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The app with all units is pretty cheap.
Besides, I thought we were talking about what we NEEDED to play. If we want to move the goalposts to what we WANT to play, then yeah, that's a different conversation.

davethepak wrote:
They STILL do not understand what they are selling and who they are selling it to.

With leadership that has business acumen and can put aside their ego - this could be a billion dollar company.

A collector buys one nightscythe - a gamer buys six.

there is a your market - right there.

They could do better, but they will never, ever, never, make a billion dollars.

 Talys wrote:


All I was getting at is that $50-$100 (less whatever discount) for rules doesn't seem out of this world expensive to me. Plus, you can get the digital editions, which are even cheaper -- and the iPad versions are arguably *better*.

Well, yeah, a flight to Hawaii for my family isn't all that expensive to me but I don't begrudge people feeling that it is. I don't mean to pick on you Talys, you bring up some good points in conversations and are mostly fairly even-keeled but the elite collector schtick gets a bit wearing when you literally bring it up in every thread where someone mentions GW model prices.

People feel things are high-priced because that's reality. Some of us could literally buy an entire store of GW models without stressing our bank accounts but that doesn't mean that there is actual value in doing so. I recommend you not take the price gripes so literally when many people actually mean there isn't value for the price, not that they can't afford it. I think that we can all agree that value for the price is subjective.

All I know is GW charges 165 NZD for their main rulebook before I buy faction specific rules.

The Flames of War rulebook costs me 56NZD and comes with faction rules.

The Mantic Book costs me 60NZD and comes with ALL the rules I need.

Firestorm Armada Rules also barely cost anything (I think 40NZD from memory?)and their main rules come with enough stuff for me to play all the starter fleets.

Black Powder was $79 dollars and had everything I needed too.

I think I purchased the complete rules and faction books for Bolt Action for cheaper than I got my 40k Rules. Plus they came with free models.

Regardless GW charges usually about 3X the price for far less and does not offer free versions of their rules (AOS is the first time we see free rules from GW). There is also little positive to say about GW rules when compared to others. I would have to say GW rule books are the ugliest in my collection (7th edition onward).

I honestly cant think of a bigger rip off book wise than GW books. Looking at all the books I own. And I own a fair few.

 agnosto wrote:

 Talys wrote:


All I was getting at is that $50-$100 (less whatever discount) for rules doesn't seem out of this world expensive to me. Plus, you can get the digital editions, which are even cheaper -- and the iPad versions are arguably *better*.

Well, yeah, a flight to Hawaii for my family isn't all that expensive to me but I don't begrudge people feeling that it is. I don't mean to pick on you Talys, you bring up some good points in conversations and are mostly fairly even-keeled but the elite collector schtick gets a bit wearing when you literally bring it up in every thread where someone mentions GW model prices.

People feel things are high-priced because that's reality. Some of us could literally buy an entire store of GW models without stressing our bank accounts but that doesn't mean that there is actual value in doing so. I recommend you not take the price gripes so literally when many people actually mean there isn't value for the price, not that they can't afford it. I think that we can all agree that value for the price is subjective.

I was actually referring to the mini-rulebook + 1 codex as being cheap in an absolute fashion -- relative to median US household income ($52,000 in 2014). A lot of people seem to think 40k or WMH require you to buy every book that's out there. In fact, you don't, and that was all I meant. You could put on the other shoe and just say, "well, how much should 300 pages of rules for a game cost?". If it's free, a lot of companies will struggle. Should it be $20? $40? $60?

But anyways, as an absolute, yes, you are right: there are a lot of people who can't afford 40k. Likewise, though, the hobby of miniatures can be expensive, which is why I said, to someone who makes $7.50 an hour or gets a $25 a week allowance, it's totally unaffordable. By this metric, there are a lot of people who can't afford to model armies for Kings of War, either. Is $2 a model for 100 models expensive? It sure is, if you don't have a spare $200 for gaming/entertainment. You see what I mean?

If you want to get into that debate, the more useful comparison would be to take a household income, call it $50,000 or whatever (which, again, is BELOW the median 2014 US household income), and say, "would it be expensive, affordable, or inexpensive at that income level considering that it's an entertainment product that offers X number of hours of entertainment?"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Swastakowey wrote:
All I know is GW charges 165 NZD for their main rulebook before I buy faction specific rules.

Well, no argument there, bud. For whatever reason, GW and New Zealand or Australia just ends up in super duper expensive prices.

Though I don't think anyone other than a collector should buy the BRB 3-book set. The mini book is identical to the rulebook (down to the page numbers and color pictures) and way more useful for gaming, and can be had very cheap to free, as it comes free with 3 different box sets.

 Thokt wrote:

davethepak wrote:
They STILL do not understand what they are selling and who they are selling it to.

With leadership that has business acumen and can put aside their ego - this could be a billion dollar company.

A collector buys one nightscythe - a gamer buys six.

there is a your market - right there.

They could do better, but they will never, ever, never, make a billion dollars.

Make a billion dollars? No, but they could become worth a billion dollars. They're already worth at least a quarter of a billion, last time I checked their stock prices. Simply put, the only reason games like Kings of War, Malifeaux, Dropzone Commander, etc. exist is because GW allowed their creation by ditching their own "Specialist Games" that those games and their companies have moved in to replace. GW has their own artists, writers, sculptors, and manufacturing. With that much vertical integration of the game creation process, there is absolutely no reason why GW cannot maintain multiple game systems, while simultaneously undercutting the competition's prices and penetrating the hell out of the market with their stores (GW's stores are currently a millstone because they sell only three games, imagine if they sold everything).

But, no, some time ago GW decided they didn't want all the money, just some of the money. Example: Someone buying a BFG ship was someone who wasn't buying more Space Marines (which have a better profit margin), in their minds. What they completely failed to grasp was that many of the people buying BFG ships were never going to buy Space Marines, so dropping BFG has lost them that income.

 Talys wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Swastakowey wrote:
All I know is GW charges 165 NZD for their main rulebook before I buy faction specific rules.

Well, no argument there, bud. For whatever reason, GW and New Zealand or Australia just ends up in super duper expensive prices.

Though I don't think anyone other than a collector should buy the BRB 3-book set. The mini book is identical to the rulebook (down to the page numbers and color pictures) and way more useful for gaming, and can be had very cheap to free, as it comes free with 3 different box sets.

When I got the rules a mini alternative was not available nor did GW say that one would be available. Another pain in butt thing GW likes to do.

 Swastakowey wrote:

When I got the rules a mini alternative was not available nor did GW say that one would be available. Another pain in butt thing GW likes to do.

LOL, yeah, that would help, right? In our group, what happened was two people bought the set, and the rest just shared and waited for the DV refresh (which didn't take long). I mean, we were sure they'd either refresh DV or release some other new starter box. From a gaming perspective, the Dark Millenium book is pretty useless, and the third book gets flipped through once and never looked at again for the vast majority of people

 Talys wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

 Talys wrote:


All I was getting at is that $50-$100 (less whatever discount) for rules doesn't seem out of this world expensive to me. Plus, you can get the digital editions, which are even cheaper -- and the iPad versions are arguably *better*.

Well, yeah, a flight to Hawaii for my family isn't all that expensive to me but I don't begrudge people feeling that it is. I don't mean to pick on you Talys, you bring up some good points in conversations and are mostly fairly even-keeled but the elite collector schtick gets a bit wearing when you literally bring it up in every thread where someone mentions GW model prices.

People feel things are high-priced because that's reality. Some of us could literally buy an entire store of GW models without stressing our bank accounts but that doesn't mean that there is actual value in doing so. I recommend you not take the price gripes so literally when many people actually mean there isn't value for the price, not that they can't afford it. I think that we can all agree that value for the price is subjective.

I was actually referring to the mini-rulebook + 1 codex as being cheap in an absolute fashion -- relative to median US household income ($52,000 in 2014). A lot of people seem to think 40k or WMH require you to buy every book that's out there. In fact, you don't, and that was all I meant. You could put on the other shoe and just say, "well, how much should 300 pages of rules for a game cost?". If it's free, a lot of companies will struggle. Should it be $20? $40? $60?

But anyways, as an absolute, yes, you are right: there are a lot of people who can't afford 40k. Likewise, though, the hobby of miniatures can be expensive, which is why I said, to someone who makes $7.50 an hour or gets a $25 a week allowance, it's totally unaffordable. By this metric, there are a lot of people who can't afford to model armies for Kings of War, either. Is $2 a model for 100 models expensive? It sure is, if you don't have a spare $200 for gaming/entertainment. You see what I mean?

If you want to get into that debate, the more useful comparison would be to take a household income, call it $50,000 or whatever (which, again, is BELOW the median 2014 US household income), and say, "would it be expensive, affordable, or inexpensive at that income level considering that it's an entertainment product that offers X number of hours of entertainment?"

I understand your opinion and share it in some measure; however, I can't help but feel that you're merging two somewhat different concepts. There's subjective value; someone could easily afford a $75 rulebook but not find value in it vs. a new computer/playstation/xbox game due to their own preferences. There there's objective value where the $75 book is poor value when compared to a competitor's offerings of a closely similar product. The WMH rulebook is 295 pages, in full color, and is offered in softback and hardback formats. The softback is about $30 and the hardback is about $40 depending on where you buy. I use PP here as I feel it to be the closest competitor (though I could very well be wrong in that assumption with the growth of XWing, but I feel that to be a bit of apples and oranges). BTW, the "just the rules" isn't available that I could see on GW's webstore (I checked because I couldn't remember if $75 was accurate) all that's available is the $165 set; the ebook is available through BL at $59.99. People have already mentioned other competitors and their book prices; so, yeah, I feel comfortable in saying that objectively, GW's rulebooks are a poor value; subjectively, people may not feel that way.

Your second point continues to confuse the two concepts. The actual number of hours of entertainment that an individual will receive from the product will vary greatly per person. Some people love all the pictures and so spend a great deal of time pouring over those, the same with the "fluff" and so on while some people will read the entire book front to back and then do so again; conversely, others will just open the book to check a rule while they play. To compare the books to the models, I would argue there is less value, as there should be since they want to sell you models above all else but we're talking about the books.

Subjective vs. Objective value. When economists talk about objective value, they're talking about facts and figures, things you can count that apply universally. Subjective values are those things that depend on opinion, taste, whim, whatever. Objectively, GW books are a bad value while subjectively they may or may not be, depending upon the person. To me that is why these conversations always go in circles, people naturally speak subjectively when dealing with something as near and dear as money (or nerd toys ) while it's a bit more difficult to approach a discussion objectively.

Wonderwolf wrote:
Why are other companies allowed to emphasise specific aspects of the hobby, targeting people with specific preferences, even if it always means losing other customers who aren't going to be into their specific view of the hobby, but GW isn't?

GW most certainly is 'allowed' to do that.

The reason that they're copping flak for it in this particular instance, though, is that they are suddenly (as in, comparitively recently in their history as a company) claiming that their aims are, and always have been, something different to what a large chunk of their customer base expects, and to what nearly 30 years of releases suggest.


This current emphasis on collecting rather than gaming is something that only really built up steam during the Chapterhouse case, when GW discovered that having their products classed as toys rather than collectible art might result on the completely losing any right to claim copyright on them. And so, all of a sudden, Games Workshop wasn't about producing games, and their customers are supposedly just buying their models to look at rather than to play with.

If any of those other companies you mentioned made such an abrubt shift, I would suspect that you would see similar comments being made by their current customer base as we see now with GW.


For what it's worth, I can actually believe that only 20% of GWs customers actively play their games. But from my experience gaming in a number of different venues over the years, and from following online discussion for almost as long, I would guess that a reasonable chunk of the remaining 80% actually still consider themselves 40k 'players' rather than just model collectors... but only play sporadically if at all, for various reasons. And as such, they're still going to have similar concerns and preferences to 'actual' gamers, because their purchases are still at least to some extent influenced by the trends in the game

Trying to market a product that was designed specifically for use in a game as anything other than a game piece seems like nailing jelly to a tree, frankly. GW's models are nice as game pieces, but are left well behind by miniatures made specifically for display. Their materials are nice (easy to work with, durable, etc) for game pieces, but as more and more of the range shifts to their soft polystyrene mix are left behind by model kits made for display in the right plastic for that use. And the current emphasis on cycling rules through as quickly as possible and getting people to buy as many new books as you can in the shortest time possible is (arguably) great for promoting a game and keeping things fresh... but completely irrelevant to (according to GW) the vast majority of their customer base.


So GW aren't copping ridicule just for claiming that their product is aimed at collectors rather than gamers. They're copping ridicule for claiming that in the face of, well, pretty much everything that they do directly contradicting this claim.

They are talking about their customers like they are walking wallets lol. It's cartoonish.

Even investor meetings for other companies use better word choice to refer to their customers.

Once you get away from the subjectiveness of...

Person 1: "Well I like what GW are doing"
Person 2: "Well I don't like what GW are doing"

The crux of the problem to me is this...

Niche businesses are often very profitable and the hard decisions they take is what makes them different, but they’re also vulnerable if unforeseen events reduce the attractiveness of the niche. That’s why most niche companies try to expand their niches, or develop related niches.

GW are marketing to a niche and for some reason they are narrowing their niche even further. Whether you like what GW are currently producing or don't like what GW are currently producing, narrowing your market just seems like a stupid thing to do.

Pissed off customers are an inevitable by-product (and no matter how much you care about money more than making customers happy, I think most successful business would agree that a vocal pissed off customer is one of the worst things for your wallet) and even if you manage to up your profits, you end up sitting on a knife's edge if you squeeze your niche too hard and it all falls apart.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

 Thokt wrote:

davethepak wrote:
They STILL do not understand what they are selling and who they are selling it to.

With leadership that has business acumen and can put aside their ego - this could be a billion dollar company.

A collector buys one nightscythe - a gamer buys six.

there is a your market - right there.

They could do better, but they will never, ever, never, make a billion dollars.

Make a billion dollars? No, but they could become worth a billion dollars. They're already worth at least a quarter of a billion, last time I checked their stock prices. Simply put, the only reason games like Kings of War, Malifeaux, Dropzone Commander, etc. exist is because GW allowed their creation by ditching their own "Specialist Games" that those games and their companies have moved in to replace. GW has their own artists, writers, sculptors, and manufacturing. With that much vertical integration of the game creation process, there is absolutely no reason why GW cannot maintain multiple game systems, while simultaneously undercutting the competition's prices and penetrating the hell out of the market with their stores (GW's stores are currently a millstone because they sell only three games, imagine if they sold everything).

But, no, some time ago GW decided they didn't want all the money, just some of the money. Example: Someone buying a BFG ship was someone who wasn't buying more Space Marines (which have a better profit margin), in their minds. What they completely failed to grasp was that many of the people buying BFG ships were never going to buy Space Marines, so dropping BFG has lost them that income.

I agree with all the reasons you've listed that GW will never be worth a billion dollars.

 agnosto wrote:

I understand your opinion and share it in some measure; however, I can't help but feel that you're merging two somewhat different concepts. There's subjective value; someone could easily afford a $75 rulebook but not find value in it vs. a new computer/playstation/xbox game due to their own preferences. There there's objective value where the $75 book is poor value when compared to a competitor's offerings of a closely similar product. The WMH rulebook is 295 pages, in full color, and is offered in softback and hardback formats. The softback is about $30 and the hardback is about $40 depending on where you buy. I use PP here as I feel it to be the closest competitor (though I could very well be wrong in that assumption with the growth of XWing, but I feel that to be a bit of apples and oranges). BTW, the "just the rules" isn't available that I could see on GW's webstore (I checked because I couldn't remember if $75 was accurate) all that's available is the $165 set; the ebook is available through BL at $59.99. People have already mentioned other competitors and their book prices; so, yeah, I feel comfortable in saying that objectively, GW's rulebooks are a poor value; subjectively, people may not feel that way.

The "just rules" is available all over the place on ebay. This guy, for instance has sold 112 copies at $25

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dark-Vengeance-Mini-Warhammer-40K-Rule-book-7th-Edition-New-/261987787489?hash=item3cffb062e1

Not only is it a lot cheaper, but it's WAY better for gaming, because it weighs a tiny fraction of the BRB and is much smaller. Or you could buy DV, Deathstorm or Stormclaw (if you can find them), and get a free copy. And DV gets you the templates, measuring sticks, and dice, too.

The codex books are $50 - $58 print; $41 if you can find stock of the mini version (I think they were limited release? I can't recall). I think the digital versions are about $40. They range, IMO, from mediocre to good value. For instance, I don't know anyone who plays (I mean, actually plays) Eldar or Space Marines who isn't happy with their last codex purchase.

A lot of times, people conflate "my army sucks" with "this book is bad value". Case in point, a lot of Guard, CSM, Tyranid, DE, and BA players think their codex blows chunks.

What exactly is "too expensive" or "good value" anyways? Lots of people buy the Forge World books, gleefully, and they are WAY more expensive than the 40k books. This is why I marry entertainment value with "value". If you use something a lot, it's going to be more valuable *to you*, and if you'll never use it (or just flip through it for pictures), it will be of a tiny value.

I get it that there are people who want a neat game with tight and inexpensive or free rules, either with or without cool minis. In my opinion, these people are better served by a company other than GW.

 agnosto wrote:

Your second point continues to confuse the two concepts. The actual number of hours of entertainment that an individual will receive from the product will vary greatly per person. Some people love all the pictures and so spend a great deal of time pouring over those, the same with the "fluff" and so on while some people will read the entire book front to back and then do so again; conversely, others will just open the book to check a rule while they play. To compare the books to the models, I would argue there is less value, as there should be since they want to sell you models above all else but we're talking about the books.

Subjective vs. Objective value. When economists talk about objective value, they're talking about facts and figures, things you can count that apply universally. Subjective values are those things that depend on opinion, taste, whim, whatever. Objectively, GW books are a bad value while subjectively they may or may not be, depending upon the person. To me that is why these conversations always go in circles, people naturally speak subjectively when dealing with something as near and dear as money (or nerd toys ) while it's a bit more difficult to approach a discussion objectively.

Yes, you're right; there is subjective and objective value. But you can't really just nail objective value to things that aren't *identical*, or at least equally desirable. If I may have A or B, and I would like A and B equally, and A is cheaper than B, then A is objectively cheaper. But the instant A and B are differentiated enough that I prefer A to B, than objective value is no longer relevant. You see this all the time, for instance, with cars, where two cars on paper are nearly identical, and one is a cheaper than the other. They might even look similar. People who buy the more expensive one, for whatever reason, aren't all irrational; they simply don't see the two products as equivalent.

With games and models, that's just the way it is. If you like WMH or 30k or 40k or AOS or Infinity better, it doesn't really matter if the books are free, $30, $50, or $100. You'll find a way to justify it in your mind and say, "this is good value, because it's awesome and I want it." Conversely, if you don't like the game, the free rules don't really matter, right? It's still a terrible value, because all the rules are just a waste of time. I just don't think you can separate subjective and objective value (at least not totally) on something that depends so much on, "I like this more."

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Once you get away from the subjectiveness of...

Person 1: "Well I like what GW are doing"
Person 2: "Well I don't like what GW are doing"

The crux of the problem to me is this...

Niche businesses are often very profitable and the hard decisions they take is what makes them different, but they’re also vulnerable if unforeseen events reduce the attractiveness of the niche. That’s why most niche companies try to expand their niches, or develop related niches.

GW are marketing to a niche and for some reason they are narrowing their niche even further. Whether you like what GW are currently producing or don't like what GW are currently producing, narrowing your market just seems like a stupid thing to do.

Pissed off customers are an inevitable by-product (and no matter how much you care about money more than making customers happy, I think most successful business would agree that a vocal pissed off customer is one of the worst things for your wallet) and even if you manage to up your profits, you end up sitting on a knife's edge if you squeeze your niche too hard and it all falls apart.

It's also a strange way to grow a business. We want to get new customers, so we'll alienate as many of them as we can. As for squeezing the niche too far, i don't think that'll be a problem for kirby. He's made his money, everything is just gravy till it's time for the golden parachute to be deployed.

 Vermis wrote:

Plenty of people have leapt at it anyway. Any of them you?

Yes although I am lost in the crowd. I find it interesting that all those posts essentially say the same thing but were all written completely independently of each other due to the requirement for admin approval of posts (who apparently doesn't work weekends).

GW White Knights, ASSEMBLE!

We've had 'white knight'

HOUSE!

The Division Of Joy wrote:
We've had 'white knight'

HOUSE!

Dammit! Just needed someone to mention kitchen cabinets...

Whatever anyone says about relative prices the evidence of the annual results for the past few years is that the market is walking away from GW.

That may be because of prices, poor rules, bad marketing and PR, or a combination or whatever, but it certainly has been happening.

From the collector versus player angle the fact these worsening results have gone in parallel with a substantial amount of new books and models, might suggest that players are turning away and collectors are not picking up enough of the slack.

We will see the results of the introduction of AoS in the half year report in January.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Whatever anyone says about relative prices the evidence of the annual results for the past few years is that the market is walking away from GW.

That may be because of prices, poor rules, bad marketing and PR, or a combination or whatever, but it certainly has been happening.

From the collector versus player angle the fact these worsening results have gone in parallel with a substantial amount of new books and models, might suggest that players are turning away and collectors are not picking up enough of the slack.

We will see the results of the introduction of AoS in the half year report in January.

This is something I defiantly see with my gaming circle, we haven't played 40K for over a year but have definitely been investigating other systems such as Malifaux and Infinity
This is in part due to the prices and perceived value of the product but also the relentless release rate makes it difficult to keep up.
The game also takes longer and longer to play so smaller games fit in with our schedules now more easily.

Also completely anecdotally, it seems to me as a long term lurker that the news and rumours section seems to have less and less GW content in it now. This is in part, I feel, to their rumour policies but also could be indicative of a changing market.
Gw need to react to the market rather than try and dictate it. They aren't such a big fish these days (even though they are still big) and need to wake up to that fact.

 MWHistorian wrote:
I think many people collect with the intention/hope of gaming and that if there wasn't a game behind it, they wouldn't collect.
(personal theory)

This is one of the many reasons AoS will fail as a product line. Even if you like the models sufficiently (for some reason), to entertain the idea of collecting and painting them, making the decision to buy them is going to be even harder knowing you can't use them for anything, with no one to play with.

I realize GW would probably put me down as a 'collector' because I spend more time painting and assembling, than I game. In the last couple of years, I've played 4-5 times a year on average, but that's only because my friends live on the other side of the country. If they weren't still into 40k, then I wouldn't be either. Everything I model, I do in anticipation of the next game, whenever that might be.

GW of all companies, should know from experience, that even the most well-designed game system is going to do badly if it can't find a player base. Most of their defunct Specialist Games, were better games and arguably better products than WHFB and 40k.

Ok, so changing the GW stores to one man affairs saves money, but doesn't it also hide the fact that you are losing money? That old 4 man town centre store used to cost £500,000 a year to run, the new one man store, in a slightly different location, is only costing £100,000. That's a lot of leeway to hide the loss of sales isn't it?

I can't help but wonder how many of those 'collectors' GW talks about are people like me.

I don't play GW games anymore, when I buy a GW box it is just to paint. That does NOT mean I am a 'collector' rather than a 'gamer'. I used to play GW games, and if they put some effort into the rules I might again. I do play a lot of other companies games and I spend a lot more money on those other companies because when it comes down to it I am a gamer.

You're arguing semantics but yes it would refer to people like you.

Me as well I guess. I bought a ton of FW stuff and some of those Khorne bloodchaps but haven't played 40k since 6th. Played lots of other games but from GWs perspective I am collecting their models.

It makes no difference to me what label that attracts, but the thought process is clear enough.

 agnosto wrote:

 Talys wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

 Talys wrote:


All I was getting at is that $50-$100 (less whatever discount) for rules doesn't seem out of this world expensive to me. Plus, you can get the digital editions, which are even cheaper -- and the iPad versions are arguably *better*.

Well, yeah, a flight to Hawaii for my family isn't all that expensive to me but I don't begrudge people feeling that it is. I don't mean to pick on you Talys, you bring up some good points in conversations and are mostly fairly even-keeled but the elite collector schtick gets a bit wearing when you literally bring it up in every thread where someone mentions GW model prices.

People feel things are high-priced because that's reality. Some of us could literally buy an entire store of GW models without stressing our bank accounts but that doesn't mean that there is actual value in doing so. I recommend you not take the price gripes so literally when many people actually mean there isn't value for the price, not that they can't afford it. I think that we can all agree that value for the price is subjective.

I was actually referring to the mini-rulebook + 1 codex as being cheap in an absolute fashion -- relative to median US household income ($52,000 in 2014). A lot of people seem to think 40k or WMH require you to buy every book that's out there. In fact, you don't, and that was all I meant. You could put on the other shoe and just say, "well, how much should 300 pages of rules for a game cost?". If it's free, a lot of companies will struggle. Should it be $20? $40? $60?

But anyways, as an absolute, yes, you are right: there are a lot of people who can't afford 40k. Likewise, though, the hobby of miniatures can be expensive, which is why I said, to someone who makes $7.50 an hour or gets a $25 a week allowance, it's totally unaffordable. By this metric, there are a lot of people who can't afford to model armies for Kings of War, either. Is $2 a model for 100 models expensive? It sure is, if you don't have a spare $200 for gaming/entertainment. You see what I mean?

If you want to get into that debate, the more useful comparison would be to take a household income, call it $50,000 or whatever (which, again, is BELOW the median 2014 US household income), and say, "would it be expensive, affordable, or inexpensive at that income level considering that it's an entertainment product that offers X number of hours of entertainment?"

I understand your opinion and share it in some measure; however, I can't help but feel that you're merging two somewhat different concepts. There's subjective value; someone could easily afford a $75 rulebook but not find value in it vs. a new computer/playstation/xbox game due to their own preferences. There there's objective value where the $75 book is poor value when compared to a competitor's offerings of a closely similar product. The WMH rulebook is 295 pages, in full color, and is offered in softback and hardback formats. The softback is about $30 and the hardback is about $40 depending on where you buy. I use PP here as I feel it to be the closest competitor (though I could very well be wrong in that assumption with the growth of XWing, but I feel that to be a bit of apples and oranges). BTW, the "just the rules" isn't available that I could see on GW's webstore (I checked because I couldn't remember if $75 was accurate) all that's available is the $165 set; the ebook is available through BL at $59.99. People have already mentioned other competitors and their book prices; so, yeah, I feel comfortable in saying that objectively, GW's rulebooks are a poor value; subjectively, people may not feel that way.

Your second point continues to confuse the two concepts. The actual number of hours of entertainment that an individual will receive from the product will vary greatly per person. Some people love all the pictures and so spend a great deal of time pouring over those, the same with the "fluff" and so on while some people will read the entire book front to back and then do so again; conversely, others will just open the book to check a rule while they play. To compare the books to the models, I would argue there is less value, as there should be since they want to sell you models above all else but we're talking about the books.

Subjective vs. Objective value. When economists talk about objective value, they're talking about facts and figures, things you can count that apply universally. Subjective values are those things that depend on opinion, taste, whim, whatever. Objectively, GW books are a bad value while subjectively they may or may not be, depending upon the person. To me that is why these conversations always go in circles, people naturally speak subjectively when dealing with something as near and dear as money (or nerd toys ) while it's a bit more difficult to approach a discussion objectively.

As for the amount of enjoyment over time argument....

I have played more Kings of War in the last six months than I have Warhammer Fantasy Battle in the last six years.

The Kings of War rules are available for free - though I have the hardcover, which still cost less than a GW codex.

Kings of War is demonstrably cheaper than Warhammer Fantasy. (I am not counting Age of Stockholders - since I would never play it, the free rules do not matter - zero divided by zero is still zero.)

I have played more Deadzone over the last year than I have Warhammer 40K in the last ten years. Deadzone is about the same price as a 40K starter box. (Another difference - I bought the Deadzone Starter box, and skipped Dark Vengeance, even though I used to play Dark Angels.)

There is a subjective reason - growing dislike for the GW rules.

But an objective result - I play more Mantic than GW.

I buy more Mantic than GW.

I buy more Reaper than GW.

I buy more Stonehaven than GW.

I buy more Raging Heroes than GW.

I buy more CMoN than GW.

I spend a fair amount on gaming, and none of it is finding its way into GW's pockets.

The Auld Grump

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
zero divided by zero is still zero.

Actually I think you'll find it's undefined because it could either be 0, 1 or infinite depending on how the limits are approached...

This article reads like it was written specifically for gripers, like how GW caters to modellers.

And yet it was written by a fairly impartial shareholder, not a 'griper'.

The Division Of Joy wrote:
We've had 'white knight'

HOUSE!

Sir knight, you have mustered upon the wrong field. I fear that this battle here has already been lost. It is time to put up your spurs and accept the reality of change.

I bought about 12 things from GW since I started.
All of them codices/rules.

I own a whole Ultramarines chapter and I literally added it up - I'm paying less than 25% for my whole Chapter on eBay than GW. The rest went on Forge World, a site worth my time.

When the prices are acceptable I might buy more (i.e Fantasy because there's barely any Bloodbound on eBay)