Disposable heroes pdf download 1d4chan - agree
Games Workshop
"A fool and his money are soon parted."
- – Dr John Bridges
"A wise man should have money in his head, but not in his heart."
- – Jonathan Swift
"For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And some people, craving money, have wandered from the true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows."
- – Saint Paul, The Bible, 1 Timothy (NLT)
Games Workshop, known to /tg/ as Geedubs, or GW is a company which produces miniatures and despite their former CEO's best efforts, games. Their three most notable games are Warhammer Fantasy, Age of Sigmar and Warhammer 40,
| Games Workshop | ||
|---|---|---|
| Alignment | Neutral Evil | |
| Divine Rank | AAA | |
| Pantheon | Tabletop | |
| Portfolio | Warhammer Fantasy, Age of Sigmar, PRIMARIS MARINES | |
| Home Plane | Lead Belt, United Kingdom | |
| Favoured Weapon | Exploit worker, Union Breaker, Weinsteinian culture, IP theft | |
The first thing that you must know is that in /tg/'s general opinion, Games Workshop used to be good, and then it was shit, run into the ground by idiots. Thankfully since a new guy took over it's been doing a lot better and most believe it could become good again. See Mordheim, Beakie, Rogue Trader and Talisman.
The second thing you must know is that Games Workshop is the reason /tg/ exists in the first place: it was originally created as a containment board to isolate Warhammer threads from the general population on /b/. Warhammer is also a massive part of tabletop gaming culture history; as such, the importance of Warhammer in /tg/ cannot be overstated.
The third thing you must know is that Games Workshop is extremely protective about their precious intellectual properties. This is funny because you can count the number of original ideas in their core games on one hand, with the original creators outright admitting they ripped off existing works wholesale. The vast majority of backstory in Warhammer and Warhammer 40, is a rehash of established fantasy/sci-fi literature, padded out with stuff the writers half-remembered from A-level history lectures. This is particularly true in the case of Warhammer Fantasy, which actually makes sense when you realize most of GW's founders actually had history degrees. 40k by contrast is mostly Fantasy IIIIN SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE, with a heaping helping of tropes from everything sci-fi that was popular in Britain in the 's.
Finally, and this is very important to understand why they have become the dominant company of the miniature market and are no longer a failing business that constantly shot itself in the legs (thanks to their own failings and tarnished reputation): GeeDubs likes the top lines in the news and shows it off. Thanks to the old fucking idiot who was crippling the company deciding to leave with a large stash of money, like a rat jumping off a sinking ship, the new management was able to realize that putting out more than a catalogue was a good way to draw in new buyers and win back some old ones. Any given week you can see them bringing articles, comics, tutorials, interviews, short stories, miniatures, codices, novels and other features, this zealous dedication to growth allows them to promote and sell their different lines, which in turn allows them to make even more profit and produce more stuff while periodically trying different niches, creating a (somewhat) virtuous economic circle, Games Workshop's resources are comparatively vast and they use them at their full (with varied although generally favorable results) add to this the extensive use of their brands in the video game industry and you see they are THE powerhouse when it comes to tabletop gaming.
History[edit]
Ancient History[edit]
The original Games Workshop was established several hundred years ago BC, originating in China. However, when the Emperor placed a commission for thousands of life-sized soldiers, this predecessor began to collapse, as with all production being geared to the creation of these soldiers and the murderous ire of the first Emperor, they were unable to introduce price rises. As one, their board of directors resolved that they must fall into hibernation, to wait out the storm, screaming defiance at the one man who ever had defeated them.
Almost-as-Ancient History[edit]
Games Workshop was established in in London as a small literal workshop that created wooden boards for public domain games, such as Chess which it sold through mail-order catalogs (not its own). The original staff was just three men in a flat in London. John Peake, Steve Jackson (not to be confused with the other /tg/ Steve Jackson), and Ian Livingstone. Livingstone was a massive games fan, and was captain of the Chess club in school, while Peake carved wood as a hobby. They soon made a business of selling boards for Chess, Go, and Backgammon.
In the same year Games Workshop put out its own newsletter, called "Owl And Weasel" which somehow wound up crossing the Atlantic and ending up in the hands of pen-and-paper-gamings' Jack Kirby, Gary Gygax. Gygax sent the trio a copy of Dungeons & Dragons to play-test for a review in their publication. Jackson and Livingstone were hooked and ordered six more copies. Gygax, thinking they were a much more established (as in established at all) company, offered them exclusive distribution rights in the entirety of Europe.
In , Jackson and Livingstone accepted and began selling copies of the game straight out of the flat by using Owl And Weasel to get the word out. Gygax himself had also been selling out of his apartment at the time, and neither found out the other group was just a couple of nerdy kids selling shit out of their home. Peake left the company as he had no interest or patience in new games (yep, people complaining every time something new comes along have been in since the beginning). After he left, D&D exploded in popularity and people who came to buy a game were continually knocking on the floor-level homes in the building, before being directed to talk to Livingstone and Jackson on the top floor. Predictably, this earned them a boot out the door from the landlord.
They rented a small office to be the original Games Workshop, slept in a van in the car park, and bathed in the restrooms of a nearby sports club while pretending to be patrons. They continued distributing D&D through mail order but had absolutely no success in convincing established hobby shops to carry the product. Without alternative, Livingstone and Jackson bought a place in west London in to sell mostly imported American gaming accessories from Dungeons & Dragons to Call Of Cthulhu and more. The two entered into negotiations to merge with TSR Games to retain exclusive distribution rights, but the owners of TSR (other than Gygax, who supported the idea greatly) turned the offer down.
Citadel[edit]
The new building allowed them to host gaming conventions which would later become the famous Games Day. This was followed Owl And Weasel being discontinued and replaced with White Dwarf, a small magazine (originally just black and white on colored stationery) written by the now obsessed tabletop gamer Livingstone, which covered industry-wide tabletop gaming news. White Dwarf was supposed to be sci-fi and fantasy neutral, referring both to a dying star and to, well, Dwarves. Originally the magazine was everything Livingstone felt like writing about, from movies to publishing short stories to computer and computer gaming-related articles. The letters section quickly became THE forum for tabletop gaming in the Old World Europe, where everything from rules clarifications to personal reviews were published. Interestingly, Livingstone published letters that were critical of both him and Games Workshop.
Games Workshop's very first new product, Reaper (not to be confused with Reaper Miniatures) was a basic fantasy skirmish game for between 5 and 30 miniatures. In , Citadel Miniatures was established under a man named Bryan Ansell as the miniature manufacturing division for any future Games Workshop products, which would produce them in bulk. Although initially a separate company simply owned by the same people as Games Workshop, it would eventually merge in the 90's into one company with the name only being a vestigial remainder of independence.
This was followed in by the release of Valley Of The Four Winds, a mostly forgotten fantasy game where two players fight over the fate of a realm. The side of evil consists of demons and the undead while the side of good consists of Elves, humans, and Dwarfs Dwarves (that spelling comes later). Battlecars was next, as a Mad Max style game. The first RPG created by Games Workshop was a licensed Dr. Who role-playing game. Fighting Fantasy was a project of Livingstone and Jackson, a fairly popular game they would leave the company to pursue.
Nothing Games Workshop made was as successful as Dungeons & Dragons, which was now being carried by competitors. Citadel sold generic fantasy miniatures for use with D&D, but players only ever made small purchases and were not in the market to collect one of everything leaving some stock hard to move. Ansell had become the primary boss of the company, and his solution was the wargaming market that had begun to catch on internationally. At this point, Games Workshop was still very much a small business with most employees putting in work as needed; a writer or mail sorter would load shipments into the building or package products.
Warhammer[edit]
In , Warhammer was released. It was created by Games Workshop writer Richard Halliwell and his friend (former mail order department) Rick Priestley (known by many nicknames on /tg/, often "The Based"). Priestley was mostly inspired by growing up and delving headfirst into both science fiction and history, the news of the Atomic Age, and World War 2; all of which led him to the first wargames, and eventually getting a job at Games Workshop with the goal of working on his own. The requirements for the new product were simple.
- Take advantage of popular fantasy favored by gamers like Conan the Barbarian and Lord of the Rings.
- Every model must have rules, so everything gets sold.
- Use six-sided dice since almost everyone everywhere already had some they could scrounge up to play the game.
Halliwell did the first draft for the game and did most of the work on raw mechanics, Priestley did development and editing. Originally having no actual miniatures associated with it, it simply consisted of a single set of three books giving a basic rule system and scenarios. The first book, Tabletop Battles, and has the core rules plus a bestiary and list of potions to be found in addition to an example scenario called The Ziggurat of Doom. The second book is Magic, containing the rules for magic where spellcasting characters with the right equipment and wizard level (, with the highest level being Archmages) can spend Constitution to use their chosen spells. The final book, Characters, adds the roleplaying game aspects including leveling up, alignment, upkeep costs, and the The Redwake River Valley example scenario.
While filled with typos, contradictory rules, and BADLY needing an FAQ that never came (so they quickly set the standard for what GW would aspire to) it was well accepted for introducing the concepts of magic failing and of the psychology of forces on the field. The setting was almost non-existent, and what little lore there was only existed in the flavor text of magic items. Of special interest is the game was originally conceived partly as a wargame, partly as a roleplaying game with actual guidelines for leveling up your general and interacting with the world— even an alignment system! If anything, the game combined the role of Dungeon master and player into one as a character led a force of generalized encounters against each other and looted the dead. Every group of friends had a different world, as the results of a previous battle fitted into the unending campaigns of war. A major difference between current and early Warhammer is an extra player was required as a Game Master for a battle to take place.
Ansell used the success of Warhammer to move Games Workshop HQ from London to Nottinghamshire, in what was presented as a merger but many at Games Workshop saw as a Citadel takeover. By that time there were six other Games Workshop locations, and cost appears to have been the only reason the name was not changed to Citadel. Few Games Workshop staff stayed on, as Nottinghamshire was in the midst of a nasty Thatcher-era labor dispute that saw employees harassed.
Due to popularity, an expansion for Warhammer called Forces of Fantasy was released in which began to describe the factions in the world (all still extremely generalized, mostly Dungeons & Dragons based). Once again containing three books (Forces of Fantasy, Fighting Fantasy Battles, and Arcane Magicks), it made the skirmish roleplaying game into a war roleplaying game with a fairly important magic system. The final booklet included, The Book Of Battalions, contained example armies for the game and included the favored armies of the Games Workshop staff, including the Perry Twins, Bryan Ansell, Nigel Stillman, and Based Priestley. The same year also saw Games Workshop stop importing printed books from the United States, and instead print them in the UK while also expanding into having a US headquarters and manufacturing division so as not to have to physically import goods in reverse.
Later in , the second edition of Warhammer was released. It combined the expansions with the core game as well as suggested supplementary rules from White Dwarf. Combat was the core rules, like Tabletop Battles. Battle Magic is the same as Magic, although it reduces equipment requirements and instead adds the lores of Illusionists, Demonologists, and Elementalists plus the example scenario The Magnificent Sven. The final book, Battle Bestiary, includes the stats of all the factions and models in the game and guides for forming armies out of them as well as homebrew additions. Still having very loose rules, the game was three books although this time they were actually professionally printed rather than looking like something off a photocopier. Paper punchouts were included to represent troops rather than any miniature although Citadel produced a range of minis which were advertised in White Dwarf (although the rulebooks still said in those days to simply use whatever you want), and the very first Warhammer lore was established.
- The Empire was a vague kingdom of men in decline, Chaos was some kind of Demonic extra-planar threat that prophesied the end of days, there was some kind of ancient race that created the monsters of the world called Slann, and Elves had some kind of civil war going on although the version presented in this book was a clash of kingdoms rather than a two way war of genocide.
- Three supplements were released, the first adding the very first Warhammer villain, Heinrich Kemmler, in the Terror Of The Lichemaster campaign. The second, Bloodbath at Orcs' Drift, introduced the first Orcs to the setting (although they weren't the asexual greenskins of today, but rather generic Dungeons & Dragons Orcs and Half-Orcs). The third, Tragedy of McDeath was basically Warhammer Macbeth, involving a plot of necromancy with Dwarfs and humans who would eventually come to be the Bretonnians. "Blood In The Streets", was just rules for fighting with buildings as well as paper scenery. The final expansion, Ravening Hordes, made the army choices much specific rather than relying on overlapping options.
On the side, Citadel had acquired the rights to produce miniatures for everything from Judge Dredd to Doctor Who, and collaborated with many other companies including Ral Partha (one of their most successful partnerships, which launched Citadel into the mainstream of tabletop), Iron Claw Miniatures (which went out of business with their molds and copyrights being absorbed by Citadel), and Marauder Miniatures (technically another company owned by the founders of Games Workshop, much like Citadel itself, which was absorbed into the company in the early 90's much like Citadel would be absorbed by Games Workshop not long after).
Games Workshop saw aggressive expansion during this time, as White Dwarf went from a general nerd culture newsletter to specifically just a magazine for Games Workshop products which also functioned somewhat like a catalog and order form for new products. By opening physical retail stores to encourage gamers to meet at, they got easy advertising as Games Workshop products were on the shelves all around them. Many smaller companies began to suffer and close due to the slow death of the mail-order catalog business model that many companies relied heavily on.
Third edition Warhammer was also released in , and was just a single hardback book (the ancestor of the Big Red Book of today yesteryear). The rules were finally ironed-out although the magic system remained the same. Players now controlled large forces with specialized troops including elites and warmachines, movement was extremely important tactically as there was Charge actions, and generally the game was considered a bit more complicated to pick up and learn than your average tabletop game. Games Workshop began to push it's own miniatures more and more, and the rules for certain types of troops came bundled with them rather than in the core book. The Warhammer setting was more fleshed out, and many consider this to be the first true edition of a Warhammer game fluffwise. Orcs and goblins were not connected and had females, undead didn't really have a reason to exist, Chaos only really mattered if you were talking about Chaos, the Empire's decline was because of cultural problems rather than being buttfucked by everyone else with twelve men or more at their command every other season, Elves were pretty much just snooty Elves and douchey Elves, Dwarves had no real flavor beyond Joseph Bugman existing, and the rest of the world was just kind of assumed to be like our own somewhat.
- Even going beyond this, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay was released which introduced an entire world outside the not-Europe of the Old World by touching on Ind, Araby, Nippon, Cathay, Naggaroth, and more.
Third edition had two expansions; Realm of Chaos, written by Ansell as a blatant ripoff of Moorcock, which introduced everyone's favorite (or hated) Evil Sues and established Chaos in a way it would basically remain from that point on; Slaves To Darkness, which detailed pretty much everyone in the actual physical world who wanted to kill you for no particular reason; The Lost And The Damned which continued giving reasons why living in Warhammer would fucking suck; and finally Warhammer Siege which gave scenarios. So more or less the late 80's/early 90's introduced grimderp, nicely paralleling the trend in comic books.
Also in , to much less fanfare but still modest success, the board game Talisman was first released. In it, players are adventurers trying to obtain the Crown of Command and kill their opponents. In Talisman received a second edition, different only in that the pieces were printed in color. In , an expansion set for Talisman, called Talisman Expansion Set (clever) was released which had an FAQ, more characters, alternate endings, and enough stuff for up to 12 players to play at once. Talisman: Dungeon came out in as well and came with an additional game board and rules for navigating it on the side of the main board.
GW also acquired the license to make Lord Of The Rings miniatures in '85, taking over from competitor Grenadier Miniatures. They'd lose this in GW, which passed to Mithril Miniatures.
Spess: Tha Finuhl Frunteer[edit]
Later that year, Games Workshop released Rogue Trader. Rogue Trader was Priestley's first creation, before he became the mail packager at Games Workshop HQ. Based on the idea of having a ship and using miniatures to play the game, and he'd refined the game as he did rules articles and sci-fi discussions in White Dwarf.
Conceived as a Frankenstein's Monster of of Warhammer/Judge Dredd/Dune/Moorcock/Heinlein/Lovecraft and John Milton's Paradise Lost (the latter work inspired the Horus Heresy) with a sprinkling of anything else perceived as cool, the game was functionally a combination of Warhammer 1st edition with Warhammer 3rd edition as a roleplaying/skirmish/wargame. It was mostly just an updated version of the game Laserburn by Ansell, who after the financial failure of his solo creation re-imagined it for Games Workshop.
Forces were originally just a Space Marines faction decided by rolling dice rather than listbuilding, which was added later as well as with most of the story in White Dwarf. The Imperium was given fluff, Orks were created as green skinned assholes described briefly in 3rd Edition although now with asexuality to go with it. Extremely complex rules for vehicles were added, and finally Ansell's Chaos was copy/pasted from Warhammer to Rogue Trader with the overt Moorcockyness removed. Priestley designed the Rogue Trader setting as part irony and part parody, with only self-deluded antivillains as protagonists.
It was hinted at various points that Warhammer 40, was Warhammer Fantasy in the future, then later than Sigmar was a "son" (its complicated) of the Emperor of 40k and thus all of Fantasy was a planet in the 40k universe, later that the 40k universe entirely existed in a box on a wizard's shelf in Fantasy, before finally the creators decided both Warhammers are reflections of each other in a multiverse.
For Those About To Rock, We Sell-out You![edit]
Many employees in left the company, unhappy with the increasingly profit-driven model of the company. Many created their own games, publications, and even went to Games Workshop's (few remaining) competitors. Notable was Fantasy Warlord, which barely sold enough to break even before shutting down. The miniatures created for Fantasy Warlord by Alternative Armies are actually still available, although some were sold to Mayhem Miniatures (which became Kennington Miniatures).
Unchallenged in the market (being the Apple of miniatures in that day), Games Workshop sought to expand its customer base into the mainstream. Television commercials were made, Games Workshop expanded aggressively into France and Australia, and the miniature lines were made less grotesque and more like the artwork. Any place that could support a major sports team was designated a potential, even eventual, Games Workshop location. Later on Games Workshop prospects were locations that could afford to support high end clothing stores like Marks & Spenser or toy store retail chains like Early Learning Centre. Games Workshop stores were designed to be friendly, with owners and employees being outgoing and knowledgeable about tabletop games while popular music like Grunge and early Alternative was played over speakers.
Ansell in the meantime had begin to expand the company into entirely different mediums, and due to his love of music had begun to use Games Workshop as a publisher for bands like Sabbat, Saxon, and Bolt Thrower. He opened a Warhammer and Warhammer 40,themed clothing line, licensed novels set in the universe, and funded LARP events. Ambitions that were not realized even included a gameshow set in 40k where players built robots to fight other robots (so a themed version of the television show Robot Wars).
In , Talisman: Timescape was released in which players in the medieval core game could randomly be thrown through space and time into other time periods, mainly those inspired by Warhammer 40,
In the same year, to compete with rival FASA and their Battletech game, Games Workshop released Adeptus Titanicus, a 10mm scale tabletop game where twelve Imperial Titans fight each other in a city. Games Workshop tied the game to the 40k franchise to boost both games. White Dwarf expansions added rules for vehicles, infantry, and aerial combat.
Talisman: City came out in which added a new board, a city for players to interact with the city guards and buy/sell items. It was likewise followed by Space Marine, which was a battle between two Space Marine armies and included miniatures for vehicles as well. In the same year, Codex Titanicus was released which combined Space Marine and Adeptus Titanicus together into one game, the first edition of Epic.
Over the next year the game received major additions including Knight, artillery, and infantry models in not only Space Marines, but also Imperial Guard ( Armies Of The Imperium), Chaos and Eldar ( Renegades), Orks and Squats ( Ork and Squat Warlords), and finally Tyranids ( Hive War).
Bitch, Where's My Money?[edit]
In Ansell left Games Workshop, and sold his shares to the General Manager Tom Kirby. Kirby's first order of business was to grow the company to quickly pay off what he had borrowed to buy it, and he was presented with two choices; grow the company with more diverse games or focus heavily on the two Warhammers. Kirby opted for the latter, and pushed the idea of more games in the two settings along with much bigger editions.
Warhammer 4th edition was released in , with changes to rules bringing the term "Herohammer" into the fanbase as most of any given army was simply there to protect the powerful characters the game was REALLY about. This was the first edition that had miniatures specifically for everything in the rulebooks, had specific race selection that prohibited using troops of another type in your army, and had a starter set which contained a two-force starter game which was High Elves VS Goblins. Magic was entirely redone, and was marketed as an expansion and used cards as spells. Magic had two further expansions, one for general magic and one for Chaos. Warhammer lore was more fleshed out, coming to resemble more or less the factions of today. The Empire was the human focus of 4th edition, with the valiant knights having no mention.
In , Games Workshop came out with Warhammer 40,, normally called Second Edition. Like Warhammer (now "Warhammer Fantasy Battles"), it was built around small units of infantry supporting ridiculously munchkinized special characters with complicated rules and war gear and appropriately pricey lead models, but at this stage Games Workshop actually cared somewhat about customers; models were made in plastic or wallet-friendly, Roman-Empire-collapsing lead, game sets included serviceable army lists and collections of miniatures, and paints were provided in 20ml pots, later ml. This switch was perhaps the first sign of the next age (and every other age, by the looks of things as paints are now just 12ml per pot).
Special NEERDS![edit]
In the same year the very first of what would later on fall under the label of "Specialist Games" (anything not Warhammer or Tolkien) was released; Man O' War. Warhammer Fantasy setting, but rather than commanding an army the players were heads of an armada on the high seas!
also saw the release of the final 2e Talisman expansion, Talisman: Dragons. It added new characters, locations, spells, and items, all themed with dragons, into the game.
In the third edition of Talisman was released, adding miniatures, experience points, alterations to the board, and the biggest change of all; it was set in Warhammer Fantasy. Later that year, White Dwarf contained mini expansions to the game while the first true expansion, City Of Adventure, reintroduced the city board as well as a forest. Dungeon of Doom came next, adding the dungeon and a mountain. The year also saw the launch of Second edition Epic, still consisting of two games. The first was a re-release of Space Marine that had Space Marines, Orks, and Eldar. The second game was Titan Legions which had the same factions.
In Dragon's Tower expanded Talisman 3e as an alternative end goal as players climbed a tower and killed a dragon (duh). It came with another White Dwarf expansion.
In Necromunda was released. Priestley was inspired by his meetings with the creator of Judge Dredd during the days of Games Workshop licensing the IP, and used it to resurrect the forgotten RPG aspect of Rogue Trader.
Fifth edition Fantasy was released in as well, along with its magic expansion which rebalanced and simplified the magic system and included all three 4e expansions. Cards remained available to buy, although all the Winds of Magic-based magic spells were included in the core rules (meaning you still had 20 more spells you had to buy cards for).
Of particular note is the Slann finally being fleshed out, creating the Lizardmen army with the starter being Bretonnia VS Lizardmen. Campaigns were released which were heavily involved in the lore; The Grudge Of Drong featured a conflict between Elves and Dwarfs which lead to the War of the Beard, Tears Of Isha involved the bitter war between the High and Dark Elves, Idol Of Gork was the first time that Orcs were truly Orcy as known today with the introduction of Gork and Mork (or was it Mork and Gork?), Circle of Blood as the Vampire Counts (then still one army with the Mummies) VS Bretonnians as the first introduction of the Blood Dragons, and Perilous Quest as a war between the Bretonnians and Wood Elves during their introduction to the lore.
Each campaign came with multiple endings decided by player involvement (becoming the precursor to Warhammer events and one of GW's biggest fuckups), paper scenery which defined the architectural styles of the featured races from then on (although this was sadly the last time these races got scenery before everything simply became Empire and Chaos), and a campaign book summarizing the story.
At some point it was determined that the stock army lists weren't enough, and so "Army Books" (for Warhammer) and "Codex Books" (for 40Kl, later simply "Codex:(faction)") began to come out, each bringing new models and rules into the game. The last round of these for 40K (Codex: Tyranids in particular) tended to make the army ridiculously overpowered and make everyone else want a new Codex to rectify the balance. Perhaps the ultimate example of Second Edition philosophy was the last book, Codex: Assassins, which consisted of nothing but four hideously powerful special characters. These included this asshole who caused the psychology effect Terror to all psykers, regardless of anything, meaning Greater Daemons and Hive Tyrants would occasionally shit themselves and run for the hills when faced with a normal-sized human.
One notable aspect of this period was that Games Workshop hated trees, and would thus include several million cards in every boxed set if given the slightest provocation; the core sets for Warhammer and Warhammer 40, both received an update governing the magic / psychic system which consisted solely of cards and templates (which were card). Some entire games (Doom of the Eldar, Battle for Armageddon, Horus Heresy) came out in this period which consisted of nothing but a board and lots of high-density card counters to lose down the back of the sofa or inside the dog.
Gorkamorka came out in , and was Priestley's answer to Mad Max meets 40k, featuring Orks in different groups crashed on a desolate planet using vehicular weapons to slaughter each other. Third edition Epic was released as well as a single game with simplified rules, but it was a financial failure after barely moving any units in six months and was recalled. This is unfortunate because Jervis Johnson and Andy Chambers consider it the greatest game they ever made. Most of the planned models were never released.
Mordheim, the Fantasy version of Necromunda set in the ruins of an Empire city where all factions are scrambling for control was released in
The last Specialist Game was Battlefleet Gothic, essentially Man O'War in space using massive battleships.
And did no one think of Blood Bowl?
Learning The Wrong Lessons[edit]
Despite the Specialist Games being massively popular, Kirby had expanded Games Workshop incredibly fast into unknown markets and as a result a massive amount of Gorkamorka sets in French, Spanish, and Italian were left unsold while English demand was high. Games Workshop was left almost on the verge of bankruptcy, causing a new sales philosophy to be decided upon. Rather than one based on restraint and market research as one would expect, the new direction was "only sure things, minimize risk". Suddenly, the irony of the 40k setting was dropped. The Imperium suddenly WAS the heroes, and Chaos was the evil that always wins in the end rather than these things being the punchline at the end of a sarcastic joke.
One of Bryan's policies for the company was that the production studio and creative minds must always be kept in charge of marketing or the company would die. Kirby, after Gorkamorka, decided the opposite was true. Given today's hindsight it turns out Bryan was right and this was one of many of Kirby's bad decisions.
Plans were made to phase out all of the Specialist Games, and over the next few years the only things available were simply unsold stock. An excuse was made for the first, Man O'War, that the molds had broken and somehow couldn't be fixed (bullshit for many reasons). The rest were quietly and unceremoniously dumped while all references to them were dropped as well.
Sometime in the run-up to Third Edition, it was decided that models should switch from toddler-murdering lead to safe, pointy pewter (or "white metal" as the industry (not just GW) insisted on calling it). This led to a 25% cross-board increase in all metal mini costs, even those ordered through Citadel's back catalog (because those figures from their back catalogue were cast up, when ordered, in the new white metal). At this point, it seemed something clicked in the heads of GW's management; they had just made a ton more money without actually doing anything. Perhaps they could do that again.
Third Edition 40K came out in and Warhammer Fantasy Battles 6th Edition (featuring Orcs VS Empire, and the last edition to come with paper scenery) came in , both reducing the dominance of single munchkin characters in favour of large armies, conveniently meaning players had to buy far more models. Then along came the fucking screw-tops, and proof that any pretense of caring about the customer had been cast aside.
Ringhammer[edit]
Games Workshop had begun to suffer financial troubles in the late 90's with competition from the surging (and independent) Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition, Magic: The Gathering, and Pokemon (no seriously, Pokemon was THAT fucking big back then).
The answer? Huge cash cow intellectual property. Priestley suggested to Kirby they cash in on the upcoming Lord of the Rings movies with the Lord Of The Rings Strategy Battle Game. Kirby was unable to see Priestley's ulterior motives through the dollar signs in his eyes and approved the project at once, so that particular series moved away from large and complex kits back to the roots of single characters and groups of soldiers.
Alessio Cavatore, a major developer of Mordheim and supplement materials, was also put on the project and it was applauded by the gaming community. Games Workshop blew through the movie material and even began making miniatures based on things from Tolkien's works that weren't in the movie such as Tom Bombadil and Goldberry. Not only that, but they also expanded armies that were barely even mentioned in the books or seen in the movies (the Easterlings in particular) and then bragged about it in White Dwarf.
The miniatures were required to be produced in 25mm scale by contract, rather than the 28mm heroic scale used by Warhammer. Its been theorized by fans this was to keep the Tolkien miniatures out of Warhammer and keep their IP from becoming an expansion to GW's existing IP.
Short Term Gain, Long Term Pain[edit]
The issue is that as hype from the movies diminished, so did sales. Kirby by this point had expanded sales and marketing into autonomy, and when the interest in the game died down (something creative teams said would happen but marketing had shrugged off) the result was marketing attempting to drive up profits with unpopular schemes, the first among these being a major change the range of paints sold.
The "problem" with the older flip-top paint pot designs that had been sold up until this point was that they actually kept paint usable for a long time. While the Citadel flip-top pot suffered from shit hinges and opening tabs which would both break after about four uses, a real man opens paint with his teeth anyway so that was not a problem. Obviously, these flip-tops were no good to GW, and so a new pot, the Screw(you)top, was designed which would gunk up its own thread and either glue itself shut forever or prevent an airtight seal forming after a couple of uses.
Apparently forgetting every other company in existence that made model paints, GW also raised the price of these new and terrible things; clearly justified, since they contained a mere 30% less paint than the old design. It was also around this point that photographs of the 'Eavy Metal studio started to vanish from the pages of White Dwarf (along with all other content that could be considered useful for anything at all other than advertising models) since they kept forgetting to hide all their non-Citadel gear for photoshoots. Even though, of course, everyone had known for years that the painters didn't "mix Snot Green with a little Chaos Black" to get a paint shade that was in Tamiya or Vallejo's stock range. Nowadays of course we can get the good stuff for cheap from Privateer Press (problem, GW?), but back then it was just fucking terrible. GW managers and staff also suffered a change in personality, pushing the idea that anything other than GW was a plague, and it was to be treated as such. "Saw you just bought some Knights of Minas Tirith, well, what about a Stompa?"
Games Workshop, highly resistant to change (ironically), began to see the shifting face of tabletop gaming towards electronics as unimportant with Kirby even calling video games "a fad". Just as Games Workshop had crushed their competition with physical stores, the internet distribution saw many new companies begin to emerge as they brought their products directly to the consumer via the internet. Games Workshop attempted to compete in this regard, although they never moved past having anything more complex than a digital version of a catalog and a little-moderated forum (which was closed down to much rage in the 's). Games Workship kneejerked and made White Dwarf exclusively Games Workshop products, allowing longtime competitor Dragon Magazine to reign triumphant as the source of tabletop gaming news in the last age of printed publications. Meanwhile a new market had emerged of making miniatures specifically designed to look like Warhammer models and be used in the game. Thisdid not go over well, and Games Workshop came to be known as ready to sue anyone at the drop of a hat, even once famously attempting to copyright "Pauldrons" and sue over the concept of a wolfskin cloak on a viking-looking warrior.
Prices began to ramp up ridiculously as GW realized they could charge whatever the hell they liked and their longterm fans would still pay. While GW was never particularly cheap, their chunky kits ended up in the same price bracket as top-quality scale miniatures by other companies; today, a Citadel Space Marine Hunter( parts entirely cast in opaque plastic) costs about the same as AFV club's Churchill mk3 (+ parts with 2 vinyl tracks, 22 metal springs, 29 Etched Brass pieces and a turned aluminium barrel). At some point, someone remembered that back in Second Edition days they actually had people willing to pay for gigantically expensive, limited-edition lead Thunderhawk Gunships. To hit this niche of "people with more money than sense," Forge World was created; all you had to do was get mom and dad to sign that second mortgage and stop being so damn selfish and a 40K-scale Titan would be yours.
Minimize Effort, Maximize Rage[edit]
In the year , Warmaster was released. Designed by Based Priestley, it was essentially the Warhammer Fantasy version of Epic.
Fourth edition Warhammer 40k was released in , and was more an advertisement for more models than an actual edition. It was advertised as being "backwards compatible", mostly because by itself it was barely a game. The rulebook was mostly sections of painted licensed plastic terrain and large models than anything else.
In , Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay was given a second edition which was largely the same but was up to date with the lore, and had a better magic system. It was used more to advertise the wargame however than as a frontline product. This came with a single unified rulebook for Lord Of The Rings that included the (greatly) expanded line in the form of the One Rulebook to Rule them All.
Around this time the bulk of plastic Warhammer scenery was released, with almost all of it in Fantasy geared towards the Empire or Chaos (with some trees maybe representing Elves?) and 40k towards the Imperium or Chaos (with a few Necron and Tau pieces from Forgeworld). Games Workshop had seemingly decided who the main characters were, and some factions in either game from this point on only were mentioned in passing while receiving no support or updates.
Seventh edition Warhammer Fantasy Battles in luckily avoided this, with Battle For Skull Pass as the starter set between Dwarfs and Night Goblins. This marked the last major change for Warhammer Fantasy, as the next update only really changed by adding more models and having minor rebalancing. Many fans of armies like Bretonnia and Wood Elves were left very unhappy their army was not updated in 7e, relying on outdated rules and thus being extremely underpowered all in favor of an event. Looking to resurrect the dying Lord Of The Rings game, Games Workshop released Legions Of Middle Earth, an "expansion" suggesting buying larger groups of models to use in a theme force using the existing rules.
Storm of Chaos was released as the major event of the 's to much pomp and circumstance, supposedly being the canonical transition from the old into the new as Chaos made its great attempt to destroy reality while every faction strapped on their wardrums and marched into the clusterfuck. Players were selected to actually play the factions to drive the narrative, and the community was kept informed of what was going on. There was a problem however Chaos couldn't win. The bulk of the story for the event was driven by the fact a fuckhuge Chaos army was invading, but the players for Chaos couldn't even manage to scrape out of the starting gate. So the narrative kept going that Chaos was a fuckmassive force that made all the other fuckmassive forces pretty much not worthy of note, and every time a player on another faction beat a Chaos player before turn four the story would state that the other player had barely delayed the forces of Chaos for only a brief time and at great cost, sometimes their complete destruction occurring anyway despite the actual battle report results saying no Chaos survived the battle and almost none of the other army was killed.
In the end, Chaos was given one last chance in the very last match as the defenders (meaning they had the advantage) in the last battle. Even this, they lost. Badly. In a phone-in result where Games Workshop made a desperate bid that fans would choose for Chaos to win and make all the actual promised narrative unnecessary, players chose to let Chaos deservedly lose. So the event ended with a single crazy fucking Orc headbutting Chaos Darth Vader in the balls, laughing at him, and walking away and thus saving the world in an ending befitting a Saints Row game. Games Workshop quickly stopped promoting the event and from that point on pretended it never happened. Combined with their Eye of Terror campaign for 40k, where Chaos conquered Cadia but lost their entire fleet in Battlefleet Gothic games (leading GW with nowhere to go aside from 'Chaos sits on a planet until the Imperium shoot them off of it') caused GW to lose faith in player-driven narrative, due to the fact that the players were driving the narrative.
In , fifth edition Warhammer 40k was released and borrowed heavily from 7e WFB as well as implemented a HEAVY emphasis on cover rules while making shooting much more important. In Games Workshop launched released War Of The Ring, which made the skirmish game into a full-fledged wargame. The rules were highly simplified to enable quick games with larger groups of models.
Dawn of the Great Derpening[edit]
The early 's could generously be described as GW's UNHOLY FUCKING DISASTER.
To start with, in , Based Priestley left Games Workshop forever, saying that "the creative team was no longer doing anything creative" and "game development and game design wasn't of any interest to them. The current attitude in Games Workshop is that they're not a games company, that they're a model company selling collectibles."
In May 11th , Games-Workshop's new terms of use restricts sales of all of their products to the European Economic Area, (EU + Norway, Switzerland and Iceland). This essentially removed Games Workshop products from online distributors other than themselves, and furthermore made their actual in-store stock of products highly limited with many models only being available directly through them (although many Friendly Local Game Stores will order from their website to fulfill requests). Oh, and they spiked the prices another % for most models.
Additionally, all metal models were on their way to being discontinued, to be replaced with much more expensive Resin kits which were INCREDIBLY unpopular with the community due to low quality casts and high price without the sense it was worth it. Unlike the pewter kits (which are basically tin), the resin kits are loaded with carcinogens; strange, since last anyone checked the reason for switching to pewter in the first place was that lead was toxic (and nothing to do with hiking the price). The quality of the product could lead one to believe it was much much cheaper, but resin damages the mold more than pewter because it sticks to the mold more. It gets expensive when you have to replace molds more often, and they also break fairly easily so that all the little ten year old Smurf players have to buy new ones when they snap them in half. So essentially, Games Workshop not only ruined the quality of their models, they jacked up the prices and made it nearly impossible for anyone outside the EU and 'murrica to obtain it. Kinda like going from fine French wine to your corner-store cheap beer and the beer is more expensive than the wine. And the beer gives you cancer.
Then-Chairman Tom Kirby mentioned in a press release that they were increasing cost cutting measures and making more products while avoiding mention of actual profits (note this is a summary, not his exact words). Given their charts, it was easy to see why he chose not to disclose the company's profits (or lack thereof).
In , Games Workshop decided to transfer their sales restriction to Canada, just as they had to Europe. As the United States had already had international sales cut back in , this had lead to a large online market for Canadian retailers, selling their products at discount sales to US customers. However, with this new change, all international sales in North America are now completely gone, as GW once again decided to fuck over long term customers and local retailers in favor of luring more small children with disposable income to their overpriced, neckbeard-run stores.
MiniWargaming, a well known FLGS with an extensive online store, decided to close shop because of these new rules. Their store manager made an entire video explaining their reasons and going over just how asinine Games Workshop's new rules are. Between jacking up prices, locking down international sales, and screwing over online sales and bitz sales, Games Workshop intentionally set itself on the fast track to running itself into the ground in the eyes of long term followers. Possibly due to their apparent belief that removing the entire world (excluding European Economic Area and Canada) from their consumer base is a good idea.
As far as games went, they at least made a dent on that front.
Eight Edition Warhammer Fantasy was released in , introducing 40k-esque large models (and pretending Storm of Chaos didn't happen). Many fans hold that this is the most balanced the game ever was, despite some particularly nasty cheese existing and some factions STILL not getting long overdue updates and having to rely on 6th edition books in a system that had nerfed the core mechanics their models relied on. It was also best not to think about how a number of the situations that could arise would realistically play out or else your head would explode, since this was the edition in which fuckhuge orcs on boars would charge a unit of skinks, and they'd all die before they could even attack. It also had units dedicating their entire lives to protecting a weak frog turn and flee, while the weak frog stayed back and fought to the death in order to ensure his guards escaped. In it was expanded with Storm of Magic which introduced fuckhuge monsters from Forgeworld that could be summoned, as well as a redone (and pretty broken) magic system. This did poorly however as the magic was terribly balanced in the main game anyway, the additions here just made it worse and the additional spells/bonuses meant to help the weaker lores were only useful to a small number of armies/situations, while the prices of the monsters were laughably high and the rules for them were not worth taking over basic infantry.
Blood in the Badlands came out in and added siege combat and advanced scenarios to the game, strangely echoing the early days of Warhammer. As Lord Of The Rings interest had largely waned, it was rereleased with updated rulebooks, new models, and licensed The Hobbit miniatures in as well.
Between all that in came sixth edition Warhammer 40k, borrowing even more heavily from Warhammer Fantasy with psychic powers becoming a clone of Fantasy's magic phase while scenery became interactive. Furthermore, armies were no longer exclusive with mixed-faction lists being possible.
In , Sigmar's Blood came out with a campaign between the Empire and Vampire Counts lead by Mannfred von Carstein, introducing advanced diplomacy rules mostly involving misfortune, and The Desolation Of Smaug expansion to Lord Of The Rings finished off releases.
In late , pop culture business site ICv2 reported that X-Winghad dethroned Warhammer 40K as the top-selling miniatures game in the United States. GW could have tried to sue George Lucas and Disney over the concept of a fascist galactic empire with fully-armored soldiers who enforce the Emperor's will, but sadly even they weren't that stupid, and they instead retaliated by refusing to renew Fantasy Flight Games' licences to the Warhammer IPs. (It could also be due to FFG being bought by Asmodee, a company GW views as a direct competitor to their new line of "Boxed Games".)
The Fall of Warhammer[edit]
In the End Times event was announced for Warhammer Fantasy while Warhammer 40k got its seventh edition. 7e 40k removed restrictions even more on armies and simply allow you to mostly take whatever you want if you are okay with not getting some bonuses, although you get advantages for sticking to groups existing in the canon. Otherwise it added a lot more to the game, not all of it good. Notably Gargantuan Creatures and Super-heavies were added into the game and the world was introduced to the horrors of Unbound lists (as well as GW's obsession with formations - GW's way of selling their stocks of unpopular models by giving powerful bonus rules when playing them in bulk). They also added even more Warhammer Fantasy-esque psychic and terrain rules.
Meanwhile, End Times ended Warhammer Fantasy. Billed as the next big thing, the event consisted of staggered releases of extremely expensive books, nearly as much as a new starter set, and new (very large and expensive) models. The books contained scenarios, massive amounts of lore, and also removed a great deal of restrictions on how armies are built; first by allowing an army to be 50% low-level characters (Heroes) and 50% high-level characters (Lords) so long as the default core requirement of 25% of your army on basic troops was fulfilled while turning every spellcaster into a master of magic, then by making magic even more fucking insane by diddling with spells and giving a metric fuckload of dice to cast them, then in the final book simply throwing all listbuilding rules out the window and saying "take whatever the fuck you want and put it on the table". Meanwhile the story consisted of nearly everyone except the Undead and Skaven taking it up the ass HARD from Chaos as it slowly meandered its way through all opposition to the heart of the Empire (read: what they wanted from Storm of Chaos); the undead got forcibly united under a reborn Nagash and the Skaven trolling everyone who was fighting Chaos. In the end the final faceoff occurred between Chaos (joined by the Skaven) and the "heroes" of the setting (both including and joined by the Undead). The "heroes" all failed miserably and were consumed by black nothingness filled with plagues, gnashing teeth, evil intellects, and naughty tentacles as the world simply ENDS. Fantasy fans were left feeling cold and full of hate, and for nearly a year simply assumed their setting had been completely and unceremoniously raped to death while all the resources and time they'd invested into the hobby had become worthless.
On a side note, multiple video games for Warhammer Fantasy were announced with some being released in this time, leaving fans tearing their hair out in frustration at the idiocy of killing a setting, then FINALLY making decent video games for it. This games include Total War: WARHAMMER, Mordheim: City Of The Damned, Man O' War: Corsair, and The End Times: Vermintide.
Age Of Skubmar: The Great Derpening[edit]
When it seemed it couldn't get any worse, Games Workshop then decided that since it had made 40k mostly like Fantasy, it would make Fantasy into 40k. A happier, LSD-fueled version of 40k.
That version, believed by some to have actually been made with Skub mixed directly into the material, was Age of Sigmar which removed literally ALL limitations on army building (as in you can take any models in the game from any faction in any number and call it an army, with rules for your opponent to play the game with an easy win condition if your army is x3 the size of theirs) and consists of a skirmish game which only has four rules, officially making it even less of a Warhammer than Warhammer 1st edition.
If that wasn't enough, almost everything was arbitrarily renamed to be trademark friendly. Zombies became "Deadwalkers", Elves became "Aelves", Dwarfs became "Duardin" despite the perfectly good trademark-friendly "Dawi" sitting right there, and Lizardmen were given the hilariously terrible name "Seraphon" which, if googled, brings up the career work of a furry tickle-fetish artist. (In their defense, the name already existed as the name of Elf Darth Vader's dragon in Warhammer. In their offense, the connection between that and Lizardmen was never actually given, so it's a moot point.) The only factions that escaped the renaming were the Bretonnians and Tomb Kings, but that turned out to be foreshadowing akin to seeing a huge silver line on the horizon on the day you plan to go to the beach.
The story was worse still, consisting of Norse mythology mixing with superhero comics in an awkward combination where Chaos Gods can be kidnapped by Elves, Warhammer Darth Vader becomes the master of the Dark Side rather than the other way around, and characters introduced and given importance in one book immediately die in the next.
The advertising for Age of Sigmar was the rules (all four pages of them) and the stats of existing models being free on launch, followed by outrageously expensive digital content that updated the game, the core lore advancement being contained within scenario books that are ludicrously expensive, and a requirement for many scenarios to have specific models which includes the expensive as hell new terrain, the rules of which can only be viewed by buying the model. To put it simply, Games Workshop managed to take the hated practice of DLC content in video games and push it fully, hard and deep into tabletop gaming.
To top it all off, Games Workshop, almost overnight, took down their iconic Space Marine statue that had sat in front of their headquarters for years and replaced it with a giant statue of a Stormcast Eternal (the Sigmarines Space Marines of Age of Sigmar). They also replaced the Imperium Eagle with Stormcast-style wings and a Ghal Maraz replica to really hammer the point home (pun intended). The beloved servant of the Emperor was relegated to being hidden under a staircase and behind an advertisement for Age of Sigmar. We really wish we were making this up.
-
-
-