"I AM HAPPY ..GW… KILLED FANTASY!!" Topic

Before you lynch me hear me out!
At first I was as shocked as the next guy. How could they be so cruel to their customers? Why (I figured that one out pretty fast ££££) I thought? The warmly remembered Warhammer world from my youth is gone, destroyed!
However……….. There are some real silver linings to the cold blooded murdering of the current Warhammer world. Those legions of fantasy players locked in the GW death spiral of ever more terrible rules and expensive figures have been set free to use what edition and figures they want. Other none GW rules will now be looked at by those players with huge armies. Other manufactures will begin producing fantasy figures knowing they do not have to compete with GW. The market is open for new figures and a more dynamic company to make fantasy its own or for it to become the property of all. Think of all those Fantasy addicts no longer able to buy from GW (as they drop their fantasy line) looking to find a replacement dealer. I have heard GW made 10% or there about's of its money from Fantasy sales. If I was a figure manufacturer I would be looking at taking a chunk of that 10% as a nice earner.
For me personally it has meant a return to fantasy. All the talk of fantasy made me look again at my old love; the thing that brought me to wargames in the first place: Warhammer 2nd edition and Ravening Hordes. Without the straight jacket of the GW fan-boys I can take 15mm Fantasy down the club and might find a player. I can use 2nd edition rules and not be sneered at. 15mm fantasy beckons now using 2nd edition with a few home grown rules. I feel for those who GW flipped the finger at but don't be down. This is a new dawn. Don't put aside your armies. Rejoice the evil witch king who has kept you enslaved has set you free. It's time to be creative, time to look at things past and pastures new.
(On a side note, I asked some fantasy players from our club if they had their old rules only to be told "No I binned them when the next edition came out." I was horror struck. Just think of the freedom these slaves to GW now have. Once they have gotten over the shock, they can play different rules; good rules).
As to Age of Sigma: Good luck to you who enjoy it. Hope your pockets are deep (have you seen the price of the new stuff). For me Age of stigma is really not my cup of tea but if they are yours all power to you. Although some of them sigmarines might get bought to be turned into true scale space marines.
Fantasy is dead; long live fantasy, I say.

Stealth this is the most positive take and post on the whole debacle.
Good on yer
Von T

Age of Sigmar has certainly polarized the Fantasy crowd. Alot of people seem to be jumping ship to Kings of War Second Edition, and their are others who are interested in 9th Age and OpenHammer, though I guess we'll see where it goes. Whatever the case, Warhammer Fantasy (of any edition) is only dead if people allow it to die. I personally loved 6th and 7th Edition and there are still players who will play. I have a 7th Edition game in a week with a Daemon player *Gulp*:)

Yes, it has a definite upside.

Meh… I never moved past 2nd ed.

Big fuss about nothing. My fantasy gaming is still locked in 1987.

Well said Stealth. There are just a few fantasy players in my area. So we never got past 3rd.

Play with what you want to play. Don't let the Cool Kids, or Management, tell you what you should enjoy.

Every Warhammer competitive/tournament Youtube channel needs to read this! Very well said OP!

Video killed the Radio Star? Nah! Still tuning in loud and clear. Yes Stealth nicely said we can now return to doing what was fun and entertaining fantasy wise, ( can't wait fort Dragon Rampart:D I always enjoyed the building and gaming in a not so directional mythical world that GW pushed it all shoehorned us into a very narrow aspect of fantasy and I hated the competitiveness of every reincarnation GW brought out 'the cheese' killed it for me during its 5th-7th incarnations so I drifted out (thank goodness I've kept my armies and as you say we're free to reinvent it all. So for me its still old school fluff and the DR rules.
Cheers all happy gaming with all your green dragons and hoards of not so green orcs again.

Well said piece. I hadn't thought of the opportunities for other companies to make rats, dark elves and other nice stuff. There is a company right now damn near duplicating WArhammer armies! Maybe we'll see some more.

Oh yeah look for the kick starters!

Wow…..that sounds very similar to the "guns kill people" rants.

Oddly enough all this talk about Warhammer did make me want to dig out my own box of 2nd edition and Ravening hordes and see if I could do something with it.

The "good points" depend on many variables which have not been input.

For the Warhammer World setting (which I rather enjoyed) I'll continue to play big battles using the Warmaster rules.

As for my larger scale figures, well, yes, this is a chance to look at Mantics Kings of War game, which, it seems, will allow me to retain my current Warhammer armies, and add things like the Trojan war.

In theory anyway.

I am still studying their free download at the moment.

Never drank the GW kool-aid.

Fantasy preceded GW and will be around when GW stands for "Gone at Warp speed" I think.

You have always been free! Your slavery was voluntary.

So why is all this bad? Not a Warhammer player mind you but why do you really care? If there is some version of Warhammer you prefer (one of the posters above likes v6 or 7 for instance) then why can't you just stick with those?

Like any game system, Age of Sigmar is going to rise and fall on its own merits.

I agree with you Stealth. A nice opening for better rules, better minis, and better prices. I see a nice resurgence for classic high fantasy gaming in the near future.

Who asked this joker shows wisdom in his comment.

The "Doom and Gloom" from our group's GW Fantasy players seems perhaps premature (but then the attitude, "You can't play a pickup game with strangers without points" seems to assume the other player will bring 20 DoomSlayers (or some such) to battle your 20 dwarves – consistently bringing Max Monsters to the table…

I am a registered card carrying cynic but that seems a bit negative to assume even to me.

Oh yeah look for the kick starters!

Well you going have to wait since the 2nd Edition Kickstarter for Kings of War was over months ago.

I am just waiting for that large box to arrive since I spent around $300 USD on it.

Did the same for Mantic's Dungeon Saga Kickstarter as well.

Yes my wife will kill me but I can deal with that.

Saved a ton by buying from Mantic because the same amount of miniatures from GW would have been 3-4 times as much.

Oh and I have all of the old rules for WFB from 3rd to 5th Edition.

You just need to tweak the rules and put in limits on unit sizes and come up with activation system that is not UGO – IGO.

Oh and tone down the Magic.

But yes it is good timing on Mantic's part since their Kings of War 2nd Edition is coming out next month.

Mithmee: "Yes my wife will kill me but I can deal with that."

Ah! You got the undead box then!

WHF was pretty much stagnate anyhow, I haven't even played a game of it since 6th edition and nobody even spoke about it until Age of Sigmar hit the shelves now. I think it's about time the game got a total overhaul, now if 40K would do the same and simplify, I might play again. But I play anything, I've been playing KoW, Warpath anyhow, so nothing they do upsets me anyhow.

The "Doom and Gloom" from our group's GW Fantasy players seems perhaps premature (but then the attitude, "You can't play a pickup game with strangers without points" seems to assume the other player will bring 20 DoomSlayers (or some such) to battle your 20 dwarves – consistently bringing Max Monsters to the table…

I doubt it's that sort of extreme they fear. It's rather they can't simply say we'll play 2000 points (or whatever) and reasonably expect it to be approximately balanced. Getting a "fair" battle will now require knowing what's in the opponent's army as well as experience of how good various stuff is in practice. You don't need a disparity nearly as large as you suggest for a battle to be pretty much a foregone conclusion.

I have never understood the need of some folks to tie themselves to a concept, idea or arbitrary set of " official Blah Blah blah of company X" in order to enjoy a day of gaming/ socializing. I have heard the same tired arguments dragged out ad infinium "but we have to play official Blabhammer 70th Ed cos it is the only way can you can get a pick up game at our FLAGS……… I am sorry I just don't buy it and I call BS. I have been involved in the wargaming hobby well over forty years and never has this been true to me. Owned and operated my own successful FLGS, been to dozens of cons and trade shows and frequented dozens of shops and never once encountered the fabled " pick up game of Blabhammer"
To see all the vital and bile hurled at various game companies for" screwing over/ robbing/ ruining their Customers games/ day/ lives…. Shows to me a deep seated problem with many folks that has nothing to do with actual gaming or enjoyment. I will say it again, buy what you like , play what you like and perhaps…. Stop expecting a toy/ game company to make or break you day / life
Or continue to vent your spew and spew your unhappiness at the world. Of course the choice is always your own.

Most of my games of PIQUET and what not have never used point systems, so AoS non-point gaming system is nothing drastically new to me, its normal and more usable to me than an army list with points, I prefer orders of battle and unit/divisional breakdowns over points and btw, no armed conflict is ever balanced, you do the best you can with the forces at hand usually. I prefer battles with a goal and time limit over total destruction anyhow. BTW we don't even play KoW using points, we just setup a scenario and field units for each side, agreeing on types.

Ah! You got the undead box then!

Why yes they will go well with the Dungeon Saga miniatures oh and I got some more Dwarves.

[quote=Rogzombie]
Oh yeah look for the kick starters!

Lol! :-D
You couldn't have aced it any better!

We know interest on our long-year awaited rulepack has been met with great enthusiasm and that's proven by the augmented hits/visits to our website and emails/pms we have been receiving. It took us a surprisingly non-existant period of time to fill in the 100 playtester spots!

The Kickstarter we are working on for end of this year will be heavy on the plastic troops we are missing but mostly should be a joy for all those people who are currently not happy with what else is out there nor the quality with which these games are supported.

I tend to agree that now that there is no WFB anymore, it might actually be easier to get more people who are interested in trying previous editions.

BTW I started a new website to foster the playing some of the previous editions. We are focusing on WFB from the 4th to the 6th, and 40K from the 2nd to the 5th. The website is:

classichammer.com

and I encourage people to check it out.

I agree with Last Conformist, he hit the nail on the head.
While it's true that real battles are not balanced, we are talking about a game of fantasy battles.
Scenario based games are great for conventions, leagues, etc. but it is nice to have a set points value and build to it, inherent imbalances in various army options notwithstanding…
I wholeheartedly look forward to seeing if a community driven effort can keep WHFB alive. 6th edition fan here…