Once the USMC, which has for the past few decades used Starship Troopers as an inspiration for how it should be organized, actually commences near-Earth-orbit operations, I'm sure they'd have an opinion about this mark and this sort of lawsuit.
In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
71–80 of 150 posts
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
About the favouring those with deeper wallets: there's a great history of players making their own miniatures. I think provided they are reasonably near the dimensions of the 'original' piece - the homemade pieces are accepted and encouraged, allowing those without the financial means to use their own.
The official line has always been fuzzy. A lot of the more quota-led managers would bring out the "no-proxy" rules a lot. But then there is a very blurred line between a "converted" figure and a plain old handmade one. In this regard, HQ was much more lenient than other stores.
Anecdote: Many many stores proudly display 'proxy' models in the windows, presumably made by the staff. I know of very specific rules for tournaments but I can't see casual gamers enforcing them.
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#73We might be watching a company eat itself here. Considering the amount of engineering types in the market for minifigs, plus the impending ubiquitization of 3D printers, customer good-will should be the most valuable asset of Gamer's Workshop.
No amount of good-will is going to prevent GW's business model from being seriously affected by consumer-level 3d printers.
Thankfully for them, we're still a few years away from this being a concern. My guess? 3-4 or whenever the UV resin-baseds take off. The Repraps and higher-quality extruders still aren't ready for your average consumer in price, time, and finish.
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#74Google's Ngram Viewer shows that the term "Space Marine" was in use for quite a while before W40K's 1987 release but there was a big increase after 1987. At a glance, the trend seems to be similar to trends for other related terms such as "powered armor" but doesn't match the trend for "Warhammer".
http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=space+marine%2C...
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#75In the future, all "space marines" will simply be "marines." In any plausible scenario in which we have "space marines," having a dedicated corpus of naval marines would be unnecessary. Ergo, the solution is simply to let Games Workshop keep the silly moniker and just call your future super-soldiers what they would properly be called.
Wouldn't they really be called something else entirely? The term marine implies a soldier who specialises in sea based warfare or deploying from sea.
They're "like" Marines, first to drop, only in space.
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Aliens came out in 1986. I don't know how much more common you need to be than that. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090605/ I'd personally been using the term since growing up watching Star Blazers cartoons in the 70s.
As pointed out elsewhere, the grunts in Aliens were not "space marines". Once again: this is a trademark. GW doesn't have a monopoly on the idea of "Sci-Fi Marines". They have a trademark on the specific term "Space Marine" as used within their realms of business. That includes fiction, so the linked post was infringing. Sorry, but it was.
Sorry, but they did use "space marines"
EX: "ALIENS SPACE MARINE LT.RIPLEY" http://www.amazon.com/ALIENS-SPACE-MARINE-LT-RIPLEY/dp/B0009...
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
About the favouring those with deeper wallets: there's a great history of players making their own miniatures. I think provided they are reasonably near the dimensions of the 'original' piece - the homemade pieces are accepted and encouraged, allowing those without the financial means to use their own.
"the homemade pieces are accepted and encouraged" It's not like they can do much about cardboard cut-outs and stand-ins.
or even these - the proud owner states they've been used in actual tournaments with permission[0]:
https://twitpic.com/show/iphone/bcbymh
https://twitpic.com/show/iphone/bcbyvf
[0] http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=108484
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#78I wish there was a Kickstarter like non-profit organization whose focus was finding and defending worthy cases like this. People/organizations submit their situation and do the work of raising awareness and collecting pledges, the organization uses the money to oversee the actual legal case and pay the attorneys, ideally a network of folks who would be willing to consider defending said cases at a reduced or pro-bono…
This was my initial reaction. Is there any reason why you couldn't create a kickstarter campaign around this?
> Prohibited uses:
> No charity or cause funding. [0]
Indiegogo would probably allow it though. See for example [1]
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#79As a huge science fiction nerd and Games Workshop customer, this feels like rank betrayal. I expect this kind of legal bullying from big companies, but from a company that makes minifigs and other gaming accessories I expect better behavior.
As much as I dislike it, I can understand their course of action. If they were to stop enforcing whatever trademark, or copyright they may hold, another judge at another point in time could potentially use that against them.
That said, it's still not pretty.
Re: In the future, all space marines will be Warhammer 40K space marines
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
GW is a large company. And it is the behemoth in it's industry. They do not innovate, just rehash same properties. They are the incumbent, "monopoly", content holder who (attempts to) destroy little guys.
Legal wrangling aside, I don't see a problem with a lack of "innovation", the same WH40K I played as a kid would still be fun today, however it is certainly interesting to see how WoTC has attempted to innovate to sell new products. The main difference, of course, is that WH40K is wargaming min-maxy and specific troop-based versus D&D allowing a great deal of flexibility in the rules and creative content.
>it is certainly interesting to see how WoTC has attempted to innovate to sell new products.
GW has no affiliation with WotC. Are you thinking of TSR, the makers of DnD?