Talk Fantasy Football

One thing to bear in mind is that it is always a risk for a company to come out with a new product. Blood Bowl and other specialist games never made GW the kind of money WHFB (AoS) and certainly 40K ever did in direct sales. I’d argue that having a more diverse product line helps to keep people coming to your stores/websites and encourages cross-sales. If someone tires of 40K they can convert or buy a Blood Bowl team or necromunda gang and play that, still keeping an interest in the GW side hobby rather than going over to a rival company. They’ll also be more likely to get back into that game if they keep in contact with other GW gamers and up to date with new releases that may reinvigorate their interest.
After all if you they continued to cut out the less successful lines they’d end up with nothing but space marines. Mind you that is pretty much Horus Heresy and that stuff is selling really well.

So GW had no idea how popular Blood Bowl would be if they brought it back. Money and time spent on the game could have been devoted to AoS, 40K or a one off boxed game instead. I can see why they would go for limited release as they want to avoid having left over stock and with Blood Bowl they didn’t have much to compare it to. If 10 thousand khorne dice sold out in 5 minutes then they may well order more of the Nurgle dice due in 6 months. They’ll now have a better idea of how popular Blood Bowl stuff is and hopefully be able to order more or get a better idea of how much stock to get.

The staggered release is a deliberate strategy as this release wants to capitalise on casual players. Us vets have plenty of Blood Bowl teams already so really only need to know the rule changes. In fact you could probably keep using crp and have someone type up a word doc with the changes there are so few. If they drip feed releases then they can keep interest up. Also had everything come out in 1 go then many people would not have been able to afford it all and by the time they could something else might have taken their eye.

Forgeworld is in a similar situation and it looks like they are doing more individual sculpts. Those stars, extra skaven, alternate human/orc parts and goblin weapons we’ve seen so far could just as easily have been more heresy era space marines. How well sales do will determine the amount of resources they devote to future Blood Bowl releases.

I must say, spubbbba is pretty spot on in his reasoning. Good post.

spubbbba wrote:One thing to bear in mind is that it is always a risk for a company to come out with a new product.

That is true.
But doesn't that mean that you actually should care about what you do instead of releasing a bugged product that has simply been a sloppy job?
With just a little more care and effort, all these mistakes could have been avoided.

Doing something risky is definitely no excuse for doing it carelessly.
In fact, there is no excuse whatsoever for careless work if I expect to be paid for it.
I rather believe that GW relies on their fanboys opening their wallets as soon as they announce something new.

Regash wrote:a bugged product that has simply been a sloppy job?
With just a little more care and effort, all these mistakes could have been avoided.

While the mistakes, about which GW seemed properly embarrassed, could and should have been avoided, to suggest that the new release was "a sloppy job" is an hysterical reaction.

Let's look at the stuff that was right about the release:

• Sticking almost entirely to the well-established rules and team lists, thereby not invalidating existing or third-party minis.
• A full-color rulebook with top-notch illustrations and graphic design.
• Expansion of the lore, and integrating it with gameplay with the historical teams in DZ1.
• Nifty bits like the markers and 3D templates.
• A two-sided board--completely superfluous for play, but there just for immersion.
• Additional teams available at or soon after release.
• A steady stream of product releases.

You can feel how you like about how GW have been releasing products, or in what quantities; react how you will to the trauma of the rules you already know by heart being spread across multiple rulebooks; complain about the day 1 errata, which GW went ahead and owned--these are things that are gripes that you might well have, some of which were clearly done intentionally. But to suggest that somehow nobody's paying attention to how the game's being put together is taking things awfully far.

Wifflebat wrote:

Regash wrote:a bugged product that has simply been a sloppy job?
With just a little more care and effort, all these mistakes could have been avoided.

You can feel how you like about how GW have been releasing products, or in what quantities; react how you will to the trauma of the rules you already know by heart being spread across multiple rulebooks; complain about the day 1 errata, which GW went ahead and owned--these are things that are gripes that you might well have, some of which were clearly done intentionally. But to suggest that somehow nobody's paying attention to how the game's being put together is taking things awfully far.

Wifflebat, if we're ever in the same place at the same time (WC2019, maybe), I'll buy you a drink myself.

While I agree with everything below. I just want to point my "shame" finger back at Grak and Crumbleberry. GW should recall all models post haste until rules have been rewritten by anyone other than the person(s) who originally created them. Also said person should be forced to play 50 games of blood bowl against a team fielding Grak and Crumblebery with the original rule set. This should all be filmed and put on youtube.

Wifflebat wrote:

Regash wrote:a bugged product that has simply been a sloppy job?
With just a little more care and effort, all these mistakes could have been avoided.

While the mistakes, about which GW seemed properly embarrassed, could and should have been avoided, to suggest that the new release was "a sloppy job" is an hysterical reaction.

Let's look at the stuff that was right about the release:

• Sticking almost entirely to the well-established rules and team lists, thereby not invalidating existing or third-party minis.
• A full-color rulebook with top-notch illustrations and graphic design.
• Expansion of the lore, and integrating it with gameplay with the historical teams in DZ1.
• Nifty bits like the markers and 3D templates.
• A two-sided board--completely superfluous for play, but there just for immersion.
• Additional teams available at or soon after release.
• A steady stream of product releases.

You can feel how you like about how GW have been releasing products, or in what quantities; react how you will to the trauma of the rules you already know by heart being spread across multiple rulebooks; complain about the day 1 errata, which GW went ahead and owned--these are things that are gripes that you might well have, some of which were clearly done intentionally. But to suggest that somehow nobody's paying attention to how the game's being put together is taking things awfully far.

Wifflebat wrote:A full-color rulebook with top-notch illustrations and graphic design.

Sometimes, less is more. Black and red over brownish grey "noise" is not so nice. It's a rule book, to be read, not a design experiment, to droll over. Other times, more is more. Some of those illustration would have been defined as sketches years ago, not finished paintings.

Update on these: https://19070-presscdn-0-68-pagely.netd ... erry-1.pdf

Grak Bone-head, Kick Team-mate, Loner, Mighty Blow, Thick Skull Any team 300,000 gp 5 5 2 9
Crumbleberry Dodge, Loner, Right Stuff, Stunty, Sure Hands 5 2 3 6

Because James has gone?

By James, apparently.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/bloodbo ... 362297785/

Finally succeeded his bone-head roll?

Well, a good update, so they've moved onto my "buy if I get a chance" list from my "no point in purchasing" list.

Shame he didn't just admit he made a mistake in the first place.

[Edit] Better late than never:

James on Facebook wrote:Andy was decent enough to let me right one of my wrongs before I left! Here are the updated rules for Grak and Crumbleberry, based on rather a lot of feedback. Oh, hindsight!

Update was written by James. Playtesters only helped with wording.

Funny story. They were always going to be updated but the more people get angry, call people names, use foul language, send abusive emails, and basically behave like they should be living in a field, the less likely they are to get what they want.

Imagine that eh.

Woot! Finally! Still don't like that any team can take them, but huge improvement. Cheers!

JT-Y wrote:....
Funny story. They were always going to be updated ....

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but are you saying they never intended for the rules that came with the figures to be in their finished form?