Phil Kelly

Just gaze at the sideburns on this guy. Gaze in awe.

Phil Kelly is a games designer for Games Workshop. /tg/'s opinion on the man is best described as Oscillating between adoration and hate depending on the new book he puts out. In any case, he's one of the few writers that /tg/ remembers fondly and aside from the new hotness that is Anthony Reynolds (who is both American and therefore not as spiffy as well as less established than Kelly), Kelly is essentially the only current game designer that /tg/ actually likes to talk about. 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.

The Pros and Cons of Phil Kelly

Kelly is often regarded as perfect by /tg/, which is only partially true. The main reason people like him is that unlike some other designers he tries to keep at least some of the themes of the old armies, rather than give away all the mystery behind an army, try to make a chapter into the greatest thing ever, or completely revamp existing armies to fit their tastes and his fluff (with the notable exception of Codex: WOLFITY WOLFITY WOLFY-WOLF WOLVES!!!!!!!!!!!!! RAAAAAAAAARGH!!!!!!!!!!!) is usually very well written and holds true to the old armies, even in cases when it should be really, really stupid. However, his actual crunch has seen ups and downs. Most of his codices 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.

Sometimes though his fluff does have problems, 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 or a handful of Space Wolves floating across space, breaking into a Chaos Space Marine flagship by hitting it, and then slaughtering all Chaos Space Marines onboard before using it to wipe out an entire Chaos fleet. 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. While most of these options have been in the Codex for some time heaping more Wolf options into the codex is an example of taking something Awesome and overdoing it, which is another problem with Kelly. 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).

Another issue would be how his armies are his wobbly crunch, if you want to make Chaos Space Marines competitive you can go Heldrakes and/or Nurgle or go home, whereas with the new Eldar codex you can spam vehicles and have essentially a guaranteed win against all comers lists. The armies do have good options, but many of the options need very specific scenarios to work and earn their points back (especially thanks to rampant over-costing), the Daemon army book for example can be really powerful if you roll decently, but a few bad rolls on mandatory tables will have you lose the game regardless of how sound your game plan is. Mediocre units (but not bad per se) are fairly common in Phil Kelly books, including Mandrakes, Chosen, Possessed, Juggernauts, Grotesques, and so on. 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 all right, and a lot of builds that just don't work very well (usually referred to as "monobuild"). You won't win nearly every game (with a few aforementioned exceptions), but you won't typically lose because somebody took all of your good units and made them terrible for their cost.

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 codices, but Chaos Space Marines introduced a Warriors of Chaos-esque table for challenges, 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 . Some see this as a good thing because it adds "spice" to the game as most of these tables do make sense from a fluff perspective (especially when we're talking about the embodiment of true chaos), but many find these tables to be tedious, annoying, and damaging to the game as it could lead to you either losing the game or curb-stomping the enemy depending on a mandatory lucky 2D6 roll with the opposing argument being "A small element of randomness is fine; too much of it is just tedious, annoying and it interferes too much with the game".

A Small List of Kelly's Work

Warhammer 40k

• Codex: Space Wolfs (5th Edition). This codex gave them their true identity as an immensely fun and tactical (though slightly underpriced) 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 fluff.
• Codex: Eldar (4th Edition). A great codex in and of itself, it fixed a lot of the overpowered nature from 3rd Edition Eldar (most notably turning Exarchs from mini characters to standard champions and their hideously overpowered vehicles) although most of the fluff is copy pasted from 2nd edition and it has not gone through editions as well as Philipus's other codices due to changes beyond his control (such as the vehicle rules and codex power creep), overall it's fun, balanced, and fluffy.
• Codex: Dark Eldar (5th Edition). This, this is arguably Kelly's best work fluff wise, Commorragh's description is a true masterpiece, along with Vect's, Malys', and Sliscus' background. At the time it was 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 certain lists 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 (though still not great). Motherfucking daemon dino-bots and a vector-striking robo-dragon flyer. The first 6th edition Codex and the first fully colored 40k Codex. To be fair, that was all fluff, the crunch was revealed to have some trouble areas, 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 and can be game winners by themselves. Speaking to the former, 3.5 ed CSM was hands down THE BEST codex for CSM, making them the over-costed, OP monsters we remember them as - with legion rules, an awesome wargear section and troops that were useful in the absence of ATSKNF. These were the days when Space Marine fanboys got bent over and raped by possessed dreadnoughts, infiltrating CSM blobs that guided obliterator deep strikes, FA13 Defilers that could fix themselves on a 4+, cult terminators and predators fitted with blastmasters. Sigh, those were the days.
• Codex: Chaos Daemons (6th Edition). The Chaos Gods would be pleased. Though the fluff, while well written, completely changes Daemons from how they used to be into something completely different (there's now a class system for example with regular Daemons looking down upon Daemon Princes for example). The better parts make him a candidate for the daemonhood reward (In said Codex, Phil actually hints in a plausible way that a Grey Knight has had a seed of doubt planted with in his mary-sue heart), whereas the crunch makes him a shoe in for the Something else entirely. The army plays like horde with cheap, disposable and deadly units all over the place and is a truly random force of destruction, never before have games been won or lost just by a single roll.
• Codex: Eldar (6th Edition). Take two! This time around, Eldar were buffed into the stratosphere, their 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 (sometimes to the detriment of a casual game). The codex included buffs like Psyker Level 4 Eldrad, Lots of DS2 weapons, SHOOTING AND RUNNING (an ability for units across the board, however Phil has recently admitted Ward came up with the idea). Some new phantom units including THE BIGGEST fucking citadel model ever outside of Apocalypse! The main drawback was supposed to be their individual soldiers being weaker, but hey, a unit that already killed its enemies before they could do anything means a unit that doesn't have to fear enemy fire at all.
  • Special note on Codex Eldar: it's important to notice that only this codex has made obsolete almost every unit in the game that uses a cover save as its main save, as the basic eldar transport can fire d6+1 S7 shoots, usually twin-linked, that ignore cover from 60". It's a big irony that the same designer that restored dark eldars for the game has destroyed them completely using a single unit, a feat that even Mat Ward has never dreamed. Stealth armours, darkshrouds, camo suits and many other items and units are also now useless. And even more, as almost weapon in the army is semi rending you will never see again a terminator suit. So, Phil Kelly changed the game forever with this codex, and many people still think that much more have been lost since then.
• Supplement: Farsight Enclaves. Crisis suits as troops? Completely crazy powerful 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 from "ambiguous but vaguely benevolent space Taoists" to "cackling mustache-twirling cartoon villains", it removed a lot of mystery that the Enclaves had and had some questionable fluff, like the Enclaves using their limited resources to carve a planet into a D20 just to show off.
• Warzone Damnos: Hands down Kelly's worst work. You thought Ward was an Ultramarine fanboy? You haven't seen anything 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 Scouts sneaking up on a completely undefended pylon, Calgar lifting up said Pylon (which somehow gives him the ability to fire it at Tomb Complexes) Cato Sicarius killing first a Necron Lord by stabbing it in the right spot, then taking out a transcendent C'tan shard in a way that would make C.S. Goto proud. Lastly it had the Deathwatch taking a stroll through the completely undefended Tomb Complex (literally, there are no Scarabs, Spyders, Wraiths or Canoptek anything in this Tomb Complex) all the while planting charges on everything and also forgetting how the new Necron Dynasties work (blow up a world and their mind transfers to the next).
• Codex Deathwatch: He co-wrote this with Robin Cruddace, as confirmed by an interview. Said Codex retcons the Deathwatch into never being a part of the Inquisition, features them using Necron weapons while saying they kill those who use Xenos weapons and has a lot of contradictory lore in general, for example stating that there's a Watch Fortress that excels so much at attacking and destroying Eldar Craftworlds (no mention of how a few Space Marines are supposed to take on a fleet capable of crippling multiple chapters) that they have prevented them from appearing in the Segmentum Solar, however the map depicts two craftworlds only being a few lightyears away from Terra (not to mention a Waaagh! Apparently happened just a few planets over from Terra now). Even though they're no longer a part of the Inquisition they retain access to a massive Inquisition-like network (no mention of how) and they retain their Inquisitorial heraldry, because the book's retconned the Inquisitorial I to just heraldry anyone can wear so long as they guard the Imperium. They also gain some Custodes Gear (no mention of how or how this affects relations with the Custodes), because why not?

All this said though, Kelly is usually a fairly safe bet for having your codex look, feel, and play mostly the same way it used to. 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: Ogre Kingdoms (6th Edition). Kelly introduces a new very fun army with the single lowest model count in the game. While the book's crunch was average (nothing overpowered but at the same time you had a good chance at winning every game you played) the fluff was very good but surprisingly for Kelly was lacking in detail, though that could be argued as the Ogres not keeping very good records of their own history. Problems only started surfacing when the FAQ came out (which did things like add the "Move or Fire" rule to a character that didn't previously have that limitation).
• Army Book: Beastmen (7th Edition) If Warzone Damnos is his worst 40K book, then Beastmen is his worst Fantasy book. The army went from having decent chances at winning games to the worst army in the entire game. Some of the rules were downright retarded, like needing two of the exact same unit to pull off an ambush, one of which would take no part in the ambush. The Beastmen themselves were also moved to a spot where the Chaos Gods and everyone else shit on them constantly, almost never blessing them with gifts to help get the job done, completely losing all access to any kind of mark, and they even lost the ability to make themselves new weapons and armour. On the plus side he kept the theme of them being Chaos Anarchy embodied, and the book introduced several new monsters that have awesome fluff, great models, and would be auto includes if they weren't all hideously overpriced (coming in slightly under some dragons but nowhere near as useful).
• 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 Viking drinking song/saga of Khalac Swordsson in it.
• Army Book: Vampire Counts (8th edition). A fairly decent release, it removed the cheese that the old one had, added some more untold horrors upon the old world, and with Storm of Chaos being retconned into not happening he then (like the rest of the new Army Books) added a bit 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, which is one of the events leading to The End Times. This also disrupted an attempt at reconciliation between the High Elves and Dwarfs.

Future Releases

Unfortunately with the removal of the author credit in the new GW books there's no real way to tell which ones he may or may not have a hand in (especially since they're now supposed to be done by a "design team"), though the White Dwarf articles still interview some of the creators of the various books, so when a new one comes out you'll have to read on the articles to see if he had a hand in it or not. In the White Dwarf issue introducing the End Times this revealed he had a hand in End Times:Nagash, but then so did Matt Ward. If the recent teaser video's on GW's Facebook page are any indication, he's also involved in the upcoming Deathwatch Codex.

And listen to this charming motherfucker chat about the DEldar with the also awesome Jes Goodwin.