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Herzlos wrote:

Herzlos wrote:
Hell, Mantic are about to launch a HeroQuest competitor on Kickstarter in 40 minutes.

I know it's poor form to quote myself, but this gives a good illustration of how popular some of the box games were, Mantics Dungeon Saga (providing a gaming experience like HeroQuest) has hit it's target of $50,000 in 4 minutes. Whilst that's an initial spike, to put it into perspective GW made approx $22k/hour over the last financial year. That's what early announcements and hype building does for you.

my feelings here are that even with a loss in profits gw will still pull through we are all still buying and playing there game, otherwise we are just blowing smoke here right? anyways a new game comes out and sold 50k, sweet for them how much do you think they will be making a min? or over this month? how many models do they have? more than likely the biggest part of there quarter was/will be that 50k day.
if anything since the release of 7th and how i have felt about what i see as a bystander that doesn't have any true insight into the ideas coming from across the pond, i think gw is starting to pick up on the fact that guys are leaving and have been unhappy. after dominating the market without any real competition for they entirety of my life, they got complacent and lazy, figured they could do what they wanted, but now with release of so many other games (in my opinions of rule changes) they may actually be hearing the loud outrage that most of the world has been doing. gw going under unlikely though, they pull more money a day than my local walmart.

Hmmm... let us see about Specialist Games in my local group.

We have not played WH40K in over a year.
We played Necromunda on Saturday.

We have not played Warhammer Fantasy Battle in two years.
We played Mordheim on Wednesday.

We still play Warhammer Quest. Purely beer and pretzels.
There is a Blood Bowl League - that largely shares players with Dreadball. (Folks are playing both - not one or the other.)

For non-GW games....

Kings of War gets played weekly. (With some of us playing more often.) It has replaced Warhammer Fantasy.
Deadzone gets played (on days I can't play, dammit) but it shares space with Necromunda (and the Deadzone terrain seems to be used a lot in Necromunda).
Lots of Pathfinder gets played. (Which replaced D&D - 4e never gained traction.)
Folks keep talking about Malifaux - but I suspect it won't happen until I set it up. (And I'm not that interested in it - but I have some of the minis for use in other games.)
WARMAHordes gets played... a lot. Almost a separate group at this point. (And a cutthroat bunch they are, too.)
FoW gets played - but shares time with Johnny Reb (another out of print game that sees regular play). I think Over the Top gets played as well, but not on a regular basis. (The game used to be played in the back of a barber shop....)
One person still runs a Behind Enemy Lines game (the Companions version - he used to work with them)., but it takes place in Bath, and I have no car.

There is a completely separate group that still runs and plays BIG games of TSR's Battlesystem at a local pub.

But the Specialist Games remain in play, even as GW's main games are abandoned.

Something is wrong there. (Also, as a group, we like a lot of out of production games.)

The Auld Grump

and since i know this is coming next, what about the outrage people have about 7th

to which i respond have you played 7th i absolutely love it

forgotten ghosts wrote:

Herzlos wrote:

Herzlos wrote:
Hell, Mantic are about to launch a HeroQuest competitor on Kickstarter in 40 minutes.

I know it's poor form to quote myself, but this gives a good illustration of how popular some of the box games were, Mantics Dungeon Saga (providing a gaming experience like HeroQuest) has hit it's target of $50,000 in 4 minutes. Whilst that's an initial spike, to put it into perspective GW made approx $22k/hour over the last financial year. That's what early announcements and hype building does for you.

my feelings here are that even with a loss in profits gw will still pull through we are all still buying and playing there game

No. No we aren't.

otherwise we are just blowing smoke here right? anyways a new game comes out and sold 50k, sweet for them how much do you think they will be making a min? or over this month? how many models do they have? more than likely the biggest part of there quarter was/will be that 50k day.
if anything since the release of 7th and how i have felt about what i see as a bystander that doesn't have any true insight into the ideas coming from across the pond, i think gw is starting to pick up on the fact that guys are leaving and have been unhappy. after dominating the market without any real competition for they entirety of my life, they got complacent and lazy, figured they could do what they wanted, but now with release of so many other games (in my opinions of rule changes) they may actually be hearing the loud outrage that most of the world has been doing.

There's absolutely no indication whatsoever that they're aware of what they need to do to right the ship.

gw going under unlikely though, they pull more money a day than my local walmart.

A multinational corporation doing "better" than a single branch of another multinational corporation is meaningless.

Did you even look at the report?



Automatically Appended Next Post:

forgotten ghosts wrote:
and since i know this is coming next, what about the outrage people have about 7th

to which i respond have you played 7th i absolutely love it

That's cool. And it's also the tiniest possible anecdote and meaningless in the grand scheme of things.

forgotten ghosts wrote:
and since i know this is coming next, what about the outrage people have about 7th

to which i respond have you played 7th i absolutely love it

Good for you, a lot of people don't play it and won't play it because they don't like the direction it was taking (same could be said of 6th). And, judging from the dropped sales, we are slowly getting to the point where more people are stopping playing.

forgotten ghosts wrote:
and since i know this is coming next, what about the outrage people have about 7th

to which i respond have you played 7th i absolutely love it

Congratulations, seems like you are one of the few that do:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/606652.page
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/605631.page

 heartserenade wrote:
I think I'm gonna name the cat I just adopted as Murderfang. He's pure white with golden eyes and fluffy.

And every day you will wake up with dead things left as gifts on your pillow..... (Lesson - do not adopt a barn cat unless you don't mind getting... presents. )

Or you may find yourself dressed in white and threatening Mr. Bond, James Bond... not sure which.

The Auld Grump

 TheAuldGrump wrote:

 heartserenade wrote:
I think I'm gonna name the cat I just adopted as Murderfang. He's pure white with golden eyes and fluffy.

And every day you will wake up with dead things left as gifts on your pillow..... (Lesson - do not adopt a barn cat unless you don't mind getting... presents. )

Or you may find yourself dressed in white and threatening Mr. Bond, James Bond... not sure which.

The Auld Grump

I live near a forest. Our cats usually eat tree frogs whole. They don't give presents, they finish them all up.

Back to the topic, even if 7th plays really well (which I doubt. If there's still a huge imbalance in between codices, vague rulings, and useless units and too much randomness then I won't bother) the pricetag itself is a deterrent for me. If I want bigger armies (and I do!), I'll go to other companies like Perry and Mantic and buy the feth out of their miniatures. If I want better rules... well, almost every game out there would have better rules than what GW is offering... for free.

I just need to find someone to play KoW with, after I finish two armies so I can do intro battles.

PhantomViper wrote:

forgotten ghosts wrote:
and since i know this is coming next, what about the outrage people have about 7th

to which i respond have you played 7th i absolutely love it

Congratulations, seems like you are one of the few that do:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/606652.page
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/605631.page

Play nice kids - he has found a game that he likes, and more power to him.

I just wish that Warpath was a good competitor/replacement for WH40K at this point... but I am not sure that it ever will be.

The Auld Grump, and off to work I go....

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Play nice kids - he has found a game that he likes, and more power to him.

To be fair, telling people to play 7e before we judge it is basically telling someone to invest on a codex, a rulebook and an army just to judge something that they may or may not love. It's definitely not endearing to tell people they have to pay up first before they can make an opinion of the game.

to all of that, if you guys dropped the game because of the direction and haven't played the game than how is your opinion worth more than mine, like i said where i play ( 3 stores slightly overlapping groups) 40k 7th everyone loves it one guy refusing to play the new missions.
again when i comes to don't play it wont play... that is your choice and makes your view and opinion of the game slightly skewed as you already choose to not like it. and that is fine i do the same thing with other games, not because of the direction they are going or my predetermined opinion of them (i love star wars!!) but because i am not gonna learn another rule set paint more models, etc.
we all know what they say about opinions we all got one right! mine and some others that i play with truly dont know what the hell everyone is always complaining about. did anyone bother to mention that the entire world has been in a recession for some time now? proven by the billions given in bailouts all across europe and in the states, any one care to take that into account, and how bout the wars going on everywhere, i now a lot of players that are in active service, how often do they get to play paint?
yes there is a shift moving to other games, but again we are looking at a giant company that is noticing its losses. in my opinion gw will fix itself, and ONE of these other games that you guys have gone to will become the target and gw will stay the walmart, i think most of the banter is hoping the one you went to becomes it.

forgotten ghosts wrote:
to all of that, if you guys dropped the game because of the direction and haven't played the game than how is your opinion worth more than mine, like i said where i play ( 3 stores slightly overlapping groups) 40k 7th everyone loves it one guy refusing to play the new missions.
again when i comes to don't play it wont play... that is your choice and makes your view and opinion of the game slightly skewed as you already choose to not like it. and that is fine i do the same thing with other games, not because of the direction they are going or my predetermined opinion of them (i love star wars!!) but because i am not gonna learn another rule set paint more models, etc.
we all know what they say about opinions we all got one right! mine and some others that i play with truly dont know what the hell everyone is always complaining about. did anyone bother to mention that the entire world has been in a recession for some time now? proven by the billions given in bailouts all across europe and in the states, any one care to take that into account, and how bout the wars going on everywhere, i now a lot of players that are in active service, how often do they get to play paint?
yes there is a shift moving to other games, but again we are looking at a giant company that is noticing its losses. in my opinion gw will fix itself, and ONE of these other games that you guys have gone to will become the target and gw will stay the walmart, i think most of the banter is hoping the one you went to becomes it.

It's not that the opinion is worth more, it's that:

A) Financial report indicates a slow but steady decline in stales
B) Those of us who no longer play are ex-customers, and in an ideal world GW should want to know why we aren't their customers

Also, although you haven't there seems to be this idea that if you don't play 40k anymore, you can't dislike it.

 heartserenade wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Play nice kids - he has found a game that he likes, and more power to him.

To be fair, telling people to play 7e before we judge it is basically telling someone to invest on a codex, a rulebook and an army just to judge something that they may or may not love. It's definitely not endearing to tell people they have to pay up first before they can make an opinion of the game.

people do it all the time with computer and video games, if you let gw take you for every penny before you played thats on you. i would go to a store and demo any game before investing in it, we try on shoes before we buy them right? i am forgetting this is an internet forum so who am i kidding

Murdermake used in Prospero Burns worked for the Russ' Wolves. Please don't abuse it GW

most of the things i have stopped doing are things i didn't like but you don't wanna hear about them. it is hard sometimes when people dropped out 5+ years ago and still rant about it. and if they used to love the game why aren't they not playing that edition you loved no one forced you to buy the new stuff, and if it has been that long since you played maybe its time to go in for another demo rather than just moan about some one else moaning.

Did you read their financial report? They gave no indication that they even know what's wrong, nevermind about them trying to fix it. It reads as if they are just going to keep doing the same and hoping it works out.

You mention the recession, but it's largely over, and pretty much every other gaming company is growing quite well, so the recession isn't to blame here.

forgotten ghosts wrote:
to all of that, if you guys dropped the game because of the direction and haven't played the game than how is your opinion worth more than mine, like i said where i play ( 3 stores slightly overlapping groups) 40k 7th everyone loves it one guy refusing to play the new missions.
again when i comes to don't play it wont play... that is your choice and makes your view and opinion of the game slightly skewed as you already choose to not like it. and that is fine i do the same thing with other games, not because of the direction they are going or my predetermined opinion of them (i love star wars!!) but because i am not gonna learn another rule set paint more models, etc.
we all know what they say about opinions we all got one right! mine and some others that i play with truly dont know what the hell everyone is always complaining about. did anyone bother to mention that the entire world has been in a recession for some time now? proven by the billions given in bailouts all across europe and in the states, any one care to take that into account, and how bout the wars going on everywhere, i now a lot of players that are in active service, how often do they get to play paint?
yes there is a shift moving to other games, but again we are looking at a giant company that is noticing its losses. in my opinion gw will fix itself, and ONE of these other games that you guys have gone to will become the target and gw will stay the walmart, i think most of the banter is hoping the one you went to becomes it.

For me, 1. it's the core concept of 7th. It's too soon after 6th and feels like a cynical cash grab. Right there it puts me off. I don't have to buy it to not like that.
2. Unbound. The game is too unbalanced for an unbound type of game play without a lot of pre-negotiation. It's unworkable for pick up games. So, right there, I don't have to play it to know that I (someone who relies on PUG's) isn't going to have fun with that. Also, its another cynical cash grab witch further puts me off of 7th.
3. Pyschic phase/deamon summoning. I play for the fluff, so when I hear that an Ultramarine Librarian can summon deamons, I lose all respect for the game. Also, a whole phase of a billion dice being rolled slows up an already slow game. Also, for armies with no psykers (I used to play SOB) its a whole phase to just sit back and take it like a chump. None of those issues require playing it. Again, its the core concept I disagree with along with it being a cynical cash grab to get everyone to just buy deamon models.
4. Mealstrom. Again, the core concept. It destroys any notion of an over-all strategy and just makes it turn by turn tactics. I like the players to determine strategy, not random cards. This is a furthering of the randomness that many players already didn't like. More of something we don't like isn't going to be better. Again, not something I have to play test to know.

 MWHistorian wrote:

For me, 1. it's the core concept of 7th. It's too soon after 6th and feels like a cynical cash grab. Right there it puts me off. I don't have to buy it to not like that.
2. Unbound. The game is too unbalanced for an unbound type of game play without a lot of pre-negotiation. It's unworkable for pick up games. So, right there, I don't have to play it to know that I (someone who relies on PUG's) isn't going to have fun with that. Also, its another cynical cash grab witch further puts me off of 7th.
3. Pyschic phase/deamon summoning. I play for the fluff, so when I hear that an Ultramarine Librarian can summon deamons, I lose all respect for the game. Also, a whole phase of a billion dice being rolled slows up an already slow game. Also, for armies with no psykers (I used to play SOB) its a whole phase to just sit back and take it like a chump. None of those issues require playing it. Again, its the core concept I disagree with along with it being a cynical cash grab to get everyone to just buy deamon models.
4. Mealstrom. Again, the core concept. It destroys any notion of an over-all strategy and just makes it turn by turn tactics. I like the players to determine strategy, not random cards. This is a furthering of the randomness that many players already didn't like. More of something we don't like isn't going to be better. Again, not something I have to play test to know.

i can respect all of that, in the defense of maelstrom missions i actually feel that randomness of them really balances out some of the overpowered crap you see being done as turn by turn you must build on your strategy and just spamming wave serpents may not actually help you do that
i hate psykers always have thought that was gonna really change things nope used them in a few games my opponents did the same against nids was the only time there were a lot of dice in that phase so far has been largely insignificant outside of the one time those vets got teleported onto that objective they needed
on another note to show the you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, when i was about 12 my mom was making me read books over the summer. i had just finished lord of the flies and when my mom hands me lord of the rings i am like no way woman, had she not told me it was "like the hobbit" i would have never read those books (about 5 times now).

A lot of people have stopped buying the game, for various combinations of reasons to do with price and not liking aspects of the modern rules.

The fact that you like the modern rules does not convince other people they are good. To get those people back, GW are going to have to change the rules and reduce the prices.

forgotten ghosts wrote:

 heartserenade wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Play nice kids - he has found a game that he likes, and more power to him.

To be fair, telling people to play 7e before we judge it is basically telling someone to invest on a codex, a rulebook and an army just to judge something that they may or may not love. It's definitely not endearing to tell people they have to pay up first before they can make an opinion of the game.

people do it all the time with computer and video games, if you let gw take you for every penny before you played thats on you. i would go to a store and demo any game before investing in it, we try on shoes before we buy them right? i am forgetting this is an internet forum so who am i kidding

Really?

If I'm considering buying a video game, I generally go to one of the independent sources I trust, either in print or online and read a review that I can be fairly sure will give me as objective and critical view as is possible with a human in the equation. I might even read several.

Care to point to a source that is similar for wargames? Because I'm not aware of one.

With regard to a demo game, are you seriously suggesting that a pre-defined game, in a GW store, conducted by a GW staff member is going to give me the sort of information I need to make a critical assessment of the game as a whole? Because that will be the overwhelming majority of demo 40K games played around the world I suspect.

Do you credit a GW staffer (a salesman when all is said and done) with the honesty to explain how many of the purchases and decisions I may make, from army choice through to units through to which pieces I choose to glue onto my models could hugely influence how likely I am to be able to win, or even compete, in games? Is it possible, through playing a brief, small scale demo, to appreciate how I could equally make decisions based on models I simply liked to end up with a collection of models that is capable of eliciting negative reactions from other gamers, up to and including a refusal to play me?

All the other items you give as examples are relatively easy to assess, shoes fit or do not, a videogame will likely garner numerous reviews, as will a movie or many other entertainment products. A wargame however, needs an educated eye to assess it's strengths and weaknesses. That requires either investment of time and resources or the consultation of others with more experience. Now, unlike videogames or movies, wargaming isn't large enough to support a whole auxiliary industry of critics, if only there were some place where people with years, in many cases decades, of experience could all come together to share their experiences.....

Ah, that would never work, unless it was all relentlessly positive people would just dismiss it as hatred because they either didn't understand or agree with the arguments.

problem with that is what rules actually changed? the true revamp of the rules happened +/- 10 years ago, since then we have changed overwatch, put in snap firing, flyers and super heavies open topped gets hit by templates, subtract 2 instead dice drop highest, went back and forth on targeting specific floors of buildings, psychic phase hull points did i miss anything? the core rules have maybe been tweaked with in my age of gaming, but not many real changes since we started the 21st other than the whole apoc, and escalation merge into 40k

 Kilkrazy wrote:
A lot of people have stopped buying the game, for various combinations of reasons to do with price and not liking aspects of the modern rules.

Well I guess that in case of an overproduction of some units or models, GW would rather destroy the overproduced items than selling them cheaper.
Just to keep the price level constant.

3rd, 4th and 5th were all pretty similar.

There was a big change in 6th, partly to do with Allies and associated stuff like Lords of War and Flyers, etc, that a number of people did not like. Some of these changes were cemented into the rules in 7th. Allies were slightly tweaked, and some other stuff was stuck in (like Maelstrom) that also has been widely unpopular.

There was a huge issue with the price of the codexes doubling between 5th and 6th, and let's remember the rulebook jumped from £30 to £45 and then £50 in 7th.

I don't think 6th/7th are a hell of a lot worse than 3rd/4th/5th but they certainly are no better, and they are a lot more expensive.

 Azreal13 wrote:

Spoiler:

Really?

If I'm considering buying a video game, I generally go to one of the independent sources I trust, either in print or online and read a review that I can be fairly sure will give me as objective and critical view as is possible with a human in the equation. I might even read several.

Care to point to a source that is similar for wargames? Because I'm not aware of one.

With regard to a demo game, are you seriously suggesting that a pre-defined game, in a GW store, conducted by a GW staff member is going to give me the sort of information I need to make a critical assessment of the game as a whole? Because that will be the overwhelming majority of demo 40K games played around the world I suspect.

Do you credit a GW staffer (a salesman when all is said and done) with the honesty to explain how many of the purchases and decisions I may make, from army choice through to units through to which pieces I choose to glue onto my models could hugely influence how likely I am to be able to win, or even compete, in games? Is it possible, through playing a brief, small scale demo, to appreciate how I could equally make decisions based on models I simply liked to end up with a collection of models that is capable of eliciting negative reactions from other gamers, up to and including a refusal to play me?

All the other items you give as examples are relatively easy to assess, shoes fit or do not, a videogame will likely garner numerous reviews, as will a movie or many other entertainment products. A wargame however, needs an educated eye to assess it's strengths and weaknesses. That requires either investment of time and resources or the consultation of others with more experience. Now, unlike videogames or movies, wargaming isn't large enough to support a whole auxiliary industry of critics, if only there were some place where people with years, in many cases decades, of experience could all come together to share their experiences.....

Ah, that would never work, unless it was all relentlessly positive people would just dismiss it as hatred because they either didn't understand or agree with the arguments.

i haven't seen a gw store in about 10 years, i am talking about players doing there part to support what they love and not always needing some payed staff member to hold there hand

they only thing that will never work is the thing never tried

i got introduced to dakka in 98 by the guys that ran the shop in portsmouth nh, good group that bunch

forgotten ghosts wrote:
problem with that is what rules actually changed? the true revamp of the rules happened +/- 10 years ago, since then we have changed overwatch, put in snap firing, flyers and super heavies open topped gets hit by templates, subtract 2 instead dice drop highest, went back and forth on targeting specific floors of buildings, psychic phase hull points did i miss anything? the core rules have maybe been tweaked with in my age of gaming, but not many real changes since we started the 21st other than the whole apoc, and escalation merge into 40k

...
Adding an entire freaking phase isn't a real change? Just...

Nevermind.

The problem is both that the rules haven't changed, and the parts that have changed have done so for the worse.

The basis of the game is antiquated by other wargame standards. Rolling three dice to determine if you kill a model is long, tedious, and complicated while adding no depth to the game. Many games do the same thing in one roll, two at the most. While that seems like a minor quibble, multiply that by hundreds of rolls per game and you'll see the difference.

The parts that have changed for the worse are the merging of standard 40k and apoc with escalation and LoW. The game is still a skirmish rule set with many aspects of small level games, but shovels large company level gaming down your throat. The list building mechanics now are a bad joke at best, and a complete absence of rules at the worst.

rigeld2 wrote:

forgotten ghosts wrote:
problem with that is what rules actually changed? the true revamp of the rules happened +/- 10 years ago, since then we have changed overwatch, put in snap firing, flyers and super heavies open topped gets hit by templates, subtract 2 instead dice drop highest, went back and forth on targeting specific floors of buildings, psychic phase hull points did i miss anything? the core rules have maybe been tweaked with in my age of gaming, but not many real changes since we started the 21st other than the whole apoc, and escalation merge into 40k

...
Adding an entire freaking phase isn't a real change? Just...

Nevermind.

They just put the phase back to consolidate the psychic rules that were scattered all over the other phases of the game? Hardly a major change.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
A lot of people have stopped buying the game, for various combinations of reasons to do with price and not liking aspects of the modern rules.

The fact that you like the modern rules does not convince other people they are good. To get those people back, GW are going to have to change the rules and reduce the prices.

attest stuff

Price alone is not enough to explain the drop in GW sales. I can afford to buy the latest stuff every month, and I'm willing to bet there are a few folk on this site who have well-paid jobs and can equally shell out as well, without breaking sweat, or noticing the effect on their bank balance. Similary, I feel for the students and the poorer folk on this site who have genuine grievances about price hikes, but it's more complicated than prices.

I don't think it's a rules problem either, because if there is one single issue that everybody on dakka agrees 100% with, it's that GW has never produced a good rules set. They've produced ok rules sets, but everybody has at least one quibble with something.

For me, personally, I gave up the GW games because of my age and switched to historicals, because for some strange reason, nobody laughs at tiny, plastic British soldiers, but everybody laughs at tiny, plastic, goblins. Historicals are more respectable.

forgotten ghosts wrote:
problem with that is what rules actually changed? the true revamp of the rules happened +/- 10 years ago, since then we have changed overwatch, put in snap firing, flyers and super heavies open topped gets hit by templates, subtract 2 instead dice drop highest, went back and forth on targeting specific floors of buildings, psychic phase hull points did i miss anything? the core rules have maybe been tweaked with in my age of gaming, but not many real changes since we started the 21st other than the whole apoc, and escalation merge into 40k

Random charges, random warlord traits, random psychic powers, random terrain, random mission objectives, allies, flyers, LoWs, fortifications...

Most of those happened with the change from 5th to 6th, hence the steep decline in the player base that happened in 6th and the consequent scramble by GW to get them back with 7th. Only they didn't do anything to actually please the people that left because of those changes...

WayneTheGame wrote:

forgotten ghosts wrote:
and since i know this is coming next, what about the outrage people have about 7th

to which i respond have you played 7th i absolutely love it

Good for you, a lot of people don't play it and won't play it because they don't like the direction it was taking (same could be said of 6th). And, judging from the dropped sales, we are slowly getting to the point where more people are stopping playing.

While this is anecdotal, I know of at least 25 people who have stopped playing since 7th edition was announced. Most of this group (which includes me) consists of players who have been with the game off and on since 2nd edition. We don't show up to the FLGS anymore for game nights, many of us have sold off their armies, and many of us have moved onto other gaming systems.

The primary reason this happened is in protest of GW's merchandising. It would be safe to say the concerns that prompted this action break down like this: we don't like the accelerated release schedules for Editions, we don't like the fact you can't buy a Codex and field a useful army with it, we don't like the supplements at all, we don't like the cost to actually start an army, we don't like the push for superheavies / fortifications, and there's a grand sense that the creativity is gone. In general, it feels like GW is just trying to pick our pockets instead of giving us something clever and worth spending time on.

Between the 25 of us, we have probably introduced several thousand people to the hobby over the years. This is not an exaggeration, most of us have been active in the hobby for decades and several of us have run GW shops. We're all very aware of the role mentoring plays in the development of new players, and the fact that people don't generally just find the game and get started with it.

Assuming our experience is not unique, this is what will really kill GW: driving off the people who have really been the ones selling your games.