Orc Space Marauders KS slapped with IP claim

[grantinvanman 7897xp 1]

Honestly, I hadn’t seen that not-Gazkul before, and other than being opposite handed… I mean, GW is probably not wrong, it’s CLOSE. Makari looks similar too. Yikes. Too close to the sun indeed.

[wonkygoblin]

The original model was a kev adams sculpt, but he did it for gw and they own the character. The miniature in the kickstarter is extremely close and noone can say they didn’t know they were trying to recreate a very slightly altered version of the character including his grot chum with banner. I am not at all surprised. Most of kevs sculpts have tried very hard to be distinct from his old sculpts. Hes avoided doing his incredibly popular night goblins I beleave for this reason. He also sculpted from concept art by other artists. This version is technically the second sculpt given the name, the original sculpt was just one of the many orcs kev put out that was later given the name ghazghkull thraka. I’m surprised the freebooters kickstarter was allowed to pass too. The only argument they have is that ghazghkull thraka has not looked even remotely like this in a very long time.

• This reply was modified 2 months, 4 weeks ago by wonkygoblin.
• This reply was modified 2 months, 4 weeks ago by wonkygoblin.
• This reply was modified 2 months, 4 weeks ago by wonkygoblin.

[onlyonepinman 18109xp 0]

@limburger GW only achieve a legal precedent if they get a court ruling in their favour and the judge in the case doesn’t state in his statement that it DOESN’T set a precedent (in some cases, especially where circumstances of the case are very unique and specific and unlikely to occur routinely, a judge may state that the judgement should not be considred to be a precedent).  What normally happens is that when faced with a C&D order, the smaller businesses backs down and doesn’t defend themselves because they cannot afford the risk.  As a business owner it is still preferable to close the business than it would be to fight and lose.  Chapter House proved what happens when you try and fight, although I do wonder if Chapter House occurred now, would he have also have been able to crowdfund a legal defense?

[scribbs 14532xp 4]

Andrew has had to cancel the KS, but has instead launched a pre-order campaign on the Meridian Miniatures website for the Orc Marauder models. The big lad Gaz isn’t there, but the various troopers are:

http://meridianminiatures.co.uk/shop/renegade-93

[somegeezer 18480xp 1]

Once the refund lands I’ll definitely be adding whatever my pledge was minus Not Big Gaz.

Lessons learned etc and so on, I’ll be supporting Meridia in future.

[grantinvanman 7897xp 2]

Good on Meridian for launching anyway, minus the one offending mini.

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