The LAF Games Workshop Discussion Thread

[Predatorpt]

if you get one could you snap a photo of the interor for me? Every review of the kit seems to go "huh, isnide detail,meh, lets look at the guns we've already seen "

Will do. The one I saw was already assembled and the only interior it had was only some benches. Apparently even the Rhino has got more detail than this one.

[chamberlain]

3d printers are very maintenance intensive as well as prone to break down in a way the casual user simply can't deal with.  In many ways this is also true of printers for printing on paper.  To the point where printer manufacturers have figured out if they offload the cost onto ink and toner, they can solve many printer failures by simply selling the customer a brand new printer, subsidized by high ink and toner costs.  I don't think a similar solution is going to be available for 3d printers any time soon.

3d printing as a hobby will become more and more accessible to more people as they become more reliable and easy to use, but I am not sure if they will ever be ubiquitous in modern homes.

They don't have to be in order to have a disruptive effect on my industries.  With the internet people can find a 3d printer for hire within their own city really, really easily.  There are websites I can use to find people even a few blocks away who will print things for a small fee.  As the costs of the printers goes down, those operating on a break even basis will charge lower and lower prices.

GW may one day be negatively impacted by this trend, but it's not today.  It's hard to even predict when it will be.  Or to what degree the disruption will be.  I may be a bit cynical, but I think their business model basically already revolves around selling people a hobby they could do more efficiently elsewhere.  So it will probably continue to function in the face of wide spread easy local access to quality 3d prints.

From what I understand, the disruptive technology in the publishing world was not the home printer.  It was the ereader.  I'm not sure what the analogue to the ereader is in the miniature wargaming world, or if there even is one, but I suspect it will take something like an ereader rather than a printer to be truly devastating to the miniature industry.

There's also a lesson to be learned from how people deal with piracy.  Content creators that establish a relationship with those who enjoy their creations have figured out that people will pay for them even in the face of free competition in the form of piracy.  Again and again people create cool miniatures and then post about them in various places and people ask about them being cast.  With market places for STL files and things like crowd funding and subscription/patronage platforms miniature producers are going to be able to find a place in a disrupted industry.

My suggestion would be to get in front of the camera now.  Start having a real face.  Start building a community of people you are inviting to participate along with you.  GW is doing this and it will become more important as the industry changes.

[Mason]

In other news, after seeing the Primaris Repulsor in the "flesh", I'm really going to get a couple of them. If you take their turret off, you get a nice armored anti-grav lander, perfect for 28mm figures (in this case it really seems you can fit 10 Space Marines in there, but not Primaris ones, ). And almost no skulls in sight, praise Roboute Guilliman!

I have not seen it in person but do agree that it would make a perfectly good sci-fi grav tank.
Not too much obvious 40K stuff that cannot be hidden or removed.

[zemjw]

I have not seen it in person but do agree that it would make a perfectly good sci-fi grav tank.
Not too much obvious 40K stuff that cannot be hidden or removed.

I picked one up at Claymore last Saturday at £10 off 

Not sure what I'm going to do with it yet. I was thinking "grav tank", but the lander option could be worth exploring.

There are pictures of the sprues on the GW site - link, but I'm not sure they help...

[Tactalvanic]

Its a nice lump of tanky grav thing, but, no not that badly dragged back to GW yet to consider it..

The lack of skull plating really helps to.

Simply not true, Have two printers, Both worked straight out of the box and have never broken down. Have balanced the print bed a few times in a few years, that takes 2 minutes and is easy. That is the limit of maintenance required. Does your printer break down all the time?

This.

I bought last year a cheap (yes less than £200 its that cheap)  Prusa Chinese clone self assembly kit thing. Even has heated  build plate (ooh).

Intentionally - so I could swear and curse and bitch and learn what it does.

Which I did, all of the above.

Added bits, printed bits to add, bought extra fans, fiddle some more, changed bits, add bits etc.

It works. It works fine actually. Ok not straight out of the box, but to be fair it was in pieces at that point...

I think up to know I might have actually spent £200 pounds on it including filament!

I don't get that much time to mess with it. so filament lasts a while... on my second reel.

Miss-print - yes, but that's been mainly down to either the STL or the slicer, or just not quite setting it right.

sometimes have to align the bed, yes, that's about it. It works, nothing massive - hooks clips and other bits and bobs - movement trays etc  and things, even some basic scenery since sorting the additional fan for cooling.

But I have not actually had it break down on me yet.

I will eventually get a better one but no rush as although surprised by the fact, it does work.

To be honest the only issue I really see with them is time - eg how long it takes to print stuff, and I think that more than anything else, will keep mass production or large production runs in manufacturing settings from being impacted, whether in our hobby or other places for longer than anything else to do with 3d printing.

we as hobby people merrily will set something printing for 4 or 10 or 18 or whatever hours, its fine by us.

But I cannot see large companies being happy with the idea of printing 10,000 item runs, and basing that on each item taking 4 hours to print, so they will be ready by... oh god no. and if there is an error in the print run - object badly sliced or whatever....

Surely that's why in the example of our happy small scale hobby they are primarily used to created masters that are used to create moulds for making large numbers of copies for sales/distribution currently surely? Even large numbers of printers that would be needed for large scale mass production -  would be a bit excessive currently even forgetting the possible long print times?

for small scale production of items, yes great, but for large runs of hundreds or thousands or more of something err, no I don't see that being done yet, its a useful tech and enhancement to many existing methods of production yes.

Its proved quite useful for printing things not hobby related more than for hobby stuff to be fair. So far

[Westfalia Chris]

Folks.

Games Workshop plots and ploys => On topic.

3D printing woes and joys => Off topic.

Thanks.

[chamberlain]

Simply not true, Have two printers, Both worked straight out of the box and have never broken down. Have balanced the print bed a few times in a few years, that takes 2 minutes and is easy. That is the limit of maintenance required. Does your printer break down all the time?

The difference between the hobby user and the general public using one is enormous.  Providing tech support for 3d printers is very similar to providing tech support for copiers and paper printers.  Individuals going "but my printer never has problems" doesn't actually encapsulate what's really going on in the larger user base once you add in truly casual users.  There is a very good reason the home paper printer market has embraced the disposable printer business model.

Anyway, the more important point is that GW is already in the business of selling people on a premium approach to the hobby, so if they're already out-competing the cheaper options, they'll probably find a way to make things work with 3d printers easily accessible to everyone.

It's also far more interesting how GW is preparing for that shift by becoming more communicative with their customers.  They want to invite them to purchase an experience of participating in their worlds through collecting, building models, painting them and playing games.  They can do that even in a world of acccessible 3d printing.

[Andrew May]

The new pics of Morty floating around (literally) look pretty nice!

[Tactalvanic]

Morty has a huge amount of detail on it, not sure I like it that much, but well.. probably outside of my ability.

 I actually have a triumvirate of the primarch set (won it in a raffle, still amazed at winning that - my luck normally does not stretch quite that far) - but although nice, I would never have actually bought it new.

Matching him on the Nurgle side although almost tempting, not sure about that, and plenty of other stuff I really, really should find the time to get on with.

Still resisting the new GW temptation

[Reed]

Mortarion looks like a fairy. Bloated and putrid, but still a fairy.
Someone had to say it.

[Elbows]

I think he can be fixed...

-Replace the wings
-Chop off the floaty chains and flies/nurglings
-Replace the slightly over-silly scythe with something a bit more sane
-Find a way to mount it that doesn't include floating.

I think there is potential there.

[Andrew May]

I'm pretty impressed already, really looking forward to seeing what the CMON crowd do with it.

[Agis]

Mortarion looks like a fairy. Bloated and putrid, but still a fairy.
Someone had to say it.

True, proof:


But I have to agree, the mini can be improved!

[3 fingers]

GW have got the galvanic servo haulers back in,just picked mine up from local independent model shop as he had ordered it for me, thinking of using them for scenery for necromunda.

[Andrew May]

He has got a Brian Froud vibe tbh but I don't mind that.