AGPO:
Here’s a low down on what I learned at the studio event on Saturday:
1. Jervis Johnson (and Jeremy Vetock)
Jervis and I had a good long discussion about veteran’s armies. Many of the boards on display were made up of gamer’s collections which had been built up over many years. I brought up chaos dwarfs and he told me that they weren’t going to be done by the studio any time in the forseeable, but they were firmly ‘still there’ and would be far more likely to get attention than anything like Cathay or Araby, however…
He said Forgeworld had “big plans for doing stuff for Chaos Dwarfs” and that they were looking to do “much more for fantasy in general” including conversion kits for the current line of plastic boxed sets similar to what they’ve done for 40k, as well as supplements. I mentioned to him and Jeremy that the current edition seemed to have got back to being based around a hobby with a group of mates and away from the competitive focus of previous editions. They were very pleased I’d said this as according to Jeremy, many of the designers felt that previous editions had become far too “tournament focused” and that they wanted to bring back the fun scenarios, quirky rules and generally the ‘fun’ ethos that attracted us all to the game in the first place.
2. Matt Ward
I raised the issue of Chaos Dwarfs not appearing in the new book with Matt, and he was very quic off the mark with his response. He said the decision had been taken to only include the fully supported armies in the book, but that we had been discussed when writing the book. He said that lists like ours were still perfectly viable, we just needed to agree a few house rules to cover any loopholes created by the new rules. I brought up Bull Centaur’s classification and there were some pretty telling looks between him and the other developers. Turns out the classification debate for centaurs (in this case centigors) was just as fervent in the studio as it is on here. in the end the studio came down on the side of counting them as cavalry, a decision Matt disagreed with but that he explained was “down to equipment.” In his opinion, cavalry are defined by having a split profile, and therefore centigors should be classed as Warbeasts, but use spears in the same manner as cavalry. He said that in his opinion, Bull Centaurs should be classed as War Beasts - we don’t lose or gain anything in that manner as we keep our weapons options but don’t get any cavalry bonuses. I mentioned that simply having a Centaur category would have solved any issues and they said they’d consider it for ninth. Matt said they were really keen to produce an apocalypse/planet strike style supplement. This was largely because he said the last proper supplement they did was 5th edition seige, and it was "about time they did one."
The day all round was fantastic. I got painting lessons on red and yellow from the Eavy Metal team, and best of all the sculptors were on hand to give one-on-one sculpting lessons. We covered faces, feathers, muscle and all different types of armour. They even produced a little booklet with stage by stage photos on various projects. The whole studio team were fantastic and, whatever corporate may do, I saw that everyone working at the studio really has the hobby close to their hearts. Great day :cheers
