February Releases?

GothmogtheWerewolf · **Posted:** Tue Jan 21, 2014 2:25 am

Oh Gundabad Orcs, oh Gundabad Orcs, how shiny is your armour?
Oh Gundabad Orcs, oh Gundabad Orcs, how shiny is your armour?
"Well, it's not our fault, GW wanted us this shiny!"

In other words, waiting for Gundabad Orcs is getting a little frustrating.

Imladris96 · **Posted:** Tue Jan 21, 2014 3:13 am

I planned an entire force around Gundabad orcs thinking they would be plastic and easy to bolster with box sets. This finecast rumor has me worried. I only get finecast from GW stores because of the whole miscast problem. Now I'll either forget it or wait for some different evil models. Really disappointed with The Hobbit's evil range, hopefully they don't just throw us some points heavy models like the Necromancer or a Dragon and expect that to take the bulk of armies so they won't need to produce more variations of evil forces.

Batman of The Shire · **Posted:** Tue Jan 21, 2014 3:36 am

Not picking up a single laketown guard, wont be picking up gundabads if they are the same.

Lord_of_the_nine · **Posted:** Wed Jan 22, 2014 7:07 pm

Well 16 pounds for 4 finecast models in a blister of any lotr range(eg. berserkers) and 15 for 3 models in a blister in the hobbit range(eg. laketown warriors).

Just great keep up the good work GW on rising the prises more and more.

Even if there was a slight chance of me buying these models now there is none. More money for less product.

I'll just keep on buying models from ebay since I noticed that GW is silently and steadily discontinuing more and more models I wanted to buy.

VandalCabbage · **Joined:** Sun Jan 19, 2014 1:12 pm **Posts:** 286

They seem to have really been thrown off track by the split to three films. I didn't think they expected so many people to want to hoard/horde (both appropriate) laketown. I don't have the DoS book, but are gundabad orcs supposed to be elites for a hunter orc army?
I think (hope) this will be their last experiment with finecast troops, and only because they expected them to be scenario only.
Communication Breakdown... its always the same ... another price rise for laketown... gonna drive me insane... dum.. dah dah dum.

tchuck · **Joined:** Tue Feb 26, 2013 10:28 pm **Posts:** 9

I haven't seen the DoS sourcebook, but if there are only 6 poses for the Gundabad orcs (3 sword/3 spear) they might have been made in finecast. Considering there last half year review to investor was not good, they might be making all they can to reduce cost. Since plastic mold cost a lot, if they don't expect to sell a lot of a product they will turn to finecast.

LordoftheBrownRing · **Posted:** Wed Jan 22, 2014 9:13 pm

Yeah that doesnt look good for us. Honestly though.....I dont see how they look to make money back by driving sales into the dirt with such a horrible idea.....

Gilcris · **Posted:** Wed Jan 22, 2014 9:23 pm

tchuck wrote:

Considering there last half year review to investor was not good, they might be making all they can to reduce cost. Since plastic mold cost a lot, if they don't expect to sell a lot of a product they will turn to finecast.

It's a vicious cycle, but I don't think that these Finecast packs are going to be the answer that ends up yielding them more revenue in the end. The manufacturing may be cheaper and the profit/unit may be higher, but after perusing the responses of fellow hobbyists in this topic, talking to RL friends following the Laketown release and seeing my local GW MANAGER hosting a hobby night this week on "How to Convert Men of Dale into Men of Laketown", I don't think the jaunt into 3-to-a-pack blisters has been a very well-received one.

Tom the Troll · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 11:09 am

Still no clue what the February releases gonna be?

Thinking of picking up the hobby again at the end of this month, really excited to see what they are going to release for February! :-D

Dr Grant · **Joined:** Fri Aug 03, 2012 1:50 pm **Posts:** 1339

We're moving to an interesting new phase for GW releases. As of Feb 1st they'll be releasing a White Dwarf and selection of releases weekly rather than monthly. As such we'll no longer get everything announced/leaked at the start of the month so I think we'll start to think less of 'February releases' and more of 'this week's releases'. The first reports of glimpses of the first edition (released this Saturday) make no mention of any SBG releases so we can now start looking forward to the edition that comes out on the 8th and what that might bring. Interesting times indeed.

DomyHill · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 1:00 pm

I didn't know about a FC Thorins company until reading this thread, I then had a good look through the rulebook and is this what you guys are on about?

Dr Grant · **Joined:** Fri Aug 03, 2012 1:50 pm **Posts:** 1339

Yep that's the one, there's a few pictures of them dotted about the rulebook, some of them look really cool (I love the Thorin pose, great to get him in his coat). It's only speculation that they're Finecast of course, there's an outside chance they're plastic but the safe money says Finecast.

We've been waiting over a year for them now though, no knows if and when they'll see the light of day?

DomyHill · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 4:07 pm

Is possible that they were metal prototypes that were produced quickly so they could start putting the rulebook together (like some of the miniatures jmh_stirling posted in the Unreleased and Rare miniatures thread) and were never actually intended for release?

mertaal · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 4:18 pm

Possible I suppose, but I think it's more likely they will release them with the last film as a sort of "ultimate company" style of thingy.

I'm happy with the company from EFGT, and while I quite like having 3 or 4 different versions of Gandalf and the fellowship, I see no real need to duplicate Thorin's Company.

Harfoot · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 4:50 pm

I won't be surprised if jmh-stirling shows them one day!

Anyone's guess when the next release will be with WD weekly? Could be ages

Imladris96 · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 4:55 pm

DomyHill wrote:

Is possible that they were metal prototypes that were produced quickly so they could start putting the rulebook together (like some of the miniatures jmh_stirling posted in the Unreleased and Rare miniatures thread) and were never actually intended for release?

I don't think so. They wouldn't produce them to only have them in one shot where they aren't even all visible. They look like they're from the final encounter with Azog from the first film. Maybe part of a vignettes pack? Possibly couldn't be released straight away due to the film changes so they have to repackage and edit. Or I could be completely off the mark and the sales people at GW are lazy and forgot to push the "available" button.

Pindergorn · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 9:03 pm

Perhaps the moulds were damaged somehow and had to be scrapped.

VandalCabbage · **Joined:** Sun Jan 19, 2014 1:12 pm **Posts:** 286

Or maybe poor EFGT sales conviced them to try and release only the most popular heroes: Thorin, Balin and Dwakilleverythinginsightlin.

Dr Grant · **Joined:** Fri Aug 03, 2012 1:50 pm **Posts:** 1339

This was my theory last year:

We know these alternate company figures were produced, along with the vast majority of the Hobbit range (excluding Azog, the young dwarves, Gundabads and Laketowners) sometime in 2012 (or maybe even earlier) when there was only going to be 2 movies. The way I see it, GW had a far more aggressive/substantial set of releases to support 2 films so came up with 3 sets of the company to support film 1 (EFGT, barrels ands these), that they would released a few months apart throughout 2013. They would then have at least one more set and probably 2 to release for film 2 throughout 2014 (Laketown gear and BOFA armour perhaps?).

Then, with the change to 3 films, GW realises that they've actually got to spread these releases out over 3 years rather than 2 and doesn't have any new scenes or locations to generate models, thus they hold back this set of figures to release alongside film 2 around december 2013 as part of the big push for DOS.

That made a whole load of sense to me.

Of course we can now see they didn't do that :oops:

My guess is still that they're holding them back so they have a 'new' set of the company to release this year but that's pure speculation on my part. I hope they do get released though, they look fantastic and the Thorin in particular is gorgeous.

JamesR · **Posted:** Mon Jan 27, 2014 11:40 pm

I believe they will be released. All the alternate sculpts of the company are shown accompanied by already released miniatures of Gandalf, Bilbo and others

February Releases?

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