Reply To: Why do all our wargames rules have to cost the bomb?

[crazyredcoatParticipant 13642xp 0]

It’s an interesting question there, mate, and I think the simple answer is that there wasn’t a single moment where it switched. Which is an annoyingly complicated simple answer. I deff agree that some what we tend call ‘mini rulebooks’ are very nice tools, particularly for grabbing off the shelf on your way to the gaming club. I’d even say that if they contain all the rules I’d rather have that than the big books in terms of rules; much more practical for the actual gaming.

I suppose the increase in app-based gaming aids has changed the situation a little bit, but I’d argue that it came at the tail end of the change or after. I’d say that there’s two ways of looking at how this came about. Firstly, the addition of ‘spam’, as you describe it was born from the desire for a ‘complete package’. For example with 40k if you add in a bit of the universe to the main rules then you have at least an intro to the setting in one book. Bolt Action is similar; you get the rules to play and also the brief overview of the historic context. Over time that extra stuff grows as newer editions are published as in-universe lore changes with time or new research brings about better historical understanding, ect. More pages means more printing costs and so prices rise, but to an understandable level. I’d say that there’s a bit of a divide between people who want the extra fluff and those who don’t, but it’s nice to have it all together.

Then there’s the side of the marketing where companies want to present the nicest looking product as a way of selling a luxury. 40k, for example, when I started a little under 20 years ago was not too bad in price and the colour pages were the mini ‘showcase’ pages but the rest tended to be black and white. It made sense, the minis were something they wanted to advertise in colour but the rest didn’t have to be. Then when they up the cost a small bit but add in more colour art here and there it looks like a nice change and that incrementally grows before you reach a point where you suddenly look back and think ‘this is getting bloody expensive now’ and start to question if you needed it.

It sort of just happened that way, I’d say, but on the flip-side companies have now got it into their heads that you can’t go back, only forwards. A lot of people now expect that level of work into a book because at prices like that it damn well better look pretty and reverting to cheaper printing methods like black and white are now seen as outdated and if you were to revert to that they may think they will lose their share of the market to someone who puts out the flashy stuff. If I’m honest, I don’t think that would happen. If companies offered both kinds of rulebooks I imagine the number of copies sold would increase due to the easier access to the game even if you charged less for a black and white book. If we take GW again as an example, I’d even argue that they might do well to offer 40k rules in their basic level for free in the same manner as AoS does. Still offer the fancy books for those who want them and sure, maybe make some particular rules (like the Warscroll Battalions) available only in those books to encourage sales. At this point I think it’s safe to say that GW is more of a miniatures company than a war gaming company, after all; the minis are their main focus and they are pretty good at making them.

At the end of the day I think it comes down to perception vs. reality. The new styles of books look very nice. I enjoy the artwork in a lot of them (though I wish artist recognition was a little better with some companies) and I’m actually one of those people that likes a bit of fluff in my rulesets, but the reality is that I would happily buy a fancy book (like one of the Battletomes for AoS) for all the extra little bits if I could just get the main rules cheap or even free. I don’t care about the presentation so long as they are understandable, well written, and well explained.