Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

In the abstract, that's true as a reproduction will generally be worse/lose information/gain noise in each transfer even in the hands of someone skilled. However, adding in other factors, things like quality control, prepping and casting techniques, material properties and preferences, and it's entirely possible that any given instance of a reproduction could be better than another given instance of a cast that's closer to the master.

I'm not saying they are, but the lasgun example is a great illustration of this point: if what recasters do is more effective than FW, it's possible the fiddly little bits will get to customers in better condition.

I've bought plenty of new and used, and some are recast, and I like FW's materials and casting better, but I generally avoid new these days because it's just not worth it.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

LOL, I assure you its not complete BS, and that it is you who has a complete misunderstanding of the process. Recasters (well, the good ones at least) do a *lot* of prep work on the models before recasting them, such as repairing miscast and damaged sections, filling in bubbles, re-scraping panel lines and improving edge details, re-engineering gates and vents, and it often includes preassembling sections to create larger and more robust sub-assemblies that are more material-intensiv but less likely to warp or miscast, etc. In terms of the casting process they generally seem to have better QC than Forgeworld as I have received fewer miscasts and missing pieces from recasters than I have from FW. I have done and seen side-by-side comparisons between recast kits and FW kits many many times and the recasts win ~80% of the time. Some of the worst resin products I have ever seen has come straight to me from Forgeworld (including a Tantalus which almost half of the kit was greasy/weeping uncured resin). The only knock I can give against recast is that some details do get ever-so-slightly softer vs the original even in spite of the work that goes into trying to avoid that, but if you're careful about painting and thin your paints well enough you literally can't tell when the models finished.

They're charging more but then a lot of stuff seems to be permanently out of stock.

For people who pay attention to the GW investor reports, how has GW's volume of sales increased over the past couple of years relative to their increasing profits?

Both revenues and profits are up, profit margins have been increasing at a faster rate than revenues, which I assume to be the result of cost cutting measures coupled with small price increases that don't seem to have had any impact on demand (i.e. price inelasticity - not good for us as it would probably be taken as evidence by management that they can continue to raise prices without seeing a negative impact against sales)

Prices hikes always suck but thankfully this one wasnt major

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

LOL, I assure you its not complete BS, and that it is you who has a complete misunderstanding of the process. Recasters (well, the good ones at least) do a *lot* of prep work on the models before recasting them, such as repairing miscast and damaged sections, filling in bubbles, re-scraping panel lines and improving edge details, re-engineering gates and vents, and it often includes preassembling sections to create larger and more robust sub-assemblies that are more material-intensiv but less likely to warp or miscast, etc. In terms of the casting process they generally seem to have better QC than Forgeworld as I have received fewer miscasts and missing pieces from recasters than I have from FW. I have done and seen side-by-side comparisons between recast kits and FW kits many many times and the recasts win ~80% of the time. Some of the worst resin products I have ever seen has come straight to me from Forgeworld (including a Tantalus which almost half of the kit was greasy/weeping uncured resin). The only knock I can give against recast is that some details do get ever-so-slightly softer vs the original even in spite of the work that goes into trying to avoid that, but if you're careful about painting and thin your paints well enough you literally can't tell when the models finished.

I said that the idea that recasts are generally better than the original was BS. Maybe you didn’t read my comment correctly, because you seem to be talking only about the somewhat mythical “good” recasters.

But hey, you started your reply with “LOL”, so obviously I defer to your greater wisdom.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

You’re making yourself look bad here. Just about every little store that casts in resin produces miniatures with fewer bubbles, less flash, and less warping than Forgeworld. This includes recasters (usually). Recasters typically clean and “fix” their FW minis before recasting, at least the ones who stay in business. They are also more motivated to dance the dance of replacement parts requests than the average Fw customer.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

LOL, I assure you its not complete BS, and that it is you who has a complete misunderstanding of the process. Recasters (well, the good ones at least) do a *lot* of prep work on the models before recasting them, such as repairing miscast and damaged sections, filling in bubbles, re-scraping panel lines and improving edge details, re-engineering gates and vents, and it often includes preassembling sections to create larger and more robust sub-assemblies that are more material-intensiv but less likely to warp or miscast, etc. In terms of the casting process they generally seem to have better QC than Forgeworld as I have received fewer miscasts and missing pieces from recasters than I have from FW. I have done and seen side-by-side comparisons between recast kits and FW kits many many times and the recasts win ~80% of the time. Some of the worst resin products I have ever seen has come straight to me from Forgeworld (including a Tantalus which almost half of the kit was greasy/weeping uncured resin). The only knock I can give against recast is that some details do get ever-so-slightly softer vs the original even in spite of the work that goes into trying to avoid that, but if you're careful about painting and thin your paints well enough you literally can't tell when the models finished.

I said that the idea that recasts are generally better than the original was BS. Maybe you didn’t read my comment correctly, because you seem to be talking only about the somewhat mythical “good” recasters.

I mean... they have quality control, FW doesn't.

There are definitely good recasters who provide casts that are of better average quality than FW's. Which is more of an indictment of FW's quality control than the recasters' quality per se, but still, it's true.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

You’re making yourself look bad here. Just about every little store that casts in resin produces miniatures with fewer bubbles, less flash, and less warping than Forgeworld. This includes recasters (usually). Recasters typically clean and “fix” their FW minis before recasting, at least the ones who stay in business. They are also more motivated to dance the dance of replacement parts requests than the average Fw customer.

I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?

Wow. Just, wow. I’m genuinely amazed by this statement.

Well yes, that's exactly what we're saying. FW's QA is, at best, a concept that they're aware of, but have never put into practice.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
... you seem to be talking only about the somewhat mythical “good” recasters.

Nothing "mythical" about them.

They make FW look like garage amateurs.

The claims that recast FW models are markedly better casts than genuine FW seems to be largely anecdotal (and I think significant bias comes into it).

Without comparing 100's of like for like samples of at least several dozen different models, there isn't any reliable data to make the claim recast are better in anyway, other than alleged personal experience.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?

Wow. Just, wow. I’m genuinely amazed by this statement.

I'm not taking sides in this debate, but I will ask one question - what's your experience like with recast FW models compared to the originals?

 Dysartes wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?

Wow. Just, wow. I’m genuinely amazed by this statement.

I'm not taking sides in this debate, but I will ask one question - what's your experience like with recast FW models compared to the originals?

As someone who has had both, my best and worst FW models are both recast. But the genuine article was definitely more consistent.

As in a consistent 8/10, a good recast is perfect with few vents or warps, the worst I had was a custodes tank where the rear needed a saw, a bucket of greenstuff and probably the loss of a finger to assemble.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

You’re making yourself look bad here. Just about every little store that casts in resin produces miniatures with fewer bubbles, less flash, and less warping than Forgeworld. This includes recasters (usually). Recasters typically clean and “fix” their FW minis before recasting, at least the ones who stay in business. They are also more motivated to dance the dance of replacement parts requests than the average Fw customer.

I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?

Wow. Just, wow. I’m genuinely amazed by this statement.

Sounds like you haven’t bought much Forgeworld, then.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Just mind that this is only based on 3-4 cases I got. Maybe someone else who ordered in the last year can give his experience?

From what you have said, it sounds like the carnodon is definitely a recast. I wonder how many people who have been disappointed with the quality of FW models have mistakenly bought recasts on the second hand market?

I’ve bought quite a lot from FW, over the past few years I would say that their quality is very good, apart from issues with the mold-release agent that they use.

Weirdly from my experience, recasts tend to be better quality-wise than either GW or FW.

I've heard people say this quite a lot. Frankly, it's complete BS.

The idea that recasts are generally better than the model that they have been cast from shows either a complete misunderstanding of the process, or just typical anti-GW nonsense. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's the latter.

LOL, I assure you its not complete BS, and that it is you who has a complete misunderstanding of the process. Recasters (well, the good ones at least) do a *lot* of prep work on the models before recasting them, such as repairing miscast and damaged sections, filling in bubbles, re-scraping panel lines and improving edge details, re-engineering gates and vents, and it often includes preassembling sections to create larger and more robust sub-assemblies that are more material-intensiv but less likely to warp or miscast, etc. In terms of the casting process they generally seem to have better QC than Forgeworld as I have received fewer miscasts and missing pieces from recasters than I have from FW. I have done and seen side-by-side comparisons between recast kits and FW kits many many times and the recasts win ~80% of the time. Some of the worst resin products I have ever seen has come straight to me from Forgeworld (including a Tantalus which almost half of the kit was greasy/weeping uncured resin). The only knock I can give against recast is that some details do get ever-so-slightly softer vs the original even in spite of the work that goes into trying to avoid that, but if you're careful about painting and thin your paints well enough you literally can't tell when the models finished.

I said that the idea that recasts are generally better than the original was BS. Maybe you didn’t read my comment correctly, because you seem to be talking only about the somewhat mythical “good” recasters.

But hey, you started your reply with “LOL”, so obviously I defer to your greater wisdom.

Tell me you have no idea what you're talking about without telling me you have no idea what you're talking about.

I've only ever seen bad recasts once, and those were the recasts I made myself. I have literally hundreds of kits and pieces (seriously, I have over 100lbs worth of resin in my to-be-assembled piled alone) from at least a dozen different recasters in my collection, and they are better than any of the stuff that I have purchased from Forgeworld - at this point the only things I actually go to forgeworld for are things which are hybrid plastic and resin (because as cheap as they are, recasts of plastic kits just aren't worth the inconvenience that comes with them). Either I'm really lucky, or you don't understand what the word "mythical" means.

I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?
Wow. Just, wow. I’m genuinely amazed by this statement.

Ever stop to consider that you're in a thread filled with people who have more experience with both recasters and forgeworld than you do? And that you're making yourself look bad by trying to speak authoritatively on something which you clearly have no first-hand experience or knowledge of? And that its very obvious to all of us that this is the case?

What does it matter, someone will ALLWAYS buy their stuff regardless of high price they go. They know it, and we know it.

I've seen bad recasts from recasters who were clearly using battered moulds that had long outlived their usefulness, but I've also seen a LOT of very high quality recasts that were significantly better than the casts I've received from Forge World.

The Storm Eagle was the last thing I ever bought from Forge World. I had one entire side that was a partial fill of the mould and would never line up with the cockpit, and the other side was clearly from a mould that had been topped up because it had a sort of "cliff" of material partway along. The parts were nowhere remotely close to straight, and even after bending in hot water they'd go back to bent within a short time. Numerous pieces had enormous mould lines on them. I swore I'd never buy from Forge World again and I haven't.

It wasn't the only model I had that was garbage. Like others, I've also had the "weepy resin" problem of poorly mixed resin that will never set. Other than that, among the standouts of poor quality product I had a BFG Grey Knights Strike Cruiser that had mould slip of more than 1mm. I had to take a knife to the entire ship, cut it in half and reassemble it to make it look reasonable.

Quality control isn't about "picking out the bad items before they're shipped" (which tbh, Forge World was never that good at anyway) - it's actually about developing a process that produces fewer defects in the first place. Given my own defect rate from FW I'm of the opinion that they have no idea what a well-controlled process is and they do not deserve the money they charge for these products.

The recasters that people are praising in this thread seem to have a better process than FW. It's unintuitive that a mould made from a production model would produce better quality copies than the moulds that FW presumably made from the master models, but I think that FW simply don't have good process control and they throw poor models out there with shocking frequency. Instead of treating the root cause, they'd rather keep increasing prices and sending out replacements because it's likely cheaper.

We saw the same thing with "Fine"cast - I had three sets of replacements for three copies of that awful thing they were calling a Dark Eldar Grotesque (9 models total) and every single one of them was flawed in mostly similar ways. They weren't checking them before shipment, and they sure weren't bothering to fix the process - probably because the majority of buyers either didn't care about the quality in the first place or because they'd bought into the whole nonsense of "you don't understand, it's a premium model from a premium process and fixing it myself is part of the experience of being an "expert modeller" - let me buy some liquid greenstuff and try to fill in all these holes and resculpt the missing detail..."

When those are the only guys who are still buying, where's the incentive for quality control?

EDIT: That Storm Eagle I bought was 80 quid back in 2012. It's now £125. Inflation wouldn't put it at more than £100. The RoW price (which is where I was when I bought it) is now £139...

Hmm nothing in my forever-FW cart went up in price.

Yup, prices did go up.
Phoenix Terminators from 66 to 70 euros.
Ursarax from 48 to 50.
Scyllax from 50 to 53.
Sicaran Arcus stayed the same...

Full Warlord Titan is now 1753 euros...

They just dug themselves even deeper.

 FrozenDwarf wrote:
What does it matter, someone will ALLWAYS buy their stuff regardless of high price they go. They know it, and we know it.

This hasn't universally been true in the past. GW got themselves into financial trouble in the early to mid 2010s by raising the price of the hobby (both through price increases and points devaluations that required you to buy more miniatures) while delivering bad rulesets people didn't enjoy playing. WHFB actually died because of this. So it's not true that the community will simply absorb any price increase no matter what.

And in fact GW's response to that - which led to the huge growth they've seen since roughly 2017 - involved various things aimed at lowering the price of getting into the hobby - cheaper SC boxes, rules resets that simplified the game and thinned down the number of books and models you needed to play it, etc etc.

They've spent the last year or two backtracking, going back to the old model of squeezing more and more money out of the customer. It's worked so far, but that doesn't mean it'll work forever. Is this particular FW increase what's going to break the camel's back? Unlikely. But I do think we're getting pretty close to that point where the squeezing starts to be counterproductive.

There was also some viable competition from a stronger WarMachine presence that’s since dropped way down. Warlord was also a much cheaper alternative then but now not so much especially for US/ROW gamers with increased regional prices and much higher shipping.

Yeah, but there are a lot of other games now that didn't exist then, too. The Star Wars games, ASOIAF, Conquest, KoW, etc. If anything the wargaming market is more competitive than it was in the mid 2010s, not less.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Well yes, that's exactly what we're saying. FW's QA is, at best, a concept that they're aware of, but have never put into practice.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
... you seem to be talking only about the somewhat mythical “good” recasters.

Nothing "mythical" about them.

They make FW look like garage amateurs.

From my experience it is a myth. The ones buying recasts are doing it because it's cheap not because they have a superior quality and from what I've seen they probably shouldn't be building any resin miniatures to begin with.

My issues with FW are when things are poorly designed in such a way that they don't fit together(landraider proteus tracks) and that they don't do a good job maintaining the quality of older products(soft/distorted details for example the keeper of secrets).

 CragHack wrote:
Yup, prices did go up.
Phoenix Terminators from 66 to 70 euros.
Ursarax from 48 to 50.
Scyllax from 50 to 53.
Sicaran Arcus stayed the same...

Full Warlord Titan is now 1753 euros...

They just dug themselves even deeper.

Is it EU prices only? Perhaps absorbing the extra export taxes into the price from UK to EU.

When was the last time there was a FW price increase?

Seems I've been luckier than most when it comes to FW kit quality. All the kits I've bought have been more or less as expected, no major casting fails on any pieces so far.

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?

From my experience, maybe not better, but on par, definitely.

Every FW order I've gotten has had serious mold lines, slippage, bubbles, flash, and occasionally broken parts as well. Meanwhile I've seen friends get recasts that were nearly flawless out of the box. FW's production quality reminds me of the lower end of garage kits, where they're using inadequate equipment and don't even have the decency to redo the failures. My last straw was a Vulture where the additional weapon mount sprues were so miscast that they couldn't be used as spacers to properly position the mounts as intended.

I am no longer giving GW any money for FW products. I'm now either 3D printing or buying secondhand.

MaxT wrote:
When was the last time there was a FW price increase?

As far as I know, when they swapped to regional pricing 1-2 years ago and half the range skyrocketed in price overnight. Prior to that it was exclusively in pounds and didn't involve the standard GW arbitrary as hell exchange rate.

 catbarf wrote:

 Undead_Love-Machine wrote:
I’m making myself look bad by saying that, in general, recasts are not better quality than the original Forge World model?

From my experience, maybe not better, but on par, definitely.

Maybe this is the wording we're all looking for.

Recasts are usually the kind of quality that you'd expect from EVERY shipment Forge World sends out.