Vox Cast: The Repository Thread

[Slips]

We've got Anuj today.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiuhlDdevmI

[No Foes Remain]

Well I am watching the hell out of that then. Thanks Slips!

[Marshal Rohr]

Excellent interview. Anuj is a cool dude.

[Boytoy]

excellent interview! the whole thing flew by. and its great to hear that the heresy is in capable hands after alan's passing

[Azaiel]

Loved the interview with Anuj, really sounds like he loves the setting and developing for it.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Sorry didn’t like it. Reasons:

 

no credit given to Alan Bligh - none.

 

so sick of the no good guys credo - is nonsense.

 

felt like his illustrious introduction to game was fabricated (lots and lots of black koolaid)

 

lots of self aggrandizing.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Dosjetka
=][= Don't dodge the swear filter. =][=

[Kenzaburo]

Black koolaid? What's that supposed to mean? Never heard that term before...

 

I liked the interview - very eloquent. I kept wondering though, what the 2nd misconception about the HH might be. He only ever got around to mentioning the first, then got derailed. 

 

About not mentioning Bligh - I got a different vibe here, and maybe that's just me, but: He mentioned the other HH writer, Neal Wily (sorry, don't know how he's spelled) - who according to Anuj has done a lot of the legwork and his rarely recognized for his work since Betrayal. I thought he decided to not mention Alan to actually showcase, that Alan wasn't doing all just on hiw own, but that there were others involved who might be stuck in Alan's shadow. 

 

If that's the case, it's fine by me to at least mention the other guys working on the HH and not always go back to the more prominent Bligh. You also gotta keep in mind that Anuj and Neal have been working on the Heresy for 2 years now. Also, Anuj has only been there for 2.5 years so might not have had all that much shared time with Bligh. 

 

So yeah, TL;DR: We all know about Bligh, maybe it's time to also mention others working on the project - and I say that with utmost respect for Bligh and his work. At some point you gotta move on.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Kenzaburo

[Marshal Rohr]

Black koolaid? What's that supposed to mean? Never heard that term before...

 

I liked the interview - very eloquent. I kept wondering though, what the 2nd misconception about the HH might be. He only ever got around to mentioning the first, then got derailed. 

 

About not mentioning Bligh - I got a different vibe here, and maybe that's just me, but: He mentioned the other HH writer, Neal Wily (sorry, don't know how he's spelled) - who according to Anuj has done a lot of the legwork and his rarely recognized for his work since Betrayal. I thought he decided to not mention Alan to actually showcase, that Alan wasn't doing all just on hiw own, but that there were others involved who might be stuck in Alan's shadow. 

 

If that's the case, it's fine by me to at least mention the other guys working on the HH and not always go back to the more prominent Bligh. You also gotta keep in mind that Anuj and Neal have been working on the Heresy for 2 years now. Also, Anuj has only been there for 2.5 years so might not have had all that much shared time with Bligh. 

 

So yeah, TL;DR: We all know about Bligh, maybe it's time to also mention others working on the project - and I say that with utmost respect for Bligh and his work. At some point you gotta move on.

 

His second point was about Xenos being available as armies to play. 

[Kenzaburo]

Ah, thanks, good Marshal. I hadn't noticed that this was actually the 2nd misconception. I was expecting him to adress the idea that the Heresy is merely 3rd or 4th fiddle nowadays and only has limited support, compared to the end of the Bligh era with 2 boxed sets supporting the Heresy.

 

Did any of you notice, that he said something like "Specialist Games, which was formerly known as Forgeworld"? I know that there's the Specialist Games division, but I wasn't aware that they were sorta going for a rebranding where the consider the FW moniker to describe a former version of that department.

[Dagoth Ur]

no credit given to Alan Bligh - none.

 

With all due respect to the man - Bligh wasn't the one singular genius behind the Horus Heresy project, but one of many. It is only fair that after years of almost solely cashing in on the reputation, that the accolades are also passed on to other individuals, such as the other writer mentioned in the interview. Bligh has been aggrandized time and time again, it is now time to pass some of the accolades on to the writers and sculptors that have gone largely unmentioned for years.

 

so sick of the no good guys credo - is nonsense.

 

Do pray tell - how is it nonsense when the Imperium is a faschistoid, eugenic-preaching, genocidal entity that conducts politics at the edge of a blade? Just because they are fighting chaos, doesn't make them the shining knight. The fact that there are no good guys has been literal canonical fact since the inception of 40k.

 

felt like his illustrious introduction to game was fabricated (lots and lots of black koolaid)

 Care to explain this expression?

 

 

lots of self aggrandizing.

Mate, what are you on about, he spends most of the time praising the work they did as a team.

Edited February 13, 2020 by The Observer

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

There’s some good guys either you believe or you don’t.... I’m not going to argue about it. The designers and writers that espouse a lack of tend to be the hipster type imo.

 

Alan is the very bedrock and foundation of HH the game.

 

Anuj mentioned towards the end that prior to this he has been an investor consulting type working for well to do. That tells me everything I need to know.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Black Blow Fly

[Marshal Rohr]

He did nothing with investing. He was a business consultant. 

[Kenzaburo]

 

Anuj mentioned towards the end that prior to this he has been an investor consulting type working for well to do. That tells me everything I need to know.

Wow, mate, this is getting a bit out of hand, don't you think? First of all, consider that some of us might be in the same line of work - so that really nasty prejudice/generalisation is offensive. What a person does for a living does not automatically reflect on their character - to say otherwise ... well, doesn't show you in the best light, you know. 

 

Second: Anuj has shown, that he's not only eloquent but knows loads about the background of the heresy and has a sense for the scale, that was for example lacking in some of BLs earlier works in the heresy. I will agree that some of his answers were a bit polished, but that's to do more with eloquence than anything else. I'm quite happy to hear that someone with loads of love and knowledge about the setting, with enough sense to approach the primarchs with a question of what they might wanna achieve, is taking care of the future of the game.

[Dagoth Ur]

The designers and writers that espouse a lack of tend to be the hipster type imo.

 

So just because they are 'hipsters' - the blandest and emptiest of husks within the boomer jargon - they do not deserve credit or recognition or respect for their work?

 

Alan is the very bedrock and foundation of HH the game.

 

Factually and categorically incorrect. While Bligh was responsible for parts of the fluff, he was not A.) the sole writer of the project, B.) the sole designer (if he was a designer at all), C.) illustrator or D.) sculptor. The HH game was a group effort and to sit here and exalt Bligh while casting a mute shadow over everyone else is the same as saying that Blanche is the sole artistic influence and designer behind 40k - factually and categorically wrong.

 

 

Anuj mentioned towards the end that prior to this he has been an investor consulting type working for well to do. That tells me everything I need to know.

Sneakily editing away the investor part and shifting the goalposts ain't a pretty sight. Besides, Anuj was not a "consulting type" - whatever the hell that wishy washy wording is supposed to imply - "for well to do". Anuj was a business consultant who consulted businesses and the government - and he says as much in the interview. To try and put an evil guy spin on him just because he was in an economic line of profession is not just distasteful - its despicable.

[Gederas]

Guys, guys. Don't feed the troll. Ignore and move on.

 

In any case, I listened to the Voxcast while working on minis last night and the interview was quite interesting, imo. I always thought the writers of 40k/HH always just decided "Well, this Real-Life battle had x number of people die in it, let's make that be how many died in the first hour of this battle." all willy-nilly. Interesting to see that they actually do kind of plan things out with the scale.

 

They still can't do math though, as it's quite clear they don't have anyone who's done actual military logistics.... :lol:

[Scammel]

 

 

Do pray tell - how is it nonsense when the Imperium is a faschistoid, eugenic-preaching, genocidal entity that conducts politics at the edge of a blade? Just because they are fighting chaos, doesn't make them the shining knight. The fact that there are no good guys has been literal canonical fact since the inception of 40k.

Actually, I do think that an excess of moral equivalency is an occasional failing of both the 40k and particularly HH writers. The early Imperium isn't a particularly pleasant place and doesn't take criticism well, but a few Primarchs and marines make extremely stupid decisions when faced with abundantly malign and abhorrent entities to the point that it severely undermines the credibility of their characters (in particular, I think there's a massive discrepancy between Argel Tal's apparently reasonable POV and the fact that he didn't hurl himself into a plasma reactor several books ago). Dorn and Guilliman are angels in a setting that also contains the Night Lords and Word Bearers.

 

Also, despite what was generally a good account of himself, Anuj did come across as a little mean-spirited regarding Xenos in 30k, and I felt his words were closer to the equivalent of 'If you want this, you don't get 30k and you're doing it wrong' rather than 'This isn't something we want to do with the setting, but you do you, man'. I seem to recall he mentioned that he was sometimes involved with the Facebook page, and I have a sneaking suspicion that I see the same tone in some of the responses on there - rebuking people asking for 40k rules for some of the recent tanks?

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Much of what he said was heavily contrived such as implying Dorn willingly let bad things happen far far away while he lovingly built sand castles but in truth was ordered by the very Emperor to remain on Terra and build the fortifications.... and no mention whatsoever about stopping the Alpha Legion. The man can brew up some quite narstee coolaid. Anuj is literally the trope regarding the 12 year old who states they still remember them RT days... LOLZ.

 

In regards to Alan even ADB gives him a lot of credit for HH. He was the very chief like it or not.

Edited February 13, 2020 by Black Blow Fly

[Marshal Rohr]

Nobody said Alan wasn't the driving force behind it  Anuj and Neil have been doing it since Malevolence, and you haven't even acknowledged that Andy and John contributed huge parts of the first few books. You don't have to like the interview, or even like the guy, but you're laughably wrong about everything else (not to mention insulting people who work in consulting and finance).

Edited February 13, 2020 by Marshal Rohr

[Dagoth Ur]

Much of what he said was heavily contrived such as implying Dorn willingly let bad things happen far far away while he lovingly built sand castles but in truth was ordered by the very Emperor to remain on Terra and build the fortifications....

 

He implied nothing of the sorts. What he said is that Dorn fortified one particular world and knowingly sacrificed others for the sake of protecting Terra - this is nothing new. This has been canon in Bligh's days as well. This is called setting priorities and sometimes that requires evil acts. Just because Dorn did it for a higher goal, doesn't mean he didn't do some terrible stuff along the way of fortifying Terra. Again, poor form putting words in other people's mouths and pulling stuff by the hair for no reason whatsoever. Your idea that the Loyalists for whatever reason where this shining example of humanity - when Dorn was perfectly fine killing people out of paranoia, the Blood Angels massacred populations wholesale, Ultramarines had a personal Stasi, Dark Angels sneezed at the Geneva convention, Iron Hands willfully ground down their mortal auxilia and scoffed at their "weakness" and Vulkan burned Eldar children - is not just factually wrong - it is fundamentally ignorant of the whole dystopian underpinning of the setting.

 

The man can brew up some quite narstee coolaid.

 

You are using this turn of phrase incorrectly - unless you are implying that Anuj is somehow founding a cult, expecting you to take his word as gospel without fact (which is not the case, all he has said thus far is demonstrably provable with fluff published in the last 15 years), or planning on murdering a bunch of people by forcing poisoned soft drinks on them. Two are slander, one is a needlessly antagonistic spin on what he said and all three are lies.

 

In regards to Alan even ADB gives him a lot of credit for HH. He was the very chief like it or not.

ADB gives him credit for the fluff, not the whole setting, game, rulessystem, miniature line or art-design - he carries a partial underpinning for the Horus Heresy, but it is by far not only his baby. Again, parse your stuff properly.

[Dosjetka]

=][= You've all laid down your points and made your positions abundently clear, time to drop this line of discussion and move on. Thank you. =][=

[Master Commander Ajax]

I really liked the interview. I got the impression that Anuj knew his stuff.

 

 

Did any of you notice, that he said something like "Specialist Games, which was formerly known as Forgeworld"? I know that there's the Specialist Games division, but I wasn't aware that they were sorta going for a rebranding where the consider the FW moniker to describe a former version of that department.

 

This is interesting. Formerly Forge World were in charge of the Specialist Game department but from the quote it looks like change is afoot. 

[Kenzaburo]

 

 

Did any of you notice, that he said something like "Specialist Games, which was formerly known as Forgeworld"? I know that there's the Specialist Games division, but I wasn't aware that they were sorta going for a rebranding where the consider the FW moniker to describe a former version of that department.

 

This is interesting. Formerly Forge World were in charge of the Specialist Game department but from the quote it looks like change is afoot. 

 

 

Yeah, that's what I meant. That and him mentioning, that Imperial Armour books seem to be sort of gone and part of the past now. He didn't say that per say though, it's me reading something into his words - so I might be wrong, of course. But it would fit with what we have seen the past 2-3 years at least.

 

It would be a bit of a shame. I value the current SG department quite a bit - Titanicus, Necromunda, Blood Bowl - they are all great offerings, for sure. But that niche boutique offering of Forgeworld of high end models, campaigns and stuff for 40k in that military history kind of way will be missed big time. Siege of Vraks and Badab War remain some of the best "realistic" fluff of 40k ever. And as a Custodes player I'm really saddened hearing that the Talons of the Emperor book will never come out. Bummer.

 

We just can't have ALL the nice things, I guess.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

GW is taking away more responsibilities from Forgeworld and I am glad.

[Marshal Rohr]

Taking away responsibilities and giving them to Specialist Games.

[Sandlemad]

Listening to this made me sad again about Fires of Cyraxus being canned. Must have been a bit of a gut punch, to work on that and then know that it won't see the light of day because of larger currents in the company.