3.0: failed or not?

[Jings]

I just want 2nd Edition core rules with 1st Edition customisation and 3rd edition status and statlines is that so much to ask? 

 

I was 1500 into a 3000 very high effort White Scars mech army when 3rd dropped and it just murdered my interest and it has yet to recover. 

 

There is no Heresy scene in my town at all. 

[Lathe Biosas]

21 minutes ago, Jings said:

I just want 2nd Edition core rules with 1st Edition customisation and 3rd edition status and statlines is that so much to ask? 

 

I was 1500 into a 3000 very high effort White Scars mech army when 3rd dropped and it just murdered my interest and it has yet to recover. 

 

There is no Heresy scene in my town at all. 

 

Heresy is non-existent in my area too.

 

I was really hoping to play 3rd edition, since I couldn't afford to play 2nd edition, without borrowing units from other players. The Armiger Tax was extremely high for Knight armies. 

 

(If you fielded a Lance of 4 Knights, you had to also field 8 Armigers on top of that)

[Brofist]

Personally I find it contemptible that GW attempts to dictate what can be used at home, in stores, clubs, campaigns, or competitive events outside their physical locations.

 

I stopped organizing 'official' narrative events when they tried to force us to comply with their unit and model restrictions.

[TheTrans]

It honestly blows my mind that so many events do that, that also are not getting prize support or anything from GW. Like why kowtow to GW's :cuss:ty whimsical rulings? 

 

Although I do find that a lot of EO's can be very concerned about numbers beyond the number of players needed to be 'in the black'.

[Razorblade]

12 hours ago, Brofist said:

Personally I find it contemptible that GW attempts to dictate what can be used at home, in stores, clubs, campaigns, or competitive events outside their physical locations.

 

I stopped organizing 'official' narrative events when they tried to force us to comply with their unit and model restrictions.

On the other hand, "citadel only" is a very easy sort of quality control. I know printing and certain 3rd party sellers have come to the point where some of the stuff looks better than the originals but I've also come across some absolutely hideous printer armies, which should be a no-go for a community that prides itself as much on good-looking events as the heresy scene does.

[Pacific81]

On 8/31/2026 at 1:07 PM, Razorblade said:

On the other hand, "citadel only" is a very easy sort of quality control. I know printing and certain 3rd party sellers have come to the point where some of the stuff looks better than the originals but I've also come across some absolutely hideous printer armies, which should be a no-go for a community that prides itself as much on good-looking events as the heresy scene does.

 

It's pretty sad though considering how the community and 30k hobby started; when the Heresy TCG was released, well before Forge World official minis and rulebooks, and everyone had to convert or garage-cast their armies (no 3D printing then either so it was a lot harder!) So restricting miniatures and creativity in that respect, especially as like has been said the events are not 'official', is a bit of a rejection of where Heresy miniature wargaming originated, in my book.

[Razorblade]

11 hours ago, Pacific81 said:

 

It's pretty sad though considering how the community and 30k hobby started; when the Heresy TCG was released, well before Forge World official minis and rulebooks, and everyone had to convert or garage-cast their armies (no 3D printing then either so it was a lot harder!) So restricting miniatures and creativity in that respect, especially as like has been said the events are not 'official', is a bit of a rejection of where Heresy miniature wargaming originated, in my book.

That's one way of looking at it. But those OG projects were intricate physical kitbashes (with citadel minis). Now I'm a massive physical kitbash snob and I know there are people who put tons of effort into creating their own amazing Minis digitally, and I wouldn't want to see those banned/restricted but just downloading a file and printing it is not exactly in the "OG heresy Spirit" if you ask me. 

[SlickSamos]

39 minutes ago, Razorblade said:

but just downloading a file and printing it is not exactly in the "OG heresy Spirit" if you ask me

 

Devils advocate here: how is that much different than just buying a kit and painting it?  If it looks cool and heresy-esq then why not?  

[TheTrans]

Look if anything, 3d printing a resin mini, washing it, de-supporting it then getting it to where you need to for painting could take a lot more effort than slapping a model together with plastic glue and calling it done... 

As with everything, its about effort, not ability nor money invested. I feel this goes for every facet of the hobby.

 

[Razorblade]

8 hours ago, SlickSamos said:

 

Devils advocate here: how is that much different than just buying a kit and painting it?  If it looks cool and heresy-esq then why not?  

My personal icks about 3d printing, which are indeed nobody elses problem aside, not much of a difference, *if* you get equal quality. But people be like "3D Printer go brrrrr" when indeed 3d printer goes "sad trumpet noise". 

That also assumes that you would build your kit straight out of the box, when GW themselves encourage you to mix and match.

 

Edited September 3 by Razorblade

[Razorblade]

7 hours ago, TheTrans said:

As with everything, its about effort, not ability nor money invested. I feel this goes for every facet of the hobby.

 

It's about results. And of course not everyone can be expected to create the same standard of results (I'm a rather mediocre painter myself), but if I can tell the printer army from two tables away that frankly does not cut it in my book, no matter the effort invested.

[Captain Idaho]

I've got some top quality 3D prints for free. They're amazing quality high as anything else.

 

It's definitely about quality. If something matches the standard of official products, they'll look great. 

 

Like this dude:

 

 

[Shard of Magnus]

Drakus is an excellent model! 
 

GW’s stance on setting requirements for independent events to get official support goes back way before HH. It’s always been a sore spot but also one area they’ve been consistent, unlike the quality of games rules and FAQs. I don’t remember where in the hierarchy that mandate came from.

[Ahzek451]

No shade on that model, but hell...it gets even better than that. I Run an elegoo saturn 4 ultra 16k and I can spit out models that you can't tell would be non-GW after slapping paint on...unless you've memorized every tiny detail and using a microscope. 

[Brother Sutek]

I have no issue with 3D printed stuff as long as it looks the part. I have the start of a Solar Auxilia army using models from Thatevilone. They are for my traitor Death Guard army and I like the models. They fit the theme and are what I want for the army, are they GW legal? Not by the company standards and if I ever had had plans to attend a tournament I wouldn't bring them. I only play with my friends now so it doesn't become an issue. One of the few reasons I do like 3D printing is that it allows me to get more marines that are the older scale that match my models. The few modern releases look giant next to my 2nd edition 40k era marines. 

[Brofist]

I take the original point, but here's what "citadel only" 30k can get you. We've all seen how 40k get mocked for official events with poorly shown armies and L shaped terrain so I won't do that derail.

 

 

At the end of the day, 'citadel only' or not, its still up to the event organizers and community to enforce what sort of game they want. I agree that there are tons of bad 3d prints, but there are plenty of half assed armies as above too. That's why I don't want anything to do with GW trying to dictate my events and community. Ultimately we're gonna have to do the work anyway.

[Griefbringer]

Brofist, is that picture supposed to be from an actual tournament, or from an "how may astartes vehicles can you fit in a deployment zone" competition.

 

At least five of the tanks seem to be missing turret weapons, which would be a noticeably disadvantage on any sort of WYSIWYG game. Particularly strange is the Predator in the front rank, which looks as if the turret is not properly connected to the hull, and neither does the turret weapon seem to be correctly attached to the turret (it seems that it is resting on top of the hull).

[Lathe Biosas]

I had a well thought out response, but I've been distracted by those blue chairs. They look really uncomfortable. 

[Gorgoff]

2 hours ago, Lathe Biosas said:

I had a well thought out response, but I've been distracted by those blue chairs. They look really uncomfortable. 

I was distracted from his shirt which labels his torso with "arm".

Outrageous. 

[Griefbringer]

It sounds to me like you guys are getting distracted rather too easily.

 

On a more positive note, I would like point out that the shown picture has some pretty decent looking terrain. Especially the multi-tier industrial plant in the centre looks like a nice centrepiece (especially if you ignore the odd pie template placed on top). It could be interesting to play an infantry skirmish game with all that terrain, placed closer together on a smaller table.

 

On the other hand, the two players seeming intent on a "Clash of Armour" game could probably benefit from playing on a larger table with less terrain. Manoeuvring such a number of vehicles on such tight environment might make for a frustrating game.

 

Considering the composition of the force in front (3 Kratos, 4 Sicaran, 6 Predator), I would hazard a guess that this might be HH 2.0 game, with the player in question having chosen Armoured Spearhead RoW (as well as maybe having deep pockets but limited time to assemble models).

[Lathe Biosas]

3 hours ago, Griefbringer said:

It sounds to me like you guys are getting distracted rather too easily.

 

Sometimes the switch gets pulled a little too easily.  

Edited September 4 by Lathe Biosas

[Brofist]

On 9/4/2026 at 12:40 AM, Lathe Biosas said:

I had a well thought out response, but I've been distracted by those blue chairs. They look really uncomfortable. 

 

Evrart's Chair from Disco Elysium, except you're asserting dominance while playing a game of heresy

[Brofist]

'Peachy Tips' had an interview on a youtube pod about his time working at Games Workshop for ~20 years. He paints a picture a lot of us have heard: out of touch leadership, toxic management, product design by middle management who often don't even play the games or are qualified to work on them. Good stuff happens in between the cracks. Not everyone sucks of course, but we've heard this all before so its clearly systemic.

 

I think the biggest shocker for me is how little they pay people. This guy was in management making something like $35K USD a year. My entry level salary in the games industry was just a bit lower, which was notoriously underpaid. A few years ago I remember a designer coming out on social media and begging the company to pay them more too.

 

Anyway, all that to say, we are absolutely getting what they pay for :) 

[TheTrans]

2 hours ago, Brofist said:

Anyway, all that to say, we are absolutely getting what they pay for :) 

I just wish we only had to pay the equivalent of what they are investing! 

[Griefbringer]

There seems to have been a shift in the studio culture in GW over the years. If you dig up old WD issues and read the great designers' notes articles they used to publish circa 1999-2005, it seems that the different kind of creative operations - rules, background, art, sculpting, painting, terrain building etc. - were still pretty integrated and the people with different roles inter-acted and co-operated during the creative process. Whatever influence the management and sales people had in the process is not obviously visible from the outside (though people who were inside, like Andy Chambers, may have something to say). There were sub-branches like Black Library, Specialist Games (Fanatic) and Forge World which seem to have sported moderate autonomy, but sometimes managed to co-time releases with the main studio products. And there was sort of "Hobby studio" in the US side of the pond, which seemed to spend their time cranking out impressive terrain and writing scenario/campaign rules. Then in 2006 there is a visible change, with White Dwarf content getting shallower and with a lot more obvious emphasis on trying to sell stuff.

 

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

Some weeks ago I read a series of Goonhammer interviews of James Hewitt, published in 2020:

 

https://www.tabletopbattles.com/the-goonhammer-interview-with-james-hewitt-part-1-age-of-sigmar-and-40k

https://www.tabletopbattles.com/the-goonhammer-interview-with-james-m-hewitt-part-2-blood-bowl-and-adeptus-titanicus

https://www.tabletopbattles.com/the-goonhammer-interview-with-james-m-hewitt-part-3-necromunda-and-needy-cat-games

 

James worked in GW design studios around 2014-2017, and before that in GW retail stores. His first work was with the End Times books (published in 2014-2015), at which time the main studio seems to have been split into different sub-groups with a task divisiona and linear workflow:

 

"To give you an idea of the structure, we had background writers and rules writers. The background team would write all the background and we’d go and apply rules to that. So miniatures would get made first, then narrative background gets written and rules would get written to fit the background and miniatures. The rules were very much the last thought in the process, and that was like the microcosm of how it was like at GW at that point."

 

After that he worked on the original Age of Sigmar (released summer 2015) development. His story tells of a design procedure driven by concept art and miniatures, where the rule developers only get involved in very late stage, management issues rather unusual specifications (no points, bases don't matter, four page rules), and customer communications is neglected. [I do have personal memories of the rather strong reactions on the now defunct Warseer boards in July 2015 - it was an unfortunately rainy July so I ended up spending too much time inside and online.]

 

Then he got transferred to the re-starting Specialist Games studio, which was co-located with the Forge World studio, where the different design activities were still co-located, in contrast to the compartmentalised main studio. Tony Cottrell, who had been running Forge World for quite a while, is described as having kept a close eye on sculpting while giving the rules authors plenty of freedom. Working on the rules for Adeptus Titanicus, he seems to have had plenty of freedom and time to concentrate on the one task at hand. His later experiences with developing new Necromunda seem to have been more affected by management/sales interference.

 

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

The present GW studio paradigm seems to be described as miniatures design driving rules design (also known as "no figure, no rules" approach on the player side), which seems to explain some of the curious design approaches witnessed nowadays.

 

A curious exception seems to be The Old World product line, which seems to be driven more by nostalgy than new releases (which have been rather limited). This seems to involve digging old moulds in the archives and bringing back to production all sort of old plastic, metal and resin figures, in some cases stretching all the way back to late 80's. And besides catering for this vast range, they have taken opportunity to include rules for some units that are not directly available off the shelf, requiring instead some converting or kitbashing.