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.

FFG is the largest threat GW faces. Right now? It's much smaller than GW, but in a short time span it's clever usage of license (star wars in particular) is allowing it to grow at an increasingly rapid and even exponential rate.

In a short period of time they've started gaining ground on GW. It could be as short as 5-10 years they could be in a position to buy up GW, and they have an interest in it. While their 40k line is not the bread winner it used to be now that Star Wars has fallen into their laps it is still their second most profitable line and it doesn't compete with the same target demographic of Star Wars.

FFG would be in the perfect position to try and buy up GW. Granted a lot can happen in 5-10 years, but if GW stays the same and or keeps shrinking then this is easily possible.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
40K certainly has more than 200K customers, or DakkaDakka would not have 90K users, and GW would not have £110,000 K sales.

How many of Dakka's users are actually real people and active?

I'm trying to find it now but there was quite an extensive poll (someone polled several forums and there was a lot of responders) and if I recall correctly it put the average spent in a year around the 800 mark, which for 120M revenue puts the sum of current GW customers around the 150k mark (and that was considering a lot of people who spend almost nothing).

My googling is failing and I can't find that poll now

But we also have Chapterhouse case numbers, GW sold $1.3M worth of 5th edition rulebooks over 3 years and $0.9M worth of 4th ed Space Marine codices over its life. Weren't codices $30 back then? So you're only looking at ~30k people buying the Space Marine codex over its life and about ~20k people who bought the 5th edition rulebook. Obviously not all 40k players are Space Marine players, but it's got to be a decent chunk and I know you didn't have to buy the 5th ed. rulebook to play but you'd still have to imagine a decent chunk of people bought it.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
Hasbro. Disney.

Yep, its a very small list.

SJ

Have those companies indicated they'd be wanting to buy?

I think the 40k IP isn't worth very much. It's not worth nothing, but the total sum of active 40k players isn't significant enough to, say, make a movie and expect it not to flop even if every 40k player went to watch it.

The 40K IP is by far the most valuable thing GW owns, way above and beyond any physical infrastructure or anything else, and is probably what constitutes the majority of their value. It's worth a lot. Anyone with even limited introduction to "geek culture" has some familiarity with 40k even if they've never played the tabletop game (much like most people could see a Gundam or a Zaku and recognize them for what they are even if they've never seen a Gundam show), it's a highly recognizable IP, and aside from the tabletop game, it's got hundreds of novels & comics, dozens of videogames, and large numbers of 3rd party products.

It might not be Star Wars vluable, but it's a valuable IP nonetheless that lots of different places would pick up in a heartbeat if it were up for sale.

I think we'll have to agree to disagree. I think a large company like Disney or Hasbro would sooner create their own IP and pay for the advertising to make it more recognisable than 40k ever is. The average advertising campaign for a movie generates more mainstream knowledge of an IP. Such an advertising campaign is expensive and out of the realm of most wargaming companies, but I think big companies would rather just pay to market an IP than buy any of GW's IPs.

The 40k IP is more of a wet dream for smaller companies than large ones IMO.

40k is an incredibly recognizable IP, it's part of why GW *can* get away with not doing any external advertising. The tabletop game is niche, yes, but the IP itself is astoundingly well known. Of everyone I know that's at all into *anything* "geek" related, everyone at least knows of Warhammer and 40k. Anyone who's been through a scifi section at a book store, anyone who's played any other tabletop wargame or RGP, anyone who's played just about any RTS or MMO, or who's into any sort of Fantasy or Scifi in general has at least heard of GW's IP's. The great thing with an IP like Warhammer or 40k is that a new owner wouldn't have to do any advertising, and 40k is already astoundingly recognizable.

Also, it wouldn't need to be another tabletop gaming company that buys the IP, there's plenty of non-tabletop value in the IP. As I said, I could see the tabletop game basically disappearing if someone else bought the IP. If GW went under, and someone like EA, Bungie, Gearbox, Blizzard, Bethesda, etc picked it up just to use for video game franchising, much the way CCP bought out White Wolf when they wanted to make a Vampire: The Masquerade game (never panned out, but they had planned to for a long while). The IP has value, and tabletop gaming is probably the least of it.

The last number I saw for 40k game sales for THQ, which was over four years ago in 2011 mind you, was 6.5 million units, it's probably safe to say that's probably around 10 million now with additional games and further time, so you're looking at video game sales over the last decade of anywhere from a quarter to a half billion dollars on that IP, and that's not even getting into things like books, FFG's 40k-based boardgames and RPGSs, comics, etc. Going onto Steam and just running a search for "Warhammer" returns a gargantuan number of titles, and that's only relatively recent stuff, not counting any of the 90's era videogames.

I think that entirely depends how much GW run it in to the ground before they go under. In a couple of years the WHFB IP is likely going to be worth a fraction of what it was a few years ago thanks to AoS, I wouldn't discount GW doing something to ruin the value of the 40k IP as well.

That's entirely possible, and unfortunately the quality of their background has notably declined in recent years for 40k as well, but that's not something we can account for really.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I'm trying to find it now but there was quite an extensive poll (someone polled several forums and there was a lot of responders) and if I recall correctly it put the average spent in a year around the 800 mark, which for 120M revenue puts the sum of current GW customers around the 150k mark (and that was considering a lot of people who spend almost nothing).

Sure, but $800/year is from people actively buying stuff. A person who finishes an army and doesn't buy anything for a while is still a 40k player and a potential customer. So it's about 150k active customers based on those numbers, and it could easily be 2-3 times that many involved in the hobby to some degree and potentially open to buying new stuff in the future. And if you cut that average purchase to $400/year you're now talking about 300k active customers and possibly a million total.

But we also have Chapterhouse case numbers, GW sold $1.3M worth of 5th edition rulebooks over 3 years and $0.9M worth of 4th ed Space Marine codices over its life. Weren't codices $30 back then? So you're only looking at ~30k people buying the Space Marine codex over its life and about ~20k people who bought the 5th edition rulebook. Obviously not all 40k players are Space Marine players, but it's got to be a decent chunk and I know you didn't have to buy the 5th ed. rulebook to play but you'd still have to imagine a decent chunk of people bought it.

But that's just purchases. That's not counting people who share a rulebook, people who bought the cheap starter set rulebook, people who just pirate everything, etc. And I suspect that the percentage of people pirating stuff is pretty high, so rulebook sales aren't the best guide.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
40K certainly has more than 200K customers, or DakkaDakka would not have 90K users, and GW would not have £110,000 K sales.

How many of Dakka's users are actually real people and active?

I'm trying to find it now but there was quite an extensive poll (someone polled several forums and there was a lot of responders) and if I recall correctly it put the average spent in a year around the 800 mark, which for 120M revenue puts the sum of current GW customers around the 150k mark (and that was considering a lot of people who spend almost nothing).

My googling is failing and I can't find that poll now

But we also have Chapterhouse case numbers, GW sold $1.3M worth of 5th edition rulebooks over 3 years and $0.9M worth of 4th ed Space Marine codices over its life. Weren't codices $30 back then? So you're only looking at ~30k people buying the Space Marine codex over its life and about ~20k people who bought the 5th edition rulebook. Obviously not all 40k players are Space Marine players, but it's got to be a decent chunk and I know you didn't have to buy the 5th ed. rulebook to play but you'd still have to imagine a decent chunk of people bought it.

There are 8000 people browsing Dakka right now. If you believe 4% of the global GW customers are reading Dakka at this moment, you're grasping at straws. Also, there is no chance in hell a regular customer spends 800 pounds per year on plastic. That's two armies' worth of models. It's diehard territory.

As for the number of rulebooks, 1) not everybody buys a rulebook, some use their friend's, others pirate; 2) there's a rulebook in the starter set, and some buy it second-hand.

 Peregrine wrote:

But that's just purchases. That's not counting people who share a rulebook, people who bought the cheap starter set rulebook, people who just pirate everything, etc. And I suspect that the percentage of people pirating stuff is pretty high, so rulebook sales aren't the best guide.

10-12 years ago if you were interested in a codex you simply went to the store and bought it. They were affordable enough to own as many as you liked. Nowadays, after the insane price hike that used the hardback change as an excuse? Not so much.

Even the non-advertised return to softback does little to alleviate this, as 33€ for a softback codex is still like twice as expensive as it should be. We're talking about something they mass-produce in China (despite what some GW fanatics seem to believe).

 -DE- wrote:
There are 8000 people browsing Dakka right now. If you believe 4% of the global GW customers are reading Dakka at this moment, you're grasping at straws. Also, there is no chance in hell a regular customer spends 800 pounds per year on plastic. That's two armies' worth of models. It's diehard territory.

As for the number of rulebooks, 1) not everybody buys a rulebook, some use their friend's, others pirate; 2) there's a rulebook in the starter set, and some buy it second-hand.

Maybe my estimates are way off.... I did admit you don't have to buy the rulebook to play... but only 20k rulebooks sold, I would be surprised if it was much less than 1 in 10 or maybe 1 in 20 active 40k players bought the rulebook or the SM Codex (and this was back in 4th when it wasn't so expensive). Unless I'm totally underestimating communities for which piracy is the norm (can't say I know too many people who didn't own the book for the army they collected even if they'd pirated all the others).

The figures I've seen mostly points to not many people buying a crap load of models rather than a huge fan base buying small amounts.

I'd also be interested to know how accurate those numbers of people reading Dakka is, it says right now 6000 online, 350 of which are registered users. I do wonder if most of those connections are actually unique people. Also I think it goes without saying a lot of Dakkites aren't active 40k players.

Oh never underestimate how much piracy goes on the internet, but at the same time there is nothing you can do but focus on the loyal customers you have and trying to offer stuff the pirates can't.

Look up Steam, Valve, and the history of PC piracy to know what I'm talking about.

Even to to his day every PC game sold there is probably 500+ people pirating it. However when you start to crack down on the loyal paying customers sit will only inconvenience them since pirates will ALWAYS find a way to pirate something.

No security measure (even Steam or always online) has ever stopped them completely.

So I don't doubt there is way more pirated books in circulation at all times than legitimate copies.

The other aspect is that with something like 40k, you really don't want to make people feel that they're being blatantly ripped off in terms of what they pay for rules.

Otherwise, they're much more likely to pirate them. Loyalty goes both ways - if you want your customers to stay loyal, then you can't just treat them like magpies with bottomless wallets.

Humble Bundle, Steam and GOG are the main reasons I have not downloaded a pirated game in years. I simply don't need to. I've been always unwilling to spend large amounts of money on videogames, and nowadays I simply don't need to. It's only a matter of having a bit of patience and waiting until any game I want is on a decent enough discount and I'll gladly buy it.

Other companies though, seem to believe that discounts somewhat make their products lose value, so they do not offer discounts, and since I find their products too expensive for what they are, they don't get my money.

 Gamgee wrote:
Oh never underestimate how much piracy goes on the internet, but at the same time there is nothing you can do but focus on the loyal customers you have and trying to offer stuff the pirates can't.

Look up Steam, Valve, and the history of PC piracy to know what I'm talking about.

Even to to his day every PC game sold there is probably 500+ people pirating it. However when you start to crack down on the loyal paying customers sit will only inconvenience them since pirates will ALWAYS find a way to pirate something.

No security measure (even Steam or always online) has ever stopped them completely.

So I don't doubt there is way more pirated books in circulation at all times than legitimate copies.

Well, Diablo 3 is still currently uncracked but that's because of the always-online with content held server-side, much like an MMO, route they took.

Which also annoyed a lot of gamers as it meant the game was physically impossible to play at all without an internet connection. Which, for a game with a single player mode, is very annoying if you do just want to play it on your own and have limited access to the internet.

 vipoid wrote:
The other aspect is that with something like 40k, you really don't want to make people feel that they're being blatantly ripped off in terms of what they pay for rules.

Otherwise, they're much more likely to pirate them. Loyalty goes both ways - if you want your customers to stay loyal, then you can't just treat them like magpies with bottomless wallets.

This is true.

Edit
Diablo 3 is one of the few exceptions and like I said. It had to inconvenience users greatly for that security and suffered for it. The infamous launch errors and inconvenience of always needing a connection even for singleplayer.

 Gamgee wrote:
FFG is the largest threat GW faces. Right now? It's much smaller than GW, but in a short time span it's clever usage of license (star wars in particular) is allowing it to grow at an increasingly rapid and even exponential rate.

In a short period of time they've started gaining ground on GW. It could be as short as 5-10 years they could be in a position to buy up GW, and they have an interest in it. While their 40k line is not the bread winner it used to be now that Star Wars has fallen into their laps it is still their second most profitable line and it doesn't compete with the same target demographic of Star Wars.

FFG would be in the perfect position to try and buy up GW. Granted a lot can happen in 5-10 years, but if GW stays the same and or keeps shrinking then this is easily possible.

FFG is not an independent company, they're subsidiary of larger gaming company Asmodee, which in turn is owned by Eurazeo investment fund. So FFG's not going to buy GW, but Eurazeo might. They could easily do it right now (the fund's assets are over 5 billion euros).

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I don't think 40k is actually that popular. It's popular for a wargame, but I reckon it's still only about 100-200k customers world wide.

Wow, what made you change your opinion so drastically in less than a year? A new edition released without my knowing? Don't you recall the last estimate? VVV

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
That places the total number of players between 350,000 and 770,000.

It's actually one more in line with what I've seen calculated. Up to a million Warhammer players with even more fans that don't buy into the game anymore or only read the fluff. That's about the numbers for a popular subscription MMO besides World of Warcraft and FFXIV which have only millions. Only this game costs way more than $15/month to play.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Maybe my (new) estimates are way off....

I'd say!

 vipoid wrote:
IMO the game peaked in 5th and has only been declining since then.

Whilst not without its issues, 5th at least had a solid ruleset and allowed for a pretty tactial game.

6th fixed virtually nothing, and instead added a lot of nonsense like flyers, Riptides and WKs that belonged in Apocalypse, starting the War of Escalation that has yet to end. It then proceeded to bog down the game with a load of random nonsense and random tables. Oh, and allies were basically added as an extra pay-to-win feature. I don't think they even bothered trying to conceal it with fluff - it was just 'have you run out of slots to take the most broken units in your army? Well now you can take broken units from other armies, too!

I'm presuming that 6th was poorly received, as GW quickly brought out 7th to replace it. So, what did GW do to fix 6th? Well, they added more 6th, of course!

Instead of adding overly large units to armies, they just made all the Apocalypse units legal. Hope everyone really loves playing against those really massive units. Also, did we hear people saythat they didn't like random tables? Well here's even more random tables! In fact, here's an entire set of missions designed around just randoming stuff! Finally, did someone say that allies were broken? And that people sometimes had to take troops before they could take broken units? Well we'll just add Unbound and Formations - take only the most broken units, and we'll throw in some free bonuses! Also, are you upset that your big units can't score, and you have to actually still make use of infantry to win games? Well not to worry - now everything can score!

I guess if you like all that stuff, 7th is the edition you've been waiting for.

Either way, GW's steadily declining profits (in spite of slashing production costs and firing numerous staff), would seem to indicate that 7th hasn't been a great success. I look forward to 8th, when GW looks at what didn't work and then proceeds to add more of it.

While I agree with some of this I disagree in regard to randomizing the missions. I think that was meant to help out with keeping armies more TAC oriented. Yeah, it failed but with Maelstrom especially you can see how a more balanced list with a blend of offense, defense and mobility was supposed to work better than all-all-out war lists.

Yeah, it failed but with Maelstrom especially you can see how a more balanced list with a blend of offense, defense and mobility was supposed to work better than all-all-out war lists.

And it doesn't work at all if GW "forgets" to give your army those 3. It works well for marines and eldars with their cheap transports and bikers, and deathstars suddenly turning in to 5 or more units in last turn of game.

Makumba wrote:

Yeah, it failed but with Maelstrom especially you can see how a more balanced list with a blend of offense, defense and mobility was supposed to work better than all-all-out war lists.

And it doesn't work at all if GW "forgets" to give your army those 3. It works well for marines and eldars with their cheap transports and bikers, and deathstars suddenly turning in to 5 or more units in last turn of game.

Please name the armies that don't have all three.

SJ

 jeffersonian000 wrote:

Makumba wrote:

Yeah, it failed but with Maelstrom especially you can see how a more balanced list with a blend of offense, defense and mobility was supposed to work better than all-all-out war lists.

And it doesn't work at all if GW "forgets" to give your army those 3. It works well for marines and eldars with their cheap transports and bikers, and deathstars suddenly turning in to 5 or more units in last turn of game.

Please name the armies that don't have all three.

SJ

CSM seem to be missing all three.

I've noticed that most people who enjoy 7th in my area are children. Couple adults, but mostly children. Makes sense.

Backfire wrote:

 Gamgee wrote:
FFG is the largest threat GW faces. Right now? It's much smaller than GW, but in a short time span it's clever usage of license (star wars in particular) is allowing it to grow at an increasingly rapid and even exponential rate.

In a short period of time they've started gaining ground on GW. It could be as short as 5-10 years they could be in a position to buy up GW, and they have an interest in it. While their 40k line is not the bread winner it used to be now that Star Wars has fallen into their laps it is still their second most profitable line and it doesn't compete with the same target demographic of Star Wars.

FFG would be in the perfect position to try and buy up GW. Granted a lot can happen in 5-10 years, but if GW stays the same and or keeps shrinking then this is easily possible.

FFG is not an independent company, they're subsidiary of larger gaming company Asmodee, which in turn is owned by Eurazeo investment fund. So FFG's not going to buy GW, but Eurazeo might. They could easily do it right now (the fund's assets are over 5 billion euros).

Not actually true.

They merged, they weren't bought, so they're not a subsidiary, and being owned by an investment fund doesn't mean much, technically GW is controlled by several similar organisations, collectively speaking.

I would agree that 5th was when 40k peaked. 6th edition had a decline due to the vast changes that were made (many being more complicated changes), however it was still a good edition. 7th edition started a vast and quick decline due to more expensive large units, broken formation and psychic stuff, and the addition of more rules to overcomplicate the game.

The number one reason I saw people flee from this game in 7th was the quick turnaround with the core rulebook and several other rulebooks (that were either $50 for a normal copy or $100 for a LE copy). That really peeved me... even though I continue to buy units and some LE codex books. I guess I continue on (disgruntled though) with a select few in this edition.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
I've noticed that most people who enjoy 7th in my area are children. Couple adults, but mostly children. Makes sense.

So now we're passive-aggressively insulting people for having an opinion?

I think it's time to lock this thread down.

 GangstaMuffin24 wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
I've noticed that most people who enjoy 7th in my area are children. Couple adults, but mostly children. Makes sense.

So now we're passive-aggressively insulting people for having an opinion?

I think it's time to lock this thread down.

That was passive aggressive and rude. And inaccurate.
I dislike 7th for many many reasons, but the reasons I dislike it may be the very reasons that others do. Everyone has different tastes and what not. No one's less of a person for liking or disliking something.

Except for steamed okra. No one should like steamed okra.

 GangstaMuffin24 wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
I've noticed that most people who enjoy 7th in my area are children. Couple adults, but mostly children. Makes sense.

So now we're passive-aggressively insulting people for having an opinion?

I think it's time to lock this thread down.

There was nothing insulting about his post. It was an observation about who is playing the game in his area.

7th edition has been great for my very small, long-standing group that plays narratively, attempts to achieve a balanced, combined-arms approach to our armies and gaming, and enjoys the hobby and Black Library books. We usually don't play in stores. I think we play the game as an excuse to drink beer, cut-up, and relax.

 themonk wrote:
7th edition has been great for my very small, long-standing group that plays narratively, attempts to achieve a balanced, combined-arms approach to our armies and gaming, and enjoys the hobby and Black Library books. We usually don't play in stores. I think we play the game as an excuse to drink beer, cut-up, and relax.

Unfortunately I think that's the only way it can be enjoyed.

 MWHistorian wrote:

 themonk wrote:
7th edition has been great for my very small, long-standing group that plays narratively, attempts to achieve a balanced, combined-arms approach to our armies and gaming, and enjoys the hobby and Black Library books. We usually don't play in stores. I think we play the game as an excuse to drink beer, cut-up, and relax.

Unfortunately I think that's the only way it can be enjoyed.

Sad, but true. 7th is very much the edition for us beer and pretzel types. Not so much for those who want a semi-decent rule set.

 War Kitten wrote:

 MWHistorian wrote:

 themonk wrote:
7th edition has been great for my very small, long-standing group that plays narratively, attempts to achieve a balanced, combined-arms approach to our armies and gaming, and enjoys the hobby and Black Library books. We usually don't play in stores. I think we play the game as an excuse to drink beer, cut-up, and relax.

Unfortunately I think that's the only way it can be enjoyed.

Sad, but true. 7th is very much the edition for us beer and pretzel types. Not so much for those who want a semi-decent rule set.

Here, here. The thing that has become a pain is game setup and teardown. It's a function of getting older I think.

 themonk wrote:

 War Kitten wrote:

 MWHistorian wrote:

 themonk wrote:
7th edition has been great for my very small, long-standing group that plays narratively, attempts to achieve a balanced, combined-arms approach to our armies and gaming, and enjoys the hobby and Black Library books. We usually don't play in stores. I think we play the game as an excuse to drink beer, cut-up, and relax.

Unfortunately I think that's the only way it can be enjoyed.

Sad, but true. 7th is very much the edition for us beer and pretzel types. Not so much for those who want a semi-decent rule set.

Here, here. The thing that has become a pain is game setup and teardown. It's a function of getting older I think.

An interesting experiment would be to try having the game group meeting just to drink beer, cut-up, and relax without playing any wargames. See how their enjoyment differs.

The Space Marine codex sales figures revealed in the Chapter House case were for North America only. The NA market at that time comprised about 30% of the total world market.

 themonk wrote:
7th edition has been great for my very small, long-standing group that plays narratively, attempts to achieve a balanced, combined-arms approach to our armies and gaming, and enjoys the hobby and Black Library books. We usually don't play in stores. I think we play the game as an excuse to drink beer, cut-up, and relax.

If the rules sections like the Apocalypse stuff and Flyers were optional supplements, would you be able to to play narrative combined arms games?

I ask this because I gave up 40K because I don't like those rules, but I recognise that other people do like them, and making them optional supplements would seem to be a good way of satisfying both groups of customers.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Average sales by GW are about £120 million a year over the past few years (it has been going down and is less than that now.)

Supposing there are 200,000 customers, each must be spending £600 a year on average.

Does that seem a realistic figure? You could be a customer and buy only a couple of boxes or books a year. OTOH there could be people spending a lot more than £600.