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I wonder if the diehard competitive guys will finally realize that 40k no longer functions as a competitive game? Let me be clear, I used to play 40k competitively. I quit near the end of 5th edition and picked up warmachine because I was sick of every game being vs grey knights and the incredibly bad rules set. I'm sure people have felt the same way about eldar and tau for the past couple years. 40k as a competitive game seems to have been dying a slow, drawn out death since then. Now the new eldar codex seems to have put the final nail in the coffin. Why do people subject themselves to this? I've heard the excuse of not wanting to look elsewhere because of how much you've already invested in 40k. I don't get that. It doesn't matter how much you've invested in 40k. Its not like it all disappears if you start playing another game. You can still play 40k with hat you have, all I'm saying is don't buy any more 40k stuff if you're not enjoying it. Why continue giving GW your money if you're being constantly disappointed? Spend your money on other games instead and eventually, (maybe) GW will start noticing drops in sales.
None of this is to say I hate 40k in general. I still think 40k is awesome. I still have tons of 40k models I need to paint, and they may end up seeing the table in friendly, casual games. But every time I hear someone talk about the "tactical depth" of 40k or ask for advice on building a competitive list, I cringe a little on the inside. Not because I think those people are stupid, but because I feel sorry for them. Yes you can talk about these things in 40k, but its like going to an amusement park and just riding the kiddie rides. You're missing out on so many other great things. If you're a gamer who likes to play competitively, you're REALLY missing out on a lot by sticking to 40k.

Here's some other great games:
Malifaux:
This one is becoming really hard for me to resit picking up. I've heard amazing things about their new rules set. It looks great when set up on a nice table, and its extremely low cost compared to 40k

Infinity:
I tried this one back in its 2nd edition. I can say I didn't enjoy it as much and I thought I would. That said, they're in their 3rd edition now and I've played a game or two with the new rules. Its much better, and this is probably the best looking minis game I've ever seen with a properly set up table.

Warmachine:
Shameless plug for my favorite. Very very steep learning curve, but incredibly rewarding once you get the hang of it. I cannot recommend any other game more than this one. I understand many players dislike the looks of the minis, but the gameplay is worth it, I promise. There's a reason you hear a lot about this game from people who've left 40k.

X Wing:
I've heard nothing but good things about this game. I've only had a demo game, but it was very fun. It is very different from most other games out there, but it's become quite popular.

Dropzone Commander:
Much like X-Wing, I've heard really good things about this one. I've seen 3 or 4 games played, but I've not yet had a demo. Seems like a ton of fun, and if you've ever had an urge to play epic 40k, this game reminds me a lot of that.

Some of you might be thinking I'm just some troll trying to get people to leave 40k because I want to see it die. Not true. The truth is I really miss playing 40k. I miss being able to have fun game that felt reasonably balanced. But GW has made it abundantly clear they don't give a gak about balance or the game being enjoyable, even at a casual level, if it means they sell a few more kits. The only thing they understand these days is their bottom line. We don't have the power to make them change, but we do have the power to vote with our wallets. I wish we would use it more.

Amen. I constantly think of playing 40k again and then have to ask myself why bother when it's such a terrible game with terrible design. And then I buy more for Warmachine instead. I want to play 40k but find zero reason why it would be worth it since the type of lists I like would get crushed by Knights or Eldarbor other spam OP unit forces. Why spend that kind of money to just constantly lose?

They know. They hate it. They stay loud and bitter hoping things will change next edition. (Spoiler warning: they won't. GW already tried to save the game by making it a competitive game. It didn't work.) And they've heard of all these games.

Barthus wrote:
GW has made it abundantly clear they don't give a gak about balance or the game being enjoyable, even at a casual level, if it means they sell a few more kits. The only thing they understand these days is their bottom line.

While the second statement there is true, the first statement is false. GW understands where the money is in the new post-ebay economy - it's in turning 40k into Dungeons & Dragons for people who don't like roleplaying. They don't want stores full of the unwashed playing their games anymore - they want people playing in their garages. Models have gotten bigger, terrain has become narrative and part of list building, and their new focus is on box set starter kits for two players. They want to sell you a $125 box set with enough starter minis for two players, so someone will invite a buddy over to kick around their garage and then pump money into building a table with terrain, bigger armies and more books. Everything now is about "Holy Crikey, dude! My Imperial Knight just blew up your Baneblade!" "Yeah, well it can suck on a vortex missile!"

The tourney scene is bad for business. It's loaded with bandwagoning list spammers who buy a bunch of models, play the list for 3-6 months, then dump them on ebay at a discount to recoup part of their money to spend on the next new hotness when the meta changes. GW doesn't care about them any more. They want teenagers and beer swilling 30-somethings with disposable income playing at home. That's the game now.

As a beer-swilling 30-something with disposable income, I'm having a hell of a time in my garage.

At this point I think the only way to get GW to change is for all of its designers and executives to die in a plane accident or suddenly get fired in rapid succession. I'm convinced they'll keep on being morons right up until they collapse and if they all did drop dead, I can't think of it doing anything but improving the game with fresh blood.

Barthus wrote:
Here's some other great games:
Malifaux:
This one is becoming really hard for me to resit picking up. I've heard amazing things about their new rules set. It looks great when set up on a nice table, and its extremely low cost compared to 40k

Seriously, just do it. Take the plunge.
The balancing is off the hook. They have managed to make a huge amount of wildly different crews with wildly different skills and playstyles, and yet keep every crew balanced in the meta. I for one am incredibly impressed with that alone.

Crews are seriously so different from each other that picking up a new crew can be like starting a whole new type of board game.

The worst part is that I really do want to play 40k again. I just can't fathom how it's worth paying that kind of money for such shoddy rules. Like I've thought several times in the past year alone of starting armies (latest is Khorne Daemonkin) and every time I look at what they come out with, look at what people field, and then hit myself for ever thinking it's a good idea to spend hundreds when I want to play the game the style they claim it's meant to be played in, but the stuff they come out with is the exact opposite. There's too much imbalance in everything where a fluffy Daemonkin army would get stomped for no good reason, or a fluffy anything else army for example. It's beyond ridiculous, and what's perhaps more ridiculous is the people who still devour everything that comes out without caring the rules are garbage.

I have not been playing 40k for all that long, to be honesty. I started a few years ago mainly because friends were playing. Some competitively and some more casual, friendly games.

The more casual players modify the game by the use of gentlemen's agreements of not bringing too harsh lists.

The more competitive players modify the game by the use of comp systems.

I do not have any experience of 40k in a time where the game was not considered to be broken, but generally modifying it by any of the two models described above tends to work. Even if both ways of modifying it means that you will not be allowed to bring the best possible list you can with your codex.

Of the listed alternatives, at my FLGS, only X Wing is still going strong. Warmachine/Hordes was popular for a time, but I haven't seen anyone playing it in months.

In order to support a tournament, you need players in your locale.

Most of the outrage comes from the fact that the game played very well during 7th up until the release of this book.

My buddy brought in some fire storm armada stuff and I've really fallen into that. I never realized special rules could be more streamlined. And then there were the costs, much cheaper

 Massawyrm wrote:
They know. They hate it. They stay loud and bitter hoping things will change next edition. (Spoiler warning: they won't. GW already tried to save the game by making it a competitive game. It didn't work.) And they've heard of all these games.

How did it not work? I remember 3-5th edition being quite popular locally compared to what it is now. The financial reports looked better for the company as well.

 Massawyrm wrote:

Barthus wrote:
GW has made it abundantly clear they don't give a gak about balance or the game being enjoyable, even at a casual level, if it means they sell a few more kits. The only thing they understand these days is their bottom line.

While the second statement there is true, the first statement is false. GW understands where the money is in the new post-ebay economy - it's in turning 40k into Dungeons & Dragons for people who don't like roleplaying. They don't want stores full of the unwashed playing their games anymore - they want people playing in their garages. Models have gotten bigger, terrain has become narrative and part of list building, and their new focus is on box set starter kits for two players. They want to sell you a $125 box set with enough starter minis for two players, so someone will invite a buddy over to kick around their garage and then pump money into building a table with terrain, bigger armies and more books. Everything now is about "Holy Crikey, dude! My Imperial Knight just blew up your Baneblade!" "Yeah, well it can suck on a vortex missile!"

GW most certainly doesn't care about balance. I'm not sure how you can claim this to be false. A quick look at the 7th edition codexes shows a huge variance in power, both in OP builds like the centstar that some dexes can pull off, and with the average power level of the entries (compare necrons or eldar to Orks, for example).

The armies have gotten bigger, true. This has happened in every edition. Every time a Chaos or Eldar dex comes out, my collection gets a bit smaller points wise.
I wouldn't say their focus is on the 2 box starter sets. They are really bad, with unbalanced forces in both. If I played the Chaos DA one, my Chaos would get crushed every time like it was nothing, and I would be discouraged from playing. Being excited that an imperial knight blew up a baneblade or whatever isn't narrative. It's no different from pulling off a combo in a fighting game, throwing a model at a warcaster in warmachine, or any other nice play in a game.

 Massawyrm wrote:

The tourney scene is bad for business. It's loaded with bandwagoning list spammers who buy a bunch of models, play the list for 3-6 months, then dump them on ebay at a discount to recoup part of their money to spend on the next new hotness when the meta changes. GW doesn't care about them any more. They want teenagers and beer swilling 30-somethings with disposable income playing at home. That's the game now.

As a beer-swilling 30-something with disposable income, I'm having a hell of a time in my garage.

A lot of this is wrong. The tourney scene, it can be argued, was great for GW. Their financials were quite strong in 3-5th edition, where the game was competitive, compared to 6th and 7th. This is even worse when you look at the release schedule. With the slower release schedule, you would think 3-5th would have been worse for the company, but the opposite is true.

I, and many of my friends, were tournament players. Some of the locals went to the larger tournaments though I never did. We all now play WMH, and they still travel. But we still own all of our models. Nobody sold anything on ebay since the pendulum swings heavily in 40k, everything weak will eventually become overpowered again. Many tournaments required painting well to place, so they were kept for that reason as well. A friend's Emperor's children army and Ultramarines are on display in our local store, and he is a very competitive player.

Even if they did sell on ebay, 3-6 months is a small window. Editions lasted for quite a while, and OP builds tended to stay at the top, or close to it, for years. Nowadays, sure, editions last a few years at best. The eldar codex had a short shelf life.

Teenagers are not likely to play this game. We have 3 locally, and it is because their fathers play. A game with an entry of 200 for rules alone, then models and paint, doesn't attract most kids, especially with the rise of e-sports (my college has an actual e-sport team ). The game is simply too expensive for someone to play if they make 7-10 an hour.

I tried Warmahordes. On one hand, I liked the way you could mess with movement mechanics and out-of-activation powers. felt the game was even more gimmicky than 40k, and it did give us the word Skornergy. I played as Menoth and anytime I dealt with others saying "Menoth is about Synergy", I felt like I was in a corporate boardroom meet where the CEO was an Eldar player. I usually countered with
"Oh, I just take Exemplar Errants because they remind me of Tactical Marines."

I know people that play X-wing. Otherwise...ehhhhhhhh.

I feel that 40k has the "best" mix of minis and gaming even if the game has been shot up with wonky rules; just like the more questionable kits can be fixed up with some conversion work (Like Dave Taylor's take on Centurions), 40k becomes playable with some patching. If I'm looking for a pure game, I figure I'll fall back on Shogi or Arimaa.

I do wish GW would pull its head out its own rear end about being a game company as well as a minis company. Or acknowledge tournament gamers too.

Akiasura wrote:
The tourney scene, it can be argued, was great for GW. Their financials were quite strong in 3-5th edition, where the game was competitive, compared to 6th and 7th. This is even worse when you look at the release schedule. With the slower release schedule, you would think 3-5th would have been worse for the company, but the opposite is true.

The problem with the crux of your argument is that it references editions that operated under a completely different financial model. Until late in 5th ed, GW operated on a 5 year plan - because the *average* 40k player played for 5 years before moving on. People would buy models, paint them, play for five years then box them up, put them on a shelf or in the attic, thinking they might one day pick it up again. GW built their entire release strategy around this idea. Ebay changed everything. Once it became established as THE safe online place to sell your own goods, someone whose interest had waned in the game found that they could get 50-60% of their money back just dumping the armies online. It is now possible for a new 40k player to live out their entire 40k lifecycle without spending a dime that goes to GW.

As the tourney scene/ebay situation evolved at the end of 5th, they changed up their strategy - disastrously. They began introducing sexy new large models with low model runs and absurd price increases, meaning fewer models would show up at a discount on ebay. The latter part of the strategy worked, but the price hike chased away too many fans. So they changed direction and created a new model. The new model is about "fun" play, not balanced play. They want you to have a giant tank or a walker, a fortification, and a bunch of cool units to support them. They have started releasing lots of small armies with no previous models to buy off ebay, that can be fielded in small numbers as an allied formation (see: Harlequins, MT, IK, Skitari, Ad Mech.) Both of the newer 2 player box sets includes a formation that can run all of the boxes models allied with whatever other army you are interested in. They've created box sets designed to supplement the core 2 player kit.

The new GW model is about having you consistently picking up the new hotness and running it as allies to the models you already have...along with the aforementioned giant robots, tanks and buildings with a BFG on top. They do want you to play narratively, but what I was talking about is they are focusing on "COOL!" And as long as GW keeps releasing small new armies and updated kits for old units, they stem the ebay erosion that they've been wrestling with. The old 5-year-plan tourney model is a product of a bygone era. It can't come back because it won't work.

To address the insidious nature of the new model, the real problem with the new codexes is that they heavily favor newer models over those you can buy off ebay. If there's one thing they got right with the Eldar codex, it is that for the first time in several codexes, our old as hell models became playable again - but are eeeeeeeveeeennnnn beeettttteeeerrr if you run them in this sweet new large formation, meaning you should probably buy more so you can run them.

Sadly, balance is the bane of the new model. If everything is balanced, there's no reason for you to buy the new hotness. (Meh, I already have 6 jetbikes, why buy the new OMGTHEYCANALLHAVESCATTERLASERS!) With their focus on garage play, balance becomes an issue handled by the players (Bill,don't bring 20 scatterbikes to my house ever again) rather than by their game designers. But to say you need balance for fun is ludicrous. The game CAN still be played for fun, and it is still fun. Just not if you're a hardcore tournament player. Those guys got boned.

It's a casual game now. that's what they want. That's how they're turning their dreadful financials around.

Competitive 40k is like pounding the square peg in the round hole it just doesn't work. Sure you can get a bigger hammer and keep pounding away trying to make that square peg fit but at the end of the day it's still a mess.

 Chute82 wrote:
Competitive 40k is like pounding the square peg in the round hole it just doesn't work. Sure you can get a bigger hammer and keep pounding away trying to make that square peg fit but at the end of the day it's still a mess.

Casual 40k can be just as bad.

 ImAGeek wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
Competitive 40k is like pounding the square peg in the round hole it just doesn't work. Sure you can get a bigger hammer and keep pounding away trying to make that square peg fit but at the end of the day it's still a mess.

Casual 40k can be just as bad.

Yes expecilly PUG.

 ImAGeek wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
Competitive 40k is like pounding the square peg in the round hole it just doesn't work. Sure you can get a bigger hammer and keep pounding away trying to make that square peg fit but at the end of the day it's still a mess.

Casual 40k can be just as bad.

IMHO casual 40k is worse, because there's such a disparity between armies. A fluffy army will get wiped out by other fluffy armies (e.g. Saim-Hann) or OP armies or anything in between.

Like I said, I want to like 40k again. I remember the lore, I oggle the pretty figures from time to time. But the game is god-awful and completely turns me off from wanting to put any money towards it because I want to play it in a casual, narrative style and the last thing I want is to spend a few hundred dollars, show up to the game shop and get steamrolled by someone fielding some fluff-breaking nonsense that tables me turn 3.

There are a lot of misconceptions about competitive play going on here.

As a "competitive 40k player" I can't speak for anyone else, but from my experience most other tournament-goers see the game similarly to how I do.

The thing is, I'm not a competitive 40k player. I'm a 40k hobbyist who enjoys the competitiveness of gaming. I don't play 40k because I want my competitive needs satisfied, I play 40k because I love 40k. But when I do play, the only way of playing I'm interested in is competitively.

I hate narrative games, it's just not for me. There's nothing about it that I enjoy. Even though I am completely in love with the 40k universe. I've read pretty much every BL novel that's ever come out, but I have no interest in telling a story with my miniatures.

Playing 40k for me is about trying to win. Trying being the operative word here. I honestly don't care if I win or lose, but without trying to win I don't enjoy the game.


As for tournaments, well, GW's incompetent rules writing isn't doing them any favours, but at the end of the day, TOs need attendees, so if GW won't fix the game, they will. So people come, play games, test their armies and abilities, meet up with old friends, make new ones, and have fun. If people were only able to have fun at a tournament through winning the whole thing, tournaments would have died out a long time ago, no matter how balanced the rules would have been. The vast majority of attendees aren't there to win the event, they're there to have fun with their hobby in the way they enjoy it.

Pick-up games, though, are a different story. Have you tried doing one of those with someone who has a different opinion of what constitutes "cheesy" lately? Yeah... At a tournament, the TO sets the limit. Anything below that is fine, and you know exactly where the line goes when you sign up, and due to the niche nature of the tournament scene, you get to be a part of deciding that line. But with pick-up games, it's a different ball game. For instance, I genuinely think three Riptides at 1500 points is perfectly fair and would have no problems going up against that with my silly Harlequin army. But I'm pretty confident in my assumption that there are quite a few people who disagree (and some quite strongly) with that.

But it's not just pick-up games that are suffering from the poor balance in 40k. Since 40k isn't exactly huge in Norway, I have fluffy armies so I can have enjoyable games against the casual/fluffy/non-competitive crowd at my club too. That used to be my Eldar Wraith army. It was piss-poor, but against other piss-poor lists it ensured enjoyable games for both players. With the new codex, well... Not so much. What if I were a purely casual/fluffy player and this were my only army? Or, what if I just happened to think a Tau army consisting of nothing but Riptides and a Commander with some Crisis Suits would be the coolest thing ever (I actually do)? Or how would my opponent and I resolve any of the plethora of rules issues that come up during a game? D6 it every time? Write our own FAQ? Not care at all, and just hope we'll magically agree on everything, ever?

If you play casual/narrative games and enjoy it; great! I hope GW doesn't screw it up for you. If the best part of writing an army list for you is finding the ever-elusive "balanced power level" then I guess you're in luck. I just hope your favourite unit doesn't suddenly become OP.

At a tournament there's an FAQ (usually a very extensive one), refs and TOs to settle disputes. You don't have to worry about being right, wrong, or relying on chance. Someone will tell you the rule. And you don't have to worry about your army being too good. You either buy in to the arms race, or you challenge yourself with a subpar army (like how the Harlequins have brought out the masochist in me).


If tournaments aren't for you, that's perfectly fine. I truly hope you enjoy this hobby as much as you possibly can. But I cannot understand why non-tournament players have such strong opinions on other people enjoying the game differently to them. We don't need to be saved from our desire to play cheesy lists against strangers over the weekend.

WayneTheGame wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
Competitive 40k is like pounding the square peg in the round hole it just doesn't work. Sure you can get a bigger hammer and keep pounding away trying to make that square peg fit but at the end of the day it's still a mess.

Casual 40k can be just as bad.

IMHO casual 40k is worse, because there's such a disparity between armies. A fluffy army will get wiped out by other fluffy armies (e.g. Saim-Hann) or OP armies or anything in between.

Like I said, I want to like 40k again. I remember the lore, I oggle the pretty figures from time to time. But the game is god-awful and completely turns me off from wanting to put any money towards it because I want to play it in a casual, narrative style and the last thing I want is to spend a few hundred dollars, show up to the game shop and get steamrolled by someone fielding some fluff-breaking nonsense that tables me turn 3.

I agree casual 40k is worse, but I didn't want everyone to be like 'oh just talk to your opponent first' as if that solves everything, so I was being diplomatic to avoid that haha. But yeah, casual play is definitely worse because you get punished or rewarded randomly based on what list you like/theme you enjoy/models you like etc.

 ImAGeek wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
Competitive 40k is like pounding the square peg in the round hole it just doesn't work. Sure you can get a bigger hammer and keep pounding away trying to make that square peg fit but at the end of the day it's still a mess.

Casual 40k can be just as bad.

IMHO casual 40k is worse, because there's such a disparity between armies. A fluffy army will get wiped out by other fluffy armies (e.g. Saim-Hann) or OP armies or anything in between.

Like I said, I want to like 40k again. I remember the lore, I oggle the pretty figures from time to time. But the game is god-awful and completely turns me off from wanting to put any money towards it because I want to play it in a casual, narrative style and the last thing I want is to spend a few hundred dollars, show up to the game shop and get steamrolled by someone fielding some fluff-breaking nonsense that tables me turn 3.

I agree casual 40k is worse, but I didn't want everyone to be like 'oh just talk to your opponent first' as if that solves everything, so I was being diplomatic to avoid that haha. But yeah, casual play is definitely worse because you get punished or rewarded randomly based on what list you like/theme you enjoy/models you like etc.

Yes, and that's the worst part because it's what keeps stopping me from wanting to play. Who wants to spend money and get trounced because what they like is weak and what their opponent likes is strong?

Yeah, especially at the price your paying. I don't want to spend tonnes of money on models I don't like to do well, or tonnes of money on models I do like and never enjoy playing them.

 Massawyrm wrote:

Akiasura wrote:
The tourney scene, it can be argued, was great for GW. Their financials were quite strong in 3-5th edition, where the game was competitive, compared to 6th and 7th. This is even worse when you look at the release schedule. With the slower release schedule, you would think 3-5th would have been worse for the company, but the opposite is true.

The problem with the crux of your argument is that it references editions that operated under a completely different financial model. Until late in 5th ed, GW operated on a 5 year plan - because the *average* 40k player played for 5 years before moving on. People would buy models, paint them, play for five years then box them up, put them on a shelf or in the attic, thinking they might one day pick it up again. GW built their entire release strategy around this idea. Ebay changed everything. Once it became established as THE safe online place to sell your own goods, someone whose interest had waned in the game found that they could get 50-60% of their money back just dumping the armies online. It is now possible for a new 40k player to live out their entire 40k lifecycle without spending a dime that goes to GW.

Do you have any proof of this? I don't know many people who operated on a 5-year plan, most people have been playing for over 20 years who still play that I know. Until this year, most of us still played. 7th and all of its craziness has seen most of us switch to the specialist games or WMH.
People could do this since the release of the internet. A lot of people buy from people who cast knock offs that look about the same, since its so much cheaper.
Remember, GW does no market research. I think you're going to have a hard time proving that this was their strategy, and that players operated under a 5-year plan.

 Massawyrm wrote:

As the tourney scene/ebay situation evolved at the end of 5th, they changed up their strategy - disastrously. They began introducing sexy new large models with low model runs and absurd price increases, meaning fewer models would show up at a discount on ebay. The latter part of the strategy worked, but the price hike chased away too many fans. So they changed direction and created a new model. The new model is about "fun" play, not balanced play. They want you to have a giant tank or a walker, a fortification, and a bunch of cool units to support them. They have started releasing lots of small armies with no previous models to buy off ebay, that can be fielded in small numbers as an allied formation (see: Harlequins, MT, IK, Skitari, Ad Mech.) Both of the newer 2 player box sets includes a formation that can run all of the boxes models allied with whatever other army you are interested in. They've created box sets designed to supplement the core 2 player kit.

I don't recall large models making an appearance until 6th, when they had already decided to change up their strategy.
I would argue that the latter strategy did not work, but I don't purchase 40k on ebay much. Can you prove that it did?

 Massawyrm wrote:

The new GW model is about having you consistently picking up the new hotness and running it as allies to the models you already have...along with the aforementioned giant robots, tanks and buildings with a BFG on top. They do want you to play narratively, but what I was talking about is they are focusing on "COOL!" And as long as GW keeps releasing small new armies and updated kits for old units, they stem the ebay erosion that they've been wrestling with. The old 5-year-plan tourney model is a product of a bygone era. It can't come back because it won't work.

You keep referencing this 5 year tournament plan, but I've never seen that before.

 Massawyrm wrote:

To address the insidious nature of the new model, the real problem with the new codexes is that they heavily favor newer models over those you can buy off ebay. If there's one thing they got right with the Eldar codex, it is that for the first time in several codexes, our old as hell models became playable again - but are eeeeeeeveeeennnnn beeettttteeeerrr if you run them in this sweet new large formation, meaning you should probably buy more so you can run them.

This isn't always true. A lot of the codexes had the new models being terrible. Look at the chaos marine codex. Plague marines are good, again, like they have been for a while. Warp talons and mutilators are crap. Even the old losers, possessed, are still garbage.

For Eldar, yes the wraithknight is really good, but guard have been good for a decent amount of time, so have bikes. Aspects got stronger, and the most popular old army for eldar was Biel-tan.



Honestly, the problem with your argument is that you make claims that have no basis in fact. GW cares about Ebay? They don't do market research, how would they know the % of players that buy their army this way. How do the new codexes battle this problem? A lot of the newer models aren't great if you look over several codexes. How did they know tournament players only operate on a 5-year plan? Again, no market research was done.

Their current financial status is terrible. I would argue this is because they alienated the tournament players, who bought a lot more then the fluffy, narrative players. I don't have evidence of this, I'm looking at a correlation and assuming its causation, but I can't prove anything since no market research is done.

Sadly, balance is the bane of the new model. If everything is balanced, there's no reason for you to buy the new hotness. (Meh, I already have 6 jetbikes, why buy the new OMGTHEYCANALLHAVESCATTERLASERS!) With their focus on garage play, balance becomes an issue handled by the players (Bill,don't bring 20 scatterbikes to my house ever again) rather than by their game designers. But to say you need balance for fun is ludicrous. The game CAN still be played for fun, and it is still fun. Just not if you're a hardcore tournament player. Those guys got boned.

It's a casual game now. that's what they want. That's how they're turning their dreadful financials around.

Bu it's NOT a casual game. It's just a bad game. There's nothing casual about 40k, and the poor rules and complete lack of balance hurts casual players more than anyone else because your "hardcore" tournament players will just buy into the flavor of the month army anyways. Your casual laid back gamer isn't going to buy everything new.

Your average Joe who buys Blood Angels because he likes how they look and likes the pseudo-vampire fluff isn't going to be that happy when he gets trainwrecked by Necrons or Eldar constantly because for whatever reason those codexes are worlds better than his Blood Angels. Your competitive dude is going to see Eldar are the new OPness and if he wants to win drop cash on scatterbikes and Wraithlords and other OP units without giving a gak about the fluff or background.

Who gets hurt more? It's not the competitive person, because they'll just switch to the new hotness. The casual/fluffy/narrative (call it what you will) gamer is the one who suffers because they want to play what they like and get shafted for it.

I honestly play 40k only casually and when my buddies at the local store do.

I really bought the miniatures more for collecting and playing scenarios and Necromunda. But since those are being shunned by GW, I really have no other reason to buy their stuff other than collecting, which is pissing me off because their price to quality ratio is getting worse by the day.

I love the fluff, but now that I am more comfortable with my own modelling skills, I am now buying 3rd party stuff, and building my own guys and playing homebrew games with buddies.

And with all these new games popping up with better support, rules, and just better service, I feel like 40k is almost doomed for sure to a path of being solely reliant on its fluff/IP and miniatures sold to rich collectors.

I have plenty of disposable income, but I am a human being, and like most human beings, do not want to start feeling like we are being duped.

WayneTheGame wrote:
Bu it's NOT a casual game. It's just a bad game. There's nothing casual about 40k, and the poor rules and complete lack of balance hurts casual players more than anyone else because your "hardcore" tournament players will just buy into the flavor of the month army anyways. Your casual laid back gamer isn't going to buy everything new.

Your average Joe who buys Blood Angels because he likes how they look and likes the pseudo-vampire fluff isn't going to be that happy when he gets trainwrecked by Necrons or Eldar constantly because for whatever reason those codexes are worlds better than his Blood Angels. Your competitive dude is going to see Eldar are the new OPness and if he wants to win drop cash on scatterbikes and Wraithlords and other OP units without giving a gak about the fluff or background.

Who gets hurt more? It's not the competitive person, because they'll just switch to the new hotness. The casual/fluffy/narrative (call it what you will) gamer is the one who suffers because they want to play what they like and get shafted for it.

Yes the casual players suffer more. Just because I like Orks means I at a serious handicap playing against most armies so much so it's taken the fun out of the game for me. I remember seeing statistics some where on Dakka where before the dice even rolled I had a 78% chance before anything happened to lose the game against certain armies. Those percentages even go higher when you don't take the most competitive builds from the ork codex against certain armies. Now does that sound like fun? My answer is No

Akiasura wrote:
Do you have any proof of this?

Not a stitch of it.

A quick biography to back all this up. In the 00's I was a prominent film critic for AIN'T IT COOL NEWS, which was, at the time, the largest movie/geek website in the world. After I wrote the world's first review of D&D 4E and it garnered *insane* traffic, Harry decided to let me write about whatever game stuff I wanted to. The 4E piece ended up getting me interviewed about D&D on NPR and I even ended up giving an answer on WAIT, WAIT, DON'T TELL ME. Needless to say, all this put me on the radar of a lot of game insiders. Companies and their employees used to leak me stuff or send me games so I would talk about it on the site. Several of those folks were GW employees. For a while they were even secretly sending me the old "Black boxes" that used to go to affiliate stores. At the same time I fell in with the BoLS crew, who played at the same local store. We used to swap info all the time.

All this to say that a lot of what I shared is old insider info that I know no one can be fired now for sharing.

GW used to run on a 5 year plan. They *DO* in fact do market research and have for years - that's how they knew the average lifespan of their players. But that's not info they share with the public. As to ebay, up until late last year, used versions of the new large models (Wraithknights, Riptides and the like) were selling for only $10-$20 cheaper than new, plus shipping. Smart gamers knew they could get new models from online retailers for roughly the same cost from discount online dealers, so GW was still making their money. Run a search for them now and you can find a terribly painted WK for $65, with the next closest shot at one running you $85. You can pay $85 for a used WK, or $92 for a new one from the Warstore. GW employees, by the way, did publicly talk about their new low count, higher cost sales at the start of 6th, but quickly shut up about it after the backlash. The stuff I'm saying about 7th is all conjecture based upon my previous years of experience dealing with game companies. EVERYONE was and is worried about ebay. The secondary market is what helped kill D&D 4e, allowing folks to keep finding a wealth of old 3.5 books (though pathfinder had more to do with it - but the Hasbro mess is another insider boondoggle I can go on and on and on about.)

As to the tournament stuff - again, that's insider stuff. There's a reason GW started pulling their instore support of tournaments and events. They weren't generating sales or interest with storefront gaming anymore. They ended up taking a bath on their year of support for model and terrain building contests (which were AWESOME...but few people showed up to, even in major markets.) They finally ousted their CEO who famously said "The internet is a fad," when arguing why GW wouldn't support online materials and frequent FAQ updates for 5th. And then they tried to be an industry leader with an experimental strategy that gave us the shortest edition turnaround in history.

So before you discount this because I can't link to a GW document, google my biographical information (I wrote under the name Massawyrm and still lurk online with it), and when it checks out, ask yourself: why would a dude who isn't involved in the industry anymore spend a chunk of his morning spinning a yarn to defend a company he owes nothing to? I'm either wasting my time on an elaborate troll in a minor thread on Dakka, or I just happen to love talking about this stuff and know a bit more behind the scenes than some ordinary internet dude. So take that as you will.

Even if true (and sure why not I'll believe you), it just reinforces that they don't have a clue about what people want. 40k could be so much better if they didn't just care about having impulse buys for the new hotness and pretending to be a designer, luxury brand for hip, trendy wargamers.

Barthus wrote:
The only thing they understand these days is their bottom line. We don't have the power to make them change, but we do have the power to vote with our wallets. I wish we would use it more.

The thing is, for a niche market within a niche market (super-tech, tabletop-gaming), with the level of disapproval the internet seems to suggest is going on with the player-base, any game that came out with the combo of good models, good rules, and good fluff should sell itself as an alternative to the hated, imbalanced 40k.

The fact that 40k has no clear #2 at its heels to me suggests that the disapproval of the current game may be more of an internet phenomonon than a wider player-based phenomenon, or that the competition just isn't really that great. I couldn't say first hand, as, while the group I play with does play several other TT games, we don't play other sci-fi TT games.

 jasper76 wrote:

Barthus wrote:
The only thing they understand these days is their bottom line. We don't have the power to make them change, but we do have the power to vote with our wallets. I wish we would use it more.

The thing is, for a niche market within a niche market (super-tech, tabletop-gaming), with the level of disapproval the internet seems to suggest is going on with the player-base, any game that came out with the combo of good models, good rules, and good fluff should sell itself as an alternative to the hated, imbalanced 40k.

The fact that 40k has no clear #2 at its heels to me suggests that the disapproval of the current game may be more of an internet phenomonon than a wider player-based phenomenon, or that the competition just isn't really that great. I couldn't say first hand, as, while the group I play with does play several other TT games, we don't play other sci-fi TT games.

I think that's more down to momentum than anything else. They grew big in a time where they had very little competition, so it's going to take time for other companies to come anywhere close. But I think other companies are definitely catching up these days, every other game seems to be growing rapidly.

 jasper76 wrote:

Barthus wrote:
The only thing they understand these days is their bottom line. We don't have the power to make them change, but we do have the power to vote with our wallets. I wish we would use it more.

The thing is, for a niche market within a niche market (super-tech, tabletop-gaming), with the level of disapproval the internet seems to suggest is going on with the player-base, any game that came out with the combo of good models, good rules, and good fluff should sell itself as an alternative to the hated, imbalanced 40k.

The fact that 40k has no clear #2 at its heels to me suggests that the disapproval of the current game may be more of an internet phenomonon than a wider player-based phenomenon, or that the competition just isn't really that great. I couldn't say first hand, as, while the group I play with does play several other TT games, we don't play other sci-fi TT games.

There shouldn't be a clear #2, the issue is there are a lots of companies now chomping at 40k's market, which it stays #1 at only because of its longevity and volume but is slowly decreasing.