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Truly America is a dark and benighted place, bereft of all the wonders of gaming clubs. Woe unto them.


Sigmarhall is not all that bad, as names go; hell, AFAIK, Valhalla literally means 'hall of the fallen' (try pronouncing it like modern german, with V pronounced as F), and was sometimes also known as Odin's hall. The afterlife is not meant to be very innovative, really.

No, the proof is in the fluff pudding for this one. There are a lot of potential benefits from a targetted rewrite of the old setting - allowing Tolkienesque elements to be updated or outright changed to be more original, and for parts of the map that served little purpose before (such as Tilea, for a random example) to be renovated into more useful places. The above excerpt is about as useful as someone skimming through a novel will ever be. (I wonder how you would describe Star Wars, if all that you ever saw was the Blockade Runner scene, Han cutting the Tuan Tuan open, and then the fight in the Emperor's Throne room?) But it is interesting to consider what little it does tell us: an altered but mostly recognizable world map; at least some individual characters could survive across, giving hope for models such as Karl Franz or the Mortarchs; a greater focus on religion, perhaps, with the incarnates-as-gods being likely candidates for supermodels in the future. I mean, if Nagash remains the Death chappy, then we apparently have a deity as a game model already.

I'm very curious about the Dwarves, myself; were they still in the World's Edge mountains? Are they still in decline? Do they still braid toy axes into their beards?!

Charles Rampant wrote:
Sigmarhall is not all that bad, as names go; hell, AFAIK, Valhalla literally means 'hall of the fallen' (try pronouncing it like modern german, with V pronounced as F), and was sometimes also known as Odin's hall. The afterlife is not meant to be very innovative, really.

AHHH! Now I know why that annoying BBC F1 commentator kept calling Vettel Fettel!

Not sure if its been posted, but local GW manager told me last night they were told to pull all current Army Books from the shelf.

heracyangel wrote:
Not sure if its been posted, but local GW manager told me last night they were told to pull all current Army Books from the shelf.

Yup cheers though

 His Master's Voice wrote:
I like the concept of Mordheim, but it was never going to work as an introduction to WFB on a relevant scale. The gap between model counts and general mechanics (urban comabt vs open battlefield) was just too big.

The game also lived and died when WFB was still going strong and GW had no desire to offer a cheaper alternative.

In general, it takes more than just low model count and the same setting for a game to be an effective gateway drug. The models and rules have to be highly compatible. Take Necromunda and 40k. Pretty much nothing from that awesome game transitions to 40k, unless as a "counts as". Now think about a Kill Team game with Deathwatch, Ork Freebooterz, Gene Cults and an some Eldar Aspect Rave Party with BBQ and Music as your starter forces. Let the top model count go as high as 30 for the Orks. Heck, go 40. Then add relevant entries for those "warbands" in the respective big game codex books, preferably as Troops.

There, you can now light your fireplace with 100$ bills.

Not to contradict you, but I like kill-team as it is quite well. Though if you go for a 40+ cultist group, it becomes ridiculously imballanced against any unprepared foe.
I think kill-team as it is now is a decent gateway drug, except hardly anyone even knows about it. I've talked to quite a number of veteran players with huge armies who reacted along the lines of "huh? never heard of it... sounds kinda interesting... is that new?"

If GW are pulling all their army books, and nobody's buying any current stuff (because they're waiting for AOS) then GW are effectively not making any fantasy sales for 3 weeks. Given that 9th rumours have been going a while, and the community has been reluctant to buy fantasy stuff for longer than 3 weeks, effectively, GW's profits have taken a hit.

What kind of company is this? What kind of company engages in such kamikaze business practices? Fantasy is supposed to be one of GW's premier lines, but they're effectively telling people to buy NOTHING.

I shake my head at the sheer folly of all this.

The sales boost of spontaneous purchases from last minute unveiling must more than compensate! (Yeah, right...)

That said, if I can do either a Bret or WE force (or maybe even both) for the cost of a few boxes, they'll get money out of me they wouldn't have otherwise had.

Plus, wasn't there a rumour that whatever Age Of Sigmar is will be £25 back a few pages? If that's a GW's rulebook, that's pretty good value too, even if it's small format.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
If GW are pulling all their army books, and nobody's buying any current stuff (because they're waiting for AOS) then GW are effectively not making any fantasy sales for 3 weeks. Given that 9th rumours have been going a while, and the community has been reluctant to buy fantasy stuff for longer than 3 weeks, effectively, GW's profits have taken a hit.

When July 11 was announced as the street date for AoS, and we were musing why they'd put such a major release up for preorder on July 4 and towards the middle of the summer, I realized that that's probably the beginning of a new financial quarter for GeeDub. My company's fiscal year begins April 1, thus our second quarter begins three months later - July 1. It seemed likely to me that GW absolutely tanked its Fantasy profits for the April-May-June quarter to begin with a fresh quarter that they could trumpet particularly great (and somewhat manufactured) Fantasy profits thanks to the new edition. Hell, if GW's fiscal year begins July 1, they could write off the abysmal 8E Fantasy sales of the previous year and start afresh with the (hypothetically but also pretty much by default at this point) stellar numbers for the next edition.

That isn't necessarily meant to sound as nefariousness as it does, or at least not in a 'GW = Evil Empire' sort of way. I know my company does the same with product releases and timing around fiscal periods.

- Salvage

 Boss Salvage wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
If GW are pulling all their army books, and nobody's buying any current stuff (because they're waiting for AOS) then GW are effectively not making any fantasy sales for 3 weeks. Given that 9th rumours have been going a while, and the community has been reluctant to buy fantasy stuff for longer than 3 weeks, effectively, GW's profits have taken a hit.

When July 11 was announced as the street date for AoS, and we were musing why they'd put such a major release up for preorder on July 4 and towards the middle of the summer, I realized that that's probably the beginning of a new financial quarter for GeeDub. My company's fiscal year begins April 1, thus our second quarter begins three months later - July 1. It seemed likely to me that GW absolutely tanked its Fantasy profits for the April-May-June quarter to begin with a fresh quarter that they could trumpet particularly great (and somewhat manufactured) Fantasy profits thanks to the new edition. Hell, if GW's fiscal year begins July 1, they could write off the abysmal 8E Fantasy sales of the previous year and start afresh with the (hypothetically but also pretty much by default at this point) stellar numbers for the next edition.

That isn't necessarily meant to sound as nefariousness as it does, or at least not in a 'GW = Evil Empire' sort of way. I know my company does the same with product releases and timing around fiscal periods.

- Salvage

Good point, but could you imagine Coca Cola deciding not to sell a single can of coke for 4 weeks? Me neither. GW seems to think normal business practice is a bad thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Azreal13 wrote:
The sales boost of spontaneous purchases from last minute unveiling must more than compensate! (Yeah, right...)

That said, if I can do either a Bret or WE force (or maybe even both) for the cost of a few boxes, they'll get money out of me they wouldn't have otherwise had.

Plus, wasn't there a rumour that whatever Age Of Sigmar is will be £25 back a few pages? If that's a GW's rulebook, that's pretty good value too, even if it's small format.

£25 would get you a good rulebook from any other company, but GW will be looking to limit/collector's edition the hell out of AOS

As for Brets and WE, if they're in AOS, I'll change my name to Tom Kirby

£25 will no double be the hardback novel explaining the fluff changes.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
What kind of company is this? What kind of company engages in such kamikaze business practices?

I think they assume their customers will continue to indulge their hobby of buying GW mini's from the 40K range in the mean time, to stock up on fantasy stuff before it goes out of production, or hold their money back to spend it all on launch weekend.

Real world economics have never really bothered them before.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

What kind of company is this? What kind of company engages in such kamikaze business practices?

GW makes the bulk of their sales on any given product upon it's initial release. Any Fantasy product sales in the last few weeks would have been miniscule at best.

Continuing to sell the product after it's initial release is something they have to do, for us to be able to build complete armies, but isn't the most profitable.

 adamsouza wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

What kind of company is this? What kind of company engages in such kamikaze business practices?

GW makes the bulk of their sales on any given product upon it's initial release. Any Fantasy product sales in the last few weeks would have been miniscule at best.

Continuing to sell the product after it's initial release is something they have to do, for us to be able to build complete armies, but isn't the most profitable.

But selling nothing in the run up to your big release is worse, in every single way, than selling a minuscule amount of other stuff in the run up to your big release.

Imagine if Apple stopped selling all of their other products for the 3 weeks before a new iPhone came out, or Microsoft stopped selling all versions of Windows weeks before releasing their new edition.

It's just pure idiocy.

Regarding the point that GW are not selling any fantasy kits for a few weeks; I really don't think it's that big of a hit for them. Fantasy came to an end because it needed a re-working to make it more popular and sell more kits. Since their profits from the first half of the year have been pretty decent (Necrons, Eldar, Ad Mech X2, Demon Kin and Imperial Knights all sold really well both online and in my local GW store) I think they can take the absence of their worst selling product for a while.

I do agree that they should have put out more information to create hype/alleviate fears though.

It's just pure idiocy.

No it isn't.

They've allowed time for the stores to return the old product for credit, and make room for new prudct.

It's also helps not to have incompatible old "Warhammer Fantasy" product on the shelf when they are trying to sell their rebooted "Warhammer" product.

Kid "What army do these cool looking Lizardmen go with ?"
Neckbeard "None. Those bastards at GW wiped out an entire army, and pissed off thousands of players"
Kid "Okay", puts the box down and backs away slowly

 Boss Salvage wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
If GW are pulling all their army books, and nobody's buying any current stuff (because they're waiting for AOS) then GW are effectively not making any fantasy sales for 3 weeks. Given that 9th rumours have been going a while, and the community has been reluctant to buy fantasy stuff for longer than 3 weeks, effectively, GW's profits have taken a hit.

When July 11 was announced as the street date for AoS, and we were musing why they'd put such a major release up for preorder on July 4 and towards the middle of the summer, I realized that that's probably the beginning of a new financial quarter for GeeDub. My company's fiscal year begins April 1, thus our second quarter begins three months later - July 1. It seemed likely to me that GW absolutely tanked its Fantasy profits for the April-May-June quarter to begin with a fresh quarter that they could trumpet particularly great (and somewhat manufactured) Fantasy profits thanks to the new edition. Hell, if GW's fiscal year begins July 1, they could write off the abysmal 8E Fantasy sales of the previous year and start afresh with the (hypothetically but also pretty much by default at this point) stellar numbers for the next edition.

That isn't necessarily meant to sound as nefariousness as it does, or at least not in a 'GW = Evil Empire' sort of way. I know my company does the same with product releases and timing around fiscal periods.

- Salvage

GW's fiscal year started on June 1, so AoS won't help towards the last FY. Mid-July is when their report to investors goes out, so they might be hoping to have initial sales numbers for AoS and then SM before that to say, "Although last year was rough, we've started out this FY the strongest we've ever been and we will only go upwards from there!"

Plus, I would have to think that End Times had to sell a lot better than 8E was before it, so they can easily point to that to say that they are moving in the right direction with WHFB (or I guess WAoS if the rumors are true that it will be a new name).

 Micky wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
Sounds like an old Weiss and Hickman book about traveling from one bubble world to the next.....the death gate cycle.

...except without the awesome story present in said book series.

And hopefully no Fizban Zifnab.

 Hive City Dweller wrote:
Regarding the point that GW are not selling any fantasy kits for a few weeks; I really don't think it's that big of a hit for them. Fantasy came to an end because it needed a re-working to make it more popular and sell more kits. Since their profits from the first half of the year have been pretty decent (Necrons, Eldar, Ad Mech X2, Demon Kin and Imperial Knights all sold really well both online and in my local GW store) I think they can take the absence of their worst selling product for a while.

I do agree that they should have put out more information to create hype/alleviate fears though.

I'd hazard a guess that's it's also no coincidence that this new whatever is directly preceeded by an (arguably unnecessary/too soon) Space Marine release. That alone should put their takings for the period well above average.

 Hive City Dweller wrote:
Regarding the point that GW are not selling any fantasy kits for a few weeks; I really don't think it's that big of a hit for them. Fantasy came to an end because it needed a re-working to make it more popular and sell more kits. Since their profits from the first half of the year have been pretty decent (Necrons, Eldar, Ad Mech X2, Demon Kin and Imperial Knights all sold really well both online and in my local GW store) I think they can take the absence of their worst selling product for a while.

I do agree that they should have put out more information to create hype/alleviate fears though.

The problem is, the sales freeze of WHFB hasn't been a few weeks. Almost everyone I know and everyone I follow on the internet (via Twitter, forums and podcasts) stopped buying WHFB models and everything when Thanquol came out (and the Lizards peaced out) and then when the final pages of Archaon leaked. That is one third of a year's worth of sales that they threw out by not supplying some sort of information. If they would have been somewhat more forthcoming, saying it was a redesign with Ravening Hordes, ala 6th Ed, and that you'll still be able to play with all of your old toys, people would have kept buying knowing they were building towards something instead of nothing.

You are completely correct in saying they needed to put out more information earlier on to keep those sales moving, or at least keep them from going dormant.

Dayum, son. Everyone I know stopped buying Fantasy when 8th edition came out and they couldn't have a normal tourney game anymore.

Some good points. For those defending GW's actions, here's what Kilkrazy had to say about it on the GW financial report discussion thread. I hope he forgives me for pinching his quote

"If this six month report is negative, it will be the fifth in a series of negative six month reports. In other words, two and a half years of falling sales."

So, a company with falling sales is obviously in a healthy position to write off 3 weeks, possibly more, of sales of one of its premier products?

Again, I say this: what kind of kamikaze business practices are GW engaging in? And who taught them this!!

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

£25 would get you a good rulebook from any other company, but GW will be looking to limit/collector's edition the hell out of AOS

Not necessarily: the rulebook for Infinity is fifty quid. Which I find hard to stomach for a skirmish game, but it seems like a good quality product. The 25 quid rulebooks that you get now are primarily in the same scale as, say, the D&D Core Book: A4, hardback, lotsa colour, roughly 256 pages. I suspect that GW will do the same kind of rulebook as 40k 7th edition, which, well, would be easier to carry around than the 8th edition hardback at least.

The best rulebooks they do are the mid-size hardback ones - you know, the ribbon bound notebook size? I wish they just sold them at launch, I far prefer that size.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

What kind of company is this? What kind of company engages in such kamikaze business practices?

GW makes the bulk of their sales on any given product upon it's initial release. Any Fantasy product sales in the last few weeks would have been miniscule at best.

Continuing to sell the product after it's initial release is something they have to do, for us to be able to build complete armies, but isn't the most profitable.

But selling nothing in the run up to your big release is worse, in every single way, than selling a minuscule amount of other stuff in the run up to your big release.

Imagine if Apple stopped selling all of their other products for the 3 weeks before a new iPhone came out, or Microsoft stopped selling all versions of Windows weeks before releasing their new edition.

It's just pure idiocy.

To be fair, not many people buy an iDevice 3 weeks before replacement apart from when it's discounted, because they usually sell/support 2 generations at a time.

Microsoft usually offer a free upgrade if you buy an edition just before a new one too.


Fantasy was barely selling by that point anyway. Would anyone think it crazy if they just dropped LOTR for instance?

 Charles Rampant wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

£25 would get you a good rulebook from any other company, but GW will be looking to limit/collector's edition the hell out of AOS

Not necessarily: the rulebook for Infinity is fifty quid. Which I find hard to stomach for a skirmish game, but it seems like a good quality product. The 25 quid rulebooks that you get now are primarily in the same scale as, say, the D&D Core Book: A4, hardback, lotsa colour, roughly 256 pages. I suspect that GW will do the same kind of rulebook as 40k 7th edition, which, well, would be easier to carry around than the 8th edition hardback at least.

The best rulebooks they do are the mid-size hardback ones - you know, the ribbon bound notebook size? I wish they just sold them at launch, I far prefer that size.

This is the digital age. Nobody should be paying £25 for a standard rulebook. Yes, you should be charged more for a collector's edition, but the paper price and digital price should have a big difference between them.

HobbyBox wrote:
GW's fiscal year started on June 1, so AoS won't help towards the last FY. Mid-July is when their report to investors goes out, so they might be hoping to have initial sales numbers for AoS and then SM before that to say, "Although last year was rough, we've started out this FY the strongest we've ever been and we will only go upwards from there!"

Plus, I would have to think that End Times had to sell a lot better than 8E was before it, so they can easily point to that to say that they are moving in the right direction with WHFB (or I guess WAoS if the rumors are true that it will be a new name).

Thanks for the date, I did figure GW's fiscal year was a known thing. And point on the End Times books - I bought zero of them myself (as I don't care for campaign books) and forgot how popular they were over those crazy few months

- Salvage

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 Charles Rampant wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

£25 would get you a good rulebook from any other company, but GW will be looking to limit/collector's edition the hell out of AOS

Not necessarily: the rulebook for Infinity is fifty quid. Which I find hard to stomach for a skirmish game, but it seems like a good quality product. The 25 quid rulebooks that you get now are primarily in the same scale as, say, the D&D Core Book: A4, hardback, lotsa colour, roughly 256 pages. I suspect that GW will do the same kind of rulebook as 40k 7th edition, which, well, would be easier to carry around than the 8th edition hardback at least.

The best rulebooks they do are the mid-size hardback ones - you know, the ribbon bound notebook size? I wish they just sold them at launch, I far prefer that size.

This is the digital age. Nobody should be paying £25 for a standard rulebook. Yes, you should be charged more for a collector's edition, but the paper price and digital price should have a big difference between them.

Not to mention CB make Infonity's rules available for free, the book is an entirely optional purchase, and as substantial as anything GW produce for a similar price.

My first fantasy purchases in 3 years (since our local scene dried up for RTT's) was the End Times books which I love. I'm looking forward to Ages of Sigmar. Granted it's tempered with nervousness but I have hopes...

 Azreal13 wrote:

That said, if I can do either a Bret or WE force (or maybe even both) for the cost of a few boxes, they'll get money out of me they wouldn't have otherwise had.

Plus, wasn't there a rumour that whatever Age Of Sigmar is will be £25 back a few pages? If that's a GW's rulebook, that's pretty good value too, even if it's small format.

I'm beginning to lean more and more in this direction. I tried to pick WHFB once with IOB (whatever edition that was) but was off put by the sheer number of models I had to prepare. Of course it didn't help that I (1) do not play with unpainted models and (2) picked Skaven.

If GW produces something that at least functions at a smaller model count, it will be likely that they get a few dollars of mine that they otherwise would not have.

Now if they would just give me a clue as to what they planned to sell me....

 Azreal13 wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 Charles Rampant wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

£25 would get you a good rulebook from any other company, but GW will be looking to limit/collector's edition the hell out of AOS

Not necessarily: the rulebook for Infinity is fifty quid. Which I find hard to stomach for a skirmish game, but it seems like a good quality product. The 25 quid rulebooks that you get now are primarily in the same scale as, say, the D&D Core Book: A4, hardback, lotsa colour, roughly 256 pages. I suspect that GW will do the same kind of rulebook as 40k 7th edition, which, well, would be easier to carry around than the 8th edition hardback at least.

The best rulebooks they do are the mid-size hardback ones - you know, the ribbon bound notebook size? I wish they just sold them at launch, I far prefer that size.

This is the digital age. Nobody should be paying £25 for a standard rulebook. Yes, you should be charged more for a collector's edition, but the paper price and digital price should have a big difference between them.

Not to mention CB make Infonity's rules available for free, the book is an entirely optional purchase, and as substantial as anything GW produce for a similar price.

The Judge Dredd rulebook is well worth the money. Imagine my surprise to see rules, scenarios, AND army lists in in one volume. The shock nearly made me fall over

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Some good points. For those defending GW's actions, here's what Kilkrazy had to say about it on the GW financial report discussion thread. I hope he forgives me for pinching his quote

"If this six month report is negative, it will be the fifth in a series of negative six month reports. In other words, two and a half years of falling sales."

So, a company with falling sales is obviously in a healthy position to write off 3 weeks, possibly more, of sales of one of its premier products?

Again, I say this: what kind of kamikaze business practices are GW engaging in? And who taught them this!!

That's just it though; it really wasn't their premier product. If they stopped making and marketing 40K for 3 months that would be kamikaze finances, but as it stands they are formally ending their no longer well selling line of fantasy products to re-invent it into something that it workable and profitable. Granted they are not masters of marketing and finance, but WHFB needed new life breathed into it.

Does this suck for the current players who are enjoying 8th? Yes. Could this generate enough excitement and curiosity to get a few 40K players to buy into a fantasy skirmish game? It seems like a risk worth taking.

I know for me what prevented me from really getting into fantasy was the insane model count, price point and ranked square bases. If they make a workable skirmish game that works with a few troops an elite choice and a wizard or two, I'd be right into it as a side project apart from my 40K army. My friends also share this view point. So if you can sell the modesl you already have to players who would play small/medium sized skirmish games with them with a simple base change, why on earth would you not?

Maybe instead of making Fantasy a skirmish game, another solution to the 'Fantasy requires too many models' issue is to provide dedicated escalation league rules? My biggest two armies (Skaven, Daemons) were painted over just such slow grow leagues, and I enjoyed my smaller point games immensely, without needing to change the core rules of the game to make it work.

To use another WM/H parallel, Journeyman leagues seem to be great ways to introduce new players into the hobby, particularly when they have bonuses built in for painting ... And those don't change the core rules of the game either. Though both Fantasy escalation leagues and Journeyman leagues require community-level organization or support that GW isn't interested in (while PP conversely is). GW, however, is quite good at decreeing things, so an Official Escalation League proclamation might be enough, even without some massive shift in game scale or clever building in of scalability.

- Salvage