AOS 2nd on ICv2's Non-Collectible Miniature Line Sales List For Fall 2018

[TheWilddog]

Some interesting news. ICv2 released their Fall list of the bestselling non-collectible miniature lines. 

1	Warhammer 40K	Games Workshop
2	Age of Sigmar	Games Workshop
3	D&D Nolzur's Marvelous Minis	WizKids
4	Star Wars X-Wing	Fantasy Flight Games
5	Star Wars Legion	Fantasy Flight Games

 As you can see AOS pulled into the number 2 spot behind 40K. Of course these are not raw sells numbers but an industry gage reached by interviews with retailers, distributors, etc. but it is good to see AOS high up there after dropping in the past.

Takeaways?

Just like the growing tournament numbers the antidotal sales info points to a growing AOS scene.

Also some other big players like the Privateer Press seem to be taking a hit. 

Stars Wars still going strong, will be interesting if FF can keep churning that IP.   

[Skabnoze]

I would be interested in seeing the top-10 and the values that determined the ranking.  How far is 40k above Star Wars:  Legion?  It could be close or an order of magnitude.

But, it is quite interesting to see Privateer fall off that list.  I am curious if Warmachine & Hordes were combined (honestly they always should have been) would it end up in this current top-5 or not?  I can't say that I am surprised to see them fall off of this list though.  From everything I can tell they have been on a downhill slide for a while.  Anecdotally Warmachine/Hordes used to be the biggest game in town here for a good number of years but it has practically disappeared not too long after the 3rd edition and also when they stopped their Press Ganger community activist program.  And online they seem to have suffered after they shut down their community forums.  I own quite a lot of stuff for that game and have no desire whatsoever to play it again.  In fact, I have decided to convert some of the models that I still really like such as the Mountain King & Winter King into AoS models (either Bonegrinder Gargants or Troggoth Hags - not sure which yet).  It sucks to see any game company fade away, but a large portion of the blame can usually be laid directly at the actions of the company (although a resurgent GW certainly contributed).

[Jamopower]

Out of interest, do the rankings go back to WHFB time? Would be interesting to compare on that. 

[TheWilddog]

10 hours ago, Jamopower said:

Out of interest, do the rankings go back to WHFB time? Would be interesting to compare on that. 

At the end of Fantasy it had fallen off this list. Here is the list from 2014, AOS was released in the summer of 2015. 

1	Warhammer 40k	Games Workshop
2	Star Wars X-Wing	Fantasy Flight Games
3	Warmachine	Privateer Press
4	Star Trek Attack Wing	WizKids/NECA
5	Hordes	Privateer Press

 

Also here is the list from Fall 2017 for comparison:

1	Star Wars X-Wing	ANA/Fantasy Flight Games
2	Warhammer 40K	Games Workshop
3	D&D Nolzur’s Marvelous Minis	WizKids
4	Star Wars Armada	ANA/Fantasy Flight Games
5	Warmachine	Privateer Press

 

So even as of last year AOS was not in the top 5. So even if these are not hard number it indicates a big jump up in the profile of AOS among retailers and distributors. 

Also note that the ICv2 is also mostly involved with the American market and largely reflects that.

[PJetski]

What releases did AOS have in fall 2018? Was it just Beasts of Chaos?

[TheWilddog]

31 minutes ago, PJetski said:

What releases did AOS have in fall 2018? Was it just Beasts of Chaos?

I guess the only actual tome was BoC, but it was coming off the summer that saw the big War Of Souls release and the edition update to 2.0.  All that summer momentum seems to have really keep going.

[Forrix]

10 hours ago, Skabnoze said:

I would be interested in seeing the top-10 and the values that determined the ranking.  How far is 40k above Star Wars:  Legion?  It could be close or an order of magnitude.

But, it is quite interesting to see Privateer fall off that list.  I am curious if Warmachine & Hordes were combined (honestly they always should have been) would it end up in this current top-5 or not?  I can't say that I am surprised to see them fall off of this list though.  From everything I can tell they have been on a downhill slide for a while.  Anecdotally Warmachine/Hordes used to be the biggest game in town here for a good number of years but it has practically disappeared not too long after the 3rd edition and also when they stopped their Press Ganger community activist program.  And online they seem to have suffered after they shut down their community forums.  I own quite a lot of stuff for that game and have no desire whatsoever to play it again.  In fact, I have decided to convert some of the models that I still really like such as the Mountain King & Winter King into AoS models (either Bonegrinder Gargants or Troggoth Hags - not sure which yet).  It sucks to see any game company fade away, but a large portion of the blame can usually be laid directly at the actions of the company (although a resurgent GW certainly contributed).

I'm pretty sad to see Warmahordes fading away. I played back in 2nd edition and while it was pretty fun every game boiled down to just kill the enemy warcaster/warlock (in my experience, never got into the tournament scene). The models and background were excellent too. I eventually burned out trying to assemble them though as I hated working with their resin/plastic/whatever it was and I discovered Malifaux which had excellent quality plastic minis.

I feel like it had a lot of potential though. Their miniatures artistically are excellent, they just needed to move to the modern Malifaux/GW plastic.  Rules needed some clean up, primarily with objectives though 3rd edition may have fixed that. Killing community programs just ensures the game death sadly.

[Dead Scribe]

I've been told kill the caster was what most of warmahordes was pretty much everywhere so yeah, pretty stagnant game play in that regard.  The gameplay seemed pretty cool, but it also reminds me a lot of AOS game play (or is it the other way around that AOS reminds me of warmahordes rules?)

Community programs I admit and agree with are pretty much vital.  It got big but never to the point of 40k or even AOS where people will play simply because everyone else is playing it - rules be damned.

[Overread]

I'm glad to see AoS really pushing up back into a high seat and I can only hope that the new CEO for Privateer PRess gets Warmachine and Hordes back up again - they've been through a rough patch with the gutting of their forums; their Press Ganger community rep system  and messing around with plastics that just didn't prove popular with the market. 

They really need to get something like their PG system going again since without any stores of their own they can't rely on store owners to market their games for them - because most geek shops are more likely to push card games over wargames for the simple economics that wargames are slower to sell with reduced profit potential whilst card games like Magic sell in large volumes very fast with decent profit. 

Having a local gamer with a vested interest and support in keeping their local scene going for a wargame is very important - GW considers it so important they run their own shops. PP I don't think can chase the shop market (its tough today to run any highstreet store) but they can get local people back into the fold once more and get a scheme to get that local person who organises games adn events doing so again.

 

 

Plus GW needs the competition to keep the market healthy. I'd argue that Starwars and DnD are not quite the same market as whilst SW is a wargame its mostly prepainted and its starwars; whilst DnD is more RPG market than wargame. 

[passtheKhorneplease]

I would agree that the FFG lines are a different market and that they also are starting to fall way behind.  I used to be a huge fan of FFG but there games just aren't very good anymore, and because none of their big games are original IPs they are wedded to what other people create for them (and in the case of Star Wars it is slow and inconsistent).   It is funny but when GW split with FFG it seemed as if FFG was in the ascendancy, but now that split is looking like it breathed new life into GW and had the opposite effect with FFG.

[Shroud Of Night]

11 minutes ago, passtheKhorneplease said:

I would agree that the FFG lines are a different market and that they also are starting to fall way behind.  I used to be a huge fan of FFG but there games just aren't very good anymore, and because none of their big games are original IPs they are wedded to what other people create for them (and in the case of Star Wars it is slow and inconsistent).   It is funny but when GW split with FFG it seemed as if FFG was in the ascendancy, but now that split is looking like it breathed new life into GW and had the opposite effect with FFG.

I am honestly surprised the Star Wars games are still going as strong as they are. The Star Wars IP has taken a pretty big hit lately in the larger general audience and I have never seen the appeal of the models.  Maybe I am just a GW model snob, but when I picked up some of the Legion models to paint about halfway through I just got disappointed and gave up. 

[Overread]

Starwars is an enigma of its own - its about the only franchise from its era that has LASTED. Even without the new prequels and sequel films it was still a popular powerful franchise on the market. It's got a life of its own so its no shock to me its popular - plus many who can't paint are likely drawn to the models - heck I'd love one of their massive super start destroyer models! 

[passtheKhorneplease]

Also FFG RPG systems stinks....like really bad....

[TheWilddog]

I would also love to see a little bit longer list with a bit more proportional context to get a better feel for the entire market.  In particular, I would love to see where smaller games like Malifaux, Mantic Kings of War and Infinity fall in at. All these games get a measure of internet buzz but I have not seen a lot of on the ground presence.  I would love to get a sense of how all these games fit in the big picture.     

[Skabnoze]

1 hour ago, Shroud Of Night said:

I am honestly surprised the Star Wars games are still going as strong as they are. The Star Wars IP has taken a pretty big hit lately in the larger general audience and I have never seen the appeal of the models.  Maybe I am just a GW model snob, but when I picked up some of the Legion models to paint about halfway through I just got disappointed and gave up. 

The interesting thing about Star Wars is that the popularity of the Original Trilogy era of the IP has never really taken a hit.  The prequels never really took off in regards to the broader IP and the new trilogy has certainly had a lot of backlash, but if you go back to Darth Vader, Storm Troopers, X-wings, Tie Fighters, etc then people still eat that up.  I know that I do.

And if you look at what Fantasy Flight has been doing they have predominantly placed their various games right square into the Galactic Empire timeline that has always remained popular.  Their problem is going to be how do they continue to expand those games with more factions & models once they have mined out most of the canon from that slice of the IP.  The longevity of those games will depend on how they expand into the other eras of the game and they appear to be starting to do that.

[Jamopower]

I doubt that Infinity or Kings of War are particularly big in the States. On the other hand in parts of Europe I can imagine that they are close to AoS popularity. But even bigger than them in Europe is the 9th Age. At least in Finland it's far more popular game, at least as far as organized gaming goes. 

[Overread]

Kings of War I feel is held back by the fact that whenever I look at their sculpt they look like they are 20 years behind everyone else and heavily styled in a way I don't like. Coupled to a hired painter who isn't as good as they should be for marketing material. 

Which is a shame because I really love some of their concepts and ideas for models. I think some of their newer are starting to improve, but I think they've got a long way to go before they will really amaze people with their sculpts 

[Skreech Verminking]

1 minute ago, Overread said:

Kings of War I feel is held back by the fact that whenever I look at their sculpt they look like they are 20 years behind everyone else and heavily styled in a way I don't like. Coupled to a hired painter who isn't as good as they should be for marketing material. 

Which is a shame because I really love some of their concepts and ideas for models. I think some of their newer are starting to improve, but I think they've got a long way to go before they will really amaze people with their sculpts 

Yeah but they are definitely growing.

 

[Skabnoze]

3 hours ago, Forrix said:

I'm pretty sad to see Warmahordes fading away. I played back in 2nd edition and while it was pretty fun every game boiled down to just kill the enemy warcaster/warlock (in my experience, never got into the tournament scene). The models and background were excellent too. I eventually burned out trying to assemble them though as I hated working with their resin/plastic/whatever it was and I discovered Malifaux which had excellent quality plastic minis.

I feel like it had a lot of potential though. Their miniatures artistically are excellent, they just needed to move to the modern Malifaux/GW plastic.  Rules needed some clean up, primarily with objectives though 3rd edition may have fixed that. Killing community programs just ensures the game death sadly.

I can understand your point.  It does suck to see the gaming landscape shrink, but if Privateer fails the IP will most likely get picked up by someone else.  At this point I think that would be the best thing for the game.  I have played that game almost since the beginning and honestly Privateer has been their own worst enemy for the most part.   

They had a very good niche and came onto the scene at exactly the right time.  They exploded in popularity by having some good initial ideas but they did very poorly at managing their own momentum.  I could write a novel on the things that I think they did both right and wrong, but at this point I think the wrong stuff outweighs the right sadly.  But many of the most successful game companies that went under had their games picked up and continued.  TSR died and yet D&D still remains strong.  I'll mourn far more for the loss of FASA and yet their biggest IPs have been carried on.  You can still find Battletech/Mechwarrior, Shadowrun, and Earthdawn products.  Hopefully some day whoever bought the rights to Crimson Skies can do something fun with it.

What I find the most sad about Privateer is that they are now making models and exploring niches in their world that I find far more interesting than what they did for the more than a decade that I actively played their games.  But sadly it is too late and I just don't care much anymore.  They seem to have grown creatively on the model side, but I simply have so many issues with the game itself and in my area the small gaming scene that remains for that game is a group that I don't have much desire to engage with.  Everyone that I enjoy gaming with has moved on as generally happens with games.  But I am thankful that Age of Sigmar has grown into a product that I now enjoy far more than Warhammer Fantasy (which I adored) so for me there is a silver lining.

[Skabnoze]

32 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

I doubt that Infinity or Kings of War are particularly big in the States. On the other hand in parts of Europe I can imagine that they are close to AoS popularity. But even bigger than them in Europe is the 9th Age. At least in Finland it's far more popular game, at least as far as organized gaming goes. 

The US is a pretty big place and popularity for anything is pretty regional.  Games Workshop was king of the tabletop market that it my experience it became similar to D&D in that no matter where you moved you could probably find a group for that game.  40k in particular has always been fairly ubiquitous across the US.  From big cities to small towns if you looked you could usually find some sort of gaming group.  Smaller games are much more localized and if you move away from large population centers your chance of finding a group goes way way down. 

In my mind that was one of the biggest keys to GWs success for so long.  They have always had some of the best mass-market models but other game systems have arguably had better rule systems throughout the years.   But the better games don't always have established player bases and so if you want to socially play games with little plastic toys then you have to either start your own group for the game of your choice or pick the game that has an existing player base.

Privateer really screwed up because for a while there towards the end of Warmachine 2nd edition they were coming close to GW levels of popularity across the US.  It was becoming really easy to find play groups in most areas you travelled to and then they had a very rapid drop-off.  My suspicion is that it was a combination of game stagnation leading to fatigue for long-term players (probably my personal biggest problem) combined with pulling back from most community building by killing their global forums and cancelling the Press Gangers.  My local area was a big hub for Warmachine despite not being a huge city (I live in Boise, Idaho), but our community was always anchored around a handfull of Press Gangers and their continued store-involvement over the last 10 years.  Those Press Gangers rotated a bit, but there was always a few of them to keep people engaged.  Once they fell away the broader community died rapidly.  There was, and probably is, still a very small core of hard-core competitive players but the game is really niche here now.  My suspicion is that my anecdotal evidence lines up with other areas across the country as well.

As to Infinity, it seems to have a bigger following here locally now than Warmachine does - although just about nobody stocks it.  Only one of ~4 stores still stocks Warmachine and that stock really seems to just sit there.  That same store also stocks a full line of Malifaux and it seems to move a bit more than Warmachine.  The Malifaux and Infinity communities are both small but have been doing decently.

[TheWilddog]

1 hour ago, Overread said:

Kings of War I feel is held back by the fact that whenever I look at their sculpt they look like they are 20 years behind everyone else and heavily styled in a way I don't like. Coupled to a hired painter who isn't as good as they should be for marketing material. 

Which is a shame because I really love some of their concepts and ideas for models. I think some of their newer are starting to improve, but I think they've got a long way to go before they will really amaze people with their sculpts 

I agree, I loved some of the ideas behind their Nightstalker faction and some of the models were ok, but compared to the new GW stuff it just does not hold up.

 

2 hours ago, Jamopower said:

I doubt that Infinity or Kings of War are particularly big in the States. On the other hand in parts of Europe I can imagine that they are close to AoS popularity. But even bigger than them in Europe is the 9th Age. At least in Finland it's far more popular game, at least as far as organized gaming goes. 

I would like some concrete data on the popularity of 9th.  I hear the reports of its success in Europe but the antidotal evidence (things like event numbers ect.) point to a pretty low level adoption in the US.   

[Forrix]

I'd agree about Kings of War. I've watched some YouTube videos of it and I really like the seemingly smooth and streamlined gameplay. As someone who focuses on the hobbyist aspect a lot the idea that you can do dioramas as your units due to the basing rules is very intriguing. However, as Overread said, their sculpts are just awful compared to their competition.

[Jamopower]

19 minutes ago, TheWilddog said:

 

I would like some concrete data on the popularity of 9th.  I hear the reports of its success in Europe but the antidotal evidence (things like event numbers ect.) point to a pretty low level adoption in the US.   

Which is not surprising, as it originates from the WHFB etc community that has strong roots in Eastern and Northern Europe. I believe it's most popular in Scandinavia, Poland, Russia, etc. 

[Skabnoze]

28 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

Which is not surprising, as it originates from the WHFB etc community that has strong roots in Eastern and Northern Europe. I believe it's most popular in Scandinavia, Poland, Russia, etc. 

Yeah, it certainly has some level of support as evidenced by some of the 3rd party manufacturers leaning into it rather than just making pure alternate models for AoS.  Companies like Mierce, Avatars of War, ShieldWolf, and others seem to be starting to make products for 9th Age.

[TheWilddog]

42 minutes ago, Forrix said:

I'd agree about Kings of War. I've watched some YouTube videos of it and I really like the seemingly smooth and streamlined gameplay. As someone who focuses on the hobbyist aspect a lot the idea that you can do dioramas as your units due to the basing rules is very intriguing. However, as Overread said, their sculpts are just awful compared to their competition.

Agreed. Like this model for example. I wanted to love it but when I got it in my hands all I got was sadness.