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 NorseSig wrote:
I make casts all the time. I make them of weapons and wargear options. I do buy official kits, but I am not gonna buy two to three kits to create ONE unit. I also magnetize the options. I would consider bits if their prices weren't a 1/4 of the kit half the time. Seriously, who in their right mind pays that much for bits?

I just bought a bunch of Bluestuff to make my own molds for bits, because I could easily double the cost of my armies with all the options I want to magnetize. There are also some things I simply can't find.

I've subsequently realized that finding ways to keep money out of GW's pockets is a major part of the fun of the hobby for me.

Containment_Failure wrote:
I just bought a bunch of Bluestuff to make my own molds for bits, because I could easily double the cost of my armies with all the options I want to magnetize. There are also some things I simply can't find.

I've subsequently realized that finding ways to keep money out of GW's pockets is a major part of the fun of the hobby for me.

Yep, I've gone down this road too. Back in 5th edition I was building a Dark Eldar army until I realized that my 4 boxes of Kabalite Warriors would not be enough to give me all my weapons options. I would have to buy another $319 of warrior boxes just to get 11 bits needed to gives me units their appropriate options. That didn't seem reasonable. I could pay eBay bits sellers $100+ to get those 11 bits, still didn't seem reasonable. I went the cheap option and decided to cast my own, invested $50+ and hours into research and mold making to get the bits the "ethical" "home grown" way, and ended up at a dead end with unsatisfying bit quality.

I quit Warhammer 40k for at least 4 years at that point.

GW was getting $0 from me during those 50 months. If I had known I could buy 10 blasters for $3, I probably would have finished that Dark Eldar army and continued to give GW money. But, that didn't happen. I got frustrated with the system and just decided, feth it.


Now, I am faced with similar options. Do I cobble together unaesthetic but morally acceptable models to get my army to the table? Do I flounder around looking for an answer and end up quitting the game entirely? Nope, I buy anything plastic from GW, all my paints and supplies from GW, and when I need 30x of some random metal model just to chop up and use for conversions I buy the resin versions from some upstanding gentleman oversees. I get the army I want in a material I can cut and convert, the game gets an active player, GW gets a bunch of my money, and someone on the other side of the planet makes a living without having to justify themselves to the internet morality police.

Seems like a win-win-win-win to me.

HuskyWarhammer wrote:
In order to get the second set of weapons, you'd have to purchase an entire second set with that option, as they didn't sell just the weapons kit separately. This bothered me enough to say, "screw this, that's not an okay thing to do," and set about finding a recast. And it is a good one, I still have it proudly atop my bookshelf. I'm not trying to justify my logic as ethical, but more to explain how I (and probably many others) got there.

Good, because any attempt at ethical justification would just be a self-serving rationalization of your selfishness and lack of moral standards. I don't know how you can seriously say things like "that's not an ok thing to do" about the horrifying crime of forcing you to pick which weapon choice to use when you buy a model. But it just demonstrates the point that buying recasts is entirely about feeling entitled to have something at a certain price, regardless of how you get it.

 Peregrine wrote:
horrifying crime of forcing you to pick which weapon choice to use when you buy a model.

So I guess the fact that you have to buy 40 Kabalite Warriors in order to build a 5 man unit of Kabalite Trueborn is Totally Cool And Not A Problem?

So I guess the fact that you have to buy 40 Kabalite Warriors in order to build a 5 man unit of Kabalite Trueborn is Totally Cool And Not A Problem?

Of course companies intentionally selling incomplete products to try to make more sales is a-ok, but as a consumer don't you dare be "entitled" or "cheap" or any of those other buzzwords folks need to use to masturbate about how morally superior they are.

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
horrifying crime of forcing you to pick which weapon choice to use when you buy a model.

So I guess the fact that you have to buy 40 Kabalite Warriors in order to build a 5 man unit of Kabalite Trueborn is Totally Cool And Not A Problem?

If you don't like it then don't buy it at all. It might be annoying, but it certainly isn't a moral problem and it doesn't mean you're entitled to buy illegal recasts instead.

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't like it then don't buy it at all. It might be annoying, but it certainly isn't a moral problem and it doesn't mean you're entitled to buy illegal recasts instead.

The people making them do it perfectly legally in their countries and I don't consider it a moral negative. Where does the problem start existing?

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't like it then don't buy it at all. It might be annoying, but it certainly isn't a moral problem and it doesn't mean you're entitled to buy illegal recasts instead.

The people making them do it perfectly legally in their countries and I don't consider it a moral negative. Where does the problem start existing?

If you don't consider it a moral negative then that says some pretty sad things about your moral standards.

 Ketara wrote:

 RedSarge wrote:
@Azreal13: There are recasters that will send the models in Forgeworld bags to avoid counterfeit seizures.

Counterfeit seizures?

Guv, nobody in customs or the police cares enough about someone replicating toy soldiers to do drug raid style seizures of resin krack. Christ, they barely care when someone reports actual theft of thousands of dollars of models. I've never heard of a single recaster packaging stuff up in FW imitation bags, and out of probably over a dozen threads on the topic, you're the first to ever claim it that I've seen.

It's a valid corollary for conversation from the main subject though, I should think (namely how to spot a recast). So where did you hear/see that recasters were going to plastic bag makers and having imitation FW ones churned out? Can we get some pictures? If so, perhaps we can try and figure out how to spot fake FW bags as well.

Oh the irony; quite a few recasters supply models in forgeworld bags (and yes, i assume these are fake). And there is a way to spot them. Aaaaand it is amazing how many come up on ebay claiming to be "in original forgeworld packaging"

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't consider it a moral negative then that says some pretty sad things about your moral standards.

So I badly cast my own blasters and that's OK
I see no problem with paying some Russian guy 3 dollars to cast blasters for me and suddenly That Says Some Pretty Sad Things About Moral Standards?

You must be a Very Smart and Wise philosopher guy.

 Peregrine wrote:

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't like it then don't buy it at all. It might be annoying, but it certainly isn't a moral problem and it doesn't mean you're entitled to buy illegal recasts instead.

The people making them do it perfectly legally in their countries and I don't consider it a moral negative. Where does the problem start existing?

If you don't consider it a moral negative then that says some pretty sad things about your moral standards.

This presupposes that IP laws are inherently moral, which I have yet to see anyone prove in this thread.

Funnily enough I've probably bought a recast without knowing it. I just buy lots of figs on the secondhand market at Geeky yard sales and bazaars.

Only one I can think of that I'm pretty sure was a recast was a Heroquest chaos warrior. It wasn't on it's "base" and the horns were a bit off, it was in resin, but has since been painted. In the lot were a bunch of old metals, slambo era metal figs that I enjoy. The rest of the Heroquest Warriors of Chaos were plastic and on their bases.

I don't care if the figs I buy are recasts or not. I don't spend enough money to warrant worrying about such things. I spent $25 on old chaos figs in a tacklebox. I like the figures, that's all I need to know.

Playing against someone who spent money on a recast fig that's painted is IMO better than Soda can drop pods any day.

Honestly the question being asked could only be important to a TO or possibly a manager of a GW store. Have fun playing a game. I think sometimes people take this stuff too seriously(Myself included)

To the people who say it's only the "big boys" that get ripped off; not the case. I've certainly seen Hasslefree and Fenris Games (both very small outfits) warning potential cusatomers about recasts.

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't like it then don't buy it at all.

Agreed. I stopped playing Magic and WH40K for this reason, and will not be buying FFG's RuneWars or Star Wars Legion, either.

I do have Shadow Armageddon (sp), which allows me to play my old GW miniatures, but doesn't oblige me to buy more GW models, like another iteration of WH40K would.

Kings of War allows you to use your own models, and many older miniature wargamers know that "universal" rule sets are quite playable.

 ulgurstasta wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't like it then don't buy it at all. It might be annoying, but it certainly isn't a moral problem and it doesn't mean you're entitled to buy illegal recasts instead.

The people making them do it perfectly legally in their countries and I don't consider it a moral negative. Where does the problem start existing?

If you don't consider it a moral negative then that says some pretty sad things about your moral standards.

This presupposes that IP laws are inherently moral, which I have yet to see anyone prove in this thread.

Inherently moral? Of course not, because then you have to get into philosophical arguments about inherent morality in general. But IP laws exist for good reasons. If you want to have new IP then you have to protect the creator's rights to their work, if anyone is free to copy something new then there's no incentive to make it yourself. Someone else can just take your work and copy it, undercutting your prices in the process because they don't have to pay all the same creation expenses that you had to pay.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't consider it a moral negative then that says some pretty sad things about your moral standards.

So I badly cast my own blasters and that's OK
I see no problem with paying some Russian guy 3 dollars to cast blasters for me and suddenly That Says Some Pretty Sad Things About Moral Standards?

You must be a Very Smart and Wise philosopher guy.

Who said your own recasting was ok?

 Peregrine wrote:

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
If you don't like it then don't buy it at all. It might be annoying, but it certainly isn't a moral problem and it doesn't mean you're entitled to buy illegal recasts instead.

The people making them do it perfectly legally in their countries and I don't consider it a moral negative. Where does the problem start existing?

If you don't consider it a moral negative then that says some pretty sad things about your moral standards.

Or you are communist.


Да здравствует Россия!

I've bought plenty of Forgeworld (one of the first to buy Lucius Warhound, Baneblade, both Marauders, every statue and bust they released and every Imperial Guard tank) and I've also bought a few recasts and honestly depending which recaster you use, you can't tell the difference once you have it in your hands.

I have no problem buying recasts because I know how much it costs to make a model from start to finish and how much Forgeworld is over charging, like people have said on here charge a fair and reasonable price for your models and recasts won't look like a better buy.

The morality issue is usually brought up by people who feel stupid for paying more for the same model and are just trying to make others feel bad, which never works.

 Rolsheen wrote:
I have no problem buying recasts because I know how much it costs to make a model from start to finish and how much Forgeworld is over charging, like people have said on here charge a fair and reasonable price for your models and recasts won't look like a better buy.

There is no "fair and reasonable" here, it's a nonsense concept when applied to luxury items like 40k models. Trying to present GW's prices as some kind of moral issue is nothing more than self-serving rationalization for selfish behavior.

The morality issue is usually brought up by people who feel stupid for paying more for the same model and are just trying to make others feel bad, which never works.

Or by those of us who are artists/authors/etc, and don't like the idea of our fellow content creators being ripped off by people who feel entitled to take whatever they want as long as it gets them a cheaper price.

Thank you Peregrine, it's always nice to hear someone's opinion that differs from one's own.

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
It isn't just GW and FW stuff being recast. That might be what most people are focusing on in this discussion, but the practice itself really feths up other areas of the hobby, especially the collecting side.

Battletech figures are notoriously easy to make cheap castings of and eBay has been flooded with them for years. That makes collecting some of the more sought after older figures extremely difficult and new collectors have paid good money for what they thought were legitimate castings only to find they had some lame tin casting from some dude's garage. Battletech is just one example, but recasts are not exclusive to GW games and they do have an impact on the secondary market.

Yeah... you'll notice that for the most part none of us here are talking about buying things we think are legitimate and then getting duped by a recaster. A lot of us are talking about recasters who say flatout that they are recasters.

First off, morality itself is nothing other than a preconceived and egotistical concept.

"The way I (and others like me) do things is the right way and your way is evil because its different"

Copywrite protections are necessary to protect the creator. This I do agree with. However, if a majority of consumers think your product is overcosted (and therefore find ways to get it for cheaper), then it is probably overcosted. This is a free market mentality.

You are free to charge whatever you want for your product, but if you charge so much that no one buys it, guess what, your out of business.

Ethics, morality and belief structures have always been a little difficult for me to get my head around.

But doesn't any artist want their work to be seen, shared and appreciated?

Money won't remember me when I'm gone!

(I'm no saint, though. Money is still useful while I'm alive )

A lot of this debate comes down to one core question:

Which is more ethical: to jack up prices when you have an effective monopoly (screwing consumers) or to knowingly purchase replicas of an item from said monopoly at lower cost (screwing the company and potentially consumers as a second order effect) ? I don't think it's as easy to answer as some would like to think...and would suggest getting down from that cross if you want to have an adult discussion about it.

 Peregrine wrote:


Who said your own recasting was ok?

GW did. They've had tutorials for doing it with green stuff both in WD and on their old website (that one's now gone).

 Eihnlazer wrote:
First off, morality itself is nothing other than a preconceived and egotistical concept.

"The way I (and others like me) do things is the right way and your way is evil because its different"

Copywrite protections are necessary to protect the creator. This I do agree with. However, if a majority of consumers think your product is overcosted (and therefore find ways to get it for cheaper), then it is probably overcosted. This is a free market mentality.

You are free to charge whatever you want for your product, but if you charge so much that no one buys it, guess what, your out of business.

Seems like the majority of people are still buying it though and it appears profits on a climb for gee dubs. even at these prices that some people are finding too high.

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
horrifying crime of forcing you to pick which weapon choice to use when you buy a model.

So I guess the fact that you have to buy 40 Kabalite Warriors in order to build a 5 man unit of Kabalite Trueborn is Totally Cool And Not A Problem?

Your lot in life is not to have nice things. That is the only moral choice. If you were meant for anything greater than sitting on the sidelines watching your betters enjoy their prosperity, your bank account would show it. I suggest you find a hobby more fitting for your station, such as toothpick chewing or rock smashing.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 ph34r wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
horrifying crime of forcing you to pick which weapon choice to use when you buy a model.

So I guess the fact that you have to buy 40 Kabalite Warriors in order to build a 5 man unit of Kabalite Trueborn is Totally Cool And Not A Problem?

Your lot in life is not to have nice things. That is the only moral choice. If you were meant for anything greater than sitting on the sidelines watching your betters enjoy their prosperity, your bank account would show it. I suggest you find a hobby more fitting for your station, such as toothpick chewing or rock smashing.

I didn't think anything good was going to come of this thread, but I stand corrected. Thank you for an unexpected laugh.

Process wrote:

Oh the irony; quite a few recasters supply models in forgeworld bags (and yes, i assume these are fake). And there is a way to spot them.

...............so would you care to, you know, enlighten us?

- Double Mold Lines
- Thin parts
- Squared edges are bowed inwards
- Anything square has a depression as the parts are not cast in high quality RTV silicone, often a cheap yellow or purple colored rubber mold. This can be described as concave depressions leading to all edges being peaked and sharp
- Transparent parts
- Horrible solvent smell that persist even after degreasing and washing
- Base material made from a different plastic than standard

 RedSarge wrote:
- Double Mold Lines
- Thin parts
- Squared edges are bowed inwards
- Anything square has a depression as the parts are not cast in high quality RTV silicone, often a cheap yellow or purple colored rubber mold. This can be described as concave depressions leading to all edges being peaked and sharp
- Transparent parts
- Horrible solvent smell that persist even after degreasing and washing
- Base material made from a different plastic than standard

All of this was already debunked in this thread.

Can we just lock it up?