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Post by: Kilkrazy
If people want to protest the prices with some hope of an effect, I suggest the following method.
Whenever you buy a non-GW product, write an email to GW saying you have bought X because it is cheaper than their product Y. Enclose a copy of your receipt.
Clearly this only really applies to substitution products. GW won't give a feth if you buy two complete armies for DBA and two sets of the rules instead of a Knight Titan. But they might care if you bought a Gundam to use as a Knight Titan.
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Post by: weeble1000
 Kilkrazy wrote:If people want to protest the prices with some hope of an effect, I suggest the following method.
Whenever you buy a non- GW product, write an email to GW saying you have bought X because it is cheaper than their product Y. Enclose a copy of your receipt.
Clearly this only really applies to substitution products. GW won't give a feth if you buy two complete armies for DBA and two sets of the rules instead of a Knight Titan. But they might care if you bought a Gundam to use as a Knight Titan.
When I first started boycotting GW because of the Chaperhouse lawsuit that is exactly what I did. The first time I did it I got personal call from customer service within a week. That kind of stuff sends up red flags with GW customer service at any rate. Not that they could do anything about my comprehensive criticism of GW's litigation, but they listened.
My initial correspondence had a bit more of a bite to it because rather than mentioning a cheaper alternative I said that I had refrained from making X, Y, and Z planned purchases and was instead deliberately using the money to by my first starter sets for competing game systems.
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Post by: carlos13th
I am not doing anything as noble or planned out as as boycotting GW. I am just not buying stuff from them anymore because its not worth the money to me.
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Post by: Azreal13
 carlos13th wrote:I am not doing anything as noble or planned out as as boycotting GW. I am just not buying stuff from them anymore because its not worth the money to me.
Pretty much this.
I don't deliberately avoid purchasing, I just have things I'd prefer to buy elsewhere.
That said, if they do release something I think is of sufficient quality at the right price, I will buy it* because that sends just as strong a message.
Doesn't happen often.
*from a discounter if possible.
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Post by: carlos13th
 azreal13 wrote: carlos13th wrote:I am not doing anything as noble or planned out as as boycotting GW. I am just not buying stuff from them anymore because its not worth the money to me.
Pretty much this.
I don't deliberately avoid purchasing, I just have things I'd prefer to buy elsewhere.
That said, if they do release something I think is of sufficient quality at the right price, I will buy it* because that sends just as strong a message.
Doesn't happen often.
*from a discounter if possible.
TBH its unlikely for me to buy anything from them even good quality at the right price because I probably would have no use for it.
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Post by: Wayshuba
 frozenwastes wrote:You're correct. It is almost impossible to play D&D as written by TSR.
Actually it's probably never been easier. Also thanks to Adkinson and Dancey, the OGL has allowed the legal publication of retro-clones. And the internet has made it easier than ever to get in contact with people who are looking to play older versions of the game. The people who appreciate these older games often self identify as the OSR (which can me Old School Revival or Renaissance) and if my little city of 70,000 people has an OSR group on facebook, I imagine many larger centres do as well.
What I meant was yes there is a strong community (including retro) but nothing new is coming out with the TSR imprint on it. Mordheim has a similar strong online community that has taken up the ball.
Online D&D is different though. Most off the materials are print, and the miniatures can be has anywhere (like Reaper), so the continuing support from the community can foster the genre and even make it grow. 40k, on the other hand, is very reliant on the models and while the community could carry the torch on the rules, if GW weren't there is would be hard for it to grow further, like RPGs, because the models would cease to be available.
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Post by: weeble1000
 Wayshuba wrote: frozenwastes wrote:You're correct. It is almost impossible to play D&D as written by TSR.
Actually it's probably never been easier. Also thanks to Adkinson and Dancey, the OGL has allowed the legal publication of retro-clones. And the internet has made it easier than ever to get in contact with people who are looking to play older versions of the game. The people who appreciate these older games often self identify as the OSR (which can me Old School Revival or Renaissance) and if my little city of 70,000 people has an OSR group on facebook, I imagine many larger centres do as well.
What I meant was yes there is a strong community (including retro) but nothing new is coming out with the TSR imprint on it. Mordheim has a similar strong online community that has taken up the ball.
Online D&D is different though. Most off the materials are print, and the miniatures can be has anywhere (like Reaper), so the continuing support from the community can foster the genre and even make it grow. 40k, on the other hand, is very reliant on the models and while the community could carry the torch on the rules, if GW weren't there is would be hard for it to grow further, like RPGs, because the models would cease to be available.
Well, first you are forgetting things like Vassal 40K. Second, there are plenty of artists well-equipped to make gorgeous work inspired by the Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 fictional universes. There's a great deal of it on the market already.
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Post by: Saldiven
Wayshuba wrote: frozenwastes wrote:You're correct. It is almost impossible to play D&D as written by TSR.
Actually it's probably never been easier. Also thanks to Adkinson and Dancey, the OGL has allowed the legal publication of retro-clones. And the internet has made it easier than ever to get in contact with people who are looking to play older versions of the game. The people who appreciate these older games often self identify as the OSR (which can me Old School Revival or Renaissance) and if my little city of 70,000 people has an OSR group on facebook, I imagine many larger centres do as well.
What I meant was yes there is a strong community (including retro) but nothing new is coming out with the TSR imprint on it. Mordheim has a similar strong online community that has taken up the ball.
But, you don't need any of that to keep playing. All you need is the core rules and an imagination.
This is similar to tabletop games. You don't need GW miniatures to play 40K or WHFB. There will always be other companies making things that are close enough.
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Post by: Wayniac
Saldiven wrote: Wayshuba wrote: frozenwastes wrote:You're correct. It is almost impossible to play D&D as written by TSR.
Actually it's probably never been easier. Also thanks to Adkinson and Dancey, the OGL has allowed the legal publication of retro-clones. And the internet has made it easier than ever to get in contact with people who are looking to play older versions of the game. The people who appreciate these older games often self identify as the OSR (which can me Old School Revival or Renaissance) and if my little city of 70,000 people has an OSR group on facebook, I imagine many larger centres do as well.
What I meant was yes there is a strong community (including retro) but nothing new is coming out with the TSR imprint on it. Mordheim has a similar strong online community that has taken up the ball.
But, you don't need any of that to keep playing. All you need is the core rules and an imagination.
This is similar to tabletop games. You don't need GW miniatures to play 40K or WHFB. There will always be other companies making things that are close enough.
The difference is that D&D was always mostly imagination, and just the rules you were using changed; there were people who were playing the same campaign with the same characters across multiple D&D editions, because ultimately the rules don't matter.
This not the case with 40k.
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Post by: MWHistorian
WayneTheGame wrote:Saldiven wrote: Wayshuba wrote: frozenwastes wrote:You're correct. It is almost impossible to play D&D as written by TSR.
Actually it's probably never been easier. Also thanks to Adkinson and Dancey, the OGL has allowed the legal publication of retro-clones. And the internet has made it easier than ever to get in contact with people who are looking to play older versions of the game. The people who appreciate these older games often self identify as the OSR (which can me Old School Revival or Renaissance) and if my little city of 70,000 people has an OSR group on facebook, I imagine many larger centres do as well.
What I meant was yes there is a strong community (including retro) but nothing new is coming out with the TSR imprint on it. Mordheim has a similar strong online community that has taken up the ball.
But, you don't need any of that to keep playing. All you need is the core rules and an imagination.
This is similar to tabletop games. You don't need GW miniatures to play 40K or WHFB. There will always be other companies making things that are close enough.
The difference is that D&D was always mostly imagination, and just the rules you were using changed; there were people who were playing the same campaign with the same characters across multiple D&D editions, because ultimately the rules don't matter.
This not the case with 40k.
Correct. Take away the minis from 40k and you're not left with much. Keep the minis and you can come up with all kinds of rules, but keep the rules and not the minis and you're playing a whole of things that don't really look like they belong in the setting. My generic fantasy elves with guns just wouldn't be Eldar for me.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
I disagree.
Except for Tyranids, there are reasonable substitutes available for all the GW models in 40K -- especially the Imperial armies -- and I would bet that Fantasy is even easier.
It's certainly possible to make entire SM and IG armies from non-GW kits. I would even go so far as to point out that if you want a Squat army, GW does not serve at all, while Hasslefree and Ollies Armies both offer nice figures.
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Post by: Wayniac
Kilkrazy wrote:I disagree.
Except for Tyranids, there are reasonable substitutes available for all the GW models in 40K -- especially the Imperial armies -- and I would bet that Fantasy is even easier.
It's certainly possible to make entire SM and IG armies from non- GW kits. I would even go so far as to point out that if you want a Squat army, GW does not serve at all, while Hasslefree and Ollies Armies both offer nice figures.
True and while I disagree that taking away the miniatures isn't a big deal, I think taking away the fluff/background is, because that *is* 40k to me (shoddy rules aside). I have no qualms about using third party miniatures for Guard, or Space Marines or whatever, but I don't think it'd be as easy to play let's say Mantic's Warpath with 40k armies (even though there are fanmade army lists) and get the same feel as playing a game of 40k, even if the rules were better.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
There is a heap of published fluff in the form of old codexes, rulebooks and Black Library novels.
Given all that, I don't see why people need more "official GW 40K fluff", especially when the timeline doesn't advance and the fluff doesn't affect the game rules.
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Post by: malfred
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a heap of published fluff in the form of old codexes, rulebooks and Black Library novels.
Given all that, I don't see why people need more "official GW 40K fluff", especially when the timeline doesn't advance and the fluff doesn't affect the game rules.
Best argument for advancing the timeline ever.
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Post by: carlos13th
I would be all for them advancing the timeline instead of the patchwork approach they seem to be having.
Only x amount of landspeeders ohh look they found this new type collecting dust in the garage.
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Post by: malfred
They could advance the timeline 50
years to 1 and nothing would necessarily
change so flagrantly.
The only issue would be balancing the
differing lifespans
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Post by: Palindrome
I disagree. The 40k universe is very rich, few fictional worlds have as much colour and depth as the 41st Millenium. I play Rogue Trader with tokens and it is still very firmly a 40k game, in fact it is probably more ' 40k' than the tabletop game is. The tabletop game is obviously highly dependent upon the miniatures but 40k is much more than little bits of plastic.
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Post by: Ravenous D
Kilkrazy wrote:There is a heap of published fluff in the form of old codexes, rulebooks and Black Library novels.
Given all that, I don't see why people need more "official GW 40K fluff", especially when the timeline doesn't advance and the fluff doesn't affect the game rules.
And everything since grey knights has been an abortion of fluff or just recycled.
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Post by: Tannhauser42
I'm also at the point where I buy very little GW product. What I do still buy is Forgeworld. FW seems to be the last bastion of the old GW, where the designers still care enough to make good models and a fun game (Horus Heresy) and actually communicate with their customers.
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Post by: SRSFACE
 Tannhauser42 wrote:I'm also at the point where I buy very little GW product. What I do still buy is Forgeworld. FW seems to be the last bastion of the old GW, where the designers still care enough to make good models and a fun game (Horus Heresy) and actually communicate with their customers.
Again, QFT.
We might complain about the price of the models GW pushes out but at the end of the day, while we might complain about the prices, all we really want is a little love. We want to know the people we're buying from care as much as we do. People might look at Forgeworld prices and be sad it's so expensive, but very few people also don't find the value in the price at the same time. It's kind of a weird dichotomy if you think about it.
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Post by: MWHistorian
 Palindrome wrote:
I disagree. The 40k universe is very rich, few fictional worlds have as much colour and depth as the 41st Millenium. I play Rogue Trader with tokens and it is still very firmly a 40k game, in fact it is probably more ' 40k' than the tabletop game is. The tabletop game is obviously highly dependent upon the miniatures but 40k is much more than little bits of plastic.
I was referring to the game itself, not the IP.
I value the universe more than the game itself.
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Post by: frozenwastes
To get this back on topic, the D&D to 40k parallel related to TSR and GW is related to the idea about whether or not 40k as a miniatures game would survive a major change to GW as D&D survived a major change to TSR. This is in the "how will this all turn out?" approach to the topic.
The worst case scenario for the survival of 40k as a game is not the collapse of GW, but it's survival in its current form with its current approach. GW is slowly grinding away the player base and turning good will into negativity.
TSR era D&D survived TSR's transition from a failing company into being part of WotC because people still really loved the game and lots of people still played it. Wizards bougth WotC, relaunched the core books of AD&D2E and then released 3.0 a few years later into a market that was healthy with demand for D&D. D&D 3.0 went on to satisfy many existing AD&D players as well as attracted a whole new generation into D&D. And those who loved pre-3.0 D&D could use the new open gaming license to bring a version of rules they liked back into print.
Will such an opportunity exist for 40k if GW continues to grind away the player base?
The real threat to the long term viability of 40k as a miniatures game is the damage to the community from the current approach to the game. This idea that 40k customers are primarily in the hobby of buying GW's miniatures and the resulting decisions about vast portions of the 40k experience (like the game) being side shows.
By the time the question of 40k's future beyond the failure of GW in it's current form comes up, will there be enough of a player base left to form the community needed to support it as a fan initiative?
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As to Forgeworld, I think it being the last bastion of GW's former approach to their products raises an interesting contrast between TSR and GW.
Was there an analogous body within TSR that still had a vibrant approach to D&D?
If the rumour that Forge World products are going to be more integrated into GW's website in the future is true, will that also mean that they will be integrated more completely into GW's current studio and production approach? Will this last bastion of a vibrant approach to 40k survive such an integration?
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Post by: Quientin
Integration can only help. Vendors feel as alienated as the players. Maybe even more so. First they pulled their advanced demo kits, then tourney support, and then refused accessibility to things like the flyer book. Vendors cannot shelve forgeworld products. There is no vendor discount thus no profit margin to be had without marking it up beyond msrp. TSR never attacked those who sold their products. At least not to where anyone noticed.
furthermore to address the concept of who could afford the buyout. If im not mistaken hasbro owns wotc. Im pretty sure they could buy 40k if they tanked. Cardboard crack has been good to them. Maybe disney could as they have expanded into mainstream comic books and star wars. Not too far of a stretch to make the emperor's favorite daughter a disney princess, with her children the blood angels.
lastly hong kong knockoffs, lego fantasy armies, 3rd party mini and other army subs are relevant. Without gw supporting tourneys anymore TOs are not required to enforce a presence of a percentage of GW models. They only enforce wysiwyg. So GW saves 50 bucks per store per month. GW loses a bunch of business with these alternatives for players and yet even more business when people quit playing because they paid full price for their army and feel slighted when someone shows up with plastic army men and model kit tanks from hobby lobby. It happens in friendly games often and is rank at tourneys,
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Post by: Kilkrazy
My view is that there is usually a point at which a game is "done", and further changes start to degrade the rules from their peak by adding unnecessary complexity and more units for a Monty Haul effect.
I would hold up Star Fire, RuneQuest (RPG) and Basic Squad Leader as games that went past their peak, got too big and stopped being as fun as the previous edition. Hardly anyone plays those games any more.
WRG's DBA, and the Fire and Fury rules, are games that pretty much achieved their peak and stopped. The designers moved on to other games, but loads of people still play the DBA and F&F.
I understand GW's argument that people would get bored of the game if they did not keep changing it. That is self-serving, of course, because people can play a different game if they get bored, but GW don't want the trouble and expense of inventing different games any more, so they just keep making changes to their existing game.
Unfortunately, GW have managed the trick of modifying the game to make it worse by making it bigger and too complex and expensive, without having got the core rules to a good peak first.
The game would be a lot more interesting if, for example, the UGOIGO was replaced by a system of unit activation by cards. That would be easy and cheap to implement. GW could put snazzy cards into every unit box and sell spares separately for old armies. But GW want to implement complex and expensive things, like the Knight Titan, which is designed to make everyone buy Escalation.
I accept that, as a business, GW want to maximise their profits. However I am not a shareholder and I only care about how GW can maximise my game playing enjoyment.
GW, like TSR, have got to the point where most of the stuff they are publishing is irrelevant and even in some ways detrimental to my interest in their game.
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Post by: jonolikespie
frozenwastes wrote:The real threat to the long term viability of 40k as a miniatures game is the damage to the community from the current approach to the game. This idea that 40k customers are primarily in the hobby of buying GW's miniatures and the resulting decisions about vast portions of the 40k experience (like the game) being side shows.
Could not agree more, exalted!
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Post by: Kilkrazy
A lot of people are in the hobby of buying 40K models. Someone who has bought 10,000 points of a single army has far many more models than they would need for playing games. There's nothing wrong with that as such, most wargamers are terrible hoarders (or horde-rs?!?)
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Post by: jonolikespie
But the company operating on the assumption that those people are their target market is terrible for the company's health.
They think that the people spending the most money don't have a crap about the game rules, which leads to minimal effort being put into them, and that drives people away.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, and that is especially true if they think their customers are in the hobby of buying GW products.
Where is the incentive to be better then their competition?
Where is the reason to produce good models instead of pumping out whatever crap and sticking a GW logo on it?
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Post by: Quientin
I have around 75k points... but most of it comes from craigslist and rage quitters. Im about to ebay most of it due to 40k being dead around here. I am the hoarder you speak of and I am ashamed. I exalted you all. Great input.
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Post by: frozenwastes
Kilkrazy wrote:A lot of people are in the hobby of buying 40K models. Someone who has bought 10,000 points of a single army has far many more models than they would need for playing games. There's nothing wrong with that as such, most wargamers are terrible hoarders (or horde-rs?!?)
Do you want your tendency to do so to cause less resources or care to be put into the game play because the real hobby is just buying miniatures?
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Post by: Kilkrazy
What I mean by hoarding is that for example in my own case there are about 20 different armies, navies, factions or other collections of figures of various scales for different games in my “collection”.
These include about 3,000 points of 5th edition Tyranids and about 3,000 points of 3rd/4th edition Tau, plus a fairly random but substantial number of SM infantry figures ranging from the original pre-RT days through Space Hulk Terminators to the SMs out of the 6th edition starter game. There were also several historical armies that I completed and sold off in the past. (And regret doing so.)
While this is a pretty substantial collection, it has been bought over the decades with the idea of making rational armies for actual games, not because I wanted the latest cool model kit or figure from X. When involved in clubs, it is pretty standard to change games occasionally because who wants to play just one system for their whole life? And you keep your old armies because you often go back to them after a few years, or switch to a different set of rules that can use the same models.
Lots of wargamers are like me, and we are no longer the target market for GW.
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Post by: frozenwastes
If I ran a miniatures company and had you as a customer, i would do anything to keep you around.
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Post by: jonolikespie
Kilkrazy wrote:Lots of wargamers are like me, and we are no longer the target market for GW.
Does anyone even know what the target market for GW actually is these days?
It seems to be 'people who buy GW products', which is, you know, dumb, but I genuinely don't think we have the information to be able to say one way or the other and GW seem to only be interested in telling themselves what their target market is, not actually researching and finding out the facts. Automatically Appended Next Post: frozenwastes wrote:If I ran a miniatures company and had you as a customer, i would do anything to keep you around.
As someone who is really, really terrible when it comes to seeing a new shiny and buying it without thinking but has bought all of 1 pot of paint from GW in the last 6 months I couldn't agree more. That is exactly the kind customer you want. I haven't counted how much I have spent on the hobby this year because holy gak I know I'd make myself feel bad if I did (I have about $200 of random infinity models on my desk as well as 2 28mm Dreamforge Leviathans under it that I bought purely because they all looked cool and were all on sale at one point).
Yet GW seem to have no interest in catering to these sorts of customers because...? It's somehow more cost effective to constantly bring in new customers? Us vets are expected to buy everything GW put out anyway so there is no need to waste effort on us?
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Post by: Wayniac
Kilkrazy wrote:I understand GW's argument that people would get bored of the game if they did not keep changing it. That is self-serving, of course, because people can play a different game if they get bored, but GW don't want the trouble and expense of inventing different games any more, so they just keep making changes to their existing game. Unfortunately, GW have managed the trick of modifying the game to make it worse by making it bigger and too complex and expensive, without having got the core rules to a good peak first. The game would be a lot more interesting if, for example, the UGOIGO was replaced by a system of unit activation by cards. That would be easy and cheap to implement. GW could put snazzy cards into every unit box and sell spares separately for old armies. But GW want to implement complex and expensive things, like the Knight Titan, which is designed to make everyone buy Escalation. I accept that, as a business, GW want to maximise their profits. However I am not a shareholder and I only care about how GW can maximise my game playing enjoyment. GW, like TSR, have got to the point where most of the stuff they are publishing is irrelevant and even in some ways detrimental to my interest in their game.
I think they could stop changing things up and go for streamlining. They don't have to stop completely and say " 40k v7 will never change", they can continue to tweak it. The main difference here is that GW has a continually evolving product, i.e. the miniatures, which TSR didn't have so after a while everything was too bloated with rules and optional rules and additional books that you might want to use and campaign settings and historical settings and the like. GW could produce a streamlined set of rules that's clear and concise, and then just evolve it every so often with editions and updates. Hell with the dataslate/supplement route (barring the crazy cost) they don't even need to republish the codex, they can create a new unit and add it to a dataslate or a supplement instead, without having a blatant "Oh new unit means new codex just $75 buy yours now!" kind of marketing shilling. There's so much in the 40k (and to a lesser extent fantasy) meta that they could pump out new things without ever touching or revamping the rules (assuming the rules were good) if they chose to. Warzones, campaigns, dataslates, scenarios, the list goes on. If they had rules that stood the test of time and were a framework, then they could just add to it without any issues. But instead they deliberately shake up the rules because they have this idea that people aren't going to buy unless they do. What GW doesn't realize is that streamlined, solid and flexible rules with reasonably-priced models is going to do a lot more than pretending you're selling a luxury product with $50 books and $40+ figures that you need several of. They like to think they are a luxury hobby but really the only luxury is in the cost. How many of us who no longer play would play again if the rules were balanced and prices were reasonable, say what they were in 2002 (which was still higher than inflation then), without all the angry GW vs. the world things (e.g. bitz was back, mail order had deals again, etc)? A lot of us, I bet. I would buy things all the time if a normal squad was $20 instead of double that.
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Post by: Quientin
My first army was squats. My second was imperial arbites. My third was genestealer cultists. After 3rd hit i didnt even touch the game til 5th. Even then I was squeamish about giving them money.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Yeah battletech has changed less in 20 years than gw does in one edition look how that worked for them. Story advance and some new gear does wonders. If it wasnt for the robotech lawsuit they would be leagues ahead. Maybe it kept them humble. Who can say? Prime example of what is being suggested here though.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
As a player I would like GW to produce a modernised set of core rules, tested over a couple of editions until it was solid and well balanced. Include codexes for 10 core armies (SM, IG, Impy specials (SoB and Grey Knights), Tyranids, Tau, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Orks, Necrons, Chaos.) Release every book in a full size hardback version with fluff and modelling guide, and a reduced size, reduced price, rules only version for people who don't need the fluff and stuff.
Then stop changing 40K because it is now as good as it will ever be.
From now on, do add-ons for super-heavies, fliers, fortifications, Cities of Death, a set of vehicle design rules so people can make their own cool conversions and put them in the game, and variants of the core army lists for all the different colours of SMs and dataslates and so on. The rest of this stuff doesn't need to be balanced because it's for occasional special fun games. A lot of it could be left to Forge World and the Imperial Armour books like it used to be.
Finally, make some new games.
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Post by: Wayniac
That's what I find so funny. They could easily build a solid set of core rules that allow additions, and then build on it with dataslates. Look at how Warmachine/Hordes tends to handle it - not the rules themselves necessarily, but how they have a rules framework that lets them pit two different games against each other as well as have constant new releases and upgrades that can play against each other, without invalidating the earlier ones that exist.
That's what GW should do, in concept at least. A solidly flexible rules framework that's easy to understand and well balanced, and then add extras as you need to without invalidating entire armies or collections just to force people to buy more.
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Post by: Quientin
Lol is gw bound to buy back its products should they go the TSR path?
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Post by: Ruberu
I've been involved with GW for about 15 years now. We just got a GW store in my area about 2 years ago. I was talking to the new store owner the other day and he told me that they have plans to open up 3-4 more stores in my area, I am confused now!?! I agree that GW is on a downwards spiral but how in the hell are they going to open 3 more stores in my little area. The gaming community in my area is large but not that large. So this almost feels like an attempt to spread the word of their products to maybe attracted new customers. All I have to say is alittle too late GW, I am going to finish the armies I have but will be done after that. I have already moved to other paints becasue the resent batch of GW paint is too watered down and drys up way too fast for the cost.
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Post by: Azreal13
They'll open 3 because they'll have closed 3 elsewhere, this is the MO.
They open, farm the area for as long as possible, if it continues to make money, great, if not, fire the manager (GW don't do franchise, so the guy you spoke to was an employee, loosely termed 'manager' not an owner) and find another location.
It is a terrible approach, IMO, and totally prevents the possibility of the growth of a sustainable, long term wargaming communities in many locations where an independent shop would have a real chance at developing one, but they've shown that they really don't care about long term anything.
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Post by: carlos13th
 Ruberu wrote:I've been involved with GW for about 15 years now. We just got a GW store in my area about 2 years ago. I was talking to the new store owner the other day and he told me that they have plans to open up 3-4 more stores in my area, I am confused now!?! I agree that GW is on a downwards spiral but how in the hell are they going to open 3 more stores in my little area. The gaming community in my area is large but not that large. So this almost feels like an attempt to spread the word of their products to maybe attracted new customers. All I have to say is alittle too late GW, I am going to finish the armies I have but will be done after that. I have already moved to other paints becasue the resent batch of GW paint is too watered down and drys up way too fast for the cost.
Agree on the paints. Lids seem to either not shut properly or open back up after being shut a lot of the time. Even being really vigilant to ensure I have pressed the lids down hard often the pot wont be properly closed when I go back to it for the next painting session.
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Post by: Wayshuba
WayneTheGame wrote:That's what I find so funny. They could easily build a solid set of core rules that allow additions, and then build on it with dataslates. Look at how Warmachine/Hordes tends to handle it - not the rules themselves necessarily, but how they have a rules framework that lets them pit two different games against each other as well as have constant new releases and upgrades that can play against each other, without invalidating the earlier ones that exist.
That's what GW should do, in concept at least. A solidly flexible rules framework that's easy to understand and well balanced, and then add extras as you need to without invalidating entire armies or collections just to force people to buy more.
All GW needs to do is look at what Forgeworld does. Most of their expansions come in the form of campaigns.
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Post by: Kroothawk
Ruberu wrote:I've been involved with GW for about 15 years now. We just got a GW store in my area about 2 years ago. I was talking to the new store owner the other day and he told me that they have plans to open up 3-4 more stores in my area, I am confused now!?!
Did you really expect him to say:
" GW is going to be bancrupt soon because the rules suck, the models are overpriced crap and our dictator boss is an idiot! Please buy elsewhere!" 
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Post by: Hivefleet Oblivion
 Kroothawk wrote:
Did you really expect him to say:
" GW is going to be bancrupt soon because the rules suck, the models are overpriced crap and our dictator boss is an idiot! Please buy elsewhere!"
No he won't. Probably because he's an intelligent person who can understand that the world is not binary.
One of the staff at Dark Sphere told me that Imperial Knights were one of the most successful GW launches he can remember. He also said Warhammer Visions was selling really badly. Always good to look at all the evidence, ain't it?
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Post by: FoWPlayerDeathOfUS.TDs
I think the main thing we should be worried about at this point is predicting the future of the gaming market. What companies do you think will expand, how much will the overall size of the hobby fall, stuff like that. We know GW isn't going to collapse overnight, but it is going to be down or at least not an industry leader before the decade is up. The only hope 40k has of remaining top dog is for another company to buy their IP up, so who is that going to be? Lets not argue on why they're failing- it has been made abundantly clear that they are failing- and look toward the future of the (no longer HHH)hobby.
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Post by: Saevus
40K doesn't have to be an industry leader though. Hell the fact there is a tabletop company pulling 200+ million a year in revenue is bonkers given that computer games and the like really limit the new customer base. GW is facing a similar problem to other industry leading companies in niche markets. The market is shifting, and GW doesn't seem willing to notice.
I think the more interesting line is that once GW's revenue finally nose dives off a cliff and they flatline and contract back into a mail order models company or sell off the IP, will we ever see a tabletop company get near their size again?
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Post by: Mr. Burning
 Saevus wrote:
I think the more interesting line is that once GW's revenue finally nose dives off a cliff and they flatline and contract back into a mail order models company or sell off the IP, will we ever see a tabletop company get near their size again?
It's possible but Consider that GW have grown over 30+ years - They sought investment and have developed into what they are today (for better or worse). IMO they also grew (for want of a better term) whilst any competition they may have had at the time faltered.
The pie is probably bigger than it was when GW started but a lot more products and companies are grabbing their small slice.
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Post by: Coldhatred
I wonder if when looking at the metrics allowing for the expanded market if more people are actually joining the hobby or it's simply a case of higher revenues to cost. I haven't looked at the numbers, but I almost feel like that would need to be answered succinctly before any thought of a new industry leader reaching GW's size could actually occur.
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Post by: Grot 6
Ruberu wrote:I've been involved with GW for about 15 years now. We just got a GW store in my area about 2 years ago. I was talking to the new store owner the other day and he told me that they have plans to open up 3-4 more stores in my area, I am confused now!?! I agree that GW is on a downwards spiral but how in the hell are they going to open 3 more stores in my little area. The gaming community in my area is large but not that large. So this almost feels like an attempt to spread the word of their products to maybe attracted new customers. All I have to say is alittle too late GW, I am going to finish the armies I have but will be done after that. I have already moved to other paints becasue the resent batch of GW paint is too watered down and drys up way too fast for the cost.
You have some GW stores in your area to soak up the "hhhobby" dollar. They do this by undercutting your local game store's crowd, then as they push the envelope and continue to change and morph business practices and eventually suck the life out of your local gaming community. Most of the time it will happen because "all the cool kidz are going over to the "New" GW store, but behind the scenes, these stores are in direct competition with each other and with your LGS for the crowd.
They have a.. rather stringent... sales target. Your "New store" doesn't know it yet, but they are living under the gun. They don't make sales, the one and two man stores of GW fame die a silent death in the excuse of "Expanding the gaming community to other areas" and they "perform a summery execution, (ala commissar style), because of the failure" on the floundering store, and either relocate the personnel, fire their butts, or redirect the store to another location. GW is a suck company to work for on a good day, and it takes a pretty intense sort to keep it from going under in their way of "Sales".
You are programmed from the moment you go in the store, to the moment you leave the store and ask yourself, "What just happened, I just dropped 400 bucks on a 1780 pt army...."
They are "spreading the word" more or less by carpet bombing your area with some 1-2 man stores to soak up the sales from several different directions. They are on a downward spiral, because of the tactics used, and the desperation in which they are moving. It is easier to kill the weak store in a few months to a year, and keep the strong one going, as you change areas. Not much overhead, liquidation needed, or loss, especially if the store in question is in a strip mall with a yearly lease.
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Post by: -Loki-
What GW does when it moves into a town is not undercutting, which implies they offer their products cheaper than their competitors. Their competitors usually undercut GW. They do however muscle out other stores with better stock availability - especially now that so much is direct only and it's so hard for stores to stock GW stuff, but this only works if said store makes most of its money from GW which is a rarity these days.
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Post by: Ravenous D
 -Loki- wrote:What GW does when it moves into a town is not undercutting, which implies they offer their products cheaper than their competitors. Their competitors usually undercut GW. They do however muscle out other stores with better stock availability - especially now that so much is direct only and it's so hard for stores to stock GW stuff, but this only works if said store makes most of its money from GW which is a rarity these days.
That and every store around that GW suddenly has mysterious supply issues as it has been reported many times.
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Post by: Quientin
Well my local gw store stocks the online orders only stuff and the manager has claimed to many since they opened that they will have forgeworld on the shelf within a month because theyer a gw store. When I called up there last january they acted like I was talking crazy.
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Post by: Kroothawk
 Ravenous D wrote: -Loki- wrote:What GW does when it moves into a town is not undercutting, which implies they offer their products cheaper than their competitors. Their competitors usually undercut GW. They do however muscle out other stores with better stock availability - especially now that so much is direct only and it's so hard for stores to stock GW stuff, but this only works if said store makes most of its money from GW which is a rarity these days.
That and every store around that GW suddenly has mysterious supply issues as it has been reported many times.
Still, in times of one-man-stores with no gaming area but aggressive sales behavior, a GW store should have serious trouble now to attract customers from a FLGS.
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Post by: Quientin
Like having the flier book on the shelf when no one else may because gw wont sell it to the flgs?
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Post by: slowthar
 Quientin wrote:Like having the flier book on the shelf when no one else may because gw wont sell it to the flgs?
Maybe, but a FLGS has about a thousand things that a GW store won't... paint options, brush options, non- GW terrain, soda, discounts, etc. I find it hard to believe that a GW store is going to put a dent in the community at any decent FLGS. Sales? Maybe. But all a FLGS needs to do is show a hint of longevity and the GW store will move out in a year when their borderline-poverty stricken single employee can't make their sales number because they're only open 40 hours a week and he's not allowed to offer any discounts, tournaments, or opinions.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
AFAIK TSR did not have shops, so that element of the thread is off topic.
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Post by: Red Corsair
Wayshuba wrote: Las wrote:I agree with the notion that it will be a huge blow to the community if GW goes under especially considering the example of TSR. I mean, it's basically impossible to play D&D these days.
You're correct. It is almost impossible to play D&D as written by TSR. If it wasn't for WotC, or more properly, Peter Adkinson's love of D&D, it would have been history as the company was in such bad shape it wasn't a good buy - even at pennies on the dollar. However, WotC had the cash as was able to pick up and save the brand because of one fact - Peter Adkinson loved D&D.
If GW does collapse - who has the cash in the industry to pick them up? People forget that GW has a tremendous amount of assets as a manufacturer and their is no one close to their size. So, does 40k have a Peter Adkinson out there, willing to make a bad buy in order to save a brand they love???
And, if you think it can't happen, you may want to read the story of WordPerfect Corporation and Wang Corporation to see how a small $500 million company (WordPerfect) caused a $51 billion dollar company (Wang) to disappear from existence in less than a year.
Robbin Williams?
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Post by: Cryptek of Awesome
Kilkrazy wrote:If people want to protest the prices with some hope of an effect, I suggest the following method.
Whenever you buy a non- GW product, write an email to GW saying you have bought X because it is cheaper than their product Y. Enclose a copy of your receipt.
Clearly this only really applies to substitution products. GW won't give a feth if you buy two complete armies for DBA and two sets of the rules instead of a Knight Titan. But they might care if you bought a Gundam to use as a Knight Titan.
That sounds like a good way to see you name brought up during the next big GW IP/copyright trial!
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Post by: Kilkrazy
I would like to see GW take on Bandai for selling toy giant robot kits.
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Post by: Talizvar
Kilkrazy wrote: Clearly this only really applies to substitution products. GW won't give a f**k if you buy two complete armies for DBA and two sets of the rules instead of a Knight Titan. But they might care if you bought a Gundam to use as a Knight Titan.
What they have also set themselves up for is that since they no longer hold "official" GW tournaments we can pretty much play what we want of competitor product so playing a Gundam may not be all that far off. Automatically Appended Next Post: -Loki- wrote:What GW does when it moves into a town is not undercutting, which implies they offer their products cheaper than their competitors. Their competitors usually undercut GW. They do however muscle out other stores with better stock availability - especially now that so much is direct only and it's so hard for stores to stock GW stuff, but this only works if said store makes most of its money from GW which is a rarity these days.
At first glance I was tempted to agree but I found the "new" stores also carry "basic" stuff and most vehicles they do not.
They were VERY quick to point out that I can order there and pick-up for "free" but they have removed another reason for buying there: when someone wants that model "now" they are of no use, might as well order online.
I have a local store that FAR surpasses the GW store and they also carry Forgeworld stuff, they really put them to shame.
It does help when they are walking distance of 2 universities and a college further down the road to dictate some terms.
It will be interesting what their next wave of "death-throes" they attempt will be.
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Post by: Las
^meeplemart?
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Post by: Shadow Captain Edithae
 Talizvar wrote:At first glance I was tempted to agree but I found the "new" stores also carry "basic" stuff and most vehicles they do not.
They were VERY quick to point out that I can order there and pick-up for "free" but they have removed another reason for buying there: when someone wants that model "now" they are of no use, might as well order online.
This came up the last time I visited a GW store. I was visiting my old gaming club in Middlesbrough (I went to Teesside Uni so the town's indepedent gaming club was my local club for 3 years) and stopped at the GW store on the way home.
I asked if they had any copies of the new slimmed down Warhammer 40K 6th Ed rulebook (the one that cuts out the fluff, and just has the rules, for £30) but it turned out that the book is Online Only. He offered to have it delivered to the store, and was very persistent even after I declined twice. I had to explain how I'd have to make a 45 min £7 train journey just to get to the store and collect it.
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Post by: Talizvar
J&J Cards and Collectables
http://www.jjcards.com/shop/
Their site does not do them justice.
A warehouse of "stuff" with GW taking up about 1/8th of the space with about 8 other gaming systems rubbing shoulders with it in the aisles.
The true scary thing about them is the much improved price compared to any other store within 50km.
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Post by: MrMoustaffa
Kroothawk wrote: Ravenous D wrote: -Loki- wrote:What GW does when it moves into a town is not undercutting, which implies they offer their products cheaper than their competitors. Their competitors usually undercut GW. They do however muscle out other stores with better stock availability - especially now that so much is direct only and it's so hard for stores to stock GW stuff, but this only works if said store makes most of its money from GW which is a rarity these days.
That and every store around that GW suddenly has mysterious supply issues as it has been reported many times.
Still, in times of one-man-stores with no gaming area but aggressive sales behavior, a GW store should have serious trouble now to attract customers from a FLGS.
If anything, GW has the advantage. In my old town, the new GW store has been raking in new players like crazy. These players apparently only play at the GW, and have no interest in breaking into the cliques established at the two Indy stores.
Add on the fact that the GW store is run by a cute girl in her 20 something's, versus the FLGS's fairly typical staff, its almost no contest. The GW store is infinitely more approachable for your average Joe, and that can be a huge deal breaker we don't often think about.
Remember, GW isn't targeting guys like us who are super into the game on forums and the like. They know the easy money is out there in the untapped market. Now whether this is business they "stole" from indies, or business the Indies would have never gotten anyways, is another argument entirely. I think its safe to say though that at least some of the new players walking into a GW store would never have walked into an average FLGS, due to things like atmosphere, playerbase, or social stigma.
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Post by: Kain
The best thing for 40k and Fantasy Battle would be for GW to die the undignified death it deserves and someone to pry the IP out of it's cold dead hands.
I've long been an advocate that Warhammer would be better under Hasbro's care than in GW's mismanagement after all.
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Post by: Mr. Burning
 Kain wrote:The best thing for 40k and Fantasy Battle would be for GW to die the undignified death it deserves and someone to pry the IP out of it's cold dead hands.
I've long been an advocate that Warhammer would be better under Hasbro's care than in GW's mismanagement after all.
Assuming Hasbro have any interest in GW and it's IP.
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Post by: Kain
I'll make this clear, the 40 and FB IPs are almost definitely going to outlive GW itself. There is a lot of money to be made in just the fictional setting alone as Dawn of War proved. There is simply no chance of 40k and FB becoming abandon ware in case GW dies because nobody is going to let those cash cows die off just because the ranch burned down.
The 40k setting is a valuable IP to set things in. Making a setting people want more of is arguably harder than making products for that setting. I mean, can you honestly name ten major characters and events in infinity without looking them up? Or point me to ten substantial discussions of their background and lore? People like the stories that can be told in the 40k setting, they want more of those stories, and taking that story-telling ability out of GW's stagnant hands and into a new body would be the best thing for the IP.
The game itself is likely to get radically redone by the inevitable buyer of the 40k IP to the point of being unrecognizable. The 40k lore though, has merchandising potential. As anyone who studies franchises can tell you, the associated merchandise of a franchise will usually drastically outstrip the actual core product in terms of revenue. Comic books for example, fewer and fewer people actually read comics, but people will buy tickets to watch the movies, purchase copies of the games set in those universes, and sink money into the toys. Or hell, Lucas or someone in Lucasarts even said that for every dollar they made on the Star Wars films, they made three in associated merchandise.
This is what makes 40k attractive to IP buyers, it's distinctive, it's got a large number of people who are demonstrably invested into the IP as a setting and not just as a game, and you could make it easily marketable. The game itself is a broken mess but the universe has the potential to make billions in the right hands. I mean, the spiderman comics themselves struggle to gross over a million every month. but the games, movies, toys, and cartoons all conspire to make Spiderman a billion dollar name even if less than a hundred thousand people actually read the comics he's in. Automatically Appended Next Post:  Mr. Burning wrote: Kain wrote:The best thing for 40k and Fantasy Battle would be for GW to die the undignified death it deserves and someone to pry the IP out of it's cold dead hands.
I've long been an advocate that Warhammer would be better under Hasbro's care than in GW's mismanagement after all.
Assuming Hasbro have any interest in GW and it's IP.
Hasbro is a money grubbing giant in the toy industry that snaps up IPs and companies it sees as having marketability while still being cheap. Which typically means dying companies looking to make their bigwigs a few last bucks by selling off everything for pennies on the dollar.
TSR's demise offered them D&D on the cheap, so they snapped it up.
GW dying would give them a way to dominate the wargaming market and gain another IP they could spin into being as huge as Transformers, G.I Joe, D&D, and MLP without overmuch effort with all the hard work of getting a fanbase to build off and basic setting premises that can interest people of before they commercialize the hell out of it being done for them.
Buying out a dying GW is completely in character for them.
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Post by: Wolfstan
If Hasbro did buy up GW's IP we could end up seeing 40k figures in the "McFarlane" style of models. I currently have a 7in Cole Train and Marcus model on my desk at work. Would love some 40k models in this scale and detail.
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Post by: Kroothawk
 MrMoustaffa wrote:Add on the fact that the GW store is run by a cute girl in her 20 something's, ...
Okay, that's unfair business practice 
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Post by: Bomster
Kain wrote:The game itself is likely to get radically redone by the inevitable buyer of the 40k IP to the point of being unrecognizable.
Yeah, you might get something like "Mechwarrior: Dark Ages" or "Mutant Chronicles 54mm Minatures Game". I wouldn't automatically assume that whoever gets a license will do a better job than GW - or at least will do something with the license you want to play... 
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Post by: Hivefleet Oblivion
Kain wrote:
GW dying would give them a way to dominate the wargaming market and gain another IP they could spin into being as huge as Transformers, G.I Joe, D&D, and MLP without overmuch effort with all the hard work of getting a fanbase to build off and basic setting premises that can interest people of before they commercialize the hell out of it being done for them.
Buying out a dying GW is completely in character for them.
Again, this obsession with Hasbro, whose main virtue is being big. If they buy GW, likelihood is that there will be even more moaning minnies than we have right now.
Granted, if new management instituted tournament support, more coherent rules, lower prices, and focused on new player recruitment, we'd all be happier bunnies. But if GW really are dying (which I don't really believe, despite the schadenfreude-addicts' constant refrains ), they're more likely to attract vultures than wizards or white knights.
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Post by: insaniak
 Bomster wrote:Yeah, you might get something like "Mechwarrior: Dark Ages" or "Mutant Chronicles 54mm Minatures Game". I wouldn't automatically assume that whoever gets a license will do a better job than GW - or at least will do something with the license you want to play...
I can't say much about the Mutant Chronicles game, but it's possibly worth pointing out that Mechwarrior: Dark Age won Origin Awards for both the game and the miniature range.
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Post by: Anpu42
 insaniak wrote: Bomster wrote:Yeah, you might get something like "Mechwarrior: Dark Ages" or "Mutant Chronicles 54mm Minatures Game". I wouldn't automatically assume that whoever gets a license will do a better job than GW - or at least will do something with the license you want to play...
I can't say much about the Mutant Chronicles game, but it's possibly worth pointing out that Mechwarrior: Dark Age won Origin Awards for both the game and the miniature range.
We would probably get something more like D&D or Star Wars Minis
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Post by: insaniak
 Anpu42 wrote:We would probably get something more like D&D or Star Wars Minis
2 more hugely successful miniatures ranges?
Still not seeing a problem here...
18080
Post by: Anpu42
insaniak wrote: Anpu42 wrote:We would probably get something more like D&D or Star Wars Minis
2 more hugely successful miniatures ranges?
Still not seeing a problem here...
I did not say that was a bad thing, though 40k would probably become more a skirmish game.
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Post by: BallinWitStalin
Kain wrote:I'll make this clear, the 40 and FB IPs are almost definitely going to outlive GW itself. There is a lot of money to be made in just the fictional setting alone as Dawn of War proved. There is simply no chance of 40k and FB becoming abandon ware in case GW dies because nobody is going to let those cash cows die off just because the ranch burned down.
The 40k setting is a valuable IP to set things in. Making a setting people want more of is arguably harder than making products for that setting. I mean, can you honestly name ten major characters and events in infinity without looking them up? Or point me to ten substantial discussions of their background and lore? People like the stories that can be told in the 40k setting, they want more of those stories, and taking that story-telling ability out of GW's stagnant hands and into a new body would be the best thing for the IP.
The game itself is likely to get radically redone by the inevitable buyer of the 40k IP to the point of being unrecognizable. The 40k lore though, has merchandising potential. As anyone who studies franchises can tell you, the associated merchandise of a franchise will usually drastically outstrip the actual core product in terms of revenue. Comic books for example, fewer and fewer people actually read comics, but people will buy tickets to watch the movies, purchase copies of the games set in those universes, and sink money into the toys. Or hell, Lucas or someone in Lucasarts even said that for every dollar they made on the Star Wars films, they made three in associated merchandise.
This is what makes 40k attractive to IP buyers, it's distinctive, it's got a large number of people who are demonstrably invested into the IP as a setting and not just as a game, and you could make it easily marketable. The game itself is a broken mess but the universe has the potential to make billions in the right hands. I mean, the spiderman comics themselves struggle to gross over a million every month. but the games, movies, toys, and cartoons all conspire to make Spiderman a billion dollar name even if less than a hundred thousand people actually read the comics he's in.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Mr. Burning wrote: Kain wrote:The best thing for 40k and Fantasy Battle would be for GW to die the undignified death it deserves and someone to pry the IP out of it's cold dead hands.
I've long been an advocate that Warhammer would be better under Hasbro's care than in GW's mismanagement after all.
Assuming Hasbro have any interest in GW and it's IP.
Hasbro is a money grubbing giant in the toy industry that snaps up IPs and companies it sees as having marketability while still being cheap. Which typically means dying companies looking to make their bigwigs a few last bucks by selling off everything for pennies on the dollar.
TSR's demise offered them D&D on the cheap, so they snapped it up.
GW dying would give them a way to dominate the wargaming market and gain another IP they could spin into being as huge as Transformers, G.I Joe, D&D, and MLP without overmuch effort with all the hard work of getting a fanbase to build off and basic setting premises that can interest people of before they commercialize the hell out of it being done for them.
Buying out a dying GW is completely in character for them.
Transformers and G.I. Joe? Jesus man, this is the thing I don't understand about people schadenfreuding GW. If someone else takes over like Hasbro, they'll probably just make it worse. Transformers and G.I.Joe both blow. While the GW 40K universe has definitely gotten a little lamer (perpetuals? come the feth on...), I really doubt any other major company would substantially alter the path they are taking story-wise, which is to make the fluff simpler and more broadly appealing to a younger, more mainstream audience.
Based off of previous experiences with these type of franchises, this path generally seems pretty inevitable. Any sci-fi fantasy setting that obtains substantial popularity, whose money is made off of merchandise sales, and whose rights are owned by a company interested in profit maximizing typically takes this route.
It just is what it is. Nothing will change as long as a big company controls the IP, which it inevitably will even if GW dies (which I am truthfully pretty skeptical of) since 40K is so popular and potentially profitable.
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Post by: Anpu42
It also depends on who gets it.
Wiz Kids: Would also not be a bad choice. I could see them doing like what they did with Shadowrun and BattleTech. Let’s say Wiz Kids buys GW to get at the Specialist Games and then pawns off Warhammer Fantasy and 40k to a secondary publisher to write the rule books.
Hasbro: We would probably get something like a booster driven Blood Bowl or Space Hulk while they figure out what to do everything else.
FoW Guys: Would see some major changes, but a lot would be the same to. FOCs, d6s and overpriced rule books.
Warlord Game: Prices might drop along with the overall model counts.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
Anpu42 wrote: insaniak wrote: Anpu42 wrote:We would probably get something more like D&D or Star Wars Minis
2 more hugely successful miniatures ranges? Still not seeing a problem here...
I did not say that was a bad thing, though 40k would probably become more a skirmish game.
40K IS a skirmish game. It's a platoon level skirmish in which GW have tried to cobble together details suitable for a rules-light RPG with the increased number of figures and units approaching a company level wargame. They have managed in several ways to get the worst of both worlds, and that is a reason for the number of problems with the game. In an ideal world, GW would produce a more detailed skirmish game, possibly set on a Hive World, and a genuine mass combat game on an epic scale, and 40K would be simplified by getting rid of a lot of the detail around characters and special rules. To make my point obvious, this is roughly where GW were 10 years ago, when they produced Necromunda, Epic and 3rd/4th edition 40K. I'm not saying those were all perfect rules, BTW.
18080
Post by: Anpu42
Kilkrazy wrote: Anpu42 wrote: insaniak wrote: Anpu42 wrote:We would probably get something more like D&D or Star Wars Minis
2 more hugely successful miniatures ranges?
Still not seeing a problem here...
I did not say that was a bad thing, though 40k would probably become more a skirmish game.
40K IS a skirmish game. It's a platoon level skirmish in which GW have tried to cobble together details suitable for a rules-light RPG with the increased number of figures and units approaching a company level wargame.
They have managed in several ways to get the worst of both worlds, and that is a reason for the number of problems with the game.
Was a skirmish game would be a better way to put it.
I would not have a problem with it going back to it though, but I also like my 2k-3k games to.
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Post by: Wayniac
I think the issue is that 40k doesn't really have a framework that allows it to scale to that, but GW has done it anyways. If the rules were well-written and balanced, you could offer 40k in multiple flavors using the same basic ruleset with modifications as needed to support the level at which you're playing.
So you might have a Skirmish version which ranges from Kill Team up through Combat Patrol (so about 200-500 points or so) and has streamlined rules for that, possibly with a bit more detail for individuality.
Then you have the Platoon level which is the "default" rulesset for 750-2000 or something like that.
Finally you have Apocalypse which again has streamlined rules designed for mass combat to make things faster and more intuitive (for instance maybe Apoc games don't have individual casualty removal but wound points on a squad).
A flexible and well-written rules framework could allow for all of those with the same basic rules at its core, and more importantly let you adapt all three as needed. The current 40k rules try to do all three of those scenarios badly.
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Post by: Kain
BallinWitStalin wrote: Kain wrote:I'll make this clear, the 40 and FB IPs are almost definitely going to outlive GW itself. There is a lot of money to be made in just the fictional setting alone as Dawn of War proved. There is simply no chance of 40k and FB becoming abandon ware in case GW dies because nobody is going to let those cash cows die off just because the ranch burned down.
The 40k setting is a valuable IP to set things in. Making a setting people want more of is arguably harder than making products for that setting. I mean, can you honestly name ten major characters and events in infinity without looking them up? Or point me to ten substantial discussions of their background and lore? People like the stories that can be told in the 40k setting, they want more of those stories, and taking that story-telling ability out of GW's stagnant hands and into a new body would be the best thing for the IP.
The game itself is likely to get radically redone by the inevitable buyer of the 40k IP to the point of being unrecognizable. The 40k lore though, has merchandising potential. As anyone who studies franchises can tell you, the associated merchandise of a franchise will usually drastically outstrip the actual core product in terms of revenue. Comic books for example, fewer and fewer people actually read comics, but people will buy tickets to watch the movies, purchase copies of the games set in those universes, and sink money into the toys. Or hell, Lucas or someone in Lucasarts even said that for every dollar they made on the Star Wars films, they made three in associated merchandise.
This is what makes 40k attractive to IP buyers, it's distinctive, it's got a large number of people who are demonstrably invested into the IP as a setting and not just as a game, and you could make it easily marketable. The game itself is a broken mess but the universe has the potential to make billions in the right hands. I mean, the spiderman comics themselves struggle to gross over a million every month. but the games, movies, toys, and cartoons all conspire to make Spiderman a billion dollar name even if less than a hundred thousand people actually read the comics he's in.
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Mr. Burning wrote: Kain wrote:The best thing for 40k and Fantasy Battle would be for GW to die the undignified death it deserves and someone to pry the IP out of it's cold dead hands.
I've long been an advocate that Warhammer would be better under Hasbro's care than in GW's mismanagement after all.
Assuming Hasbro have any interest in GW and it's IP.
Hasbro is a money grubbing giant in the toy industry that snaps up IPs and companies it sees as having marketability while still being cheap. Which typically means dying companies looking to make their bigwigs a few last bucks by selling off everything for pennies on the dollar.
TSR's demise offered them D&D on the cheap, so they snapped it up.
GW dying would give them a way to dominate the wargaming market and gain another IP they could spin into being as huge as Transformers, G.I Joe, D&D, and MLP without overmuch effort with all the hard work of getting a fanbase to build off and basic setting premises that can interest people of before they commercialize the hell out of it being done for them.
Buying out a dying GW is completely in character for them.
Transformers and G.I. Joe? Jesus man, this is the thing I don't understand about people schadenfreuding GW. If someone else takes over like Hasbro, they'll probably just make it worse. Transformers and G.I.Joe both blow. While the GW 40K universe has definitely gotten a little lamer (perpetuals? come the feth on...), I really doubt any other major company would substantially alter the path they are taking story-wise, which is to make the fluff simpler and more broadly appealing to a younger, more mainstream audience.
Based off of previous experiences with these type of franchises, this path generally seems pretty inevitable. Any sci-fi fantasy setting that obtains substantial popularity, whose money is made off of merchandise sales, and whose rights are owned by a company interested in profit maximizing typically takes this route.
It just is what it is. Nothing will change as long as a big company controls the IP, which it inevitably will even if GW dies (which I am truthfully pretty skeptical of) since 40K is so popular and potentially profitable.
I'm sorry, but I can't hear you over the sound of Transformers Prime winning emmies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformers:_Prime#Awards_and_nominations
Or the nearly universal positive reviews of Fall of and War for Cybertron.
Or the awesomeness that is the IDW Transformers comics.
Or Dark of the Moon being the sixth most successful movie ever.
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Post by: Hivefleet Oblivion
Kain wrote:
Or Dark of the Moon being the sixth most successful movie ever.
Another example of a steaming pile of gak smelling sweet to the schadenfreude freaks, as long as it's not GW.
Accounting for inflation, it's the 129th most successful movie ever. .
More importantly, it sucks!.
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Post by: Kain
If you see the words " Domestic Gross" in bold you'll see the problem with your methodology. Once upon a time, Domestic Gross was all that mattered, these days international gross can easily outstrip domestic by a huge margin and do so with regularity. Not because foreigners have different tastes, or not entirely, but because Domestic Gross accounts for a nation of 300 million, and International figures in the other 6.7 or so billion people who can buy a ticket.
In addition, I actually liked the film unironically.
There is a time and a place for serious stories with a message behind it and a time for simple over the top fun. It's why I liked the Avengers more than the Dark Knight (I liked both to be sure), because I'm not interested in films pontificating about right and wrong. It's supposed to be entertainment first, not a lecture circuit.
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Post by: Bomster
insaniak wrote: Bomster wrote:Yeah, you might get something like "Mechwarrior: Dark Ages" or "Mutant Chronicles 54mm Minatures Game". I wouldn't automatically assume that whoever gets a license will do a better job than GW - or at least will do something with the license you want to play...
I can't say much about the Mutant Chronicles game, but it's possibly worth pointing out that Mechwarrior: Dark Age won Origin Awards for both the game and the miniature range.
Which in the case of the models is utterly incomprehensible to me. As for MW: DA - it had an 'impressive' life cycle of 5-6 years, and the storyline advancement was so well done that after its demise everybody quickly returned to either the 3025 or 3050 era, as if they were slightly embarrassed about the 3100's development. I can't say much about the actual quality of FFG's Mutant Chronicles game either, but it obviously wasn't anything the buying public was in any way interested it. Rather than talking about the quality of my examples I was going for this point: whoever's willing to spend the cash for a 40k license after GW's (very hypothetical) end - might not want to create some sort of idealized version of the 40k game (like 40k but done really, really well). They might very much decide that the tabletop game was the albatross around the fluff's neck and could plug the setting into an existing rules frame (like Wizkids more or less did) or create a generic boardgame with some themed models.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
Is there anyone who thinks 40K is an absolutely marvellous set of rules, already perfect and impossible to improve?
It seems to me that the player base is spread between people who think it's fun and good, all the way to people who have pretty much given up because they think it's got so bad.
It might be the best thing ever, to dump the rules and do a ground up revision. As long as it supported the current fluff and models, and was a good set of rules, would people not accept it?
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Post by: kronk
Kilkrazy wrote:Is there anyone who thinks 40K is an absolutely marvellous set of rules, already perfect and impossible to improve?
It seems to me that the player base is spread between people who think it's fun and good, all the way to people who have pretty much given up because they think it's got so bad.
It might be the best thing ever, to dump the rules and do a ground up revision. As long as it supported the current fluff and models, and was a good set of rules, would people not accept it?
I would. I liked 6th edition, and still do.
I just can't stand Escalation, Stronghold Assault, and 100x dataslates I can't possibly keep up with.
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Post by: Herzlos
Bomster wrote: They might very much decide that the tabletop game was the albatross around the fluff's neck and could plug the setting into an existing rules frame (like Wizkids more or less did) or create a generic boardgame with some themed models.
And going by GW's current form (do the least comprehensible) then I can still only see that as an improvement.
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Post by: weeble1000
 kronk wrote: Kilkrazy wrote:Is there anyone who thinks 40K is an absolutely marvellous set of rules, already perfect and impossible to improve?
It seems to me that the player base is spread between people who think it's fun and good, all the way to people who have pretty much given up because they think it's got so bad.
It might be the best thing ever, to dump the rules and do a ground up revision. As long as it supported the current fluff and models, and was a good set of rules, would people not accept it?
I would. I liked 6th edition, and still do.
I just can't stand Escalation, Stronghold Assault, and 100x dataslates I can't possibly keep up with.
So...you don't think the 40K rules are perfect then. I got your point that you feel the core 6th ed rules are peachy. But part of the problem with 40K these days is the diffuse and inaccessible nature of the rules.
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Post by: Wayniac
Kilkrazy wrote:Is there anyone who thinks 40K is an absolutely marvellous set of rules, already perfect and impossible to improve? It seems to me that the player base is spread between people who think it's fun and good, all the way to people who have pretty much given up because they think it's got so bad. It might be the best thing ever, to dump the rules and do a ground up revision. As long as it supported the current fluff and models, and was a good set of rules, would people not accept it?
Personally I think they are literally "between Scylla and Charybdis" (i.e. a rock and a hard place, but Greek Mythology version ). If they do nothing, they're going to slowly continue on this downward spiral and eventually consume themselves as more and more people get fed up - whether they believe it or not this hobby is NOT sustainable at the rate GW is going, especially not when they seem to think the answer is the sales equivalent of "more dakka". If they do a fullblown shakeup of 40k a la 2nd -> 3rd, they risk alienating a lot of loyal "hobbyists", but could potentially save themselves if they essentially realize the problems and work to fix them to make amends. of course, that's assuming they even A) know what the problems, B) Know how to fix it, and C) care to fix it. They seem to have shown that they live in their own bubble and are ignorant of the world around them, but that could just be corporate speak because Kirby believes that. Using the classic ship analogy, I'm not so sure they can turn the ship around because they're too busy drinking champagne and partying at how great they are below decks to even notice the iceberg. They fact that they don't consider that they have any competitors (despite having several) and that they think their customers simply "buy GW products" speaks volumes for unbelievable arrogance and almost brainwash-like ignorance and towing the party line.
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Post by: Kroothawk
Anpu42 wrote:Was a skirmish game would be a better way to put it.
I would not have a problem with it going back to it though, but I also like my 2k-3k games to.
It again IS a skirmish game, as basically the number of "Titans" (Imperial Knight, Riptide, Wraithknight, Apocalypse units) in your list wins the game. The rest is more or less decoration.
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Post by: RiTides
A lot of axes are getting very sharp in this thread
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Post by: shasolenzabi
Well, they are blending base game of 40k with Apocalypse with the escalation and air power supplements and codexes and some do not want basic play over extended with superheavies/airpower/titans as Apocalypse was to cover that and I do like to break out the whole kit and kaboodle for Apoc. other times, I prefer my platoon skirmishes kept to soldiers and support vehicles at most.
I have experimented with the addition of the superheavy units and they do make for interesting occassional games, but now GW seems to be pushing for it as an "all the time" game, eben though it is still left up too the opposing players deciding between themselves how tame to all out crazy they desire to get.
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Post by: slowthar
Kilkrazy wrote:Is there anyone who thinks 40K is an absolutely marvellous set of rules, already perfect and impossible to improve?
It seems to me that the player base is spread between people who think it's fun and good, all the way to people who have pretty much given up because they think it's got so bad.
It might be the best thing ever, to dump the rules and do a ground up revision. As long as it supported the current fluff and models, and was a good set of rules, would people not accept it?
I don't think there's ever a situation where the rules are impossible to improve because there's always going to be a happy medium between detailed/realistic and playable, and people have varying opinions on where the the spectrum is perfect. Remember when they switched from 2nd to 3rd edition and got rid of everything but D6s? was that good or bad? People are split on their opinion. It certainly made the game easier to play, but it also took away a level of complexity that made things interesting in a lot of cases.
I think at the end of the day, the issue they're having, and have had for at least 5 years, is they're pricing themselves out of new players. The simple fact is the game just doesn't provide enough of a face-value proposition for people to get started and feel like they're getting their money's worth as they build an army. Sure, the boxed sets are a solid value, but everything after that is stupid overpriced when you compare it to other entertainment options like M: TG, video games, etc.
If there were better value there, the rules wouldn't have to be perfect. They would just have to be "good enough." The problem is, the rules aren't rock solid, and for the amount of money (and effort) people have to invest to participate in the hobby, it seems that dedication should be reciprocated more by having better rules and a little more thought out balance.
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Post by: dubovac
Main problem is that they are leaving behind "skirmish" level of the games which in the first place brought them most success and introduced something like bigger scale Epic.
I can see why are they doing that because lowering overall points cost makes armies bigger and people need to buy more stuff but they just didnt know when to draw a line and say "OK I think this is just too much".
With release of 6 th edition I was surprised with 2nd edition vibe with all random stuff, lots of rules etc. but after Dark Angels codex they started with overpowering armies and completely awful additions to the game (I can draw parallels between this situation in 40k with fall of Fantasy in 6th with Vampire counts, Skavens and of course game destroyers Demons).
P.S. Every time we get thread like this someone mentions Hasbro so my question is for those who played games produced by before mentioned company, how do they handle violence, gore and all other stuff which is taken for normal in Warhammer games. I mean I still see Hasbro as a younger audience fun provider and if they remove that violent part of hobby I think that wouldnt be good for a setting.
GW doesnt have much options to do right now, thing which could pull them up is some sort of skirmish game (all "veteran" players know how good games can be made by GW - Necromunda, Epic, Mordheim, Gorka Morka etc.), but I still think we have some time before GW dies and sells their IP.
Moment I will be sure that they are done is when they release Codex Blood Ravens (I firmly believe that they have it already locked somewhere as a "Plan B" for milking some more cash).
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Post by: Pacific
 Hivefleet Oblivion wrote: Kain wrote:
GW dying would give them a way to dominate the wargaming market and gain another IP they could spin into being as huge as Transformers, G.I Joe, D&D, and MLP without overmuch effort with all the hard work of getting a fanbase to build off and basic setting premises that can interest people of before they commercialize the hell out of it being done for them.
Buying out a dying GW is completely in character for them.
Again, this obsession with Hasbro, whose main virtue is being big. If they buy GW, likelihood is that there will be even more moaning minnies than we have right now.
Granted, if new management instituted tournament support, more coherent rules, lower prices, and focused on new player recruitment, we'd all be happier bunnies. But if GW really are dying (which I don't really believe, despite the schadenfreude-addicts' constant refrains ), they're more likely to attract vultures than wizards or white knights.
I don't agree with many things you say Hivefleet Oblivion, but think that you are dead on the money with that comment.
Almost all of the criticisms that can be placed at GW's door have been in some way related to the size of the company, and them being a publically owned company, which feels askew in what has traditionally been a small and personable industry. A company the size of Hasbro will truly be run by 'suits', clinically and efficiently, with little love for the background universe and wargaming culture beyond the money that it brings in. I think the things that people complain about now will be multiplied many times should GW's IP and games ever be bought out.
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Post by: Bomster
Herzlos wrote: Bomster wrote: They might very much decide that the tabletop game was the albatross around the fluff's neck and could plug the setting into an existing rules frame (like Wizkids more or less did) or create a generic boardgame with some themed models.
And going by GW's current form (do the least comprehensible) then I can still only see that as an improvement.
Yes, but that's basically what we're already getting from FFG*. I don't expect anyone who's got the cash to fully take over GW's intellectual property to be interested in creating and selling a *tabletop game*. However big GW was during its heyday - it still was very much a niche product.
*and I'm mostly happy with that. I utterly dislike their RPG rules (but that's more a personal issue than anything else) , but I love Relic and am keen to try that LCG of theirs)
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Post by: insaniak
 Pacific wrote: A company the size of Hasbro will truly be run by 'suits', clinically and efficiently, with little love for the background universe and wargaming culture beyond the money that it brings in.
Star Wars Miniatures would like a word.
Something that Hasbro generally does well is put the right creative people into the positions they need to be in, and then to a large extent just lets them do their thing. The team behind SWM had an awful lot of creative control over how that game was presented and how it evolved beyond just what the 'suits' thought made the best business sense.
Or, to put it in perspective, they do what GW used to do in the '90s.
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Post by: Wayshuba
dubovac wrote:Main problem is that they are leaving behind "skirmish" level of the games which in the first place brought them most success and introduced something like bigger scale Epic.
I can see why are they doing that because lowering overall points cost makes armies bigger and people need to buy more stuff but they just didnt know when to draw a line and say "OK I think this is just too much".
With release of 6 th edition I was surprised with 2nd edition vibe with all random stuff, lots of rules etc. but after Dark Angels codex they started with overpowering armies and completely awful additions to the game (I can draw parallels between this situation in 40k with fall of Fantasy in 6th with Vampire counts, Skavens and of course game destroyers Demons).
P.S. Every time we get thread like this someone mentions Hasbro so my question is for those who played games produced by before mentioned company, how do they handle violence, gore and all other stuff which is taken for normal in Warhammer games. I mean I still see Hasbro as a younger audience fun provider and if they remove that violent part of hobby I think that wouldnt be good for a setting.
GW doesnt have much options to do right now, thing which could pull them up is some sort of skirmish game (all "veteran" players know how good games can be made by GW - Necromunda, Epic, Mordheim, Gorka Morka etc.), but I still think we have some time before GW dies and sells their IP.
Moment I will be sure that they are done is when they release Codex Blood Ravens (I firmly believe that they have it already locked somewhere as a "Plan B" for milking some more cash).
The point about Hasbro often gets brought up when discussing this. However, these are always looked at in the current point in time. The more appropriate time would be where in the near future this could happen, which could well be after GW effectively destroys their own IP in their market at which point the IP would be almost worthless to anyone.
GW is doing the exact opposite in almost every business sense to what a $200m plus company should be doing. They are damaging their channels, constricting their product lines instead of expanding them (this has got to be one of the DUMBEST business decisions I have ever seen a 30 year old company make), raising their prices to the point of being absurd and laughable, and completely ignoring that the internet exists (heck, they demolished all their corporate social media presence today). Everything they are doing is the exact OPPOSITE of what a mature company should be doing. This is Business 101 at this point, but GW is being managed by people that seem to have not even passed the fourth grade.
At this point, about the only thing that is going to save GW is to replace management (all of them) with trained monkeys. I have NEVER seen such a poorly run company (and I have seen quite a few bad ones) in my 50 years on this planet. TSR was run poorly. Kodak was run poorly. GW is run like they are insane. How the board allows this kind of incompetence to continue is beyond me but, if it does continue, this is NOT going to be a gradual decline, it will be a collapse - just like TSR (or Kodak who went from an $15 billion company in 2008 to a $2 billion company in 2012, or Wang Computer who went from $51 billion to $30 million in the space of ONE year - and then continued out of business).
Honestly, they seem to just keep piling on stupid business decision on top of stupid business decision. No IP, no matter how good, can withstand a non-stop assault of utter business stupidity. GW has nowhere near the brand that D&D did during TSRs failure, nor today. It is a niche IP that has stayed stagnant for almost 20 years.
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Post by: Palindrome
Pacific wrote: A company the size of Hasbro will truly be run by 'suits', clinically and efficiently, with little love for the background universe and wargaming culture beyond the money that it brings in.
So exactly as things are now, except far more efficently. GW is showing itself completely indifferent to the integrity of its fluff, its rules are becoming increasingly unwieldy and obtuse and wargamers are nothing more than (hopefully) bottomless pockets. Even if someone like Disney bought GW they would, in all likelyhood, do no worse than the current management.
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Post by: Adam LongWalker
insaniak wrote: Pacific wrote: A company the size of Hasbro will truly be run by 'suits', clinically and efficiently, with little love for the background universe and wargaming culture beyond the money that it brings in.
Star Wars Miniatures would like a word.
Something that Hasbro generally does well is put the right creative people into the positions they need to be in, and then to a large extent just lets them do their thing. The team behind SWM had an awful lot of creative control over how that game was presented and how it evolved beyond just what the 'suits' thought made the best business sense.
Or, to put it in perspective, they do what GW used to do in the '90s.
100% agree with this comment.
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Post by: BrianDavion
insaniak wrote: Pacific wrote: A company the size of Hasbro will truly be run by 'suits', clinically and efficiently, with little love for the background universe and wargaming culture beyond the money that it brings in.
Star Wars Miniatures would like a word.
.
you mean that CMG they introduced at the height of the CMG fad phase got as much money as they could out of it, and then let die?
cause thats basicly what happened
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Post by: insaniak
BrianDavion wrote:you mean that CMG they introduced at the height of the CMG fad phase got as much money as they could out of it, and then let die?
cause thats basicly what happened
It's really not.
Star Wars minis were supposedly outselling D&D when WotC choose to not renew the licence. And they did so for the same reason they dumped a lot of other games from their stable at the same time - D&D was starting to struggle, and they wanted to focus on it to get it back on track.
While the game was in full swing, though, it got a lot of love from its design team. They put a lot of effort into creating a balanced game with a large array of different competitive squad types while still remaining true to the background. They provided rules support on their forums, prompt FAQ support for new releases, the designers actively engaged with the community, and fan sites, leagues and events were actively encouraged.
40K could use some of that enthusiasm from the people making it.
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
insaniak wrote:40K could use some of that enthusiasm from the people making it.
And some competence.
And some reading comprehension.
And some play-testing.
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Post by: Surtur
 H.B.M.C. wrote: insaniak wrote:40K could use some of that enthusiasm from the people making it.
And some competence.
And some reading comprehension.
And some play-testing.
And some new people.
And some talent.
And some game design.
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Post by: olympia
H.B.M.C. wrote: insaniak wrote:40K could use some of that enthusiasm from the people making it.
And some competence.
And some reading comprehension.
And some play-testing.
Sorry if I'm mistaken, but H.B.M.C., didn't I see you post in another thread that you bought the resin orbital relay tower thing or whatever? To lucidly criticize GW on the one hand, while continuously handing over your money with the other makes you part of the problem.
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Post by: Bodichi
Too bad we don't have any one on these boards that works for Hasbro, especially in any departments near M&A. To think that a company the goes around scooping up distressed assets (IP's) would not have at least some cursory scouting around GW is silly. To be a fly on the wall in Hasbro when they discuss this would be great fun.
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Post by: Saldiven
 olympia wrote: H.B.M.C. wrote: insaniak wrote:40K could use some of that enthusiasm from the people making it.
And some competence.
And some reading comprehension.
And some play-testing.
Sorry if I'm mistaken, but H.B.M.C., didn't I see you post in another thread that you bought the resin orbital relay tower thing or whatever? To lucidly criticize GW on the one hand, while continuously handing over your money with the other makes you part of the problem.
If I remember correctly from some old H.B.M.C. posts from back in the day, his play group uses a heavily modified, locally designed version of GW based rules because of their dislike for the GW rules as produced.
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Post by: zedmeister
olympia wrote: Sorry if I'm mistaken, but H.B.M.C., didn't I see you post in another thread that you bought the resin orbital relay tower thing or whatever? To lucidly criticize GW on the one hand, while continuously handing over your money with the other makes you part of the problem.
So being critical of a company means that you're not allowed to buy product from them? Besides, H.B.M.C. is avowed terrain addict. I doubt you'd have kept him from that piece. Unless it's to do with the realm of battle board...
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Post by: weeble1000
 Bodichi wrote:Too bad we don't have any one on these boards that works for Hasbro, especially in any departments near M&A. To think that a company the goes around scooping up distressed assets (IP's) would not have at least some cursory scouting around GW is silly. To be a fly on the wall in Hasbro when they discuss this would be great fun.
Well, Stephen Baker was spotted visiting GW HQ last year. And if you look at his Facebook page, you can see several endorsements by Andy Jones, Director of Legal and Licensing at GW. Endorsements aren't dated as far as I am aware, but they can't have been made prior to 2012 as LinkedIn did not have the feature until then.
So we at least know that a Hasbro executive with experience with GW IP at the very least had some contact with an executive at GW. Make of that what you will, but to me the idea that such contact is a coincidence defies credulity.
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Post by: Red Corsair
weeble1000 wrote: Bodichi wrote:Too bad we don't have any one on these boards that works for Hasbro, especially in any departments near M&A. To think that a company the goes around scooping up distressed assets (IP's) would not have at least some cursory scouting around GW is silly. To be a fly on the wall in Hasbro when they discuss this would be great fun.
Well, Stephen Baker was spotted visiting GW HQ last year. And if you look at his Facebook page, you can see several endorsements by Andy Jones, Director of Legal and Licensing at GW. Endorsements aren't dated as far as I am aware, but they can't have been made prior to 2012 as LinkedIn did not have the feature until then.
So we at least know that a Hasbro executive with experience with GW IP at the very least had some contact with an executive at GW. Make of that what you will, but to me the idea that such contact is a coincidence defies credulity.
This was listed under Bakers experience though.
Manager
Games Workshop
Public Company; 1001-5000 employees; GAW; Retail industry
August 1984 – August 1986 (2 years 1 month)
Managed the primary London retail location
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Post by: weeble1000
 Red Corsair wrote:weeble1000 wrote: Bodichi wrote:Too bad we don't have any one on these boards that works for Hasbro, especially in any departments near M&A. To think that a company the goes around scooping up distressed assets (IP's) would not have at least some cursory scouting around GW is silly. To be a fly on the wall in Hasbro when they discuss this would be great fun.
Well, Stephen Baker was spotted visiting GW HQ last year. And if you look at his Facebook page, you can see several endorsements by Andy Jones, Director of Legal and Licensing at GW. Endorsements aren't dated as far as I am aware, but they can't have been made prior to 2012 as LinkedIn did not have the feature until then. So we at least know that a Hasbro executive with experience with GW IP at the very least had some contact with an executive at GW. Make of that what you will, but to me the idea that such contact is a coincidence defies credulity.
This was listed under Bakers experience though. Manager Games Workshop Public Company; 1001-5000 employees; GAW; Retail industry August 1984 – August 1986 (2 years 1 month) Managed the primary London retail location
Yea, his first job...30 years ago. What is more likely, that Andy Jones and he were best buds when he managed a GW for a couple of years and that Andy remembered him 30 years later and endorsed him on Linked in...OR...that Andy Jones (the man responsible for schmoozing with important folks outside of GW and ostensibly the man in charge of licensing GW's IP) met with a long-term Hasbro exec familiar with GW and endorsed his LinkedIn to schmooze with him? Maybe Baker and Jones are old buddies, but given that Baker was seen being given a tour of GW HQ, I think it is much more likely that Baker either approached GW as a representative of Hasbro because he is familiar with the company and the IP or that GW approached Baker as a representative of Hasbro because they had an icebreaker in that he managed a GW 30 years ago. The more significant point on Baker's job history is this: Product Design Manager
Hasbro Games
August 1986 – July 1992 (6 years)
Managed European Game Design. My responsibilities included, design, editorial, graphics, schedules and budgets. During this period I developed Childrens, Family and Adult product including titles such as 'HeroQuest', 'Inkognito', 'BattleMasters' and 'Space Crusade'
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Post by: Red Corsair
Notice the part where I didn't contest your points at all and was simply sharing some data about the guy? Sheesh. I think both your points are possible, as are many other explanations. The only facts we have though are that he has a history with the GW and he happened to get endorsed by a guy who also works in the toy industry and for his GW now. Anything else is just blind conjecture. I is interesting however.
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Post by: weeble1000
Red Corsair wrote:Notice the part where I didn't contest your points at all and was simply sharing some data about the guy? Sheesh. I think both your points are possible, as are many other explanations. The only facts we have though are that he has a history with the GW and he happened to get endorsed by a guy who also works in the toy industry and for his GW now. Anything else is just blind conjecture. I is interesting however.
Except that saying "This was listed under Baker's experience though" sounds like you were contesting the points I was making. The critical word in that sentence is "though," as in 'although you made that point, this information contradicts it,' or 'though maybe you should consider this.' I was not attempting to be harsh or insulting in my response, but it was also reasonable to interpret your phrasing as disagreement. Having made that interpretation I responded by saying that I was aware of the information, had considered it, and made my inference based on different information I felt was more relevant. So no, I did not notice the part where you didn't contest my points. I made a different, though entirely reasonable, interpretation of your post and responded accordingly, which can sometimes happen. Notice the part where you interpreted my response as some sort of insult or personal attack?
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Post by: tjnorwoo
Wayshuba wrote:
Our continual investment in product quality, using our defendable intellectual property, provides us with a considerable barrier to entry for potential competitors: it is our Fortress Wall. While our 400 or so Hobby centres which show customers how to collect, paint and play with our miniatures and games provide another barrier to entry: our Fortress Moat. We have been building our Fortress Wall and Moat for many years and the competitive advantage they provide gives us confidence in our ability to grow profitably in the future.
 #capitalism
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Post by: Howard A Treesong
From that quote, regarding the uk in particular, they seem proud of the fact they operate a near monopoly having forced out most independent stores. Most towns/cities that have a games shop will be a GW store, because of an aggressive expansion strategy during the 90s. Yes it is quite a barrier for competitors to get in when your strategy is to own all the hobby shops. It's quite distasteful to be so boastful of operating an effective monopoly and stroking their ego with talk of 'moats and fortress walls'. Also it speaks to their bunker mentality. War gaming is a niche hobby in which most companies are tolerant and supportive of each other, go to a proper wargames show and see all the companies and products on display side by side. GW act like it's Berlin 1945 and have to lash out at everything that comes near them. It's no wonder GW are losing sales.
They seem to believe they can force the customer to come to their store. By restricting information online and making their shops and magazine the sole source of new info, and many models through direct only. But you can't twist the arm of your customer base like that, the need for GW plastic crack has it's limits. Some will pursue your models this way but putting so many barriers up to just getting their stuff will make it harder to draw in new customers and put current customers off as they lose interest because they can't read about your stuff and buy your models how they'd like. They don't all want to march down to GW every Saturday to buy your corporate magazine and buy the direct only models you hold back from other hobby shops. And even then they're likely to find out a model like that field generator terrain piece was released but due to GW's own inability to tell people what products are coming up, they're already sold out!!
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Post by: Harriticus
It's pretty hilarious people complain about the idea of Hasbro, because then the hobby would be run by "suits with no love for the fluff or game".
Am I living in an alternate reality or something? GW has absolutely no care for the fluff or game. In fact, GW actively dislikes you. They hate and have contempt for older gamer-orientated clientele and people who use that new-fangled internet. I can't imagine a company that cares less than its fluff in the face of corporatism, they're literally renaming armies on the basis of not being able to trademark the name. At least Hasbro wouldn't be at war with its customers and on top of that would do things competently rather than the embarrassingly blind/inept policies coming out of GW right now. GW right now treats "the hobby" as a juggling act, a delicate dance to manipulate the numbers for a "positive" investors report to hide falling sales and profits to make it to another year without their shareholders catching on. That's all GW is right now. Hasbro could also lose GW's weird anti-social/"MINE!" policies with their IP that'd see more video games, comics, and movies.
Any company, and I mean any company buying out GW would be a good thing and positively change the current situation. If North Korea bought it, it'd be better. After dabbling in other hobbies (non-GW wargames, comic books, ASOIAF, etc.) for the last year I've come to realize how horrible a company GW is with both customer/fanbase interaction and broad general policy.
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Post by: jonolikespie
I think I'd actually love GW to be bought out by suits looking to make money, as long as they are competent suits.
I want to give GW my money, I really do, but their current policies disgust me and their recent releases are uninspiring at best.
A company run by suits who know how to grow a business can bring in people who understand the product and give them a lot of room to play with. They can then put out a quality product that people will actually want to buy again and the suits make money because of that. It really should be that simple, unfortunately it's not though so I guess Spartan Games and Corvus Belli can have my disposable income.
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Post by: Wolfstan
Product Design Manager
Hasbro Games
August 1986 – July 1992 (6 years)
Managed European Game Design. My responsibilities included, design, editorial, graphics, schedules and budgets. During this period I developed Childrens, Family and Adult product including titles such as 'HeroQuest', 'Inkognito', 'BattleMasters' and 'Space Crusade'
I did wonder about this. They could be considering re-releasing such games or updating them for a future release. It could be the success that FFG is having has made them stop and think (Hasbro that is). Like a lot of posters I don't think GW being bought out by Hasbro would be bad either.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
 Howard A Treesong wrote:
From that quote, regarding the uk in particular, they seem proud of the fact they operate a near monopoly having forced out most independent stores. Most towns/cities that have a games shop will be a GW store, because of an aggressive expansion strategy during the 90s. Yes it is quite a barrier for competitors to get in when your strategy is to own all the hobby shops. ...
...
It’s true there used to be more independent high street games shops in the 80s and they seemed to be pushed out in the 90s when GW were aggressively expanding and sold a wide range of products, not just Warhammer FB/ 40K. Orc’s Nest in central London is the only hobby game shop still going that I remember from those days.
However there used also to be a lot more model shops, and a lot fewer mobile phone shops, so I don’t think GW is exclusively to blame.
The retail landscape has changed and is still changing due to the Internet.
Now that GW only sell Warhammer FB/ 40K, the opportunity is there in theory for anyone to set up a more widely based game shop, and we are seeing some of them like Dark Sphere. The key thing is not to depend on Warhammer, and to grow the market for other systems and products.
I am speaking about the UK, of course.
And I am off topic since TSR never operated shops.
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Post by: Howard A Treesong
MtG is owned by Hasbro and is handled very well. The 'suits' give the people working on it the freedom to do many of the things GW don't. Their websites and daily blog, competitions, responding to customers, their tournaments, the pre-release events supported at retailers are big things. What events do GW support? Almost nothing, their new releases are just put on the shelf for you to buy.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
The mystery of GW is how they recruit new customers.
There is no marketing or publicity, so they seem to depend on walk-in at their shops, and word of mouth from current users.
That is where I think they are possibly heading for a fall. The "anti-GW" sentiment has grown so much in the past few years (for very obvious reasons) that veterans are clearly much less enthusiastic about helping to recruit new players.
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Post by: dubovac
This is so true about recruiting. I have introduced 3 new players in the last 4 years!!! but strongly advised not to buy from GW but second hand or if they dont mind recasters (I mean how can some Chinese company make better casts then overpriced Forge world or GW).
Me and my wife are playing Inquisimunda since it needs less starting financial involvement and community is great.
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Post by: techsoldaten
I agree with the OPs perspective about the parallels between GW and TSR.
Time will tell if a collapse will happen and what it will look like. But the thing that concerns me the most about the company has little to do with cash on hand or diminished sales.
It's their entry into digital markets and the way they use their IP. Space Marine and DOW sold a lot of product, the fact there has not been new versions in a while concerns me. The fact there are unanswered questions about the licensing for the franchise they established with THQ concerns me. The fact they are putting a lot of effort into an MMO really concerns me, given the risk associated with finding an audience for one and the overall economics of the genre.
The way I look at it, their IP is valuable to the point where it has demonstrated market worth. The fact they can't consistently capitalize in other markets really speaks to the overall value of their brand. There's no lack of demand for their physical product, but there is a lack of licensees willing to help them expand their base in other areas. There's something about it that doesn't make sense, I suspect there's a fatal flaw that doesn't get widely discussed but causes other companies to back off.
A friend of mine works for Warner Brothers and is very aware of the GW brand, consumer consciousness about the company's products, and where people's interests intersect with the projects he works on. From what he's shared with me, the perception around GW is that the company is intriguing but serious issues exist with brand loyalty. While I haven't cornered him on what exactly that means, my guess is he's saying the people who leave the game behind are the ones that would be most desirable to have as consumers.
For me, it's always more interesting to understand what companies don't do, and why. What I don't agree with the OP about is that the company is very similar to TSR, which was primarily a publisher and dominated a much smaller market than what exists today. GW always seems to have this potential, like they could grow in all these different directions and be this huge franchise like Star Wars or Transformers. The fact that they don't, and that their ventures all seem to have a relatively short shelf life, is really disappointing. But the fact so many of the people who spend money on their products feel hated or disrespected by the company is so much worse, it just makes them toxic and costs them opportunities. Instead of polishing their brand, focusing on significant components like the rules, and making people feel great about their stuff so they stick around, GW literally gets outmaneuvered by companies pushing comic book characters on sippy cups and bibs.
Makes no sense to me. I actually think a collapse could be good for GW, someone else would grab that IP and do something useful with it.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
People have mentioned before that GW have essentially three types of customers. Those who like the game, those who like the fluff, and those who like the modelling. (There are of course large areas of overlap and sub-sets of these types of cuatomers.)
The key point is that the people who like the (tabletop) game and the modelling are not necessarily very interested in a computer game of Warhammer.
I personally think the GW fluff is more limited and less attractive than the general D&D universes, or other fictional universes such as Star Wars.
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Post by: Kroothawk
Wayshuba wrote:
Our continual investment in product quality, using our defendable intellectual property, provides us with a considerable barrier to entry for potential competitors: it is our Fortress Wall. While our 400 or so Hobby centres which show customers how to collect, paint and play with our miniatures and games provide another barrier to entry: our Fortress Moat. We have been building our Fortress Wall and Moat for many years and the competitive advantage they provide gives us confidence in our ability to grow profitably in the future.
GW is still one of the best, when it concerns building a fortress wall around their products, with less and less customers getting past it each year
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
It's nice that they acknowledge that their actions have created a barrier to entry. It's a shame that they just don't realise the barrier works both ways.
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Post by: Wayshuba
 techsoldaten wrote:A friend of mine works for Warner Brothers and is very aware of the GW brand, consumer consciousness about the company's products, and where people's interests intersect with the projects he works on. From what he's shared with me, the perception around GW is that the company is intriguing but serious issues exist with brand loyalty. While I haven't cornered him on what exactly that means, my guess is he's saying the people who leave the game behind are the ones that would be most desirable to have as consumers.
Unless you are being bought by Mark Zuckerberg because he has more money than he knows what to do with, or Peter Adkinson because he is a gamer and loves your brand so much, a standard part of any M&A or equity investment due diligence is also surveying the customer base. While GW may believe they can ignore the massive amount of customer negativity right now, a potential acquiring company will not. Even WotC did this which is why they were able to make the D&D brand strong again after TSR had trashed it. What your friend is referring to is a simple bit of research that can be done right now to see GW is severely damaging their brand. In addition, if the numb executives at GW talk about getting a 14-year old kid to buy a few models for a couple years, then rinse and repeat, no potential acquirer is going to like hearing that. Most businesses tend to try and build long term customer loyalty. This is just one example of how GW is operating so counter to standard business practices as to be harmful to their chances of acquisition.
This also is a good point to point out, this is standard operating procedure for Hasbro before they make any acquisition. They WILL survey the current customers company base and WILL spend days online looking at fan sites and forums such as this to gauge how customers react to the current company. One example is when Avalon Hill was going belly up and they did this due diligence, they found that the company had a loved and respected brand, which is one of the key factors that lead to Hasbro acquiring a $7 million company that they would normally not even look at. At Hasbro, customer perception of a brand is MUCH more important than numbers alone. In fact, any serious corporation is more concerned with brand integrity than just the financials. Thus why TSR and AH, were acquired despite the terrible financials and GW will NOT be acquired because they currently have good financials and TERRIBLE brand integrity.
techsoldaten wrote:For me, it's always more interesting to understand what companies don't do, and why. What I don't agree with the OP about is that the company is very similar to TSR, which was primarily a publisher and dominated a much smaller market than what exists today. GW always seems to have this potential, like they could grow in all these different directions and be this huge franchise like Star Wars or Transformers. The fact that they don't, and that their ventures all seem to have a relatively short shelf life, is really disappointing. But the fact so many of the people who spend money on their products feel hated or disrespected by the company is so much worse, it just makes them toxic and costs them opportunities. Instead of polishing their brand, focusing on significant components like the rules, and making people feel great about their stuff so they stick around, GW literally gets outmaneuvered by companies pushing comic book characters on sippy cups and bibs.
TSR had a larger share of their respective market ( RPGs) than GW does of theirs. In comparison, I was more referring to the way the company's are run (or were run in the case of TSR) and what the outcome of it will be.
It is obvious GW is in trouble now. Not just from their last numbers but from quite a few things that are happening now (rushing out half-baked releases, unable to capitalize on demand (Void Shield Generator), inventories starting to be reduced on plastic kits without notice (terrain, Bretonnians, etc.), major shareholders dumping stock like it is going out of style, extreme pricing that is beyond comprehension ($60 Witch Elves(). They are showing all the classic signs of a company quite close to collapsing. While it is too early to tell, I believe that the next period financial reporting is going to make this last one look good by comparison. GW is struggling now and it is showing in a lot of ways.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
It is three months to go until the end of year report.
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Post by: Wayshuba
deleted.... accidental repost
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Post by: Azreal13
Should be a little sooner, their FYE will be early may, then I believe they have three months to publish, but have typically done so around a month later, so maybe 2 1/2 months, give or take?
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Post by: techsoldaten
Wayshuba wrote:Unless you are being bought by Mark Zuckerberg because he has more money than he knows what to do with, or Peter Adkinson because he is a gamer and loves your brand so much, a standard part of any M&A or equity investment due diligence is also surveying the customer base.
Forget about Hasbro. Anytime anyone wants to put a cartoon character on a sock they need to do landscape research. People know all about GW's customers and how to get consumers to choose a spoilt banana in a wet napkin over them a certain percentage of the time.
Wayshuba wrote:TSR had a larger share of their respective market ( RPGs) than GW does of theirs. In comparison, I was more referring to the way the company's are run (or were run in the case of TSR) and what the outcome of it will be.
Yeah, I get you. But TSR operated in a world where Star Wars was just a movie, not an international, multibillion dollar industry. They are one of many gigantic franchises. You don't need to dominate this world to be a BFD.
Honestly, I see the parallels and have thought the same. I also think they are in 2 different fishbowls.
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Post by: weeble1000
techsoldaten wrote:
Yeah, I get you. But TSR operated in a world where Star Wars was just a movie, not an international, multibillion dollar industry. They are one of many gigantic franchises.
What? This makes no sense to me. What world was this, pre prequels? I'm pretty sure Star Wars was a big deal before that.
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Post by: Bossk_Hogg
Did you see it? It was actually pretty good, certain robot designs aside (Starscream shouldnt look like an ape). Much better than the 2nd with its stupid comic relief (pot brownies, robot balls, leg humping robots, and the Jar-Jar Binks level stupidity of Skids and Mudflap). The scenes of them falling through the buildings was pretty boss, and Lazerbeak was certifiably badass.
Hasbro is not the worst choice. WOTC pretty much just has to produce profits, how they do them doesnt matter a lot, so there's less "suit interference" than might be expected. I couldnt see someone like Paizo scraping together enough to buy the IP, but they would handle the source material well. Automatically Appended Next Post: weeble1000 wrote: techsoldaten wrote:
Yeah, I get you. But TSR operated in a world where Star Wars was just a movie, not an international, multibillion dollar industry. They are one of many gigantic franchises.
What? This makes no sense to me. What world was this, pre prequels? I'm pretty sure Star Wars was a big deal before that.
Yeah, back in the early 80's it was all Star Wars, all the time. Spaceballs the flamethrower wasn't far off from from how it was. Nothing really compared at the time vs. today where you have many juggernauts of merchandising.
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Post by: Kyrolon
So, for those in the know of such business things, if Hasbro looked into the customer base, as suggested above, what do you think their take would be? Would they see only the vitriol, or would they look beyond that to the underlying love for the IP that drives our deep disappointment?
Because I honestly think that a company that restored the game to a semblance of normalcy and brought it back to something with mass appeal could clean up.
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Post by: Azreal13
 Kyrolon wrote:So, for those in the know of such business things, if Hasbro looked into the customer base, as suggested above, what do you think their take would be? Would they see only the vitriol, or would they look beyond that to the underlying love for the IP that drives our deep disappointment?
Because I honestly think that a company that restored the game to a semblance of normalcy and brought it back to something with mass appeal could clean up.
This might just me talking from my own perspective, rather than any objective assessment, but based on my own feelings and those I have observed in others...
They would see a company that is operating massively below it's potential. I suspect they would see a solid base that bovinely consumes whatever is released, but that herd is progressively thinning. I also suspect they will see customers, and former customers, that retain huge passion and affection for large aspects of the models, background and game, who are massively frustrated at the way GW behaves.
Above all, I agree that I suspect anyone taking a good look at the GW customer base will see a huge potential for improvement, both in terms of customer satisfaction, but, crucially customer spend too.
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Post by: jonolikespie
Kyrolon wrote:So, for those in the know of such business things, if Hasbro looked into the customer base, as suggested above, what do you think their take would be? Would they see only the vitriol, or would they look beyond that to the underlying love for the IP that drives our deep disappointment?
Because I honestly think that a company that restored the game to a semblance of normalcy and brought it back to something with mass appeal could clean up.
Personally I don't ever expected to buy anything more substantial than a pot of paint or two from GW ever again, but (and I hope if Hasbro are doing market research they see this) I really, really want to.
I want to get back into both 40k and fantasy but I just can't with the rules, the models that look like toys, the prices and the general attitude of GW. All of those problems trace back to the guys in charge, if Hasbro bought them out and started making sweeping changes I'd probably start throwing money at them.
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Post by: Pacific
insaniak wrote: Pacific wrote: A company the size of Hasbro will truly be run by 'suits', clinically and efficiently, with little love for the background universe and wargaming culture beyond the money that it brings in.
Star Wars Miniatures would like a word.
Something that Hasbro generally does well is put the right creative people into the positions they need to be in, and then to a large extent just lets them do their thing. The team behind SWM had an awful lot of creative control over how that game was presented and how it evolved beyond just what the 'suits' thought made the best business sense.
Or, to put it in perspective, they do what GW used to do in the '90s.
In that case I stand corrected! Perhaps I should be a bit more hopeful about the prospect, and that it might genuinely bring change for the better.
I think at this point any sort of split between the sales and design/development team would make such a huge difference to the quality (and form) of the products that go on release.
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Post by: Wayniac
I think what proves GW's craziness and highlights the exact issue is this exact quote from their Investor Relations page (emphasis mine): 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.
If you ever wondered why things have gone to crap, that's why. They seriously think that all their customers want to do is to spend money on GW Products.
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Post by: jonolikespie
Are you kidding? That's my FAVORITE part of the hobby! I love going down to games day and giving GW all my money.
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Post by: slowthar
Well, the kicker is they don't even put their "Hobby centres" in a position to succeed. They're closed half the time because GW is too cheap to staff a store with 2 employees. You know how many times I played on a Sunday, then figured out I wanted a model to add to my army on a Monday? Guess what? The local GW store is closed Monday and Tuesday. By Wednesday, I either forgot I wanted the model or came to my senses and didn't want to spend the money.
Are there ANY other stores that people can think of that are literally only 1 employee running the whole store? I can't. I think even the stands in the mall have two alternating staff.
To be more on topic, however, we all seem to see a company that could be making a lot more money with their IP, but did people feel the same way about TSR? I feel like TSR developed their IP about as much as they could, and it has shown in that D&D isn't really any significantly bigger than it used to be. I always felt like D&D wouldn't be a very profitable business because it's such a niche and the most generally can ask for is people to buy a couple of $20-$50) books every few years, and even that's going to have limited success because you can't improve that dramatically on the product for that long. At the end of the day, RPGs are more dependent on the people playing them than the system they're using.
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Post by: Jehan-reznor
azreal13 wrote:
Should be a little sooner, their FYE will be early may, then I believe they have three months to publish, but have typically done so around a month later, so maybe 2 1/2 months, give or take?
I'll bet there is a lot of good news in that report, how they sold out the some products (void), and how customers are willing to pay lots for a mono-pose 6" figure (knight).
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Post by: Bodichi
This conversation is great and I am sad I stepped away from it.
No doubt in my mind that Hasbro sees the myriad amount of companies producing GW substitutes out there and rightly assumes that if multiple companies can survive on leavings then the IP is viable and is being badly run. Perhaps Heroquest is a dabbling into seeing what they can do.
If Hasbro were to purchase a failing GW, we might expect to see a significant reorganization of the game. Perhaps a removal of all tables with results being more like WM based on unit vs unit stats plus d6 rolls. Perhaps a simplification of terrain rules without removing flexibility. Perhaps a book with all armies in with significantly reduced units for balance but with a promise to bring every until back after testing.
Perhaps a push to sell product in department and toy stores, more tie ins, tournament support, standardization. a furtherance of the fluff, etc
Sure some would say that 40k was ruined but with a focus on providing to the customer thing might change for the better.
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Post by: Grot 6
I would totally go for transformers 1/ 144 scale transformers miniatures game, or a 1/32 G.I. Joe figure game. 
Yo Joe, Skulls for Cobra!!! 
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Post by: Kilkrazy
There is a game for Army Men, called Combat Storm.
http://www.combatstorm.com/
GI Joe (Action Man) is about a 1/12 scale doll.
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Post by: DarkTraveler777
You are showing your age, old man!
GI JOE hasn't been 1/12 size since the 70's (not counting the brief Hall of Fame line in 1991). 3¾-inch scale is where it is at now for Mr. Joe.
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Post by: Kilkrazy
How are the mighty fallen!
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Post by: Saldiven
 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
You are showing your age, old man!
GI JOE hasn't been 1/12 size since the 70's (not counting the brief Hall of Fame line in 1991). 3¾-inch scale is where it is at now for Mr. Joe.
That was back when GI Joe was a person, not a super-secret military organization.
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Post by: Bodichi
How interesting would a 28 MM GIJOE game be, imagine all of the vehicles and models.
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Post by: Fafnir
There'd have to be a rule requiring players to make shooting and wooshing noises to accompany their actions.
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Post by: Saldiven
 Fafnir wrote:There'd have to be a rule requiring players to make shooting and wooshing noises to accompany their actions.
I do that already.....
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Post by: Easy E
Plus, all vehicle crew automatically eject before a vehicle is destroyed.
I actually keep hoping they make a G.I. Joe or Transformers video game using the Skylanders model.
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Post by: frozenwastes
 Easy E wrote:Plus, all vehicle crew automatically eject before a vehicle is destroyed.
And all their red and blue lasers can only ever hit vehicles and buildings and never people.
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