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Some of the new models coming out are a mix of amazing and bonkers. Locally the game still just doesn’t exist which is mad given the size of the player base previously

Sunno wrote:
Some of the new models coming out are a mix of amazing and bonkers. Locally the game still just doesn’t exist which is mad given the size of the player base previously

I think this harkens back to some of the issues we identified earlier. Eg stripping out whole armies in one go from the game.

I think one mistake PP have done is that they didn't go "lets just take the old models out and update those armies" they've gone and made new armies and new factions. Yes that lets them be creative, but it instantly closed out classic army owners from leaping back in. If you've an Everblight collection you're not encouraged back in its a "you've got to start over pretty much with the new kind-of everblight army"

Now GW have done the same with some Old World armies in not moving them back; however those armies they've not brought back are functional and present in AoS.


Of course neither is a perfect solution, but I think it highlights how GW has at least opened the arms for Old World for a lot of factions whcih draws people with those models instantly back in to bolster the playerbase.



The other avenue is something we touched on earlier which is that Warmachine wasn't appearing as heavily in marketing. With the super high priced starter boxed sets at launch and the lack of a lot of "influencer" elements it was kind of a muted launch. I feel like they are growing in that regard and they've started bringing out cheaper starter packs and the like. But it very much felt like a muted return to sales. That might be intentional to slow grow for a few years so they didn't end up in a stocking issue. Though time will tell if it was the right choice or not .

Ultimately a lot of MK4 is what they had to do. They don't even have access to most of their old sculpts anymore so supporting them is kind of off the table. I don't think resculpting is even a real option. The revamped factions have a lot of resculpt flavor, but they're still dropping huge chunks of what existed before. Either way, I'm not sure it really matters. I don't feel like trying to pull back the old crowd is a winning strategy and the Legacy support is really solid now regardless.

In terms of sales it seems to have pretty significantly exceeded their production capacity, so from their perspective things are going quite well. Interest seems to have picked back up quite a bit now that product is available. FLGS support still seems a crippling problem though and it'll be interesting to see if that can be turned around. Locally though, the game is back on the radar. Certainly hoping things keep improving.

They don't even have access to most of their old sculpts anymore so supporting them is kind of off the table

Wait, what? What'd they do to their old masters?

I think they lost some that moved to plastics because the factory in China basically kept them and wouldn't send them back.

But the metal work ones they surely would have.

Thing is its one thing to say "here's the new version of X you can use the new or old model" and "Here's a new faction, you can't use any of the old"

Or rather that the old are no longer supported. It's the kind of change most firms would avoid doing wholesale and would more likely do in bits.

I "kind of" feel that Warmachine itself has faired better whilst Hordes is getting dealt with differently on that front; but even the Warmachine factions are being very heavily rebuilt.

Supposedly they tossed out all their metal/resin molds in a recent relocation. They downsized to a smaller office/warehouse/production facility and didn't have room to hold on to everything. They've been more or less fully-digital for a number of years now so they should have digital sculpts for a decently large segment of their old product range, but they seem disinterested in re-rigging them for 3d print production and making them available to customers, seems they'd rather stick to only releasing new sculpts.

Almost all of their infantry had been moved to plastic, as had the core jacks for each faction. I agree, its the kind of thing firms would avoid doing. I suspect PP has been avoiding it for years and finally just had to bite the bullet and admit they can't support their bloated catalog.


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chaos0xomega wrote:
Supposedly they tossed out all their metal/resin molds in a recent relocation. They downsized to a smaller office/warehouse/production facility and didn't have room to hold on to everything. They've been more or less fully-digital for a number of years now so they should have digital sculpts for a decently large segment of their old product range, but they seem disinterested in re-rigging them for 3d print production and making them available to customers, seems they'd rather stick to only releasing new sculpts.

Even if they kept them, the metal line really isn't up to modern standards. There are, absolutely some phenomenal sculpts in the line that hold up, but a lot of that line infantry doesn't really compete. Very likely given a lot of that stuff was in plastic they didn't remake the rubber molds that wore out either. I think though it all comes down to the sheer volume of stuff the game had accumulated and a question of who would actually buy it.

SKU bloat had become a real problem for PP, tossing old lines has to have solved that