Friday, December 9, 2011

The Battle for the Rumor Mill: Chaos Legions


You asked for it, I figured I would post it. Here is the battle for the rumor mill involving Ghost21 and via Aaron Dembski-Bowden. I will set this up a little with some common sense first before we get directly into Aaron's comments.


What are rumors. There are many levels of "real rumors". Mostly they come from the design and development phase of the project, which many different ideas are used and thrown out. (i apologize if I use terms from my run in architecture, its my background, and I have no idea what GW calls design and development). Many ideas are used, and tested during this, and many are thrown out. The beginning of the project during conceptual design, no idea is bad, it helps refine what the end product will be.

I would be surprised if 30-40% of what is originally discussed makes it into a codex. Down the road during the development of a project, ideas are still injected into the project as the codex begins to take shape and gets tested. These are often the ideas that we get some privy to in the form of rumors. Some turn out true, some false, but most have a hint of what is going on in the codex.

Other rumors come from proof-readers (like a couple of my sources), and other people involved in finishing a codex and getting it ready to print. This is just a quick summary of where rumors come from. They are not people that are privy to the final project (most of the time). They are people that have seen the codex, or are involved in its creation, at some point of its writing.

Matt Ward of Phil Kelly do not just sit down and write a codex from start to finish like most people think.

So when it comes to an author of the Black Library getting personally involved in the rumor mill it is going raise some eyebrows. First off, because he can't get involved in this, if he was going to, use a different name for pete's sake. Regardless, I do not know how the writers like Aaron and members of GW get together to discuss information.

Personally the whole thing smells like a smelly crotch queen, but I will let you decide who that is.

Comments that get out of control, are degrading/demeaning to either Ghost21 or  Aaron Dembski-Bowden will be removed. Keep it civil.


via Aaron Dembski-Bowden
The more rumours I check out, the more I see that are clearly false.

"Ghost21" seems to be the one spouting the most nonsense. Whether I was privy to actual Codex rumours or not is pretty irrelevant when there are several points I can flat-out say "Nope" to, in regards to how the IP department explains the fluff to us, and when the rumours are pretending to use characters that the codices are essentially not allowed to touch / wouldn't use without asking us what those characters' fates actually are.

There's even been several people at GDUK this year saying Mat Ward specifically said he's not writing to the Chaos Codex, yet ghost21 insists he is.

Seriously, don't get your hopes up over his rumours.


via ghost21
I'm not exactly sure what to say to that one... regardless.

If he is who he says he is, why take such a hard ass attitude?

He could friendly say "nope", or "I dont think so" or in fact I invite him to come here and talk it over in PM. I mentioned the red angel and little horus (it could have been some guys conversion but he was fairly confident he would make it ).

And if he says who he says he is, we've actually met at those IP meetings.

oh and one last thing writers are told who dies n who doesn't not the other way around


via Aaron Dembski-Bowden
if he is who he says he is why take such a hard ass attitude?

I'm not taking any attitude, really. I'm only pointing out the rumours I know are either false, or exceedingly unlikely to bear fruit.

Bear in mind how anyone in the company hears X or hears Y, from sources A, B and C. I'm not - and will never - share what I have or haven't heard about codex or army book development. Just making that clear. No one in my position would. I don't even hint whether I know anything. I say nothing about it. I like my career and have no interest in losing it.

However, purely as a member of the Heresy team and someone who suckles directly from the core lore sources, some of those rumours are either patently false, or ring hollow with how the IP seems to be presented / was explained to several of us / has been mentioned as being presented in the future.

This is what I said on B&C in my original comments on the subject. Before anything gets out of hand, I'd like to make it clear that I was specifically talking about a couple of points, most notably HH characters in the codex:

"For the record, the Red Angel showing up would surprise me just as much as the separated Renegade/Legion codices, since he's showing up in the Heresy in ways even we've not fully decided yet (we only recently decided who he was), and the IP department are fully aware of it, having been at* the meetings."

(*or privy to)

I'm not making any comment on the other stuff. If I happened to be friends with people at head office and interacted with them professionally and/or personally (which I am, and do) I'd still say nothing. Which is the same thing I'd say if I knew nothing at all. I like my job, hence why I have no interest in risking it.

Purely as an HH writer, I'd be - shall we say - stunned to see certain characters show up in the next Chaos codex, especially when we've only just decided who they are, and their fates aren't decided. That just doesn't strike me as likely.