I just wanted to make this section so that individuals could post positive thoughts and feeling for Fantasy Flight Games to see, about the up coming Box Office Buster... Only War !

So Fantasy Flight Games knows that there is a large group of interested players and fan looking forward to this game. For anyone that could possibly not understand why there should be an Imperial Guard RPG. Walk your candy tail to your local book store and find the Imperial Guard Omnibus: Volume 1... Flip to the Foreword written by Dan Abnett himself. After reading that, if your not sold on this game and the fact the the Imperial Guard is one of the best parts of Warhammer 40k. Well then, your a Hater.

You're* a hater. And no. Just because someone may have some problems or concerns about this product they do not become haters by any stretch.

Bassemandrh said:

Lol! Attacking a person's spelling, really? Did you need an ego boost or did you just not have a good response? QQing about a company making products is hating. Fantasy Flight isn't bending your arm behind your back to buy it, so why be upset they are making more material? They have attached information that allows all books to work with each other. All wish to make is RPGs that are unique for different point of Warhammer 40k and after purchasing just one a group can play the game. Thus far the "problems or concerns" have had no substance.

DM Variyn said:

Beowulf, your comments here are answered to in the other Thread. Sadly, two threads were posted when making it. Hopefully, you will have more understanding after reading that.

But isn't it your choice to buy all five core rulebooks? No one has made you buy them. And if you want to play a specific game, be it RT or DW or whatever, isn't it normal/expected that you would have to buy the rulebook for the game?


This isn't one game with 5 settings. It's five separate games. That's the way they're treated, that's the way they're written, and that's the way they're released. If they'd taken the core rules out of the core rulebook (ignoring how absurd that sounds in the first place) then everyone would be complaining that they have to buy OW and another core book.

BYE

As H.B.M.C. said, no one has a gun to your head to buy the book, not even a Commissar. Only War is not required to play any of the other games, in fact none of the other books are required to play each other. So therefore if someone only wanted to play Deathwatch they would not have to buy Black Crusade in order to play it.

It might be that someone was not interested in this at all until the announcement of Only War, so if he buys the book he has the complete game and doesn't need to buy anything else.

To bring Wizards of the Coast into the example, technically you do not need the Dungeon Masters Guide nor the Monster Manual to play D&D, as the Player's Handbook is the game itself. Now are those very good books to have? Of course they are, and to some DMs owning Rites of Battle, a DW splatbook, is great for Black Crusade, but in no means are they required to play the game.

Honestly the only situation I could think of where this would be a huge problem is if your group was a mixture of all the various games, for some reason your party consists of an Adept, a Deathwatch Assault Marine, a Rogue Trader, and a Forsaken for the hell of it. Maybe I'm just in a minority but I've never seen a level of game mixing that bad in practice.

So if you don't like the game, if you don't feel that it'll offer anything useful to you or even that it won't offer enough material that it's worth the pricetag on the cover then simply don't buy it. As easy as that.

As for me personally I'm looking forward to seeing how squad dynamics will work and how it compares to Squad mode in Deathwatch. Playing a group of guardsmen seems like a no-brainer 40k RPG idea to me, even more so than playing a xeno race like Orks (Not saying I won't buy an Ork game at the drop of a hat. I'll buy it so hard the cash leaving my wallet will ignite the air.)

WittyDroog said:

System and GM... Nightmare!

The "don't buy it then" argument is a good one.

So I won't buy it.

And FFG lose money because of customer discontent, and I'm not the only one saying they're voting with their wallets. And when customers start voting with their wallets there is a problem that needs looking at.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one guys. I'm sure the writers have put in the passion and commitment such a setting and role deserves, this is no slight on them at all, but I'm not buying the rules for a fifth time.

And Beowulf that is completely your right to do so. You don't have to buy the book if you don't want to. If this product release has you frothing in the mouth so bad you are entitled to never buying a single FFG product again and telling all your friends not to. It's pretty petty, but no one can stop you on that. Just like how despite your particular opinion, there are others who are not only excited but are eager to obtain this book. I'd like to own it, as I've wanted to play a guardsman based game and there's hope that this will use Black Crusades combat rules (I PERSONALLY, read my opinion, find BC's rules superior to prior incarnations). I have friends who have never been interested in the 40k game until the announcement of this and if they like it so much they might get the others, or they might just keep this. I don't think that the release of this book is going to torpedo the entire line. To put into context the WarHammer Fantasy 3rd Edition was met with severe animosity from fans of the game (I was among them initially) and many people were so turned off like you are towards this that they refused to buy it. And yet... it's still doing pretty well. I even own it despite originally hating the idea of it (To be fair it was a gift from a friend, but I ended up buying supplements for it, so there. For the record after playing I think it's a fine game, but I do prefer 2nd edition overall.).

You also have to remember that the internet is not a good indicator as to the success of a product or not when you consider that usually people come to voice their opinions when they are upset or disappointed. There's still a very large audience who may be interested in the product, and likely those who just like you are opposed to it, who don't belong to these forums. Only War likely won't be as exciting of a release as Deathwatch or to a lesser degree Black Crusade was, but I'm pretty sure FFG knows that already.

beowulf101 said:

Not to mention Black Crusade's combat rules are notably different than any of the prior games in how it handles many aspects.

I've no hate for FFG or the Imperial guard but keeping in mind we are talking about business here I think that the way FFG publish the books is more or less a bad joke.

Did you need to buy once more the core rule book from Warhammer 40K TT each time you want to make an other army, no, you buy it once then you pay for codex.

I think that it would have been better and more honest for FFG to publish a main rules book for Warhammer 40k universe and then to put step by step more detail by adding "codex".

I'm a fan of the warhammer 40k universe since epic and space hulk, but yes it's a money issue to have to buy once more half of a book I already bought. As a fan i will certainly pay for it but not as gladly as when I pay for DH or DW, even less than RT and BC.

Just stupid to get your customer tired.

Just my two pennies worth - I think that having distinct core books provides a few big advantages:

1) You only need one book when playing - this speeds things up. More speed = more enjoyment, unlike other areas of life

2) FFG can 'tweak' the rules as the product line evolves. Rules that don't work too well can be amended for the new game but also be used in the other lines if the GM wishes.

3) The book can be written / arranged in such a way as too highlight the thematic differences of the setting (The History of the Emperium section of Black Crusade is awesome for this).

I think this setting will give you all the heroics of Deathwatch with all the Drama of Dark Heresy and as people have already mentioned there are HUNDREDS of war movies to get inspiration from.

Feel the Love! Burn the Heretic!

From a multi-system customer viewpoint:
I think, that in an ideal world, the material would be distributed out packaged in as:

40k the RPG: Corebook (rules, gameworld, basically all of those that is the same or useable in more than one game line)

Gear book (all the gear, guns, implants and stuff you can buy & get that is useable in more then one gameline)

Dark Heresy -core (gameline specific careers, opponents, cults, daemons, heresies, subversive xenos, ..., the stuff specific & useable only in DH campaigns)
Dark Heresy Setting -books (Calixis sector, ...)
Dark Heresy Adventure -books (DH adventures)

Rogue Trader core (gameline specific careers, playing Xenos, pirates, hazards of the void, ship based adversaries, void kraken, ..., ships & all the stuff useable only to Rogue Trader -campaigns)
Rogue Trader Setting -books (Koronus expanse, ...)
Rogue Trader Adventure -books (RT adventures)

DeathWatch -core (space marine careers, the space marine-sized stuff, opponents fit for space marines, .... you get the point)
DeathWatch Setting (blah blah blah)
DeathWatch Adventures (blah)

Black Crusade -core (chaos careers, how to serve chaos, chaos only stuff, opponents of chaos, ...etc)
Black Crusade setting
Black Crusade Adventures

Only War -core (gameline specific careers, armies, enemies, ..., stuff really only useable in Only War -campaigns)
&so on.

Unfortunately, this would be completely and utterly impossible simply due to the fact that it would require all of the material ever to be published to be written, tested, corrected, compatibilized, categorized and separated before publishing any of it.
Just the pure investment required for this would be absurdly staggering. Not to mention that customers generally aren't interested in buying games that require the purchase of several separate components to play, afaik. New costomers usually want to try with just the corebook, and will buy more, if they like what they get.

Okay, maybe it could be packaged as box sets, I recall buying those for RuneQuest in the 90's but would those sell today?

So, in practice, things are done the way they are for a reason, I suspect.

That said, what I'm really, really, hoping to get is official rules for playing ogryn, rules for all kinds of machines of war, artillery, aerial warfare, etc and good mass-combat rules.
But especially the ogryn rules. What kind of a Rogue Trader worth his salt wouldn't want his own low-grade but loyal spacemarine-substitutes for cheap? Also, playing Strongdumb Tuffington would be fun for a change since I usually play intellectual characters. Now if my group would just have someone to take over those duties ...

For Only War, I will reserve judgement until I have personally seen it. No point in jumping to conclusions, really.

Thebigjul said:

H.B.M.C. said:

Do you see that complaint in the Warhammer Fantasy Battle or Warhammer 40K war-game lines? No. Do you see it with NWoD? No. The system was widely praised for the amalgamation of rules that allowed all elements of the game to be pulled together, not burnt for having a core book and then the setting / template book of choice. These arguments are fallacies and prejudicial when history elsewhere in the industry indicates the opposite is true. And one more lesson from history:

TSR struggled because it competed with itself. There was an element to them that they existed in a vacuum, yet still had the largest player base in RPG history. Instead of focusing on this, they released to many settings and to many supplements for their lines, pumping up productions costs in writing time, print, distribution and storage for books that were all going to the same audience yet had to make choices as to what they were going to buy. If the audience (the 40K audience) is going to buy, why release so many products and push your overheads up for what will essentially be a similar return? Cannibalising your own customer base is the first step of wandering off of the mark, and there's no way that at five game releases in FFG aren't doing this by now.

White Wolf: To many books, to many game lines, so many settings in the same vacuum. Company on its knees.

What do I know? I'm just a Grognard that was there at the beginning and watched TSR, ICE, GDW, SPI, Task Force Games, Gamelords, Pacesetter, West End Games, Creations Unlimited, Hogshead Publishing, Phage Press, Last Unicorn Games, Holistic Design, Imperium Games, Guardians of Order, Green Knight Publishing, New Infinities Productions and more go out of business over the years.

Instead of taking these comments as 'Don't buy it then' or 'You haven't seen it yet' or 'Hating' or 'FFG bashing' these are severe lessons from history that are repeating themselves. I love FFG products, but I know when I see bad business practice and bad business practice is to OUR DETRIMENT IN THE FUTURE if bad things like customer base cannibalisation and everything else that's been mentioned in multiple other posts begin happening. This is my last word on this, the topic has become tiresome to me. Fanboys please carry on. FFG, you know what's written here has happened before multiple times and it's NEVER worked in the history of RPG's. FFG is lucky in that it has other lines and board games aside from this part of its business. It's their cash-flow leakage, not mine, but I care enough to point it out - that's not a negative thing, it's a constructive and positive thing, but I'm sure I'll be contradicted on that point.

Coincidentally I just watched this:

http://wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx►x=dnd/4ll/20120416

Skip to 43:20. Supporting so many game lines has always been a bad thing, and it was the death of TSR, the gaming giant that started it all. Even Wizards of the Coast recognise the lesson are are seeking to fix the publishing model in the way already pointed out so many times over. This is no longer a hobby anywhere near its peak, and as much as fans of the material may hate to admit it to themselves, this is a business that has a bottom line and targets to hit. The current method is bad for FFG and bad for us as customers. Take a rational look at what is happening and has happened across the industry since 1974 and take a look at the trends that have affected RPG''s such as CCG''s, the new rise of board games, DVD, computer / console games etc. Each one is vying for our leisure time and we all have a limited amount of time.

Where we spend money for that time is key.

Making people choose which game line to play and then supporting five different lines rather than having a single game line with different facets is the worst choice in a world of financial squeeze, limited consumer time and competition that doesn''t even include other RPG''s - the competition is actually how we spend our leisure time and THEN which RPG we choose to play.

This isn''t a clear cut "I''ll buy it" or "don''t buy it you''re a hater" debate - it''s a serious issue that affects a product line (and it is exactly that - make no mistake, it''s a product line with a bottom line return) that many people have enjoyed for a very long time. It should be talked about, looked at, dissected and openly discussed. Being an ostrich with a head in the ground while your own products eat your income, the competition forges ahead and releases products that fix the problems / model you''re suffering from and ignoring the changing climate and attitudes towards where leisure money is being spent is an act of wilful ignorance.

I have no doubt a second edition is coming, I can''t see either GW or FFG maintaining this for even another 12 months.

For my sins I restructure businesses for a living. Agree with me or not, brute economic force will dictate the outcome, not my opinion or anyone else''s.

Unfortunately, FFG really does not read these boards, so your plee is unlikely to reach them.

H.B.M.C. said:

I might quibble a little bit with this. It seems that the Black Crusade corebook is necessary to update the (broken) combat rules from Deathwatch.

I don''t disagree with that actually. There are a lot of things that I''d take from Black Crusade (and, by extension, Only War) and apply to the other three games, especially Deathwatch, where getting 100 or lower To Hit (or even better) isn''t hard.

BYE

People need to quit saying "Buying the same rules over and over" because they''re not the same rules. Black Crusade as has been mentioned numerous times throughout the FFG forums is the evolutionary descendant of Dark Heresy (Which in itself is an evolutionary descendant of the Specialist Game "Inquisitor" which is an evolutionary descendant of WarHammer Fantasy Roleplay). Yes they are very similar but if people are stripping the rules out of Black Crusade to slap into other games as is wildly popular then it''s not really a verbatim copy of prior games.

In response to the "two book" issue here''s my perspective. Having a single core rulebook that has supplements works fine. It works for Dungeons and Dragons, it works for WFRP, it works for many other games. The difference, however, between that concept and the concept of the 40k ruleset is that is Core book of these games is a self-contained game. Yes it contains all the rules but it also contains enough material to actually play the game without the need for any other book. As I mentioned earlier you could play Dungeons and Dragons with just the Player''s Handbook, sure you lack premade monsters and some of the more flavorful items and classes, but it has everything you need to actually play the game and honestly play any flavor of the game.

If this 40k series was to follow such an example then the same condition would need to apply, that you could play the game with only the core rulebook. But what would you decide to be representation of the core rulebook► Dark Heresy certainly seems to be the top pick as it was the first, but what if people don''t want to bother at all with playing Throne Agents and would rather jump right ahead into playing big and powerful Space Marines► Because the games have a distinctive design philosophy and play style it really makes the idea of a "Player''s Handbook" awkward unless you would include all the pieces needed to make all those playstyles. You certainly could include all the classes, races, and specialties into this core book, but what about when Eldar or whatever are release and people want to play a game revolving around them► You would need to buy two books. H2SO4 hit the nail on the head, it would require FFG to plan everything out ahead of time. Sure I figure WotC does that but their product base is lot more focused in development and they have Hasbro''s coin to spend.

The reason it works so well for games like D&D and WHFP is that the races can easily be mixed and accomodate what the group wants to do. But with this the distinct playstyles interfere with the effectiveness of a unified core rulebook.

Also, I really don''t want to throw out the "stop being poor bastards" argument but given the rate these books are released it''s hardly a burden of investment. At its highest these books are $60 and released every few months► I spend a whole lot more on other games and publishers than that. But again that''s not really a "point" I''m claiming, because I know it''s a bad argument, I''m just saying it''s not breaking my wallet.

Why is it people will by "Mass effect 3" (Which is a great game by the way!) or Call of duty modern warfare 3, each costing $60.00 (New) and not ***** but when FFG produces OW which is arguably the setting the player base has wanted from the beginning, These people will accuse them of some "scam" to "rob" people of their cherished dough► Most Xbox or PS3 games these days are simply reskins of older games! It''s the same software coding with a few adjustments that the designers thought might work better! Sound familiar► I have no problem with FFG''s business model! I often wish the stuff would come out faster! BTW: That doesn''t make me an FFG fanboy (Read ass-kisser) it simply means that I have enjoyed their product thus far and am looking forward to the newest addition!

Why is it people will by "Mass effect 3" (Which is a great game by the way!) or Call of duty modern warfare 3, each costing $60.00 (New) and not ***** but when FFG produces OW which is arguably the setting the player base has wanted from the beginning, These people will accuse them of some "scam" to "rob" people of their cherished dough► Most Xbox or PS3 games these days are simply reskins of older games! It''s the same software coding with a few adjustments that the designers thought might work better! Sound familiar► I have no problem with FFG''s business model! I often wish the stuff would come out faster! BTW: That doesn''t make me an FFG fanboy (Read ass-kisser) it simply means that I have enjoyed their product thus far and am looking forward to the newest addition!

I see some folks saying "Don't like it, Don't buy it." That's a valid point. To the cost concerns, I see some folks countering (Radwraith above me even) with the cost of video games. "I'm buying the same rules over and over" has been responded to by pointing out that in each subsequent setting, those rules have been revised and improved upon. All interesting points and counterpoints.

The part that grinds my gears, (To borrow a segment from Peter Griffin) is that this setting/offering doesn't appear to be significantly different enough from previous offerings to warrant the attention it is receiving. To clarify further, (or muddle things up with another analogy even) what I'm saying is that this book seems like a bit more of the same, painting over the fence in a new color, or reskinning the game as opposed to building more fence or growing the brand as it were.

I'd like to have seen the writers, developers, playtesters, etc… focus their energies/monies/time on bringing to life more of the galaxy at large and less of the Imperium, re-hashed. Does that mean I want to see a tyranid or necron book, no I think they make better bad guys. However, the Orks and the Tau (and yes, maybe even the eldar to you pointy-eared space-elf freaks out there) could be fleshed out and expanded upon more. I think an all ork system would be huge amounts of fun. Replace Infamy with TEEF and everyone's ballistic skill is crap, but, you could have weird boys and minders and grots and herders and meks and if beggars were horses, something about wishes.

I understand that the Only War system is a separate entity from DH, RT, DW and BC. I understand that it is where FFG and GW chose to spend that R&D money. Does that mean I have to be happy about it? Of course not, and this being the internet, I'm here to tell all of you guys how sad it makes me and Eeyore to be offered another Imperium-centric game. =( There, I said it.

To the folks who're looking forward to this game, grats, I hope you like it. To FFG, here's hoping this game's a success for you and that sometime in the future you'll be writing the "Greater Good", or "Bashin' Fings" books I'd like to see.