Games Workshop announces that pre-tax profits in respect of the year to 29 May 2011 are likely to be below current market expectations.



Sales were down 4% in the first half to 28 November 2010. Difficult trading conditions since that time mean that this shortfall is unlikely to be recovered by the year end. The Group's gross margin and costs remain under firm control and cash generation remains healthy. In addition, the outlook for royalties receivable in the current year remains good, although not as significant as in the year to 30 May 2010.



The Board of Games Workshop currently believes that, as a result of reduced volumes, pre-tax profits in respect of the year ending 29 May 2011 are unlikely to meet current market consensus estimates.



The Board will announce the Group's half-yearly results for the six months to 28 November 2010 on 25 January 2011.

http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail.html?announcementId=10754333

70 pence drop on their shares thus far today.

Can't say that the VAT hike is going to help here either, but.. a 4% drop in the current conditions isn't too bad. The weather and travel issues in the UK/Europe won't have helped either.

I saw a piece on BBC Breakfast this morning and both Next and HMV have also announced similar falls in sales.

Next are down about 6% and HMV by 14% I believe. A lot of it is being blamed on the bad weather prior to Xmas but the VAT rise isn't exactly going to help them claw back the shortfall in January.

It's just been on the news in our office that HMV saw a 15% drop and Next saw a 12% drop... so GW were actually running well ahead of some of the major high street chains in terms of profit.

Both companies are saying the weather and travel issues are major factors in this decline. As far as HMV goes, I'd say it's more to do with people becoming more internet savvy

Games Workshop announces that pre-tax profits in respect of the year to 29 May 2011 are likely to be below current market expectations.

Time to raise the prices!

In addition, the outlook for royalties receivable in the current year remains good, although not as significant as in the year to 30 May 2010.

So it's time to raise the prices!

The Board of Games Workshop currently believes that, as a result of reduced volumes, pre-tax profits in respect of the year ending 29 May 2011 are unlikely to meet current market consensus estimates.

... so we're raising the prices!

The Board will announce the Group's half-yearly results for the six months to 28 November 2010 on 25 January 2011.

Where they will vote on how much to raise the prices by.

70 pence drop on their shares thus far today.

Which the board are confident can be quickly recouped via an across-the-board price rise.

The weather and travel issues in the UK/Europe won't have helped either.

I hear that 'It's snowing' is one of the 800,000 possibly justifications for 'price rises' listed within the Games Workshop Group PLC company handbook.





Ok, I've had my fun. Kan, you can stand down from red alert.

Considering the current economic climate and the weather over the Christmas period I'm not surprised that they've not been selling as much as expected. Apparently a large number of stores were closed before Christmas because their staff couldn't get in.

Good discussion of it here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12117510

@inmygravenimage: Yeah, thats where I just read this information. If the snow was truly and wholly to blame, why wasn't there increased sales online to counter-balance it? It seems odd that HMV are struggling because of the internet, yet GW cannot seem to harness its potential.

CadianXV wrote:@inmygravenimage: Yeah, thats where I just read this information. If the snow was truly and wholly to blame, why wasn't there increased sales online to counter-balance it? It seems odd that HMV are struggling because of the internet, yet GW cannot seem to harness its potential.

Next did see an increase in online sales apparently, just not enough to counter-balance the downturn in high street spending. Not sure of the exact figures however.

H.B.M.C. wrote:*snip*

I lol'd.

No laughing matter Sid, it's going to happen!!

For the Dakkabrits:
"It was the wrong type of snow!"

H.B.M.C. wrote:

Games Workshop announces that pre-tax profits in respect of the year to 29 May 2011 are likely to be below current market expectations.

Time to raise the prices!

In addition, the outlook for royalties receivable in the current year remains good, although not as significant as in the year to 30 May 2010.

So it's time to raise the prices!

The Board of Games Workshop currently believes that, as a result of reduced volumes, pre-tax profits in respect of the year ending 29 May 2011 are unlikely to meet current market consensus estimates.

... so we're raising the prices!

The Board will announce the Group's half-yearly results for the six months to 28 November 2010 on 25 January 2011.

Where they will vote on how much to raise the prices by.

70 pence drop on their shares thus far today.

Which the board are confident can be quickly recouped via an across-the-board price rise.

The weather and travel issues in the UK/Europe won't have helped either.

I hear that 'It's snowing' is one of the 800,000 possibly justifications for 'price rises' listed within the Games Workshop Group PLC company handbook.





Ok, I've had my fun. Kan, you can stand down from red alert.

Hmmm subtle but I think I understand what you are getting at.

As funny as HMBC's post is, you know it's going to happen too.

HMV look to be in a bad way, but when your business is selling CDs and people are increasingly buying downloads you're in a ever shrinking market.

My concern is that Waterstones will take a hit to prop up HMV and they are the only highstreet book chain still going.

As for GW, they raise prices come rain or shine. It's all they know.

I'd like to know how badly GW Australia and New Zealand is faring.

And the size of internet sales from the US or UK to Australia are.
And how much the BIG internet retailers in UK and US are sending to us down here.

I'd like to know all this because as of 2 days ago I saved 44% by buying from a UK internet retailer (no postage cost) rather than driving the 5km to my local GW store.

@Fafnir/HMBC: It happened yesterday.

Howard A Treesong wrote:HMV look to be in a bad way, but when your business is selling CDs and people are increasingly buying downloads you're in a ever shrinking market.

My concern is that Waterstones will take a hit to prop up HMV and they are the only highstreet book chain still going.

As for GW, they raise prices come rain or shine. It's all they know.

I think even Waterstones will start feeling the pinch (If they haven't already). As an example, the wife and I were browsing in there the other day and were looking at a couple of paperbacks each priced at £7.99

I can buy those same paperbacks, new, from Amazon, for £4 delivered, the only caveat being I have to wait a few days extra. I just don't see how Waterstones can continue to compete effectively while having to factor in bricks and mortar stores in a way that Amazon doesn't. Even Watersones' best sale prices can't match Amazon.


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Waaagh_Gonads wrote:I'd like to know how badly GW Australia and New Zealand is faring.

And the size of internet sales from the US or UK to Australia are.
And how much the BIG internet retailers in UK and US are sending to us down here.

I'd like to know all this because as of 2 days ago I saved 44% by buying from a UK internet retailer (no postage cost) rather than driving the 5km to my local GW store.

I have to say, personally speaking, I find the whole Oz/NZ situation laughable really. I just don't see a) why GW insist on pricing stuff like that and b) how those same GW stores can continue to operate at a profit given the huge savings you can make by ordering online there.

You mean GW sales and customer numbers dropped? Has it happened before?
And why didn't GW's massive marketing and advertising campaign (you know, sueing fan-websites and aftermarket ) did't help with sales?

BlackSparkle wrote:@Fafnir/HMBC: It happened yesterday.

Nononono, that was the OTHER price increase.

Howard A Treesong wrote:HMV look to be in a bad way, but when your business is selling CDs and people are increasingly buying downloads you're in a ever shrinking market.

My concern is that Waterstones will take a hit to prop up HMV and they are the only highstreet book chain still going.

As for GW, they raise prices come rain or shine. It's all they know.

I remember reading that Waterstones, is increasingly showing fewer and fewer profits, and HMV are propping that aspect up, not sure if it's turned around recently, but Waterstones and most highstreet booksellers are suffering as much as CD/DVD sellers are.

It's gonna be pretty hard for them to blame the snow for the 4% sales drop during the SUMMER =/

This could be bad news for WHFB fans. The sales were down during the big 8th edition push. Is it possible this might mean reduced support? 40k has always been the big cash cow, after all.

It could also be why the rumours say Grey Knights are being pushed back (into the next financial year) in favour of another wave of Dark Eldar. We know DE sold like hotcakes. Releasing the next wave sooner is a safer bet than a niche army like Grey Knights (even if they are marines). Additionally grey knight armies are small, which makes them even less likely as money spinners.

Just a few thoughts

Given the price rises last June which impacted for the full 6 months of this report, that 4% drop in turnover probably translates to something like an 8% or 9% fall in business in real terms. That's huge. Particularly when they launched 8th edition in the summer (Damp squib? Much?). Dark Eldar may recover some ground for them in December but probably not enough, or so they seem to believe.

The share price fall has a lot to do with the fact that all of the last 2 year's "growth" had been down to exchange rate movements and licence fees masking the underlying trends of falling model sales. Something that investors would have spotted had they read the financial results for themselves rather than acting like a bunch of blind lemmings based on pundits skim-reading the summary baloney produced by the company directors.


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Leggy wrote:We know DE sold like hotcakes.

Do we? There's anecdotal evidence from a few stores that they have sold well in a few places to those fanboys who were desperately waiting for them, but I haven't seen anything to say that they have been stunning overall, compared to any other army release. In any case, they were a November/December release in the stores, so their impact on the Q1-2 figures will be minimal.

Osbad wrote:Given the price rises last June which impacted for the full 6 months of this report, that 4% drop in turnover probably translates to something like an 8% or 9% fall in business in real terms. That's huge. Particularly when they launched 8th edition in the summer (Damp squib? Much?). Dark Eldar may recover some ground for them in December but probably not enough, or so they seem to believe.

The share price fall has a lot to do with the fact that all of the last 2 year's "growth" had been down to exchange rate movements and licence fees masking the underlying trends of falling model sales. Something that investors would have spotted had they read the financial results for themselves rather than acting like a bunch of blind lemmings based on pundits skim-reading the summary baloney produced by the company directors.

I wonder then if we might not be approaching a watershed moment when GW realise that perhaps raising prices continually is doing them more harm than good?

filbert wrote:I wonder then if we might not be approaching a watershed moment when GW realise that perhaps raising prices continually is doing them more harm than good?

Judging from the fact that they just passed on a (rounded up) VAT rise in their UK stores yesterday, I'm not holding my breath.

Osbad wrote:

filbert wrote:I wonder then if we might not be approaching a watershed moment when GW realise that perhaps raising prices continually is doing them more harm than good?

Judging from the fact that they just passed on a (rounded up) VAT rise in their UK stores yesterday, I'm not holding my breath.

Me neither but you never know....

Can't really blame them for the VAT rise - I don't suppose there will be many businesses prepared to not pass on the rise (although some have mentioned they are deferring it for a few months).

I've been wondering for quite some time where GW's price breaking point was going to be. According to these numbers, I think we're seeing it.

I'm also calling BS on the play with that tripe from GW. The numbers seriously do not add up. Close stores... raise prices... make money... then claim that its a win? Anyone else seeing the pattern here?

I see HMV is shutting 60 stores, looks like Christmas retail drops maybe about to claim another big victim. Woolies and Zaavi last year, HMV could be next.

I'd be gutted if Waterstones went, WHSmith really isn't a good alternative in my mind, and apart from the rare independent bookstore, I think thats about it if Waterstones does fall.


Regarding GW, I assume this will lead to price rises of some kind as most of us do. As long as the kiddies keep buying from stores, I don't think GW can smell the coffee.

I'd imagine thats whats happening in Aus/NZ as well. Kids and parents still go to stores in numbers that GW branch there isn't noticing enough, or no more than a typical sales slump in a bad financial climate anyways.

On a side note, 44% blinkin eck, thats a hugely impressive saving.

Well I guess this is proof that Chapterhouse is actually costing GW sales....

Osbad wrote:
Judging from the fact that they just passed on a (rounded up) VAT rise in their UK stores yesterday, I'm not holding my breath.

Quelle surprise.

I'll expect your public apology soon then nosferatu1001?

Everything is being blamed on the snow, no suprise for us brit's. My local GW ran out of loads of stock over christmas and could not get any deliveries till after the christmas break, these shoppers will not have gone to the internet because those 'gifts' would not arrive either! So instead of buying £30 worth of GW stock they went else ware and bought a video game or somehting, anything that was actually in stock!

Got to agree that a 4% drop in sales in the uk in the current economic climate is not bad at all! sales here are dropping, my christmas budget was half what it was last year due to various things, but the point of the matter is people have less money to spend.

With HMV, next etc that shows the real extent of the decline in sales in the uk. in comparrison a niche like GW only dropping 4% is pretty good.

Sales are down??? Wow there is a surprise considering GW decided to wait 7 months between 40k releases and never produced a single book for the new edition of fantasy to take advantage of the momentum

deejaybainbridge wrote:With HMV, next etc that shows the real extent of the decline in sales in the uk. in comparrison a niche like GW only dropping 4% is pretty good.

Is that a comparison of like for like? Are HMV and Next UK only and GW international results?

Kirasu wrote:Sales are down??? Wow there is a surprise considering GW decided to wait 7 months between 40k releases and never produced a single book for the new edition of fantasy to take advantage of the momentum

That was rather odd, wasn't it?

GW assumes too much of a captive market, maybe?

alpharius wrote:GW assumes too much of a captive market, maybe?

Oh yeah, they definitely have that problem sometimes at the top of the company. Talk to some of the people who've been to those quarterly sales meetings in Las Vegas, especially some of the people who no longer work for the company and who can be a bit more free in what they tell you. Arrogance and testosterone have always played a part in some of GW's pricing and policies and that has not changed. If anything, the slimmer market share, weaker economy and brutal overall retail climate have increased the chest-thumping involved.

The lack of releases for 7 months, and the distinctly hamfisted and very late Tyranid FAQ, and the badly playtested Tyranid codex (don't get me wrong -- it's not a bad codex by any stretch, and it's got a variety of viable builds, but some of the options are silly, and some of the points costs are way off), and the slightly peculiar choice of which models to release (eg plastic Raveners were nice, but probably not as crucial as a Tyrannofex; worse by far, boxes of Pyrovores must still be sitting in warehouses, while Tyranid players cry out for a Tervigon model...), can't have helped.

Well GW have lost 14% of their value at close today:
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q?s=GAW.L

I think Ian is quite on the mark - a total lack of decent 40k releases until Dark Eldar was killing interest on web forums as well which I had always presumed to be slightly indicative of the health of GW as a whole.

Interestingly, I'm noticing across the board significant drops in all 40k forum traffic this month as well which to me implies that not many people got 40k stuff for xmas and/or got other things which have captured their interest instead. I'm wondering if there was a bit of a november bubble caused by the marketing for the ultramarines movie.

Aside from a new main boxed set (if that happens as some have conjectured), I dont see much in the forthcoming releases leaked or rumoured so far as having much impact either. The release of the next Dawn of War instalment might draw some interest depending on how heavy the marketing is though, so that might cause a bit of an uptick in the next couple of months.

Kirasu wrote:Sales are down??? Wow there is a surprise considering GW decided to wait 7 months between 40k releases and never produced a single book for the new edition of fantasy to take advantage of the momentum

Yeah, this annoys me to no end. I believe we really should've had at least 2 army books for fantasy by now. They really need to up their release tempo. The rumors of something big for everyone in WHFB this summer really do nothing for the leagues and clubs who have a fizzling fantasy fan base right now. Someone dropped the ball, and it started with the Beastmen releases. I look at the Skaven army book and its models/rules then to my beloved Beastmen models/rules, and its just depressing.

legoburner wrote:Well GW have lost 14% of their value at close today:
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q?s=GAW.L

I think Ian is quite on the mark - a total lack of decent 40k releases until Dark Eldar was killing interest on web forums as well which I had always presumed to be slightly indicative of the health of GW as a whole.

Interestingly, I'm noticing across the board significant drops in all 40k forum traffic this month as well which to me implies that not many people got 40k stuff for xmas and/or got other things which have captured their interest instead. I'm wondering if there was a bit of a november bubble caused by the marketing for the ultramarines movie.

Aside from a new main boxed set (if that happens as some have conjectured), I dont see much in the forthcoming releases leaked or rumoured so far as having much impact either. The release of the next Dawn of War instalment might draw some interest depending on how heavy the marketing is though, so that might cause a bit of an uptick in the next couple of months.

There was marketing for the Ultramarines movie? I'm not trying to be snarky here, I genuinely have never seen anything talking about it other then the posts on fan forums; how did they market it?

There was marketing for the Ultramarines movie? I'm not trying to be snarky here, I genuinely have never seen anything talking about it other then the posts on fan forums; how did they market it?

As you say there has been no marketing for it virtually at all except via occasional mentions through existing GW devices and word-of-mouth. A friend suggested recently that if they'd have sold some as a splash in the GW stores that might have boosted sales and put some money in the GW stores and I have to agree, it would have capitalized on impulse buying in the stores and gotten word out about the movie that much more.

From my understanding it was mainly community marketing, contests, etc. It was mostly geographical with a few premieres based around London and some European community advertising too. One chap at the cinema premier had actually bought a flight to the UK from germany(?) on the hope that he would win the contest that was being held over there, then he lost but the original winner was unable to make it so they gave it to him as second place.

Dont get me wrong, it was a small budget and mostly community/forum based marketing, but it was a fairly big event that caused a lot of interest compared to the previous months and coupled with the crappy northern hemisphere weather is my main guess at an increase in Oct/Nov traffic.

WH smith is overpriced and offers rubbish... waterstones is much better. WH Smith is essentially a glorified newsagent.

I love waterstones...

Sales are down???

I guess this is overall, a hazard of being large and operating stores in so many different countries. Stores in my area did quite well. One local shop has been profitable most of the year and another tied for the best holiday sales season in North America. It seems that getting stores into profitability in all their main markets is futile and every year they are down enough in some areas to bring the whole thing down. This has got to be scary for investors and it's certainly scary for customers concerned about GW's future. One thing is certain, they can't cut any more "fat" from the stores, they already slashed everything to the bone when they went to the one-man store system earlier this year.

Is it terribly churlish to suggest some kind of special offer designed to shift volume or encourage people to start a new army? There are very few retailers that have literally no discounts or offers that allow consumers to choose.

I am continually amazed that GW's competitors who, by definition, must have higher overheads, manage special offers on GW products bought online.

Just something simple like:

"Buy x box sets and get the cheapest free" to shift volume.

"Buy an army box and commander and get a free army book" to encourage people to try a new army.

A price rise in the current climate? With a slowly increasing number of competitors producing good quality proxy miniatures? I think they've pushed prices as far as they can in terms of making money.

But I'm not a business expert, as I expect many people will be along to say.

doctorludo wrote:Is it terribly churlish to suggest some kind of special offer designed to shift volume or encourage people to start a new army?

"Buy x box sets and get the cheapest free" to shift volume.

"Buy an army box and commander and get a free army book" to encourage people to try a new army.

They used to have offers like the ones you put forth, but I personally haven't seen those in a probably a decade. Its a shame they still aren't around. They couldn't have been that draining on the company, as the ratio of purchased product to free incentives were vastly different.

GW sales and customer numbers drop for years, 5-10% on average price hikes included.
GW only answer is raising prices, firing creative staff (Priestley and Calvatore last year), no advertising, constant fight against word-of-mouth advertising ("rumour control"), sue fan-websites and aftermarket instead. I guess they invest more in lawyers hunting down fans than in marketing.

Too bad stock holders let the management go on with the obviously downward spiral for years without making the management responsible. The managers will do the same as in the years before, with the same decline in sales and customers as in the years before.

Volume discounts when they had those Apocalypse deals in 2007-2008 really moved a ton of product and generated big cash flow and I'm surprised they haven't done something that aggressive again. And Island Of Blood sales seem to have been a bit disappointing in spite of the quality of the set, but then pushing the starter set for a system less popular than 40K to $99 US may have further added a barrier to entry for Fantasy Battle, which only hurts sales of other Fantasy Battle sets all down the line.

Kroothawk wrote:GW sales and customer numbers drop for years, 5-10% on average price hikes included.
GW only answer is raising prices, firing creative staff (Priestley and Calvatore last year), no advertising, constant fight against word-of-mouth advertising ("rumour control"), sue fan-websites and aftermarket instead.

Too bad stock holders let the management go on with the obviously downward spiral for years without making the management responsible. The managers will do the same as in the years before, with the same decline in sales and customers as in the years before.

I don't know dude, being 4% off of expected profits doesn't seem like the time for doom and gloom. People have been predicting GWs demise since I got into the hobby 15+ years ago.

Hang on, To me I'd say that the prices are at a level which may persuade kiddies(or the real buyers their parents) that they may be wise to spend their money elsewhere. No doubt that there will be another infamous price hike this year sometime. From what I've read on the forums some people are quite happy to shrug their shoulders and say well I can afford to keep buying so ++++ the rest of you who can't! Some of these boxsets they release are not classifiable as elites, troops or hqs anymore. The price dictates that they are now luxury items. It is ridiculous to have to pay twelve pounds or more for a single figure, if I did(have to be struck on the head first) there is no way in hell that I would use it on the battlefield risking it to damage or even theft.

I think all GW needs to do is start advertising instead of using word of mouth and don't leave it so long between new releases. Or they could do more with computer games, a hard market but can prove worth it.

Wonder if this drop will be enough to prevent a profit being made? From what I've read, they're currently predicting reduced profits, rather than an outright loss.

I hope - but sincerely doubt it - that this loss in profits/sales/customers/everything will make the GW bosses realise the flaw in their current methods and make them change their ways. If anything, it can hopefully prove that the constant price rises don't help their business...
Hopefully. That's just speculation, I'm not a business expert or anything.

Otherwise, I agree with what Legoburner and Kroothawk have said:

legoburner wrote:Well GW have lost 14% of their value at close today:
http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/q?s=GAW.L

I think Ian is quite on the mark - a total lack of decent 40k releases until Dark Eldar was killing interest on web forums as well which I had always presumed to be slightly indicative of the health of GW as a whole.

Interestingly, I'm noticing across the board significant drops in all 40k forum traffic this month as well which to me implies that not many people got 40k stuff for xmas and/or got other things which have captured their interest instead. I'm wondering if there was a bit of a november bubble caused by the marketing for the ultramarines movie.

Aside from a new main boxed set (if that happens as some have conjectured), I dont see much in the forthcoming releases leaked or rumoured so far as having much impact either. The release of the next Dawn of War instalment might draw some interest depending on how heavy the marketing is though, so that might cause a bit of an uptick in the next couple of months.

Kroothawk wrote:GW sales and customer numbers drop for years, 5-10% on average price hikes included.
GW only answer is raising prices, firing creative staff (Priestley and Calvatore last year), no advertising, constant fight against word-of-mouth advertising ("rumour control"), sue fan-websites and aftermarket instead. I guess they invest more in lawyers hunting down fans than in marketing.

Too bad stock holders let the management go on with the obviously downward spiral for years without making the management responsible. The managers will do the same as in the years before, with the same decline in sales and customers as in the years before.

This has little to do with the amount of money they will actually make. It has to do with what they told their investors they would make, in turn how much money those investors would make as a result. Profit is good to have but not being able to raise capital is bad, m'kay?

I love the PP method of releases, where there's this constant stream of stuff coming out, being previewed, ect. Hardly a week goes by where there's not posts here about new stuff coming out. Not rumors from some cryptic guy who can't be fully identified because of fear of repercussion from GW, but actual news and information and pictures from PP itself. Wrath is still months away, but we're seeing more and more pictures, concepts, spoilers, articles talking about their design of the expansion.

I'd love to see a comparison of PP's trade info for this same time period next to GW's.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:I'd like to know how badly GW Australia and New Zealand is faring.

Not very well.

One of Australia's most profitable stores recently moved out of their choice shopping mall location to a store in a side-street two blocks away, in the part of that suburb where all the signs are in Korean, and next to an ancient Video Ezy (and we know how well video stores are doing these days, so there rent there must be very cheap to go with its terrible location).

And if you look at the prices of the new Skaven stuff, they're almost double the US prices, despite the nearly 1:1 parity of our currencies.

BrassScorpion wrote:As you say there has been no marketing for it virtually at all except via occasional mentions through existing GW devices and word-of-mouth. A friend suggested recently that if they'd have sold some as a splash in the GW stores that might have boosted sales and put some money in the GW stores and I have to agree, it would have capitalized on impulse buying in the stores and gotten word out about the movie that much more.

As I said in my review of Ultramarines:

"Overall the single greatest downside to this film is the completely lack of interest GW has shown in it. Maybe now GW will put a little grunt work of their own to cross-promote these things in the future. They're a company with their own chain of retail stores across the world for feth's sake and they think that their only role in such an endeavour is to collect the cheque at the end for the license rights they sold. If anyone in their promotions and marketing department had even half a brain their most recent issue of White Dwarf would have "Ultramarines - The Movie" as it's front cover, have interviews with the makers, the cast, a look at the film, a special movie-based scenario for people to play with rules for the main characters and - because they are a miniature company after all - a Ltd. Ed. boxed set with a metal model for each of the main characters (the exact same thing they should have done with the HQ's from Dark Crusade). But no, for GW all this means to them is more $$$ with no effort, when even the slightest bit of effort (White Dwarf) would allow them to further increase the sales."

I guess their share price is reaping the benefits of their inaction.

Sounds like your Ultramarines review is spot on, HBMC!

The total unavailability of all the licensed products in GW stores always strikes me as *crazy*. My only assumption is that someone high up at GW believes that every licensed product in a GW store or featured in WD would somehow compete with sales of the minis, but that concept doesn't hold much water. It's clear that stuff like the FFG boardgames and RPGs sell, and sell very well, in other games stores -- why not sell them in GW stores too? The sales pattern is not going to be, "Well, I came in for a box of tactical marines, but this "Chaos Marauders" stand-alone game looks fun, so I'll buy that instead." It's going to be "Ooh, this looks fun, and since I'm making a purchase anyway...".

If anyone in their promotions and marketing department had even half a brain their most recent issue of White Dwarf would have "Ultramarines - The Movie" as it's front cover, have interviews with the makers, the cast, a look at the film, a special movie-based scenario for people to play with rules for the main characters...

That would have been a great idea, wouldn't it? I can't argue with any of that, it would have been a brilliant cross-promotion. A friend of mine said recently that he would have bought a copy right there in the store while we were standing there if he could have shortly after having a look at someone else's copy.

I do get why they don't sell Third Party stuff, even when it's licensed, through the stores. The minis are their bread and butter.

But surely they could offer a weborder service in store?

Ian Sturrock wrote:Sounds like your Ultramarines review is spot on, HBMC!

The total unavailability of all the licensed products in GW stores always strikes me as *crazy*. My only assumption is that someone high up at GW believes that every licensed product in a GW store or featured in WD would somehow compete with sales of the minis, but that concept doesn't hold much water.

What's even more baffling is that, from GW's position, revenue is revenue. And my opinion has always been that fluff (e.g. the Ultramarines movie) feeds future purchasing.

Sadly revenue isn't revenue when you produce your own products.

But to not have them available in any way shape or form in the Store (even the aforementioned web site on the terminals) is a little 'huh' to say the least.

Mr Mystery wrote:Sadly revenue isn't revenue when you produce your own products.

Huh?

Normally I'd agree but when 'your own products' (40k and WHFB) have been declining year on year for the past decade then anything that makes the numbers look good is a good thing.

Eventually GW won't be a miniature manufacturer, just like it isn't a mail order D&D importer any more. They're going to have to become something, why not an IP for hire.

George Spiggott wrote:Normally I'd agree but when 'your own products' (40k and WHFB) have been declining year on year for the past decade then anything that makes the numbers look good is a good thing.

Eventually GW won't be a miniature manufacturer, just like it isn't a mail order D&D importer any more. They're going to have to become something, why not an IP for hire.

Not to be argumentative, but where do these assertions that GW has been "declining year after year" come from? I'm not saying you are wrong or anything, its just that I don't see it.

Like I said above, folks have been predicting GWs demise since the 90s. In that time I've only seen them put better product out, branch out into other media (PC+Video games, Books, Movies) and open more stores then there ever were in the 90s. Yes, they've taken some harsh measures to cut costs down lately, but they are still profitable, aren't they? Just not as profitable as they'd like to be is what I gather.

NELS1031 wrote:Not to be argumentative, but where do these assertions that GW has been "declining year after year" come from? I'm not saying you are wrong or anything, its just that I don't see it.

It's in their yearly reports. Turnover is flat (barring the LOTR boom) and has been since the turn of the century. Meanwhile inflation is up and prices are up year on year for the same period.

What i'd do if I was GW (i appreciate that it's highly unlikely that they would..) to massively boost sales and customer loyalty.

Drop Model prices by 50% (it doesn't cost all that much to make and package them, per unit)

Customers will buy by the ton assuming that GW will raise the price again later.

Wavering players will reconsider leaving to other systems (as they have been doing more and more as GW prices go up and up)

New players will have a far better time justifying to their spouse, parent or wallet that its worth it.

Also hire a compentent codex team to rapidly produce codexes/rulebooks etc. My office at work preps 20,000 page legal files and 300 + page court briefs that have to be utterly legally suffiicent, or be thrown out and the offending person fired. We do about 5 a week. It cannot be seriously that much harder to create a 100 page codex in a couple of months that works with the rules and has been properly playtested, with unambiguous rules checked for loopholes by a WAAC 14 year old.

Mr Mystery wrote:Sadly revenue isn't revenue when you produce your own products.

But to not have them available in any way shape or form in the Store (even the aforementioned web site on the terminals) is a little 'huh' to say the least.

Do you even know what the definition of revenue is?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Ascalam wrote:What i'd do if I was GW (i appreciate that it's highly unlikely that they would..) to massively boost sales and customer loyalty.

Drop Model prices by 50% (it doesn't cost all that much to make and package them, per unit)

Customers will buy by the ton assuming that GW will raise the price again later.

Wavering players will reconsider leaving to other systems (as they have been doing more and more as GW prices go up and up)

New players will have a far better time justifying to their spouse, parent or wallet that its worth it.

Also hire a compentent codex team to rapidly produce codexes/rulebooks etc. My office at work preps 20,000 page legal files and 300 + page court briefs that have to be utterly legally suffiicent, or be thrown out and the offending person fired. We do about 5 a week. It cannot be seriously that much harder to create a 100 page codex in a couple of months that works with the rules and has been properly playtested, with unambiguous rules checked for loopholes by a WAAC 14 year old.

The problem is that all they are trying to do is manage ratios. Cutting prices would throw those cost ratios off regardless of any increase in revenue.

H.B.M.C. wrote:I guess their share price is reaping the benefits of their inaction.

+1 to this.

Personally I can’t recall a decent 40k release this year baring Dark Eldar and 2010 overall was fairly lacklustre as far as releases were concerned. I suspect that GW has a misguided perspective regarding its core market as far as revenue is concerned.

It would be cool if GW took things a little more seriously in the form of more codex/army book releases and less loyalist marine splash releases (usually in a form of a random marine blister every few months).

filbert wrote:

Howard A Treesong wrote:HMV look to be in a bad way, but when your business is selling CDs and people are increasingly buying downloads you're in a ever shrinking market.

My concern is that Waterstones will take a hit to prop up HMV and they are the only highstreet book chain still going.

As for GW, they raise prices come rain or shine. It's all they know.

I think even Waterstones will start feeling the pinch (If they haven't already). As an example, the wife and I were browsing in there the other day and were looking at a couple of paperbacks each priced at £7.99

I can buy those same paperbacks, new, from Amazon, for £4 delivered, the only caveat being I have to wait a few days extra. I just don't see how Waterstones can continue to compete effectively while having to factor in bricks and mortar stores in a way that Amazon doesn't. Even Watersones' best sale prices can't match Amazon.

I am an Amazon Prime customer, so in most cases I can order a book by mid afternoon and have it delivered free, the next morning.

I only buy books at Waterstones if I need something to read the same day.

GW shops don't really seem to be retailers primarily, anymore.

It's astonishing what you can go in to buy and not find in stock. Before Christmas I went in to buy two cubes of dice and a large oval base. They didn't have any in stock, and suggested I should order them on the in-store citizen's terminal. I could have done it quicker by staying in my office.

Basically GW shops are marketing outlets. That's why the staff sell (or pester) so strongly when you go in for a look around.

NELS1031 wrote:

Kirasu wrote:Sales are down??? Wow there is a surprise considering GW decided to wait 7 months between 40k releases and never produced a single book for the new edition of fantasy to take advantage of the momentum

Yeah, this annoys me to no end. I believe we really should've had at least 2 army books for fantasy by now. They really need to up their release tempo. The rumors of something big for everyone in WHFB this summer really do nothing for the leagues and clubs who have a fizzling fantasy fan base right now. Someone dropped the ball, and it started with the Beastmen releases. I look at the Skaven army book and its models/rules then to my beloved Beastmen models/rules, and its just depressing.

And this is how Mantic intercepted the ball and ran it down close to the endzone, for lack of a better analogy. Release of a game system that is free to download and print, open beta's for each new army list, and a boxed game thats half price of whats inside jumped them up the field. Even though they are having a tiny price rise to cope with the VAT increase, the Warseer crowd isn't that worried at all.

I am an Amazon Prime customer, so in most cases I can order a book by mid afternoon and have it delivered free, the next morning.

I only buy books at Waterstones if I need something to read the same day.

GW shops don't really seem to be retailers primarily, anymore.

It's astonishing what you can go in to buy and not find in stock. Before Christmas I went in to buy two cubes of dice and a large oval base. They didn't have any in stock, and suggested I should order them on the in-store citizen's terminal. I could have done it quicker by staying in my office.

Basically GW shops are marketing outlets. That's why the staff sell (or pester) so strongly when you go in for a look around.

I have seen this disturbing trend as well of late. More and more items only sold online. It is forcing me to go elsewhere to get the items that I want.

Now as far as sales? Well the cost of the hobby is getting to the point that only the hard core will play and pay. As far as profitability? Some of the sales decline profits should be offset by layoffs and restructuring here in the US.

Less employees + closing stores deemed not profitable enough = not having to pay for their salaries and benefits, plus store rent and overhead. The result is a positive cash flow in this situation to be used elsewhere for this year.

They are still making a profit, just not as much.

Money talks, BS walks. Looks like we are gonna see a lot of walking from GW(or heads rolling) in these next few years if this trend continues.

They blame the weather, what will they blame next time? Oh wait, nvm, oil prices, herp derp. We won't see anything interesting until oil prices hit their peak and start going back down when it comes to this issue.

See you in 5-6 months (oil will peak in summer driving season I bet) when we come back to this discussion. Or next quarterly report.

I think a big problem with GW online is that if you do order online there are many retailers selling for less, so it would be cheaper to go with a different store for value.

I think the lack of releases could be another factor.
Maybe a few more boxset or intro packs.
Some online retailers are suggesting lowering prices to get more trade, any hope of this for GW?????????????. Nah!

Also 4% is not that bad if its a one to one match with other retailers, maybe its just the fact people haven't got as much money or jobs. The economy is still in a pretty bad way.

leroy233 wrote:I think a big problem with GW online is that if you do order online there are many retailers selling for less, so it would be cheaper to go with a different store for value.

Well the GWUS did what they could with that problem by making it illegal to have GW items and a shopping basket come within 30 feet of one another.

Smart move that. A lot of good press. Almost as much goodwill as the time they sent C&D letters to every Blood Bowl site in existence. God-Damn does GW know how to play nice and make friends or what?

Mr Mystery wrote:Wonder if this drop will be enough to prevent a profit being made? From what I've read, they're currently predicting reduced profits, rather than an outright loss.

While margins and costs are “under control”, sales were weak during December at the table-top games firm, which makes the Warhammer models series.

In the half year to the end of November, they were down 4%, a trend that continued over Christmas which means profits are unlikely to meet City forecasts.

Stockbroker Peel Hunt reacted to the news by slashing its profit expectations for next year from £17 million to £12 million.

In a note, Peel Hunt said: “It is obviously disappointing to see a profit reversal after the good recent improvement. However, the business has never been in better shape operationally.”

Games Workshop's shares fell 72.5p, 17%, to 380p.

“Difficult trading conditions since that time mean that this shortfall is unlikely to be recovered by the year end,” the group said.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard-business/article-23910988-games-workshop-struggles-under-poor-sales.do

..that still strikes me as a little optimistic given the continuing paucity of releases, but I must confess this whole area of profit prediction etc etc is less a grey area and more a vast black hole for me knowledge wise.

..never in better shape operationally huh ... ? hmm... okay. You can breath with one lung right ?

endtransmission wrote:It's just been on the news in our office that HMV saw a 15% drop and Next saw a 12% drop... so GW were actually running well ahead of some of the major high street chains in terms of profit.

I've seen this phrase a few times on Dakka... what is a "high street chain"?

A retailer who has significant high street presence.

IE in every UK town high street there is a Next, a Marks and Spencers, etc etc.

The "high street" being a metonym for the main retail area of a town... I guess you guys would say "main street" ...?

I don't think that expression has an American equivalent - a company so large they have a presence in nearly every town.

The slowness of codex releases, and the lack of testing (or even basic maths to calculate the utility & thus points costs of various options -- or even the game design intuition that can substitute for a fair bit of maths) in the codices that do get released, is nigh-on unforgivable! I agree that there's no real reason for either -- GW have a fair few staff in the studio, and OK, they have to crank out the occasional WD article too... but really, as staff writers and game designers, they should be capable of doing, what, about 50,000 words of playtested codex text each, every month, without working too hard.

I'm being generous there -- minimum output for each Mongoose Publishing in-house game designer is 80,000 words a month. I know several very reputable and award-winning game designers who would think that 3000 words in a day was a bit shabby, and only really think of 6000 words a day as a decent output. What the studio staff are doing all day, other than gaming (for fun, obviously, rather than playtesting anything competitively!), painting, and eating another few burgers at Bugman's, I really don't know...

NELS1031 wrote:
Not to be argumentative, but where do these assertions that GW has been "declining year after year" come from? I'm not saying you are wrong or anything, its just that I don't see it.

Numbers taken from their published accounts and graphed:




Bear in mind that 2009 and to a lessr extent 2010 included a large amount of "tunrover" that was purely due to exchange rate gains in sales demonitated in non-sterling currencies following the collapse of the £.

If they're not going to lower prices, I'd like to see more bulk deals.

Surely most Space Marine players want more than 1 Tactical Squad, so why not put two lots of sprues into one box and charge £35 - £38?

Or for Fantasy, start selling horde size units e.g. £55 for 40 Stormvermin.

All you'd need is larger boxes. In fact, if you did it online, you wouldn't even need that. Just market it with a funky picture and send it out as a bundle.

They kind of do bulk buying at the moment with Battallions but there's always one thing you don't want in those boxes (e.g. in my case, Plague Monks & those fugly Rat Ogres).

Ouze wrote:I don't think that expression has an American equivalent - a company so large they have a presence in nearly every town.

err... K mart, Wal Mart, MacDonalds, Burger King, Gap etc etc all of these would be chain stores.

reds8n wrote:

Ouze wrote:I don't think that expression has an American equivalent - a company so large they have a presence in nearly every town.

err... K mart, Wal Mart, MacDonalds, Burger King, Gap etc etc all of these would be chain stores.

Yeah, I get the idea, I just don't think we have a catchall phrase that encompasses them the way you do, though. "Box stores" would be the closest, but that really just means Walmart & Super target, stuff like that.

The more you know! //shootingstar

George Spiggott wrote:

deejaybainbridge wrote:With HMV, next etc that shows the real extent of the decline in sales in the uk. in comparrison a niche like GW only dropping 4% is pretty good.

Is that a comparison of like for like? Are HMV and Next UK only and GW international results?

It's not a direct comparrison more highlighted that it shows how much comsumer spending has dropped in the uk with big retailers who have a much larger consumer market! Next Direct is an international company so that comparrion maybe could be made, but i dont know if the results are uk only or international results, i'm not that interested.

My point was from a UK basis and that we are in the middle of a recession where evryone has less dispoble income and thus has less money to spend on items such as those sold by GW, no one in there right mind should be suprised that sales are going to take a hit. I think every retailer in the uk is in for a tough time over the next couple of years.

... I'm sure you'll just steal our phrase, murder the spelling and then claim the credit for "inventing" it anyway

GW’s core problem is that their business model currently depends on a huge, very expensive retail chain in order to market (not just sell) their products.

This is partly because the bulk of their sales are to new customers, who are much less likely to come in via hobby web sites, clubs, and independent retailers.

The "no advertising" policy is killing profits and customer base, at least outside UK where there are less stores. And the managers counter with "We are happy to be just niche, so a declining customer base is okay!" and get along with it.
Raising the entry hurdle more and more (prices for starter sets, no entry games like Space Hulk or Warhammer Quest) is a further liability, esp. when the PC games competition prices are more and less stable.

Here two nice contribution posts from Warseer:

yabbadabba wrote:Sorry but I think may of the posts here are looking at things in a far too narrow perspective.

All the issues mentioned so far - prices, range, sales, gateway products etc - all actually tied up and a much broader and, for me, failing strategic direction. GW have chosen to pursue the 11-18 year old bracket as a prime, and almost sole, primary market. The target within that bracket has been middle class boys. Comments about increasing competition from Mantic etc are, in part, entirely accurate and entirely unimportant. We have been complaining about GWs prices since the early 1990's when they were charging 2-3 times what others were charging, the real issue here is the price ceiling and the perceived value, both of which GW have got wrong.

Instead of creating a holistic and broad approach to wargaming - which is the market we are in - they have tried to shift that bracket to "teenage boys toys" and it is failing. It is failing because of the cost, the perception; back when GW games were for adults, what teenage kid didn't want to be a part of it? now they are for teenagers, more and more adults are falling out, and the teenagers are falling out quicker because it is perceived as childish. Its failing because GWs retail approach doesn't work for customers like us. Its failing because of an obsession with the US which the company has shown no understanding of or ability to adapt to.

Despite the perceived whining on here there is in essence nothig wrong with the products, and not much that cannot be addressed very simply. Its still one of the most unique brands around and one of the most accessible products of its type. The key area for me where GW have fallen down on is how to deal with the more fanatical parts of the community, exemplified by some of the tournament fanatics we have seen on here. Incorrectly GW have decided to abandon vets as a whole, instead of learning to grow a thicker skin and sideline those fanatics (pro and anti GW). This is where the overall product has been affected most of all for me.

Quite simply, the majority of the posters on here are exactly the sort of customers GW should be courting right now. GW sales are not made up of mad £400+ orders nice as they are, or by kids blowing their parents loose change as profitable as it can be, but by those 20+year old customers, in regular jobs, taking it easy and popping into their local supplier every week to spend £20. If a GW store can't look to around 100 of those types of customers (a smallish percentage of its overall customer base) then it has lost a significant income stream. Attempting to force that expenditure up without reason was a major error, and they have all but lost that regular income.

Its not the prices as such, or the products, but the overall goals and strategy. For that there is only one place to lay the blame, and that is at the very top. 3-6 years ago this would have been easy to solve, even with an upcoming sales drop due to LotR sales falling. Unfortunately a succession of no doubt qualified and experienced business people have wandered into the top areas of the business, with little or no understanding of what the base of GWs market is, what has supplied it with a form of financial stability for 20 odd years, and have chosen to interpret stores and schools full of kids playing with toy soldiers as a dependable and exploitable income stream.

The saddest thing for me is the few acquaintances I have left in the company could know be looking at joining the vast majority of the Games Workshop staff I have known over the decades, on the outside wondering what went wrong. Too many staff in important, non-systems positions have been lost to GW, people who understood the market even if it was just in terms of little soldiers on a board.

Oh well.

Chaos and Evil wrote:A rough bit of history:

GW was created in the 1980's, and it did quite well, steadily expanding.

Eventually, in 1994 it was floated on the stock market, which raised lots of cash, allowing the company to expand even faster. It continued to do well.

In the early 2000's, sales of its main games (Warhammer & Warhammer 40,000) were starting to lessen, and the company really should have paid attention to this and done something about it.

However, at about that time, GW got the license to produce a Lord of the Rings game, which, for 4 years, was a huge success. GW raked in the cash from LOTR sales, and, in the words of GW's own chief executive, grew "fat and lazy", ignoring the problems with their main games' falling popularity as LOTR was compensating for the fall in sales.

By 2005, the LOTR movies were over, and the sales of LOTR had tanked, dropping to a fraction of their previous level of sales. This was the end of the so called "Lord of the Rings bubble".

The company lost half its value on the stock market, as it was realised by the city that GW was in trouble.

Two years of losses followed. Not just profit warnings, but actual losses.

In response, GW fired half their staff, to cut costs.
They also shut quite a few of their retail stores.

As a consequence, GW has returned to making a profit in the last couple of years, even paying off the debts they took on when they were making losses.

But this was purely down to cutting costs, and getting lucky with international currency fluctuations... the core problem of the business (Falling sales, every year selling slightly less than the year before) had not been fixed.

And that leads us to where we are now, where sales have continued to fall, leading GW to warn that it is not going to make a lot of money this year.

If the trend of falling sales is not changed, GW will not just be making profit warnings, but will dip once again into making losses. If that happens, it will be forced to find more areas to cut costs (Fire more staff, close more retail stores), or increase sales.

In the last week, GW has lost 14% of its value on the stock market.

Interesting thoughts from Warseer there. It does worry me that we are a dying breed. A bit like the Eldar really.

Around here they are expanding. Well, with one-man stores mind you. They opened one in the east late last year and at least five more will be opened sooner or later around here.

reds8n wrote:... I'm sure you'll just steal our phrase, murder the spelling and then claim the credit for "inventing" it anyway

That's a very... bootstrappy idea.

We call areas where stores congregate strip malls or shopping centers.

BrookM wrote:They opened one in the east late last year and at least five more will be opened sooner or later around here.

Five? What do they need five more for? Is the market large enough to warrant such expansion?

Kroothawk wrote:The "no advertising" policy is killing profits and customer base

I don't know, White Dwarf has plenty of advertising in it.


Otherwise, I completely agree with those 2 Warseer posts you quoted, I just hope the people in GW realise the flaws in what they are doing and how much a customer means to the business and in fact changes their methods. Surely they can't be blind to what's wrong and what needs to change if we can all see it? Right?

Mr Mystery wrote:I do get why they don't sell Third Party stuff, even when it's licensed, through the stores. The minis are their bread and butter.

But surely they could offer a weborder service in store?

Why would I care? Impulse purchases are the entire reason for brick and mortar. If I have to think about it and use the POWA OF THE INTRANETZ then there's no point to the retail stores-they just burn cash.

H.B.M.C. wrote:

BrookM wrote:They opened one in the east late last year and at least five more will be opened sooner or later around here.

Five? What do they need five more for? Is the market large enough to warrant such expansion?

I doubt it. There hasn't been an official GW store in the east of my country for over a decade now. We've got three official big stores, all in the west, where most of the big stuff really is. I think this could be the start of the end of GW in my country.

Ascalam wrote:What i'd do if I was GW (i appreciate that it's highly unlikely that they would..) to massively boost sales and customer loyalty.

Drop Model prices by 50% (it doesn't cost all that much to make and package them, per unit)

Customers will buy by the ton assuming that GW will raise the price again later.

Wavering players will reconsider leaving to other systems (as they have been doing more and more as GW prices go up and up)

New players will have a far better time justifying to their spouse, parent or wallet that its worth it.

Also hire a compentent codex team to rapidly produce codexes/rulebooks etc. My office at work preps 20,000 page legal files and 300 + page court briefs that have to be utterly legally suffiicent, or be thrown out and the offending person fired. We do about 5 a week. It cannot be seriously that much harder to create a 100 page codex in a couple of months that works with the rules and has been properly playtested, with unambiguous rules checked for loopholes by a WAAC 14 year old.

I don't think you can improve it. I'd bet good Chinese currency the entire market for all miniature gaming has been declining the last five years.

Looks like GW will close a few of their smaller stores and hike the prices up as usual and hope for the best, not good news really the miniatures hobby is tiny in comparisson to book and music shops . I fear GW are a fade market now, popular with fairly well off kids until they get bored of the effort to make the models look good and understand the game who then return to Xbox.

Kroothawk wrote:The "no advertising" policy is killing profits and customer base, at least outside UK where there are less stores. And the managers counter with "We are happy to be just niche, so a declining customer base is okay!" and get along with it.

I strongly disagree. I work as a financial analyst for a UK high street retailer that has a lot of similarities to GW, including turnover. We use e-mail and national newspaper advertising as well as catalogue, corporate mailshots, corporate intranet offers and "invite only" after hours events. Catalogue launch is the only one of those that allows us to detect any change in sales in the data, and we've spent a lot of time analysing it. Bearing in mind, despite being a national chain, we can easily detect the effects of protests and tube strikes in London, and (for example) the types of weather conditions that have an adverse effect on our sales (and I mean more subtle things than whopping great piles of snow )*

*Well you can detect an invite only event in an individual store very easily, but it doesn't impact the overall numbers significantly.

@ baragash: everyone probably is already aware of your chain there right? to Kroothawk's point I would guess over 90% of the people in the US have never even heard of Games Workshop. A little effective advertising could go a long way.

now hear this, now hear this:

The world is not going to end and the sky is most definitely not falling.

That is all...

Read the whole thread, great points... it gets discussed every year, but there must be a breaking point. Less service (in the form of book releases, number of staff working their stores, etc) and higher prices will erode a customer base, especially when there are other viable options.

Hopefully, GW gets the message... and does what makes sense from a business standpoint, which would coincide at least somewhat with what most people want (as a business serving customers, that just makes sense).

Fantasy boomed here when the rulebook came out. 18 of us in a little GW shop doing an escalation league for a few months, most of us buying models at the store to build up the armies. But that's over now, and there's still no book released for 8th edition... what were they thinking??

It's going to be real difficult for me to qualify this statement as I can't link to it and it's on an obscure topic line in the Spartan Games forums, so make of it what you will.

Recently one of the distributors of models and gaming supplies did a quick volume analysis of GW versus PP and SG games, and what his source (e-figures) showed was that GW has basically been losing volume while PP and SG together have gained an equivalent amount.

This would speak directly to market share shift away from GW to competitors, for whatever region this distributor was analysing.

As someone who has actually left 40k for WM/H, this is no surprise to me. My reason was price of entry into the hobby, and I imagine the high cost of GW games relative to competitors (Malifaux, WM/H, Anima Tactics) is prohibitive for many others as well.

I haven't been paying attention for a while, but now that you mention it...where the hell IS the new set of books for Fantasy! 2010 was a complete desert in terms of releases.
I also think the overall quality is going up, but they've got only a few reliable creators left- those are the people who make the money for the company, yet every year I hear of more of them being let go.

Baragash wrote:

Kroothawk wrote:The "no advertising" policy is killing profits and customer base, at least outside UK where there are less stores. And the managers counter with "We are happy to be just niche, so a declining customer base is okay!" and get along with it.

I strongly disagree. I work as a financial analyst for a UK high street retailer that has a lot of similarities to GW, including turnover. We use e-mail and national newspaper advertising as well as catalogue, corporate mailshots, corporate intranet offers and "invite only" after hours events. Catalogue launch is the only one of those that allows us to detect any change in sales in the data, and we've spent a lot of time analysing it.

That's why I am talking about sales outside UK, where main streets are not plastered with GW stores. There are US States without any GW store, even in Germany, GW is only known by a very small niche. And old Space Hulk/Space Crusade, Heroquest (both MB marketing) and in Germany a LOTR magazine with inlaid sprue prove, what standard marketing can achieve. Still lots of people arround who got into the hobby by these.

sourclams wrote:
As someone who has actually left 40k for WM/H, this is no surprise to me. My reason was price of entry into the hobby, and I imagine the high cost of GW games relative to competitors (Malifaux, WM/H, Anima Tactics) is prohibitive for many others as well.

Isn't the cost of entry into the WM/H gaming world a bit high as well?

Competitive and winning tournament armies can be had for under $200 with an ultra-competitive Menoth 35 point list for about $175 retail. $200 won't get you in the door for any competitive GW point level.

By my estimation WM/H is somewhere around half price versus 40k for competitive play and it scales much more easily so getting a 15 point starter box game going versus a complete newcomer is easier than playing a 500 point equivalent in 40k.

In a 35 point list I tend to feature 1 Warlock kit, 2-3 Beasts kits, and 1 Unit kit plus 2-3 solos or unit attachments. Full retail, excluding starter box discounts, that's around $225-$275.

Let's just look at the vehicles I'd need for... I don't know... 1500 pts of Chaos.

Rhinos run about $30 apiece retail, so just the rhinos for my troops would probably be $120 or more. I'm halfway to my WM/H total and I've bought less than 10% of the list's total point cost...!

Morphability of a WM/H army is a lot more dramatic as warlocks tend to impact the playstyle of a list so much. I could change a warlock and swap a single unit and a beast or two (cost: $100-$150) and now I've got a distinct and completely different list, like going from Green Tide to Nob Bikers. To do that in 1500 pts of 40k you almost need to buy another list entirely.

Can you sink a huge amount of money into PP, Malifaux, or any other game system? Yes, absolutely, but the analogue in 40k would be buying 5,000 pts of the model line. Maybe there's an even more expensive minis hobby than what GW puts out, but for my store/area GW is clearly at the top of the price scale.

For my personal end, I've spent about the same on a 3K WoC monster mash army for fantasy, as I have for the trollbloods for PP.

However, I wanted to be able to field 2 almost completely different lists for the highest "standard" point level (50 points) and try out a lot of the units. So if I'd wanted only a single list for that point level, half the price of a GW standard list sounds about right.

However, I'm also got fewer models... albiet, nice large metal ones (which are also a pain to put together, but that's neither here nor there).

It's not a totally fair comparison because it is comparing a skirmish game to a more largescale army / units game. But it does matter a bit, since as posted above, you can get into WM/H a bit cheaper depending on how you do it.

Of course, you can do some similar things for GW as well (buy 2 ogre battalion boxes, convert the leadbelchers into bulls, and convert your own characters, for example) but on the whole it is a bit more accessible to get into WM/H than to create a new army for warhammer or 40k, assuming standard point levels for both.

You guys are tempting me...

I really like the Khador stuff, and I think their play-style suits mine.

What's the new "must have" rules/supplements list look like?

sourclams wrote:By my estimation WM/H is somewhere around half price versus 40k for competitive play and it scales much more easily so getting a 15 point starter box game going versus a complete newcomer is easier than playing a 500 point equivalent in 40k.

normally, i'm the first to jump onto the gw price-bashing bandwagon but i think over the past 10 years other companies have caught up with their prices when you compare apples to apples. while i agree that the cost of entry to games like malifaux and WM is lower simply because the model count is also, the price per fig of comparable size and quality is roughly the same and sometimes more when you compare similar sets (size, quality, white metal only).

Infinity starters with 6 figs? $46 USD and up retail on the warstore. GW boxes with 5 similarly sized (see link below half way down the page) figs recently released? $29.75 for the dark eldar stuff like incubi. bulkier figs like marines (LOTD)? 5 for $35.


http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/318593.page

warmachine? infantry is roughly the same size as 40k infantry. 10 IG stormtroopers? $41.25 10 winter guard rifleman? $49.99


http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/224179.page


I can theoretically make up a minis game where you only need 2-3 minis in 28mm scale for the game and charge $50 for them together and have a "lower" barrier to entry but that doesn't mean the customer is actually getting a better deal when you compare similar items (size, quality, price). mind you, this is in no way a justification of GW's current prices, just a comparison with other popular companies to show that they have caught up or in some cases exceeded GW's price per ounce of sculpted minis. GW minis used to be hand over fist more expensive but concommitently better quality than their competitors' options; neither is really true right now.

H.B.M.C. wrote:

Games Workshop announces that pre-tax profits in respect of the year to 29 May 2011 are likely to be below current market expectations.

Time to raise the prices!

In addition, the outlook for royalties receivable in the current year remains good, although not as significant as in the year to 30 May 2010.

So it's time to raise the prices!

The Board of Games Workshop currently believes that, as a result of reduced volumes, pre-tax profits in respect of the year ending 29 May 2011 are unlikely to meet current market consensus estimates.

... so we're raising the prices!

The Board will announce the Group's half-yearly results for the six months to 28 November 2010 on 25 January 2011.

Where they will vote on how much to raise the prices by.

70 pence drop on their shares thus far today.

Which the board are confident can be quickly recouped via an across-the-board price rise.

The weather and travel issues in the UK/Europe won't have helped either.

I hear that 'It's snowing' is one of the 800,000 possibly justifications for 'price rises' listed within the Games Workshop Group PLC company handbook.





Ok, I've had my fun. Kan, you can stand down from red alert.

One of the best posts ive read!

@Warboss:
Yes price per model may be the same but when you look at the total you need to outlay to play, it's far cheaper any way you look at it since you can't play with just a unit of stormtroopers or just a unit of Winter Guard. You can't compare model prices between WM and 40k because it's not relevant. That squad of Winter Guard is close to 30% of a 35 point tournament force by itself before you put any attachments to it. The stormtroopers are under 10% of a 1500 point force.

12thRonin wrote:@Warboss:
Yes price per model may be the same but when you look at the total you need to outlay to play, it's far cheaper any way you look at it since you can't play with just a unit of stormtroopers or just a unit of Winter Guard. You can't compare model prices between WM and 40k because it's not relevant. That squad of Winter Guard is close to 30% of a 35 point tournament force by itself before you put any attachments to it. The stormtroopers are under 10% of a 1500 point force.

i agree with you that you have to consider the total price but that doesn't mean you should just ignore the individual fig price. the other games have been around a fraction of the time 40k has. i don't play warmachine so i'll rely on my fellow dakkites... are "standard" WM games bigger in model cost/count than they were when the game first started out? i realize the point scale completely changed which is why i'm specifying model count. if so, do you think the "average" model count will go up or down in 5-10 years? 40k didn't start out with such a high relative entry price; its gotten bigger and bigger to generate sales with every edition and i'd suspect the other companies are following the same dastardly gameplan.

edit:

warmachine army size has gone up if you can use their championship as a yardstick. the 2005 warmachine gencon national championship was a 500pt tourney while there was another 500pt tourney that weekend also as well as a 750pt one. the 2009 championship was a scaled tourney that apparently went from 500pts in the prelim rounds to 1000pts for the final (so you needed 1000pts to compete).

http://gencon.highprogrammer.com/gencon-indy-2005.cgi/group/Privateer_Press/Jason_Soles
http://gencon.highprogrammer.com/gencon-indy-2009.cgi/type/NMN/Warmachine-%252F-Hordes
http://privateerpress.com/company/gen-con-masters-2009-crank-it-up-a-notch

I'm surprised at how well Games Workshop is weathering the economic storm, to be honest. To be down that little in the grand scheme of things is quite an accomplishment.

I know people get disgusted with price raises - it's an easy target. Here's the reality that I see. Minis war gaming is a niche, shrinking market. Every year, there are fewer and fewer people willing to purchase a ton of miniatures, paint them, set aside hours to meet friends and play, etc. I think before the days of cable, internet, computer games...minis gaming was a fun, social exercise for geeks. Now? Well, we have lots of choices.

Stuck with a relatively static market, a company has few choices. Certainly, one option would be to broaden the market - advertising, for example, Frankly, I think that's madness. It's over $1 million to do any campaign on TV. Given their revenue, I think throwing around several million dollars would be risky - at best.

Now, I've got a little glimpse into marketing and hobby games. One report I saw was that hard core geek types don't have the same price ceilings as other purchasers. This is why all of a sudden hard cover RPG books jumped from $20 to $40; there was a negligible effect on sales. Geeks want what they want. It's as core to them as food, gas, rent, etc.

Given that insight, and no doubt reams of data from previous price increases, Games Workshop' least risky move is to raise prices. I hazard to guess a dollar here, a dime there doesn't effect them much...but the cumulative effect has definitely been to increase the barrier of entry to the hobby. A starting player has a pretty daunting amount of money to spend no matter what.

Lucky for GW, no game has really stepped up (Warmachine I think is the closest in sales). But even Warmachine is vastly different than Warhammer fantasy/40k. It's a far more thinking game, IMHO and really hits the hardest of the hard core. Just my 2 cents there.

Personally I think GW's future is in 1) computer games 2) digital entertainment. Unfortunately, they've licensed out their two IP's, so they don't get the lion's share of the profits on the former. On the latter, they're starting to get their books up (though oddly not on Kindle). The movie was another license deal, though I'm aware it's REALLY tricky to make money on movies. I'd also get up some digitial comics (costs maybe $10K for a writer/artist/inker/etc. - sell it for $1.99 online, no physical copies).

Another good shot would be to invest in games that have the same "gotta buy them all" mentality, but have a smaller financial hurdle. Warmachine has got this down pat; lots of different units, but squad based gameplay. Or a combo card game minis game (think Bakugan).

Just waiting to go into a meeting right now so I had time to kill to put down my thoughts about GW. Sadly, I think a lot about it!

They're weathering it like they weather everything else - with their heads in the sand.

NELS1031 wrote:Someone dropped the ball, and it started with the Beastmen releases. I look at the Skaven army book and its models/rules then to my beloved Beastmen models/rules, and its just depressing.

We sure got the sculpting "B" team on that one, didn't we?

BrassScorpion wrote:It seems that getting stores into profitability in all their main markets is futile and every year they are down enough in some areas to bring the whole thing down. This has got to be scary for investors and it's certainly scary for customers concerned about GW's future. One thing is certain, they can't cut any more "fat" from the stores, they already slashed everything to the bone when they went to the one-man store system earlier this year.

Just seems to me that the fundamental question that GW has to answer internally is whether it's a manufacturer or retailer in a given market. The strategy about the stores seems to change like Tzeentch. And right now in the U.S., I dunno that they're effective as customer recruitment OR a retail outlet. One-man stores in lower-traffic strip malls isn't a good recruitment strategy, but limited products in stores, etc. isn't a good retail strategy either. Americans expect company specialty stores to carry the entire line and more.

Perhaps the chain makes a lot of sense in the U.K., but in the U.S. it sure seems to make more sense to focus on trade sales and maybe operate a small number of larger destination stores in the right metro markets. But what do I know? *shrug*

I don't want to see them fail...I hope they get it sorted out. But they sure seem to have bled a lot of talent in recent years, which isn't a good sign.

And I agree with others re: advertising. I think there are some more creative things they could do on the marketing side, but traditional advertising in the way most of you are probably thinking of it is enormously expensive. And what's more, their target audience is small and hard to target efficiently. Which essentially makes it even more expensive. If they were my client I'd be looking for much cheaper, more creative avenues than TV advertising, etc.

gorgon wrote:If they were my client I'd be looking for much cheaper, more creative avenues than TV advertising, etc.

TV advertising would be prohibitively expensive, and it is likely that radio advertising would be equally as pricey for a company like GW. Internet advertising on the other hand is something that they haven't embraced - not even on their own website (effective advertising that is - not the ham-fisted 'What's new Today' bullgak which is no different to WD in the way it ends every 'helpful' article with 3-6 links to buy things).

GW needs to embrace the Internet, something they clearly still regard as a 'fad' or 'curiosity' and get out there. It may be a little redundant to do it here, but could you imagine GW advertising in that little banner ad up the top right of your screens? Right now I've got an ad for Wayland Games there. Why couldn't it be GW? Why couldn't it be GW at half a dozen big 40K/gaming sites? Would it be good for the banner ad to change the closer we got to a big release (eg. 'Coming Soon - The Eldar's Dark Kin Arise, coming November '10') and so on? Does it not happen because we mention other games, and GW hates to be reminded of the fact that they aren't the hobby but just part of it?

GW's use of the internet is anaemic. They remind me of all the small business out there that have their own badly designed website and think that people actually care about the 'About Us' section and have spent a lot of time writing it when all customers really care about is the 'What can you do for me?' part.

sourclams wrote:By my estimation WM/H is somewhere around half price versus 40k for competitive play and it scales much more easily so getting a 15 point starter box game going versus a complete newcomer is easier than playing a 500 point equivalent in 40k.

In a 35 point list I tend to feature 1 Warlock kit, 2-3 Beasts kits, and 1 Unit kit plus 2-3 solos or unit attachments. Full retail, excluding starter box discounts, that's around $225-$275.

Let's just look at the vehicles I'd need for... I don't know... 1500 pts of Chaos.

Rhinos run about $30 apiece retail, so just the rhinos for my troops would probably be $120 or more. I'm halfway to my WM/H total and I've bought less than 10% of the list's total point cost...!

Morphability of a WM/H army is a lot more dramatic as warlocks tend to impact the playstyle of a list so much. I could change a warlock and swap a single unit and a beast or two (cost: $100-$150) and now I've got a distinct and completely different list, like going from Green Tide to Nob Bikers. To do that in 1500 pts of 40k you almost need to buy another list entirely.

Can you sink a huge amount of money into PP, Malifaux, or any other game system? Yes, absolutely, but the analogue in 40k would be buying 5,000 pts of the model line. Maybe there's an even more expensive minis hobby than what GW puts out, but for my store/area GW is clearly at the top of the price scale.

Round of applause for sourclams for most blatantly skewed price comparisson seen today! I do like particularly how you singled out possibly the worst bang/buck ratio model in an army to 'prove' your point.

1,500 points of Chaos eh? Why not start with say, 2 squads of 10 Chaos Marines, and a Chaos Lord Kit. Terminators..now they are a pretty decent bang/buck ratio, and fairly effective in the game. And hey, you know what, you could always, you know, use a Batallion as a starting point. Hell, why not drop in a Landraider? It's a hefty amount of points, fulfils the role of one of the Rhinos, and is a solid in game investment to boot! No? Getting too far from your 'point?'

Apologies.

I really should check my logic at the door.

Because you know, I've got a Fantasy army. Ogres it be. Consists of 2 Batallions, 1 Tyrant, 1 Slaughter Master, 2 boxes of Ironguts, and 3 Forgeworld Rhinox Riders. That's a healthy 3,000 point right there, and you know what...it's a pretty cheap (going on todays prices) £250ish, straight from GW. And you know what, I get a lot more variety out of this particular army than your Warmachine one. See, I can play 'lets go for the cheapest possible option' as well.

warboss wrote:i agree with you that you have to consider the total price but that doesn't mean you should just ignore the individual fig price.

I think I have to disagree with you on this point. For a new player (the entry level) the fig price isn't going to matter if he has to buy 4x as many. $200 can get you into WM/H right alongside the vets. $200 doesn't get you anywhere in 40k, except committed to spending the other $400 to buy the other 75% of your force.

the other games have been around a fraction of the time 40k has. i don't play warmachine so i'll rely on my fellow dakkites... are "standard" WM games bigger in model cost/count than they were when the game first started out? i realize the point scale completely changed which is why i'm specifying model count. if so, do you think the "average" model count will go up or down in 5-10 years? 40k didn't start out with such a high relative entry price; its gotten bigger and bigger to generate sales with every edition and i'd suspect the other companies are following the same dastardly gameplan.

I didn't play Mk1, but it *seems* that model count is roughly the same. Further, the main mechanic in WM/H is that a central character, the "warlock/warcaster", has a battlegroup of warbeasts/warjacks which they allocate limited resources to. The allocation of those resources largely determines how well the battlegroup functions. If you simply up the size of the battlegroup, you dilute the effectiveness of any single model within it (for the most part).

You'd have to fundamentally change the way much of the game works to have the same sort of model "creep" that GW has exhibited between editions (IG, for example, upped vehicle inclusion by 50% or more between editions; PP couldn't sustain that kind of Warjack volume).

It simply doesn't work out mathematically, either. If you drop model point cost for GW by 10% (so a 2000 pt list becomes a 2200 pt list) you can gain at least 1 full squad or a new vehicle (maybe two). If you do the same for Warmachine/Hordes, you get 3-5 points to spend on units or heavies that average 6-11 points.

Just one note, WM/H changed their point costings with MKII, so the common levels are 35 / 50 points now (rather than something like 500 points) even though the force is a similar size.

sourclams wrote:I didn't play Mk1, but it *seems* that model count is roughly the same. Further, the main mechanic in WM/H is that a central character, the "warlock/warcaster", has a battlegroup of warbeasts/warjacks which they allocate limited resources to. The allocation of those resources largely determines how well the battlegroup functions. If you simply up the size of the battlegroup, you dilute the effectiveness of any single model within it (for the most part).

the championship tournament size effectively doubled (see my post above) before MkII. in 2005 (the first year), it was 500pts. in 2009 (the last year under mkI), it scaled up to 1000pts. tournament sizes tend (not always but *tend to*) reflect average game sizes.

Mr Mystery wrote:Round of applause for sourclams for most blatantly skewed price comparisson seen today! I do like particularly how you singled out possibly the worst bang/buck ratio model in an army to 'prove' your point.

...snip...

Because you know, I've got a Fantasy army. Ogres it be. Consists of 2 Batallions, 1 Tyrant, 1 Slaughter Master, 2 boxes of Ironguts, and 3 Forgeworld Rhinox Riders. That's a healthy 3,000 point right there, and you know what...it's a pretty cheap (going on todays prices) £250ish, straight from GW. And you know what, I get a lot more variety out of this particular army than your Warmachine one. See, I can play 'lets go for the cheapest possible option' as well.

Yeah, I was a bit hyperbolic.

So let's look at your example.

250 British pounds using today's forex at 1.54 dollar/pound is $385.

So your "cheap" army is over $100 more than the average starter WM/H list.

Thanks for agreeing with me?

Now go build me a 2k mech IG list and see how the prices stack up.

International Man of Mystery wrote:Because you know, I've got a Fantasy army. Ogres it be. Consists of 2 Batallions, 1 Tyrant, 1 Slaughter Master, 2 boxes of Ironguts, and 3 Forgeworld Rhinox Riders. That's a healthy 3,000 point right there, and you know what...it's a pretty cheap (going on todays prices) £250ish, straight from GW. And you know what, I get a lot more variety out of this particular army than your Warmachine one. See, I can play 'lets go for the cheapest possible option' as well.

Hey! I already said this...

Not a Man of Mystery wrote:Of course, you can do some similar things for GW as well (buy 2 ogre battalion boxes, convert the leadbelchers into bulls, and convert your own characters, for example)

That is the best deal for a GW fantasy army right now... I've been recommending it to new players a lot . However, I don't agree about it having a lot of variety, at least not from the lists I've seen drawn up for it.

sourclams wrote:

Mr Mystery wrote:Because you know, I've got a Fantasy army. Ogres it be. Consists of 2 Batallions, 1 Tyrant, 1 Slaughter Master, 2 boxes of Ironguts, and 3 Forgeworld Rhinox Riders. That's a healthy 3,000 point right there, and you know what...it's a pretty cheap (going on todays prices) £250ish, straight from GW. And you know what, I get a lot more variety out of this particular army than your Warmachine one. See, I can play 'lets go for the cheapest possible option' as well.

Yeah, I was a bit hyperbolic.

So let's look at your example.

250 British pounds using today's forex at 1.54 dollar/pound is $385.

So your "cheap" army is over $100 more than the average starter WM/H list.

Thanks for agreeing with me?

Now go build me a 2k mech IG list and see how the prices stack up.

um... then don't compare it to a "starter" list since 3,000pts (his stated army size) is not a "starter" force in WHFB. 2000pts seems to be the average fantasy game i've seen and his army is 150% bigger and, using your own numbers, 150% more expensive. not that great of an example for your case...

I was able to make a WoC list for around 150 quid. It focused heavily on Knights and other expensive things, but it was cheap, and almost all plastic. We're off topic here, but I think the price comparison between PP and GW is completely fair. I'm often put off buying PP models from sticker shock.
Where they have an advantage is that something interesting comes out every month, with rules. GW do their "second wave" shtick, but it's not as effective because there's no new rules buzz to go with it. I mean, sure some people will buy them, but nothing gets people excited like a codex or army book release, and that is still happening far too infrequently for no particularly good reason, and the books that come out are poorly edited.
They have started FAQ'ing properly though, which is great.

sourclams wrote:

Mr Mystery wrote:Round of applause for sourclams for most blatantly skewed price comparisson seen today! I do like particularly how you singled out possibly the worst bang/buck ratio model in an army to 'prove' your point.

...snip...

Because you know, I've got a Fantasy army. Ogres it be. Consists of 2 Batallions, 1 Tyrant, 1 Slaughter Master, 2 boxes of Ironguts, and 3 Forgeworld Rhinox Riders. That's a healthy 3,000 point right there, and you know what...it's a pretty cheap (going on todays prices) £250ish, straight from GW. And you know what, I get a lot more variety out of this particular army than your Warmachine one. See, I can play 'lets go for the cheapest possible option' as well.

Yeah, I was a bit hyperbolic.

So let's look at your example.

250 British pounds using today's forex at 1.54 dollar/pound is $385.

So your "cheap" army is over $100 more than the average starter WM/H list.

Thanks for agreeing with me?

Now go build me a 2k mech IG list and see how the prices stack up.

Basic Ogre Army, consisting of 6 Bulls, 4 Ironguts, 4 Leadbelchers, 24 Gnoblars and a Bruiser to lead it all? £73.50. And yes, I can quite happily make that into a 1,000 point army.

GW do their "second wave" shtick, but it's not as effective because there's no new rules buzz to go with it.

Would you rather go back to the old model, where you had to wait 5 years (or more) for new models AND rules?

No. I'd rather they work faster. That may sound a bit unreasonable, but look at their competitors. They manage.

I'm sure they could always get the guy who did the minotaurs, razorgor, and all the Daemons to do more models...

If it means getting less of that, then I'd rather wait. We don't need any more contenders for "worst models of all time."

Sidstyler wrote:Would you rather go back to the old model, where you had to wait 5 years (or more) for new models AND rules?

I'd rather a middle ground - Wave releases so that it's not 5 years between drinks but a guarantee that all things in the Codex will get a model (like during part of 3rd Ed, where everything got a model - Necrons, Tau, etc.). What we have no might as well be 2nd Ed - where releases were as random as they were likely.

You'll note, I was talking about rules releases.

And rules for hand-in-hand with model releases.

H.B.M.C. wrote:

Sidstyler wrote:Would you rather go back to the old model, where you had to wait 5 years (or more) for new models AND rules?

I'd rather a middle ground - Wave releases so that it's not 5 years between drinks but a guarantee that all things in the Codex will get a model (like during part of 3rd Ed, where everything got a model - Necrons, Tau, etc.). What we have no might as well be 2nd Ed - where releases were as random as they were likely.

The plan is indeed to produce models for every entry.

Take the Skaven. If my rather shaky memory serves, all we need now is a Warlitter, Giant Pox Rat and Bonebreaker mount, and I think that's about it. Bound to be overlooking something though.

H.B.M.C.: Fair cop, guv'nor.

warboss wrote:

sourclams wrote:I didn't play Mk1, but it *seems* that model count is roughly the same. Further, the main mechanic in WM/H is that a central character, the "warlock/warcaster", has a battlegroup of warbeasts/warjacks which they allocate limited resources to. The allocation of those resources largely determines how well the battlegroup functions. If you simply up the size of the battlegroup, you dilute the effectiveness of any single model within it (for the most part).

the championship tournament size effectively doubled (see my post above) before MkII. in 2005 (the first year), it was 500pts. in 2009 (the last year under mkI), it scaled up to 1000pts. tournament sizes tend (not always but *tend to*) reflect average game sizes.

Honestly, Masters has rarely reflected the standard for Privateer games. A quick glance at Privateer's events board will show that the vast majority of their events are 35-50 points, roughly equivalent to the 500 and 750 games of Mk. I.

We always used to play 35. 50 was for when we had a bit of extra time or were feeling the need to do silly stuff. YMMV.

12thRonin wrote:@Warboss:
Yes price per model may be the same but when you look at the total you need to outlay to play, it's far cheaper any way you look at it since you can't play with just a unit of stormtroopers or just a unit of Winter Guard. You can't compare model prices between WM and 40k because it's not relevant. That squad of Winter Guard is close to 30% of a 35 point tournament force by itself before you put any attachments to it. The stormtroopers are under 10% of a 1500 point force.

Respectfully, you're absolutely wrong here, actually.

You CAN compare them, you just have to be clear on WHAT you're comparing.
Either you compare a "buy in" cost, which would be the required books and models for a basic force, or you compare the "per piece" cost.

Warboss clearly stated that the "buy in" cost of other games was cheaper, then illustrated (WELL, IMO) the "per piece" cost for the respective games.
Clearly, while GW games have a higher overall investment requirement, they're not overly expensive when comparing model to model, side by side.

Eric

H.B.M.C. wrote:

gorgon wrote:If they were my client I'd be looking for much cheaper, more creative avenues than TV advertising, etc.

TV advertising would be prohibitively expensive, and it is likely that radio advertising would be equally as pricey for a company like GW. Internet advertising on the other hand is something that they haven't embraced - not even on their own website (effective advertising that is - not the ham-fisted 'What's new Today' bullgak which is no different to WD in the way it ends every 'helpful' article with 3-6 links to buy things).

GW needs to embrace the Internet, something they clearly still regard as a 'fad' or 'curiosity' and get out there. It may be a little redundant to do it here, but could you imagine GW advertising in that little banner ad up the top right of your screens? Right now I've got an ad for Wayland Games there. Why couldn't it be GW? Why couldn't it be GW at half a dozen big 40K/gaming sites? Would it be good for the banner ad to change the closer we got to a big release (eg. 'Coming Soon - The Eldar's Dark Kin Arise, coming November '10') and so on? Does it not happen because we mention other games, and GW hates to be reminded of the fact that they aren't the hobby but just part of it?

Internet marketing is one. Actually attending events is another. Heck, I'd be trying borderline guerrilla marketing stuff if it was me. Why not a staged and safe -- but seemingly random and spontaneous -- "battle" between guys in SM and CSM armor at the San Diego Comic-Con? You think that'd go viral? LOL.

And perhaps I shouldn't be giving ideas to GW about how to be more draconian, but you'd think it would have occurred to those at the Reichstag that a good way to exert some influence with the owners of hobby sites is to be a key advertiser at said sites. Actually, it's not even about being draconian, it's about understanding that a community exists and that they should be USING it and interfacing with it to support their business. But again, they don't really understand or even recognize the "community" properly. Their ideas about a company's relationship with its customers seem about two decades out of date, I dunno.

They remind me of all the small business out there that have their own badly designed website and think that people actually care about the 'About Us' section and have spent a lot of time writing it when all customers really care about is the 'What can you do for me?' part.

In my professional opinion and experience, even large companies sometimes fail to understand this point. Unfortunately there are those inside organizations who view and use marketing as some kind of ego stroke instead of for legitimate business reasons. Hence a lot of well-produced but expensive and ultimately ineffective TV campaigns, etc. But hey, said CEO gets to brag to his buddies about the new TV spots, or read how wonderful his leadership is on the web site. *shrug*

Not complaining, per se...as long as stupid clients are paying clients, creative professionals and ad agencies, etc. will happily take the work.

Mr Mystery wrote:Basic Ogre Army, consisting of 6 Bulls, 4 Ironguts, 4 Leadbelchers, 24 Gnoblars and a Bruiser to lead it all? £73.50. And yes, I can quite happily make that into a 1,000 point army.

I hate to beat on this dead horse, but the danger of using models-only analysis on this is that for any GW "cheap" army, you are still looking at a USD $100 output for the army book and rulebook (and/or Island of Blood) before you can play. Island of Blood gives a nice boost for High Elves. Skaven, not so much, as you still need a metric crap-ton of rats to fill out the regiments due to their miniscule points cost. PP doesn't have this entry barrier as you can download the quickstart from the interwebs (included in starter boxes) and play immediately with the included stat-cards. The rulebook is half the cost of the GW book, and the army books are entirely optional.

Competitive (and by competitive, I mean, tournament ready) "Starter army" costs are reasonably flat across the entire PP range, while effective and economical armies within GW's range are heavily dependent on which armies have the good choices available (or convertable) from plastic. The statcard mechanism also means that players aren't waiting for a new book to use their models. GW used to do this by printing rules in White Dwarf (and/or the internet), but general resist doing this as they believe this process is too onerous for casual players.

At any rate, getting back on topic - just because GW does some things right, doesn't mean that their business strategy on the whole is on the right track. Despite their model making wizardry, their balance sheet seems to be unerringly headed towards the toilet.

The initial rulebook, or all those extra ones they release every year, you know, the ones you *need* to buy to stay up to date?

how much did a complete set of Mk1 books cost?

Anyone?

Bueller?

Bueller?

@MrMystery: Are you being intentionally obtuse?

You can play without any of the additional supplements as all models ship with their stat-cards. The supplements are a good read, but hardly necessary. I went through all of MK1 with just the first two, and in MK2, I own a grand total of 0 army books, depite having sizable armies (100 points +) in all the WM factions.

And yet if you wished to use the newer stuff toward the end of Mk1?

It's you being obtuse. You are deliberately showing one in the best possible light, and trying to show the other to be more expensive.

Hell, for £60 I can grab me the full rules for the game, and two decent starting forces. Add on the books, and it's still just under £100.

Mr Mystery wrote:And yet if you wished to use the newer stuff toward the end of Mk1?

Then you just bought the newer stuff you wanted, the rules were (and still are) packaged with the model.

So why produce the books at all?

This is what I don't get. I would rather have the rules I require in just two books (rule and army book) than have to lug around lots of books, or worry about cards. Two books, sheet of paper and all is well.

And what if you wanted to check out a new addition? Buy the book for the rules, or buy the (expensive) model for the rules, and pray it doesn't completely suck?

@MrMystery: Come come now, I didn't think that the idea that players are able to immediately use new release PP models (rulebook-free) becaues the rules are INCLUDED with the model was such a hard concept to grasp.

I'm not trying to paint the situation in any sort of light. Just trying to correct what appears to be an error in your understanding of how PP works its rules releases.

Mr Mystery wrote:And what if you wanted to check out a new addition? Buy the book for the rules, or buy the (expensive) model for the rules, and pray it doesn't completely suck?

If you 'need' the model to 'stay up to date' then you already know it has good rules, or else you wouldn't 'need' it.

Mr Mystery wrote:So why produce the books at all?

This is what I don't get. I would rather have the rules I require in just two books (rule and army book) than have to lug around lots of books, or worry about cards. Two books, sheet of paper and all is well.

And what if you wanted to check out a new addition? Buy the book for the rules, or buy the (expensive) model for the rules, and pray it doesn't completely suck?

Are you familiar with the system at all, or do you just heap scorn on it?

The cards are necessary for damage and other book-keeping tasks. New unit stats are spoiled in the No Quarter magazine and usually math-hammered on the internet. If you have a local retailer, looking at the card is usually no harder than asking if you can open the unsealed model box (and or snap-tite blister).

The books, while optional, contain hobby tips, campaign suggestions, fluff (army organization, alt paint schemes etc). They're not needed, but certainly can enrich the hobby for some.

I have played Warmachine, and really didn't enjoy it. Not my style of gaming.

All I'm challlenging here is the claim that it's an inherently cheaper game to play. Apologies if this seems a little insulting, but the smaller the army, the quicker you tire of it, as it's lack of size necessarily equates to a lack of options (something which I feel the Warcaster centric nature of Warmahordes only exasperates). So you add a new model. A pricey new model if peoples comments are to be believed. Then you tire of that, and add another. The whole design of Warmahordes seems to hinge on this, from my perspective.

So sure, you might need fewer models to play any given game, but what is the size of the average collection, because I don't believe for a second anyone goes '35 points, and that's me'. We're nerds. That just doesn't happen with us.

Does it happen with 40k either? I don't think I've seen anyone collect just the bare bones of a single 1500 point army either.

Welll that's the question.

I'll stick with my aforementioned Ogre army (little further up for reference) that I actually own, and I've been using it since the dawn of 8th Edition. 3,000 points, £250ish of models (with £90 of that being the Rhinox!). That's a big old army, and I can break it down into smaller forces if I wish. Yet to get anywhere near bored of my standard force (there is something about a horde of Ironguts that makes me giggle!). As such with this army and speaking personally I don't think I'll be adding much to it. Of course that might change when I get a new Army Book (possibly this year, maybe 2012). But not in the forseeable future.

So this is only speaking from my own perspective. The people in my usual gaming group are much the same. I guess we all put a lot of thought into what we want in our army before buying, something the Warmahordes style of releases makes an awful lot harder.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also probably worth noting I am not one for Tournaments. Thus, any perceived 'meta' has no real effect on me, so I personally have less impetus to keep up with trends. I'll just keep slugging away with my usual force, barring the odd tweak here and there (for instance, right now I'm not using the Gnoblars or the Leadbelchers). Someone who feels keeping with the 'meta' is an important part of maintaining an edge on their opponents is likely to get very different milage out of any given unit/army than I.

gorgon wrote:Internet marketing is one. Actually attending events is another. Heck, I'd be trying borderline guerrilla marketing stuff if it was me. Why not a staged and safe -- but seemingly random and spontaneous -- "battle" between guys in SM and CSM armor at the San Diego Comic-Con? You think that'd go viral? LOL.

This goes back to what I said about GW's self perception as the hobby and not as a company that is part of a wider hobby (that being 'Table Top Miniature Wargames'). As long as they view themselves as an entity unto themselves - something special and unique that no one out there even comes close to matching - this will never change and they will never attend events. Let's break down GW and events into two categories:

1. GW's Own Events.
2. Events everyone but GW goes to.

Starting with the later, things like Gen-Con and even growing conventions like PAX, GW has no presence because in their minds having a booth next to Wyrd Miniatures or Steve Jackson Games makes them feel 'less than' (and that's not a dig at Wyrd or Steve Jackson - I'm not saying they are 'less than'). They want to appear to be special, different, above and unique compared to everyone else, so attending a non-GW event would be akin to a concession that they are just 'another' miniatures company. Of course, GW's pathological need to be a hobby unto themselves and to never ever mix with the 'masses' of the miniature world is pants-on-head slowed (to quote Yhatzee) because even the biggest companies that would like to be above the rest or even consider themselves above the rest still show up to trade shows. Take E3. I'm sure Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft really hate the fact that they have to share hall-space with one another and would love to be the only console and game maker on the market, but they accept the realities of the situation and promote the ever-loving gak out of their products to maintain market dominance. GW does nothing of the sort, pretends that other companies don't exist, won't associate with other companies, and takes their audience for granted - no promotion outside of their useless monthly magazine and their fumbling website 'articles'.

And now GW's own events. I could forgive a lot of the above if GW made up for their own short-sightedness by using their own annual trade shows (Games Days!) as 'their' way of promoting the 'Games Workshop Hobby'. Unfortunately, they don't. Again, they take their audience for granted, they don't preview anything new, they do nothing to generate buzz about upcoming releases because they are petrified of people having even the slightest clue of what's about to be released. So we'll get nice cabinets full of wonderfully 'Evy Metal painted miniatures... all of which you can buy from the little kiosk to your left if you line up for 3 hours. The weirdest part though is that at these GW events we see a full-blown case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. What do I mean by that? Black Library and Forge World, that's what! These two groups do preview upcoming releases, they do show works in progress, they bring the designers and the writers and answer questions - they use word-of-mouth and the internet generate buzz. Think of all the threads we get after GW run events - the mainstream GW ones are bare, with tiny snippets of rumours, and the Forge World ones are multi-page multi-picture extravaganzas filled with new products, upcoming products and actual real news.

Does no one at GW see the problem there? The disconnect? If your own sub-companies are consistently doing what you, as the parent company, are failing to do at every step... then something has to change!!!

H.B.M.C. wrote:

gorgon wrote:Internet marketing is one. Actually attending events is another. Heck, I'd be trying borderline guerrilla marketing stuff if it was me. Why not a staged and safe -- but seemingly random and spontaneous -- "battle" between guys in SM and CSM armor at the San Diego Comic-Con? You think that'd go viral? LOL.

This goes back to what I said about GW's self perception as the hobby and not as a company that is part of a wider hobby (that being 'Table Top Miniature Wargames'). As long as they view themselves as an entity unto themselves - something special and unique that no one out there even comes close to matching - this will never change and they will never attend events. Let's break down GW and events into two categories:

1. GW's Own Events.
2. Events everyone but GW goes to.

Starting with the later, things like Gen-Con and even growing conventions like PAX, GW has no presence because in their minds having a booth next to Wyrd Miniatures or Steve Jackson Games makes them feel 'less than' (and that's not a dig at Wyrd or Steve Jackson - I'm not saying they are 'less than'). They want to appear to be special, different, above and unique compared to everyone else, so attending a non-GW event would be akin to a concession that they are just 'another' miniatures company. Of course, GW's pathological need to be a hobby unto themselves and to never ever mix with the 'masses' of the miniature world is pants-on-head slowed (to quote Yhatzee) because even the biggest companies that would like to be above the rest or even consider themselves above the rest still show up to trade shows. Take E3. I'm sure Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft really hate the fact that they have to share hall-space with one another and would love to be the only console and game maker on the market, but they accept the realities of the situation and promote the ever-loving gak out of their products to maintain market dominance. GW does nothing of the sort, pretends that other companies don't exist, won't associate with other companies, and takes their audience for granted - no promotion outside of their useless monthly magazine and their fumbling website 'articles'.

And now GW's own events. I could forgive a lot of the above if GW made up for their own short-sightedness by using their own annual trade shows (Games Days!) as 'their' way of promoting the 'Games Workshop Hobby'. Unfortunately, they don't. Again, they take their audience for granted, they don't preview anything new, they do nothing to generate buzz about upcoming releases because they are petrified of people having even the slightest clue of what's about to be released. So we'll get nice cabinets full of wonderfully 'Evy Metal painted miniatures... all of which you can buy from the little kiosk to your left if you line up for 3 hours. The weirdest part though is that at these GW events we see a full-blown case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. What do I mean by that? Black Library and Forge World, that's what! These two groups do preview upcoming releases, they do show works in progress, they bring the designers and the writers and answer questions - they use word-of-mouth and the internet generate buzz. Think of all the threads we get after GW run events - the mainstream GW ones are bare, with tiny snippets of rumours, and the Forge World ones are multi-page multi-picture extravaganzas filled with new products, upcoming products and actual real news.

Does no one at GW see the problem there? The disconnect? If your own sub-companies are consistently doing what you, as the parent company, are failing to do at every step... then something has to change!!!

Is it wrong that I want to feth you so hard right now?

I hope you mean that in a good way...

Umm...

Maybe next time just say "+1".

Exactly.





And yet GW is as blind as an astropath.

H.B.M.C. wrote: Of course, GW's pathological need to be a hobby unto themselves and to never ever mix with the 'masses' of the miniature world is pants-on-head slowed (to quote Yhatzee) because even the biggest companies that would like to be above the rest or even consider themselves above the rest still show up to trade shows.

are you going to start talking about branston pickles now? I remember the days when GW used to run events and have a big presence at gencon back in the 90's. I seriously doubt the sales they had there and goodwill they garnered were somehow detrimental to their business model.

HBMC- I couldnt have oput that better, you hit the nail on the head mate! Unfortunately I afraid that for all your and others words of wisdom GW simply don't give a f..k as they know better (at least till their sales will really srat crumbling.. which is bound to happen I think).

warboss wrote:are you going to start talking about branston pickles now?

I know the guy lives here in Oz, but Branston Pickle must be an English thing 'cause I have no idea what it is. Some... spead... thing... stuff. Yeah.

warboss wrote:I remember the days when GW used to run events and have a big presence at gencon back in the 90's. I seriously doubt the sales they had there and goodwill they garnered were somehow detrimental to their business model.

Remember the phrase 'There's no such thing as bad publicity'. Well, it's mostly true, except when you do something like... oh I dunno... sue every Blood Bowl site on the web? To put it another way, I can't imagine it would take much to promote GW better than they are, but I just can't fathom why they don't do it themselves.

Is is arrogance (ie. what I mentioned about their own self-image as the 'Hobby' rather than being part of the hobby).
Is it incompetence? I can't imagine a company with such a niche market would survive for as long as it has by dumb luck. Someone there has to have a clue.
Is it apathy? Maybe they really don't care about us and other companies as long as they make enough profit each yeah to keep the machine grinding?

Or is it all three combined?

Whether TV, radio, internet, print media, conventions or their own Games Days: GW's higher management has the same easy going relationship to the public as North Korean's politicians.
If they were on vacation for half a year, sales would rise dramaticly

BTW: I watched a Warmachine demo game: No terrain, no scenario. And if you shoot the caster, the game is over. Not my cup of tea, whatever the price. But that's off topic of course.

H.B.M.C. wrote:I hope you mean that in a good way...

Umm...

Maybe next time just say "+1".

Because "+1" isn't nearly as fun, obviously.

I mean, this topic has made me look at my miniatures purchase from the past few months, and short of a Forgeworld Biker Boss that I bought from a friend more than 4 months ago, I can't think of a single new model that I've bought by Games Workshop or its subsidiaries that goes past the bits that I bought for my truescale conversions, and that was even longer ago. And yet I can't wait for my Raging Heroes Manticore to arrive, and I've recently been scooping up Anima Tactics models (and the rulebook... which is absolutely beautiful, by the way) like the new crack.

Mind you, I've only been into wargaming for 2-and-a-half years now, but looking back, not only has my purchasing changed dramatically (from buying almost entirely GW to buying more and more into other companies, such as Cipher, Reaper, and Gamezone). And one of the biggest differences I see in this short period is that there's just nothing worth buying lately, and what is worth buying is released at such a choked rate that it's hard to really get interested in anything. Dark Eldar are a sight for sore eyes, but I'm not looking to make a large bulk purchase anymore. Hell, I've been even considering retiring my Grey Knights once the new book comes out depending on the rules just because I don't want to have to do massive bulk purchases that I know I'd likely have to make just to make the army playable again (and the guaranteed trivialization of Inquisitors doesn't help my interest either).

Two-and-a-half years ago, this wasn't the case. When I got into the hobby, not only did 5th ed just release, but Orkz and Daemons were fresh, and Space Marines had just come out of the oven. And not too far apart from one another either. Hell, we actually knew what was coming too and this was only 2 years ago.

I still remember the days where I'd browse GW's site just comparing prices and boxes considering starting a new army or eagerly expanding an old one. But lately... I just don't do that. They have no reason for me to go to their website. Hardly any real news. Hell, I just checked the site for old time's sake (and to remember what armies were coming out two years ago ), and short of the new Skaven wave (which I assume would be fantastic if I were a Skaven player, which I'm not, so that does nothing for me) is some releasing and repackaging of old kits. That's embarassing.

I mean, in short, I guess I'm just saying that GW seem to like to make it harder and harder for me to be interested in them.

Fafnir wrote:I mean, this topic has made me look at my miniatures purchase from the past few months, and short of a Forgeworld Biker Boss that I bought from a friend more than 4 months ago, I can't think of a single new model that I've bought by Games Workshop or its subsidiaries that goes past the bits that I bought for my truescale conversions, and that was even longer ago. And yet I can't wait for my Raging Heroes Manticore to arrive, and I've recently been scooping up Anima Tactics models (and the rulebook... which is absolutely beautiful, by the way) like the new crack.

That's interesting because I'm in a similar position. I'm trying to think of all the GW stuff I bought last year. There was a Shine of the Aquila... was Planetstrike last year? No, that was 2009, along with Space Hulk. So a Shrine of the Aquila, two Trygons (still unbuilt), and I did get some FW items as a Birthday Gift, plus two Vendetta kits to convert two of the Valks I bought back at the start of '09. Did buy some Mordheim Amazons and Necromunda Ratskins. That's it...

But in the past year I now have a near 100% 'Counts As' Adeptus Mechanicus army using mostly Micro-Art Studios minis (with a few Scibor releases thrown in for fun). I've also started buying non-GW terrain (Pegasus Gothic Buildings - they're AWESOME), and put a lot of effort into sourcing non-GW minis and loads of non-GW terrain products like D&D Tiles, Paizo Flipmats and Gale Force 9 maps. Hell, even got some OOP Mongoose Star Ship Trooper maps the other day. I'm buying a lot of non GW stuff... and aside from some Bloodcrushers and some Gargoyles there's really nothing GW makes that I want right now.

Now, granted, I've been playing for a lot longer than you and have armies that range from 8,000 points to 30,000 points, so I don't 'need' as much stuff. But 'need' isn't the same as 'want' and I don't really 'want' anything from them.

Fafnir wrote:I mean, in short, I guess I'm just saying that GW seem to like to make it harder and harder for me to be interested in them.

Careful now, or you'll find yourself being sigged!!!

H.B.M.C. wrote:
Careful now, or you'll find yourself being sigged!!!

Is that the flutter of butterflies in my stomach? I sure hope it is, because if it's not, then it might just be stomach cancer.

Oh, and just to add some substance to this post, one thing I realized when checking the GW website with the new Skaven release is that no one even talked about it. I mean, that just shows to me just how harmful their (nonexistant) marketing strategy is to their own business. Assuming I was a Skaven player, how would I even know that there was a new release? Sure, you might get some word from the guys at the local FLGS, but if you're like me and at a University 200 kilometers from your local FLGS for 8 months of the year, and the only FLGS that you frequent when you're at school doesn't exactly have enough room to accomodate all of GW's stock, as willing as I may be to buy, how the hell will I even know to buy it?

H.B.M.C. wrote:
This goes back to what I said about GW's self perception as the hobby and not as a company that is part of a wider hobby (that being 'Table Top Miniature Wargames'). As long as they view themselves as an entity unto themselves - something special and unique that no one out there even comes close to matching - this will never change and they will never attend events. Let's break down GW and events into two categories:

1. GW's Own Events.
2. Events everyone but GW goes to.

Starting with the later, things like Gen-Con and even growing conventions like PAX, GW has no presence because in their minds having a booth next to Wyrd Miniatures or Steve Jackson Games makes them feel 'less than' (and that's not a dig at Wyrd or Steve Jackson - I'm not saying they are 'less than'). They want to appear to be special, different, above and unique compared to everyone else, so attending a non-GW event would be akin to a concession that they are just 'another' miniatures company. Of course, GW's pathological need to be a hobby unto themselves and to never ever mix with the 'masses' of the miniature world is pants-on-head slowed (to quote Yhatzee) because even the biggest companies that would like to be above the rest or even consider themselves above the rest still show up to trade shows. Take E3. I'm sure Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft really hate the fact that they have to share hall-space with one another and would love to be the only console and game maker on the market, but they accept the realities of the situation and promote the ever-loving gak out of their products to maintain market dominance. GW does nothing of the sort, pretends that other companies don't exist, won't associate with other companies, and takes their audience for granted - no promotion outside of their useless monthly magazine and their fumbling website 'articles'.

And now GW's own events. I could forgive a lot of the above if GW made up for their own short-sightedness by using their own annual trade shows (Games Days!) as 'their' way of promoting the 'Games Workshop Hobby'. Unfortunately, they don't. Again, they take their audience for granted, they don't preview anything new, they do nothing to generate buzz about upcoming releases because they are petrified of people having even the slightest clue of what's about to be released. So we'll get nice cabinets full of wonderfully 'Evy Metal painted miniatures... all of which you can buy from the little kiosk to your left if you line up for 3 hours. The weirdest part though is that at these GW events we see a full-blown case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. What do I mean by that? Black Library and Forge World, that's what! These two groups do preview upcoming releases, they do show works in progress, they bring the designers and the writers and answer questions - they use word-of-mouth and the internet generate buzz. Think of all the threads we get after GW run events - the mainstream GW ones are bare, with tiny snippets of rumours, and the Forge World ones are multi-page multi-picture extravaganzas filled with new products, upcoming products and actual real news.

Does no one at GW see the problem there? The disconnect? If your own sub-companies are consistently doing what you, as the parent company, are failing to do at every step... then something has to change!!!

Quoted For Truth
+1 (or should I threaten to feth you also?)

H.B.M.C. wrote:

gorgon wrote:Internet marketing is one. Actually attending events is another. Heck, I'd be trying borderline guerrilla marketing stuff if it was me. Why not a staged and safe -- but seemingly random and spontaneous -- "battle" between guys in SM and CSM armor at the San Diego Comic-Con? You think that'd go viral? LOL.

This goes back to what I said about GW's self perception as the hobby and not as a company that is part of a wider hobby (that being 'Table Top Miniature Wargames'). As long as they view themselves as an entity unto themselves - something special and unique that no one out there even comes close to matching - this will never change and they will never attend events. Let's break down GW and events into two categories:

1. GW's Own Events.
2. Events everyone but GW goes to.

Starting with the later, things like Gen-Con and even growing conventions like PAX, GW has no presence because in their minds having a booth next to Wyrd Miniatures or Steve Jackson Games makes them feel 'less than' (and that's not a dig at Wyrd or Steve Jackson - I'm not saying they are 'less than'). They want to appear to be special, different, above and unique compared to everyone else, so attending a non-GW event would be akin to a concession that they are just 'another' miniatures company. Of course, GW's pathological need to be a hobby unto themselves and to never ever mix with the 'masses' of the miniature world is pants-on-head slowed (to quote Yhatzee) because even the biggest companies that would like to be above the rest or even consider themselves above the rest still show up to trade shows. Take E3. I'm sure Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft really hate the fact that they have to share hall-space with one another and would love to be the only console and game maker on the market, but they accept the realities of the situation and promote the ever-loving gak out of their products to maintain market dominance. GW does nothing of the sort, pretends that other companies don't exist, won't associate with other companies, and takes their audience for granted - no promotion outside of their useless monthly magazine and their fumbling website 'articles'.

And now GW's own events. I could forgive a lot of the above if GW made up for their own short-sightedness by using their own annual trade shows (Games Days!) as 'their' way of promoting the 'Games Workshop Hobby'. Unfortunately, they don't. Again, they take their audience for granted, they don't preview anything new, they do nothing to generate buzz about upcoming releases because they are petrified of people having even the slightest clue of what's about to be released. So we'll get nice cabinets full of wonderfully 'Evy Metal painted miniatures... all of which you can buy from the little kiosk to your left if you line up for 3 hours. The weirdest part though is that at these GW events we see a full-blown case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. What do I mean by that? Black Library and Forge World, that's what! These two groups do preview upcoming releases, they do show works in progress, they bring the designers and the writers and answer questions - they use word-of-mouth and the internet generate buzz. Think of all the threads we get after GW run events - the mainstream GW ones are bare, with tiny snippets of rumours, and the Forge World ones are multi-page multi-picture extravaganzas filled with new products, upcoming products and actual real news.

Does no one at GW see the problem there? The disconnect? If your own sub-companies are consistently doing what you, as the parent company, are failing to do at every step... then something has to change!!!

Plus one.

I think it all stems from the core fact that GW does not want to adapt to different situations- they expect their customers to adapt to GW. Hence continual price rises, making GW in emerging markets follow the same principles as GW UK with regards to advertising (you think GW advertising in the US is bad, try Japan) and their weird approach to conventions.

Kroothawk wrote:BTW: I watched a Warmachine demo game: No terrain, no scenario. And if you shoot the caster, the game is over. Not my cup of tea, whatever the price. But that's off topic of course.

I've only just started playing, Kroothawk, but I know you're supposed to have terrain, you can have scenarios, and the caster can transfer a limited amount of damage onto one of his warbeasts instead of taking it himself.

A lot of times it seems it does come down to a "caster kill", but there can be objectives, too.

As to the comment about less models meaning less complexity- from my few games so far, that just isn't true. I had to wrack my brain to make it through a 15 point game today, with only 3 models... there's just so much that each one can do for the others, the order to do things in matters, and there's just a lot of stuff going on.

/off-topic

Thus why I am moving off GW products and into the realm of other miniature games... I just can't stomach it anymore.

I have two young kids, and with the economy and job market how it is, I cannot justify spending 60 dollars on a single plastic tank for a game of toy soldiers. It is ridiculous. Yet, the prices continue to rise (even though GW is already turning a profit, surely a sign of gross overcharging for a niche market).

I cannot justify spending 60 dollars on a single plastic tank for a game of toy soldiers

You're not alone and a lot of fans, even long-term devotees with huge collections are finding it more difficult to deal with some of the prices. They keep releasing great new kits, but some of the pricing is egregious even to those of us who have happily supported GW for years.

keezus wrote:
The cards are necessary for damage and other book-keeping tasks. New unit stats are spoiled in the No Quarter magazine and usually math-hammered on the internet. If you have a local retailer, looking at the card is usually no harder than asking if you can open the unsealed model box (and or snap-tite blister).

The books, while optional, contain hobby tips, campaign suggestions, fluff (army organization, alt paint schemes etc). They're not needed, but certainly can enrich the hobby for some.

This is not actually entirely true. In mk1 in addition to the main rule book you needed:

Escalation for the following rules: Jack Marshall, Mercenary Warcasters and Warjacks, Replacing Model rules, Unit Attachments, and Weapon Crews.

Apotheosis for the following rules: Epic Warcasters, Jack Bonds, Elite Cadres, Unique Warjacks, Double-Hand Throw, Trample and believe it or not 750 point game sizes (which did not officially exist as a battle size until then).

Superiority for the following rules: Cavalry, Dragoons, expanded attachment rules, and Mercenary contracts. You could also get a rehash of the Epic Warcaster, Jack Bond, and Elite Cadre rules.

Legends for the following rules: Affinities, Allies, Cohorts, Epic Solos, Imprints, Light Cavalry, Tactics, Warcaster Attachments, and altered Mercenary Contracts.

Now you may not have needed the book to learn all these rules but obviously that is because you had somebody teach them to you. Nonetheless, somebody you play with absolutely had to purchase or read these books to be able to play a complete game of Mk1 Warmachine. No cavalry card had the complete cavalry rules written on them anymore than any epic caster had the epic caster rules or unit attachment had the attachment rules on them. So saying the expansion books were optional or weren't necessary to get the rules to play the game is incorrect.

You can certainly make an argument for it currently with mk2 but that will change as soon as Wrath comes out and somebody you know will have to read it to know how those battle engines work.

I have a friend similar to you who has never purchased a Warmachine book and does just fine having us teach him new rules. But then I also have a friend who doesn't own a 40k book and he plays a nasty chaos space marine list or three.

Man, I just had to go through 6 pages anxiously awaiting Kan to chime in. What gives?

LOL! Ok, that made me laugh.

It's ok though - we've had Dr_Mystery... sorry, Mr_Mystery to keep us well stocked on Pro-GW spin.

I wish GW was like Battlefront (makers of Flames of War). They know that if you make a decent product, people will buy it regardless. They have a balanced ruleset, excellent miniatures, and affordable prices (at least when compared to GW, and they are on the steep side of the 15mm scale). They know that it isn't their rules tweaks that sell the miniatures, so they don't mess around with little bumps in the rules that make the latest models the most powerful in the game. In fact, they don't even require you to play with their miniatures at sanctioned events, as long as the minis are in-scale. Shoot, they don't even invalidate their rules supplements (army lists and so forth) as long as you have the most current errata. I can use my out-of-print D-Minus-1 book to create a list if I want to, even though those lists are now in the D-Day compilation. Could you use a 3rd edition Codex from GW in a sanctioned event? Heck no!

I think GW is suffering from apathy, more than any other flaw, HBMC. They just don't give a crap about the consumer as long as they are turning a profit. Just like the Imperium in their fictional universe, they are satisfied to take and take from the masses until they run it right into the ground, which is eventually what is going to happen.

If their target market is young folks, how can these young folks convince their parents to buy them these 100+ dollar starter sets, when it isn't even half of what you need to really get into the game? You still have to buy the codex, another 600 points or so (for 40k) at the LEAST, just to have a playable force. And 500 points of that has to be vehicles (at 30 dollars for 50 points) to be competitive in the current mech trend (thinking IG and BA razorspam lists here).

Bleeding us dry, they are.

BrassScorpion wrote:

I cannot justify spending 60 dollars on a single plastic tank for a game of toy soldiers

You're not alone and a lot of fans, even long-term devotees with huge collections are finding it more difficult to deal with some of the prices. They keep releasing great new kits, but some of the pricing is egregious even to those of us who have happily supported GW for years.

agreed. my new years resolution for the second year running is to try and "recycle" the majority of my gaming budget via trades and selling existing stuff to fund new purchases. while that sucks a bit for my FLGS (which is a great place) since my new purchases won't be as high, i can at least stomach trading $60 of current retail value figs for a $60 tank because i only paid $35 for those figs in the first place back in the day. its twisted logic but it still gets me a new unit every once in a while while slowly decreasing Mt. Gaming Pile'o'crap in the basement.

Can I just say that it's nice to see this thread is free from the usual anti-GW Internet Hyperbole and, for once, seems to be a logical discussion of actual business flaws.

Well done Dakka. I can actually say "Stay classy" without meaning it ironically.

*anti-GW Internet Hyperbole*

I completely agree with the sentiments expressed in this thread; GW has successfully priced me out of their games, as a University Student simply does not have the kind of budget to blow on their products.
Instead, I find myself returning to Airfix kits- the original hook that led me to GW. Whilst their products are not quite the same quality, you can purchase a Tiger I tank and some infantry for less than £10. In comparison, a standard GW transport is double that. On its own. FW makes incredible models, but the price tag is so hefty that its a pipedream. It just isn't viable for me anymore.

The gaming experience has also changed beyond recognition. When I started, my FLGS contained a diverse group of players, ranging from younger beginners (as I was, bright eyed and awestruck) to grizzled Veterans. Games would be varied, with different scenarios and armies battling it out. WD had a series of scenarios printed in it, one involving flyers making ground attack runs, and another introduced the Objective markers and Generator.
Now- the Veterans have moved on. There is no hook for them. Nothing to keep them speculating about the upcoming release, one-man stores whose sole focus HAS to be sales, and with the FLGS gradually becoming a creche.

There are only three things that have me linked to GW nowadays. This exceptionable community. The few remaining figs I have yet to paint. And the upcoming Bequin trilogy by Abnett.
Sad, but true.

CadianXV wrote:*anti-GW Internet Hyperbole*
I completely agree with the sentiments expressed in this thread; GW has successfully priced me out of their games, as a University Student simply does not have the kind of budget to blow on their products.

See, you just gotta get hooked up with a job at an oil company over the summer

...but then again, even with the extra money I pull in, I still can't justify GW's prices. I mean, I know I can afford it, but at the current prices, I feel stupid for buying it.

The sense of elation in me when I found out that anima tactics minis averaged at $10 per blister cannot be measured.

I don't think it's apathy, so much as bloody-mindedness and willful blinkeredness. It seems to me that upper management at GW have a very rigid philosophy about how to run and grow the company, and have been utterly unwilling to adapt that to a changing world over the past 15 years or so.

There is no real reason for the retail stores to be losing money for them, other than poor management. If independent gaming stores can offer all that GW can (staff who know the hobby inside out, a full range of product, terrain and tables for casual play, painting advice), and more (other, related games and products -- even just other stuff that you can use for your GW games, like the Army Painter range), at lower prices, *and still turn a profit*, then GW are doing it horribly wrong!

If their own stores are doing badly -- drop them, and support independent retailers more, instead. (I know they already offer good support for independent retailers, but they could do more.)

If gamers want competitive, fair, balanced tournaments -- support that, with a competitive, fair, balanced ruleset. (I've referenced sirlin.net before for some state-of-the-art insight into competitive game design, which GW tend to ignore even the basics of).

If gamers who love your fluff, have big armies, still play, still read 40K books, still buy related games like the FFG licensed ones and the computer games... aren't buying your minis any more... there are several solutions, that can work in concert. Talk to your customers. Not on forums, probably, but do market research of established customers. Find out what's up. Then, figure out what they want -- have they got enough minis already, really? Sell them the other stuff -- more licensed products (IN YOUR SHOPS), amazing hobby events that you can sell tickets for (BUT IT HAS TO BE THE EVENTS PEOPLE WANT, BASED ON YOUR ACTUAL MARKET RESEARCH RATHER THAN CRAZY GUESSES), more BL novels. Tempt them with amazing new sculpts *that are also viable in the game*. (I know GW think of themselves as a minis company first and foremost, and the rules are mostly there for fun, but that is simply wrong -- a competitive, balanced, fair game is more fun for casual gamers who mostly love fluff *as well as* being the only acceptable game for hardcore competitive players.) Have they got too many minis still on the sprue, so what they really need is a faster way to paint them? Buy up Army Painter or launch a *better*, *at least as cheap*, or *cheaper*, *at least as good*, alternative (it's probably easier to buy them up). Do they hate the price rises, most of all? Offer a loyalty card, or a fan club that gives you money off, or bulk-buy discounts (the discounts don't have to be any more competitive than the cheapest discount webshop -- but they should be as competitive, for sure). Do they hate the lack of info about upcoming releases? Try behaving like a company that wants to make a profit, then, rather than thinking that your GWHQ staff are actually members of a Secret Club; it can actually be fine to deliberately be secretive about *some* stuff, *as part of* a proper marketing strategy, but not just for the sake of it! If you want to be secretive, run a teaser campaign, or hire an ARG designer to do an I Love Bees style competition/game that gives the winners something special and gets you a load of publicity... gah.

Whew.

Anyway. They need to engage with their fans. Successful marketing isn't about just maximising your till returns on a particular day; that's the job of sales, and in fact, it's not even that effective an approach to sales (customers will come back again and again if you give them good advice, even if that means you don't make a sale that day, rather than just trying to sell them the latest thing... again, some GW employees will do that, but by no means all). Successful marketing means you harness the power of community; you involve your customers as more than just customers, as fans. Most of us posting here *are* GW fans. We'd love to see the company more successful, and we' d love to see ourselves as a part of a GW community along with the company; but because of GW's overall dysfunctionalness and schizophrenia, we just see them as kinda crazy some of the time, and profiteering rip-off merchants the rest.

Frazzled wrote:

Mr Mystery wrote:I do get why they don't sell Third Party stuff, even when it's licensed, through the stores. The minis are their bread and butter.

But surely they could offer a weborder service in store?

Why would I care? Impulse purchases are the entire reason for brick and mortar. If I have to think about it and use the POWA OF THE INTRANETZ then there's no point to the retail stores-they just burn cash.

Yes, that is exactly the point.

I went into my local GW for some dice and bases, which they didn't have, and for some snap-fit Termagants, also out of stock.

Staff suggestion -- order them through the Citizen's Terminal. My reply, I'll do it when I get home. (Only I'll order from someone cheaper than GW.)

Just to throw something out here..

Origins Game Fair in Columbus Ohio is the baby of GAMA. (Game Manufacturers Association.) (http://www.gama.org/)

One of THE biggest gaming conventions across all game types in the USA. Board, Card, Collectible, RPG, historical AND scifi/fantasy miniatures.

I run 40k events there, and confess to bias.

Last year, our group was told that Games Workshop for the first time in many years.. paid their dues to GAMA and would have a presence at Origins 2011. Evidently this NON GW event will have some level of "official" GW support.. maybe even a booth or a seminar.

We can but hope.

-Porkuslime

BrassScorpion wrote:

I cannot justify spending 60 dollars on a single plastic tank for a game of toy soldiers

You're not alone and a lot of fans, even long-term devotees with huge collections are finding it more difficult to deal with some of the prices. They keep releasing great new kits, but some of the pricing is egregious even to those of us who have happily supported GW for years.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

I used to happily buy 4 different kits for one unit conversion, now, they're lucky if I buy one kit for it's normal intended use.
Doesn't stop me buying off bitz sites and ebay, so they're still getting some money from me.

Yes, once again I agree.

My Tau army -- 100% official kits (converted) This is my oldest army.
My SMs -- Official infantry with converted heads, 100% non-GW vehicles.
My IG -- 95% non-GW models.
My Tyranids -- 75% GW (lots of conversions and substitutions for Spods, Tervigon, Tyrannofex, etc.

If I'm going to spend £60 on a tank (and I have!) I'll buy a non-GW kit.

terrainguy wrote:This is not actually entirely true. In mk1 in addition to the main rule book you needed...

You got me there! I do admit that I forgot that I absorbed some rules due to exposure. In fairness, PP did release three itterations of Prime, each of which collected the core rules (and errata!!!) up to that point. For a new player, buying the new Prime would usually bring them up to speed.

Back on topic: I feel that GW's handling of their North American events team was and continues to be an epic tragedy. Support these days rarely extends past the thresholds of their hobby centers. While this may work in Europe due to population density - in sprawled out North America, this strategy only insulates their business against potential customers. Almost all large tournaments of note are run by independents. In smaller urban areas and rural areas, the buck has been passed to independent clubs to promote the hobby. While I can't speak to the level of support that GW extends to the former, from experience, the support that GW supports to the latter is decidedly lacklustre.

GW needs to go back to the days of chapter approved, being able to release models and rules via a monthly update, this would do two things. Add more value then painting lessons to white dwarf, and drive sales on armies inbetween their book and splash release cycle.

It sounds like they may do this with the storm raven, as they did with that eldar thingy. (I've not ran into an eldar player since it came out.) The issue this needs to be more often, if not every other month. Or better yet, if there is no new army book coming, then follow through with this series.

This would provide essentially a rules release each month, and as updates for various armies would come out through the years, that when a new book time comes, they can complie and edit instead of spending so long on release cycles.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Can I just say that it's nice to see this thread is free from the usual anti-GW Internet Hyperbole and, for once, seems to be a logical discussion of actual business flaws.

Well done Dakka. I can actually say "Stay classy" without meaning it ironically.

I was actually just thinking this also. I completely agree.
Not that they would, but if anyone from GW were to read this they could actually learn some good insight and that's just coming from 'us', I can confidently say that the majority of us aren't exactly business experts, but if we know(?) where things are going wrong then that must mean something...

Acardia wrote:GW needs to go back to the days of chapter approved, being able to release models and rules via a monthly update, this would do two things. Add more value then painting lessons to white dwarf, and drive sales on armies inbetween their book and splash release cycle.

It sounds like they may do this with the storm raven, as they did with that eldar thingy. (I've not ran into an eldar player since it came out.) The issue this needs to be more often, if not every other month. Or better yet, if there is no new army book coming, then follow through with this series.

This would provide essentially a rules release each month, and as updates for various armies would come out through the years, that when a new book time comes, they can complie and edit instead of spending so long on release cycles.

And then people who aren't willing to buy a crappy, overpriced magazine fall behind?

We've had the internet for public use for almost 20 years now. Maybe it's time GW actually used it for something constructive...

H.B.M.C. wrote:LOL! Ok, that made me laugh.

It's ok though - we've had Dr_Mystery... sorry, Mr_Mystery to keep us well stocked on Pro-GW spin.

What you did there, I saw it... Still, with Mr Mystery about the town, it's like MDG never left... isn't it...

Fafnir wrote:
We've had the internet for public use for almost 20 years now. Maybe it's time GW actually used it for something constructive...

The company's reluctance to have much of anything to do with the internet seems very very odd. It's as though perhaps they believe the computer may lure gamers over to computer games instead of the tabletop.

And I heard that the highups regard internet forums as the devil incarnate and instead of seeking to engage them and improve their PR with their customer base, simply wish to close it all down and hope the internet will be another 2 year fad (that's already over 20 years old and worth trillions in business and communication).

H.B.M.C. wrote:Can I just say that it's nice to see this thread is free from the usual anti-GW Internet Hyperbole and, for once, seems to be a logical discussion of actual business flaws.

Well done Dakka. I can actually say "Stay classy" without meaning it ironically.

And this is why I stayed away, frankly. There was nothing for me to point out as being overemotional garbage or people equating GW to child abusers, etc as is common in these kinds of threads.

So yes. "Stay classy", indeed Dakka.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:His absence is notable isn't it, perhaps it was the apology I demanded on page 1 for his pages of insistence there would be no 'rounding off' of the VAT increases.

Bwuh? Where did I say there would be no 'rounding off' of the VAT increases or anything of the kind?
You must be referring to Mr Mystery. I didn't even post in the VAT thread.

porkuslime wrote:Just to throw something out here..

Origins Game Fair in Columbus Ohio is the baby of GAMA. (Game Manufacturers Association.) (http://www.gama.org/)

One of THE biggest gaming conventions across all game types in the USA. Board, Card, Collectible, RPG, historical AND scifi/fantasy miniatures.

I run 40k events there, and confess to bias.

Last year, our group was told that Games Workshop for the first time in many years.. paid their dues to GAMA and would have a presence at Origins 2011. Evidently this NON GW event will have some level of "official" GW support.. maybe even a booth or a seminar.

We can but hope.

-Porkuslime

that is quite surprising. origins was the first big independent con that they dropped (followed by gencon). it'd be nice if the big boys played nice with the industry and WOTC and GW started attending stuff they didn't currently or previously own like origins.

Kanluwen wrote:

MeanGreenStompa wrote:His absence is notable isn't it, perhaps it was the apology I demanded on page 1 for his pages of insistence there would be no 'rounding off' of the VAT increases.

Bwuh? Where did I say there would be no 'rounding off' of the VAT increases or anything of the kind?
You must be referring to Mr Mystery. I didn't even post in the VAT thread.

Oh balls, you're quite right (for once ) and it was in fact nosferatu1001 who wrote:

noferatu1001 wrote:
MGS - ah typical you. You have now changed the conditions of the argument so yours looks less foolish and unfounded.

The price rise in January is JUST the VAT rise Nothing more.

Any price rise in summer MAY then round these off. WEll, any price rise is almost *certain* to round them off, IF there is a price rise.

Given you were the first person to shout "shut up" I was simply responding in kind. I have no desire to try to make you shut up, just correcting your repeated errors and distortions, while being amused at your contortions in trying to not admit a failure. #

The shops *cannot* eat a 2.5% VAT rise, as their margins are wafer thin. CLosing stores would reduce the recruitment of new gamers, hurting the company in the long run. I assume people calling for shops to close simply fail to grasp this basic bit of economics, despite attempts at educating otherwise.

Here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/334558.page

Full apology to you kanluwen.

Now I'll wait for my apology from nosferatu1001.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:

MeanGreenStompa wrote:His absence is notable isn't it, perhaps it was the apology I demanded on page 1 for his pages of insistence there would be no 'rounding off' of the VAT increases.

Bwuh? Where did I say there would be no 'rounding off' of the VAT increases or anything of the kind?
You must be referring to Mr Mystery. I didn't even post in the VAT thread.

Oh balls, you're quite right (for once )

Hey now. I've been right at least three times, damnit!

Full apology to you kanluwen.

It's okay, Brian Blessed. You must have been flying too fast and it obviously made you think I was someone else.

Kanluwen wrote:Hey now. I've been right at least three times, damnit!

Must have been before I joined this forum

At least I know the difference between a "source" and "copy/paste", Kroot!

That's not one of your three times

It sure as hell isn't your one time being right either

Kanluwen wrote:At least I know the difference between a "source" and "copy/paste", Kroot!

Now that is funny stuff right there. Almost sig worthy.

Well, I have been a source often enough, with my first post on Warseer being the first pic of the Wood Elf Hero on Eagle.

filbert wrote:I wonder then if we might not be approaching a watershed moment when GW realise that perhaps raising prices continually is doing them more harm than good?

That would imply they are intelligent, rational beings, so.... no.

Terminus wrote:

filbert wrote:I wonder then if we might not be approaching a watershed moment when GW realise that perhaps raising prices continually is doing them more harm than good?

That would imply they are intelligent, rational beings, so.... no.

Exactly. We are dealing with GW the warhammer giant.

lord marcus wrote:

Terminus wrote:

filbert wrote:I wonder then if we might not be approaching a watershed moment when GW realise that perhaps raising prices continually is doing them more harm than good?

That would imply they are intelligent, rational beings, so.... no.

Exactly. We are dealing with GW the warhammer giant.

Instead of attacking normally, roll on the Giant Attack table. Roll a D6:

1: Yell and bawl about fan sites.
2: Jump up and down with prices. Mostly up.
3: Pick up LoTR.
4-6: Swing with ugly club and hit the Razorgor.

You left out 5: Create codex that boosts sales of model kits with unbalanced rules, as long as the kits are $60+ in value.

Most important:
6.) Fire creative staff (veterans first) and close stores to improve the balance

Is it a bad thing that lately I get more enjoyment out of watching GW's attempts at a business model than I do out of their actual product?

GW's pricing and incredibly slow release schedule with everything is so bad it's surprising that they have managed to stay profitable at all the last few years.

They have little innovation and basically rely on the fact that some folks are simple addicts to their game.

I think they are finding out that it's not such an addictive game and they might actually have to work to make their cash.

Does Privateer Press do trading statements like this? I'd be curious to see how the two compare.

Aduro wrote:Does Privateer Press do trading statements like this? I'd be curious to see how the two compare.

depends on if they're a publicly traded corporation or not. if they're privately owned (which i'd suspect), they don't have to. mongoose does a year end review where they talk a mix of financial and creative stuff but that's the closest i've seen a private company do to this.

Aduro wrote:Does Privateer Press do trading statements like this? I'd be curious to see how the two compare.

Nope. Privateer is still privately owned, IIRC, or at the very least isn't publicly traded.

EDIT: Yeah, looks like it's owned solely by Matt Wilson, after McVey and Snoddy left.

also PP is a much smaller company then GW both physically and financially. Not that smaller is automatically less good (actually I often like it better when its smaller) but really it's not a equal comparison between GW and PP.

I actually think BoK had a decent article about this and I think Tasty's pointing to 8th fantasy and a lack of 40k releases for much of the year really seems to make sense to me as a likely cause of this drop off.

Also the price increases don't help to attract new players but thats a another long conversation.

Its totally a result of them dropping the ball on releases. They need much better organization.

Its a good thing I have plenty of backed up projects to keep me busy