This tidbit was priceless. He went to one of the big tournaments and they asked if he could bring his beautifully painted Bretonnian army because they wanted to raffle off a game with Nigel Stillman, who had written the army book so they needed a Bretonnian army. They later came up to him and said they needed him to walk Nigel through the game because apparently he was unfamiliar with how to play the army in an actual game. So my buddy had to stand at his shoulder and tell him 'ok you have 10 attacks and hit on 3s and wound on 2s.' That just tells you all you need to know about GW army design and the disconnect with the actual game. Side story about that army -- after they borrowed it, but before the tourament, they came up to him and told him they'd dropped it -- actually, someone had knocked over the whole table it was on, but not to worry, they'd repair everything. After the tourament, they came up to him and told him there was another problem. He was like "did you drop my army again?" It was actually worse than that. Someone had set it down on a forklift and then someone else had moved the forklift -- army hit the ground and the forklift drove over it.
I don't think Nigel Stillman wrote the armybook rules. Quick google search shows the bret book and wood elves books with his as "written by" but I check the actual book and he's not on there. Perhaps he wrote the stories or novel?
But the story is hilarious about the destruction of the army.
...if it was my army and painted well, not only would I demand replacement but I would demand appropriate level $ of painting compensation.
Had dinner with a guy who used to be the assistant manager at the game shop I worked at -- he went on to be the head of GW sales U.S. back in the day before moving on to another game company. Hadn't seen him in 20 years. Man, he had some great GW stories.
One thing he did confirm was that 40K outsold Fantasy by 3 to 1, even more in the U.S.
It was interesting, how his stories illuminated the disconnect between the players and the company. He was talking about how one of the big wigs was throwing a fit about GW tournaments because the players were "taking the game too seriously" and that it was supposed to be a hobby. My friend also said that when he was talking to another exec when the Vampire bloodlines first came out and he had looked at the book and told the guy, uh, you realize that being able to give them Always Strikes First is a huge deal in the game and the guy was like "Well, you don't think they're going to abuse it and take it all the time, do you?"
One other illuminating thing. One of the big wigs who came over from Mattel toys once told them "If a household doesn't have an income of $70,000, we don't consider them a GW target customer." My friend said, 'You realize that means that none of us that works at GW who plays the game would be considered a customer by that metric?" He also said that bigwig had realized that 20% of the customers were buying 80% of the product and wanted to just cut out the other 80% of the customers so they could streamline what they were producing.
Tons of other stories, but those were the ones that really stood out.
Oh, and I found out he wrote a couple Space Wolf novels. Under a pen name with a writing partner. And he doesn't particularly like writing. Hearing the process of writing a novel for GW was definitely interesting.
lol, as a financial expert and as someone who invests, i see this happen alot in business. Especially once they go public.
The top positions are not earned or based on merit, you literally just need a degree(earned or bought) in business and the rest is up to patronage.
A good businessman will invest the time to know the product he is hired to sell. Most will not.
How does GW keep on going instead of crumbling? Well the bigger the company the longer it takes.
They don't know their business so they just apply generic techniques used in other industries to try and increase profits. Then you hit the golf course and parties.
So in summary the big wigs are so stupid that they don't realize GW/hobby industry is a niche luxury long term industry. Its very similar to the diamond ring industry.
I could go on about economics and industry but i'll stop it short.
There was also a post a while back on the forums about someone who highlighted the differences between north America game design and UK game design.
UK focuses on fun and D&D type story.
USA focuses on competitive side
UK just don't understand that people want competitive play. USA doesn't understand that people want role play. that was the just of it anyway. lol.