Why do you think Warhammer is so popular, for so long?

The rules change, the fiction is fluid, but what is that all important... I don't know how to phrase it... je ne sais quoi.

What made the game succeed where so many other games have disappeared into the land of misfit toys, never to be heard from again?

It has high-street presence, where no other games like it do.
The GW/WH stores may be money pits, but they are there to keep the brand in view, and to grab new players.
And once the game has such a huge market spread, it is then a primary option for gamers to carry with them. Whether going to college or university, or on deployment with the military. Players know they will be able to get a game of 40k (and AoS to a lesser extent), where hardly anything else, even other GW games, don't.

Also, the WH universes are huge, and options to individualise or customise the models or armies are built into the games.

Well, it got going more or less before anyone else, with an approach that’s hard to replicate.

In its earliest days, it captured the nerd zeitgiest, being a bit punk rock and anarchic.

Then came the market penetration of the stores. Stores where, before too long, you could buy goods they produced. And they felt like secret clubhouses.

Also GW has been incredibly lucky in the timing of its various misfortunes. 2008 Financial Collapse, which did for some big high street names? GW survived that, having already gone through serious cost cutting measures, and Carefully Not Borrowing To Expand.

Pandemic? A more or less ideal “stay in and avoid everyone” hobby. And GW hadn’t long effectively harnessed social media to promote itself.

Now, it’s not all blind luck of course. For instance, not borrowing to expand is a conscious, financially conservative position. GW making as much of of its goods as possible in-house is also a conscious decision, which gives them a curious level of control over their supply chain which relatively few companies enjoy.

Also? By the time they’d widened the market to the point it could support competitors? They utterly dominated it - again largely thanks to having their own stores, where someone could get started in the wider wargaming hobby, and never see a competitor’s goodies.

I think a few things come to the fore of my mind for why GW has grown so big compared to others

1) Own Stores - this is a big one. As the others said if you've got highstreet stores then people take notice and way back in the 80s 90s in the pre-internet era that was almost the only way to really get exposure if you couldn't afford TV ads all the time (and GW did afford a few over the years)
Own stores push local growth - consider how many of us first started by walking into a game store. Seeing games being played; seeing the display models; the shiny pictures on the boxes.

2) Staff that were hobbyists and keen. This is another big one - the staff at (UK) GW stores were never salesmen alone. They were fellow geeks - they painted, they played they hobbied. That creates a very different impression on a customer compared to a hard-seller. Yes they were sellers too, but the methods they had were very smartly done so that the interested kid never felt like they were being sold too - they were instead being welcomed into a community and a hobby by staff who were passionate* about it.
That's a big impressionable thing on young minds - many more times so if those kids are also perhaps the kind that don't do the most socialising in general in the first place

3) Good contracts at the right time to expand. GW did land a DnD contract at some stage in the early years. They landed a few more over the years which I think helped them grow alongside their own vision.

4) Owning their own vision. Whilst they did part 3, they also pushed hard to own as much of their own vision and brand as they could. They messed up a few times (like the lost Chaos God), but quickly learned ot keep it all.

5) No loans and re-investment into owning more of their own production line. These are a huge part of why they grew and why they sustained their growth. Using what profits they had to re-invest into the company and to constantly keep buying up more of their own production and manufacture and bringing it in-house put GW in a stronger position in terms of having direct control over their own manufacture, marketing and so on.

Not taking out loans and expanding slower than many other highstreet brands probably meant GW didn't grow as fast as they could have. HOWEVER, as noted above, it meant when recessions hit the wall GW didn't have those debts sitting on their head to kill them when sales were down. This is a big thing on why GW has remained where they are on the highstreet over the years whilst many other, much bigger brands, have fallen.

6) Lore and product. GW realised early on that lore sells. It captures the imagination and GW have pushed it hard on multiple fronts. They put lore with their rules - rules being an "essential" purchase means that everyone gained a base exposure to the art and story of the setting; at least for the army(ies) they played.
Sure GW also made books and art alongside those, but they knew that was serving more interest but not the whole market by far. That's why they dribble lore everywhere - news posts; short stories; novels; artwork; codex; rulebook etc... GW smear their lore EVERYWHERE so you can't avoid it and thus you get hooked.



*Another great example of this is Top Gear. MANY fans of the show (inc myself) are not car people. And yet when you got 3 really passionate people together fooling around they became exceptionally entertaining and took you on a ride into their hobby, their interest.

The now many, many videos in the Link Tank thread also show that early GW was heavily driven by artists, be they people doing paintings, sculpting, creative writing etc, they drove a lot of it.

Yes there was a sales vision behind it, and Bryan Ansell as owner has the final say, but it all points to a collaborative effort.

At that fed into the anarchic feel of the game. A galaxy filled with weirdos and oddities that captured the imagination. It’s the same effect as the Cantina Scene. It shows worlds well beyond the scope of the existing game.

Epic was also a big part of 40k’s early success. At that scale, you could churn out tanks of varying sizes you couldn’t in 28mm metal, or afford to do in 28mm plastic. And so the vision presented grew well beyond its origins.

There was also a wide variety of looks.

Compare to Warmachine, probably the game that came closest to claiming GW’s crown. Rules entirely aside? Everything looked terribly samey. And if like me you’re not into Steampunk? It really didn’t offer anything visually. X-Wing and Armada? Serious restrictions on what you can add to the game.

Rackham also had a decent crack with Confrontation. But in the UK, the models weren’t easy to get hold of unless you had a FLGS. Which meant far fewer “oh that looks cool” impulse buys. And if the FLGS didn’t offer intro games, and/or your game isn’t played in store? You’ll struggle for promotion.

By skill and luck in just the right combination? GW created and cracked the industry as we know it now.

Honestly when you raise titles like Rackham and Warmachine its less what GW did right and almost more what their competition did wrong.

Rackham pushed for that pre-painted market and, along with other things, that didn't help and drove them under and since then the licence has bounced around and wound up in literal criminal hands.

Warmachine was hard on GW's tails at one stage and then they rushed their 3rd edition launch; shut down their PG system*; shut down most of their, at the time, active forum**. Add on top their overseas deals for model production going south on several fronts and PP just went through a phase where every choice they made appeared to result in detrimental results.

Attempting to chase fast updating meta meant that their whole "rules in the box" card approach fell apart at a time when apps and such were still kinda new and not as mainstream as they are now.


The other thing is GW got a lucky/smart break in being able to get their own plastic casting machines at just the right time. This I think is what really allowed them to grow because they could do so internally and quickly. Other firms hit the issue that resin/metal don't scale up to big markets very well at all (even without the rising costs of metal being a constant issue). Meanwhile hiring factories in China for overseas production can be very hit and miss - get it wrong and you can literally lose your moulds and everything.

It's a barrier we see many firms hit the wall of though I get the feeling its a barrier that in the last few years is coming down. Plastic casting has a few more options now and it seems like there's more ability for firms to network can gain access to good quality casting.

Warcradle I believe has their own machines or very good contacts; Siocast is out there though requires some skill training and tinkering to make it really work well***; 3D printing is an option for scaling that, in my view, seems to sit between resin/metal and plastic in terms of scaling; Tabletop Combat has access to plastic right now that feels very much like GW style, a huge step up from their earlier more packaging plastic style plastics.





*which for everyone who isn't GW with their own stores is basically essential to pushing local level support

**with the view that 3rd parties would just fill the void for them

*** from what I can gather



Also on the lore front - GW are not shy about selling their IP to other markets for use. Their video game market shows their approach really well. Basically sell to any firm willing to buy the use of the IP - BUT - have GW retain full creative control over its use. This way GW maintains their identity of their brand really well no matter who picks it up. And in side markets GW isn't afraid of smaller firms or failures - if a game fails it fails and falls to the side and no one remembers it. If it succeeds then it does everyone great.
So GW are happy to have Total War Warhammer and Space Marine even if Dawn of War 3 and Age of Sigmar failed and if Battlefleet Gothic has always remained a bit of a niche title.

Also? When it comes to licensing, it helps that GW isn’t desperate for cash, so can and will take its time to negotiate a decent deal.

The Amazon deal took what, the best part of a year for the nittygritty to be worked out to mutual satisfaction. Compare that to when Marvel, to avoid bankruptcy, sold the right to X-Men, Spider-Man and that to various media companies. And it’s still not reacquired Spider-man, despite Sony’s absolute ineptitude with the license since Spider-man 3.

It’s a solid position to be in, and is the current end result of decades of lore building across multiple fronts, and never being too much of a stickler about what is and isn’t canon.

Its interesting that over the years, especially the waning years of the previous CEO, who became convinced he was always right, they are their own worst enemy when it comes to losing their position.

And counterintuitively all this is sustained with a series of games that are often objectively terrible compared to other board and wargames, making the title of the company somewhat ironic

GW very much went through that phase of looking purely at the numbers and focusing on the finances and shareholders and nothing much else it seemed at the top end of the company.

Which is what you can honestly see from a LOT of bigger firms - they get fixated on the numbers and lose touch with their market and actual customers.

It doesn't help that a lot of "big business" these days is focused on very short term gains with a view that you'll basically pump and dump the company and make off with a big share sale at some point for the top end of the firm. So following many common business practices can result in very short term company goals and focus.

I think there is where GW have managed to survive because they've had periods of long term targets and goals.

Of course they had some bumps along the way - lets not forget that whilst Kirby's end was a bit of a disaster; his start was almost essential for turning around GW's finances and costs.

He just grew too isolated from the customers as a management team whlist the current management appears to be much more in-tune with customers. Also Kirby went through that whole "we hate the internet sue everyone" phase too!

I do wonder if GW simply outgrew Tom Kirby.

I don’t mean that as a slight against the guy, as he clearly knew his onions, and is ultimately responsible for the GW we know today.

But, being able to guide and grow a company from pretty tiny to multi-national is one thing. Being able to do the next steps of Hopefully Inevitable Growth, such as leveraging IP effectively is quite another.

He may not have had the contacts for that, he might not have had the knowledge and insight on how to go about it and so on.

I 100% get the feeling that Kirby was outgrown.

Now how much that was just him or him and the managers directly under him and so on is impossible for us to really tell on the outside.

There very much was a phase where he was 100% needed and turned things around and he set a LOT of elements in stone that have lasted the test of time really well.

But I do get the feeling he was a one-trick-pony. Or that any adapting he made was just not in the right direction.

Again its hard to separate him from the management team - it could well be he simply wound up approving and having managers under him that supported poorer choices. It could also be he read into company management from big firms that have very different attitudes and, whilst they might be big, might also have that - as I noted earlier - focus on pump-and-dump approaches to companies and that whole shareholder focus over actual customer focus.

Suffice it to say that Kirby stepping down and Rowntree stepping was very much needed at the time (if not honestly before) for GW to turn a corner and thrive like they have done.

I think if they'd stuck to their guns of AoS at launch; almost no internet marketing; hostility toward fans/news sites (esp today with 3D printing); a fixation on maximum return on investment (ergo marines marines and more marines); then I think we could well have seen GW remain big but not as big as they are now and potentially winding up burning even more long term customers.


Of course it could also have meant that other firms would have got tehir head up even more so so its not all doom and gloom. UK side though I can say that GW are almost essential for one big thing and that's new people. So many other firms rely heavily on people already into the market. Who are already geeks/wargamers/modelpainters and converting them rather than getting totally fresh blood into the hobby and space. That's where GW has maintained a massive edge and its things like their school programs; their stores and so on that really help inspire new generations.

It's great for the market in general and it does GW great because it means as their older customers move on; they've got fresh young ones coming up

Rowntree also took what I presume to be a calculated risk in bringing back side games, after Kirby had shuttered Specialist Games entirely.

That lead to different price points for consumers. For instance, Underworlds was a very cost effective game when it first launched, and offered some unique models. So it had the appeal of a game designed specifically for Competition Play, a low entry price, and appeal to painters, who now only need spend £12* to have some interesting project pieces.

Blood Bowl, Necromunda, War Cry, Aeronautica, Adeptus Titanicus and that. All very different games, and more than just Main Game At A Small Battle Scale.

So anyone wanting to get involved no longer had to spend a couple of hundred quid to get something satisfyingly usable.

I’ve no doubt those games make only a modest profit each. But I’d guess the philosophy there is “it’s new money, and a decent chunk we’d have missed out entirely, as we’re catering to those uninterested in, or unable to afford, a 40K or AoS army”.

*Yes I’m aware the price has gone up quite a bit since launch.

Great thread!

One Q I've always had - was/is Kirby a gamer? I never got the sense he was part of it in any big way.

I think what Rowntree saw was multiple kickstarters and startupfirms making games that GW had once made and being highly profitable doing so.

To me its a shift in attitude from Kirby who was very much focused on short term profits and maximum return on investment - tricks that worked really well in the early days to turn GW's finances around
To Rowntree whose management is clearly more willing to invest into side/specialist games that maybe don't bring back as much return on investment; but

1) Help keep people within the GW ecosystem and also stops 3rd parties basically profiting of what GW did in the past.

2) as you say present different price-point and I'd say time investment games. Older games might be rich in cash but poor on time whilst younger are the opposite. So having quicker games like Underworlds and lower cost games like Warcry and Killteam is ideal for both groups

3) Games like Warcry and Underworld are long term investments. On their own they aren't massive and they require more upkeep than, say Dreadfleet which was one and done. However they create new customers; keep them engaged for longer when they can't afford big armies and then BOOM before they know it they've slowly collected up enough models or gained income to afford into the bigger games.


As you say its about chasing smaller profits because GW already clearly invests more than enough into Marines. I think also Rowntree saw things like Primaris as over-investing. Much like how MTG has steadily been burning customers by over-investing in new lines and side lines and chasing "whale" customers. At some point your cash-cow hits a limit and if you push hard beyond that there's the greater risk that you just burn it out and then everything starts falling apart.

Plus all-eggs-in-one-basket is great short term; but long term leaves you highly vulnerable.

For the many flaws the GW systems have, it's also important that they are really accessible to new people.

Even discounting GW's "high street" presence, you can pick up a box of models that will get you an army to play with literally out of the box.
All you need is some form of measure (i.e., a ruler or tape measure from the DIY kit) and some basic dice (which are super, super easy to get a hold of).

GW also have quite staggering brand loyalty. And that is likely a legacy of their stores.

The rules have always been pretty wonky and imperfect. But in the early days, the community saw Mend And Make Do as part of the appeal. House rule here, tweak there, wargear banned, point adjusted. It felt pretty DIY. And GW encouraged that ethos.

Now, as ever this is not to excuse GW’s current level of offerings - but the Mend And Make Do feel of the community still continues, somewhat offsetting wonk.

Same with balance. Where other games suffer is the inevitable GW balance comparison. Like X-Wing. That was really well balanced. Until, perhaps unavoidably, it wasn’t. So they did a 2nd Edition. Which required people to cough up for an upgrade pack or three to convert their existing collection. Which suddenly felt….a bit GW. Same as WarmaHordes, which were presented (at least by the community) as the anti-GW. Until they did a GW with edition churn, invalidation of army builds and so on.

Also, look at how the stores work and are stocked. In short? You can walk into one knowing nothing of the game, and walk out having played your first game, painted your first model, and, potentially, with everything you need except the elbow grease to have a board and armies at home. The glues, the paints, the brushes, the tools, the board, the terrain, the models, the rules. All of it. With a neat little GW seal of approval.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
GW also have quite staggering brand loyalty. And that is likely a legacy of their stores.

I think its a legacy of age. A LOT of us got into gaming when we were young and that was most often through GW and GW stores.
That makes a huge impression on us that we really don't realise, but it makes it really hard to walk away from. It's similar to how generations have now grown up with games like World of Warcraft and Minecraft - both of which have massive loyal fanbases.

In miniature wargaming, esp scifi and fantasy - GW is often the gateway. It's that first impression so everything else gets compared to it and it means that its always one of those things that pulls hard on the nostalgia strings. Even if you're getting into an army you never played before its still a GW thing with their style and all behind it

Why have franchises such as Alien, Predator etc succeeded? Same reason as 40K. There's something to the setting that captures the imagination of people in a profound way, that sets them apart from the "me too" out there

One thing often overlooked is how well GW has managed distribution and keeping product on shelves. While some of these things have ruffled customer feathers, they've been very protective of the supply chain and kept retailers happy.

Resisting online sales prevented the product from being devalued. Codices keep long term players buying from the FLGS. Regularly refreshing FOMO boxes cycles the product on the shelf. These things that players begrudgingly accept are things that keep GW in their face and constantly relevant.

I do wonder if part of it is just how long GW functionally had the market to themselves?

I didn’t really encounter much in the way of competition until the mid 90’s or so. And serious competition wouldn’t materialise until the early 2000’s and WarmaHordes.

That’s a long time to be the only fish in the pond. And it felt like a lot relied on disenfranchised GW players, rather than actively seeking entirely fresh blood. At least in the UK, likely thanks to GW dominating the high street.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I do wonder if part of it is just how long GW functionally had the market to themselves?

I didn’t really encounter much in the way of competition until the mid 90’s or so. And serious competition wouldn’t materialise until the early 2000’s and WarmaHordes.

That’s a long time to be the only fish in the pond. And it felt like a lot relied on disenfranchised GW players, rather than actively seeking entirely fresh blood. At least in the UK, likely thanks to GW dominating the high street.

UK as well and I'd echo this. GW really were the only big fish in the pond - I think it wasn't helped that often GW was the only gamestore in town when there were other gamestores they were often REALLY tiny and in very poor parts of town. The kind of places that young kids are not going to wander past/into. Or maybe it was a shelf in the corner of an otherwise "stuffed with other stuff" toyshop. Even today once you step past the giants like Wayland and Firestorm - many game stores are still tiny and in the cheaper bits of town. Again the kind of places that you "go too" rather than wander past.

Warmachine was about the only other brand I recall actually seeing in a few of those 3rd party stores around the time of them growing. Most other brands are just not there to draw in the trickle of customers. You find them already being in the market - either online; in gamer groups; youtube videos or from other club members.

I feel like in some ways 3rd parties have improved and become worse over the years - improved in that more of them are willing to carry other lines now; but worse in that most want to focus on cardgames for the higher profits AND worse because costs of doing business have gone through the roof meaning that they are often still small stores; cheap spots and very limited on what stock they can hold.

It certainly doesn't hurt that GW has often been the only game in a niche that's kind of all about sunk costs.

True that!

It also helps when competitors models aren’t as appealing.

For those as old as me, remember Warzone? They weren’t bad as such, but big, solid lumps of metal, which didn’t really have much detailing on them.

The setting takes a bunch of great sci fi tropes and smushes them all together with the wildcard influence of the Holy Roman Empire in Spaaaace to make something that is just amazing.

John Blanche's visuals, Jes Goodwin's mini designs and Rick Priestley's original setting ideas and appreciation of making a sci fi setting feel like it has capital H HISTORY all blend together with the contributions of all the other creatives to just make something powerful that spurs the imagination.

I was into 2000AD, medieval history and LOTR before I found 40K. It was electrifying to see them all playing in the same sandbox, along with all this fascinating stuff that I later found out was inspired heavily by Dune, another stone cold classic. It's been 28 years and my enthusiasm for the setting hasn't really waned. I've played other games, notably Warmachine and Hordes, and though I liked the settings none of them have had that impact on me. (Though I'm well aware you can only be 12 once!)

GW / WH

Warhammer is touching 40yrs old

They've got a lot right & so much wrong

40k Space Marines the end - (playable Starwars storm troopers)

WFB - im old enough to have started at 2nd ed

2nd Ed - everything on plastic square base's . rank able straight from the off. (no metal based figures, rebasing - mini dioramas needed)
First army list appear
3rd Ed - A push to start every army off with plastic core troops, everyone of certain age will remember the fantasy regiments boxset,60 men for £9.99 -10 troops with 6 races. so all your mates gravitated to one of the 6. Orcs, Goblins, Skaven, Dark Elves, Wood Elves & Dwarfs
Then you'd end up swapping each race for your collected army.
Warhammer armies was additional add on sale to the main rule book
4th Ed - The game changer
following the same format of the 3rd Ed 40k
You get the rules - 2 starter armies with a card board character & war machine - which would appear a physical miniature's with in 3 months of launch.

Massive expansion of the GW stores all over the UK
instead of having to travel to a major city - now in just about every city & large town.

So now you can go in store, get a demo game of this fantastic boxset game with over a 100 miniature's (looks & feels very value for money, even though £40 back in 92 was a lot of cash) still a big ticket item. Christmas or birthday presents was looking odds on
the release of the card board characters & war machines as miniature's in boxsets, you get the retail golden ticket - return sales with in 3 months (not including the normal addition sales of white dwarf, paint , the odd blister or glue)

That set the model to become the giant of the gaming world.

in 2 years of releasing the 40k & warhammer core games with massive store expansion to close to 100 stores in the uk

it instantly crushed all other games of miniature manufactures by 1996

in the next 15 years GW makes some massive mistakes but with the shelve life of most gamers being 3yrs. the mistakes are overlooked or forgotten or simply not know as the wave of gamers join the ranks

now is GW to big to fail......

many companies have come close & tried to copy / emulate GW but can not touch it.
an average of 12 massive races/army in each core game, each race/army has 50 plus different miniature's
other companies have games with 4 or even 8 races/army in. but that's just 1 game
not 2 or any other spin offs like GW

GW forsore this happening in the late 80s - it farmed off 3 / 4 of their rising stars in the figure sculptors in to a spin off company called marauder miniature's to see if they could dent the GW sales figures / market share
It didnt
they worked out from sales figures it would take 10-15 yrs to rival & not within a year, which was GW main worry.

GW will not be going anywhere any time soon

Store saturation.

For me, I spent years travelling for work. I kept a gw army and a climbing sack in the boot of the car, as I knew that wherever I went in the UK, I could get a game of 40k in the evening instead of sitting in the hotel bar reading a paperback...

It's quite funny to see store saturation listed over and over again when that only applies to the UK and at a much smaller scale, the US. Meanwhile GW games managed to dominate the market in countries which had no GW store till 2010s or still don't have one, so while this might be the answer locally in the GW home market, it clearly isn't they key to their global expansion.

For me, it was the fact that they were really big on self-promotion, there were GW catalogs in local game stores that sold them even back in the late 90s in dirt-poor eastern european market. And then they followed D&D and Battletech examples, and quickly added fiction expand the settings beyond just background decorations, making it so much easier to stay invested emotionally in the games.

It certainly didn't hurt that their competition kept getting into financial troubles one way or another, be it FASA in the US or Target Games in Europe (as far as I understand).

 rockgod2304 wrote:
GW / WH
3rd Ed - A push to start every army off with plastic core troops, everyone of certain age will remember the fantasy regiments boxset,60 men for £9.99 -10 troops with 6 races. so all your mates gravitated to one of the 6. Orcs, Goblins, Skaven, Dark Elves, Wood Elves & Dwarfs
Then you'd end up swapping each race for your collected army.

I loved that box.
And several boxes worth of those old Skaven/Dwarves/Wood Elves & Goblins are still fighting in my forces today.
As are about a dozen of the Orcs. The Dark Elves? I gve those away looong ago.

Angronsrosycheeks wrote:
It's quite funny to see store saturation listed over and over again when that only applies to the UK and at a much smaller scale, the US. Meanwhile GW games managed to dominate the market in countries which had no GW store till 2010s or still don't have one, so while this might be the answer locally in the GW home market, it clearly isn't they key to their global expansion.

For me, it was the fact that they were really big on self-promotion, there were GW catalogs in local game stores that sold them even back in the late 90s in dirt-poor eastern european market. And then they followed D&D and Battletech examples, and quickly added fiction expand the settings beyond just background decorations, making it so much easier to stay invested emotionally in the games.

It certainly didn't hurt that their competition kept getting into financial troubles one way or another, be it FASA in the US or Target Games in Europe (as far as I understand).

2010s..... yes they cracked the USA

only took them 20 plus years & about 4 reboots

Try & try & try again regarding the USA

The_Real_Chris wrote:
Its interesting that over the years, especially the waning years of the previous CEO, who became convinced he was always right, they are their own worst enemy when it comes to losing their position.

And counterintuitively all this is sustained with a series of games that are often objectively terrible compared to other board and wargames, making the title of the company somewhat ironic

Agreed.

Also, answering the OP, same reply I got when asking why Discord is so popular: It got there first, despite being worse than a forum or Telegram.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Gert wrote:


Even discounting GW's "high street" presence, you can pick up a box of models that will get you an army to play with literally out of the box.
All you need is some form of measure (i.e., a ruler or tape measure from the DIY kit) and some basic dice (which are super, super easy to get a hold of).

Also this!!

As decades pass, people become more and more lazy.

So a system that requires to get the minis for an army in place A, rules in place B, and other army in place C are doomed (used to be like that in the old times).

I disagree that laziness is the factor, but rather, it is society changing and the target customer demographic evolving.

Most people don't have the time to dedicate hours to a hobby once they are past childhood.
Heck, I think the last time I even played a game was December because it was the last time the schedules of our group aligned properly.
Painting and building sure but when a game can take upwards of two hours that's just time a lot of people don't have anymore.

The advent of Combat Patrol and Vanguard as properly supported systems with their own missions and free rules is probably the best thing GW has done in recent years to make their games more accessible.
Sure the lists are static but then when you're only playing 500ish points the games are quick and you have time to even swap armies to do more games.
You could expand into getting a standard 2-3k 40k/AoS army or you could grab a few different smaller armies instead and it actually be worthwhile to do so.

What's important is that the other options are also still there. You can do the standard 2k games of 40k/AoS along with TOW/HH for more advanced games, Kill Team/Necromunda/Warcry for mini-RPG sort of games, Underworlds for super quick competitive games, and Legions/Titanicus/Aeronautica for small-scale mass battles.
Then there's Blood Bowl for some truly goofy fun and MESBG for playing a universe that isn't Warhammer.

jim30 wrote:
Great thread!

One Q I've always had - was/is Kirby a gamer? I never got the sense he was part of it in any big way.

He was a roleplayer. Did some (one?) supplements, GM'd a bit. Dropped all that when he found management more interesting. Not into wargames.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Gert wrote:
I disagree that laziness is the factor, but rather, it is society changing and the target customer demographic evolving.

Most people don't have the time to dedicate hours to a hobby once they are past childhood.

But also as a kid, what did I mostly do? Pour over models, magazines, and army lists. Got to play the games i wanted to maybe 6 times a year. I ironically get more games in now I am in my 40s!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Rowntree also took what I presume to be a calculated risk in bringing back side games, after Kirby had shuttered Specialist Games entirely.


I’ve no doubt those games make only a modest profit each. But I’d guess the philosophy there is “it’s new money, and a decent chunk we’d have missed out entirely, as we’re catering to those uninterested in, or unable to afford, a 40K or AoS army”.

Chatting to the old SG staff a fair bit, essentially what Kirby and management saw was the SG stuff cannibalised sales from larger lines. The one always quoted was a soft re-launch of BFG in the states. Total sales were up, but 40k sales dropped. While they had a greater turnover their overhead increased with more SKUs and work needed to support it, so profit was down. GW has normally been laser focused on % profit. They have always wanted to be a highly profitable company, not one with a high turnover but low profit. Who remembers the model redesigns for 40k and epic that got rid of most of the earlier detail to save wear and tear on moulds (and boasted about in the annual report).

I think the new management realised they were letting their competitors grow in the market segments they had abandoned, so profit was no longer the driving incentive.

You can not overlook the first to market advantage.

It is a well-known and well-documented benefit in business literature and theory.

The_Real_Chris wrote:
But also as a kid, what did I mostly do? Pour over models, magazines, and army lists. Got to play the games i wanted to maybe 6 times a year. I ironically get more games in now I am in my 40s!

Interesting indeed that our experiences are very different.

From the ages of 11-19 I was getting at least one game in a week, sometimes two split between a local GW and friends houses.

Kid situations varied a lot generation to generation - I got very few games in part because I lived in a fairly rural area so getting to any major town as a good hours drive to get there. Furthermore the Warhammer hobby wasn't really a thing in my school generation at all (nor was MTG); they were more things the older students got into and whilst there was the odd club here and there, they were never that well attended.





That said on the subject of models here; rules there; other stuff over there - honestly its not lazy for customers to want 1 ecosystem of easy purchases all under one roof. It's easy, its quick, its low barrier, low confusion entry. The more hurdles you put in place the more people burn out and just wander off for something easier to get to grips with. Esp if they are having to do their own research on things to find out what is what.

I know I've passed on games or model lines just because it seemed that it took forever to find anything.


Another is company interest - wargames are "slow" product lines. Gamers want games that have a sense that they'll be around in many years time. So firms that show disinterest ;poor websites; very few updates and so on can often have that air.

Heck even GW had that problems for years - Sisters of Battle being a prime example of an "ignored" army. As soon as that happens the sales drop and its a death spiral because even those who are interested worry that the models will be gone in a year or less so why bother even starting.

Self promotion is probably the biggest factor. In the UK they had the stores, but for people around my age (40s) they may also remember the WHFB and 40k box sets in the Argos catalogue. Back in the late 80s/early 90s that was basically how a lot of kids wrote their Christmas lists - pick stuff out from the Argos catalogue. Having the main game boxes in there was huge exposure, as was Hero Quest and Space Crusade being in toy shops across the country. The models helped with self-promotion as well. They were generally better than the competition, readily available and GW put a lot of effort into presenting them in the best light with professional in-house painters. The 'Eavy Metal in old WDs might look a bit comical now, but it made a difference back then.

GW were among the first to really push the pick-up game approach too. That was a big change from historical wargames and even other fantasy and sci-fi games. Being able to collect an army independent of other people's collections and show up to a club or GW store and play anyone really helped grow the game. Then, once you have critical mass, the whole thing just keeps going, steamrolling a lot of competition before they can even get off the ground.

I think White Dwarf played a large role in cementing Warhammer in the market.

I remember waiting for the next issue to learn what was coming out, what new rules or stories were going to be included, or even a free model, vinyl record (Bolt Thrower, anyone?), or even a Codex (Codex Assassins got me to buy my first WD).

Sure there were Wargaming Magazines, but a lot of them were way over my head as a kid... and some of them still are.

But White Dwarf was fun, and it made me want to get involved.

Also? White Dwarf.

A readily available monthly magazine in newsagents big and small. Whilst not Beano cheap, it was never outside of most pocket money, and it looked like nothing else on the shelf.

Even a single copy could be that first, damning Doobie on the road to a full blown plastic crack addiction.

The articles were actively entertaining, with personalities coming across the page, and importantly? Genuine Enthusiasm. The people writing it loved the hobby and what it offered, and wanted to share that with others. Conversions! Scratch Builds! ‘Eavy Metal! Battle Reports! Short Stories! Interviews! Genuine Sportsmanship!

And within its pages? New release catalogue pages and, crucially I’d argue, a store directory. Even if your town didn’t have one, there’d be one in a decent shopping area it wouldn’t be too hard to persuade your parents to visit.

And, at least during my era, all GW goods. All of it. Cheaper than advertising, paid its own way through copies sold, and amazing market penetration.

Never underestimate a White Dwarf’s ability to catch someone’s eye, and then their pocket.

OHH How could we go for 2 pages and forget White Dwarf!

Esp back in the 90s when it was the era of the mighty Fat Bloke in charge! Yes I recall reading and re-reading many many issues of White Dwarf. You might not be able to afford big armies when you were young, but a monthly magazine was well within reach of most pockets and yeah it was everywhere.

Magazines were also big back then too - it was the pre-internet dominance era so magazines in general were written very differently. Fewer ads/adpages; more meaty articles and in general more energy about them.

WD was also a lot of "fun" under Fatbloke, there was a wild charm that just captured the imagination and drew you into the world and setting.



It's waned in impact over the years - sometimes because GW tried gutting it to a shell of its former self; sometimes just in style; but it's always been there on the shelf.

Even now I noticed that whilst a lot of magazine racks have pulled back on all the wargame hobby magazines that burst back onto the shelves around the Pandemic and just after; White Dwarf is still on pretty much every rack.

Sure we are in the days of the internet and that is a powerful tool in its own right, but the Magazine is still a big draw and focus.


Honestly its a shame no other independent firm or company has managed to really pull the same trick with a 3rd party magazine for everyone else. At least for fantasy and sci fi - Historicals seem to have a better edge on it even if they drift in and out of appearing or just being direct order only .

Also rules for new units. Often, but not always (cries in 2nd Ed Epic) eventually published in a collected volume. Enough reason there to pick up a monthly copy, and keep your eyes fixed on the propaganda.

The battle reports were also pretty aspirational. Not just “man, painted armies look good battling it out”, but often the size and scale of games.

And almost all of it centre on Being A Good Sport. Which is why, when I first hit the interwebs back in….probably 1997? I had a bad reaction to the Tournament Crowd. It was just a mindset I’d never encountered, and so my idiot mind saw it as a corruption of the hobby.

Have much chilled out since then though!

WD and store staff from GW in the UK 100% sold that "this is a fun hobby come join in" aspect heavily.

Say what you like for GW and accept that the Kirby overseas hiring was almost entirely different and more salesman driven - but their UK side has always had this strong edge of making the hobby appear fun, welcoming and something you want to engage with

I do feel privileged to have played my past role as a GW Till Monkey.

I’ve said many times before, to see a shy kid get involved, and often pretty rapidly develop social skills and become comfy in their hobby safe space is a very cool feeling. To know that whatever crap they’re subjected to at school is offset by a few hours of gaming a week, in an environment where they’re welcome, and where they make friends just feels great.

It also means parents are surprisingly willing to spend. Models, paints, books, all of it. It’s not necessarily hundreds a month, but there’s usually something new bought.

Also, that UK Structure? There aren’t really any other stores like it. Is it all done chasing greater profits? Yes. Let’s not be silly. That is the desired goal. But the interest in seeing that kid grow and develop within the hobby is also genuine. Parents pick up on that.

I think GW did a lot of little things right, and certainly created a high quality product, at least compared with the other offerings of the time. But the long term success I do think has to come down to the complete vertical integration. GW owns it's IP, writes it's lore, creates it's own art, designs and manufactures its own products, and often sells them directly to customers. it also provides support in the form of the magazine, social media, events, tournaments, etc. GW is never one bad deal away from a massive set back.

The second thing that GW did was not just constantly improve, but remake old models in the new style. This allows them to continue to sell new product without having out of control range expansion.

It is startling that how many consultants would recommend a company have its own factories, writers, stores, magazine, etc. today. I suspect it would be seen as a rather archaic way of organising a manufacturing company.

Also? They really got the imagery right in the early days. Was like an interactive heavy metal album cover. Cool as hell.

Polonius wrote:I think GW did a lot of little things right, and certainly created a high quality product, at least compared with the other offerings of the time. But the long term success I do think has to come down to the complete vertical integration. GW owns it's IP, writes it's lore, creates it's own art, designs and manufactures its own products, and often sells them directly to customers. it also provides support in the form of the magazine, social media, events, tournaments, etc. GW is never one bad deal away from a massive set back.

The second thing that GW did was not just constantly improve, but remake old models in the new style. This allows them to continue to sell new product without having out of control range expansion.

True and its something that I think Warmachine fell down on. Granted they had tried but also done it moving to plastics which backfired at the time. But it not only helps control range expansion but also lets you keep old-customers. The ones who aren't spending but are playing; are running the clubs; are organising events and such.

The_Real_Chris wrote:It is startling that how many consultants would recommend a company have its own factories, writers, stores, magazine, etc. today. I suspect it would be seen as a rather archaic way of organising a manufacturing company.

In a sense it is - but then again a lot of modern business is very short term focused. You go for those big investors and loans to allow for a really rapid expansion into the market before any competition can get going; then you maximise on profit and keep an eye on when you have to bail out. I think in some ways being in a very niche product market that never really attracted BIG firms gave GW a shield. No one like Hasbro or Disney came to really try and take the market away from GW. So GW were allowed to keep steadily growing; expanding; making investments; making mistakes and all. There wasn't a big golden-firm pumping investor money in like mad to steal talent; dominate the marketing; drive prices down and so on.
It might be very different if some really big firm had muscled in and had driven the prices way down on investor money with huge marketing campaigns; powerful IP connections; celebrities and so on and so forth.


Heck There's another one - GW has never devalued their own product. They don't even do regular sales - sure we get discount boxes but they are all 100% volume controlled by GW and of limited runs. Otherwise never a single discount period for them. Which likely really helps their steady sales rate because they aren't now stuck in the "no one buys anything out-of-sale" which is SUCH an easy trap for a company and industry to fall into*


*just look at all those big-box stores that are almost in perpetual sales now.

I agree with a lot of what is already said and would like to also highlight the lasting value of the fluff they created for their game settings. Their staff made a lot of interesting background's for their armies and this carried over into the pages of White Dwarf. Over time, the most interesting stuff became canon and was continued by new staff.

The Black Library kicked this up several degrees and really fleshed out the settings. Even now when I find Warhammer 40K's rules, retcons, prices, and business model (planned obsolescence) repugnant, I still enjoy the fluff and will pay good coin for a book instead of the latest dull codice.

Also? Look to the recent Eldar release. A much needed overhaul, really split over two Codex Editions and three years.

Lots of new plastic models. Lots of refreshed sculpts.

But, Y’know? Someone who moved on at the end of Rogue Trader can, for the most part, dig out their old army, and the models will be perfectly usable. Oh they may want to buy the shiny new. But they don’t really need to.

Space Marines to a lesser degree, Orks more or less so. Nids you could, but you’ll have a pretty bare bones army from it.

Even so. We’re talking about a collection assembled and painted over 30 years ago, still be feasibly usable in the modern day.

Which is largely testament to strength of, and commitment to, GW’s design process.

I was also going to point out model design. I don't play Horus Heresy or Necromunda (no one plays locally), but I keep buying really cool new models.

Games Workshop has got me buying things that I know that I'll never use, just because they are cool looking.

No other miniatures company has had that effect on me.

I can't think of another game system where the "rule of cool," even applies.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Also? Look to the recent Eldar release. A much needed overhaul, really split over two Codex Editions and three years.

Lots of new plastic models. Lots of refreshed sculpts.

But, Y’know? Someone who moved on at the end of Rogue Trader can, for the most part, dig out their old army, and the models will be perfectly usable. Oh they may want to buy the shiny new. But they don’t really need to.

Space Marines to a lesser degree, Orks more or less so. Nids you could, but you’ll have a pretty bare bones army from it.

Even so. We’re talking about a collection assembled and painted over 30 years ago, still be feasibly usable in the modern day.

Which is largely testament to strength of, and commitment to, GW’s design process.

This is one of those things that isn't, and can't be, the main reason for GWs long term success but woo boy does it help. I was digging through some RT era Orks, and while they are different in size and overall vibe, many design elements are the same, and you could easily build units of shoota boys and kommandos out of the models that I had. As you said, it would be bare bones, but it's there.

Every now and then some models go completely dark, although with legends even that is rarer. But man, that late RT/early 2nd edition eldar range is just fire, and still lines up man for man with current units.

I think the key is that it doesn't burn bridges. Many collector hobbies can often just burn out older customers. Look at MTG - if you want to stick with it there's a LOT of constant buying that you HAVE to do to keep up. Not optional, you straight up have to keep buying to keep up with the current cycle.

Sure you can go to legacy but that has its own issues where it can even be not just constant buying but hunting down rare and exceptionally expensive cards. They aren't bigger nor shinier than regular cards, they are just limited production high demand and you can't just convert another card to proxy them in like you can with a wargame based on models.

You can drift out and drift back into warhammer and indeed many of us have done that (sometimes several times over the years). Sure when you return there are new things to get and all; but in general terms you can still put down a good chunk of your existing models. It removes a lot of that returning sting.

The golden goose is that you don't have to replace your old models but many people choose to anyway. And that's due to the huge investments and increases in model quality.

You could technically use RTB01 marines if you wanted. Even once they squat the tactical squad, you could call them intercessors. but nobody does, because the new models look better.

Not just that; GW was really smart in making "the hobby" part of the appeal. You don't just new models because they look really awesome; but also because you want to try a new paint scheme; or because you honestly enjoy assembling and modelling and such.

Making sure that was part of the hobby and appeal is a great way to help generate sales and interest - heck many of us don't even get half as many games as we do spend time messing with the models themselves.


It's a big contrast to say DnD where models are often viewed more disposably. You get them; use them once; toss them in a bucket of models and that's it.

When you get past the memes and think about it, GW viewing itself as a models company, not a games company, does set itself up for long term success. It makes games, but it's business is mostly the design, manufacture, and sale of the models.

There were always minor exceptions, but for the most part, people bought Warmachine to play the game, same with Legion. Some lines, like Inifinty or MCP, do have more notable markets of just painters, but nothing like GW has.

Thinking further on the store and market penetration?

Perhaps part of the answer is Formative Years.

Again speaking only for the UK, as that’s my experience? GW is the entry point to Wargaming. So, even if in due course you go off and discover other game which you prefer? You’ll likely have been a Warhammer player first. And thanks to their near universal reach? You’re only one “oh, that’s cool” release from spending a load of dosh.

Even things I hate from them are good business because they obviously don't bother most customers enough to actually move on.

Edition churn - keeps people hyped, keeps people excited for the next starter with reasonable value, and hey, we get to sell you a bunch of books that are mostly reprinted art and background at this point.

Scale increase - increasing the size of the models seems to have gone down well with most people, and lots have accepted replacing collections and so on with the newer, bigger models. I think this is the thing GW have done that annoys me the most, but when I look at the community response I can see I'm really in the minority here and most are happy with the newer, bigger models.

High Prices - people are still paying them! Even I went and picked up some of the Squighog boyz because I just think they're awesome models. I looked at alternatives for a good long while and and went back and forth with myself about it, but in the end I found a place that had them 20% off and picked up a box. And now they're built, I like them even more and am really looking forward to painting them once things calm down a bit.

So although I may grumble about their business practices, they are obviously working and the company seems to be doing better than ever.

Time.

Look at everything mentioned above as to why GW succeeded and it all comes to longevity and time.

Sure, the right time and place in some instances. GW has had the benefit of time to grow and succeed. It has been able to cope with failures and missteps.

Competitors to GW do not have or have not been allowed to have such a luxury to get it right.

And timing I’d argue.

They ultimately kinda created the miniatures market as we know it today. And by the time GW’s efforts had a community large enough to attract competition, they were very well established in terms of shops, casting and sculpting facilities, White Dwarf being easily found in pretty much any UK Newsagent. And it was able to do so by reinvesting the not insignificant profits it had made over what, a decade, maybe more?

That’s a fair while to have the audience more or less entirely to yourself, let alone one you pretty much built from scratch. And it meant for any other company to get noticed, it had to ramp up faster than GW had. Which costs money, and attracts a bigger risk to investment.

And of course, it didn’t stop there. It kept growing and developing.

For all that some corners of the Internet are determined that GW is shoddily run and incompetent? It’s clearly not. Especially in recent years, where its growth and expansion has been frankly incredible.

(The only other company that I can think of that has stayed in the market for a long time is Steve Jackson Games...)

Every other IP I can think of from D&D to BattleTech has been bought and sold and transfered a bunch of times.

And my thought about that is that other companies expand their games into other genres, like card games, and RPGs.

For the most part it appears that Games Workshop just licenses its IP to 3rd parties who develop these other games.

If they collapse, GW has already made its money and can rent out its IPs to another company waiting in wings.

I really don’t think there’s much chance of GW going under, if they stick to their ongoing “don’t borrow to expand” model.

As the 2008 Financial Collapse showed in the UK, its borrowing to expand that tends to do for you. You can still be nominally profitable, but the second you can’t service your debts, that’s when Bankruptcy comes a-knocking. And it needn’t be a long term hiccup either.

That’s what did for many companies. Sharp, unexpected downturn in income, can’t pay off their scheduled debts, and boom, they’re gone, when the prevailing market attitude is No More Lending.

We’ve also seen GW dedicated to constantly monitoring store performance. If a store just isn’t working out? It’s gone. Not in a knee-jerk way, as it can be the staff that aren’t a good fit, or a poor location in a town. But if it can’t pay for itself, they don’t keep it around for terribly long.

Now, that’s not nice if you happen to be the manager trying their best of course. But it is a sensibly pragmatic approach.


Where I think modern GW has wised up is appreciating its Store Model doesn’t necessarily work everywhere. They’ll give it the old college try, yes. But when it doesn’t work out? They don’t keep throwing good money after bad, instead relying on FLGS. And even try adapting it to local preferences and that. Which I think is a Post-Kirby thing, but don’t quote me on that.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
And timing I’d argue.

They ultimately kinda created the miniatures market as we know it today. And by the time GW’s efforts had a community large enough to attract competition, they were very well established in terms of shops, casting and sculpting facilities, White Dwarf being easily found in pretty much any UK Newsagent. And it was able to do so by reinvesting the not insignificant profits it had made over what, a decade, maybe more?

That’s a fair while to have the audience more or less entirely to yourself, let alone one you pretty much built from scratch. And it meant for any other company to get noticed, it had to ramp up faster than GW had. Which costs money, and attracts a bigger risk to investment. .

The offshoot of this is that there is a not-insignificant part of GW's audience who play their games because everyone else does. I've spoken to quite a lot of gamers over the years who play 40K despite not really particularly liking it, just because it's the only game that they see people playing in their area. And when you rely on pick-up games, or have an established group who aren't willing to look outside of their established comfort zone, that makes it difficult for any other game to get any traction. Everyone plays Warhammer because everyone else plays Warhammer... and nobody is prepared to play something new, because nobody else is playing it.

That’s definitely a part of it. But why do people stick with it? I think we can agree the rules are imperfect - but are they really as bad as some claim?

What I’ve stuck about for is the background. To the point I was super chuffed when Epic returned, because I love that game. Not 6/8mm Gaming. I don’t simply want to play a sci-fi game in that scale. I want to play Epic. With the right models.

As well as a bad experience when first playing Warmachine (WAAC, Noobseeking Neckbeard) the lore there just never grabbed me. And so I sacked it off.

I enjoyed X-Wing well enough and spent a pretty penny. But wait, that’s dead now. As is Armada. And various other Star Wars games, as Asmodee seem to prefer Entire Sodding Game Churn.

Marvel Infinity thing? Local FLGS carries a decent amount, only I’d want to make my own Superhero.

That is of course only my experience and thoughts, and they’re not presented as anything beyond anecdote. But, I will argue sheer momentum isn’t the only reason GW continue to dominate.

Sure, we could point to that survey thing, the one that covers North America, and has at time shown X-Wing above AoS and even 40K. Except, that poll doesn’t, has never, taken into account GW’s direct sales, either from stores or online. I worked it out from GW’s published figures once, and I’ll attempt it here. From GW’s annual report 2024.

Core Revenue- £494,700,000.00

Trade Revenue - £296,300,000.

So, 60% of its income could be reported in that poll. Except, that poll only covers North America - and participation is voluntary.

Thankfully. I believe GW also publish its income by territory. And that shows North America to have brought in £124,400,000 at Trade. Which is 25% of GW’s overall income.

A tasty amount, no argument there. But kinda making the results of said poll (ICC or summat? I dunno why I can’t remember its name). It’s only reporting at most, 25% of GW’s income source. Why at most? Because it’s voluntary, so at least some retail stockists of GW’s toys won’t be responding,

Whereas PP, AMG etc don’t seem to do direct sales as GW do them. So we’re likely to be seeing a much higher percentage of their overall sales being reported.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Why do you think Warhammer is so popular, for so long?

The rules change, the fiction is fluid, but what is that all important... I don't know how to phrase it... je ne sais quoi.

What made the game succeed where so many other games have disappeared into the land of misfit toys, never to be heard from again?

To me, it's because it's an actual wargame that, even back in 2nd edition has focused on ease of access.
I know that sounds hilarious, especially with the prices that GW wants us to pay for minis, but think about it:
Everything is rolled on D6s and uses a basic tape measure. No specialist dice are required, or special movement sticks.
Next, I'd say is the ability to keep growing your army. Sure you can stop at like.. 500 points. maybe even the combat patrol for your dudes. But at some point, GW will put out a model that just makes you say "I need to paint that". or make rules for a new dude that just wows you.
So you have ease of access tools, good models, a reason to keep coming back, and on top of that- The lore is great. 40+ years of pretty consistently good stuff. Sure, you get a blunder now and then. (I will never forgive GW for saying that Khaine shattered the Nightbringer), But it's all rather consistent, and sometimes even spectacular.
Last... and this is more of a personal bit, which is why I saved it for the end:
Skirmish games are dominating RN, and I don't really care for Skirmish games. When I want to play a war game, I want to play with just about everything on offer. I may miss out on like- IDK super heavies. or, Terminator squads, but the point is that I can take them in a full game. I may not for one game, but I can come back to them eventually.
But I am not locked to Just terminators for that game. Or only locked to This other unit for a game. Or only locked to a Daemon Prince for a game because the Daemon Prince eats too many points. TL;DR for this bit: I want to play AN ARMY, not play A UNIT (or two).

And that's why I think 40K has been successful for over 30 years despite its rising cost.

think its helped GW that while they have shot themselves in both feet on several occasions they have faced competition who use belt fed artillery for that purpose

e.g. other companies seriously screwing up new game releases on a level that GW only came close to with AoS and GW eventually backed down, slightly

generally the models are actually available as well (even if you have to order them), they seem to have a love/hate relationship with 3rd party retailers but are not as outright hostile as some.

some is blind luck, some is 'right time & right place', some is the inertia that comes off it.

regardless they won't be easy to topple by someone else

We can also look beyond the game.

There’s a lot of people out there just in it for the painting and converting elements of the wider whole.

And sure, those folk are incredibly well served, with a staggering array of manufacturers and models to suit pretty much any taste.

But GW has ease of visibility. It’s very good at self promotion these days, and its sheer popularity will get eyes on across social media. You’ll also instantly know where you can get your mitts on it, should a particular model grab an otherwise Manufacturer Agnostic painter.

There’s also guarantee of Quite Certain Quality. As in, when you buy GW, you know what you’re getting. Not necessarily The Besterest Kit Ever. Not necessarily The Greaterest Finerest Detail Ever. But, you can be confident what you see on the box is exactly what you’re getting, as GW’s marketing doesn’t really do “contouring” type paintjobs. And, if anything is broken, missing or miscast, you can be confident GW will sort it.

Compare to “trust me bro” 3d renders of STLs, Rackham’s fondness for stunning paint jobs adding freehand details not actually present on the sculpt, and I dunno, Chapterhouse shuttering but happily continue to accept your order, and your dosh, for a good while after.

Eh, GW has absolutely 100% made mistakes on par or far far beyond things that have killed their competition. They've just had the capital and zealous devotion to make it out the other side.

Honestly, one of the things that often kills competitors is the zealous devotion of spurned GW fans. The promise of doing better has often been all it takes to abandon a popular new game in droves.

Yeah that is true. A lot of people will go back to GW as soon as possible, even in the face of really annoying anti-consumer stuff like the increased base sizes for the Old World.

The AOS launch though I feel was a different thing entirely. Fantasy had been poorly handled for quite a while and 8th edition was already a lot less popular than fantasy was in it's heyday (and I get the impression Fantasy also wasn't that big in the US market anyway). AOS was an attempt to claw some money out of the Fantasy genre and get some interest, because the revenue from the game was so low it wasn't worth keeping on as far as the suits were concerned.

But GW could get away with that because 40K is such a juggernaut of success that Fantasy was a fraction of a fraction of their total profits at that stage anyway. GW have only been close to disaster when they have really badly messed up 40K because that is by far and away their most popular game. If AOS succeeded, all well and good, but if it failed? Well Fantasy was already a failure in their eyes.

And despite my personal misgivings (another sign of how out of touch with the Wargaming Zeitgeist I am!) AOS seems to have gone from strength to strength, and it really did draw in a new audience of fans who really love it. Shows what I know, because I was sure it would fail.

AoS was such a disaster at launch that it sparked GW having a massive change which shook up their whole company top-end and management.

This is the height of Kirby's "I don't need customer feedback" era of management which I put down to the top end purely looking at the stats of sales and not much else. So they convinced themselves that the only sales they had from Old World was painters collecting models due to the low uptake of games.
What it failed to take into account was

1) A lot of people weren't playing because they were in limbo waiting for new models/rule updates

2) Burnout - Fantasy at the time needed big armies to work properly and it didn't really have a working low-model count game format that was well supported.
This was compounded by a long period of not gaining new recruits so you had newbies and pros with full armies and nothing really inbetween the soften the "go build 1.5K of models to play"

3) The fact that even within those who functionally collect and paint; many aspire to game even if they don't manage too.



So when AoS launched several months after Old World was removed from shelves without any real marketing build-up and with only joke rules to armies that sometimes were 1 single model with a view that people would "collect" a Grand Alliance and just pick up the halfdozen models from sub-armies that would appear and vanish as collector models - it burned hard.

Yes it found some fans and "home brew" rule writers had a lot of fun in that time; but it lacked any sense of unity and ultimately GW had to do a massive change in tone. Shifting away from tiny armies to regular ones; actually producing sensible rules for 2.0 and a bunch of other things.




Again this was back when GW didn't do any online marketing (and mostly just sent nasty letters to sites publishing rumours); when GW would sometimes leave armies without rule updates during editions, sometimes more; would often leave armies without any model updates for very long periods and only do them in big bulk releases etc...

A LOT of attitude and marketing changes took place around that time - almost all off the back of what happened with the AoS launch.












Also this reminds me of another thing GW has had in their favour - disasters are often restricted to a single product line. Whilst general management attitudes do spread across the brand, GW has often had the advantage that one game can be failing and another doing very well. Mistakes they make in one get shielded by good sales in others. Esp when it comes to their old specialist games.
Sure they lost money or didn't get the best return on investment; but they had other lines still selling. So they could ride out a lot of mistakes because they had a broad portfolio of products that could pick up the slack. Many smaller firms often don't have that luxury because they can't support multiple games at once or they are structured so that even if they support multiple; they have zero slack in the system - every game is just keeping itself afloat.

An extreme example of this is kickstarters which can crash and burn for firms when they get delays and there's no regular product or sales line bringing in income to keep the lights on during those delays and the KS money already got burned up invested into moulds or other elements way earlier. Small firms that do maintain a previous product line can still have issues because the KS takes so much time away they hit production shortfalls and suddenly their market is drifting away because there's no stock - or because their main customers burned out on the KS and are waiting and not buying product.


If GW's fantasy fans burn out they've still got their 40K and LotR fans; if their specialist game fans burn out they've got their big heavy lifters.
Space Marines being a very solid very steady very constant seller is likely a huge backbone of this - if they suffered major sales setbacks for prolonged periods that could impact GW; but even so if other lines were doing well they could still ride it out.

8th edition I think had serious problems despite having a very passionate fan base. I had a fully painted army which was the right size to play with, but I just found the game pretty unfun to play at the time - you'd spend ages setting up your painstakingly painted units only to have them mostly removed in turns 1 and 2 by mega spells blasting them off the board. It wasn't satisfying at all in my view and a downgrade on 6e and 7e despite some good changes like Step Up and simplifying some of the sillier rules. And a beautiful and inspiring rulebook.

8th was the right edition at the right time, but definitely full of problems. Primarily its resource mechanics were a disaster, but people were excited to have resources to manage in 40k. The CP reroll alone sold so many people on the game again and really the entire launch period gave 40k the momentum it's still running on even if every codex release chipped away at what made the indexes so refreshing.

That's not to say it wasn't full of problems. I wouldn't even say it's better than 9th even though I didn't enjoy that edition at all. I do think it's a huge step up from 6th and particularly 7th, but that style of game never appealed to me in the first place, so I was always going to feel that way.

 LunarSol wrote:
8th was the right edition at the right time, but definitely full of problems. Primarily its resource mechanics were a disaster, but people were excited to have resources to manage in 40k. The CP reroll alone sold so many people on the game again and really the entire launch period gave 40k the momentum it's still running on even if every codex release chipped away at what made the indexes so refreshing.

That's not to say it wasn't full of problems. I wouldn't even say it's better than 9th even though I didn't enjoy that edition at all. I do think it's a huge step up from 6th and particularly 7th, but that style of game never appealed to me in the first place, so I was always going to feel that way.

Pretty sure he's referencing 8th ed Fantasy not 40k.

Everyone else has hit the nail on the head for longevity.

Also also?

Despite the opinions of some self appointed interwebular experts?

We’ve got to admit, GW knows what it’s doing. And is a well run company. Despite as per my earlier post (page 1 I think) here, benefitting from Sheer Blind Luck at times, the luck has been the timing, not the action.

 Hulksmash wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
8th was the right edition at the right time, but definitely full of problems. Primarily its resource mechanics were a disaster, but people were excited to have resources to manage in 40k. The CP reroll alone sold so many people on the game again and really the entire launch period gave 40k the momentum it's still running on even if every codex release chipped away at what made the indexes so refreshing.

That's not to say it wasn't full of problems. I wouldn't even say it's better than 9th even though I didn't enjoy that edition at all. I do think it's a huge step up from 6th and particularly 7th, but that style of game never appealed to me in the first place, so I was always going to feel that way.

Pretty sure he's referencing 8th ed Fantasy not 40k.

Everyone else has hit the nail on the head for longevity.

That makes dramatically more sense.

Honestly, I've never vibed with Fantasy and kind of bounced off Sigmar as well, so it went right over my head.

 Da Boss wrote:
The setting takes a bunch of great sci fi tropes and smushes them all together with the wildcard influence of the Holy Roman Empire in Spaaaace to make something that is just amazing.

John Blanche's visuals, Jes Goodwin's mini designs and Rick Priestley's original setting ideas and appreciation of making a sci fi setting feel like it has capital H HISTORY all blend together with the contributions of all the other creatives to just make something powerful that spurs the imagination.

I was into 2000AD, medieval history and LOTR before I found 40K. It was electrifying to see them all playing in the same sandbox, along with all this fascinating stuff that I later found out was inspired heavily by Dune, another stone cold classic. It's been 28 years and my enthusiasm for the setting hasn't really waned. I've played other games, notably Warmachine and Hordes, and though I liked the settings none of them have had that impact on me. (Though I'm well aware you can only be 12 once!)

Most of the comments in this (excellent) thread talk about their marketing strategies and tactics, but this one gets at what I think the real secret ingredient is – the setting and characters.

The space marine designs are iconic. The chapters allow you to dig into Roman or Mongol history or to pursue whatever martial tradition you enjoy. The religious themes make the story feel grounded and relatable but epic at the same time.

This is why Sigmar has failed to catch on to anything like the same degree, to the point where GW is giving away palettes of Skaventide at Adepticon. AoS has the same beautiful sculpts, which are even better than 40K. It has the same distribution advantages. It even has protagonists in sweet armor fighting all manner of baddies. But the unique blend of influences that make up 40K isn't a commodity; combined, they strike a resonant frequency.

It's very much a game and commercial product, but it's also got a claim to be a unique work of art worthy of study and celebration.

Personal theory, its popular because of how its themes appeal to a broad variety of people. Ie, my gaming club all likes 40k, and pretty much all my mates in the services love it.

Hell, last survey by corporate puts the amount of 40k fans in america who are in the services at 20-40%

Perhaps a bit late to this topic - but felt I'd reply as I kind of disagree with a lot of responses.

I feel a lot of them focus on "why am I, often years - decades - later, still interested in Warhammer/40k/GW in general etc".
Which might make sense if you think you are a major feature of why GW has succeeded where others have failed.
But while I can relate to this a bit - I'm not sure it holds up. I'm not convinced GW is big today because White Dwarf was great in the 90s. We are potentially talking about an era where the people probably providing the bulk of sales weren't even alive.
You could perhaps claim "ah, but everyone read White Dwarf as a Teenager and this is what sowed the seeds for the great... nerd revival amongst people now in their 30s/40s, see Dungeons and Dragons and various other things". But I don't think "everyone" read White Dwarf.

I'd argue GW has been successful because year after year they've managed to re-invent themselves and get a largely new customer base. Ex-GW people say they think their target customer joins, spends a lot on the hobby over about 18 months, and then on average moves on to other things. Sure some percent stay forever and ever - but not all that many. And if they are notionally in the hobby but never buy anything from GW that's potentially useful (versus people explicitly being out of the hobby) - but doesn't help the bottom line.

I feel if you look at the competition, this is where they failed. In the early-mid 2010s both X-Wing and Warmachine were eating up GW's market share. Its subjective, but I think a case can made that both games were better than 40k. Fantasy's sales had collapsed - and I think even 40k briefly lost its crown.
Both games were far cleaner and simpler than the seemingly ever more bloated imbalanced mess than 40k (and Fantasy) was evolving into. I think was good for "tournament/competitive players" - who wanted a cleaner and more precise game than 40k's heavy luck, kind of abstracted mess. But it was better for completely new players -

But they couldn't obviously stay that way. They didn't want to sell you a starter set or faction starter. They wanted you to become a collector and buy more stuff.
So they released more.
But over time each additional expansion, supplement, additional units etc undermined the advantages vs 40k. The game became less clean - and became more complicated and bloated. The gap between new players and experienced players - and good options and bad options - grew.
Eventually both games kind of went for resets of a sort - and imploded as a result. Possibly not helped by the fact GW finally reset 40k in 8th which was very warmly received - and a range of their own problems.

I've argued before - but I think 10th was kind of a half-hearted reset. I think its very much late 9th written up in a new language with some toning down. Its not remotely the same as the more structural changes between 7th and 8th (or 2nd and 3rd). But I think GW was very aware of complaints that 40k had grown too complicated and that this was a barrier to entry for new players. Hence the need to be seen to do something about it. I also think this is why the edition timeline is sort of set in stone - GW want to target a new generation of players every year (across their different game systems.)

Which I guess is the question. Why was 40k able to carry through these changes - and yet they broke Warmachine and X-Wing? Their Veterans kind of faded away - but the key issue was that they couldn't be replaced by new people.
Some of this was obviously issues the companies had themselves.

This is a weird analogy - but I think its a bit like World of Warcraft players. You may have seen the famous graphs of WoW subscriber count - it rises through Vanilla to Wrath, peaks briefly in Cata, then falls away. But on paper, even though its a lot lower, its still quite big. Supposedly still about 7.5 million subscribers today.
So why hasn't WoW been... socially, anything like it was in that mid-late 00s period?
I think its because people look at the graph and draw the wrong conclusion. They think people only joined through Vanilla->Wrath. Then people slowly quit after.
In reality people were constantly joining and quitting. I don't have the data for this - but I think Blizzard claimed 100 million (including free trial accounts, which obviously skews it) were set up by the time they got to Pandaria. But what this means is that there wasn't the same 11.5 million people playing throughout WoTLK. That suggests there was instead potentially 30+ million people played, just that a lot of them joined, played for a few months, and quit. Unlike previous expansions, the number of people joining only matched the number of people quitting. In later expansions the quitters outnumbered the joiners.
But in terms of "the game", it also meant the vast majority of the playerbase was very new and inexperienced. Whereas today I think the vast majority are people who've been playing for years - perhaps decades. It has a major impact on how the game is experienced.

And this is similar I think to how gaming can go. I can't imagine "starting" 40k in late 7th. It must have been... an incredibly weird experience. I think it was the loss of these players which explains why GW's crown was briefly challenged.

Basically TL/DR. I think 40k manages to keep re-inventing itself to be attractive to new players. I think a lot of the competition start out that way - sometimes producing something even better than GW. But eventually to make money from "existing players" they have to add all the bloating content GW does. And then for whatever reason, they implode rather than constantly connecting to a new generation.

I think a lot of your points were already raised - indeed we covered the whole "GW attracts newbies" part quite a bit along with how they achieve it such as stores, licenced products and so on.

I'd argue that some of GW's "reinventing itself" isn't really there considering that the latest army update we've seen - Eldar - is basically model designs from the 90s updated and Old World is currently doing rather nicely for itself on models that ARE decades old and aren't updated.

The Rules side is very hard to judge because its not just rules. New Editions come with video animations; BIG marketing hype; lots of geek hype; bundles and deals on models which are insanely good value - two armies and a rule book for what you'd normally pay for just 1 chunk of models. etc...

I feel like those drive sales way more than "oh this edition is power-level" and "we decided to rename hitpoints hp" or things like that.



Now there are gaming elements that I think do help - Underworld, Warcry, Killteam, Spearhead - these are all fantastic game modes GW has been pushing which get people gaming with very little.

Little Timmy who can't afford 500 points of models to get started let alone 1K or 2K armies; can get himself a box of underworld/warcry/killteam models - one single purchase and he can play.

Even way back in the 90s that was something the game really was missing - Killteam was a few pages in the side of the rulebook and Old World never really worked all that well until you hit 1K points minimum; meanwhile games like Mordhiem and such came and went over the years so were never long-lasting draws.



Constant turnover is 100% important and happens; but at the same time I think what older hobbies show is that there's turnover and return customers. There's also the fact that whilst oldies are fewer, they are often keypeople. They are the rolemodels; streamers; club organisers; School teachers and so on even parents - who help encourage new generations; provide information and guides and also help with gaming space.


GW honestly becomes its strongest when it appeals to both; whenever they've bled one for the other they've suffered. If not losing money at least not sustaining growth. When GW was bleeding old customers and the other games like Warmachine grew, GW was still getting in the youth; it just wasn't retaining the oldies and where the oldies went so too did the clubs and all those intro points start to shift too.

Similarly when all those oldies come back to GW - back comes stuff for the new people too.

We’ve also seen people who got started young, then wandered off when they discovered basic personal hygiene, pubs and girls (and the joys thereof), wandering back in much later years. And finding that the rules have of course changed, but the hobby hasn’t.

And in terms of long serving games/settings? That’s pretty much just GW, and I suppose Battletech.

Some of that will just be that person and presumably their friends. Some of it will be Dad’s to children of a certain age getting back into it, because their kid is now into it.

Look at how well the relaunched Hero Quest is doing. The basic game has merely been tarted up to modern standards, but the rules haven’t been (well, other than the US rules now being global rules). You don’t get a hit like that just though the power of nostalgia alone.

GW has changed of course. As noted in earlier posts it’s developed and refined and become ever more professional. But it’s all been By Degrees. It’s not done a New Adventures or All New or Son Of reboots in a desperate attempt to maintain success. It’s not even gone X-Treem. Not all at once, anyway.

Where it’s definitely getting it right these days is The Right Mix.

Ever since 2nd Ed, 40K has been tweaked and altered to allow people to field larger forces as part of a standard game. Whilst a bit chicken and egg, part of that is customer demand/will/sheer blood mindedness to want to field as much of their ever expanding collection as possible.

The Kirby Era went along with that. And it did work, there only being a year or two where they didn’t make a profit (I honestly can’t remember or be bothered to check if it ever made a loss).

But the Rowntree era has recognised there’s room for both. Small scale, low initial investment games, and large sprawling games of frankly indefinite investment. Some will favour the former, others the latter, and there are plenty like me who are slags that’ll go for any of it.

I think what has helped 40K is that cyberpunk, gothic and dark future settings have been a constant presence across the decades. Sometimes burning brightly (The Matrix), but mostly happy in its seeming natural home of a slightly rebellious, and also pretty flexible, niche. Something not quite outright counter culture, but never truly mainstream culture. 40K? Has it in spades. In a shade for every taste and every season, from the dirty gang war of Necromunda, to vast, system spanning conflicts where lives are expended as happily and readily as ammo.

You might say the satire has lost its edge. And you might be right. But the oddly rebellious “you only think it’s uncool because you, in fact, are uncool, slavishly following any fashion if you think people will think you’re cool” appeal is still there.

 Overread wrote:
When GW was bleeding old customers and the other games like Warmachine grew, GW was still getting in the youth; it just wasn't retaining the oldies and where the oldies went so too did the clubs and all those intro points start to shift too.

Similarly when all those oldies come back to GW - back comes stuff for the new people too.

I guess GW alone have the data to prove it - but I just don't think think this is right. The oldies were still there. There were long arguments on forums like these in the throes of 7th that the oldies were the only ones keeping GW going and they should do what they wanted etc.
It was the newbies who weren't showing up.

But my point isn't really about GW's success here - which I think is sort of self evident, even if explaining precisely how they achieve it is hard. The issue is more that no other company in the space seems to manage it. I guess you can argue Battletech is very old and is still around. But then its not as if Warmachine is a spring chicken in 2025.
Maybe its just dumb luck - or these companies sabotaging themselves for various reasons. But I think its more that juggling the newbies vs oldies is very difficult. I think GW got it very wrong in 6th and 7th edition - but they had a very successful reset and its been success for nearly a decade after.

IMHO the issue is the jump from a small garage company of a dozen people at most to an actual corporate business with hundreds or even thousands.

You need manufacturing engineers, logistic engineers, business degrees, marketing degrees, lawyers, many different types of lawyers, oh so many lawyers, etc. People that know how to run all the complicated parts of a corporation, and you need to be a corporation if you want to compete with Games Workshop.

I wonder if we might be able to draw some kind of inference from FLGS vs Warhammer Stores.

Both are retail premises. And it’s early days, whilst never on the main strip or High Street to the best of my knowledge? At least in the UK, they were Just Off The High Street. Not exactly front and centre, but still areas of decent foot traffic, and you don’t typically have to go hunting.

FLGS are sometimes there as well, but have a tendency to quite hidden. Shop Rents are cheaper ways.

Both are tricky to make profitable. Whether it’s cards, models, RPG etc, there’s sadly more to it than If We Stock It, They Will Come. And certainly more to it than If I Discount It, They Will Spend.

GW of course is now an old hand at this, and the training I received circa 2009 still sticks in my mind, and is effective for generating footfall, and from that, sales.

Some FLGS absolutely get this, and thrive. Dunno if they’ll ever make their owner’s wealthy men, but they turn a profit and the wages are paid.

But, some FLGS just don’t seem to get it. It’s not just a club house for your mates. You do need to be hospitable and welcoming. If you’re more interested in chatting to your mates than your customers, you are losing out on sales, and you’re not exactly encouraging the curious or the new to town to get involved.

And just as it is with GW’s games? You’ve got to go further than “We made a sci-fi game”. You can have gorgeous models and decent rules. But if your background is slim, and you’ve not gone the original WHFB “this is an agnostic rules set” to tempt people to try it? There’ll be plenty like myself who won’t find the setting engaging, and so won’t find your game engaging.

And of course there’s the economy of scale involved for GW now, and has been for a long old time. It can absorb a game being sluggish at first, or Dead On Arrival, because it’s got so many irons in the fire, and some big money bags to toss on the fire to get the heat up.

AoS, much as I never had a problem with it, is a good example here. The launch wasn’t great, baffling a great many. But before long, GW spent more money on it, and addressed the common concerns. And now, by all accounts, it’s selling quite comfortably. And it’s got a cracking background, pulling more on Greek and Roman type myths than Medieval ones.

A new game, created, playtested and released with the best of intentions which, for whatever reason, doesn’t immediately find its audience? Unless you’re GW, you may not have the funds to retool, re-promote and rejig etc.

Just had another thought here. And it’s not 40K specific, but based on another “how, how are you still going when so many others have fallen” property.

2000AD, The Galaxy’s Greatest Comic.

It’s rapidly approaching 50 years in continuous print, and I’ve two bookcases pretty much filled with collected, hardback volumes. And yes, I’m an annual subscriber.

It….it shouldn’t have survived. It’s a niche British comic which has never quite cracked the US market, And Yet It Stands. Like GW it’s had some lean years, but has muddled its way through.

Both 40K and 2000AD have a nearly symbiotic relationship, sharing writers and artists, often giving up and coming hopefuls the first chance to get their goods in front of a relatively mass Market.

Both have moved with the times.

Dredd is particularly impressive. Despite, again, some lean years? It’s the same continuity. Revisions have occurred here and there, but not “oh no, that never actually happened” or “that was a parallel universe” stuff. The Joe Dredd I just read about in this week’s Prog, is the same Joe Dredd that debuted in Prog 2 of 2000AD.

Maybe there’s just a defiant Britishness to both? Something unleashed in our psyche during the Punk and Post-Punk era of social upheaval and uneven redistribution of wealth and influence. A feeling which persists to this day, and leads those who encounter it to the same two outlets, generation after generation?

Maybe it's the antiheroes. Heroes are often flawed, anti-heries, doubly so.
And who doesn't like being the underdog? Insurmountable odds, and all that.

Personally, I think a lot of why Warhammer has succeeded where others have failed is luck in the early years of owning their IP, not having a parent company, and not having a lot of debt.

Three of their biggest competitors in the late 1990's and very early 2000's crumbled due to financial issues.

FASA had Battletech, and well, we can see how much Battletech has had a cultural impact on the people who were playing it after FASA closed down in 2001 (for the most part) and who are playing it now with CGL at the helm.

I-Kore had VOID and Celtos, and VOID was outselling 40k in multiple markets in the 1990's from what I read. The multiple companies that have had to sell this IP off in a short period of time killed any and all momentum it had gained between 2000-2003.

Target Games/Epic Games had Warzone, which was growing and getting resculpts in the new edition they were working on that were GW level (in the late 1990's), with sculptors like Kev White working on parts of the line. The game was gaining a good deal of traction and won awards in the 1990's. Their parent company closing down and taking the studio waking the Warzone game killed that one off until the botched Prodos release, and the more stable but not as large release from Res Nova.

I would mention Rackham, but while they had absolutely stunning minis, it really never felt like the game was a big threat to Warhammer (to me at least).

It really gave GW almost a lot of free reign in the non-historical hobby sector to get their stores up and running to get more eyes on the products, and to secure themselves as the earliest game in the non-historical hobby market to be relatively stable enough to get pick-up games of.

Warmachine was ding absolutely incredibly well, but the models were just okay (I still liked them), and the units not really having any way to change load outs and with the majority of the models being metal made it almost impossible to avoid the SKU bloat that plagued the game at the tail end of the second edition. Their third edition and fourth edition were just awful releases, with awful decisions made about how they sell the products to stores, and the removal of the Pressganger program.

I think the other people here have covered the other big business aspects.

GW just got really lucky, right place, right time, right audience, a lack of debt, and owning their product. Allowed them to power through bad years of poor decisions and odd marketing to essentially become "the hobby" for a large portion of the players, and a "safe" choice to spend your money on since you know you can probably get games of Warhammer anywhere you go.

Warmachine VS GW was so interesting because the two firms almost made a massive swap around.

PP went from doing everything right to a whole series of steps, some forced by other powers but some internal to them. Shutting the PG (which was partly based on legal pressure/risk of having to pay volunteer workers etc...); closing off their own forums; dropping 3rd edition too early; material changes that didn't work right; etc....

Meanwhile GW at that time made a series of really good choices that turned things around.

It caused a positive feedback for GW because people were jumping off PP and the only big firm around with open arms was GW

I was big into Warmachine and Hordes in 2nd edition. But the cracks started then with some of the changes they were making to the game - you could see it creaking under it's own weight, and stocking all of it in a game shop was a real challenge because of their release model (which from a player POV was brilliant - all factions simultaneously updated is just THE way to do it for players).

I couldn't believe it when they blew up the world and squatted the old factions. I'm even more surprised that the game seems to have survived it! I've still got my Trolls, Legion and Minions and my 2e books, but it's sad that it's much harder to find games of Oldmachine than Oldhammer!

For some reason PP really avoided the whole "just re-release the same army with new sculpts" approach to their product. They updated some when they shifted materials, but broadly speaking they always kept trying for entirely new models.

End of 2nd ed they were also buckling trying to keep a skirmish game with a wargame level of models; esp when it was hinged around the warcaster/warlock leaders so much. They honestly needed to split into two game systems like GW has done now - one for skirmish and one for wargame.

But they didn't want that pathway.


The MKIV reboot I kind of get but I also still don't get. Don't get me wrong the new models look amazing and great and creative; but it still stings that some old factions were just abandoned. Steamforged Games appear to have a bit more of a head on their shoulders for this and are looking to dip into classic stuff more so.
They honestly feel like a breath of fresh air on a PP that was getting a bit "one trick pony" but also was just lacking funds to achieve some visions.

The long story short is that PP hit the upper bounds of what can be accomplished by a private company. They grew to the point where they really needed a higher risk/reward production method, but never could quite make that leap happen.

I think part of it is the model style. The top heavy artstyle that's so iconic to their work generally just doesn't translate well to HIPS. Some companies have started to get there in recent years, but you still rarely see the kind of bulging muscles and textured surfaces that Warmachine does so well. Particularly at the time PP needed to start moving this way, even GW hadn't really started to push their craft to the level we'd start to see with End Times and AoS. PVC was kind of sold as the answer, but was kind of a scam that PP overall lost big on. Honestly, this lack of a solid mid tier material remains one of the biggest gatekeepers for companies in the industry.

There's actually a lot "of the time" to PPs woes. Resculpts weren't yet a trend people cared for, in part because digital sculpting was new and a lot of resculpts weren't enough of a jump to be worth the investment compared to new kits. The idea that old stuff lasts forever was still the primary concern and selling point for a lot of people. A lot of companies would try limited formats without much success.

Ultimately the MK4 reboot is just a result of the old line being unsustainable. PP just lost the ability to produce far too much of it and hit a point where starting over was the only real option. Honestly, I feel like the only real difference with SFG is they can make a lot of the same decisions PP was already making without it seeming like they're breaking promises. Ultimately, I hope they mostly just reign things in, as it was already starting to feel like PP was going to bloat out the new factions as fast as they had the old.

Can’t comment on the rules or the range. But WarmaHordes lost its appeal swiftly for me.

Mostly because I just didn’t like the aesthetic of Warmachine. Top Heavy, Ridiculous Little Legs, and that shared across five (at the time!) factions just left me nothing to really cleave to.

Whereas GW has pretty much always been a dab hand at giving each faction its own clear visual identity. Look to the RT era Chaos. You can tell it’s ultimately of Imperial Origin, but so mutated and twisted by Chaos, it’s unique. Eldar have also always stood out, and other than some tweaks to scaling, have barely changed since inception.

So not just a strong design language (I’m not going to be a tit and claim WarmaHordes doesn’t have a strong design language just because I don’t like it), but a variety of strong design languages.

Compare to another modern competitor, Infinity. Clearly another example of a very strong design language. But to my eyes? The same problem as PP - the factions all look largely the same, so if the aesthetic doesn’t do owt for you?

Honestly the little legs big body was mostly just two big core factions from Warmachine - a lot of the other forces started to get more sane designs over the years - Hordes was way more sane in general having more beast based models from the outset.


I do think it was a mistake of PP to have Hordes and Warmachine separate for so long. Really at MK2 they should have put them under one marketing banner; one full game because lets face it most people played both against each other all the time.



Duel marketing two so closely related brands is tricky and its going to be interesting to see the long term impact of GW doing AoS and Old World at the same time. Though there its almost the opposite where the models share aesthetics and the rules are different; whilst for Warmachine the rules were the same and the models were very different.

Heck AoS is made from Old World armies and Old World new has one army just pulled from AoS into it and another - Slaves to Darkness, just pulling up old sculpts of ones that AoS got resculpted. So its going to be interesting to see how it all shapes up and if GW's current phobia of duel game compatible models is going to work for them at splitting the lines; or if its oging to work against them when one game takes off and the other sinks and they try to roll the models into one and suddenly you've got to rebase everything (instead of doing rounds on everything and then giving Old World movement trays with round slots on them)

I started with Cygnar in Mk1 Warhmachine but quickly switched to Trolls in Hordes once it came out because the style of the Troll sculpts was much cooler to me. The problem they had was maintaining scale and style within the range - some of the Troll sculpts were scaled completely differently to each other and didn't look good next to each other. But top heavy was definitely a big part of the look even for Hordes.

Their ranges were crazy with the number of units. Each faction had more units to keep in stock than Space Marines in 40k! Back then you could have tactical, assault, devastators, terminators, bikes, scouts and scout bikes, comamnd squad and heroes and rhino, predator, whirlwind, vindicator, land raider and land speeder and you had the whole range. And Marines were the most diverse range!

Just for Trolls you had Kriel Warriors, Scattergunners, Champions, Scouts, Runeshapers, Fennblades, Bushwhackers, Burrrowers, Long Riders, Krielstone, Thumper various attachments for these units, then you had the Mauler, the Earthborn, Mulg, the Blitzer, the Pyre Troll, Impaler, Bouncer, Axer, Swamp Troll, Winter Troll, Slag Troll, Storm Troll and 30 or so Solos and Warlocks, before you get to mercenary units. It was just a huge range, and it got even bigger, and Trolls weren't especially big as a range - most ranges were at least that size for Hordes and the WM ranges were even bigger! It became impossible for shops to keep it all in stock and it can't be underestimated how difficult it was to get some units in Europe at times. I just never had a Krielstone because I could never find one in stock anywhere when I was playing, and it was considered a key Trollblood unit.

Now, as a player I loved that every faction got equal attention and simultaneous updates, but I can't deny it created a massive supply chain headache for PP and the shops.

 Da Boss wrote:
8th edition I think had serious problems despite having a very passionate fan base. I had a fully painted army which was the right size to play with, but I just found the game pretty unfun to play at the time - you'd spend ages setting up your painstakingly painted units only to have them mostly removed in turns 1 and 2 by mega spells blasting them off the board. It wasn't satisfying at all in my view and a downgrade on 6e and 7e despite some good changes like Step Up and simplifying some of the sillier rules. And a beautiful and inspiring rulebook.

Things like step up compounded some of the issues and changed the dice rolling relationship. It's shocking how few dice you rolled in 6th and 7th for a battle, which also meant there was more variance; step up and the encouraged larger units meant more normalised results and also a grind so you had the dichotomy of units actually fighting never went anywhere, just ground down and vanishing completely under spells. The larger units was also off-putting for potential players because there was just more work to do and more to buy; the game had to increase in points size beucase larger units meant fewer 'drops' in deployment meaning a smaller feeling game at the same points, in terms of choices in the game, but becuase of the grinding nature, doesn't facilitate in making it flow faster or smoother.

One thing always keeps me peaking into Warhammer games, is there ability to let you carve out your own niche of it and tell your own stories there.

Sure, there are several named and storied Space Marine chapters, Chaos Legions, and Eldar Craftworlds, Ork Klans, etc. but you don't have to use any of that. If you want to carve out your own little space of the GW-verse and make it all your own.

They have systematized it a lot, but there is still always blank space to play in. You could also tell all scales of stories from grim personal stories all the way up to Epic, world-shattering events all in the same universe and on the tabletop. That is what keeps me in the GW orbit, even if I am inactive the majority of the time.

However, I am still convinced the main factor was being first to market in Sci-fi/Fantasy in a meaningful way. Like I have said before, whole books have been written about this advantage in business.

 Easy E wrote:
One thing always keeps me peaking into Warhammer games, is there ability to let you carve out your own niche of it and tell your own stories there.

Honestly I always find this a little odd because telling your own story is something ANY wargame lets you do. Unless you're recreating historical games for accuracy, you can tell your own stories with your own models in any game.

You can convert; proxy; have narrative campaigns and all with pretty much any game. Most games feature commanders and general models that are generic or you can even just name regular units as named characters and give them some unique details. You can do it in any game setting you don't need a "whole universe" or "realms bigger than the whole of the earth" to do so.




Now granted I 100% agree GW presents their lore really well and makes it quickly and easily engaging to a point where you don't have ot hunt around for "was printed once" books or comments in forums by creative staff that were said that one time or such. Plus there's loads of 3rd party summary sites to get quick catchups on. So its very accessible lore at the casual end.

Reply by: Daba - click to view full reply 

8305

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 15:20:32

Post by: Daba

One thing about the IPs - several competitors are still around today, but it seems a famous IP, Star Wars, is more like a death sentence to a game's longevity rather than helping it.

Reply by: LunarSol - click to view full reply 

107281

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 15:48:36

Post by: LunarSol

 Daba wrote:
One thing about the IPs - several competitors are still around today, but it seems a famous IP, Star Wars, is more like a death sentence to a game's longevity rather than helping it.

I'm not sure that's so much the case as just how FFG managed their games. Their reliance on so many physical components really limited how their games could be curated and I don't think anything they made really survived all that long, Star Wars or otherwise.

Reply by: Overread - click to view full reply 

77922

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 15:49:37

Post by: Overread

 Daba wrote:
One thing about the IPs - several competitors are still around today, but it seems a famous IP, Star Wars, is more like a death sentence to a game's longevity rather than helping it.

That's honestly the same as many other big firm IPs.

They can kill in a variety of ways
1) They sell really well BUT outstrip a firms production causing them to have to invest more to catch up whilst at the same time having to pay for the licence. So they get less profits per sale; and have to invest heavily to keep up and if their customer base burns out whilst they are resolving the supply issue that can kill them.

2) At any point the licence can be taken away or have the costs raised. Granted contracts mean its not at "Any" point; but any point of renegotiation or rolling contract means that they could easily just see the parent firm end the project even if sales are good; or up the costs. The parent firm might expect sales way higher than realistic; they might expect returns way higher or they might just shelve it because of their own internal politics; shifting product focus or a billion other reasons. Heck they might even decide you did so well they are taking it in house to do themselves or pass onto another firm that offers to do the same for way less.


So whilst you can take on a big IP, many times its a huge risk for a firm; esp in the wargaming/model sector where customers and companies move much slower. It's not like a one and done video game or such where you just need that one big burst of sales; wargames and such are slow moving beasts. Customers wnat something that lasts for decades; firms need them to last for decades to grow etc...

Reply by: Easy E - click to view full reply 

1206

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 19:40:34

Post by: Easy E

 Overread wrote:


Honestly I always find this a little odd because telling your own story is something ANY wargame lets you do. Unless you're recreating historical games for accuracy, you can tell your own stories with your own models in any game.

You can convert; proxy; have narrative campaigns and all with pretty much any game. Most games feature commanders and general models that are generic or you can even just name regular units as named characters and give them some unique details. You can do it in any game setting you don't need a "whole universe" or "realms bigger than the whole of the earth" to do so.

Now granted I 100% agree GW presents their lore really well and makes it quickly and easily engaging to a point where you don't have ot hunt around for "was printed once" books or comments in forums by creative staff that were said that one time or such. Plus there's loads of 3rd party summary sites to get quick catchups on. So its very accessible lore at the casual end.

Yeah but it gives you a storytelling framework, and not all games do that.

For example, Bushido or Arena Rex or Marvel Crisis Protocol generally do not give you such a free hand. Heck, even Historical games don't really. You are using named characters with X abilities in this place doing this thing. They are always at model-vs-model scale. Yeah, you could always paint Doctor Doom Pink and Gold, but could you? You cant have the British Army of North Africa fight the British Army of North Africa without some odd contortions. You couldn't have Batman and Wolverine together in a MCP game? But you can have a reason for Blood Angels and Necrons team up in Warhammer. Heck, in the very old days you could even have Galactic Empire Stormtroopers face off against Zoats against High Elves!

Their universe just lends itself well to creative story-telling more than other universes.

Reply by: ccs - click to view full reply 

121430

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 20:49:49

Post by: ccs

 Overread wrote:

 Daba wrote:
One thing about the IPs - several competitors are still around today, but it seems a famous IP, Star Wars, is more like a death sentence to a game's longevity rather than helping it.

That's honestly the same as many other big firm IPs.

They can kill in a variety of ways
1) They sell really well BUT outstrip a firms production causing them to have to invest more to catch up whilst at the same time having to pay for the licence. So they get less profits per sale; and have to invest heavily to keep up and if their customer base burns out whilst they are resolving the supply issue that can kill them.

2) At any point the licence can be taken away or have the costs raised. Granted contracts mean its not at "Any" point; but any point of renegotiation or rolling contract means that they could easily just see the parent firm end the project even if sales are good; or up the costs. The parent firm might expect sales way higher than realistic; they might expect returns way higher or they might just shelve it because of their own internal politics; shifting product focus or a billion other reasons. Heck they might even decide you did so well they are taking it in house to do themselves or pass onto another firm that offers to do the same for way less.


So whilst you can take on a big IP, many times its a huge risk for a firm; esp in the wargaming/model sector where customers and companies move much slower. It's not like a one and done video game or such where you just need that one big burst of sales; wargames and such are slow moving beasts. Customers wnat something that lasts for decades; firms need them to last for decades to grow etc...

In addition there's only so much you can do with licensed IPs. For ex; No one making a SW minis game is adding anything NEW by themselves. Sure you'll get all kinds of mechanics. But no new characters/ships/equipment/or lore.

Reply by: LunarSol - click to view full reply 

107281

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 20:55:28

Post by: LunarSol

Eh, I'm not sure I buy that. Sure, comic team-ups are a dime a dozen, but once upon a time Spider-Man teaming up with Wolverine was a big deal event. Blood Angels and Necrons are the same kind of story as far as I'm concerned. I'm pretty sure Doom has teamed up with the Avengers in gold armor as the heroic "Victor" a few times at that.

40K is good at absorbing pop culture stuff of course. You can make a Space Wolf named Logan with Lightning Claws team up with an Warp Spider named Petyr or something, but comics do this all the time. There's a reason The Brood exist after all.

Reply by: ccs - click to view full reply 

121430

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 21:27:54

Post by: ccs

 Easy E wrote:

 Overread wrote:


Honestly I always find this a little odd because telling your own story is something ANY wargame lets you do. Unless you're recreating historical games for accuracy, you can tell your own stories with your own models in any game.

You can convert; proxy; have narrative campaigns and all with pretty much any game. Most games feature commanders and general models that are generic or you can even just name regular units as named characters and give them some unique details. You can do it in any game setting you don't need a "whole universe" or "realms bigger than the whole of the earth" to do so.

Now granted I 100% agree GW presents their lore really well and makes it quickly and easily engaging to a point where you don't have ot hunt around for "was printed once" books or comments in forums by creative staff that were said that one time or such. Plus there's loads of 3rd party summary sites to get quick catchups on. So its very accessible lore at the casual end.

Yeah but it gives you a storytelling framework, and not all games do that.

For example, Bushido or Arena Rex or Marvel Crisis Protocol generally do not give you such a free hand. Heck, even Historical games don't really. You are using named characters with X abilities in this place doing this thing. They are always at model-vs-model scale. Yeah, you could always paint Doctor Doom Pink and Gold, but could you? You cant have the British Army of North Africa fight the British Army of North Africa without some odd contortions. You couldn't have Batman and Wolverine together in a MCP game?

1) Most often when I'm playing something Historical I DON'T have any "Named Characters" in the force.
Sometimes my "force" doesn't even have historically accurate unit makings. Sure, by the yellow markings, #s, & equipment you'll be able to tell that these Shermans are meant to represent a unit that fought in North Africa (assuming you know your history). But looking closer you won't actually be able to match them up to any RL unit.

2) Of course I can paint Doom up in pink & gold.
It'll be a homage to all those knock off action figures - you know, the ones where some suspect Asian toy company rips off the legit figure, casts/paints it up oddly, gives it an axe for some reason, & gives it a name like Doom Trooper....

3) I assure you that we Historical minis players very often have non-historical match ups. Without batting an eye.

4) Ok, Batman + Wolverine doesn't happen in MCP. Not without homebrewing Batman anyways. But over in HeroClix....

Reply by: Mad Doc Grotsnik - click to view full reply 

8725

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 22:08:36

Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik

 Daba wrote:

 Da Boss wrote:
8th edition I think had serious problems despite having a very passionate fan base. I had a fully painted army which was the right size to play with, but I just found the game pretty unfun to play at the time - you'd spend ages setting up your painstakingly painted units only to have them mostly removed in turns 1 and 2 by mega spells blasting them off the board. It wasn't satisfying at all in my view and a downgrade on 6e and 7e despite some good changes like Step Up and simplifying some of the sillier rules. And a beautiful and inspiring rulebook.

Things like step up compounded some of the issues and changed the dice rolling relationship. It's shocking how few dice you rolled in 6th and 7th for a battle, which also meant there was more variance; step up and the encouraged larger units meant more normalised results and also a grind so you had the dichotomy of units actually fighting never went anywhere, just ground down and vanishing completely under spells. The larger units was also off-putting for potential players because there was just more work to do and more to buy; the game had to increase in points size beucase larger units meant fewer 'drops' in deployment meaning a smaller feeling game at the same points, in terms of choices in the game, but becuase of the grinding nature, doesn't facilitate in making it flow faster or smoother.

The double edged sword of a long term successful game. It needs to have a base rules set which will allow Sad Old Gits (like me!) field all, or at least the majority of, an army I may have been collecting for decades in a single battle, without it all grinding to a snails pace. But, at the same time? It needs to work as an experience for much smaller armies.

40K pulled that off, by and large.

WHFB sadly didn’t. 8th worked really nicely for getting as much of my army not just on the board, but actually having a say in the battle. And for me? That was glorious. Except….it did nothing to address the Genuine Fact that, due to the base mechanics focussing on manoeuvres and positioning as much as kick in heads, it just didn’t really work that well below 1,000 points. And didn’t really Become Its Potential until around 2,000 or so. Which pushed the entry price up. No, not perceived entry price. The game just didn’t, and hadn’t for a number of editions, really worked at or under 1,000 points.

Reply by: Overread - click to view full reply 

77922

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/29 22:43:30

Post by: Overread

ccs wrote:


In addition there's only so much you can do with licensed IPs. For ex; No one making a SW minis game is adding anything NEW by themselves. Sure you'll get all kinds of mechanics. But no new characters/ships/equipment/or lore.

Not just nothing new, but it also means having a 3rd party breathing down your neck potentially and slowing development at certain stages because you can't just create something on the fly.

Also another one - security and stuff. GW had to do a LOAD of security changes and such to run the Middle Earth game with the movies. All those super secret scenes and such that could not leave the building and so on.


So running another firms IP can come with restrictions, slower work rate; less creative flare/options and a bunch of other things. Now of course there are boons; getting to work with Starwars means that you can make something and have a HUGE instant market. You launch a Starwars game that's half good and you'll have a market that top end independent creators will spend possibly decades building up toward if they ever even get there. And you didn't have to do lift a finger ot make that Starwars Market.


So there are boons to working with other IP - but it has restrictions and limits and other aspects that can make it a challenge.

Reply by: Mad Doc Grotsnik - click to view full reply 

8725

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/30 00:17:33

Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik

Also, licenses come with a time period.

Even if your game is popular. Even if it’s turning a tidy profit for you and the IP owner? They can and will pull it when it suits them, even if they don’t have someone else waiting in the wings.

Reply by: The_Real_Chris - click to view full reply 

23306

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/30 10:30:33

Post by: The_Real_Chris

 Daba wrote:
One thing about the IPs - several competitors are still around today, but it seems a famous IP, Star Wars, is more like a death sentence to a game's longevity rather than helping it.

Stuff like Star Wars though isn't great for longevity because you have 2 sides. You can stretch it, but really you end up with one galactic power, one group of insurgents, then similar pirates, etc. That really limits the options. Historical games unless they are a particular conflict, have a lot more variety. 40k and fantasy grew out of a bunch of history fans transporting our world into fiction.

Reply by: Lathe Biosas - click to view full reply 

135333

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/30 11:02:46

Post by: Lathe Biosas

The other thing that I think GW did (especially in 40k), which I love, is the fact that the "canon," really isn't set in stone.

The stories from the magazines, novels, games, etc. are almost guidelines for games.

Outside of a few instances, you can set your army when you want, centered around who you want, and replay any battle with the intent of, "this is how it probably happened."

In so many games, including IPs based on famous battles or properties, we know the historical outcome.

The Empire/First Order loses. General Longstreet will follow General Lee's orders. The British army will defeat the Afrika Corps in Tunisia, etc.

In GW there is no finality to any conflict. I have a buddy who built his Orks when Codex: Armageddon was released, and he still plays battles set around Armageddon and it fits with the narrative.

I've found very few games that offer that freedom.

Reply by: Mad Doc Grotsnik - click to view full reply 

8725

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/30 11:14:43

Post by: Mad Doc Grotsnik

The early special characters first cropped up in WD sample army lists, and/or battle reports.

Ghaz? Sample Goff Army, ‘Ere We Go. Same with Mad Dok Grotsnik.

Nazdreg? Sample Bad Moons Army, Freebooterz

Tycho, and his melty face, WD Battle Report.

Calgar nearly dying to Tyranids, WD Battle Report. (Although it was a drifting spore mine, and Calgar had been hiding behind scenery most of the game)

Reply by: The_Real_Chris - click to view full reply 

23306

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/30 13:37:19

Post by: The_Real_Chris

That was also a period where the ratio of creative staff to others was far higher. Its amazing how much today goes back to that early period.

Reply by: Easy E - click to view full reply 

1206

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/04/30 15:21:50

Post by: Easy E

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
The other thing that I think GW did (especially in 40k), which I love, is the fact that the "canon," really isn't set in stone.

The stories from the magazines, novels, games, etc. are almost guidelines for games.

Outside of a few instances, you can set your army when you want, centered around who you want, and replay any battle with the intent of, "this is how it probably happened."

In so many games, including IPs based on famous battles or properties, we know the historical outcome.

The Empire/First Order loses. General Longstreet will follow General Lee's orders. The British army will defeat the Afrika Corps in Tunisia, etc.

In GW there is no finality to any conflict. I have a buddy who built his Orks when Codex: Armageddon was released, and he still plays battles set around Armageddon and it fits with the narrative.

I've found very few games that offer that freedom.

Thanks Lathe, that is what I was trying to say too. However, it appears to be a controversial take for some folks, even though I did not articulate it nearly as well as you did.

Reply by: mattl - click to view full reply 

35238

Why Has Warhammer Succeeded Where Others Have Failed? @ 2025/06/28 04:07:00

Post by: mattl

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Yes there was a sales vision behind it, and Bryan Ansell as owner has the final say, but it all points to a collaborative effort.

It seems like Ansell was far more willing to let artists get on with things than later owners. That he was back as a game consultant on a few titles shows a level of mutual respect that you don't really see elsewhere in GW after Ansell's ownership.