Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

That's how we built 40k, wwx, and aos around here. Not many played 40k, so our group of four started playing at our flgs every other weekend. Folks would stop and watch us play, ask us questions about the game, etc. This grew to 20+ folks (which has declined to about 2 with 7th edition).

We tried playing wwx and grew that community. Most players are getting older (30's) and having kids, and have moved on to the shorter and faster paced aos. This started with a few and has been growing slowly but steady.

I've seen a game played, but never with AoS models. I know some of the DZC guys I play with have given it a go with their WFB armies, but nobody was making new purchases, and all were skeptical. I don't know if they kept it up, but never heard more about it.

Completely dead.

I went to Crisis 2015 in Antwerpen/Anvers (Belgium) this Saturday. It's a small convention for all kinds of miniature wargames. And there was a stand for GW, next to Forgeworld.

Strangely enough, the GW stand only showed Age of Sigmar. There was absolutely NO 40k to buy, only AoS (well, to be fair, there was Forgeworld for that next to them). In the showcases, we could only see the Stormcast Eternals miniatures. There was a video and all, so they really did their job for a nice stand.

It feels like GW still needs to "spread the word" about their new game.

What was quite funny is that just close to the GW stand, there was a really great table of...Kings of War, with some GW's old miniatures in regiments. It was quite a big battle, with lots of units on a roughly 8' / 4'.

There were some tables for 40k to play (by players who have nothing to do with GW employees), but absolutely no AoS. Only the GW stand has a demo table for that. Of course, many other games were on show as well.

Display and demo games at shows need to have visual impact to attract the attention of visitors.

I know this is to some extent a subjective opinion, but in my view, a couple of dozen Sigmarines in blobs of six, all nearly identical in armour, don't challenge the display of a large historical battle game involving several hundred troops in colourful uniforms, with banners and so on, drawn up in ranks.

If you are going to do a skirmish game, it helps to have superb terrain and a recogniseable setting, like 7TV's James Bond-alike SpyFi styling, or Doctor Who, or a Samurai hack-em-up.

The Sigmarines don't even look human in their armour, and a casual onlooker won't be able to discern anything about the back story or setting.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Display and demo games at shows need to have visual impact to attract the attention of visitors.
.

To be honest, there was visual impact at their stand. They had a table to play at AoS, with the content of the starter box of course. And they had a video and a showcase with painted miniatures you could easily see (they weren't many, that's true). It was well prepared.

But yeah, there was no big table with hundred of painted miniatures for AoS. Kings of War, on the other hand, has that. That's why it was funny to see them that close to each other.

For the background, the employees were also there for that. It's easier to tell the people rather than showing such a thing. After all, what catches the eye first in a miniature game you never saw are the miniatures - artworks and nice "cosplay" costumes also help for that.

Warlord Games were also there to present their new Beyond the Gates of Antares starter box. By the way, we had a free miniature at the entry - and it was an Antares one on its plastic prue.

We could also see a cosplay of Space Marine (quite impressive because in scale!) and Imperial Guardswoman. That's why it was strange to see the GW stand without any 40k product on show. Next to them, Forgeworld was more a shop than a stand...everything was in boxes and we couldn't really see some miniatures in showcases. Granted, it would have taken too much place...

GW should have got a person in Sigmarine uniform. It would look quite spectacular done well in shiny gold and lapiz lazuli blue, with a big magic spear that lights up. Easy and cheap for a big company like GW to do, and cna be used at many events around the world.

Of course, it's only in the past year that GW have started to go to non-GW events at all, but they have such a long history of running their own events, from the early 1980s onwards, that it's difficult to understand why their marketing presentation should be so amateurish these days.

Forge World always is a shop at shows, in my experience. They are quite a specialist company that sells to high end involved players rather than ordinary people walking by. They have always attended non-GW shows too.

It appears that AoS is pretty much a non-entity here at the biggest FLGS in the city as of now, and I haven't seen it played at either of the other two smaller stores near me any time recently.

Conversely, that larger store had its first KoW tournament yesterday, and had 16 players show up. There is already another one planned for right after the Christmas holidays (they didn't want to schedule one between Thanksgiving and Christmas to avoid competing with holiday spending and holiday travel).

The big trend I see is that in any FLGS that is tournament-oriented, you're not going to see Age of Sigmar being played.

Age of Sigmar seems to be big with casual for fun narrative RPG types as opposed to competitive gamers that like tournament and league play.

Those type of players I find also rarely play their games at FLGS, and are more in their garages and game rooms at home.

The downside of that of course is no visibility.

auticus wrote:
The big trend I see is that in any FLGS that is tournament-oriented, you're not going to see Age of Sigmar being played.

Age of Sigmar seems to be big with casual for fun narrative RPG types as opposed to competitive gamers that like tournament and league play.

Those type of players I find also rarely play their games at FLGS, and are more in their garages and game rooms at home.

The downside of that of course is no visibility.

Their game not being shown in Tournament-oriented FLGS's doesn't really matter for GW because they don't want their game to be played anyway, right?

For my area there is only 3 people that play the game, including public groups and college clubs. They have recently banded together to play Thursdays at my FLGS, and when asked if I want to play I give it a try. It's a fairly awful game, but the people are kind and try comps to make it easier to play. Heck our blood bowl league is 20 people strong, so that kinda shows the size gap.

I was in GW Oxford today and no-one was playing it. Mind you, no-one was playing anything and there were only three customers in the shop, all post-grad student looking types. But Tuesday afternoon, what can you expect?

The big front of shop display was 30K Revenge of Caith.

I don't often visit the flgs ( I mostly buy over the internet and play with friends at home), but not long ago I bought some Fantasy miniatures at the flgs to get rid of some cash, and the store manager told me that everyone there tought AoS was a lot of fun and it was gaining popularity.
So yeah, it seems to be going strong there. I also play it with my friends. It is a lot of fun, altough I wish GW would have kept supporting WHFB besides it. But we can always continue to play 8th.

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

auticus wrote:
The big trend I see is that in any FLGS that is tournament-oriented, you're not going to see Age of Sigmar being played.

Age of Sigmar seems to be big with casual for fun narrative RPG types as opposed to competitive gamers that like tournament and league play.

Those type of players I find also rarely play their games at FLGS, and are more in their garages and game rooms at home.

The downside of that of course is no visibility.

Their game not being shown in Tournament-oriented FLGS's doesn't really matter for GW because they don't want their game to be played anyway, right?

I am pretty sure GW hates tournament-oriented players. They don't forge the narrative hard enough
That said, the narrative is exactly what makes games like AoS and 40k so much fun, so I don't get why tournament-oriented players don't play games that were made to be played competitively. Having given competitive Warmachine a try, it is so much more fun than a 40k tournament, let alone trying to play AoS competitively. IMO, you should go with the ruleset that best fits with the way you want to play, rather than trying to "fix" and force a ruleset into something it is not.

That is something I never understood. A tournament player had to buy 2250pts to even start playing, because most tournaments were played at 2250pts or more. A narrative player would buy some models here and there and maybe get 1500pts and then move to something else. He would not update his army, he would not buy a new army, if what he bought suddenly went bad. Better yet, the tournament player would buy the over priced models many times over to have a good army, while the bad player would settle with buying a box of something, and paint them or something like that. It is as if GW didn't want money from people.

Tournament players want well written rules. GW's "Narrative" players will put up with anything.

Tournament players are simply too much work, despite being the ones that spend all the money and drive all the recruitment.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
I don't often visit the flgs ( I mostly buy over the internet and play with friends at home), but not long ago I bought some Fantasy miniatures at the flgs to get rid of some cash, and the store manager told me that everyone there tought AoS was a lot of fun and it was gaining popularity.
So yeah, it seems to be going strong there. I also play it with my friends. It is a lot of fun, altough I wish GW would have kept supporting WHFB besides it. But we can always continue to play 8th.

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

auticus wrote:
The big trend I see is that in any FLGS that is tournament-oriented, you're not going to see Age of Sigmar being played.

Age of Sigmar seems to be big with casual for fun narrative RPG types as opposed to competitive gamers that like tournament and league play.

Those type of players I find also rarely play their games at FLGS, and are more in their garages and game rooms at home.

The downside of that of course is no visibility.

Their game not being shown in Tournament-oriented FLGS's doesn't really matter for GW because they don't want their game to be played anyway, right?

I am pretty sure GW hates tournament-oriented players. They don't forge the narrative hard enough
That said, the narrative is exactly what makes games like AoS and 40k so much fun, so I don't get why tournament-oriented players don't play games that were made to be played competitively. Having given competitive Warmachine a try, it is so much more fun than a 40k tournament, let alone trying to play AoS competitively. IMO, you should go with the ruleset that best fits with the way you want to play, rather than trying to "fix" and force a ruleset into something it is not.

The thing is, with "some" tweaks 40k/FB are bearable for tournament settings, but AoS is not so without a major rehaul.

In the end the only side losing with AoS being clearly made to alienate competitive players is GW - they're losing a lot of money.

Herzlos wrote:
Tournament players want well written rules. GW's "Narrative" players will put up with anything.

Tournament players are simply too much work, despite being the ones that spend all the money and drive all the recruitment.

They do spend money and do drive recruitment, but I haven't seen any evidence as to how much of it. Would be interesting though.

Herzlos wrote:
Tournament players want well written rules. GW's "Narrative" players will put up with anything.

Tournament players are simply too much work, despite being the ones that spend all the money and drive all the recruitment.

Don't let GW catch you saying that... remember the 20%!

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
I don't often visit the flgs ( I mostly buy over the internet and play with friends at home), but not long ago I bought some Fantasy miniatures at the flgs to get rid of some cash, and the store manager told me that everyone there tought AoS was a lot of fun and it was gaining popularity.
So yeah, it seems to be going strong there. I also play it with my friends. It is a lot of fun, altough I wish GW would have kept supporting WHFB besides it. But we can always continue to play 8th.

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

auticus wrote:
The big trend I see is that in any FLGS that is tournament-oriented, you're not going to see Age of Sigmar being played.

Age of Sigmar seems to be big with casual for fun narrative RPG types as opposed to competitive gamers that like tournament and league play.

Those type of players I find also rarely play their games at FLGS, and are more in their garages and game rooms at home.

The downside of that of course is no visibility.

Their game not being shown in Tournament-oriented FLGS's doesn't really matter for GW because they don't want their game to be played anyway, right?

I am pretty sure GW hates tournament-oriented players. They don't forge the narrative hard enough
That said, the narrative is exactly what makes games like AoS and 40k so much fun, so I don't get why tournament-oriented players don't play games that were made to be played competitively. Having given competitive Warmachine a try, it is so much more fun than a 40k tournament, let alone trying to play AoS competitively. IMO, you should go with the ruleset that best fits with the way you want to play, rather than trying to "fix" and force a ruleset into something it is not.

The thing is, with "some" tweaks 40k/FB are bearable for tournament settings, but AoS is not so without a major rehaul.

In the end the only side losing with AoS being clearly made to alienate competitive players is GW - they're losing a lot of money.

It doesn't really need a major overhaul. You basically need

1) a points system
2) base-to-base measuring
3) Summoning nerf

That's it really. Both 40K and WHFB have extensive comp systems and FAQs (just look at Swedish comp for WHFB!) that are easily on par with those for AoS.

You do understand that creating a points system alone will take more work than the entirety of the work that GW's AoS design team has dedicated to the game so far, right? That alone qualifies as a major overhaul.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3duq1yp3omfz76y/Swedish%20Comp%20System%20v16.0.pdf?dl=0

 Mymearan wrote:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3duq1yp3omfz76y/Swedish%20Comp%20System%20v16.0.pdf?dl=0

I am not saying people haven't tried their hands on it, with varying degrees of success. I am saying it alone qualifies as a major overhaul.

You don't need a point system for tourney play. That may be the most understood way, especially amongst those with limited wargaming experience and it offers many advantages, but all tourneys require are 'balanced' games (that's not actually true either to be honest).

There are wargames out there that have tourneys with no points, and others that have points where serious tourney players have talked of ditching the points (due to lack of balance in points).

The problem with points is that whilst they are easy to use for players, they are a huge investment for the game maker (if they are expected to provide points rather than tourney organisers). Something like AOS has mind boggling combinations of units with many synergies or unit size differences etc. That makes pointing non trivial. KOW is tourney friendly, it is also very simple with almost no interaction between units and limited choices in terms of unit size etc.

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

 Mymearan wrote:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3duq1yp3omfz76y/Swedish%20Comp%20System%20v16.0.pdf?dl=0

I am not saying people haven't tried their hands on it, with varying degrees of success. I am saying it alone qualifies as a major overhaul.

In that case, I agree. But imo, other GW games have gone through major overhauls to be tournament-friendly as well. They just aren't very good at writing clear, concise and balanced rules.

 Mymearan wrote:

 Lithlandis Stormcrow wrote:

 Mymearan wrote:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3duq1yp3omfz76y/Swedish%20Comp%20System%20v16.0.pdf?dl=0

I am not saying people haven't tried their hands on it, with varying degrees of success. I am saying it alone qualifies as a major overhaul.

In that case, I agree. But imo, other GW games have gone through major overhauls to be tournament-friendly as well. They just aren't very good at writing clear, concise and balanced rules.

Yes, GW designers excel in the ancient art of loose rules writing with enough gray area to compare to Beijing's worst smog mornings.

It's just that AoS is the loosest so far and will require the most work in order to create a competitive, balancing system. Games like Mordheim, Necromunda, BFG and especially 40k and FB need quite the bit of work to bring balance about (the Swedish comps and Coreheim come to mind). It's just easier to tweak a system that at least already has a points system - balanced or not. IMO, ofc.

GW ran annual tournaments of WHFB and 40K for decades. They stopped about four years ago. If GW hate tournament players, it is a fairly recent thing, and it makes me wonder why GW decided to bring the hate.

I think it's more likely that GW got the idea that tournament players were a relatively small section of customers and could essentially be ignored, allowing GW to less effort into selling to the much more compliant casual player.

GW's ideal customer in my view is not a keen wargamer, as such. It's someone who is happy to spend maybe £200 a year on some books and figures that give him a fun read and the experience of pushing some models around and throwing a bunch of dice. If they also manage to find GW fanatics, who spend lots more on buying even more GW books and kits, that's a bonus.

If you are a keen wargamer, you're going to spend more than £200 a year and you want a range of genres, like Ancients, Napoleonic, Naval, and WW2. GW are not interested in supplying that market.

I would love for GW to embrace the tournament scene again. It seems it would be easy in the modern age to strive for balance. Point lists outside of the warscrolls that can be tweaked on a monthly basis, FAQs available inside the app too.

Every AoS scenario could have a recommended point spilt (70-30 for example) so that these fun narrative scenarios are played and it's not all pitched battles.

I really like AoS and have fun with it. I do not like GWs recent philosophy towards many things. Reading the designer notes yesterday in the 2nd Edition 40k book and them singing the praises of the new rules allowing you to play anyone in the world under a unified structure was a stark contrast to what I see now.

A hobby that is aimed at collectors simply requires great models. A hobby aimed at gamers simply requires a balanced rule set. These things are not mutually exclusive and so I don't understand why GW think they are.

Tbh, I am a little peeved hearing that if "AoS fails, GW are dropping fantasy". In the era of Game of Thrones and Skyrim there is no way fantasy does not capture the imagination anymore. It's the exact opposite. And it just seems so easy to fix GWs errors the whole thing can be very frustrating.

puree wrote:

There are wargames out there that have tourneys with no points, and others that have points where serious tourney players have talked of ditching the points (due to lack of balance in points).

The only game system I can think of that has tourneys but no points is DBA/DBX, but that uses a strict element count (12?) for what are largely similar units, being pre-gunpowder humans. It's balancing mechanic is essentially everything boils down to infantry/skirmishers/cavalry and is pretty much balanced.

I've never heard of people dropping points due to balance - adjusting points or introducing limits sure.

But AoS has no system for balance anyway, beyond gentlemans agreement. Which is pretty much impossible in any tournament of significant size (i.e. 30+ attendees)

 Bottle wrote:
I would love for GW to embrace the tournament scene again. It seems it would be easy in the modern age to strive for balance. Point lists outside of the warscrolls that can be tweaked on a monthly basis, FAQs available inside the app too.

Every AoS scenario could have a recommended point spilt (70-30 for example) so that these fun narrative scenarios are played and it's not all pitched battles.

I really like AoS and have fun with it. I do not like GWs recent philosophy towards many things. Reading the designer notes yesterday in the 2nd Edition 40k book and them singing the praises of the new rules allowing you to play anyone in the world under a unified structure was a stark contrast to what I see now.

A hobby that is aimed at collectors simply requires great models. A hobby aimed at gamers simply requires a balanced rule set. These things are not mutually exclusive and so I don't understand why GW think they are.

Tbh, I am a little peeved hearing that if "AoS fails, GW are dropping fantasy". In the era of Game of Thrones and Skyrim there is no way fantasy does not capture the imagination anymore. It's the exact opposite. And it just seems so easy to fix GWs errors the whole thing can be very frustrating.

It's not just that, really.

GW used to encourage a much more DIY approach to the hobby parts of Warhammer - how to built X or Y terrain on your own, and without resorting to citadel-only items. Those were (for me, ofc) the glory days of White Dwarf. There were hobby and painting guides, awesome alternative, "fluffy" army lists (I especially liked the addition of additional goblinoid races and the Kroot-only army list for 40k) and even a few campaigns. They encouraged and supported the Specialist Games. Back then GW literally said "Go forth and enjoy it in your own terms, you have this here to do it in Y manner or this there to do it in X manner."

Not anymore. Now it's literally "our way or the highway - we don't want you anymore if you're not a GW supporter down to your DNA."

It makes no sense for GW to get back to the tournament scene. The competitive scene is compromised of well-educated players who think before buying and are resistant to "wooo flashy!" stuff. They play the game for the game, not primarily the models, and that's the part where GW keeps failing hard for quite a few years now. It's like asking Facebook to embrace privacy again.