Horus Heresy New Edition, or Just Horus Hearsay?

[BitsHammer]

This year I went from being able to buy a Vindicator with a couple hours of work tops, to needing nearly 5 hours just to buy a single tank without me taking a pay cut at any point along the way. So I get the price issue, and things can be different for different people.

 

Honestly that price rise thanks to import taxes paired with the fumble with the lack of Zone Mortalis rules for this edition I feel really hobbled the edition out of the gate even if you're really into the edition as a whole.

[ThaneOfTas]

6 minutes ago, TheTrans said:

So for my group of 6-12 guys (depending on what game we're playing) we're lucky enough to all have garages where we can store terrain, and when we want a big catch up, we hire an Airbnb, take our terrain and go smash out games for a weekend, or just have tables set up at someones house, so our group (only speaking from this perspective) is not really reliant upon a FLGS for gaming, nor do any of us have particuarlarly close ties with any one FLGS.. so we generally, not don't care, but I'm not going to go spend an extra $300 more of my ever dwindling hobby funds for legit gear, at a FLGS that doesn't really do much for me, as opposed to get cheaper stuff for an army that I'll probably just use at home/airbnb or an event. 

Just chiming in as a fellow Australian voice, I genuinely don't believe that any of the (very few) FLGS' near me have any space to play and wargames anyway. The Warhammer store that's about an hour aways certainly doesn't. The only tables that I ever see are clearly sized and intended for MTG or other tcgs. Table space tends to be more the purview of local clubs in my area at least. And I also fully agree that the extra 10-12% off that we can get from a couple of online retailers really is the only way to go, I'll buy paints from a local store, but not much else.

[BitsHammer]

4 minutes ago, ThaneOfTas said:

Just chiming in as a fellow Australian voice, I genuinely don't believe that any of the (very few) FLGS' near me have any space to play and wargames anyway. The Warhammer store that's about an hour aways certainly doesn't. The only tables that I ever see are clearly sized and intended for MTG or other tcgs. Table space tends to be more the purview of local clubs in my area at least. And I also fully agree that the extra 10-12% off that we can get from a couple of online retailers really is the only way to go, I'll buy paints from a local store, but not much else.

After the '08 economic crash GW stores downsized to being shopping spaces that get people started but can't support actual games or events beyond small scale demos so no shock that it's not a real gaming space.

[TheTrans]

6 minutes ago, BitsHammer said:

After the '08 economic crash GW stores downsized to being shopping spaces that get people started but can't support actual games or events beyond small scale demos so no shock that it's not a real gaming space.

Oh the 08' economic crash was the only time Aussies had a good trot at GW pricing, before GW whent and killed the European exporters and our dollar was pretty strong, we ate well. 

Hell back in 08 when our dollar was going well, and how rediculous local GW store prices were(still are) I did the maths and it was almost the same cost to make a basic DKOK army buying directly from FW, including say Vraks Part 1, as it was to make that same guard army, with just a basic codex and plastic cadians, madness! 

[BitsHammer]

29 minutes ago, TheTrans said:

Oh the 08' economic crash was the only time Aussies had a good trot at GW pricing, before GW whent and killed the European exporters and our dollar was pretty strong, we ate well. 

Hell back in 08 when our dollar was going well, and how rediculous local GW store prices were(still are) I did the maths and it was almost the same cost to make a basic DKOK army buying directly from FW, including say Vraks Part 1, as it was to make that same guard army, with just a basic codex and plastic cadians, madness! 

Yeah I remember hearing about FW being the same cost at GW plastics and frankly that is both a blessing and a curse to think about.

 

If it wasn't for trying to buy plastics through my FLGS I'd probably order from a Canadian online store to save money and have them ship it over the border to me. The FLGS doesn't make money on the resin so I don't feel bad not going through them on that but I do rely on them for plastics in general.

[jaxom]

On 8/21/2025 at 9:36 AM, Pacific81 said:

@jaxomand @BitsHammer - I agree with you to an extent, but do you not think it is excessive in this case?

Nope, it fits with what I’d expect of one trying to teach today’s youths. I’ve found that kids and teens are more and more insular with physical and cultural touchstones. Most of my students were first exposed to dice when learning probability in math class.

[Dudley Nightshade]

I debated whether to include this mostly off-topic defence of technical writing. I see it being maligned enough in this thread, though, that it would be easy for a casual reader to get the wrong ideas about the communication form or the profession.

 

My degree program required courses in technical writing, and I spent a good deal of my early career engaged in it. This book does not appear to me to be an example of technical writing. I am truly sorry to anyone whose experience with reading technical documents feels that all technical writing has to resemble what GW has presented.

 

Even though the following website appears to be selling AI writing tools, there is a surprisingly good blog post about the aims of technical writing here: https://document360.com/blog/technical-writing-tips/

 

Quote

Simply put, technical writing is documenting complex, wordy technical stuff into simple, easy, and digestible content.

 

The writer goes on to provide guidelines to be considered in technical writing, and I highlight the most relevant of them below:

• Know Your Audience and Understand Their Requirements
• Choose the Style and Structure
• Keep Simple and Concise Language
• Add Visual Cues
• Be Clear About the Purpose of the Content

I point especially to "Keep Simple and Concise Language" and "Add Visual Cues" as failings in the way GW communicates the rules in the new book.

 

Technical writing is hard. It requires careful planning for how to best present ideas as clearly as possible and even then, a healthy dose of revision.

[Pacific81]

1 hour ago, jaxom said:

Nope, it fits with what I’d expect of one trying to teach today’s youths. I’ve found that kids and teens are more and more insular with physical and cultural touchstones. Most of my students were first exposed to dice when learning probability in math class.

 

I suppose the key point here is, who is this game aimed at? The player base for Heresy is overwhelmingly 'veterans', either in age or wargaming experience. Youngsters, for whom the concept of rolling a dice is alien, are far more likely to pick up 40k or Sigmar.

[jaxom]

14 minutes ago, Pacific81 said:

I suppose the key point here is, who is this game aimed at?

They included the callout box saying folks familiar with ttg should skim or skip the section.

 

Seems to me it’s aimed at anyone who wants to play it; new and veteran alike.

Edited Friday at 03:39 PM by jaxom

[Rusted Boltgun]

Whilst there is duplication of effort and it certainly looks like more time could have spent editing, my take is that the elements relating to dice and measuring are there to introduce a common baseline for a new player who enters HH and goes to a store for a game or enters a tournament.

And therefore not a bad thing.

The Designers' note that veterans will already know how to play (in such an environment).

Surely the bar for entry to any game should be as low as possible? If can afford to buy a Saturnine box (or have it gifted to you) and you are 12+, you can have a go.

 

I got into 40k at secondary school with my softback Rogue Trader book, then Space Hulk and epic Space Marine.

My son's been getting into a bit of mini painting and has watched all the battle reports on WH+ (40k, AoS, HH, Kill Team, War Cry,  TOW, Blackstone Fortress and Cursed City) and we play a bit of Kill Team. Ask him his favourite? HH. It was absolutely his favourite diorama at Warhammer World last year.

 

I hope HH engenders the same love of Warhammer in him that I've had since my teens.

Will the rules be too much for him? Absolutely. Will there be edition churn before he's old enough to properly get into it? Unfortunately, most likely!

 

@jaxomyou got there before me, far more succinctly!

 

 

Edited Friday at 04:11 PM by Rusted Boltgun
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[Pacific81]

1 hour ago, jaxom said:

They included the callout box saying folks familiar with ttg should skim or skip the section.

 

Seems to me it’s aimed at anyone who wants to play it; new and veteran alike.

Perhaps yes. And they wrote it twice, just in case you missed it the first time! 

[Pacific81]

1 hour ago, Rusted Boltgun said:

 

@jaxomyou got there before me, far more succinctly!

 

Very much so. Honestly, probably would have made a much better job of writing this rulebook! :)

[BitsHammer]

13 hours ago, Dudley Nightshade said:

I debated whether to include this mostly off-topic defence of technical writing. I see it being maligned enough in this thread, though, that it would be easy for a casual reader to get the wrong ideas about the communication form or the profession.

 

My degree program required courses in technical writing, and I spent a good deal of my early career engaged in it. This book does not appear to me to be an example of technical writing. I am truly sorry to anyone whose experience with reading technical documents feels that all technical writing has to resemble what GW has presented.

 

*Snip*

That's fair and it's probably wrong to describe it as technical writing by those metrics. Maybe EULA writing would be a better way of evoking the precise but somehow muddled way they lay everything out.

 

I've said it before but I suspect that there is an idea from management that if they keep trying to write more precise rules that can prevent the sort of edge shooting that defines the 40k competitive meta that often leaves the devs speechless that people would do things like not attack in melee ad a stalling tactic because the rules don't force you to attack.

 

I don't think it's the right approach to writing a ruleset and it feels more like a push for the devs to be writing less FAQs and dataslate changes in general than a push for a better game.

 

That is a bit conspiratorial in thinking but it's the only thing I can see from the outside looking in that really matches this pattern in how the games are written.

 

Frankly if they want to do this we need two sets of rules. One written in plain, simple language that may leave edge cases alone but doesn't try and explain every possible rules interaction in a single sentence. And a rules appendix that goes into great detail like what we have now so they can deal with all the edge cases and vague elements of the regular rules.

 

If only because when teaching someone the game or trying to quickly reference things the current ruleset is not ideal. A summary sentence about the effect of the rule is not helpful if I have to read an entire paragraph (or skim rather as my brain glazes over) just to find out how the modifiers the rule has work. If one sentence doesn't work then use two or three sentences. A summary doesn't have to fit on a fortune cookie slip.

[Gorgoff]

4 hours ago, BitsHammer said:

That's fair and it's probably wrong to describe it as technical writing by those metrics. Maybe EULA writing would be a better way of evoking the precise but somehow muddled way they lay everything .

 

I don't think it's the right approach to writing a ruleset and it feels more like a push for the devs to be writing less FAQs and dataslate changes in general than a push for a better game.

 

That is a bit conspiratorial in thinking

Nah I think you are right on the money here. They write like this to not have a lot of work later on with FAQ and such things and fail miserably as usual.

Problem is they put too much words in the wrong sections and way to less in the important ones.

Like Line of sight for example.

Or terrain.

 

I just looked at 1ed rulebook which is half the size of the 3ed one and frankly it was easier to understand and a lot clearer than the 3ed one although using half the words.

Same number of questions I would say.

So they tried to make it clearer, didn't succeed, in the end making it harder to read for no gain.

 

Hopefully they will put out a good FAQ soon to clear things up and continue doing so once in a while. 

 

Without trying to defent any of this I would say that from a certain point of complexity onwords there will always be things people get wrong or don't get at all. That is inevitable. 

Key is that GW handles that sort of thing with FAQ. 

Edited yesterday at 09:24 AM by Gorgoff
Jeeeezuz my spelling was bonkers in this one

[BitsHammer]

Line of sight really needs several images illustrating things clearly. Explaining things with examples for line of sight always works far better than without.

 

And they definitely didn't explain that very well either.

[Dudley Nightshade]

10 hours ago, BitsHammer said:

f only because when teaching someone the game or trying to quickly reference things the current ruleset is not ideal. A summary sentence about the effect of the rule is not helpful if I have to read an entire paragraph (or skim rather as my brain glazes over) just to find out how the modifiers the rule has work. If one sentence doesn't work then use two or three sentences. A summary doesn't have to fit on a fortune cookie slip.

This struggle is real! Creating a single document that is meant to both teach AND later be used as a reference requires some careful planning. I wonder if GW has an internal style guide. … Haha, now you've got me thinking about how we could start building something like that up at work for our own documentation, where we often have similar requirements. 

[SlickSamos]

On 8/22/2025 at 3:14 PM, Dudley Nightshade said:

I point especially to "Keep Simple and Concise Language" and "Add Visual Cues" as failings in the way GW communicates the rules in the new book.

 

Technical writing is hard. It requires careful planning for how to best present ideas as clearly as possible and even then, a healthy dose of revision.

 

And perhaps most importantly is not sufficiently resourced (time/money/effort/expertise) if my understanding of GW's resourcing is correct.  So I personally believe that the staff have done the best they could with the number of man-hours they had at the level of expertise said staff have (i.e. better technical writers don't work for GW's pay)

 

Edit: I went on Glass Doors and Indeed and yeah min wage is about £24k per year and GW pays a little bit higher on some roles (including roles which require degrees or technical experience) and only pays managers sufficiently more...  What a disgrace...   

Edited 21 hours ago by SlickSamos

[Brofist]

5 hours ago, SlickSamos said:

 

And perhaps most importantly is not sufficiently resourced (time/money/effort/expertise) if my understanding of GW's resourcing is correct.  So I personally believe that the staff have done the best they could with the number of man-hours they had at the level of expertise said staff have (i.e. better technical writers don't work for GW's pay)

 

Edit: I went on Glass Doors and Indeed and yeah min wage is about £24k per year and GW pays a little bit higher on some roles (including roles which require degrees or technical experience) and only pays managers sufficiently more...  What a disgrace...   

 

Yep. Games have never been a well paid industry and trad games pay even worse...