Of Stormcasts and Space Marines

[Kugane]

The lack of new releases for other armies is a big issue perhaps, but I personally think the bigger issue is what happened at the release of the GHB2017 dropped a TON of support for the less fleshed out factions was straight up sad.

Many armies losing all named heroes and/or keywords to a point where you can't even build an army anymore. And now we are several months later with no releases whatsoever to help those armies. I understand these named heroes died in the story, but they could have easily just changed the names of these units to something more generic, or simply renamed them or given some fluff to them.

I think regular rule releases, even if its something like a battalion or some rules in a white dwarf that is tournament legal and/or purchasable in the Azyr app will not take a lot of effort at all and would keep other factions alive. Not everything needs a new model. Its easy enough to spot the problems with each army.

[Infeston]

8 hours ago, AverageBoss said:

GW is at the top, largely because they were the first to make it to the top years before their competition existed. They have an engine going that is largely perpetual at this point. GW games are the most popular, so new players are more likely to be introduced to a GW game before anything else. Similarly, picking a faction to get more support and lore than any other perpetuates an interest in that faction over any other. People are more likely to play a faction that gets more support and exposure. I remember when Dark Eldar went almost a decade without an update. Nobody played them, and people justified their lack of an update with "nobody plays them, so who cares?" When they eventually did get their model line updated, it was one of GWs all time best releases at the time.

I also totally agree with this point. I often read the argument that so many Stormcast units are produced, because they sell well. But I would agree with the statements above, that they only sell so well, because GW is promoting them like this. If they would support other factions as well, they would also sell better. 

10 hours ago, Mr. White said:

And to the idea that some responses have been that it shouldn't be GW dictating the 'main' factions but fans should. Uh...no. This is the sort of entitled mindset that has risen in the current KS era where the consumers think they also should take part in the creation. Let the _artist_ of GW (sculptors, authors, game designers, etc) create the art and vision and let us decide if we want it or not. Not only should consumers not be able to dictate art, but non-paid consumers also don't have the time or resource to really, truly vet their ideas. Not to say every published game and setting is water proof, so consumers should feel free to house-rule to their hearts content (I sure do), but we should have a tempered voice at the create-to-publish table.

This is something I totally disagree on. I think responsible and good companies should also focus on the suggestions of their consumers. In the last decades many other companies started to focus on consumer-oriented concepts and started to listen more and more to their customer base. Especially if you look at the "Indie Computer Games"-scene you see whole games being created with the whole influence of the fanbase.  And I think it is great that more and more companies start listening to the feedback of the consumers. I know many game systems where the consumer feedback has changed so much and created something truly special.

I think the "Eat what we feed you" logic is from an old era, where businesses dictated everything. I think designers, companies and consumers should work with each other to create something truly great and wonderful and companies should not just use their customers to milk their money. I have the feeling GW first started with this approach at the beginning of AoS but is now slowly moving back to their old approach. 

[Menkeroth]

It should have not, really, because the "new approach" takes AoS back to the WHFB times, and all in all is quite depressing, especially with this GHB - horrible. 40k approach is also understandable but horrible nevertheless.

[Uveron]

6 minutes ago, Menkeroth said:

It should have not, really, because the "new approach" takes AoS back to the WHFB times, and all in all is quite depressing, especially with this GHB - horrible. 40k approach is also understandable but horrible nevertheless.

We are no where near the bad old days. 

It is farily common knowledge that the slow down in new kits is because of production issues at the factory (because of the expansions they are doing). We know they are talking to the community more, but we have to also realise that currently its a two year cycle to get new models to market. (Books are alot quicker), If you presume that then most of the 'new stuff' we have seen so far was on the drawing board near the start of AOS's Existance.  

[Menkeroth]

1 hour ago, Uveron said:

We are no where near the bad old days. 

 

Not yet, but slowly and steadily, which is sad.

[Uveron]

Just now, Menkeroth said:

Not yet, but slowly and steadily, which is sad.

As long as they are at events and reaching out to the comunitee we are far from it. 

If your just concerned about lack of models, then I think thats beyond the control of GW at the moment. 

[Menkeroth]

50 minutes ago, Uveron said:

As long as they are at events and reaching out to the comunitee we are far from it. 

 

It is exactly the community who drives AoS back, unfortunately.

51 minutes ago, Uveron said:

If your just concerned about lack of models, then I think thats beyond the control of GW at the moment. 

Not only this, this is the least uncomfortable, but I am more concerned with other aspects.

[Infeston]

18 minutes ago, Menkeroth said:

It is exactly the community who drives AoS back, unfortunately.

Could you please elaborate what you mean by that? Because I would think games are designed for the community. So doesn't this mean that if you cater to the community wishes, any move in the direction of the community would be considered as progress?

Or do you mean GW listens to the wrong part of the community? I would consider you and me to also be part of the community. I don't agree on some decisions which GW has made in the last decades. And at the moment there are many critical voices wanting a change in AoS in the community. So I would say there are also people who make suggestions and want the system to develop.

I don't know which people you do mean if you talk about "the community". Also what do you consider as progress? Because I would think it to be progress if a game system caters to its audience. And a step backwards would be if it doesn't listen to its audience. 

I find it hard to say that there is a homogenous group which could be considered as "the community". Because there are so many different opinions in the AoS community. It would be more helpful for me if you would elaborate which part of the community you mean that GW concentrates too much on.

I think at the moment the voices wanting a change in the AoS narrative are getting louder. I very often read critical posts on different forums (Reddit, Facebook, TGA and other sites) about the strong focus on Stormcast Eternals and Chaos in AoS. So I don't know if you mean these voices by saying the community drives AoS back or do you mean the people who say everything is fine as it is?

[AverageBoss]

7 hours ago, Kugane said:

Many armies losing all named heroes and/or keywords to a point where you can't even build an army anymore. And now we are several months later with no releases whatsoever to help those armies. I understand these named heroes died in the story, but they could have easily just changed the names of these units to something more generic, or simply renamed them or given some fluff to them.

Oddly enough, they actually did this with Tomb Kings of all armies. Setra, Kalida, Apophas, and I think at least one other named character got completely new rules as generic character. Why they did not do this for anyone else is a real head scratcher . Sigvald the Magnificent could have been a Lord of Excess. Vlad could have been a Vampire Ancient.

[Kugane]

23 minutes ago, AverageBoss said:

Oddly enough, they actually did this with Tomb Kings of all armies. Setra, Kalida, Apophas, and I think at least one other named character got completely new rules as generic character. Why they did not do this for anyone else is a real head scratcher . Sigvald the Magnificent could have been a Lord of Excess. Vlad could have been a Vampire Ancient.

Short answer: money.

Long answer: They have no intention to earn money off the Tomb Kings range anymore because they stopped producing miniatures for it and have no intention to go back on that decision. So it is safe for them to just make the army 'complete' without any future sales being hurt and moving the army into compendium, barring it from competitive events.

Now, if you look at an army like Vampire Counts or Skaven, these are ranges they still plan to earn money off at some point in the future. They may not even have solid plans for most of these armies yet, but there is potential for them if they ever decide to do so. Rule-wise, they can sell a battletome here and there. Miniature-wise they can release new units to fill those artificial gaps they created, forcing people to buy more if they want to continue using their army.

This decision was clearly to promote future sales, and while that is quite harsh on people who spent hundreds, if not thousands of dollars/euro to buy miniatures that are now no longer supported, I feel they have the right to do so as long it moves the game forward.

The thing that I do not agree with however is when they cut support for an army, taking away everything that made them (slightly) good and offer nothing in return to make up for that gap. It has been several months now since GHB2017, and at this rate, GHB2018 may arrive sooner than the support for most of those armies. I think it really wouldn't hurt to throw players a bone with some new rulings for existing models to balance the game out a bit. I personally believe that by having more variety in playstyles and more balance it would promote sales rather than hurt it. Players would have more of a reason to go ahead and start another army, but also be welcoming for new players. But as long as the main army that gets any content happens to also be one of the only ones available for competitive play, obviously the sales figures are going to reflect as that army as being "the most popular". I think Games Workshop may have reached a point where innovation means risk. If they create an army that ends up flopping, a lot of money went into production and development for nothing. I would guess armies like Kharadron overlords may not have sold as well as they hoped they would because frankly, the army has never really been that good. I hope that won't change future release schedules though.

Either way,  until people really voice out their dissatisfaction for lack of support, I think we are stuck with 2 or 3 top armies being fleshed out and the rest being subpar at best.

[AverageBoss]

If they truly wanted to fully abandon them, they could have just left them the same, or did what they did with everyone else. Setra is now just a King in Chariot, done. But they actually put effort into them. Its just odd to me.

Further, being compendium does not bar you from competitions. TK have been compendium since AoS launch. They still show up in GTs, as does the VLoAT from Death.

[Kugane]

3 minutes ago, AverageBoss said:

If they truly wanted to fully abandon them, they could have just left them the same, or did what they did with everyone else. Setra is now just a King in Chariot, done. But they actually put effort into them. Its just odd to me.

Further, being compendium does not bar you from competitions. TK have been compendium since AoS launch. They still show up in GTs, as does the VLoAT from Death.

I see! I keep hearing from people that Compendium armies are not allowed in official tournaments. It is nice to hear they are somewhat allowed to in that case.

[AverageBoss]

Just now, Kugane said:

I see! I keep hearing from people that Compendium armies are not allowed in official tournaments. It is nice to hear they are somewhat allowed to in that case.

I have been hearing that myself lately actually and have no idea where it is coming from, because it is absolutely 100% untrue. If an event disallows compendium armies/units, that is 100% a house rule of that event.

[Uveron]

3 minutes ago, Kugane said:

I see! I keep hearing from people that Compendium armies are not allowed in official tournaments. It is nice to hear they are somewhat allowed to in that case.

What they did was change the key words to stop them fitting in none GA armies. (Aka you cannot run Skeleton Chariots in a Death rattle force)  

 

[Kugane]

1 minute ago, AverageBoss said:

I have been hearing that myself lately actually and have no idea where it is coming from, because it is absolutely 100% untrue. If an event disallows compendium armies/units, that is 100% a house rule of that event.

That is actually very great to hear. At least I can use my Tomb Kings again in that case! That  seems to be the most fleshed out army I have.

[Mr. White]

23 hours ago, Infeston said:

This is something I totally disagree on. I think responsible and good companies should also focus on the suggestions of their consumers. In the last decades many other companies started to focus on consumer-oriented concepts and started to listen more and more to their customer base. Especially if you look at the "Indie Computer Games"-scene you see whole games being created with the whole influence of the fanbase.  And I think it is great that more and more companies start listening to the feedback of the consumers. I know many game systems where the consumer feedback has changed so much and created something truly special.

I think the "Eat what we feed you" logic is from an old era, where businesses dictated everything. I think designers, companies and consumers should work with each other to create something truly great and wonderful and companies should not just use their customers to milk their money. I have the feeling GW first started with this approach at the beginning of AoS but is now slowly moving back to their old approach. 

I'm reminded of this quote in regards to Apple design philosophies:

“The businessman wants to create something for everyone, which leads to products that are middle of the road. It becomes about consensus, and that’s why you rarely see the spark of genius.”

When developing the iPhone Steve Jobs went with a vision, not consumers or feedback. At the time, people did not know that they wanted camera, internet and touch screen on their phone. So, polling the market would not have seen us with smart phones as we have today.

Sort of the same thing here. If asking the community what to do, I'm sure GW will hear more about 'Khemri' or 'Empire' rather than something knew like Stormcasts or Overlords. The latter are entirely new concepts that there wouldn't be consensus on. Plenty of warhammer players know and like Khemri and Empire so would vote that way and they would appear as the most popular or most desired. Again, it's because it is what people know.

AoS is an exciting new setting....let there be a new line. Allow the artists at the GW and Citadel studios create a new fantasy.

I'm on-board with moving forward and innovating. Going without points was a ballsy, refreshing ruleset. It brought me back. Points gives the masses what they want though (and all the balance whining that goes with it). I've conceded that Matched play is going to be the segment GW caters to, but allow them to at least move forward with their new AoS setting vision. The time of foppy hats and feathers should be in the past.

Again, listening to everyone's opinions runs the risk of resulting in either stagnation, bloat, or lack of cohesion.

All this said, the other factions will get updated and support in time. My original point that there needs to be a poster-boy faction still stands to brand the game in the larger market. It's like Mario. He may not be the best character Nintendo has or maybe even your favorite games, but he fills the iconic role that brands their products. Zeldas and Metroids and Splatoons and Arms will all get their due in time. Again, Stormcasts and Space Marines fill that role for GW and GW needs to look to other market leaders such as Apple and Nintendo, not middle of the pack companies like Wyrd Games.

[Ollie Grimwood]

I think Ford said something along the lines of  “ If I’d asked the public what they wanted they’d have said ‘a faster horse’” 

Quite a lot of the suggestions I see for what AoS “needs” are somewhat unimaginative at best.  I like what GW have come up with though it’s been rather clever so far 

[Infeston]

2 hours ago, Mr. White said:

I'm reminded of this quote in regards to Apple design philosophies:

“The businessman wants to create something for everyone, which leads to products that are middle of the road. It becomes about consensus, and that’s why you rarely see the spark of genius.”

When developing the iPhone Steve Jobs went with a vision, not consumers or feedback. At the time, people did not know that they wanted camera, internet and touch screen on their phone. So, polling the market would not have seen us with smart phones as we have today.

Sort of the same thing here. If asking the community what to do, I'm sure GW will hear more about 'Khemri' or 'Empire' rather than something knew like Stormcasts or Overlords. The latter are entirely new concepts that there wouldn't be consensus on. Plenty of warhammer players know and like Khemri and Empire so would vote that way and they would appear as the most popular or most desired. Again, it's because it is what people know.

AoS is an exciting new setting....let there be a new line. Allow the artists at the GW and Citadel studios create a new fantasy.

I'm on-board with moving forward and innovating. Going without points was a ballsy, refreshing ruleset. It brought me back. Points gives the masses what they want though (and all the balance whining that goes with it). I've conceded that Matched play is going to be the segment GW caters to, but allow them to at least move forward with their new AoS setting vision. The time of foppy hats and feathers should be in the past.

Again, listening to everyone's opinions runs the risk of resulting in either stagnation, bloat, or lack of cohesion.

All this said, the other factions will get updated and support in time. My original point that there needs to be a poster-boy faction still stands to brand the game in the larger market. It's like Mario. He may not be the best character Nintendo has or maybe even your favorite games, but he fills the iconic role that brands their products. Zeldas and Metroids and Splatoons and Arms will all get their due in time. Again, Stormcasts and Space Marines fill that role for GW and GW needs to look to other market leaders such as Apple and Nintendo, not middle of the pack companies like Wyrd Games.

Sorry that I have to disagree again. Listening to the community doesn't mean you have produce something for everyone, but to take suggestions from the community. And at the time Apple became successful it didn't even have a community to begin with. Also Steve Jobs oriented with Apple on things which consumers criticized before on other systems.

In fact Apple is the prime example of listening to the consumer. They always talk about genius but most of their ideas are stolen from other products. Also Even in AoS the Hinterlands campaign which can also be found in this forum lead to the production of AoS Skirmish. Steve Jobs also didn't create the Smartphone, he monetized on it and made it user-friendlier (which also needs the feedback of consumers). 

I think you can also see different positions in the community. And the best would be to cater to all those voices. But not in the way that you try to do please only the majority, but also the minorities. There are voices in the community who want something new and there are also voices which want to keep the old setting. 

I want GW to do their own thing, sure. But why not let them be inspired by the feedback of the fans? I am really not a fan of the "eat what we feed you"-logic and I acknowledge and support businesses which have a good balance between listening to customer feedback and doing their own thing. But I am completely against GW not listening to the consumers and doing their thing regardless of the consequences. If GW decides to go this route, they will propably loose me as a customer. 

I came back to play Warhammer, because of their new openess and them listening to the feedback of the fans. 

1 hour ago, Ollie Grimwood said:

I think Ford said something along the lines of  “ If I’d asked the public what they wanted they’d have said ‘a faster horse’” 

Quite a lot of the suggestions I see for what AoS “needs” are somewhat unimaginative at best.  I like what GW have come up with though it’s been rather clever so far 

I don't think this way. I have seen a lot good suggestions. There are also creative people with creative ideas in the community. The community doesn't only consist of passive consumers, but also active consumers, which also give feedback to the company. I have seen a lot of posts about ideas and changes which I found great. It doesn't have to mean that GW should completely give in to the voices of the fans. But they could at least listen to the voices of the fans. I think then the GHB2017 would also have been better.

Also Ford and Jobs are for me both very bad examples of innovative people, because they both didn't invent the invention they were praised for. They only brought their inventions to the people and monetized on it. Both took the credit for inventing something which other people already invented. So I always take it with a grain of salt if they are praised for their "innovations".

[Mr. White]

20 minutes ago, Infeston said:

Also Ford and Jobs are for me both very bad examples of innovative people, because they both didn't invent the invention they were praised for. They only brought their inventions to the people and monetized on it. Both took the credit for inventing something which other people already invented. So I always take it with a grain of salt if they are praised for their "innovations".

Eh, I think the Ford and Jobs comparisons are apt. One could say that GW (or Halliwell and Priestly specifically) didn't invent the tabletop wargame, but they pulled it out of the historical gamer's basement (where it languished for decades) and into the wider gaming market as the new worldwide leader. Same can be said of Ford or Apple in their industries. They did innovate their products enough to become top in their fields (not just monetizing them). You don't do that from simply copying others or doing what was done before.

It's clear we're not going to agree with design philosophies here. In the end, I view the illustrations, sculpting, fluff, setting, game design, etc of AoS (and 40K) as art and I prefer to let art be in the hand of the artists...not the consumers.

[Infeston]

6 minutes ago, Mr. White said:

Eh, I think the Ford and Jobs comparisons are apt. One could say that GW (or Halliwell and Priestly specifically) didn't invent the tabletop wargame, but they pulled it out of the historical gamer's basement (where it languished for decades) and into the wider gaming market as the new worldwide leader. Same can be said of Ford or Apple in their industries. They did innovate their products enough to become top in their fields. You don't do that from simply coping others or doing what was done before.

Jeah but they didn't create something new. And your last argument was that GW should not cater to the fans, but do their own thing.

But Ford and Jobs are examples of people who listened to the consumer. That is why they got so successful. Because instead of designing something new, they took something which already existed and made it user-friendlier and also for the masses. They looked at the problems which people had with  the old systems and started to improve them by catering to the consumer.

They weren't that innovative.

[Killax]

Quote

But they could at least listen to the voices of the fans.

Well they do, the survey is up, Facebook is up, Twitter is there etc.

Reality comes in also, with this I mean that Games Worskhop still is a compagny that should have their own vision, mission and goals to follow. Not just for the fans but for the many employees they have and general IP they do have to be able to defend. Because the fact of the matter is that there are still tons of third compagny producers that make money of the content that Games Workshop designed, suggested or even created.
Because of this new designs arn't only needed but required in order to stay ahead of the competition. Third compagnies are no real concern but the moment GW will do another 40K 7th edition or WFB 7th/8th edition I can assure you the player base will move on and collect different games.

Good games bring good results. As someone who's played WFB for quite some time I know that both their model ranges and rules weren't up to snuff. I even fully admit that I went to the other games, created by Wyrd and Privateer Press because Warhammer Fantasy was done for. No players, no FAQ, no updates, no interest, no news. Even the Storm of Chaos is something I had played in 2002 before so why would I even want to redo it in 2014?

From an outsiders perspective I can really see the same happening with Magic the Gathering now aswell. They have created several sets going back to several of the former settings, on one hand this is fun, on the other hand there is nothing new and new stuff does excite people more as rehashing the old.

I do think that Age of Sigmar should only go forward with newer stuff and the reason for this is that it boils down to why Warhammer became so popular to begin with. Warhammer Fantasy was a unique and seperate design of the well known D&D in the beginning. Focussing on army builds instead of groups of characters (ala Lord of the Rings) to promote their game.
Since Age of Sigmar they are doing this again and it's actually a good thing. We get new lore, new model designs and suddenly, new masses of players.The more armies are seperate from each other the better. As they can be indentified with as a character and not only have a head (character) that is different on the same body. To give a less criptic example, current Chaos is selling so well because Khorne and Tzeentch arn't the same (Warriors of Chaos model) armies anymore.
Current Order is selling so well because it isn't just the evil guys who posses inhuman strenght and better put current Order doesn't rely on strengths of the past to barely hang in there. No, order too has it's own warriors who are feared by other allegiances.

My moral is that the moment you complete the history or narrative of the game the game is also done for. Since 4th edition WFB didn't gow. Since 4th edition 40K didn't grow either. Yes there is hate for Primaris and even more for Stormcast but ultimately it does mean that you cannot predict what comes and this in turn continious to generate excitement.

[Infeston]

1 hour ago, Killax said:

Well they do, the survey is up, Facebook is up, Twitter is there etc.

Jeah, this made me really happy because I could give a direct feedback to GW. I hope they take the different suggestions from the fans into account. For me GW still has to prove that they will listen to the feedback. But I found the survey is a really good step in the right direction (if they really listen to the feedback). And I read multiple posts of people and also know a lot of friends who wrote down that they want more diversity in releases and a lesser focus on Stormcast Eternals.

[Tzaangor Management]

I think it'll be interesting to see the results of the survey and I hope they publish them. That said, I hope that they stick to their guns and continue refreshing the factions and alliances rather then going back to what was.

Age of Sigmar and Games Workshop in general seem to be in very good health to me. We're seeing tournaments reach record numbers surpassing WHFB at its peak (Adepticon has just sold out, I believe, at 256 players) and the GW share price is ever increasing at a rate that makes it the highest performing stock in the UK. There has of course been a bit of a slowdown of late, but there are some very well documented power supply problems and the fact that those limits are being reached and have not been before should tell you something about the level of production that is currently happening.

GW have also shown a willingness to adopt the very best ideas from the community, with Skirmish being the obvious example, as well as the recent recruitment of @bottle the creator of the popular Hinterlands campaign, as a rule writer. Add to this a group of play testers comprising of some of the best players from the UK and the States feeding into the rules that are reviewed annually.

In short, as this has become a much longer post than I'd planned, Games Workshop does appear to be listening to the community, but they can't listen to it all at once and they can't compromise their core ideas. 

[Uveron]

13 minutes ago, Tzaangor Management said:

I think it'll be interesting to see the results of the survey and I hope they publish them. That said, I hope that they stick to their guns and continue refreshing the factions and alliances rather then going back to what was.

I do not expect we will see raw data. 

It would surprise me if even GW personnel see the raw data.  I expect they are paying consulting fees to make sense of the data.  

[chord]

People should not worry about factions as much as they do IMO.  So high and dark elves are split up.  Ok, that's fine, just play as the grand alliance.   I think this is where GW had it right in the first place, just play whatever you wanted and no factions. It kept people from having tunnel vision.