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I knew it was going to happen, but I'm still saddened by GW's continued incompetence.

Would it have been so hard to just...release a completed codex?

Won't be seeing a dollar from me on this stupidity, that's for sure.

 aka_mythos wrote:
While I dunno about the rumor mongers credibility, I think is reasonable supposition that GW will do a Catachan supplement at some point.

I think this is a good case of 'say something obvious to try to get some credibility' on SS's part.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
I can't justify having to buy both the core codex (laughable concept alone) as well as the cut DLC items. Especially with the sad state of the rules writing at this point.

Dataslates aren't "cut content" as they're made by a separate team (GW Digital Editions). It's a different department with two blokes who work on these things likely in their downtime.

The Dataslates are almost exclusively content that would have been in either a Codex or WD of old, so they are still cut content. They certainly give the impression of planning to drop core content (Guard Characters) with the aim of making them available for a price (Supplements, or Dataslates). Whilst they might not be released on Day 1, they are still the definition of DLC (stuff that was intented to be DLC from the beginning, rather than expansions added after the fact).

Herzlos wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
I can't justify having to buy both the core codex (laughable concept alone) as well as the cut DLC items. Especially with the sad state of the rules writing at this point.

Dataslates aren't "cut content" as they're made by a separate team (GW Digital Editions). It's a different department with two blokes who work on these things likely in their downtime.

The Dataslates are almost exclusively content that would have been in either a Codex or WD of old, so they are still cut content. They certainly give the impression of planning to drop core content (Guard Characters) with the aim of making them available for a price (Supplements, or Dataslates). Whilst they might not be released on Day 1, they are still the definition of DLC (stuff that was intented to be DLC from the beginning, rather than expansions added after the fact).

GW has been doing this for 15-20 years (leaving stuff out of a codex and adding it to WD where you pay a price for it). The only difference is that the prices are higher and the dataslates/supplements are available more readily than back issues. We'll see if this guard characters rumor is anything more than more drek though.

 pretre wrote:
Keep in mind that...

StrykerSniper - Total rumors: (0 TRUE) / (4 FALSE) / (2 PARTIALLY TRUE/VAGUE)

Which just reinforces my stance like a Techpriest Bolstering a building.

Yes, I just made that analogy. Stop laughing.

 aka_mythos wrote:
While I dunno about the rumor mongers credibility, I think is reasonable supposition that GW will do a Catachan supplement at some point. This being GW though we'll have to wait through "Codex supplement: Cadians" first. More than marines IG are probably the easiest army to write supplements for... even if model support is lacking, I'm hoping the copy-and-paste wizards over at GW can get around to giving some of the other IG regiments attention.

Yea, saying there's going to be a Catachan supplement some day is almost like saying there's going to be a 7th Edition someday.

Herzlos wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
I can't justify having to buy both the core codex (laughable concept alone) as well as the cut DLC items. Especially with the sad state of the rules writing at this point.

Dataslates aren't "cut content" as they're made by a separate team (GW Digital Editions). It's a different department with two blokes who work on these things likely in their downtime.

The Dataslates are almost exclusively content that would have been in either a Codex or WD of old, so they are still cut content. They certainly give the impression of planning to drop core content (Guard Characters) with the aim of making them available for a price (Supplements, or Dataslates). Whilst they might not be released on Day 1, they are still the definition of DLC (stuff that was intented to be DLC from the beginning, rather than expansions added after the fact).

Not really "cut content" even then. If it was never going to be in the codex to start with then it was never "cut". And GW has been doing "DLC" longer than DLC has been around.

Sorry, I just nitpick word usage sometimes because it bugs me to mislabel things to try and improve one's point.

Businesses change how they work, it is part of life. Saying it is incompetence or greedy is silly.

The local McDonald's used to give you as many McNugget packets as you wanted. Now you get 2 and are charged for more.

On the flip side, I can remember when you went to McDonald's, got a cup of soda, and then had to pay for a refill cause the machine was behind the counter.

Thought of the Day: Plenty of people may buy the supplements, codexes and dataslates. Many more will pirate them. More and more businesses are raising their prices to cover losses due to piracy. I'm not saying that's why they cost so much for sure, but I bet it factors in. I'd also bet that if sales were low or no one bought the downloads, prices would come down.

I personally am happy they are doing more content. Better to have something than nothing.

That being said, there were 237627362 rumors about a Ravenguard, WhiteScars, CrimsonFist supplment 6 months ago and those never materialized....

General Hobbs wrote:


Thought of the Day: Plenty of people may buy the supplements, codexes and dataslates. Many more will pirate them. More and more businesses are raising their prices to cover losses due to piracy. I'm not saying that's why they cost so much for sure, but I bet it factors in. I'd also bet that if sales were low or no one bought the downloads, prices would come down.

I personally am happy they are doing more content. Better to have something than nothing.

As to your first point, ironically, doing just that will only make people pirate more, which starts a downward spiral. Providing people with content that is fairly priced, easy to access, and actually worth the money is what prevents piracy.

As for your second point, its not a matter of something over nothing. What bothers people is that they're removing content that was in the last book, and re-releasing it to generate more money when it could have easily have been included in the new book. All this new content in the form of dataslates and stuff, could have easily been included in their parent codex. None of the supplements or formations or dataslates provide any more crunch than could have fit on a page or two in the parent codex.

And then they charge half the cost again (if not the same cost as the actual codex) for very little substance.

So I'd rather not have something or nothing. I'd rather they produce completed, interesting codices that are filled with options from the get go, than having to pay for DLC to get access to a character you used to be able to field with a single book.

 1hadhq wrote:
In the age of Militarum, we will see:
Codices - Militarum Vendorum, Militarum Ordinatus, Militarum Auxillia, Militarum Tempestus, Militarum Regimentos.

We will see everything but a printed full Codex for Sororitas that includes new units and updated models. Sad but true.
Last release was 2003, 11 years ago.

 Kroothawk wrote:

 1hadhq wrote:
In the age of Militarum, we will see:
Codices - Militarum Vendorum, Militarum Ordinatus, Militarum Auxillia, Militarum Tempestus, Militarum Regimentos.

We will see everything but a printed full Codex for Sororitas that includes new units and updated models. Sad but true.
Last release was 2003, 11 years ago.

And the Sister line will get thinner too. Eventually you'll have Celestine, and a single blister of Sisters to convert things from.

Hoping there is some vein of truth. I am very keen to start an Elysian army, I love the concept, but until the rules are updated I cant move forward

I have an email from Forgeworld that says they will be updating the Imperial Armour books which reference Imperial Guard in the near future, but what that means I cant even guess. I have other info it may be the HH weekender.

If true that will at least keep the Forgeworld DKOK and Elysian regiments updated

9unit9 wrote:
Hoping there is some vein of truth. I am very keen to start an Elysian army, I love the concept, but until the rules are updated I cant move forward

I have an email from Forgeworld that says they will be updating the Imperial Armour books which reference Imperial Guard in the near future, but what that means I cant even guess. I have other info it may be the HH weekender.

If true that will at least keep the Forgeworld DKOK and Elysian regiments updated

Imperial Armour Volume 4 is in the works right now which is where the most "unique" Elysian army list was, so I would not be surprised to see the Elysians in there.

 Blacksails wrote:
I knew it was going to happen, but I'm still saddened by GW's continued incompetence.

Would it have been so hard to just...release a completed codex?

Won't be seeing a dollar from me on this stupidity, that's for sure.

i think you confuse incompetence with business smarts, I'm assuming the supplement model is doing pretty well since they are sticking with it. Why release one book at 50 bucks when you can release several books and get more money?

Yup with the above.

Just because you don't like it doesn't mean its not a smart move for the company.

Just because it's bad for the customers doesn't mean it's good for the company.

Avian wrote:
Just because it's bad for the customers doesn't mean it's good for the company.

bad for the vocal minority that post on forums or good for the silent majority that will scream shut up and take my money at GW regardless of what they do?

GW's recent finical report wasnt very strong....I can only assume the stuff they are doing now is stuff that generates money for them

 ironicsilence wrote:

Avian wrote:
Just because it's bad for the customers doesn't mean it's good for the company.

bad for the vocal minority that post on forums or good for the silent majority that will scream shut up and take my money at GW regardless of what they do?

GW's recent finical report wasnt very strong....I can only assume the stuff they are doing now is stuff that generates money for them

I wouldn't count on the midyear report that followed a world-wide bad shopping season so much. The end of year report and next year's annual report will give us a much clearer picture if this last mid-year was a trend of a hiccup caused by a short shopping season plagued by really bad weather or not.

That 'silent majority' has been getting smaller, year by year.

That 'vocal minority' has been getting bigger, year by year.

The folks that are screaming 'take my money' are screaming to somebody that is not GW....

The Auld Grump, that's what a drop in sales means, you see....

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
That 'silent majority' has been getting smaller, year by year.

That 'vocal minority' has been getting bigger, year by year.

The folks that are screaming 'take my money' are screaming to somebody that is not GW....

The Auld Grump, that's what a drop in sales means, you see....

Anecdotally (as we have no real market data to prove this yet), yes that may be what is happening. The timing of the drop in revenue during December tied to a short holiday sales season and a bad winter conditions that slammed every retailer world-wide is what makes me hesitant to declare it to be a mass exodus of players though. Looking at GW's revenue to their retained earnings and Cost of Sales there hasn't been any real fluctuations to show that they're running prices up to hide flagging sales (Cost of Sales has matched nearly point for point in terms of how things shifted up or down, the change in revenue coming in, and retained earnings has done the same. The only change is in 2012-2013 they added development costs into cost of sales instead of operating expenses which has increased cost of sales, but otherwise we haven't seen any real financial signs that they're trying to hide anything (yet)). Additionally they're revenue is looking largely flat once you take inflation out of it and look at the last 5 years financial reports. Basically they're not growing, or shrinking when inflation is mixed into things. So we're seeing a company that can't seem to grow any bigger but is still financially healthy and isn't showing signs that it's really shrinking (yet). Could Winter 2013 been the start of a shrink? Perhaps. Or it's a hiccup caused by seasonal conditions that doesn't show us that GW is actually losing ground yet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Here's the inflation adjusted numbers for revenue, cost of sales, operating expenses and retained earnings from FY 2007-FY 2013 for anyone who is interested:



So basically flat when inflation is cancelled out for most things, retained earnings went up as they're trying harder to keep a safety net there and have worked their backsides off to dig themselves out of the the hole they made with LotR.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
That 'silent majority' has been getting smaller, year by year.

That 'vocal minority' has been getting bigger, year by year.

The folks that are screaming 'take my money' are screaming to somebody that is not GW....

The Auld Grump, that's what a drop in sales means, you see....

Anecdotally (as we have no real market data to prove this yet), yes that may be what is happening. The timing of the drop in revenue during December tied to a short holiday sales season and a bad winter conditions that slammed every retailer world-wide is what makes me hesitant to declare it to be a mass exodus of players though. Looking at GW's revenue to their retained earnings and Cost of Sales there hasn't been any real fluctuations to show that they're running prices up to hide flagging sales (Cost of Sales has matched nearly point for point in terms of how things shifted up or down, the change in revenue coming in, and retained earnings has done the same. The only change is in 2012-2013 they added development costs into cost of sales instead of operating expenses which has increased cost of sales, but otherwise we haven't seen any real financial signs that they're trying to hide anything (yet)). Additionally they're revenue is looking largely flat once you take inflation out of it and look at the last 5 years financial reports. Basically they're not growing, or shrinking when inflation is mixed into things. So we're seeing a company that can't seem to grow any bigger but is still financially healthy and isn't showing signs that it's really shrinking (yet). Could Winter 2013 been the start of a shrink? Perhaps. Or it's a hiccup caused by seasonal conditions that doesn't show us that GW is actually losing ground yet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Here's the inflation adjusted numbers for revenue, cost of sales, operating expenses and retained earnings from FY 2007-FY 2013 for anyone who is interested:

So basically flat when inflation is cancelled out for most things, retained earnings went up as they're trying harder to keep a safety net there and have worked their backsides off to dig themselves out of the the hole they made with LotR.

Let's not get started on this again, I'm sure there is a thread in the discussion forum for GW's Financial results (http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/578355.page is the first one I found, there are probably others). Though flat revenue with GW's increased prices does mean the amount of units shipped is less, which would lead to the anecdotal conclusion that the player base is indeed shrinking.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Basically they're not growing, or shrinking when inflation is mixed into things. So we're seeing a company that can't seem to grow any bigger but is still financially healthy and isn't showing signs that it's really shrinking (yet). Could Winter 2013 been the start of a shrink? Perhaps. Or it's a hiccup caused by seasonal conditions that doesn't show us that GW is actually losing ground yet.

Yeah, maybe GW closing all non-UK HQs on short notice, reducing sales staff and opening hours and cutting production is pure coincidence and has nothing to do with shrinking sales

 Kroothawk wrote:

Yeah, maybe GW closing all non-UK HQs on short notice, reducing sales staff and opening hours and cutting production is pure coincidence and has nothing to do with shrinking sales

They opened more GWs here in the states than they closed in the last year. Why? Because most of those were just being moved to cheaper locations.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dawnbringer wrote:

Let's not get started on this again, I'm sure there is a thread in the discussion forum for GW's Financial results (http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/578355.page is the first one I found, there are probably others). Though flat revenue with GW's increased prices does mean the amount of units shipped is less, which would lead to the anecdotal conclusion that the player base is indeed shrinking.

Not to be arguementative, but if that were true then Cost of Sales would be going down as Revenue went up, but because the changes in Cost of Sales matches the change in Revenue we can see that isn't exactly true. Heck Cost of Sales recently (late 2012 "recently") went up because they stopped counting the dev work as an "Operating Expense" and rolled the cost into the product cost.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Dawnbringer wrote:
Let's not get started on this again, I'm sure there is a thread in the discussion forum for GW's Financial results (http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/578355.page is the first one I found, there are probably others). Though flat revenue with GW's increased prices does mean the amount of units shipped is less, which would lead to the anecdotal conclusion that the player base is indeed shrinking.

Not to be arguementative, but if that were true then Cost of Sales would be going down as Revenue went up, but because the changes in Cost of Sales matches the change in Revenue we can see that isn't exactly true. Heck Cost of Sales recently (late 2012 "recently") went up because they stopped counting the dev work as an "Operating Expense" and rolled the cost into the product cost.

Read what you just wrote: Cost of Sales did not go up because they're making more product, it went up because Games Workshop is manipulating their financial reports to make themselves look good.

 AlexHolker wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Dawnbringer wrote:
Let's not get started on this again, I'm sure there is a thread in the discussion forum for GW's Financial results (http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/578355.page is the first one I found, there are probably others). Though flat revenue with GW's increased prices does mean the amount of units shipped is less, which would lead to the anecdotal conclusion that the player base is indeed shrinking.

Not to be arguementative, but if that were true then Cost of Sales would be going down as Revenue went up, but because the changes in Cost of Sales matches the change in Revenue we can see that isn't exactly true. Heck Cost of Sales recently (late 2012 "recently") went up because they stopped counting the dev work as an "Operating Expense" and rolled the cost into the product cost.

Read what you just wrote: Cost of Sales did not go up because they're making more product, it went up because Games Workshop is manipulating their financial reports to make themselves look good.

I know that, the point is that even if they're now reflecting the true cost of products by including development costs in there (probably justifying their price increases a bit more that way) we should still see the Cost of Sales not changing in a manner that is matching with, or exceeds the changes in Revenue like it is. In short the lines should moving in opposite directions where Revenue is climbing and Cost of Sales is falling at the same time. I've been reading for something like four years now that GW is "raising prices to hide flagging sales" and we have clear proof that for at least 4/5 years they definitely have not done so. 2012-2013 is the odd year where it changes the "norm" on how things play out and it'll take more than that one data point to prove that they are/are not hiding anything.

The only thing that's changed there is Gross Profit (which is Revenue - Cost of Sales) stopped matching the changes in Revenue at the end but that has to do with the change in how Cost in Sales is calculated.

I've been hearing that this is the deathcry of GW for YEARS now and while I'll admit I don't think their board knows what to do, and that there are things that go on I don't agree with I don't think GW is showing actual signs of dying just yet. Stagnating, sure, but it's not losing nearly enough customers to exceed the new ones coming it yet. I look forward to the report in June to shed some more light on this though.

We just said that GW is in a decline for years, approaching a critical point. Noone spoke of a immediate bancruptcy.
Although there are indications, that the critical point has now been reached with crazy panic reactions by the management.

 Kroothawk wrote:
We just said that GW is in a decline for years, approaching a critical point. Noone spoke of a immediate bancruptcy.
Although there are indications, that the critical point has now been reached with crazy panic reactions by the management.

I think the panic will set in before the boat starts actually sinking.

 Kroothawk wrote:
We just said that GW is in a decline for years, approaching a critical point. Noone spoke of a immediate bancruptcy.
Although there are indications, that the critical point has now been reached with crazy panic reactions by the management.

Ahh this one again. If I had a dollar for every time someone predicted the end of games workshop, the tipping point, the critical juncture, the straw that broke, etc. I would be as rich as Kirby.

I wouldn't be surprised at a Catachans supplement, not at all. It will, essentially, be the Sly Marbo Codex, in essence, since they decided not to include him in the main codex. He's a popular enough choice that the book will sell well, but they still did some lip service to the Catachans in the main codex by including Harker and Straken.

 pretre wrote:
I would be as rich as Kirby.

That's simply not possible. No one can be as rich as he is. You don't have as many GW stocks as he does.