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Would you buy resin scenery on top of your model collections?
Yes, but only a few pieces here and there. 37%  37%  [ 17 ]
Yes, lots of scenery, I love a busy looking board. 35%  35%  [ 16 ]
Possibly, I'm not totally sure. 20%  20%  [ 9 ]
No, I'm not interested in scenery. 9%  9%  [ 4 ]
Total votes : 46
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 Post subject: A little market research - Resin scenery
PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 11:37 am 
Kinsman
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Hi folks,

I haven't been active on here for a few years but I came here alot in my college years and really enjoyed it, I always thought this was the most mature and intelligent forum I'd ever been on so I hope it's ok that I've come here for your help. Now this isn't strictly LoTR related, I hope this is ok, my apologies if it isn't. I've re-read the guidelines, sorry if i've misinterpretted anything.
Although I've been out of the loop for a while, I never lost my interest in wargames. I studied for a degree in modelmaking and special effects and after graduation I concentrated on my own modelmaking business. So far I've been making 1:1250 scale collectable ships (you can see my website here http://www.gwylanmodels.co.uk/ just so you can see what I've been up to :).)

Now I am in the process of planning a wargames company. I have a few sculptors and artists who are already working with me and we're developing our first game, which will be a 40mm scale sci-fi skirmish game, though we're also planning fantasy and historical products. Part of our "unique selling point" is that we want to support our figure ranges with extensive ranges of high quality resin scenery. So if the story is set in a town or city, you can actually buy the neccesary kits to pupulate the board and make a fantastic playing field! I'd like to know if you guys would be hypothetically willing to spend the extra money for scenery when many of you might be used to going without or making your own. We're not talking massive expense either, most of my ships are resin based so I know the costs involved and what our margins will have to be, needless to say we know we can do it well for an affordable price tag. I just want to know whether you'd be interested if there were large scenery ranges on offer, or whether you'd prefer to go without or make your own.

The resins we use are very, very hard waring and tough. They aren't anything like as brittle as some other resin products I've seen/broken, and hold extremely fine detail (which you can see on my ships.) They are also lightweight, and will survive dropping unless they gave sticky outy parts etc. Even if they do break the break is very clean and easily repaired. We vacuum cast them so you don't get bubbles, and we take alot of care with our moulds so there are very few flash lines or faults. We also have very strict quality control, duds get recycled, not sold. Solid models like barricades etc are cast in a solid piece, while big models such as buildings are made up or cast sections and slab sides to save material and weight, which keeps the price down. All you would need to do is assemble the kits, paint it and add some flock or grass etc. It's like a figure, you can go as far as you want with it :D!

So you can get an idea of the kinds of prices and variety I want to offer, lets imagine I'm developing a scenery range to go with GW's LoTR figs (just so we're clear, I'm not intending to do one initially.) But so you can get a flavour, here's a sample of 10 products I might offer in a range of say 60-100 pieces at their retail prices:

- Rohirrim cottage: £12

- Golden hall (large centrepiece): £40

- Gondor fountain: £3

- Minas tirith wall section (12" x 3"): £10

- Barricades (2 x 6"): £7

- Hobbit hole (12" dia): £12

- Moria columns (x4): £6

- Balin's Tomb and Well: £4

- Bucklebury ferry (raft, jetty and cottage set): £20

- Helms Deep set to fit 4' x 4' board inc walls and fortress: £150


Now, some of those such as the hobbit hole and helms deep I would do in GRP with resin parts where neccessary. I've done lots of stuff like that before and it's both practical and low cost which is great.

So, would you guys buy that kind of thing if it were on offer, or would it be too much of an added expense on top of your figure collections? It would be great to hear your comments and see your votes. This will really help me get an idea of whether we should go for it with the scenery ranges for our own games or not.

Will.

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Last edited by Eorling on Tue Mar 16, 2010 7:42 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 12:09 pm 
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Although I enjoy painting and gaming, terrain building has never been my favourite way to spend a Saturday afternoon. Spending a few extra pounds on terrain is not an issue for me, but spending a few extra hours is. That's why I'm always happy to buy bits and pieces from here and there - like Amon Hen style statues from Ebob, ruins kits from Antenociti etc. If you had a nice selection of quality scenery pieces, I would very probably buy some.

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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 6:50 pm 
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Interesting, though I would like to see sketches of the proposed pieces.

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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 7:20 pm 
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Even those that are very talented at creating terrain are likely to buy something and there will be hundreds of people that will buy it because they're not great at making their own/don't have time or what-have-you.

The link to your ships didn't work for me, but the pricing sounds excellent for the larger pieces, but not so great for smaller ones.

For example, I don't know how large the fountain would be, but it would have to be at least 3-4" diameter to be in keeping with the other prices. The barricade would need to be at least two pieces for £7 at 6" long. Moria columns, depends on size again, but £6 for a single column seems quite steep. Maybe 2 for £6? Balin's Tomb: if it's just the tomb, then £4 is a bit high, £2.50-£3 seems to be the higher end of such a small piece for me.

The rest however is incredibly priced. Helm's Deep at £150, a large centrepiece at £40, a cottage at £20, a fortress wall (could stand to drop a pound or two) at £10, a 12" hobbit-hole at £12 is incredulous and I would buy them in a snap (presuming I have money, which I currently don't, lol).
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 7:32 pm 
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I would defiently buy some wall sections, but unfortunalty I live far away and shipping costs might be a problem.

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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 7:37 pm 
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Ah, the link wasn't working bcause of a comma, working now. Gothmog, hopefully we will have retailers close to you, or at least on the same continent. The smaller items won't be heavy so shipping would be ok even if you bought them from us directly.

Also, the smaller items on that list such as Balin's tomb would probably be a small set of items rather than just a single piece. So for example with the tomb you'd get both the tomb and the well and maybe some dead dwarfs etc etc. I must have missed out the "s" in columns hehe. You would get four or so for that pirce.

Thanks for your comments and votes everyone, this is really helpful.

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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 9:59 pm 
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Although I enjoy making some scenery, it takes time, effort and never looks very good. I defiantly would consider buying some of those proposed pieces at those prices, especially the Rohirrem cottage and the minas tirith wall section (as long as it fitted in with the ones GW made a few years ago; how high would you make it?)

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PostPosted: Tue Mar 16, 2010 10:32 pm 
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I checked your site and wasd impressed by the naval wargame I had to admit :)

maybe I'll start that one of one day :)

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PostPosted: Wed Mar 17, 2010 9:30 pm 
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I would for one definately be interested in some scenery, because i am no good at moddelling my own, but i would definately buy some, especially if it was LOTR themed. I would just point one thing out, to get proper fans in you would have to make alot of diiferent pieces so that you could make a whole board filled with scenery for a specific reigon.

I personally would love something depicting the city of Umbar or a sleepy Rohan village. 8)

Hoped that helped you a bit. I hope this does surface because as of yet there are not many, if any, manafactureres that cater for this part of the market.

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PostPosted: Wed Mar 17, 2010 9:47 pm 
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Cheers Highlordell. The fact the no one is doing it seriously, at least none of the mainstream companies, makes me want to fill that niche to make us different.

I would LOVE to do a large range of LOTR scenery at some point, but I'd like to do it properly and with proper names etc - which would mean licences etc. Maybe one day, if we have success with our first projects.

Thanks guys this is super useful :D!

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PostPosted: Wed Mar 17, 2010 9:59 pm 
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Well make sure you come here first if everything does work out! :D

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 18, 2010 9:25 am 
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It sounds like a good idea in theory. Have you done much investigation into what other companies make/charge? One of the best retailers of medieval buildings is tabletop world. Extremely detailed models ideal for the town of Bree. Quite expensive but the best quality I've seen about.

http://www.tabletop-world.com/index.php

Gripping Beast do a range of buildings that fit in with Rohan.

http://www.grippingbeast.com/shop.php?CatID=207

Fanatascene also work in resin. I'm not so keen on their buildings but they have some nice accessories.

http://www.fantascene.net/home.htm

Then of course is Thomarillion, who do quite a bit of LotR themed pieces.

http://www.thomarillion.de/index.php?seite=home&unterseite=&modell=&pos=&sprache=gb_&PHPSESSID=f919194e8dcb22be515d51d3e5c2e0f9

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 18, 2010 12:07 pm 
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The Tabletop World models are fantastic, they have some very highly skilled mould makers thats for sure. But it is still rather on the pricey side and the range isn't exactly extensive. Still, top notch quality which is the most important thing. Thanks for sharing :).

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PostPosted: Thu Mar 18, 2010 7:26 pm 
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Ah, with those clarifications, they are worth it then ;) I would definitely suggest that you make the scenery line that you wish to make, but I'd also recommend making some of the types of scenery that you've suggested. I would, however, suggest that you make them and give them generic titles so that people feel less like they can only be used for LotR and can be used for historical battles, Fantasy games, agri-worlds and other similar things. You'd be surprised because it should allow you to be higher in search engine results and you currently know that you have some potential customers. I'd also make a mention of you over on CDO, which has a couple of thousand avid players that are likely to pass it on to other websites.
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PostPosted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 9:34 am 
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Hi guys,

I'd just like to say a huge thankyou for all your feedback it was really useful and we're really encouraged by what we've seen here and on a few other forums.

While we're developing our first game we're now intending to go ahead with a range of fantasy scenery in resin of the types and prices discussed above. It should be useable with a variety of 28/25mm fantasy games and we really hope some of you guys will be interested. We want to make sure all our systems and our website work properly before launching the big game so some scenery is an ideal test platform. When we're ready to go with it I'll let you all know (as long as that isn't against forum rules?)

Anyway I have really got back into LotR SBG with all this and I'm now finishing off my unpainted rohirrim which I'll expand soon. So I'll be around a bit more, thanks again everyone 8)!

Will.

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PostPosted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 10:04 am 
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ukfreddybear wrote:


Got an email from one of the Thomas' at Thomarillion a few weeks ago saying they were getting some pressure from New Line about their dwarf statues looking too much like Gimli, now all their LOTR style stuff has been pulled from the site! :(

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PostPosted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 10:27 am 
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Yes we heard about that too. Our stuff won't be specifically for LotR, we're hoping it will be useable for a variety of fantasy or historical games, we've got no intention of even hinting at copyright infringement. Hopefully we won't have any problems :).

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PostPosted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 4:02 pm 
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Just don't produce anything too similar to things seen int he films (which you're not planning) and you'll be fine. very pleased to hear that you shall be doing this though. let us know ASAP when we can buy things ;)
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PostPosted: Sat Jul 24, 2010 5:02 pm 
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Hi folks,

Good news, we're not far off launching our first few buildings. There will be eight or so in the first range. So far we've got two styles of generic buildings; wooden ones with thatched roofs for use with Vikings, Rohirrim etc, and half timbered town houses that could be used to represent a small English Civil War town or somehere like Bree. We have houses, stables, town halls and a few bits and bobs to go with them. Rob is keen to sculpt some generic peasants to go with them which should be cool. They will all be available from our web shop when it is up and running. Gard, our webdesigner tells me that its very close to going live but for now you can enjoy our front page 8). I'll post up pics when we're sure we're ready to go but they are looking super cool if I say so myself. To give you a flavour of what to expect, one of the town halls is based on this photo:

Image


Cheers all,

Will.

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PostPosted: Sat Jul 24, 2010 11:05 pm 
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It looks great!I'll admit that I am tempted by this stuff quite often, but I probably wouldn't buy it. Personally, I enjoy buiding terrain and buildings more than I do painting miniatures, but that's just me. I'll definately check back here though, it looks like you have some really promising developments. Best of luck. :yay:

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