After around 25 years playing RPGs I still have to see a new edition of an RPG that does not bring with it the usual barrage of negative and malcontent posts and comments. This negativity is, to me, becoming repetitive and boring, so I wanted to add my "optimistic" two cents to the discussion.

1. First of all, I don't see anything evil or "damnable" in companies (FFG in this case) trying to make money out of publishing games. I don't think many of the writers in these companies are riding around in luxurious Porsches and I feel the amount of time, interest and love they put into game designing well deserves my praise, respect and part of the easy cash I earn in uncreative jobs. Creating games is not so easy as it seems; I have experience writing scenarios for my friends, even designing some small games and anyone that has this sort of experience will tell you it's hard and very time consuming (although very exciting too).

So for me, the argument that game companies are greedy "à la MS" companies trying to squeeze all your cash is moot (even with Wizards and GW, probably the two most profit-oriented companies of this hobby) because, unlike companies such as MS, game companies don't hold a monopoly or anything. If you don't want to spend the cash, you can find very cheap substitutes, and anyway, gaming is the cheapest pastime of them all... just consider how much money you spent on, say, D&D, WH or Call of Cthulhu, and how many hours of fun you had with your friends.

2. Many of the people complaining have the same attitude as many old people towards new generations: (mumbling) "Youngsters are lazy, they have it easier than us did and world is coming down the drain..."... Come on, people, your sermons are the same as the ones I had to hear in my kid days. Your whining and nagging is useless and not at all constructive.

So they complain against any kind of innovation someone brings into games: they don't like cards, they don't like special dice, they are "hardcore gamers" and black and white musty tomes should be all anybody needs... if it were for them we would still be in the Dark Ages of RPGs!

I disagree with all this "let's go back to the Dark Ages" discourse because it is not true, it is not inspiring and, above all, it is not fun.

3. I have tried D&D 4th edition and I think the innovations and ideas brought by Wizards were intriguing and interesting, they were not 100% my group's cup of tea, so our GM (with the help of the group) changed some rules and we adapted the game to our taste (that's the RPG gamer spirit, btw, not just negative whining). The great maps they use, the scenarios, the sheer wealth of ideas is fascinating! And you can adapt them to any mechanics you want.

Also in my opinion, another company in the front of RPG innovation is Paizo. Their RPG products are amazing and they have published cards, maps, special dice and all sort of nice goodies that get you in the mood and serve as inspiration for your games.

4. FFG is my favourite boardgame publisher. Their boardgames are inspiring and their quality production is top. I think the main reason why D&D has been the RPG leader is the amount of scenarios and adventures that players have at their disposal, and their innovative capability: maybe they did not have the best RPG rules, but they did have the best scenarios, campaigns, art, maps, extra goodies and inspiration capacity. In my opinion, FFG will be able to bring all these extras into WH RP and this will make the game even better than 2nd edition.

I thought WHFRP 2nd edition was the golden age of WH because of the amount of adventures and campaign BI was able to publish, but I am confident a few years from now we'll think about this as the best time to be a WH roleplaying fan.

Thanks, FFG, for giving me so many fun moments with the friends. Lots of luck with this new edition of WH.

I sort of Agree; RPG´ing is about convertiing and making house rules, so if we want to continue playing WFRP2 the stuff from WFRP can be converted anyways...

The only limit is our imagination...

BUT, I am stil missing a real session report. It's hard to know anything about a game that not hes been properly reviewed. :-)

Armrek said:

I agree with this.

Usually I don't write about games not published, so this post was more a general statement about my personal opinion towards RPGs and game publishers.

I'm also waiting to see the game in person. I hope they will have some demo games in Essen this year.

cogollo said:

That's not entirely true.

While there are other miniature companies out there, few of them actually come close in being able to compete with GW. Games Workshop pretty much own the brunt of the market when it comes to miniature gaming, so they do have a monopoly of sorts...

cogollo said:

There is no critisism on the writers - they do as the management orders. The management is riding around in luxurious Porsches. Writers ride Beetles (the old ones!). And it is the management that wants more and more profit - cause they want the new model from Porsche ...

IMHO there is no substitute for WFRP. Of cource I can play a long long time with V2 - but there won't be new things (green skins, Tilea, ..). Probably not even in V3 because they (FFG) have to put the old stuff to the new ruleset.

Knight Panther said:

this assumes that you are playing the 3rd edition like the 2nd, which I doubt. Probably its not important anymore to have Tilea or other supplements. Look at DnD4e with its new Point of Light Setting Concept. There are no countries in the traditional sense anymore, only a single valley where you can play from level 1-10 (out of 30), a cosmology (which is genius) where you can play from level 11-30 (or so) and a half page of history. And many rpg fans who tried 4e love this.

I think for many especially new roleplayers the old world or the many details of the setting are not very important. What counts is the game, the adventure, the characters and how the players experience it. Gone are the endless and low selling encyclopedias (eg."I need Kathay, NOW!") only the lorekeepers and hardcore fans are interested in.

Varnias Tybalt said:

That may have been true in the nineties, but it's not really the case now. Privateer Press have taken a substantial bite out of the market, while Rackham were a serious competitor and might be again in future. GW are still top dog, but they need to be careful if they want to stay there.

superklaus said:

ARGGLLL!! THAT'S HERESY!!!!!!!!!!!

But seriously: The many details of the setting are my reasons for loving WFRP. I love to read about the Empire or Kislev - be it sourcebooks or novels!

THEY CAN'T TAKE THAT FROM ME!!!!!!!!!!

superklaus said:

You are talking about the basic books of D&D which have always been situated in more or less in a general fantasy setting. There has always been campaign books (or gazetteers in Teh Beginning) with lore. There is already Forgotten Realms Campaign book published for 4th ed. There will be for Eberron etc.

The general setting can take you only so far. This is when either the GM starts to build a world of his own or buys a campaign book where he can get ideas or if he wants, an entire world at his convinience. Many people dont have time to invent a whole world. This is why we have "lore" books, this is why we have supplements.

You might argue that Adventure books can fill that role completely. I'm sure our group is not only one that never uses premade adventures (as a source for idea at best). We feel that premade adventure is too much going on a rail, so we play "freeform" (dont know if it's the right word to use.. english is not my native language). We very rarely buy an adventure book.

I buy all the books to give me new fresh ideas. 2nd ed books have been quite awesome in this part. Full of seeds and lore. Full of ideas.

Knight Panther said:

They won't. The background material will make the Warhammer world "warhammerish", more than the game system. But I see more possibility of an elven sourcebook, than a tilean, or kislevite. Still, if it's true, that we have four 96-128 pages long books in the set, and most of the rules on cards, than what is inside the books? I suppose background information.

By the way, 4e's "Points of Light" concept is quite misunderstood. It doesn't says anywhere, that there is only a valley to play low levels. Just look at Eberron or Forgotten Realms. It only says, that civilized towns are rare, and there's a huge, dangerous wilderness between them. It's exactly the same in the Empire: only few towns, scattered villages, and huge, dark forests. So nothing new, that "Points of Light" is just a good slogan... Heck, people were playing D&D like that since the beginning (Blackmoor, Greyhawk, Wilderlands of High Fantasy anyone?).

superklaus said:

Lol, come play in generic warhammer, where it isn't warhammer. What's the point in playing WARHAMMER FANTASY ROLEPLAY if it's a generic setting.

The SETTING IS the game first and foremost. Anyone can pump out a set of rules with crossbows and cuirasses in it for generic fantasy worlds. Warhammer is a proprietary setting that FFG have paid good money to exploit. They'd be stupid if all they used from the setting was the NAME to draw people in, instead of exploiting the decades of background that already exists. They've pillaged GW's art stockpiles, making the graphic design of the game very cheap comparatively.

That's like spending half a million dollars on the license for star wars only to release a generic scifi game with the title Star Wars. the draw of the name won't ever offset the cost of acquiring it, so you should really milk it for all it's worth.

Hellebore

Knight Panther said:

I dont say that this will totally disappear. Just fading into the background and used only sparsely and only if it is necessary to support the characters and story which will be the focus. The approach is more from bottom up than from upside down. DnD 4 as the commercial successful genre leader shows the way to go here . How to make more money from the license than from a Tilea sourcebook with a micky-mouse circulation of 10k. Its not a bad thing IMO, just a different approach to Warhammer and traditional roleplaying. So I am quite convinced that you will not see independent 3rd edition "sourcebook" like 1st or 2nd edition had. You will see boxes with characterpacks, premade adventureboxes with maps, minis, counters and other new dice types. In those boxes you probably find some infos about the setting, but only those infos which are directly usable for the module in the box.

superklaus said:

I hope not... If FFG knows just a little bit about Warhammer and its base audience they will make background supplements... and if they keep on doing it more or less like BI did, they will be able to put them in a box and put in careers cards coming fron that particular background, and maybe new party cards or something like that...

I mean, if someone wants to play a "generic fantasy setting rpg" and do not care much about the setting, why spend 100$+ for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (the + is intended for the adventurer's toolkit, to have more material for other players) instead of spending less for D&D 4ed (that has actually and without doubt the possibility to let more ppl play right away)?

This is just my opinion, obviously...

superklaus said:

Except that DnD does do setting material. They've released the Forgotten Realms and Eberron guides, with the Dark Sun material to come this year. An 'Empire Box' would probably sell well. So may ones for Bretonnia, Kislev, Norsca, Tilea, Estalia... The Bretonnian and Kislev book were some of the most popular ones for BI, I doubt FFG will pass up the chance to profit from them.

macd21 said:

This is what I said couple of posts above. From a company point of view, you can go only so long with generic material.. sooner or later you introduce lore.. I'm not saying that everyone buys background supplements, but neither does everyone buy adventure books.. Adventures can and do introduce lore to the game, but usually the adventure plot and details takes most of the space in the book.

Only reason I would (and I presume a lot of 2nd ed. players) buy supplement of 3rd ed, would be if its lore of something that has not been touched before, and lots of it. I'm sure that once you get new players introduced to the game, there will be a lot of other people interested in lore too.

Also, even though WotC has introduced a new mechanic, they are practicly going through the old sales mechanic so far. (At least that's how I've seen it). Basic books, adventure books, campaign books, monster manuals etc. I think you could almost predict there next books by going through the release list of 3rd or 3.5 ed. So I'm not so sure what way the leader of the market shows? How to circle your old material as best as you can? Oh, WotC has been very good at that for years, that's true... I also haven't bought another D&D book for years for the very same reason.

ymrar said:

WotC has a new marketing strategy for their many settings for 4e. One of the changes is that they only sell exactly 3 books per setting per year, instead more than a dozen ones like they did before. This is 1 campaign book, 1 players guide and 1 single adventure booklet. Not more, not less. And they do it because they want to milk money out of the few remaining hardcore fans and not because they want to develope the setting further. Because they learned the hard way that setting material dont sell good. Only the core book of setting sell well. This is a lession which I am sure BI and GW learned too.

The REAL setting WotC promotes now is the Point of Light setting which has almost nothing to do with the new incarnations of 4e FR or Eberron. I bet Point of Light is exactly the same FFG wants to try with Warhammer. PoL means that the setting builtup is from bottom up and not from above to down. only the direct environment is important anmyore and not some distant regions where no (purchaseable) box or module is settled. Eg. Tilea is only then important if included in a "Tilea-box" combined with module and new cards, counters and rules and not an independent entity in itsself for reading in the sub and/or making own stuff. The focus is on the players and on their heroic deeds and NOT on the setting or world anymore. Eg. Jay mentioned something like this in the first video AFAIR.