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 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
In terms of reselling, how well do the old metal models hold up value-wise? I have Cryx and Menoth armies from MKI and early, early MKII. Are those figures worthless due to updates or are they sought after since they aren't the PVC material PP is fond of?

I'm no expert, but I've found that the value has dropped of significantly where new models have been released. It got so low that I was able to scoop up metal Khador Warjacks (the basic models) for around 6-8 bucks each second hand. Very helpfull when you need 6 of them to make a proxy unit of "Lesser Abyssal Golems"



I've no interest in the game itself and I've never been willing to pay new prices, but I've long liked the style of the minis. I'm also someone who likes metal models (I'll take metal over PVC anyday and usually over resin also), so the 4 in the pic above were a real treat!

It is kind of funny that the price policy changes haven't actually stopped the discounts.

http://www.gamenerdz.com/hordes-legion-of-everblight-blightbringer-gargantuan

I don't see any Canadian sites offering a discount anymore.

In short? Yes the material used does not justify the price tag, no matter how you want to spin this they need to change mediums fast! Looking at Salute the shelves were not moving (checked it in the beginning of the day and end of the day) but that may be the case since Wayland was selling the old stuff and everyone knows the new edition is coming. Even then the deals they had should have people buying more? Dont know.

Personally Restic is a pass.

 NAVARRO wrote:
Personally Restic is a pass.

I mostly agree.
I'm sometimes willing to use Restic or other plasti-resins, but as I consider them cheaper and lower-quality materials I expect them to be priced accordingly. I was not at all surprised when Mantic started using them as they are essentially a value-driven company deliberately shooting for a lower price point. For a "premium" company like Privateer press to use Restic with only a small price drop in some cases struck me as a bit odd.

All this to say Restic is not a "premium" material and I think that premium companies only get away with using it because it allows for kits with slightly more pieces/options and gamers perceive it as being easier to work with than metal (a point I tend to disagree with).

At the same time, perhaps gamers share the blame with the practicalities of production. Polystyrene is too expensive for many/most models, Resin is not durable or well suited to medium-large production runs and lots of hobbyists seem to dislike metal. That only leaves Restic.

Metal is great for characters and for the big fellas just use plastic I would say... To be honest if small companies manage to do plastic PP has little excuses not to... unless they are currently not selling stuff and getting back their money.

As it stands I have little interest in paying serious money for restic and like I did with finecast ( which is even worse) No money from me. You can have great miniatures but if you cast them in subpar material they are ruined IMO.

I can tolerate repetitions of the same mini on a unit box and I can even tolerate silly prices if I really like the model but the material is the final drop for me, it shows a company lack of care about the product they sell.

Sining wrote:
PP has issues with their HIPS factory I think. They only seem to come out with 1 HIPS model per year, which is really slow considering we've been waiting for 4 of them ever since they were announced in 2014, of which we've only gotten 2 so far.

I've said for years that PP just needs to take the financial loss and get most, if not all, of their current PVC plastics done in HIPS instead. At the very least, have someone on-site in their Chinese factories to make sure that the quality is there. When there's a thread complaining about your miniatures materials every few weeks on your official forums, it may just be a good sign that there are issues...

Once released retail, a 10 man metal Mierce Darklands unit will run £30 ($45). A 10 man restic Warmahordes unit costs $50+ retail. Something does not quite compute. I generally like PP, online price fixing aside, but some of their stuff I think is rather overpriced for the quality.

Bossk_Hogg wrote:
Once released retail, a 10 man metal Mierce Darklands unit will run £30 ($45). A 10 man restic Warmahordes unit costs $50+ retail. Something does not quite compute. I generally like PP, online price fixing aside, but some of their stuff I think is rather overpriced for the quality.

I've never really paid attention to Mierce because I thought they were like a $20 per basic trooper type range. I'm not familiar enough with them to know where to start looking for these more reasonably priced miniatures. Anyone know? Or is this a new product line they are launching?

My problem with PP's prices is other things in the store always get my money instead. I might think "I'd really like to add a unit of Invictors to my Retribution" but then when I actually go to the store, I end up walking out with a new platoon of 15mm WW2 miniatures. One guy that I game with some times has started using Reaper Bones as substitutes where appropriate. At first I was like "are there really enough things that can be represented by generic fantasy miniatures?" and then I saw a unit of Reaper bugbears he was running as Bloodgorgers. $30 instead of $90.



Apparently his next unit is Reaper barrow wardens as banes.

I'm thinking I'm going to join in on this Bonesmachine approach

 MattofWar wrote:

Bossk_Hogg wrote:
Once released retail, a 10 man metal Mierce Darklands unit will run £30 ($45). A 10 man restic Warmahordes unit costs $50+ retail. Something does not quite compute. I generally like PP, online price fixing aside, but some of their stuff I think is rather overpriced for the quality.

I've never really paid attention to Mierce because I thought they were like a $20 per basic trooper type range. I'm not familiar enough with them to know where to start looking for these more reasonably priced miniatures. Anyone know? Or is this a new product line they are launching?

Here's a link to the first metal age KS. Retail for the 10 man 30mm based unit should be £30 and £7 for a solo (the KS prices were 10% off, and £27 and £6. respectively). They converted the 30/40/50 mm based units to metal to help lower the cost of entry (resins are still available though). The first waves of the metals have shipped, and I'm really pleased with my units. Normally there's a few month delay between KS backers getting theirs and them appearing on the webstore, so not sure when they'll appear.

Darklands still isn't a cheap game, which is why its bonkers to me that it will be less to proxy a unit of Croakhunters with Savrar than the other way around!

Well, if Privateer's volumes have dipped and then they still have to give a cut to distributors and retailers, I can see how they could need to charge what they do for PVC.

It's entirely possible that their high pricing, restricting of discounters and the launch of MK3 is a response to having peaked a year or two ago.

Their volumes declining also might explain why they stopped the transition over to styrene plastic as it's better suited for larger runs. If any product would be perfect for styrene, it would be starters.

 MattofWar wrote:
Well, if Privateer's volumes have dipped and then they still have to give a cut to distributors and retailers, I can see how they could need to charge what they do for PVC.

It's entirely possible that their high pricing, restricting of discounters and the launch of MK3 is a response to having peaked a year or two ago.

Their volumes declining also might explain why they stopped the transition over to styrene plastic as it's better suited for larger runs. If any product would be perfect for styrene, it would be starters.

As much as I hate it, I think the starters are PVC to keep them at such a low price point. $39.99USD for a battlebox, rules, dice, demo mat, flat terrain, etc, is a pretty good price, probably low enough to tempt people into impulse purchases. I'd personally have paid $60 for it to be HIPS, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen.

The styrene transition hasn't stopped, though. Aren't they doing HIPS colossals?

The thing about HIPS is that it has a higher up front cost and a lower per unit cost. If you are going to have a high demand item and you do a larger run, it doesn't have to be $60 rather than $40. Look at what Maelstrom's Edge was able to do with their larger miniatures. The Angel is bigger than most warjacks and is $9. The Epirian Hunter is $9.50



And that's from a start up as their initial product launch after a modest $70K Kickstarter. Privateer should have more than enough to invest in a similar approach that takes advantage of what HIPS can mean in terms of per unit costs.

HIPS shouldn't mean a higher price point. The whole point of it is to reduce the marginal cost of the next sprue produced.

I can see a few reasons not to change these starters from PVC:

1) They have their PVC production in a good place in terms of consistent supply and don't want to shake things up by going with their HIPS source. Any logistical concerns would also be lumped in here.

2) They are expecting lower volumes than would merit the up front cost of a transition to HIPS. They sold some of the HIPS battle engines and jacks but in the end, the volume just isn't there to justify rolling out a new edition using HIPS.

3) They didn't give themselves enough time to do the front end work for the new material. The molds and design process are different and maybe MK3 got pushed up. Maybe it was originally supposed to be announced at Lock & Load, but released later like at Gencon or something.

When you add in the protectionist retailer policies they are trying to enact, Privateer is behaving like a company that has finished its growth stage and now has to figure out how to be a mature company. They've explicitly stated that their sales through brick and mortar stores are down and they blame the online discounters.

Then they spring MK3 right after that. GW definitely uses new editions to try to get a sales boost. I think we're seeing the same thing here.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TheWaspinator wrote:
The styrene transition hasn't stopped, though. Aren't they doing HIPS colossals?

It's been super spotty. One battle engine here, one jack there, one collasal here. Not the new starters (which you'd expect to be some of their highest volume sellers).

When they first started with PVC they had similar issues with a spotty transition. They got there eventually though and probably will for HIPS, assuming the purchasing volume is high enough to justify the up front costs.

They've said ALL new colossals going forward are HIP dual kits, and they are stepping up HIP warjack production even if the starter sets aren't. The most recent non-character jacks I can think of are the Cygnar HIP one and the Khador HIP Grolar, with the bezerker sprues being teased too.

I hope those kits come out in a timely fashion, but I highly doubt they will. Like faster than it took them to release Destors. Or implement their change from MK1 blisters to where all boxes contain full units. Heck, they still haven't finished the releases from a book from two years ago (Vengeance in March of 2014). I was super excited when I heard about the Inflictor... but something is wrong when you can't even get the kits out for one of your main factions after two years have gone by.

Then add in all the releases that come with a new edition I think it's going to be a long time before all the dual kits are released in styrene.

They can confirm all they want, but I think what we'll really see is a spotty release schedule for their HIPS models with lots and lots of waiting.

To bring this back on topic, I think they need to make this transition a much greater priority than they've demonstrated. Like have the entry point be in styrene. And have their be a critical mass of products so that anyone who doesn't want to deal with hard grey PVC can still make a viable army. Right now when you get a box off the shelf you don't really know if it'll be any good. It might be from one of their runs that had terrible mold lines and detail destroying injection gates or it might be fine. That's just not acceptable at their price point.

 Eilif wrote:

I dig that you did fist-swaps putting plastic fists on the metal dudes. It really does change their character.

 keezus wrote:
I dig that you did fist-swaps putting plastic fists on the metal dudes. It really does change their character.

Thanks!
My buddy snagged a bag of leftover jack arms and heads at a FLGS auction for me. The goal was just to have them all armed with CC weapons and for no two of them to be armed alike.

The guy with two plastic fists is one of my favorites. It's not as easy to see in the picture, but I gave him a head with a jutting jaw I nicknamed him "The Boxer". Next to him there's also a metal dude with a fist and a double-headed axe, all made from plastic parts.There are more pics of them here:
http://chicagoskirmish.blogspot.com/2014/11/more-reinforcements-knights-and.html

I started to get into Warmachine, but once I realized that most of the other players had armies similar in size to what I expected in 40k, and that the miniatures cost about the same as GW, I lost interest.

I still like playing a game now and then with my starter box of 3 warjacks and a warcaster though.