Happy Saturday ?
Thanks for the boot camp update Jim it has helped get my head around some of the army composition we can expect next weekend.
More kickstarters WHY?……..We don’t need to eat do we guys? Plastic crap diet,guaranteed weight loss.
Sorry @warzan mass battle games have been dying for years…..skirmish games are easier to get into,cheaper price point and faster gratification which the society of today craves.Old dinosaurs like you and I the have large armies are things of the past.

Another great topic. Mass battles are dead?
To give you my 2 cents worth I have to wear two hats, the gamer and the retailer.
As a gamer I’ve run the gambit. Warhammer, 40K, historicals, Kings of War, AoS, etc. There are two factors at play here, time and expense. A large army can take thousands of dollars to buy and hundreds of hours to paint. Then there’s the play time. The reality is that I have a family, work and everything else in life competing with hobby/play time. Every hour I spend painting is an hour I’m not playing. Similarly, every dollar I spend on troops is money I could be spending on scenery, storage or other expenses like food.
There’s also the psychological aspect too. 5 models are a lot easier to get finished and to give you the feeling of satisfaction of a completed job than a legion of metal or plastic. I’ve covered this in my project blog, but Kickstarters showing up at your door can be amazingly exciting, that is until you start painting them.
Finally though, I must say as a gamer that there is nothing as breathtaking as a mass battle of two beautifully painted armies. I think we all know it’s every wargamers dream. It’s one thing to be a sergeant in charge of an elite squad, it’s another to be a Chapter Master, a warlord, a general or a King.
As a retailer the current zeitgeist is undoubtedly skirmish games. For retailers skirmish games ultimately suck. Why? Because what we sell to customers in mass battle games is far more than what we sell you in skirmish games. That was until Kill Team that is. Why do games like Infinity suck for us? Because there’s nowhere for enthusiasts to go. No vehicles, no bigger battles, no need for more….. Saga is the same. If you want bigger battles, you leave the rules system and go looking for something else. Definitely a lost opportunity by Infinity and Saga.
So why has this happened? I think GW screwed up. What originally happened is that GW failed to link up their games and allowed for the increase in scale of games. Had players been introduced to Warhammer with Mordheim, been encouraged to move to Warhammer games of 500-1500 points then introduced a Warmaster style ruleset (taking off stands rather than individual models,) for truly massive battles, I dare say Warhammer would have lasted another 20 years. Let’s face it, it’s clearly their business model now for Kill Team to 40K and there will be Apocalypse games rules. Mantic has tried it, but made the dual mistakes of not producing their own unique IP and/or quality models for players to buy into quickly enough.
I watched as GW stumbled tripped and fell flat on their face with AoS. First they Killed the Old World and alienated 12-15% of their customer base in a matter of months. Had they informed the community they were moving the story forward, starting a new game in a new setting they could have left Warhammer players playing that and kicked off AoS.
They originally pushed AoS as a skirmish game, but the sales reality was that skirmish games don’t lead to big sales unless they lead to bigger and bigger battles. Have a look at the photos in White Dwarf of AoS in the first few months. It quickly goes from maybe 30-40 models to tables full of them. The problem with hundreds of models that aren’t on movement trays is that they take hours to play. Then there was the lack on new factions except Sigmarines. The community really had to house rule the game to get it to work at larger scales.
Thankfully there was finally a change at the top of GW and they started listening and engaging with their customers again. The General’s Handbook came out and finally the rules were revised. I suspect that in the not too distant future both AoS and 40K will get ‘Apocalypse’ (massive game) rules.
In the historical gaming scene a few companies are beginning to get it. Warlord recently put skirmish rules in it’s Dark Ages supplement. It allows you to fight a skirmish or larger battles without learning masses of rules. Great idea. Then they released Tank War in the Bolt Action World. It allowed people to fight with the best stuff, without hundreds of models. Battlefront released ‘Tanks’ which is effectively a skirmish game without infantry.
Mass Battles aren’t dead, just out of fashion.

WIN 😛

I think Justin has hit on part of the answer to me at c10:15 in the comment just get 10 models AND JUST PAINT THEM UP… to get sexier models to lure in people interested, it’s not a pop and play world any more – I wonder what new 40k players would think of the old 2nd ed box which in my mind looked better value for entry. There feels more interest in having painted models and a good looking playing surface than playing the games and that is off putting. Yes a simple gaming level painting maybe isn’t that hard, but the expense of the minis and drive to improve your painting levels early is scary enough at a skirmish level let alone whole armies

I agree with @warzan, the huge vehicles give a centrepiece to as army. I do also prefer a skirmish game. can’t we have a middle ground, skirmish games with huge tanks?

In for the win!

Man please as a self proclaimed history expert learn how to pronounce Vichy… Its not Written “Witchy”. Sorry but that bugs me tremendously.

I think there are lot of factors these days in gaming compared to the past making mass battles played less and in the broad view I have some points that I think lead to this.
First up time, most big games have a big rule book that you have to go through, you have to buy/build/paint your army. You have to put it somewhere and games take a fair amount of time to play and that is without the time you need to prepare an army but you can have this in smaller games as well. While with skirmish games you only need to collect a warband (that might be offered in one box) and you have the option of collecting several if you want without feeling “oh I have to do a **** load of minis again”.

Second price, the difference in price between collecting one army compared to one warband can be pretty huge. And with skirmish games it is easier to get yourselves two warbands ready in case you have a friend you want to bring in to that game or that wants to play but doesn’t want to collect that game.

Last thing I can think of for now is options, with all the different games out there it is easier to go in skirmish games with easy rules compared to mass battle games because then you can get more of them.

And in all this I think that mass games will still be played/sold because if you already have one you still want to play with it and it still looks cool on the table. Now if I can only find the time.

So you have a program that creates images from our comments… AR£E!

No I don’t think large army games are dead. But, with the rise of skirmish games I have been toeing the water to see if I can jump back into Table top games. I played 40K and Mordheim about 12-13 years back. I gave it up because of family and school but I have always missed the hobby, both painting/modeling and the unique gameplay. With games like Infinity, Necromunda and Kill Team I know a trip to the hobby shop is imminent.

Given that 80% of the games at my local club are 40K 10% are AoS and only the last 10% are Skirmish games Mass battles aren’t dead, it’s just that Killteam is so cool everyone obviously called it there favourite.

@warzan you are not alone. I to love collection big huge armies.
It just gives me such a great feeling to see it on the tabletop.
Currently I am painting an Imperial guard army with loads of infantry (Mantic GCPS model conversions). Its going to look amazing.
I even loved the look of the new nighthaunt models so much that I bought the new starter set without ever playing Age of Sigmar.
I just hope that all the killteam players start collecting 40K armies of their favorite team.
That’s what I miss with Necromunda and Infinity, that you can’t expand it into a bigger army.

Win, and hurrah for the weekend.

I’ve only been in the miniature/tabletop wargaming scene a couple years now, with only a couple real games under my belt, but I got into the hobby after a years long love of WizKids’ HeroClix line. I’ve always had a fondness and deep respect for miniature games and the craft that so many make out of them. That being said, games like Age of Sigmar and Warhammer 40K have always seemed to have this level of entry that kept me from ever thinking it’d be possible to be a part of the games or the community.

Games like Batman (and by extension the DC Universe Game) from Knight Models, Relic Knights (current Kickstarter mess not withstanding) or Star Wars Legion have an easier entry point. A few models, a basic paint job and boom you’re playing. I have started looking into the likes of Warmachine and Hordes as a new miniatures game to get into, though.

All that being said, I still find the most daunting aspect of the hobby, regardless of scale or size, is terrain. I lack the skill needed to build a board worth playing on, and most terrain for the two main miniature games I play tend to be far pricer than the miniatures themselves. I know many people say just throw something down and play, but a bad looking table completely removes me from the experience/game more so than unpainted minis.

Cat content FTW!

WIN!!!!!!!!!

wouldnt say it was dead. just think these smaller skirmish games help to get people to the hobby. bringing new blood into the game will always be a priority for games companies.

Mass battles never die,they just fade in to the darkness. Plastic crack is real…We are all long time sufferer’s of this addiction.