Recently, I've seen quite a few posts talking about how AoS "failed" and so forth in the wake of it's launch, replacing WHFB. My question is whether there's any or much actual hard data for this, or if it's just online speculation? - Especially as the product is still so new and really seemed to capture people's imagination or at least wallets with some lovely new models at a decent price - at least in the starter set box.
I'm not interested in this becoming a partisan bitchfest, or the eternal duelling between knights of black and white, or whether GW killed or saved your dog, but actual information and reasoned discussion.
It seems like speculation to me, (although it could be true),
We've had a few posts from gamestore owners saying that while the starter (and maybe sigmarite) stuff sells well the rest of the range does not
it could mean the only people buying are those using stuff as 40K proxies, or it could mean most people buying already have large WHFB armies, after all the sigmarites are the only 'new' faction, so it makes sense that these would be the runaway biggest seller
We've also had a fair few posts that it's not being played in stores, and owners who've set up leagues either never got people in or have seen the dry up
but, it's a game that isn't very suitable for 'strange at a game store' play, and there seem to be a raft of different unofficial)schemes to attach points to things which is just making things worse, what it is good for is play amongst groups of friends who are not super competitive but just want to have fun at home now and then, just the sort of people who game store owners don't see
Here in our gaming group, there is almost no more interest in AoS.
I think its failing. Reasons are the lack of playable missions and the resistance of a group of Fantasy players, notably veterans, to adapt to AoS.
It's failing because of the MASSIVE amount of players that spent GOD KNOWS HOW MUCH $$$ on WHFB only to have their armies rendered useless by the introduction of warscrolls. What if you bought that super expensive character, only to notice it's profile's absence, and then you go to the bottom of the warscroll, only to realise that it uses the same profile as that of that other character you could have bought 2 of
There have been a question in a fair few threads in the AOS section about this very topic, most notably the "AoS going strong or dying out in your area" thread.
Now, the basic issue is there is no "objective overview" that we can point to, at least until GW's next half-year report. Even then the report won't break down sales via product line, so it won't tell us specifically how well or badly AOS itself is doing in objective terms (they'll probably puff it up in the preamble however badly it's doing).
So, without real numbers from anywhere, all we can do is rely on speculation and subjectively asking how it's going in people's local areas. That said, going by what people and stores have said, the game is doing fairly badly in most areas, with a lot of groups drying up, and even some of the most enthusiastic supporters admit that there isn't a huge player base in most areas.
So yeah, nothing solid on how it's doing overall, but a lot of chatter of how badly it's doing in many locales. For my part, I'll say it's early days for a game that has to start from scratch (it is in no way a replacement of WHFB, and that's why the player base was decimated), especially with little outside advertising to bring in the "new" players the game is obviously aimed at. But things definitely are not off to a flying start.
That seems like cutting off your nose to spite your face. You've got the character and the army. They are playable in AoS. Why wouldn't you play with them?
To return to the topic, if AoS is failing then I think the reasons are:
Lack of interest by veterans.
Active dislike by a lot of WHFB veterans.
Failure by GW to energise new recruits. They are trying, with their school league rules, but the widespread support system that used to exist for clubs was thrown away for cost savings a few years ago. Also, by pissing off veterans generally, not just with AoS, GW have made it all the harder to recruit through word of mouth and hobby cadres.
One man shops are not good at recruiting because they are in out of the way locations and don't have enough space or staff. They also have to concentrate on selling the latest big release, like Battle of Calth, rather than developing AoS.
Brand confusion with the remaining large stocks of Warhammer figures, which need to be rebased on to circle bases that are available separately, and expensively. This looks looks bad to new recruits.
Although the starter set is good value, the add-on packs of figures are very expensive, and the books are mentally priced.
The fluff is a bit generic and wishy-washy. YMMV.
Slow pace of new releases if you actually are into the game.
To look at things from the other angle, what is so great about AoS that makes it a compelling hobby purchase? The fact it is by GW?
If you are a veteran gamer, there are lots of rival skirmish games available that are cheaper and arguably better, or at least certainly not any worse.
All that being said, I think we have to wait a couple of years to see if AoS really is a failure or just a bit of a slow-burner.
It just wasn't a good enough game to stay alive at my local club. People played or watched a game, then went to different things that do it better. Lot of WFB armies tucked away, so the models are there, but the game itself didn't offer anything of value for that precious weekly playing time.
the thirteenth praetorian wrote: It's failing because of the MASSIVE amount of players that spent GOD KNOWS HOW MUCH $$$ on WHFB only to have their armies rendered useless by the introduction of warscrolls. What if you bought that super expensive character, only to notice it's profile's absence, and then you go to the bottom of the warscroll, only to realise that it uses the same profile as that of that other character you could have bought 2 of
That really has nothing to do with the main reasons for most of the dislike/disdain gathered by AoS.
IMO all it really needs is a comp/balancing mechanic for pickup games and/or tournaments. I remember back the week before it was launched (since no one knew it existed before that) folks were real excited and couldn't wait.. then interest dropped like a bag of hammers and people were suddenly like "so, um, how do I build an army?"
It's clear GW wants AoS to be the main game now, hence the big statue at the HQ. I'm hoping they do a rules update to address a lot of the concerns, and then have Specialist Games release a Warhammer Olde Wolrde rulebook with all the old rules that WFB folks still love and maybe some special movement trays to fit the new models with round bases so they can still rank up good. I think they had something like that for lord of the rings at one point?
What's stopping WHFB players from picking up the previous codex and playing by those rules? If enough of you do it, that sends a statement you want to have the old style updated, not replaced by the inferior game.
I've found the forum-goer kind of crowd has been very negative toward it, but a lot of people outside of that are very positive and into it. I don't know anything about sales. I know some of the big tournament organizers are giving it a chance, especially in the UK.
I had an off again, on again member of my club contact me to ask if I could line up a game for him to try it out. Not one person who plays/played WHFB was interested, and they seldom hit forums.
The main thing that has hurt AoS bar none is the negative backlash of WHFB veteran players. Rules, prices, everything aside, the veterans refusing to play or purchase new models or show any positive interest really caused it to stumble.
jreilly89 wrote: The main thing that has hurt AoS bar none is the negative backlash of WHFB veteran players. Rules, prices, everything aside, the veterans refusing to play or purchase new models or show any positive interest really caused it to stumble.
Further issues are lack of playable missions and poor army building.
jreilly89 wrote: The main thing that has hurt AoS bar none is the negative backlash of WHFB veteran players. Rules, prices, everything aside, the veterans refusing to play or purchase new models or show any positive interest really caused it to stumble.
As jonolikespie has mentioned somewhere else, this alone meant that GW didn't have to start from scratch alone, but from a negative standpoint.
jreilly89 wrote: The main thing that has hurt AoS bar none is the negative backlash of WHFB veteran players. Rules, prices, everything aside, the veterans refusing to play or purchase new models or show any positive interest really caused it to stumble.
As jonolikespie has mentioned somewhere else, this alone meant that GW didn't have to start from scratch alone, but from a negative standpoint.
Yep. Had they just released AoS as a new/side game instead of killing off WHFB, they would be in a better position.
jreilly89 wrote: The main thing that has hurt AoS bar none is the negative backlash of WHFB veteran players. Rules, prices, everything aside, the veterans refusing to play or purchase new models or show any positive interest really caused it to stumble.
As jonolikespie has mentioned somewhere else, this alone meant that GW didn't have to start from scratch alone, but from a negative standpoint.
Yep. Had they just released AoS as a new/side game instead of killing off WHFB, they would be in a better position.
Hell, AoS could've been branded as the first new SG from the new studio. I bet it would've been much better received.
I think it is pretty well dead in Australia and I'd say it is mostly down to the lack of points. People see that* as GW doubling down on their whole 'we don't care about competitive games or balance' stance and, frankly, that is something that is making local players consider it a kiddy game.
People here were already abandoning 40k for Warmachine, X wing or Infinity because of how unbalanced 40k was getting.
Regardless of everything else I think far too many players won't consider it because they want fair, somewhat competitive games and AoS appears to be very clearly saying that is not what it is about.
*I don't want to start an argument about if AoS is balanced or not, but I think it is perfectly fair to say that people see it as I described.
jreilly89 wrote: Yep. Had they just released AoS as a new/side game instead of killing off WHFB, they would be in a better position.
Hell, AoS could've been branded as the first new SG from the new studio. I bet it would've been much better received.
I could have been toted about as the moredheim replacement for small scale stuff before you 'graduate' to the not quite apoc but still 'bigger' battles of WHFB.
This is totally anecdotal, but this is my experience.
At the largest gaming store in north-metro Atlanta, AoS is largely done and gone. It has been a couple of months since I saw a game of AoS being played there. Largely, it has been replaced by KoW. I see games of KoW being played about as often as I used to see WHFB being played, and that store had a pretty strong WHFB play group.
As for reasons, well, I think it has to do with play style. There does actually exist a segment of player that likes the blocked unit style of game. When movement is restricted that way, it requires a different style of thinking about how to play the game than does a skirmish style game. Turning block movement WHFB into skirmish movement AoS took that style of game play away from those players. KoW still offers that style of game play, so the players moved to that.
I think this is especially true for players that have been involved with this style of game play for many years. They wouldn't have stuck around for that many years if they didn't like it, so it is understandable if they were less than happy by the change away from that style and chose to move to a different system that maintained that style.
jreilly89 wrote: The main thing that has hurt AoS bar none is the negative backlash of WHFB veteran players. Rules, prices, everything aside, the veterans refusing to play or purchase new models or show any positive interest really caused it to stumble.
Highlights the weakness of the whole "Word of mouth" marketing that GW relies on. They [GW] rely so much on existing customers to help sell the game that they failed to realise the impact that a game such as AoS would have on them. WHFB was killed and the replacement game, to them, had no value. They then move onto KoW or stuck with WHFB and, when new person turns up, no-ones playing it. The saturation fails to happen.
It is still played in my area but not a lot. I have steered clear of it myself.
For many people the lack of a balancing mechanic is a big issue as it essentially promotes the "P2W" aspect of the hobby and means that he with the bigger wallet and more shiny wins almost all the time where as the player with the smaller budget gets shafted. A lack of points means that you can bring whatever you want. Sure people can use wounds to balance the game but look at a Clanrat and a Chaos Knight. Both have 1 wound but the Chaos Knight has the better save, attacks and rend and will shaft the clanrat easily.
They system itself is also really simple and rewards little in the way of tactics or grand strategy. Ultimately it is a flop.
I think a big part of why the veteran community has had such a backlash against AoS is the destruction of the background. If the End Times had wrapped up with a cataclysmic event that left the world wrecked but intact, players might not have been so upset. Heck, a post-apocalyptic high fantasy world would be interesting and, more importantly, allow fans to maintain their connection to the game. Instead, they blew up everything, changed the cosmology, and advanced the timeline by 1,000+ years. Couple that with a shift to a completely different, dumbed-down ruleset, and it feels like a slap in the face.
Guildsman wrote: I think a big part of why the veteran community has had such a backlash against AoS is the destruction of the background. If the End Times had wrapped up with a cataclysmic event that left the world wrecked but intact, players might not have been so upset. Heck, a post-apocalyptic high fantasy world would be interesting and, more importantly, allow fans to maintain their connection to the game. Instead, they blew up everything, changed the cosmology, and advanced the timeline by 1,000+ years. Couple that with a shift to a completely different, dumbed-down ruleset, and it feels like a slap in the face.
Between the endless, poorly fleshed our realms and the three factions that have been released being two immortals and a literally endless swarm of bodies there really isn't much for players to get attached to either. A lot of the Old World was originally ripped from history, tolkein or D&D but it was still something we could latch onto and become invested in dammit!
Azazelx wrote: Recently, I've seen quite a few posts talking about how AoS "failed" and so forth in the wake of it's launch, replacing WHFB. My question is whether there's any or much actual hard data for this, or if it's just online speculation? - Especially as the product is still so new and really seemed to capture people's imagination or at least wallets with some lovely new models at a decent price - at least in the starter set box.
I'm not interested in this becoming a partisan bitchfest, or the eternal duelling between knights of black and white, or whether GW killed or saved your dog, but actual information and reasoned discussion.
It seems to have revitalized Fantasy, which was basically dead, in my area. A lot of Fantasy players brought out their dusty armies to play AoS. The one FLGS that stocks AoS sells several copies of each new release. I personally have spent more money on GW product this year than I have in the previous five years combined, because I've bought every Stormcast Eternal release, and I just bought a bunch of AoS nurgle units to make a nurgle warband. Sigh.
So, basically, AoS has sold a bunch locally whereas Fantasy hadn't done well since before 8th edition.
Guildsman wrote: Heck, a post-apocalyptic high fantasy world would be interesting and, more importantly, allow fans to maintain their connection to the game. Instead, they blew up everything, changed the cosmology, and advanced the timeline by 1,000+ years.
I agree to the matter with the Story Part. But after all, the story moves forward.
I think one of the greatest weaknesses of most settings is the statics.
If you look at Shadowrun , for example, changes with each edition a bit on the background.
I would play it, when the background story would be a mixture of Mortheim and Planscape Torment
coldgaming wrote: I've found the forum-goer kind of crowd has been very negative toward it, but a lot of people outside of that are very positive and into it. I don't know anything about sales. I know some of the big tournament organizers are giving it a chance, especially in the UK.
I have experienced this firsthand. Most of the 40k and AoS players at the FLGS barely look or even know what Dakka and Warseer are - they get most of their news from like Spikey Bits or BoLS updates on their Facebook feeds. The AoS vibe is very very positive amongst them.
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Guildsman wrote: I think a big part of why the veteran community has had such a backlash against AoS is the destruction of the background. If the End Times had wrapped up with a cataclysmic event that left the world wrecked but intact, players might not have been so upset. Heck, a post-apocalyptic high fantasy world would be interesting and, more importantly, allow fans to maintain their connection to the game. Instead, they blew up everything, changed the cosmology, and advanced the timeline by 1,000+ years. Couple that with a shift to a completely different, dumbed-down ruleset, and it feels like a slap in the face.
Best thing to happen to Fantasy. I love me some Oldhammer, and began playing Warhammer in 1994... but the world timeline wasn't progressing - when it did, people bitched, when it was retconned, other people bitched. I still have all my army books and all my Warhammer Roleplay (GW and Hogshead) for that awesome oldschool Empire vibe.
The End Times and the AoS fluff are so over the top, I love it. Best thing GW could have done with the property since it was stagnating since 2006.
In the US, one of the few metrics you can look at (since GW isn't going to tell us how well it's selling) is individual FLGS accounts (which will vary) and the tournament scene (how much the game is being played).
Mikhaila has posted on here how he's struggled to sell it, as have others, but obviously judgedoug shared an opposite anecdocate.
At my store, the same has happened - they're now stocking the KoW rulebook, the fantasy guys are starting to play it and lots of folks are working on KoW armies.
Age of Sigmar is its own beast, and obviously not a fit for a fantasy tournament format (very much intentionally so). This makes it even harder to measure how well it's doing. We know it isn't being played at the tournament level, and the question is can it do well enough in informal gaming to make up for the lack of addressing that market (or those interested in formation-based fantasy games) at all.
I don't think we'll get any numbers from GW indicating its performance - even if it does poorly, it will be hidden behind other successful product revenues (such as Horus Heresy). So, we'll continue to have to rely on third party sources of info. But the "finger in the air" test is definitely not indicating that it is an overwhelming success as far as people adopting and playing it, for instance! I think that will be important for long-term success, but obviously from GW's perspective if people buy their models they won't care. But as those models become more and more niche (with the goal of making them protectable from an IP standpoint) it will be less likely that people will buy them to use with other rulesets, so if they want more than painters they're going to need the ruleset those models are for to be more widely adopted to succeed.
While I disagree with the "If you're not happy just play 8th" crowd, if you are willing to play AoS it's very easy to theme your games in the pre AoS world.
In fact many of the more iconic battles play better in a skirmish system. (City fights, Skaven/ Goblin/Dwarf tunnel/cavern battles. The Battle of La Maisontaal etc.)
We don't know and, for now, we can't really know. Anecdotical evidence is anecdotical, no matter how much some people seem to believe the state of affairs at their FLGS/club/local GW shop has to be representative of a larger trend.
From a general point of view, it seems to be doing just "decent" in the UK, and quite poorly everywhere else. Local scenarios may vary wildly however, as local communities do.
In my personal opinion, it's a mediocre product doomed to have a mediocre run unless GW decides to revamp it heavily, which won't likely happen. As in many other things, I could be wrong.
Does anyone else kind of feel like when GW release a new edition for a game they take it for granted that all the old players will continue onto the new edition so they don't really need to advertise it at all and that, with that in mind, AoS was released as if it were a new edition which all the WHFB players would immediately adopt?
I kinda get the impression GW expected people would jump right over, not considering the differences in games to mean anything. At least that makes more sense to me than them just dumping their entire WHFB fanbase (no matter how small it was, it was more than 0).
TheWaspinator wrote: The fact that the starter set is already 44% off on Amazon seems like bad news for the game.
Damn that's great news.
AoS seems to have failed around here in that it did not revitalize sales of WHF figures. The AoS figures were doing well, but with Calth and Heresy Marines, I suspect people will discover they need Stormcasts less than they thought they did, and the sales will taper.
jonolikespie wrote: I kinda get the impression GW expected people would jump right over, not considering the differences in games to mean anything. At least that makes more sense to me than them just dumping their entire WHFB fanbase (no matter how small it was, it was more than 0).
This is standard GW attitude - just slap their logo on something and assume everyone will buy it by the dozen.
There's nothing anecdotal about the Amazon and eBay sellers slashing prices on the starter far deeper than they did for 8th edition, and we're only a few months in! Also nothing anecdotal about them being UNABLE to sell out on special edition books, which are just as much an unnecessary luxury as they were during 8th Edition. And that game apparently sold less than GW super glue, so this must only sell a fraction of that fraction!
No, but seriously, the conversation about this game devolved into an us vs. them argument, but AoS's success isn't about someone being right or someone being wrong, it's about sales. It doesn't matter how hard anybody fanbois out about GW, that's their right as a hobbyist, and they're not responsible for business practices others find distasteful. That being said, the science IS in fact in. AoS is not doing that great, there's no reason to be a denialist.
In our store we have an enthusiastic following of AoS at our shop but in general terms we don't sell a ton of it. We sold the heck out of the starter boxes but after that, sales dipped quite a bit.
IMO, for what that is worth, having played it a few times it doesn't feel like a game. I prefer complex, balanced games and many folks we tend to associate with lean that way, too, and with that mindset dislike AoS. However, the folks that do like it, are very casual gamers that love just coming in and putting cool models on the table and having a laugh of a game. We've found it appeals to a totally different demographic, but a smaller group of people.
To be fair though, we hardly sold any Fantasy kits, either. It's been a slight uptick for us compared to Fantasy.
I'm not surprised that it would appeal to a different kind of user. I'm also not very surprised that the user group would be relatively small.
It would seem logical that a game that is quick and easy to learn and play would appeal to people who don't have a deep interest in more complicated, time-consuming games. This kind of user does not seem likely to want to spend a lot of time and money building up their armies and terrain, etc.
If you want to make a beer and pretzels game, you need to make sure it is easily playable by a beer and pretzels crowd.
I was talking to a UKflgs owner recently who said he used to get 60plus players for 8th edition tournaments, but struggled to get 12 for AOS. Its clear KOW is very popular now in their area
That is an interesting point, however let's recall that the topic of this thread is reasons why AoS might be caused to fail, not just evidence that it is.
Did your FLGS owner give any reasons why AoS was not doing good business for him?
Saldiven wrote:
As for reasons, well, I think it has to do with play style. There does actually exist a segment of player that likes the blocked unit style of game. When movement is restricted that way, it requires a different style of thinking about how to play the game than does a skirmish style game. Turning block movement WHFB into skirmish movement AoS took that style of game play away from those players. KoW still offers that style of game play, so the players moved to that.
Agreed. One side of the double-whammy - exploding the world being the other.
I still can't quite believe they did that. But as Lithlandis says, GW's too used to a captive audience. Too used to throwing something out with an attitude of "Here you go, plebs. You know the drill. Empty your bank accounts into the receptacle." You'd think they might have learned something from Dreadfleet.
Kilkrazy wrote:You could start a thread discussion how well AoS is doing.
Oh come on. Give him something to do that's achievable.
I think it's a valid topic for discussion. The flip side of this thread; Is AoS doing well, and why should that be expected?
As your post indicates, many people think that GW expect whatever they do to be popular just because. After Dread Fleet that seems unrealistic, but that is another topic.
My sources in GW have people looking for ways to polish a turd and sell models. AOS gave them a small bump in fantasy sales, but they lost hugely with no 40k sales in those months. My sales are down 65% for the last 4 months on GW.
Not enough people actually care about AOS. They play some because they have models, but few people are building armies.
Lizarmen codex with no new models? Pretty much tells the story. My sales rep was ok with me not even ordering it.
I could write a 2 page list of reasons why it's failing, but i don't feel like arguing with the "it's only anectdotal evidence" crowd, and don't feel like beating a dead horse. GW found a way to cost me thousands of dollars in sales each month, and has my older WFB customers selling their armies on ebay. Good job GW.
I'm curious to know this too.
Glad for you the starter is cheaper on Amazon, in France it is more expensive^^ (7€ more in fact).
I see a lot of negativity against AoS, I have difficulty to find "objective" view on this.
My sources in GW have people looking for ways to polish a turd and sell models. AOS gave them a small bump in fantasy sales, but they lost hugely with no 40k sales in those months. My sales are down 65% for the last 4 months on GW.
Not enough people actually care about AOS. They play some because they have models, but few people are building armies.
Lizarmen codex with no new models? Pretty much tells the story. My sales rep was ok with me not even ordering it.
I could write a 2 page list of reasons why it's failing, but i don't feel like arguing with the "it's only anectdotal evidence" crowd, and don't feel like beating a dead horse. GW found a way to cost me thousands of dollars in sales each month, and has my older WFB customers selling their armies on ebay. Good job GW.
I seem to remember you were pretty gung-ho when AOS came out and ran a lot of events for it. It's a bad sign if a store with an interested owner can't keep AOS afloat.
Is AoS potentially doing better in the UK than it is in the US?
The UK is still GW's base of power, and isn't there more of a focus on clubs rather than random meet-ups in stores?
That would work in AoS's favor, as it would be easier to hash out a force for a game with well-known club members than random walk-ins or weekly show-ups.
Kilkrazy wrote:
After Dread Fleet that seems unrealistic
Were some of the post-dreadfleet chairman's preambles and things a bit gushing about customers flocking to buy "jewel-like items of wonder" and such? In any case it seems like they registered Dreadfleet as a blip, a temporary abberation to be recalled, destroyed, and buried out of sight and mind, rather than an indication of what not to do. The overall 'nice minis, shame about the game' reaction seems fairly similar. A pity one involved a limited, one-off box set, and the other involved one of their big lines.
godardc wrote:I see a lot of negativity against AoS, I have difficulty to find "objective" view on this.
What's an objective view? A positive one? An indifferent one? Can't the negative view be the objective view?
But for an objective view, I think it'd be difficult to find one better than MWHistorian's summation, just above.
That would work in AoS's favor, as it would be easier to hash out a force for a game with well-known club members than random walk-ins or weekly show-ups.
Problem is that clubs can also often make it easier to hash out which games are better or more fun.
I'm still holding out hope that things will improve even if it takes a new rulebook. Even then for a lot of folks the bridge (or a whole dark elf army on youtube?) has been burned and it will take a lot to bring them back. I still dig the models, but I'm starting to feel like it's a waste of time to keep painting em :/ But I'll keep at it since painting is the fun part, will be tough with a shiny new Horus Heresy box to tempt my paintbrushes though.
I was planning to pick up some new lizardmen and the army book, but I decided not to. Maybe some day but all my gamerfunds have been spent on HH so nothing new for me for a while
It is also worth noting that the Amazon reviews have 65% 5 stars and 35% 1 star (out of 20 reviews), and nothing in between. Either you love it or hate it.
That's the rub, Vermis! In the AoS section, there was a poll which had these results:
AoS going strong or dying out in your area?
A. Picking up steam. - 24% (135)
B. Definitely less interest as time goes on. 76% (423)
That's over 550 responses. It's people who check an online forum, of course - those are the only people who you can poll without it being a local (or "anecdotal") result!
---
It could be doing well in parts of the UK, or in certain stores in the US... but on the whole, you've got a 3 to 1 ratio of people saying there is a lagging interest in AoS. This close to the launch of such a "flagship" product, that would be why people are saying it's failing. The way GW has positioned it is not to be a small Specialist game type of theirs, but a major line - and indications are people are not adopting it, and even people who considered it are often no longer doing so. GW experienced this recently with The Hobbit, too (seriously - did anyone actually play that?) so they are not unused to the idea - but they blamed that on not owning the IP, hence relegating it to "specialist game" status to focus on their own (new, in this case) IP.
It's interesting to see Reecius mention a lot of interest (and sales) at the beginning, but not continuing on... although mikhaila says it has failed, this seems to match what he experienced a bit at the beginning, too. I know I was certainly interested at the beginning - and am no longer, with everyone I know embracing KoW or moving on to other games.
infinite_array wrote: Is AoS potentially doing better in the UK than it is in the US?
The UK is still GW's base of power, and isn't there more of a focus on clubs rather than random meet-ups in stores?
That would work in AoS's favor, as it would be easier to hash out a force for a game with well-known club members than random walk-ins or weekly show-ups.
Really depends on the club. Some clubs have a fairly solid group of people who all know each other well. Others are a bit more variable, with less regular attendance and less familiarity between players.
The former would certainly have no issue with hashing out whatever rules were needed to make the game work for them... But that would assume there was enough interest in actually doing that.
Kilkrazy wrote: The UK still accounts for about 1/3rd of GW's sales, I believe.
As of the last report, GW no longer gives data on regional sales, but historically there have been three dominant regions (Europe, North America, and UK) with similar sales levels, each being more or less a quarter of total revenue (with Europe being more, NA just about, and UK slightly less). Lately I would expect it's leveled out a bit, with the Euro taking a pounding, but still, each one of those accounting for a quarter is a good rule of thumb.
The remaining quarter is made up of Australia (which has been rapidly dropping, at approximately double the rate of the overall drop), FW+BL, and everywhere else.
For some more anecdotal evidence for AOS, in my area Fantasy used to be approximately twice as popular as 40k. Fantasy is now completely gone, AOS never got started, and KOW is taking off.
Eldarain wrote: While I disagree with the "If you're not happy just play 8th" crowd, if you are willing to play AoS it's very easy to theme your games in the pre AoS world.
Yes, but without a balanced "points" or build system, it's very difficult to keep things fair for all players - especially so for competitive players.
Answer is quite simple. High price. While no codices need to be bought, minis are still over priced. $70 for 3 minis? I don't care if they are terminator size, terminators are over priced and AoS minis are more over priced.
I would have bought so more besides the boxset. I am sure others would have as well.
It's always price. Then comes rules and lack of support for their games.
Biggest mistake was killing the Old World which alienated vets more than anything else IMO. GW could have just done everything else - advanced the WFB storyline, condensed the armies, moved the aesthetic on, simplified the rules, introduced Sigmarines, but I have yet to meet a vet who has any interest in the new AoS world they have created.
What baffles me is that the End Times seemed to rejuvenate WFB, but that the decision to get rid of the Old World was already made before the End Times had even been released.
Davor wrote: Answer is quite simple. High price. While no codices need to be bought, minis are still over priced. $70 for 3 minis? I don't care if they are terminator size, terminators are over priced and AoS minis are more over priced.
I would have bought so more besides the boxset. I am sure others would have as well.
It's always price. Then comes rules and lack of support for their games.
And despite no codices, more rules which flesh out those in the free four pages must be bought in ongoing books. Fantasy players already went through buying End Times books with ongoing rules and background that quickly became irrelevant, and people aren't going to be jumping at the chance to do so all over again.
I think the the main failure point for the game possibly falling is the lack of advertisement (if we were to exclude all the veterans' problems with the system, subjective or objective). Usually the veterans at least tend to keep up with the game but the complete switch just made it easier for people to not see it as WHFB version x+1 but as something else. And with that came more scrutiny instead of just grumbling about some broken rules but still upgrading. The usual player base/network effect would have drawn the rest in but now this venue of propagation seems to have dried up.
As much as the rules seem useless to veterans there might be an actual audience for the game (even if it's not me/us) but with GW more or less not advertising and the game being a surprise release nobody who could be interested knows of the game. How did they advertise? They had a con where their own people accidentally could get there to do some promo work and they send one copy to a youtube reviewer. Did they do anything else? Even stores didn't know how to prepare for the new game if I remember correctly. That's better than what they did before which was literary nothing at all but it's just not enough if you need to inform a complete new demographic of your game's existence.
I recall a time when 40K went through a very similar transformation with just as much player revolt - the switch from 2nd to 3rd edition.
I'm betting most of the people here on Dakka are too young to know of such a time, but it happened. 40K players left in droves; it was a dark and uncertain time indeed.
I see the potential in AoS just as saw the potential in 3rd edition 40K.
Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
I had an interest, but the cost entirely killed it.
The new minis are nice, but when you've got a single mini that costs the same as a squad in most rival games, or a box of five costs only slightly less than the starter box for those same games, then it doesn't come close to competing for my hobby dollars.
oni wrote: I recall a time when 40K went through a very similar transformation with just as much player revolt - the switch from 2nd to 3rd edition.
I'm betting most of the people here on Dakka are too young to know of such a time, but it happened. 40K players left in droves; it was a dark and uncertain time indeed.
I see the potential in AoS just as saw the potential in 3rd edition 40K.
Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
You and I have very different memories of that time.
3rd edition did indeed meet with a certain amounf of opposition, and some players left as a result. But it was nothing at all like the reaction that AoS received. Largely, I suspect, because while 3rd edition streamlined things doesn considerably and removed a bunch of stuff that some people loved, it was still essentially the same game. Or at the very least, was still the same type of game... The shift from WHFB to AoS was much, much bigger. It wasn't just a rules streamlining... AOS is a completely different game at a completely different scale with completely different armies.
Interest where I am has never been high. The starter boxes initially flew off the shelves for the minis, but no-one is playing.
The fantasy community fractured in to stopping completely, playing Kings of War, or playing 9th Age.
IMO there are a number of reasons behind this....
* It pissed off a lot of veterans. Lots of people who liked playing Fantasy with their existing armies and had LOTS of money invested in models, rules and accessories suddenly found a lot of that time and effort wasted. Angry customers are not good.
* Angry Customers are not good ESPECIALLY when they are your main form of advertising. Age of Sigmar doesn't have an advertising presence outside of existing GW players talking about it, and when most of the potential audience is feeling disenfranchised...
* By essentially killing off the old Fantasy world, it killed off the one thing that a Warhammer Fantasy skirmish game had going for it - the relationship to three decades of built up IP. Now that they're essentially building new IP from scratch, players who LIKED the IP before have no real reason to play AoS.
* The game itself has no redeeming features except that it is made by GW... if you consider that to be a feature. The models as always are fantastically high quality (though that also comes with fantastically high price...) but there are numerous other established fantasy skirmish games around that are better games. There are numerous other fantasy mass battle games that are better games. AoS doesn't provide anything good or unique in the way of role-playing/storytelling and it seems specifically designed to not be capable of playing any kind of balanced competitive game. It strikes me as a board game like Mouse Trap - fun to play a handful of times when you're kids, but you eventually realize that even for a 'beer and pretzels' game you want something more.
* GW seems to have missed one of the main reasons people weren't buying fantasy anymore: the buy-in cost is very high. A quick glance at the GW website gives me a list of products, none of which are below $100 AUD and most are above $200. Even if most of them are 'bundles', just the sticker shock of the main item on your front page being $1412 is harmful. In many cases you're still paying $30-$50 AUD for a single figure. People new to the game (which is everyone, because they destroyed the old game / IP) are going to look at that, then look at Infinity or something where you can buy 2 full player armies for less than the cost of one Sigmarine hero, and the choice will be pretty obvious.
oni wrote: I recall a time when 40K went through a very similar transformation with just as much player revolt - the switch from 2nd to 3rd edition.
I'm betting most of the people here on Dakka are too young to know of such a time, but it happened. 40K players left in droves; it was a dark and uncertain time indeed.
I see the potential in AoS just as saw the potential in 3rd edition 40K.
Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
My memories of that change....um....are different than yours.
Some people left. But it drew in more players. Also, the criticisms of 3rd was nowhere near as vehement as the criticisms of AOS.
We tried at our store, ran some events, tried to promote it, but it's pretty dead. I have 2 people playing (new players that have never done minis before). Everybody else plays KoW, or if they want skirmish fantasy, they do Frostgrave or Mordheim.
I used to be a HUUUGE Fantasy playing store, with tournaments hitting over 30 and regular play nights with every table full, AoS killed it and every single player moved to Kings of War or quit altogether. In the last few months I've slashed my Fantasy wall by 2/3 and don't even reorder unless it's a special order. That broke my heart personally, I own 8 Fantasy armies.
Personally, I tried AoS, it's ok for what it is, but I played Fantasy for the rule set and world, both are gone. You can say I can just play 8th, but that's not realistic since most gamers move to supported game systems, and KoW has taken over.
Automatically Appended Next Post: That being said, if GW brought out a 9th edition......MONEY.
Automatically Appended Next Post: As to reasons it's failing imo.
It's not as good a mass fantasy game as Kings of War
It's not as good a skirmish game as Mordheim, Frostgrave or any other skirmish game
The Stormcasts are boring. Great models, but boring fluff and with being effectively immortal, there's no fear or connection when they die.
Khorne is also the most BORING of Chaos gods.. Blood blood skulls skulls blah blah blah. Nurgle or Tzeentch would have been way more interesting.
A lack of info on other races is a killer too. I've read the books, listened to the audio books and I'm not impressed with the world at all, it lacks flavor.
Cost doesn't really come into it I find, people who want to will buy the products, people who can't afford to or don't find the value in it, won't.
That being said, if GW brought out a 9th edition......MONEY.
I don't think so. First, they can't really backtrack to the Old World after putting too many bets on AoS being successful. And if they do decided to go back to rank-and-flank in Sigmarland, they then piss off every new AoS player who got into the game because they wanted a skirmish fantasy game that wasn't block based.
The only option they have now is to either make AoS into something acceptable to a wider audience - which, with the various criticism arrayed against it, seems difficult - or throw good money after bad.
You'd think after replacing their Space Marines with a Sigmarine and slapping a AoS symbol on the main headquarters, their initial release for the game shouldn't have been so half-assed. We got two new factions (one of which is just a subset of an existing faction, and the other is Fantasy Space Marines) and a few reboxings of older miniatures. And then... back to 40k! It's like GW is the kid who tells everyone he's going to cannonball off the high jump into the deep end, only to halfheartedly belly flop into the shallow end. And then get out and go back to the food stand.
If they're as dedicated to this idea as they say they are, and apparently have been, each month should have been a release of one or two completely redone factions with new looks and aesthetics. You want to rename everything in your world to copyright protect them? Fine, but show a little creativity instead of just slapping new names and round bases on old factions.
I think for AoS to have been successful GW should have put a bigger investment into it.
Yes they were trying to get the Sigmarine army out but frankly no one cared. What if instead of wasting so much time on that they rushed out a rerelease for every major faction from the Old World with say, a hero, 2 troop boxes and an elite box that were all similar enough to fit in alongside the old models but distinctly different in style. Then they should have put out.. it doesn't have to be a battletome/army book, but something like that with the new fluff for each redone race. If nothing else each race should have had 2 whole pages just for them in the first big book GW released, not every faction crammed into the bottom of a two page spread that was mostly art.
If I knew my Dark Elves still existed and they received a new Dreadlord, new spearmen, crossbowmen and cold one knights I'd probably have bought into that (even if it was just to use the minis for KoW).
Right now the only appeal is for Sigmarine players and Khorne players. You can't even really ad Lizardmen players to that list as this whole new setting with radically different fluff and supposedly completely new aesthetics left them with not a single change in their old model line.
The original WHFB was dying.There are already other games with better rules elsewhere. It was mainly supported by the old veterans. They have spent so much time, effort and money into the game that they could not afford to give up, despite the increasing discontent. With AoS, it simply destroyed everything they owned. Now that they are free. They won't come back and likely advise others not to try - a double negative impact. The miniatures look nice but I never find these GW products enjoyable to paint. Yes, they have a lot of details just to make work but does not add any meaning to the posture of the figures.
I soooo wanted to model some big spiders with catapults, and goblins and MOAR orks!!!!
Then, I heard rumors of circle bases....
SWEET!!!! My 40k orks can stand in as I collect. I was thinking they were gonna make those GF9 circular movement trays!
Oh man. This is gonna be awesome....
Ok its out!
Whaaaaa? Free rules? OMG. That's Awesome!!! They really are going to become a "miniatures company."
Wait a sec... theres no trays....
And no codexes....
And no points...
WTF?!
Let me watch some BatReps:
Huh...
20 Goblins = 20 StormCast Eternals? Wow. Easy mechanic. Cool mysterious terrain. Looks beer and pretzelsy... I like beer... and pretzels... StormCasts won. Big surprise there....
GOOGLING....
What is this Kings of War thing, anyway?
DAKKA-ING...
Hmmmm Killkrazy says "9th Age" is getting put together like Blood Bowl.
Well... I guess I'll just keep 40k'ing it... and see who wins: 9th Age, GW, or KoW. I'll just lurk on Ebay... ho-hum...
Kilkrazy wrote: The price on UK Amazon is about £60 including postage, which is 20% discount. This is not a fire sale price.
US Amazon price is $65 with free shipping vs GW's $125 with free shipping = 48% discount.
T
You guys have Amazon selling GW products in your countries? I couldn't find anything on the AU one.
wuestenfux wrote:How is your opinion about the Sigmarines.
I neither like the look of the models nor the fluff.
On the other hand, the Goreblood models look fantastic and I'm using some in my 30k WE army.
Personally I find sigmarines to be the most boring thing GW has done in recent years, both in fluff and in models.
There is some crap about them losing parts of themselves when they die but it feels kind of like a 12 year old's attempt at being 'deep' and in the end they just come out looking like faceless, nameless, immortals who you can't form any attachment to. They suffer heavily from the Wolf Wolverson riding his Wolf and fighting with his Wolf claws problem that is plaguing space marine chapters and they are quite poorly fleshed out just from a day to day perspective. Do they eat, and if so what? What do they do in their free time if they have any? Do they have any kind of arts they practice? Any kind of culture at all as a race?
All in all actually I'd say the biggest problem with AoS fluff, and this is most obvious when looking at sigmarines, it is it wargame fluff. Everything they detail is about how X army killed Y army. There have been some discussions about using the setting for an RPG and as a GM I look at that and laugh because there is simply nothing there for the day to day lives of anyone yet, it is even more 'there is only war' than 40k.
As for the models... they suffer from that same heroic scale armour oddities that space marines do but without the years of history behind them that make us all overlook that little fact. They are also faaar too static and you can see on a few of them where they have tried to pose their arms up and the shoulder pats have gotten in the way.
The UK tournament scene for WHFB was massive, hundreds of players attending various events. That's now all fragmented/dying. Some have taken up AoS, others have moved on to other games.
The saddest thing for me for this about AoS is that GW must have known how much players enjoyed getting into that (quite competitive) scene, how those big tournaments were annual events on the gaming calendar for many, but they shrugged and pulled the plug. It says to me that they are either desperate, don't care, or have a really low opinion on the intelligence of their player base (replacing a game with the mechanics of WHFB with something like AoS).
insaniak wrote:
oni wrote: I recall a time when 40K went through a very similar transformation with just as much player revolt - the switch from 2nd to 3rd edition.
I'm betting most of the people here on Dakka are too young to know of such a time, but it happened. 40K players left in droves; it was a dark and uncertain time indeed.
I see the potential in AoS just as saw the potential in 3rd edition 40K.
Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
You and I have very different memories of that time.
3rd edition did indeed meet with a certain amounf of opposition, and some players left as a result. But it was nothing at all like the reaction that AoS received. Largely, I suspect, because while 3rd edition streamlined things doesn considerably and removed a bunch of stuff that some people loved, it was still essentially the same game. Or at the very least, was still the same type of game... The shift from WHFB to AoS was much, much bigger. It wasn't just a rules streamlining... AOS is a completely different game at a completely different scale with completely different armies.
I would say there was more complaining when Marines moved from T 3 to T 4
I think for AoS to have been successful GW should have put a bigger investment into it.
Spoiler:
Yes they were trying to get the Sigmarine army out but frankly no one cared. What if instead of wasting so much time on that they rushed out a rerelease for every major faction from the Old World with say, a hero, 2 troop boxes and an elite box that were all similar enough to fit in alongside the old models but distinctly different in style. Then they should have put out.. it doesn't have to be a battletome/army book, but something like that with the new fluff for each redone race. If nothing else each race should have had 2 whole pages just for them in the first big book GW released, not every faction crammed into the bottom of a two page spread that was mostly art.
If I knew my Dark Elves still existed and they received a new Dreadlord, new spearmen, crossbowmen and cold one knights I'd probably have bought into that (even if it was just to use the minis for KoW).
Right now the only appeal is for Sigmarine players and Khorne players. You can't even really ad Lizardmen players to that list as this whole new setting with radically different fluff and supposedly completely new aesthetics left them with not a single change in their old model line.
That's probably the best criticism I've read of how AoS was handled and I apologise for being flippant with you on other threads, Jono. You've absolutely nailed it here.
Being a Lizardman player, I was kind of excited to see what my new incredile AoS minis would look like. Oh OK, there aren't any. I'll just make do with these awful Cold Ones and static-same-stance-saurus. The Ripperdactyls and Carno are awesome kits, but that really is about it.
The Sigmarites and Khorne stuff looks pretty good, but there's nothing for any other races. Perhaps a way to appease veteran players, "See, your minis are still viable! No need to buy a ton more new things"?!
I have been critical of all the negativity but that's mainly down to the fact that I wasn't particularly playing much WHFB and didn't enjoy it when I did. A lot of people have said "Well just don't play it!" but it's not as easy as that.
My favourite local radio station recently changed it's brand, and overhauled it's staff. They brought in one of the most reviled personalities in Britain to host the breakfast show. Everyone I know that listened to it hit hit the roof and most abandoned the station completely. But there's nothing else to replace it. Nothing is quite as good. The evening show has grown on me and I quite enjoy that, but I'm only getting half the fun out of my commute to and from the office.
jonolikespie wrote: If I knew my Dark Elves still existed and they received a new Dreadlord, new spearmen, crossbowmen and cold one knights I'd probably have bought into that (even if it was just to use the minis for KoW)..
I'd have done the same for High Elven spearmen and Silver Helms, for instance. Assuming, of course, they didn't decide the mess up with the scale.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
wuestenfux wrote: How is your opinion about the Sigmarines.
I neither like the look of the models nor the fluff.
On the other hand, the Goreblood models look fantastic and I'm using some in my 30k WE army.
Sigmarines are (IMO, ofc) a direct and shameless attempt at sucking in 40k Space Marine players (hence the nickname :p) I find them uninspiring both model and fluffwise (they are literally copy pasted Astartes).
That being said, I might buy one on ebay to use as a statue in Mordheim scenery. And the Griffon Hound too - though it technically doesn't qualify as a Sigmarine.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Kilkrazy wrote: As your post indicates, many people think that GW expect whatever they do to be popular just because. After Dread Fleet that seems unrealistic, but that is another topic.
I don't really think GW gives a damn about how a very specific standalone box was received. I bet you they just said "Ah it's not our forte - they were just ships anyway. We need to go back to 40k-like stuff! That's what we really excel at" and chugged it along the rest of the SG range kills they have made along the years.
Kilkrazy wrote: The price on UK Amazon is about £60 including postage, which is 20% discount. This is not a fire sale price.
US Amazon price is $65 with free shipping vs GW's $125 with free shipping = 48% discount.
T
That's a fire sale price. The retailer probably is selling the box for less than it cost him, because he needs to get rid of them and can't shift them at any higher price.
Maybe the game is doing better in the UK than in the USA?
Automatically Appended Next Post:
kestral wrote: It is also worth noting that the Amazon reviews have 65% 5 stars and 35% 1 star (out of 20 reviews), and nothing in between. Either you love it or hate it.
Yes, that is interesting. Most products have a pattern of lots of high scores and a few low scores, or the opposite. That's because on the whole, people who buy things like them. (This is well-known psychology in Marketing.) Therefore people buy things, like them and write good reviews. There's always a few people who don't like it and write a bad review. If you look at low scoring reviews, they are sometimes bollocks anyway.
OTOH there are a few products that genuinely are crap, and attract a lot of bad reviews for good reasons.
With AoS the pattern shows that there is a serious split in the market. Considering that people are more likely to write positive reviews than negative reviews, we might estimate that half of GW's customers like AoS and half of them hate it.
That doesn't seem a good success ratio for a company that has been the world's leading publishing of Fantasy/SF wargames for 25 years.
Calth is close to 25% off on Amazon.com, too, though, with free shipping to boot. It's also the #1 seller in tabletop games on amazon.com (USA), so I wouldn't read too much into it.
I suspect some of it is retailers that bought the number of copies to get the marketing and early shipment perks, and are just unloading stuff so as not to tie up capital. Also, some amazon.com US sellers buy from a non-US market (like Canada) where the cost is actually lower due to the very strong us dollar.
I get the impression a lot of stores were encouraged to buy many more boxes than they wanted, and are trying to dump stock. I doubt it's a US only thing.
As for it's failure, I was in the excited camp, I'd even talked my friend into getting back in, and then it dropped and I was in total disbelief. The rumours couldn't be true, it was a terrible plan.
The old world was gone, and replaced with a fairly obvious and cynical phoned in effort - fantasy Space Marines.
There's almost nothing in the new world to get excited about yet - my friends massive Bret army just disappeared, I had nothing to buy back into (because I don't like Space Marines or Chaos). There's nothing to get hooked in.
All the names have changed; there's no idea what an Aelf is, except it's supposedly different to an Elf. Is it worth buying my Dawi?
Then the rules; free and only 4 pages, awesome. Then people started reviewing it and the number of game breaking faults eclipsed the rules themselves.
Then there was the 'special' rules for legacy armies that were taking the piss out of old gamers - pretending to ride a horse, offending your opponent. It because clear that GW didn't put any effort into these rules, and had nothing but contempt for old players.
Since this was a new game, with no relation to WHFB, it had to stand on it's own 2 feet against new competition, and it failed miserably; the rules are a mess (which is an achievement with only 4 pages), the game is totally shallow.
I was going to get into AoS as a faster version of WHFB, but since there's no WHFB in it, it needs to take me away from my other games - Malifaux, FoW, Frostgrave. And it's inferior to them in every way.
Sure, some of the models are cool, but not enough to tempt me.
Worse, I'd probably have picked it up if there was a scene for it up here, as a game is a game, but beyond a handful of "WTF is going on?" posts, there was no interest at all. It'd killed GW fantasy gaming overnight.
That said; it's the best thing to happen to gaming in years - GW has single-handledly boosted Frostgrave and Kings Of War in ways they could never have dreamed possible, and broken many people out of the "GW is the one true hobby" mentality. Awful for GW, great for gamers.
TLDR; it was the wrong game, aimed at the wrong people, and mismanaged in every possible way.
I would imagine AoS or indeed any GW game would perform better in the UK than elsewhere as the GW store network is so prevalent.
An extreme revision of an old favourite will need constant promotion to keep up the buzz especially with the odd follow up AoS had to its initial release.
I liked the AoS boxset (and rules) but after that it was a slow weekly drip of more Sigmarites, eventually more Chaos (all great models here) and some reboxed existing models.
I think they need to reinforce the release of the game and new world they have created with some revamped forces, the oft discussed fire-dwarves being a good example. Reboxed models doesn't add to the excitement. Sigmarines probably work for rookies but lack much bite to grasp the imagination of anyone who wants a bit of depth to their gaming.
While the rules are free I get the feeling that you are now paying for the fluff. The world description in the AoS box is light on fluff and more seems to be included in the follow up books but £45 for a fluff and campaign book is more that I want to pay. I bought the first novel (fortunately heavily reduced) but it was way to thin in pages and added nothing to the limited fluff in the AoS box.
Basically GW are not giving you enough of the world to get your imagination going, the concept of it is fine but at the moment it falls short for me without this.
There are a few old players enjoying this at our club and the GW stores I've been to seem to have plenty of players enjoying it.
For me as much as i'm okay with the rules (and I can field a VC force with skellie bowmen for the first time in about a decade!) there isn't enough for me (yet) to stop playing Mordheim and Warmaster regularly.
notprop wrote: While the rules are free I get the feeling that you are now paying for the fluff. The world description in the AoS box is light on fluff and more seems to be included in the follow up books but £45 for a fluff and campaign book is more that I want to pay. I bought the first novel (fortunately heavily reduced) but it was way to thin in pages and added nothing to the limited fluff in the AoS box.
I have come to consider this exact point many times during the past few weeks. And it makes the purchase of the Battletomes even more of a waste of cash, imo.
I had no time or money put into Fantasy and was eagerly awaiting AoS. When it was released, the lack of rules and points values was a huge turnoff. I watched some videos on how to play the game and it had very little appeal for me to spend the money. Stayed with 40K.
The price is another peeve for me. I got the starter box and started a sigmarine army because it was a good deal, I picked up a box of the guys with guns/bows because I wanted em.. but honestly I don't see me buying anything else for the army at all at the current prices.. unless I get a 2nd starter box. Actually, I've been trying to trade the khorne minis I got for more sigmarines, but have had no luck. Guess everyone else has the same idea
$40 for 1 hero model? no. $50 for 3 flappy wing guys? no. $50 for a box of 5 troop guys, maybe but I'd rather just get the starter set.
I'm starting to think (maybe hope) Age of Sigmar is just a public beta test, or alpha test, and they'll be putting together a new rulebook soon that makes the game 40kish. Too bad we'll never know until a week before it's released.
George Spiggott wrote: I'm no fan of AoS but the traffic on this site for AoS doesn't seem to have slowed down much in comparison to the old Warhammer Fantasy traffic.
I think what they are saying is a lot more important than how many people are speaking at this point.
Every Friday night at the gaming club I attend there would be at least 3 games of Fantasy going on sometimes more. As soon as AoS dropped people gave it a shot and in unison said "nope not for me" and moved onto other games.
Now you hardly see any games of fantasy being played at all.
The semi-local GW Stuff Only store has given up on trying to set up games of it - leaving them with 40K and an RPG set in a world that will be turned to droplets in the wind. (How's that for motivation... yeah, you character has finally gotten to the pinnacle... but the entire world done been blowed up. Sucks to be you, eh?)
The even-less-local general gaming store has given up on the game entirely, and is dropping it's GW stocklist - having to carry AoS in order to get a better run on 40K has not been worth it.
oni wrote: I recall a time when 40K went through a very similar transformation with just as much player revolt - the switch from 2nd to 3rd edition.
I'm betting most of the people here on Dakka are too young to know of such a time, but it happened. 40K players left in droves; it was a dark and uncertain time indeed.
I see the potential in AoS just as saw the potential in 3rd edition 40K.
Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
Except that in that case it was a failing 2nd edition getting ousted by a much more successful 3rd edition, with rules that actually made more sense than the rules that they replaced.
And which included army lists so that folks could play their old armies immediately.
RiTides wrote:
That's the rub, Vermis! In the AoS section, there was a poll which had these results:
AoS going strong or dying out in your area?
A. Picking up steam. - 24% (135)
B. Definitely less interest as time goes on. 76% (423)
I hadn't even looked at that poll! It's even more telling. To me, anyway.
It's people who check an online forum, of course - those are the only people who you can poll without it being a local (or "anecdotal") result!
That's the thing about people who say 'internet forums do a lot of complaining about X game but it's popular outside the internet'. Unless you're a commercial traveller or summat, I'd say the world wide web might be a slightly larger sample.
Agreed with the rest of your post.
oni wrote:Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
I discovered GW and 40K during 3rd ed. I hate and revile the 40K game today.*
*No, not that literally.
Sergeant Horse wrote:You can say I can just play 8th, but that's not realistic since most gamers move to supported game systems, and KoW has taken over.
It might be a bit more difficult to do in a shop that has to sell the latest stuff and keep selling it, but you know there's another kind of gaming culture out there, where organised and hosted games are a thing? I'd say the Red Queen effect and pickup games are largely an artifact of GW's kind of marketing and playstyle, anyway.
More to the point, if you think "it's not as good a mass fantasy game as Kings of War", where's the beef?
Cost doesn't really come into it I find, people who want to will buy the products, people who can't afford to or don't find the value in it, won't.
But people can't afford to or don't find the value in it because the cost is too high. I think it's only subjective up to a point, especially where GW's concerned.
jonolikespie wrote:If nothing else each race should have had 2 whole pages just for them in the first big book GW released, not every faction crammed into the bottom of a two page spread that was mostly art.
I think that alone would have deflected quite a bit of rage about AoS. Maybe not enough to avoid it's current slide, but I dunno.
wuestenfux wrote:How is your opinion about the Sigmarines.
I neither like the look of the models nor the fluff.
Even before looking at their fluff or comparing to space marines, they were boring. Well-made, but boring. A bland, generic, literally faceless, adolescent idea of some kind of hulked-out badass. (And after looking at their fluff: coming with a cops 'n' robbers "I shot you!" "Nuh-uh you didn't!" element.) Same with the khorne stuff, but spikier. It's like what comics went through in the '90's. It's like fantasy as interpreted by RobLiefeld.* Complete with weird figure proportions beyond the medium's norm.
I'd say that's part of the impression that they 40K-ified (fortyfied?) WFB. WFB was ostensibly seen as the thinky, tactical, block-manoeuvre game for older, veteran gamers, compared to 40K with all it's thinking done at the listbuilding stage, and run-shoot-pile-in-and-thump mechanics. (Though I would say that being more tactical than 40K is no grand achievement in itself) It looks like they tried to recapture 40K's success not only by putting in a fantasy version of a fan-favourite faction and sticking things on round bases, but by tailoring the game from the ground up to appeal to a younger audience: boy's-own power fantasies and very simple rules bulked out with loads of special powers that you pick and choose beforehand.
Like I hinted, I don't think WFB was radically different (cries of 'herohammer' popped up periodically, over the years and editions, and the last edition was crammed so full of heroes, mad magic and monsters, that basic infantry itself needed 'special powers' just to stay on the table) but when AoS dropped and WFB went swirling down the pan, apparently all token nods towards tactical play went with it. (The loss of block manoeuvre was 'merely' a symptom of that; it's possible to have a tactical skirmish game) So I'd agree with MWHistorian and others that say that AoS is alright for a few kickaround games, but doesn't have the meat (or the right kind of meat) for older gamers to get their teeth into.
I also think it's why Kings of War picked up a lot of the slack. Now, I think KoW could stand to have a few tweaks and more tactical elements itself, but it's at least the next step: a more mature development of Warhammer. Folk almost responded in shock to it: units were an indivisible whole, living or dying more by morale, than agglomerations of wound counters being whittled down; special rules, characters, and heaps of available gear were played right down; magic wasn't a cray-cray game changer. I know the feeling. Felt it when looking at Epic:A from the viewpoint of 40K. But when WFB players migrated to it because it was the nearest, most apparent block manoeuvre game, they found that it really was all about that block, 'bout that block, no gravel - and with more tactical considerations. Tickling an older gamer's fancy more, IMO.
Pacific wrote:
The saddest thing for me for this about AoS is that GW must have known how much players enjoyed getting into that (quite competitive) scene, how those big tournaments were annual events on the gaming calendar for many, but they shrugged and pulled the plug. It says to me that they are either desperate, don't care, or have a really low opinion on the intelligence of their player base (replacing a game with the mechanics of WHFB with something like AoS).
Didn't there used to be a lot of talk about how we 'didn't get it' and competitive tournies were 'getting it wrong' because that's not how the GW studio designed and played their games, all but playing an AoS anything-goes style game with Warhammer rules anyway? In that case I'd guess that all three of the factors in your last line count, only maybe less 'don't care' so much as - ironically - 'didn't get it'.
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:
I'd have done the same for High Elven spearmen and Silver Helms, for instance. Assuming, of course, they didn't decide the mess up with the scale.
Ah, true. One of GW's pre-AoS blunders that annoyed me most. I was waiting for updated HE spearmen for my own games, thinking it was a dead cert for the last HE update. Instead we got dinghies pulled by eagles (only trumped by dinghies pulled by wolves) and now it's too late.
I don't really think GW gives a damn about how a very specific standalone box was received. I bet you they just said "Ah it's not our forte - they were just ships anyway. We need to go back to 40k-like stuff! That's what we really excel at" and chugged it along the rest of the SG range kills they have made along the years.
Herzlos wrote:
That said; it's the best thing to happen to gaming in years - GW has single-handledly boosted Frostgrave and Kings Of War in ways they could never have dreamed possible, and broken many people out of the "GW is the one true hobby" mentality. Awful for GW, great for gamers.
It's at this point that I feel this strong compulsion... Fantasy game? Smaller scale? One box = one unit? Quick playing? Individual bases? Use whatever models you like, or have? But more about the interplay of the general mechanics and unit types than loads of special rules?
RiTides wrote: Age of Sigmar is its own beast, and obviously not a fit for a fantasy tournament format (very much intentionally so). This makes it even harder to measure how well it's doing. We know it isn't being played at the tournament level, and the question is can it do well enough in informal gaming to make up for the lack of addressing that market (or those interested in formation-based fantasy games) at all.
Interesting that you brought this up, as our casual Saturday game group has decided to start an Age of Sigmar league after Christmas (there's a group that meets at my house on Saturdays, dedicated game room with several tables, terrain, board games, etc etc). Three of the people that want to do it have entirely new AoS armies (the Nurgle team I just got, a Stormcast player, and Khorne Bloodwhatever player), others are using their old WHFB models.
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jonolikespie wrote: Does anyone else kind of feel like when GW release a new edition for a game they take it for granted that all the old players will continue onto the new edition so they don't really need to advertise it at all and that, with that in mind, AoS was released as if it were a new edition which all the WHFB players would immediately adopt?
I kinda get the impression GW expected people would jump right over, not considering the differences in games to mean anything. At least that makes more sense to me than them just dumping their entire WHFB fanbase (no matter how small it was, it was more than 0).
No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product - which took me a while to realize - that was not GW's intent. I think their sole mistake was releasing free PDF's for pre-existing models. They nuked the setting and rules; they should have completely severed any ties with Warhammer Fantasy. I think those pdf warscrolls kept up an illusion that AoS was Fantasy. It's not. It's a completely new and different product.
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Kilkrazy wrote: I'm not surprised that it would appeal to a different kind of user. I'm also not very surprised that the user group would be relatively small.
It would seem logical that a game that is quick and easy to learn and play would appeal to people who don't have a deep interest in more complicated, time-consuming games. This kind of user does not seem likely to want to spend a lot of time and money building up their armies and terrain, etc.
If you want to make a beer and pretzels game, you need to make sure it is easily playable by a beer and pretzels crowd.
I think Age of Sigmar is the perfect compliment to 40k - 40k's rules are poorly written, armies are covered in exceptions and special case rules, it's a nightmare to play, and there's very little balance. Games take forever and even among more casual 40k players one can't help but feel cheated when an undercosted overpowered unit - of which there are many - wipes out entire squads with a few dice rolls. Age of Sigmar has super easy rules and is "field what you want". There's no pretense of faux balance. That's refreshingly honest.
Now, me, I love deeply tactical wargames. Kings of War being the best on the market right now, more akin to chess and relying less on powergaming axioms and entirely on the generalship of the player - especially positioning and maneuver, and how to think ahead several turns and anticipate your opponent's actions and reactions. I love war games and map games. I love any games that make me think and give me mental strain, where I'm fighting my opponent, and not the rules (this is also why I dislike 40k, because no matter how good you are as a commander, the rules and army comps are designed to negate tactical reasoning)
But I also really like Age of Sigmar because it's just ridiculous and fun, and is the total antithesis to the nontactical powergaming of 40k as well as the ultratactical KoW. It's literally it's own beast and reminds me of the Realm of Chaos days of 40k when there were no points and friends got together to just play really fun games with simple rules and neat models and drink a lot of beer. So, AoS has a home in my collection simply because it is not 40k and not Fantasy 8 (thank fething God, the worst ruleset ever published by mankind), and it's not KoW either, but it's still really ridiculously fun.
judgedoug wrote: No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product - which took me a while to realize - that was not GW's intent. I think their sole mistake was releasing free PDF's for pre-existing models. They nuked the setting and rules; they should have completely severed any ties with Warhammer Fantasy. I think those pdf warscrolls kept up an illusion that AoS was Fantasy. It's not. It's a completely new and different product.
That comment really has little to do with what Jono said. GW has been falling on their brand alone to push the increasingly badly designed rules they have been publishing these last few years. If you can't see that... I don't know what to tell you.
AoSis the continuation of WHFB - the fluff (slapdashed as it is) carries on from the last page of ET's Archaon. GW was clearly expecting WHFB players to follow along like the Pied Piper's rats - why else would they keep the iconic faction leaders alive? Archaon, Tyrion, Teclis, Sigmar, Alarielle, "Malekith", the Slann, the Skaven. Why would they issue scrolls for the now deceased world's units? (Apart from dodging the incoming riot to their HQ?)
AoSisGW's Fantasy - like it or not.
It all just massively backfired on them because they didn't realize they had already spent all their brand cred with the crappy rules and the relentless price hikes.
judgedoug wrote: No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product - which took me a while to realize - that was not GW's intent. I think their sole mistake was releasing free PDF's for pre-existing models. They nuked the setting and rules; they should have completely severed any ties with Warhammer Fantasy. I think those pdf warscrolls kept up an illusion that AoS was Fantasy. It's not. It's a completely new and different product.
That comment really has little to do with what Jono said. GW has been falling on their brand alone to push the increasingly badly designed rules they have been publishing these last few years. If you can't see that... I don't know what to tell you.
AoSis the continuation of WHFB - the fluff (slapdashed as it is) carries on from the last page of ET's Archaon. GW was clearly expecting WHFB players to follow along like the Pied Piper's rats - why else would they keep the iconic faction leaders alive? Archaon, Tyrion, Teclis, Sigmar, Allariele, "Malekith", the Slann, the Skaven. Why would they issue scrolls for the now deceased world's units? (Apart from dodging the incoming riot to their HQ?)
AoSisGW's Fantasy - like it or not.
It all just massively backfired on them because they didn't realize they had already spent all their brand cred with the crappy rules and the relentless price hikes.
I'm not talking about the background. I'm saying it's a mistake to have caused brand confusion. They should have not released free PDF warscrolls for older Warhammer Fantasy players. Age of Sigmar is a brand new game, and it should have been treated by GW as such.
You mean AoS, right? I mean... you got to mean AoS.
Oh dear me, feth no. Warhammer 4 and 5 are exponentially better than 8 could ever had hoped to be - in that Warhammer 4 and 5 were actually fun to play despite terrible rules. Warhammer 8 was just god awful. From what I can tell, Warhammer 8 was the result of someone at GW who didn't like Tuomas Purinin and used Warhammer 6 to wipe their ass and released that as Warhammer 8.
No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product
Which is why the products are all labelled 'Warhammer: Age of Sigmar'.
I agree that it's a very different concept, but that reasoning smacks a bit of, say, trying to assert 1st ed 40K was an entirely different game and intent to subsequent editions because it was actually a game called 'Rogue Trader'. (Complete with it's real title squirreled away under that massive 'Warhammer 40,000' banner...)
they should have completely severed any ties with Warhammer Fantasy.
I don't think the old-faction pdfs made much difference to that. I get the feeling WFB players were pretty aware that ties were well and truly severed through other vague hints and clues.
And strangely, Doug, that was the problem. They didn't really view it as a chance to throw their arms in the air, shout 'yay!', chuck their pricey, carefully built armies in the bin and just blindly go along with what GW dictated.
Nah, they should have released Age of Sigmar as a brand new game, and let Warhammer linger, slowly remove retail codes and move the range to direct only, and then kill it off in a year when it finally finished it's death. Aka the Epic 40k treatment.
You mean AoS, right? I mean... you got to mean AoS.
Oh dear me, feth no. Warhammer 4 and 5 are exponentially better than 8 could ever had hoped to be - in that Warhammer 4 and 5 were actually fun to play despite terrible rules. Warhammer 8 was just god awful. From what I can tell, Warhammer 8 was the result of someone at GW who didn't like Tuomas Purinin and used Warhammer 6 to wipe their ass and released that as Warhammer 8.
With all its flaws and weaknesses, 8th edition is millenia ahead of what AoS is. AoS was a massive downgrade - not an upgrade.
No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product
Which is why the products are all labelled 'Warhammer: Age of Sigmar'.
I agree that it's an entirely different game, but it smacks a bit of, say, trying to assert 1st ed 40K had an entirely different intent to later editions because it was actually a game called 'Rogue Trader'. (Complete with it's real title squirreled away under that massive 'Warhammer 40,000' banner...)
Not sure what you are saying here, because Rogue Trader and 40k 2 are pretty much different games. Several core rules changes, army composition, turn sequences, close combat, morale, hell, pretty much everything changed between RT being released, through the Compendium and Compilation and the new Vehicle Rules (well like the three iterations of vehicles rules) until 40k 2 was released.
With all the respect that I have for Epic 40k and their players... Epic isn't WHFB. To even assume FB - a two decades long flagship brand - should receive the same treatment as a SG game got when it was put down is... naive at best and insulting at worst.
coldgaming wrote: I've found the forum-goer kind of crowd has been very negative toward it, but a lot of people outside of that are very positive and into it. I don't know anything about sales. I know some of the big tournament organizers are giving it a chance, especially in the UK.
I have experienced this firsthand. Most of the 40k and AoS players at the FLGS barely look or even know what Dakka and Warseer are - they get most of their news from like Spikey Bits or BoLS updates on their Facebook feeds. The AoS vibe is very very positive amongst them.
Same deal with my two regular groups, one mixed-game club and one group of crusty old SG vets, never touch the forums in the main, but AoS has died on its arse. There's a tendency to assume people on the forums are some totally disconnected sub-culture within wargaming, but from my experience the range of views is pretty representative of the broader community, they're just held with more vehemence by forumgoing fans.
Guildsman wrote: I think a big part of why the veteran community has had such a backlash against AoS is the destruction of the background. If the End Times had wrapped up with a cataclysmic event that left the world wrecked but intact, players might not have been so upset. Heck, a post-apocalyptic high fantasy world would be interesting and, more importantly, allow fans to maintain their connection to the game. Instead, they blew up everything, changed the cosmology, and advanced the timeline by 1,000+ years. Couple that with a shift to a completely different, dumbed-down ruleset, and it feels like a slap in the face.
Best thing to happen to Fantasy. I love me some Oldhammer, and began playing Warhammer in 1994... but the world timeline wasn't progressing - when it did, people bitched, when it was retconned, other people bitched. I still have all my army books and all my Warhammer Roleplay (GW and Hogshead) for that awesome oldschool Empire vibe.
The End Times and the AoS fluff are so over the top, I love it. Best thing GW could have done with the property since it was stagnating since 2006.
I can never get my head around this mentality. If I don't like or become bored of a thing, I don't hope that thing is changed drastically to suit my tastes/changed opinion, and certainly not at the expense of the enjoyment of everyone who liked it as it was, I just find something else to play/read/watch. Warhammer was the Warhammer World, that background, those races, those animosities and conflicts, without them AoS is essentially an entirely different game set in an entirely different world, so why on earth was it necessary to gut real Warhammer Fantasy and have AoS wear its skin as a cape? If GW had simply released AoS as a third "Warhammer [something]" game, would you really have been less likely to play it because its creation didn't come at the expense of real WHF?
You perhaps saw the lack of linear story progression as "stagnation", a lot of people saw it as a setting doing exactly what a setting is supposed to do.
Yodhrin wrote: You perhaps saw the lack of linear story progression as "stagnation", a lot of people saw it as a setting doing exactly what a setting is supposed to do.
And now GW is milking that linear story progression at 45€ a pop! Ain't that swell?
Edit: By progression I mean "This book here is where X faction appears to fight chaos in Y place... and fights B faction in Z place."
Phew... such progression. I swear I have NEVER seen such a thing before!
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: With all its flaws and weaknesses, 8th edition is millenia ahead of what AoS is. AoS was a massive downgrade - not an upgrade.
But what are we comparing? As a fun skirmish game, AoS definitely beats Warhammer 8. As a tedious exercise in mental fatigue, Warhammer 8 beats AoS. If you're trying to compare only the aspect of mass-battles, Warhammer 8 is certainly better than AoS at emulating troop formations, but fails compared to any other mass battles game released since the 1990's. We had seven revisions of a product whose rules philosophy have been eclipsed by better design, even by those same authors who sought to improve Warhammer, and it's not gotten better with age. It really needed to die.
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: With all its flaws and weaknesses, 8th edition is millenia ahead of what AoS is. AoS was a massive downgrade - not an upgrade.
But what are we comparing? As a fun skirmish game, AoS definitely beats Warhammer 8. As a tedious exercise in mental fatigue, Warhammer 8 beats AoS. If you're trying to compare only the aspect of mass-battles, Warhammer 8 is certainly better than AoS at emulating troop formations, but fails compared to any other mass battles game released since the 1990's. We had seven revisions of a product whose rules philosophy have been eclipsed by better design, even by those same authors who sought to improve Warhammer, and it's not gotten better with age. It really needed to die.
Saying that a skirmish game - no matter how bad it is - is better at being a skirmish game than a mass battle block game is is like saying pears are better at being pears than oranges are at being pears - it proves what, exactly? I meant as a game - you know... with a structure?
And no - WHFB needed to be decently handled and have its rules revised - just like 40k does. It didn't need to die.
It was WHFB's death that split the community apart.
judgedoug wrote: No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product - which took me a while to realize - that was not GW's intent. I think their sole mistake was releasing free PDF's for pre-existing models. They nuked the setting and rules; they should have completely severed any ties with Warhammer Fantasy. I think those pdf warscrolls kept up an illusion that AoS was Fantasy. It's not. It's a completely new and different product.
That comment really has little to do with what Jono said. GW has been falling on their brand alone to push the increasingly badly designed rules they have been publishing these last few years. If you can't see that... I don't know what to tell you.
AoSis the continuation of WHFB - the fluff (slapdashed as it is) carries on from the last page of ET's Archaon. GW was clearly expecting WHFB players to follow along like the Pied Piper's rats - why else would they keep the iconic faction leaders alive? Archaon, Tyrion, Teclis, Sigmar, Allariele, "Malekith", the Slann, the Skaven. Why would they issue scrolls for the now deceased world's units? (Apart from dodging the incoming riot to their HQ?)
AoSisGW's Fantasy - like it or not.
It all just massively backfired on them because they didn't realize they had already spent all their brand cred with the crappy rules and the relentless price hikes.
I'm not talking about the background. I'm saying it's a mistake to have caused brand confusion. They should have not released free PDF warscrolls for older Warhammer Fantasy players. Age of Sigmar is a brand new game, and it should have been treated by GW as such.
If we take this to be true, that AoS is NOT WHFB then the reason for AoS failing becomes blindingly obvious.
Here we are months into its life with only 3 armies, and of those three armies one doesn't have models.
If you only count things released under the AoS banner then there has been an outright pathetic amount of support for this brand new game and it should not surprise anyone that it's doing poorly.
There are better games for less out there, I saw there was no points and just decided to play Kings of War.
Lets me expand to other companies I otherwise wouldn't have done.
I don't play 40k anymore, it's really not my style anymore.
No clue what I need to play it these days, every edition has something huge I need to buy, my poor chaos army is too old for this.
Oh, while I'm unable to get to sleep and posting here instead I'd just like to point out that "This is just an online forum, it doesn't represent the community" is a no more valid statement than "As the largest wargaming forum Dakka is the BEST representation of the community".
RiTides wrote: Age of Sigmar is its own beast, and obviously not a fit for a fantasy tournament format (very much intentionally so). This makes it even harder to measure how well it's doing. We know it isn't being played at the tournament level, and the question is can it do well enough in informal gaming to make up for the lack of addressing that market (or those interested in formation-based fantasy games) at all.
Interesting that you brought this up, as our casual Saturday game group has decided to start an Age of Sigmar league after Christmas (there's a group that meets at my house on Saturdays, dedicated game room with several tables, terrain, board games, etc etc). Three of the people that want to do it have entirely new AoS armies (the Nurgle team I just got, a Stormcast player, and Khorne Bloodwhatever player), others are using their old WHFB models.
I see you skipped the part of my post that had the poll results
It is great that you have a local group that is into AoS! However, I think it's pretty clear that this is as "anecdotal" as it gets - that argument can not only be one-way. I know you think Dakka posters are not representative, but the fact is the only positive-only posters I see about AoS are you and MongooseMatt. There are a lot of fantasy posters on this site, and while some might not be representative, some certainly are... and that poll showing a 3-to-1 response rate of AoS generating less interest over time is very telling for the overall trend.
Even in your case, two of the players are using the models from the boxed set, the only one you mention who bought a new army and isn't using the boxed set models is your own army! That GW didn't invest more (releasing Lizardmen with no new models, despite a supposedly completely new setting!) means I really can't see a runway for this to continue to generate interest at the level they were aiming for.
It's also fine to say a complete dropping of the line was in order and a reboot (even if I disagree, with a major computer game coming out set in the Old World, for instance). However, that would be why people are viewing it as a failure - the adoption rate is very low, and this is much more comparable now to a skirmish game like the others on the market as far as adoption, rather than the dominant position they would have had if they had released the game people were expecting and hoping for (a smaller model count version of fantasy, with rules usable in a non-casual-only setting).
Sorry if this was long, I enjoy the discussion and hopefully these points came across as I intended! No disrespect to you or your gaming group at all, it is genuinely awesome that you guys are enjoying the game
I guess we have to define failure before we can decide if AoS is failing.
Now, I don't really play GW games any more. But I am interested (I have 4 large Fantasy armies and 2 large 40K armies as well as various specialist games and a lot of LOTR stuff).
It seems to me at least that GW were looking to improve on the sales of Warhammer Fantasy while also getting an excuse to clear out a bunch of poorly selling stock (Brets etc) and make everything more "protectable".
I think the evidence suggests they failed on the first point and probably succeeded on the second and third?
But the second and third objectives mean nothing if the sales of the game dwindle even further.
I think what stands out from the release is that we're not looking at a company that is even capable of innovative game design at this point.
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: That would have caused a shitstorm that would have dwarfed the current one. We're talking Eye of Terror-level shitstorm here. It would be spitting in the face of the players that have supported their first brand for over two decades.
The bad PR that would get would be... I don't even know how to define it. Post-Heresy HORUS would have better PR than GW if they pulled that stunt.
Nah, they should have released Age of Sigmar as a brand new game, and let Warhammer linger, slowly remove retail codes and move the range to direct only, and then kill it off in a year when it finally finished it's death. Aka the Epic 40k treatment.
That would not have sold a shed load of End Times product, though.
Perhaps I am too cynical.
To get back on topic, GW released the legacy army war scrolls because they hoped that this would attract WHFB players over to AoS, and perhaps also because they clearly did not have enough AoS branded model kits ready to go.
So yes, it has created brand confusion. Not a surprise as GW clearly have no understanding of brand marketing, which is of course because they don't do marketing at all.
GW's 'marketing' strategy for years has been to release stuff and users buy it. This used to work and still does to a degree, but not nearly as well as five or 10 years ago.
However if veterans didn't switch to AoS, then it wasn't because of brand confusion, but probably because of factors like the rules.
judgedoug wrote: No, not at all. Once you realized that GW had ended Warhammer Fantasy, and this was a wholly new product - which took me a while to realize - that was not GW's intent. I think their sole mistake was releasing free PDF's for pre-existing models. They nuked the setting and rules; they should have completely severed any ties with Warhammer Fantasy. I think those pdf warscrolls kept up an illusion that AoS was Fantasy. It's not. It's a completely new and different product.
That comment really has little to do with what Jono said. GW has been falling on their brand alone to push the increasingly badly designed rules they have been publishing these last few years. If you can't see that... I don't know what to tell you.
AoSis the continuation of WHFB - the fluff (slapdashed as it is) carries on from the last page of ET's Archaon. GW was clearly expecting WHFB players to follow along like the Pied Piper's rats - why else would they keep the iconic faction leaders alive? Archaon, Tyrion, Teclis, Sigmar, Allariele, "Malekith", the Slann, the Skaven. Why would they issue scrolls for the now deceased world's units? (Apart from dodging the incoming riot to their HQ?)
AoSisGW's Fantasy - like it or not.
It all just massively backfired on them because they didn't realize they had already spent all their brand cred with the crappy rules and the relentless price hikes.
I'm not talking about the background. I'm saying it's a mistake to have caused brand confusion. They should have not released free PDF warscrolls for older Warhammer Fantasy players. Age of Sigmar is a brand new game, and it should have been treated by GW as such.
If we take this to be true, that AoS is NOT WHFB then the reason for AoS failing becomes blindingly obvious.
Here we are months into its life with only 3 armies, and of those three armies one doesn't have models.
If you only count things released under the AoS banner then there has been an outright pathetic amount of support for this brand new game and it should not surprise anyone that it's doing poorly.
This is my view on it as well. I really like the game and have bought a Stormcast army, but I'm completely baffled that they haven't released anything at all for the old factions, or variants of them. Stormcast and Bloodbound are pretty similar in that they both consist of big burly uncaring men swinging axes at each other - a theme that most certainly does not appeal to everyone, and it's all they have currently. I'm willing to bet that as soon as they release a few Elf and Dwarf kits (assuming those are next) sales will go up considerably. Although they really should hurry before they kill any momentum they have left.
Kilkrazy wrote: I think they need to be new sculpts, not just the old Elf and Dwarf kits with round bases in AoS packaging.
Yeah that's what I meant. New, exciting dwarfs, elves, rats etc. Like doug said they have released models for two factions so far, which is abysmal. I think someone (Mantic?) said you should launch a new game with at least four factions.
It is failing, I have no hard evidence but from the discussions it is a mix of everything mentioned.
Disconnected the player base from the fluff they were accustomed to, not providing something better fluff wise.
Game balance is bad and exploits thrive.
Sigmarites were poorly received as a shoved in space marine look alike faction.
Funny rules were not considered funny (next time try making the game put the players in the mood to do the funny things and not force them to do so).
No point cost or balance in warscrols
Rubbed the veterans in the extremely wrong way.
Old factions re released with old models, so whats the point of redoing them?
Price while expensive is not really an issue, GW is expensive and most people accept it while complaining if the overall product is good.
What mystifies me is how this thing failed, it had all the ingredients to be great.
While I did not like the details (I actually hated most of them) the end time had strong themes that were captivating, the end in particular, two mortal enemies united, the dead protecting the living was a strong emotional theme, as mentioned above a strong post apocalyptic theme were defiant survivors fight for various reasons, the old gods desperately holding what little normality is left, even the sigmarites could fit as Sigmar chooses champions infusing them with his essence in desperation of turning the tide (making their loss something serious) would be a good buildup from such rich background would give players a connection from old to new and give the setting for a similar gameplay experience, instead the went with world went boom, reboot.
Warscrols is a brilliant idea, balance each warscroll make it a box and have it as a product, 10 sigmarites, 25 orks, 30 scaveslaves, 1 bloodthirster, 3 heroes all equal among themselves all 1 warscroll essentially the game points would be how many warscrolls one plays and the buyer would simply buy a warscroll ready from the self (assembly and painting needed, but you get what I mean) instead they went with em what we see....
Rules... the 4 pages is not a bad thing, the plethora of pasted on extra rules is, the "funny rules" are an anathema of game design, the exploits obvious from the first hour of release are, I don't know, signs of throwing the towel?
Finally if you are the size of GW and attempt to radically reboot everything, reboot everything, new models for everybody and even though you do not need to have the entire range ready on the go the "basics" should be available from day one for everybody.
The transition from 2nd to 3rd edition of 40k was not that bad, sure there were some complains, but the fluff was not nuked, the rules were not full of exploits, there were no competitive alternatives or competitors.
I think that last point is a very strong one: 40k was the biggest of big, while today there's a pretty thriving set of smaller companies known for good rules, rather than small companies that were relative gambles in the pre-internet days of word of mouth as the primary assessment.
PsychoticStorm wrote: It is failing, I have no hard evidence but from the discussions it is a mix of everything mentioned.
Warscrols is a brilliant idea, balance each warscroll make it a box and have it as a product, 10 sigmarites, 25 orks, 30 scaveslaves, 1 bloodthirster, 3 heroes all equal among themselves all 1 warscroll essentially the game points would be how many warscrolls one plays and the buyer would simply buy a warscroll ready from the self (assembly and painting needed, but you get what I mean) instead they went with em what we see....
You know, that would have made a whole lot of sense and would have actually been simple, intuitive and potentially balanced.
And the time it took to think of that? Apparently more time than GW took. And I think it shows. AOS feels rushed and not well thought out.
As an author, it's the fluff that I especially find painful. I've heard better story ideas from teenagers at conventions. There is no emotional connection to the Sigmarines. They're faceless, have no personality and there is no real sense of urgency. If they die, they just respawn like Call of Duty. The world isn't fleshed out at all. The old Fantasy world was living and breathing. This just feels vague and unattached. They don't give us a reason to care about anything.
I have experienced this firsthand. Most of the 40k and AoS players at the FLGS barely look or even know what Dakka and Warseer are - they get most of their news from like Spikey Bits or BoLS updates on their Facebook feeds. The AoS vibe is very very positive amongst them.
No idea what threats you are talking about. When I went over to BoLS forum today. Most of the threads started with a negative view but defended by a handful of die hard fans, not surprisingly as expected.
WFB was not hugely popular in my FLGS prior to AoS. However, the typical Friday night saw a handful of people playing it. There are less people seen playing AoS on a regular basis than there was WFB. From talking to some of the staff, it's not selling well either. There have been no events, no tourneys, and no groups for AoS specifically since it's launch. That's my completely unscientific take on it in my area.
PsychoticStorm wrote:[much awesome and a pretty consecutive summary of the issues with the game]
Have an exalt good sir, you have pretty much just pinpointed every issue with the system.
MWHistorian wrote:
PsychoticStorm wrote: It is failing, I have no hard evidence but from the discussions it is a mix of everything mentioned.
Warscrols is a brilliant idea, balance each warscroll make it a box and have it as a product, 10 sigmarites, 25 orks, 30 scaveslaves, 1 bloodthirster, 3 heroes all equal among themselves all 1 warscroll essentially the game points would be how many warscrolls one plays and the buyer would simply buy a warscroll ready from the self (assembly and painting needed, but you get what I mean) instead they went with em what we see....
You know, that would have made a whole lot of sense and would have actually been simple, intuitive and potentially balanced.
And the time it took to think of that? Apparently more time than GW took. And I think it shows. AOS feels rushed and not well thought out.
As an author, it's the fluff that I especially find painful. I've heard better story ideas from teenagers at conventions. There is no emotional connection to the Sigmarines. They're faceless, have no personality and there is no real sense of urgency. If they die, they just respawn like Call of Duty. The world isn't fleshed out at all. The old Fantasy world was living and breathing. This just feels vague and unattached. They don't give us a reason to care about anything.
Agreed. In the old fantasy world you had real living people fighting and dying, trying to defend their lands and loved ones. Victories and losses mattered, races plotted against one another and everything interacted. In this new one everyone good is protected by Sigmar Sues whom are immortal and indestructible beings but ooohhh they have faults you know, every time they respawn they lose a fragment of memory. Isnt that deep and meaningful people, just think on it, these brave immortals losing something they dont even need or use in the first place.
Its pathetic
It is not deep or meaningful and it just feels like yet more Marine fanselffeth.
I miss the days when if the good guy died he was dead. And he wasnt a nomarine with superhuman abilities, he was a regular human/elf/dwaf with a bit of armour and a shield to protect him and a sword/spear/axe/hammer to fight with. He was an average bod and yet he still donned his armour and went out to fight. Not THAT was a true hero.
There are the Sylvaneth, right? And the Lizar.... Seraphon! I wonder if there will ever be good-guy unenhanced humans, though. I guess they wouldn't survive very long in the current age
I have, to date, never seen anyone playing Age of Sigmar at my FLGS. To be fair, I had never seen anyone playing WFB either (I have since been told that the group that played WFB got blacklisted from the store for being a-holes or something, can't remember exactly what happened). The store stocks some AoS stuff, but I've never even seen any of it disappear off the shelves. I have to think in this area its a dismal failure.
Which is a shame because, unlike many, I actually like the Stormcast Eternals in spite of the fact that they are fantasy Spess Muhreens. Same with the Khorne Bloodbound guys; the models are great, the game...not so much.
It is failing in my area. I don't know if its the game, or if its just not of interest to people here. We used to have a huge group of Fantasy players but they died down around 6th ed Fantasy. One of the FLGSs in my area had about 100 AOS box sets when it came out, now they have about 90 left. I overheard the owner telling another person that the game is horrible and does not sell.
There are the Sylvaneth, right? And the Lizar.... Seraphon! I wonder if there will ever be good-guy unenhanced humans, though. I guess they wouldn't survive very long in the current age
Not sure on the Sylvaneth but Seraphon are, unfortunately, technically immortal as they are *wince* dreams. Unless the Slann are stupid and decide to Deepstr- I mean magically beam down from their magical spaceships to get their fat froggy faces in range of an axe.
After reading through this thread, it appears that the "sky is falling" for AoS.
I've never seen a table top game with such a poor core rule set.
Lack of missions and no framework for army design put the final nail on the coffin.
Why is it Failing?
Once upon a time, there was a popular game called Warhammer Fantasy Battles. It had lots of players and hundreds of different miniatures to collect and paint. Then one day, Games Workshop, the creator of the game, decided to change the game a bit, instead of releasing an updated edition like everyone expected.
They made changes and more changes. They changed the background, they changed the mechanics, they gutted the point system, and even did away with the army books. They changed everything their fans loved about the game, and then acted like the players were supposed to be thrilled and amazed with the shiny new game they had distilled from their former masterpiece.
It did not work out as expected, no, not at all.
The players were shocked. While some stood and stared, others wept, while a few feigned delight with the new game. Long-time players were in denial, and sought to devise a system to balance the lopsided parody of their beloved game. Tzeentch himself would have been proud of the cacophony of thousands of voices all offering opinions at once, then being shouted down only to cry out again.
Yet no common ruleset was to be forthcoming, and the creators silently released a new fortress and some half-hearted new figures for their ill-conceived new game, as if everything were business-as-usual.
But it was not to be so. Players began to accept that their beloved hobby-game was gone. They began to look at other games from other companies, and for alternate rules which could once again allow their prized armies a chance to do battle. Of course, some just played the game as it had been before that fateful July day, others simply walked away from it all. In one extreme case, an army collection was burned in protest of the foul new pariah.
The final chapter of our tale is not yet written. Will the creators repent of their misguided tinkering? Or will the once-proud company crumble into a shadow of it's former self?
Or will a new game rise, like a phoenix from the ashes of the former passtime?
Time will tell.
It is far from unsalvageable and definitely not a trainwreak, GW has a huge loyal fanbase that has carried them and still does, this is their biggest asset, not the models, not the fluff and it has proven quite elastic and abuse tolerant, less than what GW believes but more than most believe it is sane to be.
Rules can be changed or improved especially if they are given away from free and generate some loyalty points in the process, new sculpts can be made fast, other companies with smaller budget and team of artists have faster output than GW, the biggest issue IS the fluff, but, GW sits on the goldmine that is black library authors, love them or hate them, they do a decent job and can, in my opinion, find a way to save it without completely re writing it, or find a way to completely re write it without people noticing it (on the subject it still amazes me they do not use them for their main products).
The problem is it needs more money time and effort than GW is known on giving and if they had spend that beforehand they could have reach to such a point with less money time and effort.
It was broken and the falling sales are a huge indicator of that, I do not blame them for trying to fix it, the moral is that if you try to repair a car, try the end result be a car, even a better car, not a refrigerator.
No matter how cool it may keep things, it will not go anywhere.
To be honest, if AoS is failing, I believe it's more because of a lack of communication with their loyal customers. Seriously, they need to show more things for the future of the product line - and certainly not in the way they do now with weekly White Dwarf. Having too much 40k in a row without knowing when the next new release for AoS will come is extremely frustrating.
But that's not new.
Getting the "Old WFB Guard" angry was a really bad move. Word of mouth became extremely negative in some locations because of that.
When you have a business where you don't do active publicity outside and rely on word of mouth from players, that's a pretty big Damocles sword ready to fall above your head.
GW lost a lot of loyal fanbase when they destroyed WFB (and the Old World, by the way - no matter what others can say, AoS universe is completely and utterly different). Many of them felt litteraly betrayed by the people from GW - and treason can only be punished with death, as 40k fans know it well.
Sarouan wrote: To be honest, if AoS is failing, I believe it's more because of a lack of communication with their loyal customers. Seriously, they need to show more things for the future of the product line - and certainly not in the way they do now with weekly White Dwarf. Having too much 40k in a row without knowing when the next new release for AoS will come is extremely frustrating.
But that's not new.
Getting the "Old WFB Guard" angry was a really bad move. Word of mouth became extremely negative in some locations because of that.
When you have a business where you don't do active publicity outside and rely on word of mouth from players, that's a pretty big Damocles sword ready to fall above your head.
GW lost a lot of loyal fanbase when they destroyed WFB (and the Old World, by the way - no matter what others can say, AoS universe is completely and utterly different). Many of them felt litteraly betrayed by the people from GW - and treason can only be punished with death, as 40k fans know it well.
I can't help but wonder how different the reception of AoS would have been if the day after the last End Times was released and we all saw the world blow up Warhammer TV put out a video where one of the remaining big name designers from the studio (there is still some left other than Jervis.. right?) came out and told us that a new game was coming to replace WHFB.
They could have explained that this was the whole plan from the beginning of end times. They could have explained that it would be a much more casual game, they could have spoken about how it will be free rules but with campaign books that create and ongoing story.
Instead we had to wait months with no idea what was going on except that the world was blown up and then came rumours of no point values and space marines in fantasy and the fan base was just a powder keg waiting to be set off by those rumours.
It was broken and the falling sales are a huge indicator of that, I do not blame them for trying to fix it, the moral is that if you try to repair a car, try the end result be a car, even a better car, not a refrigerator.
No matter how cool it may keep things, it will not go anywhere.
Aye, that. Or: it was broken. It's just that GW tried fixing it with a hammer.
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: Not sure on the Sylvaneth but Seraphon are, unfortunately, technically immortal as they are *wince* dreams. Unless the Slann are stupid and decide to Deepstr- I mean magically beam down from their magical spaceships to get their fat froggy faces in range of an axe.
Wait, wait, wait, what? They're dreams? I...just...wow. What were they thinking?
The problem with the thought process of "GW should have just made a 9e WHFB and kept loyal WHFB fans happy" is that WHFB accounted for something like 5% of GW's revenue. Seeing as it takes up 30%-40% of the GW models shelf space in most stores that carry it, this just doesn't make sense.
In my humble opinion, part of Fantasy's failure long before AoS's arrival can be attributed to the same reason that it's really hard for other companies to break into the "Space Marine Market" -- 40k just provides a better setting to provide the type of things that people who go crazy about the type of kits that excite people who like building Space Marines want -- zillions of cool weapons options, and everything from wee tiny grots to giant stompy robots, troop carriers, giant guns, and all that stuff. I don't think that any model love could have grown Fantasy to the level of sales that 40k enjoys.
Obviously, I'm not saying that 40k is what everyone wants, but a lot of the people who must choose between what Fantasy battle offers and what 40k offers just think 40k is a better intersection of what scratches their itch. A lot of other people go to non-GW properties, either for the game, or because the just don't like the GW style of models.
So, then, what is success?
It really doesn't matter how many people hate the game. It really doesn't matter that most of the people who loved WHFB hate AoS, because that number of people and what they bought year after year was so small that it couldn't sustain the catalog, shelf space, and gaming space. What matters is enough people love AoS and keep buying books and models to keep it alive, in a way that was sadly NOT true of WHFB in its last years. Did WHFB die off because of poor decisions by GW? Perhaps, perhaps not, but either way, that's not the subject of this thread.
I'm certainly not saying that AoS is a success -- or a failure. Frankly, I have no idea. But for sure, WHFB has NOT been successful in the last decade, and GW couldn't justify its existence. So it either had to chase the WMH crowd, which I think is a waste of time for GW, or to go look for another niche. Whether that group of players can keep AoS alive? We'll find out in a few years, I suppose. A lot of it will depend on whether GW can create the same sort of excitement for new AoS product that it does with 40k releases.
Talys wrote: What matters is enough people love AoS and keep buying books and models to keep it alive, in a way that was sadly NOT true of WHFB in its last years.
Is that actually true, though? Aren't a lot of these so called "limited" releases sticking around a lot longer than they should, or not selling out at all?
Grimskul wrote: in accordance with the behavioural rules that are in the game, you have to sing "If you wish upon a star" before being able to claim victory.
Talys wrote: The problem with the thought process of "GW should have just made a 9e WHFB and kept loyal WHFB fans happy" is that WHFB accounted for something like 5% of GW's revenue. Seeing as it takes up 30%-40% of the GW models shelf space in most stores that carry it, this just doesn't make sense.
Talys wrote: What matters is enough people love AoS and keep buying books and models to keep it alive, in a way that was sadly NOT true of WHFB in its last years.
Is that actually true, though? Aren't a lot of these so called "limited" releases sticking around a lot longer than they should, or not selling out at all?
It's about as true as all the percentages that he posted in the same thread. But hey...
Talys wrote: The problem with the thought process of "GW should have just made a 9e WHFB and kept loyal WHFB fans happy" is that WHFB accounted for something like 5% of GW's revenue. Seeing as it takes up 30%-40% of the GW models shelf space in most stores that carry it, this just doesn't make sense.
Talys wrote: What matters is enough people love AoS and keep buying books and models to keep it alive, in a way that was sadly NOT true of WHFB in its last years.
Is that actually true, though? Aren't a lot of these so called "limited" releases sticking around a lot longer than they should, or not selling out at all?
They are not selling, in fact, we've just had the best litmus test for this so far, with the rerelease of an existing army from WHFB with an existing playerbase. The Seraphon ltd ed. book is still for sale. The Lizardman 8th version sold out within hours.
I've been a 40ker for a while and wanted to try fantasy a while back I bought the island of blood stuff but just couldn't get into it and sold it off. Since AOS was released it intrigued me a whole new start to fantasy!! So after a while I decided to buy into the starter. I'm a noob at the moment but so far I am loving it!!! One of the best starters GW has produced and I'm quite happy ruleswise too!! So why people are having it so much is beyond me. Long may AOS continue because for the life of me i just didn't 'get' WHFB!!!
Automatically Appended Next Post: I meant hating not having. My bad. :-(
People are hating it for a lot of reasons. The big one for me is that the balance in army building is close to non-existent. If you put down 100 of (insert figure name here) on the table, I can put down 130 of the same figure and not even have a sudden death penalty.
That's an extreme example, but trying to figure out a fair game is riddled with problems like that that just get worse with non-identical figures. How many skaven is fair to have per elf in the other guy's army? The only guideline GW gives us is the sudden death rules, which assume that all figures are equal. And the idea that they're all equal is just laughably wrong.
Sword Of Caliban wrote: I've been a 40ker for a while and wanted to try fantasy a while back I bought the island of blood stuff but just couldn't get into it and sold it off. Since AOS was released it intrigued me a whole new start to fantasy!! So after a while I decided to buy into the starter. I'm a noob at the moment but so far I am loving it!!! One of the best starters GW has produced and I'm quite happy ruleswise too!! So why people are having it so much is beyond me. Long may AOS continue because for the life of me i just didn't 'get' WHFB!!!
Automatically Appended Next Post: I meant hating not having. My bad. :-(
because some people want a challenging strategy game and AOS is the kiddie pool in terms of strategy.
Just out of curiosity, Sword of Caliban, how old are you? (Honest question, meaning no mockery whatsoever) And were there any particular parts of WFB that you didn't get?
I think it's unreasonable for people to on one hand say "WHFB wasn't selling well, that's why GW had to kill it", yet say AoS can't be judged by the same metrics used to determine if WHFB was selling "well" (which is really just independent reports and accounts from store owners / etc, since GW isn't breaking down their sales by product line / game system). At least four different store owners have posted in this thread about how they are having a very hard time selling AoS, sometimes even with a previously thriving fantasy community.
There are lots of indications that AoS is not selling better than WHFB. The example above of the Seraphon limited edition book still being available, but the 8th edition Lizardmen book selling out within hours is a good one.
Add to this the fact that there are Many alternate game systems for the fantasy market (much moreso than for the scifi wargaming market) and GW voluntarily gave up a ton of their wargaming market share. This obviously benefits KoW and the like quite a bit, but I hope the market doesn't decrease too much as a result of the biggest player (GW) totally leaving the field!
Talys wrote: The problem with the thought process of "GW should have just made a 9e WHFB and kept loyal WHFB fans happy" is that WHFB accounted for something like 5% of GW's revenue. Seeing as it takes up 30%-40% of the GW models shelf space in most stores that carry it, this just doesn't make sense.
Proof?
I'm not sure there's proof to be had, but from memory the guy who originally floated the AoS rumours on warseer (and got mocked, derided, etc) said 8% of sales, which is close enough to 5% to be much of a muchness. As a sidenote, the thought process should have been: why does fantasy suddenly only account for about 8% of revenue? Instead they just rebooted it again without knowing what was wrong with it, and this time their random 1D6 chart seems to have rolled a 1. Oh well. How can you fix something if you don't know what's wrong with it?
Personally I don't see why 40k players liking Age of Sigmar is a good thing. The 40k players find it a funny secondary game (at the cost of killing fantasy player's main game) and honestly would've bought 40k stuff with that money anyway. You want to increase your audience rather than chop off a portion of it and have your other game's players buying less of their game to buy the new one. I feel like in the end that'd be a net loss. Even if it was more popular than fantasy a lot of those players were already buying anyway and even worse I think it'll be a net loss for 40k if it even cut into their profits at all.
Honestly considering the current GW manager getting rather annoyed about fantasy even being mentioned makes me wonder if I shouldn't just leave GW altogether. I'm buying dark eldar stuff now which is horribly balanced into the game and are under-powered (I like dark eldar's aesthetic), having dealt with my old game being destroyed and re-made into a Frankenstein and having to deal with the constantly annoying prices and finally being told by the manager that I basically don't buy enough and that gamers aren't the target market. If anything GW is trying really hard to just cut off a bunch of players that would otherwise be buying their games. As a customer I've never felt more disillusioned and disgusted as I do now. I'm very close to jumping into another wargame if there were any games I liked the aesthetic and game of. That is not a good sign for GW.
Also seriously why are painters your target market? I don't think the reason why tau sold so much was because they had a nice aesthetic and were not OP. Meanwhile supposedly a void raven bomber hasn't sold for over a year despite dark eldar having some of the prettiest models. If anything GW doesn't get the customer and I feel like they're going to lose big for it.
GW is like the imperium in the 41st millenium. It's the largest power but is dying a slow death. Also nothing ever changes and everything is grim-dark and every victory is pyrrhic (won but lost more in the end) in nature.
@Korniov - the 5% thing (or 8%) of Fantasy Battle in GW sales is just something I've seen on Dakka. In chatting with various store managers and owners, it seems to be about right. Two things are for certain in every independent that I've run across:
1. 40k sales are way, way bigger than Fantasy sales - by an order of magnitude. Regardless of the actual percentage, I don't think there's anyone that seriously believes otherwise.
2. Fantasy sales are so small that if 40k didn't exist, there's no way they would put up with GW for Fantasy (as opposed to other manufacturers who can be bought though distribution, and don't have minimum stocking and all that).
Talys wrote: What matters is enough people love AoS and keep buying books and models to keep it alive, in a way that was sadly NOT true of WHFB in its last years.
Is that actually true, though? Aren't a lot of these so called "limited" releases sticking around a lot longer than they should, or not selling out at all?
What I actually meant is, what matters is if there are enough people who love AoS to keep buying stuff. I'm not saying that there are, at all.
Take me, for example. I really like the Starter models and the Sigmarites. I bought one of everything. Now, I won't make another AoS purchase until there are more sigmarite models, at which point, I'll buy one more box of whatever is released. I mean, yippee, there's no way GW will be able to sustain the Fantasy setting on that. And I'm a guy who likes GW and GW models.
Contrast that to 40k: in the last year, I've bought more boxes of almost everything on the Astartes menu, including all the old stuff li8ke dreadnoughts, Predators, drop pods, scouts, and of course multiples of all the new stuff. Next year, I'll buy more razorbacks, more predators, more scouts, more tacticals, and more dreadnoughts. And the year after that... I won't be happy until I have way more models painted in various chapters than I could achieve in a lifetime with nothing to do other than build models. But I have no interest in building a Sigmarite equivalent (whatever they call a chapter, I forget ).
It's not that I don't like the models. I love them. But I don't want to build a legion of them.
What makes me want to build apocalypse size armies of 40k stuff? I have no idea. It's just one of the favorite things for me to do in my spare time.
I also have a hard time believing the percentage. The percentage I've heard stated at one point was 15, 18 and 20% at different times (20% during 'end times') and yet the GW manager seems to state it as a smaller and smaller slice as time goes by just as others seem to state its size.
I've also heard GW axed it because it was too basic LotR style fantasy whereas AoS wasn't. Just like how imperial guard used to be imperial guard rather than astra militarum. Ugh some of these names are idiotic.
We also know from Games Workshop that in 2014-2015 (not exactly, but the period is close enough) was something like $60-70 million. It's not possible to get the exact number, because Mail Order is such a large component, but we do know it's GBP28.5m + some percentage of GBP25.6m.
So if we call the top 5 games A, B, C, D, E, and WHFB X:
1. A>B>C>D>E>X 2. A+B+C+D+E < 125 (other games exist) 3. A = 65
Let's give WHFB the most favorable scenario, where BCDE are all very close in sales, and WHFB accounts for almost all of the other sales:
A + 4B < 125 4B + F < 125 - 65 4B + F < 60
Assume F is almost, but just under = B:
5F < 60 F < 12
So, we may deduce that in a perfect world where WHFB is *just under* the sales of X-Wing AND there are no other games other than the 6 above, it would be 18% of 40k
Now, nobody in this universe believes that this is the case; if you took a more realistic scenario, where the #2 game were about double the size of the #5 game (xwing versus hordes), and applied the same math, you'd get an upper bound of WHFB of closer to something like 9%. And that would mean that WHFB were as popular as Hordes.
Add in other games like Malifaux and Infinity, and take other non-collectible miniatures like Reaper, and assume that WHFB is more than just a hair less popular than Hordes... and suddenly, that percentage shrinks a lot.
TLDR: GW accounts for 65 / 125 million of the NA miniatures market, which is significant because all the other non-GW games can only add up to 60m. WHFB doesn't make it into the top 5. Therefore, if you do the math, whatever the percentage is, it's gotta be pretty small.
EDIT: I actually goofed it up a little, because WHFB should come under the 65m, not the 60m. But whatever; it won't shift it that much (the upper limit in the perfect, impossible universe where hordes, xwing, and WHFB are almost the same, should be $15m, not $12m).
1. ICv2 is horribly inaccurate. I know it's one of the few sources of numbers we have, but I don't value it much higher than anecdotal evidence to be honest. If you only care about NA figures, the only somewhat reliable figures we have are the Chapterhouse law suit numbers where we know there was $647k sales from 7th edition WHFB and $1,645k from 5th edition 40k. So at that point 40k was selling roughly 2.5 times more in North America.
2. In previous threads I believe we guessed that WHFB was more popular in Europe than it was in NA. NA is only a third of GW's revenue, even if WHFB was a complete flop in NA it could still be a significant proportion of sales.
Granted I don't think WHFB was massively popular compared to 40k, reality is we only have some very shaky numbers thrown around by unreliable sources.
I certainly don't think it was an order of magnitude like you suggested, Talys, though maybe after 8th edition it was that small.
@AllSeeingSkink - I'm willing to happily concede any or all of the points that you've raised. I'm only using ICv2 for hard numbers because we literally have nothing else to go by. I'm also happy to concede that I may be underestimating WHFB sales in 2014, though I really do think (without actual solid evidence) that we're talking an order of magnitude or more. And to be clear, I mean a factor of 10 -- or 10% WHFB or less versus 90% 40k or more.
Let's take the hard numbers out for a moment, and let's go by rankings, and a bit of a gut check though.
1. Star Wars X-Wing, Star Trek Attack Wing, Warmachines, Hordes -- do you think WHFB in 2014 outperformed any of these? I don't think so.
2. How about Infinity? It 'feels' like it's more. But who knows? How about Malifaux? I think that's closer. Maybe somewhere between Malifaux and Hordes. Maybe even lower than Malifaux; I don't know.
3. Even if ICv2 is not *accurate* things like rankings and generalizations are usually in the right ballpark. In other words, WHFB isn't the #2 game, and X-Wing isn't the #1 game. No matter how you cut it, I doubt WHFB ranks better than #6. And does anyone really think that Hordes and War Machine EACH come anywhere close to 20% of 40k's sales, making them, combined, 40% (ie Privateer Press does $100 million in sales)?
4. If you disagree with this, peg WHFB somewhere in the #2 - #5 spot (say which), and attribute a percentage to it. Then fill in the spots above with a percentage, and see what numbers could possibly make sense. Unless you think 40k accounts for 20% of the market and all the other games account for 15% or less (leaving 5% for everything past the top 6), it won't work.
Keep in mind that I'm not talking about player base, or enthusiasm or number of gaming groups. I'm only speaking of dollars sold at retail, because at the end of the day... that's really the only thing that matters to determine future development.
Regarding your 1 and 2 It's really hard to say. The tricky thing about it is even if you manage to guess at WHFB's numbers in North America, North America is only about a third of global revenue and I personally don't think is representative of the rest of the world.
GW has seen the largest growth in NA over recent years and that growth, IMO, has been off the back of 40k, not WHFB. Where as I think in Europe the community does have a stronger attachment to WHFB.
GW has 3 large regions of revenue. The UK, Europe and the USA. Each are roughly 30% each and the last bit is made of up of the rest of the world (which is mostly Australia). You can't really make any judgements based on the numbers of only 1 of those regions.
I think it's a mistake to project the numbers from one region (which are on shaky grounds to begin with) to global revenue.
Beyond that, we know ICv2 numbers aren't accurate and can be off by 10's of millions. As far as I'm aware, they are simply projections, not a proper analysis. I believe they just survey a bunch of stores and then project that on to a larger scale. They could be off by miles, especially if they aren't surveying GW's own stores or mail order.
The percentages are a bit of a red herring, regardless. AllSeeingSkink notes that GW had to reveal sales numbers for 7th edition fantasy and 40k for the Chapterhouse case, and it was way higher than what is being speculated above.
If 8th edition then killed fantasy interest (perhaps by requiring higher model counts and making the game more random) it is entirely GW's fault. Their actions caused it to die, so saying they needed to take action to kill it because it was dying is a circular argument!
It baffles me that some folks try to point to poor performance of fantasy as justification for AoS. It is GW's refusal to learn from their mistakes that both killed fantasy and is very quickly dooming AoS.
RiTides wrote: The percentages are a bit of a red herring, regardless. AllSeeingSkink notes that GW had to reveal sales numbers for 7th edition fantasy and 40k for the Chapterhouse case, and it was way higher than what is being speculated above.
If 8th edition then killed fantasy interest (perhaps by requiring higher model counts and making the game more random) it is entirely GW's fault. Their actions caused it to die, so saying they needed to take action to kill it because it was dying is a circular argument!
It baffles me that some folks try to point to poor performance of fantasy as justification for AoS. It is GW's refusal to learn from their mistakes that both killed fantasy and is very quickly dooming AoS.
I think we have a winner.
The failure of 8th edition was caused by GW's poor decisions and their way to 'fix' it with AOS shows more of that poor decision making not based in any kind of research data and only on "well, we think this is what's happening."
Out of curiosity was there any problem with Fantasy's sales back under 7th ed?
I know locally at least I thought our 8th ed tourney circuit was healthy when we drew 25 players to a statewide tourney. Except the vets there would go on about how that same tourney a couple of years before under 7th ed drew 200 people.
jonolikespie wrote: Out of curiosity was there any problem with Fantasy's sales back under 7th ed?
I know locally at least I thought our 8th ed tourney circuit was healthy when we drew 25 players to a statewide tourney. Except the vets there would go on about how that same tourney a couple of years before under 7th ed drew 200 people.
We don't really have any hard numbers to know for sure. I tend to think in 7th WHFB was struggling but doing well enough to keep its head above water. As I mentioned earlier WHFB 7th rulebook sold $647k in North America vs $1,645k for 5th ed 40k rulebook. While that's not great, I think it's good enough to justify its existence (especially if it was doing better in Europe like I tend to think it was).
I will admit I stopped following WHFB with 8th because the more random rules and larger army sizes killed it for me, it also killed the local interest in the game. It went from being easy to find a pick up game of WHFB to being annoying.
I'm sure if it weren't for 8th culling a lot of the old veterans, AoS would have gotten an even worse reception (yes, I think it could have been even worse ).
Also 25 players for a statewide tournament sounds tiny. Back in 6th edition we used to get that many at the local club for WHFB events (Melbourne's eastern suburbs). When I first started in the late 90's on any given Friday there'd be around 10 people looking for a game of WHFB just at the local store. Unless the state you're talking about is the Northern Territory and the tourny was being held in Yuendumu, in which case 25 is awesome.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: Also 25 players for a statewide tournament sounds tiny. Back in 6th edition we used to get that many at the local club for WHFB events (Melbourne's eastern suburbs). When I first started in the late 90's on any given Friday there'd be around 10 people looking for a game of WHFB just at the local store. Unless the state you're talking about is the Northern Territory and the tourny was being held in Yuendumu, in which case 25 is awesome.
QLD, so I guess when I say 'state wide' what I really mean is Brisbane, Gold Cost and a couple of people driving down for the weekend from god only knows where.
In the end, after so much talk, the famed "percentages" about how little Fantasy was selling are just a bunch of speculation plus anecdotical evidence, and only based on North American data that can't even be trusted.
So no proof at all whatsoever.
I know in some places of Continental Europe Fantasy, even in its darkest hours of 8th edition, was selling as much as 40k. Still anecdotical evidence, so I won't be coming up with some speculative statistics about how Fantasy provided a high % of GW's total revenue.
In any case, it's still amusing people seem to blame the game and/or its players for "not selling". The players did not neglect the product, change the rules to force themselves to buy twice the amount of models, then skyrocketed the price of said models. GW did. While more and more better written, friendlier and more affordable alternatives appeared in the market one after another.
@Korinov - There is also no proof that any other game is doing better than Age of Sigmar. Really, everything that we're talking about is anecdotal, because as has been said, there are no numbers to be had. However, you can walk into any gaming store, and just ask them how WHFB did in the last couple of years, and I doubt you'll hear a store owner tell you that it was awesome.
@Skink - You sad regarding the chapterhouse case: "$647k sales from 7th edition WHFB and $1,645k from 5th edition 40k." Is that $647,000 USD versus $1,645,000 USD? What does that even mean? That can't be 40k's North American sales. I mean, that number is just way too small; it would peg North America at less than 1% of GW's annual sales during 5e...
@MWHistorian & RiTides - I think it's a perfectly fine theory that 8e hurt the WHFB community and WHFB sales, although there could have also been other contributing reasons that people left WHFB, such as other games. But you need to act in the present and you can't rewrite the past. If GW went back to 7e-esque rules, would it help? The damage is done, so to speak, right? Rather than try to win back some of the people who left (this is a difficult task), GW opted to try to win some people who would never have considered WHFB at all.
Certainly, it's not the fault of players for WHFB not selling. But it IS reality that WHFB was not selling well enough for Games Workshop to continue it at its vector.
Games Workshop wants to be a company that builds relatively expensive infantry models and complex elite models, and really expensive centerpiece models, paired with expensive books, for people who want them and can afford them. It doesn't want to be a company that makes cheap models and cheap rules that 14 year-olds can get into with allowance money, because it doesn't see the possibility of its next quarter billion dollars that way. Whether it's right or not, it thinks that the universe of young teenagers with allowance money who are interested in wargaming and miniatures is not large enough to generate hundreds of millions of dollars, so it focuses on the market of employed persons to whom a few hundred (or even a few thousand) dollars a year on a hobby is okay if it's something they want to do.
In any case, it's not good enough for Games Workshop that people buy some models, are happy with a game, and every 5 years or so buy some new rules that they can keep using the models they bought 15 years ago on. In this way, they will never make another quarter billion dollars, because the niche isn't big enough. Instead, they need to create an atmosphere where the relatively small customerbase feels compelled to go out, every single year, and buy more and more models and grow their army, and reasons to buy their hundred dollar campaign adventures and dozen or so fifty dollar rulebooks a year.
I'm not saying it's a great idea, because after all, the next generation of people who can afford 40k/Fantasy need to start somewhere.
But the reality is, to perpetuate this massive profit machine, you need games that sell a crap ton of models, and WHFB wasn't doing that. Given that GW has the time and money to experiment, and they did not value the current state of WHFB, they decided to do AoS.... something different.
I applaud them for trying. Why not try to do something different? Plus, I actually enjoy the game, though, as I said, I have no desire to rush out and buy models that I'll spend my next thousand hours on, and if they want 40k levels of success, they need some people who feel that way. Maybe there are enough such people; maybe there aren't. On top of that, I don't think WHFB was attracting very many new players.
I don't think AoS will be successful in the sense of growing to the #2 spot in miniature wargames, or to getting sales back to what they were during 6e WHFB. I do think that it will increase the sales from where they were in 8e, but as I have argued, this is not a very high bar to beat. Plus, it might not be enough.
Talys wrote: @Korinov - There is also no proof that any other game is doing better than Age of Sigmar. Really, everything that we're talking about is anecdotal, because as has been said, there are no numbers to be had.
Yes.
However, you can walk into any gaming store, and just ask them how WHFB did in the last couple of years, and I doubt you'll hear a store owner tell you that it was awesome.
There are many gaming stores around the world, all of them dependent of what the local community of players does. As such you'll be likely to find vastly different scenarios from one store to the next.
In example, Fantasy has been virtually dead for years in my FGLS, but now it's experiencing quite a revival with a bunch of new, young players. They play mostly 8th edition, although having talked to them, most seem open to trying older editions, and perhaps even other rulesystems. It's not like they're buying tons of models anyway, as several of them are either finishing high school or beginning college, so not much disposable income and GW's prices aren't exactly helping either. Sadly the store, as far as miniatures goes, carries GW, Infinity and little else (most of the non-GW models I have, I've bought them online).
And again, local-specific, anecdotical evidence at best.
@Korinov - I hear you. I still don't think many people believe that WHFB ranks higher than xwing or war machine, though, and someone would have to provide some kind of evidence to the contrary to convince me.
I think there are many companies like Mantic that would be thrilled to have WHFB/AoS levels of sales -- but GW isn't one of them. They want another property that gives them LoTR type numbers, if not 40k, because otherwise it turns I to a rounding error that has to be managed and a constant disappointment. Keep in mind that I'm not saying that AoS won't also be that... Just that the only thing we know for sure is that GW wasn't happy with WHFB's numbers.
Talys wrote: However, you can walk into any gaming store, and just ask them how WHFB did in the last couple of years, and I doubt you'll hear a store owner tell you that it was awesome.
Depends on the store though. And let's be fair - 'wfb wasn't doing well, so scrap it for aos' is a very simplistic reading of the situation. There are a lot of reasons why people turned their backs on fantasy, or never jumped on board. Gw's management of the game was a big reason.
@Skink - You sad regarding the chapterhouse case: "$647k sales from 7th edition WHFB and $1,645k from 5th edition 40k." Is that $647,000 USD versus $1,645,000 USD? What does that even mean? That can't be 40k's North American sales. I mean, that number is just way too small; it would peg North America at less than 1% of GW's annual sales during 5e...
@MWHistorian & RiTides - I think it's a perfectly fine theory that 8e hurt the WHFB community and WHFB sales, although there could have also been other contributing reasons that people left WHFB, such as other games. But you need to act in the present and you can't rewrite the past. If GW went back to 7e-esque rules, would it help? The damage is done, so to speak, right? Rather than try to win back some of the people who left (this is a difficult task), GW opted to try to win some people who would never have considered WHFB at all.
Going back to seventh, or earlier rules would be a start, maybe. Going back to 7th or earlier price points would be a bigger step. The rot didn't set in with 8th, 8th was just when the trickle became a flood,
Now, rather than aiming at a new audience rather trying to win back some of the people who had left, well, that's fair enough. But not only did they not even try to win back those who left, they properly turned on them, and rather than having disinterested former customers, they created a very alienated, angry and extremely hostile group of people who are not afraid to be vocal about it. Add In all the negative backlash from those same former customers and Now, in a word of mouth based hobby, you have a very negative word of mouth, and you have no existing playerbase that new players can latch onto (because you've blown up their world, and actively said theyre not welcome anyway), feed off of, and integrate with.
As for people turning to other games, the big reason for the initial huge (or even explosive) growth of games like warmachine after its mk2 release (specifically 2011-2013)was because people were driven from gw games in droves by appalling game direction and shocking price increases. I love warmachine, but it, and games like malifaux, infinity etc would never have reached its level of popularity had gw not mismanaged their primacy in the hobby to the extent that they did and created a disenfranchised pool of players who were frankly looking for something better. 40k was (and is) the big game in this industry. For decades, fantasy was number 2. For those decades, if you didn't play, or want to play 40k, you played fantasy. It was a self sustaining Eco system that other wargames simply didn't have and could only look on at with envy. But in the last five years, gw had really haemorrhaged customers with their corporate direction and game design and pricing policy. It was those disenfranchised players that pp, wyrd, cb and all the other companies picked up on, and those gw refugees for the large part ended up becoming the thriving self sustaining ecosystem those other games needed to thrive, and then began shouting their merits and and drawing in new players thst would previously have automatically been drawn to gw. Win win for those smaller companies. Lose lose for gw, who now have a smaller/dwindling player base who have to pay more to cover the losses, fewer new recruits to draw on, and a lot more hostility in the background towards them. And the funny thing is It never would, or should have happened to the extend that it did if gw hadn't done what it did. We'd just be annoying voices in the wilderness, whereas right now, we're the barbarians at the gates of the empire.
Certainly, it's not the fault of players for WHFB not selling. But it IS reality that WHFB was not selling well enough for Games Workshop to continue it at its vector.
Gw are simply reaping the crops they have been sowing for ten years. Wfb needed to be managed better, not killed and replaced. Aos is fine. Aos has value and potential, but in its current form, it arguably caters to a minority as it caters to very specialised tastes, and requires a very specialised niche of the playerbase. Aos is a decent game in its own right for what it is and what it tries to be, but it is arguably a terrible replacement for what wfb was.
Games Workshop wants to be a company that builds relatively expensive infantry models and complex elite models, and really expensive centerpiece models, paired with expensive books, for people who want them and can afford them. It doesn't want to be a company that makes cheap models and cheap rules that 14 year-olds can get into with allowance money, because it doesn't see the possibility of its next quarter billion dollars that way. Whether it's right or not, it thinks that the universe of young teenagers with allowance money who are interested in wargaming and miniatures is not large enough to generate hundreds of millions of dollars, so it focuses on the market of employed persons to whom a few hundred (or even a few thousand) dollars a year on a hobby is okay if it's something they want to do.
In any case, it's not good enough for Games Workshop that people buy some models, are happy with a game, and every 5 years or so buy some new rules that they can keep using the models they bought 15 years ago on. In this way, they will never make another quarter billion dollars, because the niche isn't big enough. Instead, they need to create an atmosphere where the relatively small customerbase feels compelled to go out, every single year, and buy more and more models and grow their army, and reasons to buy their hundred dollar campaign adventures and dozen or so fifty dollar rulebooks a year.
No. Selling to a handful of massive big spenders like yourself is not the end game. It helps, certainly, but you need an ecosystem thst comprises a solid backbone of an invested and active playerbase as well. Those young teenagers are the next generation. gw don't focus on a handful of big spenders (and with respect, I think you let your own personal circumstances cloud your judgement here), their policy is 'churn and burn' where you get them in, get them to buy stuff for an edition or two, and when they move on, they are replaced with the next set of wide eyes initiates. In that sense, it is good enough to get someone to buy some models, be happy with it, and by some new rules five years later. They're not expected to stay more than two editions. The next generation can take it from there. The loss of current players will be made up by the next generation buying in. Of which the current generation will groom and mentor while they themselves are active, involved and enthusiastic.
But the reality is, to perpetuate this massive profit machine, you need games that sell a crap ton of models, and WHFB wasn't doing that. Given that GW has the time and money to experiment, and they did not value the current state of WHFB, they decided to do AoS.... something different..
Which says more about their refusal to understand why, or engage in market research as to why wfb was failing than anything else. To perpetuate the massive profit machine, you need to think a long term, sustainable and renewable ecosystem that reflects the desires of the player base. Aos is largely not that. ,Selling a crapton of models' sounds all well and good, but the story is a lot more,complicated than that.
I applaud them for trying. Why not try to do something different? Plus, I actually enjoy the game, though, as I said, I have no desire to rush out and buy models that I'll spend my next thousand hours on, and if they want 40k levels of success, they need some people who feel that way. Maybe there are enough such people; maybe there aren't. On top of that, I don't think WHFB was attracting very many new players.
.
I applaud them for trying as well, but aos should have been its own game, or the new lead in for the specialist games, rather than a replacement for a core line. A game this (ahem) 'radical' to the playerbase is a huge risk. Especially when it invalidates 'how' so many people play, and pushes a style of play so many are unfamiliar with, Whilst simultaneously neither giving the tools nor directions for its use.
Wfb wasn't attracting very many players because the rules changes for eight were hugely unpopular, and the front loaded and prohibitively expensive cost of the buy in was a massive turn off. You know, it's the problem of Tim and Fred who like the look of it, but find out that there are so few current players (because eighth drove them away) but fair enough, they can play each other, maybe get their mates involved... Then they see the cost required to get up to a 'normal sized' game and they say gtfo, let's check out warmachine or infinity instead. That there is the problem that needed addressing, not terminate the patient.
I don't think AoS will be successful in the sense of growing to the #2 spot in miniature wargames, or to getting sales back to what they were during 6e WHFB. I do think that it will increase the sales from where they were in 8e, but as I have argued, this is not a very high bar to beat. Plus, it might not be enough.
I think it might do ok in the long term, but it has a lot of hurdles to get over, and frankly, if it doesn't perform as well as gw want, they're as likely to kill their involvement in fantasy entirely rather than reinvent it, or go back to wfb.
Again the sales argument is circular - the only reason fantasy struggled was GW's decisions towards the end. Similar decisions are already stunting AoS, so positing it as the solution to fantasy's problems is just off from what is really happening (imo). The same sales info being mentioned about fantasy indicts it as already badly struggling from the interest it garnered at launch.
"They stopped supporting it because nobody bought them."
"Yeah, but people lost interest because there was no support."
Only it appears that rather than the relatively clean kill, rules wise, that they bestowed on SGs, allowing them to function in the wilderness somewhat until somebody at Lenton figured out that multiple revenue streams are a good thing, and then had the subsequent inspiration that streams can dry up without maintainance and brought them back, WHFB has been cursed with a slow death that caused the player base to atrophy long before they pulled the trigger.
I mean, even if AOS had been widely received as good, they'd have had an uphill battle restoring it to anything like parity, sales wise, with 40K, let alone with what it actually is.
Hell, there are more people in my group that bought Warhammer 8th edition as a starter for Kings of War than bought it in its own right.
The consensus seems to be that the box had great value, but that the rules were sub par.
Until the Kings of War league started up, only one person had bought Warhammer 8th (the hardcover rulesbook).
Now three have bought Island of Blood (the boxed set) - and ywo have bought more than one set.
The main selling point seems to be the High Elves - though one person has begun a Ratkin army using the Skaven from the boxes that other people have bought.
Even I will admit that the High Elves in that box are nice - but those Skaven... are not nearly as well made.
No one has bought the Age of Sigmar box, even for use in Kings of War.
Even I will admit that the High Elves in that box are nice - but those Skaven... are not nearly as well made.
Matter of opinion I guess, I think they were some of the best models GW have producerd for that line, even though 2/3 of them were just a previous set [the Clanrats] with am simplified parts breakdown.
I've got to say, my interest in AoS has waned immensely. I like the mechanics in theory, but the reality of constantly flicking through a big folder of warscrolls just slows it down far too much for me. I'm not interested in the fluff in the slightest. I'll probably finish painting the stuff I picked up for it at some point, but I haven't played a game of it since August.
Even I will admit that the High Elves in that box are nice - but those Skaven... are not nearly as well made.
Matter of opinion I guess, I think they were some of the best models GW have producerd for that line, even though 2/3 of them were just a previous set [the Clanrats] with am simplified parts breakdown.
I am speaking from a technical viewpoint.
Triangular tufts of fur rather than any attempt to make a realistic fur texture - at a guess, they made a master 3d sculpt of that triangular tuft, then copied and pasted.
Voids filled in with waste plastic rather than any attempt to avoid having the voids.
Basically, they were lazy sculpts.
You can like them - they may be fun to paint, but the technical skill was lacking, even compared to the models that appeared in Mordheim, how many years ago?
They were utilizing a 'stylized' appearance to mask the shortcuts they took in making the models.
Talys wrote: However, you can walk into any gaming store, and just ask them how WHFB did in the last couple of years, and I doubt you'll hear a store owner tell you that it was awesome.
Depends on the store though. And let's be fair - 'wfb wasn't doing well, so scrap it for aos' is a very simplistic reading of the situation. There are a lot of reasons why people turned their backs on fantasy, or never jumped on board. Gw's management of the game was a big reason.
@Skink - You sad regarding the chapterhouse case: "$647k sales from 7th edition WHFB and $1,645k from 5th edition 40k." Is that $647,000 USD versus $1,645,000 USD? What does that even mean? That can't be 40k's North American sales. I mean, that number is just way too small; it would peg North America at less than 1% of GW's annual sales during 5e...
@MWHistorian & RiTides - I think it's a perfectly fine theory that 8e hurt the WHFB community and WHFB sales, although there could have also been other contributing reasons that people left WHFB, such as other games. But you need to act in the present and you can't rewrite the past. If GW went back to 7e-esque rules, would it help? The damage is done, so to speak, right? Rather than try to win back some of the people who left (this is a difficult task), GW opted to try to win some people who would never have considered WHFB at all.
Going back to seventh, or earlier rules would be a start, maybe. Going back to 7th or earlier price points would be a bigger step. The rot didn't set in with 8th, 8th was just when the trickle became a flood,
Now, rather than aiming at a new audience rather trying to win back some of the people who had left, well, that's fair enough. But not only did they not even try to win back those who left, they properly turned on them, and rather than having disinterested former customers, they created a very alienated, angry and extremely hostile group of people who are not afraid to be vocal about it. Add In all the negative backlash from those same former customers and Now, in a word of mouth based hobby, you have a very negative word of mouth, and you have no existing playerbase that new players can latch onto (because you've blown up their world, and actively said theyre not welcome anyway), feed off of, and integrate with.
As for people turning to other games, the big reason for the initial huge (or even explosive) growth of games like warmachine after its mk2 release (specifically 2011-2013)was because people were driven from gw games in droves by appalling game direction and shocking price increases. I love warmachine, but it, and games like malifaux, infinity etc would never have reached its level of popularity had gw not mismanaged their primacy in the hobby to the extent that they did and created a disenfranchised pool of players who were frankly looking for something better. 40k was (and is) the big game in this industry. For decades, fantasy was number 2. For those decades, if you didn't play, or want to play 40k, you played fantasy. It was a self sustaining Eco system that other wargames simply didn't have and could only look on at with envy. But in the last five years, gw had really haemorrhaged customers with their corporate direction and game design and pricing policy. It was those disenfranchised players that pp, wyrd, cb and all the other companies picked up on, and those gw refugees for the large part ended up becoming the thriving self sustaining ecosystem those other games needed to thrive, and then began shouting their merits and and drawing in new players thst would previously have automatically been drawn to gw. Win win for those smaller companies. Lose lose for gw, who now have a smaller/dwindling player base who have to pay more to cover the losses, fewer new recruits to draw on, and a lot more hostility in the background towards them. And the funny thing is It never would, or should have happened to the extend that it did if gw hadn't done what it did. We'd just be annoying voices in the wilderness, whereas right now, we're the barbarians at the gates of the empire.
Certainly, it's not the fault of players for WHFB not selling. But it IS reality that WHFB was not selling well enough for Games Workshop to continue it at its vector.
Gw are simply reaping the crops they have been sowing for ten years. Wfb needed to be managed better, not killed and replaced. Aos is fine. Aos has value and potential, but in its current form, it arguably caters to a minority as it caters to very specialised tastes, and requires a very specialised niche of the playerbase. Aos is a decent game in its own right for what it is and what it tries to be, but it is arguably a terrible replacement for what wfb was.
Games Workshop wants to be a company that builds relatively expensive infantry models and complex elite models, and really expensive centerpiece models, paired with expensive books, for people who want them and can afford them. It doesn't want to be a company that makes cheap models and cheap rules that 14 year-olds can get into with allowance money, because it doesn't see the possibility of its next quarter billion dollars that way. Whether it's right or not, it thinks that the universe of young teenagers with allowance money who are interested in wargaming and miniatures is not large enough to generate hundreds of millions of dollars, so it focuses on the market of employed persons to whom a few hundred (or even a few thousand) dollars a year on a hobby is okay if it's something they want to do.
In any case, it's not good enough for Games Workshop that people buy some models, are happy with a game, and every 5 years or so buy some new rules that they can keep using the models they bought 15 years ago on. In this way, they will never make another quarter billion dollars, because the niche isn't big enough. Instead, they need to create an atmosphere where the relatively small customerbase feels compelled to go out, every single year, and buy more and more models and grow their army, and reasons to buy their hundred dollar campaign adventures and dozen or so fifty dollar rulebooks a year.
No. Selling to a handful of massive big spenders like yourself is not the end game. It helps, certainly, but you need an ecosystem thst comprises a solid backbone of an invested and active playerbase as well. Those young teenagers are the next generation. gw don't focus on a handful of big spenders (and with respect, I think you let your own personal circumstances cloud your judgement here), their policy is 'churn and burn' where you get them in, get them to buy stuff for an edition or two, and when they move on, they are replaced with the next set of wide eyes initiates. In that sense, it is good enough to get someone to buy some models, be happy with it, and by some new rules five years later. They're not expected to stay more than two editions. The next generation can take it from there. The loss of current players will be made up by the next generation buying in. Of which the current generation will groom and mentor while they themselves are active, involved and enthusiastic.
But the reality is, to perpetuate this massive profit machine, you need games that sell a crap ton of models, and WHFB wasn't doing that. Given that GW has the time and money to experiment, and they did not value the current state of WHFB, they decided to do AoS.... something different..
Which says more about their refusal to understand why, or engage in market research as to why wfb was failing than anything else. To perpetuate the massive profit machine, you need to think a long term, sustainable and renewable ecosystem that reflects the desires of the player base. Aos is largely not that. ,Selling a crapton of models' sounds all well and good, but the story is a lot more,complicated than that.
I applaud them for trying. Why not try to do something different? Plus, I actually enjoy the game, though, as I said, I have no desire to rush out and buy models that I'll spend my next thousand hours on, and if they want 40k levels of success, they need some people who feel that way. Maybe there are enough such people; maybe there aren't. On top of that, I don't think WHFB was attracting very many new players.
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I applaud them for trying as well, but aos should have been its own game, or the new lead in for the specialist games, rather than a replacement for a core line. A game this (ahem) 'radical' to the playerbase is a huge risk. Especially when it invalidates 'how' so many people play, and pushes a style of play so many are unfamiliar with, Whilst simultaneously neither giving the tools nor directions for its use.
Wfb wasn't attracting very many players because the rules changes for eight were hugely unpopular, and the front loaded and prohibitively expensive cost of the buy in was a massive turn off. You know, it's the problem of Tim and Fred who like the look of it, but find out that there are so few current players (because eighth drove them away) but fair enough, they can play each other, maybe get their mates involved... Then they see the cost required to get up to a 'normal sized' game and they say gtfo, let's check out warmachine or infinity instead. That there is the problem that needed addressing, not terminate the patient.
I don't think AoS will be successful in the sense of growing to the #2 spot in miniature wargames, or to getting sales back to what they were during 6e WHFB. I do think that it will increase the sales from where they were in 8e, but as I have argued, this is not a very high bar to beat. Plus, it might not be enough.
I think it might do ok in the long term, but it has a lot of hurdles to get over, and frankly, if it doesn't perform as well as gw want, they're as likely to kill their involvement in fantasy entirely rather than reinvent it, or go back to wfb.
Incredibly well said!!! I think WFB needed something akin to a skirmish size game system(not a box set) that would allow players to pick the army they like and build their collection up from relatively few models(under $100) and ramp up to full 2500 point armies that cost $600-800. When Skirmish and Warbands were introduced, there was virtually no marketing done for them, and as such GW lost on the potential of those rules systems to pull new players in to the WFB system and get hooked enough to want to spend the kind of money needed to play full size games.
Even if the game system of AoS was what GW wanted to move to, taking the lore and story of WFB and just blowing it all to hell was the worst possible way to do it. It immediately made veterans feel shafted, and the vast majority of them seemed to not even give AoS a second glance.
talys wrote:But for sure, WHFB has NOT been successful in the last decade, and GW couldn't justify its existence.
You don't know that. It's just a claim you've made to justify the invention of AoS.
If it's true, GW are even worse idiots than people think, to have 10 years to create a new game and all they can come up with is Dread Fleet and AoS.
Thousands of man-years of design effort would have been poured into those two titles. If this is true, GW really are fethed.
Everyone is right that we don't have the WHFB/40k breakdown. However, there is TONS of breadcrumbs that lead me to the conclusion 40k sells a lot more product than WHFB. How many public fansites are there of WHFB over the years, and what kind of membership did they have? On the front page of Dakka and in Dakka's showcase how many WHFB models do you see compared to 40k models? In the DCM "how much did you spend" forum, do you see anyone spending thousands of dollars on Fantasy models; and out of all the big purchases there, how many of them are anything other than 40k? When GW did the Summer of Sigmar, people bitch and moaned for a return to 40k *everywhere*. I mean, every online forum or news/rumor site that does GW stuff. When was the last time GW was on a 40k spree that you saw a similar type of moaning for a return to Fantasy? How many retail stores have you ever been in that thought WHFB outsold or came close to the sales of 40k? How many retailers have you ever met that were happy with their WHFB sales? What's the ratio of models printed in Warhammer Visions of 40k vs Fantasy? How many organized tournaments did you see in the Dakka Tournaments forum of 40k vs Fantasy?
It just goes on and on. Of course, it could all just add up to WHFB players being *different* than 40k players. Maybe they don't like the Internet so much, and they buy tons of stuff in a small number of stores in areas of the world that some of us have never been to. Maybe WHFB's sales are 20% of 40k, and GW is crazy and just axed it because they're insane or hate their customers. Maybe WHFB fans just don't like fan sites. Maybe they just don't like tournaments. Maybe...
But there is a pile of evidence that *suggests* that WHFB's sales were poor -- when compared to the juggernaut money-making machine that is the grimdark. And, we should believe that GW likes holding onto things that make them tons of money and likes letting go of things that don't.
Incidentally, they DID come up with LoTR, which did pretty well
In my opinion, the problem for GW is really the irony of 40k's success. 40k is a really tough act to beat ** in terms of profit **. Is GW capable of writing a good game that people will buy, like, enjoy, and play? Sure, I think they are. Look at Betrayal at Calth. GREAT game. But are they interested in doing these? I don't really think so, because, well, where's the money in it? It's not going to make them another hundred million dollars. They're looking for a business unit that will sell them the equivalent of a million $100 boxes EVERY YEAR, without taking away from 40k, and given estimated sizes of our hobby niche, that just isn't that easy.
Therefore, again, just in my opinion, GW should stop trying to follow 40k/LoTR with another hundred million dollar game. They should give up on massive centerpiece models and complex HIPS MPP sprues for a secondary game, and just go the way of PP/Infinity/Malifaux for their other games. Make them with resin or metal, or snapfit plastic; make the games relatively cheap and accessible, and concentrate on better-than-average single pose models for enjoyable games. Not because it's profitable, and not because it's what they want to do, but because it's mindshare, and it fills the shelves with stuff people want.
I remember being very up and down about AoS's release.
I was mortified by End Times and the destruction of a world I've loved since I was 10, 30 years ago... I also thought it was painfully reminiscent of White Wolf destroying all their RPGs in a huge apocalypse to then usher in the combined World of Darkness range, a move that tanked the company. Whatever my feelings about GW on any given day, it's entire destruction isn't what I or the majority of people want.
Then I was pleased, I was actually stoked, by talk of a 4 page rulebook. I've been finding a great deal of solace in Attack Wing recently and the idea of a quick, tidy set of rules appealed, as did a smaller, skirmish based game. I started compiling ideas in my head for the ranges I would collect, I started filling online shopping carts...
Then I discovered no points values and the 'amusing' rules. At which point I set it down, emptied the online shopping carts and lost any sort of interest in it at all.
Its still early days to draw conclusions regarding AOS success IMO.
Under the circumstances it was released who knows if this actually is a mild hit.
Lets not forget the EOT book spam fiasco and the half year? wait for AOS with no news or anything... Then in the middle of the silence AOS is speculated to be the WFB next edition... so yeah when AOS is finally here its NOT going to have any honeymoon by the contrary its a hairy and messy divorce from day one.
This is not WFB its a different product, its just unfortunate that GW glued this to WFB and simply does not know how handle things. AOS will never be judged by its own merits and will always ( at least for the first years) be a shadow of WFB.
Personally I think this game has huge potential to attract new casual gamers but its only on its infancy, it needs to mature more before conclusions can be made.
Then GW should have made a more complete product on release.
It doesn't take several novels to establish a well thought out and complete setting. How many AOS novels and still no one has anything but a vague idea of what's going on.
MWHistorian wrote: Then GW should have made a more complete product on release.
It doesn't take several novels to establish a well thought out and complete setting. How many AOS novels and still no one has anything but a vague idea of what's going on.
The story following end times is not interesting enough. Sigmarines in golden armor sounds just ridiculous.
In my opinion, the problem for GW is really the irony of 40k's success. 40k is a really tough act to beat ** in terms of profit **. Is GW capable of writing a good game that people will buy, like, enjoy, and play? Sure, I think they are. Look at Betrayal at Calth. GREAT game. But are they interested in doing these? I don't really think so, because, well, where's the money in it? It's not going to make them another hundred million dollars. They're looking for a business unit that will sell them the equivalent of a million $100 boxes EVERY YEAR, without taking away from 40k, and given estimated sizes of our hobby niche, that just isn't that easy.
Therefore, again, just in my opinion, GW should stop trying to follow 40k/LoTR with another hundred million dollar game. They should give up on massive centerpiece models and complex HIPS MPP sprues for a secondary game, and just go the way of PP/Infinity/Malifaux for their other games. Make them with resin or metal, or snapfit plastic; make the games relatively cheap and accessible, and concentrate on better-than-average single pose models for enjoyable games. Not because it's profitable, and not because it's what they want to do, but because it's mindshare, and it fills the shelves with stuff people want.
I don't really think that it was 40k that was so great but GW slowly pouring more and more recourses into 40k (well, Space Marines) that made it great, and accidentally/lazily letting everything else wither instead of supporting it. It started with Specialist Games, each got some support but then stopped. And now we have seen them doing the same for WHFB and LOTR/the Hobbit, recent upgrades for both went more sideways or even backwards instead of actually improving the games while GW kept making more and more Space Marine variations because that's where the easy money is.
If 40k (the original Rogue trader) were released 10 years later than it actually was it probably would have ended as a Specialist Game and gotten the same two years and then death support the others got. But early GW invested time and recourses in improving the setting/rules of their games and they both grew (that's how they grew into the dominating company in a niche). Later they saw that 40k was starting to make more money and it slowly moved from a bit more support into GW becoming 40k Workshop than anything else. Forgeworld kinda had the same process just faster. Once they actually started producing WHFB stuff and also 30k the 30k just made easier money and support for the rest withered. I think it was mostly 30k Space Marines too and the Solar Auxilia were made by a sculptor in his free time before they were released, otherwise we would have gotten only Space Marines and nothing else.
GW grew and then specialized themselves into easy money and these days (with all the competition) this approach seems to be hurting them (why else change WHFB into AOS and restart Specialist Games?) because having one hit product works when you sell iPhones to everybody who has money but not when you try to sell a few very specific toy soldiers (Space Marines) to everybody who has money and knows of your niche (that you don't advertises much). They are essentially a tiny little bird that evolved on an isolated island and lives quite happily as long as nothing changes but they also think they are some majestic eagle who can survive any change in their ecosystem. Things have changes/are still changing and Games Workshop is slowly getting suspicious that they are not that dominant and secure in their niche and neighbouring stronger predators (boardgames and wargame-boardgames like Star Wars) and scavengers (other smaller wargames) have disrupted their cozy lifestyle.
It's not 40k that became complacent but GW and their games are only to blame insofar as they were produced by GW who had it in their power to make different choices instead of going for the easy route and disregarding any competition or problems. I don't think they are looking for a game that magically makes them $100 mil a year, they barely got one that can manage that (and it seems they have no idea how to replicate that or they would be a $200 mil company like Asmodee) and got that only by actually building on top of success and growing it slowly while letting other possible success stories just wither because at some point it didn't look as profitable as Space Marines.
While I do think it would be a good idea to do all the stuff you mentioned in the second quoted paragraph I don't think they ever were looking for a new $100 mil opportunity. Judging from what they did since getting the LOTR license they seem to have just reacted mostly to the success they themselves can't actually explain that precisely.
Yeah, it's interesting to see Talys list LOTR as a success. It worked because of the movie bubble - but it suffered from very similar mistakes that GW has made with their other games that kept it from being sustainable. The Hobbit sales were an absolute fiasco... their handling of LOTR is nothing to hold up to for fantasy to aspire to (i.e. a long term, profitable game, rather than a quick sale for short term gain).
Remember, I defined success or failure in terms of profitability, not anything else. As opposed to, for example, an enthusiastic, long term customer base or franchise.
It really doesn't matter why it succeeded -- LOTR made them a lot of money, and they would like a product to replace that revenue.
LOTR making them a lot of money had almost nothing to do with their strategies, though, and more the fact that it was an international phenomenon at the time! The fact that they want to "replace that revenue" is pretty much irrelevant! They are going about it in probably the least effective way possible - repeating their past mistakes and actually doubling down on them.
Talys, you keep talking about what GW wants, but do you recognize that they in fact don't know (and don't actually bother to look at) what the customer/market wants? They are trying to find a new customer to fit this product - but by doing no marketing and offering very little support to the game, they are putting their managers and sales people in a nearly impossible position, having intentionally alienated past customers and not doing what's needed to find a new niche (since that's what AoS would mean / need to succeed in the way you're describing).
Yeah, i agree with what you're saying talys. The problem (for them) is that the 'why it succeeded' is important to the 'making a lot of money' for them. I don't see anything other than star wars having the potential to make a similar amount of money, and they don't have that license. What i think they need to do is maximize their sales of existing products, and to do that they need market research (amongst other things). AoS was the result of randomly changing a core product without attempting to improve it: all that does is risk damaging the fan/customerbase without good reason.
Torga_DW wrote: I don't see anything other than star wars having the potential to make a similar amount of money, and they don't have that license. What i think they need to do is maximize their sales of existing products, and to do that they need market research (amongst other things). AoS was the result of randomly changing a core product without attempting to improve it: all that does is risk damaging the fan/customerbase without good reason.
Talys wrote: However, there is TONS of breadcrumbs that lead me to the conclusion 40k sells a lot more product than WHFB.
I don't think anyone has ever suggested 40k sells a lot more product than WHFB, it just depends on your definition of "a lot" and whether you consider the past few stagnant years toward the end of 8th or consider the past few editions. It's also important to realise that WHFB doesn't NEED to sell as well as 40k to justify its existence, it's naive to think every product has to sell as well as your best product and it's even more naive to think it's a good idea to cut everything that isn't your best selling product.
I was going to go through breadcrumbs and give explanations how WHFB could have been quite popular in spite of your personal observations but it got too cumbersome. But the answer to a lot of them is simply what I said on the previous page, which is that I think WHFB has always been more popular in mainland Europe than the USA.
Obviously it was starting to fail otherwise GW wouldn't have killed it (noting we don't know what GW consider "failing" to be), but it's all for nought if you don't look at the REASONS why it started to fail. I'm sure a large part of it (not necessarily the biggest part) is simply because WHFB are more diverse in their army selection where as 40k has Spehss Mareenz that GW could always fall back on... which is probably why we now have Sigmarines. I tend to think a large number of the reasons WHFB failed aren't being properly addressed in AoS anyway.
I tend to be of the opinion AoS is failing too and that is going to be problematic for GW going forward as well.
I would just like to put this here:
WHFB was extremely popular in my area during 7th edition. Sue there where issues and those TFG's whom brought nothing but Brettonian Cavalry lists but the game was still extremely popular. When 8th edition dropped there was a whole party and the interest remained the same. many of us where happy that cavalry where no longer brokenly good (The afore mentioned Brettonian Cavalry list being murderously good at removing entire armies) and the the game seemed to have changed for the better. Then the codec's started dropping and the number of models needed increased. A few grumbles but nothing too bad and people liked the chance to add some exciting new units to their forces. Then the prices increased and that is when the popularity wained. It was also around this time that some of the nastier cheese lists started to come to the fore - gunline armies with some magical support where nigh unbeatable, especially to a poor Skaven player whom could not hope to compete.
With the increased prices and number of models needed the stream of new players began to dry up and the meta started to stagnate. By now the powergamers had switched to gunline armies - my regular whom had once run a Brettonian Cavalry list was now assembling a Dark Elf army - and the random rolls combined with the vastly overpowered magic phase (you had better have maxed out on wizards) was beginning to cause people to lose interest in the game.
I last played a game of Warhammer Fantasy Battles in the year of 2013 at Worthy Games (now sadly shut down) with my Skaven against a Chaos Dwarf gunline army. We rolled for missions and got the one whereby the table is divided into three parts and you roll for each unit to see where it is placed. Long story short I was fethed over by the rolls and ended up with most of my Skaven crammed into the hard left flank and some more in the centre with no room to manoeuvre and facing the Chaos Dwarf's whom had got similar roles with all of his stuff on his right flank (my left) bar two cannons, one of which was in the centre and one on the other flank.
Out of over 200 Skaven about 18 made it into combat.
After that I transferred to Warmachine and only looked back in sorrow.
TLDR:
GW fethed over WHFB by introducing far too many random dice rolls, increasing the number of models needed to play with whilst at the same time doubling or even tripling the cost of them, vastly overpowering the magic phase and making shooting far too effective whilst also making missile units core for most armies.
@Skink - Done And BTW... I pretty much agree with you
Incidentally, I don't think WHFB (or any other game, really) ever had the same appetite for the really big, expensive centerpiece models that 40k tables are now littered with, even though GW produced those models for WHFB. You can imagine a table full of riptides and wraithknights, or squads of them, but I can't really imagine a guy fielding an army full of Bloodthirsters or Treemen. I've certainly never seen it.
1. It is a casual game. Easy silly rules, smash together and roll dice. Usually mentioned along with having a few beers.
2. It is not a casual game. It takes a lot of cash. It takes a lot of time to assemble and paint. It requires effort to create a balanced game. There are numerous books to read and immersing yourself in the fluff takes some mental effort. The only "casual" miniatures games I would say are the pre-paints. Any game requiring modeling and assembly are not casual in my opinion.
3. People that want a casual game will buy a video system and get drunk while shooting at each other online, or play something like X-wing.
4. People that want a more serious war game do not want to act like they are riding a horse for a +1 or whatever. Serious gamers will find a tighter rule set with army lists and points.
It just seems to be a product positioned to appeal to a very small niche. People who spend hours reading fluff and painting armies, huge amounts of cash on figures, set aside an entire room in the house to have a game table and terrain, and yet are satisfied with ultra simplistic rules. I tend to think it lacks the depth to sustain the interest of the veteran gamers. In time it might simply vanish, or become a lesson in what not to do in the hobby.
Not sure if there is a market or not. Time will tell.
I personally quite like 8th edition but not the army books. I will be staying with that version and using the older Ravening Hordes or 3rd edition books.
I agree with the OP regarding prices. 100% of the reason I stopped buying was my being of a member of the working class and unable to afford it. The company seems to be trying to position themselves as a sort of "snob" product. Only for the rich. There are cars I don't drive, foods I don't eat, and clothes I don't wear. And miniatures I do not buy. I fully respect those with the cash to indulge- good for you. No class envy or anything. It is just not in my budget.
Maybe that is the real reason WFB was failing? Not enough rich people to replace all the regular people thrown out of the hobby?
Talys wrote: @Skink - Done And BTW... I pretty much agree with you
Incidentally, I don't think WHFB (or any other game, really) ever had the same appetite for the really big, expensive centerpiece models that 40k tables are now littered with, even though GW produced those models for WHFB. You can imagine a table full of riptides and wraithknights, or squads of them, but I can't really imagine a guy fielding an army full of Bloodthirsters or Treemen. I've certainly never seen it.
Before I elaborate on this further, allow me to first of all answer this very specific point with just one word - Smaug.
Now, moving on: you haven't seen armies full of those models because GW didn't make them to begin with. If you look back, you'll see that these giant flashy centerpieces came out for 40k just as Fantasy stopped getting as much attention. It's kinda hard to invest on gigantic centerpieces when they.. .don't exist.
On a simple example - I have three Dragons, and two Griffons for my High Elves and I was actually looking to get the Carmine Dragon from FW when I was doing the "gonna get back into FB after three years as a responsible husband and dad" planning. I guarantee you I'd buy a dragon the size of a IK if it was merely named "Indraugnir" ... and I only collect High Elves. You actually think the people who have 6/7 different armies wouldn't buy those too? I mean... ask any Lizardmen player if they would want a Warhound-sized Indominus Rex for their army and see what they'll tell you Or ask them if they would like to have a Dino-only army...
Now if you want to say the giant models don't exist because there aren't any lists that make them spammable like IK's are... that's a completely different thing. Though I am really sure I know a few Caledor-themed HE players that would totally buy a full Dragon army...
It's really hard to make an army with models that:
A) have no armylists to be played with;
B) don't actually... exist
Talys wrote: @Skink - Done And BTW... I pretty much agree with you
Incidentally, I don't think WHFB (or any other game, really) ever had the same appetite for the really big, expensive centerpiece models that 40k tables are now littered with, even though GW produced those models for WHFB. You can imagine a table full of riptides and wraithknights, or squads of them, but I can't really imagine a guy fielding an army full of Bloodthirsters or Treemen. I've certainly never seen it.
Well WHFB has stricter army composition rules and historically the big things have been designed to be one offs (for example rather than an army of dragons, you have a single character riding a dragon). I've seen people maxing out their "big toys" in WHFB games, but most armies when you max them out you still only have a couple of them. Lizardmen are one of the few armies that can do an effective monster mash and I've seen several Lizardmen armies doing that. But even there, that's more of a recent thing when Stegadons became optional as either special, rare or as a mount and in the more recent release where we got a bunch new monsters. I've seen several armies that max out on Treemen.
Personally I think it's for the better that for the most part WHFB didn't allow for armies of nothing but big things. Sure, it might alienate a few people who want to do it, but I think it's better for the game and better for the community as whole. It means your big centerpiece model is actually a centerpiece model and not just the standard size.
It doesn't really make all that much difference anyway whether you spend $60 on a 200pt monster or $50 on a 200pt regiment. In many cases the big monsters were actually more cost effective than building regiments.
Before I elaborate on this further, allow me to first of all answer this very specific point with just one word - Smaug.
Now, moving on: you haven't seen armies full of those models because GW didn't make them to begin with. If you look back, you'll see that these giant flashy centerpieces came out for 40k just as Fantasy stopped getting as much attention. It's kinda hard to invest on gigantic centerpieces when they.. .don't exist.
Yes, I love him too. But he's not really a WHFB unit, hahaha
I've actually bought one each of a bunch of the metal dragons, and almost all the plastic dragons. I think they're great models, and fun to put together, to boot. There ARE some really nice, big centerpiece models though: Nagash, Bloodthirster (and Skarbrand), Treeman Ancient, Malekith, Glotkin... just to name the ones that came since 2014. There are some gorgeous models from a few years past too, like the sphinx or phoenix.
To AllSeeingSkink's point, mostly, these guys are designed in the rules to be just one of (like, having 2 Nagash just doesn't work ). But even when that's not the case, I've never really seen a race to cram the board with big giant things. Please keep in mind, I never played WHFB even once, though I own the rules, read them for fun, and have painted a reasonable number of models (though not nearly an army). For me, I never got to the point where I had a finished army to play with, lol.
AoS has been pretty fun; it just doesn't really push me to spend more money on the game. If other people are like me (and I'm not suggesting that they are), then GW will have the problem of the people who DO enjoy it not spending more money. My wife is in much the same boat -- once her army is done, I doubt she'll add *anything* to it for a very long time, and she hasn't really been drawn to buy all the fiction (she's bought 2 books I think), even though she enjoys the game.
Of course... this is Version 1 of Age of Sigmar, and GW being GW has plenty of time and space to make changes in AoS 2.0 to make it better and keep iterating it as long as there is some interest in the franchise, so back to the original question... whether it's failing or not.... I think it's just way too early to tell.
Talys wrote: To AllSeeingSkink's point, mostly, these guys are designed in the rules to be just one of (like, having 2 Nagash just doesn't work ). But even when that's not the case, I've never really seen a race to cram the board with big giant things. Please keep in mind, I never played WHFB even once, though I own the rules, read them for fun, and have painted a reasonable number of models (though not nearly an army). For me, I never got to the point where I had a finished army to play with, lol.
Which armies are you thinking of though? Most armies can't have a lot of big things and the armies that come to mind which are allowed to do it (like Lizardmen) it is quite common to see, though they usually don't perform well on the table as they're too easy to kill given their points. But most armies you just can't do it anyway. Treemen were rare choices, in a 2000pt game you can only have 1 of them, 2 if you take the Treeman ancient, also the model sucked up until recently. My Orc and Gobbo army I have a Giant and an Arachnarok, I can only take both of them in 2000pt games, it's almost 3000pts before I can take a 2nd Giant.
Talys wrote: To AllSeeingSkink's point, mostly, these guys are designed in the rules to be just one of (like, having 2 Nagash just doesn't work ). But even when that's not the case, I've never really seen a race to cram the board with big giant things. Please keep in mind, I never played WHFB even once, though I own the rules, read them for fun, and have painted a reasonable number of models (though not nearly an army). For me, I never got to the point where I had a finished army to play with, lol.
Which armies are you thinking of though? Most armies can't have a lot of big things and the armies that come to mind which are allowed to do it (like Lizardmen) it is quite common to see, though they usually don't perform well on the table as they're too easy to kill given their points. But most armies you just can't do it anyway. Treemen were rare choices, in a 2000pt game you can only have 1 of them, 2 if you take the Treeman ancient, also the model sucked up until recently. My Orc and Gobbo army I have a Giant and an Arachnarok, I can only take both of them in 2000pt games, it's almost 3000pts before I can take a 2nd Giant.
If I remember rightly my Skaven got a largeish monster, namely the Abomination many years ago. It was okay as a model but nothing special and the price for it was too high.
We did get some stuff towards the end of the End Times, namely a much needed Verminlord and a new (and quite frankly IMO no where near as good) Thanquol and Boneripper one piece kit but they where..... Well, they where overpriced.
Fantasy has never had such the large abundance of big things as 40K, until the End Times that is and shortly after we got those kits the entire world blew up so no, technically we never actually had the big centre pieces.
What AoS needed to be, I think, was the Fantasy version of Space Hulk. Perhaps set against the backdrop of the End Times or even some predicted future. It should have been a familiar setting but with different enough a system to be it's own game. Some thing you could play out of the box and the warscrolls should have been like the old WD articles that gave you rules for non-terminators/stealers. A new, smaller scale game that FB players could get behind and want the box contents for and which just might tempt a few non FB players to take a look.
As for how it's doing here? I don't even know anyone outside of a GW employee that's bought it.
Before I elaborate on this further, allow me to first of all answer this very specific point with just one word - Smaug.
Now, moving on: you haven't seen armies full of those models because GW didn't make them to begin with. If you look back, you'll see that these giant flashy centerpieces came out for 40k just as Fantasy stopped getting as much attention. It's kinda hard to invest on gigantic centerpieces when they.. .don't exist.
Yes, I love him too. But he's not really a WHFB unit, hahaha
Don't dodge the bullet - you know exactly what I mean. It's a Gigantic dragon. It's the very definition of Fantasy.
Fantasy can drive players to buy huge centerpiece models. It's just that GW didn't even bother to try.
Before I elaborate on this further, allow me to first of all answer this very specific point with just one word - Smaug.
Now, moving on: you haven't seen armies full of those models because GW didn't make them to begin with. If you look back, you'll see that these giant flashy centerpieces came out for 40k just as Fantasy stopped getting as much attention. It's kinda hard to invest on gigantic centerpieces when they.. .don't exist.
Yes, I love him too. But he's not really a WHFB unit, hahaha
Don't dodge the bullet - you know exactly what I mean. It's a Gigantic dragon. It's the very definition of Fantasy.
Fantasy can drive players to buy huge centerpiece models. It's just that GW didn't even bother to try.
I think you misunderstood what I was saying, my friend.
In Fantasy, you'll have people who buy a Nagash or a Treeman or a Malekith. A LoTR fan might buy a Smaug, sure.
But in 40k, you'll have someone buy 3+ Knight Castigators at $350 each, a half dozen Wraithknights, 5 Imperial Knights, 5+ Hive Tyrants, et cetera... as a part of "standard" army. I mean, nobody would ever buy 3 Smaugs, but the book has *rules* squads of Stormsurges, wraithknights, and "households" of Imperial Knights. It's really gotten to the point where a lot of us are looking at tables larger than 6x4 (8x8, and even the granddaddy of gaming tables, 8x12) just to fit all our awesome stuff.
I think in the world of Fantasy, if there were an appetite to fill the table with ten $200 dragons to each side, GW would be there like a dirty shirt.
That's because units had a rarity in FB, making the use of multiple loopy units more restricted. A very good idea, especially viewed against the lunacy of 40K unit selection.
40K could use some sort of balancing mechanism like that, but they daren't, as they don't have enough players to buy one of all the big stuff now and make a return, they have to try and sell multiples.
Azazelx wrote: Recently, I've seen quite a few posts talking about how AoS "failed" and so forth in the wake of it's launch, replacing WHFB. My question is whether there's any or much actual hard data for this, or if it's just online speculation? - Especially as the product is still so new and really seemed to capture people's imagination or at least wallets with some lovely new models at a decent price - at least in the starter set box.
I'm not interested in this becoming a partisan bitchfest, or the eternal duelling between knights of black and white, or whether GW killed or saved your dog, but actual information and reasoned discussion.
Easy way to discuss this is to look at Dungeons and Dragons for a comparison. The suckfest evolution preWizards takeover is what this is looking like now. GW thinks that they can tack the name brand on something and everyone jumps on it like fried gold...
Most large scale overinflated upper echelon companies make the same mistake, then they come back around, revamp the original and pull out the "Coke Classic" bit, while they up the price for the pleasure of selling the product that they should have originally produced.
AoS is really hard to wrap around. the fact that they sunk as much, and then posed a large scale statue to try to shill the masses on it speaks even volumes on how unconnected from their customer they really are.
Biggest issue on the game is that you can't really wrap your head around the core concept. It doesn't work as an evolution of Warhammer fantasy...
Had they just kept the same fantasy concept, then added the new rule set, that might have helped the devolution of their market, but as with most things GW, they do not grasp the obvious.
Then the market price? yeah, about that.... You pick up that base game, shill out more for over priced paint, brushes, and then finally get around to the chore that those figures are, yeah, you might get through number 10-15 before you throw in the towel.
My feeling? give them another few months, and we're going to see the evolution of Fantasy 9.0. This one will end up being special unit types that show up as reinforcements/ saviors on the battlefield, ala Space Marines working with the IG/ Imperials.
Grot 6 wrote: My feeling? give them another few months, and we're going to see the evolution of Fantasy 9.0. This one will end up being special unit types that show up as reinforcements/ saviors on the battlefield, ala Space Marines working with the IG/ Imperials.
Nah, they'll pull a Microsoft, and go right to 10.....
Azreal13 wrote: That's because units had a rarity in FB, making the use of multiple loopy units more restricted. A very good idea, especially viewed against the lunacy of 40K unit selection.
There's also the advantage of mechanical units over organic units. It's easier to make two Land Raiders look good sitting next to each other than two dragons, because two identical dragons in identical poses look off, yet reposing the dragon will also look off if it fails to account for how an organic body changes shape as it moves.
In my experience, AoS appears to be very, very dead. The only product that gets moved is for use as 40k proxies.
That said, Fantasy was pretty much dead too.
Both of these systems are just too expensive. AoS's problem is that it's trying to aim for a demographic that's just as content with much smaller, far cheaper games. The newer art and background/fluff is also thoroughly uninspiring and has none of the hook that WHFB did, that 30 year old IP had power, and GW has increasingly been watering down their background & art, making it look more and more like something you'd see from a videogame or other such IP, losing that "80's metal+medieval Gothica" feel that so defined the visuals of their IP's.
Basically, WHFB priced itself out of playability, and AoS shares largely the same problem while offering largely nothing unique in terms of visuals or setting.
Talys wrote: I think you misunderstood what I was saying, my friend.
In Fantasy, you'll have people who buy a Nagash or a Treeman or a Malekith. A LoTR fan might buy a Smaug, sure.
But in 40k, you'll have someone buy 3+ Knight Castigators at $350 each, a half dozen Wraithknights, 5 Imperial Knights, 5+ Hive Tyrants, et cetera... as a part of "standard" army. I mean, nobody would ever buy 3 Smaugs, but the book has *rules* squads of Stormsurges, wraithknights, and "households" of Imperial Knights. It's really gotten to the point where a lot of us are looking at tables larger than 6x4 (8x8, and even the granddaddy of gaming tables, 8x12) just to fit all our awesome stuff.
I think in the world of Fantasy, if there were an appetite to fill the table with ten $200 dragons to each side, GW would be there like a dirty shirt.
Did you miss my earlier post?
The reason it's not done in Fantasy is because it can't be done in Fantasy. There was no point buying 5 Treemen because you couldn't use them. There's no point buying 2 Dragons because they were the mount for a Lord and unless it was a huge game you could only take 1 of them.
WHFB has always had percentage limits, if your big things are Rare choices they can't be more than 25% of your points and you must have at least 25% troops. Even before 7th ed 40k with its Unbound madness, 40k got rid of the % system back in 3rd edition so as long as a unit wasn't limited as 0-1, you could usually take 3 of them at any points level.
But either way I'm not entirely sure why we've gone off on this tangent? Does it matter if people purchase big monsters or not? Often the infantry regiments are even more expensive money wise than the monsters anyway.
To speak rather broadly, Kirby said a few years ago that GW had got fat and lazy, but actually they had become complacent and arrogant.
GW came to believe that people would buy anything they put out, simply because it was from GW, and that anyone complaining was an idiot, a croaker, or just was 'doing it wrong'.
Kilkrazy wrote: To speak rather broadly, Kirby said a few years ago that GW had got fat and lazy, but actually they had become complacent and arrogant.
GW came to believe that people would buy anything they put out, simply because it was from GW, and that anyone complaining was an idiot, a croaker, or just was 'doing it wrong'.
oni wrote: I recall a time when 40K went through a very similar transformation with just as much player revolt - the switch from 2nd to 3rd edition.
I'm betting most of the people here on Dakka are too young to know of such a time, but it happened. 40K players left in droves; it was a dark and uncertain time indeed.
I see the potential in AoS just as saw the potential in 3rd edition 40K.
Let me remind everyone who is old enough to recall and inform the young that the 40K game we all love and enjoy today is only a tweaked version of that very same, so very hated, 3rd edition rules set.
Except that in that case it was a failing 2nd edition getting ousted by a much more successful 3rd edition, with rules that actually made more sense than the rules that they replaced.
And which included army lists so that folks could play their old armies immediately.
Otherwise, yeah, exactly the same situation....
The Auld Grump
Also played through that time. While changing many things mechanically, it's not as if they turned the game setting 180 degrees on it's head like with Age of Sigmar. It all stayed the same universe people loved. Squats and Genestealer cults aside, nearly everything remained pretty status quo.
Vaktathi wrote: In my experience, AoS appears to be very, very dead. The only product that gets moved is for use as 40k proxies.
That said, Fantasy was pretty much dead too.
Both of these systems are just too expensive. AoS's problem is that it's trying to aim for a demographic that's just as content with much smaller, far cheaper games. The newer art and background/fluff is also thoroughly uninspiring and has none of the hook that WHFB did, that 30 year old IP had power, and GW has increasingly been watering down their background & art, making it look more and more like something you'd see from a videogame or other such IP, losing that "80's metal+medieval Gothica" feel that so defined the visuals of their IP's.
Basically, WHFB priced itself out of playability, and AoS shares largely the same problem while offering largely nothing unique in terms of visuals or setting.
To a certain extent, I have to disagree - in my local area, Kings of War is doing quite well, and uses armies that are just as large as WHFB.
While most of the folks are using the armies that they have built up over years (in some cases decades) of playing Warhammer, a fair number are investing in new armies - not all of them from Mantic. Some are buying a second army.
Hell, I am considering hitting eBay for Tomb Kings stuff - and I haven't made any GW miniatures purchases in four years. (A terrain purchase is the latest time that I have bought any GW.)
I think the rules are a major reason that the game is failing - though definitely behind the cost of all those darned figures.
It is not just that GW costs too much, it is that the games just aren't anywhere near enjoyable enough to justify that cost.
No matter how many times Kirby calls it a Porsche, it remains a bunch of toy soldiers.
2nd to 3rd 40k is much more akin to 5th to 6th WHFB no?
I remember loving the changes from 2nd to 3rd, despite also loving the core 2nd edition ruleset too (I'm a big Necro fan), 3rd edition just made so much more sense when playing a mass battle game.
I embraced AoS when it first came out and will try and stick with it. Today I was reading through my 8th edition Empire army book and was sad for the world we have lost.
Vaktathi wrote: In my experience, AoS appears to be very, very dead. The only product that gets moved is for use as 40k proxies.
That said, Fantasy was pretty much dead too.
Both of these systems are just too expensive. AoS's problem is that it's trying to aim for a demographic that's just as content with much smaller, far cheaper games. The newer art and background/fluff is also thoroughly uninspiring and has none of the hook that WHFB did, that 30 year old IP had power, and GW has increasingly been watering down their background & art, making it look more and more like something you'd see from a videogame or other such IP, losing that "80's metal+medieval Gothica" feel that so defined the visuals of their IP's.
Basically, WHFB priced itself out of playability, and AoS shares largely the same problem while offering largely nothing unique in terms of visuals or setting.
To a certain extent, I have to disagree - in my local area, Kings of War is doing quite well, and uses armies that are just as large as WHFB.
While most of the folks are using the armies that they have built up over years (in some cases decades) of playing Warhammer, a fair number are investing in new armies - not all of them from Mantic. Some are buying a second army.
Hell, I am considering hitting eBay for Tomb Kings stuff - and I haven't made any GW miniatures purchases in four years. (A terrain purchase is the latest time that I have bought any GW.)
I think the rules are a major reason that the game is failing - though definitely behind the cost of all those darned figures.
It is not just that GW costs too much, it is that the games just aren't anywhere near enjoyable enough to justify that cost.
No matter how many times Kirby calls it a Porsche, it remains a bunch of toy soldiers.
The Auld Grump
I think a couple of rules really did hose it, some of the more absurd Magic powers and the general ineffectiveness of combat characters, but in general, I found most people were ok with the bulk of the 8E rules, but the cost simply made starting a new army impossible. I don't know anyone that really started into Fantasy that actually completed a 2500pt army after mid 2011 or so. Even now, with people playing KoW, they're buying mantic or getting stuff off of Ebay, not buying anything retail.
I think the bigger issues with the rules were actually from late 7E, the horrific last couple of years with Daemons, Tomb Kings, and Dark Elves really kicked the game in the groin, and while 8E fixed a good deal of that, the cost issues started drying up the new playerbase very soon after.
Talys wrote: I think you misunderstood what I was saying, my friend.
In Fantasy, you'll have people who buy a Nagash or a Treeman or a Malekith. A LoTR fan might buy a Smaug, sure.
But in 40k, you'll have someone buy 3+ Knight Castigators at $350 each, a half dozen Wraithknights, 5 Imperial Knights, 5+ Hive Tyrants, et cetera... as a part of "standard" army. I mean, nobody would ever buy 3 Smaugs, but the book has *rules* squads of Stormsurges, wraithknights, and "households" of Imperial Knights. It's really gotten to the point where a lot of us are looking at tables larger than 6x4 (8x8, and even the granddaddy of gaming tables, 8x12) just to fit all our awesome stuff.
I think in the world of Fantasy, if there were an appetite to fill the table with ten $200 dragons to each side, GW would be there like a dirty shirt.
Did you miss my earlier post?
The reason it's not done in Fantasy is because it can't be done in Fantasy. There was no point buying 5 Treemen because you couldn't use them. There's no point buying 2 Dragons because they were the mount for a Lord and unless it was a huge game you could only take 1 of them.
WHFB has always had percentage limits, if your big things are Rare choices they can't be more than 25% of your points and you must have at least 25% troops. Even before 7th ed 40k with its Unbound madness, 40k got rid of the % system back in 3rd edition so as long as a unit wasn't limited as 0-1, you could usually take 3 of them at any points level.
But either way I'm not entirely sure why we've gone off on this tangent? Does it matter if people purchase big monsters or not? Often the infantry regiments are even more expensive money wise than the monsters anyway.
This, really. Smaug is used merely to highlight the point that is really just a Gigantic and horribly expensive Dragon that was sold out the moment he popped up. It means Fantasy miniatures (In the broad sense, i don't mean FB miniatures) can sell quite well at that scale.
As I said in the previous post, I am damned sure a lot of Lizardmen players would love to field a dino-only army. Or HE players to field an old Caledor army (Dragon rider galore). Or an Empire Nuln Army featuring only Steam Tanks and the new "Steam Goliath" (My imagination is lacking atm int he name dept, sorry :p) or a DE Karond Kar army with Hydras and Manticores and enslaved Dragons... etc etc etc.
But they can't because GW didn't let them. You can't buy something that isn't being offered to play with.
Kilkrazy wrote: To speak rather broadly, Kirby said a few years ago that GW had got fat and lazy, but actually they had become complacent and arrogant.
GW came to believe that people would buy anything they put out, simply because it was from GW, and that anyone complaining was an idiot, a croaker, or just was 'doing it wrong'.
Isn't that their corporate motto now?
Because you suck and we hate you. - GW
Subscribed. In the meantime on the far side of the world...
I am damned sure a lot of Lizardmen players would love to field a dino-only army.
That is exactly what I am now doing. At the time of me last playing WFB heavily there weren't the plastic dino kits out, so it was a bit of a moot point for me (never been heavily into big metal/resin stuff). By the time the plastic kits came out I wasn't really playing that often and wasn't going to spend money on something that would get fielded even less often than I was playing.
One of the big things to get me back into fantasy was AOS ditching boring army lists and going more for the use the models you want to put your money and time into. There were 3 armies I thought about, 1 could have been done, but only sort of, with WFB army lists, the other 2 not at all. It is the Dino list I am going for and am currently slowly buying and painting up. I'll probably add in some non dino stuff as well going forward, but the fact that the game by default encourages you to play with the models you like and not buy a pile of stuff I can't be even remotely interested in is a big thing for me.
To be fair, I have been wanting to get back into minis (GW ones only though) for a while but not WFB and would probably have looked at KOW instead if AOS hadn't turned up at about the same time. Except they never had the lists for all the GW models, and the last time I played that game having to make up stats for the stuff I did have didn't feel very satisfactory. I haven't looked at what KOW does now in terms of lizards and allowing the all dino army, I'd probably be happy to play that as well if it was a valid army and opponents could handle the round bases. On the other hand KOW was good in many respects but always left me feeling it was a bit bland.
I was under the impression that the AOS rules were supposed to be a 'living' ruleset with constant updates and feedback from players, which could have been a bold move.
Is that still the case, or is it been turned into a steaming pile of gak?
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: I was under the impression that the AOS rules were supposed to be a 'living' ruleset with constant updates and feedback from players, which could have been a bold move.
Is that still the case, or is it been turned into a steaming pile of gak?
This is what I remember from the early rumors as well. At this point I think it would be pretty easy to fix a few niggling rules issues like clarifying certain sections, natural 1s always fail, and a couple of others.
I remember that too, and of course it is simple to update a PDF. GW did update the rules to correct the bonus victory conditions very quickly. (The victory conditions for outnumbered armies.)
But really, there isn't very much that needs to be clarified or corrected in the rules. (Short of a massive re-write, at any rate.)
Out of curiosity, Puree, how old are you? What other tabletop wargames have you played? (Genuinely curious, meaning no mockery)
I'm closing in on 50, and have forgotten more games than I can remember, been playing wargames of one sort or another since about 10ish (give or take, memory is hazy). At some point I would have played most of the historical rulesets at least once (most as of 30-40 years ago that is) and a few more recent ones. But I'm not really into historical minis much nowadays - although that said I currently really like Maurice but use home made 'counters' for the bases rather than minis. Heard good things about Blucher and am definitely looking forward to Aurelian (i.e over the last year or so Sam Mustafa stuff has interested me a lot).
I tend much more towards board games, tactical, operational or strategic or whatever to be honest (and have a crap load of old AH/SPI/VG games etc as well as newer games from GMT etc), actual mini games I tend to drift into every now and again then drift out of after a binge. Indeed as my dakka profile probably shows I think I have had two previous active periods here with large gaps between and have now come back after another large gap. Whilst I like the look of mini games, I dislike the money and effort that could instead be spent on actually playing. I'm very much into 'games' and not the collect/paint etc. When I do get minis nowadays it has to be minis I really like and feel like the painting etc will not be chore just to fill some mandatory slot.
For the last 30 years board games have been my main historical drug, and when the mini urge strikes it tends to be for fantasy (I include 40k as fantasy BTW). If I do historical type (real minis) stuff I'll leave it to someone else to provide the army.
Talys wrote: I think you misunderstood what I was saying, my friend.
In Fantasy, you'll have people who buy a Nagash or a Treeman or a Malekith. A LoTR fan might buy a Smaug, sure.
But in 40k, you'll have someone buy 3+ Knight Castigators at $350 each, a half dozen Wraithknights, 5 Imperial Knights, 5+ Hive Tyrants, et cetera... as a part of "standard" army. I mean, nobody would ever buy 3 Smaugs, but the book has *rules* squads of Stormsurges, wraithknights, and "households" of Imperial Knights. It's really gotten to the point where a lot of us are looking at tables larger than 6x4 (8x8, and even the granddaddy of gaming tables, 8x12) just to fit all our awesome stuff.
I think in the world of Fantasy, if there were an appetite to fill the table with ten $200 dragons to each side, GW would be there like a dirty shirt.
Did you miss my earlier post?
The reason it's not done in Fantasy is because it can't be done in Fantasy. There was no point buying 5 Treemen because you couldn't use them. There's no point buying 2 Dragons because they were the mount for a Lord and unless it was a huge game you could only take 1 of them.
WHFB has always had percentage limits, if your big things are Rare choices they can't be more than 25% of your points and you must have at least 25% troops. Even before 7th ed 40k with its Unbound madness, 40k got rid of the % system back in 3rd edition so as long as a unit wasn't limited as 0-1, you could usually take 3 of them at any points level.
But either way I'm not entirely sure why we've gone off on this tangent? Does it matter if people purchase big monsters or not? Often the infantry regiments are even more expensive money wise than the monsters anyway.
This, really. Smaug is used merely to highlight the point that is really just a Gigantic and horribly expensive Dragon that was sold out the moment he popped up. It means Fantasy miniatures (In the broad sense, i don't mean FB miniatures) can sell quite well at that scale.
As I said in the previous post, I am damned sure a lot of Lizardmen players would love to field a dino-only army. Or HE players to field an old Caledor army (Dragon rider galore). Or an Empire Nuln Army featuring only Steam Tanks and the new "Steam Goliath" (My imagination is lacking atm int he name dept, sorry :p) or a DE Karond Kar army with Hydras and Manticores and enslaved Dragons... etc etc etc.
To be fair, there's a reason this wasn't allowed. It makes any semblance of balance very difficult, typically drastically ramps up the scale of the game, and often in general is simply contrary to the background (e.g. there were a fixed, finite, small, and definite number of Steam Tanks within the Empire, and IIRC never used as a massed formation).
40k is having gigantic problems with exactly this. When you can have things like entire armies of Knights, it makes basic infantry rather pointless, and, even more critically, makes the granularity of the rules extremely onerous (e.g. wound allocation and power weapon blade type become somewhat absurd with regards to basic infantry squads in such contexts)
Kilkrazy wrote: I remember that too, and of course it is simple to update a PDF. GW did update the rules to correct the bonus victory conditions very quickly. (The victory conditions for outnumbered armies.)
But really, there isn't very much that needs to be clarified or corrected in the rules. (Short of a massive re-write, at any rate.)
I have no clue how the gaming culture at stores is because I never play at stores - always been a bit awkward for me even to be inside one.
From anecdotal stories on the internet though, it sounds like AoS is not pleasing the store-goer crowd. It does have more people running tournaments than you'd expect if you go solely on forums. Some of the big Warhammer podcasters are pushing it, such as Dan Heelan.
It rejuvenated my interest in miniatures and brought me back to the hobby. It also interested my friends who had fallen out along with me as we grew up. However, even if they like it they can't justify paying GW prices.
I think AoS does a lot of things right, such as the freeform army building, scenarios, general balance between units. It does need refinement, as I find when a lot of combats start going it slows down quite a bit, and tracking all the different buffs from war scrolls is a chore.
At this point, I don't think it has the "it" factor that would get most Warhammer miniatures fans to jump on board. Whether that's a proper comp system or what, I'm not sure. But I think the miniatures are so good, the history is there, some of the fundamentals are great steps forward, that there is potential in this game surviving and thriving.
However, if GW are going to sit on their hands and sink or swim with their first edition of this ruleset, I would be disappointed.
If 2016 saw a push with some mainstays like elves, dwarfs, orcs and then an attempt at refinement in the rules or alternate mode of play, I think that could bring a lot of disillusioned fans back.
Kilkrazy wrote: I remember that too, and of course it is simple to update a PDF. GW did update the rules to correct the bonus victory conditions very quickly. (The victory conditions for outnumbered armies.)
But really, there isn't very much that needs to be clarified or corrected in the rules. (Short of a massive re-write, at any rate.)
To expand upon my original point, there was supposed to be a 'basic' rule set, and later on, the game was supposed to be a bit more 'complex' with expansions and individual units adding more layers...or something like that.
Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote: I was under the impression that the AOS rules were supposed to be a 'living' ruleset with constant updates and feedback from players, which could have been a bold move.
Is that still the case, or is it been turned into a steaming pile of gak?
This is what I remember from the early rumors as well. At this point I think it would be pretty easy to fix a few niggling rules issues like clarifying certain sections, natural 1s always fail, and a couple of others.
My response to Kilkrazy was directed at you, as well. Still can't get the hang of multi-quote
I don't remember anything about expansions to the rules, though there was lots of speculation that GW would release a point system and a tournament pack. The schools' league pack is the closest they have come to doing that so far.
Kilkrazy wrote: I don't remember anything about expansions to the rules, though there was lots of speculation that GW would release a point system and a tournament pack. The schools' league pack is the closest they have come to doing that so far.
I don't recall that as ever being a rumour, I was under the impression that was people expecting more to the game or wishlisting while the school league pack was just that, something the lower end employees put together for an event in some stores, not something that the game studio put together for wider use.
Kilkrazy wrote: I remember that too, and of course it is simple to update a PDF. GW did update the rules to correct the bonus victory conditions very quickly. (The victory conditions for outnumbered armies.)
But really, there isn't very much that needs to be clarified or corrected in the rules. (Short of a massive re-write, at any rate.)
To expand upon my original point, there was supposed to be a 'basic' rule set, and later on, the game was supposed to be a bit more 'complex' with expansions and individual units adding more layers...or something like that.
That was just pure speculation on the part of people defending AoS during the initial release of the rules. It was a lot of "Well, this can't be it, we'll just have to wait and see, your opinions on the quality of the ruleset are invalid."
Talys wrote: I think you misunderstood what I was saying, my friend.
In Fantasy, you'll have people who buy a Nagash or a Treeman or a Malekith. A LoTR fan might buy a Smaug, sure.
But in 40k, you'll have someone buy 3+ Knight Castigators at $350 each, a half dozen Wraithknights, 5 Imperial Knights, 5+ Hive Tyrants, et cetera... as a part of "standard" army. I mean, nobody would ever buy 3 Smaugs, but the book has *rules* squads of Stormsurges, wraithknights, and "households" of Imperial Knights. It's really gotten to the point where a lot of us are looking at tables larger than 6x4 (8x8, and even the granddaddy of gaming tables, 8x12) just to fit all our awesome stuff.
I think in the world of Fantasy, if there were an appetite to fill the table with ten $200 dragons to each side, GW would be there like a dirty shirt.
Did you miss my earlier post?
The reason it's not done in Fantasy is because it can't be done in Fantasy. There was no point buying 5 Treemen because you couldn't use them. There's no point buying 2 Dragons because they were the mount for a Lord and unless it was a huge game you could only take 1 of them.
WHFB has always had percentage limits, if your big things are Rare choices they can't be more than 25% of your points and you must have at least 25% troops. Even before 7th ed 40k with its Unbound madness, 40k got rid of the % system back in 3rd edition so as long as a unit wasn't limited as 0-1, you could usually take 3 of them at any points level.
But either way I'm not entirely sure why we've gone off on this tangent? Does it matter if people purchase big monsters or not? Often the infantry regiments are even more expensive money wise than the monsters anyway.
This, really. Smaug is used merely to highlight the point that is really just a Gigantic and horribly expensive Dragon that was sold out the moment he popped up. It means Fantasy miniatures (In the broad sense, i don't mean FB miniatures) can sell quite well at that scale.
As I said in the previous post, I am damned sure a lot of Lizardmen players would love to field a dino-only army. Or HE players to field an old Caledor army (Dragon rider galore). Or an Empire Nuln Army featuring only Steam Tanks and the new "Steam Goliath" (My imagination is lacking atm int he name dept, sorry :p) or a DE Karond Kar army with Hydras and Manticores and enslaved Dragons... etc etc etc.
To be fair, there's a reason this wasn't allowed. It makes any semblance of balance very difficult, typically drastically ramps up the scale of the game, and often in general is simply contrary to the background (e.g. there were a fixed, finite, small, and definite number of Steam Tanks within the Empire, and IIRC never used as a massed formation).
40k is having gigantic problems with exactly this. When you can have things like entire armies of Knights, it makes basic infantry rather pointless, and, even more critically, makes the granularity of the rules extremely onerous (e.g. wound allocation and power weapon blade type become somewhat absurd with regards to basic infantry squads in such contexts)
The point remains, however - I am pretty sure WHFB players would buy them.
GW could've made Gigantic models for Fantasy as well. They simply chose not to, for whatever the reason.
Vaktathi wrote: To be fair, there's a reason this wasn't allowed. It makes any semblance of balance very difficult, typically drastically ramps up the scale of the game, and often in general is simply contrary to the background (e.g. there were a fixed, finite, small, and definite number of Steam Tanks within the Empire, and IIRC never used as a massed formation).
40k is having gigantic problems with exactly this. When you can have things like entire armies of Knights, it makes basic infantry rather pointless, and, even more critically, makes the granularity of the rules extremely onerous (e.g. wound allocation and power weapon blade type become somewhat absurd with regards to basic infantry squads in such contexts)
+1.
I ended up selling off my biggest of superheavies because the escalation problem was just too much. My (small) meta's playing with max 1 light superheavy. Oversized centerpiece if you want it, not hoard of mecha or w/e.
While I've gotten used to it, I still feel like the last couple editions' shift to free-for-all list design really has been poor for compositions, and the old force org/WHFB's percentage caps were better.
I think it's a pretty transparent way to push more toys: the old niche 40k lists were largely "restrict yourself for a bonus" (i.e. sell specific toys) vs. the current "take combos to get free stuff" (no limitation, and sell more since they cost fewer game points).
Is 40% off better than the Amazon price mentioned earlier?
I have to admit, I was very excited about AoS when it came out. I still like the idea of it. The miniatures look amazing, too. However, after I bought the starter I went to buy the novel...that turned out to be a novella selling for a price I would balk at for a BL omnibus. Then the Sigmarines, the minis I was most interested in, came out and their prices were just too high. I put off buying them and eventually got used to the idea of not buying them. So, with no new fluff and no new minis, my excitement for AoS has pretty much disappeared. It might still give me a great excuse to roll dice someday, but I've lost that spending feeling, and it's gone, gone, gone. Wooaah-ohhh-ohh.
puree wrote:Heard good things about Blucher and am definitely looking forward to Aurelian (i.e over the last year or so Sam Mustafa stuff has interested me a lot).
The above is a clue as to why I'm pretty neutral on the whole points thing in AoS. For tactical type games I like to play within some sort of campaign framework. Something that gives each engagement some meaning, or allows some sort of feedback into future games. I generally dislike just playing the same one off equal points generic scenario over and over. Sam Mustafas games (or at least the ones that have interested me) all have a campaign/strategic element to them. You don't put down equal point forces and play a one off table top battle (you can if you want of course) . In Maurice you may start off with equal points, but as the campaign goes on, and especially within a campaigning season, each army can fall or increase in 'value' by a lot leaving you fighting quite unequal battles later on. Blucher is different, but there is an operational side to it that determines the tabletop battles, who is present and even where you start on the table etc. There are reasons to split up forces and scout etc. I was working on adapting these systems for KOW earlier in the year before AoS dropped. If it wasn't for some real life issues we'd probably be playing a lot of KOW or AoS campaign stuff by now.
I was looking into buying the starter set just based on the number and quality of the minis you get for the low price it's going for. But I got an incredibly cold reception from my friends when I mentioned it. Zero interest in playing. I think this is more to do with the Fantasy IP than the change from WHFB to AoS. Friends would just prefer to play LoTR or D&D for fantasy-type TT gaming.
Kilkrazy wrote: I don't remember anything about expansions to the rules, though there was lots of speculation that GW would release a point system and a tournament pack. The schools' league pack is the closest they have come to doing that so far.
I don't recall that as ever being a rumour, I was under the impression that was people expecting more to the game or wishlisting while the school league pack was just that, something the lower end employees put together for an event in some stores, not something that the game studio put together for wider use.
The school league battleplan was put together by GWHQ. It has the same professional style and source images. But yes, it was not intended for public release, however it was circulated on GW's intranet by HQ.
@Kilkrazy, what amendments were made to the victory conditions?
One of the bonus conditions for weak armies said you could win by beating the army by the end of turn 4. That was obviously pointless, because you would have been able to beat them by turn six anyway. It got changed to something more sensible.
Kilkrazy wrote: One of the bonus conditions for weak armies said you could win by beating the army by the end of turn 4. That was obviously pointless, because you would have been able to beat them by turn six anyway. It got changed to something more sensible.
Are you sure? This is the first I've heard of this. My rules from White Dwarf are the same as the ones you download now, I'm pretty sure.
puree wrote:Heard good things about Blucher and am definitely looking forward to Aurelian (i.e over the last year or so Sam Mustafa stuff has interested me a lot).
The above is a clue as to why I'm pretty neutral on the whole points thing in AoS. For tactical type games I like to play within some sort of campaign framework. Something that gives each engagement some meaning, or allows some sort of feedback into future games. I generally dislike just playing the same one off equal points generic scenario over and over. Sam Mustafas games (or at least the ones that have interested me) all have a campaign/strategic element to them...
I was working on adapting these systems for KOW earlier in the year before AoS dropped. If it wasn't for some real life issues we'd probably be playing a lot of KOW or AoS campaign stuff by now.
Thanks again, Puree. I'm trying to get a handle on how people view the pros and cons of AoS. (What they think the pros and cons are) Might be a bit beyond my capacity, but we'll see.
I've been enjoying Sam Mustafa's columns in W:SS. Missing them for the last couple of issues, actually. (Rick Priestly's bit has been discussing the issue of points in games too, but slides into grumpy-old-man mode too easily) I might have to check out his games too.
But overall, I agree that there could be more balance between points-based games and narrative/scenario games. Like I said in the 'GW saving itself' topic, I think GW has been sending out mixed messages about it's two main games - both points-based and apparently scenario-driven, but without making that plain, and so unbalanced - which results in this confused, 'betrayal' situation we have now.
The upshot is that most gamers seem to want points-based lists. But for your preferences, how does AoS fit for scenario/campaign gaming? Are you using the battletomes for that? If so, how many of them do you have? Do they provide enough variety?
Going back to something in an earlier post: after reading about your experience with, and preference for strategic and tactical games, I'm a little surprised that lizardmen armies are 'boring'. I guess I can see the point when you compare it to a potential, purely bigger-model 'dinosaur' army, but... for the pre-AoS lizardmen armies: do you mean they were boring to play with, or just to collect? For the AoS dinosaur armies: do they provide that strategic/tactical buzz?
As someone who's also interested in Blucher, and really needs to pick up the War to the Death card set, it's probably worth noting that Blucher has army lists and points values (200 for small games and 300 for standard games) alongside a campaign system.
And it looks like Aurelion is going along the same route.
Not sure I said lizard men were boring, which comment you are referring to there? They are actually one of my favorite Warhammer armies.
I find any rank and file models tedious and as boring as hell to do from a modelling perspective, and as I wouldn't field unpainted ones I tend to find putting together mass blocks of such stuff a big hurdle (mental and time wise). I think that may be the vibe you have picked upon? That tends to push me towards the small model count army. However, as much as I dislike putting together and painting mass of rank and file I do like many GW models - the bigger ones usually, what many would call 'center piece' models, although other stuff as well (monstrous cav etc). I can happily spend time making those and painting them, a few of those do not feel like a chore. Large models tend towards the small armies as well, useful coincidence. Part of that preference for larger models may be that I just like the larger models for the painting all those little details on them etc, but I think it also correlates with larger models tend to be the more fantastical ones, and I don't do fantasy for human looking elves and humans and dwarves etc. I like my fantasy models to be very clearly fantasy/mythical etc.
Because formal army lists usually mean a large part of your army is mass rank and file I dislike them for the above reason, but also just the fact that fantasy to me is the ultimate in imagi-nation armies, I want to do whatever I think will be cool, especially when it involves so much of my money and time getting the armies done. Hence such army list rules to me are boring, which may be the other comment you were picking up on. Points I'm neutral on. I have no great issue having them or not, and would probably use them for some things if they were there.
Nowadays my preference is to a find a nice tactical game with a campaign element to it (historical, sci-fi or fantasy, mini or board game). I'm happy to cobble my own campaign element to a tactical game, but bonus if it comes with one. The tactical game should be fast playing and reasonably able to handle both small and larger games (so a campaign can do engagements of any size). Small and large being vague and context specific. Better still if it can handle 3 or more players at once. The campaign can be very abstract, but have some way of allowing armies to slowly change over time and provide some meaning to the tactical games, and have the results of the games feed back in to the campaign. The meaningless one off point based games give a way of getting an idea of what a game is like and whether you want to play more of it, but beyond that I dislike those one off games nowadays.
I've only got the lizard man book for AoS, and whilst the scenarios in that make nice reading they are not what I'd play as a campaign. They are more one off scenarios with a back story that I'd play for one off games, although I quite like just writing my own based on what armies I know we will play with. I haven't seen the other scenarios/campaigns in other books.
As I was saying earlier, I had been working on converting the Maurice or Blucher campaign systems (or a likely combo of both) for use with KOW (hopefully my feelings of it being a bit bland would be much suppressed in a decent campaign). Then real life hit and I haven't been able to get many games in this year at all with my usual group. AoS also hit, and offered the advantage of having all our GW stuff covered (which KOW didn't) with the free pdfs. I also think the army pdfs do a very good job (on reading at least) of the armies that would likely be seen in any campaign we did. Hopefully next year we will get going properly on a campaign. So far I've not had enough games of AoS to say it is awesome and will fit etc, but it has been enjoyed thus far. It is great for the smaller warband style stuff, or starting small type campaign, we will have to see how far it can scale upwards without bogging down.
About Dino army specifically. As a very young kid some of my earliest reading was about dinosaurs, many years before Jurassic park. My parents used to joke that I could say words no one else could pronounce before I could say simple common stuff. Somewhere in the recesses of my mind is a love of dinosaurs. When 1ed D&D battlesystem hit there was a box cover of barbarians on dinosaurs that I loved. That is the army I wanted. Now I almost have my dinosaur army. I have no idea how they will play. I don't care how they will play. I get to line up my stegadons and other stuff with howdahs, pteradons over head and go "yeah!" its taken 40 years but better late than never.
If it overpowers other armies then I'll drop stuff to get the interesting games, that bit is a suck it and see. I don't think points helps there, points tend to break down as you move away from the 'normal' type of army. Plus in a campaign the larger system can balance what the tactical game might not. So for some possible rules I'm thinking about the dinosaurs would be harder to replace compared to rank and file. That sort of thing can make for an interesting dynamic where one army starts off more powerful, and the others seek to wear it down across multiple battles before the campaign objective is achieved.
puree wrote: The meaningless one off point based games give a way of getting an idea of what a game is like and whether you want to play more of it, but beyond that I dislike those one off games nowadays.
I know it's a tad unfair to pick out a single sentence from that big post in isolation, but AoS makes me uncharitable: I see this point of view regarding AoS a lot(well, "a lot" meaning "from a high percentage of the few people willing to defend AoS publicly", not in absolute terms), and it confuses me, because you were always free to ignore points.
You can't play involved campaigns with hacked-together add-on houserules adapted from other games with random people, they require a regular group I know from experience, which means if you wanted to build a Lizardmen dino-army before you could easily do it by simply disregarding the points values and army selection rules. AoS has not enabled you to do anything new, it's merely taken away the ability of players who don't share your distaste for one-off battles using rules-based army selection to enjoy Warhammer Fantasy(not that there's much left of that to enjoy given AoS' atrocious milquetoast pseudomyth background material).
In fact, the crowning irony is that literally the only reason you would need the core game rules to be designed around your personal style of play.....would be if you wanted to play one-off pickup games without a regular group.
Has anyone else noticed that the people praising AoS seem to be doing so with a lot of assumptions about how GW will flesh out the fluff for the new Empire and will have a great story planned about what happened to the Elves and Slaanesh, or because the empty setting allows them to build their own fluff, but don't praise the actual content GW have released as much?
From a game design perspective the more tight you design the game the better for those that want to build and expand upon, because building on solid foundations is better than building on sand.
That aside, the reality of our era is that one-off pick up games is the normal and involved campaigns were everybody is always attending is the statistical anomaly and game systems will be judged on the norm not the anomaly.
That aside, the reality of our era is that one-off pick up games is the normal
I would be interested in why you think that? I'd say it is not even remotely close to normal. At least in the UK the only pick up games that I ever see happens in GW stores, and a portion of that is between kids who don't have valid armies anyway and are not playing by any 'pickup friendly rules' beyond just using what they have (AoS style in fact). For any store with a couple of tables being played on there will be dozens of games going on in clubs or houses between people who know each other and have arranged a game and agree what they will bring etc. Those settings and players are also more than capable of coming up with their own army list rules that suits their preferences or campaigns if they want that sort of restriction etc. I'm sure the smallish group of people I play with does more gaming than the nearest GW store does, and they are pretty much all pre-arranged.
Is it different outside the UK, maybe I don't know. Do Americans only get to play with someone where they haven't discussed it or had a chance to discuss? Do they not play round at their mates or in clubs? I've certainly got the impression wrongly or rightly that Americans are more likely to be 'competitive' (be it warhammer or other games), but less sure about how they go about finding games outside tourneys.
Am I against supporting pick up play? No, not at all. Would I be bothered by points? not particularly, as I've said I'm neutral. I'm rather less neutral on official army lists. Do I think it is worth the hassle of all the work and effort to produce and maintain something that those who want it will still complain about it as they have for the last 30 years? No, at least in the UK it just isn't common enough to warrant that. Despite what people say points for games like AoS are not easy to do. One only has to look at the user attempts going on at the moment to see different views on how it should be done and arguments about whether it works or not. KOW is piss easy next to AoS, but I suspect there is still some fair effort that has gone into pointing stuff.
In fact, the crowning irony is that literally the only reason you would need the core game rules to be designed around your personal style of play.....would be if you wanted to play one-off pickup games without a regular group.
I don't need the core game rules to be designed around my personal style of play. If I don't like the core rules I just skip the game, no bother or stress as there are plenty more out there. Points and Army lists etc are not core game rules. They never have been and never will be. Core rules are the ones that tell you how to move, fight, take morale tests etc. Army lists etc are simply an option (as you just basically pointed out) that you may agree or not agree to use before playing the game. There are no rules on how you must choose what to bring other than those you agree to.
I've never disputed that these things facilitate pick up play. Its blatantly false to say they are needed of course, I've often seen pick up games in GW stores between kids with no 'valid' armies. If kids can do it then so can adults. If adults can't then IMO they have some bigger issues. It's been donkeys years since I actually played a pick up game in a GW store, but if I did now I wouldn't be bothered if someone whipped out an awesomely painted themed army that wasn't 'legal'. The sort of person who does that probably is also capable of coming to a quick agreement as to what looks about right for a good game. If it was a kid who wanted a game, which would be very possible in a GW store, then I'd be even less worried about legalities, get a quick idea of what sort of game he's after and just play him. If it takes more than a 5 minutes to quickly talk about what looks right then one of you probably has an issue no matter what army is involved.
However, Official army lists almost invariably push the game into that being the default way of playing. Events and tourneys in particular have a very strong tendency to use official lists at least. If I am going to plonk £500-1000 and months of effort into something that is only a secondary thing for me (games being the main part for me, not miniatures) then I want a game that by default encourages the idea that you play with the models you wanted to invest money and effort in. I am not into tourneys (though I wouldn't rule them out) but I have enjoyed the other events that GW have run in the past and they again almost invariably used official lists. I am considering going to an AoS event early next year though other factors may prevent that. They will have other restrictions, but so far they just say 'max number of models and talk with the other guy about what looks reasonable' to keep the games to a modest size and playable in a couple of hours. Then of course there are such factors as moving, joining new clubs etc. Again the default casual style of play for games gives some sort of assurance that I will probably find others who are going to be happy with the more free form army and that we can go from there, or my army will be a bit more likely to fit with any house rules. WFB would, with its default that most seem to have gone for, not give me any feeling that my army and all the money and time would be playable elsewhere.
If this was a board game it wouldn't bother me. You pay your £50 quid for a board game and get everything you need. The army lists in themselves do not make the game play itself good or bad. With command and colors for example all the pieces are there for the armies being dealt with. As I think I said elsewhere that is a big reason why I moved away from minis and increasingly towards board games in my later teens, you buy the game and just get playing. I'm the same with mini games that other want to play that I don't have stuff for, if they can provide the figures then I don't care about the lists. Give me the figures and lets play.
The difference with a mini game you want your own figures for is that you are investing serious money and effort into the miniatures. If games are your main thing and the minis are not then it can very much be an issue. If miniatures are your thing anyway (game or not) then that is not probably an issue and maybe that is why a lot of posters here don't seem to quite get that point of view. I expect there are more like me, and indeed I think that was being said earlier that started this, that some will only invest in the minis if they think the game is leaning by default towards that style of play. That 'vibe' (formal lists and army building) and perception of the sort of people who might play it may well have an effect on who either picks it up or keeps with it. Whether there are enough of those people to make up for those who want lists, points and a more competitive feel is another matter, and I do wonder that myself. However, if AoS does succeed in anything like its current form then the default pickup game will probably not be an army list game where you have to field minis you don't want to spend money and time on, and those who want pick up games will probably be of the same mind on that.
That raises the question what are you measuring success on? As I was more or less saying earlier I wouldn't have bought the miniatures if they had army lists that looked like being the default way of playing. Even if I played AoS with my old miniatures would that really be classing as success and doing my bit to preventing AoS failing? Did they not want to increase sales of something? I said earlier that I was looking at playing KOW, that would have been with my old minis as well plus maybe a few more GW ones, or possibly with home made bases Blucher style. Would that have classed as helping KOW succeed? Mantic are not going to sell me minis in the immediate future as I don't like them much. Their rules are also free like AoS. To put it another way, if AoS had army lists and points would you have gone out and bought more stuff, either now or later? A lot of people who are up in arms are long term players of WFB with existing armies. How often did you buy WFB figures and would army lists/points been the thing that kept you in AoS and buying figures?
I can tell you I have been playing Warhammer FB/40k since mid 2003 and before AoS I had NEVER seen any game that didn't abide to the typical pick up rules. Heck even the AoS games that I have knowledge of here are played following homebrewed rules to MAKE them closer to what was universally liked before.
puree wrote: I would be interested in why you think that? I'd say it is not even remotely close to normal. At least in the UK the only pick up games that I ever see happens in GW stores, and a portion of that is between kids who don't have valid armies anyway and are not playing by any 'pickup friendly rules' beyond just using what they have (AoS style in fact). For any store with a couple of tables being played on there will be dozens of games going on in clubs or houses between people who know each other and have arranged a game and agree what they will bring etc. Those settings and players are also more than capable of coming up with their own army list rules that suits their preferences or campaigns if they want that sort of restriction etc. I'm sure the smallish group of people I play with does more gaming than the nearest GW store does, and they are pretty much all pre-arranged.
Is it different outside the UK, maybe I don't know. Do Americans only get to play with someone where they haven't discussed it or had a chance to discuss? Do they not play round at their mates or in clubs? I've certainly got the impression wrongly or rightly that Americans are more likely to be 'competitive' (be it warhammer or other games), but less sure about how they go about finding games outside tourneys.
Am I against supporting pick up play? No, not at all. Would I be bothered by points? not particularly, as I've said I'm neutral. I'm rather less neutral on official army lists. Do I think it is worth the hassle of all the work and effort to produce and maintain something that those who want it will still complain about it as they have for the last 30 years? No, at least in the UK it just isn't common enough to warrant that. Despite what people say points for games like AoS are not easy to do. One only has to look at the user attempts going on at the moment to see different views on how it should be done and arguments about whether it works or not. KOW is piss easy next to AoS, but I suspect there is still some fair effort that has gone into pointing stuff.
Things are VERY different outside the UK.
In Australia, and from everything I have heard the US is in the same boat we are, it is not umheaed of to play games in your garage with friends but the vast majority of games take place between two people who meet at a store that might have seen each other around but probably don't know each other's names. You ask if they want a game, if so how many points, introduce myself and then start setting up.
As for clubs, they are rare here but most I have encountered are tied to a store that they use for tables and as a venue. Not many of us will have a table or two at home to invite people over to play on so if you are organizing a game in advance you still meet at the store to play.
I don't know about Europe, but I didn't think they were the same as the UK so I'd guess they lean more towards the pick up community.
puree wrote: I would be interested in why you think that? I'd say it is not even remotely close to normal. At least in the UK the only pick up games that I ever see happens in GW stores, and a portion of that is between kids who don't have valid armies anyway and are not playing by any 'pickup friendly rules' beyond just using what they have (AoS style in fact). For any store with a couple of tables being played on there will be dozens of games going on in clubs or houses between people who know each other and have arranged a game and agree what they will bring etc. Those settings and players are also more than capable of coming up with their own army list rules that suits their preferences or campaigns if they want that sort of restriction etc. I'm sure the smallish group of people I play with does more gaming than the nearest GW store does, and they are pretty much all pre-arranged.
Is it different outside the UK, maybe I don't know. Do Americans only get to play with someone where they haven't discussed it or had a chance to discuss? Do they not play round at their mates or in clubs? I've certainly got the impression wrongly or rightly that Americans are more likely to be 'competitive' (be it warhammer or other games), but less sure about how they go about finding games outside tourneys.
Am I against supporting pick up play? No, not at all. Would I be bothered by points? not particularly, as I've said I'm neutral. I'm rather less neutral on official army lists. Do I think it is worth the hassle of all the work and effort to produce and maintain something that those who want it will still complain about it as they have for the last 30 years? No, at least in the UK it just isn't common enough to warrant that. Despite what people say points for games like AoS are not easy to do. One only has to look at the user attempts going on at the moment to see different views on how it should be done and arguments about whether it works or not. KOW is piss easy next to AoS, but I suspect there is still some fair effort that has gone into pointing stuff.
Things are VERY different outside the UK.
In Australia, and from everything I have heard the US is in the same boat we are, it is not umheaed of to play games in your garage with friends but the vast majority of games take place between two people who meet at a store that might have seen each other around but probably don't know each other's names. You ask if they want a game, if so how many points, introduce myself and then start setting up.
As for clubs, they are rare here but most I have encountered are tied to a store that they use for tables and as a venue. Not many of us will have a table or two at home to invite people over to play on so if you are organizing a game in advance you still meet at the store to play.
I don't know about Europe, but I didn't think they were the same as the UK so I'd guess they lean more towards the pick up community.
Speaking of Europe, I can tell you that the "Warhammer scene" in Portugal has slowly whittled during the last decade (Due in part to GW's actions and in part to the rise of games like Warmahordes/Malifaux/X-wing/etc).
GW games tournaments/events here are few and far between, and most (I'd say 70-80%) of the action has now gone to (very few) clubs, and mostly in the Lisbon area. That being said, of the people I know that play in those clubs, the pick up "style" is still being used - they agree on points and then just bring an army on the agreed date - that is if they don't have one in the trunk of the car to begin with.
In Sweden at least there are very few pick-up games (by which I mean games played between people who don't know each other very well, who don't communicate before meeting and don't have an implied social contract partially determining what they will bring without asking first), simply because we don't have that many game stores. Most games are played at clubs or at home.
In the U.S. pickup games are extremely common, but we do usually know each other's names beforehand. Come on jonolikespie, give us some credit
But designing a ruleset that is Only useable with one's best mates certainly cuts off a huge part of the market, and really limits the amount the game will be adopted (in most places).
I've been playing WFB on and off since it came out in 198?. 2003 would be probably near enough for 40k, can't remember exactly.
I can't talk to what you have seen only myself. WFB didn't have army lists when I started, and us kids didn't have more than a unit or 2 each. All our games were pre-arranged either at the games club or someones house. Back then GW had very few stores and the nearest would have been about 60 miles away. I'm not sure they even had game tables back then, they were not a GW only store but a general game store.
The only pick up games I've seen since are the ones at the GW stores. Most other players arrange their games in advance at clubs or other regular meets. It is certainly possible that club goers in particular use points and army lists if they have nothing else in particular they are involved in. The game gives them that as a default, but if it didn't I have no doubt they would use what other default there was. Points alone would probably suffice, even historical gamers drop army lists and just use points. Imagi-nations and what ifs can be quiet popular.
I haven't seen a lot of AoS games yet, but I haven't exactly gone looking that hard. But the few I have seen have not had any house rules (that said I can't speak to some of the video reports I've also watched, though if they did use house rules they were not obvious and presumably took place before recording), we didn't house rule lists etc when we played, we eyeballed and just stuck down what we had for the factions were using which happened to provide close enough games.
Lets turn this around a bit. I have said that whilst I am happy with points being missing I also don't have an issue with having them either. If I or someone else turned up at random to wherever you play with a small 2000pt dino army, or the small 2000pt Artic Ogre Nomad Mourngang/Mammoth list converted with fur cloaks and hats etc on nice snow bases (one of the other armies I considered) all painted (table top quality, I'm no golden demon painter) would you refuse that pick up game due to lack of army list compliance. Will I be excluded from pick up games because the time effort and money didn't produce a 'legal' army. Is uber balance so important that rather than play with someone you would refuse a game, would you even think about talking and ask whether I can maybe drop a unit or something as your more rounded army can't handle that heavy emphasis I have? Should pick up games not also include those who have focused on the minis they want. Why exclude a set of potential players who only want to do minis they can really 'get into' as opposed to armies you want to impose on them.
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: I can tell you I have been playing Warhammer FB/40k since mid 2003 and before AoS I had NEVER seen any game that didn't abide to the typical pick up rules. Heck even the AoS games that I have knowledge of here are played following homebrewed rules to MAKE them closer to what was universally liked before.
I've been playing both since 1988 (though I stopped 40K a few years ago and WHFB when the End Times stuff dropped), and my experience has almost universally matched yours.
Very occasionally (maybe once or twice per year) did we put together some event that deviated significantly from the standard rules for force creation. Even all the way back to Rogue Trader and WHFB 3rd edition when the only points stuff was what appeared in the main rule book, that's what we used.
puree wrote: I've been playing WFB on and off since it came out in 198?. 2003 would be probably near enough for 40k, can't remember exactly.
I can't talk to what you have seen only myself. WFB didn't have army lists when I started, and us kids didn't have more than a unit or 2 each. All our games were pre-arranged either at the games club or someones house. Back then GW had very few stores and the nearest would have been about 60 miles away. I'm not sure they even had game tables back then, they were not a GW only store but a general game store.
The only pick up games I've seen since are the ones at the GW stores. Most other players arrange their games in advance at clubs or other regular meets. It is certainly possible that club goers in particular use points and army lists if they have nothing else in particular they are involved in. The game gives them that as a default, but if it didn't I have no doubt they would use what other default there was. Points alone would probably suffice, even historical gamers drop army lists and just use points. Imagi-nations and what ifs can be quiet popular.
I haven't seen a lot of AoS games yet, but I haven't exactly gone looking that hard. But the few I have seen have not had any house rules (that said I can't speak to some of the video reports I've also watched, though if they did use house rules they were not obvious and presumably took place before recording), we didn't house rule lists etc when we played, we eyeballed and just stuck down what we had for the factions were using which happened to provide close enough games.
Lets turn this around a bit. I have said that whilst I am happy with points being missing I also don't have an issue with having them either. If I or someone else turned up at random to wherever you play with a small 2000pt dino army, or the small 2000pt Artic Ogre Nomad Mourngang/Mammoth list converted with fur cloaks and hats etc on nice snow bases (one of the other armies I considered) all painted (table top quality, I'm no golden demon painter) would you refuse that pick up game due to lack of army list compliance. Will I be excluded from pick up games because the time effort and money didn't produce a 'legal' army. Is uber balance so important that rather than play with someone you would refuse a game, would you even think about talking and ask whether I can maybe drop a unit or something as your more rounded army can't handle that heavy emphasis I have? Should pick up games not also include those who have focused on the minis they want. Why exclude a set of potential players who only want to do minis they can really 'get into' as opposed to armies you want to impose on them.
It's not just about the "dino army" concept though, it's also a mechanic that ensures a game is a fair contest.
It allows people, in theory, who don't have mathematics degrees and years of games design experience to select an army and know, again, in theory, that facing a force of equal points means they've got an approximately equal chance of winning the game, and if they do, they are the architect of that victory, not that they've simply chosen demonstrably better models in game than their opponent.
It isn't about über balance, it's about a fair contest. We aren't talking about RPGs here, we're talking about a style of game with an inherently confrontational paradigm, there are winners and losers. Most people I know don't mind if they lose, but they get a whole lot more bothered if they feel they couldn't have ever won.
Points facilitate that, and, again, as already pointed out, a tightly written, well balanced ruleset does not exclude you choosing something which lives outside those rules. Neither does the absence of such mean that by putting down a bunch of models because they're the most efficient choices excuse you of douchebaggery, and in my experience if you've genuinely built an unorthodox force for any game, people are usually fine with it as long as it's not been done to take advantage of some sort of inequity in the rules.
Mymearan wrote: In Sweden at least there are very few pick-up games (by which I mean games played between people who don't know each other very well, who don't communicate before meeting and don't have an implied social contract partially determining what they will bring without asking first), simply because we don't have that many game stores. Most games are played at clubs or at home.
But, when you play, do you establish a points limit and show up with a list based on those points? Or, rather, do you throw together a cinematic or campaign style series of battles where a story is more important than attempting any sort of balance between forces?
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: I can tell you I have been playing Warhammer FB/40k since mid 2003 and before AoS I had NEVER seen any game that didn't abide to the typical pick up rules. Heck even the AoS games that I have knowledge of here are played following homebrewed rules to MAKE them closer to what was universally liked before.
I've been playing both since 1988 (though I stopped 40K a few years ago and WHFB when the End Times stuff dropped), and my experience has almost universally matched yours.
Very occasionally (maybe once or twice per year) did we put together some event that deviated significantly from the standard rules for force creation. Even all the way back to Rogue Trader and WHFB 3rd edition when the only points stuff was what appeared in the main rule book, that's what we used.
Yeah, I'd say I've been playing since about 1992? I have never in all that time turned up at a random store where I knew absolutely nobody and tried to get a game. It's always been in clubs. And almost without exception they've been points based equal match games unless it's a campaign system like Necromunda. And the exceptions were usually planned at least a week in advance, and even then they generally use points as a ready reckoner of force imbalance. Saying that most people play in clubs therefore they've always worked out what type of game they want to play and that points systems are generally ignored simply isn't true.
Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote: I can tell you I have been playing Warhammer FB/40k since mid 2003 and before AoS I had NEVER seen any game that didn't abide to the typical pick up rules. Heck even the AoS games that I have knowledge of here are played following homebrewed rules to MAKE them closer to what was universally liked before.
I've been playing both since 1988 (though I stopped 40K a few years ago and WHFB when the End Times stuff dropped), and my experience has almost universally matched yours.
Very occasionally (maybe once or twice per year) did we put together some event that deviated significantly from the standard rules for force creation. Even all the way back to Rogue Trader and WHFB 3rd edition when the only points stuff was what appeared in the main rule book, that's what we used.
Yeah, I'd say I've been playing since about 1992? I have never in all that time turned up at a random store where I knew absolutely nobody and tried to get a game. It's always been in clubs. And almost without exception they've been points based equal match games unless it's a campaign system like Necromunda. And the exceptions were usually planned at least a week in advance, and even then they generally use points as a ready reckoner of force imbalance. Saying that most people play in clubs therefore they've always worked out what type of game they want to play and that points systems are generally ignored simply isn't true.
(Ignore the flag, I'm in the UK)
Back when I was a much younger Grump, I had games that spontaneously generated in the food court of a shopping mall.... (The game store at the mall didn't have a table. But the food court was just sitting there....)
The Auld Grump - I also ran a James Bond RPG in that food court, again with absolute strangers....
It allows people, in theory, who don't have mathematics degrees and years of games design experience to select an army...
All of a sudden I'm reminded of Micro Squad's scenario design rules. (It's free on Wargame Vault, go check it out.)
I still wish there was some more implementation of scenario gaming, but there's no denying the neat convenience of points for pickups. Though I also still thnk they're not entirely mutually exclusive. Heck, most points-based rulebooks have a few scenarios in the back these days, right? How to expand on that?
Automatically Appended Next Post:
TheAuldGrump wrote: Back when I was a much younger Grump, I had games that spontaneously generated in the food court of a shopping mall.... (The game store at the mall didn't have a table. But the food court was just sitting there....)
The Auld Grump - I also ran a James Bond RPG in that food court, again with absolute strangers....
The argument is that points and lists are needed for pick up games. I take that to mean that as the Americans are saying they turn up at some place with pretty much no knowledge of who they will be playing etc. Similar to those who go to GW stores at the weekend and play who ever else turns up.
I didn't say that club goers ignore points etc (and points are not the main point being discussed, army lists are I believe as they are what mandates or prevents the use of certain miniatures and all that implies for getting people to play). I said they are not by definition pick up games (as I understand it to mean), and given they see each other regularly they are not in need of points and army lists as some vital rule, as they can discuss ahead, just as you say they do. It has seldom been my experience in the past that you will get a game at club that wasn't already arranged as most people seem to be at them for pre-arranged games, or club events etc. They are using those army lists and points as that is presented as the default. If you took lists away I have no doubt that they would continue to work with points. If you took the points away then they would continue to work with whatever else was provided or come up with their own (assuming they like the game itself, many don't like AoS irrespective of points etc).
puree wrote: The argument is that points and lists are needed for pick up games. I take that to mean that as the Americans are saying they turn up at some place with pretty much no knowledge of who they will be playing etc. Similar to those who go to GW stores at the weekend and play who ever else turns up.
I didn't say that club goers ignore points etc (and points are not the main point being discussed, army lists are I believe as they are what mandates or prevents the use of certain miniatures and all that implies for getting people to play). I said they are not by definition pick up games (as I understand it to mean), and given they see each other so regular they are not in need of points and army lists as some vital rule, as they can discuss ahead, just as you say they do. It has seldom been my experience in the past that you will get a game at club that wasn't already arranged as most people seem to be at them for pre-arranged games, or club events etc. They are using those army lists and points as that is presented as the default. If you took lists away I have no doubt that they would continue to work with points. If you took the points away then they would continue to work with whatever else was provided or come up with their own (assuming they like the game itself, many don't like AoS irrespective of points etc).
They'd still need a method of arbitrating what's a fair contest and what isn't, if you're not playing a scenario then you still want a fairly even balance of power between the two opposing sides.
Points, being strictly literal, aren't needed, but a method of determining parity is. Otherwise you're just abandoning all pretence of it being a war game and just playing a very shallow and basic RPG.
They'd still need a method of arbitrating what's a fair contest and what isn't, if you're not playing a scenario then you still want a fairly even balance of power between the two opposing sides.
Points, being strictly literal, aren't needed, but a method of determining parity is. Otherwise you're just abandoning all pretence of it being a war game and just playing a very shallow and basic RPG.
Sure, as I keep saying I have no great problem with a game design that uses points, even if I'm personally happy enough without them. Fantasy miniature games that use army lists is where I give the game (or more accurately buying into the minis) a miss.
Points plus army lists gives a distinct impression of a much more 'competitive' or 'overly serious' game. It's a fantasy game and the primary reason for it is to sell the models. Army lists get in the way of just getting and playing the models you want or worse making you get models you don't want, points don't. Points give you your game arbitrator for those who want to just play the default type game.
[edit] So going back to the earlier post are you saying that for the XXXpt armies that is not army list compliant you would refuse to play, even though you have points and the other guy may well be happy to talk setup etc given all he wants to do is play with his models. I couldn't work out which way you were going?
Ooh lovely, semantics with a thick tasty topping of implications that anyone who likes the mechanic you personally don't care about are manchildren incapable of coming to simple agreements; classy response.
They'd still need a method of arbitrating what's a fair contest and what isn't, if you're not playing a scenario then you still want a fairly even balance of power between the two opposing sides.
Points, being strictly literal, aren't needed, but a method of determining parity is. Otherwise you're just abandoning all pretence of it being a war game and just playing a very shallow and basic RPG.
Sure, as I keep saying I have no great problem with a game design that uses points, even if I'm personally happy enough without them. Fantasy miniature games that use army lists is where I give the game (or more accurately buying into the minis) a miss.
Points plus army lists gives a distinct impression of a much more 'competitive' or 'overly serious' game. It's a fantasy game and the primary reason for it is to sell the models. Army lists get in the way of just getting and playing the models you want or worse making you get models you don't want, points don't. Points give you your game arbitrator for those who want to just play the default type game.
[edit] So going back to the earlier post are you saying that for the XXXpt armies that is not army list compliant you would refuse to play, even though you have points and the other guy may well be happy to talk setup etc given all he wants to do is play with his models. I couldn't work out which way you were going?
"So you want me to play my 450 pts of Space Marines against your 5 Titans? SURE THING! That's gonna be so swell! Especially for me as I watch my army being vaporized on T1!"
Ooh lovely, semantics with a thick tasty topping of implications that anyone who likes the mechanic you personally don't care about are manchildren incapable of coming to simple agreements; classy response.
So like me you believe adults can work out balance and good games without list etc, as they will talk about it?
If the argument is that pick up games need the army lists, and that seems to be what is being argued that I can see (this whole lizard players and dino armies effectively comes about from that, not points or lack thereof) then working out whether armies that do not follow some list building rule will get rejected at some place where pick up games are played is a perfectly fair question.
If you will play such a list because the points are OK then you don't need army lists, if you need army lists then you do have a game that will get in the way of a set of potential players.
"So you want me to play my 450 pts of Space Marines against your 5 Titans? SURE THING! That's gonna be so swell! Especially for me as I watch my army being vaporized on T1!"
Are 5 titans worth only 450pts, boy I've been out of 40K a while!
Ooh lovely, semantics with a thick tasty topping of implications that anyone who likes the mechanic you personally don't care about are manchildren incapable of coming to simple agreements; classy response.
So like me you believe adults can work out balance and good games without list etc, as they will talk about it?
If the argument is that pick up games need the army lists, and that seems to be what is being argued that I can see (this whole lizard players and dino armies effectively comes about from that, not points or lack thereof) then working out whether armies that do not follow some list building rule will get rejected at some place where pick up games are played is a perfectly fair question.
If you will play such a list because the points are OK then you don't need army lists, if you need army lists then you do have a game that will get in the way of a set of potential players.
I would have no issue whatsoever in playing an all out dino list with a friend of mine while using WHFB rules - he'd send me the list in advance and I'd just sum up the total points and build an army that matches that point's cost. It's what the points are there for. Now, without any kind of balancing tool? Pffffff.... not really sure it's gonna be fun for me - or for him if I overshoot my "guesstimate" and end up whooping him.
Edit: You're trodding a dangerous path with that "adults can balance things" point...
"So you want me to play my 450 pts of Space Marines against your 5 Titans? SURE THING! That's gonna be so swell! Especially for me as I watch my army being vaporized on T1!"
Are 5 titans worth only 450pts, boy I've been out of 40K a while!
Why are you falling back on points to balance this match? The guy "only" has 5 Titans and he really wants to play them all together! Go on... play him
In Australia, and from everything I have heard the US is in the same boat we are, it is not umheaed of to play games in your garage with friends but the vast majority of games take place between two people who meet at a store that might have seen each other around but probably don't know each other's names. You ask if they want a game, if so how many points, introduce myself and then start setting up.
As for clubs, they are rare here but most I have encountered are tied to a store that they use for tables and as a venue. Not many of us will have a table or two at home to invite people over to play on so if you are organizing a game in advance you still meet at the store to play.
I don't know about Europe, but I didn't think they were the same as the UK so I'd guess they lean more towards the pick up community.
+1. Unless it a regular RPG sort of thing, I'd say at least 2/3 of my games are pickups.
They'd still need a method of arbitrating what's a fair contest and what isn't, if you're not playing a scenario then you still want a fairly even balance of power between the two opposing sides.
Points, being strictly literal, aren't needed, but a method of determining parity is. Otherwise you're just abandoning all pretence of it being a war game and just playing a very shallow and basic RPG.
Sure, as I keep saying I have no great problem with a game design that uses points, even if I'm personally happy enough without them. Fantasy miniature games that use army lists is where I give the game (or more accurately buying into the minis) a miss.
Huh? Isn't a "list" simply exactly that? A list of the units you're going to use? Whether you've actually written it down on a piece of paper is largely irrelevant, you could use "force" or "army" and mean largely the same thing. Or are you advocating for literally no structure where I can put down anything I want, in any quantity? Either way, a game that doesn't use some way of balancing the two players' armies to enable a fair contest is, as I mentioned, simply a very shallow, simplistic RPG, barely above the traditional small boys' toy soldiers.
Points plus army lists gives a distinct impression of a much more 'competitive' or 'overly serious' game. It's a fantasy game and the primary reason for it is to sell the models. Army lists get in the way of just getting and playing the models you want or worse making you get models you don't want, points don't. Points give you your game arbitrator for those who want to just play the default type game.
No, that's a fairly GW-centric way of thinking, in fact I'd be totally unsurprised to see something like that in a Jervis Johnson editorial. It's been fairly obvious for a while that GW manipulates the rules to promote model sales, many other games place a far higher priority on the gaming experience and work far harder on making their force selection (I won't call it list building ) as balanced as possible. If players want to modify those painstakingly developed systems, then nothing is stopping them. It's much harder to try and and turn an anything goes system into something that allows a fair contest. Because the nature of what's "fair" is entirely subjective, if there's no limits imposed on the situation and it makes games between star angers harder. It doesn't make games between players who know each other well any more difficult to alter if they want to break out of the status quo.
[edit] So going back to the earlier post are you saying that for the XXXpt armies that is not army list compliant you would refuse to play, even though you have points and the other guy may well be happy to talk setup etc given all he wants to do is play with his models. I couldn't work out which way you were going?
Well, if points exist in the system, the non-compliant list still has a value. If it's obviously been done for creative or fluff reasons, I can still put together a force of approximately equal points, and I'd feel free to modify the structure of that force outside of standard organisation if I wanted to as well. I'd have no problem with that and it would likely thoroughly enjoy the game.
If points don't exist in that game, and if I'm not intimately familiar with the abilities of every model that my opponent has chosen, I've got a cat in hells chance of selecting a force which will give us both an even, and therefore, for me, fun, game. I could accidentally select a force which is way too over or underpowered, and while losing is fine, being steamrollered is no fun for anyone.
So, I'm happy to play unorthodox forces, but outside of a points system there's no way to balance them into a fair contest, but if you put the equivalent of 6 Wraithknights on the table, you can feth off.
jreilly89 wrote: Had they just released AoS as a new/side game instead of killing off WHFB, they would be in a better position.
I'm still totally floored that they didn't do that. Especially considering the compatibility with square bases - there is absolutely no reason that AoS couldn't have coexisted with WHFB.
As for sales... we don't have any conrete data, but I can offer an anecdote:
I was talking to my FLGS about it, and they sold about twice as many copies of Betrayal at Calth on the Saturday release than they have sold AoS products since it's release.
Why are you falling back on points to balance this match? The guy "only" has 5 Titans and he really wants to play them all together! Go on... play him
My argument was about buying and painting etc models that you want and not buying stuff that you don't want and hence not meeting some list requirement. I thought it was obvious but clearly failed in saying that both players would still have the same points in this 'pick up game' as the start point, but may tweak from there to agree something.
So, lets assume that 2000pts of hypothetical AoS points is a 'standard' sort of size game that most places use. I turn up with 2000pts of lizards that is heavy on dinos. You have a lizard army list book that says 1 monster per 1 unit of core or whatever. My list doesn't meet that, but you have 2000 pts of something else.
A) Will you just say that we are both 2000 pts so lets play.
B) Will you look over my stuff and say that looks nice, love the paint job and I see nothing too horrible for me, it might not be perfectly balanced to mine one way or the other but lets play and see.
C) Will you say happy to play but can you remove one of your 5 dinos or whatever (you take another unit if you have them), as my list based army can't handle 5 dinos, but only 4 or an extra monster slayer unit for me should be interesting .
D) Wave the list book and say I can't play here.
Except points don't exist in AOS, and you're saying you're quite happy with that.
What the rest of us are essentially saying is the fact that there's no way to do what you are talking about and that's a big factor behind its apparent lack of popularity.
Azreal13 wrote: Except points don't exist in AOS, and you're saying you're quite happy with that.
What the rest of us are essentially saying is the fact that there's no way to do what you are talking about and that's a big factor behind its apparent lack of popularity.
Exactly! There are a lot of people here that have said that they'd be happy to play that all dino list if there at least something to give us a rough sizing of the strength. Be it points or whatever.
Without that, it's just taking a huge risk of prepping a game that won't be any fun at all.
puree wrote: I didn't say that club goers ignore points etc (and points are not the main point being discussed, army lists are I believe as they are what mandates or prevents the use of certain miniatures and all that implies for getting people to play). I said they are not by definition pick up games (as I understand it to mean)
Puree, did you see this post? I think you're just misunderstanding what people refer to when they say "pickup games":
Graphite wrote: Yeah, I'd say I've been playing since about 1992? I have never in all that time turned up at a random store where I knew absolutely nobody and tried to get a game. It's always been in clubs. And almost without exception they've been points based equal match games unless it's a campaign system like Necromunda. And the exceptions were usually planned at least a week in advance, and even then they generally use points as a ready reckoner of force imbalance. Saying that most people play in clubs therefore they've always worked out what type of game they want to play and that points systems are generally ignored simply isn't true.
(Ignore the flag, I'm in the UK)
Graphite plays in the exact same setting as you, and is referring to the usual way of getting a game - show up to your regular store / club, play an equal points match. Any exception to this had to be planned out (see above).
I think you're generalizing the US a bit too much, it's a pretty big place, after all . Almost everyone I have heard of here generally frequents the same store (or a few stores) and thus usually knows their opponents. It's possible to get games with strangers, sure, but a lot of times you will be playing a friend or at least someone you are familiar with.
When people say "pickup games" they mean that it's a game you don't have to make an "exception" for (as Graphite says) and work out all the details in advance. You can just walk into the store / club and play.
Hopefully this clears it up, I think you're getting a little confused by what people mean with the term "pickup", when it can really encompass anything other than a special scenario / campaign / rpg type game where details have to be worked out well in advance.
RiTides wrote: I think you're generalizing the US a bit too much, it's a pretty big place, after all . Almost everyone I have heard of here generally frequents the same store (or a few stores) and thus usually knows their opponents. It's possible to get games with strangers, sure, but a lot of times you will be playing a friend or at least someone you are familiar with.
When people say "pickup games" they mean that it's a game you don't have to make an "exception" for (as Graphite says) and work out all the details in advance. You can just walk into the store / club and play.
Exactly 100% of my games over the last ten+ years have taken place at a gaming store. Ever since the first year or so when I was just getting to know people, I would estimate that 75%+ of the games I've had since then have been against people I considered friends. We play at the store because it's a convenient place to meet up that has tables and terrain that we're allowed to use. Honestly, the main time I played against people I didn't already know were in tournaments. I had enough friends and acquaintances at the store that played that I almost never had to play against a complete stranger by the time I decided to stop playing GW games.
To me, a pick up game is merely one that wasn't planned in advance. I would go to the local store to hang out and see if anyone I knew was there and wanted to play, too. This is in contrast to a game that is part of a specific event, such as a tournament, campaign, or something special like a mega-battle.
In our local meta we play mostly prearranged games. If I show up late and and looking for a game I'll work out the details with whomever. However in either case We'll agree on a point total. It may not result in a ' Balanced' game as armies power levels vary as well as what I managed to bring but for me it is the starting point
Communication is the key and I don't have any problem with turning down a power gamer. If junior wants to bring 5 IK ( cause he loves them) and is looking for a game for which I don't have a chance against. I'll pass. not Interested in making it a Special day for Junior. Now Junior sets a game in advance and we work out a game ahead of time.. all good.
I've faced armies that contain 4 knights and 2 WKs in their list. Still played them but what a crappy game for me.
I'll fight any reasonable list. Points for us is the first question. I like doing off shoot games, tank only battles, Knight battles ect.. I still use the points to start.
Last I'm not saying it all has to be equal. Our group doesn't sweat if the points aren't equal ( to a point ). We usually play that for every 5 points off your opponent gets a re-roll.
Solar_lion wrote: We usually play that for every 5 points off your opponent gets a re-roll.
Cool rule, I like that mod... as long as it's not intentionally exploited (i.e. buy 2 fewer guard specifically to get the 2 rerolls)... actually, in general, that might be a bit cheap, but a fun idea either way.
Solar_lion wrote: We usually play that for every 5 points off your opponent gets a re-roll.
Cool rule, I like that mod.
We are all about the friendly game. We play competitively and our lists are moderately so. We like a good close game and no one really abuses the rule ( ie .. I added 200 pts so you get 40 re-rolls). Most of the time its like.. I'm off by 6 pts.. or I wanna give these guy melta bombs ( for which they 90 % of the time will never use) 1 re-roll.
Azreal13 wrote: Except points don't exist in AOS, and you're saying you're quite happy with that.
What the rest of us are essentially saying is the fact that there's no way to do what you are talking about and that's a big factor behind its apparent lack of popularity.
I'm not sat here waving a flag that there are no points type happy, so if by happy you mean it doesn't bother me fair enough.
But this wasn't about what we have or what I like. It was about what those of you arguing the other way want. This 'sub' thread started because someone said some might want to do armies that the WFB lists prevented, e.g. the dino army. That is not a points issue, that is an army list issue. That means there must be some who see army lists as essential to pick up games if I follow the general argument. Every one keeps coming back to points though, no matter how many times I say it is not the points that bother me nor prevent me doing that army that I actually am building/painting at the moment. It is the army lists.
So for pick up games what is needed; points, restrictive WFB style army lists defining what constitutes a legal army or both?
So if we had points in AoS but no WFB style army lists would that be a deal breaker for you. Would you feel you could not play your idea of a pick up game (and yes to the above poster there appears to be some crossed wires on what we mean by pick up game, though it probably isn't that relevant). If so is it because you are worried about having those 'uber' balanced games rather than games that are 'near enough, but might be a bit wonky' balanced or some other reason.
Mymearan wrote: In Sweden at least there are very few pick-up games (by which I mean games played between people who don't know each other very well, who don't communicate before meeting and don't have an implied social contract partially determining what they will bring without asking first), simply because we don't have that many game stores. Most games are played at clubs or at home.
But, when you play, do you establish a points limit and show up with a list based on those points? Or, rather, do you throw together a cinematic or campaign style series of battles where a story is more important than attempting any sort of balance between forces?
The former is "pick up style" play.
We do both, but the former is not what I would call pick-up style. We know each other, and arrange the game well in advance, which means that we know more or less which army and even which models we will be facing, we have implied or explicit social contracts that help us balance the game, and will agree on house rules etc before playing. If that's pick-up style, then AoS is eminently suited for pick-up style after all!
Unbound is something to consider, certainly. But I think Unbound + no point values = a complete sandbox that most wargamers aren't interested in entering.
I missed your point on that earlier puree, hopefully this addresses it!
Legal No. But some balance has to play into the equation. Points I admit IMO are arbitrary to begin with. Not sure anyone would agree on what a unit of this cost or this item X is worth. Thus there is an explosion of new games out there.
Nothing prevents you from doing anything you want. Screw the points. But on a consumer scale there has to be some measures other than who can afford the baddest/ biggest models and still relate to the other game players.
BOT: So I think AoS will end up as a nitch market game. No one plays it here. Most of the WFB folks still play the older versions and some actually resent the re-branding.
Off to buy my 2 warlord Titans ( notice I didn't say Tau ) and see if I can get a pick up game! ( humor - all, please don't get bent out of shape )
That's the thing about people who say 'internet forums do a lot of complaining about X game but it's popular outside the internet'. Unless you're a commercial traveller or summat, I'd say the world wide web might be a slightly larger sample.
It's like what comics went through in the '90's. It's like fantasy as interpreted by 
).
It's a Gigantic dragon. It's the very definition of Fantasy.
You pick up that base game, shill out more for over priced paint, brushes, and then finally get around to the chore that those figures are, yeah, you might get through number 10-15 before you throw in the towel.
The guy "only" has 5 Titans and he really wants to play them all together! Go on... play him 
