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repeating pose will work, but an army with the same 5 different poses but build from free poseable miniatures still looks different to an army using the same identical models

it is this minor difference between the same pose that happens during building the models that makes them look more natural

monopose will look worse for 50+ models even with 5 different models compared to an old kit

Sigh, this thread reminds me of the good ol' days when gw was ran by people who cared about gamers and making fun games.

back when figs were 'white metal" and they could afford to do some figures just for fun, like the christmas marines, the wounded marine, sleazy rider, thrudd the barbarian, etc.

I think people are overestimating how many kits would be required for an Imperial Guard makeover.

Right now Cadians for example have: Infantry Squad, Command Squad, and Heavy Weapons Team/Squad - this can be condensed down, and simply have extra bits of kit to represent Veterans vs Infantry vs Conscripts (assuming their rules stay the same and don't change drastically). I recently grabbed some Wargames Atlantic kits, and for their Grognards range, they have a kit that is 24 infantry with several options of weapons, and a heavy weapon/command set that can build 6 heavy weapons and several officers, and with enough heads in unique stylings to really make them feel somewhat unique.

I'm not saying GW needs to follow this model, I'm just saying that with more modern sprue layouts they can fit more goodies into it. Right now the Command Squad box is basically just a special weapon box that has a few unique heads and torsos - a more modern kit layout could easily fit that into a basic Infantry Squad kit, and the current Cadian Infantry Squad kit has plenty of room to spare. That or GW could go full ham and make a wonderful infantry box with tons of little bits and details you could add on to your guys, and then make the Command Squad box an actual support staff / leader box (generals, regimental commanders, company commanders, platoon commanders, maybe a commissar styled somewhat after regiments like the old Steel Legion Commissar, etc) instead of the only means of obtaining special weapons.

I mean, even following the current setup they have with Cadians and Catachans, it is just 3 boxes for an entire regiment.

Just a point but what Imperial Guard needs to get multiple different squads of basic infantry in different uniforms is its own game.

Slaves to Darkness has 8+ warbands who fill basically the same role as guardsmen (chaff). They vary a bit in stats but broadly fill a similar slot. The reason they got them is because Warcry came along


All GW needs is a reason for people to want to buy a regiment of IG troops and nothing else. Of course IG is in 40K and Imperial so it might have enough supporters on its own for GW to do. The trick would be putting a few tank icons/attachments, infantry, heavy weapons, command group etc... all into plastic in different regiments. The vehicles and rest of the gear can remain the same across the legions


IT might happen, but its hard to say if GW would

Voss wrote:
Custodes, Ad Mech, Knights
Finished!

Servitors spring to mind for the admech.

 kodos wrote:
repeating pose will work, but an army with the same 5 different poses but build from free poseable miniatures still looks different to an army using the same identical models

it is this minor difference between the same pose that happens during building the models that makes them look more natural

monopose will look worse for 50+ models even with 5 different models compared to an old kit

I totally agree with this. The looseness of many older kits allowed for variation even when the parts were the same. It's enough to make it work. Much less so when you have five distinctive monoposed models.

A.T. wrote:

Voss wrote:
Custodes, Ad Mech, Knights
Finished!

Servitors spring to mind for the admech.

Servitors are a weird one, as they'd serve AdMech, Space Marines and Imperial Guard with the same kit. It's a little odd we've not seem a 5 model box for them before now.

 Matt Swain wrote:
Sigh, this thread reminds me of the good ol' days when gw was ran by people who cared about gamers and making fun games.

back when figs were 'white metal" and they could afford to do some figures just for fun, like the christmas marines, the wounded marine, sleazy rider, thrudd the barbarian, etc.

Sadly, the era of 'white metal' is over not because of game companies not caring about games and gamers, but because the main material component that went into 'the cheapest possible moldable metal material' became much more expensive when it became useful for some kind of common electronic component.

White metal left the games industry because of market dynamics outside the control of game companies. It's why eventually everyone moved over to resins and plastics from metals - flames of war, malifaux, guild ball, WMH all phased their metals out.

If anything, the failed attempt to come up with a new material that would allow them to continue to use the old molds that everyone had nostalgia for was more effort on GW's part than other companies put in to preserve their white metal figs.

ccs wrote:

Voss wrote:

Spoiler:

 waefre_1 wrote:

Voss wrote:
...but I don't think the 'planetary regiments' is a formula that can be revisited in plastic.

This gets brought up frequently when speaking of bringing regiments back, but it would likely be doable with multipurpose kits (eg. a generic longcoat infantry kit with heads/bits for Vostroyans/Steel Legion/Valhallans, and a tunic infantry kit with heads/bits for Cadians/Tallarn/Mordians - Catachans would probably still require bespoke kits, though).

I guess you could do that, but they wouldn't look particularly like those regiments. Vostroyan outfits are very elaborate, valhallans have fur touches, steel legion doesn't (and have shorter coats). Tallarn aren't wearing the same outfits as Cadians, nor are Mordians- not even vaguely.

Its a way forward, I suppose, but I'd expect grumbling more than enthusiasm

Insectum wrote:
Why not? The Necrounda gangs look great and I'd imagine Guard kits would have a high chance of high sales volume since people would ve buying multiple. I think all that's needed is finding the ideal way to organize the kits. Troopers, Command, Heavy Weapons, Vehicle Crew.

The cost and risk, basically. 6 or 7 times the cost to reproduce the same 'units' in variations, with no guarantee they'd sell enough of all of them to make that money back. (especially given how regiment choice is currently baked into rules. Color=rules is bad enough, but if they actually brought back the models, specific regiments=rules would be obnoxious. Especially when the rules start changing to make the kits that sell the least sell better)

Its also just SKU proliferation, which raises all sorts of stock and shelf space issues, for a 'second tier' army. I just can't see GW's number crunches signing off on it.

Necromunda is an odd comparison, different game on a different scale and the basic gangs are 5 models with duplicate sprues for a low model count game. I don't know about you, but I wasn't pleased with that for necromunda, and it _really_ wouldn't fly for 40k when the average guard army wants 50+ models (or double that, depending on how tank heavy you go).

Have you ever seen a Guard army? There's not a lot variations between the bulk of the models pose wise. Doesn't matter if your using plastic Cadians, or metal Cadians. With the old metals you get guys aiming, guys advancing (guns up/down), two or three slight variations of Sgts, and special & heavy weapons who by default are always the same poses.
Well, guess what? That's pretty much how most people build the plastic ones too. It's not terribly important that you can slightly pose them. And in play? Most of them die fast enough that your opponant rarely notices/cares if youve adjust some of them to break up the sameness.

Strangely yes, I have seen a guard army. Its one of the main reasons I haven't done much with my valhallans for several editions. It doesn't matter that theoretical opponents might not care. I care.

As for trying (and failing) to please everyone with a kit that's trying to be 4-5 different styles? (say Krieg, SL, Valhallan & Vostroyans) You don't. You pick ONE of those & go with it. If people paint it different colors & claim the Krieg squad is _____? So be it. It's the same effect as right now today.

Yes. It is. Its worth understanding that the upshot of that approach is that the most 'practical' way forward for GW is just to keep the cadians (and catachans, since they exist) and do nothing more.
I don't think simply never redoing guard (beyond maybe an updated sprue with special weapons) is the best approach.



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 Dysartes wrote:

A.T. wrote:

Voss wrote:
Custodes, Ad Mech, Knights
Finished!

Servitors spring to mind for the admech.

Servitors are a weird one, as they'd serve AdMech, Space Marines and Imperial Guard with the same kit. It's a little odd we've not seem a 5 model box for them before now.

Sales, I expect. Presumably GW has some sort of data on how off they sell servitors. I don't suspect its high. A dedicated plastic kit might not be worth it.

Voss wrote:
Sales, I expect. Presumably GW has some sort of data on how off they sell servitors

The existing servitor models are boxed and sold in a less than ideal way for guard and admech players - heavy bolters are only available if you buy techmarines and basic servo-arm models are double-packed with meltas and plasmas.

In terms of IG.....

Bare minimum, infantry squads need to come with the four available special weapons - Plasmagun, Meltagun, Flamer, Grenade Launcher.

I wouldn’t say no to a full suite of Heavy Weapons as well, but reckon they’ll forever be a separate kit.

Voss wrote:

ccs wrote:

As for trying (and failing) to please everyone with a kit that's trying to be 4-5 different styles? (say Krieg, SL, Valhallan & Vostroyans) You don't. You pick ONE of those & go with it. If people paint it different colors & claim the Krieg squad is _____? So be it. It's the same effect as right now today.

Yes. It is. Its worth understanding that the upshot of that approach is that the most 'practical' way forward for GW is just to keep the cadians (and catachans, since they exist) and do nothing more.
I don't think simply never redoing guard (beyond maybe an updated sprue with special weapons) is the best approach.

Agree. I think they should pick two regiments & give them the plastic treatment. Maybe that works out to be re-sculpting the current two. Maybe some new/other regiments.
My personal bet is that they eventually re-do the Catachans. After that it's a toss up between A) they keep the current Cadians, B) they switch to another regiment.

But unless they do some actual NEW regiment, or Krieg/Elysians, it won't matter much to me. My own IG infantry is long finished and I have plenty of all the existing regiments - Valhallens, Tallarns, metal Catachans, Steel Legion, metal & plastic Cadians, Mordians, etc etc etc (save Krieg & Elysians :().

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Voss wrote:

Guard surprised me a little, but I don't think the 'planetary regiments' is a formula that can be revisited in plastic.

Why not? The Necrounda gangs look great and I'd imagine Guard kits would have a high chance of high sales volume since people would ve buying multiple. I think all that's needed is finding the ideal way to organize the kits. Troopers, Command, Heavy Weapons, Vehicle Crew.

It would be, if you were to actually do Regimental stuff?
-Infantry Squad, Conscripts, and Veterans. These realistically are three different kits. Infantry Squads and Veteran Squads have a dedicated Sergeant, Conscripts don't. Infantry and Veteran Squads both can take Heavy Weapon Teams and Vox-Casters while Conscripts cannot. Conscripts start at 20 models while Infantry+Veteran Squads both are 10 models only. Veteran Squads have a different allocation of Special Weapons as well.
-Heavy Weapon Squads.
-Command Squads
-Officers(Junior and Senior) plus Masters of Ordnance
-Vehicle Crews(of which the Basilisk, period, needs crew figures)

And that doesn't even go into special characters. You're looking at a handful of kits for effectively NO DIFFERENCE.
A Catachan has the same damn stats as a Cadian or a Vostroyan. It's pointless without a change to the dynamic of the book, and GW is frankly too timid to do the necessary work for it.

It's not pointless to me

Cool, so you might as well use Cadians then.

Since there's no difference after all.

I've always felt like you could do a few IG kits to cover a couple different regiments with head swaps

Greatcoat kit - Vostroyan, Mordian, Krieg
Flak armor kit - Cadian, Valhallan, steel legion
Cloth armor kit - Catachan, Tallarn

You could do it, but what is the point?

There's far, far, far more important things to do for Guard like bothering to differentiate the Conscripts from Infantry Squads and Veteran Squads.

Amusingly enough? The 'concepts' of the different regiments could actually function as y'know...units.

 Kanluwen wrote:
You could do it, but what is the point?

There's far, far, far more important things to do for Guard like bothering to differentiate the Conscripts from Infantry Squads and Veteran Squads.

Amusingly enough? The 'concepts' of the different regiments could actually function as y'know...units.

What's the point of making any model kit? for people to buy, I don't know.

Do you really think people are going to buy new Guardsmen models if there isn't something that forces them to do it?

Yeah, GW would do well to ignore Kan's hopes/desires as they pertain to a IG line refresh.

Just give us the Regiments in plastic, as either two or three kits each (depending on how you use sprue space and deal with the heavy weapons), and maybe with some of the Regiments merged into a single "set" - Mordians/Praetorians make sense here, for example, as you just need to include two sets of heads, and heads are the easiest element to fit into a sprue.

In an ideal world, I'd love plastic Kasrkin as well, but I appreciate I'm probably not getting that particular golden goose

I think they could pretty easily have one box that covers most of the regiments, with "expansion sprues" like the SM's have with shoulder pads for other regiments' heads.

As I've said before, you can use the same torso and arms, so if you have 10 torsos, 10 short-coat legs, and 10 long-coat legs, and your weapon arms, with a lot of heads [given that they're definitely fine including like 30+ heads in a kit].



That's besides the point, though, because a new IG infantry kit would be like $60 no matter what's in it, because that's the price point for new infantry kits, and that would just be unworkable for the IG.
I think that as much as I specifically would like to see guardswomen, for example, I don't really care enough to desire a new infantry kit versus, seeing actual new units or the return of the missing artillery.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Do you really think people are going to buy new Guardsmen models if there isn't something that forces them to do it?

There wasn't anything 'forcing' the purchace of Primaris.

 Dysartes wrote:
Yeah, GW would do well to ignore Kan's hopes/desires as they pertain to a IG line refresh.

Nah. They'd do better to hire me on and keep Cruddace the hell away from the army ever again.

Just give us the Regiments in plastic, as either two or three kits each (depending on how you use sprue space and deal with the heavy weapons), and maybe with some of the Regiments merged into a single "set" - Mordians/Praetorians make sense here, for example, as you just need to include two sets of heads, and heads are the easiest element to fit into a sprue.

IF they're ever doing new Guard? Heavy Weapons are guaranteed to be included. Look at how they did Fire Warriors.

Mordians/Praetorians are a lazy example by the by. They were conversions to start with.

In an ideal world, I'd love plastic Kasrkin as well, but I appreciate I'm probably not getting that particular golden goose

In an ideal world, Guard would have carapace armored veterans period as a <Regiment> keyworded option in the Elite slot since Scions are <Militarum Tempestus> Troops choices.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
Do you really think people are going to buy new Guardsmen models if there isn't something that forces them to do it?

There wasn't anything 'forcing' the purchace of Primaris.

Other than them being entirely new units?

Serious statement: look at how they did Fire Warriors. They kept their original options, gave them an alternate build(Breachers), and added the Support Turret plus all the drone variants to the sprue.
That's what you should be expecting for Guard Infantry Squads if/when redone.

I'm also fairly comfortable saying that there will be a much more limited selection of Heavy Weapons going forward.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Do you really think people are going to buy new Guardsmen models if there isn't something that forces them to do it?

I mean I would.

I have owned exactly one box of cadians in my entire life, and instantly was like 'nah, if I'm owning a guard army I'm gonna scrounge the internet for metal figs, these guys look like garbage and there's nothing interesting about them.'

In concept, I love the Guard. In practice, they all have the same lumpy face twisted into the expressions arnie pulls on mars in total recall, and their hilariously heroscaled proportions coupled with their perfectly rounded shoulderpads give them the profile of the joke stormtroopers from Spaceballs.

Heres the thing, though: The draw of the guard can be and should be that you get to personalize them, and you get to humanize them. They're supposed to be the relatable humans that look like the quasi-historical fighting force you want them to look like. They should sell them using the strategy they sell the Cities of Sigmar faction mashup in AOS: one part nostalgia, one part customization, one part human relatability.

If you make them just an exact mirror of the kit structure of, say, Genestealer Cultists, youll fall into some of the exact traps GW fell into introducing that army, which is that the customization is limited. Everyone's GSC looks like space miners, it takes some SERIOUS kitbashing and gussying up to make them not look like specifically miners, because every kit has pickaxes and wil.e.coyote dynamite sticks and built in lamps.

GW doesn't approach every army with the same sales tactics. They know that a large number of people who play Orks are in it for painting up zany intricate models so they know a release with 7 completely different monoposed single sprue buggy kits will land better with the ork playerbase than a couple of double-sprue kits with weapon options but the same chassis. They know Sisters of Battle customers are going to want customizable plastic kits after so many years and are probably willing to pay a higher baseline price point for more options, so SoBs are a multisprue $55 for 10 kit that's fully compatible with the multisprue $55 for 5 retributor kit and the multipart canoness.

I think there's a market for aesthetically distinct but not gameplay distinct guard kits where you have multiple boxes to build the same units, I really honestly do. Not enough for 8 boxes, mind you, but I think you could get away with maybe 2 or 3, maybe 2 with some upgrade frames to give people extra sets of heads and decorative bits.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dysartes wrote:


In an ideal world, I'd love plastic Kasrkin as well, but I appreciate I'm probably not getting that particular golden goose

.....I mean if you 3d print I might be dedicating a LOT of time to finding people in the 3d modeling community interested in recrating these classic out of print nostalgia-driven sculpts.

I have yet to find my true white whale, a modeler who is disciplined and dedicated enough to his craft to recreate the excellent work of Juan Diaz without clicking two distinct points on the model and running "SCALE X10", but an entire army of multipart Kasrkin is certainly within your grasp.

By that same vein, I can make the argument that I have continually made:

That any expansion of the regiment concept needs to be accompanied by revamping the actual Guard army.

You want lightly armored or equipped infantry that form up gunlines? Hey guess what that kinda sounds like how Conscripts initially got billed way back when... and the Mordian, Praetorian, Steel Legion, and Valhallan art all really fit that bill. Lightly armored with maybe a vest or helmet.

You want more professional looking Infantry Squads? That's where your Cadians, Necromundan Spyders, or whatever vest+helmeted look comes into play. Give some optional bits for upper leg plates and it could double up as a Grenadier Veteran style of kit too.

Lightly armored scout infantry are a thing that Guard have been missing for ages, with it having been pawned off onto Ratlings. The introduction of the keyword system just goes to show that there could be a <Regiment> unit that would fit the bill just as well...and is a great spot for a Tanith or Catachan styled box.

Give each 'style' a corresponding unit entry(Light armor of just vest or helmet gets a 6, Infantry Squad gets the 5+ if no greaves/vambraces, and Scouts get a 6 with a bonus when in cover or a negative to hit at over a certain range/when in cover), each unit getting a unique weapon option or something in the box and it goes and actually lets people showcase the regiments they like better via playstyle as well as graphics.

Doing a wholesale infantry update wouldn't be that difficult. With the density of modern sprues I bet you could do one three-sprue box of ten Guardsmen with options for a heavy weapon team and some command squad bits (you'd have to do things like scaling down some of the heavy weapons so they're not 1.5x the size of the same gun in other ranges), then all you'd need is head-swaps for regiments with similar torsos and you'd need, what, four kits? Praetorians/Mordians, Catachans, Cadians, and Kriegers/Steel Legion? The poses/spare parts would be pretty limited but that doesn't seem to be a big concern for GW these days.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
Do you really think people are going to buy new Guardsmen models if there isn't something that forces them to do it?

There wasn't anything 'forcing' the purchace of Primaris.

Other than them being entirely new units?

Serious statement: look at how they did Fire Warriors. They kept their original options, gave them an alternate build(Breachers), and added the Support Turret plus all the drone variants to the sprue.
That's what you should be expecting for Guard Infantry Squads if/when redone.

I'm also fairly comfortable saying that there will be a much more limited selection of Heavy Weapons going forward.

That's not "forcing".

In a similar vein, the Tactical box has been updated a number of times. In the latest version the only thing added iirc was Grav guns. Then after that, GW released two more Tactical boxes in the form of HH marks of armor.

When GW updated the Aspect Warriors kit, I think the only thing that changed equipment-wise was Exarch options, if at all.

I expect new stuff to be in an updated IG box too, but no new game options would be required for people's interest.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
I think they could pretty easily have one box that covers most of the regiments, with "expansion sprues" like the SM's have with shoulder pads for other regiments' heads.

As I've said before, you can use the same torso and arms, so if you have 10 torsos, 10 short-coat legs, and 10 long-coat legs, and your weapon arms, with a lot of heads [given that they're definitely fine including like 30+ heads in a kit].

Spoiler:

So it would look like:
10 Torsos
10 lasgun arm pairs [one with chevrons]
10 long coat legs
10 short coat legs
10 kit belts
10+ modern helmeted heads
10+ gas mask w/ helmet heads
10+ capped heads
10+ ushanka heads
A handful of heads without covers for sergeants
1 plasgun arm pair
1 meltagun arm pair
1 grenade launcher arm pair
1 flamer arm pair
1 boltgun arm pair
1 chainsword
1 laspistol
1 bolt pistol
1 plasma pistol
1 power sword
1 vox caster

And you would have pretty good coverage from a single box. You could then run regiment upgrade sprues with a couple of bits of decoration and then specific heads for like Tallarn with their head scarves, the tall Vostroyan bearskin hats.

.

That's really unrealistic, the main problem being the legs. Its the one bit that GW takes extreme care that there are no extras of in _almost_ every single possible kit. Because torsos end up on vehicle sprues for gunners/spotters, and a lot of other kits end up with spare torsos as well. I don't have too much guard stuff hanging about, but I'm pretty sure I've got enough old torsos that I could make 20 models out that kit with no problem. Its way, way beyond the limited conversion bits that GW still grudgingly allows in modern kits, and too easily lends itself towards assembling more models rather than buying another box. It just doesn't fit at all with their sales strategy.


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A.T. wrote:

Voss wrote:
Sales, I expect. Presumably GW has some sort of data on how off they sell servitors

The existing servitor models are boxed and sold in a less than ideal way for guard and admech players - heavy bolters are only available if you buy techmarines and basic servo-arm models are double-packed with meltas and plasmas.

Oh, yeah. Absolutely they are. But they're so niche I don't see GW caring enough to change that.

The other side of the coin to the argument above - people won't re-buy their guard - are people such as myself who absolutely want a guard army, would love one but won't spend the money on them as most of the infantry models currently available are absolutely awful.

Ideally, they'll do multi regiment boxes, with long coats etc as alluded to above and one option will be DKoK, however, honestly, with the way necromunda models look, a decent set of new cadians or even catachans would do me.

 Insectum7 wrote:

When GW updated the Aspect Warriors kit, I think the only thing that changed equipment-wise was Exarch options, if at all.

I expect new stuff to be in an updated IG box too, but no new game options would be required for people's interest.

Yep. Banshees (and Dire Avengers) only got access to Exarch options that theoretically existed on paper, even though several weren't produced on metal exarchs. The standard warriors got diddly.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Do you really think people are going to buy new Guardsmen models if there isn't something that forces them to do it?

If they make some new, never before made, regiment (or plastic DK/Elysians)? Sure, I'll build another IG infantry force.