Designing the Impossible! - A Perfect 40K Intro Box
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- Опубліковано 1 лип 2024
- On this episode, Brad and Eric discuss their idea for a new introduction box to onboard new players and get them playing games quicker! Is it a stroke of genius that will make Games Workshop billions? Does it already exist and these two thought they had an original idea after drinking at a sushi bar?
Show Links:
Website: poorhammer.libsyn.com/
Patreon: / solelysingleton
Brad’s Twitter: / drruler
Eric’s Twitter: / onekuosora
00:00 Intro
00:35 Inception of The Ultimate Intro Box
08:25 The Brainstorming Phase
11:40 Idea 1: No Assembly Required
14:30 Idea 2: Anime Marines (Kawaii Desu)
20:26 Idea 3: Totally Original Terrain Idea
24:43 The Final Product (and the consequences)
30:55 Thank the patrons & do the UA-cam pleasantries
Mentioned this episode:
Build Terrain with Magnets: • Build Terrain From Mag...
Picasso Tiles: www.amazon.com/PicassoTiles-C...
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“Thursday & Snow (Reprise)” by Blank & Kytt, CC BY
“First Class” by Peyruis, CC BY
“Funky Souls” by Amaria, CC BY
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Hope you all enjoy, a link to Mark Dickey's video is in the description and if you somehow didn't see it yet I highly recommend it if Boarding Actions interests you.
Please don't forget the UA-cam pleasantries, because we forgot to mention them in our discussion, as per usual...
NEXT WEEK: C̵̡̖̤̺̗̦̪͎͌̒H̷̭̹̬̻͖̭̫̰̝̪̳͐Ẳ̵̼̪̰̫͛͆͒͆͆͌͗̿Ơ̸̢͍͓̱̙̣̮̞͎̖̜̓̐̑̑̍̀̄̓͘S̸̮͚̼̄̅̏̂̓̅͐̾ ̶̡͖̜͉̫͍͉̈́̈́̀̈̌͐̈́̀͐̉͊͘̚͝Ŕ̴̨̹͆̓̈̓̌͛̕E̶̛̼͊͂̽͋̊͆̽̕͝͝Í̶̱̬͑̒͜G̶̬̞̠̻̘͖̲͉̰͛̑̉̅͊͒͠N̷̨͍̝͍̺̞̟̅́͌̆̈́͝S̷̨͈̰̫͇̘̲͖̯͓̪͖̣̻̬͋
The boxes could include like a small clipper and a small hobby knife and a small model glue.
So they don't need to make new 2d picture stands.
Yo, one thing you probably didn’t realise when discussing the elite and command editions of the starter set it that the lieutenant and warden get swapped out for a captain and a overlord. It was only in the indomitus box that you had both in addition to a bunch more extra units like the Chaplin, Judiciar, Plasmancer and Skorpekh Lord. I just thought you should know.
This was great.
The Death Guard snap together stuff was really good, GW should've kept that trend going if they're just going to go mono-pose nowadays anyway.
About GW's exploiting on Wargaming.
now, it is time to move to Gunpla (Gundam Kits) for me.
@@@ My long explanation below @@@
i think ,these days, GW is intentionally Exploiting [the nature of Wargaming].
[the nature of Wargaming] is what essencially cost you for the hobby.
Here, Example.
●Step 1. You need to build a 2000 points army to Play. (cool , impressive).
●Step 2. To do so, you need to Collect/buy multiple of same boxes. (Umm...ok).
●Step 3. To do so, you need to Bulid/Paint tons of
same models (duplicates) again and again, like 20 of Nekron Warriors.
(it is only fun with several of your fav elite models. But Never with 10+ of Plastics).
Formula:
GW's premium pricing * (Step 2 + Step 3) = Exploiting
PH: "We got an idea"
GW: Nods head
PH: "Army starter set around 60-80 dollars"
GW: Starts wincing
PH: "It should have the rules of the army"
GW: Flips papers on desk "you already blew the budget bois"
If GW had there way they'd make 60 to 80 be for your army leader
@@calebbarnhouse496 I'd like to introduce you to the Australian pricing system
@@tristanlee8495 *cries in AUS/NZD pricing Market*, gotta love that 30-70% price increase they give us for no real reason. Loved it when FW prices doubled overnight because -reasons-
@@calebbarnhouse496 I mean.....*looks over at Ghaz for $75 & Mortarion for $170*
@@demon1103 yea, yet you listed those examples because most aren't that bad, yet.
GW : "How much gross profit do we get from this set again?"
Poorhammer : "About 70% give or take"
GW : "WHAT?! Are you trying to bankrupt us??? How a company would survive selling products with less than 300% GP???"
Kudos to the editor for continuing the official Poorhammer meme “I do wanna keep this all positive.”
It was a great callback, not gonna lie.
A while back, I picked up the Battletech $20 starter box. It had two unpainted plastic mechs, a game board, cardboard to indicate terrain elevation, 8 cardboard punch-out mechs, rules, dice, and a short story. There is no reason GW can't do something similar at $60-80.
Battletech has a better box for $60 featuring 8 mechs (and 4 can be a legal game) so it’s almost ready to go just add some extra dice.
Or if you prefer terrain and moving with inches, Alpha Strike launch box features 13 mechs and cardboard/paper craft terrain for $80. It’s amazing value to get someone roped in and I’m having a heck of a time selling Warhammer to my non-Warhammer gaming group when they see this. Might be getting them into battletech alpha strike
@@timunderbakke8756 Battletech has definitely set a gold standard for a starter set. Alpha strike coming with 3 lances (each of which is about a whole "army"), terrain, rulebooks, dice and extra goodies is just amazing. They might even be operating at a loss to produce it like MCP is with their starter, but it got me hooked and I've already thrown more money at the hobby just because that box was too good to pass up.
@@timunderbakke8756 the $60 box is absolutely better than the $20 one. I was just using the $20 to illustrate a theoretical floor for this sort of start playing box.
I've also toyed with getting my friends into Battletech instead of Warhammer, but I've been beating the Warhammer drum so long it almost feels like sunk cost.
@@MrPooleish I haven't played tabletop in ages, but when I was a kid we'd make cardboard tokens to represent Warhammer models we couldn't afford.
BattleTech was the first thing that came to mind when seeing this
Including a single paintable (but not necessarily one that needs to be painted) model in each box could provide incentive to get into the hobbying side of things while keeping everything easily playable and accessible
It should be either an HQ slot or something cool to paint and not a troop.
could also throw in some beginner friendly paints for cheap, just a little bit to add detail and a small pamphlet that tells you how to do it without fucking it up
This! This is the perfect balance i think. You give a single mini in a similar form factor to the space marine heroes series (except not a blind bag). You make it an alternate hq option to one of the "normal" figures in the box. Make it push fit so no glue.
@@rougenarwhal8378 that was actually my idea, just include primary colors and like a couple brushes
I kinda wish they had like a buildabear style duo boxes were you can select which two factions face off, comes with rule books and codex...also if it was like 200$ for a basic hq 3 troops and a vehicle/monster per faction transfers sheets, 2 full modled kits with some punch out cardboard terrain.
In a discord someoned "asked" to come up with idea for versus boxes, saying which armies and models
One of my ideas was a multi vs box
Cant remember the factions I chosed lets say A-B-C-D
The "mojo" from those theoretical boxes is that the armies would be mixed so there was A/B, A/C, A/D, B/C, B/D, C/D to maximize chances 2 players got the armies they wanted
@@ismael9914 With that you risk having the unpopular combinations sitting unsold on shelves. In a perfect world there'd be a box for every combination of factions, but that's not very practical from GW's point of view.
@Preaching God's Bells no, that's not what you need, make it 3 boxes, you send out together 2 faction specfic boxes, and then the rest of it in the offical box, if GW wanted to make it really easy they could simply send one box and include 2 coupon codes for a large percentage off 2 combat patrol boxes
can you imagine how cool it’d be to have like a store shelf full of half boxes for each faction and then you like. join the packages together when you go to checkout
For the same reason that they stopped the ability to buy any individual parts by mail order (aside from not really being viable with everything on plastic sprues as that replaced metal and resin) , 8t becomes a logistics problem effectively, and takes too much labour time.
As a hobbyist (currently painting a mini while listening to this) I don’t have anything against this idea. As long as it doesn’t affect the production of minis, this starter box would literally only be a good thing, bringing more people into the community
Sitting here as a primarily Kill Team player just chanting "Kill Team! Kill Team! Kill Team!".
*Follows suit and joins in the chant!*
Same. KillTeam is the answer. And it is an awesome answer.
Step aside kill team Boarding actions is a thing and it's faster And has less rules. I do like kill team tho.
As a player who started in warhammer with Kill team I second this all the damn way!
@@ThatSupportTho bullshit. Costs twice as much for just each person to have a boarding Patrol box. Nevermind the very specific terrain you have to have that is 270 with the first rule book that doesn't even have all of the special rules for each team. You have to buy Angron for the next installment so there is 60 more. And then each installment of Sharts of Omen for more. And then in a year the shit won't be supported any more.
pls do a new combat patrol for every faction
This sounds like a very fun video to watch indeed
Ynnari and Harlequins included please since Gw forgets them
@@Unknown-qj9sm Ynnari doesn't have any unit other than named characters to include does it? I figured that was just you buy that single box of characters and put them in your Eldar collection to soup it all together.
@@thepoorhammerpodcast No but if you wanted to start Ynnari right now the best way would be the Drukhari boarding patrol and the Eldar Combat Patrol, a less expensive option that wasn't just Craftworld stuff would be nice. That's at least $270 for just those two. Also, the named characters have really nice models, if nothing else they're great to use for kitbashes to Ynnari up stuff that doesn't have models. Plus I can't get enough of Yvraine's fan.
As someone who just got started into the hobby ( about to finish my first 10 space marines and excited to get started on my ork army) , this all sounds like a great idea. The price of starting is kinda crazy for most people. We really be poor out here.
Not only is a high price, but if you are out of us/uk, you still have importation fees on top. And for products like these, the fees are usualy high
If you care more about building and painting minis than you do playing in GW tournaments I would recommend getting a 3-D printer.
It's a couple hundred $ to get started, but printed minis are just as much fun to paint and play against your friends.
This feels like reinventing the wheel to me to some extent. 2nd 40k got you a box with a fuckton of very quick to assemble actual minis, that you didn't need glue or clippers for, could paint if you wanted but didn't have to, and even had a ork dread cardboard standee, cardboard terrain, and every rule you needed for 40 quid, even doubling the price given it's no longer the 90s that'd still be a relatively reasonable 80 quid in today's money.
I feel like its remembering that today miniature prices are obscene and that once upon a time GW had much better products aimed at getting people into the game.
Maybe reminding those that know that it doesnt have to be as bad as GW claim it is.
The visual editing in this episode is AMAZING in both density and illustrative value. 10/10. Fantastic
You mostly described the 40k second edition box set. I mean they were plastic models. But it was mono pose. 40 gretchin, 20 Geoff's and a paper cut out dread Vs 20 space marines. With cardboard terrain. I think it was £50 UK... But that was 30 years ago. So I guess it would be like £100 now
At the "No assembly required" part of the video right now - I think it would be alright to have some simple push fits to assemble rather than a pre-molded single piece, but the main thing is that you need nippers for the current push fit sprues.
If you buy the Pokemon plastic models (plamo) from Bandai (or similar Entry-Grade plamo kits), they have sprues you can just push the piece off of instead - they leave a smidge of flash, but it's mostly not too noticeable and easily smoothed over later. They even have multi-coloured plastic sprues that can be used to put together different colour bits. I think GW /could/ manufacture these, or even just pay Bandai to let them do it.
It's a bit more complex than the 2d images in clear acrylic, but if you can make them fairly simple (stickers for some of the armour details and pauldron emblems, push the blue pauldron into a gold outer rim piece, etc) you could make some "simple colour" setups that still gives the "model on a sprue" experience for progression into the bigger/more complex plastic kits.
It sacrifices a bit of budget economy as well, but it exchanges it for feeling closer to the experience of the full models. I think it'd be my ideal point for accessibility, but I can see how GW wouldn't want to go that way because of the investment in new mould technology, sprues/models, etc. compared to your much easier "crop an image, print on clear plastic, go" solution.
GW once already did that, check "Space Marine Adventures : Rise of the Necron" models.
Gunpla-style easy assembled models, with different colored plastic for the various parts, would be pretty sweet. Moreover, GW could change the color on the plastic, allowing them to sell literally the same kit as different subfactions. Space Marines are great for this. Blues and yellows for Ultramarines, and then another box of yellows and reds for Imperial Fists, etc. Same with Chaos Space Marines; black and gold for Black Legion, blue and greed for Alpha Legion, etc.
Your idea #2 would be best benefited by including some "real" pieces. For example, the bases could be some mockup of a custom base (with rock terrain or molded grass), or include 2 pieces of official terrain. This way the box has long term value and evokes the sunk cost fallacy while still being something stand alone.
Black Reach, Skull Pass and Blood Island are the Golden standard when it comes to GW starter sets
The age of darkness box is 1750 points of space marines + dice and rulebook for only 225€ I'm pretty sure it's the most convenient gw box ever made.
As you were describing the requirements of the box I realized just how amazing the Battletech Game of Armored Combat box is. It's literally everything you mentioned, except enough for TWO players, all preassembled models, with terrain, for only $60.
Madness
I picked up the Beginner box randomly then promptly grabbed the one you mentioned... They compliment eachother greatly.
I think the models are such an essential part of the hobby that removing them would make an intro box fail. Instead have the push fit system that starter sets but with different colored sprues for different body parts. Have a blue sprue for the marine body, a red sprue for the sergeant helmet and a grey or metal colored one for the gun. This way people can still paint them up if they want to.
Honestly... I have no clue why you think that. I don't want to make assumptions but maybe you have a bit more cash on you, but as someone who wishes they could do the hobby but don't have any of the faculties to do so. I'd so want some pretty little 2D models to play with. Models aren't needed for Warhammer. There are tons of warhammer fans who like the lore and characters. And would just like to try the game out with some pretty set pieces.
@@De_La_Evo the reason for me is that the price Poorhammer gave for that intro box would be stupidly expensive if all you got was some 2d plexiglass with stickers and some cheap magnet terrain. I know how models aren't cheap but even then it would be a ripoff. At that point why not just print out the artworks yourself and stick it on some carton. I've seen people do that and that would be way cheaper and also give you something you made yourself.
@@BiggusFroggus it is not ripoff.
tons of 2d cardboard models and terrains.
include mini rule book and mannual (Like Command edt. which explain the terrains).
I agree. Their idea at 80 bucks is too much for a non-gamer.
Different colored sprues for different pieces works great for Gundam model kits, and while the issue comes up of having to design and make room for new sprues (which may factor into cost), that sounds like a good idea for a beginner set. And honestly aside from the rare exception, most tabletop games don't have prepainted minis matching the box art, so it's kinda silly to me to think people will see the painted box art and expect a matching prepainted mini inside. If the only options I had available to me as a beginner were cheap acrylic standees instead of models, I'd have skipped the beginner box entirely and just saved for the actual models. Especially when those *uncustomizable* standees will feel like a waste of money once I have a full custom painted army of models.
The terrain discussion reminds me of Dropzone Commander - where the starter set included an entire pop up cardboard cityscape. The Pathfinder starter set also inlcudes around 50 pop up cardboard characters like they were discussing in the video.
This video is genius level marketing. 40k and AOS on Walmart shelves does matter for exposure and this would allow for easier introduction to say my 10yo daughter, because I would so buy her the Sisters of Battle box to bounce off my models. Bear in mind she's also the one who painted all the Necrons in the Recruit Box and her and her 6yo sister will likely be the ones to paint the Necrons in the Elite Box I bought. I have the magnet tiles, a rather large collection, of my daughters. They are highly versatile and durable. They've built 4.5 ft tall towers that hold up really well...till the dog plows through it.
When I first started I actually thought about making my own 2D paper proxies pretty much exactly like this. When you actually read the rules you realize that the vast majority of them involve measuring to bases with only a few tidbits mentioning the models themselves. So technically you could play boarding actions with nothing but 2D disks that are the correct base size, like checkers, with pictures printed on them.
In some of the 1st edition single-player boxes the orc vehicles were just cardboard cutouts stood vertically on the bases.
Apparently if you have one of those it's still considered tournament legal lol
@@shigerufan1 The Deffdread, yes.
When I was a kid every Warhammer game I played had at least a couple cardboard proxies for models my friends or I couldn't afford.
So this is pretty similar to a thing in historical wargaming, the peter's paper boys line of books. It's basically a book with some background info, maybe a ruleset, and then a bunch of pages meant to be photocopied where you get a bunch of paper soldiers to print out and cut out. They even include a few pages of terrain. I never used them myself but they look great when ranked up and getting a paper army is significantly cheaper and faster than doing a full army of miniatures
I've been using Onepagerules paper minis. Can get a really good army (and even laminate it, maybe) for like... 40 bucks counting both the files and printing costs if you use officemax, and it will pack nicely too if you look into interchangeable basing. Assuming it's one of the armies they have files for yet, but they're adding about a pack a month.
Honestly, 40k acrylic "pawns" (which is what I believe Pathfinder calls them) sound like exactly what I want as official releases. As someone who doesn't really have the patience to put many, many small army men together, that would be an easy way to get me back into the game at this point. There's a reason I like the Battletech standees so much. It really wouldn't be that difficult for them to churn out.
The main problem, however, is that the "pawns" would likely cut into model sales, so they would have to limit what people can do with them in tournaments and such. I think limiting them to boarding party level/infantry only would probably be a good idea... Though I'd really like to use them in Kill Team.
It's not a bad idea, however, and I would probably be one of the first in line to buy that product.
Ready to build kits didnt really have a detrimental impact on the full model kit versions since you only get one loadout on the RTB kit. Same thing would happen with acrylic pawns.
I've just been listening to a bunch of "origins of Warhammer" podcasts and it really strikes me how back when this all started, the point was that people already had the minis. The "build and paint the figure" part of the hobby predates the rules, and the point of the rules was to give folks something to do with all these figures they'd collected. And now we've come so far down the path that folks like you are looking for ways to play the game without having to build the minis. That's a pretty major success for something that was initially an advertising tactic.
You know you guys basically described 2nd Edition box set, right?
Still have my ork dread from then
I think the "Easy to Build" Stuff fulfills some of your wishes for the models in this dream-box. They dont need glue and ppl learn a bit about building the models.
I love this idea, also I wouldn’t mind seeing a video about competitive issues
I really like the acrylic slot idea for that initial starter set. It could also be awesome for proxies so that people can test models without breaking the bank or testing armies to see if they mesh with the play style of the army.
A little stressed about a test I’m going to take in two minutes, seeing this, helped me relax just because there is something to look forward to after the test!
Your knees his back.. what are you two up to on the other side of that camera 😂
for the terrain, GW used to have little plasticard terrain in the boxes with their models that you folded and slit into each other to make simple buildings based off those old cars and boat figures you bought punched out and then created a "3-d" effect little car or boat or whatever
oh my god, i just listened to the website version like 3 hours ago
and now there is the YT with visuals
on one hand, great i can see visuals, but also, i dont want to relisten to it already
great episode tho, really something GW should look into
Listening to this reminds me that there is both MTG arena(which makes it so we can play on the relatively cheap) and that GW is a model company/paint company first
From someone who rarely (if ever) plays the actual game but absolutely loves painting, there are ways to add in the hobby side. Sell additional versions where you color in the characters and then bake them in the oven. When i was a kid I remember having several things where you colored on a piece of acrylic, baked it in the oven and it shrunk down and locked in the colors you added. That would still give the freedom to “make it your own” while keeping it super low barrier to entry, and even a fun way to share the hobby with a younger family member or something
I like boarding actions as a fun quick game mode. Horus heresy also has zone mortalis which expands it to have dreads!
Super good work. I only just found this video, but "revisiting" it after the release of Leviathan and the 10th edition starter boxes brings some interesting perspective. The first thing is that the lowest-level, "$65" 10th-edition box, and only that one!, now comes with five paints, a starter brush, and clippers. I don't know if those clippers are the super-duper "super fine detail cutters" GW sells for USD 50, but either way, factoring in the paints being $4.50 apiece at their lowest (and one of them is a metallic paint to boot) and the brush being about $12, that's still at least $30 worth of supplies, along with two small armies, a ruler, and some dice, all for roughly what you'd pay for a single box of most units.
My Age of Sigmar starter set, at $50, in technical terms had a lower cost of entry but also didn't come with paint (I bought the Paints + Tools kit alongside it, which I still make heavy use of, particularly the included mould-line remover). More notably, the middle-tier and high-tier 10th-edition boxes also do not come with these paints or tools, which to me just makes them feel like they're just "versus-boxes" being marketed as starter kits despite also having varying tiers of "how much instructions are included." One minor thing I don't like about the $210 'Ultimate Starter Set' is that the color palette on the box art does the Ubisoft thing where it looks like a washed-out version of the tier below it, where, if anything, it should look even more vibrant if you're going to be spending so much extra on it. And at that point, I'd just pay a little more and get a still-easy-to-find Leviathan box.
To me, the sheer existence of a $65 "two plastic armies + ruler + dice + clippers + paint" tells me that either GW is selling an incredibly generous loss leader to get people into buying $60 army units, or this stuff isn't nearly as expensive to produce and distribute as they want us to think it is. That said, I would not have minded if they did the Aeronautica Imperialis thing and had multiple 'flavors' of starter sets (Imperial Navy vs. Tau), with tiny armies but with different factions involved that aren't just Space Marines Versus Tie-In Novel Antagonist (e.g., Imperial Navy versus Tau or Eldar). So it'd be something of a bridge between the current One Variant Of Starter Set With Three Tiers And A Super Launch Box, and the various 2-player versus boxes that get released periodically.
Various card games like Magic and Pokémon, back when it was a Wizards of the Coast game, mastered how to market this years ago:
Level 1: Learn-to-Play set (Warhammer version: Starter box)
Level 2: Theme deck (Combat Patrol, Boarding Patrol, arguably those 2-player versus boxes and the enormous Christmas single-army boxes ... I really hope the one for the Imperial Knights gets brought back this year since I'm in a better position to buy it now)
Level 3: Booster packs (single boxes of models).
Basically I'd love to see a simplified version of Eldritch Omens, Shadow Throne, or Piety & Pain, turned into an alternate flavor of starter set.
Something kind of like the cardboard cutouts did exist way back on 2nd edition. In the versus box, the orks had a cardboard cut-out of a deff dread as I believe it didn't have a plastic sculpt at the time. It had a little stand you would use as the cut-out had a flat bottom and as such couldn't get in to a proper sloter base.
Great idea for a discussion.
Acrylic standees is the term you're looking for. I was just having a conversation on the OnePageRules page a couple weeks ago, they there is likely a market for someone to take the 2d miniature artwork they supply (or something similar) and make it into acrylic standees at a lower cost than miniatures and no painting required.
My first ever "40k" game was Space Hulk back in the 80s.
It came with press together models and various terrain cards which jigsawed together in different patterns to make the mission terrain.
As a primarily painting focused warhammer player, I think this sounds like a fantastic idea. Nothing is more painful than finishing a combat patrol and realizing you can’t really do anything with it unless someone else wants to play a 500 point match. Plus, if magic has taught us anything, players will still yearn for eventually upgrading the standup pictures into fully painted models. People spend a crazy amount on special edition magic cards that they already own the base version of.
Even if a person ends up "upgrading" to 3d models, there's always going to be someone who needs a few extra units of something basic, that they're trying out as a list. The standees can help fill out that army quickly.
@@Bluecho4 and this is the benefit to everyone if the player base increases
I mean i can tell you right now what the solution is for people who don’t want to/can’t pay a shit ton. We cut out paper in the shape of the bases, and use these little wooden blocks we have to make terrain. That’s what my brother and I do. And it wouldn’t be insane for us to move to something like this if it was available.
the final product sounds like some of the old BattleTech starter sets. they had 2D cardboard minis that you would slot into bases, plus some basic cardboard maps to play on, and beginner rulebooks. They even do cardboard minis plus plastic models in the modern Beginner Boxes, that way they can give you more units while keeping them cheap. So the final product already kind of exists, but it works. Keep on drinking at the sushi bar my dudes
Another early upload? Let’s go, poorhammer is the best part of Friday
I like Eric's approach of already built and monocolored minis, the thing is: Imagine the packaging a Boarding Patrol (for example) would need, for: a) All the minis to fit, yes they might be small but if you bunch them together they'll break and b) the foam/sponge for them to not fly all inside the box and also break. Imagine they did this in the rumored Dark Angel vs Tyrannids... The box would have to be the size of a whole computer tower! But I do appreciate the concept, cause as someone who thought for most of their life: "That's really idiotic, why would I pay $50 for a plastic frame which I have to build and have to paint to play... It should be in the cost why are you making me do all the work", but now I've fallen to the plastic crack, so any solution to get more beginners in would be appreciated, cause I do know I had a hard time getting in, and now I have Necrons, Custodes and Imp. Knights
I literally pulled the Leo pointing meme when you mentioned that video about the mag tiles as I'd seen that already XD
Ideas bringing us closer to the first hit is free, for or plastic crack of a hobby.
There's a perfect model painting onboarding solution here; which is to include like 1 or 2 unpainted blue plastic ultramarines in the box (or unpainted silver plastic necron equivilent). Include a tiny jar of a secondary color paint, and some chapter logo stickers. *And market it as a bonus*. Buy the box, get 2 starter dudes free. (Its not of course, its included in the original price). The army made of 2d standups is legal and ready to play without them, but its stronger with them. If you're just playing with your friends; its no issue just use them; but if you want to use them at your local games store then you're encouraged to paint them.
I literally just decided to create my own army in this exact style of my own accord not one week ago. Of course, it's also an entirely new game I'm making, but it's still amazing that I came up with basically this exact same idea as well, without any prior input from outside sources.
half of the Warhammer club at my school was guys playing with lego minifigs and a couple actual models
then just eyeballing about how large the base should have been
and a stick note saying what the legofig actually is
most of the terrain was peoples cannibalised history dioramas
"hes a space marine because hes got the lego spaceman helmet and a blue police uniform"
Honestly, that bit about the "pre-grimdark'd" magnetic tile terrain, with either molded plastic surfaces or a sticker depicting a spaceship interior, is a really good idea. A third party manufacturer should just make that. Loads of people currently purchase MDF or card stock terrain. I know plenty would purchase such a product, if it was on the market.
Heck, you could subcontract with the people who make those kid's toys, and tell them, "I need loads of these tiles, but can you make them opaque and neutral colored?" And then slap stickers on them yourself.
Something this reminds me of is the old punch-out model games from the early 2000s by WizKids. Granted, their marketing strategy was identical to Magic - selling booster packs and a few bigger boxes with whatever units you get being random - though all you really needed was one or two booster packs and you were ready to play.
I think the best example of this was the "Pirates!" game. Even though I had nobody to play with, I absolutely adored it, and I loved assembling all of the little ships, even if the thin plastic pieces were prone to breaking. Looking back on how the game was designed, it was super simple and self-contained. Packs would always include a small rules manual, a teeny-tiny D6, two ships (or similar, like a fort in earlier sets or sea monsters in later ones), treasure, and an island with terrain printed on the opposite side. For competitive play ships had points costs similar to other tabletop games, to balance fleet sizes and ship power. Ship stats were printed right on the plastic cards used for their pieces, and movement was determined by using the short and long edges of the cards.
I think you've highlighted the diversity of 40k as a hobby. Some want to play a game some want to sculpt and paint.
Never forget the 3rd Edition starter box and the cardboard cutout deff dread.
I'm all for a "Bucket-o-Army Men" option. I bought one for my nephews, called "The Corps!" that was like 96 sci-fi army men, plus some terrain and "vehicles". The sculpts are actual not bad. The plastic is cheap but robust and painted up nicely. If they weren't about double the scale of Warhammer, they'd make good proxies for guardsmen. I've actually used some of the terrain (sandbags, barbed wire, hedgehogs) in 40k as scatter. All for $15. Tons of the old, one piece metal models would work great manufactured this way and still look good on the table.
As far as terrain goes, GW used to make terrain for necromunda that was a combination cardstock walls and floors that slotted into plastic frames. That would be perfect for boarding action terrain.
I like the idea. Especially modular terrain in box. I don't see GW doing the printed 2d standees, but I can see them doing colored push-fit mono-pose infantry models at 500 points. Ultramarines, Black Legion, Orks, and Mechanicus kits with blue, black, green, and red colored plastic respectively.
Or, as someone else pointed out, you could do the Bandai thing, and have different sprues in the kit made in different colored plastic. So your Space Marine can have a blue body and a black bolter. Maybe the heads can be separate, and you can put one head on a different colored sprue, to denote a Sergeant. The Orks could have a black or brown body from one sprue, and heads and arms on a green sprue.
Moreover, you can switch around colors between printings. So suddenly Ultramarines can become Imperial Fists or Blood Angels or Salamanders. Or your Goffs can become Bad Moons. So GW can sell the same kit multiple times, using the same sprues, just changing the color formula between batches.
(I think the easiest to make modular would actually be Craftworld Eldar. Their color schemes are usually big blocks of color, with splashes of another color on weapons or heads. Red body + white heads for Samhein, yellow body + blue head for Iyanden, etc.)
Battle for Vedros. This was, and still is my favorite way to play an afternoon of 40K. Captain, 6 man Tactical Squad, Dreadnaught, and a Terminator vs a Warboss, Deffkoptor, 5 Nobz, and a dozen Ork Boyz. Expansions were 3 man Combat Squads, Bike, and Attack Bike vs 4 Boyz Mob, Grotz box and Wartrakk.
I think the ideal setup would roughly be the following:
'Squad' Box includes:
1 'centerpiece' model, preassembled and base coated. This is some verity of 'leader' model for the infantry unit that makes up the box set. So a Space Marine Sargent with power sword and plasma pistol, a Tyranid Warrior with scything claws and Devourer, Necron Cryptek, Dire Avenger, ect. The idea being that this introduces a little variation into a given force out of the box while giving a model for the 'hobby' aspect to lean on. Make it a unique sculpt ideally (because greed.) and feature a fully painted version on your front cover of the box.
1 Squad of basic Infantry (The box should be roughly 300-500 points in total.) in standy form, thus saving a ton of money. If being extravagant, one special weapon is included. (so, one Sister with a Flamer, or one Heavy Bolter team for Imperial Guard, etc.)
15 pieces of magnetic snap terrain, of which five are light cover rather than any kind of wall, so they have use outside of Boarding Action.
Squad Rule Sheet with all the rules for the models themselves with an illustration of which matches which, with nothing else. (possibly one paragraph of flavor text per type if you have the space.) If your going to be extravagent (and I think this might be worth it) include their rules in the full 40k games of the current edition as well.
Boarding Action Rule Sheet with the game mode rules required.
10 6 sided dice. (Very cheap, no reason not to include.)
Any required tokens for play as cardboard punchouts. (again, cheap and needed.)
The front shows a fully painted 'centerpiece' model among the standees and terrain included in the box. The back side shows the model as is in the box, selling this as 'paint as you like because it's already White primered!' to keep things feeling honest to the customer. Blurb about the faction in question included on back.
You could do this for basically all sides, though the number of Standys is going to differ by army to hit the point amount wanted.
Literally doing this for each faction is ideal. Sorry Space Marines and Chaos, you only get 1 box each. Of course it's Ultramarines and Black Legion, why wouldn't it be?
The basic idea is for each box to be ~$40, with the intention that either two people each get one and can immediately read the rule book and play against each other, or one person shells out the $80 and can play with someone else. $80 is a little high, but by not pairing sides in a single box you get maximum buy in chances as people will get the faction that appeals to them. Yes, some are going to rot on shelves because some armies aren't that popular. That is the price of doing business, the sheer number you catch makes it worth doing all of them. The point is to have an onboarding tool out there without going into the Red to do it.
The hope is to get new players and give them a path to getting immediate fun out of it, while being able to justify the investment as something they'll use after being on board. This is the role of the unique centerpiece model, in addition to bringing the hobby aspect in subtly without pushing it.
While in an ideal world, you'd just include the actual models (again, assembled, based and primed in white already.) for the whole unit, monetary concerns make that not likely an option.
As someone who is really into blood bowl, they have already done stuff before with unpainted minis being on the box, it happened in 2016.
Because of the elitism issue, I think that doing pre assembled unpainted MODELS and just putting that on the box would be a better solution. It would also keep GWs “we are a model company” thing in mind and make it easier for them to swallow
It's not a bad idea, particularly the boarding action tiles idea. GW have tried a cheap entry modes a couple of times before, Kill Team being one of the more recent successful ones but as you say not everything is there. To combat the artist complaints and introduce the idea of painting your own models (for the lucrative paint sales) perhaps you could add a single full model to your game box that is like a sergeant or something to be used if desired.
Space Hulk, Talisman and its 40K variant Relic all used to serve as entry points but built up too much as their own games and bulked out more and more. The other games like Heroquest, Blood bowl, Necromunda, Mordhiem and Gothic were all more their own games anyway but have all acted as entry points.
One last thing if you are going to have cheap dice make one of them awkwardly wonky so its weighted to roll a 2 or something to draw people into buying the more expensive dice too.
That dice gimmick sounds very evil. I like it
I genuinely love this idea and from so many standpoints this would be huge for GW to allow for a hook to get new players into it. There's so many things this can even branch out to or boost GW's stance on.
Back in the late 90s, I remember of a "Space Marine + Orcs" starting box, which included a paper Orc robot thing.
As someone who came to the hobby just over a year ago and has yet to play an actual game with the mountain of grey sitting just off screen, the 2d starter box is 100% genius. I have never felt comfortable bringing my 1/3 painted, primed and "mostly" assembled army to the local shop and so the only exposure to the actual game has been Table top simulator. I use those style miniatures for DND all the time (dungeon in a box) and they are a hit on the table. When I was younger, the price of entry was always the barrier, but currently, the barrier has been time.
I know you have mentioned it before, but this is why I'll never stop advocating for 3d printing your own models. Yes, 3d printing is its own hobby, but if it's a hobby you or a friend are into it can save you so much and get you some amazing models
This is a lovely idea IMO, I have actually considered making a standee army several times, just for the speed and the convenience of getting one up and ready.
As I've understood GW's business, this is not something they would ever do. As it would compete with their other models, this is the same reason why hugely popular games like Mordheim or Epic haven't made a comeback either, it is just the same customers buying a different, less profitable thing from them. They haven't gone after new business for a long time as I've understood it, they have and still are solely focused on squeezing more money out of the customers they do have.
Have a 2 sided print inside the bases also, an indoor/outdoor theme.
This is a fantastic idea, and the Picasso tiles have a cheaper set as well, it's about $26 for 60 tiles. You could easily get a few structures out of that.
I think they should offer a super duper scaled back version of combat patrol with like 2 ally units 2 enemy units. Include a measuring stick, dice, unit cards and rules for a few narrative-based 1-2 player scenarios played on a folded up paper map.
I had a kit like this when I was a kid. It wasn't 40k, it was some medieval miniature kit but it got me interested in the hobby and I eventually got some warhammer and lotr models. Some other noname company did their onboarding for them in my case.
To get around it being just grey plastic offer a starter brush + paint + glue pack for like 20 dollars with colors designed for the starter kit. Dont even have to sell full sized paints, there are so few units you can get away with tiny sample droppers.
I love this idea, maybe they could market this as solely a gaming thing like those Combat Area games GW launched, or they could also release a side kit of the actual models for the 2d models in the box, like a "3D Upgrade Kit" or smth.
I remember being 15, 16. I walked into a Games Workshop in my mall in Thousand Oaks, and there was a full battle field set up with nids and marines in the middle of the store. Terrain and shit, this was impressive. I was approached by an employee, asked if I wanted to try, and I went a few rounds. Walked out that day with a Battle for Maccrage starter set and a simple paint kit.
This is a really fun thought experiment. As someone who was always drawn in by the hobby, I wish GW made a starter set that just included all the tools and paints and one 500 pt team. I’d have gotten in much earlier, and been able to get some friends in as well. The sheer number of items to buy separately I think is a major deterrent-people love boxes and kits.
....this is literally one of the BEST ideas I've ever heard for game-play. Horrible for modelling...but...damn...amazing as intended as an entry.
seems like a really good idea, very well fleshed out and balanced for pretty much everyone to be happy.
Its too bad it wont happen. Thanks GW.
This is one of the best ideas I've heard. Cheap, easy intro point that doesn't harm the minis? I think it might be perfect.
Showcasing models at the end was a nice touch. That poor third one with its face covered by the channel logo tho.
This is why OnePageRules feels like the future of "miniature wargaming for the masses" to me with it being model agnostic
OnePageRules also literally does this exact idea, with 2D standees you can print out to play a full game with instead of using models from other companies or even 3D printing anything at all. Painting taken completely out of the equation, just get in and see if you like the game.
Kill team is pretty good. That's how I started you buy the box with 2 teams and rules and the tokens and 6 deployable barriers. Wish there was more dice
Thinking also about an intro box like this from a business perspective you could have little to none profit from it to get people in to the hobby of gaming, include like a squad (TOPS) of actual 3D models and the person will most likely try painting them leading to them buying paints, brushes, getting a taste for all the other parts of the hobby and just open up that world and ”actual” 3D models kind of like a gateway plastic. It’s also easier to start collecting the real profitable stuff of the company when you had a taste for it and have a teeny tiny start of an army.
Another thing that would be great is like pop-up paper and cardboard terrain. That way, you get the most terrain for the least amount of money. also, I see people saying kill team, and I have to respectfully disagree, kill team is really neat but it plays nothing like 40k, not to mention that kill team is so much smaller than a 500 point warhammer game. 40k needs its own small form game, and I think boarding actions, or at least something like it is the perfect format for introductory games that players can transition from.
So I bought Operation: Crimson Stone for Infinity and basically had two simple armies, simplified rules, dice, lots of cardboard terrain, a campaign with set up to introduce minis and rules. The minis needed assembly and paint. It also had templates, markers, and a paper play mat.
So similar goal but its, for two people (and the cost was about double). And there are 3 versions of it, each with two different armies. To be fair, armies are like 7 unique minis in the box set but with more options.
Only problem was I bought it with the intent to play with someone who then moved straight away and haven't found anyone to play it with. And have since lent the terrain to another wargamer who was complaining about planet bowling ball.
Still I don't have any 40k stuff despite spending a lot of time watching 40k lore and related vids. I do have some Age of Sigmar start collecting sets as they were a good amount for undead/ beastmen (reskinned goblins/orcs)/ evil knights (chaos) for DnD. And I like giving my DnD group a more horde type fight. So if I knew any AOS players I'd be far more likely to get into that as I've started collecting.
As someone who isn't in the hobby and has no idea how to start, A "start modeling" box would be a *GODSEND*. Pick a bunch of factions and make like boxes for each with:
Enough models for a fun enough game,
Like four colours of paint (e.g. space marines: blue, gold, gun-metal, helmet eye colour)
Some cheap-y assembly tools,
and glue or whatever you use to stick em together,
Plus a ruleset (bonus points for just friggin puttin it online for free)
and make it like
Rules are free online already and Citadel model supplies are a scam, ESPECIALLY their brushes.
Buy from your local art supply shop, then get a white glazed tile as a palette.
Inks are cool.
@@malakimphoros2164 So, I found the core rules on the official website. Is there any way to find specific codexes online? I'm thinking I might play a small game with just some printed out paper cutouts with my friend to see if I actually like the gameplay before I get into the building/painting aspect
@@max-lol4031 Go to the 40k general thread, the link is in the OP if you want a pdf
Wahapedia otherwise
@@malakimphoros2164 Right on! Thanks man
years ago I bought a hobbit movie set as I went into GW and enjoyed painting one. Liked it so much I bought the box ... went home saw all the pieces on the sheets of plastic and never even tried it
Love the idea not only for new players, but for experienced players who want to try something new. Sinking $60-$80 into trying out a new army rather than buying a combat patrol only to find out you don’t like it makes way more sense. It would also be affordable for a gaming group at a local store to just have a few of these lying around for new players to pull out and use.
For me the best gateway into 40k has been kill team. I may not be playing 40k yet but Ive been making plans to get an army going. But with kill team I payed 100 dollars for the starter box and got 2 kill teams even if you need to buy a 2nd box of the vet guard to get full use out of it and that was enough of a hook on wargameing with a slightly lower and more acceptable intro cost for a war game. Helps that I knew what I was getting into and had experience with model building a tiny amount of painting experience so it was fine
I'd buy this. I played a lot of warhammer fantasy and the 9th age many years ago, and I've been hesitant to get into the hobby again, both due to the cost and frankly because I don't know if I'd want to invest the time into building and painting an army. Maybe I get fully caught up in it (probably to be honest), but maybe I just try it out and call it a day five or ten games in - and with that viewpoint, a somwhat affordable, out of the box game would be great!
This is actually an amazing idea. I was trying to get some friends into the game and when we got to the store to look at boxes they're excitement was immediately taken away dud to the price of everything.
The real answer is kill team, it's always been kill team.
The list building in KT needs a rework to allow more variety/points in boxes and you buy three or two and a HQ kill teams to get a working boarding patrol.
Let's go with tau for example the kill team box would have 7 fire warriors, 2 stealth suits and 3 drones.
The fire warriors can be built as breachers, strikers and with the option to upgrade one to a cadre fireblade. So your list ends up being 1 hq 20 fire warriors, 6 stealth suits and 8-9 drones. Or a valid and legal boarding patrol.
Space marines would have six intercessors and an upgrade kit to make characters.
So you end up with a captain, 2 lieutenants (or even an apothecary or ancient), and 15 intercessors.
A custodes kill team is a single box of guard. Instead you can bundle two guard with a box of sister. Then suddenly you have two body’s to replace you your shield captain and praetor for your boarding patrol.
A grey knights kill team is half a strike squad get rid of the interceptor bits and sell just five for 45.
this would actually be prefect for me to get my nephew into playing
i bought the elite edition starter set (around 600 pts of necrons) and absolutely pwned my friends imperial guard army my first match.
very good box with solid troops choice (warriors), fast attack tarpit unit (scarabs), beastly scorpekh destroyers and a fun HQ choice (overlord with tacyon arrow).
just use cheap black spray primer and drybrush on your favorite metallic color, then pick out a bright color for the eyes and weapons and your well on your way to completing a very simple to paint and play army.
Well, I'm not necessarily 'new' to the hobby (tried to start off a Warhammer Fantasy army about 10 years ago with Lizardmen - while core stuff was painted, most is still in boxes and never got a chance to play), I recently motivated myself to get into the hobby again. This time though with 40k due to the many Pen&Paper games in which we covered it as a setting.
And I mainly do it via Kill Team.
Not sure if I'm doing it right, but thus far I'm building up 5 Custodes. Got myself the Kompendium and rulebook, some necessary tools and even got myself 5 Sisters of Silence on the shelf for reward, when I manage to at least put together and paint up those 5 beasts. With the Custodes alone I would already have an entire Killteam, but I wanted to have the Sisters as well in order to get some variation + I prefer the mixed combo's playstyle more.
Tabletop Simulator and having a few fun games in it also helped in further proving to me, that this is definitly the best starting faction for me. ^^
Now, should I actually be able to finish these 10 models, the next plan will be to get myself a second Killteam, either to get a buddy into the whole hobby for some nice boardgame time at a Sunday or to just have some options.
And I'm quite certain that it will be Tyranids, my alltime favorite.
Question that remains though is though whether I will just buy the current Combat Patrolbox because it has all the models I need for a Killteam and more
or just buy the two boxes I need for the more logical choice.
But then again... it would be nice to actually have some Tyranids around. And to give myself an excuse to maybe also buy myself some Raveners despite Raveners being not a thing anymore on Killteam.
Huh... I wonder.
Maybe Killteam really is a good excuse for luring people into the full 40k expierience, because the small range of models required to actually set up a game might still be worth it. Even if it is in terms of cost certainly neither cheaper.
Honestly - sounds great, let's do it. I'm more of a hobbyist than player btw.
I started my WH40k journey with the Indomnitus Box, havnt looked back.
High from the future
Same with Leviathan box!
Less than a year later im at 4k tyranids and 4k space marines and 2k orks
The kits given to schools for the program GW does are interesting, they have parts for the models on sprews which require no clippers. You just press the model and they pop off.
Those might be good for a box like this.
I'd rather see single piece models that come off the sprue like the old second edition (?) marines. Box comes with grey or black primer to fill in the armour joints, and maybe the armies are blue and red plastic.
I think the biggest draw for me when I was starting was the "those models are cool I want them!" factor
This whole conversation is why I've mostly moved over to Battletech. $15-20/model may seem a bit pricy, but when you realize you only need 4-6 models to play your game, third-party models are encouraged, and the base rule set (that comes with a full 4-6 models, designed for 2 players, plus several cardboard stand-ins, and all models are fully assembled) sits around $40-60, depending on which specific kit you're getting.
Bonus for the terrain pieces, if the players end up not completely sold on playing 40k, they can look at killteam and say : "huh let's try that out, we already have some terrain pieces, and those models kinda look cool"
As someone who's literally only into Warhammer for the hobby side (I've never played a single game of 40k) I would actually love this. Just on the fact alone that I wouldn't feel like I had to make my army or kill team perfect before I play. Just boom here's my guys I get to play now.
As someone who is new to the hobby I likely would have bought this to play. Instead I bought a cheap resin printer for $140 and some basic supplies for around $100 more and can now play using printed models. It was the cheapest option which is just crazy that buying the whole setup would literally be cheaper than 3 or 4 of the units I printed.
IDK if I could ever see the 2D acrylic models being legal, but I love the terrain idea. I could even see large scale fully magnetic terrain for 40k in a way that we could have standardized set pieces for competitive play.
I am less than 90 seconds into this video and this, this is the one I've been looking for forever. 40K seems so exclusionary and expensive between the cost in terms of money and time to get an army on the table as well as the sheer number of locations rules are stored in - I don't play, and I think you need something like 4 or 5 rulebooks to actually get started? This is the conversation I want more than anything.