AoS NEW *rumor*

I just looked that up. If it was discounted it'd be a perfect way to start a Seraphon army up. One of each SC box and a Stegadon is a great way to get most of the good units in our army (although I'd prefer 2-3 Stegadons, lol!). But since it's not any cheaper than just buying each box separately, I'm not sure that anyone who's not starting a new army and wanting to go all-in right away is going to want to buy this bundle.

 

It's less that you're getting a discount and more that you're buying the lot in fewer clicks. This is no different to some of the warscroll battalion-themed collections that GW was doing for a while (I got most of my Melusai that way via Temple Nest bundle, as well as a squadron of Primaris Repulsor hulls).

 

Woptiedo, saving us 3 seconds worth of clicking, such major time savings.

It just seems very pointless as a bundle...

 

Its...It's.... just both of the start collecting boxes and a stegadon? (Face slowly lowers to palm.) The level of laziness is astounding. They aren't even trying

 

For people who actually bother to do price comparisons of what they're buying, yes, it's pointless. For the prospective parent or newbie just getting into the hobby however, they'll think it's great value.

Scummy, but somehow people still fall for it.

 

What prospective parent or newbie just buys 200,- worth of stuff he doesn't know well without checking?

I mean, I'm sure there's people who won't pay attention, but for most people it's far too large an amount of money to spend without at least checking if it is actually a deal or not.

It's not like the 2,- candy they put near the cashregister in a supermarket they want you to impulse buy cuz you happen to be here now anyway.

 

Best point right here. No parent wants to invest 200 into something they're not even sure their kid will stay interested in.

 

AoS Coach has rules previews up for Idoneth and Fyreslayers:

 

sweet. i'll have to go over them when i get the chance.

 

The gist of each one from my point of view is:

Idoneth remain a very strong anti-shooting army and their Tides of Death is unchanged, and they got some very good stuff in addition. The Enclaves follow the 3e trend of subfactions giving one specific ability rather than multiple ones. Eel spam is still viable, but other units are definitely viable as well. Pretty much everything got buffed but also went up in price. Some units went up a *lot* (Leviadons went up by 120 points to 500 now!). Sharks are very good now, especially in Fuethan, but Eels are still good and so is basically everything else. Seems like a strong but pretty balanced book.

Fyreslayers are less changed up, but there's a bit of a shift from toughness to damage output with more ways to buff rend and get mortal wounds. Most things went up in points. I don't know as much about Fyreslayers so I'm not sure how much it changes.

But what I find interesting is that the base allegiance abilities definitely seem to continue to be the main source of power for the armies, which again makes me hope that when our book comes around the stuff we'll gain in base allegiance abilities will make up for what we lose in subfaction abilities.

 

Nah, they're just vertically-challenged.

...I'll see myself out.

 

Actually, it may be exactly for the purpose of that impulse purchase. Maybe not from newbies or prospective parents like I previously thought, but there's more than a few wargame enthusiasts who will buy into these non-discounts out of a lack of fiscal responsibility or, disconcertingly, a lack of impulse control. GW is more than willing to milk such individuals dry, which is also why we get models and kits that remain exclusive to overpriced starter boxes for months on end before they're quietly stocked individually outside of them.
Especially when the box is presented as an "early access" or "limited edition" product.



It's a pretty scummy business practice as a whole, and. as I'm sure most of us can attest to in relation to video games, is not endemic solely to GW or its marketspace either.

 

I suppose there'll be individuals who can fall for it cuz they're fiscally irresponsble, lack impulse control etc.
But, it isn't all that different from a normal box GW sells. Simply put, if this is already problematic for an individual, then the entire GW site is kind of a problem for that individual. Or well, any shop would really be problematic at that point.

It's not lootboxes, microtransactions or anything of that vile stuff. It's just a random bundle.
Hell, it doesn't even utilize pretty numbers to trick people into buying it (e.g. 9,99 is a better number than 9.97 and tricks people into buying it).

As far as scummy business tactics go the main thing GW does is FOMO by relying on limited production runs, & the random prize hikes. Which compared to the EA's of this world is pretty harmless.

 

Touché when it comes to army bundles like these, but not so much for the likes of the recent Eldritch Omens box set, let alone cases of artificial scarcity as demonstrated with Cursed City or Blackstone Fortress. Outside of hobbyists looking to start at least one of the presented armies, the kind of people that GW will be making most of their money off of in these instances are usually those who are either

1. Desperate for even a fraction of the newer models for their current collection;
2. Stricken with a case of Attention Deficit Ooh Shiny; or
   
3. WAAC players chasing meta trends.

As we both pointed out, GW likes to manufacture scarcity to drive up sales with jacked-up pricing (not to the extent of an oil or diamond mining company, mind you), which is of little surprise given the propensities of their accountants and other execs on their board of directors of wanting to make themselves look good in front of investors (even at the expense of their own employees and customers). Like Khorne's obsession with blood, they really care not from whom the money flows save for that it flows at all, and suffice to say that the easiest and most abundant source of coin for them are those who are easily manipulated into parting ways with it, usually either out of desperation or mental illness.

Warhammer Seasons and the adoption of many subscription models into their sterling portfolio comes to mind. Save for the fact that GW produces tangible assets that are capable of existing long after the company is dead, you'd be hard-pressed to convince me that they're not trying to make the tabletop version of "video games as a service".

 

I certainly agree that Eldritch Omens was shite value, but I do find it surprising that Fury of the Deep was released at the same time and was much better-value model-wise, with comprehensive starter forces for both Fyreslayers and Idoneth. If you bought that and a SC Box you would have definitely got a 1000-point force in the bag for whichever side you would have been supporting, and would have been well on the way to finishing off a 2K army.

 

Oh, for certain. In some ways, it really goes to show just which flagship game they actually seem to genuinely care about.