Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I don't believe it for a second. As said, we will have a better idea when the ICV2 numbers come, but considering that AOS hasn't had a new releases in months (except for a lame stormcast character), and that 40k has always (well for the last 2 decades) sold a lot more than its fantasy counterpart, it seems highly dubious

I agree.. 40k has always been the work horse for games workshop... And the comment that sales increased and more new players are compared to what?
Because locally AoS destroyed the fantasy games in the area. It is just now started recovering with a lot less and mostly new players.. So yes.. Sales are
up from the train wreak that AoS caused and new players are joining but compared to what numbers?? Before or After End times...

The new edition of 40k will make or break GW.. but seeing what the new president is doing.. I don't think he will allow another Age of Sigmar...
My personal feeling is AoS has a lot of similarity to 4th edition D&D; Not a bad game if not compared to its predecessor; but they did lose a lot of old players
and they only started to recover the larger market sales again until the started with 5th edition.

My original observation of AoS was that it felt like Fantasy for the crowd that already liked 40k.

So it's possible AoS sales have just cannibalised 40k sales, in which case it's more believable it's outselling 40k. They're just selling different models to the same people that were previously spending more on 40k.

I think that's a good insight, AoS being Fantasy for the crowd that already liked 40k. Makes sense given they even added space marines in the form of those sigmar guys.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
The difference that you are missing is that KoW can be played with blocks of wood representing the unit, whereas 40k and WMH and so on are all individual model games. KoW, you don't move individual models with squad coherency. Nor are models glorified wound markers.

Which is common across pretty much anything that isn't Warhammer derived, and lets you do some awesome dioramas with your units. Want a tightly packed shield wall at the front, with a loose grouping at the back? Easy. How about a unit forming up round a leader? Some unit of grots with a giant monster in the middle? Or a totem? Cart? Casualties?

You can certainly play Warhammer-derived games with blocks, and use a wound counter instead of casualty removal too.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
My original observation of AoS was that it felt like Fantasy for the crowd that already liked 40k.

So it's possible AoS sales have just cannibalised 40k sales, in which case it's more believable it's outselling 40k. They're just selling different models to the same people that were previously spending more on 40k.

More believable for sure but still terrible for GW they need to grow their customer base not rely on the dwindling pool of existing ones.

hobojebus wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
My original observation of AoS was that it felt like Fantasy for the crowd that already liked 40k.

So it's possible AoS sales have just cannibalised 40k sales, in which case it's more believable it's outselling 40k. They're just selling different models to the same people that were previously spending more on 40k.

More believable for sure but still terrible for GW they need to grow their customer base not rely on the dwindling pool of existing ones.

Maybe their board games can do that? I dunno. I think their board games are overpriced for someone who doesn't already love GW.

Right from the beginning I didn't see AoS as expanding their potential customer base, rather shrinking it because I think it removed some of the diversity between WHFB and 40k.

Things might get a little bit clearer when the next financial report comes around, but GW are great at giving us not-quite-enough information to actually figure out what's going on.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Maybe their board games can do that? I dunno. I think their board games are overpriced for someone who doesn't already love GW.

The contemporary board games are an awful way to reach out to new customers; they are generally poor, overpriced, niche games that are outclassed by so much of the competition. They have a value, but it's generally as an artificially cheap source of mini's to existing fans.

I can't think of any current board game GW is selling that doesn't already have a better, cheaper equivalent in some form.

The fact that you can only get them in GW or FLGS's really doesn't help, when you can get stuff like Star Wars: Imperial Assault, or X-Wing in Waterstones, and most geek friendly stores.

But then if you roll back 15-20 years, a huge amount of people got into GW gaming through the board games. In the UK at least, you could buy Hero Quest, Space Hulk, Blood Bowl in high street and catalog stores; they were mixed right in there with the board games. I'd played with HQ for maybe 5 years before discovering Games Workshop proper; I got it as a birthday present. 20 years later I'm still a gamer, with an overgrown collection (and I still haven't got them painted).

I agree the board games are terrible and not worth the price asked their only value is to existing customers who want the models.

Yeah I agree. I think there was potential there to bring in new customers but it mostly failed in that.

In general I think GW over recent years has only succeeded in shifting where existing customers spend money rather than actually bringing in anyone new.

True or not it does bring AoS into a new prespective. I mean most here just months ago would say AoS was a dead game with no chance of success.

True? Why not.
I enjoyed playing AoS with the new GW pt set.
40k is more for apoc games these days.

 NAVARRO wrote:
True or not it does bring AoS into a new prespective. I mean most here just months ago would say AoS was a dead game with no chance of success.

In The total absence of any proof to the contrary that's the only view to take, when we have reliable numbers we can re-evaluate, but unconfirmed rumours are not facts.

If AoS places in the icv2 charts it's improved, if not it's still failed time will tell.

Well facts are hard to get since GW does not IIRC separate both in therms of reports, and only they have the true numbers.

Meanwhile if AoS was dead on arrival we would not even be discussing rumours at this point.

"GW sells currently more AoS products than 40K ones on a worldwide basis"

I doubt this, but I think its possible, if only due to the vagueness of the statement.

While there are certainly more people playing AoS now, I still see people predominantly buying 40k. However what I have seen is more stores stocking AoS where before they had abandoned WHFB and only carried 40k. Those sales to retailers would create an influx of sales to GW as they create in-store inventory.

IF AoS product are selling "more" than 40k, I have to believe its because GW is making no distinction between retail sales to consumers and wholesale sales to retailers. That'd be some flawed accounting. It is a disconnect from reality to assume these types of sales will automatically lead to a new hieghtened and sustainable volume of consumer purchases.Ultimately that's what matters.

I know GW Portsmouth currently sells far more AOS than 40k by quite a large margin.

All painters and gamers in there are usually AOS too.

So if it's anything to go by, it really wouldn't surprise me.
My 40k spending this year is around £50 or so where as AOS spending is around £800 currently.

I'll say that if it wasn't for Genestealer Cult which brought it about even I'd have spent more money this year on AoS. Once the Generals Compendium dropped it's been picking up significantly. Local slowgrow league with 16 people in it, stores starting to run events, and apparently the local GW guy has said it's been exploding due to the summer campaign.

That said since even when WFB was doing well by company standards it was still being outsold in its entirety by the combined sales of just tactical marines and rhinos. So the odds that it suddenly is selling more than 40k is low. But if they are using a silly metric as has been mentioned earlier in the thread it might not be a factually false statement.

A throwaway clickbait 'rumor' on BoLS has generated 3 pages of discussion here - nice!

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Sorry, but do you guys actually enjoy playing 40k right now? Rules As Written?

I quit 40k and started Bretonnia for AOS. We have a group of 10 AOS Sigmar players and people are always buying AOS models instead 40k models. As, it's written I cant really see myself getting back into it unless, 8th and Sisters come out.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
According to Taco Bell:

Alcina of TGA wrote:It seems also that GW sells currently more AoS products than 40K ones on a worldwide basis.

On the face of it, that sounds preposterous. 40k has been GW's largest product line for decades, with SM outselling all other product combined.

OTOH, AoS has now settled in as a game with a very low barrier to entry, due to the free rules and units on the GW website, along with the recent GHB.

Could this really be true?

If AoS brought in newbies, as it was designed to, and those newbies started buying, like GW wants them to, then it's entirely possible that this new cohort of new players is outspending the old 40k crowd who already have all the models they'll ever need.

Interesting...So, this means when compared with a better alternative offered 40k was not as appealing?

Grot 6 wrote:Locally.

THAT is the key word in the context. See my illustrious poster that posted right before I did.

My apologies. I read your post 3 times and each time I missed the Locally part. Foot in my mouth as usual.

hobojebus wrote:
In The total absence of any proof to the contrary that's the only view to take, when we have reliable numbers we can re-evaluate, but unconfirmed rumours are not facts.

If AoS places in the icv2 charts it's improved, if not it's still failed time will tell.

Anyone who still things AoS is a "failed" game would be hard pressed to explain how it has such a large and growing community.

Looking at numbers on reddit, one of the most popular websites in the world, and in my opinion a better gauge of popularity and interest than heresay, rumor and anecdotal evidence, the AoS community in little over a year has now grown larger than the WHFB community ever was, and shows no sign of slowing down.

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

Not only that but the community is much, much larger than community for the Kings of War (which was supposedly the future of fantasy wargaming), and many other games that are allegedly putting GW out of business like Infinity, Malifaux, Bolt Action and many besides.

Not bad for a "failed" game huh?

The reddit chart is amazing.
Atm in our battle group, AoS is strongly neglected.
I find this game is at a better shape than 40k.

motski wrote:
the AoS community in little over a year has now grown larger than the WHFB community ever was, and shows no sign of slowing down.

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

The WHFB reddit community didn't START until just after WHFB 8th edition was released, which was just after WHFB started its death throes. People aren't going to subscribe to a reddit feed of a game they already stopped playing

Saying AoS is doing better than a game that was dying doesn't really say much. Tracking WHFB popularity through the 80's, 90's and 00's would be much more interesting.

I think it'll be interesting to see if the next financial report is up or neutral growth (I don't really expect it to be down). To me the popularity of AoS is meaningless if it's simply coming at the cost of 40k.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

motski wrote:
the AoS community in little over a year has now grown larger than the WHFB community ever was, and shows no sign of slowing down.

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

(1) The WHFB reddit community didn't START until just after WHFB 8th edition was released, which was just after WHFB started its death throes. People aren't going to subscribe to a reddit feed of a game they already stopped playing
(2)
Saying AoS is doing better than a game that was dying doesn't really say much. Tracking WHFB popularity through the 80's, 90's and 00's would be much more interesting.
(3)
I think it'll be interesting to see if the next financial report is up or neutral growth (I don't really expect it to be down). To me the popularity of AoS is meaningless if it's simply coming at the cost of 40k.

1) thats not the point at all. if AOE would be a failed game.. then why is this group increasing in size? and that with a unbroken trend?
oh and a growing game is ALWAYS better than a dying one. no matter what the circumstances.
2) You cant play with the past. Sure some nostalgic thoughts are always fine but i personally prefer to play with humans in the present instead of some sweet memories.
3) Why? there have always been people tha eighter play only 40k or Fantasy.

I'd probably throw myself in with the 'I can believe it' crowd, purely on the basis I've had no desire to even touch 40k for a couple of years now, but I'm increasingly tempted to get a small AoS force.

There's just too much stuff to keep up with if you have other interests with 40K right now, and the rules for things I actually care about have mostly been left to rot or poorly patched.

Fortunately since the painting and converting side was always my favourite anyway I've moved onto busts, non-gaming and larger scale stuff.

motski wrote:

hobojebus wrote:
In The total absence of any proof to the contrary that's the only view to take, when we have reliable numbers we can re-evaluate, but unconfirmed rumours are not facts.

If AoS places in the icv2 charts it's improved, if not it's still failed time will tell.

Anyone who still things AoS is a "failed" game would be hard pressed to explain how it has such a large and growing community.

Looking at numbers on reddit, one of the most popular websites in the world, and in my opinion a better gauge of popularity and interest than heresay, rumor and anecdotal evidence, the AoS community in little over a year has now grown larger than the WHFB community ever was, and shows no sign of slowing down.

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

Not only that but the community is much, much larger than community for the Kings of War (which was supposedly the future of fantasy wargaming), and many other games that are allegedly putting GW out of business like Infinity, Malifaux, Bolt Action and many besides.

Not bad for a "failed" game huh?

Lots of people don't even use social media I play kow and 9th age and I've never used reddit, stopped using Facebook years ago etc.

Social media numbers mean squat because we have zero clue how representative they are.

Sales figures will show a games popularity in comparison to other games on the market, if AoS is in the top five it's recovered after a dismal first year, if not it's still a failure.

It's a very binary situation.

 _ghost_ wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

motski wrote:
the AoS community in little over a year has now grown larger than the WHFB community ever was, and shows no sign of slowing down.

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

(1) The WHFB reddit community didn't START until just after WHFB 8th edition was released, which was just after WHFB started its death throes. People aren't going to subscribe to a reddit feed of a game they already stopped playing
(2)
Saying AoS is doing better than a game that was dying doesn't really say much. Tracking WHFB popularity through the 80's, 90's and 00's would be much more interesting.
(3)
I think it'll be interesting to see if the next financial report is up or neutral growth (I don't really expect it to be down). To me the popularity of AoS is meaningless if it's simply coming at the cost of 40k.

1) thats not the point at all. if AOE would be a failed game.. then why is this group increasing in size? and that with a unbroken trend?
oh and a growing game is ALWAYS better than a dying one. no matter what the circumstances.
2) You cant play with the past. Sure some nostalgic thoughts are always fine but i personally prefer to play with humans in the present instead of some sweet memories.
3) Why? there have always been people tha eighter play only 40k or Fantasy.

1) I don't think I mentioned anything about overall trends pointing toward success or failure, simply pointing out that comparing to WHFB reddit subscribers to AoS reddit subscribers is not a useful measure. I don't know if AoS is a failed game or not, and less than 4000 reddit subscribers doesn't really convince me one way or the other, it represents only a tiny fraction of the community so much so that I think it's not really a useful measure of anything.

2) We are talking about comparative trends here not nostalgia. My observation is WHFB died with 8th edition. I'm not talking about the quality of the rules of 8th, I'm talking about actual players playing the game. As such, looking at the trend of reddit subscribers within 8th edition vs AoS reddit subscribers seems largely pointless to me. It'd be much more interesting to have an understanding of the rise and fall of WHFB.

3) Because if AoS comes at the cost of 40k sales it simply means GW are selling to the same crowd. I've always contended that GW should improve WHFB for the sake of diversity, not all people that like 40k like WHFB, not all people than like WHFB like 40k. If AoS sales go up and 40k sales go down, it would suggest AoS is just selling different product to the same people, the net effect being GW haven't really improved the diversity of either their range or their customer base. This is why I bought up GW's boardgames earlier, the boardgames were a potential source of diversity but I think they overpriced themselves to the point of only being appealing to existing GW customers.

I would be astonished to find that AoS was outselling 40K.

There was no indication of this in the year end financial results. If the situation has changed so dramatically in the few months since then, it would indicate either a very rapid and probably terminal decline of 40K (probably to be followed by the collapse of GW) or an extraordinarily rapid growth in popularity of a new game that had an acceptable but less than stellar first year.

At any rate, the half year financial statement will tell us something.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I would be astonished to find that AoS was outselling 40K.

There was no indication of this in the year end financial results. If the situation has changed so dramatically in the few months since then, it would indicate either a very rapid and probably terminal decline of 40K (probably to be followed by the collapse of GW) or an extraordinarily rapid growth in popularity of a new game that had an acceptable but less than stellar first year.

At any rate, the half year financial statement will tell us something.

If AoS is finally taking off, then a few months can make a big difference as people get started about buying armies. I'd not be surprised at seeing a decline in 40k, given that GW pushed really hard for 7E, so people's wallets might be exhausted. But the idea of a pending collapse? Not likely.