Unpopular opinion thread

[PrimeElectrid]

Especially relevant after the translocation faq; TOs should stop putting Tooth and Nail into event packs. It unfairly penalises SCE in a way that no other battleplan penalises other armies, and SCE suffer much more than any army that uses summons.

[tupavko]

2 hours ago, Maogrim said:

I have another one concerning lore, and specifically those who are clamoring for Morathi (-Khaine) to 'get her comeuppance'. 

Yes, she seemimgly does a lot for her own gaines, but she truly and deeply hates Chaos. She was instrumental in binding Slaanesh and happily sends her troops to fight Chaos whenever and wherever. Sigmar can certainly not count on Malerion in that regard, because the boy is too busy with stalking the Lumineth and sl@tshaming his mother. 

Yes, Morathi sacrificed an army of Stormcast Eternals in the Eight Points, but her plan of throwing a wrench into Archaon's Varanite production was sucessful. Yes, she usurpt Anvilguard but was also crucial in rescuing Excelsis from Kragnos. 

The way I see it Morathi is still proving too important as an ally, and it seems that Grungni agrees with me. And she's also just plain fantastic.

Since Morathi is an elf, I will never accept she's fantastic. 😀

However, Morathi is more a part of the problem rather than a positive example. Morathi, is just Morathi. Yes, she got the snake body and godly powers, but in terms on innovation she's still the old b**** from The World That Was, with a somehow distrubing relation with her own son, the obsession for utlimate power, and she'swilling to do anything to achieve her goals. Morathi in terms of godly characters is actually one of the best, if not the best one, but not because of innovative thinking or new ideas, but actually because GW writers kept her frozen in the same exact immage as she was before, same thing thay did with Nagash except he drew the short straw so while she aged well, he became a comical relief (involontarily). Some other old heroes evolved, but I struggle to find a single one of them that actually was improved, and then we get to talk about the new ones:

- Katakros: let's be honest, he's a wanna-be-Settra but with a more trademarkable looks then a living mummy of Ramses II. Yet while in Settra's case, his megalomany and pompousness were organic to his character, with Katakros it just doesn't work well, simply because the authors wrote bad stories. He is supposed to be a Napoleon-level general and he died by charging a single Ghorgon and by so leaving his army too far behind... That's a dumb way to die, espacialy if you are someone like Julius Cesar or Napoleon...

- Kragnos: I love BoC... that's already enough to hate Kragnos, but I can accept that other people can have horns and hooves (as a professional designer there is something about design that should be explained here, but maybe another time but there is a lot to tell about "good design" and "likable design") but the narrative and his ties to the actual Destruction forces is so plain, such a strech... And buy making him badly they ruined also Gordrakk and Skragott, another two new characters, that already weren't too well presented yet they managed to ****** them even more.

WHFB had an organic and functional lore, inspired by classic literature and historical facts, something that actually made WHFB so popoluar, and one of the reasons why CA invested so much money in producing Warhammer Total War. Is that the only possible lore that can achieve that? No obviously! AoS, is not produced by someone who has no experience, we are talking the same company, the same people, the same writers who made WHFB, Horus Heresy series or Mordheim. AoS could work and definitely should work, but it needs narrative love, instead of fan service ("the best of this..." "the greatest of that"... Sometimes being the worst is also a good thing), or plain text for the sake of filling empty pages. The worst thing is that GW is still capable of doing it, Cursed City (never happened) is a great example, yet such examples are more sporadic islands in a vaste ocean of commercial mediocrity.

A perfect example of this is the White Scars paradox... Until a few years ago, it was the least known chapter of Space Marines. Black Library startedi the HH series and at the certain point they realized they hadd no lore for the WS... So a writer was charged to flesh out their lore. Chirs Wright wrote the first book that pictured WS as protagonists and for the fisrt time we read aboyt Jaghtai Khan, in "Scars"... If you go and look for reviews you'll find a massive amount of people falling in love with the Primarch only because, Wright is a really good author, who accepted the challange with passion and seriousness. This month Black Library published the last book concearning the WS by Wright, "Warhawk" and in it the author explains how he used the real life challanges such as no established lore at all, to craft the actual lore for them: "since nothing is really known about them, I decided I'll make them unknown, impredictable!" - and what a job he did.

So I accept no excuses, GW knows how to do it, and I pretend they do it, because it's better not only for us, but for them too, cause the only reason they ara basically a monopoly is thanks to their well established and recognizble lore and universe that people loved and still love. 

Edited October 20, 2021 by tupavko

[Orbei]

There have been enough comments in this thread about disliking elves that I'll go ahead and state the opposite. I love elves, they are awesome, and they are not in any way overrepresented in the game. Elves are a classic part of fantasy and Warhammer elves have always been interesting takes on them. The three WHFB factions we're so important and distinct that I cannot imagine the game without any of them. AoS aelves are similar in that regard. We don't even have very many of them... Lumineth, daughters, IDK, and the old stuff in Cities. IDK and DoK are both tiny factions in need of a second release wave. Sylvaneth don't really count at this point, they're their own thing. Aelves are basically equally represented as greenskins between the 3 ork factions and Gitz. Yet every time a new elf is revealed some people lose their ****** complaining and it's tiresome.

My opinion on chaos is exactly the opposite. There's way too much focus on chaos. Beastmen are interesting as their own thing, and I appreciate Skaven and Chaos Duarden (eventually) as their own factions. But each of the 4 gods having their own distinct armies is just too much bloat. We have 4 demon armies, slaves to darkness, the belakor faction, the first prince. Why does every chaos God need a dozen named characters? Why do we need more chaos models than death and destruction combined?

It's cool that these things exist already and people can enjoy those armies. But I think GW can cool it on new Chaos god-specific stuff for a loooooong time. If they have an itch to make chaos things, do the highly demanded chaos dwarves or give BoC updated sculpts. 

Edited October 20, 2021 by Orbei

[EMMachine]

39 minutes ago, Kaleb Daark said:

I really wish Rick Priestley and the late Alan Bligh were still around to give some serious longbeard mood and feel guidance.

I really wich Josh Reynolds would still write AoS Stories. He was literally the AoS Black Library God.

 

22 minutes ago, tupavko said:

- Kragnos: I love BoC... that's already enough to hate Kragnos, but I can accept that other people can have horns and hooves (as a professional designer there is something about design that should be explained here, but maybe another time but there is a lot to tell about "good design" and "likable design") but the narrative and his ties to the actual Destruction forces is so plain, such a strech... And buy making him badly they ruined also Gordrakk and Skragott, another two new characters, that already weren't too well presented yet they managed to ****** them even more.

Yeah, he would have fit well as the Demigod of the Beastmen next to Archaon for Mortals and Be'lacor for Deamons.

22 minutes ago, tupavko said:

WHFB had an organic and functional lore, inspired by classic literature and historical facts, something that actually made WHFB so popoluar, and one of the reasons why CA invested so much money in producing Warhammer Total War. Is that the only possible lore that can achieve that? No obviously! AoS, is not produced by someone who has no experience, we are talking the same company, the same people, the same writers who made WHFB, Horus Heresy series or Mordheim. AoS could work and definitely should work, but it needs narrative love, instead of fan service ("the best of this..." "the greatest of that"... Sometimes being the worst is also a good thing), or plain text for the sake of filling empty pages. The worst thing is that GW is still capable of doing it, Cursed City (never happened) is a great example, yet such examples are more sporadic islands in a vaste ocean of commercial mediocrity.

Thats the point. A world like AoS has so much more potential in case of lore than making a copy of our existing world. The thing is, it is more work, because they have to describe the rules of the world and have to create their own civilisations instead of saying, "these guys have a culture like in spain ... and these are japanese"

[Enoby]

28 minutes ago, Orbei said:

My opinion on chaos is exactly the opposite. There's way too much focus on chaos. Beastmen are interesting as their own thing, and I appreciate Skaven and Chaos Duarden (eventually) as their own factions. But each of the 4 gods having their own distinct armies is just too much bloat. We have 4 demon armies, slaves to darkness, the belakor faction, the first prince. Why does every chaos God need a dozen named characters? Why do we need more chaos models than death and destruction combined?

From the perspective of someone who really likes that Chaos is more segmented, I'll give you my reasoning I think one of the important things to consider is that each Chaos God is very distinct in both theme and aesthetic, narratively and gameplay wise. So when you have an army of all four gods souped together (for example through daemons and mortals), you get some dissonance.

From a lore perspective, the gods and their followers hate one another as much (if not more) that Sigmar hates them. It is very often stated in the lore that they only work together under the most exceptional of circumstances and that's why the Everchosen is such a big deal. In the same way that High Elves and Dark Elves were treat as different armies, each Chaos God is very different with opposing goals. I, and many others, would find it nonsensical should they have souped High and Dark Elves (pre End Times) because they were both the same species despite the massive cultural differences. The same stands for daemons and mortals of Chaos.

So you may just think "well sure, but just give the daemons/mortals one book but let people decide how they want to divide their forces" - so like 40k works currently, where you have the "Daemons of Chaos" book that can be played pure Tzeentch or whatever. This is all well and good, but you would first have to think on how to divide it. Do you do a daemon/mortal split, meaning that someone who likes the Khorne aesthetic can use Daemonettes in their army but can't use Bloodletters and Blood Warriors together? What about a special rule for including those god marked units? Could work, but like most books where you can use a 1or 2 in 4 of a unit, it likely wouldn't synergise properly. 

And then you'd need to contend with the problem all soup books face - have some warscrolls and themes not be fully realised or be relegated to the worst part of the book. If you loved the Khorne aesthetic, but your options for playing Khorne were buying a book where you only featured in 1/4 of it and there's a chance that to make the most of your army you need to buy models you have no interest in because they're nothing like your chosen aesthetic. 

I think aesthetically, playstyle wise, lore wise, and fan base wise the Chaos Gods are just as different as every other army is to one another. 

If a person had no perspective of Warhammer Lore and I showed them these models, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't automatically group the Chaos God stuff into one pile of sameness. 

[Neverchosen]

I honestly cannot understand people being angry about any faction getting focus. Less aelven factions would not somehow result in Fyreslayers magically getting more models, less Chaos Armies would not result in more Death or Destruction armies. The reason I tend to get huffy about new space marines has less to do with the fact that they get too much focus but more-so that the models are ostensibly the same design with different weapon load outs and colour schemes. I have never mistaken an Idoneth, DOK, or Lumineth unit for one another. I love having the god specific factions represented and I am happy that I can still use traditional chaos warriors in an undivided faction it is the best of all worlds for me. 

Edited October 20, 2021 by Neverchosen

[Orbei]

10 minutes ago, Enoby said:

From the perspective of someone who really likes that Chaos is more segmented, I'll give you my reasoning  

I get where you're coming from here. I don't expect my take to be popular. That said...

10 minutes ago, Enoby said:

So when you have an army of all four gods souped together (for example through daemons and mortals), you get some dissonance.

Dissonance, AKA Chaos.

10 minutes ago, Enoby said:

From a lore perspective, the gods and their followers hate one another as much (if not more) that Sigmar hates them

Sounds like putting them all together would result in a pretty chaotic situation! Though Chaos in Warhammer isn't really chaos, it's Evil.

10 minutes ago, Enoby said:

If a person had no perspective of Warhammer Lore and I showed them these models, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't automatically group the Chaos God stuff into one pile of sameness. 

If I didn't know better I'd say this guy is an aelf! Maybe he is under that helmet. Can we trade Lumineth for him? They like cows so maybe they can soup with BoC...

Edited October 20, 2021 by Orbei

[Beliman]

6 minutes ago, Neverchosen said:

I honestly cannot understand people being angry about any faction getting focus. Less aelven factions would not somehow result in Fyreslayers magically getting more models, less Chaos Armies would not result in more Death or Destruction armies. The reason I tend to get huffy about new space marines has less to do with the fact that they get to much focus but more-so that the models are ostensibly the same design with different weapon load outs and colour schemes. I have never mistaken an Idoneth, DOK, or Lumineth unit for one another. I love having the god specific factions represented and I am happy that I can still use traditional chaos warriors in an undivided faction it is the best of all worlds for me. 

No worries! It's just a meme, healthy rivalry and all of this unless you play a Dwarf faction.

[Televiper11]

Kragnos not being BoC was a real kick in the teeth. Just look at him!

I also play Destruction factions and I would never take him because he doesn't even come close to the aesthetic. And BoC desperately need help (new models, better rules) and Kragnos would've been a nice quick-fix solution.

[Maogrim]

@Enoby I agree and am fine with all the different Chaos factions. They are all cool in their own way. I do however like to bring Chaos up as well whenever people cry about the assumed over -supportedness of Aelves.

Just one minor complaint: The Khorne guy you posted could just as well be Slaves to Darkness were his armour black instead of red. 😅

Edited October 20, 2021 by Maogrim

[Orbei]

They should rename the grand alliances. No more Chaos, Destruction, Death and Order. Those are confusing to new players as they don't accurately represent the factions contained within. I suggest Evil, Wacky, Goth, and Everyone Else.

[Enoby]

8 minutes ago, Maogrim said:

@Enoby I agree and am fine with all the different Chaos factions. They are all cool in their own way. I do however like to bring Chaos up as well whenever people cry about the assumed over -supportedness of Aelves.

Just one minor complaint: The Khorne guy you posted could just as well be Slaves to Darkness were his armour black instead of red. 😅

No I totally agree that aelves are cool having their own subfactions I think it helps diversify them as people, rather than them feeling like a hive mind species or something. I would like humans to get more diversity too, but that has no bearing on aelves. 

Well yes, but that's because Khorne is the most boring Chaos God who lacks the artistic vision to come up with his own design 

[EntMan]

1 hour ago, Orbei said:

Sounds like putting them all together would result in a pretty chaotic situation! Though Chaos in Warhammer isn't really chaos, it's Evil.

I find no-one in lore is as evil as Dark Elves (at least they aren't quite as disturbing as dark Eldar)

You're right that Chaos isn't always that chaotic. Destruction actually seem the most chaotic.

Edited October 20, 2021 by EntMan

[Nos]

2 hours ago, tupavko said:

Since Morathi is an elf, I will never accept she's fantastic. 😀

However, Morathi is more a part of the problem rather than a positive example. Morathi, is just Morathi. Yes, she got the snake body and godly powers, but in terms on innovation she's still the old b**** from The World That Was, with a somehow distrubing relation with her own son, the obsession for utlimate power, and she'swilling to do anything to achieve her goals. Morathi in terms of godly characters is actually one of the best, if not the best one, but not because of innovative thinking or new ideas, but actually because GW writers kept her frozen in the same exact immage as she was before, same thing thay did with Nagash except he drew the short straw so while she aged well, he became a comical relief (involontarily). Some other old heroes evolved, but I struggle to find a single one of them that actually was improved, and then we get to talk about the new ones:

- Katakros: let's be honest, he's a wanna-be-Settra but with a more trademarkable looks then a living mummy of Ramses II. Yet while in Settra's case, his megalomany and pompousness were organic to his character, with Katakros it just doesn't work well, simply because the authors wrote bad stories. He is supposed to be a Napoleon-level general and he died by charging a single Ghorgon and by so leaving his army too far behind... That's a dumb way to die, espacialy if you are someone like Julius Cesar or Napoleon...

- Kragnos: I love BoC... that's already enough to hate Kragnos, but I can accept that other people can have horns and hooves (as a professional designer there is something about design that should be explained here, but maybe another time but there is a lot to tell about "good design" and "likable design") but the narrative and his ties to the actual Destruction forces is so plain, such a strech... And buy making him badly they ruined also Gordrakk and Skragott, another two new characters, that already weren't too well presented yet they managed to ****** them even more.

WHFB had an organic and functional lore, inspired by classic literature and historical facts, something that actually made WHFB so popoluar, and one of the reasons why CA invested so much money in producing Warhammer Total War. Is that the only possible lore that can achieve that? No obviously! AoS, is not produced by someone who has no experience, we are talking the same company, the same people, the same writers who made WHFB, Horus Heresy series or Mordheim. AoS could work and definitely should work, but it needs narrative love, instead of fan service ("the best of this..." "the greatest of that"... Sometimes being the worst is also a good thing), or plain text for the sake of filling empty pages. The worst thing is that GW is still capable of doing it, Cursed City (never happened) is a great example, yet such examples are more sporadic islands in a vaste ocean of commercial mediocrity.

A perfect example of this is the White Scars paradox... Until a few years ago, it was the least known chapter of Space Marines. Black Library startedi the HH series and at the certain point they realized they hadd no lore for the WS... So a writer was charged to flesh out their lore. Chirs Wright wrote the first book that pictured WS as protagonists and for the fisrt time we read aboyt Jaghtai Khan, in "Scars"... If you go and look for reviews you'll find a massive amount of people falling in love with the Primarch only because, Wright is a really good author, who accepted the challange with passion and seriousness. This month Black Library published the last book concearning the WS by Wright, "Warhawk" and in it the author explains how he used the real life challanges such as no established lore at all, to craft the actual lore for them: "since nothing is really known about them, I decided I'll make them unknown, impredictable!" - and what a job he did.

So I accept no excuses, GW knows how to do it, and I pretend they do it, because it's better not only for us, but for them too, cause the only reason they ara basically a monopoly is thanks to their well established and recognizble lore and universe that people loved and still love. 

The vast majority of the people who made GW lore what it was are no longer involved. So I'm not sure they necessarily can do it.

GW flavour text these days reads precisley to me like people who know in theory what makes GW stuff tick, but can't actually produce it.

For me, the reason is pretty straight forward. The secret about the greatest most inspirational fantasy and Sci fi lore is that its basically always about more than just itself, usually about greater artistic human themes and drawing from classic cultural touchstones and subjects. That's why they appeal to so many people- their themes are universal.

What we see now though in pretty much all of the most popular Sci fi and fantasy licenses are authors who are fans, writing for fans. They rarely reach outside the universe they are writing within and the logic of it is very congruent on itself. Its insular, designed to excite and titilate people who are already involved than reach for something more ambitious.

The main comic book franchise properties went through this about 30 years ago if not before.

This also adds into another key aspect missing from most modern fantastical IP's- they take themselves too seriously. When I got into GW in the mid 90's, there was a sense of self awareness and whimsy. Because actually, you know what, these things are trivial, they don't actually matter in the grand scheme. It was escapism that knew it was escapism. It didn't require voluminous investment to understand what was going on.  Also, there was no attempt to hide that they were proudly working within a tradition and culture where ideas were borrowed, Inherited, built upon etc. More of an open source culture.

They wernt trying to claim ownership of a monolithic property in which they are free to steal ideas and concepts from others while ruthlessly pursuing those they even claim to be doing the same to them. 

Comics went through their golden era when they were conscious of their origins as disposable kids entertainment. Attempts to turn really immature subject matter into something gritty fails 90% of the time. 

Something is going to give if (When, let's be honest) GW pursue their fiction as their main commercial property. 

Edited October 20, 2021 by Nos

[Gitzdee]

My unpopular thing of the day.

Bring back the wood elves. I think their playstyle of hit and run tactics will do better in the aos gameplay. Want Eagles. Want Wardancers warcry box.

[Neverchosen]

1 hour ago, Maogrim said:

Just one minor complaint: The Khorne guy you posted could just as well be Slaves to Darkness were his armour black instead of red. 😅

1 hour ago, Enoby said:

Well yes, but that's because Khorne is the most boring Chaos God who lacks the artistic vision to come up with his own design 

Easiest way to tell the difference, Slaves to Darkness understand armour is for protection not just a means of accenting muscles and to hold up skulls*.

But I think the real difference is in their adjacent archetypes: Khorne followers tend to be more of the traditional Barbarians  and Slaves to Darkness the Evil Knights. The issue lies in the fact that Khorne has heavily armoured variants and S2D have Marauders which both blur the lines considerably. However, with the rise of Warcry cults I think Marauders may be saying a last goodbye to the mortal realms and the two factions will be more visually distinct. 



*I say this despite my S2D army having enough skulls and horns to pay Katakros the bone tithe for Hammerhal two times over. 

Edited October 20, 2021 by Neverchosen

[chosen_of_khaine]

21 hours ago, NinthMusketeer said:

I have played in tournaments, won tournaments, and now run them regularly. I can remember every game in which I got a 1-2 double then lost, because all four times I made a critical mistake. My dislike of the double comes not from losing to it, my dislike comes from having a ~40% chance to auto-win because I had less deployment drops than my opponent. If there was skill involved it would be one thing, but all I had to do was not mess up. I'm not the greatest player out there and it's absurd how easy a 1-2 double makes it to win against opponents who are legitimately better than me.

If that's the case then I (and most games / battle reports I've seen) have simply had very different experiences with the game. 

[yukishiro1]

11 hours ago, NinthMusketeer said:

The double turn benefits the lists you are talking about more than it does the opposition. Saying random initiative is needed to combat them is literally arguing that to counter these lists the game needs a tool which makes them stronger.

I dunno, I think that depends on where you're viewing it from. From within the system, ranged lists benefit more from a double turn than melee lists. But if you're looking on a macro level, without the double turn, 50 Sentinels or any other similar list that can hit the opponent hard from the top of T1 wins 80% of the time or more if it goes first, and the game goes to a place where the one-drop list is the only list that is vaguely competitively viable, and where the outcome of most competitive games is essentially determined by who gets first turn. 

I'm not a big fan of the double turn conceptually and I'd prefer a system that tones down the alpha and removes it, but if you only removed double turns right now, the game would become unplayable competitively. 

Edited October 20, 2021 by yukishiro1

[NinthMusketeer]

50 minutes ago, chosen_of_khaine said:

If that's the case then I (and most games / battle reports I've seen) have simply had very different experiences with the game. 

When the game is over round 2 or 3 because of a double, people don't make battle reports about it. Battle reports are not a random sample; they are specifically tailored such that it isn't a one-sided slaughter (and justifiably so). They are the best-case scenario.

[Beliman]

32 minutes ago, yukishiro1 said:

50 Sentinels

Is this legal? And I'm not talking about the game!!

[NinthMusketeer]

32 minutes ago, yukishiro1 said:

if you only removed double turns right now, the game would become unplayable competitively. 

With all due respect, this simply is not true. I am immersed in AoS play from small scale narrative up to being part of the staff at some of the biggest tournaments in the US and the look of resigned disappointment on players faces as an otherwise close game is aborted from an early double is universal at all levels. It isn't limited to the losing party either. Non-WAAC tourney players in particular WANT to be challenged, they spend a good chunk of time and money to go to an event for some engaging high-level play only for a match to become entirely one-sided.

For every game where the underdog gets a comeback from a timely double I see one where an underdog that had a slim but fighting chance get obliterated, and I see three where what would have been a contested game becomes one-sided. I see players who are invested, who have fully assembled and beautifully painted armies, who have set aside their weekend for an event, sitting at the table like it's a morning commute. Something they do to get to the next game which might be better.

And quite often it IS better. The majority of games don't have a 1-2 double and the round 3 objective removal makes taking a 2-3 double a meaningful choice in relevant scenarios. AoS is a great game at its core, GHBs have consistently delivered excellent scenarios overall, and the eccentric style of GW rules design lends itself to all sorts of crazy antics and cinematic moments. More often than not early-double matches just end up as a chore players push through so they can play the real game next time.

[Mattrulesok]

5 hours ago, PrimeElectrid said:

Especially relevant after the translocation faq; TOs should stop putting Tooth and Nail into event packs. It unfairly penalises SCE in a way that no other battleplan penalises other armies, and SCE suffer much more than any army that uses summons.

Yep totally agree on this one, SCE and Nighthaunt (who are bad enough as is) get utterly screwed for what reason? because a couple of summoning armies are good and instead of nerfing or adjusting them a bunch of teams that already struggle (BoC and Slaanesh also come to mind) suffer, Oh and gargants get another battleplan that's easy victory.

Edited October 20, 2021 by Mattrulesok
a word

[EccentricCircle]

5 hours ago, Nos said:

The vast majority of the people who made GW lore what it was are no longer involved. So I'm not sure they necessarily can do it.

GW flavour text these days reads precisley to me like people who know in theory what makes GW stuff tick, but can't actually produce it.

For me, the reason is pretty straight forward. The secret about the greatest most inspirational fantasy and Sci fi lore is that its basically always about more than just itself, usually about greater artistic human themes and drawing from classic cultural touchstones and subjects. That's why they appeal to so many people- their themes are universal.

What we see now though in pretty much all of the most popular Sci fi and fantasy licenses are authors who are fans, writing for fans. They rarely reach outside the universe they are writing within and the logic of it is very congruent on itself. Its insular, designed to excite and titilate people who are already involved than reach for something more ambitious.

The main comic book franchise properties went through this about 30 years ago if not before.

This also adds into another key aspect missing from most modern fantastical IP's- they take themselves too seriously. When I got into GW in the mid 90's, there was a sense of self awareness and whimsy. Because actually, you know what, these things are trivial, they don't actually matter in the grand scheme. It was escapism that knew it was escapism. It didn't require voluminous investment to understand what was going on.  Also, there was no attempt to hide that they were proudly working within a tradition and culture where ideas were borrowed, Inherited, built upon etc. More of an open source culture.

They wernt trying to claim ownership of a monolithic property in which they are free to steal ideas and concepts from others while ruthlessly pursuing those they even claim to be doing the same to them. 

Comics went through their golden era when they were conscious of their origins as disposable kids entertainment. Attempts to turn really immature subject matter into something gritty fails 90% of the time. 

Something is going to give if (When, let's be honest) GW pursue their fiction as their main commercial property. 

I absolutely agree. I've been listening to a lot of the Black Library audio books on audible recently, from both the old world and the new, and there is such a stark divide in the quality of the storytelling. Not so much in how the prose is written, but the atmosphere and the attitude of the books. The older novels are more rough around the edges, but they feel more believable, and I think are much closer to being actual fiction for its own sake. They are writing books which happen to be set in the shared universe of warhammer. Not writing warhammer books to be warhammer books because that's the brief.

I think there is a key difference in the demographic of people who write games now, from how it was when warhammer was getting started.

In essence gaming is now big enough that you can have professional game designers who do it as a day job (not everyone mind, but certainly everyone at GW). And gaming is now old enough that you have people writing warhammer products who grew up reading warhammer books. The probably read other fantasy as well, but there is a fair chance that warhammer itself was one of the big cultural influences on their work. After all, they are now working for Games Workshop. This means that you have a kind of ouroboros effect, where things become more and more self referential, and the in depth knowledge of the original inspirations are lost.

If you go back twenty years, being a gamer was much less common, if you go back 30 it was basically impossible to have grown up playing these games, because they didn't exist.

The original crew of Games Workshop brought with them a varied suite of interests. They were fans of historical wargames naturally, but that also meant they were fans of real world history, because the folk who are into those games tend to be very knowledgeable about it. They clearly had an eclectic taste in movies and fantasy novels, you can tell just how widely read they must have been by the amount of weird stuff they were referencing and parodying. Lastly it wasn't yet a big business, so they weren't taking it as seriously as they do now.

You also get the definite sense that there was a counter cultural element to it, which isn't the case any more. So what we got was an anarchic, "punk rock" fantasy setting of over the top parody of history, and because it wasn't filtered through a corporate entity, it was free to reflect that anarchic politics and ideology. It was satire.

Read any of the old Gotrek and Felix or Genevive novels and its all about class war, its about corrupt nobles, and totalitarian regimes (especially 40K, but still WFB to a great extent). They were commenting on their own politics through the medium of fantasy. They were writing about the 80s through the lens of the far future, and parodying the Holy Roman Empire of all things because they happened to be quite knowledgeable about it, and those were the cultural touchstones they had.

The touchstones for the younger generation of games writers, are games. And that means that they probably don't have as deep an understanding of the stuff that inspired those games, or if they do then its out of having deliberately researched it, not because of having lived it.

I bet relatively few of the people writing Black Library novels today have an in depth knowledge of the Holy Roman Empire, because really who does? So they aren't going to create a nation in the new setting with as well thought out and historical of a foundation. I'm sure that there are good world builders among the GW staff, but I'm not convinced that they are writing in a space which will allow them the freedom to go all out on creating an in depth and believable setting.

They probably aren't writing what they love. Many of them are probably doing work for hire, writing to a brief, or writing a pitch which they think will sell. This means that the attitude and atmosphere that made warhammer what it was is diluted. The grimdark is there because that's the brand, and that's what they have to write, not necessarily because they want to make a salient point about society.

Its just the difference between someone within a corporate framework, and a hobbiest who's turned their hobby into a job. In many ways the former potentially has advantages. They have more resources, more stability, more people looking into what will sell well, and what won't. However, they don't have creative freedom unless the company decides to give it to them.

We often hear that GW has a models first approach. For better or worse they decided that the sculptors were the ones who needed that creative freedom the most, and it filters down from there.

 

[RexHavoc]

5 hours ago, Nos said:

The vast majority of the people who made GW lore what it was are no longer involved. So I'm not sure they necessarily can do it.

GW flavour text these days reads precisley to me like people who know in theory what makes GW stuff tick, but can't actually produce it.

Those that have left that created a lot of the older lore and settings were also history buffs, architects and had degrees in history and stuff like that. They stuff they crafted WFB from is often real history (or older legends/tales), which I have always assumed why some of the older books and settings seem more realistic and well crafted.

A lot of AoS & 40k (and even a lot of wider wargaming hobby) reads like it was created by people that grew up with warhammer, but not the things like the real history that warhammer was built around.

I don't dislike AoS lore- I'm often found crying foul at loosing the eight lamentations sequels. But I can see why people can be put off by it. Its almost like a parody of a parody at this point.

Edit: Ninjad by @EccentricCircle by mere moments who worded it far more elegantly! 🙂

Edited October 20, 2021 by RexHavoc

[EccentricCircle]

8 minutes ago, RexHavoc said:

Those that have left that created a lot of the older lore and settings were also history buffs, architects and had degrees in history and stuff like that. They stuff they crafted WFB from is often real history (or older legends/tales), which I have always assumed why some of the older books and settings seem more realistic and well crafted.

A lot of AoS & 40k (and even a lot of wider wargaming hobby) reads like it was created by people that grew up with warhammer, but not the things like the real history that warhammer was built around.

I don't dislike AoS lore- I'm often found crying foul at loosing the eight lamentations sequels. But I can see why people can be put off by it. Its almost like a parody of a parody at this point.

Edit: Ninjad by @EccentricCircle by mere moments who worded it far more elegantly! 🙂

Why thank you. Your post was much more concise!