Let's talk GW... A quick calculation shows that I have been involved in this hobby for about 16 years. For most of that time I have been involved in gaming with some kind of GW based rule-set. I have armies for 40K and Fantasy:
To whit:
40K :
- Dark Angels
- Imperial Guard
- Sisters of Battle
- Daemon Hunters
Fantasy:
- Empire
- Dwarfs
- Gobbos
I also play and have armies for: WAB, LotHS, and Great War. I think I can say I have pumped quite some money in GW produced stuff. I used to love their rule-sets which worked fine and captured the fluff of the armies mentioned very well making my games, even though I tend to loose pretty much all of them, very worthwhile. But for years now I have joined the Legion of Grumblers who have been driven away by strange and down-right wrong policy decisions within the GW empire.
It started out with the simple fact that a new version of my codex/ armybook was released about every 2 years and the same more or less is true for the core rules. The result always has been that I would moan and gripe and eventually I'd go to the store and get one anyway. Some revisions are necessary that much even I will admit. But something inside me really snapped when the rules were twisted into a mould which produced rules for small kids...
The fluff was gone from the codex and the army-book, the army-lists became dominated by pimped up heroes and small squads of super troops, therefore playing with a themed or as I say fluffed army was a sure road towards disaster from the start.It hurt me most in the present Space Marine and Dark Angels codices: the Space Marines pretty much got all options that only the more revered chapters used to have and the Dark Angels pretty much lost all the juicy special rules and even special characters like Asmodai! He's the core, the heart and soul (pun intended) of the Chapter! And then the choices to limit the use of war-gear and number of troopers in squads! Now all Space Marine squads can have plasma cannon as Tactical squad heavy weapon, what happened to the first Founding Chapter having more of these ancient weapons? And why oh why is a Dark Angel veteran sergeant limited in his choice of war-gear more then say a Vanilla erm Ultra Marine smurf?
What about this one? who were the original Angels of Death? Yeah that's right! The Blood- and the Dark Angels! They used to have an awesome duo-codex off their own stating why they were truly the angels of death, now every bloody jerk in brightly coloured power armour can call himself Angel of Death, my ar..!
It doesn't stop there either: look at the Chaos Space Marine Codex! What happened with the Iron Warriors? Where's their Basilisk gone to?
Sure there are Errata and other benefits instead of the stuff I've mentioned, mind you I've refrained from more grumbling because there's a load more grievances in my Book of Grudges that'd take to much time and space to vent here, but I think most of their games are now aimed at simplicity for kids to learn the game and, more importantly: SPEND LOADS OF MONEY on GW products...
The heart of the game has switched from playing a characterful game representing the games' background and universe into a money-driven company who produce pretty nice figures now and again. I will still play some 40K and Fantasy battles mostly because most players around here don't play anything else, but I will do my utmost best to turn them to the historical gaming side in which you can use cheap plastic figures (100 chaps for €10,- instead of one hero figure for €12,-) and where your grasp of strategy, deployment and use of troops coupled with a bit of luck from the Dice Gods will win you the battle.
Why I came to rant about this all? I made the mistake of buying this months White Dwarf which features the launch of GW's Finecast resin range. Basically the story is like this: white metal is becoming too expensive so all present metal mini's will in the future be made from resin, but because casting resin is a different process then white metal and resin moulds are less durable then metal moulds prices will rise anyway...
Yes well that's the mathematics of a superpower for you...
And on that bombshell...
1 comment:
I gave up on GW long ago. After pumping a small fortune into rules and miniatures I found most of my old purchases had become obsolete. My solution was to sell the whole sodding lot of them and move on to games by companies not out to prize the teeth out of my head hunting for gold. I am suspicious of their claims of how the molds are less durable so it is not going to be any cheaper. Spin casting metal pieces is not cheap, when you factor metal, machinery, energy cost to melt the metal and extra shipping costs. Wow now you got me o a rant too.
ok deep breath...
Cheers
Will
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