Misjudging the Market: AOS VS Star Wars

[Mr Mystery]

True - there's a lot of unknowns at the moment. So many, we likely don't even know that we don't know we don't know them.

Has anyone announced, beyond FFG, that they have a license for the new films stuff? What scale of game are they going for? A skirmish game for Star Wars could work, except FFG already have Imperial Assault, which has slightly ropey (well, in my opinion) models - ropey enough to put me off the game.

What if, against expectation and what we've seen so far, the films turn out to be terribad? Yes it seems incredibly unlikely given what Disney have done with Marvel, but there's always that chance, especially with something as beloved as Star Wars (though I'm sure there's many a neckbeard getting into a horrible sweaty lather about just which crude comparatives they can use to describe just how much Disney just betrayed their childhood).

[40kGamer]

I don't know that they plan to do anything. Imperial Assault is in the vein of Descent so the minis are ok... I guess. Not spectacular but they do paint up ok. I really enjoy X-Wing and Armada both for what they are but man it would be really cool to have an actual tabletop Star Wars game to kick around.

And sweet lord, let's hope Episode VII doesn't suck!

[Mr Mystery]

There's been attempts before, but nothing stuck around very long. Could make other companies very wary.

FFG have said they'll be doing Episode VII ships, which I'm happy about even more happy at the 'Rebels' wave. Very excite for that one!

[40kGamer]

Awesome... 7th edition ships coming is very shiny! FFG tends to stick with what is working for them so I'd be shocked if they took a huge risk on a tabletop game. Somehow I missed the other attempts over the years... although I have a not supposed to exist citadel stormtrooper model from way back when.

[nsc]

I don't think you get my point. I'm talking about youth dollars, i.e. the youth market. In that contest Games Workshop can only lose.

Ok well, I don't see x-wing winning the battle for "youth dollars" either.

I see youths jabbing their fingers at iphones and hanging out in shopping malls, not playing x-wing.

[Mr Mystery]

Speaking of FFG....seems there's been a rapidly shut down leak of Episode VII stuff.

I haven't seen the leak myself - but there's a peculiar post on one of my Facebook feeds about Disney having better lawyers than anyone else, and a short statement about sharing inappropriate images....

For the sake of BoLS, and avoidance of wrist slapping, I kind of hope we don't see them pop up on here!

[Caitsidhe]

Ok well, I don't see x-wing winning the battle for "youth dollars" either.

I see youths jabbing their fingers at iphones and hanging out in shopping malls, not playing x-wing.

This is a fair point. I'm not convinced that the youth dollar is interested in our niche market at all. I'm merely pointing out that the few that are will likely get sucked up by Star Wars purchases rather than AOS. What you bring up is an entirely different problem which faces AOS, i.e. that our niche market really isn't made up of children. In the United States there is no youth market, period. The people who play tabletop war games are young adult to seniors. Every now and then some guy will bring his kid to try and make the next generation part of it, but I have yet to see those kids stick. I'm told in Europe that the culture is very different. It is implied that there is this huge market of kids playing the game. I am willing to accept it with a grain of salt as a cultural difference. Over here, that simply does not exist. AOS isn't going to change that in the States.

All that aside, I can see from other posts here that people still are talking about the upcoming release of Star Wars as not being a problem as long as there isn't a game of the same nature released. Again, I want to stress that there doesn't have to be a tabletop war game released to steal youth dollars. The issue is that Games Workshop doesn't have an inexpensive game. AOS is not inexpensive. The only difference is that you can play it with fewer models. I say that you can in theory because the design of the mechanics give all the edge the the person with the most models. Regardless, it isn't an low cost venture. This means that it isn't a hobby that kids (or their parents who pay for it) are going to be able to maintain at the same time as they maintain a Star Wars fetish. If little Timmy is collecting Star Wars junk (and it doesn't have to be a game) he isn't going to get to collect AOS too. That is the long and the short of it. There just aren't enough rich people.

What I'm pointing out is that it is truly insane to be working hard to marginalize and alienate your older consumers at a time when you are facing the oncoming Empire (Disney) which is about to dominate the market. I think you should want those older people in the shops, excited, and playing the game. It seems to me that it makes more sense to find ways to keep them happy and get them buying. Of course, this doesn't have to be a theoretical argument. Star Wars is almost here. We are going to see and feel these effects shortly. What is more, this isn't just another set of movies coming out one every couple of years. Disney didn't drop all that money to make a movie or a trilogy. We are looking at a movie a year for the next ten to fifteen years, billions of franchise dollars, toys, games, clothing, etc. that could drive the economies of entire countries, television excursions, and so on. This is Disney we are talking about.

[nsc]

Yeah but you're still looking at it from a game perspective.

No tabletop game is as inexpensive as video games. For $60-90 you get the latest Call of Duty which you play for a year. It can consume all your free time.
Price per hour that's damn cheap, and it feeds you exciting gameplay immediately, you just pop in the disc and away you go.

What age of sigmar does do however, is provide a possible entry for the youth market, there is a child who frequents the store near me, and he plays games with his father, and he buys and assembles maybe one box every two months, and slowly expands his collection of dudes very slowly.

Previous versions of the warhammer brand never really supported a slow expansion of cool dudes, in fantasy and 40k you needed your hq and two troop choices, and good luck finding a game against someone with just that. However in age of sigmar you can just buy your cool box of 10 guys, and maybe you can find a game, maybe you can't. Maybe you can find a team game, who knows, but those ten guys are a force which can be fielded in age of sigmar.

Necromunda, Kill-teams, Mordheim, these aren't officially supported anymore (lovely games though) so finding a small and inexpensive GW game is dependent on your location. If you knew what necromunda was you could get a box of cultists and be ready and playing games.

Age of Sigmar wraps up these skirmish type games and encompasses it in a shell which runs very well for small games and runs very well for larger games. It lets you scale your force and watch it grow. A lot of people who have tons and tons and tons of fantasy models won't get that. They'll play forces from one army book and they won't really branch out.

I love it though, I can get a box of anything, and swap out any unit, and suddenly I've got 10 brand new models that I've painted and I'm playing with. No longer do I assemble 100+ models just to try out a new army.

So while you're right that Age of Sigmar doesn't fight for the youth dollar, I would argue that it allows the youths to spend their dollars, if they're interested. I remember in highschool I got into D&D because I heard someone mention it--I had never played D&D, but I knew enough of what it was culturally to know that it interested me, so I talked to him about it.

Warhammer as a brand is a cultural identity, popularized by the black library and relic entertainment (yeah I know, like everyone and their dog makes 'warhammer' video games these days, but dawn of war is what get a lot of people interested I find). People will find warhammer, and then when they hear about little model soldier they can paint and play with, well some of them will come looking and they will find the hobby.

After all, how did you find the hobby?

[Erik Setzer]

Previous editions of 40K *did* support smaller matches. That's what 2nd edition was all about. But people wanted to expand and expand and expand, to where even the stuff for Apoc matches is now in the core rules and there's not even a need for an Apoc expansion really. At one point 40K was all about 20-50 models on each side going at it, maybe a tank or two. Now super-heavy stuff is in every other army on the battlefield, and you see dozens of models minimum. People wanted more, GW wanted to sell more, and then we see Kill Team and Combat Patrol stripped from the rulebook to remove the optional ways of playing smaller battles, which were fun and *were* ways people played smaller matches. Similarly, WFB had Skirmish in 6th edition, and introduced Warbands through White Dwarf... but both were kicked to the side to promote "MOAR MODELZ!!1!" Add in the insane book prices, and it was a nightmare.

And if you pointed out those problems, the "GW is perfect!" brigade showed up to rip you a new one. Glad they were around to tell us everything is awesome, I mean, it'd be a shame if we lost a 30-year-old game because there were problems that could be easily fixed.

Oh, right, that just happened.

Sure, AoS "can" be played with smaller forces. I've only seen one match like that so far, each side had one or two characters, some infantry, and a large monster. Otherwise, practically every game I see seems to have more models on the table than WFB matches did. And when you look at an Eternals army on the table and recognize it's got to be around $700 to $800, that's not helping sell AoS as a cheaper alternative. "Oh, but you can play smaller games!" Sure, but there's no incentive to (quite the opposite), and you could have done that in WFB, especially before they stripped the rules to make such games work better.

As for kids... Yeah, they'll go Star Wars easy. It's not just the franchise. You've got a strong franchise that kids like, yes. But then you also have models that are quite affordable even before you start looking at retailer discounts. (I got enough models to do two S&V squadrons and still have leftovers for $100.) The models are already assembled and painted. You can literally go download the rules, grab four or five fighters, and be playing in minutes for just $60-$80. It's easy to find $15 here or there to toss at a new fighter, which you can open in the store and use immediately.

Contrast that with $33 characters who are just as posable as an X-Wing model (that is, not at all), have to be clipped, cleaned, assembled, and painted. Add in a couple units and you're at $133 for the models to play, though you still need to do all the assembly and painting stuff.

GW prices are designed for collectors. Not kids, not even average gamers. While they lament the lack of new customers, they also make plans to paint themselves into even more of a niche, a contradiction that hurts to think about.

But hey, let's see how the new GW AoS lineup does against the new Star Wars lineup. I'm not sure the most diehard "GW is so perfect, everything is sunshine and rainbows and looking up up UP!" person can claim AoS will win that fight in its current sales format.

[Caitsidhe]

After all, how did you find the hobby?

Old guys. I was recruited, like the vast majority of those in the U.S. by seeing older guys playing in my local gaming store. I watched them play, checked out the models, and wanted (like most competitive young guys) to be a part of that. There was a community of older players always around and thus there were people to teach the game, lend armies, and bring us up. Of course, I should point out that I wasn't a child. I was a young adult. Children have other things that catch their interest. I know I harp on the cultural difference thing, but it needs to be said again and again. Games Workshop seems unwilling to accept the fact that the people who play the game in the U.S. are different and require a different business model. We are recruited in a different manner. We enjoy competitive games (and that doesn't make us all power gamers) because that is the way we were raised. For better or for worst, Americans can play competitive games for the love the the sport. It doesn't mean we don't get the hobby aspect. It doesn't mean we don't enjoy scenarios. It simply means that there is another equal aspect for us. Americans don't see competitive games as a bad thing. In fact, they are kind of part of our zeitgeist. Attempting to eliminate the competitive aspect more or less cedes the American market. If Games Workshop can take that hit, power to them. I don't know why they would want to do that, but it is their call. It seems silly to me because there is no reason a balanced game can't service all types of players.

I don't want to digress too far from the topic here though. Game design is another ball of wax entirely. The issue here is at whom is AOS really being aimed? What is the age group they think are waiting in line to buy this stuff? Have they ever set foot in an American store? At some point, I'm going to have to hop across the pond and check out these British GW stores just to see what they look like and who shops there. By all the chatter here, I kind of imagine it like that scene from Willie Wonka where all the little kids are pouring into the candy store dying to give their money up to the singing candy man. I need to see this. I can intellectually accept your word for it but emotionally I just don't believe it. It isn't part of the American reality. Thus, it is hard for me to believe that AOS really has a market among children. If it is directed at adults, the mechanics are simply not there. I have a hard time seeing how it is going to compete with all the other interesting toys, games, and sundries that the youth market buys, much less the oncoming storm of Star Wars.