Zuh-Khinie:
Oh yeah, none of our hands are clean. I'm just saying that suggesting GW/FW could learn a thing or two from Chinese companies that infringe copyright is kind of like saying a rail company could learn a thing or two from Mussolini. It's easy to be efficient when you just stop caring about the ethics of your actions!
I'm not saying you're not ethical, Zuh-Khinie, just that these are not good people to be dealing with and shouldn't be held up as any kind of standard to emulate.
Thommy H
True enough, and I know that comparing the two is hard, but still... last year we ordered a War Mammoth for a friend's birthday, and the just put it all in zip-lock bags and threw it in a box. That resulted in several spikes being broken... we're talking about a £200+ model here. Later on, some fimirs were ordered... with arms broken off. A few months ago we ordered a skullcracker. It was once again just thrown in a box together with a rogue idol! We also did a monster order with a toaddragon, 2 marienburg landships,... and they put them together in 1 box without proper protection. FW's packaging and shipping is a disaster if you live outside of the UK. It's also way too expensive if you take an objective look at how it's shipped and what you pay. And then I'm not yet starting about FW's quality control.
I understand that it's unethical to buy these miniatures from China (which is why I haven't done so a second time), and I'm playing the devil's advocate here, but surely, from a consumer's point of view, you must also see my point? What can it cost for FW to package their goods properly, let alone check their miniatures for miscasts?
Thommy H:
I’ve never ordered anything from FW but, yeah, that does sound really shoddy. There’s no excuse for that kind of incompetence.
Zuh-Khinie:
I don’t have any FW boxes lying around anymore, or I would upload a picture for you… If you ever order something bigger than dwarf-, human- or ogresize, you should hold on to your heart, because you can never be sure in what state it’ll arrive (or models with fiddly bits).
Anyhow, and I’ll write it in capital letters to be sure for everyone to see:
DON’T BUY CHINESE REPRODUCTIONS! Always double check here and ask what other people think, because you’re damaging FW-ip.
Common signs of reproduction:
- Darker resin
- The ‘sprue’ that connects various parts: FW uses big resin blocks, chinese recast ‘sprues’ tend to be a lot smaller and thinner, and tend to have the writing ‘games workshop’ printed on them.
- Sellers are commonly located in Hong Kong.
AGPO:
Obviously before saying anything else, I have to make clear that Chaos Dwarfs Online is against any violation of IP and encourages members to report it to ebay and GW when they encounter it.
With that ‘official’ bit dealt with, ordering from Forge World is a pain in the neck. I’m lucky in that living in Nottingham I can go and pick up my orders straight from Warhammer World. This means I only have to wait seconds for my replacements. The HQ store now keeps a stock of the most common FW orders behind the till, so that you can check them there without having to send someone to the warehouse every time a piece is miscast. Says it all really.
Ebay provides GW with its only real competition. Other companies are always going to struggle to compete with GW on the social side of the hobby, as there are just so many more GW players out there. You can rock up at any GW store or club and get a game, something which simply isn’t there for Flames of War or historic wargaming. Second hand minis may often be poor quality, but they’re often much cheaper. It’s easy for knock-offs to slip into this market, as they’re virtually undetectable until they arrive, and many buyers are happy enough to pick up a bargain and look the other way. Quality control becomes less of an issue when you’re dealing with people who will spend the extra time to rescue second hand minis to save cash.
GW could go a long way towards dealing with this problem by cutting some prices and looking at its quality control. As Zuh-Khinie says, it’s difficult not to be attracted to a much cheaper model, especially if the service is good. Most of GW’s overhead lies outside of production, and I think they’d find demand for their product is pretty elastic.
Time of Madness:
Just as an FYI the buy it now prices don’t save you much cash. But this same seller runs actual actuions, some of which have ended dirt cheap.
As someone else mentioned, there isn’t much you can do about items coming from China. The only hope here is E-bay cancels the sellers account, or they start getting a lot of negative feedback.
Time of Madness
richard barby:
i would not play anyone who had these knock offs indirectly your suporting almost slavery and childrens labour. if you need models that badly proxi
gIL^:
The best thing to do is ignore the sellers i think. By giving them light it will create a greater interest in cheaper minis and from my experience can actually be better quality ( Especially the finecast stuff )
I actually seen finecast models that are in metal and from a 1st hand view of a guy at my local club, They were excellent.
He had a Metal firebelly and other metal Ogre characters that were just excellent.
Pirating is wrong but best keep it quiet so it isn’t highlighted in my opinion.
thrawn:
The best thing to do is ignore the sellers i think. By giving them light it will create a greater interest in cheaper minis and from my experience can actually be better quality ( Especially the finecast stuff )
I actually seen finecast models that are in metal and from a 1st hand view of a guy at my local club, They were excellent.
He had a Metal firebelly and other metal Ogre characters that were just excellent.
Pirating is wrong but best keep it quiet so it isn't highlighted in my opinion.
gIL^
i've heard other people say that the metal is better then the finecast but i don't see it!?!?
the finescast detail is as good or better, plus it's way lighter, so it won't tip on the battle field, less likely for the paint to chip, and much easier to assemble. i really don't see how anyone can prefer the metal. i also don't see how the metal has more detail. i've been playing since 5th edition, when basically your entire army was metal, and the finecast is just as good or better.
AGPO:
Without turning this into another Finecast bashing thread, I think Gil^ was talking about the quality control. I’ve had some good finecast models and some awful ones, but most people I know who’ve bought knock-offs have only had good words to say about the quality.
gIL^:
Without turning this into another Finecast bashing thread, I think Gil^ was talking about the quality control. I've had some good finecast models and some awful ones, but most people I know who've bought knock-offs have only had good words to say about the quality.
AGPO
Yes that's what I meant :hat off.
gIL^:
I heard through the grapevine that the Chinese knock off maker has been shut down you probably know of the website i speak.
It has Miniatures and hobby in the name.
There will always be pirated warhammer but this one was the big one so hopefully the amount of ebay fakes will lessen.
Valrim:
I agree. I’d never buy a recast of a miniature unless that miniature was no longer in production. Personally, I just use proxy models while I slowly build out my army. Besides, I thought FW and GW had excellent customer service. Every time I’d had miscasts or the wrong items I just had to go to my local store and they would fix everything! I don’t have a local store anymore, but I can’t imagine that they wouldn’t get you a new model if the one you ordered was miscast. Broken spikes and things can just be glued and green stuffed back on.
Just my thoughts on the matter…
Support the companies that create the games you enjoy. Otherwise, there wont be any games being supported that you enjoy anymore.
Ulgurstasta:
I have been tempted to get recasts and partly that’s because Forgeworld shipping costs/pricing are stupid. At 15% of your order (for us outside the UK) it punishes you for making larger orders! I have been turned off buying from them several times when I start to calculate the shipping costs, if other companies based around the world can offer reasonable shipping charges to me, Why cant Forgeworld?
AGPO:
FW shipping is one of those annoying things. Originally it was supposed to be because large delicate pieces needed extra careful packing, which was costly. However, looking at the standards of packaging from FW this doesn’t appear to be where the money is going.
Kera foehunter:
Point of order ! everything is made in china. China own most of our countries by buying our dept
So in a round about way China own Forge world… so eather way you paying China…
Valrim:
You should be able to order anything from Forge World through your local retailer or GW store. By doing this you will avoid the shipping fees. Support your retailers. Support the companies. It is a win win.
Ulgurstasta:
You should be able to order anything from Forge World through your local retailer or GW store. By doing this you will avoid the shipping fees. Support your retailers. Support the companies. It is a win win.
Valrim
I have never heard of that! Gotta ask them next time I'm at my local GW store.
Bronze Bull:
I’d also like to say that while it does cost more to get them from Forgeworld but if we do show support for Chaos Dwarfs by buying from Forge World there is the slim chance of seeing more models in the future. I’m not an expert in this but if Chaos Dwarfs continue to turn profits for them then we might see some new models for them in the future!
yanloup:
I have been tempted to get recasts and partly that's because Forgeworld shipping costs/pricing are stupid. At 15% of your order (for us outside the UK) it punishes you for making larger orders! I have been turned off buying from them several times when I start to calculate the shipping costs, if other companies based around the world can offer reasonable shipping charges to me, Why cant Forgeworld?
Ulgurstasta
FW are like GW: they are eager to grasp any penny they can, if not from minis they are doing it from inflating their shipping costs.
Plus, I don't like their minis at all, two reasons why I never had and will never buy their products.
Last thing, all that is from China must stay in China :~