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.

 Stux wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Stux wrote:
Marines will always work, because they fulfil the heroic human trope.

That's a funny way of saying Imperial Guard.
I think its a lot more heroic and awe-inspiring for an ordinary human to beat super humans with century long life spans than super humans beating super humans.
Space Marines aren't humans. They were humans, but they've undergone so many genetic enhancements that they could hardly be considered human anymore.

The game and setting would be a lot better if the focus on Imperial Guard rather than marines, imo. That's what made the Empire so appealing in WHFB; you had your ordinary humans armed with nothing but steel, gunpowder and sheer will fighting against undead, hulking brutish monstrosities and demonically empowered humans in magical armor.

Oh sure the Empire had magic and demigryphs, but those weren't the mainstay of the Empire's forces. Space Marines and Sigmarines just don't have the same sort of dramatic appeal.

You misunderstand me. Ordinary guard are not exciting to the layperson. Super soldiers in power armour are. That's the heroic humans that sell. People want to be paladins, not peasants.

But they aren't heroic humans though.
You have to be human to be a heroic human, for starters, and if you think about it their actions aren't really heroic.

A space marine kills 100 orks by himself - pretty standard, per the fluff.

An imperial guardsman kills 100 orks by himself - Extremely unlikely, and ergo a lot more impressive. Unless he's Sly Marbo, who's supposed to be exceptional anyway.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Not Online!!! wrote:


Nope, guard fills the trope just fine. The reason guard don't sell is because the Cadian models are Dated as feth, and not the good kind of dated.

Yeah, the Guardsmen range could use some love. Maybe some new tanks, a new LRBT design so its not so squat looking, and of course, new infantry models.
Seeing a return of all of the different IG regiment kits would be nice, but it's more likely GW would try to consolidate them all under a single regiment / design to save themselves effort and money.
As long as whatever design they go with as standard isn't the Ventrillan Nobles and they go with something that looks more like the Solar Auxilia or that Jes Goodwin art of that trenchcoat wearing guardsman I'll be happy.

Guard are also a hoard army. which can turn off a LOT of people. Marines, at least for me, fill a sweet spot of being able to field a decent sized force, but not requiring me to have hundreds of models on the table.

ohh BTW Hoard armies aren't exactly very good "heroic armies"

It's not about the actual lore, it's about how it looks superficially. Marines are inherently the easiest faction to sell, so that's why they've always pushed them. Simple as that.

I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

Marines are cheap as a starter army. They lend themselves to many play styles. They are easy to paint. They are easy to carry around.


They are designed to be the most played faction.

Give the same amount of releases to eldars, and i can easily expect that you will not have half the revenues from it.

BrianDavion wrote:
that'll only be true for people who blindly insist any human in power armor is the same faction.

You are wrong, people don't confuse Sisters with Marines. One get new release all the time, the other… is Sisters.

people wrote:Marines inherently sell better because they are heroic humans or whatever

People keep saying that. There isn't significantly more terran (marine) players than there are zerg (tyranid) players, though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
https://www.rankedftw.com/stats/races/1v1/#v=2&r=-2&l=-2

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

Marines are cheap as a starter army. They lend themselves to many play styles. They are easy to paint. They are easy to carry around.


They are designed to be the most played faction.

Give the same amount of releases to eldars, and i can easily expect that you will not have half the revenues from it.

Could you point out where people are saying this? Seems like you just made it up on the spot

What people are saying here is that investment in other factions could improve sales, not that they'll replace marines as the primary faction. It will also bring more balance to the tabletop in local stores so there aren't Marine v. Marine faceoffs. With all the marketing and releases directed toward Marines, this does become a self-fulfilling prophecy

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
that'll only be true for people who blindly insist any human in power armor is the same faction.

You are wrong, people don't confuse Sisters with Marines. One get new release all the time, the other… is Sisters.

sisters no, but People insisted when Custodes came out that they where "Just Space Marines" likewise people who insist space wolves are the exact same as Ultramarines.

AngryAngel80 wrote:
I can't wait to get my optional book to make my forces feel marine like in power. Maybe chaos will get some better attention with them ? I'm sure we'll all be thrilled.

You may be waiting a few editions, so don't hold your breath.

If one really wants to, one can make an argument for many non-Marine factions selling well.

Take for example Craftworld Eldar. I think historically they have been one of the best selling xenos factions. There are many people out there that like Tolkien-esque Elves. Eldar Aspect Warriors and Exarchs are also basically anime space ninjas. Computer games like Warframe show there is a market for this.

Dumb Smart Guy wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

Marines are cheap as a starter army. They lend themselves to many play styles. They are easy to paint. They are easy to carry around.


They are designed to be the most played faction.

Give the same amount of releases to eldars, and i can easily expect that you will not have half the revenues from it.

Could you point out where people are saying this? Seems like you just made it up on the spot

What people are saying here is that investment in other factions could improve sales, not that they'll replace marines as the primary faction. It will also bring more balance to the tabletop in local stores so there aren't Marine v. Marine faceoffs. With all the marketing and releases directed toward Marines, this does become a self-fulfilling prophecy

Take a look at the thread and you will see many people arguing on this point.

Other factions will never outsell marines, but since the vast amount of factions is one of the selling points of the game, they will keep giving them the minimum support so that they don't get abandoned and the game devolves into SM vs SM (which is happening right now, so they need to swing the pendulum in the other direction with Awakening).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Iracundus wrote:
If one really wants to, one can make an argument for many non-Marine factions selling well.

Take for example Craftworld Eldar. I think historically they have been one of the best selling xenos factions. There are many people out there that like Tolkien-esque Elves. Eldar Aspect Warriors and Exarchs are also basically anime space ninjas. Computer games like Warframe show there is a market for this.

And that's why i used Eldar for my example, but even with them, the returns would be abysmal compared to SM. So obviously being GW a company they will choose the direction which provides more revenues and keep the game centered around SM.

BrianDavion wrote:

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
that'll only be true for people who blindly insist any human in power armor is the same faction.

You are wrong, people don't confuse Sisters with Marines. One get new release all the time, the other… is Sisters.

sisters no, but People insisted when Custodes came out that they where "Just Space Marines" likewise people who insist space wolves are the exact same as Ultramarines.

The same way that "people" add up ALL the various Marine releases to shout about how many they sell?

Space Wolves started as standard Chapter, got some background to make cosmetic changes in the early dexes - mostly names of units (the same as many, many Chapters who don't have the attention lavished on them), then later got massively flanderised with Santa Logan etc,

kingheff wrote:
As the title suggests, do you think that the psychic awakening books will be about renewing the non marine codexes rather than all the factions getting new standalone codexes?
Personally I think non marine codexes won't be released and we'll get rules and changes in the relevant books.

If the rumours are to be believed you're correct. There will be additional rules, relics, stratagems and the like in the campaign books, though they won't be 'codexes' as such.

Time will tell if these have any chance of achieving balance against the new marine stuff.

Phoenix rising will be interesting because it will give us a good indication of what to expect.

Iracundus wrote:
If one really wants to, one can make an argument for many non-Marine factions selling well.

Take for example Craftworld Eldar. I think historically they have been one of the best selling xenos factions. There are many people out there that like Tolkien-esque Elves. Eldar Aspect Warriors and Exarchs are also basically anime space ninjas. Computer games like Warframe show there is a market for this.

I think GW has shed a lot of players over the years that liked some of these other factions. Alienation of players is a real possibility when you run a game like GW does. It also i think breeds bad blood when you can sit on bad rules for years, why another space marine chapter gets a new book and some new models.

Kill team i wonder is getting players back, how much is hard to tell. But that itself needs some work to clean those rules up.

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

Some people don't understand.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

And that is highly debatable and you have no numbers for it.
Secondly we allready have multiple exemples of stagnation and deinvestment, which were overall damaging for the buisness.

We don't have the numbers, but they do.

Since they actually stake a lot on these kind of decisions, while we are discussing things here just to waste time on useless discussion that no one cares about, i would trust them on the matter.

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

The thing is though we don't know that as things have never been equal. To truly test this hypothesis, all factions would have to have equal attention and marketing.

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

Do you have anything to back that up?

I think it s not necessarily about investment at the same levels as marines but about giving Xenos factions some attention to give them the model and fluff depth that imperials and chaos have.
I'm not expecting massive model releases but things like clam pack characters. These are the things that fill out races/factions personality. Xenos factions have so few of these - and the AoS factions mostly have multiple single characters so it is doable.
We have lost lots of characters - NIds have a single clam pack model - the Broodlord, thats it. Eldar only have a single variant Autarch model, DE lost lost lots of their characters. This isn't a big investment and would help a lot expand and maintain interest in factions other than the imperium.

Someone mentioned to me that Nids haven't had a model release in 5 years.. I didn't believe it and looked it up and its true. I hadn't noticed because I lost interest in 40k as it had pretty much become Imperium vs Chaos. I have nothing against Imperials and Chaos getting their factions filled out, but it means I'm not engaged in the game. The upcoming releases for Psychic Awakening have got me interested again. Even just the possibility of a new Nid character clam pack has me back engaged. And these fit in alongside the SoB releases and the marines releases. Small regular releases could really refresh a lot of factions for a lot of people.

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

Do you have anything to back that up?

That in other games the heroic human trope is always the most popular. Eg, in WoW: human is the most played race.

Marines trump guard because they are (superficially) far more aspirational and heroic.

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

Do you have anything to back that up?

There's the old comments that space marines outsold the entirety of whfb before sigmar. Generally they used to alternate book releases, so for marines to beat the entire sales of their other flagship game it means they had more pull (even in a year without a marine book) than 3-4 faction re-releases.

Dudeface wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

Do you have anything to back that up?

There's the old comments that space marines outsold the entirety of whfb before sigmar. Generally they used to alternate book releases, so for marines to beat the entire sales of their other flagship game it means they had more pull (even in a year without a marine book) than 3-4 faction re-releases.

You have to remember, even when that come up more often it was after time of neglect for even some of the bigger races. As silverstu said above, in some cases. Its not just low support, its no support for years and longer at a time.
Often even a single pack or a box, And if they had handle forgeworld to support 40k as a whole. A single resin alternate or character for a race here and there would be huge.
No sweeping changes, or huge releases.
Just a single model, maybe even on a weekend with a few others would be enough.

The other issue is that the design of 40k is really tired and not that well thought out, who or why. But we have groups of minis that are put out to die with what seems like no planing or thought from the design teams. And its seems like the marines are bloated up with other groups and factions left without models to fill holes that a better game would use to make the game play better.
Flyers are a great example, you cannot have good rules for them if not every faction has access to them mean-fully, and ways to respond to them.
And if the way they go though the design process is true, then a lot of it is dumped on a rules team that has no hope to right the mess its got into at this point.

Clampacks are impossible.

Making a clampack means making a mold for a single model which is hardly taken in multiples by players, They can exist only for marines, and even there they have to price them high to recoup the expenses.

No, multi unit packs are what i expect for xenos.

Spoletta wrote:
Clampacks are impossible.

Making a clampack means making a mold for a single model which is hardly taken in multiples by players, They can exist only for marines, and even there they have to price them high to recoup the expenses.

No, multi unit packs are what i expect for xenos.

GW is the largest company making miniatures of this kind, Yet they fail to be able to do what every other company seems well capable of doing with what must be a much much lower budget and sales expectation.
This i would only be-leave if GW has cannibalized large sections of there own player base and hobbyists.

Dudeface wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

 Stux wrote:

 TheFleshIsWeak wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
I think that many people are delusional if they think that other factions would sell as well as marines given the same investment.

Marines are the icons of 40K. Wherever you hear about 40K there are always marines. People come to see what 40K is expecting marines. There is a huge amount of fluff about them going around.

So the faction that GW constantly pushes above all others in terms of marketing, fluff and models is also the one that sells the best?

ImagineMyShock.png

That's not what we're saying. We're saying all things equal, Marines would still sell better. So they make sense to be the one they push most.

Do you have anything to back that up?

There's the old comments that space marines outsold the entirety of whfb before sigmar. Generally they used to alternate book releases, so for marines to beat the entire sales of their other flagship game it means they had more pull (even in a year without a marine book) than 3-4 faction re-releases.

They outsold a neglected and hard to get into game? Big whoop.

Well, the announcement post for Phoenix Rising going up on pre-order has some information about what we'll see in it.

And I quote...

There are loads of new rules and abilities for the Asuryani and Drukhari – an entire codex expansion’s worth of content! These include Exarch Power options for each Aspect temple, a third psychic discipline in the Runes of Fortune and new customisable Craftworld Attributes that work like the Successor Tactics in Codex: Space Marines! You’ll also find rules for Drukhari Obsessions (specifically for the Kabals, Wych Cults and Haemonculus Covens), and the full set of Ynnari rules first featured in May’s issue of White Dwarf.

 Dysartes wrote:
Well, the announcement post for Phoenix Rising going up on pre-order has some information about what we'll see in it.

And I quote...

There are loads of new rules and abilities for the Asuryani and Drukhari – an entire codex expansion’s worth of content! These include Exarch Power options for each Aspect temple, a third psychic discipline in the Runes of Fortune and new customisable Craftworld Attributes that work like the Successor Tactics in Codex: Space Marines! You’ll also find rules for Drukhari Obsessions (specifically for the Kabals, Wych Cults and Haemonculus Covens), and the full set of Ynnari rules first featured in May’s issue of White Dwarf.

who wants to bet the eldar craftworld traits will make the customizable marine stuff look like a joke? (in fairness.... marines would be alright if that was the case so long as the super doctrines remained a marine only thing)

Why should super doctrines remain marine only? I like the idea of using them as the mono army incentive.

I can easily see Tyranids having the stages of invasion/digestion as theirs.

I wonder if they'll "fix" Alaitoc.