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 Manchu wrote:
OTOH, someone (maybe reds8n?) reported that Nottingham employees were rather puzzled as to the reactions against AoS on message boards because they thought they were providing an exciting product of good quality. And TBH it is an exciting product of good quality. I don't know of any Fantasy plastics out there as nice as the AoS starter figures. The artwork is really cool and the rules are IMO fun if very, very casual even by comparison to 40k. I understand their viewpoint entirely. I also understand how frustrating it feels to be one of their customers, given I am one.

Well, the players want 9th edition, not a new game entirely. If I want a steak and you gave me salad, even if it's the best damn salad in the world I would be pissed.

 judgedoug wrote:


Yes, we see it with Mikhaila, who owns two game stores, talked down the game and cried that it was going to ruin him, and then still sold all eighty of his copies. Again, contrast with DRNo172000's game store, which has two game demo displays - Age of Sigmar and Gates of Antares. And as he mentioned, Age of Sigmar starter has sold more since release than the last three years sales of Dark Vengeance. But that is a store that actively promotes it, runs games, and has, as he mentioned, a community of gamers more interested in casual/narrative/not-tournament style gaming.

I remember it differently (I read about him complaining in this thread and thought he was still championing the game until that point). In the original thread about the game and rumours regarding the changes he mentioned how he was making terrain and demo tables (when he got to preorder) and later, when it was sure that there won't be any points and the warscrolls were shown, a simple point system for the old veterans so they can also play AoS. I remember him initially being enthusiastic (because I wasn't and couldn't understand why) about the game and trying to make it work quite a bit more than that "talked down the game and cried" bit you mention.

I don't know what more he could have done to push the game besides giving it away for free (I think he also mentioned selling the starter at a discount to hook people on the game so he wasn't even far off that idea).

It went from negative to positive to back to negative, Mario.


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 RiTides wrote:
Organic models in general are harder to make attractive duplicates of unless the kit is really clever.

Very true, plus some of them are characters like Nagash or Celestan Prime as opposed to mass-produced vehicles.

Nah, just one way - mikhaila was extremely enthusiastic for the new edition, did well with his initial sales, but it didn't have legs in his store with the way it is set up (for reference, mikhaila has often run major tournaments at his store and made all sorts of interesting comp for various game systems). I think he was hopeful with some of the Azyr type fixes, but in the end there's no reason to push a game your players don't want when you can just direct them to something else that they're excited for!

Still, I know this is costing a lot of stores because players don't immediately transition, so for stores that were doing a lot of sales in fantasy whose players haven't adopted AoS, there is definitely a pain point until they migrate to another system. But since all "external signs" point to fantasy having struggled at retail, thankfully this doesn't seem to have hurt most stores too badly and they're able to pick up the slack elsewhere (or with AoS, for communities that have adopted it!).

If AOS's massive changes were an attempt to bring in people who don't normally play miniatures games, GW really doesn't understand what the real barrier is. It's not rules complexity, it's modelling. Star Wars Imperial Assault and X-Wing are a lot more complex than AOS and are currently doing really well. Those games even use, gasp, point systems. There's a lot of people who simply don't want to assemble models in order to be able to play.

 TheWaspinator wrote:
If AOS's massive changes were an attempt to bring in people who don't normally play miniatures games, GW really doesn't understand what the real barrier is. It's not rules complexity, it's modelling. Star Wars Imperial Assault and X-Wing are a lot more complex than AOS and are currently doing really well. Those games even use, gasp, point systems. There's a lot of people who simply don't want to assemble models in order to be able to play.

I think there's an element of truth there. If someone is willing to put in the massive amount of time to actually assemble and paint an army, I'm guessing a larger than 4 page rulebook isn't going to be a big barrier to entry and for many of those who like the idea of 4 page rules the army building is probably a bigger barrier to entry.

Granted I think WHFB was getting bloated, but I also think GW massively over shot the mark on cutting it down.

 TheWaspinator wrote:
If AOS's massive changes were an attempt to bring in people who don't normally play miniatures games, GW really doesn't understand what the real barrier is. It's not rules complexity, it's modelling. Star Wars Imperial Assault and X-Wing are a lot more complex than AOS and are currently doing really well. Those games even use, gasp, point systems. There's a lot of people who simply don't want to assemble models in order to be able to play.

I think even more of an issue with that segment of the population is the cost of the models. I see a lot of people on Dakka having a hard time rationalizing the cost of some of these new AOS kits, and I can't imagine how the layman feels seeing that box of three Chaos knights for a freaking C-note.

"And this is pretty much my whole army right?"

EDIT: mind you, the starter boxset is a fair deal. A lot for a newbie, but a fair deal. Everything else though (especially the new stuff) makes the whole thing look like the old bait-and-switch.

 RiTides wrote:
I think saying the fantasy customer base was the equivalent of a "gangrenous smashed pulp of an appendage" might be going a bit too far, judgedoug . Some of those folks actually adopted AoS, you know!

Not the customer base, the game itself. Warhammer 8 was a five plus years gangrenous smashed pulp of an appendage that needed to be cut off.


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 the_Armyman wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
We're in central VA. Is AoS doing really well up by DC? But yeah as this discussion progresses, I am thinking -- we should take the results of our private escalation league, all these painted armies and terrain and experience with the ruleset, and bring them to the LGS for an exhibition game. That could really drive interest.

My apologies on the northern/central mixup. I'd love to see pics of the escalation armies in progress.

My AoS Nurgle force is currently grey plastic.. all assembled, at least. but not a bad idea to start a thread somewhere for RVA AOS League.


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 RiTides wrote:
Nah, just one way - mikhaila was extremely enthusiastic for the new edition,

uh.. no? He came into the N&R thread and reported back what his rep told him after the reps had their training day - no points, skirmish, blah, blah, how it would ruin his store, and then attempting to sell the game IN THE THREAD at a discount, then started a thread in the Swap Shop to sell the game at a discount, in an effort to dump the eighty copies he ordered.

What amazing confidence.

Anecdotally continuing, this is when I personally was beginning to think AoS was going to the most slowed thing ever - in large part to the freakouts like Mikhaila's, and I even argued with Manchu IRL about how much of a bad idea and terrible product AoS was (though not for replacing Warhammer Fantasy - again, it had been dead to me for years. I just thought AoS was overall a terrible idea, the rules too simplistic, no points! no points! gasp!). Then the FLGS (where AoS has done well) had their release event, opened up a copy for a make-and-take, had a raffle for a free copy, even had a giant cake made with the AoS logo, and it was absurdly popular (iirc they said that in addition to the 20-something that were preordered they sold another 20-something at that midnight release?) I did a make and take model, took it home, still thought it was dumb, saw some games played, played a game, saw everyone having fun, bought a copy. One of the Bolt Action players bought a copy of AoS that night and literally said "this is the best gaming event I have been to since GenCon". So do you guys see the difference between a store owner who bashes a game and tries to dump his stock BEFORE release, versus one who holds a massive midnight release party? The atmosphere is already toxic in the former example, the atmosphere is full of delicious cake and free make-and-take models in the second example.


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 Accolade wrote:
EDIT: mind you, the starter boxset is a fair deal. A lot for a newbie, but a fair deal. Everything else though (especially the new stuff) makes the whole thing look like the old bait-and-switch.

This is obviously something we can all agree on. Despite the fact that AoS has made me spend more on GW in the last few months than I have in the previous five plus years, it's still stupidly expensive. I have two core sets and one of each Stormcast release, except Paladins and a Celestant Prime, because when I get close to buying either of those sets I'm reminded I can literally have another 1000 point Bolt Action army for the same cost as those two kits

You never told me there was cake, doug, I totally would have gone in for it with cake (Malifaux actually has a cake contest at AdeptiCon and some other events, it's weird and awesome!).

I think you misunderstood what I meant, mikhaila was extremely enthusiastic until "no points" were revealed, and since he had 80 rather than 20 sets wisely moved the last dozen sets at a discount (note that Reecius and others heavily discounted their AoS later and stopped carrying it, too).

I'm genuinely happy it's doing well for you guys I just don't think you should assume it could/should have done well in other places with different demographics, etc. But maybe the cake would've done it, as that's legitimately freaking awesome

coldgaming wrote:
I don't think rules complexity has anything to do with target age. When I was a kid I had all the time in the world to figure out the complexities of my favourite games and master them. As an adult I prefer something more streamlined and easier to jump in and out of.

I've said it before, based on half-assed extrapolations of neuroscience, kids can soak up masses of complex info, but don't have the prefrontal cortex to make overly complex decisions with it. Adults are are in the opposite situation.

The thing about warhammer is that, for the last few editions at least, it was built around the kid-friendly approach. Lots of wargear, magic items and unit-tailoring options, and lots of special rules. But despite it's status as the 'mature' one of GW's core two, it was tactically shallow. Get a flank or rear charge. Block a march. (As long as it's not 8th ed) Divert frenzied units. Most else was automatic IGOUGO stuff, with interminable tallying up for hitting, wounding, saving, combat resolution, rank bonusing, leadershipping, zzzzzz adding to the impression of depth. Just as long as you brought the right individual units with the best power to points ratio to pound the enemy units quick.

I have a theory that the rules churn eventually got to long term players because they grew up, but the game didn't. It just grew bigger, and loaded down with more special rules, and more OTT models. When I hear about Warhammer players calling the game stagnant and AoS a breath of fresh air, after twenty plus years, I'm not bleedin' surprised! If I ate Happy Meals for twenty years I'd consider a Farley's rusk a breath of fresh air.

AoS at least cuts out the clutter from the main rules. Trouble is, it's otherwise the same thing - a shallow ruleset dependent on the models you bring and the special rules they have - but with the few tactical bits cut out too. Still great for kids, no doubt, but will Moms and Pops buying starter sets for birthdays and Christmas, work this time? Despite (or because of) AoS's appeal as a quick, uncomplicated game, I wonder how long the novelty will last for older gamers, too. I wouldn't fancy eating Farley's rusks for the next twenty years.

It's a shame that AoS hasn't done better at mikhaila's store, but whether he promoted it heavily or not, there's no guarantee that it will catch on with any one player base. From what I understand he had quite the vibrant WHFB community, which is certainly not the right environment for AoS to thrive.

You know if we look past how it is doing at FLGSs and simply ask how it is doing in GW stores I am sure the answer won't be very different.

 jonolikespie wrote:
You know if we look past how it is doing at FLGSs and simply ask how it is doing in GW stores I am sure the answer won't be very different.

Good luck with that

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 TheWaspinator wrote:
If AOS's massive changes were an attempt to bring in people who don't normally play miniatures games, GW really doesn't understand what the real barrier is. It's not rules complexity, it's modelling. Star Wars Imperial Assault and X-Wing are a lot more complex than AOS and are currently doing really well. Those games even use, gasp, point systems. There's a lot of people who simply don't want to assemble models in order to be able to play.

I think there's an element of truth there. If someone is willing to put in the massive amount of time to actually assemble and paint an army, I'm guessing a larger than 4 page rulebook isn't going to be a big barrier to entry and for many of those who like the idea of 4 page rules the army building is probably a bigger barrier to entry.

Granted I think WHFB was getting bloated, but I also think GW massively over shot the mark on cutting it down.

We know that there are lots of players who aren't prepared to put in the effort to paint their army, but they still want to play 40K, and they just don't paint the figures..

Why shouldn't AoS go the same way? The Sigmarines are piss easy to paint, actually. You just spray them gold and do a couple of details.

The thing about warhammer is that, for the last few editions at least, it was built around the kid-friendly approach. Lots of wargear, magic items and unit-tailoring options, and lots of special rules. But despite it's status as the 'mature' one of GW's core two, it was tactically shallow. Get a flank or rear charge. Block a march. (As long as it's not 8th ed) Divert frenzied units. Most else was automatic IGOUGO stuff, with interminable tallying up for hitting, wounding, saving, combat resolution, rank bonusing, leadershipping, zzzzzz adding to the impression of depth. Just as long as you brought the right individual units with the best power to points ratio to pound the enemy units quick.

I don't think I've ever played a mini wargame that is any more tactically deep than that at a low level. At the low level that is pretty much all they can be. Whether games are more involved tends to revolve around having some victory condition that will be 'interesting' to achieve, and the high level decisions that are required to meet them - did I send enough to guard the bridge whilst sending enough to attack the other flank and enough reserve to react to 'stuff'. The game system in those cases tend to be less important.

 Mymearan wrote:
It's a shame that AoS hasn't done better at mikhaila's store, but whether he promoted it heavily or not, there's no guarantee that it will catch on with any one player base. From what I understand he had quite the vibrant WHFB community, which is certainly not the right environment for AoS to thrive.

We gave it our best shot. I really didn't like it at first. Like everyone else I was in mourning for the Old World, and not looking forward to the drama and anger when my WFB players found out GW has killed their game. After the initial shock and disappointment i got to work doing anything i could to sell the game, and promote it. It's not a bad game, i had fun playing it, got in about 20 games and painted up a new skaven army. I offered it to my players at 90.00 the first week, ran a release party, held a tournament, then a league, and ran demos. Probably 10x the work and effort we put into X-wing. The crowd i got into AOS wasn't the old crowd of WFB players. We had loaner armies, and all the warscrolls in binders for players to use. Extra copies of the rules. We ran with it for about 6 weeks, but slowly the players dropped off. Still in the store, but going to magic , warmachine, and xwing. At some point we didn't have anyone showing up to play.

We still have people showing up for games. There's a pattern to these. Two people have decided to play a game, show up together, know what they are going to play with. Have a decent game. But the only reason they are at the store is to use our tables and scenery. They could just as easily played at home. We get 0 people showing up looking for pick up games. If other stores are doing good with it, that's awesome. But it's not working for me, and I'm out of energy to promote it. I don't like having to convince someone that they want to play a game, and then work to get them to buy it. The same way most of you complain about the hard sell you get from some GW stores. I'd rather work with customers buying the games they want to play, and that i know they will find other people wanting to play The same time and energy put into Xwing, 40k, 30k, flames of war, team yankee, and warmachine give much better results.

Puree: Depends what you mean 'at a low level'. Going by your description of high level mechanics, I guess you mean the basic mechanics?

Other block manoeuvre games do go beyond that. Order phases and generated action points, for one thing. Making your lords and heroes something more than CC monsters who occasionally bump up a leadership test. Do you risk rolls or resources to send this or that unit forward, or leave them to rely on standing orders? Do you group a number of units into a 'brigade' to send them forward in one go?

Grouped units - adjacent units - can also support eachother if one is charged. Do you keep them together for defence, in the face of the enemy, or do you need to spread them out for certain goals? Spears (and pikes!) get a solid counter vs. cavalry*, making it more important where you deploy and move them against the opposing army. Basic alternate activation makes you think a bit more about which unit to use next. Hail Caesar lets you form squares, perform traversing shots, and alters fighting effectiveness in sustained close combat. Kings of War's chess clock nudges you into decisiveness, especially about which units should take priority. Mayhem's dice mechanic prompts you to judge risk vs. reward, to perform a dice roll or stick with the safe default value, for most actions. And so on.

And that, IMNSHO, makes guarding the bridge and deploying reserves all the more interesting.

* I have to admit, I couldn't remember if spears were a cavalry counter in Warhammer. I had to go google to remind myself that they allowed multiple ranks to fight. But the initial discussions I found about spears in 8th ed brought up some things that didn't surprise me: quite a few people considered them not worth taking unless they used in a big unit of bigger, stronger troops, preferably a horde (i.e. buy more bigger, dearer models) or unless you used - wait for it - special rules or certain spells to boost the spear attacks of weaker troops.

The spear. Not worth taking. Think about it. Forget cavalry, sounds like they weren't much of a counter vs. anything.

Anyway. AoS. Not even a spear in that.

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 mikhaila wrote:
The crowd i got into AOS wasn't the old crowd of WFB players... We ran with it for about 6 weeks, but slowly the players dropped off. Still in the store, but going to magic , warmachine, and xwing. At some point we didn't have anyone showing up to play.

Anecdotal evidence, etc. etc. blah blah blah... but eenteresting.

Very interesting read, thanks for that Mikhaila.

 Vermis wrote:

Anyway. AoS. Not even a spear in that.

Umm, spears quite important in AoS.

Lord of the Rings is doing better then AOS here... that tells a LOT.
Most people are still grumpy about the entire thing.

MongooseMatt wrote:

 Vermis wrote:

Anyway. AoS. Not even a spear in that.

Umm, spears quite important in AoS.

Because of the "measuring from the model" or because they provide an inherent benefit against cavalry?

Herzlos wrote:

MongooseMatt wrote:

 Vermis wrote:

Anyway. AoS. Not even a spear in that.

Umm, spears quite important in AoS.

Because of the "measuring from the model" or because they provide an inherent benefit against cavalry?

Iirc spears have a 2" attack range while standard weapons (swords, clubs) have 1"

I guess that makes some sense

I didn't use to play WHFB so I was a potential new customer for AoS. At first I was excited and impressed, particularly that GW had done the war scrolls for all legacy WHFB armies, even though I didn't have one.

Unfortunately I quickly realised that while a free set of rules is much cheaper than an £80 set of rules, it isn't much cheaper than a £10 set of rules. I find the AoS rules very limited in terms of content, and clunky at the same time. I would rather grab a copy of something like Songs of Blades and Heroes, Hordes of The Things, or the new Lion Rampant, for doing fantasy games.

Secondly, while the starter box is good value, I don't like Chaos. I also have become not very fond of the Sigmarines. While recognising the technical expertise in them, I find the aesthetic bland, uninspiring and lacking in variety.

Add-on kits turn out to be very expensive, as are the terrain pieces, though there is no denying their technical quality.

Mario wrote:

 judgedoug wrote:


Yes, we see it with Mikhaila, who owns two game stores, talked down the game and cried that it was going to ruin him, and then still sold all eighty of his copies. Again, contrast with DRNo172000's game store, which has two game demo displays - Age of Sigmar and Gates of Antares. And as he mentioned, Age of Sigmar starter has sold more since release than the last three years sales of Dark Vengeance. But that is a store that actively promotes it, runs games, and has, as he mentioned, a community of gamers more interested in casual/narrative/not-tournament style gaming.

I remember it differently (I read about him complaining in this thread and thought he was still championing the game until that point). In the original thread about the game and rumours regarding the changes he mentioned how he was making terrain and demo tables (when he got to preorder) and later, when it was sure that there won't be any points and the warscrolls were shown, a simple point system for the old veterans so they can also play AoS. I remember him initially being enthusiastic (because I wasn't and couldn't understand why) about the game and trying to make it work quite a bit more than that "talked down the game and cried" bit you mention.

I don't know what more he could have done to push the game besides giving it away for free (I think he also mentioned selling the starter at a discount to hook people on the game so he wasn't even far off that idea).

You tend to exaggerate a lot of things Doug, especially about my store which you have never seen. I don't talk down games in my store. And while i got rid of all but two of my copies, most of those were either at 90.00 in my store, discounted on dakka, or on ebay. The later two puts them close to cost, especially ebay. I didn't feel like having a few dozen copies sitting around and poor cashflow because of it.

Argue all you want about the game. But i'd rather both sides of this argument leave me out of it as a good/bad example. For you folk it's just arguing on dakka, but it feels more personal to me.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 TheWaspinator wrote:
If AOS's massive changes were an attempt to bring in people who don't normally play miniatures games, GW really doesn't understand what the real barrier is. It's not rules complexity, it's modelling. Star Wars Imperial Assault and X-Wing are a lot more complex than AOS and are currently doing really well. Those games even use, gasp, point systems. There's a lot of people who simply don't want to assemble models in order to be able to play.

I think there's an element of truth there. If someone is willing to put in the massive amount of time to actually assemble and paint an army, I'm guessing a larger than 4 page rulebook isn't going to be a big barrier to entry and for many of those who like the idea of 4 page rules the army building is probably a bigger barrier to entry.

Granted I think WHFB was getting bloated, but I also think GW massively over shot the mark on cutting it down.

We know that there are lots of players who aren't prepared to put in the effort to paint their army, but they still want to play 40K, and they just don't paint the figures..

Why shouldn't AoS go the same way? The Sigmarines are piss easy to paint, actually. You just spray them gold and do a couple of details.

It's not just paint, it's assembly. If you look at reviews of games like Sedition Wars, you see a lot of board gamers complaining about having to use glue. There's a lot of gamers who outright dislike the hobby aspects of these games and want either pre-assembled or single-piece figures.

Prepainted preassembled models are things people have been asking for for many many years - and games like xwing have started to deliver.

 TheWaspinator wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 TheWaspinator wrote:
If AOS's massive changes were an attempt to bring in people who don't normally play miniatures games, GW really doesn't understand what the real barrier is. It's not rules complexity, it's modelling. Star Wars Imperial Assault and X-Wing are a lot more complex than AOS and are currently doing really well. Those games even use, gasp, point systems. There's a lot of people who simply don't want to assemble models in order to be able to play.

I think there's an element of truth there. If someone is willing to put in the massive amount of time to actually assemble and paint an army, I'm guessing a larger than 4 page rulebook isn't going to be a big barrier to entry and for many of those who like the idea of 4 page rules the army building is probably a bigger barrier to entry.

Granted I think WHFB was getting bloated, but I also think GW massively over shot the mark on cutting it down.

We know that there are lots of players who aren't prepared to put in the effort to paint their army, but they still want to play 40K, and they just don't paint the figures..

Why shouldn't AoS go the same way? The Sigmarines are piss easy to paint, actually. You just spray them gold and do a couple of details.

It's not just paint, it's assembly. If you look at reviews of games like Sedition Wars, you see a lot of board gamers complaining about having to use glue. There's a lot of gamers who outright dislike the hobby aspects of these games and want either pre-assembled or single-piece figures.

That is true, and for people like that there are games like Zombie Something, RuneLords and Twilight Imperium III, which include a lot of ready assembled, colour coded game pieces. Or X-Wing and so on, where the pieces come ready painted.

GW isn't in that market at the moment, though I remember they made a set of colour coded Judge pawns for the original Judge Dredd board game.

Arguably, GW should look into this market again, however ATM apparently they see themselves as a model collector company, rather than a game company.

DakkaDakka has in the past often discussed the pros and cons of pre-painted figures. There are quite a lot of HHHobbyists who hate the idea of models they don't have to do anything to in order to use them. (As if you can't repaint ready painted figures.)

That said, a lot of HHHobbyists hate AoS, and if GW are prepared to dump lots of their old HHHobbyists for the sake of new rules and fluff, maybe they could do it for the sake of new game pieces too.

I am not surprised in a way to hear you contrast AoS unfavorably to Lion Rampant, KK. They are similarly streamlined but LR is completely generic and really relies on the strong existing POV of the player. I think pretty much all of the flavor of LR comes from the spectacle of the miniatures and terrain and the attitude of the players. LR's rules get out of the players' way, assuming the players have these great miniatures and this preexisting wonderful attitude drawn from a certain era or film. But if the players don't already have that spirit, LR seems to fall completely flat for them. It doesn't teach the player anything he doesn't already know or make him feel anything he doesn't already feel. It just stands aside. But AoS beckons you into its world and wants to express to you its mighty, cosmic clashes.

I hate the idea of prepainted miniatures. It doesn't appeal to me at all, especially as I would have to strip the paint off first before painting them myself.

For personal reasons, I'm glad GW refuses to embrace that market.

Space Hulk had coloured plastic and single pose models. That's good enough for a board game in my eyes. Most board games I play just have coloured pieces of plastic.