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 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
If you think about it like this Byte:
Designers of video games have put thousands of hours of effort into the game, the coders have put thousands of hours into writing the cryptic stuff that allows the game to be produced and the artists have painstakingly crafted the models for the characters. For all that effort, $60 a pop is a fair price.

For a codex. You still need a lot of talent to produce such work, but nowhere near as much work goes into, say, the new Chaos Space Marine codex to the new Call of Duty (and I hate those games, but CoD makers have to consistently perform and release a huge new game every two years).

It's just not a relevant comparison.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(the point was a lot better in my head)

I understand your point. I just don't agree with it. The end result is a consumer spending money. I don't need to hear about the pain, I just want the baby(from the consumer stand point). If I get 5 years of use(or more!) out of a Codex, that's pretty good! Can the same be said about a video game?

The only reason I've not been priced out is that neither the DE nor the Tau have been updated within the past year. As soon as the Tau update hits home, I'm out of it, I reckon.

It depends on how good the video game is, and how good the modding community is (Rome Total War has been played for donkey years) but I see your point.

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
It depends on how good the video game is, and how good the modding community is (Rome Total War has been played for donkey years) but I see your point.

Donkey years...

I have played DoW 2 for donkey years thats for sure.

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

Assuming the game is a one shot game - you average 10-15 hours of play time for console games. Lets say it costs you $60 for the first go. You play it, beat it, trade it in at Gamestop. They give you a $20 credit because you bought it the night the game came out and didn't mess around beating it...so it is still a "new release" and qualifies for their highest trade in value. You trade it in for credit on the next new release, because you are trading for another new release at $60 retail - it qualifies you for the 25% bonus credit. So, your $20 becomes $25 and you end up paying out $35 for game #2. 10-15 hours later and you now repeat the process over again.

Figure you have a life outside of video games - so you spend 2 weeks per game...26 games per year. $935 for 260-390 hours of gaming. No need to worry about storage, travel costs to and from game stores/gaming locations, time to become disinterested before you get your first game in (quite a common problem for many people), finding gaming partners, scheduling games and all the rest of the issues relating to tabletop gaming. It also ignores games with a high replay value whether it is because of their multiplayer aspect or an immersive environment that provides for entertainment value beyond just one pass through the game. And of course it ignores the ability to pick up a game a month or two after it is released for half off. The value of those games ends up being in the worst case $3.50 an hour of gaming.

The price for consecutive years ends up being the same - $3.50 per hour of entertainment on the worst case scenario.

Compare that to any particular GW army list. A quick 1500 point SM list ran up to $548.25 for figures and the army Codex. Add another $75 or so to get a Hobby Starter set and a couple of bottles of paint from outside that. $15 for GW rattle can black and another $15 for rattle can clear cote. Now start the clock on the entertainment value... The list ends up being 43 figures and 4 vehicles. Not looking to win golden demons...but it is the persons first army...so figure 2 hours or so per figure and 4 hours for a vehicle to get them painted and on the table. 102 hours to get the army assembled and painted. That puts you 3-5 months into your year of the hobby and the first army is finished (or at least playable). The cost for the video games is actually a little bit better at this point ($270-375 for the same number of games for the time invested in assembling the models).

Now, you have to figure how much gaming you will actually be able to get in with your new army. Can you get 5-8 hours of games per week without spending anything more? Based on the rather non-scientific polls found here on Dakka - most people play one game or less per week and each game is 2 hours or less. So, assuming the most hobby time (i.e. - enjoyment) you get in another 72 hours of gaming (assuming your army is complete in 3 months as opposed to 5 months) in the remainder of that first year. So - the first year of tabletop gaming you are at 174 hours of hobby time for $3.75 per hour of hobby time. 25 cents more expensive per hour when compared to video games. You also get about half the total time out of the tabletop gaming when compared to video games.

In order to get the same amount of hobby time out of that first army - you would need to go ahead and game with it on a regular basis for another 14 months. Now, I don't know about you but after playing the same army for 23 months - the replay value starts to drop significantly. You haven't gotten anything extra to adjust your army list - so chances are pretty good that the fun factor will be disappearing pretty quickly. Granted 26 months after you bought the army - it would only be $2.25 per hour...so it is a good deal compared to video games.

If you add more options to your army the costs start to add up pretty quickly (as the options tend to be more expensive - things like Land Raiders, Terminators and other things which are expensive on a per figure basis). Add another starter army and the price is pretty close to the same - but your game time doesn't increase too much...that tends to be limited by the logistics of arranging a game as opposed to actually playing the game.

So - lets add a second army into the calculations. Luckily we will assume a never ending supply of paints on the paint supplies you purchased. A quick Eldar 1500 point list comes to $533.25 with the Codex for 39 regular sized figures and 12 larger figures (walkers, bikes and the like). Two armies for a total of $1186.50 (which includes the never ending supply of paint). The second army gives you another 126 hours of assembly and painting hobby time (2 hours for the regular figures and 4 hours per for the larger stuff). Subtract out the 2 hours of gaming time you get each week and figure 6 hours a week are available for assembling and painting that second army. So - at the 8 month point of our year in the hobby - you now have two small armies to choose from. You have gotten 256 hours of hobby enjoyment out of it and have spent $1186.50 to get there for $4.63 per hour of hobby time (over a dollar more per hour than the video games now). Add in another 32 hours of games for the remainder of the year and you get $4.12 per hour of hobby time.

The upside though is that now you have two armies with which to alternate with during your games. Another 8 months of gaming with those two armies and you are on parity with one year of video game entertainment on a cost per hour of hobby time (which is an improvement over the 26 months for one army). You still end up with a lot of extra free time each week that you aren't gaming or building models with...what to do with that remaining 6 hours or free time each week? Maybe get an XBox?

The end result of all of that of course is a more realistic look at the actual "return on investment" you mentioned. While you might not need to replace a Codex for 4 or 5 years (or 10 years in some cases) the actual hobby time that you get from each component isn't measured in years...rather hours spread out over several years. An army which is 4 years old might only have a hundred hours or so invested in in to include assembly, painting and gaming.

Considering that many one-shot video games (i.e. - games you beat) have play time averages of over 20 hours and many more have very high replay values (either because you can play against opponents or because you can play them in different methods for different results) the value of that Codex or box of Space Marines when compared to a video game or two or three (or 26) isn't quite as sweet as it might first seem.

Grand Theft Auto IV averages 46 hours, Final Fantasy XIII averages 55 hours, all the Mass Effect games average more than 30 hours each... Those 5 games if bought new would set you back $300 but give you over 200 hours of gaming. Not a bad return when compared to GW games. Throw in a game like Call of Duty, HALO or DoW and you are able to replay ad nauseum.

The reason comparisons with other hobbies isn't really valid is that the point of a comparison on price is to find things that are similar and then compare their prices. If the things are substantially different (a piece of software and a plastic model kit) than it's is 100% useless as a comparison if you are trying to isolate a single factor.

The other reason is that hobby expenditures can go up to nearly infinite levels. Everything is always reasonably just by comparing it to a slightly more expensive hobby.

It's simply not true that the because super car racing and space tourism are both very expensive that means that GW's product is good value for the money.

I think it's a misleading line of reasoning meant to muddy the waters so you can't say anything definite about GW prices out of some naive claim of all hobby prices being relative.

The whole point of price comparisons is to get as like of a comparison as possible. Different products for the same hobby-- in this case, that's miniature wargaming.

Let's just say that killing people is a hobby for serial killers, and if we are allowed to compare different hobbies, why not that too? Gardening is a hobby too but you don't see that being compared to miniature wargaming. Or pottery. Or flower arrangement. Or underwater basket-weaving.

If we compare wargaming to, say, origami, it would look insanely expensive. Just like comparing wargaming with collecting antiques, in which case collecting antiques would look absurdly expensive. Well no gak, Sherlock there are other hobbies more expensive than yours, just as much as there are hobbies much cheaper than yours.

Hence, we don't compare hobbies versus other hobbies when it comes to price. It's as absurd as comparing roller blades prices to car prices.

^- This. I could very easily say that after an initial investment, gardening is extremely cheap to do. But I won't.

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

GW is expensive to play. Sand castle sculpting isn't.

My comment was referring to the post in which I'm quoting myself for your easy reference.

I wasn't talking about armies, lifestyles, and sports cars. I was talking about a single purchase of either a video game or a codex.

Rounds of golf costs me $50-$80. I simply didn't go play and I picked up the codex. Both are my hobbies. I'll get more use out of the book, but I gave up a nice day outside in the fresh air and didn't get to use my ridiculously expensive golf clubs that I didn't get to use at all in 2012. A bottle of single malt Scotch costs me... I could go on and on. Pretty simple concept.

Value resides in the eye of the beholder. A dollar well spent is subjective.

Lets not make an empire out of a village.

I'm sure somebody out there can see my reasoning. Otherwise I may grow a little concerned...

 Breotan wrote:
According to BoLS, here are the prices for the new DA stuff coming in January:

Codex: Dark Angels (English) 104pp Colour Hardback $49.50
Ravenwing Dark Talon 1 Mini $75.00
Land Speeder Vengeance 1 Mini $65.00
Deathwing Command Squad 5 Minis $60.00
Ravenwing Command Squad 3 Minis $50.00
Dark Angels Battleforce 8 Minis $110.00

That's right. $75.00 for that flier and $50.00 for three bikes. Oh, and don't forget that awesome DA Battleforce with eight whole models.

I heavily rely on Dark Angels figures for my DYI chapter but I'm wondering if GW has finally hit that magical point where I simply can't justify the cost of their product. I have more disposable income than a lot of people out there so I expect that many of you have already hit this wall. If so, when did it happen for you? If you haven't hit it yet, how is your hobby future looking?

Myself? I find that I am migrating over to Malifaux these days, that and spending obscene amounts of money on kickstarters (damn you McVey, Poots, and the rest). Some small purchases and some specific Forge World purchases are still in the cards, but I'll certainly not be starting up any new armies with GW. I used to buy every codex when it came out. Now I only buy the onces I actually use. Once the annual price increase hits this coming summer, my GW portion of the hobby will likely be reduced to painting. Shame, really.

It was when I sold my *entire* *Sniffle* Chaos Space Marines army off. It's getting ridiculously expensive and I simply can't afford it anymore...so there went 2,000 points for about 1/3 what I paid for it originally. Yeah...not a good day Then I got into Mordheim and Necromunda and found the smaller skirmish games much more doable.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

 Byte wrote:
New XBOX 360 games run $50-$60 USD, it will be in the used rack in 2 weeks for 1/3 that.

The same retail price as a new Codex you can potentially use for 3 years or more...

Any hobby value is "return on investment" in time, enjoyment, and usage.

Assuming the game is a one shot game - you average 10-15 hours of play time for console games. Lets say it costs you $60 for the first go. You play it, beat it, trade it in at Gamestop. They give you a $20 credit because you bought it the night the game came out and didn't mess around beating it...so it is still a "new release" and qualifies for their highest trade in value. You trade it in for credit on the next new release, because you are trading for another new release at $60 retail - it qualifies you for the 25% bonus credit. So, your $20 becomes $25 and you end up paying out $35 for game #2. 10-15 hours later and you now repeat the process over again.

Figure you have a life outside of video games - so you spend 2 weeks per game...26 games per year. $935 for 260-390 hours of gaming. No need to worry about storage, travel costs to and from game stores/gaming locations, time to become disinterested before you get your first game in (quite a common problem for many people), finding gaming partners, scheduling games and all the rest of the issues relating to tabletop gaming. It also ignores games with a high replay value whether it is because of their multiplayer aspect or an immersive environment that provides for entertainment value beyond just one pass through the game. And of course it ignores the ability to pick up a game a month or two after it is released for half off. The value of those games ends up being in the worst case $3.50 an hour of gaming.

The price for consecutive years ends up being the same - $3.50 per hour of entertainment on the worst case scenario.

Compare that to any particular GW army list. A quick 1500 point SM list ran up to $548.25 for figures and the army Codex. Add another $75 or so to get a Hobby Starter set and a couple of bottles of paint from outside that. $15 for GW rattle can black and another $15 for rattle can clear cote. Now start the clock on the entertainment value... The list ends up being 43 figures and 4 vehicles. Not looking to win golden demons...but it is the persons first army...so figure 2 hours or so per figure and 4 hours for a vehicle to get them painted and on the table. 102 hours to get the army assembled and painted. That puts you 3-5 months into your year of the hobby and the first army is finished (or at least playable). The cost for the video games is actually a little bit better at this point ($270-375 for the same number of games for the time invested in assembling the models).

Now, you have to figure how much gaming you will actually be able to get in with your new army. Can you get 5-8 hours of games per week without spending anything more? Based on the rather non-scientific polls found here on Dakka - most people play one game or less per week and each game is 2 hours or less. So, assuming the most hobby time (i.e. - enjoyment) you get in another 72 hours of gaming (assuming your army is complete in 3 months as opposed to 5 months) in the remainder of that first year. So - the first year of tabletop gaming you are at 174 hours of hobby time for $3.75 per hour of hobby time. 25 cents more expensive per hour when compared to video games. You also get about half the total time out of the tabletop gaming when compared to video games.

In order to get the same amount of hobby time out of that first army - you would need to go ahead and game with it on a regular basis for another 14 months. Now, I don't know about you but after playing the same army for 23 months - the replay value starts to drop significantly. You haven't gotten anything extra to adjust your army list - so chances are pretty good that the fun factor will be disappearing pretty quickly. Granted 26 months after you bought the army - it would only be $2.25 per hour...so it is a good deal compared to video games.

If you add more options to your army the costs start to add up pretty quickly (as the options tend to be more expensive - things like Land Raiders, Terminators and other things which are expensive on a per figure basis). Add another starter army and the price is pretty close to the same - but your game time doesn't increase too much...that tends to be limited by the logistics of arranging a game as opposed to actually playing the game.

So - lets add a second army into the calculations. Luckily we will assume a never ending supply of paints on the paint supplies you purchased. A quick Eldar 1500 point list comes to $533.25 with the Codex for 39 regular sized figures and 12 larger figures (walkers, bikes and the like). Two armies for a total of $1186.50 (which includes the never ending supply of paint). The second army gives you another 126 hours of assembly and painting hobby time (2 hours for the regular figures and 4 hours per for the larger stuff). Subtract out the 2 hours of gaming time you get each week and figure 6 hours a week are available for assembling and painting that second army. So - at the 8 month point of our year in the hobby - you now have two small armies to choose from. You have gotten 256 hours of hobby enjoyment out of it and have spent $1186.50 to get there for $4.63 per hour of hobby time (over a dollar more per hour than the video games now). Add in another 32 hours of games for the remainder of the year and you get $4.12 per hour of hobby time.

The upside though is that now you have two armies with which to alternate with during your games. Another 8 months of gaming with those two armies and you are on parity with one year of video game entertainment on a cost per hour of hobby time (which is an improvement over the 26 months for one army). You still end up with a lot of extra free time each week that you aren't gaming or building models with...what to do with that remaining 6 hours or free time each week? Maybe get an XBox?

The end result of all of that of course is a more realistic look at the actual "return on investment" you mentioned. While you might not need to replace a Codex for 4 or 5 years (or 10 years in some cases) the actual hobby time that you get from each component isn't measured in years...rather hours spread out over several years. An army which is 4 years old might only have a hundred hours or so invested in in to include assembly, painting and gaming.

Considering that many one-shot video games (i.e. - games you beat) have play time averages of over 20 hours and many more have very high replay values (either because you can play against opponents or because you can play them in different methods for different results) the value of that Codex or box of Space Marines when compared to a video game or two or three (or 26) isn't quite as sweet as it might first seem.

Grand Theft Auto IV averages 46 hours, Final Fantasy XIII averages 55 hours, all the Mass Effect games average more than 30 hours each... Those 5 games if bought new would set you back $300 but give you over 200 hours of gaming. Not a bad return when compared to GW games. Throw in a game like Call of Duty, HALO or DoW and you are able to replay ad nauseum.

Not that I disagree with your post at all, but since you included the cost of the codex/paints in the GW cost don't you think you should include the cost of the console in the video game side? I know it probably won;t make a massive difference (I actually don;t video game so have no idea how expensive they are) but it should really be included.

an argument could also be made for the annual cost of the electricy to run the console all year long - though that would be pedantic I admit, and all this presumes that you already have a TV (I know 99.9% of people do, but there are still some out there who do not)

I wouldn't mind the price rises so much if GW was actually producing quality product.

They're not, IMO. When I liked their stuff, WD was awesome and there was a whole ton of fully-supported and great specialist games to play.

They're a shadow of what they once were, a zombie company that lost its heart a long time ago and is now doomed to half-heartedly trying to keep the shareholders happy.

Yes - I also left off things like the Big Rule Book, dice, tape measures, gas money driving back and forth to the game store, terrain and related gaming expenses plus a more realistic measure of the costs of modeling and painting supplies.

Figured between those things and the console cost itself it would be a wash in the long and short run.

The reason I don't think it's worth comparing across different hobbies, though you did quite a thorough job of it there, Sean, is different hobbies mean different things to different people and inherently hold different values not just in how much time you spend but the quality of how that time is spent, something extremely subjective. I don't value 10 hours spent painting a model the same way I value 10 hours spent playing a video game or 10 hours spent driving my gas guzzling and tyre destroying muscle cars.

The reason I mentioned the Corvette cost was to show the silliness of comparing across hobbies. The Corvette may cost me 40 times more initial lay out and even more again in maintanence, but it's a completely different ball game, to me personally, it's holds a completely different value, so to compare it to my other hobbies is pointless.

Comparing dollars per hours I think is a bit silly as well. People often say video gaming is cheap compared to going out on the town or seeing a movie at a cinema, but it's a completely different experience. Just because I'm a gamer doesn't mean I don't also go to see movies or go to the pub with mates to play pool, just because they have poor dollar/hour values doesn't mean they are poor value.

You also have some games that have incredible replay value and others which don't, and while it might be a factor in deciding if I'll buy a game, it's hardly the ONLY factor. No one I know goes out and buys new release console games, plays10-15 hours, trades them and repeats. If I know a game is short, I'll probably pay $20 or less for it. Some games I'll play for hundreds of hours. COD4 I played for several hundred hours online in multiplayer. I bought a 3 month Warhammer Online subscription, put in a couple of hundred hours for very little money. Bad Company 2, Live for Speed, Skyrim, Space Marine, Dawn of War... all games I've put 70+ hours in to. However, that doesn't necessarily mean I value them more than a game like Darksiders, which I only put about 20 hours in to (and also only paid about $20).

Time spent playing is such a massively variable factor and the quality of time spent is such a subjective factor that I find the comparison pointless unless you just do it for YOU personally and don't try to pretend you are analysing it with any generality at all.

When I say I think an $83AUD codex is overpriced, it's because I think an $83AUD codex is overpriced, not because I'm ignoring that it's a similar price to a video game or ignoring the fact I spend 300 times more than that on the hobby car in my garage.

Hell, if we are looking at relative hobby pricing, for me personally, when I do (rarely) play a table top game with friends, it almost always involves alcohol and take away food, so we should include that in the equation as well

Priced out? yes and no. Do i plan to buy as much stuff? no. What I do buy, I intend to buy at a discount, or used from someone else.

I actually started collecting some marines, and dark angels stuff a year ago, none yet assembled or painted. I was waiting until the new codex came out to figure out what configurations to make my guys.

Now I am actually waiting for someone to post a torrent download of the codex. I feel a bit bad about that, I would normally have just said "yea codex" and bought it from my local store. But now i just can not justify it.

Pretty content to just play with what I have with my friends for however long that lasts. No reason to get something new, unless as I said.. extra money + deep discount.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Hell, if we are looking at relative hobby pricing, for me personally, when I do (rarely) play a table top game with friends, it almost always involves alcohol and take away food, so we should include that in the equation as well

OK, you self admittedly rarely play table top. So of course the value of a pricey codex doesn't appeal to you. The return of investment isn't adequate. However, some one like myself with over 55 games of 6th edition under my belt might value the codex as an update to my existing DA army and also to become familiar with what I'll be up against in my next tournament.

Value is in the eye of the beholder.

@AllSeeingSkink

I agree it is silly to make comparisons outside of like for like comparisons - however, others had already and the reality is that they were not really making an honest comparison.

If you compare a video game to a tabletop game - you can't just say, I will beat that game in 2 weeks...because with things like wargames, there is no beating of the game which happens. As a result, if you want to make that comparison - you have to make a more measured comparison by looking at the actual entertainment time which you might get out of each hobby.

The same would go for all the other "expensive" hobbies which other people have thrown around in this and other threads like it. Old cars? Sure - if you purchase a fully restored vehicle it is a very expensive prospect to just drive. For most people, a good part of that hobby is actually turning wrenches and restoring the car. You might pick up something like an old Galaxy 500 for a few hundred dollars and over the course of several years spend a few thousand dollars and a few hundred hours tearing the car down and either restoring it or making it into a muscle car/cruiser. When you actually do a cost analysis of how much hobby time you get from start to a "playable" car - it actually doesn't end up being nearly expensive. Never mind that you can actually drive the car and get some level of practical use out of it (or use the 4x4 for pulling trailers or hauling things which won't fit in the back of the sedan).

It isn't exactly a true comparison, as they are significantly different - but you can't just say that a classic car is expensive compared to gaming but ignore the process of building the car and the enjoyment that that provides for many people. You also can't discount the nature of the end game for each hobby. If you pick up a junker and put a few years of blood, sweat and tears into it (plus a few thousand in new parts) you can normally turn around and sell it for significantly more than you purchased it for - you may even be able to get more out of it than your financial investment (depending on how carefully you make those decisions along the way).

Even if you were to say that your hobby was a new car - just buy and drive - if you look at the actual time connected to the car...average 15K miles per year, average 30 mph (not sure on that one...it is what the trip calculator on my car shows) I end up with 500 hours a year in the car. At the end of a 72 month loan you would be looking at 3,000 hours. So, if you were to have gotten something like a new 4x4 (say $30,000 for a Wrangler) or Corvette (say $60,000 for a midrange model) you get either $10 or $20 per hour of "hobby" time. But wait, you need a car anyway, right? Knock $10K off the price to figure about the cheapest regular car you can get. $6.66 per hour in the Jeep and $16.66 per hour for the Vette.

Of course, you get to trade that in on the next go around. A 6 year old Jeep in good condition with 75K miles has a trade in value of $11,000 and and the Corvette has a trade in value of $16,000. Those would drop your cost per hour of fun to $3 and $11.33 per hour. That Jeep is actually a pretty good deal now isn't it?

 scarletsquig wrote:
I wouldn't mind the price rises so much if GW was actually producing quality product.

They're not, IMO. When I liked their stuff, WD was awesome and there was a whole ton of fully-supported and great specialist games to play.

They're a shadow of what they once were, a zombie company that lost its heart a long time ago and is now doomed to half-heartedly trying to keep the shareholders happy.

Sadly, this sums up my opinion completely. I'm not seeing very much creativity or desire to try new things - just the same old stuff, year after year. And I'm sorry to say it, but the new concepts look like they are the kind of thing I would have found under the Xmas tree when I was 12, crewed by an Action Man or something similar.

Perhaps if enough people stop buying it then things will change, but until then it looks like GW has become far too fat and lazy while sitting on the throne. It will be interesting to see how much their competitors are able to nibble from their fat, wart-covered form before they notice and try to react to it.

Based on the majority of the responses I've read in this thread.

I would have to say, yes, GW has priced a lot of folks out.

 Pacific wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
I wouldn't mind the price rises so much if GW was actually producing quality product.

They're not, IMO. When I liked their stuff, WD was awesome and there was a whole ton of fully-supported and great specialist games to play.

They're a shadow of what they once were, a zombie company that lost its heart a long time ago and is now doomed to half-heartedly trying to keep the shareholders happy.

Sadly, this sums up my opinion completely. I'm not seeing very much creativity or desire to try new things - just the same old stuff, year after year. And I'm sorry to say it, but the new concepts look like they are the kind of thing I would have found under the Xmas tree when I was 12, crewed by an Action Man or something similar.

Perhaps if enough people stop buying it then things will change, but until then it looks like GW has become far too fat and lazy while sitting on the throne. It will be interesting to see how much their competitors are able to nibble from their fat, wart-covered form before they notice and try to react to it.

Damn skippy, GW's pricing strategy may be ridiculous but if they backed it up with genuinely jaw dropping models and not the lazy cynical stuff we've been recently seeing it might be even remotely understandable. Few of the models have any soul or charm and i think the last truly outstanding release was actually Dark Vengeance (well the Chaos bits, i didnt care greatly for the Dark Angels) For me its not a case of being priced out. I could still afford GW prices, i choose not to because i dont think their product is worth it.

 Byte wrote:
OK, you self admittedly rarely play table top. So of course the value of a pricey codex doesn't appeal to you. The return of investment isn't adequate. However, some one like myself with over 55 games of 6th edition under my belt might value the codex as an update to my existing DA army and also to become familiar with what I'll be up against in my next tournament.

Yes, I rarely play at the moment (mostly because I gamed among close friends previously, the majority of which have quit in recent years), but I have been in the hobby for some 16 years now, different times of which I have gamed either regularly or rarely. My feeling that $83AUD for a Codex is overpriced is very much gaming centric. In a game which contains 15 different major armies, the rules for a single army should not cost that much. That means to get the complete set of rules for 40k, you would need to spend $1245AUD on Codices alone + $124 for the rulebook, $1370 all up to collect all the rules, which is just insane IMHO. Even if you don't want all army books/codices, if you're like me and collect 3 or 4 40k armies and 3 or 4 Fantasy armies (rather than building monolithic single armies, I prefer several small armies), you're looking at around $4-500 every few years just to keep up with the armies you yourself collect.

As I said earlier, I'd have less of an issue if they released the rules themselves in smaller supplements in black and white soft cover for a fraction of the price (which is better for gaming anyway IMO, easier to flick through a soft cover black and white book and suffers less wear and tear from being held open on certain pages for long periods of time), and then kept the story books and hard cover art books separately. It was less of an issue when Codices were cheaper, but now they insist of pointlessly making every page colour and making the books hard cover, it would be nice if GW did this... of course, they won't, because they know many people don't want flashy art books and so wouldn't buy them, rather they'd force you to buy them if you also want the rules.

Value is in the eye of the beholder.

Yep, no doubt, which is an underlying theme of my previous posts, which is why it's hard enough to compare value within a given hobby and pointless to compare it across various different hobbies.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
*snip*

Yeah, tis all relative and tis all subjective. Though I still think comparing dollars per hour is largely pointless. As 1 hour table top gaming does not = 1 hour video gaming, does not = 1 hour driving a classic car, does not = 1 hour driving a race car, does not = 1 hour trying to force a suspension member to fit on your heavily customised car, does not = 1 hour in a jet fighter, does not = 1 hour with a woman (or man if that's your thing ).

We could have a whole discussion about the value of car hobbies. For many years I was a car enthusiast, but got by driving a 34 year old car that only cost me $1000 to buy and has cost me about $1000 to maintain for the past 5 years. It was a very cheap "car hobby", as it was my daily drive as well. I still own that car, it's a fun car (by my standards at least, some people would hate it because it doesn't have a CD player and doesn't have air conditioning). But since then I've spent copious amounts of money on old muscle cars, coz I love old muscle cars, and yeah, I could make a lot of money back if I sold them, but no where near what I've put in to them (especially when you consider the additional cost of fuel and insurance when pushing an old classic V8).

FYI, the Corvette I plan to spend $24k on is no where near fully restored, lol. It's a 1970 model, that $24k covers the car which is slightly rusty and needs work, the Tremec TKO600 5spd transmission I plan to put in it and the shipping cost to ship it back to Oz. On top of that $24k I need to fix the wiper cover, the diff, some of the gauges and clean up some rust. You CAN theoretically be a car hobbyist without spending much money... most people tend to spend a lot of money, even if they're restoring a heap of junk, restoring junk is both time consuming AND expensive in most cases, lol.

But yes, we could have a whole discussion about the cost of car hobbies, but the point I was trying to make by mentioning that was simply that comparing values across hobbies is a bit meaningless even when within a given hobby both the cost and value changes per person and cannot simply be expressed as a dollars per hour number.

 Byte wrote:
Based on the majority of the responses I've read in this thread.

I would have to say, yes, GW has priced a lot of folks out.

I don't know, an awful lot of people, myself included, have cited the perceived decrease in quality sculpts as an example. IMO all of the recent releases have several models that are fairly clownshoes, whereas even just a few years ago awful models were nonexistent or rare. People always posted Nagash or the warthog because there weren't that many awful modesl, but the over the top GI Joe\Digimon\Zoids styling seems to be on the upswing.

So you're saying it's more of a value-for-money issue given the new art direction rather than just an issue of price increases?

I've been buying the last of my fantasy Chaos stuff here and there because I fear what the models will be like when they are next redone. I don't play WFB, but use other rules, but I want my little force complete before the miniatures I do like are replaced by horrible caricatures of themselves. I had Empire during 6th edition and didn't quite get all the models I wanted before they redid them all with angry faces and skulls and other over the top elements. Fortunately I just finished my force using historicals as they fit in perfectly with the 5th and 6th edition Empire stuff. I won't have that option with my chaos stuff. Once GW replaces them with goofy nonsense, the line I like will be gone.

EDIT: It was Artizan Designs who makes the 6th edition compatible historicals that let me finish my Empire properly. At £1.40 a figure for metal.



..

Pricing is certainly an issue, I think. I would never buy the rulebook or hardback codecies these days, with the price points they're at. That said, the current art direction makes it a hell of a lot easier to pass it all by.

agustin wrote:
So you're saying it's more of a value-for-money issue given the new art direction rather than just an issue of price increases

Certainly that's the case for some people. I can afford to spend more on 40k now than at any previous point in my hobby, but stuff like that forgefiend and heldrake make me think I could spend those dollars better elsewhere. I think that line of thinking may make up a not inconsiderable part of the "why I got priced out" hobby for posters.

I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

The models on the other hand i find hard to defend. Particularly the laziness.

Chaos Warriors release for example. (im not even goign to talk about the war altar) but the Slaaneshi cavalry that were released were great big hulking marauders on top of lithe sinuous steeds. They looked RIDICULOUS. It was just laziness to the nth degree. Some of the rest of the release fared better but then we got ....
Chaos Space Marine: I was REALLY looking forward to this release, i got 2x Chaos contents of DV in preperation based upon the fact that GW seemed to have FINALLY got Chaos right, the chosen were wondrous models harking back to the rogue trader days and were so much more than just spiky space marines. I couldnt wait to see what was coming and put a fair bit of money aside to finance the army. What did we get?

a £30 codex and dinobots, along with some seriously lacklustre finecast characters. The only thing i found decent were the Raptors (the Warp Talons were typical Overblown GW silliness, a total write off)

Meanwhile the basic troops choice for chaos is YEARS old, their supposed champion looks like an angry midget compared to his bodyguard and overall it was just a massive slap in the face. The Obliterators and mutilators in particular are an insult and should have never been released. Where were the multipart characters that WFB has been enjoying? Are they trying to MAKE us buy finecast (i refuse to)

Mini rant over. Point is expensive awesome is kind of understandable. Expensive crap is unforgivable.

 Ouze wrote:

agustin wrote:
So you're saying it's more of a value-for-money issue given the new art direction rather than just an issue of price increases

Certainly that's the case for some people. I can afford to spend more on 40k now than at any previous point in my hobby, but stuff like that forgefiend and heldrake make me think I could spend those dollars better elsewhere. I think that line of thinking may make up a not inconsiderable part of the "why I got priced out" hobby for posters.

That fits me perfectly. I haven't been "priced out" in that I can't afford it, I have found that with the new Chaos release, my money was so much better spent elsewhere (like investing in a new company that my friend is introducing) which is what has "priced me out" of 40k.

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

I don't value the rulebook because I don't value the actual game it describes. If I did, I certainly wouldn't want a huge tome. I'd grab a portable version off of eBay as it's more useful for gaming.

Chaos Warriors release for example. (im not even goign to talk about the war altar) but the Slaaneshi cavalry that were released were great big hulking marauders on top of lithe sinuous steeds. They looked RIDICULOUS. It was just laziness to the nth degree.

These later releases are what have spurred me on to finish my stuff (through eBay discounters). I don't know what they're going to do to the regular Chaos Warriors or Knights once they decide it's time to redo them. I just don't trust GW to deliver a good product in the future.

Chaos Space Marine: I was REALLY looking forward to this release, i got 2x Chaos contents of DV in preperation based upon the fact that GW seemed to have FINALLY got Chaos right, the chosen were wondrous models harking back to the rogue trader days and were so much more than just spiky space marines. I couldnt wait to see what was coming and put a fair bit of money aside to finance the army. What did we get?

a £30 codex and dinobots, along with some seriously lacklustre finecast characters. The only thing i found decent were the Raptors (the Warp Talons were typical Overblown GW silliness, a total write off)

It wa a trainwreck. I thought the Hellbrute was a bit too over the top in the Dark Vengeance set, but it was nothing compared to what came next.

Mini rant over. Point is expensive awesome is kind of understandable. Expensive crap is unforgivable.

Good summation.

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

Strongly disagree. Sure, you get well over 400 pages, but most of it is reused fluff and artwork that I don't care about. For someone who's already been initiated to the game, the rulebook is a massively bloated and incredibly heavy tome that makes actually using the damn thing as a reference tool during games much more cumbersome than it has to be. What's more, being in hardback does not help.

 Fafnir wrote:

 DiabolicAl wrote:
I actually think the rulebook is a pretty good buy, Its a quality product and well over 400 pages for £45 is easier to stomach than a codex which is a third of the content for 2/3 the price.

Strongly disagree. Sure, you get well over 400 pages, but most of it is reused fluff and artwork that I don't care about. For someone who's already been initiated to the game, the rulebook is a massively bloated and incredibly heavy tome that makes actually using the damn thing as a reference tool during games much more cumbersome than it has to be. What's more, being in hardback does not help.

Point being that when i bought my rulebook (admittedly for consdierably less than RRP from Wayland) I actually felt like i was getting value for money. The presentation and content i thought was great and when it comes to a history of the imperium its hard to mix up all that much. Nice artwork, full colour and as you say it was a hefty tome. Admittedly no good as a travelling reference due to its size/weight but thats what i use the mini rulebook for. I love the rulebook, i think it presents a great overview of 40K as a hobby and is better than any of the BRB to precede it.

Now when you look at the codexs on the other hand 2nd edition we had 100+ page codexes about £12 (if memory serves) I still have a few and they are great!
then 3rd edition they stripped them right down to about 80 pages for £8
Then it went back up to £12 but i think they got a bit thicker again
Then £15
then £18, still hovering around the 120 page count i think (im not at home)
then £20 (this was when i was like : Orly?
Now Hardback 104 (admittedly full colour) pages £30.. NO GW THATS A BAD GW...!!!

I mean seriously?