GW’s Winning New Post-Codex Format
After two years of experimenting, it looks like Nottingham has found a winner to move past pure codexes.
We have been hearing for about a year now that GW is working on a way to reduce the importance of codexes. It’s an understandable goal. While every army likes to have thier very own book, that eternal lifecycle of codex updating leaves each army with an early golden era (looking at you Craftworld Eldar) , a mid-life crisis (Grey Knights) and generally being ignored in it’s old age (CSMs). Then it all starts again.
The problem is obvious, some armies may need update because of crap rules, while others may be at the top of their game but have ancient models that simply need replacing. Then you have the unbalancing factors like the Space Marines who get updated sometimes twice as often as anyone else due to thier importance in the game’s eco-system. If the studio releases a dull codex, the faction’s players feel abandoned for years.
It’s a very different model than many other use such as Privateer Press’ omnibus books that are a must buy for the entire community and include a handful of units for every faction.
Some way was need to expand upon the standalone codices and give them new life outside of a full new version.
Rocks and Shoals
In June 2013 GW tried a different approach – releasing the first supplemental codex Iyanden. Coming quick on on it’s heels were other such Clan Raukaan, Sentinels of Terra, Farisght Enclaves and the like. Some like Black Legion were minimalist and almost entirely fluff based, with only a page or so or rules. Some like Tempestus Scions attempted to offer a “mini-codex” approach with lots of derivative color plates and a tiny handful of units to build armies out of. Others like Crimson Slaughter offered up some notable wargear and still live on to this day.
Alongside these came the Warzone books that wee initially Apocalypse centered like Valedor. There were others in the series such as Damnos, but tied to Apocalypse they seemed like a sideshow not quite “really” part of the game.
Most of these cost roughly the cost of a full codex.
I think in hindsight all of these early attempts were very uneven and released at seemingly random times, sometimes accompanying thier “parent” codex and other times dropped out of the ether.
A Solution Emerges
Then in 2014 GW began to tie these two concepts together with the multi-week campaigns such as Stormclaw and Shield of Baal. These offered a halfway house between the Supplemental Codices and the Warzone books. They usually came out in multiple volumes separately, making collecting them somewhat tricky after the fact. As an interesting trick, the campaigns served as a “narrative bridge” between codex releases from the two sides. So you saw for example Shield of Baal released sandwiched in between the Tyranid and Blood Angel codices – injecting some life into the entire multi-month release.
Then came END TIMES and GW figured it out, learned and devised a winning format:
Nagash raced out of the gates in August 2014 with a sexy new format. ONE product to buy, got you a sexy slipcover, and two hardcovers within, one 100% narrative with amazing artwork and photography – bringing you into the game’s universe and a 2nd volume of purely rules and in-game scenarios. It was the perfect lure. Whether you were a fluff bunny or a hardcore player it was all wrapped up in 1 easy to grab product and it was costed at roughly one and half times the cost of a codex.
Riding off into the Sunset?
Wash rinse repeat. GW cranked out 4 more END TIMES slipcovers and now we see it moving over into 40K with the fantastic Kauyon campaign which only sweetened the pot by offering 2 bonus Space Marine armies alongside a massive Tau update that made the accompanying codex “optional”.
I think GW has a format winner on it’s hands. I can easily see them cranking out 2-3 of these each year to link two antagonist codex releases and give the entire year of releases an interlinked narrative storyline – just perfect to for drawing players of all types into the game’s universe.
I think they finally found the dream format to accompany and one day even eclipse the venerable codex. I ignored almost every Supplemental Codex and Warzone book, but now consider the campaign slipcovers automatic buys.
What do you think of the new 2-book slipcover format?
