BOMBSHELL: Harry Talks End Times for Warhammer Fantasy

You may remember last year I was being very vague about some ‘radical changes’ in a thread about 9th edition.

Back at the start of the year, in one of my first posts of the new year I said this:

I don’t think they are trying to destroy it.
I suspect they will be trying their hardest to breath new life into it.
We are not seeing the “End times” for Warhammer just yet.

Did you see what I did there?
The clues are always there fellas.

So I first heard about all this last autumn?
I was told 2014 would be “Year zero” for Warhammer.

Had no idea what that meant at first but if you Google your way to the wikipedia you get this:

The term Year Zero, applied to the takeover of Cambodia in April 1975 by the Khmer Rouge, is an analogy to the Year One of the French Revolutionary Calendar. During the French Revolution, after the abolition of the French monarchy (September 20, 1792), the National Convention instituted a new calendar and declared the beginning of the Year I. The Khmer Rouge takeover of Phnom Penh was rapidly followed by a series of drastic revolutionary de-industrialization policies resulting in a death toll that vastly exceeded that of the French Reign of Terror.

The idea behind Year Zero is that all culture and traditions within a society must be completely destroyed or discarded and a new revolutionary culture must replace it, starting from scratch. All history of a nation or people before Year Zero is deemed largely irrelevant, as it will (as an ideal) be purged and replaced from the ground up.

It was made clear to me that this was what we were talking about for warhammer.
Everything that existed being completely destroyed (or discarded) and something new replacing it from scratch … purged and replaced from the ground up.

I hinted in various posts that they would be getting rid of the existing timeline, the existing map, etc. (In an effort to soften the blow. )

I am going to get this a bit wrong because I honestly can’t remember where I heard it but to confirm the three book rumour …. I did hear the “End times” were going to be spread over three books.

Nagash was the first, followed by Malekith followed by Glotkin

Good luck with that!

You think I haven’t had all the same thoughts being voiced on here?

I can’t see them throwing out everything they have done either … but the only way to own the IP is to loose all the generic Fantasy that other companies can copy … normal Dwarves, Elves and sure as heck you have to get rid of the historical based human armies … or you can go build an Empire or Bretonnian army from anyone’s miniatures.
I can’t see them getting rid of any armies either … but they can not continue to support all of them so some of them have to go or some get mashed together.
I can’t see them wanting to reduce the number of minis you need …. but if it costs too much to complete an army people don’t even start an army …so is it better to sell some minis for a scaled down game or no minis? Is it better to ramp up the Lords and monsters allowance and keep on selling the big kits so an army is ‘more tanks and less infantry’ and thus less minis and easier to paint …. or sell no minis.
Simple fact is so many people have so many armies now unless they do something drastic with the look of the armies no-one is buying enough minis. The only way to force folks to buy new stuff is if we cannot use our current stuff. Some folks may refuse to buy the new stuff on principal ….. what do they care? They were not buying the stuff anyway as they already had their army. Imagine how badly Fantasy must be selling compared to 40K if anyone even thought about knocking it on the head for even a moment …. they must be thinking …. it can’t make things any worse!!! What have we got to loose??? But if they are doing this why even bother completing 8th edition? Why do all the books?

I have been around and around with this in my head ….. the only thing that makes any sense to me at the end of the day is that 8th edition is complete enough and robust enough to endure a bit longer and 9th edition will not be a complete new edition of the rules …. but an alternative background and rules with which to play post End times battles but you still need the core rules to play A bit like all the stuff in Strom of Magic was an add on to the existing rules. The core rules and books will still exist for those that want to remain stuck in the timeline but if you want to be down with the cool kids you really need to buy the new post End Times stuff.