While the GW delays are a bit of a bummer, it may be a blessing in disguise for local game stores and hobbyists alike- here’s why.
GW has made an about-face on their November 3rd. announcement. Where originally they said it was full steam ahead for the release schedule, now they have announced their 6-month revenue earnings estimates, they are admiting that COVID is actually affecting them (more on that later). If you want to see the full post about the delay, you can check it out here. This is going to be more about how we think it will impact the hobby, in a good way!
Honestly, this could be very good news for all Local Game Stores (LGS) in particular. Why? Well, hopefully, this means that allocations will become far less restricted, and game stores will be able to bring in Warhammer releases in bigger (though less frequent) intervals to general revenue.
Plus for the hobbyists that maybe could only get out to the store once every few weeks anyway, release date delays may not even matter. Hopefully, we will all be able to get the new releases in a timely manner from the venue(s) of our choosing from game stores to web stores!
GW Delays May Be A Blessing in Disguise
For those who haven’t seen the announcement, here’s a quick overview. First off, there will continue to be light releases into January and February especially due to the current situation of the world, just like the allocation of products to stores recently. Second, and more importantly, new releases will be every two weeks, which means that things will roll out slower.
Most notable for 40k hobbyists is that Codexes (whether supplements or expansions) will go to once a month- for now.
That seems to indicate the Imperial & Xenos/Chaos pairing of Codexes each month will no longer happen and a singular new faction will be released each month. While this may mean you have to wait a little longer for everything to hit shelves, once it does, we’re hoping there will be more stock available for both players and game stores to help sustain them.
I think we can all agree, the state of the hobby would change dramatically if a majority game stores were to close.
Helping Local Game Stores
Recently we did a breakdown of how much game stores were making per release with the previous allocations, and it wasn’t much. For the Morathi release, stores were only making around $600. While that doesn’t sound too horrible, it is basically nothing. If a store has built a good Warhammer community, they rely on those releases.
At that rate, stores couldn’t even cover the rent on just their gaming table space on new releases for the whole month. Guess what kind of product sells the best? New releases obviously- big oof.
With the releases going down to once every other week, and one new faction a month, we would like to assume stores will be getting way more product, and not getting choke-slammed by delays AND allocations. While we don’t know what the new numbers will be, we can only imagine that some, is well, better than just one.
Sure not getting things as often sucks, but game stores actually getting the product we want is amazing. Overall we may need Local Game Stores to survive these challenging times to keep the hobby at the state it is or growing. So any time they get the support they need from their sales partner, Games Workshop, is a win for the hobby in our opinion.
Supply = Demand?
We as players may also benefit from GW pumping the breaks on releases. If your particular faction has had a book announced, we’re looking at you Dark Angels and Dark Eldar players, this means you may have to wait another month or so. However, when they actually do come out, getting all of the new releases like the book, minatures, combat patrols, and free mini promotions, should get way easier.
This should mean fewer scalpers and more supply. You won’t have to sit on the GW page refreshing your cart just hoping you actually can grab one. While waiting sucks, if the release is better, it will just be an overall better experience. But that does leave one question, how will the release schedule be affected- overall?
Free Miniature Promo & Releases Moving Forward
So we know that most likely, January will see the launch of Death Guard and that it will be a singular release. So that means either Dark Angles or Dark Eldar will be pushed all the way back to March. That part of it does kind of suck, but it will hopefully be outweighed by the other factors. We don’t know the order quite yet of which faction will fall to which month, but some players will be happy, the other snot so much…
Age of Sigmar fans will now see a huge release in February, as the Christmas day preview will be focusing on that it seems. It looks like they originally wanted to drop some of those in their normal January AOS faction slot, but one month isn’t too long to wait.
The last thing to ponder on is the coins and free mini promotion at GW’s own stores. With the Death Guard one still going out in December, will January have one?
Will they just re-release the Death Guard stuff, or hold it over till January- who knows? But we assume once we get into the swing of the new schedule, whichever faction is the biggest release, will get the free mini promo treatment. Or perhaps it will tick back to an AoS promo..
Only time will tell…
Do you think stores being able to keep their shelves stocked with new releases help? Do you think it was the right move to slow down a little and come out with better releases?
Let us know in the comments of our Facebook Hobby Group, and make sure you enter the latest monthly giveaway for FREE today! You can also support us on Patreon and get ad-free access to the site, plus a ton of minis that helps support some of the best creators out there!
About the Author: Rob Baer
Rob Baer
Job Title: Founder, Publisher, & Managing Editor
Founded Spikey Bits in 2009
Socials: Rob Baer on Facebook and @catdaddymbg on X
Bio: Virginia restless, miniature painter & cat dad. He blames LEGOs for all this, as there was something about those little-colored blocks that started it all. Spikey Bits sprung from Rob staying motivated to hobby on his backlog of projects, while sharing his knowledge with others during the early blogging era.
LEGO maniac and scale model hobbyist in the 80s turned miniature wargamer and trading card player ever since. He’s played every edition of Warhammer 40k and Warhammer Fantasy (since 5th Edition), but Titans of all sizes will always be his favorite! It’s even rumored that his hobby vault rivals the Solemnance Galleries, containing rulebooks filled with lore from editions long past, ancient packs of black-bordered Magic Cards, and minatures made of pewter and resin.
