What I was hoping for...

By hellebore2, in Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay

Was a 40kesque split in Warhammer. Seperate games for different sections of the world.

It is obvious this one is in no way WFRP, for a start your PC starts out as a HERO (as per the blurb for the product), emphasised I think deliberately.

What I was hoping for is 'A Ratcatcher's Tale' being the low end WFRP experience the current game is and this one to be the high end of heroes. However the inference has been that a ratcatcher's tale is not a real product, leaving only a game of heroes slaughtering enemies. enfadado.gif

I don't see how they can claim it to be true to the original game if from the very start your character is described like this: "As a hero, you will take up weapon, spell, or prayer and do your best to combat the might of enemies terrifying to behold."

Sounds like D&D, not Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

Obviously they think that normal people fighting the good fight in a world gone mad doesn't sell to the ADD kiddies of today. you need to pwnzor everyone or you aren't cool.

I find it very sad.

Hellebore

Hellebore said:

Was a 40kesque split in Warhammer. Seperate games for different sections of the world.

It is obvious this one is in no way WFRP, for a start your PC starts out as a HERO (as per the blurb for the product), emphasised I think deliberately.

What I was hoping for is 'A Ratcatcher's Tale' being the low end WFRP experience the current game is and this one to be the high end of heroes. However the inference has been that a ratcatcher's tale is not a real product, leaving only a game of heroes slaughtering enemies. enfadado.gif

I don't see how they can claim it to be true to the original game if from the very start your character is described like this: "As a hero, you will take up weapon, spell, or prayer and do your best to combat the might of enemies terrifying to behold."

Sounds like D&D, not Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

Obviously they think that normal people fighting the good fight in a world gone mad doesn't sell to the ADD kiddies of today. you need to pwnzor everyone or you aren't cool.

I find it very sad.

Hellebore

Im with ya Hellebore

My sentiments exactly.

It's so true I don't even know what to say and how to feel...

I don't think FFG caters to the "DnD kiddie" crowd. Although I, too, hoped to see a low-end ultra-focused WFRP game a la Dark Heresy, I don't think we should be unhappy about this product as it seems to be. FFG has consistently proved me wrong whenever I expected one of their products to suck, and in the RPG lines, they truly excel.

Although I'm kinda cautious about the dumbed-down, rollplay aspects of this new incarnation of WFRP, I have yet to see them go wrong with a Warhammer/Warhammer 40k product, so I'll wait, definitely buy and then make my opinion.

It is obvious this one is in no way WFRP, for a start your PC starts out as a HERO (as per the blurb for the product), emphasised I think deliberately.

You'll see that WFRP1 and WFRP2 both describe PCs as heroes on the back cover blurb. Nothing new here. And probably the most common complaint about WFRP2 is that characters start off underpowered. So maybe it's a way of saying 'you might actually hit something!'

What I was hoping for is 'A Ratcatcher's Tale' being the low end WFRP experience the current game is and this one to be the high end of heroes.

The Daily Altdorfer mentioned Dwarf Ironbreakers, High Elf Swordmasters, Dockworkers, Sewer Jacks and Rat Catchers. It suggested to me that there would be the same sort of career spread we're used to in WFRP1 and WFRP2, with both low and high end careers.

However the inference has been that a ratcatcher's tale is not a real product, leaving only a game of heroes slaughtering enemies. enfadado.gif

You can see that the Envoy career has a Charm skill, and there are slots for Reputation cards. I doubt those will be related to combat.

I don't see how they can claim it to be true to the original game if from the very start your character is described like this: "As a hero, you will take up weapon, spell, or prayer and do your best to combat the might of enemies terrifying to behold."

Sounds like D&D, not Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

That's the usual sort of action-adventure fantasy blurbage. Nothing new here. And you know what? That almost perfectly describes the front cover to WFRP1. It would have been nice if WFRP1 had provided that sort of experience right away, instead of The Oldenhaller Contract .

I'm extremely psyched for this, as I am other FFG Warhammer products. This type of hyrbidish game looks to be just the thing for my gaming group. Hell, right now we are four regulars and this thing is balanced towards one DM and three players. Its like they read my mind and gave me everything I could hav hoped for in an RPG :D

Plus, I love gaming bling and production values, which this has in spades it looks like!

Im with you on this one!

DagobahDave said:

It is obvious this one is in no way WFRP, for a start your PC starts out as a HERO (as per the blurb for the product), emphasised I think deliberately.

You'll see that WFRP1 and WFRP2 both describe PCs as heroes on the back cover blurb. Nothing new here. And probably the most common complaint about WFRP2 is that characters start off underpowered. So maybe it's a way of saying 'you might actually hit something!'

The back of the WFRP2nd ed book says:

"In Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay you are unlikely heroes in a grim world of perilous adventure. You venture into the dark corners of the Empire and deal with the threats that others cannot or will not face. You'll probably die alone in some festering hellhole, but maybe, just maybe, you'll survive foul mutants, horrible diseases, insidious plots, and sanity blasting rituals to reap Fate's rewards."

That is clearly a different pitch to the 3rd ed blurb.

Hellebore

DagobahDave said:

I don't see how they can claim it to be true to the original game if from the very start your character is described like this: "As a hero, you will take up weapon, spell, or prayer and do your best to combat the might of enemies terrifying to behold."

Sounds like D&D, not Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

That's the usual sort of action-adventure fantasy blurbage. Nothing new here. And you know what? That almost perfectly describes the front cover to WFRP1. It would have been nice if WFRP1 had provided that sort of experience right away, instead of The Oldenhaller Contract .

And The Oldenhaller Contract is bad because of...?


I don't have anything against people enjoying the new game but I find distasteful people claiming that new game, that is completely different, is here to fix the errors of the past.


Now, I am sure that you haven't meant that BUT your last post can be misread in that way. I hope you see my point.

Oh yes,

just to add my 2 cents.

FFG has ditched the 2e in the same way that callous and cowardly boyfriend ditches a girlfriend. You know FFG just texted its old customer base that they are not together anymore. Not even a 'it's not you, it's me' line.

And tomorrow she gets to see him with his new, younger and more hip, girl on the GenCon.

You see, they (FFG) knew that this kind of backlash was inevitable. Grognards will be grognards, trolls will be trolls, kids will be kids. Pope ***** in woods and bear is the catholic. Nothing new. Except a new and completely different edition of the Warhammer.

So, they should just have got their game together and said, as soon as they knew what is the direction they want to take, look we intend to radically change the game (...while staying true to 'the spirit' of v2, yadaddadadadadad) and have a stomach to patiently and truly answer all of our questions and endure the backlash.

That would have been manly thing to do. You know, like mensch and not like schmuck.

By the way, if FFG wanted to change something they could start with this blasted forum engine.

Hellebore said:

That is clearly a different pitch to the 3rd ed blurb.

It's the usual stuff, told differently. There's more emphasis on war, but that's kind of Warhammer's thing and I don't have a problem with it. I'm sure there will be plenty of diseases, insanities and hell-holes to keep everyone happy.

Cat that Walked by Himself said:

And The Oldenhaller Contract is bad because of...?

I don't have anything against people enjoying the new game but I find distasteful people claiming that new game, that is completely different, is here to fix the errors of the past.

Now, I am sure that you haven't meant that BUT your last post can be misread in that way. I hope you see my point.

The Oldenhaller Contract is a fine adventure that neither looks nor feels like the cover image to WFRP1, which is what sold me on the game. While I don't expect WFRP3's cover to depict the actions of starting PCs, I do expect the setting's bloody, high energy grimdark fighting to be featured prominently. To me, WFRP3 evokes the same sense of adventure that I've been getting from WFRP1's cover art for 20 years now. That's good stuff.

Hellebore said:

What I was hoping for is 'A Ratcatcher's Tale' being the low end WFRP experience the current game is and this one to be the high end of heroes. However the inference has been that a ratcatcher's tale is not a real product, leaving only a game of heroes slaughtering enemies. enfadado.gif

Totally with you.

A quick easy approach for newbies would of been fine and "A Ratcatcher's Tale" was a cool sounding name for such a game. This could of easily been a more high-powered version of WFRP, allowing Swordmasters, Battle Wizards, etc more scope in a game within the setting of Warhammer, and not what seems to be a fubar version of WFRP.

Dear DagobahDave,

Your optimism really insipres me! :)

But we should always remember that the optimist is an under-informed pessimist :)

This will probably sound shocking to many, but I wouldn't mind it if it had a higher powerlevel than WFRP 2ed. simply because we already have 2ed. for that type of game. The same goes for systems - a 2.5ed would be uninteresting for me and I'd rather give a whole new approach a go in the hopes that it'll provide another (hopefully in some ways better) gamingexperience.

So I'm cautiously optimistic that FFG have come up with a cool new approach to playing in the Warhammer world and am willing to pay the 100$ (which seems fair for 4 books and parafinalia) and test it out. I'm also pretty sure that it'll still feel like an RPG and not be terribly boardgamey. I'm actually getting more a complicated card game feel for some of the features more than a boardgame...

And lets face it economically it makes perfect sense for FFG to put out a new game since it'll be harder and harder to make money of the old line.

42!
Whos optimism is based on precisely the same info as the pessimists! gui%C3%B1o.gif

Pessimist - (pess-e-mi-st) noun. Word used by optimists to describe those who see the world as it really is gui%C3%B1o.gif

Frostyfrog said:

I'm extremely psyched for this, as I am other FFG Warhammer products. This type of hyrbidish game looks to be just the thing for my gaming group. Hell, right now we are four regulars and this thing is balanced towards one DM and three players. Its like they read my mind and gave me everything I could hav hoped for in an RPG :D

Plus, I love gaming bling and production values, which this has in spades it looks like!

I agree. People are complaining about "$100!!!!", but think about what you get.

4 (FOUR) full rulebooks, which I think are mentioned as being hardback, which suggests they are going to be fairly hefty.

30-40 dice - Who doesn't love more dice? You can never have too many dice!

Cards and stuff with rules on - Awesome! Means I don't have to flick through the rulebooks (of which there are 4) every 5-10 minutes to find one specific rule.

Sounds like a great game to me! I'm with you and Dave on this one, I'm looking forward to it.

MILLANDSON said:

Frostyfrog said:

I'm extremely psyched for this, as I am other FFG Warhammer products. This type of hyrbidish game looks to be just the thing for my gaming group. Hell, right now we are four regulars and this thing is balanced towards one DM and three players. Its like they read my mind and gave me everything I could hav hoped for in an RPG :D

Plus, I love gaming bling and production values, which this has in spades it looks like!

I agree. People are complaining about "$100!!!!", but think about what you get.

4 (FOUR) full rulebooks, which I think are mentioned as being hardback, which suggests they are going to be fairly hefty.

30-40 dice - Who doesn't love more dice? You can never have too many dice!

Cards and stuff with rules on - Awesome! Means I don't have to flick through the rulebooks (of which there are 4) every 5-10 minutes to find one specific rule.

Sounds like a great game to me! I'm with you and Dave on this one, I'm looking forward to it.

Maybe if you could buy it in components it would be ok, but having to spend it all in one go is a bit much. 30-40 custom dice as they so regularly put it means they are useless in anything else.

You'll notice my complaints are about atmosphere and 'level'. WFRP didn't have to stoop to D&D's level to be a good game.

Hellebore

Hellebore said:

Maybe if you could buy it in components it would be ok, but having to spend it all in one go is a bit much. 30-40 custom dice as they so regularly put it means they are useless in anything else.

You'll notice my complaints are about atmosphere and 'level'. WFRP didn't have to stoop to D&D's level to be a good game.

Hellebore

Where have you read that it's stooping to DnD's level? I've never seen WotC come out with something as polished and unique as the 3rd edition looks.

MILLANDSON said:

Hellebore said:

Maybe if you could buy it in components it would be ok, but having to spend it all in one go is a bit much. 30-40 custom dice as they so regularly put it means they are useless in anything else.

You'll notice my complaints are about atmosphere and 'level'. WFRP didn't have to stoop to D&D's level to be a good game.

Hellebore

Where have you read that it's stooping to DnD's level? I've never seen WotC come out with something as polished and unique as the 3rd edition looks.

I meant how the game was pitched. D&D is a game of high magic with +10 swords of killing. WFRP is known for it's distinctive ratcatcher.

2nd ed's blurb on the back referred to PCs thusly:

"In Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay you are unlikely heroes in a grim world of perilous adventure. You venture into the dark corners of the Empire and deal with the threats that others cannot or will not face. You'll probably die alone in some festering hellhole, but maybe, just maybe, you'll survive foul mutants, horrible diseases, insidious plots, and sanity blasting rituals to reap Fate's rewards."

Whilst 3rd ed decided to say:

" As a hero, you will take up weapon, spell, or prayer and do your best to combat the might of enemies terrifying to behold."

That seems like a pretty clear shift to me. And if we are supposed to be reading more into the description than is there, well it's a bad description.

I'm not passing final judgement until Gencon reveals actual rules and gameplay. I'm hoping some people will get a chance to play it and give a review.

But if the game is just a normal RPG with extra bells and whistles rather than how it's been described, FFG's first taste marketiing is pretty poor. It's not in their interests to generate negativity, so you'd think their advertisement and descriptions would focus on how atmospheric and true to warhammer and the warhammer fantasy roleplay world it is. Instead they spend ages describing how innovative it is with its custom dice and unique methods of story telling. So either the game is focused on the areas they push in their description or their advertising people have done a poor job.

Hellebore

Hellebore said:

I'm not passing final judgement until Gencon reveals actual rules and gameplay. I'm hoping some people will get a chance to play it and give a review.

Somebody, please, make a video record of this!

MILLANDSON said:

Hellebore said:

Maybe if you could buy it in components it would be ok, but having to spend it all in one go is a bit much. 30-40 custom dice as they so regularly put it means they are useless in anything else.

You'll notice my complaints are about atmosphere and 'level'. WFRP didn't have to stoop to D&D's level to be a good game.

Hellebore

Where have you read that it's stooping to DnD's level? I've never seen WotC come out with something as polished and unique as the 3rd edition looks.

Frankly, D&D 4e is pretty polished. The books certainly look pretty, but most gamers I know dismiss this as just style over substance. I'm not saying that's necessarily the case here, but polished and pretty doesn't equal good gameplay (they're not mutually exclusive either, just to be clear). As for unique, that could go either way.

DagobahDave said:

The Oldenhaller Contract is a fine adventure that neither looks nor feels like the cover image to WFRP1, which is what sold me on the game. While I don't expect WFRP3's cover to depict the actions of starting PCs, I do expect the setting's bloody, high energy grimdark fighting to be featured prominently. To me, WFRP3 evokes the same sense of adventure that I've been getting from WFRP1's cover art for 20 years now. That's good stuff.

So, basically you are saying that you had to wait 20 years to play the game you wanted?

I mean you are either the most persistent person in the world or the graphic strength of the v1 cover was really astounding ;)

Ok, I tease a little bit but if we try our hand (or even better eyes) on the reading the image and do the comparative analysis of the v1 cover and v3 cover I think that we would deduce that they are radically different and are not conveying the same message.

Let’s take a look:

V1 cover has a standard adventuring party facing off some orcs in what seems as typical post-Tolkien fantasy BUT it seems a little bit out of joint. It is a little pulpy (note the joy on the face of the warrior skewering that big ball and chain wielding ogre or sheer psycho-strain look on the dwarf braining that poor orc), a little bit S & S (wizard is obviously hiding and readying the spell), a little bit dirty (rats and bats in the background), a little bit Leiberian (what is that background? Evil temple? Long abandoned? Dusty tomb?). So in the V1 cover we have a group of adventurers (who look like a group of ne’er-do-wells that are going to ‘adventure’ in order to alleviate their financial woes) who have stumbled into the ruined Temple (abandoned Dwarven City, whatever…) and there by ill chance ran into Orc chieftain and his cohorts.

V3? Priest in heavy plate ducking it out with similarly heavily armored Chaos warrior, standing amidst conflagration caused by obviously pyromaniac wizard slaughtering some invisible foes? It seems that they are in the middle of the almost super-heroic slugfest. Almost like something more out of the 40k then its fantasy cousin.

So instead of the heroes by chance in dark fantasy setting, we get (on the cover, we don’t know anything about the contents as yet) super-heroes on some epic battlefield fighting rampaging hordes of armored Chaos warriors.

Do we wait another 20 years to play that game?

For some reason the v1 cover always made me think of Trollslayer by William King gui%C3%B1o.gif

Also, I don't think trying to objectively analyse art(work) is the best way of making a point happy.gif

I am scared. I am usualy overenthousiastic about anything new, but this is just. Wrong. And I hear chainswords slowly buzzing, if this "new edition style" will move towards the 40k roleplay...