Are they Outriders? - Hell No! They are Regulators! Rebel outlaw unofficial non-tournament rulemeisters that have been contributing ideas to WH40K for over 20 years. They began in the mid-1990s publishing a web page that issued House Rules to fix inconsistencies in the game, adding content to make 40K more mature and playable, and enriching the game when the shareholders of Games Workshop UK tried to "dumb down" the product to a younger age group. Rogue Trader was issued with a warning: "Ages 16 and up", to which House Shadis has been true for 20 years.

How does Games Workshop feel about this? - GWUK has threatened many sites with legal action, but House Shadis has never sought to profit or infringe on the copyright of Games Workshop. Further, they have lectured and spoken about the intellectual rights of authors and corrected GWUK on several issues in trademark and language use. House Shadis published the first "Codex [species]", Codex Squat, Codex Shadis - noting the use of Eldar Codex was incorrect Latin and schooling GW editors about this humorously.

Jervis Johnson has praised the work, but other hobbyists such as the sales and marketing groups have decried House Shadis as a poor influence on the hobby - adding confusion to the young players who cannot fathom custom rules or sportsmanship concepts - and sought to imitate or mimic the Shadis promotional events run at regional convensions since 1989 with a program called "Outriders". Outriders are, in the opinion of the Shadis group, salespeople pretending to be hobbyists in order to push for status in an organization owned solely by the parent comapny, and as such - their conflict of interest between good rules, fun games, and profit for the parent firm is clear in the eyes of adults.

Why is Warhammer 40,000 Popular now (2009) - After several failures and laughable attempts, GWUK has finally carried off "Dawn of War" and "Dawn of War 2" in video game consoles. These games introduced a much larger audience to the realisitic appeal of large-scale warfare that House Shadis recognized in the 1980s with Warhammer 40,000. After the similar "Warhammer Online" product failure, GW position int he market remains very unstable. More people know about Warhammer 40,000 now than the fantasy product, and the audience of todays "War on Terror" is much more receptive to high technology stories than Midieval superstition and debate. This has been augmented by a successful run of fiction novels by GWUK, which are in bookstores today and well marketed.

What does House Shadis get out of this? - Many core elements (including the backstory) have changed, and House Shadis now operates a library consisting of the old and new material for academic research and historical purposes. The firm uses GWUK, Disney, Apple, Intel, AMD, Fallout/Wasteland, and other media products as public examples teaching a new generation the fundamentals of game design and development for global worldwide audiences - while promoting hobby and social activities for youth and young adults. The success and failure of GWUK over the years is an excellent example of business "Do's and Don'ts" in intellectual property. While most consumers do not recognize this history, House Shadis is keen to discuss it from the perspective of an independent and vested 3rd party in the marketplace.

Do House Shadis sell any books? - Not Warhammer 40,000 related content. The group gives away all of its product online in digital format for use worldwide under copyright protection (protection from reprinting or claim by others or transfer of content). Under the Berne Convention, all extensions to a game belong to the originator of the game system - including fiction written exclusively for the game. This ruling is to prevent other publishers from "preying" on a game publisher with unauthorized expansions should a licensing relationship break down and was established in the famous case between the Star Trek boardgame and a former employee of the firm responsible for 90% of their content. However, copyright does prevent GWUK or other affiliate from adopting the rules or methods without giving credit, citing them as their original work, or seeking to profit by their sale. The power limits only commercial use of extensions, not a full transfer of content rights as presumed by some authors. This means that while GWUK may like or dislike Shadis content, they cannot adopt from it directly for commercial use without citation and purchase of publication rights (protecting the authors from unauthorized transfer of work).

Should GW UK reach a licensing agreement, Shadis content would be available through GWUK or their affilliates. Until then, it is free online exclusively from the SDA3. The only restriction asked is that such content is cited as "unofficial expansions" and not a product or publication of Games Workshop now, in the past, or in the foreseeable future. This protects "official" shops and tournaments from unfair inclusion of rules or elements which may alter the fairness of play or contests run by GWUK or its retails. Individual groups playing for fun and entertainment outside these formal contests are free to use the rules put forth by House Shadis without any legal penalty or risk, and are in fact encouraged to do so by Jervis Johnson and Rick Priestley in all of the rulebooks from 1987-2009.

In other words, do what you want and have fun. The hobby will benefit most in this way. That is how Warhammer 40,000 started after all (using zoids and figures from other games), before becoming a unique property with a proprietary scale and figure set.

Outriders will tell you that you MUST USE ONLY OFFICIAL MINIATURES and WHAT YOU SEE IS ALL YOU GET. To Hell with them. We came to have fun. Whatever you can agree on with your opponent is fine. The idea you have to buy and equip your figures is just anal, and not even close to what the hobby is REALLY about (at House Shadis). Sportsmanship, honesty, agreement, and fun. And resolving a dispute with a die...well, that's just stupid. Call a judge. And if you can't find two players AND a judge the way you play with others - then you are already doing it wrong.