WARGAMES FACTORY joins forces with SLITHERINE

RichardD · Post by **RichardD** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 9:25 pm

Did the existence of plastic moulded figures mean that GW stopped producing white metal ones? Nope. And GW spent a lot of money buying injection moulding machines, really pushing the use of plastics for 28mm figures during the 90s.

Ultimately, once you have the machine time (whether you own the machines or subcontract the manufacture), you are still only partway there - tooling (the moulds themselves) is *incredibly* expensive. Massively so for something that will alow you to mould in a plastic that retains nice crisp edges. When you've got your tools, you can churn out figures for fractions of pennies, but you really, really need to be producing - and selling - in large volumes.

Now those volumes are entirely achievable for an outfit like GW, producing its main product lines. But all of the speciality figures will still be cast in white metal - it's just not economically viable to spend £30k on mastering and tooling for a figure that might sell 1,000 copies. But they can afford to cast in metal, because the moulds and centrifuges are a whole order of mangitude cheaper to make and run.

I remain slightly skeptical that the big volumes needed to break even can be achieved by many manufacturers, or indeed many product lines. Main trop types for omans and Gauls, maybe. 100YW English and French men-at-arms, archers and knights - quite possibly. Medieval Scots or Ancient Spanish? Not a chance. So there will still be a call for entire product lines in white metal, along with all of the speciality troops to go along with the plastics.

PS -Ian, I'm blaming you for my current spending spree on 28mm. Those figures you had on the table at the WMMMS have encouraged me to start buying and painting Romans. Frankly my only hope for retaining some spending money this year lies in Wargames Factory managing to churn out good looking legionaries at an affordable price. becuase if I carry on buying Foundary figures, I am surely doomed.

flameberge · Post by **flameberge** » Fri Apr 04, 2008 4:20 am

More options are always good so if you like plastic, great. I personaly hate plastic figures. I see many people like the light weight of plastic while that is the number one reason I don't like them.

Malidor · Post by **Malidor** » Fri Apr 04, 2008 5:47 am

flameberge wrote:More options are always good so if you like plastic, great. I personaly hate plastic figures. I see many people like the light weight of plastic while that is the number one reason I don't like them.

That's fixed by using heavy bases. I buy expensive pre-cut mdf bases that have heavy magnets on the underside, but the same could be done if you are making your own cardboard or plywood bases ~ just glue something heavy to the underside.

Landsknecht · Post by **Landsknecht** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 4:07 am

Does anyone know when and if these fellows from Wargames Factory will release the models they promised to produce?

Malidor · Post by **Malidor** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 7:19 am

Landsknecht wrote:Does anyone know when and if these fellows from Wargames Factory will release the models they promised to produce?

...they're not in production? I thought the Romans and Celts had been available for ages.

nikgaukroger · Post by **nikgaukroger** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 8:58 am

The Warlord figures have been available for a few weeks now not the Wargames Factory ones.

Must admit the delay to WF is getting really annoying now

hammy · Post by **hammy** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 9:29 am

There are some pictures of real figures on the Wargames Factory site now.

From what has been said on the miniatures page they are not making any promises that they cannot be 100% sure to keep. They have also remastered their Romans as having done the Celts they realised they were way better than the Romans so went back and redid them to keep consitency.

I am also in the would really like to see them in the flesh camp.

CrazyHarborc · Post by **CrazyHarborc** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 6:07 pm

I am also growing tired of waiting and waiting. On the plus side, I am now caught up with getting my bags of Old Glory barbarians painted. THAT means I am now looking for stuff to paint. I am actually starting to dig down into the stacked up, back log of "I'll paint them someday minies" I have. ( I hope everybody else does too.)

willb · Post by **willb** » Mon Jul 14, 2008 1:43 am

the delay has made me a bit nervous about getting them. their contest getting hacked and not being put back up hasn't helped either. the warlord figures are looking more inviting even though they would cost me twice as much with the current exchange rates.

Landsknecht · Post by **Landsknecht** » Mon Jul 14, 2008 5:41 am

CrazyHarborc wrote:I am also growing tired of waiting and waiting. On the plus side, I am now caught up with getting my bags of Old Glory barbarians painted. THAT means I am now looking for stuff to paint. I am actually starting to dig down into the stacked up, back log of "I'll paint them someday minies" I have. ( I hope everybody else does too.)

I still have many Old Glory barbarians to paint. I just got the Little Big Man shield transfers for them, so they should look nice when I'm done.

The pictures of the figures on the Wargames Factory website look great. I wonder how they will stand up next to Old Glory miniatures.

CrazyHarborc · Post by **CrazyHarborc** » Tue Jul 15, 2008 12:19 am

Today I dug into the hidden corners of the several locations of "miniatures to paint....someday" stacked in my basement.....THEN, there is the stash in the dining room.

I have begun to paint (I am ashamed) my Lizardman army

.....MOST of the minies ARE plastic.

Landsknecht · Post by **Landsknecht** » Tue Jul 15, 2008 12:26 am

CrazyHarborc wrote:Today I dug into the hidden corners of the several locations of "miniatures to paint....someday" stacked in my basement.....THEN, there is the stash in the dining room. I have begun to paint (I am ashamed) my Lizardman army .....MOST of the minies ARE plastic.

There's no shame in that, I played my Orcs and Goblins army yesterday against Dwarves and lost. That was shameful. It's fantasy that brought me into wargaming Ancients.

Empgamer · Post by **Empgamer** » Fri Aug 01, 2008 2:43 pm

Not a good track record for WF thus far. Plenty of promises, loads of hype, no figures and no information forthcoming for a long time. Taking pre-orders - errrrm - no thanks!! I was looking for some Celts to face off against my EIR etc and, as I don't really like Celts that much (as a wargaming army

) I thought of using WF. I'm not in a hurry for them so can wait BUT if I was in a hurry I'd not hesitate to g with Warlord. Lots of people have pre-ordered and had their cards debited and thus far got nothing. Not good, not good at all. IMHO of course.

OldenTired · Post by **OldenTired** » Sat Aug 02, 2008 5:12 am

saw plastic romans on table today. a base of 4 legionnaires was lighter than 4 white metal in 15mm!!

nice figures. looking forward to the range being finished...