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Well to be fair the death company box contains more plastic than half of the Tac Squad box. It has 2 sets of arms for each model (tactical squad does not so far as I know), has 2 backpack options (standard, and Jump packs) and is listed as a 94 piece kit. Vs the tac squad at 165 pieces. Which means it should run about $25 based on number of pieces but many of the DC pieces are larger as far as I know. This doesn't mean their pricing structure makes any sense though as a regular tactical squad box is $40 and has 179 pieces.

Breng77 wrote:
Well to be fair the death company box contains more plastic than half of the Tac Squad box. It has 2 sets of arms for each model (tactical squad does not so far as I know), has 2 backpack options (standard, and Jump packs) and is listed as a 94 piece kit. Vs the tac squad at 165 pieces. Which means it should run about $25 based on number of pieces but many of the DC pieces are larger as far as I know. This doesn't mean their pricing structure makes any sense though as a regular tactical squad box is $40 and has 179 pieces.

Right. I would be fine with paying $25 for it, since it has the jump packs and presumably additional pieces with Death Company iconography. But $33, especially when I'm going to need more than 5, seems like a ripoff which is sadly what I feel when looking at most GW products.

I know it doesn't excuse GWs dumb ass pricing, but just FYI it is quite easy to get GW kits for 20% off from most independent retailers which would put it much closer to your idealized number.

 Las wrote:
I know it doesn't excuse GWs dumb ass pricing, but just FYI it is quite easy to get GW kits for 20% off from most independent retailers which would put it much closer to your idealized number.

It does, but there's still GW only kits

My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

 Chute82 wrote:
My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

I wish mine was like that. It's basically all 40k with a small group of WMH players (usually 4-6) that meet one day a week for a few hours. Usually when I'm at work or at the Bama game . The last 40k tournament the store held had over 20 players and they do them monthly. There's a GW 1 mile away that's always full of people playing and painting too so it's not like that FLGS has a monopoly on 40k gaming in the area.

 Toofast wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

I wish mine was like that. It's basically all 40k with a small group of WMH players (usually 4-6) that meet one day a week for a few hours. Usually when I'm at work or at the Bama game . The last 40k tournament the store held had over 20 players and they do them monthly. There's a GW 1 mile away that's always full of people playing and painting too so it's not like that FLGS has a monopoly on 40k gaming in the area.

Maybe I'm seeing a trend where there is none, but 40k appears to have a stronger grip on the US South than it does in the Northeast. Not that the following in the Northeast is weak, just appears to be losing audience at a faster rate to competitors as far as I can tell.

The biggest overall thing for me is the quality of the game. I would be okay (not happy with, but not vehemently against) most of GW's prices if it was a good, solid game that wouldn't kick me in the ass for wanting to play a heavily themed army, since the unit types would be within a few steps of each other on the power scale not huge jumps.

Since 40k doesn't do that and can have a bad game for any number of reasons (e.g. opponent and I disagree on what makes a fun game, opponent picked powerful units w/out regard for fluff while I picked fluffy units, opponent picked fluffy Eldar which is better than fluffy anything else, random mission objectives favored opponent, etc.) and Warmachine has a solidly written set of rules that is almost as close to balanced as a game can reasonably be, it's no contest for me.

Even as someone who constantly wants to give 40k another shot I find that I can't because why spend that kind of money for a poor game? If I didn't care about the game and wanted pretty figures, then maybe, but seeing as I want a solid game to play frequently not just models to collect, 40k has some pretty major dealbreakers going for it.

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 Toofast wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

I wish mine was like that. It's basically all 40k with a small group of WMH players (usually 4-6) that meet one day a week for a few hours. Usually when I'm at work or at the Bama game . The last 40k tournament the store held had over 20 players and they do them monthly. There's a GW 1 mile away that's always full of people playing and painting too so it's not like that FLGS has a monopoly on 40k gaming in the area.

Maybe I'm seeing a trend where there is none, but 40k appears to have a stronger grip on the US South than it does in the Northeast. Not that the following in the Northeast is weak, just appears to be losing audience at a faster rate to competitors as far as I can tell.

Next week I will ask around why many of the new players choose warmachine over 40k. Most are first time gamers but my bet would be the start up cost. I live in a place where the economy really sucks and good paying jobs are a thing of the past. I know warmachine is expensive but it seems like you get more for your dollar. He also has two really good Pressgangers that work at the shop which helps push the warmachine product.

 Chute82 wrote:

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 Toofast wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

I wish mine was like that. It's basically all 40k with a small group of WMH players (usually 4-6) that meet one day a week for a few hours. Usually when I'm at work or at the Bama game . The last 40k tournament the store held had over 20 players and they do them monthly. There's a GW 1 mile away that's always full of people playing and painting too so it's not like that FLGS has a monopoly on 40k gaming in the area.

Maybe I'm seeing a trend where there is none, but 40k appears to have a stronger grip on the US South than it does in the Northeast. Not that the following in the Northeast is weak, just appears to be losing audience at a faster rate to competitors as far as I can tell.

Next week I will ask around why many of the new players choose warmachine over 40k. Most are first time gamers but my bet would be the start up cost. I live in a place where the economy really sucks and good paying jobs are a thing of the past. I know warmachine is expensive but it seems like you get more for your dollar. He also has two really good Pressgangers that work at the shop which helps push the warmachine product.

I all but guarantee that it will be one of A) Cheaper start up cost/cheaper to get a regular sized force for average games and B) Better/more balanced rules.

WayneTheGame wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:

 gunslingerpro wrote:

 Toofast wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

I wish mine was like that. It's basically all 40k with a small group of WMH players (usually 4-6) that meet one day a week for a few hours. Usually when I'm at work or at the Bama game . The last 40k tournament the store held had over 20 players and they do them monthly. There's a GW 1 mile away that's always full of people playing and painting too so it's not like that FLGS has a monopoly on 40k gaming in the area.

Maybe I'm seeing a trend where there is none, but 40k appears to have a stronger grip on the US South than it does in the Northeast. Not that the following in the Northeast is weak, just appears to be losing audience at a faster rate to competitors as far as I can tell.

Next week I will ask around why many of the new players choose warmachine over 40k. Most are first time gamers but my bet would be the start up cost. I live in a place where the economy really sucks and good paying jobs are a thing of the past. I know warmachine is expensive but it seems like you get more for your dollar. He also has two really good Pressgangers that work at the shop which helps push the warmachine product.

I all but guarantee that it will be one of A) Cheaper start up cost/cheaper to get a regular sized force for average games and B) Better/more balanced rules.

Yeah, that's pretty much it. For me, better rules with more tactical depth was #1. The models and character of the game was #2. Fluff #3 and cheaper #4.

I started it because of the rules, that's it. I like the aesthetics, fluff and models of 40k wayyy more than WMH. The price was a toss up because they will both cost about the same amount of money over time. It says something about how terrible GW rules are when I would rather play another game despite not liking the aesthetics, quality of models or the fluff.

 Toofast wrote:
I started it because of the rules, that's it. I like the aesthetics, fluff and models of 40k wayyy more than WMH. The price was a toss up because they will both cost about the same amount of money over time. It says something about how terrible GW rules are when I would rather play another game despite not liking the aesthetics, quality of models or the fluff.

Actually it says more about your personal taste.

And GW's product failing to meet his expectations in terms of rules.

 frozenwastes wrote:
And GW's product failing to meet his expectations in terms of rules.

Sure, which would still make it a question of taste.

I get that there's rhetorical utility to reducing everything to opinion or personal taste when other people don't like the thing you do. It's an effective means of invalidating what they have to say.

I must be all alone in that opinion. That's why it's the number one complaint I hear about GW games in forums, Facebook groups, FLGS and even the GW store by my house. We have a long list of 'house rules' at the local GW so that everyone knows what to expect when they come there for a game and there's no 20 minute discussion about what rules we're playing by. Funny how that isn't necessary when I go somewhere to play WMH, infinity, malifaux or MTG...

I've always thought rules should be "top down" in that the game developer creates a system within which a game can be played. Concessions are made and disbelief is then suspended, as the actual is modified or replaced by the abstract, which is reformulated into a ruleset.

House rules work "bottom up", like Calvinball.

 frozenwastes wrote:
I get that there's rhetorical utility to reducing everything to opinion or personal taste when other people don't like the thing you do. It's an effective means of invalidating what they have to say.

I'm not invalidating what he has to say, I'd just like to avoid the "this objectively sucks" arguments.

 Chute82 wrote:
My LGS has voted for Warmachine.. We have 20 players in the journeyman league while the 40k escalation league has 3 players.

My flgs was like that too. Everyone wanted to give warmachine a go. Now that the journeymen is over a lot of people hate the higher point games as its to competitive. A lot of people are going back to 40k haha!!! I love 40k, nough said.

There isn't really a way to objectively say rules are good or bad. However, when they are the number one complaint and cause a large amount of people to play game Y instead of game X, when they prefer the aesthetics, background and quality of game X models and when game X rules are heavily house ruled just to have a playable game, that's about as close to objectively bad as you can get.

 Toofast wrote:
There isn't really a way to objectively say rules are good or bad. However, when they are the number one complaint and cause a large amount of people to play game Y instead of game X, when they prefer the aesthetics, background and quality of game X models and when game X rules are heavily house ruled just to have a playable game, that's about as close to objectively bad as you can get.

Can you not see how subjective all of these opinions are? There is no data, for one. Two, the only thing close to objective is that these are the main viewpoints that lead people to leave 40k for warmachine. Even then that's not what objective means.

So what? If multiple people are having issues with 40k and people are choosing other options because of rules issues, then subjective vs objective is irrelevant. It does not matter if it's opinion or subjective or whatever, because the actual result is that there is a declining 40k player base and those who do play often play house ruled variants. 40k's comparative advantage of reliably local opponents has faded away for many people. If a given person makes a 40k army they won't know whether or not they're going to be able to find opponents willing to play against their army. Will unbound be okay? What about certain types of detachments? Forgeworld okay? Defensive structures? Will the people who play even want to use the rules as written or will there be fixes? Who decided which fixes?

Those who have a cohesive and functioning 40k community are the lucky ones. It's an objective fact though, that you don't need to worry about any of these things for WM/H.

As I said, I understand the utility of minimizing people's issues by claiming they are subjective, opinion or idiosyncratic to something about them, but in this case, doing so would be irrelevant.

---

Subjective: GW's rules suck because I think so.
Objective: GW's rules suck because the majority of rational humans say so.

 Las wrote:

 Toofast wrote:
There isn't really a way to objectively say rules are good or bad. However, when they are the number one complaint and cause a large amount of people to play game Y instead of game X, when they prefer the aesthetics, background and quality of game X models and when game X rules are heavily house ruled just to have a playable game, that's about as close to objectively bad as you can get.

Can you not see how subjective all of these opinions are? There is no data, for one. Two, the only thing close to objective is that these are the main viewpoints that lead people to leave 40k for warmachine. Even then that's not what objective means.

So the basis you have for rejecting the argument is the lack of data. So on what basis are you rejecting the argument?

You want data? Look at the polls on which edition of 40k people preferred. 7th came in behind 5th, 4th and 6th. Look at the poll on what GW should change. A significant number of people chose "better rules authors". Look at the GT turnouts. They have been declining since 6th was released. Look at the amount of rules alterations in a tournament packet now compared to one from 5th. If the rules are so great, why do they need 20 pages of changes? Look at YMDC threads for 40k compared to WMH. 40k threads can go on for pages and often get locked because there are different ways of interpreting a rule, this is BAD rules writing. WMH threads are often quickly solved without a whole lot of argument by simply saying "read sentence X on page Y carefully, this is what it means". Look at the eldar facebook group where we had a 3 day debate on the firing arc of a serpent shield because the rules are not clear on this. Again, BAD rules writing and lack of comprehensive FAQs causes this. Look at the fact that a lot of codexes almost immediately have an FAQ released to clarify all the things they failed to clarify in the $50 codex they rushed out the door. You can use semantics to dismiss complaints all you want but you aren't going to convince anyone that GWs rules are even acceptable, let alone good, especially compared to PP.

 agnosto wrote:
Subjective: GW's rules suck because I think so.
Objective: GW's rules suck because the majority of rational humans say so.

Technically both are subjective. If you want an objective reason why GW's rules suck, look at Toofast's latest posts. Those are real facts of the matter. Actual situations people are finding themselves in as they try to make 40k work for them. One of 40k's strengths used to be that it put strangers on the same page. Now, objectively speaking, the rules no longer do this.

 frozenwastes wrote:
So what? If multiple people are having issues with 40k and people are choosing other options because of rules issues, then subjective vs objective is irrelevant. It does not matter if it's opinion or subjective or whatever, because the actual result is that there is a declining 40k player base and those who do play often play house ruled variants. 40k's comparative advantage of reliably local opponents has faded away for many people. If a given person makes a 40k army they won't know whether or not they're going to be able to find opponents willing to play against their army. Will unbound be okay? What about certain types of detachments? Forgeworld okay? Defensive structures? Will the people who play even want to use the rules as written or will there be fixes? Who decided which fixes?

Those who have a cohesive and functioning 40k community are the lucky ones. It's an objective fact though, that you don't need to worry about any of these things for WM/H.

As I said, I understand the utility of minimizing people's issues by claiming they are subjective, opinion or idiosyncratic to something about them, but in this case, doing so would be irrelevant.

---

Look, the reason I made that post was because I find this topic interesting, but often instead of discussing the highlights and shortcomings of each game it devolves into either side making wild statements as if they are fact. I could say wmh has bland rules and is mtg with bad minis, then someone will mention how it is actually more dynamic than 40k. Niether are so.

As for the above, I have a hard time believing that this scenario is the rule rather than the exception for most 40k players. I have never found such a convaluted mess of an environment, nor do I think those issues would be the monumental detractors you make them out to be. However you are correct that wmh doesn't deal with them by way of being a much smaller, younger game. Also, by virtue of 40ks huge player base, there must be benefits to the game that outweigh these shortcomings as is no doubt also true of wmh. Which brings us back to personal taste and preference

 Las wrote:

 frozenwastes wrote:
So what? If multiple people are having issues with 40k and people are choosing other options because of rules issues, then subjective vs objective is irrelevant. It does not matter if it's opinion or subjective or whatever, because the actual result is that there is a declining 40k player base and those who do play often play house ruled variants. 40k's comparative advantage of reliably local opponents has faded away for many people. If a given person makes a 40k army they won't know whether or not they're going to be able to find opponents willing to play against their army. Will unbound be okay? What about certain types of detachments? Forgeworld okay? Defensive structures? Will the people who play even want to use the rules as written or will there be fixes? Who decided which fixes?

Those who have a cohesive and functioning 40k community are the lucky ones. It's an objective fact though, that you don't need to worry about any of these things for WM/H.

As I said, I understand the utility of minimizing people's issues by claiming they are subjective, opinion or idiosyncratic to something about them, but in this case, doing so would be irrelevant.

---

Look, the reason I made that post was because I find this topic interesting, but often instead of discussing the highlights and shortcomings of each game it devolves into either side making wild statements as if they are fact. I could say wmh has bland rules and is mtg with bad minis, then someone will mention how it is actually more dynamic than 40k. Niether are so.

As for the above, I have a hard time believing that this scenario is the rule rather than the exception for most 40k players. I have never found such a convaluted mess of an environment, nor do I think those issues would be the monumental detractors you make them out to be. However you are correct that wmh doesn't deal with them by way of being a much smaller, younger game. Also, by virtue of 40ks huge player base, there must be benefits to the game that outweigh these shortcomings as is no doubt also true of wmh. Which brings us back to personal taste and preference

I apologize if this is not the case, but it seems a lot of the time that your main defense of 40K basically boils down to, "It has more players than any other game", as if that somehow is more important than anything else. Now, to me at least, it's not. It's not that hard to convince people to try out WM/H or another, similar game, because they have relatively low entry points. I've gotten several people to start playing locally because the buy in to learn if they would like the game or now was $50, lower if you're smart.

Even if the number of players was a huge decision maker, the fact that "you can get a game of 40K anywhere" seems to be less and less true as time goes on.

Having the biggest player base is kind of meaningless when that player base is shrinking by the day and other games are experiencing record growth. Look at the icv2 industry numbers, WFB used to be in the top 5 every year. Now it has fallen out and Warmachine and Hordes are both in the top 5. For some reason they separate the sales numbers for those two. At this rate, it won't be very long before 40k loses the top spot.

As someone else said, the amount of people playing is not a measure of quality. Lots of people eat McDonald's, far less eat Hyde Park, Ruth Chris, or Eddie Merlots, that doesn't mean McDonald's has better food.