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I know GW has made many questionable decisions. But let's be honest it's impossible to satisfy everyone. I'm just so fed up with the constant complaining about everything GW does. This general air of negativity makes the 40k community seem very unaccepting, and I think scares off potential new players. Stop trying to point out every single thing that is wrong with a company and start trying to have fun for a change. After all isn't that why you started 40k in the first place?

If they'd stop being a horrible company with terrible business practices that punish the customer you might hear less negativity.

Also, I'm intentionally scaring off potential new players to other games.

 Random Dude wrote:
I think scares off potential new players.

I am not a sales man. I am a game player. It is more my job to give an informed opinion on the state of the game and my happiness with it. It is entirely dishonest for me to not say what I feel about the game, in the hopes that a new player will make a less informed opinion before investing in the hobby.

It is GW's job to interest people in the game. They rely on word of mouth to get people in, and it's been that way for a while. It shouldn't surprise them that if they produce a product that causes distaste then there are less new players coming in.

The point, often, is to show people there's more than GW. A lot of people, for whatever reason, think the whole world revolves around GW and 40k and don't care to look outside the box. That's what hurts the community. You can like 40k but hate GW (most people seem to), but what's really liberating is when you look elsewhere and see what 40k COULD have been. For example, I actively encourage people to look elsewhere first, and even if they play 40k to at least look into other games because there's so much more out there. I want to be a WARgamer, not a 40k gamer.

For instance, I just played a demo of Bolt Action this weekend. It was a blast, and felt closer to 40k than 40k does. Of course being historical it's not for everyone, but the key issue is that there are alternatives and open your mind. The narrow-minded person sticks with 40k because it's all they know, and all they want to know, which is the height of ignorance.

The wargaming community is a lot more than just Games Workshop products, but you only find this "One thing to rule them all" mentality with 40k (and Fantasy I suppose) players, every other game tends to have people that dabble in a variety of games, instead of play one exclusively and push it as the end-all, be-all.

It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

 Random Dude wrote:
It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

I did. I play Warmachine and Infinity now.

 Random Dude wrote:
It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

I think a lot of people like 40k but hate GW. So they play the game but buy most things second-hand via eBay or the like. I can only think it's due to either the investment they've already put into the game (harder to switch when you've put hundreds, if not thousands, into it, to say nothing of time spent assembling and painting) or just cluelessness about other things. I've met a few people who started playing 40k within the past year or two and just aren't aware of alternatives, since they were brought into a pro-40k culture so they don't know how GW/40k used to be to know how bad things are now.

I don't really "push" other games, I push the idea there's more to wargaming than 40k. I'd love for an actual wargames club that plays different things, not people playing just 40k because 40k is all they know.

The only thing I don't like about GW is the prices. I don't complain I just buy my models at local wargaming stores with discounts.

Random Dude wrote:I know GW has made many questionable decisions. But let's be honest it's impossible to satisfy everyone. I'm just so fed up with the constant complaining about everything GW does. This general air of negativity makes the 40k community seem very unaccepting, and I think scares off potential new players. Stop trying to point out every single thing that is wrong with a company and start trying to have fun for a change. After all isn't that why you started 40k in the first place?

Wow. Your comments are a breath of fresh air. I don't think anybody has taken the bold stand that you have. Kudos.

Random Dude wrote:It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

That's a fascinating and brilliant point. We rarely see such skilled rhetoric around here.

Random Dude wrote:The only thing I don't like about GW is the prices. I don't complain I just buy my models at local wargaming stores with discounts.

That's a poorly understood point. If you do the math, a 10-20% discount completely makes up for prices doubling in 10 years. Most people are just too stupid to realize it.

 Random Dude wrote:
It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

People are, a lot of the "negativity" is possibly people that are leaving not because they want to, but that they feel there is nothing left for them in 40k/GW games .

I play lots of games, right now I don't play 40k realy just due to time and tiring. Evrything about the game is just far more effort and time, And GW seems at no point wanting to help me stay in there games so I am negative about that, and it also means I have less to fall back on when they do other things I dislike.
And why when something they do I do like, I have little positive to say anyway.

I also don't beleave at this point it's negative for new players to see the negatives of GW and there place int he hobby.
Around where I am, young players can't keep up anyway and it's not a healthy part of hobby for them to try and engage in over other parts of this great hobby.

 Random Dude wrote:
I know GW has made many questionable decisions. But let's be honest it's impossible to satisfy everyone. I'm just so fed up with the constant complaining about everything GW does. This general air of negativity makes the 40k community seem very unaccepting, and I think scares off potential new players. ... ...

I think this is a possibility and if it happens GW will come to regret having pissed off so many veterans.

 Random Dude wrote:
The only thing I don't like about GW is the prices. I don't complain I just buy my models at local wargaming stores with discounts.

But you have to admit that their aggressive business models undermine Customer confidence and create a situation where there is an air of user about the company, almost like instead of a customer, you are a commodity that they are trading. What other company has a business model where they have an interactive game and do not welcome customer feedback. GW are pushing its older players away and t them that is alright, a hey are the ones that already have their armies and remember how once upon a time the company cared about those that played their games.

Incoming another anti-gw thread.

your point was true, OP, but the gw haters will swarm to this.

Dragonzord wrote:
Incoming another anti-gw thread.

your point was true, OP, but the gw haters will swarm to this.

And what makes his point true? Should people just "shut up" and stop complaining? I think no.

WayneTheGame wrote:

Dragonzord wrote:
Incoming another anti-gw thread.

your point was true, OP, but the gw haters will swarm to this.

And what makes his point true? Should people just "shut up" and stop complaining? I think no.

Has complaining ever made gw stop and think? I think no.

Is it getting boring to read multiple anti gw threads on the front page? I think yes.

I never said they should stop complaining. However they should look at both sides of the debate before coming to a conclusion.

So, according to the OP and his one supporter, I should suck it up and continue giving money to a company that has nothing but disdain for me?

It's not a charity or a government. I don't have to give them money.

Since this is a capitalist economy, I choose to give my money to products I like better and companies I feel more deserving.

Dragonzord wrote:
Incoming another anti-gw thread.

your point was true, OP, but the gw haters will swarm to this.

So brave.

 MWHistorian wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

I did. I play Warmachine and Infinity now.

And yet you still visit the 40K forums to complain about it. Hooray.

Seriously, all this negativity surrounding every fart GW makes is pretty bad for my enjoyment of dakka.

Dragonzord wrote:
Incoming another anti-gw thread.

your point was true, OP, but the gw haters will swarm to this.

Should we refer to posters like yourself as GW Fanboi White Knights? Is that helping the air of negativity on the forums? Is that enhancing everyone's forum going experience? Is that an intelligent way to go about discussing a difference of opinions on this forum?

No.

So instead of making childish comments like referring to people as GW haters, maybe you could address some of the issues and explain why they're not issues at all.

But maybe that's too much work and instead labeling people in a black and white fashion to dismiss their opinions is easier.

text removed.

reds8n

 Random Dude wrote:
I never said they should stop complaining. However they should look at both sides of the debate before coming to a conclusion.

Look at both sides? What does that even mean? I've been playing since RT and I used to be a big GW supporter. I'm not some blind internet puppet. I'm a real person that loves 40k but hates seeing what its become.

People on Dakka never fail to be hateful.

 Random Dude wrote:
People on Dakka never fail to be hateful.

I see more hate in comments like this than anything critical that has ever been said about GW/40k.

I only see insults and personal attacks coming from GW supporters. Maybe they're the negative ones?

 Random Dude wrote:
People on Dakka never fail to be hateful.

Such incredible insight!

With such reasonable and thoughtful posts like that one, those people that have seen their years of hobby turning worse and worse with every passing season will surely stop complaining about it!

Bravo sir, I applaud you!

PhantomViper wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
People on Dakka never fail to be hateful.

Such incredible insight!

With such reasonable and thoughtful posts like that one, those people that have seen their years of hobby turning worse and worse with every passing season will surely stop complaining about it!

Bravo sir, I applaud you!

Wow! Your sarcasm is hilarious!

 Random Dude wrote:

PhantomViper wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
People on Dakka never fail to be hateful.

Such incredible insight!

With such reasonable and thoughtful posts like that one, those people that have seen their years of hobby turning worse and worse with every passing season will surely stop complaining about it!

Bravo sir, I applaud you!

Wow! Your sarcasm is hilarious!

Then add something of substance then.

GW have messed up 40k beyond all recognition. They're doing just fine on Fantasy still. It's a good game, and the Triumph and Treachery addition was very well received.

The feeling in the Fantasy side is more "God I hope they don't start giving fantasy the 40k treatment."

the so called "GW haters" have good reason to be angry. They've often invested thousands of dollars in a game that is now close to unplayable unless you sit down with your friends and start figuratively ripping pages out of the rulebook and replacing them with your own.

You can't have a game where you have to make so many house rules to make it work that the rules of the game will differ wildly from playgroup to playgroup.

If the product was only as god-awful as it is, maybe I would be in the apologist corner, but the attitude towards the gamers is so abyssal too. They do nothing to apologise for their utter mess of rules they've made, but rather they make it even worse and then tell you that you're playing the game wrong because you're using the rules they've provided, telling you that you should be "forging a narrative!"

They know everyone wants the rules and only the rules. But even they know charging the prices they want for a small book of only the rules would be bananas, so they force you to buy two more books that you don't want.
If they had any notion that people wanted those books they would sell all three separately as obviously if the quality and substance of the other books were worth the money people would still buy it.
They know only a sliver of a minority would.

I really can't understand the apologist crowd. The sheer amount of mistreatment we're receiving from GW is like a daily kick in the teeth.

GW is not a terrible company. They have provided us with absolutely stunning models of fantastic quality. They're priced to reflect it, but that doesn't change the fact that they are amazing.
They have given us a very good Fantasy ruleset.

But they have also completely manhandled their whole 40k fanbase, and for that they should get the hate they deserve.

I wouldn't recommend the game to anyone. Even Fantasy I'd warn people that while it's good now, GW has such a poor track record that you shouldn't get in to it if you aren't prepared for the worst.

 Random Dude wrote:
It's interesting, many people who talk about what a horrible company GW is continue to play 40k. If GW is SO bad why don't more people switch?

I did. I now play Warmahordes. Luckily I am a decent painter and made no loss on any of my armies when I sold them. I have one army left for casual games now and then.

 Savageconvoy wrote:

 Random Dude wrote:
I think scares off potential new players.

I am not a sales man. I am a game player. It is more my job to give an informed opinion on the state of the game and my happiness with it. It is entirely dishonest for me to not say what I feel about the game, in the hopes that a new player will make a less informed opinion before investing in the hobby.

It is GW's job to interest people in the game. They rely on word of mouth to get people in, and it's been that way for a while. It shouldn't surprise them that if they produce a product that causes distaste then there are less new players coming in.

At my local FLGS there were two guys looking to get into 40k. Long story short a few of us that play both systems discussed the pro's and conns to both systems. We also addressed the initial cost to buy into each game. Sufficient to say the walked out with the 2 player starter warmachine set.