Introduction
So has the unthinkable happened and Games Workshop has pulled off the launch of 10th Edition without Leviathan selling out to box scalpers in seconds? It looks like the box has now disappeared from most Games Workshop webstores around the world, so let’s talk about the results of Leviathan’s release and how things went over the weekend. Hello and welcome today we are talking about the 10th edition and the countdown to the edition has started now that Leviathan pre-orders are in and the box set will ship on the 24th. The release was widely anticipated, and people were quite pessimistic about whether or not Games Workshop would sell out too quickly for them, understandably so, as it had with Indomits. Was, and has been with many of his recent ones. Releases about Warhammer 40k Leviathan Box or Kill Team boxes.
Apprehension Among Fans
I think a lot of people were pretty scared when they got to the Games Workshop web store on Saturday, and probably weren’t sure if they were going to waste their time standing in line for a few hours. For which they can’t get it anyway. Over the past few weeks I did a poll asking people how quickly they expected the Leviathan Box to sell out, and just to generally comment on how good they thought the release would be. I think people were very disappointed. The majority polled said less than 5 minutes, only a few for less than 2 hours, and most of the rest in one day. Perhaps this shows that quite a few people were perhaps a little less realistic, as Games Workshop said they were going to do an online queuing system for this, which would likely take less than 5 minutes. Is.
Frustrations and Supply Concerns
But still definitely gets the passion that people have for picking up boxes from Games Workshop on recent releases. It’s all very frustrating when you’re a hobbyist and you’re waiting for Games Workshop to release a box set that they’ve been hyping up for ages, only to have it disappear in seconds. Took I’m sure plenty of people who have tried to pick up either Lionel Johnson or that Galo 4 box set will be able to tell you about it. I feel like when any kind of run-of-the-mill box set is released though a little less important than Games Workshop looks, it would be kind of silly if they didn’t supply them properly. . The Indomitus box sold out in about 15 minutes, I believe, and was the largest print run of any Warhammer 40k Leviathan box they’d ever made.
Leviathan Box’s Popularity
It had more miniatures and was a bigger, more impressive box set than the Indomitus box, which a lot of people hyped it up to be. To some extent, provided Games Workshop didn’t get completely ridiculous with the numbers, they basically had a license to print money, and selling very few of them wouldn’t be their main goal. At least in the UK, the big online third-party gaming stores tend to sell out of them pretty quickly, perhaps understandably, since that’s where you can get them for cheaper than anywhere else. Usually somewhere between 20 or 15 percent or something
UK Stores and Supply Issues
Many from the UK seem to sell out either almost instantly or within about an hour. The big discounters obviously tend to go first, and there’s probably a slight bias towards those who are more popular for online web stores as opposed to more in-person shops. Games Workshop often has a love-hate relationship with these guys, certainly having one of the biggest and most popular product lines for miniature wargames, so it’s a big part of their business, but It seems that these stores would like to sell them to have a shorter allocation date.
Distribution Challenges
Say they can order 100 copies of a box and receive only 20. Again from several reports online, it seems that a bunch of these stores had a limit on the number of boxes they could sell late in the day, which was apparently quite annoying for them. Especially for some of those who had a pre-order system in place, this could mean they couldn’t have anything for sale on launch day. I noticed that another very good discount store in the UK called The Outpost reported that they had reduced their copies to about a third of what they wanted. For most people who weren’t on hair trigger alert though, it was the Games Workshop web store that was the primary way to catch it.
Queuing System and Success
They had a queuing system, so you got a spot in line. They seem to randomly sort out where the queue sits when it’s actually 10am or whenever the box set is released local time, and then limit orders that you can buy from there, so you Can’t have just a few scalpers out of hundreds of them. By and large, the general consensus seems to be that the system worked well. Anecdotally, I’ve heard a lot of people who were able to pick up a box that weren’t, and rather than being a story of seconds or hours, most places around the world seem to have Still 12 in stock left. hours later, which is pretty unusual for a Games Workshop release, though the US webstore seems to sell out a little faster than most places, probably somewhere around the 6-hour mark, I’m sorry to say. Not sure at all.
As of Sunday night, at least here in the UK, it seems copies have gone out in most places except Australia and New Zealand. Leviathan seems to have now been sold primarily in the UK, EU and USA. For a two-week pre-order window, it’s still a bit early to be honest, if you just advertised it the way Games Workshop did, you’d probably think you had 14 days to get your order in. , and then you’ll get a copy, rather than having to show up on the same day and make sure you’re somewhat prompt. Still, it’s a lot better than the literal seconds to minutes that some of their recent box sets have gone for, and for a big release like this I think it’s a good step in the right direction.
Production and Positivity
Looks like they made a whole load of copies. I think that’s why I saw a lot more positivity in the comments than negativity. The queue time for the Games Workshop web store was anywhere from 0-90 minutes. Although a few people reported waiting longer than that during busy times. It’s definitely still a pain to wait if you’re not really that free that day and able to sit by the monitor when it’s time, although it seems to have had the desired effect for rationing copies. Is. There have been a few reports of lag and bugs with the queuing system, but nothing completely excessive, it seems like people have been widely copied. Obviously I’m sure there are very few people who would still be willing to take on Leviathan, who either weren’t able to get to a computer on the weekend or weren’t willing to have someone else do it for them.
Store Redirects and Availability
It seems that if you go to the Games Workshop web store, at least in the UK, they’ll try and redirect you to your nearest Warhammer store, where they’ll launch on the 24th. Copies will also be available for . There seems to be a really reliable way to get them, especially if you come early. Again this is another good way to ration things by geography rather than a queuing system on the internet. This has its downsides though, many people are going to be miles away from a Warhammer store, so it won’t be reliable, so it can be annoying if you miss an online order. Otherwise a bunch of third party stores may either have some for sale on launch day or have extra stock if Games Workshop allocates more money to them.
Second Waves and Third-Party Retailers
They often get second waves if there is extra stock that Games Workshop releases. You may be a little more likely to have success with third-party retailers that don’t have a large online web store presence to actually pick things up on launch day. And if things aren’t clear online it might just be worth contacting your local gaming store and seeing if they have copies coming. There’s also the option to resell the box parts to people. You’ll probably be able to get just the Space Marines or just the Tyranids for significantly less than the original box price. For that I’ll probably wait until after the 24th and people have actually gotten their hands on the miniatures. Most casual players who don’t want to make a profit will usually be reselling the miniatures after getting them, while many people who have listed Leviathan Bits online are now high sellers. Maybe they are trying to make a little profit. , so prices are likely to be higher for a while.
Scalping and Market Prices
I was interested to see what it was like to scalp the leviathan in the UK at least. And at this point I’d say things aren’t looking too dire. Those selling them at this point will definitely be looking to make a profit, but even then the margins aren’t huge for scalpers, most of them seem to be around 150 or so. are going to. I guess people probably managed to get them straight off the discounter, and I saw a couple of gaming stores selling them themselves. I guess the fact that it didn’t sell out anywhere near as fast as expected probably means that a lot of people who wanted one at the time got one, so the price could stay down for a while.
Competition and Price Comparison
Plus just with the sheer volume of copies, the market is going to be competitive. While it’s never nice to see, you wouldn’t really expect prices on eBay to be the same as brick-and-mortar stores. I’d say that number represents a success in large part because Leviathan isn’t really working too hard. If you compare that to Lionel Johnson’s prices, his box set costs around £60 and he’s going for around £180 or so. So it was about three times the price. It would have been equivalent to the Leviathan Bucks in the UK at £450. So anyway, let me know your experiences with the Leviathan box set, do you think Games Workshop did a good job, or are they still selling a bit too fast?
Visit Complete and Affective Video Review here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fq1HS7UDWw8&ab_channel=AuspexTactics