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 Bottle wrote:

*Sigh*... Not talking about the mechanics still.

Neither was I. WHFB was always prominently displayed in large solid units, LotR stuff was not.

Aesthetically AoS is much closer to 40k than LotR was to WHFB in terms of model design.

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 Bottle wrote:
I disagree.

Are you sure you've seen the models?

AoS Orcs:


LotR Orcs:


40k Orks:


WHFB Orcs:

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Frankly I think you've made an assertion that's both incredibly difficult to prove and highly suspect.

LOTR is a different scale, with different packaging, the minis will be painted in a different palette (broadly) and pursue a different aesthetic.

I also think you're doing a disservice to the younger kids, I've been impressed far more often than I've been disappointed when speaking to them on the odd occasion I drop into the local GW by their insight, understanding and enthusiasm to learn as much as they can. Probably (although I admit this is an assumption on my part) that it attracts the brighter, more intellectual kids, the sort who would likely get confused are already down the park doing their damnedest to kill the few spare brain cells they've got, one way or another.

Plus, you're not making account for how easy it is to correct any potential misunderstanding. "Why are those boxes blue?" "Where'd that giant elephant come from, which army can take those?" and any number of other questions that will happen naturally and lead to a discussion about how LOTR is a different rule set.

I really think it's as obvious as Fantasy was moved towards 40K in AoS because 40K sold much better, and lacking any sort of insight, GW just decided to make it more similar. Possibly for reasons no more sophisticated than they may get more crossover sales.

 Bottle wrote:
I think to a young mind who has never wargamed, the biggest difference out of those 4 will be 1 is armed with guns and 3 have swords/axes. Move away from orcs to elves and dwarves and they become even more similar.

I don't think any of those games are terribly similar. If someone is confused then they'd have to be daft or it would be a very bad salesman to let a customer get confused. People knew what LotR was back when the game came out coz, ya know, those 3 little movies that made out of it Individually speaking aesthetically WHFB models and 40k models are closer to each other IMO, as a whole GW always set up demo tables with the different games on them and WHFB was ranked models while LotR and 40k were individual models.

I'd really be surprised if many people interested enough in wargaming to give it a shot was confused sufficiently to be meaningful.

But either way, I stand by what I said earlier, which is that I think AoS is going to appeal more to existing 40k players and thus GW is competing with itself and reducing diversity and the benefit of having 2 core games.

But whatever, I don't see the point in continuing to discuss this.

So stop replying to it

-

 Bottle wrote:
Disagree if you want.

Indeed I shall.

Fine. My original point has has got twisted through the back and forthes. Someone said they thought AoS cannibalised 40k sales, and my opinion is that LOTR and WHFB were much more likely to cannibalise each other's sales than AoS does to 40K.

Well I don't really agree that LotR and WHFB did hugely cannibalise each other, though even if they did I'm not sure the relevance to the discussion of whether AoS cannibalises 40k sales. Diversity is good. Appealing to a wider range of audiences is good. There's always going to be some overlap between varying game systems, WHFB, AoS, 40k, LotR.... the point of having different game systems is to BOTH get money out of customers who want to buy a WHFB army and a 40k army and a LotR army AND also to appeal to a wider range of players who might only like LotR, or only like WHFB, or only like 40k. By removing WHFB and bringing AoS in to a place where it's going to appeal to 40k players more than anyone else is reducing the overall diversity of your customer base, you're narrowing your niche and becoming reliant on less people spending more money, which IMO has been a problem for GW for many years now.

-

Is anyone listening to what Bottle is saying? Instead of trying to prove him wrong, listen to what he is saying. SHEESH.

Good example when my parents were alive. They don't know science fiction much. They couldn't tell you the difference between a colonial viper on the Enterprise with the capitan holding a light sabre. To them it's a science fiction movie, to use, it's all wrong. That is what Bottle is trying to say, if nobody knows what wargaming is and goes into GW Fantasy and Lord of the Rings look the same.

NOTHING ABOUT PLAY STYLE.


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 Selym wrote:

 Bottle wrote:
I disagree.

Are you sure you've seen the models?

AoS Orcs:

Why did I find this so freaking funny? Mind you I was scrolling down slowly so only saw this pic and the question asked.

 Bottle wrote:
With LOTR coming back, I see it more as widening the niche between their 2 fantasy ranges. I think AoS and LOTR will appeal to two different demographics largely - whereas I think WHFB and LOTR had a lot of crossover to who it appealed to and these players might have only bought an army for one system.

So you think there was more crossover between LotR and WHFB than there is between AoS and LotR? I disagree.

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Davor wrote:
if nobody knows what wargaming is and goes into GW Fantasy and Lord of the Rings look the same.

Is anyone listening to what we are saying? Instead of trying to prove us wrong, listen to what we are saying. SHEESH.

But yeah, we've talked about it not only from a mechanics perspective but also an aesthetic and perception perspective...

LotR is a well known franchise, even if people don't know what WHFB is they know what LotR is so it's not hard to dispel any confusion with "Yes that one is LotR, this one is a completely different Fantasy setting".

Aesthetically, model wise, 40k models and WHFB are similarly scaled and heroic proportions. LotR models are smaller and realistically proportioned.

Aesthetically, colour wise, LotR models were usually painted with a duller palette to match the movies, 40k and WHFB were typically painted with a brighter palette.

Aesthetically, army wise, demo tables for WHFB were set up with ranked regiments, LotR was set up in loose formations.

If there's any confusion whatsoever it's incredibly easy to dispel, if a new customer walks in it takes all of 30 seconds for a salesperson to say "This is LotR, the game based on the world you know and love from the books and movies, it's a game about loose formations of troops often revolving around specific powerful characters like Gandalf and Aragorn. This is WHFB, another fantasy game, based in a different setting that's not LotR but still has Elves and Dwarfs and Orcs, it's based around large regiments of troops. This other game is a futuristic setting, it's got alien races and genetically modified superhumans wearing incredible armour, it's a game based around loose formations".

If they're not listening after you've said that and pointed to the various miniatures set up on demo tables (or even the boxes on the walls which have always been visually distinctive) then they were probably never going to be customers in the first place.

If they happen across an online store where no one is there to explain it, they might get confused, but I'd suggest the number of people who get in to wargaming by randomly going on GW's website is bugger all. Most people are going to stumble in to a store or be introduced to a game by friends.
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 Bottle wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Bottle wrote:
With LOTR coming back, I see it more as widening the niche between their 2 fantasy ranges. I think AoS and LOTR will appeal to two different demographics largely - whereas I think WHFB and LOTR had a lot of crossover to who it appealed to and these players might have only bought an army for one system.

So you think there was more crossover between LotR and WHFB than there is between AoS and LotR? I disagree.

I think you mean 40k, but yeah, that's the gist.

I copied the titles from your own post.

Funny how every time these sorts of threads come out there's always "We have to wait until next year to see if...". Godot ain't coming guys.

 Selym wrote:
TW tried to screw people over by making a faction that was guaranteed for release into a DLC

To be fair, that's not the fault of the people making the game. Creative Assembly's only major issues are crippling bugs, something that Warhammer Total War seems miraculously free of (compared to the last Rome, certainly). SEGA is the one fething with everyone over stupid DLC policies.

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 Bottle wrote:
So you think AoS and LOTR are more similar than WHFB and LOTR?

Take that particular tangent to a separate thread, please.

 Bottle wrote:
So you think AoS and LOTR are more similar than WHFB and LOTR?

 Nithaniel wrote:
GW has almost returned to its routes of being a mailorder (web order) that substitutes advertising costs with the costs of its stores. Its business plan states that it relies on its stores to generate new business.

Thats insane. I think there are plenty of kids and even a few adults that would realy enjoy the hobby but they'll never know about it unless one of their mates plays and drags them into a store.

They need to market their product even if this is online only marketing.

Cost increases however are still roughly in line with inflation. They were a very expensive hobby in the 90's and they are now still a very expensive hobby!

I agree the shops Arnt enough they Arnt always in the best spot to catch attention, look at Manchester that's tucked away and your not going to stumble over it very often walking around when shopping.

They need to advertise but that would really cut into their profits which currently Arnt so hot, what's more any advert featuring the price would be a turn off.

The biggest issue is kids have no money and most parents won't shell out GW prices for toy soldiers, they need pocket money level kits like they used to have, when £5-10 can't buy you any model you've priced out your source for new blood.

hobojebus wrote:

 Nithaniel wrote:
GW has almost returned to its routes of being a mailorder (web order) that substitutes advertising costs with the costs of its stores. Its business plan states that it relies on its stores to generate new business.

Thats insane. I think there are plenty of kids and even a few adults that would realy enjoy the hobby but they'll never know about it unless one of their mates plays and drags them into a store.

They need to market their product even if this is online only marketing.

Cost increases however are still roughly in line with inflation. They were a very expensive hobby in the 90's and they are now still a very expensive hobby!

I agree the shops Arnt enough they Arnt always in the best spot to catch attention, look at Manchester that's tucked away and your not going to stumble over it very often walking around when shopping.

They need to advertise but that would really cut into their profits which currently Arnt so hot, what's more any advert featuring the price would be a turn off.

The biggest issue is kids have no money and most parents won't shell out GW prices for toy soldiers, they need pocket money level kits like they used to have, when £5-10 can't buy you any model you've priced out your source for new blood.

Thing is, GW made a lot of effort to go to hidden locations out of the way spots for one man stores. This I could never understand. How much money are you really saving if nobody knows where you are? Only people to know where you are is customers who already gone to a GW store. There is no way someone stumbling into a GW store out of the blue when it's out of the way in an industrial area or what not from what I read of some of the locations GW chose to go to.

My quick take.

GW isn't broke, isn't going broke, and won't die any time soon...barring a catastrophe. As an investor, I'll keep my money in.

That said, if you look at the financials, you can see that they're not really seeing an increase of sales revenue which is what they're in business for, to sell things.

I'll continue to say that their brick and mortar approach is a long-term fail, especially in the North American market, this assertion verified upon examination of revenue streams with a decline in mail-order and retail while witnessing an increase in trade sales. Look at the associated expenses; it cost 35,930,000 to maintain their B&M stores, contrasted with the 8,899,000 to develop trade channels. Diminishing the retail presence would have a benefit on the bottom line in that it would reduce operating expenses substantially. They actually lost 3,410,000 operating stores..and that's before tax (20%). Wow. Let's just go ahead and double-down on losing money with an antiquated system of service delivery and somehow expect it to magically produce profits...um, no thanks.

Another small issue is the growing dependency upon royalties to turn an otherwise lackluster performance into something relatively solid. That doesn't bode well for long-term growth as there are no guarantees that whoever picks up the IP will do a good job (snotling flinger app I'm looking at you). It also gets away from the core business model (selling physical goods). The decrease in pre-royalty profit is a mild concern but is in alignment with their slow decline over the past 5+ years.

Interesting but not overly important is inventories. There's an increase in finished goods and goods for resale of 758,000 pounds. This isn't necessarily a big deal but it can indicate unsold stock sitting in warehouses...not alarming or anything, just something I look at in retail companies. In the same section, you see this bit:

During the period, the Group utilised an inventory provision of £916,000 (2015: £1,189,000) and £1,805,000 (2015: £1,247,000) has been charged to the
income statement.

This indicates the destruction/liquidation of excess or obsolete inventory. Sorry Brettonian players, there go all your knights.

I like looking at these things. You can see some interesting stuff hidden in financial statements that give you a window into processes in the business.

So, final note. GW is a pretty efficient company with their money. I, personally, don't agree with some of their business decisions but I don't have to in order to make money from my stock ownership. I may not like their B&M stores as I see them as a financial lodestone but I'm not overly concerned because they turn a profit every year and as long as they continue to do so, they're a stable company in which to invest.

One major thing about The Lord of the Rings game - it brought in a new audience, not just cannibalizing Warhammer Fantasy.

It showed up in major book stores, and even at WalMart in the States.

People that have never been in a game store in their lives saw and sometime bought Lord of the Rings.

It was losing that new market that caused GW to suffer losses - instead of turning to other GW games they left the hobby (or the H-H-Hobby) completely.

As for AoS cannibalizing 40K sales... ... ... maybe? I have seen more AoS starters being used to make 40K armies than I have games of AoS itself being played.

Play wise, AoS looks closer to 40K than it does WHFB, so it would make sense to me that it is more popular with people that like the style of play from 40K than they do WHFB.

The problem with that line of thought is that it means that people that prefer the style of play from WHFB were forced to migrate to other games.

Properly handled, this would mean less than you might think - as I mentioned above, miniatures games are like razors and razor blades - the money is in the blades, not the razors themselves, or, in the case of miniatures gaming, in the models, not the rules.

In my primary group, more copies of Island of Blood were bought when we made the changeover to Kings of War than when the IoB was new and shiny.

People hated the rules for 8th edition - but they were buying the models.

AoS... kind of killed that - people are not gobbling up AoS models for KoW. (This may change, to some degree - one of the players has started a Varangur army.)

Make of it what you will.

The Auld Grump


Automatically Appended Next Post:
One major thing about The Lord of the Rings game - it brought in a new audience, not just cannibalizing Warhammer Fantasy.

It showed up in major book stores, and even at WalMart in the States.

People that have never been in a game store in their lives saw and sometime bought Lord of the Rings.

It was losing that new market that caused GW to suffer losses - instead of turning to other GW games they left the hobby (or the H-H-Hobby) completely.

As for AoS cannibalizing 40K sales... ... ... maybe? I have seen more AoS starters being used to make 40K armies than I have games of AoS itself being played.

Play wise, AoS looks closer to 40K than it does WHFB, so it would make sense to me that it is more popular with people that like the style of play from 40K than they do WHFB.

The problem with that line of thought is that it means that people that prefer the style of play from WHFB were forced to migrate to other games.

Properly handled, this would mean less than you might think - as I mentioned above, miniatures games are like razors and razor blades - the money is in the blades, not the razors themselves, or, in the case of miniatures gaming, in the models, not the rules.

In my primary group, more copies of Island of Blood were bought when we made the changeover to Kings of War than when the IoB was new and shiny.

People hated the rules for 8th edition - but they were buying the models.

AoS... kind of killed that - people are not gobbling up AoS models for KoW. (This may change, to some degree - one of the players has started a Varangur army.)

Make of it what you will.

The Auld Grump

And the big advantages of the LOTR games was destroyed when The Hobbit dropped - It wasn't available everywhere and the price was horrifying.

 Bottle wrote:
Fine. My original point has has got twisted through the back and forthes. Someone said they thought AoS cannibalised 40k sales, and my opinion is that LOTR and WHFB were much more likely to cannibalise each other's sales than AoS does to 40K. Disagree if you want.

LoTR and WHFB co-existed for 15 years. It seems very unlikely that GW would have allowed this situation to continue if they were cannibalising each others' sales.

My previuos post with Tomb kings was to show that even teenager young lads are playing 8th edition ( what is the quality of it 8th I dont want to judge ). The thing that Total war is blockbuster could have refreshed WFB. Just look at google trends:

https://www.google.co.uk/trends/explore#q=%2Fm%2F03mf9x%2C%20Age%20of%20Sigmar&cmpt=q&tz=Etc%2FGMT-1

Its still more popular then AoS.

Also, if AoS is selling better then WHFB, why didnt they sell the out the limited edition releases for the game the "Gates of azyr" book has still 400 copies left at 20 pound price.....

http://www.blacklibrary.com/aos/whaos-feat/gates-of-azyr-ltd-ed.html

And this is the case with most the limited edition AoS books. Where WHFB ones sold out in maximum days on higher price points.

On the last note its quite sad to see that they didnt made a free version WHFB rule- and armybooks, but atleast you can aquire the e-rulebook for 20 quid.

herjan1987 wrote:
My previuos post with Tomb kings was to show that even teenager young lads are playing 8th edition ( what is the quality of it 8th I dont want to judge ). The thing that Total war is blockbuster could have refreshed WFB. Just look at google trends:

https://www.google.co.uk/trends/explore#q=%2Fm%2F03mf9x%2C%20Age%20of%20Sigmar&cmpt=q&tz=Etc%2FGMT-1

Its still more popular then AoS.

That's really more search results than outright popularity. The results are pretty close between fantasy and AoS up until they spike due to TW:W's release.

If we're going by "I wonder what this is about" as an equal to people playing it, then AoS had already came close to 40k popularity since by 1d4chan alone they got enough views on AoS to overcome the views on the 40k subjects which were far more viewed than anything fantasy.

I do agree though, it's a pity fantasy couldn't survive long enough to see total war's revival of it.

I can't really blame GW's decision not to wait three years to see if the failing product that was hemorrhaging profits would pull a complete 180 just because of one game which they had no idea if it would be successful or even be ready by 2016 where as AoS was started in 2013.

Also, if AoS is selling better then WHFB, why didnt they sell the out the limited edition releases for the game the "Gates of azyr" book has still 400 copies left at 20 pound price.....

http://www.blacklibrary.com/aos/whaos-feat/gates-of-azyr-ltd-ed.html

True, but I think GW are more concerned with model sales than book sales.

The fact that Orruks, Sylvaneths and many older models like Lord Kroak are constantly being sold out as opposed to before in 8th when they hardly moved kinda makes up for the book sales in my view.

@TheAuldGrump, I actually see many KoW and 9th players talking about buying AoS models for their games.

Heck, I see conversations on both forums for making rules for Stormcast armies and the like.

The fact that Orruks, Sylvaneths and many older models like Lord Kroak are constantly being sold out as opposed to before in 8th when they hardly moved kinda makes up for the book sales in my view

Book sales still reflect interest in the universe overall, the Heresy series was regularly hitting the NYT bestsellers until they started fiddling around with the formats.

Also, "sold out" is meaningless in isolation. It could represent an increase in popularity. It could also mean they've cut production runs by 90% or started allocating a lot more to the retail and indirect channels and less to online. It's very easy to have a small number of things to sell, then hail the fact they're sold out as a great success.

We know AoS is doing better than FB, they've told us, and while there's much they can do to fluff the information, they can't outright lie.

I've yet to see a compelling argument that it's doing significantly better than FB though. Then one has to account for the fact that GW will measure success in revenue, and I've seen some very punchy prices for AoS stuff vs older FB pricing, so it's quite possible that it's seen an increase in revenue while still posting declining unit sales.

Total revenue fell despite a massive boost from Total War:Hammer. This means that revenue from games fell more, about 4.7% in fact.

Whatever the arguments about unit price of kits and AoS having high priced kits, it is impossible to split sales of AoS from sales of 40K. Looking at the aggregate figures, if we suppose that AoS is doing well, it simply means that 40K must be doing worse.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Total revenue fell despite a massive boost from Total War:Hammer. This means that revenue from games fell more, about 4.7% in fact.

Actually this had me confused. It seems to me that the "Revenue" listed on the first page isn't actually total revenue but rather sales, it seems that figure doesn't include revenue from royalties. If you scroll down to page 9 where they have a better breakdown. They list

Revenue: 118,069
Cost of Sales: -37,438
Gross Profit: 80,631
Operating expenses: -60,710
Royalties: 5,939
Operating Profit: 16,860

Adding it up, Revenue - cost of sales - operating expenses + royalties = 118069-37438-69710+5939 = 16,860 = operating profit

So that means the income from sources other than sales, including royalties, is not included in the "revenue" on the first page.

Which does make it look not as bad, that means they only lost 0.9% actual sales to customers and 0.8% if you take it at constant currency.

I'm not sure why they wouldn't list total revenue, as that would mean total revenue is up by 2.8%.
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 Kilkrazy wrote:
Whatever the arguments about unit price of kits and AoS having high priced kits, it is impossible to split sales of AoS from sales of 40K. Looking at the aggregate figures, if we suppose that AoS is doing well, it simply means that 40K must be doing worse.

It's all really hard to say, because we know they make more money from new releases than existing stock. If AoS took more release slots off 40k, then it could be that the non-new-release sales figures for 40k could be better, worse or unchanged, but the overall sales are worse because of less new releases.

That's also why the statement that AoS has made more money than WHFB has in the past several years is not meaningful because AoS has had more releases than WHFB has had in the past several years as well.

Throw the likes of BAC and Silver Tower and it's pretty much impossible to say anything meaningful about the breakdown of sales between the different games.

The tin-foil-hatter in me would say GW intentionally tweaks their release schedule to make it impossible for us to determine anything useful from it (making sure no half year report can be attributed to only 1 group of products).

Which does make it look not as bad, that means they only lost 0.9% actual sales to customers and 0.8% if you take it at constant currency.

All losses on year to year sales is bad. Maybe it's *only* 0.8% but that's enough to get a lot of people fired considering it's consistent by now.

 Kirasu wrote:

Which does make it look not as bad, that means they only lost 0.9% actual sales to customers and 0.8% if you take it at constant currency.

All losses on year to year sales is bad. Maybe it's *only* 0.8% but that's enough to get a lot of people fired considering it's consistent by now.

But it's not nearly as bad as losing 4.7% in a single year

0.8% drop could be acceptable if they weren't expecting AoS to do as well as 40k to begin with.

The system of flogging 40k for all it's worth like previous years has limits, you might be willing to take a 0.8% drop in sales if it means a more stable future because you aren't relying solely on 40k for profits.

Though as I mentioned previously I think AoS was a bit of a wrong move in the sense I feel it's just going to be appealing to the same customers who already like 40k, a better move would have been trying to diversify, but it also would have been riskier. Given GW doesn't advertise to new customers, selling a new game that appeals to existing customers probably isn't a terrible outcome. Though to be fair, they have diversified a bit by investing effort in to BAC, Silver Tower and those sorts of games.

As people were saying when AoS first came out, it'll be a few years before we really understand how AoS impacts things.

I reckon some people in GW must grimace over the fact TWW pulled their arses out of the fire and it came from an IP they just killed

At a guess, it seems TWW might have pulled in more royalties than their 40k games.