With the constant price hikes and frenetic release schedule bloat, this may be a great way to play your favorite Warhammer games now.
As something to think about, GW’s prices might have inadvertently spurred people to jump into their smaller skirmish games. But now even the skirmish Warhammer games are getting rules bloat, meaning more money, minis, and confusion.
While getting new rules can be fun, even the skirmish games like Necromunda are getting new books every quarter. That begs the question, why not just play the version you like? If you have a group of hobbyists who love an edition, there’s no need to keep up with all the new stuff!
One Great Way To Play All Your Favorite Warhammer Games
If you don’t want to keep paying more, the first version of many skirmish games are some of the most fun. But if you want new minis and rules, by all means, keep moving forward! This is more of an idea for people who are getting tired of the constant releases and new rules every quarter for a simple skirmish game.
Let’s be real for a sec, GW has always been expensive. But even since the start of 8th edition 40k (9th is looking no different), we’ve seen two things happen. Prices have shot up and there are more fun units than ever. Meanwhile, there has been a steady increase in supplements we need for games (which GW also said would not happen).
With both of these things becoming more and more commonplace, it seems like it pushed a huge community of hobbyists into their skirmish games. Let’s take a look at the symptoms:
GW Prices Keep Going Up & Rules Keep Coming
Back in 2019, GW announced their first big price increase (which we’ve also seen hit Forge World now- twice since 2017). That price increase made kits across the board rise as far as 20% of what they originally cost. And there wasn’t any change made on GW’s part. There was no revamping of the box or anything. Simply, overnight, prices shot up on the exact same product. We’ve since seen the prices continue to rise throughout 2020
On the other side of things, they have recently reset the points with 9th, but if it’s anything like 8th, the points will slowly go down. That means you have to buy more minis. And with new campaign books already announced, the rules bloat is going nowhere. How much fun was it to go to a tournament with 5 books, sooo much fun…
Basically, with more rules and campaigns hitting, you have to buy more stuff all the time and try to keep up with the meta.
You used to be able to get a fairly decent army for about $300 only a few years back. Now, it’s not uncommon for any faction to spend nearly $1,000 to even play a 2,000 pt game. You might be saying “you have to shop smart“…But if you go on websites like eBay, you’ll also notice that most armies have completely dried up.
In fact, the majority of what you’ll find is commission services for armies and units that are even more expensive than buying an entire army NIB. What does all this mean? Basically, more people are moving to skirmish style games, where they only have to spend a couple hundred to get everything they need.
Has This Pushed the Community Into Skirmish Games?
With prices only going up and games becoming more packed with units, this could have in essence, pushed people out of the hobby. What we mean by that is that some of the community might have “backed down” from the 40k/AoS high-speed trend of monthly supplements and rules changes, and have gone for the more cheap alternative. Skirmish games.
If you haven’t paid much attention to GW’s specialist games, they probably have at least one game for any type of player. There are some outstanding games that don’t get as much coverage such as:
- Warhammer Underworlds
- Warcry
- Necromunda
- Kill Team
- Blood Bowl
- Adeptus Titanicus
All of these games, barring Adeptus Titanicus, are incredibly inexpensive to play and can even use models from your current AoS/40k collection. However, if you were to jump straight into the game without any models, dice, or rules, you could get everything you needed for about $100. And that’s not bad considering that they’ll last you nearly forever and most console games on things like PC/Xbox/PS4 cost roughly $60-$80. But now, they are getting releases almost on par with 40k and AoS. So what’s the remedy?
Enter Now: Win a $200 Pop Goes the Monkey Gift Card
Playing Your Favorite Version of the Game
If you love the first version of the new Necromunda, why not just play that? If you and a few friends have everything they need and all love that version. There is no need to keep up with the ever-expanding rules and campaigns. We saw the roadmap for Necromunda and in just this year alone they are getting four new books.
While that’s not crazy, it’s just a lot to keep up with when you’re playing a narrative style skirmish game for fun. With less of a competitive aspect, why not just play what’s the most fun? If you have a group of people who love a version of the game, just keep playing it! Also, this means you can spend more time modeling and painting your minis instead of constantly chasing the new stuff and throwing the hobby aspect aside.
Blood Bowl already has a new edition, meaning more money on minis and rules. But if the old edition was your jam, just keep playing it. We’re sure you can find people willing to play a fun game and realize it is just for that… fun.
Have you moved more into the skirmish style games? Are you tired of constantly keeping up with all the new rules?
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About the Author: Travis Pasch
Travis Pasch
Job Title: Head Writer & Editor
Socials: @paschbass
About Travis Pasch: Travis has been a Warhammer 40k hobbyist since the 1990s, playing the game since Third Edition. Through extensive traveling, he’s seen a lot of the miniatures hobby from across the world, giving him a unique perspective on the latest gaming topics and trends.
Travis’s brother even owns a commission painting studio, where he’s picked up a lot of good advice and techniques for painting Warhammer and tabletop miniatures over the years, as well. Travis joined the Spikey Bits team in 2019 and has been the lead writer since 2020.
Currently, he’s working on converting all his 40k Adeptus Mechanicus models and becoming a true tech enjoyer, complete with both sad and happy robot noises!
