Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

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Canadianguy
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Canadianguy »

all elves were done together, evidence supports this ie pics of treeman and supposed elementals and seamonsters when high elves came out.
i think wood elves will get released after dwarves.
bretonian unsure but tombking have a new book so likely the dark eldar treatment.
so realy only looks like bretonia getting dropped but i doubt it.
my 2 cents which in Canada now rounds down to zero so take it for what its worth
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Omnichron
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Omnichron »

The way I see it, the problem with GW is that they are a company with a bit of a specialized product. Sure, miniature gaming is fun and great, but it's not for everyone, and they've kept getting stores all over the world.

The expenses for keeping these shops must be quite high, and the initial effects of such stores would mean an increase in players. However, compared to a lot of shops which have a huge selection of hobby games, comics, movies and so on, I believe that the specialized GW shops has a hard time keeping up with their sales (naturally), after the initial opening.

Sure, those who play Warhammer Fantasy, 40k and LotR usually comes by and/or spend time to paint a bit, chat a bit and so on. But once you've got the miniatures you want, have got the setup you want of that army in that edition, will you buy much more miniatures? Maybe when you want a new army, although I know most would rather buy what they want from friends or on the internet rather than starting from scratch on a GW shop and empty their bank accounts.

The thing is that the expenses after the initial growth has probably lead to the price hike, which also means that the customers, us, will rather look for options rather than getting the new GW miniatures (even though the GW models are quite nice). Competition can hurt them from smaller companies who hasn't even close to the same expenses...

Anyways, by closing most of their stores and relying more on the excisting hobby retailers, they might cut their expenses so much that they might even manage a price drop sometime in the future... After they have stabilized their business, because if rumors are right things look kinda bad now.
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by xFallenx »

My take as to how things can be fixed by GW without dropping stores (Only pay the overhead of the store & collect 100% of the kit price), which make more money than the indy retailers (They pay a % of what the kit's are worth), and keeping a majority of the current price points intact is to:

First things first (not necessarily in this order):
1) Bring back the Bones program;
2) Re-instate the Grey knights (Is that what the guys setting up regular games events were called?) to act as front line hobby builders;
3) Return the frequent buyer cards that provide a free unit after the card is filled;
4) Return the free limited ed models to the army box sets;
5) Return the free models in White Dwarf's(Visions now).

None of these things were broke when they previously existed, bring them back, it was those things that got me into the hobby way back when, it'll have the same effect again.

Secondly, rent the GW (40K & Fan) IP for royalties.

Third, dump the Lord of the Rings/Hobbit nightmare. Paying royalties into something that can't even make them back is bad business. Stop the bleeding.

Fourth, Scale down on the courtly inquisition, as it’s completely unwinnable & a total money sink. Space Marine HA!

Fifth, rebuild the hobby that made GW an empire in the first place.
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Dragon9
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Dragon9 »

Having the stores isn't all bad. But it depends on location. My local GW store is in an area that gets a lot of foot traffic. I have seen quite a few people come in because they were curious about what they saw and have seen some come back and buy starter kits, etc. so they can be an effective form of advertising.
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widowson
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by widowson »

Thought I would join your debate, having been employed by GW in one of their stores( a number of years ago, I must add), I can assure you that they have been steadily pricing themselves out of the market. For years they had the SI-FI/ Fantasy thing pretty much covered, then they brought out bombs like Warmaster, Mordhiem, Necromunda, Inquisitor and then Lord of the Bloody Rings, no one really played these games after the first month, we couldn't even give Warmaster away! After that along came Privateer Press and hey presto people are going elsewhere.
My advice, make your prices more competitive, lets face it over £200.00 for a Titan, when you can buy one from Dreamforge Games that is almost the same height, less than half the price and looks better to boot, I know where I would spend my money!
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Dangerous Beans »

I'll be very interested to see how GW recover from this over the next 5 years. I believe that is their realistic deadline to turn things around. And they can. If they're smart.

Seperating themselves so coldly from their fanbase was their biggest and worst move. Gamers, once they reach the age of 17+ (when they start to earn their own income and eventually have kids of their own to play games VS, you only have to ask a few peeps on here who brought their kids up on GW). This is your core market. The guys who, if you treat them with at least a half ounce of respect, will return the favour ten fold. Gamesworkshop are acting a little like George Bush over climate change, pretend to ignore the white elephant in the corner and it'll grow.

As others have said, they need to reach out to their fanbase (and its a massive one) and they'll find a helping hand, but only if they stop acting like the aloof hipster school bully going through puberty first. Not sure if that analogy really works, but hopefully you get the point!

Business wise I don't think you need a first class honours from Cambridge to see where they're falling short at the moment. As widowson says, where GW are slacking, others are taking up that slack and pulling the other end of the rope in their direction (now there an analogy that works!).

It reminds me of a couple of blogs I read over the past year:
http://thefrontlinegamer.blogspot.co.uk ... kshop.html

and particularly the chuckling I gave at the 9th comment on this one:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/ ... ong?page=1

EDIT: On another note, one of the webs largest Ork forum's has written a signed petition/formal letter asking GW not to re-write their upcoming codex after what happened with the latest Tyranids codex (the only codex/army book written in a VERY long time to not have an author pertaining to its creation - did no games designer want to own up?!)
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Dalamar »

GW can easily pull itself out of the ditch it dug out itself. It's very simple, but it requires them to swallow a massive humility pill first .

Step #1: Reach out to the community and APOLOGIZE for the treatment the fans have been receiving, for all the cease and desist orders on people who PROMOTE THEIR PRODUCT FOR FREE. Sure, it's not the exact promotion that corporate GW has in mind, but fan promotion works a million times better than an ad in a magazine. Then dropping a c&d order on people who have actual following on you tube or twitter is like shooting yourself in the foot with 12 gauge.

Step #2: Once the apology has been made, reopen wide communication channels. Hire a small team (you don't need more than a couple people I could probably do the job myself) to run an official facebook page, an official twitter account and to scour the more popular fora (Warseer, Warhammer.org.uk, Druchii.net ;) ) etc and maintain a line of communication with the fans. Take questions and pass them on to the studio, collect FAQs and release answers in a timely manner. Communicate, Communicate, Communicate. It's the key to every healthy relationship, be it with your spouse or with your rabid fans.

Step #3: Using your communication channels, find out what players would like to see, run contests for "best scenario idea" "best story" "best whatever". Have those printed in Warhammer Visions as a prize (often that is enough for fans to go crazy). As mentioned by xFallenx run loyalty programs. Free *unique* mini for magazine subscribers, unique limited edition minis in spearhead boxes. BRING BACK SPEARHEADS, armies on a discount when they're released, not these strange bundles that sometimes end up being more expensive than buying things separately.

Step #4: Run volunteer programs in stores. Have a summer campaign idea, find volunteers to run it in your store for free, have them collect results and send them to the HQ. Have MEANINGFUL consequences of those campaigns (no repetition of Storm of Chaos retcon). Reward your volunteers with unique goodies at the end of campaign.

Steps 1-4 would vastly improve customer relations and expand player base.

Step #5: Reduce the price of a starter kit, it's the gateway drug. Have army battalions at 75% of the cost of the units within *or less*. Fans are crazy to pay high prices if they love the product enough. But, you end up having no fans if you have nobody buying into the hobby in the first place. If I were to consider starting a wargame right now... I doubt I would look at Warhammer... Warmahordes are out there, Avatars of War and Raging Heroes are both working on wargaming systems... GW is not the lone wolf anymore. Of course the fact that I was introduced to warhammer through WHFRP first edition did contribute.

Step #6: Make sure rules are written with quality in mind (it's gotten better over the years but there's room for improvement). There's only so many people buying miniatures just to paint them and look at them, and they can often find just as nice miniatures for less.

Step #7: Have their legal team create some form of an Open License so that fans can create content for the game (video blogs, podcast etc.) without fear of a c&d notice.

and finally Step #8: Start supporting Warhammer events while not being crazy restrictive about miniatures used. If the quality of your product speaks for itself, people will buy it. If you tell people "You have to have 100% GW miniatures or you can't play", people won't show up. Exposure is more important than sales. 10 people buying only GW products don't compare to 100 people buying 50% GW product.

That's about it... is GW looking for a new CEO?
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Gnosis »

Clockwork wrote:Never Going to Happen:
Wood Elves, Bretonnia, Beastmen and Khemri products will no longer be produced, updated or supported

Armies haven't been chopped since the days of Squats and Chaos Dwarfs. Look at what they did with Tau or Dark Eldar instead: given previously unpopular armies a complete revamp and relaunching them. Especially with the Dark Elves and High Elves both getting redone recently, with new racial ASF, and Wood Elves being referred to in the Dark Elf book, I can't see them getting dropped. Tomb Kings have an 8th edition book, and Beastmen is near as damnit. The only one of these I'd see any plausibility to is Bretonnia, but I think its more likely that we're seeing misinterpretation as with the Germany closures. Maybe what we're seeing here is these armies being moved to a direct from GW only basis.

Bit of a topic necro, but how wrong were we then...
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Clockwork »

Gnosis wrote:
Clockwork wrote:Never Going to Happen:
Wood Elves, Bretonnia, Beastmen and Khemri products will no longer be produced, updated or supported

Armies haven't been chopped since the days of Squats and Chaos Dwarfs. Look at what they did with Tau or Dark Eldar instead: given previously unpopular armies a complete revamp and relaunching them. Especially with the Dark Elves and High Elves both getting redone recently, with new racial ASF, and Wood Elves being referred to in the Dark Elf book, I can't see them getting dropped. Tomb Kings have an 8th edition book, and Beastmen is near as damnit. The only one of these I'd see any plausibility to is Bretonnia, but I think its more likely that we're seeing misinterpretation as with the Germany closures. Maybe what we're seeing here is these armies being moved to a direct from GW only basis.

Bit of a topic necro, but how wrong were we then...


Well! I'd say that I was only half wrong, as Bretonnia and Tomb Kings are still sort of semi-supported through the transitional war scrolls that came out when AoS was released, and as far as we can see Wood Elves and Beastmen will still be supported (albeit in some new wacky AoS guise).

You are right though that the change was a lot more radical than I think anyone ever expected.
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by direweasel »

Gidean wrote:I recently tried to get Glade Riders (a newer plastic box set) so I could use the horses for Darksteeds. The game store owner was shocked to find it no longer had a product code for direct ordering. He had to call in the request. Either they are making new glade riders or indeed discontinuing the woodelves. :?


Or doing new wood elves without glade riders...
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Saintofm »

direweasel wrote:
Gidean wrote:I recently tried to get Glade Riders (a newer plastic box set) so I could use the horses for Darksteeds. The game store owner was shocked to find it no longer had a product code for direct ordering. He had to call in the request. Either they are making new glade riders or indeed discontinuing the woodelves. :?


Or doing new wood elves without glade riders...



Whatever works best for Age of Sigmar in GW's mind, which if it isn't already will quickly get to clear "New Coke" coca cola level of stupidity on their part.

If i had to guess, they may be also getting rid of the usual suspects. Not buying our darkriders?

Redo Warriors and Glade riders.

I wouldn't be half surprised if daemonetts and gargoyals are next.
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Re: Rumours about GW in 2014 - not good ones

Post by Gidean »

Uh...I wrote the above quoted line in January of 2014. Isn't this thread necromancy? :shock: And it would seem in hindsight that GW did intend to not produce Glade Riders anymore or for that matter any Wood Elves now. :(
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