Overpriced GW

[twinstripeukParticipant 150xp 0]

I saw Red Harvest what I loved about was the little mining setup. In my head I went that is amazing I can use that in a ton of games why has nobody thought of doing that before. Frostgrave, StarGrave, Saga, D&D, AOS, 40K. How many times have we seen in classic fantasy films, books and Sci-Fi advetures around a mine as a central feature.

They have done it before…. they just didn’t charge £150 for the privilege (Mantic do a little one for around £20)

When you say you dont see value in any of the 40K and AOS starter. If you mean personally because your not interested in them okay. But if you cannot look beyond that and judge the quality of the models for the price you pay and see that is good value that is on you. They work out about 1.50 a model for that quality.

No, I mean as in ‘the boxes contain units you’ll never field, and also don’t even approach an acceptable points limit even if they did’. Even the ‘best value’ boxes contain around 60% of what you’d need for a full game even if you were to play all of it

You talk about firefight. But you seem to ignore the firefight set with the 2 vehicles which comes in at 152 pounds which is a lot closer to the 180 HH and a better way to compare it.

It’s actually £122.50, which still makes it £57.50 cheaper. You know what I could get for that? Some scenery. So for the same £180 I could have not one, but two 1000 point armies(with heavy and support options, unlike the HH box), vehicles for both sides, scenery and all the rulebooks I need

I keep seeing the subject of ‘quality’ being brought up and it’s really beginning to grate on me, because in the end it’s just believing the same stuff that the fashion industry has lived with for years.

This piece of cheap cotton or polyester produced in a sweatshop is better than that piece of cheap cotton or polyester produced in a sweatshop because it has a different logo on the packaging. And why do people believe that? Because somebody told them to believe it, and they really don’t want to look beyond that.

And that saddens me deeply…

[onlyonepinman 18063xp 0]

@limburger I totally disagree because as has already been pointed out, Mantic, Wargames Atlantic and Northstar all charge significantly less for products that can be considered like-for-like to a Games Workshop product.  So to suggest “that’s not how it works” is untrue.  If a business can charge less than a competitor and still turn a profit, they will do so if the increase in sales would ultimately offset the lower profit margin per unit.  So if anyone is looking at other games companies and saying that those prices are driven by Games Workshop, they’re kidding themselves – they’re not.  Those prices are driven by what the business needs to charge, per unit, in order to make a return on investment to keep the business profitable.  Whilst we may not like it, even Games Workshop are driven by that model, only they have the added consideration of shareholder profits and stock market opinions to contend with.  If a company can charge less and still make profit then they can and will do so, especially if that means growing market share.  And that’s something GW don’t currently need to worry about – market share.

I’m not necessarily going to argue whether  Games Workshop is too expensive to either play or get started in – terms like “isn’t that expensive” is entirely relative to ones own circumstances.  But whilst some things might seem comparatively cheap with Games Workshop, what you get as a percentage of you need is generally much, much lower and thus the over all cost to get into the hobby is higher because to move past the starter boxes requires more expenditure.  So the starter boxes for other games (Deadzone, Firefight, Infinity) could still be argued to be better value, by some measures (and I stress the word some, because as I keep telling people, value is subjective), by having significantly lower additional/ongoing costs.

Are there cheaper ways to enjoy Games Workshop?  Yes. Kill Team is fairly cheap, Necromunda can be cheap if you don’t feel the need to buy everything – you don’t really need much more than than the starter box.  But most people want to experience Games Workshop’s worlds on a grander scale via 40k or Age of Sigmar and there’s simply no question in my mind that those two games are simply more expensive, as hobbies in their own right, than the competition.

[onlyonepinman 18063xp 0]

@redscope I do see what you are saying and, for what it’s worth, I actually think within the context of Games Workshop products £180 for the HH box is actually good value.  I think you get a lot of stuff, you get two decent sized armies, all the rules and of course you get a tank and a dreadnought. It’s also worth noting that you are not obliged to paint those miniatures as two opposing forces if you don’t want because as far as I can see there’s no chapter specific markings on anything.  You can make one big army out of the box if you like so it also has some flexibility with it as well.  So I think on balance that is a good starter box.  The price is a little daunting and perhaps makes it a little inaccessible but it’s otherwise a good box – I earn a decent income but I would think twice about dropping nearly £200 on a box of Miniatures.  Not saying I wouldn’t, only that it would need some serious consideration.  But like I said, I do think it’s a good box and certainly WAY better than the current crop of 40k starters

How does it compare to Firefight?  Well, for the big £150 box, Firefight gives you 70 miniatures compared to 40 and two vehicles. Again we see two decent sized armies to play with however the two Armies are separate and distinct so you can’t just build one big army out of the starter box.  That said, each side is, I think, around 800 points, which is a significant chunk of the largest recommended game size of 1000-1500 points (above 1500 and  you need a bigger play area than the recommende 4′).

Both boxes are comparable in terms of content and they each have a bit of an advantage over the other in one area.  So which is better value?  I guess it depends on what your values are

@twinstripeuk The Firefight box is currently £125 on Mantic’s website, however that is basically listed as a reduction.  The full RRP is £150.  I think it’s more fair to compare the full price because there’s no guarantee how long it will be discounted for.  However the fact that Mantic HAVE discounted it at all is a point scored (IMO) on GW who basically never have sales or offer discounts (not in the traditional sense).

I don’t know why you are upset about the question of “quality” though, quality is objective – that’s how we have quality standards.  There are some aspects of the miniatures we choose to buy that are absolutely subjective.  I like how some models look, but not others, that’s subjective and is not a measure of quality.  But there are some objective measures that can be applied to products to measure and determine quality.  In terms of models, things like how complex is the structure and how easy is it to assemble?  How much cleanup work does the model need? How easy is the material to work with?  I am sure we could all add more to that list.  Whilst I believe, and nothing said her so far has convinced me otherwise, that Games Workshop games are the most expensive sub-hobbies within Wargaming, it is also objectively true to say their plastic Miniatures are the best plastic Miniatures on the market bar none.  I limit this statement to plastic because honestly I don’t rate their resin or metals as highly, they are comparable or worse to other manufacturers (their resin is particularly bad).  But their plastic Miniatures produce some amazingly complex and dynamic shapes and poses and generally hide the joins between the parts incredibly well. The plastic is very easy to work with, easy to clean and prep, the instructions are fairly simple.  The details on the plastic are good, especially as they have slowly increased their scale to help overcome some if the limitations of HIPS. You also quite often get options to make variants of the same model. Objectively, the plastic models are extremely high quality, even though I don’t personally like most of the sculpts I can still admit that.

[ced1106Participant 6224xp 1]

>  So if anyone is looking at other games companies and saying that those prices are driven by Games Workshop, they’re kidding themselves – they’re not.

I guess I’ll just add that when you buy GW, you’re not just buying miniatures, you’re buying the “culture / support” that goes along with it. You sorta mentioned it with branding, so I’ll expand on it. Mantic, Wargames Atlantic and Northstar, while they product miniatures, don’t have the tournament events, game stores, conventions, house magazine, game lore, etc. to the extent that GW has. If you’re just buying miniatures to paint, or to play only with your gaming group, then it shouldn’t be hard to find alternative miniatures at a lower price. But if you like all that “culture / support”, then there aren’t many alternatives to GW.

Magic the Gathering might be the closest similar business model. You can find a card game that’s less expensive, but you’re not going to find the Magic game nights, sealed deck tournaments, prerelease events, etc. etc. that Magic has. While CCG’s are now part of the hobby, many boardgamers refused to play it because of its price — Mr. Suitcase was a derogatory term for those players who spent hundreds of dollars on the game. Sure, per card they paid as much as a casual player, but the criticism, though not exactly the same as GW, was that it was an expensive game to play, relative to others (eg. most boardgames).

GW is one of those “lifestyle” hobbies. It’s beyond a game (so’s Magic with its trading and collecting). So, while per game a GW player spends more than a casual gamer, who may have hundreds of different games, the total dollar amount spent on his hobby may not be all that different. Of course, many miniature (and CCG, and comic book lines) try to be “lifestyle” hobbies, but I think each hobby niche can only have one or two, and GW (and Magic) is the “lifestyle” game of its niche.

[onlyonepinman 18063xp 0]

@ced1106 Wargames Atlantic and Northstar perhaps don’t have a tournament culture, I think Mantic does.  It’s not as large as GW but they do still have one and organised play events.  So there are still cheaper alternatives to GW even if you want tournament play.  I also don’t really think that those tournaments represent a particularly large cost to Games Workshop either, they’re generally run independently at someone else’s cost, the only cost to GW is if they choose to have a physical presence there.  I think you can definitely say it is a selling point of Games Workshop as a hobby preference (as is ease of finding opponents) but I don’t think it can be used as a justification of price.

And honestly I absolutely don’t begrudge anyone buying Games Workshop nor do I expect people to justify their enjoyment of Games Workshop products.  The conversation literally started as someone whining that Games Workshop are too expensive, my only motive here was to point out to those people that if you aren’t prepared to pay GW prices, there are alternatives out there.  I left the GW hobby a while ago now and I am now quite well acquainted with all the myriad of options that exist outside of the GW ecosphere, I’m just trying to show people that there are other ways, outside of GW for anyone who has had enough; I just want people to enjoy painting toy soldiers and play wargames with them rather than quitting because they feel priced out of the Market. So despite having pretty much left GW behind, I didn’t rage quit the GW hobby or burn hundred of Miniatures in protest.  I just found other games and Miniatures that are more to my tastes – I actually prefer things with a more realistic, clean sci-fi aesthetic than the Fantasy in Space Grimdark that is 40k.  But I still have loads of nostalgia for GW and some really happy memories, I certainly don’t hate them.  I have tried to stay away from being overly critical of GW because I don’t really care; it’s not my problem (saying they’re more expensive than their competition isn’t a criticism, although people seem to think it is). I don’t buy GW products and so their prices are really not my concern.

[limburger 21726xp 0]

@onlyonepinman no amount of ‘like for like’ is going to convince the average gamer to buy non GW products to play a GW game.

The culture and scene surrrounding those products simply won’t allow it, except for small groups of friends (at which point anything goes).

It’s like trying to convince an Apple fan that they should buy a Microsoft product because it is ‘cheaper’
Or like telling a Windows user that Linux can do anything Windows does at a fraction of the cost.

It never worked and it never will work, unless said user is frustrated enough to want to look at alternatives and can ignore the ‘sunk cost’. It’s why Linux is still used by geeks and the average consumer still doesn’t give a fuck that he’s sending all his private data to the book of faesces because he gets to be with the in-crowd.

If you are at a level of interest in games that you can accept the like for like comparions you are making then you are already a bit of a geek within the hobby.

Most people just don’t want to deal with the added ballast of finding alternatives, unless said alternative is at the same shop on the same shelve. And even then they simply may love the GW style enough to not worry about the cost.

I’d love to see a proper newbie react to Firefight vs 40k in a way that prevents the branding of those products from changing his opinion. A blind A/B test if you will… (I suspect they will prefer the Mantic rules, but may like the GW models more …)

 

[onlyonepinman 18063xp 0]

@limburger nobody is trying to convince the average GW buyer of anything, it’s not an attempt to somehow destroy the evil GeeDubz.  This is all aimed at the fed up and burnt out GW buyers; the ones who have had enough or can’t afford it anymore or whatever.  The average GW buyer can continue to buy GW products for all I care, enjoy what you enjoy.  But when you stop enjoying it, there’s other options

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