As you are doubtless aware, the new Dark Angels book is out. You may also remember I highly considered switching to the new book when it came out. With news of cheaper Librarians and more flexible Tactical Squads, among other things in game sense this seems like a Good Move. My Marine collection is extensive enough that I don't really need new models, either. However, this would now involve buying a £30 Codex. And that's really £10 more than I want to spend. Even considering it would be one of the least expensive reference documents I have bought in a while. Jump.
Furthermore, although I can just about deal with £20.50 for 5-man squads (although this is a very big Just About), the apparent new pricing system bothers me. If I want to buy 5 Deathwing Terminators and deck them out with actual Deathwing insignia, I either pay £28 for regular Terminators and rely on my bitz box (which, to be fair, expanded a bit back when the Dark Angels Veterans kit was £15 and in my opinion the best value kit GW ever produced while it was still at that price mark), or for £7 more get all that plus loads of bitz I can't immediately use.
GW's philosophy of giving people loads of cool bitz for infantry is great and all, but when you're not using half the sprue you pay for, that's worrying. Hence magnet work. Or finding some kind of alternate use. That said, you could instead turn this to your advantage with bitz, right?
Let's say I buy the new Deathwing Command box and use it to build five Deathwing Terminators. I then wish to build a squad of Deathwing Knights. To make that, I need:
- 5 bases (£2.00)
- 5 back bodies (£1.45)
- 5 handless right arms (£1.95)
- 5 legs (£9.95)
- 10 shoulder pads (£7.50)
And then there's GW's favourite, Shiny Expensive Centrepiece Syndrome, which seems to get worse by the day. The new Fantasy Shiny Chaos Thingy is 50, and again you're probably not using half the kit. The only reason I bought both Chaos 40 Pluses is that I knew I would magnetise them both. Oh, and the opposite of not using all the kit also applies. You use 95% of the Heldrake, which to me suggests it should be £35 if the pre-requisite of being a 40+ is multi-use and having excess parts to that effect. The original Flyer price point of £27.50 is probably too low as those things are rather easy to put together and the Heldrake isn't as much.
I don't like ranting if not doing it for comic effect, but I needed to put something down. Eventually, I'll find the Codex at a price mark I like, and then I'll see what I want to do from there.