Grimstonefire:
For anyone interested there is a fairly lengthy reply about his view on CD:
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BLOOD AXE:
Can you summarize it? Good news? Anything definite?
Firehammer:
Here the Chaos Dwarf specific part:
Me: Recently, an American Warhammer player qualified to the Las Vegas GT using the Indy Chaos Dwarf armybook at one of the Indy GTs. Will GW ever consider Chaos Dwarfs profitable/large enough to consider doing as a full fledged army book? Would YOU personally want to see the Chaos Dwarfs get some love?
Gav: I can�?Tt speak for GW�?Ts attitude to whether another Warhammer army would be profitable, but I can say that within the design-types in the Studio and above, there was always the belief that Chaos Dwarfs could be a great army. I was involved on-and-off with various proposals and discussions about Chaos Dwarfs over the years, and there is huge scope for a very cool army, background and range of miniatures.
Given how long it has been, it would be a completely new army, resource-wise. Having seen how much is involved with the Tau, Ogre Kingdoms, the re-dos of the Bretonnians and Wood Elves, I can safely say that it is a big chunk of schedule to commit to one project, and that can be a risky proposition. You could probably produce the equivalent of Apocalypse or Cities of Death and support half a dozen armies with a few releases each for the same amount of resource invested in creating a whole new army �?" which is better for the hobby? It�?Ts an impossible question to answer, there are pros and cons to both courses of action.
On a purely selfish level, I would always plump for the new army option, but there are lots of real-world consequences about retail space, ongoing support and �?~catalogue�?T size that weigh against it.
fauthsie:
Personally I think it was a really good interview… I found the SOC discussion particularly interesting. Unfortunately there was nothing new for CDs in there.
Grimstonefire:
It is a valid argument he made for and against doing a complete WA:CD range. Think of all the space marines they could make with that time and money… :mad
But then they have shown a willingness to create whole new ranges every now and then in the past.
Thommy H:
Pretty much what I’ve been saying all along, in fact - a new army is always a risk when Space Marines, Empire and Orcs and Goblins are such a sure thing.
Willmark:
Same reason why Hollywood is fixated on remakes.
snowblizz:
I also think that is is a genuine concern that a release of a new book could become a non-event because it�?Ts been given out in dribs and drabs for months�?� Generally, a Codex or army book will be finished at least half a year before it actually hits the shelves, which means any meaningful feedback would have to be gathered at least nine months before release. The other problem is that many �?~balance�?T issues might arise from new units or other elements being introduced to an army, and I can see that spoiling the surprise (to put it bluntly) by releasing details of that unit so early would be counter-productive.I found this to be the most interesting.
I don't know where they come from but where I'm at the release of a book is already a "non-event". I hardly have time to react that a new book is out when the next one hits WD. Blipping past with a speed of one book a month is just as non-spectacular as dribbling one book out over a longer period.
What points is the "surprise" when there's no models to sell with the surprise models anyway.
Thommy H:
I think he’s comparing it to the “Army of the Month” period during 3rd Edition 40K, where not only was there a Codex released every month, but also frequently many variant lists appearing in White Dwarf. Now at least it’s one thing each month - not “one thing for each system, plus a bunch of rubbish little things that were never playtested”.
Willmark:
GWs keepng things close to the vest is supposed to be to builys suprise. More cynically to keep the masses buying. GW doesn’t seem to get that there are now people who will just wait until they hear news about the army they want. There are always those they will keep buying no matter what or the mythical ten year old gamer… Suffice of to say this will prove interesting.
Tarrakk Blackhand:
Well, I hope they hurry up and build something for us soon!
Don’t they pay attention to the GT Indy players and people showing up in CDO shirts, not to mention this web site?
Um…hello GW…I think we’re showing some support of CD’s even if you aren’t!
ryanamandaanna:
Is there anywhere to get CDO shirts before the Baltimore Games Day this year?
Thommy H:
More cynically to keep the masses buyingIsn't that the idea?
Grimstonefire:
I don’t think it is directly. I think GW see the people on forums as a relatively small part of their overall business strategy, and the effort/ resources it would take to regularly leak out information months in advance like clockwork is more than they want to spend.
Added to that, they probably presume we are all dumb enough to buy every new army that comes out.
So the lack of information should not be seen only as a ploy to get us to spend more, though it is a big reason why I think. Considering the numbers of customers that leave them though you’d think it would be an idea to do something to try and keep them.
The strange thing though is they do follow rumour discussions generally very closely.
Thommy H:
I think GW see the people on forums as a relatively small part of their overall business strategyWe are. The internet crowd are a very vocal minority.
Grimstonefire:
I always thought it would be interesting if people did a massive survey of gaming groups, GW stores etc to see how many people are actually on wargame forums.
Also, how many people learn about upcoming releases from wargame forums (or indirectly from people who are).
Thommy H:
Probably fewer than you think. Warseer is probably the biggest GW-related forum around, and it has 12,000-odd active members (according to the stats at the bottom). That’s not a large percentage of the game-playing public.
Servius:
Im amazed the SoC Question wasnt about how Gav and the other organizers completely ignored the submitted results and basically let Chaos skip over any areas that were holding them up… Namely Bohsenfels.
Grimstonefire:
Probably fewer than you think. Warseer is probably the biggest GW-related forum around, and it has 12,000-odd active members (according to the stats at the bottom). That's not a large percentage of the game-playing public.I've quickly added together the members for the 7 largest forums I know of, and using your 12,000 figure as a % overall it comes out as about 35,000 active members (which may of course include duplication). Bear in mind that this is only the currently active members, we will assume that lurkers don't count as active.
Thommy H
Now if those 35,000 know 5 people who are not on forums to share news and discuss things, that's 175,000 people already. Which must be a fair chunk of the GW market globally I imagine, and that is only 7 forums.
It's all guesswork really, as probably most of those people don't follow news or discussions at all anyway. But then those who don't use forums may not either.
Demographically it would be very different of course, as I don't see many 12 year olds on forums...
:)
Anyhow, back on topic. I think Servius that Gav only mentioned in passing before the campaign the fact that it would follow a story. In hindsight we all should have read a lot more into that comment, as it was obvious what it meant. Chaos got hopelessly whipped anyway, they should have done the map so the chaos attack could fight on many fronts and still besiege Middenheim, by a global modifier. I.e. instead of only registering at key locations, the chaos wins collectively counted in all locations simultaneously, but the wins of everyone else only counted at one location each time.
Thommy H:
I've quickly added together the members for the 7 largest forums I know ofDon't you think there's a fair amount of overlap? Pretty much everyone has some presence on Warseer, which is why I chose it for my figure.