The Amazon Prime Effect: learning from Fallout to predict Warhammer's streaming series

[N1SB]

From YouTubers to even Games Workshop annual reports, there's been discussion of future Warhammer streaming shows on Amazon Prime.  In the meantime, the platform has had seasons of shows adapted from other properties, including Fallout, a dystopian satirical game series with power armour.

 

Fallout is NOT Warhammer 40,000 despite superficial similarities (both being dystopian, satirical, a game series, with power armour).  This thread is NOT about Fallout, but being familiar with it (too many hours logged in its games), I already got a front row seat, so I didn't just watch, I observed how the show affected the player base.

 

Would a TV show based on a game drive players to play it?  If so, how long does that affect last?

 

 

I went into the online Fallout 76 and invented Vaulthammer 40,000, like Fallout's version of 40k and built a Friendly Local Gaming Store for it.  In case you know Fallout, YES, I DO sell Molded Plastic (used in the game's crafting system) to represent Vaulthammer models.  Other Fallout 76 players who know 40k will buy all my Molded Plastic.

 

Fallout had 2 seasons on Amazon Prime.  For cross-promotion, Fallout 4 and 76 added new free content each time.  In the case of the older Fallout 4, a decade-old game, it was substantive: they gave away some previously paid for items, with new makeshift weapons AND stitched them together with new story content:

 

 

That massive update paled in comparison to what Fallout 76 had.  They had veteran actor Walton Goggins's character, a bounty hunter named The Ghoul, appear in-game played/voice acted by him.  They made him the 1st person you meet when you leave the starting Vault now.  The show and the games are directly tied, share a setting:

 

 

NOT everyone likes all the changes, for good reason.  In addition to Walton Ghoulguns, who remains universally liked, they added armour skins from the Fallout TV show in Fallout 76...but the game is a prequel that takes place 2 centuries before.  Those designs should not exist then.  We openly question the lore now.

 

(Those of us that track Fallout's lore call Fallout 76 "Tranquility Lane", meaning we're just an in-universe simulation like the Matrix.)

 

Both games are on Steam, the PC gaming platform.  There is a tool called Steam Charts that only count Steam players.  For our purposes, we don't need to know the absolute numbers of Fallout players, we just want to get an idea for how much Amazon Prime's TV show got people in or BACK into the game, like a percentage.

 

(As one former McKinsey Consultant said to me, "I'm a historian, don't give me a snapshot, I want to see the TREND.")

 

— Fallout 4

— Fallout 76

 

The top green line represents Fallout 4's Steam player count.  The bottom blue line represents Fallout 76's Steam player count.  Take note Fallout 76 initially launched exclusively on its developer's Bethesda.net platform, only to be added to Steam later, so we don't see its absolute peak (usually the 1st month of a game's release).

 

Why yes...you see those 2 recent peaks, those ARE exactly Amazon Prime's Fallout Season 1 and Season 2.

 

(There are issues I won't go into as not to go further off-topic, like imho Season 1 was a lot better than 2.)

 

After dropping off from release, there's a few bumps from new Downloadable Content, then it just flattens out.  There's a MASSIVE 7x (seven-fold) SPIKE early 2024; THAT's the 1st season of the Fallout TV show, then a much SMALLER 2x to 3x (double or triple) bump in at the turn of 2025/2026 for the 2nd season.

 

(Older games like Fallout 3 and New Vegas had similar bumps, but too small side-by-side with Fallout 4/76.)

 

A Sugar High That Doesn't Last AND Doesn't Repeat

 

I could've just shown you this chart, I think, we're Warhammer players, we're smart.  I just wanted to show I did my homework.

 

It's very obvious there are 2 things going on, despite all the talk about an Amazon Prime series, celebrity this, studio exec that, it's just:

 

• Amazon Prime can absolutely bring a Sugar High that will spike interest in Warhammer
• But that Sugar High does NOT last, and it does NOT quite ever repeat to the same heights

 

The following is actually a common marketing mistake.  You do a big marketing campaign, it creates awareness, brings all these potential customers to your places of purchase.  After that initial success, you repeat that marketing campaign...it barely moves the needle.  Why?  People are already aware!

 

The old adage about you only get one chance to make a 1st impression, you also only need to do that ONCE.

 

New Customers or Lapsed Customers?

 

Did the Fallout TV show actually bring new players that bought a game, or just old ones that re-installed for free?  It's Fallout 76's Steam player count that reveals there WERE new customers.  It reached a new peak more than double its release on Steam.  I cannot say the same about Fallout 4, as it's all mixed together.

 

It's rare I can make such a concrete, definitive, self-evident statement.  It's only because you can clearly see a new peak.

 

Lest GW Forgets

 

GW's old guard, like Rick Priestley (Beloved By All), knows all this and more.  A similar thing happened with Lord of the Rings:

 

 

He's describing when GW licensed LotR for their own miniatures game, the belief...actually the hope, perhaps the cope, was that it would bring LotR fans to then Games Workshop stores and be converted to Warhammer players.  You see him here describing a sales curve that will reach a new peak, and plateau.

 

That's not what happened at GW.  After reaching a peak with Return of the King AND (thanks to you, my Frateri et Sororitas) the Eye of Terror campaign, GW had a period of decline until its worst year in 2007 when it had negative profits, had to lay off a bunch of employees, close many of its stores, going into a decade of decline.

 

The reason was the initial Sugar Rush from Fellowship of the Ring and Two Towers prompted GW to expand with GOOD intentions.  You got all these new LotR players that need to be taught to play the game, to paint tabletop miniatures, so GW hired more employees to help customers.  Problem was, 1 day the customers left, never to return.

 

More recently, we saw a similar thing with Space Marine II the video game.  A much lighter touch cross-promotion with Captain Titus and the 500 Worlds.

 

Effect On the Hobby?

 

We're not GW employees, although I value those of you who are or were, you always bring the best intel to the table.

 

We're The Hobbyists.  We're greater than GW.  We span different games.  D&D players love us because we can paint their minis.

 

The Fallout community is kinda like us.  We talk army lists, they talk character builds.  We talk about painting/converting, they talk about player-made mods you can install.  Our D&D friend who hears us 40k players discussions calls what we do "talking shop", like we're craftsmen, which we are.  Same with the Fallout community.

 

When the Fallout TV show hit, it went from a hobby similar to ours to a FANDOM.  We who referred to the older games' lore, like how the timeline of the show doesn't quite make sense, we were shouted down because we're supposed to LOVE or HATE this celebrity, SO EMOTIONAL THE ACTING/THIS SCENE BROKE ME.

 

It was very irritating, but I bear good news: this, too, will pass...because the Sugar Rush will.  We'll ride it out together.

 

It lasted for like...a month after.  Then all those guys moved on to whatever is the next hyped thing.  We remain.

 

TL;DR:

 

• Amazon Prime Warhammer series will bring a huge Sugar Rush spike, then smaller bumps every new season
• It will likely bring back lapsed players AND will introduce new players to The Hobby (based on Fallout 76's peak)
• GW should be careful to account that the Sugar Rush is temporary and does not quite reach the same peak after
• If you are annoyed by The Hobby turning into a Fandom, I believe that too shall pass, because Fandoms do

[grailkeeper]

I think it's fair to say the hobby is already a fantom. Outside of blood bowl I haven't really played a tabletop game in a long time but I love 40k all the same. I've read literally hundreds of BL books.

[MoriyaSchism]

The Fallout show was one of the dumbest things I've seen in recent times. Season 1 was really bad too, it was just visually recognizable and I guess that's enough for most people. Hard to imagine watching a television show and not actually hearing the dialogue. I don't know how anyone who enjoyed that can really call themselves a Fallout fan, but hey Bethesda Fallout fans will eat anything up. As Todd once said "people will buy just about anything". Fallout went from a post-apocalyptic RPG series to what Todd called "funny Itchy & Scratchy violence". The show itself originally started as a nepotism job for the son of the late Zenimax CEO. Warhammer getting irreparably changed for the worse just to get a short boost that will gradually fade away would be the worst case scenario. I welcome part of this, it will mean many people who got suckered into this hobby will be flogging all their shiny new partially assembled and still on sprue miniatures on Ebay at firesale prices after the daunting task of the hobby starts looming over them. Getting into a plastic miniature wargame hobby takes a lot more work than buying microtransactions or picking up Fallout 4 or 76 at a really discounted price off steam. In general if the Warhammer TV show is on par with the Fallout show in terms of quality, lore impact and writing then I don't think it would be worth it.

[N1SB]

1 hour ago, grailkeeper said:

I think it's fair to say the hobby is already a fantom. Outside of blood bowl I haven't really played a tabletop game in a long time but I love 40k all the same. I've read literally hundreds of BL books.

 

Brother Grailkeeper, you are way too modest.  You PLAYED 40k.  You STILL play Blood Bowl.  Srsly, if YOU're not a Hobbyist

 

I owe this kid that came into our Warhammer Store for showing me what a Warhammer Fan, instead of a Hobbyist, is:

• "Who's your favourite Primarch?"  He conceptualises them as Marvel/DC superheroes
• "What's your favourite piece of lore?"  He never played, never read, knows 40k only via LoreTube

The questions were so odd to me, I said something about my favourite Primarch is Angron (because he clearly saw that he and everyone else in the Imperium are just slaves) and that scene in Master of Mankind where the Emperor and Arkhan Land were examining him was my "favourite piece of lore".

 

And as always, the best lessons came from making mistakes, as I just did here.

 

After that kid left, I turned to our Warhammer Store manager and another friend, "I was wrong," like that scene in Monty Python where a knight was asked what's his favourite colour and he gave the wrong answer, I felt so stupid.  Because what's my favourite piece of lore, YOUR favourite piece of lore, is...

...what we made ourselves.  We create our own 40k characters, our own armies, our own lore.

 

These new fans, they never created before (but hopefully will soon).  They only consume.

 

Our Warhammer Store exclaimed back, "I was about to say!"  Because I won one of the stores Armies On Parades with a converted army, he knows how I create my own characters.  We are entirely a different breed, Brother.

 

Btw, that kid, he left the Warhammer Store with a novel and a box of Goliath, I think.  So there's hope.

[Valkyrion]

I watched Fallout without ever playing the game and enjoyed it. It didn't inspire me to dive further into the setting, I just enjoyed it for what it was.

The Witcher was another show I watched without ever having played the game and thought it was rubbish.

I'm a big Warcraft fan and enjoyed the live action film despite its terrible acting, but it wasn't 100% true to lore and that annoyed me a bit.

 

I suppose my point is that a 40k show will draw people in who don't care about it and just want to watch Henry Cavill in space, it will draw in proper fans who will enjoy it despite its flaws, it will draw in proper fans who will despise it because of its flaws.

[Doghouse]

I want to believe.

 

I know it will be an unpopular opinion, but I don't have faith in either Amazon or Henry Cavil on this. As a caveat, I really do genuinely like Henry especially as Superman but he's attached himself to so many underperforming or failed projects.

 

I really did not enjoy saying that... 

 

For me it will be the success or failure of the Highlander film series that seals it for me. I did sort of dip in and out of the Fallout tv series having played the games for years but wasn't overly impressed. There were a few cool moments like seeing things from in game such as the Deathclaw or the Power Arnour but other than that I went back to channel hopping.

 

I think there will be an enormous amount of hype, especially with the painful Youtube click baiters before they move onto the next thing but can't see it being a sci fi master piece.

 

If I want to watch 40k on the big screen I can just go watch Dune. 

 

Having said that I still watch and genuinely enjoy Ultramarines and the Final Liberation cutscenes and really don't like the modern CGI animated shows so may not be the target audience. 

 

I will give it a try though.

[Dark Shepherd]

GW are now in a position to get a lovely spike in licensing revenue from videogames especially, and merch, when an Amazon show goes live

 

If theyre clever they can also do a *Show Title* special box designed for new players, heck sell it on AMAZON and toy/nerd shops. Make it troop heavy so existing players dont scoop it all up

[N1SB]

10 hours ago, Doghouse said:

I know it will be an unpopular opinion, but I don't have faith in either Amazon or Henry Cavil on this. As a caveat, I really do genuinely like Henry especially as Superman...

 

It's too big a burden for a Brother to bear.

 

I see these YouTube videos with clearly made up news about how Henry Cavill locked up all the writers in a room with the Horus Heresy novels and a box of ramen or something, and then the cheerleading in the comments section.  They're living precariously through this parasocial relationship with him.

 

A friend does not help a friend by placing a bigger load on his shoulders.

 

Then you add on GW execs, who can barely manage themselves, you see how much infighting there is within GW, adding an extra dimension of bureaucracy to deal with.  If you had to deal with 2 corporations, it's not just double the load, it's like a whole new dimension of complications.

 

You're brave enough to correctly point out that this is probably not a job even for Superman.

Edited August 30 by N1SB

[Jukkiz]

Intresting topic but easy answer is: Maybe?

Take critical role for example, it was about d&d then started going on the rails story telling with weird premises of certain real life things mixed in. Later moved to their own thing, but still partly related to D&D. 

If you know critical role and people who watch it, it ain´t really D&D. It´s an rpg that´s puppeteered forward with base as D&D. Sure it drove up intrest and maybe players to try the thing, but after being dm in couple of such games with such people, they´re insufferable. Their expectations is YOU (DM), the basically play everything like critical role does and not close to roots of D&D. 

Sure the fallout show also drove intrest to said series, but most people poked their head in 4th game (which is really weird, i leave it at that) and due the show being full of not great story telling, weird reddit chungus humor and BoS turned to moronic fratboys, it isn´t really what you´d want for YOUR hobby, do you? 

Anything with show can start intrest in people, but does it have proper staying/spending power behind that intrest? Most people might peek in, see current prices of warhammer and nope out faster then GW store manager restocks ultramarines to shelf. 

[Doghouse]

2 hours ago, N1SB said:

 

It's too big a burden for a Brother to bear.

 

I see these YouTube videos with clearly made up news about how Henry Cavill locked up all the writers in a room with the Horus Heresy novels and a box of ramen or something, and then the cheerleading in the comments section.  They're living precariously through this parasocial relationship with him.

 

A friend does not help a friend by placing a bigger load on his shoulders.

 

Then you add on GW execs, who can barely manage themselves, you see how much infighting there is within GW, adding not a layer of bureaucracy to deal with.  If you had to deal with 2 corporations, it's not just double the load, it's like a whole new dimension of complications.

 

You're brave enough to correctly point out that this is probably not a job even for Superman.

 

I think he genuinely has the best intentions but he did with the Witcher as well. I think this time he has creative control but I'm not sold just yet, one day I hope to eat these words but for now my gut is telling me I am probably right.

 

I think he geeks out on quite abstract things at times, like the chandelier in the Witcher that looked a bit like a Blackstone Fortress but he couldn't explain to others because they wouldn't get the reference. He has the homeground this time though and the majority of the people surrounding him do get the Blackstone Fortress reference.

 

Yeah those vids drive me up the wall with the Henry sat up all night with a red marker nonsense, I've also seen a few "influencers/content creators" suddenly getting into Warhammer getting ready to tap the Sugar Rush before moving onto the next stage of get excited for product, consume new product and get excited for next new product.

 

I truly miss the pre-social media days when we just used to make cool stuff and show each other how to make it online without the need for side hustles or sponsorship.  

[Magos Takatus]

3 hours ago, N1SB said:

 

Brother Grailkeeper, you are way too modest.  You PLAYED 40k.  You STILL play Blood Bowl.  Srsly, if YOU're not a Hobbyist

 

I owe this kid that came into our Warhammer Store for showing me what a Warhammer Fan, instead of a Hobbyist, is:

• "Who's your favourite Primarch?"  He conceptualises them as Marvel/DC superheroes
• "What's your favourite piece of lore?"  He never played, never read, knows 40k only via LoreTube

The questions were so odd to me, I said something about my favourite Primarch is Angron (because he clearly saw that he and everyone else in the Imperium are just slaves) and that scene in Master of Mankind where the Emperor and Arkhan Land were examining him was my "favourite piece of lore".

 

And as always, the best lessons came from making mistakes, as I just did here.

 

After that kid left, I turned to our Warhammer Store manager and another friend, "I was wrong," like that scene in Monty Python where a knight was asked what's his favourite colour and he gave the wrong answer, I felt so stupid.  Because what's my favourite piece of lore, YOUR favourite piece of lore, is...

...what we made ourselves.  We create our own 40k characters, our own armies, our own lore.

 

These new fans, they never created before (but hopefully will soon).  They only consume.

 

Our Warhammer Store exclaimed back, "I was about to say!"  Because I won one of the stores Armies On Parades with a converted army, he knows how I create my own characters.  We are entirely a different breed, Brother.

 

Btw, that kid, he left the Warhammer Store with a novel and a box of Goliath, I think.  So there's hope.

 

This is an odd concept to me. 

 

I have been involved in this hobby since the early 90's. I started off collecting Blood Angels and gradually started to create my own colour schemes, chapters and lore.

 

However, I also greatly enjoyed the background for 40k with novels that gave me inspiration to paint, create a kitbash or tweak my own lore. I've had reveals in novels that gave me the chills.

 

If someone asked my about my favourite piece of lore, to me  that answer feels like being asked for my favourite episode of a TV series and answering with "the one I wrote on this napkin, of course". Perhaps I over-value the official work or under-value my own background but I feel what I write is just a reconstituted imitation of existing lore. I look at projects like the Dornian Heresy as an interesting experiment but I just don't hold fan content in the same regard. I view that as a way of creating my own little plot of land within the setting, but I don't consider it part of the setting.

[grailkeeper]

6 hours ago, N1SB said:

 

Brother Grailkeeper, you are way too modest.  You PLAYED 40k.  You STILL play Blood Bowl.  Srsly, if YOU're not a Hobbyist

 

• "Who's your favourite Primarch?"  He conceptualises them as Marvel/DC superheroes

They kinda are like Marvel superheroes now, any fight between them is basically meaningless as they'll still be back next week. But you're being nice to me so I wont niggle about it. 

Ive played Fallout, my wife hasnt. We both loved the show. 

I suppose another IP it could be compared to is 2000AD as a bad case scenario. The first Dredd Movie was bad, the second was excellent but not a box office smash. Neither did 2000AD much good. Doug Jones said that they even made it hard for him to get his Rogue Trooper movie funded. Perhaps it might do more for 2000AD or the rumoured upcoming Taika Waiti Dredd movie. (Which I'm a bit dubious of)

Edited August 29 by grailkeeper

[N1SB]

4 hours ago, grailkeeper said:

I suppose another IP it could be compared to is 2000AD as a bad case scenario. The first Dredd Movie was bad, the second was excellent but not a box office smash. Neither did 2000AD much good. Doug Jones said that they even made it hard for him to get his Rogue Trooper movie funded. Perhaps it might do more for 2000AD or the rumoured upcoming Taika Waiti Dredd movie. (Which I'm a bit dubious of)

 

And Hollywood is all about Marvel/DC films, yet Diamond Distributors who de facto controls their comics went bankrupt last year.

 

7 hours ago, Magos Takatus said:

If someone asked my about my favourite piece of lore, to me  that answer feels like being asked for my favourite episode of a TV series and answering with "the one I wrote on this napkin, of course". Perhaps I over-value the official work or under-value my own background but I feel what I write is just a reconstituted imitation of existing lore. I look at projects like the Dornian Heresy as an interesting experiment but I just don't hold fan content in the same regard. I view that as a way of creating my own little plot of land within the setting, but I don't consider it part of the setting.

 

I agree, yet remember the Astartes animation was a fan-made YouTube animation before it was acquired for Warhammer+.

 

How about if I were to ask what your favourite Dungeons & Dragons or Dark Heresy campaign?  Probably not the Dungeons & Dragons films (neither the early 2000s one with Jeremy Irons nor even the recent one with Chris Pine) nor Critical Role, but your own campaign where your friend did that idiotic thing and the DM allowed it, but it worked.

 

(That idiotic friend would have been me.)

 

Maybe lore was the wrong word, I was replying this neophyte.  But "lore" like our favourite stories are the ones with our friends.

[N1SB]

10 hours ago, Jukkiz said:

If you know critical role and people who watch it, it ain´t really D&D. It´s an rpg that´s puppeteered forward with base as D&D. Sure it drove up intrest and maybe players to try the thing, but after being dm in couple of such games with such people, they´re insufferable. Their expectations is YOU (DM), the basically play everything like critical role does and not close to roots of D&D.

 

That's good intel, thanks for sharing that.  I know of it because my Discord friends referenced it, I saw some clips, I know what you mean.

 

On the ground of your words, I'm going to look at Critical Role again, maybe let a session play out while I'm painting or something.  A really good point.

[Magos Takatus]

I understand a little better now.

 

I suppose as more of a painter than a gamer or lore writer most of my energy goes into the models but even if you are a novice lore writer like myself I have plenty of stories from the tabletop to reminisce over.  In fact, I just remembered an Apocalypse game where we had two Stompas on our side. The other Stompa got outflanked by a multimelta-armed Land Speeder. When my fellow Stompa Kaptain was about to turn around to engage it I confidently stated he should push toward the enemy and my Stompa would handle the Land Speeder and cover his back. Of course, I completely failed to hit the skimmer and when it got it's chance to fire it set off a chain reaction and blew the other Stompa apart. Oops! 

 

Thinking about it, most of the was stories I remember are when things went horribly wrong for me.

 

As for comparing it to D&D, the reference isn't something I can directly relate to but I did watch TotalBiscuit's Dark Heresy campaign and I still remember someone picking up a pot of beans cooking on the stove and throwing it as in improvised weapon and joking about whether it would get the melta rule. It was so long ago I can't remember if someone in the party made that joke or if it was a comment I left beneath the video but the whole ordeal was so funny it stuck with me.

 

In light of your post, I guess I understand what you were getting at. I have some ideas sketched out for lore between three of my armies and how they interact with each other and though it isn't fleshed out yet it's more personal to me than the official lore, even if it's not been written by a professional author and isn't up to that standard.

[Firedrake Cordova]

21 hours ago, Doghouse said:

I'm not sold just yet, one day I hope to eat these words but for now my gut is telling me I am probably right.

Hope is the first step on the road to disappointment. At least if you have low expectations, it's unlikely you'll be disappointed, and more likely that you may be pleasantly surprised.  

[Frogian]

On 8/29/2026 at 2:28 PM, Doghouse said:

I know it will be an unpopular opinion, but I don't have faith in either Amazon or Henry Cavil on this. As a caveat, I really do genuinely like Henry especially as Superman but he's attached himself to so many underperforming or failed projects.

 

I don't have any faith in Amazon but with Cavill at least he wants to be loyal to the source material. Seeing what happened with the witcher or halo series (we don't pay any attention to the games...) that's a good thing - just have to hope he doesn't go too Filoni with it, but hopefully GW would rein any of that in

[Tawnis]

I know that's it's pretty anathema to internet culture, but I am actually cautiously optimistic. My hopes aren't high, but I see a world where it's done well.

 

It's not like I've never been disappointed before by adaptations, while the Halo series was a fine sci-fi series, it was a terrible Halo adaptation, which really sunk it for me (though it got my 60yr old father to finally start playing the Halo games co-op with me as he got into it via the series, so I can't say it was all bad on that front either ). A while back the Warcraft movie was another rough blow as one of my favourite franchises again got done dirty. However, in both those cases, the studios just tossed the lore into the woodchipper and did what they wanted, I don't really see that being the case with Cavil at the helm. 

While I haven't seen the Fallout series myself, I never really got all that into it or the games (Only played 3), my best friend is obsessed with Fallout, (well the original games 1-3 and New Vegas, he played 4 and 76, but didn't really care of either of them.) 3 though, he played that game so many times the disc literally wore out in his drive and snapped in half mid game after many years. He's huge into the lore community as while having written lots of video essays and fanfics on it as well. As a lover of the series and a writer himself, he quite liked the Fallout show, acknowledging that it wasn't perfect but was a solid adaptation of the essence of Fallout. What that means, I can't exactly say since I'm not as emersed in the fandom, but I trust his judgment. If Amazon can capture the 40k feel for their series and stay away from altering any massive lore moments, I think it will go well. 

Lastly, 40k is such a vast open space, it's literally designed so that people can make up their own stories to tell in the universe. If Cavil takes the series this route and avoids major lore spots, just doing their own thing in the universe, I think that would be the best bet. Don't try to cash in on a specific character or moment or story like translating Eisenhorn to the screen; make your own. Kind of like how Relic gave us the Blood Ravens and all those stories. 

As for it being a hobby gateway, the numbers don't lie in broad strokes, but they don't tell the whole truth either. To OP's example, I am someone who came to GW to get the LOTR minitures game after I saw the movies in my pre-teens. I then discovered that they had a sci-fi game and got hooked into 40k pretty quickly, I've been playing 40k since 3rd edition, but I haven't played any LOTR since a year or so after I bought the OG starter set. While the value gained may not be worth the cost spent, some people introduced through these other sources do stick around and get into the hobby, even if there are not all that many of us. And as previously stated, my father got into the Halo games because of the TV series. 

I just caution everyone, when there inevitably is this influx of people coming to try out the hobby because of the T.V. Show, don't be gatekeepy about it. Regardless of how we came to 40k, we were all new to the setting and lore, interested in some tidbits we found somewhere and wanting to know more. Don't treat these people as "not real fans" or any of the other nonsense I've both heard about and seen happen. More people in the hobby is a great thing, the TV will bring them to the hobby, but to the OPs point, the TV series will not keep them coming back to the tabletop, finding a healthy place to game and have fun is what will.

 

[Jings]

Honestly I don't think there's enough information to be concerned about either way. 

 

Cavill being in charge is a good sign. He's at least interested in the hobby enough that he's brought it up several times unprompted in interviews prior to landing the gig. He's a big name with a passion for the IP which puts him in good standing. 

 

The larger concern, for me, is the content itself. 

 

If, as many suspect, we're looking at an Eisenhorn adaptation - which given the delay in the final Bequin book and Cavill's own fanboying of Valdor is a strong possibility - we might be on track for something great. It would be such a safe introduction to the character of the Imperium as a whole that it would lay out a strong foundation for further works going forward and the possibility of creating a strong media franche provided it is palatable to the general audience. 

 

If, on the other hand, we are thrown into Bolter Porn: The Series, I think we could be in a spot of bother. They're cool, sure, but Amazon will struggle to get the wives and girlfriends to watch that compared to more domestic 40K avenues. 

 

No point in being anxious about it yet. There's a promising start, namely with Cavill, a horror director being on board, and Amazon front the capital. The worries really are poor execution and the possibility of compromising on some of 40Ks less savory elements in favour of general audience sensibilities. But we'll see. I can't imagine Cavill would remain involved if we were facing a subversive Rings of Power-style subversion/reinterpretation. The big trap really would be Primarch and Space Marines from the get go. 

[N1SB]

You guys are already broaching this, but an actual 1st-hand learning from Season 1 to Season 2 of Fallout:

 

 

Setting > Story

 

I wanted that to show Setting is great than the Story, but Setting leads to Story is also true.

 

I noticed many people that loved Fallout Season 1 fell out (omg, not intentional pun, I swear) with Season 2.  They'd talk about this plot hole or that change to the lore, it was bad writing...but BOTH Seasons had the exact same writers and everything.  It's just people felt differently about it the 2nd time.

 

It took me a re-watch to see why.  Season 1 built mostly on top of its Setting.  Season 2 destroyed most of its Setting.

 

Season 1 took place in California, just like the 1st Fallout game, about a century after.  It was very recognisable, as Brother Moriya said.  1 significant locale was destroyed for a major revelation/plot twist in the Season 1 finale iirc.  The show definitely made changes, but mostly added to the Setting.  People forgave those changes.

 

Season 2, on the other hand, was set in Fallout: New Vegas, 15 years after the game, which was about taking control of it for whichever faction the player supported.  It was shown as destroyed, used by monsters as a nesting ground, the major factions decimated or in a civil war or turned into feral ghouls.

 

It wasn't just recognising the Setting, it's also recognising what players did in those games.  Season 1 didn't acknowledge what we did in Fallout 1 per se, but the world we left behind.  Fallout Season 2 deliberately negated the choices we made in Fallout: New Vegas.

 

But why that choice in Season 2?  There was an actual GOOD reason...just bad execution, perhaps.

 

 

"Don't Pick a Winner"

 

Apparently, the TV showrunners were given a mandate by Bethesda that bought the Fallout license:

 

"Don't Pick a Winner" in Fallout: New Vegas.  The idea was that there were many plot choices, many paths, that lead to multiple ending options; players could have helped one faction or its enemy, helped one settlement or just ignored them.  Bethesda did NOT want the TV show to pick 1 canonical end over others.

 

When we realised this, we saw why it backfired.  "Don't Pick a Winner" became "Make Everyone Losers."

 

Whichever side a player supported, that faction fell apart later.  People he had helped/hurt, they became Feral Ghouls, so attack on sight.

 

You can see what good intentions lead to, the showrunners could just say the tagline, "Hey, War Never Changes," it ended up like this.

 

And you can imagine how this translates to Warhammer, like a Season deals with the latest Armageddon War.  But it might be okay considering, well, how many Wars for Armageddon there have been.  Maybe the grim darkness of the far future has a natural buffer for this.  There Is Only War Never Changes.

 

Going forward, Bethesda has indicated the TV show will be considered canon for future games like Fallout 5 in particular.

 

 

"Theme Park"

 

Around the time of the show, a Fallout: New Vegas senior designer (edit - thanks Brother Khulu!) wrote on Twitter:

 

 

The idea of the Setting becoming a Theme Park really resonated with the players...because it's so true.  You guys were mentioning players who only consider the games by the original designers: Fallout 1, 2, New Vegas, to be canon.  As much as I love the later games, they're like games that just have a Fallout skin.

 

A number of Fallout 76 players had an epiphany because they logged in, opened the game map, and as a Quality of Life improvement, Bethesda colour-coded different zones like in a Theme Park.  Green was the Forest Area, beige was the Desert Area, Red was the new...Desert Area.  Activities were an interactive roller coaster.

 

What you guys were saying that at least Brother Henry Cavill both understands and cares kinda relates to this, you see why I share it here.

 

 

Even I Made This Mistake

 

In the OP, I showed a Friendly Local Gaming Store in Fallout 76 with Vaulthammer 40,000...my own spin on Fallout.

 

Players didn't like that as much as my main Base Camp, which was mostly just this (yes, there's Popcorn and Soda, too):

 

 

It's just a movie theatre, a big, empty room.  The screen is a Western mural, just a static image.  The seats are actually airplane seats (copied over from Fallout 4) arranged in rows.  The projector is actually a construction light through a tiny barn window, so you can see that god beam effect.

 

Players would emote they liked the base, get out of their power armour to take a screenshot of their characters watching the film.  Why?

 

This FEELS like part of the Fallout universe.  Westerns were popular, one of the TV show's characters plays a cowboy actor pre-War.

 

(There's other details.  Near the exit, there's a poster for a zombie movie and I added "Coming Soon" on it.  The nuclear bombs fell on October 23, a week before Halloween...so of course the next film to be shown at this cinema would have been a horror film.  Warhammer taught us to incorporate lore into our models.)

 

Setting > Story.

Edited September 8 by N1SB

[SpecialIssue]

Yes please - I hope there is some realisation that the best thing they can do is leave the big stuff alone. People want a good story, not necessarily a big story.

 

Space marines for all the love we have for them make poor main characters, and the need to increasingly make them human in order to force them to be main characters increasingly decreases their mythology.

 

Like all media of our time it seems, I fear for 40k falling into the the cargo-cult method of production, where the surface level signs and images of the IP are blindly copied (power armour fantasies, old-timey language, demons in space, etc) without the realisation for why they are effective and work. It is turned into a product that relies on fan callbacks/callouts to give any credence of authenticity to the original universe, because it cannot/or doesn't match, the more evocative ideas of the original.

 

For Fallout for example, it was seen in the single-minded focus on call-backs to the imagery of the NCR (Ranger with anti-mat rifle, the fanfare entrance of their faction) when in fact the show had destroyed the entire development and meaning of the faction from the world in order to preserve the surface-level theme park of the post-apocalypse ("we need to keep the pop-imagery of the the post-apocalypse being a wasteland with only straggling survivors and raider lunatics; even hundreds of years after the bombs - therefore we need to destroy the NCR out of nowhere"). Blatantly riding on the coat-tales of NV's vibrant world-building (which was why we were invested into the imagery of the NCR in the first place), while actively undoing it for no other reason than that it gets in the way of the story/imagery they want in the show.

 

40k's unique voice is the resonance and combination of themes that are so different and more confronting than anything else out there; the co-dependence of the Imperium and chaos, the finger-trap of doing anything for power for survival, powerful humanity as being also the corrupt, insane, brainwashed bad guys, the inhumanness of post-humans, the juxtaposition of the strange and savage culture with high, decaying technology; and lastly the dyad of the gothic (mysterious, horror, romanticism, unknown) and tragic that are the cardinal directions of the entire universe. I do not want a melodrama about the Primarchs or the Emperor. That is not 40k. That is a callout/callback riding on the coattails of 40 years of buildup and constraint that has now largely been spent.

[Khulu]

8 hours ago, N1SB said:

You guys are already broaching this, but an actual 1st-hand learning from Season 1 to Season 2 of Fallout:

 

 

Setting > Story

 

I wanted that to show Setting is great than the Story, but Setting leads to Story is also true.

 

I noticed many people that loved Fallout Season 1 fell out (omg, not intentional pun, I swear) with Season 2.  They'd talk about this plot hole or that change to the lore, it was bad writing...but BOTH Seasons had the exact same writers and everything.  It's just people felt differently about it the 2nd time.

 

It took me a re-watch to see why.  Season 1 built mostly on top of its Setting.  Season 2 destroyed most of its Setting.

 

Season 1 took place in California, just like the 1st Fallout game, about a century after.  It was very recognisable, as Brother Moriya said.  1 significant locale was destroyed for a major revelation/plot twist in the Season 1 finale iirc.  The show definitely made changes, but mostly added to the Setting.  People forgave those changes.

 

Season 2, on the other hand, was set in Fallout: New Vegas, 15 years after the game, which was about taking control of it for whichever faction the player supported.  It was shown as destroyed, used by monsters as a nesting ground, the major factions decimated or in a civil war or turned into feral ghouls.

 

It wasn't just recognising the Setting, it's also recognising what players did in those games.  Season 1 didn't acknowledge what we did in Fallout 1 per se, but the world we left behind.  Fallout Season 2 deliberately negated the choices we made in Fallout: New Vegas.

 

But why that choice in Season 2?  There was an actual GOOD reason...just bad execution, perhaps.

 

 

"Don't Pick a Winner"

 

Apparently, the TV showrunners were given a mandate by Bethesda that bought the Fallout license:

 

"Don't Pick a Winner" in Fallout: New Vegas.  The idea was that there were many plot choices, many paths, that lead to multiple ending options; players could have helped one faction or its enemy, helped one settlement or just ignored them.  Bethesda did NOT want the TV show to pick 1 canonical end over others.

 

When we realised this, we saw why it backfired.  "Don't Pick a Winner" became "Make Everyone Losers."

 

Whichever side a player supported, that faction fell apart later.  People he had helped/hurt, they became Feral Ghouls, so attack on sight.

 

You can see what good intentions lead to, the showrunners could just say the tagline, "Hey, War Never Changes," it ended up like this.

 

And you can imagine how this translates to Warhammer, like a Season deals with the latest Armageddon War.  But it might be okay considering, well, how many Wars for Armageddon there have been.  Maybe the grim darkness of the far future has a natural buffer for this.  There Is Only War Never Changes.

 

Going forward, Bethesda has indicated the TV show will be considered canon for future games like Fallout 5 in particular.

 

 

"Theme Park"

 

Around the time of the show, Fallout: New Vegas's lead director/designer wrote this on Twitter:

 

 

The idea of the Setting becoming a Theme Park really resonated with the players...because it's so true.  You guys were mentioning players who only consider the games by the original designers: Fallout 1, 2, New Vegas, to be canon.  As much as I love the later games, they're like games that just have a Fallout skin.

 

A number of Fallout 76 players had an epiphany because they logged in, opened the game map, and as a Quality of Life improvement, Bethesda colour-coded different zones like in a Theme Park.  Green was the Forest Area, beige was the Desert Area, Red was the new...Desert Area.  Activities were an interactive roller coaster.

 

What you guys were saying that at least Brother Henry Cavill both understands and cares kinda relates to this, you see why I share it here.

 

 

Even I Made This Mistake

 

In the OP, I showed a Friendly Local Gaming Store in Fallout 76 with Vaulthammer 40,000...my own spin on Fallout.

 

Players didn't like that as much as my main Base Camp, which was mostly just this (yes, there's Popcorn and Soda, too):

 

 

It's just a movie theatre, a big, empty room.  The screen is a Western mural, just a static image.  The seats are actually airplane seats (copied over from Fallout 4) arranged in rows.  The projector is actually a construction light through a tiny barn window, so you can see that god beam effect.

 

Players would emote they liked the base, get out of their power armour to take a screenshot of their characters watching the film.  Why?

 

This FEELS like part of the Fallout universe.  Westerns were popular, one of the TV show's characters plays a cowboy actor pre-War.

 

(There's other details.  Near the exit, there's a poster for a zombie movie and I added "Coming Soon" on it.  The nuclear bombs fell on October 23, a week before Halloween...so of course the next film to be shown at this cinema would have been a horror film.  Warhammer taught us to incorporate lore into our models.)

 

Setting > Story.

Minor correction here - Avellone did work on F:NV, and I think was lead for one or two of the DLCs, but Josh Sawyer was lead for F:NV itself. 

 

Otherwise, well said!

[Adeptekon]

My main concern is that Henry is one man. How long can he sustain it 40k orthodoxy? Once Henry is out, the studio has all the smoke.

[Jings]

14 hours ago, SpecialIssue said:

I do not want a melodrama about the Primarchs or the Emperor. That is not 40k. That is a callout/callback riding on the coattails of 40 years of buildup and constraint that has now largely been spent.

 

Your post is great in its entirety and echos many of my sentiments, in particular your note about the necessity for humanising Space Marines as protagonists undoes what makes them special. 

 

However, I do want to note that there is design space for Space Marine and Primarch melodrama - namely the Heresy. 

 

But to your point on setting trumping story, this would have to be a prequel - it requires requisite knowledge of 40K proper to fully appreciate, and can only be done after establishing the "modern" setting in a decently-lengthed series. 

 

Star Trek presents a strong case study for this. Traditionally, it had avoided long-form storytelling beyond picking up ongoing threads here and there. It was a setting with stories within it, providing a rich canvas to draw from. TNG was a great example of this - one and done episodes or two-parters, with recurring story elements tied usually to recurring characters. It entrenched the modern Federation and it's ethos in interacting with the galaxy at large. 

 

And then DS9 came along, presenting as a foil. It put the Federation not only to war, but on the back foot. It delved into the necessity of compromising on ideals in favour of pragmatism. It tested the limits of the ethos established and pushed them to their edge through the Dominion War - which was a grand 7-season story with seeds planted within the traditional one and done episodes and two parters that grew eventually into a serialised story over the final two seasons, where even the one and done stories contributed to the overall war narrative. 

 

I bring this up as the Heresy is well poised to act in such a way to show "how we got here" to the general audience, but like DS9, would not function without that prerequisite information. 

 

Should I be correct that we're looking at an Eisenhorn series, I think the Heresy could be a logical next step given the Valdor link through, with the obvious caveat that such an Eisenhorn show would need to be a cultural phenomenon, nigh Game of Thrones-level success, to warrant a budget sufficient enough to pull off such an endeavour. 

 

But in any other scenario Space Marines need to be mysterious and novel characters that appear rarely to perform exceptional violence exceptionally. 

[Adeptekon]

I'd be happy if they just made a movie out of the 10th ed trailer.

Edited September 9 by Adeptekon