Field of Glory Renaissance: V1.1?

What a momentous week in the weird world of Field of Glory.  Nik Gaukroger has announced that he is to lead an official, Slitherine endorsed, update project.  In a post on the Slitherine forum he said:

“It is not going to be a v2, it is going to be an update to v1 - so think of it as v1.x. You can decide on what the "x" is when the scope becomes clear.

It is not going to be a new rules book. This, logically, means that a PDF download is the most likely distribution method. No new army list books either before anyone asks.

… the aim is to keep the number of changes within reason - update not wholesale revision is the aim.

… I anticipate a small number of army list revisions may be included but the number … will be kept low

… I do not anticipate any new [army] lists”

He’s already enlisted the help of well known players Kevin Johnson and Stephen Stead to help.  As of this morning there was no indication whether the update would be a free download similar to the errata or not. It appears the dog’s breakfast that is “destroyed artillery” is already on the list of things to look at.

What interests me is how this came about.  There’s been a nearly constant stream of “what should we change posts” dating back two or three years so why now? 

It seems to have been centred around three threads which appeared within days of one another and Nik Gaukroger’s participation in all three:

• Nigel Emson kicked things off on Monday with a thread entitled “More competitions in 2017 without the 50:50 rule?” which raised the issue of army choice in competitions being stifled by ad hoc list restrictions. 
• Then Tim started another thread on Tuesday entitled “What two things would a spruced up FoG:R have to have?” which asked for suggestions that would help halt, if not reverse, the decline in numbers playing in FOGR competitions.
• By Thursday Kevin Johnson had started another thread entitled “Is it really the rules or is it...” which asked for suggestions to improve the format of competitions rather than the rules themselves again this was aimed at boosting player numbers.

By Friday this had led to Nik approaching “the powers that be” [sic] and agreeing to lead an update project.  Looks to me like a case of having the right people in the right place at the right time.  I wish them lots of luck with the project and I will be following this with interest.