Phil Kelly or Matt Ward doing Nids

[wisdomseyes1]

Jan 22, 2013 21:55:47 GMT seahawk said:

You can still write fluff books but be kicked from the Dev team.

What was said was that he was fired from GW, not he was kicked from the dev team. Those mean 2 totally different things.

[seahawk]

Well then BL obviously isn't GW then, is it, considering he's still writing goofy books for them.

It is a similar statement, in any case.

[Space is pretty big]

I couldn't care less about fluff. As for power creep? Well Couldn't care less about that either to be honest.

Here is my fear: boring army design.

What I miss about the older editions was the sense of fun.

Elite Fexs are a good example; a 100 some on point unit that can punch a hole in a land raider with it's fist? Pretty cool.

Flying warriors, no wait leaping warriors, no wait walking warriors, that can be combat warriors, no wait shooting warriors, no wait sniper warriors? Thats just one unit!

Hi, I'm a genestealer, you're a tank... I'm shorter and can be cheaper than a marine, and can rip you in half with my bare hands. Good to meet you.

Red terror eat models, not causes a blast template that can scatter; he EATS them, WHOLE. Yummy.

Now a-days?

Hive guard... It shoots good... you know... it's good at shooting... thats what it does...

Trygon can burst through the ground!... but can't assault... and has no invulnerable saves... but other units can come through the hole!... next turn... only some units... who can't assault...

Pyrovores... what else do I need to say?

Wards 'Nids need to be fun. We joke about how ward units (please do not swear) lightening? Well, what if that's what they ACTUALLY did? Now that would be cool.

[seahawk]

For the record, my four T codexes were written by:

2nd: Andy Chambers (okay)
3rd: Andy Chambers (better)
4th: Andy Chambers and Phil Kelly (best)
5th: Robin Cruddace (cruddy Cruddace strikes again)

Any other names are just plain wrong. I mean, it's right in the cover on the very first page...

[leeroy1986]

Tbh I quite like the current codex, took me a while to warm to it(a few years) but I do like it
So what writer's are there Phil Kelly, Mat Ward, Jeremy Vetock and Robin Cruddace?

Phil Kelly tends to do a good job of Xenos races imo, Orks i'd say is the best written book of the last few years from a gaming/balance PoV. I personally don't think he's done a good job of the current Chaos codex though, it's just as boring/dull as the last one really. So previously you had Lash/Plague Marines/Oblits. Now you have Lord/Plague Marines/Oblits/Havocs/Heldrakes. I am sure it will get very samey quickly, I personally think the current Chaos codex lacks diversity. Same with Space Wolves grab yourself aload of greyhunters, longfangs and runepriests. But he did do a good job of the last Tyranid codex, so I think he does the Xenos races really well personally.

Mat Ward will always get a hard time for doing the current 2 most powerful codices in Greyknights and Necrons. Games Workshop have apologised for the Greyknight book that tells us enough. Necrons if you discount flyers have quite alot of versatility, but it was the FAQ for thew new rules that made Necrons too powerful so I don't really blame Ward for that and as you say he's done a goodjob of the Fantasy book. It's also worth bearing in mind he did also do the Blood Angels book which doesn't seem too bad, sure it has powerful elements but you never really see Blood Angels at tournaments getting anywhere.

Robin Cruddace having done Imperial Guard& Tyranids. Tbh in this edition these are two powerful books, last edition in the edition of tanks Tyranids were bad there is no avoiding that and guard were good. But now they seem equally decent but again that's down to the FAQ's not down to Cruddace. Although I did like Tyranids last edition with the Trygons, Tervigons, Tyrants and so on they weren't "that" bad imo but there is some silly elements done in the book it isn't really well designed across the board. Imperial Guard however he has done a good job across the board with that imo, so he does seem to be getting better. I guess we will see how far he has come with his next book because he doesn't seem to me to have written as much so he still lacks experience.

Jeremy Vetock, I know he has done the Skaven which are alot of fun! With some good wacky things in it! I picked up the Dark Angels book yesterday which everyone kept banging on about will be super powerful because Mat Ward wrote it, it turns out Jeremy Vetock wrote it. Again there is some really cool things in this book and they don't seem super powerful at all to me really and I'm reading the fluff in it now and I am quite enjoying it to be honest(which I normally don't). But yeah imo Vetock is a better writer than Ward and Cruddace.


I think Ward should of done Chaos, he knows Marines and he does seem a bit like a modern Pete Haines lol, however he didn't and we have what we have. I wouldn't be too confident with Ward writing the Tyranids book tbh I don't think he's written any Xenos yet, so he would need some experience under his belt before he tinkers with my beloved race Phil Kelly i'd be happy with him writing the Tyranids book, he does Xenos well and I think he would write a good set of rules for Tyranids. Cruddace I probably wouldn't want writing Tyranids again at the time there does seem to be alot of inconsistencies across the board. Vetock I would be happy to write Tyranids as everything he has written has been good imo, although he must be due a bad book

Leeroy

[Raven]

Jan 27, 2013 16:48:25 GMT leeroy1986 said:

Necrons if you discount flyers have quite alot of versatility, but it was the FAQ for thew new rules that made Necrons too powerful so I don't really blame Ward for that and as you say he's done a goodjob of the Fantasy book. It's also worth bearing in mind he did also do the Blood Angels book which doesn't seem too bad, sure it has powerful elements but you never really see Blood Angels at tournaments getting anywhere.

I think you're forgetting that Mat Ward had a lot to do with the current rules so most likely the Flyer rules and FAQ regarding the Night Scythe are on him.
Blood Angels may not be as powerful now, but they were the top army when the were released, until Grey Knights came out, then BA faded to obscurity and GK were on top, then Necrons came out and GK faded to obscurity and Necrons were on top. I don't want to have the next army that people complain about until the next OP Codex comes out.

[retnab]

Jan 27, 2013 17:19:49 GMT Raven said:

then Necrons came out and GK faded to obscurity

Man, I really wish that had happened in my local meta. Of the 7 regular players I know, 3 use GK...

[Psychichobo]

It wasn't so much a case of Ward being overpowered as Ward being powerful but lacking in subtlety. The BA Dex was just Marines with tonnes of buffs randomly scattered around, it just felt a bit... I dunno, like replacing a rifle with a rocket launcher. Sure, you could use skill, but it didn't feel encouraged.

[Davor]

When did GW apologize for GW?

[HERO]

Jan 28, 2013 22:50:06 GMT Davor said:

When did GW apologize for GW?

Yeah, I don't know about this either. Not once have I see GW apologized for GK.

As for who writes the book, I'll post what I wrote on my blog about the hallmarks to a good army book:

There are three things I look for in a army book when it gets released.

These three things are:
Overall Design
Internal Balance
External Balance

Overall Design is how well the book translates its fluff, lore and background into the gaming world. I think this is pretty straight forward as you can pretty much read every unit entry, and then read the rules. Does it reflect well? Does it make sense? This should be well-reflected in the "actual" feel of the codex and its rules. It must feel right to the player playing it, both in consistency terms and in terms of imaginative immersion.

e.g. The Void Raven Bomber is designed to be a more destructive air-ground aircraft compared to the Razorwing. Both aircraft are designed for ground annihilating ground targets, but the Void Raven has more armor, a Void Mine, stronger Lances, and deadlier missile options. Because of its heavier payload, its points cost is noticeably higher than the Razorwing.

Internal Balance is a balancing factor with all things considered within your own army book: How the book comes together, where the units fit in, how do they scale, do they conflict on the force organization, how they're priced compared to other options..etc. Internal is exactly that, it's your book and your book alone. This plays a heavy part in whether or not a book is considered fun or not. Does the book have enough viable options for different army builds? Do those army builds appeal to the new, casual and competitive player?

e.g. Wyches and Warriors fulfill different roles, but are both great Troop choices. Both excel at their respected roles of close combat and shooting, and both are priced competitively. As an Dark Eldar player, both are excellent and viable choices when designing their army.

External Balance is a balancing factor when compared to the game as a whole; more importantly, against other "factions" that exist in the same game. How do they balance out compared to those units in respects to unit cost, function, special rules, force organization, ..etc, is strictly comparing one unit from one army to another. This plays a heavy part in the metagame, general longevity of the army book, and how much fun a player can have before realizing he's either outclassed or is facerolling people.

e.g. Grey Hunters are more cost-effective than Tactical Marines from the Space Marine codex. For less points, you get Counter-Attack, a close combat weapon, cheaper weapon options, and better upgrades. No heavy weapon options, but don't get me started on Long Fangs!

From a player/gamer's perspective, there's no greater importance than these three things for me. The book has to make sense, the fluff has to play out accurately on the table, and the balance must be good. There is no order of importance because all three are vital to the success of the army book. Poor design leads to a lot of raised eyebrows and that's always no good. Shoddy internal balance means less player options, unneeded restrictions and general frustration. And well, bad external balance means you're either too weak or too powerful to compete fairly in the current metagame with the rest of your peers. No one likes that.

Phil Kelly is imo, their best designer. He's the only one who really captures internal and external balance well, while keeping the overall scope of the army in perspective. His next book is Eldar, and we all know that Eldar is his and Jes' baby. I can't wait for it because I'm an Eldar player through and through.

Mat Ward is a good rules writer, like everyone has said. The design is good, the internal balance is solid, but the external balance is horrendous. It's always on the upper side of the curve, making the army significantly more powerful than the current power army, and this seems to be an ongoing thing! Look at 7th Ed. WHFB Daemons, 5th Ed. SM was a fluke that was tame, then came Blood Angels, Grey Knights and Necrons. One more powerful than the other with GK and Necrons sitting on top. If army creep exists, Mat Ward makes it so.

As for Cruddace, he's just very erratic. His books are unpredictable and questionably biased. He plays IG, and look at that army. He barely plays Tyranids, and look what happend there. Then you look at 8th Tomb Kings, and that book is just.. bland.

Personally, I don't care who writes the next Nid book. As long as it hits all 3 elements of a good book, I'll be happy.

[chuckles]

What about Vetock? After two books I think we're able to start commenting on his work, and thus far I'd say he's shaping up as one of the best rules design guys GW have had on the team in a while.

I'd also dispute your claim about Phil Kelly. He captures neither internal nor external balance terribly well, but he usually manages one of those, just never both. Look at Space Wolves... all over the place. However, his previous Tyranid effort was very good indeed, and on that strength I think I could probably get behind him working on the Tyranids codex

[Geneva]

Jan 30, 2013 12:14:03 GMT chuckles said:

What about Vetock? After two books I think we're able to start commenting on his work, and thus far I'd say he's shaping up as one of the best rules design guys GW have had on the team in a while.

I don't know much about Skaven or anything he had to do with Fantasy but I really disliked Codex: Dark Angels. Everything seemed incredibly bland without any real flavour to it. The wargear options were generic, even the special character's weapons, and nothing at all grabbed my eye or made me think, "Wow, I'd love to play Dark Angels just to get my hands on that!".

Ignoring the abundant typos (because that's an editing problem as much as anything else) the codex had a lot of useless options and items (enough to be reminiscent of Cruddace in fact) and seemed full of missed opportunities. Space Wolves often gets criticised because of the imbalance of 'Blood Claw' units compared to everything else, but even that seemed minor compared to DA. There was just too much of a "You'll always take this and you'll never take that" feel to it, a la Tyranids, with the only divisive factor being the Ravenwing/Deathwing concept which has been a part of DA from the beginning. I just felt sort of bland to me, I guess.

[Psychichobo]

Well, Vetock's Skaven book does have a fairly erratic level of useful and not useful - the weapon teams are VERY far apart in terms of useful and terrible, and the whole thing was a rules nightmare in terms of creating confusion. It mostly did well because he very strongly captured the feel of Skaven (although the ld buff from ranks rule often meant that Skaven became curiously braver than the average army, which was wrong).

The magic items in that book were also strangely awful, if I recall. I did wonder whether that was an external balance factor though, it did mean that whilst you feared the monsters and war machines you never expected to go up against a brutal Skaven CC character.

[chuckles]

Jan 30, 2013 13:13:55 GMT Geneva said:

Jan 30, 2013 12:14:03 GMT chuckles said:

What about Vetock? After two books I think we're able to start commenting on his work, and thus far I'd say he's shaping up as one of the best rules design guys GW have had on the team in a while.

I don't know much about Skaven or anything he had to do with Fantasy but I really disliked Codex: Dark Angels. Everything seemed incredibly bland without any real flavour to it. The wargear options were generic, even the special character's weapons, and nothing at all grabbed my eye or made me think, "Wow, I'd love to play Dark Angels just to get my hands on that!".

Ignoring the abundant typos (because that's an editing problem as much as anything else) the codex had a lot of useless options and items (enough to be reminiscent of Cruddace in fact) and seemed full of missed opportunities. Space Wolves often gets criticised because of the imbalance of 'Blood Claw' units compared to everything else, but even that seemed minor compared to DA. There was just too much of a "You'll always take this and you'll never take that" feel to it, a la Tyranids, with the only divisive factor being the Ravenwing/Deathwing concept which has been a part of DA from the beginning. I just felt sort of bland to me, I guess.

That's pretty par for the course for Dark Angels though. Every one of their codices has had a similar feel, and inasmuch as it's changed at all with Vetock it hasn't changed much, and in some cases it has changed for the better. Deathwing in his hands have become considerably more interesting than they were previously (Deathwing used to mean "Terminators with Fearless and a weird deployment option, now the different types of Deathwing have some genuine distinctions marking them out).

[voncrown]

Personally, in my opinion internal balance > external balance > fluff.
I want an army where I can play around with oddball lists without feeling I'm hamstringing myself too hard. Yeah, it probably sucks to be the 'cheese of the day' army, or considerably behind the pack, but as long as you can do something different and not fall on your face for it I can deal.
Given my priorities, I'm obviously a bit excited about a potential warddex, though Phil Kelly has also proven in the past he has the chops to give the bugs interesting options.
I guess I'm just saying I'm happy with either, as long as we can wash the Cruddace smell off.

Tldr; I want to want carnifexen again.