46907
Post by: EldarN00b
GW's price rises on already overpriced products, their perpetual denial of what customers know about things and so on. I have noticed a large number of people whom I know progressively move away from GW by buying from discount online stores offshore, or even moving to a different game system entirely (Infinity is becoming popular within local gaming circles were I am) and so the point is this: is GW pissing customers off so much that they will eventually die out because we refuse to do business with them?
I know that this is a worst case scenario thing but in considering their business model, they are driving customers away. I'd like to see what people think and if there are any corporate analysts who frequent this forum please comment.
27987
Post by: Surtur
Pretty much. They've been losing revenue. Investors are in it for the dividends.
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Post by: SilverMK2
They constantly get fewer physical sales year after year and cover it with increased prices. Pretty soon they will hit the tipping point where raised prices will not cover falling sales.
To be honest that time can't come soon enough.
27987
Post by: Surtur
It already isn't.
Revenue:
2008: 110.3m
2009: 125.7m
2010: 126.5m
2011: 123.1m
Revenue at constant (refers to the previous year's dollar value) (the number in () is the change in real revenue from the previous year)
2008: 110.3m
2009: 113.9m (+3.6m)
2010: 121.8m (-3.9m)
2011: 122.8m (-3.7m)
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Post by: Phototoxin
I get more value from RPGs and other minis. I don't think I play or enjoy my 40k stuff enough to warrant the stupidly overpriced costs.
Long term they will crash and burn as with shareholders it's the short term cash flow that's important to them.
If I were an eccentric millionaire I'd buy GW and then run it to break even or there abouts.
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Post by: Pacific
Someone was saying on another forum about trying to persuade Robin Williams (who apparently plays the game) to throw a few mil in, and buy a majority share of the company, then fire the entire upper management.  (Personally I would add to that list anyone who uses the term 'hobby love' ..)
I view miniatures and their various forms as a type of art, and surely worthy of a wealthy philanthropists attentions! 
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Post by: Mad4Minis
They wont go out of business. They are reaching the point where the "sell less at a higher price" business model will fail. That, combined with the flood of other good games at cheaper prices will force them to go to the "sell more volume for lower price" model in order to build thier sales volume and regain customer base.
Funny thing is the joke will still be on the customer. GW will bank huge cash on things like $74 LR (for example) for a year or so. Then they will make a huge deal about reducing the price back to $66. A sales pitch like "GW, the best hobby value on the market, pay 2012 prices for 2014 products". Then people will be all "ZOMG GW price reduction!!! Im back in!"
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Post by: WarOne
There will be a point where GW will have to redress a threat to their business. Such as it is, they still believe the economy is bad and that they are doing good despite poor economic conditions.
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Post by: culsandar
Mad4Minis wrote:Funny thing is the joke will still be on the customer. GW will bank huge cash on things like $74 LR (for example) for a year or so. Then they will make a huge deal about reducing the price back to $66. A sales pitch like "GW, the best hobby value on the market, pay 2012 prices for 2014 products". Then people will be all "ZOMG GW price reduction!!! Im back in!"
The same thing oil companies due to gas prices! "Hey look, gas has dropped 20 cent!" "That's still a dollar more than last year!"
12260
Post by: Davylove21
It seems to me that they have the readies in the bank to take risks like making SM battleforces £80 RRP. If it works, hooker and meth party at Kirby's place. If it doesn't, they can probably swallow the hit and put the prices back.
Not that I know anything about business beyond watching The Apprentice, but that doesn't stop Kirby et al
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Post by: Barksdale
I'm going to play devil's advocate here. Yes, prices are rising. However, there are two things that you people are not considering.
First, price increases occur in every product you buy. Sometimes you may not even notice it. What alot of companies do is to decrease the quantitiy of what you get, but keep the price the same, which is in effect a price increase. I'll give the example of cereal products here.
Second, increases in quality of the plastic kits (I will admit finecast is definately a step back). The plastic kits these days are highly customizable, and include a ton of bitz for other projects. The kits can swapped around cross range and inter-range with the fantasy line to create even more options.
I just don't understand this pre-occupation with GW prices. The product is a luxery one, and people always want more than they can have or more than they can afford. How is this GW's fault? The answer is simple: it is not. I wil also note here that GW has one of the best customer service departments in ANY business, often replacing more than the original defective product.
One more thing to address the OP: No GW is not committing slow corporate suicide. It will always have rational customers, such as myself, who knows what they can afford, and makes purchases to suit their tastes as well as their budget. . I made this argument several months ago in another thread but I'll repost it. I mean, you can get an awesome and large competitive army by spending $100/month for one year. I just don't see how people view this as expensive. There just isn't another hobby that gives you years of enjoyment of a relatively little price.
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Post by: Kiwidru
They've already blown thier video game rep (which is one of the most social networks in terms of opinion trending) by having Warhammer Online, Dawn of War 2, and now Space Marine all fail using the same tabletop marketing strategy: How to act like a monopoly while losing the controlling share of the population.
I mean a gaming company that makes an archaic RTS analog should be doing whatever it can to increase popularity, yet they cut all sponsored funding for events (Being 'Established' already was the only thing keeping GW afloat in terms of intrest), which to me is like saying, "Our company is becoming increasingly obscure, our products have dropped in quality, our prices have increased 15% per year despite this, all forays into other media have failed due to a lack of corporate response to the community (which is a telescoping timeline that would have been reached already in tabletop if GW proper had to answer to compaints on a forum), and now we arnt going to offer ANY incentive to play our game over Warma-Hordes, or Dust Warfare, or Starcraft, or D3...
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Post by: Byte
Their biggest problem IMO is the troubled advertising strategy. Its ridiculous and doesn't sit well with budget minded consumers.
Otherwise, GW isn't going anywhere unless they get sick of hearing the vocal minority and sell out.
27987
Post by: Surtur
Kiwidru wrote:They've already blown thier video game rep (which is one of the most social networks in terms of opinion trending) by having Warhammer Online, Dawn of War 2, and now Space Marine all fail using the same tabletop marketing strategy: How to act like a monopoly while losing the controlling share of the population.
DoW2 and Space Marine were both successes. Space Marine actually performed better than THQ anticipated in face of their other games that crippled them. It's why Dark Millennium was transformed and not tossed all together.
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Post by: Adam LongWalker
Surtur wrote:Kiwidru wrote:They've already blown thier video game rep (which is one of the most social networks in terms of opinion trending) by having Warhammer Online, Dawn of War 2, and now Space Marine all fail using the same tabletop marketing strategy: How to act like a monopoly while losing the controlling share of the population.
DoW2 and Space Marine were both successes. Space Marine actually performed better than THQ anticipated in face of their other games that crippled them. It's why Dark Millennium was transformed and not tossed all together.
Space Marine did indeed did a fair amount of success. Over 1 million sold world wide at the end of 2011.
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Post by: Brother SRM
Mad4Minis wrote:They wont go out of business. They are reaching the point where the "sell less at a higher price" business model will fail. That, combined with the flood of other good games at cheaper prices will force them to go to the "sell more volume for lower price" model in order to build thier sales volume and regain customer base.
Funny thing is the joke will still be on the customer. GW will bank huge cash on things like $74 LR (for example) for a year or so. Then they will make a huge deal about reducing the price back to $66. A sales pitch like "GW, the best hobby value on the market, pay 2012 prices for 2014 products". Then people will be all "ZOMG GW price reduction!!! Im back in!"
I feel that if this were to occur, it would happen in the next year or two. The price points are reaching to some crazy heights and while people say this every year, the market won't be able to bear it if it goes much further. We're closing in on the point where a single (non-superheavy) vehicle costs $100 USD with the Stormraven, and if things get to that point GW will have to shake up its pricing and marketing to make money again. Even if the joke's on us, a price drop would make a lot of people happy. While I can stomach the prices, I know I'd be a bit more impulsive if kits were cheaper.
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Post by: Kroothawk
GW already has reached the limit where price hikes don't lead to higher revenue but are completely eaten up by lower sales and lost customers. It is only a matter of time when revenue falls down sharply. Only the total retirement of Tom Kirby and a total exchange of management can save GW.
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Post by: redkeyboard
I think that they obviously realise that they are losing customers but are ignorant to why. They seem to just think they are loosing custmers because people are stopping wargaming not moving to another gaming system or buying second hand.
To cover this they increase prices every year. When the real reason they are losing customers is because of the raising prices. So they are ignorant to the fact that if they lowered the prices of models they would have more people buying from them as the game would be more affordable. I am expecting GW to last maybe another 10 to 15 years (if they get their act togeather 2-5 years if they don't)before other games take over. I can see PP taking over the market.
I can also see Rules of engagement, Infinity the new Dropzone Commander and Miniwargamings Dark Potential all becoming decent games and entering the market at the right time.
Some games entered at the wrong time when people still could afford GW products. PP entered at a good point and. dropzone Commander and dark Potential are entetring at incerdibly good times as people are looking for cheaper gaming alternatves to GW. Miniwargaming have a substantial fanbase and have managed to acheive alot in a short time perioid. Thei large fanbase will get alot of people into their game and they will not be working from the ground up.
They had hundreds of contributors in their fundraiser and I imagine many of these will be starting Dark Potential. And probably some that did not contribute.
So in short I feel like GW have dug a pit and it is slowly filling with water without them realising due to the arrogance and ignorance.
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Post by: Kingsley
The Hobbit and 40k 6th edition are right around the corner. Unless GW screws up massively, I think they're actually poised to surge dramatically ahead. Does anyone else remember how GW did back when the Lord of the Rings movies were coming out? Right now, GW's debatably in a bit of a holding pattern, but they can afford to bide their time and wait until these big new games bolster their playerbase dramatically.
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Post by: Ravenous D
So anyone want to explain how GW isnt an evil corporation?
And why are we taking this quietly? It just adds to the belief that we all suffer from battered housewife syndrome.
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Post by: Brother SRM
Ravenous D wrote:So anyone want to explain how GW isnt an evil corporation?
And why are we taking this quietly? It just adds to the belief that we all suffer from battered housewife syndrome.
I'm pretty sure everybody knows GW is an evil corporation, as if there were any other kind. There's a divide between the creative types we know and love and the business and legal side of things though, so we buy cool stuff from the former regardless of the actions of the latter. The reason folks are taking it quietly is because we're too busy bitching about it on forums to actually do anything, like sending them letters (which may not be effective, but is at least more effective than worthless online petitions) or voting with our wallets and not buying new stuff. However, I feel that even if more GW customers did abstain from buying new stuff this year, The Hobbit and 40k 6th edition will make up for any potential losses. Those are going to be big, big deals.
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Post by: Mad4Minis
Brother SRM wrote:Mad4Minis wrote:They wont go out of business. They are reaching the point where the "sell less at a higher price" business model will fail. That, combined with the flood of other good games at cheaper prices will force them to go to the "sell more volume for lower price" model in order to build thier sales volume and regain customer base.
Funny thing is the joke will still be on the customer. GW will bank huge cash on things like $74 LR (for example) for a year or so. Then they will make a huge deal about reducing the price back to $66. A sales pitch like "GW, the best hobby value on the market, pay 2012 prices for 2014 products". Then people will be all "ZOMG GW price reduction!!! Im back in!"
I feel that if this were to occur, it would happen in the next year or two. The price points are reaching to some crazy heights and while people say this every year, the market won't be able to bear it if it goes much further. We're closing in on the point where a single (non-superheavy) vehicle costs $100 USD with the Stormraven, and if things get to that point GW will have to shake up its pricing and marketing to make money again. Even if the joke's on us, a price drop would make a lot of people happy. While I can stomach the prices, I know I'd be a bit more impulsive if kits were cheaper.
Ill agree. Like someone pointed out in a post below yours, they will ride a nice wave with 6th ed and The Hobbit, but Id say 2-3 years of the current policies will bring them to the point of having to change. Now there are many ways they could do it, and Id say an across the board reduction would be unlikely. Perhaps a reduction of core units to attract new players into the game. Then maybe a rotation of temporary reductions of the bigger stuff like super-heavies and such.
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Post by: Chaos Legionnaire
Ironically, the price hikes have a temporary effect of boosting sales. I have been in this hobby for many years now, and every time there has been a price hike, there has been a mad rush to buy GW products before the prices increase. 
Obviously, I am not a fan of this tactic, but it always seems to be the case.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Pacific wrote:Someone was saying on another forum about trying to persuade Robin Williams (who apparently plays the game) to throw a few mil in, and buy a majority share of the company, then fire the entire upper management. (Personally I would add to that list anyone who uses the term 'hobby love' ..)
There would have to actually be enough shares available to purchase to become majority shareholder and by all accounts there aren't.
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Post by: Motograter
Why do people insist on mentioning the hobbit? It is not LOTR and it will not bring in a load of money for GW. It will bring some but it wont save them like LOTR did.
As for 6th no one knows anything about it and some don`t even care after the price rise hits will there really be any interest in GW anymore unless your a die hard.
Currently Privateer Press, Mantic, Infinity all wipe the floor with GW no maybe not in sales but in terms of the games and in some though not all the models are superior yet GW charge a "premium" as the models they produce are cast in gold apparently.
GW unless they change and chage sharp could really find themselves behind and very soon
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Post by: Milisim
Well truth be told I will order a LLizardmen Battalion before prices goes up. After that I will be slowly adding to them, while I focus on FoW and Infinity.
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Post by: Davylove21
Motograter wrote:Why do people insist on mentioning the hobbit? It is not LOTR and it will not bring in a load of money for GW. It will bring some but it wont save them like LOTR did.
As for 6th no one knows anything about it and some don`t even care after the price rise hits will there really be any interest in GW anymore unless your a die hard.
Currently Privateer Press, Mantic, Infinity all wipe the floor with GW no maybe not in sales but in terms of the games and in some though not all the models are superior yet GW charge a "premium" as the models they produce are cast in gold apparently.
GW unless they change and chage sharp could really find themselves behind and very soon
Popular films make money for a lot of people. Video games of big films are rarely good ( LotR had a couple of great ones though) but they still get made, kids see The Avengers, kids want The Avengers. The Hobbit WILL make good money for GW, who will probably issue an expansion to the rules for LotR or are just anticipating a boost in LotR popularity, which means their only cost would have been to renew the license with New Line (plus they already have actor-approved (image rights) sculpts of Gandalf and anyone else that crosses over with LotR so New Line wouldn't have wanted megabucks to renew when they can just make easy money)
Also, the game itself IS fun to play, the miniatures are excellent and the fanbase is as loyal as it should be for a game system they've seen grow side by side with themselves. The other games you mention are doubtlessly good - a healthy amount of people pay for them - but it would be very hasty to suggest PP or Infinity are about to leave GW in their wake in terms of competition. For too many reasons to go into.
Anyway, it's not about competition. I wish PP all the best, I love their minis but I can't be bothered to learn the rules. The reason I want them to do really well though is simple - The WWF was at its best whilst WCW were doing everything possible to destroy it. I see GW going the way of 'WWE' and becoming PG-13 rubbish that for some reason I still can't stop paying for.
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Post by: Platuan4th
When was WCW trying to destroy the World Wildlife Foundation? 
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Post by: DemetriDominov
At least the books don't seem to be getting any more expensive. Can't put a price on imagination.
Btw, what about Forge World? Are they independent from GW or just a branch of it? If so, I know their models tend to be more expensive, but I haven't seen a raise in prices in their models for years...
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Post by: Trasvi
Barksdale wrote: I mean, you can get an awesome and large competitive army by spending $100/month for one year. I just don't see how people view this as expensive. There just isn't another hobby that gives you years of enjoyment of a relatively little price.
Because I can get an awesome and large competitive army for Warmachine by spending $30/month for one year. Not the HHHobby, but the same hobby.
However, GW would have to be incredibly stupid to 'die' from this.
They make a lot of money. They are still making fairly significant profits. Less significant than before, but still a profit. They have no substantial debt, and no serious competitors on their scale: many of the other wargames companies at the moment do not have the production capacity to keep up with demand. Their business is leaner and more efficient than it was before. They have a loyal fanbase, a valuable IP portfolio. It could be another 5 years at current rates before they are in the red, another 3 before it becomes dire, and then they have multitudes of ways of getting out of there. They're not going to go belly up any time soon.
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Post by: SilverMK2
Many people probably would not know there was a tabletop game version of the Hobbit, since GW don't bother advertising to anyone who is not already buying their stuff... and given that no one seemed to play LOTR even a couple of years after it was released, I can't see anyone other than the very keen buying any of the Hobbit stuff.
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Post by: -Loki-
DemetriDominov wrote:Btw, what about Forge World? Are they independent from GW or just a branch of it? If so, I know their models tend to be more expensive, but I haven't seen a raise in prices in their models for years...
Forgeworld are a wholly owned subsidiary. They even have their offices in the same building as GW and use the same factory for manufacturing.
However, GW don't touch their marketing or pricing structure. FW haven't done a price rise because FW don't do price rises, outside of standard increases to cover VAT.
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Post by: Bobthehero
DemetriDominov wrote:At least the books don't seem to be getting any more expensive. Can't put a price on imagination.
Btw, what about Forge World? Are they independent from GW or just a branch of it? If so, I know their models tend to be more expensive, but I haven't seen a raise in prices in their models for years...
Asked on Facebook, they're reviewing their prices, like any years, people seem to think there's going to be a raise, I really hope not.
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Post by: Pacific
Aren't Forge World actually cheaper now in a number of cases? Someone pointed out the new SM MkIV Apothecary set, where you get 2 for £20, as opposed to the single (now quite dated) official GW SM Apothecary for £13.
I know for the countries which are 'ahead of the curve' in pricing (Australia) even common options, such as Land Raiders, are cheaper to export from ForgeWorld UK and have sent around the world!
As a part of GW, it wouldn't surprise me at all if FW were forced to raise their prices by the sales department, just to keep the differential in price between them and the official products. It's utterly mental that the official prices of GW are now approaching those of FW, especially considering that when the latter appeared all those years ago pretty much everyone used to joke about how mind-bendingly expensive they were despite there being some great models!
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Post by: Bobthehero
Pacific wrote:Aren't Forge World actually cheaper now in a number of cases? Someone pointed out the new SM MkIV Apothecary set, where you get 2 for £20, as opposed to the single (now quite dated) official GW SM Apothecary for £13.
As you said that depends on the products, there isn't a single Krieg product cheaper than its GW equivalent, at least in Canadian dollars.
-Loki- wrote:[However, GW don't touch their marketing or pricing structure. FW haven't done a price rise because FW don't do price rises, outside of standard increases to cover VAT.
Well that is excellent.
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Post by: Kingsley
Motograter wrote:Why do people insist on mentioning the hobbit? It is not LOTR and it will not bring in a load of money for GW. It will bring some but it wont save them like LOTR did.
Since the Hobbit looks to essentially be another two Lord of the Rings movies, I wouldn't be so sure.
Motograter wrote:As for 6th no one knows anything about it and some don`t even care after the price rise hits will there really be any interest in GW anymore unless your a die hard.
GW raises prices every year and they've been doing fine thus far. This price rise, like the rest, will not kill GW.
Motograter wrote:Currently Privateer Press, Mantic, Infinity all wipe the floor with GW no maybe not in sales but in terms of the games and in some though not all the models are superior yet GW charge a "premium" as the models they produce are cast in gold apparently.
I think rules are a matter of preference. Generally, I very much like GW's 5th edition Warhammer 40k ruleset-- I think it's generally balanced, and while some elements are showing their age a little, the rapid growth in independent tournaments and events is a good sign that 5th edition has struck a chord with the community. Mantic's rules do nothing at all for me. There's a certain point where simplification goes too far, and Mantic IMO long since passed it. I don't have much experience with Infinity, though I'd like to-- it looks really cool. Lastly, while Privateer has certainly produced a "tight" ruleset, the general attitude of the rules doesn't match my tastes and the combo-centric gameplay really isn't for me.
As for prices, I'm not sure I see what you're seeing. GW games generally have larger numbers of models on the field, so it may cost more to assemble a force, but Warmachine and Infinity models are more expensive per-model compared to GW, and much less customizable to boot. Mantic models are cheaper but really suffer quality-wise, though they are improving on that front. Defiance Games has really cool, customizable, and inexpensive models, but they don't have a real ruleset at this time.
Overall, GW certainly has many competitors, but GW is also the elephant in the room for a reason. I don't anticipate them being cast down anytime soon.
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Post by: scarletsquig
If people are crazy enough to buy £25.50 Empire Greatswords (and they are), then GW has absolutely nothing to worry about.
I'm about as big a fan of Mantic as you can get, but this idea that GW is going to collapse or is doomed to fail is completely wrong... wealthy parents looking to buy the new "space mans mega-tank" for little Timmy so he'll stop whining for a few weeks are not going to care if it's $41 or $56.
The veterans market is worthless to GW, they are older players who have already spent thousands with GW, already have armies and don't spend as much as newcomers while also being more cynical and vocally critical about the company, and are harder to fool into paying high prices. If we leave, they don't really care, and their bottom line has never been dependant on us as a demographic, so it's really not going to hurt much to continue with their current strategy.
GW are excellent for recruiting new people into the broader wargaming hobby, something which their retail stores do an excellent job of.
They're not stupid, or incompetent, they are highly efficient at producing a high dividend yield for their shareholders, which is the primary concern of every publically-floated company on the planet.
I think a lot of people project their own personal irritation on to the company quite often, trying to justify their anger by saying how it's all going to end in tears and the company will go bankrupt, when the odds of that happening are very slim indeed.
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Post by: -Loki-
Pacific wrote:Aren't Forge World actually cheaper now in a number of cases? Someone pointed out the new SM MkIV Apothecary set, where you get 2 for £20, as opposed to the single (now quite dated) official GW SM Apothecary for £13.
I know for the countries which are 'ahead of the curve' in pricing (Australia) even common options, such as Land Raiders, are cheaper to export from ForgeWorld UK and have sent around the world!
Yup. A good example is a Stone Crusher complete kit with 2 pairs of wrecker claws, which contains the complete Carnifex kit and the stone crusher options, which is cheaper for Australians than a Carnifex from a GW store by $13au. So that's a full Carnifex $13au cheaper than GW sells them, with an additional $45au worth of resin parts for free.
Then look at, say the Deimos pattern Predator Executioner (I'm using it as an example because I adore it). It's $8 cheaper than the GW Predator. The Mark IIB Land Raider is almost $10au cheaper than buying a Land Raider from GW, comes with a complete Land Raider kit, plus the IIB conversion kit.
Somethings definitely wrong with GW's official pricing, at least over here.
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Post by: SilverMK2
Fetterkey wrote:As for prices, I'm not sure I see what you're seeing. GW games generally have larger numbers of models on the field, so it may cost more to assemble a force, but Warmachine and Infinity models are more expensive per-model compared to GW, and much less customizable to boot.
I don't mind paying £6-7 for the average Infinity model when I only need 9 or 10 of them on the field to play a 300 point (one of the largest points levels commonly used) game... nor do I mind paying that price for models which, quite frankly, blow GW's models out of the water in terms of sculpt quality
They may not be as customisable as GW's models tend to be, but it is a different kind of game where you don't really need to customise them. Besides, it is cheap and easy enough just to buy another figure with the right wargear/etc
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Post by: Just Dave
DemetriDominov wrote:At least the books don't seem to be getting any more expensive. Can't put a price on imagination.
If you're referring to Codices, then they're going up by 25% (in the UK) apparently.
If you're referring to Black Library, then no, thankfully they seem to be the same and can even be brought cheaply from places such as Amazon.
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Post by: Breotan
Regarding US prices, some of the Vindicators and Razorbacks have reached parity with FW full kits which means you get a little extra by buying FW instead of GW but not a lot. I've only spotted one item that is actually a better buy from FW.
SPACE MARINE WHIRLWIND $57.75
FW WHIRLWIND HYPERIOS COMPLETE KIT $45.24
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Post by: Kingsley
SilverMK2 wrote:Fetterkey wrote:As for prices, I'm not sure I see what you're seeing. GW games generally have larger numbers of models on the field, so it may cost more to assemble a force, but Warmachine and Infinity models are more expensive per-model compared to GW, and much less customizable to boot.
I don't mind paying £6-7 for the average Infinity model when I only need 9 or 10 of them on the field to play a 300 point (one of the largest points levels commonly used) game... nor do I mind paying that price for models which, quite frankly, blow GW's models out of the water in terms of sculpt quality
They may not be as customisable as GW's models tend to be, but it is a different kind of game where you don't really need to customise them. Besides, it is cheap and easy enough just to buy another figure with the right wargear/etc
I like GW models for their customizability not because of in-game options, but because they really allow me to make a force my own in terms of visual appearance. For instance, my Marines use parts from the entire Space Marine line and have custom bits and equipment on them, so they look really distinct on the battlefield. Infinity models seem to be mostly single-pose and offer much fewer options for conversion. That's not necessarily bad, since it means they can get tons of detail in, but I do wish they were more easily modified.
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Post by: TheLionOfTheForest
The only GW purchases I will be making will be 2nd hand from Ebay. GW's prices are absurd to begin with, this price hike feels more like a shakedown!
I am 30, married with a 16 month old, I can afford GW's products even less now then when I was 15 years old with a part time Job! When I was 15 making $8.50 an hour I could afford to buy 3 paint pots or 1 blister pack containing 2 models. At todays current minimum wage you would have to work for at least 2 hours to be able to afford 1 finecast (garbage) model. GW minis just aren't in the budget when you pay for a mortgage, car leases and other assorted living costs. $18.50 for 1 finecast model, $70+ for a Landraider ? I have also heard rumor that the codexes will be all hardcover now, so again they will cost more. Are you kidding me ? I dont know who GW thinks their market is but they have just narrowly cut their sales, which I suppose will mean more price increases down the road to make up for the decrease in sales.
This hurts our local gaming stores. Before I didnt mind paying a bit more than the amazon price for models so that I could support my store where I play. Now the stores will probably loose money as people decide to make their purchase off of the internet just to make their $$$ go a little further.
I brought a friend to my local store to try and get him back into 40K, he scoffed at the prices... I had to agree with him. And theses are the prices before the increase to come!
GW has opened the door to 3rd party companies selling miniatures that people will use in place of their own. They have opened the door further to people straight up copying their products with a simple mold making and casting (its really not hard at all). If I have to spend $2000 on a 2000 point army OR spend $2000 on pro quality mold making equipment and casting equipment more people will make the decision to just start making molds.
If I hadn't been collecting GW mini's for 18+ years I would not be getting into the hobby now.
I think this is pretty sad. Why raise the entry barrier to a game with an already high entry barrier?
As far as a solution.... Maybe GW can give independent retailers a significant wholesale discount so that people can still afford to support their local store. I mean GW can't even keep their own stores in business, if they hurt their 3rd party retailers how does that help the game, or the company, or the community?
A move like this, I cant understand. The miniature range has never been better with so many armies and models to choose from, GW has had success entering into the video game market and with a whole new line of paints of superior quality would seem to be indications of success?! If profits are down year to year, how about consolidating your position as a company, maybe decrease the range, DONT spring on new paints, and make the existing range CHEAPER! Move more product, surely the more you sell the more you produce, the cheaper your cost. Bring back the old miniature range in metal and have it be a cast on need basis, I wouldnt mind waiting 5 weeks to know I can get something I want at a decent and FAIR price. Bring back 2000 point army boxes with a significant price break. Dont package your army boxes with useless or underused vehicals or models because people will not buy them and the people that do will be annoyed when they find out they got duped ("ah gotcha.... that vehical is total garbage, you need this one at $55+ per"). Bring back the troop & transport box for our local stores, from what I understand they couldn't keep them on the shelves. Re-release ALL your PDF articles of all things you can build yourself.. the bunkers the tanks the scenery.... AND keep them archived for everyone to use. I mean come on GW, most of them we can find on some russian website anyway with a little hunting why be a jerk about it. What you think if you give us a print out cardstock PDF bunk we won't spend $45 on your plastic kit, well you are probably right maybe the plastic kit should be $30 instead......THESE are the reasons we used to LOVE you GW.... Things just aren't the same anymore... Yes your models are more smoking hot then ever, they just are too costly.
Is this price increase caused by GW eating it on FineCast returns?
Or was the Australian pricing just a test to see if people would just pay more for the same product and due to the test being "successful" that pricing instituted to everyone?
I for one am more upset than angry, as I simply just cannot afford to purchase any more of GW's mini range. Its upsetting because this type of move is more and more evident in today's economy, you just get so much less for your $. My household pulls in $67k before taxes... we are by no means poor.... I guess we're just not rich enough to buy 40k miniatures.
~A very sad Lion~
17349
Post by: SilverMK2
Fetterkey wrote:I like GW models for their customizability not because of in-game options, but because they really allow me to make a force my own in terms of visual appearance. For instance, my Marines use parts from the entire Space Marine line and have custom bits and equipment on them, so they look really distinct on the battlefield. Infinity models seem to be mostly single-pose and offer much fewer options for conversion. That's not necessarily bad, since it means they can get tons of detail in, but I do wish they were more easily modified.
I entirely get what you mean - I'd love to have some truely unique looking Infinity models, however since I will only very rarely have repeating models in any force I play it significantly less of an issue than 40K where you have essentially a hundred or so identical models on the table at any one time
Even selling weapons packs would be a step in the right direction
35671
Post by: weeble1000
GW flew into the jet wash of their up-and-coming competitors and has gone into a flat spin. Kirby is reaching for the ejection handle, but he's waiting it out 'cause he doesn't want to smack right into the canopy. Mark Wells is going to attempt to recover control, but he can't really get into the fight until GW gets over the past and tosses Kirby's dog tags into the ocean.
16689
Post by: notprop
Well you squeezed that simile for everything it was worth Weeble!
17816
Post by: coyotius
weeble1000 wrote:GW flew into the jet wash of their up-and-coming competitors and has gone into a flat spin. Kirby is reaching for the ejection handle, but he's waiting it out 'cause he doesn't want to smack right into the canopy. Mark Wells is going to attempt to recover control, but he can't really get into the fight until GW gets over the past and tosses Kirby's dog tags into the ocean.
"Flight of the Intruder" or "Top Gun"? I forget which.
35671
Post by: weeble1000
Barksdale wrote:
I just don't understand this pre-occupation with GW prices. The product is a luxery one, and people always want more than they can have or more than they can afford. How is this GW's fault? The answer is simple: it is not. I wil also note here that GW has one of the best customer service departments in ANY business, often replacing more than the original defective product.
I've never been a fan of this "luxury good" argument. Yes, hobby products are non-essential. However, being a non-essential good does not mean that comparative value ceases to be a concern of a discerning consumer. Does GW provide excellent quality products? Yes, principally with regard to its plastic injection molded kits. Are GW's injection molded plastic kits some of the best in the industry? Absolutely. Are they worth as much as GW chooses to charge for them? That question is more than fair, and any reasonable consumer will ask and answer that question. Compared to other products on the market, I believe GW's prices are bordering on unreasonably high. I can get more "bang for my buck" from the company's competitors, who unilaterally treat their customers with more respect and concern than Games Workshop (the customer service department not withstanding).
GW makes a transparent habit of regularly increasing prices with little or not respect to production cots or the economy with such consistency that it has become laughable.
Why is the Storm Raven kit 25% more expensive? Did GW re-engineer the mold? Did the cost of producing that kit suddenly rise by 25% in the last year? Is the economy trending down so badly year over year that GW must make up the deficit by driving the price of that kit higher? I couldn't care less as I have never purchased a Storm Raven kit, nor will I ever do so. But the price increase is arbitrary. It is the summer, GW is increasing its prices again. GW feels that its customers will not whine at a 25% increase in the cost of the kit. GW wants to push its revenue higher. End of story.
If you think the kit is worth 80 bucks, buy it. If not, don't. And if you felt that last year's price was fair, communicate that to Games Workshop. Just because you WANT a Storm Raven kit rather than NEEDING it does not mean that you cannot have a valid opinion about the value of the product.
53595
Post by: Palindrome
scarletsquig wrote:If people are crazy enough to buy £25.50 Empire Greatswords (and they are), then GW has absolutely nothing to worry about.
Some people undoubtably are, but less and less of them buy each year. GW isn't going to implode in a spectacular fashion, they are going to die a slow lingering death. Little Timmy's parents may well dote on him but even they will baulk at buying a couple of grammes of plastic for £2.50 (if not substantially more). Pricing is the most obvious problem but their are others ranging from degrading fluff to poor rulesets.
Personally I would love to see GW move away from the profit first model that they have been using for years, not least because it is killing them. I would love to see GW emulate the successes of their mid 90's hayday but I doubt that I will see this happen. I won't be losing much sleep over it though, plenty more fish in the sea. I would bet good money that veteran gamers have considerably more spending power than little Timmy's parents.
v
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Post by: notprop
Palindrome wrote:
Personally I would love to see GW move away from the profit first model that they have been using for years, not least because it is killing them. I would love to see GW emulate the successes of their mid 90's hayday but I doubt that I will see this happen. I won't be losing much sleep over it though, plenty more fish in the sea. I would bet good money that veteran gamers have considerably more spending power than little Timmy's parents.
v
You do realise that Ton Kirby has been at the helm of GW since 1986. Good times and bad times eh.
53595
Post by: Palindrome
That doesn't mean that the 90's weren't GW's hayday.
53116
Post by: helium42
Fetterkey wrote:The Hobbit and 40k 6th edition are right around the corner. Unless GW screws up massively, I think they're actually poised to surge dramatically ahead. Does anyone else remember how GW did back when the Lord of the Rings movies were coming out? Right now, GW's debatably in a bit of a holding pattern, but they can afford to bide their time and wait until these big new games bolster their playerbase dramatically.
GW will see a major surge in revenue from the release of the Hobbit, but how long will that last? A year or maybe two?
I disagree that 6th edition will have the same effect that the Hobbit release will have. I'm not sure if people outside the hobby will jump in simply because a new edition is released. Most people outside of the wargaming circles are blissfully unaware that 6th edition is coming out, so how will they be pulled in by such a thing? If anything, raising prices right before an edition change might put some people off of picking up the new rulebook. I know I'll be waiting for the small paperback version that will likely come with the 6th edition starter set to come out and then pick one up on Ebay.
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Post by: Shadowbrand
I -really- want to get back into 40k. But honestly this only makes me want to buy GW products for their paintline. And to finish my poor little Beastmen army. Because Price Hikes or not. I intend to finish what I start.
Even if it takes a long time. And I've a feeling no matter how far GW pushes they will get away with it.
*Looks at the LOTR range and sighs*
33661
Post by: Mad4Minis
Chaos Legionnaire wrote:Ironically, the price hikes have a temporary effect of boosting sales. I have been in this hobby for many years now, and every time there has been a price hike, there has been a mad rush to buy GW products before the prices increase.
Obviously, I am not a fan of this tactic, but it always seems to be the case.
This is very true...and they almost got me with it. For a few weeks Ive been toying with the idea of getting LR and the CHapterhouse conversion. Thats $50 for the LR (ebay) and $25 for the conversion kit, so $75 all together. With the price hike that will move the price closer to $100. SO instead Ive decided to wait (since the LR will be at the end of the list of things for my army) and save up to buy the retro stlye LR from Forgeworld.
4010
Post by: Delephont
I don't think these price rises will hurt GW in the slightest, sure it will lose a few disgruntled customers, but nothing more.
After the HUGE backlash of last year, with much fist shaking and pelvic thrusts, the dust soon settled and things rapidly went back to how they were. Many of those "die hards" on here that wanted to Boycott GW or swore never to buy another GW product soon went to ground, and with the release of Necrons etc you would see those same names popping up to tell us how they couldn't wait to play the various armies.....
I think the one thing I took away from last years rises were, either you can afford to play or you can't. Theres no evil involved from GWs part, it's not like the Oil or power companies, where you need to buy their goods. With GW it's a choice you make, and then get on with it.
Maybe I'm more mellow, because I pulled away from GW and stayed away, maybe that has given me some more perspective on the issue...I don't know. Bottom line is, GW will continue to charge what the market is willing to bear, and for those people for whom WH40K, etc is their life, methinks the market can bear a lot more than it currently has to!
33661
Post by: Mad4Minis
coyotius wrote:weeble1000 wrote:GW flew into the jet wash of their up-and-coming competitors and has gone into a flat spin. Kirby is reaching for the ejection handle, but he's waiting it out 'cause he doesn't want to smack right into the canopy. Mark Wells is going to attempt to recover control, but he can't really get into the fight until GW gets over the past and tosses Kirby's dog tags into the ocean.
"Flight of the Intruder" or "Top Gun"? I forget which.
Top Gun
53595
Post by: Palindrome
Delephont wrote:I don't think these price rises will hurt GW in the slightest, sure it will lose a few disgruntled customers, but nothing more.
After the HUGE backlash of last year, with much fist shaking and pelvic thrusts, the dust soon settled and things rapidly went back to how they were. Many of those "die hards" on here that wanted to Boycott GW or swore never to buy another GW product soon went to ground, and with the release of Necrons etc you would see those same names popping up to tell us how they couldn't wait to play the various armies
How do you explain GW's relatively flat revenues when their prices rise by 5-10% per annum? The most simple explanation is that people are simply not buying anymore, or are buying less. GW are arguably already charging more than the market can bear.
53116
Post by: helium42
Delephont wrote:
I think the one thing I took away from last years rises were, either you can afford to play or you can't. Theres no evil involved from GWs part, it's not like the Oil or power companies, where you need to buy their goods. With GW it's a choice you make, and then get on with it.
I don't see GW as evil, nor can I not afford to play. I simply don't think that some of the new prices make sense, and I'm tired of GW's denial that anything is wrong with finecast. That is enough to push me toward other game companies. I still love the GW IP. I will still continue playing 40k and fantasy. I just will not be spending my hobby money elsewhere from here on out.
3933
Post by: Kingsley
helium42 wrote:Fetterkey wrote:The Hobbit and 40k 6th edition are right around the corner. Unless GW screws up massively, I think they're actually poised to surge dramatically ahead. Does anyone else remember how GW did back when the Lord of the Rings movies were coming out? Right now, GW's debatably in a bit of a holding pattern, but they can afford to bide their time and wait until these big new games bolster their playerbase dramatically.
GW will see a major surge in revenue from the release of the Hobbit, but how long will that last? A year or maybe two?
I'd say 1-3 years, since The Hobbit is actually two movies. More importantly, though, it'll give them a second chance to get their Lord of the Rings line on its feet as an independent system.
helium42 wrote:I disagree that 6th edition will have the same effect that the Hobbit release will have. I'm not sure if people outside the hobby will jump in simply because a new edition is released. Most people outside of the wargaming circles are blissfully unaware that 6th edition is coming out, so how will they be pulled in by such a thing? If anything, raising prices right before an edition change might put some people off of picking up the new rulebook. I know I'll be waiting for the small paperback version that will likely come with the 6th edition starter set to come out and then pick one up on Ebay.
I don't think 6th Edition will bring new people in like The Hobbit likely will, but I do think it will reinvigorate a lot of existing players whose interest in 5th Edition is flagging.
664
Post by: Grimtuff
Delephont wrote:
After the HUGE backlash of last year, with much fist shaking and pelvic thrusts, the dust soon settled and things rapidly went back to how they were. Many of those "die hards" on here that wanted to Boycott GW or swore never to buy another GW product soon went to ground, and with the release of Necrons etc you would see those same names popping up to tell us how they couldn't wait to play the various armies.....
There is a significant difference between still playing GW's games and buying their products. How many of those aforementioned poster's had existing Necron armies for example? I have not bought any GW products in about 18 months yet I have still played 40k in the intervening time and have still been "in the loop" as it were. I refuse to give GW any more of my hard earned cash until they get their head out of their arses but I'm still able to play their games, unless they wish to charge a fee for that now (not that I want to give them ideas). 
EDIT: Heh, 1066 posts. Rather apt (if you know me IRL.  )
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Post by: Flashman
Grimtuff wrote:EDIT: Heh, 1066 posts. Rather apt (if you know me IRL. )
Why? Are you the reincarnation of William the Conqueror?
If so, sod off back to France
16689
Post by: notprop
No, he has an arrow in his eye.
Grimtuff to Dakka, Cyclops to his mates.
664
Post by: Grimtuff
Flashman wrote:Grimtuff wrote:EDIT: Heh, 1066 posts. Rather apt (if you know me IRL. )
Why? Are you the reincarnation of William the Conqueror?
If so, sod off back to France
notprop wrote:No, he has an arrow in his eye.
Grimtuff to Dakka, Cyclops to his mates.
To put you both out of your misery my surname is Hastings.
25703
Post by: juraigamer
They don't need to raise prices, they need to keep releases coming. These lulls where literally nothing is released doesn't help, and keeping models from being released when people want them doesn't do any good.
50563
Post by: quickfuze
Also there is a trend of using non-GW models in events. Since really its up to the organizers now what they allow as GW support has gone the way of the DoDo bird. Like manticgames. I have seen numerous VS armies that use the MG zombies and skeletons, becuase A)they are far cheaper to field the numbers you need and B)in my opinion just a better looking model (no stupid over sized hands etc etc). I for one am planning on converting a force using the Orks rules, which means yes I will buy a bomber or two and some def koptas (those will be from ebay cause the plastic ones are just that awesome) and I will be converting "da boyz" from mantics soon to be released Veer-myn. Space Skaven for the win!! But I still want to support my FLGS so I am ordering the Veer-myn through them instead of an online discount house. Look for more of this....more use of other model ranges.
Oh and let me say how much of a crap rag White Dwarf has become.....and $9 really GW really? I can get the subsrciption figure at full retail price if I get a subscription? What happened to getting the figure free with a subscription?
55847
Post by: Buttons
Davylove21 wrote:It seems to me that they have the readies in the bank to take risks like making SM battleforces £80 RRP. If it works, hooker and blow party at Kirby's place. If it doesn't, they can probably swallow the hit and put the prices back.
Fixed. Honestly who has ever heard of a meth party? Meth is for impoverished rednecks, not a party drug like cocaine or ecstasy.
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Post by: Brother SRM
Fetterkey wrote:
I don't think 6th Edition will bring new people in like The Hobbit likely will, but I do think it will reinvigorate a lot of existing players whose interest in 5th Edition is flagging.
While I enjoy 5th edition, I'm starting to get a bit tired of it. When I went home a few months ago I picked up my old Kryomek rulebook and started looking around for new rulesets to spark my interest. Then I read the "pancake" edition of 40k and my interest was completely reinvigorated. I can't be alone in this, and the 6th ed anticipation has me pretty jazzed.
34439
Post by: Formosa
the new warpath minis are truelly great for imp guard elysians too, or any high tech guard to be fair.
26348
Post by: gohkm
I don't buy GW products all that often, maybe once every half a year or so, and certainly not in the volumes required to build an army.
For that reason alone, I don't particularly notice the price increases - I splash out on nice models from other companies, so I don't see see the difference in doing the same for GW.
They've got some really nice stuff out of late, particularly the Vampire Counts carriage-thing (I think it's called the Mortis Throne or something), but it's no more a priority purchase than anything else.
20880
Post by: loki old fart
weeble1000 wrote:Barksdale wrote:
I just don't understand this pre-occupation with GW prices. The product is a luxery one, and people always want more than they can have or more than they can afford. How is this GW's fault? The answer is simple: it is not. I wil also note here that GW has one of the best customer service departments in ANY business, often replacing more than the original defective product.
I've never been a fan of this "luxury good" argument. Yes, hobby products are non-essential. However, being a non-essential good does not mean that comparative value ceases to be a concern of a discerning consumer. Does GW provide excellent quality products? Yes, principally with regard to its plastic injection molded kits. Are GW's injection molded plastic kits some of the best in the industry? Absolutely. Are they worth as much as GW chooses to charge for them? That question is more than fair, and any reasonable consumer will ask and answer that question. Compared to other products on the market, I believe GW's prices are bordering on unreasonably high. I can get more "bang for my buck" from the company's competitors, who unilaterally treat their customers with more respect and concern than Games Workshop (the customer service department not withstanding).
GW makes a transparent habit of regularly increasing prices with little or not respect to production cots or the economy with such consistency that it has become laughable.
Why is the Storm Raven kit 25% more expensive? Did GW re-engineer the mold? Did the cost of producing that kit suddenly rise by 25% in the last year? Is the economy trending down so badly year over year that GW must make up the deficit by driving the price of that kit higher? I couldn't care less as I have never purchased a Storm Raven kit, nor will I ever do so. But the price increase is arbitrary. It is the summer, GW is increasing its prices again. GW feels that its customers will not whine at a 25% increase in the cost of the kit. GW wants to push its revenue higher. End of story.
If you think the kit is worth 80 bucks, buy it. If not, don't. And if you felt that last year's price was fair, communicate that to Games Workshop. Just because you WANT a Storm Raven kit rather than NEEDING it does not mean that you cannot have a valid opinion about the value of the product.
Extremely well put.
44255
Post by: Rayvon
I have heard people have this discussions for about ten, fifteen years now, and GW dont go anywhere.
664
Post by: Grimtuff
Rayvon wrote:I have heard people have this discussions for about ten, fifteen years now, and GW dont go anywhere.
Really? On the Internet in 1997 discussing the death of GW were we? Pull the other one.  Thing is GW WERE in major danger of dying on their arse 15 years ago due to the Pokemon craze that sucked away their main demographic quicker than... something that does that. GW held on, due to setting ruthless daily sale targets for their stores and other factors then came their boom period from LOTR, which incidentally was about 10 years ago, another period where I highly doubt people would have been preaching doom about GW.
All it takes is another Pokemon to come along and GW is dead in the water.
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Post by: Lanrak
A quick note on the financial history of GW plc.
From 1988 to 1997 gw(plc) doubled turn over every 3 years.(Despite holding sales and not incresing prices over inflation every year, or gouging the ROW..  )
1998 to 2000 growth slowed down,(Due to the tradeing card games.)(£76M to £91M from memory.)
2001 to 2004 , GW plc '...grew fat and lazy on the back of easy sucess...' of the LoTR licence.(Admitted by Mr Kirby.)
Thier turn over went up to £151M!(From memory.)
Then the LotR bubble burst.
And GW plc started loosing sales volumes.So GW plc put prices up to cover lost sales volumes, and the sales volumes plummeted faster.
SO GW plc increased the retail prices again to make up for lost sales volumes , and guess what happened!
I remember reading a report on here where the projected turn over adjusted for the rate of inlfation (average UK.)
EG all values in todays money.
Showed 2004 turn over at £174 M.(From memory.)
So GW plc lost 28% of its customers after the LoTR boom.
But how much did they loose if we factor in the price rises over inflation since then?( GW plc prices have more or less doubled on average , after infation is taken into acount.)
Odly enough its about half of its sales volumes.
Who would have thunk it?
Writing rules specificaly for a fickel demoghraphic that dont promote long term interest.Coupled with raising prices over inflation every year.
Actualy looses you customer faster than you can recoup money of the remaining ones!
When the game developers were left alone to develop and support a wide range of games for gamers, GW doubled its turn over every 3 years.
Since Kirby decided GW plc '...is in the buisness of selling toy soldier to children...' they have lost sales volumes ever since.
Before some one points out Kirby was at GW from 1986 ,he lead the managment buy out in 1992 etc.
He only started to 'influence ' games development in 1998.( 40k 3rd ed .)And had 'heavy influence' on game development since the early 2000s.
(All figures from memory are within the 10M mark(Eg £76 M, is definatley 70 somethingM. )
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Post by: Pacific
scarletsquig wrote:If people are crazy enough to buy £25.50 Empire Greatswords (and they are), then GW has absolutely nothing to worry about.
I'm about as big a fan of Mantic as you can get, but this idea that GW is going to collapse or is doomed to fail is completely wrong... wealthy parents looking to buy the new "space mans mega-tank" for little Timmy so he'll stop whining for a few weeks are not going to care if it's $41 or $56.
The veterans market is worthless to GW, they are older players who have already spent thousands with GW, already have armies and don't spend as much as newcomers while also being more cynical and vocally critical about the company, and are harder to fool into paying high prices. If we leave, they don't really care, and their bottom line has never been dependant on us as a demographic, so it's really not going to hurt much to continue with their current strategy.
GW are excellent for recruiting new people into the broader wargaming hobby, something which their retail stores do an excellent job of.
They're not stupid, or incompetent, they are highly efficient at producing a high dividend yield for their shareholders, which is the primary concern of every publically-floated company on the planet.
I think a lot of people project their own personal irritation on to the company quite often, trying to justify their anger by saying how it's all going to end in tears and the company will go bankrupt, when the odds of that happening are very slim indeed.
Really well written post, I agree with it completely!
57786
Post by: pitboy2710
The price increase doesn't hit me that hard, mainly because i don't play the games ( any games ) i just paint the models.
I tend to just buy one or two boxes a time.
I have wanted to get in to playing but can't justify the cost of buying an army
299
Post by: Kilkrazy
helium42 wrote:Fetterkey wrote:The Hobbit and 40k 6th edition are right around the corner. Unless GW screws up massively, I think they're actually poised to surge dramatically ahead. Does anyone else remember how GW did back when the Lord of the Rings movies were coming out? Right now, GW's debatably in a bit of a holding pattern, but they can afford to bide their time and wait until these big new games bolster their playerbase dramatically.
GW will see a major surge in revenue from the release of the Hobbit, but how long will that last? A year or maybe two?
I disagree that 6th edition will have the same effect that the Hobbit release will have. I'm not sure if people outside the hobby will jump in simply because a new edition is released. Most people outside of the wargaming circles are blissfully unaware that 6th edition is coming out, so how will they be pulled in by such a thing? If anything, raising prices right before an edition change might put some people off of picking up the new rulebook. I know I'll be waiting for the small paperback version that will likely come with the 6th edition starter set to come out and then pick one up on Ebay.
Me too.
No way I'm going to pay £45 for a massive hardback most of which (fluff and modelling) is recycled from previous editions. I only want the rules.
4010
Post by: Delephont
scarletsquig wrote:If people are crazy enough to buy £25.50 Empire Greatswords (and they are), then GW has absolutely nothing to worry about.
I'm about as big a fan of Mantic as you can get, but this idea that GW is going to collapse or is doomed to fail is completely wrong... wealthy parents looking to buy the new "space mans mega-tank" for little Timmy so he'll stop whining for a few weeks are not going to care if it's $41 or $56.
The veterans market is worthless to GW, they are older players who have already spent thousands with GW, already have armies and don't spend as much as newcomers while also being more cynical and vocally critical about the company, and are harder to fool into paying high prices. If we leave, they don't really care, and their bottom line has never been dependant on us as a demographic, so it's really not going to hurt much to continue with their current strategy.
GW are excellent for recruiting new people into the broader wargaming hobby, something which their retail stores do an excellent job of.
They're not stupid, or incompetent, they are highly efficient at producing a high dividend yield for their shareholders, which is the primary concern of every publically-floated company on the planet.
I think a lot of people project their own personal irritation on to the company quite often, trying to justify their anger by saying how it's all going to end in tears and the company will go bankrupt, when the odds of that happening are very slim indeed.
While I agree, in the main, lets not forget, companies can and do go bust. Ok, Ford and GM haven't gone bust yet, but look at how close they came to catastrophy?!? Look at the number of video games companies going to the wall, retail chains!?
If you take any one of those victims of change, you'd probably find, at the core of their demise, a combination of bad luck, flat-lined markets, and bad decision making......it's really that simple.
GW isn't protected from these things in the same way that Banks and (by and large) the Automotive sector is (in terms of Government funding, etc), and we mustn't forget, being floated on the stock exchange means that GW is competeing for investors alongside major pharmaceuticals, arms manufacturers and ginats like Hasbro, etc.....
While I don't believe things will go wrong for them in the short term, it is and will always remain a possibility.
16689
Post by: notprop
Yeah, £12 from a bitz store for the mini rule book after they break it up for minitures is my plan.
That said it's my birthday on the 12 June so if you fellers are getting me the new 40k boxed game then I may not have to. Thanks in advance by the way. 
9892
Post by: Flashman
notprop wrote:Yeah, £12 from a bitz store for the mini rule book after they break it up for minitures is my plan.
That said it's my birthday on the 12 June so if you fellers are getting me the new 40k boxed game then I may not have to. Thanks in advance by the way.
Oops, we thought you wanted a puppy?
22051
Post by: Barksdale
weeble1000 wrote:Barksdale wrote:
I just don't understand this pre-occupation with GW prices. The product is a luxery one, and people always want more than they can have or more than they can afford. How is this GW's fault? The answer is simple: it is not. I wil also note here that GW has one of the best customer service departments in ANY business, often replacing more than the original defective product.
I've never been a fan of this "luxury good" argument. Yes, hobby products are non-essential. However, being a non-essential good does not mean that comparative value ceases to be a concern of a discerning consumer. Does GW provide excellent quality products? Yes, principally with regard to its plastic injection molded kits. Are GW's injection molded plastic kits some of the best in the industry? Absolutely. Are they worth as much as GW chooses to charge for them? That question is more than fair, and any reasonable consumer will ask and answer that question. Compared to other products on the market, I believe GW's prices are bordering on unreasonably high. I can get more "bang for my buck" from the company's competitors, who unilaterally treat their customers with more respect and concern than Games Workshop (the customer service department not withstanding).
GW makes a transparent habit of regularly increasing prices with little or not respect to production cots or the economy with such consistency that it has become laughable.
Why is the Storm Raven kit 25% more expensive? Did GW re-engineer the mold? Did the cost of producing that kit suddenly rise by 25% in the last year? Is the economy trending down so badly year over year that GW must make up the deficit by driving the price of that kit higher? I couldn't care less as I have never purchased a Storm Raven kit, nor will I ever do so. But the price increase is arbitrary. It is the summer, GW is increasing its prices again. GW feels that its customers will not whine at a 25% increase in the cost of the kit. GW wants to push its revenue higher. End of story.
If you think the kit is worth 80 bucks, buy it. If not, don't. And if you felt that last year's price was fair, communicate that to Games Workshop. Just because you WANT a Storm Raven kit rather than NEEDING it does not mean that you cannot have a valid opinion about the value of the product.
Just because you are not a fan of calling GW products luxury goods does not mean that they are not luxury goods. If you want more than you can afford how is this GW's problem? Get a better paying job, or just buy less product. Another possibility is pay cheaper prices at some of the competitors. Unfortunately, you are sacrifcing alot of the quality customization options that the GW plastic kits give. Again, your choice.
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Post by: PhantomViper
Barksdale wrote:
Just because you are not a fan of calling GW products luxury goods does not mean that they are not luxury goods. If you want more than you can afford how is this GW's problem? Get a better paying job, or just buy less product. Another possibility is pay cheaper prices at some of the competitors. Unfortunately, you are sacrifcing alot of the quality customization options that the GW plastic kits give. Again, your choice.
By that reasoning, every toy I buy for my child is a "luxury good".
They are toys and increasingly lower quality ones at that, but GW can charge whatever they wan't for them and past statistics show that approximately 90% of the people will still continue to buy them and that includes a vast majority of those that are claiming "never again" on all the threads going on currently here on Dakka...
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Post by: SilverMK2
Barksdale wrote:If you want more than you can afford how is this GW's problem?
Well, I would think that GW's dwindling sales year on year would tell you exactly how it is GW's problem they are pricing themselves out of the market.
Get a better paying job
Haha, you can have a well paying job and still consider $80-100 for a small plastic kit (and not even a particularly good one unlike many Airfix/etc models in that price range) too much to pay. Besides which, getting a better paying job isn't really something you can just do. I'm sure that there are lots of people who would love to be earning more money, not just so they can pick up overpriced bits of plastic from GW but you know... pay their bills, put food on the table, maybe go on holiday etc...
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Post by: DarthOvious
PhantomViper wrote:Barksdale wrote:
Just because you are not a fan of calling GW products luxury goods does not mean that they are not luxury goods. If you want more than you can afford how is this GW's problem? Get a better paying job, or just buy less product. Another possibility is pay cheaper prices at some of the competitors. Unfortunately, you are sacrifcing alot of the quality customization options that the GW plastic kits give. Again, your choice.
By that reasoning, every toy I buy for my child is a "luxury good".
They are toys and increasingly lower quality ones at that, but GW can charge whatever they wan't for them and past statistics show that approximately 90% of the people will still continue to buy them and that includes a vast majority of those that are claiming "never again" on all the threads going on currently here on Dakka...
I think it's just a way to vent their frustration really. I'm not concerned if people make those kinds of statements but then continue to buy. It's just human nature to want to vent in these kind of circumstances.
I'm still going to buying GW stuff. I will try to get more of it off of discounted sites but I'm not going to give up 40k or Fantasy because of it. I'll even still buy some things from the shop when I need something quickly or if I want to make sure I get a good cast in case of finecast.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
SilverMK2 wrote: Haha, you can have a well paying job and still consider $80-100 for a small plastic kit (and not even a particularly good one unlike many Airfix/etc models in that price range) too much to pay. Besides which, getting a better paying job isn't really something you can just do. I'm sure that there are lots of people who would love to be earning more money, not just so they can pick up overpriced bits of plastic from GW but you know... pay their bills, put food on the table, maybe go on holiday etc...
Yes Airfix do have multi-part plastic kits, but I think local model shops operate in a different way from GW. The main part of the problem is the way that GW operates it's buisness. They run their own shops, with overheads and staff wages along with the rest of it. The store I go to every Saturday runs it's events on that day. Campaign of some sort in the morning and Apocalypse in the afternoon and this requires a member of staff to oversee (It's not a one man store). They have painting classes and beginners classes to teach people how to play the game or how to paint a model and they offer this service freely and OK, I do admit that you could probably find this for free anyway on the net but it's still a cost in their books. They also have to use some of their product to make terrain or for their stores projects.
In a trip to Warhammer World in Nottingham, my friend and I saw a gaming table that litterally had hundreds of pounds, thousands worth even of models being used to decorate the board. Expensive, yes, but totally awesome.
Now I'm not saying that GW aren't greedy money grabbers here. Not saying that at all, but it does get a bit difficult to quantify how much they are ripping you off here when their business operates in a completely different way from it's competitors. Thye even operate in a different way from your FLGS store since most of them usually require you to bring your own terrain.
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Post by: Byte
Delephont wrote:I don't think these price rises will hurt GW in the slightest, sure it will lose a few disgruntled customers, but nothing more.
After the HUGE backlash of last year, with much fist shaking and pelvic thrusts, the dust soon settled and things rapidly went back to how they were. Many of those "die hards" on here that wanted to Boycott GW or swore never to buy another GW product soon went to ground, and with the release of Necrons etc you would see those same names popping up to tell us how they couldn't wait to play the various armies.....
I think the one thing I took away from last years rises were, either you can afford to play or you can't. Theres no evil involved from GWs part, it's not like the Oil or power companies, where you need to buy their goods. With GW it's a choice you make, and then get on with it.
Maybe I'm more mellow, because I pulled away from GW and stayed away, maybe that has given me some more perspective on the issue...I don't know. Bottom line is, GW will continue to charge what the market is willing to bear, and for those people for whom WH40K, etc is their life, methinks the market can bear a lot more than it currently has to!
Same thing will happen this time as well. The release of 6th will be the smoke screen this time.
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Post by: PhantomViper
DarthOvious wrote:Thye even operate in a different way from your FLGS store since most of them usually require you to bring your own terrain.
Say whaaaa?
Is this a common "thing" in the UK? Because in the 5+ LGS that I've entered at one time or another on this side of the pond, not one of them made their players / customers bring their own terrain... 
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Post by: loki old fart
PhantomViper wrote:DarthOvious wrote:Thye even operate in a different way from your FLGS store since most of them usually require you to bring your own terrain.
Say whaaaa?
Is this a common "thing" in the UK? Because in the 5+ LGS that I've entered at one time or another on this side of the pond, not one of them made their players / customers bring their own terrain...
The independent store in stoke has it's own terrain.
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Post by: redkeyboard
My two FLGS also have their own terrain.
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Post by: theQuanz
The only interest I have in GW now are their horus heresy novels, and the hobby itself.
Hands down GW models are great for that and just the amount you can do with them. Game play though...I am going to get into Second Edition with some local guys as that is a smaller game with tighter rules.
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Post by: DarthOvious
PhantomViper wrote:DarthOvious wrote:Thye even operate in a different way from your FLGS store since most of them usually require you to bring your own terrain.
Say whaaaa?
Is this a common "thing" in the UK? Because in the 5+ LGS that I've entered at one time or another on this side of the pond, not one of them made their players / customers bring their own terrain...
Perhaps. I may be making an unwarranted assumption since the FLGS store in the city doesn't have any terrain on their tables from what I could see, but then they play a lot of different things there. I was talking to the store owner in regards to infinity to ask how many players they have there. He told me there is a core few who play but it was difficult running tournaments around infinity since terrain was an issue and it was really needed in a competitive environment for infinity. So they may have some terrain but nothing compared to what you'll find in GW. Both my local store and the one I go to every Saturday make game boards and terrain on a regular basis. My local have just done up a new board, while the store I go to on a Saturday are in the process of converting their own Thunderhawk Gunship using 2 SRs, a vindicator and some movement tray pieces. Although this doesn't outdo one of his previous pieces where he apparently made a dreadnought out of 2 drop pods. I don't know how he did it.
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Post by: PhantomViper
DarthOvious wrote:PhantomViper wrote:DarthOvious wrote:Thye even operate in a different way from your FLGS store since most of them usually require you to bring your own terrain.
Say whaaaa?
Is this a common "thing" in the UK? Because in the 5+ LGS that I've entered at one time or another on this side of the pond, not one of them made their players / customers bring their own terrain...
Perhaps. I may be making an unwarranted assumption since the FLGS store in the city doesn't have any terrain on their tables from what I could see, but then they play a lot of different things there. I was talking to the store owner in regards to infinity to ask how many players they have there. He told me there is a core few who play but it was difficult running tournaments around infinity since terrain was an issue and it was really needed in a competitive environment for infinity. So they may have some terrain but nothing compared to what you'll find in GW. Both my local store and the one I go to every Saturday make game boards and terrain on a regular basis. My local have just done up a new board, while the store I go to on a Saturday are in the process of converting their own Thunderhawk Gunship using 2 SRs, a vindicator and some movement tray pieces. Although this doesn't outdo one of his previous pieces where he apparently made a dreadnought out of 2 drop pods. I don't know how he did it.
Yeaaaaah, I think you might have misunderstood what the store owner was talking about...
Do you have any idea of the amount of terrain needed to play a competitive game of Infinity?
This much (the vehicles present on the tables are terrain pieces as well btw):
An average 40K table has around 8-10 different terrain pieces. An Infinity table has close to 50!
Now multiply that by 5 different tables that you would need to run a 10 person tournament and tell me that your average local GW store has that much terrain available...
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Post by: DarthOvious
PhantomViper wrote: Yeaaaaah, I think you might have misunderstood what the store owner was talking about...
Do you have any idea of the amount of terrain needed to play a competitive game of Infinity?
This much (the vehicles present on the tables are terrain pieces as well btw):
An average 40K table has around 8-10 different terrain pieces. An Infinity table has close to 50!
Now multiply that by 5 different tables that you would need to run a 10 person tournament and tell me that your average local GW store has that much terrain available...
Well he did give me the impression that it was more than you would need for other games, but I took what he said along with not seeing much terrain about. I may be mistaken but I thought he did say that those infinity players brought their own terrain but perhaps that is on top of anything else he may provide in the store. I'll have a look in two weeks time to see what the deal is and make a proper note of it.
The store also has more than 5 tables. They have quite a few but I will have a look next time. Also like I said, they play a lot of different things there, so I think a lot of card games are played too, like Magic for instance.
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Post by: Kaptajn Congoboy
And this is why we're trying to establish, locally, that Infinity players contribute to a stock of Infinity-spesific terrain at our LGS.
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Post by: theQuanz
I just looked at the GW Website...it took me to the Australian version and holy crap those prices are ridiculous.
Beating a dead horse, but wow...these people aren't going to be around much longer at this rate. By 2015 I think GW will be dead and gone.
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Post by: weeble1000
Barksdale wrote:weeble1000 wrote:[
Just because you are not a fan of calling GW products luxury goods does not mean that they are not luxury goods. If you want more than you can afford how is this GW's problem? Get a better paying job, or just buy less product. Another possibility is pay cheaper prices at some of the competitors. Unfortunately, you are sacrifcing alot of the quality customization options that the GW plastic kits give. Again, your choice.
I never said that GW products were not luxury goods. I simply argued that being a non-essential good or service does not ipso facto mean that one cannot have a reasonable opinion about the value of that good or service. Luis Vuitton handbags are quitisentially luxury goods, but I bet that there are plenty of folks that feel a Louis Vuitton handbag is overpriced when compared to other high end designer handbags. I do not like the argument that because hobby products are luxury goods, customers can either buy them or shut up about it. Luxury or not, GW produces goods in a competitive market. And the GW brand does not have much value as a status symbol, by the way. I do not pay whatever GW charges for a Storm Raven kit on the basis that it is a conspicuous good. I do not walk into a gaming store, unpack my Storm Raven model, and expect other gamers to know that I am cool/affluent enough to have a Games Workshop product. There are many reasons to buy GW products, but consumers also have many reasons to not purchase GW products, one of which is the price point. As you have argued, GW's plastic injection molded kits contain many "bonus" bits, therefore increasing the value of the kits. This is true, but it is also true of many competing products, namely because GW exists in a competitive market. If you see 80 dollars of value in a Storm Raven kit, that's fine, but others are more than free to decide that 80 dollars is an unreasonably high price for the value of the prduct. GW's generally high prices across its product range also tends to erode the value of its products, as a gamer cannot play a game with but a single Storm Raven model, for example.
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Post by: Howard A Treesong
Lanrak wrote:
When the game developers were left alone to develop and support a wide range of games for gamers, GW doubled its turn over every 3 years.
Since Kirby decided GW plc '...is in the buisness of selling toy soldier to children...' they have lost sales volumes ever since.
Before some one points out Kirby was at GW from 1986 ,he lead the managment buy out in 1992 etc.
He only started to 'influence ' games development in 1998.(40k 3rd ed .)And had 'heavy influence' on game development since the early 2000s.
I'd like to draw a correlation between their dropping of games development and their decline in sales. It's rather hard to say for certain because of the many other factors, but a big problem with GW for me is that they aren't a games workshop now, they are a Warhammer workshop. They almost totally focus on Warhammer and LOTR, and throw the very occasional bone of something like Space Hulk which was similar to previous releases, and Dreadfleet which was just poorly designed. GW used to produce some quality stuff, they lead the market for a reason, they made a huge range of stuff that pulled in gamers of all sorts. Now if you don't want Warhammer, they don't want you. The price increases have become a joke. Every summer they now stick about 20% on. GW have always been known for being expensive and having dubious price increases, but it's just ridiculous and working on a regular cycle. I gave up playing GW years ago and mostly do other stuff because they sucked all the fun out of it by pushing the prices through the roof and killed all the many things that made their part of the the hobby fun.
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Post by: Palindrome
weeble1000 wrote:
If you see 80 dollars of value in a Storm Raven kit, that's fine, but others are more than free to decide that 80 dollars is an unreasonably high price for the value of the prduct. GW's generally high prices across its product range also tends to erode the value of its products, as a gamer cannot play a game with but a single Storm Raven model, for example.
this is thrown into sharp focus when you compare what you get in a GW kit with what actual model companies sell. GW tank kits are like lego when comparied to the likes of Tamiya which actually cost less than a similar GW kit.
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Post by: ruff
Palindrome wrote:weeble1000 wrote:
If you see 80 dollars of value in a Storm Raven kit, that's fine, but others are more than free to decide that 80 dollars is an unreasonably high price for the value of the prduct. GW's generally high prices across its product range also tends to erode the value of its products, as a gamer cannot play a game with but a single Storm Raven model, for example.
Don't I know it.. I have put together many Dragon Models of WWII vehicles and there insane with the amount of parts they have.. Then I see GW tank kits and there like a vacation to put together for a third of the parts and twice as much as a museum quality model..
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Post by: SilverMK2
ruff wrote:Then I see GW tank kits and there like a vacation to put together for a third of the parts and twice as much as a museum quality model..
A third of the parts? I have a 1:72 soviet tank model which has more parts than a Rhino and it is about 2.5 inches long
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Post by: ruff
I was referring to the gw kit being a third of the parts compared to another kit, and twice the cost..lol..
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Post by: SilverMK2
ruff wrote:I was referring to the gw kit being a third of the parts compared to another kit, and twice the cost..lol..
I know, I was expanding on the point by saying that a cheap model tank which is about 2.5 inches long has more parts than a rhino
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Post by: redkeyboard
I am suprised they dont sell them ready built and then charge another 20% for assembling it for us.
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Post by: Platuan4th
redkeyboard wrote:I am suprised they dont sell them ready built and then charge another 20% for assembling it for us.
But then they couldn't push the HHHobby.
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Post by: Pacific
Kaptajn Congoboy wrote:And this is why we're trying to establish, locally, that Infinity players contribute to a stock of Infinity-spesific terrain at our LGS.
Yes right.. it helps of course as well that you only have to paint up 10-12 models max for your force. You will have that much more time to devote to making some terrain. My friends and I are all contributing to a couple of tables, and as something new (we haven't really bothered with terrain so much before) are actually quite enjoying the fresh challenge.
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Post by: Kingsley
Platuan4th wrote:redkeyboard wrote:I am suprised they dont sell them ready built and then charge another 20% for assembling it for us.
But then they couldn't push the HHHobby.
What's with this "HHHobby" meme?
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
Something us Black Knights devised for the express purpose of pissing off White Knights.
No, not really. Ask KillKrazy. It's his invention IIRC.
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Post by: brettz123
helium42 wrote:Fetterkey wrote:The Hobbit and 40k 6th edition are right around the corner. Unless GW screws up massively, I think they're actually poised to surge dramatically ahead. Does anyone else remember how GW did back when the Lord of the Rings movies were coming out? Right now, GW's debatably in a bit of a holding pattern, but they can afford to bide their time and wait until these big new games bolster their playerbase dramatically.
GW will see a major surge in revenue from the release of the Hobbit, but how long will that last? A year or maybe two?
I disagree that 6th edition will have the same effect that the Hobbit release will have. I'm not sure if people outside the hobby will jump in simply because a new edition is released. Most people outside of the wargaming circles are blissfully unaware that 6th edition is coming out, so how will they be pulled in by such a thing? If anything, raising prices right before an edition change might put some people off of picking up the new rulebook. I know I'll be waiting for the small paperback version that will likely come with the 6th edition starter set to come out and then pick one up on Ebay.
Two movies over two years so probably a three year bubble based on the previous movies. And it will most likely be a sizeable bubble. When GW releases the complete set of dwarves from the Hobbit it will be a huge seller.
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Post by: J.Black
Fetterkey wrote:
What's with this "HHHobby" meme?
It seems to be an in-joke for the MODs and DCMs...... I wouldn't worry about it
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
Yep. 2 years of movies. 3 years of bubble. 3 years of Kirby using that bubble's inevitable burst as an excuse for why they're not performing so well across 2016-2018.
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Post by: brettz123
Barksdale wrote:
Just because you are not a fan of calling GW products luxury goods does not mean that they are not luxury goods. If you want more than you can afford how is this GW's problem? Get a better paying job, or just buy less product. Another possibility is pay cheaper prices at some of the competitors. Unfortunately, you are sacrifcing alot of the quality customization options that the GW plastic kits give. Again, your choice.
It is a huge problem for GW because their sales volume has been drastically slashed. That means they have a smaller and smaller customer base. I'm assuming you understand that this is not what a business wants correct? If GW keeps this trend going (and we have every reason to believe they will) the company could very realistically go out of business.
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Post by: Kirasu
I think when comparing Forgeworld Prices to GW it's fairly important to add on atleast a 15% discount to GW prices since you *can* order from the warstore (Sorry I wont discuss Australian prices, they're beyond absurd and don't really deserve much discussion other than to say they're abnormally high)
A lot of people also can get up to 30% off retail prices however its almost impossible to get discounts on FW without resorting to buying models made from stolen molds/recasts from Russia/China
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Post by: brettz123
Kirasu wrote:I think when comparing Forgeworld Prices to GW it's fairly important to add on atleast a 15% discount to GW prices since you *can* order from the warstore (Sorry I wont discuss Australian prices, they're beyond absurd and don't really deserve much discussion other than to say they're abnormally high)
A lot of people also can get up to 30% off retail prices however its almost impossible to get discounts on FW without resorting to buying models made from stolen molds/recasts from Russia/China
Don't forget the 15% shipping cost of forge world unless you spend 250 pounds or more.
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Post by: Bobthehero
IIRC you can order your FW products to be sent at your local GW store and avoid paying shipping fees.
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Post by: SilverMK2
Kirasu wrote:I think when comparing Forgeworld Prices to GW it's fairly important to add on atleast a 15% discount to GW prices since you *can* order from the warstore (Sorry I wont discuss Australian prices, they're beyond absurd and don't really deserve much discussion other than to say they're abnormally high)
A lot of people also can get up to 30% off retail prices however its almost impossible to get discounts on FW without resorting to buying models made from stolen molds/recasts from Russia/China
I'm not really sure what the use of comparing the prices ofgoods from one part of a company to the prices of goods from another part of the same company is. Forge world does produce some good kits but my god are their prices set way too high for the amount of warpage etc you get with some of them. Nor does saying 'you can buy these overpriced kits with a slight discount' mean all that much. Even with a 20 percent discount the new storm raven price will be 5 percent more after the price rise than full retail price is now.
Even if you do say that you can get item X at 15-20 percent off, there are still plenty of kits out there that are better, more detailed, etc, for less or comparable money.nd since GW keeps dropping the in game points and pushing bigger battles, people find even cheap less detailed/cusomisable/etc kits more attractive, especially for whfb were there are plenty of people selling there types of kits.a
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
SilverMK2 wrote:I'm not really sure what the use of comparing the prices ofgoods from one part of a company to the prices of goods from another part of the same company is. Forge world does produce some good kits but my god are their prices set way too high for the amount of warpage etc you get with some of them. Nor does saying 'you can buy these overpriced kits with a slight discount' mean all that much. Even with a 20 percent discount the new storm raven price will be 5 percent more after the price rise than full retail price is now.
Not if you live in my part of the world. FW is cheaper than GW-proper from an Aussie perspective.
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Post by: Holycrusader27
Doom amd gloom aside, 6th ed is were will see if it sinks or swims with me. Price increases don't effect me alot just because I have alot of the models I need for my army and have no desire to update reguardless of what codex keep, meta changes there will be. I stopped playing competitively and yet to regret it, if I want to play TTWG competitively again id stick to warmahordes. But I do see it effecting my lfgs/community I have helped out with doing demos but its the sticker shock that prevents people from starting that was before this years increase.
Flgs has only been open six month and has yet to break even on the stock he purchased when he opened. As alot of people pointed already with online retailer vs brick n mortar stores its hard. Ive seen some strategies from other stores where you buy into discounts were you pay X ammount unlocks X% off usually doesn't go higher then 20% but hey better then nothing.
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Post by: Surtur
Lanrak wrote:A quick note on the financial history of GW plc.
From 1988 to 1997 gw(plc) doubled turn over every 3 years.(Despite holding sales and not incresing prices over inflation every year, or gouging the ROW.. )
1998 to 2000 growth slowed down,(Due to the tradeing card games.)(£76M to £91M from memory.)
2001 to 2004 , GW plc '...grew fat and lazy on the back of easy sucess...' of the LoTR licence.(Admitted by Mr Kirby.)
Thier turn over went up to £151M!(From memory.)
Then the LotR bubble burst.
And GW plc started loosing sales volumes.So GW plc put prices up to cover lost sales volumes, and the sales volumes plummeted faster.
SO GW plc increased the retail prices again to make up for lost sales volumes , and guess what happened!
I remember reading a report on here where the projected turn over adjusted for the rate of inlfation (average UK.)
EG all values in todays money.
Showed 2004 turn over at £174 M.(From memory.)
So GW plc lost 28% of its customers after the LoTR boom.
But how much did they loose if we factor in the price rises over inflation since then?( GW plc prices have more or less doubled on average , after infation is taken into acount.)
Odly enough its about half of its sales volumes.
Who would have thunk it?
Writing rules specificaly for a fickel demoghraphic that dont promote long term interest.Coupled with raising prices over inflation every year.
Actualy looses you customer faster than you can recoup money of the remaining ones!
When the game developers were left alone to develop and support a wide range of games for gamers, GW doubled its turn over every 3 years.
Since Kirby decided GW plc '...is in the buisness of selling toy soldier to children...' they have lost sales volumes ever since.
Before some one points out Kirby was at GW from 1986 ,he lead the managment buy out in 1992 etc.
He only started to 'influence ' games development in 1998.( 40k 3rd ed .)And had 'heavy influence' on game development since the early 2000s.
(All figures from memory are within the 10M mark(Eg £76 M, is definatley 70 somethingM. )
If those numbers are near correct, then they're doing horrid compared to then. Factor in inflation and they make less than half of what they did during the LotR bubble.
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Post by: Rayvon
Grimtuff wrote:Rayvon wrote:I have heard people have this discussions for about ten, fifteen years now, and GW dont go anywhere.
Really? On the Internet in 1997 discussing the death of GW were we? Pull the other one. Thing is GW WERE in major danger of dying on their arse 15 years ago due to the Pokemon craze that sucked away their main demographic quicker than... something that does that. GW held on, due to setting ruthless daily sale targets for their stores and other factors then came their boom period from LOTR, which incidentally was about 10 years ago, another period where I highly doubt people would have been preaching doom about GW.
All it takes is another Pokemon to come along and GW is dead in the water.
Where did i mention the internet o wise one ?
Why would i lie ?
People have been saying GW is committing suicide by for the past fifteen years with the constant price hikes like it or not.
They wont be going anywhere, i assure you.
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Post by: Lanrak
Hello again.
just got some official numbers .(After the LoTR bubble burst in 2005 to last year.)
Turn over.
2005=£135.08M
2006=£114.88M
2007=£109.50M
2008=£110.34M
2009=£125.70M
2010=£126.51M
2011=£123.05M
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Post by: Makaleth
Wow, so still not caught up to the 2005 peak... might be 10 years at this rate.
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Post by: Dawnbringer
Using the Bank of England's inflation calculator, I get these results indexed to 2011
2005: £165.49M
2006: £136.38M
2007: £124.65M
2008: £120.79M
2009: £138.34M
2010: £133.09M
2011: £123.05M
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Post by: PhantomViper
Lanrak wrote:Hello again.
just got some official numbers .(After the LoTR bubble burst in 2005 to last year.)
Turn over.
2005=£135.08M
2006=£114.88M
2007=£109.50M
2008=£110.34M
2009=£125.70M
2010=£126.51M
2011=£123.05M
I'm willing to bet that 6th edition 40K won't bring that much income as 5th did in 2009! 
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Post by: Grimtuff
J.Black wrote:Fetterkey wrote:
What's with this "HHHobby" meme?
It seems to be an in-joke for the MODs and DCMs...... I wouldn't worry about it
I believe it is a reference to the character Simon Quinlank (King of Hobbies!) From the sketch show "Fist of fun"
http://www.containsmoderateperil.com/simon-quinlank-king-of-all-hobbies
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Post by: Palindrome
Rayvon wrote:
They wont be going anywhere, i assure you.
The key word that you are missing is 'yet'.
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Post by: frozenwastes
Dawnbringer wrote:Using the Bank of England's inflation calculator, I get these results indexed to 2011
2005: £165.49M
2006: £136.38M
2007: £124.65M
2008: £120.79M
2009: £138.34M
2010: £133.09M
2011: £123.05M
Ouch.
In the end it doesn't matter though. Current GW managment will use the company to retire rich. The health of the company can be someone else's problem at that point
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Post by: Lanrak
Just to point out 2004 was the highest year of turn overs for GW plc.
(The hight of the LoTR boom.actual turn over was in the £150M to £160M mark!)
And if you look at the price increses of product from then to now...
20 IG Catachans were £12 .Same models as now.
What are they selling for now.(Should be about £18 for 20 for inflation over this period.)
£18 for TEN!!!!!
Thats about double the price over inflation!
So from 2005 if GW plc had constant sales volumes , they would be turning over £331M now....flipin eck it worse than even I though it was!
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Post by: Just Dave
And the money made in the past couple of years should include the cost-cutting practices I'd imagine too, such as fewer shops/staff etc.
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Post by: Surtur
Just Dave wrote:And the money made in the past couple of years should include the cost-cutting practices I'd imagine too, such as fewer shops/staff etc.
I believe this is all revenue we've been talking about so it will have no show as to profits and costs.
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Post by: loki old fart
I can't understand why GW didn't franchise their stores out.
The onus being on the owner/manager to make the store profitable.
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Post by: Mad4Minis
loki old fart wrote:I can't understand why GW didn't franchise their stores out.
The onus being on the owner/manager to make the store profitable.
Becuase they want direct control over every aspect of the store operation.
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
Mad4Minis wrote:Becuase they want direct control over every aspect of everything ever.
Fixed it for ya.
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Post by: redkeyboard
Mad4Minis wrote:loki old fart wrote:I can't understand why GW didn't franchise their stores out.
The onus being on the owner/manager to make the store profitable.
Becuase they want direct control over every aspect of the store operation.
Even as a franchise they would. The franchisee would only run the store. Hiwever they would have to follow regulations and run the store how they are told to. So they must have the uniforme they are told to and sell at the prices they are told to.
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Post by: brettz123
SilverMK2 wrote:Many people probably would not know there was a tabletop game version of the Hobbit, since GW don't bother advertising to anyone who is not already buying their stuff... and given that no one seemed to play LOTR even a couple of years after it was released, I can't see anyone other than the very keen buying any of the Hobbit stuff.
Seems like a fairly foolish assumption on your part considering how well the LOTR miniatures sold when the films were still fresh. Most likely the same thing will happen for the Hobbit (well at least we have no reason to think differently). Should be a nice big bubble for 2-3 years and then it will suddenly drop off.
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Post by: zilegil
I.E.: GW needs PR. **Evil smile**
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Post by: doc1234
Barksdale wrote:I'm going to play devil's advocate here. Yes, prices are rising. However, there are two things that you people are not considering.
First, price increases occur in every product you buy. Sometimes you may not even notice it. What alot of companies do is to decrease the quantitiy of what you get, but keep the price the same, which is in effect a price increase. I'll give the example of cereal products here.
Sorry here, some amazzingly wordered and balanced arguments here, but this for some reason just put the thought in my head of...well minis in the cereal boxes :') ridiculous of course, but just reminded me when they used to x3 imagine opening your khorneflakes and finding a little plastic terminator
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Post by: Pacific
brettz123 wrote:SilverMK2 wrote:Many people probably would not know there was a tabletop game version of the Hobbit, since GW don't bother advertising to anyone who is not already buying their stuff... and given that no one seemed to play LOTR even a couple of years after it was released, I can't see anyone other than the very keen buying any of the Hobbit stuff.
Seems like a fairly foolish assumption on your part considering how well the LOTR miniatures sold when the films were still fresh. Most likely the same thing will happen for the Hobbit (well at least we have no reason to think differently). Should be a nice big bubble for 2-3 years and then it will suddenly drop off.
I would be very, very surprised if the Hobbit films reach the hype and fever pitch that the LoTR films did. People forget the ridiculous amount of media coverage that those films got, even in the regular press, because they were genuinely doing something new and exciting.
I have no doubt that Peter Jackson will make a good job of the hobbit film (sorry.. films..  ), and that some people will purchase LoTR stock because of the films. But, I was working in GW at the time those original films came out, and it was absolutely mental - the stock was selling quicker than we could put it on the shelves. It was a really exciting time. I just can't imagine these films reaching anything like that level of shopper-games console at christmas-style frenzy, there just hasn't been the build-up to them.
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Post by: DarthOvious
brettz123 wrote:SilverMK2 wrote:Many people probably would not know there was a tabletop game version of the Hobbit, since GW don't bother advertising to anyone who is not already buying their stuff... and given that no one seemed to play LOTR even a couple of years after it was released, I can't see anyone other than the very keen buying any of the Hobbit stuff.
Seems like a fairly foolish assumption on your part considering how well the LOTR miniatures sold when the films were still fresh. Most likely the same thing will happen for the Hobbit (well at least we have no reason to think differently). Should be a nice big bubble for 2-3 years and then it will suddenly drop off.
The problem with LOTR was that it was set-up all stupid. It was really badly planned with releases in my opinion. Plus it's not really a game of factions, so I don't play it as I like the feel of "It's my species vs yours". LOTR only had Good vs Bad. It they made so you could have Rohan vs Dwarfs then it would have been much better. GW now have a second chance to do this properly and get people not only into the game but keep them into it as well.
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Post by: Surtur
You can play good vs good, just declare someone to be evil for the sake of roll offs. DONE.
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Post by: SoloFalcon1138
Sorry for the reiteration, but I just noticed the otjer rantfest was locked.
Ascalam wrote:
Doesn't help that the CEo sees the company as his personal piggybank
I would love to see it acquired by another company that cares about the customers (and then brought to heel, with all the races equal in power, equally supported and with great fluff and awesome, yet well balanced.
First, be careful making statements like this without some sort of evidence.
Second, if this happened, the perfect game would be conceived and no one would play any other game... in other words, no one will ever release a game encompassing all of this. Compromise and moderation are the secrets to sanity.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
sparkywtf wrote: It will falter and hopefully someone will pick up the IP, but that will probably just lead us all to disappointment with prepainted soft plastic kits.
What needs to happen is some multimillionaire decides to buy a bunch of stock who actually likes the hobby (and not the hhhoby) and tells Kirby, Ward, and a few others to feth off.
And third, quit with this crap. If you can do a better job, why aren't you? The Kirby/Ward/anyone else rants weren't funny months ago, and like cheese, they don't get better with age...
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Still, most intrigued by Ascalam's assertion that GW os collapsing because the CEOis using the company as his piggy bank. Evidence?
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Post by: Trasvi
Armchair accountants on the internets have noticed that Kirby owns ~7% of the shares in GW. Meaning that every time the company issues a dividend, Kirby receives an amount of money exceeding his annual salary.
Never mind that it is sensible and desirable for a CEO to own a stake (even a controlling stake) in their own company, or that paying dividends is fairly standard practice for a large number of publicly traded companies.
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Post by: Lanrak
Just some clarification.
Mr Tom Kirby is the Chairman of GW plc .(He used to be the CEO AND Chairman, untill it became illegal. )
Ascalam, is simply using a theory that fits with the financial actions of GW plc.
After the LoTR bubble burst.Mr Kirby said that they ,(corperate mangment) had grown ' fat and lazy' on the easy sucess the LoTR brought.
Obviously something had to change .After making lots of low paid workers redundant at GW plc, Kirby got a pay rise.
Rather than investing time and money into a full study of markets and demoghraphics ,(only corperate managers can enable this.)To gain better synergy with GW plc potential customer base, and grow the buisness.
GW plc corperate managment simply kept on putting up prices, over the rate of inflation, to make up for falling sales volumes, just like they did when they were 'fat and lazy.'
Some could draw the conclusion that NOT investing in GW plc future , but using the money to pay out large share bonuses.
MAY have something to do with Mr Kirby being the largest individual owner of GW plc shares,and how close he is to retireing...
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Post by: Chimera_Calvin
Don't know if this has been mentioned but I found the interview with Rick Priestley on Beasts of War fascinating - how effectively GW was a bunch of punk game designers when TSR's UK operation folded and Tom Kirby then came into the business and brought a load of people with him. It made me think that in the early days the 'corporate' outlook that he brought was probably essential in turning GW into the success that it was (otherwise it may just have fizzled out as too many undisciplined creative types may not have been able to make the company work cohesively). However, the pendulum has been slowly swinging too far the other way and GW has now lost the spark of madness that made it great in the first place. Rick Priestley himself bemoaned the way that he (and others) concieved 40k as being a universe so big that anything you could imagine would find a home there, but the current rules and background for 40k have restricted this to almost an 'our way or the highway' approach - something which seems to have given rise to the incessant retconning as a desperate attempt to have something 'new' to write with each new book. For myself I think GW has just got bloated. Too many games, too many publications, too many factions, too many stores. There are a lot of solutions to the problems they have (indeed some are fairly obvious) but it seems that GW is unwilling or unable to make a course correction. I think its fair to say that the age and financial plans of senior board members is a part of this, but mainly it is down to the fact that the majority shareholders are simply funds whose managers have no interest in or knowledge of the company beyond its bottom line. They are interested in short-medium term profits and share dividends, not long term sustainable growth (and certainly not if such growth would have a short-term financial impact). Just a few thoughts (and by the way before someone comes along with the 'so if you could do so much better why aren't you running it then' line I'd be happy to. Anyone going to give me the job? )
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Post by: brettz123
DarthOvious wrote:brettz123 wrote:SilverMK2 wrote:Many people probably would not know there was a tabletop game version of the Hobbit, since GW don't bother advertising to anyone who is not already buying their stuff... and given that no one seemed to play LOTR even a couple of years after it was released, I can't see anyone other than the very keen buying any of the Hobbit stuff.
Seems like a fairly foolish assumption on your part considering how well the LOTR miniatures sold when the films were still fresh. Most likely the same thing will happen for the Hobbit (well at least we have no reason to think differently). Should be a nice big bubble for 2-3 years and then it will suddenly drop off.
The problem with LOTR was that it was set-up all stupid. It was really badly planned with releases in my opinion. Plus it's not really a game of factions, so I don't play it as I like the feel of "It's my species vs yours". LOTR only had Good vs Bad. It they made so you could have Rohan vs Dwarfs then it would have been much better. GW now have a second chance to do this properly and get people not only into the game but keep them into it as well.
You can certainly play good vs good or bad vs bad with LOTR not sure why you think you can't. I don't think LOTR will ever be a giant seller after the movies fade from the main stream consciousness. It has been hashed over multiple times in the past but many people buy what they need from the movies and then there isn't much interest in getting miniatures that deviate from what is considered canonical. But that is fine as long as you treat the bubble like a bubble. It brings in a large amount of extra money for a short period of time which can be used for other things and that is about it.
It will hopefully revitalize GW and get them through this rough patch and back to where they need to be.
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Post by: RatBot
I think they might get a bit of a spike when the Hobbit is released, but that will, unfortunately, mask the slow decline as the popularity of the Hobbit fades. They've still got quite a bit of time left, for sure, we'll certainly see 9th WHFB and 7th 40K, but after that, I'm not so sure. The company will still exist, thanks to their lucrative licensing, but they might not be producing miniatures and rules for miniatures in a decade, barring some huge change somewhere along the line.
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Post by: BrotherVord
Kiwidru wrote:They've already blown thier video game rep (which is one of the most social networks in terms of opinion trending) by having Warhammer Online, Dawn of War 2, and now Space Marine all fail using the same tabletop marketing strategy: How to act like a monopoly while losing the controlling share of the population.
I mean a gaming company that makes an archaic RTS analog should be doing whatever it can to increase popularity, yet they cut all sponsored funding for events (Being 'Established' already was the only thing keeping GW afloat in terms of intrest), which to me is like saying, "Our company is becoming increasingly obscure, our products have dropped in quality, our prices have increased 15% per year despite this, all forays into other media have failed due to a lack of corporate response to the community (which is a telescoping timeline that would have been reached already in tabletop if GW proper had to answer to compaints on a forum), and now we arnt going to offer ANY incentive to play our game over Warma-Hordes, or Dust Warfare, or Starcraft, or D3...
Dawn of War 2 isn't a failure...it has actually done really well, but commercially and critically.
Warhammer Online and Space Marine also did not do horribly...though not as critically acclaimed, they certainly still have a following and were not at all panned by critics. (though neither game got quite the positive reception of the Dawn of War series has, and deservedly so)
I just disagree with your stance on GW's videogames...the last 5 years has actually produced a lot of quality content.
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Post by: H.B.M.C.
RatBot wrote:I think they might get a bit of a spike when the Hobbit is released, but that will, unfortunately, mask the slow decline as the popularity of the Hobbit fades.
It will be a good smokescreen for the next few financial reports. Things will spike this year, next year and a bit of 2014 thanks to The Hobbit (and we'll get 2 price increases in that time, despite the extra income the movies will generate). Then for another 2-3 years they'll blame the Hobbit 'bubble' bursting, and that will be the way they brush their declining sales under the rug. After that we'll get the more realistic take, and that's when 9th/7th will appear.
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Post by: Palindrome
BrotherVord wrote:
I just disagree with your stance on GW's videogames...the last 5 years has actually produced a lot of quality content.
GW has had varying success with games over the years with some good but niche games like Final Liberation and Chaos Gate but also some horrors like Rites of War. Dawn of War is what really put GW on the computer gaming map. Dow 2 is still a good game, Space Marine did ok from a sales point of view (and was an adequate game) and WAR suffered from being a WoW clone.
If GW was more selective over the types of games that they allow ot be licensed then they could make a lot of money; for instance Warhammer:Total War would almost certainly by highly successful.
I don't know how the Hobbit will play out for GW, it will almost certainly increase LotR sales but almost certainly not to LotR levels. Once the last Hobbit film has been released then GW will be left entirely on its own so in an ideal world if the Hobbit does bring in a significant sales increase it would be an ideal time to reduce prices.
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Post by: Surtur
WAR didn't suffer from being a WoW clone, it suffered from severe suck. The graphics could be compared to Half Life 1, the animation was terrible and the game lagged.
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Post by: Palindrome
Wow clones are usually "severe suck" due to their very nature. For an MMO the graphics and visuals weren't bad, it was the already decade old game play that killed it. Rather ironically DAoC (mythics orignial MMO) actually has better PvP despite being release din 2002.
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Post by: Necro
If they released Total War: Warhammer I would buy it in a heartbeat.
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Post by: Surtur
Mount and Blade: Warhammer.
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Post by: rockerbikie
They will eventually die due to price increasing too much.
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Post by: wuestenfux
Kroothawk wrote:GW already has reached the limit where price hikes don't lead to higher revenue but are completely eaten up by lower sales and lost customers. It is only a matter of time when revenue falls down sharply. Only the total retirement of Tom Kirby and a total exchange of management can save GW.
In fact, this kind of break even point might have already been reached.
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Post by: Jordan
I know absolutely nothing about exactly what they're doing or thinking. A friend of mine seems to think GW is raising prices in part to be a sort of "designer" game, in addition to smoothing out their sales throughout the year. Like I said, I don't know, but that's a decent theory.
Personally, I don't really care. I'm not buying NEARLY as many GW miniatures any more, and my purchasing will probably decline even further. I designed my own IG regiment thing from scratch along with vehicles and i"m casting that stuff up for myself. I've gotten into Warpath, and if 6th is crap, that'll be my main game. I've been on a downward slide for a while, mostly because I don't care for how GW doesn't give it's gamers ANYTHING. No hints, no news, nothing.
I have a friend who's practically boycotting GW not only because they seem to jerk customers around, but also because the prices have increased way too much for his liking. He's done.
So to answer OP's question: Yes, I think GW is committing a slow corporate suicide.
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Post by: TechMarine1
Mad4Minis wrote:They wont go out of business. They are reaching the point where the "sell less at a higher price" business model will fail. That, combined with the flood of other good games at cheaper prices will force them to go to the "sell more volume for lower price" model in order to build thier sales volume and regain customer base.
Pretty much this. Even the most inept person working there has to realize at some point that they are losing customers and have to drastically lower prices. The question is, will it be too late to make a difference.
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Post by: deggreg@yahoo.com
lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
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Post by: loki old fart
deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
As a general rule that top 1% doesn't want their children to play warhammer.
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Post by: RatBot
Actually, what deggreg just said is so unbelievably mental I'm not even going to bother with a response other than GW may want the 1%, but they're delusional if they think there are enough 1%'ers who are both interested in tabletop gaming and willing to spend a premium on it to keep the company afloat.
I've already moved on to a better and cheaper alternative, thanks.
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Post by: Shadowbrand
GW fanboys vs PP fanboys.
/popcorn
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Post by: Kanluwen
Surtur wrote:WAR didn't suffer from being a WoW clone, it suffered from severe suck. The graphics could be compared to Half Life 1, the animation was terrible and the game lagged.
The game didn't lag--it was a memory leak issue which took them a bit to solve.
The biggest problem that it suffered from, quite simply, is that people expected a lot from a MMO launch. You see it every time a MMO launches, where inevitably everyone compares it to "the launch of WoW which was totally flawless"(it wasn't. The launch of WoW was a fething trainwreck. The servers constantly crashed, they had memory leak issues, peoples' account registration didn't work, people were billed multiple times per subscription period, etc. Inevitably, the same thing happens every expansion launch for WoW as well).
They also had a big problem in that Blizzard superdupersubtly decided to have the "Wrath of the Lich King" preview patch (which unleashed all the WOTLK talent trees) launch the very next week after WAR was doing semi-okay.
Blizzard did the same thing this year, announcing the "Mists of Panderia" expansion when The Old Republic launched. It's their MO. It's sneaky, it's underhanded, and there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it. People will inevitably flock back to Blizzard and WoW simply because it's a "better game"(which has had a little over half a decade to polish itself up) and they don't want to suffer through the launch of a MMO.
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Post by: RatBot
Kanluwen wrote:Surtur wrote:WAR didn't suffer from being a WoW clone, it suffered from severe suck. The graphics could be compared to Half Life 1, the animation was terrible and the game lagged.
The game didn't lag--it was a memory leak issue which took them a bit to solve.
The biggest problem that it suffered from, quite simply, is that people expected a lot from a MMO launch. You see it every time a MMO launches, where inevitably everyone compares it to "the launch of WoW which was totally flawless"(it wasn't. The launch of WoW was a fething trainwreck. The servers constantly crashed, they had memory leak issues, peoples' account registration didn't work, people were billed multiple times per subscription period, etc. Inevitably, the same thing happens every expansion launch for WoW as well).
They also had a big problem in that Blizzard superdupersubtly decided to have the "Wrath of the Lich King" preview patch (which unleashed all the WOTLK talent trees) launch the very next week after WAR was doing semi-okay.
Blizzard did the same thing this year, announcing the "Mists of Panderia" expansion when The Old Republic launched. It's their MO. It's sneaky, it's underhanded, and there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it. People will inevitably flock back to Blizzard and WoW simply because it's a "better game"(which has had a little over half a decade to polish itself up) and they don't want to suffer through the launch of a MMO.
Pretty much this, though I think the gross class imbalances in PvP and Mythic's spectacular slowness in addressing them (instead, in fact, choosing to add the Land of the Dead update before doing so) also really hurt it. Obviously perfect balance is difficult, if not impossible, to achieve, but WAR didn't even come close.
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Post by: deggreg@yahoo.com
loki old fart wrote:deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
As a general rule that top 1% doesn't want their children to play warhammer.
what do you base this statement on?
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Post by: Shadowbrand
Even rich people have hobbies. I know if I was bringing in the cash. I'd have one of those 10,000 point strong Space Marine army, like I see in some Dakkaites sigs.
However mark my words. GW cannot keep this up much longer, they will get a reckoning in the pocket.
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Post by: heartserenade
deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:loki old fart wrote:deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
As a general rule that top 1% doesn't want their children to play warhammer.
what do you base this statement on?
Your own statement is based on anecdotal evidence, so it's pretty much par for the course.
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Post by: deggreg@yahoo.com
heartserenade wrote:deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:loki old fart wrote:deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
As a general rule that top 1% doesn't want their children to play warhammer.
what do you base this statement on?
ha..i guess ur right. I will say that my local GW, and I've been there twice since the price hike, is still busy and positive and fun and like I said, I saw dude move $700 of product in 2 hours to people who obviously didn't care that the stormraven is seven million dollars now. If there is a pullback from GW, it's not showing up in store traffic...and that's from what I've actually seen .
Your own statement is based on anecdotal evidence, so it's pretty much par for the course.
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Post by: Orlanth
Actuaklly while i hate the policy GW price rises are fairly sound busines policy.
Yes increased prices do drive down sales, but obviously not by enough, however reduced sales do also reduce overheads, for example if prices double you need only seel half as much, which means you only need to produce and stock half as much.
GW are exploring their market, watching very carefully what happens at every level of price rise. At some point they will have to stop, except to account for general inflation.
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Post by: skkipper
loki old fart wrote:deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
As a general rule that top 1% doesn't want their children to play warhammer.
as a parent and in the top 5%, I am ok with my kids playing warhammer.
Warhammer is a hobby. it is artistic and challenging and cheap.
for a $1000 you can go pickup almost any 2k army and the rules and keep you busy for years.
GW is way cheaper then my other hobbies, like car restoration and kite boarding.
Hell i spend more on booze in a year then I do in games workshop.
the Ork bommas were cool i picked up three. GW will not go out of business. They will keep chugging along.
haters will hate.
people need to look at other hobbies and see the warhammer is not that expensive.
59491
Post by: d3m01iti0n
GW is fine. Ive been in auto retail most of my employed life and you want to talk yearly price increase? And you may argue that everybody needs a car, but not everybody needs a Cobra, Supra, or something excessive. But if you are the type of person those units appeal to, then you will find a way to purchase and maintain it. And you will pay the inflated prices for the "good stuff" oil, tires, mods, etc. Maybe in a few years youll upgrade to a new model that is ten grand more than what you bought before. And you will do it with a smile on your face because thats your hobby, your love, your pride and joy, your lifestyle.
I dont smile when i dump 500 bucks a year on rear tires for my Cobra. I grumble and mutter halfass GW complaints to the cashier when i fork out 50+ dollars on a bunch of plastic space men. But i bust my ass to make a decent amount of money and when I put another cocky driver in my rearview or i wipe that last drop of paint onto a tiny plastic scroll i realize its worth it, im creating memories, and thank god im not glued onto COD or some other garbage pasttime.
My only comment on the status of GW is i hope they are able to sort their video game issues out. That is a huge gateway to draw people to the hobby (Space Marine is the entire reason im here today, $1000+ poorer lol). And they need more of a push into the media. A movie for instance. Merch would help too. Clothing, scale action figures, stickers for the car, etc.
41268
Post by: Deepeyes
Wow some people have their heads up their own rear in this thread.
I am not sure if this has been posted yet. Very informative.
http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2012/06/editorial-gw-double-edged-sword-of.html
If I recall correctly there hasn't been a price hike in AUS/NZ this year. It could mean that they have possibly hit the point where raising prices there is hurting them more in those regions. We will just have to wait and see.
53708
Post by: TedNugent
Just a thought. I have an avid interest in art and art history, and I am proficient in sculpting, painting, and drawing with various media, point being, I can accurately render your face in clay, stone, in oil on canvas, acrylic, with pencil, charcoal, or pastel.
This hobby is not "artistic." If you want to get your kids something artistic, get them a few heavy weight sheets of paper and a set of Prismacolors or pastels and pay for a few art lessons.
This is about having a hobby, modeling, splicing, making beautiful models conceptualized by other professional artists and showing them off to others. It's about playing games, making friends, and most of all, enjoying the intellectual property that Games Workshop has a death grip over. In return, they continue to pay artists and designers and Codex writers and professional writers to create high quality master sculpts, concept art, Codexes and Codex art, and books. In other words, your function is to enjoy, or amalgamate into your lifestyle, the art that other people have produced.
There is nothing wrong with this. Filmmakers watch Akira Kurosawa and Citizen Kane and appreciate its beauty. I am stunned by the majesty of sculpture and tapestry in the city's art museums. I am stunned by the art in GW's codexes, by the creativity of their designs, by the complexity of their universe and the rich flavor of it. It's why I would rather play 40k or nothing at all.
But if you were really creative, or interested in a creative pursuit, you wouldn't need GW beyond their simple industrial base and the raw material and bits they produce. And the fact of the matter is that higher quality and more ductile materials exist than the ones that you will find on your local GW shop for creative expression. Canvas, paint, hammer and chisel, granite. Michelangelo crafted The David without reference to Codex Space Marines.
I have never seen such a flaccid deflection as the idea that you continue, tepidly, to pursue funding Games Workshop for the purpose of developing your kids' artistic skills. If that's the case, I would seriously suggest that you consult me or someone better educated, preferably a professional, on an actual avenue that would develop your children's, or your own, creative talents.
46907
Post by: EldarN00b
Admittedly, this has been one hell of an interesting thread and a damn long lasting one at that.
Great to see constructive observations from the community.
20880
Post by: loki old fart
deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:loki old fart wrote:deggreg@yahoo.com wrote:lol at you guys. I'm at my local GW yesterday, putting together a razorback....and the place is packed. I saw 2-3 doom scythes go off the shelf, someone bought a Stormraven..and then a family who sounded australian came in and had a stack of boxes (chaos stuff I think) that was 4 feet high. Oh, I was there for maybe 2 hours.
GW is fine, their model is fine. Here's the thing, everybody who complains about the price...as mean as it is...they don't WANT you to buy anything. They don't want average regular people with average salaries (or who's parents have average salaries) to be the heart of the hobby. They want the top 1% of salary earners to drop loads of money on something creative and well "exclusive".
GW is fine, if you can't afford something now...it's because they don't want you. Accept it and move onto a horrible and cheap alternative...
As a general rule that top 1% doesn't want their children to play warhammer.
what do you base this statement on?
The old mans birthday. Did he want to buy an army? no. He spent all day negotiating for a 75, 000 pound boat, and mooring fee's....
If you want to white knight, at least be credible.
PS If you want a boat got some beautiful one's at the mulberry marina Conway 
skkipper wrote:
as a parent and in the top 5%, I am ok with my kids playing warhammer.
Warhammer is a hobby. it is artistic and challenging and cheap.
for a $1000 you can go pickup almost any 2k army and the rules and keep you busy for years.
GW is way cheaper then my other hobbies, like car restoration and kite boarding.
Hell i spend more on booze in a year then I do in games workshop.
the Ork bommas were cool i picked up three. GW will not go out of business. They will keep chugging along.
haters will hate.  so old sing something else
people need to look at other hobbies and see the warhammer is not that expensive.
Well that's one customer then, only a few thousand to go.
57786
Post by: pitboy2710
TedNugent wrote:Just a thought. I have an avid interest in art and art history, and I am proficient in sculpting, painting, and drawing with various media, point being, I can accurately render your face in clay, stone, in oil on canvas, acrylic, with pencil, charcoal, or pastel.
This hobby is not "artistic." If you want to get your kids something artistic, get them a few heavy weight sheets of paper and a set of Prismacolors or pastels and pay for a few art lessons.
This is about having a hobby, modeling, splicing, making beautiful models conceptualized by other professional artists and showing them off to others. It's about playing games, making friends, and most of all, enjoying the intellectual property that Games Workshop has a death grip over. In return, they continue to pay artists and designers and Codex writers and professional writers to create high quality master sculpts, concept art, Codexes and Codex art, and books. In other words, your function is to enjoy, or amalgamate into your lifestyle, the art that other people have produced.
There is nothing wrong with this. Filmmakers watch Akira Kurosawa and Citizen Kane and appreciate its beauty. I am stunned by the majesty of sculpture and tapestry in the city's art museums. I am stunned by the art in GW's codexes, by the creativity of their designs, by the complexity of their universe and the rich flavor of it. It's why I would rather play 40k or nothing at all.
But if you were really creative, or interested in a creative pursuit, you wouldn't need GW beyond their simple industrial base and the raw material and bits they produce. And the fact of the matter is that higher quality and more ductile materials exist than the ones that you will find on your local GW shop for creative expression. Canvas, paint, hammer and chisel, granite. Michelangelo crafted The David without reference to Codex Space Marines.
I have never seen such a flaccid deflection as the idea that you continue, tepidly, to pursue funding Games Workshop for the purpose of developing your kids' artistic skills. If that's the case, I would seriously suggest that you consult me or someone better educated, preferably a professional, on an actual avenue that would develop your children's, or your own, creative talents.
My parents buying me a paint set and some minis when i was a kid was what got me interested in art.
44255
Post by: Rayvon
TedNugent wrote:Just a thought. I have an avid interest in art and art history, and I am proficient in sculpting, painting, and drawing with various media, point being, I can accurately render your face in clay, stone, in oil on canvas, acrylic, with pencil, charcoal, or pastel.
This hobby is not "artistic." If you want to get your kids something artistic, get them a few heavy weight sheets of paper and a set of Prismacolors or pastels and pay for a few art lessons.
This is about having a hobby, modeling, splicing, making beautiful models conceptualized by other professional artists and showing them off to others. It's about playing games, making friends, and most of all, enjoying the intellectual property that Games Workshop has a death grip over. In return, they continue to pay artists and designers and Codex writers and professional writers to create high quality master sculpts, concept art, Codexes and Codex art, and books. In other words, your function is to enjoy, or amalgamate into your lifestyle, the art that other people have produced.
There is nothing wrong with this. Filmmakers watch Akira Kurosawa and Citizen Kane and appreciate its beauty. I am stunned by the majesty of sculpture and tapestry in the city's art museums. I am stunned by the art in GW's codexes, by the creativity of their designs, by the complexity of their universe and the rich flavor of it. It's why I would rather play 40k or nothing at all.
But if you were really creative, or interested in a creative pursuit, you wouldn't need GW beyond their simple industrial base and the raw material and bits they produce. And the fact of the matter is that higher quality and more ductile materials exist than the ones that you will find on your local GW shop for creative expression. Canvas, paint, hammer and chisel, granite. Michelangelo crafted The David without reference to Codex Space Marines.
I have never seen such a flaccid deflection as the idea that you continue, tepidly, to pursue funding Games Workshop for the purpose of developing your kids' artistic skills. If that's the case, I would seriously suggest that you consult me or someone better educated, preferably a professional, on an actual avenue that would develop your children's, or your own, creative talents.
What an arrogant condescending post, not to mention incorrect. Like it or not, mini painting is a hell of a lot more artistic than most passtimes a child endulges in, and anything that can encourage children to be more artistic is a good thing.
Im sorry we all do not match up to your artistic greatness, but you have to realise, us normal people do not all share your opinions.
For many younglings, this hobby is an entry point into something artistic, which they would not otherwise indulge in.
28295
Post by: TiB
TedNugent wrote:This hobby is not "artistic." If you want to get your kids something artistic, get them a few heavy weight sheets of paper and a set of Prismacolors or pastels and pay for a few art lessons.
Well, as an illustrator, I do think this hobby is artistic.
Yes you can give your kids all the best quality art supplies in the world and tell them to create, but they'll just shrug and go play xbox.
I see this hobby as kind of 'gateway art'. It allows you to be creative (colour schemes, painting technique, conversions) within well-defined boundaries. It introduces kids to an artistic environment in which they can achieve good looking results within a reasonable timeframe and not have to suffer through years of gakky drawings before anything worthwhile comes out.
People who spray their marines blue and call it a day were never going to be interested in art in the first place, but people who might otherwise not have picked up a brush and realise they like it may well venture deeper into the creative world.
Pitboy2710 wrote:My parents buying me a paint set and some minis when i was a kid was what got me interested in art.
my point
53059
Post by: dæl
So, people are spending less money on expensive non essentials during a global recession, who would have thought it.
10093
Post by: Sidstyler
Rayvon wrote:What an arrogant condescending post, not to mention incorrect.
Would you say it's more or less condescending than the guy basically saying "I have a Cobra, I make a lot of money, and I think the prices are fine."?
I hate that gak so much, lol. "Tires for my sports car cost almost as much as your army, so you have no right to complain!" Must be fething nice. I work my ass off too you know, still can't afford GW.
Which is how it should be, apparently. Us inferior, bottom-feeding dregs would just hurt GW and their brand by being seen in their prestigious stores, playing with their world-renowned miniatures. We were wrong to get all uppity and start thinking we were worthy enough to play, we all need to stop kidding ourselves and go back to wallowing in our shitholes, enjoying our horrible, cheap, garbage pasttimes.
6987
Post by: Chimera_Calvin
The actual issue is that GW has little real competition.
Regardless of how they 'see themselves' or whether they want to be a 'boutique product' (or whatever corporate flim-flam people feel a need to throw into this debate as justification for their seemingly endless price rises) the points are simple.
Compared to their competitors:
1. They have very poor and unbalanced rules.
2. Their miniatures are vastly overcosted for the quantity and quality of the casts themselves (finecast are easily some of the worst resin pieces you will find despite their premium pricetag, the plastics are just as good as any other companies but again the price-per-model is about the highest you will find).
3. They do not communicate with their customers, accept no feedback or advertise effectively (or indeed, at all).
4. They do not support factions (or whole games!) for excessive periods of time.
BUT:
5. They have a very well-established background that (for all the recent Necron-related retconning) has wide appeal and acceptance amongst the gaming community.
6. Their plastic kits have a much greater degree of flexibilty to customise models than normal and have more and crisper detail than other kits (due to design rather than casting).
7. They have a unique chain of brick-and-mortar stores effectively guaranteeing them a self-perpetuating player base that has no exposure to other games. Also their 'one stop shop' approach by providing paints, brushes, tools, scenery etc. means their customers do not need to go to other stores to look for gaming essentials, further limiting the likelihood of coming accross competitors.
8. They have a wide range of 'gateway' products such as Black Library novels and computer games that provide exposure outwith the normal gaming community and raises their public profile alongside their branded B&M stores.
9. They have a successful and well run schools league and other club tie-ins to encourage (particularly) younger gamers to invest in them.
In order for GW to have an incentive to fix 1-4 they need to be challenged on 5-9. Companies are getting there slowly on points 5 and 6 but for GW to address the issues that people have with them the key is to challenge the public perception that GW is the only show in town.
If Gamers were exposed to Infinity, Kings of War/Warpath, Warmachine/Hordes, Malifaux, Dystopian Wars/Uncharted Seas/Firestorm Armada etc not to mention the countless historicals systems from the start and could make informed judgements on their hobby at the buy-in point, GW would have no choice but to change the way it does business or its dominant position would be threatened.
The only question left is how can this be achieved?
31306
Post by: Brother Gyoken
Back in the late 90s/early 2000s, I ran a game store. GW business was booming locally for us. 40K/WFB models were pricey, but affordable enough that our regulars would start new armies after they finished with the current one. Specialist games actually brought in a decent amount too, with local Blood Bowl and Mordheim leagues.
Now I don't see anyone locally with more than one 40K army and/or one WFB army. The majority opinion is that it's just too expensive. I see a lot of these people starting WarmaHordes, Infinity and Malifaux, along with a couple that are super excited about Dropzone Commander.
The point I am trying to make is back then they were making money off veterans buying 2nd, 3rd, and even 4th armies. They have priced themselves out of that, to the point where some local players are even privately griping that they are considering selling their 40K armies rather than give GW more money for a new rulebook. That is dissatisfaction a competitor couldn't buy for GW.
1084
Post by: Agamemnon2
Rayvon wrote:What an arrogant condescending post, not to mention incorrect. Like it or not, mini painting is a hell of a lot more artistic than most passtimes a child endulges in, and anything that can encourage children to be more artistic is a good thing.
Im sorry we all do not match up to your artistic greatness, but you have to realise, us normal people do not all share your opinions.
For many younglings, this hobby is an entry point into something artistic, which they would not otherwise indulge in.
Painting 40k miniatures is to art what a tricycle is to owning a Kawasaki Ninja. You said it yourself, it's an entry point. Something to be surpassed. I paint decent looking miniatures, but I would never, ever call myself an artist of what I do to be art. That would be condescension.
This is not art.
It's a plastic toy with a Japanese masterpiece inexpertly copied on it. By me.
52163
Post by: Shandara
That particular example may not be 'art', but that can be said of many examples of what is surely called art by their creators, commonly found along highways or in suburbs.
To me, you can't define art, even though I'm sure many textbooks try to (and many people with them, claiming it as absolute truth).
1084
Post by: Agamemnon2
That's a very blinkered view of academia, FYI. I've never been taught a single "absolute truth" by a lecturer or professor. Well, except that Clint Eastwood is the greatest Western gunslinger protagonist in European cinema, but that's surely obvious.
48156
Post by: Lightcavalier
Chimera_Calvin wrote:The actual issue is that GW has little real competition.
If Gamers were exposed to Infinity, Kings of War/Warpath, Warmachine/Hordes, Malifaux, Dystopian Wars/Uncharted Seas/Firestorm Armada etc not to mention the countless historicals systems from the start and could make informed judgements on their hobby at the buy-in point, GW would have no choice but to change the way it does business or its dominant position would be threatened.
The only question left is how can this be achieved?
I dont fully disagree with you, but a little perspective helps sometimes.
I have never lived in a town with a GW shop. From day 1 I was exposed to a number of games, systems, etc. I went with GW for two reasons back then:
1. It had the staying power of having survived 15 years where many of the other games around me had come and gone when I was still a little kid
2. Scale....not one of the other games people tout as competition to 40k has yet offered me a game of sufficient size...most of them seem to be competing with Rogue Trader if anything.
Since then I have tried my hand at Infinity (to asian for my taste), warmachine (turned off by the players in my stores constant hate of GW), malifaux (meh), Firestorm Armada (no one played, wound up using the models to play Full Thrust), but I did pick up Dust Warfare...now I just need to convince other people to play it with me. This hobby only becomes an either or issue when you start dealing with the demographic who buy GW product as opposed to who they are marketing it it to.
50724
Post by: orkybenji
This thread actually turned into a "what is art" discussion. This is embarrassing.
20880
Post by: loki old fart
Chimera_Calvin wrote:The actual issue is that GW has little real competition.
Regardless of how they 'see themselves' or whether they want to be a 'boutique product' (or whatever corporate flim-flam people feel a need to throw into this debate as justification for their seemingly endless price rises) the points are simple.
Compared to their competitors:
1. They have very poor and unbalanced rules.
2. Their miniatures are vastly overcosted for the quantity and quality of the casts themselves (finecast are easily some of the worst resin pieces you will find despite their premium pricetag, the plastics are just as good as any other companies but again the price-per-model is about the highest you will find).
3. They do not communicate with their customers, accept no feedback or advertise effectively (or indeed, at all).
4. They do not support factions (or whole games!) for excessive periods of time.
BUT:
5. They have a very well-established background that (for all the recent Necron-related retconning) has wide appeal and acceptance amongst the gaming community.
6. Their plastic kits have a much greater degree of flexibilty to customise models than normal and have more and crisper detail than other kits (due to design rather than casting).
7. They have a unique chain of brick-and-mortar stores effectively guaranteeing them a self-perpetuating player base that has no exposure to other games. Also their 'one stop shop' approach by providing paints, brushes, tools, scenery etc. means their customers do not need to go to other stores to look for gaming essentials, further limiting the likelihood of coming accross competitors.
8. They have a wide range of 'gateway' products such as Black Library novels and computer games that provide exposure outwith the normal gaming community and raises their public profile alongside their branded B&M stores.
9. They have a successful and well run schools league and other club tie-ins to encourage (particularly) younger gamers to invest in them.
In order for GW to have an incentive to fix 1-4 they need to be challenged on 5-9. Companies are getting there slowly on points 5 and 6 but for GW to address the issues that people have with them the key is to challenge the public perception that GW is the only show in town.
If Gamers were exposed to Infinity, Kings of War/Warpath, Warmachine/Hordes, Malifaux, Dystopian Wars/Uncharted Seas/Firestorm Armada etc not to mention the countless historicals systems from the start and could make informed judgements on their hobby at the buy-in point, GW would have no choice but to change the way it does business or its dominant position would be threatened.
The only question left is how can this be achieved?
Until then GW will just increase prices.
The real tipping point for GW will be when enough people have left, that you cannot guarantee a game.
664
Post by: Grimtuff
Sidstyler wrote:Rayvon wrote:What an arrogant condescending post, not to mention incorrect.
Would you say it's more or less condescending than the guy basically saying "I have a Cobra, I make a lot of money, and I think the prices are fine."?
I hate that gak so much, lol. "Tires for my sports car cost almost as much as your army, so you have no right to complain!" Must be fething nice. I work my ass off too you know, still can't afford GW.
Which is how it should be, apparently. Us inferior, bottom-feeding dregs would just hurt GW and their brand by being seen in their prestigious stores, playing with their world-renowned miniatures. We were wrong to get all uppity and start thinking we were worthy enough to play, we all need to stop kidding ourselves and go back to wallowing in our shitholes, enjoying our horrible, cheap, garbage pasttimes.
Exalted.
Even though I can afford GW's products I refuse to buy them just on this principle. Do they really want a new generation of gamers that are mix of rich snobs and their spoiled offspring? They have lost their soul in pursuit of a quick buck. No wonder all of these "other" games are filled with GW "haters" as they've been kicked to the curb by something they've invested their time and money into.
I'll leave GW to the hoighty-toightys of this world. I work my arse off for my cash and if the (non local) gaming community now thinks you have to earn a certain wage to play GW's games I'll stick with other companies who are less discerning over what amount of money I earn.
I believe the advent of 6th ed. will truly show what kind of person GW wants to cater to. Sure I can afford to drop £45+ on a rulebook with a week's notice, but how many other gamers and/or parents can? When I got into this hobby, it was funded by the bank of mum and dad initially (then a paper round). If I said to my mum I *needed* (let's not kid ourselves here, this is pretty much a compulsary purchase) that kind of cash with only a weeks notice she'd tell me where to shove it.
4139
Post by: wuestenfux
orkybenji wrote:This thread actually turned into a "what is art" discussion. This is embarrassing.
Well, not really. If GW and art have some overlap, one needs to look at GW from the art point of view. Art is generally something that is more expensive.
34906
Post by: Pacific
The winner of last year's Turner Prize. A bin (and not even a very well made one, from the looks of things).
Seriously, this is art.
People have been discussing for a long time what exactly it is that constitutes 'art'. For the purposes of this discussion, you could say in this context that at least GW is promoting some form of creativity on behalf of the kids that take it up. It is perhaps less now than ever before (pre-made terrain/basing/'paint your marines in this colour'), but it is still a lot more involved than most other forms of entertainment you care to mention.
494
Post by: H.B.M.C.
Agamemnon2 wrote:Painting 40k miniatures is to art what a tricycle is to owning a Kawasaki Ninja.
Pompous to the last as always Aggy. I got three words for ya: 1. French. 2. Golden. 3. Demon.
7613
Post by: Kiwidru
I view modeling as my artistic release/expression, and get significantly more enjoyment (now that I'm an old timer) out of posing and painting minis than the games I tend to play.
This is the only area GW excells IMO, it's quite nice to get a ton of leftover knickknacks with each purchase, and if you hoard them, a quite substantial bits box will be left after any army construction. This used to justify the cost for me, as the value of purchase combined with the potential conversions was much nicer than a single-pose metal model with minimum (if any) extra bits.
But when you factor in the scale of the game that is played (2500), and the fact that units are just grindmachines with few tactical abilities other than "buy more guys for your units"... And it gets old IMO...
58669
Post by: Grugknuckle
Barksdale wrote:
Second, increases in quality of the plastic kits (I will admit finecast is definately a step back). The plastic kits these days are highly customizable, and include a ton of bitz for other projects. The kits can swapped around cross range and inter-range with the fantasy line to create even more options.
This is absolutely true. No other miniature company approaches the quality and customizability of the GW kits.
I mean, you can get an awesome and large competitive army by spending $100/month for one year. I just don't see how people view this as expensive. There just isn't another hobby that gives you years of enjoyment of a relatively little price.
The real problem is that by increasing their prices, they have made it more difficult to enter the hobby - especially for younger players who don't have a lot of money. While it's tempting to say, "Who cares? Get a job if you want some minis." This single fact dramatically restricts the potential growth of the game systems they own.
Yes. I agree that you can get a kick ass army on a $100 / month budget. That is how I built mine! But
1) The average parent of a 13 year old isn't willing to spend $100 / month on warhammer 40K models for their kid. Not to mention paint and such. A kid comes into my store and says, "Mom I want that." and she says, "HOW MUCH! No. Get something else."
2) Players want to play the game now. Not in a year. This is true for everyone, but especially true for younger players (13 - 16 years). If you told a teenager that they would have to pay hundreds of dollars a month for a year before they could play their first game, they would probably just go buy a PC game instead.
If you think about it, you can see that GW has been aware of this problem for a long time. Some (not all) of their new ideas over the last 10 years have been designed to address exactly this problem, with mixed success. For example, White Dwarf articles with rules for "Warhammer Skirmish" or " 40K in a flash" are designed to make the game playable with a dramatically lower model count. Likewise with the RPGs "Deathwatch" and "Dark Heresy". There is Mordheim and Bloodbowl. You can also see it in some of the "over-powered" 40K armies (e.g. Grey Knights - I'm not looking for an argument) which allow you to play a competitive 1500 point army with little or no WH40K experience and just a couple of boxes of minis (20 - 25 models). People bitch that they're OP, but GK probably wasn't intended for 40K veterans - they were meant to be a starter army so that GW could get some new players.
Without new people investing in mini's, GW will die when the old players stop buying. That's a fact. And higher prices mean less new players. Automatically Appended Next Post: TheLionOfTheForest wrote:
Why raise the entry barrier to a game with an already high entry barrier?
Exactly.
48321
Post by: Zarren Wevon
The fact that we now compare GW miniatures with the tires on an AC Cobra these days is just nuts. This used to be a fun, stupid game you played with your buddies in a garage. I dunno what happened, but I'm not really a fan of it.
35671
Post by: weeble1000
skkipper wrote:
as a parent and in the top 5%, I am ok with my kids playing warhammer.
Warhammer is a hobby. it is artistic and challenging and cheap.
for a $1000 you can go pickup almost any 2k army and the rules and keep you busy for years.
GW is way cheaper then my other hobbies, like car restoration and kite boarding.
Hell i spend more on booze in a year then I do in games workshop.
the Ork bommas were cool i picked up three. GW will not go out of business. They will keep chugging along.
haters will hate.
people need to look at other hobbies and see the warhammer is not that expensive.
This argument always comes up in these sorts of discussions, but the problem with it is that on a very significant level you are comparing apples to oranges. GW's market saturation is beginning to deteriorate, and it is facing increasing competition. The cost of Games Workshop's products are especially relevant within this context. When you say that GW is a cheap hobby, what you are really saying is that wargaming is a cheap hobby, and that is entirely correct. But as consumers have a greater degree of choice when it comes to wargaming, the cost of GW's products relative to that market is significant. As a parent who knows nothing about wargaming, you are going to buy Warhammer stuff if your kid asks for Warhammer stuff. GW's large share of the market and its advertising has a lot to do with those kids being aware of Warhammer. This was especially true in a pre-internet era when a high street presence was a particularly important part of influencing brand recognition and customer consideration. However, GW's dominance within the realm of fantasy wargaming is being challenged, and these challengers are becoming increasingly successful. Think, for example, of the kid who sees Monsterpocalypse on the shelf at Barnes and Noble, and later wants to branch out into WarmaHordes. What about the parent who goes to the FLGS and sees Warhammer on the shelf along with Mantic products, Infinity, Flames of War, Dust Warfare, Malifaux, Dystopian Wars, etc. etc.? What about the parent whose kid wants to play Warhammer but who can't find anyone in the local area who plays it? What if that parent finds that there is a large community of gamers playing Dust Warfare? Games Workshop is no longer the Aplha and Omega of fantasy wargaming. So when you talk about Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000 as a hobby, you can't simply compare it to every other possible hobby as if those products are the sum total of the wargaming hobby. There is a broad world beyond Games Workshop. That world is growing every day, and mostly at the expense of Games Workshop's market share. Customers and potential customers have significantly more and easier access to information than they did 20, 10, or even 5 years ago. It is fair to say that GW's customers are rather sophisticated in the sense of being educated, informed, discerning consumers. They will, and do consider Games Workshop's products within the broader wargaming market when that information is accessible. Automatically Appended Next Post: Agamemnon2 wrote:That's a very blinkered view of academia, FYI. I've never been taught a single "absolute truth" by a lecturer or professor. Well, except that Clint Eastwood is the greatest Western gunslinger protagonist in European cinema, but that's surely obvious.
Yul Brynner, man, Yul Brynner. No one comes close. It isn't the quantity that counts, it's the quality. But that is hideously off topic. To be slightly more on topic, assembling and painting a model may not be considered "fine art," but in terms of an activity for your kids, wargaming is something that encourages creativity, imagination, hard work, socialization, reading, problem-solving, and argument. It is a positive activity for a child to be engaged in. Encouraging a child to produce something and enjoy the fruits of their labor is very important. Encouraging a child to be creative is very important. Encouraging a child to read, interact with others, think critically, and resolve disputes is very important. There are many ways to do that, and wargaming is one of them. I wouldn't say that if your kid is into wargaming you can check off the "learn fine art" box on your "how-to-raise-a-genius-child" list, but it is a positive, constructive activity that encourages the development of important skills. I think that is precisely what everyone has been saying, and I think it was a bit of an overreaction to take that sentiment as an assertion that painting a model is synonymous with fine art. Comparing wargaming to fine art is like comparing classic literature to Goosebumps. But if someone says that a child reading Goosebumps is a good thing you wouldn't say, "Oh, but that isn't real reading, you should have him/her reading A Tale of Two Cities."
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Post by: infinite_array
weeble1000 wrote:
When you say that GW is a cheap hobby, what you are really saying is that wargaming is a cheap hobby, and that is entirely correct. But as consumers have a greater degree of choice when it comes to wargaming, the cost of GW's products relative to that market is significant.
It's like what I said in another thread when someone tried comparing what they spend on GW to some other, completely unrealted hobby: infinite_array wrote:Yeah, I've got to admit, my hobby of enriching uranium in my custom-built backyard underground bunker is waaaaaay more expensive than what I used to spend on GW.
It's a pretty common red herring - we're talking about wargaming. Not boat-sailing, or cars, or sky diving, or paintball, or the creation of enriched uranium. Also, is it just me, or is there a trend in GW supporters in the apparent argument that since they can afford it, the prices are fine?
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Post by: Dawnbringer
Grugknuckle wrote:
This is absolutely true. No other miniature company approaches the quality and customizability of the GW kits.
See http://www.perry-miniatures.com/product_info.php?products_id=2713
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Post by: Vulcan
skkipper wrote:for a $1000 you can go pickup almost any 2k army and the rules and keep you busy for years.
GW is way cheaper then my other hobbies, like car restoration and kite boarding.
Hell i spend more on booze in a year then I do in games workshop.
the Ork bommas were cool i picked up three. GW will not go out of business. They will keep chugging along.
haters will hate.
people need to look at other hobbies and see the warhammer is not that expensive.
How the  do we keep coming back to this?
YES WE KNOW that wargaming is not an expensive hobby compared to many other ones.
WHAT WE ARE POINTING OUT is that Warhammer charges BMW level prices and delviers a Ford level product. In the case of Finecast, it is Ferrari level prices for Yugo quality product.
Other companies can manage to produce plastic minis every bit as good - IF NOT BETTER - for under HALF what GW charges. THAT IS WHY WE DON'T LIKE GW.
It's not the cost per se, it is that the cost of GW minis is SO FAR OUT OF LINE WITH THE REST OF THE HOBBY.
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Post by: Baldsmug
Why is this such a big deal, the price of everything goes up every year regardless of its quality. If ya don't like then don't buy the product, it's not like anyone NEEDS to play 40k. Maybe its a conspiracy by GW to get as much advertising as they can for free. They raise the price, the internet has a sh!tfit, people read about it and decide to flip the bird to GW by ordering through some other online source for gw products thinking they just pulled a smooth burn on gw and saved a buck. But GW wins no matter what.
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Post by: Grimtuff
Baldsmug wrote:Why is this such a big deal, the price of everything goes up every year regardless of its quality. If ya don't like then don't buy the product, it's not like anyone NEEDS to play 40k. Maybe its a conspiracy by GW to get as much advertising as they can for free. They raise the price, the internet has a sh!tfit, people read about it and decide to flip the bird to GW by ordering through some other online source for gw products thinking they just pulled a smooth burn on gw and saved a buck. But GW wins no matter what.
But the rises are not in line with inflation. Unless everything got around 30% more expensive since last year...
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Post by: Baldsmug
I suppose that is a bit much for just inflation.
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Post by: Jordan
Shadowbrand wrote:GW fanboys vs PP fanboys.
/popcorn
Obscure board games, thanks. You can get on my level. Baldsmug wrote:I suppose that is a bit much for just inflation.
Quite, unless your'e in Zimbabwe. I've heard from others that GW's price increases are to test the economic irrationality of its base and to try to make it an "elite" game, as others in the thread mentioned. Which, frankly, is rather silly. "Art" is whatever someone makes and calls "Art." It may be "art," but that doesn't mean it's "good."
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Post by: Shadowbrand
But your level sucks.
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Post by: Jordan
Shadowbrand wrote:But your level sucks.
You're just saying that 'cause you're jellymad that you're not on it. Like all the plebs who can't afford GW and talk crap on it. Go play reasonably priced war games from companies who actually care about their customer base.
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Post by: Shadowbrand
Do you actually talk like that in real life?
And really whats the harm at gocking at two nerds butting heads over what game is better?
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Post by: Eidolon
I spent $350 on drinks at bars during my 2 month hiatus from tournament playing, gw isnt the only expensive hobby out there.
With that said, I realize that one of the warmahordes summer sale starter boxes is only about $40 more than a 6th edition rulebook, so I might transfer systems, these prices are too much.
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Post by: infinite_array
Eidolon wrote:I spent $350 on drinks at bars during my 2 month hiatus from tournament playing, gw isnt the only expensive hobby out there.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaugh!
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Post by: Eidolon
Well, its true. Im not saying the prices are justified, but lets face it. A gallon of beer is going to last you all of about 2 hours, models last longer.
When this http://store.privateerpress.com/khadorsummersalearmybundle.aspx is twice the cost of the 6th edition rulebook alone though, its pretty hard to wonder why people still buy gw. I think they have gotten $200 from me this last year.
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Post by: McNinja
Not yet. Close, but not yet.
There is a point where the increase in prices will not be able to compensate for reduced sales. This new price increase will not be it, especially with the advent of 6th edition.
I think the next sales increase will be the one that causes GW to rethink their business decisions. As it is, they are still technically making money, so they have no reason to try something else (though any sane person who knows anything about economics knows otherwise). Automatically Appended Next Post: orkybenji wrote:This thread actually turned into a "what is art" discussion. This is embarrassing.
What is art? Not Mass Effect 3!
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Post by: inquisitorlewis
Eidolon wrote:Well, its true. Im not saying the prices are justified, but lets face it. A gallon of beer is going to last you all of about 2 hours, models last longer.
When this http://store.privateerpress.com/khadorsummersalearmybundle.aspx is twice the cost of the 6th edition rulebook alone though, its pretty hard to wonder why people still buy gw. I think they have gotten $200 from me this last year.
It is a good deal, but some of us (at least me), can't stand warmachine models, or the background. I suppose thats the reason why chumps like me just keep going with GW.
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Post by: Adam LongWalker
infinite_array wrote:weeble1000 wrote:
When you say that GW is a cheap hobby, what you are really saying is that wargaming is a cheap hobby, and that is entirely correct. But as consumers have a greater degree of choice when it comes to wargaming, the cost of GW's products relative to that market is significant.
It's like what I said in another thread when someone tried comparing what they spend on GW to some other, completely unrealted hobby:
infinite_array wrote:Yeah, I've got to admit, my hobby of enriching uranium in my custom-built backyard underground bunker is waaaaaay more expensive than what I used to spend on GW.
It's a pretty common red herring - we're talking about wargaming. Not boat-sailing, or cars, or sky diving, or paintball, or the creation of enriched uranium.
Also, is it just me, or is there a trend in GW supporters in the apparent argument that since they can afford it, the prices are fine?
No I see it as well. As on cue, The GW spin doctoring by the White Knights has begun once again.
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Post by: Pacific
inquisitorlewis wrote:Eidolon wrote:Well, its true. Im not saying the prices are justified, but lets face it. A gallon of beer is going to last you all of about 2 hours, models last longer.
When this http://store.privateerpress.com/khadorsummersalearmybundle.aspx is twice the cost of the 6th edition rulebook alone though, its pretty hard to wonder why people still buy gw. I think they have gotten $200 from me this last year.
It is a good deal, but some of us (at least me), can't stand warmachine models, or the background. I suppose thats the reason why chumps like me just keep going with GW.
Oi! I thought I saw you posting in the Infinity section? What happened?!
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Post by: SickSix
Prices will never be rolled back. A price 'freeze' maybe. I cannot think of one market that is similar to this where prices were rolled back across the board.
It saddened me that GW is doing what they are because I really enjoy the 40k story and models. But its just too damn expensive.
I will be getting the 6th rulebook probably and that is it. All my foreseeable future purchases will be with 3rd party resin casters.
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Post by: Platuan4th
Shadowbrand wrote:And really whats the harm at gocking at two nerds butting heads over what game is better?
It's spelled gawking. If you're going to use a word to attempt to sound intelligent, at least spell it correctly.
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Post by: Shadowbrand
At least I try. Saying gak like "Jellymad" should render you suitable to castration so you can't have children.
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Post by: EldarN00b
Shadowbrand wrote:At least I try. Saying gak like "Jellymad" should render you suitable to castration so you can't have children.
At least no one's made any inferences to Nazis yet... Alas, I was hoping the thread could remain civil for a little bit longer.
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Post by: Surtur
Ya know the Nazis...
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Post by: Agamemnon2
H.B.M.C. wrote:I got three words for ya:
1. French.
2. Golden.
3. Demon.
I wouldn't know about "last".
The French Golden Demon painters represent the top 1% of their craft. Perhaps what they make is art. If you're good enough, you can make a work of creativity and art out of the simplest things. That doesn't change things for us common slobs. My miniatures will never be art, and no amount of putting on airs can make them so. "All my best is dressing old words new, spending again what is already spent."
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Post by: SickSix
If human feces smeared onto a canvas can be called art, painting miniatures is damn art.
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Post by: TiB
Agememnon2 wrote:My miniatures will never be art, and no amount of putting on airs can make them so.
If I remember correctly, this whole discussion wasn't about whether painted mini's are art, but about whether miniature painting is an artistic activity, which to me it very much is.
No your dipped Ultramarines may never be on a pedestal in the Tate, but you're busy thinking about colours and forms, finding your own aestetic and generally getting your hands dirty, which is what it's all about.
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Post by: Shadowbrand
EldarN00b wrote:Shadowbrand wrote:At least I try. Saying gak like "Jellymad" should render you suitable to castration so you can't have children.
At least no one's made any inferences to Nazis yet... Alas, I was hoping the thread could remain civil for a little bit longer.
Give it time. And on Dakka. That's a rare occurrence.
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Post by: RatBot
I was about to say that I thought it already had come up, but then I remembered that was a different thread (with a similar theme!) that got locked.
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Post by: Formosa
Agamemnon2 wrote:H.B.M.C. wrote:I got three words for ya:
1. French.
2. Golden.
3. Demon.
I wouldn't know about "last".
The French Golden Demon painters represent the top 1% of their craft. Perhaps what they make is art. If you're good enough, you can make a work of creativity and art out of the simplest things. That doesn't change things for us common slobs. My miniatures will never be art, and no amount of putting on airs can make them so. "All my best is dressing old words new, spending again what is already spent."
in a world where a bed is art and a model isnt...
if you expres yourself in your models then its art, as in "artistic expression"
2
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Post by: Shadowbrand
Those Dark Angels are lovely, are they yours?
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Post by: Pacific
Is that bed 28mm?
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Post by: TiB
That's the same kind of comparison you so often see on the internet between graffiti and modern art.
To really qualify as 'Art' I think there has to be a conceptual or layered element to the work. Those Dark Angels, while looking good, are just prefab models painted according to the book.
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Post by: Lightcavalier
There are no qualifications on art. It is purely subjective to the beholder and the creator. In short there is nothing that is intrinsically art. An act can be artistic, but an object cannot natively have the quality of art...that requires interaction with an observer.
This is how a blank canvas can sell for thousands of dollars as "art," where a mural painted by street hooligans is written off as a public nuisance.
I would argue that the DA above are still art...just of a collaborative form.
The same thing happens in the real of literature.
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Post by: loki old fart
You can't make art with a machine. Those models were molded in their thousands by machine, so not art If they were hand made and painted, then yes.
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Post by: Shandara
loki old fart wrote:You can't make art with a machine. Those models were molded in their thousands by machine, so not art If they were hand made and painted, then yes.
Many artists produce art made out of prefabricated models/beginnings.
We had an artist who got a great many other artists to paint/adorn/mutilate/etc a plastic elephant and then the 100 (if I recall correctly) or so results were displayed as 'art'. Mind you, some of them were really nicely done.
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Post by: Kaptajn Congoboy
We'll see about the Hobbit and how it relates to sales. The book is a very different bird than the LOTR series in relation to making miniatures games - the focus is much more on the individuals and less on the grand scope of things - the Battle of Five Armies is almost an afterthought, in the best tradition of germanic epics..
Someone will make a lot of money on the movie. Who remains to be seen. It is also very dependent on what sort of movies PJ wants to make.
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Post by: loki old fart
Shandara wrote:
Many artists produce art made out of prefabricated models/beginnings.
We had an artist who got a great many other artists to paint/adorn/mutilate/etc a plastic elephant and then the 100 (if I recall correctly) or so results were displayed as 'art'. Mind you, some of them were really nicely done.
Prefabricated parts not a whole.
Carve a statue out of concrete or stone, it's art.
Cast hundreds of them out of concrete, they're garden ornaments.
Smash them into pieces, and use to make a collage, and you have art again.
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Post by: Pacific
TiB wrote:That's the same kind of comparison you so often see on the internet between graffiti and modern art.
To really qualify as 'Art' I think there has to be a conceptual or layered element to the work. Those Dark Angels, while looking good, are just prefab models painted according to the book.
Yes I kind of agree with you there - in the same way as painting by numbers, just copying someone else's creative inspiration perhaps is not as easily quantifiable as art.
Something like this model perhaps, shows a creative spark on behalf of the modeller and painter. I would be far more inclined to label this as artistic, as opposed to the Dark Angels above, despite the admittedly fine standard of painting.
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Post by: Lightcavalier
It just keeps coming back to people's individual interpretations of what art is...it still has yet to be demonstrated that there is an innate quality of art to anything.
What is the difference between a mass produced model which started as a miniature sculpture being seen as a piece of art, and mass produced prints of the Mona Lisa?
Also....what does this have to do with GW committing corporate suicide?
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Post by: weeble1000
Lightcavalier wrote:It just keeps coming back to people's individual interpretations of what art is...it still has yet to be demonstrated that there is an innate quality of art to anything.
What is the difference between a mass produced model which started as a miniature sculpture being seen as a piece of art, and mass produced prints of the Mona Lisa?
Also....what does this have to do with GW committing corporate suicide?
Exactly. It is not a practical discussion within this context, it is entirely off topic, and it only came up because someone mentioned that wargaming is a positive, constructive hobby for one's child to be engaged in.
The question of "what is art" is and always has been an ongoing debate. If people want to have a debate about the nature of art, I think it would be an excellent topic for the Off-Topic forum.
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Post by: Post Human Republican
theQuanz wrote:I just looked at the GW Website...it took me to the Australian version and holy crap those prices are ridiculous.
Beating a dead horse, but wow...these people aren't going to be around much longer at this rate. By 2015 I think GW will be dead and gone.
Heh
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Post by: zedmeister
Your thread necromancy skills are impressive. A four year old thread:
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Post by: reds8n
Thread is being locked due to thread necromancy.
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