Games Workshop Failing at the Mechanicum

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[@XX-jn8co]

For Dark Mechanicum I feel like you almost need vehicle design rules or Tyranid mutable genus rules, because the Dark Mechanicum were in full-on fuck it whatever mode and no two armies should have the same units, they were modified and created based on the whims of the magi running them. Maybe go for provenances and unlock classes of weapon to stop the entire thing being too chaotic, use a provenance to unlock say heavy combat servitor chassis, sonic weapons and phase blades and go from there What I don't want is a Dark Mechanicum that's just loyalist Mechanicum with more options. That's boring for everyone. Maybe make it so Dark Mech lose their tanks and Myrmidons or something and you need to use your rules to construct replacements for those bits.

[@lostalone9320]

A big problem is that any "build your own" strongly encourages players to 3D print their stuff. Which is not a problem if you are a gamer, but its a huge issue for GW.

[@SteelStorm33]

like for all chaos, nothing is uniform.

[@margaretwood152]

Uh Huh, Yep....and *_Yes._*

[@vnyxnw]

@@lostalone9320 wasn't a problem when they made Daemons & Militia for 2.0...

[@farsonsfinest1402]

In a similar vein we now have a setup where there is no benefit at all to play loyalist mech because they have no loyalist specific units apart from a special character

[@brastionskywarrior6951]

dark mechanicum should have at least 3 archetypes representing the diversity of the faction -chaos corrupt -xenophiles (integrate xenotech, lots of straight biotech integrating xenos biology) -technologists (accelerate human technology and use previously forbidden dark age techs, less human looking) Each one could have upgrade kits similar to the legions which you could use to upgrade baseline mechanicum models. Alongside their own faction associated units (chaos corrupted already have all these daemon engine units, technologists and xenophiles could lean more into the spiders). Unfortunately the spider guys try to combine all these factions but they don't really give any distinctive aesthetic or feeling. They are quite literally the black legion of dark mechanicum. They barely even feel all that forbidden compared to standard mechanicum Sadly GW seems to be against weapon options and upgrades these days. It's a real missed opportunity. I think what we're getting is a good generic baseline. It's just they really need to build from there

[@SerbianLifter997]

Oh boy dark mechanicus minus any basic infantry, basic transports, you know literally anything? Oh and I don't count recoloring and touching up Admech units as Dark Mech. Dark Mech have all their own unique constructs, vehicles, architecture, *everything* by the heresy and especially late heresy. You can't use the same excuse you can for astartes.

[@Tosicc567]

"You'll get two walker kits that make 4 units and be happy with it god damnit, do you think we are actually going to support this system after the hype chasers have already dipped?" - Gw

[@CoverSlaves]

The funniest part is, they didn't make the dark mech stuff "knights" in terms of li's rules, they're scale 2-3, so somehow giant spiders will be getting charged by rhinos and arvus lighters and being locked in combat by them... oof

[@Alan-ut4ve]

Why can't you use the admech units as dark mech? It's a civil war they're going to use the similar kit and weapons not to mention unit types.

[@SerbianLifter997]

@Alan-ut4ve here comes the excuses lmao.

[@Tosicc567]

@@Alan-ut4ve smh why didnt I think of that, they should just change the names of the units and darkmech players should just be thankful they're getting the same army with different words! You can really just convert models to look different smh my head, in that vain you can actually just use rocks in place of models right?

[@akumaking1]

When has GW not been a total failure lately?

[@sagacity1071]

ask valrak and rest of the hype clowns... they love everything.

[@uwesca6263]

Well the new kill team sounds good and rekindled the interest in our group atleast. Also aos with speerhead got a lot of praise. And the new necromunda book got hailed by many people within the community as the best they released so far. So yeah they can do stuff quite right.

[@Maximus_Vulpes]

Their last financial report, to begin with...

[@the98themperoroftheholybri33]

Probably around 2nd or 3rd edition.

[@egnaroelprup]

​@Maximus_Vulpes pretty sure it's been acknowledged for at least a year within their own financial reports that their biggest money makers is the ip license loaned out to video games not the miniatures It's like having a band that makes more money on its t-shirts than its records

[@johnfarscape]

Going back to 2nd edition 40k, it was the same as you mentioned in 7th edition Fantasy, lots of units were featured, but had no models, the models would then gradually be released, the issue with this, was people kitbashed, by the time the Whirlwind was released, everyone had already made their own version, it was even more common with character, I think Belial was proxied for 5 or 6 editions. . . Now they seem to like to keep you guessing.

[@onkyo13]

The other issue I see with this problem is, for every month passing by without the release of these key units, players will just find replacements and have them 3D printed. And when the actual models do release, some will just simply not buy because why spend so much money and time when you already have a fully painted 3D printed version of it?

[@Maximus_Vulpes]

Wow. There are still people to think that 3D print is a thing for GW ?

[@uwesca6263]

I wonder how much this is actually the case. We have several members in our group with 3d printers and i have yet to see a fully 3d printed army for any gamesystem. People tend to use it most for heads and weapons for their space marine chapters/warbands above anything else. And the basemodels that got these upgrades remain gw ones.

[@onkyo13]

@@uwesca6263 This is the idea I was referring to. Example. Since they have not released an official kit to convert say breacher squads for HH. I will just simply get the Mk3's (be it old or new ones) 3D print the arms, shields and weapons and call it a day. If GW decides to release an official breacher squad. why would I need to buy more when I already have ones? The only model I could even think of that you'd 3D print the entire thing would be cases like for the Mechanicum the Vorax or mymidon secutors or any of the forgeworld that are still resin instead of plastic.

[@chaosgrunt9554]

@@uwesca6263 I'm already seeing people in my group with heavily hybrid armies of 3D printed and official kits (my own IG drop troops army is one such). Usually its printed infantry and plastic vehicles. One guy has a fully printed Krieg army, though, even down to the tanks. It's likely that you'll see this happening more often outside of the UK first: The prices prices are very high out here, in "the wilds", but it's only a matter of time, in my opinion, before UK groups start to see the same phenomenon.

[@rutgaurxi7314]

​@@chaosgrunt9554 It's already happening in the UK, this I can confirm. It might only be in small groups, but it is happening, no one is willing to pay the money GW charging right now, not with what the government is pushing on the common people. edited.

[@cerohero1]

There's definitely some very strong stuff in Mechanicum, but the internal balance is so wildly off

[@V-V1875-h]

honestly, even marines are hard to get into, all the chapter specific units are unpurchaseable because FW is never stocked outside of the UK. I just end up buying recast for all things resin because they cost half as much and are actually available

[@noquarrel2758]

I think that incomplete factions and rules is a major reason I never started an HH army. What attracted me to HH was the lore, the superior sculpting, and the superior painting as presented on the Forgeworld site in 2017/2018. Now, the art isn't as good, the sculpts are the same (which is good), but the availability and completeness of armies is low, the rules have problems, and the prices continue to go up.

[@jamesespinosa690]

"the sculpts are the same (which is good)" Are you blind? The nu-scale plastic tacticals look totally different. For the worse.

[@Anathema0420]

@@jamesespinosa690 agreed, looks like they used a primaris base and scaled around it.

[@01oo011]

At this point I don’t pay attention to what GW does and don’t really care. All my stuff comes from the printer.

[@NapoleonicWargaming]

Your admech doesn't

[@Anathema0420]

I just said fuck it im kitbashing whatever GW actually makes and built a Thunder Warriors army and a Minotaurs army using the same technique for Badab Wars campaign. I figure I can use either army for heresy, I don't care about 40k but 30k is where it's at.

[@VallornDeathblade]

Praise the machine spirit. May your prints be clean and unwarped in the name of the Omnissiah.

[@Anathema0420]

@@VallornDeathblade May your STL's be uncorrupted, your prints immaculate and your plate never empty. Imperator Protegit

[@WhatThe40k]

Eightbound are lame!!!! I feel vindicated!😂😂

[@Anathema0420]

I see some wicked prints out there, but the list building and availability aren't there for GW content. At least in second edition codex Chaos you had all types of units and the lovely cultists. Now, not so much for 40k.

[@TheOuterCircle]

Not only are they bad models, but the lore is abominable.

[@WhatThe40k]

@@TheOuterCircle wholly agree. A bad choice through and through. Just imagine the Word Bearers special exemplary unit: Arena Champions. 🤢🤮

[@TheOuterCircle]

@@WhatThe40k their unit would be possessed by a daemon from each of the 4 gods, the Pantheon Possessed. It's dumb enough to happen.

[@Anathema0420]

@@TheOuterCircle jackals are right up there with possessed as well, just weird anesthetics instead of scary daemon look.

[@JohnDoe-sx6iw]

I'm just going to say thank you for referring to us as Customers and not Consumers. Can not tell you how many times I have to sigh when I hear youtubers call us Consumers.

[@Anathema0420]

Customers.consume.

[@Tosicc567]

Gw execs when it comes to starving a game system so badly its new playerbase is dropping like flies. Cant make the fans wait for it if all the new ones are already gone...Genuine 10/10 marketting scheme, heresy thursday constantly being for LI models whilst they refuse to release the 28mm ones they have already completed is hilarous. The company and setting have long gone to shit and they are laughing at us

[@GoalOrientedLifting]

cant claim the playerbase is dropping when everything goes up. especially now, after space marine 2

[@sagacity1071]

BuT GlOrIUs PriMaRiS!!!!!! CoSumE1111

[@Tosicc567]

@@GoalOrientedLifting talking about heresy 2.0 lol all the hype chasers have dipped already because gw more or less stopped supporting it in any meaningful way. Its now just the original heresy players left once again. The gamers into space marine two arent exactly going to be into tabletop either, you can get a full game for the price of what 3 primaris models? The reason why people want warhammer video games is because they cant ass fuck you with prices lmao

[@Tosicc567]

@@GoalOrientedLifting The heresy playerbase is pretty much back to where it was prior to 2.0. All the hype chasers dipped already because gw stopped supporting it in any meaningful way. Leaving the og players with the scraps of what was a much better game system before gw stepped in. I think youtube deleted the first response I wrote idk why but space marine two isnt exactly getting tabletop more players. No one is buying a full game for the price of a 3man primaris squad and going "man I really want to spend more money than this game on 1/15 of my army". Pretty much everyone outside of the warhammer community understands gw is scummy as and their games are as greedy as possible.I know a lot of people who like space marine two that wanted to play it so they can play warhammer without the stupid prices

[@BittermanAndy]

The 28mm ones they've already completed are resin, they're going to have to be redone in plastic before they see a release. Couple of years probably.

[@henrythe9th377]

GW screwed everything. Even Blood Bowl

[@Raygun9000]

Theory: the two gw studios have to compete with each other for production resources. They take it turns with the sprue manufacturing. But they have to have out sourced components like packaging, books, dice etc in possession before pressing the plastic. But not only that they have to use up those components as soon as possible. So they maybe compelled to release things out of order as out sourced components are unavailable or are taking up space. (They may not do it anymore but they used to charge their products rent in the warehouse to see if the were worth producing, this may include components of a product as well).

[@farsonsfinest1402]

@Raygun9000 This is sort of why specialist games died the first time. They had their own casting setup for metals but it would get pulled to cast main game items instead. It ended up with lots of specialist game stuff not getting produced. Jervis Johnson talked about it around 10 years ago

[@Raygun9000]

@@farsonsfinest1402 that was true to some degree, however there were a lot of moving parts that lead to specialist games being moth balled. I was only freelancing at the time so wasn't in studio more than a couple times. 1. The rise in share prices due to lotr meant they had to trim less profitable enterprises to maintain their income as the lotr gold dried up. (Coupled with new leadership at the time) 2. Specialist games took up valuable space in the small stores. 3. Specialist games were much cheaper to collect than the main 3 games (maybe not epic). 4. There was a minor disaster with a model mold that cost an awful lot of SGs budget (the mold was remade 6(?) times to fail every time). (This was over a year before sg shut down, but it would've made the profits look pretty terrible. 5. Forgeworld produced a fair number of the models for epic and bfg (maybe a few other bits). This wouldn't have counted towards SGs profit. 6. Pricing was mental. Not set for what people would pay but directly due to weight, number of components and size of box. 7. Lots of freelancers and volunteers. Not necessarily a bad thing, but unpredictable in quality and quantity. 8. Storage was a bit of an issue as specialist games had such a large catalogue that sold slowly. (They might have been better off letting forgeworld lose with metal casting on demand, they were far more reactive to stock needs). Or recast them as standard resin (rather the fine cast centrifugal resin. Actually this might not have been available at the time anyway).

[@Anathema0420]

I do see this as a low probability, they're simply shooting themselves by not having a solid release line up etc, they're all over the place with so many systems and units production.

[@DMKA94]

GW studios have finally embraced Mork and Gork

[@Raygun9000]

@DMKA94 heh, although it might be the two headed eagle. One looking to the future and one blind to the past.

[@nightingale4632]

I agree resin and plastic are reasonably simillar, but GW resin is a nightmare

[@XSgtBiscuitX]

GW does this shitty drip feed of new releases and splitting armies in half because “you bought the first codex, now you’ll need the second codex to get the other half of the army” and they just rake in money

[@TopazTiger2000]

Well you see, therein lies the problem- they rake in the money. That means there’s enough people that don’t care and buy from them, invalidating our genuine concerns of the game and hobby states…

[@Anathema0420]

Two years later, hey guys a new cod3x hits lol, gotta buy that shit now too.

[@Anathema0420]

@@TopazTiger2000 I blame the normies...

[@Balevolt]

We also need solar aux special weapons

[@GoalOrientedLifting]

It could be that they released dark admech on the small scale cause they got a production line for this scale and want to keep em running, or expand it. When you work in production all productionlines are seperated on the budget. how much they bring in, maintenance, running costs are applied to that line, etc, for that specific product. Maybe its a line that doesnt run constantly because they expanded the machinery, fall in sales, or it simply werent used enough. Part time machinery is the most expensive machinery to run. i know theyre waiting for buying new venues. so maybe theyre just scaling up so they can move in and the new venue already will have decent production. so ROI looks better on paper

[@maxmagnus3793]

Personally I just prefer the game system of Legions Imperialis. The scale, movement speeds, firing ranges etc allow for proper combined arms warfare. The 28mm scale models are beautiful but it just doesn't make for a good "fire & maneuver" game system. The armies start in firing range of each other, no time and no room for grand movements. Almost all decisions are made during army selection and deployment, after that it's just resolving those pre made decisions. Then there are the ridiculous 2.0 rules. So yeah I quietly stopped working on my HH 2.0 army and now let myself be convinced to get into LI by some people at my club. Even if Gee Dubs stops supporting the game it should still be possible to enjoy playing it.

[@CoverSlaves]

"Personally I just prefer the game system of Legions Imperialis. The scale, movement speeds, firing ranges etc allow for proper combined arms warfare." The problem is nothing incentivizes it. It's currently far to reliant on both players being on the same page in terms of army construction as there is no strong incentive to build for combined arms. Infantry spam basically wins the day, as infantry are quite broken. The game has potential and amazing models but badly needs a faq/errata/some love at core level.

[@NapoleonicWargaming]

I think the main problem with 30k is that it's based on the 40k system. The 40k system that has been utter dog shit for 15 years

[@Anathema0420]

@@NapoleonicWargaming yes it has, it's gotten so bad I don't care for 40k, but stay in heresy and necromunda or other specialist games.

[@TheSixYardBox]

Lumineth has like 3 army books within a year of them coming out because gw kept drip feeding stuff and released them just before 3rd Ed. They did the same with daughters of khaine too and used the end of 2nd edition add on books to do it. Think it was during 8th space marines had 3 codexes come out too because of stuff coming out every few months. Gw are parasites sometimes

[@ShadowPhoenixMaximus]

I wonder if this is an attempt at testing the community response to another Horus Heresy army? They mentioned in the article that they've been contextualising a Dark Mechanicum range for years prior to this release. Its possible GW is uncomfortable with the idea of releasing another army for Horus Heresy (after releasing Solar Auxilia and Mechancium in plastic) and stretching that studio's responsibilities further, when Horus Heresy is largely focused on Space Marines. That all said, when GW removed all Horus Heresy units from the Space Marine and Chaos Space Marine ranges it did isolate the relevancy of the game. So maybe increasing the number of unique factions will draw in more players and by extension more sales - keeping the game alive to be milked for several years or more.

[@KnightsofTitan]

The dark macha-canicum has risen . You should make a kosher salt themed mechamicum army for the memes

[@joshuacouture479]

meanwhile sisters of silence having rules with no existing army

[@andreastauber5739]

So here is what should have happened: 1) GW releases the first book of the martian war together with the major necessities for mechanicum as well as some new non-corrupted dark mechanicum models - among those would be the new models they released for legiones, but half the size so you can actually field a few of them as dreadnought-like units. 2) 2-3 months later GW releases a D&D-like dungeon crawl game focused on the exploration of the caverns of mars, with models compatible with HH, usable a leaders and specialists for mechanicum armies as player characters as well as several NPC models that can be used as units for dark mechanicum armies. 3) 2-3 months after that they release the second book of the martian war, now with the remaining of the regular mechanicum range as well as an extensive range of dark age of technology tech and corrupted dark mechanicum models, including some really large ones.

[@Anathema0420]

They're not even that bright or savvy, they have no brains or shite for it.

[@edwardaugustus9680]

Don't know if it's a video I've missed but what evidence is there for Legions Imperialis being dead on arrival?

[@TheOuterCircle]

The game dropped, and before it even hit the hands of the players, The Old World was announced as arriving in 28 days time. Immediately anyone who only had money to spend on one system now had to decide, and Imperialis came off worse in that trade. On top of that, the nickle-and-diming of the players with sweet-FA in each book, with miniscule ranges on release compared to old Epic 40k means they have not invested a lot into the content for the system, either not trusting it to perform, or not intending to support it to the extent that it needs. Either way, not great. Lastly, limiting it to the Age of Darkness cuts out all of the Xenos players, and that means instantly you've shrunk your market.

[@edwardaugustus9680]

@TheOuterCircle ah thank you for the response. I can see your logic regarding competition with Old World, but I don't think it was as bad as you see it given how difficult it was to get any LI stuff for the first few months. Then again, everyone in my circle already had multiple fantasy armies, which probably skews it a bit as we just grabbed the new books and ran. Overall, my take is that they didn't trust it to perform as well as it did, but the same can be said for Old World. I was lucky enough to be at Warhammer World for release and talking to staff they were pretty open that they didn't expect it to be as popular as it was either. I'll eat humble pie if I'm wrong, but I don't think they'll be dropping the system as soon as you're envisioning.

[@TheOuterCircle]

@@edwardaugustus9680 my guess is a year or two before LI winds down, it didn't sell well here, but neither did TOW, so who knows.... watch this space!

[@IVIaskerade]

I suspect the dark mech is coming out first for LI because it got shunted down the schedule in 28mm for the melee weapons. There's less competition for LI kits so they can make it more easily.

[@CoverSlaves]

It's coming out first because the entire dark mech release is likely fewer sprues than even 1 28mm equiv kit.

[@axcel9128]

Is the Resin vs Plastic discussion bc of eas pf handling the material or toxicity? Bc plastic dust doesn‘t seem safer for me

[@lostalone9320]

Apparently resin dust is genuinely really bad to breathe in. Personally I've never created any large amount of dust when fettling parts, since resin is almost always soft enough to scrap off with a razor blade. But apparently if you grind resin into a fine powder and snort it, it'll give you cancer or whatever.

[@noquarrel2758]

I think the Resin/Plastic issue is about durability of fidly bits on small figures but more about fit/assembly of larger/vehicle models

[@BittermanAndy]

I am told (I have no expertise in this area myself) that resin dust is carcinogenic, plastic is not. Something to do with the size and shape of the particles, again, I'm no expert. More than anything else, though, resin is slow and labour-intensive to cast, plastic you just run through the machine as many times as you want, produce as many models as you want. That's the main driver for doing everything in plastic, to my understanding.

[@chadmrrsn]

It could be that you have to wash the resin and put more effort into cleaning the kits compared to plastic, and a lot of hobbyists aren't looking to do that nowadays

[@Adventurerblitz]

@@BittermanAndy It's because the resin used is chemically cured but because of the way the chemicals cured, in some resins only the outermost layers are fully cured and safe to handle so when its ground down into dust you have a bunch of only semi cured resin that is potentially toxic. That being said any kind of particulate in your lungs can give you lung cancer so its not that big of a difference.

[@RazielLordOfSecrets]

this is why I play armoured clash

[@SuperDuperHappyTime]

My theory is they don’t release everything right away because they don’t have the factory capacity.

[@Anathema0420]

Think about how many units they print of all the various primaris units, then look at every other game they have and print? They're all over the place, it's not capacity issue.

[@YimingDong-r8j]

The situation of mechanicum really shows the mess of horus heresy now. The mechanicum bacame an unplayable faction because of the 'half plastic', with they already said more was coming in the community website but nothing came, bisides they phased out the big guys for mechanicum, sorry I don't remember the name rip. Though I'm a marine player, it is really sad to see these happenned. Also for the auxilia and melee weapons, sicarans, infantries, really no word to say.

[@colinmack8655]

Maybe the imperialis fans should go to wpuc warpath

[@MC-el2us]

Hell yeah

[@egnaroelprup]

I know it was an offhand tangent but I will always bring it up for how much they mess it up by being lazy A marine has 1 soul put 8 daemon souls in it How many souls What's Khorne's funny number Whoops

[@TheWarlock97]

Getting a lil audio issues (every 3 words), might be my internet though

[@Watch-CaptainAlain]

Got the same thing when I watched the premiere. Didn’t come back when I returned for the vod, though. KZbin shenanigans.

[@CoverSlaves]

You're not wrong, old world basically killed li here. Most of the people who got into li dropped it for old world, and I can't exactly blame them, old world is much more scalable in terms of evening and weekend gaming, compared to li which 3k takes way too long. Old world already largely exists in their grey matter and there are a ton of events both big and small. None of that is really the case for li at least outside of europe/uk. As other have mentioned in the comments, the real scandal is that dark mechanicum sorta make mechanicum taghmata a joke because they can have their cake and eat it too, they get new units while being able to field most of mechanicum's units, and the ones they can't field they can just take as allies, because li's army construction is a bit of a joke.

[@Anathema0420]

Not true, people love heresy and imperialis and other specialist games and do run campaigns and tourneys. Just have to know where to go bro.

[@Sommeill]

Mechanicum outside of myrmidon spam and a few other builds are a fucking joke. Hell, most factions are a fucking joke in HH2.0. Also if we get dark mechanicum I hope it doesn't lock out normal mechanicum from being traitor aligned.

[@DauntlessProductionz]

Some one at GW sure loves war of the worlds lol

[@rutgaurxi7314]

Should've been a smooth "Flight of the Navigator" style orb!(!).

[@Hurricanelive]

Brrrrrrrr!

[@laviljoski6952]

macca unc status

[@AllThingsCubey]

All this photo analysis.... they're NOT miniatures, they are illustrations. GW said 28mm versions are way off, if they're coming at all. No prototypes will exist yet. The fact I'm seeing so much analysis of the artwork as if they're minis explains so many people who can't identify AI images from real life.

[@rogaldorn8519]

If these massive walkers were released in 28mm, they would be the biggest plastic kits they have ever made. They are huge.

[@rutgaurxi7314]

​@@rogaldorn8519 Sure they will be, you utter spaz.

[@AllThingsCubey]

@@rogaldorn8519 The overlord is about as tall as a Warhound Titan. The butcher and archer are Knight sized

[@joshuacouture479]

@@rogaldorn8519but also spindly, so hopefully the price wouldn’t be that high if they made them but it’s GW so it will be absurdly high

[@TheOuterCircle]

Too many micro-details such as how parts are joined to one another and seams that suggest they are full-size, but I'm not suggesting plastic, I'm suggesting 3d printed miniatures in the eventual full size, not production run 28mm scale.

[@andrewpavone5429]

Will probs go 28mm with the new edition