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Yeah, the sample sizes are tiny.

At the end of the day, loving the game isn't enough... People gotta open up their wallets

I've never had illusions about 40k being a technically great game, yet it's fun, and I buy a lot of models and books for it. On the basis of technical excellence, I'd give both XWing and WMH high marks, yet XWing gets practically none of my money, and WMH gets some, but hardly any game time.

 keezus wrote:

Vyxen wrote:
You're wrong. There are many companies that are purposely exclusionary in order to gain marketshare in their target demographic. For example, why doesn't a vegetarian restaurant serve a couple of meat dishes? You're arguing that they're purposely limiting their customer base, and it would make it a lot easier for the couple where one person isn't a vegetarian to go there.

I respectfully disagree. Targeting the vegetarian demographic for a restaurant is fine because that is your primary business plan and there is sufficient customers within that demographic to support the business plan.

The reason this doesn't work as well with Games Workshop is that their primary business plan is to sell miniature games, which is a niche subset of the larger gaming market. With AoS, they are targeting a niche market, within a niche market, within a niche market: i.e. AoS is a subset of Fantasy Games, which is a subset of Miniature Games. Games Workshop is like a restaurant that serves Italian food (i.e. serves the Fantasy miniature game market) deciding that they can't make enough money under the current regime, so they restructure and make the store only sell Vegan Italian Food. All the old options are there, just vegan versions. While vegan customers are overjoyed (and might bring in some new customers), and old customers might be persuaded to return if the vegan food is good, this plan removes all those not looking for vegan food from the target demographic. This only works if the new customers outnumber the old customers. Keep in mind, because they are an Italian restaurant, they by definition exclude all people NOT looking for Italian food: i.e. people looking for Tacos, Sushi, Chow Mein and Burgers etc. On top of this, GW is the kind of company that won't canvass it's customers on what they want, nor will they give warning that this change is coming. It will just happen.

I'm glad that your play group likes Age of Sigmar. I hope that GW continues to improve it. I've got no dog in this fight, but I find some of their decisions a bit head-scratching. Happy gaming!

To further your metaphor, it's as if an Italian restaurant, upon receiving complaints that the meal quality was slipping and the prices were getting too high, decided that the best course of action was to switch to a vegan-only menu, keep the same lousy chef, and increase the prices!

The core of the problem with AoS is that the rules are bad. Simplistic, untested rules are bad. A lack of a balancing mechanic (beyond "what can you afford?") is bad. There's no getting around it. To go back to the restaurant metaphor, I'd be happy to try vegan Italian food, but only if it's good. If the food is bad, it doesn't matter if it's vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, Italian, Scandinavian, or Ethiopian. I won't be going back.

I would hesitate to rely on Board Game Geek's ratings with so few votes - they're susceptible to bandwagoning.

We are all in agreement that the sample sizes are small, and the ratings can only be considered a curiosity at this point. Some of the up/down votes also have comments.

Regarding bandwagoning: It appears that only registered members of the site can provide ratings. If that is the case, registration is in itself is a barrier to casual drive-by up/down votes.

fwiw AOS sales on ebay have been quite high, I have seen many people selling the models/box sets with over 50+ sold, which for the amount of time they have been out is quite high.

Compared to some armies which have been out for years and have sold ~100 kits for the same faction from the same ebay sellers.

success here is not measured by what a incredibly small insignificant amount of people think, its measured by the purchase of product from the retailer.

and AoS is selling well.

blaktoof wrote:
fwiw AOS sales on ebay have been quite high, I have seen many people selling the models/box sets with over 50+ sold, which for the amount of time they have been out is quite high.

Compared to some armies which have been out for years and have sold ~100 kits for the same faction from the same ebay sellers.

success here is not measured by what a incredibly small insignificant amount of people think, its measured by the purchase of product from the retailer.

and AoS is selling well.

But as GW don't do market research they do not know why. All they know is AoS is moving X amount of units.

Are these going to people actually playing the game? Are they going to painters? Are they going to 40k players wishing to convert them to Khorne Bezerkers/Custodes? Are they going to people with money to burn to simply put them in a grinder to spite GW? Are they even going to be used in a GW game?

All of these are quite pertinenet questions that GW will never know the answer to.

 keezus wrote:

Vyxen wrote:
You're wrong. There are many companies that are purposely exclusionary in order to gain marketshare in their target demographic. For example, why doesn't a vegetarian restaurant serve a couple of meat dishes? You're arguing that they're purposely limiting their customer base, and it would make it a lot easier for the couple where one person isn't a vegetarian to go there.

I respectfully disagree. Targeting the vegetarian demographic for a restaurant is fine because that is your primary business plan and there is sufficient customers within that demographic to support the business plan.

The reason this doesn't work as well with Games Workshop is that their primary business plan is to sell miniature games, which is a niche subset of the larger gaming market. With AoS, they are targeting a niche market, within a niche market, within a niche market: i.e. AoS is a subset of Fantasy Games, which is a subset of Miniature Games. Games Workshop is like a restaurant that serves Italian food (i.e. serves the Fantasy miniature game market) deciding that they can't make enough money under the current regime, so they restructure and make the store only sell Vegan Italian Food. All the old options are there, just vegan versions. While vegan customers are overjoyed (and might bring in some new customers), and old customers might be persuaded to return if the vegan food is good, this plan removes all those not looking for vegan food from the target demographic. This only works if the new customers outnumber the old customers. Keep in mind, because they are an Italian restaurant, they by definition exclude all people NOT looking for Italian food: i.e. people looking for Tacos, Sushi, Chow Mein and Burgers etc. On top of this, GW is the kind of company that won't canvass it's customers on what they want, nor will they give warning that this change is coming. It will just happen.

I'm glad that your play group likes Age of Sigmar. I hope that GW continues to improve it. I've got no dog in this fight, but I find some of their decisions a bit head-scratching. Happy gaming!

Though GW seems to have decided that not only must it be Vegan, they have replaced all of the tomato sauces with Heinz Ketchup.

Because everybody likes ketchup, right?

The Auld Grump

Pfft. Mustard!

 Talys wrote:
Pfft. Mustard!

EWW! Mustard!? Yuck!

Anyways, yeah, perhaps I could've worded my response a bit...better before, But I'm sure we've all said something at least once in our lives that could've been phrased better as well, we're only human (well, mostly, haha)

I think we can all agree systems that can cater to both the scenario and competitive crowds are good, that's why I loved 5th edition 40K so much, aside from the super terrible "True" Line of Sight (DAMN YOU GW!!!) 5th edition was overall a very balanced ruleset. Things did start to spiral out of control with the Blood Angels book though (Come on, Who else loved the Dreadnought lightning claws that generated extra attacks? I loved it, and nicknamed my Furioso the "weed whacker of doom and Venerator of red splatter)"

Honestly, even using the current system, creating thematic forces to play out a story isn't hard, the hardest part is writing the story (Yeah, been working on this for a year... Still not done)

I really hope GW doesn't come after 40K, because I love playing 40K tournaments, and I love competitive gaming. Even though I casually game, it doesn't mean I don't want to win. But it is nice to see who built the better list.

AoS doesn't do it for me.

And Deadnight, I'm already working on a Convergence of Cyriss army for Warmachine, So far I've only decided on 25 points of my army, and it's already pretty busted. Modulators FTW!!

Modulators are awesome.

Saw the AoS models on display at my local games shop the other day. They are very nice models indeed.

My painting list is far to full for new additions and I have no interest in playing the game.

Would not mind painting a couple of them but the game has failed to capture my interest.

I'm probably going to go to ebay for multiples of the Khornate lot, I need some new Khorne-themed cultists and some choppy looking berserkers with new Armor. I wish GW would make a new berserker kit, but alas, they're probably holding a new KB kit hostage until these sell well. Oh well.

 Talys wrote:
Pfft. Mustard!

Hey, the Romans were putting mustard on burgers before ketchup ever had tomato paste added to it! (Ketchup used to be a vinegar sauce used on fish... but the Brits added tomato paste, because....)

The Auld Grump - the Romans had hamburgers before Hamburg was even founded... a beef patty, served between two buns. With mustard.

*EDIT* On topic - my real question is whether AoS will be sustainable - which is where I think that the game will fail.

If I am correct, then the second question becomes - how long until it does fail?

 TheAuldGrump wrote:


*EDIT* On topic - my real question is whether AoS will be sustainable - which is where I think that the game will fail.

If I am correct, then the second question becomes - how long until it does fail?

That's an interesting question and I think it's been discussed a bit in this thread.

I think there are a few factors at play here:
1. Free rules. GW has created an environment whereby the entire success of the game depends upon their ability to get people to buy miniatures.
2. Miniatures. If enough people like the miniatures and buy them, this could keep going for some time, years.
3. Ongoing support. People often blame poor WHFB sales on the death of WHFB but let's be honest; before End Times WHFB updates to armies and models were fairly infrequent with the company dedicating the bulk of its resources to 40K. Almost like a self-fulfilling prophecy of doom. "WHFB isn't doing well, pull its resources and dedicate them to 40k!" People won't buy an unsupported product so if they do the same with AoS, it'll go the way of WHFB.
4. Pricing. High prices for 5 models has become commonplace in 40K; outside of the reasonable deal for the box-set, people adding to their forces will be dependent upon how big of a game they want to play/ is fun to play because I can't see even a "skirmish" game being fun with less than 20 models and that might become costly if someone's not interested in the two box forces and the new pricing structure holds true with upcoming model releases.

In my inexpert opinion, the next 2 years will give us primary indicators as to the staying power of AoS. You've got to allow time for the, "ooh, new shiny" to wear off and people to get tired of dancing, bribing their opponent, and shouting "for the lady!" every time they want to roll dice.

The major issue with AoS is the rule set.
Without specific scenarios as in WMH the games will end up in large combat phases.
This will make the game boring and players will soon get uninterested.

 Grimtuff wrote:

blaktoof wrote:
fwiw AOS sales on ebay have been quite high, I have seen many people selling the models/box sets with over 50+ sold, which for the amount of time they have been out is quite high.

Compared to some armies which have been out for years and have sold ~100 kits for the same faction from the same ebay sellers.

success here is not measured by what a incredibly small insignificant amount of people think, its measured by the purchase of product from the retailer.

and AoS is selling well.

But as GW don't do market research they do not know why. All they know is AoS is moving X amount of units.

Are these going to people actually playing the game? Are they going to painters? Are they going to 40k players wishing to convert them to Khorne Bezerkers/Custodes? Are they going to people with money to burn to simply put them in a grinder to spite GW? Are they even going to be used in a GW game?

All of these are quite pertinenet questions that GW will never know the answer to.

GW cares not to whom the models flow, only that the models flow.

I pretty much agree with agnosto above, with the exception of the 5-model price structure of GW being high. If you walk into an independent and look at any of the miniature games that are featured with prime real estate, you're mostly looking at premium models that run in the $10+ ppm range.

Of course, there's cheaper stuff like Heroclix and Reaper minis, but I think these service a different market. Not that there isn't crossover -- some people who buy GW/Wyrd/PP will pick up the occasional Bones model for sure, but, those nice bits of plastic meant to be modeled & painted don't come cheap. Even a lot of Reaper's single minis aren't really *cheap* anymore (and some are God-awful ugly!).

The self-fulfilling prophecy is pretty much it -- GW had a long streak where they didn't properly service Fantasy Battle because of declining sales, and that meant it just declined further.

Oh, on another note, if people like AoS, they'll buy the books, which are a super-duper high profit margin (even compared to miniatures). I shelled out $50 USD to get the big book -- and that's with a hefty discount -- which is probably the upper limit I would pay for a book just for fluff on a game that I don't plan to play much. That book, incidentally, has fantastic artwork and photography, good fluff, a reasonable amount in the way of campaigns, and not much of anything for people who just want to play pickup games (unless your idea of a pickup game is to play a campaign scenario).

@Talys,

The problem with pricing is that it's not going to be evenly distributed. 5 models for $45 or $50 is high when compared to the starter box. What if you don't want one of those armies? There isn't an alternative discount, entry source for new players. I'm not a huge fan of PP but one thing that they do right, in my opinion, is offer a discounted starter for every force in their games, this helps remove the barrier to entry for new players and a reasonable starting point for building armies. GW does this but always with limited releases and not in a coherent, comprehensive manner which is a missed opportunity in my mind.

 agnosto wrote:
@Talys,

The problem with pricing is that it's not going to be evenly distributed. 5 models for $45 or $50 is high when compared to the starter box. What if you don't want one of those armies? There isn't an alternative discount, entry source for new players. I'm not a huge fan of PP but one thing that they do right, in my opinion, is offer a discounted starter for every force in their games, this helps remove the barrier to entry for new players and a reasonable starting point for building armies. GW does this but always with limited releases and not in a coherent, comprehensive manner which is a missed opportunity in my mind.

Not to mention GW considerably downsized their battleforces, and maintained the high price on them, so now, you're not even coming ahead at all. $100 for a furioso, a captain, and a tac squad... You'll get eaten alive on tax anyways, it'd just be better to buy from an ebay discounter.

 agnosto wrote:
@Talys,

The problem with pricing is that it's not going to be evenly distributed. 5 models for $45 or $50 is high when compared to the starter box. What if you don't want one of those armies? There isn't an alternative discount, entry source for new players. I'm not a huge fan of PP but one thing that they do right, in my opinion, is offer a discounted starter for every force in their games, this helps remove the barrier to entry for new players and a reasonable starting point for building armies. GW does this but always with limited releases and not in a coherent, comprehensive manner which is a missed opportunity in my mind.

The current starter boxes that PP has are FAR superior to the old starter boxes. They are a great value! Still, if you want to play a 50 pt game, or be "competitive" with what people play, you're going to be buying some extra models.

I am guessing that as GW moves along, they're going to make more starter boxes for different factions; at the moment, a lot of the factions don't really have the right models/distribution for AoS anyhow. Keep in mind that the two "campaign" boxes, Deathstorm and Stormclaw, are a fantastic value for models, but terrible starter boxes -- like, who wants tactical terminators, a Furioso, Death Company and a Terminator Captain... as the start of their blood angels army O.o Or genestealers, a broodlord, tyranid warriors (and a Carnifex) Likewise for Stormclaw, great models, crappy mix for a starter box.

Dark Vengeance, though, is a great starter box IMO.

IMO, 40k and WHFB had some GREAT starter boxes. For example, the Eldar box was a good value, and Necron box is terrific value. I have no idea if the FB models were good, but you sure got a lot of them in a box. The problem, of course, is that the complete army is 7x the size of the starter box I suspect that there will be starter boxes like these at some point for Sigmar, and they'll be more meaningful because you won't need to buy $700 of stuff on top of the starter for a normal-sized army.

As long as you want to play CSM or DA, or your friend wants to play one and you play the other, sure.

If you don't feel the need to buy the codex(es) so you can add to the forces in the box, fine.

There's plenty of good to say about DV, but as a "starter" it's flawed. That's not all down to the set, some of it is a consequence of the way GW has structured the necessary purchases, but flawed nonetheless.

I'm not a WM player - although I will be if they ever release a faction whose aesthetic appeals - but a faction starter that only requires me to find an opponent is definitely the way to go. Heck, you can get two for approximately the cost of DV.

With GW, if you don't want one of the starter factions, then the box becomes dramatically more expensive, and the alternative is pricey too (if I wanted to start Tau, for instance.)

@Az - you posted that right after I made the edit with the coment on the other starter boxes

No matter how you cut it, 40k is a USD $750-$1,000 game to be properly "in it". I think anyone expecting otherwise is just going to be disappointed.

Starter box or no, 1500-2000 points is pretty average, with many games going up to 3000 points. I'll exclude BRB, because everyone can get this cheap now. Even so, there are models, at least 1 codex, paint, supplies, carrying cases, do-dads, and some variation in your battle force so that you're not playing the same thing every time, and so that you can "go with the flow" when the meta shifts.

And it takes a long time to build and paint all those models, too.

I don't think this is a negative; it's just what it is: a game where players have normalized on a lot of models, and also on BIG models (vehicles, titans, etc).

Other than the people who quit 40k after trying out DV, I don't know anyone who's stopped at DV models. If you want Tau or Necron, they have decent starter boxes, by the way, where you get a cut off the total price of the pretty useful models. Ironically, the only faction with crappy starter box now is Space Marines, lol. The value couldn't possibly get worse than a SM or BA starter box...

 Talys wrote:
The value couldn't possibly get worse than a SM or BA starter box...

What makes you think they're going to stop at marines though?
The eldar battleforce currently saves you $36 off of the MSRP of each unit individually. Not bad, but not as great as it used to be.

The Windrider battlehost only saves you $20... Woo.... :/

Oh wow, the Eldar Wraithhost box only saves me ~$1... Again, not a savings, it's just a bundle...

GW's box deals haven't been "deals" in quite a while. The only good boxes they've managed to release with decent value are DV, Deathstorm, and Stormclaw.

They're not starter boxes, some of the, aren't even a standard Force Org, and they're offered at nothing like the discount of DV and don't include any rules at all. Plus you don't get to exclude the BRB, reduced cost or no, as it is still a vital expense (plus "I can get it on eBay cheap" doesn't count in these discussions, as it applies equally to almost all other equivalents, RRP or go home.)

40K's weakness in comparison to other games is that thanks to the slightly unintelligent approach of cutting points cost to drive model sales, it requires a much greater investment to get typical army size, more models means more painting time (and greater chance for disillusionment - you might like it, not everyone else does) and, for whatever reason, it has always seemed less acceptable within the culture to play a below-standard size game.

These are all things that don't affect the competition, either as badly or at all.

On top of all that, if you make it over all those hurdles, the game ain't that great other than as some sort of pseudo RPG, and you can bet that isn't how it's pitched in a lot of the stores.

Charge over the odds for a substandard product and you will get cushy out eventually - as I fear is the fate of AoS.

 Talys wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
@Talys,

The problem with pricing is that it's not going to be evenly distributed. 5 models for $45 or $50 is high when compared to the starter box. What if you don't want one of those armies? There isn't an alternative discount, entry source for new players. I'm not a huge fan of PP but one thing that they do right, in my opinion, is offer a discounted starter for every force in their games, this helps remove the barrier to entry for new players and a reasonable starting point for building armies. GW does this but always with limited releases and not in a coherent, comprehensive manner which is a missed opportunity in my mind.

The current starter boxes that PP has are FAR superior to the old starter boxes. They are a great value! Still, if you want to play a 50 pt game, or be "competitive" with what people play, you're going to be buying some extra models.

I am guessing that as GW moves along, they're going to make more starter boxes for different factions; at the moment, a lot of the factions don't really have the right models/distribution for AoS anyhow. Keep in mind that the two "campaign" boxes, Deathstorm and Stormclaw, are a fantastic value for models, but terrible starter boxes -- like, who wants tactical terminators, a Furioso, Death Company and a Terminator Captain... as the start of their blood angels army O.o Or genestealers, a broodlord, tyranid warriors (and a Carnifex) Likewise for Stormclaw, great models, crappy mix for a starter box.

Dark Vengeance, though, is a great starter box IMO.

IMO, 40k and WHFB had some GREAT starter boxes. For example, the Eldar box was a good value, and Necron box is terrific value. I have no idea if the FB models were good, but you sure got a lot of them in a box. The problem, of course, is that the complete army is 7x the size of the starter box I suspect that there will be starter boxes like these at some point for Sigmar, and they'll be more meaningful because you won't need to buy $700 of stuff on top of the starter for a normal-sized army.

Don't get me wrong, GW makes some strong starters but they are hardly ever playable forces right out of the box and more often than not are limited edition instead of being a set SKU which is what PP does. I think GW is doing themselves a disservice in this regard because playable starters do three things for new players; (1) they provide a new player with a playable, rules legal force that they can put together and start playing games with, (2) they offer a discount of some sort that reduces the barrier for entry and (3) they provide a stable platform from which to build your collection further.

PP has this figured out and I believe its one of the reasons they're growing. FF has this figured out with XWing and their other games as well. Nobody will argue, I think, that these are intended to be single purchases, thus "starter", but they serve a valid marketing purpose that has proven in multiple industries to be successful (new printers being cheaper than the ink, razors being cheaper than the blade refills, etc.)

GW did have a marine starter force recently (strike force ultra or somesuch?) that had a rhino, a squad and a captain. That was a legal, low-point force from which people could build their collections, but I think it was limited edition so if you want to start a marine force later, tough luck and it was only one faction. What's needed is for this to exist for all factions and be a permanent sales fixture to aid recruitment of new blood. For AoS, they need to take the concept that already exists on ebay, break the starter into factions and charge $50 for that faction; this would be a great starter at a very reasonable price and doesn't saddle you with units from an army that you're not necessarily interested in buying/trading off/ or posting on ebay.

@Az - Well, I don't think anyone who asks around will or should invest in 40k if they're not prepared to have a 70+ model army (or a specialized army with a bunch of big, expensive robots, etc.). If they don't do at least that little bit of research (or ask store staff...) it's kinda their tough luck

But there aren't many games that encourage really big armies with infantry, "planes, trains, and automobiles" so to speak, certainly not in the non-historical world, so it 40k just fills a niche. I mean, all you gotta do is look at a wall of GW product for a faction and ask, "do I want to buy a whole bunch of those boxes?" ... bad math bad math bad math... calculator... "ZOMG that's a month's rent... F* THAT!"

Or look at someone playing it and crap your pants wondering how you'll paint all those models in the next year

Yeah, I totally get that 40k or the old WHFB is either unattractive or the wrong game for a lot of peeps -- for the same reasons, the folks who like it do.

@agnosto - I think GW should have more & better starter sets / discount bundles, too. I think it would help them immensely for AoS.

By the way, I'm not positive that is PP is still growing at similar rates as before. I've heard grumblings (from store owners) that WMH sales aren't as exciting as they used to be, and some of the stores aren't stocking as much of the battle boxes -- though one of the reasons is that they can get them in really quickly special order if someone wants one.

XWing seems to be zipping right along, with a big part of the attraction being that you're buying game pieces, not models -- and the game is good.

The current Space Marine starter box has a tactical, a captain, and a dreadnought. Which wouldn't suck if the dreadnoughts were better :( Or if the captain wasn't really easy to kitbash. I totally agree that $50 is a great price point (though PP has gone closer to $100 MSRP for their new, beefier starters).

An ideal starter kit in my mind would be 5 or 10 troops, 1 transport, and 1 captain-type for USD $50 for each faction. I think that would be a great seller. It's not even that crazy a price -- they had the Dark Eldar kits that had a Raider + 10 Kabalites, or a Raider + 10 wyches, for less than that, and you can make yourself a kitbash Succubus or Archon.

 Talys wrote:
An ideal starter kit in my mind would be 5 or 10 troops, 1 transport, and 1 captain-type for USD $50 for each faction. I think that would be a great seller. It's not even that crazy a price -- they had the Dark Eldar kits that had a Raider + 10 Kabalites, or a Raider + 10 wyches, for less than that, and you can make yourself a kitbash Succubus or Archon.

We're thinking the same here; a small force like that at a similar price-point, include something like kill-team rules and I think they'd have a winning beginners set-up. They could even make additional bit bigger sets at around the $75 to $100 mark for people that want a bit more like the bigger PP battle boxes.

On a side note, Talys, PP is growing. I know people that work in PP. One of them just got a figure modeled after him.

Wow, sweet, MW. That would be awesome!

 agnosto wrote:

 Talys wrote:
An ideal starter kit in my mind would be 5 or 10 troops, 1 transport, and 1 captain-type for USD $50 for each faction. I think that would be a great seller. It's not even that crazy a price -- they had the Dark Eldar kits that had a Raider + 10 Kabalites, or a Raider + 10 wyches, for less than that, and you can make yourself a kitbash Succubus or Archon.

We're thinking the same here; a small force like that at a similar price-point, include something like kill-team rules and I think they'd have a winning beginners set-up. They could even make additional bit bigger sets at around the $75 to $100 mark for people that want a bit more like the bigger PP battle boxes.

Another idea: start with $50 "Battleforce" sets with the miniatures mentioned above - small HQ unit, 10 strong Troops squad, and a single Transport. Then $50 - $75 "Reinforcement" set with the second (and different, if possible) Troops choice, another infantry unit (Elite/Heavy/Fast Attack) and a second vehicle.