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Dudeface wrote:

 Trickstick wrote:
Did anyone else find the exhibition game quite dull? I only watched the Guard one and it lasted so long and was so boring to watch at points.

I found the presentation a little lacklustre, I suspect it's a combination of hosts being tired, not knowing what they can say, being too professional sometimes.

Those guys are used to talking meta, plays, situational stuff and general banter outside of a GW stream. Having no meta to discuss, no known as or tactics, not being able to reference points or other units/armies and suddenly they're left filling time.

The format itself needs work. It was just a single overhead camera for like 99% of the game. Not very interesting.

Breton wrote:

 vipoid wrote:


But who made them the bread and butter?

The consumers. Superhuman do-it-all heroes? And you wonder why they're the bread and butter?

Weird how AOS manages to not have different colors of Stormcast comprise half the factions.

Shame it can't be helped, as the consumers force helpless GW to put Marines in all the starter sets and on all the marketing and in half of the new release slots.

 Trickstick wrote:
Did anyone else find the exhibition game quite dull? I only watched the Guard one and it lasted so long and was so boring to watch at points.

It would have been better served if they had been able to play with the rules beforehand. Being thrown into a new system all but guarantees really slow play like they had. And on the first one they kept bringing the same datasheets up constantly. The second was a little better with Brandt able to speak to things a little more concisely.

It was hard to judge lethality, too. It seemed similar to most of my 9th games, but those all had a decent amount of stuff on the table near the end. So whether this system cuts out those round 2/3 wins is unclear.

They should have had players who knew 10th, proper painted GW miniatures, good terrain, and made it a fun game instead of boring competitive 9th playstyle. Like I get the difficulty that would all be, but it was supposed to be an exhibition! Should have been fun and engaging for the audience, not waiting to bloody turn 2 to end so we can see another datasheet.

Yea as campy as GW's stuff can be they did an excellent job with their first battle report with the combat patrols.

I kind of can't believe that a major GW pr stream, full of reveals, had 3rd party miniature bits.

 catbarf wrote:

Breton wrote:

 vipoid wrote:


But who made them the bread and butter?

The consumers. Superhuman do-it-all heroes? And you wonder why they're the bread and butter?

Weird how AOS manages to not have different colors of Stormcast comprise half the factions.

Shame it can't be helped, as the consumers force helpless GW to put Marines in all the starter sets and on all the marketing and in half of the new release slots.

I don't know much about AOS, I wasn't really encouraged to switch. But a quick check of the website tells me Stormcast Eternals have 68 kits, Cities of Sigmar (which appears to be a collection of human Fantasy leftover kits) has 56, finally one of the non-Order factions Slaves to Darkness (left over Chaos Warrior kits) has 50 - most factions appear to have 20-30. And Morathi is a good guy?!? I mean you can blame GW for human psychology all you want, but they neither invented nor had to work at a Mary Sue event here. Superman Worldsaver is not a GW invention, and they didn't "make" the consumer buy into that archetype more often than the others.

Breton wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

Breton wrote:

 vipoid wrote:


But who made them the bread and butter?

The consumers. Superhuman do-it-all heroes? And you wonder why they're the bread and butter?

Weird how AOS manages to not have different colors of Stormcast comprise half the factions.

Shame it can't be helped, as the consumers force helpless GW to put Marines in all the starter sets and on all the marketing and in half of the new release slots.

I don't know much about AOS, I wasn't really encouraged to switch. But a quick check of the website tells me Stormcast Eternals have 68 kits, Cities of Sigmar (which appears to be a collection of human Fantasy leftover kits) has 56, finally one of the non-Order factions Slaves to Darkness (left over Chaos Warrior kits) has 50 - most factions appear to have 20-30. And Morathi is a good guy?!? I mean you can blame GW for human psychology all you want, but they neither invented nor had to work at a Mary Sue event here. Superman Worldsaver is not a GW invention, and they didn't "make" the consumer buy into that archetype more often than the others.

No, Morathi and her witchelves are in the Order faction. Order =/= Good, just order. In their case think of them as the Lawfull Evil alignment from D&D.

Breton wrote:
I don't know much about AOS, I wasn't really encouraged to switch. But a quick check of the website tells me Stormcast Eternals have 68 kits

If the worst you can say about Stormcast is that they get more kits than other factions, you're pretty much making my point for me.

Breton wrote:
Superman Worldsaver is not a GW invention, and they didn't "make" the consumer buy into that archetype more often than the others.

Superman Worldsaver is a popular trope and I have no doubt that the heroic macho man power fantasy (dial down the 'brainwashed castrated child soldiers', dial up the 'heroic selfless Chiselslab McKnightly') has enough intrinsic appeal to make it a popular choice. GW did create the Stormcast to tap into that appeal in fantasy.

However- the decisions to balloon the Marine range with a total redo, to give them new kits every few years such that none of their stuff is truly old (while other factions have models old enough to drink), to shower them in rules support to the point where their subfactions get equal billing to other factions, to pay attention and course-correct whenever they underperform (bolter discipline, armour of contempt, heck they just plain get more codices), to put them in every starter set and on all the marketing and in all the videogames, to create an entire spin-off game that is Marines, Marines, and more Marines- that's not the consumers' doing.

It's silly to act like those factors have absolutely no causal relationship with their popularity on the tabletop, or that Big Man In Big Armor is so intrinsically appealing that it is only natural for it to pull the entire rest of the game into its orbit. AOS gives Stormcast a lot of attention but isn't anywhere near as myopically focused on them as 40K is on Marines, and go figure they're just a more popular faction among many, rather than half or more of the armies on the table in any given shop.

Now in fairness to GW, rolling all the alternative paint schemes into the same army again is a surprisingly egalitarian take, and they've been doing a decent job of updating non-Marine factions to a modern standard after the absolute glut of Primaris that dominated the game for 3-4 years. But as Vipoid was getting at, there's still a distinct sense of haves and have-nots when it comes to wargear options and NMNR, and that's pure design favoritism.

 catbarf wrote:

Breton wrote:
I don't know much about AOS, I wasn't really encouraged to switch. But a quick check of the website tells me Stormcast Eternals have 68 kits

If the worst you can say about Stormcast is that they get more kits than other factions, you're pretty much making my point for me.

Breton wrote:
Superman Worldsaver is not a GW invention, and they didn't "make" the consumer buy into that archetype more often than the others.

Superman Worldsaver is a popular trope and I have no doubt that the heroic macho man power fantasy (dial down the 'brainwashed castrated child soldiers', dial up the 'heroic selfless Chiselslab McKnightly') has enough intrinsic appeal to make it a popular choice. GW did create the Stormcast to tap into that appeal in fantasy.

However- the decisions to balloon the Marine range with a total redo, to give them new kits every few years such that none of their stuff is truly old (while other factions have models old enough to drink), to shower them in rules support to the point where their subfactions get equal billing to other factions, to pay attention and course-correct whenever they underperform (bolter discipline, armour of contempt, heck they just plain get more codices), to put them in every starter set and on all the marketing and in all the videogames, to create an entire spin-off game that is Marines, Marines, and more Marines- that's not the consumers' doing.

It's silly to act like those factors have absolutely no causal relationship with their popularity on the tabletop, or that Big Man In Big Armor is so intrinsically appealing that it is only natural for it to pull the entire rest of the game into its orbit. AOS gives Stormcast a lot of attention but isn't anywhere near as myopically focused on them as 40K is on Marines, and go figure they're just a more popular faction among many, rather than half or more of the armies on the table in any given shop.

Now in fairness to GW, rolling all the alternative paint schemes into the same army again is a surprisingly egalitarian take, and they've been doing a decent job of updating non-Marine factions to a modern standard after the absolute glut of Primaris that dominated the game for 3-4 years. But as Vipoid was getting at, there's still a distinct sense of haves and have-nots when it comes to wargear options and NMNR, and that's pure design favoritism.

Firstborn marines do have some kits old enough to drink as well (outside of the US anyway). The command squad sprues are dated 2004, the bike squad is 2002, the land speeder/speder storm is 1999, there's never been a plastic firstborn techmarine, marines need a refresh as much as anyone else, they're just in plastic, and instead of a refresh they got what is functionally a completely different army (rules wise) welded onto them. Bikes are especially showing their age like Gaunts were with their split-body design.

Space marines definitely are favored, but if you don't like primaris at all, or at least, not beyond a few kits you're making do with kits from 3--4th ed and 6th ed barring a couple exceptions like Centurions or Deathwatch vets,

As much as Space Marines do in fact sell I think we can also say with some confidence that GW massively underestimates the potential popularity of the armies languishing in finecast. The Sisters release was the most profitable egg on their face one could ask for... and one of the neglected armies is the goddamn High Elves. As much as I don't like elves I can tell you that they're one of the most popular factions in basically every story they're in.

 Arachnofiend wrote:
As much as Space Marines do in fact sell I think we can also say with some confidence that GW massively underestimates the potential popularity of the armies languishing in finecast. The Sisters release was the most profitable egg on their face one could ask for... and one of the neglected armies is the goddamn High Elves. As much as I don't like elves I can tell you that they're one of the most popular factions in basically every story they're in.

Might be a case of effort to dollars ratio too.

Refreshing an entire range like sisters (or elves) requires a lot of work, from concept art, to building each unique model, to even have someone passionate about the project to keep each model in line with the vision for that army.

Versus something like Space Marines, which has two separate model lines in the mainline game (firstborn and primaris) and their own other entire super special game (Horus Heresy), where they can just take ye olde generic Space Marine, slap on a new gun, or slap a new gun on a new gun, or a new gun on a new gun on a new gun, like the infamous nerf blasters, and they'll sell like hotcakes. Hell, for the most part, GW can fart out a new chapter by slapping a paint scheme and maybe a new pauldron on existing models. Maybe throw in one or two unique kits, and bam.

Doesn't help that GW for some reason has decided that their range refreshes can stop halfway through nowadays. It's like they've decided that as long as there's enough new models for an Imperial faction to look guy fighting beside (but not as good as) Space Marines, or a xeno to get bodied by them, they're fine. Shame too; I was looking forward to starting a 'Guard or Ork army.

 ProfSrlojohn wrote:


Firstborn marines do have some kits old enough to drink as well (outside of the US anyway). The command squad sprues are dated 2004, the bike squad is 2002, the land speeder/speder storm is 1999, there's never been a plastic firstborn techmarine, marines need a refresh as much as anyone else, they're just in plastic, and instead of a refresh they got what is functionally a completely different army (rules wise) welded onto them. Bikes are especially showing their age like Gaunts were with their split-body design.

Space marines definitely are favored, but if you don't like primaris at all, or at least, not beyond a few kits you're making do with kits from 3--4th ed and 6th ed barring a couple exceptions like Centurions or Deathwatch vets,

I'm not sure logic matters. We just went from GW made Marines the Poster boy because most of the stuff is for them to Stormcast may have the most stuff but GW didn't make them the poster boy. And the trope that makes Marines and Stormcast popular somehow isn't the point anymore anyway. Its still somehow GW's fault SM are popular and getting stuff because they're popular in some sort of circular logic to justify some hate on SM and/or GW.

Tyel wrote:

If those things are essentially gone (or at least much reduced) - then you end up with a character who is just sort of flat. He's too expensive compared with cheap 40-50 point buffing characters. But he doesn't do anything compared with blinged out SM Captains and up. He feels bad from a Timmy, Johnny and Spike perspective - which is never a good place for a unit to be..

Too expensive? Points been leaked while i was hospitalized?

There is a chance that GW wanted to replicate the space marine formula for AoS, but then one of two or both things happened. The AoS players didn't like Stormcast eternals the way w40k players like marines or the formula didn't work.

Plus GW main problem with space marines, is that while they are their big money maker, but how popular there are there is a big secondary market for them. Both of GW and non GW products. There aren't many recasters doing stormcast infantry, there were some doing the dragons, and there are legions of people making marines.

And all of this happens before the whole marines vs primaris split, which enough people actualy do care about.

In the end who knows, GW policies are sometimes so esotheric and 5D, that a mortal man can't get his head around it.
HH for example. Super popular, based on their most popular IP. First choked for a year with releases of big, small and huge tanks and vehciles. Skipped basic infantry or characters. Then after people don't ditch the game anyway, you make the HH tanks no longer playable in w40k. Where a ton of people jumped to HH, because they thought they would have an army for two systems.

tneva82 wrote:
Too expensive? Points been leaked while i was hospitalized?

Yeah they are all over reddit...

Just joking - I was referring to 9th's points. Perhaps naively, I imagine stuff won't deviate massively. But we wait and see.

 Arachnofiend wrote:
As much as Space Marines do in fact sell I think we can also say with some confidence that GW massively underestimates the potential popularity of the armies languishing in finecast. The Sisters release was the most profitable egg on their face one could ask for... and one of the neglected armies is the goddamn High Elves. As much as I don't like elves I can tell you that they're one of the most popular factions in basically every story they're in.

The high elves just got 3 tomes in as many years to degree that whenever gw puts order tome running joke is another elf book

Breton wrote:
I'm not sure logic matters. We just went from GW made Marines the Poster boy because most of the stuff is for them to Stormcast may have the most stuff but GW didn't make them the poster boy. And the trope that makes Marines and Stormcast popular somehow isn't the point anymore anyway. Its still somehow GW's fault SM are popular and getting stuff because they're popular in some sort of circular logic to justify some hate on SM and/or GW.

You can just say you don't know how AOS compares to 40K without resorting to this mindless 'they must just hate GW!!!' tripe.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Arachnofiend wrote:
As much as Space Marines do in fact sell I think we can also say with some confidence that GW massively underestimates the potential popularity of the armies languishing in finecast. The Sisters release was the most profitable egg on their face one could ask for... and one of the neglected armies is the goddamn High Elves. As much as I don't like elves I can tell you that they're one of the most popular factions in basically every story they're in.

GW seems continuously surprised that giving an army decent rules and new models is a massive boon to their popularity. Sisters are the classic case, but I've also seen dramatically increased popularity in xenos factions and Guard as they've gotten updates.

It's pretty much proof positive that the relative popularity of factions does in fact have something to do with how GW handles them, and isn't purely reflective of their intrinsic appeal.

 catbarf wrote:

Breton wrote:
I'm not sure logic matters. We just went from GW made Marines the Poster boy because most of the stuff is for them to Stormcast may have the most stuff but GW didn't make them the poster boy. And the trope that makes Marines and Stormcast popular somehow isn't the point anymore anyway. Its still somehow GW's fault SM are popular and getting stuff because they're popular in some sort of circular logic to justify some hate on SM and/or GW.

You can just say you don't know how AOS compares to 40K without resorting to this mindless 'they must just hate GW!!!' tripe.

I did. First thing. You were the one that moved the goal posts so you could hate on GW and/or Space Marines after losing the Trope debate.

GW didn't "make" Marines sell well, basic human nature - especially that of the teenaged male - did. As that's what makes them sell well, that's what makes them earn enough to keep the lights on for the other factions.

Breton wrote:
I did. First thing.

...And then proceeded to argue anyways, about a game you by your own admission know nothing about. And when I said that your cursory analysis of kit count isn't anywhere close to the entire story, you declare that there must be no logic, I'm moving goalposts, and I'm just looking for an excuse to hate GW. Yeah. Sure.

Well, if you really in your heart of hearts believe that GW has never made any decisions that promote Marines, that their popularity is solely a result of human nature, and refuse to accept that some wargames don't orbit around their beefcake supermen- I'll leave you to it.

In the meantime, going back to where this segue started, I'm just glad that Tyranids are getting only a little bit of short shrift in rules this time around. Maybe it has something to do with the community finally recognizing their intrinsic appeal that they've had all along, since it certainly couldn't be new models or center-stage billing contributing to newfound popularity.

It's a whole chicken and egg thing that GW stuck with for a long time. I do think they're leaning more away from marines now than they have in the past, but I don't have good data to quantify that.

@Daedalus81 Regarding our earlier conversation, I think we can now say that SM Captains have definitely not been hurt badly in the options department. If anything, it looks like they might actually have more options now than they had in 9th.

Want to take a wager on whether Xeno HQs are treated the same way?

 catbarf wrote:

...And then proceeded to argue anyways,

You brought them up, not me. Then bailed on it after we found out that even being a brand new faction they already had more kits than the left over Fantasy factions.

Well, if you really in your heart of hearts believe that GW has never made any decisions that promote Marines,

Breton wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

...And then proceeded to argue anyways,

You brought them up, not me. Then bailed on it after we found out that even being a brand new faction they already had more kits than the left over Fantasy factions.

Well, if you really in your heart of hearts believe that GW has never made any decisions that promote Marines,

No I believe you're again lying about what someone else said. I said they didn't have to do anything in order to make Marines popular. I said Marines would have been popular all on their own because they're THAT trope. I said GW saw which way the wind was already blowing and decided to let SM keep the lights on.

If you have to lie about what was said to get some sort of "victory" is it really a win?

Breton wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

...And then proceeded to argue anyways,

You brought them up, not me. Then bailed on it after we found out that even being a brand new faction they already had more kits than the left over Fantasy factions.

Well, if you really in your heart of hearts believe that GW has never made any decisions that promote Marines,

No I believe you're again lying about what someone else said. I said they didn't have to do anything in order to make Marines popular. I said Marines would have been popular all on their own because they're THAT trope. I said GW saw which way the wind was already blowing and decided to let SM keep the lights on.

If you have to lie about what was said to get some sort of "victory" is it really a win?

 vipoid wrote:
@Daedalus81 Regarding our earlier conversation, I think we can now say that SM Captains have definitely not been hurt badly in the options department. If anything, it looks like they might actually have more options now than they had in 9th.

Want to take a wager on whether Xeno HQs are treated the same way?

- Primaris Captain lost MC ABR, MC SBR, SI Bolt Carbine as per all the recent condensing, but otherwise is mostly the same sheet without the extra faffing about.
- All the Gravis dudes got condensed, but didn't lose anything that I can see.
- Phobos CPT unchanged
- All firstborn lost singular LC, maul, axe, and any true combi.

All Primaris variants lost a wound.

I won't take that bet anyway, because it's anyone's guess at this point.

 JNAProductions wrote:
I see four Grand Alliances in the AoS side of the store.
Stormcast are a subset of Order. They're the LARGEST subset, but not by a ridiculous degress.

I see four supersets in the 40k side of the store.
Imperium, Chaos, Xenos, and Space Marines. Space Marines, generically, have 90 store entries, with some subfactions of this Imperium subfaction reaching over 100.
Second most numerous is Orks, at 59. Third is Guard, at 58. Nothing else breaches 50.

Yeah, that's kind of my point. The new Knight In Shining Armor trope faction went from 0 to the Most in a few short years. They were at what? 60? 70? Most of the other Subset of assorted Orders were at what? 25? 30? Which ones were closest? what used to be Chaos Warriors (Black/Mirror Knights) and Cities of Sigmar which looks like bits and pieces of 3? 4? different Fantasy factions? I see Empire, Wood Elves, Dark Elves, Dwarves, and maybe even some High Elves?

GW doesn't have to "push" the Big Blue Boy Scout factions

The original question was: Who made SM top sellers - my answer was the people who bought them. I'm sure there are plenty of ex hobby shop employees in here who can tell us which models little Timmy most wanted to play with on the Demo board. Does anyone really believe the SM wouldn't still be the top seller - release schedule being equal?

Stormcast got tons of kits due to gw making tons of kits.

Not showing up as popularity of army though. Sigmarines aren't such a seller as marines despite gw trying to replicate marine effect.