Advertising and player strength

[vongarr]

Does reaper do much advertising for Warlord? I haven't seen any. Nor have I seen any reviews on the gaming sites. And even on the reapermini.com site, I had difficulty figuring out what Warlord was. When I did, all I could then see was pictures of the various factions. Nothing close to background info.

 

Is there a reason for this?

 

What is the Warlord player strength like? From the forum, it seems a lot of the players are in Texas. (Which is good, being a displaced Texan) Does it compare to Warmachine in the number of players?

 

I ask these questions because I'd like to know what to expect once I make my triumphant return to America in terms of Warlord players.

 

-Wayne

[Qwyksilver]

Warlord HQ is where you want to go to find out the players in your local area. You will need to register on the site, and from there, you have access to all the Data Cards, there are Errata updates posted, you can see how the world of Taltos is effected by your local battles (every registered player is assigned a territory in Taltos based on their RL location - Forgewalk Marches is New England, battles reported there are reflected in the controlling army on the Balance of Power Map). You can also find local players and send them messages if you want to try and get a game together. There are a number of people that are registered on Warlord HQ that are not regular members here, but enjoy the game. A lot of us that are regulars here use the same Callsign on Warlord HQ. If you;re looking for a place to play, check out the RAGE store locator to find the FLGS in your area. There is usually a good contingent of players at most of those stores. Number of players, and activity level of players varies. We have a fairly good crowd of regular players here in Northern MA/Southern NH. Rochester is another busy area. It varies.

[wildbill]

In my neck of the woods, Warlord spread by word of mouth and by two or three of us diligently playing every single week for like 6-8 weeks before we got a new recruit. No joke! It was very depressing. But now it's all good.

 

As far as reporting battles goes, that also depends on whether or not the players have internet access. I have a couple of players that either have very limited or no access at all. We've played a ton of battles, but can't report any!

 

Wild Bill

[Stubbdog]

The probably reason for so many people showing up from Texas is the fact that Reaper itself is in Texas.

 

Advertising, would be at the local levels with gameshops and Black Lightning members hosting games at shops or conventions and such.

 

I know they do also put stuff in a few different mags.

 

What kind of advertising are talking about that you see other games doing that Reaper is not?

[Shadowhunter]

The probably reason for so many people showing up from Texas is the fact that Reaper itself is in Texas.

 

Advertising, would be at the local levels with gameshops and Black Lightning members hosting games at shops or conventions and such.

 

I know they do also put stuff in a few different mags.

 

What kind of advertising are talking about that you see other games doing that Reaper is not?

 

 

I think the OP means that games like Warmachine get a bigger spotlight for wahtever reason and are more well known than Warlord. I myself didn't know that Warlord was a game and not just a cool line of minis. In another thead I believe called "What got you into Warlord" read how many people didn't know that there was a game attached to the minis and found out by almost accident. No one plays it at a store around here but at houses so I that may be one reason it is not in the spotlight, stores not promoting it as well as Privateer Press and GW products. In my area I'm trying to get the four or five players to play at some stores so that we can spread the word and maybe get some new recruits.

[Qwyksilver]

The reason in that thread for a lot of people getting the miniatures, not knowing that a game was attached was because the line was in existence for quite awhile before the game came out. I know I was buying Warlord branded figures for about a year before the actual rulebook was made available.

[Hyperion]

Upstate NY has a fairly good showing. We've got Froggy and Myself up here pushing it. I've been selling it on college campuses. The Demo team does a lot of work getting the word out with live demo's. I mean how much good does a magazine ad do you when you can't play the game.

 

However, I would highly suggest that some other people start thinking about canvasing the college scene. There are a lot of gamers out there and this is a nice cheap alternative for wargaming as compared to GW. I've gotten 8-10 players into the game down here. (albiet not all of them are active, of that 8-10, I'd consider 6 really active)

[spiritual_exorcist]

I think Brushmaster and I could really get the ball rolling here in Australia if I didn't have to work every bloody weekend, it makes it hard to get out, and demoing games by yourself can be a bit tough. I think the biggest problem here is that were are fighting the high cost of Reaper minis, which are very comparable to the cost of those put out by the more established GW or Warmachine lines. For the game to really take off here I think Reaper would need to find some way to help local gaming stores bring the minis in at a cheaper cost; whether that means stores direct ordering from Reaper rather than from a distributor, or Reaper finding a quality company located within australia to outsource it's casting to. GW is very entrenched here in Australia, and people arn't as open minded when you present an alternative option that costs the same. One of my biggest Warlord seeling points when back in Canada has been it's lower relative cost. Now I think we need to concentrate more on the notion that you can use suitable proxy miniatures to play the game, with the hopes that doing that will spark the game, and in doing so eventually lead to higher miniature sales.

 

Reaper's miniatures are readily available here in Australia at some gaming stores (Tin Soldier in CBD Sydney carries a very large number of them), but high cost of living here, combined with the overeas shipping cost from America to Melbourne (where the distrubutor is) and then again from Melbourne up to Sydney is really crippling local gaming stores ability to sell Warlord minis at a reasonable price. I know I would love to be able to support local stores, but the reality of the situation is I'm living pay check to pay check with a limited gaming budget, and I can't justify spending more moeny than I have to; so mail ordering directly from American companies online is the way I have to go, as I find I can import minis for a substantial savings (at very least 25% if not more, even after taking into account shipping).

[mooseyjoe]

I would agree with the advertising problem. When I walk into any one of several flgs'es I see whole display cases full of GW stuff. there is typically a wall of shelves displaying books, and every other one is GW. Over in another corner there will be shelves covered in confrontation and warmachine minis (for some reason these seem to get diplayed together). These same shelves are covered on top by large box sets with beautiful eyecatching artwork. Once I manage to tear my eyes away from images of giant warjacks and noble spacemarines I find the warlord area. This area has 3 kinds of books. It has a rack of beautiful minis, but they are all still blisterfied and white metalish. They don't catch the eye. There is nothing about this section to draw me over from across the store to check it out. Even the stack of old munchkins games has more attraction potential.

 

warlord can beat out any other game if you can get someone to play it, but it is not doing so well outside of word of mouth advertising. I get a whole magazine in the mail each month dedicated to GW. I see big posters of warmachine in any gaming area. The only warlord media I see is right here on this site, and I wouldn't come here if I didn't already play the game.

 

Love the game, but it could use some more publicity.

[spiritual_exorcist]

Even a couple of different posters, maybe one with the release of each faction book, and one core one, featuring Talin's artwork in large, and small pictures of a 6-10 of Reaper high quality minis, with high quality paint jobs, and a bold decisive blurb about either the game itself or the newly released faction, would make me take a good look at the game.

 

From what we've heard, Warlord sales have exceeded expectation, so perhaps Reaper doesn't feel the need to do this sort of thing, but I think they could take a big chunk of the market if they organised a farily inexpensive advertising campaign, combined with a conserted effort by local Black Lighting on the ground pushing the by demoing it. Perhaps a grand scale Warlord weekend twice a year with some sort of decisive global campaign or battle would help to get the game exposure.

[Spike]

From what I see at our local FLGS, the involvement of the Black LIghtning reps in the area and the wllingness of the game shop owner to work with them and Reaper is the largest factor in how well recognized the game is in a region.

 

For instance, our FLGS here in NW Georgia has come under new management in the past two months. While the prior manager was passively cooperative as far as making the shop a RAGE store and giving Reaper models a fair share of space on the sales floor, the new manager has gone above and beyond to make our game league and other Warlord players feel as though they have a home.

[spiritual_exorcist]

I agree that currently Warlord is taking off in areas where there are small groups of players pushing it. But how does one know advertising would not be an effective device to get people interested if little or none is currently being done?

[MasterPlan]

WarMachine has recently expoloded and was around for several years before really taking off.

 

I see Warlord following that pattern. I Know I see more and more interest at or FLGS.

[spiritual_exorcist]

I have no doubt Warlord will eventually grow to sizable proportions, I'd just rather see it happen quickly as opposed to gradually.

[Brushmaster]

Look , I see Warlord like a snowball . Ok, little at present (compared to others) but it will gradually increase as it becomes known . I've started of a small group in the West of Sydney and it's growing and next year I plan to start demoing at another LGS and do a weekend at the Royal Easter Show in the Hall of Industry ( it'll be huge) . Just give things time , the game's barely available for over a year now (far as I know ) .