Games Workshop Group PLC ("Games Workshop" or the "Group") announces its half-yearly results for the six months to 29 November 2015.
Highlights:
Six months to
Six months to
29 November
30 November
2015
2014
Revenue
£55.3m
£56.5m
Revenue at constant currency*
£56.9m
£56.5m
Operating profit pre-royalties receivable
£4.7m
£5.5m
Royalties receivable
£1.5m
£0.7m
Operating profit
£6.2m
£6.2m
Pre-tax profit
£6.3m
£6.3m
Cash generated from operations
£8.6m
£7.8m
Basic earnings per share
14.9p
14.5p
Dividend per share declared in the period
20p
36p
Kevin Rountree, CEO of Games Workshop, said:
"We have made some good progress on our strategic initiatives all focused on delivering long term growth. Whilst we are disappointed with the decline in return on capital reported in the period, we are all confident that we are focused on delivering the necessary changes to address this decline.
In the period we launched some great new products and our new visitor centre has performed well.
December sales were below expectations across the Group. At this stage in the Company's financial year, the Company's internal projections indicate that pre-tax profit for the year to 29 May 2016 is unlikely to exceed £16 million. A further update will be made when appropriate. "
We have made some good progress on our strategic initiatives all focused on delivering long term growth. Whilst we are disappointed with the decline in return on capital reported in the period, we are all confident that we are focused on delivering the necessary changes to address this decline.
In the period we launched some great new products and our new visitor centre has performed well.
We are focused on delivering value. Our key measure of our performance is return on capital. During the period our return on capital fell from 38% at November 2014 to 36%. This was driven by both an increase in average capital employed** and a decline in operating profit before royalties receivable.
Trading update
December sales were below expectations across the Group. At this stage in the Company's financial year, the Company's internal projections indicate that pre-tax profit for the year to 29 May 2016 is unlikely to exceed £16 million. A further update will be made when appropriate.
Sales
Reported sales fell by 2.2% to £55.3 million for the period. On a constant currency basis, sales were up by 0.7% from £56.5 million to £56.9 million; split by channel this comprised: retail £23.0 million (2014: £23.4 million), trade £22.3 million (2014: £22.0 million) and mail order £11.6 million (2014: £11.1 million).
Retail
This channel showed growth in non-core retail but was offset by declines in our core retail business. However on a constant currency basis sales were broadly in line with last year. We opened, including relocations, 22 one man store format stores and three multi man format stores in the period. We also started our trial of four multi man format stores in high footfall locations; Sydney, Munich, Paris and Copenhagen. After closing 13 stores, our net total number of stores at the end of the period is 430.
The key priority is store manager recruitment. On 9 November 2015, I appointed an expert in recruitment to my management team. This person will ensure we have a constant supply of retail store managers and trade recruiters and account developers. She will also work with me to review our global people strategy.
Trade
All key territories were broadly in line with last year. In the period, our net number of trade outlets increased by 61 accounts.
To broaden our core trade product reach, in the period, we have designed a small new product range and are at present actively signing up distribution agents to sell this product into North America. We continue to work on other product formats to optimise other opportunities.
Mail order
Sales in our online shops were up 5.3%.
Non-core
This includes licensing, digital, export, the visitor centre, non-strategic trade accounts, book trade, magazine and mass-market opportunities. Non-core sales were down by 2.5% from £7.8 million to £7.6 million due to declines in sales in digital, export and the book trade offset by growth in visitor centre and non-strategic trade sales. In the period, royalties receivable from licensing increased from £0.7 million to £1.5 million.
Operating profit
Core business operating profit (operating profit before royalty income) fell by £0.8 million to £4.7 million (2014: £5.5 million). On a constant currency basis, core business operating profit increased by £0.1 million to £5.6 million. The net impact in the six months to 29 November 2015 of exchange rate fluctuations was a loss of £0.9 million. It is not the Group's policy to hedge against foreign exchange exposure.
Operating expenses increased by £0.3 million due to an investment in sales facing activities relating to new retail store costs. Costs remain a key area of focus.
Capital employed
Average capital employed** increased by £3.3 million to £40.8 million. The book value of tangible and intangible assets increased by £2.6 million, mainly due to the refurbishment of the visitor centre whilst trade and other receivables increased by £1.0 million, inventory increased by £0.6 million, provisions fell by £0.6 million and current liabilities increased by £1.5 million.
Cash generation
During the period, the Group's core operating activities generated £6.6 million of cash after tax payments (2014: £5.5 million). The Group also received cash of £1.1 million in respect of royalties in the year (2014: £1.0 million). After purchases of tangible and intangible assets and product development costs of £6.3 million (2014: £5.1 million) and dividends of £6.4 million (2014: £11.5 million) there were net funds at the end of the period £7.8 million (2014: £8.4 million).
Projects
We have three major projects being implemented currently:
European ERP system replacement (enterprise resource planning) - on track.
Forge World mail order store - this store was launched in August 2015 on time and within cash limits.
Mail order warehouse system replacement - complicated project currently postponed until after the busy December trading period.
Risks and uncertainties
The board has overall responsibility for ensuring risk is appropriately managed across the Group. As discussed in the 2015 annual report, the top five risks to the Group are reviewed at each board meeting. The risks are rated as to their business impact and their likelihood of occurring. In addition, the Group has a disaster recovery plan to ensure ongoing operations are maintained in all circumstances. The principal risks for the balance of the year are the same as those identified in the 2015 annual report and are discussed below:
ERP change. This is a complicated project with the risk of widespread business disruption if it is not implemented well.
Store manager recruitment. This comprises both recruitment of managers for new stores as well as replacing poor performing managers. Retail is our primary method of recruiting new customers and so we need great managers in all our stores.
Supply chain. We are changing our mail order warehouse system. This is part of an ongoing programme of continuous improvement for these warehouse systems. As with any system change there are risks associated with the transition.
Range management. We constantly review our range to ensure that we are exploring all opportunities.
Distractions. Anything else that gets in the way of us delivering our goals.
The greatest risk is the same one that we repeat each year, namely, management. So long as we have great people we will be fine. Problems will arise if the board allows egos and private agendas to rule. I will do my utmost to ensure that this does not happen.
Going concern
After making appropriate enquiries, the directors have a reasonable expectation that the Group has adequate resources to continue in operational existence for the foreseeable future. For this reason they have adopted the going concern basis in preparing this condensed consolidated interim financial information.
Statement of directors' responsibilities
The directors confirm that this condensed consolidated interim financial information has been prepared in accordance with IAS 34, 'Interim Financial Reporting', as adopted by the European Union, and that the interim management report herein includes a fair review of the information required by DTR 4.2.7 and DTR 4.2.8, namely: an indication of important events that have occurred during the first six months and their impact on the condensed set of financial statements, and a description of (i) the principal risks and uncertainties for the remaining six months of the financial year; (ii) material related-party transactions in the first six months and (iii) any material changes in the related-party transactions described in the last annual report.
There have been no other changes to the board since the annual report for the year to 31 May 2015. A list of all current directors is maintained on the investor relations website at investor.games-workshop.com.
By order of the board
K D Rountree
CEO
R F Tongue
Group finance director
Original Post:
I didn't see that this had been posted yet. ICV2 put out a report on GW's sales for the half-year:
It seems to be saying that this year's sales were broadly in line with the previous fiscal year, which represented a 4% sales loss overall. GW says it's going to be expanding into boardgames more directly than simply licensing to FFG.
Have at it.
EDIT: I see this may be jumping the gun a little. GW will release the full reports on January 12th 2016. This is just information ICV2 has gathered on them.
The profit numbers matter a lot. But if 4% is actually the number, considering THREE of the 6 reported months are Age of Sigmar, they should be popping the champagne. And it would also justify future investments in AoS.
After all, internet wisdom was that skids of Sigmar plastic were sitting unsold because everybody hates the game.
By the way, the wildly fluctuating currencies wreaking havoc is a real thing. It impacts us in Canada in ways that we couldn't have even imagined. A few years ago, CAD and USD were at parity. Now, one USD is worth $1.32 CAD. It does crazy things for our import and export businesses, which is to say, constant currency comparatives is something that more and more companies that are impacted are doing.
To put it another way, if my business' revenue (which is very much paid in USD), increases by 20%, that could actually be a bad thing, because it actually means our sales dropped 12%, lol.
@Talys: The fluctuations vs GBP and EUR are not as stark (i.e. it's CAD that's gone into the toilet) - While I'd like to think Canadian sales means something, I think that we don't make that much of a difference, esp, since our numbers are a small part of the America's reporting region.
Well, the obvious answer is to move the company to Australia so that they can really poor-mouth about corporate earning due to currency woes since they appear think that the Australian Dollar is the strongest currency in the world.
Talys wrote: The profit numbers matter a lot. But if 4% is actually the number, considering THREE of the 6 reported months are Age of Sigmar, they should be popping the champagne. And it would also justify future investments in AoS.
After all, internet wisdom was that skids of Sigmar plastic were sitting unsold because everybody hates the game.
Psst... Betrayal at Calth came in during that period as well. Also, the current marine codex was released either right at the beginning of this current period or in the weeks before it. You, know, the cash cow line that added up to previously more than all of WHFB sales combined that got a double release this period including finally a very very very long awaited 30k plastic push for the first time. But, hey, let's just preemptively assign the potential credit to AOS based on personal preferences instead...
Talys wrote: The profit numbers matter a lot. But if 4% is actually the number, considering THREE of the 6 reported months are Age of Sigmar, they should be popping the champagne. And it would also justify future investments in AoS.
After all, internet wisdom was that skids of Sigmar plastic were sitting unsold because everybody hates the game.
Psst... Betrayal at Calth came in during that period as well. Also, the current marine codex was released either right at the beginning of this current period or in the weeks before it. You, know, the cash cow line that added up to previously more than all of WHFB sales combined that got a double release this period including finally a very very very long awaited 30k plastic push for the first time. But, hey, let's just preemptively assign the potential credit to AOS based on personal preferences instead...
Sure, but just think of all the releases that COULD have come out in those 3 months. The Space Marine codex came out, but there were no new models except Devastator and Assault Marine. It's highly doubtful that ASM made top 10, and we know it hasn't made 11-28. Devastators barely made the top 28. So it's not like a $50 book is going to save a quarter, you know what I mean? Looking at those top 28 models for the year, so far, drop pods are the only fantastic seller for Space Marines, and let's be honest: drop pods have always sold well. Other than the LRC at #25 and Devastators at #22, there isn't even another Space Marine entry on the list so far.
Calth is a fantastic box release. But guess what? Last year they had Space Hulk in the same period, which they sold every copy they produced. Also, Deathstorm was a fantastic box set that sold very well. I mean, do we really think that AoS did as well as Deathstorm *OR* Space Hulk? It certainly didn't sell out. And Calth only got 3 weeeks, if that (since it cuts off Nov. 29). So, comparing apples to apples (this year to last), if they can keep revenue about the same, I think they did well.
Sure, but just think of all the releases that COULD have come out in those 3 months. The Space Marine codex came out, but there were no new models except Devastator and Assault Marine. It's highly doubtful that ASM made top 10, and we know it hasn't made 11-28. Devastators barely made the top 28. So it's not like a $50 book is going to save a quarter, you know what I mean? Looking at those top 28 models for the year, so far, drop pods are the only fantastic seller for Space Marines, and let's be honest: drop pods have always sold well. Other than the LRC at #25 and Devastators at #22, there isn't even another Space Marine entry on the list so far.
Calth is a fantastic box release. But guess what? Last year they had Space Hulk in the same period, which they sold every copy they produced. Also, Deathstorm was a fantastic box set that sold very well. I mean, do we really think that AoS did as well as Deathstorm *OR* Space Hulk? It certainly didn't sell out. And Calth only got 3 weeeks, if that (since it cuts off Nov. 29). So, comparing apples to apples (this year to last), if they can keep revenue about the same, I think they did well.
I only see up to #10 currently and don't have the app. Is there any AOS specific release on the list so far? Not units previously for WHFB or End Times that can incidentally be used for AOS but specifically new AOS only units. I don't see any but I'm not familiar with all their releases. If you're judging Space Marines based partially on the list so far, wouldn't it be fair to judge AOS the same way?
As for the boxed sets, the Space Hulk rerelease might have sold out (no idea, I'll take your word on it) but it wasn't greeted with the fanfare it was the last time that's for sure (and that's coming from a big fan who picked up 2.5 boxes and made an entire Deathwing army out of them). Deathstorm was a meh release as well (again, I am/was a BA player so got half of that as well and followed it closely). BaC though got metric tons of praise and deservedly so. We don't know the individual print runs of any of the above but I'm guessing that BaC was much larger than Deathstorm or Spulk 1.1 as well. In the end, we'll never know unless GW tells us the unofuscated truth which is unlikely since they generally don't break down sales on a line by line basis.
Talys wrote: The profit numbers matter a lot. But if 4% is actually the number, considering THREE of the 6 reported months are Age of Sigmar, they should be popping the champagne. And it would also justify future investments in AoS.
After all, internet wisdom was that skids of Sigmar plastic were sitting unsold because everybody hates the game.
By the way, the wildly fluctuating currencies wreaking havoc is a real thing. It impacts us in Canada in ways that we couldn't have even imagined. A few years ago, CAD and USD were at parity. Now, one USD is worth $1.32 CAD. It does crazy things for our import and export businesses, which is to say, constant currency comparatives is something that more and more companies that are impacted are doing.
To put it another way, if my business' revenue (which is very much paid in USD), increases by 20%, that could actually be a bad thing, because it actually means our sales dropped 12%, lol.
Currency exchange variations are a fact of life for international companies like GW. What they win on the swings they will lose on the roundabouts (a British expression). A few years ago the GBP was very weak, thus making GW's results look a lot better than they were in some respects.
The company is UK based, it reports in GBP, its shares are priced in GBP and its dividends are paid in GBP, and if the final result is a loss in GBP, it's a loss.
That said, they are of course still very profitable and if sales in Europe are going up that is an encouraging sign.
I only see up to #10 currently and don't have the app. Is there any AOS specific release on the list so far? Not units previously for WHFB or End Times that can incidentally be used for AOS but specifically new AOS only units. I don't see any but I'm not familiar with all their releases. If you're judging Space Marines based partially on the list so far, wouldn't it be fair to judge AOS the same way?
As for the boxed sets, the Space Hulk rerelease might have sold out (no idea, I'll take your word on it) but it wasn't greeted with the fanfare it was the last time that's for sure (and that's coming from a big fan who picked up 2.5 boxes and made an entire Deathwing army out of them). Deathstorm was a meh release as well (again, I am/was a BA player so got half of that as well and followed it closely). BaC though got metric tons of praise and deservedly so. We don't know the individual print runs of any of the above but I'm guessing that BaC was much larger than Deathstorm or Spulk 1.1 as well. In the end, we'll never know unless GW tells us the unofuscated truth which is unlikely since they generally don't break down sales on a line by line basis.
I think that Age of Sigmar starter set will have done very well. It will almost certainly make the top 10. But so far, in 10-28, the ONLY box that released in the second half of the year, is the Space Marine Devastator Squad, at #22. Literally every other set was made before this half-year. That means, if the revenue numbers are only a slight dip, either a lot of people bought a lot of product that wasn't new releases (which is exceedingly good news for GW), and/or that Age of Sigmar and Betrayal at Calth did really well.
I can't imagine that GW sold $100 million worth of copies of Calth in 3 weeks to make up for the rest of the sales of the half-year
Incidentally, however many boxes of Deathstorm they made, they sold. I know a lot of people who bought 4+ of those, and I know of relatively few people who bought more than 2 Calth, because after all, what are you going to do with 100+ tacticals? If I had to guess, I think Calth > Space Hulk > Deathstorm > Sigmar Starter > Dark Vengeance (each in its own half-year only).
Currency exchange variations are a fact of life for international companies like GW. What they win on the swings they will lose on the roundabouts (a British expression). A few years ago the GBP was very weak, thus making GW's results look a lot better than they were in some respects.
The company is UK based, it reports in GBP, its shares are priced in GBP and its dividends are paid in GBP, and if the final result is a loss in GBP, it's a loss.
That said, they are of course still very profitable and if sales in Europe are going up that is an encouraging sign.
Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying, though. Some years results will look a lot better or a lot worse based on currency, but this should not be an indication of whether a company's success (and growth). The number of players/collectors and boxes of stuff, and the dollar value of each box of stuff are all indicators of this success; massive currency fluctuations are out of the control of the company. If they sold 9,000 copies of DV in 2014 and 10,000 copies of DV in 2015, but in GBP they made less money because of currency, I would be a happy sales manager; conversely, if the number went from 10k to 9k, but I made more revenue because of a strong foreign currency, I would be asking what I did wrong.
So sales have been fantastic. So fantastic, that they're reporting *another* decline? Even if i were to believe their constant currency line, and they stayed relatively flat - is that really good news for them? I can't speak for AoS, but BaC is what i'd call 'firing the big guns' and the end result is flat/declining revenue?
Let's not also forget the panic buying that will have taken place when AoS was released. This might be a sign that they're stabilizing income, or it might simply be a prelude to a another migration of customers away from them.
Torga_DW wrote: So sales have been fantastic. So fantastic, that they're reporting *another* decline? Even if i were to believe their constant currency line, and they tayed relatively flat - is that really good news for them? I can't speak for AoS, but BaC is what i'd call 'firing the big guns' and the end result is flat/declining revenue?
Let's not also forget the panic buying that will have taken place when AoS was released. This might be a sign that they're stabilizing income, or it might simply be a prelude to a another migration of customers away from them.
Well, if you believe their constant currency line, sales are up a little. Otherwise, sales are down a little. But one product and 3 weeks to sell it can't carry the entire half-year, man.
What I'm saying is that, if true, AoS (starter) probably didn't do as horribly as a lot of people on the interwebs think it did, which is certainly better for GW than AoS Starter doing as badly as the people on the interwebs think, or even if AoS Starter sold comparably to Isle of Blood in the few half-years before that. It would mean that AoS Starter and the three months of Stormcast Eternal releases actually did not perform absolutely horribly in sales (which we guess that WHFB did for at least a few years). Remember, conventional wisdom is that AoS is so horrible and dead that nobody bought the stuff, it's just piling up, and nobody plays it. But they must have sold some AoS stuff after Starter, if the sales are only a slight decline (or slight increase).
Also, a bunch of that so-called panic-buying helps independents a lot more than GW. GW makes nothing on independents selling Isle of Blood or old codex releases, or even many of the old models, off their shelves, because it's not restocked.
Torga_DW wrote: So sales have been fantastic. So fantastic, that they're reporting *another* decline? Even if i were to believe their constant currency line, and they tayed relatively flat - is that really good news for them? I can't speak for AoS, but BaC is what i'd call 'firing the big guns' and the end result is flat/declining revenue?
Let's not also forget the panic buying that will have taken place when AoS was released. This might be a sign that they're stabilizing income, or it might simply be a prelude to a another migration of customers away from them.
Well, if you believe their constant currency line, sales are up a little. Otherwise, sales are down a little. But one product and 3 weeks to sell it can't carry the entire half-year, man.
What I'm saying is that, if true, AoS (starter) probably didn't do as horribly as a lot of people on the interwebs think it did, which is certainly better for GW than AoS Starter doing as badly as the people on the interwebs think, or even if AoS Starter sold comparably to Isle of Blood in the few half-years before that. It would mean that AoS Starter and the three months of Stormcast Eternal releases actually did not perform absolutely horribly in sales (which we guess that WHFB did for at least a few years). Remember, conventional wisdom is that AoS is so horrible and dead that nobody bought the stuff, it's just piling up, and nobody plays it. But they must have sold some AoS stuff after Starter, if the sales are only a slight decline (or slight increase).
Potentially yes. But selling 80 AoS starters to an indie store that will only sell 3 in the next several years would count towards successful starter sales. It could be that AoS did alright as far as sales went, but as i said it could also be a prelude to another revenue loss. If the game really was that average/successful then that's one thing, but if they burnt a lot of indies to reach those sales then things may not be as rosie as they seem. And they don't seem particularly rosy now, although if they've managed to halt the decline then that's a step in the right direction at least.
Yeah, I agree. If indie stores are stuck with truckloads of Sigmar starters, that would be pretty bad for GW
I don't think it's THAT horrible. Why? If that happened, surely they would not keep buying and stocking Stormcast and Dreadfort releases, not to mention the *many* other second-half AoS drops like Skarbrand, Arcahaon, and all the chaos models. And if that happened, we imagine there would be a precipitous drop in revenue for the half-year, because after all, this is all that GW pumped out.
Even excluding the 3 months that weren't 100% Sigmar, there were weeks where 40k surrenedered to Fantasy model sales -- Varanguard and Archaon, for example. If they had popped in another $180 Imperial Knight and some $100 Eldar model in place of that, I am positive the sales would have been a lot more.
Well, once they're committed to it they have to follow through. Even if the initial AoS sales tanked horribly (not saying they did), they still have the followup stuff in the pipeline that they need to push out regardless. We'll get a better idea in january when we see the actual numbers. I'm always wary of 'broadly in line with expectations' and this whole constant currency seems to be relatively new (or else i just haven't noticed it before) - currency is always fluctuating, but short of a global financial upheaval it looks to me like a way of saying the numbers don't look good but here's an excuse for that.
I think that Age of Sigmar starter set will have done very well. It will almost certainly make the top 10. But so far, in 10-28, the ONLY box that released in the second half of the year, is the Space Marine Devastator Squad, at #22. Literally every other set was made before this half-year. That means, if the revenue numbers are only a slight dip, either a lot of people bought a lot of product that wasn't new releases (which is exceedingly good news for GW), and/or that Age of Sigmar and Betrayal at Calth did really well.
I can't imagine that GW sold $100 million worth of copies of Calth in 3 weeks to make up for the rest of the sales of the half-year
I do expect the AOS core box to be on that list but frankly I'll be surprised if any other AOS specific units will make the as of yet unrevealed top 10. From the multitude of reports here on dakka (admittedly mass anecdotes but "I dare you to find better!" in my Captain Pike voice), the core set sold intially well and then interest largely dried up. If we don't see at least a few AOS boxes on the top 28 list (and the spots are filling up fast!) let alone if nothing shows up there beyond the core, I don't think it is viable to attribute any of the potential sales increases to the most reviled product/line since Dreadfleet. The sales simply wouldn't back up that kind of assertion in that case.
I agree that AOS has had a much longer tail in which to accumulate extra sales compared with BAC though. There was a statement (whether just attributed to GW or actually from them I don't know) saying that the majority of a kit's sales are in the first few weeks/month or two. If that is the case, BAC might have racked up a few. If in only a few weeks BAC ends up higher on the list than AOS after 6 months (and months of followup related releases/exclusive focus compared with none for BAC), would that be enough for you to call AOS a dud overall? (not personally for you but in terms of overall sales/impact). If AOS puts in just 5 spots on the top 28 (not difficult to do since it is only one of 2 core lines that received any support this year), I'll definitely be surprised and admit I'm wrong.
I think that's sales in general, the majority of sales are in the first few weeks/month or two, and that fuzzy window (which i'm sure is clearly defined somewhere) is used to determine success of a product at launch.
@warboss - I think that AoS has to be compared to Warhammer Fantasy Battle in its latter years to determine whether it's a dud or not. Does it move product for GW and independents, should be the metric of success. I don't think it really matters (and more importantly, it can't be measured) whether people play it, because if people are buying celestant primes and archaons because shrink wrapped boxes look good in their attic, what does GW or the hobby shop care?
If it's selling a lot better than WHFB, I think it's safe to say it's successful; if not, I think that GW needs to make adjustments. I think GW is playing the long game, so a little success that builds will make people there (and AoS fans, obviously) happy. On the other hand, if, over several quarters, it declines and become irrelevant, then it would most certainly be a dud.
Incidentally, I'm not characterizing AoS as a success; only that it probably isn't a horrible failure, if the half-year isn't a disaster, because I don't think it's possible to have a decent half year, no matter how good Calth is, to make up for 3+ months of releases for a disastrous product. But not being a disaster doesn't mean that it's a success, by any stretch. I don't think it's possible to gauge this (except an epic disaster that requires a "stop the presses" change) without giving the game a couple of years to see if people stick with it, continue to buy books and new models, etc.
Talys wrote: @warboss - I think that AoS has to be compared to Warhammer Fantasy Battle in its latter years to determine whether it's a dud or not. Does it move product for GW and independents, should be the metric of success. I don't think it really matters (and more importantly, it can't be measured) whether people play it, because if people are buying celestant primes and archaons because shrink wrapped boxes look good in their attic, what does GW or the hobby shop care?
If it's selling a lot better than WHFB, I think it's safe to say it's successful; if not, I think that GW needs to make adjustments. I think GW is playing the long game, so a little success that builds will make people there (and AoS fans, obviously) happy. On the other hand, if, over several quarters, it declines and become irrelevant, then it would most certainly be a dud.
Incidentally, I'm not characterizing AoS as a success; only that it probably isn't a horrible failure, if the half-year isn't a disaster, because I don't think it's possible to have a decent half year, no matter how good Calth is, to make up for 3+ months of releases for a disastrous product. But not being a disaster doesn't mean that it's a success, by any stretch. I don't think it's possible to gauge this (except an epic disaster that requires a "stop the presses" change) without giving the game a couple of years to see if people stick with it, continue to buy books and new models, etc.
just my 2 cents
Thanks for clarifying. Unfortunately, I don't think we'll ever know via those criteria (AOS vs WHFB) unless GW flat out gives it to us in the next yearly report. What we have though is one of only two actively supported lines (did LOTR get any support in 2015? I don't recall any but could be wrong) that had a big release and months of exclusive focus over the summer (no 40k releases during that time) and followup normal paced releases for months later. If that isn't enought to break the top 28 spots a few times, I'm not sure what they could do with it and not call it a failure personally.
Actually, to clear the investment GW put into its creation and production, AoS would have to be selling a lot more than WFB, or it's definitely dud. I'm not sure where you're coming from Talys.
Joyboozer wrote: Actually, to clear the investment GW put into its creation and production, AoS would have to be selling a lot more than WFB, or it's definitely dud. I'm not sure where you're coming from Talys.
Tip: regarding GW, it's always good news from Talys' point of view.
Even when they're reporting another consecutive sales (and potentially profits) loss.
I'll wait for official numbers in Januarty before commenting on the issue. In any case, a 4% drop in sales would be in line with expectations, the slow decline continues in a growing market that looks more dynamic than ever before.
Talys wrote: The profit numbers matter a lot. But if 4% is actually the number, considering THREE of the 6 reported months are Age of Sigmar, they should be popping the champagne. And it would also justify future investments in AoS.
After all, internet wisdom was that skids of Sigmar plastic were sitting unsold because everybody hates the game.
By the way, the wildly fluctuating currencies wreaking havoc is a real thing. It impacts us in Canada in ways that we couldn't have even imagined. A few years ago, CAD and USD were at parity. Now, one USD is worth $1.32 CAD. It does crazy things for our import and export businesses, which is to say, constant currency comparatives is something that more and more companies that are impacted are doing.
To put it another way, if my business' revenue (which is very much paid in USD), increases by 20%, that could actually be a bad thing, because it actually means our sales dropped 12%, lol.
Currency exchange variations are a fact of life for international companies like GW. What they win on the swings they will lose on the roundabouts (a British expression). A few years ago the GBP was very weak, thus making GW's results look a lot better than they were in some respects.
The company is UK based, it reports in GBP, its shares are priced in GBP and its dividends are paid in GBP, and if the final result is a loss in GBP, it's a loss.
That said, they are of course still very profitable and if sales in Europe are going up that is an encouraging sign.
It is not the warehoused skids of AoS that would be the problem - it would be the returns of unsold boxes, going back on those skids.
I know that we have one local store that intends to return most of their original stock of the game, and another that did not buy in nearly as deep, so is willing to hold onto the unsold boxes.
But that will not happen before the end of December - the store wants to cut down on unsold stock before tax time, and may be able to offload some of them as last minute Christmas gifts.
Returns... are a bad thing - part of what hurt 4e D&D was the massive amounts of stock that the bookstores returned unsold.
Torga_DW wrote: Well, once they're committed to it they have to follow through. Even if the initial AoS sales tanked horribly (not saying they did), they still have the followup stuff in the pipeline that they need to push out regardless. We'll get a better idea in january when we see the actual numbers. I'm always wary of 'broadly in line with expectations' and this whole constant currency seems to be relatively new (or else i just haven't noticed it before) - currency is always fluctuating, but short of a global financial upheaval it looks to me like a way of saying the numbers don't look good but here's an excuse for that.
Constant currency is a pretty standard reporting format for international companies. Obviously such companies take in and spend money in all the different countries where they operate. For example, most of GW's European operations make sales in Euros and need to spend Euros to pay their operating costs. The problem arises when they have to buy stock in GBP, and make profits that are returned to the parent company as GBP.
OTOH, when the GBP was low a few years ago, the European part of the company was laughing, because their stock was very cheap. The boot was on the other foot.
Constant currency is a pretty standard reporting format for international companies. Obviously such companies take in and spend money in all the different countries where they operate. For example, most of GW's European operations make sales in Euros and need to spend Euros to pay their operating costs. The problem arises when they have to buy stock in GBP, and make profits that are returned to the parent company as GBP.
OTOH, when the GBP was low a few years ago, the European part of the company was laughing, because their stock was very cheap. The boot was on the other foot.
I think the chunk of the problem is when GBP is high, and they sell a kit at a foreign currency that's low, they effectively make less money in GBP, because their customer is quoted prices in the foreign currency, NOT in GBP. So if GBP is 20% higher than usual, that's like discounting all of your product 20%.
This generally isn't a problem, because currencies are historically relatively stable, at least within a broad period. But recently, there has been a lot of craziness around the world, and there have been just some wild roller coaster fluctuations that either stubbornly refuse to stabilize, or worse, plateau and quasi-stabilize at some outrageous historical high or low. Anyhow, the numbers should be represented as both actual and adjusted. The adjusted numbers are just to indicate how the unit sales or business unit profitability are relative to previous years, which is a fair (and useful) tool.
So is this consistent currency thing something every international company deals with, and a totally BS excuse, or are GW in a unique position with it due to what I can only then assume is poor management?
I mean its not like they are the only people who manufacture then sell overseas, what makes this an issue worth talking about and not just a regular old aspect of running a business?
It's something that a lot of international companies deal with when they're not truly giant yet have substantial overseas operations. Nintendo is commonly cited as having experienced difficulties during the Wii era when the majority of its business was done outside of Japan, and the Yen kept on getting stronger and stronger. Revenues fell even as sales grew, with the result that they (in a very unpopular move) actually INCREASED the price of some of their products in some territories, something unheard of in that market.
jonolikespie wrote: So is this consistent currency thing something every international company deals with, and a totally BS excuse, or are GW in a unique position with it due to what I can only then assume is poor management?
I mean its not like they are the only people who manufacture then sell overseas, what makes this an issue worth talking about and not just a regular old aspect of running a business?
If you read my earlier post companies use constant currency numbers to help investors understand the true health of the companies accounts when they trade in many different countries.
I quote..
"This calculation exists to make financial statements "cleaner."
So GW saw a modest increase in sales at constant currency is the thing investors will be most interested in, its not an excuse at all like many want it to be. Because remember when the pound is weak the shoe could be on the other foot and sales could be falling and profits rising.
jonolikespie wrote: So is this consistent currency thing something every international company deals with, and a totally BS excuse, or are GW in a unique position with it due to what I can only then assume is poor management?
I mean its not like they are the only people who manufacture then sell overseas, what makes this an issue worth talking about and not just a regular old aspect of running a business?
If you read my earlier post companies use constant currency numbers to help investors understand the true health of the companies accounts when they trade in many different countries.
I quote..
"This calculation exists to make financial statements "cleaner."
So GW saw a modest increase in sales at constant currency is the thing investors will be most interested in, its not an excuse at all like many want it to be. Because remember when the pound is weak the shoe could be on the other foot and sales could be falling and profits rising.
Using it is also based upon the assumption that investors are unable to tell the difference which shouldn't be the case since GW are primarily vested by institutional investors.
Also, recall that GW used to have manufacturing and warehousing in the US as well as the UK which actually contributed to some of their better reports due to the weakness of the dollar vs the pound.
Basically you are right. If GW Notts make a kit costing £25 to manufacture, then GW France needs to sell it for more than £25, while it has been priced at perhaps 30 Euros. If the Euro value drops, 30 Euros may become worth less than £25, and the company loses money.
Given a sufficient variation of exchange rate, it is possible for GW France to sell more kits and make less money. (GW's trading statement says this is what has happened.)
Of course the opposite also can happen, and GW benefited from a weak GBP for several years after 2008.
The historical variation of exchange rates does tend to even out over time. For example, in the past 20 years the JPY/GBP rate has varied from about 200 down to 120, up to 240, down to 120, and back up to about 190 right now. IDK what the average is over that whole period, but probably about 180.
These swings were very significant, and do not happen overnight, but they certainly happened over the course of a few months to a year or two. Obviously if a foreign currency varies by 100% over 18 months, it will put a big dent into your company's accounts.
Talys wrote: The profit numbers matter a lot. But if 4% is actually the number, considering THREE of the 6 reported months are Age of Sigmar, they should be popping the champagne. And it would also justify future investments in AoS.
After all, internet wisdom was that skids of Sigmar plastic were sitting unsold because everybody hates the game.
A lot of that depends on how they do the accounting. If stuff's sitting in LGS's and not moving off of *their* shelves, GW still gets to count that as a sale. If WHFB was already pretty much dead (which by all accounts it was), and AoS likewise also dead, well, there's nothing really to celebrate.
By the way, the wildly fluctuating currencies wreaking havoc is a real thing.
Yes, but it's what GW blames literally every single year for any sort of negative numbers.
You can't just handwave away revenue decreases, year after year after year, for over a decade like this. Any one particular year? Sure, maybe. When your revenue has been declining since 2004? That's another story.
What GW count as a sale, is a unit of product that someone has bought as of the day it is ordered and goes off GW books in return for a promise to pay for it.
If an independant distributor or retailer orders a kit costing £100, then GW record a sale of £100, even if the cash has not been handed over and the kit has not been shipped out yet. This example imaginary kit doesn't need to be in an end user's hands unless it is going through GW's own retail outlets.
You can't just handwave away revenue decreases, year after year after year, for over a decade like this. Any one particular year? Sure, maybe. When your revenue has been declining since 2004? That's another story.
Don't forget the last couple of years where we got the, "well, the one-man stores are a great idea but the change is still working its way through and we've experienced a downturn due to that."
Implementation dip is a real thing but at some point an organization has to take responsibility for their own successes/failures not apply handwavium and hope nobody notices.
Currency fluctuations also mean less when you raise prices on your products at higher than inflation rates...
You can't just handwave away revenue decreases, year after year after year, for over a decade like this. Any one particular year? Sure, maybe. When your revenue has been declining since 2004? That's another story.
Don't forget the last couple of years where we got the, "well, the one-man stores are a great idea but the change is still working its way through and we've experienced a downturn due to that."
Implementation dip is a real thing but at some point an organization has to take responsibility for their own successes/failures not apply handwavium and hope nobody notices.
Currency fluctuations also mean less when you raise prices on your products at higher than inflation rates...
Yeah, I keep wondering what the next excuse will be for declining sales. Probably start blaming the customers next
Implementation dip is a real thing but at some point an organization has to take responsibility for their own successes/failures not apply handwavium and hope nobody notices.
They had the LOTR bubble and blamed that for all kinds of disasters. "They got complacent with their success" or however they liked to spin it. Soon they will probably have The Hobbit…Hole (?) to blame for whatever bad happens.
Implementation dip is a real thing but at some point an organization has to take responsibility for their own successes/failures not apply handwavium and hope nobody notices.
They had the LOTR bubble and blamed that for all kinds of disasters. "They got complacent with their success" or however they liked to spin it. Soon they will probably have The Hobbit…Hole (?) to blame for whatever bad happens.
Not likely - The Hobbit never became a big enough bubble to cause much damage when it collapsed.
Hell... it is a chewed wad of gum, with no bubble in sight.
jonolikespie wrote: So is this consistent currency thing something every international company deals with, and a totally BS excuse, or are GW in a unique position with it due to what I can only then assume is poor management?
I mean its not like they are the only people who manufacture then sell overseas, what makes this an issue worth talking about and not just a regular old aspect of running a business?
One thing to keep in mind is that not all business work the same way. If you sell raw materials, agricultural goods, or even many industrial goods, you often sell the goods in your own currency, or negotiate a price for every order in the buyer's currency, despite selling to overseas customers. For example, for milk, eggs, or steel, currency fluctuations make it so that you make more or less money because there is more or less demand, but it doesn't affect your gross profit margin. On the other hand, for companies like GW (and Nintendo, as mentioned above), the price quoted is in the buyer's currency, and is locked in for a very long time.
In GW's case, too, a huge percentage of their business is NOT in their home currency; it's not like only a quarter of their business is overseas. So yes, constant currency is a valuable tool to understand whether a company is doing well or poorly; on the other hand, the bottom line is important too, because if you make a tens or hundreds or thousands of millions or lose tens of millions, ultimately, and especially in the long term, all the reasons why are less important than the results.
It's also worth mentioning that a lot of US companies aren't as affected, because a great deal of international commerce is conducted based on the USD, and prices quoted in USD are the norm for many transactions. So it becomes more or less expensive for the buyer, and the buyer must suck it up. In a way, the same thing happens when we're talking about Forge World models. You can get a 20% discount, or pay a 20% premium, just based on when you buy the model.
This is out of an investing booklet -
While many companies do a good job managing currency volatility, reporting it in a meaningful and transparent way that keeps investors and other stakeholders informed, a sizable number appear still to be grappling with the issue. So, how should companies present bottom-line results when currency volatility distorts the bigger picture? When is it appropriate to explain that a “loss” is not a loss, but simply the result of a — perhaps very temporary — currency movement?
Net profit or loss, naturally, is usually the first metric to catch investors’ eyes. But that number packs in many variables, including currency impact, that can leave management looking for ways to explain which variables are “central to a company’s operations and which variables may be slightly less vital,” says Chris Rhodes, accounting advisory partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
Implementation dip is a real thing but at some point an organization has to take responsibility for their own successes/failures not apply handwavium and hope nobody notices.
They had the LOTR bubble and blamed that for all kinds of disasters. "They got complacent with their success" or however they liked to spin it. Soon they will probably have The Hobbit…Hole (?) to blame for whatever bad happens.
Not likely - The Hobbit never became a big enough bubble to cause much damage when it collapsed.
Hell... it is a chewed wad of gum, with no bubble in sight.
The Auld Grump
As an over the top "we forgot what made the predecessor so good" blatant cash grab, the hobbit "trilogy" might be an apt title for GW to exploit and for us to use as a comparison. It does really put into less geeky (but still geeky) laymans terms what GW has been doing wrong over the past few years (BaC and forgeworld excluded).
Currency schmurrency. That is the same excuse USA based EXPORTERS use. This argument just can't be both ways. Either Caterpillar can use the currency excuse of strong USD or GW. I find CAT's argument much more compelling. But I'm no economist. I'm just a gamer, and Betrayal looks BORING and only seems to be getting good reviews for the minis and AoS.... well.... I don't need to say much about that "game."
doktor_g wrote: Either Caterpillar can use the currency excuse of strong USD or GW.
No, that's incorrect because GW aren't using the strong USD as an excuse, they are using a strong GBP as an excuse. That statement would only apply if Caterpillar was a US based company trading solely with the UK and GW was a UK based company trading solely with the US, obviously they both trade globally so your assumptions are flawed.
GW is a UK based company, a strong USD helps GW, but GW also trades in Europe and the GBP has been stronger than the Euro, which hurts them. At a very ROUGH estimate, they're about 11% WORSE off in Europe and about 7% BETTER off in the USA compared to the same period last year. Those are rough estimates because I didn't calculate averages, I just guessed an average based off the graph. The GBP has also been strong relative to the smaller markets like Oz, Hobbit Land and Canadia, so GW are losing in all those markets too.
Caterpillar, I don't know anything about them, but if they're a US based company then they're getting hurt everywhere because the USD has been strong relative to both the GBP and the Euro. They would also trade heavily with Asia and the USD has been strong relative to the Asia-Pacific markets.
So GW are losing on one front and gaining on the other (but by my estimates, not as much). Caterpillar are losing on all fronts.
EDIT: I'm not sure how much either company makes in China these days, but the GBP is weaker next to the CNY, which would also hurt when they purchase things from China, the USD is strong relative to the CNY, so Caterpillar would get hurt selling to China, but would be better off when they buy things from China. As far as I'm aware GW doesn't sell a considerable amount to China so having a weaker GBP/CNY can't help them.
There is a valid point in GW's position. If the Euro drops 10% compared to the GBP, then GW can increase their Euro sales by 5% in volume and money terms, but the books will show it as a 5% drop in European sales. (Simplified.)
However, next year, if the Euro strengthens 10%, suddenly there will be a huge leap in sales revenue without an increase in sales numbers.
Wargames have a fairly strong network effect operating, so it's always good to recruit more customers, which canny investors would want to know about even if the bald, top-line figures seem to show a fall.
Against that, a fall in revenue is a fall in revenue whatever the reason. If Euro sales dropped 5% due to currency, then GW have that much less cash on hand at the end of the year.
So really, whether this is a good thing or a bad thing depends on your attitude as an investor.
They had the LOTR bubble and blamed that for all kinds of disasters. "They got complacent with their success" or however they liked to spin it. Soon they will probably have The Hobbit…Hole (?) to blame for whatever bad happens.
Not likely - The Hobbit never became a big enough bubble to cause much damage when it collapsed.
Hell... it is a chewed wad of gum, with no bubble in sight.
The Auld Grump
My point was that The Hobbit won't create a bubble or huge sales so they will be disappointed and point very surprised at the hole (where their profits should be) along the lines of "LOTR was very successful and this should have been too. For some (unexplainable) reason it didn't generate much profit and that's why, this year (whenever they use that excuse), the sales are down again".
The way I see it, when they got the LoTR licence, GW opened a gold mine. Thanks to massive product placement, the huge publicity and popularity of the films for several years, and other promotion like the DeAgostini magazine, they sold tons of LoTR stuff, made loads of money and spent it on enlarging their retail chain.
But somehow, when all the promotion surrounding the film and game went away, GW expected people to keep on buying at the same rate or transfer to 40K or Fantasy. This didn't happen, for pretty obvious and predictable reasons, and GW found themselves with egg on their faces.
The Hobbit could have been another gold mine but it didn't work because the films weren't as popular and in particular, the Hobbit game products were an awful lot more expensive. Therefore, the Auld Grump is right. There hasn't been a Hobbit boom so there can't be a bust.
The sad thing is that if GW had played the whole Hobbit campaign better, they could potentially have sold more Hobbit stuff, avoided a post-Hobbit bust, and recruited people back to LoTR as well. (Just my personal opinion, of course.)
Kilkrazy wrote: The way I see it, when they got the LoTR licence, GW opened a gold mine. Thanks to massive product placement, the huge publicity and popularity of the films for several years, and other promotion like the DeAgostini magazine, they sold tons of LoTR stuff, made loads of money and spent it on enlarging their retail chain.
But somehow, when all the promotion surrounding the film and game went away, GW expected people to keep on buying at the same rate or transfer to 40K or Fantasy. This didn't happen, for pretty obvious and predictable reasons, and GW found themselves with egg on their faces.
The Hobbit could have been another gold mine but it didn't work because the films weren't as popular and in particular, the Hobbit game products were an awful lot more expensive. Therefore, the Auld Grump is right. There hasn't been a Hobbit boom so there can't be a bust.
The sad thing is that if GW had played the whole Hobbit campaign better, they could potentially have sold more Hobbit stuff, avoided a post-Hobbit bust, and recruited people back to LoTR as well. (Just my personal opinion, of course.)
I completely agree with every point, I am not saying The Hobbit had a boom (or will have one). That's why it mentioned a Hobbit Hole (= financial hole, as in debt or lack of money) and they will use the that difference in performance (between LOTR and Hobbit) as an excuse. Essentially: "It should have performed the same but it didn't. How could that happen?" Without mentioning that the movies had different degree of popularity (or even blame the movies), the price increase, or the lack of outside advertisement or magazine.
For some reason they think new consumers just appear as if by magic and can't comprehend that advertisement (or just simple exposure outside of your niche) actually works. The original post I replied to was that an "organization has to take responsibility for their own successes/failures" and I'm just saying The Hobbit will probably be the next scapegoat. They can wring one more year excuses from that.
LotR ended up damaging GW because they got used to bringing in all that extra income - and it was from sources that came to them, rather than GW reaching out and trying to attract new customers.
Because it was part of the deal, LotR got a lot of advertising - and showed up in mainstream toy, game, and book stores.
All of this withered like Jonah's gourd - and GW was not in any way prepared for the enormous hole that lack of extra income left.
So it did a lot of damage to the internals of GW.
They went out of their way to make sure that the Hobbit would not hurt them in a similar fashion - which meant that they never got that extra income, and did not have to deal with the aftermath when the sales dried up.
TheAuldGrump, I don't know if you are serious or if that's the usual dakkadakka snark aimed at GW's corporate decision making process. I think it's snark mixed with GW justification for their bad handling of the LOTR profits. They wasted the money (I think some went towards new injection moulding machines) and then cried about their revenue declining while doing absolutely nothing to keep all these new customers or to expand their customer base further.
Honestly, I think a lot of the problem is that GW is used to being a passive business. They have a product, people learn of the product through osmosis, people come to them to buy the product.
They're not used to the idea of the more traditional method of hunting customers. They're used to resting on their laurels. Now companies like Privateer, Mantic and Corvus Belli come along and follow traditional methods and GW gets fethed by it.
It doesn't help either that GW's horribly inflated costs (which are, in all honesty, probably justified by GW's bloat of infrastructure and consistently declining revenue stream) have created a considerable secondary market of... Other producers who often sell for less than half of the price that GW demands and make huge profits by doing so.
TL;DR: GW's strategy has got it caught in a trap and it can't change.
Mario wrote: TheAuldGrump, I don't know if you are serious or if that's the usual dakkadakka snark aimed at GW's corporate decision making process. I think it's snark mixed with GW justification for their bad handling of the LOTR profits. They wasted the money (I think some went towards new injection moulding machines) and then cried about their revenue declining while doing absolutely nothing to keep all these new customers or to expand their customer base further.
I am being completely serious.
No snark at all.
GW is not the only business that has been damaged by the aftermath of a big boom for one of their lines.
It is called 'boom and bust' - please look it up before accusing me of snark. It is also sometimes called a 'bubble' - and can leave a company in tatters when the bubble bursts. (Hell, look at the Great Depression - a real estate and stock market bubble that took the world economy with it when it popped.)
Investing in new machines was not waste - updating capitol investments is a good thing.
Tearing out the injection molding machines in their US center - that was a waste. The US market for their games has enough mass to justify those machines.
Some of the other costs were unavoidable - they needed to expand their sales force to handle the increased load - but that meant having a much larger overhead when the LotR boom ended.
What they needed to do - but didn't - was come up with ways to hold onto that huge lead that LotR had given them.
Instead, they patted themselves on the back for a job well done... until the job wasn't going so well.
The thing that I consider 'waste' is when GW hands out dividends in a cycle where they have lost market.
Or put up an enormous statue dedicated to an untested game.
When they decide that market research is Otiose in a Niche Market. And proudly trumpet about how they don't do any. (I actually think that the last time they did any they were told that they were doing things wrong - and decided that the research was wrong, because obviously they weren't.)
Disbelieving market research can have dire effect.
The Sigmarine statue is interesting because on the face of it the purpose is to appeal to current staff and dedicated fans of GW.
I wonder how many heretics saw the statue unveiled and wondered how much cash had been diverted from their Christmas bonus or party, or even from making new games, to pay for that piece of frippery.
Kilkrazy wrote: The Sigmarine statue is interesting because on the face of it the purpose is to appeal to current staff and dedicated fans of GW.
I wonder how many heretics saw the statue unveiled and wondered how much cash had been diverted from their Christmas bonus or party, or even from making new games, to pay for that piece of frippery.
Oh my word, I had not seen this and have just googled it
Haven't they done other big "things", like a space marine in the front previously, and a life-size Rhino somewhere? My local GW store has a life-size space marine statue in it (not out of any expensive material, I'm sure).
I don't know why people would say this is a waste of money, any more than building a fountain in the front of an office building. I'm pretty sure they didn't have to pay millions for it Not that I think it's gorgeous or anything, but whatever... it's a statue. Can't miss the building if you're driving up to it LOL.
Talys wrote: Haven't they done other big "things", like a space marine in the front previously, and a life-size Rhino somewhere? My local GW store has a life-size space marine statue in it (not out of any expensive material, I'm sure).
I don't know why people would say this is a waste of money, any more than building a fountain in the front of an office building. I'm pretty sure they didn't have to pay millions for it Not that I think it's gorgeous or anything, but whatever... it's a statue. Can't miss the building if you're driving up to it LOL.
The difference is that the Space Marine is the foundation upon which the company was built on, one of the few things that GW can lay claim to that is genuinely iconic.
To have that outside the HQ was not only fitting and appropriate, but it had stood there for years, since the construction of the building itself I believe.
The Sigmarine is none of that, it's a false idol that had done nothing, and to date hasn't done anything, to justify its installation. A derivative pretender installed because the board felt like "doing marketing" and because they've no clue what's valuable to people about what they do, had no idea of the symbolism in the process of tearing down the long standing Space Marine (and literally stuffing it under the stairs) and replacing it with that.
They used to have a life size Space Marine, 8 feet tall, and they used to have a working Rhino built on an FV430 chassis (British APC a bit like an M113.)
The reason you do these things is for publicity. At least you can see YouTube videos of the Rhino, so it wasn't for nothing.
The life-size Sigmarine statue would have been a great idea if they launched it with a national press beano bigging up GW as one of Britain's most successful export design and manufacturing companies, launching a brand new fantasy 3D Action Role-Playing Strategy Game. Etc. If it was me, I would have flown in hobby journalists from all the major territories, staged a two-day extravaganza with demo games, free starter kits, interviews with the designers, and a launch party culminating in the unveiling of the Sigmarine with fireworks. I mean feth, this was supposed to be their biggest launch in 15 years!
Instead, it was used as an opportunity to round up the HQ staff in the car park and talk at them.
We live in a world in which an email or a video can go viral and reach millions of people. GW just hope someone will drive up to their HQ building.
Twelve people participated in the latest AoD campaign day about the Snow Witches of ThingummyLand.
GW appears to be genetically allergic to marketing.
Talys wrote: Haven't they done other big "things", like a space marine in the front previously, and a life-size Rhino somewhere? My local GW store has a life-size space marine statue in it (not out of any expensive material, I'm sure).
I don't know why people would say this is a waste of money, any more than building a fountain in the front of an office building. I'm pretty sure they didn't have to pay millions for it Not that I think it's gorgeous or anything, but whatever... it's a statue. Can't miss the building if you're driving up to it LOL.
The major difference is that WH40K was already a big success beforeGW went and commissioned statues commemorating the game.
In the case of the Sigmarine, it commissioned was because GW was speculating that Age of Sigmar was going to be a runaway success.
From what I have heard... it wasn't.
So, it is like commissioning a giant Oscar for Battleship: the Motion Picture before the movie hits the theaters.
I think the placement of the Sigmarite Warrior was less a show of them thinking it would be a success and more a sign to everybody that they would see this Age of Sigmar thing through and that they are committed to it.
BrookM wrote: I think the placement of the Sigmarite Warrior was less a show of them thinking it would be a success and more a sign to everybody that they would see this Age of Sigmar thing through and that they are committed to it.
Given how well the game is doing locally (far less than Warhammer) I think that it is more of an indication that they should have been committed for it.
The word that I would grab would be 'hubris'.
The Auld Grump - whom geeks destroy, they first make mock.
BrookM wrote: I think the placement of the Sigmarite Warrior was less a show of them thinking it would be a success and more a sign to everybody that they would see this Age of Sigmar thing through and that they are committed to it.
Didn't the Space Marine get put back up in place of the Sigmarine recently? Or was that just a rumour?
Flashman wrote:Oh my word, I had not seen this and have just googled it
Spoiler:
"Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Kilkrazy wrote:Twelve people participated in the latest AoD campaign day about the Snow Witches of ThingummyLand.
What, the one that showcased the unimaginably deep background and immersive gameplay by basically saying "Here's some snow; have a fight"?
TheAuldGrump wrote:Given how well the game is doing locally (far less than Warhammer) I think that it is more of an indication that they should have been committed for it.
Ramesses II lived nearly 90 years -- beyond exceptional in his day, outliving most of his children and wives -- and remains one of the most famous, influential, powerful and revered monarchs in the history of mankind. His body is still on display today. If that's reflective of GW's legacy, regardless what poetic travelers in desert wastes think in the future, it would be a pretty good epitaph
Talys: and he's dead. It's kinda the point of the poem, dontcha know. Erecting big statues is not going to save anyone or their empire. But at least Rameses/Ozymandias had the excuse that no mere mortal can outrun time in the end.
If GW leaves a legacy of people saying "ooh didn't they have a good run" it'll likely be followed by "and then they botched it right up." It won't save them from the fact that they're actively transforming their gaming scene into 'lone and level sands' right now.
Talys wrote: Ramesses II lived nearly 90 years -- beyond exceptional in his day, outliving most of his children and wives -- and remains one of the most famous, influential, powerful and revered monarchs in the history of mankind. His body is still on display today. If that's reflective of GW's legacy, regardless what poetic travelers in desert wastes think in the future, it would be a pretty good epitaph
No - we are not going by the historic Ramesses II (or Ramses as my spellchecker is trying to force down my throat) - we are going by the poem....
You know - the one that goes:
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."
And that is the legacy being summed up in that quote.
A legacy of decay, desolation, and eventual erasure from the world.
So, if you are going to try to reinterpret what was meant by bringing up Ozymandias then you can expect correction.
Frankly, given the 'success' of AoS... I think that is pretty likely of what will be left of meaning for that statue.
I also suspect that WH40K will long outlive AoS - and so would make a better fit for your interpretation than the Sigmarine.
Talys wrote: Ramesses II lived nearly 90 years -- beyond exceptional in his day, outliving most of his children and wives -- and remains one of the most famous, influential, powerful and revered monarchs in the history of mankind. His body is still on display today. If that's reflective of GW's legacy, regardless what poetic travelers in desert wastes think in the future, it would be a pretty good epitaph
That's as may be but this thread is about GW's trading statement.
GW is not the only business that has been damaged by the aftermath of a big boom for one of their lines.
It is called 'boom and bust' - please look it up before accusing me of snark. It is also sometimes called a 'bubble' - and can leave a company in tatters when the bubble bursts. (Hell, look at the Great Depression - a real estate and stock market bubble that took the world economy with it when it popped.)
I left out the second part (I again agree completely with all of it) but I don't really think of the LOTR bubble as a bubble in economic terms. It wasn't really inflated in some unnatural way (see 2008) that needed to burst at some point. They just got a product that got (massively) advertised and popular and did nothing with that. It was only a bubble because they called it that and didn't handle it well. If they just assume the money will come rolling in without doing anything or thinking about their own future then it's their fault and not of the fault of the sudden hit product they had.
Real economic bubbles tend to have a mismatch in perception and economic reality component, and not just a slightly lopsided supply/demand imbalance. That's what makes them so volatile and not easily absorbed. If a simple short term economic imbalance were a bubble then every startup that is bought for an inflated price and can't deliver a follow up product to justify that price would be a bubble. The dot-com bubble, for example, was on a bigger scale than just a little mismatch between a few elements.
GW acted naive (at best) but then tried to blame the bubble for everything that went wrong after that. It's not like they accidentally became a Walmart supplier and had to churn out bad product for little money to keep up with the new demand. If I remember correctly churning out the plastic and boxing it was at the time 5 or 7% of the MSRP. Even if the success of the LOTR line made them complacent or lazy it's still their fault and not the product's fault. It's like nobody at the company thought about what could happen after the third movie. Like I said above, naive at best.
I always associated the terms boom and bust or bubble with wider economic impact and not just one company (or a few) mismanaging their production.
Gaming isn't really like real estate though, so the "bubble" term doesn't refer to the same thing. As a franchise ages, generally speaking, people get bored and try other things. Most of even the happiest D&D players went to try other RPGs because they wanted to give something new a shot.
So when we're talking about gaming bubbles, we're speaking of games that have a rapid growth cycle but short lifespan, as opposed to those that endure. Could anything have been done to make LoTR endure? I don't know. Not in the traditional way that GW has gotten people to stick with 40k, because you're limited to what's in the Tolkien lore. They can't really upsell people to wyverns, dragons, ever-more powerful (and bigger) heroes and pseudo-deities, to "enhance their gaming experience".
I have actually always thought it amazing that 40k has had the endurance that it does, and that there are people who buy both in dollars and number of models more today than they did decades ago.
Voltaire would certainly agree that nothing can endure forever. 40K arguably is showing signs of metal fatigue in the airframe. WHFB of course turns out not to have endured.
GW are trying to make LoTR endure now, though. They have announced they will be supporting it in the future. (Alongside AoS and 40K, making three flagship systems.)
I don't see why LoTR shouldn't do pretty well. The books make it a great licence even without the films, and they do still exist and get shown on TV. The Hobbit, though not as successful as LoTR, actually was pretty successful and also gets shown on TV. (IMO the selling problems with The Hobbit were more to do with GW's marketing strategy than the success of the films.)
GW have a huge range of figures available. The rules apparently are rather good (I haven't read them.) And there certainly is a market for fantasy games apart from WHFB/AoS.
On the Hobbit, aren't we lucky GW didn't release a Dungeon crawler board game for the first Hobbit movie, imagine the poor shape they'd be in after a bubble that size burst.....
The Hobbit could have become a successful skirmish game if GW had bothered to give it proper support. The issue is, as of now, GW business practices have evolved to such a point that they simply cannot* give a skirmish game proper support. I believe part of the early success of LoTR was, beyond the hype of the movies, how affordable the plastic kits were. All the initial factions, iirc, had one or two plastic boxes with a good number of decent quality models and nice prices. Also the rules were good and you didn't need a truckload of models to play. So it felt like a welcoming game.
Now look at what happened with The Hobbit. No affordable models on sight, quite the contrary. Not even metal blisters for characters, finecrap instead, and with ridiculous prices stamped on them. Some of the models looked so uninspired that the price tag seemed like an insult, and showed how little the company cared about the product.
I think you could even draw correlations between those two games and the state of GW at the time of their respective releases. LoTR was released during the golden age of the company (late 90s - early 00s), The Hobbit on the other hand seems like a posterboy for all the flaws that have led GW to its current declining and stagnating state: absurd pricing policies, little to no care for their own product, disdain (when not open contempt) towards their customers, etc.
* in theory they can, of course. But they won't. Just look at AoS, the "easy to get into, affordable skirmish successor to Fantasy" as its fans shouted at the beginning. To be fair I guess it can be affordable, if you don't play with GW minis.
Speaking of AoS and GW, are there videos or online articles on how to convert you current ( or what were current) fantasy armies to AoS forces? In detail, I mean, for each race?
Korinov wrote: The Hobbit could have become a successful skirmish game if GW had bothered to give it proper support.
I think what killed The Hobbit game is the Goblin Town boxed set being overpriced and underwhelming. When the first movie came out GW released a bunch of plastics and the Goblin Town set, when subsequent movies came out they stopped releasing plastic and instead just released very limited sets of failcast models.
My conclusion is they expected Goblin Town to sell like hotcakes and when it didn't they decided it wasn't worth supporting and didn't even bother releasing plastics for the later movies. They were probably too stupid to realise the reasons it didn't sell.
BrookM wrote: I think the placement of the Sigmarite Warrior was less a show of them thinking it would be a success and more a sign to everybody that they would see this Age of Sigmar thing through and that they are committed to it.
Didn't the Space Marine get put back up in place of the Sigmarine recently? Or was that just a rumour?
The space marine was never taken down, the Sigmarine is in a totally different spot.
BrookM wrote: I think the placement of the Sigmarite Warrior was less a show of them thinking it would be a success and more a sign to everybody that they would see this Age of Sigmar thing through and that they are committed to it.
Didn't the Space Marine get put back up in place of the Sigmarine recently? Or was that just a rumour?
The space marine was never taken down, the Sigmarine is in a totally different spot.
False. It's in the same spot.
Additionally, I can't find it right now, but there is also a pic doing the rounds of the Space Marine unceremoniously shoved under the stairs somewhere in Warhammer World.
Joyboozer wrote: Speaking of AoS and GW, are there videos or online articles on how to convert you current ( or what were current) fantasy armies to AoS forces? In detail, I mean, for each race?
There's not much to be done. Go to the GW homepage, scroll to the bottom and choose "Age of Sigmar: Rules" and then select the free PDF of your army. Inside you'll find all the stat-blocks (now called Warscrolls) for every unit you have.
Done. :-)
I'm also rebasing my models onto round/oval bases - but it is not a requirement. And if you're going to be playing WHFB still, or Kings of War, it will likely be easier to leave them on the square bases.
Grimtuff wrote: Additionally, I can't find it right now, but there is also a pic doing the rounds of the Space Marine unceremoniously shoved under the stairs somewhere in Warhammer World.
Grimtuff wrote: Additionally, I can't find it right now, but there is also a pic doing the rounds of the Space Marine unceremoniously shoved under the stairs somewhere in Warhammer World.
Joyboozer wrote: Speaking of AoS and GW, are there videos or online articles on how to convert you current ( or what were current) fantasy armies to AoS forces? In detail, I mean, for each race?
There's not much to be done. Go to the GW homepage, scroll to the bottom and choose "Age of Sigmar: Rules" and then select the free PDF of your army. Inside you'll find all the stat-blocks (now called Warscrolls) for every unit you have.
Done. :-)
I'm also rebasing my models onto round/oval bases - but it is not a requirement. And if you're going to be playing WHFB still, or Kings of War, it will likely be easier to leave them on the square bases.
What size bases are you using for larger minis? Is there a handy base size conversion chart?
Grimtuff wrote: Additionally, I can't find it right now, but there is also a pic doing the rounds of the Space Marine unceremoniously shoved under the stairs somewhere in Warhammer World.
Joyboozer wrote: Speaking of AoS and GW, are there videos or online articles on how to convert you current ( or what were current) fantasy armies to AoS forces? In detail, I mean, for each race?
There's not much to be done. Go to the GW homepage, scroll to the bottom and choose "Age of Sigmar: Rules" and then select the free PDF of your army. Inside you'll find all the stat-blocks (now called Warscrolls) for every unit you have.
Done. :-)
I'm also rebasing my models onto round/oval bases - but it is not a requirement. And if you're going to be playing WHFB still, or Kings of War, it will likely be easier to leave them on the square bases.
What size bases are you using for larger minis? Is there a handy base size conversion chart?
I don't have a chart, but the rule of thumb is to go for a circle/oval base slightly larger than their square so:
20mm Square = 25mm Round
25mm Square = 32mm Round
40mm Square = 50mm Round
Etc etc.
But it is best to play around and find a base size that fits best. For example my Dwarven infantry go onto 25mm rounds but I have put Grim Burlokkson on a 32mm as he is so bulky. Some of the End Times chaos infantry (like the Rot Bringers and Skulltakers) look best on 40mm rounds as they are Stormcast size and looked a bit small of the 40mm squares they came on before.
I actually think they could/should have repurposed the LotR rules for WHFB and/or 40k. Didn't they also come out with a larger version of the game for bigger battles? I remember the original set but stopped playing after that.
WayneTheGame wrote: I actually think they could/should have repurposed the LotR rules for WHFB and/or 40k. Didn't they also come out with a larger version of the game for bigger battles? I remember the original set but stopped playing after that.
I suppose the "justification" spin against that would be to not invalidate all the codexes at the same time like in 3rd edition... they'd rather do so over 2 years of 6th edition by rehashing largely the same products with a 50%+ price increase with the switch to hardcover and then rehash the rehashed books again in 7th 1-2 years later. I would have preferred a custom built from the bottom up ruleset with some sense instead every 3 editions. Instead, we've had to rebuy mostly the same stuff just for the priveledge of cramming in a ton of stuff that doesn't belong in this scale of conflict.
BrookM wrote: I think the placement of the Sigmarite Warrior was less a show of them thinking it would be a success and more a sign to everybody that they would see this Age of Sigmar thing through and that they are committed to it.
Didn't the Space Marine get put back up in place of the Sigmarine recently? Or was that just a rumour?
The space marine was never taken down, the Sigmarine is in a totally different spot.
False. It's in the same spot.
Additionally, I can't find it right now, but there is also a pic doing the rounds of the Space Marine unceremoniously shoved under the stairs somewhere in Warhammer World.
So is the Sigmarine still there? I heard someone say a few weeks ago that it had been taken down and replaced with the Space Marine.
Joyboozer wrote: Speaking of AoS and GW, are there videos or online articles on how to convert you current ( or what were current) fantasy armies to AoS forces? In detail, I mean, for each race?
That is fairly simple. If you have Dwarves, you use the Dwarf (Dwarfadin) War Scrolls. If you have Elves you use the Aelf War scrolls. Etc.
Ogres = Ogers.
Orcs = Oruks.
Undead = Tomb Kings or Vampire Counts As.
And so on.
Grimtuff wrote: Additionally, I can't find it right now, but there is also a pic doing the rounds of the Space Marine unceremoniously shoved under the stairs somewhere in Warhammer World.
He's clearly peeing.
Ein Wildpinkler*? Well of course a Space Marine would lack the courtesy to face the wall
At least he has full cover. And he can still lob a krak grenade over top!
Is that the actual statue that used to be outside? It really doesn't look very big. We have a space marine statue at our local GW that's about that size, I think.
warboss wrote: I can't tell if that is a joke by Mantic or not. The sculpt quality reminds me of some of their early plastics.
It was an officially sanctioned pic on their twitter account and I'm pretty sure it was just a photoshop job AND I totally agree that it looks like ass, as do most of their models.
jonolikespie wrote: Yeah, those silly models and their bad quality. Their business must surely be suffering horribly.....
Regarding your signature, since it's appropriate to this thread:
Fafnir wrote: Oh, I certainly vote with my dollar, but the problem is that that is not enough. The problem with the 'vote with your dollar' response is that it doesn't take into account why we're not buying the product. I want to enjoy 40k enough to buy back in. It was my introduction to traditional games, and there was a time when I enjoyed it very much. I want to buy 40k, but Gamesworkshop is doing their very best to push me away, and simply not buying their product won't tell them that.
This is why companies should do god damn market research.
But Games Workshop do market research, just not the nice kind, you don't spend that much on web design, they're getting a lot of information from their end.
Joyboozer wrote: But Games Workshop do market research, just not the nice kind, you don't spend that much on web design, they're getting a lot of information from their end.
100,000 pounds or so of it was to pay the Chairman's no experience wife to manage the project as a contractor.
Joyboozer wrote: But Games Workshop do market research, just not the nice kind, you don't spend that much on web design, they're getting a lot of information from their end.
1) What you're suggesting runs contrary to what GW have explicitly stated so you'd need more than the price of the website as proof.
2) That would still be terrible market research as it only accounts for people already visiting GWs website, and nowhere on that website is a 'tell us what you think' section.
Torga_DW wrote: So sales have been fantastic. So fantastic, that they're reporting *another* decline? Even if i were to believe their constant currency line, and they tayed relatively flat - is that really good news for them? I can't speak for AoS, but BaC is what i'd call 'firing the big guns' and the end result is flat/declining revenue?
Let's not also forget the panic buying that will have taken place when AoS was released. This might be a sign that they're stabilizing income, or it might simply be a prelude to a another migration of customers away from them.
Well, if you believe their constant currency line, sales are up a little. Otherwise, sales are down a little. But one product and 3 weeks to sell it can't carry the entire half-year, man.
What I'm saying is that, if true, AoS (starter) probably didn't do as horribly as a lot of people on the interwebs think it did, which is certainly better for GW than AoS Starter doing as badly as the people on the interwebs think, or even if AoS Starter sold comparably to Isle of Blood in the few half-years before that. It would mean that AoS Starter and the three months of Stormcast Eternal releases actually did not perform absolutely horribly in sales (which we guess that WHFB did for at least a few years). Remember, conventional wisdom is that AoS is so horrible and dead that nobody bought the stuff, it's just piling up, and nobody plays it. But they must have sold some AoS stuff after Starter, if the sales are only a slight decline (or slight increase).
Also, a bunch of that so-called panic-buying helps independents a lot more than GW. GW makes nothing on independents selling Isle of Blood or old codex releases, or even many of the old models, off their shelves, because it's not restocked.
The long term impact is why was the AoS starter bought? Sure, I saw a lot of the starter bought locally (two by me alone), but most..including myself...bought them for conversion and counts as within 40k. I would not be too quick to see a decent release of the AoS starter as indicative of the health and viability of maintaining and investing in the line.
Torga_DW wrote: So sales have been fantastic. So fantastic, that they're reporting *another* decline? Even if i were to believe their constant currency line, and they tayed relatively flat - is that really good news for them? I can't speak for AoS, but BaC is what i'd call 'firing the big guns' and the end result is flat/declining revenue?
Let's not also forget the panic buying that will have taken place when AoS was released. This might be a sign that they're stabilizing income, or it might simply be a prelude to a another migration of customers away from them.
Well, if you believe their constant currency line, sales are up a little. Otherwise, sales are down a little. But one product and 3 weeks to sell it can't carry the entire half-year, man.
What I'm saying is that, if true, AoS (starter) probably didn't do as horribly as a lot of people on the interwebs think it did, which is certainly better for GW than AoS Starter doing as badly as the people on the interwebs think, or even if AoS Starter sold comparably to Isle of Blood in the few half-years before that. It would mean that AoS Starter and the three months of Stormcast Eternal releases actually did not perform absolutely horribly in sales (which we guess that WHFB did for at least a few years). Remember, conventional wisdom is that AoS is so horrible and dead that nobody bought the stuff, it's just piling up, and nobody plays it. But they must have sold some AoS stuff after Starter, if the sales are only a slight decline (or slight increase).
Also, a bunch of that so-called panic-buying helps independents a lot more than GW. GW makes nothing on independents selling Isle of Blood or old codex releases, or even many of the old models, off their shelves, because it's not restocked.
The long term impact is why was the AoS starter bought? Sure, I saw a lot of the starter bought locally (two by me alone), but most..including myself...bought them for conversion and counts as within 40k. I would not be too quick to see a decent release of the AoS starter as indicative of the health and viability of maintaining and investing in the line.
The only way that I can see myself ever buying AoS is if somebody commissions me to paint it for them.
Both of the two sets sold to my group have been turned into 40K figures as well - Blood Angels and Chaos. (Amusingly, the backpacks for the Blood Angels are from a third party company.)
The Auld Grump - piece of irony - I think that Kings of War has led more people in my group to buy GW figures than either of the two most recent editions of Warhammer - three if you want to count AoS. (Ogres seems to be the Mantic army that people are buying - they want to support the company, and Ogres make good allies for pretty much any army.)
agnosto wrote: 100,000 pounds or so of it was to pay the Chairman's no experience wife to manage the project as a contractor.
Jesus. Bet that paid for a nice holiday or house extension.
To be completely fair she was well suited for the position since her previous employment was as the board secretary (a ghost position) for Kirby's tax shelter company and before that she was a recreation specialist for the local sports facility.
agnosto wrote: 100,000 pounds or so of it was to pay the Chairman's no experience wife to manage the project as a contractor.
Jesus. Bet that paid for a nice holiday or house extension.
To be completely fair she was well suited for the position since her previous employment was as the board secretary (a ghost position) for Kirby's tax shelter company and before that she was a recreation specialist for the local sports facility.
She fits GW's policy of hiring for attitude not competence.
Joyboozer wrote: But Games Workshop do market research, just not the nice kind, you don't spend that much on web design, they're getting a lot of information from their end.
1) What you're suggesting runs contrary to what GW have explicitly stated so you'd need more than the price of the website as proof.
2) That would still be terrible market research as it only accounts for people already visiting GWs website, and nowhere on that website is a 'tell us what you think' section.
GW's old web site told them where I lived, where I worked, my birthday, and the games and armies I was interested in buying. By extension and the use of cookies, they could infer the stuff I wasn't interested in. But all that information was thrown away when they dumped the customer registration database rather than move it to the new "web store".
I think a lot of people overthink it. GW decides what it's going to make based on what sells: they make more of the stuff that people buy, less of what people don't, and occasionally try something new. So if people want to buy big fancy kits, they'll make more big fancy kits, and if people want to buy more space marines, they'll make more space marines. If tungsten carbide tooled model kits will sell for an overall higher gross profit, they'll do it, if finecast doesn't generate sales, they'll walk away. Of course they care about the long term health of the game, but that is secondary to short and mid-term profits, because the way they figure it is that a bird in the hand is worth five thousand in the bush. That's because in the long term, so many things can change that they figure, make money while you can; you can always do something else later.
But this is not unique to GW. The whole human race operates on this. You can call it corporate greed, myopic short-sightedness, practicality, being responsible to your shareholders or good business sense, depending on your perspective.
Look at fullsize SUVs and luxury crossovers: man, these vehicles are hot. But collectively, they're TERRIBLE for the environment. They use twice as much gas as a car, have a big, fat carbon footprint, use up lots of materials, and for what? Most people who have them use the "utility" part very seldomly, and just like them because they're big, fancy, impressive cars. They don't care about the gas consumption because they can afford gas whether it's $1 / L, $2 / L, or even $5 / L. Arguably, they're contributing to the long-term destruction of the environment (at least in relevant human years), which is, you know, pretty important. Tornados and blizzards in Texas and all.
The right thing to do would be to make a lot less SUVs, make cars out of lighter and more fuel efficient materials, and stop pumping out 5L (and larger) V8s in favor of fuel efficient 4-cyls. Instead of pouring R&D into heads-up displays, panoramic roofs, radar-based safety features, and nav computers with ever-more humongous screens that you can see in direct sunlight, increase fuel efficiency and reduce production costs for cars targeted at the masses. But car manufacturers aren't going to do that. All their R&D goes into awesome new SUVs with super high tech gadgets and big price tags.
Why?
Because at least in the short and mid term, that's what "people" are paying for. Not "people" in the sense of every person buying a car, but "people" in the sense of the most profitable segment and the people that it's easiest to sell a new car to. No different than GW popping centerpiece models, whether they're good for the ecosystem and community or not.
What about the low end cars and all that? They leave it to the Korean manufacturers like Kia to cover that much-less-profitable segment, knowing that even though a chevy or a Honda or a Volkswagen won't give you as good value, it doesn't matter, because they're still going to get some of that low-end business no matter what, and it's more important for them to keep the marketshare of the easy money. No different than GW just surrendering the inexpensive model market / low model count game to other companies, and deciding they don't even want to compete there.
Ok, so if I read that right, GW make lots of Space Marines because people like owning 4x4s?
In all seriousness, and to stretch your terrible, poorly informed, analogy, still further, GW may well be choosing to not make 4x4s in a market where people are desperate to buy them. There's no mechanism in place for them to tell.
Not a criticism you can level at big car makers.
Also, there's no such thing as over analysis or over thinking when it comes to trying to optimise your products for your customer and therefore optimise sales and profits.
Unless you're GW, in which case the answer is any thinking or analysis is clearly considered too much.
Talys wrote: I think a lot of people overthink it. GW decides what it's going to make based on what sells: they make more of the stuff that people buy, less of what people don't, and occasionally try something new. So if people want to buy big fancy kits, they'll make more big fancy kits, and if people want to buy more space marines, they'll make more space marines. If tungsten carbide tooled model kits will sell for an overall higher gross profit, they'll do it, if finecast doesn't generate sales, they'll walk away. Of course they care about the long term health of the game, but that is secondary to short and mid-term profits, because the way they figure it is that a bird in the hand is worth five thousand in the bush. That's because in the long term, so many things can change that they figure, make money while you can; you can always do something else later.
The problem with this approach is that you're just throwing crap at the wall to see what sticks.
The release and subsequent good or poor sales of any given model this week is no actual indication of how well a similar thing will do next week, particularly in a setting where purchases are affected by gameplay. That's the sort of thinking that results in you releasing, say, a deluxe version of one of your most popular boardgames and then when that sells well following it up with a shiny new naval boardgame that nobody actually wants.
We also heard a story a few years back about how GW 'proved' to themselves that lowering prices wouldn't increase sales, by putting out two different cavalry kits for WHFB at different prices - they (apparently) noticed that the cheaper kit didn't sell any more than the more expensive one, without paying any attention to the fact that the cheaper kit was a unit that nobody wanted because they sucked in-game.
But car manufacturers aren't going to do that. All their R&D goes into awesome new SUVs with super high tech gadgets and big price tags.
Uh... what?
Car manufacturers over the last decade or so have been pumping a ridiculous amount of money into developing petrol-electric hybrids or fully-electric cars, and lowering emissions and fuel efficiency on regular engines.
Edit for the bit where I went all old-man and missed half a sentence...
Talys wrote: I think a lot of people overthink it. GW decides what it's going to make based on what sells: they make more of the stuff that people buy, less of what people don't, and occasionally try something new. So if people want to buy big fancy kits, they'll make more big fancy kits, and if people want to buy more space marines, they'll make more space marines. If tungsten carbide tooled model kits will sell for an overall higher gross profit, they'll do it, if finecast doesn't generate sales, they'll walk away. Of course they care about the long term health of the game, but that is secondary to short and mid-term profits, because the way they figure it is that a bird in the hand is worth five thousand in the bush. That's because in the long term, so many things can change that they figure, make money while you can; you can always do something else later.
The problem with this approach is that you're just throwing crap at the wall to see what sticks.
The release and subsequent good or poor sales of any given model this week is no actual indication of how well a similar thing will do next week, particularly in a setting where purchases. That's the sort of thinking that results in you releasing, say, a deluxe version of one of your most popular boardgames and then when that sells well following it up with a shiny new naval boardgame that nobody actually wants.
We also heard a story a few years back about how GW 'proved' to themselves that lowering prices wouldn't increase sales, by putting out two different cavalry kits for WHFB at different prices - they (apparently) noticed that the cheaper kit didn't sell any more than the more expensive one, without paying any attention to the fact that the cheaper kit was a unit that nobody wanted because they sucked in-game.
But car manufacturers aren't going to do that. All their R&D goes into awesome new SUVs with super high tech gadgets and big price tags.
Uh... what?
Car manufacturers over the last decade or so have been pumping a ridiculous amount of money into developing petrol-electric hybrids or fully-electric cars, and lowering emissions and fuel efficiency on regular engines.
Give this man a cigar because he gets it. Give a space marine librarian a D weapon and watch them fly off of the shelves. Give a humble kroot shaper a D weapon and they'll be sold out tomorrow. Big, fancy kits sell because of the rules attached to them. The reason that these models don't have game breaking rules is because they're relatively cheap compared to a Knight or Axe wielding bloodthirster.
@insaniak - 'all' was too strong an adjective. There is a disproportionate investment in redesign an improvement into a segment that is not good for all of us in the long term. Things like sports cars and big-engine SUVs were just an example, but I'm sure you can think of many things in the world that follow, 'make what they want now, not what will be good for them later'.
Also, the GW way is not terribly different from Microsoft forcing the bungee team (before the contract ended) making nothing hut Halo. It drove the devs nuts, but MS knew it would sell, so screw the potential of two or three franchises, give the players what they want. No different than pumping out more space marine and imperium. Though in hindsight, comparing Destiny to Halo 5, they probably did the right thing.
@agnosto - yet Centurions, Windriders, Wraithknights, and Wraithguard are NOT bestsellers -- not even top 28 --, while Blood Angels Tactical Squad, Tyranid Swarm, Cadian defense force, and Harlequin Troupe are. If anyone thinks these are a path to a super-winning army, have I got a bridge to sell you. In fact, a ton of the top 28 kits so far are weak -- they made more money off of land raiders and toxicrenes than wraithknights and riptide, ffs. Hardly anything you see on power lists show up, with the notable exception of drop pods and the entire skitarii faction. Maybe GW is right and there is a high proportion of non- and hardly-gamers.
I do not believe that the overwhelming plurality of wargamers and collectors are totally price insensitive, but I think for a good chunk of people, if they love a product enough, they'll spend a lot more, if they can afford it. Like the $4 coffee which makes no sense, especially when the coffee is free at work, except the person wants it.
In terms of models, I'd much rather spend more for the model I really want than less for the one is okay, but doesn't scream for me to take it home.
Talys wrote: @insaniak - 'all' was too strong an adjective. There is a disproportionate investment in redesign an improvement into a segment that is not good for all of us in the long term. Things like sports cars and big-engine SUVs were just an example, but I'm sure you can think of many things in the world that follow, 'make what they want now, not what will be good for them later'.
Citation needed. I for one couldn't find any sort of detailed information on this without stumping up $750 for a licence to access it. There's a world of difference between investing in 4x4s is totally different than building them. Car manufacturers will develop a system and then use it across the range, even across multiple ranges, where appropriate. This was, and remains, a tenuous analogy based largely on your supposition.
Also, the GW way is not terribly different from Microsoft forcing the bungee team (before the contract ended) making nothing hut Halo. It drove the devs nuts, but MS knew it would sell, so screw the potential of two or three franchises, give the players what they want. No different than pumping out more space marine and imperium. Though in hindsight, comparing Destiny to Halo 5, they probably did the right thing.
Again, it is if there was a large market looking for something else Bungee was well placed to produce but Microsoft simply churned out the same thing because they CBA finding out.
@agnosto - yet Centurions, Windriders, Wraithknights, and Wraithguard are NOT bestsellers -- not even top 28 --, while Blood Angels Tactical Squad, Tyranid Swarm, Cadian defense force, and Harlequin Troupe are. If anyone thinks these are a path to a super-winning army, have I got a bridge to sell you. In fact, a ton of the top 28 kits so far are weak -- they made more money off of land raiders and toxicrenes than wraithknights and riptide, ffs. Hardly anything you see on power lists show up, with the notable exception of drop pods and the entire skitarii faction. Maybe GW is right and there is a high proportion of non- and hardly-gamers.
You mean, older kits that have likely fulfilled the demand already didn't sell as much as kits released this year and staples? Shock! Horror! We also have absolutely no idea what criteria where applied to arrive at the result. Asking the mums that brought their kids to WHW one day in November what they liked the look of for all we know.
I do not believe that the overwhelming plurality of wargamers and collectors are totally price insensitive, but I think for a good chunk of people, if they love a product enough, they'll spend a lot more, if they can afford it. Like the $4 coffee which makes no sense, especially when the coffee is free at work, except the person wants it.
It is also likely superior quality to a jug of filter coffee that's been sat stewing for hours Brewer on a machine that hasn't been cleaned in a decade. There's a difference between paying a premium for a tangibly better product and just "because."
In terms of models, I'd much rather spend more for the model I really want than less for the one is okay, but doesn't scream for me to take it home.
So would we all, but that's not the same as paying good coffee rather than have gak coffee for free.
The idea that GW, Microsoft or really any decently sized company "CBA" or is "too lazy" to think of how best to manage its business and sell more products I think is a lazy analysis itself.
Tom Kirby wrote: We do no demographic research, we have no focus groups, we do not ask the market what it wants. These things are otiose in a niche.
In addition to spending a fortune on a new website and not even porting over existing customer data.
What else does one infer?
To be fair, that doesn't show that they don't consider how best to manage their business and sell more products... just that they don't bother to include feedback from their customers in that consideration.
Or, in other words, they consider how best to sell more products, but they're either just guessing what their customers want and hoping for the best, or are totally convinced that their customers will buy whatever they choose to release.
Kirby's general attitude points more towards the latter.
He mimicked my phrasing, and I used that phrase in the context of not doing market research, so took it to mean the same.
Of course, a great deal of effort goes into extracting as much cash as possible from their customers, I'm sure one click bundles took many hours of meetings at the highest level just by themselves!
But I can't find a better word for a retailer/manufacturer that doesn't exploit every possible avenue open to it to find out what its customers want, so it can actually make it, than lazy?
Well, I suppose there's arrogant, but why not both?
They don't skip the market research out of laziness, they do so out of a belief that it is completely uneccessary, so doing it would just be a waste of time and resources.
That's not laziness, it's efficiency... provided you're actually correct, and you know what you're doing.
And that fits Kirby's attitude perfectly. He feels that there is no point in doing market research, because he is firmly convinced that the product they make is the product that their customers want... and if you don't want it, well, you're not a customer, so that doesn't count.
Although I did actually say CBA rather than lazy, originally, which fits just as well.
I'm sure in two weeks Mr K will be completely vindicated.
Garbage in, garbage out. They get out of the system that they created an income commensurate to the amount of effort that they put into it to begin with.
Falling sales volume likely caused by (choose one or several):
- Lack of communication with customers.
- Lack of advertising.
- Poor quality product.
- Toxic corporate culture.
- Loss of customer satisfaction resulting in loss of customers.
- Bad public relations (i.e. sue someone who uses a similar word to one that you do), resulting in loss of customers.
- Poor product support after sale (i.e. rules clarifications, also see first point).
- Overestimating demand for some products while grossly underestimating demand for others resulting in poor customer experience or excess stock. Likely caused by first point and contributed by second point (you can't gauge excitement about a product (potential demand) that you don't advertise until a week before it's released).
The good news is that we only get his ramblings in 1/2 of the report now, The Chairman's Preamble, unless Mr. Rountree goes the same literary route in the CEO report.
@agnosto - yet Centurions, Windriders, Wraithknights, and Wraithguard are NOT bestsellers -- not even top 28 --, while Blood Angels Tactical Squad, Tyranid Swarm, Cadian defense force, and Harlequin Troupe are. If anyone thinks these are a path to a super-winning army, have I got a bridge to sell you. In fact, a ton of the top 28 kits so far are weak -- they made more money off of land raiders and toxicrenes than wraithknights and riptide, ffs. Hardly anything you see on power lists show up, with the notable exception of drop pods and the entire skitarii faction. Maybe GW is right and there is a high proportion of non- and hardly-gamers.
You mean, older kits that have likely fulfilled the demand already didn't sell as much as kits released this year and staples? Shock! Horror! We also have absolutely no idea what criteria where applied to arrive at the result. Asking the mums that brought their kids to WHW one day in November what they liked the look of for all we know.
Read up to see Insaniak's context as to Agnosto's comment, but essentially it boiled down to "kits with good rules sell well, while kits with bad rules will sell not as well".
Yet Eldar Windriders, a kit that is brand new to 2015 and is argued as the most overpowered troop in the entire game, did not make the top 28 bestsellers list. Eldar Harlequin Troupe, launched only a little while before them, and a MUCH, MUCH weaker unit, is near the top of the pack. At the far extreme, Blood Angels Tactical Squad, arguably one of the worst units in one of the crappiest factions (if you like winning) in terms of rules right now, got something like #6 bestseller.
So what I'm saying is, good rules isn't the only thing that sells models. Hell, awesomely imbalanced rules might not even sell models. People buy what they want to buy because the think Blood Angels look cool, and Harlequins are awesome. It hardly matters that both are great ways to build an army that will lose way more battles than they'll win.
Looking at the top 28 list so far, if you strip out the AdMech (which people have been asking for... ever), a lot of the units just aren't good units, or at least aren't GREAT units or kits that are a part of a winning formula:
Tyranid Swarm, BATac Squad, Cadian Defence Force, Harlequin Troupe, Toxicrene, Zoans, Tyrannocyte, Chaos Space Marines, Starweaver, Tempestus Scions, Land Raider Crusader, Baneblade -- and I would even argue Space Marine Tactical Squad, because other than Gladius, they kinda suck.
So out of the 17 40k kits listed so far (excluding AdMech), I think that somewhere around 12 of those are "junk units". Like, competitive players do not use baneblades, LRCs, toxicrenes, etc. For all the, "Eldar and Necron are easy mode", there's nothing that's Craftworld Eldar, and only the Necron battleforce in the top 28. Draw whatever conclusions you want out of that. One *possible* conclusion is that GW is right, and a lot of their customers buy the models just because they like modelling them, and rarely, or never play, or only play casually, without caring much about strength levels of models.
If you disagree, then tell me why you think Harlequins outsold Windriders.
Azreal13 wrote: So would we all, but that's not the same as paying good coffee rather than have gak coffee for free.
Except some of us disagree, and like the coffee we're paying for, and think the competitor's coffee is lest tasty.
If I had to guess, I would suspect that Harlies outsold the new jetbike due to a combination of the fact that the Harlies are really pretty models while the jetbike was a little underwhelming compared to the Dark Eldar version, and the fact that plastic jetbikes have been available for 20 years now, while plastic harlequins haven't.
The rules certainly aren't the only factor in determining sales, but I very strongly suspect that they do have an influence.
To be frank, we have no idea how GW compiled their best-selling list. We don't know if it was done on units sold, or value sold, or some kind of compensation factor for cost/time. It might conceivably just have been made up by the web content manager to suit a promotion idea. And it's only a ranking, not a list of hard data.
We don't know the sales period, except it doesn't include Christmas 2015 because this ranking started at the beginning of the month. Maybe 1,000,000 dads bought stocking fillers of the little Termagant Snapfit kit on Christmas Eve? We'll never know.
Anyway, it's obvious that everyone doesn't have the same motivation for buying a kit. Some people buy it for rules, others buy it for looks.
insaniak wrote: If I had to guess, I would suspect that Harlies outsold the new jetbike due to a combination of the fact that the Harlies are really pretty models while the jetbike was a little underwhelming compared to the Dark Eldar version, and the fact that plastic jetbikes have been available for 20 years now, while plastic harlequins haven't.
The rules certainly aren't the only factor in determining sales, but I very strongly suspect that they do have an influence.
Indeed, I am one of the people who bought harlequins for no reason other than that I love the models. Still, windriders came with 3 of each heavy weapon, including scatterlasers. For the competitive crowd, that's pretty important -- I mean, otherwise, no particular model is important, as you can proxy anything for anything else. Still, BANEBLADES, LRCs, and toxicrenes outsold all those awesomely performing models, like space marine bikes, eldar bikes, wraithknights, riptides, dreadknights, and on and on.
I mean other than drop pods and presumably IK, there were no OP 'easy mode' spammy models that made it to the top. az's point was valid to say that other than windriders, a lot of the powerful models are dated, so the people who wanted them already bought them. But a lot of the models that made top 28 that are weak are also dated, and there are fantastic performers that are nice models for crappy factions.
I don't think, therefore, that the GW position that a lot of their customers are primarily modelers or collectors is that outrageous. It shouldn't be jut dismissed. This leads to two interesting conclusions: first, because GW still accounts for a huge percentage of miniature sales, a significant percentage of gamers/modelers' spending goes to what they perceive as cool models rather than strong units; and that there are plenty of people for whom weak model rules is not a deterrent to purchases.
Putting on the conspiracy hat, is it possible that nids and blood angels have nigh unwinnable rules, while necron and eldar have superb rules as an experiment to see if strong factions mean strong sales?
I don't think, therefore, that the GW position that a lot of their customers are primarily modelers or collectors is that outrageous. It shouldn't be jut dismissed.
I don't dismiss it. I'm now a GW "modeller" who only buys a model once in a while when I think it is cool. I think I bought 4 models/boxes this year and the same roughly last year. This is unfortunately not by choice though. I used to make an army a year back in 3rd edition and then slowed down to an army every edition by 5th. With the changes in 6th, any thoughts of a new full army just stopped cold and I pretty much just dropped down to buying the codex for my existing armies. With 7th and the rehashing of 1-2 year old books that I just bought in gaming terms, I stopped even doing that. I've got one army that I'll keep tourney legal (my Tau) and the rest will just live on as battlescribe army lists of my existing models and units where applicable without GW getting a penny. So GW successfully converted someone who was spending over $1000 a year each year in 5th edition to someone that has spent about $200 this year (most of it "recycled" by selling existing GW products on the secondary market instead of increasing my collection) and likely less in 2016 because I don't plan on buying any rules at all this upcoming year... yay for Kirby and his apprentice and their master plan?
Kilkrazy wrote: To be frank, we have no idea how GW compiled their best-selling list. We don't know if it was done on units sold, or value sold, or some kind of compensation factor for cost/time. It might conceivably just have been made up by the web content manager to suit a promotion idea. And it's only a ranking, not a list of hard data.
We don't know the sales period, except it doesn't include Christmas 2015 because this ranking started at the beginning of the month. Maybe 1,000,000 dads bought stocking fillers of the little Termagant Snapfit kit on Christmas Eve? We'll never know.
Anyway, it's obvious that everyone doesn't have the same motivation for buying a kit. Some people buy it for rules, others buy it for looks.
Exactly. What sales is being utilized to determine a products position on that list? Sales volume, percent of stock sold, informal questionnaire, number of clicks on the website? Without hard data, it's impossible to determine that anything on that list is valid so then what's left is supposition, guestimation, and anecdotal conversation. Talys may disagree with my take on it but lacking any hard data it's all opinion vs. opinion.
@warboss - there is no question in my mind that GW has alienated some players by their pricing and their game rules.
@agnosto - When you read the paragraphs in the app, it's pretty clear and consistent that they're best SELLERS, rather than clicks on the website, or choices for stocking stuffers. Now, we can debate whether that's unit or dollars, but it's probably dollars, because it's hard to imagine more Tyranid swarm KITS than Blood Angels Tactical or Harlequin Troupe kits.
The blurb on Tyranid Swarm reads:
Into the top 5...
Our fifth-biggest selling kit of 2015? Why that would be the Tyranid Swarm. Understandable, you get a lot of models for your money - ninety-five miniatures are included! How do you fancy overwhelming your opponent with sheer force of numbers? This is the perfect kit for you, truly.
Only a few more kits to go until we reveal the biggest seller - what do you think it will be?
Talys wrote: @warboss - there is no question in my mind that GW has alienated some players by their pricing and their game rules.
@agnosto - When you read the paragraphs in the app, it's pretty clear and consistent that they're best SELLERS, rather than clicks on the website, or choices for stocking stuffers. Now, we can debate whether that's unit or dollars, but it's probably dollars, because it's hard to imagine more Tyranid swarm KITS than Blood Angels Tactical or Harlequin Troupe kits.
The blurb on Tyranid Swarm reads:
Into the top 5...
Our fifth-biggest selling kit of 2015? Why that would be the Tyranid Swarm. Understandable, you get a lot of models for your money - ninety-five miniatures are included! How do you fancy overwhelming your opponent with sheer force of numbers? This is the perfect kit for you, truly.
Only a few more kits to go until we reveal the biggest seller - what do you think it will be?
To be fair, iirc a few tourney players experimented with the Toxocrine in place of the Dimachaeron in metas that didn't allow forgeworld, same for Venomthropes where Malanthropes weren't allowed.
Tyrannocytes besides being the Tyranid drop pod also included Mucolids, another competitive choice for tourney lists as a minimum troops choice- three were required for the Leviathan detachment that lets you run 3 Flyrants.
Tyranid swarm includes Rippers- another tourney troop choice, Genestealers and a Carnifex(alternate choices for different lists), Gargoyles to be used in the more competitive Flyrant formations, and then "free" termagants and hormagaunts.
I'm a little surprised Lictors didn't make the list because of "Lictor Shame" that was being run for a good while, but they also didn't get a new kit. But I did notice their prices shot up on eBay.
Talys wrote: @warboss - there is no question in my mind that GW has alienated some players by their pricing and their game rules.
Yeah, I just wanted to point out that folks critical of their policies don't necessarily discount their "modelers" focus. Heck, I'm one of those "success" stories in that they turned me from a lowly peasant games focused consumer into a chosen master race modeller who incidentally spends only a fraction of the amount that I previously did.
@warboss - as the game ages from years to decades, it's hard to imagine how they keep it fresh other than to introduce new factions, though.
If GW stopped adding to old factions (in a significant way, ie just refreshes and occasional minor releases or releases that are purely optional and a lateral power shift rather than vertical) and just released new factions as their primary moneymaker, they'd be making like 8 factions a year (this year, they added 3... Sigmarites, Harlequins, and AdMech); in 20 years, they'd have 160 factions
You can't just add "more of the same" and expect people to keep buying for their factions forever, too. Like, continuously churning out more 28mm infantry models for decades is going to be a dead end at some point, because no matter how much people love librarians, they're going to stop (or at least drastically slow down) once they hit a certain number.
So the obvious solutions are to (1) build radically different things and change the game or (2) build another game.
I think #1 is easier to succeed in than #2, if you have a really hot game. After all, if someone is going to quit 40k and look at another game, it's a great time for them to just say, why not consider another company altogether? On the other hand, if the choice is between adding to their 40k collection or starting another game, that's a different thought process entirely.
Like I said a while back, I think it's worthy of discussion if and how a company can maintain churn for someone like you, ** for decades ** without drastically mixing things up. I don't think that in a context of a game with 10 or so factions, it's possible to expect someone to spend $1,000 a year for 20 years on basically horizontal shifts of the same stuff (more infantry, more tanks, more elite infantry, more fast/recon units, reboot infantry, reboot tanks, etc.).
Talys wrote: @warboss - there is no question in my mind that GW has alienated some players by their pricing and their game rules.
@agnosto - When you read the paragraphs in the app, it's pretty clear and consistent that they're best SELLERS, rather than clicks on the website, or choices for stocking stuffers. Now, we can debate whether that's unit or dollars, but it's probably dollars, because it's hard to imagine more Tyranid swarm KITS than Blood Angels Tactical or Harlequin Troupe kits.
The blurb on Tyranid Swarm reads:
Into the top 5...
Our fifth-biggest selling kit of 2015? Why that would be the Tyranid Swarm. Understandable, you get a lot of models for your money - ninety-five miniatures are included! How do you fancy overwhelming your opponent with sheer force of numbers? This is the perfect kit for you, truly.
Only a few more kits to go until we reveal the biggest seller - what do you think it will be?
I'm that case there's an obvious bias towards kits that were out a whole year vs those out a month or less also a bias towards box sets rather than single models, etc.
Highest selling doesn't necessarily mean money, it quite often means number of units sold.
Are they just using their own data or does that include 3rd parties? If it includes 3rd parties, it will be inflated as it won't include returned product or product just sitting on shelves. They very well might just be counting anything that left warehouse as a sold item. I think that you can tell the issue with relying on bald statements not backed by hard, clearly defined data and parameters.
Are we back to arguing quality again? I find a lot of Mantic's figures to be pretty decent (their Orcs and Undead are really good, their Elves look like fae not GW pointy-eared humans, and their Dwarves while a bit taller than normal look blocky like Dwarves should), and the worst of them (Basileans) are no worse than GW's Empire troops that look about as ugly, if not uglier, since at least the Basileans look uniform not like a bunch of riffraff that were stuffed into Landsknecht uniforms and sent out (and what is up with the barefoot guy? Did he lost his boots in a game of cards?).
GW's problem is they aren't all that much quality. It's basically the equivalent of selling you a Lexus that turns out to really be a Camry, but you paid for a Lexus. If you're okay with that, then fine, but there's REAL quality miniatures out there (typically plastic kits by Bandai and Tamiya and the like) which, while it might not scratch your itch if you want Space Marines and skulls and Aquilas on things, quality-wise are heads and shoulders above anything GW can do.
Talys wrote: @warboss - as the game ages from years to decades, it's hard to imagine how they keep it fresh other than to introduce new factions, though.
If GW stopped adding to old factions (in a significant way, ie just refreshes and occasional minor releases or releases that are purely optional and a lateral power shift rather than vertical) and just released new factions as their primary moneymaker, they'd be making like 8 factions a year (this year, they added 3... Sigmarites, Harlequins, and AdMech); in 20 years, they'd have 160 factions
You can't just add "more of the same" and expect people to keep buying for their factions forever, too. Like, continuously churning out more 28mm infantry models for decades is going to be a dead end at some point, because no matter how much people love librarians, they're going to stop (or at least drastically slow down) once they hit a certain number.
So the obvious solutions are to (1) build radically different things and change the game or (2) build another game.
I think #1 is easier to succeed in than #2, if you have a really hot game. After all, if someone is going to quit 40k and look at another game, it's a great time for them to just say, why not consider another company altogether? On the other hand, if the choice is between adding to their 40k collection or starting another game, that's a different thought process entirely.
Like I said a while back, I think it's worthy of discussion if and how a company can maintain churn for someone like you, ** for decades ** without drastically mixing things up. I don't think that in a context of a game with 10 or so factions, it's possible to expect someone to spend $1,000 a year for 20 years on basically horizontal shifts of the same stuff (more infantry, more tanks, more elite infantry, more fast/recon units, reboot infantry, reboot tanks, etc.).
This is in response to my post but I'm definitely not arguing against any of that (and I don't see anyone in the thread doing so either) in case that was why. I think it would have been better for the company to "reboot" 40k in 6th edition with a ground up purpose built ruleset that accomodated the change of focus to the "bigger" both in terms of model count and model size that the company wanted. Instead, they decided to just take the previously optional apoc rules and cram them right up the rear end of the main rules leaving out the single mediocre attempt at a balancing factor they had (points cost for formations). Would there be an uproar if they had invalidated every codex and every supplement at one time after 3 editions? Sure.. absolutely. There was one in 3rd edition when they did the same thing... but people got over it when they realized they had a full set of streamlined (compared to second edition) rules that started everyone on relatively equal footing. If they wanted to shake things up again like in 3rd edition which also had an increase in game scope and model size by adding in what was previously only apoc, they should have done it the right way instead of just has assing it TWICE with books that were only intended to last half the time yet costed twice as much as their predecessors. It was their choice of trying to have their cake AND eating it too that has gotten them to this point.
If you want to start another thread to discuss what they could/should have done, feel free to post the link here so we don't derail it further.
edit: For readers, please note that I'm not looking back at 3rd edition with purely rose tinted glasses as I fully admit that it had lots of growing pains and warts. Some were cleared up in further editions up to and including 5th but some stayed on largely because the desire to really change things was lost after 3rd but at least the desire to refine stayed until 5th. 3rd was a big departure and I'm sure it lost them some customers but it was also a huge success and a period (at least subjectively) of great growth for the game. I got in on 3rd precisely because I wanted to play something in store (the "herd" effect) and because it felt like everyone was going to be on the same footing with regard to books and rules. The local 40k group grew from 3-4 regulars in 2nd edition to over a dozen showing up twice a week midway through 3rd. YMMV obviously but the changes I saw (especially when I looked at the previous 2nd edition rules) were positive overall and I was glad that GW had the business sense to do what was very good for them in the long term and look beyond just 6 months into the future. Unfortunately, the changes over the past 3 years or so (whenever 6th edition hit) feel purely motivated by the desire to sell every NEW model to every customer with fluff/rules/balance "spin" tacked on as an afterthought to justify the already cemented decision.
Talys wrote: Indeed, I am one of the people who bought harlequins for no reason other than that I love the models. Still, windriders came with 3 of each heavy weapon, including scatterlasers. For the competitive crowd, that's pretty important --
Less important if you already have a bunch of jetbikes and can buy scatterlasers to slap on them from eBay.
I don't think, therefore, that the GW position that a lot of their customers are primarily modelers or collectors is that outrageous. It shouldn't be jut dismissed.
Not only was I not dismissing it, I completely agree with it.
My point was that rules potentially have an impact on sales, not that they are the sole factor in it.
WayneTheGame wrote: Are we back to arguing quality again? I find a lot of Mantic's figures to be pretty decent (their Orcs and Undead are really good, their Elves look like fae not GW pointy-eared humans, and their Dwarves while a bit taller than normal look blocky like Dwarves should), and the worst of them (Basileans) are no worse than GW's Empire troops that look about as ugly, if not uglier, since at least the Basileans look uniform not like a bunch of riffraff that were stuffed into Landsknecht uniforms and sent out (and what is up with the barefoot guy? Did he lost his boots in a game of cards?).
GW's problem is they aren't all that much quality. It's basically the equivalent of selling you a Lexus that turns out to really be a Camry, but you paid for a Lexus. If you're okay with that, then fine, but there's REAL quality miniatures out there (typically plastic kits by Bandai and Tamiya and the like) which, while it might not scratch your itch if you want Space Marines and skulls and Aquilas on things, quality-wise are heads and shoulders above anything GW can do.
where exactly are the GW plastics lacking in quality???
i see this statement a lot on here, but have yet to crack open a new GW plastic kit that has any quality issues, as far as i can tell...
what am i missing???
Toofast wrote: Other companies make tank models far larger and more detailed than anything FW produces for $40-50. The smaller, less detailed FW tanks are $100-400.
which other company makes a Land Raider Spartan, or a Tau Hammerhead, or an Eldar Night Spinner???
the point is not that i can buy an Abrams with more detail for less money, the point is that i can get a specific model from GW, which i cannot get from another company...
if i want a Hammerhead, an Abrams is not going to cut the mustard, even if it costs half as much...
aesthetic appeals aside, my question is, where are the recent GW HIPS kits lacking in quality???
is the plastic bad???
are the moldlines excessive???
are the details shallow???
does the material warp???
are miscasts common???
i understand that they may not be to everybody's aesthetic taste, and that the prices are turning off a lot of people, but i don't see where the lack of quality argument is coming from...
lack of perceived value, sure, i can understand...
the problem is, if people are not buying the kits in the first place, then they don't have the sprues in hand to really judge the quality of the sculpting and casting...
no photo will ever compare to actually holding a model in hand, unfortunately...
at half the price, i am sure a lot more people would appreciate the good work the the studio is doing...
jah-joshua wrote: which other company makes a Land Raider Spartan, or a Tau Hammerhead, or an Eldar Night Spinner???
Oh seriously, this AGAIN?
"What's wrong with GW quality?"
"Other companies make higher quality models for lower prices"
"BUT THEY DON'T MAKE SPACE MARINES!"
I've read this discussion so many times it's starting to get a bit old.
aesthetic appeals aside, my question is, where are the recent GW HIPS kits lacking in quality???
is the plastic bad???
are the moldlines excessive???
are the details shallow???
does the material warp???
are miscasts common???
To me they're just over priced. Whether you say they lack quality for their price or their price is too high for the quality is kind of the same thing.
aesthetic appeals aside, my question is, where are the recent GW HIPS kits lacking in quality???
is the plastic bad???
are the moldlines excessive???
are the details shallow???
does the material warp???
are miscasts common???
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
Looking at vehicles GW don't use nearly as many parts as someone like Tamiya, leading to fewer sprues and cheaper production costs, but a huge lack of detail and theynstill cost more.
GW do a lot of giant monsters in plastic and for the most part I'd say plastic is simply a bad material to do large sections of flesh with because there should be anlot kore texture over those areas than GW use. Ideally a real resin would be what you want there.
Little things like chains dangling off marines actually being more like solid disksthat simply move through one another instead of actual chains.
Details on things like knee pads that suddenly become blurred or shallow as they curve around the leg because of the limitations on GW plastics and undercuts.
@Skink: why even bother to respond just to belittle my argument, ignoring the fact that i also gave an example of an Eldar vehicle, and a Tau vehicle???
that should make the discussion new and fresh...
if you don't like what i have to say, just put me on ignore, instead of dismissing the fact that there are models that you can get from GW which you cannot get from another company, and that the sprues are excellent casts...
this is a thread about GW model sales, so i am talking about GW models...
what a shock!!!
nice chatting with you...
maybe relax a little, and enjoy the holiday spirit...
jah-joshua wrote: @Skink: why even bother to respond just to belittle my argument, ignoring the fact that i also gave an example of an Eldar vehicle, and a Tau vehicle??? that should make the discussion new and fresh...
if you don't like what i have to say, just put me on ignore, instead of dismissing the fact that there are models that you can get from GW which you cannot get from another company, and that the sprues are excellent casts...
this is a thread about GW model sales, so i am talking about GW models... what a shock!!!
I'm not putting you on ignore because I don't hate everything you say.
though I will admit.... I hate... the way.... you type everything... like this...
But aside from that, we know other companies don't make GW models.... the fact GW is the only one that makes GW models doesn't factor in to the objective quality argument. It factors in to whether you subjectively are happy to pay an excess for the quality, but in and of itself it is not a quality argument.
Other companies produce models with more parts, more advanced design, using sliding moulds, with less prominent mould lines, for less money.
No, they don't make Space Marines... however the fact something is or is not a Space Marine does not factor in to the quality debate.
maybe relax a little, and enjoy the holiday spirit...
Yeah I fething hate this time of year, best not to appeal to my holiday spirit
@Skink: i see it like this, if i want a Warcaster, i buy a PP model, but i don't buy one of the restic versions in the Battle Box, because the mold lines are excessive and the casts have the bends...
instead, i buy a metal one...
at the end of the day, i have a model that fits the PP aesthetic, and the IK setting, and inspires me to paint a recognizable symbol of that world...
i could get a passable stand-in for a Warcaster from Reaper for less money, but it wouldn't be the model i want...
is a metal Reaper mini (that doesn't do as good a job of representing the Warcaster), but is cheaper, better quality than the more expensive PP mini???
if you compared the GW sprues to a Wyrd sprue, there are no more mold lines on a GW mini than there are on a Wyrd plastic mini...
the GW plastic is actually a bit softer, and easier to clean the mold lines off of than the Wyrd plastics...
both are equally well cast sprues, and go together with a similar amount of gaps on the monopose minis, which GW's modular kits don't suffer from at all...
the difference is, Wyrd kits are cheaper, but again, if you are not after a Steampunk style mini, then the lower price doesn't help...
kits like the Baneblade have used sliding molds since 2007, but if the price is too high, then less people will be able to appreciate the fact that GW bothered...
i get that...
the question is, where are the technical faults in the 2013 Space Marine Tactical Squads sprues that would make the Dreamforge Valkir be perceived as higher quality sculpts???
is the fact that they cost almost half as much the new measure of quality in sculpting and casting???
i don't think so, but i don't expect anyone to agree with me...
If someone wants a GW fantasy model, for whatever reason, then a GW model is what he wants.
A Perry Bros ACW model will not fill the part, no matter how much "objective" quality it contains in terms of accuracy, fine details per square inch and so on.
That is "quality" defined in terms of meeting customer requirements.
Talys wrote: @insaniak - 'all' was too strong an adjective. There is a disproportionate investment in redesign an improvement into a segment that is not good for all of us in the long term. Things like sports cars and big-engine SUVs were just an example, but I'm sure you can think of many things in the world that follow, 'make what they want now, not what will be good for them later'.
Where car manufacturers diverge from GW is that car manufacturers spend millions of dollars a year on both market research (what do people want? In the US that is SUV's and huge engines), and on improving everything about their cars. In the US you can now get Mustangs and Camaros with V6 engines that was unheard of a generation ago, and in Europe most high end cars have dropped a couple of cylinders too and are going the turbocharging route. So your statements are entirely incorrect.
An example that shows car manufacturers overcoming the GW mindset. In the late 80's/early 90's, Toyota bigwigs refused to consider making a pick-up truck even for the export market because there's no need for them in Japan and they can't figure out why anyone would enter such a small market. Said bigwigs are taken to a baseball game and shown the car park, which is made up of nearly 50% pick-up trucks. They immediately change their mind and bring out the Hilux, regarded as the best pick-up truck ever made.
Japanese companies are glacially slow to change anything (it's part of their culture), but they'll still admit mistakes and make changes they feel are needed.
jah-joshua wrote: is the fact that they cost almost half as much the new measure of quality in sculpting and casting???
i don't think so, but i don't expect anyone to agree with me...
You can talk about quality in terms of price.
You can think of it as being able to buy the same thing cheaper, in which case the thought of it being over priced comes to mind.
Or you can think of it as being able to buy something of higher quality for the same price, in which case the thought of it being lower quality comes to mind.
I think the Imperial Knight is poor quality because I can compare it to kits of the same price from other manufacturers. Likewise if the IK was half the price I might no longer think of it as poor quality because I'd no longer be comparing it to those other premium kits. So which is it, is it poor quality or is it over priced? Really just depends how you look at it.
Kilkrazy wrote: If someone wants a GW fantasy model, for whatever reason, then a GW model is what he wants.
A Perry Bros ACW model will not fill the part, no matter how much "objective" quality it contains in terms of accuracy, fine details per square inch and so on.
You can still compare quality between disparate items. Viewing a Space Marine and a Perry ACW infantryman as fluffless generic miniatures, which one is the higher quality? Is the price difference worth it?
That is "quality" defined in terms of meeting customer requirements.
Only if the customer requirement is that it's made by Games Workshop, and I have to admit GW have acted brilliantly in getting this mindset to become so prevalent.
Sure, there's a distinct benefit in meeting your customer requirements, but that'd be a customer service quality rather than a miniature quality, unless the mini was custom build to a customers specifications.
We can all agree that only GW can make GW models (though plenty of proxies exist), but that doesn't invalidate the view that GW miniatures are poor quality (or poor value) compared to other miniatures.
@allseeingskink. Another knight type model being in existence of subjectively higher quality does not mean the Knight does not have quality. You seem to confuse price with quality. There isn't really any other way to look at it in the terms you are using.
Quality is defined by the perceived (or actual) technical aspects of a model, you seem to confuse this with perceived worth.
notprop wrote: @allseeingskink. Another knight type model being in existence of subjectively higher quality does not mean the Knight does not have quality. You seem to confuse price with quality. There isn't really any other way to look at it in the terms you are using.
Quality is defined by the perceived (or actual) technical aspects of a model, you seem to confuse this with perceived worth.
The first thing that comes up when you google "define: quality"...
1. the standard of something as measured against other things of a similar kind; the degree of excellence of something.
"of similar kind" is one of the main benchmarks by which we can measure quality.
Saying something is high or low quality relative to products which are similar and of similar price is a valid way of looking at things.
notprop wrote: @allseeingskink. Another knight type model being in existence of subjectively higher quality does not mean the Knight does not have quality. You seem to confuse price with quality. There isn't really any other way to look at it in the terms you are using.
Quality is defined by the perceived (or actual) technical aspects of a model, you seem to confuse this with perceived worth.
There is nothing subjective about a big robot model with fully articulate legs being superior quality to one in the same material with static legs.
notprop wrote: So not cost mentioned in the googled definition then?
Now you could argue you can get more quality for less cost but that doesn't diminish the quality of the object you are comparing to.
This is just getting in to a semantic debate. Quality as a comparative measure requires similarity, there's no point saying saying an Imperial Knight is poor quality relative to a Rolls-Royce Pegasus.
If you don't like using cost as a point of similarity, fine... all GW models are terrible quality because Tamiya and Bandai exists, end of story
@jonolikespie - the problem with the debates on quality is that you can't have an objective comparison of two items without defining "quality". It's even tougher because people weigh the importance of different aspects of quality differently.
There's quality of cast, consistency, fit, durability of the material, ease of customizability, sharpness of tooling, detail per square inch of plastic, and on and on. Some of these may be of value to some hobbyists or gamers, and be of little or no value to others.
In some cases, like 2015 devastators vs 2005 devastators, the models are *clearly* a better quality, in every measurable way. But in other cases, it's just not nearly so clear.
To me, "quality" in the most subjective sense is things like the cast being free of imperfections and artifacts, the material being free of blemishes, and how the final model reflects the intention of the sculptor, For instance, if the sculptor intended a sorcerer to hold a perfect cube, all of the angles should be exactly square. If a vehicle is tracked, every link in the tread should be identical. Every piece in the model should fit perfectly.
Technically, fully articulating limbs is a feature (perhaps a great one), not an aspect of quality. In the same way that being able pose a model, or select one of 5 weapons, or treat the figure like an action figure. Feature set is distinct from Quality, as is evidenced, for instance, by Chrysler cars, which on paper have every feature you can imagine, but are a piece of junk as an automobile. In comparison, some Toyotas may have a lot less on the feature sheet, but the *quality* of the car is much higher, because people weigh highly attributes like reliability, low maintenance, few repairs, longer lifespan, and so on.
For some people, and in some contexts, things like posability or articulating parts may be very important, and to other people, or in another context for another person, they may not be.
For me personally, articulation post-modelling is undesirable, as it just messes up the paint job. It's not even a feature, because if it's offered, in the modelling process, I'll glue it shut. Examples on GW models are like drop pod doors - yeah, it's cool, in that the drop pod can be open or closed (and I model them both ways), but articulation is pointless, because it just wears off paint at the joints.
An example of poor quality on GW's part is *some* of their Chinese manufactured terrain. The quality of the plastic is *obviously* inferior to similar kits produced in the UK. That doesn't make the Chinese manufactured terrain bad, and after it's all painted, maybe nobody can tell. But it's still objectively inferior.
Posability and customization is a feature very important to me where there are many copies of the similar models (like infantry squads), because I don't want every soldier to be identical, especially if I have 50, 100, 200. It's much less important to me if it's a named model, because I'm only going to have one. And because I'm only modelling one, if I decide I want some other pose, I am willing to go the extra mile and do it the hard way. Generally speaking, in the case of such models, I would prefer a very cool single pose, than the ability to pick between more generic poses.
Also, good quality doesn't have to mean good design. For example, a terribly designed robot that is unnecessarily hard to assemble and really hard to transport might be a lousy design, but still be a good quality model.
notprop wrote: So not cost mentioned in the googled definition then?
Now you could argue you can get more quality for less cost but that doesn't diminish the quality of the object you are comparing to.
This is just getting in to a semantic debate. Quality as a comparative measure requires similarity, there's no point saying saying an Imperial Knight is poor quality relative to a Rolls-Royce Pegasus.
If you don't like using cost as a point of similarity, fine... all GW models are terrible quality because Tamiya and Bandai exists, end of story
Feller, you feel te need to quote dictionary definitions. Maybe your next search should be pedant.
I don't mind cost for comparison but clearly it is not useful when talking about quality. Obviously googling a word does not lead to understanding it.
One thing the tamyia comparison always fails to reflects is that wargaming companies create simplified models for wargamers who want something reasonably accurate without the need for all the sprockets and rivets to be individually cast and built in. Take a look at PSC, Armourcast or Rubicon for example. I've seen lots of those make the gaming table never a Tamyia. They're a fraction of the cost of similar Tamyia models but no less quality (Armiurcast excepted ).
notprop wrote: Feller, you feel te need to quote dictionary definitions. Maybe your next search should be pedant.
Feller, get over it, the use of quality as a comparative requires some measure of similarity and cost is clearly a useful similarity, if you've got a problem with that then I can't help your narrow mindedness. If you don't want to use it that way then fine, I really don't care that much.
Regardless, my meaning was clear and I have nothing to add, little fella. I think we can get by without the semantic discussion.
One thing the tamyia comparison always fails to reflects is that wargaming companies create simplified models for wargamers who want something reasonably accurate without the need for all the sprockets and rivets to be individually cast and built in. Take a look at PSC, Armourcast or Rubicon for example. I've seen lots of those make the gaming table never a Tamyia. They're a fraction of the cost of similar Tamyia models but no less quality (Armiurcast excepted ).
Tamiya simply doesn't make models for wargaming, but they still show how a big expensive kit can be done. Very fine mouldings with sharp details, very little clean up work needed, the kits I've seen have very little in the way of mould lines, slide casting and part design ensures there's not areas missing details, the fit is flawless, even on things like aircraft models where you often need to fill every joint, the Tamiya kits go together with little to no join lines, not to mention extras like magnets for removable panels and metal bits where appropriate and stuff like landing gear that can be represented up or down without any compromise to the model's visuals.
They aren't appropriate for wargaming because they are expensive kits with accurate (thus very fine and delicate) details. Rubicon and PSC simplify a lot of that detail away to make the models more durable which is not something Tamiya are interested in doing, but it doesn't take away from the other aspects I described.
For the most part wargamers are interested in cheap and durable, but since I was specifically talking about the Imperial Knight which is not all that cheap, it puts it up in to the price range of Tamiya's higher end kits.
Yes, in some ways quality can be subjective but not when you're asking if the company in question is using the most modern techniques, materials, and processes to create their product. Does the product provide the largest consumer audience with an experience at least comparable to what they will receive from competitors for a similar good?
The easiest comparison for objectivity's sake is to compare technical aspects of models. GW will excel in some regards and fail in others just as their competitors will also fail and excel.
The comparison that I make often is between the DFG Leviathan and the GW Knight. I own 1 Leviathan and 7 Knights (4 of which are forgeworld) and the Leviathan wins hands down, mainly because it's a "master" level model vs the Knight which appears to have been designed so that a half-blind orangutan can put it together. So, in this regard they're a bit like comparing a $10 Gundam and a $90 Gundam, the master-level Gundam kit is technically far superior to the toy, $10 kit.
Details on the model are a bit subjective and depend completely on the design. Yes, GW make use of massive amounts of sundry "details" like skulls, purity seals, and other bits and doo-dads but that's due to their "fluff" and not really a requirement when determining technical quality of product. It's almost a shame that GW don't do historical because I'd love to see their take on a Panzer II vs Revell, Tamiya, or Zvezda; this would allow for a real "apples to apples" comparison.
Some things that I don't know. Does GW use the latest techniques to create their models? Sliding molds for exampled to reduce parts volume.
notprop wrote: Feller, you feel te need to quote dictionary definitions. Maybe your next search should be pedant.
Feller, get over it, the use of quality as a comparative requires some measure of similarity and cost is clearly a useful similarity, if you've got a problem with that then I can't help your narrow mindedness. If you don't want to use it that way then fine, I really don't care that much.
Regardless, my meaning was clear and I have nothing to add, little fella. I think we can get by without the semantic discussion.
Awww, did the nasty man upset you by pointing out quoting dictionaries as a call to authority doesn't really work when you get it wrong.
For the most part wargamers are interested in cheap and durable, but since I was specifically talking about the Imperial Knight which is not all that cheap, it puts it up in to the price range of Tamiya's higher end kits.
Your cheap may be differant to mine then.
You also deliberately ignore that gamers also want cool looking models and/or plastic over resin.
So really it comes down to whether they like the IK, and after many and various posts of your holding up the extremely good selling IK kit as one you don't like I can confirm we understand. Please can you change the record.
The problem with quality is it's 100% subjective. If your definition of quality is GW-esque aesthetics (e.g. aquila, skulls, power armor, Tau cloven hoofs, Eldar cone helmets, etc.) then nothing is going to meet your definition of quality except GW models, and then there's no point in having a discussion.
Jah, for example, likes the GW aesthetics, as he points out all the time. There's nothing wrong with that, but it also means that nothing else is going to qualify as being "quality" because it's not the aesthetic he's looking for. Sculpting-wise, a Perry ACW miniature might be as detailed or more detailed than a Space Marine, but Jah isn't interested in ACW so no matter how good it is, it's useless to him and he'll say the GW model is better quality. That's not to pick on him, but that's basically the crux of his argument - GW > all because nothing looks like GW figures look, and he likes how GW figures look.
That's the problem with these talks. If you like GW's Elves, then Mantic Elves aren't going to be "quality" to you because they don't look like GW's elves, even if the figures themselves are of comparable sculpting/molding quality.
It's a useless argument because it's 100% subjective and can't be discussed.
That's aesthetics, not quality or technical achievement. It is possible to compare two separate infantry models, for example, and compare the techniques used to create the model, the material used in its production, and manufacturing techniques and equipment used. All such a conversation needs is the metrics used in the comparison and a modicum of objectivity.
It's fine to say that all you like is one manufacturer's products but it's willfully ignorant to state that a comparison is impossible.
See, I think Wayne has it precisely right. Let's look at the dictionary definition of qauality:
1.the standard of something as measured against other things of a similar kind; the degree of excellence of something
2.a distinctive attribute or characteristic possessed by someone or something.
The problem with #1 and #2 is WHAT quality are we talking about? Production quality? Sculpting quality? Feature set? Technical difficulty?
GW is second to none, for example, at making tabards, cloaks and cables on infantry sized models that are technically difficult to produce. You have amazing use of negative space and staves and cables that run between other model pieces that make me ask, "how did they do that" when I see the finished model (before seeing the sprue). Yet some other people will go, "who cares? that's just a pain to paint."
To Skink's point, there are certainly technical deficiencies that you can point out in a model and say, this isn't a high quality kit because [...]. But looking at two great kits, it's much harder to say, "this one is poorer quality", because often it's a statement colored by preference in what's important to an individual.
Regarding gundams and leviathans - I just don't like Gundams; I've given them much consideration, looked at $50 intermediate and $200 master kits, and decided against buying them for reasons other than cost. I don't like the colored plastics, the simplistic outer armor panels with virtually no details etched in them, and the action-figure nature of the finished product. All of the things which are great features for some people are poor features for me; it's just a product produced for a market other than mine.
For example, colored plastics make it harder to basecoat with airbrush, as you need to prime the whole thing black, instead of being able to use colored polyurethane primers. You can't use a red airbrush primer on blue, gold, and white plastic, because those pieces will look different afterwards. Therefore, a feature to one person is a negative attribute to another.
This isn't black and white though. There are certainly features in the design of a Gundam kit that appeal to me, like really nice "insides" (the detail behind the armor plates).
Agnosto, with respect to the leviathan being a master-level kit, and a Knight being an easier to assemble: you could say the same thing about your FW kits versus your GW kits, and to me, this comes back to the same question of "what are you looking for?" For me, all of the fun in a kit comes in the painting stage: I am not really fond of the assembly and prep, and I therefore prefer the kit that goes together perfectly rather than the one that requires fiddling. Since time is a finite resource, I want to spend more of my time painting, and less of my time building. But if you find your fun in the build process, then that's different.
From a practical perspective, GW is making kits that appeal to GW customers. They're not looking to attract people who like Gundam kits or Privateer Press kits: they're happy not to compete in that market. For better or worse, their design, pricing, aesthetic and focus is narrowly targeted at a specific niche, and for this niche, the feature set is perfect. Hence, folks like jah and me who look at them, and say, "yeah, this is what I want to model today". And again, it's not black and white. It doesn't mean that I don't like *anything* out of other kits, or wish some of those features were in GW kits, or that I think that other kits are of poor design, aesthetic or quality.
Talys wrote: I think a lot of people overthink it. GW decides what it's going to make based on what sells: they make more of the stuff that people buy, less of what people don't.
GW has no idea what its customers want. It has operated from a position where they thought they could dictate to the customers what they should buy. Their release schedule is merely hurling a gakload of stuff against a wall to see what sticks. The incredibly short preview window doesn't even let them make course corrections. Sure, they'll produce less of the stuff that doesn't sell... but they've already sunk the resources to make that non-selling gak a reality.
Talys wrote: Look at fullsize SUVs and luxury crossovers: man, these vehicles are hot... ...The right thing to do would be to make a lot less SUVs, make cars out of lighter and more fuel efficient materials, and stop pumping out 5L (and larger) V8s in favor of fuel efficient 4-cyls. Instead of pouring R&D into heads-up displays, panoramic roofs, radar-based safety features, and nav computers with ever-more humongous screens that you can see in direct sunlight, increase fuel efficiency and reduce production costs for cars targeted at the masses. But car manufacturers aren't going to do that. All their R&D goes into awesome new SUVs with super high tech gadgets and big price tags.
You are entirely incorrect about fullsize SUVs and crossovers being top of the heap. There is a growing segment, even in North America, for well built, well featured small cars. The GMs and Fords of the world can't leave that pie to the Koreans/Japanese anymore, which is why they've been forced to compete with small vehicles that don't suck. There's a reason why all the luxury car makers have entered the compact market. This has been the case for some time in Europe and Asia.
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Talys wrote: GW is second to none, for example, at making tabards, cloaks and cables on infantry sized models that are technically difficult to produce. You have amazing use of negative space and staves and cables that run between other model pieces that make me ask, "how did they do that" when I see the finished model (before seeing the sprue). Yet some other people will go, "who cares? that's just a pain to paint."
I assembled my first kingdom death mini. Other than one very annoying gap in a recess, the kit had insanely high tolerances for fit and finish.
I have to disagree regarding the tabards. I feel that the GW add on tabards always look like a chunk of plastic glued on, even if you shave it down a bit. They always look rubbish compared to the ones that are moulded onto the torso and/or greenstuffed on.
Since it's totally off topic, I'll just surrender the whole SUV analogy. I was simply using it because I went shopping (and purchased) a very high end luxury crossover, but I looked at/considered both luxury sedans and sports cars too. I thought the amount of new technology crammed into cars is shockingly little compared to the amount of technology crammed into the latest top-end SUVs in the vehicles that I checked out. When you include the lower end stuff, the number of new crossover and small SUV models is crazy, and car magazines routinely talk about the super hot crossover segment.
But anyhow, it's definitely NOT the best example of us (humans) doing things for profit's sake while ignoring what's good for us in terms of a habitat for our species. I'll leave everyone to just fill in that spot for themselves, and if they don't think that we're wrecking the Earth (and I'm just as guilty of contributing to it), at least in the short term, for the sake of profit, well, it's just too far a viewpoint from mine for me to debate.
There are plenty of better examples, like mountaintop removal and fracking that fall into the category of "give people what they will spend money on, not what's ultimately good for their ecosystem."
Regarding tabards and such -- okay, well, a lot of that goes back to preference, I guess. I think GW plastic characters are pretty awesome in the use of negative space.
Quality is neither aesthetics nor feature and is not judged by price.
Two companies can make cubes both can produce cubes that the variation is 0.00000001cm one sells them for X and the other sells them for 2X who has the best quality? none both are equal one is twice expensive though.
We are talking about toy soldiers here, what does quality mean?
Aesthetic is not it, love as much as you want GW aesthetics (or me CB) Aesthetics are subjective and meaningless in talking about toy soldiers quality.
Multi part, multi posed, posable, alternative parts, are features nice to have but not quality related.
Material used is not part of quality (not exactly) yes plastic is inferior to all for capturing details metal is the middle and resin is the king, but really at present technology level the differences are minor, plastic bonds best, resin is easy to assemble and metal is the least easy to glue together, but a top tech casting company can produce kits that "assemble themselves" in any medium.
So what determines the quality of a toy soldier?
The sharpness of the details, the mouldlines (the less the better), the ease of assembly and the robustness for tabletop usage and the casting methods used.
Bandai definitely uses better technologies than GW with no moldlines technology, sliding mould technology, precoloured plastics tecnology and has better assembly and sprew layout, but they do not produce toy soldiers, Personally I find GWs plastics quality lacking, they have in their arsenal far better tech (all the above mentioned) but do not use them, their detail can be sharper their sprew layouts and channels can be better placed and I am sure if they get their minds they can make the no mouldlines technology work for wargaming.
They just sit on their laurels making the same monolithic posed models increasing surface texture and call it detail.
But do they have the best quality out there? I don't think so, many miniature manufacturers can produce similar or better quality some in plastic most not. they are among the best though, the really sad part is they can do so much more.
Now since the whole thread is subjective I find their aesthetic boring and so stuck on the past that their models are completely indifferent to me.
Talys wrote: I just don't like Gundams; I've given them much consideration, looked at $50 intermediate and $200 master kits, and decided against buying them for reasons other than cost. I don't like the colored plastics, the simplistic outer armor panels with virtually no details etched in them, and the action-figure nature of the finished product. All of the things which are great features for some people are poor features for me; it's just a product produced for a market other than mine.
You should check out WAVE's Five Star Stories kits.
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Talys wrote: Since it's totally off topic, I'll just surrender the whole SUV analogy. I was simply using it because I went shopping (and purchased) a very high end luxury crossover, but I looked at/considered both luxury sedans and sports cars too. I thought the amount of new technology crammed into cars is shockingly little compared to the amount of technology crammed into the latest top-end SUVs in the vehicles that I checked out. When you include the lower end stuff, the number of new crossover and small SUV models is crazy, and car magazines routinely talk about the super hot crossover segment.
Its not entirely off topic: GW is focused like a laser beam on the luxury market and letting all manner of little guys take over the "products for the unwashed masses" market. This works well if you know your target market well and luxury services is all the populace wants. When one is so focused, you can't see the rest of the market (like how in your search, luxury compacts didn't even enter the equation due to being not high end enough). If it turns out the marketing strategy is incorrect, they'll find thenselves way out of position to compete.
Regarding gundams and leviathans - I just don't like Gundams; I've given them much consideration, looked at $50 intermediate and $200 master kits, and decided against buying them for reasons other than cost. I don't like the colored plastics, the simplistic outer armor panels with virtually no details etched in them, and the action-figure nature of the finished product. All of the things which are great features for some people are poor features for me; it's just a product produced for a market other than mine.
For example, colored plastics make it harder to basecoat with airbrush, as you need to prime the whole thing black, instead of being able to use colored polyurethane primers. You can't use a red airbrush primer on blue, gold, and white plastic, because those pieces will look different afterwards. Therefore, a feature to one person is a negative attribute to another.
This isn't black and white though. There are certainly features in the design of a Gundam kit that appeal to me, like really nice "insides" (the detail behind the armor plates).
Yes, GW loves useless detail etched onto armor plates because that happens so much in real armored vehicles. I know that it's a fictional universe but, just like in movies, there has to be some level of suspension of disbelief to enjoy the material. I'm not sure where you're getting the difficulty to basecoat and airbrush thing; coloring the plastic doesn't change its nature at an atomic level and somehow make it a different material; it's the same plastic, the colored plastic doesn't add a layer so that priming it like you normally would results in loss of detail (outside normal goof-ups). This just tells me that you've never tried it; I have and it was a non-issue.
Talys wrote: Agnosto, with respect to the leviathan being a master-level kit, and a Knight being an easier to assemble: you could say the same thing about your FW kits versus your GW kits, and to me, this comes back to the same question of "what are you looking for?" For me, all of the fun in a kit comes in the painting stage: I am not really fond of the assembly and prep, and I therefore prefer the kit that goes together perfectly rather than the one that requires fiddling. Since time is a finite resource, I want to spend more of my time painting, and less of my time building. But if you find your fun in the build process, then that's different.
Yes, the FW kits were in the middle, between the "pants on head" stupidly easy assembly of the plastic knights and the utter joy of modelling that I got from putting the Leviathan together. Personally, I don't like the aesthetics of the Leviathan but that doesn't preclude me from recognizing the technical mastery involved in the creation of the kit. I don't like many Gundam models either but that doesn't stop me from appreciating the colored plastics, slide tool molding process and other techniques that result in a kit that fits together perfectly with no gaps or warpage, poseability, and nearly any other modelling checkbox; it's all there.
Talys wrote: From a practical perspective, GW is making kits that appeal to GW customers. They're not looking to attract people who like Gundam kits or Privateer Press kits: they're happy not to compete in that market. For better or worse, their design, pricing, aesthetic and focus is narrowly targeted at a specific niche, and for this niche, the feature set is perfect. Hence, folks like jah and me who look at them, and say, "yeah, this is what I want to model today". And again, it's not black and white. It doesn't mean that I don't like *anything* out of other kits, or wish some of those features were in GW kits, or that I think that other kits are of poor design, aesthetic or quality.
I'm sorry, but how can you say that and still attempt to have any credibility as someone who has worked in the business world; none of that makes any sense and you well know it so please don't speak to me like I'm an idiot or expect anyone to believe a word of that. Everyone is a potential GW customer and if they think differently, they deserve to continue their slide into obscurity. For too long they've not had to chase sales but now they have to and the current leadership in the company is not equipped to do so on a competitive level that grows their business and returns greater investment to their shareholders.
It's all well and good to love the current models but would you absolutely hate an Imperial Knight with fully articulated joints? I highly doubt it.
Would if murder GW's remaining market to have their snap-fit models precolored for those just starting out or with little interest in painting? Nope. Would it possibly attract more newbies? Possibly. They've tried it before but always limited and half-arsed and then just pointed at it as being not successful, even though they didn't really try to begin with.
Kilkrazy wrote: In business terms, price and quality are different variables. Otherwise the same item would gain quality by being sold at a lower price.
In business terms, both are part of a derived variable - perceived value - so they actually mesh pretty tightly.
@PsychoticStorm: how is their quality abysmal for a collectors model???
what is the criteria for base entry to that genre???
i collect models from nearly every wargaming company on the market, and there are no plastic minis out there that are any better in quality, nor worse...
every plastic kit that i have cracked open from a wargaming company has been on par with each other in casting quality...
@Wayne: please don't think that i only us GW as the metric of quality, and thus nothing else will compare...
my metric for quality is how well a model is cast...
GW does plenty of things that i think could be better, and wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole, like Finecast, or switching paint lines way too often, and using pots that i think are horrible, or moving to nearly all synthetic brushes...
if you honestly feel that i don't think anything on the market will measure up to GW, then you need to read what i write better...
i love PP minis, as long as they are not restic, and just bought two Extreme Khador 'Jacks last week...
i love CB's minis, and buy Infinity stuff all the time...
i loved Confrontation, and bought at least half of Rackham's entire line before they went pre-painted plastic...
i buy Helldorado, Soda Pop, GF9, and many others, too...
the thing is, people aren't starting threads about how horrible PP minis are, or CB minis, or Warlord and Perry minis...
you see a lot of complaints about Mantic's quality in their thread, but people don't start a new thread about how rubbish they are every week, so the voices are not as prominent...
people complain about restic in PP and Mantic threads, but in a GW thread about sales, or anything else GW related, it always comes down to the same people on both sides having the same tired arguments...
i am just as sick of it as everyone else...
basically, show a GW kit that has replaced an older plastic kit in the last five years, and point out where it isn't an improvement on the previous iteration...
that is my point, and why i defend GW quality...
they make new kits that improve the previous kits, and i give them immense credit for that...
i am still looking for examples of where you guys feel that the recent plastic kits are lacking in quality...
which kits are not good casts???
are there kits that don't go together well???
jah-joshua wrote: @PsychoticStorm: how is their quality abysmal for a collectors model???
what is the criteria for base entry to that genre???
i collect models from nearly every wargaming company on the market, and there are no plastic minis out there that are any better in quality, nor worse...
every plastic kit that i have cracked open from a wargaming company has been on par with each other in casting quality...
These are toy soldiers,they are not collectors models.
aesthetic appeals aside, my question is, where are the recent GW HIPS kits lacking in quality???
is the plastic bad???
are the moldlines excessive???
are the details shallow???
does the material warp???
are miscasts common???
cheers
jah
Its not so much the GW kits are bad, Its that the level of detail on Tamiya/Hasegawa etc. kits is much higher. The detail on a modern Tamilya/Hasegawa tank kit engine deck is mind boggling. Makes you wonder how they were even able to machine details that small. Details are very crisp, and deep if necessary, corners are sharp both inside and outside. Scribe lines are beautiful. A Tamiya produced Space Marine figure would have mind boggling sharp detail compared to current GW product. Really can't appreciate the detail until you actually see a well done kit in person.
@PsychoticStorm: so, what qualifies something as a collectors model???
this is what i am trying to get to the root of...
@timd: i don't disagree with you...
if i was a fine scale historical model collector, i would be all over Tamiya...
all i'm saying is that the new GWSM kits blow GW's own old SM plastic kits out of the water...
compare the new squad boxes to the old squad boxes, and you see that they do up their game with each new iteration...
the whole point is that wargaming miniatures are what we should be using as a comparison, rather than fine scale models...
i don't walk into a model shop looking for a Wave Serpent, and walk out with an Apache instead, because it had more interior detail, and cost less...
i am a helicopter nut, but when i build and paint a mini, i want something that could not possibly exist in our real world, but something that only lives in the imagination...
that is the appeal of miniatures, for me...
Talys wrote: From a practical perspective, GW is making kits that appeal to GW customers. They're not looking to attract people who like Gundam kits or Privateer Press kits: they're happy not to compete in that market.
I'm sorry, but how can you say that and still attempt to have any credibility as someone who has worked in the business world; none of that makes any sense and you well know it so please don't speak to me like I'm an idiot or expect anyone to believe a word of that. Everyone is a potential GW customer and if they think differently, they deserve to continue their slide into obscurity. For too long they've not had to chase sales but now they have to and the current leadership in the company is not equipped to do so on a competitive level that grows their business and returns greater investment to their shareholders.
It's all well and good to love the current models but would you absolutely hate an Imperial Knight with fully articulated joints? I highly doubt it.
Would if murder GW's remaining market to have their snap-fit models precolored for those just starting out or with little interest in painting? Nope. Would it possibly attract more newbies? Possibly. They've tried it before but always limited and half-arsed and then just pointed at it as being not successful, even though they didn't really try to begin with.
I can say that precisely because I've operated in the "business world" for nearly my entire adult life, with, I think, pretty decent success (At least with enough success to buy as many GW models as I want ). At some point, it's not uncommon for folks who are successful and fully busy doing things they love to say, "Gee, doing only the things I love and that I think I'm good at, I'm making more money than I and all the people who started up with me can spend in their entire life. Do I want to try out other stuff and make even more, or just be content working on my core competencies and stay within my happy zone?"
The right answer is different for everyone, but as a personal matter I would rather take the certainty and $2 million dollars a year than try to compete on all sorts of other things and maybe make $20 or $200 million a year. Why? I can't even spend $2 million a year, so effectively, $200 million a year is just money I'm going to give away anyhow. In other words, having millions in the bank, to me, is effectively the same as having billions in the bank, because I'm not going to do anything with most of either. There are many people that share my view: do what you're great at, be exceptional at it, and charge top dollar -- so long as there's a surplus of demand, just take the customers you want, and let the others that you don't go somewhere else.
The other thing, too, is that you only have so much time and focus, and it's easy to lose yourself (and that profitable niche) if you expand beyond to other things, botch it, and also botch up your cash cow that you used to really enjoy, because your eye was on something else. It's not always easy to just hire people to take care of another business unit.
So long as GW is profitable and the board is happy, they can afford to just do the things they want to do, and ignore market segments that don't appeal to them, whether it's the tournament scene or finescale models. I'm not saying this is what they SHOULD do, it's just that they have the luxury of choice, and they can do whatever pleases the board. Who knows, maybe next year the board will decide they want to compete in the tournament segment and make a real push for it, and great on them if they choose to do so, too.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
jah-joshua wrote: compare the new squad boxes to the old squad boxes, and you see that they do up their game with each new iteration...
This is something that's a no-brainer to people who are going to spend money with GW; but with many others who see them as nothing more than game pieces... well, do you remember how many posts there were when Devastators or ASM came out that the new boxes were essentially exactly the same as the old boxes? >.<
I mean, I posted pictures of the legs side by side, with differences as clear as day, and there were people who STILL went, well, that's just useless greeble.
If I had to venture a guess, a collector's model could be anything, but "collecting" for display purposes would be the end use. Whether or not the model is used for another purpose would be irrelevant. I think items like busts and all non-gaming miniatures falls into this category.
I think from a "collector" perspective, Games Workshop product is expensive on a per model basis. While I don't disagree that the tooling on their kits is impressive, especially the larger ones - in game power, and often, the necessity to buy in multiples due to packaging levies a "game" tax on the models that you might not find in a pure collector's range like Reaper, Andrea, Nocturna, Dark Sword etc. In addition, GW's decision to go forward entirely in plastics is in some ways limiting. Resin and metal can hold finer detail than plastic, though in many ways, certain details are quite a bit more durable in plastic. GW is really losing out by not embracing hybrid kits in their mainstream line. That way they could have the benefits of all the materials...
A generic fantasy infantry sized character is $6-8USD from Reaper. Dark Sword ones are on average $10USD. I looked at the "Boutique" style models from Nocturna. Even the 30mm resins have insane detail. They are very pricy at 15EU though. The Kingdom Death models, also targeted at "Boutique" style buyers are also very expensive but come with lots of "collector" targeted extras like nice packaging, art cards etc, that make the model feel more "exclusive" somehow... (if you're into that thing). The "naked" minis-only packages are quite a bit more affordable, and IMHO, speaks to where GW's pricing might sit without the trappings of the game system.
Pricing is the biggest hurdle for me for Games Workshop. Now that I don't play their games any more, I look at their products from a purely modelling and painting perspective. Games Workshop infantry heroes are anywhere from $10usd for old mail order ones to $30+ for the newest (and most awesome) releases. Size nor material is a factor in the price since the Slaughterpriest is more expensive than the Exalted Deathbringer, older mounted metal and finecast heroes and strangely, even the SEEKER CHARIOT OF SLAANESH. IMHO, I don't have many complaints about the technical aspects of GW's new models. I'm not a huge fan of the aesthetics of the Stormcast, nor the new overly gribbled chaos. I think that the ever escalating price with each new release needs to halt however. Every time I look at a Games Workshop piece, the first thing that runs through my head is that I'd need more parts to finish the project, and the base kit can fund 1.5-3 of my other planned projects. This very much makes GW a non-starter from my non-gaming perspective.
I can say that precisely because I've operated in the "business world" for nearly my entire adult life, with, I think, pretty decent success (At least with enough success to buy as many GW models as I want ). At some point, it's not uncommon for folks who are successful and fully busy doing things they love to say, "Gee, doing only the things I love and that I think I'm good at, I'm making more money than I and all the people who started up with me can spend in their entire life. Do I want to try out other stuff and make even more, or just be content working on my core competencies and stay within my happy zone?"
The right answer is different for everyone, but as a personal matter I would rather take the certainty and $2 million dollars a year than try to compete on all sorts of other things and maybe make $20 or $200 million a year. Why? I can't even spend $2 million a year, so effectively, $200 million a year is just money I'm going to give away anyhow. In other words, having millions in the bank, to me, is effectively the same as having billions in the bank, because I'm not going to do anything with most of either. There are many people that share my view: do what you're great at, be exceptional at it, and charge top dollar -- so long as there's a surplus of demand, just take the customers you want, and let the others that you don't go somewhere else.
The other thing, too, is that you only have so much time and focus, and it's easy to lose yourself (and that profitable niche) if you expand beyond to other things, botch it, and also botch up your cash cow that you used to really enjoy, because your eye was on something else. It's not always easy to just hire people to take care of another business unit.
So long as GW is profitable and the board is happy, they can afford to just do the things they want to do, and ignore market segments that don't appeal to them, whether it's the tournament scene or finescale models. I'm not saying this is what they SHOULD do, it's just that they have the luxury of choice, and they can do whatever pleases the board. Who knows, maybe next year the board will decide they want to compete in the tournament segment and make a real push for it, and great on them if they choose to do so, too.
Yes, yes, all very interesting except all of that has little to do with running a publicly traded corporation that has been in decline for several years. Maybe you and I define "successful" differently but when the bank account shrinks, most people in the business world frown in my experience. But hey, maybe Canadian companies think losing money means they're actually in the black; the world is a truly strange place. We can compare CVs another time if you like but back to the topic at hand. In my experience dealing with retail concerns of varying sizes in several countries, all of which were publicly traded, sales are very important; I'll go out on a very strong, short limb and say that sales are important to GW as well or they wouldn't have their well-documented and very draconian system of hiring and retention of sales staff (i.e. produce or get out). Again, maybe things were different with the companies that you dealt with but I sort of doubt it; retail needs cash influx to survive, a large cash reserve like GW has is laudable but in reality is only representative of about 3 months of operation expenses if the ship really sinks. So they have to keep financing that beast of a loadstone that is their retail chain and keep it from pulling them down faster than they're already sinking; the result is that they've pulled out all of their big guns, they've released so much, so quickly that I wouldn't be surprised if we somehow learned that their manufacturing capabilities are stretched to the limit which would also explain why the models aren't more technically complex; simpler models are easier to produce and generally faster to produce and easier to package due to lower model counts. I suppose that I'm a bit nonplussed as to how someone who professes some expertise in business can look at a company that is hemorrhaging sales volume, cash reserves, and apparent market share and not say that something's rotten in the state of Denmark. That is why we're discussing the health of the company. For me it's a bit of spare time exercise but in full disclosure, I also own stock, a fair amount, so I have a selfish reason for concern as well. They're making money for me but it's a short-term bet rather than a long-term because at the rate they're going, I'll have to sell the stock, again.
What I am, and have been, addressing is the sort of identity crisis that GW seems to be going through. Are they a game company? Are they a model/collectibles company? As it appears right now, they're kind of a hybrid, almost chimera of the two resulting in their not doing either one particularly well. Generally, gamers what tight rules that can be applied evenly and are fairly balanced for all modes of identified play and models that are easily put together and paint; collectors, generally, want high detail, options, and great potential for customization. Sure, there's all sorts of middle ground for people, like me, who like both games and collecting but it's not impossible to satisfy both groups. You seem to be under the misapprehension that it's impossible for a company to provide models to both groups even though there are companies that do so (Tamiya being one). It wouldn't be all that hard for GW to appeal to a wide segment of hobbyists; gamers, modellers, and painters all at the same time. Heck, who knows, Rountree could very well look at a bit of differentiation in the catalog as he stated in the annual report that he was going to give the product line a good, hard look.
I think part of the problem may be that people are conflating style and quality.
World of Warcraft does not (or at least, did not, not certain so much now) have high quality graphics, but it has highly stylised graphics. The style may make up for the lowered quality.
There's also an issue of expectation when it comes to quality.
If I sold a customer a phone for £20 to get them out of a hole because their main handset was out of commission, and it broke within 6 months? Not a problem, I doubt they'd return it for warranty repair even if they were covered.
I sell the same customer a phone which costs £250? Then it's a different matter.
The same issue occurs with GW, especially, but not exclusively, with the gaming side.
If I download a rule book for free, pick up a box of models and the game sucks? Meh, on to the next one.
If I spend a small fortune on the rules alone, alongside a further investment of £60? £80? to get enough models for a "traditional" legal force, in order to play a game, and it turns out to be the mess that is current 40K? That's a whole other issue too.
If I then realise the money I've spent on getting started with a GW game would have got me a large and well rounded force plus rules in a competing game which suffers few if any of the flaws of GW games? Well, no wonder there's people with an axe to grind.
Setting a premium price sets premium expectations, and while there's certainly areas you can point to where GW certainly does well, where's the premium, aesthetics aside?
If GW are indeed following Talys' ludicrous ideas about doing just "what they love" (which is so totally at odds to the money grubbing, small minded, short sighted GW their actions seem to portray them to be it's laughable, the only thing they're in love with is more money) then they're failing miserably at communicating this to their customers and adjusting their expectations accordingly.
There's nothing inherently wrong with the quality of anything GW produces, but their prices set expectations that aren't supported by that quality, especially when viewed at what is possible at a lower RRP or how much more can be achieved when trying to hit a comparable price point.
(And if someone tries to counter this with some variation of the argument 'but Spaaace Mariiines" I swear I'll travel to wherever you are in the world and beat you with the wet end of your painting arm!)
@agnosto - I'm not awesomely successful, but I am happily so, when I look in the mirror There are countless hordes of people far more successful than I by whatever metric you choose to measure, and that's just fine with me.
GW's bank account is irrelevant, as they empty it out every year to pay it to the shareholders. I've said routinely that I think that GW would be better off as a private company, because they don't leverage any of the most powerful tools of a public company, namely acquisitions, the ability to rapidly grow, and capital. In fact, they seem to shun it.
I think GW is a company that likes making nice models, and wrapping a game around those nice models. I think that *clearly* the models are more important to GW than the game -- based on evidence, such as there being an entire, expensive magazine sold each month devoted to photography, and high quality videos that show you how to build and paint models, and nearly none of that for gaming. I've said this before too -- I think to GW, models > fluff > game.
You say that I'm under the impression that a company can't satisfy both groups (gamers and collectors), but I routinely say that GW could do a much BETTER job of making gamers happier with just a little bit of work.
What I don't think is possible is for any game company to get people to spend a thousand bucks a year for 20-30 years (that's $25,000) on just 28mm infantry models and small vehicles. This was *specifically* what I was responding to -- someone who said they went from a $1000 a year spender to a $200 a year spender, because GW's rules aren't appealing to them anymore. It isn't a hypothetical that I made up; it was someone's life personal position that I was replying to.
Basically, to get SOME people to keep spending a thousand bucks a year (or ten...), GW has gone to bigger models, centerpieces, expensive characters, and all that. In the process they lost a bunch of the people who were spending a thousand bucks a year. But they would have lost some of those people anyhow, because they would have gotten bored of new models for the old infantry-based game, eventually.
I also observe a desire for some people to just let a game or franchise die with age so that new games can fill their shoes, even if it's set in the same universe, but also to give other companies a shot. After all, nobody really expects Halo 30. For whatever reasons, some of which we should attribute to GW's actions, 40k is not such a game, and has had amazing longevity, surprising even to me, a fan of 40k from its inception.
Automatically Appended Next Post: @Azrael13 - Someone who does what they love can STILL charge the maximum price that the market will bear for their goods and services. Just because you're doing what you want to do doesn't mean that you can't ALSO want to make as much money as you can doing it; it just means you don't necessarily want to do other things, sometimes because you don't have to.
For the record, I fully believe that GW seeks to maximize their profits. The pricing isn't out of love of the gaming or hobby community. But producing the kinds of models they produce, the type of game they want to write, and the type of books they want to publish? Absolutely, I think this is their primary interest of the people who have a say.
If you look at things like the free videos on WarhammerTV, you get a sense that they're a company that loves their models. Personally, I think they're a company that just doesn't care about their game to the same degree as their models, and hobbyists should spend their money accordingly.
I get your point about rules expectations, by the way. The more you pay, the more you expect to get out of it. If you compare a codex from 2015 to one from 2005, what do you get more? You get a hardcover book, printed on nicer paper, with nicer and more artwork, cool fluff, better photography. If someone doesn't care about the game a lot, but doesn't mind spending $50+ on a book rulebook because they like shiny rulebooks with nice pictures and fluff, they'll be thrilled; that same guy back in 2005 would think the old rulebook was not very colorful and pretty. Which just goes to my point that GW is a company that cares more about its models and fluff than it's game mechanics.
Talys wrote: I think that *clearly* the models are more important to GW than the game -- based on evidence, such as there being an entire, expensive catalogue sold each month devoted to photography, and high quality videos that show you how to build and paint models, and nearly none of that for gaming.
To be honest, the White Dwarf of today, while production values are much higher, is a far cry from the content of yesteryear. I think the thing most missing from GW these days is engagement from the higher ups. There used to be editorials and designer articles in White Dwarf. Sculptors and Painter profile articles. These days, there might be a showcase, but its more of a: "this guy paints awesome, here are some pictures you can get from the internet reproduced in glossy. Here's two sentences about the guy himself." I feel that GW management actively shuns this sort of engagement, sending out their peons to be the messengers of increasingly indifferent news.
The advent calendar painting videos from Warhammer TV are essentially a paint by numbers, the GW way. Informative for beginners, but extremely narrow in scope and rigid in application, boiling down to 1 shade, 1 highlight, edge highlight, call it a day. There is no information from the painter as to what their thought process is, the kind of end result they want to get, or on color selection. They don't always show the model completely finished. The videos as produced come across more as infomercials for the product line than actual tutorials.
Someone who does what they love can STILL charge the maximum price that the market will bear for their goods and services. Just because you're doing what you want to do doesn't mean that you can't ALSO want to make as much money as you can doing it; it just means you don't necessarily want to do other things, sometimes because you don't have to.
Where on earth are you getting the concept that any decision maker at GWloves what they do? Every single shred of evidence we have, be it anecdote, rumour, first hand account or Facebook post suggests that these people are not gamers and have a healthy contempt for gamers. You even have Rick fething Priestley, the father of 40K, saying that the studio is nothing more than extension of the accounts department of a toy company.
For the record, I fully believe that GW seeks to maximize their profits. The pricing isn't out of love of the gaming or hobby community. But producing the kinds of models they produce, the type of game they want to write, and the type of books they want to publish? Absolutely, I think this is their primary interest of the people who have a say.
Really? They want to write a game people aren't excited to play?
The people who have a say have no desire for anything other than the highest return for the least outlay. This, inherently, isn't a problem. The problem lies that they've now reached a point where the reduction in outlay is hurting that return, but have continued on the same path.
If you look at things like the free videos on WarhammerTV, you get a sense that they're a company that loves their models.
Do you think the actresses in porn films are enjoying it all the time too?
Personally, I think they're a company that just doesn't care about their game to the same degree as their models, and hobbyists should spend their money accordingly.
Yeah, why would they care about the thing that the person who created it admitted was developed primarily as a vehicle to drive model sales.
More likely they've driven away most of the rules writing talent (even Ward's stopped!) and failed to find anything like a competent replacement for most of them, while simultaneously increasing the pressure to churn out material and are desperate to find someone who is capable of turning things around.
I get your point about rules expectations, by the way. The more you pay, the more you expect to get out of it. If you compare a codex from 2015 to one from 2005, what do you get more? You get a hardcover book, printed on nicer paper, with nicer and more artwork, cool fluff, better photography. If someone doesn't care about the game a lot, but doesn't mind spending $50+ on a book rulebook because they like shiny rulebooks with nice pictures and fluff, they'll be thrilled; that same guy back in 2005 would think the old rulebook was not very colorful and pretty. Which just goes to my point that GW is a company that cares more about its models and fluff than it's game mechanics.
Except that isn't the point I was making, not even close, so stop straw manning and either tackle the point that was actually made or admit defeat. I was speaking, I thought fairly clearly, about someone looking to play the game, not someone looking to fill their bookshelf with random guff.
at the end of the day, i would never say that GW could not produce a range of products that appeal to a broader spectrum...
they've done it before, and can do it again if they choose to...
i bought all the larger scale Inquisitor minis, and Forge World collectors series models and busts, so it is hard to see GW as a company that no longer caters to the "collector crowd", since those models are sitting right in front of me...
when it comes to 28mm models, there are plenty of companies that produce quality miniatures...
i am not taking anything away from those companies when i defend the quality of GW's plastic kits...
all i'm saying is that they are not lower quality than any other HIPS minis on the market...
the Leviathan being better engineered doesn't detract from the quality of the Knight as far as i'm concerned, it just gives another option for miniature buyers, which is a good thing...
i just don't feel like i am getting ripped off by GW when i buy a miniature that i like the look of, and get a sculpt that looks exactly like they advertise on the cover...
the whole reason that i don't collect Finecast is that i don't get the product that is advertised on the cover...
i get a warped, bubbled, miscast mess, that is not worth the effort that i would have to put into making it presentable...
when i get paid to work in Finecast, i really earn my money...
for the price, i wouldn't consider it a purchase where quality+price=value, but then i feel the same about any restic product, no matter who makes it...
with the new plastics, i do feel like i get what i want, and that makes me a happy customer...
i collect models from nearly every wargaming company on the market, and there are no plastic minis out there that are any better in quality, nor worse...
That's just it, though... GW is trying to market themselves as a producer of collectibles, not gaming miniatures. The fact that their collectibles are usable in their games is a secondary consideration.
GW minis compare well to other gaming miniatures... But not to collectibles. And the plastic is a large part of that... the soft plastic that GW uses is designed to be cheap and robust, not to capture fine detail.
i bought all the larger scale Inquisitor minis, and Forge World collectors series models and busts, so it is hard to see GW as a company that no longer caters to the "collector crowd", since those models are sitting right in front of me...
So, exactly how far back in time do I have to travel to buy any of those from a GW store? Or even online?
insaniak wrote: And the plastic is a large part of that... the soft plastic that GW uses is designed to be cheap and robust, not to capture fine detail.
Credit where credit is due. I think the new plastic process captures detail adequately for most applications... - the horsehair crests on the new Marine helmets are very good.
Spoiler:
Its not at the level of what resin is capable of however. I was looking at the Menite Warcaster Anson Durst. He has a resin body. The filigree on his armor and the patterning on his tabard is very fine indeed. His shield is metal, and you can see the difference in how thin the patterning is on the body vs the same kind on the weapon and shield.
i bought all the larger scale Inquisitor minis, and Forge World collectors series models and busts, so it is hard to see GW as a company that no longer caters to the "collector crowd", since those models are sitting right in front of me...
So, exactly how far back in time do I have to travel to buy any of those from a GW store? Or even online?
Ergh... I'd buy them now if they were available... there's a reason why Inquisitor, Necromunda and Mordheim figures re-sell for small fortunes.
i bought all the larger scale Inquisitor minis, and Forge World collectors series models and busts, so it is hard to see GW as a company that no longer caters to the "collector crowd", since those models are sitting right in front of me...
So, exactly how far back in time do I have to travel to buy any of those from a GW store? Or even online?
that was my point...
GW have done it before, and i hope they do it again...
i have no problem admitting that GW is not the same company it was 15 years ago...
all i say is that they have not pushed me away, as they have others, because i still enjoy painting the models...
i am positive about the potential changes coming, but haven't been priced out as others have...
if i were priced out, i would probably be one of the critics, too...
Look, what I'm saying is that GW is producing a book targeted at the person who cares less about the rules and more about it being a nice book for their enjoyment and collection. Therefore, to the first person who is a straight-up gamer, the rulebook is poorly written, badly balanced junk that weighs a ton, has worthless pictures, and is egregiously overpriced. To the second person, the book is a perfect balance of art, fluff, and function, looks great on their shelf, and has rules that are perfectly enjoyable for their sort of game. Not only is the price not crazy, hut they went and bought the digital version too, to put on their iPad to game.
Two people, two perspectives, one book.
Likewise, you're twisting what I'm saying about gw and profits. They're maximizing profits writing the game they want to write, which SOME people (eg me) think is a really fun game and among the best ways to spend their free time. They don't particularly care if you don't find it fun, and they don't want to chase you as a potential customer, because they're still making enough money from people who do find them fun.
One day, maybe that will change. Maybe they'll chase after your business because they pissed off too many of their customers, and it will be too late, and they go out of business. Or maybe there are enough people who love cool GW models and don't much about rules and they'll keep being the biggest wargame company around. Who knows.
By the way, it's not about winning or 'admitting defeat', it's about understanding other viewpoints. There are people who genuinely like GW and their products and are okay with the prices -- I mean, clearly there are some, based on GW's sales -- so I'm just here to express ONE viewpoint. Take it or leave it; doesn't bother me either way.
But thanks for chatting with me because otherwise I would die of boredom watching Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffith do new years. 53 minutes of torture left.
@insaniak - why not collectible gaming miniatures? The two categories aren't mutually exclusive.
Look, what I'm saying is that GW is producing a book targeted at the person who cares less about the rules and more about it being a nice book for their enjoyment and collection. Therefore, to the first person who is a straight-up gamer, the rulebook is poorly written, badly balanced junk that weighs a ton, has worthless pictures, and is egregiously overpriced. To the second person, the book is a perfect balance of art, fluff, and function, looks great on their shelf, and has rules that are perfectly enjoyable for their sort of game. Not only is the price not crazy, hut they went and bought the digital version too, to put on their iPad to game.
Two people, two perspectives, one book.
Except my point doesn't require two people. You've introduced a second person for no reason.
Likewise, you're twisting what I'm saying about gw and profits. They're maximizing profits writing the game they want to write, which SOME people (eg me) think is a really fun game and among the best ways to spend their free time. They don't particularly care if you don't find it fun, and they don't want to chase you as a potential customer, because they're still making enough money from people who do find them fun.
One day, maybe that will change. Maybe they'll chase after your business because they pissed off too many of their customers, and it will be too late, and they go out of business. Or maybe there are enough people who love cool GW models and don't much about rules and they'll keep being the biggest wargame company around. Who knows.
This was, and remains, absolute rubbish. Who is writing the game they want to write? They're perilously close to posting a loss in the next couple of years on current trends, what they're doing isn't working.
By the way, it's not about winning or 'admitting defeat', it's about understanding other viewpoints. There are people who genuinely like GW and their products and are okay with the prices -- I mean, clearly there are some, based on GW's sales -- so I'm just here to express ONE viewpoint. Take it or leave it; doesn't bother me either way.
See, it's this sort of bs that makes you look patronising. Why, on gods green earth, did you feel I needed this explaining to me? This is a debate with opposing views, of course there's an impetus to try and prove your own points or undermine the opposing ones. I understand yours, and most others, viewpoints just fine. I just don't happen to agree with them necessarily. Just for future reference, by most objective measurements, I'm apparently relatively clever, I'd appreciate if you'd accommodate that in your posts addressing me.
@Azreal13 - I'm replying to you, because you quoted me (in a response to someone else). If you don't want to hear my viewpoint, don't quote my post
The reason I type @Azreal instead of quoting you is that quoting is harder on a tablet. I'm watching this stupid new years countdown ATM -- really, almost all the time I'm on dakka, excluding uploading photos, it's from a tablet on phone, while I'm doing something else.
You mention things like 'internet win' and 'admitting defeat', which I find hilarious. Anyways, FOR ME, it's not about winning or losing, it's about expressing the perspective of someone who likes GW's games and models the way they are.
Oh, also, Az, the game they want to write is the game for the folks who fit onto their ideal parameters:
1. Enjoys frequent meta change
2. Plays amongst friends who are like minded, rather than pickup
3. Not ultra competitive
4. Really likes their models
5. Not really price sensitive
6. Likes large scale (many models, big table)
7. Highly values cool and spectacle
8. Likes adding new models
The more of those you say yes to, the more likely you're going to like 40k or 30k, in my opinion.
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Azreal13 wrote: That post has almost nothing to do with what I wrote.
Automatically Appended Next Post: But, for the record, I post almost exclusively from a tablet, quoting is just fine.
It's easy to quote a small piece like this. Harder to break up a long post, especially from my phone.
Well OBVIOUSLY, the people writing the game are the game writers that HR and management hire....
Who cares what their names are?? Unless its some iconic name like Steve Jackson or Gary Gygax, the specific authors names matter not at all to me. I'm not even sure they are credited in the rulebooks. Incidentally, I was answering the game they want to write part, that you italicized, as I assumed the literal question of 'who' was for emphasis rather than a real question, lol.
By the way, HAPPY NEW YEAR 2016!!! (in the ears coast USA/Canada)
Kilkrazy wrote: In business terms, price and quality are different variables. Otherwise the same item would gain quality by being sold at a lower price.
In business terms, both are part of a derived variable - perceived value - so they actually mesh pretty tightly.
The Auld Grump
What I mean is this: There are different ideas of quality. One is objective measurements. Another one is customer acceptability. Perceived value is not quality in itself, though obviously if you can buy the same product at two different prices, people see more value in the cheaper one.
If you buy steel hawser, the breaking strain of a particular quality doesn't change because the price goes up or down.
If you want to buy a GW kit, in other words the acceptable quality of the kit is that it must be GW, no Tamiya kit will ever achieve this customer defined "quality" no matter how cheap it is. This doesn't mean the Tamiya kit has less parts, or is less poseable, it just isn't what the customer wants.
If GW kits are too expensive and should come down in price, that's perceived value.
I think that *clearly* the models are more important to GW than the game
Citadel has always been a model company, the GW games were created expressly to sell more models as D&D players only really need 1 of anything. There's no doubt they view the models as more important than the game but they seem to fail to grasp *why* people buy their models. The disconnect seems to be that they view the rules as something to do with your models when you have enough prepared, but the reality is that the rules provide a framework for the collection and people buy the models to play the game rather than the converse. This is easily evidenced by the grey hordes at most events.
What I don't think is possible is for any game company to get people to spend a thousand bucks a year for 20-30 years (that's $25,000) on just 28mm infantry models and small vehicles.
As one gamer who spends at least $1000 a year on gaming (admittedly only over about 8 years so far) I've never bought anything bigger than a tank, except for a Valkyrie (which I sold NIB) and a Baneblade (which I also sold NIB). Pretty much every other wargaming company in history has managed without resorting to massive kits too, but a lot of them scale better so there's no reason not to have 500 pikemen mini's in massive phalanxes, for instance.
GW also managed to survive for 2 decades without anything bigger than a standard tank, but at the time they had much more variety - at least 3 core games plus a handful of specialist games. It's only now it's 40K only that they are driving the model size up which is in part what's putting people off.
But you're claim that people aren't spending that sort of money is nonsense, ask any 10+ GW vet what their spend is and if they are still engaged in the hobby it'll likely be in that sort of level. It's just these days the money probably isn't all going to GW.
Look, what I'm saying is that GW is producing a book targeted at the person who cares less about the rules and more about it being a nice book for their enjoyment and collection. Therefore, to the first person who is a straight-up gamer, the rulebook is poorly written, badly balanced junk that weighs a ton, has worthless pictures, and is egregiously overpriced. To the second person, the book is a perfect balance of art, fluff, and function, looks great on their shelf, and has rules that are perfectly enjoyable for their sort of game. Not only is the price not crazy, hut they went and bought the digital version too, to put on their iPad to game.
That's fine if it's a fluff/art/history book, but it it's a fething rulebook then you really ought to tailor it to the gamer and not the collector.
If, as a gamer, you compare a 2005 codex with a 2015 codex you'll notice an awful lot more filler, less units in the book, possible less text (but mostly copy & pasted anyway). You'll also notice a hardcover (which is a nuisance for a gaming book), full colour (again, pointless for a gaming book) and a higher quality paper (which might make it a bit more durable, it's not that big a a deal since it'll be obsolete in 4 years anyway). Are these changes worth an extra 50% on the item price? All we've really added is some more durable paper and some more pictures.
If they are trying to cater to both markets they really need to split the products and do a gamers edition (no hardback, fluff, colour or pages just of illustrations) and a collectors edition (hardback, full colour, fluff, illustrations) at a price point that suits everyone. Just like everyone else does; as usual, it's not uncharted territory they need to deal with here, they just need to go to a gaming convention with their eyes open and see what the people that used to drive their business are doing for their competition now.
jah-joshua wrote: @PsychoticStorm: so, what qualifies something as a collectors model???
this is what i am trying to get to the root of...
A model designed for a collector is a model designed for a display, Gundam master grade are collectors models, their sole purpose is to be displayed that is why they have such insane detail internally and externally some of it never to be seen except for the exceptional modeler who wants to do something special with it, in the same category come the expert historical model kits or kits from boutique companies like Kallamity.
A model designed for display is true to scale, has accurate portrayal of detail fictional or historical and does not sacrifice intrigue detail for robustness needed for gaming, the helicopter you mentioned is designed for display, it would not survive in a gaming environment a model for wargame will.
You can collect wargame models, there is no shame in that nor it is a bad thing, but their purpose is to be gaming pieces, toy soldiers, they can be astonishing beautiful well crafted gaming pieces, but they are not scale models designed solely for been displayed in a collection.
Herzlos wrote: As one gamer who spends at least $1000 a year on gaming (admittedly only over about 8 years so far) I've never bought anything bigger than a tank, except for a Valkyrie (which I sold NIB) and a Baneblade (which I also sold NIB). Pretty much every other wargaming company in history has managed without resorting to massive kits too, but a lot of them scale better so there's no reason not to have 500 pikemen mini's in massive phalanxes, for instance. GW also managed to survive for 2 decades without anything bigger than a standard tank, but at the time they had much more variety - at least 3 core games plus a handful of specialist games. It's only now it's 40K only that they are driving the model size up which is in part what's putting people off.
But you're claim that people aren't spending that sort of money is nonsense, ask any 10+ GW vet what their spend is and if they are still engaged in the hobby it'll likely be in that sort of level. It's just these days the money probably isn't all going to GW.
I think you misunderstand me. Obviously, people DO spend tens of thousands of dollars on GW. As a game matures, it becomes harder and harder to get more money out of players for the same type of thing. For a while, GW could count on adding new factions. Then, they could iterate models into newer versions with clear benefits. But now, as we approach 2010+, the quality of plastic troop-level models have gotten really excellent, the number of factions is very high, and that avenue has been shut down.
Starting in the early 2000's, GW added vehicles like Land Raiders that are technically tanks, but large size tanks, and noticed that they sold pretty well. They added flyers, and they sold well. They added big centerpiece models (like Wraithknights and Hive Tyrants) and those sold really well, too. So GW understood that it's 40k playerbase -- at least the spendy playerbase -- wants big, fancy kits. Hell, look at the top 28, and see how many are huge models.
So what I'm saying is, changing the meta, mixing up the game is a way to keep 40k fresh, and adding larger models is one aspect of the meta change. It's not like you HAVE to play large models. Decurion, scatterbikes, gladius, deathstar, greentide, invincible land raiders -- there are many other types of armies, and MSU that you can play to compete against big stompy robots. But that's where the money is, right now, like it or not, and if you're not using them, you need to gear your army to win against them, which means buying more models too.
Also the reason GW stopped producing specialist games, according to GW, is that they weren't profitable. Clearly, as the years went by, 40k became increasingly popular, and in my opinion part of this is attributed to the fluid meta, and upsizing of models. I know this is one of the big reasons that I enjoy 40k, even if I still like playing and modelling the small models, too.
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Herzlos wrote: If, as a gamer, you compare a 2005 codex with a 2015 codex you'll notice an awful lot more filler, less units in the book, possible less text (but mostly copy & pasted anyway). You'll also notice a hardcover (which is a nuisance for a gaming book), full colour (again, pointless for a gaming book) and a higher quality paper (which might make it a bit more durable, it's not that big a a deal since it'll be obsolete in 4 years anyway). Are these changes worth an extra 50% on the item price? All we've really added is some more durable paper and some more pictures.
Not only do I agree, but I think I said exactly the same thing. To a gamer, the new sparkly hardcover is worth LESS but costs more. The whole thing is a nuisance, if anything, to the gamer. That includes me, by the way, even when it's just carrying rulebooks from down 2 floors from my painting room to my basement to play games. They're a freaking pain as far as game rulebooks are concerned, but they're a luxurious read and nice for the shelf.
It brings me a little bit back to my point that GW's target audience is the mostly-hobbyist, little-bit-gamer type, who's going to let that rulebook sit on his shelf below his AD&D hardcover Dungeon Master's Guide an awful lot.
In other words, while 40k is a game played by a lot of hardcore gamers, and enjoyed by many prolific gamers, but it's not a game designed FOR that crowd.
If they are trying to cater to both markets they really need to split the products and do a gamers edition (no hardback, fluff, colour or pages just of illustrations) and a collectors edition (hardback, full colour, fluff, illustrations) at a price point that suits everyone. Just like everyone else does; as usual, it's not uncharted territory they need to deal with here, they just need to go to a gaming convention with their eyes open and see what the people that used to drive their business are doing for their competition now.
I agree. I believe they acknowledge this too: At least they've made a Gamer's edition available digitally at half the price of the regular digital version (which is already cheaper than the print version). Actually, owning two digital books, I really like them for gaming. The one downside is that the interactive version is FAR superior, but only available for iPad, and I don't use an iPad for gaming (I use a Surface, because I want Excel). Were it available for PC, I'd buy the whole set of them.
Oh, and I would buy the gamer edition, because on the version for my tablet for gaming, I could care less about the fluff.
You can collect wargame models, there is no shame in that nor it is a bad thing, but their purpose is to be gaming pieces, toy soldiers, they can be astonishing beautiful well crafted gaming pieces, but they are not scale models designed solely for been displayed in a collection.
I don't see why models for display or collection must be true to scale, any more than a painting or sculpture for a museum must be to scale.
I believe the purpose of a model is whatever the purchaser desires for it to be, whether as components to another model, toy soldiers/gaming pieces, or to collect shrink wrapped on a shelf. If someone buys a Wraithknight to build a diorama, it becomes a piece of art; if someone spray paints it blue to play in a game, it becomes a badly painted game piece, and if someone spends 100 hours on it, it becomes a beautifully painted game piece (hopefully), or perhaps a model for display.
I think that more and more, GW's target audience is the crowd that likes to build wargame armies or models that are not played a lot (sometimes, not at all) -- so called "collectors". If you asked me, a month ago, I'd have thought the ratio of "game more, collect less" was either close or tilted to the gaming crowd; but looking at the top 28 sellers of 2015, I revise that position and now believe that GW's customers "game less, collect more". Why? With the exception of the Imperial Knight and Adeptus Mechanicus, both of which are special cases, the most powerful units in the game don't even make it onto the list, and the list is littered with units that have horrible game value.
Consider kits like Baneblade, Toxicrene, Land Raider Crusader, Blood Angels Tactical, Tyranid Swarm, Cadian Defence Force, and heck, the top-selling model, Smaug. These are not models for "true gamers", at least not the ones that enjoy winning pickups or tournaments. Imperial Knight has good rules, but is also a modelling favorite, so it's tough to say. AdMech has *great* rules, but lots of people bought these because, well, people have wanted them for a really, really long time.
Another factor is transportability. Some of these models, like Toxicrene or even Imperial Knight, are just horrible to transport. If you own a dozen of them, YES, you can move it around, but it's just not a lot of fun. Imagine packing Archaon and Celestant Prime to your next game at the local store. Or even Treeman Ancient. Three of them in the Sylvaneth army box! Good luck with that. I mean, sure, you can do it; but I don't think a lot of people consider that a whole lot of fun.
I would argue that the big centerpiece models you say sold well because the rules for them made them indispensable from the competitive market.
The formula seems to be want a new model to sell make the rules game breaking, want it to be more expensive make it bigger.
Edit
The above was a general response written before you quoted me.
I have yet to see in my local meta and in my discussions internationally people who collect GW or any wargame armies for the sole purpose of collecting them and not having the intention of using them to play a game.
I don't see why GW couldn't make money by selling a well written set of core rules for large skirmish (i.e. a cleaned up 5th edition 40K) plus optional extra rules that support large models that would also be bought by collectors (Apocalypse, Planetary Assault, etc.)
It's clear to me that GW drove away a lot of gamers by the changes over 6th and 7th edition. Given the continuing fall in revenue, they obviously didn't recruit enough model collectors to compensate.
I don't understand why GW would want to turn away potential customers.
Now I have both. And the Ukrainian guy wins hands down.
Now neither kit supplies legs or bases. And both are in resin, so it's a like for like comparison.
games workshop produces gaming pieces. The quality isn't good enough for collecting.
Locally (well my country is small so I visit tournaments all over Holland) I don't really know anyone who purely collects GW miniatures without also playing at least one of their game systems.
Exactly. You wouldn't meet people who are collectors only because they would have no reason to visit a club, gaming night or tournament... They also would have no reason to visit gaming forums. Look on painting forums and you'll find them.
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loki old fart wrote: I think GW's quality is lackluster at best. When some guy out in the sticks can produce better space marines. Compare thousand sons.
GW at 13 pounds plus p+p
[]http://www.games-workshop.com/resources/catalog/product/600x620/99800102019_ThousandSonsUpgradePackNEW01.jpg[/img]
Too some guy in Ukraine at 18 pounds
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/181880138230?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT []http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/ODAwWDgwMA==/z/faQAAOSwv0tVeaVi/$_57.JPG[/img]
Now I have both. And the Ukrainian guy wins hands down.
Now neither kit supplies legs or bases. And both are in resin, so it's a like for like comparison.
games workshop produces gaming pieces. The quality isn't good enough for collecting.
That TS kit is super old. if you want to talk collectibles, look at something like Nagash.
Mymearan wrote: Exactly. You wouldn't meet people who are collectors only because they would have no reason to visit a club, gaming night or tournament... They also would have no reason to visit gaming forums. Look on painting forums and you'll find them.
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loki old fart wrote: I think GW's quality is lackluster at best. When some guy out in the sticks can produce better space marines. Compare thousand sons.
GW at 13 pounds plus p+p
[]http://www.games-workshop.com/resources/catalog/product/600x620/99800102019_ThousandSonsUpgradePackNEW01.jpg[/img]
Too some guy in Ukraine at 18 pounds
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/181880138230?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT []http://i.ebayimg.com/00/s/ODAwWDgwMA==/z/faQAAOSwv0tVeaVi/$_57.JPG[/img]
Now I have both. And the Ukrainian guy wins hands down.
Now neither kit supplies legs or bases. And both are in resin, so it's a like for like comparison.
games workshop produces gaming pieces. The quality isn't good enough for collecting.
That TS kit is super old. if you want to talk collectibles, look at something like Nagash.
So I use a 18 pound resin troop choice for comparison, against a resin troop choice. And you compare it to a 65 pound HQ model.
Maybe the "collectors" only order online and don't come into the stores. I have seen zero evidence of people purchasing GW product with zero intents to play it.
Regarding price inelasticitiy... It my sales region, it looks like GW has been following the 5x minimum wage for squad boxes and 7x minimum wage for tanks / monster kits for quite some time. Only recently have they moved beyond this. The new tau squad box is 7x minimum wage and the current crop of big kits is 10-13x minimum wage and Archaon represents a new high, as he's a heady 20x minimum wage.
Considering that real incomes also increased at around the same amount 2000-2015 (Canada average of $16.50/h to $23.50/h), for a full time worker - if GW products were viewed as expensive before, ratcheting up the prices at the speeds they are now are going to really test that "price inelasticity" that they are so fond of.
I really do not know, I know most of the shops (of my country) and nobody in our conversations ever mentioned somebody buying a force just for display purposes.
keezus wrote: Maybe the "collectors" only order online and don't come into the stores. I have seen zero evidence of people purchasing GW product with zero intents to play it.
I saw one, once. Was recognised by the staff too and popped in when he was in the area to find out what was new to paint since he was in last. I think he bought one of the big character packs at the time (this was pre Hobbit, so I'm struggling to remember what).
So anyway, they definitely exist, but unless you hung out in a GW you'd probably never notice them as most probably don't vocalise why they are there. I still think they make up a pretty small proportion of sales though, compared to a mr 5-unpainted-baneblades-for-an-apoc-game at the same store.
keezus wrote: Maybe the "collectors" only order online and don't come into the stores. I have seen zero evidence of people purchasing GW product with zero intents to play it.
Well, if you pop open a Visions, you'll see clearly that some models aren't meant for game play -- all those in dioramas or mounted onto display plinths, but also a lot of the really pretty ones are unlikely to ever see a game table. And obviously contest entries.
Ironically, all of my non-GW models -- like all my PP models and Infinity models -- are purchased just to collect, and not to game with In terms of GW, I think that 60% of my 40k models see at least 1 game, but some of them for factions that I do play never see a game (like Mephiston; I just don't like the unit, but I like the lore). That number comes out of me varnishing about half of my models, and playing just 1 or 2 games with a few models that I don't bother to varnish, because I know it won't see a game table again. My entire Fantasy collection was not intended for game play, and a few of them only ever saw a game table because of wanting to try out AoS.
Also, I have a complete, painted set of Space Hulk models (painted to a decent standard), that have never seen a game of Space Hulk. Why? I painted them in 2014, and I haven't played a game of SH since the 3e release, what, 5 years ago, and don't really ever plan to again, so that last set was really done from a collectors' perspective, though it's not inconceivable that they see a SH game some time in my life (but the models aren't varnished).
Automatically Appended Next Post: You know, it's worth looking at GW's mission statement if you want to know if they intend to be a miniature or gaming company, or to what degree:
We have a simple strategy at Games Workshop. We make the best fantasy miniatures in the world and sell them globally at a profit and we intend to do this forever.
Simple, but every part of this statement is important.
We make things. We are a manufacturer. Not a retailer. We do have outlets in retail locations. We call these Games Workshop Hobby centres because they show customers how to engage with our hobby of collecting, painting and playing with our miniatures and games. They are the front end of our manufacturing business. If our Hobby centres do a great job, we will recruit lots of customers into our Hobby and they will enjoy spending their money on the products we make.
...
The games are a key part of both our Hobby and our business model. Our games are played between people present in a room (a Hobby centre, a club, a school), not with a screen. They are truly social and build a real sense of community and comradeship. This again makes good business sense. The more fun and enjoyable we make our games, the more customers we attract and retain, and the more miniatures our customers want to buy. This in turn allows us to reinvest in making more and more exciting miniatures and games, which creates a virtuous circle for all.
We are also clear that we will only make fantasy miniatures, not historical ones. Fantasy miniatures from our own Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 worlds allow us unlimited scope for product innovation. In addition, we can, and do, defend our intellectual property rigorously against imitators, thus ensuring that our worlds are synonymous with quality.
So the takeaway:
1. They're only interested in making fantasy miniatures and games for them. 2. Games are important to their concept of the hobby 3. Computer games are not envisioned as a core part of their business (ie no screen) 4. Their "virtuous circle" is all about attracting and retaining customers to buy more miniatures so that they can make more miniatures and games 5. They don't consider their retail stores... retail... but rather a recruitment center for customers, which is only important in that they probably don't ever have to be profitable as a business unit, in GW's eyes.
And if you didn't catch it, they consider miniatures the core part of their business. Like, 1-line mission statement at the top.
It doesn't matter if we don't agree with any of it; it's how GW perceives and defines itself. They'd be a company with a different focus, for example, if their top-line missions statement was, "We write the best fantasy wargames in the world and make miniatures for them." It also jives with my assertion that GW has no intention under its current mission and leadership to expand beyond its niche of scifi/fantasy miniatures and games for them (for example, into RPGs, CCGs, movies, etc.), although of course, they will continue to license the IP out to others to do so. Making fantasy miniatures is what they "love to do" (as I put it), and that's what they want to keep doing; everything else they do is in support of that.
A Does anybody believe this statement?
B Does anybody believe GW higher ups believe it?
C If the above are a yes, why they do everything in their hands to not do what they state in their business model?
1. GW is a company that wants to make what it believes are the best fantasy miniatures (obviously, that's subjective), and make as much profit as it can doing so.
2. The game is a central part of selling the miniatures. Keep in mind, I'm not saying the tournament or pickup game, or whatever game people imagine that 40k should be. But, the game of 40k is important to the selling of 40k miniatures.
3. Also, the purpose of the games are to sell miniatures, which is something important people should understand, because if that's reversed, it changes everything (if the purpose of miniatures is to sell games). It means that for a lot of people, 40k just won't be the right game, because the purpose of the game isn't to be the best game that it can be; the purpose of the game is to do everything possible to maximize miniature sales..
4. GW isn't going to get into anything other than making miniatures and writing games for them any time soon.
Keep in mind that just because some of us might think we can do things better or they'd be more profitable if they just did something else, or sold things more cheaply, or wrote better rules, or whatever, we could be wrong. After all, NEVER would I have guessed that a $500 Smaug would be their BEST selling model -- more than space marines, or anything else.
For that matter, at least half the top 28 sellers, I would have said, "Not a chance!" to, so shows you what I know (it still blows my mind that toxicrene and baneblades are there, lol). It's still fun to speculate, though, and it's a decent way to pass time when I'm multitasking
A $500 model being a top seller could also indicate extreme downward pressure on sales volume. We sold 1000, $500 models for $500,000 could indicate that the models on the list below that really performed poorly.
A $500 model being a top seller could also indicate extreme downward pressure on sales volume. We sold 1000, $500 models for $500,000 could indicate that the models on the list below that really performed poorly.
I can't recall but was Smaug limited release?
JamesY mentioned in the top28 thread that the first batch of 200 (the limited December run) was sold in 5 minutes, and staff weren't allowed discounts, and then they did more batches starting January, and the second and third batches instantly sold out too. You can buy it now, too.
If you do the math, it's arithmetically impossible for GW to only have sold 1,000 smaugs, because if we assume that most of GW's revenue is in models, the'd have to have hundreds of kits that sold as well as their best selling lit to reach GBP 119m. Plus, imperial knight is 1/3 the price, and I don't think anyone believes GW sold just 3000 IKs in 2015.
Whatever the number is, the profit on Smaug must have been really awesome.
keezus wrote: Maybe the "collectors" only order online and don't come into the stores. I have seen zero evidence of people purchasing GW product with zero intents to play it.
What evidence are you looking for? I don't know every person who walks in to the local shop to buy stuff, I see a lot of people come in and buy stuff and then never see them in the store or local clubs playing a game (or at least back in the day when I followed the local 40k scene), goodness knows what they do with the models after buying them.
I used 1000 as an example; without hard data, I'm not married to it. This does lend credence to the assumption of total intake per model rather than volume of models sold for that list...that's still a biased way to look at it because it takes so many more kits of devastators sold to equal 1 smaug making it not a true representation of a model's popularity which is generally how other companies handle such lists.
keezus wrote: Maybe the "collectors" only order online and don't come into the stores. I have seen zero evidence of people purchasing GW product with zero intents to play it.
Well, if you pop open a Visions, you'll see clearly that some models aren't meant for game play -- all those in dioramas or mounted onto display plinths, but also a lot of the really pretty ones are unlikely to ever see a game table. And obviously contest entries.
I just feel the need to point out here that I do dioramas, and I love painting for local comps, but I still game. Not with the models I buy to paint to the best of my ability, but it would be completly wrong to say I am a painter, not a gamer.
My roomate is the same, as are the other guys that enter the local GW painting comps, and the Slayer Sword winner I know from my FLGS.
Just because someone makes a diorama doesn't mean they are buying all their models just to paint.
When he said, "I have seen zero evidence of people purchasing GW product with zero intents to play it." I took that to mean that he's never observed someone ever buying GW product with no intention of playing it (not even one person with one model).
That seems a little extreme, as I'm pretty sure there must be some people at every store who buy at least the occasional GW model just because they want to model them (with no intention of ever playing them). But maybe he means that he's never observed people who generally buy GW product, but don't ever intend to play GW game.
To which I'd say, well, we have at least one... jah-joshua buys books and paints models and doesn't want to play any of them I actually know a few people here, locally, who only model in the GW, PP, and historical realms. But I think that a pretty good chunk of GW hobbyists have tried playing some GW game at some point. Likewise, I think the vast majority of 40k gamers actually regard their models as more than game counters and have some affinity towards the miniatures as part of the miniature collection.
I totally agree with you that guys who make dioramas aren't all just buying all their models for just painting. After all, I'm one of 'em who likes both
Azreal13 wrote: Except we still don't know the criteria for the "top selling."
3000 Knights? Nope. 3000 Knights through the website, or even the direct channel in its entirety, at full RRP?
Much more plausible.
Yeah, if they sold 1000 Smaugs and less than 3000 Knights through the website, that would imply less than 21,000 Knights in total, I think that's a more realistic number. That means they sold up to around £2 mill worth of Knights (at MSRP) and the Knights were up to around 1.5% revenue (lot's of "up to around" because it could obviously be less than that and it's just rough guesstimates).
Could be more, I don't imagine that they wouldn't include wholesale units sold to distributors and to independents at discount on top of full price direct sales.
notprop wrote: Could be more, I don't imagine that they wouldn't include wholesale units sold to distributors and to independents at discount on top of full price direct sales.
I suspect that really depends on whether those are booked into the same system or not.
Kilkrazy wrote: We don't know, so it's another example of how the ranking is fairly meaningless.
On the other hand, the ranking could underline that collecting models is very big. Playing Smaug is meaningless.
It could also mean that they were just using data from their webstore since Smaug's an exclusive, right? I don't recall the exact number but I think that the webstore only accounts for about 30% of overall sales.
As Killkrazy stated, it's all meaningless without knowing what basis they used for the ranking system.
Kilkrazy wrote: We don't know, so it's another example of how the ranking is fairly meaningless.
On the other hand, the ranking could underline that collecting models is very big. Playing Smaug is meaningless.
It could also mean that they were just using data from their webstore since Smaug's an exclusive, right? I don't recall the exact number but I think that the webstore only accounts for about 30% of overall sales.
As Killkrazy stated, it's all meaningless without knowing what basis they used for the ranking system.
Kilkrazy wrote: We don't know, so it's another example of how the ranking is fairly meaningless.
On the other hand, the ranking could underline that collecting models is very big. Playing Smaug is meaningless.
It could also mean that they were just using data from their webstore since Smaug's an exclusive, right? I don't recall the exact number but I think that the webstore only accounts for about 30% of overall sales.
As Killkrazy stated, it's all meaningless without knowing what basis they used for the ranking system.
It's ~40/40/20 wholesale/stores/online. But that 20 includes FW and BL. At least that was the breakdown the last time I figured it out.
Did they calculate the wholesale products as sold at full GW retail price when they are sold to the retailer? Someone in an earlier post speculated that the trade sales may or may not go through the same recording system as retail sales. If not, it clearly affects the quality of the data.
I'm not saying Smaug didn't sell well, but there is a danger of making a lot of conclusions from a set of information that doesn't have supporting data and a methodology to look at.
After all, this whole ranking was just done as a fun Advent Calendar kind of feature.
wuestenfux wrote: Can't believe that Smaug has been sold that much. After all, its only a (centre) piece for a painter or collector.
In the same way that the Mumak was only a centre piece for painters and collectors? This is one hell of a sweeping statement.
People can and do play with big massive centre piece models, even in tournaments. All-monster and all-hero lists are actually quite popular at SBG tournaments (quick to assemble and paint, monsters and heroes are fun to use, can be quite challenging to play with and against). And Smaug is probably the ultimate all-monster list. Anecdotally, I've seen Smaug used at least once in a tournament and by all accounts it was quite fun to play against because the player decided "Feth it, I'll play like Smaug would and SMASH EVERYTHING", and he ignored the objectives.
Even if nobody anywhere has ever used Smaug in a game, there'll be plenty of people buying it simply because its Smaug. Its a giant feth off dragon, beautifully detailed, one of the best big dragon kits on the market. If I could justify burning £300 in cash, I'd get it for my DnD campaign.
The argument that the rules and games drive sales for GW miniatures might apply most of the time, but I'd say Smaug is one of the exceptions.
I can't recall the number, but GW's web store sales were pretty significant. GW said best selling, and did not qualify that. But regardless, it's still impressive that a lot of Smaugs sold, T least to me.
Looking at the list of top 28 in its entirety, I am becoming increasingly convinced that a really big chunk of GW's income is derived from so-called collectors (much bigger than I thought a month ago), though I do believe a lot of them play the game at least occasionally.
It's also possible that you don't see a lot of these people on places like forums, because, I think, if you don't war game much or at all, a place like this becomes less relevant.
Kilkrazy wrote: In business terms, price and quality are different variables. Otherwise the same item would gain quality by being sold at a lower price.
In business terms, both are part of a derived variable - perceived value - so they actually mesh pretty tightly.
The Auld Grump
What I mean is this: There are different ideas of quality. One is objective measurements. Another one is customer acceptability. Perceived value is not quality in itself, though obviously if you can buy the same product at two different prices, people see more value in the cheaper one.
If you buy steel hawser, the breaking strain of a particular quality doesn't change because the price goes up or down.
If you want to buy a GW kit, in other words the acceptable quality of the kit is that it must be GW, no Tamiya kit will ever achieve this customer defined "quality" no matter how cheap it is. This doesn't mean the Tamiya kit has less parts, or is less poseable, it just isn't what the customer wants.
If GW kits are too expensive and should come down in price, that's perceived value.
Or you look at the perceived value, and decide 'no, it doesn't need to be a GW model - I can get better for less'.
So, I have a Leviathan, I do not have a knight.
I have Kings of War, I do not have Age of Sigmar.
If GW's sales are dropping, and it looks like they have been doing so fairly consistently, then GW has a disconnect between price and quality - and thus in perceived value.
I actually like GW's current models less than I did the models from a few years ago - I consider them overly ornate and impractical.
I dislike the shortcuts thyat they are taking with their CAD - they are overly fond of copy and paste.
Just because you can use CAD to model a skull popping out of something's knee does not make it a good model.
The Auld Grump - I can point to far too many people that have left GW because of the lack of percieved value - one of them wears my shoes, while another occasionally steals my tee shirts....
*EDIT Fixed a mess o'typos.... Grumps are not meant to attempt thumb typing....
Guildsman wrote: But it is only a painter's/collector's piece. It's not in scale with the 28mm Hobbit figs and, as far as I know, doesn't have rules attached to it.
As far as you know? So I take it you don't play the SBG then?
There most certainly are rules for Smaug.
The rules for Smaug I believe were first released in White Dwarf (not sure, I don't buy WD anymore). Then they were released for free online in a pdf supplement, along with rules for the other Battle of Five Armies releases. Then the pdf was released in a physical format as a small booklet supplement.
I've got them in my hands right now.
Like I said, I saw Smaug used in a tournament last September. That would be a tricky without rules, no?
And what on earth does scale have to do with it? If anything, it was scaled down to make it useable on the tabletop. If it was purely a painter and collector's item, then it would have been much bigger.
Guildsman wrote: But it is only a painter's/collector's piece. It's not in scale with the 28mm Hobbit figs and, as far as I know, doesn't have rules attached to it.
As far as you know? So I take it you don't play the SBG then?
There most certainly are rules for Smaug.
The rules for Smaug I believe were first released in White Dwarf (not sure, I don't buy WD anymore).
Then they were released for free online in a pdf supplement, along with rules for the other Battle of Five Armies releases.
Then the pdf was released in a physical format as a small booklet supplement.
I've got them in my hands right now.
Like I said, I saw Smaug used in a tournament last September. That would be a tricky without rules, no?
And what on earth does scale have to do with it? If anything, it was scaled down to make it useable on the tabletop. If it was purely a painter and collector's item, then it would have been much bigger.
You mean this Smaug? The one with the tiny Bilbo on the base, which is scaled more for 15mm than 28mm? The one that GW describes thusly:
Every scale, horn and battle-scar has been expertly reproduced to create a beatifically authentic collectors piece.
Sure, they released rules for him. But that doesn't mean that the model was originally intended, or even suited, for use in-game.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Back to the original topic, the half-year report isn't really surprising. The studio threw everything they had at consumers, and it shored up sales for another year. Sooner or later, though, they're going to run out of big, exciting releases.
And ending up with a loss is still significant, even if it's down to currency fluctuations. A loss is a loss, regardless of the reason.
Back to the original topic, the half-year report isn't really surprising. The studio threw everything they had at consumers, and it shored up sales for another year. Sooner or later, though, they're going to run out of big, exciting releases.
The Knight model and codex where a "new" release both in 2014 and yet rehashed in 2015... and the former was one of the most popular kits according to GW. Don't underestimate the lows to which the fan base will sink to get their officialTM brandedR plasticrack fix. If GW feels the need for another cash infusion, they'll rerelease BaC (assuming that it goes OOP) or some other Retribution on Prospero with more plastic HH stuff to make some bonkers quick cash. While another HH box actually would IMO be a good idea, they'd also probably have no qualms about rehashing yet another marine codex or 40k edition as well (1-2 year product life cycle) which wouldn't be a good idea.
Guildsman wrote: Back to the original topic, the half-year report isn't really surprising. The studio threw everything they had at consumers, and it shored up sales for another year. Sooner or later, though, they're going to run out of big, exciting releases.
And ending up with a loss is still significant, even if it's down to currency fluctuations. A loss is a loss, regardless of the reason.
What's wrong with selling as many big, splashy releases as the market will bear? It's not really GW's problem I the spending on their gaming-unfriendly models sucks lots of money out of people who might otherwise spend it on more gaming-friendly products (or not). If it stops being of interest to the market, I'm sure they'll stop making them. But when storm surge makes top 28 with only a couple of months on the shelf (release window) you can bet more will come.
I'm not so sure they lost money. Wasn't it that they made less money than last year, though it would be slight growth under constant currency? Could be wrong, just going from memory.
To be honest, I'm rather surprised the last half year wasn't absolutely horrible, with Sigmar taking 3 solid months, and then a few weeks spread out, out of 6. I mean, did anyone expect 3 months of sigmar to be in par with last year's releases?
Guildsman wrote: But it is only a painter's/collector's piece. It's not in scale with the 28mm Hobbit figs and, as far as I know, doesn't have rules attached to it.
As far as you know? So I take it you don't play the SBG then?
There most certainly are rules for Smaug.
The rules for Smaug I believe were first released in White Dwarf (not sure, I don't buy WD anymore).
Then they were released for free online in a pdf supplement, along with rules for the other Battle of Five Armies releases.
Then the pdf was released in a physical format as a small booklet supplement.
I've got them in my hands right now.
Like I said, I saw Smaug used in a tournament last September. That would be a tricky without rules, no?
And what on earth does scale have to do with it? If anything, it was scaled down to make it useable on the tabletop. If it was purely a painter and collector's item, then it would have been much bigger.
You mean this Smaug? The one with the tiny Bilbo on the base, which is scaled more for 15mm than 28mm? The one that GW describes thusly:
Every scale, horn and battle-scar has been expertly reproduced to create a beatifically authentic collectors piece.
Sure, they released rules for him. But that doesn't mean that the model was originally intended, or even suited, for use in-game.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Back to the original topic, the half-year report isn't really surprising. The studio threw everything they had at consumers, and it shored up sales for another year. Sooner or later, though, they're going to run out of big, exciting releases.
And ending up with a loss is still significant, even if it's down to currency fluctuations. A loss is a loss, regardless of the reason.
There's only one smaug.
You're moving the goalposts. You claimed that Smaug is a co!lectors only item, and didnt even have rules which is cleaRly not true. Why would they make rules and scenarios for him if he's only for collectors? And what exactly is your criteria for "was not originally intended to be used in games"? That its simply to big and inconvenient? What about the balrog? Mumakil? Warhound and Reaver Titans? Forge world Fliers?
If were talking about games workshops "original intentions, " then every model they make is originally intended for painters and co!lectors. Gaming is only an afterthought. Thats their ethos right? That's the prevailing argument on dakka dakka, they are (or rather, think they're) a model company, not a gaming company?
Even if BaC can be rightfully called a success, I wonder how many Tactical Squad, Terminator Squad and Dreadnought kits were not sold after the contents of the game box were announced.
I say this because I actually know someone who was thinking about starting a new Space Marines army and went for BaC instead of getting the separate kits.
Irony can be quite a bitch sometimes, specially considering how Specialist Games were canned in the past due to not selling enough and "cannibalizing" sales from the main products.
PsychoticStorm wrote: Actually from the latest Priestly interview, they were cut because the "other languages" editions almost bankrupted the company...
Yeah, read that one, and still midway in a state of disbelief. Translating a game, specially a game like GW's specialist games, shouldn't bankrupt anyone. It's not like translators are as well paid as the companies' higher ups.
Korinov wrote: Just how many Necromunda or Gorkamorka rulebooks one has to print in order to get nearly bankrupted?
Too many.
Plus, depending on distribution terms, they may have had to have the boxed translated games destroyed, rather than returned. Which means the boxes and models as well as the rulebooks.
(Fairly typical in the toy industry, I'm afraid - most unsold toys are not returned to the manufacturer, but are crushed on site.)
For what it is worth, similar things happened to the other industry giant, TSR. Reading the account of WotC buying out TSR is heartbreaking.
Plus, depending on distribution terms, they may have had to have the boxed translated games destroyed, rather than returned. Which means the boxes and models as well as the rulebooks.
(Fairly typical in the toy industry, I'm afraid - most unsold toys are not returned to the manufacturer, but are crushed on site.)
Why???
Automatically Appended Next Post: From that TSR article.
In all my research into TSR's business, across all the ledgers, notebooks, computer files, and other sources of data, there was one thing I never found - one gaping hole in the mass of data we had available.
No customer profiling information. No feedback. No surveys. No "voice of the customer". TSR, it seems, knew nothing about the people who kept it alive. The management of the company made decisions based on instinct and gut feelings; not data. They didn't know how to listen - as an institution, listening to customers was considered something that other companies had to do - TSR lead, everyone else followed.
I know its been pointed out countless times, but...wow.
Spoiler:
In all my research into GW's business, across all the ledgers, notebooks, computer files, and other sources of data, there was one thing I never found - one gaping hole in the mass of data we had available.
No customer profiling information. No feedback. No surveys. No "voice of the customer". GW, it seems, knew nothing about the people who kept it alive. The management of the company made decisions based on instinct and gut feelings; not data. They didn't know how to listen - as an institution, listening to customers was considered something that other companies had to do - GW lead, everyone else followed.
Korinov wrote: Even if BaC can be rightfully called a success, I wonder how many Tactical Squad, Terminator Squad and Dreadnought kits were not sold after the contents of the game box were announced.
I say this because I actually know someone who was thinking about starting a new Space Marines army and went for BaC instead of getting the separate kits.
Irony can be quite a bitch sometimes, specially considering how Specialist Games were canned in the past due to not selling enough and "cannibalizing" sales from the main products.
Indeed, GW is shooting itself in its foot. The BaC set is such a good deal that customers collect Tacticals, Termies, and Dreads from there.
Korinov wrote: Even if BaC can be rightfully called a success, I wonder how many Tactical Squad, Terminator Squad and Dreadnought kits were not sold after the contents of the game box were announced.
I say this because I actually know someone who was thinking about starting a new Space Marines army and went for BaC instead of getting the separate kits.
Irony can be quite a bitch sometimes, specially considering how Specialist Games were canned in the past due to not selling enough and "cannibalizing" sales from the main products.
Indeed, GW is shooting itself in its foot. The BaC set is such a good deal that customers collect Tacticals, Termies, and Dreads from there.
Not really. Nobody buys basic terminators anymore, dreadnoughts are lousy 40k units (and contemptors are the wrong loadout), and the tactical are missing grav weapons that you have to get elsewhere. You solve all your bolter tacticals, and you get 3 melta, plasma, flamer and combs, which are useful. Plus, you get a chaplain (very usable), but the terminator captain is pretty useless.
If all you want are 40k units, you're better off buying the Demi-company box, or just 3 boxes of ttactical and one box of a elite unit like sternguard. If you want a dread, get the mew start building box. But really, how many gw vets need more bolter tacs, never mind 30 more, or 60, for the people who bought 2 boxes?
But none of this gets to the core of GW's so-called 'collector' or big spender modelling audience. This is the first time tactical in mk4 are in plastic, the first time cataphractii are in plastic, and the first time you can get a 30k chaplain and cataphractii terminator in plastic. And contemptor! These customers want the Tigrus pattern bolsters and the retro missile launchers because an mk4 marine is not the same as an mk3 or mk7, and will no doubt model both. If you have ever built a FW tactical, you'll know how infinite better these are.
Of course, others will think these fans are crazy. But that's part of the recipe to GW's success -- an audience that is captivated by different marks of armor, different models of the same guns, $30 decal sheets with campaign markings, and all that heraldry that goes with the imperium.
Also, on the flip side, this will almost certainly boost 30k sales. The most annoying thing about 30k, IMO, are substandard space marin parts, when compared to modern GW kits like blood angels, space wolves, or sternguard. This cuts through that with a great foundation, and lets players/collectors focus on the expensive vehicles, primarchs, characters, titans and all that.
@Talys.
If players want cheaper game counters, then they will buy and use the cheaper game counters in BaC.
Rather than using coke cans as 'proxies' using the 'right models' with different weapons options is much better!
IF the ONLY people buying into 40k are well off collectors like yourself, then your argument s are valid.
BUT I suspect lots of customers are trying to play a game of 40k on a more restricted budget.
On a side note, every one expects the starter set to be better value for money than the standard minature range.
But in the case of GW this yawning chasm between starter prices and standard range prices ,causes a massive sticker shock in many potential players.And they just walk away.
Korinov wrote: Even if BaC can be rightfully called a success, I wonder how many Tactical Squad, Terminator Squad and Dreadnought kits were not sold after the contents of the game box were announced.
I say this because I actually know someone who was thinking about starting a new Space Marines army and went for BaC instead of getting the separate kits.
Irony can be quite a bitch sometimes, specially considering how Specialist Games were canned in the past due to not selling enough and "cannibalizing" sales from the main products.
Only because this specialist game is essentially their core line; 28mm Space Marines. Putting it another way; how many people bought BaC for the game and not the marines? You can get the game contents (without the marines) on eBay for $10 shipped.
The same doesn't apply to any other specialist game, because it's either a different scale, game size, or sub-world. Except gorkamorka, that was a great source of cheap trukks and boys.
Substandard? they (the FW resin) are the only space marine parts that allow one to have space marines that are not a moving shrine!
GW should not care if veterans buy Bac they are a company with constant decline in units sold, they should really care what potential new players could buy and how they can lure them in.
And if dreadnoughts and terminators are not worth it with the current meta its GWs fault of not keeping a balanced game, not the players.
Lanrak wrote: @Talys.
If players want cheaper game counters, then they will buy and use the cheaper game counters in BaC.
Rather than using coke cans as 'proxies' using the 'right models' with different weapons options is much better!
IF the ONLY people buying into 40k are well off collectors like yourself, then your argument s are valid.
BUT I suspect lots of customers are trying to play a game of 40k on a more restricted budget.
On a side note, every one expects the starter set to be better value for money than the standard minature range.
But in the case of GW this yawning chasm between starter prices and standard range prices ,causes a massive sticker shock in many potential players.And they just walk away.
But my point is that Calth is not an efficient way to buy legal to play WYSIWYG space marine game counters for 40k at $150, if you want a quasi-competitive or good-for-pickup starter force.
Going straight models, you can buy 3 tactical squads for $120, leaving you with $30 to contribute to a hero, which will give you much better game value (or at least, relevant counters), since the terminators, terminator captain, and dreadnought are not very desirable, and the tactical squad doesn't have ideal weapons.
Or you can buy an $85 start collecting, plus 2 more tactical squads, for just $15 more, and get all 40k models and weapons, and a dreadnought and captain that has the right configuration for 40k. Or you can buy the $220 demi company, which includes, "a Space Marine Commander, three Space Marine Tactical Squads, a Space Marine Assault Squad, a Space Marine Devastator Squad and a Space Marine Dreadnought" -- far more relevant to 40k. Yeah it's $70 more, but, you're getting way better stuff for 40k.
In other words, Calth doesn't deprive GW of 40k sales for smart 40k astartes players, because there's better ways of getting to a Gladius, Demi-company, starter force, or whatever. It's really ideal for people like me, who value getting Mk4's, cataphractii, etc. for their uniqueness, rather than gaming value (at least in 40k), because really, most of the non tactical stuff kinda sucks, and the tactical stuff still leaves you having to fill in the holes with more 40k kits.
I've said this a zillion times -- 40k isn't a cheap game. If the budget is tight, 40k is probably going to be a tough game to love.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
PsychoticStorm wrote: Substandard? they (the FW resin) are the only space marine parts that allow one to have space marines that are not a moving shrine!
GW should not care if veterans buy Bac they are a company with constant decline in units sold, they should really care what potential new players could buy and how they can lure them in.
And if dreadnoughts and terminators are not worth it with the current meta its GWs fault of not keeping a balanced game, not the players.
Apparently models need rules to be sold.
Have you put together a FW power armor basic marine and a basic Calth marine? if not, please don't talk about something you're not familiar with. If you really want, I can give you high resolution side by sides. The hand sculpted resin bits cast from rubber molds are miles inferior to the CNC tooled steel molds. The calth pieces are also much more posable. Want more proof? The FW 30k faction squads include the Caleb plastics now.
My point was actually that great rules are NOT important to sell all those calth models. I really don't think people are buying Calth because contemptors and cataphractii and bolter or missile launcher marines are going to win them 40k games. Those calth boxes are moving because the models have some limited use in 40k (good excuse) and because there are people who really want the models (real reason). As I stated in alternatives above, if you want to buy models to play the rules (and win) for 40k, Calth isn't an efficient way to go about it.
If you want to start 30k, that's totally different. But then welcome to your first $150 of $3,000+++. What do they care of you got a nice deal on bolter marines, when your first tank is going to cost as much as your whole calth box, and your first titan is going to cost more than twice that?
Edit - actually, here, I did this ohoto to compare plastic and resin parts for some thread just a few days ago:
While FW as is GW really do not care about the quality of their product and deliver a sub par casting, CAD is no privilege of plastics nor is the medium deprived of the ability to deliver sharp detail, if nothing else resin is better at capturing sharp details.
Why they include bac in their line now, simply ease of manufacture, it takes less to pop up a plastic sprew than to make a resin cast and moulds degrade.
At least the resins can capture detail in areas plastics are unable and do not need cables,purity seals or odd bending foot to make the foots and leg guard castable.
I am sorry but in your comment you said "are substandard space marin parts, when compared to modern GW kits like blood angels, space wolves, or sternguard." and I commented that in contrast to the "modern GW kits" were the kit is a moving shrine of stupid, unnecessary, cluttered, extra junk, the FW kits can deliver a clear model without all this junk.
Moreover if your point was that people buy bac regardless of rules sorry you failed to deliver your point, you yourself sated why certain kits are in decline because of the rules hence why I mentioned that GW uses rules to sell the models and models by themselves do not sell, in my opinion people buy bac because its dead cheaper to get 30k marines in comparison to FW.
My point was actually that great rules are NOT important to sell all those calth models. I really don't think people are buying Calth because contemptors and cataphractii and bolter or missile launcher marines are going to win them 40k games. Those calth boxes are moving because the models have some limited use in 40k (good excuse) and because there are people who really want the models (real reason). As I stated in alternatives above, if you want to buy models to play the rules (and win) for 40k, Calth isn't an efficient way to go about it.
If you want to start 30k, that's totally different. But then welcome to your first $150 of $3,000+++. What do they care of you got a nice deal on bolter marines, when your first tank is going to cost as much as your whole calth box, and your first titan is going to cost more than twice that?
Edit - actually, here, I did this ohoto to compare plastic and resin parts for some thread just a few days ago:
I think you're jumping to conclusions there.
I've heard many people say they're buying it to jump into HH or to flesh out 40k armies. I haven't heard anyone say they're buying it just to look at shelf displays.
Also, if you want "competitive" you're just a WAACTFG-er anyway, right? (According to new speak GW style)
Like I said earlier, if I was starting a SM army, this is actually exactly where I'd start. Especially for someone that doesn't know what's good or not. (The reason AOS isn't good with newbies. You can eye ball an even battle if you actually know the power levels of both sides.)
Resin from the Orient has usually either a yellowish or a darker grey tone, it varies from one recaster to another.
That looks like the real deal, although it should be said that at this stage the difference in quality between genuine FW products and what the best recasters are able to produce is virtually nonexistant. Some of said recasters have even managed to improve upon the original moulds.
Of course it's genuine. It is from an outrider kit from Forge World, directly, previously one of their best selling kits. Ive bought two kits (six bikes) and they're all like that, some slightly worse. When it's finished, you'll never know. I will post the pictures, and you'll never know there were imperfections in the resin. But the prep job is like 20 hurts for 3 bikes.
Incidentally, you can't use regular bike parts for the eider because the base is the plastic scout bike kit.
It's also one of the kits I paid 24% tax on (12% at purchase 12% at delivery), and FW never refunded me half of that back, after 10+ emails and s promise to.
More proof it's authentic? Here's one of the pics that I took for the "proof" shot for the January painting contest in P&M forum. See how some of the parts are still on the resin blocks & posts, forge world style, and the FW sticker with the actual part number? And how the plastic parts, are well, plastic?
1. You don't need to play genuine space marine minis at all. My first games of 40k were with paper counters. By GW! 2. The point is, you're not spending more money AND you're getting more relevant parts if you spend your $150 elsewhere. 3. Sure, you can buy third party bits. If you go the other route and get 40k parts, you wont spend more and you wont need to.
If you think Calth is a great way to get into a 40k starter for a quasi or fully competitive army, please tell me how you arrive at that. It's not terrible, but this isn't some super spectacular gaming piece deal for 40k. You get 3 tactical squads, 1 chaplain, 1 termie captain, 1 terminator squad 1 dreadnought for $150. That is NOT a screaming deal, because the last 3 items are not really that helpful.
But in Talys' world collectors don't play and players don't model.
When did I ever say this, agnosto?
I've consistently said that I believe that most collectors have played at least a little, or at least aspire to, and I believe that most gamers value their models as something more than a counter. I would challenge you to find even one post where I've ever said that collectors don't play, and players don't model.
That doesn't preclude the obvious fact that there are lots of people who buy SOME models just to model, and that there are a minority hobbyists who don't play any game and never intend to.
Plus, depending on distribution terms, they may have had to have the boxed translated games destroyed, rather than returned. Which means the boxes and models as well as the rulebooks.
(Fairly typical in the toy industry, I'm afraid - most unsold toys are not returned to the manufacturer, but are crushed on site.)
Why???
Because toys have a limited shelf life, and the cost of returning, repackaging, and warehousing them is more than the cost of getting new stock. (The frowny is not at you - this practice annoys the heck out of me. When the local BaM! was getting rid of the boxed 4e D&D Essentials sets... they didn't even let folks scavenge the dice. )
Automatically Appended Next Post: From that TSR article.
In all my research into TSR's business, across all the ledgers, notebooks, computer files, and other sources of data, there was one thing I never found - one gaping hole in the mass of data we had available.
No customer profiling information. No feedback. No surveys. No "voice of the customer". TSR, it seems, knew nothing about the people who kept it alive. The management of the company made decisions based on instinct and gut feelings; not data. They didn't know how to listen - as an institution, listening to customers was considered something that other companies had to do - TSR lead, everyone else followed.
I know its been pointed out countless times, but...wow.
Spoiler:
In all my research into GW's business, across all the ledgers, notebooks, computer files, and other sources of data, there was one thing I never found - one gaping hole in the mass of data we had available.
No customer profiling information. No feedback. No surveys. No "voice of the customer". GW, it seems, knew nothing about the people who kept it alive. The management of the company made decisions based on instinct and gut feelings; not data. They didn't know how to listen - as an institution, listening to customers was considered something that other companies had to do - GW lead, everyone else followed.
"Market research is otiose in a niche market".
Yeah... though it was the Dragon Dice Debacle that really came to my mind - and is closest to the translated overstock dilemma. (I am working on a pulp game... it may have had an effect on my phrasing....)
The term that always rises in my mind when reading of the end of TSR, and while looking at the problems of GW is 'Hubris'. Hubris and overweening vanity.
By comparison, take a look at what Domino's did. (They went 'Oh my God! We're losing marketshare! We gotta fix this! Quick, to the Surveymobile!' and started trying to fix the problems that being the leader in the industry had led them into.)
Or even WotC - 4e has similarities as well, but after the #1 best selling RPG fell to being the #2 best selling RPG (and kept dropping) they were at least willing to admit that maybe, just maybe, they should have been listening, eh? (They pretty much ignored their playtesters during the lead up to 4e... and then had to do an enormous errata fixing problems that had cropped up in an early draft, and never fixed.)
That D&D has, by most accounts, returned to being #1 speaks to the effort expended trying to get out of the hole that WotC had dug for itself. (Only most accounts - the local BaM! is still selling more Pathfinder - but that is mostly because the hardcover 5e adventures just don't sell.)
Auld, that shows a humility that the D&D brand has twice shown they're capable of (pre 3rd edition and pre 5th edition). I don't believe GW has ever shown that willingness during the same timeframe. Even WOTC, mindful of the mistakes of TSR's past, seemingly forgot that lesson under Hasbro after the success of 3/3.5.
warboss wrote: Auld, that shows a humility that the D&D brand has twice shown they're capable of (pre 3rd edition and pre 5th edition). I don't believe GW has ever shown that willingness during the same timeframe. Even WOTC, mindful of the mistakes of TSR's past, seemingly forgot that lesson under Hasbro after the success of 3/3.5.
WotC had almost entirely ousted the folks that had been in charge of the success of 3.X - and the new lead designer had their own vision of what they wanted 4e to be.
And then, they too got ousted - and the lead designer of 4e was put in charge of board games instead.
Fun fact - the wording of the OGL was specifically used because the designers of 3e were convinced that sooner or later upper management would move to kill the license... and, sure enough... they came up with the GSL for 4e, and were amazed at the number of third party publishers not flocking to the new system... and that Pathfinder, using the old license, supplanted D&D as the top dog in the industry.
Which... brings up the importance of third party support - another major failing of GW is that they want to be the only ones supporting their games.
The Auld Grump - you used the letter G! We're gonna sue!
I went to the local GW for the 40th Anniversary thing-a-ma-bob. Other than open gaming and the staff flogging the new "actual discount" box sets, there was nothing different than usual.
No event swag for sale, no hobby events, no special anniversary gaming events, no models of yesteryear to showcase the history of GW. NOT EVEN A SIGN ON THE DOOR. Apparently there would be some sort of event freebies at some undefined time in the afternoon... The outlet was pretty full of regulars, and pretty devoid of walk-in traffic. It seemed less organized than the normal Games Workshop "grand opening celebrations" and the regular "birthday celebrations", which have at least defined support. It looked like headquarters just threw it out there at the last minute and the local staffers were left to figure it out on their own.
There is one enormous difference between the 4e and AoS situation. 4e, for all its flaws, was mechanically and design-wise the best game that ever bore the D&D name. Considering that, it's no miracle that the designers thought it would catch on.
They completely underestimated the fact that most D&D players are uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different than 3.5. However, they absolutely recognized that after the fact and so 5e, or "3.75" as it's called affectionately by the D&D enthusiasts around here, was born.
In a similar way, GW completely failed to acknowledge that many people playing WHFB want to play WHFB and not something completely different.
Korraz wrote: There is one enormous difference between the 4e and AoS situation. 4e, for all its flaws, was mechanically and design-wise the best game that ever bore the D&D name. Considering that, it's no miracle that the designers thought it would catch on.
They completely underestimated the fact that most D&D players are uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different than 3.5. However, they absolutely recognized that after the fact and so 5e, or "3.75" as it's called affectionately by the D&D enthusiasts around here, was born.
In a similar way, GW completely failed to acknowledge that many people playing WHFB want to play WHFB and not something completely different.
I'd disagree. I'd say that it wasn't the fact that 4th wasn't 3rd, it was the fact most D&D players didn't feel like playing "Warcraft Pen&Paper".
Korraz wrote: There is one enormous difference between the 4e and AoS situation. 4e, for all its flaws, was mechanically and design-wise the best game that ever bore the D&D name. Considering that, it's no miracle that the designers thought it would catch on.
They completely underestimated the fact that most D&D players are uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different than 3.5. However, they absolutely recognized that after the fact and so 5e, or "3.75" as it's called affectionately by the D&D enthusiasts around here, was born.
In a similar way, GW completely failed to acknowledge that many people playing WHFB want to play WHFB and not something completely different.
I believe both WotC and GW fell into the same trap you just jumped in: A simplified, streamlined system isn't "better".
Battletech is a highly complicated tabletop.
X-Wing is a highly accessible tabletop.
Both have sci-fi small-scale encounters as their theme and game style with a focus on tactical maneuvering with alternating activations (or a variation thereof - initiative values).
Neither is - to me - objectively better. Both have quirks and rules I dislike (LB20 cluster shots are a nightmare to roll; "normal" hits being unevadeable is frustrating, so is automatic regen of shields), but both have unique advantages over the other which are simply opposites at times: BT features a highly detailed damage system while X-Wing is fast-paced action where you also have to read your opponent at times.
Are simulation video games better than action video games , or are they simply DIFFERENT?
Most people who were into Battletech despised MechWarriorark Age since it was too simplistic and simply an entirely different game, set in the same universe. And that's were Wizkids back then, WotC with 4E and GW with AoS made their big mistakes: Telling people "hey, this stuff here is now gonna replace the game you like. It's vastly different and does away most of the stuff you guys liked, but its still the same IP and basic type of game so you folks will LOVE it! And in case you don't we'll cancel your old, crappy favourite game now so we don't cannibalize our own sales".
Korraz wrote: There is one enormous difference between the 4e and AoS situation. 4e, for all its flaws, was mechanically and design-wise the best game that ever bore the D&D name. Considering that, it's no miracle that the designers thought it would catch on.
They completely underestimated the fact that most D&D players are uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different than 3.5. However, they absolutely recognized that after the fact and so 5e, or "3.75" as it's called affectionately by the D&D enthusiasts around here, was born.
In a similar way, GW completely failed to acknowledge that many people playing WHFB want to play WHFB and not something completely different.
I'd disagree. I'd say that it wasn't the fact that 4th wasn't 3rd, it was the fact most D&D players didn't feel like playing "Warcraft Pen&Paper".
More of a tactical board game than a computer game - though I believe that the monthly subscription model for the online tools was part of what drove the design.
The rules actually work pretty well for the 4e derived board games - where variables can be limited.
But I do feel that 4e and AoS would both have done better had they been run in tandem with the systems that they instead replaced.
That said... Fantasy had been failing for a while - but amputation is not the recommended treatment for a scalp wound.
GW knew that Fantasy had done better in previous editions than in the few most recent iterations.
They should have expended effort in finding out why it was failing, and fix those problems that had been introduced.
Instead, they pulled out the bone saw, and amputated at the neck.
Korraz wrote:
They completely underestimated the fact that most D&D players are uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different than 3.5.
I
Hear
That.
nekooni wrote:I believe both WotC and GW fell into the same trap you just jumped in: A simplified, streamlined system isn't "better".
TheAuldGrump wrote:
That said... Fantasy had been failing for a while - but amputation is not the recommended treatment for a scalp wound.
That too.
People say in the other thread that AoS was a good idea, badly implemented. Well, no, that just makes it a bad idea. Some of the 'bad implementations' weren't unavoidable necessities of a 'good idea'; they all started as smaller 'bad idea' components of an overall bad idea.
AoS, as a 'different' game, did draw in some players, but I'd say Korraz' point still stands when a portion of those were 40K players attracted by the big-skirmish, no-structure, special-rules, fantasy-marine-saturated nature of the game. Not that different, from some POVs. And as Nekooni says, all that and the simplification doesn't mean it's better, or even good - a good game, or a good idea.
There are ways in which a smaller, streamlined game would have been a good idea - after all, people were wishlisting for it - but a good idea is not as simple as that. The fact that some jumped on AoS rather than check what else there was ("uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different") as disgruntled WFB players did with KoW, doesn't necessarily make it a bold new direction and the saviour of GW. Strip out the Poochie background and the fact you can start with fewer minis (hello guts-of-a-grand mini bundles), and as I say, it looks pretty familiar, and business as usual for GW.
Battle of Calth and actually discounted bundles seem, to me, to be far more radical departures from GW's otherwise moribund way of doing things. As simple as they are.
The discounts of some of the bundles are pretty neat, to the point of making the GW models inside more or less reasonably priced (=/= cheap).
Until very, very recently GW has lived up to the dogma that discounts are a bad thing because they somehow devaluate the product. If they're willing to suddenly offer such discounts... well, two options here: a) the half-year report is not going to look pretty, b) they have a lot of plastic they want to get rid of.
Korinov wrote: The discounts of some of the bundles are pretty neat, to the point of making the GW models inside more or less reasonably priced (=/= cheap).
Until very, very recently GW has lived up to the dogma that discounts are a bad thing because they somehow devaluate the product. If they're willing to suddenly offer such discounts... well, two options here: a) the half-year report is not going to look pretty, b) they have a lot of plastic they want to get rid of.
The thing is that nothing has a lower value than an unsold product.
They broke the law of financial elasticity, and now they are paying the fine.
Korinov wrote: The discounts of some of the bundles are pretty neat, to the point of making the GW models inside more or less reasonably priced (=/= cheap).
Until very, very recently GW has lived up to the dogma that discounts are a bad thing because they somehow devaluate the product. If they're willing to suddenly offer such discounts... well, two options here: a) the half-year report is not going to look pretty, b) they have a lot of plastic they want to get rid of.
The thing is that nothing has a lower value than an unsold product.
They broke the law of financial elasticity, and now they are paying the fine.
The Auld Grump
There's something with even worse value: unsold products gathering dust in a shelf, becoming the undeniable statement that nobody is actually interested in them.
Happening to several boxes of Sigmarines at my FLGS, right now.
I've just bought two Lizard Men starter sets, the new one that has £85 worth of contents but costs only £50.
Even by the standards of historical players, £50 for a set containing 12 infantry, 8 cavalry and a big feth-off monster is not bad. Whereas £50 for the monster by itself is a joke.
Now I'm planning a number of other Lizard Man purchases, and I probably will end up spending £300 overall. Without the initial value of the starter set, I would have left the whole army on the shelf and GW would have got NOTHING.
That is the promotional value of discount bundles.
To be clear, I'm not buying any AoS or WHFB books. I will build the army as a generic fantasy army for use with KoW and HoTT. But GW are a model company anyway so they won't mind.
This is the first GW product I have bought in five years.
Kilkrazy wrote: I've just bought two Lizard Men starter sets, the new one that has £85 worth of contents but costs only £50.
Even by the standards of historical players, £50 for a set containing 12 infantry, 8 cavalry and a big feth-off monster is not bad. Whereas £50 for the monster by itself is a joke.
Now I'm planning a number of other Lizard Man purchases, and I probably will end up spending £300 overall. Without the initial value of the starter set, I would have left the whole army on the shelf and GW would have got NOTHING.
That is the promotional value of discount bundles.
To be clear, I'm not buying any AoS or WHFB books. I will build the army as a generic fantasy army for use with KoW and HoTT. But GW are a model company anyway so they won't mind.
This is the first GW product I have bought in five years.
The first GW purchase that I've made in the better part of a year to eighteen months is the new Skitarii bundle. I agree with you completely; hopefully this makes someone at GW wake up a bit.
Oh yes, and I forgot to mention that I used to buy GW stuff off their website so they knew my birthday, where I lived, where I worked and the armies I played and the kind of add-on products I liked. They threw away all that knowledge when they moved to the new "web store" without bothering to migrate their customer database (because apparently £4 million isn't enough money to design a website and migrate your data.)
But now I have ordered from the new web store that have got some of that info back. They can send me a promotion voucher for my birthday, or news about clubs and events in my local area and so on.
I would have been tempted by a decent Tyranid bundle, but they hamstrung it by making the included monster a Hive Tyrant which means they can't put a different big beast in there, but that's been an issue with Tyranids since second edition. Also, since they're going with a formation to avoid the FoC, they didn't really need a Tyrant.
I would have jumped on a Tyranid set if they had a different big bug and Termagants or Hormagaunts. Termagant/Hormagaunt box, Warrior box and Exocrine/Haruspex kit or something along those lines would have been pretty great.
Going with Gargoyles and Warriors feels more like a stock clearance attempt than a good value box.
Korraz wrote: There is one enormous difference between the 4e and AoS situation. 4e, for all its flaws, was mechanically and design-wise the best game that ever bore the D&D name. Considering that, it's no miracle that the designers thought it would catch on.
They completely underestimated the fact that most D&D players are uninterested in playing a game that is good, but different than 3.5. However, they absolutely recognized that after the fact and so 5e, or "3.75" as it's called affectionately by the D&D enthusiasts around here, was born.
In a similar way, GW completely failed to acknowledge that many people playing WHFB want to play WHFB and not something completely different.
I believe both WotC and GW fell into the same trap you just jumped in: A simplified, streamlined system isn't "better".
Battletech is a highly complicated tabletop.
X-Wing is a highly accessible tabletop.
But which one of those two is objectively more successful? Accessibility combined with marketing and a popular IP has done amazing things for X-wing.
To try and decide which of Battletech or X-Wing has been 'objectively more successful' you need to define the criteria to be judged.
If it's longevity, for instance, Battletech wins easily. The game is still in print about 35 years after its creation, and new models are being produced. Even WHFB can't claim that.
If it's sales, X-Wing probably has done better, but we don't know. Battletech has a good lead built up.
If it's profitability, X-Wing depends on a very expensive licence. It's possible the profits are relatively low.
The point is we don't know the true state of these factors and they don't depend on game complexity anyway.
It's also worth pointing out that the stability of BTech is such that its rules have not changed significantly across its entire lifespan, and that supplements printed 15+ years ago are still compatible with the game today (let alone the minis).
Hell, I was putting together some BTech minis today, some of which are 23 year old sculpts.
I think, from comments from various media, that the Starwars licence is not that expensive.
The treasure of Battletech is its its own IP and can bring further money by licensing itself and or it can be branched to other games, more importantly new things can be developed for it a problem Xwing faces.
A games success is dependent on a wide factor of points and how widely its played or how much it sells is not always an indicator of success.
Kilkrazy wrote: To try and decide which of Battletech or X-Wing has been 'objectively more successful' you need to define the criteria to be judged.
It really comes down to this. Take movies for example.
If a movie is largely panned, but it makes hundreds of millions and isn't going to have a sequel, is it a success? Hobbit 3 has a lousy 59% metacritic, but really, do the stakeholders care? There's not going to be another LoTR movie and whatever fans think about the Hobbit trilogy, it made a brick ton of money. Even most of the people who knew it wouldn't be their thing shelled out money to see it.
Or is success defined by something that becomes a fan/cult favorite? By that measure, The Highlander was highly successful. It got a whole bunch of crappy sequels, too. But the movie didn't make anyone much money, nor the sequels. And Christopher Lambert went from one second-tier movie to another.
Or is it defined by critical acclaim? There are lots of movies that have near-universal critical acclaim. You see them in the Oscars every year. But I can't stay awake through some of them even if you paid me, and I think some of them are the most boring or depressing movies with zero entertainment value ever written. And it's not just me, evidenced by the fact that nobody is actually willing to pay $12 a ticket and $7 for popcorn and a drink to watch them in the theatre.
It's really no different in games. A well-written game isn't necessarily the most entertaining, or longest lasting, or most profitable, or has the largest fanbase, and so forth. At the end of the day, it will be some mix of those factors, but it will be a different mix depending on the reviewer's personal bias.
For instance, I would rate "success" in terms of number of fans, profitability, and longevity, weighted in that order. But other people might have a totally different method of prioritization.
Talys wrote: For instance, I would rate "success" in terms of number of fans, profitability, and longevity, weighted in that order. But other people might have a totally different method of prioritization.
GW has spent the Kirby Years at war with its fandom, and overall profitability during the post LOTR boom has been decreasing, despite raised margins on kits and aggressive cost cutting. By your metrics, GW hasn't really been a "success" in the last few years. But then again... we can't see all the data can we. GW has longevity, so they must be doing everything right.
Looks like Rowntree is starting his stint in the right direction. I actually took a second, third and FOURTH look at those $100 bundles. NOTE: Still didn't buy though, as during the Age of Strife (the Kirby Years), I built up an impressive backlog of Heretical Miniatures from the Eye of Chaos.
H.B.M.C. wrote: That's just your longwinded way of saying that AoS needn't be balanced, right Talys?
Since GW is a miniature making company in the first place, balancing is something that could be done by the gaming community. There are a few approaches like http://www.scrollbuilder.com/
This is one hell of a sweeping statement.
(The frowny is not at you - this practice annoys the heck out of me. When the local BaM! was getting rid of the boxed 4e D&D Essentials sets... they didn't even let folks scavenge the dice. 
