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GW's prices have gone to the skies. Sorry if I am going off on a rant, but for Christ's sake why does a 5-man devastator squad cost 46$, when I can buy a 10-man tactical squad for 40$.
I have just gotten fed up with the pricing of models. Same thing goes for HQ's. Honestly I have seen so many people go over to WM/H because of this. GW wants new players in the hobby, but are shooting themselves in the foot by increasing the prices of models. Let's be honest here we know they have no business ethic at all shown by their practices. If you got any problems with GW just post replys below. Sorry again for the same argument and the rant just had to get this of my chest.

Yeah, it's actually kind of sad to watch them so deliberately and unknowingly driving the company off a cliff.

Canknotstandmods/admins wrote:
Why does a 5-man devastator squad cost 46$, when I can buy a 10-man tactical squad for 40$?

Because they are both 3 sprue kits, and the Dev kit will no doubt be a smaller run as SM players will usually buy no more than two (in order to get 4 of each heavy weapon.) It doesn't matter that there are 10 dudes in one and 5 in the other when the Dev kit has 12 heavy weapons and a bevy of special weapons in the place of the other 5. The cost is based on the number of sprues and the amount of kits produced, not some arbitrary amount based on how many dudes it makes. GW knows it will sell far more Tac squad boxes than Dev Squad boxes, so it makes fewer Dev Squad boxes and has to charge more to make them profitable. Hence the $6 difference in costs.

Canknotstandmods/admins wrote:
GW's prices have gone to the skies. Sorry if I am going off on a rant, but for Christ's sake why does a 5-man devastator squad cost 46$, when I can buy a 10-man tactical squad for 40$.

Because GW continue to think it is better to have a chain of 1 man stores eating more than half of their profits than to simply be nice to FLGS owners and have them push their product.

To be honest I think the new devastator kit is better than the old one. For a handful of dollars more you get 1 extra missile launcher, multi melta and 2 gravcannons with grav amps as well as a cherub holding a multi melta and some more ornate decorative tidbits.

Wouldn't consider it a price markup

 Sir Arun wrote:
To be honest I think the new devastator kit is better than the old one. For a handful of dollars more you get 1 extra missile launcher, multi melta and 2 gravcannons with grav amps as well as a cherub holding a multi melta and some more ornate decorative tidbits.

Wouldn't consider it a price markup

It is a price markup, but a marginal one. 10 years ago it took four $25 Dev kits to make 20 Devs with 4 matching weapons. Now 2 Dev boxes and a Tac box costs you $132 for the same amount. 32% markup over 10 years isn't bad.

Canknotstandmods/admins wrote:
GW's prices have gone to the skies. Sorry if I am going off on a rant, but for Christ's sake why does a 5-man devastator squad cost 46$, when I can buy a 10-man tactical squad for 40$.
I have just gotten fed up with the pricing of models. Same thing goes for HQ's. Honestly I have seen so many people go over to WM/H because of this. GW wants new players in the hobby, but are shooting themselves in the foot by increasing the prices of models. Let's be honest here we know they have no business ethic at all shown by their practices. If you got any problems with GW just post replys below. Sorry again for the same argument and the rant just had to get this of my chest.

You're not alone. I have several friends who are very interested in playing 40k but choose not to get started due to cost of entry & the pricing of models. Its pretty damn expensive even if you make an above average income. I don't even know how Games Workshop remains in business at this point. In the past 10 years, all but a handful of FLGS that carried GW in my area have gone out of business or no longer carry GW products. Very few new players are entering the hobby since exposure to it has been almost cut off entirely directly related to tons of FLGS shutting down. Whoever at GW decided it was a good idea to screw over FLGS & try to isolate all sales via their online site or GW stores completely f'd the future of their company. They should have done the exact opposite. Give incentives for FLGS to carry their products, give them discounts, get as much exposure to the hobby as possible.

If you see Warhammer visions a glossy lounge room magazine, then you clearly see that GW superior quality miniatures are for the suave high class socialite that goes with his Porsche Cayenne to the GW shop with his army painted by a high class painting service, playing a fun game while revealing his current ventures on the stock market.

GW luxury items are clearly not for those low income peasants!

Commissar Benny wrote:
Whoever at GW decided it was a good idea to screw over FLGS & try to isolate all sales via their online site or GW stores completely f'd the future of their company. They should have done the exact opposite. Give incentives for FLGS to carry their products, give them discounts, get as much exposure to the hobby as possible.

That decision, sadly, was made by the players when they began buying their models from online retailers (many operating out of their garage) offering 20-25% discounts. Once the FLGSs were no longer the primary source of 40k sales, and in store games were no longer the best advertisement for the game, they shifted toward being the main source themselves. This wasn't GWs doing, it was the gamers looking for a bargain.

 Jehan-reznor wrote:
If you see Warhammer visions a glossy lounge room magazine, then you clearly see that GW superior quality miniatures are for the suave high class socialite that goes with his Porsche Cayenne to the GW shop with his army painted by a high class painting service, playing a fun game while revealing his current ventures on the stock market.

GW luxury items are clearly not for those low income peasants!

There is a big jump to being able to afford $50-$100 or so a month on a hobby to being able to afford a Porche Cayenne

To answer the original question, simply look at the sprues for the Tactical Squad and the Devastator Squad. Them Dev kits come with a lotta stuff, man. Space Marines players have known for decades now that kits are only really parts that you use to interchange with other kits to make what you want. Since you have 2 of every heavy weapon and a bazillion Devastator heads, you can combine it with other kits or even old, unused bits, to make more "free" devastators. The ability to make 5 models is only reflective of the number of the upper torsos and legs, something which most SM players have lots of.

For example, buy an assault squad, BOOM. 5 extra upper torsos and 5 extra backpacks. Buy a command squad, get 6 legs for 5 models. Upgrade sprues, extra torso fronts. And on and on.

Personally, what I look for in a box is how many of the core items that I want from the box is in it. For example, heavy weapons, jump packs, special weapons, special pistols, 1h weapons, that kind of thing.

 Massawyrm wrote:

Commissar Benny wrote:
Whoever at GW decided it was a good idea to screw over FLGS & try to isolate all sales via their online site or GW stores completely f'd the future of their company. They should have done the exact opposite. Give incentives for FLGS to carry their products, give them discounts, get as much exposure to the hobby as possible.

That decision, sadly, was made by the players when they began buying their models from online retailers (many operating out of their garage) offering 20-25% discounts. Once the FLGSs were no longer the primary source of 40k sales, and in store games were no longer the best advertisement for the game, they shifted toward being the main source themselves. This wasn't GWs doing, it was the gamers looking for a bargain.

I agree 100% that players who began buying their models online looking for deals did contribute to the decline of FLGS. Despite the decline in sales however, I still feel that FLGS were & are the best advertising source that GW has going for them. Where else are players going to be exposed to the 40k tabletop if not in a FLGS? Its not on TV. There are barely any advertisements in ads on the net. Your average young gamer is never going to be exposed to it unless they are going to like a Warhammer event referred by someone else who is interested in 40k. There is like no exposure to this hobby.

Despite players being to blame for the decline of FLGS, GW also played a large part in it. I started at the beginning of 3rd edition & even then the hobby was extremely expensive to get into. While I can understand models cost more to make back then because they were pewter metal, I still thought it was crazy for them to be charging like $10.00-20.00 for like 2 IG infantry models. If GW's target market is young to middle aged adults, they need to adjust the prices to appeal to that demographic. With the economy as it is nowadays, just about all the teenaged kids I know barely have enough money to buy gas & are saving what little money they can to put towards outrageous tuition costs.

Online sales is the reason why other games have started having a chance to get into the market. Before online sales, GW wasn't just the behemoth they are today, they completely eclipsed any other game system.

So yeah, GW's sales have suffered. Sort of in the same way that any monopoly suffers when it suddenly gets competition.

Commissar Benny wrote:
If GW's target market is young to middle aged adults, they need to adjust the prices to appeal to that demographic. With the economy as it is nowadays, just about all the teenaged kids I know barely have enough money to buy gas & are saving what little money they can to put towards outrageous tuition costs.

Three points. One I agree with your assessment of the storefront model. I never liked that GW backed away from supporting it, but I understand the thinking. The exposure to 40k is now coming from third party video games and word of mouth. They're counting on the viral nature of this content rather than the dwindling storefront sales model. Though, I would argue that people walking into a storefront WANT to spend money. People who hear about the game other ways are not so likely inclined.

Two, teenagers and thirty-somethings have the largest disposable income of any group. If you're looking to fleece someone, those are your targets. The push toward teenagers is coupled with the marketing fact that males tend to revisit and stay in love with the things they loved as teens. Getting teens on 40k early means they are likely to return 10-20 years later as well. It's a long term strategy that has paid off dividends for decades. Hence all of the "Hey! returning player needs advice," threads on every forum. Constantly.

And three, the cost of entry is the thrust of these cheap new sets. Here, have two armies for $125! And here, for $135 you can get even more stuff for one of your armies! You hooked yet? Here's an $85 model that you'll need three of to win consistently. Don't they look SUH-WEET???

 Massawyrm wrote:

Commissar Benny wrote:
Whoever at GW decided it was a good idea to screw over FLGS & try to isolate all sales via their online site or GW stores completely f'd the future of their company. They should have done the exact opposite. Give incentives for FLGS to carry their products, give them discounts, get as much exposure to the hobby as possible.

That decision, sadly, was made by the players when they began buying their models from online retailers (many operating out of their garage) offering 20-25% discounts. Once the FLGSs were no longer the primary source of 40k sales, and in store games were no longer the best advertisement for the game, they shifted toward being the main source themselves. This wasn't GWs doing, it was the gamers looking for a bargain.

It was.

GW knew exactly what they were doing when they began to allow online retailers to offer their products not at just 20-25% discounts, but up to 40% in some cases. True, it was the era when the LotR game hit the shelves and GW wanted to expand business, but still, GW knew perfectly well what would happen to physical retailers who in the best of cases were only allowed to offer 10% discount.

Due to their insane business perspective, GW began to consider independent retailers as some sort of 'enemy' they had to bully and denigrate in order to promote their own official stores. They still do to this day. It's one of the factors that will end up biting them in the ass really hard.

http://www.games-workshop.com/en-NZ/Devastator-squad-web-bundle

2x Devastator squads for the unbeatable price of $259. Alternatively you can buy the 5-man box for the very competitive $92. That's only $18.40 per model! Unbeatable value!

Regional pricing for no reason other than "we can so we did". Rather unsurprisingly I see a lot of Chinese resin models in this country.

Commissar Benny wrote:I agree 100% that players who began buying their models online looking for deals did contribute to the decline of FLGS

You can say the same thing about a large percentage of brick and mortar stores. For example, in my work (photography) the Internet has dramatically reduced the price of equipment, especially for the amateur photographer and budding professional photographer. To compete, brick-and-mortar stores have had to reduce their prices to nearly the price of Internet sellers, which is very hard to do. In this sense, Games Workshop is doing local stores a favor by being the only online seller, and selling at full retail. That's assuming that local stores sell at a discount, of course.

Commissar Benny wrote:With the economy as it is nowadays, just about all the teenaged kids I know barely have enough money to buy gas & are saving what little money they can to put towards outrageous tuition costs.

I agree with you that teenaged kids now have a real struggle with tuition. They take out student loans to pay for just the basics, and spend the little bit of extra money they might earn or that is gifted to them to go out with friends here and there. But how does dropping prices, even to 2005 prices, help Games Workshop? These student's basically can't afford to pay anything, because they have no extra money.

 Massawyrm wrote:
Two, teenagers and thirty-somethings have the largest disposable income of any group.

I completely disagree. Sure, there are some teenagers who have parents that are fabulously wealthy. And there are some thirty-somethings who are single, professional, and have a lot of spare time and money. But both of these groups are really small, especially the first.

Most teenagers have a little bit of spending money, but they sure aren't the demographic with "the largest disposable income". I mean, most of them are working retail or fast food, if they're working at all. If they have a brain, and are early teens, their parents are helping them to put money away for their college, because Christ that's gonna cost.

Many thirty-somethings are trying to build their life. If you have kids, toss that whole "disposable income" thing away. If you're trying to buy a house, and have a mortgage, a new fridge or dishwasher is way more important than a wargame. It goes on and on, because at this age range (me!) we are starting to plan for our future, we've just kind of got our groove, and we actually DON'T have a lot of disposable income.

I'd actually argue that successful 20-somethings and 40+ have the most disposable income. At 20, you're more likely to find the singles, who will just have a lot more money to throw around. They're likely to be renting, and in 2015, they're less likely to have kids, or even a dog. And holy smokes, you think Warhammer is expensive, go buy a puppy.

My friends that are 40-something and successful are on the mortgage track, have gotten past the shell shock of kids (you think a puppy is expensive... have a kid), they've gotten a few raises, and they've paid off a lot of debt. By the time they're in their 50s, everything is paid off, and they're still earning pretty good money.

If I were Games Workshop, the only thing they could produce for "poor teenagers" (doesn't that sound horrible?!) is a small model count game, because they really can't afford anything else.

Once people actually have paid off their debts and have a regular income, and disposable income at any level, the question is not really any longer can I afford Warhammer or not. Because Warhammer, as expensive as it may seem for a tiny model, isn't actually expensive if you have even a little bit of income. Even if you spend $1000 a year, that's not even $100 a month. Anyone with disposable income can afford that, if they want it.

There's a question of "is there something else that's cheaper and or a better fit for me that I want to spend money on instead?". But that's a different question. It's not a question of whether someone can afford Warhammer, it's a question of whether someone would rather do something else.

People who pay good money for tution just don't realise how many YouTube videos there are that cover everything for free

 Sir Arun wrote:
People who pay good money for tution just don't realise how many YouTube videos there are that cover everything for free

Many don't think to pay attention the first time in school. I like your point though

 Sir Arun wrote:
People who pay good money for tution just don't realise how many YouTube videos there are that cover everything for free

"To whom it may concern.

I was excited to see that your company is seeking to fill a position as systems analyst. I have no formal education, but I've totally watched hundreds of youtube videos, and I'm sure you'll agree that that's basically the same thing, amirite?

In addition to my solid theoretical foundation, I have also a great deal of experience from various internet forums. Through my contributions to the WeabooNation forums, trolling declined by 20%. I firmly believe that my background and expertise makes me the right fit for your company, and I look forward to discussing this with you in the near future.

Best regards,

John Toocoolforschool"

In my experience, it's not the price that's turning people off. Yep, it's significant but it can be mitigated in some ways. The main problem is that rules are pretty bad for this price.

 koooaei wrote:
In my experience, it's not the price that's turning people off. Yep, it's significant but it can be mitigated in some ways. The main problem is that rules are pretty bad for this price.

The absurd pricing ensures I will never buy direct from GW. If they some how forced online retails to do the same, I would stop playing all together. Some of GW's stuff is still acceptable, but a lot of it is moronic. It prevents me from ever starting another army. The rules do play a huge factor, but the game is still playable and fun even if the balance is in the toilet. And since I already have models it is not as big of a deterrent as the price is.

 koooaei wrote:
In my experience, it's not the price that's turning people off. Yep, it's significant but it can be mitigated in some ways. The main problem is that rules are pretty bad for this price.

It can be both. Few people will want to invest 600$ in to something that not only has bad quality, but brings no value in return. I am speaking of my own expiriance here. I had fun playing my army in 6th, at least part of it and end of 5th was awesome. If I were to start my army now, I just wouldn't. The cost is too high and the army I picked sucks. And I seem to not be the only one thinking like that, as I can't remember having a new w40k player in any of the FLGS I play. there is ton of warmahordes people, there are people playing bolt action, even a few playing infinity, ton of x-wing players. And dead WFB and w40k where all players are from 5th or 6th edition.

 Massawyrm wrote:

 Sir Arun wrote:
To be honest I think the new devastator kit is better than the old one. For a handful of dollars more you get 1 extra missile launcher, multi melta and 2 gravcannons with grav amps as well as a cherub holding a multi melta and some more ornate decorative tidbits.

Wouldn't consider it a price markup

It is a price markup, but a marginal one. 10 years ago it took four $25 Dev kits to make 20 Devs with 4 matching weapons. Now 2 Dev boxes and a Tac box costs you $132 for the same amount. 32% markup over 10 years isn't bad.

Or it cost $25 and you swapped bits with the guys at your local store.

GW has awful pricing policies but it doesn't matter because not enough people are willing to tell them with their wallets. Change rarely comes without some sort of impetus. Until the community at large provides real impetus, we're going to keep suffering in this cycle of "complain/adjust/settle/repeat".

A bit off topic, but you really could use a better thread title, OP. This isn't reddit. Many people would appreciate some actual description or reason to click through.

lustigjh wrote:
A bit off topic, but you really could use a better thread title, OP. This isn't reddit. Many people would appreciate some actual description or reason to click through.

YOU WON'T BELIEVE THESE 12 FACTS ABOUT THIS INTERESTING THING!

Yeah, forum etiquette dictates that your topic be informing.

 Massawyrm wrote:
The push toward teenagers is coupled with the marketing fact that males tend to revisit and stay in love with the things they loved as teens. Getting teens on 40k early means they are likely to return 10-20 years later as well. It's a long term strategy that has paid off dividends for decades. Hence all of the "Hey! returning player needs advice," threads on every forum. Constantly.

Dang, that's a really good point. My whole close group falls into this category.

Theres a reason aside from something I simply cant get anywhere else that I don't buy GW models new anymore. I love the universe, I love the fluff, I even love the models but I have other things to spend money on. I buy used marine stuff on ebay and bartertown if I need them(I really don't, I have 50+ that are still primered). For IG I simply use Warlord, Artizan, or Mantic models to represent troopers. Too expensive to do otherwise and the models are just as good and still fit the look. Tauros venator I can use a pair of lascannon from my bits box and pick up 1/48th scale ww2 armored cars. Done, $25 bucks. What is it 30 some odd infantry guys, customizable plastic for I think $36? A couple of these and there's my army. If someone has an issue then I play someone else, although I haven't had any issues. Some armies there is no substituting but then I just hunt for deals on ebay and BT. Might have to soak them in Awesome! and brush them off but better than paying GW prices.

Normal Geedubs seems really fething cheap once you've started buying Forgeworld models. Just saying...

GW plc pricing seems hideously expensive compare to Perry Minatures,Avatar of War, Mantic , Plastic Soldier company etc.
And Forge World prices seem even higher still.

GW plc make a gross profit of 76% on retail price.(This covers everything but logistic and retail costs.)
So after everything but retail costs are covered , GW have a gross profit of about 68%
And only a nett profit of about 13%

So they spend 55% of their gross profit on a retail chain that only generate 43% of sales.
And less than 2% on the other sales outlets that generate 57% of sales.

So if you like paying twice as much as you could be to support a chain of one man retail stores you may never use.Keep buying GW !
And GW plc will keep on with its steady decline in to insignificance....

 Massawyrm wrote:

 Sir Arun wrote:
To be honest I think the new devastator kit is better than the old one. For a handful of dollars more you get 1 extra missile launcher, multi melta and 2 gravcannons with grav amps as well as a cherub holding a multi melta and some more ornate decorative tidbits.

Wouldn't consider it a price markup

It is a price markup, but a marginal one. 10 years ago it took four $25 Dev kits to make 20 Devs with 4 matching weapons. Now 2 Dev boxes and a Tac box costs you $132 for the same amount. 32% markup over 10 years isn't bad.

Heresy! You condemn us with your voice of logic and reason! Now go back to whining about high about high prices with the masses before you actually make people start thinking!