Angry GW letter..all I can say is wow...

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**Dark_Angels_Sav**

Okay friend just forwarded this to me and I thought it would be funny to share...hope I not breaking any DakkaDakka rules by posting it. This is a guy in my friend's local gaming group that he said is normally a great guy, but really been put off GW. So the guy sends this to GW, and fowards a copy to all the local gamers asking them that if they agree with his statements that they need to send a similar letter in there own words to GW. ----- Forwarded Message -----

From: *Deleted*
To: "custserv@games-workshop.com" <custserv@games-workshop.com>
Sent: Tuesday, July 26, 2011 5:51 PM
Subject: Your fired.......

Dear Games Workshop,

Your fired! This has to be the absolute worse year of collecting and gaming that I have ever had with you. My decision to stop buying your products and attending your promotions is due to the following reasons;

1. Finecast Minis....or should I say "finecrap". These minis were supposely designed to replace the pewter ones to allow a better product, finer details, better quality, and all while under the guise of using a cheaper material. It has failed! The minis while very good on a weight level, have no other redeeming qualities. The detail levels are not superior to plastic or pewter, mostly they are inferior. The details are plagued with pits inside the model, and you have to try to re-trim almost the whole model, which as you probably know will break way too easily. If this is not bad enough then there is the flexing issue. Anytime the model is placed on its side, gets to hot from being inside a car, or even just picked up the appendages will warp, bend, or break. I had an entire unit melt together after leaving them in the car truck over a weekend. The you have increased the price on the model range to boot. Stop trying to a) pass off an inferior product off as "superior in detail", b) maximize profit to your stockholders by increases the price on models that are made from cheap materials, and c) come up with new ways to cheat your customers out of there money with lies and false claims.

2. GW stores not allowing non-GW models in the store. Well this one wasn't a surprise to me when I heard that GW was banning all non-GW models from its store and events. WAKE UP CALL.....YOU DON'T EVEN MAKE HALF OF THE MODELS IN THE CODEXES!!!! Lets take a look at the Tyranid Codex shall we...hmm....Tervigon...nope no model....hmm...Tyrannofex....nope again.....Harpy....nope....okay maybe its just the Tyranids. Lets go to Space Wolves....Thunderwolf Cav....OMG no model....wow. Lets go to IG....Any Basilisk models besides the basic one...nope. Oh but look....Forgeworld "a GW company"...make them...for a lot more then anyone can really afford to pay. Also, if your not in the UK....your going to have to pay the models cost in shipping! If another company makes a product that you are not providing you claim that "our intellilectual property is being stolen"....omg...you have an idea, sit on it, and when someone makes a model for your customers to use, you get mad...so get off your lazy butts, stop having employees paint up armies and play a game in the shop to feature in the White Dwarf...and make the model line until it is complete. Until you have the entire line of models, stop working on redesigning other lines! Its like your company has decided that its going to make a car...you build the frame, the interior, and all the nice little extras, but when you roll it out, it has no engine, no transmission, and it never will because you move on to designing another car.

3. White Dwarf....you want to save money and get profits back up...kill this worthless rag. You are using this magazine to premiere your new model lines, codexes, and anything else that falls out of your design team bottoms what looks like it might make money. Most of us gamers are going to come to the store, look at the magazine, flip thru it, then put it back on the shelf and wait until the models are released to get a better look at them. Yet you still take this thing to print. Here's an idea.....use your website!!!! Its cheap, easy, and you are going to just reprint what you are putting into the white dwarf into the website after a month or two. Cut out the middleman, make a section in your website for sneak peek articles and such. You respond by saying "well we going to put codexes back into the white dwarf magazine!". Well great...so you going to sell one copy of the thing, it gets copied or scanned into a PDF file, and posted on the internet. Is this illegal? Sure, but you really think that some people are going to stop doing this because of that. You have people that are making a living off making resin copies of your product and selling them on Ebay.

4. Bitz. Well lets see...you put a new codex out with great new gear in it and you know people are going to want it. Things like Long Fang Missile Launchers, Wych Weapons, Blaster, Wings, Razorback Turrets, heck even the heads of some of the models. People are going to want these items in large amounts. So what do you do? You put one of these items into a package...or you put them in a different model all together, cause if someone wants to get the bit...they have to buy a lot to get it. This will work right.....wrong. We trade, we buy them for cheaper on Ebay, or we just copy them. Now can this be avoided and make you a profit...sure it could. You could make special weapon kits, or vehicle kits for everything and they would sell, but that would require you actually put some inital money into the design or better yet, require a lil more thought on spuce design before you rush to make a model line.

5. Game Support. I have never seen a game that has gotten so out of control as far as playability that is requires a degree in English to be able to play. Your rules are getting more complex, and so poorly worded that they are continuous FAQs to answer the basic question on how something works. Every codex released so far for 5th edition including the rulebook is guilty of this. How about this...next codex you release...go to a game store and don't let anyone know you work for GW. Listen to the players playing...then when a rule question comes up, call your own customer support to get the answer, then call again, and again, and again. You will need a scorecard for this, as the answers you get aren't going to be the same everytime. Its bad when the people playing your game have to come up with there own FAQ to address items that you don't for about 4-6 months.

6. Lastly, I have to say that you have utterly failed at Ard Boyz this year. Do you realize that in the Fantasy line you favored some armies over other with the rules? Extra points for having a wizard alive at the end of the game.....dwarfs don't have wizards...oh well, guess you don't get the points. How about the lightning bolt thing wrecking armies that their only advantage in the game is war machines. Next is 40k....as of today, 18 days before the tournament...there are still no scenarios for the tournament. What happened to the "month in advance"? It didn't happen, until 5 days ago you didn't even have a list of where to play!

All these things have come together to force me to say no more. I'm sure you are going to read this and toss it in your trash bin, but I had to say this. It really bugs me that all the time I have spent teaching this game to younger players, and running local events that it would lead to this. As far as the future of GW goes, you need to start listening to your gamers, rather then your stockholders. They are the ones buying your items, and as your annual report shows....they are going down. If you want some advice, I am more then willing to provide it to you, but I really think it would fall on deaf ears.

Sincerely,

Your Average Customer

I agree with him on some points...and he had to be mad since there is a ton of misspellings...what you guys think??

**Kanluwen**

I like how he started off by spelling "You're" wrong and went on ranting from there.

**RatBot**

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. It would be better to calm down, spell/grammar check, and coherently and thoughtfully make the point he's trying to make.

**-Loki-**

I saw the misspelled 'You're' but kept reading. My favorite was putting point 6 about 'Ard Boyz and complaints about it, then signed it with 'Your Average Customer'.

Their average customer has no idea what 'Ard Boyz even is.

**Adam LongWalker**

VOTE! with your wallet!!!

Now if you take all of the anger issues out of the posting I have to agree with points 1 to 5 as I too see the failings of the company to perform.

**TheBlueRedPanda**

Hmmm . . Whilst he does have some good points, the obvious spelling & grammatical errors take away from it's potency.

**dalsiandon**

Kanluwen wrote:I like how he started off by spelling "You're" wrong and went on ranting from there.

QFT...

The rant is awesome and Epic in it's proportions but the spelling errors are numerous. Those are probably the biggest thing that is going to get this letter ignored. The wigs will simply remark "He can't spell, this is some kid playing a prank."

If he really wanted this letter to get attention the first thing he would do is spell check and grammar check the crap out of it. Then he would print it up and sign it with his own name with a Black pen. After that he would buy an envelop (5cents maybe) with his return address on it, drop a 42 cent stamp on it (USA sorry rest of the World but you can convert for your local area and get the idea) put it in his mailbox and then voom.

That would get noticed. This is just email trash from some kid who cannot spell to them.

However I must say that I agree with a lot of what he has to say in his rant.

**augustus5**

Kanluwen wrote:I like how he started off by spelling "You're" wrong and went on ranting from there.

Troll much?

@OP:I'd like to respond to the letter point for point.

1)I don't have any experience working with finecast minis, since I stopped buying GW products before they came out so I can't really comment here.

2)I know that this policy exists, but in my experience with the one GW store that was open for a few years in St. Louis, they didn't really enforce it. I just wouldn't play in a store that enforced silly rules like that. As far as them not producing a full line of models for each codex, it sucks. But what can we really do? Again, we can play with our converted models in places that don't bar their use.

3)WD is terrible, and has been for years. I would much rather see it become more like its former self rather than going the way of the buffalo. WD was at one point, a really good read, with good articles and rules supplements.

4)The bitz included in most boxes are maddening. The fact that GW stopped selling bitz really put me off. I would love to see GW begin selling bits, or at least selling sprues with commonly used weapons to supplement the boxed sets.

5)I agree that the rules are not the best written, and the FAQs don't alway answer the most pressing questions, but I've made due with that for a long time. A nice compromise is getting your game group to accept something like the INAT FAQ. Even though I don't agree with everything it says, it's nice to at least have a solid FAQ that answers most of the pressing questions that can arise during a game.

6)It would be nice to have more notice for scenarios for big tourneys like Ard' Boyz but what can you do? As long as some people don't have early access to them before others then it still should produce a fair tournament.

While some of the things that GW has done in the past have caused me to not purchase new products from them any more, I still love the game and the fluff, and will play with the models I have, and models and kits I pick up second hand.

**Aerethan**

augustus5 wrote:
Kanluwen wrote:I like how he started off by spelling "You're" wrong and went on ranting from there.

Troll much?

Kanluwen is easily one of the bigger GW fanboys so it's no surprise he'd nitpick a GW hate letter.

Not meant as an insult, merely an observation.

**candy.man**

The letter mentions some good points and all in all it was a good read. I’ll have to reiterate “the vote with your wallet” point that other posters have mentioned. I’d recommend anyone wanting to write an “angry GW letter” to list any non GW purchases as a result of their negligence (the more significant and frequent the purchases are the better).

I’d also have to say negative feedback like this won’t do any good….yet. In a few years time when GW have exhausted their ability to cut costs, raise prices and generate short term revenue (to make their financial reports look better), the point will start to drive home.

**KeithGatchalian**

Good Luck

**theQuanz**

Guys, I think he is angry.
Wrong...no.

Angry...probably.

**Brother SRM**

Reading that gave me a seizure. The quality of writing is terrible, and nobody will take that seriously. GW gets letters like this already, and frankly they don't really care.

**mikhaila**

theQuanz wrote:Guys, I think he is angry.
Wrong...no.

Angry...probably.

Wrong..yes. In that he's wasting his time if he wants anyone to read his rant. If you insult someone, don't expect them to care enough to read through your angry rant.

Angry, sure. But I'm confused, since it's not like this stuff all occurred at once, did he just have some nerd rage epiphany one morning and decide to go on a rampage?

**daedalus**

- Removed by insaniak. Don't do this. -

**Ralin Givens**

dalsiandon wrote:
Kanluwen wrote:I like how he started off by spelling "You're" wrong and went on ranting from there.

QFT...

The rant is awesome and Epic in it's proportions but the spelling errors are numerous. Those are probably the biggest thing that is going to get this letter ignored. The wigs will simply remark "He can't spell, this is some kid playing a prank."

If he really wanted this letter to get attention the first thing he would do is spell check and grammar check the crap out of it. Then he would print it up and sign it with his own name with a Black pen. After that he would buy an envelop (5cents maybe) with his return address on it, drop a 42 cent stamp on it (USA sorry rest of the World but you can convert for your local area and get the idea) put it in his mailbox and then voom.

That would get noticed. This is just email trash from some kid who cannot spell to them.

However I must say that I agree with a lot of what he has to say in his rant.

That seems like alot of effort and money for someone who clearly does not want a hobby....

**Slarg232**

I agree with the first five points, and the point of him making too many spelling errors for this to be taken seriously.

But anyway.... Yeah, I'm heading over to Warmachine, hopefully PP is different/better.

You know, I might have to do that whole idea of printing out a letter, signing it with my name, and sending it in all formal like. Because I can.

**dalsiandon**

Ralin Givens wrote:
dalsiandon wrote:
Kanluwen wrote:I like how he started off by spelling "You're" wrong and went on ranting from there.

QFT...

The rant is awesome and Epic in it's proportions but the spelling errors are numerous. Those are probably the biggest thing that is going to get this letter ignored. The wigs will simply remark "He can't spell, this is some kid playing a prank."

If he really wanted this letter to get attention the first thing he would do is spell check and grammar check the crap out of it. Then he would print it up and sign it with his own name with a Black pen. After that he would buy an envelop (5cents maybe) with his return address on it, drop a 42 cent stamp on it (USA sorry rest of the World but you can convert for your local area and get the idea) put it in his mailbox and then voom.

That would get noticed. This is just email trash from some kid who cannot spell to them.

However I must say that I agree with a lot of what he has to say in his rant.

That seems like alot of effort and money for someone who clearly does not want a hobby....

That's true $1000.00 on plastic mini figs but 50 cents for a stamp and envelop is too much...lol.

**Ralin Givens**

Well then there's the money for the ink, calligraphy lessons, nice paper, walking/driving to the post office, a new pen to write with, wax seal, ring for your wax seal.....it all adds up!

**Pael**

I love these threads it goes to show the more we see of them the more people are actually discontented with GW.

**Bobino**

"Uhh... I left my plastc things in a hot car and they melted because I'm irresponsible, WTF Games-Workshop?! Why aren't you plastic toys melt proof?!!?!?!?!?!??!"

Seriously guy, they will laugh at you're (sic) letter and not consider a word of it, because it sounds like a ten year old child wrote it.

You want a letter to have any impact, take your time and proof-read.

**Stormrider**

Bobino wrote:"Uhh... I left my plastc things in a hot car and they melted because I'm irresponsible, WTF Games-Workshop?! Why aren't you plastic toys melt proof?!!?!?!?!?!??!"

Seriously guy, they will laugh at you're (sic) letter and not consider a word of it, because it sounds like a ten year old child wrote it.

You want a letter to have any impact, take your time and proof-read.

I agree with this, at least try to sound like an adult.

And please, don't leave stuff you care about in a hot car.

**timofeo**

I agree on the note of every Unit designed should have a model, this is a very important matter. I always thought they should do BITS bags for armies that you could buy to try and get the gear you need.

**nkelsch**

I had an entire unit melt together after leaving them in the car truck over a weekend

Never happened. All objective tests by multiple people on the net show finecast doesn't melt in this way. It actually becomes rock hard at extreme high temps.

To latch on to intellectual dishonestly in this letter shows a lack of integrity. Other 'angry letter' threads were actually somewhat respectful and didn't resort to exaggeration or lying to try to make a point.

Where is the picture of the guy with "oh this thread again" when you need him?

**sennacherib**

You know the spelling isnt really what should be at issue. the issue are the points that he is raising and the question of their validity. I would say that i agree with all of them but points 2,3 and 4 are really accurate. If GW is so hard up for cash all they have to do is market the things that people want.

It seems like they could use finecast to produce bitz packs much easier than cutting a mold for plastics or for metals.

The most cutting of the points that he made concerned the lack of tervigon, terorfex etc in the nids dex. I realise that the nids dex is a total flop. I am selling my nids due to the extreamly poor rules provided for them by CrudyAce. No doubt this has something to do with the lack of models for the line but still, they could have at least made one kit for both of these models and sold a Ton of them befor people realised how crappy the new dex was.

and on a side note. Maybe he is ten years old and thats why his letter reads the way that it does. You know nothing about anyone here except the look of their avatar.

**Norsehawk**

There are some good points in that rant,however the shaky writing style will cause the message to lose a lot of the impact it could have.

First,the spelling errors really bring it down. Spellcheck and proofreading really needs to be done on any correspondence with a company. Never give them a reason to circular file your letter right off of the bat. Also, watch the tone of the letter. Going on a full bore attack from the starting gate will get the letter junked quick.you want to persuade them, not berate them. Another method to get your letter read is to send it through the mail. Not electronically. Email is super easy to erase, often it is only read by a both that returns an automatic response, never to be seen by human eyes.

Buy a single share of the company's stock. Starting off your letter with "As a shareholder ..." adds a ton of impact. And adds considerable weight to your argument.

That said, while at this point in my gaming career, my painting is actually funding my own hobby, gw's business practices do annoy me greatly in several areas that were touched upon in your friend's letter. I usually only buy White Dwarf if it has a particularly good painting article in it. Huge gaping holes in the model lines hurts many armies in both fantasy and 40k.

**Dark_Angels_Sav**

Okay..think this one is going into the record books as the most comments from any post I have every made...I just wish it was my letter that was getting the comments. I do agree that the guy...who I found out is like 20, needed to proof read a lot of his stuff. I thought the "Your Fired" thing was hilarious too. But the more times I read it, it does seem to bring out some good points. I think point #6 is just whining, he probably played dwarfs at Ard Boyz and got hosed by a few of the rules..something most of us can adjust in our list to prevent. So I going to leave that one alone, but the other ones I did have some comments on...

Point #1: Finecast isn't really that great...I bought one finecast model and I don't think I going to buy anymore. Its took forever to clean up the model, and I was really worried when doing it that I would destroy some of the details. The cost thing I really didn't like, since they are making it cheaper to produce, why did it get more expensive to buy? They should have done like Chaos Daemons and just reproduced the models in plastic rather then resin. As for the melting thing, I'm not sure. I know my DE Archon's sword I am having to constantly bend back straight. I have seen the air bubble thing, but GW replaced them.

Point #2: I don't have a GW store in Savannah, so we really don't care about the "only GW model" rule. I do agree with not producing the models line though. It does seem like they rush to the next army and just forget to go back and add finish out the last army line-up. It sometimes feels like they are trying to pull a "newest and greatest" army thing over on us, sell a bunch of core items, and then release the next "newest and greatest" army.

Point #3: Never bought a White Dwarf. If I want painting tips or new information on upcoming releases..I come here.

Point #4: This is a home run in my book. They need to start making weapon packs. It would make them money, cause I know how much time I waste trying to trade bits and weapons, and some of them are almost impossible to get the number you need. I wanted all my wyches to have the helmet heads, but not paying the asking prices on ebay for them.

Point #5: Another good point. You can call GW 10 times and get 10 different answers, and it takes them way too long to get an FAQ out. Then when the FAQ does come out, it still doesn't answer all of my questions. I tried to get GW to send me an email about Doom guy in Tyranids codex affecting units in a vehicle so I could show proof, but they won't send anything, they just say "thanks for your question...for us to answer it, please call customer support".

In general I think GW is losing touch with their customer base, and I hope it changes cause I really like playing 40k. I might write and I mean write a letter to GW based on his points. Just to see if it does anything. If not, well, there are other games out there.

**Waaagh_Gonads**

I don't need to send them a letter.

My FLGS is getting FOW in so I'll be starting a DAK force and painting the mass of GW models I already own.

I also enjoy spamming their facebook page with witty diatribes.

**dalsiandon**

Ralin Givens wrote:Well then there's the money for the ink, calligraphy lessons, nice paper, walking/driving to the post office, a new pen to write with, wax seal, ring for your wax seal.....it all adds up!

Well if he used a computer, he doesn't need calligraphy, even real nice resume paper isl 500 sheets for $10 (again american), in the US the postman comes to your house or place of business to collect the mail so he wouldn't even have to leave his parents house, a bic pen is 5 cents or 20 for $1 just to sign it, as for the wax ring and seal, well....yeah it adds up your right,....

hahaha...

love it.

**marielle**

If we use this template are we supposed to use green ink?