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Yes, there is a lot more to GW than what we *both* are saying, carmachu.  You can say I have "forgotten" if you'd like (though that's kind of bush league, as I've agreed that they have notable failings in the last few years).  I'm just not pretending they did nothing positive for the hobby before that.

They are a business. Businesses aren't people. They don't lie. They make business decisions and then sell those decisions.  They dumped squats as a business decision.

For each of those screw-ups you mention, they brought something original and new to the hobby that no other company did before.

And they killed internet sales, what, two or three years ago? After they had over two decades in the business. It was a terrible business decision, and they are paying for it. But it hardly is their entire history.

I don't want to take this in another direction, but since I work for an e-commerce company I thought I'd pitch in. First, they didn't "kill" internet sales, they tried to kill internet discounting. That is a good business decision, even if it pisses you off that you can't buy your stuff 20-30% off anymore. Stopping the heavy discounters encourages people to actually buy stuff in their and independent brick and mortar stores, rather than using the stores as a place to game and browse and then buying online.

Just for example, I have never purchased Warmachine in a store. I have only ever bought from The Warstore. Why wouldn't I? I get it cheaper with the entire selection. But that is not good for PP who needs distribution to stay alive, not just one Internet Retailer.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

Ozy, I keep going back and forth with you.  One post I'm defending you and the next I'm pointing out the stupid crap you're trying to sell.  I like it when people write about this topic as if they know what they are saying.

Games Buckshot attempted to kill online retailers because they were a direct competition to their own online store.  It has little to nothing to do with getting people to buy from brick and mortar stores.  It's completely transparent to GW how retailers sell their stock, through the internet or across the counter.

Privateer Press doesn't own its own chain of brick and mortar stores and its on-line shopping cart is exclusively offered as a bitz-service.  There is no conflict between any of PP's services and online retailers/brick and mortar stores.  Privateer Press gets it's cut whether the whole world buys from Neil or if everyone buys from their FLGS.  Matt Wilson couldn't care less where you buy your figs.  He has an interest in keeping his product visible in FLGS's (just as GW does) but that's about as far as it gets.

I appologize for the completely off-topic post, by the way.

Godspeed to the McVeys.  Mike's been around for a long time, I'm sure we'll see him, again.

I have to disagree slightly. I work with over 300 brands in my job and I have seen many of them struggle with online discounters and none of them have their own B&M stores. Does GW stand to gain by killing online discounters, of course. But to say that is their only reason for doing so doesn't tell the whole picture.

You can bet that FLGS's are glad that there are no more online discounters of GW products.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

EDIT: This is a good topic for discussion, and I'd love to show you that specific strategy of GW is actually good for the industry as a whole, but it is off-topic for this thread.  So this is my last post on that subject in this thread and hopefully steers it back on topic.

What they tried to do, and what they did are two different things.

I work retail. You CANT kill internet commerce. Its here to stay, you can minimize it by settling limits on the discounts online, and enforce it, as they do in my industry.

What they did, effectively, was kill sales. I can back that up by pointing to their own records in the US and show how badly sales have tanked afterwards and since, in unit sales. A slight bump up in profit in 2004, but overall, they KILLED internet sales. Period.

They attempted to save brick and mortar, but again, looking over their records....thats a flimsy excuse at best. They sell themselves online....and have their own stores to compete against many brick and mortars, moving into the same market close by in many cases.

Their own records show their attempt hurt, rather than helped, a good deal of the stores....wasnt it last years records that showed a good number of them closing?

Doubtful. I know my last FLAGS was pissed, because once the ban went into place, it effectively killed their LotR sales.

Again, we can debate this in another thread if you like.

Back on topic. Does anyone know why Mike McVey left GW?

Ozymandias, King of Kings

In 1997, Mike realized that he'd achieved pretty much everything he wanted to do in the miniature painting world, so he changed direction and became a miniatures designer. "It was a pretty logical step, as I'd always done a lot of converting and modeling," he explains. "Since then, I've concentrated on design exclusively and haven't picked up a brush in two years. I'm just starting out in the world of miniatures sculpting in a lot of ways, and I have a lot to achieve. I've made some pretty good miniatures so far, but nothing that I'm really one hundred percent happy with. The closest would be the Eldar miniatures I made for GW just before I left."

In 1999, Mike joined Wizards of the Coast's new miniatures division. Visa issues have delayed his move to Seattle, but in the meantime he?s writing a series of painting articles for Dragon magazine and sculpting some of the new D&D miniatures. "It's great because it's like going back to my roots, when I first started playing D&D and painting those miniatures as a kid," he says. "There are a lot of exciting things planned for the D&D minis and I'm looking forward to being part of them!"

WOTC article

I think he wanted to design minis and GW let him, and then didn't want him to anymore.

btw: Mcvey was not the customer service front. Perhaps he and Aly were the "Heavy
Metal" of PP, but the legwork for customer service was whomever ran that frontdesk
of their's.

Posted By carmachu on 06/13/2007 2:50 PM

You can bet that FLGS's are glad that there are no more online discounters of GW products.

Doubtful. I know my last FLAGS was pissed, because once the ban went into place, it effectively killed their LotR sales.

Ok, I'm confused. How did the ban kill off a local stores LOTR sales?

And hell, it isn't much of a ban. Warstore and everyone else still sells GW at a discount. All that got taken away was the shopping cart, and now you have to phone up Warstore or wherever to get it.

Posted By mikhaila on 06/13/2007 5:23 PM    And hell, it isn't much of a ban. Warstore and everyone else still sells GW at a discount. All that got taken away was the shopping cart, and now you have to phone up Warstore or wherever to get it.

Neil's a pretty nice guy, too.

Just after the Games Workshop internet coup went into effect, I phoned up The Warstore and made a huge 40k purchase.  Just out of spite.

In retrospect, I should have probably thought about things before I made my empassioned purchase.  GW still got my money, after all...

Tehy sold most, if not all LotR their their online store. My ex-FLAGS wasnt just minigames, they sold alot of stuff, a great deal online.

That was the main channel that LotR went...when you couldnt point and click and had to call or email....that killed it.

As the saying goes: "If you want to improve GW buy Warmachine"

Posted By malfred on 06/13/2007 4:50 PM
I think he wanted to design minis and GW let him, and then didn't want him to anymore.     

After Chaplain Lemartes no-one wanted him to design figures any more.

The story went that GW wanted him to go back to 'eavy metal and making dioramas after seeing his output while Mike wanted to keep sculpting so he left GW.

Posted By t-tauri on 06/18/2007 2:15 PM

Posted By malfred on 06/13/2007 4:50 PM
I think he wanted to design minis and GW let him, and then didn't want him to anymore.     

After Chaplain Lemartes no-one wanted him to design figures any more.

The story went that GW wanted him to go back to 'eavy metal and making dioramas after seeing his output while Mike wanted to keep sculpting so he left GW.

I find it hard to believe that a company that still employs Gary Morley would ask any of their sculptors to stop designing figures.

Why does Michael Bay get to keep on making movies?  And why does Gary Morley get to keep on sculpting minis?

"Cause Pearl Harbor sucked, and I miss you. da da da DA da, da da da DA da..."

"Cause Dark Eldar suck, and I miss you..."

Ozymandias, King of Kings

While Morley has definitely produced some fugly models in his day, in all fairness he's made some nice ones as well. Off the top of my head I can think of the current Orion, and the latest armoured sons of Elrond from LOTR.

And Michael Bay made The Rock which I enjoyed, but it doesn't make him a great director. 

Ozymandias, King of Kings

Gary Morley has produced some horrid figures granted-Nagash and the metal chaos possessed to name a couple of his worst offences. On the other hand some of his properly scaled figures for LotR are very good and by all accounts he's great at training up the new sculptors.

Posted By Clarence on 06/20/2007 7:00 AM
While Morley has definitely produced some fugly models in his day, in all fairness he's made some nice ones as well. Off the top of my head I can think of the current Orion, and the latest armoured sons of Elrond from LOTR.

I think trick is to find a sculptor who can produce the current Orion and the latest armoured soms of Elrond while at the same time NOT producing the metal Chaos possessed.  If only such a sculptor existed...

To Abby and Ozy: Don't get me wrong, a scupltor is not justified in making poor sculpts if they occaisionaly make good ones too, but all we ever hear about Morley are his (many) terrible scuplts, and we seem to ignore his successes, which I think is unfair. That is all.

Fair enough. I'll take a look at his LOTR stuff. I'm not that familiar with that line.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

His LOTR stuff is pretty nice. If nothing else, it's worth looking at the full line of LOTR just to catch some of the nicer sculpting jobs. A few are meh, but quite a lot of them are very well done, very nice scale and proportions. We just spent a month 'altering' about 3 dozen various LOTR models, chopping off weapons and adding beer mugs, and other drinking accessories to run a bit of a different LOTR scenario at Baltimore games day.

It not his fault his sculpts for the possesed were crap.. ITs GW fault for producing them. Cmon people if we are playing the blame game at least try and get it right