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 Daba wrote:
Your home printer, even a Laser one still is nowhere near the quality of worst-quality trash paperbacks. Even most office printers don't even get that quality.

2D printing has been around for how long? Why do you assume that good quality 3D printing will become affordable?

I see it being affordable for dedicated businesses, but for a home user I don't see it ever happening because I don't see a mass market function for such a high quality 3D printer.

It could easily reach the point of being "good enough" though - my parents have been printing family photos at home with acceptable results for about a decade now. Sure they aren't as good as repo shop prints, but that doesn't bother them. I don't see why the same won't apply to 3D printing.

nkelsch wrote:


And as to the 'PP is cheaper even though it has the same prices as GW', GW has explicitly said 2/3rds of their customers never play the game..

.Sounds dubious.............because how does GW know this if they don't do any market research?

Herzlos wrote:

 Daba wrote:
Your home printer, even a Laser one still is nowhere near the quality of worst-quality trash paperbacks. Even most office printers don't even get that quality.

2D printing has been around for how long? Why do you assume that good quality 3D printing will become affordable?

I see it being affordable for dedicated businesses, but for a home user I don't see it ever happening because I don't see a mass market function for such a high quality 3D printer.

It could easily reach the point of being "good enough" though - my parents have been printing family photos at home with acceptable results for about a decade now. Sure they aren't as good as repo shop prints, but that doesn't bother them. I don't see why the same won't apply to 3D printing.

There are various reasons but I would not say it was impossible, just probably less likely than you think. I agree with MWHistorian that a technology that might threaten GW in five or 10 years is not the concern right now. It's possible they won't survive long enough to have to worry about it.

nkelsch wrote:
GW has explicitly said 2/3rds of their customers never play the game.

Citation needed.

How would they even know? They don't do market research.

nkelsch wrote:

And as to the 'PP is cheaper even though it has the same prices as GW', GW has explicitly said 2/3rds of their customers never play the game.

GW as stated and takes pride in the fact that it doesn't do any market research, ergo they have no way of knowing what their customers do or don't do so any statement that they put out on this is completely irrelevant since it has no basis in actual facts.

PhantomViper wrote:

nkelsch wrote:

And as to the 'PP is cheaper even though it has the same prices as GW', GW has explicitly said 2/3rds of their customers never play the game.

GW as stated and takes pride in the fact that it doesn't do any market research, ergo they have no way of knowing what their customers do or don't do so any statement that they put out on this is completely irrelevant since it has no basis in actual facts.

Jervis has said during interviews that two thirds of their customers never actually play their game. They call them "craft hobbyists" and see them as their core market. Considering 'craft Hobbyists' are a real thing, to try to discount them as having power int he market place or not existing again goes to 'veterans' overestimating their self-worth and their buying power and how much they should be catered to.

The issue is there is a significant market of people who buy minis but don't play specific games, so 'cost per mini' is perfectly relevant. This makes GW and PP both similar in cost and are both expensive. 'Cost of entry' doesn't make figures cheaper when entry is a single figure to paint/collect.

nkelsch wrote:

PhantomViper wrote:

nkelsch wrote:

And as to the 'PP is cheaper even though it has the same prices as GW', GW has explicitly said 2/3rds of their customers never play the game.

GW as stated and takes pride in the fact that it doesn't do any market research, ergo they have no way of knowing what their customers do or don't do so any statement that they put out on this is completely irrelevant since it has no basis in actual facts.

Jervis has said during interviews that two thirds of their customers never actually play their game. They call them "craft hobbyists" and see them as their core market.

The issue is there is a significant market of people who buy minis but don't play specific games, so 'cost per mini' is perfectly relevant. This makes GW and PP both similar in cost and are both expensive. 'Cost of entry' doesn't make figures cheaper when entry is a single figure to paint/collect.

Again, they don't do any market research so how can they possibly know this?

And not only that but every shred of evidence that we have access to contradicts this. We know that kit sales are directly influenced by the rules released for them, with even older kits suffering sale spikes when new and more powerful rules are released for them... This wouldn't happen if the vast majority of people are only buying them to paint and display.

It all boils down to competition for our "disposable" income.

We all may have a set amount for war gaming.
I was about to go into a long comparison of what you get for $300 from each leading game company.
I got lazy and figure most of you have that already figured out.

I find X-wing exciting and have little problem with the cost of the waves that have been released.
Battletech is getting dusted off lately with my group so a new book and some mech models are purchased (Really like the new "Alpha Strike" rules).
A couple of the latest codex's released by GW were purchased and that is pretty much it...
Still waiting on Robotech Tactics kickstarter rewards....

There are so many other great games out there that I cannot see for any reason me starting a new army in 40k which happened a fair bit in the long forgotten past.
We maintain what we have since entry is too expensive for GW and entry in other systems is equivalent in cost to a GW "update" so it is looking not good for GW.

I look at where my money goes and this year compared to last: GW is getting 1/4 of my cash than last year.
I am not all that special, there are plenty of others that have a multitude of shiny new games out there to get interested in.
MTG is still kicking hobby butt so could be creating a money vacuum.

Davor wrote:

Not sure what you mean by "Illegal but unenforceable" category, because as I understand it, anything for "personal" use an "not making money off it" is legal. At least in Canada we are allowed to make copies and keep the original as a back up. It's illegal to distribute said material either by Torrents, or selling it in stores or the back of your trunk.

Are you sure about that?

The last time I ran into a person saying that, it took me less than 5 minutes to look up the copyright laws of his specific country (New Zealand), and quote the law showing that he was wrong.

Please note, I am not saying that you are wrong. I have not looked up the copyright laws pertaining to Canada.
I am just pointing out that a lot of times we are just spreading internet myths, and not taking the time to look up the actual law.

And of course we need to keep in mind that the laws of various countries differs wildly, so stating that "the law is such and such" is always sketchy at best.

Herzlos wrote:

 Daba wrote:
Your home printer, even a Laser one still is nowhere near the quality of worst-quality trash paperbacks. Even most office printers don't even get that quality.

2D printing has been around for how long? Why do you assume that good quality 3D printing will become affordable?

I see it being affordable for dedicated businesses, but for a home user I don't see it ever happening because I don't see a mass market function for such a high quality 3D printer.

It could easily reach the point of being "good enough" though - my parents have been printing family photos at home with acceptable results for about a decade now. Sure they aren't as good as repo shop prints, but that doesn't bother them. I don't see why the same won't apply to 3D printing.

The question is, whether there is a mass market use.

If I make a 3D printer that I can manufacture inexpensively, I still require a mass market use for it to shift at mass market prices.

If my consumer base is going to be small, I need to price it high with a large profit margin otherwise I will sell my stock to those who want it and not sell any more again, and no longer have a business.

If my numbers are low, and those who want it would set up business, I am better served in creating a more expensive, higher quality machine that will go to those 'print shops', who themselves are serving a niche market.

The question is, how do I create need for it? What do I have to create need?

Wargamers are better and more cheaply served by existing companies, who can cast, produce and sell for a lower price than a high quality 3D print would (possibly even lower than the material cost to 3D print it, nevermind the equipment).

What I think is stopping it from being in houses is a mass market use to make it worthwhile to make and sell.

Currently, I see use in it by existing companies to produce fast prototypes and masters or parts. In fact, this is how they are currently used, and the quality is possibly already there. Without a mass market use though, that's where 3D printers are going to stay.

The example of 2D printers printing the photo being 'good enough' is a use for a 2D printer that is reasonably mass market. What is an equivalent in 3D printing for the home?

We don't know what the mass market for 3d printers will be yet. Just like there wasn't initially a mass market for 2d printers or cd writers either.

There are a lot of small companies that could benefit from rapid prototyping facilities particularly in design and engineering. Fabricators making components or templates for instance. Architectural models. It might never make it into every home but I can see it being in the shop of every 1 man manufacturing and enthusiasts outfit. My dad would get one just to make random stuff with, should the price be good rather than make wooden templates

The comment Jervis and some other GW studio staff make about who they think their target audience are, is directly derived from what Tom Kirby tells them .

If he tells them via the sales department , he wants them to write rules to sell the latest releases to 11 to 16 year old boys, that what they do.

If he tells them that well defined , edited proof read and play tested rules are a waste of time because less than a third of customers actual bother playing the games.That is the instruction they follow.

There you go:

http://www.easypolls.net/poll.html?p=53e65cb1e4b0ecddd1ca2e9f

Shows GW has no dang idea what they are doing. When a simple survey shows 78% of people buy GW for the game and 16% are collectors, I guess GW, in their infinite incompetence, will cater to the 16% instead of the 78%.

I mainly play Infinity and occasionally Hell Dorado. I do, however, collect some minis I want to just paint, convert, or display as well. Know what, I very, very rarely look at GW. Collectors want one or two models of what interests them (like you used to be able to get in boxed sets).

When GW began the conversion to plastic, it was mostly the basic regiments with the remainder being available in blisters. I'd be willing to bet at that time, it was mostly gamers who bought the regiment sets while both gamers and collectors bought blisters. Now that everything is in a box set (and ridiculously priced to boot), which is of little appeal to most collectors and the rules are written as if they are unimportant since they target collectors and now have turned off many gamers.

GW has an idea of what they believe a collector is. Unfortunately, because they don't do any research they have no idea that it is not the largest segment of the market and the kits they make for collectors are of limited appeal. In other words, they no longer know their market or customers.

You think in the millions they spent on the site they could have put a simple poll in the online store to ask what your purchase is for. Gift, game, collect, other. Four simple options at the very bottom in an optional block would give them a lot of useful data.

 Savageconvoy wrote:
You think in the millions they spent on the site they could have put a simple poll in the online store to ask what your purchase is for. Gift, game, collect, other. Four simple options at the very bottom in an optional block would give them a lot of useful data.

THESE THINGS ARE OTIOSE!

I was just wondering, How do people know that they don't do any market research ?
Is there any proof of this ? or are people just assuming it.

I've noticed this seems to crop up in all the GW debates as a major point, but I have yet to see anything to back it up.

I always like reading these debates, GW really cause a lot of division on these forums, its fun to read mostly, there are always a few with agendas, but thats expected.

 Rayvon wrote:
I was just wondering, How do people know that they don't do any market research ?
Is there any proof of this ? or are people just assuming it.

I've noticed this seems to crop up in all the GW debates as a major point, but I have yet to see anything to back it up.

I always like reading these debates, GW really cause a lot of division on these forums, its fun to read mostly, there are always a few with agendas, but thats expected.

Tom Kirby explicitly stated it in the Financial Report.

 Rayvon wrote:
I was just wondering, How do people know that they don't do any market research ?
Is there any proof of this ? or are people just assuming it.
I've noticed this seems to crop up in all the GW debates as a major point, but I have yet to see anything to back it up.
I always like reading these debates, GW really cause a lot of division on these forums, its fun to read mostly, there are always a few with agendas, but thats expected.

Quoted word for word from their financial report.
Easy to understand your disbelief.
http://investor.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/2013-14-Press-statement-final-website.pdf
Do a search and find these words:

"Our market is a niche market made up of people who want to collect our miniatures. They tend to be male, middle-class, discerning teenagers and adults. We do no demographic research, we have no focus groups, we do not ask the market what it wants. These things are otiose in a niche.

Easy enough to find, go look.
Still makes me feel all strange reading those words.

Regardless of the motivation for doing so, all the big stuff and fliers they release doesn't mesh well with a rule set designed for 28mm miniatures.

I stopped GW largely because I just got fed up of every single release consisting of expensive rulebooks and overly large kits. Very few new infantry kits were being released which - considering both Fantasy and 40K were originally infantry based games - was infuriating.

I got into Warhammer to play with the little guys with the occasional big guy to act as a centre piece for my army (the benefit of this approach is that you didn't need hordes of miniatures to make the game work). This was clearly not the focus of GW anymore, so I just stopped caring and thus stopped buying too.

Yea that is pretty backwards, I could understand if they were growing nicely without it, and if they were at least gathering some feedback in house, but neither are the case.

 Talizvar wrote:

"Our market is a niche market made up of people who want to collect our miniatures. They tend to be male, middle-class, discerning teenagers and adults. We do no demographic research, we have no focus groups, we do not ask the market what it wants. These things are otiose in a niche.

Otiose - That's a new word for me. I will try and use it in a sentence today

EDIT - But if you do no market research, how do you know who your niche market is?

Just had an amusing thought as to what it would be like to have Tom Kirby on The Apprentice in the project manager role of a task involving selling a product.

Specifically, what Alan Sugar would think of him and say to him in the boardroom after Kirby's team lost the task


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Flashman wrote:

EDIT - But if you do no market research, how do you know who your niche market is?

Well it's just common sense and whatever niche market is cheapest for the company, obviously

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Flashman wrote:

EDIT - But if you do no market research, how do you know who your niche market is?

Well it's just common sense and whatever niche market is cheapest for the company, obviously

It's an odd thing to claim that you know your target market with no market research. The definition of their market may have been true in the 90s, but these things shift over time. I would be very dubious of this sort of sweeping statement if I was a shareholder.

nkelsch wrote:

PhantomViper wrote:

nkelsch wrote:

And as to the 'PP is cheaper even though it has the same prices as GW', GW has explicitly said 2/3rds of their customers never play the game.

GW as stated and takes pride in the fact that it doesn't do any market research, ergo they have no way of knowing what their customers do or don't do so any statement that they put out on this is completely irrelevant since it has no basis in actual facts.

Jervis has said during interviews that two thirds of their customers never actually play their game. They call them "craft hobbyists" and see them as their core market. Considering 'craft Hobbyists' are a real thing, to try to discount them as having power int he market place or not existing again goes to 'veterans' overestimating their self-worth and their buying power and how much they should be catered to.

The issue is there is a significant market of people who buy minis but don't play specific games, so 'cost per mini' is perfectly relevant. This makes GW and PP both similar in cost and are both expensive. 'Cost of entry' doesn't make figures cheaper when entry is a single figure to paint/collect.

Can it really be true that "craft hobbyists" actually buy more stuff than people who play the game?

Someone in this thread or another similar one said they buy about one or two kits a year, just for painting, in other words a "craft hobbyist". Someone building an army needs to buy a lot more kits and books too. Even if "craft hobbyists" are 2/3rds of customer numbers it seems unlikely they contribute 2/3rds of revenues.

Actually I doubt GW could survive if they lost 1/3rd of their revenue.

When I see that "most of our customers don't play" claim I don't think of dedicated hobbyists lovingly building and painting model after model for their display shelf, without ever allowing such tasteless concerns as "will this win the game for me" to interfere with the true art of the GW™ Hobby™. It makes me think of the kid who begs their parents for a box of space marines and forgets about it by the end of the week, or the potential player who gives up after realizing that the $100+ starter box is barely 10% of what they need to spend to actually play the game, or people like me who have mostly moved on to better games but might still occasionally buy something for the display shelf. Instead of deciding that the correct response to most customers never playing the game is to skip investing in making better rules GW should be asking why so many customers are buying a game and never playing it, and what they can do to get those customers to start playing. They've taken something that should be a giant red flag and turned it into an idiotic propaganda statement!

 Peregrine wrote:
When I see that "most of our customers don't play" claim...

Spoiler:

I don't think of dedicated hobbyists lovingly building and painting model after model for their display shelf, without ever allowing such tasteless concerns as "will this win the game for me" to interfere with the true art of the GW™ Hobby™. It makes me think of the kid who begs their parents for a box of space marines and forgets about it by the end of the week, or the potential player who gives up after realizing that the $100+ starter box is barely 10% of what they need to spend to actually play the game, or people like me who have mostly moved on to better games but might still occasionally buy something for the display shelf. Instead of deciding that the correct response to most customers never playing the game is to skip investing in making better rules GW should be asking why so many customers are buying a game and never playing it, and what they can do to get those customers to start playing. They've taken something that should be a giant red flag and turned it into an idiotic propaganda statement!

GW's target market segment is people who buy lots of whatever high-priced products GW choose to put in their shops.

From GW's angle this is a winning strategy.

I am seriously reminded of the first episode of Gordon Ramsay's "Hotel Hell" show. There was this pompous owner running a failing inn in a small town and he charged like $350 a room a night, with a 2-night minimum, and meals were three courses for $60 or $75 with rack of lamb. Anyways, Gordon Ramsay makes a comment to him about how the prices are too high for the locals, and the guy makes some comment about how, since the locals find the price too high, they aren't the kind of people he wants patronizing the inn.

That's how I imagine Kirby talking, clearly anyone who isn't willing to pay such high prices for those "small, jewel-like objects" are riffraff and not the kind of person that GW wants as customers.

Here's the quote:

Gordon Ramsay: How can you expect to appeal to the locals?
Owner: We haven't identified the appropriate people to come here
Gordon Ramsay: Hold on, what do you mean "appropriate people"?
Owner: People who can afford $59 for three courses.

Change some wording and that could be a Tom Kirby meeting

 Wayshuba wrote:
GW has an idea of what they believe a collector is. Unfortunately, because they don't do any research they have no idea that it is not the largest segment of the market and the kits they make for collectors are of limited appeal. In other words, they no longer know their market or customers.

I think collectors were the largest market for them but I also think their definition of collector is somebody who collects a lot of GW boxes/kits. My guess is that at some point collectors were the tournament players who buy armies as complete packages and teenager who managed to squeeze a starter army out of their parents. Just these days the rules are not tournament acceptable and the cost of entry to try a whole new army is beyond high-but-acceptable.

And a small starter army just doesn't look to be of enough value for parents these days too. I remember when a box of space marines or a land raider could be sold for less than a console game (there was something to compare against volume/weight wise) and also be something that the kids work on with their hands instead of just sitting in front of a TV screen. Telling parents that their kid needs this, that, and that thing over there, plus some paints is not that easy anymore as you end up with something that now actually is more expensive than a console and a game. And I don't know how the comparison is with Lego. While their boxes also got more expensive I think they didn't have the same price explosion as GW stuff had.

Some ways of selling their stuff to parents just got screwed over by the cost, as well as army size creep.

I don't think collector's and tournament players where one in the same, I think the mentality of 'kids who buy a bunch but never play' was something that came about during the LotR days. At that time it was working for them so they stuck with it, ignoring how the market it entirely different now than it was then because they think they know better.