I was reading a review of Riot Quest on boardgamegeek (because I googled Riot Quest hoping to see something newer than 4 months old), and while it was a glowing review of Riot Quest, I've been dwelling on this last line: "Lastly, these figs are compatible with WarmaHordes. (To which I say, nice, but ultimately those games are dying so not a huge selling point.)"
This isn't the only place I see this term. It pops up in my meta's discord--albeit ironically at times, as well as other places online. The way Warmachine is mentioned in passing on GMG Let's Talk also indicates that there is a pervasive belief that Warmachine is a dying game.
Although people have been speculating about the SKU death of the game since Superiority in Mk 1 (or even before, but I wasn't tracking), the game has persisted--and even thrived at times. However, we now live in an age of mass targeted media consumption, and people coming into contact with Warmachine might be dissuaded by these perceptions. The distributor woes, and some dude gakking the bed on GlassDoor last year didn't help either.
Only PP can reverse this perception by actually changing the game in ways that their hardcore won't expect, or like. Their hardcore have kept the game limping along, but now it's holding it back. This is why they're pulling jump to space fantasy.
But despite how down I am on the state of Warmachine, I don't think it's dead or dying. It's in yet another major downswing after a combination of mismanagement (micromanagement of the wrong things), poor investment in manufacturing, and market forces turning against them (40K and AoS turning around and becoming popular again).
It's a few more missteps away from dying under PP, but it's also a few changes away from coming back.
Warmachine launched in 2003, but despite using an app for a lot of things, it still feels like an app from 2003.
I find the biggest issue is that WMH requires more concentration to play than most wargames, so players come off as standoffish and unfriendly when people wander up to the table in their FLGS and ask them about it.
It is not a dying game, there is a lot of animosity toward the company for marketing and other business decisions not the game itself. the only thing that tryhards are upset about is that MKIII has brought all factions in the game into close proximity power level of competitiveness so there is not the extremes in over VS underpowered factions anymore. some players don't like it when you change their performance curve.
For example in MKI CRYX always won. they were top dog at every event and in casual play. now they are mid pack. if anything I blame the attitude of some in the player base for the lack of growth in the WM/H community in recent months.
I think also not having their own PG program any more really hurt them the most. Having one person at each club with a personal invested interest in promoting a game does a VAST amount for marketing and keeping the game alive. Having someone who's volunteer "job" is to recruit new people; do demo games; organist events; make sure people are playing etc.... is a huge thing when you don't have hundreds of shops of your own doing that.
Especially as the general view is that many 3rd party stores are not really "pushing" wargames and would rather push magic the gathering and other card games. Fairs fair to the store those card games seem to generate far more profit and sales for the store and are much easier to stock than wargames.
However it means your wargame at a local level might only get promotion if the store owner happens to be a player/enjoys the game.
I think PP made a series of small to medium blunders in quick succession at the same time GW started to turn the tables on their own blunders. The combined effect was a dramatic fall off of players. IT doesn't help that, online, PP also self-gutted their own forums which were once the focus point for their community; and they've not really picked up the slack on Facebook themselves form what I can see.
There were also issues with them trying to shift into plastics that came back and bit them hard.
Personally I also think that they've bloated their own game system and really need to pause and consider making a Warmachine game in two parts - one part large armies and one part skirmish. Rather than trying to have a single system for both which has resulted in some limiting choices - eg the push toward having theme list based armies only and cutting out a chunk of army building an choice for players. Balance wise it makes sense as you basically try to take big diverse armies and make them into smaller sub-armies; however in practice I think it makes for less "choice" for players as from one army they can't "put down what they want" so easily and remain decently competitive
Part of it is the ever increasing cost of mini's as they are now on a par with, or exceed. the Geedubs but wildly swings in quality from 'worse than boardgame minis" to "mostly okay"
Part of it is PP not really trying to push it themselves, relying on hobby heroes or stores to push it is dink think
The previously mentioned SKU bloat, yes there are get started boxes but they are sort of pricey and thanks to PP's flakey logistics a major PITA to obtain outside the US
The wide range of options, at time of Mk1, it was broadly Warhammer, WMH, now there's a squillon options a click away
Fingers crossed Neo-Mek is the low model count I'm hoping for (and cheaper than the Marvel game !)
I can only give the testimonies that I have received from my local meta. It was a combination of ThemeMachine, "We only play Steamroller here", and other games being more accessible.
The introduction of Mk 3 and the Themes that came along with it, replicated the same disastrous Formations of 7th Ed 40K. If you didn't play in Theme, you were playing at fewer points and fewer rules than your opponent was. This was even worse when you had to do a lot of research in order to find out what qualified in your army to build that way, making it less desirable for the quick pick up game.
This left only the hypercompetitive and the stubborn left (consider me in that last category), who ignored anything but the Steamroller mantra. Some would complain about the lack of narrative games/events, etc, but wouldn't buy the No Quarter that had many of those things in there, and the people left largely didn't bother opening themselves up to those games anyway. Pick up games for WMH were not very common before ThemeMachine, and became less so afterwards.
When Mk 3 launched, AoS was just finishing its first year under the General's Handbook, and popularity was resurging. 40K had rebooted their game in to 8th Edition, making it simpler and less rules intense, as well as getting rid of the Formation mess. X-Wing was showing to be a mostly balanced game and didn't require any hobbying to play.
You see posts about warmahordes dying because
- models are gone from flag stores in broad places (like europe)
- distributors dont have models
- Its more difficult to get models
- overall impression is that numbers of players are shrinking
- few new players are recruted.
- game is gone from top selling list
- at the same time other miniature games are having good times.
The game is not dying, but it is in a rough spot. For several reasons.
PP seem to have accepted this themselves. They are pouring resources into monpoc, riotquest and the new warmachine in space. If warmachine in space is a flop i would be really worried.
I think, if anything, WMH hit it's lowest point a few years ago. Mark III came out, what, late summer of 2015? The fact that it's still being updated, played, and bought is a sign of life.
I don't think it's a dying game. Dying games don't have regular releases if both models and updates.
that said, it's clearly a more niche game than it was in the heyday of Mark II. I think PP realized that between a few blunders and GW's resurgence, it was never going to regain that market share. Hell, I'd argue that even if PP hadn't made any blunders, they'd be gutted by new 40k and the AOS bounce back. At some point, there's just so big a game can get, and so big a model range can get. Shifting to a more direct sales model with smaller sales but higher margins can keep the game profitable, which will help keep it supported.
The online community got incredibly toxic when MK3 hit. I stepped away, not from the game, but the community simply because I've never seen so much effort put into imploding on oneself. I think when a bunch of players seemed hellbent on dying on the hill of "technically can't charge knocked down models" was about the point where I checked out of the drama.
Truthfully, the game's biggest problem is a lack of new players and it just not working well with changes to distribution. As far as the negativity is concerned, the new players seems to be the primary issue. As much as people found excuses, personally knowing a good number of them, I know a lot of it was just getting old and life. A lot of prominent players got married and had kids near the end of MK2 and relearning the system just wasn't a priority. I fell into that camp as well and while I didn't seek out an excuse to leave, I played with a lot less effort and more fun. That's all well and good, but without a new generation of try hards to champion the game, the community took every opportunity it got to destroy itself. :(
I think the idea that nothing can touch GW is false, I think if PP works at it and establishes where the problems are they can grow again. Its hard and it would take a huge amount to move them up to GW's size; but I could see PP restore themselves to a healthy position.
I think they've just got to perhaps shift to MKIV rules system and use that as a launchpad to in effect relaunch their own game system. Coupled to a big marketing push; coupled to some kind of community program so that they can get some form of PG like system going again.
What direction they take the game is hard to say, In some ways I think they allmost need to go back to their core ideals. Rules in the box/ cards on the table. I think one problem they've found is that trying to build a living game rules edition kinda only works so far with a physical product and game line. Many people don't use apps for gaming; many dislike continual changes to the game rules and stats. Many just want to "open the box and play".
Furthermore whilst increased balance is good it seems PP has increased it by cutting down on choices through the themes system. I think that has turned people away because they see a single big army and they get ideas of what they'd like to build as an army then the theme system railroads them into pre-defined segments.
Now you get this happen in any game balance system anyway; but the theme system really enforces it powerfully.
AoS does the very same thing to control players. Only with AoS what GW did was use battletomes and allegiance abilities coupled to restricted allies systems to basically promote individual armies. And you see that in the armies people make and use; they are using full armies not souped even though the rules allow for it. It's a system where the restrictions - I think -benefit the marketing and the idea that the marketing and lore puts in a customers mind so it gets taking up really easily and happily.
PP is at odds with itself because all their marketing prior to the MKIII themed change is all showing you these big varied armies where all you were bound to was your warcaster choice - one model. Now they've bound it further and I think people dislike that even if they like the increased balance of the system.
I'd really like to think that PP is working on a MKIV and a big marketing campaign. I'd love to see the game soar back again into popularity.
They've clearly not abandoned the game and I don't think they will, its just not in its best shape right now; especially for outreach and getting new bums on seats. PP has a lag time of a good few years whils that's ok for them. Their competitive market will keep things alive. The risk is that they leave it too many years and they get generation gaps and miss out big generations of new gamers because the bigger the generation gap you get the harder it is to get younger people into your game.
LunarSol wrote: The online community got incredibly toxic when MK3 hit. I stepped away, not from the game, but the community simply because I've never seen so much effort put into imploding on oneself. I think when a bunch of players seemed hellbent on dying on the hill of "technically can't charge knocked down models" was about the point where I checked out of the drama.
I remember that somewhat differently. PP lost its online community because it decided they were superfluous to requirements and purged them.
Telling your fans that they're not necessary or even welcome tends to piss them off.
LunarSol wrote: The online community got incredibly toxic when MK3 hit. I stepped away, not from the game, but the community simply because I've never seen so much effort put into imploding on oneself. I think when a bunch of players seemed hellbent on dying on the hill of "technically can't charge knocked down models" was about the point where I checked out of the drama.
I remember that somewhat differently. PP lost its online community because it decided they were superfluous to requirements and purged them.
Telling your fans that they're not necessary or even welcome tends to piss them off.
I think it was a bit of both, but I do think PP made the first step when they gutted their own forum. Which was honestly really surprising because they had a very active and engaged forum at a time when Facebook was rising up really powerfully. It was a huge waste I think and the wrong choice. I think PP sort of hoped that the community would pick up the slack, but at the same time I dont' think they realised that the community wasn't going to because it wasn't wanting too. I've seen forums die when users drift onto other services and sites - that happens. However PP tried forcing it in a half hearted way which left people half on their forums and half feeling like they'd been kicked out by the company they were paying money to support.
I think BOTH sides had issues, I do think PP made a first major step. That said they likely see it that they were perhaps reacting to increased negative feedback on a service that should be positive and promoting their game. So they might well have felt that their action was a reaction in itself. It might also be linked to the voluntary staff situation again with the forum being moderated by volunteers and PP not wanting to get sued or even the hint of a threat of being sued and didn't feel that they could pay staff to moderate the forums themselves. So again PP might have made choices that weren't the best, but were made for logical reasons and not spite or hate or anything like that.
Suffice it to say that on its own its nto a disaster; but done with the other things that happened all around the same time they each compounded each other.
I, for one, like Mk3 more than Mk2. I'm not a tournament player and I play just with my buddies, so know nothing about Steamroller and balance. But do you remember when in Mk2 people used to complain the game should be called Infantrymachine? Now we have a greater presence of stompy robots on our tables (and people are complaining about the lack of infantry, because people have to complain) and I'm quite happy with it.
Nothing is perfect (I miss wreck markers, I found them quite thematic, but they could be abused, apparently). Also now I have double Primal sources in both Farrows and Circle, while I'd love some more variety (how good was the Mk2 Battle Boar animus? How much it lasted, before Mk3 dropped? One month? What a joke) but I overall love the current edition.
About it's eventual "death", I don't care too much. I currently play "dead" games already (Dark Age, for example. One of the best systems I ever played, thanks CMoN for the umpteenth Zombicide KS nobody (should) care about) and I can see myself playing Warmachine for the time to come, being it supported or not, even if no tournament will be organized (not interested) or new models will be released (there are already enough models to buy and keep me busy for years already).
I think it was a bit of both, but I do think PP made the first step when they gutted their own forum. Which was honestly really surprising because they had a very active and engaged forum at a time when Facebook was rising up really powerfully. It was a huge waste I think and the wrong choice. I think PP sort of hoped that the community would pick up the slack, but at the same time I dont' think they realised that the community wasn't going to because it wasn't wanting too. I've seen forums die when users drift onto other services and sites - that happens. However PP tried forcing it in a half hearted way which left people half on their forums and half feeling like they'd been kicked out by the company they were paying money to support.
The forum was largely gutted because it was volunteer run using more or less the same system as the PG. The players also relentless mocked the forums and it was a mess of faction infighting. A lot of people had already jumped to Facebook and PP was putting a lot of effort into that and Twitter. It made sense to me from a squeaky wheel perspective, but I don't think PP appreciated how many new players used the forum and how much that relied on the older players hanging out there. What's left is still fine for new players, but they lack a passionate base of experience players to respond to new player questions.
I remember that somewhat differently. PP lost its online community because it decided they were superfluous to requirements and purged them.
Telling your fans that they're not necessary or even welcome tends to piss them off.
I'm always surprised how personal of a view people take when systems get shut down. I was a PG that spent a lot of times on the forums, but I would never say I felt "purged". I still don't love Twitter and Facebook as community hubs (I'm here after all), but I also get that forums just aren't what they used to be and sometimes I need to start using something new simply because that's where the community is.
I think BOTH sides had issues, I do think PP made a first major step. That said they likely see it that they were perhaps reacting to increased negative feedback on a service that should be positive and promoting their game.
Given that it was an attitude they created, fostered and pushed hard, especially for the first five-six years, I find myself incredibly unsympathetic.
They slathered the game and themselves in the 'play like you got a pair' mentality, where anything that wasn't perfect was rejected, so its unsurprising that the playerbase followed suit by being critical of anything that didn't live up to PP's own standards.
aphyon wrote: the only thing that tryhards are upset about is that MKIII has brought all factions in the game into close proximity power level of competitiveness so there is not the extremes in over VS underpowered factions anymore. some players don't like it when you change their performance curve.
Literally no-one is upset about that, particularly because your statements about balance simply aren't true. The games factions remained horribly unbalanced in general.
For example in MKI CRYX always won. they were top dog at every event and in casual play. now they are mid pack. if anything I blame the attitude of some in the player base for the lack of growth in the WM/H community in recent months.
Also simply untrue, Cryx is still a powerhouse when fielded in certain themes.
I don't think it's a dying game. Dying games don't have regular releases if both models and updates.
An important distinction needs to be made here - Warmachine/Hordes *doesn't* have regular releases of models and updates - Riot Quest does, the majority of models released over the last few months and scheduled for release over the next 6+ month are Riot Quest minis given rules in WMHDs. PP seems to have partially abandoned/stepped back from the narrative of Warmachine and is instead focusing on the release of Riot Quest's "alt history" Iron Kingdoms. The CID schedule and updates in general for core Warmachine/Hordes rules has slowed to an absolute crawl, and outside of the newly released faction and the Oblivion campaign book there hasn't been much in the way of "pure" Warmachine/Hordes releases. It's also worth noting that over the last 2-3 years the majority of new releases for WMHDs proper have been for the new "limited" factions (Grymkin, Crucible Guard, Infernals), the existing factions have had to settle for access to mercenaries and solos/attachments. PP has all but ceased updating existing factions with new Warbeasts/Warjacks and unit boxes. This goes hand-in-hand with the Riot Quest releases, as those are all essentially solos/attachments.
chaos0xomega wrote: PP seems to have partially abandoned/stepped back from the narrative of Warmachine and is instead focusing on the release of Riot Quest's "alt history" Iron Kingdoms.
The Hengehold Scrolls twitter account is actually pretty great. Bitesize bits of lore every day reads a lot better than the way these things have traditionally been done either through the books or insiders. In part that's because the fluff has always worked better as more of a highlight reel, in part because of the quality of the writing and in part because it's a universe that thrives on big turns of fate more than character interactions.
In terms of release schedule, I think CID kind of blunts the impact of new releases. We've seen a ton of stuff released for the Morrowans in the last couple months and starting next month the clockwork angels are getting quite a few new releases. The main problem is just that the excitement for that stuff was spent months ago. It doesn't feel new or interesting; its just kind of tedious living in a game state where these things are both old hat and unavailable.
I cannot go to a shop anywhere within several hundred kilometers of my location and buy warmachine miniatures any more, so I think that might be a pretty major problem. The EU is the worlds biggest single market, and it's richest, if you can't manage to keep your game in stock here then you are not really a big player any more.
Da Boss wrote: I cannot go to a shop anywhere within several hundred kilometers of my location and buy warmachine miniatures any more, so I think that might be a pretty major problem. The EU is the worlds biggest single market, and it's richest, if you can't manage to keep your game in stock here then you are not really a big player any more.
It's very much an issue of the SKU bloat. Distributors aren't restocking products... like, in general. There's too much new stuff across the industry to bother wasting warehouse space on the odd chance that some store might suddenly want to stock Magnus1 or.... IDK, Kossites or something. It's an industry wide problem, but PP is absolutely suffering the worst of it in no small part because rather than make changes as the industry did; they were pretty happy for too long to let online shops solve their inventory management problems for them. Other games have adapted (even GW with all the limited edition box sets) or were just born into it. PP remains pretty crippled by a game designed to support a retail system that just isn't practical anymore.
Da Boss wrote: I cannot go to a shop anywhere within several hundred kilometers of my location and buy warmachine miniatures any more, so I think that might be a pretty major problem. The EU is the worlds biggest single market, and it's richest, if you can't manage to keep your game in stock here then you are not really a big player any more.
It's very much an issue of the SKU bloat. Distributors aren't restocking products... like, in general. There's too much new stuff across the industry to bother wasting warehouse space on the odd chance that some store might suddenly want to stock Magnus1 or.... IDK, Kossites or something. It's an industry wide problem, but PP is absolutely suffering the worst of it in no small part because rather than make changes as the industry did; they were pretty happy for too long to let online shops solve their inventory management problems for them. Other games have adapted (even GW with all the limited edition box sets) or were just born into it. PP remains pretty crippled by a game designed to support a retail system that just isn't practical anymore.
Well SKU bloat is an issue. But not all of it.
Its not uncommen to hear of Flags who dont want to stock warmahordes because of bad history with PP. Like card packs going away after it was released, command book becoming absolute after they was released, black anchor, mystery boxs and others.
Another big issue is that several Flags indeed had a big stock. But it didnt sell. The Flags sold it out on big sales and after being burned and lost money, refuse to restock.
A lot of that comes down to online competition from what I saw. Getting people to buy local was an exercising in pulling teeth when product was regularly 65% or so online compared to what they get in stores after taxes. A lot of them said that stores just need to compete with online. A lot of stores decided they just didn't need to sell PP stuff. PP tried to put the genie back in the bottle, but timing that with the MK3 launch just gave a bunch of people all the more reason to resent MK3.
EDIT: On that note, one of their current problems is that the game experienced much of its explosive growth around the release of huge resin models whose real price was pretty heavily masked by online discounts. While they're not a problem competitively, PP pushed more of them into the game than the market would have beared normally. A lot of their current issues with kits not being competitively priced comes down to resin appearing practical when it was priced with massive discounts.
For myself, WMH is just a little too gimmicky. I'm not a big fan of stacking buff upon buff upon buff upon buff upon debuff… just *knowing* all the interactions is taxing.
I enjoy the game, but in a casual way. While I have no problems getting games, I don't care if it's Steamroller or by the book or whatever, I know I don't put as much effort into it as the other folks at the FLGS do, so I tend to get sideswiped pretty easily.
I'm also not into playing with felt pads for forests, or a popsicle stick for a wall... that's a big turn-off for me. I don't mind if minis are partly assembled, or unpainted, or even if the terrain is poorly made and falling apart... but if I wanted to play a 2d game I'd play a video game. I want the 3d element and it is unpopular in my (limited) experience.
I've said it before, but the game could be a fair bit more welcoming to new players, by simplifying the rules into more of a battle game, then skirmish game, and reducing the number of special rules / stacks. One or two buffs at a time is not so bad... 5 or more becomes silly.
Also, get rid of 1/2" measurements. 1" increments are granular enough. Base contact, 1", 2" for melee. Less focus on units blocking their own LOS from each other. Again, more of a battle game than a skirmish.
I'm actually aiming to finally paint a new army and play some MK3 this year, spurred in part by the PP art book KS and in part because I'm really burning out on GW stuff. Kill Team is barely supported, 40k is back to being a train wreck, AOS continues to be uninspiring in-game (despite both of my factions - ogres + tzeentch - receiving new books recently), and then GW deliberately kneecapping the successful launch of KOW 3E reminded me that NüDub is still the predator it's been since the early 2000s. You know, like when WM was released and PP was a breath of fresh air.
Anyway, couple responses:
1) I loved the theme lists from MK2. Being rewarded in interesting ways for taking weird stuff was a good feel that fed into how I make armies anyway. MK3 themes bear almost no resemblance, it's just extra rules for a few units and more stuff you'd be a fool (and down 3-18ish points) if you didn't take advantage of.
2) I appreciate that PP has moved beyond books for their rules content. It's pretty asinine that GW makes players buy book after book after book (and track down FAQ after FAQ) to stay current. That said, PP's books are also some of the only outdated game books I'm happy to keep around, as I dig the art + fluff.
Gabbi wrote: (Dark Age, for example. One of the best systems I ever played, thanks CMoN for the umpteenth Zombicide KS nobody (should) care about)
3) I'm still really hoping somebody competent buys all of those beautiful new Dark Age sculpts and fresh rules content and puts the game back out. I'm shocked at how much awesome work went into that game for it to be dumped so quickly.
4) Full disclosure: I think I'm going to finally paint up a version of that Cryx force I started amassing at the end of MK2. Partially because Cryx seem rather mediocre now, or at least the way I'm going to play them should be
I'm also not into playing with felt pads for forests, or a popsicle stick for a wall... that's a big turn-off for me. I don't mind if minis are partly assembled, or unpainted, or even if the terrain is poorly made and falling apart... but if I wanted to play a 2d game I'd play a video game. I want the 3d element and it is unpopular in my (limited) experience.
This is a side effect of the game being a very tightly written competitively balanced (which isn't the same as general balance) ruleset. Even fractional differences in measured distances and model placement can completely change the outcome of the game, so precision measurements are a must. The community by and large has decided that 3D terrain is totally incompatible with that approach, and so they don't use it in order to preserve the "purity" of gameplay. The problem could be addressed fairly easily by establishing terrain design standards, updating the terrain rules a bit to remove some of the issues that players have with 3D terrain, and releasing a line of officially supported 3D terrain designed with gameplay considerations in mind - but that might be more than what PP is capable of for the time being.
2) I appreciate that PP has moved beyond books for their rules content. It's pretty asinine that GW makes players buy book after book after book (and track down FAQ after FAQ) to stay current.
Flip side is that by doing this PP killed a big revenue generator, caused the games fluff development to stagnate and created somewhat of an access barrier to the fluff (the absence of books with fluff in them means most players are entirely clueless about the fluff and the lore and makes them less likely to buy the novels that PP has published in their place), and indirectly contributed to the decline of the WMHDs casual community by killing much of the interest in the lore and eliminating a lot of the narrative/casual level content from the game. GWs release model has a *ton* of problems and plenty of room from improvement, but PP is a case study in why GW shouldn't follow their lead and instead try to find a different approach.
Yeah a lot of established gamers who have one army (or several) that they've collected for years tend to forget that the lore in the codex/battletome is often a big part of what helps keep people sticking around GW products and games. Whilst we might argue about the price and the time they fall out of date etc...; there's no denying that the physical book product helps sell stuff.
Plus its something affordable you can put in the hands of most people wanting to start and send them away and its FAR more interesting than a free leaflet at engaging them. I bet there's many a person who went into a GW store (or 3rd party) and left with just a battletome/codex and returned later for models. If you take that out then you lose a marketing tool and theo nly thing to inspire them with is a box of models that need building and painting before they look good (and that's assuming the person has skill/resources to achieve that).
Also GW's FAQs aren't that hard to find - its basically one or two clicks on their website and you've got them. Plus by and large they aren't re-writing the whole book; many are small adjustments and addendums. some of the changes are even just fine-tuning the language to avoid abuses or confusion on interpreting what was written.
I just don't think that the fast paced rules and balance changes that computer games have; easily translates to tabletop. Because in a computer game all those changes are handled by the computer on its own. In reality the person has to remember them; remember that they've changed, reference them etc....
Da Boss wrote: I cannot go to a shop anywhere within several hundred kilometers of my location and buy warmachine miniatures any more, so I think that might be a pretty major problem. The EU is the worlds biggest single market, and it's richest, if you can't manage to keep your game in stock here then you are not really a big player any more.
AFAIK the comic shop in nuremberg city still sells WM/H stuff.
But it's definitely not as popular as it was some time ago. I still got a cupboard full of WM miniatures that I'm trying to sell, but there is not much interest in privateerpress products in germany anymore...
Alright, I agree. I guess I commend centralized, updated rules more than anything. I also super dislike GW's campaign style books with 2 pages of rules updates for your army and a truck load of stuff you don't care about. Neither mean that PP got it right with their approach tho.
chaos0xomega wrote: Flip side is that by doing this PP killed a big revenue generator, caused the games fluff development to stagnate and created somewhat of an access barrier to the fluff (the absence of books with fluff in them means most players are entirely clueless about the fluff and the lore and makes them less likely to buy the novels that PP has published in their place), and indirectly contributed to the decline of the WMHDs casual community by killing much of the interest in the lore and eliminating a lot of the narrative/casual level content from the game.
Many fair points. I very much like WMH's lore - which is shocking because I really struggle to care about game lore, especially fantasy lore; to date 40k + WMH are the only I've really been gripped by - so this is a big, sad thing. Lore divestment probably adds to the feeling that the game is just played by hyper competitive types who only use 2D terrain and min/max list design.
I will agree that GW's campaign books can be a rather miss system when they include a mix of campaign and core rules and when GW spreads them out rather messily as they have been doing with 40K thus far.
But I think the core concept of codex/battletomes works very well and I think 30 years of GW doing well kinda proves it.
Heck if you look at even casual lore most GW gamers know the casual lore of the game setting and their army and likely one or two others. Contrast that to other games and many have a much more hazy understanding of the story setting - even if its written better at a technical or depth level.
AS for novels they are so easily overlooked - even GW's Black Library is often overlooked even within fantasy and sci-fi reading groups (perhaps barring a big signature series like Horus Heresy).
I think that PP's issues with stock and price in the EU/UK market for a while didn't help matters. Again I think its another one of those "several bad things came along at once and all made each other worse as a result" kinda aspects. Gamers couldn't get stock for a while or it was iffy; so they started shifting interests to the point where stock demands went way down etc...
There is a lot of stuff that has gone on behind the scenes that most players know nothing about. Several years ago, I heard a very true statement: "Privateer Press is successful despite Privateer Press". But they are a shadow of where they were in 2010-2012. There was some hope for the game and company last year, but that door was abruptly shut, and now, here we are. PP isn't dead yet, but it needs to do a lot of things to turn things around.
1. Rules and Rules Bloat- MK IV?
2. Inventory Issues- this constant cycling of models- as in, get the new stuff when it comes out, or you'll be waiting months, if not years, before it's made again needs to stop
3. Distributor issues- I should 100% be able to go to my FLGS and have them order a model. Instead, the FLGS or their distributor have dropped PP, forcing me to buy direct from PP 4. Community Management- Engage the community in two way communication, not one way from PP -> customers
5. SKU bloat- A long time ago, PP said no model will ever be retired or made obsolete. This is unsustainable. They have to generate new models to keep sales up, but there are so many SKU's now, that it contributes to 1-3
6. Go 100% plastic. This will require a huge investment in $, which PP probably doesn't have now. For a company that plans out models and releases years in advance, they seem very short sighted when it comes to running the business
The Skull Island Expedition novels are pretty solid, but PP published way too many of them for the size of the audience. There's a few that are pretty massively important to the fluff and the Butcher's origin novel is fantastic, but as much as I enjoy the setting, there was just way too much to keep up with.
You aren't alone on that front, from what I've gathered the novels haven't done very well overall, in large part because they were created in an attempt to make up for the fact that PP moved away from their old model of advancing the fluff with each new rulebook - but without having anything tangible tying the fluff back to the game ala the rulebooks, there was very little interest in the novels.
5. SKU bloat- A long time ago, PP said no model will ever be retired or made obsolete. This is unsustainable. They have to generate new models to keep sales up, but there are so many SKU's now, that it contributes to 1-3
I think an evolution to the Active Duty Roster is needed in this sense. I think most of us agree we don't want to have our older models forever invalidated because the got pulled out of rotation, it would be nice if instead each year PP published an ADR that extended to units, solos, etc. and those were the units eligible for Steamroller/competitive play for the duration of the year. I would propose a healthy ADR mix would be somethinng like 50% models from the previous 1-2 year period, 25% "legacy" models from prior to that period, and 25% new models released over the course of the season. This way players are encouraged to continue purchasing newer stuff, but their older stuff doesn't eventually become forever useless - if its not eligible for competitive play this year, it might be eligible next year. As far as retailers are concerned, I would think its a win/win - they only need to worry about ordering and keeping inventory of the latest SKUs into the shop, but if they have older inventory they don't need to blow it out at bargain basement prices because even if its not hot this year - it might become hot again next year. On PPs end its also advantageous as they don't need to worry about maintaining production/stock/distribution of their entire back catalog all the time, they can focus on the latest stuff and a curated selection of their back catalog relevant to the current years ADR, refresh the molds, etc. for the other stuff in the downtime without worrying about people bitching that xyz unit is out of stock and the game has become pay to win because they can only get it on eBay for 300% markup, and then rotate their production at the start of the next year. Alternatively, they can rotate the non-ADR models into direct only/made to order sales with a longer lead-time and a higher profit margin if they are concerned about accessibility of the back catalog to newer/casual players.
In any case, basically the idea here is that you acknowledge that a not insignificant segment of the back catalog will be more or less unavailable for somewhat lengthy periods of time, but thats okay because you are discouraging those models from being used anyway/encouraging the community to use other models instead, and also because no matter what that back catalog will never be *permanently* unavailable, because you will inevitably rotate other parts of the back catalog back into availability after a fixed period of time. In truth, I think 1 year rotations might be a bit *too* lengthy - particularly with regards to bringing in new players who might be interested in rounding out their collections, etc. but I don't see this system working to combat SKU bloat in any chunks of time smaller than that. As far as the existing playerbase is concerned, however, I don't see any issues as most of us probably already own everything for the factions we play.
A lot of rotation could be done with generous proxy rules. Rotated out characters being available as legal stand ins for something else. There's enough resculpts in the system as is (particularly post Minicrate) we're essentially already there.
Realistically GW has the right idea with Legends. Ceasing production on something, locking its rules down, and making it "casual play only" is probably the way to go. That's effectively how it works now, without the advantage of being able to cut the SKU from production.
That, and they need some serious rebundling of old SKUs. There's zero reason by this point not to have faction support packs that contain say.... Krielstone/Runebearer/Whelps or Choir/Vassals/Wracks and the like. Yes, technically Choir are FA:2. Probably a good time to change that.
Realistically GW has the right idea with Legends. Ceasing production on something, locking its rules down, and making it "casual play only" is probably the way to go. That's effectively how it works now, without the advantage of being able to cut the SKU from production.
That was essentially a "one and done" thing though - GW isn't going to keep shifting things over to Legends over time, they only shifted over those items that were already long out of production (if they were ever in production in the first place)/unavailable for years. Not only that, but they didn't declare Legends rules to be casual only or permission only or whatever - they recommended away from using them in tournaments because they would not be supporting those models with FAQs/erratas/balance updates going forward, but that decisionw as left strictly up to TOs as to whether or not they would allow them. Thats very different than PP deciding that every model is going to be removed from production and made limited-use on its 10th birthday (for example) and no longer sanctioned for use in any events (unlike 40k, WMHDs competitive scene is largely dominated and controlled by the company itself). The community absolutely would not support this and you would absolutely see the game die as a result. The only reason GW was able to get away with it with limited public outcry is because the vast majority of models affected by it were not models that GW sold people in the first place. I mean, am I pissed that my 30 rough riders are probably never going to be usable outside of casual games? Sure - but they also aren't minis that GW sold me for that purpose in the first place. Almost everything in the Legends list was something that had to be kitbashed/converted for that purpose (if you wanted to be strictly WYSIWYG at any rate), or are models that GW had stopped selling 2-3 editions prior because they had been phased out/replaced by something else - Ork Big Gunz were discontinued in 2012, Ork Skorchas were discontinued years before that. The majority of the people that still had those older models weren't playing anymore (and if they were, weren't using those models very often). It just worked. The situation with WMHDs is very different and its not an environment conducive to that sort of policy.
That, and they need some serious rebundling of old SKUs. There's zero reason by this point not to have faction support packs that contain say.... Krielstone/Runebearer/Whelps or Choir/Vassals/Wracks and the like. Yes, technically Choir are FA:2. Probably a good time to change that.
Absolutely agree, especially if they are going to reboot the game and try to make it more accessible to new blood coming in. Shift the standalone miniatures to direct only for established players who already have most of the contents of those packs and don't want to drop $50 to get the one solo they need and I think you're golden.
I wouldn't say it has to be on the model's 10th anniversary, just when it is completely redundant. There's lots of examples of that already; mostly in casters, but also in solos, also a few units. If say, Sword Knights and Long Gunners went away no one would care, particularly if they were made alt sculpts of say, Marrowans and Trencher Long Gunner respectfully. Lots of casters could work the same way.
chaos0xomega wrote: I think an evolution to the Active Duty Roster is needed in this sense. I think most of us agree we don't want to have our older models forever invalidated because the got pulled out of rotation, it would be nice if instead each year PP published an ADR that extended to units, solos, etc. and those were the units eligible for Steamroller/competitive play for the duration of the year. I would propose a healthy ADR mix would be somethinng like 50% models from the previous 1-2 year period, 25% "legacy" models from prior to that period, and 25% new models released over the course of the season. This way players are encouraged to continue purchasing newer stuff, but their older stuff doesn't eventually become forever useless - if its not eligible for competitive play this year, it might be eligible next year. As far as retailers are concerned, I would think its a win/win - they only need to worry about ordering and keeping inventory of the latest SKUs into the shop, but if they have older inventory they don't need to blow it out at bargain basement prices because even if its not hot this year - it might become hot again next year. On PPs end its also advantageous as they don't need to worry about maintaining production/stock/distribution of their entire back catalog all the time, they can focus on the latest stuff and a curated selection of their back catalog relevant to the current years ADR, refresh the molds, etc. for the other stuff in the downtime without worrying about people bitching that xyz unit is out of stock and the game has become pay to win because they can only get it on eBay for 300% markup, and then rotate their production at the start of the next year. Alternatively, they can rotate the non-ADR models into direct only/made to order sales with a longer lead-time and a higher profit margin if they are concerned about accessibility of the back catalog to newer/casual players.
In any case, basically the idea here is that you acknowledge that a not insignificant segment of the back catalog will be more or less unavailable for somewhat lengthy periods of time, but thats okay because you are discouraging those models from being used anyway/encouraging the community to use other models instead, and also because no matter what that back catalog will never be *permanently* unavailable, because you will inevitably rotate other parts of the back catalog back into availability after a fixed period of time. In truth, I think 1 year rotations might be a bit *too* lengthy - particularly with regards to bringing in new players who might be interested in rounding out their collections, etc. but I don't see this system working to combat SKU bloat in any chunks of time smaller than that. As far as the existing playerbase is concerned, however, I don't see any issues as most of us probably already own everything for the factions we play.
That's already in place with ADR. There are two aspects associated with ADR, the Warcasters and the Theme. Champions events are restricted to both the Warcaster and Theme listed in the ADR, and you cannot duplicate either in the two lists you bring.
The problem is that Steamroller is the preferred format, not Champions.
Part of the problem is just that Champions is a little too limited, and thus far has been regularly derailed by one caster with no real counters that quickly stagnants the format. The idea is sound, but I think PP needs to shoot for a format more akin to Modern than Standard.
The problem with existing ADR though is that its a very limited game format thst basically isn't played much outside of certain big events, not tied to model availability/SKU rotation in any way, and even with the theme and caster restrictions still covers a very large range of models.
chaos0xomega wrote:The problem with existing ADR though is that its a very limited game format thst basically isn't played much outside of certain big events, not tied to model availability/SKU rotation in any way, and even with the theme and caster restrictions still covers a very large range of models.
The frequency of use is a choice by the organizers. The lack of limitation is what makes Steamroller the favored format.
Outside the mini-factions, limits the model available by the amount that would be suggested, outside the 'Jacks and Beasts. Of course, some Themes are more limited, like Skorne's Exalted, while some are quite expansive like Mercs' Irregulars. However, it is still an equivalent reduction of available models. Tying model availability to the ADR wouldn't be that difficult, after all.
LunarSol wrote:Part of the problem is just that Champions is a little too limited, and thus far has been regularly derailed by one caster with no real counters that quickly stagnants the format. The idea is sound, but I think PP needs to shoot for a format more akin to Modern than Standard.
It's still the basic concept and how it would operate, for all intents and purposes. All that would be needed was to expand the Caster/Lock list a little bit more to be equivalent.
I think the level of casual play at our game nights is so much more friendly than what the rest of you have run into. until this topic came up I had never even heard of steamroller or champions.
I knew people who were super big into the game back in MKI and II but I wasn't really into it until MKIII was just releasing. and even then I was playing based on the rule of cool. the minis I use are only based on how they look. it just turned out that they preform pretty good together. I also did not super invest into the game. all told I currently have 1 caster irusk II, 3 jacks, a gun carriage, 5 solos 1 attachment and a unit of 4 for a grand total of 15 miniatures. I may get 1 more drahkuun to replace the spriggan at 75 points but that's all I care to do with the force.
I also have the book for the iron kingdoms RPG, hopefully get to play that after our current run with infinity is up on the roleplaying side of things.
We've been cultivating a rather casual meta here in uptown Chicago, and picked up a few new players during last year's Journeyman league. It'll be interesting to see how energize/burnt out people are after Adepticon and ATC.
I personally think they should crop huge swathes of the model line with extreme prejudice, make Champions the standard "Modern" SR, and introduce a Legacy format like MTG. Run official events for both Modern and Legacy, with different structural prize incentives and support for each. I say this as someone who has been collecting since 2007. I'm fine with 80% of my collection becoming obsolete if it means the game will once again be competing with GW for shelfspace in a meaningful way. There's always IKRPG for using old models haha
Bloviator wrote: We've been cultivating a rather casual meta here in uptown Chicago, and picked up a few new players during last year's Journeyman league. It'll be interesting to see how energize/burnt out people are after Adepticon and ATC.
I personally think they should crop huge swathes of the model line with extreme prejudice, make Champions the standard "Modern" SR, and introduce a Legacy format like MTG. Run official events for both Modern and Legacy, with different structural prize incentives and support for each. I say this as someone who has been collecting since 2007. I'm fine with 80% of my collection becoming obsolete if it means the game will once again be competing with GW for shelfspace in a meaningful way. There's always IKRPG for using old models haha
Get rid of like, most of the Mercenary/Minion Solos, Get rid of old non epic castors and like, try to curb the bloat from big units and that solves alot of problems.
Alternatively, rebalance the entire game at once so that things aren't so hardcore rock, paper, and scissors.
I was about to try to steer this topic back on track, but we're kinda still discussing the "dying game" issue. In that, it's hard to be perceived as a vibrant active game when you can't bring in new players and keep them.
The reason it's not a dying game, but really could dwindle and die, is that there's just the hardcore left. Or there were, but even hardcore players are drifting away where there aren't active player groups, especially where Press Gangers no longer exist to promote it.
The hardcore groups and tournament scene will be pointed at by some as signs that the game isn't dying, and that's partially true, but on the other hand, it's not really thriving either. Much like GW games, while at their worst, were still around in a hardcore and tournaments scene. But, the rise of other games like Song of Ice and Fire to draw the non-GW crowd and the march of time will erode that audience to the point where PP must react or die.
Da Boss wrote: I cannot go to a shop anywhere within several hundred kilometers of my location and buy warmachine miniatures any more, so I think that might be a pretty major problem. The EU is the worlds biggest single market, and it's richest, if you can't manage to keep your game in stock here then you are not really a big player any more.
AFAIK the comic shop in nuremberg city still sells WM/H stuff.
But it's definitely not as popular as it was some time ago. I still got a cupboard full of WM miniatures that I'm trying to sell, but there is not much interest in privateerpress products in germany anymore...
Nah, if anything is left it is a few clam packs. They put it all on half price, and I took advantage of that to get some Legion, Circle and Minion stuff, but it sold out pretty fast. It is all Dungeons and Dragons miniatures there now.
Runewars went the same way.
Ultra Comix is an awesome shop but they can be pretty ruthless when something is not selling.
Although people have been speculating about the SKU death of the game since Superiority in Mk 1 (or even before, but I wasn't tracking), the game has persisted--and even thrived at times. However, we now live in an age of mass targeted media consumption, and people coming into contact with Warmachine might be dissuaded by these perceptions. The distributor woes, and some dude gakking the bed on GlassDoor last year didn't help either.
What can be done to reverse this perception?
The game thrived ten years ago for many reasons. It has declined massively since five years ago for many others. The old phrase 'there's no smoke without fire' comes to mind.
The real question is should people try to reverse this perception of a 'dying game' in the first place? I mean, if it is on the ropes, blatantly denying this or calling 'fake news' on it helps no one. Or should people be open and honest and be able to discuss the state of the game and the environment it is in?
People can talk in a forum endlessly.. but personally what have you and the local tired to save it? If its a good game, people will feel like they should save it.
A few years back my life changed downward financially so there had to be a number of hobbies that ended up on the chopping block.
Warmahordes was one of them... Not looking back as a bad or good choice.. I did it with magic also..neither of them do I plan to return.
Locally I cant imagine it being anything but extremely healthy, the main stores in town carry it almost exclusively and it is far and away the most common game played. If I didn't have the internet I would think it was GW that was mostly out of business, haven't seen a game of 40k in a store played in years. and AoS only when I bring it myself. I think locality matters.
The remaining Warmahordes products are all in the clearance section of my flgs--50% off. Perhaps more telling is that most of those items have been there a very long time; they simply don't sell even at half off.
As it so happens last night I got a game in, but keeping with the afore mentioned issues some people have with caster kill I played a game with a newer player who hates that aspect so we played using the unbound rules-roughly 50 points(I had to use every single non jack/warcaster model, save the wardog, I had in my small collection), no jacks (unless you have a jack marshal). it was a learning curve since I was using a new unit and he has very few games in. it was fun and he is now planning to tweek his list a bit with his jack marshal/mechanic solo and single jack added to the mix for his crucible guard for our next game.
the guy who normally shows up who has all the objective markers was a no show so we just did a straight up battle.
it looked like this-
Also 3d terrain is awesome. it adds so much more immersion to the feel of the game. I will never use the official 2d terrain.
Get rid of like, most of the Mercenary/Minion Solos,
Also I love my gobber tionker merc solo...I don't want him to go away
greatbigtree wrote: For myself, WMH is just a little too gimmicky. I'm not a big fan of stacking buff upon buff upon buff upon buff upon debuff… just *knowing* all the interactions is taxing.
I enjoy the game, but in a casual way. While I have no problems getting games, I don't care if it's Steamroller or by the book or whatever, I know I don't put as much effort into it as the other folks at the FLGS do, so I tend to get sideswiped pretty easily.
I'm also not into playing with felt pads for forests, or a popsicle stick for a wall... that's a big turn-off for me. I don't mind if minis are partly assembled, or unpainted, or even if the terrain is poorly made and falling apart... but if I wanted to play a 2d game I'd play a video game. I want the 3d element and it is unpopular in my (limited) experience.
I've said it before, but the game could be a fair bit more welcoming to new players, by simplifying the rules into more of a battle game, then skirmish game, and reducing the number of special rules / stacks. One or two buffs at a time is not so bad... 5 or more becomes silly.
Also, get rid of 1/2" measurements. 1" increments are granular enough. Base contact, 1", 2" for melee. Less focus on units blocking their own LOS from each other. Again, more of a battle game than a skirmish.
These are reasons why I got out of warmachine. That and the "if you don't know what opponent's units do inside out some nasty surprise screws you" habit. And with all the units even in early MK2(during which I bowed out)...Ugh. I simply wasn't able to keep up with irregular games here and there plus odd tournament once in a while. Even after 2 years nearly every game yet another new combo appeared that killed my warlord middle of my army or something equally silly.
Boards with their flat 2d terrain also is major turn on.
I can see why some people like it and with similar minded people I'm sure I could enjoy WM but the kind of players here that play it are looking for completely different type of game than I am. Which is fair enough obviously. I'm not claiming they have to change what they play for my sake But I know not to bang my head to the game and ruin enjoyment of their game as well as waste my time.
LunarSol wrote: That, and they need some serious rebundling of old SKUs. There's zero reason by this point not to have faction support packs that contain say.... Krielstone/Runebearer/Whelps or Choir/Vassals/Wracks and the like. Yes, technically Choir are FA:2. Probably a good time to change that.
Sort of like what Wyrd did with their third edition of Malifaux?
Death Marshal Recruiters, Domadores de Cadaveres and The Jury were all separate SKU's, but have now been rolled into the Wake the Dead-box. Of course, Malifaux also added a hard cap to models on top of all that, so you'll never need to buy more than one box, which might be an issue for PP.
LunarSol wrote: That, and they need some serious rebundling of old SKUs. There's zero reason by this point not to have faction support packs that contain say.... Krielstone/Runebearer/Whelps or Choir/Vassals/Wracks and the like. Yes, technically Choir are FA:2. Probably a good time to change that.
Sort of like what Wyrd did with their third edition of Malifaux?
Death Marshal Recruiters, Domadores de Cadaveres and The Jury were all separate SKU's, but have now been rolled into the Wake the Dead-box. Of course, Malifaux also added a hard cap to models on top of all that, so you'll never need to buy more than one box, which might be an issue for PP.
That would go against their theme...theme though. Its also one of the things that really put me off WMH. I don't really want to buy three units of iron fang pikemen for one list that don't fit in anywhere else, especially not at how much PP charge for them. I really liked "open" lists and finding unexpected synergies amd combos, themes basically killed that. I know they changed it recently but its too little too late. I almost bought into Grymkin when they came out and I'm so glad I didn't because I've played maybe one game since their release.
WMH has died out here mostly. The only players now are in Dublin but the main shop has stopped stocking it. Its really a bunch of factors that lead to WMH to be considered as "dying".
On 2/5, War Room will no longer support pre-Oblivion theme forces. Army lists using these older, invalid themes will be deleted at that time. Re-create favorite lists using the new Oblivion themes available now. Also, online multiplayer functionality will no longer be supported. pic.twitter.com/KTn8zS0CSX
On 2/5, War Room will no longer support pre-Oblivion theme forces. Army lists using these older, invalid themes will be deleted at that time. Re-create favorite lists using the new Oblivion themes available now. Also, online multiplayer functionality will no longer be supported. pic.twitter.com/KTn8zS0CSX
No real surprise. The "Oblivion phase" Themes were always meant to completely take over eventually, and they tend to be more favorable to general builds as opposed to the restricted builds towards Jacks, Beasts, or Infantry.
On 2/5, War Room will no longer support pre-Oblivion theme forces. Army lists using these older, invalid themes will be deleted at that time. Re-create favorite lists using the new Oblivion themes available now. Also, online multiplayer functionality will no longer be supported. pic.twitter.com/KTn8zS0CSX
No real surprise. The "Oblivion phase" Themes were always meant to completely take over eventually, and they tend to be more favorable to general builds as opposed to the restricted builds towards Jacks, Beasts, or Infantry.
It’s was in reference to the point that they’re removing functionality from an app that people paid to use
On 2/5, War Room will no longer support pre-Oblivion theme forces. Army lists using these older, invalid themes will be deleted at that time. Re-create favorite lists using the new Oblivion themes available now. Also, online multiplayer functionality will no longer be supported. pic.twitter.com/KTn8zS0CSX
No real surprise. The "Oblivion phase" Themes were always meant to completely take over eventually, and they tend to be more favorable to general builds as opposed to the restricted builds towards Jacks, Beasts, or Infantry.
It’s was in reference to the point that they’re removing functionality from an app that people paid to use
It was never intended to last that long, anyway. And it was more about reducing confusion. Oddly enough, they bothered to take that step instead of doing what Conflict Chamber did (but CC doesn't have you scroll through everything on a Theme before going on to the enxt one).
Kommisar wrote: Online multiplayer functionality wasn't intended to last?
Most of the notes were about the Themes, and it is to that I addressed.
I never was able to get the connectivity function to work, so in my mind, it's not removing functionality, its removing a bug by giving up on a non-functioning feature.
On 2/5, War Room will no longer support pre-Oblivion theme forces. Army lists using these older, invalid themes will be deleted at that time. Re-create favorite lists using the new Oblivion themes available now. Also, online multiplayer functionality will no longer be supported. pic.twitter.com/KTn8zS0CSX
Supporting old themes caused more confusion than any real benefit. People embraced the new system immediately before it was even technically legal.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Oh. The online play. I’ve never heard it working. Even when people have made a connection the battery drain was crippling.
Anecdotally, a lot of people are fed up with the marine meta in 40k in my local area.
Due to the recent power creep Games Workshop has been injecting into 40k and AoS...I think we might see some more new and returning players in 2020.
Also, a lot of our local Warmahordes crowd switched to Infinity. Now that a new edition has been announced (but will not be released for some time) interest in playing has waned a bit as people wait for changes.
Personally, I have shelved my Convergence army, but have also started to pick up Monsterpocalypse.
It could be a good year for PP, or Neo-Warcaster may fall on its face.
I'm hopeful, but wouldn't invest right now even if I had the funds. At most I'd continue with my current collections, with a possible MonPoc development. Only problem is my LGS is poor on PP product, while my old LGS is going decently strong with it.
The local Warmahordes scene hasnt recovered from the launch of MK3. No more Saturday events with 15-20 people. I could get a pick up game any night of the week. It was because players said every single week "The game is dying"
Months and months of 4~ players showing reguarlly on one specific night sort of killed it for me. That and the lack of painting being enforced in all events.
The gamesworkshop skirmish games, xwing, and guildball/small set games took over.
The gamesworkshop skirmish games, xwing, and guildball/small set games took over.
I still play, but I don't think I could go back to playing a single system week after week like I did during the height of MK2. It's just so much more enjoyable to be able to wander away and play something new and fresh when the game or my army gets stale.
i got the same way with 40K playing 3+ games every saturday, well it also helped that when 6th ed dropped it was so bad that it killed 40K at the FLGS...... now WM is just one of several games i bring to game night so i can enjoy a bunch of things.
My theory is that by positioning Warmachine as a “perfect” competitive game, when they slipped a bit, the players looking for that play experience moved on. In my local experience, they went to Malifaux, Guildball, X-Wing and Bushido.
For me, who was actively driven away by competitive play wiping out the narrative appeal, the edition changes meant a year or so of nothing new. Now, when I play, there’s no immersion. 40k, Infinity, X-Wing all feel like battles. Warmachine ... is just pushing models around.
At least their re-release of Monsterpocalypse is an attempt at diversifying, as was Level 7. I suppose Riot Quest and this new sci fi game are too.
What got me into the game was the idea of 40k dreadnought being able to do something else besides move and shoot. I loved the fact the cards had different actions the warjack could make,
Then 40 other designs came out with certain special units that could wipe the board no matter what you took. Getting curb-stomped every game got me to stop playing, I don't need to win every game,
but never winning and always getting almost tabled every time because I didn't play regularly was the big cause of me leaving the game. Plus I only like about twenty percent of the design
of the miniatures. Some look very nice while most are not good looking.
When company creates so many separate games while being so small, you can see writing on a wall. It would require for far bigger company to properly support all these games and lack of support simply means that people get bored with a game and simply move on.
Games needs some maturing also. Wiki is full of errors. Setting and gameplay do not match. For example, Retribution is supposed to be this "elite" army, because elves are dying out. On tabletop they are all, but that. They have elite ninja cadre, but most of their units are quite average performing. Their riflemen do not reflect their extensive training and use of heavy rifles. Their bonuses and statline sucks. Hallberdeers or their warjacks simply do not give me this super advanced, elite army who is dying out feeling. All their stuff is not better than that of other factions. In fact it is worse, because of broken design, making Arcanists so incredibly powerful that every other warjack had to have gakky POW on their own. Furthermore, they are quite fragile and poor shots for supposedly elite army and their field mechanic often feels more than a gimmick than an important part of their gameplay. Nobody simply cared to mature this game where it feels right. Not to mention issue of immense alphas, point denial from gameplay perspective. There are a lot of units who have blatant balance issues of either being too important not to take if you can or being unbalanced both from points perspective and from narrative/gameplay side by lacking solid vision of what they should represent.
Ernestas wrote: When company creates so many separate games while being so small, you can see writing on a wall. It would require for far bigger company to properly support all these games and lack of support simply means that people get bored with a game and simply move on.
Actually so far PP is doing ok - Warmachine/Hordes are still getting releases; Monster Apoc is doing well; their MiniCrate seems to be doing well (its now up to 3 models a month) and their new game is going to be started with a KS.
They are a long way form what we saw with a company like Spartan Games where, for a few years as things got rough toward the end; they were launching lots of new games whilst having existing games without new content for a long while and missed release deadlines and things that were announced that never appeared or get forever delayed without warning.
Certainly PP isn't as healthy as it was nor as big, but I don't think they are near the doors closing.
GW fanboys gleefully running around going "DEAD GAME, DEAD GAME! TEHEHEHEHE!" probably doesn't help that online perception either I imagine.
Warcaster I think will probably be a sink-or-swim situation though. If it does well, I could see them shift gears out of Warmahordes almost completely. If it sinks I still think Warmahordes will plod along at a reduced rate, but won't be taken out back, just be less favoured compared to something like MonPoc.
I think the knowing the opponent's army or you get hit by a nasty surprise became an increasing issue as the number of factions, casters and combos increased.
Themes making 80%+ of the product on the shelf unpurchasable for a game focused so heavily on competitive play was probably the final nail in the coffin for a lot of stores that were already seeing declining sales. And when you see everything for a game discounted at 50-75% off retail in multiple stores in multiple cities across the world I think it's pretty clear just what the health of the game is like.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also is Monsterpocalypse dead too? When I go to the website news section the latest item is from September of 2018.
Is Privateer really down to just ongoing Warcaster Kickstarters or bust?
Is Privateer really down to just ongoing Warcaster Kickstarters or bust?
PP is having a lot of issues with the current state of distribution. They're pushing the Kickstarter as a way to use direct distribution to build up a playerbase, but my understanding is the game will still get regular distribution releases; PP just doesn't believe that is enough to seed a healthy community currently.
Is Privateer really down to just ongoing Warcaster Kickstarters or bust?
PP is having a lot of issues with the current state of distribution. They're pushing the Kickstarter as a way to use direct distribution to build up a playerbase, but my understanding is the game will still get regular distribution releases; PP just doesn't believe that is enough to seed a healthy community currently.
At least that’s the narrative we’re being told anyways.
Whether that’s actually true or not is what I’d question.
It sounds to me like they don’t have the capital to fund the start up themselves, and that’s why they are on KS with a Warcaster.
To me it looks more like they need funding to try something new because they just don’t have the means to anymore.
I personally don’t think it matters either way.
Starting a new miniatures game isn’t cheap, nor easy these days. There’s no reason why they shouldn’t use KS for marketing purposes. It’s where most of my big purchases are made these days anyway.
I just question the reasoning, as it seems that they aren’t making as much capital for reinvestment.
One disadvantage of the KS model is that it will be difficult to find other players to actually game against, unless one either buys several factions to introduce others to, or can convince others to back at this early stage. It will be unlikely that many 'pick-up', casual games will occur at local games stores, which will limit playability and access to impulse purchases. Not convinced by the longevity of Warmahordes 40K because of this.
Eh Ks is no better nor worse than any other kind of distribution for that. You've always got to work at it to get a local group going no matter if a game goes through KS or just appears one day on the list of games the distributor sells to retail outlets.
If anything KS actually works better because it draws a huge amount of online marketing together around a focused platform that maintains (when properly run of course) activity and interest for a prolonged period. PP is even working it well by running short KS campaigns with short target release windows. So come the mid-summer PP will be advertising and the game will be out on retail pretty soon after you get your pledges.
A lot of KS fail because they complete the Ks, but then take a long while getting from that point to the retail release - not often helped by them missing their original release window by considerable periods of time. So the game stalls on its own marketing.
PP likely won't have those issues. Plus any release delay won't impact the duration between KS release and commercial release.
In the end yes if you are the only person that buys into it locally you will have to work to get a local group going. PPs' PG system shows that even one locally interested person can turn things around and, with the right motivation and methods, can make a game locally popular. It does take time and effort and yes if you are the only one locally buying into it you want to get two forces so you can do demo games. You've got to sell a game to your local community if you want it to take off. That's no different if it was released through KS or any other distribution method.
Overread wrote: Eh Ks is no better nor worse than any other kind of distribution for that. You've always got to work at it to get a local group going no matter if a game goes through KS or just appears one day on the list of games the distributor sells to retail outlets.
If anything KS actually works better because it draws a huge amount of online marketing together around a focused platform that maintains (when properly run of course) activity and interest for a prolonged period. PP is even working it well by running short KS campaigns with short target release windows. So come the mid-summer PP will be advertising and the game will be out on retail pretty soon after you get your pledges.
A lot of KS fail because they complete the Ks, but then take a long while getting from that point to the retail release - not often helped by them missing their original release window by considerable periods of time. So the game stalls on its own marketing.
PP likely won't have those issues. Plus any release delay won't impact the duration between KS release and commercial release.
In the end yes if you are the only person that buys into it locally you will have to work to get a local group going. PPs' PG system shows that even one locally interested person can turn things around and, with the right motivation and methods, can make a game locally popular. It does take time and effort and yes if you are the only one locally buying into it you want to get two forces so you can do demo games. You've got to sell a game to your local community if you want it to take off. That's no different if it was released through KS or any other distribution method.
The downside is, however, that a lot of retailers won't necessarily stock this because of the fact it was available via KS, meaning a lot of their possible/potential customers will already have it. I know, if I were managing a retail store, I'd not be taking the risk of having this on the shelf where there's a high risk of it not selling, compared to other items that I know usually would.
So im a big Dum Dum.
How exactly do you have such a problem getting product from manufacturers? and how is it to companies allow these distribution problems to Occur?
When I approached stores in my area I was politely rebuffed, with the common (and reasonable) explanation that they wanted to sell stuff that they were sure was going to sell. Probably depends on the store and the manager's instinct regarding the game and the tastes of the local area.
There's a board game cafe in my town as well, where it's really useful to try out these games without committing.
hotsauceman1 wrote: So im a big Dum Dum.
How exactly do you have such a problem getting product from manufacturers? and how is it to companies allow these distribution problems to Occur?
This is a huge concept with a whole bunch of logistics and scenarios that my little TLDR here is just going to scratch, so don't take this as the big picture but just kind of an idea of what's going on.
Manufacturer > Distributor > Retailer > Customer (with manufacturing often outsourced so there's another link the supply chain above what I'm doing here)
You buy from a retailer, the retailer buys from the distributor, the distributor buys from the manufacturer. You have a budget you spend on games, the retailer has a budget that THEY spend on games, the distributor also has a budget they spend on games. Their business depends on selling enough of what they buy to recoup the expense and have enough to buy more and whatever is left pays for food on the table. Manufacturers have to convince distributors to buy their product, often by proving theirs a market for it at the retail level, who will only buy it if they believe their customers want it.
Right now, there's just so much being produced that distributors can't really afford to stock it all or at the very least, don't really care if they're meeting demand. It hurts to understock something like, say Looncurse, but even if you order more, by the time you can supply it the customers have moved on to say... the Sisters boxset. Selling through your stock is what matters; stock that sits on shelves or in warehouses will likely never sell, or at least not much above cost, so its at best breaking even, and realistically a loss. Minis are kind of a horrible product to this end. Their business model revolves around being evergreen, manufactured in bulk, and sitting at a distribution center until a new player picks up the game and buys a huge lot of the stuff. This lead to a lot of distributors getting into the business of direct sales and wholesale discounts through online stores, which devalues the product at retail, which makes it essentially not profitable for stores to carry. They're really only competitive the first week or two of sales when convenience and loyalty trumps price. If you don't sell it in the first couple of weeks, the likelihood of finding a customer for it drops to the point where you might as well assume its a loss.
The thing to realize is this is a problem more or less industry wide. It's not a matter of one game system over another; its minis games as a whole vs other product lines like board games, card games and other products that have a higher rate of churn. That's why even GW has gone to more of a big bang release system where much of their product is sold through limited edition box sets designed to sell out on day one and quickly be replaced by the next big thing. Minis games as a whole are struggling to compete for warehouse space at distributors, who just don't want to go through the hassle of managing large, ever growing SKU catalogs of stuff that takes up a ton of space with unpredictable demand. It's smarter business to stock the 3-4 SKUs worth of Magic cards available at any given time and sell boxes of blind packs that are universally applicable to every Magic player there is. Trying to manage how many Dakaars the Skorne community in Wisconsin needs is way outside that level of knowledge.
I think there's another aspect, which is that a lot of physical retail stores are finding it harder and harder to earn their keep. Furthermore the sites many are in are often getting smaller and smaller as the costs keep going up. I've seen some geeky stores even in pretty affluent UK towns where the shops are tiny - hardly room to swing a kitten, let alone a cat.
The result is a double hit that they have so little space that stocking a wide variety of games like wargames is really impractical unless the store owner likes one or two lines specifically; furthermore with increased overheads and online stores stealing more sales; it means that they often don't want to stock much anyway. Making them less reliable to stock a large full game so that even if they do get local demand its haphazard in nature.
I think it creates a system that often runs at the store end with them ordering direct from the distributor for what the local club wants; which means if one thing gets popular it gets a stock run and the distributor runs out.
Of course there's also the handful of retailers that struck it big; getting physical locations they could afford and grow into major local gaming centres and getting online early and well enough that they secured a good online distribution network to customers - helping them overcome their costs.
My local store is pretty big, I think they sold off their PP stuff because people stopped playing the games.
In the UK the problem is the insane rents for everything, very difficult for small business owners.
Taking a punt on a system that goes under is a disaster for a business that size so they tend to be conservative and go for what they know will reliably generate profit. That used to be PP games when the games were more popular, now it definitely seems to be dungeons and dragons and GW stuff.
And against it all is MTG offering cheap products with a very small shelf impact which have a huge number of accessories* and a high turn over of product. With play modes that encourage playing (booster draft); regular release events (at least three or for major ones a year); easy tournament building (all you need is a few tables and chairs - no terrain, boards, dice).
In the space that perhaps two big starting boxed sets for a Warhammer game go you can fit multiple boxes of boosters of several MTG editions. In the space of one GW small carry case (accessory) you can display several binders, deck protectors etc.....
*accessories in many markets are often very cheap to buy and marked up to make profits
Warcaster seems designed to give a lot of stuff more shelf life though.
Instead of a single box being like having a single magic card take up an entire box on the shelf, even after it's outdated.
A lot of Warcaster's core systems promote slipping things in and out of your lists. If they need to breathe new life into a unit, a new unit attachment means that it can now soft counter something new, while still having all the other benefits of its other attachments available at all times.
Then the jacks, instead of just buying 1, maybe two of each you can customize them a lot, even if you magnetize it's worth getting more than one. Then there's all the weapon upgrades.
Gameplay-wise those changes are great for making the game more dynamic, even though like in 40K and similar games, a meta of certain builds will develop.
I'd say that around here the "memory" of Warmahordes isn't terribly healthy. While it still exists...everyone always refers to Warmarhordes as a game that used to exist.
"Remember back when we played Warmachine..."
"Remember back in Warmachine when you..."
"Back when Warmachine was out..." etc.
Both the older group I game with (generally 50+) and the younger group (predominantly mid-20's), Warmachine just isn't a thing, and both of these groups would be target consumers for a game like Warmachine. It's just as if it doesn't exist anymore. It's taken on a bit of Battletech vibe...as people are almost shocked when someone is playing it. "Oh, you still play Warmachine?" much in the way I see people refer to Battletech "Wait, like that game from the 80's or 90's?" etc.
Now, is my area or my playgroups indicative of anything? Possibly no, but if there are more areas like mine, it would be bad news for Privateer Press. The entire "Oh that old thing?" vibe is pretty damning of its condition.
A little addendum, as somebody familiar with the store side. GW is just as bad as anybody else. to justify distribution to non GW retailers they require a set amount of minimum purchase value and then often turn around and open GW official retail locations in close proximity to the FLGS that are already selling their product. creating negative sales pressure on the non GW enterprise. then if items do not move off the shelves rather it is WM or GW it becomes overhead cost for the FLGS.
It is one of the many reasons like those listed previously that the old supply chain model has been eclipsed by newer technology making direct sales much more viable. this is what has turned companies like amazon into the powerhouses that they are. it removes loads of costs related to retail locations -building maintenance, rent, utilities, business licenses, employees, advertising, etc..... that all cut into the overall profitability.
locally I see nothing that would indicate that warmahordes is a dying game at all. I see warmahordes and monpoc all the time, not sure where this "Dying game" idea is coming from. Not being top tier doesnt mean dying.
Bloviator wrote: I was reading a review of Riot Quest on boardgamegeek (because I googled Riot Quest hoping to see something newer than 4 months old), and while it was a glowing review of Riot Quest, I've been dwelling on this last line: "Lastly, these figs are compatible with WarmaHordes. (To which I say, nice, but ultimately those games are dying so not a huge selling point.)"
This isn't the only place I see this term. It pops up in my meta's discord--albeit ironically at times, as well as other places online. The way Warmachine is mentioned in passing on GMG Let's Talk also indicates that there is a pervasive belief that Warmachine is a dying game.
Although people have been speculating about the SKU death of the game since Superiority in Mk 1 (or even before, but I wasn't tracking), the game has persisted--and even thrived at times. However, we now live in an age of mass targeted media consumption, and people coming into contact with Warmachine might be dissuaded by these perceptions. The distributor woes, and some dude gakking the bed on GlassDoor last year didn't help either.
What can be done to reverse this perception?
Warmachine is not a dying game. Like most games, Mantic, Wyrd, Infinity, 8th dropping and sucking alot of oxygen out of the room shrank its market, but those areas would have shrank to begin with. Each game still exists because they have a dedicated core, to be far, when interest in 7th 40k started dying GW was staying afloat because of the same thing.
There are also other markets that Warmachine does very well in but GW doesn't, like Latin America. This is due to PP's location, NAFTA, there is a benefit to selling in the Americas as a whole that GW doesn't experience (expect Brexit and C-19 to shape the market as well).
Beyond that doe, the biggest reason why PP is seen as "dying" rather than shrinking by GMG and other retailer markets is that PP is moving away from distributors to be a direct partner with retailers. Of course, alot of retailers are resistant, some of this is due to habit and another is that distributors would overbloat the market by ordering on some figs (and selling them at a step discount due to ordering in bulk) and then sometimes straight up lying (by telling retailers certain figs were out of order even though PP had a warehouse full of them, it was just that the distributors only wanted to order in bulk).
These practices didn't affect large corps like GW, WoTC, and FFG that have huge distribution chains, but these practices really hurt smaller companies in the market the PP, Wyrd, And Corvus Belle, because when you run a small business, having tight analytics is KEY. You have to know what is really selling, not what is being ordered through distributors orders with sales that may or may not be real.
Honestly though, I think retailers will eventually turn around. Through direct order, some retailers who are participating as partners with PP and other smaller game companies rather than ordering product through distributors, and direct order systems like KS and Amazon, there will just no longer be a cost benefit for going through standard distribution chains.
thekingofkings wrote: locally I see nothing that would indicate that warmahordes is a dying game at all. I see warmahordes and monpoc all the time, not sure where this "Dying game" idea is coming from. Not being top tier doesnt mean dying.
I think alot of it comes from store just not stocking it that much.
I know for my group(I use that loosely, more like my local people who play wargames) believe if it is no longer being stocked, its not worth the effort to get into it because you have to go out of your way to buy them.
thekingofkings wrote: locally I see nothing that would indicate that warmahordes is a dying game at all. I see warmahordes and monpoc all the time, not sure where this "Dying game" idea is coming from. Not being top tier doesnt mean dying.
I think alot of it comes from store just not stocking it that much.
I know for my group(I use that loosely, more like my local people who play wargames) believe if it is no longer being stocked, its not worth the effort to get into it because you have to go out of your way to buy them.
That has to be regional, our stores are very very well stocked with PP (monpoc, RQ and Warmahordes) among other games, for 40k or AoS you pretty much have 2 choices to go to and one of them is the GW.
I think the singlest greatest blow to Warmachine was their drop of community programs. Without someone advertising game through demos, beginner matches, etc. you simply can't attract enough people to fill spots of people who are leaving. When person enters into a hobby store, they have a million of other options to go for. Chances are that they are going to play that is most advertised on shell space like Warhammer or what has a strong IP like Star Wars. We have store clerks who are passionate Warmachine gamers and they themselves make Warmachine the strongest game in our city through free work they do in advertising their game to others.
Also, second hand market often is a good indicator of how well something is doing. Warhammer auctions on ebay always sells boxes for respectful price. Warmachine on the other hand goes for a lot steeper discounts and often, even few bucks for painted solo is too much to ask.
That's true of any game system. lets face the fact this is a niche market. we may love miniature wargaming but the vast majority of the public purchasing customer base is spending their money on other things entertainment wise-video games, pro sports etc.... forming a much larger market.
Then consider everything that is available in just this little niche market
warmachine, warhammer 40K , battletech, infinity, flames of war, victory at sea, DUST, heavy gear, riot quest, monpoc, bolt action, beyond the games of antares, Xwing, SW armada, SW legion, star trek attack wing, hero clix, malifuax, konflict 47, AOS, kings of war, warpath, DBA, drop zone/drop fleet commander, all quiet on the martian front, wings of war, blood bowl....and the list goes on.
Many times people don't even know many of these games exist even within the gaming community because they are so overshadowed by a few well known titles that have strong corporate support or there is nobody around that actively plays and supports them, or does so in a welcoming and supportive manner.
The hobby is great fun and good social activity, but without people to play with there is no real incentive to do more than get your modeling fix with a few display pieces
Yup. wargaming is a niche market, small even compared to model market. Though, I would say that when you are within that market, you especially have to be concerned with marketing and promotion. Only big names within that market like Warhammer or Star Wars can trust in their IP to do marketing for them. Small names like Warmachine will rarely attract anyone interested. They have far less shell space to attract attention and they do not look exceptionally great compared to other offerings. Company has to constantly try to market their game in clever ways in order for it to succeed. As for now, I do not see anything done from those companies in that regard and any game is rather niche affair, meant only for those people who are already into the genre.
In Lithuania, a lot of games were pretty much dead meaning that several people only actively playing them. When they did advertisement for their games, interest grew by several hundred percent. Communities who are not concerned about attracting new people like Warhammer and Star Wars are actually least popular games out here. Games who are like Warmachine are the most popular games.
thekingofkings wrote: locally I see nothing that would indicate that warmahordes is a dying game at all. I see warmahordes and monpoc all the time, not sure where this "Dying game" idea is coming from. Not being top tier doesnt mean dying.
I think alot of it comes from store just not stocking it that much.
I know for my group(I use that loosely, more like my local people who play wargames) believe if it is no longer being stocked, its not worth the effort to get into it because you have to go out of your way to buy them.
That has to be regional, our stores are very very well stocked with PP (monpoc, RQ and Warmahordes) among other games, for 40k or AoS you pretty much have 2 choices to go to and one of them is the GW.
Well, the alternative is that the regional outlier is 'your stores,' not everyone else's
My local stores, sadly, fall into the "don't stock PP stuff" category. However, about three hours away, the city there stocks TONS of PP stuff. I think it just depends on what your local meta looks like. Everyone looks at their meta and says, "Well the game is [healthy/dying] based on my observations" when none of us has the full picture.
It's not just market, but I think if your local store wants to grow its market. The PG system showed that a single person with a vested interest and time could help make a game popular and promote it.
If a store owner wants it to work they've got a greater chance to make it happen provided they've the customers and the will, resources and drive to get more.
Similarly if a local store isn't that bothered or doesn't want the game (wanting something else) they can also work against it. We've more than a few stories of stores unfriendly to wargamers in general and who favoured MTG and other card games instead. Or who had only one game they wanted (eg 40K) at the detriment to other groups.
Sometimes its simply a matter of economics and the store just hasn't got the spare income to invest into promoting the line; or they see such a greater return on other product lines that its hard for them to justify taking and resources away from what is earning; to push something that might earn, but will earn less for them.
It probably doesn't help that a lot of geeky stores that I've seen, don't have all that many staff. When you've only one or two staff its hard to focus on lots of games and lots of product lines because the staff might not find time to promote and retail and support it all to the same degree.
thekingofkings wrote: locally I see nothing that would indicate that warmahordes is a dying game at all. I see warmahordes and monpoc all the time, not sure where this "Dying game" idea is coming from. Not being top tier doesnt mean dying.
I think alot of it comes from store just not stocking it that much.
I know for my group(I use that loosely, more like my local people who play wargames) believe if it is no longer being stocked, its not worth the effort to get into it because you have to go out of your way to buy them.
That has to be regional, our stores are very very well stocked with PP (monpoc, RQ and Warmahordes) among other games, for 40k or AoS you pretty much have 2 choices to go to and one of them is the GW.
Well, the alternative is that the regional outlier is 'your stores,' not everyone else's
your missing the point. Everything is "regional". whats popular one place is not necessarily popular in others.
True that. classic battletech is still huge in my area. got several people hooked on it who moved back to their home states (lots of military stationed nearby) that found nobody there played it.
That leads back to the topic of press gangers and community building. if you love a game system and you want it to thrive you must share it. i personally have bought classic battltech minis for new players. along with entire epic scale 40K armies and even some DUST units to help other players get started. That's in addition to the multiple armies i always have with me to teach people how to play things like DUST and the B5 wars system(especially for use in star wars and star trek).
When it comes to WM i only have my khador army, but i am more than willing to talk shop about how the game works, factions and models with interested parties.
your missing the point. Everything is "regional". whats popular one place is not necessarily popular in others.
This is very true and also something I wish more people were aware of when they talk about if something is dead or huge or not.
Our local eco systems do not reflect the overall global health of a game, rather just the local eco system.
I have had people in my own city with five different game stores post on forums that a game is dead everywhere, when 20 minutes down the road it was huge at the other store.
However to them since it was dead at their store, it was dead everywhere. And they were voicing that to the world which is massive misinformation.
I have a friend that just moved to a much larger city that I know has a large playgroup. He insists its dead because he refuses to use any of the social media tools the coordinate with. He switched to 40k, but 40k is dead too for the same reason....
LunarSol wrote: I have a friend that just moved to a much larger city that I know has a large playgroup. He insists its dead because he refuses to use any of the social media tools the coordinate with. He switched to 40k, but 40k is dead too for the same reason....
"There are none so blind as those who will not see."
thekingofkings wrote: locally I see nothing that would indicate that warmahordes is a dying game at all. I see warmahordes and monpoc all the time, not sure where this "Dying game" idea is coming from. Not being top tier doesnt mean dying.
I think alot of it comes from store just not stocking it that much.
I know for my group(I use that loosely, more like my local people who play wargames) believe if it is no longer being stocked, its not worth the effort to get into it because you have to go out of your way to buy them.
That has to be regional, our stores are very very well stocked with PP (monpoc, RQ and Warmahordes) among other games, for 40k or AoS you pretty much have 2 choices to go to and one of them is the GW.
Well, the alternative is that the regional outlier is 'your stores,' not everyone else's
your missing the point. Everything is "regional". whats popular one place is not necessarily popular in others.
Ah. I hadn't realize that was your point. All you said was it wasn't dead because in your local area it isn't, which trumped hotsauceman1's local experience.
I think there is another factor.
For a time, Warmachine really muscled in on territory that was GWs for quite a bit. They where stealing players from them, with quite a few who did leave being very vocal opponents of GW. They where top dog for quite a bit. But then they got Icarused and fell from grace hard. There are other games that came and went, DZC, Infinity, Relic Blades, tons. But none that had the appearence of WM/H. so their fall was very public and very noticeable.
It is worth remembering that Warmachine/Hordes big surge was during a very dark period for GW. A lot of GW's customers at that time had grown weary of GW for many reasons and wanted something new and fresh. PP's products were just that, so at the time PP had a very willing market to sell to. It was all about perfect timing.
I honestly think that PP made a few miss steps with how they handled their flagship products, and those miss steps coincide with GW getting their act together. So it was a bit of a perfect storm, and sadly PP haven't been able to regain what they once had.
If I had enough money I'd buy one of each of their battle group boxrs, and do demo games with them. That level is where I think the game should be focused on, the hobby seems to be going through a phase of wanting quick skirmish games that can be played on a coffee table. PP have a product that is perfect for that.
stonehorse wrote: It is worth remembering that Warmachine/Hordes big surge was during a very dark period for GW. A lot of GW's customers at that time had grown weary of GW for many reasons and wanted something new and fresh. PP's products were just that, so at the time PP had a very willing market to sell to. It was all about perfect timing.
I honestly think that PP made a few miss steps with how they handled their flagship products, and those miss steps coincide with GW getting their act together. So it was a bit of a perfect storm, and sadly PP haven't been able to regain what they once had.
If I had enough money I'd buy one of each of their battle group boxes, and do demo games with them. That level is where I think the game should be focused on, the hobby seems to be going through a phase of wanting quick skirmish games that can be played on a coffee table. PP have a product that is perfect for that.
I think you're on the money when it comes to 'quick skirmish games.' I want the satisfaction of playing a Warhammer 40k game, but I don't have the patience for 2+ hours per game at the moment to get that hit.
stonehorse wrote: It is worth remembering that Warmachine/Hordes big surge was during a very dark period for GW. A lot of GW's customers at that time had grown weary of GW for many reasons and wanted something new and fresh. PP's products were just that, so at the time PP had a very willing market to sell to. It was all about perfect timing.
I honestly think that PP made a few miss steps with how they handled their flagship products, and those miss steps coincide with GW getting their act together. So it was a bit of a perfect storm, and sadly PP haven't been able to regain what they once had.
If I had enough money I'd buy one of each of their battle group boxes, and do demo games with them. That level is where I think the game should be focused on, the hobby seems to be going through a phase of wanting quick skirmish games that can be played on a coffee table. PP have a product that is perfect for that.
I think you're on the money when it comes to 'quick skirmish games.' I want the satisfaction of playing a Warhammer 40k game, but I don't have the patience for 2+ hours per game at the moment to get that hit.
I'd put money on it being due to in the 90's there was a big increase in popularity of the hobby, mainly from teenagers. Now those teenagers are grown ups with families and life commitments, so can't devote as much of their free time. I've gone from several long miniature games every week, to maybe one a month... I just don't have the freedom of time anymore.
There's no doubt a number of the big podcasts and tournament stars got married or had their first kid around the launch of MK3. I certainly ran into that problem myself in terms of being able to regular demo and run events for the game.
There's also the issue with growing a product like this, and how after a while you either run out of room to expand horizontally or you need a new product.
Nurglitch wrote: There's also the issue with growing a product like this, and how after a while you either run out of room to expand horizontally or you need a new product.
Go go back and re-imagine what you already made. That's one trick GW has used for years and years. Whilst they expand armies outward as well, they've also spent years revisiting old models and re-releasing them in new designs. Of course one thing that lets them do this is because they continually advance their sculpting and casting options. Many smaller firms can only increase the former in-house whilst the latter can be much harder to improve when you have to hire and outside firm who might not have high quality models as their bread and butter earner or focus.
Still PP could easily start going back to first generation models and releasing new updated sculpts. Some are what, 10 years old? A new updated Warpwolf would likely be able to take advantages of shifts in their design ethos and skill even if its still cast in the very same metal.
Nurglitch wrote: There's also the issue with growing a product like this, and how after a while you either run out of room to expand horizontally or you need a new product.
Go go back and re-imagine what you already made. That's one trick GW has used for years and years. Whilst they expand armies outward as well, they've also spent years revisiting old models and re-releasing them in new designs. Of course one thing that lets them do this is because they continually advance their sculpting and casting options. Many smaller firms can only increase the former in-house whilst the latter can be much harder to improve when you have to hire and outside firm who might not have high quality models as their bread and butter earner or focus.
Still PP could easily start going back to first generation models and releasing new updated sculpts. Some are what, 10 years old? A new updated Warpwolf would likely be able to take advantages of shifts in their design ethos and skill even if its still cast in the very same metal.
I think the question, which is why they're still casting in resin and metal, is how many Warpwolfs can you sell? I suspect they can't sell enough to justify the cost of plastic tooling,etc. Monsterpocalypse and Grind were their attempts, as I understand it (and probably not terribly well) at mass market products, and given that the former has been rolled back to metal/resin that seems like it indicates they're inclined to cater to their existing fans rather than try to expand non-organically. I think some of the success of GW over the years has been that word-of-mouth expansion that grew the customers enough to both expand and redo their ranges.
The problem for companies "Not GW" is that they need mass sales to make plastic work; however the modern market sort of wants plastic before it will gain mass appeal.
You can see a problem there.
Furthermore because GW sets a very high bar for plastics the bar for any company following into plastics has to be high too.
Some companies get around it by using Kickstarter, however that comes with its own rafter of risks including that you oversaturate your own market for a long period after the KS ends. You can also end up trapped in a KS pattern where you gain lots of customers who only want to spend at KS prices not at retail prices.
Or you end up trapped needing a second KS to fund the first etc... ergo you end up locked into using KS over and over.
Or you can end up with a factory that doesn't work great first time around and suddenly you've got to find a second or third one and the KS runs over budget and drains your resources.
PP might have the best approach in keeping their production in-house and perhaps working toward steady purchase of plastic casting equipment. Of course then they need highly skilled people to operate them and still mass sales to make it work. It's tough, esp as its only got more expensive ove the year; the competition has grown stronger and GW keeps pushing the bar higher.
At my LGS it was very noticeable when WM/H tapered off.
The week after the PG program ended the local (former) PG had the WM/H crowd playing Guildball. Few weeks later and the suddenly anemic WM/H section was emptied out and the shelf space was taken over by the now expanded 40K section.
You’d see more people there playing BattleTech or historicals after that.
So, given the market conditions we've discussed, what was so appealing about MkII that wasn't appealing about MkIII. Warmahordes isn't something I was interested in playing, but I am interested in what is appealing about it to other people.
At the time of MK2 its rules clarity and resource management made it a stand out game in terms of making player decisions more impactful than dice rolls. That's still very much the case, but its also something that's become something of the baseline for a new game since its release. The whole era of "MK2" with things like Malifaux M2E, Infinity N2/N3 and the like were about taking their original rules and rewriting them in a keyword driven style similar to what made Warmachine stand out initially. Even much of the success of 8th edition involves elements of Warmachine's appeal, though I think that's more a sign that those elements have become the norm than anything.
I think whats happened (not quite) locally highlights the impact of the loss of the PG program was
The game was pretty much dead in these parts until one chap took it upon himself to start cheerleading for it on our local FB game page
Managed to get it going again and had already had a few Steamroller days with passable turn-outs with more planned, sadly the blessing of Papa Nurgle has derailed it for the time being
LunarSol wrote: At the time of MK2 its rules clarity and resource management made it a stand out game in terms of making player decisions more impactful than dice rolls. That's still very much the case, but its also something that's become something of the baseline for a new game since its release. The whole era of "MK2" with things like Malifaux M2E, Infinity N2/N3 and the like were about taking their original rules and rewriting them in a keyword driven style similar to what made Warmachine stand out initially. Even much of the success of 8th edition involves elements of Warmachine's appeal, though I think that's more a sign that those elements have become the norm than anything.
There's a lot to be said about games one can actually play. What about the actual game though? Does it do anything you can't get elsewhere, or was it just easier to play than what was/is available?
The big appeal of Warmachine has always been rule clarity, both in the wording and PPs efforts to ensure consistent rulings. It creates a game where the rules are a universal language, capable of showing up anywhere with your stuff and having the same experience.
As for the game itself, there's a number of things it does really well. I'd say its probably the closest approximation of the appeal of American Football out there. It drives a great clash in the center where battlelines are as much about blocking physical space as attacking one another. Your turn feels similar to a football play with certain units tasked with creating holes in the enemy lines, others passing buffs to key pieces you use the combined efforts to take out a key piece. A caster assassination has the thrill of a QB sack, while winning on scenario often feels like you've driven the enemy back to the end zone.
All said and done, Warmachine is still my favorite mass battle game. I can't think of anything where I'm running 30 or more models on the table I'd prefer to play. Honestly, the main drawback to it for me now is just that I prefer games in the 5-15 model count on my terrain heavy boards.
LunarSol wrote: As for the game itself, there's a number of things it does really well. I'd say its probably the closest approximation of the appeal of American Football out there. It drives a great clash in the center where battlelines are as much about blocking physical space as attacking one another. Your turn feels similar to a football play with certain units tasked with creating holes in the enemy lines, others passing buffs to key pieces you use the combined efforts to take out a key piece. A caster assassination has the thrill of a QB sack, while winning on scenario often feels like you've driven the enemy back to the end zone.
Nurglitch wrote: So, given the market conditions we've discussed, what was so appealing about MkII that wasn't appealing about MkIII. Warmahordes isn't something I was interested in playing, but I am interested in what is appealing about it to other people.
I liked warmachine originally because it was a mix of chess and board/card game mechanics like resource management. It was generally a great game in their steamroller format at tournaments and conventions. It wasn't nearly as interesting in a casual format.
MKIII however made a lot of core rules changes that I didn't like. For instance I never liked theme lists in MKII and MKIII made them stronger so you basically always wanted to play in theme.
Though the bigger issue with warmahordes and why I don't play MKIII much anymore is the game feels both bloated and stale. I am just kind of bored of it at this point.
There is definitely something to the simple truth that by the time MK3 came around, we had all played a LOT of games and MK3 didn't significantly change things up. I really enjoyed the change to MK3, simply because big stompy robots were finally fun to play, but its not something that significantly changed the experience.
There is definitely something to the simple truth that by the time MK3 came around, we had all played a LOT of games and MK3 didn't significantly change things up. I really enjoyed the change to MK3, simply because big stompy robots were finally fun to play, but its not something that significantly changed the experience.
I would agree with that. It also didn't help that one of factions that I primarily played was skorne which sucked pretty hard after MKIII dropped.
Nurglitch wrote: So, given the market conditions we've discussed, what was so appealing about MkII that wasn't appealing about MkIII. Warmahordes isn't something I was interested in playing, but I am interested in what is appealing about it to other people.
I liked warmachine originally because it was a mix of chess and board/card game mechanics like resource management. It was generally a great game in their steamroller format at tournaments and conventions. It wasn't nearly as interesting in a casual format.
MKIII however made a lot of core rules changes that I didn't like. For instance I never liked theme lists in MKII and MKIII made them stronger so you basically always wanted to play in theme.
Though the bigger issue with warmahordes and why I don't play MKIII much anymore is the game feels both bloated and stale. I am just kind of bored of it at this point.
See i am the opposite. i looked at WM in MKI and just could not get into it, i opted for infinity instead. i love MKIII for the most part, but then again i never play steamroller and much prefer casual games with 3d terrain and sometimes we just do army games with no warcasters(just jack marshals or their equivalent if we want jacks/warbeasts) similar to kingdom of iron but with the entire armies. i see it as something akin to warhammer fantasy with a steampunk setting in the latter version.
I also never run theme lists WM style. my theme is to take units i think look cool. my khador are a mix of manowar and winterguard units.
P.S. i looked at skorne as a hordes faction but i mainly like all the construct units-ancestral guardians, advocate zaal, supreme guardians, immortal vessels and the like. they didn't really have any beasts that i liked other than the hydra, but it did not really fit the look of the army so i never went forward with it. .
Nurglitch wrote: So, given the market conditions we've discussed, what was so appealing about MkII that wasn't appealing about MkIII. Warmahordes isn't something I was interested in playing, but I am interested in what is appealing about it to other people.
I liked warmachine originally because it was a mix of chess and board/card game mechanics like resource management. It was generally a great game in their steamroller format at tournaments and conventions. It wasn't nearly as interesting in a casual format.
MKIII however made a lot of core rules changes that I didn't like. For instance I never liked theme lists in MKII and MKIII made them stronger so you basically always wanted to play in theme.
Though the bigger issue with warmahordes and why I don't play MKIII much anymore is the game feels both bloated and stale. I am just kind of bored of it at this point.
See i am the opposite. i looked at WM in MKI and just could not get into it, i opted for infinity instead. i love MKIII for the most part, but then again i never play steamroller and much prefer casual games with 3d terrain and sometimes we just do army games with no warcasters(just jack marshals or their equivalent if we want jacks/warbeasts) similar to kingdom of iron but with the entire armies. i see it as something akin to warhammer fantasy with a steampunk setting in the latter version.
I also never run theme lists WM style. my theme is to take units i think look cool. my khador are a mix of manowar and winterguard units.
P.S. i looked at skorne as a hordes faction but i mainly like all the construct units-ancestral guardians, advocate zaal, supreme guardians, immortal vessels and the like. they didn't really have any beasts that i liked other than the hydra, but it did not really fit the look of the army so i never went forward with it. .
Warmahordes has too many gotchas and hard counters for me to really enjoy casual play. A no warcaster game does sound interesting, though it would be hard to sell since warcasters/warlocks are so central to the games identity.
As far as skorne goes for me it was all about the beasts and light infantry. I loved nihilators (for awhile they were my only infantry I owned outside beast handlers), titans and cyclops. The bronzeback titan was probably my favorite beast.
Games without casters are honestly just kind of boring. There's nothing special about the unit rules, so its just kind of a dice and stats matchup, that is just as prone to hard counters.
My sell for khador were clamjacks and the gun carriage. i ended up with the manowar solos just because i loved the models.
Sorry gotta disagree there lunar there are a bunch of special rules that make units unique. casters themselves are supposed to be incredibly rare and only take to the field of battle in limited actions. most of the battles in the lore are fought by the line troops like winterguard, trenchers, manowar units, stormguards, deliverers and the like.
It also prevents the caster cluster. so you can use the full table and lots of terrain.
If time and money(and space) constraints were not a thing i would definately build a rhulic 50 point list with high shields, and forge guard centered around the siege crawler for a straight up phalanx caster free battle line type game in the same vein as WHFB
I stopped playing in 2011 when I got a new job that left very little time for playing warmachine. I was a Press Ganger and also ran a stand at wargaming shows throughout the UK.
When I decided to get back into wargaming, I started by looking at warmachine. As I hadn't looked at any gaming web site for ages, I was surprised how WM/H had effectively vanished here in the UK.
The lack of players at my local shop means I am now returning to wargaming with 40K - a game which I last played in 2004!
Warmahordes is a dead game, and PP may be gone soon as well. So many reasons why.
From a player stand point: Too competitive, discouraged new players. Fixed movement led to games where players micromanaged each others moves. Visually, 3d terrain was discouraged, and terrain is a major component of miniatures games. Individual mini rules were crowd sourced for corrections leading to a minimization of army strengths and weaknesses, so Vanilla.
From a distributors point of view: Too many SKU's, then went direct sales to FLGS.
From an FLGS point of view: Too many SKU, removal of revenue streams by getting rid of books and cards and moving to APP. Loss of Press Gangers to help promote in stores. Going direct to consumer with large models (the center pieces of your army).
Blunders on Privateer's part: Removing Forums, focusing on other games when their flagship game was in crisis, and staff have told me that the wife of PP owner was not easy to work with, while the owner was more interested in shopping MONPOC movie to Hollywood than running his business. Owner doesn't live in same area as business or creative staff. When your business is in crisis, you have to grab the reigns or hire someone more qualified than you to do it. Finally, trying to create a new game, then finding out you have burned bridges with distributors, so they won't carry it. Burned bridges with FLGS, so they won't carry it. Then having to resort to crowd funding to launch it.
Another thing besides way to may SKUs is the fact PP has been having major sales on everything for the past few years.
From FLGS clearance things out to Blind box armies direct sales. If anyone was looking to finish an army they've had their chance with all the major sales.
Genoside07 wrote: Another thing besides way to may SKUs is the fact PP has been having major sales on everything for the past few years.
From FLGS clearance things out to Blind box armies direct sales. If anyone was looking to finish an army they've had their chance with all the major sales.
Yeah, I feel like for Privateer to keep going they have to contend with a very glutted aftermarket. It's hard to sell someone on a Cryx army when folks on Bartertown are trying to offload at 25% of retail and miniature market is having a sale every quarter.
In an ideal world you'd offset that by offering either a new game (which PP is trying with their kickstarter) or offering old units in plastic (which PP doesn't seem to have capital nor the will to do).
IMOWM/H is not a dead game. However we cannot pretend that it’s a game without issues. However the issues are NOT the game itself i.e. rules and factions. The issues are around supply, cost and the attitude of large parts of the community itself. I can only speak from UK experience, a place that has struggles over the last year to get new products into the UK due to issues with distributors (Wyrd and other companies have been hit with the same issue).
The thing is if you look at the metrics of people turning up to the big National comps in the UK and Europe, WM/H numbers are rising. I believe that last year was the biggest ever Welsh master for example, with over 180 players. The other EU comps are doing well also. However this also shows a huge flaw in how we measure success in the WM/H. The community seems to care more about numbers a big events rather than developing local metas, casual play, narrative play etc. Everything seems to be about the next SR or event, not about developing the scene. This is why I think that while numbers at comps is going up, the community seems to be gathering around a number of “hubs” rather than having lost of flourishing communities all over the country. I play in a basement group and don’t really travel to the play with the wider meta. But how many basement group like ours are there? Are there lots? Are we the only ones? We just don’t know because nobody seems interested in that side of things here in the UK.
The issues around cost, the 2nd hand market etc is well known and discussed to death. However when it comes to supply what does concern me is that many stores here in the UK can get stock if they wanted to. Like many other companies, the distributor to the UK isn’t very good. Wyrd was also hit with the same issues of getting stock to the UK. Im also a big Malifaux player so we had some interesting months. All a store needs to do is set up a direct ordering account with PP (same with Wyrd). The telling thing is that of all the big online and B&M store I know of in the UK, only one has done so which is why when new stuff comes out and I want it, I go to that store. Other stores don’t really want to deal with PP all that much for WM/H although many of them are now starting to carry Riotquest and MonPoc. PP really needs to work on rebuilding its relationship with stores in UK and Europe. OR get its own proper UK/EU distribution.
I LOVE WM/H, but the other fact is im not really sure where the game goes from here. It cant keep expanding and expanding. PP seems to be going down the route of less releases but doing more campaign packs, narrative play etc with the first one being the Oblivion set (which I enjoyed a huge amount). PP seems to have a good plan for the future with product plans for WM/H, Riotquest, MonPoc and Warcaster (the new game) and I hope they do well. I expect PP to do a “final rules release” for the game and then put model releases on hold and focus on its new products and supporting the community. And I would be OK with that.
I think the market glut isn't as big a problem as people think. A huge part of it is being bought up every time by "whale" type customers who are already still fans of PP. So the stock is shifting, just on steep discount.
This suggests a basically matured market which hasn't had lots of new models to feed it for a while so they are filling in bits or buying dirt cheap models to build that "next army".
With such a system it means that there should be ample room for PP to profit and retail sale if they can resecure a NEW generation of gamers. They basically need to focus purely on marketing, recruitment and getting local-level game organising back on the table again. If they can reboot that area of the business then in theory new people join in; old gamers come back and the market starts to rebuild itself.
Right now they are heading toward a viable, but continually dwindling loyal population that isn't expanding, but contracting. They've got to turn the contraction around with new customers and new gamers if they want the game to survive.
In some ways their new game they are launching might well help with that in bringing new people in and it lets them make a lot of noise; but without their own stores they've got to find ways to get local gamers or store owners back into some kind of PG system that allows them to encourage, promote and organise local level gaming.
The aftermarket glut is worrying for PP because of the reduced focus on hobbying and the sheer amount of stuff available from MKII or earlier. Basically, if you just want models to play with, used is fine, and you don't care about them looking amazing. If anything, pre-assembled models are a bonus!
Also, dead or dying games with low supply and low demand can still sell things at a good price, because there isn't enough stuff in circulation. That's definitely not the case with PP. There are tons of armies floating around for cheap, and not enough buyers.
Secondhand can be an issue and yet not. Look at GW - there are huge volumes of secondhand models in all states and yet new still vastly outsells them.
In fact with 40K I don't tend to see new people buying used and more established people. Those after specific older models; or those after a cheap army for the new meta etc.... New people are more likely to buy into new products right off the shelf to go with their new tools and book and such.
Of course those on stricter budgets are more likely to buy used when new to a game. However one can argue that if budget forces them to buy used then they aren't even the company's target market.
I can add about second hand market. It is not as big as it was before, a lot of people had off loaded their collections already and not everybody is trying to sell them. From time to time you get someone offloading a lot, but these are brief windows of opportunity. Though, price on new miniatures are dirty cheap. Even 40 euros for colossal is a hard bargain sometimes. I'm now negotiating price between 30 and 40 euros for it. It of course depends on where item is and how powerful it is considered. I can't get for example battle engines anywhere for cheap, you can forget about new OP releases too. Yet, I was lucky enough to get my new Hyperion kit for 40 euros with no one else bidding for it. I see other such biggies go in auctions at 40-60 euros.
Entire expensive, finished 75 point armies can go for 50-200 euros. I bought one, Khador cavalry army for 60 euros + import/shipping added another 60.
Individual pieces can go for as low as euro up to 5 euros. They are assembled and sometimes painted models.
I'm sure this is going to be an unpopular opinion, but I'm going to chime in anyway. I, personally, am glad the game is in decline. I got into it way back in 2012 with some friends and played regularly for 2 years, arguably when Warmachne was at its apex as far as popularity goes. Page 5 and the general attitude of PP fans made for an incredibly toxic community that boiled over into my local group and pretty much soured everything. It honestly seemed like hatred of GW was as important to being a PP fan as actually playing the game itself, and this was clear both from the guy in my group who got us all started with WM as well as from virtually every online interaction I had related to the game. I hated page 5 more than anything, and also hated caster kill. I also ate up all the 'everything is viable we promise' that was a selling point for the game, which was total hogwash. I hated that theme lists were garbage, and find it very amusing that they're now the only way to play.
Honestly I don't think I can say I enjoyed a single thing about WM, anything objectively good about the system was buried under the vitriol and the uncompromisingly competitive mindset of PP fans.
I do feel the bloated aftermarket does show that whole armies are being sold at small percentages of their original sale price.
But with WM is another issue I see their theme image is so very strong with everything. I realize that GW about got their lunch ate from this
but to make more generic figures that D&D and other type players might pick up the miniatures to add to their collection.
So much of it is branded so strongly you can't think of it outside of WM/H, It's hard to put it in any other game, tabletop or RPGs
anything objectively good about the system was buried under the vitriol and the uncompromisingly competitive mindset of PP fans.
That right there is the number one thing, like i said previously. started actually playing in MK III stayed away before that. game play and game mechanics for a casual game player are quite good. playing without casters (as a general steam punk style army game) or caster kill can be quite fun.
The small group i play with on my normal game night are quite enjoyable for WM players(we all play multiple game systems)...the hardcore group that plays on the day before..not so much. got an odd day off and tried to come in to play with them to get some games against different players. they were not social, only wanted to play within their own group watching each other play multiple games on the same table with 2d terrain even though my friend and i had both our armies out and a beautiful table set up with nice 3d terrain. so i ended up just playing the same i guy i normally play on the regular day. never going to bother with them again.
So the lesson is if i get people to play with my group i think the game will be fine. i cannot see any growth for it with the other group.
I really struggle with the nature of the competitive community personally. In part its because I was actively running events during its rise and am friends with a number of the players who helped drive it to where it is today and from that I understand everything that's lead it to where it is now. The road to hell, good intentions, and all that jazz.
Some of the issue was just how much of an advantage threat range was throughout MK2 and how much that drove precise measuring. PP eased up on that a lot by switching to premeasuring, but by then the community had all the tools to turn that into its own kind of monster. I think the big problem continues to be that the game's terrain rules. They're just largely all too punishing for a game that demands static models that need to move significant lengths in perfectly straight lines. That's what really drives the terrible tables, though to a degree PPs love of top heavy models that grossly overextend their bases doesn't help either.
It's tough, simply because the game is uniquely rewarding when played by the strict rules and there are plenty of ways to do so without sacrificing casual flourishes like cool looking armies and terrain and player banter. There's so much emphasis on making every game conform to the limitations created by the tournament environment though that its hard to get these kind of things back into the community at a casual level.
creeping-deth87 wrote: Honestly I don't think I can say I enjoyed a single thing about WM, anything objectively good about the system was buried under the vitriol and the uncompromisingly competitive mindset of PP fans.
Competitive mindsets destroying all enjoyment in games sadly isn't exclusive to PP. I do think that Warmachine's page 5 nurtured a very toxic attitude towards sportsmanship, which spilled over into other systems. At the start I think it was meant as a piece of fun, nothing to be taken too seriously... which was blatantly obvious from the language being used. However for some it was 'Rules as Written' justification to be an utter nobhead.
Honestly the Page 5 thing always felt overblown to me. I'm sure someone took it way too serious and I've heard it was more of an issue in MK1, but all through MK2 it was tongue and cheek at worst. It's always felt like something that was perpetuated by people that didn't like the game more than something that happened with any regularity.
Genoside07 wrote: I do feel the bloated aftermarket does show that whole armies are being sold at small percentages of their original sale price.
But with WM is another issue I see their theme image is so very strong with everything. I realize that GW about got their lunch ate from this
but to make more generic figures that D&D and other type players might pick up the miniatures to add to their collection.
So much of it is branded so strongly you can't think of it outside of WM/H, It's hard to put it in any other game, tabletop or RPGs
That last line is what matters a lot to me, I dont like warmahordes as a main game, I do LOVE the RPG and getting the models for the RPG and being able to convert. I also really love CoI so smaller forces are nice. Most of the second hand armies I see that dont sell are due to "no splits" which for me is a no go as I dont have a use for lots of the higher end models so buying lots is no value at all. WM/H has a very healthy and vibrant community here locally, so much so that it dwarfs GW's presence in pretty much every store but GW itself (for obvious reasons) locally is shows no signs of even being in decline.
creeping-deth87 wrote: Honestly I don't think I can say I enjoyed a single thing about WM, anything objectively good about the system was buried under the vitriol and the uncompromisingly competitive mindset of PP fans.
Competitive mindsets destroying all enjoyment in games sadly isn't exclusive to PP. I do think that Warmachine's page 5 nurtured a very toxic attitude towards sportsmanship, which spilled over into other systems. At the start I think it was meant as a piece of fun, nothing to be taken too seriously... which was blatantly obvious from the language being used. However for some it was 'Rules as Written' justification to be an utter nobhead.
The truly ironic thing was that anyone using page 5 as an excuse and justification to be a bellend was that they were completely at odds with what page 5 was actually about. 'Page 5 is never an excuse'.
I don't think it's fair to say page 5 nurtured it. I don't think it's even fair to say ' competitives ruined it'. Competitive is a spectrum after all. As you say,vin every game. Some amount of competitive drive and competitive spirit is a good thing, or at worst, fairly neutral. i think it's fairer to say that at some point, the various shades of competitive and casual have been slowly pared back to a competitive at all cost core in too many areas on the whole, and an overly competitive focused approach gradually drove away too many less competitive and more casual players over a period of time and a combination of bloat etc made the game less and less attractive for new blood to come in and replace the natural attrition. To a large extend, only the truly hardcore are still involved and pp has retrenched around them. I would argue too much focus, and especially too much of a hyper-intense focus on any one thing is bad for any game. If it's one thing gw do well, it's to present a 'broad church' for everyone from the super casuals and the hard core to those who don't game and are just happy to paint. Privateer press never quite managed to get this mix right.
The removal of page 5 in mk3 was one of the saddest things of the edition change for me.
I think people often got fixated on the over the top language as being 'what it was about'. Look at the ideas beyond the over-the-top language. Page 5 was remarkably empowering and a pretty damned good approach to take for anyone in gaming if you ask me. Play the best game you can. Play fair. Seek to improve yourself. Mix it up, try new things, don't crutch. Be a good sport, whether you are on the winning end or the losing. And remember we all came here to enjoy ourselves, don't be a bellend or a jerk. And don't use the game as an excuse either.
Ethos, pathos, and logos constitute your repertoire for communicating. At best, and in theory, you should make sure these all align. The pathos and logos of the Page 5 blurb really really don't line up, and people tend to run with the pathos part.
Nurglitch wrote: Ethos, pathos, and logos constitute your repertoire for communicating. At best, and in theory, you should make sure these all align. The pathos and logos of the Page 5 blurb really really don't line up, and people tend to run with the pathos part.
"we call the donkey-caves, they go the house ?"
personally I've never encountered this mythical bad sportsmanship in WMH, 40k and MTG are wholly another tale of woe
I wouldn't say I encountered bad sports in WMH, but there's definitely a "git gud" attitude. I've played top 40k players, and they tended to be pleasant while dismantling me. WMH guys tended to be hyperfocused and all in even when wiping me out.
From my experience sportsmanship was not worse in WMH. It defiantly had its fair share of "that guys" but no more than any other game. Page 5 never came up during in person conversations when I played in MkII.
WMH is definitely something of a "git gud" game. Honestly, there's a lot of things about it equitable to Dark Souls in that regard. It punishes mistakes, often brutally, but also has a lot of room to learn from those mistakes and not make them again. There are also quite a few surprises that can feel very unfair, but give the game a sense of endless novelty while you learn what everything does. To me, the Page 5 attitude was similar to "git gud" for From Fans. It was about approaching failure with a mindset of learning and improving rather than feeling defeated.
It might simply be highlighting that wargaming is very green when it comes to actual tactical play conversations. The whole "get gud" thing happens because when you make a more tactical game those who know tactics dont' know how to teach it and people are still hung up on it being about army lists.
40K shows this very same pattern. You can buy books on making terrain, painting, modelling, sculpting is a bit of a closed shop area, but there's still plenty out there on the youtubes and website. What's really lacking is tactical discussions. From the moment you've made a list to the moment you end the game there's VERY little educational material and conversation.
This leaves people very adrift when it comes to getting better because the only advice they can get is often list based coupled with "go for the objective" etc...
Warmachine was popular, but also tactical and thus highlighted the issue; however instead of the population responding in a positive fashion it went a bit closed shop. I think because a lot of people play without realising what they are doing at a level that lets them teach someone else that same skill. They can show that using Unit X in Y method against Unit Z works. But they can't really explain the underlaying principles that makes all that work so a player with a different army can adapt the same tactical approach for their own force.
To give it an analogy its like painting red. Most people can't explain nor easily learn how to paint red with any paints. Instead we do get a similar effect in that loads of people list recipes for their red; which many others then robotically follow.
What's really lacking is tactical discussions. From the moment you've made a list to the moment you end the game there's VERY little educational material and conversation.
Neon sign this. And when you put material out that focuses on those things, it is often ignored, which makes putting out such material often not worth the effort.
What's really lacking is tactical discussions. From the moment you've made a list to the moment you end the game there's VERY little educational material and conversation.
Neon sign this. And when you put material out that focuses on those things, it is often ignored, which makes putting out such material often not worth the effort.
Forums have never been a great format for tactical discussions. Now that forums are dying, we're seeing that their successors (Facebook, Twitter, Discord, etc) are even worse suited for the job. :(
What's really lacking is tactical discussions. From the moment you've made a list to the moment you end the game there's VERY little educational material and conversation.
Neon sign this. And when you put material out that focuses on those things, it is often ignored, which makes putting out such material often not worth the effort.
Forums have never been a great format for tactical discussions. Now that forums are dying, we're seeing that their successors (Facebook, Twitter, Discord, etc) are even worse suited for the job. :(
It's not totally the platform, its the people.
In fact its the community at large. You can find detailed painting guidelines and videos; long how to guides and detailed piecharts of dice results. Energy is there to do this stuff. But when it comes to tactical discussions the community lacks the group understanding at large to make it work.
Heck in AoS you can see this in a rather grim light in terms of the double-turn which forced some to learn some basic tactics to try and survive. Screening and suchlike are talked about as double turn tactics when they should be purely normal good solid tactics for any wargame play.
It's something that, as a community, we really need to work toward. Sadly I think that key-gatekeepers on the understanding either haven't got teaching skills and/or not the motivation to produce material.
Nurglitch wrote: Part of it might be that good tactics discussion requires diagrams, and people who are good at producing art tend not to be the ones good at tactics.
Yes but considering that those good at sciences, maths and technical things tend to be a higher percentage of the gamer population, this would suggest that painting would be an exceptional rarity of a skill. Yet it proves to be totally the opposite. In general all the whole "you're either technical or artistic minded" is basically broadly rubbish. I think its mostly done at schools to try and auto-sort students into groups more easily without having to spend extra time teaching students who have the capability, but not the current talent of arts/sciences. So instead of investing more teaching time into them you create artificial barriers.
But that's getting a bit off topic- suffice to say if you can make a table to show off dice theory your'e more than capable of drawing a few squares and rectangles and putting a few lines for movement direction etc... Just as if you can spend a few hours producing a painting tutorial you can easily do the same for tactical.
I think the internet (forums, message boards and people's websites) generally does a decent job on the planning side. One thing I really liked about WMH in MkII was the forums had lots of "get started" and "buying guides". I have found the same is true in another games like infinity.
I think the issue with advice about what tactics to employ during a game is that the proper answer 9 time out if 10 is: it depends. I have a few times seen people do guides over the years with certain go to tactics or tricks. Often times though what separates great players from middling players is that great players adapt fast on the fly.
I have been watching a lot of pro play for RTSs recently. The pro players will change their entire strategy due one thing they noticed when scouting. It is hard to teach that online or in person even.
Edit: Also a lot of skill in games comes from practice and can't be taught online by reading a forum post.
Most people simply do not play enough games to learn adaptive strategies to issues they face in games. It's very difficult when you're playing something like 20 games a year to see the patterns that make up general strategies. Most players get caught in the "what does that do?" phase of the process.
Plus learning from your losses and wins requires some basic understanding of what is going on. You need some grounding theory to let you best understand the practical.
Chance/luck games can really mess with this if you don't have the grounding. For example you might fire your best anti-tank unit at a tank and not do much damage. You might get this several times as a result of poor dice rolls. Then you might shoot the unit at an infantry block which its not supposed to be good at killing; but lucky dice rolls results in a big kill rate.
As a result the anti-tank gun now looks better as anti-infantry and within a single game or two the player has had that pattern reinforced by the luck of the dice. Without the game theory understanding to realise that its the dice causing it; that person might continue to incorrectly use that unit. Firing at infantry more than tanks.
Humans (and most animals) quite readily accept the first information they take in about something (first impressions count and all that); so if their first lessons are based on luck of the dice causing abnormal results; then they are going to be building part of their game plan around incorrect information.
Furthermore self-leaning and improvement is a skill all of its own and some people don't have it. Furthermore its my observation that even those with that skill progress a LOT faster with guidance from the more experienced.
Overread wrote:It's something that, as a community, we really need to work toward. Sadly I think that key-gatekeepers on the understanding either haven't got teaching skills and/or not the motivation to produce material.
That may be part of it, but also I've seen with some if you are not willing to play at a competitive points level (low collection, or didn't bring competitive collection) or whatever the local tournament craze, then you are simply not getting a game. That goes for WMH and Steamroller as well as 40K with ITC. Don't have 75 points? No WMH game for you. You don't have 2000 points? No 40K game for you. Hard to get in to a game where you are expected to bring the whole kit and caboodle that a collector could have over years when you're just starting out.
LunarSol wrote:Most people simply do not play enough games to learn adaptive strategies to issues they face in games. It's very difficult when you're playing something like 20 games a year to see the patterns that make up general strategies. Most players get caught in the "what does that do?" phase of the process.
That is true. I think I played 4 games last year, 1 3-way battlebox game and 3 25 point games. The 3-way was with my brother in law and his son with an extra box I had on hand, and the other was a just a lucky night where I was able to meet up with the local group and others were willing to downplay to my level. Games before that were few and far between (see above as to why).
Overread wrote:It's something that, as a community, we really need to work toward. Sadly I think that key-gatekeepers on the understanding either haven't got teaching skills and/or not the motivation to produce material.
That may be part of it, but also I've seen with some if you are not willing to play at a competitive points level (low collection, or didn't bring competitive collection) or whatever the local tournament craze, then you are simply not getting a game. That goes for WMH and Steamroller as well as 40K with ITC. Don't have 75 points? No WMH game for you. You don't have 2000 points? No 40K game for you. Hard to get in to a game where you are expected to bring the whole kit and caboodle that a collector could have over years when you're just starting out.
I think that is the reason skirmish games seem to be getting more popular. Killteam for instance really took off locally.
Easy buy in certainly helps. The other big thing is that skirmish games usually come with built in scenario elements. One of the things that plagues wargames is that players go into them with the expectation that they'll just put down their armies and fight to the death, only to discover there's often to incentive to advance on one another.
Scenarios are essentially created to solve this, but over time players find ways to exploit them, and those exploits get tightened up and sooner or later the scenario only really works at the point level it was designed for. It creates the weird situation where if you're not playing at the competitive level, you're playing something that feels somewhat easy to exploit. Skirmish games just never seem to have the same belief that you can play without scenario and for the most part, people rarely try to play them below the recommended points level, because there's just not that much to get there.
LunarSol wrote: Easy buy in certainly helps. The other big thing is that skirmish games usually come with built in scenario elements. One of the things that plagues wargames is that players go into them with the expectation that they'll just put down their armies and fight to the death, only to discover there's often to incentive to advance on one another.
Scenarios are essentially created to solve this, but over time players find ways to exploit them, and those exploits get tightened up and sooner or later the scenario only really works at the point level it was designed for. It creates the weird situation where if you're not playing at the competitive level, you're playing something that feels somewhat easy to exploit. Skirmish games just never seem to have the same belief that you can play without scenario and for the most part, people rarely try to play them below the recommended points level, because there's just not that much to get there.
It's the easy buy in my experience. High school kids can't really afford to buy a 2k 40k army all at once or 2 75pt lists for WMH. They can drop say $70 for box of Chaos space marines and some cultists. That gets you a decent kill team. Model a few of the CSM with chainswords or the axe and run them as khorne berserkers. Make one of the CSM a sniper with a plasma gun and throw in the some cultists to grab objectives. Not the most competitive list but solid. At least half of the people that were playing kill team locally were all young or brand new to the hobby. The cheap buy really helped sell the game.
PP really missed an opportunity with their skirmish game IMO. Killteam's mechanics are similar enough to 40k that people can easily learn 40k after starting with killteam. Company of Iron wasn't like that.
Regarding Page 5, I think the biggest issue was that the message was at odds with how it was delivered.. If you read it carefully, there was a lot of good stuff in there about being a good sport, no honour in stomping newbies or winning through being a jerk, etc. But, it was couched in such over the top aggressively edgelordy language that a lot of people took it as licence to be a jerk and approach the game with a "page 5 bro, grow a pair and git gud, noob" attitude. Unnecessarily gendered references were just the cherry on top. There is still a Page 5 in the Mk.III books which, from what I remember, contains a similar sort of statement of values, just without sounding like it is being screamed at you by an obnoxious 13 year old who plays a ton of Call of Duty.
It may have been necessary at one point for PP to plant a flag and distinguish themselves from the competition, but it's good that they outgrew their teenage edgelord phase.
As for CoI, the two things that bothered me about it were army building (seriously, having to take 6-10 man units in a skirmish game instead of just being able to throw in a couple Assault Kommandos?) and the fact that the rules were very similar to WMH, only just different enough to be confusing. I am looking forward to trying out Riot Quest though; that has gotten me pretty excited and I think it would probably be a better entry point into WMH than CoI as it introduces the models and the universe but doesn't have a bunch of stuff you need to unlearn.
As for the community, I took some time away because I was getting pretty burned out with competitive play and was kind of tired of being told by random people on the internet that I should f*** off to 40K. However, I went to a tournament recently and I actually had a lot of fun, and it did seem a little more oriented towards casual play (it was a 50 point tournament, and there was actually something that acknowledged painting as part of the game). Terrain was still kind of meh, but apart from that it was a good experience. I think there are things that can be done to encourage things like casual play, better looking tables, etc., but it is hard to get buy-in from the community at large on that given the outsized influence that competitive play has.
One of the things driving Privateer Press sale was that GW had burned a lot of there fan base in the early 2000s. Prior to the release of the current edition of 40k and the first general's compendium WM/H was doing very well. GW fixed their (rather abusive) problems, reworked fantasy to replace WM/H, and strongly focused their games game in to smaller bite size faction of the month.
PP failed to learn from this shift. This combined with the CCG way WM/H is played (overpowered Combos and game ending gotchas) that made it very difficult for new players to come into the game. The existing players became hyper completive in a very toxic way. PP had a very real chance to fix their games with 3rd editions, and they chose to kill their flagship line with that book. Just like a failing restaurant, they try to save themselves by putting new things on the menu while not trying to fix the existing game. Faction and SKU bloat is a fantastic example of this.
Now it is important to know that I think this is very fixable. Privateer needs figure out WM/H is a card game or a model game, it is clear that I can no longer be both. The game at this point is just too big at this point. In both paths the game needs to dramatically cut back.
crimsyn wrote: Regarding Page 5, I think the biggest issue was that the message was at odds with how it was delivered.. If you read it carefully, there was a lot of good stuff in there about being a good sport, no honour in stomping newbies or winning through being a jerk, etc. But, it was couched in such over the top aggressively edgelordy language that a lot of people took it as licence to be a jerk and approach the game with a "page 5 bro, grow a pair and git gud, noob" attitude. Unnecessarily gendered references were just the cherry on top. There is still a Page 5 in the Mk.III books which, from what I remember, contains a similar sort of statement of values, just without sounding like it is being screamed at you by an obnoxious 13 year old who plays a ton of Call of Duty.
Well, it helps to actually READ what is written. Sadly, that is not a strong trend as evidenced by some of the YMDC discussions I've gotten in to with 40K. So people only read the bold type, not anything else, so running as a jerk-hole seems justified.
LunarSol wrote: Company of Iron suffered mostly from requiring a box of models no one wanted to get the cards to play with the stuff you had. :\
...they sold the cards themselves online for $8. That was all you needed to play since the rules were/are free.
yep sadly the postage for anywhere outside the US more or less doubled that and adding on a mini or two to lessen the impact, at least in the UK left you wide open to the somewhat unfair 'handling' charge, I'm fine with import duty but the £8 handling was often 2 or 3 times the duty, why they couldn't have just the cards on the card database a few months after the box came out is a mystery, its a shame as low model count skirmishy games are rather popular in my corner of the shire (and may have let my Skinwalkers see table time, rather than naaahhh i'll just use the Tharn)
LunarSol wrote: Company of Iron suffered mostly from requiring a box of models no one wanted to get the cards to play with the stuff you had. :\
...they sold the cards themselves online for $8. That was all you needed to play since the rules were/are free.
Online only sales of cards needed to play isn't a huge hurdle, but its a small enough hurdle for enough people that you don't get that initial buy in spike needed to take off. I feel like that's been the bane of Guild Ball for similar reasons; with updates to the plot deck not sold in a timely manner (or at all) being regular points that people just don't keep up with it anymore.
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crimsyn wrote: I am looking forward to trying out Riot Quest though; that has gotten me pretty excited and I think it would probably be a better entry point into WMH than CoI as it introduces the models and the universe but doesn't have a bunch of stuff you need to unlearn.
I think its a fun little system, but I need to try it again with a new map. The starter map has a bad tendency to spawn figures completely out of the game and since there's a cost to activating a figure to move, they'll often remain there the entire game unless the opponent suffers a similar fate. The pirate ship map looks like its got a better design, though I think in general the game would benefit from smaller maps given the constraints on model movement.
crimsyn wrote: Regarding Page 5, I think the biggest issue was that the message was at odds with how it was delivered.. If you read it carefully, there was a lot of good stuff in there about being a good sport, no honour in stomping newbies or winning through being a jerk, etc. But, it was couched in such over the top aggressively edgelordy language that a lot of people took it as licence to be a jerk and approach the game with a "page 5 bro, grow a pair and git gud, noob" attitude. Unnecessarily gendered references were just the cherry on top. There is still a Page 5 in the Mk.III books which, from what I remember, contains a similar sort of statement of values, just without sounding like it is being screamed at you by an obnoxious 13 year old who plays a ton of Call of Duty.
Well, it helps to actually READ what is written. Sadly, that is not a strong trend as evidenced by some of the YMDC discussions I've gotten in to with 40K. So people only read the bold type, not anything else, so running as a jerk-hole seems justified.
That's kind of my point. If you actually read all the fine print carefully and think about it, it's got some good stuff in there. But it seems like PP undermined their own message about good sportsmanship by pretty much screaming it in people's face as aggressively as they could, which is not a good communications strategy. So when it backfires, yeah, you could say "stupid player base didn't read the fine print" or you could realize there was a failure in communication somewhere and change, like PP did when they started phasing out the "play like you've got a pair" slogan and changing how they approached page 5.
I had all but forgotten the page five rules, don't get me wrong, I have played bad players in 40k and Warhammer. But I don't know why it seemed that most of the WM/H players where WAAC and took delight in curb-stomping newbies.
The other thing that someone has already mentioned is the fact the tables don't look that great and when both players have half unassembled unpainted models, it doesn't draw people over to the table to check it out.
Even if someone new wanted to start playing, once they realize about the secondary market is glutted, they might be afraid they are just throwing money away at a system about to die, hence the topic of this thread.
Genoside07 wrote: I had all but forgotten the page five rules, don't get me wrong, I have played bad players in 40k and Warhammer. But I don't know why it seemed that most of the WM/H players where WAAC and took delight in curb-stomping newbies.
My guess that would be because of the way the game was marketed. I remember being on Facebook months ago and reading the PP and GW Facebook pages. The GW one had the standard promotional material for new stuff but beyond that it had posts like:
GW: Hey guys show us your painted version of X
Comments: Tons of people showing off their painted minis
Or
GW: Hey guys who do think would win in a fight, X or Y? (X and Y being characters in the game)
Comments: Fans talking about the hypothetical match up.
In general GW always seems to be marketing a hobby and has no interest in really heavily promoting, supporting or even creating any "pro" circuit. Which is why ITC exists. PP however does. Their Facebook page had live streams of the finals of some competitive event at a con. Like a lot of esports they had commentators and stats/names on the screen like you see during a football game. A game that is marketed and presented as more of a sport is probably going to draw a lot more of the WAAC type players.
I agree that in the past that his how the game has been marketed. However PP has made great strides in promoting the hobby side of the game and does regular hobby streams and video on their yourtube. The issue is the community.
Some of the most talented painters and the most amazing paint jobs I have seen in person have been at WM/H events. Also at those same events I have seem a person literally pour their 75pt Cryx "army" out of a shoe box, unpainted, broken and battered, set it up in front of my well painted trollbloods army and not see anything amiss. "This is a about playing, not about painting" he said.... And never will those two camps meet.
Don't get me wrong, its not just a WM/H thing. Iv seen the same in 40K games. Its just more common in WM/H.
As WM/H starts to get less releases as PP focuses more on Warcaster and Riotquest PP should take this opportunity to encourage more hobby, 3D terrain use etc to gain wider appeal. WM/H is a very very good game and great to play either competitively or casually.
Many years ago, I was interested in learning about new games beyond GW. Of course, War Machine was a new game so I took a look at the rules. I read Page 5, put the book back on the shelf and never looked back at the game again. That was NOT the type of game I wanted to play.
If Page 5 ethos was not a thing, Great! They lost at least this customer with that pitch. If it is still part of the game that is a problem in my eyes and hindering their growth by not being a game for all players, but a game for a certain type of player.
Easy E wrote: Many years ago, I was interested in learning about new games beyond GW. Of course, War Machine was a new game so I took a look at the rules. I read Page 5, put the book back on the shelf and never looked back at the game again. That was NOT the type of game I wanted to play.
If Page 5 ethos was not a thing, Great! They lost at least this customer with that pitch. If it is still part of the game that is a problem in my eyes and hindering their growth by not being a game for all players, but a game for a certain type of player.
I think a lot of the worst offenders got a tad sniffy about Mk3 undoing a lot of their secret 'git gud gotcha' tech and stropped off, and whilst Mk3 was a bit wobbly and balance was not the proclaimed 'most tested ever', Skorne players could legit and justifiably out-salt any 40k no-love faction player at launch and one of the first casters released was Iron Hands level of ill-considered wtf'ery, its mostly okay now
I'd say the Geedubs pushes the same sort of agenda just in a more insidious and spendy way with power creep to flog new toys and doing us a favour with frequent errata, once sales targets have been reached, but, it is known. I'm a rabid gw hater just for playing other games
Paymaster Games wrote: One of the things driving Privateer Press sale was that GW had burned a lot of there fan base in the early 2000s. Prior to the release of the current edition of 40k and the first general's compendium WM/H was doing very well. GW fixed their (rather abusive) problems, reworked fantasy to replace WM/H, and strongly focused their games game in to smaller bite size faction of the month.
PP failed to learn from this shift. This combined with the CCG way WM/H is played (overpowered Combos and game ending gotchas) that made it very difficult for new players to come into the game. The existing players became hyper completive in a very toxic way. PP had a very real chance to fix their games with 3rd editions, and they chose to kill their flagship line with that book. Just like a failing restaurant, they try to save themselves by putting new things on the menu while not trying to fix the existing game. Faction and SKU bloat is a fantastic example of this.
Now it is important to know that I think this is very fixable. Privateer needs figure out WM/H is a card game or a model game, it is clear that I can no longer be both. The game at this point is just too big at this point. In both paths the game needs to dramatically cut back.
You pretty much nailed it here. I think they should of slowed the warmahordes bloat and released Warcaster Neo years ago as well.
Easy E wrote: Oh, yeah. I play a ton of other games besides GW, just not War Machine.
It is popular at one of my local stores, so who knows..... I might change my mind one day.
After all, I prefer dead games anyway! Zoinks!
can't be having fun wrong
GW and I were doing alright till mid-7th, which even the faithful would have a hard time defending, then X-Wing happened
And since we've just been out of sync, Bloodbowl comes out a few months after I pick up Guild Ball, Aos's remarkably daft launch didn't tempt me away from WM/H, although seems the jinx is broken as I've got a Gaslands book and Dark Future seems unlikely
But as is know the GW fans only deal in absolutes so I'm a hater (an absurd CWE collection disagrees but wut 'ver)
Easy E wrote: Oh, yeah. I play a ton of other games besides GW, just not War Machine.
It is popular at one of my local stores, so who knows..... I might change my mind one day.
After all, I prefer dead games anyway! Zoinks!
can't be having fun wrong
GW and I were doing alright till mid-7th, which even the faithful would have a hard time defending, then X-Wing happened
And since we've just been out of sync, Bloodbowl comes out a few months after I pick up Guild Ball, Aos's remarkably daft launch didn't tempt me away from WM/H, although seems the jinx is broken as I've got a Gaslands book and Dark Future seems unlikely
But as is know the GW fans only deal in absolutes so I'm a hater (an absurd CWE collection disagrees but wut 'ver)
LunarSol wrote: Wargaming as a community constantly reminds me of the console wars. Tribalism is a helluva drug.
pffft young 'uns today, they know nothing of the Speccy vs C64 war of the early 80's....(which against all odds the speccyites won due to their owners blending with the background and the 64'ers being unable to sneak attack without kik-botty tunes)
But its a valid point, which the intertubes has fuelled as nuance and snark doesn't work so well in text, leading to escalations by all sides
Charistoph wrote: I can only give the testimonies that I have received from my local meta. It was a combination of ThemeMachine, "We only play Steamroller here", and other games being more accessible.
The introduction of Mk 3 and the Themes that came along with it, replicated the same disastrous Formations of 7th Ed 40K. If you didn't play in Theme, you were playing at fewer points and fewer rules than your opponent was. This was even worse when you had to do a lot of research in order to find out what qualified in your army to build that way, making it less desirable for the quick pick up game.
This left only the hypercompetitive and the stubborn left (consider me in that last category), who ignored anything but the Steamroller mantra. Some would complain about the lack of narrative games/events, etc, but wouldn't buy the No Quarter that had many of those things in there, and the people left largely didn't bother opening themselves up to those games anyway. Pick up games for WMH were not very common before ThemeMachine, and became less so afterwards.
When Mk 3 launched, AoS was just finishing its first year under the General's Handbook, and popularity was resurging. 40K had rebooted their game in to 8th Edition, making it simpler and less rules intense, as well as getting rid of the Formation mess. X-Wing was showing to be a mostly balanced game and didn't require any hobbying to play.
Don't really see an issue with the theme machine since it helps new players navigate a huge SKU, but having gotten newbs to table top gaming at all into RQ and Monsterpocalypse and probably Warcaster too, is that Warmachine is a 3rd ed. d20 based wargame that places too much math in front of the dice, while their other games which are growing put the math behind the dice. I think they would have to make Warmachine operate more like their other games (and yes with speciality dice) to keep the game from getting sh%$ rules like GW games, but still keep the math behind the dice. If the math is behind the dice, if SKU just becomes options.
The strike system in their other games, especially Warcaster is way more fluid than "My MAT is X, what is your Def? Oh okay so that means I have to roll (quick math for people who are not lifelong gamers or engineers) a 9?" Don't get me wrong, this was revolutionary in its day but with the market shifting from hardcore gamers to casuals, strike system allows competitive play and is ridiculously easy for new players.
That said, if PP died tomorrow it would be a HUGE loss for the hobby. Can you think of any independently owned IP that even comes close to 40k or AoS? That would be a bad sign not just for PP but the industry as a whole. PP has taken alot of hits and some through poor decisions but can anyone even think of any other non-licensed IP that comes close to PP? Even Infinity, is very small outside of EU.
Themes where nice until the game got overbloated with them.
Giving so many free solos/attachments along with the WC points made the game way bigger than it seemed.
Also, Dropzone came very close, as did SW properties.
hotsauceman1 wrote: Themes where nice until the game got overbloated with them.
Giving so many free solos/attachments along with the WC points made the game way bigger than it seemed.
Also, Dropzone came very close, as did SW properties.
You really notice it in the way WJPs play out these days. It used to be that your two jacks ate a point or two out of your list. Now you're leaving 2-3 points on the table because you've got enough WJPs to start into a third jack but really don't want that many in the list.
I quite like themes, but I think the game would flow better at 50 points. The main issue is just that the scenarios are absolutely miserable at anything short of 75.
hotsauceman1 wrote: Themes where nice until the game got overbloated with them.
Giving so many free solos/attachments along with the WC points made the game way bigger than it seemed.
Also, Dropzone came very close, as did SW properties.
You really notice it in the way WJPs play out these days. It used to be that your two jacks ate a point or two out of your list. Now you're leaving 2-3 points on the table because you've got enough WJPs to start into a third jack but really don't want that many in the list.
I quite like themes, but I think the game would flow better at 50 points. The main issue is just that the scenarios are absolutely miserable at anything short of 75.
What makes you think scenarios are miserable at lower points levels ? It's not my experience at all, maybe bar two most spread out ones.
Check this discussion: https://lormahordes.freeforums.net/post/145970/thread
Also, Brawlmachine (the format of the future IMO, if there's any future for WM&H at all) has its own scenarios.
hotsauceman1 wrote: Themes where nice until the game got overbloated with them.
Giving so many free solos/attachments along with the WC points made the game way bigger than it seemed.
Also, Dropzone came very close, as did SW properties.
You really notice it in the way WJPs play out these days. It used to be that your two jacks ate a point or two out of your list. Now you're leaving 2-3 points on the table because you've got enough WJPs to start into a third jack but really don't want that many in the list.
I quite like themes, but I think the game would flow better at 50 points. The main issue is just that the scenarios are absolutely miserable at anything short of 75.
What makes you think scenarios are miserable at lower points levels ? It's not my experience at all, maybe bar two most spread out ones.
Check this discussion: https://lormahordes.freeforums.net/post/145970/thread
Also, Brawlmachine (the format of the future IMO, if there's any future for WM&H at all) has its own scenarios.
I just find that covering the scenario leads to armies spread too thin. One side ends up collapsing and there's little opportunity to come back. I find its far more likely that someone has to choose between running their army to die or lose immediately at 50.
marxlives wrote:Don't really see an issue with the theme machine since it helps new players navigate a huge SKU, but having gotten newbs to table top gaming at all into RQ and Monsterpocalypse and probably Warcaster too, is that Warmachine is a 3rd ed. d20 based wargame that places too much math in front of the dice, while their other games which are growing put the math behind the dice. I think they would have to make Warmachine operate more like their other games (and yes with speciality dice) to keep the game from getting sh%$ rules like GW games, but still keep the math behind the dice. If the math is behind the dice, if SKU just becomes options.
As I said, it was viewed to replicate the mistakes of 40K's Formations. A bunch of new rules for free along with free models. There was a lot of bad tastes in people mouths as a result.
I think the Themes are great for guiding purchases, but the sku lists are rarely set up to reflect that in the stores, either online or in the b&ms.
marxlives wrote:The strike system in their other games, especially Warcaster is way more fluid than "My MAT is X, what is your Def? Oh okay so that means I have to roll (quick math for people who are not lifelong gamers or engineers) a 9?" Don't get me wrong, this was revolutionary in its day but with the market shifting from hardcore gamers to casuals, strike system allows competitive play and is ridiculously easy for new players.
I'm sorry, but that's low level math that my 2nd and 3rd grade children did last year. It is not the mathematics of engineers. There's more math involved in positioning without measuring than there is in the differential. If one can't handle this level of math, than they're probably broke from over-spending at the store and shouldn't be allowed near sharp objects like modelling knives.
marxlives wrote:That said, if PP died tomorrow it would be a HUGE loss for the hobby. Can you think of any independently owned IP that even comes close to 40k or AoS? That would be a bad sign not just for PP but the industry as a whole. PP has taken alot of hits and some through poor decisions but can anyone even think of any other non-licensed IP that comes close to PP? Even Infinity, is very small outside of EU.
The only one I know of at present is Fantasy Flight Games who are riding the Star Wars whale, and maybe the Batman game and Marvel Crisis Protocol, but as you said, they're licensed as well. Everybody else is considered niche, no matter how good Infinity, Bolt Action, or Malifaux are taken.
Cyel wrote:Also, Brawlmachine (the format of the future IMO, if there's any future for WM&H at all) has its own scenarios.
Yeah, and Brawlmachine might not fly because its not in PP's documentation. Maybe once the game stores are allowed/willing to have gaming in their stores again, it might start taking off, but it's too early to tell. I know having scenarios for smaller games may have helped me out last year. Trying to run against a 75 point scenario with 25 points is a challenge for a "new" player.
Unless Brawlmachine is an official format and promoted by PP, it's not going to save warmachine. It'll end up yet another insular thing by small groups.
marxlives wrote:The strike system in their other games, especially Warcaster is way more fluid than "My MAT is X, what is your Def? Oh okay so that means I have to roll (quick math for people who are not lifelong gamers or engineers) a 9?" Don't get me wrong, this was revolutionary in its day but with the market shifting from hardcore gamers to casuals, strike system allows competitive play and is ridiculously easy for new players.
I'm sorry, but that's low level math that my 2nd and 3rd grade children did last year. It is not the mathematics of engineers. There's more math involved in positioning without measuring than there is in the differential. If one can't handle this level of math, than they're probably broke from over-spending at the store and shouldn't be allowed near sharp objects like modelling knives.
That is a very insulting thing to say.
Its not that the math is hard, it isnt, its the the math is done under pressure(Clock, opponent pressure, pressure from the game in general) that can cause people to slip and or take a moment especially if they are tired.
IT isnt hard math, but something done under stress can become hard, like a test.
Which is why games now use custome dice more, at a glance you can see if you got a hit, crit or blank
Vertrucio wrote: Unless Brawlmachine is an official format and promoted by PP, it's not going to save warmachine. It'll end up yet another insular thing by small groups.
Well, it seems that the fact that the format has been prepared by well-respected guys from LOS/WM University is enough of a legitimisation for many players. I keep encountering opinions of players delighted with the format. For example check comments under this MrMalorian video:
We receive quite literally a dozen messages a day from people expressing how much fun they're having and how fast their meta is growing with returning players and new players who are enjoying this format over the drive to get to 75, and I think that says a lot about the potential right there.
Standard 75pts 2 lists apparently isn't the way to play if the game is to be popular - the evidence is all around in dying metas. I am happy that WM&H communities are more and more ready to accept good ideas even if they aren't official and that the stance "only official matters and PP are gods of design" is heard les and less.
marxlives wrote:The strike system in their other games, especially Warcaster is way more fluid than "My MAT is X, what is your Def? Oh okay so that means I have to roll (quick math for people who are not lifelong gamers or engineers) a 9?" Don't get me wrong, this was revolutionary in its day but with the market shifting from hardcore gamers to casuals, strike system allows competitive play and is ridiculously easy for new players.
I'm sorry, but that's low level math that my 2nd and 3rd grade children did last year. It is not the mathematics of engineers. There's more math involved in positioning without measuring than there is in the differential. If one can't handle this level of math, than they're probably broke from over-spending at the store and shouldn't be allowed near sharp objects like modelling knives.
That is a very insulting thing to say.
Its not that the math is hard, it isnt, its the the math is done under pressure(Clock, opponent pressure, pressure from the game in general) that can cause people to slip and or take a moment especially if they are tired.
IT isnt hard math, but something done under stress can become hard, like a test.
Which is why games now use custome dice more, at a glance you can see if you got a hit, crit or blank
Well, it's not like ENGINEERS are under constant pressure to do such math in their head in a second's notice. They spend numerous hours checking their calculations, to say nothing about having calculators to process most of that information that is far more complex as an arithmetic stream.
So if you think it is insulting, maybe you shouldn't be making such insulting comparisons.
hotsauceman1 wrote:I never mad comparisons to engineers, you did.
No, I did not. I was countering it. This is what I quoted:
marxlives wrote:The strike system in their other games, especially Warcaster is way more fluid than "My MAT is X, what is your Def? Oh okay so that means I have to roll (quick math for people who are not lifelong gamers or engineers) a 9?" Don't get me wrong, this was revolutionary in its day but with the market shifting from hardcore gamers to casuals, strike system allows competitive play and is ridiculously easy for new players.
I now notice you weren't the one I had quoted, though.
Vertrucio wrote: Unless Brawlmachine is an official format and promoted by PP, it's not going to save warmachine. It'll end up yet another insular thing by small groups.
But sometimes thats enough, locally the wmh playerbase consists of myself and two other chaps who due to work commitments (and us being old) tend to have to leave club nights early meaning a fair few 75pt games remain unfinished
This smaller format might be good for us, although I see my fav caster, Krueger 2, is already on banned list and Morvhana 2 is on the watch list, meenies
I personally think what needs to happen is the game needs to actually be 75Pts, No free Solos, no free Warjack Points. Just make the game actually represent what it is. It can be a midsize skrimish game. Also, lets take a look at DEF and MAt and why it is a bad system now Put simply it requires you to know your opponents models aswell as yours. When attacking, you had to ask or somehow know how to hit your opponent. Its the D&D system, but that has the benifit of being relaxed. When i play legion all i really need to know is what kinda dice do they roll red or white, boom thats all, but even then that doesnt matter that much or effect on how many hits i might get.
Vertrucio wrote: Unless Brawlmachine is an official format and promoted by PP, it's not going to save warmachine. It'll end up yet another insular thing by small groups.
But sometimes thats enough, locally the wmh playerbase consists of myself and two other chaps who due to work commitments (and us being old) tend to have to leave club nights early meaning a fair few 75pt games remain unfinished
This smaller format might be good for us, although I see my fav caster, Krueger 2, is already on banned list and Morvhana 2 is on the watch list, meenies
I played two Brawlmachine games yesterday (High Reclaimer vs Barnabus2 & Venethrax vs Helga2) and our first impression is that the scenarios are very live.
It's not even the 4Vps advantage, it didn't happen. But with only 5 turns and forces running out of models to score and contest VERY quickly even getting a 1Vp advantage early could mean that the opponent has to work double hard to beat this. Scenario-wise those games were very exciting, extremely focused on scoring and contesting.
For example this game was lost by Minions despite their huge attrition advantage. They just didn't have enough pieces to counter High Reclaimer's 2Vps scenario advantage from previous turns, before time runs out.
So no wonder such control-machines as Krueger are banned. I'm waiting for more to follow.
hotsauceman1 wrote: I personally think what needs to happen is the game needs to actually be 75Pts, No free Solos, no free Warjack Points.
Just make the game actually represent what it is. It can be a midsize skrimish game.
Also, lets take a look at DEF and MAt and why it is a bad system now
Put simply it requires you to know your opponents models aswell as yours. When attacking, you had to ask or somehow know how to hit your opponent. Its the D&D system, but that has the benifit of being relaxed.
When i play legion all i really need to know is what kinda dice do they roll red or white, boom thats all, but even then that doesnt matter that much or effect on how many hits i might get.
I personally kind of like that solos aren't really worth their points but you get a certain amount of them free. It's kind of like the WJP system in that it helps split up the currency. I'd rather play 50 points with themes as is than 75 without.
In terms of MAT/DEF, POW/ARM, the issue is really that it messes with the how much the dice curve can be manipulated in a game that LOVES to manipulate the dice curve. MAT 6 vs DEF 12 is fine. It makes MAT 7 excellent, and DEF 13 excellent too. MAT 5 and DEF 11 are subpar, which would be okay... right up until something takes DEF 13 to DEF 15.... then DEF 17. Now MAT 5 is really useless so everyone takes things MAT 7 minimum and DEF 12 becomes bad and there's just less valid design space on the curve then it seems like there should be.
So no wonder such control-machines as Krueger are banned. I'm waiting for more to follow.
Realistically, almost every problem with the game is a result of a few casters that are just grossly overtuned for the environment warping the entire system around themselves.
I think it was a bit of both, but I do think PP made the first step when they gutted their own forum. Which was honestly really surprising because they had a very active and engaged forum at a time when Facebook was rising up really powerfully. It was a huge waste I think and the wrong choice. I think PP sort of hoped that the community would pick up the slack, but at the same time I dont' think they realised that the community wasn't going to because it wasn't wanting too. I've seen forums die when users drift onto other services and sites - that happens. However PP tried forcing it in a half hearted way which left people half on their forums and half feeling like they'd been kicked out by the company they were paying money to support.
The forum was largely gutted because it was volunteer run using more or less the same system as the PG. The players also relentless mocked the forums and it was a mess of faction infighting. A lot of people had already jumped to Facebook and PP was putting a lot of effort into that and Twitter. It made sense to me from a squeaky wheel perspective, but I don't think PP appreciated how many new players used the forum and how much that relied on the older players hanging out there. What's left is still fine for new players, but they lack a passionate base of experience players to respond to new player questions.
I remember that somewhat differently. PP lost its online community because it decided they were superfluous to requirements and purged them.
Telling your fans that they're not necessary or even welcome tends to piss them off.
I'm always surprised how personal of a view people take when systems get shut down. I was a PG that spent a lot of times on the forums, but I would never say I felt "purged". I still don't love Twitter and Facebook as community hubs (I'm here after all), but I also get that forums just aren't what they used to be and sometimes I need to start using something new simply because that's where the community is.
hotsauceman1 wrote: I personally think what needs to happen is the game needs to actually be 75Pts, No free Solos, no free Warjack Points.
Welcome to Mark 1 where even Warcasters cost points, and people brought as few Warjacks as they could.
hotsauceman1 wrote: Also, lets take a look at DEF and MAt and why it is a bad system now
Put simply it requires you to know your opponents models aswell as yours. When attacking, you had to ask or somehow know how to hit your opponent. Its the D&D system, but that has the benifit of being relaxed.
When i play legion all i really need to know is what kinda dice do they roll red or white, boom thats all, but even then that doesnt matter that much or effect on how many hits i might get.
I rather disagree. Such a system doesn't provide as much granularity as WMH's current system.
Now, don't get me wrong, it can be abused (and let's face it, has been), as was just pointed out above by LunarSol. It is one of the things I don't like about FFG's game systems, and I'm not very strong on Neo-Mechanica's use of it.
I think the biggest problem with Warmachine is the lack of casual interest in the game. The hobby side has always been a secondary aspect of Warmachine and the rules/playing side has always been in focus.
Their models aren't the best in the industry and almost all the models are monopose which for me personally stunted my interest in painting my models for Warmachine.
Their lore and short stories were pretty decent, though kinda linear but that seems to be lacking now that Seacat left.
In 40k there is a decent chunk of fans that don't play the game at all and are completely in for the hobby or lore side that might peek into the game if they just have models readily available.
As for brawlmachine, while it may be a step in the right direction, the fact that PP isn't supporting it as official standard will cause the community to divide. This type of community based rulesets work in games like Pokemon where the fanbase is huge and a divide splits it into two big communities, but I can't see it working in a niche game in an already niche market.
You aren't alone on that front, from what I've gathered the novels haven't done very well overall, in large part because they were created in an attempt to make up for the fact that PP moved away from their old model of advancing the fluff with each new rulebook - but without having anything tangible tying the fluff back to the game ala the rulebooks, there was very little interest in the novels.
5. SKU bloat- A long time ago, PP said no model will ever be retired or made obsolete. This is unsustainable. They have to generate new models to keep sales up, but there are so many SKU's now, that it contributes to 1-3
I think an evolution to the Active Duty Roster is needed in this sense. I think most of us agree we don't want to have our older models forever invalidated because the got pulled out of rotation, it would be nice if instead each year PP published an ADR that extended to units, solos, etc. and those were the units eligible for Steamroller/competitive play for the duration of the year. I would propose a healthy ADR mix would be somethinng like 50% models from the previous 1-2 year period, 25% "legacy" models from prior to that period, and 25% new models released over the course of the season. This way players are encouraged to continue purchasing newer stuff, but their older stuff doesn't eventually become forever useless - if its not eligible for competitive play this year, it might be eligible next year. As far as retailers are concerned, I would think its a win/win - they only need to worry about ordering and keeping inventory of the latest SKUs into the shop, but if they have older inventory they don't need to blow it out at bargain basement prices because even if its not hot this year - it might become hot again next year. On PPs end its also advantageous as they don't need to worry about maintaining production/stock/distribution of their entire back catalog all the time, they can focus on the latest stuff and a curated selection of their back catalog relevant to the current years ADR, refresh the molds, etc. for the other stuff in the downtime without worrying about people bitching that xyz unit is out of stock and the game has become pay to win because they can only get it on eBay for 300% markup, and then rotate their production at the start of the next year. Alternatively, they can rotate the non-ADR models into direct only/made to order sales with a longer lead-time and a higher profit margin if they are concerned about accessibility of the back catalog to newer/casual players.
In any case, basically the idea here is that you acknowledge that a not insignificant segment of the back catalog will be more or less unavailable for somewhat lengthy periods of time, but thats okay because you are discouraging those models from being used anyway/encouraging the community to use other models instead, and also because no matter what that back catalog will never be *permanently* unavailable, because you will inevitably rotate other parts of the back catalog back into availability after a fixed period of time. In truth, I think 1 year rotations might be a bit *too* lengthy - particularly with regards to bringing in new players who might be interested in rounding out their collections, etc. but I don't see this system working to combat SKU bloat in any chunks of time smaller than that. As far as the existing playerbase is concerned, however, I don't see any issues as most of us probably already own everything for the factions we play.
I would like to see an extended ADR for competitive play over Theme lists. Basically they could pull a BattleTech competitively and only certain models per faction are available based on the era you are playing in. Even old school, Vinter is still in charge era leading up to Lion's Coup is possible due to junior casters.
SiLKY wrote: I think the biggest problem with Warmachine is the lack of casual interest in the game. The hobby side has always been a secondary aspect of Warmachine and the rules/playing side has always been in focus.
Their models aren't the best in the industry and almost all the models are monopose which for me personally stunted my interest in painting my models for Warmachine.
Their lore and short stories were pretty decent, though kinda linear but that seems to be lacking now that Seacat left.
In 40k there is a decent chunk of fans that don't play the game at all and are completely in for the hobby or lore side that might peek into the game if they just have models readily available.
I think this sums it all up. A few years back I posted a thread asking what happened to Warmahordes. The consensus at the time was
1. Edition change that was poorly tested and poorly received.
2. Killing the Pressgangers.
3. Killing the forums.
4. Pulling GW-style shenanigans.
5. GW getting their act together and re-surging.
I liked the models and the artwork. Monopose is no bother to me. Then I bought a starter box and found the worst excuse for miniatures I've ever seen. The lore was always interesting, but I don't think they knew how to properly present it to the audience. And the whole "IM IN UR FACE PLAY LIKE U GOT A PAIR" vibe left a bad taste in many folks mouths while fueling the hordes of "that guy" (who, lets face it, were drawn to this game like moths to a flame) to a whole new level of neckbeardery. Which ironically is who kept this game alive. Like the story in this thread about the guy who dumped his broken models out of a shoebox onto the table.
But really, it seems to me that the biggest problem with Privateer is that their whole shtick could be summed up as "We aren't GW".
When GW started taking players seriously and tournaments again, what did Privateer Press have to offer?
It's a question that I think Privateer themselves would have difficulty answering.
But really, it seems to me that the biggest problem with Privateer is that their whole shtick could be summed up as "We aren't GW".
I think there's some (painful) truth to this. When Warmachine first launched, they really pushed the idea of being the underdogs, courting all the disgruntled GW players. Sure, they built up their own community, but as many have mentioned, it became pretty full of tryhards pretty quickly.
Also, early on, there was more focus on making "cool miniatures" and the whole "we use metal, baby, not some cheap plastic, so we're higher quality" was another thing that they eventually left behind. As the game became more and more about just viewing the models as "necessary tokens," the model quality dropped, some might say significantly, when they moved to the PVC and so on. For me, a very large part of interest in any miniatures game is, well, the miniatures themselves, so when the quality there started dropping, it likewise started dropping my interest. I'm sure I'm not the only one that got sad just seeing boring 2d felt cut outs for terrain ("because it makes micro-measuring much easier"), half assembled, unpainted models, and so on.
And I think as GW really pushed the model quality (say what you want about their games, their models are definitely top tier), and many other Indies (which PP branded themselves as early on, but grew beyond that) are making models that are just flat out better than what PP is currently offering, PP started losing more from their community except all the folks who didn't care about the models as much, and the community as a whole got worse, IMO.
But really, it seems to me that the biggest problem with Privateer is that their whole shtick could be summed up as "We aren't GW".
I think there's some (painful) truth to this. When Warmachine first launched, they really pushed the idea of being the underdogs, courting all the disgruntled GW players. Sure, they built up their own community, but as many have mentioned, it became pretty full of tryhards pretty quickly.
Also, early on, there was more focus on making "cool miniatures" and the whole "we use metal, baby, not some cheap plastic, so we're higher quality" was another thing that they eventually left behind. As the game became more and more about just viewing the models as "necessary tokens," the model quality dropped, some might say significantly, when they moved to the PVC and so on. For me, a very large part of interest in any miniatures game is, well, the miniatures themselves, so when the quality there started dropping, it likewise started dropping my interest. I'm sure I'm not the only one that got sad just seeing boring 2d felt cut outs for terrain ("because it makes micro-measuring much easier"), half assembled, unpainted models, and so on.
And I think as GW really pushed the model quality (say what you want about their games, their models are definitely top tier), and many other Indies (which PP branded themselves as early on, but grew beyond that) are making models that are just flat out better than what PP is currently offering, PP started losing more from their community except all the folks who didn't care about the models as much, and the community as a whole got worse, IMO.
It’s the main reason I lost interest - there wasn’t much interest in the hobby aspect and too much focus on the meta.
I played with stuff that looked cool and was fun to paint. I did t win much but I still enjoyed playing.
But the enjoyment gets sucked out of you when you’re the one of two guys with a fully painted list.
Let alone one of half a dozen that even had the models fully assembled.
After facing off against torsos on bases (not even glued mind you) grey hordes, and ‘Gotcha’ gameplay, I got tired of it.
I felt like the only person pushing the hobby aspect out of a community of 20+.
@Ghool, yup, I never really "chased the meta" for any game I play (even though I was an Infernal for a while, that was just more about finding clarity in the rules and plugging loopholes when possible). The hobby aspect is at least half, if not more, of the appeal to any miniatures wargame for me (and I know, for you, too). "Rule of cool" is how I usually build any army list in any game.
Thing is, with Warmachine/Hordes, that quickly became a way to only be subjected to being curb stomped by players who instead focused on finding the most crazy combo to one shot your warcaster with. And it also started moving more and more to, as you say, gotcha-gameplay, where either you got nuked because you misjudged a threat range, or just got faced with some combo you hadn't seen before. To me, this became extremely un-fun.
But really, it seems to me that the biggest problem with Privateer is that their whole shtick could be summed up as "We aren't GW".
I think there's some (painful) truth to this. When Warmachine first launched, they really pushed the idea of being the underdogs, courting all the disgruntled GW players. Sure, they built up their own community, but as many have mentioned, it became pretty full of tryhards pretty quickly.
Also, early on, there was more focus on making "cool miniatures" and the whole "we use metal, baby, not some cheap plastic, so we're higher quality" was another thing that they eventually left behind. As the game became more and more about just viewing the models as "necessary tokens," the model quality dropped, some might say significantly, when they moved to the PVC and so on. For me, a very large part of interest in any miniatures game is, well, the miniatures themselves, so when the quality there started dropping, it likewise started dropping my interest. I'm sure I'm not the only one that got sad just seeing boring 2d felt cut outs for terrain ("because it makes micro-measuring much easier"), half assembled, unpainted models, and so on.
And I think as GW really pushed the model quality (say what you want about their games, their models are definitely top tier), and many other Indies (which PP branded themselves as early on, but grew beyond that) are making models that are just flat out better than what PP is currently offering, PP started losing more from their community except all the folks who didn't care about the models as much, and the community as a whole got worse, IMO.
It’s the main reason I lost interest - there wasn’t much interest in the hobby aspect and too much focus on the meta.
I played with stuff that looked cool and was fun to paint. I did t win much but I still enjoyed playing.
But the enjoyment gets sucked out of you when you’re the one of two guys with a fully painted list.
Let alone one of half a dozen that even had the models fully assembled.
After facing off against torsos on bases (not even glued mind you) grey hordes, and ‘Gotcha’ gameplay, I got tired of it.
I felt like the only person pushing the hobby aspect out of a community of 20+.
There’s some naked truth to the quoted statement.
To add to this. Our little basement group are mostly all big hobbyists. All of our stuff is painted to a high level. We also use 2.5D or full 3D terrain. We have a lot of high quality, accurate terrain we have bought as a group or printed. Again, all painted to a high standard. We do also have 2D terrain that we use if we are playing at another location like somebody else’s house etc.
I feel you paint about the lack of hobby in WM/H. I remember going to one of the few tournaments I ever went to and getting by well painted models out of my box and placing them down. Only to have one of my opponents literally pour his models out of a shoebox and set the broken and unpainted pieces down. His attitude was “you don’t win games with painting”. And this was prevalent in a lot of WM/H community.
But I think this attitude has actually changed over the last 2 years. As a counterpoint to the above, at the same tournament I came across one of the most beautifully painted Retribution armies I have ever seen in my life. Again, I think PP has been trying to push painting but I think they can do more on that front.
We have just opened a weekly games club in our local area now that we are opening up a bit. We had some demo/example games of WM/H on the go. Fully painted and full 3d terrain. We had 4-5 people in the space of one day express and interest in getting involved due to “how cool it looked” and our personal attitude (friendly, having a laugh, but still accurate in game play). We also had another who dropped out the game say that “he had never seen WM/H played in that way” and expressed an interest in buying back in “if that’s the way you guys play it here”.
So the simple truth is that fully painted models and epic 3d/2.5d terrain SELLS THE GAME TO OTHER PEOPLE much better than unpainted models and flat 2d neoprene templates. Im not against 2d terrain. It’s a good idea and for some it’s the only solution they have. But we should move towards 3d/2.5d being the norm in the same way it is in other games. We will attract so many more people when we show them that is a great epic war-game with a story to tell.
So the simple truth is that fully painted models and epic 3d/2.5d terrain SELLS THE GAME TO OTHER PEOPLE much better than unpainted models and flat 2d neoprene templates. Im not against 2d terrain. It’s a good idea and for some it’s the only solution they have. But we should move towards 3d/2.5d being the norm in the same way it is in other games. We will attract so many more people when we show them that is a great epic war-game with a story to tell.
Absolutely. The game can look gorgeous, but the playerbase has gone out of its way to actively discourage doing so. Locally we have a few players who won't even put a mat down. They're pretty insistent that felt on a bare table is the height of precision (despite felt sliding all over the place on a smooth surface). It's frustrating as what was once one of the inclusive aspects of the culture of the game has really morphed into something keeping players out.
Part of it is in PPs rules. Terrain interaction is too complex and too punishing when it comes to rough terrain, leading to a lot of micromanagement when it comes to measuring. It's one of the areas of the game that could really use an overhaul without really changing the game as a whole.
From everything that I have read about the hyper precise gameplay, this game should really be a hex based one, like Battletech. If we are down at the point where 10.1 vs 10.0 inches matters enough to fight over, its time to break out the grid.
Frankly, Privateer needs to decide what the hell they are doing with this game. Either beer and pretzel it like Warhammer and keep the cool figs, or come out with MK4 and set it on a hex grid with boardgame - quality precoloured one piece miniatures. Or do both, with 2 rulesets - this is totally plausible.
Frankly, Privateer needs to decide what the hell they are doing with this game.
I suspect that's exactly what's going on. The focus on MonPoc and Riot Quest and Warcaster is mostly letting WMH rest while they figure out how to modernize it.
Frankly, Privateer needs to decide what the hell they are doing with this game.
I suspect that's exactly what's going on. The focus on MonPoc and Riot Quest and Warcaster is mostly letting WMH rest while they figure out how to modernize it.
I hope that is the case. I've never actually played other than a few store demo games, but it was a very cool unique setting and did have some interesting tactical concepts and the minis I've seen in their artwork look cool and different.
However, I suspect they are turning into Steamforged Games or CMON. Why bother developing a game and a product, creating rules, nurturing a community, having quality sculpts cast in a quality material, etc. Ain't nobody got time for that when they can ride the Kickstarter gravy train. You get all the money up front, know exactly how much stuff to make, and if anyone happens to buy some of the leftover you dump into the retail market well that's just a cherry on top.
Eh compared to Cmon or Reaper, PP are a LONG way from the "KS Gravy Train". If anything for all their former "second biggest wargame firm in the market" they actually draw quite small amounts from KS. Heck a good number of no-name brands have secured much bigger amounts of funding. If anything Warcaster shows that PP can use KS to hop along rather than leap and bound along. Which seems to be their idea too in the way they've desgined it. Which isn't a bad idea. Some big games have done huge KS that then take 3 years or so to fund and complete. That's a long time between idea and market. Instead PP has gone for smaller goals that are achieved within months whereby PP then has a game out in the market rather than lots of huge orders and a game 3 years from market.
I also can't see them abandoning Warmachine/Hordes. Whilst on the outside its slowed, its still a huge archive of models and is what grew the company. I think its just in its difficult years like Old World was for GW.
It needs a fresh take and a new angle and a big injection of energy, marketing and drive. Perhaps also retiring some old sculpts and issuing new designs after 10+ years of design and manufacture improvement.
IF anything I wonder if the hurdle for PP is that they are big enough that resin and metal are worries if they hit it big again; but they are small enough that they can't afford the plastic machines and tooling (and can't easily find a good 3rd party to do it for them).
If they could get to near GW levels of plastic quality and then strike out with some 10 redesigned original models (plus one or two new) in plastic in boxed sets and such for a big re-launch of each faction they could easily get onto a winner.
Their Kickstarter offerings are definitely different from the SFG/CMON style. I didn't buy into Warcaster, but went in for the second season of Riot Quest and its definitely a very different culture more in line with high end statue/figure preorder systems. I think its pretty clear its mostly about dealing with the current distribution issues more than anything.
I definitely agree PP's biggest issues are being big enough to need plastic, but not big enough to afford it. That was essentially the promise of PVC for so many companies, which has unfortunately driven much of the line into a place where there's just too much to efficiently update. In some ways, I think its as much as its a problem, it could be a huge opportunity to revamp and modernize the game design with smaller unit sizes. Regardless of how its done, I think it's going to take a few years to develop and produce the PVC replacements, and the game is likely to stay pretty dormant until that gets finalized for a MK4 relaunch.
My memory of the launch of Mk1 (at least, in my LGS) was that the GW players latched onto it hard because PP appeared to be more crunchy with their rules. Unambiguous rules with official responses to questions was something GW was actively avoiding at the time. The cheaper buy-in was also certainly a part of it as a standard Mk1 army was generally cheaper (and smaller) than a standard tournament army in 40k's 3rd ed or 6th ed Fantasy.
That being said, I do like the suggestion on the redesign of a few choice units in plastic for the relaunch. Up the quality of the starter boxes, reintroduce a box per faction that can build multiple units (Kind of like the Cygnar box that can make Stormguard and Stormblades). Focus the relaunch on these specifically with promise to reintroduce multi-boxes for other units and warjacks/beasts down the line.
And yeah, some skus (and units) need to be retired, but the models themselves don't need to be invalidated. As an example, I think at this point Cygnar Long Gunners are pretty much dead. They haven't really had a place since Mk1, and in Mk3 they introduced Trencher Long Gunners which quite frankly are better in almost every way. I'm not sure why they don't just tell people they can use their Long Gunner models as Trencher Long Gunners and axe the original unit.
I think the big issue with having a large product range for a game is that new people see loads of cool new models and want them all; whilst existing gamers have them all.
But if you're running a tiny squad based game, whilst the newbies can buy into it easily (great!); neither group can use "big" armies in the game. This means that, even before you consider the meta of the game, there's a high chance of a larger number of models gathering dust on shelves.
We've seen this time and again with companies building a skirmish game; building bigger factions and diversity and then steadily upping the number of models in the game.
PP has clearly been thinking about this - the idea of a "side board" for Warcaster is genius because it introduces a means by which you can play with more of your collection and vary your army whilst still taking the same "working" core. That said it could still suffer the same problem in the long run.
In the long run I think Warmachine/Hordes IF they can crack plastic, would be best steadily redesigned into a larger model wargame. Perhaps not like Old World or AoS where you have big 30 model units; but where you've more variety on the table. I think aprt of that might be making casters less powerful and allowing for a bit more operation of warbeasts/jacks outside of caster influence so that the army can operate over more of the table (even for armies that don't use many machines/monsters, people still want their big toys on the table).
I do wish more people were open to having tiers of play which were associated with game sizes, much like how 40K is divided up between Kill Team, Combat Patrol, Competitive, and Apocalypse, along with having more restrictions the farther down one goes. Brawlmachine seems to be receiving some praise around some of the circles I read, so there is hope.
To kind of use the case in point above, certain Warcasters/Warlocks would be Brawlmachine level, like the Battlebox BG Controllers, while others would be tiered in to the Steamroller category like ADR (though broader), and then there are the multi-Controller battles which would have a third tier and work well with other Warcasters/Warlocks.
But getting people to play Warmachine Apocalypse (I forgot PP's name it is referenced so little) is a bit challenging, and up to relatively recently, anything not Steamroller didn't get an ear.
Warmachine likely has a big issue because of its more limited population and for those that have held on being focused on the competitive scene. Whilst a competitive scene can help things, it can also hinder others. A small population focused on one aspect is going to ignore other aspects.
MTG gets away with having different modes in part because it has a huge population of fans ;but also because most of their game formats appear at competitive events.
You can compete in the standard, the limited, the open, the booster draft. Each one is an event category in its own right. Granted the game is much much quicker in general so that also helps diversity.
Wargames tend to focus on one single format for an area/region at the competitive end. I suspect in part because its a bigger thing to setup (for MTG all you need is tables and chairs - no terrain etc...); and takes longer to resolve.
Kind of a rehash, but I'll repeat. I'd actually prefer the smaller sized game, but there's never really been proper scenario support to make them a worthwhile experience and WMH demands a scenario to drive engagement.
At the moment I am running a Brawlmachine league on War Table and have just finished playing with a friend who left WM&H ~2 years ago but wanted to try again when he heard about this neat format.
I am a fan of Brawlmachine. Those scenarios are very good, live and tense. You have to score and contest every single turn, which gets more and more difficult with diminishing forces. Even a single point of advantage can be successfully carried to the endgame, as the battle is just 5 turns long.
Overread wrote:Warmachine likely has a big issue because of its more limited population and for those that have held on being focused on the competitive scene. Whilst a competitive scene can help things, it can also hinder others. A small population focused on one aspect is going to ignore other aspects.
MTG gets away with having different modes in part because it has a huge population of fans ;but also because most of their game formats appear at competitive events.
You can compete in the standard, the limited, the open, the booster draft. Each one is an event category in its own right. Granted
But other formats exist, it is the organizers and groups who decide which to use. It is not PP's fault in this area when it is based on local reactions. As a point, I only played a few 40K games because few people were willing to play below tournament points. They were unwilling because all the games during the "work week" were to prepare and adjust lists for the upcoming tournament. In my area, it was at a point where you could get a 40K tournament in every weekend as we had numerous stores around (if you were willing to take the hour drive) who provided them in a staggered manner so as not to compete with each other's tournaments.
I saw this attitude start getting busted up with the 40K crew around the time that one of the stores started doing odd-ball tournaments, such as a revised FOC (back in middle of 6th Ed) which required full Elite or Heavy Support slots, games in pairs where both members of a team provided a portion of 2000 points, or just even 1000 points games with slightly relaxed FOC requirements. Interestingly enough, here the tournament-focused rules are not even provided by GW, but by an independent group that released their format on the internet.
I wonder if providing something besides locked in Steamroller would have kept WMH from falling so hard locally, but with ThemeMachine, 40K 8th Ed, and X-Wing really taking off, it may not have.
LunarSol wrote:Kind of a rehash, but I'll repeat. I'd actually prefer the smaller sized game, but there's never really been proper scenario support to make them a worthwhile experience and WMH demands a scenario to drive engagement.
PP has provided some small encounter scenarios, but people have not been supporting them as much. They were usually found in No Quarter, so if your group never looked at No Quarter (which an increasing number were not), then they would be unaware of them.
To be honest, most of those scenarios could have been put out in PDF format later on after No Quarter was closed, which is something they have missed out on, and Brawlmachine is attempting to address.
But I know not to bang my head to the game and ruin enjoyment of their game as well as waste my time.
