Why I'm against objective comp systems

This issue comes up almost as often as the general attack on composition, a lot the subjective composition system (tiering, panels, peer marked) and their inevitable level of inaccuracy versus the known outcome of objective composition systems (rewards/penalties for certain elements or a yes/no exclusion style rule).

I’ve certainly made it known where my preferences lie and that is with the subjective system. This is not because I think this because the subjective system is always perfect it is because I know that the objective system is fundamentally flawed.

The reason that composition is there is because there is a view that the game lacks balance in a tournament setting. The objectives of the composition system are in my view; stop abusive armies attending, and add some measure of balance to the game. The idea of “balanced” or “hard but fair” composition is a concept that is dependent on combinations within the entire army and the gaming environment it is to use the cliché many shades of grey rather than black and white.

On the most part the people that play at tournaments have a level of competitiveness in their nature. Evidence of this is borne out in the fact that we actually care what we score and that we care wether or not we get the right composition. If people truly weren’t competitive then they wouldn’t even look twice at their score.

It is because of these two factors that I believe and objective composition system is not only flawed but counter productive.

An objective system that simply draws a line in the sand views everything in black and white it is utterly incapable of shades of grey, hence it can only ever accurately apply to something that fits into the black or the white category (which you’d want to think subjective composition systems would be able to also judge effectively).

Then layer on top of that the system is based either on the points costs or the classifications (core/special/rare etc) of the models. This in particular I find perplexing given that the system is there because we don’t think these classifications or points costs lead to balanced armies.

This black versus white when combined with competitiveness then inevitably leads to exploitation. Having played under these systems it quickly becomes evident that people begin to push towards the optimal build or the build which some how side steps the restrictions and allows them to field an army which is substantially more competitive than many of your opponents. This will inevitably lead to an arms race as people who showed restraint, and lost, will now emulate this behaviour (game theory anyone?).

What is more concerning is that those that are most likely to have been the culprits which the fielded abusive or unbalanced lists that lead to the creation of composition systems are those that are the and most likely to exploit the new objective system and are probably going to be the most adept at it.

So in introducing this system rather than taking away an advantage and creating a level playing field it actually adds a layer of constraint onto those who did not need a composition system to keep them in check whilst providing an advantage to the players most likely to abuse it.

I believe that the sustained use of an objective composition system in the Australian scene would be a sizable regression to the current soft score influences and drive us towards a more competitive UK model. I believe this because that is where we have come from and I certainly hope that none of these systems get enough traction to send us back there.

Why I don’t think sizable increases in effectiveness are good business?

Why I don’t think sizable increases in effectiveness are good business?

First let me say this is all my views from the sidelines. It has been a while since I read an equity analyst reports on GW as I completely lost faith in Kirby and didn’t trust the LoTR decision so stopped entertaining investing in the company. I have no access to customer demographic data or management accounts that actually give you an idea of what is happening (their full year accounts are Investor Relations spin 101).

From my perspective it seemed like the biggest problem with GW’s recent abysmal performance was the balance in their customer base got significantly distorted. Their growth from the late 80’s was based on the platform supplied by a group of customers who were:

- brand loyal and hence limited threat of substitution
- advocates of the product and hence a free sales force
- relatively price inelastic and hence able to rise prices out of line with inflation

Then as the company sought growth it started to add this core base (strangely enough when Kirby had venture capitalist partners come in) a level of “churn” customer’s who were:
- relatively new games so interested in generic start up sets
- not brand loyal and hence open to substitutes (wether that be other miniatures or other hobbies)
- not the key decision maker for spending and hence more elastic level of demand

As they started to penetrate this significantly larger, but substantially less brand loyal and more price sensitive, segment sales started to grow significantly.

Now this isn’t a bad model. Most businesses run on having a stable core customer base with limited capacity for growth and augment that with a less “sticky” customer base which offers them opportunities to grow revenue.

The challenge however is to find the right balance for your objectives, the more you focus on the churn business the more volatile your cash flows, the more you focus on the brand loyal the lower your growth opportunities.

Now in the Kirby LoTR blunder he significantly increased the number of churn customers and got a short term shot in the arm from growth however this churn increase was always going to be temporary so the strategy should have been focused on growing the core customer base in order to keep the balance between stability and growth. Unfortunately the agreement GW entered into actually did the opposite.

Now with the current power sprint you have a strategy being employed where by the idea is to get army upscalling and generate churn but this time they are trying to get it from their existing customers. Now this is fantastic if you can keep it going however miniatures aren’t exactly fast moving consumer goods like razors or batteries it is difficult to up sell you core customer base continually when you are talking a grand or so every time.

So they are assuming they can ramp up the level of spend from the core customer base, that is a relatively stable purchaser during what the UK chancellor describes as the worst economic conditions for 60 years. To me that seems like an exceptionally risky ploy that could potential damage and erode the one attribute that the past three of four years have shown that you need to foster, brand loyalty.

Of course it is always possible (perhaps probable) that in the same vein as the child like FAQs and rules sets that another strategy was intended but was simply executed poorly.

It will be interesting to see what happens in the coming years as much of this design strategy is likely to be from the Kirby School of Business (from the course of how to fail in a discretionary consumer spending sector during an unprecedented economic golden age). I look forward to seeing what Wells does in the CEO seat once he moves pas the restructuring focus.