40K: NEW Beta Codex, Rules Development & Future Campaigns Details

One lucky gamer attended the GW seminar and took VERY GOOD NOTES. Here’s what GW revealed:

Gamer CaptainBetts was at GWHQ for the Vigilus Weekend and took down everything he heard from the seminars. Here’ what he recorded:

FUTURE RELEASES AND FUTURE CAMPAIGNS:

• Renegade guard codex isn’t “in the works” right now.
• There is more than one campaign book in the style of vigilus coming.
• Each setting has its own theme.
• Imperium will be in each campaign setting.
• The next campaign setting is very fleshed out already – similar in structure to what we see with Vigilus and City fight.
• Campaign books like city fight won’t be limited (i.e. there won’t be a 6 month window in which you can buy them).
• There are more codexes coming out next year.
• There are currently no plans to release an “agents of the imperium” codex. The designers felt that the units don’t translate to the battlefield well. An inquisitor etc. feel more appropriate for rogue trader/kill team. Specifically gave example of a character with a simple rapier and a laspistol doesn’t feel “right”. They actually used Eisenhorn as a very specific example too.
• For boxed games they usually work about a year in advance.
• The person giving the seminar was working three years ahead on some stuff. Miniatures team plan significantly further than 1 year.
• More rogue trader explorations (or at least this style of release) will come in the future.

BETA CODEXES

• Beta codexes are a sort of thing we’ll be seeing in the future, but not in the same way as the Sisters of Battle beta. The beta rules will be put in white dwarf (e.g. a datasheet, a few stratagems), if they’re well liked they’ll find their way into matched play 40k (maybe with tweaks depending on feedback).
• Sisters of Battle should be good standalone.

RULES

• They don’t want to punish soup. They’d rather reward builds than penalise them. No comment on whether they’d try to reward monofaction armies.
• They are aware that they don’t quite “get” soup yet.
• Points are worked out using a formula, some of which depend on points themselves.
• Open play rules are mainly to “scratch a certain itch”, and gives an opportunity to add more “creative and crazy” rules into the game without breaking play.
• They know the fly FAQ change was an issue. They wanted to solve a simple problem which lead to oversights. They want to create simple fixes rather than add a load of complication to the game.

CHANGING RULES IN FAQS AND CHAPTER APPROVED

• They don’t want to be changing the rules constantly and frequently. They say that most players aren’t in the tournament circuit. Instead missions included in Chapter Approved etc. are meant to put a new spin on the rules.
• They don’t like the idea of having too many required books either (e.g. having one page from a campaign book, two from white dwarf etc) – they say that it will be possible to build an army without needing hundreds of different sources.
• They say their goal is to have it be possible to make a good army with fewer sources. They used GSC as a specific example.
• Index options are here to stay for a while. They’re just not in the codex because it’s bad to have a codex with selections you can’t buy.

~Give it up for Captain Betts and have at it!

Author: Larry Vela

Dad, Gamer, Publisher, Pilot, Texan. All games all the time since junior-high. I started BoLS Interactive in 2006. I’m a lifelong tabletop & RPG gaming enthusiast, and internet publisher working to entertain and inform my readers every day. I've been playing RPGs and Tabletop Games since the 1970s. I'm been playing and covering Warhammer and Warhammer 40K for over 35 years.