Games Workshop is Still Driving Frustrated Warhammer Players to 3D Printing
Games Workshop’s perennial product shortages are testing the patience of its passionate players and pushing them towards 3D printing solutions.
Being a Warhammer 40k fan can be a deeply frustrating experience, but it’s worse for those who actually play the popular Grimdark fantasy tabletop game. Games Workshop’s constant limiting of supply and mean, lean allocations of desirable new miniatures are leaving players with little alternative but to seek solutions in resin 3D printing.
GW’s issues have affected Chaos-aligned players in particular, with Death Guard, World Eaters, Emperor’s Children, and Chaos Knight fielders left without hope of bagging some of the most desirable and exciting releases for the factions in recent years. 2025 was meant to be the year Chaos took front and centre stage, but with GW allocating just three items per store in some cases, players have been left caught between the Slaaneshi temptations of scalpers, or embracing the Nurglesque mess of resin 3D printing.
As Rob Baer over on the excellent Spikey Bits website says, “…players will keep finding their own ways to field the models they want, and for many, that means 3D printing.” Who can blame them? Resin 3D printing might be about as pleasant as Mortarion’s armpits, but it sure beats having to refresh a page at the perfect time on the perfect day just in the hope of securing an order for your desired product. Failure can mean waiting months for another opportunity, too, and World Eaters players aren’t exactly the sort to chill out and sip tea until their next chance.
Flirting With Danger
Despite the ease and accessibility of downloading 40k “inspired” models (or perhaps even remolded official miniatures), hobbyists do technically risk violating IPs. However, enforcing the rules on the internet is often difficult for brands. That being said, earlier this year the popular cosplay Patreon and STL storefront Galactic Armoury was hit with the banhammer of a cease and desist for its Warhammer-inspired designs, and it is rumored that Games Workshop has recently stepped up efforts to protect its IPs.
A shortage of options is no issue for 40k players, though. It takes just a 30-second Google to find Death Guard-esque “Decay Soldiers” (Plague Marines) models on Etsy. You can even find creative spins on the recently launched GW Saturnine Terminator squad models if you’re a Death Guard player wanting some extra punch on the tabletop. So, you don’t even need to own a 3D printer to embrace 3D printing as a solution to your Warhammer supply problems.
A Long Battle
Games Workshop was lucky enough to get a big boost in popularity thanks to the great gift of Nurgle known as the Coronavirus Pandemic. A further boost landed thanks to the excellent Space Marine 2 video game that came out earlier in 2025, and with Space Marine 3 expected in the not-too-distant future, popularity could jump again. Games Workshop is meeting this rise in popularity by building facilities to produce further products, but many players have been left feeling like it’s all a FOMO business strategy.
With Warhammer fans being a loyal, dedicated bunch, and paying extremely high sums of money for small plastic models, you can definitely see why they might feel aggrieved at the potential for that rumor to be true. There are no signs of shortages ending any time soon, either.
It’s likely there’s an element of truth in both the honest supply problems and FOMO business maneuvering behind the scenes. Regardless, though, Warhammer players look set to continue to use 3D printing as a way to work around the frustrations Games Workshop is causing in the community.
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