So the price of metal in one way absolutely affects my purchasing - metal costs and is too fiddly for my troops, and in another way it barely affects it at all as I would pay much more for great character sculpts.

On ‘green gaming’ - I’m waiting for the 6×4 lcd touch screen gaming table, where you pop on your 3-d glasses and watch the animations of your figures battle it out. Only consumable - electricity.

Tardis, can you elaborate on what these are, pehaps a link or something? I’d be curious to know what you are speaking of.

http://ca.games-workshop.com/storefront/store.ca?do=Individual&code=99110201179&orignav=13

My prices are in canadian dollars. Sorry for not having specified this point.

Both products are imports.

You’re right though they’re 22$ on the US GW store and 20 euros on the french online store (about 31 US $ today at 9.33 am or 30.5 CA $).

In the worst case price per mini is identical. So the point is : you can have a nice package, free rules, nice and different minis without having to pay more for this.

From the London metal exchange, prices don’t go up only occasionally. The increase has been pretty close to exponential for the past 5 years. And even if the amount of raw material isn’t that large in a single blister, that constant increase has to have an impact on the blister price. I’m not sure the impact should necessarily be as large as what we’ve experienced over that same period, but I just wanted to clear that detail up :)

That’s is true. But on the other hand considering that every single miniature company uses their own particular alloys, and considering that even within one range the alloy may significantly change from one model to the next (depending on the size and/or amount of detail they want to mould), then metal may not be that easy to recycle either. I remember people suggesting to send their extra metal (moulding flash and tab) to Rackham so they can reuse it, and we were told that it wasn’t that easy and would probably not be any cheaper.

Thinking about it, I don’t believe I ever heard of any company recycling metal for their miniatures.

GW : khorngor command : 5 different models 35 $ (7$ per model)
Asmodee : Hell Dorado Westener Starter Box : 11 different models : 56.95 $ at my local store (5.18$ per model)

Are you sure? The GW US online store only asks for $22 for that Khorngor command. And comparing the Asmodée prices vs. the GW France ones, I see 40€ for the Westerner box and 20€ for the Khorngor box which makes the difference very tiny per model (especially considering that the 40€ price also applies for the 8 model Lost ones box). Granted the prices are likely to be discounted in stores, but both the HD and the WH ones are.

Sure, price of metal goes up occasionally. But, to what extend you’d see the impact on the price of a single blister ? Price of many other things went up in the last 20 years. IMHO, overpackaging, professional artwork and shiny paper/cardboard might be the things gamers should think about next time they pay for their miniatures.

The start-up cost for a skirmish game makes players much more inclined to try them when compared with a mass combat game. If GW hadn’t gone to so much plastic in the last few years, I cant imagine many people willing to start into a Warhammer or 40k game. Taking the above example of $7 each and an average army size for WFB of lets say 100 models…..$700 to start playing a game as it was intended is brutal compared to $60.

We also have the gateway-drug of pre-paints now that would never have existed if metal were the only option.

Metal prices have already changed the face of gaming, along with many other factors. And metal will continue to rise unless something drastic changes. All that is left is to decide whether the change is for the better or not.

I personally think that production techniques will allow plastic and other technologies to catch up to metal standards in the near future. As much as I dislike GW, their current plastic kits are far better then their old metal models already, nostalgia aside.

I just want my models decent and cheap so I dont mind. I will continue to play games even if I only have paper cutouts left as an option. I also cast my own models at home the old fashion way (like Price August moulds and some moulds I got that are about 50 years old and still working). The great thing about that is that I can melt down any old lead I can find as long as I do it safely. With two moulds of three minis each you can make a complete 2000 point army of WFB Dwarfs for about $75 even buying the metal online.

The hobby has changed and always will. Its effect on me personally is very little as I am willing to adapt, and never have had the need to buy the newest shiny or the official minis.

GW : khorngor command : 5 different models 35 $ (7$ per model)

Asmodee : Hell Dorado Westener Starter Box : 11 different models : 56.95 $ at my local store (5.18$ per model)

Just my two cents… ;o)

There are games I loved back in the day, with collections of hundreds of minis from multiple armies, that I can’t ever imagine myself playin’ in their simplified current versions.

Once you’ve had red wine, red Kool Aid looses it’s appeal as the drink of choice for dinner. And there is nothin’ wrong with the kids who drink Kool Aid.

Not all plastics are recyclable

For the consumer it will mean more churn in the market place as some of the recent entries into the increasingly crowded “boutique miniatures” market feel the pinch, and larger companies face problems where they have over-extended themselves. Inevitably it will mean we see some upward pressure on end-user prices, which we will swallow, or not.

I don’t see it as the “end of the industry” though. Companies may have to “sweat their assets” (e.g. keep costs down by saving on new designes and regurgitating old ones) and try out new production methodologies (Warlord Games, Alkemy and Wargames Factory, have demonstrated that the plastics market is no longer a “no go area” for start-up companies, and with developments in rapid prototyping this trend is likely to continue further. BUT, metal costs for the “large” companies in the “industry” are still, even after double-digit inflation over the past couple of years, a relatively small factor in their cost base compared to other compnents of the business. Design, distribution and selling costs, as well as overheads continue to be more significant factors - particularly with the spiralling cost of fuel.

Certainly there can be no complacency. As ever in a changing market place, the fit survive and the flabby go to the wall. There is no easy money to be made. But then there never was: ’twas ever the way in the gaming industry!

If most of the skirmish games provide their rules for free, this is included in the price of a model. If the game uses few models, this is included in the price of the model. f you buy a unit with all unique models (as opposed to PP 4 different models in a 6 man box), that is included as well,

Overall, I can’t see this being a business at all if for a nicely packaged unique model with free rules you charge less than 10$. Please remember that the producer rarely sees more than 4-5$ out of it in his pocket. As Micropanzer mentioned, the math is brutal.

Does the price point keep me away…no. However, the amount of dollars I spend on the hobby has remained flat (by choice) so I stay more narrowly focused.

Things abound like - Scrunts (sigh), Wyrd, Dark Age, Urban Mammoth that I really like but I don’t buy in due to cost - how I budget, not necessarily a bad price point by the manufacturers.

So I’m less likely to be introduced into new lines by buying a figure here and there today then in the past.

When it’s 8 for a man size fig it’s easy to slip one in your shopping cart and get into the rules later (I’m visually attracted to most games first). Then if I like what I read I may buy more. However, when the figs creep to $10 to $14 then it becomes difficult to justify the one off purchases and I’m more likely to keep playing the games I have.