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Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

 Chute82 wrote:

 judgedoug wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
PP Said parasite buisness practice... Not people buying online are parasites. To much drama

And the hundreds and hundreds of bucks I have spent on my Circle, Minions, and Menoth armies (to the tune of five Battlefoam D-Box and Stacker boxes full of minis along with a large Target storage crate full of unbuilt minis) from online discounters are meaningless? PP still made their distributor bucks. Meanwhile, I don't play WMH in stores, so I see no reason to pay this extra "tax" to punish me for buying from an online "parasitic" discounter. I can get virtually every other manufacturer's models at a greater discount now than PP - including GW, DZC, Mantic, et al. I'll still play the occasional WMH game at home w/ my buddies but there's no incentive now to purchase any new product.

Still PP don't call you a parasite... Which is what you claimed and I pointed it out to be false. I personally don't agree with PP policy and never posted I did. Just pointed out that PP never called you personally a parasite like you claimed.

Actually they did. Because you are actually part of that Business the moment you buy.

Thimn wrote:

 DrNo172000 wrote:

Thimn wrote:
I think its a good thing because stores are more likely to carry PP product now. People can see the game and buy it right away. I have already told the story of the Cleveland area and how the shops stopped carrying it because of online discounters and yet the game is still popular. I don't see anyone locally here ditching the game over this, and it will give more people the opportunity to buy in, as opposed to going to a nebulous online website that a new person wouldn't know about to begin with.

So no, I don't view it as less people getting reached, its more as far as I can see it. Other game companies have a similar policy, like Hawk for example. That is not stopping the game from growing because there are no deep discounts.

Time will tell whether this was a good move for PP, I wish they had done it 2 years ago, but next April I think the game will have more players as a result of this.

Every store I have ever been to is an unprofessional mess, and I've been to stores in multiple states (all anecdotal I know). They wear no uniforms, they don't engage customers (not that I've met many staff members of stores that had any salesmanship skills anyway), they don't run demos, and usually you have to be part of the in club to be treated like a human being. I have never gotten into a game thanks to a B&M, never. I've been introduced to all my games through friends. Not to mention these days I can usually read the rule book online for free as provided by the company. So maybe I'm jaded, or maybe this just makes no sense because no other market would be better off from this kind of move.

You mentioned Hawk but DZC is 20% off at MM, compared to 12% for PP now, so that doesn't seem to support your point. In fact the main company we can look to that has had a similar long standing policy is GW. GW by contrast is not growing, their sales are shrinking and 40k dropped to number 2 on the best selling mini game list. Now of course all that's anecdotal and correlation doesn't equal causation. But still I have to wonder what makes people think that gaming should operate any different than any other business. Fact is online sales increase customer base in all other businesses. People love to throw out that niche market tag like it means something. But what's interesting is the hobby market has grown exponentially since the rise of online sales. Again I know correlation doesn't equal causation, but one at least has to wonder if the two things are related.

Dr.No, maybe you don't understand, but MM abides by the Hawk Trade policy, they aren't deep discounting as far as Hawk is concerned.

So PP has a similar policy now, that's it. Yes it will cost more to order online, and PP sees not a dime of that money. This is about keeping PP product in local game stores where it can attract new customers. I fully understand people who don't play at a flgs being upset by this.

My take away, if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do. Obviously they see a problem, and this policy they put out doesn't make them more money (unless you count the new potential customers buying more from either flgs or online). This is truly something that should have been addressed years ago. Now we have a player base expecting 30% off to be the norm.

We are just going to have to agree to disagree, I simply see this as counterproductive to actual business sense. If Warmachine drops off the top 5 at ICV2 when the numbers come out next year though I will be back to say I told you so . Let's all just have fun playing our game, I for one am done sweating this stuff.

 DrNo172000 wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:

 judgedoug wrote:

 Chute82 wrote:
PP Said parasite buisness practice... Not people buying online are parasites. To much drama

And the hundreds and hundreds of bucks I have spent on my Circle, Minions, and Menoth armies (to the tune of five Battlefoam D-Box and Stacker boxes full of minis along with a large Target storage crate full of unbuilt minis) from online discounters are meaningless? PP still made their distributor bucks. Meanwhile, I don't play WMH in stores, so I see no reason to pay this extra "tax" to punish me for buying from an online "parasitic" discounter. I can get virtually every other manufacturer's models at a greater discount now than PP - including GW, DZC, Mantic, et al. I'll still play the occasional WMH game at home w/ my buddies but there's no incentive now to purchase any new product.

Still PP don't call you a parasite... Which is what you claimed and I pointed it out to be false. I personally don't agree with PP policy and never posted I did. Just pointed out that PP never called you personally a parasite like you claimed.

It would seem though that their position implies that he is a less valuable customer to them.

You can read into it and twist it to support your vision, like many have. It has nothing mentioned in the statement about customers who buy online just that PP views online discount realitors as parasites on the community. EBay still exists so that's always an option for deep discounts on products.

 Azreal13 wrote:
Assuming wholesale cost vs RRP follows normal retail (wholesale cost is often approx half RRP before taxes across a lot of products) I'd assume somewhere ~10% would be a logical place to peg a "sustainable" discount for brick and mortar stores and online stores alike. Quibbling over 3% from a large retailer is probably too petty, given the situation.

I can tell you for a fact cost is roughly 47-50% of MSRP or RRP as you guys call it. Honestly a B&M can easily sustain 20-30% off depending on their overhead. One of the LGS around my way pays nothing for thier building because they own it, and the other pays very less than like 3k a month for what amounts to two large store fronts. Neither offer discounts, neither get my dollars because my dollars are valuable to me. Though I do try and help them sell stuff when I'm in there, like if there's a question a staff member can't answer and I can. I just like my dollars.

 Manchu wrote:

Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

No the game doesn't need to be played at a LGS, but it's better for the game if stores actually carry the product.

 Chute82 wrote:
You can read into it and twist it to support your vision, like many have. It has nothing mentioned in the statement about customers who buy online just that PP views online discount realitors as parasites on the community. EBay still exists so that's always an option for deep discounts on products.

It's not a twisting of words. PP isnt' stupid enough to call out it's own fan base, but you can't paint online sellers with a moral brush, and not risk offending the people that bought from those sellers.

Essentially, PP is saying that there is a wrong way to sell PP, which means there's a wrong way to buy it.

I'm not personally offended, but their choice of moral language was odd.

Thimn wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

No the game doesn't need to be played at a LGS, but it's better for the game if stores actually carry the product.

Out of curiosity, why? Other than confirmation that the thing exists and there's a variety of things that exist, what does it matter if stores on the periphery of the marketplace carry it? Big box chains like Wal-Mart and Target where orders are measured in the tens of thousands and people can encounter it by chance? Sure. Outside of those online retailers they were just decrying I'm curious how many stores order dozens, let alone hundreds, of a given item. Add in that the advertising is almost reliant on already being in the hobby (think when the last ad of any kind you saw for a local game store was), and it's hard to see where they're doing any of the things that the end-customers are being asked to subsidize.

That sucks - every WM mini I own came from MM. (save a few pity purchases from my FLGS).

I wonder if they can do lower discount, but then something like "Warmachine/Hordes purchases get you double (or triple or whatever) the MM reward points."

Something like that and a lower threshold for free shipping.

You'd still be paying more for your WM/Hordes - but it'd ease the sting, make future minis a bit cheaper, and for MM, have the added benefit of keeping your next purchase to be more likely from them vs. someone else.

Thimn wrote:
you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do.

Decreasing your customer range?

Obviously they see a problem

No, they don't. That's the problem. What PP doesn't see or doesn't /want/ to realize is that the retail market has been changing for quite a while now and they do not know how to cope with that change. That's the elementary problem here and that's what PP doesn't understand.

I don't understand the title update, did something change? It used to say "MM stands up to PP" and now it says "caved". If someone can link to it I'll update the OP.

 RiTides wrote:
I don't understand the title update, did something change? It used to say "MM stands up to PP" and now it says "caved". If someone can link to it I'll update the OP.

There's no announcement or anything that I could find (I imagine they aren't eager to announce such an embarrassingly quick turnabout), but if you go to MM and look at their WM/Hordes stuff - the price is considerably higher than it was a day or two ago.

 Krinsath wrote:

Thimn wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

No the game doesn't need to be played at a LGS, but it's better for the game if stores actually carry the product.

Out of curiosity, why? Other than confirmation that the thing exists and there's a variety of things that exist, what does it matter if stores on the periphery of the marketplace carry it? Big box chains like Wal-Mart and Target where orders are measured in the tens of thousands and people can encounter it by chance? Sure. Outside of those online retailers they were just decrying I'm curious how many stores order dozens, let alone hundreds, of a given item. Add in that the advertising is almost reliant on already being in the hobby (think when the last ad of any kind you saw for a local game store was), and it's hard to see where they're doing any of the things that the end-customers are being asked to subsidize.

In case of MM they've been known to order 1k+ of an item. They got in 1805 of the Force Awakens core for x-wing when it came out. I too wonder how many solely B&M stores boast those kind of numbers.

 RiTides wrote:
I don't understand the title update, did something change? It used to say "MM stands up to PP" and now it says "caved". If someone can link to it I'll update the OP.

1. PP calls online-only retailers parasites and force high prices on their products
2. MM says "Nope, we stay at our price"
3. ???
4. MM caves in and adjusts their prices to what PP wants

 Sigvatr wrote:

Thimn wrote:
you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do.

Decreasing your customer range?

Obviously they see a problem

No, they don't. That's the problem. What PP doesn't see or doesn't /want/ to realize is that the retail market has been changing for quite a while now and they do not know how to cope with that change. That's the elementary problem here and that's what PP doesn't understand.

Sigvatr, do you also no longer support all the other game systems that have the same policy? All of those other companies give the same reason, how is PP not seeing the problem? If an industry trend is showing the problem, and PP has been famous for never addressing it amongst retail stores, the fact that they now take the problem on makes them blind?

How does other companies like GW not seeing the problem invalidate PP not seeing the problem? PP doesn't see the problem, that's the issue for them.

Personally, I buy X-Wing at -25% and Mantic at -20%. Last thing my wife and I bought from GW was in October 2013. For us, FLGS can die out. They are a relict from older times and as someone co-leading an own gaming club and hosting regular tournaments with 30+ participants, it becomes oh-so-apparent that FLGS are unnecessary if players are willing to do some work on their own. Retail is a dying business in a lot of areas.

Thimn wrote:

So PP has a similar policy now, that's it. Yes it will cost more to order online, and PP sees not a dime of that money. This is about keeping PP product in local game stores where it can attract new customers. I fully understand people who don't play at a flgs being upset by this.

My take away, if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do. Obviously they see a problem, and this policy they put out doesn't make them more money (unless you count the new potential customers buying more from either flgs or online). This is truly something that should have been addressed years ago. Now we have a player base expecting 30% off to be the norm.

You are marking two very large assumptions here, assumptions that I don't think are likely true.

Assumption 1: Local game stores carrying models for a game (not just the rules) is the primary driver of new customer growth, not word of mouth or similar effects. That is to say, most people don't start playing because they have friends that play or because they see people playing, but rather because they see the game and specifically the models on the shelf and decide to buy into it.
Putting it yet a different way, the difference in new player growth between seeing people playing in a store with no models in stock and seeing people playing in a store with models in stock is large.

- I don't think that is true. It might be true that some new players see a two player battle box, think it looks cool, and jump in. I have strong doubts about whether someone sees a 15$ warcaster model and decides to jump in on the 1-200$ for an army without knowing other people that play. There are probably some people that do that, but compared to the number that know friends that play, whether local friends or online, or see games played at a convention or on YouTube or what have you, the number of impulse new players has to be very tiny. Especially because PP's price point relative to the quality of their models is not amazing. I have bought some PP models in the past because they were cool, but the vast majority of my purchases have been because they did something specific in game and I needed those models to play in official tournaments. I would never have bought epic Kreuger without knowing ahead of time how good he was in the game.
From the other perspective, Assumption 1 suggests that if people see their friends playing a game, or just see the models being played with in a store or online, the model's absence from the LGS shelves would turn that player away from the game. So if my buddy says "Oh man, you have to try this game Hordes! I have been playing for a while and it is really fun!" I would likely not get into the game because I can't buy it locally. That strikes me as unlikely.

I do suspect that having the rule books around gets new people into the game, as ~30$ for a rule book for a new game is pretty reasonable, and it seems that a lot of folks are willing to drop that kind on money on books. A store carrying the core rule books vs the entire line is a BIG difference however. As someone else noted, PP's line is something like 1000 SKUs now. Carrying most of their stuff is nearly impossible for midsized stores.

Assumption 2: The price elasticity of Warmachine/Hordes players is low, such that the increase in new players from Assumption 1 is greater than the loss of existing players who drop out of the game due to price increases, as well as new players who don't start because of the cost of entry.

- This is the killer I think. Even if Assumption 1 is true, and people will see the models in the store and buy into the game, or because the models are in their local store will buy into the game their friends are playing, it still has to be true that those new players are willing to pay the buy in price (again, 100-300$ pretty handily) and existing players won't decide that the game has gotten too expensive and spend their hobby money on other games instead. Increasing prices will drop demand, the question is just how much. For your argument to work, that PP's decision here is good for the health of the game, it must be true that the number of new players generated by having more stores with PP in stock is greater than the number of players lost or never gained due to higher prices. That's a very big assumption. Now, it is possible that instead of dropping Warmachine/Hordes players simply stop using PP models to save money, and that might be ok for the health of the game. Players could also buy far fewer models, limiting the variations in lists and factions they play, but that doesn't seem healthy for the game.


So in a nutshell, it seems that the only way PP's move here is good for the game is if the free marketing from stock sitting on FLGS shelves draws more players than are lost. I am not optimistic about that being the case.
Note that it isn't even about whether or not there even will be a LGS. As others here have pointed out, miniature games do not keep LGS going, so people buying PP locally is not likely to make the difference between the store being there or not, and so is not going to make a difference between seeing people playing the game or not. The vast majority of the effect is tied to people seeing the product on the shelves and deciding to jump in. (It also is tied to the idea that OLGS that drop PP models didn't provide any marketing, and so there will be no loss of players. Apparently I am the only one who spent time at work browsing The WarStore and CMoN looking for models to buy.)

 DrNo172000 wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
Assuming wholesale cost vs RRP follows normal retail (wholesale cost is often approx half RRP before taxes across a lot of products) I'd assume somewhere ~10% would be a logical place to peg a "sustainable" discount for brick and mortar stores and online stores alike. Quibbling over 3% from a large retailer is probably too petty, given the situation.

Honestly a B&M can easily sustain 20-30% off depending on their overhead.

Except those that can't.

With sales taxes of 20% in the UK, a £100 item at standard markup is going to gross a store ~£40 at RRP. @30% discount = ~£16.

So if your business model can cope with profits less than half the standard, more power to you, but most businesses have rent and salaries to pay, as well as maintaining enough cash flow to keep new product coming in, utilities etc.

It isn't impossible, but to say it's sustainable in broad terms is not exactly correct.

GW's policies for online stores was one of the reasons I stopped buying from them. I've been a fan of PP for 9 or 10 years now, but some of their recent decisions made me a bit worried, but this one actually really bothers me. PP always felt like this fresh, hip company, but this policy is archaic. I have never been an LGS player for the entirety of my time in the hobby, 99% of my gaming is done with friends at home and 99% of my minis are bought online. I am not sure where I would go if I ended up dropping PP, I have played lots of other mini games, but only Warhammer and Warmachine have really, truly grabbed me. I haven't tried Infinity yet so that's a possibility.

Zatsuku wrote:
I am not sure where I would go if I ended up dropping PP, I have played lots of other mini games, but only Warhammer and Warmachine have really, truly grabbed me. I haven't tried Infinity yet so that's a possibility.

Just get the Song of Blades and Heroes rules and repurpose all those PP minis! Instant win!

Get some circular movement trays and have your PP guys double in as a Kings of War army. Double instant win!

At this point in the past few years I think I have played one proper WMH game, whereas my Trolls and Skorne have seen quite regular play in SoBH.

Bummer about the MM prices - thanks for the clarification guys!

 TheKbob wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:
I will be honest this almost makes me want to play Warhammer again because at least with GW it's the devil I know and I know they are trying to cheat me. I really think that this is going to backfire on PP with the bad publicity.

At least this was a good vector check to see you, I, or anyone else wasn't just a new blind fan of something. It definitely sours my taste on the company, the game is still good. I will likely move away from larger games after Warmachine unless there's one that create large scale at lower cost (historicals?).

I like the game still, but at this rate may as well go back to the Evil Empire and get better quality figures and less stressful (not right word) gameplay. A 30% discount was a big reason I've bought so much PP stuff. At least I have a store relatively nearby that offers 20% so 13% including sales tax. Just PP doing it at all sours me on them since it's a very GW like move.

 Azreal13 wrote:

 DrNo172000 wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
Assuming wholesale cost vs RRP follows normal retail (wholesale cost is often approx half RRP before taxes across a lot of products) I'd assume somewhere ~10% would be a logical place to peg a "sustainable" discount for brick and mortar stores and online stores alike. Quibbling over 3% from a large retailer is probably too petty, given the situation.

Honestly a B&M can easily sustain 20-30% off depending on their overhead.

Except those that can't.

With sales taxes of 20% in the UK, a £100 item at standard markup is going to gross a store ~£40 at RRP. @30% discount = ~£16.

So if your business model can cope with profits less than half the standard, more power to you, but most businesses have rent and salaries to pay, as well as maintaining enough cash flow to keep new product coming in, utilities etc.

It isn't impossible, but to say it's sustainable in broad terms is not exactly correct.

We don't have that sort of sales tax in the U.S. so I didn't consider it, my apologies. If rent and labour though are causing you to struggle well that's simply a bad business model. These are cost that should be factored in before you even open your doors. Also obviously you must have a plan in place to increase volume if you have an aggressive price model. As I said before though I've never been in a store that actively tries to aggressively increase its customer base. Which is odd because a new player is way more valuable in terms of sales as the initial buy in is far greater than someone who's been playing for years.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:

Zatsuku wrote:
I am not sure where I would go if I ended up dropping PP, I have played lots of other mini games, but only Warhammer and Warmachine have really, truly grabbed me. I haven't tried Infinity yet so that's a possibility.

Just get the Song of Blades and Heroes rules and repurpose all those PP minis! Instant win!

Get some circular movement trays and have your PP guys double in as a Kings of War army. Double instant win!

At this point in the past few years I think I have played one proper WMH game, whereas my Trolls and Skorne have seen quite regular play in SoBH.

I do try to do this, but I am still stuck in the mindset that the rules and background and minis are intrinsically linked. I guess that's still GW's legacy on my thought process. I actually really enjoy the gameplay of Kings of War because it emphasizes the movement phase, which is my favorite part of block infantry games, but the one time I playted SoBH I felt it went much too far in simplifying things. Part of my love for Warmachine/Hordes is the kind of combos you can pull off, and the fact that the rules are both clear AND intricate, something few games succeed at. I feel that isn't there in SoBH, but I could be entirely wrong.

 Azreal13 wrote:

 DrNo172000 wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
Assuming wholesale cost vs RRP follows normal retail (wholesale cost is often approx half RRP before taxes across a lot of products) I'd assume somewhere ~10% would be a logical place to peg a "sustainable" discount for brick and mortar stores and online stores alike. Quibbling over 3% from a large retailer is probably too petty, given the situation.

Honestly a B&M can easily sustain 20-30% off depending on their overhead.

Except those that can't.

With sales taxes of 20% in the UK, a £100 item at standard markup is going to gross a store ~£40 at RRP. @30% discount = ~£16.

So if your business model can cope with profits less than half the standard, more power to you, but most businesses have rent and salaries to pay, as well as maintaining enough cash flow to keep new product coming in, utilities etc.

It isn't impossible, but to say it's sustainable in broad terms is not exactly correct.

Which means that you have to sell five at the discounted price to make th same profit as two at full price. Discounting helps on your cash flow, because people will buy more, but businesses need to work out how much they want to discount to still run a profitable enterprise. Dark Sphere's in-store prices are generally slightly higher than online, but that's because if you go into the store they've got more overheads to cover, an I imagine that their location costs them a fortune, especially given how much space they have. Wouldn't surprise me if it was 3-4k a month.

 DrNo172000 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Azreal13 wrote:

 DrNo172000 wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:
Assuming wholesale cost vs RRP follows normal retail (wholesale cost is often approx half RRP before taxes across a lot of products) I'd assume somewhere ~10% would be a logical place to peg a "sustainable" discount for brick and mortar stores and online stores alike. Quibbling over 3% from a large retailer is probably too petty, given the situation.

Honestly a B&M can easily sustain 20-30% off depending on their overhead.

Except those that can't.

With sales taxes of 20% in the UK, a £100 item at standard markup is going to gross a store ~£40 at RRP. @30% discount = ~£16.

So if your business model can cope with profits less than half the standard, more power to you, but most businesses have rent and salaries to pay, as well as maintaining enough cash flow to keep new product coming in, utilities etc.

It isn't impossible, but to say it's sustainable in broad terms is not exactly correct.

We don't have that sort of sales tax in the U.S. so I didn't consider it, my apologies. If rent and labour though are causing you to struggle well that's simply a bad business model. These are cost that should be factored in before you even open your doors. Also obviously you must have a plan in place to increase volume if you have an aggressive price model. As I said before though I've never been in a store that actively tries to aggressively increase its customer base. Which is odd because a new player is way more valuable in terms of sales as the initial buy in is far greater than someone who's been playing for years.

I think it's more about an environment is developing where, unless you're lucky enough to have some deeply unusual competitive advantage, such as a pile of money lying around with which to by your own premises, that people aren't opening their doors because there's no point. They calculate that they can't generate enough profit from the sales they believe they can generate, because they know the prices that their product can realistically sell for in order to be competitive.

The bigger players probably have the established customer base etc in order to justify the higher prices or get in and roll in the mud with the pigs, so to speak, but when one takes a long term view, if one takes the view that LGS are important to the the long term future of the hobby, which PP clearly have, and one wants them to be viable in areas that don't necessarily have the large footfall to support a high turnover/low profit model, then trying to do something to make new stores more viable may be a way to go.

Of course, all the online sellers are now making more money per transaction on any PP product they sell, so unless they really tank, that money could well be used to beat PP over the head in other ways.

It's an admirable stance PP have taken, IMO, but it's a badly executed and flawed idea.

Thimn wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

No the game doesn't need to be played at a LGS, but it's better for the game if stores actually carry the product.

You keep asserting this, but I've yet to see a single solitary shred of evidence to support the claim. Indeed, I'd like you to explain something for me; how does WarmaHordes even exist in the UK & Europe? Most gaming here is done in clubs and independent retailers are much rarer than in America, but PP products somehow managed to penetrate this market and have been steadily growing ever since - by your thesis that shouldn't work, they should be struggling constantly even to be noticed. As should every other game maker except GW which has comparatively massive "reach" of the kind you claim is better than anything else for spreading a game thanks to their chain of stores, but again the reality is GW stagnating and various alternative games and model makers in the ascendant(we'll see if GW's recent moves turn that around).

 adhuin wrote:
We need a new thread name. May I suggest.

Privateer Press beats miniature market with a Stick.

How about The Auld Grump Stops Buying Privateer Press - News At 11.

Because that was the very first result that it had when I found out that PP was trying strong arm tactics.

I stopped buying GW, and I have no problems with no longer buying PP.

Well done, PP, well done. You have won.

The Auld Grump

 Yodhrin wrote:

Spoiler:

Thimn wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

No the game doesn't need to be played at a LGS, but it's better for the game if stores actually carry the product.

You keep asserting this, but I've yet to see a single solitary shred of evidence to support the claim. Indeed, I'd like you to explain something for me; how does WarmaHordes even exist in the UK & Europe? Most gaming here is done in clubs and independent retailers are much rarer than in America, but PP products somehow managed to penetrate this market and have been steadily growing ever since - by your thesis that shouldn't work, they should be struggling constantly even to be noticed. As should every other game maker except GW which has comparatively massive "reach" of the kind you claim is better than anything else for spreading a game thanks to their chain of stores, but again the reality is GW stagnating and various alternative games and model makers in the ascendant(we'll see if GW

It all starts to get very relativistic here.

Sure, PP do ok in the UK, but we have no data to show how much better they'd be doing if decreased price pressure from online stores allowed more independant stores to both open and continue to trade.

It's the whole "known unknowns, known knowns, unknown unknowns" thing at play.

 Yodhrin wrote:

Thimn wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Thimn wrote:
if you really cared for the health of the game you just need to acknowledge what PP is trying to do

What exactly is "health of the game" here? Does WMH need to be played in the LGS to be "healthy"?

No the game doesn't need to be played at a LGS, but it's better for the game if stores actually carry the product.

You keep asserting this, but I've yet to see a single solitary shred of evidence to support the claim. Indeed, I'd like you to explain something for me; how does WarmaHordes even exist in the UK & Europe? Most gaming here is done in clubs and independent retailers are much rarer than in America, but PP products somehow managed to penetrate this market and have been steadily growing ever since - by your thesis that shouldn't work, they should be struggling constantly even to be noticed. As should every other game maker except GW which has comparatively massive "reach" of the kind you claim is better than anything else for spreading a game thanks to their chain of stores, but again the reality is GW stagnating and various alternative games and model makers in the ascendant(we'll see if GW's recent moves turn that around).

Oh come on, are we really going to argue that a product sells better in a store when it is actually available to buy? Why wouldn't Warmachine exist in Europe? You are making alot of wierd claims. My statement is, a product sells better in stores, when it is actually stocked.