A Petition to Games Workshop

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**GothmogLordofBalrogs**

The videos in the the MUST SEE: GW CORPORATE STRATEGY EXPOSED post on BoLS got me thinking about all the open letters over the years. But I feel now is a better time then ever to reach out and try and reason with GW as their customers, before it is all too late.

I did up a petition outlining a few core concerns the gaming community has with their business practices and how they should reflect upon them selves and how their strategy is not meeting customer desires or expectations.

So far I have over 250 signatures!

You can go to it via my blog here

Or directly to it here

Or read it here before going:

Refocus your business model on the sale of a game and support of a gaming community vice the pure sale of collectible miniatures.

As competition from outside organizations grow and GW revenues and profits fall, your company seemingly continues to pursue a business model not in alignment with your customer base's desires and expectations.

Your business model states "We make the best fantasy miniatures in the world and sell them globally at a profit and we intend to do this forever". Realize that you produce a game, and that the models are playing pieces in that game, not the end product themselves. Without the game, there is no need to purchase Games Workshop models. They are not collectible in the same sense as scale military tanks and aircraft, nor are they as utilitarian as historical wargames miniatures, applicable to multiple game systems and supported by real world events. GW models are only useable in the context of GW games, the primary of these being Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer Fantasy Battles.

I and many others collect your models to play the game. Only a fraction of the community do so purely for the experience of owning, building and painting Citadel miniatures. This is why when armies are timely updated and released, model sales for those armies jump. It is not because of marketing through White Dwarf and Online Stores. It is because people want to play with the newest "Toy". Collectors continue with these factions to keep playing the game, not just own miniatures.

Your fanbase and the dedicated gaming and hobby community ask that you adopt the following policies

1- Support gamers, conventions, and tournaments, primarily through well-developed rules and encouraging competitive play. Despite GW's desire for Warhammer to be a "Beer and Pretzels" game that is simply a reason to buy and collect GW miniatures, gamers want a system that can be used for competitive play as well. Just because this is supported does not mean that fun, narrative driven relaxed play is not possible. Appeal to both sides of the gaming community, not just the one you want to more. You cannot interface directly with the small group playing a campaign in their basement. You can with the 100+ players at a tournament. Doing so will improve your corporate image, impassion your playerbase and ultimately encourage the playing or your game which directly correlates to the sale of your miniatures. This means releasing fairly balanced, well play tested rule sets, and timely FAQs which address the issues players are encountering. The relaxed narrative players will appreciate these clearer and improved rules just as much as the cut-throat tournament gamer.

2- Reduce the number of "Direct exclusive models" and support the FLGS. Game Stores are where your community exists. It is not in their home, alone, painting. Most of the hobby may occur there, but it with the objective in mind that on the weekend they will travel down to their local friendly game store and set up across the table from someone and play a game. That is why they put all the hours into building and painting their army. Sure it may be fun to build and paint it, but it is a means to an end, not the end itself. Since the objective of collecting is to play a game, game store owners are going to promote games they can sell in their store. If majority of your product is exclusively available from your webstore, game store owners will not push your product as they lose potential sales. Without that push or those sales, their gaming community abandons GW games, and without the game they abandon GW/Citadel models.

3- Competitively price your products. You have some room to charge a slight premium because of the quality of your miniatures. But since the ultimate objective is to play a game at the end of the week, players are going to financially invest in what they can better afford. All wargaming is a luxury market. If a player can get the same amount of game time for less with another game and have just as much, if not more fun, then that is where I will invest my dollars. This is a big factor as to why so much competition now exists whereas very little did before. A potential aide to this point would be to allow sales of bits, aftermarket 3rd party add-ons, and discount online retailers. This all encourages throughput of your products, and for players to gather larger or more forces for their games. Sales for GW have only become worse with the policies that eliminate these possibilities.

4- Change your website to be hobby and gaming driven with a webstore option attached for support. This used to be the way it was. Your website should not just be an online marketplace. Your site should be the one stop shop for painting, tactics, gaming communities, upcoming tournaments, etc. etc. The webstore should then be a feature that a player can access after reading a tactica article or a painting guide. It is in game performance that drive sales of models the most, so discussing the performance and ways to use particularly models in game can only benefit you by swaying consumers to purchase it. Beautiful photos and well painted models help, but a vast majority of your playerbase knows is cannot paint as well as your webstore and White Dwarf images, so they fail to be lured in by that trap.

5- Conduct market research and increase player involvement. With the advent of social media this is easier than ever. Rather than just having youtube videos for new releases, have discussions of in progress design concepts to allow hype to be generated and discussion to occur, then systematically feed this back into your development process. Release trial rules again and gather important commentary from the players to fine tune them. Furthermore understand your consumer base and what they need and want to continue collecting, converting, painting Citadel miniatures and playing GW games rather than just assuming another huge kit or wacky limited edition gaming aide is what they need to be fed. With a generation thriving off constant connectivity and insight into early product development in virtually every market, particularly the growing tech and video games industries which manage to steal potential hobbyists daily, a policy of secrecy and blind assumption only will accomplish an alienation of the consumer.

In short, rededicate your company to supporting the selling of a game. This is your main product. Your models are the key playing pieces of this game, and will make you the most money. Without the game though, they are worth nothing.

**Wayniac**

A useless effort but one that should be commended nonetheles .

**pretre**

The only way this works is if you get all the stockholders to sign it and then vote appropriately.

**Accolade**

Unfortunately, I sincerely doubt anything will come of this. GW does not care one iota what we think...they definitely don't care about their distributors (as referenced in this video) and probably only legitimately care about their share holders, who they continue to release strong dividends to.

The only way GW is going to change is when people stop buying their product. I encourage people to point out alternative game options, voice their opinions on the cost of the game, and so forth. Perhaps one day enough people will be dissuaded- if the annual reports are any measure to go by, this may already be happening. It's going to take an entire restructuring of GW management to deal with these issues, and I'm not entirely sure the current management isn't so petty as to drag the games with them to their demise.

**GothmogLordofBalrogs**

While I agree to some extent that this likely will have no effect, to have so many gamers that would otherwise let their discontent go unvoiced gives me hope that GW won't just see it as a vocal minority, but indicative of a vast majority.

Plus it is all being sent to their investor relations email. So at least someone will notice, and it likely won't go unremarked upon at least.

**Jehan-reznor**

I have GW's reaction right here

Spoiler:

**insaniak**

GothmogLordofBalrogs wrote:
While I agree to some extent that this likely will have no effect, to have so many gamers that would otherwise let their discontent go unvoiced gives me hope that GW won't just see it as a vocal minority, but indicative of a vast majority.

The problem is that GW see the internet as a whole as nothing more than a vocal minority (which is true) that has no actual correspondence to what is going on in the real world (which is not so true).

As such, they are going to pay very little attention to an internet petition... because they're going to dismiss it as the wailing and gnashing of teeth of a minority of the community that is predisposed to complain about everything they do, right or wrong.

Of course, the fact that they see it that way is exactly where a lot of the complaints are coming from in the first place, so it turns into a vicious cycle...

**GothmogLordofBalrogs**

insaniak wrote:
GothmogLordofBalrogs wrote:
While I agree to some extent that this likely will have no effect, to have so many gamers that would otherwise let their discontent go unvoiced gives me hope that GW won't just see it as a vocal minority, but indicative of a vast majority.

The problem is that GW see the internet as a whole as nothing more than a vocal minority (which is true) that has no actual correspondence to what is going on in the real world (which is not so true).

As such, they are going to pay very little attention to an internet petition... because they're going to dismiss it as the wailing and gnashing of teeth of a minority of the community that is predisposed to complain about everything they do, right or wrong.

Of course, the fact that they see it that way is exactly where a lot of the complaints are coming from in the first place, so it turns into a vicious cycle...

True. This is why I tried my hardest to write it as clearly and level headed as possible. I didn't want it to seem like it was whining or ranting, but rather concern and constructive criticism.

**insaniak**

Don't get me wrong - I agree with what you have written. But ultimately, I think the only way GW will pay attention is for the market to shift away from them entirely. At the moment, they're still scrabbling after a falling spend, and not actually looking at why it's happening. They're not going to stop and listen to what their customers have to say until they're forced to, because the guy running the show is still firmly convinced that they're doing everything right.

**prplehippo**

I'm a bit surprised that "change your hiring practices" wasn't in there since a large part of the problem is their overall staff.

They are the ones making these decisions, so if things are going to change you have to put people in place that have the capability and desire to make those changes.

**Mr. Burning**

When thinking of GW and communicating with them always consider the following:

Our market is a niche market made up of people who want to collect our miniatures. They tend to be male, middle-class, discerning
teenagers and adults. We do no demographic research, we have no focus groups, we do not ask the market what it wants. These things are
otiose in a niche.

**Flippa**

insaniak wrote:

The problem is that GW see the internet as a whole as nothing more than a vocal minority (which is true) that has no actual correspondence to what is going on in the real world (which is not so true).

As such, they are going to pay very little attention to an internet petition... because they're going to dismiss it as the wailing and gnashing of teeth of a minority of the community that is predisposed to complain about everything they do, right or wrong.

Of course, the fact that they see it that way is exactly where a lot of the complaints are coming from in the first place, so it turns into a vicious cycle...

Can you blame them in all honesty? The amount of hate that spews from the internet towards them is mind blowing, no wonder they consider it more toxic than pappy nurgles butt crack. Over the years instead of focussing on the good that they can do and engaging in rational conversation it has been Nerd Rage this and Your prices that. On the flip side you have the White Knighters who will defend them with almost as much vigour.

I very much doubt this petition will give them the slightest cause for concern unless it reaches millions of signatures, the community caused this backlash of non communication as much as GW did, to the point it now looks like divorce with people going away from GW onto other things.

Although people mock GW for stating they make the best miniatures in the world, in relative terms they do. Yes there are some other fantastic minis out there (and some awful GW stuff) overall they produce more gems than duds. Most of the other companies minis tend to look like GW's circa 1995.

Are they overpriced? Some are yes?

Are they greedy? For sure but then what company doesn't push it's profits as far as they can?

Are they pricing themselves out of the market? Who knows but from what I saw at Warhammerfest they're still selling by the bucket-load. Maybe that's why they get a lot of hate, because people are seeing the hobby they grew up with moving out of their price range of affordability.

Do their rules need more work? Definitely, that's not to say I and nearly every single gamer I know plays them and has fun doing so.

Should they have more than 3 games? Yes I would like to see the returns of old classics, however seeing as they impact the main games which is where GW make their profit it's unlikely to happen.

I'm not White Knighting as I find their business practices mind boggling, but I do see both sides of the scenario.

**insaniak**

Flippa wrote:
Can you blame them in all honesty? .

Having spent the last 20 years watching them find ever more creative ways to piss off formerly-loyal customers while slowly shutting down every possible method for those customers to make themselves heard?

Yes, absolutely I blame GW.

The complaints about GW aren't just some crazy internet 'thing'. People were complaining about GW before there were internet forums to do it on. And all of the complaints that I see online, I hear in games stores, and gaming clubs, and at tournaments, and talking to friends who game.

The thing is, instead of addressing the complaints, GW justkeeps giving people new things to complain about as well. On those odd occasions where they have seen fit to address customer complaints, they tend towards nonsense company speak that does nothing more than insult the intelligence of their customers.

The current level of vitriol directed at GW is entirely a thing of their own creation. Other companies producing miniatures games manage to maintain public forums and Facebook pages and Twitter feeds and the like without attracting the same sort of complaint. Partly because those other companies by and large aren't doing boneheaded things like suing people for using common words, or putting retailers under ridiculous limitations, or putting out unfinished game rules and expecting their customers to fill in the blanks... and partly because those other companies use those platforms for (gasp!) communicating with their customers.

The Games Workshop forums weren't a vile cesspool of scum and villainy just because they were on the internet. There were a vile cesspool of scum and villainy because Games Workshop provided their customers with a place to talk about all things Games Workshop, did a bunch of stuff that said customers weren't too keen on, and then refused to talk to those customers about what was going on. And so the complaints got louder, and more widespread, and eventually started pushing out any worthwhile discussion.

Oddly enough, though, the Specialist Games team managed to maintain an 'official' forum for some years without any of that sort of nonsense. Why? Because they got involved. They built a rapport with their fans that the core GW studio once had and frittered away by ignoring the people who made them what they are.

Games Workshop aren't a victim here. They are a business that has chosen to ignore their customers and just do what they want, when they want. The level of hostility directed at them is nothing more than the direct consequence of that behaviour.

**Runic**

Just out of interest: Why do people expect something made by a company to suit their needs so tightly as we see in this case, especially since they ultimately can´t please anyone in the end anyway?

I don´t go to the movies expecting the movie to be what I want it to be. And I don´t expect the phone I buy to be tailored for me exactly. Why do people seem to expect this about wargames? Why is the level of self-adaptation so low in this instance?

And, why can't one just quit and be done with it, just like one chooses not to go to a movie one knows will suck or buy that phone one doesn´t like? Why make a continous campaign about it, that I don´t understand.

Is it just that you still love the game(s), can´t let go and on some subconcious level you think voicing your thoughts on forums might make a change, or what? Vent frustration? Anger felt towards a company for their business moves and this is a way to exact revenge/give one a sense of justice?

I´m just sincerely interested. I guess the reasons also vary from person to person. Personally I quit 40K a couple of times and played other games, but I didn´t have these "issues" some seem to have, nor did I feel the need to announce the quitting or the reasons ( boredom. ) Then after a year or so I started playing again, no problems. Has happened more than once.

Signed the petition anyway, didn´t see anything in it that could hurt, on the tiny chance it will have any effect on anything.

**insaniak**

RunicFIN wrote:
I don´t go to the movies expecting the movie to be what I want it to be. And I don´t expect the phone I buy to be tailored for me exactly. Why do people seem to expect this about wargames? Why is the level of self-adaptation so low in this instance?

A movie is a one-time, small purchase. You go see it, if you don't like it you can just not watch it again.

When you buy a phone, you buy the one that best suits you at the time. If nothing changes, then sure, you've got little to complain about. In this day of the smart phone, however, people do expect phone companies to listen to feedback on operating system changes and the like, because these affect the customer's continued enjoyment of the product.

A wargame is the same, but amplified by the much higher cost of entry. you buy to get into the game. Under GW's model, you have to keep buying to stay in the game. And so people want the experience to remain one that they will enjoy.

And, why can't one just quit and be done with it, just like one chooses not to go to a movie one knows will suck or buy that phone one doesn´t like? Why make a continous campaign about it, that I don´t understand.

Speaking for myself, I've invested 20 years, God knows how many thousands of dollars, and an unmeasurable amount of creative effort into building armies for Warhammer 40000. Just choosing to pack that all away and go play something else isn't as easy as deciding to not go back to the cinema the next day.

**Runic**

insaniak wrote:

Speaking for myself, I've invested 20 years, God knows how many thousands of dollars, and an unmeasurable amount of creative effort into building armies for Warhammer 40000. Just choosing to pack that all away and go play something else isn't as easy as deciding to not go back to the cinema the next day.

I guess this varies. I´m in the same boat aside from the years, 14 for me now. But for me it was kind of easy, then again I´m as antimaterialistic as you can get. I just sold all my armies, bought new ones when coming back and then painted and modeled them again. Now I only have my Necrons which I am in the process of painting, I´ve previously owned all WH40K armies in the past in the 1500-2000 point range aside from SOB, Eldar and IG, some multiple times ( both marines atleast twice. ) But I got pictures of them and the memories, if I end up bored with an army it´s getting sold and there´s no regrets nor do I feel bad, as they do nothing for me dusting on shelves. I can always get/paint/model more if I want to.

As a sidenote I know a guy who has atleast 3 plastic grey armies dusting on his shelves, for nigh 10 years running now, and he always swears ( and probably believes ) that one day he will paint them. And everyone else knows he won´t. I find it a bit funny and sometimes wonder how one can deceive himself so hard.

Similiarly when a unit gets nerfed or broken due to a rules update, I just sell it and buy something better. This has only happened a few times though. Certainly it annoys me like it probably does everyone, but instead of being angry and doing nothing about it aside from posting on forums I just adapt, as in the end being frustrated does nothing for you. Much easier to either quit and forget about it, or do something that makes the situation better.

"Huh, riflemen aren´t as good as they used to be. Was a good run fellas, cya. Time to get some new blood into the army."

And I don´t need to do that ofcourse, no one is forcing me.

It´s obvious though the more common way to feel is to be "attached" to your work and figs and not wanting them being made irrelevant gamewise.

**Pacific**

Bloody cracking pair of posts there Insaniak.

**ImAGeek**

Pacific wrote:
Bloody cracking pair of posts there Insaniak.

Agreed, pretty much my thoughts about GW of late written down!

I doubt anything will come of this, but I'll sign the petition anyway.

**MWHistorian**

RunicFIN wrote:

I´m just sincerely interested. I guess the reasons also vary from person to person. Personally I quit 40K a couple of times and played other games, but I didn´t have these "issues" some seem to have, nor did I feel the need to announce the quitting or the reasons ( boredom. ) Then after a year or so I started playing again, no problems. Has happened more than once.

Signed the petition anyway, didn´t see anything in it that could hurt, on the tiny chance it will have any effect on anything.

There's a whole long thread about that very topic if you're genuinely interested and want to know the reasons people left.

**Runic**

MWHistorian wrote:

There's a whole long thread about that very topic if you're genuinely interested and want to know the reasons people left.

I´m guessing it´s more about why they left than "why quit in a continuous vocal manner." instead of just quitting. I´ve checked most of it though.

**MWHistorian**

RunicFIN wrote:
MWHistorian wrote:

There's a whole long thread about that very topic if you're genuinely interested and want to know the reasons people left.

I´m guessing it´s more about why they left than "why quit in a continuous vocal manner." instead of just quitting. I´ve checked most of it though.

Huh?

Automatically Appended Next Post:

RunicFIN wrote:
MWHistorian wrote:

There's a whole long thread about that very topic if you're genuinely interested and want to know the reasons people left.

I´m guessing it´s more about why they left than "why quit in a continuous vocal manner." instead of just quitting. I´ve checked most of it though.

If you've read most of it, why are you still asking why people are leaving?

**monders**

insaniak wrote:

*shnip*

A wargame is the same, but amplified by the much higher cost of entry. you buy to get into the game. Under GW's model, you have to keep buying to stay in the game. And so people want the experience to remain one that they will enjoy.

And that's every other game publishers model. It's odd GW get so much stick for it.

Mantics Dreadball had like 5 'Season' expansions in two years. Deadzone is on its third (iirc) expansion in a year.

FF keep releasing the same fecking X-Wing models, just in different packaging, and they're flying off the shelves (just noticed the pun. Definitely not intended).

Infinity isn't too old, and CB are already resculpting a huge portion of their original kits. For the better, I might add. They make awesome minis.

I doubt there are many starter sets that are utterly complete and require no further purchases.

**Pacific**

monders wrote:
insaniak wrote:

*shnip*

A wargame is the same, but amplified by the much higher cost of entry. you buy to get into the game. Under GW's model, you have to keep buying to stay in the game. And so people want the experience to remain one that they will enjoy.

And that's every other game publishers model. It's odd GW get so much stick for it.

Mantics Dreadball had like 5 'Season' expansions in two years. Deadzone is on its third (iirc) expansion in a year.
FF keep releasing the same fecking X-Wing models, just in different packaging, and they're flying off the shelves (just noticed the pun. Definitely not intended).
Infinity isn't too old, and CB are already resculpting a huge portion of their original kits. For the better, I might add. They make awesome minis.
I doubt there are many starter sets that are utterly complete and require no further purchases.

I'm not sure that's the case Monders. With all of those games you have mentioned I could still use my original starter set box/rulebook and play the game against someone who came into it last week.

I think it's the fact that the player has the option of upgrading to those new things, rather than them being a necessity. As we all know Infinity has a new rulebook coming out in a month or so, but the rules themselves are going to be freely downloadable. Battlefront give out free rulebooks if you bought the last edition, and have online list building tools which are extremely cheap. Mantic stuff is so dirt-cheap by comparison that you can't really view it in the same way.

I could go on; it's the pace of updates, the price of them, that units are written out of new books or that you're having to pay even more for DLC and just to keep treading water. You can make strong arguments for the business model from GW's perspective. But, for the regular fan it sucks just because every other company out there is managing to survive as a company without being so veracious for the player's cash.

The funny thing is that I think a lot of the rule books would still sell for GW even if they did have a vastly cheaper or free download option. But, the problem for them then would be that they would have to make it a product worth buying for its own sake, rather than an unwanted upgrade to the last set of rules thats going to wipe out some of your old characters/units and make whatever new plastic kit has gone on sale a no-brainer purchase, but one that players are nonetheless compelled to purcase if they want to keep taking part in the game.

**Flippa**

insaniak wrote:
Flippa wrote:
Can you blame them in all honesty? .

Having spent the last 20 years watching them find ever more creative ways to piss off formerly-loyal customers while slowly shutting down every possible method for those customers to make themselves heard?

Yes, absolutely I blame GW.

The complaints about GW aren't just some crazy internet 'thing'. People were complaining about GW before there were internet forums to do it on. And all of the complaints that I see online, I hear in games stores, and gaming clubs, and at tournaments, and talking to friends who game.

The thing is, instead of addressing the complaints, GW justkeeps giving people new things to complain about as well. On those odd occasions where they have seen fit to address customer complaints, they tend towards nonsense company speak that does nothing more than insult the intelligence of their customers.

The current level of vitriol directed at GW is entirely a thing of their own creation. Other companies producing miniatures games manage to maintain public forums and Facebook pages and Twitter feeds and the like without attracting the same sort of complaint. Partly because those other companies by and large aren't doing boneheaded things like suing people for using common words, or putting retailers under ridiculous limitations, or putting out unfinished game rules and expecting their customers to fill in the blanks... and partly because those other companies use those platforms for (gasp!) communicating with their customers.

The Games Workshop forums weren't a vile cesspool of scum and villainy just because they were on the internet. There were a vile cesspool of scum and villainy because Games Workshop provided their customers with a place to talk about all things Games Workshop, did a bunch of stuff that said customers weren't too keen on, and then refused to talk to those customers about what was going on. And so the complaints got louder, and more widespread, and eventually started pushing out any worthwhile discussion.

Oddly enough, though, the Specialist Games team managed to maintain an 'official' forum for some years without any of that sort of nonsense. Why? Because they got involved. They built a rapport with their fans that the core GW studio once had and frittered away by ignoring the people who made them what they are.

Games Workshop aren't a victim here. They are a business that has chosen to ignore their customers and just do what they want, when they want. The level of hostility directed at them is nothing more than the direct consequence of that behaviour.

As I said I'm not White Knighting for GW and some of their actions are mind boggling, but I can see why they shut up shop on the community. In essence we said the same thing.

You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time, springs to mind. Whilst you and others including myself are unhappy with the business model GW employs there are still plenty of people willing to buy their stuff (myself included) yes my spend is a lot less than it used to be, but it's still there.

I never saw the GW forums, I was taking a 14 year hiatus from the hobby but I've heard about what they were like and I've seen some of the venom from here and other sites directed at them. You yourself said it was pushing out any worthwhile discussion. So what were they to do, bearing in mind Tom Kirby has the final say and as you're well aware he's a fruit loop. They did the wrong thing and shut it down.

I can remember going to the grand open day at the oxford store, I bought my nurgle army and in my hands I have 25 blisters of minotaurs and the manager said to me at that time.... "Guess you've got a chaos warband then?" still expensive back then but made easier by the 3 for 2 of the open day offers. They have always been about the models, the games have always come second and are purely a vehicle to sell more models. It was true in the 80's and it's true now and it's why the specialist games were dropped, they didn't sell enough models and probably didn't make the money back on developing and supporting the game.

Maybe they haven't moved with the times as they should've and taken advantage of their IP, there are plenty of other companies that defend their IP with more vigour. Can't trademark a name? Well they did and until someone challenges them they have every right to try and defend it, is it right? Of course it is if the can do it. Morally right? Absolutely not! But then does morals come into business? You have the likes of Starbucks making £400m in sales and only paying £8.6m in tax. Business is business at the end of the day if they can get away with it they will try.

Games Workshop aren't interested in addressing the complaints about their games systems because they simply don't care about them, they're purely there so they can sell more models, and the vocal minority can just do one. According to every single person that has a beef with GW all their problems could be solved by 2 little things and that is to make a skirmish game of 40k and WFB, then everything would be rosey in the Wargaming hobby!

**Wayniac**

The GW forums weren't that bad, I remember going there all the time. You had the occasional trollish "WTF GW Y U NO DO X" threads, but most of it was civil discussion, and complaints were legitimate concerns.

It was no better or worse than any other forum. GW closed it because they wanted to paint a rosy picture and pretend that if you can't hear complaints, then none exist.

**Flippa**

Like I said I never saw them, but on 1 hand I have Insaniak telling me that "There were a vile cesspool of scum and villainy because Games Workshop provided their customers with a place to talk about all things Games Workshop, did a bunch of stuff that said customers weren't too keen on, and then refused to talk to those customers about what was going on. And so the complaints got louder, and more widespread, and eventually started pushing out any worthwhile discussion." And on the other saying they weren't bad. Who knows I didn't see them? I've already said they did the wrong thing by shutting them down but as I said we all know what TK is like.

**MWHistorian**

GW's ignoring criticism is only making the situation worse. Even if they don't fix the problems, letting people know that they're aware of them would still go a long way.

**Wayniac**

MWHistorian wrote:
GW's ignoring criticism is only making the situation worse. Even if they don't fix the problems, letting people know that they're aware of them would still go a long way.

Exactly. Instead they act as though there are no problems at all, and their rabid fans decry anyone hinting there are problems as "haters"

**Flippa**

I thought they had when they said 40k isn't a balanced game for tournies, it's a beer n pretzels game with your friends! Although as a British company I'm sure they said Cuppa and Rich Tea!

**Occhiolini**

MWHistorian wrote:
GW's ignoring criticism is only making the situation worse. Even if they don't fix the problems, letting people know that they're aware of them would still go a long way.

I agree, GW hasn't even attempted to take the first step in resolving issues.

Profits are starting to dry, I don't know how much money they have to lose before they take action. I wonder what they're thinking up there in GW HQ.