http://gangeekstyle.com/2014/06/andy-chambers/
Saw this pop up on Andy's feed. In French and English translation. A thoroughly enjoyable read.

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Hi!

I was disappointed that after a decade since he left GW, he still doesn't want to talk about why he left.

But I will forgive him since he basically apologies for "killing epic because of epic 40k".

That and mentioning netepic as popular.

Primarch

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Primarch


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Yes. You know that must be a ugly story. The morbid side of me wants the details though as well.

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He's a lawyer and a super-villian. That's like having a shark with a bazooka!

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Hi!

Given his personality, he doesn't seem to be like the "yes men" type.

That alone is a hanging offense at GW these days.....

Primarch

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Cheers JZ, enjoyed reading that...

Nice to see him rate BFG so highly to, it's a great game.

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http://hordesofthings.blogspot.co.nz/

Yeah, me too.

The NetEpic reference was awesome.

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"I don't believe in destiny or the guiding hand of fate." N. Peart

thanks for the link, interesting read

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AFK with real life, still checking PMs

That was a very enjoyable read. I liked his honesty about Epic 40K in particular, but everything that he talked about was of interest in one way or another.

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I particularly liked him speaking of elegance. I also liked how he spoke of E40k as too much of a change in one go for the old epic fans, not as a bad system as such.

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Nitpicks Knapsack (Scratchbuilding and 3D designing and printing and painting)

Yes that was what I took from it too - ie saying that the principles behind epic40k (elegant uncomplicated rules) are still good, but regretting what happened due to the game coming on the back of 2nd ed. Which seems fair, since BFG (which uses the same principles) was what he says he was most proud of and nobody really laments that it was different to space fleet.


So we should blame the failure of Epic on the prior existence of 2nd edition! (Joking!)

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I don't think he's right in that E40K was what killed epic, although I'm sure many here will disagree....

E40K came at approximately the same time that GW looked to consolidate their outputs, 40k and WFB were always their main focus and they made a concerted effort to focus more on their core lines, E40K was a casualty of that, the rules while very different to what had come before, were actually very very good for a war game, and the models they released were orders of magnitude better than their predecessors.... they just didn't push the game as hard as they had done back when they released SM2 and TL because by that time they had focused pretty much all efforts in WD and instore on the 'big two' and essentially marginalised any other games

my personal experience of the time was that I hadn't played much epic for a few years and my group was 100% playing WFB at the time so epic was at the back of my mind, when I saw they'd released a brand new version with a complete re-write of the rules I thought 'pfffft I'll stick with what I know' and didn't get involved, the fact that they had about 5 articles in WD meant it slipped well and truly off my radar very quickly.... I'm sure this was the case for many, the internet wasn't as widespread back then either, so unless games were pushed in WD or instore, people didn't have the access to them that they do now, and it was harder to find groups of other players

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My hunch is still that epic40k was rushed out on the shelves when management decided to consolidate on the 2 main lines to reap back some of the development costs (they may have already known about lotr too.) That's why IMHO the core rules were solid and mini lines were stunning but the list structure / faction specific rules were limited and undeveloped. Always felt half finished to me...

It's not really how I remember it. I remember thinking that they really pushed it hard with a lot of development and production effort spent, lots of miniatures and plenty of space allocated in stores etc. It's just that it was extremely short lived support. I figured that they just saw the initial sales figures and knew it was a flop, and so decided to can it rather than throw good money after bad.

After that it just became the poster child for what can happen when you make a big game that fails, hence the focused strategy we have today - sideline games being first segregated into the Fanatic second tier, and thenn as limited release box sets.

However I really don't remember a time before 3rd edition where it was on an equal footing with 40K - I guess that was before my time - so to me it looked like 3rd edition was a ramp UP in support.

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There should be a Godwins law here. Change nazis for E40K. Me, I loved it B-)

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Nitpicks Knapsack (Scratchbuilding and 3D designing and printing and painting)