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How do?

Just this month, I leaned on Our Man In Japan from the Loot Sharing Group. And procured a complete set, including Captain, of the Space Marine Heroes Series 1.

No, it wasn’t especially cheap, but meh. Wants, gets.

But what struck me, and considering they’re made in the U.K., and thus Lenton, is just how stupidly fine the injection port bits between sprue and model are. I mean, you can literally pop them out with your thumb - genuinely no clippers needed. Like, at all. Barely even to tidy up.

And that’s kinda irked me. See, there’s a lot Of kits out there with badly positioned flow channels - where we need to clip it free by gentle degrees, lest we knack a component.

Now I suspect such things will inevitably have to go somewhere awkward at some point. I honestly don’t know because I’ve no idea of the tolerance and that. But man, if they can produce bits that skinny? Surely there’s less need for honking great ones on other kits?

GW is inconsistent with their molding process.
Take a look at the sprue of Dire Avengers.
You can see where the mold got stuck and someone had to hammer a metal spike into it to make the bond less flush.

 DeffDred wrote:
GW is inconsistent with their molding process.
Take a look at the sprue of Dire Avengers.
You can see where the mold got stuck and someone had to hammer a metal spike into it to make the bond less flush.

I've looked at the sprue and I'm not really sure what you're referring to.

I don't suppose you could provide a picture of this could you? I'm quite curious.

That entire line of Japanese heroes also calls into shame the silliness of $30-35 independently sprued plastic characters...

 Elbows wrote:
That entire line of Japanese heroes also calls into shame the silliness of $30-35 independently sprued plastic characters...

this, so very much this.

and why have they not released them for the rest of us.

 vipoid wrote:

 DeffDred wrote:
GW is inconsistent with their molding process.
Take a look at the sprue of Dire Avengers.
You can see where the mold got stuck and someone had to hammer a metal spike into it to make the bond less flush.

I've looked at the sprue and I'm not really sure what you're referring to.

I don't suppose you could provide a picture of this could you? I'm quite curious.

I no longer have my Eldar army or any of its sprue frames.
But ask anyone you know with some Dire Avengers if they still have the sprues. If you look along the edges you will see an uneven line of small impacts.
That's the result of someone having to alter the mould of the models. They literally take a hammer and nail to the mould to disturb the surface so when the mould is separated from the plastic it doesn't stick. Its an old plastic injection trick that saves time and money.

 Elbows wrote:
That entire line of Japanese heroes also calls into shame the silliness of $30-35 independently sprued plastic characters...

Apparently each of them costs about 700 Yen... which is less than £5.

I guess the Japanese have a lower tolerance for being ripped off.

 DeffDred wrote:

I no longer have my Eldar army or any of its sprue frames.
But ask anyone you know with some Dire Avengers if they still have the sprues. If you look along the edges you will see an uneven line of small impacts.
That's the result of someone having to alter the mould of the models. They literally take a hammer and nail to the mould to disturb the surface so when the mould is separated from the plastic it doesn't stick. Its an old plastic injection trick that saves time and money.

Ah, okay. I'm Looking at the ones on the GW site and I think I can see what you mean.

 vipoid wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
That entire line of Japanese heroes also calls into shame the silliness of $30-35 independently sprued plastic characters...

Apparently each of them costs about 700 Yen... which is less than £5.

I guess the Japanese have a lower tolerance for being ripped off.

Exactly. GW charge their stupid prices because they know people will buy them anyway.

It probably doesn't explain everything, but remember that some of these molds are very old.

They probably could update some of them based on more modern casting techniques, but creating a new mold is pretty expensive so they probably don't feel it's worth it.

I don't have a huge sample size to draw from, but I feel the contact points on newer mod are at least a little better than older kits. I just put a Cadian Infantry Squad together and some of the contacts are pretty poorly placed, on exposed shoulders and such. Primaris ones don't feel as bad.

The flow lines on Necron Warriors heads' couldn't be any worse placed. I spend longer filing the head than assembling the rest of the model.

Stux wrote:
It probably doesn't explain everything, but remember that some of these molds are very old.

They probably could update some of them based on more modern casting techniques, but creating a new mold is pretty expensive so they probably don't feel it's worth it.

That doesn't make sense.

These new models must all be new molds, yet not only can they can afford to make them, they can afford to sell them at a fraction of what they charge for older molds.

It just means that the heroes series in Japan is more popular than we think. There isn't much difference in cost between an hormagant and a marine captain, it's just that you sell hormagants by the dozen to players, while captains (as all characters) make really low sale numbers. Hormagants are shipped in big packs which also lowers the shipping costs. The end result is that hormagants cost 1/12 of a marine char.

If those heroes are selling well and are packed conveniently, then they can afford to lower the cost.

I think they're also supposed to be a hobbyist intro kit.

One other reason though is that they're random. They come in a box like a bunch of magic boosters, you pick one, buy it and open it to see what you got. I bought whole box and got 2 of each, but if you're only grabbing one or two here or there, then the cheaper price would have you coming back for more.

Spoletta wrote:
It just means that the heroes series in Japan is more popular than we think. There isn't much difference in cost between an hormagant and a marine captain, it's just that you sell hormagants by the dozen to players, while captains (as all characters) make really low sale numbers. Hormagants are shipped in big packs which also lowers the shipping costs. The end result is that hormagants cost 1/12 of a marine char.

If those heroes are selling well and are packed conveniently, then they can afford to lower the cost.

Keep believing that lie, and maybe you can sleep at night after purchasing one. They're cheap enough that GW throws character models into SC sets at prices that effectively you get the characters for free. GW is simply milking players for all they can when it come to the clamshell character packs - if they were to sell the characters at about $15, I'm sure they'd still make a grotesque amount of profit, but it's questionable if they would sell more to make up via volume for what they sell at now - you'd still only need one per army (at best).

One thing to bear in mind with the Space Marine heroes line is that they were a co-production between Games Workshop and a Japanese model manufacturer. The models were actually designed by Max Factory and GW. Max Factory produce loads of kits like these.

This is why they are of superior quality to most GW kits - hopefully, GW will take some of the knowledge learned and apply it to future kits.

 Stormonu wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It just means that the heroes series in Japan is more popular than we think. There isn't much difference in cost between an hormagant and a marine captain, it's just that you sell hormagants by the dozen to players, while captains (as all characters) make really low sale numbers. Hormagants are shipped in big packs which also lowers the shipping costs. The end result is that hormagants cost 1/12 of a marine char.

If those heroes are selling well and are packed conveniently, then they can afford to lower the cost.

Keep believing that lie, and maybe you can sleep at night after purchasing one. They're cheap enough that GW throws character models into SC sets at prices that effectively you get the characters for free. GW is simply milking players for all they can when it come to the clamshell character packs - if they were to sell the characters at about $15, I'm sure they'd still make a grotesque amount of profit, but it's questionable if they would sell more to make up via volume for what they sell at now - you'd still only need one per army (at best).

HOW DARE A COMPANY MAKE A PROFIT!

BrianDavion wrote:

 Stormonu wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It just means that the heroes series in Japan is more popular than we think. There isn't much difference in cost between an hormagant and a marine captain, it's just that you sell hormagants by the dozen to players, while captains (as all characters) make really low sale numbers. Hormagants are shipped in big packs which also lowers the shipping costs. The end result is that hormagants cost 1/12 of a marine char.

If those heroes are selling well and are packed conveniently, then they can afford to lower the cost.

Keep believing that lie, and maybe you can sleep at night after purchasing one. They're cheap enough that GW throws character models into SC sets at prices that effectively you get the characters for free. GW is simply milking players for all they can when it come to the clamshell character packs - if they were to sell the characters at about $15, I'm sure they'd still make a grotesque amount of profit, but it's questionable if they would sell more to make up via volume for what they sell at now - you'd still only need one per army (at best).

HOW DARE A COMPANY MAKE A PROFIT!

There's making a profit and there's gouging gw clearly does the later.

 Mmmpi wrote:
I think they're also supposed to be a hobbyist intro kit.

One other reason though is that they're random. They come in a box like a bunch of magic boosters, you pick one, buy it and open it to see what you got. I bought whole box and got 2 of each, but if you're only grabbing one or two here or there, then the cheaper price would have you coming back for more.

Exactly this. They are packed at RANDOM, the clampack characters are not. GW knows that the clampack characters are poor sellers because not everyone collects the army they are from and the people who do are only likely to buy one. They cost more so that GW can make the cost of producing them and distributing them back. The Marine Heroes sets are at random so you aren't guaranteed to get the one you want, therefore keeping you coming back again and again until you get lucky and get the one you want. Therefore they have a much greater potential for selling and thus make the money back quicker, enabling GW to sell them for cheaper, which in turn makes them more compelling to keep coming back to buy. A self fulfilling cycle, unlike the clampack characters which they know will sell in very limited quantities.

At OP, I feel your frustration.

I managed to practically wreck one of the Shadespire Storm Cast Eternals when putting it together because of naff moulding. I've been assembling GW products for over 20 years so it is not like I am coming to this as a beginner!

Japan has far better techniques when it comes to injection moulding products.

Gundam kits never needed clippers since it was launched. I used to usr my teeth to grind out whatever little bit that was left.

I wish they sold them outside Japan.