Games Workshop To Launch New Warhammer Adventures Book Series
May 24, 2018 by brennon
Games Workshop and Black Library this week announced that they would be working with Cavan Scott and Tom Huddleston on a range of books, Warhammer Adventures, designed to introduce younger readers and gamers into the world of Age Of Sigmar and Warhammer 40,000.
The first two titles will be City Of Lifestone and the Attack Of The Necron, focused on young adventurers making their way through these worlds on their own adventures whilst the rest of the world goes on around them.
There has of course been a massive backlash against these, but also resounding support as well. I think personally any chance to tell a new and interesting story within these worlds is worth exploring. Both the authors have also talked about their aims on Twitter and they seem very much on the side of accepting the worlds as they are, but being able to put their own unique spin on things.
I generally believe that if you're a parent with young kids who love these games, then why not give them a wider window into the narrative. They are going to be more encouraged to read if they love the subject...so let's see where these go before we judge them.
What are your thoughts?
"They are going to be more encouraged to read if they love the subject...so let's see where these go before we judge them..."
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I think it sounds like a good idea if it is done right.
Seems like a great way to potentially create a new age group of player base by allowing parents to get their children engaged in the Grimdark before they may be ready to play some AOS or 40K.
I think this is great! I first started reading Black Library books when I was about 11 and I was not ready for some of those. Farseer had a spaceship shaped like a demonic phallus and a man getting fleyed alive and I remember getting really freaked out when I read that scene.
Having something like this means younger gamers can still engage with the setting they are interested in.
I agree they might want to tone some of it down for younger readers, but some how feel that a bunch of teenagers have a 4 legged felines chance in the warp of surviving the many things that are a) trying to kill them , b)eat them c) possess them and turn them something Cthulu wouldn’t take home to his mom, d) enslave them , Probably all at the same time.
A massive backlash against what? Get kids off PC’s, tablets and consoles to play games with real people and then get them to read real books. I must find something to complain about. Hang on, nope can’t think of anything.
Here, here – if I had kids into GW games I’d be getting them onto these!
You may find that getting them onto these may get them into GW games. If not they still read a book :-).
I have two fears here:
Firstly, I think this risks being a case of too little too soon. This will be great for 8 to 12 year old and get them into the world but what exists between there and the (and I use this term loosely for lack of anything better so forgive me if it sounds gatekeeper-y 3= ) adult work? If said 12 year old loves in love with the Warhammer Adventures: Attack of the Necrons, what products exists between this and say: Fulgrim or Fifteen Hours or the Night Lords.
Secondly, I wonder how they will handle the grim, often genocidal tone of these worlds and (especially seeing as at least one of the characters is more or less stated to be a pacifist) and hope it doesn’t bleed back into primary properties in weird ways.
That being said, I choose to remain more or less optimistic. Being able to share my love of the franchise with my son when he grows up appeals to me greatly. I will just reserve wider judgement to we see how this pans out over the next few years and see if they manage to bring the two together well.
Love the look of this, a great way to get youngest more engrossed in the amazing fluff that exists in these wonderful IP’s as well as the painting and then game that they do now.
Granted it’ll be a hell of a shock when they start reading about the ‘grim dark’ when they get older 😀 😀
Why a backlash?
I’m more curious if anything, even though I’m not in age group (just !!!) I am tempted to buy one when it come outs to see how they do it.
My 9 year old already has been painting and playing AOS since it launched, and 40K with the release of the new edition. He loves these games and the miniatures. But his exposure to the deeper world has been limited by me and what codices/rules I let him openly browse.
He is extremely excited by the news that these books are on the way! Also by the fact he is already a huge fan of Cavan Scott and Tom Huddleston from their Wild Space series.
I can’t help but hope that this new series will help keep his interest in the hobby and provide an entryway for his friends(I foresee us sending these books as gifts to birthday parties).
I almost hope they go pre-school with it, maybe in the vein of Julia Donaldson – “Whats a Necron, a necron, don’t you know – they have green glowing weapons and shiny metallic bodies, bug like servants and come back from the dead… nite nite my angel – the emperor protects
Well it they can put a version of ‘The Call of Cuthulu’ done in the style of Dr Seuss on U-tube anything is possible (plus the great ‘Cuthulu fun things to do on a sunny day’ colouring book).
i was not aware of those… that needs to be watched.
The current Black Library output is hardly mature reading. Kids can deal with peril and danger in their books just fine. This could be good and I’ll be reading them to my kids.
Gut feeling is this will be bad but I’ll reserve judgment until it’s out.
40k is a setting as a setting there’s room for lots of different story’s, See caiaphas cain, a book with inquisitors the arbiter trilogy for example war is the backdrop not the only thing. (Country to the blurb I know but there’s already a pressident set in the books mentioned above)
-Thoughts-
I wonder how much of the nasty stuff will be sidestepped, the blurb on the site says it’s not a nice place and everyone knows it just doesn’t go into details. If told from the children’s point of view the man being taken away with the mutation might just be going to jail but we adults know he’s about to be purified with fire. Child “Mummy where’s navigator bob” mom – “he passed away during warp transit” we don’t need it said that the navigator had a daemon rip its way out of the man ear.
Good choice with the necrons as the bad guys no blood and they teleport out when they die. Also anything killed by a gauss weapon can be short handed to “billy was disintegrated” rather than “billy was ripped apart layer by layer …”
I think the story will be the children get lost/trapped in a awakening tomb and the story will be a Dr who esque run away until the space marines show up to save the day.
If the Explorer has some sort of inquisition or rouge trader esque permission to interact with Xeno tech that could explain why the protagonists aren’t killed off to keep the knowledge of the cross quiet.
The art threw me off at first, but after a second’s thought I thought if this were a comic/graphic novel I wouldn’t even blink at the artwork, so I just shrugged it off and accepted it.
I think this is a great idea and a great way to get kids into the hobby/fandom early.
I think the backlash is ridiculous and the haters are blowing things out of proportion. There seem to be two camps, one who think the entire setting will be watered down and become all rainbows and hugs, and the other camp who think the kids will be hit full in the face full on with graphic gore and Slaaneshi orgies. I can only roll me eyes at this. I’m not familiar enough with AoS to comment on that one, but on the 40k one all these haters seem to be ignoring the fact that the setting is vast and not everything is a war torn hellhole; it’s perfectly plausible for these books to take place somewhere away from the horrors of war. It doesn’t even need to be on another planet; kids books set in the real world don’t mention the numerous conflicts happening concurrently in real life, so why would a 40k book necessarily have to mention a war between the Imperium and an ork Waaagh! happening on the other side of the planet?
As for Slaanesh, there’s no reason anything Slaaneshi need appear, and even if it did, people seem to be forgetting that there’s more to Slaanesh than sex, drug and rock&roll. Slaanesh is about any pleasure, so that angle could be pursued instead of the worn out sexual one. Unfortunately this is something that’s happened to all the Chaos Gods, people forgetting there’s more to them than one or two themes (Khorne is also about honourable combat, Tzeentch about hope and innovation, Nurgle about resilience in the face of all odds), so these books could be a great way of exploring those forgotten avenues and maybe even reintroducing them to the ‘adult’ fiction to flesh out Chaos and breath new life into it.
I’ve also seen people moaning about the info that one of the characters hating weapons and everyone thinking that means she’s a pacifist and has no place in 40k. I roll my eyes at this because disliking weapons does not mean being a pacifist – Batman hates guns, but no one would call him a pacifist; the Doctor hates guns and violence and calls himself a pacifist yet exterminates aliens all the time. Why would the 40k kid be any different?
All in all I do wonder how many of the haters are the old grognards who hate on all things new and how many are immature teenagers (not necessarily actual teenagers, that’s just their maturity/sofistication level) who think that talking about ‘bewbs and violence’ makes them look ‘kewl and edgy’. :/
This kind of makes me nervous.
I remember in the 80’s through the early 2000’s when the video stores and rental places repeatedly had issues with idiot parents who thought all anime was for kids because it’s a cartoon…even if it was placed in a very different place with movies rated for adults (or actually with adult movies) and then returning in a rage about how dare they sell smut and gore for children.
They didn’t even look at the box beyond it being a form of animated entertainment, even ones with clear ratings labels still visible.
I’m afraid these are going to lead to that kind of scenario where after reading these, little Jimmy gets one of the other Warhammer books and GW stuff ends up in the news for pointing kids to that kind of thing.
I’ve seen someone suggest that that might be the intention and this is a calculated move by GW to replicate the ‘Satanic Panic’ that surrounded D&D in the 80s to give them free publicity and boost their popularity in the same way D&D benefitted from the Satanic Panic.
Personally I think that’s a worthless conspiracy theory, but thought it was worth bringing up nonetheless.
I don’t know what to think about these. While idea seems good on paper it all comes down to execution and how it turns out. One thing that worries me is how they will handle those child characters while also having things like Space Marines vs Necrons as well as how they handle settings that are known to be less than child friendly.
Seems like a good idea to me.
Be interesting to see how they approach it, but from my point of view it has 3 possible effects on the hobby – bring in more gamers, help widen the appeal so we get a more diverse group, get kids reading – none of the above can be bad.
I think the worry is probably misplaced. The point of doing children’s books is surely to avoid dumbing down the setting as portrayed in the rest of the material they put out.
As it is, over the years GW have put out some shockingly bad source material – novels, sourcebooks, etc. I think such books do more damage to the setting than a series of ringfenced for children books will do. Children’s books can easily be avoided (or read, enjoyed and set aside as not being part of the ‘real’ setting). It’s harder to disentangle the settings, plots and characters introduced by bad writers in the ‘proper’ novels and army books / codexes, etc.
Don’t see what the fuss is about. If it works it works and if it doesn’t it doesn’t. As A child I’d liked to have had something like this and I would have no issue buying these for children either.
To thus asking what the backslash is about, here is a short explanation:
The main backlash is due to the fact that 40k is not kid friendly, so the fear is that this may lead to a kid proofing of the whole franchise. Just look at the handling of Slanesh, it could become an issue.
For example due to a backlash from soccer moms who after buying this for their kids, buy the other non kid friendly material (it is Warhammer it is for kids you know; just look at the Deadpool Superhero problem) and end up with kids who read stuff that they definitely don’t want them to read. Which may lead to GW making the whole franchise more kid friendly. Which people object to as the grimdark is what 40k is about.
The second issue is that People hate the SJW and the cover reaks of SJW (10 years ago nobody would have cared for such an cover but now…). So people object that.
But as an observer of GW in the past, I don’t think the cover is due to SJW, it is just how GW rolls (They try for new markets for some time now). Also the art is very non GW, which amplifies the foreign feeling of the cover and thus the fear of an SJW infiltration.
But the first issue is the real deal. Who knows what GW thinks of next. Although the reaction is a little bit to strong.