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The price argument doesn’t hold up. Back in 2005ish, 20 imperial guard cost $35. Today, Wargames Atlantic sell 20-30 not-Imperial Guard for $35. They also sell 30+ historical minis ready for IG duty or fantasy at $35. Clearly decent prices are still viable, even for companies working on a smaller scale.


And yeah, I haven’t bought GW in years. But my decades of investment are paying off in hitching rights.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Stux wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Welcome to the world of plastic to everything.

Right? We're in a time at the moment where various factors (some global, some specific to the UK) are causing costs to soar across the board. Getting pretty grimdark out there.

When a Drop Pod is priced at $50 against two Warlocks costing $55, it's not the price of the @#*&ing plastic.

How much do you think plastic was going for the last time they did a run of Drop Pods? Can we blow the dust off the box and see?

Drop Pod plastic is cheaper than Warlock plastic, you see.

C'mon! Everyone knows that.

 Stux wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Stux wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Welcome to the world of plastic to everything.

Right? We're in a time at the moment where various factors (some global, some specific to the UK) are causing costs to soar across the board. Getting pretty grimdark out there.

When a Drop Pod is priced at $50 against two Warlocks costing $55, it's not the price of the @#*&ing plastic.

Its not literally just the plastic...

Everything is getting more expensive. And when has the amount of plastic dictated the price anyway?

The price hasn't been tied to much of anything. It's just dollars for dollars sake because they can.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Breton wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Stux wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Welcome to the world of plastic to everything.

Right? We're in a time at the moment where various factors (some global, some specific to the UK) are causing costs to soar across the board. Getting pretty grimdark out there.

When a Drop Pod is priced at $50 against two Warlocks costing $55, it's not the price of the @#*&ing plastic.

How much do you think plastic was going for the last time they did a run of Drop Pods? Can we blow the dust off the box and see?

Better question: How much do you think plastic goes for?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Drop Pod plastic is cheaper than Warlock plastic, you see.

C'mon! Everyone knows that.

Did you think you'd look better pretending to be obtuse enough to not understand a petroleum product like plastic might be cheaper a few years ago vs today and the $7.00 a gallon California gas? The cost of plastic in a Drop Pod is pretty well set. I'd guess they've made about as many as they're going to of that mold, and the only thing that can increase their costs on a Drop Pod now is having to store it for another two years in a warehouse somewhere. Given polystyrene prices and history, and the fact that they're not melting down unsold drop pods to make Warlocks, I'm guessing the real cost is likely in the labor. Do you think GW is more likely to have recouped costs of the market saturated drop pod from a decade ago, or the Warlocks box that hit the shelves a week ago? But at least instead of having an honest discussion we had someone launch into a "Hurr Hurr! I'm going to pretend that wasn't a point about year over year inflation and depreciation.".

I'm ridiculing the notion that the cost of materials rising means that only the new things go up, whereas existing ones don't*.

If the cost of production going up necessitates the increase of product prices, then why is it only the new ones that seem to go up?

Moreover, 6 months ago this wasn't the issue and GW were still raising the price. A year ago this wasn't and issue and they were still raising the prices. 2 years ago this was't the issue and, yet, GW still kept putting prices up.

The Warlocks vs Drop Pods comparison is a frightingly stark comparison at how absurd it has become, and the idea that it's because petroleum costs are high because of inflation in the US or Russia being a big pack'a witches is LAUGHABLE. Yet you accuse me of being dishonest, and want to blame the price of Warlocks on current events?

And that's before we even get into GW's margins, which we well know are absurdly good.


*Yes, I am aware of the recent price announcement, but again, why are the proportional prices so vastly difference (ie. Drop Pod vs Warlocks).

 Insectum7 wrote:


How much do you think plastic was going for the last time they did a run of Drop Pods? Can we blow the dust off the box and see?

Better question: How much do you think plastic goes for?

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Stux wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Welcome to the world of plastic to everything.

Right? We're in a time at the moment where various factors (some global, some specific to the UK) are causing costs to soar across the board. Getting pretty grimdark out there.

When a Drop Pod is priced at $50 against two Warlocks costing $55, it's not the price of the @#*&ing plastic.

You realize right it's not the material price alone?

Hint: Small quantities of plastic castings will be lot more expensive for GW to produce than huge number. DUCY? It's actually pretty basic. Even elementary school kid can understand this if explained so you should be able to figure it out on yourself(I'm presuming you are at least teenage ager) even.

That's why models that are sold in small quantities(characters in particular) should never have been plastic. You don't sell 10 boxes of Guillimann to even guy that collects 10k Ultramarine army do you?

If you think only thing that matters in model cost is the material cost...Well lol what a noob

Isn't this argument kind of stupid. If you're blaming the price increase on Russia (?) then why did GW only start producing Warlocks last week and not months in advance of their release?

 Sim-Life wrote:
Isn't this argument kind of stupid. If you're blaming the price increase on Russia (?) then why did GW only start producing Warlocks last week and not months in advance of their release?

Yes, it is, that's kind of why they're doing it.

The Cost of Labor and Materials is much higher today than a decade ago when the Drop Pod kit was created.

Ha ha you blamed Russia?

tneva82 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Stux wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Welcome to the world of plastic to everything.

Right? We're in a time at the moment where various factors (some global, some specific to the UK) are causing costs to soar across the board. Getting pretty grimdark out there.

When a Drop Pod is priced at $50 against two Warlocks costing $55, it's not the price of the @#*&ing plastic.

You realize right it's not the material price alone?

Yes. Duh. Why'd your post focus on plastic then?

But even bringing the other factors into it, GWs prices still don't make sense. Because other companies can make and ship products around the globe, and for much cheaper.

Now I'm willing to recognize the fact that if GW is making everything in Britain that could incur higher costs. And I as a consumer am totally willing to pay a price toavoid a "Made in China" label. But I'm still not going to believe that GWs prices are sensible. $50 codex. $32 hobby knife, and $55 for two minor characters remains preposterous.

I just love to see the GW protectors jump in to protect " Muh Queen " GW as if it's crying in the corner because all the bully boys are bashing its outlandish prices.

GW isn't a sports car, and they would raise the prices on any day ending in Y and it has nothing to do with materials, costs, anything its they want moar profits while giving us a loving spoonful of sob story. That's it.

The actual manufacturing costs of these kits is *negligible* once they get the production line going.
I've spoken to some people "in the know" at Warlord games - and producing the box art is the greatest single element of releasing a new kit.
Granted, those were for relatively simple aircraft models but still.

GW's prices pay for their retail staff, their design staff, their brick&mortar properties, etc etc.
They could stick 300 minis in the box and I suspect the biggest increase in cost to GW would be shipping costs given the increased volume of an individual box.

Glad to see that along with calls for better bolters, the price gouging still gets complained about. This is the GW I know and love to hate passionately while still supporting.

If the price hike is a problem for you vote with your hobby dollars and don't buy. GW are massive at this point and need to sustain their profits. There is a concept in economics called price elasticity of demand for which they will have already accounted for. They know there will be drop off in consumers but the ones that remain paying higher prices for less product will produce more money for them and cost savings in reduction of distribution and warehousing. It rarely hurts a company of this size but will likely hurt all the smaller reseller stores more.

 Nithaniel wrote:
If the price hike is a problem for you vote with your hobby dollars and don't buy. GW are massive at this point and need to sustain their profits. There is a concept in economics called price elasticity of demand for which they will have already accounted for. They know there will be drop off in consumers but the ones that remain paying higher prices for less product will produce more money for them and cost savings in reduction of distribution and warehousing. It rarely hurts a company of this size but will likely hurt all the smaller reseller stores more.

What like the great wobble of 2012(ish) ? That kind of thinking earned GW quite the slap with other games hacking chunks out of "their" money, it wasn't fatal but was quite the wake up call, seem we are close to that happening again

No, difference to 2012 is that Wahapedia and 3D printing exists
so 40k and AoS will continue to be the games being played, so no chance that others games reach the critical threshold

hence GW will still get the money from all those coming fresh into the hobby because they start with the games that are already played
(and this is all GW wants)

so as long as people play 40k, they support GW in making money

Breton wrote:
The Cost of Labor and Materials is much higher today than a decade ago when the Drop Pod kit was created.

Cost of plastic is utterly negligible as a factor in an injection-molded kit, GW's price rises have been well in excess of inflation, and labor costs (ie wages) haven't kept up with inflation to begin with.

Other manufacturers who also make all their merchandise in the US/UK under US/UK labor costs and using the same plastic are somehow able to deliver products for lower cost.

This is grasping at straws. Prices on kits have never been direct representations of cost to manufacture and distribution, the same way a movie DVD's pricing has very little to do with how much the raw materials to print a DVD cost or how much labor is required. They're set to amortize up-front costs of mold-making and long-term operational costs of running the business, plus a healthy dose of 'how much more can we charge and have people still buy', ie profit.

Honestly I am in the I wish GW prices were lower, but its not really affecting me or my group too much camp.

Compared to other hobbies its still not super pricey even if it is just little plastic soldiers. As a gamer and current AAA titles running $60 give about 20-40 hours of entertainment usually for main story mode games, if you bang out ever achievement closer to 80ish hours.

A 10 man intersessor kit runs $60 retail (street price is $51 on amazon and $48 at a lot of other etailers, but wimpler to look at it this way). Building an painting to a nice standard that will be probably 10 hours building, priming and painting them for entertainment. Those 10 intersessors are 1/10 of a 2000 point list so really it depends on how many games you play for them to break even with a AAA video game title. personally for me it is 1-3 games per week likely 2-4 hours a game. so call it 6 hours of play a week. so for me these intersessors need another 50 hour of entertainment to value my AAA game. they are 1/10 a list, so with my 2 games a week 3 hours each average they reach .6 hour of the video game a week for one squad. So to me in 83 weeks the Intercessor squad if i played monofaction space marines every week break even with my entertainment dollar for the AAA title.

Not bad but not great. I think GW would attract more people to the hobby by dropping prices but for my personal spending they have not curbed the buying one box (be it a starter set, box set or individual model) per month for the past 2 decades

comparing hobbies,
needing 2000€ worth of basic hardware and paying 60€ for games, is cheap combared to being a glider pilot
but than, looking at the cost of running your own submarine, it is still cheap

but usually you don't compare different hobbies to make one looking cheaper than the other
compare within the hobby to see if the price is ok or not

if my hobby is being a glider pilot, I don't look at submarines to check if the fees for the airport are overpriced or not
I compare it with other airports

or better said, you know that a company has unreasonable prices if you cannot compare it to other companines within the same "hobby" but need to look at a different hobby to say that those are not that bad

 kodos wrote:
comparing hobbies,
needing 2000€ worth of basic hardware and paying 60€ for games, is cheap combared to being a glider pilot
but than, looking at the cost of running your own submarine, it is still cheap

but usually you don't compare different hobbies to make one looking cheaper than the other
compare within the hobby to see if the price is ok or not

if my hobby is being a glider pilot, I don't look at submarines to check if the fees for the airport are overpriced or not
I compare it with other airports

or better said, you know that a company has unreasonable prices if you cannot compare it to other companines within the same "hobby" but need to look at a different hobby to say that those are not that bad

i would agree if I were comparing a hobby i do not partake in, but I also do regularly play video games so to me it tracks (for my own spending, ymmv). Both cost a lot more than one of my other hobbies Gardening where i probably save money on food by growing it from cheap seeds and seeds from last year's crops. I mostly use free containers and beds from cheap or reclaimed wood. I mix my own soil from free compost (local municipality provides it free, i pay gas to go get it but its not far from my house). So compared to that hobby i guess you could say 40k is infinitely more expensive.

you have several hobbies, one of them being cheaper than the other, still not see the point of comparing different hobbies to show if a manufacturer of hobby supply sells overpriced stuff

so if you buy AAA game for your other hobby, there are 2 similar games, one for 60€ and the other for 120€, you buy the more expensive one and because the new 40k Box costs 200€ the game cannot be overpriced because 40k is still more expensive

The fairest comparison is to other, similar games, such as Mantic’s Warpath or Marlstrom’s Edge or Infinity or something like that. Warmachine is as pricey as GW, but Warmachine is dead and everyone knows it.

 kodos wrote:
you have several hobbies, one of them being cheaper than the other, still not see the point of comparing different hobbies to show if a manufacturer of hobby supply sells overpriced stuff

so if you buy AAA game for your other hobby, there are 2 similar games, one for 60€ and the other for 120€, you buy the more expensive one and because the new 40k Box costs 200€ the game cannot be overpriced because 40k is still more expensive

I guess then use your own justification to spend your own money? all I ever said is that is how i feel about it personally, that you don't find value in my own personal reasoning doesn't affect how i still feel about money spent on the hobby, but no hard feelings either way. Your feelings and justification is just as valid for your own pocketbook

I absolutely would agree that GW prices are much higher than they should be for the amount of plastic and rules which we also pay for seperatly (and are of dubious quality on release). It just not past the point where I feel it matters to me. (again personally you and many others can certainly disagree and spend your hard earned money otherwise)

On other systems and models, I got into warmachine/hordes, infinity, bolt action, and malifaux but the problem there is getting a community to play with. I can always find a 40k game in town, finding opponents for another game system outside a few close friends was difficult.

With 3d printing i actually hope we get more people in because of the barrier to entry being lower. I have several 3d printers both FDM and resin. i print some custom bits and even whole armies and terrain sets but still buy 1 box per month to support the FLGS and like having legit GW models as well in my collections. Heck i even am a Imperium magazine subscriber as I want to see all the scenarios and lore bits in the magazines themselves moreso than the minis.

Pseudo related to the 3d printing and minis for GW's continued survival as a company. I personally would love GW to have warhammer+ include access to all codexes and rules. With that make it a living ruleset that they regularly balance update through the app. Until then. even spending what i do on the hobby, I am not, and do not plan on getting warhammer+.

you can do with your money what ever you want, you don't need to justify it, specially not on the web

I like well made rulebooks, so I spend much more money on rules without ever playing the game
I just like to read them but I would never compare the price of a book to a PC game this just makes no sense at all
I compare them to other books to see of the price is reasonable enough to by it for the read and not to something completely different just both consume time


so the GW prices would need to be compared to other similar "hobbies"
being it boardgames, miniature games, wargames or display models

 G00fySmiley wrote:
but the problem there is getting a community to play with. I can always find a 40k game in town, finding opponents for another game system outside a few close friends was difficult.
With 3d printing i actually hope we get more people in because of the barrier to entry being lower.

and this is exactly my point in the post above, instead of doing other games, to get away from expensive GW, free rules and cheaper models are used to grow the playerbase of GW games so that it is getting harder and harder to find people for other games

but going with that, GW is overpriced and the models not worth the money, but their rules must be superior to everything else, as people look for replacement in models but not for different games

 kodos wrote:


but going with that, GW is overpriced and the models not worth the money, but their rules must be superior to everything else, as people look for replacement in models but not for different games

No.

the irony, I know

 kodos wrote:
you can do with your money what ever you want, you don't need to justify it, specially not on the web

I like well made rulebooks, so I spend much more money on rules without ever playing the game
I just like to read them but I would never compare the price of a book to a PC game this just makes no sense at all
I compare them to other books to see of the price is reasonable enough to by it for the read and not to something completely different just both consume time


so the GW prices would need to be compared to other similar "hobbies"
being it boardgames, miniature games, wargames or display models

 G00fySmiley wrote:
but the problem there is getting a community to play with. I can always find a 40k game in town, finding opponents for another game system outside a few close friends was difficult.
With 3d printing i actually hope we get more people in because of the barrier to entry being lower.

and this is exactly my point in the post above, instead of doing other games, to get away from expensive GW, free rules and cheaper models are used to grow the playerbase of GW games so that it is getting harder and harder to find people for other games

but going with that, GW is overpriced and the models not worth the money, but their rules must be superior to everything else, as people look for replacement in models but not for different games

I also have a pretty big board game collection, that's harder for me to compare as just like other games its sometimes hard to get a chance to play a game many times. one of my current newer fav games is unfathomable. it cost ~$60 but i have only gotten to play it 3 times so far. amazing game very in line with one of my other favorite board games battlestar galactica, but that too i probably only every got 10 or 15 games in for a similar price (still regard both as well worth the price though). I will say if a person said hey there are 4 or us want to play 40k or unfathomable i would probably go for the board game.

I do agree though on price there I think GW would find a lot more sales and ultimatly make more money if they were more approachable. When i started playing you had shortly after that the assault on black reach box set for if i recall right $70 and get 2 small armies to start. at the timee i want to say a tac marines squad was $20ish and boyz box $15 we had new players jumping in all the time. now people express interest when they see us play then look at the prices and say they will think abotu it instead of buying a box.

Eh, honestly doesn't affect me much - my hobby budget is relatively fixed based on other expenses. I'm an awfully slow painter, and never buy things until I'm fully painted in what I already have. So the change will mean I'll possibly buy fewer things - or stick more to bundles and such instead, but the overall effect on me personally will be about nothing. Not a meta chaser or anything, rarely buy the latest shiny thing, just get what I think looks good and fits into my army.

There's probably a future point where I may have to stop and reevaluate if I can afford to continue buying stuff to paint, but this isn't it.

Buying GW stuff is a completely voluntary thing, its not like anyone needs it to survive. If you can't afford it, find alternatives or stop. Take up chess, similar but way cheaper!

One can stop buying GW (years ago) and still complain about their price hikes and other business practices that have a negative effect on the non-GW rest of the hobby.