Sons of behemat are unsustainable

[Jymmy]

People, when reacting to this threat, be mindful that the original poster is Icegoat: negativity is ensured 😂

[Baron Klatz]

4 hours ago, Lich King said:

GW knows most people will never even want to collect a full SOB army.

I thought similar even before the pricing but the internet has proven that dead wrong. I've been looking for good Mega-Gargant merc armies but it's full Sons of Behemat armies as far as the eye can see be it Twitter, Reddit or especially Youtube.

At most the "cheap" tactic people have been using is just to make the third Mancrusher out of odds and ends to give their kit-bashing & greenstuff muscles a work out. Otherwise everyone jumping into the army has been doing it like a Warstomper(both feet and full impact into the horde )

It's as Greyshadow said, the gargant collectors have been Fee Fi Foing  before the Sons even rumbled the realms.

This forum's Duke Gisoreux even showed off his Aleguzzler army on a discord to march alongside the Gloomspite when they released last year.

 

[Sleboda]

On 10/24/2020 at 2:27 PM, Icegoat said:

And reboxing and upping the price is the small giants that can be fielded in units of three in a box of 2 is absolutely shameful

I almost never wag my finger at GW for business decisions. Even with prices I don't like I still recognize that it's all about seeing what you can get, and I don't really begrudge them.

 

That said, this choice is a finger-wagging-worthy one. Not cool. I understand that if you go to two units of three, you can make it work, but still, come on.

Edited October 27, 2020 by Sleboda

[Sleboda]

4 hours ago, Scythian said:

I have a full Sons army of 2 Megan’s and 2 units of 3 Mancrushers. I hardly see them as limited or a waste of money. They’re exactly what I’ve always wanted. Low model count with easy rules. 

This is absolutely, in my opinion, the coolest thing about the army. I've watched some battle reports, and I really like the speed and ease of the games.

[Lich King]

1 hour ago, Baron Klatz said:

I thought similar even before the pricing but the internet has proven that dead wrong. I've been looking for good Mega-Gargant merc armies but it's full Sons of Behemat armies as far as the eye can see be it Twitter, Reddit or especially Youtube.

At most the "cheap" tactic people have been using is just to make the third Mancrusher out of odds and ends to give their kit-bashing & greenstuff muscles a work out. Otherwise everyone jumping into the army has been doing it like a Warstomper(both feet and full impact into the horde )

It's as Greyshadow said, the gargant collectors have been Fee Fi Foing  before the Sons even rumbled the realms.

This forum's Duke Gisoreux even showed off his Aleguzzler army on a discord to march alongside the Gloomspite when they released last year.

 

So you think they the majority of Aos players everywhere - most will have a full Behemat army? I highly doubt that. Also the army in the picture doesn’t have any new  SOB models.... kinda defeats the purpose when talking about who is actually buying into the army. 
    When I mentioned GW’s idea behind releasing the army - they price centerpiece models highly because most people will ever only buy one. Similar to Teclis - most of the time he will only be bought but LRL players and they’ll only buy one of him. That’s why they set the prices per center piece high - return on investment. I know there are  those who buy just Teclis to paint or those who buy 3 or 4 new boxes of Mega Gargants but they are just exceptions to the rule .

[Baron Klatz]

32 minutes ago, Lich King said:

So you think they the majority of Aos players everywhere - most will have a full Behemat army? I highly doubt that.

Eh, I haven't seen much evidence to the contrary. Even on Facebook it seems people interested in Mega-gargants from the start are interested in going all in.

But let's wait a few more months and see what happens.  Could still be the hype train at full steam and the mercs will come into their own down the line.

Certainly it's pulled a bunch of new players in that have dreamed of a full Gargant army. I helped one good fellow on reddit the other in ways he could use his new Mega-gargants army in Warcry & AoS Skirmish/Hinterlands with homebrew "raid boss" ideas.

 

32 minutes ago, Lich King said:

Also the army in the picture doesn’t have any new  SOB models.... kinda defeats the purpose when talking about who is actually buying into the army. 

If people are happy to buy a gargant army around a resin behemoth then getting plastic behemoth(s) with more kit options is a much easier deal.

But mostly it's just showing Sons have been a long time dream of many. Like our good King Brodd.

57 minutes ago, Sleboda said:

This is absolutely, in my opinion, the coolest thing about the army. I've watched some battle reports, and I really like the speed and ease of the games.

Definitely. Taker Tribes hands down have the funnest reports. Their boys playing rugby with objectives while they can kick them to a new field goal and then go into a kaiju battle with the enemy's big leader/monster.

Completely turns the game on it's head.

Edited October 25, 2020 by Baron Klatz

[novakai]

I mean the amount I seen on reddit and Twitter seems like a lot of megas and Mancrusher are being painted has been quite a lot too. That usually my metric of seem to be doing all right

[Kramer]

4 hours ago, Lich King said:

When I mentioned GW’s idea behind releasing the army - they price centerpiece models highly because most people will ever only buy one.

Is that a fact or an assumption? 
because it sounds nice, but while you present it as fact, it sounds to me like an assumption  

if you claim to know the decision making proces regarding price, I would love to see some sources. 😁

Edited October 25, 2020 by Kramer

[Overread]

8 minutes ago, Kramer said:

Is that a fact or an assumption? 
because it sounds nice, but while you present it as fact, it sounds to me like an assumption  

if you claim to know the decision making proces regarding price, I would love to see some sources. 

It's a logical conclusion. 

 

A character or monster or other model that will, rulse/balance/mechanics wise only be expected to sell once to each customer of an army is going to sell less volume than a troop box that sells perhaps a half dozen or more times per customer. 
 

If they both were of the same size in sprue (a large character) then the moulds would be a similar cost. Therefore you've got the same investment in mould production you've got one selling more and one selling less. So that's why you often see characters/monsters priced higher. Because the estimated sales are much lower.

 

That said its only one element of a price set. There are likely multiple other elements. GW does publish their overall profits for a year, but its only a general summary for shareholders; its not a breakdown army by army;model by model review of the prices and selling rates and investment costs and all the rest. Sometimes we do get the impression that GW raises a price more because they can than because they need too (which we can argue when GW reports record profits during a year like 2020). 

 

[Greybeard86]

26 minutes ago, Overread said:

Sometimes we do get the impression that GW raises a price more because they can than because they need too (which we can argue when GW reports record profits during a year like 2020).

Is there any doubt about that? GW is not devoted to making the best and most affordable models out there, but rather to making the most money out of it. If they think they'll make more by charging hundreds or thousands of dollars for a kit (titans, big resin centerpieces), instead of selling more at a lower price, they will. Or does anyone believe that the astronomically high prices in forgeworld are mostly due to higher production costs? The same logic applies to plastic kits.

[Overread]

1 hour ago, Greybeard86 said:

Is there any doubt about that? GW is not devoted to making the best and most affordable models out there, but rather to making the most money out of it. If they think they'll make more by charging hundreds or thousands of dollars for a kit (titans, big resin centerpieces), instead of selling more at a lower price, they will. Or does anyone believe that the astronomically high prices in forgeworld are mostly due to higher production costs? The same logic applies to plastic kits.

Oh very true, GW deserve to profit. The question is how much they can profit at the same time without driving away fans or reducing sales. Thing is right now sales are so high GW can't keep up. Meanwhile at the same time the whole "this is too expensive" dance is something we've done as a community for decades. Even to the point where you can spot some user in long term communities who have been around the community and game for years who cry wolf at the prices every single rise - yet they remain. 

So separating actual "this is too much" from whining about prices going up, is likely tricky for the community let alone GW. Meanwhile GW can see their production systems unable to keep up with demand so clearly prices aren't hte barrier on the whole. Of course they also see a breakdown of sales so  chances are they can see when a boxed set sells well and when it sells poorly. Best we can do as fans is to try adn clearly communicate to GW that the reason we did not buy was not because of content but because of price and perceived value for what we get for that price. 

 

 

As for FW, in the UK their resin prices are not that far off similarly sized resin models from some other firms. The real issue is when they go abroad and the prices get the GW mark-up element which shifts them into a much higher price bracket than the competition. 

[Nos]

GW minis are a luxury product. They are completely unnecessary for anyone to buy. They do not need to be sustainable. 

[Greybeard86]

3 minutes ago, Overread said:

So separating actual "this is too much" from whining about prices going up, is likely tricky for the community let alone GW. Meanwhile GW can see their production systems unable to keep up with demand so clearly prices aren't hte barrier on the whole. Of course they also see a breakdown of sales so  chances are they can see when a boxed set sells well and when it sells poorly. Best we can do as fans is to try adn clearly communicate to GW that the reason we did not buy was not because of content but because of price and perceived value for what we get for that price.

Absolutely. GW does monitor sales and I am sure they make very calculated decisions when it comes to that. Whinning about prices will not get any attention if the rest buy enough; there isn't much else to say about it.

If you do not like the current "high prices", the only solutions are things that diminish GW's market dominance, since that is the main reason for the price levels. As an individual consumer, this means being careful with your budget. But we can do a bit more than that, though. We can be more accepting of 3rd party sculpts in tournaments, for example.

[Kramer]

1 hour ago, Overread said:

It's a logical conclusion. 

 

A character or monster or other model that will, rulse/balance/mechanics wise only be expected to sell once to each customer of an army is going to sell less volume than a troop box that sells perhaps a half dozen or more times per customer. 
 

If they both were of the same size in sprue (a large character) then the moulds would be a similar cost. Therefore you've got the same investment in mould production you've got one selling more and one selling less. So that's why you often see characters/monsters priced higher. Because the estimated sales are much lower.

 

That said its only one element of a price set. There are likely multiple other elements. GW does publish their overall profits for a year, but its only a general summary for shareholders; its not a breakdown army by army;model by model review of the prices and selling rates and investment costs and all the rest. Sometimes we do get the impression that GW raises a price more because they can than because they need too (which we can argue when GW reports record profits during a year like 2020). 

 

I can think of at least one more logical conclusion. 

the big heroes are loss leaders. Expensive to make, produce and store. Less sales to compensate it. But it does drive people to an army and collect the smaller models which actually make the profit. 

would explain why sons of behemat need to be more expensive. As there are no boxes with a bigger margin in the army for them to function as a loss leader to. 

same for the Warcry box. First starter a loss leader. Make the profit on the expansions and warbands. 
 

Now I’m not saying one or the other is the truth. I’m speculating as well

We don’t know all the facts and we definitely don’t know the arguments used to decide the price and strategy. That’s why I asked is this an assumption or is there some source to this.

(Just for context. PlayStation and Xbox famously did/do sell their consoles beneath production prices. While Nintendo refused to. Because Sony and Microsoft  will make a profit on the games and side products as long as enough players buy into their system. This was the case for the ps3 and 4. Haven’t followed the news with the next console. So don’t know if they still do it. The big difference is that if Microsoft stops selling their console as a loss leader, players will switch to PlayStation. GW has no competition like that, for better or worse. )

[Beliman]

9 hours ago, Jymmy said:

People, when reacting to this threat, be mindful that the original poster is Icegoat: negativity is ensured 😂

Not going to lie, I'm here just for the LOLs.

[Gaz Taylor]

Okay my thoughts on this....

Firstly, I’m not a massive fan of the cost of the mega gargants but they do look an impressive kit and I think they would be fun to assemble and paint. Also the army has the attractive option of not having lots of models, so you can have more fun with each one. 
 

Secondly, I have no idea how they play but imagine they are a hard counter for a lot of lists due to how they can just sit on objectives. I suspect ruleswise they are spot on for this but I’ve not played them or seen any games being played yet.

I think the main issue for a lot of people is the cost but as somebody who doesn’t have the time to spend painting an army in one go, I’ve given up trying to buy everything in one go. So for me, buying a mega gargant now and then as a slow pace is just right.

+++ Mod Hat On +++
@Icegoat - very simple reminder. Less of the negative comments please. I know it can be tough with what’s going on in the world but you have been reminded about this before. Continue and you will be banned for good.

This forum is for everybody to enjoy Age of Sigmar and should be an escape from any negativity outside this. Let’s keep it that way

[Twisted Firaun]

On 10/24/2020 at 6:04 AM, Icegoat said:

This army as a collector is not a sustainable army it is not an army you collect it is an army you buy once and that's it. 

The entire range is built of 2 kits that In itself is disastrous but that each kit cost so many in game points is a tragedy. I collect maggotkin and cities of sigmar. This means every month I realistically can buy a box of a new unit and add it in to one of my forces. I have what 50 plaguebearers, 50 chaos warriors 30 blighkings, a giant, maggots riders, chaos knights, beats of nurgle plague drones the list is endless and so are the possibilities of what to build and buy next and the combinations used .

Well if I was a mega gargant collector  what do i add? What new creature what new unit fits into my army? None. I can have what max 9 small giants. Now sold in boxes of 2 or I can have 3 mega gargant max. Now maybe their are some crazy people who will build 3 each of each variant of mega gargant but really? 

Sob is not about collecting and building it's the first of what are going to be many I believe gw releases one and done they got your 400 quid goodbye armies. I will be very interested to see how many years it's going to be until the next sons of behemat release. I think we will be waiting for a long while. How many people in 40k run pure knight lists and how many use them in conjunction with an imperium force? Sons of behemat have even less options than imperial knights in their book and far fewer kits.

I agree with all of the above(especially the Knight's bit(first model I ever bought as I am a sucker for giant robots) as I tend to ally mine to my chaos space marines).

[Euphanism]

I saw this thread title and thought, well of course they aren't!

They probably eat three tons of food a day. What army has that much to spare?

Edited October 25, 2020 by Euphanism

[overtninja]

Warhammer armies are not an evergreen product, once people buy a given range they run out of things to purchase, and if nothing else appeals they are essentially out of the hobby as a customer for models. This is what killed WHF after several decades - people had literally bought everything they wanted, and the cost of buying into the hobby became too high to start.

This isn't really a problem with SoB - if they release more giant options, people who want them will buy them. The range as presented currently lets you play at 2k easily. No army is going to be infinitely expandable.

[Shearl]

I think we should try and keep in mind that the main thrust of this thread is that the army is lacking in design space and composition, and not about price.

There's another thread discussing pricing ad nauseum, we probably shouldn't replicate that in here.

In regards to the topic, I think this army still has plenty of room to grow. They can come out with new smaller giants, maybe some with ranged weapons. Easily come come out with a new mega box with a couple new builds. Maybe a hero box that can make a chief, Brodd, or a shaman. 

Realistically this is not an army for everyone but I don't think it was meant to be. It also begs the question of is there anything wrong with that? 

[Icegoat]

59 minutes ago, Shearl said:

I think we should try and keep in mind that the main thrust of this thread is that the army is lacking in design space and composition, and not about price.

There's another thread discussing pricing ad nauseum, we probably shouldn't replicate that in here.

In regards to the topic, I think this army still has plenty of room to grow. They can come out with new smaller giants, maybe some with ranged weapons. Easily come come out with a new mega box with a couple new builds. Maybe a hero box that can make a chief, Brodd, or a shaman. 

Realistically this is not an army for everyone but I don't think it was meant to be. It also begs the question of is there anything wrong with that? 

I 1000% agree this army has many places it can grow but 5 years of aos releases tells me not to get too excited about that just yet.

Fyreslayers have scope to grow, the kharadron the sylvaneth and the idoneth have scope to grow. So do all the older armies skaven ogors cities.  But since each of these armies intial releases theyve all had no more than 5 extra models produced for them.

That's why this army is so limited because of the slow slow pace of aos releases it's always a big new army being released so far we have not had a single release for an aos army that just added multiple new units and sculpts to an existing army. Save stormcast which are the exception that proves the rule. It's going to be a long wait I think for that second mega gargant. 

[Euphanism]

23 minutes ago, Icegoat said:

I 1000% agree this army has many places it can grow but 5 years of aos releases tells me not to get too excited about that just yet.

Fyreslayers have scope to grow, the kharadron the sylvaneth and the idoneth have scope to grow. So do all the older armies skaven ogors cities.  But since each of these armies intial releases theyve all had no more than 5 extra models produced for them.

That's why this army is so limited because of the slow slow pace of aos releases it's always a big new army being released so far we have not had a single release for an aos army that just added multiple new units and sculpts to an existing army. Save stormcast which are the exception that proves the rule. It's going to be a long wait I think for that second mega gargant. 

Not trying to stir the pot here, but if the argument is that the SoB are not a good faction because they will not see much expansion past their initial release, just like every other AoS faction minus Stormcast...isn't that just how the game is? I've never known anyone who bought into a new army with the expectation that they would get a slew of new models anytime soon. That really seems more like a complaint against the game's release schedule itself, not so much the SoB.

I agree that the army, on paper, is limited to only two boxes, and the Mancrusher price increase + only getting 2/3 is a bit wonky, but most SoB players I know intend to eventually own all three variants, myself included. I have no evidence to back up my claim here, but I would doubt that SoB are anyone's first Age of Sigmar faction. And if someone ONLY wanted to use them, there's still tons of conversions and kit bashing that can be done to make something unique. 

[Sleboda]

16 hours ago, Baron Klatz said:

Definitely. Taker Tribes hands down have the funnest reports. Their boys playing rugby with objectives while they can kick them

As it turns out, I think that's the worst thing about the army. There are going to be sooooo many arguments about how to handle certain objectives. In my opinion, it may be the worst rule in AoS.

[Greybeard86]

1 hour ago, Euphanism said:

Not trying to stir the pot here, but if the argument is that the SoB are not a good faction because they will not see much expansion past their initial release, just like every other AoS faction minus Stormcast...isn't that just how the game is? 

That sums it up. AoS is not like 40k or the old WHFB, at least it has not been like that in all it’s existence. Sure, I prefer deeper factions with more models, as opposed of large blobs of the same for each faction and then multiple factions. But that’s not how GW is developing AoS and SoB aren’t any different. 

[Slayerofmen]

Barring having to pay an extra 100 dollars after the exchange rate from UK to aud to buy a mega giant my position is less about the price and more and the book feeling lacklustre, AoS has too many examples already of books coming out with what id argue is bare minimum for them. It should have hit with more unit choices