Kind of? It's not like you can't look at the 'menu' on their website so I think it's more like having a menu that simply says 'burger' on it, but you have to pay to find out the ingredients and nutritional value so you can really make a proper decision. And all the while, there's Russians loitering in the restaurant handing out bootleg 'full' menus for free.
OPR seems to have hit a balance of old school feel with modern mechanics. They really seem to have hit all the right tweaks that GW dances around to make money.
Yup exactly the same. I play gorkamorka so have tons of orks and grots so to get a decent list together I would only have to buy a bit but every time I think about it they pull something dumb like this and it’s an immediate nope from me. Way to go GW, you’ve lost a bunch of sales to people like me.
Never related so hard to a comment. Pretty much stopped sometime in 7th, tried coming back each following edition, and even with a host of options for pirating rules and whatnot, I settled on just collecting and painting a handle of models that I like, and I occasionally play Kill Teams to scratch the 40k itch. 40k is just a dumpster fire of a game system through-and-through and has been since I started in 5th.
I hate our subscription based economy right know, I miss actually owning the things I pay for! I will stick to pen and paper until I find a list building app that works. Great video as always!
@@jellydamgood Wow, that's just dumb. Also, it's great argument for making various Chaos Legions just one Codex: CSM with different detachement-based rules imho.
@@nyekomimithe world eaters index is a disaster. My fear is that the codex will release in a year and a half with, like, two new kits. GW really screwed up this one
They target ppl like me who just wanna paint and look at cool shit out of their golden youth. That model is sculpted after one of the most iconic chaos atworks of all time, i would've paid double or twiple the price of wh+ for that. When you're sinking hundreds of hours into a single miniature, those 50 bucks become irrelevant.
You're the first other person I've heard in a long time saying how making a dedicated app for everything is way worse than just a web-app that works through a browser on a computer, tablet or phone. The current corporate push that every single action we ever have to do needs to be made through its own individual app is astounding to me and I've honestly got to the stage of just not giving many companies my time if they can't respect me enough to allow me to use a webpage.
Proprietary software allows for more control and easier legal coverage (easier to sue essentially). In addition, in marketing schools nowadays it is taught that you have to occupy the attention of the customer as long as possible (for customer binding). The more attention on your product, the less on products of the competition. Social media "services" like X, Twitch and TH-cam went full force with this since years now. Your attention has become a currency now too...feel honored....
Privacy protection, restrictions on use of 3rd party cookies - all these things are being heavily regulated (by EU law for example) through the web channel, but they can be circumvented when it's a native app that you fully control. That's the why part. If it was about ease of development / maintenance, accessibility and user experience then web apps would be the way to go - but sadly that's not the main factor at play 😔
@leanja6926I love messing with things but a lot of people don't. They are actually making it worth it for those people to spend time and money doing something they don't understand or enjoy. If they were to keep prices for minis reasonable they'll keep lots of customers. But that takes foresight instead of just chasing profits.
Totally agree. If GW makes more money from the models and accessories than the stat sheets/codexes, an accessible list builder is a must. If you lock it away, I'll buy one or 2 cool looking models but not an army... on second thoughts GW may be accidentally trying to save me money
I am a model lover first and foremost. I have considered running a small army since my local GW store is run by an incredibly excellent dude. This sort of nonsense from GW Mothership makes me not want to. I will stick to the one or two models now and again.
@@liamoneill7692 My thoughts exactly. I bought single models or units now and then for more than a decade. Whenever I think about expanding one of those collections into an actual army and start playing, something like this happens.
While I do prefer the idea of the list builder being free, or even a buck or two, I'll probably try the app based on this. I'm just happy they're not putting all the rules behind a book wall.
@@congobryan5571oh, when the codexes are released I bet you anything there will be no digital only option to buy the rules. The physical book will come with a code to unlock the rules in the app. That will be the only way.
Unless they change drastically from what they did in 9th edition you will have to buy the book to have access to that section of the army builder app so you are behind a paywall and a book wall. @@congobryan5571
It feels like the new player friendliness of GW games comes in cycles. They'll do something that makes the games more accessible and easy to get into, then they'll realize that they can earn more money by increasing prices and making the cheap stuff harder to come by then it goes far enough that there's no good entry point and there's a lack of new players, at which point the cycle will begin anew and GW will release stuff that will make it easier to get into the games. Right now it feels like GW still realizes that there needs to be some entryways into the hobby, with the pretty generous starter set and the combat patrol games, but we'll have to see how long that lasts.
Every now and then I think about getting back into it but the price of re-entry is very steep even though I have the models ready to go. It is far cheaper for me to use my old models in different systems like OPR or 5PFH
That would mean that the people who write the app need to be 40k buffs who play competitive tournaments and scour the Internet for the best synergies and wacky army lists that exists. We all know that GW will never properly play-test anything, they just make the line of models that they want to sell broken. Once all stock is out, it's time for a rules update and repeat the cycle for the next faction.
The thing that actually makes me laugh about the army builder being paywalled now is we've all had a chance to use it and found that its not actually very good. Its missing a bunch of functionality that I feel should be reasonably easy to build, and is a bit clunky. While it is improving, we have essentially been dealing with a free beta, so I can only imagine there aren't many folks who would be tempted by it in its current state. Its perfectly fine for free but I really dont think its worth paying for as is.
The UI is so gross like what were they thinking with drop down menus on a stablock??? And why 7 dropdowns 🤮. Who ever creates these ideas is on something
I mostly disagree. It’s not the prettiest to look at, but all my group have been using it in game instead of having cards or print outs and it works beautifully.
I'm amazed at it's functionality personally, but only because the previous app they tried putting out was such a heaping pile of crap. The only functionality I dislike about it is how I have to tap once on a unit, then again on a button in the corner to see its data sheet properly. BattleScribe creates a printable and highly readable list in one button, I'd like to see something similar in Battle Forge.
I find the app has good functionality and is easy to use. Was already subscribed to WH+ which lets be honest is a minimal amount anyway, so don’t really see an issue here, unless the app isn’t maintained properly, and so far it has been. People that are happy to pay £5-25 for a small plastic soldier moaning about paying like £5 per month to use an app I find quite bizarre. It would be good if they could find a way to give new players a free usage period although no doubt people would abuse it.
The 9th Ed version was clunky and buggy enough that I just cancelled my Warhammer+ subscription, and nothing I've seen about this new version has made me want to go back
100%... When I got back into the hobby I came across Battlescribe and spent hours building armies... which got me excited about the game again... and 'encouraged' me to splash out on the plastic! Free marketing, right there... and that wasn't even their software... madness!
The word "roadblock" you used really does encapsulate how I feel about this. The army builder and index have been super useful for me getting back into 40K, but sticking such a basic function of the game behind a $60 paywall is a real stick in the craw.
@@bruderfaust5021 Its the difference between choice, and implied requirement. I can choose to spend that $600 (you're being generous) or not to play the game. But since I've already spent that money, having the army builder as an enhancement to that is a good deal. But making me pay for services I don't want in order to get something useful that enhances the money ive already spent... that's a dick move. As said in the video, I'd be happier if it was just a subscription for only the army builder, and not for a setvice i have zero desire for. In short, I'd have to pay for trash I don't want in order to use an item i do, and that's some BS. "You want some ketchup for your fries that you ordered? That comes with a bowl of soup you must purchase separately."
Exactly this kind of thing is why I've moved away from anything GW, because it just feels like they're disrespecting their customers at every opportunity they have. I fully agree with you on the list builder being a key tool to get people hooked and that it should be freely accessible. I remember spending loads of time building different lists and trying different gimmicks in BattleScribe and then actively looking for models to specifically extend my collection in a way that I could play those lists.
I actually avoid going into GW stores because their sales policies basically make the shops themselves very anti-consumer and anti-hobbyist. I thought it was just because our local store is run by That Guy but I moved cities to study at uni and the store over there was basically the same. Apparently it's just GW policy to train sales people like that - pushy, difficult, and angry when you mention any brand other than Citadel (I nearly got kicked out of the store for recommending W&N Series 7 brushes to a new friend).
@@robinfox4440 You mean *anti-customer* GWS are very PRO-consumer, as they always direct you towards the most popular/newest products on offer. Customers make informed and gauged choices; consumers buy what they are told to.
OPR all the way. I just play for headcannon & the storytelling. Alot of solo Planet28, the derelect for Planet28 is fun. Plus i started to make my own minnis!!! This hobby is so much more than GW.
I see GW as just the entry port to the hobby. The hotels are vastly overpriced and you have to eat in expensive restaurants, but once you get to the next town there are cheaper bed-and-breakfast hotels and you can buy takeaways, and in the one after that you can rent a room that suits your budget and cook your own meals.
Yeah it's astonishing just seeing their business decisions from a outside looking in perspective. They seem to have a complete and utter lack of understanding of.. just what kind of company they are and how they actions will affect the reputation and stability of their business over a extended period of time. It's like they're trying to turn their consumer base against them and force themselves into bankruptcy, they refuse to automate their production lines as well. Their stock is always out of stock which costs them money, and paying workers to make their models also costs them money. it's just horrific as a shareholder I would be mortified with the companies business decisions.
@dominusbalial835 As a shareholder you would be very wealthy, and would back each decision they make. Welcome to warhammer. You sound like you're new to the game. This shit, and worse, has been going on for the last couple of decades
It isn't incompetence its keeping the shareholders happy it's a pandemic in everything from video to table games and movies I could go on but you get my point, the shareholders want money and that's the end of it they don't care how terrible the product becomes as long as they get their money
GW´s marketing team is atrocious since over a decade at least. The only thing that keeps them alive is their name brand in the niche that tabletop gaming still is. I have a degree in marketing and i have trouble counting the number of times their decisions induced a heart attack.
They need stronger competition. Privateer press at its peak is the closest I've seen in the last couple of decades but nowhere near the sheer presence of gw
@@hydra66 It is a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy. Competition would need to put money into it (starterboxes, lore, several factions) to challenge GW. But they don´t because they think they can´t do it. They don´t realize that at this moment so many people are just fed up with GW and their price hikes, that it would be easy to carve out a good base-market segment.
@@2nd_Directorate its not just their name though, its their product. their lore/world and their models are the best in the space by a long, long, long, long way. Theres plenty of other model companies that make their own models and they are out there to buy, and none of them are anywhere near as consistently good as GWs minis.
@@2nd_Directorate there are discruntled wargamers for decades. Warhammer is the only one with brand recognition outside of people who already play wargames. I know some 40k fans who know all the lore and stuff, but never touched a single mini. that is a hard feat to replicate.
I hate list building as well. I play because it's a story and it's a culmination of hours of modelling to get a good looking game happening so worrying about legal wargear is tedious to me since I field units that are fun to paint and look good so anything that's tick box that lets that get done so I can play then that's great. I'm not paying for it, though.
I often go through this process of -Getting into 40k lore -Wanting to get into some of the tabletop stuff -Remembering it is entirely exploitative and anti-consumer and the lore is the only good part of the IP.
@@ddis29nothing wrong with mentioning grim dark future by one page rules, even if you go for the £5 a month patreon and get the character/unit calculator to put charactwr and unlisted units into the GDF rule system, you can do that in a month, download all the rules qnd codexes you need and you only paid a £5 for it all! GW literally use 40k as a cash cow and nothing else
@@shaunlavalley1131 I dig Gundam, put together some model's years ago. I've taken to painting Battletech just because the figures are super affordable, and not nearly as scummy as GW tabletop.
They are trashing the lore as well. Remember their statement that 40k is a dark and horrible place but "we" are not dark and horrible people, so "we" will purposefully be creating new characters who represent our idealised political beliefs about 2020s Earth.
I mean in the end, it's just the latest move by GW that shows how tone deaf they can be. They are the KINGS of bad decision making in the world of nerd gaming.
If I could sum up GW's tone deafness in one image, it would be that atrocious airbrush they did when someone finally convinced the higher ups that us nerds were using airbrushes.
It’s the Tzaangor effect. They lost money from WH+ after investing heavily into it, so they take something good to bundle their flop item with. Hence, the Daang Tzaangor effect.
Interesting this Tzaangor effect, what you referring to ? I know that there are / were Tzaangors that were AoS only, then they had Tzaangors that were WH40K also all in the same box (with WH40K chainsaws and pistols etc) but then they got rid of the WH40K Tzaangors box and split their WH40K weapons as a separate upgrade pack to buy with the AoS Tzaangors. Don't think I don't spot these business practices !
@@davedogge2280 The 40K Tzaangors were not very good in a Thousand Sons army. They’re GREAT in AoS, but in 40K they’re lackluster. Nobody wanted them. So, GW threw 20 of them into the Thousand Sons Combat Patrol box. There are only six models in that box that are not Tzaangors. They did the same thing with Space Marine Impulsors. They throw an unwanted item into a bundle box and tell you it’s a good deal. And now they’re trying to sell WH+ as a “better value” bundle by including an app that should be free. The Tzaangor effect.
@@davedogge2280the tzangor effect is they over invested in making tzangor sprues that nobody asked for, so they now package them in literally every Tzeentch related 40K or AoS box set. Look at the thousand sons combat patrol and how it’s literally “oops all tzangors”. Nobody who plays thousand sons wants a million of these little beaky beast men we want the marines of the army. But GW has to push them out somehow. That’s what he means.
I want to like this video twice! The GW business model sees the sales to entrenched hobbyists as cream on their sales cake, and Warhammer+ is a tool for getting more cream on their cake. The only way to change their mind is to hit their wallet and do it loudly, as was demonstrated by the D&D community earlier this year. The GW community stood around and thought it was hilarious, but you can bet they’ll just fork out their cash to GW.
Absolutely agree with you. Putting it behind their flailing streaming service is a terrible decision. I subscribed to it for a couple months to check it out and it was not worth the price. Not enough content for that much when compared to other services.
What really adds salt in the wound is how much content they took off of TH-cam in order to create their oh so amazing streaming service, while telling the rest of us such fan-based enthusiasm was now verboten. Some idiot in corporate just thinks "streaming services" are the way to go. You see this with corps that have changes in leadership, and the leadership always wants to chase the Big Thing they think will make money - be it video games, subscription-based services, or streaming. Hasbro/WOTC is a good example.
I remember the old days when I was a beardling. I had to subscribe to… a pencil and a piece of paper. It was something that made maths fun. And it made me buy LOADS of minis. Been away for nearly two decades. I want to, but I’m in two minds about getting back into the hobby because of this stuff. I just don’t have the disposable income for apps and subs and what have you. I could acquire a small army in time, pace myself so I can paint it up really nicely and that… but the idea of paying every month just to organise the lists and whatnot… it feels like something I can’t really commit to. Especially since I’d be coming back, not already established with loads of opponents and what have you. I dunno. It is, as you say, “off putting” to a recidivist noob. Other games don’t do this, so I’ll probably focus on those instead.
Having the rules for ever unit and the army builder be free is a major factor in my decision to get into a Wargame, the master unit list website is one of the biggest reasons I choose Battletech Alpha Strike over other games.
How strange that GW tries to squeeze more money with a non consumer friendly move, didn't really expect it... Jokes aside, I hope for 40k players that other "solutions" will come out (don't know if BattleScribe is still on, but that was a good solution). Otherwise, I guess that paper & pencil are always available. Meanwhile, I'll keep enjoying my free Infinity army builder, which has just been updated with the new optional rules, again for free.
@@freddiebates5795 hope they won't face any problem from GW scu...legal department, since I think that a good chunk of players are still around 40k thanks to them. Not that GW wouldn't mind making another dumb move if it meant squeezing some extra cash, but I hope this time they'll be smart.
@mrmaster9801 I only play 40k because battlescribe its already hard to make a list checking so many PDFs and statblocks, then setting up time with friends, setting up the table its already a heavy time investment im not paying for something that sucks.if battlescribe goes under i would play the game maybe 3 times a year compared to maybe once a month
I'm a returning wargamer and the day they announced this I started looking for something else to play other than 40k. Kill team, warcry and moonstone all have great free support online so all my money goes into models which is where my limited budget should be spent!
It’s a terrible idea on their part. One of many. My friends and I recently decided to turn our backs on current GW after finding 10th lacklustre and dusted off our old fantasy models for some games of 6th and 7th edition fantasy. It’s incredibly refreshing to be outside the bubble of GW money drives and space marine parades.
Now, you just need to ditch the GW rules altogether and play something that’s actually fun with your armies. l would suggest the scifi/fantasy mod for Chain of Command, which is vastly superior in every respect.
Well, they did the same with White Dwarf - they binned that off and that was effectively a monthly catalog for their goods THAT THE PUNTERS PAID FOR! I'm sure that they'll have lost a lot of casual interest in their products because of that. They eventually reinstated the magazine. Maybe they'll see sense this time around too? Shame they didn't learn from the previous experience though.
I bought thd most recent WD after being gifted Primaris marines from the new box by a mate. First WD I've bought in years. Really naff. Waste of £6. Told me very little & the 40k batrep was garbage.
I’ve paid the annual price for WH+ and sold both models to justify the cost, but I wouldn’t pay for the army builder specifically and the animation content is now coming out at a snail’s pace, probably because the subs are so low they can’t justify the cost to produce a ton more. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw a majority of the video content go away and the army builder be left holding the bag in a year or two (at a reduced monthly cost).
I just love how they took the best free animated content on YT, put it behind a paywall, told everyone they're not allowed to make fan animations anymore, and now the animations themselves are barely even being produced. Fucking GW, man.
Not only are they moving it behind the paywall, current monthly paying subscribers are having the price put up by a £1 per month while keeping the yearly price the same. But with only 136,000 Warhammer + subscribers they’re not making enough money to keep the shareholders happy
I think this is the key thing Warhammer + was pretty much a massive flop and the subscriber numbers aren't getting the costs back. As pointed out in the video, Lore, Batreps, painting...all of that can be gotten for free on youtube, usually to a higher production standard (Play On's 40k in 40 minutes has very good editing and production values and I'd argue is a better brand ambassador than anything GW puts out). The painting advice is probably literally just the 'eavy metal style which Duncan covers already plus other styles as well (them losing Duncan was a pretty big blow to their online presence, especially when he was popular enough to make his own youtube channel AND paints brand and be a pretty big success). Lore is covered by fuck knows how many channels, from the cringey edgy teenage boy style takes of Majorkill for that crowd to the listicals and shorts of Weshammer to more indepth coverage by Luetin09 and Occulus Imperia. So all you're left with is the expensive animation (hence why the early hammer and bolter episodes were basically motion comics because it's cheaper) and the free miniature as the key draw and that's not going to draw enough people in. So tagging the need to use Warhammer Plus onto the Army Builder app is literally just a way for corporate to try to make up the numbers and, like you said, keep the shareholders happy.
40k's dominance in the wargaming marketplace probably means GW thinks it doesn't need to use the army builder to drive sales, so it's only worth their time if it's making them some money. After all 3rd parties are already happy to make army builders at no cost to GW and GW don't seem to struggle to sell almost everything they can produce. If GW felt their position in the market was under more pressure than it is we'd see them doing more consumer friendly actions than they currently do.
Best T-shirt ever. I remember buying every ziplock bag of Carwars games and addons I could find back in the early 80s. And still have many of them locked up in an old cardboard box that my wife threatens to throw away. Heresy!
I hope GW watches this video! The 'tinkering' and the subsequent temptation to buy was inspired. Next, they'll be charging you for the air you breathe if you enter their stores.
Honestly, I've been using the warhammer app for list building and everything you've said about maintaining engagement is so spot on. The moment it goes behind the paywall though, I'm switching to battlescribe. It works fine for my needs and its free. I don't want a warhammer+ account or a monthly charge and I have options. GW really do need to look at the app as a loss leader. I've created about a dozen lists and my desire to buy the minis for several of them (beyond the armies I already collect) is strong. If I'm not playing with the app though, whats my driver to expand into new armies?
if they wanted to make more cash with the app they could have impelemented a "where to buy" button or a link to the webstore for every unit. so you can tinker and think "damn i want THIS unit! its cool!" oh look... a link to the store and another 100 bucks gone 😂 i used the app and it was nice but now i'll drop it like a venomous snake...
Yeah they could even do the webshop "Other people have bought this"-thing, where they recommend a unit that works well with the one you are looking at. They could turn it into such a money sink for people like me, but nope.
I completely agree. That app would drive a ton of new sales and get new players. I would sit on the AOS one and look at units and then order things based on seeing it on the app.
i now exlusivly play other games, mostly because of the rules changes and range changes but that sucks to hear, still enjoy some of their miniatures for collecting and painting but other than that i've been and will be abstaining from GW games.
It's decisions like this that make OPR my system of choice for playing with my Gee Dub models. There's no way in hell I'm signing up for warhammer plus because they've locked the listbuilder behind it, I'm just going to use a different list builder, especially since the official one doesn't have the essential function of being able to print out a quick reference page of everything you have in your army. the app is still a good rules reference, though, so I'll keep using it for that. I'm going to have my first game of 10th this weekend, and from what I've read it looks like I'll almost certainly like it more than 9th, but if this is any indication then Grimdark Future is still going to be my jam.
I completely agree. Yet even in my casual group I have people defending the choice of GW. This basically led me to believe that GW has finished building up their base of whales sometime in 9e and now the business is catering only to them, the rest be damned. The whales will consume anything GW offers and will fanatically stand by any change to their beloved systems, regardless of how idiotic the change is. OPR is great, but it just cannot gain steam in my local area, because people just can't imagine playing a different game than 40k.
Basically Games Workshop have established the one thing any company wants, a Lifestyle Brand. Hasbro has done the same with D&D now you get people who don't play the game they just like the 'brand', they'll buy 40k T-shirts, mugs, read all the books, make being into 40k (it's always 40k, I rarely ever see it with Age of Sigmar) their whole personality but they don't actively engage with what was the core part of the hobby, the tabletop game, the miniatures and painting said miniatures, they don't engage with any of that side of the hobby and just spend their time arguing on internet forums about lore and such. This is why OPR isn't ever going to be as big purely because it lacks a lot of lore (namely because most of its stuff is just legally distinct GW stuff), it's purely tabletop game focused which is great for miniature wargamers but those 'lifestylers' won't ever engage with it.
@@arielsanchez465 Oh I've seen plenty of comments that OPR is the 'Warhammer Killer' from people a bit too enthusiastic about it. As I pointed out the 'lifestylers' don't give a fuck about rulesets, they're largely not interested in the game at all, they're interested in the IP and 'lore', which is what GW is transitioning towards by making 'Games Workshop' or more explicitly 40k a lifestyle brand instead of a miniatures and ruleset brand.
I think a mass email complaint campaign is due for GW. This paywall is a total slap in the face of existing customers and potential new entrants to the hobby. They need to be told that people are not happy about this.
That video where Uncle Atom realizes GW is shifting from a model company to an IP driven company. With the rise of 3D printing, revenue streams to get at the IP is Warhammer's future. Enjoy.
As someone who studied business development and marketing, nearly every decision GW does baffles me so damn hard. I seriously can't imagine anything coming nearly close to the stupidity of GW. Warhammer+ doesn't fully work where I live (Austira), meaning, I could only be read the stuff and watch maybe painting tutorials and battlereports, both of which you find plenty on TH-cam. So why in the world would I subscribe with the full price for a aervice I can't really use all it's offerings. And now this. Bravo GW, bravo. Stupid piss-face suits.
Love the warhammer 40k setting, always have. So I will most likely continue playing whatever dumb greedy move they make. However, owning a 3d printer I cannot see myself buying models from them again or paying a subscription for stuff that should be free... They lost me as a customer.
Whenever there are complaints about GW's rulesets being poorly written or balanced, defenders always say things like "GW is a model company, not a rules company". But, like, they are charging money for the rules too?
Don’t get too down, you can still look at the index rules and datasheets for free and that can tell you what you want to buy. We’re just losing the list builder.
I absolutely love the OPR army builder. The best thing is that they have a bunch of third party armies included. So, I've been building an army from Dragon Trapper's Lodge and I can really easily use the OPR army builder.
GW has been taking ideas from the video games industry since they came under new management after 8th edition...Remember when they made loot boxes? Pepperage farm remembers...Also, all I ever needed for building a list is notepad and a calculator. I don't get how that's so hard...
@intense_pickle1232 The CEO of GW is a former Hasbro employee. Once he joined GW that's when things became a money grab. These business practices you see made by GW are classic Hasbro.
Back in 9th edition, when I first discovered onepagerules's army builder, I literally spent hours brewing up lists for Grimdark Future more than I have with 40k. The condensed view with keywords popping up on touch was amazing for learning. Seriously one of the best army building lists out there. AND IT WAS FREE.
This sounds like if I was running a business that sells lights, and I made an app that would let you preview how lights would look / reflect off of a variety of different room types, how different color temperatures would look, had all the info on them, how much money you could save by switching to various lights based on your square footage... And then told my customers that they would have to pay a subscription in order to use my app. Except worse because lights aren't impulse purchases nearly as much as a purely luxury hobby like wargaming is. This is so nutty of them.
Just ordered a $190 dollar box, had a missing piece and a few bent. GW stuffed my emails for four weeks... So just found a DHGate seller who's getting my next GW order. 😂 Suck it GW
The problem I have is that anything that's subscription based isn't something someone kids will get. Parents won't pay for that because they won't see an actual physical thing and that means new people will miss something that makes playing easier to get into. When you make an app entirely subscription that what that means is they won't install it and that means you remove them seeing your logo on their phone every day and you won't get push notifications, you wo't get their email on your mailing list and it's out of sight out of mind. That is the reason shops have their own apps, to make sure you see their business every day and will be more likely to buy.
one thing not mentioned in the vid, was that they are increasing the price of WH+ to accommodate the value add of this app. I'm not sure I have the numbers correct but is it an extra $1 per month or and extra 1 sterling per month?
GW: look at all the engagement we get on this app also GW: let's reduce engagement on this app by installing a paywall for something that people don't actually need to use
1. OPR listbuilder is the gold standard. Their Patreon "make your own list" fuction is amazing too. GW's janky offering doesn't come close. 2. OPR as a game is 10/10, compared to GW's thin gruel antique broken games, e.g. 40k 10th being 2/10. 3. I subbed for Warhammer+ for the first year to check it out. I was hoping it was going to be an awesome resevoir of great GW content. Never again. It is NOWHERE NEAR being value for money. 95% of the animations are awful. Some were little more than narrated slideshows - clearly cobbled together on the cheap. The Vault is awful. A disjointed few back issues of White Dwarf, with all the game content, old rules etc. stripped out - you know, the stuff that's actually interesting. The painting videos were worse than most of the stuff you can see for free on TH-cam. The early battle reports were dire. The presenters were unengaging, the reports disjointed, and the visuals surprisingly bad, with models obscured by video effects like snow on the screen. And the camera angles used (mostly top down) meant you simply couldn't see what was going on half the time. The production quality was amatuer (why are you shakily filming the guy who is moving the models rather than filming the midels he's moving?!) Far better offerings for free on YourTube. The Loremaster videos were OK if you're into that sort of thing, but again there's better stuff on TH-cam. Same with the learn to play videos. There were "subscriber offers" apparently but I only received one in the whole year, and it wasn't worth it (a £10 voucher - what can you buy at GW for £10?). As soon as my "free" miniature turned up I cancelled the sub on that day. Now they've paywalled the army builder (which is inexplicably an app rather than a webpage - i assume so they can monetise it easier?), I'm even less likely than the 0% chance I had of resubbing to GWs ridiculous "streaming service". With so many FAR BETTER options out there it amazes me that people still give money to GW, while GW kick them in the metaphorical teeth.
Tail end of 7th ed/ dawn of 8th ed, there was a listbuilder app that was web based. It was essentially GWs current listbuilder, but it was better (if u changed how many models were in a unit, it would automatically adjust the stock wargear). It had pictures, points, the works. GW took it down with a copyright strike. Funny thing is, that web app was free, and GW wants to charge for an inferior product..
Something you didn't mention is that this move is coinciding with the first codex for 10th being released, the free index datasheets were one thing but GW were never going to allow players to bypass the codex purchase requirement to access the codex rules for free or for a nominal cost. You can make the argument that codex rules should be free too for the same reason, but the decision makers in Nottingham don't agree and they're not going to allow a backdoor route to the same end goal either.
i was so excited when they started 10th with free rules and codex. but putting the army builder behind a paywall goes against the foundation they started with. on ramps and ease of use are needed. like you said it needs to be easy and free to drive sales for models and paints. the more people play and think about playing the more they want to spend and justify spending.
Now that all of my homeclub's AoS armies are 'caught up' with 3rd edition I'm feeling like this is the perfect time to get off the acquisition rollercoaster and let GW sail off into the sunset without me. I did enjoy that brief period of "New GW" though. That was nice for a hot second.
I dont buy subscriptions, EVER. I am used to the "pay once, own forever" business model of the 90s. You can take the "pay forever, own never" model and jog on over the nearest hill. I am not paying multiple times for something only to lose everthing the second I stop paying and this is absolutely the hill I die on. Now I get things on the internet under the "pay never, own forever" model. Your move, GW.
Totally agree. My previous organization also didn’t understand that marketing is a cost center. They figured they paid for salaries why would you need more money for lead generating activities when they’re not revenue streams. That being said, I don’t know the development cost and maintenance of a web-based army building tool that is regularly updated for a large corporation. What I think these corps forget about is price elasticity and underpricing the cost of entry over a long period of time is a great way to subsidize your costs and potentially make a little bit of money. BUT (like you’re saying) be an amazing on-ramp for purchases, which is obviously the core business. I mean hell, I pay $10 a year for a video games collection app to track what I own and see game prices. You better believe it gets me to discover and buy more video games.
In his latest monthly live chat, Gaetano (One Page Rules CEO) described his company's approach as "agile" - a term borrowed from software development which implies a co-operative relationship between vendor and customers with systemic mechanisms to enable iterative development and review. OPR's corporate attitude is based on making everything as transparent as possible and providing products that are as useful as possible. Many other game publishers and miniature designers follow variations on this approach In contrast, GW seem to be de-evolving to a 'we talk, you listen', 'take it or leave it' corporate dictatorship in which the talented writers and designers, customers and retailers are all tied by the company's inflexible 'monetize everything' roadplan. It's crying shame that they've taken this approach and a wonder that such a strong enthusiastic community persists despite being permanently held hostage.
I'm pretty new to warhammer, but from what I've seen in the last 18 months I have no idea how anyone could put so much into this hobby. It's like building a house on loose sand. I purchased a 3d printer and will be more than happy to never buy another GW product.
Great video Sir - hit the nail on the head as usual! Had my first game of 40K in years a few days ago at a friends place, just using his old 40k minis, as he was thinking of buying new armies after testing the Battleforge app. It was the app that made it work for me, easy to use, show cased the new minis for 40k armies, and got me excited again about units and armies I could buy and use to play 40k. I was seriously considering getting back in to 40k - crazy! However, making me pay for Warhammer Plus just to get access to the app means I just won't bother getting back into 40k. Using that simple piece of software had me seriously thinking about diving back in, given the ease of army building and playing with just using the app. Probably would have ended up buying $1000's of GW miniatures and hobby items...again! 😄, Probably would have inevitably started playing other GW games... even more $$$ 😂 This decision to put it behind a Warhammer Plus subscription means I probably won't do those things. Why? Because I do not like being forced to pay for subscription-based products, especially when priced to include things I don't want/need. As explained in the video, using the app created and drove my enthusiasm to build and design lists which in turn increased my desire to purchase the figures - without access to this readily available free advertising and promotion of GW's own products, my interest to explore playing 40k tabletop lessens dramatically. In turn it makes me think I'll keep exploring Infinity: The Game by Corvus Belli and encourage my mates to check out their free rules and army app, as it also is a very enticing game. The miniatures for Infinity are beautiful and they have also released simpler easy play rules, for free naturally. Weird, it turns out you'll not the only sparkly fish in the ocean GW.... So, this is yet another missed opportunity and classic GW fail. You almost had me again with clever marketing, but congratulations on screwing that up GW 😆 you managed to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory once again. Lucky save for me maybe...or a win for Corvus Belli... 🤔 😅
Loving the t-shirt 😊 I started playing Car Wars after buying the original little black 'rack hanger' box at a small Games Day back in '85. Also.... does the vault include the 'Thrudd The Barbarian' comic strips? 🤔 😜
Thanks for the video! I had considered picking up Leviathan for the 'nids to jump back into 40k after a 13-14 year hiatus, but I'm not dealing with GW's shit. I don't *want* to resin print a whole OPR alien bugs army, because that's a lot more work and only marginally cheaper than buying a box of plastic, but I will. GW if you want to F*** me in this day and age, you at least need to buy me dinner first (I'll have a list builder for an app, thanks).
This is the final thing that prove that I won't be spending money on Warhammer+. It's good that the hobby is growing, BUT i don't like where is heading. There is a difference between easy access and have to buy or subscribe on things you really don't need. There used to be a time when it was a creative hobby. Now its more like fill in the right colors. It used to be your creation of stories that matter, now its like playing video games.
The rules themselves should not be revenue sources either: they should all be available for free digitally; they should sell physical books at cost, or just give you PDFs you can print yourself.
I couldn't agree more. I've recently been fortunate enough to get a deathwatch combat patrol off a friend cheaply. Just yesterday, I made a large purchase of plastic because I've had the freedom to mess about with my lists in the app. I have been messing with the lists during my lunch break/before bed/during meals and I haven't even played my first game yet. As a brand new player, without the ease of access to the forge, I doubt I'd be diving into the hobby as hard as I am.
I'll consider going the Warhammer+ way if it gives me enough resources to be considered worth it but I'll likely build my lists using lists of tournament winners and stuff like that along with my own theorycrafting and just add the points on paper.
GW are learning the lessons so many companies have in the past, creating compelling digital content costs time and/or money and it's not something you can do half-hearted. It's been pretty clear to date, GW have created digital content in-house, using existing staff and resources, which is quirky, nerdy, geeky and fun... when staff have time to create it aside from their regular job of writing rule books, designing packaging, editing a magazine etc. So the content tends to be sporadic, rushed and charming and the audience is okay, because it's free and about what they want. It also leaves massive room for GW customers/game players to fill in the gaps with their imagination. It's also the British way... for example the production values of Dr Who through the 1970's and 1980's vs Battlestar Galactica or Buck Rodgers. Now back to the future and GW have been shocked to see creative people use their IP to create amazing content and tools, but not grasping that it's been done via love and a lot of time vs. a traditional studio model of get a big bag of money and hire as many people/tools and get it done... yes, it costs more, but once it's working you just keep rolling the content out. GW is a massive siloed business that not only owns the IP, they own the manufacturing and retailing as well... so at their core, the business is running a store, with people coming in the door to buy and all activity needs to lead to people coming into the store (and coming back). Warhammer+ was created to replicate the store experience and also enhance it. It would have cost a reasonable amount of money to set up and keep running and they have now learnt 2 years on that creating more original content is really more expensive than they thought, so now they are trying to find more products and services to add to it. Rightly or wrongly it's a more a sandbox for them and it's future could easily see it shuttered and all the content becomes free (or vanishes back in a vault), or it expands to included access to other content such as digital games (mobile, PC, console etc.), a print your own mini service, or downloadable STL files. For me, I think the bigger question is what should they do to make the army building exercise easier, because if it needs an app (free or behind a paywall), then it's too fucking complicated to begin with... and that's a problem.
The thing I noticed about 10th is that models that people didn’t use in 8th & 9th became needed or useful , and that units people did use got point cost increases or units where dumbed down which is a very clever way to drive sales on units people didn’t use or buy before. Adeptus Custodes player from 8th ed.
also for opr you can use custom armies made by people, you can find wip to ones that are full complete and verified ones, patron to make your own but they give info to make it without I believe, I'm definitely enjoying trying to make my own army of nobles that are more single models with large variety of weapons and buffs, but lighter is easier to shoot while heavy isn't but have better armor, need to learn how to make minis just for these models though and that's the hard part as theirs not to much info
Lots of excellent points, well said. However... Everything you criticise is extremely on brand for Games Workshop. This is a running theme for them since... at least for as long as I have been in the hobby, which is the late 90s. For some odd reason they absolutely do not understand the concept of "spend money to make money", they never did. Maybe they never will. This is - changing topic a bit here - one of the reasons why we will probably never get over the "Marine oversaturation in 40K". To GW it seems to look ONLY like "Marines sell, so do more", when in reality Marines sell well because they are featured so heavily since the inception of 40K (thus have easy brand recognition, ease of access, thus greater customer base with Marines in their collection, thus more people willing to buy more Marines, etc.). It has become a positive feedback loop - you could call it a self-fulfilling prophecy - a long time ago. It never dawned on anybody at GW - or at least nobody able to make the right decisions - that by investing into other factions (thus making them more appealing, widening THEIR "customer base" etc.) similar effects and most importantly more sales could be generated. Nothing of this is new or hard to grasp, but GW is unwilling or unable to act accordingly. In this case I hope it bites them in the ass more than usual. I doubt it will, but hope dies last... And thank you for yet another excellent video!
I have had Warhammer + for about 6 months now and to be honest, have been on the fence about canceling it after my year is over. I love the exclusive models and even though I don't play chaos or AoS, paid extra for the second one and now both are in prime positions on my shelf of my favorite GW figures along with Helbrecht and my various dreadnought. Besides their master class paintings videos, nothing else has seemed interesting to me so I have completely ignored it. Now that the app is included, I look at it as a $38 kit and a $22 yearly subscription to the app, that is much more value to me than before where I was just looking at it as a $60 exclusive model. I will still buy the physical copy of the books for the two armies I play, Black Templars and Orks, but have no plans to but the books for the other 8 or 9 armies that I just collect just for something different unless I decided to build one up into a playable army. For the $22, that alone is worth it, hell, for the full price of $60 I couldn't buy 3 of the books for my other factions. So I feel that including it in the Warhammer +, added a ton of value to the subscription and am very happy they didn't make it a second subscription as I was afraid they would.
I have Warhammer+ and never understood the hate towards it. Your points are all 100% valid, but also just criticisms, not hate. For $60, I get a free mini that would be ~$45 (and 3 out of 4 were very cool), and a $10 voucher. That means it's like $5 for some shows I'll binge to catch up every few months. Personally though, I think the smartest thing they could do is tweak the model to make it a net $0 to the customer via vouchers. For example, make it $10 a month for the app and the shows. Drop the "free" mini (maybe keep exclusive access to buy) and then every month you get a $10 GW store voucher that's valid and stackable for 13 months. You'll get some people who use the $10 every month on stuff and supplement with their own cash, some who save up the full $120 (still spending their own cash, just not as much), and even some who forget about the vouchers and so it's an easy $10 that GW still makes. Edit: and the consumer feels like they're not being taken advantage of. Getting "free" stuff always makes an associated cost seem more palatable. Like when you get the free monthly games from xbox/ps subscriptions.
I really do have to agree with your sentiments overall. It feels like so much less of a premium bonus (the list builder) than it does a baseline core feature for ease of use, and I feel like as you said restricting use overall can only damage the playerbase, potential customerbase for GW, and the accessibility of the game overall which has always had a perceived huge wall of accessibility to overcome looking in from the outside. At the end of the day it sucks, and I'm still happy enough just printing out datacards from the free indexes for a game, but to many people thats not an option and beyond that I personally fear for the wall this core feature being paywalled might have on people who for whatever reason might not be able to make a list in another way. For some disabled or differently abled people not having access to a baseline feature might just be the bridge too far and they might just drop the hobby as a whole.
GW sales keeps making decisions that looses them money. What I mean by that is not that they are going into red. What I mean is that when presented with the option of making some money right now or a whole lot of more money down the road, they always take the "some money right now" option.
I used to use Army Builder years ago, don't know if it still exists at all. It had great UI and printed off great looking lists too. I think it was put out by Lone Wolf or something like that Yeah I still sub to Warhammer+ £5 a month is nothing TBH plus I got cool minis at the end of the year. Black Talon has been good so far, not watched the latest Blood Angel thing yet though. I do agree with you the Army building app should be free though
This is spot on. I actually bought 4 kits when I had the app and just list building... Hadn't painted or played in 20 years. But the app drew me back in now that the app isn't available... I'm not looking at kits anymore cause I'm like the stuff I got should be good enough. If it was free they would make more money off the people who enjoy painting and building. Typically those people go the opposite and find cheaper minis or print them or play other games and stray from GW completely.
I already stopped buying anything from GW since early 9th, and actively planned on never playing 10th ever since I saw what horrors they inflicted on my Tau. And somehow still I find that every move they make increases how much I hate them. I thought I would have hit a limit by now.
![ไข้ขึ้นเลย! เมื่อแฝดโดนจัดเต็มวัคซีนครบ2เดือน🤒 [cc] แดนแพทตี้ SS2 | EP.54 |](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/z2VHItnyyvY/mqdefault.jpg)
It's like McDonald's charging you to look at the menu.
Perfect comparison
Kind of? It's not like you can't look at the 'menu' on their website so I think it's more like having a menu that simply says 'burger' on it, but you have to pay to find out the ingredients and nutritional value so you can really make a proper decision. And all the while, there's Russians loitering in the restaurant handing out bootleg 'full' menus for free.
SHHHH! Dont give them ideas!
@@HeretixAevumwahapedia isn’t updated yet so that’s kinda shot
3D printing burgers is the way to go.
Every time I start thinking about getting back into 40k GW do something like this and I remember why I shouldn't.
OPR seems to have hit a balance of old school feel with modern mechanics. They really seem to have hit all the right tweaks that GW dances around to make money.
Yup exactly the same. I play gorkamorka so have tons of orks and grots so to get a decent list together I would only have to buy a bit but every time I think about it they pull something dumb like this and it’s an immediate nope from me. Way to go GW, you’ve lost a bunch of sales to people like me.
Never related so hard to a comment. Pretty much stopped sometime in 7th, tried coming back each following edition, and even with a host of options for pirating rules and whatnot, I settled on just collecting and painting a handle of models that I like, and I occasionally play Kill Teams to scratch the 40k itch. 40k is just a dumpster fire of a game system through-and-through and has been since I started in 5th.
Yep.. I have been feeling the urge to finally finish up my Ork army.. Nah man, I think I'm good.
Just buy third-party miniatures/STL files. GW sucks
I hate our subscription based economy right know, I miss actually owning the things I pay for! I will stick to pen and paper until I find a list building app that works. Great video as always!
Gotta get used to it unfortunately. With the UN and WEF EVERYTHING including your house will be subscription based.
Genuine question, what does the UN and WEF have to do with everything turning into subscriptions?@@Mr_jz_12
Battlescribe is now updated for 10th
@@Mr_jz_12they will try….
@@timunderbakke8756 try? They're already succeeding.
An exclusive world eater model that cant even be used in a world eater army.
What a deal!
Wait what please tell me
@@nyekomimi the world eaters index doesn't have an entry for a Terminator Chaos Lord.
@@jellydamgood Wow, that's just dumb. Also, it's great argument for making various Chaos Legions just one Codex: CSM with different detachement-based rules imho.
@@nyekomimithe world eaters index is a disaster. My fear is that the codex will release in a year and a half with, like, two new kits. GW really screwed up this one
They target ppl like me who just wanna paint and look at cool shit out of their golden youth.
That model is sculpted after one of the most iconic chaos atworks of all time, i would've paid double or twiple the price of wh+ for that.
When you're sinking hundreds of hours into a single miniature, those 50 bucks become irrelevant.
You're the first other person I've heard in a long time saying how making a dedicated app for everything is way worse than just a web-app that works through a browser on a computer, tablet or phone. The current corporate push that every single action we ever have to do needs to be made through its own individual app is astounding to me and I've honestly got to the stage of just not giving many companies my time if they can't respect me enough to allow me to use a webpage.
Proprietary software allows for more control and easier legal coverage (easier to sue essentially).
In addition, in marketing schools nowadays it is taught that you have to occupy the attention of the customer as long as possible (for customer binding). The more attention on your product, the less on products of the competition. Social media "services" like X, Twitch and TH-cam went full force with this since years now.
Your attention has become a currency now too...feel honored....
Privacy protection, restrictions on use of 3rd party cookies - all these things are being heavily regulated (by EU law for example) through the web channel, but they can be circumvented when it's a native app that you fully control. That's the why part.
If it was about ease of development / maintenance, accessibility and user experience then web apps would be the way to go - but sadly that's not the main factor at play 😔
Also, apps can do push notifications, which drag your attention back to the brand at regular, annoying intervals. Trickier to do with a webpage.
In theory I like web based software better but I've had too many that aren't optimized for the device I'm using so I can't access parts of it.
@@2nd_Directorate I can't pay my fuel bills with attention.
The corporate side of GW loves screwing over GW.
The Alpha Legion have infiltrated GW
I'm willing to bet the people in the C-Suites are not gamers, don't care for games, and only give a shit about money.
They're more concerned about holding their fans hostage than anything else.
Yeah it's literally like the alpha legion has implanted sleeper agents into games workshop and is sabotaging them from the top down
"Working on your army list when you're in line at the DMV"
I can feel the rage flowing through you...
Yes yes let it flow through you Luke 🔥
One cannot overestimate GW's ability to seize defeat from the jaws of victory. The love of money is, as they say, the root of all evil.
GW have always taken every opportunity to gouge every last penny from its customers....
Many evils*
@leanja6926I love messing with things but a lot of people don't.
They are actually making it worth it for those people to spend time and money doing something they don't understand or enjoy.
If they were to keep prices for minis reasonable they'll keep lots of customers. But that takes foresight instead of just chasing profits.
people were saying that for years, they still make money, so it seems to be working.
Translation : Money is the root of all evil.
Totally agree. If GW makes more money from the models and accessories than the stat sheets/codexes, an accessible list builder is a must. If you lock it away, I'll buy one or 2 cool looking models but not an army... on second thoughts GW may be accidentally trying to save me money
I am a model lover first and foremost. I have considered running a small army since my local GW store is run by an incredibly excellent dude. This sort of nonsense from GW Mothership makes me not want to. I will stick to the one or two models now and again.
@@liamoneill7692 My thoughts exactly. I bought single models or units now and then for more than a decade. Whenever I think about expanding one of those collections into an actual army and start playing, something like this happens.
While I do prefer the idea of the list builder being free, or even a buck or two, I'll probably try the app based on this. I'm just happy they're not putting all the rules behind a book wall.
@@congobryan5571oh, when the codexes are released I bet you anything there will be no digital only option to buy the rules. The physical book will come with a code to unlock the rules in the app. That will be the only way.
Unless they change drastically from what they did in 9th edition you will have to buy the book to have access to that section of the army builder app so you are behind a paywall and a book wall. @@congobryan5571
The fact alone that their army builder is free has led to many impulse purchases from CB's Infinity range for me.
It's becoming less and less new player friendly, with every added cost it puts people off.
Not to mention its expensive af to begin with. 60$ for plastic? Paints, Brushes, tools etc
It feels like the new player friendliness of GW games comes in cycles. They'll do something that makes the games more accessible and easy to get into, then they'll realize that they can earn more money by increasing prices and making the cheap stuff harder to come by then it goes far enough that there's no good entry point and there's a lack of new players, at which point the cycle will begin anew and GW will release stuff that will make it easier to get into the games. Right now it feels like GW still realizes that there needs to be some entryways into the hobby, with the pretty generous starter set and the combat patrol games, but we'll have to see how long that lasts.
This seems to be happening a lot in the hobby world. Whether it's table top games or other collectables.
But the whole point of 10th edition is to be new player frienddly!
Every now and then I think about getting back into it but the price of re-entry is very steep even though I have the models ready to go. It is far cheaper for me to use my old models in different systems like OPR or 5PFH
Just imagine an army builder app that actually helps you building an army by providing hints, army templates and even build tutorials.
Why we have TH-cam now and pen n paper for last 30 years of playing
That would mean that the people who write the app need to be 40k buffs who play competitive tournaments and scour the Internet for the best synergies and wacky army lists that exists.
We all know that GW will never properly play-test anything, they just make the line of models that they want to sell broken.
Once all stock is out, it's time for a rules update and repeat the cycle for the next faction.
So you want a WAAC Powergamer Dudebro netlist App?
The thing that actually makes me laugh about the army builder being paywalled now is we've all had a chance to use it and found that its not actually very good. Its missing a bunch of functionality that I feel should be reasonably easy to build, and is a bit clunky. While it is improving, we have essentially been dealing with a free beta, so I can only imagine there aren't many folks who would be tempted by it in its current state. Its perfectly fine for free but I really dont think its worth paying for as is.
The UI is so gross like what were they thinking with drop down menus on a stablock??? And why 7 dropdowns 🤮. Who ever creates these ideas is on something
I mostly disagree. It’s not the prettiest to look at, but all my group have been using it in game instead of having cards or print outs and it works beautifully.
I'm amazed at it's functionality personally, but only because the previous app they tried putting out was such a heaping pile of crap. The only functionality I dislike about it is how I have to tap once on a unit, then again on a button in the corner to see its data sheet properly. BattleScribe creates a printable and highly readable list in one button, I'd like to see something similar in Battle Forge.
I find the app has good functionality and is easy to use. Was already subscribed to WH+ which lets be honest is a minimal amount anyway, so don’t really see an issue here, unless the app isn’t maintained properly, and so far it has been. People that are happy to pay £5-25 for a small plastic soldier moaning about paying like £5 per month to use an app I find quite bizarre. It would be good if they could find a way to give new players a free usage period although no doubt people would abuse it.
The 9th Ed version was clunky and buggy enough that I just cancelled my Warhammer+ subscription, and nothing I've seen about this new version has made me want to go back
100%... When I got back into the hobby I came across Battlescribe and spent hours building armies... which got me excited about the game again... and 'encouraged' me to splash out on the plastic! Free marketing, right there... and that wasn't even their software... madness!
And to think, they've been trying their damn hardest to shut it down for years.
The word "roadblock" you used really does encapsulate how I feel about this. The army builder and index have been super useful for me getting back into 40K, but sticking such a basic function of the game behind a $60 paywall is a real stick in the craw.
The whole game is behind a $600 (minimum) paywall. What's 60 more, or 80 on a month to month basis for the next 12 months
@@bruderfaust5021 Its the difference between choice, and implied requirement.
I can choose to spend that $600 (you're being generous) or not to play the game. But since I've already spent that money, having the army builder as an enhancement to that is a good deal. But making me pay for services I don't want in order to get something useful that enhances the money ive already spent... that's a dick move. As said in the video, I'd be happier if it was just a subscription for only the army builder, and not for a setvice i have zero desire for. In short, I'd have to pay for trash I don't want in order to use an item i do, and that's some BS.
"You want some ketchup for your fries that you ordered? That comes with a bowl of soup you must purchase separately."
Battletech and Infinity have great free online army builders that are updated as new units and errata are produced.
Exactly this kind of thing is why I've moved away from anything GW, because it just feels like they're disrespecting their customers at every opportunity they have.
I fully agree with you on the list builder being a key tool to get people hooked and that it should be freely accessible. I remember spending loads of time building different lists and trying different gimmicks in BattleScribe and then actively looking for models to specifically extend my collection in a way that I could play those lists.
I actually avoid going into GW stores because their sales policies basically make the shops themselves very anti-consumer and anti-hobbyist. I thought it was just because our local store is run by That Guy but I moved cities to study at uni and the store over there was basically the same. Apparently it's just GW policy to train sales people like that - pushy, difficult, and angry when you mention any brand other than Citadel (I nearly got kicked out of the store for recommending W&N Series 7 brushes to a new friend).
@@robinfox4440 You mean *anti-customer*
GWS are very PRO-consumer, as they always direct you towards the most popular/newest products on offer.
Customers make informed and gauged choices; consumers buy what they are told to.
OPR all the way. I just play for headcannon & the storytelling.
Alot of solo Planet28, the derelect for Planet28 is fun.
Plus i started to make my own minnis!!! This hobby is so much more than GW.
'This hobby is so much more than GW' - I couldn't agree more!
I see GW as just the entry port to the hobby. The hotels are vastly overpriced and you have to eat in expensive restaurants, but once you get to the next town there are cheaper bed-and-breakfast hotels and you can buy takeaways, and in the one after that you can rent a room that suits your budget and cook your own meals.
@@sirrathersplendid4825 That is a good analogi.
GW needs to familiarize itself with the concept of corporate espionage. No group of people can be this incompetent on their own.
Yeah it's astonishing just seeing their business decisions from a outside looking in perspective. They seem to have a complete and utter lack of understanding of.. just what kind of company they are and how they actions will affect the reputation and stability of their business over a extended period of time. It's like they're trying to turn their consumer base against them and force themselves into bankruptcy, they refuse to automate their production lines as well. Their stock is always out of stock which costs them money, and paying workers to make their models also costs them money. it's just horrific as a shareholder I would be mortified with the companies business decisions.
@dominusbalial835 As a shareholder you would be very wealthy, and would back each decision they make.
Welcome to warhammer. You sound like you're new to the game.
This shit, and worse, has been going on for the last couple of decades
I think you underestimate the British for incompetence
It isn't incompetence its keeping the shareholders happy it's a pandemic in everything from video to table games and movies I could go on but you get my point, the shareholders want money and that's the end of it they don't care how terrible the product becomes as long as they get their money
@@jacktowers7533racism is awesome
GW´s marketing team is atrocious since over a decade at least. The only thing that keeps them alive is their name brand in the niche that tabletop gaming still is.
I have a degree in marketing and i have trouble counting the number of times their decisions induced a heart attack.
They need stronger competition. Privateer press at its peak is the closest I've seen in the last couple of decades but nowhere near the sheer presence of gw
@@hydra66 It is a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy. Competition would need to put money into it (starterboxes, lore, several factions) to challenge GW. But they don´t because they think they can´t do it.
They don´t realize that at this moment so many people are just fed up with GW and their price hikes, that it would be easy to carve out a good base-market segment.
Mantic games firefight was my choice over gw
@@2nd_Directorate its not just their name though, its their product. their lore/world and their models are the best in the space by a long, long, long, long way. Theres plenty of other model companies that make their own models and they are out there to buy, and none of them are anywhere near as consistently good as GWs minis.
@@2nd_Directorate there are discruntled wargamers for decades. Warhammer is the only one with brand recognition outside of people who already play wargames. I know some 40k fans who know all the lore and stuff, but never touched a single mini. that is a hard feat to replicate.
I hate listbuilding, but the army builder from OPR is really the best and I even enjoy making lists with it.
I hate list building as well. I play because it's a story and it's a culmination of hours of modelling to get a good looking game happening so worrying about legal wargear is tedious to me since I field units that are fun to paint and look good so anything that's tick box that lets that get done so I can play then that's great.
I'm not paying for it, though.
List building is my favorite part of the game.
@@The_Tradwife thank you.
and it is completely free, imagine that :D
What will most likely happen is that free army builders will pop everywhere on the internet.
That didn't happen in 9th, everyone used battlescribe the whole time
@@MrMaharg79 I'm sure Chat GPT 4 will make you the perfect army if you ask it xD
@@Jenjak i think i love this idea. it can make the custom chapter, craftworld, hive, what have you as well.
@@Jenjakit's what I used lol for fun.
Battlescribe is your friend.
I often go through this process of -Getting into 40k lore -Wanting to get into some of the tabletop stuff -Remembering it is entirely exploitative and anti-consumer and the lore is the only good part of the IP.
i kind of don't want to be that guy, but one page rules. (probably only if you have buddies you can convince to play to.)
@@ddis29nothing wrong with mentioning grim dark future by one page rules, even if you go for the £5 a month patreon and get the character/unit calculator to put charactwr and unlisted units into the GDF rule system, you can do that in a month, download all the rules qnd codexes you need and you only paid a £5 for it all! GW literally use 40k as a cash cow and nothing else
The models are great too. But if you want cool, easily accessible lore, and cool models then Gundam and Gunpla is the way to go.
@@shaunlavalley1131 I dig Gundam, put together some model's years ago. I've taken to painting Battletech just because the figures are super affordable, and not nearly as scummy as GW tabletop.
They are trashing the lore as well. Remember their statement that 40k is a dark and horrible place but "we" are not dark and horrible people, so "we" will purposefully be creating new characters who represent our idealised political beliefs about 2020s Earth.
I mean in the end, it's just the latest move by GW that shows how tone deaf they can be. They are the KINGS of bad decision making in the world of nerd gaming.
If I could sum up GW's tone deafness in one image, it would be that atrocious airbrush they did when someone finally convinced the higher ups that us nerds were using airbrushes.
It’s the Tzaangor effect. They lost money from WH+ after investing heavily into it, so they take something good to bundle their flop item with. Hence, the Daang Tzaangor effect.
Interesting this Tzaangor effect, what you referring to ? I know that there are / were Tzaangors that were AoS only, then they had Tzaangors that were WH40K also all in the same box (with WH40K chainsaws and pistols etc) but then they got rid of the WH40K Tzaangors box and split their WH40K weapons as a separate upgrade pack to buy with the AoS Tzaangors. Don't think I don't spot these business practices !
@@davedogge2280 I too would like to know what the Tzaangor effect is.
@@davedogge2280 The 40K Tzaangors were not very good in a Thousand Sons army. They’re GREAT in AoS, but in 40K they’re lackluster. Nobody wanted them. So, GW threw 20 of them into the Thousand Sons Combat Patrol box. There are only six models in that box that are not Tzaangors. They did the same thing with Space Marine Impulsors. They throw an unwanted item into a bundle box and tell you it’s a good deal. And now they’re trying to sell WH+ as a “better value” bundle by including an app that should be free. The Tzaangor effect.
@@davedogge2280the tzangor effect is they over invested in making tzangor sprues that nobody asked for, so they now package them in literally every Tzeentch related 40K or AoS box set. Look at the thousand sons combat patrol and how it’s literally “oops all tzangors”. Nobody who plays thousand sons wants a million of these little beaky beast men we want the marines of the army. But GW has to push them out somehow.
That’s what he means.
They didn't lose money, they made a profit albeit a little one
I want to like this video twice!
The GW business model sees the sales to entrenched hobbyists as cream on their sales cake, and Warhammer+ is a tool for getting more cream on their cake.
The only way to change their mind is to hit their wallet and do it loudly, as was demonstrated by the D&D community earlier this year. The GW community stood around and thought it was hilarious, but you can bet they’ll just fork out their cash to GW.
Absolutely agree with you. Putting it behind their flailing streaming service is a terrible decision. I subscribed to it for a couple months to check it out and it was not worth the price. Not enough content for that much when compared to other services.
Warhammer + definitely not worth the money.
Thats right. I found angels of death worth watching, thats just a few hours long. Easily watched in a week. Really there is nothing else on it.
What really adds salt in the wound is how much content they took off of TH-cam in order to create their oh so amazing streaming service, while telling the rest of us such fan-based enthusiasm was now verboten. Some idiot in corporate just thinks "streaming services" are the way to go. You see this with corps that have changes in leadership, and the leadership always wants to chase the Big Thing they think will make money - be it video games, subscription-based services, or streaming. Hasbro/WOTC is a good example.
I've just fallen in love with One Page Grimdark Future. All of the fun, none of the BS.
I remember the old days when I was a beardling. I had to subscribe to… a pencil and a piece of paper. It was something that made maths fun. And it made me buy LOADS of minis.
Been away for nearly two decades. I want to, but I’m in two minds about getting back into the hobby because of this stuff. I just don’t have the disposable income for apps and subs and what have you. I could acquire a small army in time, pace myself so I can paint it up really nicely and that… but the idea of paying every month just to organise the lists and whatnot… it feels like something I can’t really commit to. Especially since I’d be coming back, not already established with loads of opponents and what have you.
I dunno. It is, as you say, “off putting” to a recidivist noob. Other games don’t do this, so I’ll probably focus on those instead.
Having the rules for ever unit and the army builder be free is a major factor in my decision to get into a Wargame, the master unit list website is one of the biggest reasons I choose Battletech Alpha Strike over other games.
How strange that GW tries to squeeze more money with a non consumer friendly move, didn't really expect it...
Jokes aside, I hope for 40k players that other "solutions" will come out (don't know if BattleScribe is still on, but that was a good solution). Otherwise, I guess that paper & pencil are always available. Meanwhile, I'll keep enjoying my free Infinity army builder, which has just been updated with the new optional rules, again for free.
BattleScribe has been updated for 10th, thank the Emperor
@@freddiebates5795 hope they won't face any problem from GW scu...legal department, since I think that a good chunk of players are still around 40k thanks to them. Not that GW wouldn't mind making another dumb move if it meant squeezing some extra cash, but I hope this time they'll be smart.
I can't believe I thought for years that Infinity was the more expensive option. I can't believe how wrong I was.
Well battlescribe, or use grim dark future from one page rules as a complete alternative rule system
@mrmaster9801 I only play 40k because battlescribe its already hard to make a list checking so many PDFs and statblocks, then setting up time with friends, setting up the table its already a heavy time investment im not paying for something that sucks.if battlescribe goes under i would play the game maybe 3 times a year compared to maybe once a month
I'm a returning wargamer and the day they announced this I started looking for something else to play other than 40k. Kill team, warcry and moonstone all have great free support online so all my money goes into models which is where my limited budget should be spent!
Use your models with OnePageRules
I notice 2 of the three game you listed are GW.
It’s a terrible idea on their part. One of many. My friends and I recently decided to turn our backs on current GW after finding 10th lacklustre and dusted off our old fantasy models for some games of 6th and 7th edition fantasy. It’s incredibly refreshing to be outside the bubble of GW money drives and space marine parades.
Now, you just need to ditch the GW rules altogether and play something that’s actually fun with your armies. l would suggest the scifi/fantasy mod for Chain of Command, which is vastly superior in every respect.
Looking forward to Warhammer: the Old World then?
I remain optimistic... But I'm not holding my breath.@@ChrisKCook
I recently played a game of Battlefleet Gothic.
I agree it's great playing abandoned games beyond GW's meddling.
Well, they did the same with White Dwarf - they binned that off and that was effectively a monthly catalog for their goods THAT THE PUNTERS PAID FOR! I'm sure that they'll have lost a lot of casual interest in their products because of that. They eventually reinstated the magazine. Maybe they'll see sense this time around too? Shame they didn't learn from the previous experience though.
I bought thd most recent WD after being gifted Primaris marines from the new box by a mate. First WD I've bought in years.
Really naff. Waste of £6. Told me very little & the 40k batrep was garbage.
GW’s greed is untethered and knows no bounds
GW have always taken every opportunity to gouge every last penny from its customers
They think themselves gods! GOLDEN GODS!
I need my list building TOOLS!
Wyrd offering their app for free was great. Help me get other people into the game.
I wish their app would tell you what box a figure was from. That's my only complaint.
I’ve paid the annual price for WH+ and sold both models to justify the cost, but I wouldn’t pay for the army builder specifically and the animation content is now coming out at a snail’s pace, probably because the subs are so low they can’t justify the cost to produce a ton more. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw a majority of the video content go away and the army builder be left holding the bag in a year or two (at a reduced monthly cost).
I just love how they took the best free animated content on YT, put it behind a paywall, told everyone they're not allowed to make fan animations anymore, and now the animations themselves are barely even being produced. Fucking GW, man.
One-page rules army builder is damn near perfect!! If your patreon you can actually build your own stats for your custom miniatures! I love it!
Not only are they moving it behind the paywall, current monthly paying subscribers are having the price put up by a £1 per month while keeping the yearly price the same.
But with only 136,000 Warhammer + subscribers they’re not making enough money to keep the shareholders happy
I think this is the key thing Warhammer + was pretty much a massive flop and the subscriber numbers aren't getting the costs back. As pointed out in the video, Lore, Batreps, painting...all of that can be gotten for free on youtube, usually to a higher production standard (Play On's 40k in 40 minutes has very good editing and production values and I'd argue is a better brand ambassador than anything GW puts out).
The painting advice is probably literally just the 'eavy metal style which Duncan covers already plus other styles as well (them losing Duncan was a pretty big blow to their online presence, especially when he was popular enough to make his own youtube channel AND paints brand and be a pretty big success). Lore is covered by fuck knows how many channels, from the cringey edgy teenage boy style takes of Majorkill for that crowd to the listicals and shorts of Weshammer to more indepth coverage by Luetin09 and Occulus Imperia.
So all you're left with is the expensive animation (hence why the early hammer and bolter episodes were basically motion comics because it's cheaper) and the free miniature as the key draw and that's not going to draw enough people in. So tagging the need to use Warhammer Plus onto the Army Builder app is literally just a way for corporate to try to make up the numbers and, like you said, keep the shareholders happy.
GW has “Blood from a stone” as one of the pillars of their business plan.
40k's dominance in the wargaming marketplace probably means GW thinks it doesn't need to use the army builder to drive sales, so it's only worth their time if it's making them some money. After all 3rd parties are already happy to make army builders at no cost to GW and GW don't seem to struggle to sell almost everything they can produce. If GW felt their position in the market was under more pressure than it is we'd see them doing more consumer friendly actions than they currently do.
Best T-shirt ever. I remember buying every ziplock bag of Carwars games and addons I could find back in the early 80s. And still have many of them locked up in an old cardboard box that my wife threatens to throw away. Heresy!
I hope GW watches this video! The 'tinkering' and the subsequent temptation to buy was inspired. Next, they'll be charging you for the air you breathe if you enter their stores.
They do. But not the board because why should they care?
Have you ever thought of offering consultation services to the GW team? 😋
took them 25+ Years to make a fun working army builder but only seconds to break our hearts
Honestly, I've been using the warhammer app for list building and everything you've said about maintaining engagement is so spot on. The moment it goes behind the paywall though, I'm switching to battlescribe. It works fine for my needs and its free. I don't want a warhammer+ account or a monthly charge and I have options. GW really do need to look at the app as a loss leader. I've created about a dozen lists and my desire to buy the minis for several of them (beyond the armies I already collect) is strong. If I'm not playing with the app though, whats my driver to expand into new armies?
if they wanted to make more cash with the app they could have impelemented a "where to buy" button or a link to the webstore for every unit. so you can tinker and think "damn i want THIS unit! its cool!" oh look... a link to the store and another 100 bucks gone 😂 i used the app and it was nice but now i'll drop it like a venomous snake...
Yeah they could even do the webshop "Other people have bought this"-thing, where they recommend a unit that works well with the one you are looking at. They could turn it into such a money sink for people like me, but nope.
I completely agree. That app would drive a ton of new sales and get new players. I would sit on the AOS one and look at units and then order things based on seeing it on the app.
i now exlusivly play other games, mostly because of the rules changes and range changes but that sucks to hear, still enjoy some of their miniatures for collecting and painting but other than that i've been and will be abstaining from GW games.
It's decisions like this that make OPR my system of choice for playing with my Gee Dub models. There's no way in hell I'm signing up for warhammer plus because they've locked the listbuilder behind it, I'm just going to use a different list builder, especially since the official one doesn't have the essential function of being able to print out a quick reference page of everything you have in your army. the app is still a good rules reference, though, so I'll keep using it for that.
I'm going to have my first game of 10th this weekend, and from what I've read it looks like I'll almost certainly like it more than 9th, but if this is any indication then Grimdark Future is still going to be my jam.
I completely agree. Yet even in my casual group I have people defending the choice of GW. This basically led me to believe that GW has finished building up their base of whales sometime in 9e and now the business is catering only to them, the rest be damned. The whales will consume anything GW offers and will fanatically stand by any change to their beloved systems, regardless of how idiotic the change is. OPR is great, but it just cannot gain steam in my local area, because people just can't imagine playing a different game than 40k.
Basically Games Workshop have established the one thing any company wants, a Lifestyle Brand. Hasbro has done the same with D&D now you get people who don't play the game they just like the 'brand', they'll buy 40k T-shirts, mugs, read all the books, make being into 40k (it's always 40k, I rarely ever see it with Age of Sigmar) their whole personality but they don't actively engage with what was the core part of the hobby, the tabletop game, the miniatures and painting said miniatures, they don't engage with any of that side of the hobby and just spend their time arguing on internet forums about lore and such.
This is why OPR isn't ever going to be as big purely because it lacks a lot of lore (namely because most of its stuff is just legally distinct GW stuff), it's purely tabletop game focused which is great for miniature wargamers but those 'lifestylers' won't ever engage with it.
@luketfer
1. No one ever argued that OPR was going to become bigger than 40K.
2. OPR is just a rule set so it isn't incompatible with GW lore.
@@arielsanchez465 Oh I've seen plenty of comments that OPR is the 'Warhammer Killer' from people a bit too enthusiastic about it. As I pointed out the 'lifestylers' don't give a fuck about rulesets, they're largely not interested in the game at all, they're interested in the IP and 'lore', which is what GW is transitioning towards by making 'Games Workshop' or more explicitly 40k a lifestyle brand instead of a miniatures and ruleset brand.
I think a mass email complaint campaign is due for GW. This paywall is a total slap in the face of existing customers and potential new entrants to the hobby. They need to be told that people are not happy about this.
That video where Uncle Atom realizes GW is shifting from a model company to an IP driven company. With the rise of 3D printing, revenue streams to get at the IP is Warhammer's future. Enjoy.
Yup, she’s a dying franchise. Amazon has its hooks in now. All that’s left is a few years of waiting for that to release, then the implosion begins.
As someone who studied business development and marketing, nearly every decision GW does baffles me so damn hard. I seriously can't imagine anything coming nearly close to the stupidity of GW.
Warhammer+ doesn't fully work where I live (Austira), meaning, I could only be read the stuff and watch maybe painting tutorials and battlereports, both of which you find plenty on TH-cam. So why in the world would I subscribe with the full price for a aervice I can't really use all it's offerings. And now this. Bravo GW, bravo. Stupid piss-face suits.
Love the warhammer 40k setting, always have. So I will most likely continue playing whatever dumb greedy move they make. However, owning a 3d printer I cannot see myself buying models from them again or paying a subscription for stuff that should be free... They lost me as a customer.
Whenever there are complaints about GW's rulesets being poorly written or balanced, defenders always say things like "GW is a model company, not a rules company".
But, like, they are charging money for the rules too?
Bummed cause I’m barely getting int 40K and I found the app very helpful to figure out what I would want to buy next
Don’t get too down, you can still look at the index rules and datasheets for free and that can tell you what you want to buy. We’re just losing the list builder.
"what i want to buy next" lol
I absolutely love the OPR army builder. The best thing is that they have a bunch of third party armies included. So, I've been building an army from Dragon Trapper's Lodge and I can really easily use the OPR army builder.
GW has been taking ideas from the video games industry since they came under new management after 8th edition...Remember when they made loot boxes? Pepperage farm remembers...Also, all I ever needed for building a list is notepad and a calculator. I don't get how that's so hard...
Hasbro…..
@@grimgoreironhide9985 I'm sorry?
@intense_pickle1232 The CEO of GW is a former Hasbro employee. Once he joined GW that's when things became a money grab. These business practices you see made by GW are classic Hasbro.
Back in 9th edition, when I first discovered onepagerules's army builder, I literally spent hours brewing up lists for Grimdark Future more than I have with 40k. The condensed view with keywords popping up on touch was amazing for learning. Seriously one of the best army building lists out there. AND IT WAS FREE.
OH MY GOD. This has honestly dampened my intrest in playing 40K and I just started to play honestly such a dog shite change...
This sounds like if I was running a business that sells lights, and I made an app that would let you preview how lights would look / reflect off of a variety of different room types, how different color temperatures would look, had all the info on them, how much money you could save by switching to various lights based on your square footage...
And then told my customers that they would have to pay a subscription in order to use my app.
Except worse because lights aren't impulse purchases nearly as much as a purely luxury hobby like wargaming is. This is so nutty of them.
Just ordered a $190 dollar box, had a missing piece and a few bent. GW stuffed my emails for four weeks... So just found a DHGate seller who's getting my next GW order. 😂 Suck it GW
Chinese recasts so hot right now 😂
@@BriarLeaf00 The seller sent me the pics and it no joke had less flash then my GW "Perfect" armigers.
The problem I have is that anything that's subscription based isn't something someone kids will get. Parents won't pay for that because they won't see an actual physical thing and that means new people will miss something that makes playing easier to get into.
When you make an app entirely subscription that what that means is they won't install it and that means you remove them seeing your logo on their phone every day and you won't get push notifications, you wo't get their email on your mailing list and it's out of sight out of mind.
That is the reason shops have their own apps, to make sure you see their business every day and will be more likely to buy.
one thing not mentioned in the vid, was that they are increasing the price of WH+ to accommodate the value add of this app. I'm not sure I have the numbers correct but is it an extra $1 per month or and extra 1 sterling per month?
1 pound I believe
GW: look at all the engagement we get on this app
also GW: let's reduce engagement on this app by installing a paywall for something that people don't actually need to use
1. OPR listbuilder is the gold standard. Their Patreon "make your own list" fuction is amazing too. GW's janky offering doesn't come close.
2. OPR as a game is 10/10, compared to GW's thin gruel antique broken games, e.g. 40k 10th being 2/10.
3. I subbed for Warhammer+ for the first year to check it out. I was hoping it was going to be an awesome resevoir of great GW content. Never again. It is NOWHERE NEAR being value for money. 95% of the animations are awful. Some were little more than narrated slideshows - clearly cobbled together on the cheap. The Vault is awful. A disjointed few back issues of White Dwarf, with all the game content, old rules etc. stripped out - you know, the stuff that's actually interesting. The painting videos were worse than most of the stuff you can see for free on TH-cam. The early battle reports were dire. The presenters were unengaging, the reports disjointed, and the visuals surprisingly bad, with models obscured by video effects like snow on the screen. And the camera angles used (mostly top down) meant you simply couldn't see what was going on half the time. The production quality was amatuer (why are you shakily filming the guy who is moving the models rather than filming the midels he's moving?!) Far better offerings for free on YourTube. The Loremaster videos were OK if you're into that sort of thing, but again there's better stuff on TH-cam. Same with the learn to play videos. There were "subscriber offers" apparently but I only received one in the whole year, and it wasn't worth it (a £10 voucher - what can you buy at GW for £10?). As soon as my "free" miniature turned up I cancelled the sub on that day. Now they've paywalled the army builder (which is inexplicably an app rather than a webpage - i assume so they can monetise it easier?), I'm even less likely than the 0% chance I had of resubbing to GWs ridiculous "streaming service".
With so many FAR BETTER options out there it amazes me that people still give money to GW, while GW kick them in the metaphorical teeth.
Tail end of 7th ed/ dawn of 8th ed, there was a listbuilder app that was web based. It was essentially GWs current listbuilder, but it was better (if u changed how many models were in a unit, it would automatically adjust the stock wargear). It had pictures, points, the works.
GW took it down with a copyright strike. Funny thing is, that web app was free, and GW wants to charge for an inferior product..
Completely agree. The App has been great to get new starters engaged in their armies. The subscription is an absolute turn-off.
Something you didn't mention is that this move is coinciding with the first codex for 10th being released, the free index datasheets were one thing but GW were never going to allow players to bypass the codex purchase requirement to access the codex rules for free or for a nominal cost.
You can make the argument that codex rules should be free too for the same reason, but the decision makers in Nottingham don't agree and they're not going to allow a backdoor route to the same end goal either.
I’m 100% sure GW won’t feel anything regarding this decision. Everyone will still buy models and play game.
And this makes me sad 😞
The models and lore are just that good, especially these days. Can't quit that plastic crack.
i was so excited when they started 10th with free rules and codex. but putting the army builder behind a paywall goes against the foundation they started with. on ramps and ease of use are needed. like you said it needs to be easy and free to drive sales for models and paints. the more people play and think about playing the more they want to spend and justify spending.
Now that all of my homeclub's AoS armies are 'caught up' with 3rd edition I'm feeling like this is the perfect time to get off the acquisition rollercoaster and let GW sail off into the sunset without me. I did enjoy that brief period of "New GW" though. That was nice for a hot second.
Yeah that 5 or 6 year period of New GW was great. Shame it didn't last!
I dont buy subscriptions, EVER. I am used to the "pay once, own forever" business model of the 90s. You can take the "pay forever, own never" model and jog on over the nearest hill. I am not paying multiple times for something only to lose everthing the second I stop paying and this is absolutely the hill I die on. Now I get things on the internet under the "pay never, own forever" model.
Your move, GW.
Totally agree. My previous organization also didn’t understand that marketing is a cost center. They figured they paid for salaries why would you need more money for lead generating activities when they’re not revenue streams.
That being said, I don’t know the development cost and maintenance of a web-based army building tool that is regularly updated for a large corporation.
What I think these corps forget about is price elasticity and underpricing the cost of entry over a long period of time is a great way to subsidize your costs and potentially make a little bit of money. BUT (like you’re saying) be an amazing on-ramp for purchases, which is obviously the core business.
I mean hell, I pay $10 a year for a video games collection app to track what I own and see game prices. You better believe it gets me to discover and buy more video games.
In his latest monthly live chat, Gaetano (One Page Rules CEO) described his company's approach as "agile" - a term borrowed from software development which implies a co-operative relationship between vendor and customers with systemic mechanisms to enable iterative development and review. OPR's corporate attitude is based on making everything as transparent as possible and providing products that are as useful as possible. Many other game publishers and miniature designers follow variations on this approach In contrast, GW seem to be de-evolving to a 'we talk, you listen', 'take it or leave it' corporate dictatorship in which the talented writers and designers, customers and retailers are all tied by the company's inflexible 'monetize everything' roadplan. It's crying shame that they've taken this approach and a wonder that such a strong enthusiastic community persists despite being permanently held hostage.
I'm pretty new to warhammer, but from what I've seen in the last 18 months I have no idea how anyone could put so much into this hobby. It's like building a house on loose sand. I purchased a 3d printer and will be more than happy to never buy another GW product.
Great video Sir - hit the nail on the head as usual! Had my first game of 40K in years a few days ago at a friends place, just using his old 40k minis, as he was thinking of buying new armies after testing the Battleforge app. It was the app that made it work for me, easy to use, show cased the new minis for 40k armies, and got me excited again about units and armies I could buy and use to play 40k. I was seriously considering getting back in to 40k - crazy! However, making me pay for Warhammer Plus just to get access to the app means I just won't bother getting back into 40k. Using that simple piece of software had me seriously thinking about diving back in, given the ease of army building and playing with just using the app. Probably would have ended up buying $1000's of GW miniatures and hobby items...again! 😄, Probably would have inevitably started playing other GW games... even more $$$ 😂 This decision to put it behind a Warhammer Plus subscription means I probably won't do those things. Why? Because I do not like being forced to pay for subscription-based products, especially when priced to include things I don't want/need. As explained in the video, using the app created and drove my enthusiasm to build and design lists which in turn increased my desire to purchase the figures - without access to this readily available free advertising and promotion of GW's own products, my interest to explore playing 40k tabletop lessens dramatically. In turn it makes me think I'll keep exploring Infinity: The Game by Corvus Belli and encourage my mates to check out their free rules and army app, as it also is a very enticing game. The miniatures for Infinity are beautiful and they have also released simpler easy play rules, for free naturally. Weird, it turns out you'll not the only sparkly fish in the ocean GW.... So, this is yet another missed opportunity and classic GW fail. You almost had me again with clever marketing, but congratulations on screwing that up GW 😆 you managed to snatch defeat out of the jaws of victory once again. Lucky save for me maybe...or a win for Corvus Belli... 🤔 😅
Loving the t-shirt 😊 I started playing Car Wars after buying the original little black 'rack hanger' box at a small Games Day back in '85.
Also.... does the vault include the 'Thrudd The Barbarian' comic strips? 🤔 😜
I think it goes back only by about 10 years, and randomly at that.
Thanks for the video! I had considered picking up Leviathan for the 'nids to jump back into 40k after a 13-14 year hiatus, but I'm not dealing with GW's shit. I don't *want* to resin print a whole OPR alien bugs army, because that's a lot more work and only marginally cheaper than buying a box of plastic, but I will.
GW if you want to F*** me in this day and age, you at least need to buy me dinner first (I'll have a list builder for an app, thanks).
This is the final thing that prove that I won't be spending money on Warhammer+.
It's good that the hobby is growing, BUT i don't like where is heading. There is a difference between easy access and have to buy or subscribe on things you really don't need.
There used to be a time when it was a creative hobby. Now its more like fill in the right colors.
It used to be your creation of stories that matter, now its like playing video games.
The rules themselves should not be revenue sources either: they should all be available for free digitally; they should sell physical books at cost, or just give you PDFs you can print yourself.
I couldn't agree more. I've recently been fortunate enough to get a deathwatch combat patrol off a friend cheaply. Just yesterday, I made a large purchase of plastic because I've had the freedom to mess about with my lists in the app. I have been messing with the lists during my lunch break/before bed/during meals and I haven't even played my first game yet.
As a brand new player, without the ease of access to the forge, I doubt I'd be diving into the hobby as hard as I am.
Love your Car Wars t-shirt! But what did you made Steve Jackson work on?
I ended up buying 2 additional Conquest: Last Argument of Kings armies because their rules are all on their army builder for free.
I'll consider going the Warhammer+ way if it gives me enough resources to be considered worth it but I'll likely build my lists using lists of tournament winners and stuff like that along with my own theorycrafting and just add the points on paper.
Love the Car Wars T shirt. "The right of way goes to the biggest guns". Great game.
“You could literally from the toilet buy a unit.” My spirit brother.
GW are learning the lessons so many companies have in the past, creating compelling digital content costs time and/or money and it's not something you can do half-hearted. It's been pretty clear to date, GW have created digital content in-house, using existing staff and resources, which is quirky, nerdy, geeky and fun... when staff have time to create it aside from their regular job of writing rule books, designing packaging, editing a magazine etc. So the content tends to be sporadic, rushed and charming and the audience is okay, because it's free and about what they want. It also leaves massive room for GW customers/game players to fill in the gaps with their imagination. It's also the British way... for example the production values of Dr Who through the 1970's and 1980's vs Battlestar Galactica or Buck Rodgers. Now back to the future and GW have been shocked to see creative people use their IP to create amazing content and tools, but not grasping that it's been done via love and a lot of time vs. a traditional studio model of get a big bag of money and hire as many people/tools and get it done... yes, it costs more, but once it's working you just keep rolling the content out. GW is a massive siloed business that not only owns the IP, they own the manufacturing and retailing as well... so at their core, the business is running a store, with people coming in the door to buy and all activity needs to lead to people coming into the store (and coming back). Warhammer+ was created to replicate the store experience and also enhance it. It would have cost a reasonable amount of money to set up and keep running and they have now learnt 2 years on that creating more original content is really more expensive than they thought, so now they are trying to find more products and services to add to it. Rightly or wrongly it's a more a sandbox for them and it's future could easily see it shuttered and all the content becomes free (or vanishes back in a vault), or it expands to included access to other content such as digital games (mobile, PC, console etc.), a print your own mini service, or downloadable STL files. For me, I think the bigger question is what should they do to make the army building exercise easier, because if it needs an app (free or behind a paywall), then it's too fucking complicated to begin with... and that's a problem.
The thing I noticed about 10th is that models that people didn’t use in 8th & 9th became needed or useful , and that units people did use got point cost increases or units where dumbed down which is a very clever way to drive sales on units people didn’t use or buy before.
Adeptus Custodes player from 8th ed.
This is what happens when the bean counters become the game designers. They will soon be charging us admission to their stores.
also for opr you can use custom armies made by people, you can find wip to ones that are full complete and verified ones, patron to make your own but they give info to make it without I believe, I'm definitely enjoying trying to make my own army of nobles that are more single models with large variety of weapons and buffs, but lighter is easier to shoot while heavy isn't but have better armor, need to learn how to make minis just for these models though and that's the hard part as theirs not to much info
Lots of excellent points, well said. However...
Everything you criticise is extremely on brand for Games Workshop. This is a running theme for them since... at least for as long as I have been in the hobby, which is the late 90s. For some odd reason they absolutely do not understand the concept of "spend money to make money", they never did. Maybe they never will.
This is - changing topic a bit here - one of the reasons why we will probably never get over the "Marine oversaturation in 40K". To GW it seems to look ONLY like "Marines sell, so do more", when in reality Marines sell well because they are featured so heavily since the inception of 40K (thus have easy brand recognition, ease of access, thus greater customer base with Marines in their collection, thus more people willing to buy more Marines, etc.). It has become a positive feedback loop - you could call it a self-fulfilling prophecy - a long time ago.
It never dawned on anybody at GW - or at least nobody able to make the right decisions - that by investing into other factions (thus making them more appealing, widening THEIR "customer base" etc.) similar effects and most importantly more sales could be generated. Nothing of this is new or hard to grasp, but GW is unwilling or unable to act accordingly.
In this case I hope it bites them in the ass more than usual. I doubt it will, but hope dies last...
And thank you for yet another excellent video!
I have had Warhammer + for about 6 months now and to be honest, have been on the fence about canceling it after my year is over. I love the exclusive models and even though I don't play chaos or AoS, paid extra for the second one and now both are in prime positions on my shelf of my favorite GW figures along with Helbrecht and my various dreadnought. Besides their master class paintings videos, nothing else has seemed interesting to me so I have completely ignored it. Now that the app is included, I look at it as a $38 kit and a $22 yearly subscription to the app, that is much more value to me than before where I was just looking at it as a $60 exclusive model. I will still buy the physical copy of the books for the two armies I play, Black Templars and Orks, but have no plans to but the books for the other 8 or 9 armies that I just collect just for something different unless I decided to build one up into a playable army. For the $22, that alone is worth it, hell, for the full price of $60 I couldn't buy 3 of the books for my other factions. So I feel that including it in the Warhammer +, added a ton of value to the subscription and am very happy they didn't make it a second subscription as I was afraid they would.
I have Warhammer+ and never understood the hate towards it. Your points are all 100% valid, but also just criticisms, not hate. For $60, I get a free mini that would be ~$45 (and 3 out of 4 were very cool), and a $10 voucher. That means it's like $5 for some shows I'll binge to catch up every few months.
Personally though, I think the smartest thing they could do is tweak the model to make it a net $0 to the customer via vouchers. For example, make it $10 a month for the app and the shows. Drop the "free" mini (maybe keep exclusive access to buy) and then every month you get a $10 GW store voucher that's valid and stackable for 13 months. You'll get some people who use the $10 every month on stuff and supplement with their own cash, some who save up the full $120 (still spending their own cash, just not as much), and even some who forget about the vouchers and so it's an easy $10 that GW still makes.
Edit: and the consumer feels like they're not being taken advantage of. Getting "free" stuff always makes an associated cost seem more palatable. Like when you get the free monthly games from xbox/ps subscriptions.
I really do have to agree with your sentiments overall. It feels like so much less of a premium bonus (the list builder) than it does a baseline core feature for ease of use, and I feel like as you said restricting use overall can only damage the playerbase, potential customerbase for GW, and the accessibility of the game overall which has always had a perceived huge wall of accessibility to overcome looking in from the outside.
At the end of the day it sucks, and I'm still happy enough just printing out datacards from the free indexes for a game, but to many people thats not an option and beyond that I personally fear for the wall this core feature being paywalled might have on people who for whatever reason might not be able to make a list in another way. For some disabled or differently abled people not having access to a baseline feature might just be the bridge too far and they might just drop the hobby as a whole.
GW sales keeps making decisions that looses them money. What I mean by that is not that they are going into red. What I mean is that when presented with the option of making some money right now or a whole lot of more money down the road, they always take the "some money right now" option.
I used to use Army Builder years ago, don't know if it still exists at all. It had great UI and printed off great looking lists too. I think it was put out by Lone Wolf or something like that
Yeah I still sub to Warhammer+ £5 a month is nothing TBH plus I got cool minis at the end of the year. Black Talon has been good so far, not watched the latest Blood Angel thing yet though. I do agree with you the Army building app should be free though
This is spot on. I actually bought 4 kits when I had the app and just list building... Hadn't painted or played in 20 years.
But the app drew me back in now that the app isn't available... I'm not looking at kits anymore cause I'm like the stuff I got should be good enough.
If it was free they would make more money off the people who enjoy painting and building. Typically those people go the opposite and find cheaper minis or print them or play other games and stray from GW completely.
I already stopped buying anything from GW since early 9th, and actively planned on never playing 10th ever since I saw what horrors they inflicted on my Tau. And somehow still I find that every move they make increases how much I hate them. I thought I would have hit a limit by now.