Is NewGW returning to old ways?

[warhammergrimace 13766xp 2]

There have been complaints regarding the new Kill Team expansion, one of which is the lack of value in the box. Another one is the book contain all the data sheets for Marines and Necrons, which includes new data sheets and all the others have been updated. The complaint about this is there are currently no plans to sell this book separately, so if you want all the new and updated data sheets, then you’ll need to buy the expansion box.

I think as a company they go through periods of annoying their customer base, then pulling back and being nice then a few years later they do it again.

It could also be a problem they’ve created for themselves by releasing so much new stuff every month, that they’re having trouble keeping up with themselves.

Or it could just be that they’re being Aholes again…..

[limburger 21775xp 2]

@phaidknott you are underestimating the convenience factor here …

Yes … total cost may be more than buying a 3D printer + resin

However I can have this terrain tomorrow just by clicking and paying with my credit card.

3D printing is very userfriendly and cheap compared to a few years ago, but it still is far too technical for a person that just wants a few bits of nice looking terrain with minimal effort.
Heck, you don’t even have to paint the terrain.

The real threat for GW are the terrain kits from Archon Studios (the Rampart terrain used to create the 40k studio table).
Those target the same audience as opposed to the 3D printer fans.

[torros 23820xp 2]

From what I’ve read the new expansion has 12 models some terrain and a rulebook with all the data sheets for marines and necrons. People are complaining as they don’t seem to be going to release the rulebook separately.  So if your an existing player and you wanted all the updated data sheets you have to buy the box set

[warhammergrimace 13766xp 2]

@torros yeah, that’s correct apparently

[phaidknott 7027xp 0]

Thats nice of them 🙁

Does the “Marketing Dept” at GW actually speak to the designers, and/or ppl who actually know about the game (or even “gasp” the players to see what THEY want (rather than GW deciding what YOU want)) when it comes to launching new products?

Mind you the one GW game I have (Necromunda) has had me rebuying rulebook after rulebook to get the rules (when an errata would have done) and card pack after card pack (as the rules there weren’t printed in the rulebooks). So GW have absolutely NO IDEA how to package up their games/rules in a user friendly (or even just allowing for common sense) format 🙁

[rastamannParticipant 2735xp 2]

Hi guys, sorry for not replying sooner, but real life(tm) is kicking my ass right now with the work load!

I’m also a grumpy old dude and so I’ve never been in any doubt as to why it is GW is in business. That’s fine, we live in a capitalist world and this is the way of things.  I also don’t particularly object to the pricing structure – usually, if I feel something isn’t worth the asking price (even emotionally speaking – I would, and have, probably pay more for some old Epic models than they’re really worth), I simply don’t buy it.

That’s really not the issue I’m having – what I mostly object to, and this is something I’m quite sure is objectionable and actionable both in Portugal and abroad, is false advertising, and causing people to buy based on such advertising, and then stealthily changing of said false advertising. False advertising by mistake is not really fine, but it is forgivable; but the stealth change shows a deplorable behaviour, and this is really what had me raging.

Of course, the concept of repackaging stuff with less content for a substantial mark-up in price is also annoying, but it wouldn’t be so much of an issue if it were properly advertised.

@limbutger I still love the IP and do own an Elegoo Mars 3d printer, and there’s a veritable wealth of files out there that can rival anything GW does, but I tend to use it for outliers, OOP stuff, such as epic, etc. I buy the models and terrain I do from GW because I like them and like the concepts and the way it easily fits in with other parts of the range, and don’t see it that they’re pricing themselves out – to be fair, @phaidknott, I remember reading that since at least the early 2000’s, and what we’ve seen with this CEO is profit rising and rising. GW stock went up by over 1000% since he took over, and that trend isn’t showing signs of slowing down.

Sure, 3d printers are getting more and more affordable but aren’t all that user friendly for the ordinary hobbyists ang gamers, that prefer to not have the hassle of getting settings right, dealing with resin and residue, cleaning up supports, etc. I don’t doubt eventually we’ll get there, but we’re not there yet.

@sundancer I understand why they don’t have comments activated on the YT channel and only to subscribers on the twitch channel – the warhammer fans, for some reason (even if only a small minority) are absolutely toxic and I remember the first warhammer preview last year being filled with nonsense, offensive and downright moronic posts as the comments flew by. They had deactivated them to non-subscribers by the second preview, IIRC

Finally, while I understand there are alternatives to GW games, and I do play them, there are some of their games I do enjoy.

I can’t bring myself to enjoy Warhammer 40k since they went to 3rd edition (I know, a long time ago), and I have tried every single edition to see if that changes. I do love the setting and the models, though, so I keep trying out other stuff. I do like the Kill Team rules very much, which are superior to 40k in that they’re more interative and stepped away from the IGOUGO, and have used other sets with 40k models, including the OnePageRules. In my case I think they lost quite a bit when they tried assuming it as a mass battle game, for which the scale isn’t suited to, and I think looks ridiculously bad in a table when I have vehicle car parks or titans at 28mm, within spitting distance of each other, but that is grumpy old me speaking, and hence I usually play Epic Armageddon 🙂

[rastamannParticipant 2735xp 0]

@phaidknott – I feel your necromunda pain, but in that case, I think the completist in me loves the layout of the books and the ambiance (though I think the page background should be lighter) so much, that I’ve bought everything plastic they’ve put out. None of the FW stuff, though, as the pricing to EUR zone is obscene.

[limburger 21775xp 2]

@phaidknott I bet they speak to the designers to ensure all content is spread across as many SKU’s as possible.
I mean … imagine being able to buy all the rules at once ?
I bet they’ve seen the DLC/Microtransaction mania that has infected the videogame industry and they are trying to replicate that.

Sort of ‘Pokemon Rule system’ : got to collect them all …

I suspect that this is why WarCry was such a success compared to Necromunda/Killteam.
Everything needed to play the game in the box and only a few extra faction boxes needed to expand the scope of the game.
Killteam feels more like : f*ck people might like the smaller games … best make sure it gets as expensive and complicated as possible. oh … and make sure stock is limited so we can sneak in more cost increases.

@rastamann I doubt you can catch them on ‘false advertising’ unless disclaimers like ‘content may not match the images shown’ type of things are illegal in Portugal. I’d also argue that ‘buyer beware’ ought to apply to anything pre-ordered with minimal information. I’d rather not pre-order at all unless I was 99% certain all the content shown would be available.
Given that the initial information for these terrain kits was very limited (my favourite webshop only had the box covers and very little else) I’m glad that I didn’t pull the trigger and saw this topic first.

If we as a community keep each other informed by providing as much facts about new releases/preorders as possible then the impact of the kind of stunts that GW may have attempted to pull can be minimized.

If you need to be careful with your hobby budget spendings I’d suggest being as patient as humanly possible before preordering anything. There are enough of us with less budget limitations that are willing to pay the price for their lack of patience … 😀

[rastamannParticipant 2735xp 1]

@limburger indeed, but they make no claims that contents may not match the images shown on their community website, and and a pattern can be established that it is not their practice, but rather that they’se so far presented exactly what is coming in the boxes with the previews. In either case, if enough complaints were to be received, they’d have to be more careful in the future.

But I agree that we need to keep each other informed :). In this case, I think my usual lack of patience was compounded by FOMO and hence I triggered the preorder right when it went up. I’ll be sure to be more careful and perhaps post in the discord whenever something new goes up 🙂

And yes, I think they’ve ramped up the DLC style stuff in the last years, Necromunda was probably the most blatant case of that. Still, in that case I don’t mind as much, as I like its overall look and feel 🙂

 

[horus500 11505xp 0]

GW is a financial success, the biggest in our hobby world. Because they are a public company they want, they NEED to make profits. The sad thing is that it’s so obviously tempered, driven by greed that we all end up feeling abused.

I bet that they could milk even more from their customers if they didn’t constantly squeeze them. They haven’t realised that if they charged 75% of what they are, that the customer base would grow and customers would buy twice as much (the profit margin for GW is around 40% for those wondering).

The endless books, the lack of support for existing product, the constant releases and cult of the ‘shiny’, feeding FOMO, bullying competitors, abusing independant stockists, international price fixing, and the list goes on. The truth is they were always the Evil Empire, they just learned to smile while they were raping your wallet.

[rastamannParticipant 2735xp 0]

I’m not convinced they haven’t realised it and I’m pretty sure they have made their studies about the pricing structure and the fact is they view themselves as a company that sells premium products, much like Apple does in its own segment

I think, however, they have made great progress in respect to giving us more of what we want instead of what they want us to want, and that is one of the reasons they’ve been soaring, profit and share price wise.

Of course, the motives will always be the same: make more money – that is why they’re a publicly  traded company. Though for some reason I have lots of difficulty buying their shares here.

[limburger 21775xp 0]

@rastamann don’t blame yourself … I hadn’t thought of comparing their terrain kits to any of their previous offerings despite the fact that they looked like re-packaged versions of the same old terrain kits they had done before.
I guess the ‘killteam’ branding had an effect …

@horus500 I’m not convinced that they could milk more out of their fan base by dropping prices.
In fact I’d argue that they probably could squeeze even harder if they wanted to.

They have even managed to sell the concept of ‘made to order’ boxes for some of their releases as them being nice to their customers …
However I don’t have any facts to back this up, but I doubt GW has suffered at all.

I also doubt that even the shenanigans with these killteam terrain kits have been noticed at all.

[onlyonepinman 18072xp 1]

I am reasonably certain that GW are not guilty of False Advertising, unless you can prove that the item listing and photographs on the page on which you actually purchased the item (so for example on the OTT store or GW webstore) changed AFTER you clicked order, then GW are not guilty of false advertising. They put some photographs up on a blog page that accompanied an announcement about an upcoming product. They later changed those photographs to match the contents of the box.

I can see how it’s annoying, I can see how it’s frustrating and I to an extent I even agree with you. But they are not definitely guilty of False Advertising.

[horus500 11505xp 0]

@onlyonepinman GW might not be guilty of false advertising, but they certainly are of misleading customers. GW has done that many products and when I was a FLGS owner it led to numerous arguments with both GW and customers. if you’re after examples there are literally hundreds of them. Space Hulk – limited release, never again, except when we reprint it again in a couple of years. Buy Specialist games now because when they are gone they are gone…..until we revive the line like Middle Earth. Old World has exploded and will never live again….unless … etc

@limburger I had a discussion with a GW exec years ago around the fail-cast time where I put it to them and was basically told they had never tested the market beyond it’s tolerance to pay. His exact words were “We’d rather have 1 guaranteed $100 per week customer, than 2 theoretical $75 a week customers”. That theory almost came off the rails just a few years ago when they lost about 10% of their customer base (just after AoS launched in 2015). They have since clawed it back and have gone back to the previous model. Whilst they continue to satisfy sales requirements and shareholders and customers keep buying they don’t care what marketing says.

Like I said elsewhere, all they learned for 2015 is to smile whilst they gouge you.

 

[hobbyhubParticipant 4169xp 0]

@horus500 – I think GW have learnt one marketing trick.  They use their customers’ painting expertise to promote GW products.

When someone uses one of GW’s hashtags in a social media post, that person is promoting GW.  They also seem to be giving GW the rights to use the pictures posted as part of the GW webstore content for the pictured unit.  In return, the customer gets an ego boost for GW using their picture and the possibility of a prize, being free product…. Possibly another unit that they will paint up, post a picture of on social media, using a GW hashtag….

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