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 Peregrine wrote:

 Kojiro wrote:
But why is foreknowledge bad?

Because GW is obsessed with impulse buys. They want your first knowledge of a new product to be when you see it on the shelf at your local GW store, preferably with a "limited edition, buy now!!!!" sign on it, so that you'll have the obvious "wow that is awesome" reaction and then buy it immediately. They're afraid that if you have time to think about it and more information about the new product you'll realize that you don't really want it after all. From that perspective playtesting leaks are terrifying, they give out information far in advance of release day, and they're an obviously unfinished product that might make the new release look bad and make it even less likely that you'll buy it.

Now, obviously this demonstrates a very low level of confidence in their own products, which suggests that GW's management know they're publishing garbage that doesn't deserve confidence. Companies with better products don't worry about this as much, since they know that learning more about a new product will only add to your desire to buy it, and impulse buys are a lot less important. In fact, they'll "leak" information in their own previews to build interest in a new release. And since their customers know the final product will be awesome it's not a big deal if unfinished rules leak, because everyone knows they're unfinished and the problems will be fixed in the final product.

That is interesting and I wonder if some part of that is why GW creates an iron curtain around themselves. With Warmachine they tell you far in advance what's coming out. People get excited and say "Oh, I want that in my army." or "That's cool, I can make an alternate list for that." Or whatever. It builds excitement and talk. With the latest GW releases, we get lies, half truths and a few actual hard facts so it creates a mess of negativity, disappointment and confusion. That can't be a good thing.

I imagine that playtesting at GW is a very simple process where they bring in some units and "give 'em a go" - a few games later you've got a unit ready for print in a new codex free of blatant spelling or grammatical errors.

If editorial is so weak at GW, why would they playtest thoroughly?

 Peregrine wrote:

Because GW is obsessed with impulse buys. They want your first knowledge of a new product to be when you see it on the shelf at your local GW store, preferably with a "limited edition, buy now!!!!" sign on it, so that you'll have the obvious "wow that is awesome" reaction and then buy it immediately. They're afraid that if you have time to think about it and more information about the new product you'll realize that you don't really want it after all. From that perspective playtesting leaks are terrifying, they give out information far in advance of release day, and they're an obviously unfinished product that might make the new release look bad and make it even less likely that you'll buy it.

Well personally I'll be giving my money to Privateer and other companies who put out finished products.

 Peregrine wrote:
Now, obviously this demonstrates a very low level of confidence in their own products, which suggests that GW's management know they're publishing garbage that doesn't deserve confidence. Companies with better products don't worry about this as much, since they know that learning more about a new product will only add to your desire to buy it, and impulse buys are a lot less important. In fact, they'll "leak" information in their own previews to build interest in a new release. And since their customers know the final product will be awesome it's not a big deal if unfinished rules leak, because everyone knows they're unfinished and the problems will be fixed in the final product.

Oh man. Can't playtest because people will see how bad the rules are. Rules are bad because not playtesting enough.

But this is something they really need to bite the bullet on. Especially now when they're doing naked cash grabs. I mean, imagine if they'd done the exact same thing Privateer had done. Imagine they released a beta of new rules- free to all- and every single unit in the game- at once. Then let the player base submit tens of thousands of pieces of feedback and, after six more months of their own testing and balancing released a new edition. Then one book/codex per month for the next year. Can you imagine the cash they'd be making if *everyone* got an update? If *everyone* had been listened to and had their concerns addressed? If you knew with absolute certainty that- even if you were *last* you were still only a year from a codex (and you had the free rules until then)? Other than the fact it would take effort and community interaction where is the downside to all this?

 Kojiro wrote:
Oh man. Can't playtest because people will see how bad the rules are. Rules are bad because not playtesting enough.

Well, they can't use external playtesters. GW's obsessive secrecy means that they'd have to hire their own playtesters, under strict NDAs. It's not impossible though, MTG does their own playtesting (with a fairly large group of people, largely composed of former high-level competitive players) and doesn't really have any problems with playtest cards leaking. It just means that they would have to be a lot more careful than they would if they had more confidence in their products.

But yeah, it's definitely not a good situation. Years of laziness and incompetence have put the game in a really bad state, where there are no easy solutions and attempting to fix everything could be almost as bad as just letting it continue to fail. This is why GW should be a lesson on what not to do, if you're a hopeful future game designer.

Other than the fact it would take effort and community interaction where is the downside to all this?

Cost. See my previous post about how GW believes that their target market doesn't actually play the game. It would involve spending a lot of money on improving the game for a group that GW doesn't care about, which would directly contradict their policy of making short-term profits a priority over absolutely everything else, including future growth potential.

 Peregrine wrote:

Well, they can't use external playtesters. GW's obsessive secrecy means that they'd have to hire their own playtesters, under strict NDAs.

The sad thing is that they think they can't. They could- others have shown that to be possible. They just have the foregone conclusion that information control is paramount because... well for some reason.

 Peregrine wrote:
Cost. See my previous post about how GW believes that their target market doesn't actually play the game. It would involve spending a lot of money on improving the game for a group that GW doesn't care about, which would directly contradict their policy of making short-term profits a priority over absolutely everything else, including future growth potential.

I wonder how much playtesting the Chapterhouse lawsuit could have paid for?

But seriously they have to know- they surely can't be so deluded- that they believe that an inferior product serves them as well or better than a polished one? It'd be like Marvel putting out an Avengers comic, but with shoddy art and a crap story and insisting that 'fans just want to buy Avengers/Marvel stuff- there's no reason to pay good artists and writers!' Done right it would cost them but it would be an investment. If they were a start up- if they didn't have a fan base- let alone a vocal contingent crying out for it- I could see how you could say 'the investment is too risky at this point'. But at this point with a legion of hungry fans such an investment can only pay off- no one is going to complain about tight rules and good balance.

Maybe their business model specifically prevents them from creating a balanced game.

In quite a few moral tales, perfection is frowned upon. Like the artist who creates a perfect picture, permanently spoils himself for other artworks.

So maybe it is an intentional swing of balance between edition, as ruled by their business model. After all, no one is looking forward to second edition monopoly or cluedo but enough players with enough investment would catch up to the latest edition in warhammer.

Cool things like psychic phase, chariots etc. there would be enough players who would subscribe to the new edition and perhaps buy more models. And after a while, GW will release a new edition with new toys, to stir up interest again.

Games companies are like sharks who need to keep swimming. If they ever create the perfect game system, they stop moving and they die.

Young games systems don't need to swim so fast - they're still adding things to the game, they're still reaching new customers.

Old games systems are mature, people have what they need. You have to keep moving things around to keep swimming because you're grown too big for your tank.

And all this doubly-so for miniatures companies. If GW ever invent bio-degradable miniatures, it will be a happy day for them. I imagine they've got Brian Nelson locked in a potting shed working with plant matter even as we speak.

The problem with that is that things like rough riders haven't been good in forever (ever?) so they won't sell many ever.

It might work well with say, vehicles being great, then crap the next edition, but it's a terrible idea, or at least being handled terribly, when you look at the finer points.

And realistically introducing new units and factions, or new expansions should be more than enough to keep players interested (it works for every other game).

These points are interesting to discuss and I agree with a lot of what is being said.

However, the topic is about whether it is possible for GW to play test the game, and we ought to stick to that.

If people want to discuss why GW don't want to play test, that would make a good thread in its own right.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
However, the topic is about whether it is possible for GW to play test the game, and we ought to stick to that.

The problem with that 'discussion' is that it's short and simple- yes. Other companies with vastly less resources manage it for games equally if not more complex. As I said, Warmachine has some 130 feats, around 80 unique spells, two dozen USRs and over eight hundred model abilities. Look at the YMDC page- the average number of replies to a given question is about 5 (49 topics, 248 answers).

If GW don't want to get that complex fine, if they don't want to get that tight on balance fine, but for the love of Jeff that level of clarity should be expected of company of their age, experience and resources.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Kojiro wrote:
But why is foreknowledge bad?

Because GW is obsessed with impulse buys. They want your first knowledge of a new product to be when you see it on the shelf at your local GW store, preferably with a "limited edition, buy now!!!!" sign on it, so that you'll have the obvious "wow that is awesome" reaction and then buy it immediately. They're afraid that if you have time to think about it and more information about the new product you'll realize that you don't really want it after all. From that perspective playtesting leaks are terrifying, they give out information far in advance of release day, and they're an obviously unfinished product that might make the new release look bad and make it even less likely that you'll buy it.

Now, obviously this demonstrates a very low level of confidence in their own products, which suggests that GW's management know they're publishing garbage that doesn't deserve confidence. Companies with better products don't worry about this as much, since they know that learning more about a new product will only add to your desire to buy it, and impulse buys are a lot less important. In fact, they'll "leak" information in their own previews to build interest in a new release. And since their customers know the final product will be awesome it's not a big deal if unfinished rules leak, because everyone knows they're unfinished and the problems will be fixed in the final product.

The funny thing is, this exactly describes what they are doing RIGHT NOW with the ork codex. Instead of showing off all their new models at once, and dropping the codex two weeks later, we get them one unit at a time, sorted from least competitive to most competitive. Anyone who thought about buying a Morkanaut for some reliable anti-tank in a green tide has now completely discarded the possibility due to being able to choose between Flash Gits (far superior models) or Mek Gunz (far superior on the tabletop). Instead of actually making the Morkanauts useful for orks, they just hoped that people would buy them before they revealed their other new heavy support choices.

 knas ser wrote:
Games companies are like sharks who need to keep swimming. If they ever create the perfect game system, they stop moving and they die.

Young games systems don't need to swim so fast - they're still adding things to the game, they're still reaching new customers.

Old games systems are mature, people have what they need. You have to keep moving things around to keep swimming because you're grown too big for your tank.

And all this doubly-so for miniatures companies. If GW ever invent bio-degradable miniatures, it will be a happy day for them. I imagine they've got Brian Nelson locked in a potting shed working with plant matter even as we speak.

Even if this is a fear GW has, it's far from reality. While they'll reach the point where they are hard pressed to find something new to add to their armies, that point is still far away for most armies. Even then. during 6th they've added a lot of stuff to the game that not has been done before: non-apoc formations, new single Characters, specialist codices focusing on a few units, supplements representing a faction from the fluff, a book full of fortifications et cetera. All those things are great for shaking up the game for at least a decade. However, this would require them to understand how their game works. For example, Cipher didn't have any impact at all, because they failed at creating rules interesting enough to build armies around him. Unlike some Inquisitor and his cyber-eagle who seem to be everywhere at once.

 Kojiro wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
However, the topic is about whether it is possible for GW to play test the game, and we ought to stick to that.

The problem with that 'discussion' is that it's short and simple- yes. Other companies with vastly less resources manage it for games equally if not more complex. As I said, Warmachine has some 130 feats, around 80 unique spells, two dozen USRs and over eight hundred model abilities. Look at the YMDC page- the average number of replies to a given question is about 5 (49 topics, 248 answers).

If GW don't want to get that complex fine, if they don't want to get that tight on balance fine, but for the love of Jeff that level of clarity should be expected of company of their age, experience and resources.

Yes, I totally agree with you.

I don't know why the topic has to drag on so long, it seems too obvious that GW could do play testing if they wanted.

Obvious that they should and frustrating that they don't. *grumbles* Not a cent for rules form me until they fix them.

 Yonan wrote:
Obvious that they should and frustrating that they don't. *grumbles* Not a cent for rules form me until they fix them.

Same here- I opted not to buy the 7th ed rulebook for fear it would not be worth the bother (let alone the cost) despite the 20% off presale the FLGS offered, and seeing the final product reaffirmed that decision.

I'll make do with the in-store copy (and other means ) until I feel they give me a product that's worth mt money.

Their incompetence has also seriously put me off of buying new models...

 Kojiro wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
However, the topic is about whether it is possible for GW to play test the game, and we ought to stick to that.

The problem with that 'discussion' is that it's short and simple- yes.

Well it's not an epic discussion, but there's still some mileage in it. The primary issue with the OPs argument (no offence OP, this is just my analysis and feedback) is that it presumes that playtesting requires testing of all the different combinations. This is unfeasible as they point out and it also doesn't cover correct usage of models either. For example, one might say Striking Scorpions are woefully underpowered vs. Dire Avengers if one assessed by shooting, rather than close combat. How does one weight the different aspects of units against each other? And then you have synergies. Is a farseer overpowered? Is a jetbike? Is a warlock? Is a farseer plus warlocks on jetbikes overpowered? I think you see where I'm going with that.

It's been suggested that computer simulations could do this. Yes, they could do a lot of this if a lot of work was put in. Whilst that is less of a mammoth effort than actually playing all the combinations, it is still a huge effort and likely still unfeasible.

The OP has a reasonable point in rejecting doing all this. But it is wrong to take a binary approach of saying you need to do this in order to playtest. There are many smaller or more sophisticated approaches one can take. You can compare units to units in terms of points. You can look at the average armour saves and AV values between armies and say: "okay, this armour save on Space Marines actually isn't going to apply in all these cases with the preponderance of low AP weapons these days, so it shouldn't add so much cost".

I think most would agree with the OP that what they suggest is not possible. But most would disagree that there isn't a lot GW still could do in order to play test and balance the game.

Rigeld - nope, nothing. The problem they had (one of many, rather) is poor leak control. The company was a hobbyist company run by hobbyists with little to no business sesne, so they came up with an idea and implemented it with poor controls. Thus they were never able to reliably identify where the leaks were from (remember this is from a time when stock control was manual, and non-loss was anyones discretion essentially. Waqsnt abused by staff, ever, honest)

As to previews hurting them - they have a theory, internally and that was fairly well borne out in sales, that hobbyists are cyclical - their interest naturally waxes and wanes. By controlling release schedules and when information is released you tap into that cycle. Get it wrong and information falls flat, isnt exciting to the right people at the right time,e tc. Anyone who was a black / blue shirt should have heard of this, certaiunly my husband had this when he was there a few years back.

Of course that was also when they generally had release schedules with time to build up to a release - usually a release had a month build up, with the staff aware of it, able to see models etc and get THEM excited about it.

Its only a lot more recently, sadly tied to Hobbit leak control, that theyve moved to "surprise!" releases with a weeks notice.

nosferatu1001 wrote:
As to previews hurting them - they have a theory, internally and that was fairly well borne out in sales, that hobbyists are cyclical - their interest naturally waxes and wanes. By controlling release schedules and when information is released you tap into that cycle. Get it wrong and information falls flat, isnt exciting to the right people at the right time,e tc. Anyone who was a black / blue shirt should have heard of this, certaiunly my husband had this when he was there a few years back.

I can see the logic in that. You do want to have some control about when you announce things. New edition of D&D or release of X-Wing: you don't want your new game or codex going toe-to-toe with that. Likewise if you think you can build more interest by doing a steady build of "what ork miniature have they released today?" rather than a quick "bang - there's orks!", there's nothing inherently wrong with that.

I guess the problem is if it prevents useful feedback into the design process.

The last thing Chambers did when he was at GW was essentially have an open beta of 4th edition. While 4th was not perfect, it was arguably the most air tight and well understood edition ever to have existed. GW also did a lot better financially at that time. I think that GW has drawn the wrong conclusions from the recession and that the marketing guys more or less are running the asylum.

What they really need are a group of playtesters who are not their best buds and who have the stones to tell them when something is bad design. The problem now is not that they lack playtesting, its just that the inner circle is stacked full of yes men.

 Phazael wrote:
The last thing Chambers did when he was at GW was essentially have an open beta of 4th edition. While 4th was not perfect, it was arguably the most air tight and well understood edition ever to have existed. GW also did a lot better financially at that time. I think that GW has drawn the wrong conclusions from the recession and that the marketing guys more or less are running the asylum.

This is just an aside, but I remember when they first started doing battle reports in White Dwarf and most often it was Andy Chambers vs. Jervis Johnson.

And pretty much every one of them ended with Jervis Johnson losing.

 knas ser wrote:

 Phazael wrote:
The last thing Chambers did when he was at GW was essentially have an open beta of 4th edition. While 4th was not perfect, it was arguably the most air tight and well understood edition ever to have existed. GW also did a lot better financially at that time. I think that GW has drawn the wrong conclusions from the recession and that the marketing guys more or less are running the asylum.

This is just an aside, but I remember when they first started doing battle reports in White Dwarf and most often it was Andy Chambers vs. Jervis Johnson.

And pretty much every one of them ended with Jervis Johnson losing.

Obviously the reason for that was the deplorable lack of utterly random sh*t in the game back then, which grossly tipped the balance by simultaneously preventing Jervis from Forging a Narrative™ and giving an unfair advantage to Andy with his "understanding of the rules" and "tactics".

Thankfully, that oversight has been rectified.

4th had the , to this day, least understood terrain system I am aware of. The levels mixed with tlos mixed with area terrain misunderstanding was horrific.

 Phazael wrote:
The last thing Chambers did when he was at GW was essentially have an open beta of 4th edition. While 4th was not perfect, it was arguably the most air tight and well understood edition ever to have existed. GW also did a lot better financially at that time. ...

...

It didn't, actually. They had some of their worst years during 2005 to 2008 which was 4th edition time.

Really? Because I remember full sized stores with specialist games thriving at the time, but maybe it was eclipsed by the Apoc Craze, I guess.

Problems with playtesting:

Having broken combos encourages people who want to be competitive to play those broken combos and are usually new units that cost a lot of $$$ and so GW loses money by making the new shiny stuff just as good as the old stuff for efficiency.

Playtesters can leak rules. Bad for GW as their records show that utter secrecy makes them money.



SSSSSOOOOO...GW ain't playtesting.

The only 'problem' with play testing is GW plc s view of it.

IF all the units in the game are viable choices, people buy new units because they like the look /function of them.
And everyone can buy what they want when they want and enjoy playing.And then they tell their friends how much fun this game is, and they buy armies to enjoy playing.
And the customer base grows and the company sell higher volumes of minatures.

You can add new releases into the game, but they do not have to generate all your new income.

Every other company in the table top war games market seems to understand the importance of play testing , editing and proof reading .

 Phazael wrote:
Really? Because I remember full sized stores with specialist games thriving at the time, but maybe it was eclipsed by the Apoc Craze, I guess.

I am talking about their financial results, which are the only data that count for business.

Lanrak wrote:
The only 'problem' with play testing is GW plc s view of it.

IF all the units in the game are viable choices, people buy new units because they like the look /function of them.
And everyone can buy what they want when they want and enjoy playing.And then they tell their friends how much fun this game is, and they buy armies to enjoy playing.
And the customer base grows and the company sell higher volumes of minatures.

You can add new releases into the game, but they do not have to generate all your new income.

Every other company in the table top war games market seems to understand the importance of play testing , editing and proof reading .

There is a difference between a new model being a slightly better choice than the existing ones, and a new model tossing the entire game into a state of imbalance like riptide, wave serpent and helldrake did. And I highly doubt the sold a single new model for the Grimoire.

New models and new rules like Allies are what did it.

 MWHistorian wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 Kojiro wrote:
But why is foreknowledge bad?

Because GW is obsessed with impulse buys. They want your first knowledge of a new product to be when you see it on the shelf at your local GW store, preferably with a "limited edition, buy now!!!!" sign on it, so that you'll have the obvious "wow that is awesome" reaction and then buy it immediately. They're afraid that if you have time to think about it and more information about the new product you'll realize that you don't really want it after all. From that perspective playtesting leaks are terrifying, they give out information far in advance of release day, and they're an obviously unfinished product that might make the new release look bad and make it even less likely that you'll buy it.

Now, obviously this demonstrates a very low level of confidence in their own products, which suggests that GW's management know they're publishing garbage that doesn't deserve confidence. Companies with better products don't worry about this as much, since they know that learning more about a new product will only add to your desire to buy it, and impulse buys are a lot less important. In fact, they'll "leak" information in their own previews to build interest in a new release. And since their customers know the final product will be awesome it's not a big deal if unfinished rules leak, because everyone knows they're unfinished and the problems will be fixed in the final product.

That is interesting and I wonder if some part of that is why GW creates an iron curtain around themselves. With Warmachine they tell you far in advance what's coming out. People get excited and say "Oh, I want that in my army." or "That's cool, I can make an alternate list for that." Or whatever. It builds excitement and talk. With the latest GW releases, we get lies, half truths and a few actual hard facts so it creates a mess of negativity, disappointment and confusion. That can't be a good thing.

I am not totally sure, but it is possible as a publically traded company GW may be prevented from revealing information about new products. I work for a software company which is public and we have to be very careful what we share in the public realm about our develpment. If we reveal features of software prior to release and then fail to deliver those features, it can prevent us from recognizing ANY revenue until said features are released. The are SEC rules. We would like to share plans.etc with customers but in many cases are not able to.

This COULD be the same situation for GW. if they announce product and then for some reason fail to deliver it at the time they said (things happen a the time) then they may have a revenue recognition problem as well if the same kinds of rules apply to them as they do for my company.

I have no real idea if this is why GW is "secretive". I am just throwing it out as a possible reason.

Loborocket wrote:
I am not totally sure, but it is possible as a publically traded company GW may be prevented from revealing information about new products. I work for a software company which is public and we have to be very careful what we share in the public realm about our develpment. If we reveal features of software prior to release and then fail to deliver those features, it can prevent us from recognizing ANY revenue until said features are released. The are SEC rules. We would like to share plans.etc with customers but in many cases are not able to.

A lot of that is because of the competition. GW doesn't have competition in the same manner.