Phil Kelly
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Phil Kelly is a games designer for Games Workshop. /tg/'s opinion on the man oscillates between absolute adoration and hateful skub. The guy writes goddamn amazing fluff. His fluff is the direct antithesis of Matt Ward. The crunch, on the other hand... Well, most of his books are fairly decent, but his skill at internal balance (i.e. weighing units against each other in a single Codex) is nearly as bad as Robin Cruddace. That's not to say the Codices are bad, per se; rather, his Codices usually have one truly great build, one or two other builds that work alright, and a lot of builds that just don't work very well (usually referred to as "monobuild").
In any case, /tg/ generally loves this guy, if just because he isn't Ward or Cruddace. He almost definitely isn't as good as Jeremy Vetock (except where the fluff is concerned), but Vetock is both American (and therefore not as spiffy) and not as well established as Kelly, so Kelly is generally considered the top dog among games devs.
Ahem...
Aside from the new hotness that is Jeremy Vetock, Kelly is essentially the only game designer that /tg/ actually likes. Robin Cruddace fucked up Tyranids badly and buffed Imperial Guard to Wardian levels, and Matt Ward... well, if you've spent any time here at all you know our feelings on a certain chapter's spiritual liege.
Kelly is often regarded as perfect by /tg/, which is only partially true. His fluff (with the notable exception of Codex: Space Wolves) is almost uniformly awesome, even in cases when it should be really, really stupid. However, his actual crunch has seen ups and downs. Most of his Codexes are very middle-of-the-road, and the internal balance is almost always terrible; it's not a Kelly book unless there's at least one completely useless unit and one completely overpowered, auto-include-or-else unit.
Why Phil Kelly Isn't Matt Ward
Matt Ward designs armies by taking a bunch of units and cranking up their power level to MAXIMUM, either by making them extremely difficult to kill, extremely shooty, extremely choppy, or any combination of the three. He then assigns points values to these units based on what he thinks they should cost and peppers a few special rules here and there for "flavour" before tossing the Codex into the printers office.
Phil Kelly designs armies that work as armies, rather than a bunch of units that rely on simply being "better" than anything the opponent can field in order to function properly. That's why neither the Dark Eldar or Space Wolves Codexes have big, fat, expensive units with Thunder Hammers, Storm Shields and Feel No Pain for 200pts - you can have units like this if you want them, but where Matt Ward has to give them to you for peanuts because he can't design an army without making it broken, Phil Kelly makes you pay through the bumhole for them because in his army books, these units are a luxury, not a necessity.
tl;dr: Phil Kelly is the best designer GW have got, the only one who makes armies that require any thought to play, and the only thing standing between the gaming side of 40k and complete assmongery. If your army hasn't had a new Codex yet pray to THE EMPRAH/CHAOS GODS that it's Phil Kelly who is going to write the update because if it is, you can count on your book still kicking ass three years down the line, looking like a joke but being almost unbeatable in the right hands, or surviving through two Editions as a force to be reckoned with. Unlike certain army books written by a certain spiritual liege, which seem broken at first but quickly fizzle out as they collapse under the weight of their own hollow bullshit, and even at their peak still have a number of units that are utterly worthless due to stuff in the book that does their job better.
However dialectic around GW writers never stops and it seems that the tides are changing direction. Now that everyone everywhere loathe Ward and workship Kelly, it's cool, very cool indeed, loving Matt Ward and his work and blaming Phil Kelly about all the bad design around WH40k and remember stupid designs within Space Wolves, Dark Eldar and Chaos Space Marine codices (special mention to certain dragon). Now, all hipsters are turning to Ward, until he will be so popular that Phil Kelly will be awesome again.
However due to Ward moving over to writing the mini-dexs people are starting to notice Kelly's flaws more and more...
Why Phil Kelly isn't perfect
Phil Kelly isn't a hot topic for the boards of tg because he isn't as bad as Matt Ward, Gav Thrope, Cruddace or CS Goto in ether the fluff or rules writing department. That being said, Kelly isn't perfect; he has a few shortcomings as well.
The most notable example would be some of the issues surrounding Codex: Space Wolves. First and foremost, much of the fluff is frankly ridiculous, such as a story about scuba-diving Terminators. Most of the non-Codex: Space Marines wargear has the word "Wolf" thrown in for no reason, such as Wolf Fangs, Wolf Necklaces, Wolf Tail Talismans, and, of course, wolf mounts. Yes, this Codex has Space Wolves ride giant Thunderwolves while acting like wolves with their wolf wargear, while leading packs of Fenrisian Wolves. It's an example of taking something Awesome and overdoing it. Additionally, the Codex is an extreme example of "Codex Creep." It has a number of choices that are outright better than the Codex: Space Marines equivalents while costing much less, leading to the disappearance of vanilla Marines from competitive play. The most egregious examples are Grey Hunters (who have a bunch of special rules and equipment, including Wolf Guard Terminators as Sergeants, at a cheaper cost than vanilla's Tactical Squads) and Long Fangs (who have much greater firepower than the equivalent Devastator Squads but cost nearly the same). To be fair, the Codex Creep may have been forced on him, and Kelly hasn't repeated these mistakes as of yet, showing some sign of restraint and learning.
Kellyfanboirantcounterargument: Yeah, what would you expect a werewolf in space army to be about, badgers? Also, except for the thunderwolves, most of the wolf wargear has been present since at least 3rd edition.
Another issue would be the low(ish) level of competitiveness of his armies, the exception being the aforementioned Wolfdex: Wolf Wolves. To be fair, both Orks and Eldar are old books that can't be expected to feasibly compete, especially given Eldar is now the third-oldest book. Still, it seems like army lists from his books come down to "Eldrad and Vect" or "Heldrakes and Nurgle". The armies do have good options, but many of the options don't seem as good as they really should (especially thanks to rampant over-costing), leading to a lack of choices in army lists. Mediocre units (but not bad per se) are fairly common in Phil Kelly books, including Mandrakes, Chosen, Possessed (although Possessed are much better than their 4th edition incarnation), Juggernauts, Grotesques, and so on. Some of these can be good, but are harder to use than units in other codexes. Of course, that could just be balance talking...
Kellyfanboirantcounterargument: They are designed to be good in the hands of a good player, not for a kid to pick everything he likes and then beat everyone, like a certain spiritual liege did with certain space marines in shiny grey armor.
Counterpoint: Its funny Kelly's books are the only ones people constantly rave that you "have to be a good player to use them", Cruddance makes bad crunch and he gets vilified, Kelly does it and "Screw you, you're just not a good enough player to use the book!". Also its funny how he made CSM the 40k equivalent of a wet noodle unless you want to take a dragon, while buffing Eldar into the stratosphere yet never once got accused of fanboying the book, I wonder how much venomous raging there would be if Matt Ward had written that very same codex? How many gamers would rip him for being a space elf fanboy and making them broken? Or maybe they would nickname him the High Lord of Wave Serpants. Yet Kelly is free of any and all criticism? Not saying he isnt a good author but its amazing the double standard people have with some of these codex writers.
Counterpoint 2: Yeah too bad its easier to just spam Heldrakes, in fact since Grey Knights are fairly mid tier now so can take more skill as its easy to counter them and their tactics that made them into rape trains no longer work.
Finally, Kelly is becoming known as the "High Lord of Random Tables" because he puts random tables in every... fucking... thing. This has only started with his more recent codexes, but Chaos Space Marines introduced a Warriors of Chaos-esque table for challenges, Dark Eldar had randomized combat drugs (although that was an artifact of their original codex), and the new Chaos Daemons are an absolute mess of random tables, with most of the wargear and a number of special rules (including Daemonic Instability and Warp Storm) being entirely random (of course, it should be remembered it is Chaos we are talking about...). Some see this as a good thing because it adds "spice" to the game, but many find these tables to be tedious, annoying, and damaging to the game.
Kellyfanboirantcounterargument: What? Ok lets see, you find tedious rolling 1 die for a daemonic gift in a game that take hours to collect, assemble and paint a single model and weeks to paint an army? What about the NOT random option of replacing an exalted roll for a grimoire of true names(while having a chance to also roll 1 and get a freeby small reward), one of the only ways to make bloodcrushers playable, or 4 out of 6 greater rewards upgrading your survivability? That's good odds and not only "spice", "annoyance" or "damaging the game". Also, you'd expect the EMBODIMENT of PURE CHAOS to NOT be random? Let's face it, the new Chaos Daemon book is awesome and it's because of Phil Kelly(and Robin Cruddace).
Counterpoint: A small element of randomness is fine; too much of it is just tedious, annoying and it interferes too much with the game.
tl;dr = Phil Kelly needs to do less damage in /tg/, see my new stat block.
A small list of the great deeds of Philipus Kellius
Warhammer 40k
- Codex: Space Wolfs (5th Edition). This codex gave them their true identity as an immensely fun and tactical army that absolutely spams the word "wolf." WOLFY WOLF WOLF FOR THE WOLFWOLF.
- Codex: Orks (4th Edition). A Codex that has survived through two editions still coming out somewhat strong though with a very small number of competitive builds to this day. Though the cheese it once had seems to have been stolen by mice. Responsible for the dreaded 'Aspekt boyz'; forcing specialized orks into designated squads, forcing lootas to use only deffguns, burna boyz to stick to one squad, and so on. Also, hilarious.
- Codex: Eldar (4th Edition). A great codex in and of itself, although it has not gone through editions as well as Philipus's other codexes due to changes beyond his control (such as the vehicle rules and codex power creep), it is still one of the better written codexes of all time, fun, balanced, and fluffy.
- Codex: Dark Eldar (5th Edition). This, this is the best written Codex EVAR. Commorragh's description is a true masterpiece, along with Vect's, Malys', and Sliscus' background. It is powerful without being broken, fun without being weak, and as tactically challenging as a fast glass cannon should be. Moreover, Kelly managed to give new life to the evil cousins of the Eldars, allowing them to be competitive once again.
- Codex: Chaos Space Marines (3rd & 6th Edition). We knew the bucks we were paying were worth it. Failbaddon is getting shit done and kicking Cadia's arse, possibly with the Primarchs. Possessed and the-ones-which-shall-not-be-named are better than last edition. Motherfucking daemon dino-bots and a vector-striking robo-dragon flyer. The first 6th edition Codex and the first colored 40k Codex. To be fair, the 'dex has revealed some of its trouble areas over time, namely its internal balancing: Warp Talons and Mutilators are terminally useless whereas Heldrakes are second only to Vendettas as the best flyer in the game.
- Codex: Chaos Daemons (6th Edition). The Chaos Gods will be pleased. Even if they write them half as good as their mortal counterparts will be TWO times or MORE better than they are now. You're deserving the daemonhood, Phil... (P.S.: In said Codex, Phil actually hints that a Grey Knight has had a seed of doubt planted with in his mary-sue heart. Yes, Lord Kelly is this awesome.) Crunch-wise, the army plays like horde with cheap, disposable and deadly units all over the place.
- Codex: Eldar (6th Edition). Take two! This time around, Eldar weaponry will bring a rapetrain's worth of fun to the guys firing them and cause purest agony to the ones they are directed at. Psyker Level 4 Eldrad! Lots of DS2 weapons! SHOOTING AND RUNNING ability for units across the board (However Phil has recently admitted Ward came up with the ideal). A whole slew of new phantom units including THE BIGGEST fucking citadel model ever outside of Apocalypse! Of course, Eldar are still made of wet cardboard, but hey, a unit that already killed its enemies before they saw it doesn't have to fear enemy fire at all.
- Supplement: Farsight Enclaves. Crisis suits as troops? Completely crazy bodyguard squad made of independent characters (including an independent character RIPTIDE)? The Dawn Blade stealing the life force from those it's killed, and giving it to Farsight? Need I say more? (On the downside, the Etherials shift a little too hard from "ambiguous but vaguely benevolent space Taoists" to "cackling mustache-twirling cartoon villains.")
- Warzone Damnos: You though Ward was an Ultramarine fanboy? I haven't seen nothing yet. Due to their defeat at Damnos there was a massive morale drop throughout the Imperuim so the Ultramarines lead a force to reclaim the now Major Tomb World. It has Calgar lifting up a Pylon and firing it at Tomb Complexes and Cato Sicarius killing a transcendent C'tan shard in a duel.
Every general prays to Khorne/Empy/Khaine that their army's next codex is written by Kelly.
Unless you have faith in our Spiritual Liege. Or the Treadhead, if you lead a certain shooty army. Or the new guy.
And now Kelly is moving into Black Library with a series of novels about Commander Farsight. Only time will tell whether or not they'll be what every Tau fan has been waiting for since... ever.
http://www.blacklibrary.com/new-at-bl/new-tau-series-coming-soon.html
Warhammer Fantasy Battle
- Army Book: Vampire Counts. Philipus has become the savior of undeath, bringing untold horrors apon the old world, and for that he has our immortal gratitude. He even tried to advance the plot of Warhammer Fantasy! A bit of fluff in the codex has Mannfred conspiring with Kemmler to resurrect Nagash in a ritual involving a battle, the abduction and sacrifice of the High Elf Everqueen's daughter (as the future Everqueen, this on its own would have terrible ramifications for the High Elves if it succeeded). This also disrupted an attempt at reconciliation between the High Elves and Dwarfs.
- Army Book: Warriors of Chaos 7th edition. Pretty damn good. He gave them some nifty special characters such as Valkia, Sigvald and Wulfric. And it had the saga of Khalac Swordsson in it. He put a fucking Viking drinking song into a Warhammer codex; that's how awesome he is.
- Army Book: Beastmen Coming soon
Codexes Lord Kelly is rumored to write
if you are a true servant of the Lord of Random Tables, you shall keep vigilant watch for rumors of upcoming codexes, and write here those that may be written by Kelly, that the masses may receive knowledge in advance.
- Orks
- Bretonnia (no, it's still not Brettonia)
And listen to this charming motherfucker chat about the Deldar with the also awesome Jes Goodwin.