The job to rewrite the rulebook has been posted

[PercyTheTroll]

Also, will the next NAFC go back to being called the Blood Bowl?

[Glowworm]

more importantly....... does this mean next years NAFC will be back at Warhammer world?

Best question I've heard on this thread...

I hope not!

Can I ask why? The "new" venue has consistently underachieved every year I've gone, that's not a criticism of the organisers, but it's ran out of beer, ran out of food, and the lunch in particular was hardly Stella!!! They turned coaches who had rooms booked away ( actually sending them to an aweful alternate hotel in Nottingham) whilst booking in a wedding party into the wing they had " problems with"

At least GW did OK food and it's got a sense of belonging to it......

Just my thoughts, either way I'm likely to attend.

[DixonCider]

Does anyone know who got the job? Is it someone who had been a member of NAF and/or TFF?

[howlinggriffon]

It's Andy Hoare. He's a nice guy - spoke to him a few times when I was a GW forum moderator.

[DixonCider]

It's Andy Hoare. He's a nice guy - spoke to him a few times when I was a GW forum moderator.

awesome, thank you

[Steam Ball]

More people claiming the job.
https://twitter.com/lagoon83/status/691630668829347843
He worked for Mantic years ago.

[Deus Magi]

Well, I personally believe that threads like this will actually be read by the people involved in the games re-production. So I'll put my constructive thoughts in. I think it would be clever of GW to remain with the balanced rules as they are, but to tweak a few things. As already mentioned, better explanations, easier layout of the rules. Certain teams are well known to be weaker. Halflings for instance. A new Skill "Podgy rear" for a better landing, and maybe one for something else that assists them. Maybe even a skill for the Orks, "Grab flying Halfling!" Then a Star Player who's immune to that skill, Ken Tuckie the Flyin Chicken. That sort of thing. The names of the teams, and daft player names are everything.

For me, the old game was also about the sense of fun, and this was clearly in the rulebooks with all the humour overtly and covertly inserted. I'm not even into sports at all, but this game even interests me. The gameplay, everything about it. The humour was key, taking the mickey out of various fast food chains, sports names, news stories and life in general. All that was great. If that's not represented, then it will be a great loss to this genre. GW solicitors would no doubt be tearing their hair out, but even jokes about drug taking done cleverly, really make the older audience take an interest. Especially if relevant to the news of the era. Not great examples but things like: the Halfling player Gorge Cheddar of the Somerset Littlies is their main Blocker as he suffers from AHDD (A Heavy Duty Diet). but he recently failed a Diabetes test after he got seriously sugared up when he was force fed half a tonne of Smerties by the Goblin Cheerleaders. They'd recently been put on the banned substances list. He said he'd been taking Smerties for the last ten years, they were prescribed by his sports dietician and he didn't realise that they were sweets.

I mean things like the businessman Ronald Tramp saying that when he is team President, he'll be building a wall around the stadium so that no teams can get in to beat them. The other teams, thinking they were buying shares in the club, ended up paying for the wall via an offshore account in Panamanic islands. Unfortunately due to a contractor error, the wall was built whilst the home team were playing away in Norsica. So even they couldn't get into their home ground. Having won their only game of the season, it looked like they may get high on the League tables due to poorly worded rules. Except for the Skaven team who arranged for a Gyrocopter for the Dwarven referee and then tunneled under to score 672 to nothing. it would have been a higher score, but there were two unexpected injuries due to,.......

I also like the old WHFB rulebooks with all the banners that could be photocopied. A good thing would be for GW to do various billboard notices, team supporters flags and fun adverts that can be used by fans. It's little touches like this that make the game what it is. It's that hook, that sells the product. Correctly thought out and marketed, this is going to be a really good product. If they change the pitch size, dimensions, then they are asking for trouble. if they come out with a 30mm round base for the medium sized figures, then I think that would be good (Perhaps they already do one?).

It wouldn't surprise me if they make it a darker product, more violence, danger, more 40K, but the light humour sets it aside from their other products, and that's a good hook for all ages and sexes. All three of them?!?!!

I think if people put what they think needs changing, updating or amending and any other good ideas to take the game forward, on this thread, then that could well be seen by whoever is going to be working on this re-dux of the game.

[rolo]

Well, I personally believe that threads like this will actually be read by the people involved in the games re-production.

Don't want to come across as "that internet guy", but I don't think you've been paying attention to GW these past 20 years

[Deus Magi]

I've never met "that internet guy", maybe he's me!?!? but for a business to have succeeded, where so many other miniature manufacturers have failed, and to have kept going since 1975, when hundreds of others dropped away, then they must be doing something right. Yes, they've made mistakes, but I feel that anyone taking on something like this, will read up on old versions, and do research online. Any business would have to look at it's customer base. You're also right, I'm not one to always pay attention

Perhaps all the good ideas and points could be written up in brief, on a locked thread, and then posted to GW's creative dept,.... or the guy who our Goblin spies tell us will be writing up the new development. I feel it a good idea.

[Darkson]

and do research online.

Yeah, about that...

[Deus Magi]

and do research online.

Yeah, about that...

?

You could expand on that?

I refer to looking at what other products are out there, improve on those, see where the genre is going, where it could go. Look at the fan base, ages, interests, ideas, what's good about the game, what's appreciated, what's not appreciated. What products do people want, additions, what money buys in a game these days, what's considered value for money. How much people will pay, should the rules be free like Age Of Sigmar, would people prefer a hardback limited book. GW may not be able to get this information from stores, store managers and existing customers, as a huge base of them may not even know what the game is. I'm just in a small way trying to put influence on what any improvements on it could be.

[Darkson]

As it says in the link, they admitted at a shareholders meeting they don't do research, and they're proud of that.

[rolo]

Not only do they not do market research, they have a history of actively cutting off avenues by which customers could give feedback. Games Workshop themselves don't have any fan forums, and they have been known to send cease-and-desist notices to third party websites and forums (I believe this site used to be called TalkBloodBowl, but that was before my time here so I don't know if that's related). They disabled comments on their facebook page because there were too many negative comments.

A lot of those negative comments were about game rules, and price, and less about model quality. GW still does make some great looking models (with some exceptions, and I'm not sure they are the best in the world), but they have a long-established history of making terrible, unbalanced rules, ignoring customer feedback about those rules, giving rules advantages to newer and more expensive models, stuff like that. I think that history is behind a lot of the worry you see in this thread; until we hear for sure otherwise, a lot of us are worried that GW is going to do to Blood Bowl what it did to Warhammer.

As to companies needing to know their customers and market in order to thrive ... GW is not thriving. They've been steadily raising prices for about a decade and a half (sometimes hidden price increases, like delivering 8 models in a box which used to have 10, for the same price or only slightly higher), and they've only just now begun to realize that this is not sustainable. If you read between the lines of their financial statements, their revenue has not been increasing as quickly as their prices, which implies that they've been selling fewer and fewer models while charging more and more for them. Which seems to fit what many of us have been noticing for some time - Warhammer Fantasy is dying not because people no longer want to play fantasy wargames, but because they've priced themselves out of too many gamer's budgets.


Now, they have a new CEO (Kevin Roundtree), and he seems to be saying the right things, but that means nearly nothing yet. That's what new CEO's do, at every company - show some major problems (which are clearly the fault of their predecessor), announce some major changes (so if things improve, they can take credit for it). Will this mean actual changes to the GW corporate culture? Only time will tell. The "old" GW would have repackaged Blood Bowl with a new, poorly balanced and largely untested ruleset, introduced several new races and all new models which left about half of the old teams obsolete, then released update packs every six months or so for each race, which immediately made that race the best in the game. ("Here's the new High Elf Stadium Pack! Now with ST4 Blitzers, Catchers start with dodge, and three all-new star players!!"). How different is the "new" GW? Anyone who can tell you for sure has probably signed an NDA.

[Deus Magi]

Ah now I see. The grey on Grey, I didn't realise that it was a link.

In answer to a point that guy makes, Games Workshop is a miniatures company, very early on it was board games, which is where the name comes from, but miniatures was where the money was, and that area took off. I understand the points you raise. They did send cease and desist letters, and still do. They were advised that legally that is what they had to do. Legally if they don't defend their IP, then they lose it. No firm could have that, not one that intends to continue in business. That attitude, of sending letters, is likely to occur from way back when they lost the rights to their own products, that was back in 1980. It was a harsh lesson that they learned in business. Back then the company was run differently, on a handshake, if it continued to be run that way it would not be here now. Nostalgic products yes, my era? More so perhaps, but many companies form back then folded. Even now, miniature companies go under, even if they have a great product. Business is about surviving, and GW have done, so they must be doing something right. If GW had folded with the others in the 80's, many people would still be mourning their loss now.

Price rises for a decade and a half? GW have always been the most expensive, going way back past 1985. Grenadier and Ral Partha did some incredibly detailed stuff, and it was cheaper. Various maufacturers then were cheaper, a lot of those no longer exist. GW were in my eyes, the best. They still say they make the finest miniatures in the world, but that's business, they cannot say they are the worst! There are some great manufacturers out there, producing really nice stuff. I've bought some of it, but GW definitely are there at the top. I doubt gaming and the hobby itself would exist in the manner that it does, without GW's huge input over the years. I remember the Dwarfs cannon of the 90's? Prices rose and people kicked up, but that remained the same price. Until someone realised that it now had less crew figures in it! Ah them were the days!

You raise various points, and I agree with many of them. Regards the negative comments being disabled, I see both sides, unhappy fans, but a firm that does not want to pay people to answer them all, as they would never end. I sell myself, and I answer the mail received, politely, and it can take me ages. I don't make any money though. GW does, that's the difference.

I don't know if Warhammer Fantasy is dying "not because people no longer want to play fantasy wargames, but because they've priced themselves out of too many gamer's budgets." I think if someone wants something, they'll pay for it. Prices are a factor though, I agree, but I think the fantasy trend has diminished by itself as well. The heyday of AD&D is gone, but who knows though, fantasy could again move up against science fiction, things change over time. People may get bored of computer games and downloads, wanting something tangible, and of inherent value so may move away from technology, or it may lose it's impact as science fiction even more rapidly becomes science fact.

I don't doubt an NDA has been signed. No point GW investing time and effort in a project, to have someone sneak out something similar into the shops earlier, and detract from their product. Business has a habit of doing that. It's a shame, because it would be good to know who will be designing and writing the new product.

Does GW listen? Can they? Could they and then say thanks for those points made? if they did, then someone could say, that's my idea you've used, thus open themselves up for legal shenanigans and all the hassles that go with it.

What I'm putting forward is, a way forward. You could just say, "Lets see what happens." "GW won't listen, so why bother." "I hope they don't destroy it with crazy rules." I can understand that, but if you don't fish, then you won't catch anything.

[Heff]

Potential power creep is my worry. how long before Dwarf Deathrollers fly? I know JTY's already does!