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AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I wonder if that 4 months starts just before or just after the brexit vote.

They say sales are up even at constant currency which is good.

For a company that gets roughly two thirds (from memory) of its revenue overseas, the drop in the pound was going to be a huge boost. They're making roughly 16% more on each overseas sale than they were last year.

GW's fiscal year started June 1, Brexit vote was June 23. Sterling got smacked immediately afterwards so they've enjoyed over 3 full months of sales with GBP down 15% vs USD alone.
Their stated increase in sales at constant currency is encouraging, but I'll wait until mid-year results to raise a glass.

I'm beginning to wonder if GW was right all along - their games don't really matter. My impression is that their games have taken a huge hit the last two years or so. Gaming nights at the store used to be packed with people playing Warhammer and 40k, and shelf space in the store was nearly 50% GW stuff. It's completely fallen off a cliff. Their shelf space has been slowly shrinking and I rarely see people playing their games.

Yet they seem to be cranking along at basically the same pace these past two years.... I guess most of their customers really are just collectors buying minis to paint and model. Frankly I'm impressed they've kept the wheels,on the bus this whole time, despite their actual games becoming less and less popular and competitors snatching up those people.

When AoS came i(after at least trying it which more than I can say for many old WFB players I knew), thought this really was the beginning of the end. I tried using the opportunity afforded by the death of fantasy to get back into 40k but... Yeah what a mess that is right now, and the player base just isn't what it used to be. I dunno, somehow the show goes on. Actual "gamers" like myself apparently really aren't what drives their sales.

It's important to take this statement in context. Unlike their financial reports, this sort of thing doesn't have any legal obligation to accuracy.

Firstly, we have no clue as to what the expectations were for this quarter, so "above expectations" could be code for "bad, but not as bad as we thought."

Secondly, their first half last year was pretty dire, according to their FYE report, only turning thing around in the post Christmas period. So sales being up YOY doesn't necessarily mean that they're actually any good.

Sales being up and a pleasant surprise for the board is in no way a bad thing, but it isn't necessarily particularly remarkable either.

dosiere wrote:
I'm beginning to wonder if GW was right all along - their games don't really matter. My impression is that their games have taken a huge hit the last two years or so. Gaming nights at the store used to be packed with people playing Warhammer and 40k, and shelf space in the store was nearly 50% GW stuff. It's completely fallen off a cliff. Their shelf space has been slowly shrinking and I rarely see people playing their games.

Yet they seem to be cranking along at basically the same pace these past two years.... I guess most of their customers really are just collectors buying minis to paint and model. Frankly I'm impressed they've kept the wheels,on the bus this whole time, despite their actual games becoming less and less popular and competitors snatching up those people.

When AoS came i(after at least trying it which more than I can say for many old WFB players I knew), thought this really was the beginning of the end. I tried using the opportunity afforded by the death of fantasy to get back into 40k but... Yeah what a mess that is right now, and the player base just isn't what it used to be. I dunno, somehow the show goes on. Actual "gamers" like myself apparently really aren't what drives their sales.

I think it's really hard to pinpoint who buys the models when the game is such trash. I mean, there's a lot of people who will say the game is great because they play with like the same 2-3 people and they have fun, but for every situation like that there's the one you said where the GW groups have all splintered and gone to other games; other than the GW store itself, barely any store stocks anything besides the bare minimum for GW stuff, and I rarely see people play it.

I do think that a lot of it is the IDEA of collecting and playing. I can use myself as an example because the past few months that's what I've done. I've bought several hundred dollars of different things (few CSM things, started a Flesh Eater Court army for AOS) but I've barely used it. Yet I spend most days looking at Warhammer things, whether that's browsing forums, looking at pictures, watching Youtube videos, eyeing models, etc and I already have several ideas for other armies brewing in my head, despite playing like all of 2.5 games of AOS and not even having played 40k yet in some 16 years (first game is set for tomorrow though). So why is that? I don't even exactly have an answer, but I know I've already thought of buying several more things, for the sake of "Maybe this will be what I enjoy", and I can only imagine that's how it must be for other people too. It's the illusion of buying this cool army and painting it up and playing with it that keeps them going, and I know this because that's what has me thinking periodically of starting a Genestealer Cult army, or a Nurgle Chaos army, or maybe a Bonesplitterz or Necron or Eldar army, or maybe buying Calth to start playing 30k, all of which has happened in the past month or so (thinking about it, not buying it). Like, I can't even really explain it fully, and writing this makes me think it's just crazy but that's how it is. I spent most of today considering if I were to start a Nurgle army in AOS, how I might paint my models, and then reading some old Nurgle fluff. I don't own any Nurgle models, and I've barely played my Flesh-Eater Courts in AOS. But here I am thinking of doing another army and dropping a few hundred bucks on it, because the idea of collecting it sounds appealing. The IDEA. Not the game. The idea of collecting the army.

Maybe that's their trick.

Reading Wayne's comment, I sometimes wonder if GW has hit some kind of "balance" point at this stage, in which they've basically burned all bridges that could be burned. Most new - prospective - players are scared away at the sight of their prices, many veterans have left after having been treated with pure contempt for years, so in the end GW is left with the "whales" (the kind of veteran who pretty much spends all their wargaming budget on GW and won't even have a look at other games/models).

What I mean is, perhaps at this point GW has managed to get themselves to a stage where they can more or less keep their profits stable despite sales still going down and their market share still shrinking in a bussiness environment (wargaming and miniatures) that according to all signs seems to be growing and growing. Obviously those profits are stable thanks to cost cutting measures and more price raises, policies which we know won't be sustainable on the long run. But between that and some lucky hits with royalties (Total War) they may be able to survive for a few more years without suffering internal turmoil.

When the machine eventually breaks down, it's not going to be pretty though.

Their main issues (terrible rules, crazy prices) show no sign of getting fixed anytime soon, in fact they're getting worse by the minute. I'll be probably starting a new project soon, a Fantasy mercenary army intented to play WHFB 5th, 6th or 7th edition, or perhaps any fanmade ruleset based on them. And it's likely I won't be buying anything from GW, because as things stand right now they're pretty much the worst option out there in terms of price/quality.

In fact, at this rate, the only thing I'll ever buy from GW again will be some Black Ark Corsairs because I really want to complete my Dark Elf Corsair force with models from 5th, 6th and 7th editions, and those guys are priced decently for a change (ten models, 21€).

dosiere wrote:
Yet they seem to be cranking along at basically the same pace these past two years.... I guess most of their customers really are just collectors buying minis to paint and model. Frankly I'm impressed they've kept the wheels,on the bus this whole time, despite their actual games becoming less and less popular and competitors snatching up those people.

This is true in the short term, I think. The problem is with the picture several years out. No matter how good a game is people will eventually stop buying. They finish their collections, have life events that force a change of priorities, etc, and that's the end of the money you're getting from them. To stay alive you have to keep getting new customers to replace the ones you lose. GW used to have (and still does have, to some degree) a huge advantage in their market dominance: no matter where you went there were people playing GW games, so the first game a new person would be introduced to was almost always a GW game. And then maybe, once you were into GW games, you might have poked around at some of the non-GW options. But now GW is losing this "critical mass" factor. Fewer people are playing GW games, and more new customers are being introduced to GW's competition instead. So yeah, the dedicated collectors are going to keep giving GW revenue, but who is replacing them when they're gone?

I think GW rely heavily on their whales these days.

I've joked for years that GW's business practice is increasingly trying to squeeze as much money out of as few customers and as time goes on I think it becomes more true.

Thing is, there's a ton of people who are like that. I see it all the time (some are on this forum) where people only know GW, nothing else comes close to quality (so they say), no other game appeals to them because it doesn't look like a GW game, nothing else strikes their fancy but GW's over the top approach, so GW is it.

I've met a ton of people who still feel that the entire wargaming hobby is Warhammer; even now people seem to know like Warhammer, maybe Warmachine, sometimes X-Wing (but honestly I don't really consider X-Wing to be in that same category, even though it really is), and that's it. Anything else they are completely ignorant of. Mention something like Flames of War, or Bolt Action, or Frostgrave or some of those kickstarter type miniature games (names escape me now but there's like a Wild West one that looked cool, and a weird fantasy one, Dark Age I think? I don't know, there's tons) and you get blank stares followed by essentially ignoring that you just mentioned another game (as opposed to asking to know more about it). For me this is especially hard because I have a laundry list of games I've seen that looked cool and I might be interested in (to say nothing of the fact I like military history and as a result various historical eras), but not only does nobody around me play them, but nobody I've ever talked to knows/cares about them, because they aren't Warhammer/Warmachine/something you can readily buy in a game store and then proceed to play games only at that game store. Which usually leads back to my rant on how "game store culture" is awful and gaming club culture is much better, but I'll spare that particular rant again

I do see that mentality far more common in the GW crowd though; often any comment of another game is met with immediate reasons why said other game is inferior to Warhammer, or occasionally an "I used to play that game, but I left because <reasons> and went back to Warhammer" followed by saying how the game isn't as good as Warhammer because of XYZ (usually related to the lore and/or the models).

It's very weird, but I guess I can't bash it as much as I used to because I am essentially a "whale" right now. The idea of building a cool looking army and playing with it is enough to get me to want to spend money, sad as I am to say. I've spent more in the past like 2 months than I did in an entire year on Warmachine (which I haven't played since the new edition came out because I've been focusing on buying Warhammer stuff). Hell, if my 40k game goes well tomorrow and I like it, there's a solid chance the following week I'm going to drop like $300-400 on Genestealer Cults, and even if not there's a very good chance I'm going to spend at least $100 and maybe more on either stuff for my Flesh-Eater Courts or starting a new AOS army. Like I said, it's the idea of doing it, of having a very visually cool looking army (which I can no longer deny, the GW models ARE usually cool looking and have a very unique looking aesthetic to them, by which mean they have a very distinct look that, even though I do enjoy a lot of figures from other games, it's not the same. It's kind of like preferring the look of a Honda; a Toyota might be a great car, maybe even better than the Honda, but it doesn't quite look like a Honda) even in the face of the game (although truth be told I did enjoy Age of Sigmar and want to play it more).

I think a lot of forum dwellers either are or were at one time whales for GW, I remember a 40k poll a while back that asked how much people spend on 40k and the average was quite high even. I know I've been one in the past, but after a while the game just fails to capture me so even when I get excited about an army I'm left with the thought I'm never going to actually play a game with them so what's the point.

As such I haven't bought anything from GW in a while now, even though there are forces I'd like to experiment with.

I really hope I haven't said this in this thread already. - It's kinda one of the things when you do have long discussion threads but... I think it's a case of, "I always meant to post it but never did."

I do think that it'll end up being a combination of more prevalent gaming stores combined with licensed games that take down GW.

After all, a [strike]space marine[/strike]Adeptus Astartes is cool and all but, like the saying goes.

Always be yourself.
Unless you can be Batman
Then always be Batman.

@wayniac it's called the walled garden mate, companies like Apple and Sony both do similar things with proprietary tech to keep customers only buying their products.

 Compel wrote:
I really hope I haven't said this in this thread already. - It's kinda one of the things when you do have long discussion threads but... I think it's a case of, "I always meant to post it but never did."

I do think that it'll end up being a combination of more prevalent gaming stores combined with licensed games that take down GW.

After all, a [strike]space marine[/strike]Adeptus Astartes is cool and all but, like the saying goes.

Always be yourself.
Unless you can be Batman
Then always be Batman.

It'll be interesting to see if licensed games end up dominating. X-Wing certainly does well, but I think in general 40k is a universe designed around a game rather than a game designed around a universe and that makes for better gaming in the end. Where licensed games tend to hit walls when it comes to expanding the range, 40k can always invent new armies or new factions within existing armies and just write them in to the wider fluff.

I quit playing 40k in 5th edition and WFB at the end of 7th.
I was a big advocate of and actively demoed for Mantic for a couple of years. Over the past two years, I've bought back into GW because of the games. I like AoS (and I understand the rage over the points/force org not coming out with the game's release).

I've also bought into GW's board games and primarily because they are self-contained games that are actually pretty decent themselves (Execution Force, Warhammer Quest, B@C, Deathwatch Overkill). These games have solid rule sets and let me play in the 40k/Fantasy settings without having to buy into huge armies. I also don't have to rely on others to buy in since the games come with both sides.

GW have made some mistakes during the past couple of years, too. For example, I cancelled my sub to the new WD once the first issue screw-up became clear---and it looks like they're still jacking that up. But overall, they're doing better and I look forward to Blood Bowl and the Prospero game for the games themselves.

I've seen a solid resurgence in gw lately locally. It feels like manic squaneed their chance with kings of war and AoS with points has already started to push it out. Leagues are starting g again. When we haven't had them I the last 7 years for AoS and 40k seems to be on an uptick. And all of this is in Ffgs backyard where xwing is insanely popular.

I think gw is slowly righting the boat. The moment is going to be the release of 8th. So many want simplification but there is always backlash from diehards.

For me with the release of points for AoS and genestealer Cult they got me for a decent bit of cash this year outside of their boardgames.

Why are people calling other people whales now? I don't get it.

 Hulksmash wrote:
I've seen a solid resurgence in gw lately locally. It feels like manic squaneed their chance with kings of war and AoS with points has already started to push it out.

According to data from reddit, which in my opinion is more a truthful reflection of actual numbers than anecdotal evidence and hearsay, AoS has left KoW behind a long time ago. The AoS community is now bigger than the old WHFB community, and growing:

http://redditmetrics.com/r/kingsofwar#compare=warhammerfantasy+ageofsigmar

Whales is a term mostly used in free-to-pay videogames (maybe it existed before, but that's mainly the context I've seen it) but has become more prevalent in describing customerbases in general.

Most of the frree-to-play users play for free or pay for just the occasional premium stuff. But a few players get hooked enough to put in vast sums of money, buying all of the skins, weapons and digital tat.

The companies make most of their money on those few "whales" , similar to how GW seems to become increasingly dependent on a smaller customer-base, purchasing big quantities of stuff.

 Zywus wrote:
Whales is a term mostly used in free-to-pay videogames but has become more prevalent in describing customerbases in general.

Most of the frree-to-play users play for free or pay for just the occasional premium stuff. But a few players get hooked enough to put in vast sums of money, buying all of the skins, weapons and digital tat.

The companies make most of their money on those few "whales"

Thank you, learned something new today. Greatly appreciate the explanation.

-

I believe 'whales' actually originates from casinos, it's a synonym for a high roller. But Zywus has the right of it in this context.

motski wrote:

 Hulksmash wrote:
I've seen a solid resurgence in gw lately locally. It feels like manic squaneed their chance with kings of war and AoS with points has already started to push it out.

According to data from reddit, which in my opinion is more a truthful reflection of actual numbers than anecdotal evidence and hearsay, AoS has left KoW behind a long time ago. The AoS community is now bigger than the old WHFB community, and growing:

http://redditmetrics.com/r/kingsofwar#compare=warhammerfantasy+ageofsigmar

It would be nice to know, however, if it is simply 40k players looking at something different without getting out of GW games rather than new customers. If it is, and they're just cannibalising their own 40k sales, then it's not a win. It's not a loss either though.

The trick with having multiple games is you need each to have its own voice that appeals to different parts of the market. Crossover from people that like the universe (if shared) or the company are always going to happen, but you don't want that to be your overall goal since they're still likely spending the same amount of money on your product, just split between different properties.

 -Loki- wrote:
It would be nice to know, however, if it is simply 40k players looking at something different without getting out of GW games rather than new customers. If it is, and they're just cannibalising their own 40k sales, then it's not a win. It's not a loss either though.

The trick with having multiple games is you need each to have its own voice that appeals to different parts of the market. Crossover from people that like the universe (if shared) or the company are always going to happen, but you don't want that to be your overall goal since they're still likely spending the same amount of money on your product, just split between different properties.

Honestly I feel more inclined to the first possibility. Personally I can't bring myself to see AoS as a game with a high appeal to new customers, specially considering what it pretends to be: a skirmish game. The market already had several skirmish games and pretty much all of them (at least the ones I know: Frostgrave, Saga, etc.) have superior rules to AoS and are cheaper to play, both on the short and the long term. AoS may not require a huge number of models to be played but in the end it doesn't matter because the shiny units and characters are outrageously expensive.

As I see it, AoS may be enjoying some success among the usual crowd of GW "whales" and very GW-centric communities, mostly located in the UK and certain parts of the US. Among here, most people I know look at it with either contempt or indifference (or a mixture of both) and new players attracted to the hobby are mostly drawn to some old edition of WHFB and some of the newly appeared fanmade rulesets. But then again, AoS was dead on arrival here, so this was to be expected.

So in the end I think it's more whale-milking than anything else. And I doubt it's having much of an impact on sales anyway, seeing at how in the previous fiscal year GW was saved by Betrayal of Calth first and then by the royalties from Total War (overall sales continued to decline).

motski wrote:
According to data from reddit, which in my opinion is more a truthful reflection of actual numbers than anecdotal evidence and hearsay, AoS has left KoW behind a long time ago. The AoS community is now bigger than the old WHFB community, and growing:

http://redditmetrics.com/r/kingsofwar#compare=warhammerfantasy+ageofsigmar

It's data, but you have to be very careful in how you interpret it. For example, the graph you directly linked to seems to be comparing the number of new subscribers added each day, which has the potential to be very misleading. If subreddit X has 10,000 subscribers but only adds 1-2 per day because everyone who is interested has already subscribed while subreddit Y has 1,000 subscribers and adds 10 per day that graph will show Y leading by a huge margin. But in the number that matters, total size of the community, X is the obvious winner. And then there are the problems with tracking subscriber count as your deciding factor: people who subscribe and then ignore it vs. a smaller number of people who are actively contributing, whether a low-activity subreddit means a small community or that the community just uses something besides reddit, etc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
It'll be interesting to see if licensed games end up dominating. X-Wing certainly does well, but I think in general 40k is a universe designed around a game rather than a game designed around a universe and that makes for better gaming in the end. Where licensed games tend to hit walls when it comes to expanding the range, 40k can always invent new armies or new factions within existing armies and just write them in to the wider fluff.

I don't know, I think design space in the rules is more of a problem than running out of ideas in the fluff. X-Wing still has lots of EU stuff to draw from, but it's running into some big problems with not having enough room in the core rules/stat line/etc to make new ships without complexity creep and/or balance problems. FFG's biggest concern in expanding the game is (or at least should be) making sure that each new release has good rules, as long as they can keep doing that they'll be fine. And 40k has a lot of the same problem. Sure, the background has lots of stuff, but the tabletop rules are a bloated mess. We don't need 50 different space marine codices. Genestealer cults could have been done just fine with IG and Tyranid allies. Etc. GW can keep throwing out all these new armies with plenty of new fluff, but it's really hurting the game in the process.

Additionally, a lot of the big licensed properties - Star Wars, Star Trek, Batman, Marvel are very much living properties, just as much as a game universe is.

And these properties also live and die on their merchandising. Sure, they may not make things with games specifically in mind but they most certainly do make things with, "sell lots of stuff" in mind.

It's no coincidence that even in the Marvel film universe, Iron Man is now up to Mk44 in his armour suits... And Justice League is adding 2 new Batsuits to his repertoire.

 Peregrine wrote:
We don't need 50 different space marine codices. Genestealer cults could have been done just fine with IG and Tyranid allies. Etc. GW can keep throwing out all these new armies with plenty of new fluff, but it's really hurting the game in the process.

It's because that's how GW makes their money and keeps interest in the game. If GW released an awesome set of rules for 40k and then just didn't touch it for 2 years they'd probably go out of business.

GW made 30% of their money on new releases last financial year, if that doesn't include existing models in the same range as the new releases (eg. an uptick in tactical marines when a new SM codex comes out) then the influence of new releases is probably even bigger than 30%.

It's a bit of a catch 22, if you don't release models, you don't make money, interest in the game wanes and you lose critical mass and the game dies out. If you do keep releasing models, then at some point you're just bloating the game.

The solution in my mind has always been that GW should have diversified their lines years ago before they let 40k became bloated. It seems they're partly doing that now but it's too late to help 40k's bloat.

It's a bit of a catch 22, if you don't release models, you don't make money, interest in the game wanes and you lose critical mass and the game dies out. If you do keep releasing models, then at some point you're just bloating the game.

Not really - that just assumes you're selling to the same pool of players
Ideally want you want is a constant stream of new players buying older models - you don't then have to go through the costly business of creating as many new models to keep interest up.

Bartali wrote:

It's a bit of a catch 22, if you don't release models, you don't make money, interest in the game wanes and you lose critical mass and the game dies out. If you do keep releasing models, then at some point you're just bloating the game.

Not really - that just assumes you're selling to the same pool of players
Ideally want you want is a constant stream of new players buying older models - you don't then have to go through the costly business of creating as many new models to keep interest up.

I don't think you could sustain yourself as one of the larger gaming companies by just trying to get new players buying older models any more than a video games company could sustain themselves purely off selling games they've already made. Even scale model manufacturers like Tamiya, Airfix, Revell, etc are constantly releasing new models and dropping the old ones out of production.

While I do think GW could do a better job of getting new gamers in, I doubt they could make up for the 30% loss in revenue if they stopped releasing new models.

Wouldn't a constantly growing range of models also serve to bring in more people with different interests? I see alot of people entering AoS due to liking the look of a specific army.

 Peregrine wrote:

motski wrote:
According to data from reddit, which in my opinion is more a truthful reflection of actual numbers than anecdotal evidence and hearsay, AoS has left KoW behind a long time ago. The AoS community is now bigger than the old WHFB community, and growing:

http://redditmetrics.com/r/kingsofwar#compare=warhammerfantasy+ageofsigmar

It's data, but you have to be very careful in how you interpret it. For example, the graph you directly linked to seems to be comparing the number of new subscribers added each day, which has the potential to be very misleading. If subreddit X has 10,000 subscribers but only adds 1-2 per day because everyone who is interested has already subscribed while subreddit Y has 1,000 subscribers and adds 10 per day that graph will show Y leading by a huge margin. But in the number that matters, total size of the community, X is the obvious winner. And then there are the problems with tracking subscriber count as your deciding factor: people who subscribe and then ignore it vs. a smaller number of people who are actively contributing, whether a low-activity subreddit means a small community or that the community just uses something besides reddit, etc.

Definitely a good point on being careful on interpreting data but I've been a Reddit lurker since the beginning of this year and have seen the Reddit AoS community constantly growing, discussing and showing off their new armies.

I mean, isn't the fact that it's been constantly getting a dozen new posts per day that vary between "finished painting my army", "what army should I get" and "new AoS player here" a good sign? It's pretty frequent activity.

 Korinov wrote:

 -Loki- wrote:
It would be nice to know, however, if it is simply 40k players looking at something different without getting out of GW games rather than new customers. If it is, and they're just cannibalising their own 40k sales, then it's not a win. It's not a loss either though.

The trick with having multiple games is you need each to have its own voice that appeals to different parts of the market. Crossover from people that like the universe (if shared) or the company are always going to happen, but you don't want that to be your overall goal since they're still likely spending the same amount of money on your product, just split between different properties.

Honestly I feel more inclined to the first possibility. Personally I can't bring myself to see AoS as a game with a high appeal to new customers, specially considering what it pretends to be: a skirmish game. The market already had several skirmish games and pretty much all of them (at least the ones I know: Frostgrave, Saga, etc.) have superior rules to AoS and are cheaper to play, both on the short and the long term. AoS may not require a huge number of models to be played but in the end it doesn't matter because the shiny units and characters are outrageously expensive.

As I see it, AoS may be enjoying some success among the usual crowd of GW "whales" and very GW-centric communities, mostly located in the UK and certain parts of the US. Among here, most people I know look at it with either contempt or indifference (or a mixture of both) and new players attracted to the hobby are mostly drawn to some old edition of WHFB and some of the newly appeared fanmade rulesets. But then again, AoS was dead on arrival here, so this was to be expected.

So in the end I think it's more whale-milking than anything else. And I doubt it's having much of an impact on sales anyway, seeing at how in the previous fiscal year GW was saved by Betrayal of Calth first and then by the royalties from Total War (overall sales continued to decline).

Well, it can't be argued that AoS can be pricey but there's been alot of improvement this year with new sets like the Beastclaw Raiders who are about 1/3rd the price of the models bought together in seperate purchases, the Easy-to-build sets which are really cheap ways to test out if you like the game and Silver Tower hero packs which get you a awesome deal on heroes.

I don't think it can be denied that "whales" are a pivotal force for AoS as they are for 40k but it is a lower entry barrier that has given birth to quite a few stories on Reddit, Facebook and TGA of "starting the tabletop for the first time" and "AoS revived fantasy in my area".

There's certainly counter stories to those, like your own area, but the growing popularity is there regardless.

Just my two cents.

Baron Klatz wrote:
Wouldn't a constantly growing range of models also serve to bring in more people with different interests? I see alot of people entering AoS due to liking the look of a specific army.

 Peregrine wrote:

motski wrote:
According to data from reddit, which in my opinion is more a truthful reflection of actual numbers than anecdotal evidence and hearsay, AoS has left KoW behind a long time ago. The AoS community is now bigger than the old WHFB community, and growing:

http://redditmetrics.com/r/kingsofwar#compare=warhammerfantasy+ageofsigmar

It's data, but you have to be very careful in how you interpret it. For example, the graph you directly linked to seems to be comparing the number of new subscribers added each day, which has the potential to be very misleading. If subreddit X has 10,000 subscribers but only adds 1-2 per day because everyone who is interested has already subscribed while subreddit Y has 1,000 subscribers and adds 10 per day that graph will show Y leading by a huge margin. But in the number that matters, total size of the community, X is the obvious winner. And then there are the problems with tracking subscriber count as your deciding factor: people who subscribe and then ignore it vs. a smaller number of people who are actively contributing, whether a low-activity subreddit means a small community or that the community just uses something besides reddit, etc.

Definitely a good point on being careful on interpreting data but I've been a Reddit lurker since the beginning of this year and have seen the Reddit AoS community constantly growing, discussing and showing off their new armies.

I mean, isn't the fact that it's been constantly getting a dozen new posts per day that vary between "finished painting my army", "what army should I get" and "new AoS player here" a good sign? It's pretty frequent activity.

I don't follow reddit, how long has the warhammerfantasy reddit existed? It says it had 76 subscribers at the end of 2012, which to me would suggest the metrics only started after WHFB started to die a couple of years after 8th was released.

I don't think anyone argues that WHFB was popular in 8th, whether or not you liked 8th rules, most people will agree that WHFB died out in 8th edition.

AOS definitely feels like the better game. I know I'm fully on it after doing a beginning 40k game yesterday (finally!) and finding it way too clunky and cumbersome and nowhere near as much fun. Also, whether true or not it does feel less expensive to jump into.