Blood Bowl back at Warhammer World

[frogboy]

Probably going to this event....

It dose sound like fun, I'd be up for it too. Pick m up on the way

ROADTRIP!!

WOOP WOOP!

[lawquoter]

This feels like Deja Vu. G.W. supporting the game again...I'm on this forum again...it just needs its old name back.

[bound for glory]

Kinda late to the party, but are the gw guys looking over every team to make sure only gw figures are in use?
I can understand a person could'nt bring a whole 3rd party team, but could you get away with a few figures?

[bound for glory]

...Blood Bowl has a lot of these factors already, but "the community" consists largely out of competitve....or rather say "win-oriented" players instead of purely fun oriented ones ...

Then you are hanging out with the wrong crowd.
The people I socialise with like to win, yes (who doesn't?), but having fun and spending time with friends is the first reason we go and spend a weekend away from home.

Agreed with my man, lunch. Mean to say, our league is going on our 22 year, with the same core of 15 people, and we all like to win, but its a fun league. not win at all cost.
We use a modified 3rd ed rules. And every new "season'(we have 2 a year) means making a new team. No "power building". I'd list our changes, but tbh, most would not like our way of playing.
But it works for us, as its a bunch of friends playing a game we love.

[harvestmouse]

Kinda late to the party, but are the gw guys looking over every team to make sure only gw figures are in use?
I can understand a person could'nt bring a whole 3rd party team, but could you get away with a few figures?

There's a road past my house. I know the police frequent it, but if I go out tomorrow and drive 5mph/8kmh over the speed limit will I be stopped? How about 8mph/13kmh? A rope's length is a ropes length.

We can be sure of these rules though.

A: The organisers don't want any trouble.
B: 3rd party figures are not allowed.
C: There are a wide variety of figures out there, but BB specific figures and official is a small selection. I could do the job of working out what is official or not..........maybe they could too.

Other games are trickier. I've heard of Warhammer players being turned away from officially sanctioned events (not by GW staff mind) for having figures that were official. I was even at a Warhammer event where a guy with old citadel plastic wood elves was told he couldn't field them. This got my and another guys goat up. Personally I'd have walked out if he wasn't allowed to field them, and all was eventually worked out.

[bound for glory]

You misunderstand.
I'm not saying to start trouble over a game. Just wondering if all the teams are being scrutinized, thats all.

[MagicElmo]

A friend of mine once had to leave a GW tournament, because his Chaos army had too much green stuff.
He's really talented and is also great at painting, so all the green stuff he added was mistaken for parts of another company. He took it as a compliment.

Personally I don't think there is a need for this rule (to only use GW minis) any more. There is something like the internet out there and most gamers (even the new starters) are well informed about what else is out there. 3rd party BB teams would be okay in my eyes.
But it's GW's tournament and their rules and I have no issues at all with them.

I still think that the tournament might be a bit early, Though it will be interesting to see how many original teams are out there (I can't find my original Skaven team) and if they'll be able to organise enough official dice.

[Regash]

There is something like the internet out there and most gamers (even the new starters) are well informed about what else is out there. 3rd party BB teams would be okay in my eyes.

I think GW just is concerned about people seeing 3rd party teams, which look better.
So their tournament would promote sales of other companies, big or small, and that is what GW doesn't want.
They exist to sell miniatures after all and for nothing else.

[Darkson]

I have no issue with GW saying GW only, though I d think it's a bit daft when they haven't sold BB teams for years (and haven't encouraged conversions for longer).

If you're taking old GW figures though be prepared and maybe take a pic of somewhere like the StuffOfLegends page. I know that one year I was reffing at the old GT someone had a team of the Games Day lizardmen and the GW guys didn't realise it was an official GW team and were about to ask him to remove them (I sorted that one).

I also hope (or at least hope the NAF have spoken to them about it) that they use something a bit better to run the event than their basic Excel sheet (which screwed me out of Most TDs one year ).

[MagicElmo]

@Regash
Yeah, I guess that's their way of thinking.

@Darkson
And here I though Blood Bowl 2 crashing on me in turn 16 when leading 3:0 (with several injuries inflicted to the enemy team) was bad.

[bound for glory]

Darkson with most TD's, kicking ass and taking names!

Awesome.Pure awesome.

[Wulfyn]

as far as I know, FUMBBL has even more changes, at least in the use of unofficial teams.

Which changes?
FUMBBL uses the CRP, the 21 official teams and the 3 unofficial ones for GW (because they lacked a miniatures range) but official for BBRC.
FUMBBL is the most CRP-compliant online Blood Bowl.

Whilst it may be the most compliant (there's no objective way to measure it), that's different from saying that FUMBBL has no other changes with regard to official teams. Now whilst you might say something like Simyans are not allowed in Black Box because it is pure, that is forgetting all the little perks that have been handed out over the years that are definitely not CRP and definitely not GW, BBRC, or any other sort of 'official'.

For example:
https://fumbbl.com/p/team?team_id=615960

So I played against this team ages ago and right off the bat PurpleChest starts defending the inclusion of the goblin in his dwarf team because he won it as a prize. Fair enough. But regardless of whether you think it is a good or a bad thing, that's a FUMBBL house rule to let him have that. You cannot pretend otherwise.

I have no issue with GW saying GW only, though I d think it's a bit daft when they haven't sold BB teams for years (and haven't encouraged conversions for longer).

I think now is the only time it does make sense. With little viable alternative available from GW at the moment bringing the excellent Willy, Meiko, RN, BlackScorpion, Impact, Greebo, et al ranges to WW will create a buzz around looking for 3rd party manufacturers. People could invest their pennies into them and maybe not feel the need to get the GW stuff when it comes out later this year &/or next year.

Where I feel they are short sighted is in having this as a longer term policy. If they truly believed that they are the best miniature manufacturer in the world they would not be scared of a little competition. They would welcome the chance for other manufacturers to have their models compared outside the world of the internet and the photoshop cleaned pictures we see in kickstarters. There's nothing like this direct comparison to make people see how much better their models are.

It is a bit like when James Daunt took over as CEO of Waterstones. At the time there was a lot of fear of Kindles as being a threat to people buying books. Waterstones refused to sell them in their stores for fear the competition would hurt their sales. Daunt reversed this and brought them in. He said that he didn't care if people came in to buy a Kindle as long as they came into his store. Because when people who loved reading went into a Waterstones even if just to get a coffee and read for a bit he had the confidence that his stores were so good he could sell things to them.

"All that we have to do is encourage people to come into our shops and to choose the books," he says.
"I don't frankly care how they then consume then, or read them, or indeed buy them.
"But if you spend time in my shops, and you really enjoy it, and you come back more often and spend longer - you're going to spend money in my shops."

That was 3 years ago and now they have returned to profit. Ironically Kindle sales are now actually so bad that they decided to pull them a few months ago, that's howl little of a threat they were.

I feel that GW shoud have the confidence to adopt this same approach. Just get people who love BB into Warhammer World and into their shops. Because if you do that and you have good miniatures for sale then people will buy them. I loved the intelligence of Greebo at the world cup ~ give me a team for free and then offer to sell me half another team as a booster (and recently offer to sell me even more in a kickstarter, you evil genius bastards!). What a fantastic strategy. But for GW to do that they have to have those boxed sets stacked high.

[harvestmouse]

It is a bit like when James Daunt took over as CEO of Waterstones. At the time there was a lot of fear of Kindles as being a threat to people buying books. Waterstones refused to sell them in their stores for fear the competition would hurt their sales. Daunt reversed this and brought them in. He said that he didn't care if people came in to buy a Kindle as long as they came into his store. Because when people who loved reading went into a Waterstones even if just to get a coffee and read for a bit he had the confidence that his stores were so good he could sell things to them.

Fairly different actually. Here Waterstones are selling and making a profit on 3rd party miniatures. If GW were allow 3rd party miniatures, that would be promoting and advertising products they cannot make money on.

A similar thing would be to licence 3rd party miniatures and then allow them.

I really don't get the hang up on this, it makes not commercial sense for them to allow 3rd party miniatures. It was also obviously going to happen. Converting also isn't hard, and if you wanted to, you could pick up figures suitable dirt dirt cheap. 4th edition Warhammer plastic goblins go for........about 5p on Ebay for example.

As for the FUMBBL thing, I think that's one of the best things about FUMBBL. With a site playing the same formats day in and day out you need incentives and one of perks (as we say this I'm just finishing the touches on a new custom player)

[Wulfyn]

I'm not against the perks (I hope that was clear but I guess not). I'm saying that it is evidence that FUMBBL is more than just the official teams in the pure divisions, as a counter to Matt's argument.


As for the Waterstones thing that is not the point. The problem with selling Kindles was not that Waterstones would make money (I mean that's hardly a convincing argument for why they would not do it), but because having bought a Kindle shoppers would come into their store, research books, and then go away and buy those books from a 3rd party seller online. In both circumstances you have a product in your store that you make money on (margin on Kindle sale vs ticket price of the tournament), and in both circumstances you have the potential for these customers buying those 3rd party products outside of your store at a later time.

Waterstones decided to take the "build it and they will come" approach of just getting as many people into their store as possible as those customers would buy things from them. GW are taking the approach of turning customers away out of fear that some small time competitors will defeat them (I love the 3rd party sellers but they are psyched when they hit 50kEUR in a kickstarter, well outside the league that GW are in). GW should make some kick ass models, put them in their shop, and not give a shit what people bring to warhammer world because the stuff they make is so much better that people will buy it.

[BillyDee]

No problem with the no GW minis rule, although agreed there isn't the biggest selection of official options available.
If you were a pub running a beer festival, would you be happy with people turning up with a sixer they'd bought from the supermarket next door? Not a direct analogy, I know, but near enough?