Staying loyal to 40k, while divorcing GW?

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**Watchersinthedark**

I'll probably continue to support my FLGS. While it sucks that prices have jumped quite a bit, I have been rather happy with some of the new kits GW has released. Considering that most of the folks I play with now and have played with in the last couple years pretty much have most of the models they want for their armies. They don't go out any purchase new versions of the same models because why should they? Unless they really like how the new stuff looks there really is no reason to. Unless GW releases something new for them to pick up then the folks around here aren't going to purchase new stuff. GW is a business and part of being a business is bringing in money. To do this they have released a new edition of 40k, 5 codexes for 40k, 3 for Fantasy (Not sure on that one) and a bunch of new models. Folks complain that the games keeps changing or that GW keeps bringing out new stuff that you need to get to keep your army in tip top shape. Well of course they do, otherwise who the hell would buy their stuff?

**Pacific**

Byte wrote:
GW isn't going anywhere. The haters will come and go.

I think many people see GW not 'going anywhere' as being a big part of the problem.. but perhaps not in the sense that you have intended !

**jonolikespie**

Pacific wrote:
Byte wrote:
GW isn't going anywhere. The haters will come and go.

I think many people see GW not 'going anywhere' as being a big part of the problem.. but perhaps not in the sense that you have intended !

I know I do

**Just Dave**

grumpusbumpus wrote:*Lots of great stuff.*

Great post; I completely agree with everything you've said.

**SickSix**

grumpusbumpus wrote:
As much as I play their games, as I love the settings, and I enjoy the communities at my local game store, I don't buy GW products. I convert or manufacture my own miniatures to use to play their games. I've been playing their games since '95, including 40k, Fantasy, Blood Bowl, and Mordheim, and I've seen the volume and quality of their support for the game and hobby aspects of their merchandise drop dramatically, while the cost for their products has increased. I find I really enjoy finding alternative ways to represent miniatures for Games Workshop games instead of paying their exorbitant prices.

Additionally, their practices in regards to their franchise have become increasingly profit-motivated through the years. My preference, as I assume most hobbyists would prefer, would be that the Games Workshop staff work to support and refine the quality of their game systems, miniatures, and hobby products, resulting, incidentally, in an enthusiastic and loyal consumer base. Instead, their design work, marketing, and business practices are directly profit-motivated, which I find grating.

As an example, consider White Dwarf Magazine. White Dwarf is effectively a product catalog. Buying one, to me, is analogous to paying to watch television advertisements. The vast majority of the magazine merely outlines newly-available, expensive models, interspersed with pointless interviews with self-obsessed Games Workshop staff. The magazine wasn't always this way. Below is a list of some of the features the magazines used to include, which I found appealing:

Mini games

Art posters (as opposed to product posters)

Add on games components (miniatures, character cards, spell cards, equipment cards, maps, cardboard terrain etc.)

Scenario rules

Campaign rules

Fiction

Detailed modeling project guides (terrain building, etc.)

As another example, consider the way the rules for their games are progressively altered in order to sell more miniatures. This does not improve the games, and, in fact, often makes them worse. Rules should be altered to make a game system more appealing, exciting, balanced, elegant, interesting, easy to learn, quick to play, etc. These latter sorts of changes result in a better game, which incidentally ought to draw more customers, and therefore more business.

In the end, GW makes decisions based on what's best for the company, but there ought to be a symbiotic relationship between GW and it's customer community. They see their numbers, and their decisions must be working out, but I have a niggling suspicion that they are inevitably undermining their own market. I make this assumption, because there must be other hobbyists out there like me. I play their games; I've been playing them for almost 20 years, but I won't give them another cent.

Great post.

**stubacca**

GW HAVE CHEAPER UNITS!!

Tau Battlesuits are now £40 for three, instead of originally £15 for one!

See, they really do care about us