Re: any one else totally pissed off with GW?

Posted by MortiS-the-Lost on May 14, 2013; 8:56am
URL: http://the-lost-and-the-damned.71.s1.nabble.com/any-one-else-totally-pissed-off-with-GW-tp7579915p7579949.html

The thing is,due to their stores GW have a false monopoly over the miniatures industry, especially here in the UK. Many fans think GW are the only miniature producing company in the world because that's how they got into the hobby and they don't know of any others.
The internet has done something towards opening a people's eyes, but the most popular hobby sites tend to be GW fan dominated and very insular when it comes to non-GW products.  
Many GW fans when confronted with miniatures by another company will simply proclaim that they are 'a cheap knock-off' 'copying GW' and act like GW invented it all - denial is another big thing with GW fans - they can't except that they are paying well over the odds for what they are buying and don't like the fact most other companies charge a lot less than GW - the attitude of “If someone else is doing what GW are doing but for less, there has to be something wrong with them” and  “If it's not GW it's crap” is a big part of what keeps GW in business and keeps smaller companies out of the main stream.
These 'hard-core' fans refuse to see the flaws in GW products and in their next breath will try they hardest to tear down anything non-GW, it's brand loyalty gone nuts!
One of these fan-boys may be reading this thread right now, fan-rage building up, Caps Lock ablaze ready to call us all haters (haters is the GW fan boy term for non-GW gamers), ready to leap into this thread and strike a blow back for beloved GW, tell us how much better the new extra-big £60 plastic kits are than any other miniatures ever made … and so on.
Actually they're not all like that - a few of them will try and appear more open-minded by telling you they've played 'Warma-hoards' and/or Infinity and decided they prefer 40k anyway (You'll note that WarMachine and Infinity are the next most expensive miniatures to buy after GW).
Then again a few of the more rage-bound will tell you they've played a demo of “Mantic” (they rarely actually know the names of the games) and that they thought it was really terrible (asking for details often exposes the fact they are making it up to try and prove their point)

But anyway the point is, as long as GW can provide an environment free of out side influences they will remain in business and be able to charge what want for whatever cheaply made products they want. This is why White Dwarf isn't a real magazine any more - this is why you don't see many adverts for GW in other magazines - GW can't compete with other companies in a wider market, so they just do their best to deny that the wider market is there - and sadly it works (with a little help from their hard-core mega fans), but it might not work forever, we'll have to wait and see.