Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I just wanted to vent my frustrations over the state of WD as of late... This magazine has become nothing more than a glorified catalogue with no real information, articles or anything of much worth anymore. Ive had every single WD since 97 and find the back issues to be alot more fun, informative and hobby friendly. I understand GW is a profit making company that doesnt have many ways of advertising its product... But come on, this is beyond a joke! Decembers issue was the straw that broke the cammels back! I think every page had a product list and price guide on!... "Look at these new minis, there the best in the game, and heres the price!"

Bring back Paul Sawyer! Gamer and Staff armies fighting battle reports ( not all of us are eavy metal trained!), army profiles, money off vouchers!!, experimental rules, FAQs!! When they produced spearhead in WD i thought it was a step in the right direction, but it looks like marketing got involved once again! noticed the "meta" was armour and created a game to play with alot of expensive tank models!

All in all, its the Death of WD for me, i will buy januarys in the vain hope that the BA content will be good... or they may just try and sell me 4 x storm ravens and the new dreads... the joy!

I know this seems another negative rant about GW, but surely im not the only one who has become disenchanted with the magazine formaly known as white dwarf, but soon to be known as citadel catalogue monthly?

Also, i do need another magazine to replace WD, any suggestions? i subscribe to military modeller and have tried wargames illustrated... but nothing seems to beat the good old fashioned WD for hobby/terrain tips

Thanks for reading

Liam

I stopped buying WD when they did the uber huge Bretonnians/ Dark Elves batrep. The ONLY thing WD is good for is pictures, most of which can be found online.

With as many blogs and batreps as there are on this site alone, the content of WD is subpar at best.

You're not alone, I think WHite Dwarf has really started to suck ever since they pulled that gimmick where it was half LOTR crap. Since that happened its been more and more advertising and less useful content.

Not to mention the continued price increase on it as well, its what, 9$ now? thats slowed.

Yeah, I quit buying it when the LOTR stuff took over the back end of it. I can't stand LOTR, either as a game or a movie or a book, so there's no way I am going to pay for half a magazine full of it.

To be honest, this is the first rant about GW where I have felt the ranting is justified. Yes, the pictures are pretty, but I wish GW would pay for normal advertising and give us back the old WD.

I've been a long time buyer, but I've officially swapped it for Wargames Illustrated.

...Sigh... so its not just me then... what a gakker, i agree with the LoTR thing, i love the books, like the films, despise the game.

Is it sad im so crestfallen over a bloody magazine? lol... has anyone read the ancible or the unseen lurker, i believe these are good WD stand ins

Liam

If only we had good writers for white dwarf. They are no longer good. I stopped buying 7 years ago.

Wait, White Dwarf declined in quality? Since when!?

Joking aside, this is no new news. I have back issues from as recent as 2005/6 that are still good reads, and have cool battle reports with converted armies and the like. If I didn't get issues for free as a perk for my hobby store work, I wouldn't read em.

One thing that bugs me most about WD these days is that every battle report is using the 'Eavy Metal models. Those guys are great painters, don't get me wrong, but you'll only ever see a handful of army builds, since it's pretty much only the figures they painted for box art. Even then, it's the same models month by month. I liked it a lot more when WD writers would have their own models on display, with their conversions and paintjobs. Having our own unique, one of a kind armies is the best part about this hobby for me. To take that away leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

I agree that seeing staff armies would be much more interesting. The General's Compendium did this and that book was awesome. If we want to see studio models we can look online and in army books.

I personally never grow tired of looking at unique personal armies even if I don't play the game( WFB only over here).

I'm also surprised that LotR is still around. And I don't really get WD as an advertising device as the only people who buy it already know what's coming out and what it looks like.

Yes, I don't think this is something new.. you have to go back years to when the magazine was an eagerly awaited read.

If I had to hazard a guess, it would be that the budget WD gets nowadays is tiny compared to what it had in the past. Rather than having a dedicated staff making the magazine, I think it's probably just an editor and a couple of other staff grabbing bits and pieces from here and there, doing a bit of writing, then slapping in a hundred stock photos.

So, around the same time GW became a public company the quality of the magazine, or certainly it's position as a respected publication, started a slow and steady decline. I don't think this is just a coincidence.

I enjoy. I always look forward to getting my new issues. Very useful painting guides and interesting tips to be found. I don't particularly care about Batreps as I'm not good with the game myself (don't even now my dex rules lol).

To be fair, their painting tutorials are really nice.

Pretty pictures, nice tutorials, other than that? Nothing. Where I live, LOTR has a very minor following; I fail to see why they dedicate so much of their magazine to it every month. Perhaps they're trying really hard to draw in new players?

WD has been a AD Rag for years, And if people are willing to pay money for GW to continue making this AD rag, it will exist in the future.

I stopped buying WD at 07, and am spending more money on hobby magazines that promote "Creativity".

Brother SRM wrote:One thing that bugs me most about WD these days is that every battle report is using the 'Eavy Metal models. Those guys are great painters, don't get me wrong, but you'll only ever see a handful of army builds, since it's pretty much only the figures they painted for box art. Even then, it's the same models month by month. I liked it a lot more when WD writers would have their own models on display, with their conversions and paintjobs. Having our own unique, one of a kind armies is the best part about this hobby for me. To take that away leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

I was thinking about the same thing a while back when people were talking about "why does the IG always loose".

The problem is that people have to adapt their playing style to whatever models the 'Eavy Metal team has painted. And the 'Eavy Metal team is painting models to make them look cool, not to make a balanced army list.

"Three of those would make a great army! What, we only have two painted? Then I guess I will take those two and this crappy substitute..."

To be perfectly honest, I don't see a lot of value in any printed magazine these days.

If you're after battle reports and pictures of pretty models, there's a whole internet full of them. Which is pretty much why I stopped buying WD several years ago... I realised that the stuff I was buying it for I could access just as easily, and less expensively, online.

insaniak wrote:To be perfectly honest, I don't see a lot of value in any printed magazine these days.

If you're after battle reports and pictures of pretty models, there's a whole internet full of them. Which is pretty much why I stopped buying WD several years ago... I realised that the stuff I was buying it for I could access just as easily, and less expensively, online.

And online BatReps are more likely than WD's to reflect:
1. What actually happened
2. What will happen if you try the same thing

The main problem is that they expect their customers to pay for their advertisements.

It wouldn't be so sad if this wasn't a reflection of GW's overall attitude towards its "followers," as their financial statements refer to us.

Since there are battles involved, that would make us camp followers!

aerethan wrote:I agree that seeing staff armies would be much more interesting. The General's Compendium did this and that book was awesome. If we want to see studio models we can look online and in army books.

I personally never grow tired of looking at unique personal armies even if I don't play the game( WFB only over here).

I'm also surprised that LotR is still around. And I don't really get WD as an advertising device as the only people who buy it already know what's coming out and what it looks like.

That was cool back when they had a staff. They have let way too many good people go, down to a skeleton crew.

Skeleton crew.
Do they use ghost writers?

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Skeleton crew.
Do they use ghost writers?

They must. Their plots are thin, Narritive is whispy and seldom seen, and content is transparent.

So.. does anyone have any alternative mags they can recommend?... i know all the stuff is readily available at the tip of your fingers and a search engine... But to me their is something "propa" about having a physical mag to read.

...Also, whats a man to do while having a dump? Im not going back to reading product labels!!!!!

Insaniak raises a good point. Printed magazines in general stink, across the board.

There is too much content freely available for nearly every conceivable thing. Why pay for WD to advertise to us?

The ony valid reason they had in the last decade was neat articles about variant rules. Stuff that wasn't official, but promoted conversions and new unique models and armies.

That died when Chapter Approved was thrown in the gas chamber earlier this decade.

Luckily, GW counts on fresh new 13 yr old boys to walk buy and pay $10 for that shiney new ad rag. And somehow they continue to print rubbish.

Yep, I do recall I used to have LOADS of mid-late 90's WDs and they were epic reads.

Huge hobby articles, many and varied battle reports.

I've recently subscribed (the price of subscription is quite cheap, works out at £3 an issue, which I won't miss). And I do get what people mean - it's gone the way of most magazines, just a huge glorified advert.

It's the same with Bike magazine, which is another I like to get every now and then. Real, honest to goodness writing, is being replaced by huge two-page gloss ads.

CptCortez128 wrote:So.. does anyone have any alternative mags they can recommend?... i know all the stuff is readily available at the tip of your fingers and a search engine... But to me their is something "propa" about having a physical mag to read.

...Also, whats a man to do while having a dump? Im not going back to reading product labels!!!!!

Thats a very good point! Aside from the toilet read, I also like to just sit back on the sofa and flick open a mag sometimes.

Re. batreps, yes you could say they look too good (with the standard of painting), but they always make me enthusiastic about playing or painting when I read them. And name one blog on the net that even reaches half their level of quality (production/photos/writing etc.?)

Re other mags

Used to regularly buy two aircraft modelling mags.
They were imho the best of the bunch as a lot of the competition did look like catalogues in some of the layout.

One had a new editor, a makeover that made it indistinguishable from all the other mags, and a reduction in content. Furthermore it started to be very uncritical of new releases. Everything was suddenly wonderful. The magazine articles sounded like promotional leaflets.

The publishers of the other messed about with its identity, and lost a very good editor as a result.

Like others have said the info is usually available online.
Pity because I do prefer hardcopy.

BrookM wrote:I've been a long time buyer, but I've officially swapped it for Wargames Illustrated.

Thats what I did about six months ago and could not be happier. I find the articles in Wargames Illustrated full of interesting terrain and ideas. And on top of that most of the miniatures featured in the articles are painted by gamers. Even if you don't like Flames of War the magazine will still have a lot to offer.

The only down side is that it is for historical gaming and the most fantasy or science fiction I have seen is some pulp WWII. So it may not be for everyone here.

Never bought White Dwarf, may never do so.

Dakka should make its own online magazine!

And that is my...

Every since Paul "Fat Bloke" Sawyer left WD has steadily gone downhill to where it is today. I havent bought a WD in well over 2 years and have no plan to buy one in the future. US$10 for a catalog is absolute crap. I have better things to buy with that 10 spot.