What Games Workshop and Wizards of the Coast Won't Tell You
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- Опубликовано: 19 сен 2024
- A bit over dramatic but still true.
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#tabletopwargaming #dungeonsanddragons #warhammer40k #wizardsofthecoast #gamesworkshop
If they haven't gotten it right after TEN editions, maybe they aren't even trying to.
100% they are not trying. Moneeeeeeeeeeeeeey!!!
Note that Lord of the Rings / Middle Earth Strategy Battle went for 25 years without a new edition - and the new "edition" is just a small clean up pass and tweaking of some rules nobody was using.
They CAN design game systems as well as anyone. The do have talented designers, or at least talented designers rotate through the company regularly.
Management wants 40k and Age of Sigmar replaced every 3 years.
new editions are more to keep tournament play fresh & create FOMO to sell product
That's 100% the way they should be doing it. Actually improving the game with each addition. Not changing it for changing sake
Yo Andy Chambers recently said they should have ditched Ugoigo.... in 3rd! My whole life is a lie because gw is a bunch of hacks. They are stinking up the joint
I stopped a WD sub even though it is a write off because you cannot see what is happeining in the bat reps. Dark models on dark boards.... well done gents!
If you're not kitbashing, homebrewing, creating your own units/missions/scenarios and building stuff from scratch, you're not playing Warhammer or D&D. You're playing a computer game in which you do all the math work that the computer is supposed to do for you 😁
True!
Modern GW games are what I call "Table top video games".
Its no longer a war game where people with military experience and knowledge can walk up to a table and identify exactly whats going on.
Preach!
Hah! I've always thought that about tabletop wargames. 😊
Closed source, live-service video game with no SDK at that
Gdubs is now anti-hobby. I never thought I'd see another company as anti conversion as Privateer Press was, but here we are.
The amount of idiots on here that still call Warhammer "the hobby" too. They have them all fooled lol. They are only trying to sell us more crap lol.
@@kingnothing5706 what happened with privateeer press?
The best GW games are from the era when they actively encouraged scratch-building and conversions. Mordheim seems more popular than ever, and the old version of Necromunda continues to have a fantastic following through the Community Edition. These games came out when GW was officially supporting hobby creativity through publications like, for example, How To Make Wargames Terrain. Their products lost that "special something" when GW went hyper-corporate.
Common story and pattern for gaming companies.
GW doesn’t even allow fan animations. Anything to deter creativity.
@@GarredHATES fan animation still exist. This is something that people keep perpetuating because TTS used the controversy as an excuse to stop. There are still fan animations being made to this day.
Do you also believe musicians should allow anyone to use their music for free ? What about authors ? Profiting from other people's IP is plagiarism- whether you're a fan or not
the truth bombs coming from this channel are off the charts
Thanks dude! :)
GW's monopose sprues are basically DRM for miniatures.
That's a great comparison.
I hate that, especially when I look at modern Ork sprues compared to my old box from back even in the late 00's. And even then that's basic customization.
OPR has this issue for making lists too.
@talldorf6445 Many of the so-called "miniature agnostic" rulesets use GW factions in all but name. While I understand this from a business and rules adoption standpoint, it makes the games overly rigid to the point where you basically have to shoehorn your chosen minis into a GW faction anyway. OPR and Star Breach come to mind.
Just give me a bunch of generic troop types and let me build my own list.
@@MrSkullhead1 look up great escape miniature as well as star grave, made some sweet space cowboys kitbashing them together they have the same proportions and the universal stance and assembly options
@@MrSkullhead1but OPRs army builder changes so much about the game. You can build an army from scratch of you want.
"Don't ask questions! Just consume product, then immediately get excited for next product!" - This has been so true, especially for Magic The Gathering lately.
Fun fact, GW also used to sell bitz in their store if you asked them. They don't do that anymore as well.
Oh yeah! Before my time but I remember hearing about that!
Yea they sold the left over bits from the showcase models they put in the store. Depending on the store there could be a lot. The store I went to in the past also showcased a lot of Customized and Kitbashed Armys now that I think of it.
The only thing they showcase nowadays, are boxes content and the miniture of the month.
It wasn’t just odd bits in store you could buy, but when I started playing they had a catalogue so if you wanted a random right arm of an ogre, or a dreadnaught left shin, or pretty much anything then it could all be ordered separately and delivered to the store in a couple of days.
When they moved more of the range into plastics, bits probably became less and less viable for them as splitting sprues is a manual task just adding cost to that part that may or may not be recouped.
@@GoldenDragoon you are right. What you mean was Mailorder this was pretty common back then. I remember Lego did that as well and then they stopped for basically the same reason. Cost reduction.
@@GoldenDragoon It was more that the molds would force them to cast up 6 bodies, 6 heads and 12 arms... because someone had ordered a single head. Even worse if they'd ordered a dozen of that head. I do miss the mail-order back catalogue though - there were some real (often uncatalogued) gems that you could get, right up until they discontinued it. One of my last purchases from them was a bundle of Terminator prototypes, an Ambul and 10 RT era jump packs, and I think that was some time between 2000 and 2002.
I agree with everything you said.
GW in particular is very good at rewriting history, both in their business model and lore.
Once upon a time, GW was about the hobby, they literally teach you how to kitbash and convert your minies and how to build terrains out of cardboard and plastic bottles.
Now they have a "no model, no rule" policy, they are making all their minies monopose with the express goal to make them as impossible to kitbash as possible, they sell terrains at an insane price and are trying more and more to make "the official GW terrain" required pieces to play the game.
As someone that is there first and foremost for the lore, then the hobby, then the game, GW is making their product less and less appealing to me.
WOTC is following the seasonal DLC that a lot of video game companies are doing these days. I've been playing D&D since 1980, and I've got a decades of content to dray from. I don't need to buy any more of their books; I got all I'll ever need. Likewise with GW; I don't need their games. I might still buy some minis, but I've got 30 years of bits I've stockpiled to convert with. I also have a 3-D printer, and OPR.
These companies could make things that help us but instead they are on a reboot / sequel model just like hollywood movies
If you want to play D&D I would buy the 1e/2e AD&D rules or the current OSE rules. The current version is just a money grab. And as far as GW is concerned, Satan is hand-picking their pineapples.
3.0 and 3.5 are a little more beginner friendly, though. And a lot of the manuals are available online (though by less than legitimate means) and predate Hasbro's reign of greed.
I made a very serious try at 5e. 3 months later, I ditched it and went back to AD&D. Its absolute crap.
3rd edition is a bit crunchy. Stick to OSE or AD&D and enjoy a fun adventure game which isn't bogged down by the dreaded "character optimisation" mini-game
AD&D makes characters so squishy that you have to steal gold and avoid combat to level up.
@@AaronReece OSE and b/x derivatives are way more beginner friendly than AD&D
Dude, 30 seconds into the video and I was like, "Amen, preach the history!" I started playing in the 90s, and just hearing the words "Ral Partha" cheers me up.
Same! I used to go to the Ral Partha factory back in the early 90s here in Cincinnati. Whenever my AD&D group wanted new minis, or we started a new campaign it was "Hey guys lets all go over to the Ral Partha factory this week!" ... we used to buy their minis fresh off the press.
@@daweimer71 I grew up in Appalachia and the two hobby stores we had both struggled to get product. So, ordering stuff was difficult and forget browsing through it. Every Wargames West catalog I got ended up beaten to pieces from handling by the time the next one arrived every quarter.
It's crazy to remember looking at those products and wondering what the books were like, when we now have the ability to jump onto Wikipedia and get a full breakdown most of the time. Not to mention that the actual product is often only a click away.
The hill I die on is that RPGs are the only nerd hobby where if you had the time to make a basic rule set, type it up and print it out, and get your friends together, that's it. You only spend enough money is for random generation and the time it takes to write said rules.
I've writen homebrew stuff for a game and use these rules instead of asking the person to make it. Because thats what I love to do.
I have struggled against wargamer philistines my entire life, and in no place have I struggled harder than space marines. Space marines, to me, are space marines. The color of their armor isnt where their special rules are derived from, and yet, if you dont have yellow paint then you cannot play "spaz marins" using the imperial fist rules, for example. At least according to folks who really should be playing napoleons since they are so concerned about the color of my pants.
It's this brand of thoughtless braying about how the game SHOULD be played, missing the entire point about gathering together with your buds to push dollies around a table into various other dollie houses to see who "wins" a game of dollies, that has caused me to actually look away from pick up games ever anymore. Life is just too short for such nonsense.
If they the people you mention truly wish to play by the rules to the word, they should know that paint doesn't matter, only wargear does. I, personally, try to play by the rules just because we are a somewhat competitive community where imbalance could affect our enjoyment. And I can tell you that paint doesn't matter
At all. It doesn't matter in competitive games. It doesn't matter in tournaments. And it shouldn't matter in casual games.
My Death Guard is red and gold. And, forgive me if I sound conceited, but my death guard is better painted that what many people can pull off. If anyone tells me I cannot play them as Death Guard, they can f off.
I use the marneus Calgar model (suitably kitbashed) as the chapter master for my blood angels successor chapter. The number of people who have, even in casual settings, told me I can't do that, is extremely disappointing.
@@theendofmyropemydude to me, that feels like the same irrational disconnect where someone is asking you "What is your fave animal", and after you answer, you are told that you are wrong.
Like, how is an entirely subjective opinion "wrong/incorrect"?
You saw marneus, imagined he would look cool as your leader, and wanted to share that inspiration with others.
Its valid that they may not like it, but to outright say you cant play with your dollies the way you want to play with them, is even more ridiculous than calling dollies "dollies".
@@Colorcrayons I even went through the hassle of removing all the Ultramarines iconography and replacing it with my own. But no, since he has the keyword Ultramarines in the codex it's just impossible for people to imagine him being used in a fluffy blood angels successor list.
That's what gets me the most, this isn't even tournament cheese, it's just liking a model and not liking Ultramarines.
Sadly you have to shop around for players if you are creative. Keep searching!
Pretty soon we are gonna need a subscription for imagination I love hearing the old school older guys talk about gaming back in the day
😄😄😄. Too true.
The "by the book" players have always been there. Gaming of all sorts just attracts a certain kind of person. I remember when WD had a readers letters page back in the 80's and some kid was wanting clarification on whether his space marines were game legal because he'd come up with his own colour scheme but his friends refused to play him because it wasn't an official chapter. Of course the reply was that you could paint marines in any colour scheme. No matter how much anybody even GW explains that you can add to and adapt games to do what you want there's still a majority of players that have to be spoon fed.
That's true but GW don't really support adaptive play or "narrative" play.
There's barely any few mentions of kitchen table Warhammer in the rules and their entire business model is built around selling rule books and tat.
I still have a copy of the first White Dwarf magazine I ever got; my mom bought it for me because we went to a nerd shop and she told the guy behind the counter that I was getting into a Lizardmen army. He suggested the WD magazine, it was May 1999 issued 232, the one about the launch of Battlefleet Gothic because it had a huge article on how to play and paint Lizardmen. WD used to be insanely based, there'd be articles showing you how to create cool terrain using toilet paper tubes, and showcased a Chaos army where over half the models were conversions and/or HEAVILY greenstuffed.
You hit the nail on the head I think. Contemporary GW doesn't want guys that make their own terrain, kitbash models or think up their own missions to play. They want people who need to be spoon-fed content and need their Painboy to look exactly like the Painboy model on the website. It makes me sad because this game no longer encourages or rewards creativity.
There is always such a charm in handmade things, especially if it was made for free out of trash. I can't explain it, but it's the truth.
My babysitter's son, who was over 18 and in the army in the 90s, introduced me to the game when everything was red. We played Rogue Trader for Years. Creative is gone but they also stole ideas too. I played again later, but so much of the game had changed. The fun has been taken out of the game. Missions are so different now. I miss making armies out of paper, and so many other things that made it unique back then.
Its up to the Community and the Tournament Organizers to allow the proxy/kit bash. It would be great to go to an event that wasn't a tournament where you could sign up for a table that has a narrative that you think is fun and play that scenario then go to another table where you signed up to play on that totally different scenario. it not all about win rates, some people just want to play the game and having some fun terrain pieces with narrative missions and special rules would be cool, id sign up for 3 totally strange games on a Saturday. Organizing such things would be very hard...
Exactly! My convention that I run has exactly the narrative focused tables you're talking about. Our tournaments take a back seat to the narratives and the narratives grow every year in popularity.
The problem lies in your first sentence. Tournaments. Its a dollie game. Tournaments should be just an excuse to gather together to play dollies. But because people think a tournament equals "Serioz biznizz", that tourneys hold some magical weight over the heads of anyone, ever, about how dollies should be played.
I think you quickly realize that taking dollies too seriously is a recipe for the absolute absence of fun. Because people think "Tourneys" are a magical word for anything other than summoning the most offensive neckbeards.
@@Colorcrayonscrazy knowing that but also knowing the people who play in tournaments are such a low percentage of the people involved in the hobby.
I'm fine with a company trying to sell me something new, but it seems that both WOTC and GW are putting "sell new product" over any other aspect of the hobby and then just call people racists or something if they complain. I call it the "death spiral", a company gets big enough it stops innovating because it can't afford to risk anything and so recycle what they already have. The trouble is they have no passion anymore, the people who did are either retired or moved to start something new because they probably weren't ruthless enough to survive in the new environment. So you're left with nothing but a bunch of suits coasting the work of much better people than them, so when the try to copy what the original people did it's inferior. They keep doing this with "new" products being ever more inferior reproductions of "what worked", until they fade into either irrelevance or just exist to be mocked. You see each new attempt at recapturing their audience (with ever lower opinions of the people who liked it) they shed more and more of the original fanbase without attracting replacements in the same numbers.
Think GW is too big for that? Look at what just happened with Blizzard. Passed around like the village bike, from company to company, until now she's no longer anything special at all, but just another name a big company owns, in a list of names.
I always hated hipsters, but at this point I really do want to give as little attention and money to big companies as I can possibly get away with, and so I'm starting to sound a little like one.
absolutely 100% true, except the hipster part. as someone who cares, you were given no choice in arriving at this position. it's not being elitest or being cool, it's being rational.
Well said! You can also look at the big movie studios for this exact trend as well. So big they can't innovate. Excellent comment!
Just don't listen to obscure crappy music and try to convince everyone around you, you're cool because of it.
😄😄
They are constantly recycling the same sub par content on a faster and faster basis and increasingly subscription based service.
They open themselves up to 3rd parties / increased competition that fills the massive void they create. And then sometimes they take it to a new level with the Ogl debacle.
Corporations think you are a battery to suck money out of.
GW want 40k to be a lifestyle brand/E Sport live service that you constantly pay for to engage. The soul of the company went a long time ago. But it's YOUR hobby. You can do whatever you like with your hobby and you SHOULD.
Yeah and they most likely going to ruin the lore trying to capture the imaginary modern audience and tone down everything that makes them great. Most likely fail as a result of trying to pander to the modern audience crap
One Page Rules is gaining steam, they're like "hey just use what ever minis you want and have fun."
One reason I've gotten into third party. Resin kits, 3D prints, and yes, even paper tanks....
As a massive kitbasher I find it annoying but not impossible to get what I want without a bit of work.
But it saves money and I'd say looks better than some of GWs offerings.
People now days seems to want everything served in a gold plate it seems. I am 51 years old (been into GW since 1988 and metal miniatures even before that.) and still paint and convert GW models. Monopose figures have been there since the start of miniatures. You just need to be ingenious your self. And do not forget that back then stuff were made in metal and were harder to convert. Now days it is mostly plastic or resin. So it is damn easy to convert as you want.
Oh yeah, how many times have you cut your hand trying to shave off detail from a metal miniature? LOL. Probably too many times to count.
This reminded me of a friend of myn that painted his goblin army as blue skins and his son who was a determined "coolade drinker" said you cant do that they have to be green. His dad said "it's fantasy who says they have to be green, they are mountain goblins and it's cold up there😅" that was decades ago but the brainwashing started back then with the "only our figures,paints,glue,tools and brushes can be used in our game.
I'll admit it: I clicked on this video solely because of the thumbnail with woTC and GW in a shady '50s gangster outfit
I thought it was neat too. Thanks! Maybe a little over dramatic but I liked the imagery
GW and WotC have been "hamburglered". McDonald's was awesome when the McDonald brothers owned it and for the couple decades that followed. But, Corpo logic takes its toll on every brand in the end.
All brands will become zombie brands so the VCs and tech bros can make AIs that were trained by content created by AIs (that is actually a thing the tech bros are into).
GW’s minis are also cut that way to counter illegal recasting and the scourge of 3D scanning and printing. The Last Great Hurrah of GW’s DIY era was the 2003 General’s Compendium from Warhammer Fantasy Battle 6th edition. This book was produced by the US studio… which believe it or not, used to exist. It is chock-full of DIY ideas for creating a WIDE variety of terrain, building your own boats of various sizes, building a 3D campaign map without using their plastic “Mighty Empires” hexes (oop at the time), converting miniatures and running an elaborate map campaign. The only thing wrong with that book is the binding, which uses the stiffest glue I’ve ever seen in a book. It’s almost impossible to read the book without permanently damaging it (mine is still together but I am VERY careful with it.) This book also came out around the time of “Warhammer Skirmish” which was a great little system that also encouraged DIY activities (also produced by the US studio, iirc).
I think this book was noticed by the execs at GW and it was the light bulb going off over their heads. “Why are we giving away all this free skill-building instruction when we could just sell them every little thing possible?” It’s been a downhill slide into GW forcefully spoon-feeding everything to their customers since. 😢
Re: D&D I remember seeing a short video clip of Gary Gygax saying, “Don’t let anyone know, but all you need are the basic rules and an imagination.”
TSR originally never intended to produce adventure modules. In fact, in one of the original edition books, the foreword by Gygax says something like, “and with this book, Dungeons and Dragons is complete. Enjoy!” There was a brief moment in time where he actually thought the Game Was Done. The first D&D module is a licensed vampire adventure by some third party. It’s SUPER-rare now, as you can imagine. Once Gygax saw how much money the game was bringing in, he realized they needed to keep producing new products to take advantage of the opportunity. That’s now gone into hyperdrive with WotC at the wheel.
Holy hell, great to see you again friend! Good to see you speaking more truth again and I absolutely agree! I though at beginning of video "I hope he brings up when white dwarves used to teach terrain building and creating your own units" and you did which was great! You're definitely right about there being two types of players, the ones who feel they have to do it by the books are the worst or at best just really missing out on the great other and TRUE ways of playing out there! I'm sick of seeing all the new players thinking every single match in 40k having to be the same tournament layout with 5 pieces of terrain, as you pointed out WHERES THE CREATIVITY AND IMAGINATION??? It's great you do that with the objectives and really threw those people off hahaha. Putting asymetrical layouts, twists, all that stuff really feels more in the setting. this estyle itc tournament bullshit is not real warhammer, not real wargaming! and it sucks it's infested everything to be the standard. But there are still players out there holding the flame lit and keeping with the better ways, so there is hope!
Thanks for watching! It sounds like we're in the same boat with our views on this. I have a stack of old White Dwarf magazines from around 2000 that are just FULL of do-it-yourself stuff. That was my favorite part of the magazine! And I've been here the whole time, making videos roughly every week or so. Glad you found me again! Praise the Algo Rythmn Gods!
@@LetsTalkTabletop Absolutely! I'm gonna get your game system too and try it out with my group. I'm running a club for these indy wargames down here in south florida and we're starting to grow!
GW seems to have taken the fun and soul out of Warhammer 40k, opr, here I come with my minis
The overpriced "Gallowdark" Kill Team sets and the rule mess of 40k 9th really soured me on GW. I haven't touched any of those games in two years and haven't missed it. Still enjoying Stargrave though, and found that The One Ring, Mothership, and Pathfinder are excellent replacements for D&D since the whole OGL issue.
classic white dwarf straight up gave sculpting and modeling guides on making carapace armoured ogryn and cadians, there also was tutorials on using greenstuff and a pencil to replicate purity seals for use on miniatures in white dwarf atleast once! the modern white dwarf feels so devoid of creativity to the point that i can't justify the hiked price for it most of the time. i think though we can pinpoint when things shifted for gw from creativity friendliness to cold corporatism and it was both the chapter house lawsuit where it cost them a lot to do and while in name they won it they also lost parts of it too which was why suddenly a whole lot of options that only really existed in the rules suddenly started vanishing from the game in late 6th ed (carapace armoured imperial guard veterans and a 3rd of the characters) the other was the company nearly going under in 2014 which has been talked about a bit over on the painting phase channel by former gw and whtv staff
The GW miniatures requiring you to assemble from 1000 pieces make GW more money. More pieces means more difficult for recasting, and blister-pack characters require very little designing or production cost but sells at a premium, especially when the new character have better rules than they normally would. I don't really mind. With one-page rule in hand, a little home-brew missions, and 3d-printers go brrrrrrrrrrrr, I'm enjoying the hobby like never before.
Chinese can recast anything they want with reasonable quality at least and more than often it is as good as the real thing. GW did this to stop kitbashing period. They want to set their miniatures appart from the competition with details overload.
@@vlad78th Exactly. Recasters even has better service whenever you need a part replaced or something. Dealing with forge world on the other hand, your experiences may vary.
You're right, I've always leaned anti-corpo, it's always been your hobby, it's your choice to make the most of it
The thing that breaks my heart is hearing new players say "but i can't play that yet because i don't have enough models", not even considering that they can just put printouts into bases just so they can actually play prior to dropping $1k or more on a 2k pt army. Like they have read the rules book and codex, and that's IT. Not even trying a practice game to see if that's the style they like.
As if they can’t proxy. Be creativez
You're exactly right, and there is no shame in some cheap proxies, even more so if they are young. I want to tell you a quick story, we had a 14 year old that joined our club a decade ago and he only had a few Marines and didn't have much budget. So he bought packages of army men that included tanks and used the cheap plastic tanks as rhinos and predators. A couple of our guys in the group teased him about it, but we didn't let anybody actually make fun of them seriously. Fast forward 10 years and he joins the group again after finishing college and he can afford actual miniatures. But if we had been dismissive of his proxies as a child he certainly would not be in this hobby anymore.
I was in my local GW store yesterday and asked if AoS and 40k were rules-compatible enough to play against each other.
His response was that there's no way a bunch of leather-clad rat men with knives would stand up to sustained bolter fire.
Which is... valid... but not really what i was asking
My upcoming Mass battle game that will be out in about 2 months allows for any genre models from any game to be played. Everything from Titans to airplanes to monsters to your rat men. We've been having a blast playing age of Sigmar versus 40K armies.
That is actually not that bad of a concept from him but yeah I want to have Salamanders and Lizards against Chaos and skaven / beastmen so kudos to you I think your head is in a fine space!
I like alternative rule sets that have compatible fantasy and sci-fi versions.
Can't wait to play a game of 200 skeletons vs 40 robot skeletons.
Not exactly correct either.
Or did they not hear about a thing called Orks.....
To have one last ramble before bed, like an old man yelling at clouds:
I've always found it annoying that an attack, with a blunt stick, could potentially kill an armored Marine.
This is the core of the question you asked, and what the answer provided really should have been about. For very much yes, it is the reason why Melee Heavy armies have a reasonable chance against most lists in the first place. By bringing a lot of numbers they can overcome the odds through dice rolls alone. Which are not that difficult in a D6 system to begin with, thus making the little rats with blades somewhat viable against a squad of space marines.
Praying to the dice gods, of course, but always viable.
I miss the vehicle design rules
Oh man! I meant to mention that and completely forgot. Good catch! My upcoming Mass war game will have vehicle design rules, so keep a lookout for Mass Brutality!
Buy from Wargames Atlantic, Oathmark, Stargrave/Frostgrave and kit bash to your hearts content. Not one penny for the Evil Empires
I like your approach. I see so many people cope with still buying from GW because they are addicted. I tell them to buy more consumer friendly companies.
And get a 3d printer to make terrain all day long without stealing your kids' art supplies or unrolling the toilet paper.
@@johnamcf I have friends to do that for me.
Truer words have rarely been spoken in regards to WotC and GW.
While I’ve had this view of RPGs for a long time, I had not thought about GW & other miniatures companies (Wizkids’ heroclix) doing the same thing. Definitely going to think about this information the next time I’m deciding what minis to buy.
Thanks for watching as always Zachary!
Well said! Glad it isn’t just me. The new plastic kits give the downsides of plastic (having to assemble) with none of the upsides (kit bash and posing)
Preach! I have been trying to explain this for decades to people. I cant anymore.
Here's my torch, brother.
Haha! Thank you! 😊
Monopose. The Death of Creativity?
Well...GW is loosing on many Fronts.
Not what It used to be?
5:25 We make our OWN MISSIONS!!!
Just found the channel. Looking forward to watching n learning
Thanks brian!
GW is the reason I don't play GW games!
I will never use online tools to play my paper-pencil D&D game!
As for missions I like asymmetric warfare and poking at my prey, you have to know when to strike set up traps and trades.
One of the things that really annoys me, and Game Workshop is prime for this:
Removing good ideas from the system... usually to appease marketing.
It is the control Hasbro wants to have over D&D going forward too. If something doesn't sell well on their virtual tabletop they might 'save server space' by removing it from everyone's portfolio. We saw the start of this recently, with Hasbro changing a few things around and just forcing said changes onto everyone's character sheet. So you better hope your favorite digital property continues to sell well, or it might no longer be usable in your campaign.
Perhaps I should be thankful:
Game Workshop overlooked the value of Virtual Table Tops!
So we won't have to worry about our favorite faction being... used with full irony... squatted.
I LOVE the Godzilla! I used to work at GW in the 80's. I loved that time.
Thanks! It's a resin print that I use in my mech and Kaiju game Brutal Epic.
I'm old. I used to love the VDRs (vehicle design rules) from 3rd edition.
Just the fact that you are wearing a Thundercats Ho! Tee shirt told me immediately you knew what the [BLEEP] you're talking about.
Haha. Oh, the cats are one of my favorite properties ever. Hooooooo!
Before stumbling on your channel I was starting to wonder if there was anyone left who actually remembers everything we’ve lost over the years. It’s our duty as experienced gamers to make sure the newer community members understand what wargaming was and what it can become again.
Awesome to hear! Thanks Mike!
I'm more interested in the lore of Warhammer 40k but I actually admire kitbashing part of the hobby and creativity of different paintings schemes of the different fractions and armies, dioramas are pretty cool, The miniatures look cool but I don't really care about the actual table top wargaming aspect or rules of the hobby and more interested in the golden demon competition.
@@shaneriggs6678 all parts of the hobby are valid parts of the hobby. I mostly convert and paint and play the odd game with college friends mostly
Sorry RUclipsrs are just as responsible for promoting this way of hobbying.
That's the truth, but it's also what gets the most views. The problem with RUclips is that competitive people go out of their way to watch competitive things and a portion of the casual players will also watch competitive things. But when you talk about casual stuff, almost no competitive players are interested in that so it's naturally a smaller audience. Smaller audiences don't get the views and don't get pushed like the competitive stuff does.
@@Slipperbatter going to be Frank but I think a lot of RUclipsrs in the Warhammer 40K scene are just content farms who need to adhere to whatever GW dictates.
My entry into miniatures was xwing, which played the same way GW and WotC does things with constant rebalance/tweaks. Got into 40k. Love the models and the IP.
Getting fed up with the rule changes just for the rule changes, but not sure how to build up a new group to play a set rule set that’s more static
To kitbash the new GW miniatures with multiple kits you often have to assemble them before cutting out the pieces (ie. assemble the 2 parts of the arm then cut at the shoulder/elbow/wrist before transfering it to someone else.
The sad corporate state of games, is following the sad corporate state of society don't think for yourself, buy our product because we did the thinking for you. Eat, sleep, consume our products.
GW can't acknowledge 3d printing revolutionizing terrain in White Dwarf because players would then realize they could use it for vehicles and, with a little more effort and safety precautions, for minis.
I disagree that kit bashing and creating your own D&D content doesn’t make these corporations money. Share holders are just too shortsighted. I think the originality that comes from kit bashed mini’s, custom built models and free rolled, imagined, or on the spot D&D are some of the best ways of pulling in dynamic new customers. Sure that Ork player is scratch building a stompa from trash but when he has a few bucks to buy something he will want to, where he otherwise may have never gotten into the hobby because of the overall price point. Further just because a DM hasn’t read the entire Curse of Straad Module doesn’t mean I cann’t slam together some vampire story from some movies and TV shows I watched and have a good time introducing Twilight fans to D&D. These are the ways to grab new players and new players are worth a lot more over the life time of that customer than forcing your new customers to buy monopose Ork Boys while they try to figure out how to kit bash in 5 more chappa boys and screw up half of what they have only so they have to buy another box. Or that feeling of failure when you miss understand or ignored a key plot point because your characters spent to much time in the tavern and you have to wind back the story. That kind of stuff will kill new players, you may have made an extra $60 but in doing so you may just be turning off potential life long customer before they even got started. There are so many ways new comers can face plant in this stuff before they even get started and these companies are making it worse. To play D&D at best all you need is 1 PHB. How is a new player going to handle D&D Beyond’s 50+ book selection, where do they start if a group wanted to get in on it on their own. Second hand materials and 3rd party free stuff is literally where people start their hobby now, and many will never leave because the middle ground is falling out. But look at any companies marketing and sales department, new customer acquisition is usually the largest dump of capital they do and these corporations literally don’t see these people as potential customers. I started 3rd edition D&D with “illegal” photo copy’s of the PHB from kinko’s, scratch built Ork trucks from old garage sale die cast cars, and proxy magic cards with sticky notes. 15 year old me never would have gotten into this so that 40 year old me would buy hundreds of dollars in secret layer packs and commander decks, GW plastic, and D&D Beyond subscriptions without those starting points. That’s where many of us got started. Because of this new mentality the only way into these hobbies is to have some money to burn and some friends to bring you into the community, 15 year old me never would have made it.
I completely agree with what you're saying, I probably should have said that it does not make them money immediately. So they see it as not making them money at all. Everybody is just looking at the bottom line of that next quarter whether or not they keep their job.
I hate that Games Sweatshop war games are like the only thing people seem to play at the local stores anymore. I like me some Frostgrave and Stargrave because that's where the fun of using random things and kitbashing is still fun to do.
Shameless plug, but you should try Brutality Skirmish Wargame! You can get the car rules for free to try it out on our website
@@danielpalama3700 it's pretty much the Call of Duty of War gaming. So many people just play it because that's all they know. I try to get people into frost grave or star grave and it's basically like trying to get someone out of a drug addiction.
Great Video, we think you did a good job (trying to be constructive it was a little slow paced I literally watched on times two speed and you were still perfectly understandable). We thought you did really well, another thing you should have mentioned which I think would have solidified your point would be mentioning how they call it the Warhammer hobby rather than the Wargaming hobby.
Great video as we said we shouted you out on our community tab have a good one - Cal and Sunny
Hey, thanks! I guess I'm just a slow talker, haha. Thank you for boosting the signal, friends! Yeah that's a good point, they are even double speaking the name of the hobby now.
That's one way to look at it, probably the pessimistic way. The reality is companies can provide you a boxed experience and a couple of options for paint schemes, they can't really provide a person with creativity, and many people just want to relax and participate in a hobby with some level of guide rails. So I wouldn't say it's nefarious of them, rather it's to make for easier entries into the hobbies and then those who wish to pursue the more intricate and complex parts will regardless of their actions. Think of it like computers, an industry started by tinkerers but the vast majority of people just want a computer they can use out of the box and install some games on, not to build one or even try to make custom boards for.
I definitely see your reasoning and saying this, and certainly everybody has different levels of creativity and not everybody has the patience or energy to make up their own stuff. I get that totally, but doing it as a scheme to make it easy for new players to enter the hobby is a bridge too far in my opinion. They do practically nothing to include new players, they're exorbitant prices being the number one piece of evidence against what you're saying. Of course there's no real wrong answer here, and I appreciate you chiming in.
@@LetsTalkTabletop I might be biased as an independent store owner that carries a lot of GW products, but I do not believe GW prices are exorbitant for the most. There are obviously some exceptions, but I would easily argue that they have done more to create lower priced entry points, solid deals in bundle boxes, and even without all of that the reality is while Warhammer has a hire entry cost it has a much lower upkeep cost and will cost less overall than any card game out there if followed for several years.
Some behind the scenes things people don't consider is that a lot of the cost is not the models themselves, but things like the injection moulds which can cost hundreds of thousands a piece to produce in high qualities, and the distribution networks that GW has to run. I don't think people really give full credit to the scope and scale of GW's operation and how expensive something like that is to keep functional at the level that they do.
Naw they trying to make you reliant upon them what would you do if you were them?
This is why people are more and more often trying to include ethics in capital because it is just as monstrous of an economic system as any other. It needs us to police it or it will crush us (when I say us I mean not just people in the Congo or Asia but also people in rural factories making same $ as they did when they started in the 80s... only difference is now their kids are in prison / dead for opiods and the gramps are taking care of the grandkids).
Aint just 40k that is messed up.
Kitbashing or scratch building stuff is still alive and well. Especially with 3D printing as great as it is. I’m new to the hobby and I’ve kitbashed my Minotaurs army and terrain. You just need to learn how to use milliput or green stuff. There’s a learning curve in the beginning but you should pick it up as a skill. My pro tip to other newbies is to get some nail art brushes and go to a pet shop for weird terrain. Budgie sand or reptile bark go really far. It’s fun!
I am nearly 40 though so I spent my youth playing meccano and model train kits/ terrain. Maybe it’s a generational thing about following the rules and painting like the box art that gen z do?
In 3rd Edition 40k there were rules to make your own vehicles. You could give them weapons, armor, points, everything. The rulebook understood that you could easily abuse this system but it relied on the intelligence of the player to refuse to do so and thus respected the player.
I was so sad when I found my 3rd edition rulebook ruined in my parents' basement. My 2nd edition stuff survived.
@@imperialcitizen4811 The problem is that unfortunately a lot of people don't have the gentleman's game approach to Warhammer 40K anymore. It's all about finding ways to cheese wins with your models
I really miss chapter approved being able to kitbash your own vehicles and make rules for them was awesome.
I no longer associate gw with the lore. As far as im concerned, 40k is in the state it was when i started playing in 4th ed.
Ayyye. I'll be honest. Only came for the thumbnail
Haha. Small internet, am I right?
Ah finally new video on my favourite tabletop philosophy channel
Wow, thanks! That means a lot!
@@LetsTalkTabletop haha, i really felt the lack of a channel that talks our hobby not from an “overexcited fun” point of view, but from a point of a critical thinking person, who remembers that our hobby is in hands of people who don’t care about it at all.
I started with Games Workshop way back with 1st edition, Rouge Trader as it was known.
I phased out of the hobby some years ago now when the prices got just too high and the editions kept coming out too quickly and it became so obvious that they didn't care about the hobby or the players, all they cared about was making money.
I won't go into all that though, I just want to throw up 2 examples of how it used to be.
Back in the Rouge Trader rulebook there were instructions on how to build an Imperial grav-tank using I think it was a deodorant bottle as the main body of the vehicle. Or maybe it was a shampoo bottle? I really can't remember, it's been like 30 years! But yes, in the main rule book it showed you how to make a vehicle out of empty bottles.
Second, the whirlwind. This I think was 2nd Edition, you bought yourself a Rhino, and using a large square monster base and some card and some bits from the Rhino sprue you made yourself your own missile launcher to go on the top of the Rhino to turn it into a Whirlwind. The instructions to do this was either in the White Dwarf or a rulebook or maybe in with the Rhino itself, I really can't remember, but it was official advice from GW on how to build your own Whirlwind launcher to go on top your tank.
I remember building two Whirlwind launchers and putting one on top of a Land Raider and the other on top of a Dreadnaught!
Even as a long time Blood Bowl coach I encourage people to make their own teams from whatever they can use or third party models.
I'm not here to make sure you're the proper fan of GW, I'm here to kill your best player and get touchdowns
This channel deserves way more subs than you have this is exactly how old school gamers like me feel about the way the hobby has gone. It's just a shame that GW is so big that whatever it does leaks out into other games, even if you go somewhere else to avoid it everything else seems to get caught in its gravity.
Bolt action is full of GW refugees who have came to enjoy a game more like how things used to be but the paradox is the more successful it becomes the more the newcomers make it become more like they thing they were running away from.
Hey thanks for saying that! The channel is only been around for a year, so I'm slowly growing. I've seen a distinct uptick in blessings from the algo rhythm gods lately. I just recently broke a thousand subscribers and it was a huge deal! I completely agree with you, it's kind of in the same way that my local area is often a retirement area for people from the cities nearby. But the people in the cities are often angry and miserable and they bring all of that to the smaller communities like my area. So then they just slowly turn this community into exactly what they were trying to flee from not knowing they were the cause.
Well explained! Do it yourself - this is so much fun, I guarantee it to you.
Totally agree with the bs snap fit sprue.
That greediness is also main reason why I do not buy things from GW (I also do not really buy things from WOTC, but that is more to do, that D&D isn't most interesting fantasy settings for me. But problem is actually same as the video points: D&D is not interesting for me, because there is not really mystery or something new, or creative. If in D&D I face something like drow, I can look rules, and see what they are. And end of story. But if I meet something in Mörkborg or in Forbidden Psalm or even in Frostgrave something, there is no exact knowledge about things. There may be rules, how they are represented by game mechanic, but not really what they are... And rules are simplified enough, that they give room for imagination.)
"This game is yours"
My friends and I prefer 40k 9th edition over 10th edition
I have been making my own custom rules, balance changes, and units to make the game more fun for us all
For example, one of our friends plays Orks, and he was sick of their low leadership, because in lore, more Orks = braver Orks
So I whipped up some new rules to give Orks more leadership in bigger units, and we love having to try hold out against the oncoming green tide
One of my friends plays Grey Knights, and was annoyed that they aren't daemon-killing specialists anymore because of how Daemonic Saves work
So now we let Grey Knights AP work against Daemonic Saves, and the army gets to play their lore niche again
Thanks for the foundation GW, but now that 9th is finished, I'll take it from here
I like having the rules and supplements as a base, but there is no way I would stop at just that especially since there is no reason not to create our own stuff.
Had a former gaming group that was hyper competitive and they basically just killed the enjoyment in order to just win at all costs.
Glad I am playing on my own and never believed in the term "sadhammer" for solo games as at the end of the day these models are no different (except for the building, painting or custom creations) than buying a bag of army men (still gotta get a copy of combat storm).
Never regretted my stuff just that as of now I have no room to play at the moment as I had to put stuff into storage since the move U_U
My background is solo gaming, so I also don't agree with Sadhammer. You'll find time and space to game again! Even if it means playing smaller scale.
I mean... about Games Workshop... Ok... Is kind of.... regular... but Wizards surprises me more because most of their games have been championed and praised for "play your own style" type of things
I full on use a Mantic Warpath Enforcer army as a Tau proxy army. I like the Tau rules, I just hate the Tau lol. I even based my army on the old TTRPG Rifts, completely disregarding 40k factions
I agree with all of it but God speed to those of you who want to get a group together for a different ttrpg. I am a semi professional DM and I would say about 25% are willing to go against the grain with a different setting and 10% willing to go with another system. It seems wotc wants to force everyone online but ironically it's the only place non-dnd ttrpgs have found a place to thrive.
Man, I completely believe you but I hate to hear it. Sometimes I think that resistance to change is the only reason why the big companies stay on top. Because there's tons of independent stuff way better.
Only a bit overdramatic? One might say that, yes there where better days for us hobbyists/kitbashers, but the hobby has been more popular lately than back in the day. Stores where closing, WH Fantasy was killed off because it didn't make money, they changed (more easy to build models, smaller armies yet bigger models, less details to paint here and there) to attract more younglings. Without their bussiness mindset the WH hobby might have been dead in the water years ago. And, simply put, who would buy their stuff if they allowed 3rd parties and 3D printed models into their main events? (And don't forget they aren't stopping you if you don't attend their events and just play with friends.)
I always was aware of this aspect of D&D since I learned from an Uncle who's as old as Gygax but it's honestly only older RUclipsrs who turned me onto the homebrew history of wargaming. I hope we see the demise of publicly traded game companies and IP in my lifetime. Great vid!
@ Timestamp 8:50 what’s all this “we” business 😏
I agree to all the points in the video. But it only applies to people who are creative. People who completely lack creativity or come from the corporate tradition of wargaming have very different motivations.
Man, that statement is just too true. And I feel like creativity is getting lower and lower every generation.
My friend and I played 40k in the 90s and early aughts before quitting and are now picking it back up again. Since I am playing Dark Angels and they are going with Orks, we're already coming up with ideas for a Piscina IV campaign and we're definitely going to come up with homebrew rules/missions. I think the standardization of Warhammer came with the game's shift towards tournament play, which was never much of a consideration when I picked up the hobby.
I understand what you mean and I think your video has a point. I'm one of those dinosaurs that started both D&D and Warhammer in the 80's so I can relate to lot of things you mention. But you're missing one element that in my opinion count. At my time there was scarcity. Even if I was lucky enough to have a fully fledged hobby store in my small Italian city and considering everything was only in English at the time there was a scarcity of products that forced us to come up with kitbashing, scenery building and rules writing. Nowadays this scarcity doesn't exists anymore, not only there are a lot of products but it's easier than ever to get them. I'm almost 50, do I really want to buy stirfoam and tools and flock and glue and make my own hills or is it better to just buy them ready? It depends on what are your objectives in the hobby. You want to build terrain? Please go and buy the stuff you need to make terrain, but if it's not your cup of tea it's good to know we have alternatives. Are the big corporation blocking you from doing that? Not really, they are just not showing you anymore how to make terrain because they have the ready product. Are they really obliged to give you the alternative to their own product? It doesn't sounds realistic yeah? I think the internet made possible the creation of communities that are not dependant on big corporations so we just need to do our part to show\inform\tell about the alternatives. And there are some pretty good communities out there. Same for D&D. I love that I can play online and with digital products because now my group lives in three different countries and having tools like fantasy grounds helps me greatly to get a game in. So in short I partially agree, I think the focus, instead of been on blaming corporations because they do what they are supposed to do, should be on promoting the ways of the hobby that people might not know because they are only exposed to the contents of the corporations that run their games. Whoa, that was long... 😅
Haha, yes it was long but it was well said! I think you have a good point there.
I figured this out way back in the 90s. I started WH40K in the 80s when I was in middle school. WH40K:RT was the only 40K rules out there (yes, I know about LaserBit ) and it's an unholy mess but goddamn is it fun.
When GE starthed leaning hard into releasing games, filling WD with rules clarifications and additional rules then abandoning the game, they lost me as a customer. I didn't have the money to invest in every new game only to see it disappear in a year.
I now play 40K with Halo minis from MegaBlox. It's just as fun and extremely customizable.
I very much agree with your assessment. I see so many people throw hissy fits and complain online about how their units got shelved into Legends. Im confused because the rules are still there but they cant olay them in tournaments. Most players dontnolay tournaments and even then i don't under why they needbto care what GW thinks is legal. Its your game to play. Its why my friends and i dropped modern 40k and play older editions with our own house rules.
So many players are ruled by meta and the tournament balance thinking. If they want a balance game i recommend chess.
Well said!
@@LetsTalkTabletop to me the game is a rat race that people only play because they're LGS or friends play it.
So I am a dude on the rim of this community, playing DND and building minis for fun, but although I have armies of minis, I never got into the Warhammer community because half of them are 3d printed and I don't want to limityself to one company. Also, I don't have the time to learn a new addition every other year. I'd love to play 2-3 wargames a year. But there just does not seem to be a niche for this kind of scope.
Maybe I'm in a minority here, but I feel like as GW minis are getting more make-it-yourself, they're actually becoming easier to convert. I remember when a hero was just a fat slab of metal that you could repose if you were quite capable, but now you can grab quite a lot of their models and just snip here, snip there, boom. I say this because it exposes the greatest flaw of their other games like Killteam, where often times its that fucking foul push-fit they do. A sight better than just having to buy a low quality plastic attempt at an Elf Ranger that looks more like a Grey Ooze ate a tree sapling, but still.
Bit bashing minis is way better with other brands nowadays
W40k feels a lot like a live service PC or mobile game. Armies are fun to play only in specific ways. Play it different or "your own" ¿ prepare for pain or just plain no legal way to play your army . And this means that people have to either not care about the game (but then why buy +500$, besides addiction to buying) or they play on a clock. This also means a lot of people get in to the mind set of "l had to follow the rules, so you will have to follow it too" . A bit sad, but this is how it is.
Buying a 3d printer to print my own minis and getting the 4th edition rulebook and codices was the best decision i made in regards to getting into this hobby.
Trench Crusade, aka: Mordhiem 2.0 is doing this right. Model agnostic and rules will always be free
And as for games workshop in 40 K there are two things that doesn’t matter how much they try to change the model to wear. They think that you can’t bash it. It can be because I’ve seen a lot channels on RUclips of people that know a lot more than I do, and they have kit models with new primary stuff the snap together stuff and the second thing that is really going to put a crimp in games. Workshops shorts is 3-D printing and they can’t stop it at this point. The only thing they can do is hopefully try to profit off of it, but they won’t get they won’t get out of this phase of it’s not an official workshop model, you know what it doesn’t matter because there is not enough money in the universe to make me wanna buy their crap anymore. I will only accept from third parties or from private people or from getting a 3-D printer and making my own.
And the only thing that’s going to happen when wizards of the coast goes completely digital they’re going to have a little bit of profit for a few years. I would say two at the most but then people are just going to start walking away. It’s like having a nice shiny new toy when you’re a kid at Christmas, you’ll play with it for a while but then you’ll get bored with it and they’re gonna get bored with it really quickly And what’s going to happen to Dungeons & Dragons is this people are just going to go back to doing the exact same thing they were doing during the 1980s homebrewing when that happens wizards the coast might as well just close because their entire digital thing will crash on them and they won’t be making any money at all and then somebody like Piso can come in and buy the IP for a song
I agree with your points, however, this almost feels like a rant directed at this strawman of "by the book" players that complain on the internet. I think there's some important rebuttals to this perspective.
1. Some people actually enjoy a system that is more frequently updated and tweaked for balance reasons, and they aren't wrong for that.
2. The people who enjoy it, and knowingly participate in the monetization, likely aren't complaining as much as you think. Even if every gamer in the world took up independence from corporations, we'd still inevitably have people who want to reach a unified system, and people who will complain about things on the internet.
3. Some people are just wayyy to busy these days too be using their spare time for homebrewing rules or terrain. In these instances, being able to purchase such a thing is incredibly convenient. Although I'd still say go 3rd party because the monetization is getting pretty egregious.
4. I REALLY like some GW sculpts still, enough to shell out once in a while. That being said, Fuck em, 3D printer goes Brrrr.
All of these are valid points, good comment. There are always two sides of a coin.
The truth , "un" even battle are awesome ( unless playing against OP factions )
Boarding actions are the most fun played "un" even . A boarding torpedo only carries a squad pf terminators VS an entire ship of Naval Breachers and/or Rogue traders staff and /or Inquisition retinue with Inquisition Storm troopers
Kit bashing died with 3D printer models being illegal in tournament play
I don’t like gw all that much, but no, the reason the miniatures are made right now has nothing to do with preventing kitbashes…
They are such a corporation ! Yeah that sprue slicing is annoying.... sisters ...are fab... but damn ! 😢 ! ..Genestealer cults ..phew straigforward ... 😊 .... .....60 plus years old ....... Ditto to all you say ! The phrase Capture the Imagination .....till you don't use yours !
Just subscribe to your channel been a gamer since 1984 in belleview Florida. Love your content so far
Hey, welcome aboard! What games did you start with in 1984? What has been your favorite over all this time?
@@LetsTalkTabletop The red box D&D and Marvel Super Hero RPG.
I've always wanted to try the marvel superhero rpg, it always looks so fun. I just never got around to it and I'm sure the books are expensive now.