How do they keep getting it wrong?

[Bob821]

How do they keep getting it wrong I wonder? Do they not play test their armies? I assume they do and if so how do they not notice when they don't cut the mustard? Or when certain elements are a little too good. How did no one pick up hell turkeys being just a little too good? How did the Riptide get though at that points cost? Why did dreadnoughts not get a buff? Do they not like selling dreadnought kits? This can go on for many hours!

I love my 40K and most of what games workshop put out. IMO it’s all about feedback. Without a little community consultation or maybe issuing trial codexes/rules for people to play test and feedback on they are still going to keep dropping the same clangers. They just dump rules on us! Some are fantastic and some are total turds. Why do they never seem to do customer satisfaction surveys? Is my opinion of no value to them? Do they not care what I (we) think of this or that new Codex or rules supplement. My bank asks me what I think of their service and products. My super market and car dealership do the same! So why do GW think themselves above actually engaging with the customer?

So how do they keep managing to get it wrong guys and gals? Why don’t they speak to us? Or perhaps you think everything they do is pure gold or that they are interested in our opinions or that they do not need to be! Let’s hear it because I am interested in what you have to say!

[Pssyche]

Ask yourself two questions.
Who's your favourite band?
When was the last time they asked you for your opinion on the album they were currently recording?

Quite frankly, they don't need to ask you for anything and neither do Games Workshop.

[Digitarii]

Games Workshop (a misnomer of a name if I've ever seen one) is in the business of selling models. The rules simply allow them to sell more models. Good, bad or indifferent, the rules are simply a vehicle to allow them to sell more models. Forge World has the ultimate in that regard as well. Particularly in the Horus Heresy ruleset. Tactical squads with sizes of 10-20 models and they sell the tac squads in batches of 5? Super Heavy tanks that cost hundreds of dollars?

[Christopher Szynkowski]

The issue is that they do playtest the armies, but most likely in an environment with an unheard of amount of terrain, a group encouraged to build and play lists to the spirit of the game and with little to no eye towards 'ardboy's level list building.

In that kind of environment, the tyranids make sense. Lots of terrain to hide behind, their flyers not worrying about double this + a quad gun or 3+ other flyers. Rarely, if ever, facing armies who have allies costing of a single Divination psyker plus the cherry picked most lethal combination that can be found.

The problem is what it has always been, the wider playerbase looking through one lens at things and the studio looking at it through another. They make what they believe works, but they have never gone in looking for every single exploit and when faced with a lament about playing against players that do and use those exploits, would probably reply with "Why do you play against them at all if they are going to play that way?"

A final thought... Considering we (as a playerbase) are the ones that look for those exploits, jump on them and then try to make them the benchmark for how the entire game should be designed with little thought for anything else, I suppose the thought is 'How do we keep getting it wrong?"

[Lexington]

How do they keep getting it wrong I wonder? Do they not play test their armies?
Scuttlebutt from reliable source-types is that, no, they really don't anymore. Wouldn't be surprised if the time/money going towards army list design's been cut as well.

[Popsical]

Take a look at the studio armies used in the battle reports over the last 10 years plus.
You will see that the games played by the design teams and white dwarf crew were not netlist kerb stomp affairs at all.
They used armies with a wide range of units to showcase them to the public and quite frankly because its never ever been the intent of the 40k designers to make the game tournament based.
The biggest complaint these days (except for chaos marine players about their codex) is from folk about tournament balance.
Really dont bother. Play warmahordes instead.
Play 40k for fun.

[Browntj007]

Ask yourself two questions.
Who's your favourite band?
When was the last time they asked you for your opinion on the album they were currently recording?

Quite frankly, they don't need to ask you for anything and neither do Games Workshop.

How true. Of course, that's how companies and bands go out of business. Don't adapt, goodbye. Don't value your customer base, goodbye. It's been proven time and time again companies that fall out of touch with their customers die. plain and simple. There are very few industries that can act with complete arrogance. GW ain't one of them. The numbers don't lie.

[Stone Edwards]

Take a look at the studio armies used in the battle reports over the last 10 years plus.
You will see that the games played by the design teams and white dwarf crew were not netlist kerb stomp affairs at all.
They used armies with a wide range of units to showcase them to the public and quite frankly because its never ever been the intent of the 40k designers to make the game tournament based.
The biggest complaint these days (except for chaos marine players about their codex) is from folk about tournament balance.
Really dont bother. Play warmahordes instead.
Play 40k for fun.

Completely this. Understand that if you are concerned with tight balance you are a niche player and that it will never happen. There is a reason GW doesn't do official tournaments anymore, they just don't want to balance for it and honestly I don't blame them. I can't imagine actually balancing the mass of units, weapons, and rules that both warhammers are. From all the recent additions it has become clear that the game is really made for people to have fun just playing with the models that they like, not using some spammy optimized netlist or what ever.

[A HUGE BLUNT]

Completely this. Understand that if you are concerned with tight balance you are a niche player and that it will never happen. There is a reason GW doesn't do official tournaments anymore, they just don't want to balance for it and honestly I don't blame them. I can't imagine actually balancing the mass of units, weapons, and rules that both warhammers are. From all the recent additions it has become clear that the game is really made for people to have fun just playing with the models that they like, not using some spammy optimized netlist or what ever.

Its been proven time and again on this forum and others that good rules and fun games are not mutually exclusive. In fact, they compliment each other! So put down the GW kool aid.

[Eldar_Atog]

Completely this. Understand that if you are concerned with tight balance you are a niche player and that it will never happen. There is a reason GW doesn't do official tournaments anymore, they just don't want to balance for it and honestly I don't blame them. I can't imagine actually balancing the mass of units, weapons, and rules that both warhammers are. From all the recent additions it has become clear that the game is really made for people to have fun just playing with the models that they like, not using some spammy optimized netlist or what ever.

I agree that the niche tournie players have some unrealistic expectations but GW also has some unrealistic expectations.

They still need to work on some balancing issues. They can't expect someone to spend years getting kicked in the teeth and maintain the mindset that they enjoy the game. I've seen too many players quit after flyers came on the scene. They got beat over the head over and over relentlessly by armies that had access to flyers while they did not. Most of the people that I have seen walk away did not come back when their codex was updated. Those weren't tournie players. They just wanted to visit with friends and have a fun game... but getting beat over and over is never a positive.

If GW wants to make "fun" rules then they need to worry about everyone having fun... especially the armies rolling with older rules. Even when the play group tries to mulligan the older lists, it's still going to wear on everybody. It ends up with the newer codex players thinking "I hope Bob ain't at the store tonight. I want to try this new model out but it will smash his sisters". A playgroup won't survive this very long. If the play group dissolves, then those players are probably not buying much product or be picking up books.

[DarkLink]

Take a look at the studio armies used in the battle reports over the last 10 years plus.
You will see that the games played by the design teams and white dwarf crew were not netlist kerb stomp affairs at all.
They used armies with a wide range of units to showcase them to the public and quite frankly because its never ever been the intent of the 40k designers to make the game tournament based.
The biggest complaint these days (except for chaos marine players about their codex) is from folk about tournament balance.
Really dont bother. Play warmahordes instead.
Play w40k for fun.

Problem is, evidently a "fun" game is not what the customers want. They want a quality game, with well written rules and solid game balance. Instead, GW gives us Eldar and then Nids.

[daboarder]

Take a look at the studio armies used in the battle reports over the last 10 years plus.
You will see that the games played by the design teams and white dwarf crew were not netlist kerb stomp affairs at all.
They used armies with a wide range of units to showcase them to the public and quite frankly because its never ever been the intent of the 40k designers to make the game tournament based.
The biggest complaint these days (except for chaos marine players about their codex) is from folk about tournament balance.
Really dont bother. Play warmahordes instead.
Play 40k for fun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKiaYmQ9lz0

Playin 40k, for FUN.....sorry what?

[DarkLink]

Same reason I stopped playing Apocalypse a long time ago. 40k is generally fun. Taking 30min to deploy your army, then picking it all back up and packing it away 5min later, however, is not.

[Bob821]

Games Workshop (a misnomer of a name if I've ever seen one) is in the business of selling models. The rules simply allow them to sell more models. Good, bad or indifferent, the rules are simply a vehicle to allow them to sell more models. Forge World has the ultimate in that regard as well. Particularly in the Horus Heresy ruleset. Tactical squads with sizes of 10-20 models and they sell the tac squads in batches of 5? Super Heavy tanks that cost hundreds of dollars?

But would good rules not mean they sold more models?

[daboarder]

ignore him bob, GW's own stock listing informs everyone that yes game systems are also their bussiness

[chicop76]

I think if GW took your tournament winners and have them play test list before they go out I think you will have a better product.I think GW needs to tone down a lot of models. If you make one model too ppowerful they need to buff other armies in the same way.

I don't think the game should be ruled on who have the best Tau/ Eldar army out there.

The problem is you will never put out as many game combinations as the gaming community would put out. To play test you will have to play every army several times with different unit combinations and allies. It is simply not feasible.

Look at Flamers of Tzeentch for example. It took awhile for people to go hot Damon they are good. I used them from day one and with the Masquerade I was kicking butt. It was fun for me and not really for my opponent. However it was balanced due to mishaps and you kinda needed something like that to compete with everyone at the time. The white dwarf book boggled my mine which they didn't need to be buffed like that , than to be nerfed months later.

I only can say you have been in the game long enough to know updating armies take awhile. Honestly they are doing a really good job at updating armies now, as in you don't have to wait over 10 years for an update. Yet instead of a good job they get the same complaint. Damn if they do or don't. .

Personally I love it that Tau have their time in the sun. They never really had it. Eldar always been a good army which I would love to see nerfed. To be fair at one point or another all of GW armies have been a top tier army at one point or another. Nid players wasn't complaining in 3rd and 4th when they was the Tau army back than, as well as Eldar.

How can you please a base that complains about everything. My opinion is you just ignore them and do what you want to do.