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silent25 wrote:
Remember there is that whole Necromancer in Mirkwood storyline that is being shoehorned in.

You do know it's being shoehorned in because Tolkein himself shoehorned it in, right?

 -Loki- wrote:

silent25 wrote:
Remember there is that whole Necromancer in Mirkwood storyline that is being shoehorned in.

You do know it's being shoehorned in because Tolkein himself shoehorned it in, right?

Yea, and you expect it to be anything like what Tolkein wrote? They will have the entire cast there instead of just Gandalf.

silent25 wrote:

 -Loki- wrote:

silent25 wrote:
Remember there is that whole Necromancer in Mirkwood storyline that is being shoehorned in.

You do know it's being shoehorned in because Tolkein himself shoehorned it in, right?

Yea, and you expect it to be anything like what Tolkein wrote? They will have the entire cast there instead of just Gandalf.

You mean like when the entire cast was with Frodo and Sam at Mount Doom?
Or when the entire cast was with Gandalf at Isengard?

 Kanluwen wrote:

silent25 wrote:

 -Loki- wrote:

silent25 wrote:
Remember there is that whole Necromancer in Mirkwood storyline that is being shoehorned in.

You do know it's being shoehorned in because Tolkein himself shoehorned it in, right?

Yea, and you expect it to be anything like what Tolkein wrote? They will have the entire cast there instead of just Gandalf.

You mean like when the entire cast was with Frodo and Sam at Mount Doom?
Or when the entire cast was with Gandalf at Isengard?

And point to me the section in the Hobbit where Bilbo and the dwarfs are saved by Legolas and Arwen? Because guess what, they are in the movie saving them in Mirkwood. The Hobbit is an "inspired by" movie with things stuck in for no point and to pad it. I have no faith in Jackson at this point.

silent25 wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

silent25 wrote:

 -Loki- wrote:

silent25 wrote:
Remember there is that whole Necromancer in Mirkwood storyline that is being shoehorned in.

You do know it's being shoehorned in because Tolkein himself shoehorned it in, right?

Yea, and you expect it to be anything like what Tolkein wrote? They will have the entire cast there instead of just Gandalf.

You mean like when the entire cast was with Frodo and Sam at Mount Doom?
Or when the entire cast was with Gandalf at Isengard?

And point to me the section in the Hobbit where Bilbo and the dwarfs are saved by Legolas and Arwen? Because guess what, they are in the movie saving them in Mirkwood. The Hobbit is an "inspired by" movie with things stuck in for no point and to pad it. I have no faith in Jackson at this point.

Seriously? So I take you don't like the first 3 films?

I think it's safe to say that The Hobbit franchise has more artistic liberties in it than the first three films.

I think it's safe to say this thread is done.

 SickSix wrote:
I think it's safe to say this thread is done.

It was done before it started. No business is permanently safe from financial disaster. All these "GW is on the Verge of Disaster" threads are argued from the flimsiest and most tentative of 2nd and 3rd hand evidence and speculation.

They are recreational typing at its finest.

 SickSix wrote:
I think it's safe to say this thread is done.

Agreed. I believed GW is S.O.L. back in 2006 when I started to see the serious changed to their business model. Vertical Integration sometimes works and other times it does not. In this case it is working but at what cost? Who wins are the top 5 holders of stock investment. Who loses are the people, their customer base who they alienated a long time ago.

Now I know and seen typed on this site and on others concerning the dividend aspect. Well of course where is this being taken from? Profits. Every company has a right to run it the way they want it to be ran, but in my case I won't invest into a company that does not have a substantial cash reserves to be properly placed back into the company or to be used in an emergency. I do not see a sufficient amount with this corporation.

We have beaten this topic to the ground. We all know that there is going to be a big profit coming from the next financial report and this is due in churning out a crap load of product in a short amount of time, the highest I have ever seen in the 25+ years dealing with this part of the hobby.

I am not against a company making a profit. I am against a company that is pricing themselves out of their customer base and giving their profits to a chosen few.

silent25 wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

silent25 wrote:

 -Loki- wrote:

silent25 wrote:
Remember there is that whole Necromancer in Mirkwood storyline that is being shoehorned in.

You do know it's being shoehorned in because Tolkein himself shoehorned it in, right?

Yea, and you expect it to be anything like what Tolkein wrote? They will have the entire cast there instead of just Gandalf.

You mean like when the entire cast was with Frodo and Sam at Mount Doom?
Or when the entire cast was with Gandalf at Isengard?

And point to me the section in the Hobbit where Bilbo and the dwarfs are saved by Legolas and Arwen? Because guess what, they are in the movie saving them in Mirkwood. The Hobbit is an "inspired by" movie with things stuck in for no point and to pad it. I have no faith in Jackson at this point.

Awesome! Could you tell me how to watch the second film now rather than in december, as I quite want to watch it. I mean, I assume you've seen it, as you appear to be making statements about the plot that you could only know if you had seen it.

Unless of course you're just making vague assumptions based on what you don't want to happen, in which case keep on going.

 Goliath wrote:

Awesome! Could you tell me how to watch the second film now rather than in december, as I quite want to watch it. I mean, I assume you've seen it, as you appear to be making statements about the plot that you could only know if you had seen it.

Unless of course you're just making vague assumptions based on what you don't want to happen, in which case keep on going.

You saw the Lego Mirkwood sets that came out last year, didn't you?

*edit* And image to boot:

There's a Lego Iron Man 3 set that has Iron Man fighting the Mandarin. The Mandarin is piloting some sort of walker tank thingy. That didn't happen in the movie.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
There's a Lego Iron Man 3 set that has Iron Man fighting the Mandarin. The Mandarin is piloting some sort of walker tank thingy. That didn't happen in the movie.

That totally happened in the movie.

They must have edited it for Australia.

In regards to the LEGO Mirkwood set; supposedly there was a ton of products which had already been made and earmarked before the final decision to cut the Mirkwood scenes into The Hobbit II: The Hobbiting. If they weren't huge spoilers(like how Smaug looks), they were released.

Also that's not Arwen, that's Tauriel, an elf made for the films... but the blonde guy is in fact Legolas...

 Kanluwen wrote:
In regards to the LEGO Mirkwood set; supposedly there was a ton of products which had already been made and earmarked before the final decision to cut the Mirkwood scenes into The Hobbit II: The Hobbiting. If they weren't huge spoilers(like how Smaug looks), they were released.

That and, as we've seen from Lego products and even GW's own Hobbit stuff, some changes were made at the last minute to the Hobbit so some of the sets don't even follow the films.

 Alfndrate wrote:
Also that's not Arwen, that's Tauriel, an elf made for the films... but the blonde guy is in fact Legolas...

Yup.

Tauriel is the captain of Thranduil's royal guard, and was added because Peter Jackson felt that the "lack of female characters" was an issue that he wanted to remedy.

Tokenism: Making everything better!

silent25 wrote:

 Goliath wrote:

Awesome! Could you tell me how to watch the second film now rather than in december, as I quite want to watch it. I mean, I assume you've seen it, as you appear to be making statements about the plot that you could only know if you had seen it.

Unless of course you're just making vague assumptions based on what you don't want to happen, in which case keep on going.

You saw the Lego Mirkwood sets that came out last year, didn't you?

*edit* And image to boot:

Spoiler:

I was unaware that Arwen was now ginger rather than having black hair like she did in the other three films.

 Alfndrate wrote:
Also that's not Arwen, that's Tauriel, an elf made for the films... but the blonde guy is in fact Legolas...

I stand correct there. I recalled it being Arwen., but you are right, it is Tauriel.

It's a light brunette, but w/e

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
We all know that there is going to be a big profit coming from the next financial report and this is due in churning out a crap load of product in a short amount of time, the highest I have ever seen in the 25+ years dealing with this part of the hobby.

Yeah, years ago they were selling only 4 plastic kits per month, now they are selling up to 4 plastic kits per month!

BTW looking forward to a LEGOlas miniature

Redacted due to Ninja activity.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Tokenism: Making everything better!

But even better than that is Tolkienism!

Valete,

JohnS

Well getting back to the OP's question. Nothing that has been posted here or elsewhere has convinced me that GW is currently in any kind of "financial trouble" at this time.

There are lots of opinions on how GW could be doing things differently and perhaps better but this thread is wildly off topic at the moment.

JWhex wrote:
Well getting back to the OP's question. Nothing that has been posted here or elsewhere has convinced me that GW is currently in any kind of "financial trouble" at this time.

There are lots of opinions on how GW could be doing things differently and perhaps better but this thread is wildly off topic at the moment.

Well back on topic, in the Chapterhouse lawsuit thread, the financial information regarding GW's North American sales were accidentally released. GW did see a significant reduction in sales among key items in 2012. I don't have a direct link, but I'm sure others do.

The interesting thing was certain lines made very little. Some WHFB kits were making less that Forge World sets. I think the HE infantry were only selling a couple thousand dollars worth a year.

People are complaining about old kits not being redone, but I believe GW doesn't see redoing the kits as being profitable. You may sell twice the number of kits you currently do, but if overall sales are so low, you don't recoup your investment in the redesign.

JWhex wrote:
Well getting back to the OP's question. Nothing that has been posted here or elsewhere has convinced me that GW is currently in any kind of "financial trouble" at this time.

Fact is that GW revenue is flat for years (adjusted for inflation) in a growing market:

It is flat since they quit the cooperation with DeAgostini doing all the standard marketing for the LOTR line.
Fact is that the Hobbit starter set sells far from expectations, with the limited edition now available for 6 months. Anecdotical evidence says that the complete hobbit line is not selling.
Fact is that even with shrinking sales, GW is not anymore able to fill in all orders, not for Tau and (as admitted by GW) not for Eldar: http://www.thecombatcompany.com/whats-happening-with-the-eldar-release/ . One high up GW manager made structural problems with supply responsible for that.

In the past, GW made insane price hikes to just keep total revenue flat. In the past 7 months, the standard price for Hobbit products doubled (compared to LOTR products incl starter), I predict a doubling of prices for most standard troops in the next 2 weeks like they just did for Dire Avengers. The price for a codex/armybook is now double the price of its predecessor at time of release. The price of new flyers is double the price of Storm Talon and Nightwing, while using the same number of sprues (in case of Stormtalon/Darktalon only slight variations of the same sprues).

If you need to double the price for the bulk of your sold products just to keep revenue flat, what does that say about the financial conditions of a company? And will it help the company's health to double prices?

silent25 wrote:

Well back on topic, in the Chapterhouse lawsuit thread, the financial information regarding GW's North American sales were accidentally released. GW did see a significant reduction in sales among key items in 2012. I don't have a direct link, but I'm sure others do.

The interesting thing was certain lines made very little. Some WHFB kits were making less that Forge World sets. I think the HE infantry were only selling a couple thousand dollars worth a year.

In case of HE infantry however, it probably does not sell because you can get that much cheaper from starter set.

Kroothawk 528503 5658039 wrote:]I predict a doubling of prices for most standard troops in the next 2 weeks like they just did for Dire Avengers. The price for a codex/armybook is now double the price of its predecessor at time of release. The price of new flyers is double the price of Storm Talon and Nightwing, while using the same number of sprues (in case of Stormtalon/Darktalon only slight variations of the same sprues).

If you need to double the price for the bulk of your sold products just to keep revenue flat, what does that say about the financial conditions of a company? And will it help the company's health to double prices?

Yes, they're price gouging, but don't exaggerate. Prices for most troops haven't doubled.

You can read the evidence in any way that suits your preconceptions. You can say revenues are increasing at the moment, which is a great result in recession-hit Europe, and that they're outperforming rivals like Hornby, who produce mass market plastic kits for the leisure market. Or you can say they're not doing as well as they should be doing.

Your own evidence is hugely contradictory - you're simultaneously saying sales are flat, and that they're not satisfying increased demand for new product. Which is it? People like Dark Sphere are saying that the new Tau and Eldar ranges are up in sales terms. So it's quite possible that this tactic, more new models, is working, whether or not we/you/I like it.

GW is a publicly quoted company. Complaining about their concentrating on short-term profit, is like complaining that dogs bark. Focusing only on short-term profit is, unfortunately, what all Brit and most American publicly-quoted companies do.

Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:

Kroothawk 528503 5658039 wrote:I predict a doubling of prices for most standard troops in the next 2 weeks like they just did for Dire Avengers.

Yes, they're price gouging, but don't exaggerate. Prices for most troops haven't doubled.

Please read again. Also have a look at the Hobbit range.

Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:
Your own evidence is hugely contradictory - you're simultaneously saying sales are flat, and that they're not satisfying increased demand for new product.

1.) I say total revenue is flat, adjusted for inflation.
2.) With price increases above inflation, sales are not flat but shrinking.
3.) No contradiction with supply problems, as in the last 2 years, they closed all production facilities in China and USA, making the business report look good because selling infrastructure gives short term money.
4.) BTW, GW administration also massively reduced sales staff, but hired more administration staff (data by Sean O'Brian)
2002 2001 Production 324 359 Selling and distribution: Full time 1,224 1,133 Key time 631 483 Administration 303 232

and the most recent figures:

2012 2011 Design and Development 114 90 Production 172 163 Selling and distribution: Full time 1010 1032 Part time 254 233 Administration 412 383

The fact that they also increased the number of production staff and design staff makes me think that they don't expect themselves to go under any time soon. Also, what's wrong with more administration?