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One, they are still better than PP's large kits (and far easier to assemble...grumble). Two, I think a part of the poses on the larger kits has to do with fitting a certain footprint (for Fantasy), and trying to cut it to fit a sprue frame in a very specific way. While it aids with ease of assembly, it does tend to limit conversion options, and the poses can be a little...too dynamic, if that's possible.

The Thundertusk/Stonehorn was great, and I like the High Elves phoenix kits. Tervigon was excellent, and as for detail, the models in Dark Vengeance were crisp. And I'm sorry, but the Riptide Battlesuit is amazing. Apparently lots of people thought so too, as the model sold out faster than any in recent history.

Right now, the big kits are in style from both GW and PP. There's a bit of a double-edged sword there. People complained about having to buy too many models to play these games, and so these big kits come out that cost more points and fill up lists. Now we are sad about the big kits and we want them to focus more on infantry. GW makes infantry better than anyone, and I doubt that will just go away.

it will once they price people out, and they will, the only question is time, how long will it take

Backfire wrote:

 poda_t wrote:

as and aside, I disagree that PP and Reaper don't make good models. Look at the price. Comparing the price against what you get, against GW, looks to me like reaper and PP look to offer better models for a better cost.

Do they? Comparing aforementioned Ravagers with GW Terminators, Ravagers are six models for $55, Terminators are five for $50. Material is same, Ravagers seem bit bigger so you could argue that PP kit offers somewhat more for cost. However, Ravagers are monopose with just three individual sculpts, Terminators are multipose with tons of options. So it doesn't really look like big difference.

depends on the terminators, and by and large, the 10 degrees of movement afforded by the parts, is that really worth the money? it isn't for me, because in the end the models get posed more or less identically, so your complaint against the static appearance of the monopose models is weak, because while the standardized multipart plastic kits give you more permutations of poses, there really are only so many poses to choose from. I'll grant that you do have more options with multi-parts, but I find that monopose models are better posed than component models. The real advantage comes with kitbashing, bitfarming and magnetizing, though that benefit is limited only to few characters and special weapons. In one sense, there is a convenience afforded by mono-posed models in that cleaning is a snap, and there's no assembly required. There is a lesser time investment, which makes it easier for me to get the army done, and not get bogged down and bored with it half-way through, and then there's also considerably less waste to think about or dispose of. While I'm sure that GW adds nice bits in for options, do I really need the servo skulls included in the kit? do I really need the melta bombs and extra ammo hoppers which just clutter up the models and make them look more ridiculous with this weird gear already stretching the hard to believe proportions? aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah I don't, so there's a lot of waste in plastic kits as I'm concerned, that I can't even sell off because of established bits dealers and the ability to pillage a friend's bit box.

Also, my dreadnoughts are $63 for 5, and the tharn ravegers are $62.85. As an aside, I've always had problems with the CSM terminators: the pauldrons have a terrible habit of not wanting to fit, without liberal filing of elbow contact points, or the rim where it comes into contact with the trophy rack.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
it will once they price people out, and they will, the only question is time, how long will it take

Did you go to Adepticon? Miniatures are expensive period. Every single miniatures company has expensive stuff. There wasn't a booth with a reasonably priced game, nor an artistic company with reasonably priced single minis. Jérémie Bonamant Teboul was promoting a few 75mm figures that were going to be the last of their kind because it's expensive to produce them.

It's a niche market within a niche market. Privateer is more expensive, model-for-model, than Games Workshop. GW just requires a larger upfront investment.

 brassangel wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
it will once they price people out, and they will, the only question is time, how long will it take

Did you go to Adepticon? Miniatures are expensive period. Every single miniatures company has expensive stuff. There wasn't a booth with a reasonably priced game, nor an artistic company with reasonably priced single minis. Jérémie Bonamant Teboul was promoting a few 75mm figures that were going to be the last of their kind because it's expensive to produce them.

It's a niche market within a niche market. Privateer is more expensive, model-for-model, than Games Workshop. GW just requires a larger upfront investment.

no I don't live in the states and not allowed to go there as I lack a passport, not that I'd want to
yes miniatures are expensive, but GW is really a cut above the rest. in upfront investment and long term play
No book that will be utterly useless in a few years is worth 100 dollars (or 50 for the codex's)
there's reasonable prices and then there's what GW charges

 poda_t wrote:

Backfire wrote:

 poda_t wrote:

as and aside, I disagree that PP and Reaper don't make good models. Look at the price. Comparing the price against what you get, against GW, looks to me like reaper and PP look to offer better models for a better cost.

Do they? Comparing aforementioned Ravagers with GW Terminators, Ravagers are six models for $55, Terminators are five for $50. Material is same, Ravagers seem bit bigger so you could argue that PP kit offers somewhat more for cost. However, Ravagers are monopose with just three individual sculpts, Terminators are multipose with tons of options. So it doesn't really look like big difference.

depends on the terminators, and by and large, the 10 degrees of movement afforded by the parts, is that really worth the money? it isn't for me, because in the end the models get posed more or less identically, so your complaint against the static appearance of the monopose models is weak, because while the standardized multipart plastic kits give you more permutations of poses, there really are only so many poses to choose from. I'll grant that you do have more options with multi-parts, but I find that monopose models are better posed than component models. The real advantage comes with kitbashing, bitfarming and magnetizing, though that benefit is limited only to few characters and special weapons. In one sense, there is a convenience afforded by mono-posed models in that cleaning is a snap, and there's no assembly required. There is a lesser time investment, which makes it easier for me to get the army done, and not get bogged down and bored with it half-way through, and then there's also considerably less waste to think about or dispose of. While I'm sure that GW adds nice bits in for options, do I really need the servo skulls included in the kit? do I really need the melta bombs and extra ammo hoppers which just clutter up the models and make them look more ridiculous with this weird gear already stretching the hard to believe proportions? aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah I don't, so there's a lot of waste in plastic kits as I'm concerned, that I can't even sell off because of established bits dealers and the ability to pillage a friend's bit box.

Also, my dreadnoughts are $63 for 5, and the tharn ravegers are $62.85. As an aside, I've always had problems with the CSM terminators: the pauldrons have a terrible habit of not wanting to fit, without liberal filing of elbow contact points, or the rim where it comes into contact with the trophy rack.

So Mulg the Ancient vs. say...a Hive Tyrant for the same price. I can make a Hive Tyrant, a Flying Hive Tyrant, or a Swarmlord for the same price as one, single pose metal clunky Mulg. The Tyrant will be plastic as well, so it won't shatter when it tips, no pinning required, easy to assemble, and easier to transport as a result. Oh, and the details are miles sharper.

Or for the same price as a jack, I could get a GW tank that makes 2 or 3 variants.

Or how about the price of Chaos Knights versus any cavalry in PP's line? 1/3 of the price.

Have you assembled a Colossal or Gargantuan? $120 for a single-pose, awkwardly posed, miscast lump of junk with oddly placed metal bits. For $120 I can buy 2 giant monster kits from GW - which will likely be a hybrid kit, mind you - and I can magnetize it to represent different things for different games. Or I can get almost 3 Night Scythes for that, or a Night Scythe, the accompanying Immortals, and still have money left over.

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

Look, GW is far from perfect, and leaves a lot to be desired. But their FAQ's, frequent army releases, and the improvements to White Dwarf have been a godsend the past 12 months. If they keep it up, it's all roses. Privateer is just as profit-seeking, just as expensive (more per model).

And really, PP is still behind GW in terms of the cool factor on their models.

We can drag this game on all we want, but all that's happening is people trying, desperately, to hate GW's models by justifying their alternative purchases.

I am all for people buying whatever models they want. I encourage the hobby as a whole; but don't pretend GW is any more expensive for it's content than anyone else. Upfront investment? Sure. But model-for-model, they are actually rather moderate by comparison.

 angelofvengeance wrote:

Erm. They're monsters? They're supposed to be angry beasts, they're not going to be just passive looking lol. As for the Helbrute-great model. Loving it. Bear in mind they haven't gotten around to casting a new kit for the Helbrute. Only what they've got in Dark Vengeance. The Slaughterbrute is fantastic also, I'm sure GW is aware people want to tinker and adjust the positions of limbs etc. That's surely what being in the hobby is about isn't it? To unleash your creative potential and whatnot?

Slaughterbrute is terrible, with way too much gak, tentacles, spikes, tongues and whatnot, to say nothing about the pose. Storm of Magic monsters wouldn't be bad as such, in fact singularly they're rather good, but when you have many models in aggressive dynamic ninja poses, it just loses effectiveness and looks silly when your army is assembled on the tabletop, with everyone leaping or swinging etc. They also make conversions more difficult.

MInd you, I like most of the GW's large monsters and I also like dynamic poses when they're used in moderance, for example in some unique Special character etc. However as with everything, too much of a good thing is a bad thing.

I have purchased, New Daemons, Tau, and Dark Angels armies. I think the models look great. even the Chaos space marines look fine. As for fantasy, all the new warriors of chaos look fine IMO, VC, and empire look great also imo.

What happened to GW models?

They are becoming bigger and bigger and they forgot that even if the monsters are huge the texture work needs to be worked in accordance with the 28mm scale... As such big monster look more and more like happy meal toys with little to no texture, as for concepts... the hit and miss is becoming miss and miss.

If I had to say in one sentence the actual state of GW minis I would say that they stripped the wargaming out of the minis and dressed them with shallow toys instead.

But when they manage to make nice things they still rock, sad is not as often as it used to be.

 brassangel wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
it will once they price people out, and they will, the only question is time, how long will it take

Did you go to Adepticon? Miniatures are expensive period. Every single miniatures company has expensive stuff. There wasn't a booth with a reasonably priced game, nor an artistic company with reasonably priced single minis. Jérémie Bonamant Teboul was promoting a few 75mm figures that were going to be the last of their kind because it's expensive to produce them.

It's a niche market within a niche market. Privateer is more expensive, model-for-model, than Games Workshop. GW just requires a larger upfront investment.

Really? You're not looking too hard, I just ordered a pair of Stephane Simon's "Sinister" sculpts, they cost less together including shipping than most GW character models, they're cast in hard resin, and they're more Blanchian-grimdark than almost anything GW sell plus are fantastic quality. Statuesque Miniatures do packs of four "Resistance Fighter" female troopers for £11, they're perfectly proportioned, the faces are some of the nicest female ones I've ever seen on a mini, they're cast in metal and come with separate heads and weapons.

There are loads of small companies and individuals out there producing incredibly high quality sculpts in great materials at prices that put GW to shame, and these days they're only a crowd funding campaign away from pissing all over GW's corn flakes. Raging Heroes are gearing up for a kickstarter to fund three full armies of all-female sci-fi soldiers, with another planned later on for what sound suspiciously like not-Sisters of Battle. Warthrone dwarves make GW's look comical, if they could sort out their fulfillment issues there'd be no reason whatsoever to buy GW's dwarf range unless you play in one of their stores.

GW requires a larger up-front investment due to a combination of continual year-on-year above-inflation price rises and the continual drive by the suits at HQ to make people buy bigger and bigger armies with more and more large-scale expensive kits, and that's a policy that's no more sustainable than any of their other recent business practices.

 brassangel wrote:


So Mulg the Ancient vs. say...a Hive Tyrant for the same price. I can make a Hive Tyrant, a Flying Hive Tyrant, or a Swarmlord for the same price as one, single pose metal clunky Mulg. The Tyrant will be plastic as well, so it won't shatter when it tips, no pinning required, easy to assemble, and easier to transport as a result. Oh, and the details are miles sharper.

Or for the same price as a jack, I could get a GW tank that makes 2 or 3 variants.

Or how about the price of Chaos Knights versus any cavalry in PP's line? 1/3 of the price.

Have you assembled a Colossal or Gargantuan? $120 for a single-pose, awkwardly posed, miscast lump of junk with oddly placed metal bits. For $120 I can buy 2 giant monster kits from GW - which will likely be a hybrid kit, mind you - and I can magnetize it to represent different things for different games. Or I can get almost 3 Night Scythes for that, or a Night Scythe, the accompanying Immortals, and still have money left over.

text removed.
Reds8n

If you extend it to vehicles and to gargantuan scale models, sure, plastics will win out. I notice you completely ignored my praise of GW's models two pages ago, but let's not let that get in the way of your pompous ego shall we? We can go on about the sharpness of the models details, though I'm having trouble seeing what kits you have problems with. I've noticed myself that GW's kits have a lot of sharp detail, though I fail to see how it's good to have a really sharply detailed skull covering every facet of every surface on half the product line, or the growing problem that as many of the monsters are getting bigger, the details are not remaining constrained to 28mm. I am wiling to bet I can come up with plenty of problems with GW's "sharpness" even point out that GW's tau vehicles are disasters when it comes to assembly (I've never assembled a tau vehicle or suit that didn't need extensive work to deal with the seams). The only issues I've had to date with PP models was the disastrous alignment of the hands/arms/shoulder sockets of the steelhead helbardiers, which I still found easier to deal with than the half-melted slag that habitually comes out of the finecast process. Yeah, I bought a number of metal models, and I've gotten around to pinning them, and I find I don't actually mind it. I haven't actually had a pinned model fall apart on me ever, and I've had plastic models suffer the same kind of catastrophic damage that you accuse only metal models capable of.

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

the pot calls the kettle black...
I'm well aware of the fact that PP would drop the boot on anyone using third party resources in their events, but then this makes sense given that the event is hosted by PP. I urge you to walk into a GW store and play on their tables with models that are obviously not GW's. Actually no, I dare you to play on GW's tables with parts that are obviously manufactured by CHS, or use a model with CHS parts in a golden daemon competition. They will boot you just as readily as PP will boot you from their event. The reason people get away with using non GW parts in tournaments, is because there's really only one or two tournaments that GW runs (which are strict about what can be used on the table), so other TO's can pick whatever rules they want.

Look, GW is far from perfect, and leaves a lot to be desired. But their FAQ's, frequent army releases, and the improvements to White Dwarf have been a godsend the past 12 months. If they keep it up, it's all roses. Privateer is just as profit-seeking, just as expensive (more per model).

Have you ever had to assemble a titan or a thunderhawk from FW? Read anything about the horror stories that people had to deal with to fix those models? I'm sure that those particular pieces are incredibly easy to transport, and there isn't the slightest concern that the resin will snap in the unfortunate event the model should tip over. Or how about the illustrious history of GW's finecast production line. You complain that PP is just a greedy profit seeking company, completely ignoring GW's annual price increases. Let's also completely discard the fact that starting a playable army for GW costs something in the area of $200 if you didn't get the DV starter set, and considerably more if you go the hard-cover rulebook route. GW's rulebooks alone will swallow $120 if you are getting a current 6th edition army. OH YEAH! and then lets disregard the fact that GW's latest trade policy decisions means that FLGS can't carry the fliers rulebook, which is needed to field the flier models at their stores. The same financial commitment with PP gets you a large army. Yeah, i see clearly how privateer press is an arrogant company solely directed toward profiteering off of the misfortunes of those that make the grave mistake of straying into their product line, ESPECIALLY by giving customers the option of buying just specific parts without having to buy the entire kit.

And really, PP is still behind GW in terms of the cool factor on their models.

Let's get your head out of your ass for a minute. Your own lack of preference for the steam-punk aesthetic does not reflect as a ubiquity of your opinion. I'm not overly fond of their fantasy line of stuff. In fact I'm not fond of anyone's line of fantasy stuff. Just isn't my thing, as such I haven't touched on them, I've stuck mostly to 40k. 40k's design aesthetic is starting to get annoying with the goofy cartoony proportions on many of the models. GW wants us to believe that humans are gangly apes with shoulders as wide as the human body is tall. In case you are too lazy to look back at my previous remarks, which I assume you are given the pompous remarks you've made, I will mention it again here, that I find the necrons and dark eldar to be particularly well executed product lines. There are things I like from GW (I think the incubi in particular are very well done were it not for the fact that they are finecast), and there are things that look like utterly terrible, which is almost the entire line of space marines.

We can drag this game on all we want, but all that's happening is people trying, desperately, to hate GW's models by justifying their alternative purchases.

I am all for people buying whatever models they want. I encourage the hobby as a whole; but don't pretend GW is any more expensive for it's content than anyone else. Upfront investment? Sure. But model-for-model, they are actually rather moderate by comparison.

And why should i confine myself to buying exclusively from GW when I feel that another model from a different line has a more aesthetically pleasing effect for the army theme? And here we go again with what I said earlier of asking you to not misrepresent my comments. The up-front investment isn't a one-time fee. I have several versions of several different rulebooks from my time with GW. I don't have to justify a damn thing, though I am pointing out that if someone doesn't like the design produced by GW, the person is not constrained to buying those models from GW. There's no justification necessary, to each their own. The bulk of my response to OP is to point out that the product line has not been sliding as badly as OP would believe, and nor is OP restricted to buying GW's toys to play GW's games. But hey, let's not let all of that get in the way of your egomania.

Y'know, PP does big kits well, Like really well, But i clearly see they struggle with smaller kits, Infantry look horrid in my opinion, Heck, even in the opinion of many PP lovers at my FLGS.
Thing is, Other then poses, I can be sure GW will make a kit that will atleast have good detail and good assembly, I hear horror stories of older ones, but new models i hear are as easy as snap and fit models.

Poda, I hate to call you out on your rant there, but I own two titans and they're an absolute blast to assemble. Very easy if you're even a moderately skilled modeler.

I've personally never had a any problem with a tau vehicle and I've assembled two devilish and a pirana this week. I guess I have to surmise that you're not a very skilled modeler, especially if you've had a plastic model suffer the same "catastrophic" damage of which you speak. Assemble them with a decent plastic cement and there should be no problem.

Also, my LGS had a copy of Death from the Skies in it today. So, yeah, you're wrong there too.

I suggest you go smoke or have a beer, friend, because you need to mellow out.

 poda_t wrote:

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

the pot calls the kettle black...
I'm well aware of the fact that PP would drop the boot on anyone using third party resources in their events, but then this makes sense given that the event is hosted by PP. I urge you to walk into a GW store and play on their tables with models that are obviously not GW's. Actually no, I dare you to play on GW's tables with parts that are obviously manufactured by CHS, or use a model with CHS parts in a golden daemon competition. They will boot you just as readily as PP will boot you from their event. The reason people get away with using non GW parts in tournaments, is because there's really only one or two tournaments that GW runs (which are strict about what can be used on the table), so other TO's can pick whatever rules they want.

This is actually incorrect. While you need to use at least 50% of the original model, there's a hell of a lot of stunningly converted armies using a wide amount of GW parts in official Privateer tournaments. Just look at Aduro's Cryx and MattieK's Retribution.

 cincydooley wrote:
Poda, I hate to call you out on your rant there, but I own two titans and they're an absolute blast to assemble. Very easy if you're even a moderately skilled modeler.

I've personally never had a any problem with a tau vehicle and I've assembled two devilish and a pirana this week. I guess I have to surmise that you're not a very skilled modeler, especially if you've had a plastic model suffer the same "catastrophic" damage of which you speak. Assemble them with a decent plastic cement and there should be no problem.

Also, my LGS had a copy of Death from the Skies in it today. So, yeah, you're wrong there too.

I suggest you go smoke or have a beer, friend, because you need to mellow out.

1.) there is variance in the resin parts, and some require more effort in straightening than others, and on the scale of a titan still require pinning for a strong hold. The correlation here is that metal models do not have unique problems.
2.) I try to go for the perfect clean aesthetics. I would love to know what my skill as a modeler has to do with a sprue desgin that habitually yields warped hulls, and puts seams in places that are difficult to deal with. My case in point is the tau riptide, and the fact that you can pick out the seams despite GW's professional team having gone over it. This is the kind of flaw endemic of tau models. I've assembled plenty of tau vehicles as well as imperial vehicles, and even my most badly warped rhino and leman russ could still be made to have the seams align without any effort.
3.) the catastrophic damage i speak of is the kind that happens with tipping and falling, or, contact with children. The only thing that can protect your larger models from sustaining damage is a carpeted floor, or a lock to keep children out. I would love to know just how what decent plastic cement has to do with the tolerance of plastic. You are making mistaken assumptions that the only place a model can sustain any kind of damage is where two pieces meet.
4.) and that one single copy of death from the skies ate up almost 1/10th of your FLGS allotted $500 to purchase direct order only products, of which death from the skies is a part, which explains why they will have just the one copy for the remainder of the month. You will of course be forgiven for not being aware of GW's trade policy, and the fact that it's making retailers irate to the point where they have actually banned the use of this book in their stores. You can read more on that here

 Laughing Man wrote:

 poda_t wrote:

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

the pot calls the kettle black...
I'm well aware of the fact that PP would drop the boot on anyone using third party resources in their events, but then this makes sense given that the event is hosted by PP. I urge you to walk into a GW store and play on their tables with models that are obviously not GW's. Actually no, I dare you to play on GW's tables with parts that are obviously manufactured by CHS, or use a model with CHS parts in a golden daemon competition. They will boot you just as readily as PP will boot you from their event. The reason people get away with using non GW parts in tournaments, is because there's really only one or two tournaments that GW runs (which are strict about what can be used on the table), so other TO's can pick whatever rules they want.

This is actually incorrect. While you need to use at least 50% of the original model, there's a hell of a lot of stunningly converted armies using a wide amount of GW parts in official Privateer tournaments. Just look at Aduro's Cryx and MattieK's Retribution.

Aside from just being wrong, at a GW-sanctioned event or tournament... oh, wait, I have to stop right there, don't I? At least PP has events.

 sourclams wrote:

 Laughing Man wrote:

 poda_t wrote:

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

the pot calls the kettle black...
I'm well aware of the fact that PP would drop the boot on anyone using third party resources in their events, but then this makes sense given that the event is hosted by PP. I urge you to walk into a GW store and play on their tables with models that are obviously not GW's. Actually no, I dare you to play on GW's tables with parts that are obviously manufactured by CHS, or use a model with CHS parts in a golden daemon competition. They will boot you just as readily as PP will boot you from their event. The reason people get away with using non GW parts in tournaments, is because there's really only one or two tournaments that GW runs (which are strict about what can be used on the table), so other TO's can pick whatever rules they want.

This is actually incorrect. While you need to use at least 50% of the original model, there's a hell of a lot of stunningly converted armies using a wide amount of GW parts in official Privateer tournaments. Just look at Aduro's Cryx and MattieK's Retribution.

Aside from just being wrong, at a GW-sanctioned event or tournament... oh, wait, I have to stop right there, don't I? At least PP has events.

GW still hands out their golden demon to someone, i assume they have to have an event for that, and then there is the the throne of skulls. So. Yes. GW does actually have events.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
Y'know, PP does big kits well, Like really well, But i clearly see they struggle with smaller kits, Infantry look horrid in my opinion, Heck, even in the opinion of many PP lovers at my FLGS.

There are some absolute dog PP kits, especially older ones. Thing is, PP does update this stuff and the new plastics generally are great for assembly, and I think they look pretty good as well. I just did a unit of Incendiarii this weekend; no problems at all and other than a very questionable design decision regarding the officer's head and his independent helmet bit, they're highly detailed figs with very good 'presence'. Poses are limited, I'll be the first to fess up to that. I don't feel it really holds much of the PP infantry back, though.

The PP 'big' kits, however, like the new Gargantuan releases, are simply above and beyond anything I've put together from GW... save maybe the old Terminator Chaos Lord/Sorceror, which just might be my favorite model of all time (and is not a big kit). Seriously go to Cool Mini Or Not and check out the variants of Mountain King and Archangel. I don't care for those models ruleswise, but they have great table presence.

The Gargs are a plastic/resin hybrid with attendant metal bits. I just finished priming the Mammoth--64 pieces in all, and it took me a grand total of 15 minutes to trim flash/clip sprue connectors. No problem whatsoever. It fits together like a dream, but still offers a lot of leeway for an enterprising sculptor to pose differently. The Dreadknight had a crapton of bits but regardless what you did, it still looked like a robot with a baby-man-doll strapped to its front. It's also hilariously monoposed, so that pretty much goes right out the window in a comparison for argument's sake.

The Dreadknight is probably my most disliked GW model ever made

I didn't pin a single piece of my titans. I used epoxy as my primary adhesive and magnetized the torsos, weapons, armor plates, and cockpit. Easy.

As to part straightening, you're right: it did take me nearly 45 seconds to microwave the water I needed to straighten the resin.

@clams - I like my Mountain King, but he's pretty darn monopose. The Stormwall, however, was a fun build. I had a lot of big mould line problems on the King, but nothing that was too hard to fix. My Storm Striders were by far the worst with mould lines, but it was their first.

My biggest problem with PP is that they refuse to front the $$ to make a 5 model box all unique sculpts. The Trollkin Sluggers are the latest culprit that just irk me, and as such I've yet to buy them. 3 unique models in a 5 model box doesn't cut it for me.

I'm highly aware of GWs new trade policy, of which my two primary LGSs have no problem. Rarely are any of them ordering that much Direct in a month anyway.

Coincidentally, both of these LGSs care about their customers and acted like adults, purchasing a house copy or the Skies book for all to use.

Tsilber wrote:
I have purchased, New Daemons, Tau, and Dark Angels armies. I think the models look great. even the Chaos space marines look fine. As for fantasy, all the new warriors of chaos look fine IMO, VC, and empire look great also imo.

Say Waaaaat? The new WoC models are so terrible they literally put me off collecting them any more, I have 3000 points or do of them but nope, I refuse to collect any more goofy, cartoony models! And yes DoC got some great sculpts but GW really focused on the wrong stuff, I mean cumon nurglings? Seriously? The massively outdated greater daemons were just crying out for a new sculpt. If they had done good enough ones, GW would have made a absolute killing from them!

BaconUprising wrote:

Tsilber wrote:
I have purchased, New Daemons, Tau, and Dark Angels armies. I think the models look great. even the Chaos space marines look fine. As for fantasy, all the new warriors of chaos look fine IMO, VC, and empire look great also imo.

Say Waaaaat? The new WoC models are so terrible they literally put me off collecting them any more, I have 3000 points or do of them but nope, I refuse to collect any more goofy, cartoony models! And yes DoC got some great sculpts but GW really focused on the wrong stuff, I mean cumon nurglings? Seriously? The massively outdated greater daemons were just crying out for a new sculpt. If they had done good enough ones, GW would have made a absolute killing from them!

I liked the Nurglings- they give the impression of Nurgle's children quite wonderfully. They kind of remind me of the Minions from the game Overlord. So far as I know, the Greater Daemons are in the pipeline anyways so just be patient. Or just save up and buy a FW greater daemon? Or cease your whining and make your own Greater Daemon? After all, you're not telling me all daemons look the same are you?
What exactly is wrong with the WoC stuff? Looking at the models now on GW website, the majority of them look great!

 brassangel wrote:
There wasn't a booth with a reasonably priced game, nor an artistic company with reasonably priced single minis.

Man, I had not known things were that bad over on the far side of the Pond. If you truly have no cheap miniatures games left, then I can only pity the lamentable state of the hobby over yonder. I recently paid £99 for 40 or so 28mm miniatures and one vehicle kit, which, I'm sure you'll agree, is a pretty sweet deal any way you slice it.

 brassangel wrote:

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

Really? I ran a unit of Nyss Hunters with Dark Eldar heads, and there wasn't a peep of complaint at any tournament I've used them in. The official rules for conversions in the Steamrollers rules are:

--Must be at least 50% the original model.
--Weapons can't be changed for weapons with different in-game effects--ie, a short sword can't be changed for a spear that would imply the model has the reach ability.
--The TO can make any exception to these rules at their discretion, the usual criteria being "Is it obvious at a glance what this is meant to be?"

So if you're basing that on experience, rather than hyperbole, the TO was breaking the rules.

I must be a person of extremely bad taste, because besides the Dreadknight and Demons, I'm loving every single one of the GW miniatures.

The Slaughterbrute was one of those models that made me go "Damn, I wish I had a chaos army to field that bad boy", the Riptide made me decide to start Tau allies, the Dark Angels have so many juicy details with all those church decorations (and I still think they look good), the CSM's Dragon and Forgefiend were "Look at that awesome robot."

And this new release, oh man, the Ice Phoenix is beautiful and although strange, I like the chariot pulled by the falcon.

I don't know, maybe I'm just strange but I hope they keep releasing a big MF for all races.

Oh, and please don't say the good miniatures were the ol'ones. I mean, I just have to take a look at my army. Those original necrons *shudders* everything back then looked like it was being squashed by massive gravity.

 poda_t wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:
Poda, I hate to call you out on your rant there, but I own two titans and they're an absolute blast to assemble. Very easy if you're even a moderately skilled modeler.

I've personally never had a any problem with a tau vehicle and I've assembled two devilish and a pirana this week. I guess I have to surmise that you're not a very skilled modeler, especially if you've had a plastic model suffer the same "catastrophic" damage of which you speak. Assemble them with a decent plastic cement and there should be no problem.

Also, my LGS had a copy of Death from the Skies in it today. So, yeah, you're wrong there too.

I suggest you go smoke or have a beer, friend, because you need to mellow out.

1.) there is variance in the resin parts, and some require more effort in straightening than others, and on the scale of a titan still require pinning for a strong hold. The correlation here is that metal models do not have unique problems.
2.) I try to go for the perfect clean aesthetics. I would love to know what my skill as a modeler has to do with a sprue desgin that habitually yields warped hulls, and puts seams in places that are difficult to deal with. My case in point is the tau riptide, and the fact that you can pick out the seams despite GW's professional team having gone over it. This is the kind of flaw endemic of tau models. I've assembled plenty of tau vehicles as well as imperial vehicles, and even my most badly warped rhino and leman russ could still be made to have the seams align without any effort.
3.) the catastrophic damage i speak of is the kind that happens with tipping and falling, or, contact with children. The only thing that can protect your larger models from sustaining damage is a carpeted floor, or a lock to keep children out. I would love to know just how what decent plastic cement has to do with the tolerance of plastic. You are making mistaken assumptions that the only place a model can sustain any kind of damage is where two pieces meet.
4.) and that one single copy of death from the skies ate up almost 1/10th of your FLGS allotted $500 to purchase direct order only products, of which death from the skies is a part, which explains why they will have just the one copy for the remainder of the month. You will of course be forgiven for not being aware of GW's trade policy, and the fact that it's making retailers irate to the point where they have actually banned the use of this book in their stores. You can read more on that here

Whilst i dont do many vehicles from GW i do have to say i have had problems aswell. In particular the damned shadow sword is supplied with the hull, track guards etc in 2 peices. Despite the fact it would be easyer to make them one piece. But my biggest moan? The huge bolts-so big they would be car wheels in real life and the very crappy massive aquilas moulded onto every surface. The skulls arnt to bad but tje aquilas? I am making a rebel force, not a loyalist one so why would i want fething huge aquilas smattered everywhere?

And as for dealing with the catastophic damage i advise you switch to using Revells Contacta Professional plastic glue. This forms a stong bond, literally welding the 2 peices together. The only disadvantage is that you have to be precise as it is almost impossible to get the 2 peices apart if you wish to move them, as the join is stronger than the surrounding plastic. Whatever you do dont use the GW crap. There glue used to be one of the best out there but now any model built with it can fall apart at the first glance.

Regarding price: PP's models are just as expensive, model for model.

The difference? You need fewer.

For example:
Tharn Bloodtrackers cost $55 for 10 (metal I think) models on their website. $5.50 a model.
10 Eternal Guard models, also metal, cost $47 for 1 command set and 1 normal set. $4.7 a model.
However, you'll probably be wanting 1 command and 3 normal sets for a unit of 20, so overall the cost of one unit would be $91.

Per model, the prices are roughly the same, but for an army, GW costs a lot more, as you may expect.

For one off purchases, I'll compare the Judicator to the Baneblade.

The Judicator costs $134.99 on their webiste.
The Baneblade $115 on the GW website.
But of course, the Judicator is half your army, so you'll need fewer models. You can use it in every game. The Baneblade, on the other hand, can only be used in Apocalypse games, which feature quite a few models on both sides. Maybe $1500 a side in total for a large game?

Aesthetically, it's up to taste whether you prefer the steampunk look of Warmachine, the attempt at something unusual Fantasy-wise for Hordes (some, in my opinion, hit, others miss by 20 metres), the distant future-yet-familiar look of 40k or the generic fantasy of WFB.

Can we please get back to GW models?

1500 per side? Maybe in giant games. But in above it might be 600 per side. And while pp might require less, for a modeler and collected like me it is the same.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
1500 per side? Maybe in giant games. But in above it might be 600 per side. And while pp might require less, for a modeler and collected like me it is the same.

The idea of 'redundancy' has to be entertained in a 'collector' comparison between GW and PP, though. In PP, other than a few warjacks and tier lists (and it is not very many), you are almost never rewarded in-game for taking multiples of anything. If I have a unit of Fennblades with the Unit Attachment, I will probably never want/need another unit of Fenns with UA.

That actually results in WM/H collections becoming 'complete' pending new releases. I think I priced up owning the entire Trollblood line (whichi s the most expensive), i.e. basically every list you could ever want to play, for something around $1,000. Add another $200 for Mountain King and recent releases, so $1200. You could go spend more, but there's really not much reason to.

Now compare to 40k. Changing an armylist within a faction isn't as simple as just dropping out X unit and replacing with Y vehicle. Oftentimes you have to eliminate a wide swathe of your army and replace it with large swathes of new models, probably very similar/identical models. Imagine going from troop-heavy Imperial Guard to mechanized Guard. Now, I haven't been following the newest edition, and it seems like vehicles are out other than flyers and bodyspam is largely 'in', so that helps somewhat. Last edition, though, to make the 2500 pt 'Ard Boyz IG list I wanted to play was an easy $800, for just that one army. To switch it to a LR IG list would probably cost another $200+. To go infantry heavy would be another easy $300+. So now I'm invested for about the same price (more, really) as an entire WM/H faction, and when the edition switches my army apparently sucks.

 sourclams wrote:

 Laughing Man wrote:

 poda_t wrote:

How about tournament play? At a PP sanctioned event or painting competition, if they so much as recognize a BIT from GW's line on a mini, you get disqualified.

the pot calls the kettle black...
I'm well aware of the fact that PP would drop the boot on anyone using third party resources in their events, but then this makes sense given that the event is hosted by PP. I urge you to walk into a GW store and play on their tables with models that are obviously not GW's. Actually no, I dare you to play on GW's tables with parts that are obviously manufactured by CHS, or use a model with CHS parts in a golden daemon competition. They will boot you just as readily as PP will boot you from their event. The reason people get away with using non GW parts in tournaments, is because there's really only one or two tournaments that GW runs (which are strict about what can be used on the table), so other TO's can pick whatever rules they want.

This is actually incorrect. While you need to use at least 50% of the original model, there's a hell of a lot of stunningly converted armies using a wide amount of GW parts in official Privateer tournaments. Just look at Aduro's Cryx and MattieK's Retribution.

Aside from just being wrong, at a GW-sanctioned event or tournament... oh, wait, I have to stop right there, don't I? At least PP has events.

any "events" GW had that I enjoyed were staff run only, and weren't the idea of the company... meaning that was a few years ago and are bland and unenjoyable these days