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I've been finding it very hard to afford the hobby anymore, I really wish GW would throw a sale once in a blue moon.

It's at the point where I am tempted to go completely FW, because if I am paying the same price I might as well get the company that I feel handles things better/has better quality. Ebay used to be my go to, I swapped to my FLGS to support the local economy but, frankly it is a huge waste of money for me to do so when I can buy new from FW or go on Ebay and get some cool OOP models.

I wouldn't complain but, this year alone the price of models has skyrocketed to where I feel like I couldn't even get into this hobby anymore. I also am getting sick of the pro-GW attitude at my shop. I'm not a negative nancy or "feth GW, down with GW," type person but, I find myself slipping more towards the latter than the former.

@agnosto - thanks for the very detailed reply

I don't have time to respond point by point in kind today, so I'll be (somewhat) brief --

I guess I look at GW products differently than you, since they're through the filter of my own spending habits. As my own income increased, I have proportionately spent more on miniatures & hobby, at least to a point (within a faction there's only so much stuff to buy), and owning more hobby stuff makes my happier. At points in my life, when I have had less income, I purchase fewer (or no) hobby products. So, I think this is pretty close to the definition of a luxury good.

You are right about there being other sorts of goods such as Veblen, normal, and inferior goods, though these terms are not all mutually exclusive -- a luxury good can also be a Veblen good, for example (where increasing the price increases the perceived value of the product, like a $50,000 Channel handbag). Another example of overlap is that GW products are a luxury good to me until I own everything in the collection in multiple quantities, and then, they become normal or inferior goods though only as they relate to me (at some point I hit pause until there is a new release I want).

With regards to Canada's economic middle class bursting with happiness and joy, studies can be very deceiving. Vancouver is second most expensive place in the world to buy real estate (second only to Hong Kong), and the cost of living here is extremely high, especially compared to our American counterparts.

I watch the 6pm news almost every day, and at least once every other week, there is an article on how unaffordable it is to live here -- how even renting has become unaffordable. To give you an idea, an 85 year old, condemned shack on a main road that has a bus stop in front of it and 30,000 cars drive within 20 feet of the front door every day, on a tiny lot cannot be had for a million dollars in Vancouver, today. If you put it up for sale at a million dollars, there would be 10 offers within hours, some offer for 1.5 million, and many of them with certified cheques attached and no sale conditions. It's literally nuts here, because it is perceived as a "great place to live" (it actually is, just really expensive). Most people, if they want to own a home, must live very far away from where they work; and to give you an idea, an average couple who make a combined income of $50,000 can't ever actually own a home here.

It's not just Vancouver, too -- other metropolitan centers like Toronto and Calgary have also gone gangbusters, and the cost of living has skyrocketed. Anyways, my point is: for people in this situation, owning a home and paying for things they need is more important than hobby, and even if hobby spending would constitute a tiny part of their income, a lot of folks around here spend almost everything they earn just to pay the bill.

For renters, it's a really scary picture. A 1 bedroom apartment in an old building without insuite laundry, and not even in the city core can be $1,300. An hour away from the city, a basement suite that's a couple bedrooms can cost even more than that. When 90% of household income goes towards housing costs:

http://www.vancitybuzz.com/2012/08/vancouver-still-the-least-affordable-housing-market-in-canada/

That leaves not much in the hobby kitty. And by the way, that article was written in 2012; the housing situation in 2015 is even worse!

That's not to say that there aren't a lot of people who can afford GW products and meet GW's target demographic in Vancouver, though. Despite life being very tough for the average person, guess what -- someone owns those 1.5 - 25+ million dollar homes, and in fact, a ton of homes are purchased entirely with cash -- it's actually stunning, because the chances of buying a desirable home if you need to put a subject to sale of your old home, or subject to financing, is very low (or zero); if you want a good deal on a good home, you better have your million bucks or more in cash or equivalents and ready to go. So there are lots of super-rich people. Just proportionately, a lot more people who struggle to get by, which was my point about income disparities.

Its a little cheaper out here on the superior coast, but I still count myself as being pretty damn fortunate to own a house at my age. Friends of mine who only make a fraction less than I do are struggling to put aside a downpayment while paying rent, which is ~90% what I pay for my mortgage!

As for how that tangent relates to the topic, I have found my hobby budget to have dropped off to barely three figures annually due to having the house, two cars, a fluffy puppy, and the usual household expenses for a new build. So when I decide to commit to a wargaming purchase, the best value is what I aim for. Part of that is quality of the models, quantity of the models, and the quality of the game (or potential game in the case of 3rd party minis) attached to the models. My latest purchase was backing the Reaper Bones III for either 1 or 3 Sledgehammer arty pieces, because the price is simply excellent for such a beautiful, and gameplay wise, useful model.

As for how GW could get some of my cash, besides my usual points, more of those box sets with good deals and a variety of them too. If I could buy a bunch of models for 20-25% off because of a bundle deal, I'd be happy, especially if I could find a webstore deal on top of that.

 Talys wrote:

I guess I look at GW products differently than you, since they're through the filter of my own spending habits. As my own income increased, I have proportionately spent more on miniatures & hobby, at least to a point (within a faction there's only so much stuff to buy), and owning more hobby stuff makes my happier. At points in my life, when I have had less income, I purchase fewer (or no) hobby products. So, I think this is pretty close to the definition of a luxury good.

That's actually not what the economic definition of a luxury good is. If your spending increases in a proportionate manner to your income, as in your income goes up 50% and your spending on the item goes up roughly 50%, then it is a normal good.

An item is a luxury good when spending upon that item rises in a disproportionately high rate relative to increases in income. For example, a person making $25,000.00 per year spends nothing on boats, or 0%. A person making $100,000 might buy a $15,000 bass or ski boat, financed over 3 years, paying about $6000 per year for it, or 6% of their annual income. A person making $1,000,000 per year might buy a $150K cruiser potentially paying cash, or 15% of their income. (Obviously, these are hypothetical examples to serve an illustrative purpose. I personally have no idea how people spend money on boats because they don't interest me.)

Actually... on an aside... since home ownership has come up... I've found that years of apartment living has really made me pare back my belongings. I've stubbornly hung onto my hobby stuff, but I've begun to start clearing the stuff out as of late. Space is really at a premium, especially in the hot housing markets of Toronto/Vancouver.

Those of us who live in small accommodations are pretty much reliant on game clubs / FLGS to game because we don't have enough room to host ourselves. When the FLGS / Clubs die... I find these players are forced from the hobby. I feel that GW is employing a one-size-fits-all approach to operating world wide. This might account for why the retail store model is not working as planned in the US, where there is strong home ownership and strong home gamer-ship... and why markets like Japan, where there is no room for anything might not fit into UK centric approach.

I lived in temporary mil housing for...almost 8 years. I'd move once every year on average, and every time I'd purge everything I didn't need. By the time I moved to my house, just about every single thing I owned fit in my hatchback (minus set of winter tires) and a box of lego my wife already had in her apartment.

Now that I have house, I don't even know what to do with all the space. The basement is empty, and one of our rooms upstairs is completely unused. Mrs. Blacksails is also behind the idea of turning the basement into a classy man-cave where I can have a table and terrain on hand for games of any kind.

 keezus wrote:
Risking going further OT: However, trends in disposable income are relevant.

Two comments about Canada's performance in the recent years. You'll notice the tail end of the graph is flattening out. (Its awful small, but it looks like your graph starts at 1900???)

1. The graph shows increase against USD presumably? I'd be interested if this graph also takes into account the actual increase vs inflation.

2. I wonder if this graph takes into account fluctuations in currency. Canadian buying power growth in recent years would have been buoyed by the strong Canadian dollar (as a byproduct of oil prices). Our dollar has gone into the toilet (as a byproduct of gov't pro-oil policy), so it'd be interesting to see where this all stands in 2015.

Looking at the GW years in the graph... They are raising prices like crazy in the face of what I might be considered relatively stagnant increases middle class buying power.

That graph's hard to see but it's 1990. Keep in mind that these studies are done considering differentiations in spending power relative to inflation and currency fluctuations but they're done infrequently due to the massive amount of data that it takes to do it properly. Still, interesting read. LIS is located in Luxembourg so no US bias as far as currency goes. The get the data for different years, depending upon when and how it's collected in the various countries and then do a comprehensive analysis for years where the stars align.

 Talys wrote:
@agnosto - thanks for the very detailed reply

I don't have time to respond point by point in kind today, so I'll be (somewhat) brief --

I guess I look at GW products differently than you, since they're through the filter of my own spending habits. As my own income increased, I have proportionately spent more on miniatures & hobby, at least to a point (within a faction there's only so much stuff to buy), and owning more hobby stuff makes my happier. At points in my life, when I have had less income, I purchase fewer (or no) hobby products. So, I think this is pretty close to the definition of a luxury good.

You are right about there being other sorts of goods such as Veblen, normal, and inferior goods, though these terms are not all mutually exclusive -- a luxury good can also be a Veblen good, for example (where increasing the price increases the perceived value of the product, like a $50,000 Channel handbag). Another example of overlap is that GW products are a luxury good to me until I own everything in the collection in multiple quantities, and then, they become normal or inferior goods though only as they relate to me (at some point I hit pause until there is a new release I want).

With regards to Canada's economic middle class bursting with happiness and joy, studies can be very deceiving. Vancouver is second most expensive place in the world to buy real estate (second only to Hong Kong), and the cost of living here is extremely high, especially compared to our American counterparts.

Spoiler:

I watch the 6pm news almost every day, and at least once every other week, there is an article on how unaffordable it is to live here -- how even renting has become unaffordable. To give you an idea, an 85 year old, condemned shack on a main road that has a bus stop in front of it and 30,000 cars drive within 20 feet of the front door every day, on a tiny lot cannot be had for a million dollars in Vancouver, today. If you put it up for sale at a million dollars, there would be 10 offers within hours, some offer for 1.5 million, and many of them with certified cheques attached and no sale conditions. It's literally nuts here, because it is perceived as a "great place to live" (it actually is, just really expensive). Most people, if they want to own a home, must live very far away from where they work; and to give you an idea, an average couple who make a combined income of $50,000 can't ever actually own a home here.

It's not just Vancouver, too -- other metropolitan centers like Toronto and Calgary have also gone gangbusters, and the cost of living has skyrocketed. Anyways, my point is: for people in this situation, owning a home and paying for things they need is more important than hobby, and even if hobby spending would constitute a tiny part of their income, a lot of folks around here spend almost everything they earn just to pay the bill.

For renters, it's a really scary picture. A 1 bedroom apartment in an old building without insuite laundry, and not even in the city core can be $1,300. An hour away from the city, a basement suite that's a couple bedrooms can cost even more than that. When 90% of household income goes towards housing costs:

http://www.vancitybuzz.com/2012/08/vancouver-still-the-least-affordable-housing-market-in-canada/

That leaves not much in the hobby kitty. And by the way, that article was written in 2012; the housing situation in 2015 is even worse!

That's not to say that there aren't a lot of people who can afford GW products and meet GW's target demographic in Vancouver, though. Despite life being very tough for the average person, guess what -- someone owns those 1.5 - 25+ million dollar homes, and in fact, a ton of homes are purchased entirely with cash -- it's actually stunning, because the chances of buying a desirable home if you need to put a subject to sale of your old home, or subject to financing, is very low (or zero); if you want a good deal on a good home, you better have your million bucks or more in cash or equivalents and ready to go. So there are lots of super-rich people. Just proportionately, a lot more people who struggle to get by, which was my point about income disparities

I think you're still not getting the difference between normal and luxury goods but I'll leave off as it will be a distraction is just me being nitpicky about using actual definitions for things.

Anecdotally, I've lived in Seoul and Tokyo, I know what I can get for a similar amount of money (laundry on the balcony and a one-room apartment, not one-bedroom, one room). Big city living is expensive which is why suburbs exist around the world and the life of a commuter... *le sigh* My wife's parents could sell their plot of land just outside Tokyo and probably buy half of the state that we live in.

This is beside the point. People still buy cars, still buy homes, still spend money on entertainment expenses and food and all the other necessary and non-necessary things in life.

The point here is that smart companies market to the people who they know are able and willing to buy their products.

Smart companies realize such things as price and product elasticity exist and are real concepts that affect the bottom line.

Smart companies actively plan and pursue growth strategies and then perform research on the actions that they take to ensure effectiveness.

Smart companies react to retractions and market adjustments that negatively impact their revenues.

Smart companies adjust their company culture with the change in times and market environment.

Smart companies make you want to buy their products by drawing you in, becoming your friend and engaging you as a customer. People will buy your stuff if they feel it has value to them and studies have shown time and time again that relationships matter when it comes to selling stuff to people.

That's not to say that a company can't be dumb and still be profitable. But just being profitable doesn't make a company smart, sometimes it just means it's been lucky.

 agnosto wrote:
That graph's hard to see but it's 1990. Keep in mind that these studies are done considering differentiations in spending power relative to inflation and currency fluctuations but they're done infrequently due to the massive amount of data that it takes to do it properly. Still, interesting read. LIS is located in Luxembourg so no US bias as far as currency goes. The get the data for different years, depending upon when and how it's collected in the various countries and then do a comprehensive analysis for years where the stars align.

Its definitely eye-opening what after tax income the chart considers MIDDLE CLASS to be.

In 2010, the CAD was roughly at parity with the greenback. That suggests that $17.5k after tax earning is enough to be considered in the middle class! Assuming 20% tax rate, that's $21k pre-tax income. Prorated for a 40 hour week, if you made slightly more than minimum wage... you'd be "middle class". That seems to be setting the bar pretty low - I guess that says a lot about a country's level of prosperity I suppose. -edit- Median income was somewhere in the neighbourhood of $32k/year before tax in 2010.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
-edit2- I think that the lowest bracket 2010 Canadian "middle class" would have difficulty participating in the GW hobby. The median income... no problems whatsoever.

Agonsto, I get everything you're saying -- and on many points I agree. I'm still not convinced the optimum point for profitability isn't to maximize prices to those who are price-inelastic and who want to buy a lot, versus having more customers that individually buy a little.

I can't recall the exact number, but let's just say, GW's US/Canada sales are $30m for the sake of argument, and that an "average gamer" spends $500 a year (I will admit I don't know if this is true, but it kind of feels right, based on what I and people I know spent in their youth, when we didn't have very much disposable income).

That would take 60,000 average fans, right?

But what if you had fans that spent $1,000 a month? That's only 2,500 customers that spend $12,000 a year!

I know that this is an achievable number, because within our gaming group of 6 people, 3 hit that number, with one person way, way over that because he buys Forge World stuff, and another who buys everything direct from GW's web store because he doesn't want to drive out to the hobby shop (he also doesn't live very close to one). The other 3 probably spend about $300 a month (or, around $4k / year).

I think appealing to this group is simply a lot easier than trying to sell multiple armies to the 30 model per army crowd and growing that crowd. In part, as the last half-year has shown, if you produce stuff these guys want, even at a crazy release schedule, they'll just buy it.

 Talys wrote:

I know that this is an achievable number, because within our gaming group of 6 people, 3 hit that number, with one person way, way over that because he buys Forge World stuff, and another who buys everything direct from GW's web store. The other 3 probably spend about $300 a month (or, around $4k / year).

Well, with a sample size of 6, how can I argue?

 keezus wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
That graph's hard to see but it's 1990. Keep in mind that these studies are done considering differentiations in spending power relative to inflation and currency fluctuations but they're done infrequently due to the massive amount of data that it takes to do it properly. Still, interesting read. LIS is located in Luxembourg so no US bias as far as currency goes. The get the data for different years, depending upon when and how it's collected in the various countries and then do a comprehensive analysis for years where the stars align.

Its definitely eye-opening what after tax income the chart considers MIDDLE CLASS to be.

In 2010, the CAD was roughly at parity with the greenback. That suggests that $17.5k after tax earning is enough to be considered in the middle class! Assuming 20% tax rate, that's $21k pre-tax income. Prorated for a 40 hour week, if you made slightly more than minimum wage... you'd be "middle class". That seems to be setting the bar pretty low - I guess that says a lot about a country's level of prosperity I suppose. -edit- Median income was somewhere in the neighbourhood of $32k/year before tax in 2010.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
-edit2- I think that the lowest bracket 2010 Canadian "middle class" would have difficulty participating in the GW hobby. The median income... no problems whatsoever.

I think in Canada it depends a lot on where you live. If you live in Lethbridge or Chateauguay, yeah, $32k / year lets you comfortably buy all sorts of fun stuff, maybe even think about a home. If you live in Victoria or Vancouver, $32k a year, and it's way, way harder.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Azreal13 wrote:

 Talys wrote:

I know that this is an achievable number, because within our gaming group of 6 people, 3 hit that number, with one person way, way over that because he buys Forge World stuff, and another who buys everything direct from GW's web store. The other 3 probably spend about $300 a month (or, around $4k / year).

Well, with a sample size of 6, how can I argue?

Well, surely we are not the only 6 people around like this Just look at signatures of people and their army sizes, or go look on the DCM forum at "how much did I spend". There's one fella there that blows me out of the water in terms of spending. He's bought every single release, and when it comes to codex, he buys LE, regular, and digital! Of every faction!

 Talys wrote:
I think appealing to this group is simply a lot easier than trying to sell multiple armies to the 30 model per army crowd and growing that crowd. In part, as the last half-year has shown, if you produce stuff these guys want, even at a crazy release schedule, they'll just buy it.

I think this is only correct if you look at it through the lens of "guys buying to collect", since more models = build more / paint more.

If you look at it it through the lens of "guys buying to play", as long as the rules are balanced and the models aren't crap, you'll get players branching into additional armies without any extra effort from the manufacturer, since multiple armies = multiple play styles = more play value. The GW model of trying to sell a lot for one army is hamstrung by the shoddy rules and generally results in: single army = meta optimized play style (regardless of units owned) = no increased play value... it's still only one way... just different. Say what you will about "play to win" vs "play for fun" - the reality is that in GW's systems, pretty much every armybook/codex boils down to one dominant build. AoS might have mitigated this problem by allowing everything (also, unlinking the customer's purchases from one particular army), but IMHO, as a result, the game isn't really suitable for organized play as a direct result.

@keezus - Philosophically, you're right. I'd rather invest in a game with better rules than worse rules, all other things being equal. There is the issue of aesthetics, genre, and lore too, but let's put that aside, because essentially, I agree with you.

Practically, however, people who *want* buy lots of models to play with can't do so unless a collection is large enough and unless the release schedule is at a fast enough cadence, no matter how much they love the game. At some point, they'll just own everything, and play with it, and buy a small amount of stuff as it trickles out, and the only thing they can do is buy another game, of which there are a limited number. Plus, not everyone wants to hop from game to game to game, because their play group settles on something and wants to stick with it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
By the way, I would really like to add that as someone who loves both tabletop and PC gaming, I do not believe this is the right way to run a company, and were it up to me, I would almost certainly do many things differently.

All I'm doing is describing a possible path of least resistance (low hanging fruit, if you will) that might describe the thought process at GW. I'm also totally open to Agnosto's theory that I'm totally off base.

But just think about it... Between the US and Canada, GW needs less than 50 superfans per state to hit $30m in sales (and obviously, there will be some number of less avid customers too). That is just not a huge number, and speaks to how profitable that demographic is. It also jives with a lot of anecdotal 'i haven't seen people play 40k', because a lot of this demographic has little interest in public pickup games. It would take me 3 hours just to pack models and terrain to drag down to a store, and I'd probably damage some models, PLUS who knows if I'll enjoy the pickup game, so, I just play at home with friends.

 Talys wrote:
Practically, however, people who *want* buy lots of models to play with can't do so unless a collection is large enough and unless the release schedule is at a fast enough cadence, no matter how much they love the game.

I feel this is a false dilemma. GW has total control of what and how many models are in the game. Large-enough-collection only factors into it if the game rules require it, and completeness is a factor of how many unreleased kits exist at time of rules publication. There is nothing to stop a player from dabbling in another army while they wait. This occurred frequently in 3rd edition. It's not as likely now due to cost... but this is also entirely within GW's control. I'm not sure where you're getting the "leaving the game" part from. On the point about people who *want to buy lots of models*. I think you'll agree that the horde-army-gamer is a subset of the overall gamer customer base, and not representative of the demographic as a whole (other than the part about them playing games).

-edit- $10k a year is pretty crazy. Most people I know who can afford that level of investiture don't have the time to mess with the hobby to that extent and this informs their buying. Those with time are either youth (can't afford) or retirees (ones who can afford, also a dying breed in this economy). Don't get me wrong... I met a retired guy with a basement full of Forgeworld... but I would expect that to be the exception rather than the norm. I think trying to rely on that type of customer is wise, or sustainable.

 Talys wrote:
Agonsto, I get everything you're saying -- and on many points I agree. I'm still not convinced the optimum point for profitability isn't to maximize prices to those who are price-inelastic and who want to buy a lot, versus having more customers that individually buy a little.

I can't recall the exact number, but let's just say, GW's US/Canada sales are $30m for the sake of argument, and that an "average gamer" spends $500 a year (I will admit I don't know if this is true, but it kind of feels right, based on what I and people I know spent in their youth, when we didn't have very much disposable income).

That would take 60,000 average fans, right?

But what if you had fans that spent $1,000 a month? That's only 2,500 customers that spend $12,000 a year!

I know that this is an achievable number, because within our gaming group of 6 people, 3 hit that number, with one person way, way over that because he buys Forge World stuff, and another who buys everything direct from GW's web store because he doesn't want to drive out to the hobby shop (he also doesn't live very close to one). The other 3 probably spend about $300 a month (or, around $4k / year).

I think appealing to this group is simply a lot easier than trying to sell multiple armies to the 30 model per army crowd and growing that crowd. In part, as the last half-year has shown, if you produce stuff these guys want, even at a crazy release schedule, they'll just buy it.

This is where economies of scale come in, producing (and selling) less product makes each item more expensive for GW. You have to remember that they've got that massive retail chain monkey riding shotgun on their back, or a loadstone ready to pull them down. In any event, ideally a company will hit a sweet spot where the per unit price reaches a sustainable level. Since there is a retail chain to begin with, it kind of discounts the concept that GW is around to support a handful of fans who spend massive amounts of money. If this were the case, they would close the retail outlets and just make an online buyers club or some such for these fans to interact with them; this would increase their profits exponentially overnight.

Since the retail chain exists, the assumption is that GW is a growth-minded company that wants to attract new customers, not simply maintain a steadfast core of current hobbyists.

I'll also disagree that catering to a select group would be sustainable for any length of time because if any of them dies or falls off, they're not as easily replaced as 1000 other people buying a few models each. Restricting your audience will result in a smaller consumer base that opens your company up to any of a myriad of issues that could result in its premature demise; it would only take one miscalculation to send the company into a death spiral so tight that there would be no escape. GW has avoided this due to strong cash reserves. I disagree with Kirby et al on a number of management decisions but I invest in the company because I know that, if nothing else, they know how to manage and manipulate the balance sheet to show a profit and continue to pay dividends. I shiver to think of a real gamer running the show up there, the company would truly die quickly then.

You make good points, agnosto

I would say that there should be a balance between gamers, hobbyists (p&m), and business folks at the helm. At the end of the day, you need to run the financial component competently (which I agree with you, they do well), and try to be the company that your core customers and peripheral customers want you to be (which I think they have less success in).

In the absence of products at least SOME people love, you wind up with HP: a company that doesn't make much that's cool anymore, and is run by corporate types that don't really connect with anyone other than Wall Street. Cough. Carly Fiorina. cough. I can't believe she's now running for US president and polling at 9% (among likely Republican voters).

 Talys wrote:
You make good points, agnosto

I would say that there should be a balance between gamers, hobbyists (p&m), and business folks at the helm. At the end of the day, you need to run the financial component competently (which I agree with you, they do well), and try to be the company that your core customers and peripheral customers want you to be (which I think they have less success in).

In the absence of products at least SOME people love, you wind up with HP: a company that doesn't make much that's cool anymore, and is run by corporate types that don't really connect with anyone other than Wall Street. Cough. Carly Fiorina. cough. I can't believe she's now running for US president and polling at 9% (among likely Republican voters).

All very true. I've learned through my own missteps to let the creative types do their thing, within reason, while I keep the money and compliance stuff straight. Some painful lessons in there over the years.

 Talys wrote:
@
Practically, however, people who *want* buy lots of models to play with can't do so unless a collection is large enough and unless the release schedule is at a fast enough cadence, no matter how much they love the game. At some point, they'll just own everything, and play with it, and buy a small amount of stuff as it trickles out, and the only thing they can do is buy another game, of which there are a limited number. Plus, not everyone wants to hop from game to game to game, because their play group settles on something and wants to stick with it.

That point of view only really makes sense if you've got a very narrow hobby focus - i.e. you only collect army X from company Y.

With the boom of gaming at the moment, I could retire tomorrow with an infinity hobby budget and still never run out of things to paint without even touching GW or buying duplicate kits. For instance, I can buy pretty much any army from any era in 28mm currently (from the Sea Peoples of Biblical times, to Mayans, to White War Fins), most of it in plastic, there are dozens of sci-fi kits and factions, dozens of aircraft.

And that's only 28mm. I could more or less do the same again in 20,15,10,6,3mm.

Sure, If I only collected GW Blood Angels I'd have run out of kits within a year, or Guild from Malifaux I'd be done within a month, but that's a pretty unrealistic statement.

Herzlos wrote:
That point of view only really makes sense if you've got a very narrow hobby focus - i.e. you only collect army X from company Y.

With the boom of gaming at the moment, I could retire tomorrow with an infinity hobby budget and still never run out of things to paint without even touching GW or buying duplicate kits. For instance, I can buy pretty much any army from any era in 28mm currently (from the Sea Peoples of Biblical times, to Mayans, to White War Fins), most of it in plastic, there are dozens of sci-fi kits and factions, dozens of aircraft.

And that's only 28mm. I could more or less do the same again in 20,15,10,6,3mm.

Sure, If I only collected GW Blood Angels I'd have run out of kits within a year, or Guild from Malifaux I'd be done within a month, but that's a pretty unrealistic statement.

Pretty close to that -- though I was talking about games, specifically, in my comment, and it's really hard to get your friends to just switch games. I can't get ANYONE in my group to give Infinity game time, not for lack of trying.

There are a lot of us who aren't interested in anything historical or real, though, and that limits it a lot -- this is me... if it exists or has ever existed, or even if it COULD exist, I have no interest in modelling it. If the person looks like a real person, my interest severely diminishes. I'd rather do a sorcerer or heroic warrior with an over-the-top magical weapon or winged angel wearing impossible armor, for example. If you further are interested primarily in either Fantasy or Science Fiction, that restricts the possibilities even more.

By the way... about your comment on GW Blood Angels... check my Gallery Everything for BA on there painted basically since the codex drop at the end of last year, plus lots of multiples (like, I didn't post up all 30 death company, or all 40+ tactical marines so far, all 6 razorbacks, etc.). In somewhere between 1 to 2 years, I'll have painted a LOT of Blood Angels, essentially exhausting the collection until GW's next refresh, and not to some cruddy 3-color standard, either. From there it will probably be Necron or Adeptus Mechanicus, then Space Wolves or Eldar, probably Tyranids after that, and then hopefully there will be cool new Ork releases. Keep in mind a lot of these are all factions that I own 5,000+ points of painted models for, that I just like to periodically refresh or totally reboot (like in the case of Blood Angels, where my army was 15 years old, not really playable, and disjointed in terms of modelling continuity).

In between, I'll do a whole bunch of terrain, and probably a whole lot of of Cyrix, Menoth, and Retribution, plus squeeze in Sigmarites for my wife, and paint up whatever models CB drops for Infinity. Or stare at them wishing they were plastic

I can't really fathom spending $1000 a month on GW models consistently. I mean if I had an unlimited amount of funds to spend on GW stuff, I still wouldn't do that even if I thought the rules were fantastic, wasn't married with kids and wasn't employed. Sure I would spend that much here and there, even significantly more on occasion. But even if I was spending most of every day building models and painting I don't know how I could keep up with new purchases. That's before I have to find the time to play actual games with the models. I don't know how I could find the time to play enough in a month with those $1,000 of new stuff that I would be ready to move on next month to more and keep up that pace month after month. Unless you're just hoarding boxes of models you never touch how do you spend that kind of money?

Even if I was having everything commission built and painted so I don't spend any time modeling, I have a hard time imagining averaging $1,000 a month in purchases over several years. There would just be piles of models I don't touch boxed up somewhere since displaying them all would take way too much space. I'm not interested in stashing away stuff I never touch.

I like the setting, models and broadly speaking the game system. I like most of the factions to some degree and if I could get everything I wanted I would have some of most if not all the factions. And there is no other game system that competes for my attention. Still I just don't see $1000 a month. There just isn't time.

Even if I did get that much stuff, I think I would sell it off on ebay or something or maybe give it away. I certainly wouldn't throw it away. If I was updating, someone would end up with my old stuff costing GW sales because that person isn't buying from them.

So the point of all that is that Talys situation, even assuming unlimited funds and removal of every source of restraint, is one I could never see myself in simply because I can't picture being ready to move on to the next thing at a quick enough pace to buy that much. I would want to spend a few months really getting to know each new army idea, before moving to the next. My interest doesn't wane that quickly.

--

Pricing I think is the least of the questionable intelligent things GW does. I am in a better financial position now than I was when I started this hobby, but had very little when I started so I can understand the difficulty of trying to build an army with few resources. It took me years to get the wraith guard I wanted. (Finally got some for a great price on ebay). Then I had to sell everything and step away from the game for a while. High prices are a drag, but GW is there to make money so they are going to keep them high if possible.

To me the biggest problem is lousy rules. Make solid rules and people will grudgingly dig into their pockets to buy stuff. Good rules make people across the spectrum of potential customers happy participents. They lead to good word of mouth free advertising. GW doesn't seem to care about making the best rules possible. That is not smart.

 Talys wrote:
By the way... about your comment on GW Blood Angels... check my Gallery Everything for BA on there painted basically since the codex drop at the end of last year, plus lots of multiples (like, I didn't post up all 30 death company, or all 40+ tactical marines so far, all 6 razorbacks, etc.). In somewhere between 1 to 2 years, I'll have painted a LOT of Blood Angels, essentially exhausting the collection until GW's next refresh, and not to some cruddy 3-color standard, either. From there it will probably be Necron or Adeptus Mechanicus, then Space Wolves or Eldar, probably Tyranids after that, and then hopefully there will be cool new Ork releases. Keep in mind a lot of these are all factions that I own 5,000+ points of painted models for, that I just like to periodically refresh or totally reboot (like in the case of Blood Angels, where my army was 15 years old, not really playable, and disjointed in terms of modelling continuity).

In between, I'll do a whole bunch of terrain, and probably a whole lot of of Cyrix, Menoth, and Retribution, plus squeeze in Sigmarites for my wife, and paint up whatever models CB drops for Infinity. Or stare at them wishing they were plastic

You have a separate private island property where this is all displayed right?

@Gwai - there is no question that I buy more stuff than I can paint. Partly, this is because I like to keep bits inventories. I have every space marine box broken down and sorted into cases with little trays of each part so that whatever I want to model is there. For example, when BA upgrades came out, I bought 12, so that I'd have 12 of each shoulder pad to build complete squads. I used up 11 each of 2 pads; so now that they are back in stock, I ordered 10 more. The remainder are all bits.

In part, this is practical. If you want to kitbash a particular pose, say, you want a hand that's holding onto a door, you can't check it without physically trying a bunch of hands. You can't choose a pair of legs from a catalogue; you need to bluetac it to the model to see how it looks. So, the ability to express creativity is constrained by the availability of parts (assuming that I want to minimize sculpting).

In part, it's because I dream of painting all of my models, and my wallet is more powerful than my brush But I am not unique in this.

Finally, you get a lot better and faster at painting and modelling if you paint and model a lot. If you look at my gallery and hit blood angels, every model but one was painted after the codex release, and representative of some significant squad numbers (I didn't post up all 30 death company, for instance, nor each razorback and each drop pod, etc.). They might not be international competition quality, but they're reasonably decent, I think -- and I'm certain I could paint up $5000-$6000 a year to this standard, painting about 3-4 hours a night, a little more on weekends.

It's very lucrative for GW because every now and then, like this year, I do a faction reboot (redo every model) and that's big bucks.

Regarding space, I agree it's a huge constraint. Until 4 years ago, I lived in a condo, and even though it was a good-sized, and most of my models were in cases. Since then, I've purchased a house, with ample gaming and modelling space (more than I will ever use).

By the way, a thousand bucks a month doesn't even cover things like expensive hobby tools. You can easily spend a few hundred bucks on an airbrush (or another airbrush), for example. You can easily spend a few thousand dollars on renovations for extracting fumes. Or a commercial drill press, or any number of other fancy tools.

I'm not trying to convince anyone that 'my way is the right way', just trying to shed light on how you get to that volume of hobby spending.

I know literally one person that buys like Talys says people do. And that guy doesn't buy GW because he thinks they're a rip off. "Cartoony proportions, skulls everywhere and a company that hates you." Is his quote.

I think you're being too honest Talys. Kirby is going to have you abducted for cloning.

Though it would save the company...

 MWHistorian wrote:
I know literally one person that buys like Talys says people do. And that guy doesn't buy GW because he thinks they're a rip off. "Cartoony proportions, skulls everywhere and a company that hates you." Is his quote.

Yeah, that's totally fair. I know a historical guy like that, too. I joke with him at how mundane his models are (they're beautiful) and he jokes with me about how I my guys are all neckless superheroes

@Eldarain - LOL!!

I can understand spending a lot on the hobby. One time not too long ago I used to spend around 1000 a month on hobby stuff. However not on GW most of the time.

Unlike Talys though I hate having too many projects and not enough time so I reduced what I spend hugely and just get what I "need". I am also not as wealthy as I was so that helps keep the spending down.

It is easy to spend heaps of money because not only are there endless lines of shiny models, but you can also purchase a lot of hobby tools, paints, scenic stuffs and other items im sure I missed to tinker with.

Personally I have had more fun with the hobby taking it slow than I ever had buying whatever I pleased whenever I pleased, but I cannot imagine buying all those Black Templar shoulder pads for example. I still value not being ripped off and often find the cheapest most efficient way of doing things in the hobby. But I can certainly see his mindset.

It's too easy to spend money on all these fancy models around.

Back on planet earth where the regular gamers live, my GW budget is $500 US. That is to say I will spend that much on their products before I'm done collecting GW permanently. I'm up to $300 so far, buying only used minis at 50% off retail or better. That's gotten me 2k points of one army and 1k points of another. I see no reason to own more than 2k points of an army because even 2k point games are unbalanced and tedious. I stick to 1000 point games because armies can't leverage their nonsense formations (decurion, gladius, etc.) and the arbitrary special rules don't stack up too high through "creative" use of allied formations the way they do in larger games. My group is talking about limiting our play to a campaign system using CA detachments only, no allies or formations, no fortifications, no unique characters, no lords of war and one heavy slot per army. Without this level of restriction you can tell who will win any given game before deployment even begins.

is not really hard to spend 500$ or 600$ a month at the hobby store, tho maybe not every month

still I blew 5000$ last year fi I had to guess

the hobby is very addictive lol. like swastakowey says there are so many shiny stuffs to buy and not just from GW but many other companies too and many tools that i would like to own

i think it is just what you can afford and what makes you happy and what your family is cool with

Haruspex wrote:
My group is talking about limiting our play to a campaign system using CA detachments only, no allies or formations, no fortifications, no unique characters, no lords of war and one heavy slot per army. Without this level of restriction you can tell who will win any given game before deployment even begins.

To be fair, you still will be able to tell who will win before deployment. Moreso, actually. This is because not all armies are created equally. They all leverage different slots their own way. Some armies hurt when Heavy Support is restricted, some hurt when Fast Attack is restricted, some rely on Formations to have any teeth at all, and so on. By restricting so much, you're basically kicking some armies in the balls. Comp systems, well thought out, can work, outright restrictions rarely do. With those restrictions, I hope no one plays Tyranids.