Can Steamforge Save Warmachine?
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- Опубликовано: 4 июн 2024
- We go more in depth on the acquisition of privateer press by steamforge games. We give our takes on what we think may happen as well as somethings we would like to see as retailers.
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Guys please do a little more research before talking about the issues with PP.
MK4 was their "End Times." All the old armies were legends, new amries were brought out but PP had production issues and missed the launch by more than 6 months and they are still having production issues 2 years later.
Add on the fact that they refused to listen to the community's feedback about the game even though they had created a system to submit balance feedback, killed off their volunteer community engagment team(the press gang,) and had a mass exodus of the development team.
SFG has an opportunity to right the ship from Willsons mismanagement imo, but they need to be super careful. They dont need to "blow up" the game.. that already happened,.and the current range is tiny in comparison to the end of MK3. They need to begin community outreach and mend fences. Bring back the press gang and make sure that product is coming out ON TIME.
Thanks for telling everyone this even if they were already aware of literally everything you stated.
Pretty sure the press gang program was axed due to potential legal issues. If it comes back, it will be very different
But the rest is bang on and better said than my attempt
Cool man, that's like, your opinion.
We have ours :)
Blow it up!
Give me a box with a caster, their ‘jack, and a unit and let me play a fun game without competitive play as the ONLY focus. I want campaigns, I want a narrative. The Iron Kingdoms is a great setting!
As someone whose favourite game for many years was Warmachine, the thought of them 'blowing it up' should anger me the same way the death of Warhammer Fantasy did. Though honestly, this announcement inspires neither anger nor excitement. Whether or not they invalidate my collection, I'm not going to be picking up a new version of the game, so it doesn't really matter.
A year or two ago I'd have had strong opinions, but the non-stop churn of games and editions has finally convinced me that the "Hobby" is a young man's game. I fell for the promise of 10th Edition 40k, but it was just another few hundred bucks for stuff that was fundamentally identical. Now they're promising the same thing with Age of Sigmar, but the previews are all showing it's going to be the same game in a slightly different colour of pajamas.
I don't have the room or time to keep buying new stuff, and at this point, I've lost the will to even keep up. As a lifelong hobbyist, it's a weird thought, but it's been actually very liberating. After dropping 40k, my friends and I have built and played with some old Bolt Action we had sitting around, got back into Malifaux 3e, finally opened that box of Titanicus...
The thing is, I'm not even trying to be one of those guys saying "I QUIT 40k!" It wasn't like that. I just finally accepted that I'm the old man who's too slow to play on his house league soccer team, and that's fine! That's just the way things go. We were spending more time and money buying and following new rules and product than we were enjoying the actual hobby. There's still a bunch of 40k stuff I want to get around to. Same with Warmachine. I printed every card at the end of 3rd Edition so that I had a 'complete' version of the game I could future proof, the same way I did with 8th Edition Fantasy.
I hope this new game is a success. Warmachine was a ton of fun and I hope newer generations get to experience something similar to the dynamism and excitement that was Mk1. So, blow it up, I say! If it means the 'death' of us original adopters, so be it. Our old models and rules will still exist, if we ever want to revisit the setting.
Thanks for sharing your experience. I don't think you are alone with how you feel.
Keep it low model-count, and encourage painting and scenic (i.e. 3D) terrain. Keep the buy-in low; offer larger-play modes as options.
WarmaHordes was dead to me when I saw tournament-style play, with bare/undercoated models and mouse-mat 'area terrain' and 'hills'. It screamed out that the player-base didn't respect the game as a whole.
The game was too "competitive" 3d terrain made mm measurements impossible so that scene went flat
Dont be hatin on neoprene mats lol! I actually enjoy them more than most 3d printed hills and rough terrain cus i dont have to fight the entire game to keep models standing
@@telleryoutube4458 exactly. Went from cinematic to mathematic.
@@telleryoutube4458 it's possible to have both, right now warmachine looks like garbage on the table. it needs a bit more glamor to attract new players
War machine is anti terrain lol
I never really played warmachine but honestly I’m invested in how this is going to shake out. I always liked the models and the setting. If it could come back as an improved game with a total reset and easier access into the game that would be a good thing. Good for players old and new, good for the community and for just good old competition for GW. Back in the day PP was about the only game I have ever seen that gave GW any sustained competition.
Steamforge should recoup some of the money spent to buy the IP by renting it out to Joytoy. I would buy a few Joytoy 1/18 Khador Warjacks.
If they did jacks and prime casters we could play upscaled battleboxes...
it would be sick to see them do something like that. the issue is the fact does the IP have the power anymore to want people to rent it.
@@Reuvii yes. as a matter of fact, ppl are looking into playing 40k combat patrol styled games with joytoy stuff.
@@flameknightdragon there is still a lot of love of the WM/Hordes IP. As long as Steamforged use JoyToy and not the half assed companies like Macfarlane or Bandai, it will sell like hotcakes.
If SFG can get a solid small release out, like each faction as a small warband with a caster, a few soldiers, and warjacks, with rules contained in those boxes, I think you could get a good fresh start. A scale increase can help sell the flashy new models.
Oh, like how the game started? That was the golden age of Warmachine, the battle boxes with a unit or two.
Started with just a caster and 2-4 jacks, nothing else. I like the way PP was planning to release starter boxes with caster, unit, jack (non-customizable), and solo. Gives you a taste of everything.
They already do that. Jesus christ.
@@rayslover8526 in bad resin models. SFG have a proven record with their plastic. The Epic Encounter minis are great quality
Rules are free and available already and SfG already announced a 2 player box.
"It's like your landlord moving into your house" 🤣
Love the show. Btw the background makes it look like a split screen at a glance. It's that black edge of the display case. Maybe it's the white edge. Idunno.
Green screen!
Flames of War will die next. They gave away huge box last adepticon. I wonder if there is a historical scene in your store and your thoughts on it, like Warlord Games.
QUESTIONS
1) Are you worried about Steamforged making the game TOO competitive, like they did with Guildball?
2) What do you think of the rules of mk4 compared to other rulesets? They simplified a lot of things that imo made the game move quite a bit quicker, and made it leaner, but they also removed some complexity that the fans loved, and brought in ‘build your own warjack / war caster rules’, which made it complicated again.
3) What do you think they do about the lore? Mk4 lore is all over the place, but all the characters that people loved are in the ‘past’.
4) What are your thoughts on Brawlmachine? I think it is AMAZING. It works at both a casual and competitive level as a game as they banned some of the more bonkers casters and limited the ability to spam. Should Streamforged learn from that?
5) What, if anything, can steamforged learn from Corvus Belli as to how to be a successful miniature company that has prospered for so many years?
To point 1: Warmachine was always hyper competitive. That was one of its flaws, in my opinion. It was catered toward the tournament crowd exclusively
MK4 has good rules and the changes were nice, allows more casual play along with the tournament feel still being there. but PP was in a bad way and part of it was they just didnt market it at all. I thought that warmachine went under long ago until i got fed up with GW and started looking around again.
I really liked Warmachine as a setting and for the models. The game was fun also. I just never found the community to play with. And I live in the Seattle area.
I lived in Seattle during the Mk2 era. I saw lots of product on shelves at most game stores, but I didn't see a lot of casual play. When I went to a store whose primary focus was Warmachine and asked about in-store gaming, I was told that they had regular game nights, but that they weren't really looking for more players, but if I really wanted to come I could stop by in case someone didn't show up. Needless to say, I never went to that store again. I wandered into a few other LGS game nights, and never saw a painted army. I saw warjacks with no arms, not sure why they didn't just use cardboard circles to match the base size and forget the models entirely. Nobody wanted to talk about the game with someone who was new but interested in playing. And no one cared about the hobby side of it. I didn't dig the lore, but none of the players I saw seemed to care about it anyway.
If they do release more Iron Kingdoms rpg stuff, that would be awesome. I hope they use their own system or their old system and not port it to D&D though.
Heartily agreed. It needs to stand on its own.
I got into into it at end of mk2,, purely because that's all anyone was playing (I'm in rural AU, so can't be picky). I found it too technical/abstracted and steampunk really isn't my thing. Glad Hordes was an option though. I'm open to trying it again, if I'm able to knock the moss off of my Circle Orboros.
Really enjoyed everything about Guild Ball though. Go the Brewers!
I was hyped for Mk4 then found out that the "new" style minis I got in the first production Cygnar starter were then improved upon and redone.
Our warmachine scene when I played (Indianapolis) was MASSIVE. We had Warmachine days 4-5 days a week, all at different shops, all with different player bases and skill levels. We had huge local tournaments regularly that had massive turn outs.
Sad what happened to this game :( MK1 were the days, MK2 wasn't bad once adjusted, although it killed a few of my armies lol.
I was around then, playing wh40k though, I remember the GP south was always full of warmachine players.
@tanen7264 gp south was the one I rarely went to, jus couldn't fit it in with everything else. I started at games to die for, migrated to gp north, then settled at Saltire Games as they has the best players lol.
@@caseyddr - lol, so it wasn’t just gp south. I knew it was really strong in Indy for a while. Back then if you didn’t know tt games and walked into a game store you would have probably went with WM just based on games being played.
Would love to see a Steamforged/Warmachine wishlist video!
Coming very very soon lol
I think an easy win is to bring back the
Agreed. Small, Manageable entry points and nibbles purchases
I remember when it was getting big and I thought it seemed cool but I was not making a lot of money and anything I could save for hobby's was spent towards Warhammer. I hope they can save it and make it something great. The only other non GW tabletop game I have played was Warzone.
That was the main problem with WM, IMO: you could not play it casually. You were either all in competitively, or you didn't play it. Of course there were other problems, but for me, the entire local community were all hardcore competitive players. I won't get into the hobby aspect, or the horrible game tables.
the hobby aspect of WM was absolutely terrible. my community had at least 30 players but only 2 of them were serious about making their models look good. competitive players generally HATE the hobby aspect of tabletop gaming and unfortunately, PP went all out to pander to that crowd.
This is why PP products are not even picked up by hobbyists when the system pretty much rolled over and died because they are also designed and produced terribly in terms of quality.
Seems to me that the big problem here is that, if SFG does very little and just tries to more-or-less re-release what was already available, it will surely fail. But to make it something that could succeed, they will need to invest a lot of time and money, which obviously increases the risk to the company if Warmachine fails again for the umpteenth time.
I don't envy their position lol
al
Yes.
As long as they understand the separation between Warmachine "the game", and Warmachine "the business".
Growing up in Ohio Warmachines popularity was always in flux (in my local area) and truly seemed to die a few years after mk3s launch. The pandemic put the name on the gravestone as like you have said, there wasnt a strong hobby base. Without tournaments or events all the collections got sold and by the end you could pick up used warjacks for a couple bucks from LGSs.
I moved to washington state last year and have been blown away by how dead it seems here in the "home" of privateer. Granted i havent been to EVERY game store but in ten or so i have visited i have found one store that stocked a few of the starter armies. And even then the shelf they were on was smaller than the battletech selection. Which would have blown my mind when i got into wargaming in 04/05.
They need to make a whole new game... set in the Iron Kingdoms setting.
Sort of like what gw did with age of sigmar?
@@lordsofwargamesandhobbies3905
Yeah, but good
Oooof
@@direden hey. I feel attacked by that one. LOL
AoS is a solid game and better than 40k for sculpts and rules. AoS 4 looks like it cleans up a lot of Warhammer's past sins too, especially with the Spearhead game mode.
Whatever the solution is, it cannot include 2D terrain and unpainted armies as the standard 😅
That was always my problem with the game. I’d wheel out fully painted armies and no one and I mean no one would have anything painted. Terrain was mouse pad cut outs throw on a table. It was shit.
As an active Player I can tell you that shift is already happening. I played more painted games with WMH than with any GW games.
Terrain is changing too.
Do you have any further insights into what happened to Dark Age? Their latest minis were even better than CB and it was during GW's weakest period in terms of mini design that it was relaunched. Awesome minis, great fluff books, even better rules and the availability wasn't too bad either. I'm still baffled to this day and in february I bought the last remaing modern minis and books at Noble Knight.
I am curious about that as well, always had a curious eye on Dark Age. However I will say the availability of CMON stuff in Europe was always abysmal, I don't think I've ever seen a online store from mainland Europe able to have all Dark Ages stuff in stock back in the day.
I think it has to do with business model. It’s not the same to support a miniatures game than a boardgame. Too many SKUs, production issues and so on. CMON does a fancy boardgame and only needs to worry of having a single thing in stock. Miniatures there is a starter for each faction, individual unit boxes, sometimes blisters, core rules and faction books, counters and all the other additional things… and with lower margins than boardgames, ‘cause even if it’s manufactured in the same place as boardgames, you need to factor in logistics.
CMON binned it because it wasn't making enough money, but they are also sitting on the perpetual license they have so no other company can pick it up.
Cmon got spooked at how much they were spending to promote the game (employing 2 employees) and went back to the warm, cozy blanket that is kickstarter.
Honestly, the road back for a minis game after you've been in the discount bin in a retailers store is...bleak.
I like the aesthetic of Warmachine, but I know nothing about the game. If you make a good skirmish game with that aesthetic I'll at least give it a second glance.
It can be played at the skirmish level. There are multiple army size tiers to play from. Though I do understand the majority play at the high point levels so finding a dedicated group who is willing to only play the smaller game sizes would be difficult.
Though I do think that is one thing SFG should do is really push journeyman leagues. You get people to buy in at a small price point, encourage painting, and encourage small to mid sized games. People will continue to buy product to try new things at the smaller points range, and then suddenly they have enough to field a full 100 pt army. So hopefully that would foster more people to stick around for small and medium sized games
It's an incredibly tight and engaging game with lot's of ways to list build, play and win.
It also has a very competitive aged player base.
I'm not sure how much you know about mark 4, but they have nuked the old armies and have started a new army rollout. You have a base army and there are elite cadres that work for many armies under that faction. The old armies can still be played with mk4 under legacy rules.
Yeah that shit needs to go.
The sad truth is that Warmachine is just an IP with too much baggage.
The future is already out in the wild, and that is the 3d sculptors doing big time work creating 3d models.
These monthly offerings by these companies are immense, and are making immense money.
PP hiding their minis line behind their own subpar 3d printing is a significant sign of them going to fail hard. Like the RIAA in the face of MP3's.
This is why companies like OPR, Osprey, etc. are going to come out ahead, because they are making games that are miniature agnostic.
For less than $500, you can buy everything you need to print out an army of anything you please, and for less than $100, you can pay somebody else to do it for you.
Why settle for an IP neglected by its creators and the player base? I'd even bet those 6 people playing WM at adepticon are more indicative of the actual numbers of people playing, because I haven't seen nobody play it, let alone discuss it unironically, in over a decade.
TL,DR; is that their IP doesn't have much worth. Chasing it is not going to lead to success, and I hope SFG bought out PP really cheap to minimize those inevitable write offs they will have to make for this basically dead IP.
I'm not in the retail industry and I don't have experience running this or any other type of business. First, I have a question about the plan of Kickstarting the RPG as a first step. My experience doesn't mean that it's true everywhere, but the people I know and play games with don't tend to be really into both RPGs and miniature wargames. I would say that, generally, I also find that to be the case with the content creators that I consume. As game store owners, maybe our two hosts have a better sense of the overlap between RPGers and mini wargamers. If the RPG KS does well, does that necessarily suggest that Warmachine itself will do well?
So here's my idea: I've seen several hobby content creators wax nostalgic about P3 paint. I can't say that any of them have talked longingly about the miniatures or the games. I remember the Mk2 minis. They were crap. Plastic that you had to user super glue on, mould lines that would wreck your blades, poor detail, etc. No wonder players didn't get into the hobby side. Anyway, I know you said SFG don't have experience with paint, so maybe they need to partner with someone who does. Bring back the paint line. Make it a KS, and have a small number of high-quality brand-new sculpts that are available as stretch goals and/or add-ons. Make it attractive to hobbyists who like to paint great minis even if they don't game with them. Show that SFG is committed to the hobby "pillar" and get people excited about the models, and hopefully the game itself. The rules can come later, or maybe you do the one-page version of them.
It is good yas touched on the toxicness of WM communities. I will never play WM again after Mark 2. My experience was coming from 40k and had a buddy who played WM. So I built and painted a full 50 point list for Khador. I had played some games against him and have wargaming experience so I went with him to a local stores wargaming night. They paired me with one of the younger guys of the group who apparently has trouble playing against the neckbeards/more experienced guys. He proceeded to punch my shit in. Didnt kill my caster but just utterly destroyed me. Every single player of the group 12-14 all came over afterwards literally laughing and saying "oh that was like a top tier tournament list he used against ya". I literally sold my army at a huge lost that night. Had no interest to be in thay kind of community. In terms if Mark 4, I'm an avid painter and collector of HH30k and I'm also a 3d printer. The HH community really embraces that. Anyway I will never buy a $200 3d printed WM starter when I know it costs maybe $30 in resin and I can print it better. I understand they are a business and a reasonable mark up makes sense to me. But not $200.
Here is the good, the bad, and the ugly
The Good
SFG has an opportunity to address some of the problems PP just cant do like advertising. This week alone I am seeing multiple people talk about this, table top websites have a blurb over it, and a reddit post talking about this. They have a chance to improve the sculpts and fix the trust on the brick & mortar front. Also the people at SFG were huge fans of the game and wmh is lucky that it has had two hugely successful fan products made for the game. One being steamroller which revolutionized how tournaments go and the other was Brawlmachine which made playing smaller games faster and much more successful & entertaining. SFG can carry on this legacy by addressing some of the rule issues and clunkiness of MK4. I mean i just took a quick peak in the fan server discord and people are still to this day are complaining about unit movement rules saying its a gotcha and more difficult to explain which is the total opposite of the objective PP was trying to achieve when making its new edition.
The bad
WMH 4th edition for the most part is on a downward trend. From longshanks only showing 977 unique players to conventions not having its 100+ turn out to even its online leagues being half of what it use to be is concerning. Even on the reddit post I read that some players lost faith in the developers at PP. This is quite the mountain SFG has to climb
The ugly
SFG doesnt have the best reputation. I mean lets be honest here... The handling of guild ball will forever be a stain on its legacy and after reading some of its comments on the reddit post it doesnt inspire much confidence either. It seems more like a 'please be happy' and 'we are trying really hard' instead of 'we hear you and understand the concerns, we will go ahead address X and then hopefully Y will fall into play and then make sure Z gets done'
I know today they plan on giving us more information but as stated prior i am not inspired. Personally AMG would have been a better fit but lets see
I look more at their recent track record. Guild ball was their first product as a company so I will give them a bit of a pass on that one.
Totally fair that others will not.
I accept that I am biased as both a former Warmahordes and Guild Ball player but for me both companies have burned too many bridges for me to get excited about this. SFG started out strong with Guild Ball, but they handled the ending of that game pretty badly. PP created a cool system and setting but failed to make it a hobby game, playing in public simply wasn’t worth it with all the grey plastic (a similar issue is happening locally with Conquest as well right now). My prediction is that SFG takes the IK IP and starts pumping stuff out in their plastics, probably in coloured plastic per faction similar to how they handled the late Guild Ball releases so that Warmachine becomes more board gamey and accessible. I’ll be watching but I certainly won’t be buying.
Totally fair
You guys didnt do any research at all. They already reduced the faction lists and model range and blew up the world with mark 4.
Hilarious that you think they don't already know that.
@@chriswilson6486They obviously don’t.
So, they are morons with an axe to grind.
@@chriswilson6486So they have an axe to grind? An agenda.
So there is malice here?
@chriswilson6486 then why are they saying to do what they've already done?
It's always the axe with you lol
though it looks like from their new press newletter that they are going to try shifting away from the hyper competitive mind set.
Not sure if this comment section is spicier than the usual GW crowd, or if the toxic perception of the Warma/Hordes gang is on full effect here. 🤣
Bring on the spice!
Like what you dudes are doing here, good talks. One question though, what is a “pat tree on”?
It comes off as though you guys dont have a full understanding of what MK4 is. They did effectively nuke everything to start over. Sure you can still find the product in some places but that is the last of it you will see. They did do the wishy washy 'oh you can still play some of your old models" but from your gamestore perspective they dont exist. So as it stands there are currently 7 armies that exist. As for the quality of the models yeah that is a disappointment. Some come out great, some come out horrible. It helps that they have an amazing parts replacement policy (though international shipping is hot garbage) but they really should be catching more before it leaves the warehouse.
And I don't understand the comment about getting rid of jack attachments. I would much rather spend $45 and have every option available over having to shell out $35 three different times for specific kits. Unless you mean by a game complexity standpoint but honestly the games complexity is rarely a talking point of why people are not interested. Privateers biggest problems have been lack of availability, lack of advertising, and screwing over retailers with a bunch of dead product/SKU bloat. And maybe refusing to relocate out of Seattle one of the most expensive areas in the US. They probably could have had an easier go of it if they operated out of Nebraska or something.
We know what mk 4 was. We are suggesting that they should maybe look at re-relaunching the game.
As for the less options in a box, if they are going to Plastic Injection Molding then I welcome all the options. If they are going to be resin or steamforged boardgame plastics then I'd lean on less options and more simple kits personally
Thanks for the comments much appreciated
Maybe an entirely new game, set in the Iron Kingdoms.... That might work. 🤷
Edit: As a guy in a long time committed relationship, I can confirm "She will want it back". 🤣🤣
Lmao
honestly MK4 was them making a fresh start and it fell flat on it's face. Pissed off old fans by killing off most factions off screen. it pissed off stores since they were now stuck with dead stock no one wanted even at heavy discount. and they drove away new players by continuing the hyper competitive focus plus pricing them out. the entery was $200 and since you can only get box sets from LGS and you had to buy more then 1 of it. and honestly it is telling that at the end PP was shifting from only new factions to remaking the old factions, and trying to make new models look like the old art style.
Yea the lack of small starters was a bit bizarre.
Destroying the IP for some AOS makeover is literally the dumbest Idea they could go with.
that was MK4 already.
Also just saw the mention of Dark Age. I will never forgive CMON for that travesty. Such a great little game with a lot of potential, all wasted.
Solid maybe. Honest truth is I was interested in mk 4 until I saw the price. Then the models were kinda meh, let alone the resin issues. SFG CAN do that, but there’s a massive investment required beyond just the IP’s purchase. SFG probably have most of the tools in place from what they learned from GB, I just don’t know if the funding is there.
They're models are just too busy looking and chunky over the top. Plus if they don't do physical rulebook and cards then forget it.
The launch of mk4 was AOS, they legacied pretty much all the existing range, moved the timeline fowards and altered many of the existing factions.
It might of worked but that launch needed to be a confidence booster to retailers/customers and it definitely wasn't.
Drip feeding the (re)release of the factions robed it of a lot of the potential punch it would have needed. At that point PP needed to treat warmachine like a brand spanking new game on the block.
Games workshop can sorta get away with it, as much as people constantly complain about it, their resevoir of good will is infinitely greater. And even then, GWs transition to AOS had them officially transitioning most of the existing range and AOSing the factions much more gradually.
PP as a whole had been in decline for a while by the time mk4 was announced. What was left on the shelves in store was heavily discounted and had been for a while. ( my store had a box in the back you could rummage thru. When mk4 was annouced, they added a note to the box "make us an offer")
Mk4 needed to generate new enthusiasm for the game and inspire confidence. Instead, it oozed panicked desperation.
I don't know what steamforged have planned, I do hope they succeed (the iron kingdom is such a cool expansive setting i enjoyed thru mk1 to mid mk3) but they certainly have an uphill battle to contend with.
This, exactly. It smelled desperate. Now the thing is AoS worked out very well for GW because yeah they bungled the first release but the constant releases, commitment to a roadmap etc AoS is not a top tier game as far as sales go. They also finally got the lore rolling out with consistent quality.
@mattp6953 3d printing was always going to be an issue. Beyond their obvious cash flow problems, the stretched out release schedule was likely dictated by their printing times. Stocking up on product for a release had to be a nightmare of watching grass grow, even with a printer farm. A safe (financially) system if your game doesn't catch as much as you need, but woefully inadequate if it takes off.
Would have been a great system for fulfilling demand of older units, though.
@@nicolastousignant9160 I agree I think smaller mini companies should invest in 3dp for back catalog MTO stuff that isn't in distribution. They could have the best of both worlds. Older back catalog MTO via direct sale, and current SKUs through end retailers. Everyone is happy.
Are there any wargame products outside of GW games that is exploding in terms sales? I don't think so.
I think players need to adjust their expectations for non GW games
@khodezabegum431 PP themselves set that expectation, the player base mostly along with it..... until they didn't.
You might imagine that Steamforge would have come up with a plan to revive Warmahordes before they even made the offer. That said, I’m sitting here trying to imagine what they could do, that would make me get back into the IP and I can’t come up with any scenario that would tempt me to roll those dice.
They certainly have a plan, to be sure.
Answer: No. There's too much bad blood. The Win-At-All-Costs fundamental of the game backed up by a massive litany of granular and technical rules at its core fostered a meta that rivaled or exceeded the worst GW tournament full of sweaty grognards. You have to ask what is there even left to salvage out of this? Consider what got Warma as big as it got, given that GW's mismanagement of its own product was a colossal part of PP's success.
I could rant for a long time, but I'll spare you and just say this: The greatest thing Privateer and Warmahordes ever did was scaring GW enough that they drastically pivoted and greatly improved their product. Past that, PP and Warma did not have a ton of merits to stand on its own. It had some I could list out, but god it was all buried hard the instant you put a model on the table.
I hope Steamforge didn't pay much, as the odds of recouping their investment are low. I sold my stuff with bitterness years ago, so good luck attracting whoever is going to be the new customer. It's definitely not me or people like me. I see a PP model these days and it's nothing but bad memories of a ton of wasted time and money.
Thanks for sharing!
I hope they reboot it to a pre-Mk4 standard. I lost all interest with the rules changes (teleporting movement?!) and "Primaris Marines"-style push to force players to re-buy their armies.
I miss the old aesthetic of Warhammer Fantasy. Never had an army, but I can appreciate it for what it was.
Warmahordes takes the prize for games with the lowest painted army rate of any game I saw. I remember seeing it around during it's peak and never seeing more than a handful of minis that were even base coated. That is what kept me out of it.
Yeah the game looks extremely ugly between the area objectives, the flat terrain, the crap mish mashed unpainted or not matching colors because of the need to borrow models left and right to have a meta list. it was a rare sight to have 2 painted armies fighting each other. The game was good tho
@@jeancouscousRight. The poor aesthetics of the game were all a symptom of the meta list style of warmahordes.
I honestly think Warma/Hordes is closer to card games like MTG, than traditional miniature games like 40k or whatever.
The minis are just game pieces, they just need to represent a function on the table for most people. Which in turn makes it very off putting to people into more traditional mini games.
@@jeancouscous That was one of the factors that drove me out. I had fully painted Khador and Cryx lists and I wanted to play on good looking tables, but that wasn't the scene after mid MK2.
Your knowledge of the current state of WM is somewhat out of date.
In thinking about your three pillars concept... Warmahordes was definitely more of a obelisk than a tripod. What did I like? Well the lore/setting was excellent. Very plausible, believable and coherent, unlike AoS, particularly early on. But, that said, the Iron Kingdoms lore didn’t have the depth of 40k or Fantasy. So, the setting/narrative was good enough to keep a player interested in the game. Not so silly and implausible that it would turn someone off. Models/hobby? I honestly can’t remember anyone who was into Warmahordes just for the hobby. Again, even more so than the setting (which, again, was a 10) the minis were “good enough”. Not a turn off but not a reason to get involved in the game. Everyone that I knew, who was into Warmahordes, PLAYED Warmahordes. Played frequently. At least once a week, many more often. It was all about the rules and the game play, and I guess it was fairly competitive. But, at least in my area, I wouldn’t have called it “toxic”. People were competing, but also having fun with it and actively trying to recruit new people. That would have been at the start of the Mk2 era I think.
That's a accurate brief of what warmachine was
the reason people did not get into the models for the hobby was the fact you could play with your conversion since it was banned by the competitive rule. warmachine had no narrative play even though it's roots come from TTRPGs. there was no way to legally convert your RPG character into a model for the table top. without narrative play of hobby side the game was doomed to collapse.
My point was, and it’s anecdotal I know, but I never met anyone who collected Warmahordes models just for the joy of building them, painting them and putting them on a shelf. Everyone that was into Warmahordes played the game, yes, often with unpainted models and 2-D terrain pieces, and tended to make model purchases solely on the basis of in game performance.
Believe it or not I really liked the models when I first bought them in MK1. I thought the jacks were cool.
sad to hear the 3d prints suck. I've seen like no reviews of them especially on youtube
The 3d prints are awesome, these idiots just have an axe to grind
@@Zieg_Games no they are trash. they are poor quality and easily break. there is a reason you see so many posts of new players of ""what should i do many of my parts came broken" and even getting replacements would end up also arriving broken.
@@flameknightdragon Oh, so you are also a bad actor with an axe to grind.
@@Zieg_Games nope just stating the fact you leave out. their prints are brittle, and break easily, their are reports of people getting stuff that were broken in the box and 2 replacements they got were also broken on arrival. multiple reports of getting things that were under washed, and under cured. I have a sub to mini create and have had to put models out into the sun for over an hour since they they were sent uncured. I have brought all their 5e stuff, i have backed every IK book so far. i have done more to keep them going then you likely ever have.
@@flameknightdragon Yep, bad actor using an appeal to authority in pursuit of an agenda.
I am sorry. I disagree with most of what is said here. My community is constantly buying Warmachine, continuously playing casual and attending events. We are growing steadily.
if it is doing as well as you claim then why did they sell it off? they would not do that if they are doing well.
@@flameknightdragonThey got it to the point that they could sell it.
Terrible take.
@@flameknightdragon Because demand was exceeding production. PP is still a small business with a couple dozen employees. SFG offers increased production and distribution.
@@flameknightdragon It wasn't a sell off. It's an expansion of resources
@@Avatarsoul7 "Acquisition" is not an expansion of resources. Don't assume that your community is representative of the market as a whole. Anecdotal evidence is not evidence at all. There are active 6th edition WHFB communities out there. It doesn't mean that a company could make a profit from it.
Complete reboot and actually make good models for it.
Card table booth?? You guys have no clue what you're talking about.
Literally was at adepitcon and saw with my own eyes a few years ago but ok 👍
Hope SFG is watching!
Might need to set up a Consulting tier on the Patreon, haha
SFG listening to these jackasses will kill the game.
Which is what these bad actors want.
I suppose keeping down the current path is working well for them?
Curious what makes us 'bad actors'? We are pretty transparent with our biases.
@@lordsofwargamesandhobbies3905 The obvious misinformation, either by ignorance or malice.
Attempting to shape the narrative under these conditions makes your intentions very clear.
Look, I have my misgivings as well, but I am informed on the situation as I am a current player and a former player from the Mark I days.
At least put the effort in.
Warmachine has been dead for so long now, just limping on zombie-like... I loved it during 2nd and that's when it started ending.
To see how bad it is, the PP forums barely have forum posts with more than half a dozen replies on them and the post about the takeover when i looked had 5...
I'm hoping it could be resurrected but I'm not confident with SFG due to my experiences with the Dark Souls KS and the Guildball fiasco - i loved that game.
Last year I checked them out again and was shocked by the prices and the gutting of the factions, that confused me no end
According to some commentors it's actually 'thriving'
@@lordsofwargamesandhobbies3905 To me that's surprising as I don't think I've seen a game of it in the last decade being played, I don't really hear it being talked about either apart from this week, I occasionally see the models pop up on news sites
Make Guildball your competitive game and make Warmachine your narrative game. Don't change the aesthetic and background but change the rules. Move away from pointless scenarios that have no relationship with the lore. Reduce model count in game and overall range. Make it cheaper to get into. Have scenario books and campaigns similar to Frostgrave nit army books. Allow gamers to create their own characters in the game alongside pre-existing characters. Ramp up support and access for the rpg.
I would go all in if they offered this.
by restoring all the old armies to prime, including the old stuff theres not enough new to hold intrest its severely limited, ugly, tacky, and i dont care about any of the new heros or armies for khador, brinebloods, or cygnar my armies are old khador old cygnar, and old trollbloods wich look better, have a medival steampunk theme and most of thier models i like. most of the new models just feel wierd and off, and i dont like any of them. there are a couple models in different new models i kinda like but most of them are crap putting me off. if they dont restore the old they wont have a product to sell and the company will die. i love my old plastic and metals better then the resin 3d printed junk.
Obviously tastes are different but maybe besides the MOW the new khador line is a lot better than the old one. Look wise and quality wise.
Gee, you guys sure are making a lot of content with no research or knowledge for a “dead” game….
since it is dead. most stores don't stock it. there are almost no local groups around. and the tournament scenes is not a good indicator of a games health.
Most stores don’t stock anything but GW and 1 or 2 niche games for their area. My point is, if it’s a “dead” game, why are they making so many videos for n it?
@@flameknightdragonIs it though?
Tournament attendance is increasing across the country.
@@robertellis4658 I live in a medium-sized American city. Game stores in my area carry GW, sure, but they carry lots of miniature games. Flames of War. Song of Ice and Fire. Armada. Conquest. Infinity. I can walk into a store and buy Oathmark or Battletech or Kings of War or a half dozen miniatures games I have never heard of and know nothing about. But what I can't buy in any game store in the metropolitan area in which I live is a single Warmachine or Hordes product. There are videos for every niche hobby you can imagine. I wouldn't take that as evidence to suggest a thriving game. If stores aren't carrying it, it's hard to suggest that the game is in a healthy place.
@@robertellis4658Why are they making so many videos? It’s because everybody loves watching a train wreck.
Name one Star Wars Legion product that isn’t a card or dice that they’ve given away for free.
Boba fett!
@@lordsofwargamesandhobbies3905 never have they given away anything free when I’ve played this game.
They need a complete reset. It’s too far gone.