Very interesting looking models. Not sold on the square bases, though... what do people tend to use for Epic? The only Dropzone Commander models that I see based are infantry, or sometimes circular or rounded rectangular bases on vehicles.
Just the fact that they already have a 28mm infantry game in the works for this pretty much confirms that they'll ditch this game like every other game they've made.
Spartan Needs to learn to actually take time to make a good game first and keep it supported instead of this constant mill of new games.
That said, their models do look good, and they're still around so this mill of games strategy seems to be working, but in terms of customer service, I won't be touching any more of their stuff. I've got dropzone to cover this scale of gaming.
Spartan Games, making and designing games one day, dropping them the next. I would seriously look into some of their games if they didn't have that rep.
Vertrucio wrote: Just the fact that they already have a 28mm infantry game in the works for this pretty much confirms that they'll ditch this game like every other game they've made.
Spartan Needs to learn to actually take time to make a good game first and keep it supported instead of this constant mill of new games.
That said, their models do look good, and they're still around so this mill of games strategy seems to be working, but in terms of customer service, I won't be touching any more of their stuff. I've got dropzone to cover this scale of gaming.
I'm not really up on their reputation vis-à-vis the quote here. But it does seem like they are getting stretched pretty thin for a rather redundant game.
I mean they already have Dystopian Wars - a 15mm battle game over Land, Sea and Air. Now they are expanding Firestorm Armada ( a 15mm space game) to a land-based game too. Plus they have Dystopian Legions(?) a 28mm spinoff game, and they're going to launch a 28mm spinoff from Firestorm too now? Plus they still have fantasy boat game too, which iirc is kinda of life-support.
Vertrucio wrote: Just the fact that they already have a 28mm infantry game in the works for this pretty much confirms that they'll ditch this game like every other game they've made.
Spartan Needs to learn to actually take time to make a good game first and keep it supported instead of this constant mill of new games.
That said, their models do look good, and they're still around so this mill of games strategy seems to be working, but in terms of customer service, I won't be touching any more of their stuff. I've got dropzone to cover this scale of gaming.
I'm not really up on their reputation vis-à-vis the quote here. But it does seem like they are getting stretched pretty thin for a rather redundant game.
I mean they already have Dystopian Wars - a 15mm battle game over Land, Sea and Air. Now they are expanding Firestorm Armada ( a 15mm space game) to a land-based game too. Plus they have Dystopian Legions(?) a 28mm spinoff game, and they're going to launch a 28mm spinoff from Firestorm too now? Plus they still have fantasy boat game too, which iirc is kinda of life-support.
What other games have they dropped support for?
about 2 or 3 years ago they said they will release a 10mm, 15mm and 28mm games for Firestorm. I could see them doing a 10 or 15mm for large scale games and a 28mm for skirmish games like Infinity or malifaux. But all 3? i that really needed?
Spartan has a history of making a new game every other year and put previous games on the back burner (like uncharted seas, firestorm armada went over a year before it recived anything new at one point). They also have a history of releasing a new rule book ASAP after the initial rules release for a new game. There was a joke on TMP, you pay to play test with Spartan games.
I love Spartan product but they don't show any long term dedication to their products.
God dang, those are some seriously cool models. The infantry look great and the mechs are awesome. The only thing I can think when I see the big mechs is "THOR IS HERE"
Vertrucio wrote: Just the fact that they already have a 28mm infantry game in the works for this pretty much confirms that they'll ditch this game like every other game they've made.
Spartan Needs to learn to actually take time to make a good game first and keep it supported instead of this constant mill of new games.
That said, their models do look good, and they're still around so this mill of games strategy seems to be working, but in terms of customer service, I won't be touching any more of their stuff. I've got dropzone to cover this scale of gaming.
I'm not really up on their reputation vis-à-vis the quote here. But it does seem like they are getting stretched pretty thin for a rather redundant game.
I mean they already have Dystopian Wars - a 15mm battle game over Land, Sea and Air. Now they are expanding Firestorm Armada ( a 15mm space game) to a land-based game too. Plus they have Dystopian Legions(?) a 28mm spinoff game, and they're going to launch a 28mm spinoff from Firestorm too now? Plus they still have fantasy boat game too, which iirc is kinda of life-support.
What other games have they dropped support for?
about 2 or 3 years ago they said they will release a 10mm, 15mm and 28mm games for Firestorm. I could see them doing a 10 or 15mm for large scale games and a 28mm for skirmish games like Infinity or malifaux. But all 3? i that really needed?
Spartan has a history of making a new game every other year and put previous games on the back burner (like uncharted seas, firestorm armada went over a year before it recived anything new at one point). They also have a history of releasing a new rule book ASAP after the initial rules release for a new game. There was a joke on TMP, you pay to play test with Spartan games.
I love Spartan product but they don't show any long term dedication to their products.
Not just on the backburner, but they also usually release their newest games in a pretty sad state of rules, then taking years to fix it properly (as mentioned, they halfheartedly throw out another .1 rulebook soon after a release).
To be honest, if they wanted to just keep making a bunch of miniatures and sell them, they should just put all their rules online for free as a living rulebook. Don't force their customers to wait, and let the community more actively fine tune the game, supporting whatever lone designer works with them.
Another aspect is whether they're using that same tired system of exploding D6s in every game.
It's obvious this business strategy is working for them though, but it's still almost as crappy to customers as the way GW operates. My friends and I won't touch a Spartan Game again. And, like I'm doing now, I have to warn people to look past the pretty models if they happen to be looking for a game, but are otherwise okay if they're looking for new models.
Kilkrazy wrote: How bad and unfinished are Spartan Games's rules? I haven't played any of them so I don't know.
At this point? They actually aren't. I was about ready to give them up after the last Dystopian Wars reprint, but Firestorm 2.0 was a damn solid game by any definition of the word. The 2nd Edition of Dystopian Wars is actually quite good too (only major complaint was the use of bold text in the main rules being somewhat overboard). I think DWars is probably clunkier than FSA2.0, but both are actually solid offerings that were part of a big initiative by the designers to stop putting out half-arsed work. They had a fairly big community-backed private playtest for both of them and it managed to save both games in our group's rotation.
Though I will admit they may be stretching a bit thin, but at least Planetfall could potentially have some overlap in the same way the three theatres of Dystopian Wars do. The 28mm offering does seem to go a bit far (especially since it feels like Dystopian Legions hasn't had a release in a while) but sticking to mass-army and fleet-scale combat seems to work out fairly well for them. So long as they keep making sure to keep up the quality shown in Firestorm and Dystopian Wars 2.0, then they keep me as a customer. But I do admit that if I weren't one of the folks that played several of their lines, then the waxing and waning of release schedules would certainly put me off. But their work on the last two releases has turned things around enough for me to give them the benefit of the doubt again. Probably wont be on this in the initial wave of excitement, but I will be looking forward to something filling the Epic-sized hole in my heart.
Either way, those minis look gorgeous (man, those infantry make me want to play the dirty Terrans... I'll have to wait and see what Din infantry looks like).
It's modular resin, with pre-made magnet holes for interchangeable arms.
I was at that demo and whilst I didn't play it I spent about 15 minutes talking about it. Starter army boxes will be about £60-65, and all the boxes come with some scenery (usually resin/card buildings which is quite a cool system). All the rules and stats will be online for free.
The mechanics seem to be fairly similar to dystopian wars (in that I recognised some of it from a demo game of the last edition).
The list building mechanic is pretty cool as well, using the equivalent of a colour wheel, so you have to choose between complimenting unit types (i.e. to take another heavy unit you need to forfeit your artillery support).
BobtheInquisitor wrote: Yet another range of beautiful Spartan Games models that I look forward to being priced out of.
Odd to say as Spartan Games prices are some of the best on the market. Least in my view for what you get gamewise and model wise they charge a very good rate on their models. This is UK view, overseas it might be different; but UK side I'd honestly say that they are some of the best priced.
Spartan makes some awesome models - those mechs are outstanding. Though as said whilst they can design and make and sell great models they seem to have trouble supporting multiple game lines. I think they might be over the hump that was partly caused by Dystopian Wars going crazy popular very suddenly (that sapped resources from everything barring Dystopian wars - killing Uncharted Seas and nearly killing Firestorm).
I think Spartan has reached out more toward its core community - Firestorm 2.0 rules were significantly player-base tested with a beta team and Firestorm has been done the same treatment. So in theory the rules we get for Planetfall should be nearer to 2.0 than 1.0 (ergo they should be stronger and more solid due to increased testing player base size). I really hope it does well - a sci-fi wargame like this shouldn't impact Dystopian wars and should compliment it in helping to increase the size and validity of wargames on this scale which has been a pretty fringe market since Epic 40K died off.
Kilkrazy wrote: How bad and unfinished are Spartan Games's rules? I haven't played any of them so I don't know.
Since FSA 2.0, not at all, but only FSA and DW (their two 'main' games) have been fully updated. Both are complete, and they got a proper playtest team on them and rebalanced all the factions to a state that is far better than before.
If they treat this the same way, and work on Dystopian Legions then they may have turned around from their old model (which I think is to do with them getting excited about a new idea too easily, rather than refining the existing product).
Kilkrazy wrote: How bad and unfinished are Spartan Games's rules? I haven't played any of them so I don't know.
I picked up FSA 2.0 (the Battle for Valhalla box set and 4 starter fleets to get the basics for all 6 races) when it was released late last year. My original intent was to expand our 40k campaigns to include actual fleet battles and the BFG rules were a complete nightmare to work with. The FSA rules, by comparison, are easy to read and make complete sense. In the past 8 months we had a grand total of 2 rules questions, both of which boiled down to just skimming the relevant section instead of actually reading it. Also, in that time, FSA has released two more books for purchase while also releasing them as free downloadable PDFs. They are similar to codexes in that they feature the various races, a bit of back story and all of the ship details. I'd prefer more story, but it's really hard to compete with the depth of 40k.
The rules were beta tested by actual customers and it shows. Thus far it appears that all of the races are actually pretty well balanced while each race has it's own flavor. Price wise, FSA is FAR cheaper than getting into 40k ... by an order of magnitude. Time wise, a 1200 point FSA game will take around the same amount of time as a 1500 point 40k game - 1:30 to 2:00. For people new to both games, FSA takes FAR less time as the rules are clear, to the point and don't require you to constantly flip from one section to another to figure out how simple things like MOVEMENT works.
That said, I'm not interested in a ground based game in the 10mm or 15mm range. I played Battletech a long time ago and didn't get any satisfaction from painting the small infantry/tank models. 28mm is just about right imho.
What amazing timing. I was just asking about this in Misc-Games.
It looks soooooo good. I would drop a pile on this in a second. Any rumored release dates? Are they going the Kickstarter route (one site I saw had that briefly rumored)?
Looking closely at pictures I definitely see a lot of "retail" boxes and apparently army starters.
Still, October is right around the corner, and yet no one has preorders up? Is that par for the course from Spartan? Do they tend to announce/put up orders in advance?
Been playing dystopian wars since its release it has never been put on the back burner even with the firestorm v2.0 release.
There 2 major games is dwars and firestorm armada. Dystopian wars being a run away success for them and with a massive model count now and decent to good rule set. If only they worked on designing the rule book better without the bold .
The rest of there games should be dropped in my opinion as not worth while but they have served as test beds for the company
As far as I can see.
As for any one looking at Spartan games go for dwars or FSA until this release. Only time will tell if they fixed the rules and such but it has been beta tested by Spartan forum members for a while so should be decent set of rules.
Think dzc but with backing to expand quicker and bigger could be a run away success fingers crossed.
I'd prefer they didn't. Hawk seems to be dedicated in growing it's nascent game and lowering the price point.
Spartan meanwhile is fixing up it's old, nearly unplayable rules (FSA v2 for example is a massive fix), and continuing to shotgun new product lines out there
I like Spartan's games, but seriously, they have 6 games running on extremely similar (in most cases, nearly identical) ruleset:
Uncharted Seas (and the various revised versions)
Firestorm Armada (v1 and v2)
Dystopian Wars (v1 and then v2)
Armored Clash (Almost the same as DW)
Dystopian Legions
Planetfall 10mm
Planetfall15mm
Planetfall Infantry Game Thing.
My hope is that the vehicle sizes are similar so I can use PF minis for both games because I am not a fan of the DZC aesthetics. I only like the look of the PHR. I know some people who are invested in DZC and others that want PF.
neiltj1 wrote: My hope is that the vehicle sizes are similar so I can use PF minis for both games because I am not a fan of the DZC aesthetics. I only like the look of the PHR. I know some people who are invested in DZC and others that want PF.
I'll admit, I'm glad they went with a conventional scale for this. Although I love it to death now, it always irked me that Firestorm was so out of scale with most other space fleet lines.
Being 10mm means there are going to be a good amount of terrain options for it (might have to grab some of the stuff from Hawk actually).
And although I love 15mm scale, I'm also glad they decided to pick one scale and go with it instead of try for both. As much as I would have loved some of the models in a 15mm force for Tomorrow's War, trying to handle both at the same time is an exercise in madness.
So, wait, is Planetfall 15mm or 10mm? I'm seeing people saying both.
I like the designs. I think I could be tempted to pick up a few kits here or there if they're not too expensive. I rather like those funky little hover tanks. A lot of what they've shown has a very nice Command & Conquer vibe to it.
Speaking of, I'm surprised that nobody's made a C&C tabletop game.
I also noticed that in those demo shots, their 28mm game is taking place within the same setting as the Planetfall game. That could be kind of a cool idea for tournaments, having multiple games at different scales going on within the same battle.
Did they settle as 10mm for real? Because last I heard, Spartan wanted to create THREE ground scifi games. 10mm, 15mm and infantry 28mm.
It was called Planetfall, Invasion and something else. All of which were different scales of the same universe. Which I found redundant as hell.
The project stands a much, much. much better chance of success if they just stick with the 10mm Planetfall they showed earlier. They simply aren't going to compete against other 28mm scifi skirmish games by not being different enough.
I agree. Doing both 10 and 15mm definitely seems redundant. There's a great synergy between having a Regimental-scale system and a squad-scale system (look at the campaigning possibilities with 6mm Epic and 28mm WH40K, even if GW utterly failed to realise what they had), but I don't really see the need to treat Regimental-scale (10mm) and Company-scale (15mm) differently.
I recall an early interview with the head of Spartan and yes it seemed like they wanted to hit every possible scale with their model line. I think their intent is to use their creative and mould making capacity to try out multiple lines within the same world setting/theme and then see what sticks in the market.
It's not a totally daft idea - there are a lot of 10mm scale wargames that have never gotten off the ground nor beyond a very niche market. Indeed Dystopian Wars and Dropzone Commander are almost in the market alone with wide spread appeal.
Indeed Planetfall started life as a side-release not even under the main Spartan Banner so it must have sold well and generated lots of interest back then for them to consider pushing it into mainstream production.
The only downside is Spartan spreading their resources too thin internally - although I think and hope they've learned from this in Dystopian wars and they will be able to better support multiple lines. I think they've also learned a marketing lesson in not releasing info on new releases too early - one thing that plagued Firestorm Armada was constant news/hints of future releases that never came or which took far far far too long to ever come - heck we are still waiting on Leviathans to appear.
Killionaire wrote: Did they settle as 10mm for real? Because last I heard, Spartan wanted to create THREE ground scifi games. 10mm, 15mm and infantry 28mm.
The original plan under Studio Sparta was for all three. In making Planetfall a core game it looks like 10mm is a lock. The 28mm game is called Spec-ops or something.
But it doesn't look like they'll be doing a 15mm one at least (not from anything I've hear in the past year or so at least).
one thing that plagued Firestorm Armada was constant news/hints of future releases that never came or which took far far far too long to ever come - heck we are still waiting on Leviathans to appear.
Yeah this was a big one. They previewed a whole lot of minis for Firestorm that never, ever came to pass. I still remember when they were still mostly in to doing historicals alongside Uncharted Seas... Xyston or something, and they put up preview shots of Firestorm ships that would become the Dindrenzi. There are some transports and a few small ships in those shots that never saw the light of day. The Leviathan is another good example.
In the early days they were really scattershot about previews and let a lot of dates and releases slip. They are a hell of a lot better on that front these days, and hopefully their experience with a large line like Dystopian Wars will help juggling future endeavours. But I really hope they give Spec-Ops a lot of time after the release of Planetfall.
Oh and on that note, apparently Dystopian Legions is getting an announcement soon, so looks like it isn't quite dead either. I guess we'll see if they can pull it off.
I've seen the whole "preview too much too early" from a fair few companies. I suspect the problem is that they really do want to share news and keep customers in the loop - but at the same time if a model has a setback or if its canned or if a million and one other things happens that slows or prevents its release they don't want talk about it.
So their marketing ends up all one day (like big companies) but without the eventual delivery.
In that light they tend to learn one of two lessons
1) Don't say anything till its pretty much if not actually finished and will 100% be out the door unless we close down
2) Actually fess up and say "something went wrong and its not coming."
The latter of which being not ideal in marketing terms so most learn lesson 1.
And i hope it will be in 10mm en be combined with 28mm skirmish.
15mm is to much of a "between-scale", it competes with both 10mm and 28mm.
6mm/10mm is, tactically speaking, the most interesting scale if you want to play big battles.
28mm or bigger is for skirmish.
My favourite game still is GW's Epic (Armageddon); that is/was 6mm on paper, about 8mm in practice, so close to 10mm.
Dystopian Wars (1/1200 scale) is since it exists one of my "newer" favourites.
15mm (like Flames of War) is already a lot toward 28mm and already as far from the same large scale feel as Epic or DW gives you.
I hope for 10mm and 28mm Firestorm and, unlike GW has ever done right, a combination of all scales.
And, like more potential players have done, i have communicated this to Spartan Games as well.
I have most GW armies on 40k, Epic and BFG level, partly for this reason.
But GW never got to supporting this as a whole and Epic and BFG now officially don't exist anymore
A combination of 3 levels, space, large scale battle and skirmish is what i would love above anything, wargaming at it's best.
Add resources and you have strategic level gameplay to tactical wargaming on different scales.
I hope Spartan will take the time to do it right and to create "a whole".
Even if done slowly, they can do this in a few years.
In regard to some of the posts i read here I must also add that Spartan 2.0 (since Dystopian Wars) is a company i like a lot.
I don't understand "they quit game systems", they only have a few and these still exist.
I have most GW systems and most are not supported anymore, even worse, most systems i have don't exist anymore, some exist again (like Warzone).
The game systems Spartan has are or have become mature now, they listen to the community and if there is imbalance in rules (there sometimes is), they listen and actually fix it.
And the current versions of Dystopian Wars and Firestorm Armada are good and balanced systems.
To be complete: Dystopian Legions is balanced, but i would like to see another ruleset that is model-based, not unit-based which is perfect for DW and FA, but feels a bit weird IMO when playing skirmish.
I have a collection of DL models though.
Many Spartan miniatures are at the top of quality and originality of what i have seen in 25 years of wargaming, only GW's early days and Rackham come to mind as peaks in miniature design.
Planetfall also has a few models that are exactly what i like to see in sci-fi.
If i wil only buy the models or play them game depends on the rules.
Don't forget price too - Spartan charges a very fair amount for their models. You can build big armies if you want and you can get something for £10 or less that actually makes a difference on the table top. Although granted they are shifting toward more large boxed sets as opposed to smaller unit boxed sets (to lower their shelf footprint to get into more stores).
I'll be honest, no matter the scale I am very excited for this. I've been with Spartan games for about 4 years now and I've seen this slow and steady creep of them working their games to great production level. Their models have always been pretty good and like what @Overread said their prices are great, easily able to get starters in each set.
My Faith in them was restored with the recent edition of Firestorm Armada and that essentially told me that whatever they are releasing now is golden. I cannot wait for this release, my Aquan Prime will now have FISH TANKS....get it? Fish tanks?...Cause...they're fish?
I'm new to the party, as Firestorm Armada 2.0 is my first Spartan game, but I do know that I have long wanted a space-fleet scale game, and a 6/10mm scale game to compliment my seemingly endless collections of 28mm games.
Had GW not evolved into an evil empire, I have no doubt I would have been a Battlefleet Gothic/Epic Armageddon/40k player for life, and would have run endless tier'd campaigns, but the reality of two of those games being dead/oop/unsupported means i've been looking elsewhere.
X-wing has been a fun gate-way drug for space-scale, but I needed a meatier game, and Firestorm Armada found me at the perfect time.
That leaves me hungering for a 10mm game (non-historical), but with very very few more widely available options. I've heard good things about DzC but hate the aesthetics, and Dystopian Wars was about to "win" by default despite my not being interesting in the alt-Victorian-Steampunk-kinda setting...
Planetfall thus seems perfect and perfectly time. I am so incredibly excited, and will be going in hard as soon as pre-orders pop up. As such, i'll be the guy who takes one for the team and i'll make sure I put up plenty of early-days bat-reps, etc...
Only dilemma is... I find myself liking different faction aesthetics in Planetfall versus FSA, which will complicate any longer term campaign concepts.
I just started FA, being a long time BFG player.
In a couple of aspects they are quite similar.
But one thing sets FA far apart from BFG in a good way: deployment, coming from hyperspace, "flanking"; this is space, everything can happen! This alone makes it a game with an unending number of possible battles.
I also play X-Wing, i like it. But i agree, it's beafy enough for a real tabletop wargame. For me it's a snack between other games.
And @Avrik_Shasla: LOL regarding the Fish Tank concept!
Been playing dystopian wars since its release it has never been put on the back burner even with the firestorm v2.0 release.
There 2 major games is dwars and firestorm armada. Dystopian wars being a run away success for them and with a massive model count now and decent to good rule set. If only they worked on designing the rule book better without the bold .
The rest of there games should be dropped in my opinion as not worth while but they have served as test beds for the company
As far as I can see.
As for any one looking at Spartan games go for dwars or FSA until this release. Only time will tell if they fixed the rules and such but it has been beta tested by Spartan forum members for a while so should be decent set of rules.
Think dzc but with backing to expand quicker and bigger could be a run away success fingers crossed.
I've been collecting and playing Dystopian Wars since just about three months after its release. I just recently bought a small fleet of Firestorm Armada as well, but that's mainly to get prepared for Planetfall.
I very much am of the opinion that Dystopian Legions and the Planetfall are the best games that Spartan has made. There were only a couple of weaknesses I felt was the command rules were a bit complicated and the melee can be slow yet holds up all units involved.
I very much look forward to the full rulebook and new factions which have been stated to be relooking at these rules, enhancing the vehicle combat, and I hope streamlining the use of the game cards as was done in DW 2.0.
Planetfall was similar, but a bit more fast paced, with some additional rules showing more of the technologically advanced abilities, such as unlimited range, reactive fire, and bringing in reinforcements through predetermined landing zones.
I guess I can say that my main gaming system for the past 15-16 years was 40k, until I realized that I was just bored playing all my games in the past 4.5. I was tired of fighting against untold numbers of Space Marines, I didn't like GWs habit of relying upon producing big flashy gimmicks for each codex to try to draw the easily distracted people in, with all of the big over the top deathstar units and then big flyers/huge walkers for every army.
Things like the flyer rules felt very forced in and didn't really mesh with the game, especially with the existing flyers be as hard to hit as a supersonic interceptor yet more heavily armored than the medium tanks.
I had spent the year or so before DL was announced trying to find a game to replace 40k, Dust was just slightly to abstracted for me, Warpath was MUCH to simplified, I hated the gameplay of Warmachine and its aesthetics, I have never been able to find the same enjoyment out of skirmish games because I have more fun thinking through the squad level tactics and more general strategies. FoW was to expensive and I find historical games to restrictive.
I just started playing Firestorm with a buddy a couple of months ago, and we're both really excited to give Planetfall a whirl. The campaign possibilities are endless. I hope it gets well supported!
The models look snazzy, but I have a hard time seeing them as hard sci-fi. They lack the utilitarian miltary aesthetics that I've grown fond of, but this is just a matter of personal taste.
That said I am interested in how game-play will work. What sorts of tactical operations will this game best convey? Do we know what list design is like and what the variety of models available to each faction will be at launch?
Nightwolf829 wrote: That said I am interested in how game-play will work. What sorts of tactical operations will this game best convey? Do we know what list design is like and what the variety of models available to each faction will be at launch?
Exactly. I'm all for great-looking models, but tactically challenging manoeuvre warfare is what I'm really looking for in games like this (I'm a huge 6mm fan for this reason).
Very much looking forward to learning more about how the game plays.
First of all, building an army you split it in half, and then split one of the halves between two reserve groups, which entered the game through two RTZ's (Reinforcement Target Zone or some such) each player designates at the beginning of the game.
The activation of units alternates by player but each player sets their order of activation at the beginning of the turn without knowledge of their opponents order.
The attacks use pools of dice set up from the contributing weapons and trying to get a number of successes to match the targets Kill Rating, so that is similar to the naval games, but like Dystopian Legions the game used a colored dice mechanic, so the weapons would be designated with a number of black, blue, or red dice. Each black die gets one hit on a 4+, the blue dice get one hit on a 4+ but a 6 counts as two hits, and the red dice acts as in the naval games where a 6 counts as two hits and allows another dice to be rolled.
The dice color can be modified either up one color by forfeiting movement to lock onto the target or down by firing at long range.
This is one of the big things that has been stated to change for this new release, Spartan said that they were unable to provide the variety in units due to the low KRs and effective dice this mechanic required, so they have said they are moving back to the full exploding dice mechanic found in the naval games.
I myself worry about this because how it is implemented in DW makes sense when talking about massive naval vessels with their redundant and isolated systems, but I hope they will keep the fast and bloody feel of Planetfall.
Terrain also of course is of much more use with units able to interact with it better.
The new game introduces a "Helix" system to Force-Organization.
Basically, every army has a "core" helix, made up of an HQ choice, 5-15 infantry stands, 5-10 medium tanks/etc... This is essentially your starter-box.
Now imagine this hexagon is surrounded by six more hexagons. Each has a category... Air-Support, Allies, Heavy Armor, Leviathan (Giant mechs, etc...) and a few others.
You can choose one item from each category, OR take a second one from the same category IF you omit any units from the opposite "side" hexagon.
So taking a second mech might mean you can have zero allies, etc...
Mentioning allies - I honestly hope Spartan keeps allies out of things. I dislike when rules systems try to marry up whole factions with others and encourage allied armies because it tends to break the balance. Either the armies tactical differences become so minor that they are all basically the same (to avoid overpowered combos) or you end up with overpowered combos because army X and army Y "fix" too many of each others problems.
I've always seen allied armies as an addendum to the rules - a "If you want to you can; but its not part of the balanced core game" element.
If they're created similar to how FSA treats them, I wouldn't worry.
You're allowed up to 25% of your value from a faction on your side of the war. If you do so, you lose out on faction specific TAC cards, which isn't insignificant.
Additionally, each faction has a natural ally, which can be an additional 25% of your fleet value. If your fleet is purely your core faction plus natural ally, you still get your special cards. In most cases, the natural allies for each fleet are pretty similar; they're often a more focused version of the core fleet at the expense of other aspects. The Veydreth, for example, give up a lot of basic resilience in their cruisers to get access to deployment shenanigans and board better than the Sorylians, but don't have the raw staying power or firepower.
I think it'll be fine to be honest. It'll open up some cool options that'll be hard to abuse between army composition, min requirements, and general balance.
Blacksails wrote: If they're created similar to how FSA treats them, I wouldn't worry.
You're allowed up to 25% of your value from a faction on your side of the war. If you do so, you lose out on faction specific TAC cards, which isn't insignificant.
Additionally, each faction has a natural ally, which can be an additional 25% of your fleet value. If your fleet is purely your core faction plus natural ally, you still get your special cards. In most cases, the natural allies for each fleet are pretty similar; they're often a more focused version of the core fleet at the expense of other aspects. The Veydreth, for example, give up a lot of basic resilience in their cruisers to get access to deployment shenanigans and board better than the Sorylians, but don't have the raw staying power or firepower.
I think it'll be fine to be honest. It'll open up some cool options that'll be hard to abuse between army composition, min requirements, and general balance.
The ally system In firestorm armada is great. It forces so many hard decisions that it feels really balanced. I really look forward to having linked campaigns between Planetfall and Armada.
You might have missed this earlier, but, here's the leaked info on how force composition work.
From the thread these were in on SG - Armies are built around a "core helix" which is a balanced selection of core troops which has a lot of flexibility, with a bit of everything possible. To this, you can then add one of each specialist helixs per core - ( the 6 options are Leviathans, Heavy tanks, Air support, Artillery, Assault, Allies).
Alternatively, you can take 2 of the same specialist Helix, but this prevents you taking any of the opposing helix option on the selection wheel (e.g. if you take 2 Leviathans, you can't take any Heavy armor helix's). This gives tonnes of flexibility, while giving balance to force selection at a higher level. See the info sheet on display below.
I like the allies concept. It's done well in the FA rules and i expect them to be about the same in Planetfall.
Because it's also embedded in the background of the Firestorm Universe and because it's embedded in the standard rules (in Firestorm Armada) that you have to choose 1 main force and allies, it gives flexibility and freedom in miniatures and gameplay AND fits the background better than huge fleets without allies.
In 40k for instance allies are an addition and many alliances are not embedded in the background at all by more than a few historical examples.
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: I wish they would just put up preorders. I've taken gambles on lesser concepts from lesser companies, so this is an easy Day-1 for me.
Ehhh, I'm really not a fan of pre-orders, and I'm certainly not a fan of the business culture its creating. Unlike kickstarters which are for backing something that otherwise wouldn't exist without funding up front, handing over your money for pre-orders is rewarding a company for showing pretty pictures.
I'd much rather them release it and let people buy it then. Let people buy it, review it, and make an informed decision, than going off of the best available pictures at the time.
I like Spartan, but I don't give them money until the models are ready to be shipped, and generally until after I've read some reviews or at least an unboxing. While I'm excited for Planetfall, I'm holding all money until I see a video of a Sorylian unboxing and associated review.
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: I wish they would just put up preorders. I've taken gambles on lesser concepts from lesser companies, so this is an easy Day-1 for me.
Ehhh, I'm really not a fan of pre-orders, and I'm certainly not a fan of the business culture its creating. Unlike kickstarters which are for backing something that otherwise wouldn't exist without funding up front, handing over your money for pre-orders is rewarding a company for showing pretty pictures.
I'd much rather them release it and let people buy it then. Let people buy it, review it, and make an informed decision, than going off of the best available pictures at the time.
I like Spartan, but I don't give them money until the models are ready to be shipped, and generally until after I've read some reviews or at least an unboxing. While I'm excited for Planetfall, I'm holding all money until I see a video of a Sorylian unboxing and associated review.
I agree, and appreciate the wisdom of this but only under the assumption that stock is there for people who want it, once it is available.
Last week when you motivated me to try FSA (thank you, btw), it was an ordeal finding a Battle for Valhalla starter unless I was willing to use Ebay.
I find pre-orders acceptable when I know I will be buying something that I feel will probably sell out relatively quickly, and then require a long restock time.
For example, i've learned to pre-order X-wing ships because they tend to sell out and then take an age to restock. True FFG has essentially "trained me" to do this and thus not risk having excess stock, but the bottom-line is, if I want it, its something I end up needing to do.
Pre-orders make a lot of sense business wise - you tap into your target market earlier; thus letting you clean up a lot of sales from people who, if they waited for the official launch, might well have spent their money on something else.
Similarly it can act as a crude measure of market awareness and how well the marketing is going. Get very few pre-orders and you know something is likely wrong - either the product itself is wrong; the marketing is wrong or your company has a bad history that has rendered pre-orders ineffective.
Similarly if you get a massive influx of pre-orders you get a much earlier warning that "yes, yes we do have something good here and yes we DO need to consider upping our production capacity/rate! )
I first saw that "cover on the base" style used to great effect by an Epic player named Onyx. It looks awesome. Here's an example of his stuff:
It always struck me that this is one of the big advantages of modelling at the smaller scales, like 6mm and 10mm--you can do fairly simple things at a fairly low cost that nonetheless come out looking super-cool.
Onyx's stuff looked so awesome that I had to ask him if I could use his stuff in one of my old Epic:Armageddon articles on BoLS (from back in the day, when I was still trying to drum up interest in GW's best gaming system...before the dark times...before they utterly killed it off and I got so angry/depressed that I walked away from GW completely).
Thankfully, others are now stepping into the void left by GW and I can get my 6mm fix elsewhere. It's looking increasingly like I might be adding this game to my list of No More Epic grief-counselling games -- but there's always room for more small-scale warfare awesomeness. I'm getting a tad excited about Firestorm Planetfall's potential to join the list.
I don't even like 15mm/10mm stuff, but I'd seriously consider grabbing a few of those vehicles. Those Drindenzi hover tank things look really neat.
These are the 10mm figures though, right? I could swear I've seen pics of pretty much the same vehicles, but with very different looking figures, and I'm guessing those were the 15mm version.
I too have a HUGE collection of Epic, still my favourite game, but GW axed both Epic and BFG and i won't sell anything (still play them once and again, especially Epiuc), but i add new game systems from other suppliers.
And Spartan is my favourite new supplier.
And where Firestorm Universe is a bit different is that it is more sci-fi than sci-fantasy.
I love the 40k setting too, but a more realistic background is a nice change from a background where 10 heroic marines can clear a whole planet :-)
ORicK wrote: And where Firestorm Universe is a bit different is that it is more sci-fi than sci-fantasy. I love the 40k setting too, but a more realistic background is a nice change from a background where 10 heroic marines can clear a whole planet :-)
Wanted an old epic replacement as well but although the models looks great Spartan rules can be a let down but fingers crossed for this hope its not like the previous version of the rules.
10penceman wrote: Wanted an old epic replacement as well but although the models looks great Spartan rules can be a let down but fingers crossed for this hope its not like the previous version of the rules.
There are already a few very decent Epic replacements out there. I would recommend Exodus Wars (www.exoduswars.com) for obvious reasons (there's a reason why I wanted to make a computer game of it), which also has the advantage of a free rulebook and free Faction Books you can download, but I also quite like Future War Commander. Both feature the same alternating activations of Epic and are fast-playing.
Found some better pics of models already shown. (from Spartans FB page). They said they will be posting some smaller units tomorrow.
Next up is a Dindrenzi Federation Leviathan Class for you to have a look at. Like its Terran Alliance opponent this version is the Combat build, and it is armed with Dual Rail Guns and Dual Missile Launchers. Mounted in to the head of this machine is a Sky Drop designator.
The model also comes on a 100mm x 100mm textured base and stands a mighty 130mm tall. Forming a Leviathan Helix in game terms the model can also be supported with Aerial and Recon ground units.
A major feature of this model is its Sky Drop designator which allows the model to 'call in' other units from low orbit, using a rapid strike capability to move and conquer a battlefield.
Time to show some larger, more detailed images of our Planetfall models as we fast approach the game's launch date. I picked the first model to show you as the Combat version of a Terran Leviathan Class, one of the larger models in the Terran force.
This version is armed with a G-72 Dual Laser, body mounted Raptor Launcher, Heavy Rotor Chain Guns and a Nexus Designator. Its armour is tough, but the model also utilises Shield technology as part of its defences.
As part of a Leviathan Helix the model (in either its Combat or Close Combat variants) can be supported by Aerial Gunships and/or Recon Tanks.
The model comes on a 100mm x 100mm textured based and stands 120mm tall and across the shoulders he is approximately 140mm.
Heavy Tank flanked by two Mediums. The Heavy is on a base that is 70mm x 100mm to give you an idea of size
10penceman wrote: Wanted an old epic replacement as well but although the models looks great Spartan rules can be a let down but fingers crossed for this hope its not like the previous version of the rules.
Though to be fair, that is the one place they have improved on with the last two big releases. If Planetfall gets the same attention to playtesting as the 2nd editions of both Firestorm and Dystopian Wars, then we shouldn't have any issues.
I'm a bit leery as this is the first edition of a completely new line, but DW and FSA have been pretty solid rule sets. The issues with the original editions of DWars and FSA were that they felt rushed out the door and very under-tested. They have a lot more experience under their belts for games of this scale and the test issues seem to be over for the time being with them moving over to large testing pools pulled from community volunteers.
So I am confident enough to give them the benefit of the doubt here. But I am still a bit worried that this one may have a few teething issues early on. Luckily, Spartan have also been showing a willingness to clarify or even outright change things post release if it turns out to not work well (FSA has seen revisions to the costs of core fleet units, errata on TAC cards that were overpowered, rapid revision of some Marauders rules quickly after the initial release to solve a few issues). So even when things haven't been perfect (and honestly the amount of changes has been within normal tolerance... we're not talking Infinity-sized FAQs here) they have been willing to fix it instead of saving it to a later sub-edition/printing.
Between these factors, I think Spartan has done something a bit miraculous in terms of rules development quality. Hopefully Planetfall hews to this instead of the bad old days of live, paid beta tests.
Models look excellent. I'd like to see more Sorylian goodness, but not because I'm biased or anything like that.
I haven't played any of their other ground combat games (Dystopian Legions/Wars), but it its anything like FSA in basic mechanics, I'll be thrilled. Hell, even the helix method to list building is fething cool.
I haven't played any of their other ground combat games (Dystopian Legions/Wars), but it its anything like FSA in basic mechanics, I'll be thrilled. Hell, even the helix method to list building is fething cool.
Aside from boarding (which is still gives me headaches), DWars ground combat is actually seriously good, its a great counterpoint to the other DWars theaters
I think the Aquan tanks in the grey color scheme look so much better than in blue. I am really curious about what the other Leviathans are going to look like.
I do really like the look of the Terran leviathan. The Dindrenzi one is right down my friends alley (he's aTau player).
I'm very excited for the rules, assuming they'll be as good as the original ones hopefully even better. I'm just hoping that the game will move faster than the DW land game since they've said the colored dice mechanic was being removed in favor of the standard exploding dice.
I'm really looking forward to the other factions. They've said the Directorate leviathan will be a flying vehicle, so I am willing to make a bet (small one) that it'll look something like the carrier or frigate in FSA.
I can definitely picture some possibilities for how the Sorylians and Aquans could be designed, but I'm really interested in seeing the Relthoza, but mainly because the only "vehicles" we've seen of there's are little more than body armor for the k'ss'ark warriors, so I am eager to see what kinds of larger constructions they will do for planetary invasions.
I just had a Battletech-gasm at those walker minis.
This LOOKS great, but I have a stompy robot combined arms game. This will have to be utterly fantastic for me to do anything other than pick up a couple minis.
What I love is the dynamics - the walkers are not just big standing there like they came off the assembly line- they've got a twist to the arms and body that suggests motion and action! They look fantastic
Mattlov wrote: I just had a Battletech-gasm at those walker minis.
This LOOKS great, but I have a stompy robot combined arms game. This will have to be utterly fantastic for me to do anything other than pick up a couple minis.
Just out of curiosity, which stompy robot combined arms game do you prefer? I know you mentioned Battletech, but when I've ever looked into it the vehicles and power armored infantry seemed to be more of a hindrance to a force and only taken if you really wanted a thematic force.
That said, Planetfall seems to be the game for me but I'm likely not going to be using the leviathans in my army... Unless the Relthozan one really speaks to me I will stick with the smaller vehicles backed up by a heavy walker or two.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Overread wrote: What I love is the dynamics - the walkers are not just big standing there like they came off the assembly line- they've got a twist to the arms and body that suggests motion and action! They look fantastic
In their Facebook comments, Spartan has said they used ball and socket joints where possible to allow for the dynamism.
Is this 15mm or 10mm? Can't remember. I've been glancing at DZC lately with the plastic starters about to come out but this is more open field warfare which I prefer.
I'll grab some to paint as I always do with Spartan Games. Not sure I'll play it as much as DZC scratches my itch more, and imagine Planetfall resolves around the usual Spartan Mechanics. The force composition looks fun, so I hope it's not too gimmicky. Especially looking forward to the Alliance and League minor factions.
Hulksmash wrote: Is this 15mm or 10mm? Can't remember. I've been glancing at DZC lately with the plastic starters about to come out but this is more open field warfare which I prefer.
It's 10mm. It looks like the 15mm version they were talking about was scrapped.
There should be some rules on how to incorporate the standard FSA space game with Planetfall, and there may be a 28mm skirmish game coming sometime in the future, but I really don't think it's anything to hold your breath over. It's likely a long way away.
I'll grab some to paint as I always do with Spartan Games. Not sure I'll play it as much as DZC scratches my itch more, and imagine Planetfall resolves around the usual Spartan Mechanics. The force composition looks fun, so I hope it's not too gimmicky. Especially looking forward to the Alliance and League minor factions.
This is where I sit currently. I love the tactical nature of DZC as well as the hard sci-fi elements that it incorporates. The models for PF look cool, but the open warfare and oversized mecha feels a little unrealistic for my taste. I have 40k for science fantasy.
Still. I will reserve final judgement until I see a demo of it.
DZC also has walkers (which would probably not exist in hard sci-fi), the titans are flying and the rebels are partly mad max lookalikes.
In regard to game system i will have to see which i like more (or less). The DZC fuleset was enough for me to not start playing it (but i will probably get some of the rebel models).
I don't know yet in which category Planetfall will... well... fall.
iirc, each Helix (i.e. force group on the org chart) will have its own boxed release. This is probably a Terran Helix, though we don't know which specific one yet. And assuming that this is an Helix, the building will be included as well.
Eumerin wrote: iirc, each Helix (i.e. force group on the org chart) will have its own boxed release. This is probably a Terran Helix, though we don't know which specific one yet. And assuming that this is an Helix, the building will be included as well.
This is more than a single helix.
For comparison purposes, the Dindrenzi Core Helix mockup box visible in the Claymore photos (which is probably a good starting point for force building) shows eight infantry bases, four small vehicles (I'm guessing APCs), three medium vehicles, one large vehicle, and what appear to be two drop pods.
I think they may have mentioned in the last Facebook post with these models and terrain that the terrain comes pre-painted. That would be the only part and I'm not going to hold them to it.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I agree that this is not a single helix. There are two heavy tanks shown along with the leviathan and command vehicle.
It was stated in the Claymore information that the Leviathans and Heavy tanks are in opposing helix's, so while you may get two heavy tanks in a single helix it won't come with the leviathan or all of the other stuff.
roadkizzle wrote: I think they may have mentioned in the last Facebook post with these models and terrain that the terrain comes pre-painted. That would be the only part and I'm not going to hold them to it.
Correct. Here's the quote from the Facebook post -
The terrain comes pre-painted, so can go straight to the gaming table and our boxed sets include the terrain.
I don't want to play the dirty Terrans, but all those models look so cool. I hope they show more Directorate stuff, before I get swayed to the Terrans.
Man, the more I see of that Dindrenzi walker, the more I love it. And the best part is it sounds like they play a lot like Epic 40k space marines (lightning strikes using a lot of orbital assets and precision firepower to take the enemy apart faster than they can react). So that should be right up my alley. But I can't say no to any hovertanks, so it was something of a foregone conclusion.
I can't wait to see more teasers, their work on Planetfall is simply amazing so far. A very nice rendering of each faction that still makes calls to their fleet aesthetics without just being straight-up copies.
At their event at Claymore the Planetfall and Armada games were linked. If I understand correctly a victory in armada meant that their ground forces would receive additional reinforcements. I feel like the linking of the two games is very important to Spartan Games. I have not been this excited about a game in a long time.
That picture of the Army box has me sold. I have been seeing the posts from spartan on my FB page and my interest has been building. Also loving the inclusion of some terrain pieces. The Space stations in FA have always been a good addition and make for a quick game set up so its good to see them carry this on.
Like other people on this thread, I don’t normally go in for pre-ordering (Board or Computer games) and I am burnt out on kickstarter after feeling utterly let down by myth (Got a refund), that being said I will definitely be pre-ordering enough to get playing a game with my boys and link this together with our FA forces. If campaign rules are not out at the start i can always do some in house rules that link together the offence and defence advantage from a planetary invasion force.
I have the Valhalla box and I feel it would be a smart move by Spartan to have the Terran and Dindrenzi forces as the starter armies in a Planetfall box to link this together quickly in terms of a campaign setting.
Looking forward to this developing over the coming months.
Mooks wrote: I have the Valhalla box and I feel it would be a smart move by Spartan to have the Terran and Dindrenzi forces as the starter armies in a Planetfall box to link this together quickly in terms of a campaign setting.
The following is from the guy who's posting the Planetfall pics on the Spartan Games Facebook page (emphasis added by me).
Images of the Directorate coming very soon. They feature as a core nation in the first of our Two Player boxed sets.
Mattlov wrote: I just had a Battletech-gasm at those walker minis.
This LOOKS great, but I have a stompy robot combined arms game. This will have to be utterly fantastic for me to do anything other than pick up a couple minis.
Just out of curiosity, which stompy robot combined arms game do you prefer? I know you mentioned Battletech, but when I've ever looked into it the vehicles and power armored infantry seemed to be more of a hindrance to a force and only taken if you really wanted a thematic force.
That said, Planetfall seems to be the game for me but I'm likely not going to be using the leviathans in my army... Unless the Relthozan one really speaks to me I will stick with the smaller vehicles backed up by a heavy walker or two.
I have been a Battletech Demo Agent for about 18 years, so yeah, that's my game. Combined arms in Battletech only gets clunky because infantry operates on a completely different set of rules. Overly complicated ones if you ask me, but it was a balancing issue. 'Mechs and vehicles use a majority of the same rules, with just a few differences. 'Mechs and vehicle games are easy and smooth.
I love the Battletech world, and the mechs. I've read a handful of the books. But I've never enjoyed a game of it. I've always felt that mech games represent a few mechs in basically arena/very small scale combat, but they have always felt much more based around target priority and in Battletech weapon controlling with the heat mechanics.
I prefer my games with actual squad actions and a bit more strategy with a little less of the nitty and gritty. I think I may prefer some more of the very simplified Battletech rules, but then I'd prefer something where I could easily control four or more lances of mechs or two or three with a number of supporting tank/infantry formations.
I see Planetfall as more of large scale war scenarios with some heavy backup in the Leviathans or heavy tanks rather than a mech game with some supporting tanks and infantry backup.
Mooks wrote: I have the Valhalla box and I feel it would be a smart move by Spartan to have the Terran and Dindrenzi forces as the starter armies in a Planetfall box to link this together quickly in terms of a campaign setting.
The following is from the guy who's posting the Planetfall pics on the Spartan Games Facebook page (emphasis added by me).
Images of the Directorate coming very soon. They feature as a core nation in the first of our Two Player boxed sets.
Thanks Eumerin, I had missed that bit. Still interested but my initial purchase might be different now. All depends on these other box sets and which armies they are. Could be like the Mercs box sets that were kickstarted. I may buy the book and two armies in separate army boxes.
Looking forward to new news rolling out as we get closer. loving the build up of the release.
Avrik_Shasla wrote: I honestly just want to see more of the Aquan Prime right now.
Anyone got a release date for this yet?
The rumor-mill keeps saying October, and their forum-mods haven't done anything to dissuade us from thinking that. However, if it is the case, they'll announce something in the next week or two, and they always have their pre-release "calender" up six weeks in advance.
roadkizzle wrote: I love the Battletech world, and the mechs. I've read a handful of the books. But I've never enjoyed a game of it. I've always felt that mech games represent a few mechs in basically arena/very small scale combat, but they have always felt much more based around target priority and in Battletech weapon controlling with the heat mechanics.
I prefer my games with actual squad actions and a bit more strategy with a little less of the nitty and gritty. I think I may prefer some more of the very simplified Battletech rules, but then I'd prefer something where I could easily control four or more lances of mechs or two or three with a number of supporting tank/infantry formations.
I see Planetfall as more of large scale war scenarios with some heavy backup in the Leviathans or heavy tanks rather than a mech game with some supporting tanks and infantry backup.
Look into Alpha Strike then. Sounds like it is the Battletech you need.
While I have seen Battletech played occasionally at my LGS, and people play it at conventions, nobody plays Alpha Strike.
It has potential, but not really what I would prefer. I like having mechs be a punctuation to a game not the other way around.
Spartans games are fun, especially Dystopian Legions and the original Planetfall rules, and it is looking like the adjustments for the full rulebooks are just taking the games in the right direction.
Also... Battletech doesn't have armies built around sentient 25ft tall spider-centaurs who go to battle with powered armor in place of battle tanks, who make heavy use of stealth and cloaking systems to entrap their opponents in a web of nanobots to tear them apart molecule by molecule.
I'm sorry, but Planetfall and the Relthozans or Sorylians is one of the few games for me.
•Win conditions (how many what they are).
•Scenarios in the rulebook?
•Ideal table size (I'd assume 6x4 from pictures).
•Size of armies in a general game.
•Time it takes to play a "general" match.
•Tactics/Strategies etc.
Sev
Hi Sev, Delboy/Spartan Derek here!
Thanks for the questions, which I'm happy to answer!
I've grouped my responses since a lot of what you are asking dove-tails into each other.
1+2 - Win Conditions and Scenarios.
There are 3 ways to play a Planetfall Game - Objectives, Narrative or Scenario Games
*Objective Games involve the placing of Primary and Secondary Objectives (each with an Attached Tactical Value -TV) and you win the game by moving your Zero-Hour Tracker down to 0 by taking and holding these objectives, along with killing the enemy of course!
*Narrative Games allow players to build a scenario by bidding points on conditions prior to the game such as Battlefield Conditions, Deployments, etc. This also uses Objectives if desired and the Zero-Hour Tracker is used too..
*Scenario Games are pre-set games generated using a simple D6 (i.e. there are 6 of them!). This is the simplest game designed for those who don't have much experience of combined strategic/tactical gameplay and allows those folks to get started straight away. The Win Conditions here are dictated by the scenario played.
3 The ideal gameplay space?
Well it all depends on your agreed MFV (Maximum Force Value) but a 6x4 will give you enough space to play up to 5000pts....I know that doesn't really mean anything to you right now as you don't know how much things cost...... but...... its enough space to play a game with 4-6 Helixes in it!
4+5 Size of Armies and How long for a game?
It really depends on what size of game you want to play. Competitive Play is designed to be at 4000pts, with 6x4 being used and games should last about 2-2.5 hours depending on the players! This means that Planetfall should be suitable for many folks who want to use it as a Tourney-Game.
6 Strategies
Yikes.....where do I start?
The game is designed to encourage players to think strategically (prior to the game starting) with the placement of Terrain, Objectives, Sky Drop/ Ordnance Markers, and Deployment.....along with Tactical Action Cards and their likely execution in-game.
But once the game kicks off its the tactics of the player and their ability to adapt that becomes important - in much the same way as most Spartan Games. Explosive Dice can be unforgiving, but its a poor player that cites their dice (....even if I do it all the time.....but that's different.....). Having a battle plan, a route to engagement, perform success plotting, reserve elements and in some cases having the wherewithal to deliver a Forlorn Hope into the teeth of the enemy all combine to achieving victory.
I know that I've not been very helpful with question 6....but there is simply too much to cover to paint with anything other than broad strokes
Hope that's answered a few things for you?
Cheers
d
Boblogik, on 28 Aug 2014 - 07:39 AM, said:
Nifty info. I have a question, are the helix choices fixed or are there different configurations within them? I wouldn't mind seeing a teaser entry like what was shown for the pathogen, just a screenshot of a helix entry itself (any helix) would be nice.
Here is an example of a Helix: The Directorate Recon Helix
Quote
The Directorate Recon Helix MUST contain:
1 Reprimand Light Recon Tank Squadron – The Squadron gains the Command Element (8”) MAR
Options: *In addition, the Recon Helix may add the following squadrons:
0-2 Clearance Infantry Cadres - A Clearance Infantry Cadre may be deployed via a Breacher Medium Transport for the appropriate additional points
0-1 Avenger Medium Ack-Ack Tank Squadron
The Directorate Recon Helix has only one Requisite - The Reprimand Light Recon Tank Squadron, but has options to take Light Infantry (which can be mounted in an APC), and an Ack Ack Squadron too.
When you buy the Directorate Recon Box, you will get all the options available. Of course you don't need to use them all, all the time, but its nice to have access to all of them if you want them.
During testing last night we had a 'Drone Heavy' Relthosan list (....with so many Light and Heavy Infantry Drones on the table, we could hardly move them!) against an Aquan 'Focused Anti-Armour' list.
The elite Aquans were brutally efficient, shooting round corners and sniping off the larger elements in the Relthosan force....and then the Drones began to capture the objectives, scoring solidly, pushing the Aquans back with sheer weight of numbers.
In the end both forces were in tatters, with an Aquan Heavy Helix (with 2x Heavy Tanks and 2x Tank Hunters) and the remnants of the Core Helix holding out against the Relthosan Assault Helix with loads of Heavy Drones in objectives..... a fantastic game that ended in an exact draw (in terms of Tactical Value). Both players achieved their Zero-Hour score by the End Phase, and even managed to score the exact same amount (due on part to a TAC played by the Aquan Player to win the Recon Phase)....leading to our first draw in over 200+ games!
Both players noted that the flexibility in the building mechanics meant that taking lists that were off the wall didn't feel off putting and both are now away to build more zany lists that push the system to maximum - I believe one is planning a Leviathan Stampede (2x Leviathan Helixes and an Assault Helix) whereas the Relthosan player is planning a Drone Nexus/Brood Mother Force (A strong Core Helix with lots of Light Infantry and 2x Field Support Helixes....including 2x Brood Mothers!)
Taking a leaf out of their book, I'm planning a game today with a list I'm calling 'Iron Rain'.....a Dindrenzi force with so many Drop Pods and Nexus Designators (the mechanic used to guide the Drop Pods to their target) that I feel kinda....dirty.....I'm even planning to drop in a Leviathan (...cos I have no shame!) :blink:
Of course I'm informed that my Sorylian foe is planning an Assault Force, with 2xAssault Helixes! ......which may be a tough prospect. :unsure: ....especially if they get close to my Hyperion Leviathan.
Cant Wait!
For me, this is one of the best things about the upcoming Planetfall - the diversity that is possible within the simple system of list building. The Core Helix has 3 Requisites (1x Heavy Tank Squadron, 1x Medium Tank Squadron, 1x Light Recon Tank Squadron), and all other Helixes have 1 Requisite (although this differs between the Helixes)......and after that, the restrictions are minimal, and are based upon the choices of helixes players decide upon.
Of course, that said, List Building in any game is important - but it shouldn't replace gameplay.
I would have looked at the Aquan/Relthosan game last night on paper and said the Aquans were gonna get hammered. but good gameplay and some acts of in-game heroics meant that it was the Relthosan player that was scrambling at the end (....the Aquans hit their Zero-Hour mid turn, and the Relthosan had to pull out all the stops to get over the line - performing a Storming CQB Action into a building with Heavy Infantry deployed via a Birthing Pod shot by the Brood Mother......). All this lead to a lot of people crowding round the table, watching the Relthosan player 'throw the long bomb'.......with some scattered cheering and more than a few shouts of "you jammy git!" chorusing out from the watchers.
Just to chip in here chaps, I saw the rapid prototypes for the Directorate Heavy tank and infantry, Relthoza small & medium armour units, infantry swarms, Sorylian Medium and Heavy walkers, heavy/light infantry and APC, plus some other (more hush-hush!) toys yesterday - and they're looking awesome!
At the moment I plan to just get EVERYTHING!!!
So far the games I've played have been BRUTAL. Don't get attached to your units, people, the Firestorm Universe is a harsh and unforgiving one where weapons tech is very, very nasty! Scrambled Terran, anyone?
these two images are the rendered models with color added
Directorate Armoured APC
Just finished painting this one, so thought I would snap a quick picture. This is one of my favourite models for the Directorate, I just love its battle hardened exterior and those chunky wheels!
It is a great size model, sitting on a 70mm x 40mm scenic base and designed to hold several bases of the Shock Infantry I posted a picture of earlier. The logic being it had to look like it could actually carry its occupants.
Meet the Bruisers!
It is fair to say the Sorylians are the heavyweights in the game, their reptilian nature showing through. In Planetfall they have two types of troops to start with, Light and Heavy. Although Light is almost an odd thing to say, given that they are larger than humans.
But it is the Heavies that are the scariest to engage as they are designed (and armed) to take on vehicles.
Here are some sample poses.
I have to admit, I am not to sure about these. I want to see them painted.
Ooh, interesting. Works Raptor (and Terquoi) stuff might mean some of the subfactions are making an appearance. I wonder if there will be pure Works Raptor available?
The Directorate are not really based on the Daleks, rather the early flying saucer UFO sightings... In fact there's a very interesting bit of fluff describing the Directorates alien encounters, carving out their area of space and the technology that defines their ships design.
That said, they've already shown pictures of some Directorate infantry. They're the second picture on the last picture post.
The Directorate are human arms manufacturing corporations that have no qualms over forcibly abducting civilians from any race or galaxy to do genetic/weapons research on, and the heavier assault infantry may be cybernetically enhanced creatures.
The Pre-Orders link on the Spartan Games website currently leads to the Planetfall section of their Online Store - as in, the top of the page indicates that you're in the Planetfall section, and clicking the Planetfall tab leads you to the same page. However, the only products listed there are a couple of Dystopian Wars battlegroups. It appears that they're in the process of tweaking the website for a Planetfall release announcement, but haven't finished quite yet.
str00dles1 wrote: Wow they all look amazing. No release date yet though right?
Nope. Nothing yet. Spartan's been hinting at being extremely busy, though, suggesting that they've got a lot of releases planned for next month. So hopefully they'll be making an announcement shortly.
Some of the stuff looks awesome - and some of it not so much. I'll be more curious when it launches. I'd like some of the terrain for use with my DZC battles
I have and play on occasion dystopian wars but not played it since the new rules mostly because ever second word in the book is in bold so couldn't be bothered with it.
Problem I have with Spartan is all the games are the same play dystopian wars you have played firestorm or legions or even uncharted seas they have never modified the rules correctly to scale and have no concept that you have to change the rules when you scale a game up.
I really don't think this game is going to be any different all hit on the same everything will be subject to the 4 range bands and dice according to the band and the link fire makeing the tank in this case have no flavour on its own and try and put in Mars (special small bits) to pug the dull gap.
I so hope I am wrong but I won't be best thing to do is make your own game with it which is what I am considering depending on how good or bad the rules are where its simple fixes or throw the book away time will tell Only thing that gives me hope is this is the longest play tested of the games I think so who knows
Stuff looks great but I literally am unable to paint models that small. I might be interested in a 28mm game, if one ever arises, but tiny unpainted models are a non-starter for me.
agnosto wrote: Stuff looks great but I literally am unable to paint models that small. I might be interested in a 28mm game, if one ever arises, but tiny unpainted models are a non-starter for me.
Seriously?
In my experience, the itty-bitty stuff is *easier* to paint than larger models. If you don't pick out the fine details on 28mm stuff, that's all anyone sees. If you don't do that on 15mm figures, no one notices.
agnosto wrote: Stuff looks great but I literally am unable to paint models that small. I might be interested in a 28mm game, if one ever arises, but tiny unpainted models are a non-starter for me.
Seriously?
In my experience, the itty-bitty stuff is *easier* to paint than larger models. If you don't pick out the fine details on 28mm stuff, that's all anyone sees. If you don't do that on 15mm figures, no one notices.
Hey, to each their own. I personally don't like 10-15mm stuff as it's more of a pain to paint for me. I try making these things look like the pics and they'll look like utter gack because I don't have the fine motor control to paint just a faceplate on a helmet; my hamfisted self will wind up putting the faceplate color over the whole model.
I haven't been this excited for a tabletop wargame release in quite some time. Ive just recently bought in to Firestorm Armada and now this comes along. ouch my wallet. Spartan Games, despite some of its faults feels like a breath of fresh air compared to some other large company's stale product releases of late. while 28mm is nice it just really doesn't work for large scale battles in my opinion. Im really looking forward to mass battle tank formations and stompy mechs in the near future.
10penceman wrote: I have and play on occasion dystopian wars but not played it since the new rules mostly because ever second word in the book is in bold so couldn't be bothered with it.
Problem I have with Spartan is all the games are the same play dystopian wars you have played firestorm or legions or even uncharted seas they have never modified the rules correctly to scale and have no concept that you have to change the rules when you scale a game up.
I really don't think this game is going to be any different all hit on the same everything will be subject to the 4 range bands and dice according to the band and the link fire makeing the tank in this case have no flavour on its own and try and put in Mars (special small bits) to pug the dull gap.
I so hope I am wrong but I won't be best thing to do is make your own game with it which is what I am considering depending on how good or bad the rules are where its simple fixes or throw the book away time will tell Only thing that gives me hope is this is the longest play tested of the games I think so who knows
Have you ever played or even read through the Legions rules?
I do agree that there are a lot of similarities between Dystopian Wars, Firestorm Armada, and Uncharted Seas, although I think that the variety between weapon systems, turning style, targetted attacks, and reliance on directional weapons means that Firestorm has a different feel to the game than DW. It puts a bit more emphasis on maneuvering.
But I will say that Legions has very little in common with the smaller scale games. You roll dice and count successes. But the fact that in Legions you target a squad but kill of each model with one wound each while the naval games are a struggle to get any model off the table.
Legions also puts a stronger emphasis on the strategy involved with the set activation order for each turn, and the Command Point resource management (at least with my FSA this is a big deal). In general the Command mechanics in Legions are central to the feel of the game, where officers are crucial for a number of things like giving orders to units, allowing them to run or shoot at long range, and their morale benefits.
The emphasis on terrain also leads to very different gameplay, while islands do block line of sight in DW there are big difference in how prevalent terrain is for the infantry and how they can actually use it.
The old rules for Planetfall were much more similar to Legions than they were Dystopian Wars or Firestorm Armada. Tanks were much more fragile and maneuverable. Most vehicles could be killed with just one attack. It also put more of an emphasis on strategy with the set activation system as well but with also a very defined reinforcement mechanics representing forces being deployed from planetary orbit.
The new rules will be changing though, so I will absolutely not make any predictions on how similar or different they are from Firestorm or Dystopian. I will say that Spartan has stated that the game is very fast paced, and that units die quickly, but I think they say the same about DW 2.0 so it sounds more like marketing speak to me. I will say that so far I'm not happy that they did away with the colored dice differences, but I'm hoping that it doesn't signal to much of a return to Spartans original game design.
I find it funny that there is a large surge in 6-10mm gaming, with absolutely cool models coming from several sources......just not the giant elephant of a company who already has the possibility of a 6mm game with more than two decades of history and tons of casts for sculpts both in metal and plastic. Really, GW? It shows when the "little guys" can walk all over them while they just rehash old successes 'till there is no meat left on the bones.
More power to Spartan. I never was interested in Dystopian Wars, and Dropship Commander looks awesome on a table revolves too much around Dropships (yeah I know it's in the name...but still) and using their (admittedly awesome) city building terrain.
I hope Planetfall really has that "combined arms" feel that I am looking for since the different versions of Epic 40K. It would definitely make me want to get back into 6mm minis again, as their stuff so far is beautiful.
I have read the rules for legions it was utter crap one of the worst rule systems I have seen for a 28mm game and never liked the models much. Just my opinion
I never got to play the original PF didn't like the rules and had to order it from Spartans sub site but again the minis where nice as are the looks of the new ones except the bugs.
Don't mind tanks have one hit point but I do want flavour all different weapon systems different traits to them I want depth but I get a very bad feeling they are going to role out the same old system and screw it up be another armoured clash but for firestorm. If artillery can't fire a lot longer range than a tank there is something screwed up.
One thing I wonder is will they bring out more of the big drop ships terrain things?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Gw won't do epic again because epic 40k was a huge failure they went from epic being one of there best sellers to epic 40k being one of there worst.
Would be great if they admitted they where wrong an started the old epic back up I know at least 10 people that would drop huge amounts of cash if it was done right but sadly all we have is fond memories.
Spartan models are good there resin is usually great have huge amount of dwars models and they have been a joy to paint its the rules that worry me greatly it would be better the rules being closer to FoW than dwars/firestorm but just can't see them using a new rule system.
10penceman wrote: One thing I wonder is will they bring out more of the big drop ships terrain things?
Probably. The plan is to link Firestorm Armada, Planetfall, and an as-yet unannounced 28mm skirmish game. Given that, making dropship models available in all three scales (i.e. FSA, 10mm, and 28mm) is probably going to be required. As you've noted, there are already some available. But they'll need more to cover the full spectrum of supported races.
Battle For Proteus Prime: a 2-player battle box that contains over 33 models, full colour rulebook, campaign book, scenery, and so much more. Contents include:
Aquan Core Helix
1 x 'Sedna' Heavy Skimmer Tank
3 x 'Lamana' Medium Skimmer Tanks
4 x 'Imzani' Light Recon Skimmer Tanks
1 x 'Sirsir' Medium Skimmer Designator Tank
2 x 'Votari' Crystal Nodes (with the ability to swap out the Crystals for Anti-Air Batteries!)
5 x Bases of Aquan 'Khitari' Infantry (mix of scenic bases with 3-4 minis on each)
Directorate Core Helix
1 x 'Desolator' Heavy Battle Crawler Tank
3 x 'Retaliator' Medium Battle Crawlers Tanks
5 x 'Informer' Light Recon Buggies
2 x 'Trojan' Cyber Warfare Tanks
1 x 'Intruder' Combat Personnel Carrier
5 x Bases of Directorate 'Patriot' Shock Infantry (mix of scenic bases with 3-4 minis on each)
Plus:
1 x Full Colour Rulebook
2 x Planetfall TAC Decks
1 x 64-page 'The Battle of Proteus Prime' A5 Campaign Book (including Statistics for all Aquan and Directorate Forces in the set)
2 x Medium Bunkers
3 x Small Buildings
1 x A5 Crashed Shuttle Sheet
A5 Token and Template Sheets
Dice
Products come unassembled and unpainted. The images of digitally painted models used in this section were created using the actual 3D models used to create our highly detailed miniatures.
IMPORTANT NOTE: This product does not ship from the online store until 22nd October.
This Allied Expansion Helix allows owners of the Aquan Prime forces from the Battle For Proteus Prime Boxed Set to immediately expand their forces. In the rules up to TWO Allied Helixes can be added to each Core Helix deployed into the heart of a ground battle.
The Terquai are close allies of the Aquan Prime, and this Recon Helix is intended to aid Aquan forces in harassing their enemies. The Iophon Heavy Gunship lays down devastating fire, while itself soaking up enemy attacks, and can be used to deploy Temporal Portals onto a battlefield. The flexibility of this Helix though comes from the two cadres of Nabis Heavy Infantry Drones which can use the Temporal Portals to be transported instantaneously into battle zones.
1 x Iophon Heavy Gunship
10 x Bases of Nabis Heavy Infantry (2 Full Cadres)
2 x Temporal Portals (60mm x 40mm scenic base)
All models come unpainted and unassembled.
Note: The Temporal Portals are provided with laser-etched live-edge acrylic to simulate the Portal in action
This Allied Expansion Helix allows owners of the Directorate forces from the Battle For Proteus Prime Boxed Set to immediately expand their forces. In the rules up to TWO Allied Helixes can be added to each Core Helix deployed into the heart of a ground battle.
Works Raptor ground forces are, like their space fleets, all about stabbing the enemy in the heart. The GX-74 ‘Witch’ Interceptors are sleek, fast and deadly, and a match for any aerial foe. The LR-6 Recon Tanks are all about capturing strategic objectives, and then having the fighting prowess to hold on to it. Also included in the Helix is a crashed Works Raptor Escape Pod which can be used as part of a narrative driven scenario, or simply as a Strategic Objective.
3 x GX-74 ‘Witch’ Heavy Interceptor
5 x LR-6 Recon Tank
1 x Crashed Escape Pod (60mm x 40mm scenic base)
Very nice love the dirctorit stuff and the fish and the recon for the fish only thing I don't like is the raptor flyers. Cover of rule book is naff just hope the pages beyond are great
Honestly thought they would have tried for the 6 core races first but think this has to be on my list to buy so love the directority big crawler and the buggies
I just started Firestorm Armada, partly because Planetfall was coming too.
I chose terran/kurak alliance, my first co-player chose dindrenzi. And now already i see models that are not of my faction, but which i love.
I chose terrans for the wheeled vehicles, but now the dindrenzi have buggies... this is going to be a problem...
But not a bad problem, a good one... ;-)
Just ordered one of everything. I wish it was Terran and Dindrenzi as I know i'll want to main those eventually, but the two-player starter is a good value, with its included rule-book, and the allies helixes will obviously be useful with my future armies.
Haven't been this excited about a game in years and years. I know its been hard to find rules info, but for those living on the forums, and following interviews, there is actually a lot of info to piece together. Sounds like an excellent system.
10penceman wrote: Honestly thought they would have tried for the 6 core races first but think this has to be on my list to buy so love the directority big crawler and the buggies
I suspect the rest of the major races (and possibly non-starter set core helixes for the Aquans and Directorate) will be out in November. They'll probably be announced in a month.
I'm pleasantly surprised that they released the two Allied Helixes as well. Though interestingly enough, the Works Raptor Helix appears to exist to give the Core Aquan Helix's anti-aircraft support something to shoot at.
This looks really great and Im tempted to buy the starter box but I may hold off to see what they release for the Terrans and Dindrenzi. Looks like its time to start offloading some 40k and WHF armies.
A little mining of the forums and comments from the designers imply that the next month's release will be all the core helixes (essentially faction starters) and the corresponding "Allies" each bring.
Remember, btw, that factions can ally with anyone on their "half" of the macro-conflict, so those Works Raptors recon flyers and such will work with more than just Directorate in the "Allies" slot.
So none of the factions I play in Firestorm are available yet. That'll keep this on the shelf until they are. Otherwise, super cool figures. Hopefully the rules live up to the figures.
oh man those Terran infantry look sexy. Im really torn. I play Dindrenzi and Directorate in FSA but im really liking the looks of those Terran and Sorylian models.
I'm digging the terrain. I will see about getting some for use in Dropzone for raids on a Military area. I want to get some of the infantry as well. Not sold on the game - but not hating it too much.
It'll also boil down to if anyone around here plays it. No one that I know of plays FSA but they might come out of the woodwork with a new game.
Those Din-fantry look amazing. Holy crap, I need this game.
As a massive freaking fan of hovertanks, I dare say I may go a bit overboard on this one. Whether by fans, ground effect, or gravitics (or just plain thrusters+brick flipping gravity the bird) I just can't get enough of over-armed floating blocks of metal. Those APCs (I think) are looking nifty too.
I can't wait to see what their aerial stuff looks like.
Ronin_eX wrote: I can't wait to see what their aerial stuff looks like.
Some can already be seen in the Claymore pictures.
And, of course, there are the Works Raptor Heavy Interceptors shown above. And I think it's safe to say that the Iophon Gunship in the Terquai helix is an air unit as well.
I can see massive planetary invasion in my future. Firestorm Armada invasion fleet getting past a blockade, Space hulk for boarding actions, Planetfall for the ground assault and Deadzone for taking key objectives. Great narrative play for my boys and I.
I have never been one for the fluff so the pure look of the models is what attracted me to Spartan in the first place. Their FSA fleets look spectacular on a board.
On a side note, just because I like to share, I loved the deadzone rules and have a great board setup with some MDF industrial buildings to bolster it up so it does not look like a fight over an ISO park. I just hated the restic mini's. I am in the process of swapping out the enforcers for SM and ditching the restic marauders for GW orks. Same weapon loadouts but GW's 28mm mini's are so much more better looking (2009 and Space Hulk brought back into the wargaming world.) I will have to look at some kind of aesthetic cohesion between the 10mm and the 28mm. I can keep my paint scheme between the FSA ships and the Planetfall tanks but my troops should have cohesive uniform or the narritve will be off. In the future I will look at the Spartan 28mm skirmish game but until then i am a bit too heavily invested at the 28mm level for an entirely new game system.
Just very pleased to have a fantastic campaign in my future.
Ronin_eX wrote: I can't wait to see what their aerial stuff looks like.
Some can already be seen in the Claymore pictures.
And, of course, there are the Works Raptor Heavy Interceptors shown above. And I think it's safe to say that the Iophon Gunship in the Terquai helix is an air unit as well.
I meant specifically Dindrenzi (or RSN) air assets.
So far we've only seen Directorate and Works Raptor aerial stuff (those VTOL gunships are Directorate, they were shown off as renders in some previews earlier in the year) on the Zenian League side of things. They're allies to the Dindrenzi of course, but I want to see the homegrown aerial stuff (if this initial release is anything to go by, my guess is we will see RSN air assets first).
I meant specifically Dindrenzi (or RSN) air assets.
So far we've only seen Directorate and Works Raptor aerial stuff (those VTOL gunships are Directorate, they were shown off as renders in some previews earlier in the year) on the Zenian League side of things. They're allies to the Dindrenzi of course, but I want to see the homegrown aerial stuff (if this initial release is anything to go by, my guess is we will see RSN air assets first).
No close-ups, unfortunately. But there are some Dindrenzi air units visible in the Claymore pics.
Check on the right-hand side of the first pic (near where the four boards meet). The last pic in the first post has what appears to be a second type of flyer, though the details are hard to make out.
I would imagine that you were hoping for a closer look, but it's better than nothing for the moment.
I meant specifically Dindrenzi (or RSN) air assets.
So far we've only seen Directorate and Works Raptor aerial stuff (those VTOL gunships are Directorate, they were shown off as renders in some previews earlier in the year) on the Zenian League side of things. They're allies to the Dindrenzi of course, but I want to see the homegrown aerial stuff (if this initial release is anything to go by, my guess is we will see RSN air assets first).
No close-ups, unfortunately. But there are some Dindrenzi air units visible in the Claymore pics.
Check on the right-hand side of the first pic (near where the four boards meet). The last pic in the first post has what appears to be a second type of flyer, though the details are hard to make out.
I would imagine that you were hoping for a closer look, but it's better than nothing for the moment.
Those are actually the Directorate gunships that Ronin_ex first mentioned. They were used as allied units for the games at Claymore.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: Incidentally, I like how either through fluff, aesthetics, or play-style... each faction/sub-faction has a 40k/Epic/Battle-fleet Gothic analog.
I'm absolutely painting my Directorate to match my Necrons (air-superiority and pure tech domination), and Aquan to be Eldar.
One other friend is already going Relthoza as his "not-Tyranid", and a second has Sorylians as his "Not Orks".
Really I largely don't see the FSA as nearly Warhammer analogs.
Now, sure the Sorylians are big and bulky and the Relthozans have multiple legs, but that is really where the similarity between the factions ends. The aesthetics, fluff, and playstyle for these factions really seem different to me. Fluff wise the Sorylians are the most level headed and bureaucratic race, very slow to allow themselves to be drawn into a fight. They are masters of science, and rely upon long ranged artillery and over engineered machines of war to outlast their enemy.
The Relthozans are a beautiful race, with profound understanding of nanotechnology. They use this technology to create cloaking and stealth armor so that their modus operandi is manipulating their enemy weaving a web to pull them in before springing the trap and finally taking them out in close range. They are an extremely intelligent and individualistic species, and outside of their swarming urges every few centuries when a new generation of queens are hatched, they are largely peaceful and keep to themselves.
I don't really see the Necrons as that high tech. Sure they are robots, but in all honest they are nothing more than Egyptian mummies... In Space. 40k is sci-fi, so ALL races outside of Tyranids and Orks have highly advanced technology.
The Directorate are much more akin to Dark Eldar if anything. They are all about manipulating their allies and enemies alike, selling arms to both sides and making lightning fast raids on battlefields or civilian settlements alike capturing slaves and technologies that may be useful in developing new bigger and more dangerous weapons to both sell and use to get more fun toys.
The Terrans may be considered to be similar to IG... But they're standard humans so there isn't much else.
I do see a lot of similarities with the Aquans and the Eldar though. The smooth lines of the Aquans, crystal targetting matrix (yay 2nd/3rd ED 40k), and use of laser weaponry just feels Eldar...
The Dindrenzi likewise remind me of Tau, with their prevalence of railguns, hover tanks, hit and run mobility tactics use of angular lines to denote motion and rigidity... And when I look at their Leviathan all I see is a Riptide.
My only problem with Spartan is their scale and rules Exploding d6's for me aren't fun and the models seem to always be bigger than my other games. Still, hopefully the rules for this might change my mind despite the exploding d6?
I highly doubt the exploding D6 and threshholds to hit things is going to change. That's been a constant in all of the Spartan Games.
A pity really, that they've been only doing minor modifications to the same game engine across what... 5 or so titles? There could be space for more maneuver-based gameplay than bucket-of-dice and modifiers play.
Not that such systems are bad, just that they're almost effectively reskins across several games.
I like the exploding 6's. One of the issues I have been having recently is the paper-rock-scissor nature of 40k. In Firestorm armada while frigates might not be the optimal unit to shoot at a battleship, with a couple of 6s you can do some damage.
The_Real_Chris wrote: My only problem with Spartan is their scale and rules Exploding d6's for me aren't fun and the models seem to always be bigger than my other games. Still, hopefully the rules for this might change my mind despite the exploding d6?
I also understand people's dislike of the exploding D6 although I really like it.
I was a very statistics oriented Industrial Engineer, and I always find the very simple statistical distributions found with just rolling a couple of dice to reach a number or a single dice trying to get a set number to be much to predictable of an outcome to produce interesting games. I like that I have to plan my turns playing Spartan Games products with very robust flexible strategies because anything can happen.
When you have naval games then virtually anything DOES happen. There are uncountable instances within real world battles where the big ships are crippled by a single lucky attack. I find that the statistics behind the exploding d6 have the potential for big shocking events... But those things happen within war so I enjoy being able to represent them.
That said, I am very certain that Dystopian Legions is right in having only a very limited use of the actual exploding D6. The game uses a variety of dice colors where either the 6 only counts as one success, or it counts as 2 successes, or it rarely counts as 2 with the exploding additional dice. This means that there can be a very big flexibility and control over the actual potential number of hits and therefore damage while the average hits remains constant. This also makes it difficult to predict the effects of an attack and flexibility in thinking to accommodate bad luck.
roadkizzle wrote: Those are actually the Directorate gunships that Ronin_ex first mentioned. They were used as allied units for the games at Claymore.
So they are. Oops!
On another note, Spartan Games has confirmed that the early order bonuses - i.e. the crashed shuttle model, and the art prints - will be available in all copies during the first month of the game's release, and not just copies purchased directly from SG.
Swastakowey wrote:Do they have plans for creating campaigns which use both fleets and ground forces?
The game that was played at Claymore apparently involved linked Firestorm Armada and Planetfall games (as well as a planned but as yet otherwise unannounced 28mm skirmish game in the same setting). So yeah, I expect some linkage info to be available (either in the rules, or on the website).
Does anybody have any decent links to the background for the races etc. From what I have looked at I can find very little yet people seem to have lots of info I cannot seem to find.
Does anybody have any decent links to the background for the races etc. From what I have looked at I can find very little yet people seem to have lots of info I cannot seem to find.
Well I purchased the starter set (went halves with a friend) and the two natural ally sets as well. I got my fleet separately and now the long wait to start playing. Its sheer luck that my chosen fleet and my friends chosen fleet had planet fall forces to match.
The thread linked in the OP has been closed, anybody know where the new one is?
There are a number of threads about the game in that same forum.
There haven't been any new con appearances, so there are no new photo-filled threads. And I doubt there will be before the game is released next month.
Well, can't say i'm lucky... I just spent $300-ish on Forces which I will, at best, end up ally-ing in to games down the road.
Still, I have high hopes for the system, LOVE the models, and always wanted a crack at 40k Epic while it was alive. This game checks a lot of boxes for me, and i'm really excited.
That said, the rest of the factions will have stuff, including their core helix, about a month later, so i'll have just enough time to mess with the system before deciding if I need to throw a wall of money at the game, "for real". :-p
Swastakowey wrote: Same im hoping they bring out a campaign book for that. If not im sure it will be mere weeks before the community makes a good set
I actually think we might see campaign rules right in the core rule-book. The designers said this game was built with linked campaign play from day-one, and it has integral hooks throughout scenarios, etc...
lord_blackfang wrote: Is there a particular reason why people are preordering rules sight unseen? I daresay Spartan doesn't exactly have a stellar track record with rules.
Maybe those people like Spartan's other games? I'm not going to speak to rules quality, my only real experience with Spartan was browsing the Dystopian Wars 1.0 book, which was definitely not well written, but the game seemed pretty popular anyway.
I know gamers are notoriously incapable of understanding that other people might like a game they like, or not like a game they like, but come on.
EDIT: Perhaps they like the miniatures and want to use them for other things. Hell, perhaps the people pre-ordering are GW's much vaunted "collector" and just want to paint the miniatures for fun.
EDIT EDIT: Of course, if they really hate Spartan's other games especially due to specific things like exploding D6's and are pre-ordering this with the intention of playing it, hoping that "maybe things will be different this time!", well....
Swastakowey wrote: Same im hoping they bring out a campaign book for that. If not im sure it will be mere weeks before the community makes a good set
I actually think we might see campaign rules right in the core rule-book. The designers said this game was built with linked campaign play from day-one, and it has integral hooks throughout scenarios, etc...
The first game they had at the open day had 3 battles. A space one and a 28mm one (I think) and it all influences the planet fall battle at the end. So hopefuly you are right and its all in the main book.
lord_blackfang wrote: Is there a particular reason why people are preordering rules sight unseen? I daresay Spartan doesn't exactly have a stellar track record with rules.
Because I have a fleet and have always wanted a ground force to match the fleet. This is the perfect opportunity.
To have real battles over star systems committing naval and ground assets to certain fronts and zones and so on.
The models really look good in my opinion.
Even if the rules suck, version 2.0 when it comes out for it will definitely kick but as their 2.0 versions usually do.
Their other games are pretty enjoyable.
And back to the first point I have a navy, with ground forces and its very possible to have them work together in vast campaigns with my friends.
Actually lots of people who have played Firestorm: Armada from the beginning have completely loved the new rulebook that has recently come out. It improves on the original game in a multitude of ways.
So if they have put that quality into the Planetfall book, it should be pretty good from the start.
lord_blackfang wrote: Is there a particular reason why people are preordering rules sight unseen? I daresay Spartan doesn't exactly have a stellar track record with rules.
Well, this is a long-standing point of contention between the two of us; I never thought Spartan's rules going all the way back to FA 1.0 were all that bad! However, as the others have said I think by any objective standard Spartan has drastically improved their rules quality with FA 2.0 and especially DW 2.0, thanks to a combination of more robust playtesting and (it appears, anyway) bringing in some staff with actual rules/technical writing experience. If you haven't seen the new editions yet, it might be worth a look.
Ha fire storm armada was OK rule wise but the dwars rule book is so badly done it is a choir to read hell cant get a mate to read it because it is that badly done.
If your looking for good rules with scope for growth and difference then look elsewhere but if your looking for beautiful models then this is it they do make a good model a true joy to paint just use some one else's rules for some flavour
Have held hope out for Spartan for a long time and they fail me on game system all the time so buy a rule book first before buying the models as the rules can be so disappointing you just don't bother painting the models or buynthe models and sod the rules
I would have bought the Platinum deal purely for the models I guess, most Spartan stuff is fun to paint, but I would have picked it up in a week or two so too late. I'll probably pass now unless the game gets massively awesome reviews, I've got a ton of DZC and I've gone off Dystopian Wars due to the rule issues so probably a blessing.
If Planetfall is half as good as the latest versions of FSA and DW, it'll be a solid product.
Spartan's first efforts were...off, to put it lightly, but they've learned a lot and the new rules for their two big systems are quite excellent; cleaner, more depth and variety, far better balance, and generally improved gameplay.
I'm excited for PF, but I won't be getting the bundle as I'm not a fan of Aquans or Directorate. I'll buy the rule book, but I'll await the inevitable Sorylian vs Relthoza box.
Yeah, the only real bummer is that I want factions that are not on the initial release. In fact, funny enough they are the exact factions I do not really care for, although Aquans aren't too bad.
I would still play this over Dropship Commander, because I want a 6-10mm game that involves combined unit tactics on the field, whereas nearly every purchase of a unit (or at least half of them) you make for Dropzone basically requires you to also purchase a dropship as well, to bring them into combat.
Swastakowey, What colour scheme are you going for? I have the same idea.
I am a sucker for exclusive miniatures but held off this time on the deals and just pre-ordered a vanila version. The extra bits will come around again soon.
Thats what I did yesterday. The camera doesnt show it off very well but thats my basic ship scheme. I dont know how it will translate for my ground troops though. But from a distance they look pretty nice and more importantly it was really quick to do, with my mediocre skills.
I had visions of doing my Tropical fish tank fish colours in my fleet, but I couldnt quite do it haha. thats what I settled on.
I got the older versions in a trade (Swapped for Dreadball. I got fed up with Restic) and I am thinking a very similar organic feel but I also liked the blues. Seeing yours, I may go with a green base. I am still toying with a yellow base and blue details. Just not sure yet. Edit* Something like these colours?
I have my terran battleship on my table at the moment and that is light grey with Blue and Light silver details. The Solar panels down the side are gold. Going to use some old decals to add some markings. Just one or two small ones to look like designations.
I will try and post pictures tonight when I get out of work.
Awesome, yea I originally wanted a blue organic look too. I tried a freak shot with the green and it looked pretty good.
I simply spray painted it white, washed it camoshade green twice, dry brushed it white, painted the flesh bone white and then washed it with seraphim sepia and did the crystals red and it was done.
I think a similar effect can be achieved with any colour. Blue would probably be pretty easy to do as well. Just do yellow crystals instead of red! Or as you said, yellow base and blue details.
I look forward to some pics though!
How do you like the old models? I personally much prefer the newer ones. Although the old Medusa dreadnought is very impressive.
Just getting into FSA myself and having this right round the corner is causing the hype in my mind to snowball out of control. x_x Must add ground elements for my Terran fleet.. then must make EVERYONE join me in a united space and planet campaign!
Delboy over at Spartan forums has been dropping some additional bits of info about planetfall and it sounds amazing.. even if it is mostly Dindrenzi stuff. Those Drop Pod fetishists have the ability apparently to deploy Low Orbit Field Guns... that can choose their armament WHEN they drop... O_O
i am loving these models more and more every time i see them...
i think it would be really fun to build some little action dioramas with these models...
the simple addition of ruins to the infantry bases is really inspiring me...
I'm digging that card terrain in the picture. I wonder when that city scape is going to be released. I was going to pick up the dzc buildings, but i like these better.
I suspect that the more generic stuff will be sold separately, while the stuff that links more closely with specific races will only be sold with a helix.
Case in point, the bunkers that can be found in the starter are also available separately in the bunker terrain pack (along with a number of other bunkers). Meanwhile, the portals and crashed escape pod are only available with units.
Eumerin wrote: I suspect that the more generic stuff will be sold separately, while the stuff that links more closely with specific races will only be sold with a helix.
Case in point, the bunkers that can be found in the starter are also available separately in the bunker terrain pack (along with a number of other bunkers). Meanwhile, the portals and crashed escape pod are only available with units.
That's just a guess, though.
The portals also have an in-game in-faction effect right? It doesn't make much sense to sell that kind of stuff seperately
Yea the portals are dropped by the ship to deploy the recon infantry. But I think the starter sets will contain generic stuff as well as it being separate.
I think, ill have to check where I read that though.
Swastakowey wrote: Yea the portals are dropped by the ship to deploy the recon infantry. But I think the starter sets will contain generic stuff as well as it being separate.
I think, ill have to check where I read that though.
The terrain from the starter is being offered in a bundle that contains larger buildings and more buildings in general
The portals also have an in-game in-faction effect right? It doesn't make much sense to sell that kind of stuff seperately
For the most part, yes. However, the portals are technology that's been developed from the already existing ancient alien portals on Proteus Prime. So while the portals are tied directly to the Terquai, they can also be used to represent an artifact-strewn battlefield.
Similarly, the escape pod in the Works Raptor box can be treated as generic if the players choose. But stylistically it matches up with the general Works Raptor aesthetic.
In both cases, the terrain in question is specifically tied to the faction that it's bundled with. But there's nothing preventing you from using it in a game that doesn't include those factions.
Swastakowey wrote: Yea the portals are dropped by the ship to deploy the recon infantry. But I think the starter sets will contain generic stuff as well as it being separate.
I think, ill have to check where I read that though.
The terrain from the starter is being offered in a bundle that contains larger buildings and more buildings in general
Yea I know, I got them both haha. But I meant the patrol fleet equivalent for Planetfall might have terrain in each one. But I cant remember where i got that info form.
It's been stated by Spartan Games that every Helix box will include terrain. We don't know the specifics of the bundled terrain (i.e. how much of it will be generic, and how much of it will be specific for the race it's bundled with), but we do know that there will be terrain.
It seems likely that the two player starter includes the terrain that comes with the Aquan and Directorate Core Helixes (Helici?), though this is purely speculation.
They've actually said that EVERY box, period, will come with something that can be considered terrain. In some cases it'll be a thematic item that could be an objective marker as well as possibly having its own rules, whereas Helix boxes likely come with more generic faire.
As they said though, building your collection of terrain as you build your forces was a core idea in their design.
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: They've actually said that EVERY box, period, will come with something that can be considered terrain. In some cases it'll be a thematic item that could be an objective marker as well as possibly having its own rules, whereas Helix boxes likely come with more generic faire.
One quick clarification here to avoid misunderstandings -
*Every* box will be a Helix. Two Core Helix boxes (i.e. what your force is built around) will make a full-strength Core Helix, while each of the other Helix boxes will contain the units needed to make a full strength helix of that type. A single Core Helix box will contain more than the minimum required number of units to form a Core Helix.
As an example (this was just posted on the Spartan Games forum earlier today), an Aquan Core Helix must contain -
1 Heavy Tank
1 Medium Tank Squadron
1 Light Tank Squadron
The Aquan Core Helix box will contain the same Aquan units that are in the 2 Player Starter. Those units are
1 Heavy Tank
3 Medium Tanks (i.e. one squadron)
4 Light Tanks (i.e. one squadron)
5 Infantry Teams
2 Crystal Nodes
1 Medium Designator Tank
So as you can see, the Core Helix box exceeds the minimum requirements for a Core Helix, but you'll need two boxes to run the helix at full strength.
Fair enough... we've had that conversation earlier here, as I recall, so yes... most boxes, barring the Core and they said MAYBE Heavy-Support Helixes will always be One box = On FULL option Helix. :-)
Opeth30 wrote: With every sneak peek I become more and more anxious for the release, but at least the wait is giving me time to paint up my Dindrenzi fleet.
My friend just painted his Dindrenzi this weekend. For a weekends work they look really good.
But we arent sure when they are being released which sucks. Your group have plans for galactic conquest campaigns yet?
Opeth30 wrote: With every sneak peek I become more and more anxious for the release, but at least the wait is giving me time to paint up my Dindrenzi fleet.
My friend just painted his Dindrenzi this weekend. For a weekends work they look really good.
But we arent sure when they are being released which sucks. Your group have plans for galactic conquest campaigns yet?
Sort of. My group for firestorm is currently one other person, a Terran player. We've been playing as if the Dindrenzi have been pushing into Terran space so its about time we had some planetary conquest action. I know of at least 4 other people with small fleets that stopped playing right before 2nd edition. This area is nothing but warmachine and x-wing these days. It's a shame they are going to miss out.
Although, my opponent and I have been toying with the idea of Vanguarding. That might rekindle things.
Anyone know if the limited edition is exclusive to Spartan Games' website? The local retailer has the starter up for pre-order, but it's listing the regular edition.
Aesop the God Awful wrote: Anyone know if the limited edition is exclusive to Spartan Games' website? The local retailer has the starter up for pre-order, but it's listing the regular edition.
Whilst I can't say for certain, retailers did get the limited edition of the Dystopian Legions starter set (with Schneider, and the Dubois Sisters prints) so I'd expect them to get this limited edition too.
Aesop the God Awful wrote: Anyone know if the limited edition is exclusive to Spartan Games' website? The local retailer has the starter up for pre-order, but it's listing the regular edition.
Whilst I can't say for certain, retailers did get the limited edition of the Dystopian Legions starter set (with Schneider, and the Dubois Sisters prints) so I'd expect them to get this limited edition too.
Okay, thanks. Gonna shoot the store an email. I'd much rather order from a Swedish store, given how worthless our currency is right now
Aesop the God Awful wrote: Anyone know if the limited edition is exclusive to Spartan Games' website? The local retailer has the starter up for pre-order, but it's listing the regular edition.
All boxed sets sold within the first month should have the free shuttle wreckage and prints, regardless of where you purchase the box from. This has been confirmed by Spartan Games.
Yeah, I was under that impression. What made me ask was the fact that other retailers have a copy-paste description of the product from the SG website, and the store in question has a different one. They probably just went for the vanilla description so that they don't have to change it later.
I can't confirm personally as I didn't preorder, but it sounds like anything ordered directly from Spartan will be delayed due to overwhelming demand. A gentleman who is part of a local gaming group of mine forwarded the email to us.
It sounds like they will definitely be missing the Oct 22 release date.
EDIT: There also appears to have been an issue with the printer material. Estimated shipping date is the 29th.
Thank you for choosing the pre-order Planetfall launch products with the Spartan Games Online Store. Due to overwhelming demand and an unexpected delay with a printed material, we will not be able to ship these orders from October 22nd as originally intended. We will be working hard to ensure these products are delivered as quickly as possible, and anticipate that mail orders will begin shipping around a week after the aforementioned date.
If you have any questions regarding your order please e-mail dispatch@spartangames.co.uk. We apologise for any inconvenience this delay may cause and thank you for your patience in the meantime. We will keep you updated with further developments.
Eumerin wrote: One item worth noting - the Hawker Allied Aerial Helix claims to only contain three heavy ground attack fliers, but the picture has four.
An update from Spartan Games - the picture for the Hawker Aerial Helix is correct, and the text description is incorrect. The helix contains four heavy ground attack fliers, and not three.
Over on the official forums, one of the posters has apparently already gotten his hands on his copy of the game. No description yet, but he did say he liked what he saw.
It's a long video (27 minutes), but it covers everything that's in the box. There's a lot in there!
Im watching it now, did you get any of the allied helix sets?
I bought both, but they're in the post. I'll eventually unbox the whole of wave 1.
Ok cool. I also got all of wave one but they havent shipped mine or something. So im living my unboxing through your videos... Also I like your other videos. I watched them when I started, particularly the Aquan ones. Keep iy up dude.
I don't know... because well. Uncharted Seas was dropped like a rock. Same with Firestorm v1 for about a year and a half. Probably for the best for Firestorm V1, since that game objectively was sucky and V2 is awesome but that's besides the point...
There's a sort of weird awkwardness about their approach to Dystopian Wars spin-offs. The sea/air game is fine, but they kept releasing all those awkward armored variants which NOBODY played. They're probably pretty dead.
Dystopian Legions is still getting releases, I suppose.
We'll see for this new firestorm ground game.
In the meanwhile, I'm going to continue playing Dystopian Wars and Dropzone Commander though, which satisfies my scifi ground war quite a bit.
Spartan's a small company. I think they might have initially expanded a bit faster than was wise, but I think that's becoming less of an issue for them.
Of their initial three game lines -
Uncharted Seas is arguably unsupported. You can still get all of the stuff for it, but it's been a while since they released anything new for it.
Firestorm Armada had the rules overhauled and rereleased. A new 2 player starter was also released for the game. And Spartan frequently releases new figures.
Dystopian Wars is in the same situation as Firestorm Armada.
Dystopian Legions was released with downloadable rules, and then left alone. But then just last month Spartan Games released a brand new 2 player starter and revised rulebook, new factions with figures, and new downloadable army lists. It's too early to know how much additional support will be provided for the game, but things look promising at the moment.
Firestorm Planetfall had a "beta" release a while back with a limited run of figures for two of the factions. It just had its official release this week with a two player starter, brand new rules, and a couple of supporting units. December will see the release of additional starting forces and support units. And enough photos exist of figures that won't be available even in December to suggest that there's a solid line-up of stuff in the pipeline for next year.
That leaves Armored Clash, which is a game that uses the land and air figures from Dystopian Wars. It's designed for larger-scale battles than are seen in Dystopian Wars, and the rules are available via PDF download. Support for figures will continue as long as Dystopian Wars continues to sell. Despite the fact that Dystopian Wars players focus mostly on the sea and air aspects, Spartan Games continues to fully support the land figures as well. But whether it will eventually get the same level of support that the other game lines have is something that remains to be seen.
Dystopian Legions wasn't just released and then left alone until last month. Spartan spent a good year releasing new units for all four of the release factions. They all have good variety and are great fun with multiple infantry units, veteran infantry units, bike/small vehicle units, APCs, jet pack troops, and big tanks.
They really just haven't released anything much new except for a squad of mercenaries for about one year.
The main thing was that Spartan was regularly saying the game would get a full physical rulebook regularly since release the promised date just kept getting passed and then a new one would be set. They also said the remaining three main factions would be coming out in 2013 and even though they have been "released" last month I don't really consider having two infantry units a release so I don't feel the French will actually be very playable until next year.
roadkizzle wrote: I don't really consider having two infantry units a release so I don't feel the French will actually be very playable until next year.
Probably not, although from what I've heard the game has a pretty low model count.
But Spartan's got two simultaneous releases going on right now - DL and Planetfall - and Planetfall's ending the year in a somewhat similar situation to the DL French. I expect we'll see a lot released in the first half of next year.
My copy of Planetfall arrived on Friday, and I've been looking through it. The rules look good, though I won't get a decent read on how fragile they are until the people at my FLGS have had a chance to go through and look for breakable bits and loopholes (and they tend to be good at that...). The figures look very nice, as is expected from Spartan Games. I've got the Aquans primed, and I think I've finished up priming the Directorate.
Some thoughts -
You're probably not going to want to assemble the Aquan skimmers until you've painted them. There's nothing forcing you to do this, of course, but the light skimmers have some pretty tight spaces that will be hard to get paint into after assembly. The undersides of the medium skimmers are cramped, though still workable. The heavy skimmer comes with a clear plastic peg, and painting after assembling risks getting paint on it.
The included buildings are clear plastic frames with cardstock roofs and walls. I primed the plastic, built the frames, and then added the cardstock pieces. No glue was required, and they seem to be holding up well for now. Unfortunately, directions aren't included. But it's not hard to puzzle out. I'd start with one of the small buildings first, as there are fewer parts to figure out. And once you've figured out the small buildings, the two medium-sized ones are easy to put together. Overall, the buildings are a very nice touch, particularly since most players probably don't have any 10mm sci-fi terrain (unless they've been playing DZC).
There was a small resin piece bundled in the same bag as the crystals and a few other items. It took me a while to realize what it was - it's where the peg inserts into the Sirsir Support Skimmer. You need to glue it the piece into the underside of the support skimmer, and there's a small hole for it. I'm not sure why Spartan went this route, particularly since the Sirsir seems to be about 80% in common with the Aquan medium skimmer, and the medium skimmers are one piece.
The two small metal missile launchers belong to the Directorate APC. Due to the way that they sit, painting their underside is likely to be difficult if you do it after assembly. So I plan on painting everything first, and attaching them afterwards.
Looking really good. If it gets picked up locally I'll be all over it. Really like most of the models. Looking forward to the full initial factions being out.
Wish they'd bundled the Mark II turret with the Directorate Heavy Crawler in the starter. The one that comes in the starter is the same turret used by the Medium Crawler, and it looks less imposing than the turret on a heavy tank ought to look, imo.
I suggest, if you are starting, get a patrol box the frigate box and the destroyer or carrier box plus a core helix and an allied helix.
That will set you up for plenty of games and still give you heaps of room to expand.
Unfortunately my box has not shipped yet, Which sucks as I got the Platinum box and the extra terrain set and was really looking forward to showing them off and getting others interested by now. Apparently they will be shipped before the end of this week.
I've knocked up a quick models by model explanation for the Awuans in the same way as I did for the Directorate and Works Raptor.
Feel free ot ask questions and comment!
Why Play Aquans?
Well..... They represent the best guerrilla force in the game using three dimensional thinking to engage their enemies on a two dimensional plane.
They can hit and run on some of the fastest vehicles in the game, bend lasers round corners using crystal technology, drop in punishing emplacements to strie the enemy from the Flank or Rear and sport some of the most motivated/elite forces in the galaxy.
....it also helps their vehicles look amazing!
AQUAN PRIME CORE HELIX
As I did previously with the Directorate write up, I'll start with the Heavy Tank and work my way down.
Heavy Tank
The Sedna is a beast. Blessed with a single fore firing Laser that punishes squadrons from range, the Heavy can be taken in 1s or 2s and gives up 4 or 9TV respectively.
The Dual Heavy Corona Laser gives a great firebase for Aquan Commanders with the laser suffering little drop off in effectiveness over the ranges. It also has Poinpoint 2 - meaning that should Damage be caused by the Tank (which is likely) and a target suffers damage, but isn't destroyed..... the Aquan player may roll 2D6...if any of these die come up a 6, the damaged target suffers an additional point of damage...... ouch!
In keeping with the Aquans in general, the Sedna doesn't have great armour (it IS a guerrilla fighter and so needs speed and manoeuvrability instead!).....but it does have 4 Shield Dice to save against incoming attacks! Which is pretty awesome when you're fighting at range.....but NOT good when engaged in CQB (where shields have no effect).....stay away from infantry with these guys.
The Sedna (and indeed all the Aquan vehicles baring Emplacements) have the Hit and Run MAR....a truly evil gameplay mechanic that allows the commander to Move and Shoot (like normal) OR Shoot then Move......which can bring howls of frustration from slow moving enemies who lose their firing LOS due to Aquan shenanigans. In addition you get the Hover Vehicle MAR that improves the survivability of the tank at long range AND allows the tank to move over terrain that might be impassable to other vehicles!
Oh, and before I forget, as if all that weren't enough, the Sedna can also transport up to 8 Infantry bases (or specially adapted infantry squads that will be explained later)...... this helps to reduce the damaging effect of their poor CQB stats....by having an Infantry cadre on-board ready to jump out and splat something that looks like it might threaten their majestic Heavy Tank!
Medium Tank
The Medium Lamana Tank is a simple engagement tool, capable of mixing it at short and long range effectively. Taken in 2s or 3s for 4 or 7TV respectively, they form the backbone of the Aquan Core Helix (especially when the Sirsir is attached.....see later)
Armed with a Sunburst laser with Pinpoint 1, the squadron can do damage and even has a slight chance of accelerating that damage if it rolls well. Its CQB is painfully low however, so don't get locked in any CQB engagements with high CQB enemies - especially Infantry!
Of course, as an Aquan staple, the tank also has Hit and Run, Hover Vehicle and is Elite, in keeping with the theme and engagement methodology of the force as a whole.
Medium Support Tank
The Sirsir is an odd vehicle at first glance..... no visible weapons and quite expensive in terms of points. It MUST attach to either the Heavy or Medium Tanks and adds +2TV to the parent squadron.
The Sirsir DOES have a piece of technology that is absolutely vital for Aquan success however - The Nexus Designator (ND).
NDs are used in a number of ways in Planetfall - As a means to deploy artillery, designate Drop Sites and Target Lock enemy squadrons. The Aquans use theirs to designate Drop Sites for the most part (certainly when looking at the Sirsir - who doesn't have Artillery Support in its MARs).
The Sirsir has access to 2 Sky Drop Markers (SDM) which it can place on the battlefield at the start of the game.
A Note on Good SDM Placement - Initially most players make the mistake of placing these markers exclusively in their opponents side of the board, This is generally a bad idea as it becomes easy for the enemy to foul you LoS to these markers, making the drop site very difficult to designate. Better to split your SDM, half on your side (for reserve support reasons) and half on your opponent's side (for reasons of threat.).
One of the unusual things about the Sirsir is its high CQB!....a rarity in Aquan terms!......once you have dropped/designated your sites don't be afraid to put this guy into the CQB mix if you are engaging later in the game....those +5AD will come in handy!
Light Tank
This little cutesy of a Tank is perfect for early battle pressure and late battle objective grabbing! Taken in 3s or 4s for 3 or 4TV respectively, the Imzani often provides the killing blow to enemy squadrons reeling under the laser barrages of their larger cousins.
Armed with a Maelstrom Pulse Cannon, the recon Tank is very good at hurting enemy infantry, especially those out in the open! Toting 16AD at short range, an undamaged squadron can threaten much larger prey too.....especially later, when they might be suffering damage,
Make no mistake these guys get clobbered easily....but then they are only light recon tanks..... :rolleyes: ...... its in their job description....!
But if you can keep them alive, they will win through against larger squadrons descending upon them like piranhas!
Stingray Weapon Emplacements
These provide a ready reserves to the Aquan forces and are especially good at Flanking or Rear attacks where their weapons (primarily used to engage Flyers) can give many surface squadrons a real shock. Taken in pairs for just 2TV they are well worth it IMO.
Armed with Stingray Missiles (a weapon with Corrosive and Interceptor MARs) they can hurt enemy flyers with ease and bring their survivability down further through the placement of Debilitating Effect Markers. As you might expect once deployed, they cant move, so its important to get them in the right place at the right time.....!
Votari Crystals
These esoteric elements are designed to further enhance the play style of the Aquans, giving them a feeling of 360-degree engagement. They are cheap and cheerful giving up only 1TV each and MUST be dropped in using Sky Drop.
What do they do??..... Using the Aquan preference for laser tech, the Votari allows an attack made by Laser weapons to extend their range and even shoot round corners!!!..... The Aquans shoot the crystal..... then the crystal 'shoots the target' bouncing the attack off itself towards the enemy. Doing this loses the Pinpoint MAR however...... but tactically it is often well worth the trade off! Combined with the Aquan vehicles ability ot hit and run, a well used Votari crystal can allow the Aquans to 'shoot and scoot' better that anything else in the game!
Take at least 2 of these in every single Aquan Core Helix......at least 2!
Light Infantry
The Aquans don't have access to Heavy Infantry, preferring instead to use a sub-species to form their battlefield cadres - The Khitari. These elite soldiers are fielded in 3s or 5s for 3 or 4TV respectively.
They are fast......real fast. This is invaluable as it reduces the likelihood that their squishiy-selves will be caught out in the open......
In the soon to be released full ORBAT, these flexible troopers can also upgrade to have Field Guns, Officers and other cool enhancements...... watch out for these!
They can also be transported on the Sedna Heavy Tanks......which is often a good idea as the hardened shell provides a great staging point to assault an objective.
Conclusion
Not a point and clock force by any means, the Aquans need careful thought to engage properly. Using layered tactics from Emplacements/Crystals/Hit and Run etc the enemy needs to be weakened at range before committing forces to take and hold the objectives.
A thinkers-force..... but a rewarding one I think.
Cheers
d
Also for the lesser faction
Why play the Directorate?
Simple....they are the baddies.
And they have some of the coolest looking models out there.
And you get to use lots of Legal/Business jargon when you blow things up.
....and when it comes to ruining the opponent's fun, the Directorate simply cant be beat!
I'm sure folks will have their own takes on the models discussed here and they should feel free to pitch in, but here are my thoughts on the Core Helix.
Heavy Tank
These can be taken in squadrons of 1 or 2. If I'm only running one Core Helix I ALWAYS take 2 of these guys - as much to secure my Core Helix from Disorder as anything! Taken as 1s they give up 4TV, but taken as 2s they give up 9TV (the increase in TV represents their increased strategic role)
They have relatively high armour for a Heavy Tank and a small shield save too. Armed with Plasma Weapons (including the Terrifying Plasma Surge) they are best used AFTER another element has put a Debilitating effect marker on a target (this means the target has -1DR and so is easier to damage).
The Heavy Tank is pretty slow, but should never be afraid to halt if it plans to go on a Specialist Fire Order (Focused Fire normally being the best).....this is possible because one of their weapons has the ability to fire All Round......a very useful ability once a tank has reached a suitable fire point on the battlefield.....as it simply remains stationary and turns the turret to face any threats.
Medium Tank
The Medium Tank is a solid element of the Core Helix. It can be taken in 2s or 3s costing 4 or 7TV respectively.
They have good armour and a small shielding save. Armed with even more turreted Plasma Weapons, this tank is flexible and a very good finisher of elements that have suffered damage (and likely have Debilitating Effect Markers on them).
Another big thing in the favour of the Medium Tank is its CQB capability...soon when the full ORBATS come out Directorate players will be able to luxuriate in their Shrapnel Storm Special Rule - a faction-wide Terror Weapon CQB rule..... meaning these tanks can really double down on the enemy with a mix of terrifying CQB and brutal 21AD Plasma-death.....
Light Tank
OK, so its more like a Light Buggy ..... It can be taken in 3s or 5s for 3 or 5TV respectively.
Its fast and equipped with Closure Flamethrowers - a weapon with Anti-Personnel and Terror Weapon MARs (a very potent combo when targeting Infantry....and flexible enough to hurt other prey as well)
The Flamers aren't very long range, but marshalled together can provide a powerful tipping point in certain engagements. Add this to the (Terrifying CQB) and you have a potent little threat on the battlefield.
AND it can make a recon move at the start of the game and can even hold objectives too!
Medium APC
A very useful vehicle - Taken in squadrons of 1 these are pretty cheap giving up only 2TV.
They are armed with a solid Interceptor weapon and a good CQB score......and most importantly can bring BOTH Heavy and Light Infantry into the fight (many other APCs are build with troop types in mind).
I find these tanks get overlooked by enemies when there are lots of other targets to fire at.....and this suits me just fine...... they don't have the firepower to knock out a Heavy Gunship....but they can weaken Interceptor units with ease...allowing you to use your own flyers more aggressively.
Probably one of my favourite support models.
Cyberwarfare Tanks
The ace in the hole vehicle for the Directorate in the Core Helix. These are the vehicles that SHOULD FIRE FIRST EVERY TURN when able! Coming in Squadrons of 2 and giving up only 4TV they are simply amazing if they get their effects off!
"
Oh Cyberwarfare....how do I love thee?
Let me count the ways,
0101101102100110101
"
:huh: ....no wait!....ERROR>>>> ERROR>>>>
Why is Cyberwarfare so cool?.....well assuming you can roll over 2 on a D6 (gr1mdan.....) you have lots of handy effects you can dump on the enemy, irrespective of their defences (Shields, Cloaking, Hard Target, etc). You can stop them using Specialist Fire Orders, give them Debilitating Effect Markers, Disorder Markers, and.....wait for it...... Activation Markers!
Ever wished..... "Gee, wouldn't it be cool if that Dindrenzi Hyperion Leviathan didn't get to blast my underpants clean off this turn?"
Roll a six and your will be done!
They even have a reasonable CQB score....which will be terrifying in the upcoming ORBATS...... a winner I reckon.
Patriot Infantry
Tough, Capable and (very likely) Heavily Drugged, the Patriot Light Infantry are a staple for players looking to flexibility and aggressive action. They are fielded in 3s or 5s giving up 3 or 4TV respectively. I take as many as I can...always.
They don't have any Upgrades in the basic Core Helix, but soon players will be able to throw in Officers, Breacher Teams (Infantry with really high DR) and even Peacemaker Missile Field Guns (a MUST if you are likely to face lots of flyers) from the Recon Helix set that is coming!
The infantry in Planetfall are probably one of the most flexible parts of force creation to my mind. I can build a Cadre to be an Objective Holder (using a basic un-upgraded choice), an Objective Taker (using Breacher and Officer upgrades) or even a Hunter Force (using the Missile Field Guns) that can be used in reserve to eliminate heavy aerial resistance...or any other resistance that needs squashing. :rolleyes:
Conclusion
All in all I reckon the Directorate Core Helix is one of the most interesting to play with long-term. It has a good mix of Assault and Esoteric/Support elements...... and can often fly on the seat of its pants at times......definitely not for the faint hearted.
But well executed, they use synergy with their disparate elements to bring the enemy to their knees and keep them there.
Swastakowey wrote: I suggest, if you are starting, get a patrol box the frigate box and the destroyer or carrier box plus a core helix and an allied helix.
That will set you up for plenty of games and still give you heaps of room to expand.
Unfortunately my box has not shipped yet, Which sucks as I got the Platinum box and the extra terrain set and was really looking forward to showing them off and getting others interested by now. Apparently they will be shipped before the end of this week.
All in all really cool stuff though.
I'll wait until a bundle is put together by Spartan or an online store, or a sale. I'm not too interested in starting, waiting to see how the cost of the box sets and the size of the game progresses.
Swastakowey wrote: I suggest, if you are starting, get a patrol box the frigate box and the destroyer or carrier box plus a core helix and an allied helix.
That will set you up for plenty of games and still give you heaps of room to expand.
Unfortunately my box has not shipped yet, Which sucks as I got the Platinum box and the extra terrain set and was really looking forward to showing them off and getting others interested by now. Apparently they will be shipped before the end of this week.
All in all really cool stuff though.
I'll wait until a bundle is put together by Spartan or an online store, or a sale. I'm not too interested in starting, waiting to see how the cost of the box sets and the size of the game progresses.
Fair enough. Its a lot of fun though (firestorm that is) so your missing out!
So I hadn't been paying any attention to this game, and walked into the local game store today and they had the Firestorm Planetfall starter box by the window.
A few hours later, here I am sitting at home, and my question is: How do you put these cardboard and plastic buildings together?
solkan wrote: So I hadn't been paying any attention to this game, and walked into the local game store today and they had the Firestorm Planetfall starter box by the window.
A few hours later, here I am sitting at home, and my question is: How do you put these cardboard and plastic buildings together?
Im on my phone so its hard to get a link up. However there is a thread in the planetfall forum on spartans site that answers your question.
1.) Remove the clear plastic pieces from the frames. Keep the frames for now, as the identification numbers on the frames correspond to the identification numbers on the building cardstock, and you can easily figure out which piece came from which frame.
2.) Prime and otherwise paint the plastic pieces as you wish. I just gave mine a generic coat of grey primer.
3.) Take the four plastic pieces used for one of the smaller buildings . Take one of the larger pieces, and hook in the two smaller plastic pieces. You should be able to figure out how to do this just by looking at the pieces. Then attach the other large piece to the other side of the two smaller pieces. This is your basic building framework, and the two smaller pieces are the base of the building. The other two pieces are walls.
4.) *CAREFULLY* remove the cardstock pieces for one of the small buildings. Note that the exterior *will* tear if you're not careful, giving you a piece that's the correct shape, but missing part of the coloration.
5.) You should have two identical cardstock pieces with short tabs on each side, and no holes. These can be slid into the very narrow slits on the plastic wall pieces. Do so.
6.) Place the roof piece on top of the structure. It's the cardstock piece that is unique. Note that it won't stay in place yet.
7.) Take the last two cardstock pieces. They should have large slots on the bottom, and a tab with a hole on the top. The slots on the bottom are for the plastic base pieces. The hole on the top is for the tabs on the cardstock roof piece. Attach each of the cardstock pieces so that the holes are in the right spots.
You should now have one of the small buildings finished. Note that no glue was required, though it might become necessary later on due to wear and tear. And once you've built one of the small buildings, it should be a simple matter to figure out how to build the two medium buildings. Just make sure that you're using the right pieces (which is why you held onto the plastic frames). Also note that the cardstock sheets for the two medium buildings include extra items that can be used either as decoration, or as bridges between buildings.
8. Photocopy punched out cardstock frames to produce blank building patterns, and go to town because now you've got simple, sturdy buildings that stay in place on the table that can be easily redecorated.
8. Photocopy punched out cardstock frames to produce blank building patterns, and go to town because now you've got simple, sturdy buildings that stay in place on the table that can be easily redecorated.
No, that won't work. You *must* have the plastic frames. You *cannot* build these buildings with just the cardstock pieces. The plastic pieces aren't just internal support. They're also visible from the outside, which is why I included Step 2.
8. Photocopy punched out cardstock frames to produce blank building patterns, and go to town because now you've got simple, sturdy buildings that stay in place on the table that can be easily redecorated.
No, that won't work. You *must* have the plastic frames. You *cannot* build these buildings with just the cardstock pieces. The plastic pieces aren't just internal support. They're also visible from the outside, which is why I included Step 2.
I gave the wrong impression.
What I meant was "Decide one day that you're tired of the green camo pattern, to take the plastic frames and add in your own custom card stock pieces."
After putting together one or two of them, I think they look just fine with the plastic left clear. I think it's worth taking a colored marker to the cardstock to reduce the visible white edging, but I think you lose a lot of flexibility if you paint and/or glue the things together.
But I'm really kicking myself for not noticing this a few months ago, and missing out on the research facility.
In the back of the Planetfall rule book, there is a single page advertisement on "Firestorm: System Wars", a system for linking Firestorm Armada games with Planetfall games. It's advertised as being available for free download from the Spartan Games website, which will happen soon-ish I guess.
Anyway, there is a single picture of a planet surrounded by Terran and Dindrenzi ship models. I've not seen these Dindrenzi ship models before (maybe others have) and the caption associated with the picture calls them Dindrenzi invasion ships...whether that is an official ship title or just a description of their function (or both) i'm not sure.
Both the ships look cool. Assuming no losses (as in the picture it seems they have taken damage) it looks like a Squadron of 2 (Light?) Cruiser-sized ships and a squadron of 4 Frigate-sized ships. Unmistakably Dindrenzi in design, but certainly also different to what is available at this time.
Yay free campaign rules soon.
The research station looks very cool. Heaps of people were bummed when it was released without warning for a limited time and missed out.
