I remember being told Warhammer was too expensive when i was a kid and looking at catalogues of that era i'm wondering ''Was it expensive then?'' prices from the 2000 would cause everything to sellout overnight if they did that now. How were they able to do that back then with less sales, smaller international market and almost no brand recognition from ''mainstream'' but can't somehow do it now? They are too preocupied with becoming a media company perhaps and the costs of keeping that shitty WH+ service up and running.
@@KneeCapHill Back in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, I could save up pocket money to buy warhammer 40k models. A box of plastic space marines cost me $23. A box of 3 Rhinos cost the same. Metal dreadnoughts were $9 each for Space Marines, Orks, and Eldar, or an extra $6 if you wanted to upgrade the ork one to have two arms and two weapons. It’s not just inflation - GW has been increasing the size of their models, too, and using that to justify price increases even though they don’t add much in the way of cost. A metal Eldar Avatar that used to cost like $15 in the late ‘90s now costs $110 in plastic.
when I realised I could get a resin 3d printer for less than the cost of an army box or starter set that did it for me, had the printer delivered 2 days later & been happy ever since
I agreed that growing up in the low income class, I could never afford this hobby until I found a stable job in my early 20's after finishing school and a degree. Now I just play/paint proxy armies for fun as ever, and I just pay my friend a couple of bucks in resin, and he will print me proxies and many badass minis found on the interweb...now my children and family can enjoy the hobby without breaking our banks.
I worked in a number of independent hobby stores, and the sad truth is that the thing that was most heavily shop lifted, by FAR, was Warhammer minis. And the kids who took them were always the poorer ones. It was frankly very sad and uncomfortable to deal with. They were doing wrong by stealing, but also... they were gamer nerds, full of imagination and creativity and dreams, and they simply couldn't play with the richer kids. And this was the late 90s and 00s, so there were by far fewer alternatives if you wanted to play fantasy or sc-fi miniatures games.
Same, I just order resin minis from people around who are taking printing orders, goes WAAAAAAAAY cheaper than any GW or WIzards of the coast or any other "official" minis.
The reality is, GW has been acting like they need to milk customers are wildly as possible for years. I'm someone, like you, who has a massive collection that I've been working on for 25 years but if I look back at myself as a kid. Had GW been at modern prices, even adjusted for inflation, it would have been impossible for me to get into the hobby. How can that be a good long term business strategy? Old World pricing has been such a shocking revelation, at least for me. With other sets they can make arguments like "new kits require more cost to make and produce because they are more detailed larger kits yadda yadda yadda" but with old world its almost entirely kits that are 25-30 years old that GW had to do 0 work to remake other than maybe remaking some molds yet these are some of the most expensive kits relatively speaking that GW has ever put out. The Brettonia starter set is $310CAD. When I was young, in 2000, the 6th edition starter set for Warhammer fantasy was $110CAD. These two kits are compatible in size and contents. Both had about 100 minis, both had dice, templates, and a book. If you adjust that $110 for inflation, it comes out to be about $180 in 2024. This means that GW's prices have nearly DOUBLED relative to what they were in 2000. We see it over and over. Dark Vengeace was $107 in 2014. Dark Imperium was $160 in 2017. Indomitus was $199 in 2020. Leviathan was $250 in 2023. We see a consistent pattern over time of GW's prices going up faster than inflation across all product lines. Eventually this camel's back is going to break and when it does I fear our whole hobby is going down with it. Until then GW is going to milk us for every penny. One shocker that really is an eye opener is when you think about gross margin. When people think about crazy margin they think of companies like Apple who has a wildly healthy 30% gross margin. (aka profit). GW crushes that at a whopping 41% making them one of the highest margin companies in the world outside of a few absurd elite luxury brands.
I 100% agree with you. The number of new people getting into the hobby has been dwindling at least in my local area. What will likely happen, is that GW runs itself into the ground and it's stock price drops and then they get bought out by Hasbro or a larger company. Then that's where the real fun begins! LOL
With increased expenses in shipping, storage, manufacturing, materials, wages, employee benefits, marketing costs, distributors and not only for GW but for the distributors, games shops and all the parts inbetween (the marketing landscape is *much* more diverse and costly now than back in 2000, with multiple channels, sponsordeals, influencers, ads, social media ++++) I can guarantee you that GW sees very little of that price increase, we are talking maybe a few dollars pr set in profit after all expenses have been paid - the miniature production is only a small part of that cost, and the price hike we see now is the results of *every* part of the chain increasing prices over the last couple of years. Not defensivt GW here, but this is not unique for GW, but these price increases, especially for «small» marginal products like miniature games, will continue for a while until the world market in general slows down. During the late stages of the pandemic, because of shipping container shortages, the price of a container from china went from 1200 to 6000 usd - and that’s just the container price, add to that the actual shipping price increase as well - so what we are seeing now is a result of the crazyness from the last 4-5 years of shortages and increase in demand that drive prices of services and manufacturing through the roof, which of course will hit the smaller product niches that sell relatively small amounts of product much harder than manufacturers selling products in much larger quantities
Just to add. On top of the price increase the number of models in the sets have also steadily decreased. And the latest rumor I came across is the updating of the current combat patrol boxes as the respective codex get released. Obviously getting a little shrinkflation in the process…. 🤦🏻♂️
@@AndreSjobergGet real! 😂 GW are beyond greedy shits. They have piss poor management. Terrible website. Warhammer plus leaves a lot to be desired. (I still like warhammer +) I've been all in with GW since the late 90's and things are beyond stupid.
@@AndreSjoberg Gw has incredibly healthy margins, which suggests this isn't true. Their prices are rising twice as fast as most other companies and their gross margin is nearly 50% higher than even Apple. They are absolutely enjoying this profit.
Insane is the fact that the start collecting box which included the magmadroth was $80 and the magmadroth AT THE SAME TIME was ALSO $80. Their prices are so arbitrary and inconsistent that they can’t even keep track of how much they’re artificially jacking up prices on stuff that can be clearly compared!
Sending a Magmadroth to USA and sending a Start Collecting Fyreslayers (that included Magamadroth) would be minimally different. Similar size box just a little bit of weight difference. The actual production of the plastic is pennies (excluding R&D and tooling etc.) I am no way trying to justify this.
I mean how do you make a package deal without doing this? I'm not a fan of the pricing itself but this kind of "let's bundle a few of X together and sell it at a 'discount'" thing isn't new and isn't exclusive to GW
The starter boxes have always been cheaper, and this is standard pricing across all businesses and industries. You lower the price of the commonly sold items, raise the price of the slow-moving ones. Also starting boxes are meant to... get you started? Like an entry? Imagine if the starter box was $1000 and the dragon was $10.
If I recall, I checked the product description of the magmadroth back when the start collecting still existed, and it actually said it included the rest of the start collecting contents as well Edit for clarification: This WAS the case, but since they stopped making SC boxes, they removed the additional dorfs from the box, and kept the price the same
WAY back in the days of 3rd Edition (1998-2003), GW released the Vehicle Design Rules, which allowed players to kitbash their own models for use in the game, with official stats. I ended up building a bunch of 1/35 scale 20th-century armor for my Imperial Guard army, and dressing them up to look futuristic. Not only were the models better looking and a more appropriate scale, but they were MUCH less expensive. I never looked back.
I believe that GW is really only after short term profits. They've got problems meeting demand, which have gone on for years. They're not building new production capacity. So what's their plan, raise prices? There is no long term plan. They're walking right into the 3D printing debacle, the same way Blockbuster did with Netflix.
Coming off the «high» of the increased pandemic sales increasing production capacity now, before knowing what the new normal will be the next 3-5 years would be shooting themselves in the foot - sooo many companies are stuck now with overstock from ordering increased production based on pandemic demands, only to discover now that demand is allowing down due to people going back to having less spare time. The shortages of the last 4-5 years had some *very* specific reasons, some of which are still in effect, but for a company like GW in their niche it will always be better to underproduce just a little bit, rather than meet all demands and get stuck with old stock - as for short term profit … they probably have plenty of long term plans as well as alternative plans, but the 3D printing market, large scale, isn’t there yet for abandoning a business model that still works - when profits of that part goes below a certain level it makes sense to look into selling official 3d models, or prints of 3d models - at the same time they *know* if they where to sell 3d models of their products those would be posted *everywhere* within weeks, so their plan as for now is keeping production as close to, but slightly below, market demand, making sure products are in demand and sought after - any business in this kind of niche doing something else is not doing business properly long term
@@MrJopanti They know that the moment they release 3D files of their models they will be distributed for free online within hours - it works for smaller companies that people want to support because they are «small» and «better» than GW - 3D-model sales for GW will only work if the purchase and print-process is as easy for grandparents and parents as clicking «buy» and the 3d-printer in the kitchen spots it out in 10 minutes saving a trip to the store and the model file itself is not leaving the server farm - even then somebody will find a way to leach the 3D print co-ordinates from the transfer and put it online for free, but at least GW will have the income from the larger group of purchasers who want convenience.
The art of making profit from manufacturing is to avoid creating excess products and production capacity is designed to try and make the right amount and in such a way so that the process from purchasing the raw materials to getting the customers' money into your pocket is as short as possible. Creating capacity is pointless unless you know it is for more sales. The sales are the horse and capacity the cart
The issue from my perspective is that GW has created the aftermarket by their incredibly predatory pricing model. They incent their players to go to 3D proxies because Warhammer is such an incredibly expensive hobby.
I think the biggwst problem of all companies is that they are so desperate to milk their old fanbase that they lose on new fans and this will bite them back longterm.
I got to a point with 40k in what I don't even enjoy the new edition rules and the prices are just complete madness. I started playing OPR with a couple of friends and my girl and it's enough. I buy usually alternative brands too, because having 1.500 points of imperial guard it's literally more expensive than a horse. AK and Vallejo (I'm spanish, so i'd rather buy a national brand) got nice enough paints and tools too. So i'm basically done with GW, wich feels weird because i have been partaking on WH since the early 90s, but they are not the hobby anymore, they are just a greedy corporation holding it hostage.
I'm Swedish and I buy Vallejo and AK because they're the best. (Even though AK are a bit edgy personally, lol). There are some Citadel paints I use, mainly washes and some contrast/techincal paints which have no good equivalents from other manufacturers, but the Spanish companies simply make the best paints in the market.
I buy: AK for Printers Vallejo for paints Army Painter for Speedpaints There is no need for GW at all on that side. I'm much happier mixing the better/cheaper companies.
@@joriankell1983 yes, there are awesome models like h7k around, 3d printer nowadays are at mold injection level of detail... i have a minotaur marinechapter army partially printed and no one can say the d8fference between the printed ones and the orginal. i sculpted them myself with zbrush...
The company I work for has gotten itself into a similar situation. For the past 5 years, they have been only looking at improving profit rates, despite all the calamities in the world, and they thought all is well. Then they realized as they were taking a look at the sales numbers, that the company was making more and more money with less and less products sold, because of the price hikes. Management has now realized that this is unsustainable, and now they are investing as much as possible into product development, logistics improvement, customer research to figure out ways to improve actual sales numbers instead of hiking the prices even further. And sometimes sales even does some heavy discounts too, in order to lure more customers in. I think this phenomena is the case for a lot more companies, including GW, than we would have originally thought for. Here is hoping that they will eventually realize their mistake when looking at the dropping sales numbers, and begin to course correct... eventually. There isn't much else we can do, other than voting with out wallets here.
I 100% agree with everything you're saying. The problem is that people, and especially gamers have really poor impulse control and they will just continue paying these exorbitant prices until they have to mortgage their house or live on the street.
I took a step back from Warhammer because I didn't have anyone to play with and I was getting tired of constant Space Marine releases when other armies needed a face lift in 8e/9e. I thought I about getting back into it so I can have something do with painting the minis, and the pricing increased $20-60 across the board. I immediately went "Yeah, not happening."
I had gotten into the hobby right as Covid hit...watched a box of skitarii rangers go from $35-$60 in the course of 3 years. Also, with things like Age of Sigmar, a lot of models are still resin/ finecast and sold at an exhuberant price. Half of my Beasts of Chaos army was 3D printed simply because the sculpts looked better and less goofy lol!
Not to mention the cost of ''rules'' and other various books is flat out a bad investment since they become obsolete in a matter of months. They never miss a chance to make their customer base feel cheated and taken for a ride.
Hey good video. The demographic shift that you mention is something a lot of people overlook. Look at Harley Davidson. For the longest time, the average age of a Harley buyer increased by about a year every single year. That meant that no new people are becoming Harley riders. And every year a crop of Harley buyers put away the bikes for good. If GW isint growing, it’s dying. If people are playing Rogue Trader or Total War:Warhammer fantasy, very very few are going to actually buy a box of minis when a single box cost more than the that got them interested in the miniature game, and a full army costs more than the computer they played it on.
this is why they're pivoting to tv shows, licensing etc. they've been short sighted in not trying to licence AAA games over the last decade. Imagine if Skyrim had've been set in the old world? They wouldn't even need the miniature games anymore. If GW are going to survive they need to start seriously looking beyond the models.
@@paulyg405 They have been trying to license it out..... they're just really really bad at it. For every 1 serviceable WH video game, theres 3 more that no one has heard of, or cared about (even within the fan base). The fact they haven't had a slam dunk action game yet is beyond mortal comprehension. 40k has a decent potential of genre options it can succeed in; but so far its strongest titles are 3 RTS games, 2 L4D clones, 2 X-com-like if you count Rouge Trader being unusually popular. I didn't even know there was a Space Marine 1 until I heard about Space Marine 2. And whats concerning is how that game feels like its half a decade late to the Gears of War train. So quality control was a problem, marketing was always a problem, and even if they somehow get past those 2 hurdles, their timing up until this point has been horrible. Never quite able to hit at just the right time, for maximum impact. As for passive media, like TV and movies.... they basically destroyed their strongest assets with Fan productions, and tried to pay wall it for themselves. As much as I think the DnD movie was botched, at least Hasbro invested in a proper production. But what I think was even more concerning with GW, is how the fan productions were on a level rarely seen (even in independent films), and they didn't think to leverage that interest to get a commercial production off the ground. If the fans were putting out that level of quality, imagine what a fully funded movie studio could accomplish? So now our biggest kernel of hope is Henry Cavill, hot off the heels of ditching the Witcher, because "that" production team went south. Now we just have get past Amazon not doing something stupid, and we MIGHT get a 40k movie with a proper foot hold for the rest of the franchise to grow from.
@@freelancerthe2561The rumour mill seems to say that the reason they have failed so hard with video games is not wanting to let other companies have much creative freedom, plus being too tight to invest properly in it. Kinda also why I think they've been short sighted, it isn't even really just about the relative low quality of the games they have put out, they don't seem to realise the advertising potential of decent games for their brand. It's almost like they think that if they invest in the brand, they'll lose a few sales of intercessors or something because fans were buying the games instead. I had a really long break from the hobby after school and I was shocked to discover how little had changed since I'd stopped playing, once a friend finally lured me back in. And in all those years, 40k was pretty much invisible. I never saw it anywhere unless I was flipping through a white dwarf at the shop. In those years, if they'd come out with a truly slam dunk game I would've been back in the hobby like that afternoon. It's ridiculous! They're sitting on a gold mine with their IPs. They need to bring in some talent from outside the business at a management level. Most of the ideas they have had since just before Covid have been terrible as well. Like you mention, shutting down and paywalling fan productions (literal millions of views on YT) and Warhammer + .. dumbest idea ever, who wants to pay for another streaming service just locked to their content, when their models and rules are already way overpriced? Fans can only afford so much. As far as Henry goes, I have a lot of respect for him but I reckon you couldn't get worse timing for the launch of a TV/Movie franchise for 40k. Modern cultural/political sensibilities don't suit GW's IPs. Other people have said it better, but my concern is that 40k is like an ultra violent Japanese cartoon from the 80s and that kind of subject matter will just not fly, Amazon execs would baulk at a universe in which an arguably sadistic, fascist/theocratic regime is the best humanity can do. Especially when the main prop to keep the regime running are a bunch of genetically engineered MALE super soldiers whose job is to uncritically murder anything that gets in the way of humanity's assumed right to dominate the stars. I think people are too dumb to appreciate the nuance behind ideas like that these days. It's also un-PC now to make content aimed at boys/men that leans in to things that boys have traditionally liked. After all, 40k is pretty much a modern interpretation of the kind of bombastic war stories our grandfathers would have read as kids. So whatever comes out at the end of this production process, I just don't think even Mr Cavill is mighty enough to make sure it doesn't turn out as awful as most franchise IP stuff has over the last few years.
I have three Plague Crawlers. One GW two 3D printed. I could afford all three to be GW… but Nurgle is all about been sick and twisted not been uniform and identical and having three completely different styles looks amazing together.. also I prefer the 3D ones! One has all eyeballs and tentacles!
I’m sure if games workshop just lowered their prices they would make so much more money with people buying their plastic crack. But idk if they can do that with how much and how long things stay out of stock
It's crazy how they don't realize that having discounts drives sales. Having a loyalty program perhaps? I spend upwards of hundreds buying from their online shop. Toss customers a bone. You think not making me pay 5$ for shipping is gonna affect my expenses ? Look at any other retail platform. Have seasonal sales, have a christmass sale on stuff, discount units that sell less than others. But you know what they do? They cram their unsold shit into ''combat patrol'' boxes and if something isn't selling enough they just change the rules for 6 months so people who play competitively buy it. Then they change the rules again and that's what happens EVERY SINGLE TIME. Just look at Votan.
I've been cobbling together a Death Korps army for about 8 months. Picked up Steel Legion - Made to Order in April 2023. 2 full squads, one full heavy weapons team (Las Cannons), and a Lieutenant for $185 (Steel Legion were the original models for Death Korps in 3rd edition) My girlfriend was kind enough to pick up a plastic Death Korps "Veteran Guardsmen" squad for my birthday in September, 5 of which I intend to use as my command team, or to forgo the command team and just run them as a full ten man squad of Death Korps. In addition she got me the Ogryn squad ($55) which I will run as a 3 Ogryn Ripper Gun team, or the single Nork Deddog, to go with a metal female Commissar from Games Day 1998 ($25 eBay price) I picked up a single Leman Russ tank for $65 in October, and a set of Atillan Rough Riders on Amazon for $55 in November. (Converted with some Death Korps adjacent heads) All fine and dandy yes? $185 - Steel Legion $51 - Veteran Guardsmen $55 - Bullgryns $25 - Commissar $65 - Leman Russ $55 - Atillan Rough Riders $436 for my current force, not including sales tax. Its not even 1000 points. For that I'll need a hell of a lot more infantry squads, or perhaps elites. But since I'm running Death Korps, and Forge World prices are insane, I need to be smart. The obvious answer is mechanized vehicles. Sentinels, and Chimera's specifically. To allow my force to move up the board at speed and take some damage without being creamed. My conundrum: Chimera's are $60 a pop, and I need at least two, and Sentinels are $45. I want to run a full team of 3 Sentinels for firepower and maximum point usage. To even out my force to 1000 points I still need to spend $255, a little over half of what I've put in already, in other words complete insanity. I've spent less on my Sisters of Battle and Firstborn Space Marine armies combined. Here comes Etsy and alternative 40k model companies to the rescue. I can buy two resin Chimera's for 44 GBP with free shipping ($56) - so two Chimera's for a little less then the price of one on the GW site. And in addition I can get a set of three Sentinels for $55 on Etsy. Instead of spending $691 on a full thousand points, I'll have spent $547 $441 if you only count the things personally paid for, and not the gifts I received. I could have paid even less If I had found Death Korps proxies that I enjoyed, however I am a sucker for old school minis and the GW Death Korps look in of itself, so here we are. The point is, 3D printing is a wonderful alternative for those looking to get into the game system without having to pay close to $1000 just to have a seat at the table. I and my girlfriend have spent $436 on 49 models piecemeal, and its not even a full army yet. Meanwhile I just spent $276 on The Old World starter box for Bretonnia, which comes with 76 models (1250 points), a rulebook, dice, templates, and those little whippy plastic measuring sticks. Its no secret where GW wants you to spend your money, because owing to their dodgy pricing system, $276 is a steal compared to buying everything separate.
Games Workshop is always expensive, but you went for the super premium army! LOL. Steel legion has been notoriously expensive compared to the other factions.
@@LetsTalkTabletop XD I only picked up one set of Steel Legion, as I said XD And to be fair, they were cheaper then buying eBay. But again; that’s mostly due to GW prices. It’s mind boggling how they insist on printing/updating the golden boys only, and barely give the other regiments the time of day. Vostroyan, Valhallan, Mordian, Praetorian… I know plastic kits would cost a lot up front, so why don’t they release rough equivalents to the patrol boxes with classic minis mixed with modern plastic vehicles? Imagine a vostroyan combat patrol with a sentinel or two. People would scoop it up without question.
For Imperial Guard players I always suggest looking into Wargames Atlantic for Infantry if you don't care about tournaments. Half the price for twice the bodies in plastic and a lot of bits left over.
@@luketfer I like wargames Atlantic, but they don’t stock Death Korps models specifically. The les grognard kits are flexible, but the bits don’t reflect what I’m aiming for.
What confuses me is GW strategy to get new players in. What is little Timmy gonna tell his mom? I need this +$250 box which isn't assembled. Or painted. Isn't even a complete army. Or include terrain. Or rules. Or include your opponent. Last time I played warhammer youngest guy was 30ish years old. Dad's are the only one who can afford. Killteam is cheaper but still eye watering.
The closest value bang for your buck is the combat patrols, not all of them for sure, but GW plastic with standardized GW designs. Outside of picking up hard to get spare unit or centerpiece model, there isn't any value to buying from GW website. The last GW purchase I made that I felt was worth it's actual price was a squad of stealth suits for my tau. Every other purchase I've made since them, retail price, has been actually breaking the bank. Single model characters starting at 40 dollars, and decent hard signature units 80-100+ dollars has made me firmly into the secondary market. They've priced me out a long time ago. There is way too many options and game systems to be firmly locked into the games workshop environment.
The problem isn't even the price, it's the amount you have to buy to play a reasonable game. $60 for the rule book, $60 your Codex and then $300-$500 for a 1k army (plus painting) is a lot compared to most other games I have looked at or played, even when GW is charging less per mini, to say nothing of getting a second person going. Battletech is cheaper for the main rules, and the starter box has enough minis for 2 'standard' forces and you can get both for less than the cost of a Combat Patrol. Looking at Warmachine mkIV, you can get most, if not all of the equivalent to a 2k army for less than $400, and the rules are completely free. And both of those games are made in such a way that they are very proxy friendly (Battletech actively encourages it), unlike 40k's true line of sight.
not just the price of the miniatures, the price of books to start playing too. They lied us this edition saying they will be at least one free list to play. They are erasing the free one with each army codex launch. So at the end, it was not free. And the fact that inside codexes there's no new combat patrols or anything make me thing that "this edition will be more accessible with ways to play cheaper" was just a marketing campaign to sell the new edition and not a real commitment.
I know mate. The price of Horus version 1 or 2 is absolute BS. Plus there's that tank for a whopping $1249 but it's only half that price on the UK store. Plus another one for $789. Not to mention the Leviathan box set. I wouldn't touch GW stuff with a ten metre pole. Etsy ftw.
Everytime this comes up, I can't help but think it'll be STC cartridges you have to insert, and it'll self destruct after X number of prints, so you have to keep buying cartridges as form of on-brand DRM.
100 GB = $126.33 on 4 February 24 , then look at GW's mark up charged US which makes up to 60% of over all sales GW sending plastic by 1st class seating on passenger airlines ? Local hobby stores are GW's warehouses
After years playing MtG and years of videos about how MtG is supposedly dying, I was expecting a "old man yells at clouds" video. But this was actually very well thought of and interesting. You're making a solid point from a business point of view, and I'm sure that this will be one of GW's board major topic in the upcoming years.
The thing is, though, for an MTG player the costs aren't accelerating unless you engage in the money printing machine that is arena. For a casual modern deck I spend about $100, just like I used to spend about $100 a decade ago. For a competitive deck its more like $500. For GW the costs are increasing by about double the rate of inflation. 10 years ago you could have built 1.5 armies for what it costs to build one now.
Mtg isn't dying, but it's certainly not what it was originally about imo. But GW is doing the same thing. Money money money. Who cares about the reason why the game itself exists
So much of GW stuff has been scanned to and released into the wild. Hypothetically, if you have a decent printer, one could create a 1to1 40k army for the price of the resin. Like it or not, GW is fu£ked.
23 years, 8 armies for 40K, 2 BFG fleets, 11 epic 40K armies...and 11 or so other game systems i actively play not related to games workshop. i have not bought a new model from GW since i picked up some aeronautica to add to my epic armies back when it first was released. nor would i given the prices now (i thought it was spendy when i paid $45 for my land raider crusader new, now it is at last check-$110-NOPE!) I do not need GW anymore. especially since we have a large group of like minded players at the FLGS who hate current 40K and enjoy playing house 5th ed 40K. the 3d printing stuff is just icing on the cake. the prices are reasonable and many of the model designers do a better aesthetic job than what GW is currently producing.
I understand that sentiment and on one hand I agree with you, on the other hand you have to support things like your local store or your favorite game or they may not be around anymore. It's such a fine line to tread, especially when one of your favorite games makes it less and less possible for you to support them.
Is there an alternative? Somebody who create a new sci fi like warhammer 40k franchise? I would buy and paint it... (but it should have some kind of space marines and nice LORE if possible)
I think your closest option would be mantics dead zone or warpath. That is their version of necromunda and 40K respectively. Their prices are typically 60 to 70% of what gws is. But their model quality isn't quite as high.
Actually, being that my local store does not offer any discounts on these ridiculous prices, I support the store by buying hobby supplies just like you suggested. I buy a paint or two every single week I go in there and occasionally I'll buy a kit. It's a good suggestion! We can't forget about the local stores.
I used to own my own store and I remembered how "expensive" i used to think GW figs were 20 years ago. There are some finer detail figures I will splurge and get from GW because the plastic holds up better should the figure get dropped vs. resin models, but generally Id rather bulk out my forces with resin printed stuff at this time from an initial box set than pony up $1000 to finish out rank and file guys for my army. I agree with all of your points. Its also likely why GW wants to push the IP ends with books, Warhammer TV and Prime TV/Movie deals instead of just little plastic men.
Thanks. To be honest I think that is their future. Hold on to the IP and charges for rules with their miniatures being secondary for their bottom line.
Good video. You didn't even mention that after spending that money on models, which I have, GW expects you to turn around and spend hundreds on the rules and tools to play the game for 3 years.
That ridge runner looks like something I could pick up at the toy aisle at Wal-Mart and kitbash. I've been doing a lot of kitbashing. Orks are a great faction where I can junkball stuff like stompas and gargants scale to Titanicus and BattleTech.
Raging Heroes for example, started as a physical minis company, but when they saw the rise of 3D printing (and the fact that many of the sculptors that worked for them started making their own Patreon, like Artisan Guild), they made their own Patreon and MMF pages, and started selling STLs. If GW is smart, they will make an online store for STLs. But they think they're un-demolishable. Reminds me of how Blizzard thought that the MOBA style wouldn't draw in the gamers, and when they woke up and released Heroes of the Storm, it couldn't compete against LoL and DotA 2 because it came too late.
Haha. Here's a question though, do you have any remorse about it at all? Is this your first and only army? Or have you already spent tons of money with gw?
I wanted to play GW games, saw prices and realised I can afford 1 warband. Then local game group introduced me to OPR :) I don't own 3d printer, I just buy minis from other games and make warbands. And it is still cheaper. Huge plus for me is that I can make minis I like and find rules for them. Or just make my own as last resort.
That's exactly what I do with Brutality Skirmish Wargame. Buy whatever models I want and use them instead of being shackled to a single miniature provider.
Ya know, if GW was smart, they'd embrace 3d printing and switch from selling plastic models to licensed printer files. I know it's not that cut and dry, but I bet they could do it and still come out on top while making everything more affordable.
Games workshop is a corporation. If people atop buying from them worst thing that happens is they get bought out or sell the WH IP, in that case the new company can lower prices or face the same fate
the more they hike prices the more they are going to push people to find more cost effective alternatives and with the rise of 3d printing and it becoming cheeper and more acceptable in the community , thats were people will go .Lets also note that the ability to make new Models with 3D desighn packages is also on the increase so model making is becoming less of a nich skill set . If they dont change their pricing policy there will be a growing trend for people to go the 3d path. People obviously still like playing the game however there is another nock on , the less models they produce because people are going elseware could impact the cost effectivness of producing the kit , making them more expensive to make and lowering profit margins , GW will find itself in an ever worsening possition / cycle . They need to lower the prices down to increase sales , increase production and cost effectiveness and also reduce the appeal/ need for people to go elseware to play GW games. Its either that or they will need to change their business model to reflect the fact that model sales will not be as big a part of its activities.
As a guy that lives near Nottingham and goes to whw frequently I agree I hardly spend in there other than paints or eating in bugmans it's really expensive especially forge world so for people living in the states having to pay shipping etc alot of people are going to turn to 3d prints.
I started 20 years ago when I was 13. Now I have 14 armies for 40k, 4 armies for Old World. And I'm close on quitting all things GW-related. The prices are just unjustifiable.
I've been collecting GW minis since I was 10, which was in the late 80s. My local hobby store literally had a bin full of random GW figures, all in pewter, which they sold for 50 pence each. Back then a character model in a blister pack would have been about 3.99 which was about what a Happy Meal cost back then. I have not bought a GW model though since the day I got married. I can't justify the cost.
I have a strong feeling GW is trying to get as much money as possible right now, make deals to get them into popculture consciousness ASAP, then sell the company at a high price before the chumps who bought it realise it will fall apart in 2 years. My hunch.
Well said, I really do think they're trying to do that. I think they see the 3D printing has the writing on the wall for them. So they're going to crank up the prices and make as much money as they can to make the business look good and then try to sell it to Hasbro or somebody. And you 100% right about collapsing 2 years after the purchase. I follow a lot of business news and things like that, and it's alarming how little research these investment companies do on the corporations they buy. Then they are left holding the bag.
I remember battle of macragge was like 50€, basic troops 30€, heroes 15€, monsters and veichles 40-50€ and detachments (today's equivalent of start collecting) were 75€, but had loads of miniature inside. Now everything costs double when you're lucky, if you're not a turnament player though you don't need gw mins, because there are so many beautiful minature that don't infringe on copyright that can be printed.
I do agree. Its getting ridiculus. I am a single man in my early 30's so I can buy myself a plastic soliders. The thing is I just paid the cost of monthly student accomodation (in PLN I am from Poland) for 20 plastic toy soliders (4x Adepta Sororitas Seraphim Squads). I think that the Adepta Sororitas will be my last army full in GW plastic, and I will just start to print. My friend got himself a 3D printer. He printed all of his Tau Battlesuits, that would have cost near the price of a week summer vacation abroad :0. Plus I cannot even imagine, the teen getting in this hobby.
Get a printer. It will boost your hobby in ways you can't imagine. It's not so much the cost as the freedom to customize and get the exact look you want for whatever crazy project you can think of. The file selection is simply vast out there, so many talented sculptors working through Patreon, Tribes and other store fronts.
Well, if they stopped trying to destroy their own Fandom by destroying the heritage and legacy of the warhammer universe, then they would have secured more longevity because then it would be more about the game and franchise itself rather than just the miniatures. If the fans are left with nothing other than just the miniatures then they are more interested in other options.
Vote with your dollar. Most Proxies look as good or better than GW. They are multipose, they usually come with extra bits if you ask the seller, and they are usually a reasonable price.
I mean I think GW is going to go on as a miniature company for the next 10 years; but the future could indeed be for GW to shifting to be to a multimedia company, with 40k video games, series, movies (cf. Cavill-Amazon etc)
I recently got back into WH. I played it a bot back in the 90's with Second Edition (such cool models). I was shocked when I saw how much everything costed. I actually started looking at perhaps buying a printer since it would probably be less expensive in the long run. That's really sad cause I'd love to buy the real deal but just don't have the money since my three kids also want to play and have their own armies. 😅
I can print a whole baneblade out full sized with weapon options for about 30 dollars of resin. and still have a little left for a squad of guardsmen. So far ive printed about 8 leman russ tanks, 3 baneblades an unknown and ungodly amount if infantry and ither weird stuff. I still buy some GW stuff of course but most of my collection is 3d printed now. I dont hate ge either i grew up with gw and want them to succeed but i cannot afford theor prices anymore.
i play warhammer 40k since 2012 and in 2020 because of the pandemic i brought a 3d printer since no shop was shipping miniatures for me in that moment. and from 2020 to 2022 was the best hobby time of my life. i 3d printed epic. i dreamed of having epic scale miniatures. i printed for myself barely all the factions for warmaster. it is so good, i gifted whole 8mm scale army to my friends and stuff. it was awesome.
One of my biggest hurdles to 3d printing (besides it being a bit of a pain in the ass) is that you can't play it with printed models at the warhammer store. Then the store manager lets us know that we can't really hang out at the store as much anymore because he wants to focus more on recruitment and he needs space for intro games... oookaaay...
Yeah that really sucks if that's your local store. Fortunately for me I don't play at a GW store. But even some independent stores are like that as well.
I have a 3d printer and print poxies for GW models all the time. The one problem I have with etsy is that they don't always have the sculptor's permission to sell the models. Someone put some time and effort into creating the sculpt so I think they should be compensated
Absolutely! I had not considered that some people on Etsy may be doing it illegally. Although I'm not sure how I would verify that. You are fine with 3D printer proxies, but would you be fine with someone completely printing their entire army for warhammer? Where do you draw the line?
@@LetsTalkTabletop The dark side of printing services isn't them pirating GW designs, it's them pirating the proxies of small creators. Knowing if they are is hard part, but if you get into the printing/design community, there are a lot of big Discords servers where people do bring up sculpts they've seen pirated on Etsy, Teemu, Alibaba and the like to the attention of the sculptor. And that's a line of separation between dedicated "print bros" and people like you who seem leery of printing - the people who print themselves are in touch with the printing scene and its creators and care about them. People just slumming on Etsy are the ones taking money from small businesses to get a cheap proxy with no effort or research. And yes, I would be completely fine with printing an entire Warhammer army. And I have. GW is a huge public company who have long since stopped caring about the product they make, instead simply trying to squeeze as much money as they can from the existing customer base short term. I love Warhammer, but having loyalty to a company which does not care about that or making a good product line with the intent to create a stable long term product landscape is... a choice I guess. If GW has created an environment in which people are fine with buying large amounts of pirated products, that's a problem they have created for themselves. I'm not going to support a company for being bad at creating a sustainable business. I would love to give them my money for minis, but since I can get products that are superior and cheaper to play a tabletop game with, why should I not get them? Supply and demand rules. My demand is to play games. I can do that with GW rules or any rules I want. GW can own IP of images and such, but they can't own me playing a game in my home and calling it a Warhammer game. How I get the models and rules to get my Warhammer experience is something they can affect by offering me a product which supplies my demand. If some little digital craft goblins working part time doing digital sculpts of writing community rules sets fulfill that demand I have of Warhammer better, that's GW's problem, not mine. As so often is said, it's premium hobby, a luxury, not an essential service. It's a product for pleasure, it satisfies imagination, creativity and camaraderie among players and fans. These are qualities of experience which the products satisfy, not the other way around. As in, GW does not sell us the pleasure, creativity and camaraderie, we use the products to satisfy these. If their business model does not supply us with what we need to fulfill our desires as customers, why should we have loyalty to the company? It has shown its utter disinterest in being loyal to our needs. GW has chosen a purely cut throat, transactional relationship to its customer base, so I really have a hard time understanding objections to treating them the same way back.
I bought a couple of printed models because they were no longer available at my country. 6 month into the hobby. GW will start lowering prices or not increasing them more because of 3D printing. Right now the demand is greater than their model produccion , this its why then can charege a lot more. They are also going to move a lot more into movies in the future
I feel like GW has a competitive advantage due to the vast world building it has done over the last 4 decades. They are 'the premium' miniature seller (as far as I know) and are at the moment probably in some what of a golden age of wargaming. They have seen a massive uptake of TT wargaming (COVID, PC gaming being made less accessible due to crypto driving up GPU prices) and general acceptance of 'the hobby' in general. I'd argue that *currently* the 3D printing trend works in their favour. People buy the majority of their kit from GW and print only as a supplement to their GW purchases. As the quality and accessibility of printers improves and the gap between what GW produces and 3rd party products diminishes.... Well I think they might find themselves in the reverse of the current situation. Case in point: when is the last time someone you know purchased any GW terrain? It's peripheral, non essential, 3D printer go BRRRRRRR!!!! The other element that will accelerate this is removal of their competitive advantage. I.e. tamper too heavily with the lore and/or compromise artistic development and drive away long term supporters. The backstory may seem like fluff to the initiated, fair enough. However... If you are going to charge a premium for your product you need a point of differentiation (or one hell of a marketing dept...)That differentiation used to be quality of miniatures, not being able to be replicated by small business due to capital required to design and produce. That's out the window. So the lore & 'goodwill' (brand recognition) is all that's left. I'd be very surprised if this issue does not have pride of place at most strategy meetings within GW. What I would be surprised to hear is that they have even the slightest idea how to tackle it! TLDR: GW charge too much, interest rates up, blackrock & vanguard piss people off regularly, neckbeards be spiteful and technically adept, in 2025/26 3D printer go BRRRRRRR & GW go uuuurrrrrggghhhhh....
Even in the ass end of the world (AKA Australia 🦘🌏) 3D printers get here faster than GW releases. And if you think the US has a rough time with international mark ups, CRICKEY!!! Mate are you fair dinkum? Their mark up is as bad as the ozone layer down here. Also I checked last night after the current social media debacle initiated by GW RE: Custodes and saw that I could buy a 12 or 14k resin printer for less than 2 tanks for the custodes. Or buy them for 1/4 of the price from local recast sellers. Up until they decided to gaslight fans and take the edge off of the setting I was in your boat 'i pay GW prices today, so I can have a game to play tomorrow'. Since then i've cancelled my AUD$80+ book and my AUD$16.99/month WH+ sub, set wahapedia to my home page on chrome, signed up to 3D printer tutorials on youtube and PayPal payin4 took care of the rest. I also sold my GW tool set on FB marketplace and replaced it with Tamiya tools and products that are higher quality but 1/2 the price.
I think when it swings, it's going to be very, very fast. Way faster than GW can react to market conditions. The reason is, GW is really pushing the competitive side of things. Competitive gamers will walk in and buy a whole new army because a new codex just came out and put that army at the top of the meta. Competitive gamers don't really care too much about models. They're just playing pieces. They're the price of entry. The majority I've seen will slap down an army they threw together the night before, mold lines everywhere, a drybrush and some contrast if the tournament requires painted models, and that's it. A lot of tournaments are perfectly fine with 3d printed models and if they're not, people are going to start organizing their own tournaments that are. Nobody can stop them. When the critical mass hits of a few tournament winners running 3d printed armies for a fraction of the cost of what everyone else spent, it's done. GW can tweak all the FAQs they want and release all the overpowered codexes they want. They're not going to be making a dime off it. And there isn't an army of lawyers big enough to shut down every seller on Etsy that they think infringes. By the time they wake up, it'll be done. And then we'll be looking at Hasbro-Warhammer.
The big issue is that Games Workshop sees regular profits year over year that are well beyond their operating costs. They don't NEED to increase their prices to make money, but it's the classic issue with capitalism. They're a publicly traded stock based company, so they need to show ever increasing profits year over year, and because of the point they've priced themselves to, it's impossible to show those profits without simply further increasing their prices to milk their established player base. It's difficult for GW to draw in new customers because the barrier to entry is simply so high for a lot of their games. The argument that GW is a big company and thus has greater expenses is an enormous logical fallacy, because as economies of scale provide, the greater the scale of your production the less and less labour and cost of material factors into the overall pricing of your product. It's the reason why McDonalds can sell a Cheeseburger for $1.99, when it would usually cost you double that to make a cheeseburger at home yourself, the normally cost effective method. The more of something you make, the less you have to spend relative to your sales on production. By all logic, GW should actually be able to price themselves significantly lower than a private etsy based maker and still make a profit, because of the law of economies of scale. They simply don't because of the profit motive inherently necessary within a capitalist system. It's an ironically wildly dystopian issue with modern society that 40K as a universe is supposed to parody, but instead GW has become the very thing that they intended to parody with their universe.
100%. Economically they should be in the position to be the Walmart of miniatures companies. They lead the market, and by reducing their prices they could actually cut out many of the smaller companies who couldn't compete.
What are the sources you guys are looking at for profit? Just curious. Are they actually crushing it, or is the media and licensing what's floating them?
@@horselats according to Games Workshop's own investor reports, their annual revenue has been increasing by about 40-50 million GBP or Great British Pounds each year. In 2023 they saw 470 million GBP annual revenue, while in 2024 they saw 525 million.
You bring up some Valud points. The price hikes ofate have been eye watering. I personally have focused more on battletech in the last 3-4 years and going on to GW's website I was shocked at the prices as they were no longer normalised to me.
Ive been super interested in WH40K. I absolutely adore the setting, I play games in the setting, I consume an insane amount of WH40K content. The pricing for the minis terrifies me so much I just dont see it as something Im going to get into.
Nice vid. As a terrain maker full-time, I am torn between "Quit making physical product because 3D printing" Then when I think about 3D printing - "AI will make all human designers redundant" I wish I was gen X or something, AI is terrifying for creative jobs.
Well as someone who has been a GW “supporter” since the beginning (have my 1st ed Warhammer fantasy, 1st edition WH 40k rogue trader rule book, both Realms of Chaos books) still have numerous armies (and gave away or sold countless armies to friends or others) and still have many citadel rogue trader minis in my armies and a bunch of oop minis packed away…….. anyone interested. What I will say is GW has always been on the high end in miniature prices since they were usually the pinnacle of miniatures (even back in the rogue trader days) compared to other Mini companies of the time. That being said there biggest problem is a lot of their minis are “dated” (old world min the case) (personally I’d buy everything that comes out for their prices even overpriced except most of those minis are sculpts from 15+ years ago) and even some of their newer stuff is dated out of the box. Personally I think GW has “lost their edge” in mini sculpture most everything is computer generated sculptures and it shows……… just my two cents………
as a commissioned miniature painter of 20 + years, i always try to persuade my customers to pick up cheaper tabletop games. gw's main ambition is to brand their products as luxury items. so you get the luxury brand price tag. luxury products are not meant for the middle class, just to put that across the least harsh as possible.
I've just got a 3D printed Skaven team with over 20 models, including 3 Rat Ogres, plus a Troll, for about £30 and the models are really nice. I think the GW team with 12 models is £35 (or £25 from discount retailers), so yeah they are expensive. They were relatively expensive in the 90's too, when I worked for them
I've been into 40K since 2001. I've loved 40K for most of that time (took a few years off) and this latest round of price increases has been too much. I'm going 3rd party and playing other games now.
I moved to Horus Heresy when 2.0 came out. That entire community is a lot more open to 3D printing than the 40K crowd. It's been great to not have to buy things at an inflated price. Plus, I can try things out before I maybe purchase them as well.
Yep, HH gang represent. For historical reasons it has a lot of older players, and since the game originally was a side project by some true creative types it's a lot more interesting. And since the models were initially FW, people just accepted re-casts and prints because those prices were ridiculous back then. Nowadays, GW plastic is approaching old FW prices though...
Pretty sure everyone in 40k is open to 3d printing since the speculation on minis has become apparent to everyone. The prices have never been worse but at least minis were getting cleaner (less and less mould lines and crisper detail) and more raffined. But the way they are charging for minis that are 30 and 20 years old makes it really hard to justify. They are putting an end to scalping by doing the scalping themselves
Hello! Path chosen by GW is really unreasonable. I understand when they deleting scans of their original sculpts, but they also blocking authors with their own designs, which were only inspired by GW. And prices of new boxes are really insane. I suppose, that new lines and new sculpts for old ones will be much more pricey, then we have now. I own three 3d printers and even started to kitbash my own minis on my laptop. It gives me more motivation and feeling of success, cause I made unique things. Best wishes for you and yours family. (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧
@@rangda_prime even if you can't buy a 3d printer, you can create something, which over people were looking for. And they will then comment yours work - "yes, this is what I were searching for months. Thank you creator!", and this is the most enjoyable part of the hobby. Helping another people, who can't create 3d models and can't afford in multiple reasons learn 3d modelling.
@@АртемМасальский-э2ю Absolutely! It's a machine, which together with digital sculpting and modding apps puts the hobby in the hands of the players, creators and community. And that, perhaps, is the greatest threat is poses to the GW business model, rather than pure pricing/costs.
I think it's funny that you say "the kids are fine throwing money at GW" because in my community it's the kids who can't afford GW and are printing armies. And it's the old heads that berate us for having "fake" or "inauthentic" models. They tell us "they have to do those predatory rules releases." "They have to always raise their prices" "wouldn't want GW to go out or business right?" We just have to tell them that we don't have the conveniences of generational wealth. Many of our players entered working age during the pandemic and our economy is not strong. We don't own property and renting a house for 2600 a month is killing us already. Our armies may not be GW plastic, but it's still a physical model that we are bringing to games. We aren't buying GW rule books when OPR has free rules and a better activation system. These old heads aren't converting us. They are fueling our hatred for the abuse these companies levie towards us. And cementing our belief that they aren't good fits to our growing youth gaming community, and aren't getting invites to events.
I'm not sure how much of the video you watched, but I actually said that it is pricing kids out of the hobby. The local youth population is terrible for Warhammer due to cost. I agree that the people that always want to brow beat everyone on how they play is a real pain. And the older players got into it when it was waaaaay more affordable, so they really shouldn't get on the younger people about not supporting the ever-more-expensive hobby.
@LetsTalkTabletop Yeah, and I think that's a very valid position. I wrote this comment while cooking breakfast and watching the video. You covered the point while I was tying. Good video and good discourse. I think your position is insightful. I'm one of the few in my play group who's been playing for a while and has seen many faces of GW. (Started in early 6th ed). We've got a narrative campaign for OPR Grimdark Future on the way and are working on the narrative for the next one with how much appeal we've been seeing with the college kids. It's bringing a lot of fresh life to the hobby. And ours is a good young men's group with several good strong role model like guys in our group. It's a shame the GW fan boys here get mad at us for not drinking the GW tea.
The Vanguard boxset for space marines in nzd is $400, and includes two units GW doesn't sell them individually. Intersessors are $120 nzd without shipping
@LetsTalkTabletop hence why I turn to sites like Mighty ape and Trade me. Yes the range isn't big, but at least I can either part pay or the cost plus the shipping is HALF of what GW have without shipping
The moment the sales drop the prices will drop. It's economic basics - supply and demand. The more people are willing to pay the bigger the prices will go up and up. The prices is not high enough if everything is sold out in hours and there is not enough stock for all the demand. The prices will continue to go up.
I always question them selling out so fast, sounds like they're not making enough. But you are right about the economics, unfortunately nerds often have poor impulse control and spend way too much money on stupid crap. So I don't expect the prices to go down anytime soon.
The 3D printing is way less prevalent in the historical gaming space because there is a lot more variety and the companies charge fair price. A lot of these figures are also in white metal which is more expensive material supposedly. Still better value than GW plastics.
With historical wargaming - Napoleonics, for example - you didn't have the closed environment that GW has worked so hard for. You bought the rules from company A, and you bought miniatures from companies B, C, D, or whomever, with the only consideration being that your units needed to be roughly in scale with the units the people you played with brought. The rules publishers were never in a position where they could make the same declaration GW has - that to play in a GW-sponsored official game, you could only use GW miniatures. You played with _their_ rules, using _their_ miniatures, and they could keep changing one or the other to keep you scrambling to keep up. You could always back off from the tournaments and play with your existing minis, kitbashes, and third-party substitutes, using outdated rules, but you were taking yourself out of GW's ecosystem, and didn't matter any more. But as long as they can exploit FOMO and the cachet of 'official' recognition, their business model will keep working. And it won't be until enough of their player base stops chasing the mechanical rabbit that GW will recognize that they have to change.
Im aware that Printing is a great alternative to make armies more accesible, what I like to bring attention is how Horus Heresy kinda PROVES that they can make collecting minis actually cheaper, unlike 40K. 5x Jumpack Intercessors for 35£ Vs 10x Assault squads MKVI for 42.50£ Basically double the amount of Space Marines in Jumpack for 7£ more instead of buying a whole new kit, the H.H. kit even comes with 2 powerfists, so you could totally make 2 squads. They can make it cheaper, they just don't want to.
You are correct, but also you are using BP. If you check the prices of USD, AUD or anything else, it is even crazier. And it doesn't match the exchange rate at all.
@@LetsTalkTabletop that is true, being in Mexico the exchange is rough in Mexican Pesos the H.H. assault squads are $1350 (wich is about 62.50£ BP and about $80 USD) and the Jumpack Intercessors are $1150 MXPesos (53.30£ BP and $68 USD), i just wished GW made boxes that included more models so that at least we could get our money worth to build an army (60 usd for 85 points is so low its not even worth checking the new sculps).
Games workshops prices have been insane for a long time, I bowed out mostly due to a growing hatred of their rules and found Dropzone commander and deadzone which have far superior rulesets and great miniatures for far lower prices. Price wasn’t my motivator at the time but ive considered dipping back in to build a small force purely for display because I love the IP even if the game is trash but then I see the prices and I immediately get over that idea. In recent years I have started 3D printing and I’ve refound my love for the 40k universe through Adeptus titanicus scale. Loads of minis available for free and some genuinely amazing new minis in the 8mm range “not marines” and “not Eldar” available both free and for reasonable prices (units about €5) printing them costs about €20-30 worth of resin for a whole freaking army. It’s a no brainer. I don’t think GW are dead in the next few years. No debt and good cash flow make them a hard whale to take down, but a tipping point might come in the next 20 years where they have to look at the practicality of their retail chain. 3D printing is still a niche within a niche for our hobby.
I wana preface this by the fact I’m not a GW stan, I think the price hike is ridiculous, and I literally own a 3d printer to print off my own models. But i feel that their are some elements of the whole printer vs non printer argument thats sorta ignored in this video, that i feel need to be considered. Value wise 100% printing is better, and valid. If you want to just go ahead and print away with your buddys sure i do that all the time. But their are key elements that do make buying over printing still hold value for some (even if they are being exploited imo). The first is legitimacy (you could also kida call this elitism but i think its a bit more nuanced than that) I think the easiest way to put this is an analogy to MTG why do people still buy cards when printers exist. Sure lots of friends allow kitchen table magic with proxies. But their is something to be said about owning the thing, collecting is a large part of the hobby, so for many people collecting is important, it feels legitimate and is something they care about, furthermore while 90% of games are played between friends who may accept proxies, that wont always be the case for other games. Game stores holding tournaments, or just other friends may not be so willing to accept proxies. So for people who want to play at their LGS or go to tournaments, while proxiny is cheaper its not nessasrily better if your restricted with who you can play (obviously maybe we can as a community change the culture around proxies but atm thats neither here nor their.) The second issue i find is that of time. 3d printing at the moment is a hobby all its own, knowing how to find models, how to prep models, how to setup a printer. Alot of these take time and practice to learn.Furthermore it simply takes more time to get an army printed vs assembled from a box. Warhammers main demographic are people in the age range of having jobs and familys, they simply may not have the time to learn and maintain a second hobby. Now the easy answer their is they can buy them online, which is 100% true but can be location dependent, etsy shiping can cost alot, and their arnt always distributers nearby that can do it cheap (one of the reason i had to buy my own printer) so while etsy is great it may not be a solution to everyone. Not to mention models are hard to find. Gw constantly strikes anything that resembles their models. So whats my point, to simply say “no your wrong” No. im saying that the argument “printers are going to kill gw” is not really enough, printers are absolutely a start, but as a community we can’t rely on them to stop these price gouges as their are legitimate reasons to still buy plastic. We as a community need to also stand against these practices, becoming more open of proxies at tournaments, creating resources to help people wanting to get into printing, Calling out and fighting Gw constantly taking down legitimate makes people have sculpted. If we want to see this change we need to fight it as a community and not simply hope that the existance of 3d printers will kill GW
I bought the Bretonnian box set for The old world ONLY to get the rule book because it was sold out and the intent was to 3d print my army (still is just in smaller scale and to add units to the GW army). I can't afford much more than that. If GW went the route of selling STLs of their models, I think they would make even more money as well as licensing the rights to sell printed models.
I can't fathom spending more than $60 on a single unit. I look for the army boxes where they have two armies or the Christmas boxes. Another option is to use other companies' models as proxies. Reaper, Mantic, Perry all have minis that could be used to play for usually a third of what GW charges. Luckily, I got a lot of the Start Collecting boxes before they were replaced by the Vanguard boxes. I have purchased 1-2 SC of the armies I may want to do in the future. I started with WH40K RT and quit right after WH40K 3rd Ed started. My youngest son liked fantasy so I got the Bret / Lizardmen starter set in 2000. I got back into GW in 2020 when we were all locked up and had too much time to spend shopping on the internet and I picked up Start Collecting Malignants, and two SC Skeleton Horde that were discontinued in 2019. One of the UA-camrs I watched was talking about them going away so I went and got them for $76.50 before that happened. They were from AOS 1.0 so when they introduced Nighthaunt and redid the Death faction, they got rid those boxes. I then picked up two SC Flesh Eater Courts and I proxy the ghouls as zombies. With those, I have a decent 2000+ SBGL army with the Coven Throne as general with Mannfred and Neferata and two zombie dragons with enough points leftover for 80 zombies for under $400.
A timely rehash of a perennial topic. I tend to agree with you as I don’t see them having an “end game” to solve this pressing issue of profits to shareholders versus a sustainable increase year on year.
could always tell the shareholders to fuck right off since growth for the sake of growth is what is making businesses crumble. GW is bloated. doesn't look like they are getting money from shareholders anyways. Stuff just keeps getting more expensive. People will just stop buying and then what good will the shareholdes do ? They too will drop GW
I'm an Oldhammer player that started in the late 80s with WFB 3rd edition and Rogue Trader.. GW has been mostly dead to me for the past 3 years due to 3d printing.. pretty much the only thing I buy from them is the occasional rulebook or paint. I just got a new 12k mid sized resin printer and frankly the quality these days on newer stls is insane, not to mention the print speeds are literally a 5th of where they were 5 years ago.. I can print an entire 20 man squad in 2 hours or less that looks as good as anything from GW. If they die they die, there are plenty of other alternatives such as Kings of War which is aready showing us the future with their 3d Mantic Vault transferring many of their models to stls, One Page Rules and other games not to mention Oldhammer and just playing older editions like I often do. GW shareholders can kick rocks we don't need them or their product if they think they are going to suck out my bone marrow they are in for a rude awakening as they go the way of Hasbro WotC
I'm an old Grognard like you, and I agree completely with everything you said. I got a printer a few years back and it's set my hobbying free in a way I could not have imagined. The sculpting market is insanely deep and the sculptors so very talented these days and the change has been very swift.
Just found your channel today. Only GW game I play is Blood Bowl. Its probably the cheapest of all their games but there are so many online options to 3D print. Even companies making their own models. I've wondered this myself with so much 3D printing.
Started playing GW games in '94. The funny thing is as a teen who couldn't really afford (even at that time and prices) much I was very willing to pay for the miniatures then. Never even considered looking for alternatives. Now in my 40's I am very fortunate and could still afford their products if I wanted to without much concern. My willingness to do so however is completely gone. Yes their pricing is completely ridiculous but so is their handling of systems and people. I'm thankful for GW blazing a way in this happy but it is them not us that is sealing their fate.
Long response ahead- I just started trying to learn wh and trying to learn to paint at the same time. I bought a kill team box and a combat patrol box it was 250$, I cannot even play the game. Once factoring for paint and such now we're another 200$, add in modeling supplies another 50$. I'm not poor, I do quite well but to get a 2000pt army that's competitive that's upwards of 1000$ once factoring for supplies. That's absolutely insane. And it's not a cash outlay I can or want to afford for a hobby I don't even know if I will like. Granted I knew before I started I would enjoy the building and painting part. But guess what I did? I bought a printer for 200$ a 2 liter bottle of resin for 35$ and some rubbing alcohol. My patreon subs are 10$ for models and I've made and painted more warhammer adjacent models from patreon than I have warhammer models. Because I could actually get on the board to play. I am absolutely someone willing to buy into a hobby and the game. But 1000$ is a lot. Now that I've got my first army that's 3/4 "proxy" I'll slowly add authentic models into the mix. Unfortunately because of their insane pricing I'll never play competitively because if my decided army isn't good I'd need to spend another 700-800$. So bottom line if a combat patrol was 100$ and characters were 25-70$ and 5 unit space marine type boxes were 30$ my entire army would be authentic. But instead I'm in no hurry. I guess I'm just too poor to play warhammer. But it seems very business stupid. If their profits are as high as their stock price reflects its dumb that they don't want more players. I don't think the movie is going to do it for them either. Because the average 25 year old won't spend 1000$ to figure out if they like something. I happen to be older with more expenses but also more income. You mention golf, I also play golf. I got my first set of clubs for like 300$ and now I can play anywhere. Now I have probably 1000-2000$ in clubs but that took years. Warhammer you can't even play without that outlay. They dont balance the game around 500pts they balance it around 2000 and the game is simply not as fun in my opinion with a combat patrol game. So yes 3d printers will force them to get into competitive range for new blood or die. I can't imagine people who have played long term like paying 50% more than they did a few years ago. Engaging new players with such big marketing coming their way with the movie just seems common sense. Also setup a us factory so you don't have to gouge us. It's not hard to see the price conversion doesn't add up and that alone makes me feel less bad printing proxy models that are well enough to play with friends.
I feel like both Games Workshop and Lego slowly forgot that children exist. lol.
Hahahaha. 100%
I remember being told Warhammer was too expensive when i was a kid and looking at catalogues of that era i'm wondering ''Was it expensive then?'' prices from the 2000 would cause everything to sellout overnight if they did that now. How were they able to do that back then with less sales, smaller international market and almost no brand recognition from ''mainstream'' but can't somehow do it now? They are too preocupied with becoming a media company perhaps and the costs of keeping that shitty WH+ service up and running.
@@LetsTalkTabletophi there
100% ... they make half hearted effort here and there ... but they have.
@@KneeCapHill Back in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s, I could save up pocket money to buy warhammer 40k models. A box of plastic space marines cost me $23. A box of 3 Rhinos cost the same. Metal dreadnoughts were $9 each for Space Marines, Orks, and Eldar, or an extra $6 if you wanted to upgrade the ork one to have two arms and two weapons. It’s not just inflation - GW has been increasing the size of their models, too, and using that to justify price increases even though they don’t add much in the way of cost. A metal Eldar Avatar that used to cost like $15 in the late ‘90s now costs $110 in plastic.
when I realised I could get a resin 3d printer for less than the cost of an army box or starter set that did it for me, had the printer delivered 2 days later & been happy ever since
I agreed that growing up in the low income class, I could never afford this hobby until I found a stable job in my early 20's after finishing school and a degree. Now I just play/paint proxy armies for fun as ever, and I just pay my friend a couple of bucks in resin, and he will print me proxies and many badass minis found on the interweb...now my children and family can enjoy the hobby without breaking our banks.
I worked in a number of independent hobby stores, and the sad truth is that the thing that was most heavily shop lifted, by FAR, was Warhammer minis. And the kids who took them were always the poorer ones. It was frankly very sad and uncomfortable to deal with. They were doing wrong by stealing, but also... they were gamer nerds, full of imagination and creativity and dreams, and they simply couldn't play with the richer kids. And this was the late 90s and 00s, so there were by far fewer alternatives if you wanted to play fantasy or sc-fi miniatures games.
Same, I just order resin minis from people around who are taking printing orders, goes WAAAAAAAAY cheaper than any GW or WIzards of the coast or any other "official" minis.
The reality is, GW has been acting like they need to milk customers are wildly as possible for years. I'm someone, like you, who has a massive collection that I've been working on for 25 years but if I look back at myself as a kid. Had GW been at modern prices, even adjusted for inflation, it would have been impossible for me to get into the hobby. How can that be a good long term business strategy?
Old World pricing has been such a shocking revelation, at least for me. With other sets they can make arguments like "new kits require more cost to make and produce because they are more detailed larger kits yadda yadda yadda" but with old world its almost entirely kits that are 25-30 years old that GW had to do 0 work to remake other than maybe remaking some molds yet these are some of the most expensive kits relatively speaking that GW has ever put out. The Brettonia starter set is $310CAD. When I was young, in 2000, the 6th edition starter set for Warhammer fantasy was $110CAD. These two kits are compatible in size and contents. Both had about 100 minis, both had dice, templates, and a book. If you adjust that $110 for inflation, it comes out to be about $180 in 2024. This means that GW's prices have nearly DOUBLED relative to what they were in 2000.
We see it over and over. Dark Vengeace was $107 in 2014. Dark Imperium was $160 in 2017. Indomitus was $199 in 2020. Leviathan was $250 in 2023. We see a consistent pattern over time of GW's prices going up faster than inflation across all product lines.
Eventually this camel's back is going to break and when it does I fear our whole hobby is going down with it. Until then GW is going to milk us for every penny. One shocker that really is an eye opener is when you think about gross margin. When people think about crazy margin they think of companies like Apple who has a wildly healthy 30% gross margin. (aka profit). GW crushes that at a whopping 41% making them one of the highest margin companies in the world outside of a few absurd elite luxury brands.
I 100% agree with you. The number of new people getting into the hobby has been dwindling at least in my local area. What will likely happen, is that GW runs itself into the ground and it's stock price drops and then they get bought out by Hasbro or a larger company. Then that's where the real fun begins! LOL
With increased expenses in shipping, storage, manufacturing, materials, wages, employee benefits, marketing costs, distributors and not only for GW but for the distributors, games shops and all the parts inbetween (the marketing landscape is *much* more diverse and costly now than back in 2000, with multiple channels, sponsordeals, influencers, ads, social media ++++) I can guarantee you that GW sees very little of that price increase, we are talking maybe a few dollars pr set in profit after all expenses have been paid - the miniature production is only a small part of that cost, and the price hike we see now is the results of *every* part of the chain increasing prices over the last couple of years. Not defensivt GW here, but this is not unique for GW, but these price increases, especially for «small» marginal products like miniature games, will continue for a while until the world market in general slows down. During the late stages of the pandemic, because of shipping container shortages, the price of a container from china went from 1200 to 6000 usd - and that’s just the container price, add to that the actual shipping price increase as well - so what we are seeing now is a result of the crazyness from the last 4-5 years of shortages and increase in demand that drive prices of services and manufacturing through the roof, which of course will hit the smaller product niches that sell relatively small amounts of product much harder than manufacturers selling products in much larger quantities
Just to add. On top of the price increase the number of models in the sets have also steadily decreased. And the latest rumor I came across is the updating of the current combat patrol boxes as the respective codex get released. Obviously getting a little shrinkflation in the process…. 🤦🏻♂️
@@AndreSjobergGet real! 😂 GW are beyond greedy shits. They have piss poor management. Terrible website. Warhammer plus leaves a lot to be desired. (I still like warhammer +) I've been all in with GW since the late 90's and things are beyond stupid.
@@AndreSjoberg Gw has incredibly healthy margins, which suggests this isn't true. Their prices are rising twice as fast as most other companies and their gross margin is nearly 50% higher than even Apple. They are absolutely enjoying this profit.
Insane is the fact that the start collecting box which included the magmadroth was $80 and the magmadroth AT THE SAME TIME was ALSO $80. Their prices are so arbitrary and inconsistent that they can’t even keep track of how much they’re artificially jacking up prices on stuff that can be clearly compared!
Sending a Magmadroth to USA and sending a Start Collecting Fyreslayers (that included Magamadroth) would be minimally different. Similar size box just a little bit of weight difference. The actual production of the plastic is pennies (excluding R&D and tooling etc.) I am no way trying to justify this.
I mean how do you make a package deal without doing this? I'm not a fan of the pricing itself but this kind of "let's bundle a few of X together and sell it at a 'discount'" thing isn't new and isn't exclusive to GW
The starter boxes have always been cheaper, and this is standard pricing across all businesses and industries. You lower the price of the commonly sold items, raise the price of the slow-moving ones. Also starting boxes are meant to... get you started? Like an entry? Imagine if the starter box was $1000 and the dragon was $10.
I think the problem is why would you buy an inferior product over one that is at the same price and worth more?
If I recall, I checked the product description of the magmadroth back when the start collecting still existed, and it actually said it included the rest of the start collecting contents as well
Edit for clarification:
This WAS the case, but since they stopped making SC boxes, they removed the additional dorfs from the box, and kept the price the same
WAY back in the days of 3rd Edition (1998-2003), GW released the Vehicle Design Rules, which allowed players to kitbash their own models for use in the game, with official stats. I ended up building a bunch of 1/35 scale 20th-century armor for my Imperial Guard army, and dressing them up to look futuristic. Not only were the models better looking and a more appropriate scale, but they were MUCH less expensive. I never looked back.
I believe that GW is really only after short term profits. They've got problems meeting demand, which have gone on for years. They're not building new production capacity. So what's their plan, raise prices? There is no long term plan. They're walking right into the 3D printing debacle, the same way Blockbuster did with Netflix.
Oooh, I had not thought the the whole Blockbuster/Netflix thing, but that is a great point.
Coming off the «high» of the increased pandemic sales increasing production capacity now, before knowing what the new normal will be the next 3-5 years would be shooting themselves in the foot - sooo many companies are stuck now with overstock from ordering increased production based on pandemic demands, only to discover now that demand is allowing down due to people going back to having less spare time. The shortages of the last 4-5 years had some *very* specific reasons, some of which are still in effect, but for a company like GW in their niche it will always be better to underproduce just a little bit, rather than meet all demands and get stuck with old stock - as for short term profit … they probably have plenty of long term plans as well as alternative plans, but the 3D printing market, large scale, isn’t there yet for abandoning a business model that still works - when profits of that part goes below a certain level it makes sense to look into selling official 3d models, or prints of 3d models - at the same time they *know* if they where to sell 3d models of their products those would be posted *everywhere* within weeks, so their plan as for now is keeping production as close to, but slightly below, market demand, making sure products are in demand and sought after - any business in this kind of niche doing something else is not doing business properly long term
They could sell 3D print files but they are greedy
@@MrJopanti They know that the moment they release 3D files of their models they will be distributed for free online within hours - it works for smaller companies that people want to support because they are «small» and «better» than GW - 3D-model sales for GW will only work if the purchase and print-process is as easy for grandparents and parents as clicking «buy» and the 3d-printer in the kitchen spots it out in 10 minutes saving a trip to the store and the model file itself is not leaving the server farm - even then somebody will find a way to leach the 3D print co-ordinates from the transfer and put it online for free, but at least GW will have the income from the larger group of purchasers who want convenience.
The art of making profit from manufacturing is to avoid creating excess products and production capacity is designed to try and make the right amount and in such a way so that the process from purchasing the raw materials to getting the customers' money into your pocket is as short as possible. Creating capacity is pointless unless you know it is for more sales. The sales are the horse and capacity the cart
The issue from my perspective is that GW has created the aftermarket by their incredibly predatory pricing model. They incent their players to go to 3D proxies because Warhammer is such an incredibly expensive hobby.
I think the biggwst problem of all companies is that they are so desperate to milk their old fanbase that they lose on new fans and this will bite them back longterm.
I got to a point with 40k in what I don't even enjoy the new edition rules and the prices are just complete madness. I started playing OPR with a couple of friends and my girl and it's enough. I buy usually alternative brands too, because having 1.500 points of imperial guard it's literally more expensive than a horse. AK and Vallejo (I'm spanish, so i'd rather buy a national brand) got nice enough paints and tools too. So i'm basically done with GW, wich feels weird because i have been partaking on WH since the early 90s, but they are not the hobby anymore, they are just a greedy corporation holding it hostage.
"more expensive than a horse" lol. That really made me laugh. But you're not wrong.
@@LetsTalkTabletop I bought a beautiful Andalusian horse in August for like 630 euros... I meant it hahahaha
I'm Swedish and I buy Vallejo and AK because they're the best. (Even though AK are a bit edgy personally, lol). There are some Citadel paints I use, mainly washes and some contrast/techincal paints which have no good equivalents from other manufacturers, but the Spanish companies simply make the best paints in the market.
I buy:
AK for Printers
Vallejo for paints
Army Painter for Speedpaints
There is no need for GW at all on that side. I'm much happier mixing the better/cheaper companies.
As a guard player it was offensive to have waited five years for a new codex and have barely five months of gameplay before a new edition.
Die hard GW enjoyers don't understand how easy it is to print an entire space marine army with very good looking STLs
But can it print Maugan Ra?
@@joriankell1983 yes, there are awesome models like h7k around, 3d printer nowadays are at mold injection level of detail... i have a minotaur marinechapter army partially printed and no one can say the d8fference between the printed ones and the orginal. i sculpted them myself with zbrush...
The company I work for has gotten itself into a similar situation. For the past 5 years, they have been only looking at improving profit rates, despite all the calamities in the world, and they thought all is well. Then they realized as they were taking a look at the sales numbers, that the company was making more and more money with less and less products sold, because of the price hikes. Management has now realized that this is unsustainable, and now they are investing as much as possible into product development, logistics improvement, customer research to figure out ways to improve actual sales numbers instead of hiking the prices even further. And sometimes sales even does some heavy discounts too, in order to lure more customers in.
I think this phenomena is the case for a lot more companies, including GW, than we would have originally thought for. Here is hoping that they will eventually realize their mistake when looking at the dropping sales numbers, and begin to course correct... eventually. There isn't much else we can do, other than voting with out wallets here.
I 100% agree with everything you're saying. The problem is that people, and especially gamers have really poor impulse control and they will just continue paying these exorbitant prices until they have to mortgage their house or live on the street.
I took a step back from Warhammer because I didn't have anyone to play with and I was getting tired of constant Space Marine releases when other armies needed a face lift in 8e/9e. I thought I about getting back into it so I can have something do with painting the minis, and the pricing increased $20-60 across the board. I immediately went "Yeah, not happening."
I fear that will be more and more the case as the prices rise.
honestly i have just been printing armies at this point haha
I had gotten into the hobby right as Covid hit...watched a box of skitarii rangers go from $35-$60 in the course of 3 years. Also, with things like Age of Sigmar, a lot of models are still resin/ finecast and sold at an exhuberant price. Half of my Beasts of Chaos army was 3D printed simply because the sculpts looked better and less goofy lol!
Not to mention the cost of ''rules'' and other various books is flat out a bad investment since they become obsolete in a matter of months. They never miss a chance to make their customer base feel cheated and taken for a ride.
ive started collecting in 6th edition when a 10 man box of guardsmen was 22.50 Euro .. now its 45 :D
Hey good video. The demographic shift that you mention is something a lot of people overlook. Look at Harley Davidson. For the longest time, the average age of a Harley buyer increased by about a year every single year. That meant that no new people are becoming Harley riders. And every year a crop of Harley buyers put away the bikes for good. If GW isint growing, it’s dying. If people are playing Rogue Trader or Total War:Warhammer fantasy, very very few are going to actually buy a box of minis when a single box cost more than the that got them interested in the miniature game, and a full army costs more than the computer they played it on.
this is why they're pivoting to tv shows, licensing etc. they've been short sighted in not trying to licence AAA games over the last decade. Imagine if Skyrim had've been set in the old world? They wouldn't even need the miniature games anymore. If GW are going to survive they need to start seriously looking beyond the models.
@@paulyg405 They have been trying to license it out..... they're just really really bad at it. For every 1 serviceable WH video game, theres 3 more that no one has heard of, or cared about (even within the fan base). The fact they haven't had a slam dunk action game yet is beyond mortal comprehension. 40k has a decent potential of genre options it can succeed in; but so far its strongest titles are 3 RTS games, 2 L4D clones, 2 X-com-like if you count Rouge Trader being unusually popular. I didn't even know there was a Space Marine 1 until I heard about Space Marine 2. And whats concerning is how that game feels like its half a decade late to the Gears of War train.
So quality control was a problem, marketing was always a problem, and even if they somehow get past those 2 hurdles, their timing up until this point has been horrible. Never quite able to hit at just the right time, for maximum impact.
As for passive media, like TV and movies.... they basically destroyed their strongest assets with Fan productions, and tried to pay wall it for themselves. As much as I think the DnD movie was botched, at least Hasbro invested in a proper production. But what I think was even more concerning with GW, is how the fan productions were on a level rarely seen (even in independent films), and they didn't think to leverage that interest to get a commercial production off the ground. If the fans were putting out that level of quality, imagine what a fully funded movie studio could accomplish?
So now our biggest kernel of hope is Henry Cavill, hot off the heels of ditching the Witcher, because "that" production team went south. Now we just have get past Amazon not doing something stupid, and we MIGHT get a 40k movie with a proper foot hold for the rest of the franchise to grow from.
Never buy direct from GW,you can always get awesome proxies or other retailers reducing prices on GW stuff.
@@freelancerthe2561The rumour mill seems to say that the reason they have failed so hard with video games is not wanting to let other companies have much creative freedom, plus being too tight to invest properly in it. Kinda also why I think they've been short sighted, it isn't even really just about the relative low quality of the games they have put out, they don't seem to realise the advertising potential of decent games for their brand. It's almost like they think that if they invest in the brand, they'll lose a few sales of intercessors or something because fans were buying the games instead. I had a really long break from the hobby after school and I was shocked to discover how little had changed since I'd stopped playing, once a friend finally lured me back in. And in all those years, 40k was pretty much invisible. I never saw it anywhere unless I was flipping through a white dwarf at the shop. In those years, if they'd come out with a truly slam dunk game I would've been back in the hobby like that afternoon. It's ridiculous! They're sitting on a gold mine with their IPs. They need to bring in some talent from outside the business at a management level.
Most of the ideas they have had since just before Covid have been terrible as well. Like you mention, shutting down and paywalling fan productions (literal millions of views on YT) and Warhammer + .. dumbest idea ever, who wants to pay for another streaming service just locked to their content, when their models and rules are already way overpriced? Fans can only afford so much.
As far as Henry goes, I have a lot of respect for him but I reckon you couldn't get worse timing for the launch of a TV/Movie franchise for 40k. Modern cultural/political sensibilities don't suit GW's IPs. Other people have said it better, but my concern is that 40k is like an ultra violent Japanese cartoon from the 80s and that kind of subject matter will just not fly, Amazon execs would baulk at a universe in which an arguably sadistic, fascist/theocratic regime is the best humanity can do. Especially when the main prop to keep the regime running are a bunch of genetically engineered MALE super soldiers whose job is to uncritically murder anything that gets in the way of humanity's assumed right to dominate the stars. I think people are too dumb to appreciate the nuance behind ideas like that these days. It's also un-PC now to make content aimed at boys/men that leans in to things that boys have traditionally liked. After all, 40k is pretty much a modern interpretation of the kind of bombastic war stories our grandfathers would have read as kids. So whatever comes out at the end of this production process, I just don't think even Mr Cavill is mighty enough to make sure it doesn't turn out as awful as most franchise IP stuff has over the last few years.
I don't get why they don't just sell stl files for oop minis
I have three Plague Crawlers. One GW two 3D printed. I could afford all three to be GW… but Nurgle is all about been sick and twisted not been uniform and identical and having three completely different styles looks amazing together.. also I prefer the 3D ones! One has all eyeballs and tentacles!
I now own a 3d printed rogal dorn tank! And it doesnt even have a massive hole in the underside :D
@@wurstsalatplays523 The forbidden pasta holder
I’m sure if games workshop just lowered their prices they would make so much more money with people buying their plastic crack. But idk if they can do that with how much and how long things stay out of stock
Yeah the restocking has been really bad in recent years.
It's crazy how they don't realize that having discounts drives sales. Having a loyalty program perhaps? I spend upwards of hundreds buying from their online shop. Toss customers a bone. You think not making me pay 5$ for shipping is gonna affect my expenses ? Look at any other retail platform. Have seasonal sales, have a christmass sale on stuff, discount units that sell less than others. But you know what they do? They cram their unsold shit into ''combat patrol'' boxes and if something isn't selling enough they just change the rules for 6 months so people who play competitively buy it. Then they change the rules again and that's what happens EVERY SINGLE TIME. Just look at Votan.
100% spot on.. I hate seeing it.. but clearly GW is ignoring the lessons that were displayed by Blockbuster ignoring Netflix.
I just worry about the outcome in the end ...
@@LetsTalkTabletop Warhammer will always live on.
@@LetsTalkTabletop warhammwr/40k will never die.
I've been cobbling together a Death Korps army for about 8 months.
Picked up Steel Legion - Made to Order in April 2023. 2 full squads, one full heavy weapons team (Las Cannons), and a Lieutenant for $185
(Steel Legion were the original models for Death Korps in 3rd edition)
My girlfriend was kind enough to pick up a plastic Death Korps "Veteran Guardsmen" squad for my birthday in September, 5 of which I intend to use as my command team, or to forgo the command team and just run them as a full ten man squad of Death Korps.
In addition she got me the Ogryn squad ($55) which I will run as a 3 Ogryn Ripper Gun team, or the single Nork Deddog, to go with a metal female Commissar from Games Day 1998 ($25 eBay price)
I picked up a single Leman Russ tank for $65 in October, and a set of Atillan Rough Riders on Amazon for $55 in November.
(Converted with some Death Korps adjacent heads)
All fine and dandy yes?
$185 - Steel Legion
$51 - Veteran Guardsmen
$55 - Bullgryns
$25 - Commissar
$65 - Leman Russ
$55 - Atillan Rough Riders
$436 for my current force, not including sales tax. Its not even 1000 points. For that I'll need a hell of a lot more infantry squads, or perhaps elites. But since I'm running Death Korps, and Forge World prices are insane, I need to be smart.
The obvious answer is mechanized vehicles. Sentinels, and Chimera's specifically. To allow my force to move up the board at speed and take some damage without being creamed.
My conundrum: Chimera's are $60 a pop, and I need at least two, and Sentinels are $45.
I want to run a full team of 3 Sentinels for firepower and maximum point usage.
To even out my force to 1000 points I still need to spend $255, a little over half of what I've put in already, in other words complete insanity. I've spent less on my Sisters of Battle and Firstborn Space Marine armies combined.
Here comes Etsy and alternative 40k model companies to the rescue.
I can buy two resin Chimera's for 44 GBP with free shipping ($56) - so two Chimera's for a little less then the price of one on the GW site.
And in addition I can get a set of three Sentinels for $55 on Etsy.
Instead of spending $691 on a full thousand points, I'll have spent $547
$441 if you only count the things personally paid for, and not the gifts I received.
I could have paid even less If I had found Death Korps proxies that I enjoyed, however I am a sucker for old school minis and the GW Death Korps look in of itself, so here we are. The point is, 3D printing is a wonderful alternative for those looking to get into the game system without having to pay close to $1000 just to have a seat at the table.
I and my girlfriend have spent $436 on 49 models piecemeal, and its not even a full army yet. Meanwhile I just spent $276 on The Old World starter box for Bretonnia, which comes with 76 models (1250 points), a rulebook, dice, templates, and those little whippy plastic measuring sticks.
Its no secret where GW wants you to spend your money, because owing to their dodgy pricing system, $276 is a steal compared to buying everything separate.
Games Workshop is always expensive, but you went for the super premium army! LOL. Steel legion has been notoriously expensive compared to the other factions.
@@LetsTalkTabletop XD
I only picked up one set of Steel Legion, as I said XD
And to be fair, they were cheaper then buying eBay. But again; that’s mostly due to GW prices.
It’s mind boggling how they insist on printing/updating the golden boys only, and barely give the other regiments the time of day.
Vostroyan, Valhallan, Mordian, Praetorian…
I know plastic kits would cost a lot up front, so why don’t they release rough equivalents to the patrol boxes with classic minis mixed with modern plastic vehicles?
Imagine a vostroyan combat patrol with a sentinel or two. People would scoop it up without question.
For Imperial Guard players I always suggest looking into Wargames Atlantic for Infantry if you don't care about tournaments. Half the price for twice the bodies in plastic and a lot of bits left over.
@@luketfer I like wargames Atlantic, but they don’t stock Death Korps models specifically. The les grognard kits are flexible, but the bits don’t reflect what I’m aiming for.
not if you print scans
What confuses me is GW strategy to get new players in. What is little Timmy gonna tell his mom? I need this +$250 box which isn't assembled. Or painted. Isn't even a complete army. Or include terrain. Or rules. Or include your opponent.
Last time I played warhammer youngest guy was 30ish years old.
Dad's are the only one who can afford.
Killteam is cheaper but still eye watering.
The closest value bang for your buck is the combat patrols, not all of them for sure, but GW plastic with standardized GW designs. Outside of picking up hard to get spare unit or centerpiece model, there isn't any value to buying from GW website. The last GW purchase I made that I felt was worth it's actual price was a squad of stealth suits for my tau. Every other purchase I've made since them, retail price, has been actually breaking the bank. Single model characters starting at 40 dollars, and decent hard signature units 80-100+ dollars has made me firmly into the secondary market. They've priced me out a long time ago. There is way too many options and game systems to be firmly locked into the games workshop environment.
So is Disney, you dont see them stopping the shenanigans
Yeah, but that can't last forever. All they do is keep tanking
Inflation in Australia right now is crazy and $95 AUD for THREE Eradicators is insane.
HOLY COW
The problem isn't even the price, it's the amount you have to buy to play a reasonable game. $60 for the rule book, $60 your Codex and then $300-$500 for a 1k army (plus painting) is a lot compared to most other games I have looked at or played, even when GW is charging less per mini, to say nothing of getting a second person going.
Battletech is cheaper for the main rules, and the starter box has enough minis for 2 'standard' forces and you can get both for less than the cost of a Combat Patrol.
Looking at Warmachine mkIV, you can get most, if not all of the equivalent to a 2k army for less than $400, and the rules are completely free.
And both of those games are made in such a way that they are very proxy friendly (Battletech actively encourages it), unlike 40k's true line of sight.
Well said.
not just the price of the miniatures, the price of books to start playing too. They lied us this edition saying they will be at least one free list to play. They are erasing the free one with each army codex launch. So at the end, it was not free. And the fact that inside codexes there's no new combat patrols or anything make me thing that "this edition will be more accessible with ways to play cheaper" was just a marketing campaign to sell the new edition and not a real commitment.
I'm honestly shocked that people still buy the books in great numbers considering Wahapedia exists.
Australia is 431 dollars for the old world boxes which i feel is a much more intimating price just from the sound alone
INSANE!
Aaaaaaand it’s $578 in NZ
It's like they don't realize there's people selling them for cheaper on eBay. it's literally that simple. They have become their own worst competitor.
I know mate. The price of Horus version 1 or 2 is absolute BS. Plus there's that tank for a whopping $1249 but it's only half that price on the UK store. Plus another one for $789. Not to mention the Leviathan box set. I wouldn't touch GW stuff with a ten metre pole. Etsy ftw.
GW should embrace 3d printing and print on demand. Put 5 printers in stores and have them run them themselves.
Everytime this comes up, I can't help but think it'll be STC cartridges you have to insert, and it'll self destruct after X number of prints, so you have to keep buying cartridges as form of on-brand DRM.
@@freelancerthe2561 it's not like they are asking for little money as it is. They'll be more than happy to burden the customer with any costs
100 GB = $126.33 on 4 February 24 ,
then look at GW's mark up charged US which makes up to 60% of over all sales
GW sending plastic by 1st class seating on passenger airlines ?
Local hobby stores are GW's warehouses
After years playing MtG and years of videos about how MtG is supposedly dying, I was expecting a "old man yells at clouds" video. But this was actually very well thought of and interesting. You're making a solid point from a business point of view, and I'm sure that this will be one of GW's board major topic in the upcoming years.
The thing is, though, for an MTG player the costs aren't accelerating unless you engage in the money printing machine that is arena. For a casual modern deck I spend about $100, just like I used to spend about $100 a decade ago. For a competitive deck its more like $500.
For GW the costs are increasing by about double the rate of inflation. 10 years ago you could have built 1.5 armies for what it costs to build one now.
Thank you alex! I am definitely not a Games Workshop hater, but everyone reaches a point where the prices are just too much.
All very valid points, I fear that we are seeing the rapid failing of the company. And raising prices just makes it quicker of a fall.
Mtg isn't dying, but it's certainly not what it was originally about imo. But GW is doing the same thing. Money money money. Who cares about the reason why the game itself exists
when i was a kid i bought a box of 30 space marines and it was 20$, thats 50$ in todays money but it was 30 customizable mini, now for 50$ you get 10
Yeah they are definitely increasing the prices far faster than inflation would suggest
So much of GW stuff has been scanned to and released into the wild. Hypothetically, if you have a decent printer, one could create a 1to1 40k army for the price of the resin. Like it or not, GW is fu£ked.
23 years, 8 armies for 40K, 2 BFG fleets, 11 epic 40K armies...and 11 or so other game systems i actively play not related to games workshop. i have not bought a new model from GW since i picked up some aeronautica to add to my epic armies back when it first was released. nor would i given the prices now (i thought it was spendy when i paid $45 for my land raider crusader new, now it is at last check-$110-NOPE!) I do not need GW anymore. especially since we have a large group of like minded players at the FLGS who hate current 40K and enjoy playing house 5th ed 40K. the 3d printing stuff is just icing on the cake. the prices are reasonable and many of the model designers do a better aesthetic job than what GW is currently producing.
No one should feel bad about enjoying their hobby in a way they enjoy and feel is sustainable.
I understand that sentiment and on one hand I agree with you, on the other hand you have to support things like your local store or your favorite game or they may not be around anymore. It's such a fine line to tread, especially when one of your favorite games makes it less and less possible for you to support them.
Is there an alternative? Somebody who create a new sci fi like warhammer 40k franchise? I would buy and paint it... (but it should have some kind of space marines and nice LORE if possible)
I think your closest option would be mantics dead zone or warpath. That is their version of necromunda and 40K respectively. Their prices are typically 60 to 70% of what gws is. But their model quality isn't quite as high.
@LetsTalkTabletop ypu can support thrm with paints, accessories, etc
Actually, being that my local store does not offer any discounts on these ridiculous prices, I support the store by buying hobby supplies just like you suggested. I buy a paint or two every single week I go in there and occasionally I'll buy a kit. It's a good suggestion! We can't forget about the local stores.
I used to own my own store and I remembered how "expensive" i used to think GW figs were 20 years ago. There are some finer detail figures I will splurge and get from GW because the plastic holds up better should the figure get dropped vs. resin models, but generally Id rather bulk out my forces with resin printed stuff at this time from an initial box set than pony up $1000 to finish out rank and file guys for my army. I agree with all of your points. Its also likely why GW wants to push the IP ends with books, Warhammer TV and Prime TV/Movie deals instead of just little plastic men.
Thanks. To be honest I think that is their future. Hold on to the IP and charges for rules with their miniatures being secondary for their bottom line.
Maximising profits before they fold.
That's exactly what I think as well
Good video. You didn't even mention that after spending that money on models, which I have, GW expects you to turn around and spend hundreds on the rules and tools to play the game for 3 years.
Yeah that's why they are wearing me out. LOL
Hmmmm, 3d printing is also impacting Historical gaming. So, it`s not just GW. It`s gonna fuck up so many companies.
Oh, that sounds bad. I have no hate towards historicals.
Good talk. I'm a long time warhammer player starting OPR and 3D printed models for all the reasons you listed. You've earned a sub.
Awesome, thank you!
That ridge runner looks like something I could pick up at the toy aisle at Wal-Mart and kitbash. I've been doing a lot of kitbashing. Orks are a great faction where I can junkball stuff like stompas and gargants scale to Titanicus and BattleTech.
Yeah you definitely could, although admittedly I have a very brightly colored paint scheme that makes it look like a toy as well.
The tipping point is coming soon
I agree with you
Raging Heroes for example, started as a physical minis company, but when they saw the rise of 3D printing (and the fact that many of the sculptors that worked for them started making their own Patreon, like Artisan Guild), they made their own Patreon and MMF pages, and started selling STLs.
If GW is smart, they will make an online store for STLs. But they think they're un-demolishable. Reminds me of how Blizzard thought that the MOBA style wouldn't draw in the gamers, and when they woke up and released Heroes of the Storm, it couldn't compete against LoL and DotA 2 because it came too late.
i am currently printing an entire tyrranid army
Haha. Here's a question though, do you have any remorse about it at all? Is this your first and only army? Or have you already spent tons of money with gw?
When I got in the game Land Raiders were 2 to a box and Rhinos were 3 to a box...
Wow, I didn't even know that was a thing
FYI if GW goes under your rule books still work. You can still play your games without GW emptying your wallet.
100%. I think a lot of people forget that.
It will be better because the book you buy won't be invalidated 2 months later by an online rules/points update.
I wanted to play GW games, saw prices and realised I can afford 1 warband.
Then local game group introduced me to OPR :)
I don't own 3d printer, I just buy minis from other games and make warbands. And it is still cheaper. Huge plus for me is that I can make minis I like and find rules for them. Or just make my own as last resort.
That's exactly what I do with Brutality Skirmish Wargame. Buy whatever models I want and use them instead of being shackled to a single miniature provider.
Great video. This message bodes well for the future of 3d print model based gaming.
Couldn't agree more!
Ya know, if GW was smart, they'd embrace 3d printing and switch from selling plastic models to licensed printer files. I know it's not that cut and dry, but I bet they could do it and still come out on top while making everything more affordable.
Games workshop is a corporation. If people atop buying from them worst thing that happens is they get bought out or sell the WH IP, in that case the new company can lower prices or face the same fate
the more they hike prices the more they are going to push people to find more cost effective alternatives and with the rise of 3d printing and it becoming cheeper and more acceptable in the community , thats were people will go .Lets also note that the ability to make new Models with 3D desighn packages is also on the increase so model making is becoming less of a nich skill set . If they dont change their pricing policy there will be a growing trend for people to go the 3d path. People obviously still like playing the game however there is another nock on , the less models they produce because people are going elseware could impact the cost effectivness of producing the kit , making them more expensive to make and lowering profit margins , GW will find itself in an ever worsening possition / cycle . They need to lower the prices down to increase sales , increase production and cost effectiveness and also reduce the appeal/ need for people to go elseware to play GW games. Its either that or they will need to change their business model to reflect the fact that model sales will not be as big a part of its activities.
There's a lot of people that simply don't see what we're saying. I think it's short-sighted.
As a guy that lives near Nottingham and goes to whw frequently I agree I hardly spend in there other than paints or eating in bugmans it's really expensive especially forge world so for people living in the states having to pay shipping etc alot of people are going to turn to 3d prints.
and their FW kits are rubbish to boot.
I started 20 years ago when I was 13. Now I have 14 armies for 40k, 4 armies for Old World. And I'm close on quitting all things GW-related. The prices are just unjustifiable.
I don't think we are alone in that sentiment.
The pricing and blatant greed of Games Workshop is what has made me decide to not support them in any way
Can't blame you for that.
I've been collecting GW minis since I was 10, which was in the late 80s. My local hobby store literally had a bin full of random GW figures, all in pewter, which they sold for 50 pence each. Back then a character model in a blister pack would have been about 3.99 which was about what a Happy Meal cost back then.
I have not bought a GW model though since the day I got married. I can't justify the cost.
I completely understand your point of view. It gets harder and harder to justify it to any spouses. LOL
I have a strong feeling GW is trying to get as much money as possible right now, make deals to get them into popculture consciousness ASAP, then sell the company at a high price before the chumps who bought it realise it will fall apart in 2 years. My hunch.
Well said, I really do think they're trying to do that. I think they see the 3D printing has the writing on the wall for them. So they're going to crank up the prices and make as much money as they can to make the business look good and then try to sell it to Hasbro or somebody. And you 100% right about collapsing 2 years after the purchase. I follow a lot of business news and things like that, and it's alarming how little research these investment companies do on the corporations they buy. Then they are left holding the bag.
I remember battle of macragge was like 50€, basic troops 30€, heroes 15€, monsters and veichles 40-50€ and detachments (today's equivalent of start collecting) were 75€, but had loads of miniature inside.
Now everything costs double when you're lucky, if you're not a turnament player though you don't need gw mins, because there are so many beautiful minature that don't infringe on copyright that can be printed.
Too true!
I do agree. Its getting ridiculus. I am a single man in my early 30's so I can buy myself a plastic soliders. The thing is I just paid the cost of monthly student accomodation (in PLN I am from Poland) for 20 plastic toy soliders (4x Adepta Sororitas Seraphim Squads). I think that the Adepta Sororitas will be my last army full in GW plastic, and I will just start to print. My friend got himself a 3D printer. He printed all of his Tau Battlesuits, that would have cost near the price of a week summer vacation abroad :0. Plus I cannot even imagine, the teen getting in this hobby.
Get a printer. It will boost your hobby in ways you can't imagine. It's not so much the cost as the freedom to customize and get the exact look you want for whatever crazy project you can think of. The file selection is simply vast out there, so many talented sculptors working through Patreon, Tribes and other store fronts.
Well, if they stopped trying to destroy their own Fandom by destroying the heritage and legacy of the warhammer universe, then they would have secured more longevity because then it would be more about the game and franchise itself rather than just the miniatures. If the fans are left with nothing other than just the miniatures then they are more interested in other options.
Vote with your dollar. Most Proxies look as good or better than GW. They are multipose, they usually come with extra bits if you ask the seller, and they are usually a reasonable price.
I'm leaning more and more that way all of the time. And I know a lot of other people are. GW will eventually figure it out I guess.
I mean I think GW is going to go on as a miniature company for the next 10 years; but the future could indeed be for GW to shifting to be to a multimedia company, with 40k video games, series, movies (cf. Cavill-Amazon etc)
I recently got back into WH. I played it a bot back in the 90's with Second Edition (such cool models).
I was shocked when I saw how much everything costed. I actually started looking at perhaps buying a printer since it would probably be less expensive in the long run.
That's really sad cause I'd love to buy the real deal but just don't have the money since my three kids also want to play and have their own armies. 😅
3D printing is keeping OOP GW system alive, kicking and even flourishing as fan led communities have taken 'ownership'
I'm watching this as i'm slicing my next full build plate of models for my friends. Excellent recommendation AI.
I can print a whole baneblade out full sized with weapon options for about 30 dollars of resin. and still have a little left for a squad of guardsmen. So far ive printed about 8 leman russ tanks, 3 baneblades an unknown and ungodly amount if infantry and ither weird stuff. I still buy some GW stuff of course but most of my collection is 3d printed now. I dont hate ge either i grew up with gw and want them to succeed but i cannot afford theor prices anymore.
i play warhammer 40k since 2012 and in 2020 because of the pandemic i brought a 3d printer since no shop was shipping miniatures for me in that moment. and from 2020 to 2022 was the best hobby time of my life. i 3d printed epic. i dreamed of having epic scale miniatures. i printed for myself barely all the factions for warmaster. it is so good, i gifted whole 8mm scale army to my friends and stuff. it was awesome.
One of my biggest hurdles to 3d printing (besides it being a bit of a pain in the ass) is that you can't play it with printed models at the warhammer store.
Then the store manager lets us know that we can't really hang out at the store as much anymore because he wants to focus more on recruitment and he needs space for intro games...
oookaaay...
Yeah that really sucks if that's your local store. Fortunately for me I don't play at a GW store. But even some independent stores are like that as well.
@@LetsTalkTabletop i do understand the argument that they want you to play with stuff they sell, but it still sucks.
I have a 3d printer and print poxies for GW models all the time. The one problem I have with etsy is that they don't always have the sculptor's permission to sell the models. Someone put some time and effort into creating the sculpt so I think they should be compensated
Absolutely! I had not considered that some people on Etsy may be doing it illegally. Although I'm not sure how I would verify that. You are fine with 3D printer proxies, but would you be fine with someone completely printing their entire army for warhammer? Where do you draw the line?
@@LetsTalkTabletop The dark side of printing services isn't them pirating GW designs, it's them pirating the proxies of small creators. Knowing if they are is hard part, but if you get into the printing/design community, there are a lot of big Discords servers where people do bring up sculpts they've seen pirated on Etsy, Teemu, Alibaba and the like to the attention of the sculptor. And that's a line of separation between dedicated "print bros" and people like you who seem leery of printing - the people who print themselves are in touch with the printing scene and its creators and care about them. People just slumming on Etsy are the ones taking money from small businesses to get a cheap proxy with no effort or research.
And yes, I would be completely fine with printing an entire Warhammer army. And I have. GW is a huge public company who have long since stopped caring about the product they make, instead simply trying to squeeze as much money as they can from the existing customer base short term. I love Warhammer, but having loyalty to a company which does not care about that or making a good product line with the intent to create a stable long term product landscape is... a choice I guess. If GW has created an environment in which people are fine with buying large amounts of pirated products, that's a problem they have created for themselves. I'm not going to support a company for being bad at creating a sustainable business. I would love to give them my money for minis, but since I can get products that are superior and cheaper to play a tabletop game with, why should I not get them? Supply and demand rules. My demand is to play games. I can do that with GW rules or any rules I want. GW can own IP of images and such, but they can't own me playing a game in my home and calling it a Warhammer game. How I get the models and rules to get my Warhammer experience is something they can affect by offering me a product which supplies my demand. If some little digital craft goblins working part time doing digital sculpts of writing community rules sets fulfill that demand I have of Warhammer better, that's GW's problem, not mine.
As so often is said, it's premium hobby, a luxury, not an essential service. It's a product for pleasure, it satisfies imagination, creativity and camaraderie among players and fans. These are qualities of experience which the products satisfy, not the other way around. As in, GW does not sell us the pleasure, creativity and camaraderie, we use the products to satisfy these. If their business model does not supply us with what we need to fulfill our desires as customers, why should we have loyalty to the company? It has shown its utter disinterest in being loyal to our needs. GW has chosen a purely cut throat, transactional relationship to its customer base, so I really have a hard time understanding objections to treating them the same way back.
I bought a couple of printed models because they were no longer available at my country. 6 month into the hobby.
GW will start lowering prices or not increasing them more because of 3D printing. Right now the demand is greater than their model produccion , this its why then can charege a lot more.
They are also going to move a lot more into movies in the future
I completely agree. They're going to have to do something about it or they're going to lose everything.
I feel like GW has a competitive advantage due to the vast world building it has done over the last 4 decades. They are 'the premium' miniature seller (as far as I know) and are at the moment probably in some what of a golden age of wargaming. They have seen a massive uptake of TT wargaming (COVID, PC gaming being made less accessible due to crypto driving up GPU prices) and general acceptance of 'the hobby' in general.
I'd argue that *currently* the 3D printing trend works in their favour. People buy the majority of their kit from GW and print only as a supplement to their GW purchases. As the quality and accessibility of printers improves and the gap between what GW produces and 3rd party products diminishes.... Well I think they might find themselves in the reverse of the current situation.
Case in point: when is the last time someone you know purchased any GW terrain? It's peripheral, non essential, 3D printer go BRRRRRRR!!!!
The other element that will accelerate this is removal of their competitive advantage. I.e. tamper too heavily with the lore and/or compromise artistic development and drive away long term supporters. The backstory may seem like fluff to the initiated, fair enough. However...
If you are going to charge a premium for your product you need a point of differentiation (or one hell of a marketing dept...)That differentiation used to be quality of miniatures, not being able to be replicated by small business due to capital required to design and produce.
That's out the window. So the lore & 'goodwill' (brand recognition) is all that's left.
I'd be very surprised if this issue does not have pride of place at most strategy meetings within GW. What I would be surprised to hear is that they have even the slightest idea how to tackle it!
TLDR: GW charge too much, interest rates up, blackrock & vanguard piss people off regularly, neckbeards be spiteful and technically adept, in 2025/26 3D printer go BRRRRRRR & GW go uuuurrrrrggghhhhh....
Even in the ass end of the world (AKA Australia 🦘🌏) 3D printers get here faster than GW releases. And if you think the US has a rough time with international mark ups, CRICKEY!!! Mate are you fair dinkum? Their mark up is as bad as the ozone layer down here.
Also I checked last night after the current social media debacle initiated by GW RE: Custodes and saw that I could buy a 12 or 14k resin printer for less than 2 tanks for the custodes. Or buy them for 1/4 of the price from local recast sellers.
Up until they decided to gaslight fans and take the edge off of the setting I was in your boat 'i pay GW prices today, so I can have a game to play tomorrow'. Since then i've cancelled my AUD$80+ book and my AUD$16.99/month WH+ sub, set wahapedia to my home page on chrome, signed up to 3D printer tutorials on youtube and PayPal payin4 took care of the rest.
I also sold my GW tool set on FB marketplace and replaced it with Tamiya tools and products that are higher quality but 1/2 the price.
And for anyone new starting out. For the love of God. DO NOT waste money on GW brushes. Winsor & Newton Cotman 111 series. You'll thank me later.
I think when it swings, it's going to be very, very fast. Way faster than GW can react to market conditions. The reason is, GW is really pushing the competitive side of things. Competitive gamers will walk in and buy a whole new army because a new codex just came out and put that army at the top of the meta. Competitive gamers don't really care too much about models. They're just playing pieces. They're the price of entry. The majority I've seen will slap down an army they threw together the night before, mold lines everywhere, a drybrush and some contrast if the tournament requires painted models, and that's it.
A lot of tournaments are perfectly fine with 3d printed models and if they're not, people are going to start organizing their own tournaments that are. Nobody can stop them. When the critical mass hits of a few tournament winners running 3d printed armies for a fraction of the cost of what everyone else spent, it's done. GW can tweak all the FAQs they want and release all the overpowered codexes they want. They're not going to be making a dime off it. And there isn't an army of lawyers big enough to shut down every seller on Etsy that they think infringes. By the time they wake up, it'll be done. And then we'll be looking at Hasbro-Warhammer.
The big issue is that Games Workshop sees regular profits year over year that are well beyond their operating costs. They don't NEED to increase their prices to make money, but it's the classic issue with capitalism. They're a publicly traded stock based company, so they need to show ever increasing profits year over year, and because of the point they've priced themselves to, it's impossible to show those profits without simply further increasing their prices to milk their established player base. It's difficult for GW to draw in new customers because the barrier to entry is simply so high for a lot of their games.
The argument that GW is a big company and thus has greater expenses is an enormous logical fallacy, because as economies of scale provide, the greater the scale of your production the less and less labour and cost of material factors into the overall pricing of your product. It's the reason why McDonalds can sell a Cheeseburger for $1.99, when it would usually cost you double that to make a cheeseburger at home yourself, the normally cost effective method. The more of something you make, the less you have to spend relative to your sales on production.
By all logic, GW should actually be able to price themselves significantly lower than a private etsy based maker and still make a profit, because of the law of economies of scale. They simply don't because of the profit motive inherently necessary within a capitalist system. It's an ironically wildly dystopian issue with modern society that 40K as a universe is supposed to parody, but instead GW has become the very thing that they intended to parody with their universe.
100%. Economically they should be in the position to be the Walmart of miniatures companies. They lead the market, and by reducing their prices they could actually cut out many of the smaller companies who couldn't compete.
What are the sources you guys are looking at for profit? Just curious. Are they actually crushing it, or is the media and licensing what's floating them?
@@horselats according to Games Workshop's own investor reports, their annual revenue has been increasing by about 40-50 million GBP or Great British Pounds each year. In 2023 they saw 470 million GBP annual revenue, while in 2024 they saw 525 million.
You bring up some Valud points. The price hikes ofate have been eye watering. I personally have focused more on battletech in the last 3-4 years and going on to GW's website I was shocked at the prices as they were no longer normalised to me.
Ive been super interested in WH40K. I absolutely adore the setting, I play games in the setting, I consume an insane amount of WH40K content. The pricing for the minis terrifies me so much I just dont see it as something Im going to get into.
If you keep raising your prices, sales will always go up. Until they start going down.
100%
Nice vid. As a terrain maker full-time, I am torn between
"Quit making physical product because 3D printing"
Then when I think about 3D printing -
"AI will make all human designers redundant"
I wish I was gen X or something, AI is terrifying for creative jobs.
Well as someone who has been a GW “supporter” since the beginning (have my 1st ed Warhammer fantasy, 1st edition WH 40k rogue trader rule book, both Realms of Chaos books) still have numerous armies (and gave away or sold countless armies to friends or others) and still have many citadel rogue trader minis in my armies and a bunch of oop minis packed away…….. anyone interested.
What I will say is GW has always been on the high end in miniature prices since they were usually the pinnacle of miniatures (even back in the rogue trader days) compared to other Mini companies of the time. That being said there biggest problem is a lot of their minis are “dated” (old world min the case) (personally I’d buy everything that comes out for their prices even overpriced except most of those minis are sculpts from 15+ years ago) and even some of their newer stuff is dated out of the box. Personally I think GW has “lost their edge” in mini sculpture most everything is computer generated sculptures and it shows……… just my two cents………
Everyday their competition grows, between other companies and printers. I agree with you.
Currently, I will 3D print any model that I can not get my hands on the kit locally.
That's a solid middle ground.
as a commissioned miniature painter of 20 + years, i always try to persuade my customers to pick up cheaper tabletop games. gw's main ambition is to brand their products as luxury items. so you get the luxury brand price tag.
luxury products are not meant for the middle class, just to put that across the least harsh as possible.
Haha, that's actually a really interesting perspective on it.
I've just got a 3D printed Skaven team with over 20 models, including 3 Rat Ogres, plus a Troll, for about £30 and the models are really nice. I think the GW team with 12 models is £35 (or £25 from discount retailers), so yeah they are expensive. They were relatively expensive in the 90's too, when I worked for them
I've been into 40K since 2001. I've loved 40K for most of that time (took a few years off) and this latest round of price increases has been too much. I'm going 3rd party and playing other games now.
I moved to Horus Heresy when 2.0 came out. That entire community is a lot more open to 3D printing than the 40K crowd. It's been great to not have to buy things at an inflated price. Plus, I can try things out before I maybe purchase them as well.
Yep, HH gang represent. For historical reasons it has a lot of older players, and since the game originally was a side project by some true creative types it's a lot more interesting. And since the models were initially FW, people just accepted re-casts and prints because those prices were ridiculous back then. Nowadays, GW plastic is approaching old FW prices though...
Pretty sure everyone in 40k is open to 3d printing since the speculation on minis has become apparent to everyone. The prices have never been worse but at least minis were getting cleaner (less and less mould lines and crisper detail) and more raffined. But the way they are charging for minis that are 30 and 20 years old makes it really hard to justify. They are putting an end to scalping by doing the scalping themselves
Hello! Path chosen by GW is really unreasonable. I understand when they deleting scans of their original sculpts, but they also blocking authors with their own designs, which were only inspired by GW. And prices of new boxes are really insane. I suppose, that new lines and new sculpts for old ones will be much more pricey, then we have now. I own three 3d printers and even started to kitbash my own minis on my laptop. It gives me more motivation and feeling of success, cause I made unique things. Best wishes for you and yours family. (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧
Thanks for chiming in! Happy New Year!
The ability to be able to digitally kitbash unlocks such incredible potential for your hobby. It is the thing I like the most about having a printer.
@@rangda_prime even if you can't buy a 3d printer, you can create something, which over people were looking for. And they will then comment yours work - "yes, this is what I were searching for months. Thank you creator!", and this is the most enjoyable part of the hobby. Helping another people, who can't create 3d models and can't afford in multiple reasons learn 3d modelling.
@@АртемМасальский-э2ю Absolutely! It's a machine, which together with digital sculpting and modding apps puts the hobby in the hands of the players, creators and community. And that, perhaps, is the greatest threat is poses to the GW business model, rather than pure pricing/costs.
Protectionism will only get them so far.
I think it's funny that you say "the kids are fine throwing money at GW" because in my community it's the kids who can't afford GW and are printing armies. And it's the old heads that berate us for having "fake" or "inauthentic" models. They tell us "they have to do those predatory rules releases." "They have to always raise their prices" "wouldn't want GW to go out or business right?"
We just have to tell them that we don't have the conveniences of generational wealth. Many of our players entered working age during the pandemic and our economy is not strong. We don't own property and renting a house for 2600 a month is killing us already.
Our armies may not be GW plastic, but it's still a physical model that we are bringing to games. We aren't buying GW rule books when OPR has free rules and a better activation system. These old heads aren't converting us. They are fueling our hatred for the abuse these companies levie towards us. And cementing our belief that they aren't good fits to our growing youth gaming community, and aren't getting invites to events.
I'm not sure how much of the video you watched, but I actually said that it is pricing kids out of the hobby. The local youth population is terrible for Warhammer due to cost. I agree that the people that always want to brow beat everyone on how they play is a real pain. And the older players got into it when it was waaaaay more affordable, so they really shouldn't get on the younger people about not supporting the ever-more-expensive hobby.
@LetsTalkTabletop Yeah, and I think that's a very valid position. I wrote this comment while cooking breakfast and watching the video. You covered the point while I was tying.
Good video and good discourse. I think your position is insightful. I'm one of the few in my play group who's been playing for a while and has seen many faces of GW. (Started in early 6th ed).
We've got a narrative campaign for OPR Grimdark Future on the way and are working on the narrative for the next one with how much appeal we've been seeing with the college kids. It's bringing a lot of fresh life to the hobby. And ours is a good young men's group with several good strong role model like guys in our group. It's a shame the GW fan boys here get mad at us for not drinking the GW tea.
The Vanguard boxset for space marines in nzd is $400, and includes two units GW doesn't sell them individually. Intersessors are $120 nzd without shipping
Holy crap! 😳
@LetsTalkTabletop hence why I turn to sites like Mighty ape and Trade me. Yes the range isn't big, but at least I can either part pay or the cost plus the shipping is HALF of what GW have without shipping
The moment the sales drop the prices will drop. It's economic basics - supply and demand. The more people are willing to pay the bigger the prices will go up and up. The prices is not high enough if everything is sold out in hours and there is not enough stock for all the demand. The prices will continue to go up.
I always question them selling out so fast, sounds like they're not making enough. But you are right about the economics, unfortunately nerds often have poor impulse control and spend way too much money on stupid crap. So I don't expect the prices to go down anytime soon.
The 3D printing is way less prevalent in the historical gaming space because there is a lot more variety and the companies charge fair price. A lot of these figures are also in white metal which is more expensive material supposedly. Still better value than GW plastics.
I agree, every time I've looked at historical miniatures they are very reasonably priced.
With historical wargaming - Napoleonics, for example - you didn't have the closed environment that GW has worked so hard for. You bought the rules from company A, and you bought miniatures from companies B, C, D, or whomever, with the only consideration being that your units needed to be roughly in scale with the units the people you played with brought. The rules publishers were never in a position where they could make the same declaration GW has - that to play in a GW-sponsored official game, you could only use GW miniatures. You played with _their_ rules, using _their_ miniatures, and they could keep changing one or the other to keep you scrambling to keep up. You could always back off from the tournaments and play with your existing minis, kitbashes, and third-party substitutes, using outdated rules, but you were taking yourself out of GW's ecosystem, and didn't matter any more. But as long as they can exploit FOMO and the cachet of 'official' recognition, their business model will keep working. And it won't be until enough of their player base stops chasing the mechanical rabbit that GW will recognize that they have to change.
Im aware that Printing is a great alternative to make armies more accesible, what I like to bring attention is how Horus Heresy kinda PROVES that they can make collecting minis actually cheaper, unlike 40K.
5x Jumpack Intercessors for 35£
Vs
10x Assault squads MKVI for 42.50£
Basically double the amount of Space Marines in Jumpack for 7£ more instead of buying a whole new kit, the H.H. kit even comes with 2 powerfists, so you could totally make 2 squads.
They can make it cheaper, they just don't want to.
You are correct, but also you are using BP. If you check the prices of USD, AUD or anything else, it is even crazier. And it doesn't match the exchange rate at all.
@@LetsTalkTabletop that is true, being in Mexico the exchange is rough in Mexican Pesos the H.H. assault squads are $1350 (wich is about 62.50£ BP and about $80 USD) and the Jumpack Intercessors are $1150 MXPesos (53.30£ BP and $68 USD), i just wished GW made boxes that included more models so that at least we could get our money worth to build an army (60 usd for 85 points is so low its not even worth checking the new sculps).
Games workshops prices have been insane for a long time, I bowed out mostly due to a growing hatred of their rules and found Dropzone commander and deadzone which have far superior rulesets and great miniatures for far lower prices. Price wasn’t my motivator at the time but ive considered dipping back in to build a small force purely for display because I love the IP even if the game is trash but then I see the prices and I immediately get over that idea.
In recent years I have started 3D printing and I’ve refound my love for the 40k universe through Adeptus titanicus scale. Loads of minis available for free and some genuinely amazing new minis in the 8mm range “not marines” and “not Eldar” available both free and for reasonable prices (units about €5) printing them costs about €20-30 worth of resin for a whole freaking army. It’s a no brainer.
I don’t think GW are dead in the next few years. No debt and good cash flow make them a hard whale to take down, but a tipping point might come in the next 20 years where they have to look at the practicality of their retail chain. 3D printing is still a niche within a niche for our hobby.
I wana preface this by the fact I’m not a GW stan, I think the price hike is ridiculous, and I literally own a 3d printer to print off my own models. But i feel that their are some elements of the whole printer vs non printer argument thats sorta ignored in this video, that i feel need to be considered. Value wise 100% printing is better, and valid. If you want to just go ahead and print away with your buddys sure i do that all the time. But their are key elements that do make buying over printing still hold value for some (even if they are being exploited imo). The first is legitimacy (you could also kida call this elitism but i think its a bit more nuanced than that) I think the easiest way to put this is an analogy to MTG why do people still buy cards when printers exist. Sure lots of friends allow kitchen table magic with proxies. But their is something to be said about owning the thing, collecting is a large part of the hobby, so for many people collecting is important, it feels legitimate and is something they care about, furthermore while 90% of games are played between friends who may accept proxies, that wont always be the case for other games. Game stores holding tournaments, or just other friends may not be so willing to accept proxies. So for people who want to play at their LGS or go to tournaments, while proxiny is cheaper its not nessasrily better if your restricted with who you can play (obviously maybe we can as a community change the culture around proxies but atm thats neither here nor their.) The second issue i find is that of time. 3d printing at the moment is a hobby all its own, knowing how to find models, how to prep models, how to setup a printer. Alot of these take time and practice to learn.Furthermore it simply takes more time to get an army printed vs assembled from a box. Warhammers main demographic are people in the age range of having jobs and familys, they simply may not have the time to learn and maintain a second hobby. Now the easy answer their is they can buy them online, which is 100% true but can be location dependent, etsy shiping can cost alot, and their arnt always distributers nearby that can do it cheap (one of the reason i had to buy my own printer) so while etsy is great it may not be a solution to everyone. Not to mention models are hard to find. Gw constantly strikes anything that resembles their models. So whats my point, to simply say “no your wrong” No. im saying that the argument “printers are going to kill gw” is not really enough, printers are absolutely a start, but as a community we can’t rely on them to stop these price gouges as their are legitimate reasons to still buy plastic. We as a community need to also stand against these practices, becoming more open of proxies at tournaments, creating resources to help people wanting to get into printing, Calling out and fighting Gw constantly taking down legitimate makes people have sculpted. If we want to see this change we need to fight it as a community and not simply hope that the existance of 3d printers will kill GW
I agree, and I have seen more and more acceptance of printed armies out in the wild. It's definitely happening. At an ever more increasing rate.
All those words but i aint heard you say minis should be cheaper 1 time. Which they should. and if they do not get cheaper then the company is dead
This aged well after 2 months.
It's only gotten worse. 😳
I bought the Bretonnian box set for The old world ONLY to get the rule book because it was sold out and the intent was to 3d print my army (still is just in smaller scale and to add units to the GW army). I can't afford much more than that. If GW went the route of selling STLs of their models, I think they would make even more money as well as licensing the rights to sell printed models.
I can't fathom spending more than $60 on a single unit. I look for the army boxes where they have two armies or the Christmas boxes. Another option is to use other companies' models as proxies. Reaper, Mantic, Perry all have minis that could be used to play for usually a third of what GW charges.
Luckily, I got a lot of the Start Collecting boxes before they were replaced by the Vanguard boxes. I have purchased 1-2 SC of the armies I may want to do in the future.
I started with WH40K RT and quit right after WH40K 3rd Ed started. My youngest son liked fantasy so I got the Bret / Lizardmen starter set in 2000.
I got back into GW in 2020 when we were all locked up and had too much time to spend shopping on the internet and I picked up Start Collecting Malignants, and two SC Skeleton Horde that were discontinued in 2019. One of the UA-camrs I watched was talking about them going away so I went and got them for $76.50 before that happened. They were from AOS 1.0 so when they introduced Nighthaunt and redid the Death faction, they got rid those boxes. I then picked up two SC Flesh Eater Courts and I proxy the ghouls as zombies. With those, I have a decent 2000+ SBGL army with the Coven Throne as general with Mannfred and Neferata and two zombie dragons with enough points leftover for 80 zombies for under $400.
A timely rehash of a perennial topic. I tend to agree with you as I don’t see them having an “end game” to solve this pressing issue of profits to shareholders versus a sustainable increase year on year.
could always tell the shareholders to fuck right off since growth for the sake of growth is what is making businesses crumble. GW is bloated. doesn't look like they are getting money from shareholders anyways. Stuff just keeps getting more expensive. People will just stop buying and then what good will the shareholdes do ? They too will drop GW
I'm an Oldhammer player that started in the late 80s with WFB 3rd edition and Rogue Trader.. GW has been mostly dead to me for the past 3 years due to 3d printing.. pretty much the only thing I buy from them is the occasional rulebook or paint. I just got a new 12k mid sized resin printer and frankly the quality these days on newer stls is insane, not to mention the print speeds are literally a 5th of where they were 5 years ago.. I can print an entire 20 man squad in 2 hours or less that looks as good as anything from GW. If they die they die, there are plenty of other alternatives such as Kings of War which is aready showing us the future with their 3d Mantic Vault transferring many of their models to stls, One Page Rules and other games not to mention Oldhammer and just playing older editions like I often do. GW shareholders can kick rocks we don't need them or their product if they think they are going to suck out my bone marrow they are in for a rude awakening as they go the way of Hasbro WotC
I'm an old Grognard like you, and I agree completely with everything you said. I got a printer a few years back and it's set my hobbying free in a way I could not have imagined. The sculpting market is insanely deep and the sculptors so very talented these days and the change has been very swift.
At some point, GW will start selling ridiculously priced STLs.
Which is weird because around that same time i will be acquiring those ridiculously priced STLs though similarly ridiculous means.
I fully agree. I have not bought anything since leviathan (record length of time ) and I have not preordered SM2.
Just found your channel today. Only GW game I play is Blood Bowl. Its probably the cheapest of all their games but there are so many online options to 3D print. Even companies making their own models. I've wondered this myself with so much 3D printing.
Welcome!
Started playing GW games in '94. The funny thing is as a teen who couldn't really afford (even at that time and prices) much I was very willing to pay for the miniatures then. Never even considered looking for alternatives. Now in my 40's I am very fortunate and could still afford their products if I wanted to without much concern. My willingness to do so however is completely gone. Yes their pricing is completely ridiculous but so is their handling of systems and people. I'm thankful for GW blazing a way in this happy but it is them not us that is sealing their fate.
I think an awful lot of us feel that way.
Long response ahead- I just started trying to learn wh and trying to learn to paint at the same time. I bought a kill team box and a combat patrol box it was 250$, I cannot even play the game.
Once factoring for paint and such now we're another 200$, add in modeling supplies another 50$. I'm not poor, I do quite well but to get a 2000pt army that's competitive that's upwards of 1000$ once factoring for supplies. That's absolutely insane.
And it's not a cash outlay I can or want to afford for a hobby I don't even know if I will like. Granted I knew before I started I would enjoy the building and painting part. But guess what I did? I bought a printer for 200$ a 2 liter bottle of resin for 35$ and some rubbing alcohol. My patreon subs are 10$ for models and I've made and painted more warhammer adjacent models from patreon than I have warhammer models. Because I could actually get on the board to play.
I am absolutely someone willing to buy into a hobby and the game. But 1000$ is a lot. Now that I've got my first army that's 3/4 "proxy" I'll slowly add authentic models into the mix.
Unfortunately because of their insane pricing I'll never play competitively because if my decided army isn't good I'd need to spend another 700-800$. So bottom line if a combat patrol was 100$ and characters were 25-70$ and 5 unit space marine type boxes were 30$ my entire army would be authentic. But instead I'm in no hurry. I guess I'm just too poor to play warhammer. But it seems very business stupid.
If their profits are as high as their stock price reflects its dumb that they don't want more players. I don't think the movie is going to do it for them either. Because the average 25 year old won't spend 1000$ to figure out if they like something. I happen to be older with more expenses but also more income.
You mention golf, I also play golf. I got my first set of clubs for like 300$ and now I can play anywhere. Now I have probably 1000-2000$ in clubs but that took years. Warhammer you can't even play without that outlay. They dont balance the game around 500pts they balance it around 2000 and the game is simply not as fun in my opinion with a combat patrol game.
So yes 3d printers will force them to get into competitive range for new blood or die. I can't imagine people who have played long term like paying 50% more than they did a few years ago. Engaging new players with such big marketing coming their way with the movie just seems common sense. Also setup a us factory so you don't have to gouge us. It's not hard to see the price conversion doesn't add up and that alone makes me feel less bad printing proxy models that are well enough to play with friends.
Well said. I completely agree with you. It is absurd and I think its a bad strategy on their part.