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 zedmeister wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
Does Games Workshop make literally any games that are genuinely fun to play from a boardgame player perspective, and not a "cool lore/cool minis" perspective? Like, you could sit someone down who enjoys Catan or Last Night on Earth, and play X with them, and it's not a poorly-written-and balanced, tedious slog?

I'd give them Talisman and maaaaybe Space Hulk, but SH does lean awful hard into having a cool backstory.

The game that came in Betrayal At Calth was praised quite highly, even on BGG. Ironic really, as most people bought it for the minis. A James Hewitt work that gets largely missed, sadly.

BAC would have been a great core mechanic for 40k boxed game releases. So much could have been done using two force release boxes with tiles and the dice. But they sadly derailed that path with the Prospeo game using some goofy alternative shortly ish afterwards.

Somniare wrote:
I'll be interested in seeing what happens with the expansions, depending on the content/prices. I was lucky and managed to bag a copy the first time around, with the added benefit of a discount from the FLGS. I think there will be those who got burnt by what happened and have decided to just move on, but it's good news for those who are still interested.

"Burnt" is perhaps not quite the right word; personally it's more a simple case of having accepted long ago that I'm not getting this set because it's gone, or was meant to be gone. While it seemed unbelievable at the time that it would never return, that was the eventual conclusion. Guess it's nice that it'll finally be returning after all, but I'm certainly less likely to pick it up now than I would have been at the time.

Dear GW, if we're in this sort of productive mood, could you please reprint the BSF expansions.

If nothing else, if you can't redo the cardboard bits, could we at least have the models added to the online store as sprues, just like Warhammer Underworlds gets?

A thought occurs. It’s not necessarily a good thought or even an accurate one.

The main upset about Cursed City the first time around wasn’t so much it selling out on the day, but that we’d been lead to believe it was to be a stock item. And when that changed, GW just said nothing. At all. I think the most we got was a rather non-committal “like, maybe it’ll be back, I dunno”.

Since then, we’ve seen GW be a good deal more open when things are delayed, including when certain items are delayed in certain locales.

We’ll likely never know what happened with Cursed City like. But it does feel like GW have at least learned something.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
A thought occurs. It’s not necessarily a good thought or even an accurate one.

The main upset about Cursed City the first time around wasn’t so much it selling out on the day, but that we’d been lead to believe it was to be a stock item. And when that changed, GW just said nothing. At all. I think the most we got was a rather non-committal “like, maybe it’ll be back, I dunno”.

Since then, we’ve seen GW be a good deal more open when things are delayed, including when certain items are delayed in certain locales.

We’ll likely never know what happened with Cursed City like. But it does feel like GW have at least learned something.

Better to let that ship sail away I think.
There are lessons to be learned in many aspects of CC but it depends on their own interpretation as a company of what exactly happened I guess. Some companies demonise their clients others make fun of them and others respect and try... In different occasions GW has done all of those so I dont know what they decide to do tomorrow.

Apparently by the comments here the game is not that good either, so another lesson would be minis alone sell. Hence the super expensive bundles with parts of the sold out boxes are in store... Still a slap in the face of customers that could not get the original box sets.

I think GW would’ve been better just telling us.

As has been speculated, if there was some kind of legal wrangle involved, I accept they couldn’t really say anything.

But if that wasn’t the case, at least acknowledge something has gone wrong/went wrong. Communicate they at least have the intent of trying to get it back, even if it comes with the caveat “but we seriously cannot promise anything”.

Their stuff selling out is nothing new. But they set the “stock item” expectation, then just…..silence.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
We have seen improvements there. As well as telling us of delays up front, they’ve moved to a MTO window for otherwise limited sets.

The MTO is probably the happiest of mediums. GW don’t really risk sitting on unsold stock, as they can go with a more conservative initial stock level. We the potential customer don’t suffer from Scalpers hoovering up the initial stock, because we know that, with a bit of patience, it will be ours provided we can buy it within the MTO window.

I like yourself do also prefer transparency over the silence displayed, specially on a hobby niche company. But the company choose not to for its own reasons and I cannot speak for others but it turned me off from getting this.

When a company makes it extra hard for you to get their things and is not even transparent about the continuity/future of said products then I drop it.

The MTO may turn out to be the best option but is far from ideal since GW is all about providing new things on the spot every week to keep you buying, if the delivery dates start to collide with future new releases you end up with a client sitting & waiting for the MTO to be delivered first before going for new things.

I get the feeling these stock issues have more to do with the inability to produce x amounts of volumes rather than just Covid Brexit... Something tells me with production increasing to meet growing demand it needs a huge investment that is quite risky... Just a gut feeling but its almost like when companies reach a critical production size and do not meet demand anymore.

Silence is probably their best bet.

We’ve all know no matter what they do somebody or some group will chastise them. If it was a legal issue then they will get the “They should focus their legal team on these issues instead of punishing people making fan films.” If it was a supply chain issue then their purchasing department should have been on it” if it wasn’t enough profit then “the bean counters suck” , production capacity “Why didn’t we build the factory larger.”

Really, they are making money, even during the Pandemic. It’s best to not engage and let the complainers complain. It’s not like GW is known for great communications anyway.

They are bringing the game back due, wether it’s due to great demand or finally getting the raw materials, it’s back. Complainers should save their energy for the fully expected price rise when it hits the market again.

GW know they can stay silent because odds are it's going to just blow over anyway. Toss out the next New Shiny and 99% of people will start clapping for it, rather than lingering on what came before.

How long did that 'boycott' last as soon as the new Black Templars were revealed?

 NAVARRO wrote:
I like yourself do also prefer transparency over the silence displayed, specially on a hobby niche company. But the company choose not to for its own reasons and I cannot speak for others but it turned me off from getting this.

When a company makes it extra hard for you to get their things and is not even transparent about the continuity/future of said products then I drop it.

The MTO may turn out to be the best option but is far from ideal since GW is all about providing new things on the spot every week to keep you buying, if the delivery dates start to collide with future new releases you end up with a client sitting & waiting for the MTO to be delivered first before going for new things.

I get the feeling these stock issues have more to do with the inability to produce x amounts of volumes rather than just Covid Brexit... Something tells me with production increasing to meet growing demand it needs a huge investment that is quite risky... Just a gut feeling but its almost like when companies reach a critical production size and do not meet demand anymore.

Well they’ve not long opened their second foundry in Nottingham. And I’m told (by all means salt to taste!) that in order to maintain a COVID “safe” environment, neither has foundry is running at full capacity. Space between workers, proper clean down between shifts.

When this all starts to settle down again, they should be OK.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 NAVARRO wrote:
I like yourself do also prefer transparency over the silence displayed, specially on a hobby niche company. But the company choose not to for its own reasons and I cannot speak for others but it turned me off from getting this.

When a company makes it extra hard for you to get their things and is not even transparent about the continuity/future of said products then I drop it.

The MTO may turn out to be the best option but is far from ideal since GW is all about providing new things on the spot every week to keep you buying, if the delivery dates start to collide with future new releases you end up with a client sitting & waiting for the MTO to be delivered first before going for new things.

I get the feeling these stock issues have more to do with the inability to produce x amounts of volumes rather than just Covid Brexit... Something tells me with production increasing to meet growing demand it needs a huge investment that is quite risky... Just a gut feeling but its almost like when companies reach a critical production size and do not meet demand anymore.

Well they’ve not long opened their second foundry in Nottingham. And I’m told (by all means salt to taste!) that in order to maintain a COVID “safe” environment, neither has foundry is running at full capacity. Space between workers, proper clean down between shifts.

When this all starts to settle down again, they should be OK.

Thats good to know, GW never produced so many miniatures in so many fronts, 40k, AoS, Lotr and loads of specialists support. They really need that extra capacity to be there now.
Cursed City seems to be having expansions so its another knot to add to the range of specialists.
Boxed games come and go, can you imagine the amount of box sets if they still kept all in production? That would be great for us but way too many sets to handle I guess.

I mean Blackstone Fortress has been in production for what, almost 4 years by now?

 Theophony wrote:
Silence is probably their best bet.

We’ve all know no matter what they do somebody or some group will chastise them.

Not sure about that argument. Just because they won't make everyone happy all the time, the amount of unhappy people and their reasons for unhappiness with GW's behaviour will be rather different based on what that behaviour is. GW's failure to communicate anything during the CC debacle didn't just give the usual haters ammunition, it was also a major turn off for people legitimately enthusiastic about the release.

Indeed.

It’s another example of GW’s curious luck when it comes to world events they can’t influence.

LOTR bubble bursting caused them to resize their business and rationalise stores just before the global recession, so whilst everyone else ran to do the same, they were more or less wrapping up.

COVID? I believe the second foundry had just been completed (more or less) just before lockdown hit (and it included major public works to increase the electrical grid!), so they had the space to continue a decent level of production.

I'm happy to see it come back, and I may pick up a copy this time, especially if they do expansions.

What I would like to see GW do is offer a series of made-to-order card reprints for Blackstone Fortress and Adeptus Titanicus. I sadly missed a couple of them, and .pdfs are just not the same.

Transparency is a great goal. It's a good way to build trust, and especially in a team, it can lead to some great stuff.

Transparency can also be messy. Decisions often have a lot of moving parts.

Lets just look at the decision whether or not to do a second print run of CC, based on information we have publicly, and a general understanding of how businesses make these decisions. A second CC run would cost GW money to find a new vendor for the board game components, and while they own the plant for making the minis, my understanding is that they are at or near capacity, so running CC sprues means pushing other sprues back.

GW is not interested in CC making it's money back, it's interested in making the best investment of it's time, money, and plant. I have a lot of SOB players in my life, so I know that Sacresancts are perennially out of stock. So, righty out the gate, any production of CC would need to be more profitable than simply running off sacrosanct and selling them basically immediately. Oh, and from that, you need to subtract the cost of board game component, and figure in that demand for CC is reduced due to the initial print run. Then, factor in the loss incurred if molds for the expansions were already cut, BUT also figure out if running more CC would delay any other new models. All of this is not super tough to figure out, aside from the wild card: the cost of printing and shipping the board game components.

Okay, now, I would be fascinated if GW would have said that, instead of nothing. But I understand why they didn't. It turns a simple question into a complicated answer. It also, BTW, has the effect of letting vendors know how badly they want to make more CC, which could, in theory, allow those vendors to charge more.

Would people really have been more satisfied if GW said "if we have the time and money to make more, we're going to try, but we're not going to bump back any other planned new releases."

Would everyone have been happy? Probably not. And that’s any snark I might harbour toward serial complainers entirely aside.

But I think it would’ve been better than “Cursed City, what’s that?” Head in the sand responses we did get.

 Sacredroach wrote:


What I would like to see GW do is offer a series of made-to-order card reprints for Blackstone Fortress and Adeptus Titanicus. I sadly missed a couple of them, and .pdfs are just not the same.

Still can't see why they don't set up a POD facility for cards and maybe even select titles like Slaves to Darkness etc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Wonder if it hit around the same time Heroquest makes it to retail.

 Polonius wrote:
Transparency is a great goal. It's a good way to build trust, and especially in a team, it can lead to some great stuff.

Transparency can also be messy. Decisions often have a lot of moving parts.

Lets just look at the decision whether or not to do a second print run of CC, based on information we have publicly, and a general understanding of how businesses make these decisions. A second CC run would cost GW money to find a new vendor for the board game components, and while they own the plant for making the minis, my understanding is that they are at or near capacity, so running CC sprues means pushing other sprues back.

GW is not interested in CC making it's money back, it's interested in making the best investment of it's time, money, and plant. I have a lot of SOB players in my life, so I know that Sacresancts are perennially out of stock. So, righty out the gate, any production of CC would need to be more profitable than simply running off sacrosanct and selling them basically immediately. Oh, and from that, you need to subtract the cost of board game component, and figure in that demand for CC is reduced due to the initial print run. Then, factor in the loss incurred if molds for the expansions were already cut, BUT also figure out if running more CC would delay any other new models. All of this is not super tough to figure out, aside from the wild card: the cost of printing and shipping the board game components.

Okay, now, I would be fascinated if GW would have said that, instead of nothing. But I understand why they didn't. It turns a simple question into a complicated answer. It also, BTW, has the effect of letting vendors know how badly they want to make more CC, which could, in theory, allow those vendors to charge more.

Would people really have been more satisfied if GW said "if we have the time and money to make more, we're going to try, but we're not going to bump back any other planned new releases."

Transparency for the sake of transparency and deprived of any sort of responsible thought can actually be damaging, but thats like anything theoretically positive landed in a unprofessional way.
Thats not what I mean and actually you can be transparent about a subject in a way that you don't spill the beans you dont want/need to share.

Something along the lines "The demand has been amazing and we are looking into releasing more box sets, but due to covid and Brexit delays we are not at this point sure of the exact dates, we will do our best, thanks for your support"
Much better than silence even if very vague and with not much information....

 kodos wrote:
Going by the latest boxed games price increases my guess is ~150GBP/190€/250$

It was £125 before, I can’t see it being more than it’s original price really. Maybe £130 at a push.
I’ll be hesitant to buy it if it went up.

Black stone was the same price for several years.
This is the same thing, just was missing from stock for a huge while. So it shouldn’t go up at all in that sense..

Obviously they are marketing it as “it’s rereleasing/returning!” But in reality it would have just been here this whole time if it weren’t for whatever production issues they had etc.

 NAVARRO wrote:
Transparency for the sake of transparency and deprived of any sort of responsible thought can actually be damaging, but thats like anything theoretically positive landed in a unprofessional way.
Thats not what I mean and actually you can be transparent about a subject in a way that you don't spill the beans you dont want/need to share.

Something along the lines "The demand has been amazing and we are looking into releasing more box sets, but due to covid and Brexit delays we are not at this point sure of the exact dates, we will do our best, thanks for your support"
Much better than silence even if very vague and with not much information....

I think at some point we're splitting very fine PR hairs. Your statement looks fine, but then when they don't release it again, you'll have people pissed that they said they'd release more. Especially since the phrase "we will do our best" implies that they will actually make it a priority, when the reality is that CC was never going to be a major priority.

Keep in mind, we're now talking with hindsight after the rerelease was announced, I did not expect that, I figured they'd take the sunk cost and move on.

I just think it's odd that the blanket assumption by GW fans, myself included, is that the things they do is the result of incompetence. I'm sure there were many meetings in which people argued how much of a response to give to questions about CC. Now, I think the valid critique is that even though we get peeks a few months out now, GW might still be pushing people to buy what's available instead of holding off for a future purchase.

GW's moves around Cursed City are debated on the internet, but I have a feeling literally nobody back in the real world who manages a business looks at the situation and goes, "Oooh, I gotta learn from that."

People who imagine this toy maker is filled with a lot of Warren Buffets of plastic production, who follow the narrow golden path of genius business moves may as well keep on imagining. It's all idle internet fun anyway.

 Polonius wrote:

 NAVARRO wrote:
Transparency for the sake of transparency and deprived of any sort of responsible thought can actually be damaging, but thats like anything theoretically positive landed in a unprofessional way.
Thats not what I mean and actually you can be transparent about a subject in a way that you don't spill the beans you dont want/need to share.

Something along the lines "The demand has been amazing and we are looking into releasing more box sets, but due to covid and Brexit delays we are not at this point sure of the exact dates, we will do our best, thanks for your support"
Much better than silence even if very vague and with not much information....

I think at some point we're splitting very fine PR hairs. Your statement looks fine, but then when they don't release it again, you'll have people pissed that they said they'd release more. Especially since the phrase "we will do our best" implies that they will actually make it a priority, when the reality is that CC was never going to be a major priority.

Keep in mind, we're now talking with hindsight after the rerelease was announced, I did not expect that, I figured they'd take the sunk cost and move on.

I just think it's odd that the blanket assumption by GW fans, myself included, is that the things they do is the result of incompetence. I'm sure there were many meetings in which people argued how much of a response to give to questions about CC. Now, I think the valid critique is that even though we get peeks a few months out now, GW might still be pushing people to buy what's available instead of holding off for a future purchase.

I kind of assume CC was always going to be a big release with expansions... but yes we dont know if at the time they had the information that they could resolve the "issue" stopping them for producing more sets.

But what Im saying is that transparency is doable without being to specific about details and still keeping the game to yourself. Its good PR.
I think its easier to assume they are incompetent in some regards but a company doing well in current times doesn't get there by chance, so yeah I think numbers show us that actually they are very competent at what they do.

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
I mean Blackstone Fortress has been in production for what, almost 4 years by now?

About three years.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Well I'll be...

Guess that means we'll get to find out if this mini or this mini really were expansions hastily rushed out as regular releases when CC vanished the first time.

They are far too large for the board. Even Annika and the Rat guy don't fit with their length - models in the game may go beyond their base size (with weapons for example), but not at the base itself.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
A thought occurs. It’s not necessarily a good thought or even an accurate one.

The main upset about Cursed City the first time around wasn’t so much it selling out on the day, but that we’d been lead to believe it was to be a stock item. And when that changed, GW just said nothing. At all. I think the most we got was a rather non-committal “like, maybe it’ll be back, I dunno”.

Since then, we’ve seen GW be a good deal more open when things are delayed, including when certain items are delayed in certain locales.

We’ll likely never know what happened with Cursed City like. But it does feel like GW have at least learned something.

Yep. They learned they can complete bobble a release, release some of the characters at HUGE increase (Beast mode Radukar is on the 'top picks' right now (yeah, yeah I know he wasn't in the CC set), but the Court is still under soulblight for $125), and then confidently start reselling it afterwards as if nothing had happened.

 Coenus Scaldingus wrote:

 Theophony wrote:
Silence is probably their best bet.

We’ve all know no matter what they do somebody or some group will chastise them.

Not sure about that argument. Just because they won't make everyone happy all the time, the amount of unhappy people and their reasons for unhappiness with GW's behavior will be rather different based on what that behaviour is. GW's failure to communicate anything during the CC debacle didn't just give the usual haters ammunition, it was also a major turn off for people legitimately enthusiastic about the release.

Yet they seem to still be selling everything really well. I don't know of anyone who threw out their miniature collection or set it ablaze due to the CC debacle. Actually more people are playing at my local game store now with new armies compared to before CC. Wether it's because they had cash to spend, more time to paint or whatever, the lack of communications has not "Hurt" them. Maybe they lost out on some possible sales, but if people are claiming that the game is really bad as I have read here in this thread, maybe it's for the better that they did not instantly restock it. GW is still making money, they are still expanding their market, and their is still demand for their games. Them being quiet has only caused rage here in forums which is small potatoes to the rest of the gaming world.

Mark Twain said it best "It is best to remain silent and thought a fool than to talk and remove all doubt." GW is remaining silent on the issue. You can continue to criticize their plan, but we don't know the "truth" behind what happened with the release and why it's so botched. What would they have to gain from bringing it up again? People are not going to let it go either way. Either they will continue to criticize how poorly it was handled and say how they could have done it differently, or moan about why it wasn't handled earlier.

If people are truly turned off and will never come back to GW it hasn't stopped them from bringing in enough new blood to replace them. I fell away from GW for about 3 editions, tired of the creep and the rules. I returned with Indomitus and Dominion, mainly due to the new models, but mostly because I have a little more time available and wanted to get back to the "Main game out there". Just not enough competition to lead me elsewhere. The people who are truly turned off will eventually return, or they were probably at the end of their miniature gaming life cycle. It happens, I left miniatures for a D&D campaign for 3-4 year over a decade ago. I had time one night a week because of school, kids and work where I could do that but not enough for the miniature gaming. People change their lifestyles, gaming styles and sometimes they come back. GW knows it, if they upset someone now, they know they have a chance of them coming back later. One bad decision is not going to ruin them forever, if it did then a majority of us wouldn't be here currently.

 Ouze wrote:
Does Games Workshop make literally any games that are genuinely fun to play from a boardgame player perspective

I hang out with a TON of board gamers and they loved Silver Tower when I introduced them to it.

ccs wrote:

 Wiz Warrior wrote:
The game is crap, and still nearly unplayable faff even after end user intervention.

But i want these models for warcry, as they fit the bill more than admirably. The game can go in the trash. I dont say that .ightly, as a boardgamer, such stuff is normally the main reason why id pick this up.

Well if you're just going to scrap the non-mini elements? Toss the original box, shove them in a flat rate shipping box/mailer envelope & send them my way. I'll pay the postage.
You can even punch the cardboard parts out of the frames & stick the tokens etc in a ziplock baggie. Whatever makes for the cheapest shipping.

My interest is mostly the game. We can play that with any # of existing minis though.

This is exactly what I did, bought the complete game minus the minis off ebay for a fraction of the retail price since I already have close stand ins from years of collecting GW and Reaper and D&D figures. Haven't had a chance to actually play it so I can't comment on gameplay, but the cardboard components are top notch and the cards and dice are as good or better than many of the dungeoncrawlers I have.

GW WAS famous for its board games too. Games like Warhammer Quest 1995 and Space Hulk are great games and true classics.

GMG has had a lot of '95 Warhammer Quest on his Throwback Thursday videos lately and had a few playthorughs of the new Cursed City when it hit. Original Warhammer Quest looks fun but clunky, is it actually better than Cursed City or is it just nostalgia?

 Dryaktylus wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Well I'll be...

Guess that means we'll get to find out if this mini or this mini really were expansions hastily rushed out as regular releases when CC vanished the first time.

They are far too large for the board. Even Annika and the Rat guy don't fit with their length - models in the game may go beyond their base size (with weapons for example), but not at the base itself.

And they’re in the Soulblight book. It’s not like with lead time they could just whip up their inclusion just because expansions weren’t happening.

The expansions are just likely things we wouldn’t even think of etc..