Eilif wrote:
Stranger 83,
You've backed yourself into a corner where the only way you can win your argument that the best place to spend your £10 is GW is to ONLY compare GW price-per-miniature to two of the most expensive miniature makers out there. And those are games who don't require nearly as many miniatures as GW games.

You've formed an argument based on discounting the dozens of other miniature wargaming options whose price per-figure AND price per army are drastically cheaper than any of the "Big 3". And you've discounted them soley because they don't fit into your point of view.

Give it up man. You've LOST!

But my point is still the same, if GW are not the most expensive why do people not compalin about the more expensive companies pricing people out of the market? Again, the fact that there are other companies cheaper than GW doesn;t make them the most expensive. By all means complain that you find GW too expensive, but if you do the, on the stand point of the fully hobby (i.e. not just the game) then you should find the compaines more expensive than them to all be too expensive and complain about them just as much.

And for price per model IS important when you inclde both "Build" and "Paint" into the hobby, which I was told by the thread OP is what was meant by "The Hobby"


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 keezus wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:
I’m also not sure what you are basing your maths on – you show that you can get 10 infinaty models for $80 and are comparing that to 50 GW models, which doesn’t seem fair to me.
quote]

I think you are overly fixated on model/$ in a vacuum.

In my original example, you've completly ignored my argument that the number of models needed to enable standard play with other players needs to be relevant. If 40k (for example) needs on average, 50 models to hit 1500 points, and Infinity needs 10 models, it means that the Infinity player is getting full use (i.e. play) out of his/her models after $80 investment where as at that point the 40k player might have 2 troops and an HQ at that point, and twice the models of the Infinity player, but if they intend to play standard sized games - the 40k player needs to continue buying models. This is of course by game design.

Using your example of 50 models in each system:

50 models ~ 1500 points in 40k
- Standard game size: 1500-1850
- Play style(s) afforded by 1 1500 point army - one (This is by game design, as 40k units rely heavily on their own statistics to carry the day, and unit actions are limited by the targeting rules.)

50 models ~ 75 points in Warmahordes
- Standard game size: 35-50 points
- Play style(s) afforded by 1x 50 point model + 25 points in hot-swappable components - 10+ (This is by game design, as WM/H units rely heavily on unit to unit interactions and swapping out a unit creates different synergies)

50 models ~ ??? points in Infinity
- Play styles afforded by 50 models!!! is enormous as Infinity relies on MODEL TO MODEL interations and having 50 hot-swappable pieces creates hundreds of possible play styles!

Ergo - In your example, the other systems cost more money to get to the 50 point mark, but offer greater "HOBBY' value as they provide greater tactical options in game-play. This is again, by concious design by the various game system designers.

Keezus, you are looking at it for a gamer perspective. For someone who is a hobbiest that collects models first and plays games second (and believe me there are many out there- infact there are many hobbiests who collect models and never play) then the number of points that the army would be does not matter. Now I've shown that Infinity is the cheaper game, I've accepted that from the start - but this is about the hobby, which I was informed was "Build, paint,play" and therefore the number of stuff you get to "build and paint" for your cash is just as important as size of the army you get for it too.

Stranger83 wrote:
Yes, and I presume that the people who are diven away from GW for the price are also driven away from the more expensive ones too.

That is not necessarily true:

e.g. 1 - Baneblade Superheavy vs. Warmachine Colossal

The colossal is more expensive but a player might still spring for one, as you can use it in normal sized games and it adds a new dimension of gameplay to the WM/H system. The Baneblade on the other hand (Disclaimer: I own a Shadowsword) is more of a centerpiece that will see little to no gameplay at all and is basically just a fancy model kit... ergo, as far as Hobby goes, the Colossal provides more VALUE as you get the gameplay out of it as well. This perception of VALUE does a lot to sway customers.

e.g. 2 - The Hobbit: White Council vs. Chaos Helldrake

This seems like terrible value, as it contains models that may not see a lot of game play for a huge price. (Finecast too!). The Helldrake on the other hand, for Chaos players will see tons of game-play despite its high cost. Ergo, GW are likely selling many magnitudes more Helldrakes than White Councils.

e.g. 3 - GW Manticore vs Raging Heroes Manticre

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Stranger83 wrote:
Keezus, you are looking at it for a gamer perspective. For someone who is a hobbiest that collects models first and plays games second (and believe me there are many out there- infact there are many hobbiests who collect models and never play) then the number of points that the army would be does not matter. Now I've shown that Infinity is the cheaper game, I've accepted that from the start - but this is about the hobby, which I was informed was "Build, paint,play" and therefore the number of stuff you get to "build and paint" for your cash is just as important as size of the army you get for it too.

I already covered this in my inital post... which noted that if customers were buying only to build-paint, they need not be limited to WARGAMING miniatures and models. Companies like Reaper make quality fantasy models at competitive prices, and Raging Heroes and Kingdom Death are putting out high quality display pieces that are specifically targetting modellers. There's no reason for a Helldrake to cost the money that it does when non-wargaming manufacturers are offering things like fully articulated, and engineered transforming model kits for about half the price.

I'll use a comparison I used earlier in the thread for emphasis.

I bought a Kromlech Rotten Butcher, which is slightly more expensive than a Workshop GUO but makes an ideal counts as. Its a bit larger and resin cast, so is a roughly comparable as a product being sold to the same consumers in the same market for a comparable purpose.

However I am happy that I have purchased a great model and have no regrets over spending the money.

The issue I have with the GUO is the quality of the model is not sufficiently high to justify the asking price, so thats why I haven't bought it.

I think thats the issue here, it's not that the prices of GW models is inherently higher than many other companies, it's that the price is disproportionate to the product on offer. If the Council consisted of 4 of the most epically sculpted, dynamically posed models ever tp grace a range, this conversation would be much shorter.

 keezus wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:
Yes, and I presume that the people who are diven away from GW for the price are also driven away from the more expensive ones too.

That is not necessarily true:

e.g. 1 - Baneblade Superheavy vs. Warmachine Colossal

The colossal is more expensive but a player might still spring for one, as you can use it in normal sized games and it adds a new dimension of gameplay to the WM/H system. The Baneblade on the other hand (Disclaimer: I own a Shadowsword) is more of a centerpiece that will see little to no gameplay at all and is basically just a fancy model kit... ergo, as far as Hobby goes, the Colossal provides more VALUE as you get the gameplay out of it as well. This perception of VALUE does a lot to sway customers.

e.g. 2 - The Hobbit: White Council vs. Chaos Helldrake

This seems like terrible value, as it contains models that may not see a lot of game play for a huge price. (Finecast too!). The Helldrake on the other hand, for Chaos players will see tons of game-play despite its high cost. Ergo, GW are likely selling many magnitudes more Helldrakes than White Councils.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Stranger83 wrote:
Keezus, you are looking at it for a gamer perspective. For someone who is a hobbiest that collects models first and plays games second (and believe me there are many out there- infact there are many hobbiests who collect models and never play) then the number of points that the army would be does not matter. Now I've shown that Infinity is the cheaper game, I've accepted that from the start - but this is about the hobby, which I was informed was "Build, paint,play" and therefore the number of stuff you get to "build and paint" for your cash is just as important as size of the army you get for it too.

I already covered this in my inital post... which noted that if customers were buying only to build-paint, they need not be limited to WARGAMING miniatures and models. Companies like Reaper make quality fantasy models at competitive prices, and Raging Heroes and Kingdom Death are putting out high quality display pieces that are specifically targetting modellers. There's no reason for a Helldrake to cost the money that it does when non-wargaming manufacturers are offering things like fully articulated, and engineered transforming model kits for about half the price.

Kingdom Death and Raging Heroes are both perfect examples, both charge more than GW as standard yet are still being bought in droves, yet neither comes with an offical game attached. Now since the question is "Are GW priceing people out of the hobby?" and not "are GW overpriced?" they how can we say that GW are priceing people out if there are 2 other companies selling so well? Yes both Raging Heroes and Kingdom death make much better minis, but again, the thread is about price alone


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 azreal13 wrote:
I'll use a comparison I used earlier in the thread for emphasis.

I bought a Kromlech Rotten Butcher, which is slightly more expensive than a Workshop GUO but makes an ideal counts as. Its a bit larger and resin cast, so is a roughly comparable as a product being sold to the same consumers in the same market for a comparable purpose.

However I am happy that I have purchased a great model and have no regrets over spending the money.

The issue I have with the GUO is the quality of the model is not sufficiently high to justify the asking price, so thats why I haven't bought it.

I think thats the issue here, it's not that the prices of GW models is inherently higher than many other companies, it's that the price is disproportionate to the product on offer. If the Council consisted of 4 of the most epically sculpted, dynamically posed models ever tp grace a range, this conversation would be much shorter.

this exactly, if people are prepared to pay for other other companies models then the issue is not that GW are so expensive, it's that they are so expensive for what you get, they 2 are very different arguments.

GW's prices are getting crazy, they are really shooting themselves in the foot, especially as many for the GW shops here in the UK are stopping gaming nights when gamers going to the gaming nights are probably their main source of income.

Also have you guys seen the new Space Marine bundles they released where you don't get a discount?

You hit the nail on the head. GW is expensive for what you get. Ergo, for some, the price has become untennable.

 keezus wrote:
You hit the nail on the head. GW is expensive for what you get. Ergo, for some, the price has become untennable.

Yes, but this is not the same as GW pricing you out of the hobby - it's not that they are so expensive that you can't afford their stuff, it's that you feel the other stuff is better value for money. The 2 are different things.

How is it not? If it were cheaper (or the game system was better), it'd offer better value for money, and those who left might still be customers.

I have had a thought... as you all know GW have been making these bundles where you don't get any savings. I'm thinking that when GW raise the prices once again, they will keep the bundles the same price as they are now so then they will look like a 'good value' compared to the prices of everything else, essentially scamming unwary people.

 keezus wrote:
How is it not? If it were cheaper (or the game system was better), it'd offer better value for money, and those who left might still be customers.

Because being priced out means that you can no longer afford to buy something you want. It''s not the same as choosing to buy something else because you think it's better value for money.

For example, I am priced out of owning a supercar, however I am not priced out of owning a ford - I don't own a Ford because for the money I would have to spend on a Ford I could get a better quality car (in my opinion) elsewhere. The two are not the same thing.

Stranger83 wrote:
Because being priced out means that you can no longer afford to buy something you want. It''s not the same as choosing to buy something else because you think it's better value for money.

For example, I am priced out of owning a supercar, however I am not priced out of owning a ford - I don't own a Ford because for the money I would have to spend on a Ford I could get a better quality car (in my opinion) elsewhere. The two are not the same thing.

Right... except in this case, GW is making Fords but pricing them like Super Cars. Super Car buyers aren't going to buy Fords at Super Car prices, and people that want Fords can't afford Super Cars.

-edit- actually.. it's more like super car bodies on Ford platforms. So there are still people that will buy these for the look, but they are part of a decreasing population.

Stranger83 wrote:


Kingdom Death and Raging Heroes are both perfect examples, both charge more than GW as standard yet are still being bought in droves, yet neither comes with an offical game attached. Now since the question is "Are GW priceing people out of the hobby?" and not "are GW overpriced?" they how can we say that GW are priceing people out if there are 2 other companies selling so well? Yes both Raging Heroes and Kingdom death make much better minis, but again, the thread is about price alone

Actually, the argument still applies. Keep in mind that GW markets itself as a gateway to the young and novice. Both Raging Heroes and Kingdom Death are for more seasoned veterans of the hobby with a much higher degree of skill.

Stranger83 wrote:
Keezus, you are looking at it for a gamer perspective. For someone who is a hobbiest that collects models first and plays games second (and believe me there are many out there- infact there are many hobbiests who collect models and never play) then the number of points that the army would be does not matter. Now I've shown that Infinity is the cheaper game, I've accepted that from the start - but this is about the hobby, which I was informed was "Build, paint,play" and therefore the number of stuff you get to "build and paint" for your cash is just as important as size of the army you get for it too.

The problem though is that most people who collect and never game are in fact going to be spending significantly more per figure from GW than elsewhere - as they will likely be more interested in character figures as opposed to unit boxes.

The only thing that keeps prices down per figure on a 100 figure army for GW are their relatively (compared to metal) cheap plastics. If you are a collector - you will probably not want to collect and paint 80 some odd Cadian infantry. Instead, you will want models that have a lot of character to allow more painting styles as opposed to the drudgery of painting dozens of the same figure.

In that regard, GW is at least twice as expensive as anyone else, with many figures being much more than that. In that regard, the Build-Paint aspect of the hobby is less with GW. Although there is more building and painting to make a playable army...for those who are not interested in the Gaming aspect of miniatures - it isn't really a selling point that the troops costs are a little bit lower for GW, as in most cases they will only be picking up a single box of troops to convert and paint as opposed to a half dozen of those troops which are needed for a playable army.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/150/497907.page#5135618

If you were to take your same dollar amount to any company other than GW, you would get a larger variety of figures to paint than you would from GW with the exception of some limited run boutique companies (who are priced higher than GW - but not by all that much in most cases).

So...You take each system and compare the value for each type of hobbyist.

Miniature Painters and Modelers? No - you do not get good bang for the buck. There is an advantage to GW though in that a large selection of plastic figures are available and plastic is the preferred medium for a lot of converters.

Gamers? No - you do not get good bang for the buck. Entry costs for new armies and keeping up with rules changes is quite costly. There is an advantage with 40K though in that it is more popular in most areas than other games.

People who like to roll dice? GW has an edge here, as the rules were largely designed for smaller games and still require more dice rolls per turn than most other game systems. Although you could well enough scale other games up to comparable sizes - they generally are not.

this exactly, if people are prepared to pay for other other companies models then the issue is not that GW are so expensive, it's that they are so expensive for what you get, they 2 are very different arguments.

See the link above. They are both expensive and expensive for what you get. Two different arguments with the same end result. Troops, they are a little cheaper. Characters, they are a lot more expensive. Monsters and the like they are comparable or horrible depending on the material in question.

 keezus wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:
Because being priced out means that you can no longer afford to buy something you want. It''s not the same as choosing to buy something else because you think it's better value for money.

For example, I am priced out of owning a supercar, however I am not priced out of owning a ford - I don't own a Ford because for the money I would have to spend on a Ford I could get a better quality car (in my opinion) elsewhere. The two are not the same thing.

Right... except in this case, GW is making Fords but pricing them like Super Cars. Super Car buyers aren't going to buy Fords at Super Car prices, and people that want Fords can't afford Super Cars.

And this is where my point about GW not being the most expensive comes in - for your example if GW are charging like supercars then so ares PP/infinity/raging heroes/kingdom death and any other company that costs more than GW. Now if you are all able to buy GW stuff (or the supercar) but decided that they want something that you precieve to be better for the money you spend. you people havn't been "priced out" of GW stuff - you have just deciding to buy something else.

Stranger83 wrote:
And this is where my point about GW not being the most expensive comes in - for your example if GW are charging like supercars then everyone who buys PP/infinity/raging heroes/kingdom death and any other company that costs more than GW are all able to buy GW stuff - they just decided that they want something that they precieve to be better for the money they spend. these people havn't bee "priced out" of GW stuff - they are just deciding to buy something else.

So by your logic, if I were to sell cubic zirconiums as diamonds, at diamond prices, and people who want to buy diamonds pass me by to buy actual diamonds from another company - I haven't priced myself out of the market... I'm only providing poor value.

I think we'll have to agree to disagree.

Now that I think of it, since the AUS dollar is almost the same as the American is, perhaps GW realises that they can keep increasing the prices to the same as the AUS prices?

For example, a Land raider costs:
$110 AUS
$ 74.25 USD

So since $1 AUS = $1.05 USD, GW knows that since people are still buying the $110.00 Land raider in AUS with the same money, they can increase the USD prices to from $74.25 to $110.00 and people will still buy it.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:
Keezus, you are looking at it for a gamer perspective. For someone who is a hobbiest that collects models first and plays games second (and believe me there are many out there- infact there are many hobbiests who collect models and never play) then the number of points that the army would be does not matter. Now I've shown that Infinity is the cheaper game, I've accepted that from the start - but this is about the hobby, which I was informed was "Build, paint,play" and therefore the number of stuff you get to "build and paint" for your cash is just as important as size of the army you get for it too.

The problem though is that most people who collect and never game are in fact going to be spending significantly more per figure from GW than elsewhere - as they will likely be more interested in character figures as opposed to unit boxes.

The only thing that keeps prices down per figure on a 100 figure army for GW are their relatively (compared to metal) cheap plastics. If you are a collector - you will probably not want to collect and paint 80 some odd Cadian infantry. Instead, you will want models that have a lot of character to allow more painting styles as opposed to the drudgery of painting dozens of the same figure.

In that regard, GW is at least twice as expensive as anyone else, with many figures being much more than that. In that regard, the Build-Paint aspect of the hobby is less with GW. Although there is more building and painting to make a playable army...for those who are not interested in the Gaming aspect of miniatures - it isn't really a selling point that the troops costs are a little bit lower for GW, as in most cases they will only be picking up a single box of troops to convert and paint as opposed to a half dozen of those troops which are needed for a playable army.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/150/497907.page#5135618

If you were to take your same dollar amount to any company other than GW, you would get a larger variety of figures to paint than you would from GW with the exception of some limited run boutique companies (who are priced higher than GW - but not by all that much in most cases).

So...You take each system and compare the value for each type of hobbyist.

Miniature Painters and Modelers? No - you do not get good bang for the buck. There is an advantage to GW though in that a large selection of plastic figures are available and plastic is the preferred medium for a lot of converters.

Gamers? No - you do not get good bang for the buck. Entry costs for new armies and keeping up with rules changes is quite costly. There is an advantage with 40K though in that it is more popular in most areas than other games.

People who like to roll dice? GW has an edge here, as the rules were largely designed for smaller games and still require more dice rolls per turn than most other game systems. Although you could well enough scale other games up to comparable sizes - they generally are not.

this exactly, if people are prepared to pay for other other companies models then the issue is not that GW are so expensive, it's that they are so expensive for what you get, they 2 are very different arguments.

See the link above. They are both expensive and expensive for what you get. Two different arguments with the same end result. Troops, they are a little cheaper. Characters, they are a lot more expensive. Monsters and the like they are comparable or horrible depending on the material in question.

Actually if you are building and paitning an entire unit/regiment then a similar style is preferable. For instance I have a full regiment of British troops from WW2 (granted using models from a couple of different companies) that I have never painted, I got these so that I could recreate my Grandads regiment for him for his 85th Birthday, he was very touched. People only in it for the models (or mainly in it ffor the models) don;t have some kind of hatred for unit models.

And yes, the end result of being priced out of GW stuff and choosing to not buy GW stuff because they are overpriced is the same (i.e you don;t buy GW stuff) But the thread is about are you priced out, noy have you stoppe buying for any reason at all.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 keezus wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:
And this is where my point about GW not being the most expensive comes in - for your example if GW are charging like supercars then everyone who buys PP/infinity/raging heroes/kingdom death and any other company that costs more than GW are all able to buy GW stuff - they just decided that they want something that they precieve to be better for the money they spend. these people havn't bee "priced out" of GW stuff - they are just deciding to buy something else.

So by your logic, if I were to sell cubic zirconiums as diamonds, at diamond prices, and people who want to buy diamonds pass me by to buy actual diamonds from another company - I haven't priced myself out of the market... I'm only providing poor value.

I think we'll have to agree to disagree.

Ah no, again different things, GW priceing themselves out of the market is not the same as a customer being priced out of buying their stuff. Yes GW have priced themselves out of the market for anyone who thinks that they are overpriced for what you get, but you are not priced out of buying GW, you are just choosing not to.

 VanHammer wrote:
Now that I think of it, since the AUS dollar is almost the same as the American is, perhaps GW realises that they can keep increasing the prices to the same as the AUS prices?

For example, a Land raider costs:
$110 AUS
$ 74.25 USD

So since $1 AUS = $1.05 USD, GW knows that since people are still buying the $110.00 Land raider in AUS with the same money, they can increase the USD prices to from $74.25 to $110.00 and people will still buy it.

As stupid as GW can be, I think they would be idiotic to base pricing info off Aussie sales figures. From what I have heard and been told, Aus sales have absolutely tanked since the embargo (not surprising really).

What about the Canadian prices then?
The Canadian dollar is also worth more than the american yet Canadians still pay more for the same products from GW.

 VanHammer wrote:
What about the Canadian prices then?
The Canadian dollar is also worth more than the american yet Canadians still pay more for the same products from GW.

Possibly. Ultimately, GW will keep hiking prices up to the point that the market will bear it. If people are still buying stuff in sufficient enough quantities, then that strategy is working for them.

 VanHammer wrote:
What about the Canadian prices then?
The Canadian dollar is also worth more than the american yet Canadians still pay more for the same products from GW.

Yeah, regional pricing is terrible, talk about a way to piss off your customers.

Stranger83 wrote:
Yes, and I presume that the people who are diven away from GW for the price are also driven away from the more expensive ones too.

Is this a valid assumption? What about higher per model costs but lower per army cost games? Do you really think every single person does a per figure cost analysis and decides soley on the result of that? People keep bringing up that the total cost for a game is lower on many miniature games than for 40k (and especially for WFB). I think they bring this up with good reason. Perceived value is also an important factor that might lead someone to purchase something that costs more than GW but is seen as a better alternative. I can think of lots of reasons where people will be driven away from GW by their prices but then buy miniatures that are more expensive on a per figure basis but offer something GW does not.

Stranger83 wrote:Yes, but this is not the same as GW pricing you out of the hobby - it's not that they are so expensive that you can't afford their stuff, it's that you feel the other stuff is better value for money. The 2 are different things.

Priced out of the hobby does NOT mean you can't afford it. It means you won't buy it because of the price. It says nothing about what you can afford. Some people priced out of GW's games have hobbies like snow boarding and skiing that cost way, way more. They can afford it. They just don't see the value.

For the remainder of this thread can we agree that "priced out" means anyone not purchasing because of the price, regardless of what they can afford or not?

And even if we agree that priced out does mean that people can't afford it, what's the point of the distinction? GW is pricing their goods at a higher and higher rate each year and more and more people aren't buying. What does it matter if some of them are priced out by your definiton and the rest just don't see the value anymore? End result is that they're not buying the quantity they used to.

@Filbert: Canada enjoys a 20% markup over US MSRP. Our discounters basically sell product to us at US MSRP. Buying from US discounters is akin to 50% discount.

 filbert wrote:

 VanHammer wrote:
What about the Canadian prices then?
The Canadian dollar is also worth more than the american yet Canadians still pay more for the same products from GW.

Possibly. Ultimately, GW will keep hiking prices up to the point that the market will bear it. If people are still buying stuff in sufficient enough quantities, then that strategy is working for them.

This.

Though I'm really not sure how well this is working for GW. I have a friend in Toronto that runs a game store there and he's always complaining about losing sales to US ebay sellers and Miniature Market on GW stuff.

But this will be hidden from the share holders as they no longer report Canada separately from USA. Sales to Canada come from the same production center in the USA.

agustin wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:
Yes, and I presume that the people who are diven away from GW for the price are also driven away from the more expensive ones too.

Is this a valid assumption? What about higher per model costs but lower per army cost games? Do you really think every single person does a per figure cost analysis and decides soley on the result of that? People keep bringing up that the total cost for a game is lower on many miniature games than for 40k (and especially for WFB). I think they bring this up with good reason. Perceived value is also an important factor that might lead someone to purchase something that costs more than GW but is seen as a better alternative. I can think of lots of reasons where people will be driven away from GW by their prices but then buy miniatures that are more expensive on a per figure basis but offer something GW does not.

Stranger83 wrote:Yes, but this is not the same as GW pricing you out of the hobby - it's not that they are so expensive that you can't afford their stuff, it's that you feel the other stuff is better value for money. The 2 are different things.

Priced out of the hobby does NOT mean you can't afford it. It means you won't buy it because of the price. It says nothing about what you can afford. Some people priced out of GW's games have hobbies like snow boarding and skiing that cost way, way more. They can afford it. They just don't see the value.

For the remainder of this thread can we agree that "priced out" means anyone not purchasing because of the price, regardless of what they can afford or not?

And even if we agree that priced out does mean that people can't afford it, what's the point of the distinction? GW is pricing their goods at a higher and higher rate each year and more and more people aren't buying. What does it matter if some of them are priced out by your definiton and the rest just don't see the value anymore? End result is that they're not buying the quantity they used to.

Fair enough, maybe "cannot afford" is the wrong choice of words again, "cannot afford from the budget they assign to the hobby" would have been better.

If we are going to agree that the "priced out" doesn't actually mean "priced out" but infact means I'm not prepared to pay their prices for stuff then yes there will be lots of people priced out of GW.

As for the point of the destinction. There isn;t one - but the thread itself puts a distinction in there - i.e. not "are people leaving GW because they think things are overpriced" it's "Are people leaveing GW because they are priced out" The answer to the first question is yes, the answer to the second is no.

"Priced out" is not a specific term you can point at for an objective definition. It has different usages in different circles (for example, in real estate, it only applies to sellers listing their houses above market comparables), so I don't understand why you are insisting on your specific definition for it. As if what you are saying is the definition of priced out.

Why not go with the broad and colloquial meaning that people just won't buy because of price?

Everyone else understood that priced out just meant people not buying because of price. You added this extra "because they can't afford it" criteria onto the thread that just wasn't there before you brought it up.

agustin wrote:
Why are you making the distinction if it is meaningless?

"Priced out" is not a specific term you can point at for an objective definition. It has different usages in different circles (for example, in real estate, it only applies to sellers listing their houses above market comparables), so I don't understand why you are insisting on your specific definition for it. As if what you are saying is the definition of priced out.

Why not go with the broad and colloquial meaning that people just won't buy because of price?

I'm making the distinction because the distinction is right there in the thread title. I'm answering the question that was asked, not the question that I want to have been asked.

Priced out from the point of view of the seller means that it is above market value (for example GW have priced themselves out of the market) as their models are too expensive for what you get Priced out from the point of view of the buyer means they cannot afford it with the budget they have. to use your real estate example, a house that is more expensive than others of the same type is priced out of the market, but a buyer looking to buy a house that is "correctly" priced for it's value but cannot afford it has been priced out of buying it. The question that is asked very specifically says pricing people out of the hobby, not pricing itself out of the market.

A quote from the OP:

I heavily rely on Dark Angels figures for my DYI chapter but I'm wondering if GW has finally hit that magical point where I simply can't justify the cost of their product

Where are you getting this "can't afford it" business? It's an element YOU are adding to the thread title. The OP talked about justifying the cost of GW's product, not "can't afford it."

Is there actually a point of disagreement between you and anyone else in the thread at this point? I can't tell with how you're muddying the discussion by insisting on some meaningless distinction about the definition of "priced out."

To bring things back to the topic at hand, where do you think GW is going to go from here with their prices? What will be the effect?

@Stranger83:

Insufficient funds to purchase OR Chose not to purchase due to poor value.

Both lead to a non-sale for GW, directly linked to price.

Your defnition suggests that as long as GW keeps their prices under the discretionary hobby budget of their targetted demographic, the haven't priced themselves out of the hobby, even if they make no sales. This makes no sense.

@Stranger83 - if you could summarize what I'm supposed to have understood by reading your posts in this thread, I'd appreicate it. You made some claim about GW being among the cheapest miniature gaming hobby options and that if GW is too expensive for someone, then all others priced at the same price per model will also lose that sale. Is there something else?

I don't believe either of those two claims are true, but I don't want to deal with them further if they are not what you are saying.

agustin wrote:
A quote from the OP:

I heavily rely on Dark Angels figures for my DYI chapter but I'm wondering if GW has finally hit that magical point where I simply can't justify the cost of their product

Where are you getting this "can't afford it" business? It's an element YOU are adding to the thread title. The OP talked about justifying the cost of GW's product, not "can't afford it."

Is there actually a point of disagreement between you and anyone else in the thread at this point? I can't tell with how you're muddying the discussion by insisting on some meaningless distinction about the definition of "priced out."

To bring things back to the topic at hand, where do you think GW is going to go from here with their prices? What will be the effect?

I'm getting the "can't afford it" from the priced out in the question. Priced out is an actualy phrase in the English Language that means (from the point of view of the buyer" that you cannot afford it for the price.

However, you are right, this is getting off topic so I will instead agree that, to the question of "are GW overpriced for what you get" then the answer is yes.

As to where I think it's going to go, I don't see it changing anything at all. Thinking about it logically wargaming is still a pretty cheap hobby (as you mentioned before when compared to snowbording or my own other hobby of archery - if you think GW are expensive try spending £200 on some arrows that you'll only use for 6 months or £250 on a target) Therefore the only ones who see GW as expensive are the ones who are into wargaming and then look around at what else they can get. GW, weather we like it or not, are usually a players first point of call to the hobby due to their larger presence. The fact that you can actually see stores in "normal" locations is a big plus. Whilst other games are in LGS they tend to be out of the way due to the need for gaming space - this means that unlike GW stores you don't realise they exist unless you are looking for them (i.e. after you have already bought your GW stuff).

So, until such time as GW becomes expensive enough that those who might take it up look at it and go "Why for the same cost I could take up archery" then I don't think they are in any trouble at all. Indeed even if it did become as expensive as archery I'm sure there would still be people who would prefer wargaming over archery so would still choose GW.

All I can say is it looks like I better buy my FW Termies now before the price hike.

Stranger83 wrote:

Eilif wrote:
Stranger 83,
You've backed yourself into a corner where the only way you can win your argument that the best place to spend your £10 is GW is to ONLY compare GW price-per-miniature to two of the most expensive miniature makers out there. And those are games who don't require nearly as many miniatures as GW games.

You've formed an argument based on discounting the dozens of other miniature wargaming options whose price per-figure AND price per army are drastically cheaper than any of the "Big 3". And you've discounted them soley because they don't fit into your point of view.

Give it up man. You've LOST!

But my point is still the same, if GW are not the most expensive why do people not compalin about the more expensive companies pricing people out of the market? Again, the fact that there are other companies cheaper than GW doesn;t make them the most expensive. By all means complain that you find GW too expensive, but if you do the, on the stand point of the fully hobby (i.e. not just the game) then you should find the compaines more expensive than them to all be too expensive and complain about them just as much.

And for price per model IS important when you inclde both "Build" and "Paint" into the hobby, which I was told by the thread OP is what was meant by "The Hobby"

I think we're talking about a few different things here.

1)While the hobby does include painting/gaming/building/etc, it shoudl be pointed out that most folks seem to be taking the OP's use of the word "The Hobby" to mean specifically "The Games Workshop Hobby". This is a fair assumption, because GW prices can only drive someone out of the "GW hobby". GW can't price someone out any other part of the wargaming hobby, because they only make and sell the "GW Hobby".

2) Price per model is important. I agree that building and painting are a big part of the hobby. I will even go so far as to agree that the big 3 do price their miniatures similarly with some being even more expensive per miniature than GW. However, your artificial limitation to just the big 3 is nonsensical. There are far more miniature makers than the big 3, and nearly all of them (with the exception of a few high-end-boutiques) make miniatures that cost less-per-mini.

3) Lastly, regardless of whether painting and building are part of the hobby or not, the fact remains that collecting a standard size GW army is more expensive than any other game, and that's enough to price someone out of the GW hobby, regardless of how much painting and building are included in that cost. The idea that a much higher cost-for-entry is offset by simply having more figures to build and paint is an argument that will not be enough for many folks who seem (if this thread is any indication) to believe that GW has priced them out.

agustin wrote:
@Stranger83 - if you could summarize what I'm supposed to have understood by reading your posts in this thread, I'd appreicate it. You made some claim about GW being among the cheapest miniature gaming hobby options and that if GW is too expensive for someone, then all others priced at the same price per model will also lose that sale. Is there something else?

I don't believe either of those two claims are true, but I don't want to deal with them further if they are not what you are saying.

My summary is this. By it's very definition "Priced out" from the point of view of the buyer means that you cannot afford to buy what you want with the funds you have. So, by definition if you have been priced out of someething that is not the most expensive then you must have been priced out of everything that is even more expensive too.

Looking at "the hobby" as a whole (i.e. build/paint/play), and not just "what do I need to play the game" then GW are not the most expensive company out there, therefore to say that GW and GW alone are pricing people out of the hobby is wrong.

You might not buy GW because you don't like the rules, you might not buy GW because you don't like the models, you might not buy GW because you don;t like the mediums they use to make the models - but non of these have anything to do with price - they are value for money questions, which is not what is asked.

Now yes I did say GW were one of the cheapest - and I have admitted on multiple occasions that this was a poor choice of words when all I was trying to say is that - taking the full "build/play/paint" into equasion - that GW are not the most expensive.

By definition if you are buying something that is more expensive than the thing you are not buying you have not been "priced out" of it, you have simply decided the the thing you are buying is better value for money.

I actually made no claim about if someone doesn;t buy a GW model because of the price then all the more expensive companys will also not make the sale, just that if you are choosing to buy the more expensive model it isn't because YOU have been priced out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Eilif wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:

Eilif wrote:
Stranger 83,
You've backed yourself into a corner where the only way you can win your argument that the best place to spend your £10 is GW is to ONLY compare GW price-per-miniature to two of the most expensive miniature makers out there. And those are games who don't require nearly as many miniatures as GW games.

You've formed an argument based on discounting the dozens of other miniature wargaming options whose price per-figure AND price per army are drastically cheaper than any of the "Big 3". And you've discounted them soley because they don't fit into your point of view.

Give it up man. You've LOST!

But my point is still the same, if GW are not the most expensive why do people not compalin about the more expensive companies pricing people out of the market? Again, the fact that there are other companies cheaper than GW doesn;t make them the most expensive. By all means complain that you find GW too expensive, but if you do the, on the stand point of the fully hobby (i.e. not just the game) then you should find the compaines more expensive than them to all be too expensive and complain about them just as much.

And for price per model IS important when you inclde both "Build" and "Paint" into the hobby, which I was told by the thread OP is what was meant by "The Hobby"

I think we're talking about a few different things here.

1)While the hobby does include painting/gaming/building/etc, it shoudl be pointed out that most folks seem to be taking the OP's use of the word "The Hobby" to mean specifically "The Games Workshop Hobby". This is a fair assumption, because GW prices can only drive someone out of the "GW hobby". GW can't price someone out any other part of the wargaming hobby, because they only make and sell the "GW Hobby".

2) Price per model is important. I agree that building and painting are a big part of the hobby. I will even go so far as to agree that the big 3 do price their miniatures similarly with some being even more expensive per miniature than GW. However, your artificial limitation to just the big 3 is nonsensical. There are far more miniature makers than the big 3, and nearly all of them (with the exception of a few high-end-boutiques) make miniatures that cost less-per-mini.

3) Lastly, regardless of whether painting and building are part of the hobby or not, the fact remains that collecting a standard size GW army is more expensive than any other game, and that's enough to price someone out of the GW hobby, regardless of how much painting and building are included in that cost. The idea that a much higher cost-for-entry is offset by simply having more figures to build and paint is an argument that will not be enough for many folks who seem (if this thread is any indication) to believe that GW has priced them out.

OK, for 2) I'll say that yes, there are other cheaper companies, but the reason I fixate on the other big three is because they are more expensive and thus prove my point that it isn;t being "priced out" it' making a choice that you are prepared to pay more for something bette (or if it costs the same that you prefer company 1 to company 2). Yes there are cheaper companies too, but just because GW are not the cheapest doesn;t make them the most expensive. If a Ford is cheaper than an Audi that doesn;t make Audi the most expensive company.

For 3) I've always said GW are the most expensive for the game, this is why I questioned what "the hobby" was before I started posting, as there is more to "the hobby" than just the game, yes if you are doing the hobby just for the game part then GW are more expensive, but I've bever claimed otherwise.

As for 1) based on just looking at GW in a vacume I think they are one of the cheapest hobbies I could think off that actually means you have to aquire things (Videos games are probably cheaper, so is hobbies that involve making things if you had free access to a workshop) so therefore no, if I look at just GW and acted like there were no other wargamer companies at all (weather cheaper or more expensive) then no I do not think that the hobby would be overpriced.

Oh dear I am sorry I could not stop laughing when I saw this http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=&prodId=prod1890027a

Now they have put some stuff into bundles for us, no discount just easier to manage but boy oh boy do the prices look ridiculous for this one, £100 for 17 guys, £100 I just really dont get it, didnt know wether to burst into tears or laughter.

Stranger83 wrote:

As to where I think it's going to go, I don't see it changing anything at all.

So GW will likely keep raising prices 10%+ percent per year, some people will stop buying and their revenues will be flat? This also makes space for increased competition, so it's probably fair to assume that we'll see more individual product lines from multiple companies, more 3rd party bitz sellers, more choices, more options. It only really sucks if people want to buy stuff from GW and they get to pay 10%+ more for the same product.

Thinking about it logically wargaming is still a pretty cheap hobby (as you mentioned before when compared to snowbording or my own other hobby of archery - if you think GW are expensive try spending £200 on some arrows that you'll only use for 6 months or £250 on a target)

I used to do 4x4 off roading, so I know what you mean. Redoing my suspension with a lift kit and custom shocks, struts and leaf spring mods so I can off road 10 or so times more over a year got very, very expensive.

Therefore the only ones who see GW as expensive are the ones who are into wargaming and then look around at what else they can get.

I see people who don't know anything about wargaming pick up a GW kit at the local shop, making a sucking sound when they see the sticker and put it back down all the time. Even people not into the hobby can see when the price of some plastic dudes is high.

GW, weather we like it or not, are usually a players first point of call to the hobby due to their larger presence. The fact that you can actually see stores in "normal" locations is a big plus.

In the UK. In the places I've lived, GW has never had a presence in the normal places.

Whilst other games are in LGS they tend to be out of the way due to the need for gaming space

Really? I don't think I've ever seen a store where the product is hard to get at. Sounds like terrible store design.

- this means that unlike GW stores you don't realise they exist unless you are looking for them (i.e. after you have already bought your GW stuff).

The UK must be strange place when it comes to buying miniatures as GW shelves make up the minority in all the independent stores I've been to over the last few years. They might still be large, but they're usually still smaller than the board game sections.

agustin wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:

Whilst other games are in LGS they tend to be out of the way due to the need for gaming space

Really? I don't think I've ever seen a store where the product is hard to get at. Sounds like terrible store design.

- this means that unlike GW stores you don't realise they exist unless you are looking for them (i.e. after you have already bought your GW stuff).

The UK must be strange place when it comes to buying miniatures as GW shelves make up the minority in all the independent stores I've been to over the last few years. They might still be large, but they're usually still smaller than the board game sections.

Apologies, I didn't word this quite right, I meant that the shop it'self is out of the way - i.e. on an industrial estate or in a converted mill on the outskirts of town, places that you only really travel to because you know that a specific shop is there - I wasn;t trying to say that the shop hid all it's merchadise in the back...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

agustin wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:

As to where I think it's going to go, I don't see it changing anything at all.

So GW will likely keep raising prices 10%+ percent per year, some people will stop buying and their revenues will be flat? This also makes space for increased competition, so it's probably fair to assume that we'll see more individual product lines from multiple companies, more 3rd party bitz sellers, more choices, more options. It only really sucks if people want to buy stuff from GW and they get to pay 10%+ more for the same product.

Yes, but flat revenues (or revenues that increase in line with inflation anyway) and lower production costs due to needing to make more models is still an increase in profits.

'GW are the only company to have a point of sale which puts them beyond their competitors...'

Like apple?, but I thought they were Microsoft?

:p

Dynamix wrote:
GW's offerings have been percieved by me to be poor value for some time now .

I agree, the problem is however that there is a tipping point where "poor value" changes from something that you pay begrudgingly to something that you refuse to pay because you feel like you are being taken for a ride and GW are coming dangerously close to that point for a large portion of their fanbase.

Riquende wrote:
Windows comparison is invalid - a big factor in MS retaining their market share is the hardware 90% of users purchase come with a Windows licence.

More than just that - thousands of companies use localized and custom software which runs only on Windows (either because of interface requirements or specific programming methods). Upgrading those across companies is prohibitive and since people use Windows at work, they are inclined to use Windows at home and be educated in the use of Windows in training courses.

Even ignoring that aspect - I can use a Windows (or some obscure 'nix system) regardless of what anyone else is using. However, I need an opponent to play a game against. The popularity of GW is tied to the popularity of GW. That is, one of the reasons a lot of people cite for playing GW games isn't because the figures are great or the rules are great...rather that it is easy to find a game opponent. As the popularity falls...it will fall faster as it is no longer the popular system. PP has already made significant grounds in many areas of the US markets, and several stores I have visited in the last year have dropped WHFB completely from their stock. There are several games who are nipping at 40K and may well see a comparable change in the not so distant future.

It won't happen overnight though. It took several years for PP to get where they are relative to WHFB in the US. I understand that they haven't reached that same level in Europe yet, though apparently it is close to that point in Australia.

I don't think you can say that for Australia fairly though!

sonicology wrote:

Dynamix wrote:
GW's offerings have been percieved by me to be poor value for some time now .

I agree, the problem is however that there is a tipping point where "poor value" changes from something that you pay begrudgingly to something that you refuse to pay because you feel like you are being taken for a ride and GW are coming dangerously close to that point for a large portion of their fanbase.

GW prices being at parity with Forgeworld prices is a dangerous precedent. That would be akin to General Motors pricing Chevy's at the same price as Cadillacs... This has two outcomes. If Cadillacs have retained their quality, Cadillac will rob Chevrolet of sales. If Cadillac has dropped in quality to the level of Chevy, the brand will take a huge hit in confidence. These are both bad outcomes.

I wouldnt say their pricing people out, but definitely keeping young kids from getting in. I started when I was 12 and my parents would buy me misc things here and there, and it was costly for them. Now a days, how do you expect a 16 year old, who works part time at mcdonalds, and goes to highschool to get into this? Too bad bc I had many good games with other kids growing up, and my family as well on Friday nights.

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
That's not true.

For my Wood Elves army, to try and cut costs somewhere, I've been converting a lot of miniatures. My Highborn, for example, is built out of Glade Rider, Dark Elf Spearmen, Glade Guard and even Gallows Grove kits. My Khorne Berzerkers are built from Khorne Berzerker, Possessed and CSM kits. My Eternal Guardsmen are built from Dark Elf spearmen and Eternal Guard parts (which I have not mentioned there, because they actually look like gak).

My favourite part of the hobby is actually building models and seeing what can happen when I let my imagination go wild. I just like playing the games, like most people who buy GW products do.

Make your move.

Noctem I think you forgot to add the Rhinos for the Beserkers in to your total cost for the GW army

Its kind of funny.... I Am just restarting into the hobby...
I have a very small ork army, that is very non competitive. ~800 pnts. And I am trying to scratch build as much as i can .
Im also starting an emporers children army soon, and a Salamanders army is in progress.

The only way I can afford it is Dakka swapshop, ebay, and trade.. and scratch building drop pods.... Thank the emporer for cardboard...

danp164 wrote:
I don't think they'll ever hit a wall whereby people stop buying/playing warhammer. It always amuses me when I'm told GW are pricing themselves out of the market, its like saying Microsoft can price itself out of the market with the next iteration of windows. In fact you can actually make a DIRECT comparison.

...yeah, saying you can make a direct comparison doesn't make it so. If we were to extrapolate the analogy to its logical conclusion, not playing Fantasy or 40k would mean that I wouldn't be able to play any other miniatures game or in 99% of all game stores (which certainly isn't true, at least in the US where GW stores aren't the ubiquitous retail presence that they are in the UK).

So, in a very vague way GW's apple is kind of sort of like Microsoft's orange in the sense they are both sort of roundish.

The real joke though, is the direct price comparison between 40k and WarmaHordes. Have you SEEN their prices increases?! from going to a cheaper medium, a box of TEN bane thralls sets you back £50, if one were to make a Cryx army using Goreshade as its caster, those banes are a free unit, for over £60 you can get a 0 point army. I can drop £60 in Games Workshop and walk out with 2 unit boxes, paints, brushes, spray and actually have somewhere to play. That's GW's NEAREST COMPETITOR.

I'm trying to understand this analogy: for 60 pounds you can buy a box of Bane Thralls and a warcaster and not have a legal army, but for 60 pounds you can buy two boxes of tactical marines and also not have a legal army?

 jonolikespie wrote:

Codex because you need it - $83

Holy -ing bajeezus on a cracker. When did Codices get up to $83 in Oz? That's insanity. I don't care if it's laced in gold, that's stupid for something you NEED to play the game.

That's a 20% increase compared to the Orc and Goblin Army book, which is also colour and hardback AND more pages. And the O&G book itself was a huge price increase from previous army books/codices.

danp164 wrote:
Have you SEEN their prices increases?! from going to a cheaper medium, a box of TEN bane thralls sets you back £50, if one were to make a Cryx army using Goreshade as its caster, those banes are a free unit, for over £60 you can get a 0 point army. I can drop £60 in Games Workshop and walk out with 2 unit boxes, paints, brushes, spray and actually have somewhere to play. That's GW's NEAREST COMPETITOR.

I think if people are judging Privateer Press as fairly costed, GW has a LONG way to go before it gets TOO expensive.

@Damp: Bane Thralls are still metal. They went from MSRP 30 GBP for six to 50 GBP for 10. That's a huge price increase of 5 GBP per model to 5 GBP per model.

How big are the bane thralls? They look about the same as terminators :0 for 10 terminators they are only 6 pound more if getting from waylend, could you realy get paints brushes and spray for that ?

I actuly realy dislike the exact comparessen, since I think it realy just dissolves the issue people are trying to discuss.

Now from where I am, people are not leaving 40k for warmachine based entirely on the unit to unit price they are leaving since warmachine flows far better in price up. To start a army is at max half the price of 40k here, and that's buying the book and a extra to GW battle force.
Buying two two tac boxes doesn't realy get you very far, when starting up, when you can spend 50$ here and start warmachine fairly happily and adding from there you can up your game size fairy well with slow investments.

@ allseingskink have you seen the rule book price ? With a new codex its $208 to get the rules. Nearly 400 if you get them with a battle force. For chaos or dark angels here.
Throw in extra $40 and can buy a delux wiiU :0

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 jonolikespie wrote:

Codex because you need it - $83

Holy -ing bajeezus on a cracker. When did Codices get up to $83 in Oz? That's insanity. I don't care if it's laced in gold, that's stupid for something you NEED to play the game.

That's a 20% increase compared to the Orc and Goblin Army book, which is also colour and hardback AND more pages. And the O&G book itself was a huge price increase from previous army books/codices.

The CSM codex is the same price; I'm assuming it happened with the move to hardcover. And if you want the limited edition DA codex (for whatever reason), it'll set you back $150.

 Dheneb wrote:
The CSM codex is the same price; I'm assuming it happened with the move to hardcover. And if you want the limited edition DA codex (for whatever reason), it'll set you back $150.

No, the O&G book was the first hardcover and that's when the price increased to $69 from whatever it was ($55 maybe), which in itself was a big price increase. $83 for these codices are now a 20% price increase for absolutely no reason.

New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

GW is expensive to play. Sand castle sculpting isn't.

I am new to the hobby. I also work at Hobby Town USA and see the prices of other hobbies. While it isn't cheap and those who have price complaints make valid points, 40K isn't any worse than a dozen other hobbies. I don't like the prices, but compared to other things, I don't see the prices as being insane.

It's a hobby I love and have loved for a decade of my life. I don't know if I could ever be priced out of it, as I'd probably just look for it cheaper elsewhere. Do I think the stuff is overpriced? Sure. Do I wish it was cheaper? Sure. Am I going to ragequit because of it? No. Why should I let GW's stupid business decisions ruin the hobby for me? There are ways around their pricing like third party sites and buying and refurbishing used models. I love Warhammer 40k as both a hobby and a fictional universe. Until it's so expensive that I'm literally incapable of affording it no matter where I go, I'm not going to quit.

But not everyone has my mentality and I can understand people being distressed over it.

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

GW is expensive to play. Sand castle sculpting isn't.

I don't like it when people compare the price of hobbies unless they are being very thorough about it, as usually it's hard to impossible to do. The Corvette I'm looking at buying for the sake of a "hobby" is going to cost me $24,000. I don't try and compare it to my video gaming or miniature hobbies though. A better comparison might be the service manual for my car, it is cheaper, longer and more detailed than a Codex, it'll probably hold it's value better too Yes, a 360 game at launch costs that much, but then you can get it a few months after launch, still new, for far less. GW prices don't drop even as things get old. Either way, not worth doing comparisons IMO.

My problem with a Codex being that pricey is purely and simply that I don't think it should cost nearly that much to buy the rules for just a single army when the main rules are gonna cost you even more again and then any rules for any other army are going to cost you even more again. If they wanted to make big expensive colour art books and sell them as big expensive colour art books and then give the rules away for a few bucks, that would make me happy, but they'd rather bleed customers by making it necessary to purchase excessively expensive extras to play. When I started in this hobby, I could afford to play it based off doing chores around the house to get pocketmoney and pay for models and books. I doubt I could do that these days if codices are going for $83AUD. I honestly don't remember the prices of codices back in the day, I think I paid $20 to $25AUD for a 2nd edition Space Wolf codex, it'd take a few weeks for me to save up for it, but I could still manage it.

 jonolikespie wrote:
If someone wandered in to a GW store and wanted to get into 'the GW hobby' down here you'd be looking at the following:

Lets say we are starting DAs since they are shiny and new and are working of the most current GW pricing scheme.

Dark Vengance because it is 'great value' - $180 (fun fact, limited edition is still up on the website)
Codex because you need it - $83
Tac marines to make a second troop choice - $62
A unit of termis - $75

Then you need the actual hobby part of the hobby so they will try and sell you:
Citidel hobby starter set - $96
A can of spray paint - $26
And a tape measure because whipy sticks suck - $18

Now a whole 2 tac squads, a couple of HQs, 5 termies and 3 bikes is what, 850 points?
You are paying $540 for less than 1k points, a whole 9 paints and 1 brush (which are just as important as models when taking the whole hobby into account.)

Anyone walking into a store and being told that's what it takes to start the hobby is going to be put off.

There's 10 termies there, that set would be around 1200 points in fact. And of course, you can sell off Chaos models.

Hi all.
If you define the 'GW hobby ' as buying products at full price from GW B&M stores.(Which is what GW corperate WANT the GW hobby to be.)
Then you could say this point has been reached...

If you are going to compare other hobbies to the GW hobby.Can we stick to table top minature wargames please.


EG the total cost per minature of a similar size and material.
Or the total cost to play a full sized game , using the cheapest or average option for both systems.

Currently the only justification for paying more for GW product is..
1)Athetic preferance, (You like it enough...)
2) Popularity
3)Previous level of investment.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

GW is expensive to play. Sand castle sculpting isn't.

I don't like it when people compare the price of hobbies unless they are being very thorough about it, as usually it's hard to impossible to do. The Corvette I'm looking at buying for the sake of a "hobby" is going to cost me $24,000. I don't try and compare it to my video gaming or miniature hobbies though. A better comparison might be the service manual for my car, it is cheaper, longer and more detailed than a Codex, it'll probably hold it's value better too Yes, a 360 game at launch costs that much, but then you can get it a few months after launch, still new, for far less. GW prices don't drop even as things get old. Either way, not worth doing comparisons IMO.

My problem with a Codex being that pricey is purely and simply that I don't think it should cost nearly that much to buy the rules for just a single army when the main rules are gonna cost you even more again and then any rules for any other army are going to cost you even more again. If they wanted to make big expensive colour art books and sell them as big expensive colour art books and then give the rules away for a few bucks, that would make me happy, but they'd rather bleed customers by making it necessary to purchase excessively expensive extras to play. When I started in this hobby, I could afford to play it based off doing chores around the house to get pocketmoney and pay for models and books. I doubt I could do that these days if codices are going for $83AUD. I honestly don't remember the prices of codices back in the day, I think I paid $20 to $25AUD for a 2nd edition Space Wolf codex, it'd take a few weeks for me to save up for it, but I could still manage it.

Like it or not it's a relevant comparison. Their hobbies. Some buy gardening seed, others buy plastic army men at inflated prices. I put it right in my post. Is the return of your investment of time and money worth it? If its no its no.

Also, I've had multiple armies since 1996 and it's always been expensive relative to the cost of living. I wasn't spending chore money at the time, it was rent money and car payment stuff.

If you think about it like this Byte:
Designers of video games have put thousands of hours of effort into the game, the coders have put thousands of hours into writing the cryptic stuff that allows the game to be produced and the artists have painstakingly crafted the models for the characters. For all that effort, $60 a pop is a fair price.

For a codex. You still need a lot of talent to produce such work, but nowhere near as much work goes into, say, the new Chaos Space Marine codex to the new Call of Duty (and I hate those games, but CoD makers have to consistently perform and release a huge new game every two years).

It's just not a relevant comparison.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(the point was a lot better in my head)

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
If you think about it like this Byte:
Designers of video games have put thousands of hours of effort into the game, the coders have put thousands of hours into writing the cryptic stuff that allows the game to be produced and the artists have painstakingly crafted the models for the characters. For all that effort, $60 a pop is a fair price.

For a codex. You still need a lot of talent to produce such work, but nowhere near as much work goes into, say, the new Chaos Space Marine codex to the new Call of Duty (and I hate those games, but CoD makers have to consistently perform and release a huge new game every two years).

It's just not a relevant comparison.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(the point was a lot better in my head)

I understand your point. I just don't agree with it. The end result is a consumer spending money. I don't need to hear about the pain, I just want the baby(from the consumer stand point). If I get 5 years of use(or more!) out of a Codex, that's pretty good! Can the same be said about a video game?

The only reason I've not been priced out is that neither the DE nor the Tau have been updated within the past year. As soon as the Tau update hits home, I'm out of it, I reckon.

It depends on how good the video game is, and how good the modding community is (Rome Total War has been played for donkey years) but I see your point.

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
It depends on how good the video game is, and how good the modding community is (Rome Total War has been played for donkey years) but I see your point.

Donkey years...

I have played DoW 2 for donkey years thats for sure.

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

Assuming the game is a one shot game - you average 10-15 hours of play time for console games. Lets say it costs you $60 for the first go. You play it, beat it, trade it in at Gamestop. They give you a $20 credit because you bought it the night the game came out and didn't mess around beating it...so it is still a "new release" and qualifies for their highest trade in value. You trade it in for credit on the next new release, because you are trading for another new release at $60 retail - it qualifies you for the 25% bonus credit. So, your $20 becomes $25 and you end up paying out $35 for game #2. 10-15 hours later and you now repeat the process over again.

Figure you have a life outside of video games - so you spend 2 weeks per game...26 games per year. $935 for 260-390 hours of gaming. No need to worry about storage, travel costs to and from game stores/gaming locations, time to become disinterested before you get your first game in (quite a common problem for many people), finding gaming partners, scheduling games and all the rest of the issues relating to tabletop gaming. It also ignores games with a high replay value whether it is because of their multiplayer aspect or an immersive environment that provides for entertainment value beyond just one pass through the game. And of course it ignores the ability to pick up a game a month or two after it is released for half off. The value of those games ends up being in the worst case $3.50 an hour of gaming.

The price for consecutive years ends up being the same - $3.50 per hour of entertainment on the worst case scenario.

Compare that to any particular GW army list. A quick 1500 point SM list ran up to $548.25 for figures and the army Codex. Add another $75 or so to get a Hobby Starter set and a couple of bottles of paint from outside that. $15 for GW rattle can black and another $15 for rattle can clear cote. Now start the clock on the entertainment value... The list ends up being 43 figures and 4 vehicles. Not looking to win golden demons...but it is the persons first army...so figure 2 hours or so per figure and 4 hours for a vehicle to get them painted and on the table. 102 hours to get the army assembled and painted. That puts you 3-5 months into your year of the hobby and the first army is finished (or at least playable). The cost for the video games is actually a little bit better at this point ($270-375 for the same number of games for the time invested in assembling the models).

Now, you have to figure how much gaming you will actually be able to get in with your new army. Can you get 5-8 hours of games per week without spending anything more? Based on the rather non-scientific polls found here on Dakka - most people play one game or less per week and each game is 2 hours or less. So, assuming the most hobby time (i.e. - enjoyment) you get in another 72 hours of gaming (assuming your army is complete in 3 months as opposed to 5 months) in the remainder of that first year. So - the first year of tabletop gaming you are at 174 hours of hobby time for $3.75 per hour of hobby time. 25 cents more expensive per hour when compared to video games. You also get about half the total time out of the tabletop gaming when compared to video games.

In order to get the same amount of hobby time out of that first army - you would need to go ahead and game with it on a regular basis for another 14 months. Now, I don't know about you but after playing the same army for 23 months - the replay value starts to drop significantly. You haven't gotten anything extra to adjust your army list - so chances are pretty good that the fun factor will be disappearing pretty quickly. Granted 26 months after you bought the army - it would only be $2.25 per hour...so it is a good deal compared to video games.

If you add more options to your army the costs start to add up pretty quickly (as the options tend to be more expensive - things like Land Raiders, Terminators and other things which are expensive on a per figure basis). Add another starter army and the price is pretty close to the same - but your game time doesn't increase too much...that tends to be limited by the logistics of arranging a game as opposed to actually playing the game.

So - lets add a second army into the calculations. Luckily we will assume a never ending supply of paints on the paint supplies you purchased. A quick Eldar 1500 point list comes to $533.25 with the Codex for 39 regular sized figures and 12 larger figures (walkers, bikes and the like). Two armies for a total of $1186.50 (which includes the never ending supply of paint). The second army gives you another 126 hours of assembly and painting hobby time (2 hours for the regular figures and 4 hours per for the larger stuff). Subtract out the 2 hours of gaming time you get each week and figure 6 hours a week are available for assembling and painting that second army. So - at the 8 month point of our year in the hobby - you now have two small armies to choose from. You have gotten 256 hours of hobby enjoyment out of it and have spent $1186.50 to get there for $4.63 per hour of hobby time (over a dollar more per hour than the video games now). Add in another 32 hours of games for the remainder of the year and you get $4.12 per hour of hobby time.

The upside though is that now you have two armies with which to alternate with during your games. Another 8 months of gaming with those two armies and you are on parity with one year of video game entertainment on a cost per hour of hobby time (which is an improvement over the 26 months for one army). You still end up with a lot of extra free time each week that you aren't gaming or building models with...what to do with that remaining 6 hours or free time each week? Maybe get an XBox?

The end result of all of that of course is a more realistic look at the actual "return on investment" you mentioned. While you might not need to replace a Codex for 4 or 5 years (or 10 years in some cases) the actual hobby time that you get from each component isn't measured in years...rather hours spread out over several years. An army which is 4 years old might only have a hundred hours or so invested in in to include assembly, painting and gaming.

Considering that many one-shot video games (i.e. - games you beat) have play time averages of over 20 hours and many more have very high replay values (either because you can play against opponents or because you can play them in different methods for different results) the value of that Codex or box of Space Marines when compared to a video game or two or three (or 26) isn't quite as sweet as it might first seem.

Grand Theft Auto IV averages 46 hours, Final Fantasy XIII averages 55 hours, all the Mass Effect games average more than 30 hours each... Those 5 games if bought new would set you back $300 but give you over 200 hours of gaming. Not a bad return when compared to GW games. Throw in a game like Call of Duty, HALO or DoW and you are able to replay ad nauseum.

The reason comparisons with other hobbies isn't really valid is that the point of a comparison on price is to find things that are similar and then compare their prices. If the things are substantially different (a piece of software and a plastic model kit) than it's is 100% useless as a comparison if you are trying to isolate a single factor.

The other reason is that hobby expenditures can go up to nearly infinite levels. Everything is always reasonably just by comparing it to a slightly more expensive hobby.

It's simply not true that the because super car racing and space tourism are both very expensive that means that GW's product is good value for the money.

I think it's a misleading line of reasoning meant to muddy the waters so you can't say anything definite about GW prices out of some naive claim of all hobby prices being relative.

The whole point of price comparisons is to get as like of a comparison as possible. Different products for the same hobby-- in this case, that's miniature wargaming.

Let's just say that killing people is a hobby for serial killers, and if we are allowed to compare different hobbies, why not that too? Gardening is a hobby too but you don't see that being compared to miniature wargaming. Or pottery. Or flower arrangement. Or underwater basket-weaving.

If we compare wargaming to, say, origami, it would look insanely expensive. Just like comparing wargaming with collecting antiques, in which case collecting antiques would look absurdly expensive. Well no gak, Sherlock there are other hobbies more expensive than yours, just as much as there are hobbies much cheaper than yours.

Hence, we don't compare hobbies versus other hobbies when it comes to price. It's as absurd as comparing roller blades prices to car prices.

^- This. I could very easily say that after an initial investment, gardening is extremely cheap to do. But I won't.

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

GW is expensive to play. Sand castle sculpting isn't.

My comment was referring to the post in which I'm quoting myself for your easy reference.

I wasn't talking about armies, lifestyles, and sports cars. I was talking about a single purchase of either a video game or a codex.

Rounds of golf costs me $50-$80. I simply didn't go play and I picked up the codex. Both are my hobbies. I'll get more use out of the book, but I gave up a nice day outside in the fresh air and didn't get to use my ridiculously expensive golf clubs that I didn't get to use at all in 2012. A bottle of single malt Scotch costs me... I could go on and on. Pretty simple concept.

Value resides in the eye of the beholder. A dollar well spent is subjective.

Lets not make an empire out of a village.

I'm sure somebody out there can see my reasoning. Otherwise I may grow a little concerned...

 Breotan wrote:
According to BoLS, here are the prices for the new DA stuff coming in January:

Codex: Dark Angels (English) 104pp Colour Hardback $49.50
Ravenwing Dark Talon 1 Mini $75.00
Land Speeder Vengeance 1 Mini $65.00
Deathwing Command Squad 5 Minis $60.00
Ravenwing Command Squad 3 Minis $50.00
Dark Angels Battleforce 8 Minis $110.00

That's right. $75.00 for that flier and $50.00 for three bikes. Oh, and don't forget that awesome DA Battleforce with eight whole models.

I heavily rely on Dark Angels figures for my DYI chapter but I'm wondering if GW has finally hit that magical point where I simply can't justify the cost of their product. I have more disposable income than a lot of people out there so I expect that many of you have already hit this wall. If so, when did it happen for you? If you haven't hit it yet, how is your hobby future looking?

Myself? I find that I am migrating over to Malifaux these days, that and spending obscene amounts of money on kickstarters (damn you McVey, Poots, and the rest). Some small purchases and some specific Forge World purchases are still in the cards, but I'll certainly not be starting up any new armies with GW. I used to buy every codex when it came out. Now I only buy the onces I actually use. Once the annual price increase hits this coming summer, my GW portion of the hobby will likely be reduced to painting. Shame, really.

It was when I sold my *entire* *Sniffle* Chaos Space Marines army off. It's getting ridiculously expensive and I simply can't afford it anymore...so there went 2,000 points for about 1/3 what I paid for it originally. Yeah...not a good day Then I got into Mordheim and Necromunda and found the smaller skirmish games much more doable.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

Assuming the game is a one shot game - you average 10-15 hours of play time for console games. Lets say it costs you $60 for the first go. You play it, beat it, trade it in at Gamestop. They give you a $20 credit because you bought it the night the game came out and didn't mess around beating it...so it is still a "new release" and qualifies for their highest trade in value. You trade it in for credit on the next new release, because you are trading for another new release at $60 retail - it qualifies you for the 25% bonus credit. So, your $20 becomes $25 and you end up paying out $35 for game #2. 10-15 hours later and you now repeat the process over again.

Figure you have a life outside of video games - so you spend 2 weeks per game...26 games per year. $935 for 260-390 hours of gaming. No need to worry about storage, travel costs to and from game stores/gaming locations, time to become disinterested before you get your first game in (quite a common problem for many people), finding gaming partners, scheduling games and all the rest of the issues relating to tabletop gaming. It also ignores games with a high replay value whether it is because of their multiplayer aspect or an immersive environment that provides for entertainment value beyond just one pass through the game. And of course it ignores the ability to pick up a game a month or two after it is released for half off. The value of those games ends up being in the worst case $3.50 an hour of gaming.

The price for consecutive years ends up being the same - $3.50 per hour of entertainment on the worst case scenario.

Compare that to any particular GW army list. A quick 1500 point SM list ran up to $548.25 for figures and the army Codex. Add another $75 or so to get a Hobby Starter set and a couple of bottles of paint from outside that. $15 for GW rattle can black and another $15 for rattle can clear cote. Now start the clock on the entertainment value... The list ends up being 43 figures and 4 vehicles. Not looking to win golden demons...but it is the persons first army...so figure 2 hours or so per figure and 4 hours for a vehicle to get them painted and on the table. 102 hours to get the army assembled and painted. That puts you 3-5 months into your year of the hobby and the first army is finished (or at least playable). The cost for the video games is actually a little bit better at this point ($270-375 for the same number of games for the time invested in assembling the models).

Now, you have to figure how much gaming you will actually be able to get in with your new army. Can you get 5-8 hours of games per week without spending anything more? Based on the rather non-scientific polls found here on Dakka - most people play one game or less per week and each game is 2 hours or less. So, assuming the most hobby time (i.e. - enjoyment) you get in another 72 hours of gaming (assuming your army is complete in 3 months as opposed to 5 months) in the remainder of that first year. So - the first year of tabletop gaming you are at 174 hours of hobby time for $3.75 per hour of hobby time. 25 cents more expensive per hour when compared to video games. You also get about half the total time out of the tabletop gaming when compared to video games.

In order to get the same amount of hobby time out of that first army - you would need to go ahead and game with it on a regular basis for another 14 months. Now, I don't know about you but after playing the same army for 23 months - the replay value starts to drop significantly. You haven't gotten anything extra to adjust your army list - so chances are pretty good that the fun factor will be disappearing pretty quickly. Granted 26 months after you bought the army - it would only be $2.25 per hour...so it is a good deal compared to video games.

If you add more options to your army the costs start to add up pretty quickly (as the options tend to be more expensive - things like Land Raiders, Terminators and other things which are expensive on a per figure basis). Add another starter army and the price is pretty close to the same - but your game time doesn't increase too much...that tends to be limited by the logistics of arranging a game as opposed to actually playing the game.

So - lets add a second army into the calculations. Luckily we will assume a never ending supply of paints on the paint supplies you purchased. A quick Eldar 1500 point list comes to $533.25 with the Codex for 39 regular sized figures and 12 larger figures (walkers, bikes and the like). Two armies for a total of $1186.50 (which includes the never ending supply of paint). The second army gives you another 126 hours of assembly and painting hobby time (2 hours for the regular figures and 4 hours per for the larger stuff). Subtract out the 2 hours of gaming time you get each week and figure 6 hours a week are available for assembling and painting that second army. So - at the 8 month point of our year in the hobby - you now have two small armies to choose from. You have gotten 256 hours of hobby enjoyment out of it and have spent $1186.50 to get there for $4.63 per hour of hobby time (over a dollar more per hour than the video games now). Add in another 32 hours of games for the remainder of the year and you get $4.12 per hour of hobby time.

The upside though is that now you have two armies with which to alternate with during your games. Another 8 months of gaming with those two armies and you are on parity with one year of video game entertainment on a cost per hour of hobby time (which is an improvement over the 26 months for one army). You still end up with a lot of extra free time each week that you aren't gaming or building models with...what to do with that remaining 6 hours or free time each week? Maybe get an XBox?

The end result of all of that of course is a more realistic look at the actual "return on investment" you mentioned. While you might not need to replace a Codex for 4 or 5 years (or 10 years in some cases) the actual hobby time that you get from each component isn't measured in years...rather hours spread out over several years. An army which is 4 years old might only have a hundred hours or so invested in in to include assembly, painting and gaming.

Considering that many one-shot video games (i.e. - games you beat) have play time averages of over 20 hours and many more have very high replay values (either because you can play against opponents or because you can play them in different methods for different results) the value of that Codex or box of Space Marines when compared to a video game or two or three (or 26) isn't quite as sweet as it might first seem.

Grand Theft Auto IV averages 46 hours, Final Fantasy XIII averages 55 hours, all the Mass Effect games average more than 30 hours each... Those 5 games if bought new would set you back $300 but give you over 200 hours of gaming. Not a bad return when compared to GW games. Throw in a game like Call of Duty, HALO or DoW and you are able to replay ad nauseum.

Not that I disagree with your post at all, but since you included the cost of the codex/paints in the GW cost don't you think you should include the cost of the console in the video game side? I know it probably won;t make a massive difference (I actually don;t video game so have no idea how expensive they are) but it should really be included.

an argument could also be made for the annual cost of the electricy to run the console all year long - though that would be pedantic I admit, and all this presumes that you already have a TV (I know 99.9% of people do, but there are still some out there who do not)

I wouldn't mind the price rises so much if GW was actually producing quality product.

They're not, IMO. When I liked their stuff, WD was awesome and there was a whole ton of fully-supported and great specialist games to play.

They're a shadow of what they once were, a zombie company that lost its heart a long time ago and is now doomed to half-heartedly trying to keep the shareholders happy.

Yes - I also left off things like the Big Rule Book, dice, tape measures, gas money driving back and forth to the game store, terrain and related gaming expenses plus a more realistic measure of the costs of modeling and painting supplies.

Figured between those things and the console cost itself it would be a wash in the long and short run.

The reason I don't think it's worth comparing across different hobbies, though you did quite a thorough job of it there, Sean, is different hobbies mean different things to different people and inherently hold different values not just in how much time you spend but the quality of how that time is spent, something extremely subjective. I don't value 10 hours spent painting a model the same way I value 10 hours spent playing a video game or 10 hours spent driving my gas guzzling and tyre destroying muscle cars.

The reason I mentioned the Corvette cost was to show the silliness of comparing across hobbies. The Corvette may cost me 40 times more initial lay out and even more again in maintanence, but it's a completely different ball game, to me personally, it's holds a completely different value, so to compare it to my other hobbies is pointless.

Comparing dollars per hours I think is a bit silly as well. People often say video gaming is cheap compared to going out on the town or seeing a movie at a cinema, but it's a completely different experience. Just because I'm a gamer doesn't mean I don't also go to see movies or go to the pub with mates to play pool, just because they have poor dollar/hour values doesn't mean they are poor value.

You also have some games that have incredible replay value and others which don't, and while it might be a factor in deciding if I'll buy a game, it's hardly the ONLY factor. No one I know goes out and buys new release console games, plays10-15 hours, trades them and repeats. If I know a game is short, I'll probably pay $20 or less for it. Some games I'll play for hundreds of hours. COD4 I played for several hundred hours online in multiplayer. I bought a 3 month Warhammer Online subscription, put in a couple of hundred hours for very little money. Bad Company 2, Live for Speed, Skyrim, Space Marine, Dawn of War... all games I've put 70+ hours in to. However, that doesn't necessarily mean I value them more than a game like Darksiders, which I only put about 20 hours in to (and also only paid about $20).

Time spent playing is such a massively variable factor and the quality of time spent is such a subjective factor that I find the comparison pointless unless you just do it for YOU personally and don't try to pretend you are analysing it with any generality at all.

When I say I think an $83AUD codex is overpriced, it's because I think an $83AUD codex is overpriced, not because I'm ignoring that it's a similar price to a video game or ignoring the fact I spend 300 times more than that on the hobby car in my garage.

Hell, if we are looking at relative hobby pricing, for me personally, when I do (rarely) play a table top game with friends, it almost always involves alcohol and take away food, so we should include that in the equation as well

Priced out? yes and no. Do i plan to buy as much stuff? no. What I do buy, I intend to buy at a discount, or used from someone else.

I actually started collecting some marines, and dark angels stuff a year ago, none yet assembled or painted. I was waiting until the new codex came out to figure out what configurations to make my guys.

Now I am actually waiting for someone to post a torrent download of the codex. I feel a bit bad about that, I would normally have just said "yea codex" and bought it from my local store. But now i just can not justify it.

Pretty content to just play with what I have with my friends for however long that lasts. No reason to get something new, unless as I said.. extra money + deep discount.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Hell, if we are looking at relative hobby pricing, for me personally, when I do (rarely) play a table top game with friends, it almost always involves alcohol and take away food, so we should include that in the equation as well

OK, you self admittedly rarely play table top. So of course the value of a pricey codex doesn't appeal to you. The return of investment isn't adequate. However, some one like myself with over 55 games of 6th edition under my belt might value the codex as an update to my existing DA army and also to become familiar with what I'll be up against in my next tournament.

Value is in the eye of the beholder.

@AllSeeingSkink

I agree it is silly to make comparisons outside of like for like comparisons - however, others had already and the reality is that they were not really making an honest comparison.

If you compare a video game to a tabletop game - you can't just say, I will beat that game in 2 weeks...because with things like wargames, there is no beating of the game which happens. As a result, if you want to make that comparison - you have to make a more measured comparison by looking at the actual entertainment time which you might get out of each hobby.

The same would go for all the other "expensive" hobbies which other people have thrown around in this and other threads like it. Old cars? Sure - if you purchase a fully restored vehicle it is a very expensive prospect to just drive. For most people, a good part of that hobby is actually turning wrenches and restoring the car. You might pick up something like an old Galaxy 500 for a few hundred dollars and over the course of several years spend a few thousand dollars and a few hundred hours tearing the car down and either restoring it or making it into a muscle car/cruiser. When you actually do a cost analysis of how much hobby time you get from start to a "playable" car - it actually doesn't end up being nearly expensive. Never mind that you can actually drive the car and get some level of practical use out of it (or use the 4x4 for pulling trailers or hauling things which won't fit in the back of the sedan).

It isn't exactly a true comparison, as they are significantly different - but you can't just say that a classic car is expensive compared to gaming but ignore the process of building the car and the enjoyment that that provides for many people. You also can't discount the nature of the end game for each hobby. If you pick up a junker and put a few years of blood, sweat and tears into it (plus a few thousand in new parts) you can normally turn around and sell it for significantly more than you purchased it for - you may even be able to get more out of it than your financial investment (depending on how carefully you make those decisions along the way).

Even if you were to say that your hobby was a new car - just buy and drive - if you look at the actual time connected to the car...average 15K miles per year, average 30 mph (not sure on that one...it is what the trip calculator on my car shows) I end up with 500 hours a year in the car. At the end of a 72 month loan you would be looking at 3,000 hours. So, if you were to have gotten something like a new 4x4 (say $30,000 for a Wrangler) or Corvette (say $60,000 for a midrange model) you get either $10 or $20 per hour of "hobby" time. But wait, you need a car anyway, right? Knock $10K off the price to figure about the cheapest regular car you can get. $6.66 per hour in the Jeep and $16.66 per hour for the Vette.

Of course, you get to trade that in on the next go around. A 6 year old Jeep in good condition with 75K miles has a trade in value of $11,000 and and the Corvette has a trade in value of $16,000. Those would drop your cost per hour of fun to $3 and $11.33 per hour. That Jeep is actually a pretty good deal now isn't it?

 scarletsquig wrote:
I wouldn't mind the price rises so much if GW was actually producing quality product.

They're not, IMO. When I liked their stuff, WD was awesome and there was a whole ton of fully-supported and great specialist games to play.

They're a shadow of what they once were, a zombie company that lost its heart a long time ago and is now doomed to half-heartedly trying to keep the shareholders happy.

Sadly, this sums up my opinion completely. I'm not seeing very much creativity or desire to try new things - just the same old stuff, year after year. And I'm sorry to say it, but the new concepts look like they are the kind of thing I would have found under the Xmas tree when I was 12, crewed by an Action Man or something similar.

Perhaps if enough people stop buying it then things will change, but until then it looks like GW has become far too fat and lazy while sitting on the throne. It will be interesting to see how much their competitors are able to nibble from their fat, wart-covered form before they notice and try to react to it.

Based on the majority of the responses I've read in this thread.

I would have to say, yes, GW has priced a lot of folks out.

 Pacific wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
I wouldn't mind the price rises so much if GW was actually producing quality product.

They're not, IMO. When I liked their stuff, WD was awesome and there was a whole ton of fully-supported and great specialist games to play.

They're a shadow of what they once were, a zombie company that lost its heart a long time ago and is now doomed to half-heartedly trying to keep the shareholders happy.

Sadly, this sums up my opinion completely. I'm not seeing very much creativity or desire to try new things - just the same old stuff, year after year. And I'm sorry to say it, but the new concepts look like they are the kind of thing I would have found under the Xmas tree when I was 12, crewed by an Action Man or something similar.

Perhaps if enough people stop buying it then things will change, but until then it looks like GW has become far too fat and lazy while sitting on the throne. It will be interesting to see how much their competitors are able to nibble from their fat, wart-covered form before they notice and try to react to it.

Damn skippy, GW's pricing strategy may be ridiculous but if they backed it up with genuinely jaw dropping models and not the lazy cynical stuff we've been recently seeing it might be even remotely understandable. Few of the models have any soul or charm and i think the last truly outstanding release was actually Dark Vengeance (well the Chaos bits, i didnt care greatly for the Dark Angels) For me its not a case of being priced out. I could still afford GW prices, i choose not to because i dont think their product is worth it.

 Byte wrote:
OK, you self admittedly rarely play table top. So of course the value of a pricey codex doesn't appeal to you. The return of investment isn't adequate. However, some one like myself with over 55 games of 6th edition under my belt might value the codex as an update to my existing DA army and also to become familiar with what I'll be up against in my next tournament.

Yes, I rarely play at the moment (mostly because I gamed among close friends previously, the majority of which have quit in recent years), but I have been in the hobby for some 16 years now, different times of which I have gamed either regularly or rarely. My feeling that $83AUD for a Codex is overpriced is very much gaming centric. In a game which contains 15 different major armies, the rules for a single army should not cost that much. That means to get the complete set of rules for 40k, you would need to spend $1245AUD on Codices alone + $124 for the rulebook, $1370 all up to collect all the rules, which is just insane IMHO. Even if you don't want all army books/codices, if you're like me and collect 3 or 4 40k armies and 3 or 4 Fantasy armies (rather than building monolithic single armies, I prefer several small armies), you're looking at around $4-500 every few years just to keep up with the armies you yourself collect.

As I said earlier, I'd have less of an issue if they released the rules themselves in smaller supplements in black and white soft cover for a fraction of the price (which is better for gaming anyway IMO, easier to flick through a soft cover black and white book and suffers less wear and tear from being held open on certain pages for long periods of time), and then kept the story books and hard cover art books separately. It was less of an issue when Codices were cheaper, but now they insist of pointlessly making every page colour and making the books hard cover, it would be nice if GW did this... of course, they won't, because they know many people don't want flashy art books and so wouldn't buy them, rather they'd force you to buy them if you also want the rules.

Value is in the eye of the beholder.

Yep, no doubt, which is an underlying theme of my previous posts, which is why it's hard enough to compare value within a given hobby and pointless to compare it across various different hobbies.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
*snip*

Yeah, tis all relative and tis all subjective. Though I still think comparing dollars per hour is largely pointless. As 1 hour table top gaming does not = 1 hour video gaming, does not = 1 hour driving a classic car, does not = 1 hour driving a race car, does not = 1 hour trying to force a suspension member to fit on your heavily customised car, does not = 1 hour in a jet fighter, does not = 1 hour with a woman (or man if that's your thing ).

We could have a whole discussion about the value of car hobbies. For many years I was a car enthusiast, but got by driving a 34 year old car that only cost me $1000 to buy and has cost me about $1000 to maintain for the past 5 years. It was a very cheap "car hobby", as it was my daily drive as well. I still own that car, it's a fun car (by my standards at least, some people would hate it because it doesn't have a CD player and doesn't have air conditioning). But since then I've spent copious amounts of money on old muscle cars, coz I love old muscle cars, and yeah, I could make a lot of money back if I sold them, but no where near what I've put in to them (especially when you consider the additional cost of fuel and insurance when pushing an old classic V8).

FYI, the Corvette I plan to spend $24k on is no where near fully restored, lol. It's a 1970 model, that $24k covers the car which is slightly rusty and needs work, the Tremec TKO600 5spd transmission I plan to put in it and the shipping cost to ship it back to Oz. On top of that $24k I need to fix the wiper cover, the diff, some of the gauges and clean up some rust. You CAN theoretically be a car hobbyist without spending much money... most people tend to spend a lot of money, even if they're restoring a heap of junk, restoring junk is both time consuming AND expensive in most cases, lol.

But yes, we could have a whole discussion about the cost of car hobbies, but the point I was trying to make by mentioning that was simply that comparing values across hobbies is a bit meaningless even when within a given hobby both the cost and value changes per person and cannot simply be expressed as a dollars per hour number.

 Byte wrote:
Based on the majority of the responses I've read in this thread.

I would have to say, yes, GW has priced a lot of folks out.

I don't know, an awful lot of people, myself included, have cited the perceived decrease in quality sculpts as an example. IMO all of the recent releases have several models that are fairly clownshoes, whereas even just a few years ago awful models were nonexistent or rare. People always posted Nagash or the warthog because there weren't that many awful modesl, but the over the top GI Joe\Digimon\Zoids styling seems to be on the upswing.

So you're saying it's more of a value-for-money issue given the new art direction rather than just an issue of price increases?

I've been buying the last of my fantasy Chaos stuff here and there because I fear what the models will be like when they are next redone. I don't play WFB, but use other rules, but I want my little force complete before the miniatures I do like are replaced by horrible caricatures of themselves. I had Empire during 6th edition and didn't quite get all the models I wanted before they redid them all with angry faces and skulls and other over the top elements. Fortunately I just finished my force using historicals as they fit in perfectly with the 5th and 6th edition Empire stuff. I won't have that option with my chaos stuff. Once GW replaces them with goofy nonsense, the line I like will be gone.

EDIT: It was Artizan Designs who makes the 6th edition compatible historicals that let me finish my Empire properly. At £1.40 a figure for metal.



..

Pricing is certainly an issue, I think. I would never buy the rulebook or hardback codecies these days, with the price points they're at. That said, the current art direction makes it a hell of a lot easier to pass it all by.

agustin wrote:
So you're saying it's more of a value-for-money issue given the new art direction rather than just an issue of price increases

Certainly that's the case for some people. I can afford to spend more on 40k now than at any previous point in my hobby, but stuff like that forgefiend and heldrake make me think I could spend those dollars better elsewhere. I think that line of thinking may make up a not inconsiderable part of the "why I got priced out" hobby for posters.

I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

The models on the other hand i find hard to defend. Particularly the laziness.

Chaos Warriors release for example. (im not even goign to talk about the war altar) but the Slaaneshi cavalry that were released were great big hulking marauders on top of lithe sinuous steeds. They looked RIDICULOUS. It was just laziness to the nth degree. Some of the rest of the release fared better but then we got ....
Chaos Space Marine: I was REALLY looking forward to this release, i got 2x Chaos contents of DV in preperation based upon the fact that GW seemed to have FINALLY got Chaos right, the chosen were wondrous models harking back to the rogue trader days and were so much more than just spiky space marines. I couldnt wait to see what was coming and put a fair bit of money aside to finance the army. What did we get?

a £30 codex and dinobots, along with some seriously lacklustre finecast characters. The only thing i found decent were the Raptors (the Warp Talons were typical Overblown GW silliness, a total write off)

Meanwhile the basic troops choice for chaos is YEARS old, their supposed champion looks like an angry midget compared to his bodyguard and overall it was just a massive slap in the face. The Obliterators and mutilators in particular are an insult and should have never been released. Where were the multipart characters that WFB has been enjoying? Are they trying to MAKE us buy finecast (i refuse to)

Mini rant over. Point is expensive awesome is kind of understandable. Expensive crap is unforgivable.

 Ouze wrote:

agustin wrote:
So you're saying it's more of a value-for-money issue given the new art direction rather than just an issue of price increases

Certainly that's the case for some people. I can afford to spend more on 40k now than at any previous point in my hobby, but stuff like that forgefiend and heldrake make me think I could spend those dollars better elsewhere. I think that line of thinking may make up a not inconsiderable part of the "why I got priced out" hobby for posters.

That fits me perfectly. I haven't been "priced out" in that I can't afford it, I have found that with the new Chaos release, my money was so much better spent elsewhere (like investing in a new company that my friend is introducing) which is what has "priced me out" of 40k.

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

I don't value the rulebook because I don't value the actual game it describes. If I did, I certainly wouldn't want a huge tome. I'd grab a portable version off of eBay as it's more useful for gaming.

Chaos Warriors release for example. (im not even goign to talk about the war altar) but the Slaaneshi cavalry that were released were great big hulking marauders on top of lithe sinuous steeds. They looked RIDICULOUS. It was just laziness to the nth degree.

These later releases are what have spurred me on to finish my stuff (through eBay discounters). I don't know what they're going to do to the regular Chaos Warriors or Knights once they decide it's time to redo them. I just don't trust GW to deliver a good product in the future.

Chaos Space Marine: I was REALLY looking forward to this release, i got 2x Chaos contents of DV in preperation based upon the fact that GW seemed to have FINALLY got Chaos right, the chosen were wondrous models harking back to the rogue trader days and were so much more than just spiky space marines. I couldnt wait to see what was coming and put a fair bit of money aside to finance the army. What did we get?

a £30 codex and dinobots, along with some seriously lacklustre finecast characters. The only thing i found decent were the Raptors (the Warp Talons were typical Overblown GW silliness, a total write off)

It wa a trainwreck. I thought the Hellbrute was a bit too over the top in the Dark Vengeance set, but it was nothing compared to what came next.

Mini rant over. Point is expensive awesome is kind of understandable. Expensive crap is unforgivable.

Good summation.

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

Strongly disagree. Sure, you get well over 400 pages, but most of it is reused fluff and artwork that I don't care about. For someone who's already been initiated to the game, the rulebook is a massively bloated and incredibly heavy tome that makes actually using the damn thing as a reference tool during games much more cumbersome than it has to be. What's more, being in hardback does not help.

 Fafnir wrote:

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

Strongly disagree. Sure, you get well over 400 pages, but most of it is reused fluff and artwork that I don't care about. For someone who's already been initiated to the game, the rulebook is a massively bloated and incredibly heavy tome that makes actually using the damn thing as a reference tool during games much more cumbersome than it has to be. What's more, being in hardback does not help.

Point being that when i bought my rulebook (admittedly for consdierably less than RRP from Wayland) I actually felt like i was getting value for money. The presentation and content i thought was great and when it comes to a history of the imperium its hard to mix up all that much. Nice artwork, full colour and as you say it was a hefty tome. Admittedly no good as a travelling reference due to its size/weight but thats what i use the mini rulebook for. I love the rulebook, i think it presents a great overview of 40K as a hobby and is better than any of the BRB to precede it.

Now when you look at the codexs on the other hand 2nd edition we had 100+ page codexes about £12 (if memory serves) I still have a few and they are great!
then 3rd edition they stripped them right down to about 80 pages for £8
Then it went back up to £12 but i think they got a bit thicker again
Then £15
then £18, still hovering around the 120 page count i think (im not at home)
then £20 (this was when i was like : Orly?
Now Hardback 104 (admittedly full colour) pages £30.. NO GW THATS A BAD GW...!!!

I mean seriously?

I think it's because they are army essentials. For the veteran players, if you want to play, you pretty much have to buy it. For the new person, if they can increase the price of the must have items, they'll get more money out of a person before they might quit. And with GW targetting a younger and younger audience that sort of thing happens when boys discover girls and beer, for example.

I've gotten myself an almost complete set of 2nd edition codexes over the last year. They are so good. The art is a different style and the miniature presentation is far more bright, but the fiction is so much better. My 3rd through 5th edition Fantasy books are just as good for awesome old school fiction.

One place the old approach to fiction is still largely present is in the RPG books by Fantasy Flight Games. They are pricey as well, but very, very nice. And one book is a complete game other than paper, pencils and dice. I would absolutely love it if they outsourced the 40k and WFB studios to Fantasy Flight Games given the quality of their work on the 40k RPG line.

Well this is getting repetitive. Time to bow out I think

GW fanboys will always fight on until the impending doom hits them when it does.

Here is my biggest complaint about GW right now that I have thought about it. The books.

Big rulebook? $70? codex you need for your one army now $50 each. That's at least $170 for two people playing different armies, and about 3/4 of the material combined is fluff and pretty pictures, aka not needed to play the game.

Then you have a newer less well known game like Infinity, Basic rulebook with almost every stat for every unit you need, available for officially free online , or if you have to have a book, $50-55 for a rulebook that also contains the information for the majority of models and weapons in the game. So just the books for the game are less than 1/3rd the price.

The price of models is a bit high for GW, but actually are comparable. I have Warmachine players tell me how much cheaper that game is all the time, and true it's like $50 to start an army about, none of those guys are packing around anything less than $1000+ worth of the game at any given time. They are just getting hit for $30 at a time instead of $40-$50.

 Fafnir wrote:

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

Strongly disagree. Sure, you get well over 400 pages, but most of it is reused fluff and artwork that I don't care about. For someone who's already been initiated to the game, the rulebook is a massively bloated and incredibly heavy tome that makes actually using the damn thing as a reference tool during games much more cumbersome than it has to be. What's more, being in hardback does not help.

That's my view exactly. As a vet, I disliked having to pay so much for such a huge tome that was only 30% useful. So much so that I sold it when I got the DV box set.

I don't see any value in the "hobby" third of the book, I don't see why the rule book should contain so many catalogue pages or instructions on gluing things together, it's a rulebook. I also don't entirely see the point of the fluff, I just didn't find it an interesting read. I'd have much rather seen the 3 sections split into separate books on sale for £15-20 each. £20 for the rules bit on it's own in large format softback would have been great. £45 for a hardback tome of which 60% is of no daily use is not.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Stranger83 wrote:

Herzlos wrote:

Stranger83 wrote:


“But they are the wrong models for the game” the owner says, “I don't care” replies the customer “I'm in it for the game and the infinity

With the intention of playing Infinity with the marines, or of playing 40K?

I don't think anyone is arguing that some sets of figures by X cost more than some sets of figures by Y, but that the overall cost for GW is getting pretty high (enough figures to play + rules + codex). Some GW plastics are cheaper than some companies metals, but then some companies metals are cheaper than GW's plastics too.

If the guy had walked into the store and asked "how much would I need to invest in any of these systems to be able to get a game in a club", what would the owner have advised?

to play infinity with, I fully accept that GW is the more expensive game, but under the terms of Build/Paint/Play that I was told the issue was about when I said that GW are a cheaper hobby than some other companies then the question of the number of models that you get to build and paint is also important.

Again, I do not deny that the cost of GW for the game is a lot more than any other wargame, and if you question "is the GW game getting to the point it is pricing people out?" then, although I don;t think we are there yet then yes I think we are getting there.

Thanks for clarifying, I agree with you

 Shadowseer_Kim wrote:
The price of models is a bit high for GW, but actually are comparable. I have Warmachine players tell me how much cheaper that game is all the time, and true it's like $50 to start an army about, none of those guys are packing around anything less than $1000+ worth of the game at any given time. They are just getting hit for $30 at a time instead of $40-$50.

Heh. The difference here is that they are WILLING to spend that much. That indicates that those players see VALUE in the system. When people ask me if WM/H is an expensive hobby - I tell them: It's not too expensive to start, and an average sized army is about $300. However, there IS NO UPPER LIMIT TO INVESTMENT - the player sets this themselves according to how much flexibilty they want in game, and how much they feel comfortable investing in the game.

I think this is the main difference.
A GAMES company offers an easy in , followed by sales driven by great game play, the desire to invest more into the system you play,getting better returns long term from gamers

As GW plc belive most customers quit before they play a 'full sized game' they simply load up the return on the 'next step' products they sell.
Eg rather than expect long term investment from gamers.(Like game companies do.)

GW plc extorts as much money as possible before customers move on...

Taking Tweenys To The Kleaners. or 4TK (40k) for short...

The answer is no. I've spent the last two Sunday's at my local GW. The place has been packed and I have seen no less then 4 Hobbit Starter sets solds (and they are expensive). When I went in there this sunday, he was almost totally sold out of the DA codex, totally sold out of the new DA finecast and only had 2 dark talons left (he said he started out with a dozen).

To answer your question, the hobby is still strong and apparently GW knows what they are doing...it's never been a hobby for those without a good amount of pocket change..still isn't.

I bought the DV DA minis to start a DA army when they were out.. The prices made me forget about it and the rules making the wings non scoring even with their wings HQ's forced me to use DV minis for conversions.

 Asherian Command wrote:
GW fanboys will always fight on until the impending doom hits them when it does.

With 16K points in GW models are you part of this fanboy club?

Have I been priced out... Let's see the last year's spend.

I spent about £200 on Sedition Wars.
About £200 on a Perry Wars of the Roses army (3000+ pts of WAB or about 150 infantry, 20 cavalry and a smattering of cannon).
About £120 on the Reaper kickstarter. Silly amount of stuff there.
And most recently £65 on Gates of Antares (a middling box set, but a project I wanted to support).

£70 went to GW for the Dark Vengeance LE box set. Which is still sitting on sprue with not much hope of coming off any time soon.

That's it (of my own money - not counting client stuff).

So er, yeah, looks like.

winterdyne wrote:
Have I been priced out... Let's see the last year's spend.

I spent about £200 on Sedition Wars.
About £200 on a Perry Wars of the Roses army (3000+ pts of WAB or about 150 infantry, 20 cavalry and a smattering of cannon).
About £120 on the Reaper kickstarter. Silly amount of stuff there.
And most recently £65 on Gates of Antares (a middling box set, but a project I wanted to support).

£70 went to GW for the Dark Vengeance LE box set. Which is still sitting on sprue with not much hope of coming off any time soon.

That's it (of my own money - not counting client stuff).

So er, yeah, looks like.

so you decided to spend 600 on things other then GW, doesn't sounds like you are "priced out", sounds like you'd rather do something else beyond GW.

I like to get my money's worth when it comes to plastic / lead crack. :-)

For a laugh, price up what £200 of Empire troops gets you, compared to Perry's WotR stuff. That £200 includes all the 'warhammer' style basing too. It's an eye opener. Same sculptors for a lot of stuff, same sort of detail level and options available (I'm of the opinion the Perry stuff is nicer, but I'm an ex WotR reenactor). To all intents and purposes the ranges are the same subject matter, in the same scale (if slightly different proportions).

almostreal wrote:

winterdyne wrote:
Have I been priced out... Let's see the last year's spend.

I spent about £200 on Sedition Wars.
About £200 on a Perry Wars of the Roses army (3000+ pts of WAB or about 150 infantry, 20 cavalry and a smattering of cannon).
About £120 on the Reaper kickstarter. Silly amount of stuff there.
And most recently £65 on Gates of Antares (a middling box set, but a project I wanted to support).

£70 went to GW for the Dark Vengeance LE box set. Which is still sitting on sprue with not much hope of coming off any time soon.

That's it (of my own money - not counting client stuff).

So er, yeah, looks like.

so you decided to spend 600 on things other then GW, doesn't sounds like you are "priced out", sounds like you'd rather do something else beyond GW.

Its more that those other companies aren't dishonest in their practices. I'd glady drop $1000 on a new airsoft rifle because its made properly, I dont have to buy "G&G barrel hole filler" to fix a design flaw, or worry about getting kicked out of a store for using a different companies after market part. Point is the companys attitude is a huge selling point, and a lot of people (myself included) feel that GW isnt interested in selling me a good product, they just want to me out of money and nickel and dime me to death with every breathe they take and have the nerve to do it under the guise of "its fun".

If you feel that the price of GW stuff is too high to justify the quality that still counts as being priced out. You are still making a decision not to buy something because you see it as too expensive. I spent about $170 on 5 models from Nocturna simply to paint, and I am happy with that because they range from 30mm to 70mm and are very very pretty. It is worth the money in my opinion. I can get 5 termies for only $75 from GW but I have decided not too because I think that is too much for 5 models that are very simple in comparison. Had they have been $50 I'd have happily picked them but, but they are not so I have been priced out of it.

Mm. It's a quality over cost thing coupled with a numbers thing. If I need nearly 200 models for a good size game (WAB) then I'm not gonna pay a high price for a model that is lost in a crowd. Centrepieces and characters are where high model prices can be justified or exploited as there's a much lower volume of sale and production.

agustin wrote:

One place the old approach to fiction is still largely present is in the RPG books by Fantasy Flight Games. They are pricey as well, but very, very nice. And one book is a complete game other than paper, pencils and dice. I would absolutely love it if they outsourced the 40k and WFB studios to Fantasy Flight Games given the quality of their work on the 40k RPG line.

Umm, FFG is not exactly known from error-free rules or timely erratas.

For the DA battle force here in NZ we have to pay $180 USD

 redkommando wrote:
For the DA battle force here in NZ we have to pay $180 USD

And it'll probably be $200+ in July.

winterdyne wrote:
Mm. It's a quality over cost thing coupled with a numbers thing. If I need nearly 200 models for a good size game (WAB) then I'm not gonna pay a high price for a model that is lost in a crowd. Centrepieces and characters are where high model prices can be justified or exploited as there's a much lower volume of sale and production.

True. I see people pick out the bad Mantic miniatures, and declare how they'd never give up on GW's superior craftsmanship. Then I watch a game of Warhammer where 200+ dudes go on the table, and most of them are simply lost in the crowd, and then see the templates come down in turn 1 or 2, and 50+ of those dudes get scooped up and put back in the case.

Long time player (since 1988) getting back into it. My 40K armies are Tyranids, Chaos (Nurgle) and Dark Angels.

Picked up DV and was very impressed with most of the models, especially the Chaos models. Designs were good and the molding techniques were quite innovative so I was quite looking forward to the upcoming Chaos and DA releases. Then Chaos released... WTF? Dinobots and Helturkeys? I bought only the codex and a box of Raptors. Now DAs are out... WTF? Land Speeder Escalades and another silly looking flyer? I have plenty of metal Termies and bikes, so all I will be buying is the codex. Am I priced out? Not really, but I'm certainly not going pay actual money for stupid looking models. Would not buy them even with a 75% discount...

Tim

Backfire wrote:

agustin wrote:

One place the old approach to fiction is still largely present is in the RPG books by Fantasy Flight Games.

Umm, FFG is not exactly known from error-free rules or timely erratas.

Error free rules and timely errata mean what exactly when you're looking for a source of fiction?

RPGs also have the advantage over wargames when it comes to rules issues in that in the end, the GM can decide. So posting on a forum and asking for advice about what to do about an error is far far more effective as the game doesn't depend on official word from on high. The GM is running the game and when they figure out a solution that works, that's what happens. In a miniature game, both people would have to agree to use the fan solution or wait for an errata.

This may have already been covered, but does anyone else think that complaining about getting priced out of the hobby while spending $5k on it last year is a bit ridiculous?

Stranger83 pointed out that "priced out" was really the wrong term to use. The original poster meant more about value for money than not being able to afford things.

If someone spends $5,000 on miniature gaming in a year and GW raises it's prices enough, that person might stop seeing value in GW's products and the amount of revenue that GW sees from that person might drop from $5,000 a year to $500 or even ZERO.

From GW's perspective, the pricing factor driving away the customers with the greatest purchasing power should concern them more, not less.

 Kung Fu Hamster wrote:
This may have already been covered, but does anyone else think that complaining about getting priced out of the hobby while spending $5k on it last year is a bit ridiculous?

Note how it says "models" in the OP's sig. This can cover the entire gamut of figures in the WARGAMING hobby and is not just limited to GW's releases.

agustin wrote:

Backfire wrote:

agustin wrote:

One place the old approach to fiction is still largely present is in the RPG books by Fantasy Flight Games.

Umm, FFG is not exactly known from error-free rules or timely erratas.

Error free rules and timely errata mean what exactly when you're looking for a source of fiction?

It's quite relevant as you praised "quality of [FFG's] work". In my experience - including their RPG's - is that they are impressive looking, but error-ridden, ie. very similar to what GW produces so I fail to see what improvement that would bring.

Mind you, FFG is much smaller company than GW with much larger number of separate titles, so it's understandable not all their work is perfect.

 Kung Fu Hamster wrote:
This may have already been covered, but does anyone else think that complaining about getting priced out of the hobby while spending $5k on it last year is a bit ridiculous?

Perhaps you missed the whole "Bang for your buck" bit that's been discussed.

You also may not be aware, but (and the OP's title also suffers from this) GW is not the hobby. GW has priced me out of GW games. I'm still playing and am interested in many other tabletop wargames by other manufacturers.

Backfire wrote:

It's quite relevant as you praised "quality of [FFG's] work". In my experience - including their RPG's - is that they are impressive looking, but error-ridden, ie. very similar to what GW produces so I fail to see what improvement that would bring.

Mind you, FFG is much smaller company than GW with much larger number of separate titles, so it's understandable not all their work is perfect.

I guess I haven't noticed the errors and typos as much. Certainly not to any extent that we had to interrupt play to figure something out. I thought their stuff was okay on that front. You could well be right though and I just haven't noticed the problems as much that they stick out to me as being especially prevalent.

I have shown the book to new players and none of them found it hard to pick up or read due to errors, typographical or otherwise.

Shrug.

The real issue is pricing people IN to the hobby. Lower barriers mean more return business.

The issue with Games Workshop's prices is; is that it makes it harder for newcomers to make returning purchases frequently, especially when the economy or living quality, is even a bit tough.

You're paying what, 70$ for the rulebooks? I have just recently gotten into the hobby, and with the way the pricing boils out, it may be hard for me to stay in it. It's a bit worrying, as I love and adore this hobby.

To be fair, there is no point in buying most Games Workshops products since they are starting to match Forgeworld's prices. As such, you may as well just buy Forgeworld items.

It's been very tempting to just box up the Stormraven I own, and trade it to someone for cash to recover, plus the two small tactical squads.

[EDIT] Oh and get me started on Finecrap...

$70 dexs that are full of typos. Clearly they are high quality.

 Ravenous D wrote:
$70 dexs that are full of typos. Clearly they are high quality.

Yes - but you can get the iBook for $49.99...and I am sure they will fix those issues right away...

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/codex-dark-angels/id583342414?mt=11

With reviews like this one...why would GW's management think they should change course:

Must have purchase!

by Jay Sin

I bought an iPad just to get this iBook! What better way to get an up to date codex every time you open the pages. This digital release already has the errata integrated, awesome! While your buds might have errors or missing rules, you will have the most up to date codex at the table. This codex already has 3 updates over the printed text! Worth every dollar, I would pay more even. Not only do you get the errata updates, you get additional model pictures (360 views), instant rule links ( no need to hunt for a rule or definition), and searching.

Buy it and become a member of the Inner Circle!

_____________________

You know - every time I look at what GW does...it just reveals itself as a little more stupid. I really have a hard time understanding how people keep giving them money at all...

Case in point - their eBooks.

The old Space Marine book is priced at $41.99 and is listed as having 334 pages. The new Dark Angels book is priced at $49.99 and is listed as having 191 pages. Between that old codex and the newest one - they also released the Necron book which is priced at $32.99 and listed at having 195 pages. Does that seem odd to anyone?

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

 Ravenous D wrote:
$70 dexs that are full of typos. Clearly they are high quality.

Yes - but you can get the iBook for $49.99...and I am sure they will fix those issues right away...

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/codex-dark-angels/id583342414?mt=11

With reviews like this one...why would GW's management think they should change course:

Must have purchase!

by Jay Sin

I bought an iPad just to get this iBook! What better way to get an up to date codex every time you open the pages. This digital release already has the errata integrated, awesome! While your buds might have errors or missing rules, you will have the most up to date codex at the table. This codex already has 3 updates over the printed text! Worth every dollar, I would pay more even. Not only do you get the errata updates, you get additional model pictures (360 views), instant rule links ( no need to hunt for a rule or definition), and searching.

Buy it and become a member of the Inner Circle!

$700 for an ipad and $60 on the electronic copy? Hell no, if it was 1/10th the cost maybe, that and Im 90% sure that guy works for GW that wrote that review. In fact I think I know exactly who he is.

That 'review' is more parody than reality.

agustin wrote:

Backfire wrote:

It's quite relevant as you praised "quality of [FFG's] work". In my experience - including their RPG's - is that they are impressive looking, but error-ridden, ie. very similar to what GW produces so I fail to see what improvement that would bring.

Mind you, FFG is much smaller company than GW with much larger number of separate titles, so it's understandable not all their work is perfect.

I guess I haven't noticed the errors and typos as much. Certainly not to any extent that we had to interrupt play to figure something out. I thought their stuff was okay on that front. You could well be right though and I just haven't noticed the problems as much that they stick out to me as being especially prevalent.

Rogue Trader RPG was full of various editing errors and Psychic powers were partially rewritten in Errata. Road to Legend was so buggy that returning to 40k after an RtL campaign was actually refreshing because it had less errors and better, more timely erratas! And I didn't even play the Tomb of Ice or Sea of Blood which are reputed to be buggiest Descent expansions. Lets not even mention game balance.

This is not to say FFG games aren't enjoyable and certainly well made from material standpoint, but airtight rules writing and through playtesting are not amongst their strengths.

Thanks for letting me know. I don't actually have experience with the products you mentioned. I've played the chaos focused RPG, the new IG one, some Deathwatch, WFRP3, lots of Arkham Horror and a good amount of Android: Netrunner. I had good experiences with those.

Like GW, FFG is good at getting the setting and basics right. It's the small details where errors start to show up...

Back to pricing.

I might have hit my limit from buying from GW shops, but the internet still has a way to go before I depart completely.

Some of these prices aren't ideal, but then again they are more in line with what i'd expect/remember such kits to be.

http://totalwargamer.co.uk/warhammer-40k/chaos-space-marines.html

CSM - £17.62
Raptors - £15.37

Obviously these prices are rounded down due to percentage off the RRP, but they are getting back into the realms of reasonable pricing.

If GW rounded those figures down to 17.50 and 15.00 it would be £5.00 and £5.50 off of the current retail price. I know there is a point where GW needs to make a profit to maintain their staff, but it can't be denied that cheaper kits would shift more of them. GW sales figures indicate that they are doing roughly the same profits, but with increased prices surely the volume of sales is decreasing.

Instead of arguing ad nauseam, why don’t I tell you what happened at my local store. I was browsing when a young man (about 17, perfect GW demo) and his dad came in to look at the war games. They were considering starting 40K, but one look at the prices shocked them. I saw they were new and having some issues, so I let them know that there were alternatives; the store offered discounts and the could buy used from some of the older players. The dad said “Even so, this seems like a rich man’s game.” The kid put down the starter set with a laugh and said “I think I’ll spend my money on some 360 games instead ”.

In the end, you can make all the excuses you care to. Compare plastic toy soldiers with Faberge eggs, bundled software, gasoline or hamburgers. Use objectivist theory or Socratic deconstructionism to muddy the conversation. Insult 3rd party minis. Rationalize, rationalize, rationalize. If all else fails just call everyone a poor lying whiny pirate when they say they won’t buy.

I know more than a few potential customers GW has chased away. We know the value of a dollar and we certainly aren't alone.

Boggy Man wrote:
...just call everyone a poor lying whiny pirate...

I think this applies to many things.

Take an exalt, BTW. Excellent summation. I see this too, all the time. People off the street see this mass produced plastic at those prices and think, "Hells no. This is cheap made in China crap and you have to build it an paint it yourself, WTF?" and walk right the hell back out the door. I saw it all the time a couple years ago when I still went in to the local GW.

I've posted this before, but the problem with GW pricing is they are a "big boy" manufacturer who should be able to utilize their economies of scale to reduce prices. Instead, they price like they are specialty boutique or small scale manufacturer.

Because they are setting the prices that high, the smaller guys are able to actually make minis and games and can sell it at sufficient prices to support their business. They get a leg in on the market. Privateer Press and Wyrd are able to make plastics now because 1. the price has decreased as technology advances and 2. GW is pricing plastics as if they were metals. Finecast are priced comparable to boutique resin. When Forgeworld looks reasonable, you know GW prices are too high.

Because of this, overall, the prices for GW and as a result the overall miniwargaming market are high. But this artificially high level will allow PP or Wyrd or Mantic or someone to eventually reach that critical mass where they can really start to compete with GW, if not already then soon. Then we should see prices drop as they have to really compete for customers. Theoretically, of course.

So yes, when I look at the prices of GW and think of how much I have to buy, I have bowed out. That mass produced plastic junk isn't worth that much. With the same dollars, I'd rather buy a few PP or Wyrd or Brushfire or EFT minis and have them actually have meaning in a game, and be able to take time to paint them to the level that the price point demands.*

*Edit - PS - my note about my armies in my sig is ironic because we all know that Sisters and Wood Elves are not getting re-done for years, if ever. By then GW will have to compete in price or I can take a HELOC on the house to pay for it.

Boggy Man wrote:
Instead of arguing ad nauseam, why don’t I tell you what happened at my local store. I was browsing when a young man (about 17, perfect GW demo) and his dad came in to look at the war games. They were considering starting 40K, but one look at the prices shocked them. I saw they were new and having some issues, so I let them know that there were alternatives; the store offered discounts and the could buy used from some of the older players. The dad said “Even so, this seems like a rich man’s game.” The kid put down the starter set with a laugh and said “I think I’ll spend my money on some 360 games instead ”.

In the end, you can make all the excuses you care to. Compare plastic toy soldiers with Faberge eggs, bundled software, gasoline or hamburgers. Use objectivist theory or Socratic deconstructionism to muddy the conversation. Insult 3rd party minis. Rationalize, rationalize, rationalize. If all else fails just call everyone a poor lying whiny pirate when they say they won’t buy.

I know more than a few potential customers GW has chased away. We know the value of a dollar and we certainly aren't alone.

And video games aren't cheap either, new ones at around $60 US, the almost necessary online subscription, and the console. If you are a hardcore video gamer your cost could be similar to the HHHobby. GW can be done on a budget, but for what you get in a box the prices are too high, period. IG used to be twenty guys in a box and now they are ten for 20% more cost, how does that make sense when they are one of the most model heavy armies in the game? Orks, sixteen down to ten per box, GW thinks we're stupid? We see the difference.. Too high a cost for too little product,

I dunno about it being "just capitalism" or whatever, that GW tries to only sell to people who don't know much about their products and way of business.

After all, one of the basis of an ideal capitalistic system is that the customer DOES know any necessary detail about each product, and as a result, they do not make choices out of ignorance.

But given that idealism doesn't actually exist, this isn't the case in most industries, obviously.

 Melissia wrote:
I dunno about it being "just capitalism" or whatever, that GW tries to only sell to people who don't know much about their products and way of business.

After all, one of the basis of an ideal capitalistic system is that the customer DOES know any necessary detail about each product, and as a result, they do not make choices out of ignorance.

But given that idealism doesn't actually exist, this isn't the case in most industries, obviously.

Speaking of Capitalism, GW needs to be slapped by the Invisible Hand.

I've made it my goal to build 500 points more of my IG army before the new price increases and 6E IG release.

 Melissia wrote:
I dunno about it being "just capitalism" or whatever, that GW tries to only sell to people who don't know much about their products and way of business...

Yeah, that's the thing, capitalism isn't a moral philosophy but it's often confused with one. It's what causes the cliffnotes Ayn Rand 'there's no such thing as too much profit" line. No, it's not immoral for GW to charge $50 for a Nob Biker, but it's bad capitalism. It's feeding their profit margin at the expense of their net profits (they are two different things) their customer base and their long term survivability.

Saying it's just capitalism is like saying killing the goose that lays golden eggs is fine because you're not a vegetarian.

I've got it!

Maybe what GW should do is stick large labels on their products saying "Made in the UK" like American or Australian goods. That way they can justify their prices to the average consumer.

Boggy Man wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
I dunno about it being "just capitalism" or whatever, that GW tries to only sell to people who don't know much about their products and way of business...

Yeah, that's the thing, capitalism isn't a moral philosophy but it's often confused with one. It's what causes the cliffnotes Ayn Rand 'there's no such thing as too much profit" line. No, it's not immoral for GW to charge $50 for a Nob Biker, but it's bad capitalism. It's feeding their profit margin at the expense of their net profits (they are two different things) their customer base and their long term survivability.

Saying it's just capitalism is like saying killing the goose that lays golden eggs is fine because you're not a vegetarian.

No, it's capitalism. If GW price themselves out and bring about their own downfall, another company will step into the spotlight.

 BryllCream wrote:

Boggy Man wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
I dunno about it being "just capitalism" or whatever, that GW tries to only sell to people who don't know much about their products and way of business...

Yeah, that's the thing, capitalism isn't a moral philosophy but it's often confused with one. It's what causes the cliffnotes Ayn Rand 'there's no such thing as too much profit" line. No, it's not immoral for GW to charge $50 for a Nob Biker, but it's bad capitalism. It's feeding their profit margin at the expense of their net profits (they are two different things) their customer base and their long term survivability.

Saying it's just capitalism is like saying killing the goose that lays golden eggs is fine because you're not a vegetarian.

No, it's capitalism. If GW price themselves out and bring about their own downfall, another company will step into the spotlight.

Only in an ideal capitalistic system.

Capitalism in the real world doesn't work like that.

I thought I was out...but a friend and I decided to go ahead and finish our armies and give 6th a go. Looks like GW will get a couple hundred more $$ out of me.

 Mad4Minis wrote:
I thought I was out...but a friend and I decided to go ahead and finish our armies and give 6th a go. Looks like GW will get a couple hundred more $$ out of me.

Till you get a codex update, FAQ changes the rules, a codex release negates one of your units, etc and you need to buy different units. There is no "finish" in 40k.

 Melissia wrote:

 BryllCream wrote:

Boggy Man wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
I dunno about it being "just capitalism" or whatever, that GW tries to only sell to people who don't know much about their products and way of business...

Yeah, that's the thing, capitalism isn't a moral philosophy but it's often confused with one. It's what causes the cliffnotes Ayn Rand 'there's no such thing as too much profit" line. No, it's not immoral for GW to charge $50 for a Nob Biker, but it's bad capitalism. It's feeding their profit margin at the expense of their net profits (they are two different things) their customer base and their long term survivability.

Saying it's just capitalism is like saying killing the goose that lays golden eggs is fine because you're not a vegetarian.

No, it's capitalism. If GW price themselves out and bring about their own downfall, another company will step into the spotlight.

Only in an ideal capitalistic system.

Capitalism in the real world doesn't work like that.

Yes it does.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BlueDagger wrote:

 Mad4Minis wrote:
I thought I was out...but a friend and I decided to go ahead and finish our armies and give 6th a go. Looks like GW will get a couple hundred more $$ out of me.

Till you get a codex update, FAQ changes the rules, a codex release negates one of your units, etc and you need to buy different units. There is no "finish" in 40k.

Some people might regard that as a good thing.

 BryllCream wrote:
Capitalism in the real world doesn't work like that.

Yes it does.

 Melissia wrote:

 BryllCream wrote:

Yes it does.

You can say taht, but it still doesn't.

Capitalism as an ideal relies upon perfect information and no barriers to entry, amongst other things that this industry does not have.

Only a first year macro student honestly thinks that capitalism works this way.

There are competitors to GW out there, yet people clearly think GW offers the best quality product at a price that they are willing to pay, hence they're still the biggest tabletop company around.
If GW did collapse the money would either flow into competing companies, or into other sources of the GW IP. I don't see how "capitalism doesn't work like that" is useful for anyone.

 BryllCream wrote:
[
Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BlueDagger wrote:

 Mad4Minis wrote:
I thought I was out...but a friend and I decided to go ahead and finish our armies and give 6th a go. Looks like GW will get a couple hundred more $$ out of me.

Till you get a codex update, FAQ changes the rules, a codex release negates one of your units, etc and you need to buy different units. There is no "finish" in 40k.

Some people might regard that as a good thing.

Having the option to flesh out your army with new options = good thing. Being forced to flesh out your army to stay competitive = bad thing.

I can't say I've ever heard someone say "wow that Farseer FAQ update made my farseer totally useless in my build. That's awesome and gives me a reason to buy an Autaurch!"

 BryllCream wrote:
[snip]

Being the best seller does not make you the best author/musician/sculptor/artist/etc. It never has.

Marketing, placement, timing, and pure luck play a lot in to how successful a business endeavor is, without any relation to the quality of its products.

 Melissia wrote:

 BryllCream wrote:
[snip]

Being the best seller does not make you the best author/musician/sculptor/artist/etc. It never has.

Marketing, placement, timing, and pure luck play a lot in to how successful a business endeavor is, without any relation to the quality of its products.

In the short term yes. In the long run not so much. Want proof? WM/H has now surpassed GW Fantasy as the number two game in the US. Give it another 5 or so years and if GW (and PP) keep doing what they are doing we should see PP overtake GW.

That' capitalism at its finest. For another example look at Samsung vs. Apple. iPhone dominated the market, forcing other companies to step up and now Samsung is starting to outsell them. Its the way it works. Either companies adapt or they are overcome.

GW from my vantage point has chosen not to really innovate and keep up with the competition, and they are now being caught up to (slowly for sure, but they are).

 darefsky wrote:
That' capitalism at its finest. For another example look at Samsung vs. Apple. iPhone dominated the market, forcing other companies to step up and now Samsung is starting to outsell them. Its the way it works. Either companies adapt or they are overcome.

GW from my vantage point has chosen not to really innovate and keep up with the competition, and they are now being caught up to (slowly for sure, but they are).

I don't disagree. But there's also examples in the music and film industry, as well as gaming industry, of stagnation in the medium term, and we'll see if this continues in to the long as the years go by.

literally the only reason i justified getting into warhammer when 6th hit (didnt play before 6th) was because i have awesome luck finding people on ebay selling their entire army for wicked cheap. I bought ~900 dollars worth of orks off one guy for ~400 lol....
The few things ive gotten from GW and not Ebay felt way too expensive though. Im always flipping the decision around in my head to buy a new box legit or wait for another cheap army on ebay. I need lootas, and im tired of making new deffguns out of craptons of left over sluggas and shootas lol but $25 bucks for FOUR deffguns (mek is the 5th model) is way too expensive since i usually field 25-30 of them.

 Melissia wrote:

 darefsky wrote:
That' capitalism at its finest. For another example look at Samsung vs. Apple. iPhone dominated the market, forcing other companies to step up and now Samsung is starting to outsell them. Its the way it works. Either companies adapt or they are overcome.

GW from my vantage point has chosen not to really innovate and keep up with the competition, and they are now being caught up to (slowly for sure, but they are).

I don't disagree. But there's also examples in the music and film industry, as well as gaming industry, of stagnation in the medium term, and we'll see if this continues in to the long as the years go by.

Sadly I think it will. I look at companies like Dell about 7 years ago. They were on top of the computer world. Got lazy and started just selling on price at the time the stock was in the $50-$60 range. Now its at what $11-$14?

They are a shell of what they were with very little innovation to offer. Lets compare them with IBM, they saw the righting on the wall, and re-invented their business, I don't know if GW upper management doesn't see the trends in the industry or if they truly believe they are in the correct market position with little to worry about.