First, you're wrong. The Dire Troll is significantly heavier than a Juggernaut. I wish I had the model weights at home, but fortunately, I rarely need that information here. I'm happy to post them Monday if anyone likes. What rubs me a little raw here, though, is that the entire premise of this post is false. I don't mind if people point out Privateer's shortcomings all day long, but at least get the facts straight.

Now, allow me to draw you a picture:
(If this works, there's goingto be a picture of a graph of tin prices, starting September 1, 2002 when we started production of WARMACHINE, and ending May 2, 2006, today. Unfortunately, I have never in the last three years posted a picture, so I don't know if this is going to work or not. If it doesn't and you want to see it for yourself, go here and enter in those dates for yourself

http://www.lme.co.uk/tin_graphs.asp

(Okay, the picture showed up at the bottom.)
As the astute might guess, the graph shows a significant increase in the price of tin—the metal we make our models out of—over the past four years. Note that during that time, not once have we raised prices. We HAVE priced models accordingly with the current price of metal, however. And we will continue to do so. The simple fact of the matter is that metal costs more now than it did when we started making WARMACHINE. Even if, for example, a Dire Troll weighed the SAME as a Juggernaut, today it would be priced higher than the Juggernaut whiich got priced three years ago. The other fact of the matter is, that because we haven't raised prices on this stuff, we're kind of taking a bath on some of it. We make a lot less money on the earlier produced models than we do on current ones, and at a certain point, when we can't sustain a company on those margins, things have to change.

So here's the reality bomb: we have never said we would not raise prices. We have said that 'never have' and we have said that 'we don't have any current plans to'. But I will tell you right now that someday, we will raise prices across the board, unless the price of tin drops dramatically. However, historically, metal prices rarely go down unless massive quantities of the resource are suddenly discovered. Right now, the world is very focused on silver mining, and the few places that actually produced tin are supplying very little, so this isn't a phenomenon you will be seeing with tin in the near future. Times change, inflation rises, and a business has to adapt to the way the world is going. As consumers, so do you. The uninformed will believe that we should keep prices the same forever and are tantamount to criminals if we do any differently. The educated and observant will understand that a company doesn't stay in business if they're taking a loss on their product.

Something else you have to understand is that we've never sold ourselves as a cheaper alternative to GW. It costs money to make top shelf products, and they're not going to be sold at bargain basement prices. If all you care about is the price, you're playing the wrong game. And the truth is, WARMACHINE and HORDES aren't for everybody. These are games for people of discriminating taste, not folks that don't really care if the lump of metal in front of them looks good or not, so long as they didn't have to pay much for it. We have sold our game as having a low entry price, and that is and will always be true. A battlebox or a warpack are a low price for starting a miniatures game. They're not cheap—you're paying for those miniatures. But you can have a fulfilling gaming experience with the contents of that box without having to invest hundreds of dollars up front just to be able to start a game. We have never touted the prices of our miniatures as a low priced alternative to anything. We're going to make great stuff, and great stuff is going to be costed appropriately.

Does this make us like GW? I'm pretty sure it doesn't. I doubt the owner, much less anyone, is going to get up on a Saturday morning to give this kind of explanation to some forum users. Also, we always hold up our end of the bargain—when you spend your money on our products, it's money well spent. Privateer also delivers an unmatched level of service when you purchase our products, and genuinely care for the people that play our game. Just because we actually have to charge money for the products we make, I don't believe it's justifiable to stand us next to an icon that you feel is disreputable. At the end of the day, though, you have the final vote. And if you believe there is a better game with better models, better service, and a better overall consumer experience at a cheaper price, then you know what to do. So far I don't think you can get a better bang for your buck than what Privateer has to offer.

Here's a link to the post.

Knight