Games Workshop and Roleplaying

[Clumsy Bob]

Hi all, as we were sat around our gaming table tonight my friends and I got into a disscussion about settings etc.
We then wondered why Games Workshop had not used its vastly resourceful settings of Warhammer and W40K as a role playing game, possibly D20.
Sure I know until recently WHFRP was still around, but would it have worked as D20 (officially not fan based). Then of course there is 40K, to me it screams to be played as an RPG. The amount of background material is vast, to turn it into a viable game should not take too much work for a company like GW.
So what are your thoughts, has this question been raised before?

Bob

 

[Chroma]

There's no good reason...

...just bad ones.

I used to work for GW, and the main reason there were no GW produced RPGs is that several of the "Big 'Uns" (read: upper management) simply hated pen and paper roleplaying games. I was at management meetings (and the drinking sessions afterwards) where the idea was brought up and then promptly shotdown and pissed on. I believe the ill-will stemmed from early GW days, when they sold a variety of products from different companies, but I could never get any definite answers. Heck, I had to keep my D&D affiliations in the closet when I worked there for fear of reprisal! *laugh*

Though they were gaga over miniature games in any form! *laugh*

 

[WayneLigon]

Re: There's no good reason...

I used to work for GW, and the main reason there were no GW produced RPGs is that several of the "Big 'Uns" (read: upper management) simply hated pen and paper roleplaying games.

Ah, great. After they took White Dwarf, one of the best RPG magazines that ever was, and drained the life out of it's twitching corpse to produce the shambling thing it is today... I kinda wondered if it was that they saw no profit in pen-and-paper or if there was some other reason.

Glad I still have all those old issues. I wish they'd do a CD of all the RPG issues.

 

[Cold Beer]

Three words:

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.

That was way back around...oh...86-88? Anyone else play this?

 

[pogre]

RPGs are generally outside of the GW business model. The return purchase rates for RPG is just not high enough. With miniatures people keep building and painting their armies. There is a reason WOTC went to a miniature based combat model.

 

[Thresher]

Yeah we tried it out in a few settings, the WHFRP was quite easy to just use as a 40k-Necromunda setting if you just took the equipment out of the boardgames and stuck a pricetag on it.

They could have done a lot more with it in my opinion, the fantasy and 40k environments where really good and had a lot of ideas for games. As for the system it was really, really brutal, even more so than AD&D so it was quite easy to die and get horribly maimed.
I think I managed to survive 3 head injuries and lost a leg on 1 Dwarf Slayer before he finally got squished by a giant, it all added to the charm I also have fond memories of an Orc Stormboy I played in the 40k setting.

It was lots of fun at the time, I guess if someone was really keen you could adapt it to D20, but the existing gritty rules probably did it more justice and it was easier like I said to just drag equipment and careers over from the boardgames and adapt it to a PC-NPC environment.

 

[Clumsy Bob]

Another question, if I was to run a 40K game, which d20 rules set currently in print would be closest in terms of equitment, space combat etc?

thx Bob

 

[hellbender]

Another question, if I was to run a 40K game, which d20 rules set currently in print would be closest in terms of equitment, space combat etc?

thx Bob

As a big Dredd fan, I would suggest Mongoose's Judge Dredd d20. A Judge character is basically a Marine Scout or starting Inquisitor. The Psi Talent book is very handy, and many of the supplements tie in quite well. Not a lot on Space Combat, though, maybe Dragonstar for that?

hellbender

 

[Ranger REG]

Another question, if I was to run a 40K game, which d20 rules set currently in print would be closest in terms of equitment, space combat etc?

thx Bob

T20: The Traveller's Handbook.

 

[Yuan-Ti]

As a big Dredd fan, I would suggest Mongoose's Judge Dredd d20. A Judge character is basically a Marine Scout or starting Inquisitor. The Psi Talent book is very handy, and many of the supplements tie in quite well. Not a lot on Space Combat, though, maybe Dragonstar for that?

hellbender

Wasn't the original Judge Dredd a GW game? Maybe in a another universe but I certainly seem to remember it that way. Anyway, the flavor is certainly there, so I think the rules might work for WH40k. You would have to do a lot of converting, though unless you kept it simple and basically put your players in certain roles and then had the rest be just bad guys.