Necromunda, Adeptus Titanicus, Blood Bowl, Warhammer Underworlds, Lord of the Rings, to a lesser extent the Horus Heresy which I suspect though was more of a revenue stream than WHFB had been for some time. Then there are the one-off games like Warhammer Quest and entry level games. Very unscientific here, but I guess I listen to around 10 GW related podcasts on a semi-regular basis and the one thing most people saying that the release rate has become staggering – and I’d agree – and you have to be much more discerning. Its not only about the money, there isn’t enough time to remotely dabble in all systems.

Lets be honest, GW is pretty mercenary when it comes to dishing out its IP for licences and will puts its name on some really suspect stuff. So you are right there are people doing the numbers and maximising the IP for what in some cases must be pretty limited profits. RPGs and electronic games are part of this because GW can’t or doesn’t want to do this in house.

The one area where GW is very protective is games with models because that is the core business. GW and FFG parted ways as they slowly had overlapping interests. GW prides itself with being the leader in miniatures production and I don’t think would be keen on licensing out an IP for another party to produce, from its perspective, second rate miniatures. In addition GW sells a complete hobby system miniatures, scenery, paints etc…- to the point that even in articles on scenery building it doesn’t mention generic building materials everyone has at home. Breaking up that chain for limited gains is what I meant with not being in GWs interest.

GW probably has the best market research and business understanding in this field so I suspect if in years to come they felt money could be made with a limited re-release of a classic game they would do it. If another manufacturer was making serious headway with a massed battle game to the detriment of GW’s interest they could well do this to undermine the competition (unlikely but possible).

If I had to guess where GW might put more energy in the future it would be CCGs after what seems to be the success of AoS Champions. Three big license games came out this year – AoS Champions, Dice Masters 40k thing and Heroes of Black Reach game – Champions seems to have the most buzz.

I’d have really liked to have played WHFB, in fact I bought the starter after AoS came out…