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The last time I went to GenCon was waaayyy back when Paizo released a softcover Beta for the brand new and shiny Pathfinder roleplaying game....

They got clobbered! People were buying stacks of the book.... (I got in early, and managed to snag two copies.)

People do a lot of business there... and I have no doubt that GW would not be an exception.

But instead, they have focused on their own con - Games Day!

Oh... wait....

The Auld Grump

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 darefsky wrote:
In all fairness Forgeworld has a sales booth at GenCon (or used to anyway).

That's because Forge World remain the only subsection of that company run by adults. It used to be them and Black Library, but BL succumbed to Horus Heresy-itis, and started doing limited edition books and not telling anyone about new releases until a week before and expensive hardbacks that no one asked for. Now FW remains the one group doing what they can to promote their product by going to various conventions across the world whilst fighting their own Horus Heresy-itis infection (it's already claimed their book-writing arm, but it hasn't spread to their brain yet).

Agreed. I still shake my head at the hard cover over $20 books. I mean come on GW...... Stupid pricing is stupid.... I can get a Jim Butcher or Larry Correia book for $8-10 on amazon and they are much better writers imho.

 darefsky wrote:
Larry Correia book for $8-10 on amazon and they are much better writers imho.

wow thanks for the tip. I Googled him and found his blog. Apparently he's really into warmachine..

http://monsterhunternation.com/

Did someone actually say that GW is handling FAQs better now? Farthest from the truth. I don't forget that 7E FAQs were days late and full of typos and copy + paste errors. When your errata needs errata, crap's bad.

 TheKbob wrote:
Did someone actually say that GW is handling FAQs better now? Farthest from the truth. I don't forget that 7E FAQs were days late and full of typos and copy + paste errors. When your errata needs errata, crap's bad.

I still find it ludicrous that every addition change / new codex drop needs a FAQ. Its poor planing and poor rules writing.

Through in data slates that co-release with a codex and it makes my brain melt that people still pay for this junk.

That is a good point. Completely ridiculous.

 puma713 wrote:

 heartserenade wrote:
Dunno man, 8 year old me would find the fluff pretty cool.

Until I look at the model. Why does it have an ugly head stuck outside a robot body?! It's not only impractical (I'm fine with the rule of cool), but that's definitely waaaay uncool.

Does anyone know if the head is interchangeable? I'm with you - I think it looks ridiculous, but leaving it off or swapping it with another would be passable.

Now about that name and fluff. . .

If I had enough money I would totally put a Razorgor head on the Murdernaught and mount him in a double-wide Wolf Chariot pulled by four wolves.

It is rather a lot to spend for a joke though.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 puma713 wrote:

 heartserenade wrote:
Dunno man, 8 year old me would find the fluff pretty cool.

Until I look at the model. Why does it have an ugly head stuck outside a robot body?! It's not only impractical (I'm fine with the rule of cool), but that's definitely waaaay uncool.

Does anyone know if the head is interchangeable? I'm with you - I think it looks ridiculous, but leaving it off or swapping it with another would be passable.

Now about that name and fluff. . .

If I had enough money I would totally put a Razorgor head on the Murdernaught and mount him in a double-wide Wolf Chariot pulled by four wolves.

It is rather a lot to spend for a joke though.

The Porsche of Porsches.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 puma713 wrote:

 heartserenade wrote:
Dunno man, 8 year old me would find the fluff pretty cool.

Until I look at the model. Why does it have an ugly head stuck outside a robot body?! It's not only impractical (I'm fine with the rule of cool), but that's definitely waaaay uncool.

Does anyone know if the head is interchangeable? I'm with you - I think it looks ridiculous, but leaving it off or swapping it with another would be passable.

Now about that name and fluff. . .

If I had enough money I would totally put a Razorgor head on the Murdernaught and mount him in a double-wide Wolf Chariot pulled by four wolves.

It is rather a lot to spend for a joke though.

I'm sure you could probably get some kind of Dakka collection going for that

 TheKbob wrote:
Did someone actually say that GW is handling FAQs better now? Farthest from the truth. I don't forget that 7E FAQs were days late and full of typos and copy + paste errors. When your errata needs errata, crap's bad.

And removed errata on 6th ed books (see also: Helldrake), confusing the issue on whether errata still applies

nobody wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
Did someone actually say that GW is handling FAQs better now? Farthest from the truth. I don't forget that 7E FAQs were days late and full of typos and copy + paste errors. When your errata needs errata, crap's bad.

And removed errata on 6th ed books (see also: Helldrake), confusing the issue on whether errata still applies

You'll know the answer when you buy your next version; less content, more price, all errata! Best Value!

 Pacific wrote:
[8 year old me would have found it cool. But, the 10/11 year old me that first got into GW did so precisely because it didn't appear childish. Actually, WD 126 (the famous Eldar issue) was the first copy I picked up from a local newsagent. The miniatures, artwork and stories inside had a cool 'adult' edge to it, which separated it from the other toys that you are moving away from at that age.

I think an element of this is getting older (moving away from it as it is moving away from me) but I think a good number of the new releases are far more toy-like, and the company in general seems far more sanitised and much less edgy - I guess part of that is the change to a bigger and more professional company (no room for boobs or racial skin tones!) but a side consequence of that is that I think it actually then appeals less to the target age group that GW are going for.

That's one of the things about GW. Regarding the full version of that quote by C S Lewis:

“Critics who treat 'adult' as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adult themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence. And in childhood and adolescence they are, in moderation, healthy symptoms. Young things ought to want to grow. But to carry on into middle life or even into early manhood this concern about being adult is a mark of really arrested development. When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”

I've heard 'putting away the fear of childishness' as a defence for tabletop wargaming, which I'd agree with, and even applied to GW games I think it has a point; but I have a feeling most 10-12 year-olds got into 40K because of that fear of childishness, or at least 'the desire to be very grown up'.
While there's a lot to like about GW's back-catalogue of fluff and minis, 40K has always been a bit goofy and OTT, and has become much more so (or less obviously tongue-in-cheek for the older gamer) in recent years. Though I'd guess that to a kid, at any point in GW's history, all the grimdarkness and ultraviolence must look dead badass, grown-up, and 'admirable'. Even the rules, with grown-up tables and fings, and centred around listbuilding and memorise-to-win, seem aimed at children coming off daytime cartoons, bland boardgames, and/or disorganised action figure/cops 'n' robbers games. After that I'd say it takes puberty, and occasionally a few extra years' worth of rehashes, for the novelty to wear thin.* Or to hold little appeal for a new, mature gamer.

Though for people who stick to it like a limpet for 20+ years... that's a whole 'nuther session on the couch.

*I call it the 'prequel syndrome'. Sure, Jar-Jar Binks and Mannequin Skywalker can't easily be called 'good' updates, but part of the problem has to be that we've gotten old since 1983. Or even 1980. We're not in the target market anymore.

I got into wargaming because I was into military science.

I hate to tell you this, but in no way does playing with toy soldiers count as 'very grown up'.

(The priest that introduced me to wargames also introduced me to RPGs - which he described as 'let's pretend, with rules'. He was also a huge fan of C. S. Lewis*, and used that quote extensively.)

The Auld Grump

* Indeed, many of the members of the Inklings.

Theres not wanting to be childish, and then theres not liking that something has grown so silly and over the top and just generally crap that its jumped the shark.

For me, 40K in recent years has become the latter. If I was ever worried about being childish, I would never have gotten into miniature wargaming in the first place.

(first Lord of the Rings, then Warhammer40K, and now I'm looking at starting Historical games)

For years my parents denigrated my hobby, calling it a waste of money and childish yet I stuck with it for the last 11 years. Its only in the last 3 years that I began to get really serious about painting and improving my skill that they became impressed and began to consider my hobby favourably.

Oh, I won't argue there - but the idea of miniatures being 'very grown up' is just silly.

Heck... take a look at Little Wars, which assumed that the wargamers were young, though the people that Wells played against were not children.

But the argument that GW has grown 'Very Childish' is true enough - the Space Wolves... are going to be tainted forever by what they did for this codex....

The Auld Grump

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Backfire wrote:
-quicker update schedule for Codices
-abandoning annual price hikes
-improved and more comprehensive FAQs

Do you want to know why so many at Dakka are quick to throw out titles like "White Knight", "Apologist", "Tireless Defender" and so on? It's because of disingenuous posts like this one above Backfire.

1. The quicker updates are to increase short-term profits. Their entire release schedule is about that now.
2 (and easily the most egregious and wilfully ignorant of the above). They now increase prices with each release, rather than in a block. You'd have to be blind not to see that by now.
3. Based on what? When a new FAQ comes out I tend to look for people like Yakface to break them down, and he's often left posting little emORKticons like "" at whatever new nonsense GW has managed to come out with. The latest batches of FAQ's created different rules depending on what medium you owned the book, with FAQ's and digital editions contradicting one another. GW don't try all that hard when it comes to errata. If they did they'd be more frequent about it, and they'd certainly be more accurate.

I'm no GW apologist, but I think it is disingenuine to automatically dismiss all possible reasons for GW's behaviour just because it also makes them a profit.

People have been asking for years for a faster release schedule, for online codices, for online updates. Now GW has given players all of these things. It might be that doing so increases short term profits... but at the same time, it does acquiesce to player demands. Which of those was the primary concern of GW is an exercise left to the reader, but I prefer to use Hanlon's Razor when making judgements like that.

People wanted online updates. Now we have online updates, and people are complaining that the books are out of sync and bashing GW for that. Well, what did you expect to happen?
People wanted faster release schedule. Now we have a 40k codex every month - and people are complaining that its too quick. I think there is a legitimate complaint here - there are just so many different rules coming out so fast that people really can't keep up. I think people were really asking for a codex every 2-3 months rather than waiting 10 years for a codex update for some people. But I think the far bigger problem is the balance between codexes and rules: if we could rely on things being balanced, a new codex every month wouldn't be a terrible thing, but it's really hard to play if next week there might be an army full of D-weapons or super-heavies around the corner.


You do have a valid point about the FAQ's. I did have a little bit of hope for them a while back - but they have actively regressed from that point. Look at the Tau FAQ. One (quite necessary for balance) errata about missile drones. There was a question/answer regarding suits with 2 of the same weapon, but it has disappeared. One change to a scenario in the Farsight supplement that no-one cares about. But nothing about the single most frequently asked question: can battlesuits suits fire 2 weapons on overwatch? Blargh. GW FAQ's are absolutely terrible.

Trasvi wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Backfire wrote:
-quicker update schedule for Codices
-abandoning annual price hikes
-improved and more comprehensive FAQs

Do you want to know why so many at Dakka are quick to throw out titles like "White Knight", "Apologist", "Tireless Defender" and so on? It's because of disingenuous posts like this one above Backfire.

1. The quicker updates are to increase short-term profits. Their entire release schedule is about that now.
2 (and easily the most egregious and wilfully ignorant of the above). They now increase prices with each release, rather than in a block. You'd have to be blind not to see that by now.
3. Based on what? When a new FAQ comes out I tend to look for people like Yakface to break them down, and he's often left posting little emORKticons like "" at whatever new nonsense GW has managed to come out with. The latest batches of FAQ's created different rules depending on what medium you owned the book, with FAQ's and digital editions contradicting one another. GW don't try all that hard when it comes to errata. If they did they'd be more frequent about it, and they'd certainly be more accurate.

I'm no GW apologist, but I think it is disingenuine to automatically dismiss all possible reasons for GW's behaviour just because it also makes them a profit.

People have been asking for years for a faster release schedule, for online codices, for online updates. Now GW has given players all of these things. It might be that doing so increases short term profits... but at the same time, it does acquiesce to player demands. Which of those was the primary concern of GW is an exercise left to the reader, but I prefer to use Hanlon's Razor when making judgements like that.

People wanted online updates. Now we have online updates, and people are complaining that the books are out of sync and bashing GW for that. Well, what did you expect to happen?
People wanted faster release schedule. Now we have a 40k codex every month - and people are complaining that its too quick. I think there is a legitimate complaint here - there are just so many different rules coming out so fast that people really can't keep up. I think people were really asking for a codex every 2-3 months rather than waiting 10 years for a codex update for some people. But I think the far bigger problem is the balance between codexes and rules: if we could rely on things being balanced, a new codex every month wouldn't be a terrible thing, but it's really hard to play if next week there might be an army full of D-weapons or super-heavies around the corner.

The problem with that is it assumes they do something that Kirby has said they specifically do not do - seek or ask for feedback of any kind. They just make their product and release it, and if it aligns with what the community wants, it's pretty much a coincidence.

If they released digital books, it's because they decided to internally, not because community outcry reached them. If they sped up the pace of releases, it's because they decided to internally, not because community outcry reached them.

Trasvi wrote:
I'm no GW apologist, but I think it is disingenuine to automatically dismiss all possible reasons for GW's behaviour just because it also makes them a profit.

When GW has been acting purely with a short term profit motive, to ascribe something that is perfectly explained by that to something else that they have shown no evidence for is silly. By GWs own admission they do no research so they don't know what we want so they *can't* give us something that we want because we want it, if they give us something we want it's purely accidental at this point. They just give us what they want to make - they've said this.

 Yonan wrote:

Trasvi wrote:
I'm no GW apologist, but I think it is disingenuine to automatically dismiss all possible reasons for GW's behaviour just because it also makes them a profit.

When GW has been acting purely with a short term profit motive, to ascribe something that is perfectly explained by that to something else that they have shown no evidence for is silly. By GWs own admission they do no research so they don't know what we want so they *can't* give us something that we want because we want it, if they give us something we want it's purely accidental at this point. They just give us what they want to make - they've said this.

Theres a lot of difference between the statement "We don't do market research" and "We have absolutely no idea at all what our customers want, and if they do talk to us we stick our fingers in our ears and sing 'lalala' until the pesky customer goes away".

I don't dispute that GW's main motivator is short term profit... but a really simple way to get short term profit is to give your customers what they want.

Trasvi wrote:

 Yonan wrote:

Trasvi wrote:
I'm no GW apologist, but I think it is disingenuine to automatically dismiss all possible reasons for GW's behaviour just because it also makes them a profit.

When GW has been acting purely with a short term profit motive, to ascribe something that is perfectly explained by that to something else that they have shown no evidence for is silly. By GWs own admission they do no research so they don't know what we want so they *can't* give us something that we want because we want it, if they give us something we want it's purely accidental at this point. They just give us what they want to make - they've said this.

Theres a lot of difference between the statement "We don't do market research" and "We have absolutely no idea at all what our customers want, and if they do talk to us we stick our fingers in our ears and sing 'lalala' until the pesky customer goes away".

I don't dispute that GW's main motivator is short term profit... but a really simple way to get short term profit is to give your customers what they want.

How about the statement "We don't ask them what they want, they buy what we make"?

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Oh, I won't argue there - but the idea of miniatures being 'very grown up' is just silly.

Heck... take a look at Little Wars, which assumed that the wargamers were young, though the people that Wells played against were not children.

But the argument that GW has grown 'Very Childish' is true enough - the Space Wolves... are going to be tainted forever by what they did for this codex....

The Auld Grump

meh, space wolves have always been dumb and they went fulltard ever since thunderwolf cavalry.

the wolf chariot is the turd cherry on top.

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Oh, I won't argue there - but the idea of miniatures being 'very grown up' is just silly.

Heck... take a look at Little Wars, which assumed that the wargamers were young, though the people that Wells played against were not children.

But the argument that GW has grown 'Very Childish' is true enough - the Space Wolves... are going to be tainted forever by what they did for this codex....

The Auld Grump

Little Wars is a set of rules for adults to play with toy soldiers. Kriegsspiel is a military simulation that was used for training Prussian army staff officers.

All modern wargames sit somewhere on a spectrum between the two extremes.

The Wolf Chariot is a silly thing, but it does not affect the quality of rules and the level of the prices.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Oh, I won't argue there - but the idea of miniatures being 'very grown up' is just silly.

Heck... take a look at Little Wars, which assumed that the wargamers were young, though the people that Wells played against were not children.

But the argument that GW has grown 'Very Childish' is true enough - the Space Wolves... are going to be tainted forever by what they did for this codex....

The Auld Grump

Little Wars is a set of rules for adults to play with toy soldiers. Kriegsspiel is a military simulation that was used for training Prussian army staff officers.

All modern wargames sit somewhere on a spectrum between the two extremes.

The Wolf Chariot is a silly thing, but it does not affect the quality of rules and the level of the prices.

Except as yet another example of writing rules in order to sell an overpriced... thing.... (Thing is a much kinder word than what went through my head.)

I had the old metal Master of the Ravenwing - which even Jervis Johnson admitted made no sense, given that he was a close combat character, in a vehicle that could not enter close combat....

So, yes - the Wolf Chariot does affect the quality of the rules, and the level of the prices - both at the same time. Or, more accurately, is a symptom of those problems.

And it is still better than Murderclaw.... (Here comes Murderclaw, here comes Murderclaw, right down Murderclaw lane....)

The Auld Grump

It is an example or symptom of bad rules and design rather than the cause of the rest of the game breaking down.

If we are honest with ourselves, GW has never been a bastion of excellent rules writing. It produced rules that were mostly tolerable until a few years ago given the other attractions of the games.

It is mainly pricing that has tanked their sales recently. Also the realisation that things will never get any better, only more expensive.

Regarding the new Logan Grimnar on his wolf drawn chariot of derpiness. Is that the only way he can be fielded now or can he still be played on foot, in Terminator Armour like the classic model? Logan himself looks really cool - if I played Space Wolves, I'd stick him on a large piece of slate to give him some verticality (so he looks like he's atop a rocky outcrop spurring his men onwards to charge) and attach him to a squad of Wolf Guard Terminators.

And then melt down the chariot or something...

At least with got the stuff that forgeworld churns out, their imperil armour and heresy books is what 40k should be like. it's a shame really whats happening to honestly an absolutely awesome product and universe

 agnosto wrote:

 darefsky wrote:
Larry Correia book for $8-10 on amazon and they are much better writers imho.

wow thanks for the tip. I Googled him and found his blog. Apparently he's really into warmachine..

http://monsterhunternation.com/

He's also written a few books for Privateer as well. I've only read the Makeda novella so far, but it was excellent.

Backfire wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

Backfire wrote:
"No market research" does not mean that they do not listen to their customer base at all - they do get feedback, they must be well aware what are the most common complaints, and it is obvious that some changes in recent years have been results of customer feedback. Sure, they might not listen customers that MUCH, but it doesn't mean that they're completely ignorant about what average Joe Gamer feels.

I really think they are. What "changes in recent years" can you verify are because of customer feedback? I'm aware of literally zero.

I've mentioned them before, but here goes again:

-quicker update schedule for Codices
-abandoning annual price hikes
-improved and more comprehensive FAQs

You can verify they've done these because of customer feedback? And really..
-Customer feedback (that I saw) wanted oldest codexes redone first... why are GK already being redone?
-instead they're just hiking the price of "new" boxes. Significantly in many cases. Much stealthier method.
-This is a joke, right? They're not improved, and they're actually less comprehensive. Questions that were answered in the 6th edition versions are now up in the air again because they didn't copy/paste them over and their "awesome" rules writing didn't cover the issue.

So i played the Conquest, the GW equivalent to High Command, yesterday at the FLGS... and... i really enjoyed it.

Although it definitely screams "we are jsut aping PP, and hoping for spillover from their ideas/success" it was genuinely enjoyable.

My biggest complaint is that the game has 6 factions but is only has rules for 2 player games. This seems extra daft when the gameshop owner and I came up with a multiplayer version that worked with the existing framework (and better than high command, arguably) in the 5-10 mins we were chatting between our 1st and 2nd game.

Kiwidru wrote:
So i played the Conquest, the GW equivalent to High Command, yesterday at the FLGS... and... i really enjoyed it.

Although it definitely screams "we are jsut aping PP, and hoping for spillover from their ideas/success" it was genuinely enjoyable.

My biggest complaint is that the game has 6 factions but is only has rules for 2 player games. This seems extra daft when the gameshop owner and I came up with a multiplayer version that worked with the existing framework (and better than high command, arguably) in the 5-10 mins we were chatting between our 1st and 2nd game.

Just to let you know, Fantasy Flight Games worked on 40k Conquest, not GW.