS is really taking off, with the Mortal Realms becoming an incredibly compelling place (or... set of places?).

The team's never been stronger (not just because I left, honest) and I'm really looking forward to seeing what comes next

I'm really glad that AoS wasn't a hit as GW expected when it was released(Please don't kill me yet! Specially the ones that tought AoS was a great experience when it was released, I totally respect your opinion!), as a result of being so heavely directed by managment. That showed GW the failures of that style of doing things. To be honest I think all the GW changes have been directly a result of AoS failure when it was first released (And Kirby and Merrit leaving the company of course).

So, the positive changes of AoS now (Reboxings with lower prices?! General Handbook?!), the changes in how GW engages with the community, etc...  are (In part) a result of the Old World sacrifice. Never forgetti.

I could go and look at the interesting and AoS related answers to copy them here if you don't want to dig in the reddit thread.

 

[shinros]

Well yes the inception of AOS was handled by the old management that largely screwed the hobby. They had the wrong idea on how to reinvigorate fantasy and the hobby in general. 

The new management letting the designers do their thing is what resurrected AOS(and 40k in a sense). I mean hell if it's getting ADB to considering writing an AOS novel they must be doing something right.  All of this is being reflected in how well they are doing now as a public company. 

[Killax]

The responce not only makes a ton of sence but I think anyone with a feeling for design knows that the books mentioned are either allready upgraded for the better or contain large parts of illogical design. Best example I can still give, Archaon leads several Slaves to Darkness armies (confirmed in book) yet there are no units of that kind in the book, Varanguard are seen as direct commanders of Archaon and even outrank a Chaos Lord or anything akin to that if they feel to (confirmed in book) yet they are displayed as a markless unit devoid of such character. While Fyreslayers and Seraphon certainly where worked out better as Everchosen they only showed up to the competitive or larger gaming scene thanks to finally recieving an Allegiance in GH2017.

Now though I indeed can say that design is much better, the last Battletomes, Firestorm things that seem in the making and the general great game that 40K 8th has become only spells good news. Again though I wonder when we will see a second edition of AoS because to date Generals Handbook is being a bandaid to AoS' Core Rules who currently admitted by several of it's designers lack even the depth the designers wanted to put in there.

An Age of Sigmar that would incorporate all the magic that is mentioned in the narrative, have characters indeed be heroically protected and really puts the emphasis on melee combat with ranged support in my opinion is the only next logical step. Likewise I'm also interested in how Battalions could be handled differently.

Cheers,