"40K and Jumping the Shark" Topic

Has 40K "jumped the shark" – and if so, when (what year) did it do so?

This is highly subjective.

For me, they have done it many times and in different ways.

Most recently it was their new Dreadknight for the Grey Knight Terminators. The thing is just silly looking and pointless when you consider dreadnoughts themselves.

I have not followed 40K closely enough in recent years to name too many other though.

-Eli

Many people have fond memories of playing 40K when they were younger and will respond no doubt with specific years / publication dates when the game traded its magic for crass commercialization.

And many people play it now and have fond memories of recent sessions, who will respond with valid points about why the current version is the best version of the game ever.

Me? I never played 40K. So I have this to ask:

How can a game set in a fantasy version of a science fiction future, with space elves and space dwarves (originally) and space zombies and space demons … ever be considered NOT to have jumped the shark?

I mean no offense. Some crass commercial products are likeable, even admirable, precisely for how commercial they are. 40K may very well be one of those today, and (as I ask above) possibly always has been.

EDITS: I forgot to mention space orcs and space ogres! And I apologize for citing the space zombies -- that is a cheap shot, since in 40K the undead are actually robots, and derivative of an SF film for their source material. Much more fitting to an SF setting than the rest, which basically just involved taking fantasy literature (or a generic fantasy gaming world derived from several fantasy literature sources) and translating it to space.

In the original sense of the term (a flashy event intended to impress that instead does the opposite), that would be the launch of either 3rd or 4th editions.

I liked "Rogue Trader". Since then, it's been a regular Sea World extravanganza.

Allen

Nobody is listing years…

What year did the Tau come out?

Like Allen, when they dumped Rogue Trader for what ah considered a kiddy game…I dumped it. Whatever year that was ? <chuckle> Buuuut..that's just my unhumble opinion

Still the biggest miniatures game around, by far. So for your personal experience it might be done, but the company in and of itself is doing just fine.

For reference, according to Wikipedia:

Rogue Trader – 1987
Second Edition – 1993
Third Edition – 1998
Fourth Edition – 2004
Fifth Edition – 2008

donrice – jumping the shark has more to do with how somethign is received by the target audience, not by those who do not play or are uninterested in it.

-Eli

There is something to that, emu2020. So what year or edition did 40K jump the shark for you?

I concur with Allen and Wolfshanza, so that would be 1993.

It most thoroughly jumped the shark with the release of the Dreadknight, so I'd guess that'd be 2011.

It's been going off the steepest part of downhill since 2004.

For me they have jumped it on many occasions. As I mentioned originally, the most recent bit was their ridiculous Grey Knight Dreadknights. So you could say 2011.

it's not 40K, but I thought they jumped the shark in Fantasy Battle when they turned the Bretonnians from dirty 100 Years War French to a frankish version of the Arthurian legends.

Really I find the love for Rogue Trader a bit humorous. I loved that game too, but let's be honest, it was seriously broken and allowed degrees of insanity that the current editions still have yet to match. It was awesome, but hardly the sainted thing that a lot of folks hold it up to be.

-Eli

Third Edition, 1998.

Dale

I don't play the game but I remember when the sisers of battle had a tank that came out with an organ on top, I thought that was beyond silly even with all the silliness they already had.

1987 with Rogue Trader – it jumped the shark then and slowly but surely became the Great White shark preying upon any competitor which came close. Then again, I quite enjoy the game with friends – it is fairly campy and silly in the extreme, but then again D&D wasn't anything different when it comes right down to it. I wonder why these questions get asked on here in the first place?

THREAD HIJACK: On a completely different note, I've had numerous friends who thought that the DreadKnight was a silly model, stupid looking, and the like. That is until they saw one that I had assembled, then they saw it in a different light and not like it was shown on the box. Some still didn't like it, others found it kinda cool in a space-fantasy Alien's cross-over kinda way. In any case, my local store sold 10 of them in a day.

Yes, Madzerker, I much prefer the MLRS version that Forgeworld came out with to that gaudy thing.

Astranagant – I think Madzerker is referring to an actual organ, not the Sister version of the Whirlwind. they literally had a tank with an organ on it.

picture

although not as bad as some of the chaos conversions I've seen with organs of a different sort on their Rhinos .

-Eli

Every version of 40K has it's ups and downs. Rogue trader was a brilliant concept with so many 'flaws' that led to competitive gamers 'taking advantage'…these were not tied to a sales strategy yet. 1993 saw 2nd ed. and an attempt to 'make things fair' and/or integrated. I continued playing with 2nd. edition, but a lot of the magic was lost. At this time, GW really started to adjust their miniature prices according to the game-mechanics. That was also a big turn off. Also, all the cards etc… were annoying. Still, in 1993-1997 it was THE sci-fi game of choice (with some feeble competition from 'WarZone'). When 3rd edition came out, everything changed. There was no longer even an attempt to disguise their unpopular buisness practices, and a lot of the involved 'skirmish' feel was abandoned entirely. The following editions are really just rehashes of third edition. So I guess 3rd ed. is where the fish came out of the water, but 2nd. ed was just the dorsal fin showing above the surface. The universe which was introduced (and often 'elaborated' or 'improved' upon, not to mention mimicked) in Rogue Trader was so strong that it has survived in the hearts and memories of many folks who now openly scoff at the current incarnations of 40K. I think that is why it continues, along with the fact that a lot of younger gamers are not aware of the alternatives (thanks to GWs massivley succesful marketing strategies and early corner on the market.) So in a nutshell, 3rd ed, 1998… but I wouldn't play 1st OR 2nd today, despite my fond memories. Shame really, such a brilliant universe/concept.

Sometime after 2nd edition rolled out. When it became more about the tournament and less about the game.

But they really hammered the nails in the coffin when they decided that the specialist games were a waste of time.

Mostly like WoC they have forgotten that games are the hobby, not just what they say it is.

1998, when they openly admitted that they were moving the game from "skirmish" to "battle" rules. Especially since they already had a perfectly serviceable set of battle rules called Epic 40k.

Their utter and total incompetence not only destroyed a decent rules set in Epic 40k, but ensured Epic:Armageddon would never get a chance to take one cent away from WH40k sales. Everything done with Warhammer 40k since 1998 has been exclusively about the sales of more miniatures than can ever maneuver on a game table.

Chris

As emu2020 aludes to, jumping the shark happens when the wider group of fans decide that a franchise has gotten to rediulous and abandons it. People have left 40k at all points along it's history and they can point to many seemingly shark jumping moments (the organ tank, the anime GK dread, etc). However, the game is still going strong with seemingly as many fans as ever (or more), so in the strictest sense 40k hasn't jumped the shark.

All that said, I think from the beginning of RT, 40k established a world so wonderfully rediulous that it's nearly impossible to jump the shark. When you start a game with a race called squats and techno space monkeys the shark has been effectively pre-jumped.

Whenever the edition after the one you started on came out. Just like every other game.

I disagree. I think that 3rd edition made a huge leap forward in the game. 2nd edition was just a glorified skirmish game, it was overly complex, had too many things on and off the table that junked up the game, the combat was too slow and power characters dominated everything. 3rd edition changed all of that. Assassins were killed by units of Genestealers, or even guard actually, a regular space marine was something to be feared, units of space marines were the tabletop killer unit.

It made it into a wargame more so than a crazy skirmish game. There were a lot of things I liked about 2nd edition. The orks were certainly more fun to play back then. But ultimately I was more interested in space marines and chaos space marines and lots of them and the game just broke down with too many models on the table and basic marines were just about useless.

Armies didn't look like armies, tactical marines were never deployed. I think that 3rd edition took a big step to fixing all of that.

Was it perfect, no there were some huge flaws in some forces but it was better. It was a faster game that allowed you to put more models on the table.

And I really like the new Dreadknight.

I think it was in the recent year when they tried to get us to play spearhead

I haven't played 40k in years, but I did get my start gaming with it, so it does have a space in my heart. With that said, for me, the best days were when I painted and collected the miniatures…the worst were playing the rules. All of them had their problems and made it difficult at times to have fun because the rules got in the way. But the time when this was least for me was third edition. It was a nice stripped down version that had eliminated some of the problems and power gaminess of the earlier editions. Though, it also ended up growing and expanding into a broken system after a while anyway due to their vicious cycle of army book releases.

I am with Pictors. I think we had very similar experiences with 40k. 3rd was a whole new game and it was better for it. I totally agree that RT and 2nd never really figured out if they were skirmish games or unit games.

I know a lot of people have a nostalgia for Rogue Trader, and I can see why from a fluff point of view. But the Rogue Trader rules just sucked. They had some neat and fun moments (Orks on hoverboards anyone?), but man was that system unplayable. IMO.

For me, everything came together with 3rd when you used the armies straight out of that book.

I probably played more games of that than all of the other editions combined (I stopped before 4th came out).

40k has given me both an interest in the hobby and many years of fun modeling and gaming, but I am glad to have discovered historical gaming. A few of my friends play 40k and I played my first game in close to 15 years, and it was fun because it is fun to game with those guys…but again, the rules are terrible. They make everything so much more nitpicky and open to interpretation and power gaming than they have to. I'd rather do my taxes. Again, IMO.

So for me, it hadn't really ever jumped the shark in one single edition. Each one had issues. It only jumped the shark for me simply because I moved on in gaming, but that wasn't due to one edition or another.

The few things I really look back fondly on:

Squats on trikes.

Conversion Beamers.

Ork Madboy charts.

Hoverboards.

The old Rogue Trader scenario charts for instant game ideas. Those were invaluable!

Squats.

The Wargear cards and the game within a game of the 2nd edition psyker phase. That had some fun, but totally broken elements.

Necromunda (yeah, it's not 40k but it was really fun).

Squats.

The original beakie sprues and 3 to a box rhinos.

Squats.

I think that covers it for me. Did I mention Squats?

Having played the Imperial Guard through all editions up to the beginning of 4th, I have seen my army change so many times for better or worse.

If I really had to point out one thing that really "Jumps The Shark" for me, it is the revisions to the army lists that nulify and void out purchases that I have made.

GW's continuing disreguard for customer loyalty and the money that players have spent on their game at every turn is a serious shark-jumper. Therei s absolutely no reason that they could not have found ways to keep these models in the game "officially", something I consider a neccesity with the GW hobby due to the high degree of tournament mentality that frowns on the use of non-standard and unofficial options and rules.

As an IG player I have lost (some came back) at one time or another…

Dreadnoughts
War Robots
Psychers
Bikes
Jump Packs
Medics
Beast Troopers
Assault Troops
Some Special Characters
Regimental Special Abilities

This doesn't even include the modifications made to force maximums that grossly changes how many figures I can/have to use for a given points value. Due to these changes I ended up with excess squads that could never be used in a single army or found that I suddenly had too few troops for the same points.

THIS, out of everything else, is the single greatest fin-hopper for me!

-Eli

Third Edition – 1998 was the start of what we call Baby K.
It was just to dumb for words and never came back.

3rd was a whole new game and it was better for it.

3rd was also the edition where it became clear (especially to us Eldar players) that the setting and the game had as little to do with each other as was necessary to sell more Marines.

I really try to avoid placing too much value on the maturity or seriousness of the game at all. I make no illusions of 40K being adult and as such would never call later editions more immature.

Later editions actually seem to have taken a grittier, more serious approach to the setting that was not present in the RT days where 40K was really a mish-mash of things pulled from Heinlein, Herbert and the pages of 2000AD and other brit strips.

How much of the 40K universe can you pin on Judge Dredd alone?

-Eli

"How much of the 40K universe can you pin on Judge Dredd alone?"

That is one of the cool things about it. It has this mish-mash of all the sci-fi that I like. There is Dune, there is Star Wars, there is now Manga and there always was plenty of Heinlein and Gieger. And yet it was still unique with a rich history of it's own. It had so much that you could use no matter what your inspiration was that day.

I can't point to a year, all I can remember is the miniature of I think it was a witch hunter's dreadnought? The Witch Hunter Inquisitor Lord Karamazov and his walking porcelain alter.

link

This is what jumping over a shark looks like.

It jumped the shark for me some time between '93 and '98, but definitely by '98.

I've run one game of 40K since then and it was a game of Rogue Trader. My 40K miniatures more often get used with Shockforce/WarEngine.

I don't think the 'jump the shark' idiom applies to games… 'Happy Days' was a TV show. It got stupid and there wasn't anything you could do about it except stop watching… unlike games where you can keep playing earlier versions that worked (unless you are under direct control of GW's zombie masters) or you can tweak the current rules to suit your tastes (again, the zombie masters might not be pleased). Gaming is not a passive form of entertainment like TV… or at least I never thought it was.

Regardless, I had/have no interest in anything after 2nd… that's when the 'tournament' garbage started and it became a different game.
Rogue Trader works fine if you don't try to play it with jerks.

Rogue Trader works fine if you don't try to play it with jerks.

Well, to be fair…that kind of applies to all games, but I know what you mean. I agree with gaming being not being passive and that the jump the shark label doesn't really work so easily for gaming.

The real question is…when did the Simpsons Jump the Shark?

The problem is that is the majority of people are shifting to new editions and pulling the party line, you really don't have much choice if you want to play. Sure you could take some sort of moral high ground, but then you might as well just sell off your armies if that's the case.

Very few people have the luxury of regular gaming groups that are willing overlook stuff. Heck, even in a regular gaming group you are likely to have folks who want to buy into the new editions.

-Eli

donrice – jumping the shark has more to do with how somethign is received by the target audience, not by those who do not play or are uninterested in it.

Going by that definition (which I'd agree is correct for the Happy Days origin of the term) it hasn't jumped the shark at all. Its player base is still a healthy one, and continues to replace lost members at a decent clip. There is always another generation growing in to the game at least as fast as people leave it. There was a noticeable dip when 3rd ed (arguably the most radical alteration since RT) came out, but the game recovered in short order, and hasn't slowed since.

I bought and painted a lot of models, never played with them, and sold them off.
So, I was kind of on dry ground. Hardly room for a shark on dry ground.

I got disenchanted by the grim fluff, which seemes to turn some on.

To pick a point where it jumped the shark is to ppint out the start of its demise. It's still going strong, so I guess it hasn't.

5th ed, " 'true' line of sight". Done.

Very few people have the luxury of regular gaming groups that are willing overlook stuff. Heck, even in a regular gaming group you are likely to have folks who want to buy into the new editions.

Are people really that inflexible that you can't make a deal with them, such as, "OK, this weekend we'll play the crappy game YOU like… next weekend we'll play the crappy game I like"? That's kind of how it works with the guys I play with (who still have no interest in the latest version of 40K… but that might just be because they're cheap).
Heck, I even agreed to play AD&D 4E with them (straight-faced, no bitchin') and I REALLY don't like that game (they still won't play Call of Cthulhu with me though… ers)

For me it was after "Spacefarers" which was published in 1981 by the then good Games Workshop LTD.
link

It cost $6.75 USD but I got it on discount for half a buck. So, maybe the "shark was Jumped" in 1984 when Games Workshop ceased distributing its products in the USA through Hobby Games Distributors.

Spacefarers had your inspired sides: Imperial marines, Dark Disciples and the Star Patrol. All you basic 40K weapons, jet packs and jet scooters, good art, even robots. Rules 16 pages, support info another 28 pages.

I did have some fun with "Rogue Trader" but stopped the madness after that point. The rules were clearly not being play tests like the older rules had been, so Spacefarers was definitely the high water mark in the actual game.

DyeHard

The Black Wash 20 Apr 2011 9:09 p.m. PST:

5th ed, " 'true' line of sight". Done.

Don't know about this shark jumping business but I suppose that'd be the "it's lame now" moment for me too. Not that I played a lot of the 4th edition either tho so might perhaps apply better, but since it was more like the 3rd edition than the 5th is and like Pictors I actually consider that an improvement I'm willing to lay the blame for me dropping it on external circumstances, not the edition itself.

It was the year when they brought out the Tau and gave them a strength 5 AP 5 weapon that also had a range of 30 inches.

They also brought out the Black Templars that year as well.

They also decide that Eldar Guardians only were armed with Shuriken Catapults and they now only had a range of 12".

Oh and they change the way moving was done and movement was 6" and then a 6" assault.

Making those Eldar Guardians now useless since they were lucky to get off one shot before being destroyed.

Plus lets not forget the Force Comp chart.

It was very shortly after this that I and many others stop playing.

Since then my figures have just sat in in their cases and have not seen the table top.

Following a trend a few others have expressed, despite some grumbles and resentments up to that point it was the release of 3rd edition in 1998 that kicked me out of 40k (later to return to earlier versions).

At the time, I thought it was the simplification of that edition that bothered me, but in hindsight I know that's not true. Some of my favourite games are also some of the simplest I own, and I'm currently looking with great interest at the FUBAR one-page SF rules. No, it was the changes to what the game was trying to achieve and portray that really put me off.

That said, as others have also commented, I don't think it's possible to say that 40k has jumped the shark, as it's still incredibly popular (possibly more popular than ever before?).

When it stopped being "Rogue Trader" and started being 40k.

The real question is…when did the Simpsons Jump the Shark?

When Flanders wife died.

Now, in the real deffo of jumping the Shark – a point where they are so desperately short of things to do they do something so incredibly dumb that the majority of the fanbase retch – It doesn't seem to have yet.

Now FANTASY jumped the Shark with the last but one edition, which had not a single thing in it that made me smile.

Pat

i really liked rogue trader and 2nd ed. minis….but never really liked the rules for either….I enjoyed the rules for 3rd edition when it first came out, but thought all the new codexes ruined the supposed balance

3rd edition, though not in the beginning. It was when they decided to sell more White Dwarf copies by changing the rules with Chapter Approved articles in every issue that wore me out.
Fourth came around, it was terrible and I quit.
When fifth came around, my friends that stuck with it tried to get me to return because they said it was 'fixed'. But I had moved on to other things.