John Zeitler

(Before you ask: I slept better last night, but not perfectly. Tonight should be short but better, and then tomorrow night will be as close to perfect as I’m likely to get, I think.)

I kept this relatively quiet at the time, but around the end of April I picked up the “starter set” for Warhammer 40,000, called “Assault on Black Reach”. This was partly the fault of TV Tropes’ incessant pimping of the game, partly due to an attraction to the fluff, and partly due to the fact that I like da Orks. Orks is green an’ Orks is big an’ Orks is always ‘ard, an’ dey kin stomp da oomies wheneva, wereva. As you can see, the Orks’ particular mindset is… infectious, to say the least.

I’ve yet to actually field the army due to the fact that Warhammer, like most miniatures games, is obscenely expensive. The Black Reach set cost $65, even after discounts through being a member of the club, and it only has enough figures to create the barest minimum fieldable squads for both the Orks and the Space Marines. Furthermore, the “big” units included for the Orks (Deffcoptas) aren’t quite what I’m looking for, as I’d be much happier with just a huge, greenskinned tidal wave of rage swarming over the battlefield.

So, at GASP this past weekend, I looked into picking up some additional figures in order to make up the difference. They start at about $2 per figure, and armies sufficient for a legal match might have up to 100 units or more. In my case, “more” is the operative word since I’m eschewing the heavy artillery in favor of more or less Zerg Rushing. (Some lesser support units, in the Ork parlance: Gretchin, go for about $1.50 each.) The actual numbers crunched to make a legal army differ from faction to faction, and are standardized in faction-specific Codex books that run $25 each. I did mention that it’s in addition to a required rulebook that is itself $50, right? And that the units are seldom sold individually, instead in boxes of 10 or more? And that on top of all of that, units are pretty much expected to be painted, after you assemble them, sometimes with specialized tools? And as a final coup-de-grace, there are army carriers that can run $50 plus $20 per foam layer, so as to prevent damage to the miniatures?

I did say “expensive”. And that’s not why I’m complaining– in fact I’m more than happy to compensate Games Workshop by buying the legit gear when possible and plausible (as amiable as I am, there is no way in Hell I am going to pay a 150% premium for the GW-branded paints when similar or better ones are at the craft store just up the road from my house).

What bugs me is the idiotic way that Games Workshop has managed to “protect” the value of their goods. There are countless horror stories about the draconic controls that GW has placed on the stores that sell models and supplies. A certain percentage of the store’s floorplan must be devoted to their products, and they’re required to hold events (read: release parties and tournaments) at certain times of the year, even if that conflicts with a local club’s events. Ordering from GW is a convoluted process that requires a high-level degree in mathematics to figure out. And purchasing the minis online used to be impossible, because GW found that online sellers were pricing them at significant discounts off the retail value and quickly pulled the licenses of those sellers.

I say “used to be impossible” for a very good reason. Amazon, through its partners program, makes the ugly business of scouring the net for sellers willing to discount far simpler. I managed to find a set of Ork Boyz listed for $15– 40% off the labeled price. For ten Boyz, that’s not bad… multiply that by a few more, and you’ve got a less expensive route to having your own army. To add to the thrill, Amazon is too big for GW to raise a stink at, and there’s a fairly large pool of sellers who’ll offer discounts of varying amounts. Overall, it mitigates a significant portion of the high barrier to entry that the game has.

But it also illustrates an interesting point about capitalism. Even if you hold a monopoly on an item or resource, in this day and age you cannot completely control the end-to-end price points of the goods in question. The free market, or as free as it gets, is always governed by people, and sometimes people will break “the rules”. Nine times out of ten, that’s bad– see all the other cases of big companies screwing people just because they think they have the money to buy themselves out of trouble. But the one time out of ten that it’s good, the lucky or savvy consumer will take advantage of it ten times out of ten.

In all honesty, this isn’t just good for the consumer, it’s good for Games Workshop, too. Sure, they take a hit on the cost of their gear. But they also introduce a lot more people to the game; and like it or not, there will come a day when I’m at a game day or a GW event, and something will break or chip, and I’ll shell out for the expensive, proprietary-branded supplies to fix it (it’s just probability). Like I said, my problem isn’t that it’s expensive, it’s that it’s needlessly so, and that the steps taken to keep it that high are ultimately locking people out of a game that’s, in my opinion, kind of cool.

It’s all a moot point right now, as I’m not exactly in the green enough to go on a major Ork-buyin’ binge. For the time being, I’ll content myself with the books and the computer games. But, well, piecemeal is how these things are supposed to go anyway, I think. And the Ork Codex is on my list for this week.