Tiamat666 said:
That's a sound assumption. Then again, maybe 3D printing will cause Games Workshop to lower the prices of their miniatures to reasonable levels, which might cause them to gain new customers and expand the franchise. It will always be cheaper for a specialized company to create miniatures than for a home user with expensive 3D printer and materials.
Well, yes. The laws of production and line-costs ensure Games Workshop a potential place in the world, but their highly monopolistic agenda and years of financial success lead me to believe they will not survive when confronted with new market forces. Specifically those whom they cannot just sue out of existence.
Companies like theirs do not behave like those who are used to competition. Everything I've seen based on their business practices and behavior tell me that they think anti-competitively rather than competitively. They try to change the market to suit their needs rather than changing their offering to suit the market.
I won't lie; part of me wants to see Games Workshop collapse entirely rather than recover, even for the "right reasons".
Partly to open up the miniatures market further so that I can finally get in on that. (I've actually designed tabletop game systems as a hobby, using LEGOs as placeholders. Actual miniatures would work much better. So 3D printers might be in my future)
Partly to end their insane, almost terrifying legal inquisition against the world.
But mostly to set an example.
For years, I have specifically avoided Warhammer on account of the asking cost alone. That's just market neutrality talking.
But then there's the company behind the brand: Games Workshop. I am not kidding when I say that everything new that I learn or hear about Games Workshop is bad, and usually a case of "bad to worse". Like an upgrade patch of bad that enhances the previous levels of bad.
And I'm not just getting this from the Internet Hate Machine either; Store owners, hobbysts at conventions, my friends, even random folks at college; everyone who has dealt with GW in the last decade has almost nothing nice to say about them as a business.
They really just seem like the worst kind of company to have around, let alone succeed, and even if they do turn their financial ship around, they don't seem the sort to learn from their mistakes.