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I was interested until I saw previews of the compendium and went cold on it. No way am I going to sink $200+ into a game that is only going to give factions usable rules in $200+ box sets once per quarter.
... then we wouldn't be making a valid comparison. Doubly so given we know exactly how much GW are charging for dice, for the stupid measurement things and the barricades/counters, the cards, and the rulebook.
The rulebook, card set, "essentials" set, and half a dice set ('cause the box has 10 D6's, not 20 like a dice set) comes to US$120.50.
And you think the Kommandos will be US$45 per box? I can see them easily being the same price as Intercessors at US$60. The Kriegers have an extra sprue, much like the Cadians, so we'll call them US$45. Then Charadon US$150 on top of that. And we don't even know how much the Octarius book would cost, so we'll call that a gimme and say it's $0.
We're looking at US$350-US$375 worth of stuff for US$199. Doesn't matter if some people don't "value" the terrain, as the terrain has value. A monetary one. And not a small one at that.
This box is far, far, far from a US$220 box with a twenty buck "discount".
It's a good value. Especially considering that it's widely available with the 15% mail order discount.
I expect each of the teams will retail for $60, maybe $65. It contains one more frame of terrain than the Command Expansion Bundle ($90) and two fewer frames, and one fewer board, than the Charadon Battlezone ($150). Let's split the difference and value the terrain at $120. That's $240-$250 of comparable value in plastic.
If someone wants to impute $17 of value for the orange dice, or $35 for whippy sticks and cardboard pushout tokens, or $50 for a softback rulebook that will be certainly be superseded by some commander expansion/FAQ'd to death by the time the next war zone debuts in October, by all means, knock yourself out. Even if you believe that these toss-ins and widely-panned rules push the box to a $350 value, the Hexfire box which launched the week prior to KT had roughly that some amount in kits for $30 less.
Again, I pre-ordered KT the day it was announced at my FLGS. My point was simply that the reason for slow sales likely had more to do with the price to value ratio rather than a sign that the game was intrinsically unpopular or that "the boycott" was bearing fruit.
Gregor Samsa wrote: The most alienating aspect of the box is the fact that they didn’t include the compendium in the rulebook and so that tacked on yet another fee. Most people who play KT do so because they have a smattering of different factions, and so GW doing everything they possibly can to eek every extra cent out of consumers is just a tactic that people are now tired of.
Agreed, it's very disappointing the compendium isn't part of the starter. Kill Team is what got me to start collecting several new factions, seeing additional price gouging is just poor form.
redux wrote: I was interested until I saw previews of the compendium and went cold on it. No way am I going to sink $200+ into a game that is only going to give factions usable rules in $200+ box sets once per quarter.
flaherty wrote: It's a good value. Especially considering that it's widely available with the 15% mail order discount.
That could, of course, be said about everything GW makes minus the webstore exclusives which they charge more to retailers to buy and thus don't have much of a discount.
I expect each of the teams will retail for $60, maybe $65. It contains one more frame of terrain than the Command Expansion Bundle ($90) and two fewer frames, and one fewer board, than the Charadon Battlezone ($150). Let's split the difference and value the terrain at $120. That's $240-$250 of comparable value in plastic.
I sure hope the teams aren't $60-65 each, that's equal to or more expensive than Primaris marines for Guardsmen and Orks.
I'm hoping the DKOK are $45, same as the Cadians with their new upgrade sprue. Much more than that and I'd rather just buy the FW version of the DKOK since they still look nicer.
The Kommandos, I dunno, GW will probably throw a dart at a board. I'm not sure if there's any recent equivalent to use as a comparison, but GW love to charge absurd prices for Orks, I think they secretly hate Ork players when you look at stuff like $55 for 5 Flash Gitz and $50 for Mek Gunz.
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H.B.M.C. wrote: The rulebook, card set, "essentials" set, and half a dice set ('cause the box has 10 D6's, not 20 like a dice set) comes to US$120.50.
Yeah I don't think too many people actually place that value on it, and I think precious few people are actually going to front up $120 to buy all that.
Also the dice are just plain, they don't have any special symbols on the 6 or 1, they're just orange, but plain, I dunno if you're considering that in your pricing.
This box is far, far, far from a US$220 box with a twenty buck "discount".
I think that's how your average gamer will see it, $220 of plastic, most of which is terrain that again your average gamer doesn't care as much about as the actual models they can use in their army, with a bunch of near-worthless accessories.
By comparison, look at the 40k Command starter set, $165, something I reckon people would actually see as good value. You get roughly $125 of Necrons if bought separately, $125 of Primaris if bought separately and $90 of terrain. That's $340 of plastic, for $165. Even if you only really care about one of the forces, you aren't going to feel completely ripped off buying it. Or even if you place no value on the terrain, it's still $250 of models separately for $165 bundled.
The range rulers, dice and rulebook might be necessary to play, but are people REALLY including that in consumer value calculations? I doubt it.
And remember, we're not talking about what the cost of items is if all bought separately, we're talking about why maybe it isn't super appealing to your average gamer.
That said, as I type this I noticed it's finally sold out in the USA, still available in the UK/Europe though.
This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2021/08/22 19:53:38
I think at around $150 would have been a decent pricing for it. At $199 it is just really high priced for a skirmish game.
I am interested to know if the future box sets they are planning quarterly will include the rulebook and will also be $199, as I think they are going to have some issues at that price point.
angel of death 007 wrote: I think at around $150 would have been a decent pricing for it. At $199 it is just really high priced for a skirmish game.
I am interested to know if the future box sets they are planning quarterly will include the rulebook and will also be $199, as I think they are going to have some issues at that price point.
I don't.
Infinity's 2P starters are $143.99 MSRP...for the same amount of models(with less options built in), card scenery rather than plastic, and a "40 page booklet" that details the 2 factions in the box's units and has some basic missions for the game.
Malifaux's "Core boxes" for a specific Master are anywhere from $50-$65USD.
Star Wars Legion's starters clock in at $99.95.
There's more I could probably go into, but these boxes if they continue on this path? It's probably going to do well, if only because people know that they can part these kinds of boxes out easier than other games.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: Yeah I don't think too many people actually place that value on it...
It doesn't matter what value people "place on it". That's the actual value of those items, in dollars, as per GW. We don't have to speculate on their value; we know exactly what it is.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: ... and I think precious few people are actually going to front up $120 to buy all that.
And when Octarius is gone and people want to get into Kill Team? They're going to need to pay that (maybe not for the dice). More actually, given the Compendium.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: I think that's how your average gamer will see it, $220 of plastic, most of which is terrain that again your average gamer doesn't care as much about as the actual models they can use in their army, with a bunch of near-worthless accessories.
And again, it doesn't matter that the "average gamer" doesn't care about terrain. The terrain has an actual cost. Just like the miniatures in there have a cost.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: The range rulers, dice and rulebook might be necessary to play, but are people REALLY including that in consumer value calculations? I doubt it.
Then they're not doing it right. Pure and simple. Those items are not free. Neither is the terrain. Saying that the Octarius box is a low value item because it only contains 10 Orks, 10 Guardsmen, a Grot and a Squig is just dishonest. It contains a boatload more than that.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: And remember, we're not talking about what the cost of items is if all bought separately, we're talking about why maybe it isn't super appealing to your average gamer.
Why would such a box be unappealing to the average gamer*? If they want to get into KT, they see this box, or the stream of items available separately, and can see that just buying the essential items would set them back a pretty penny, and for not much more they get two full forces and the entire surface to play upon? That's value.
*Whatever that means...
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/22 22:31:41
lmao, if someone disagrees with the 'value' of the box set, then they don't buy it. Simple as that.
As it is, we know at least 27000 boxes sold (the number of exclusive metal gauges as the preorder bonus) and likely quite a few more, so at least 27000 people disagree with the "don't place value on it" idea.
What we have here is an issue of "projecting". Just because YOU don't want to pay a certain price doesn't mean an "average gamer" wouldn't. First of all, there's no "average gamer", there are people that buy the product because they want it and people that don't buy the product because they don't want it. Pushing your opinion onto a labeled group only makes people that may identify as an "average gamer" and happen to disagree with you not like you and the stuff you say
AllSeeingSkink wrote: Yeah I don't think too many people actually place that value on it...
It doesn't matter what value people "place on it". That's the actual value of those items, in dollars, as per GW. We don't have to speculate on their value; we know exactly what it is.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: ... and I think precious few people are actually going to front up $120 to buy all that.
And when Octarius is gone and people want to get into Kill Team? They're going to need to pay that (maybe not for the dice). More actually, given the Compendium.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: I think that's how your average gamer will see it, $220 of plastic, most of which is terrain that again your average gamer doesn't care as much about as the actual models they can use in their army, with a bunch of near-worthless accessories.
And again, it doesn't matter that the "average gamer" doesn't care about terrain. The terrain has an actual cost. Just like the miniatures in there have a cost.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: The range rulers, dice and rulebook might be necessary to play, but are people REALLY including that in consumer value calculations? I doubt it.
Then they're not doing it right. Pure and simple. Those items are not free. Neither is the terrain. Saying that the Octarius box is a low value item because it only contains 10 Orks, 10 Guardsmen, a Grot and a Squig is just dishonest. It contains a boatload more than that.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: And remember, we're not talking about what the cost of items is if all bought separately, we're talking about why maybe it isn't super appealing to your average gamer.
Why would such a box be unappealing to the average gamer*? If they want to get into KT, they see this box, or the stream of items available separately, and can see that just buying the essential items would set them back a pretty penny, and for not much more they get two full forces and the entire surface to play upon? That's value.
*Whatever that means...
The debate isn't "does this stuff have monetary value as determined by GW?" it's "Why did this box stick around for seven days when every previous 40K box sold out in under seven minutes?" Maybe it's increased stock, perhaps MTO scared off scalpers, or it might be that more folks value $120 in extra models over $120 in game accessories. Another 14 pages in this thread should help us get to bottom
The debate isn't "does this stuff have monetary value as determined by GW?" it's "Why did this box stick around for seven days when every previous 40K box sold out in under seven minutes?" Maybe it's increased stock, perhaps MTO scared off scalpers, or it might be that more folks value $120 in extra models over $120 in game accessories. Another 14 pages in this thread should help us get to bottom
No, I'm pretty sure this thread has hit bottom already.
She/Her
"There are no problems that cannot be solved with cannons." - Chief Engineer Boris Krauss of Nuln
Kid_Kyoto wrote:"Don't be a dick" and "This is a family wargame" are good rules of thumb.
... then we wouldn't be making a valid comparison. Doubly so given we know exactly how much GW are charging for dice, for the stupid measurement things and the barricades/counters, and the rulebook.
I purposely left it out because I don't think your average gamer is going to consider that worth any monetary value in this context (weighing up the value of a box).
I just paid $120 CAD for everything but the kill teams and terrain. No true Scotsman…?!?
I bought the box because I want the kill teams and the terrain and consider the killteam stuff mostly worthless.
Which essentially proves drbored's point that there is no average gamer.
And honestly, if it weren't for finally having some cool looking and functional ork ruins (or some other company had made something similar before), I wouldn't have given the box the time of my day.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/23 06:05:48
7 Ork facts people always get wrong: Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other. A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot. Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests. Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why. Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor. Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers. Orks do not have the power of believe.
AllSeeingSkink wrote: Yeah I don't think too many people actually place that value on it...
It doesn't matter what value people "place on it". That's the actual value of those items, in dollars, as per GW. We don't have to speculate on their value; we know exactly what it is.
The value consumers place on it is literally the only thing that matters. If you try and charge $300 for a pizza, then put it on discount for $250, you aren’t going to sell much because it’s the value the consumer places on t that’s important.
Obviously we can just add up all the junk and say “oh wow, what a great deal”, but if consumers see $220 of plastic for $200, I’m pretty sure most people will see that as less of a deal than $340 of plastic for $165 dollars.
People share rule books, they pirate rule books, they already have a pile of dice, they are willing to use their existing rulers instead of some special circle square pentagon gauges, they build their own terrain or buy from other suppliers instead of needing GW branded terrain, more people collect Imperials than Orks so have less use for Ork terrain. These are the reasons I don’t think people place as much value on that sort of stuff over the raw models in the box.
Which essentially proves drbored's point that there is no average gamer.
There is a statistical theory that there is no single person that represents he average, as when you have enough variables to define the average, the number of people who fall into all categories drops to zero.****
When I talk about the “average gamer”, I’m talking about some theoretical average which is what a company based decisions around, not a specific person who is the average.
**** the idea is if you take all heights of people, you can find an average and a number of people who fit within a percentile range, if you take the average chest diameter, you can find an average and overlay that with the average height data and find people who fit within an average percentile of both, which will be smaller than the first group who were only average height. As you start adding more variables, say finger length, crotch height, neck length, nose width, eye spacing... each of those has an average and forms a more complete picture of an “average” person, but the number of people who get categorised as “average” starts to drop to zero.
In wargaming terms relevant to Kill Team, it would be like saying how many people are interested in Orks? Well on average more people are interested in imperial armies so won’t see value in Ork terrain. How many people are interested in terrain? Well, some, but certainly not everyone. How many people in the target market don’t already have a pile of 20+ dice and also don’t know you can get dice cheaply elsewhere? I’d say not many, so to everyone else those dice are worthless. How many people genuinely value the new range finding gauges? I’m sure many, but not everyone. How many people actually think the rules are way overpriced? I’m sure more than a few. How many people actually are buying this for Kill Team? Some, but not all (by contrast how many people bought HH because they care about the HH, versus how many simply wanted a big ol’ pile of space marines?). That limits the potential customer base, eliminating many of those who care not about KT but just want some cool models.
With all those questions you paint a picture of the average gamer. I’m not saying one gamer exists that necessarily meets that average, I’m saying that average is what you base business decisions on. You don’t make an equal number of small shirts as you do medium, because there’s more mediums out there. GW don’t make 3mm 40k not because there’s no one who wants 3mm 40k, but because that’s not what the average wants.
EDIT: And to close off this absurdly long post on an absurd topic, I appreciate maybe my estimation of the average gamer is wrong, but to me that is the whole question, not what numerical value you get by adding up the individual components, dividing by the cost of the box and taking the reciprocal. That is a trivial mathematical question, and hardly worthy of discussion.
... then we wouldn't be making a valid comparison. Doubly so given we know exactly how much GW are charging for dice, for the stupid measurement things and the barricades/counters, and the rulebook.
I purposely left it out because I don't think your average gamer is going to consider that worth any monetary value in this context (weighing up the value of a box).
I just paid $120 CAD for everything but the kill teams and terrain. No true Scotsman…?!?
We're talking about real dollars here, not monopoly money
But did you really buy all the combat gauges, dice, cards, counters, etc also? If so, good for you, I'd just be surprised if that's what most people would do.
I imagine there's a significant number who bought the compendium + core rulebook, I'd guess the number would drop off significantly once we start adding the other gubbinz.
And if you did buy all that, you don't feel a bit short changed that you also didn't get the Octarius book?
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/08/23 07:38:17
It's a Kill Team starter set. It's good value if you want to start playing Kill Team. It's not good value if you want some extra Orks or Guard for your armies.
Dominion and Indomitus are the wrong comparison - those boxes were made for existing players who wanted to "upgrade" to the new edition and get a very nice deal on minis.
This box, with the dice, range rulers, terrain, etc. is designed for people who want to start playing from scratch. It's the equivalent of the Command/Extremis sets. But it's still a limited quantity thing because it's not one of the core games.
Which essentially proves drbored's point that there is no average gamer.
There is a statistical theory that there is no single person that represents he average, as when you have enough variables to define the average, the number of people who fall into all categories drops to zero.****
When I talk about the “average gamer”, I’m talking about some theoretical average which is what a company based decisions around, not a specific person who is the average.
**** the idea is if you take all heights of people, you can find an average and a number of people who fit within a percentile range, if you take the average chest diameter, you can find an average and overlay that with the average height data and find people who fit within an average percentile of both, which will be smaller than the first group who were only average height. As you start adding more variables, say finger length, crotch height, neck length, nose width, eye spacing... each of those has an average and forms a more complete picture of an “average” person, but the number of people who get categorised as “average” starts to drop to zero.
In wargaming terms relevant to Kill Team, it would be like saying how many people are interested in Orks? Well on average more people are interested in imperial armies so won’t see value in Ork terrain. How many people are interested in terrain? Well, some, but certainly not everyone. How many people in the target market don’t already have a pile of 20+ dice and also don’t know you can get dice cheaply elsewhere? I’d say not many, so to everyone else those dice are worthless. How many people genuinely value the new range finding gauges? I’m sure many, but not everyone. How many people actually think the rules are way overpriced? I’m sure more than a few. How many people actually are buying this for Kill Team? Some, but not all (by contrast how many people bought HH because they care about the HH, versus how many simply wanted a big ol’ pile of space marines?). That limits the potential customer base, eliminating many of those who care not about KT but just want some cool models.
With all those questions you paint a picture of the average gamer. I’m not saying one gamer exists that necessarily meets that average, I’m saying that average is what you base business decisions on. You don’t make an equal number of small shirts as you do medium, because there’s more mediums out there. GW don’t make 3mm 40k not because there’s no one who wants 3mm 40k, but because that’s not what the average wants.
EDIT: And to close off this absurdly long post on an absurd topic, I appreciate maybe my estimation of the average gamer is wrong, but to me that is the whole question, not what numerical value you get by adding up the individual components, dividing by the cost of the box and taking the reciprocal. That is a trivial mathematical question, and hardly worthy of discussion.
I appreciate the detailed explanation. My point was more that there are multiple, different personas who want to buy this box for multiple reasons. This is what you do when designing software, assuming one "average customer" usually ends up making no one happy.
There is the diehard ork fan like me, who wants to buy ork terrain and kommandoz, while knowing that you can easily find someone to buy the DKOK from you for a fair price. Terrain+Kommandoz+Guardmen Squad with upgrade sprue are more expensive than the box.
Then you have the collector who just want everything.
You have the kill team fan, who want the box and the tools, this is still a great deal for them even if they want neither DKOK or kommandoz, because they can easily sell them off or split the box.
Even for people who just want the terrain, it's still a great deal.
Same is true for people who need any combination of 1 killteam plus KT rules.
People who don't want them are those who just want the bare essentials to play KT with the stuff they already have, just want one of the teams and nothing else or simply don't want to spend that much money at once.
And of course, there is a huge percentage of people who play neither orks nor AM nor KT nor buy terrain.
So I agree that this box probably has a much lower percentage of the fanbase interested than most of the recent 40k boxes.
7 Ork facts people always get wrong: Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other. A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot. Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests. Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why. Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor. Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers. Orks do not have the power of believe.
I'm just happy that non-marine players get to have a starter box for once.
Then I also happen to be an Ork player, and the terrain and Kommandos still most likely makes it worth it for me even if I never get around to actually playing Kill Team. Krieg is also sufficiently cool to make me interested in painting at least a few. I don't think I would have felt the same way if there were space marines instead.
But I agree it sucks for Eldar, Tau and Tyranid players who have never gotten a starter box (we Orks got one with AoBR, which I think was very successful).
However, it sounds from rumors that they may get these in the future, if this talk about "season" boxes is true.
More variety is always great, and I'm not cynical enough to believe that GW always optimizes every single release to maximise volume (then they would never release anything except new space marines).
Also, you can buy the rule book standalone anyway, now if it was locked into the box I would understand the complaints but now it isn't, so I don't really get what is the problem? It mostly sounds like people complaining that something that they wouldn't buy anyway is too expensive?
