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 Don Savik wrote:

 Olthannon wrote:

 Don Savik wrote:
I can't believe some people are still extremely salty about Age of Sigmar all these years later.

Considering it crashed a lot of people out of the hobby, the fact that it was a ludicrous thing to do and the fact that the replacement was a bizarro mockery of 40k fantasy of course people still hate it with a passion.

It wasn't ludicrous to re-imagine a game that was costing them money. Old GW didn't know how to make people buy that game. It was too confusing and expensive for new players to get into. Could they have done it more gracefully? Sure, but that was during the time when old management of GW was still in charge.

And its not a mockery of 40k or fantasy, its just the difference between high fantasy and low fantasy in a setting. While obviously a difference in style for people, I don't think that warrants the amount of hatred it gets. Is it a bummer that people can't play their game because it got discontinued? Sure. Does that mean Age of Sigmar is a bad game? No.

Also nothing is stopping you from playing it. I still play Mordheim from time to time. Games get discontinued sometimes, that's just life.

edit: I guess I am just saying that harboring all that negative emotion all these years is bad for you. Reconcile and move on.

Yeah top3 selling miniature game in the world cost them money.sure.

 Graphite wrote:

 BlackoCatto wrote:
... now when the average teenager knows more about the Old World then that of the Sigmarized one by large margins to the point of hilarity do they come crawling back. Most of my friends are versed in Total Warhammer or Vermintide, have played the old Rpg as well...

Hmm. While anecdotal, that is interesting. And I don't think there are many AoS computer games. It's not like GW is shy about licensing - it implies that The Old World still has a lot more brand recognition to appeal to computer game developers.

Total War 3 can't be that far off, surely?

not a surprise

old world is there for a long time now, still available in fantasy books and I know people who like to read Gotrek & Felix without knowing anything about the game

Total War is doing its thing to keep people talking about

AoS on the other hand is much more generic to give much more space for development and ideas
yet has no iconic "history" or famous characters for people outside the tabletop bubble and is too generic to be an alternative to other fantasy genres

same for the game
AoS is a Mass-Skirmish game among many other Skirmish games
there is nothing special about it, neither the design of the models nor the rules
it is just there because it is from GW and without constant support and pushing would be gone faster than Warmaster (because there is nothing unique about it that would keep people playing it)

Warhammer on the other side was a mix between Mass-Skirmish and R&F that took the best of both worlds at its peak

it failed for the same reason why LotR failed, because GW did not understand why people played the game and bought the models


and because some people are still salty about Warhammer (of course spending several 1000$ and years of time in "hope" to finally get the new models and rules that were promised but than just get the world blown up) there is also a chance to fail hard with this one

and I see no hint that GW learned from the past mistakes or will finally give people the game they are waiting for
(shitstorm will be big after the initial hype if the game does not deliver what some people expected not matter if GW said something different before or not)

chaos0xomega wrote:
A ludicrous thing to do and yet its selling better than WHFB ever did and is in fact the best selling fantasy miniatures product line on the planet, whereas WHFB was playing second fiddle in sales to LotR for a number of years - even when LotR was post-peak and barely selling in and of itself.

[...]

Necromunda makes money hand over fist [...]

You have access to detailed sales information I take it? Apart from scarce hints during Twitch interviews (I recall Andy Hoare occasionally referring to "producing more Y than they previously made for release X" and perhaps things selling "well", such specific information is rarely made public.

LotR's main success came when it was a narrative skirmish game, the attempts to revamp it as a big battle game have not really caught on with the community [...]

There has only ever been one attempt, a new set of rules called War of the Ring, it was dropped after one supplement and the game continued with the skirmish rules, that were never dropped or meant to be superseded anyway.

(and thats part of the reason why we've only really seen releases of one-off heroes and characters, etc. and re-releases of older kits the last couple years instead of the whole new armies and units that GW promised us when they relaunched the game a couple years ago).

They never promised anything of the sort. In fact, when they relaunched the game, the official line was not to expect any new plastics (aside from the Lake-town terrain that was already produced but never released), and that the only new sculpts would be in the form of books and FW resin figures. Due to seemingly good sales, they have since started making new figures in plastic too.

When did LotR fail exactly? I don't call a game that's been constantly in print for 20 years a failure.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
When did LotR fail exactly? I don't call a game that's been constantly in print for 20 years a failure.

first of all, it was not constantly in print for 20 years (otherwise you could say the same about Necromunda) but was "paused" in between and re-released

sometime after the 3rd film, GW made famous decision to half the box content and double the price
yes, this is not just a meme but they really did it with the LotR plastic boxes

problem was that a big part of the community did not come from GW or Warhammer but either from historical games or was new to the wargaming hobby at all and with being used to different prices and thing did not worked out well
not only stopped people buying the models, but also stopped playing the game because "vote with your wallet" was something that community did take seriously and meant no support at all (including making events or playing public in shops or clubs)

it was basically dead and GW just did not drop the license for the one reason that someone else could take it and easily make it big again while moving it to the FW Specialist Games

LotR went from the main Fantasy Game into a niche game over night because GW thought they can treat the community the same way as the Warhammer players

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
When did LotR fail exactly? I don't call a game that's been constantly in print for 20 years a failure.

It certainly balked during the Hobbit years due to insane price hikes on new products and comparatively poorer sculpts made exclusively in resin as opposed to metal Perry Twin magic, but all that means is that it failed to capture the returning popularity of the franchise and just continued steadily as it had for years. It's what introduced me to the hobby back in 2008, well after the initial frenzy had dropped and plateaued, and still took up a significant section of the store walls. It could have been considered dead by the same corporate metrics that declared WHFB dead, but I think we all agree that wasn't entirely accurate to the average person's perception.

Speaking of Middle-Earth, 25mm bases are what I'd expect to be the standard in The Old World. 20mm just feels too small now. Based on absolutely nothing except for the size of the project, I'd expect armies to be smaller than they were when the End Times ended, so a slightly larger minimum base size shouldn't have too much of an impact on games.

Yes it was. The core rules and miniatures you needed to play have always been available. They have never been unavailable on the site, unlike necromunda which was completely Oop for s number of years.

Yes the box reduction happened (and has since been reversed) did happen, but didn't stop people playing.

The historical comment really isn't true. Most people who got into it weren't even wargamers previously (myself. Included). Historicals really had nothing to do with it then or now.

Call it dead if you want, but it's wrong. The game continued and continues to be played without issue and is getting back a lot of player base it had lost before.

chaos0xomega wrote:
Theres literally nothing unique about it, which is why countless knockoff minis from 3rd parties exist for it, and why I expect that whatever they do with The Old World is going to leave a lot of people unhappy that there is going to be some sort of major departure from the expectation of what these minis are supposed to look like.

There's nothing unique about anything, ever. Or something.

Look, we know WFB is just early Renaissance Europe with magic, but the way all those familiar elements that are so easy to 'knock off' are combined does add up to a unique blend. People do know what Warhammer Fantasy is as a complete package and are able to distinguish it from other popular settings, much like 40k is just marines fighting Aliens and space elves, and yet it is a also one of the most distinct pieces of fantasy world building in existence.

chaos0xomega wrote:
Licensing isn't that clear cut or simple.

Which is why I considered motivations, not unknown contractual details. In my view, GW is the only player on the market that can utilize the licence effectively and is possibly willing to pay a premium for that, and both New Line and GW know that. I don't see anyone rocking that particular boat for a penny or two.

 BlackoCatto wrote:
Ill take it like my club owner said about the death of Fantasy....

Back in the days of 5th and even older editions, he could charge $100s for a full massive weekend campaign and fill every single slot. By 7th and 8th Edition he'd charge half as much and be unable to even fill up half. As he was told it wasn't the lore or armies that was the issue for players, it was the rules that pushed those out of playing the game. Back to back bad editions followed by a lack of new models save for at the tail end of 8th.

GW killed Fantasy already through their own incompetence and now when the average teenager knows more about the Old World then that of the Sigmarized one by large margins to the point of hilarity do they come crawling back. Most of my friends are versed in Total Warhammer or Vermintide, have played the old Rpg as well. I had to explain to them wtf AoS even was and all I've gotten was, "O they ported Marines to it." It's a sad fact as someone whom does like the game of AoS but it is real.

Total War does a good job keeping interest in the Old World. It has its flaws, but it's so good at conveying the feeling of WHFB.

Total War convinces me that 15mm scale is ideal for a WHFB-like game, because 60+ large regiments look soooo cool and 15mm is big enough that you still fit a decent amount of detail on the models, but not so big that you can't paint them quickly. I'd love to have a crack at painting a 100 large regiment of 15mm scale Night Goblins (I have painted 120 28mm scale NGs, but it took so bloody long).

The problem with 15mm is your characters don't look as distinctive, but I think it's a good compromise for being able to represent something that looks like an actual army.

Doubt GW would go down that path though.

chaos0xomega wrote:

yadda yadda AoS and financially superior and WHFB sucks etc

To cut a long wossname short, there's absolutely no point trying to jam debatable logic over human emotion. You can say AoS sells better than WHFB all the live long day and it matters not a jot to a whole bunch of people. Because in the end it really doesn't matter in the slightest.

GW knows fine well that if they give us new Warhammer fantasy and it looks good, then people like me are going to scuttle out of our caves with our money bags and suck up all that Bretonnian goodness with a crazy straw.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Yes it was. The core rules and miniatures you needed to play have always been available. They have never been unavailable on the site, unlike necromunda which was completely Oop for s number of years.

maybe I miss some years here, but the time the rules were OOP they were available for free to download (at least the german version)

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:

Call it dead if you want, but it's wrong. The game continued and continues to be played without issue and is getting back a lot of player base it had lost before.

failed =/= dead and I don't see it regain any player base but more of a constant flow
the community is there, but far from were it was once and it neither grows nor declines, similar to the Warhammer community that still play the game with the legacy rules

Warhammer is not dead either and there are more people around here playing one of the re-worked legacy rules (WarhammerCE, Fluffhammer, Warhammer Armies) than playing LotR

 kodos wrote:
Warhammer is not dead either and there are more people around here playing one of the re-worked legacy rules (WarhammerCE, Fluffhammer, Warhammer Armies) than playing LotR

It's a shame that the final iterations of Warhammer weren't widely liked. I know some people liked it, but so many people didn't, so there's no unifying voice of what edition (or cobbled together mess of multiple editions) are most likely to be played. Some editions had better core rules with worse army books or vice versa, and the latter editions are what caused many people to stop playing before GW actually killed it.

AoS really needs its own big breakout videogame to really entrench itself in the minds of people, but with CA being busy with TWW and Relic being dead there's few opportunities to take advantage of that.

However even then, GW have sort of designed themselves into a corner with AoS where it is on the one hand very generic high fantasy with few unique or evocative twists of its own... while also having some very weird aesthetic choices that make people bounce off of it super hard. Most actual antagonism I see towards it nowadays are from people who never even played WHFB; at most they've played one of the games or read one of the Gotrek and Felix books, but other than that they have no real attachment to the old world or old game. And yet some of the visual and lore choices GW made are like Kryptonite. I thought OBR were fairly popular or at least looked on positively, but apparently people in the game and outside of it really hate their designs. The Lumineth can't be described as anything but "Mixed" in terms of reception and of course Stormcast have not set the world on fire and in fact are usually the main point of contention for people who dislike the game.

Plus, there's the issues of the entire narrative and setting making it very difficult to become immersed in it. Maybe because people when they hear Fantasy expect and prefer more grounded and gritty settings (which is why the Old World still has legs), but there's certainly an issue when it's harder to relate and feel a sense of place in AoS than it is in 40K (and 40K can be so unfathomably huge and miserable at times so that's quite a feat)

Of course AoS is still in it's early days, but I still don't feel that GW have done a good enough job of crafting a good sense of place and history throughout much of its setting. You can bring up WHFB's long period of existence as a counter, as if GW was continually developing it over 30-odd years, but really how much development of the game was there? And even then, a small miniature company mostly being run out of bedrooms and garages in the first stages of its existence in the misery that was 80's Britain and trying to develop and nail down an entirely new idea is very different from a giant corporation in 2015-2020 with all the resources of the world on its side and decades of experience to draw upon. I play Gloomspite Gitz and while I enjoy Skragrot da Loonking, he still doesn't hold a candle to Skarsnik or Grom in terms of evocative imagery or entertainment. Very few of the characters in AOS hold up well to WHFB ones honestly, even the ones carried over are now unfathomable God-things that lose basically everything that made them somewhat compelling.

None of this is insurmountable or unchangeable of course, I've heard lots of good things about the Morathi book for instance, but it also shouldn't be taking this long for GW to create something a bit more interesting. At the very least if they wanna do something new, then actually do something new, because they keep going back to the Old World Nostalgia Well to dredge up iconic and fun characters (Sigvald) because they just seem to be incapable of making new ones.

 Graphite wrote:

 BlackoCatto wrote:
... now when the average teenager knows more about the Old World then that of the Sigmarized one by large margins to the point of hilarity do they come crawling back. Most of my friends are versed in Total Warhammer or Vermintide, have played the old Rpg as well...

Hmm. While anecdotal, that is interesting. And I don't think there are many AoS computer games. It's not like GW is shy about licensing - it implies that The Old World still has a lot more brand recognition to appeal to computer game developers.

Total War 3 can't be that far off, surely?

TWW3 is widely expected to come out next year. It's been hinted that there would have been an annoucement this year but for COVID.

AoS just doesn't have the appeal or a distinctive enough identity (yet?) to replace WHFB in the minds of people, which is why there won't be any breakout video game about it anytime soon.

Maybe a generation or two from now, after children have grown up with Sigmarines, it might develop a similar iconic status, but I feel the design philosophy attached to the game is actively preventing that.

If it does come back as it was, they would need severe changes.

I was a die hard WHFB player for years and loved everything about it.
In its final years though it was starting to die off at a worrying rate.
Buy in costs for new armies, rules bloat, poorly written rules etc all added to this and made it nose dive.

It got to the point that most gaming groups in my area almost stopped playing it entirely.
Tournaments were a rare thing and took months of prep work just to get the attendance.


When AoS hit is was a dumpster fire.
I had maybe 10-12 games and left it alone, writing it off as a lost cause due to no balance and just poor rules.

Then the fans came in and started to add some order to the game, adding points, limitations and tweaking rules.
I had a few games and it was at least playable at this point.

Jump forward to now and in my area, it has overtaken just about every other GW game.
Constant tournaments, new players etc.
It’s like the golden years of fantasy again.

Don’t get me wrong, still not happy about the factions and named characters that got killed off.



If they want to revive the old world it will take some changes though.
Bringing back a game as it was after it died just won’t work.
Sure, it will have a fan base, but not enough to really justify an entire restart of a system.

don't think that AoS can ever replace the Warhammer lore

for the main reason that GW is not doing that kind of lore any more

it already started prior 8th Editon Warhammer that those kind of things changed and the new stuff was not as detailed and consistent as the older ones (like that the daily raids of Dark Elves on the Imperium and Bretonnia took a number of Slaves equal to the people living in the biggest cities) and was mostly ignored by people

also the change with Chaos from being neither good or evil and "just there" to be an evil personification of something

Warhammer, Fantasy and 40k, lives from what was done in the past and the new stuff just builds on it
with AoS, there is no well build world as base were you can just throw stuff on it and it will work somehow

without investing time and money into basic world building and not just add stuff to justify a new release, AoS won't get that iconic status

It's difficult to imagine being successful without lower buy-in costs, that's for sure.

 kodos wrote:

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
Yes it was. The core rules and miniatures you needed to play have always been available. They have never been unavailable on the site, unlike necromunda which was completely Oop for s number of years.

maybe I miss some years here, but the time the rules were OOP they were available for free to download (at least the german version)

What time/rules are we talking about here?
As far as the English-language rules are concerned, I think some of the faction books (Fallen Realms, Kingdoms of Men, those things) were out of stock for a while, and one of the big things for the new team was to get those printed again as soon as possible. The core Hobbit-era rulebook I don't think ever went out of production; the "limited edition" starter set containing the small version famously never actually selling out in the first place.
Translated versions may well be different though; just like how recent publications had the rules section downloadable in German when they decided to no longer create full translations of the books.
Miniatures were always available (in general; specific ones of course being dropped or selling out occasionally), and as such I would consider the game to be officially supported since 2001, even if there were some times when new releases were scarce.

Carlovonsexron wrote:
It's difficult to imagine being successful without lower buy-in costs, that's for sure.

I think this is why the 10mm idea continues to get mentioned.

Just the Empire or Bretonia would require 3-5 new kits each for their core, plus characters and special stuff. Which players need to buy, build and paint.

A 10mm game could do most factions on a single sprue and would take just a few hours for players to have something ready to go.

I'm not saying I want 10mm or even expect it, but relaunching all of TOW, in plastic, while supporting 2 other fantasy games just seems so... unlikely.

there was a timeframe were the game was a Specialist Game

this was before The Hobbit re-print of the rules

during this time, all Specialist Games rules were available to download (including Necromunda, BFG etc.) except for the LotR rules which might have still been available in English but was not over the German GW site (which did not sold any SG stuff but provided the German rules for download)

so might that it was just a local thing

 kodos wrote:
don't think that AoS can ever replace the Warhammer lore

for the main reason that GW is not doing that kind of lore any more

it already started prior 8th Editon Warhammer that those kind of things changed and the new stuff was not as detailed and consistent as the older ones (like that the daily raids of Dark Elves on the Imperium and Bretonnia took a number of Slaves equal to the people living in the biggest cities) and was mostly ignored by people

also the change with Chaos from being neither good or evil and "just there" to be an evil personification of something

Warhammer, Fantasy and 40k, lives from what was done in the past and the new stuff just builds on it
with AoS, there is no well build world as base were you can just throw stuff on it and it will work somehow

without investing time and money into basic world building and not just add stuff to justify a new release, AoS won't get that iconic status

Actually 8th Edition Army Books had alot of lore as it was building up to the End Times - all the time lines had long add on bits rather than the simple reprints of the last couple of editions. I was not keen on some of it but it was there.

Alot of the world building was done outside the Army books and shifted and changed over the editions - see 1st-3rd Edition Slann vs 4-8th Edition. Much of this was in the RPG, the novels, the lorebooks etc.

AOS has been building up on the latter - the novels have expanded considerably the background and base to build on- although again this is shifting and changing somewhat, the new Morathi campaign book has quite a bit of good lore. The Soulbound RPG is also oing a good job with this.

If they do a Total War: Age of Sigmar set in a single Realm that could be both a big boost to people knowing about it and impressive

Total War: Warhammer def has kept the Old World in focuss for many.

Buy In Costs were only one of many issues. Old World suffered on multiple fronts at once. It's the same as why Warmachine has dwindled dramatically over the last few years - its' not one singular cause and effect, it is multiple factors that add together.

Each issue on its own isn't a huge problem. AoS has armies like Daughters of Khaine who can put down 90 witch aelves at £35 for a box of 10. We already have large armies that would fit rank and file at high costs and it still works.



Buy in cost was one factor of many for Old World. It's not good enough to just fix that and its not good to fixate on price as the only barrier to entry. If anything a greater barrier to entry was the fact that the game didn't really work well till you hit 1500 to 2000 points. So the price to buy in on individual models wasn't the barrier, it was that you needed a big investment in time and money (build and paint) to get an army ready for the field; with limited game engagement options in your build up toward that point.

And when you reached that point most of your opponents were experienced. Even if they weren't pros they still had years of gaming under their belt. So there was then the fact that if you made it through the huge struggle to get an army down you might well lose - a lot. With fewer newbies of your own skill level to play with.

 Overread wrote:

If anything a greater barrier to entry was the fact that the game didn't really work well till you hit 1500 to 2000 points. So the price to buy in on individual models wasn't the barrier, it was that you needed a big investment in time and money (build and paint) to get an army ready for the field; with limited game engagement options in your build up toward that point.

I think for me personally, I do see that as the buy-in cost. It's fine that you have a different perspective, but it's worth it to take the time to clarify my own also.

As if you can't really play without x-investment into a game, then x becomes the buy in cost. (for me)

Carlovonsexron wrote:

 Overread wrote:

If anything a greater barrier to entry was the fact that the game didn't really work well till you hit 1500 to 2000 points. So the price to buy in on individual models wasn't the barrier, it was that you needed a big investment in time and money (build and paint) to get an army ready for the field; with limited game engagement options in your build up toward that point.

I think for me personally, I do see that as the buy-in cost. It's fine that you have a different perspective, but it's worth it to take the time to clarify my own also.

As if you can't really play without x-investment into a game, then x becomes the buy in cost. (for me)

Oh don't get me wrong, cheaper buy in costs per model most certainly do help large format games. My point was more that the cost that's important isn't so much the cost per model or per box but the cost per "game" or rather per army. My view is that you can have a higher buy in cost per model and have it work so long as you've got a higher game engagement system that works at more varied lower point values. So each box you add feels rewarding and can be used in games.

Rather than a system whereby you don't really get the game reward until much later.

I mentioned in a previous post, WHFB in the latter years sucked for new players because it encouraged large armies which is both expensive and time consuming to paint, and also the rules were not well written for learning how to play.

On top of sucking for new players, a lot of older previously loyal players didn't like the changes in the latter years.

So you have a game that appeals to neither newcomers nor veterans.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Just the Empire or Bretonia would require 3-5 new kits each for their core, plus characters and special stuff. Which players need to buy, build and paint.

I think combined kits are a good way of building a game quickly. Like, don't make a box of men at arms and a box of archers, make a box of men at arms and archers together.

Considering how fantasy has often worked you could have one box of mounted knights for Bretonnia and with a variation in heads, arms and perhaps a few armour segments for the horse you could get several different types of unit out of it. Heck just look at what Hawk Wargames have done with their model line for Dropfleet Commander - a single cruiser kit builds something like 7 or so different classes of cruiser from light to heavy.

The real issue for WHFB started in 7th ed, where in the core rules the rank bonus was changed to basically encourage larger regiments with a width of 5 models, while at the same time a lot of new plastic kits were coming out with fewer models in them. Overnight a box of 20 Empire state troops went from £15-18, to £15 for 10 of the new ones, basically doubling the cost while also increasing the numbers needed in-game. Some old regiment sets couldn't even get maximum rank bonuses from what was in the base box anymore as now a 4x4 size regiment would get no bonuses whatsoever. Obviously running them that way was never the most optimal choice, but you had the option to if money was tight or you were playing a casual friendly game.

I was essentially stopped buying new WHFB armies from that point on, long before 8th edition, just sticking to my Greenskins and Ogres.

I recall looking at Skaven and being turned off not just by the number of slave rats that you needed (a kit that GW only sold in metal - though most people just used clan rats in plastic); but also by the fact that for the most part they went on the table just to die and come off the table. Ergo they were purely a chaff unit and you needed LOADS of them for the 1 or two cool things to do their job.

So for Skaven it wasn't just numbers, it was what they also did on the table itself. Whilst its a fun concept, its just not practically fun to build a huge army where most of it is there to purely die and nothing else.

As a kid, it was a money issue more than anything (back then a lot of stuff was metal and unaffordable to me, buying 3 metal Terradons was a big deal). As an adult with a job, the cost wasn't so much an issue as the time. I think if people were realistic about how much time it takes to paint 1 Skaven model, thus how long will it take to paint 200 of them, there'd probably be less 80-90% unpainted armies on ebay, lol.

But yeah, GW really needed to push the small game more. A while back there was the "skirmish" format, it still used rank and file but it was written around armies of a couple of hundred points and could have been developed into a good starter for new players on their way to buying and painting an entire horde.