Does Games Workshop's current business model harm existing factions?

[SwampHeart]

1 hour ago, Thiagoma said:

In my case, Elven armies.

Take Phoenix Temple. Its got 4 units, 0 wizards. Phoenix benefits from nearby casters, so a good plan would be to ally Eldritch council. With the ally restriction you are  for example unable to take 2 archmages (100 pts each) because you can only have 1 ally.

Result: a struggling army got even more restricted.

There is 0 reason for you play Phoenix Temple as anything other than GA: Order - you have no mechanical bonus for choosing to play PT. You've self imposed a restriction which isn't the fault of the game. 

Also if you take 4 units in your army you can take 2 allied wizards. 

[Yoshiya]

21 minutes ago, SwampHeart said:

There is 0 reason for you play Phoenix Temple as anything other than GA: Order - you have no mechanical bonus for choosing to play PT. You've self imposed a restriction which isn't the fault of the game. 

Also if you take 4 units in your army you can take 2 allied wizards. 

If you want a PT army with Phoenix Guard battleline you need to play PT. It's not an effective army by any means but GW wouldn't give rules like that if they'd never intended it to be used like that.

Also, you need 6 units from your own allegiance to be allowed to use two allies. (Total units 8 divided by 4 = 2 possible allies)

[bsharitt]

I think problem #1 is that AoS at launch was basically the peak of GW considering themselves a miniature company and not really a games company. It's initial state of barely having a veneer of rules was basically Kirby's parting gift. While Roundtree and Co. have been righting the ship with the GHB and battle tomes with allegiance abilities, but the mistake of Grand Alliances and mini factions is still a problem, though it does seem to be one they're also working with battletomes like Legions of Nagash, Beasts of Chaos, and Gloomspite Gitz along what appears to be discontinuing of factions they don't intend to support like Greenskinz and Gitmob Grots. I think what GW really needs to do is make their intentions clear. When 40k 8th came out, they releases the indexes buy also said they'd be getting out new codexes for the current factions in the coming year or something. Right now GW needs to come out and say what their plans are for legacy support going forward and if something isn't going to be supported, they need to either discontinue it, or move it to a "Warhammer Legends" section of the store.

[SwampHeart]

8 minutes ago, Yoshiya said:

If you want a PT army with Phoenix Guard battleline you need to play PT. It's not an effective army by any means but GW wouldn't give rules like that if they'd never intended it to be used like that.

Also, you need 6 units from your own allegiance to be allowed to use two allies. (Total units 8 divided by 4 = 2 possible allies)

Fair enough, its still a poor example given that at least one person was having strong success with PT and using an ally. So it clearly isn't that improbable or hard to do. 

But this is so far off topic that I'm going to drop it. I think allies should be restricted as heavily as possible (to the point of them basically not being seen). Its a strong opinion and elicits strong responses. I see the other side of the argument, I just don't agree with it. 

[Rumblefish]

11 minutes ago, bsharitt said:

I think problem #1 is that AoS at launch was basically the peak of GW considering themselves a miniature company and not really a games company. It's initial state of barely having a veneer of rules was basically Kirby's parting gift. While Roundtree and Co. have been righting the ship with the GHB and battle tomes with allegiance abilities, but the mistake of Grand Alliances and mini factions is still a problem, though it does seem to be one they're also working with battletomes like Legions of Nagash, Beasts of Chaos, and Gloomspite Gitz along what appears to be discontinuing of factions they don't intend to support like Greenskinz and Gitmob Grots. I think what GW really needs to do is make their intentions clear. When 40k 8th came out, they releases the indexes buy also said they'd be getting out new codexes for the current factions in the coming year or something. Right now GW needs to come out and say what their plans are for legacy support going forward and if something isn't going to be supported, they need to either discontinue it, or move it to a "Warhammer Legends" section of the store.

I think this captures most of it.

GW clearly have been and will continue to support some existing 'legacy' armies, but which ones, how and when they will do that is completely up in the air (from our perspective).

I honestly don't think it's doing TOO much damage, there's enough new things for almost everyone to be excited about. For me personally, this is the first time I've been playing Warhammer with any serious effort or enthusiasm in over 20 years.

[novakai]

It doesn’t seem like that what GW wants to do though, GW seems like they  preferred to put a tight lip on there future plans for the most part. I doubt they would change TBH

their solution seems to be that you can always play your old armies in open and narrative play and that there nothing stop you from doing so

[Thiagoma]

2 hours ago, Yoshiya said:

If you want a PT army with Phoenix Guard battleline you need to play PT. It's not an effective army by any means but GW wouldn't give rules like that if they'd never intended it to be used like that.

Also, you need 6 units from your own allegiance to be allowed to use two allies. (Total units 8 divided by 4 = 2 possible allies)

This happens with every Aelf army avaiable. 

[Ollie Grimwood]

Legends and AoS although they use the same rule are different things when it come to releases. Legends beyond made to order stuff will not have any releases and certainly not anything new. AoS will have new factions and units released as we go forward.  Just because a unit is included in a Legends Battletome doesn’t mean that it will be removed from AoS either DoK shows this.   It’s also worth noting that the Spireguard were originally a compendium unit but were later upgraded to an AoS faction. 

As far as AoS is concerned things remain flexible things will come and go and possibly come back again. The whole endeavour was to create a setting that allowed for as much flexibility as possible. 

[Floom]

On 1/28/2019 at 1:42 PM, Asensur said:

I think the "stormcast chamber" will be the new model for army updates. 

Gloomspite is also an indication as far as the Moonclan side goes. Rules, new models, terrain, spells and maybe a new unit or two. 40k seems to be doing the same with Genestealers, so there's that. 

[Lucio]

I think that it's possibly a simpler motivation, the design team don't want to re-do old stuff, they want to be creative and build a shiny exciting new faction!

 

 

[Thiagoma]

1 hour ago, Lucio said:

I think that it's possibly a simpler motivation, the design team don't want to re-do old stuff, they want to be creative and build a shiny exciting new faction!

 

 

It is a mixed bag really. Gloonspite and DoK are revamps of "old" stuff.

[Jamopower]

I just want the full set of Warhammer Legends armylists, after that they can do whatever they like

[Forrix]

On ‎1‎/‎28‎/‎2019 at 8:18 PM, Kyriakin said:

I think GW initially had a "churn and burn" attitude, but realised that it might not have been the best course of action.

Assuming they never go pre-painted, this is fundamentally a niche hobby - as most people do not have the inclination to paint tens, or even hundreds, of 28 mm miniatures - and the customer base is therefore somewhat limited. 

Churn and burn may increase short-term profits, but it upsets members of the finite player base that get burned (i.e. TK players, etc.), and spooks many of those that remain. After all, nothing kills a hobbyist's momentum more than wondering if your army might be squatted in the coming weeks, months or years - whether it eventually comes to pass, or not.

Furthermore, outside the UK, the FLGS and game clubs are the main hub of the hobby, and managers/owners of such establishments hold a huge sway over the viability of a given game or company in that community. Upset those guys, and watch him/her push Infinity, Malifaux, Warmahordes (etc.) ahead of your games.

As a result, I feel GW has been on the charm offensive for the past few years, as they attempt to become more likable. Sure, as the industry leader, they will always have a target on their back and it is always cool to hate on the big guy. However, the disdain towards GW in 2012-2015 had gone far beyond that, IMHO.

--------------------------------

More directly on topic. I love the dual box set idea. While, say, Soulblight/LoB and Seraphon clearly need a Gloomspite-style mega release, there are quite a few factions where two or three new kits would make all the difference - be it by replacing some crappy old sculpts (e.g. BCR frost sabres/yhetees, Clan Pestilens priests/censer bearers, FEC Vargulf/courtiers, etc.) or topping up a newer faction with a smaller range (e.g. Ironjawz, Fyreslayers, etc.).

Fireslayers mgiht seem like throwing good money after bad, but I don't think they are conceptually doomed - just badly executed. They desperately need more fire-based units (i.e. similar to, say, Kdaai Fireborn), endless spells and terrain (a volcano and lava flow?), rather than half-naked dwarfs with afros. 

I strongly agree with what you said about Fyreslayers. I started a Fyreslayer army last summer (thank you ebay and start collecting for actually making that army affordable) but burned out quickly. It just felt like a half done faction. There were effectively 2 sculpts in the whole army, the magmadroth and half naked male dwarfs. The Hearthguard kit, which builds 3 different units, literally only has 5 heads. Half or more of your army winds up being repeats of the same five dudes just with different weapon options.  The Vulkite kit was okay but again lacked in variety and is possibly the most overpriced miniature kit ever released. Its duplicate sprues with little variety in heads and none in bodies (literally 2 sets of 5 monopose figures). 

The lore in the battletome is lacking too. The general idea is good but it fails to flesh out their society. This is a pet peeve of mine with GW Dwarfs but there isn't even a single concept art image of a female dwarf or any description of what they look like or do in their society. Dwarfs are meant, at least to me, to be a fairly humanish society so ignoring 50% of their population prevents them from feeling "real" to me.

Edit: I've developed a strong hatred of Stormcast Eternals due to how much support they get while my beloved fire dwarfs are a living example of "half-assed then forgotten".

[Gecktron]

8 hours ago, Forrix said:

The lore in the battletome is lacking too. The general idea is good but it fails to flesh out their society. This is a pet peeve of mine with GW Dwarfs but there isn't even a single concept art image of a female dwarf or any description of what they look like or do in their society. Dwarfs are meant, at least to me, to be a fairly humanish society so ignoring 50% of their population prevents them from feeling "real" to me.

Not to be nitpicky, since this is only tangible related, but atleast in the world-that-was, female dwarfs made up only a minority of the dwarfen population. Numbers range from 33% to only 10% of the whole population. 

I agree, the Fyreslayers are a little short on background but GW did a good job establishing the Kharadron society (including female duardin).