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.

first of all, they ARE a savings, tactical/chaos marines are $3.50 USD per fig vs $2.66. But more important, none of us are the target audience. Same thing happened back when preiview pics of Battle for Maccrage snap-marines first hit the net, "oh my god, GW is ruining plastics" "these are so horrible, I need to stock up on current ones!". These aren't replacing current bosets and they certainly aren't for veterans looking for cool bits. They're for impulse buys, pure and simple.

We get it all the time at my shop, kids come in and see people playing games and want to grab a few figures just to play with or (more often than not) mommy drops off Little Billy for some free day care and gives him some money for lunch and something small to shut him up. After a little while of watching people play he starts looking around and asks what he can buy for $10 or even $20. There used to be a lot of blisters to point them to, but now aside from a very few it's just boxes of troops for $30+ that they can't afford. These are perfect little "well, you can always use a couple more troops" sales.

>>>> If third-world manufacturers of green plastic armymen can get their poses right, why can't one of the world's largest producers of fine gaming miniatures do so?


Most third-world produced green plastic army men are pantographically reduced scale copies of original 1/32 scale Airfix and Matchbox figures.

These aren't just for kids. At the store I used to game at they required a purchase to play. Well you can't buy a squad box every week so I ended up with a lot of crappy blisters.

A $10 or so troop set would be perfect.

Totally agree on the poses through, the Cadian look especially awkward. A gun at the shoulder would be so easy to sculpt and cast, I can't see why they didn't do that.

Hehe nicely put Pariah!

I like the idea they are going for here, but I am not terribly impressed with the implementation. I think if they could have knocked the price to 1.25$ a figure I would be inclined to grab some, even if I didn't love the models. Maybe it is just because Sisters don't come in full squad sized boxes, but I always find myself wanting a spare 3-4 guys as filler for units. As long as your army wasn't ALL these guys, they wouldn't look too bad. If one or two guardsmen out of ten are not really in a shooting pose, it doesn't look bad.

However, at least for me, I would rather drop 35$ for 20 and get all the extra bits and the ability to glue them together as I like, than save .15$ per figure and not get that. Kind of a shame really.

Now, if they were to make weapons packs, say with 1 of every Imperium special weapon, or a combi-weapon pack, and sell those for say 3-5$, I would snatch those up left and right. I wouldn't even realize I was doing it.

Kid_Kyoto wrote:These aren't just for kids. At the store I used to game at they required a purchase to play. Well you can't buy a squad box every week so I ended up with a lot of crappy blisters.

Not to veer off topic, but they literally made you buy something before you could use a table? Even if you bought a $300 army there they week before? I guess it's a good way to keep out rifraff, but I'd rather just impose a table fee (one local store charged $10 a week for club room).

Polonius wrote:

Kid_Kyoto wrote:These aren't just for kids. At the store I used to game at they required a purchase to play. Well you can't buy a squad box every week so I ended up with a lot of crappy blisters.

Not to veer off topic, but they literally made you buy something before you could use a table? Even if you bought a $300 army there they week before? I guess it's a good way to keep out rifraff, but I'd rather just impose a table fee (one local store charged $10 a week for club room).

I'll play on the floor of my apartment before I pay to play. Just not going to happen.

Le Grognard wrote:

I'll play on the floor of my apartment before I pay to play. Just not going to happen.

I don't mind paying for a service or good, I'd just rather pay for it straight up rather then bundle it with some sort of compulsory purchase.

Le Grognard wrote:

Polonius wrote:

Kid_Kyoto wrote:These aren't just for kids. At the store I used to game at they required a purchase to play. Well you can't buy a squad box every week so I ended up with a lot of crappy blisters.

Not to veer off topic, but they literally made you buy something before you could use a table? Even if you bought a $300 army there they week before? I guess it's a good way to keep out rifraff, but I'd rather just impose a table fee (one local store charged $10 a week for club room).

I'll play on the floor of my apartment before I pay to play. Just not going to happen.

It was a blister or $5 IIRC and it was NYC. You couldn't play a game of tiddly winks on the floor of my apartment.

And space of course was a lot more expensive.

In DC there's literally no where within the beltway you can play these days, everything requires a 45-1 hour drive.

Here in Beijing the club just lost their space so we'll see what happens.

Kid_Kyoto wrote:

In DC there's literally no where within the beltway you can play these days, everything requires a 45-1 hour drive.

Here in Beijing the club just lost their space so we'll see what happens.

Depending on where one lives of course. I have 4 stores within 15 minutes of my house (Woodbridge VA). and add in about 6 more if I don't mind the 45min-1hr drive..

NorthernVa and Maryland are hopping with stores currently. and SouthernVA(Richmond and south of that) are doing pretty well too.

Unfortunately if you live in DC proper your options are NOVA or Maryland. Better not to live in DC anyways as the two other states are cheaper to live in..

You can't do anything in DC that doesn't involve drugs or the mayor, or the mayor doing drugs. Everything else they squeeze the joy out of...

Even here in the wilds of NE PA we have a plethora of stores. Finding them can be hard, but with a GPS, a bloodhound and a divining rod, you are practically falling all over them.

Montgomery County, MD has lost one of the two main game stores. Dream Wizards is still around, but the other store, Other Realms, lost their lease and went under a while ago. Ticked off a friend as he had a lot of extremely well-painted Tyranids in their display case...

OK, upon reflection there are places within the beltway, Compleat Strategist and there's one GW shop near Springfiled mall (formerly in the mall).

Anyway the point being, life in the big city is not conductive to games that require a lot of space.

I saw the cadians are up on the GW US site $8 for 5. Not bad at all.

Kid_Kyoto wrote:OK, upon reflection there are places within the beltway, Compleat Strategist and there's one GW shop near Springfiled mall (formerly in the mall).

Anyway the point being, life in the big city is not conductive to games that require a lot of space.
.

Oh, I wasn't trying to be argumentative, I actually agree with you point completely. I was merely pointing out that the DC metro area has seen quite a bit of growth lately. Although the standard GW stores are still tight when it comes to space..

And yeah the Beltway and within, with studio or apartment rent as high as it's ever been for basically a front room whihc double for a bedroom and a kitchen that doubles for a bathroom, you really don't have room to lounge, let alone play anything except for a few DVD's on your laptop or tv..

I'm planning to grab a couple of boxes of the cadians to just mix in with my other men.

I think these small boxes of troops are a good thing. I'd love to see them done for all the armies.

Ever build a special list and wish you just had 2 or 3 more men for a certain unit, but you don't want to blow $35 on a whole box of them when you don't need em all? Grab yourself a marine 3-pack and you're all set

As far as them being there for the little kids with $10 to blow cash on, that's a good thing too.. it makes em money even if it's just pennies in the grand scheme of things.. but it could be the start of someone new getting into the hobby and growing to love it and contribute a lot over the years (the next gav thorpe could be just waiting for these noobfigs to come out!). Or worst case they'll never play with em and one day the figs will appear on ebay for like $5