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http://privateerpress.com/community/privateer-insider/insider-10-20-2017

Seems like many future resin colossals/gargantuans and models on a 120mm base will be direct only.

Sining wrote:
http://privateerpress.com/community/privateer-insider/insider-10-20-2017

Seems like any future colossals/gargantuans or anything on a 120mm base will be direct only.

The ones I have are of varied quality and definitely not worth their MSRP.

Good luck selling them with no discount.

We GW now.

Yup, any slight chance to get back into it is shattered… I mean if the quality was there I would consider it but paying high premium prices for subpar casts is not my idea of good value.The bigger in price and size these models are the more I expect superior quality.

I’ve never had an issue with the quality, but it means I have to pay customs and handling on them which means I’m paying a lot more than American customers even with shipping being free.

 ImAGeek wrote:
I’ve never had an issue with the quality, but it means I have to pay customs and handling on them which means I’m paying a lot more than American customers even with shipping being free.

That was my first thought as well. Unless they open a European distrobution center they're going to get bugger all sales outside of America. When I ordered my Extreme models back when they were direct only I had to pay like an extra €25 on top of the cost of the models and shipping (which was also very high).

Given how 3rd edition seems to have gone down fairly badly it may be that stores just aren't ordering enough of the really big stuff to make it worth their while to keep them in distribution

but it's certainly going to go a long way to killing non-US sales, full retail prices and customs for a lot of places for units that are generally underpowered anyway

This seems like a huge step back... making your biggest, supposedly most desireable centerpiece models direct only? And with no European distribution? Seems like it could kill the game in Europe unless they act quickly.

I feel like they want to say "we're starting our own forgeworld" but didn't want to be so open about it.

Ugh. Their webstore is utter garbage. Scroll down, and the top 1/3 of the page 'drops down' to block whatever you were looking at. Black background. Busy backgrounds on all images of miniatures on the main pages. Barely zoom-able photos from maybe 2 angles on $150 miniatures, or just the box art.

PP, if you're reading this, your webstore does NOT make me want to buy stuff.

Its definitely a weird move (and I don't really get why it would need its own 'label,' as its PP models for PP games sold by PP). Unless its purely a business paperwork thing where they can just jettison it with few consequences if it fails.

It also sounds like (with the 'we like big models') they didn't make the game they wanted to make originally. That Colossals/Gargantuans was what they wanted to be the focus in the first place, but didn't have the capabilities to make them at the start.

But it's also weird, because rules-wise, the big stuff has largely been trash tier, in a game VERY focused on rating units and only using the best.


Also, the dracodile as suddenly a biped is a tribute to their weird aesthetic. The original monster entry and pics are a quadruped.

 John Prins wrote:

PP, if you're reading this, your webstore does NOT make me want to buy stuff.

My biggest turn off is the absurd shipping charges. Even in the US they want multiple dollars for individual cards, let alone models.

To be fair free international postage is pretty good.

Voss wrote:
Its definitely a weird move (and I don't really get why it would need its own 'label,' as its PP models for PP games sold by PP). Unless its purely a business paperwork thing where they can just jettison it with few consequences if it fails.

It also sounds like (with the 'we like big models') they didn't make the game they wanted to make originally. That Colossals/Gargantuans was what they wanted to be the focus in the first place, but didn't have the capabilities to make them at the start.

But it's also weird, because rules-wise, the big stuff has largely been trash tier, in a game VERY focused on rating units and only using the best.


Also, the dracodile as suddenly a biped is a tribute to their weird aesthetic. The original monster entry and pics are a quadruped.

 John Prins wrote:

PP, if you're reading this, your webstore does NOT make me want to buy stuff.

My biggest turn off is the absurd shipping charges. Even in the US they want multiple dollars for individual cards, let alone models.

It’s free delivery on these items, so that’s not an issue if you’re in the US. Outside the US though it does nothing to help with customs and handling which are the bigger issues when ordering from the US.

Wasn't PP involved in some shenanigans recently about refusing to sell product to retailers selling it too cheaply, purportedly as move to support physical stores.

How is this reconciled by selling a bunch of stuff direct-only? That's a bunch of stuff physical stores cannot stock.

 Zywus wrote:
Wasn't PP involved in some shenanigans recently about refusing to sell product to retailers selling it too cheaply, purportedly as move to support physical stores.

How is this reconciled by selling a bunch of stuff direct-only? That's a bunch of stuff physical stores cannot stock.

Yep. This is more of PP following the handbook titled 'Things GW Did Wrong in 12 Easy Steps'

 Polonius wrote:
I feel like they want to say "we're starting our own forgeworld" but didn't want to be so open about it.

Hope not, their casting quality is subpar. Signed up for their MiniCrate subscription and after the first miniature canceled it. Figure has noticeable mold lines and the next figure coming up looked like crap. Friends who are work for hires with assembling/painting miniatures charge a premium for PP miniatures because they are such poor quality and a pain to put together. They didn't do that even with Finecast to give you an idea of how bad it is.

I don't see this though as anything different that what GW has been doing with moving low selling SKUs to direct only. One of my FLGS owners has always complained about PP having horrible SKU bloat. While it sucks when you want to buy one and need to pay full price, I don't see this being anything malicious.

Guess I should get my Prime Axiom/Conflux now.

No. No, no, no, no...

This is not how it's done, PP. This is Kirby style.

 Cream Tea wrote:
No. No, no, no, no...

This is not how it's done, PP. This is Kirby style.

Are we sure he didn’t apply at PP when he left his position at GW. I know he’s on the board still, but nothing saying he can’t moonlight.

 Theophony wrote:

 Cream Tea wrote:
No. No, no, no, no...

This is not how it's done, PP. This is Kirby style.

Are we sure he didn’t apply at PP when he left his position at GW. I know he’s on the board still, but nothing saying he can’t moonlight.

GW pay him to work his magic at PP! Illuminati confirmed!

 Zywus wrote:
Wasn't PP involved in some shenanigans recently about refusing to sell product to retailers selling it too cheaply, purportedly as move to support physical stores.

How is this reconciled by selling a bunch of stuff direct-only? That's a bunch of stuff physical stores cannot stock.

Cannot stock or will not stock?

Looks PP's pricing policies encouraged retail stores to the point where they were willing to carry even the large PP models.

Oh, wait.

PP lost a ton of good will in the last two years, but it's possible that this isn't as disastrous as it looks at first blush. If they don't move all large model to this, and keep the current kits in retail, but instead use Black Anchor to produce lower volume, higher cost models, that could allow them to make more models that might not be economical to sell through distribution channels.

Resin casting is expensive, finicky, and has a high failure rate. Even for small shops, it can be tough to do so profitably while also selling though distribution (where the manufacturer sells for about 30% of retail).

I could be wrong, and this is just another attempt to maximize profits through forced scarcity, but it's not necessarily that.

Such a baffling series of business moves. Such an odd world we live in where GW keeps improving and PP seeks to emulate the worst of the post LotR Kirby era.

 Polonius wrote:
PP lost a ton of good will in the last two years, but it's possible that this isn't as disastrous as it looks at first blush. If they don't move all large model to this, and keep the current kits in retail, but instead use Black Anchor to produce lower volume, higher cost models, that could allow them to make more models that might not be economical to sell through distribution channels.

The problem is, the 'lower volume, higher cost models' are... exactly the same kind of stuff they've been doing. The dracodile is another gargantuan (the...6th? 7th?), and a big monster with the most demand over the years (ever since the Monsternomicon 1, the d20 version, people have been expecting this model), next up is some trollkin thing, probably a battle engine (and there are a good dozen of those bloody things and all mostly awful in terms of rules), and after that is another huge based warcaster/warlock, the 4th or 5th of those (and second for Cryx).

I mean, I get ForgeWorld. When it was created, they did speciality kits in a different material at a higher price point due to the costs and lower volume, stuff that people didn't expect to use in normal games, and moved on to even bigger stuff.
This is more of exactly the same stuff PP has been producing every couple months for the last several years, stuff that has been the focus of their strategy for almost an edition and a half. It's kinda weird not to sell it through normal channels. I'm wondering if it means that strategy hasn't worked out so well.

What on earth is PP doing nowadays?! I loved Mk.II, even with all it's problems, but shortly sold all my stuff off a little after Mk.III kicked off due to it being an absolute train wreck, and strange company policies. This just adds to the list of strange ideas they have had recently... I don't get it.

 Breotan wrote:
Guess I should get my Prime Axiom/Conflux now.

That’s HIPS so I think you’ll be okay there.

I left PP when they pulled their "no sale to stores that discount" crap for Europe and even before avoided their non-metal stuff. Their quality "plastic" that is the same or worse than SDE (dpwn to identical connection stubs on pieces, so likeöy same factory) and other boardgames stuff and worse than CMONs better mixtures of PVC but several times the price of a KS mini. Urgh. My Khador and Trollblood stuff could be a lot bigger had they really invested in HIPS early or stayed metal because there are many nice sculpts ruined by their sub-par casting.

And huge minis are not really my thing anyway for playing so making them even more expensive ro get for Europeans, nah, I'm good.

Oh, I just read the announcement, along with the quantities they're allowing for the initial Dracodile preorder, and this just seems to be a result of wanting to move to resin on big models (which they might only have the margin on to sell directly, in addition to the ability to only make x units a month).

Ideally, we'll get better quality as a result, and it will be more economical for them to do than having them injection molded at the quantity they expect to sell.

I've been critical of PP, and while this might reflect falling demand due to their other moves the past two years, I view this one as a win-win for the most part. Really depends on the quality of the resin, though!

That dracodile does look beautiful

Ultimately while stores might be willing to stock a huge base per faction, its just not practical to keep 5+ Different huge base kits per faction available in your store unless you're MiniMarket. I've bought probably 10 of the things locally, but only one was "off the shelf" and not a direct order. I assume that's not uncommon and if that's the case, distributors aren't going to buy the volume to make it profitable.

So ultimately, the choice is to limit the game to one or two huge bases per faction or do something like this. It's worth noting that the Dracodile price is a lot better than other resin gargantuan. I'll be curious what the real cost difference ends up being.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
Given how 3rd edition seems to have gone down fairly badly it may be that stores just aren't ordering enough of the really big stuff to make it worth their while to keep them in distribution

Wouldn't be surprised. I worked in a big store when 3rd edition launched.
When I started the job we had a really strong showing for PP, lots of stock and a well organised and enthusiastic player base.It was easily one of the most popular games and most sold product ranges.
3rd ed came out and it just stopped. No one bought event tickets, no one played, the guys organising games and demos off their own back lost all enthusiasm.
We also had huge problems with getting certain stock, but not big items, core boxes of basic things like troops or rulebooks. they'd just be out of stock at the supplier for months cus PP weren't sending any.
We ended up putting it on sale at something ridiculous not long after I left because the shelves were overflowing with stock no one wanted and we needed to make room for other stuff that was overtaking it.

It was a shame to see a very enthusiastic and happy player base just dry up, But it seemed like alot of them had alot of grievances with PP's recent decisions. (Such as the pathfinder fiasco