"GW figure change" Topic

alphga3six, when I say a GW miniature from today, I mean one that was released now or recently.

GypsyComet, what GW miniatures do you own that were released recently?

The H Man: A few times recently GW has done a "made to order" thing where you could order certain out of production metal models.

"Forge World miniatures will not normally have a problem if you leave them in the car."

Then the Hydra conversion kit I have, which I had to straighten two barrels on and engineer considerable reinforcement for prior to assembly, and the forest of tiny pieces on top of my $200 USD superheavy which would wilt with a stern look, are a delusion?

"what GW miniatures do you own that were released recently"
You've already openly challenged my sanity. Drop it.

I dunno, you may just be unlucky? I live in South Florida, the temperature in my car frequently reaches horrendous levels yet the two FW Hydras and FW Hydra platform I own have never had a problem (course I had to dunk the barrels for ALL the Hydras in boiling water in the first place to straighten them out but that has nothing to do with hot cars). Nor have either of the Tyranid Hierodules I own. To be honest though I try really hard to not leave any of my models in a hot car in the first place….

Yeah, I have had to leave some FW items in a hot car and they made it fine. When I assemble them I also use boiling water and even then it does not "wilt" quickly. Finecast yes, FW resin, no.

GypsyComet, did you buy directly from Forge World, from ebay, or from China? Maybe you got a "Chinacast" or "Forgery World" ripoff and its made with a different Resin.

Never had a problem with Forge World models other than the occasional warped part that was easy to realign with some hot water and thirty second in said water. There are knock offs on ebay that are recasts that are not as good. Heck even my old Armorcast 40K vehicles have stood the test of time.

did you buy directly from Forge World

Yes. This was a decade ago, before the resin recasters really got running, not that I would have willingly ordered from recasters. GW/Forgeworld was using a resin that is nice and rigid once you pass a half-inch thick or have ample structural resistance to bending. My old Ork Totem Pole could be used as a murder weapon. My Command Sentinel kit? Not so much.

Heck even my old Armorcast 40K vehicles have stood the test of time.

Those were designed and cast to be *play* pieces, a distinction Forgeworld didn't understand for years. I can transport my fully painted Warhound to a game in the original box and assemble it on the table ready to go in minutes, and stow it afterwards just as fast.

Gypsy…

I have had some "old" forgeworld stuff, and the quality was kind of variable back then… the resin could be different colors, and the casting wasn't as clean.

My comments above are for more recent FW orders …. like the last 5 years especially. The casting is almost always perfect and the resin seems to be the right consistency every time… not too "soft" or "brittle" as I have had in the past.

I've noticed that FW resin sometimes feels soft, a little like PVC. It's all the same light gray color, and is not model dependent, so I assume this is due to inconsistent preparation of resin batches.

I noticed this in the last 2 years.

My old epic FW castings are all over the place with dark, light, and medium grey resin, some with a permanent sheen to them.

So, GypsyComet, you don't actually own any recent GW releases? How do you know the old models are better then?

I actually do own recent GW models. I have a dozen or so of the new Primaris Marines. They are better executed in some ways than the first CAD modeled plastics during WFB 8, but that's a really low bar. They are, however, no more amenable to conversion than a metal model, and considerably less so than the Marines of the late 90s and early 00s. And that IS taking the material differences into account.

While the aesthetic has changed somewhat, moving away from the decorated warrior monk look toward an SF military look, no posing options and no design considerations for parts swaps means they are a step backwards for GW. The smaller number of parts also means some inherent compromises in detail, which is also a step backwards.

I doubt I will be updating my Marine vehicles, as I refuse to pay for GW's vain attempts to redesign a shoe box.

I also have one of those silly AOS not-Marines, acquired for eventual Frostgrave use. He has all the posed stiffness of a 1980s one-piece lead miniature, with an imposed awkwardness that none of my late 80s IG suffer from. My mid-80s GW Melniboneans show more animation, and they're pretty stiff.

Well said.

They are definitely moving more towards easy to build or at least single pose models, so each one is it's own individual. A definite move away from when they were trying to make plastic kits as modular and pose-able as possible. I do like being able to do conversions and such, but unless you need a huge unit the variety might not be worth all the extra time they take to assemble and pose.

Still, I think if you are comparing the single-pose old metal models to the single-pose new plastics, the new ones are much better in the amount of detail and how well engineered they are (though obviously if you don't like them stylistically that won't matter).

I do think some of my old metal chaos marines or chaos warriors had a lot of character and personality compared to what they make today. Maybe that's just nostalgia. Take the new death guard. They are all single pose individuals, but they all look pretty broadly similar to me. Nobody stands out. But though I haven't really used them in a long time, I can still picture some of my old metal chaos models. They really had some unique individuals. But again, that's kind of an artistic style thing rather than a quality thing.

They are definitely well engineered and go together great, but yes there is a lot of lost conversion potential, which I miss.

I feel art and quality go hand in hand. Plastic is a move away from both in preference of price and ease of manufacture. Which is fine for a grunt option but kills character pieces especially if one piece.

One piece figures are always going to look flat in plastic as you can't have under cuts in a steel mold. For example a space marine with bolt gun would look bad one piece as there would be no gaps between his arms, gun and body. Two piece fixes this but then the body is hard to pose without an obvious mold line flatness occurring around it anyway, whichIis why many one piece figs are standing to attention.

Single pose =/= single piece. A lot of the single pose Death Guard minis (from the starter set, so they are *supposed* to be easy to put together) are multi-piece figures so the poses are pretty dynamic with undercuts etc. Far more dimensional that a lot of the old metals. I'm pretty sure a more detailed Plague Marines box is coming with more weapon options and more individualized figure elements.

I was using GW figures (actually Citadel, from their Spacefarers range back in the late 70s/early 80s) and while I do still *love* those old figures (the majority of my 8000pt Dark Elf army is old metals) and wax nostalgic over them, the newer ones are easier to transport, easier to build and in most cases, more interesting models. Imho, ymmv etc :)

HIPS death guard with under cuts? I assume not. Multi part molds, maybe

Easier to transport? With all the fragile thingies hanging off them like many do? Lighter than metal, but I would say more fragile.

Easier to biuld? Once you get the rotters off the blessed spure! Tiny bits are more fiddly than metal.

More interesting? Plain plastic you have to paint texture on to? Even so, I doubt the few new figs are more intetesting than the hundreds, or even thousands, that preceed them.

Like you said. Your opinions.

I see that I'm not alone in preferring metal models. Their heft makes a big difference to me; plastics feel flimsy and insubstantial. I definitely enjoy the WH40K universe, but most GW figures don't really do a whole lot for me. Luckily, I mostly dabble in Imperial Guard and PDF, so just about any 28mm sci-fi or historical figures are suitable.

I chose Pig Iron Heavy Infantry for mine, and did a good deal of head swaps, cutting, and filing to achieve the PMC-in-space aesthetic I was gunning for. They have a lot more personality than the generic Cadian figures, and fit together more easily as well.

Someone who actually had any of the recent characters would know that they aren't single piece, and are much more dynamically posed than the old metal models.

Albino Squirrel, why do you even bother to respond? The guy clearly has no clue whatsoever.

Its all flat plain plastic with no texture

Basically you might as well paint a blister pack.

As a FW/Horus Heresy fan, I just want to point out how the lack of grit or texture in resin castings (vs many metal castings) enhances the details of the sculpt. I like metal minis, but I can get my lead fix from other sources.

"I can't believe that anyone who owns any GW miniatures from 20 years ago and any from today could possibly argue that they were better 20 years ago. That is sheer delusion."

Hmmm. I still like my Cerebus the aardvark from, what, 30 years ago. And my 15mm Traveller miniatures still show such simple finesse as to make current GW SF look like free toys from a bubblegum machine.

The world turns, but not all old stuff is rubbish, just as not all new stuff is either.

It comes and goes depending on the scupltors. The Perry Brother Bretonians were fantastic, the current line Monty Python crap. Metal plastic irrelevant – scuplt (and knowledge of how armor works and actually looks like) critical. Fantasy much better say 10 years ago.

40K again depends. Guard remain pretty good and tanks have improved (tank rules though have tanked).

I have actually come to prefer plastics (though have plenty of old metal around).

Maybe if Age of Silly implodes they will re-create the Old World and the many magnificant sculpts it inspired.

TomT

More people are playing Age of Sigmar now than had played WHFB in YEARS. You can actually go to my FLGS and play AoS, which was impossible for WHFB. I played WHFB and loved it for years but it had many problems, especially in getting new players in. The rules for armies were badly outdated, and tournaments were heavily comp-ed. AoS plays fast, and is fun… the rules are simple but have some interactions and tactics that require skill. They basically kept WHFB on life support for several editions, but now with the change to AoS they are actually selling stuff and people are actually playing. So I really doubt it will implode.

I don't think there's any requirement for any WFB player to try AoS. The differences are huge and it is literally a different game in a different reality (even if you can technically still use the old units).

It's kinda like blaming Napoleonics players for not wanting to play a WWI game (in a world where every napoleonics game goes OOP for some reason) even though it still has French vs Prussians(Germans).

Except no company eliminated napolionics and replaced them with ww1. Then tried to get the same people to buy them.

I should have phrased my post better. I meant that WFB players should not be expected to play AoS just because AoS is the successor to WFB and is popular amongst other gamers.

If the same people were not meant to like it, why make it at all? They had 40k going. Not sure what they were supposed to be doing it for in that case.

A few old school haters but overall a very positive attitude for a Games Workshop post. They had a severe dark age for a while but now they are making great products and using the philosophy that better and thoughtful products
sells more than simple arrogance.

I was once a metalist but after buying into kickstarters with high quality plastic sculpts I realized what a pain metal is. The new plastic is superior in every way. Besides metal and shipping costs have made metal unprofitable.

This is 2017 quite a few years they have been around. If they want to continue to be around they need to accommodate a faster and younger audience. Which is what they have done.

Another thing they have done is change stuff including the paints so they do not have to compete with the knockoffs. Another profit driven act.

Consider what they are. A for profit company. But they also realize they must please a significant audience to continue on. I wouldn't touch their stuff a few years ago but what they are doing today is fantastic and they are pushing all the right buttons.

It is expensive but you can buy and play on a budget.
While they have very expensive stuff in some cases, everything isn't. The new skirmish games are great for keeping your costs down and not have to give up the whole system. Its no less foolish to expect you can buy all this as if you are angry you can't buy a Mercedes.

As far as metal and the old days being better, it may seem like it in your mind but it's not. I understand some prefer the old stuff but the newer stuff is clearly superior in every way. This of course isn't the great Nigel Stillman's Games Workshop but it is new, geared toward 2017 and this is great too.

+1Rogzombie

Who said there was a requirement for WHFB players to play AoS? They don't have to, they can continue to play WHFB. GW didn't "eliminate" WHFB 8th edition.

If a person claiming to be a GW employee came and took your rulebooks, I'm sorry, but you were scammed.

If you need new copies of WHFB rulebooks and army books, I'll sell you mine.

Groan.

"Yes I hate games workshop!" That is why I would like to see it return to its roots and it's glory days.

I hope that makes sense to you, cause I'm bothered if it does to me.

I think a lot if people feel the same way, weather they still play or not.

Thanks Kallman, he needs it.

Ahem…

Oddly enough gw seems to be the only (or of a very few) large, game writing, mini games comps that only do plastic/resin (99%). Almost every other use metal in part, or most companies/businesses entirely (including all mini makers ). Gw must be the only company still stuck in 2017. Poor them.

Again, why make aging sick ma (aos, sorry, I'm still fuming)? Who was it made for, if not fantasy gamers?

(Ps. Just remembered, round bases, skirmish formations, magic marines. 40k players, of course. Yet they still have 40k… For now… I'm still not convinced.)

And I am pretty sure fantasy battles is out of print, or not be I got reprinted. Except at mantic, of course.

Hey, all smack talk aside, these are all great comments. (Yes, I am vainly including my own)

If your just reading , please consider letting us know your point of view.

The day of the red shirts is over, the WArhammer store guy in Pittsburgh is really nice.

I really doubt Gee-Dubya would risk a law suit by stealing someones rulebooks, lol…

At any rate why come on here and complain about something you are not interested in? The old games still exist. Someone ran a kickstarter with chaos guys that look just like they came out of the old Citadel collection. You can have anything you want these days, why waste time on something you don't like.

Sorry to point it out, but if you actually read my first post you will discover how far this topic has strayed.

I did not come here to talk about something I don't like. You came here to not answer or comment on my original questions.

As it is my topic I am certainly free to respond to any and all comments made.

I would love to hear some thoughts related to my original post.

I would love to hear some thoughts related to my original post.

Space Orks swung a bit too far when the 2e to 3e change was implemented, and have only barely swung back by bringing back a sense of humor and acknowledging the Tribes. The middle editions lost the inherent satire of the entire setting in its early form and caused the setting to become a satire of itself. The Orks were a symptom of that. What was doubly sad was that the Gorka Morka Orks had more character than the general line reset that followed. The interesting feral Orks of GM morphed into boring feral Orks as the GM sculpts were quickly replaced. It took several editions for them to be interesting models again, and that occurred mostly through the regrettable path of their vehicles.

I say regrettable because a 40k fight is such a small area that most anything bigger than a bike is ridiculous. In scale a 4' x 6' table is about the size of a strip mall parking lot.

In that respect, vehicles are largely a cash grab. People love 'em, but at this scale they are *terrain*.

From memory rouge trader was a skirmish type game, with only one or two vehicles. So I get your point re table size.

chaos also used to have more humor in the figs. Tezee. .whatever and nurgle especially. Now they seem more serious which is a shame. More horror than chaotic warping.

Like orcs there seemed to be no fluff to explain the changes.

Of the aliens I feel tyranids had the best and easiest explanation for a sweeping sudden range change. It's another hive fleet. Decisive and simple for everyone.

necrons on the other hand also has no fluff explanation. The changes in the scarab and destroyer were imence.

First off H Man if you do not want a thread you start to go off topic I would not post on TMP. I've tried in the past to do just that with threads I start and unfortunately you just invite trolls when you attempt that.

It's an open forum with some oft time uneven enforcement of its rules, but it is what TMP is.

I have also found that if you want to keep a thread on topic as much as possible, be extremely specific in your phrasing and syntax and even that is not a guarantee.

Going back and reading your opening post I will attempt to answer your questions.
"What with the new super marines and all."

"Why is it some GW figure changes have a game based reasoning and some do not? Of course it's all about money, in reality, but that's not as much fun."

I think you answer you own question for the most part with the above. It was also what Rogzomie did answer regarding your query,i.e., it is a safe bet that most figure changes that GW has made are to drive sales. Whether one likes the older or newer models is a matter of taste and aesthetics which is difficult to argue the merits one way or another. This is due to each person's cultural background, education, experience and a number of other more esoteric factors. I can say I like blue and you can say blue sucks because green is better. That is opinion and not fact based. Which means there cannot be a meeting of the minds as each party is grounded in promoting and defending their opinion as opposed to engaging in a debate of facts. It is one reason the majority of TMP threads become tiresome and pointless after some time. (Hmm…this particular thread may be a good example.)

"Model changes that have background in (an) attempt to explain changes:
Tyranids new hive fleet.
Marines new makes of Armour, genetics
Lizard men , I think it was a new spawning?
Aos, world blew up groan."

This one is a bit tougher. Yes, no, perhaps it is all of the above? Nids really needed a more expanded force choice from what was originally done with their first codex. My thinking is that would fall in the both category as it was needed to make the army more diverse and interesting and hence drive more sales. Clearly Nid players are a bit spoiled for choice with their force organizations now.

In regards the Space Marines and the new larger models, again, this is a both but more likely leans more to the sales goal. While it finally is a response to the changing fluff over the years that the Space Marines are not only genetically enhanced humans, they are now (over the years) supposed to be giants. The new models are nice and show what can be done with the new technology available with plastics. I would agree some of the models lack the character that we have come to enjoy from older iterations. Of course the advantage of plastics, at least for me is the ability to make a more dynamic figure. The limitations of metal casting and multi part castings have issues in regards what can be achieved. Of course the plastics have similar but different restrictions. Overall I am of the opinion that the plastics are for the most part better. YMMV

Lizardmen…well I am just glad I have the older stuff and that is what I will play with an older edition of WFB. Again, this is opinion and we could argue till doomsday, but why do so?

AOS, okay, I really hated this when it came out and engaged in the tearing of sack cloth and heaping on of ashes as many long time fans of WFB did. The hard facts, (yes facts here not opinion) is that WFB was on life support from GW's bottom line. This is not debatable, WFB had become so bloated and expensive to enter into that the game system had dropped to below 17% of GW's market share. Something had to be done and AOS was the result. And guess what, sales of AOS have been extremely successful for GW. Yes, they blew up the world we loved. You know what we can still play that world or go play Kings of War. Enough with the sack cloth and ashes already. In fact I am now considering jumping into AOS after being one of its detractors. After all I have a ton of Chaos Warriors and Lizardmen to play with.

Model changes that are a simple cash grab (yes, I do dangle carrot):
Necrons
Orc

Carrot? What carrot, regardless, I will bite. The Necrons were kind of stale after the new shinny wore off and needed an update, in my opinion. Oh and yes to drive sales.

OrKs…in my "opinion" one of the best forces to collect and scratch build in 40K but it has also been one of the orphans of the game world, perhaps not as much as Sisters of Battle, but it seems that GW does not understand what to do with the greenskins. They were (in my opinion) best back in 3rd and especially 4th editions. That was when they were fun, zany, and had tons of character and rules that really tried to be respectful of the fluff. 8th appears to be bringing some of that back and we will see when they get their codex. In a world of Grim/Dark they are the guys that bring fun to war. Yes, I just said that. Right now the Space Orks suffer from a lack of models that one can purchase from GW when they used to have some of the greatest diversity. So if you want to start a Space Ork force a good bit of your force currently does not have update models or models at all to purchase. Fortunately there is E-bay and many other buy/sale/trade forums (including TMP) where you can find what you want.

"Sometimes they are a nice update. Some times pointless or just bad (cold ones)."

Again, opinion, but I would agree and if you are talking about the Lizardmen Cold Ones, yes, awful, why did the Dark Elves get the cool looking Cold Ones and not the Lizrdmen? Ah well.

"There are loads of others in both camps.
Thoughts?"

I think I have taken up enough time so I will leave that question for another day.

OK. Thanks.
I agree my first (only first? ) post was not to clear.

Basically just asking which major range changes had story fluff to explain it and which did not.

It's all about money at the end of the day, so we can leave that at that.

Nids orks necrons marines are well covered.
New ones?

Cold Ones got four or five versions by the end. A couple were good looking, and a couple were good models. These overlapped only once IMO.

Yes there was no real explanation for most cold one changes, except perhaps the new lizard man spawning?

The belly dragging 1910s fat lizard ones were horrendous. I felt they were rather quickly replaced by new plasics, for the lizard men at least. Fast for plastic that is, they still had to shift a few sprues first. Though the kroot conversion of it (wd mail order exclusive conversion with cold one body and kroot ox head with kroot rider) looked cool.

The original metal long-legged quadrupeds were interesting, but bore little resemblance to anything real.

Then came the metal Raptors. Horrid models that might look good with a lot of work. Lots of QA/QC issues.

The plastic bipedal heavy-jawed Allosaur was next, and remains my favorite for attitude if nothing else.

The plastic frill lizard, though still bipedal, was not as good looking but was, IIRC, better executed.

The last of the WFB Cold Ones went back towards a raptor/tyrannosaur look but also varied the mount considerably for heroes, *finally* suggesting more openly that different spawnings and auspicious signs produced different Cold Ones.

I don't know the full aos line, but I assume it's all retrospectiEast en .

What about ogres? The newer bulky plastic ones don't look like he ogres of old one bit. They In theory look OK, as characters but seem a bit too bulky to hold guns in an asthetic manner. Over all i think it was too much of a change too soon. Although they were always part of someone elses army in the past. But then, so where giants. Hmmm… (giant army?)

Ogres had no fluff to explain their sudden physical changes, that I know off.

PS I did like the look of the metal exotic ogres, pirate, middle Eastern and such. But that was enough, I don't feel they needed an entire army.

Well, the updated Ogres came when they create a full Ogre army, with new background about them coming from the far east. I don't recall what explanation there was for ogres before that. But that could easily be the difference between "European" ogres and "Asian" ogres. Except that the Old World ogres ceased to exist…

I guess that's true. I think it's the best explanation we are likely to come up with. They came from different places.

Giants and greater demons spring to mind, as there were a few versions of them. I feel no fluff was needed, as each would be slightly differentand Iindividual like humans. Although albion (I think that was the island) giants had their own back ground.

Lesser demons don't get off so lightly. I can't remember any explanation between versions. And with all of them there were some major changes.

My faves were the early 90s blood letters, last metal late 90s demonettes, early 90s horrors. Flamers shmamers, not sure there. Most plague bearers seemed OK to me. For what it's worth.