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Davor wrote:

 Steve steveson wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
You've just cited the business model GW seems to be pursuing!

In fairness though, things ultimately cost what people are prepared to spend. So, if enough people are willing to pay $70 a time for the whole thing to be viable, more power to them.

I will not be one of them.

The existence of recasters, or widespread piracy of any sort in any other industry, is generally indicative of a disconnect between the customer base and the price/quality of the product on offer, which would suggest GW have overstepped the mark in that regard.

No, it's an indication that people place no value on intellectual property and when you look at the number of people still pirating books and music, despite the price drops and availability in multiple formats, that some people will always chose free over legal.

I think Apple iTunes want a word with you. If all those people wanted free, how come iTunes have made Billions?

What on earth are you talking about? I'm aware of itunes thank you. But despite services such as that music piracy still exists. That's my whole point. I didn't say everyone pirates, I said SOME.

 azreal13 wrote:


The existence of recasters, or widespread piracy of any sort in any other industry, is generally indicative of a disconnect between the customer base and the price/quality of the product on offer, which would suggest GW have overstepped the mark in that regard.

No. The existence of piracy is generally a reflection of the fact that a product is desirable and that dodgy people can make a quick buck. Everything is counterfeited, VW brake parts, baby milk, Lego, Levi's, Beats, any/all DVDs, wines, viagra, olive oil, salmon. Remember the kids poisoned with fake baby milk containing melamine?


You're distorting the argument to make it look like GW are being counterfeited because they're bad and after a quick buck. The reality is it's the counterfeiters who are thieves, after a quick buck.

 ashcroft wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
existence of recasters, or widespread piracy of any sort in any other industry, is generally indicative of a disconnect between the customer base and the price/quality of the product on offer, which would suggest GW have overstepped the mark in that regard.

No, the existence of piracy is indicative that the capability exists to copy a product and sell it for less/free.

And that is all that it indicates.

So much self deception in this thread. Pirating GW/FW is no different morally from pirating any other mini manufacturer. The recasters don't give one feth about GW's policies, or pricing, or rules imbalance. They recast GW because that's what sells. If you think for one solitary second that they wouldn't do the same to Privateer Press or Victoria Miniatures or anyone else then you are very very wrong.

Seriously people, if you must buy your knock offs then do so, but stop pretending that you're taking some sort of stand against Big Bad GW by doing so.

Except with the rise in the accessibility and drop in price of entertainment media via the likes of Netflix and iTunes, the evidence is that piracy has actually dropped, supporting my point and refuting yours.

Also, yes, the recasters recast GW because that's what sells.

Stopped to consider the reasons underlying why the other stuff doesn't?

 Captain Avatar wrote:

Klerych wrote:
Yeah! Why not go steal someone's car? I mean.. I already have downloaded a book and pirated a game, so now I am excused in further law violations and it's perfectly okay and justified! And if I infringed someone's copyright already, why not go for more? All I'm saying that if one crime is not wrong, then maybe another one isn't either, right?

See the flaw yet?

Yes, it is in your analogy.

A more accurate auto motive analogy would be to ask if it is ok to pull molds of the body panels and then "build" your own car.

To do such is perfectly legal. In fact there is an entire industry built around it. They are called "Kit Cars" or "Repli-cars".

No. Most car manufactures either licence or tolerate replica/lookalike kits. Some don't:

http://m.autoblog.com/2012/03/23/daimler-crushes-unauthorized-mercedes-benz-300-sl-body/

 Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:


The existence of recasters, or widespread piracy of any sort in any other industry, is generally indicative of a disconnect between the customer base and the price/quality of the product on offer, which would suggest GW have overstepped the mark in that regard.

No. The existence of piracy is generally a reflection of the fact that a product is desirable and that dodgy people can make a quick buck. Everything is counterfeited, VW brake parts, baby milk, Lego, Levi's, Beats, any/all DVDs, wines, viagra, olive oil, salmon. Remember the kids poisoned with fake baby milk containing melamine?


You're distorting the argument to make it look like GW are being counterfeited because they're bad and after a quick buck. The reality is it's the counterfeiters who are thieves, after a quick buck.

Except the quick buck cannot be made without someone willing to purchase.

That person needs to be motivated to do so, and yes, frequently the price will be enough. But in the case of GW models, we seem to have multiple factors, not only price, but actually improved quality and also discontent.

My contention that if there were more satisfied customers who could purchase kits at a high standard of QC at what enough felt was a reasonable price, then the issue of piracy resolves itself.

Of course, you'll always get some counter-culture hipsters "sticking it to the man" but ultimately, studies of the changes in consumer behaviour in the entertainment industry are showing that if the product is right, people are happy to pay what they perceive to be a fair price for legal product.

Apathy is a powerful thing, the easiest way to stamp out piracy is to make it not worth the effort for the majority.

 azreal13 wrote:
[Except with the rise in the accessibility and drop in price of entertainment media via the likes of Netflix and iTunes, the evidence is that piracy has actually dropped, supporting my point and refuting yours.

Piracy has only dropped in the sense that it's fallen off the news media radar for now, and the steps taken to restrict access to pirated material has been effective only in (perhaps) dissuading the casual browser. I could still lay my hands on just about any digital media product, for free, within a day or so of it's release. Price drops have helped perhaps, but no price will ever be able to compete with Free and so piracy will continue.

Also, yes, the recasters recast GW because that's what sells.

Stopped to consider the reasons underlying why the other stuff doesn't?

For the same reason that World of Warcraft has more goldsellers than any other MMO. More players = more potential customers.

But there has to be more to it.

Surely you can sell enough Warmachine to make money? It's not like there's a massive investment, hell, you could list the box on your recaster website and only go out and get it if someone ordered it.

With such low risk, low level up front investment, and, while agreed smaller, an established worldwide playing community, it should be worth it, surely?

Assuming that players are only buying recast product on the basis of cost, and no other reason, of course.

Steve steveson wrote:
That's simply not true. Fakers will always be cheaper than the real thing. They have no intellectual costs and have another business to build there market. It's not about who owes who what. Every country has IP laws for a reason. The free market lets other companies develop competing products, not people make fakes. Fundamentally the market needs protections to encourage innovation. Without IP protection no one will have a guarantee of being able to profit from the work so why bother innovating?

Source please.

It has been pretty much proven that "fakers" can not profitably undercut the manufacuter's price unless the company is overcharging by a fair margin. It is simply a matter of the scale of production.

Also, design and prototyping make up about a penny of the sale price of most models. Look at who gets paid what and what tools are available for prototyping and you will see that HW staff "artists" and designers make a middle class wage and that those teams are quite small.

Last, even the best equipped knock off companies can't match gw's facilities......with one exception.

The exception is for the "unauthorized" model producers that GW created themselves by farming out their production to china while still claiming everything was Nottingham made.

In that case, I view it as karma. For years, GW defrauded their customers by selling cheap Chinese plastics as expensive Nottingham pieces. Now those same Chinese manufacturers are still producing and selling at the cost GW should be charging all along.

Thats right the price they should be charging because they are producing GW models with GW molds and with GW methods. The price difference between GW and thier former Chinese factories should be pennies but due to GW's price gouging the chinese can operate profitably at 50% of the price.

 azreal13 wrote:
...ultimately, studies of the changes in consumer behaviour in the entertainment industry are showing that if the product is right, people are happy to pay what they perceive to be a fair price for legal product.

I'll leave it here to avoid a repetitive to-and-fro.

Did parents buy lethal powdered baby milk because breast milk is not available for a fair price?

Criminals will do whatever they can to sell their product. Blaming legit companies, who pay taxes, minimum wage, for piracy is not a morally-justifiable position.

 Captain Avatar wrote:

It has been pretty much proven that "fakers" can not profitably undercut the manufacuter's price unless the company is overcharging by a fair margin. It is simply a matter of the scale of production.

Also, design and prototyping make up about a penny of the sale price of most models.

Says a source you just made up.

Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:

 Captain Avatar wrote:

It has been pretty much proven that "fakers" can not profitably undercut the manufacuter's price unless the company is overcharging by a fair margin. It is simply a matter of the scale of production.

Also, design and prototyping make up about a penny of the sale price of most models.

Says a source you just made up.

Nope, data extrapolated from GW financials.

 Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
...ultimately, studies of the changes in consumer behaviour in the entertainment industry are showing that if the product is right, people are happy to pay what they perceive to be a fair price for legal product.

I'll leave it here to avoid a repetitive to-and-fro.

Did parents buy lethal powdered baby milk because breast milk is not available for a fair price?

Criminals will do whatever they can to sell their product. Blaming legit companies, who pay taxes, minimum wage, for piracy is not a morally-justifiable position.

Yeah, I'm not sure selling rat poison as baby milk, or whatever the details were, or any other product, when the consumer is ignorant of the fact is really comparable to people openly selling a reproduction/counterfeit at a substantially discounted price to consumers who, in the main, know what they're buying.

There's no deception in the latter, at least none between vendor and consumer.

 azreal13 wrote:
Surely you can sell enough Warmachine to make money?

Sure, of course you could probably make money on Warmachine stuff. But it's a question of opportunity cost, if you're spending your time on Warmachine recasts you're not spending that time making GW recasts. And GW simply has a bigger market share and therefore a larger number of potential customers.

 Captain Avatar wrote:
It has been pretty much proven that "fakers" can not profitably undercut the manufacuter's price unless the company is overcharging by a fair margin.

Sigh. It really hasn't been proven, because there is no such thing as "overcharging" in this context. There is no "fair" price for a 40k model, the price is simply what GW feels like charging. The fact that you wish the prices were lower does not mean that they're too high in some objective sense.

Also, design and prototyping make up about a penny of the sale price of most models. Look at who gets paid what and what tools are available for prototyping and you will see that HW staff "artists" and designers make a middle class wage and that those teams are quite small.

The point is that it's a huge up-front investment, even if the per-model cost is small. If recasters had to do all that work before making a new kit they'd be out of business overnight. The only reason they can make a profit selling at their current prices is that all they have to do to start production of a new kit is buy one from GW and make some molds from it.

For years, GW defrauded their customers by selling cheap Chinese plastics as expensive Nottingham pieces.

Did GW ever advertise where the models were produced? Because I don't remember seeing any claims about that.

Thats right the price they should be charging because they are producing GW models with GW molds and with GW methods. The price difference between GW and thier former Chinese factories should be pennies but due to GW's price gouging the chinese can operate profitably at 50% of the price.

First, no, price gouging does not exist for gaming miniatures. Please stop making this absurd claim that "I want it to be cheaper" is the equivalent of increasing bottled water prices 100000% when a natural disaster hits.

Second, you're still ignoring all of the other costs GW has to pay. The cost of a model kit includes a lot more than just the raw materials and manufacturing cost, and those Chinese factories avoid paying those costs by stealing GW's work. You wouldn't be getting those kits at the same price if the Chinese factory had to design their own kits (including the rules to use them), advertise them, and back them with GW's level of customer service.

 Peregrine wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
Surely you can sell enough Warmachine to make money?

Sure, of course you could probably make money on Warmachine stuff. But it's a question of opportunity cost, if you're spending your time on Warmachine recasts you're not spending that time making GW recasts. And GW simply has a bigger market share and therefore a larger number of potential customers.

Unless you're under the (I strongly suspect) mistaken impression that anyone recasting is working flat out, all the time, with more orders than they can handle, then there is no opportunity cost, just another order.

 Captain Avatar wrote:
And lastly, the practice of price gouging most certainly does exist on luxury items, just doing such is not a prosecute-able offense.

No, it really doesn't, you just don't understand what price gouging is. Price gouging refers to taking advantage of exceptional but temporary need to charge significantly more than the usual price for an essential product. For example, doubling the prices of bottled water when a natural disaster hits and contaminates the local water supply is price gouging. The normal market value of the water isn't that high, you're just taking advantage of the fact that nobody has any option besides paying your inflated prices. Even at $100 a bottle you have to buy it because otherwise you die of dehydration or take your chances with contaminated water. This can't happen with 40k models for two reasons: there's no unusual situation to drive up prices, and it's a luxury product that you can just decline to buy if the prices get too high.

Funny, in the Washington Redskins thread weren't you one of the people arguing that the loss of copyright protection was a blow "for" the free market?

No, I haven't participated in that thread at all. Please don't try to tie me to someone else's argument.

They were never intended to be used as a means by which corporations create mini-monopolies.

...

Are you serious? Do you actually have any clue what a monopoly is? Let me give you a hint: GW being the only company that can produce space marines for 40k is not a monopoly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 azreal13 wrote:
Unless you're under the (I strongly suspect) mistaken impression that anyone recasting is working flat out, all the time, with more orders than they can handle, then there is no opportunity cost, just another order.

They might not be working flat out, but how much more time do they have? And remember that doing Warmachine recasts requires a certain minimum time commitment, both to make the molds and initial stock, and to finish all of the orders in a reasonable amount of time so that you don't lose all of your customers. If the market for Warmachine recasts is small (primarily because the market for Warmachine in general is small compared to GW) then it's a case of diminishing returns compared to focusing on your profitable GW recasts.

My oh my. Looks like people are willing to even defend GW`s pricing policy if that lets them feel like they are on a moral high horse.

Me? I played against someone with a recast FW avatar and 3 hornets just the other day. I know for a fact that person hasn't pirated a PC game ever since Steam became a thing. People will pay what they feel is a fair price even if they could get it for free. And they will pirate it if they feel the price is unfair.

 Peregrine wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
Unless you're under the (I strongly suspect) mistaken impression that anyone recasting is working flat out, all the time, with more orders than they can handle, then there is no opportunity cost, just another order.

They might not be working flat out, but how much more time do they have? And remember that doing Warmachine recasts requires a certain minimum time commitment, both to make the molds and initial stock, and to finish all of the orders in a reasonable amount of time so that you don't lose all of your customers. If the market for Warmachine recasts is small (primarily because the market for Warmachine in general is small compared to GW) then it's a case of diminishing returns compared to focusing on your profitable GW recasts.

Yeah...no.

Sorry, but do you have the impression that Beijing is littered with massive factories churning out nothing but knock off Gw product?

 TheCustomLime wrote:
I wouldn't care. I'm not GW legal and it is none of my business where he got his models. Unless he stole them from another player, of course.

This.

Only other thing is if it looks atrocious.

I could care less if they are GW models or not as long as they look the part and the person put some time into them. Saying "I won't play against those, they are not official" to recasts, is about the same as a special build from scratch model. If someone has the skills to build, cast, or recast nice looking models, good for them.

 azreal13 wrote:
Sorry, but do you have the impression that Beijing is littered with massive factories churning out nothing but knock off Gw product?

No, of course not. But what does that have to do with the opportunity cost of making non-GW models?

 azreal13 wrote:
Surely you can sell enough Warmachine to make money? It's not like there's a massive investment, hell, you could list the box on your recaster website and only go out and get it if someone ordered it.

With such low risk, low level up front investment, and, while agreed smaller, an established worldwide playing community, it should be worth it, surely?

Why bother? TTG is a niche market... why waste time and effort on a niche of that niche?

Assuming that players are only buying recast product on the basis of cost, and no other reason, of course.

The substantial hatedom that follows GW does, I imagine, make them more attractive to recasters. In any form of piracy the big guys are always seen as fair game, and smaller 'friendlier' companies may have a more loyal (and less hypocritical) fanbase that will support them regardless.

But that is, I suspect, a statistically insignificant factor. An individual may make the decision to pirate or not to pirate based on conscience, but the internet has no conscience and will take whatever is Free, or cheap.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
My oh my. Looks like people are willing to even defend GW`s pricing policy if that lets them feel like they are on a moral high horse.

Who said anything about defending it? Arguing that it's not price gouging is not the same thing as defending it, you can have a pricing policy that is bad business even if it isn't price gouging. GW's prices are arguably too high, but if you don't like it just stop buying. Whining about how expensive everything is doesn't justify stealing it.

And they will pirate it if they feel the price is unfair.

And for a lot of people "unfair" is "anything above $0". Stop trying to turn this into some bizarre moral high ground where piracy is just a statement about fairness. It isn't, it's simply a decision that you'd rather steal something than not have it.

 Peregrine wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
Sorry, but do you have the impression that Beijing is littered with massive factories churning out nothing but knock off Gw product?

No, of course not. But what does that have to do with the opportunity cost of making non-GW models?

Because if you're just someone doing some recasting in your spare time, which is I assume what most recasters are, and today you woke up, and you had 4 orders, and you filled them, then tomorrow you wake up and have 5 orders, one of which is Warmachine, unless you can only fill 4 orders a day, theres no fething opportunity cost!

These aren't factories with production planned months in advance who have to shut down the Centurions machine in order to do a batch of Khador Warjacks.

 azreal13 wrote:
Because if you're just someone doing some recasting in your spare time, which is I assume what most recasters are, and today you woke up, and you had 4 orders, and you filled them, then tomorrow you wake up and have 5 orders, one of which is Warmachine, unless you can only fill 4 orders a day, theres no fething opportunity cost!

Sure there is. You have to get the Warmachine kit and make the molds, two things that require multiple sales just to break even and make you lose money if you just get that one sale. And then you have to make the molds and make the model, something you may or may not be willing to do depending how much time you're willing to invest into your little side business. And then you have to be prepared to spend the time required when you get four orders for Warmachine kits, since you can't afford to have angry customers who didn't get their products. So the question is whether it's really worth it to make that commitment for the occasional Warmachine sale when, even in ideal circumstances, Warmachine stuff will never make up more than a small percentage of your total sales.

In fact, these things are probably bigger factors if recasting is a "spare time" business, since it's a lot harder to reach the break-even point on new molds with such low production volume, and the recaster is a lot more likely to say "screw it, I'm not spending more than 3 hours a day on this, I'm going to go play video games" instead of rearranging their production schedule to accommodate demand for Warmachine kits.

But that's not opportunity cost.

That's just cost

If you're going to throw recognised terms around, please be sure that you know what they mean, and be consistent in their application.

I am curious to see within the next few to 10 years from now, if these people who are up in arms over recasts, if they will be using their 3D printers to be making GW minis or terrain.

Davor wrote:
I am curious to see within the next few to 10 years from now, if these people who are up in arms over recasts, if they will be using their 3D printers to be making GW minis or terrain.

You reckon they'd ever admit to it if they were?

Davor wrote:
I am curious to see within the next few to 10 years from now, if these people who are up in arms over recasts, if they will be using their 3D printers to be making GW minis or terrain.

If and when 3D printing becomes viable - as cheap and ubiquitous as pcs are now, and with the definition to make it possible to duplicate these models - then it will hit the entire mini making industry very hard indeed. I doubt the arguments will change - people will still claim that to pirate GW is justified and to do so to other manufacturers is not.

The fact is that this tech is potentially less threatening to the survival of GW than it is to the little guys who are more reliant on each individual sale.

 ashcroft wrote:

Davor wrote:
I am curious to see within the next few to 10 years from now, if these people who are up in arms over recasts, if they will be using their 3D printers to be making GW minis or terrain.

If and when 3D printing becomes viable - as cheap and ubiquitous as pcs are now, and with the definition to make it possible to duplicate these models - then it will hit the entire mini making industry very hard indeed. I doubt the arguments will change - people will still claim that to pirate GW is justified and to do so to other manufacturers is not.

The fact is that this tech is potentially less threatening to the survival of GW than it is to the little guys who are more reliant on each individual sale.

That's true, but if X-wing shows anything there is a market for miniatures that are fully painted and assembled. So the 3D printer shouldn't be taking away these sales, but I see what you mean it will hurt the little guys. Then again, how is Magic doing? By that I mean can not people just copy and print their cards? Sales are still going strong right? So how is the Magic sceane doing with "printed" cards.

 Klerych wrote:

And it's even worse with people who say "Can't afford it! Better buy a recast at 50% off the price!" and then spend the saved money on stuff like alcohol or cigarettes.

How about twice as many miniatures? I have a strong moral opposition to both of those things. Does this mean I'm going to become an alcoholic smoker because I buy recasts from China? That's a really odd and very baseless assertion.

Davor wrote:
Then again, how is Magic doing? By that I mean can not people just copy and print their cards? Sales are still going strong right? So how is the Magic sceane doing with "printed" cards.

I'm fairly sure that WotC took some measures against that. I mean.. some cards are worth quite some money.

 Frozen Ocean wrote:

 Klerych wrote:

And it's even worse with people who say "Can't afford it! Better buy a recast at 50% off the price!" and then spend the saved money on stuff like alcohol or cigarettes.

How about twice as many miniatures? I have a strong moral opposition to both of those things. Does this mean I'm going to become an alcoholic smoker because I buy recasts from China? That's a really odd and very baseless assertion.

I already covered that when asked what I meant.. 'ere ye go:

 Klerych wrote:
It was only partially relevant, I admit. It's just that some people often like to justify themselves saying that they won't buy books/movies/games because they can't afford them/are too poor/have too low salary to pay for them while wasting even more money on stuff like alcohol and cigarettes. That's precisely what I call hypocricy.

Please make sure to notice the "some" in second sentence.

 azreal13 wrote:
But that's not opportunity cost.

That's just cost

If you're going to throw recognised terms around, please be sure that you know what they mean, and be consistent in their application.

Except it IS opportunity cost because the point is that the "spare time" recaster has a limited budget of time and money for things like buying new kits or making new molds, and that's very important when the choice is between buying a Warmachine kit to recast or buying the latest big GW thing to recast.