Kill Team Kill Team: Hivestorm (New Edition)

[Marshal Rohr]

So will Kommandos be repackaged or are they joining the long list of recent kits discontinued 

[Matrindur]

There is a <1% chance units that have normal 40k entries like Kommandos or Krieg will be discontinued. They simply won't be a Kill Team product anymore but a 40k product instead. 

What could be removed are Kill Teams like the Hierotek-Circle or the Heathkyn Salvagers since those aren't 40k units and none of the models are needed for a 40k units, or upgrade sprues that made a normal 40k unit into a Kill Team.

So for example the Tau Pathfinders themselves won't vanish but they might lose the Kill Team upgrades (I think the grenade launcher is the only piece represented in 40k rules anyway)

Another example would be the Hand of the Archon upgrade sprue which also only really gives you some visual customizability but nothing needed for the 40k Kabalites.

Those I could see removed.

 

For Kill Team you simply have two choices in the future, do you want the newest rules? Then you will need to buy one of the latest 33 Kill Teams which isn't a small number anyway.

Do you just want to play specific models? Nobody except your opponent can stop you from using them in casual games if they have rules for the current edition even if they aren't balanced with the newest ones and if they don't have updated rules again you only need to find an opponent that will play a previous edition with you. 

The only thing that will be impossible with this system is playing one of the newest Kill Teams with one of the oldest since those won't have rules for the same edition but it should take 6 years for that to happen since every Kill Team should get rules for two editions. And even then you can probably adapt the rules for your Kill Team for the next edition by yourself so again your opponent is the only person you will need to convince to allow you to use them.

 

Of course I would have also preferred if we get rules for every Kill Team forever and they very likely could have gone on doing that for a while longer but there will likely come a time where there are simply too many Kill Teams for them to balance against each other while still feeling different from each other. So they probably made the change now as the outcry would just get bigger the more Kill Teams exist.

 

 

Edited September 8 by Matrindur

[Tastyfish]

 

So will Kommandos be repackaged or are they joining the long list of recent kits discontinued 

Neither. Magic 8-ball says ask again in 3 years.

[jimbo1701]

Pick up those scouts and striking scorpions before they’re reboxed into 40K packaging with 5 members for a few £ less than the 10 man KT boxes. 

[Antarius]

 

 

The problem is this just isn't the modern gaming landscape we live in. 

 

Technically it's true GW aren't coming around to smash up your models if they have an expiry date, nor are they burning your rulebooks, but in practice if you go into most communities and say "who wants to play KT'21?" post-KT'24 you're mostly going to be met by weird looks. You can rage against the dying light all you want, but most people have an aversion to touching anything but the latest, Party-approved version of a game - at least in this day and age. 

 

Sure, there's going to be anecdotal exceptions of "me and two of my mates still play 40k 3rd!" and absolutely more power to them for that, but they are not the vast majority of people. It's like when Fantasy was killed with the End Times: A chunk of people went to play things like Kings of War, developed 9th Age or stuck playing 8th, but the overwhelming majority just threw their hands up and shelved/sold their collections or begrudgingly played AoS because it was the GW-approved fantasy 'successor'. Is it silly? For sure. Should we be encouraging people to play older editions if they don't like something? Absolutely, but unfortunately the landscape we're in means most people aren't interested in doing that.

 

I know. That's why I started my post the way I did 

Disclaimer: I'm using the general "you" in this post, so please don't think I'm attacking you and your very reasonable post that I broadly agree with, the quote is just a jumping-off point for my thoughts

That being said, my main point is "you actually don't have to go along with this, if you don't want to" and I don't really think it's unrealistic to take the view that it's up to the individual to take charge of their own hobby happiness, since noone else is going to do it.
On the contrary, I think choosing to actively go along with a 100% market driven strategy that makes you unhappy in your hobby life and complaining about it is super unproductive; it's something we know isn't going to change, so complaining about is literally "raging against the dying of the light".

Games Workshop is a profit-driven organisation. They will never not be and they never were any different, even before they became a listed company. Warhammer was created to sell toy soldiers and if a product isn't expected to be profitable, it doesn't get made. Nostalgia and illusions to the contrary, that's the way it's been from the beginning, which is why I mention the "good" old days of "1 big box, 1 expansion, done" - the company has always moved on from previous products (editions) to sell you new stuff (or sell you the same stuff again) and they've arguably been worse about it previously. That's not going to change, so I think it's only logical to say "I'm okay with buying this game/codex/box of minis for the new edition, because it will bring me joy, even though it's being offered to me as part of a company's market strategy", but I really don't think it's productive to go "I hate this, but I'll go along with it anyway because I have to" - especially when you don't have to.

It's important to note that I'm not saying GW is good/evil here, or that their products are good/bad. I'm just saying that it flies against everything we know to be true, to believe that you should be able to expect a product for a game with a 3-year edition cycle to be guaranteed to "last" for more than four years. Unless you're willing to play with it even though it's no longer tournament legal, that is. And how many people really play in tournaments as their main game mode? I mean, the game may be designed with those people in mind, to some degree, but It's absolutely up to the community whether that really is the one and only standard for a bunch of models to be usable in a game (pick-up game or otherwise).

The idea that you should basically throw out your models because they can't be played in an official tournament may be "the way it is" - and it may/may not be encouraged by GW - but it does not have to be what defines your hobby and not throwing out your Kommandoz does not mean you have to only play with one or two other people in a dank cellar with rules written on ancient parchment (although that sounds kinda cool). I quite simply do not believe that if you show up in a game store with your Kommandoz in 13 months (with the free, updated KT24 rules, of course) that people will refuse to play you because the team is "illegal" as of yesterday.
But is is 100% possible to convince yourself that it is that way and have your Kommandoz and hobby life ruined as a consequence. So at the end of the day, all I'm saying is "don't ruin your own hobby life for no reason".

Quite apart from all of that, I think that even if your gaming enjoyment of a kill team really is 100% dependent on being able to use it in a tournament, there are many other factors that make the hobby enjoyable; I've never looked back at a unit of 10-15 models that I've had the hobby pleasure of, assembling, painting, playing with and telling stories about and thought "that was a wasted purchase", even if I don't play with those particular minis anymore. 

Edited September 8 by Antarius

[TheArtilleryman]

 

not throwing out your Kommandoz does not mean you have to only play with one or two other people in a dank cellar with rules written on ancient parchment (although that sounds kinda cool).

Love this. This is how we should all play Warhammer. I’d also add torchlight.

Edited September 8 by TheArtilleryman

[Noserenda]

Its exhausting to keep repeating this every single time something gets mothballed by GW but its all very well to personally be ready to play with those rules... but its a 2(plus) player game that a lot of people play with strangers or casual acquaintances, which means sticking generally to "matched play" rules, which because GW does not discriminate that well, means tournament rules.

Now you might have a tight knit group that you can trust to play with whatever, i know i do and its great (When we can coordinate our middle aged schedules!) but it hasnt always been that way, and ive recently been coaxed out to play in a LGS again recently where it isnt and all the hobby idealism in the world is not going to change that kind of culture any time soon, for good and bad reasons.

So yeah, lets not try to pretend this isnt a problem? Again?

[Indy Techwisp]

 

Love this. This is how we should all play Warhammer. I’d also add torchlight.

 

If you swap Warhammer out for Chainmail, this is basically how D&D was started.

[Antarius]

 

Its exhausting to keep repeating this every single time something gets mothballed by GW but its all very well to personally be ready to play with those rules... but its a 2(plus) player game that a lot of people play with strangers or casual acquaintances, which means sticking generally to "matched play" rules, which because GW does not discriminate that well, means tournament rules.

Now you might have a tight knit group that you can trust to play with whatever, i know i do and its great (When we can coordinate our middle aged schedules!) but it hasnt always been that way, and ive recently been coaxed out to play in a LGS again recently where it isnt and all the hobby idealism in the world is not going to change that kind of culture any time soon, for good and bad reasons.

So yeah, lets not try to pretend this isnt a problem? Again?

No, sorry, but I disagree completely. It's emphatically not about playing with only your personal friends, it's about not insisting on the worst potential future as the only possible one - people are literally choosing this reality and thus it becomes that way, simply because people believe it will.
There is aboslutely no reason to hold the belief that real people will refuse to play a pickup game against your Kommandoz in 13 months.

 

Edited to add: I realise I might come off as a bit dismissive, but that's very much not my intention. I'm not trying to pretend there's no problem; I'm just offering a suggestion for a solution - because the alternative seems to be no solution.

I know Forge World models was sometimes (emphasis on sometimes) an issue back in the day, when it came to pick up games, but I don't think anyone is really going to turn down a pick-up game with a team that has actual, official KT24 rules (and remember, GW has specifically said that they will keep updating them for balance), if there's a fellow hobbyist who wants to keep playing them.

People are saying things like "this has killed all talk of Kill Team in my area" and I don't mean to say that that is not true - I absolutely believe that it is. I'm just saying that that is a perfect example of people as a community saying "noone is going to want to play against my Kommandoz in 13 months, so we might as well not bother with this game that we all enjoy" rather than saying "well, I'll still be happy to play with/against Kommandoz in 13 months, so it'll probably be alright". Again, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy and it's completely unnecessary. 

Edited September 8 by Antarius

[Mogger351]

 

No, sorry, but I disagree completely. It's emphatically not about playing with only your personal friends, it's about not insisting on the worst potential future as the only possible one - people are literally choosing this reality and thus it becomes that way, simply because people believe it will.
There is aboslutely no reason to hold the belief that real people will refuse to play a pickup game against your Kommandoz in 13 months.

 

Edited to add: I realise I might come off as a bit dismissive, but that's very much not my intention. I'm not trying to pretend there's no problem; I'm just offering a suggestion for a solution - because the alternative seems to be no solution.

I know Forge World models was sometimes (emphasis on sometimes) an issue back in the day, when it came to pick up games, but I don't think anyone is really going to turn down a pick-up game with a team that has actual, official KT24 rules (and remember, GW has specifically said that they will keep updating them for balance), if there's a fellow hobbyist who wants to keep playing them.

People are saying things like "this has killed all talk of Kill Team in my area" and I don't mean to say that that is not true - I absolutely believe that it is. I'm just saying that that is a perfect example of people as a community saying "noone is going to want to play against my Kommandoz in 13 months, so we might as well not bother with this game that we all enjoy" rather than saying "well, I'll still be happy to play with/against Kommandoz in 13 months, so it'll probably be alright". Again, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy and it's completely unnecessary. 

I'd also add that there are other outcomes/factors:

 

- Stick with current rules and hit stagnation. If they don't change things people get bored and move on

- Bloat. You cannot add force after force after force and not have overlap on design space

- Balance. More combinations and factors equate to more balancing issues

- Stock. It likely isn't feasible for most suppliers to stock 70+ Kill Team boxes

- Literal turnover. Most of these gripes are that people don't want to pay to play. If you don't pay there's no incentive to keep supporting. It's harder to get someone on board for a discontinued game than not.

 

All of these things are valid reasons for what they're doing, I get it might not be ideal for everyone, some people affected more than others. But either they do this, leave it to rot or it becomes an overly messy quagmire.

[Noserenda]

 

No, sorry, but I disagree completely. It's emphatically not about playing with only your personal friends, it's about not insisting on the worst potential future as the only possible one - people are literally choosing this reality and thus it becomes that way, simply because people believe it will.
There is aboslutely no reason to hold the belief that real people will refuse to play a pickup game against your Kommandoz in 13 months.

 

Yes but what is your recourse when you turn up to club night and people dont want to play with your out of date team? You can insist they are perfectly fine and balanced and supported, but ultimately they arent are they? Or they would be endorsed by GW still and its absolutely the culture in a lot of places that people stick to the "official" rules, whether or not you make a scene its still a cooperative experience that somebody else needs to agree to and i dont see any particular reason Kill team legends will be treated differently to the other systems, some places will allow it, most folks will play  them if they have a gaming group but there will be places that wont let you and its pretty rude on top of dismissive to insist otherwise frankly.

[Mandragola]

We had a chat about this on goonhammer if anyone’s interested: https://www.goonhammer.com/kill-team-roundtable-classified-kill-teams-and-rotation/

 

My own take is that I think this could be good for the game but possibly bad for the hobby. Making teams more transient will mean that I might choose to invest a bit less time in them. 
 

In my own case that’s honestly not rational. I can’t think of many models that I’ve used for over four years. A big part of the hobby for me is about the new stuff, however problematic that might be.

 

As a tournament 40K player I’ve long been used to the idea that as rules changed my models might become better or (as I tended to buy competitive stuff) more often worse. This isn’t that different to that, except that GW are now telling me I won’t be allowed to use my toys in certain settings. In 40K I was allowed to use them but they were rubbish - but might one day be good again. 
 

So I guess for me this won’t be that different in reality, but it might feel different. And in the specific cases of my unfinished Phobos, starstriders and novitiate (and still on sprue pathfinders) I’m genuinely not sure what to do. If they’re good I might get them battle ready. 

[Antarius]

 

Yes but what is your recourse when you turn up to club night and people dont want to play with your out of date team? You can insist they are perfectly fine and balanced and supported, but ultimately they arent are they? Or they would be endorsed by GW still and its absolutely the culture in a lot of places that people stick to the "official" rules, whether or not you make a scene its still a cooperative experience that somebody else needs to agree to and i dont see any particular reason Kill team legends will be treated differently to the other systems, some places will allow it, most folks will play  them if they have a gaming group but there will be places that wont let you and its pretty rude on top of dismissive to insist otherwise frankly.

I am genuinely sorry that you feel that way.

[INKS]

It's about support for me from a competitive stand point. Hopefully GW will change their mind OR other community members and tournament organizers will set up tournaments for non classified teams and or events.

 

Ex: In MTG when I buy new cards, they are in Format A after some time they rotate out and are only in Formats B/C/D/E/F etc. How viable they are in those formats really depends on those formats, how powerful or useful the card is and so on. But many of the GOOD cards have a life after they rotate out of A from a competitive stand point. You of course can always play kitchen table magic and use whatever cards you like. 

 

This isn't THAT different for Killteam. Except: Right now GW is saying, we aren't going to personally support tournaments for unclassified teams. So for them and from a competitive stand point only format A matters. It is up to other players for format B to matter or exist in a competitive sense.

 

And who knows, maybe unclassified tournaments won't be that good or shouldn't even be a thing. Time will tell at this point. 

For some of these discussions, the cart is before the horse. So it's a wait and see sort of situation. 

 

And if you don't care about tournaments then 99% of this doesn't matter. Play with your models, enjoy throwing dice and so on. The truth is, the amount of people this strongly effects is minimal. And GW knows that. 

[Redcomet]

Does it suck if your teams get classified, of course it does. If you mostly play in Gw sanctioned events and against people who do what Daddy GW say. 
 

But unless you play 10 different teams, I can’t see it is a huge catastrophe to once every 2-3 years to have to buy a new team or two. And by that time who knows, it is a new edition or the game gets axed

[INKS]

 

Does it suck if your teams get classified, of course it does. If you mostly play in Gw sanctioned events and against people who do what Daddy GW say. 
 

But unless you play 10 different teams, I can’t see it is a huge catastrophe to once every 2-3 years to have to buy a new team or two. And by that time who knows, it is a new edition or the game gets axed

Nah it isn't. I was certainly being super dramatic early on because I simply didn't like the news. I certainly would not invest in ANY season 1 team. But I would in the 2 new teams. Vespids or Jump guard. 

[Ripper.McGuirl]

So, by the end of this edition, there will be in the realm of 57ish teams that have rules, assuming they keep the current scheme of 2 teams a quarter. All of the rules for all of them will be free for the entirety of the edition, and all of the rules will be updated for the life of the edition, as well. This, to me, is absolutely bonkers and unlike literally anything they have ever done. I'd rather a few teams rotate out every few years than the entire game get the can and disappear for 20.

A single kill team is how many dollars? And it provides how many hours of entertainment? And that is how many dollars an hour to be entertained? I feel like the math probably works out as good or better than most things like video games, streaming services, going to the movies, etc.
On top of all this, they are *actually telling us their plan* which in and of itself is a huge leap forward for them.
Honestly, this edition sounds absolutely awesome to me.
I do agree that the health of the game and the health of the hobby are different things. However, I think the hobby-end issues are a totally separate conversation from the declassification issue.

[INKS]

So by the end of the edition, and if they keep the pace there would be somewhere in the neighborhood of 50+ teams. Some of those teams will be at the end of their life, Even casually. Teams released near the start of an edition should have approx 6 years of life. - 4 years of Classified life +2 casual years after. 

 

It's a little unclear how this works or falls into place for teams that come in the middle of an editions life span. It might suggest they get less time, but I don't know that it's spelled out like that exactly. 

 

All the rules will be free. It's a little unclear how often unclassified teams rules will be updated. We'll have to wait and see. But they should see some updates.

 

A Single team is approx 70 Cdn dollars. Hours of entertainment will vary, but it's a good valid point of entertainment value.

 

[ThePenitentOne]

Frankly, even "Rules will be free" isn't clear enough: I expect them to be skeletal bare-minimum, get you by kinda stuff that ecludes as much as it can while still being technically functional... You know, the way 8th's Indices were the dullest things ever printed, or the way that 10th Indices gave you a single detachment.

 

The new content you pay for will be better and more detailed, providing the depth that people don't get from free content.

 

I could be wrong of course, but so could everyone who's still seeing sunshine and roses.

[Matrindur]

 

So by the end of the edition, and if they keep the pace there would be somewhere in the neighborhood of 50+ teams. Some of those teams will be at the end of their life, Even casually. Teams released near the start of an edition should have approx 6 years of life. - 4 years of Classified life +2 casual years after. 

 

It's a little unclear how this works or falls into place for teams that come in the middle of an editions life span. It might suggest they get less time, but I don't know that it's spelled out like that exactly. 

 

All the rules will be free. It's a little unclear how often unclassified teams rules will be updated. We'll have to wait and see. But they should see some updates.

 

 

So as far as I understood about the 4 seasons and classified stuff:

 

Every team has 4 season of classified rules with each season going for a year and each edition going for 3 seasons. So example 1 would be a team released in the first season of an edition that will get updates until the end of the first season of the next edition. Example 2 would be a team released during the third season of an edition that will get updated until the end of the third season of the next edition.

Afterwards a team leaves classified but could still be playable in casual matches, the first example above that gets updates until the first season of the next edition won't get balance passes for the second and third season but still has rules for that edition from the first season so can still be played in casual games so a total of 4+2 seasons of playability.

The second example above that ends support on the third season won't get rules for the season afterwards since it is a new edition so only 4 seasons of playability.

 

Here's a visual version of how I think it works:

 

 

Edited September 9 by Matrindur

[Lord_Valorion]

I see from this, that the competitive people don't love their models and that is a shame. 

[lhg033]

To echo others

I like the communication a lot - it definitely lets me know from the outset what to expect for if I plan to buy into this edition.

 

I have concerns about teams going end of life and what this might mean for the hobby but I am also not really affected by this personally. I still havent gotten around to doing anything with the Kreig/Ork big set I got at the last launch (and the 1.5 set before that didnt get a lot of love either). The games I have played generally were made up of models from 40k armies I have.

 

I really like the concept of Kill Team but I dont play competitively and given my history with previous editions I am inclined to hold fire on buying this version at launch and wait in the hopes of the cheaper/smaller version like they did in the last edition. I would have gotten more into Kill team if it was actually possible for me to buy the Gallowdark sets I was actually interested in. FOMO marketing/frustration is most likely what will drive me away above anything else.

 

[Emperor Ming]

 

So will Kommandos be repackaged or are they joining the long list of recent kits discontinued 

From that article, all retired kits will go to 40k at some point

 

Even sounded like what they were saying was: kill team is just a platform for us to sell 40k models for 40k, disguised as kill team models, for a time

 

 

 

 

[INKS]

 

I see from this, that the competitive people don't love their models and that is a shame. 

I am sure some competitive people do. Or maybe many do?

I personally don't. I don't get attached to things like that. On the hobby side of things I am almost never satisfied. I can almost always learn and do better. 

From a knick knack, joy toy figures kind of side of things or just owning models. I get tired of looking at them. At some point they no longer spark joy for me. So I tend to sell them or get rid of them and replace it with things that do spark joy.

[Magos Takatus]

 

I am sure some competitive people do. Or maybe many do?

I personally don't. I don't get attached to things like that. On the hobby side of things I am almost never satisfied. I can almost always learn and do better. 

From a knick knack, joy toy figures kind of side of things or just owning models. I get tired of looking at them. At some point they no longer spark joy for me. So I tend to sell them or get rid of them and replace it with things that do spark joy.

I understand that some people do need change and while I respect that I can say I can look at the resin Triaros Armoured Conveyor that sits uselessly on display in my cabinet downstairs and be glad that I don't get tired of looking at it. I've still not started work on the Kommando Kill team on sprue in my cupboard and while I'm a bit peeved that I won't get my money's worth out of them game-wise in Kill Team, as least in that case I can roll them into my Ork army where they will probably spend most of their time on display since I don't game often anyway.

 

This is a multi-faceted issue and I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it yet. My gut instinct is that I don't like an expiry date on Kill Teams but I understand that they can't keep adding new teams without it quickly becoming unmanageable.