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 RunicFIN wrote:

A company that has continued to grow for 6 years running, had it´s best results very recently, and is now suffering a minor sales setback for one report ( so far ) isn´t still going strong asfar as you´re concerned? Does it seem like they are struggling to survive, hanging onto a thread, then?

Uh, wut?

They are in decline. Their response to reduced sales was increased prices which further reduced sales. In order to maintain profits, they began cutting costs. They reduced stores to 1-man operations, closed their bunkers in the US. They got rid of games days and closed their other european offices. They dropped metal in favor of resin for low volume models. Then they ramped up their release schedule ( we went from 8 Codex releases in all of 5th edition to 12 in 6th and already 4 in 7th) and profits are still down 42% over the previous year. That is not the mark of a growing company.

They are in decline, but we don't know if that will actually lead to "death" or if they will stabilize at some new, lower level of revenue and profitability. And that doesn't mean that every local scene will react the same. Some areas will see 40k boom. In others it will wink out of existence. Overall it will be less than before given the current trend line. The problem with these kinds of threads is that people let their local experiences form the basis for their view of the company's health.

 Arschbombe wrote:
They are in decline, but we don't know if that will actually lead to "death" or if they will stabilize at some new, lower level of revenue and profitability. And that doesn't mean that every local scene will react the same. Some areas will see 40k boom. In others it will wink out of existence. Overall it will be less than before given the current trend line. The problem with these kinds of threads is that people let their local experiences form the basis for their view of the company's health.

Underlined part a million times. Indeed, they are now suffering from a downward direction. It is my point exactly that this can however mean nothing in the end. Even bouncing back is a possibility just asmuch as it not happening. It´s a fact they are doing worse now than say, last year.

The fact alone that there are now more options than ever before when it comes to wargaming makes it so players will be divided among games, some permanently, some take turns in conjunction with their local groups between games or their own interests, and so on. This doesn´t mean the death of any game, by any manufacturer, from any logical viewpoint.

 RunicFIN wrote:
I have indeed noticed some individuals who truly lack any true understanding whatsoever ( or experience, for that matter ) on how companies of this size function and what is required for certain scenarios to be even likely let alone in effect.

It has now been stated in this thread alone that revenue doesn´t prove anything, that you should neither look at sales, and now profit won´t do either.

I guess we need a chart of how many keystrokes Tom Kirby has typed on his chairman´s preambles over the years, as this, when surveyed with some unfathomable logic, will provide us with an accurate and satisfying factual statistic of how GW is doing that satisfies all parties. It requires however that we add to this the amount of codices ruined by Matt Ward and divide the result with great pictures created by John Blanche, end result will tell us in a 0-100 scale how GW is faring.

Who stated revenue doesn't prove anything? Certainly not something I noticed. Revenue is THE thing, it's a hard number that can't be manipulated, massaged or misrepresented, unlike profit which can be manipulated up or down to suit your own objectives, or sales, which are a wonderful, ephemeral thing which can defined and redefined to suit your own purposes. Revenue has been demonstrated, using GW's own figures, to have been in decline for a number of years once adjusted for inflation. This means less money has been going into GW's coffers, which, in turn, for a retail/wholesale company means people are buying less stuff from them. If you'd like to argue otherwise, go right ahead, but I insist you show your working, just making statements of belief and fairly poor sarcasm isn't going to cut it I'm afraid.

If they don't fix things though, they'll learn nothing. The absolute worst possible outcome is that GW still writes crappy rules, sells overpriced figures, but only has let's say 25% of the market instead of 50% (numbers for example purposes only) and continues chugging along. That's not what any of us want, ultimately. We want them to look at declining sales and go "Oh crap what the heck were we doing?" and fix things: Write better rules, price models appropriately, foster the game and community and local retailers, and turn themselves around.

That's what *I* want anyways, because I do want to play again just not with how GW currently is.

WayneTheGame wrote:
If they don't fix things though, they'll learn nothing. The absolute worst possible outcome is that GW still writes crappy rules, sells overpriced figures, but only has let's say 25% of the market instead of 50% (numbers for example purposes only) and continues chugging along. That's not what any of us want, ultimately. We want them to look at declining sales and go "Oh crap what the heck were we doing?" and fix things: Write better rules, price models appropriately, foster the game and community and local retailers, and turn themselves around.

I agree partially ( I don´t find the rules "crappy" even if the aren´t perfect and I have a good time every time I play 40k. ) Though I would be fine them having "example 25%" of the market than 50%, if that would result in better balanced rules and some of the stupider things like 1 unit codices and dataslates being removed ( I´m still okay with the miniature prices personally, but I wouldn´t be mad if they got cheaper. ) What I mean is that if being smaller is what it takes for things to improve ( as in being forced to alter their strategies, if it doesn´t happen voluntarily ) then by all means. I have faith that they will keep going as they have done all the time, and there´s clearly effort in changing things for the better even if it´s not exactly what someone wants. Codices are now better balanced than before ( albeit still not comparable to WM, but in their own scale. ) and the 7th ed rules are allround better than 6th and massively improved from 5th. New starter kits with more faction options are being made, and they´re pushing out codices to have them all on the same line ( or that´s their goal anyway. )

My own prediction is that they might do some improvements in the future, but probably not asmuch as some people want ( cheap books, cheap miniatures, WM level rules balance, reopened forums, easier entry to the game all combined ) and that they will continue to function as the largest or one of the largest wargame manufacturers for a long long time.

What I hope is even the most biased people will give GW a chance should they continue doing things for the better ( or do completely new things that some people want ) instead of continuing the GW doom/hatecycle just because. It´s a sad thing if they take a new good direction and the community just keeps on hating as they can -never- satisfy everyone.

 RunicFIN wrote:
What I hope is even the most biased people will give GW a chance should they continue doing things for the better ( or do completely new things that some people want ) instead of continuing the GW doom/hatecycle just because. It´s a sad thing if they take a new good direction and the community just keeps on hating as they can -never- satisfy everyone.

I think most of us would, just that GW has shown that they don't care about doing things better as long as they have loyal fans who keep buying anything they produce, and they actively ignore feedback and even communication. As I said, I would love to play 40k again. I have a community of 40k players. I refuse to get into it because the game rules from what I have seen are all over the place and the cost is astronomical. If they fixed those issues, I'd even be tempted to drop WM/H for 40k again. Since they don't though, I play WM/H which has better rules and feels like I get more for my money.

Imagine a GW that actively communicates, teasing new releases, providing alpha/beta rules to get feedback, has the devs on Twitter to ask rules clarifications, writes a balanced game and supports the local stores and doesn't price their figures like collectibles when they aren't anywhere close but prices them comparatively and offers deals and discounts and bundles. That GW I would support 100%.

Yeah, nothing bad about that, why not.

I am still supporting them and loving the games, while acknowledging simultaneously that they could vastly improve some things with fairly little effort. I have faith that one day they will. Then again, it´s not like every company has to function the same way and I got no gripes about that, the level of customer interaction varies with all companies and GW is far from being the only one with a miniscule trend on that.

It cannot be denied however that their popularity wouldn´t increase if they would do the things you mentioned in your last post example. It´s given.

I guess it´s like I´m looking at a good friend do dumb, but not dead serious things with his life, knowing him well enough that I can rest assured he´ll get his act together one day, one way or another. When that happens I don´t know, but I have faith it shall be so.

 RunicFIN wrote:
Yeah, nothing bad about that, why not.

I am still supporting them and loving the games, while acknowledging simultaneously that they could vastly improve some things with fairly little effort. I have faith that one day they will. Then again, it´s not like every company has to function the same way and I got no gripes about that, the level of customer interaction varies with all companies and GW is far from being the only one with a miniscule trend on that.

It cannot be denied however that their popularity wouldn´t increase if they would do the things you mentioned in your last post example. It´s given.

I guess it´s like I´m looking at a good friend do dumb, but not dead serious things with his life, knowing him well enough that I can rest assured he´ll get his act together one day, one way or another. When that happens I don´t know, but I have faith it shall be so.

I can't support the prices. I could maybe deal with the rules, but not paying $230USD for 750 points, or having a $50 kit that doesn't even come with enough options to fully outfit the unit in all the ways I want without buying another $50 kit.

I say that, but if they came out with plastic Plague Marines I'd be VERY tempted, but likely still the price would be offputting enough to not make it worth it overall.

The issue with the "managed decline" theory is that it would have to be done with a great deal more competence than it is easy to credit the current management team with.

GW are profitable now, but they have a massive cost base, and their revenue is perilously close to dipping below the tipping point where their expenditure outweighs their income.

Should that point be hit, the wheels will come off in short order, being unable to pay rent, utilities and wages tends to do that to a business.

Certainly a smaller business that can react more quickly is probably suited to this industry much better, but a managed decline of that nature is incredibly hard to do, and will be massively unpopular with the share holders.


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 RunicFIN wrote:
Yeah, nothing bad about that, why not.

I am still supporting them and loving the games, while acknowledging simultaneously that they could vastly improve some things with fairly little effort. I have faith that one day they will. Then again, it´s not like every company has to function the same way and I got no gripes about that, the level of customer interaction varies with all companies and GW is far from being the only one with a miniscule trend on that.

It cannot be denied however that their popularity wouldn´t increase if they would do the things you mentioned in your last post example. It´s given.

I guess it´s like I´m looking at a good friend do dumb, but not dead serious things with his life, knowing him well enough that I can rest assured he´ll get his act together one day, one way or another. When that happens I don´t know, but I have faith it shall be so.

At what age do you begin to wonder if he's capable of putting things right? Because this 'friend' is knocking on for 40 and still not getting things right.

40K seems to be holding out in my area. To be honest I read all the 40K hate threads on here, and the complaints seem to be great reasons to hate the game, on paper. To be honest with oyu I have NEVER encountered a single super heavy unit, forge world unit, or an unbound list, NOT ONE. I have a friend who has encountered a player with super heavies though, he said that played asked him if he wanted to play against it, when he said no the player simply did not field the super heavy. At the end of the day this game is about having fun, sure the game is not perfect, but what game is? Honestly my opinion on most of the issues that people complain about with 40K goes back to my opinion on most issues with most games. If you want to take super heavies, forge world, or unbound, ask your opponent if they want to play against that, and honestly JUST DON'T BE A DICK. wave serpent spam? Rip tide spam? Dick moves, don't do them. The quality of the game comes from the quality of the players.

Things is, that's like saying "giving alcoholic, drug dependant, hyper aggressive psychopaths free hand guns is fine, because nobody has ever shot me in the face."

Just because it hasn't happened to you, and that's great BTW, doesn't mean it can't, or hasn't happened to other people, and it doesn't make it a good idea. Much better idea is to not give/take away the guns and then nobody gets shot by the psycho.

True. Sadly some of us have some awful players as our only regular opponents and there isn't a lot you can say where there idea of fun is different to yours but still entirely within the rules of the game.

 EVIL INC wrote:
As i said before, believe what you like. Someone who has actually done their homework knows better. If you want to totally ignore economics go right ahead. Perhaps someday, you will take a few classes in order to understand them.

Again, I have two degrees in this sort of thing and do it for a living, and you're the guy who clearly isn't aware of how accounting and financial reporting for a publicly traded company works here. Knock off the flame-bait, that's what got you banned from Warseer.

Your lack of knowledge on that subject aside (because it is meaningless to the actual topic here), when YOU FIRST decided that you liked 40k. Did you ring up GW and find out their financials before you were willing to say "Thats cool. I think I'll try it out"?

Hooray. yet another red herring fallacy.

Exactly how do you think that that graph will cause every single person who likes 40k to immediately stop playing worldwide?

How/where/why did I say any of that or try to make it out like that's my intention in any way?

Short answer? I didn't. You are making things up and putting words in my mouth. Stop that.

Even more than that, how do you think it will cause every one of us who likes the game or the mythos or models to immediately change our minds?

Again, never something I tried to do, that's entirely in your own mind.

Because THIS is what the thread is about. How popular the game is or do we still like it.

Yes, how popular the game is. We were looking at GW's financials to see how much people are still buying as an indication of how healthy the game is on a macro-scale as reflected by the level of sales. I'm not sure how hard that is to understand here for you.

Even those small minority who are unhappy with the current rules are outnumbered by newcomers who like them.

Without taking a side on that, do you have any sort of metric to use as proof of that, or just your say so?

Also, even those few minority still like the game, the mythos and models.

not debating that at all, for like the millionth time.

You just don't understand Vakthathi. You don't have the secret knowledge that Tom Kirby will provide once you become a level GW-IV, after which point you can take a cruise with the management and be shown the truth of how amazing GW is.

Still not seeing any hard evidence that GW isn't in a decline. I'm not a business guy. But there are many people who are and anyone who knows anything about it say GW is in a decline. (Not just a slump or cycle, but a decline.)

What I'm saying is, given that it's in a decline, they need to chance or they will continue to decline until they level out at a much lower area or go under all together.

But in order to pull out, they have to make positive changes and that won't happen until they listen to the customer and pull their heads out of the sand.

 Accolade wrote:
You just don't understand Vakthathi. You don't have the secret knowledge that Tom Kirby will provide once you become a level GW-IV, after which point you can take a cruise with the management and be shown the truth of how amazing GW is.

Unfortunately the cruise ship is a Citadel Fineboat™ and sinks due to holes.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 EVIL INC wrote:
As i said before, believe what you like. Someone who has actually done their homework knows better. If you want to totally ignore economics go right ahead. Perhaps someday, you will take a few classes in order to understand them.

Again, I have two degrees in this sort of thing and do it for a living, and you're the guy who clearly isn't aware of how accounting and financial reporting for a publicly traded company works here. Knock off the flame-bait, that's what got you banned from Warseer.

Your lack of knowledge on that subject aside (because it is meaningless to the actual topic here), when YOU FIRST decided that you liked 40k. Did you ring up GW and find out their financials before you were willing to say "Thats cool. I think I'll try it out"?

Hooray. yet another red herring fallacy.

Exactly how do you think that that graph will cause every single person who likes 40k to immediately stop playing worldwide?

How/where/why did I say any of that or try to make it out like that's my intention in any way?

Short answer? I didn't. You are making things up and putting words in my mouth. Stop that.

Even more than that, how do you think it will cause every one of us who likes the game or the mythos or models to immediately change our minds?

Again, never something I tried to do, that's entirely in your own mind.

Because THIS is what the thread is about. How popular the game is or do we still like it.

Yes, how popular the game is. We were looking at GW's financials to see how much people are still buying as an indication of how healthy the game is on a macro-scale as reflected by the level of sales. I'm not sure how hard that is to understand here for you.

Even those small minority who are unhappy with the current rules are outnumbered by newcomers who like them.

Without taking a side on that, do you have any sort of metric to use as proof of that, or just your say so?

Also, even those few minority still like the game, the mythos and models.

not debating that at all, for like the millionth time.

For your own sanity, stop.
EVIL INC isn't *enter metaphor for an intelligent human being here*.

I don't think he's ignorant at all really. I just think he's trolling the bejesus out of these threads in hopes of getting them derailed and locked.

As to why? The only reason I can get at it he doesn't like people talking bad about poor defenseless GW.

I find all these graphs pretty meaningless without context and comparison. So real revenue is down, that much we know. But what does it mean? How will it affect GW, how does the market react, how does this compare to other similarly sized companies during the same time frame, how big are the influences from external factors (the financial crisis for example), etc. We need more information to make any sort of judgment.

A pro-GW poster who got banned from Warseer.

Think on that....


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Mymearan wrote:
I find all these graphs pretty meaningless without context and comparison. So real revenue is down, that much we know. But what does it mean? How will it affect GW, how does the market react, how does this compare to other similarly sized companies during the same time frame, how big are the influences from external factors (the financial crisis for example), etc. We need more information to make any sort of judgment.

Not really.

GW are unique in their sector, but their closest competitors (who are not comparable in size or structure) seem to be showing growth, there is little to be gained by comparing GW to similar companies who aren't in the wargaming sector, so any meaningful comparison is not really achievable. One could, perhaps, compare their performance to a more general toy manufacturer, but I think the results would be limited.

There is no correlation between GW financial performance and the financial crisis, a claim that GW make which seems borne out by fact. In fact there's good evidence to suggest that small luxuries do well in times of recession as people 'treat' themselves on smaller things while not being able to afford new cars or holidays.

Real revenue is down. Customers and third party retailers are giving GW less cash, it really is that simple. The reasons are where it gets complex, and without a wide ranging survey, can only be speculated about.

Within a few weeks we will have another report, which will again make it easier to make some more concrete assumptions, but there is plenty of info out there already.

Wow. A pro-GW poster banned from pro-GW Warseer.

I'm in the boat that GW is moving slowly downhill and they know it.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 RunicFIN wrote:
No evidence whatsoever has been displayed about the popularity of 40K as a game in the scale of the whole wargaming community.

The strange thing to me is that anecdotally 40k is actually dying even faster in popularity than it is in sales.

ive seen the exact opposite (it is growing in popularity but not as much in sales although sales are still on the rise anecdotally speaking of course.and spoken with others outside of my geographical area who agree as well. From what I have gathered, this is due to prices and such things as nversions, 3rd party models and agnetizing to uild upbulk out armies.

Of course, as we have seen, the graph has nothing to the subject and only a fool would think it is. This is one example of why that you mentioned. The supposed profits (with no information regarding where the numbers came from or ho they were gatheredhe background information that wwnednformation) y is not a truy accurate reflection of ow much players actually like the game
The thread is not about profits or sales, it is about popularity. his is shown by actual gaming and the time a player will spend on the hobby. As mentioned, even though GW is secure in s, if some catasrophic change happened overnight to close the company down, the game would STILL be played. We would still love the mythos and we wuld still se fan fiction and home brewed rules. No one has been able to disprove this yet. Although I have seen red herrings and smoke screens, I have yet to see actual evidence that the game is 'dead".

I want to see this graph of people who like 7th more than those who don't. Because being slightly better than 6th (oh wow, better than the edition that was so terrible GW felt the need to replace it in 2 years to stop the hemoraging) and having to deal with unbound and a bunch of other crap does not mean I like it or many like it more than say 5th 4th or 3rd. In fact the only improvement over say 5th that 7th has in my opinion is the random game objectives breaks up the monotony of cross the board and punch each other, all while playing king of the hill on D3+2 objectives.

 Orock wrote:
I want to see this graph of people who like 7th more than those who don't. Because being slightly better than 6th (oh wow, better than the edition that was so terrible GW felt the need to replace it in 2 years to stop the hemoraging) and having to deal with unbound and a bunch of other crap does not mean I like it or many like it more than say 5th 4th or 3rd. In fact the only improvement over say 5th that 7th has in my opinion is the random game objectives breaks up the monotony of cross the board and punch each other, all while playing king of the hill on D3+2 objectives.

We had a poll about which edition was your favourite, after a bit of searching I dug it up...

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/120/606652.page#7106922



So yeah, at least on Dakka, more people liked 5th and 4th edition individually than liked 6th and 7th edition combined.

Honestly, as a TO for one of our cities gaming stores, I've only ever seen unbound lists when people want to take a couple of things extra that they normally couldn't. 4 predators instead of 3 and so on. The worst people were expecting, an army of riptides for instance, has not happened yet in our game stores. Mainly because no one wants to:
A) buy that many riptides
B)play againsy an army like that.
Most TO's agreed that our tournaments will have limitations force org. wise. As well as house rules need to be in play.
Worst that GW has done really is make the game expensive, and make rules that either aren't very clear, or result in unnecessary arguing.

I mean, I honestly don't know how people liked 5th edition. I didn't play back then, but I've heard a lot about the rules. It sounds pretty terrible to me.

I actually prefer 7th over 6th, mainly because it fixed a lot of cheese. (I'm looking at you, Taudar). Granted, there's always still more cheese to be found, it just isn't as easily done now.

On the topic of if 40k is dying, well, hmm. On a personal level, I still love the game, as imbalanced as it can be. It's mainly the idea of dreading my 7th ed. Necron book. I feel there are a lot of special rules that units should have that would make them fluffy and flavorful, and yet a lot of the time it doesn't happen. Hence, my 7th ed. book, whether or not it's better, might make me reconsider playing this game.

 EVIL INC wrote:


Of course, as we have seen, the graph has nothing to the subject and only a fool would think it is. ...
...

Given that the fundamental law of economics is that stuff sells if people want it, the fact that GW stuff is selling less might be taken to indicate that people want it less.

Leaving that aside, it is rude to call members fools.

 krodarklorr wrote:
I mean, I honestly don't know how people liked 5th edition. I didn't play back then, but I've heard a lot about the rules. It sounds pretty terrible to me.

There aren't enough in the world....

 krodarklorr wrote:
I actually prefer 7th over 6th, mainly because it fixed a lot of cheese.

I think the general consensus is most people who really liked 6th above and beyond earlier editions tend to like 7th even more. Hence why 6th didn't get many likes, but 5th and 7th got quite a few.

 Azreal13 wrote:

 krodarklorr wrote:
I mean, I honestly don't know how people liked 5th edition. I didn't play back then, but I've heard a lot about the rules. It sounds pretty terrible to me.

There aren't enough in the world....

I mean, sorry. But as a Necron player, I don't think I would enjoy using 5th edition rules. Play Rhino bunkers, then I can't do anything to you. How is that fun?