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So, I'm net to 40k, and been here for a few months. I keep seeing these endless complaints about GW, and stuff, and the more I see the more I wonder how this game and GW stay afloat.

The game is horribly balanced from what I see, and things like the new eldar aren't even rare from what I've heard.

The company has people who wright lore do the crunch, and people who do crunch wright lore.

The game keeps getting more and more expensive until large portions of the community leave. Literally most of the people who got me interested in 40K say they stopped playing/buying models because the prices are stupid high. It's like they enjoy killing off their customer base.

They go after fan and community sights, basically alienating more of their customer base.

They act like they have a monopoly when they don't.

They're website is useless, and only works as a marker place.

They release stuff that could have been easily balanced by less than a day's worth of play testing.

Seriously, I don't see why GW hasn't died yet, or at least 40k. It seems like a war game that the company doesn't want to treat like a game, while also having a company that wants to kill the community. How is GW and 40k not dead? They've been doing this for like 10 years. It doesn't make sense to me.

Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

They got the best looking, and highest multi-pose models on the market.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

This. GW built a near-monopoly at a time when they had weak, if any, competition. Now that they're facing legitimate competition they're falling behind in quality and losing customers, but their sheer size keeps them in business for now.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

This and the fluff. I got into it because a friend got so animated evey time he spoke about the fluff, and I got curious so, now here I am.

 Peregrine wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

This.

I agree with ya, but I feel like the fact that 40k is 40k is a lot of it. The setting is well known and has a lot of appeal. I'd go with warmachine if I actually knew anything about the lore, but I knew about space marines long before I even thought about playing 40k.

Because people like me continue to buy the models, play the game and have a good time. I don't give a rat's poop chute about how GW delivers their rules or what gets updated at what time or how balanced it is.

I've got a FLGS and a group of friends to play games with and the friends have similar views on how the game is played, don't go crazy about power levels, enjoy throwing dice and play with the rules presented to us in all but the most obvious 'well this needs to be fixed' case. And when it needs to be fixed, we fix it between ourselves, don't make a fuss about it and carry on with our game.

I understand I'm not the only person in the world and that not everyone has the options that I do, but as long as there's enough casual players like myself playing the game and still enjoying it, the books released with it and the company itself because we interact with them in the 'I'll just buy my models from wherever' sense, GW will do just fine. So will the beer and pretzel companies.

Jaxler wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

This.

I agree with ya, but I feel like the fact that 40k is 40k is a lot of it. The setting is well known and has a lot of appeal. I'd go with warmachine if I actually knew anything about the lore, but I knew about space marines long before I even thought about playing 40k.

That could account for some of GW's new players but I would reckon that most people who start 40k know little to nothing about it. Many will fall in love with the setting, sure, but for a lot of people a setting is not enough to keep them in the game. They will just game elsewhere and keep up with the setting through Black Library, the RPGs or forums like this.

This is really the sad part of it all. 40k could have been something so much greater if GW just put in a little more effort into it's rules, had a team to keep the fluff in line and good and actually had some sort of QC before they released new models. But nope. It's why I like Forgeworld so much more. I feel that they "get" 40k more than the main GW studio.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SharkoutofWata wrote:
Because people like me continue to buy the models, play the game and have a good time. I don't give a rat's poop chute about how GW delivers their rules or what gets updated at what time or how balanced it is.

I've got a FLGS and a group of friends to play games with and the friends have similar views on how the game is played, don't go crazy about power levels, enjoy throwing dice and play with the rules presented to us in all but the most obvious 'well this needs to be fixed' case. And when it needs to be fixed, we fix it between ourselves, don't make a fuss about it and carry on with our game.

I understand I'm not the only person in the world and that not everyone has the options that I do, but as long as there's enough casual players like myself playing the game and still enjoying it, the books released with it and the company itself because we interact with them in the 'I'll just buy my models from wherever' sense, GW will do just fine. So will the beer and pretzel companies.

It's sort of is and sort of isn't people like you that keep GW afloat. My belief is that people like you keep GW afloat by inspiring other people to start up the hobby regardless if they ever actually become a dedicated gamer.

GW released a setting that is distinct and vivid. My friends and I got into the setting and the books long before we picked up our first models. While some units are unbalanced, my FLGS has just ten or so regulars and we play friendly matches with the OP units kept to a minimum.

I can see the unbalanced rules being a problem in tournaments, where everyone is bringing jetbike, decurion, riptide, or farseer council spam, but it doesn't affect my occasional purchases.

As a new player it's probably best to stay away from websites like this one. The (very) vocal minority who decries literally everything the 'Evil Empire' does is the height of tedium yet they are a tireless bunch and some mods even jump in on it, so it's here to stay unfortunately.

Mainly because all of this negativity is a very, very vocal minority. Plenty of people are playing 40k and having a blast. Same logic as how a lot of people won't write a good review for a restaurant, but if they feel the need to write a bad review they shout it from the rooftops.

Jaxler wrote:
So, I'm net to 40k, and been here for a few months. I keep seeing these endless complaints about GW, and stuff, and the more I see the more I wonder how this game and GW stay afloat.

The game is horribly balanced from what I see, and things like the new eldar aren't even rare from what I've heard.

The company has people who wright lore do the crunch, and people who do crunch wright lore.

The game keeps getting more and more expensive until large portions of the community leave. Literally most of the people who got me interested in 40K say they stopped playing/buying models because the prices are stupid high. It's like they enjoy killing off their customer base.

They go after fan and community sights, basically alienating more of their customer base.

They act like they have a monopoly when they don't.

They're website is useless, and only works as a marker place.

They release stuff that could have been easily balanced by less than a day's worth of play testing.

Seriously, I don't see why GW hasn't died yet, or at least 40k. It seems like a war game that the company doesn't want to treat like a game, while also having a company that wants to kill the community. How is GW and 40k not dead? They've been doing this for like 10 years. It doesn't make sense to me.

They pretty much are slowly going under, their Real (i.e. adjusted for inflation) revenue has been on a constant decline for over a decade, while they've massively increased prices, which leads to the inevitable conclusion that they're moving far less product than they used to.

That said, they're still the 600lb gorilla in the room (though not quite the 800lb one they used to be) with a massively popular IP, tons of licensing, and amazing brand recognition, so they're not just going to fold overnight.

 Vaktathi wrote:

That said, they're still the 600lb gorilla in the room (though not quite the 800lb one they used to be) with a massively popular IP, tons of licensing, and amazing brand recognition, so they're not just going to fold overnight.

GW is like an 800lb gorilla with the runs. It's big enough to have a take-it-or-leave-it attitude, but every now and then you come back and it seems like it's lost a few pounds, and what it's offering smells suspiciously like gak.

every company sucks on the internet.

BrianDavion wrote:
every company sucks on the internet.

And some of them suck offline. GW is one of them.

 SharkoutofWata wrote:
Because people like me continue to buy the models, play the game and have a good time. I don't give a rat's poop chute about how GW delivers their rules or what gets updated at what time or how balanced it is.

I've got a FLGS and a group of friends to play games with and the friends have similar views on how the game is played, don't go crazy about power levels, enjoy throwing dice and play with the rules presented to us in all but the most obvious 'well this needs to be fixed' case. And when it needs to be fixed, we fix it between ourselves, don't make a fuss about it and carry on with our game.


Well said.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

and rich nerds that buy 20k points worth of forgeworld every few months. there seems to be quite a few of those around.

 SharkoutofWata wrote:
Because people like me continue to buy the models, play the game and have a good time. I don't give a rat's poop chute about how GW delivers their rules or what gets updated at what time or how balanced it is.

I've got a FLGS and a group of friends to play games with and the friends have similar views on how the game is played, don't go crazy about power levels, enjoy throwing dice and play with the rules presented to us in all but the most obvious 'well this needs to be fixed' case. And when it needs to be fixed, we fix it between ourselves, don't make a fuss about it and carry on with our game.

I understand I'm not the only person in the world and that not everyone has the options that I do, but as long as there's enough casual players like myself playing the game and still enjoying it, the books released with it and the company itself because we interact with them in the 'I'll just buy my models from wherever' sense, GW will do just fine. So will the beer and pretzel companies.

Yeah, there you go.

You know, you could ask: "With movie tickets costing 5 times more than they did 20 years ago, and concession costing 10 times more, and plots being constantly regurgitated, how do movies stay alive and how do studios not go under?" The answer is just that there are enough people who will go to the next Avengers movie to pay Robert Downey Jr. his big, fat paycheck. Not that I begrudge him that; he's exactly what I imagine Tony Stark to be

Jaxler wrote:
So, I'm net to 40k, and been here for a few months. I keep seeing these endless complaints about GW, and stuff, and the more I see the more I wonder how this game and GW stay afloat.

Because the complaints you are seeing are coming from a tiny fraction of the entire armount of wargamers on the planet. Negative comments are also made more readily than positive ones, and the ones being happy with GW aren't here complaining - that's why you only see the negative. And as evidenced by vaurious DakkaDakka polls, the amount of people doing the complaining actively is indeed, a drop in the ocean. You can accept this or deny it, it doesn't matter.

Your view is based on a single/multiple internet forums, and in reality that doesn't account for much in the end. On a global scale things are quite different. In fact, any company making a profit of millions in this economical state and such a niche market is a company that is doing rather well in the scale of things ( be it that their profits have dropped massively. ) This is also simply a fact.

 Runic wrote:

Jaxler wrote:
So, I'm net to 40k, and been here for a few months. I keep seeing these endless complaints about GW, and stuff, and the more I see the more I wonder how this game and GW stay afloat.

Because the complaints you are seeing are coming from a tiny fraction of the entire armount of wargamers on the planet. Negative comments are also made more readily than positive ones, and the ones being happy with GW aren't here complaining - that's why you only see the negative. And as evidenced by vaurious DakkaDakka polls, the amount of people doing the complaining actively is indeed, a drop in the ocean. You can accept this or deny it, it doesn't matter.

Your view is based on a single/multiple internet forums, and in reality that doesn't account for much in the end. On a global scale things are quite different. In fact, any company making a profit of millions in this economical state and such a niche market is a company that is doing rather well in the scale of things ( be it that their profits have dropped massively. ) This is also simply a fact.

to be fair, the complaints about balance and prices being so high people I know had to quit aren't limited to this forum. Also going after community websites isn't exactly smart IMO no matter how you crack it.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Momentum, really. 40k is big because 40k is big. People pick up 40k because that is what everyone else is playing. It's going to be a slow death as GW squanders away it's market domination.

This. A huge , compering to other systems community, although I must say that why a few years ago shops were able to support themselfs by selling GW games, right now in my area the only one left out of four is the one that focused on MtG and board games.

And the people you know are also quite a small sample size. And I wasn't going "after" a community website, simply stated what is true when it comes to quite many internet communities.

I am seeing similar sentiments to what is expressed on here echoed by other players I encounter IRL. This is definitely not isolated to the internet.

 Ashiraya wrote:
I am seeing similar sentiments to what is expressed on here echoed by other players I encounter IRL. This is definitely not isolated to the internet.

Me too.

If GW started today, and they released the rule sets they have for the price they charge, I'm willing to bet they would gain almost no traction at all. They grew big in a time when they had no competition, but it mostly is momentum keeping them going at the moment. Judging by their falling profits their momentum is definitely slowing. So it isn't just 'people on the internet complaining about everything', there's definitely more to it than that.

 Robisagg wrote:
Mainly because all of this negativity is a very, very vocal minority. Plenty of people are playing 40k and having a blast. Same logic as how a lot of people won't write a good review for a restaurant, but if they feel the need to write a bad review they shout it from the rooftops.

It may be a minority, but it's a large enough minority to cause GWs revenue to drop every year the past 5+ years. 49% is still a minority, but if 49% of your customers are unhappy, it isn't magically less of a problem than if 51% of your customers were unhappy. The "vocal minority" excuse gets thrown around almost as much as "forge the narrative" and "beer and pretzels", it's also just as poor of an argument.

People also love the setting. Space Marines are popular because Space Marines are cool, and people want to play Space Marines even though their rules are not very good.

People love space marines too much to ever let go. Hence GW battering them with prices, bad rules and people still forking over the cash.

 Runic wrote:

Because the complaints you are seeing are coming from a tiny fraction of the entire armount of wargamers on the planet. Negative comments are also made more readily than positive ones, and the ones being happy with GW aren't here complaining - that's why you only see the negative. And as evidenced by vaurious DakkaDakka polls, the amount of people doing the complaining actively is indeed, a drop in the ocean. You can accept this or deny it, it doesn't matter.

Your view is based on a single/multiple internet forums, and in reality that doesn't account for much in the end. On a global scale things are quite different. In fact, any company making a profit of millions in this economical state and such a niche market is a company that is doing rather well in the scale of things ( be it that their profits have dropped massively. ) This is also simply a fact.

To consider this point from another angle - GW does not really care about people's opinions on the Internet. They acknowledge forums like this exist and do everything in their power to keep employees from using them to promote their products.

It's easy to mistake the conversations here as something that have a broader significance. But the truth is GW's sales are not really impacted by the conversations that happen here, and they don't gain from engaging people with wildly differing opinions. If you think about it, how often can you satisfy an Ork and an Eldar player in real life? The best thing to do is avoid the conversation altogether.

What GW does instead is set up hobby centers and release really good looking models. People's impressions of the game are based around colorfully painted figures that display a lot of imagination. The politics of long time players don't have the same impact as seeing the finished product up front, GW knows this and acts accordingly. Despite diminished profits over recent years, they have a great sales model for action figures.

The reason GW is huge and other companies are not is that other companies don't have the marketing and distribution model that GW has, or the capital to make big moves in the marketplace. That would require venture capital, which doesn't seem to be very focused on the tabletop gaming industry at the moment.

Don't get me wrong - I think GW has made a mistake by not working harder to cultivate a more loyal fan base online. Friends of mine work in brand research and licensing products from companies like GW, and the negative exposure / rate of attrition in forums like this impacts GW's opportunities to make traction in other markets such as video games, movies, comics, collateral like bibs and sippy cups and the like. While I have never really waded into the raw attitudinal data they collect about GW and Space Marines, I know that what they find is enough to make licensing GW products less than attractive compared with other brands.

The way it's been explained to me is like this: if someone loved Spider Man as a teenager, there's a good chance they like Spider Man as an adult and would be willing to spend money on a movie to get into Spider Man's world for a little bit. That person might also be willing to buy t-shirts, comics, action figures, board games, etc that were licensed from Marvel Comics. Part of the reason that happens is that people have had no negative interactions with the brand over the years. Maybe there was a storyline that was particularly unappealing and caused someone to stop reading the comic, but that's what retcons are for - they eliminate negative experiences.

With GW, it's a little more complex. They sell you a worldview, take much of your money over an extended period, and create incentives (based on your investment) to keep you from leaving the game. New rulesets ensure you never reach the point where you have everything you need for the game, and variations in the rules keep you locked into this system. The only response for most players is to eventually quit when this system is no longer affordable, which often leaves people with a hole in their lives. GW does nothing to address that, and it leaves people with VERY bad memories where they swear off the product forever. The Internet is where we go to discuss these feelings, because we get a larger audience for them.

From my perspective, GW's lack of attention to it's playerbase is what keeps the company from getting huge, not what influences profits. They do a great job with direct sales at the expense of being a worldwide franchise. But they don't have the resources / vision to make the experience better for long time players which are key to capitalizing on the value of their IP on a global level. We won't see GW go away any time soon, but we will see them operate similarly to a late-stage direct sales operation that has to sell products through direct interaction.

The company they are most similar to is Cutco - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutco. Great knives, but easily imitated and not universally loved.

^I like his explanation.

Also GW isn't to the point where it's easily imitated yet. The models are still a level above and beyond the competition in almost every way.

Because every gaming system on the planet has a negative and vocal minority. And a minority scales with the size of the player base.

40k has many, many vocal players... because it has many many many many many players, the majority of which are very happy with the game and the experience of playing it.

The same is true for WoW. CoD. Warmachine. Magic the Gathering. etc etc.

The reality is that the vast majority of 40k players enjoy the setting, like the models, enjoy the painting and play friendly games that don't cheese.

GW are a creative, interesting company who work hard on their games. Are they perfect? Not in the slightest. But then no gaming system is. Complex game systems are difficult to balance. Especially one of this scale.