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In the US, one of the few metrics you can look at (since GW isn't going to tell us how well it's selling) is individual FLGS accounts (which will vary) and the tournament scene (how much the game is being played).

Mikhaila has posted on here how he's struggled to sell it, as have others, but obviously judgedoug shared an opposite anecdocate.

However, the U.S. Masters fantasy circuit voted overwhelmingly to switch to the Kings of War ruleset:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/665351.page

At my store, the same has happened - they're now stocking the KoW rulebook, the fantasy guys are starting to play it and lots of folks are working on KoW armies.

Age of Sigmar is its own beast, and obviously not a fit for a fantasy tournament format (very much intentionally so). This makes it even harder to measure how well it's doing. We know it isn't being played at the tournament level, and the question is can it do well enough in informal gaming to make up for the lack of addressing that market (or those interested in formation-based fantasy games) at all.

I don't think we'll get any numbers from GW indicating its performance - even if it does poorly, it will be hidden behind other successful product revenues (such as Horus Heresy). So, we'll continue to have to rely on third party sources of info. But the "finger in the air" test is definitely not indicating that it is an overwhelming success as far as people adopting and playing it, for instance! I think that will be important for long-term success, but obviously from GW's perspective if people buy their models they won't care. But as those models become more and more niche (with the goal of making them protectable from an IP standpoint) it will be less likely that people will buy them to use with other rulesets, so if they want more than painters they're going to need the ruleset those models are for to be more widely adopted to succeed.

While I disagree with the "If you're not happy just play 8th" crowd, if you are willing to play AoS it's very easy to theme your games in the pre AoS world.

In fact many of the more iconic battles play better in a skirmish system. (City fights, Skaven/ Goblin/Dwarf tunnel/cavern battles. The Battle of La Maisontaal etc.)

We don't know and, for now, we can't really know. Anecdotical evidence is anecdotical, no matter how much some people seem to believe the state of affairs at their FLGS/club/local GW shop has to be representative of a larger trend.

From a general point of view, it seems to be doing just "decent" in the UK, and quite poorly everywhere else. Local scenarios may vary wildly however, as local communities do.

In my personal opinion, it's a mediocre product doomed to have a mediocre run unless GW decides to revamp it heavily, which won't likely happen. As in many other things, I could be wrong.

Does anyone else kind of feel like when GW release a new edition for a game they take it for granted that all the old players will continue onto the new edition so they don't really need to advertise it at all and that, with that in mind, AoS was released as if it were a new edition which all the WHFB players would immediately adopt?

I kinda get the impression GW expected people would jump right over, not considering the differences in games to mean anything. At least that makes more sense to me than them just dumping their entire WHFB fanbase (no matter how small it was, it was more than 0).

 TheWaspinator wrote:
The fact that the starter set is already 44% off on Amazon seems like bad news for the game.

Damn that's great news.


AoS seems to have failed around here in that it did not revitalize sales of WHF figures. The AoS figures were doing well, but with Calth and Heresy Marines, I suspect people will discover they need Stormcasts less than they thought they did, and the sales will taper.

 jonolikespie wrote:
I kinda get the impression GW expected people would jump right over, not considering the differences in games to mean anything. At least that makes more sense to me than them just dumping their entire WHFB fanbase (no matter how small it was, it was more than 0).

This is standard GW attitude - just slap their logo on something and assume everyone will buy it by the dozen.

There's nothing anecdotal about the Amazon and eBay sellers slashing prices on the starter far deeper than they did for 8th edition, and we're only a few months in! Also nothing anecdotal about them being UNABLE to sell out on special edition books, which are just as much an unnecessary luxury as they were during 8th Edition. And that game apparently sold less than GW super glue, so this must only sell a fraction of that fraction!

No, but seriously, the conversation about this game devolved into an us vs. them argument, but AoS's success isn't about someone being right or someone being wrong, it's about sales. It doesn't matter how hard anybody fanbois out about GW, that's their right as a hobbyist, and they're not responsible for business practices others find distasteful. That being said, the science IS in fact in. AoS is not doing that great, there's no reason to be a denialist.

Thank God, there's been whole seconds between someone posting an AoS Fail thread.
Praise Jeebus that this one arrived in time.

FFS.

You could start a thread discussion how well AoS is doing.

In our store we have an enthusiastic following of AoS at our shop but in general terms we don't sell a ton of it. We sold the heck out of the starter boxes but after that, sales dipped quite a bit.

IMO, for what that is worth, having played it a few times it doesn't feel like a game. I prefer complex, balanced games and many folks we tend to associate with lean that way, too, and with that mindset dislike AoS. However, the folks that do like it, are very casual gamers that love just coming in and putting cool models on the table and having a laugh of a game. We've found it appeals to a totally different demographic, but a smaller group of people.

To be fair though, we hardly sold any Fantasy kits, either. It's been a slight uptick for us compared to Fantasy.

I'm not surprised that it would appeal to a different kind of user. I'm also not very surprised that the user group would be relatively small.

It would seem logical that a game that is quick and easy to learn and play would appeal to people who don't have a deep interest in more complicated, time-consuming games. This kind of user does not seem likely to want to spend a lot of time and money building up their armies and terrain, etc.

If you want to make a beer and pretzels game, you need to make sure it is easily playable by a beer and pretzels crowd.

I was talking to a UK flgs owner recently who said he used to get 60plus players for 8th edition tournaments, but struggled to get 12 for AOS. Its clear KOW is very popular now in their area

That is an interesting point, however let's recall that the topic of this thread is reasons why AoS might be caused to fail, not just evidence that it is.

Did your FLGS owner give any reasons why AoS was not doing good business for him?

Saldiven wrote:
As for reasons, well, I think it has to do with play style. There does actually exist a segment of player that likes the blocked unit style of game. When movement is restricted that way, it requires a different style of thinking about how to play the game than does a skirmish style game. Turning block movement WHFB into skirmish movement AoS took that style of game play away from those players. KoW still offers that style of game play, so the players moved to that.

Agreed. One side of the double-whammy - exploding the world being the other.

I still can't quite believe they did that. But as Lithlandis says, GW's too used to a captive audience. Too used to throwing something out with an attitude of "Here you go, plebs. You know the drill. Empty your bank accounts into the receptacle." You'd think they might have learned something from Dreadfleet.

Kilkrazy wrote:You could start a thread discussion how well AoS is doing.

Oh come on. Give him something to do that's achievable.

I think it's a valid topic for discussion. The flip side of this thread; Is AoS doing well, and why should that be expected?

As your post indicates, many people think that GW expect whatever they do to be popular just because. After Dread Fleet that seems unrealistic, but that is another topic.

It's failed.

My sources in GW have people looking for ways to polish a turd and sell models. AOS gave them a small bump in fantasy sales, but they lost hugely with no 40k sales in those months. My sales are down 65% for the last 4 months on GW.

Not enough people actually care about AOS. They play some because they have models, but few people are building armies.

Lizarmen codex with no new models? Pretty much tells the story. My sales rep was ok with me not even ordering it.

I could write a 2 page list of reasons why it's failing, but i don't feel like arguing with the "it's only anectdotal evidence" crowd, and don't feel like beating a dead horse. GW found a way to cost me thousands of dollars in sales each month, and has my older WFB customers selling their armies on ebay. Good job GW.

The game is too simple to hold gammers attention for long. Easy to learn, yes. Able to hold interest? Probably not.

I'm curious to know this too.
Glad for you the starter is cheaper on Amazon, in France it is more expensive^^ (7€ more in fact).
I see a lot of negativity against AoS, I have difficulty to find "objective" view on this.

The price on UK Amazon is about £60 including postage, which is 20% discount. This is not a fire sale price.

 mikhaila wrote:
It's failed.

My sources in GW have people looking for ways to polish a turd and sell models. AOS gave them a small bump in fantasy sales, but they lost hugely with no 40k sales in those months. My sales are down 65% for the last 4 months on GW.

Not enough people actually care about AOS. They play some because they have models, but few people are building armies.

Lizarmen codex with no new models? Pretty much tells the story. My sales rep was ok with me not even ordering it.

I could write a 2 page list of reasons why it's failing, but i don't feel like arguing with the "it's only anectdotal evidence" crowd, and don't feel like beating a dead horse. GW found a way to cost me thousands of dollars in sales each month, and has my older WFB customers selling their armies on ebay. Good job GW.

I seem to remember you were pretty gung-ho when AOS came out and ran a lot of events for it. It's a bad sign if a store with an interested owner can't keep AOS afloat.

Is AoS potentially doing better in the UK than it is in the US?

The UK is still GW's base of power, and isn't there more of a focus on clubs rather than random meet-ups in stores?

That would work in AoS's favor, as it would be easier to hash out a force for a game with well-known club members than random walk-ins or weekly show-ups.

The UK still accounts for about 1/3rd of GW's sales, I believe.

Kilkrazy wrote:
After Dread Fleet that seems unrealistic

Were some of the post-dreadfleet chairman's preambles and things a bit gushing about customers flocking to buy "jewel-like items of wonder" and such? In any case it seems like they registered Dreadfleet as a blip, a temporary abberation to be recalled, destroyed, and buried out of sight and mind, rather than an indication of what not to do. The overall 'nice minis, shame about the game' reaction seems fairly similar. A pity one involved a limited, one-off box set, and the other involved one of their big lines.

godardc wrote:I see a lot of negativity against AoS, I have difficulty to find "objective" view on this.

What's an objective view? A positive one? An indifferent one? Can't the negative view be the objective view?

But for an objective view, I think it'd be difficult to find one better than MWHistorian's summation, just above.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 infinite_array wrote:

That would work in AoS's favor, as it would be easier to hash out a force for a game with well-known club members than random walk-ins or weekly show-ups.

Problem is that clubs can also often make it easier to hash out which games are better or more fun.

For them.[/intheinterestsofobjectivity ]

I'm still holding out hope that things will improve even if it takes a new rulebook. Even then for a lot of folks the bridge (or a whole dark elf army on youtube?) has been burned and it will take a lot to bring them back. I still dig the models, but I'm starting to feel like it's a waste of time to keep painting em :/ But I'll keep at it since painting is the fun part, will be tough with a shiny new Horus Heresy box to tempt my paintbrushes though.

I was planning to pick up some new lizardmen and the army book, but I decided not to. Maybe some day but all my gamerfunds have been spent on HH so nothing new for me for a while

It is also worth noting that the Amazon reviews have 65% 5 stars and 35% 1 star (out of 20 reviews), and nothing in between. Either you love it or hate it.

 Vermis wrote:
What's an objective view?

That's the rub, Vermis! In the AoS section, there was a poll which had these results:

AoS going strong or dying out in your area?

A. Picking up steam. - 24% (135)
B. Definitely less interest as time goes on. 76% (423)

That's over 550 responses. It's people who check an online forum, of course - those are the only people who you can poll without it being a local (or "anecdotal") result!

---

It could be doing well in parts of the UK, or in certain stores in the US... but on the whole, you've got a 3 to 1 ratio of people saying there is a lagging interest in AoS. This close to the launch of such a "flagship" product, that would be why people are saying it's failing. The way GW has positioned it is not to be a small Specialist game type of theirs, but a major line - and indications are people are not adopting it, and even people who considered it are often no longer doing so. GW experienced this recently with The Hobbit, too (seriously - did anyone actually play that?) so they are not unused to the idea - but they blamed that on not owning the IP, hence relegating it to "specialist game" status to focus on their own (new, in this case) IP.

It's interesting to see Reecius mention a lot of interest (and sales) at the beginning, but not continuing on... although mikhaila says it has failed, this seems to match what he experienced a bit at the beginning, too. I know I was certainly interested at the beginning - and am no longer, with everyone I know embracing KoW or moving on to other games.

 infinite_array wrote:
Is AoS potentially doing better in the UK than it is in the US?

The UK is still GW's base of power, and isn't there more of a focus on clubs rather than random meet-ups in stores?

That would work in AoS's favor, as it would be easier to hash out a force for a game with well-known club members than random walk-ins or weekly show-ups.

Really depends on the club. Some clubs have a fairly solid group of people who all know each other well. Others are a bit more variable, with less regular attendance and less familiarity between players.

The former would certainly have no issue with hashing out whatever rules were needed to make the game work for them... But that would assume there was enough interest in actually doing that.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The UK still accounts for about 1/3rd of GW's sales, I believe.

As of the last report, GW no longer gives data on regional sales, but historically there have been three dominant regions (Europe, North America, and UK) with similar sales levels, each being more or less a quarter of total revenue (with Europe being more, NA just about, and UK slightly less). Lately I would expect it's leveled out a bit, with the Euro taking a pounding, but still, each one of those accounting for a quarter is a good rule of thumb.

The remaining quarter is made up of Australia (which has been rapidly dropping, at approximately double the rate of the overall drop), FW+BL, and everywhere else.


For some more anecdotal evidence for AOS, in my area Fantasy used to be approximately twice as popular as 40k. Fantasy is now completely gone, AOS never got started, and KOW is taking off.

 Eldarain wrote:
While I disagree with the "If you're not happy just play 8th" crowd, if you are willing to play AoS it's very easy to theme your games in the pre AoS world.

Yes, but without a balanced "points" or build system, it's very difficult to keep things fair for all players - especially so for competitive players.

Answer is quite simple. High price. While no codices need to be bought, minis are still over priced. $70 for 3 minis? I don't care if they are terminator size, terminators are over priced and AoS minis are more over priced.

I would have bought so more besides the boxset. I am sure others would have as well.

It's always price. Then comes rules and lack of support for their games.