I mean, i ordered just ONE black round base for The Great Unclean One and that costs 12$ ( pretty sure it costs about 5 cents or so to make that base, im just guessing ). Also it seems that citadel is the smallest paints you can get, also some of the worse design for a container for the paint. Half of my paint ends up gettin spilled over the sides of the container just because thats how it acts when i close the cap... And then theres the most expensive spray paints i have ever seen... etc etc
What are your thoughts on this?, do you think its a bit ridiculous that things seem to cost more and come in less quantity compared to every other war game?
edit - Also bought some green stuff, which is about the size of a 2 space marines ( the blue and the green together )... thought there would be alot more, and that was 24$ edit - It was a bit bigger actualy, i didn't see the other part of it in the container it was in, so make it the size of 3 space marines.
Any way, im not complaining to be fair, im more interested in what others think about this compared to other wargames, or what ever knowledge/thoughts they have on this.
edit - But if this seems just like me complaining please delete this thread and i apologise.
Yes, but people will use any argument to show why it's not. Model to model pricing, comparing really expensive things to start collectings, comparing boxes and not the size of armies, etc. People always try to show how GW really isn't the most expensive wargaming company.
Wayniac wrote: Yes, but people will use any argument to show why it's not. Model to model pricing, comparing really expensive things to start collectings, comparing boxes and not the size of armies, etc. People always try to show how GW really isn't the most expensive wargaming company.
I don't really know at all. But its just like, i bought a 5 dollar spray can for priming, and it works just as well as the two times i spent more then 30$ on citadel spray which is also has less paint then the cheap one i got. And i thought they would have a stock or some thing of bases, didn't think it would cost so much, if i knew that i would just try repair the one i screwed up lol.
I think they would do better if they lowered there prices to be honest, i think that would be a better buisness model going fowards, but i dont know.
I guess they reached this point ( becoming a billion dollar company or what ever it is ) by doing what they do, so i guess there on the right track i suppose?
Easily the most expensive war gaming company out there.
are GW games the most expensive table top miniature war game?
eh. some games and level of play could be. some can be very cheap to start and get into.
cant say exact money wise but imho i feel like malifaux can get stupid expensive at a "competitive" level as last i recall you build your list right as you are about the start the game meaning you need basically everything for a faction or two to be "competitive"
also are we excluding alternative means of purchase or MSRP?
When i first started this hobby last year. Every shop that is not GW is cheaper. I dont understand how this works well for them. Even if its only a small amount cheaper, it is always cheaper from other places...
Oh who cares, this is the price you pay for not looking to see what else is out there. Like instead of me buying green stuff, i probably could find cheaper larger quantity of the same type of thing with a different name. But i guess the question of why this works for them is still worth while talking about.
I use 3rd party sites within the UK and it honestly is not all that bad. I looked into games like Bolt action and infinity not so long ago and I noticed the prices are not too far apart.
I will say that some kits seem way overpriced. But all in all, they are just as expensive as everything else nowadays IMHO.
Edit: I am aware that for everywhere else in the world they bumped up there prices quite substantially!
They have stuff which everyone wants and only they make it.
You don't have to support Citadel though. There's nothing unique about that branch - paint is paint, and rest is common items made in China with pretty logo on them.
Star Wars Legion is just as costly, then there is Drop Ship Commander.
GW is costly, but when you compare the models and the size/amount of plastic you get, they really are not the most, especially b.c you can get cheap armies. There are 2k armies that are under $350USD, you just wont like all the models.
IMOMTG is way more costly if you are playing the meta, that game is a hell hole for your savings (I know i play tournaments for years).
Alphabet wrote: I use 3rd party sites within the UK and it honestly is not all that bad. I looked into games like Bolt action and infinity not so long ago and I noticed the prices are not too far apart.
I will say that some kits seem way overpriced. But all in all, they are just as expensive as everything else nowadays IMHO.
Edit: I am aware that for everywhere else in the world they bumped up there prices quite substantially!
Kingdom Death and Privateer Press are both more costly on a model to model basis. The benefit for PP at least is that you generally need less models. But their models cost the same or more, individually. So ymmv.
I think it depends on what you want to play. A guy who wanders into a GW store and buys a brand new Primaris force, with Gman and Calgar, and all the options and then has them order him a Astreus...
Versus the guy who buys Dark Imperium stuff from Ebay, and amazon and a Astreus from a dubious seller on another site in a few away country..
That is like $1500 between them, and they have the same thing.
If you measure cost purely by the amount you pay per piece of plastic then GW is up near the top end of being expensive.
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go. The durability of that player community is not an accident, GW invest quite heavily in promoting it in a lot of ways and the costs of all that get amortized into the costs of the piece of plastic you buy.
I have had a lot of miniatures in my time and most of them are all but worthless now as the games no longer exist or are not supported. The GW miniatures I own still have value, even if I never wanted to play again they would still have value as I could probably sell them on for 30-50% of their current sale price (depending on paint quality and current desirability). Those other miniatures may have had a lower initial purchase price but were they actually better value?
I mean... it is the most expensive for a company that sells thier own models, but if you want to see some crazy prices check out some of these independent miniature companies selling add ons for war gamers. I see addons and counts as models often that are scaled for 40k but run 50+% more. i get a good laugh sometimes going to aftermarket bits sites to see how much they want for some bits.
and before somebody tells me how expensive it is to make those things and time to design I have multiple 3d printers (2 fdm, 1 sla) and design my own bits and full counts as models. yes it takes time, and no the resin/ PLA or ABS are not free but i look at the cost of some of these and really think people are crazy to spend $40 for replacment weapons on a contemptor dred (as an example of something that actually exists)
Thsi does not excuse GW's premium price for plastic but it does add a little context...
on the paint GW paint is garbage switch to army painter or vallejo, dropper bottle plus wet pallet = best investment ever. you cna use a paper towel in a sandwich container with parchment paper on it or somethign like this if you have a 3d printer [link] https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3517666 [/link]
Can we just talk about the citadel paint containers for a moment. They seem to be to be designed to help you waste paint or at least designed in a way where you are more likely to waste paint for various reasons. 1 reason can be when you close the lid to quick after opening it it usually pours down the outsides of the container. 2nd reason the big opening allows more evaporation . 3rd reason, the little lip they put on the inside of the container is there apparently so you can use it to get your paint off, which means you are leaving the cap open letting more evaporate. So am i right that there paint is the most money draining paint ever? lol
edit - Putting a drip tip on the end of them would just be the holy grail savior.
Since HIPS has taken over historical wargaming and full metal armies are not necessary any more, GW is the most expensive by far.
Usually a full army ready to play is around 100-200$/€
An army were only metal models are available can still be more expensive. Take a smaller nation for Napoleonics were you need 200 models only available in metal for 1,5-3$ per model and you end up with 400-500.
But also a WW2 skirmish army can be around 400 if only metal/resin models (infantry, artillery and tanks) are available.
A reason why 28mm historical wargaming was not a huge thing until plastic was available as it was considered to expensive by a lot of people
And than you have GW games were a full ready to play army starts at 500$.
But of course you can start to convert snap fit models, add 3rd party bits and stick to an elite faction with core box models available to decrease the price to 200-300$, something you can also do with any other game (no need to buy an expensive metal Norwegian Army for Napoleonics if you can convert the infantry using the existing plastic boxes).
But your starting point for GW is there were most other games ends and compared to other games with a huge number of models, GW is double the price at best.
Stormatious wrote: Can we just talk about the citadel paint containers for a moment. They seem to be to be designed to help you waste paint or at least designed in a way where you are more likely to waste paint for various reasons.
Because selling paint for 10 times the prize to finance those fancy pots is not enough
timetowaste85 wrote: Kingdom Death and Privateer Press are both more costly on a model to model basis. The benefit for PP at least is that you generally need less models. But their models cost the same or more, individually. So ymmv.
On man i forgot about Kingdom Death, such a great game, wish i could play it more.
G00fySmiley wrote: I mean... it is the most expensive for a company that sells thier own models, but if you want to see some crazy prices check out some of these independent miniature companies selling add ons for war gamers. I see addons and counts as models often that are scaled for 40k but run 50+% more. i get a good laugh sometimes going to aftermarket bits sites to see how much they want for some bits.
and before somebody tells me how expensive it is to make those things and time to design I have multiple 3d printers (2 fdm, 1 sla) and design my own bits and full counts as models. yes it takes time, and no the resin/ PLA or ABS are not free but i look at the cost of some of these and really think people are crazy to spend $40 for replacment weapons on a contemptor dred (as an example of something that actually exists)
Thsi does not excuse GW's premium price for plastic but it does add a little context...
on the paint GW paint is garbage switch to army painter or vallejo, dropper bottle plus wet pallet = best investment ever. you cna use a paper towel in a sandwich container with parchment paper on it or somethign like this if you have a 3d printer [link] https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3517666 [/link]
Yeah, ill do that. But i feel sorry for GW, because i feel most people dont buy citadel ( for these reasons ), so i dont get it.
G00fySmiley wrote: I mean... it is the most expensive for a company that sells thier own models, but if you want to see some crazy prices check out some of these independent miniature companies selling add ons for war gamers. I see addons and counts as models often that are scaled for 40k but run 50+% more. i get a good laugh sometimes going to aftermarket bits sites to see how much they want for some bits.
and before somebody tells me how expensive it is to make those things and time to design I have multiple 3d printers (2 fdm, 1 sla) and design my own bits and full counts as models. yes it takes time, and no the resin/ PLA or ABS are not free but i look at the cost of some of these and really think people are crazy to spend $40 for replacment weapons on a contemptor dred (as an example of something that actually exists)
Thsi does not excuse GW's premium price for plastic but it does add a little context...
on the paint GW paint is garbage switch to army painter or vallejo, dropper bottle plus wet pallet = best investment ever. you cna use a paper towel in a sandwich container with parchment paper on it or somethign like this if you have a 3d printer [link] https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3517666 [/link]
Yeah, ill do that. But i feel sorry for GW, because i feel most people dont buy citadel ( for these reasons ), so i dont get it.
why feel sorry for GW? they choose to use pots, they get feedback in lots of forums, facebook posts etc where poeple express preferring dropper bottles and they do not listen. they also charge more than most companies per mL of paint. its not liek thier paint is even that great. heck thier washes are basically designed to tip over and waste wash so i am just done with them. i buy a lot of thier models though so they get plenty of my $
Stormatious wrote: Can we just talk about the citadel paint containers for a moment. They seem to be to be designed to help you waste paint
Of course they are.
i feel most people dont buy citadel
It is easier to manipulate people with shiny brand and having closest shop only sell Citadel paints than you think. And the high price just makes people think that they buy best stuff because they spend more money.
If you qualify it as "price to have a proper force for a regular game on the table"... I can't think of anything that comes close to GW. But given that I own all the forces in my sig and a couple more... clearly hasn't deterred me...
...but other than books, never bought anything directly from GW
G00fySmiley wrote: I mean... it is the most expensive for a company that sells thier own models, but if you want to see some crazy prices check out some of these independent miniature companies selling add ons for war gamers. I see addons and counts as models often that are scaled for 40k but run 50+% more. i get a good laugh sometimes going to aftermarket bits sites to see how much they want for some bits.
and before somebody tells me how expensive it is to make those things and time to design I have multiple 3d printers (2 fdm, 1 sla) and design my own bits and full counts as models. yes it takes time, and no the resin/ PLA or ABS are not free but i look at the cost of some of these and really think people are crazy to spend $40 for replacment weapons on a contemptor dred (as an example of something that actually exists)
Thsi does not excuse GW's premium price for plastic but it does add a little context...
on the paint GW paint is garbage switch to army painter or vallejo, dropper bottle plus wet pallet = best investment ever. you cna use a paper towel in a sandwich container with parchment paper on it or somethign like this if you have a 3d printer [link] https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3517666 [/link]
Yeah, ill do that. But i feel sorry for GW, because i feel most people dont buy citadel ( for these reasons ), so i dont get it.
why feel sorry for GW? they choose to use pots, they get feedback in lots of forums, facebook posts etc where poeple express preferring dropper bottles and they do not listen. they also charge more than most companies per mL of paint. its not liek thier paint is even that great. heck thier washes are basically designed to tip over and waste wash so i am just done with them. i buy a lot of thier models though so they get plenty of my $
ACtualy the last two paints i bought from GW are extremely lumpy, even if i shake the gak out of them they are heaps of lumps in them. I can take a picture if this is uncommon.
happy_inquisitor wrote:
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go. The durability of that player community is not an accident, GW invest quite heavily in promoting it in a lot of ways and the costs of all that get amortized into the costs of the piece of plastic you buy.
This is an underappreciated point. GW's high prices partly reflect its investment in brick-and-mortar stores, a magazine, and a heavy community presence that's focused on bringing in new blood. That's the kind of stuff that keeps a wargame alive over the long term. You're effectively subsidizing the infrastructure that other game companies offload more of on to the community.
Dunno if I can defend the AU/NZ upcharge, though.
G00fySmiley wrote:I mean... it is the most expensive for a company that sells thier own models, but if you want to see some crazy prices check out some of these independent miniature companies selling add ons for war gamers. I see addons and counts as models often that are scaled for 40k but run 50+% more. i get a good laugh sometimes going to aftermarket bits sites to see how much they want for some bits.
and before somebody tells me how expensive it is to make those things and time to design I have multiple 3d printers (2 fdm, 1 sla) and design my own bits and full counts as models. yes it takes time, and no the resin/ PLA or ABS are not free but i look at the cost of some of these and really think people are crazy to spend $40 for replacment weapons on a contemptor dred (as an example of something that actually exists)
Ever tried running an online store- including keeping a nice-looking website running, maintaining stock, doing all the shipping and customer service- for an extremely niche product that maybe a few hundred people in the world are going to want? I haven't either, but it sounds like a pain in the ass that I'd want to see some profit off of.
Aside from that, those couple hundred weirdos who want that contemptor dread weapon really want that contemptor dread to look exactly how they want it. There's a huge spectrum of willingness to invest in hobby, and "pay a lot to get exactly what I want" is just as valid an end member as the eBay scrap hound.
happy_inquisitor wrote:
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go. The durability of that player community is not an accident, GW invest quite heavily in promoting it in a lot of ways and the costs of all that get amortized into the costs of the piece of plastic you buy.
This is an underappreciated point. GW's high prices partly reflect its investment in brick-and-mortar stores, a magazine, and a heavy community presence that's focused on bringing in new blood. That's the kind of stuff that keeps a wargame alive over the long term. You're effectively subsidizing the infrastructure that other game companies offload more of on to the community.
Dunno if I can defend the AU/NZ upcharge, though.
G00fySmiley wrote:I mean... it is the most expensive for a company that sells thier own models, but if you want to see some crazy prices check out some of these independent miniature companies selling add ons for war gamers. I see addons and counts as models often that are scaled for 40k but run 50+% more. i get a good laugh sometimes going to aftermarket bits sites to see how much they want for some bits.
and before somebody tells me how expensive it is to make those things and time to design I have multiple 3d printers (2 fdm, 1 sla) and design my own bits and full counts as models. yes it takes time, and no the resin/ PLA or ABS are not free but i look at the cost of some of these and really think people are crazy to spend $40 for replacment weapons on a contemptor dred (as an example of something that actually exists)
Ever tried running an online store- including keeping a nice-looking website running, maintaining stock, doing all the shipping and customer service- for an extremely niche product that maybe a few hundred people in the world are going to want? I haven't either, but it sounds like a pain in the ass that I'd want to see some profit off of.
Aside from that, those couple hundred weirdos who want that contemptor dread weapon really want that contemptor dread to look exactly how they want it. There's a huge spectrum of willingness to invest in hobby, and "pay a lot to get exactly what I want" is just as valid an end member as the eBay scrap hound.
i have a few sites i maintain and run a bank of servers. but i do not have experience in actual store online selling physical products (only software and server space/data backup) as for stock though... if i were doign bits i would just print to order or keep a few on hand. on the sla ones you can knock out detailed small prints like that in a few hours per part. my form labs2 was ~$2.5k though so if it were not a hobby and a buisness you would need to factor that cost plus resin. and yea its niche, I am not saying nobody will pay $40 for 2 contemptor guns obviously they will i just question if its better to sell them for $8-10 a piece and then more people would buy them /shrug. and with how the printer works you could fill a buildplate with them and they would take the same amoutn of time to print 10 as it would 2
wuestenfux wrote: We have a guy here who started 40k five years ago.
He said he had spent 30,000 Euro for all the stuff he bought.
I've been keeping a record (bad idea?) and I've spent £550 in the year I've been back. To be honest, it's not the most expensive of my hobbies...
right! i have been playing for quite a long time. if you buy over time it makes sense. I have gotten a box a month for over a decade rarely buying more than one box in a month with few exceptions (like 4 talons of the emperor boxes at once just to have a full custodes army but i called that a quarterly purchase). I have video gamer friends who buy a new title or 2 every month which means they are spending more than I do and those games do not gain value whereas i coudl sell my 40k models for a profit due to inflation by GW and the time i spent painting them. another hobby i have is wood working and... yea that sure does that add up fast, decide to make a nice new project for a friend, price out the hardwood and in 40k terms you cna buy a small army for lumber cost on a book case making a heirloom quality piece.
timetowaste85 wrote: Kingdom Death and Privateer Press are both more costly on a model to model basis. The benefit for PP at least is that you generally need less models. But their models cost the same or more, individually. So ymmv.
man, with themes and CID always changing the landscape, plus needing two lists now with virtually no overlap, I did the cost on my khador pair vs my competitive aeldari army or my buddies ig soup and it was pretty shocking.
The IG souop army cost as much as my two list pairing (with WAY more models that look better in it) and my khador 2 list pairing was about 33% more expensive than my aeldari pairing.
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go.
Going that way, GW is even worse
Buying a 600$ 40k army now, it would have a lifetime of ~3 years
No chance to use it without further investment of new models after 5 years or even in 10 years.
I experienced this more than once, buying an army full price from GW, using it for an edition and after that if you can re-use 50% of it you were the lucky guy
With Age of Sigmar it is now better but the game is only in its 2nd edition, lets see what happens with its 3rd.
Comapring to historical games, they will be the same and useable in 50 years too, although they just cost a thrird or less compared to GW.
This is an underappreciated point. GW's high prices partly reflect its investment in brick-and-mortar stores, a magazine, and a heavy community presence that's focused on bringing in new blood. That's the kind of stuff that keeps a wargame alive over the long term. You're effectively subsidizing the infrastructure that other game companies offload more of on to the community.
Dunno if I can defend the AU/NZ upcharge, though.
Their Magazine is just paid advertising. If they would give it away for free it would be an argument but as you have to pay for it.
Community presence is a thing but they do it with stores and those have to make money (a store manager that is not able to sell enough is replaced, a store that does not make enough money is closed sooner than later)
Other companies directly support the communities (sponsoring torunaments/events, giveaways for stores, exchanging old rules for free during an edition change etc), so nothing exclusively for GW but just different
And if GW need to 3 times more expensive on their stuff to keep their stores running, when other FLGS owners can life from their store, they are doing something very wrong.
wuestenfux wrote: We have a guy here who started 40k five years ago.
He said he had spent 30,000 Euro for all the stuff he bought.
I've been keeping a record (bad idea?) and I've spent £550 in the year I've been back. To be honest, it's not the most expensive of my hobbies...
This. The supercharger for my mustang was 2800, and i got it cheap, the stuff to install it (fuel lines, injectors, cooling, belts, etc...) was another 2000
hell, I have a multiple optics from trijicon for some of my rifles that cost more than any of my armies.
its all about what you love and what you love to do.
i love pushing man dollies, driving a fast car (though i dont do that anymore)), shooting, and hanging out with my daughter and wife, in reverse order!
I agree GW is very pricey and the price is based on the model in game not the cost of the model to make. Plus with GW not allowing stores to sell the stuff at prices they want means they control the market.
Take a commander model for example the commander might take 3 times as long to sculpt the original compared to a basic trooper but the cost to make is the same so why are commanders 4 or 5 times more? Plastic is cheap I have been around the hobby for years and and you can see how "special Characters" cost a lot more just like units that work well cost a lot more.
But having said that I do feel like the money spent vs the time spent in the hobby it pretty cheap to play long term compared to other hobbies. But that goes for any of the wargames on the market not just GW.
Buying a 600$ 40k army now, it would have a lifetime of ~3 years
No chance to use it without further investment of new models after 5 years or even in 10 years.
I experienced this more than once, buying an army full price from GW, using it for an edition and after that if you can re-use 50% of it you were the lucky guy
That's always going to be the case if you play to chase the meta, no matter who you buy your models from. His point was that the game itself would still be around, and the core units from the majority of armies are still usable in anything but the most cutthroat competition.
Their Magazine is just paid advertising. If they would give it away for free it would be an argument but as you have to pay for it.
Community presence is a thing but they do it with stores and those have to make money (a store manager that is not able to sell enough is replaced, a store that does not make enough money is closed sooner than later)
Other companies directly support the communities (sponsoring torunaments/events, giveaways for stores, exchanging old rules for free during an edition change etc), so nothing exclusively for GW but just different
I highly doubt (though could be wrong) that White Dwarf / GW brick-and-mortar business is net profitable for the company. Those look like loss leaders to me.
And if GW need to 3 times more expensive on their stuff to keep their stores running, when other FLGS owners can life from their store, they are doing something very wrong.
A successful FLGS almost certainly doesn't live off GW product alone.
kodos wrote: Since HIPS has taken over historical wargaming and full metal armies are not necessary any more, GW is the most expensive by far.
Usually a full army ready to play is around 100-200$/€
An army were only metal models are available can still be more expensive. Take a smaller nation for Napoleonics were you need 200 models only available in metal for 1,5-3$ per model and you end up with 400-500.
But also a WW2 skirmish army can be around 400 if only metal/resin models (infantry, artillery and tanks) are available.
A reason why 28mm historical wargaming was not a huge thing until plastic was available as it was considered to expensive by a lot of people
And than you have GW games were a full ready to play army starts at 500$.
But of course you can start to convert snap fit models, add 3rd party bits and stick to an elite faction with core box models available to decrease the price to 200-300$, something you can also do with any other game (no need to buy an expensive metal Norwegian Army for Napoleonics if you can convert the infantry using the existing plastic boxes).
But your starting point for GW is there were most other games ends and compared to other games with a huge number of models, GW is double the price at best.
I don't know about that, most factions you can start out with a couple of Start Collecting boxes and then fill in the gaps to get a workable army. Is that really $500? It is far from that in the UK.
The size of a "full" army also matters. GW dropped their points values for their events to 1750 which was an instant 12.5% reduction in the cost of getting a full army on the table. Nothing to do with them if ETC/ITC want to stick to higher points values - actually given their approach of expecting people to do serious travelling for the tournament scene the cost of 250 points of models is perfectly rational to the ETC/ITC.
If we are talking the sort of army you need to be a regular player at big tournaments then it might cost a lot more because you need/want specific models rather than the cheaper sets GW sells - but quite frankly at that point the large majority of your spend is probably on travelling, hotels and so on rather than the models. Being a tournament player is expensive for all sorts of other reasons The couple of years I have bothered with travelling to play tournaments that has been the majority of my spend for those years and I have never been what you would call a serious dedicated tournament player.
If you are into the competitive side to any serious degree - which is the only time you actually need an expensive army for it to be viable - then the travel, hotel and tournament fee costs will almost certainly be the main part of your expense. The better supported and more popular the game the lower those might be as you will have more events closer to home. To this extent the GW games are some of the cheapest to compete in if you are a regular tournament goer who is still cost-conscious. Obviously if money is no object and you want to fly to the LVO and then fly to play in the ETC you can spend as much money as you want but really is the extra $5 for a box of minis any impact on the thousands of dollars you are spending on your hobby by that stage?
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go.
Going that way, GW is even worse
Buying a 600$ 40k army now, it would have a lifetime of ~3 years
No chance to use it without further investment of new models after 5 years or even in 10 years.
I experienced this more than once, buying an army full price from GW, using it for an edition and after that if you can re-use 50% of it you were the lucky guy
With Age of Sigmar it is now better but the game is only in its 2nd edition, lets see what happens with its 3rd.
Comapring to historical games, they will be the same and useable in 50 years too, although they just cost a thrird or less compared to GW.
This is an underappreciated point. GW's high prices partly reflect its investment in brick-and-mortar stores, a magazine, and a heavy community presence that's focused on bringing in new blood. That's the kind of stuff that keeps a wargame alive over the long term. You're effectively subsidizing the infrastructure that other game companies offload more of on to the community.
Dunno if I can defend the AU/NZ upcharge, though.
Their Magazine is just paid advertising. If they would give it away for free it would be an argument but as you have to pay for it.
Community presence is a thing but they do it with stores and those have to make money (a store manager that is not able to sell enough is replaced, a store that does not make enough money is closed sooner than later)
Other companies directly support the communities (sponsoring torunaments/events, giveaways for stores, exchanging old rules for free during an edition change etc), so nothing exclusively for GW but just different
And if GW need to 3 times more expensive on their stuff to keep their stores running, when other FLGS owners can life from their store, they are doing something very wrong.
What do you mean by life time, do you mean some models become obsolete, or do you mean they are nerfed in a way where other models are needed or some thing. Either way i really hate the idea of models you buy wonday becoming obselete, thats rubbish and if thats true i would rather pick another wargame maybe like historical. I hope they have some thing written some where that allows models you bought a long time ago to still be used. ( i would still buy cool looking models though just for display )
edit - UNless the model dies in the 40k universe some how and thats why they become obselete, then thats fine i dont mind that.
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go.
Going that way, GW is even worse
Buying a 600$ 40k army now, it would have a lifetime of ~3 years
No chance to use it without further investment of new models after 5 years or even in 10 years.
I experienced this more than once, buying an army full price from GW, using it for an edition and after that if you can re-use 50% of it you were the lucky guy
With Age of Sigmar it is now better but the game is only in its 2nd edition, lets see what happens with its 3rd.
You only have that level of obsolescence if you are playing at a competitive level, in which case your other costs (travel, hotel, tournament fees) are way more than $100 per year which is what your costs above come out to (and you did not include selling the stuff you no longer want on ebay). If you are chasing the dragon of the competitive meta for any other reason than serious regular attendance of big tournaments then the price of GW models has nothing to do with what is going on in your life.
If you were to measure it by the amount you pay per opportunity to play with your plastic then it would come out as one of the cheapest. You can be reasonably confident that the plastic model you buy today will still be playable and that there will still be a player community in 5, 10 or 20 years. So the durability of that product as part of a playing experience is on a different scale to all the smaller companies which come and go.
Going that way, GW is even worse
Buying a 600$ 40k army now, it would have a lifetime of ~3 years
No chance to use it without further investment of new models after 5 years or even in 10 years.
I experienced this more than once, buying an army full price from GW, using it for an edition and after that if you can re-use 50% of it you were the lucky guy
With Age of Sigmar it is now better but the game is only in its 2nd edition, lets see what happens with its 3rd.
Comapring to historical games, they will be the same and useable in 50 years too, although they just cost a thrird or less compared to GW.
This is an underappreciated point. GW's high prices partly reflect its investment in brick-and-mortar stores, a magazine, and a heavy community presence that's focused on bringing in new blood. That's the kind of stuff that keeps a wargame alive over the long term. You're effectively subsidizing the infrastructure that other game companies offload more of on to the community.
Dunno if I can defend the AU/NZ upcharge, though.
Their Magazine is just paid advertising. If they would give it away for free it would be an argument but as you have to pay for it.
Community presence is a thing but they do it with stores and those have to make money (a store manager that is not able to sell enough is replaced, a store that does not make enough money is closed sooner than later)
Other companies directly support the communities (sponsoring torunaments/events, giveaways for stores, exchanging old rules for free during an edition change etc), so nothing exclusively for GW but just different
And if GW need to 3 times more expensive on their stuff to keep their stores running, when other FLGS owners can life from their store, they are doing something very wrong.
What do you mean by life time, do you mean some models become obsolete, or do you mean they are nerfed in a way where other models are needed or some thing. Either way i really hate the idea of models you buy wonday becoming obselete, thats rubbish and if thats true i would rather pick another wargame maybe like historical. I hope they have some thing written some where that allows models you bought a long time ago to still be used. ( i would still buy cool looking models though just for display )
edit - UNless the model dies in the 40k universe some how and thats why they become obselete, then thats fine i dont mind that.
models rarely get squated. I have a few that have been out of print long enough to be index only. example my ork big mek with kff is no longer sold so it got index rules unsure if it will get brought over to 9th, but that model is at least a decade old at this point. most models I have including ones for basic troops and HQs that cna be in cases 20+ years old are still viable (mostly my older eldar aspect metal models). The biggest set i have that comes to mind are my harliquin jetbikes, i still use them for counts as windriders (not the new style i think there are from the late 80's) but they no longer reall have rules and have no had them since.. 4th?
What do you mean by life time, do you mean some models become obsolete, or do you mean they are nerfed in a way where other models are needed or some thing. Either way i really hate the idea of models you buy wonday becoming obselete, thats rubbish and if thats true i would rather pick another wargame maybe like historical. I hope they have some thing written some where that allows models you bought a long time ago to still be used. ( i would still buy cool looking models though just for display )
edit - UNless the model dies in the 40k universe some how and thats why they become obselete, then thats fine i dont mind that.
Historicals get obsolete. Pretty weird but true. I started out my tabletop gaming with WWII and then moved onto ancients. None of those models are usable now because in the intervening years the scale at which people play has changed. Around the time I was getting into ancients 40K came along, pretty much any of the models anyone purchased then are still usable in the game now.
Hardly anything from GW gets obsoleted, yes it does/can happen but it is pretty darned rare. If you happen to be that person with a full Squat army then I salute you and suggest that I would be happy to play against you using them as an AM army.
Warhawk77 wrote: Take a commander model for example the commander might take 3 times as long to sculpt the original compared to a basic trooper but the cost to make is the same so why are commanders 4 or 5 times more? Plastic is cheap I have been around the hobby for years and and you can see how "special Characters" cost a lot more just like units that work well cost a lot more.
A lot of that is down to the mouldmaking costs - steel moulds for injection moulding plastic are very expensive and the costs need to be recouped from sales of the models. A lot of heroes and special characters are the sort of model where you don't really need more than one. If everybody buys one of the commander, and buys four troop boxes, then they sell four times as many troop boxes as commanders. Each commander they sell needs to carry a much larger share of its mould costs than the troop box does.
wuestenfux wrote: We have a guy here who started 40k five years ago.
He said he had spent 30,000 Euro for all the stuff he bought.
I've been keeping a record (bad idea?) and I've spent £550 in the year I've been back. To be honest, it's not the most expensive of my hobbies...
This. The supercharger for my mustang was 2800, and i got it cheap, the stuff to install it (fuel lines, injectors, cooling, belts, etc...) was another 2000
hell, I have a multiple optics from trijicon for some of my rifles that cost more than any of my armies.
its all about what you love and what you love to do.
i love pushing man dollies, driving a fast car (though i dont do that anymore)), shooting, and hanging out with my daughter and wife, in reverse order!
Do people actually buy the official GW plastic bases? I looked into it when i needed some 32mm for an old box of necron warriors i had. I bought a pack of 100 off amazon for cheaper than buying 10 from GW
Asmodios wrote: Do people actually buy the official GW plastic bases? I looked into it when i needed some 32mm for an old box of necron warriors i had. I bought a pack of 100 off amazon for cheaper than buying 10 from GW
depends on the base, the new biker bases i found cheaper through GW than I could on any 3rd party retailer. I picked up a few packs as i waned official gw bases for possible tournament use for my orks... otherwise i would have just 3d printed them.
Asmodios wrote: Do people actually buy the official GW plastic bases? I looked into it when i needed some 32mm for an old box of necron warriors i had. I bought a pack of 100 off amazon for cheaper than buying 10 from GW
Ya know for the normal black ones yeah you can get way cheaper from other places.
but some times its really hard to get ones that are super specific like certain sized ovals and the really big stuff. and not everyone is crafty enough to make a perfect circle or oval with plastic or mdf.
now I will give GW those new plastic urban bases. they come with a 3mm hole for magnets and the convenience of not having to whip out the hot glue or green stuff to magnetize bases is REALLY nice for the price.
also you dont have to do toooo much more to the base to make them look nice while also being generally way cheaper than resin 3rd party scenic bases (though some scenic bases are way more dynamic)
timetowaste85 wrote: Kingdom Death and Privateer Press are both more costly on a model to model basis.
That's not true for Kingdom Death, at least. The KD Core is proportionally cheaper than what you'd pay for similar sized GW models, and the expansions are priced no worse than what GW charges.
Stormatious wrote: I mean, i ordered just ONE black round base for The Great Unclean One and that costs 12$ ( pretty sure it costs about 5 cents or so to make that base, im just guessing ). Also it seems that citadel is the smallest paints you can get, also some of the worse design for a container for the paint. Half of my paint ends up gettin spilled over the sides of the container just because thats how it acts when i close the cap... And then theres the most expensive spray paints i have ever seen... etc etc
What are your thoughts on this?, do you think its a bit ridiculous that things seem to cost more and come in less quantity compared to every other war game?
edit - Also bought some green stuff, which is about the size of a 2 space marines ( the blue and the green together )... thought there would be alot more, and that was 24$
Any way, im not complaining to be fair, im more interested in what others think about this compared to other wargames, or what ever knowledge/thoughts they have on this.
edit - But if this seems just like me complaining please delete this thread and i apologise.
My thoughts:
It really depends on how you look at it. My CSM army cost me over 500$. I've been playing it for over a month now, and will get many years out of it.
My Tank Guard cost a similar amount. I'll be playing it for years, but half the fun of that purchase was in my interest in painting it.
My buddy plays competitive magic. So far this year he's dropped over 4,000$ as of last week, many of the cards he has aren't useable at all. Many more will only be useable for a set amount of time, and some of those might go into older formats to become parts of new combos and so on.
Games Workshop certainly charges a premium for their models. No doubt.
Most gamers though do not understand business dynamics and will insist it is all some "greedy ploy" to steal all of the money. Meh. Who knows.
Warhawk77 wrote: Take a commander model for example the commander might take 3 times as long to sculpt the original compared to a basic trooper but the cost to make is the same so why are commanders 4 or 5 times more? Plastic is cheap I have been around the hobby for years and and you can see how "special Characters" cost a lot more just like units that work well cost a lot more.
A lot of that is down to the mouldmaking costs - steel moulds for injection moulding plastic are very expensive and the costs need to be recouped from sales of the models. A lot of heroes and special characters are the sort of model where you don't really need more than one. If everybody buys one of the commander, and buys four troop boxes, then they sell four times as many troop boxes as commanders. Each commander they sell needs to carry a much larger share of its mould costs than the troop box does.
I understand that logic and agree it does play a role in the pricing. I don't think it is the reason for the prices being higher I feel it is based on a models game play value. Taking characters out of the example a 10 man space marine tact squad is $50, 5 man Assault squad $35 and 10 Astra Militarum $25. I could be totally wrong but having played 40k as it moved from RT to 5th edition you could watch model prices get higher as they became better in the game.
Stormatious wrote: I mean, i ordered just ONE black round base for The Great Unclean One and that costs 12$ ( pretty sure it costs about 5 cents or so to make that base, im just guessing ). Also it seems that citadel is the smallest paints you can get, also some of the worse design for a container for the paint. Half of my paint ends up gettin spilled over the sides of the container just because thats how it acts when i close the cap... And then theres the most expensive spray paints i have ever seen... etc etc
What are your thoughts on this?, do you think its a bit ridiculous that things seem to cost more and come in less quantity compared to every other war game?
edit - Also bought some green stuff, which is about the size of a 2 space marines ( the blue and the green together )... thought there would be alot more, and that was 24$
Any way, im not complaining to be fair, im more interested in what others think about this compared to other wargames, or what ever knowledge/thoughts they have on this.
edit - But if this seems just like me complaining please delete this thread and i apologise.
GW is definitely stupidly predatory when it comes to stuff you can get elsewhere. Glue, tools, green stuff, NEVER buy that stuff from GW, everything is 3x the price or more. One exception, those painting handles are like $10 CAD and well worth it.
Paint-wise, I'll use GW paint because it's easy to acquire, that's it. I have a sizable range of Reaper and Vajello paints a well, but some shades are just unique to GW and I can rely on getting replacement paints the next day, where if I need to order Reaper paints it's a couple weeks because no dealers are nearby. So there's a price for convenience I'm willing to pay.
Miniature wise, if GW is pretty much the most expensive. You could probably find corner cases, but in general, they are the most expensive.
Now, does that matter? Does GW provide value for the money? Obviously the people playing and collecting the game feel they're getting something out of it or they'd skip it. There are plenty of cheaper games none of us will play because we don't like the minis, the lore, the gameplay, even at one third the price of GW.
Yes it is the most expensive but value is relative, I buy one kit a month these days to paint and I get value from that so the expense is not as bad for me, people who chase the meta must spend a hell of a lot more than I do and they likely find value in that, if we do a direct comparison to other companies that are equal or better in quality though you start seeing less value in the prices, a few years ago the claim that GW made the best models in the world had some merit, not anymore, not by a long shot, since their reliance on CAD sculpts the quality has dropped as the detail has risen for me, the lack of options for conversions and the difficulty in doing so, even with plastic, has significantly lowered value for me compared to the cheaper alternatives.
From what I understand about other games being played at my store. If I took my 370$ and bought in to infinity or any of the WWII historial games, I would get 2-3 armies if I bought them at store price. Second hand I could get more. No idea if there are cheaper games, but I do know that I have never seen more expensive ones then those made by GW. On top of that the rotation in models or even entire armies is huge in GW games.
I've recently gotten back into infinity and I have to say the price difference is pretty striking, in terms of fielding an army. The models work out more expensive per model, but £150 will get you a full army with lots of options.
And as for paints, I use Vallejo more than Citadel - better paints in better containers. Having said that, some citadel colours are just awesome - bad moon yellow, for instance, is the best damn yellow I've used.
Formerly Wu wrote:
I highly doubt (though could be wrong) that White Dwarf / GW brick-and-mortar business is net profitable for the company. Those look like loss leaders to me.
I would say they do, as I saw those things changing a lot over time and stores that were too large were scaled down (moved to smaller rooms that cost less with just one or no table to play), those that did not worked well closed and so on
Also what those stores had on stock changed a lot over time to keep them profitable
Of course in some cities/countries it might be different as just having the presence of a big GW store is worth it without making profit but they wouldn't do it if it is an overall los.
happy_inquisitor wrote:
I don't know about that, most factions you can start out with a couple of Start Collecting boxes and then fill in the gaps to get a workable army. Is that really $500? It is far from that in the UK.
Just got thru the numbers in a different topic, if just the cheapest boxes (start collection, core box, snap fit) is used you still end up around 400-500 depending on the army you play
before you start caring to win or talking about having the same 5 models 20 times to get the numbers.
Formerly Wu wrote:
That's always going to be the case if you play to chase the meta, no matter who you buy your models from. His point was that the game itself would still be around, and the core units from the majority of armies are still usable in anything but the most cutthroat competition.
happy_inquisitor wrote:
The size of a "full" army also matters. GW dropped their points values for their events to 1750 which was an instant 12.5% reduction in the cost of getting a full army on the table. Nothing to do with them if ETC/ITC want to stick to higher points values - actually given their approach of expecting people to do serious travelling for the tournament scene the cost of 250 points of models is perfectly rational to the ETC/ITC.
Stormatious wrote:
What do you mean by life time, do you mean some models become obsolete, or do you mean they are nerfed in a way where other models are needed or some thing. Either way i really hate the idea of models you buy wonday becoming obselete, thats rubbish and if thats true i would rather pick another wargame maybe like historical. I hope they have some thing written some where that allows models you bought a long time ago to still be used. ( i would still buy cool looking models though just for display )
happy_inquisitor wrote:
You only have that level of obsolescence if you are playing at a competitive level, in which case your other costs (travel, hotel, tournament fees) are way more than $100 per year which is what your costs above come out to (and you did not include selling the stuff you no longer want on ebay). If you are chasing the dragon of the competitive meta for any other reason than serious regular attendance of big tournaments then the price of GW models has nothing to do with what is going on in your life.
Jus to make things clear
I started Warhammer Fantasy at the end of 4th and beginning of 5th edition. Had a small group, tried to get everyone to play something different. I had a 3000 point Empire army and was just playing with friends, never competitive and also thought about a Khorne army just to have something different. And this was an expensive one as by that time a single Knight had nearly the price of Box plastic Infantry and ordering them at GW was kind of random as I wanted to have 10 Knight, 1 unit, with lances from one order and got 5 White Wolves, 5 from different knightly orders. Complaining on the Phone was complicated and the answer we got was that Knights in Blisters are packed randomly into Mail Orders.
Same with Artillery, I needed 3 Mail Orders until I got a cannon instead of a Mortar.
With 6th edition everything changed and my 3000 points were worth 1500 at best but did not fit the new restrictions anyway so it was more like 1000 points but with proxies as Haflings and some war machines were gone and never returned.
This was also the time I moved to a different city for job, so I stopped with Fantasy and started 40k with the local community.
Space Wolves in 3rd/4th edition
Guess what, things changed and I played Thousand Sons during 4th (a 3000 point collection as games were just 1500 but with some variation the army will grow. The whole thing is something around 1000 points with 8th edition Codex and no were near legal playable with the current rules)
.
As the game become worse over time the community shrinkend and we got into Warhammer again with 7th edition
My Empire army was still not useable (units never returned, army size changed as core units needed to be bigger now and so on) and I needed to start from scratch anyway so it dwarfs.
Again around 3000 points painted but only 2250 needed but just to have some variation
This was also the time I went to tournaments as my local Fantasy group did so and we played just for fun so I went there with a full melee army, which was also more expensive than the regular one.
Was a very fun time and so I decided to start the old dream of a Khorne army again.
A lot of expensive metal models again and a lot of conversions to get those Juggernauts from just one hero models.
This time I just bought what was really needed to get those 2250 points because I wanted to get it ready sooner and save money
8th edition hit, and my just bought Khorne army was not worth the points needed to play again (same for the dwarfs)
But this was also the big time of 40k here, as tournaments were bigger than for Fantasy (which was already declining at the end of 7th but just died with the edition change) and 5th was better than the previous ones
So back to Space Wolves and added some more units to play "Codex Hopper" with own colour scheme as I didn't want to buy 9 Rhinos just to have 3 grey, 3 blue and 3 green ones.
And I wanted to get around the problem that units just disappear/are removed from the game by playing different armies
Ended up with a lot more than before. Did not play with the meta but just what I wanted.
Still waited to get my 1kSons back to the game and with the new Codex the army split into CSM and Deamons. With the Sons not really being playable on their own (without regular CSM) I took the other half of the army and started Deamons
6th edition hit before I finished painting them
Family and Job things changed so 6th was over before I could play a game and than 7th came with the free unit inflating stuff
I played some games with Daemons, but as soon as formations hit my ~10k Space Marines could not make a single 1750 point army anymore (I had too many of the wrong units and too less of the others)
So you don't need to hunt down the meta to have the problem that your army becomes obsolete
Units get removed from the game, some may return and others are never seen again. Some you can use as proxy if the opponent/tournament allows it others are just nice models on the shelf.
Each time GW changes, the standard game size increases in 2 ways, total point cost rises and points per model decrease.
A 2000 point army in 3rd edition is now equal 1000 points in 8th.
Of course you can play 1000 points now and if you opponent allows proxies/count as and agree to play a non standard point size and so your initial investment lasted 20 years.
But in reality as long as there is no fixed group that does not changes over time (they are out there, I still know people who just play 5th edition 40k and never made the edition change) it is easier and cheaper to just shelf your stuff after and start from scratch
PS:
This is also a reason why Skirmish games are on the rise as no one wants to have a huge collection of an army on the shelf that will never be used again. (and it is also easier to get people playing an OOP skirmish game from time to time than to get people playing an old edition of 40k)
kodos wrote: I played some games with Daemons, but as soon as formations hit my ~10k Space Marines could not make a single 1750 point army anymore (I had too many of the wrong units and too less of the others)
I am extremely skeptical of this claim given the fact that the standard 5th edition FOC was still legal in 7th. I believe what you mean is that you couldn't make a competitive 1750 point army that exploited the "get free stuff" formations, which is not the same as not being able to make an army at all.
No point in playing a game were you auto loose turn 1 because your opponent brought double the amount of points.
7th was not the game of basic FOC armies against each other but about formations
If you wanted to have a competitive army you needed specific formation and allied forced. I am not talking about competitive or tournament armies here.
I played my Wolves several times in 7th with without formations, was wiped out turn 1 ever time and deployment took longer than the game itself
I don't consider this "you can still play the game" as it is not "playing" to place models on the table and remove all of them 15 minutes later without doing anything
Asmodios wrote: Do people actually buy the official GW plastic bases? I looked into it when i needed some 32mm for an old box of necron warriors i had. I bought a pack of 100 off amazon for cheaper than buying 10 from GW
i bought some of the new scenics from GW and they were like 30$ for 40 32mms, 10 40mms, and 3 dreadnought bases (60mms?)
kodos wrote: No point in playing a game were you auto loose turn 1 because your opponent brought double the amount of points.
7th was not the game of basic FOC armies against each other but about formations
If you wanted to have a competitive army you needed specific formation and allied forced. I am not talking about competitive or tournament armies here.
I played my Wolves several times in 7th with without formations, was wiped out turn 1 ever time and deployment took longer than the game itself
I don't consider this "you can still play the game" as it is not "playing" to place models on the table and remove all of them 15 minutes later without doing anything
So, exactly what I said: you had a legal army, you just didn't have a competitive army that could win against competitive armies that were doing their best to exploit the formation bonuses. "I can't compete" may be a legitimate complaint, but it is not the same as "I can't play".
My experience in North America, Canada in particular, is that it is substantially cheaper to make a WMH double theme list than it would be to make a 1750 list in 40k.
And when it comes to the second hand market? WMH is amazing. For under $600 CAD I purchased four themes and basically the entire Retribution model line. I can play anything I’d want. Some of that was full retail, but mostly second hand.
TLR - if you want a cheap game, WMH is where it’s at right now... in Canada.
greatbigtree wrote: My experience in North America, Canada in particular, is that it is substantially cheaper to make a WMH double theme list than it would be to make a 1750 list in 40k.
And when it comes to the second hand market? WMH is amazing. For under $600 CAD I purchased four themes and basically the entire Retribution model line. I can play anything I’d want. Some of that was full retail, but mostly second hand.
TLR - if you want a cheap game, WMH is where it’s at right now... in Canada.
Honestly i recall some shops not being able to move WMH stuff even at cost or super steep discount.
and having played it. its a hard eh. can be very cheap seasonally, and very nice (i know some dont like the aesthetics but thats a personal preference (also like the steam punk style)) models so long as they are not PVC. god i dont ever want to touch another PVC jack again. the amount of work it takes to get that stuff flashed filled and properly built is not worth it.
Alphabet wrote: I use 3rd party sites within the UK and it honestly is not all that bad. I looked into games like Bolt action and infinity not so long ago and I noticed the prices are not too far apart.
I will say that some kits seem way overpriced. But all in all, they are just as expensive as everything else nowadays IMHO.
Edit: I am aware that for everywhere else in the world they bumped up there prices quite substantially!
Oh because the brexit stuff they bumped it?
Oh, I'm sure that's one convenient excuse they'll happily claim. But in reality they're just pushing it as far as the market will allow. Just like they've done for years. As for the paint, brushes, green stuff, bases, & other hobby supplies - that all manner of other companies produce in equal + quality for less? They're relying on your ignorance.
Formerly Wu wrote:
I highly doubt (though could be wrong) that White Dwarf / GW brick-and-mortar business is net profitable for the company. Those look like loss leaders to me.
I would say they do, as I saw those things changing a lot over time and stores that were too large were scaled down (moved to smaller rooms that cost less with just one or no table to play), those that did not worked well closed and so on
Also what those stores had on stock changed a lot over time to keep them profitable
Of course in some cities/countries it might be different as just having the presence of a big GW store is worth it without making profit but they wouldn't do it if it is an overall los.
happy_inquisitor wrote:
I don't know about that, most factions you can start out with a couple of Start Collecting boxes and then fill in the gaps to get a workable army. Is that really $500? It is far from that in the UK.
Just got thru the numbers in a different topic, if just the cheapest boxes (start collection, core box, snap fit) is used you still end up around 400-500 depending on the army you play
before you start caring to win or talking about having the same 5 models 20 times to get the numbers.
Formerly Wu wrote:
That's always going to be the case if you play to chase the meta, no matter who you buy your models from. His point was that the game itself would still be around, and the core units from the majority of armies are still usable in anything but the most cutthroat competition.
happy_inquisitor wrote:
The size of a "full" army also matters. GW dropped their points values for their events to 1750 which was an instant 12.5% reduction in the cost of getting a full army on the table. Nothing to do with them if ETC/ITC want to stick to higher points values - actually given their approach of expecting people to do serious travelling for the tournament scene the cost of 250 points of models is perfectly rational to the ETC/ITC.
Stormatious wrote:
What do you mean by life time, do you mean some models become obsolete, or do you mean they are nerfed in a way where other models are needed or some thing. Either way i really hate the idea of models you buy wonday becoming obselete, thats rubbish and if thats true i would rather pick another wargame maybe like historical. I hope they have some thing written some where that allows models you bought a long time ago to still be used. ( i would still buy cool looking models though just for display )
happy_inquisitor wrote:
You only have that level of obsolescence if you are playing at a competitive level, in which case your other costs (travel, hotel, tournament fees) are way more than $100 per year which is what your costs above come out to (and you did not include selling the stuff you no longer want on ebay). If you are chasing the dragon of the competitive meta for any other reason than serious regular attendance of big tournaments then the price of GW models has nothing to do with what is going on in your life.
Jus to make things clear
I started Warhammer Fantasy at the end of 4th and beginning of 5th edition. Had a small group, tried to get everyone to play something different. I had a 3000 point Empire army and was just playing with friends, never competitive and also thought about a Khorne army just to have something different. And this was an expensive one as by that time a single Knight had nearly the price of Box plastic Infantry and ordering them at GW was kind of random as I wanted to have 10 Knight, 1 unit, with lances from one order and got 5 White Wolves, 5 from different knightly orders. Complaining on the Phone was complicated and the answer we got was that Knights in Blisters are packed randomly into Mail Orders.
Same with Artillery, I needed 3 Mail Orders until I got a cannon instead of a Mortar.
With 6th edition everything changed and my 3000 points were worth 1500 at best but did not fit the new restrictions anyway so it was more like 1000 points but with proxies as Haflings and some war machines were gone and never returned.
This was also the time I moved to a different city for job, so I stopped with Fantasy and started 40k with the local community.
Space Wolves in 3rd/4th edition
Guess what, things changed and I played Thousand Sons during 4th (a 3000 point collection as games were just 1500 but with some variation the army will grow. The whole thing is something around 1000 points with 8th edition Codex and no were near legal playable with the current rules)
.
As the game become worse over time the community shrinkend and we got into Warhammer again with 7th edition
My Empire army was still not useable (units never returned, army size changed as core units needed to be bigger now and so on) and I needed to start from scratch anyway so it dwarfs.
Again around 3000 points painted but only 2250 needed but just to have some variation
This was also the time I went to tournaments as my local Fantasy group did so and we played just for fun so I went there with a full melee army, which was also more expensive than the regular one.
Was a very fun time and so I decided to start the old dream of a Khorne army again.
A lot of expensive metal models again and a lot of conversions to get those Juggernauts from just one hero models.
This time I just bought what was really needed to get those 2250 points because I wanted to get it ready sooner and save money
8th edition hit, and my just bought Khorne army was not worth the points needed to play again (same for the dwarfs)
But this was also the big time of 40k here, as tournaments were bigger than for Fantasy (which was already declining at the end of 7th but just died with the edition change) and 5th was better than the previous ones
So back to Space Wolves and added some more units to play "Codex Hopper" with own colour scheme as I didn't want to buy 9 Rhinos just to have 3 grey, 3 blue and 3 green ones.
And I wanted to get around the problem that units just disappear/are removed from the game by playing different armies
Ended up with a lot more than before. Did not play with the meta but just what I wanted.
Still waited to get my 1kSons back to the game and with the new Codex the army split into CSM and Deamons. With the Sons not really being playable on their own (without regular CSM) I took the other half of the army and started Deamons
6th edition hit before I finished painting them
Family and Job things changed so 6th was over before I could play a game and than 7th came with the free unit inflating stuff
I played some games with Daemons, but as soon as formations hit my ~10k Space Marines could not make a single 1750 point army anymore (I had too many of the wrong units and too less of the others)
So you don't need to hunt down the meta to have the problem that your army becomes obsolete
Units get removed from the game, some may return and others are never seen again. Some you can use as proxy if the opponent/tournament allows it others are just nice models on the shelf.
Each time GW changes, the standard game size increases in 2 ways, total point cost rises and points per model decrease.
A 2000 point army in 3rd edition is now equal 1000 points in 8th.
Of course you can play 1000 points now and if you opponent allows proxies/count as and agree to play a non standard point size and so your initial investment lasted 20 years.
But in reality as long as there is no fixed group that does not changes over time (they are out there, I still know people who just play 5th edition 40k and never made the edition change) it is easier and cheaper to just shelf your stuff after and start from scratch
PS:
This is also a reason why Skirmish games are on the rise as no one wants to have a huge collection of an army on the shelf that will never be used again. (and it is also easier to get people playing an OOP skirmish game from time to time than to get people playing an old edition of 40k)
LOL.
If true? Especially that 10k SM part? Then you're incompetent at picking units/making armies.
Btw; Other than adding +10 Grey Hunters this edition, I've been using the same SW army since 2nd edition.
By the end of 2nd I had 3k pts worth & although points have shifted up/down/back & forth/etc, this has always been enough inventory to field a functioning army (& still is). Until here in 8th where I found I needed at least another 5 models to make a third troop slot if I wanted to field a Battalion.
Note that these new Grey Hunters were optional. I could just as easily made 2k+pt Patrols/Vanguards/Spearheads/Outriders....
Anything else spent on my SW has been purely cosmetic - metal shoulder pads, replacing my ancient Armourcast drop pods, etc
wuestenfux wrote: We have a guy here who started 40k five years ago.
He said he had spent 30,000 Euro for all the stuff he bought.
I've been keeping a record (bad idea?) and I've spent £550 in the year I've been back. To be honest, it's not the most expensive of my hobbies...
This. The supercharger for my mustang was 2800, and i got it cheap, the stuff to install it (fuel lines, injectors, cooling, belts, etc...) was another 2000
hell, I have a multiple optics from trijicon for some of my rifles that cost more than any of my armies.
its all about what you love and what you love to do.
i love pushing man dollies, driving a fast car (though i dont do that anymore)), shooting, and hanging out with my daughter and wife, in reverse order!
40k is the least expensive hobby(for me at least) that I have. At least I can go play 40k on Thursday night for basically free. If I want to take my race car out(just for a trackday) it's probably close to $5-900 (trackday, gas(race & hauler), tires, etc). That's not even including the car itself & all of the mods.
Shooting is a close second, hell the last S&W I bought would've snagged me a warlord titan, at least the revolver has an actual secondary use that could save my(family) life. Warlord isnt doin much besides looking badass and costing a metric shittonne of points.
Is 40k more expensive than (insert other game) probably. Are GW's hobby supplies more expensive than anothers? You bet your sweet bippy. Are they better/higher quality? Kinda depends. I'll always prefer Tamiya paints but sometimes GW does make a color that I need & I complain about the pots. I recently needed to replace my tamiya stuff & forgot how much value they have over (specifically) GW. Tip; tamiya metallics are probably the best.
Don't buy anything from GW but the miniatures; OR buy the mini's second hand from ebay. 3D print them if you can afford to do so. Everything else is just arts and crafts. Paint, primer, paintbrushes, green stuff, bases. Even generic stuff like weapons, grenades, capes, banners, sci-fi armor. You can easily make them or buy them yourself. All it takes is time...granted, its a large amount of time, but thats what hobies are for right? Killing time.
Terrain, you can make using clay, cardboard, paper mache, styrofoam. Whatever you have at your disposal, and whatever you can buy cheaply. I loved making terrain out of clay. I'm lucky in that i have an artist for an aunt, and she happened to have several old kilns lying about in her studio. (Turns out I didn't even use it that often. Most clay you can get at arts and crafts stores can be dried in home ovens. Best stuff needed the kiln of course.)
LumenPraebeo wrote: Don't buy anything from GW but the miniatures; OR buy the mini's second hand from ebay. 3D print them if you can afford to do so. Everything else is just arts and crafts. Paint, primer, paintbrushes, green stuff, bases. Even generic stuff like weapons, grenades, capes, banners, sci-fi armor. You can easily make them or buy them yourself. All it takes is time...granted, its a large amount of time, but thats what hobies are for right? Killing time.
Terrain, you can make using clay, cardboard, paper mache, styrofoam. Whatever you have at your disposal, and whatever you can buy cheaply. I loved making terrain out of clay. I'm lucky in that i have an artist for an aunt, and she happened to have several old kilns lying about in her studio. (Turns out I didn't even use it that often. Most clay you can get at arts and crafts stores can be dried in home ovens. Best stuff needed the kiln of course.)
Not everyone thinks this way, some of us would rather our local clubs stay in business, mine is literally open 24/7 with 6 gaming tables and a couple larger ones, we do 3-5 league at any given time that we dont pay for. We can do that b.c our players supports the business.
I dont mind supporting my local store, but come on whats up with these anoying paint containers, come on, what the heck. Life would be so much easier with a simple way of extracting the paint, its like can you make it more obvious you are trying to suck as much money with pots that constantly spill out paint when you simple close the lid....
edit - It may not be on purpose that the design of the containers do this, but its kind of strange.
Peregrine wrote:
So, exactly what I said: you had a legal army, you just didn't have a competitive army that could win against competitive armies that were doing their best to exploit the formation bonuses. "I can't compete" may be a legitimate complaint, but it is not the same as "I can't play".
I don't consider removing models from the table without doing anything "playing a game"
Not talking about being able to win, but being able on taking part playing the game
ccs wrote:
LOL.
If true? Especially that 10k SM part? Then you're incompetent at picking units/making armies.
I just never cared about what was good/bad or "hunting the meta" but used the stuff I liked from the fluff and/or wanted to paint.
Main problem is that I have a lot of things using the wrong weapons/wargear, wrong unit size or models that are not with the army any more (the Leman Russ says hello).
So nothing that can be solved with a little investment but this is the point (like buying some more Guard stuff to take the Leman Russ as an AM Detachment)
Saying that the high cost is justifiable because you can still play with it in 10 or 20 years and this is only a problem if you play the flavour of the month, is something I cannot agree with
greatbigtree wrote: My experience in North America, Canada in particular, is that it is substantially cheaper to make a WMH double theme list than it would be to make a 1750 list in 40k.
And when it comes to the second hand market? WMH is amazing. For under $600 CAD I purchased four themes and basically the entire Retribution model line. I can play anything I’d want. Some of that was full retail, but mostly second hand.
TLR - if you want a cheap game, WMH is where it’s at right now... in Canada.
So WMH is much cheaper on ebay, if you buy your stuff on ebay that is relevant to you. If you buy it in the game store it is relevant in a bad way - when/if you want to sell it you will get almost nothing for it and your cost of ownership is almost the entire purchase cost. By contrast the prices of GW stuff on ebay hold up pretty well, so the cost of ownership for those models will usually be something like 40% less than the purchase cost.
And in the UK I have not seen anyone playing WMH for a couple of years, no point having models that sit on a shelf because nobody plays the game. A very quick search showed up 50 times as many 40K tournaments here as WMH tournaments so I'd say that is a virtually dead game here. The models had better be almost free on ebay.
greatbigtree wrote: My experience in North America, Canada in particular, is that it is substantially cheaper to make a WMH double theme list than it would be to make a 1750 list in 40k.
And when it comes to the second hand market? WMH is amazing. For under $600 CAD I purchased four themes and basically the entire Retribution model line. I can play anything I’d want. Some of that was full retail, but mostly second hand.
TLR - if you want a cheap game, WMH is where it’s at right now... in Canada.
So WMH is much cheaper on ebay, if you buy your stuff on ebay that is relevant to you. If you buy it in the game store it is relevant in a bad way - when/if you want to sell it you will get almost nothing for it and your cost of ownership is almost the entire purchase cost. By contrast the prices of GW stuff on ebay hold up pretty well, so the cost of ownership for those models will usually be something like 40% less than the purchase cost.
And in the UK I have not seen anyone playing WMH for a couple of years, no point having models that sit on a shelf because nobody plays the game. A very quick search showed up 50 times as many 40K tournaments here as WMH tournaments so I'd say that is a virtually dead game here. The models had better be almost free on ebay.
And in the UK I have not seen anyone playing WMH for a couple of years, no point having models that sit on a shelf because nobody plays the game. A very quick search showed up 50 times as many 40K tournaments here as WMH tournaments so I'd say that is a virtually dead game here. The models had better be almost free on ebay.
Indeed, it appears that WMH is almost dead in Europe but will still be played in the States.
GW managed to turn around their business model for the better after Kirby left.
Stormatious wrote: I dont mind supporting my local store, but come on whats up with these anoying paint containers, come on, what the heck. Life would be so much easier with a simple way of extracting the paint, its like can you make it more obvious you are trying to suck as much money with pots that constantly spill out paint when you simple close the lid....
edit - It may not be on purpose that the design of the containers do this, but its kind of strange.
I think you may be overstating things a bit on the paint pots. They're certainly not my favourite style of pots and GW paint is, like most of they're products, on the more expensive end of the scale, but I've never had a major problem with wasted paint with any of the current style pots. I've had some of those pots last me years of near-constant use. Sounds like maybe being a bit more careful when closing the lid might save you a lot of paint.
I've moved a lot since I got out of college, in multiple states. Some areas had really strong WMH communities, some played a lot of infinity, one played a lot of classic battletech. The only consistencies I've seen in the wargaming communities across all the states I've lived, is 40k/AOS, X-Wing, and Magic. Those are also the more expensive games to keep up with.
kodos wrote: No point in playing a game were you auto loose turn 1 because your opponent brought double the amount of points.
7th was not the game of basic FOC armies against each other but about formations
If you wanted to have a competitive army you needed specific formation and allied forced. I am not talking about competitive or tournament armies here.
I played my Wolves several times in 7th with without formations, was wiped out turn 1 ever time and deployment took longer than the game itself
I don't consider this "you can still play the game" as it is not "playing" to place models on the table and remove all of them 15 minutes later without doing anything
So, exactly what I said: you had a legal army, you just didn't have a competitive army that could win against competitive armies that were doing their best to exploit the formation bonuses. "I can't compete" may be a legitimate complaint, but it is not the same as "I can't play".
Yeah, I play at a place that buys up a lot of miniatures from estate sales and someone found a huge rogue trader harlequin army in someone's basement, so I gobbled up like one of each sculpt that didn't look like ass at a great price.
Guess what? Out of the 30 sculpts I have, four are not WYSIWYG and legal in the current game. That's not always the case, but it is often enough to impress me.
Stormatious wrote: I mean, i ordered just ONE black round base for The Great Unclean One and that costs 12$ ( pretty sure it costs about 5 cents or so to make that base, im just guessing ). Also it seems that citadel is the smallest paints you can get, also some of the worse design for a container for the paint. Half of my paint ends up gettin spilled over the sides of the container just because thats how it acts when i close the cap... And then theres the most expensive spray paints i have ever seen... etc etc
What are your thoughts on this?, do you think its a bit ridiculous that things seem to cost more and come in less quantity compared to every other war game?
edit - Also bought some green stuff, which is about the size of a 2 space marines ( the blue and the green together )... thought there would be alot more, and that was 24$
Any way, im not complaining to be fair, im more interested in what others think about this compared to other wargames, or what ever knowledge/thoughts they have on this.
edit - But if this seems just like me complaining please delete this thread and i apologise.
GW is definitely stupidly predatory when it comes to stuff you can get elsewhere. Glue, tools, green stuff, NEVER buy that stuff from GW, everything is 3x the price or more. One exception, those painting handles are like $10 CAD and well worth it.
Paint-wise, I'll use GW paint because it's easy to acquire, that's it. I have a sizable range of Reaper and Vajello paints a well, but some shades are just unique to GW and I can rely on getting replacement paints the next day, where if I need to order Reaper paints it's a couple weeks because no dealers are nearby. So there's a price for convenience I'm willing to pay.
Miniature wise, if GW is pretty much the most expensive. You could probably find corner cases, but in general, they are the most expensive.
Now, does that matter? Does GW provide value for the money? Obviously the people playing and collecting the game feel they're getting something out of it or they'd skip it. There are plenty of cheaper games none of us will play because we don't like the minis, the lore, the gameplay, even at one third the price of GW.
idk about the glue part. gw plastic glue is the least aromatic plastic glue i have tried. it is a bit more but not crazy amounts more so generally speaking that I consider worth it... thir tools are a a complete rip off as are thier paints and green stuff though. and thier superglue is literally a scam. I have had to grsab some at events to go quick model repair twice, and in both instances at least 1 of the bottle didn't even have super glue in it, it was a sealed tube of air. (in one box it was 2/6 just air)
War Machine / Hordes still has a following in London, Ontario.
I like the game play better than 40k. In North America, even buying at full retail, the game is cheaper than 40k would be.
Local tourneys run 1500 to 2000 points, in 40k. WMH tends to be paired lists at 75 points.
While cases can be made for both to be expensive, particularly if you don't play the "main" factions of either system, WMH is by far cheaper in North America.
Absolutely not - out of all the wargames, playing Advanced Squad Leader is certainly the most expensive, as more than half of the supplements are out of print at any given time and sell for several hundred dollars apiece.
LumenPraebeo wrote: Don't buy anything from GW but the miniatures; OR buy the mini's second hand from ebay. 3D print them if you can afford to do so. Everything else is just arts and crafts. Paint, primer, paintbrushes, green stuff, bases. Even generic stuff like weapons, grenades, capes, banners, sci-fi armor. You can easily make them or buy them yourself. All it takes is time...granted, its a large amount of time, but thats what hobies are for right? Killing time.
Eh, I'd rather spend time converting/painting models, than doing pointless minutiae that cost you more in time than you ever "save" by doing so. Especially when GW accessories really upped their game in cost-effectiveness (also completely refuting the OP argument). Case in point, you can make skulls out of greenstuff, wasting time and expensive material, ending up with bad looking ones, you can buy gakky third party resin skulls for 1$ each, or grab GWs 350 skull pack for peanuts, each one being perfect scale for game, nicely looking, costing you literally less than the greenstuff you'd use, never mind your time. Ditto for bases, if you want to go easy route, arts and crafts is fine, but when you want say detailed fantasy or industrial bases, GW's base packs (such as this* one) are literally impossible to beat, 55 bases for less than the greenstuff you'd spend making something looking far worse, or for the cost of 10-12 gakky resin third party bases (small ones, too, that 65 mm base alone would cost good 10-15$ in resin...). My time is money too.
GW craft supplies seem to be overpriced pointlessness, considering you can get exactly the same stuff cheaper from many outlets.
As for their models, some of the "horde" style boxes (e.g. daemons, guard, orks) seem reasonable value for money, but their "premium" models are scaling a bit out of control (greater daemons at £80-£90 each for example). it comes down to pricing versus the number of models required for the game, which can be quite arbitrary. many other systems actually cost most than GW PER MODEL (for an infantry model for example), but if you only need 6 models in your typical army it works out cheaper to play. based on the rules, and the size of game that is popular/fun (for example Infinity comes in at close to 10 euros per infantry model, on average, but you don't need many models for a typical game)
If you were only to play kill team, for example, GW models would seem pretty cheap.
I don't think GW's per box pricing is particularly egregious by fantasy/sci-fi wargaming industry standards. The issue is that the fanbase loves its huge 2000 point games so you end up having to buy a lot of stuff. However, I think their paint is exceptionally overpriced. I mean, really, five dollars for a pot of paint?
Cheeslord wrote: GW craft supplies seem to be overpriced pointlessness, considering you can get exactly the same stuff cheaper from many outlets.
As for their models, some of the "horde" style boxes (e.g. daemons, guard, orks) seem reasonable value for money, but their "premium" models are scaling a bit out of control (greater daemons at £80-£90 each for example). it comes down to pricing versus the number of models required for the game, which can be quite arbitrary. many other systems actually cost most than GW PER MODEL (for an infantry model for example), but if you only need 6 models in your typical army it works out cheaper to play. based on the rules, and the size of game that is popular/fun (for example Infinity comes in at close to 10 euros per infantry model, on average, but you don't need many models for a typical game)
If you were only to play kill team, for example, GW models would seem pretty cheap.
Mark.
I can agree with most of that. I pretty much started in WWII style miniatures (going full WWII for a while), so Vallejo paints worked well for me, and I couldn't see spending more per ml especially in a paint pot. I have also never really seen the need for regular tools, glues and cheap brushes.
I think most GW miniatures are okay at about a 20% discount. Not exactly a good value, but cause minimal grumbling by me. There are exceptions of course. I felt Shadowspear was just worth the ~30% off I managed by stacking eBay coupons. I also felt that the new CSM stuff was a little bit pricey for units that I would expect to buy multiples of. I also feel that some of the older stuff (example: Chaos Predator) is overpriced given the current time standard poor quality of the model compared to competitors (I think most/all Mantic vehicles are better than the Rhino). Then there is the single character models most of which are just pants on head crazy priced. I kinda want Haarken Worldclaimer, but not at $35 I don't. I would much rather start a Death Watch kill team instead.
As for Kill Team, I wouldn't say putting together a team is exactly cheap. However, seeing as most factions can have a pretty good roster at $70 US, I think it is an actual affordable level for many potential players to at least play a 40k game. Most of the opponents I have played in Kill Team always wanted to play 40k but simply couldn't afford to until Kill Team. I seriously doubt many will move on anything beyond a few kill teams, or at best, maybe a 1000 point army.
I'm not going to defend GW's hobby tools or even their paints (some of which I still buy just to have all my guys look the same) price wise.
One thing I've seen on dakka and other online outlets is this idea that to get into the hobby you drop the money to have 1750 to 2500 army in one go, which at this point is probably a grand or two depending on what army your playing.
That was not my experience when my gaming group got into it about a decade ago and not the culture around the stores I play at. Most of our players are willing to play a smaller game to let some one test the waters and see how different armies feel.
I'm curious about other places if such a steep buy in is expected?
TheCustomLime wrote: However, I think their paint is exceptionally overpriced. I mean, really, five dollars for a pot of paint?
You're ultimately paying for shipping to the US in that too. Same reason as our NZ-based OP is paying nearly double what we do in the UK for his Green Stuff.
It doesn't have to be expensive if your don't buy from GW. I was saving £20-50 by buying for 25% off here in the uk for new models. But still, after playing other games I was shocked. I was like this model is £30 just for a space ship? Then the dude goes "yeah, but that one space ship is half your entire points and it's also fully painted to a pretty good standard when you buy it. That's when I learned to stop hating GW and just spend my money on other games while slowly building and painting the remainder of my collection.
greatbigtree wrote: War Machine / Hordes still has a following in London, Ontario.
I like the game play better than 40k. In North America, even buying at full retail, the game is cheaper than 40k would be.
Local tourneys run 1500 to 2000 points, in 40k. WMH tends to be paired lists at 75 points.
While cases can be made for both to be expensive, particularly if you don't play the "main" factions of either system, WMH is by far cheaper in North America.
Well, PP is located in North America. So its no surprise that this game is cheaper there.
We had an active group playing WMH but it vanished totally. Even the addicted WMH players (some weird guys among them) now (try to) play 40k.
TheCustomLime wrote: However, I think their paint is exceptionally overpriced. I mean, really, five dollars for a pot of paint?
You're ultimately paying for shipping to the US in that too. Same reason as our NZ-based OP is paying nearly double what we do in the UK for his Green Stuff.
shipping is not nearly that expensive when done in bulk quantities for a company like GW. I used to help a smallish chemical company (all green/enviromentally firendly products)with their books/inventory software. sending a gallon of chemicals from FL to the UK was only a few bucks. in that same box size/weight one could fit hundreds of paint pots or blister packs of green stuff. GW is so much bigger than that company and i guarantee the y get even better rates than that.
HoundsofDemos wrote:I'm not going to defend GW's hobby tools or even their paints (some of which I still buy just to have all my guys look the same) price wise.
One thing I've seen on dakka and other online outlets is this idea that to get into the hobby you drop the money to have 1750 to 2500 army in one go, which at this point is probably a grand or two depending on what army your playing.
That was not my experience when my gaming group got into it about a decade ago and not the culture around the stores I play at.
It's not my experience, either. I built up a 1500pt (Index) Slaanesh Daemon list over three months with a SC! Box and a Daemonettes box each month
It's a pretty expensive hobby, but ultimately way less than my 4 year PC upgrades and VR headset among other things.
I'm sitting pretty on my next build with all new models - 60 CSM, 3 VC, and other stuff for $350.
And the thing is...i'll never have to replace these models. Not for 10 years. Not for 20 years.
Some people do manage to make it more expensive by cutting up $150 kits with $80 kits to make their own thing, but that's what they enjoy, so their choice.
I agree entirely that the long term investment in 40k models, or any models is good. I'm still using models (and even some paint!) that are pressing 20 years old now.
But there are cheaper companies to buy into that, hypothetically, are also going to be useable in 20 years time.
Regarding NA vs Europe, the OP is in New Zealand. So regardless of continent they have the import costs to deal with. I also specify NA as many European posters have claimed WMH is more expensive in the past, and that 40k is cheaper... so of course 40k is cheaper in the EU as they're in the EU.
I have the benefit of coming into WMH in 3rd edition, after the 2nd edition players have abandoned the game. I have confidence that PP will turn the popularity around in 4th, hopefully going for a less gimmicky approach but only time will tell. Right now, I find my casual approach to the game to be far more fulfilling of the experience I want from a wargame than 40k. I'm hopeful that WMH will see a resurgence in their next edition, particularly should GW continue the "Formations-esque" approach that drove 7th edition into the ground.
Generally speaking as a wargamer, GW is in the top couple. There are some bespoke companies who also charge $30-40 per miniature (which is fething insane) and there are a couple of companies I can think of which have pretty horrendous pricing, Battlefront for example.
Given the average size of 40K it's safe to say it's one of the most expensive, easily.
TheCustomLime wrote: However, I think their paint is exceptionally overpriced. I mean, really, five dollars for a pot of paint?
You're ultimately paying for shipping to the US in that too. Same reason as our NZ-based OP is paying nearly double what we do in the UK for his Green Stuff.
OTOH, isn't Flames of War dramatically cheaper over in NZ vs US / UK?
Oh I’d say GW is probably the most expensive, but their more recent plastics are simply better than everyone else, so . . .
I recently finished painting Belisarius Cawl. That model is absolutely packed with detail and various tubes and robes and arms all overlapping, but it wasn’t that hard to build, and there were relatively few mold lines to worry about.
The redemptor dread is just a fantastic kit that goes together beautifully and is very pose-able.
There are weird value head scratchers in there like the plastic contemptor, but meh, just about everything since the launch of 8th has been brilliant.
I even like some of their paints and tools. The painting handles and dry brushes are just great and worth the money (and they’re even competitively priced). Some of their paints like Khorne red or retributor armor are very tough to beat. Their pots do have a slight flaw where paint tends to drip behind the lid “tongue” and dry in the area where the lid should snap on. Just clean it out with a toothpick once in a while no big deal.
Then again I buy paints from just about every manufacturer. There are stars and duds in every brand’s paint line. I don’t use any GW brushes besides the dry brushes, because the others aren’t as good as say Rosemary and Co or Raphael.
I guess what I’m saying is the modern GW stuff seems to be expensive, but I’d actually say it’s generally worth the premium over their competitors.
Now they just need to step up their rules publication/distribution game. It does seem like they’re actively trying to improve on that front though.
TheCustomLime wrote: However, I think their paint is exceptionally overpriced. I mean, really, five dollars for a pot of paint?
You're ultimately paying for shipping to the US in that too. Same reason as our NZ-based OP is paying nearly double what we do in the UK for his Green Stuff.
shipping is not nearly that expensive when done in bulk quantities for a company like GW. I used to help a smallish chemical company (all green/enviromentally firendly products)with their books/inventory software. sending a gallon of chemicals from FL to the UK was only a few bucks. in that same box size/weight one could fit hundreds of paint pots or blister packs of green stuff. GW is so much bigger than that company and i guarantee the y get even better rates than that.
Ask the guys down under or in NZ. They pay premium prices.
It's a fair argument - their Finecast is complete gak and expensive...and you would be better off asking "how many did you not buy because of the cost/material".
For instance I assembled a 5,000+ point Eldar army using almost entirely 2nd ed metals because their modern Eldar are mediocre sculpts in finecast and obnoxiously priced. I would have gladly purchased modern GW kits if they were plastic and reasonable.
Elbows wrote: It's a fair argument - their Finecast is complete gak and expensive...and you would be better off asking "how many did you not buy because of the cost/material".
For instance I assembled a 5,000+ point Eldar army using almost entirely 2nd ed metals because their modern Eldar are mediocre sculpts in finecast and obnoxiously priced. I would have gladly purchased modern GW kits if they were plastic and reasonable.
Yeah, from the backlash they've been getting with their attempts to move characters to plastic sprues (yep, a 30$ per model price point is actually pretty realistic given how many Primaris Space Marine Apothecaries they probably expect to sell...) I can see the desperation that probably went into the Finecast Debacle. Bunch of corporate execs sitting around a table telling themselves no, it looks good, and this means we don't have to throw out all our molds! You just...you just gotta fill some air holes sometimes...well, all the time...
I think they (at some point) must have accepted how bad it is --- I know most GW stores allow you to open them at purchase and verify if it's good or not (heard of some people going through 3-4 of them to find a decent cast). If you look at finecast it's dirt cheap resin...it doesn't cost them anything to make or ship it (outside of the packaging). At some level they finally admitted it's garbage.
I haven't bought anything new for a while. Are they still doing finecast? I would have thought they'd stop making them. With a material that's all across the board inferior, you'd think that business decision wouldn't be sustainable.
Luckily there is a 3rd party option conversion kit.
Why would anyone ever buy the GW version if they knew this option existed.
GW pricing is disgusting. It's got to the point where people will actively go out of their way to find 3rd party buy old metal and strip especially due to how awful finecast is. With the quality of finecast and the fact that they are using old sculpts and molds from metal minis, no finecast single character should cost more than £10 and no box of 5 should cost more than, £20. Thats is all they are worth, at a push based on what you'd pay for the same quality from elsewhere.
Finecast is the worst resin product in the industry, while being one of the most expensive, outside of the limited edition ranges with a collectibility factor, such as kingdom death.
The single pose plastic characters are usually a total rip off too. They just need to learn to nail resin casting, because if tiny boutique resin casters can get perfect beatutiful casts, sell them for less desipite not having efficiency of scale, gw certainly have the R&D budget to get it right.
They are doing their customers a great disservice by not keeping up with the rest of the market, and for low volume character models, a high quality resin cast is the best option.
When it comes to the plastic kits, many are 10-20% overpriced, if you shop around, take advantage of your flgs discounts and are willing to use ebay you can usually find kits priced sensibly.
I started Warhammer Fantasy at the end of 4th and beginning of 5th edition. Had a small group, tried to get everyone to play something different. I had a 3000 point Empire army and was just playing with friends, never competitive and also thought about a Khorne army just to have something different. And this was an expensive one as by that time a single Knight had nearly the price of Box plastic Infantry and ordering them at GW was kind of random as I wanted to have 10 Knight, 1 unit, with lances from one order and got 5 White Wolves, 5 from different knightly orders. Complaining on the Phone was complicated and the answer we got was that Knights in Blisters are packed randomly into Mail Orders.
Same with Artillery, I needed 3 Mail Orders until I got a cannon instead of a Mortar.
I'm going to be blunt here- either you got scammed or you're straight up lying.
I started Warhammer Fantasy at the end of 4th and beginning of 5th edition. Had a small group, tried to get everyone to play something different. I had a 3000 point Empire army and was just playing with friends, never competitive and also thought about a Khorne army just to have something different. And this was an expensive one as by that time a single Knight had nearly the price of Box plastic Infantry and ordering them at GW was kind of random as I wanted to have 10 Knight, 1 unit, with lances from one order and got 5 White Wolves, 5 from different knightly orders. Complaining on the Phone was complicated and the answer we got was that Knights in Blisters are packed randomly into Mail Orders.
Same with Artillery, I needed 3 Mail Orders until I got a cannon instead of a Mortar.
I'm going to be blunt here- either you got scammed or you're straight up lying.
Those were the days. I remember reading off huge lists of seemingly random bits for awesome conversions.
Apparently GW were losing a fortune on selling bits.
Funny that now its gone a blooming 3rd party bits industry has taken it's place.
Yet another thing that is disgusting about GWs practices is that they don''t do weapon sprues, they know you have to buy 4 boxes to make the one squad you want. The upside is that there are garage industries who cater to this and anything that promotes small businesses is a good thing.
Apparently GW were losing a fortune on selling bits.
I doubt that.
They could be cast to order and GW staff could buy stuff for £30/kg (50p Crisis Suits baybay! ). If anything they got rid of it to streamline their catalogue and clear warehouse space rather than it was haemorrhaging money.
I started Warhammer Fantasy at the end of 4th and beginning of 5th edition. Had a small group, tried to get everyone to play something different. I had a 3000 point Empire army and was just playing with friends, never competitive and also thought about a Khorne army just to have something different. And this was an expensive one as by that time a single Knight had nearly the price of Box plastic Infantry and ordering them at GW was kind of random as I wanted to have 10 Knight, 1 unit, with lances from one order and got 5 White Wolves, 5 from different knightly orders. Complaining on the Phone was complicated and the answer we got was that Knights in Blisters are packed randomly into Mail Orders.
Same with Artillery, I needed 3 Mail Orders until I got a cannon instead of a Mortar.
I'm going to be blunt here- either you got scammed or you're straight up lying.
This is what I did later but via a FLGS and not with the Mail Order directly.
Could be that I just had bad luck with the German MO guys and instead of telling that stuff is out of stock they just shipped something else and played stupid if called again.
But also years later when I pre-ordered the new Dark Eldar Codex I got the book nearly 2 months after release and they told me that this is normal as stock is used to ship orders made on release day and pre-orders are done after that if something is left (and they ran out of stock so I had to wait)
£24 for a rubbish cast in a horrible(worst on the market) material.
No wonder the 3rd party market is booming.
That right there is the most extreme example I know of what i was saying earlier in the discussion.
That is a crazy price kit and everyone knows it. On the other hand the resale value on ebay is almost the same as the purchase price. So if you bought one of those wildly overpriced kits a year ago, played games with it for a year and are now selling it to buy a different army then its cost of ownership for that year is minimal.
Both crazy expensive and really cost effective at the same time
Apparently GW were losing a fortune on selling bits.
I doubt that.
They could be cast to order and GW staff could buy stuff for £30/kg (50p Crisis Suits baybay! ). If anything they got rid of it to streamline their catalogue and clear warehouse space rather than it was haemorrhaging money.
I think that depends on what you considering losing. If you think that it is normal to have to buy 4 boxs of havocks to have one unit armed with them, then anything that lets people do it with one box and some bits is going to be considered bad.
Luckily there is a 3rd party option conversion kit.
Why would anyone ever buy the GW version if they knew this option existed.
GW pricing is disgusting. It's got to the point where people will actively go out of their way to find 3rd party buy old metal and strip especially due to how awful finecast is. With the quality of finecast and the fact that they are using old sculpts and molds from metal minis, no finecast single character should cost more than £10 and no box of 5 should cost more than, £20. Thats is all they are worth, at a push based on what you'd pay for the same quality from elsewhere.
Finecast is the worst resin product in the industry, while being one of the most expensive, outside of the limited edition ranges with a collectibility factor, such as kingdom death.
The single pose plastic characters are usually a total rip off too. They just need to learn to nail resin casting, because if tiny boutique resin casters can get perfect beatutiful casts, sell them for less desipite not having efficiency of scale, gw certainly have the R&D budget to get it right.
They are doing their customers a great disservice by not keeping up with the rest of the market, and for low volume character models, a high quality resin cast is the best option.
When it comes to the plastic kits, many are 10-20% overpriced, if you shop around, take advantage of your flgs discounts and are willing to use ebay you can usually find kits priced sensibly.
10-20% overpriced? More like 100% or more. Basic infantry boxes, for example, would ideally be around $25.
Yep, most other manufacturers of plastic HIPS infantry (and cavalry) are more often than not $30-35, and thus available around $25-30 with discounts, etc.
Perry
Victrix (though more for some of their boxes because of 60+ figures)
Gripping Beast
Fireforge Games
Oathmark
Avatars of War (a little pricier but more models)
Dreamforge Games
etc.
It's worth noting that the miniatures are often a bit smaller (scale-wise) but you also frequently get 30-40 miniatures in a box, or 12+ cavalry etc. So bang for buck is much higher (and needs to be since historical kits are a competitive market)
No one else in the HIPS market charges $60 for a box of miniatures. Occasionally for a large vehicle maybe? I think the closest to expensive would be Warmachine and then companies like Warlord Games, etc.
Per model basis? Are you kidding me some games charge waaaay more for the same quality. In fact you will be hard pressed to find similar quality miniatures for cheaper. (A lot of the people commenting really don't seem to be factoring in quality in the comparison)
That being said though GW games will cost you more based off the sheer volume of models you need for standard games.
Every time this hobby comes around, I tend to look at the cost through the value proposition lens.
Do I see value in the products I am buying? if the answer is yes, then I'll buy them and move on. If I struggle to see the value in the purchase, then I just won't purchase it.
I like this game, I'm not sure how many people do on here, lol, but I do, so I don't mind the cost.
Ozomoto wrote: Per model basis? Are you kidding me some games charge waaaay more for the same quality. In fact you will be hard pressed to find similar quality miniatures for cheaper. (A lot of the people commenting really don't seem to be factoring in quality in the comparison)
This depends really on the specific Box.
Usually people compare new GW stuff to older Boxes from other companies and say GW is better and therefore worth the price, while they forget that older Boxes are not the same quality and better than newer stuff from other companies but still cost the same.
Also people like to mistake quality with design and say that GW's model are higher quality just because they like their look more (while the quality is not really good).
Than it depends what a model is made for.
Like if a model is made to be placed as basic infantry in a rank&file unit anywhere but first rank, it need different qualities than the first rank models as models that are used in a small Skirmish game (and GW failed hard with the R&F design for some boxes)
Or if models are made to look more real and fit a specific scale over several different boxes (also something GW failed hard over time and there were not really a lot of factions were they kept the same scale/size for different Boxes)
Talking about HIPS in general and not about HIPS in the wargaming niche, GW's quality is on par with the rest of the industry while still being a bit behind for large model kits like tanks or large infantry (comparing 54mm models with GW models and they are just expensive without the quality one would expect for that price)
My main game is currently Guild Ball and the pricing is on a par with GW
However being a 6 a side skirmish game, each model contributes something to every game whereas Bolter Bob or Lasgun Larry #5 through #30 usually function as little more than wound sponges and/or difficult terrain to protect other models
Also picked up Gaslands which makes everything seem expensive
And of course GW actually come off quite well against PP who've managed to make worse models for more money
I don't really understand the per model example. Army end cost is what matters. If a game has models that cost 30$ per one, but I nede 5 of them to play. Then at the cost of an avarge w40k army, one could probably buy the whole game or at least most of its factions.
Karol wrote: I don't really understand the per model example. Army end cost is what matters. If a game has models that cost 30$ per one, but I nede 5 of them to play. Then at the cost of an avarge w40k army, one could probably buy the whole game or at least most of its factions.
Per model cost, or per unit cost is a valid reference though. 'Army' cost is nebulous - what 'size' of army? 1000pts? 2000pts? 3000pts? Larger? Smaller? Kill team? What constitutes said 'army'?
What happens, also, for example if you are less interested in collecting 'armies', and more interested in collecting specific models for paInting, or various other projects? Also, per model counts here when it comes to expanding your collection. For example, I love the look of the everblight chosen cavalry models for pp's legion of everblight army. Now when it's pointed out that even with a 20% discount on wayland, it's £85 for five models, I find it very hard to justify that kind of expenditure (nearly £18 a model for a damned grunt!)
Another valid 'per model' cost is comparing things like characters, vehicles and see how they match up, like Abadoon from 40k, versus something like the Butcher unleashed (butcher3) from warmachine, or comparing cavalry units, like khornate juggernauts versus everblight chosen, and compare prices across various ranges from various companies. This becomes arguably more important in historicals where there are a Whole slew of companies making generic Roman/ww2/various historical period units.
Well a kill team army for w40k cost more then the same size killed team for other games. Save maybe for GK who have one box to buy. But everyone else has to buy 2-3 boxs, and that is before the cost of multiple books, not all other systems seem to require to play.
As point goes I think we can agree that 2000pts is the norm. But even if someone took something over sized as 3000pts, and some over sized army from another system, there is just no way for GW stuff to cost less.
It is just not possible when a tournament list cost 200-300$ for some system, and a random collection for any GW game will cost twice as much.
Karol wrote: Well a kill team army for w40k cost more then the same size killed team for other games. Save maybe for GK who have one box to buy. But everyone else has to buy 2-3 boxs, and that is before the cost of multiple books, not all other systems seem to require to play.
Does it? Look at Infinity, for example. Easily £8- £10 a model in a game where armies are between 10 to 20 models in size, and and that is before the cost of multiple books as well. And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Look at Privateer Press' company of Iron (if you can find it being played). Depending on the constituents of my force (for example, let's say I'm running my tharn ravaged/bloodtracker band) it costs quite a bit. In addition, Thanks to brexit, pp costs have soared. Both total, and per model counts factor in.
As for my kill team - mine is essentially reivers and intercessors. Pretty sure I have enough in one of the 40k 'easy build'starter sets or collections they put up.
As point goes I think we can agree that 2000pts is the norm.
Can we? It may indeed be a tournament standard, but not everyone plays tournaments. I prefer smaller games myself. Point was though, we were not talking about 'armies' as the best metric as opposed to 'per model' - what about those of us who have 'collections' rather than 'armies', or those of us expanding what we have? Per model comparisons have their place. Getting started comparison have their place. Expanding comparisons have their place. 'Total cost of an army' - sure, it can have value, but it's not the over riding metric you should go on.
But even if someone took something over sized as 3000pts, and some over sized army from another system, there is just no way for GW stuff to cost less. It is just not possible when a tournament list cost 200-300$ for some system, and a random collection for any GW game will cost twice as much.
It depends on what you buy. Betrayal at calth is something like over 1000pts- someone please correct me if I am wrong here (terminator commander, chaplain, dreadnought, 5 terminators, and 30 marines) and in terms of price is prettt decent.
And for what its worth, I've seen tournament lists cost twice that in warmachine. In WMH, you take 2 lists to a tournament, and while it's legit to have the same build and just swap casters, this very rarely happens as it opens you to hard counters - I priced my late mk2 tourney lists one time and it was eye watering. I played vlad2 'charge of the horselords' which is a list with a big focus on expensive heavy cavalry, as one of my lists (well over £300 iirc for twenty something models), and the other had no cross over units with it. If I remember right, I took butcher 3 (£40 on his own, with a discount!), ruin (£50), a grolar (£27), greylord cavalry (£40) and a bunch of other stuff in as well (might have been black dragon pikemen, which cost a fair whack when they were metal only, when I got them!. Let's also factor in these are prices with a 20% discount. Let's also factor in books, and the warroom app here too, because fair is fair.
The fairest thing to say is that this is an expensive hobby. I certainly won't defend gw and say they are cheap, but I don't think it's strictly accurate to go about and say things like 'there is no way for gw stuff to cost less'. The prices for gw can approach reasonableness, or cost an arm and a leg, depending on ones approach. The prices for other games, likewise, can also approach reasonableness, or can cost an arm and a leg.
Blastaar wrote: 10-20% overpriced? More like 100% or more. Basic infantry boxes, for example, would ideally be around $25.
{citation needed}
Where are you getting these numbers, besides "I want to spend less money"?
From Everyone else in the industry?
20-25 is the price for a standard infantry box, difference is just how many models it contains
like Mantic or Fire Forge Games sells 10-20 models per Box, Perry Miniatures, Conquest or Victrix are 40-50 models, and all are around 25
It is only GW who charges 40-60$ for HIPS Troops
But is this a case of GW having the wrong prices by charging too much, or the competition having the wrong prices by charging too little? After all, for all people talk about how awesome it is that other companies sell cheaper boxes it's GW that is the large and successful company while the competition is stuck selling niche-market historicals.
Does it? Look at Infinity, for example. Easily £8- £10 a model in a game where armies are between 10 to 20 models in size, and and that is before the cost of multiple books as well. And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Well even if the models went for 10$ per one, then a 20 model infinity army woud still cost more then 3 times less then an avarge w40k army. It would cost less then some units sold by GW.
Terrain can be an issue, but from what I understand w40k requires specific terrain to be used too. Not saying it balances itself out, but does infinity require 3-4 rule books plus CA to be legaly played? By the way this is not a rhetorical question, I just don't know, maybe they require more books then GW.
Can we? It may indeed be a tournament standard, but not everyone plays tournaments. I prefer smaller games myself. Point was though, we were not talking about 'armies' as the best metric as opposed to 'per model' - what about those of us who have 'collections' rather than 'armies', or those of us expanding what we have? Per model comparisons have their place. Getting started comparison have their place. Expanding comparisons have their place. 'Total cost of an army' - sure, it can have value, but it's not the over riding metric you should go on.
I have seen this argument being used. But the fact is that matched play 2000pts is the thing that is being played the most. Plus I don't know maybe infinity or other games have lower point, and I know zero about points in other game systems, have low point games too. a 1000pts army, even an elite one like GK still would cost around 200$, from what I have been told, and am not excluding the possibility of being lied to here, 200$ is enough to build a real army for other systems.
I can't comment on the collecting thing, as I have never met or seen someone who bought models to collect them and not play with them.
And for what its worth, I've seen tournament lists cost twice that in warmachine
now my knowladge of tournament comes from talking to people and reading about them online, but your argument seem to strange to me. It matters little how much the box cost, or how much it is discounted for, if out of all the models your maybe going to use a few tacticals. And that is a big maybe. A tournament space marine list goes way above 300$. My army sucks, is no where near mid casual level and it still cost over 300$.
GW prices are resonable only if a priory we assume that their prices are fair for what they sell people, and i don't think they do. A friend of mine showed me some imported models he bought in Japan and the quality and detail are better then GW, and they do not cost a lot more. And japan models are not in EU, sold by a FLGS, but have tax etc added to it.
Or to make it really short. I agree that for other games super optimised tournament list can cost a lot of money, but they only reach the level of a non optimised avarge w40k army. A tournament w40k list can easily beat the cost of other games armies , with the cost of books needed to play it.
From Games workshop, my Grey knight list, which consists of only only 43 models costs £336 or $442 before you factor in any rules or something to transport them in.
If I had bought my Custodes from GW, it would have cost 352 or $363.
But these are outliers, because they are the 2 of the most elite, low model count lists in the game.
If I were to buy all of my current Tau list from Games Workshop, it would cost £546 or £719.24!
...hey but at least they chuck in free postage right...
Actually it would cost a load more than this, if it was from GW only, because I need 8 cyclic Ion blasters, which would mean buying 8 commander kits. That would be an additional £180, just to get the right guns. But no one would ever really do that, thanks to 3rd party resin casts or 3d prints.
Lists that rely heavily on spamming certain finecast kits can cost even more.
Yes GW is the most expensive out of all the wargames, but even more notable is how jarring the discrepancy between the cost of certain armies can be, due to how out of line the pricing of some of the range is.
Deadnight wrote: And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Infinity and 40k/KillTeam need different kind of terrain but for both it can be scratch build (or download the Infinity templates) and you just need 10$ worth of paper, glue and paint
Not saying it balances itself out, but does infinity require 3-4 rule books plus CA to be legaly played? By the way this is not a rhetorical question, I just don't know, maybe they require more books then GW.
But is this a case of GW having the wrong prices by charging too much, or the competition having the wrong prices by charging too little? After all, for all people talk about how awesome it is that other companies sell cheaper boxes it's GW that is the large and successful company while the competition is stuck selling niche-market historicals.
GW is large and successful for several reasons, charging high prices is for sure one but the first multi-pose HIPS boxes GW sold were also in the same price range. The original Cadian box here had 20 models for less than the current 10 model box.
But than, historical kits won't sell for a much higher price anyway as the market is different.
I go back and forth when it comes to GW pricing. Sometimes I feel that it is reasonable, decent value and there are other times when I see (Usually small individual figures) and just think this is a bloody rip off!
Does it? Look at Infinity, for example. Easily £8- £10 a model in a game where armies are between 10 to 20 models in size, and and that is before the cost of multiple books as well. And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Well even if the models went for 10$ per one, then a 20 model infinity army woud still cost more then 3 times less then an avarge w40k army. It would cost less then some units sold by GW.
Comparing full games of 40K with Infinity is rather silly, especially when GW have kindly given pre-packages sets for Kill Team which are clearly what you should be comparing with Infinity.
So what are the relative prices of a Kill Team and an Infinity army?
So what are the relative prices of a Kill Team and an Infinity army?
Kill Team would be 40 to 130$ (31 to 100€ not sure about the $ prices) depending on list and faction for 100 point (GK or Harli can be done with one Box, some others would need 2 or more Boxes and it depends on the single Box price as Harlequin are 31€ while others are 50€)
Infinity is ~ 90$ (70€) for a 300 point list, but all metal models (if quality of the models is an argument)
Hollow wrote: I go back and forth when it comes to GW pricing. Sometimes I feel that it is reasonable, decent value and there are other times when I see (Usually small individual figures) and just think this is a bloody rip off!
That's because they do too. Some boxes, like the Stormcast repacks, are great value in terms of Points Per Dollar (which is what actually matters in a points balanced wargame), some like...basically any genestealer cult box are TERRIBLE value.
Then you have thing like the Witch Aelves box, which is not only terrible in terms of Points per dollar AND models per dollar, it's also just 1 sprue doubled up. You don't even get 10 actual sculpts.
Does it? Look at Infinity, for example. Easily £8- £10 a model in a game where armies are between 10 to 20 models in size, and and that is before the cost of multiple books as well. And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Well even if the models went for 10$ per one, then a 20 model infinity army woud still cost more then 3 times less then an avarge w40k army. It would cost less then some units sold by GW.
Comparing full games of 40K with Infinity is rather silly, especially when GW have kindly given pre-packages sets for Kill Team which are clearly what you should be comparing with Infinity.
So what are the relative prices of a Kill Team and an Infinity army?
Pretty similar actually. People love to spout the line about Infinity being "cheaper", but it really isn't unless you're buying stuff from box breakdowns.
People don't seem to understand that Infinity, while not a "mass battle game"? It is very much a game of "efficient profiles vs inefficient profiles".
And Karol's point about terrain is exceedingly important. It is not a game for bare tables. It's why the "Army Packs" and "2 Player Battle Boxes" include cardboard terrain stuff.
Does it? Look at Infinity, for example. Easily £8- £10 a model in a game where armies are between 10 to 20 models in size, and and that is before the cost of multiple books as well. And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Well even if the models went for 10$ per one, then a 20 model infinity army woud still cost more then 3 times less then an avarge w40k army. It would cost less then some units sold by GW.
Comparing full games of 40K with Infinity is rather silly, especially when GW have kindly given pre-packages sets for Kill Team which are clearly what you should be comparing with Infinity.
So what are the relative prices of a Kill Team and an Infinity army?
Pretty similar actually. People love to spout the line about Infinity being "cheaper", but it really isn't unless you're buying stuff from box breakdowns.
People don't seem to understand that Infinity, while not a "mass battle game"? It is very much a game of "efficient profiles vs inefficient profiles".
And Karol's point about terrain is exceedingly important. It is not a game for bare tables. It's why the "Army Packs" and "2 Player Battle Boxes" include cardboard terrain stuff.
In my local group of close-knit friends, we have 4 3d printers, I have one, another buddy has two, and another has one. We trade off what we are printing and share printing/basing/painting responsibility for our tables. It is through this is the ONLY way i would ever consider playing infinity. Its designed for 3d, multi-level, multi-tier terrain with lots of bridges and walkways on elevation. if we didn't have tons of 3d printers, we wouldn't even try it, honestly.
Apparently GW were losing a fortune on selling bits.
I doubt that.
They could be cast to order and GW staff could buy stuff for £30/kg (50p Crisis Suits baybay! ). If anything they got rid of it to streamline their catalogue and clear warehouse space rather than it was haemorrhaging money.
I think that depends on what you considering losing. If you think that it is normal to have to buy 4 boxs of havocks to have one unit armed with them, then anything that lets people do it with one box and some bits is going to be considered bad.
To be fair warehouse space is probably the most expensive part of the whole process.
Does it? Look at Infinity, for example. Easily £8- £10 a model in a game where armies are between 10 to 20 models in size, and and that is before the cost of multiple books as well. And terrain. Because in infinity, you need a hell of a lot of terrain before you get started.
Well even if the models went for 10$ per one, then a 20 model infinity army woud still cost more then 3 times less then an avarge w40k army. It would cost less then some units sold by GW.
Comparing full games of 40K with Infinity is rather silly, especially when GW have kindly given pre-packages sets for Kill Team which are clearly what you should be comparing with Infinity.
So what are the relative prices of a Kill Team and an Infinity army?
Don't you still need a full roster for kill team, as you pick models for it before the game? but if we compare boxs GW starter for kill team seem to avarge around 35 £ and infnity around 40£. That is hardly less considering kill team requires you to buy whole boxs to get a few models, and multiple rule books, when ifinity rules seem to be free. I maybe wrong here though. I never played infinity people just told me about it.
Don't you still need a full roster for kill team, as you pick models for it before the game? but if we compare boxs GW starter for kill team seem to avarge around 35 £ and infnity around 40£. That is hardly less considering kill team requires you to buy whole boxs to get a few models, and multiple rule books, when ifinity rules seem to be free. I maybe wrong here though. I never played infinity people just told me about it.
Last i recall the team builder is free for infinity, rules are purchased.
comparing starter to starter though.
Infinity: Operation cold front, is about 80$ comes with a paper board, paper terrain, and nice metal models for two teams, and if i recall paper back cold front specific rule book.
Kill teams actual starter: appears to be gone, so its hard to compare, but CORE game is about 40, and one team about 50$ + plastic terrain no board.
imho kill teams is way more expensive overall to start, but you do get nicer terrain, and can reuse models you already have. while infinity starters are kinda more for the models as they are generally new sculpts that people want. :/
OK, so yes, GW models aren't cheap. I'm not going to try to say they are inexpensive. But, I will go on record saying they are worth the money.
Let's jump out of wargaming for just a minute and head on over to the world of Bandai and Gundam models. Yes, Bandai pumps out many new models each year. I'm not 100% sure how they are able to create new molds so quickly. I do know that Build Fighters and Build Divers are based on old models where they can reuse a lot of old parts and only make a few new parts.
But, let's look at the quality compared to GW... even the quality of Real Grade Gundam models which can have many tiny pieces. Are any Gundam models as detailed as GW models? None that I've seen... not even close especially when you compare scale. Only the high end Gundam Kits (I believe Ver. Ka and above) even come with water slide transfers. Most of the time, it's stickers or dry rub transfers.
Is there another company, besides GW, that can produce plastic kits (plastic being the key here as I simply don't work with metal and don't like to have to deal with resin unless it's absolutely the only way to get a model) with as much detail as GW. Is there another company that supplies water slide transfers with the vast majority of their kits?
Is GW expensive? Absolutely! Are they the most expensive tabletop wargame company out there? Probably. Are their models worth what they charge by comparison to other models from other companies that still cast in metal and/or resin, still only provide stickers if any markings with their kits? From the point of view of a person who has worked with other model kits (wargaming and other) as well as GW, I think GW's models are definitely worth the money.
Is there another company, besides GW, that can produce plastic kits with as much detail as GW.
Current Gundam models are designed hand-in-hand with the mecha, and vice-versa. That is Bandai has a hand in steering Gundam mecha design to things that Bandai can produce. It's pure merchandising. That said, if you look at Unicorn, they can do some very cool things. Also "detail" means different things besides surface greebling.
Kingdom Death has amazing plastic kits that are better than GW in terms of detail, pose and proportion.
Kingdom Death has amazing plastic kits that are better than GW in terms of detail, pose and proportion.
Its the same people that make wyrd stuff no?
Wyrd has some absolutely insane plastic kits.
which is interesting as single figure from wyrd is about 11-12$ while Kingdom death is at 25$
The markups from Branding is real. (actually that may or may not be fair as those 11-12$ kits arent sell through or limited all the time)
Yeah, same factory (WGF). The Kingdom Death figures are a bit larger (35-40mm vs 30-33mm), and they may have some rules content content included, both of which bump the cost a little bit. The main thing is that I believe Wyrd may have a larger customer base / production runs than Kingdom Death to spread costs across. That said, Kingdom Death stuff can go on sale up to 50% off, so the price can be very comparable.
Ishagu wrote: No problem with paying more as long as it's the best.
And yes, it's the best.
Except they are not, atleast not in the field of resin.....
In the field of Boutique or high end miniatures for figure painting, no way in hell. gw is not even close for scale/figure quality when it comes to resin miniatures besides maybe their highest end character series.
In the field of "War gaming" debatably one of the best if not a literal industry leader
Value per model is stupid subjective. different people value different things for different reasons.
Ishagu wrote: No problem with paying more as long as it's the best.
And yes, it's the best.
Except they are not, atleast not in the field of resin.....
In the field of Boutique or high end miniatures for figure painting, no way in hell. gw is not even close for scale/figure quality when it comes to resin miniatures besides maybe their highest end character series.
In the field of "War gaming" debatably one of the best if not a literal industry leader
Value per model is stupid subjective. different people value different things for different reasons.
True, they are probably one of the best overall but they have their shortcomings
Galas wrote: Yeah I don't think "The most popular= the best" but GW just has no competitor at their level and scale.
Even if there are other companies with better prices, better rules, etc... theres just not direct competitor as well rounded as GW.
That probably has to do with the lack of big names in the wargames market.
Which is cyclical. 40k Does to tabletop wargaming what Magic the Gathering does to...tabletop gaming in general. It totally warps the market around it, strangling out small/startup products/companies just by existing at the scale it does.
Ishagu wrote: No problem with paying more as long as it's the best.
And yes, it's the best.
Except they are not, atleast not in the field of resin.....
In the field of Boutique or high end miniatures for figure painting, no way in hell. gw is not even close for scale/figure quality when it comes to resin miniatures besides maybe their highest end character series.
In the field of "War gaming" debatably one of the best if not a literal industry leader
Agree. GW is a wargames miniatures manufacturer that does good work, assuming that you want "heroic" (semi-deformed) models with a LOT of surface greebling texture.
As a resin manufacturer, GW sells adequate product at excessive price. Their product is clearly inferior to Arena Rex and Kingdom Death resin, to say nothing of the best boutique work out of Japan.
Ishagu wrote: GW are the best. It's not a singular category that decides this.
They have incredible models, regular releases, huge variety, great presence, big fanbase, etc.
All these things combined make them the best. There's no competition.
No competition of similar scale, sure. I wouldn't say they're the "best" though. The last 2-3 years of releases are more often than not over-decorated, soulless and generally subpar from a design/artistic standpoint, though after acquiring a few WM/H kits on sale, GW kits are definitely easier to clean and prep. Regular releases, variety- yeah, they've got that. The rules, as always are a mess. The fanbase is kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point- it has less to do with the quality of their games and minis and more to do with a critical mass that perpetuates itself.
Whether GW is the most expensive or not may be beside the point. The value just isn't there. And by value, I don't mean the value we find in their products, but the production cost compared with retail price.
A box or two a month is fine price wise for folk with a small amount of disposable income. (I always buy or order at a brick and mortar gw store too, they're fabulous),
I just calculated. x12 130mm round flat black base's would cost 144$ NZ. Probably would cost about a dollarr to make them or less..But 12 round peices of plastic 130mm in size, no detailing or any thing, unless you wanna call the matte texture on top detail.
At least it came in a fancy see through plastic bag with citadel logo.
Stormatious wrote: I just calculated. x12 130mm round flat black base's would cost 144$ NZ. Probably would cost about a dollarr to make them or less..But 12 round peices of plastic 130mm in size, no detailing or any thing, unless you wanna call the matte texture on top detail.
At least it came in a fancy see through plastic bag with citadel logo.
I'm sure some chinese lads could cut you a better deal, heck they might even throw in a fudge world baggy
note for the hard of thinking I'm of course joking but I'm sure legit version can be had way cheaper, unless GW are looking to copyright basic shapes
Well its expensive, but the quality of packaging and the bag it self with CITADEL written nicely on the side makes it all good. Cant believe The shop ordered 1 base all the way from the uk and charged 12 dollers, cant GW stock up on bases, or tell the customer, come back another time when we have some in, instead of charging you 12 dollars to get this 1 little round base shipped all the way from the other side of the world holy bananas? gak. But as i say, the see through bag with citadel on the side made it all worth while.
Remember i wasn't the one who went in the shop, i got some one else to go there, didn't know they ended up having to order one for 12 bux from the other side of the globe, would have been pretty hard for them to reach inside of one of the boxes and grab a base out for a customer instead of this 1 week ship sailing 12 doller nonsense, do gw think we are caviar eating money toilet paper using people?
Any way i am now in complain mode which is what i wasn't supposed to do. So ill leave it at that.
Stormatious wrote:Well its expensive, but the quality of packaging and the bag it self with CITADEL written nicely on the side makes it all good.
Not sure if serious...
Nurglitch wrote:It's kind of interesting to see what happens when people offer a cheaper alternative. Take Mantic, for example.
Mantic are an interesting example. I ordered a bunch of Ghouls from them when WH was still a thing because GW Ghouls were ridiculously expensive for a large unit. The models were OK but extremely restricted in pose, annoying to clean, difficult to assemble because of how the torso joined the legs, and impossible to rank up. I think they've gotten a little better recently but it did show that there are a lot of htings GW does right with its models that you don't always notice. I'd argue price isn't one of those things though.
You guys are ignoring the costs of initially designing the model and getting it to production stage.
A kit like a Knight could cost 7 figures to design and get to mass production. There are substantial investments - the mass production is cheap but they need to sell a lot to break even. Some kits don't even turn in a profit.
This is why intellectual property is so important to GW. Only the ignorant look at something like the cost of plastic and declare the product to be of no value.
Stormatious wrote:Well its expensive, but the quality of packaging and the bag it self with CITADEL written nicely on the side makes it all good.
Not sure if serious...
Nurglitch wrote:It's kind of interesting to see what happens when people offer a cheaper alternative. Take Mantic, for example.
Mantic are an interesting example. I ordered a bunch of Ghouls from them when WH was still a thing because GW Ghouls were ridiculously expensive for a large unit. The models were OK but extremely restricted in pose, annoying to clean, difficult to assemble because of how the torso joined the legs, and impossible to rank up. I think they've gotten a little better recently but it did show that there are a lot of things GW does right with its models that you don't always notice. I'd argue price isn't one of those things though.
Very much. When I was in financial sales we were told to sell on value rather than cost, on the notion that as 'financial advisors' we could provide more than just the sale of financial products. Complete bull, but I think it's a good notion for GW products in that people feel like they're getting value. People who complain about the cost aren't really complaining about the cost so much as the lack of perceived value in what they're getting.
Crimson Devil wrote: It's not ignoring so much as people simply don't respect the work it takes to produce something like this.
Yeah, unfortunately it seems a lot of people are ignorant and entitled and refuse to grasp the full picture.
To add to the topic, no GW is not the most expensive wargame because GW isn't a wargame. GW makes various wargames, some of which are incredibly cheap and some of which can be expensive. I can play Kill team for 20 quid. A large game of 40k costs more, but again it depends on the army.
I was spending more on Xwing than 40k when I was trying to stay competitive.
Ishagu wrote: You guys are ignoring the costs of initially designing the model and getting it to production stage.
A kit like a Knight could cost 7 figures to design and get to mass production. There are substantial investments - the mass production is cheap but they need to sell a lot to break even. Some kits don't even turn in a profit.
This is why intellectual property is so important to GW. Only the ignorant look at something like the cost of plastic and declare the product to be of no value.
And some people ignore that this is the same for all miniature and scale model companies out there
Nothing unique to GW, although it is much cheaper for them than for some others as they do everything in house and don't need "external" companies for the job
So really I don't know why this should be an argument here as those costs are the same for all others too. So it is not forgotten but just ignored (same as we are not talking about packaging, storage cost, Christmas bonus for employees and all those things that everyone has to pay)
Ishagu wrote: You guys are ignoring the costs of initially designing the model and getting it to production stage. A kit like a Knight could cost 7 figures to design and get to mass production. There are substantial investments - the mass production is cheap but they need to sell a lot to break even. Some kits don't even turn in a profit. This is why intellectual property is so important to GW. Only the ignorant look at something like the cost of plastic and declare the product to be of no value.
And some people ignore that this is the same for all miniature and scale model companies out there
Nothing unique to GW, although it is much cheaper for them than for some others as they do everything in house and don't need "external" companies for the job
So really I don't know why this should be an argument here as those costs are the same for all others too. So it is not forgotten but just ignored (same as we are not talking about packaging, storage cost, Christmas bonus for employees and all those things that everyone has to pay)
How is putting up front all the costs of owning and maintaining machinery cheaper than throwing some digital designs at china? also warehousing, maintenance, cost of employees, lease, etc. even removing the up front cost of the machine as by now its probably paid for. (i mean honestly its probably would be interesting to break down actual costs of goods. some times its surprising )
How is putting up front all the costs of owning and maintaining machinery cheaper than throwing some digital designs at china?
Manufacturers don't go to China because it is cheaper but because it is the only option to get stuff done.
There are not many companies outside of China that are able to produce HIPS kits, and those are fully booked.
China is an option for those that need more capacity until they can build it "here" and it is not necessarily cheaper as place your order, get your pre-shipment sample, need to change/adjust it and they can still mess up your order which you only know after it arrives.
If it is something you cannot sell your investment is gone + another year waiting time for a replacement
Companies won't produce anything in Europe if it would be overall cheaper to do it in China, but it is not for several reasons (and not only for HIPS, this is for all kind of products, even clothing industry comes back to Europe/USA now as producing in China wasn't cheap in the long run)
Ishagu wrote: You guys are ignoring the costs of initially designing the model and getting it to production stage.
A kit like a Knight could cost 7 figures to design and get to mass production.
No, we're not. The DFG Crusader is larger and more complex than a Knight, and it was low 6 figures to get into production. There's no need to overstate things.
...just to make sure I'm clear...someone just stated that it could take $1,000,000 to design and produce an Imperial Knight kit. Okay, so that's the kind of thread this is now. Gotcha.
Elbows wrote: ...just to make sure I'm clear...someone just stated that it could take $1,000,000 to design and produce an Imperial Knight kit. Okay, so that's the kind of thread this is now. Gotcha.
Alphabet wrote:I use 3rd party sites within the UK and it honestly is not all that bad. I looked into games like Bolt action and infinity not so long ago and I noticed the prices are not too far apart.
I will say that some kits seem way overpriced. But all in all, they are just as expensive as everything else nowadays IMHO.
Edit: I am aware that for everywhere else in the world they bumped up there prices quite substantially!
Reemule wrote:I think it depends on what you want to play. A guy who wanders into a GW store and buys a brand new Primaris force, with Gman and Calgar, and all the options and then has them order him a Astreus...
Versus the guy who buys Dark Imperium stuff from Ebay, and amazon and a Astreus from a dubious seller on another site in a few away country..
That is like $1500 between them, and they have the same thing.
This should probably not need to be said, but... If you are looking at costs from a third party retailer or even second hand, you are not buying from GAMES WORKSHOP and thus are not answering the question. Obviously Warhammer has a very large market and if you want to be economic you can go bargain hunting for second hand models, but this thread is asking where GW is pricing their stuff relative to competitors.
To be honest I don't care, 20 years ago GW products were extremely expensive, people ignore that fact. Its always been extremely expensive. I started collecting in 2nd edition and even then I couldn't afford a full army even though I had a full army. Nothing has changed really, its always been extremely expensive, the only thing that's changed is my income in able to buy more models. I am poor as gak and I'm really fed up with people moaning about the price, DON'T fething BUY THEM. If they are so expensive then you wouldn't be asking the question 'are they too expensive' because you would have already stopped buying them before you asked that.
Delvarus Centurion wrote: To be honest I don't care, 20 years ago GW products were extremely expensive, people ignore that fact. Its always been extremely expensive. I started collecting in 2nd edition and even then I couldn't afford a full army even though I had a full army. Nothing has changed really, its always been extremely expensive, the only thing that's changed is my income in able to buy more models. I am poor as gak and I'm really fed up with people moaning about the price, DON'T fething BUY THEM. If they are so expensive then you wouldn't be asking the question 'are they too expensive' because you would have already stopped buying them before you asked that.
Your logic is blowing my mind. As long as you think this makes sense I guess.
Delvarus Centurion wrote: To be honest I don't care, 20 years ago GW products were extremely expensive, people ignore that fact. Its always been extremely expensive. I started collecting in 2nd edition and even then I couldn't afford a full army even though I had a full army. Nothing has changed really, its always been extremely expensive, the only thing that's changed is my income in able to buy more models. I am poor as gak and I'm really fed up with people moaning about the price, DON'T fething BUY THEM. If they are so expensive then you wouldn't be asking the question 'are they too expensive' because you would have already stopped buying them before you asked that.
Your logic is blowing my mind. As long as you think this makes sense I guess.
Not really. It was expensive, it is expensive. I really don't care, moaning about it does nothing because we are all still going to buy the plastic crack and GW aren't going to suddenly think 'we should give them a break, lets lower the price'. Its either buy it or don't and moaning about it isn't going to change anything other then getting other people to agree and say 'yeah its so expensive'. I don't have the energy to care about things that aren't going to change and we all know it isn't going to change; so what are we actually talking about, really? I mean I learnt years ago to only spend what I can model and paint, which takes a few weeks to a month if you paint them to a high standard, if you do that its really not that expensive. It gets expensive when you have to buy a unit every other day or week. Just takes discipline. I mean it is expensive as feth and you's have a right to say so but what good does it do, we are all still going to buy the gak.
GW has always been luxury level pricing. They have been making an effort to keep the basic game easy for kids, but also hitting the right stuff for veterans(model, fluff, game)wise.
I had to mow a ton of lawns and not buy music or ammo to get my Squat biker gang. If you only buy the models you like(for whatever reason) then the only expense you really have is taste. Taste being subjective and an entirely personal choice.
It's as true now, as it was when I was 11. Now tho, I have a lil more cash, am a much better painter, have great looking models, and enjoy the game when I play with friends.
Dont complain how expensive something is. I'm not exactly in the market for a Lamborghini(would LOVE to be and aspire to tho) and while I might bemoan my current income, I do not complain that they're too expensive. A Repulsor is not a Lambo, but its place in the market is a similar one.
Racerguy180 wrote: GW has always been luxury level pricing. They have been making an effort to keep the basic game easy for kids, but also hitting the right stuff for veterans(model, fluff, game)wise.
I had to mow a ton of lawns and not buy music or ammo to get my Squat biker gang. If you only buy the models you like(for whatever reason) then the only expense you really have is taste. Taste being subjective and an entirely personal choice.
It's as true now, as it was when I was 11. Now tho, I have a lil more cash, am a much better painter, have great looking models, and enjoy the game when I play with friends.
Dont complain how expensive something is. I'm not exactly in the market for a Lamborghini(would LOVE to be and aspire to tho) and while I might bemoan my current income, I do not complain that they're too expensive. A Repulsor is not a Lambo, but its place in the market is a similar one.
How "awesome" GW models are is because of their IP owned niche market.
Compare an IG/AM tank (~$60) to pretty much most mid level tank kits out there and GW is "garbage" in comparison for the price (More detail/parts at 1:35 scale which is bigger at $45-$65 depending on included resin, photo etch parts, metal barrels).
For fits and the look of models, Malifaux I find far exceeds GW but for a "normal" model you are looking at around $7 a model while GW normal troop models fall in around $2.50 depending on the kit you get.
The esthetic of "heroic" proportions are also a taste thing.
In the end, the market and availability of the models and players in general is why most people grit their teeth and spend on GW.
I would say a good counterpoint to them being expensive is that people are always selling off their stuff and I can get it really cheap.
It is so pervasive, you could potentially get the game for cheaper than all the other wargames if you are not afraid of shopping around and a bit of work.
The trick is, to get past those who feel their model is "pro-painted" that is badly in need of being stripped down and started over.
Time and money are truly interchangeable.
Badly made models for a few dollars here or there?
Break it down into component parts, clean them up and you have a "new" model.
Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it (Unless they are like a well paid single adult with no childs so basically they have, for the scale of cost of warhammer, nearly infinite amount of spare and hobby money).
I personally love looking for bargains. Is not only the fact that you end up saving a TON of money. Is also an acomplisementh and is fun on itself. Thats how I have built like 3 2,500k points armies in two years for less than 700€.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
Galas wrote: Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it (Unless they are like a well paid single adult with no childs so basically they have, for the scale of cost of warhammer, nearly infinite amount of spare and hobby money).
I personally love looking for bargains. Is not only the fact that you end up saving a TON of money. Is also an acomplisementh and is fun on itself. Thats how I have built like 3 2,500k points armies in two years for less than 700€.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
Not everything is available second hand, or for a bargain, especially for popular units. Trust me. Sometimes it's a necessary evil.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I hope this ain't a stupid question, but where ? Because FLGS price aren't much different from prices GW store has, and to get discounts you often have to first spend a lot more then what an army costs.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I hope this ain't a stupid question, but where ? Because FLGS price aren't much different from prices GW store has, and to get discounts you often have to first spend a lot more then what an army costs.
Only time you are going to find new in box 70-75% off is ether estate or garage sales where the person selling has no idea what the value is, storage container auctions, or full business liquidations.
Galas wrote: Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it
Time constraints. I usually order online at discounts, but sometimes you can't find certain things at retailers, while GW has them, so you either wait until it shows up online or order it from GW.
Some stuff you can only only order from GW or secondhand. Interestingly, Vaul's Wrath battery is cheaper from GW than buying the support weapons separately at online discount (functionally a 20% discount).
Galas wrote: Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it (Unless they are like a well paid single adult with no childs so basically they have, for the scale of cost of warhammer, nearly infinite amount of spare and hobby money).
I personally love looking for bargains. Is not only the fact that you end up saving a TON of money. Is also an acomplisementh and is fun on itself. Thats how I have built like 3 2,500k points armies in two years for less than 700€.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I always buy at my FLGS at full GW price.
I play there, so it is only correct that i contribute.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I hope this ain't a stupid question, but where ? Because FLGS price aren't much different from prices GW store has, and to get discounts you often have to first spend a lot more then what an army costs.
Only time you are going to find new in box 70-75% off is ether estate or garage sales where the person selling has no idea what the value is, storage container auctions, or full business liquidations.
Actually that one was from a guy here on Dakkadakka.
Galas wrote: Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it (Unless they are like a well paid single adult with no childs so basically they have, for the scale of cost of warhammer, nearly infinite amount of spare and hobby money).
I personally love looking for bargains. Is not only the fact that you end up saving a TON of money. Is also an acomplisementh and is fun on itself. Thats how I have built like 3 2,500k points armies in two years for less than 700€.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I always buy at my FLGS at full GW price.
I play there, so it is only correct that i contribute.
Thats different. I also pay full GW prices at my FLGS.
Galas wrote: Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it (Unless they are like a well paid single adult with no childs so basically they have, for the scale of cost of warhammer, nearly infinite amount of spare and hobby money).
I personally love looking for bargains. Is not only the fact that you end up saving a TON of money. Is also an acomplisementh and is fun on itself. Thats how I have built like 3 2,500k points armies in two years for less than 700€.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I always buy at my FLGS at full GW price.
I play there, so it is only correct that i contribute.
By being a good opponent and participating in building a local community and scene for your LGS, you are contributing.
I pay tournament fees in my FLGS, but I always try to buy something every tournament, even if is something small.
I don't buy EVERYTHING from the FLGS because screw GW prices. And I don't play only in one FLGS. But I'm friends with the owner so one always try to buy a couple of items each month. I try to balance my hobby money for all my FLGS's (Some with discounts, some others without), UK shops (Man paying Pound prices with discount after brexit is so sweet), Ebay, forums, etc...
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I hope this ain't a stupid question, but where ? Because FLGS price aren't much different from prices GW store has, and to get discounts you often have to first spend a lot more then what an army costs.
Only time you are going to find new in box 70-75% off is ether estate or garage sales where the person selling has no idea what the value is, storage container auctions, or full business liquidations.
Actually that one was from a guy here on Dakkadakka.
Galas wrote: Buying directly for GW is something I can't understand why people does it (Unless they are like a well paid single adult with no childs so basically they have, for the scale of cost of warhammer, nearly infinite amount of spare and hobby money).
I personally love looking for bargains. Is not only the fact that you end up saving a TON of money. Is also an acomplisementh and is fun on itself. Thats how I have built like 3 2,500k points armies in two years for less than 700€.
If you know where to look you can find things like 450€ worth of miniatures new in their boxes, with the plastic and everything at something like a 70-75% discount.
I always buy at my FLGS at full GW price.
I play there, so it is only correct that i contribute.
Thats different. I also pay full GW prices at my FLGS.
One of the FLGS here actually sells GW at a markup from what direct from GW costs
I don't get and never will agree with the " Don't complain about price " argument. I'll complain about whatever I want thank you very much.
As much as people want to say the price is fine, it really isn't and it is a put off for many who want to get in. Now you can be fine with it, that is your right of course. It is however over expensive and you can say its a luxury and you're glad to pay it, again fine.
Some will have to agree to disagree on that. Fact is if something is over the top expensive, I won't buy it even if I have the money ready to go. Lower prices would do a boon to the game, not a negative I firmly believe that and think they'd make up in quantity what they lack in single shot cost.
You'd be surprised how many of something people will get if they feel its a good deal and how few they will if they feel they are being ripped off.
It depends what you want. Warhammer underworlds for example is a pretty reasonably priced game. Killteam and bloodbowl are both relatively affordable when compared to similar games like infinity and guildball. It is really with the two mainline games where the cost starts rising considerably. 40k is probably the single most expensive wargame to collect an army for.
One important benefit though, is that GW miniatures have a pretty good resale value, especially if you paint reasonably well.
Only time you are going to find new in box 70-75% off is ether estate or garage sales where the person selling has no idea what the value is, storage container auctions, or full business liquidations.
Makes sense , although I don't with the only store in my city to be closed down.
I do hate how expensive GW stuff is. My current bain is the citadel paints and how cake filled the rim gets when you shake the pot and open it. There not worth nearly £3 for how little you get as well. I only buy them because of the cool names, which adds a bit more character to whatever your painting.
R - if you want a cheap game, WMH is where it’s at right now... in Canada.
). If anything they got rid of it to streamline their catalogue and clear warehouse space rather than it was haemorrhaging money.
