Games Derpshop – Codex Iyanden

Games Workshop never cease to amaze me. I admit, they managed to drag me back in to their sweaty clutches with the Dark Vengeance boxset last year, but the brief madness passed, and I’ve sworn off Warhammer 40,000 for good, preferring to turn to companies like Privateer Press and Mantic to satisfy my tabletop wargame hunger. I’m a slave to the Warhammer 40,000 lore, that’s a given, but the models and gaming side of it… sheesh.

If there’s one thing I will never understand about GW, it’s their game design philosophy. Aside from their extortionate prices, it’s the absolute biggest gripe I have with them, because it makes them look like goddamn morons compared to other companies. Warhammer 40,000 is an utter mess of army books and FAQs from different editions.

Their announcement today takes the cake though, because of how utterly pants-on-head retarded it is. Behold.

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCKING FUCK.

Okay, things that immediately spring to mind.

1) WHY.

2) Nice business strategy, dipshits. One of your oh-so-treasured customers can hope and pray that they’ll get one of the limited 500 hardback copies (which are probably all gone within 5 minutes of being made available and will be on eBay for double the price within a week), or, if the customer has an iPad, they can get it off the iBookstore… FOR THE EXACT SAME FUCKING PRICE AAAAARGH WHY IS THE DIGITAL COPY THE SAME PRICE AS A HARDBACK PAPER COPY YOU MOUTHBREATHING BACKBIRTHS THAT IS DEFEATING THE ENTIRE POINT OF DIGITAL PUBLISHING.

3) Also, wow, great way to isolate players late to the party. “Oh wow, Iyanden, my favourite Craftworld! Oh, and they have their own Codex! Awesome!”  LOL NO SORRY LIMITED EDITION ALL GONE. “Oh. Okay.”   BUT DON’T WORRY YOU CAN GET IT FOR YOUR IPAD.   “But I don’t have an iPad, because I don’t want one/can’t afford one.”  OH WELL TOUGH SHIT LOLOLOLOLOL.

4) “What Codex shall we dedicate time and effort to writing? Orks? Sisters of Battle? Something exciting and new like Adeptus Mechanicus? Naaah, let’s make a supplement to that Codex WE LITERALLY ONLY JUST RELEASED.” I get why you chose Iyanden GW, but Eldar players have already creamed their pants because you’ve finally pulled your thumb out of your backside and plastic Wraithguard are now a thing; you didn’t need to offer any more incentive for people to buy them.

5) On that subject; Iyanden? You can honestly fill a whole £30 Codex with content on the Craftworld whose gimmick is “army of spooky ghoooosts!”. And don’t try and claim rehashed fiction as “content”. Players can go to Lexicanium for fluff, Codexes should be for the crunch first and foremost, though that said, have fun paying a grand-spanking total of £60 (because as mentioned, this is a supplement, so you need the main Eldar Codex as well) just so you can make a Wraithknight your Warlord, and have a few new bits of wargear. Oooo. So worth it.

6) To go back to a previous point, WHY IS A FUCKING SUPPLEMENTAL CODEX THE SAME PRICE AS ITS PARENT CODEX. “Hey guys, do you want to pay the same price for a third of the content?”  “Yes we do!” replied the idiot fanboys.

7) There is no way on Earth that GW will continue to regularly release other supplemental Codexes like this for other armies that are no longer in the spotlight (for example, Thousand Sons or Lost and the Damned for Chaos). They didn’t update Dark Eldar for 10 years, what fucking hope have Iron Warriors got? Hell, Iyanden might even be the only Eldar sub-Codex they do. Tough shit, Biel-Tan players!

GW, seriously, this isn’t rocket science. Stop acting like dicks. Stop pretending that it’s exciting because it’s Limited Edition; it isn’t. It just widens the divide between casual gamers and demented fanboys with more money than sense. Make these “Limited Edition” Codexes cheaper (£15 doesn’t seem too unreasonable), and make them print-on-demand. Or release it as a PDF so players who don’t own iPads can buy it too. Oh my goodness, look at that, you’ve widened your target market. I hear that’s a good thing in business. Admittedly, you don’t get the “gold rush effect” and you don’t make obscene amounts of money within a small space of time, but you can be certain that you’d  make a lot more over the long run.

Phew. Rant over. At least until GW do something else equally stupid. Shouldn’t take too long.

– Gareth