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So, GW looks to be phasing out any scratch built terrain and boards from their stores.
The stores have been ordered to get rid of any terrain in order to better showcase their plastic kits and ROB boards.
Looks like the store managers have the final say in how the terrain is got rid of but auctions, sales, raffles or the bin are all options.
Go into your local store and have a word and a bit of a scrounge.
I've picked up couple of bargains this morning and you should be able to aswell, Not sure if this is happening outside the UK.
I'll get some pics of my haul this afternoon!

I hate to say anything against GW, BUT, if true this is surely the end of any pretence they make to be the shining light of the wargame hobby.

When GW made and publicised excellent conversions and scratchbuilds -- models and terrain -- it could act as an inspiration for everyone and a recruiter for wargaming as a hobby.

More and more GW just want to churn the teenybopper SM dollar.

Good grief! They are even going so far as to suppress the hobby talent of the staff and loyal customers to further shove the stuff they put out into our faces.

I mean, WTF? Did they just tell them to get rid of all the stuff they spent ages on, and display MOAR GW TOTAL AWESOME kits such as the Realm of Battle board (skulls in the ground ftw...) and replicas of kits they are already displaying?

Is this really nescassary? It sounds like yet another excuse for GW to shove more product at us and kill the hobby spirit. What's next, a decree telling all store owners that anything plastic or metal in the store should be made of only GW sanctioned plastic or metal? An order that anyone who scratchbuilds is no longer allowed to purchase GW stuff on the grounds of being a hobby heretic? No other hobby kit allowed? Really? Really? What exactly do they hope to accomplish by this?

It may be good for those lucky hobbyists who get a good deal for some scenery, but this seriously fails.

/endrant.

Even though I'm not a big fan of GW I cant find fault in them doing this.

Their strategy is to sell ever more units of their own branded products so what better way of promoting their goods than by having them out on the table top for potential customers to see?

I'm sad to see this happen at store level but I'm too jaded to care much..onto other things.

Kilkrazy wrote:I hate to say anything against GW, BUT, if true this is surely the end of any pretence they make to be the shining light of the wargame hobby.

When GW made and publicised excellent conversions and scratchbuilds -- models and terrain -- it could act as an inspiration for everyone and a recruiter for wargaming as a hobby.
More and more GW just want to churn the teenybopper SM dollar.

ditto
Guess the writing was on the scratchbuilt wall when they took all the "how to biuld terrain" articles off the web site when it got revamped.

From a marketing point of view of course there is no fault.
But it is a sad reflection of the mentality at the top of GW

Sounds crap, they are just making every store a clone of each other. All will have the same stupid plastic gameboard with the same selection of plastic buildings. Ugh.

Once upon a time GW stores and hobbyists were encouraged to make their own terrain and take pride in it. This is what White Dwarf terrain articles were about, making stuff yourself. Now they are just about painting their own terrain kits. Terrain is something that has been heralded as being as expensive or cheap as you want to make it, how many times have we been told that you can make high quality stuff on the cheap with some effort and imagination? And WD articles frequently used to reflect this making great stuff on a shoestring.

Part of the thing that made all GW stores unique were their gaming tables and the store armies in the cabinets. Some of them are fairly awesome. Then they started pushing more of their plastic terrain so the more and more often you see the same old pieces appear in articles and on gaming tables everywhere. But 'no worry', said some, 'it's just to give an easy option to those not inclined or able to make their own terrain'. Well now GW take the next logical step, scrap all non-company terrain from the shops.

What's the point in even selling a "How To Make Wargames Terrain" book if you're going to only use terrain out of their own plastic kits in the shops? Yet again GW put sales above the actual hobby aspects of the hobby, that being using your imagination and making stuff.

I can only think of that store with the warlord Titan, storm bird and incredible ultras drop force display.... What a shame....

It will certainly homogenize the stores, which sucks, it used to be a nice surprise knowing you would find some completely unique things in each store based on the people who run/frequent it.

I don't know they don't go the whole hog and produce a range of pre-painted stuff.

Hush man! Don't put ideas in their heads

Good point about the sameness of the stores.
Worse still it may also mean the promo displays of the latest release popping up all over the place.

There was some really nice stuff on the tables at the Sheffield stores.

The upside is that we have this thing called an internet forum for the swapping of ideas and encouragement of developing modelling skills.

Who needs pre made stuff when there is card, foamboard and imagination aplenty

The Realm of Battle board is horrible. It's got hills that you can't remove and the god-awful pit of skulls. The thought of seeing a couple of these in every shop...

Howard A Treesong wrote:The Realm of Battle board is horrible. It's got hills that you can't remove and the god-awful pit of skulls. The thought of seeing a couple of these in every shop...

Ah but the staff can have competitions to come up with the best catchphrase for every time a model falls over those bloody awful hills when they are playing demo games:

"Hey thar mr marinez, I didn't say Go To Ground! KeKeKeKe!!"

Now the sound of clacking dice will be inescapable.

Arent UK stores basically the size of a bathroom anyway? It is really lame, but not surprising now that GW has been acting more and more like a true corporation

They just dont have room for gaming.. the impact is fairly small yet it does send a bad message

I have to agree with the sentiments here. It was the scratch-built terrain aspect that got me hooked. When I go to the hobby store it is in part to get terrain inspirations. I understand where they are coming from but I think it's bunk and is against the spirit of the DIY aspect of the hobby.

Kirasu wrote:They just dont have room for gaming.. the impact is fairly small yet it does send a bad message

But they had the room for gaming before... and now they don't... are the walls moving again!!1!???

Just a quick statement here:

They do this every few years. They've been doing it for quite awhile.

They sell off old theme based terrain that's taking up space in storage. They generally try to sell it off to FLGSes before opening it up to the public for sales. It's how my old FLGS got three former Games Day Baltimore tables.

Kirasu wrote:Arent UK stores basically the size of a bathroom anyway? It is really lame, but not surprising now that GW has been acting more and more like a true corporation

They just dont have room for gaming.. the impact is fairly small yet it does send a bad message

Some are small, the Watfrod store is the smallest , its about 15'x15' about the size of a reasonable size sitting room. Most stores are much bigger twice to three times the size on average. You dont need huge shops though for GW, and yes our shops and enclosed spaces in general tend to be smaller.

I wonder if they will take How to Make Wargames Terrain off the shelves too?

Here's my haul so far, it needs a bit of work to bring it back up to scratch.
Still some more bits to pick up!

I'd usually jump on the GW Hate train with both feet, but I think this could be a good thing. Isn't it reasonable to expect that the shops will be able to convert the existing terrain and boards? For example, combining terrain and filling in the skull pits.

It's all fine and deandy to have the Battle Board packed and ready for the next sucker to buy it, but it couldn't hurt sales to have some out actually being used and showing what you can do with them.

I think it would be silly for GW to dump EVERY SINGLE terrain piece that they don't make officially though. There are holes in the line that need to be filled with custom builds. This could also be a win for players who have their own boards and get some nice unique terrain above their building levels.

I spent £14 and got 4 nice pieces of scatter terrain this morning. They were also selling off bags of bitz, old blisters and boxes plus several fully painted armies and a lot of painted stuff from out of the display cabinets. My son bought a box of 5 knights on cold ones and a dozen of the old metal temple guard for £20.
I think it's great to get a bargain at my FLGS, and I plan to keep going back as more stuff will be cleared out.
I have no problem with them having a clear out, why not? The terrain used by the "club" members was getting a bit tatty and the boards could do with some fresh paint and a bit of flock.
The ROB boards are a bit problematic when trying to put models on the slopes, maybe it would have been better done as flat "contours" but it is what it is. I have one at home and use it most of the time. The skull pits are just painted the same base colours as the rest of the rocks and look fine. If they bugged me I would fill them with water effect and make them into bogs. With a variety of scatter painted with similar base colours I can rearrange it in more than enough different ways to keep it interesting. I still have my COD mat and the flat grass mat when I dont want the hills. I use the base hardboard on my table if I want a desert. If my FLGS can make up each of its six tables to show that kind of variety and the scatter pieces are varied then I'm a happy gamer : )
They are a SHOP first and a club second. They don't charge me for my games at Vets night each week, so I try to buy my hobby stuff from them as a way of saying "keep up the good work" because if they close the shop I loose my club night games AND the convenience of a local hobby supplier with (generally) useful help and advice. For more scratch build, conversions, alternative game systems and the rest there is DAKKA and the rest of the internet. Whats the problem?

My local GW recently had a big auction of old stuff, including old models and terrain, however, on the boards was new scratch built stuff (there was a big sewerworks and trench system). So scratchbuilts aren't dead, (yet).

Alex Kolodotschko wrote:I wonder if they will take How to Make Wargames Terrain off the shelves too?

Here's my haul so far, it needs a bit of work to bring it back up to scratch.
Still some more bits to pick up!

Hell of a good haul man. Was that stuff out in the store for playing on for awhile? Because there's not much of the normal wear and tear.

Has anyone heard about this happening in the US? I'd love to pickup some nice scratch built terrain or bitz on the cheap.

Haven't heard anything about it Kolath, but it's possible. Keep an ear to the ground and you should be able to hear about it.

Does this apply to Hills as well? Because their selection of Hills they sell is rather barren.

I very much doubt this is them doing anything other than clearing out specifically themed tables to have more generic ones that can work for Fantasy, 40k, and Lord of the Rings.

I don't like the idea but it is a sound business decision. GW stores are a place to buy GW products and what better way to show them off? It's a branding kinda thing. All GW all the time!

All the more reason to play and buy from your FLGSes

Except what if GW is the only FLGS in town? It's hard to see how they can maintain a community if they downplay all the DIY elements of the hobby.

Kanluwen wrote:Hell of a good haul man. Was that stuff out in the store for playing on for awhile? Because there's not much of the normal wear and tear.

Yeah, they were available to play on for ages they are a bit beaten up but nothing too savage or unfixable.

Aduro wrote:Does this apply to Hills as well? Because their selection of Hills they sell is rather barren.

As far as I can tell ALL scratch hills, rivers, boards or anything else are going to have to go.
If staff want different shaped hills they will have to cut down/join together existing citadel hills. If they need plasticard they will have to use movement trays or tank doors.

Somehow this news is worse to me than even the price increase. We knew they were already doing it anyway, but still...disappointing.