40k DLC season Pass? - The future of 40k?

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**Kdash**

Not Online!!! wrote:
Kdash wrote:
Ok, so, anyone complaining that the codices are “to expensive” etc, I invite you to do something –

Go down to your local main book store or library.
Look for a full colour, hardback, 100-200 page, A4 book containing glossy printed pictures and artwork. (these are generally reference books as well)
Look at the price.

You will generally see a price range of £20 to £45. GW Codices are currently priced at £25 online.
While there, compare the GW price, to the prices of all the hardback autobiographies, or new release hardback novels. Before discounts, you’ll be looking at paying £20-£25 on average.

Suddenly, the cost of a GW codex, for what it is, doesn’t seem that expensive.

As for Chapter Approved. It will all depend on what this years contains and is priced at. Last years, was reasonably priced for what it contained. Sure, you could argue that the points changes should have been free, but, I’d then also argue that the rest of the books contents was perfectly fine being in there for the price tag. Do I use CA regularly? No. I think, since I’ve got it, I’ve used it at 2 events, and then, only as a reference/should someone want to make sure my info is correct. For someone who generally only plays at events, it was a bit of a wasted buy just for the points cost, but, if you’re more interested in playing the game casually it contains a whole load of info, especially for armies that didn’t have a codex at the time.

But, at the end of the day, is a game update and new content worth £20 a year? Arguably it is, and in many cases in digital games, you'd be paying a lot more.

I personally can’t speak on all the necromunda/specialist games issues and releases, but, if you are playing a single faction in one of those games, do you need that much? Looking at it from someone who doesn’t play it, I’d say I only need 1 Gang War book and then the Gang cards as handy play references in order to play a normal game? I’m guessing, if I brought some of the GW terrain to go “3d”, the terrain would contain the relevant rules info in order to be used? If they don’t, where are the “3d” rules? In a Gang War?

So, at most, I’d be looking at paying £35 on books and £9 on arguably unneeded cards. Now, maybe I’m looking at this from a 40k perspective, but, is that really over the top and too expensive? Especially as it looks like there are free core rule downloads on the necromunda website, similar to the 40k core rules.

The only thing I’d be currently annoyed at, is if GW pulled an AoS on everything else, and re-released a completely changed Space Marine Codex every 6 months like they’ve apparently done with Sigmarines. (that said, I do wish they would start adding in FAQ and CA changes into the codices quicker than they currently do.)

First: Name me one online game that charges additional money for the balance of the game. I am waiting. Even Paradox does release balance updates for free. Additional content is priced, that is correct and that would not be the problem. The pts. changes however are a problem.
Secondly: The price of books vastly depends on the country you are in. Depending on book price laws etc.

I didn’t say companies charge for balance changes, I said they charge for updates and new content – which are generally rolled into 1 a lot of the time, either as a Steam DLC, or an Expansion. An “update” isn’t necessarily a bug fix or balance change.

As I said in my post, I agreed that the points cost changes should have been separate/could be argued to be, and that they should have already been updated in all codices printed after CA was released. But, the actual cost of CA for the other content it included was reasonable. GW made a controversial decision including the points changes in the book, but, as most players build their lists using something like battlescribe anyway, you could argue that anyone just wanting it for the points changes could have skipped it anyway. Let’s face it, when was the last time someone asked to check your copy of CA for the updated points cost of one of your units, so they can double check you’ve got your battlescribe list right in the middle of an event? Or do they generally check the lists themselves on battlescribe (if they want to) or rely on the list checking procedures put in place by the TO prior to the event starting?

Ok, but, as we are talking about GW prices (a British company) is it not right to then compare them to other books priced in the UK? What is the current cost of a GW codex for you? And then the current cost of one of my example books in your local book store? Are they in a similar situation to here in the UK?

**Not Online!!!**

I pay for the books:
Rulebook: 58 CHF or 44£
Index: 25.50 CHF or 19.35£
Codex: 42-51.50 CHF or 31.86£ -39.07£
CA: 32CHF or 24.28£

I would think they are compareable in reagards monetarywise. The only real outlier i see is the CA which just costs an addition 20%.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Not Online!!! wrote:

If they really would've wanted to sell us the additional scenarios, they could've had other ways. Heck i would not mind an additional and optional scenario book, if the scenarios were PROPERLY TESTED before hand.

I am certainly not against additional content and to pay for that btw. I am just against the fact that a balance update is hold behind a paywall.

**Nightlord1987**

All. The Killteam faction rules are in the Killteam rulebook.

So I'm not surprised that we get so few initially.

Now they can add in Killteam kits that will include rules in the boxes and can also be usable for 40k. Sounds good to me.

**nekooni**

phillv85 wrote:
Not Online!!! wrote:
phillv85 wrote:
I thought Chapter approved was annual? Isn't the FAQ free as well? So they update the rules in press once a year and it's £20? They also print New games modes etc. in it. It's not the worst deal in the world people, come on.

Are you honestly trying to justify, what essentially is a balance patch, should be sold for extra money from the player?
I mean not even EA pulled such shenanigans.

Yes I am. People wanted updates regularly, GW provides for a nominal fee. GW have seen their chance to monetize updates by providing them in print along with other extra content people are conveniently forgetting about when they want a whine. I'm not saying it's the optimal system, but my word people, keep your toys in the pram for once.

Having to pay for new content is fine.
Having to pay for balance changes is not.

They should've just released the few pages of point changes as a PDF for free in addition to printing them in CA, and people not interested in the new content wouldn't have had to buy it just for 3 or 4 pages of rules.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Kdash wrote:
I didn’t say companies charge for balance changes, I said they charge for updates and new content – which are generally rolled into 1 a lot of the time, either as a Steam DLC, or an Expansion. An “update” isn’t necessarily a bug fix or balance change.

Balance changes and bugfixes are almost always free updates while new content - e.g. a new playable race, a new story line, new units - is usually a paid DLC.

**cmspano**

I'm sure being able to sell expansions is part of their decision to release limited choices at launch but there are a few other factors that have to be in play.

Release time: more units/factions means more work, more testing, more writing, more art, more pages in the core rules. The physical cost of the book goes up the larger you make it, but the price also goes up the longer it takes you to get the book out. For example lets say it took 12 months to finalize the release edition of Kill Team. That includes the book and all it's writing and art, the game design, the packaging design of the starter kill teams, etc. Lets say they release a lot more units and it takes them 18 months to get all that ready. That's a 50% increase in labor cost and some increase to production cost for a bigger book. That's going to drive the price of the book up if GW wants to hit their target ROI on the product. The higher the price the less people will buy it.

It makes much more sense to keep the initial release more limited and get it out there and then release an expansion.

There's also the game balance perspective that I'm sure they considered. They want this edition of Kill Team to be balanced, or as balanced as a GW game can be. They want KT to have a solid competitive scene, similar to Shadespire. That's also why they brought the Shadespire team into the project to help with game balance, since they did a pretty good job of making SS a balanced competitive game. This is way easier to do if you limit people's options. They can see how everything plays out and adjust from there. Then add more units. The more options you have, the more ways to break the game there will be.

This also makes good business sense. If you can make a good competitive scene for Kill Team you will pull in a lot of new players because of the lower barrier of entry than 40k. I know a number of people who think 40k is neat, but would never sink money into a full army and books. But if they had a game with a similar feel where they only need 5-10 models that's way more accessible. They'll also pull in competitive players from other genres of game who spend the bulk of their money elsewhere. Competitive MTG players spend huge amounts on their decks and might not want to sink money into another game. Same thing, they might see another competitive game they can get into for a lower price point.

**Skaorn**

I'm not going to do this because I'm not really invested enough in this argument, but why doesn't someone do a poll asking if people would have bought the last CA if the rules and point changes were also made available for free online. See if people think the extra content was worth purchasing on its own if the updates to the game weren't something you need to pay for.

I don't really think so, considering the last CA book I had paid for had things like the Kroot Merc list and VDR rules for more than just LRs. That's just me though.

**Blastaar**

Nightlord1987 wrote:
All. The Killteam faction rules are in the Killteam rulebook.

So I'm not surprised that we get so few initially.

Now they can add in Killteam kits that will include rules in the boxes and can also be usable for 40k. Sounds good to me.

Including more options initially would in no way have prevented them from releasing new kits with rules in the box, though. This is a business decision, nothing more.

And for those speculating that fewer options will make the game more balanced- restrictions are part of balance, but not to the degree of "you get two different guys to choose from." That is lazy, let's-make-the-game-less-interesting-because-balance-is-too-hard balancing. It remains to be see whether GW will, for the first time, write a forward-thinking ruleset that can accommodate unit types that haven't been released yet.

**Delvarus Centurion**

BrianDavion wrote:
phillv85 wrote:
Most people are just fine with Chapter Approved as well, but to a vocal minority an extra £20 a year to keep up to date with the rules and to get some new additional content is tantamount to blackmail or worse.

And most of those people are just looking for something to complain about. If you don't like chapter approved, the best advice I can give you, get the points costs on the internet, and don't buy it.

And people like you love to complain about people complaining. Its like there is nothing that some GW fans will never moan about, its okay to vent about things you don't like, why do you care if people are moaning.

**nekooni**

Skaorn wrote:
I'm not going to do this because I'm not really invested enough in this argument, but why doesn't someone do a poll asking if people would have bought the last CA if the rules and point changes were also made available for free online. See if people think the extra content was worth purchasing on its own if the updates to the game weren't something you need to pay for.

I don't really think so, considering the last CA book I had paid for had things like the Kroot Merc list and VDR rules for more than just LRs. That's just me though.

What do you consider "rule changes"? CA contains just new content and a list of rebalanced point values, at least by my definition of what that means. And yes, I'd still have bought it - I don't use the points in CA anyway because I only ever build my lists using Battlescribe.

**Skaorn**

nekooni wrote:
Skaorn wrote:
I'm not going to do this because I'm not really invested enough in this argument, but why doesn't someone do a poll asking if people would have bought the last CA if the rules and point changes were also made available for free online. See if people think the extra content was worth purchasing on its own if the updates to the game weren't something you need to pay for.

I don't really think so, considering the last CA book I had paid for had things like the Kroot Merc list and VDR rules for more than just LRs. That's just me though.

What do you consider "rule changes"? CA contains just new content and a list of rebalanced point values, at least by my definition of what that means. And yes, I'd still have bought it - I don't use the points in CA anyway because I only ever build my lists using Battlescribe.

Updated points and anything that probably should be part of an FAQ like new beta rules or beta rules going into final forms. Additional content would be things like the VDR, variant army lists, new missions, specialist rules for running games like ship boarding actions, etc. In other words, if you insure the basic updates to the game are freely available in other formats too, would players still see CA as worth it buy based on the additional content? I don't think the CA for 2017 was that great for additional content. 2018 might be better though, considering we know that it will almost certainly have SoB beta rules, but we don't know how in depth that will be or what quality the other content will be. It could turn into a cop out that just updates existing rules and models from the index for SoB, with no insight into things like new units, and the many reason people end up getting it is for the rebalancing of points and rules as the other content isn't really that great either.

**Karol**

Yeah, buying updated points for GK, is tough to explain to oneself. Getting rules for a full chamber that is specilised in using a special tactic or a unit of some sort, is welcome.

And it may even work for people who already have good armies, eldar players are done as far as army goes, but if someone gave them an option for a good army with units they don't use as often, then they may buy it.

How many BA players would want to play with a full space marine assault company, if it had the actual rules to support that kind of game play?

**CREEEEEEEEED**

Can someone explain to me why a physical tabletop game with physical rules books keeps getting compared to video games as though the two were one and the same and operate on the same playing field? Because they don't. Hence why the OP idea of 40k going season pass is so ridiculous.

**Wolf_in_Human_Shape**

What's so ridiculous about the idea? It's been argued that having digital products that can easily and quickly be updated are a superior (if alternate) format that would allow the rules to be tweaked and GW to make their money too.

**BrianDavion**

Wolf_in_Human_Shape wrote:
What's so ridiculous about the idea? It's been argued that having digital products that can easily and quickly be updated are a superior (if alternate) format that would allow the rules to be tweaked and GW to make their money too.

because they're two seperate platforms. l40k isn't a video game.

**ValentineGames**

It's exactly the same principle though...so what's the problem?

**BrianDavion**

ValentineGames wrote:
It's exactly the same principle though...so what's the problem?

Because it's showing an absolute misunderstanding of the structure. a better way to understand it would be to look at other table top games. a good example is D&D. you're given the core rules and then they produce optional supplemental rule books with more rules and information etc. they're not always nesscary, but back in the days of 3rd edition, you definatly had power creep with the sourcebooks, and if you wan ted your char to be at the top of the game, you wanted to make sure you had the latest relevant Spaltbooks.

so basicly what GW's doing is nothing new if you look at table top gaming on the whole

**ValentineGames**

BrianDavion wrote:
ValentineGames wrote:
It's exactly the same principle though...so what's the problem?

Because it's showing an absolute misunderstanding of the structure. a better way to understand it would be to look at other table top games. a good example is D&D. you're given the core rules and then they produce optional supplemental rule books with more rules and information etc. they're not always nesscary, but back in the days of 3rd edition, you definatly had power creep with the sourcebooks, and if you wan ted your char to be at the top of the game, you wanted to make sure you had the latest relevant Spaltbooks.

so basicly what GW's doing is nothing new if you look at table top gaming on the whole

Really?
I've never had MANDATORY points and rules updates every six months for bolt action that cost me £20 each time...
Or for Attack Wing.
Or Black powder.
Or Disposable heroes.
Or Battlefleet Gothic.
Or Star Fleet Battles........
How weird for you to say that.

No point comparing £20 mandatory points changes to D&D optional or additional rules.
They aren't mandatory.
Silly.

**CREEEEEEEEED**

ValentineGames wrote:
Really?
I've never had MANDATORY points and rules updates every six months for bolt action that cost me £20 each time...
Or for Attack Wing.
Or Black powder.
Or Disposable heroes.
Or Battlefleet Gothic.
Or Star Fleet Battles........
How weird for you to say that.

No point comparing £20 mandatory points changes to D&D optional or additional rules.
They aren't mandatory.
Silly.

A) Rule 1
B) Just because GW has some less than pleasant money gouging practices, does not make this a video game.

**Blastaar**

The principle is the same- withholding components of the core experience of the game to charge players multiple times for the same product- it is only the medium that is different. Not every book outside of Codices and the BRB is an expansion. Cities of Death is an expansion, because it has extra optional content fully contained within its pages. Gang War is less a stand alone product and more akin to DLC, especially the first book, because GW held back portions of the core rules so that they could release them separately and charge players a second time for the full product. WOTC didn't remove the fighter from the 5th ed. Player's Handbook and sell the rules for it separately for $20. And don't forget the data slates and formations during 7th, some of which were exclusive to special bundles/boxes and/or were literal Downloadable Content.

**Dandelion**

There seems to be a few misconceptions in this thread:
1) Chapter approved is an ANNUAL supplement. Not every 6 months.
2) The FAQs and Erratas are every 6 months and those are free.
3) Digital codexes exist and are updated to match any errata including those done in chapter approved.

Now, Chapter Approved as an annual expansion to missions is great. New apocalypse/stronghold assault/planetstrike rules and missions. Tired of the same old missions? Get Chapter Approved. However, I agree that points changes should not be held exclusively in Chapter Approved. Any and all errata should be free online, since we paid for the book already.

As for Gang Wars, well aren't those expansions? Didn't the team straight up say they haven't finished the models or rules for each gang? You know since rules follow models at GW. Hardly intentionally withholding content. If anything the Gang Wars books are like the Dawn of War games: Core game with starting factions and a campaign. Then each expansion gave you new factions and new campaigns. Unless you guys consider that swindling.
Maybe they could have done a better job of it but it's hardly day one DLC or cosmetic DLC or loot boxes. Heck, it's not even a season pass since you can do whatever you want in home games. You don't *need* the updates/expansions to play the game at all.

Edit: to clarify, you would need the gang wars books for the gangs which is a shame, but it likely has to do with the clunky release they had.

**Skaorn**

CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
ValentineGames wrote:
Really?
I've never had MANDATORY points and rules updates every six months for bolt action that cost me £20 each time...
Or for Attack Wing.
Or Black powder.
Or Disposable heroes.
Or Battlefleet Gothic.
Or Star Fleet Battles........
How weird for you to say that.

No point comparing £20 mandatory points changes to D&D optional or additional rules.
They aren't mandatory.
Silly.

A) Rule 1
B) Just because GW has some less than pleasant money gouging practices, does not make this a video game.

A) I'm not going to talk about.

B) I think that a table top wargame has far more in common to a video game than a table top RPG. For one thing both are played against an opponent, even if it is the computer, where as RPGs are generally supposed to be a cooperative game between players and the GM. Yes you can have PVP or PVGM games but, in my experience, those tend to be very short lived games. Ideally both war games and particularly multiplayer video games are balanced so that the ultimate deciding factors are skill, planning, and luck. They get tweaked when it turns out that one option might be too strong, too weak, or had unintended consequences. RPGs don't need to worry that much about balance because everyone is usually working together, you have a GM who will often try to keep things going smoothly and try to give all the players fun things to do, and the victories are generally shared by all. DnD has never been well balanced as your heaviest hitters when you get to high levels are your wizard or cleric. There are games like Rifts that specifically state that designers made no attempts to balance things. Then you have games like GURPS which try to balance things out with a point system with lots of options that might only come up once in a campaign (like pressure tolerance) or might completely miss like realizing there was a Hiking skill when you figured your three Survival skills in various terrains covered that. Ultimately in an RPG not being as powerful as the person across the table from you or buying things for your character that are suboptimal but fit with your theme aren't going to be the problem it is when you're directly playing versus another opponent. RPGs can generally go longer without addressing imbalances and their supplements are all suggestions for things that can be used or not. Adding a supplement to DnD that adds a few over or underpowered classes isn't going to be the problem as adding a new DLC with imbalanced PVP characters or an OP army. For an RPG the supplement can just be ignored in future releases. You can't really do that for a video game or a war game.

In the digital age, I see no reason that games that rely heavily on getting things to be as fair as possible to release updates to the products people have already bought for free.

**Blastaar**

Dandelion wrote:
There seems to be a few misconceptions in this thread:
1) Chapter approved is an ANNUAL supplement. Not every 6 months.
2) The FAQs and Erratas are every 6 months and those are free.
3) Digital codexes exist and are updated to match any errata including those done in chapter approved.

Now, Chapter Approved as an annual expansion to missions is great. New apocalypse/stronghold assault/planetstrike rules and missions. Tired of the same old missions? Get Chapter Approved. However, I agree that points changes should not be held exclusively in Chapter Approved. Any and all errata should be free online, since we paid for the book already.

As for Gang Wars, well aren't those expansions? Didn't the team straight up say they haven't finished the models or rules for each gang? You know since rules follow models at GW. Hardly intentionally withholding content. If anything the Gang Wars books are like the Dawn of War games: Core game with starting factions and a campaign. Then each expansion gave you new factions and new campaigns. Unless you guys consider that swindling.
Maybe they could have done a better job of it but it's hardly day one DLC or cosmetic DLC or loot boxes. Heck, it's not even a season pass since you can do whatever you want in home games. You don't *need* the updates/expansions to play the game at all.

Edit: to clarify, you would need the gang wars books for the gangs which is a shame, but it likely has to do with the clunky release they had.

Gang War 1 was day-one or nearly day-one DLC because it contained elements integral to Necromunda- campaigns and 3-d terrain- that were removed from the core rules where they belong so that they could be sold separately. The following GW books less so, but there is an argument to be made that GW model kits should include the unit's full rules- this would also make it easier for them to release new kits.

**Dandelion**

Blastaar wrote:

Gang War 1 was day-one or nearly day-one DLC because it contained elements integral to Necromunda- campaigns and 3-d terrain- that were removed from the core rules where they belong so that they could be sold separately. The following GW books less so, but there is an argument to be made that GW model kits should include the unit's full rules- this would also make it easier for them to release new kits.

I do think the gang wars release was mishandled, but I'm not entirely convinced it has to do with nickel and diming as it does with the dev team making mistakes (I believe they're a relatively new team in specialist games). It certainly didn't help convince me to grab a gang. Do the kits not have rules in them like their 40k counterparts? If so that's a big mistake on their part.
As for 40k proper, people want long term support and balance fixes. Just look at how long Shadow War lasted... There's certainly room for improving their system, but I wouldn't go so far as to

**Blastaar**

Dandelion wrote:
Blastaar wrote:

Gang War 1 was day-one or nearly day-one DLC because it contained elements integral to Necromunda- campaigns and 3-d terrain- that were removed from the core rules where they belong so that they could be sold separately. The following GW books less so, but there is an argument to be made that GW model kits should include the unit's full rules- this would also make it easier for them to release new kits.

I do think the gang wars release was mishandled, but I'm not entirely convinced it has to do with nickel and diming as it does with the dev team making mistakes (I believe they're a relatively new team in specialist games). It certainly didn't help convince me to grab a gang. Do the kits not have rules in them like their 40k counterparts? If so that's a big mistake on their part.
As for 40k proper, people want long term support and balance fixes. Just look at how long Shadow War lasted... There's certainly room for improving their system, but I wouldn't go so far as to

40k kits do include datasheets, but if I remember correctly, they still require the codex and don't provide everything to make them playable right out of the box. I haven't purchased any Necromunda myself because of the expense, can anyone confirm whether or not a gang can be run out of the box, without a corresponding GW book?