Products available from Spartan Games at http://www.spartangames.co.uk/

Here are all the Halo: Ground Command Pics. There are a lot, be warned!


Preamble:
Did someone say Halo? Well, strictly speaking no, no one did. Actually, even generally speaking they did not. I'm sitting - alone, in my office and not speaking. BUT, I did think the word Halo like someone had said it, so I should probably rephrase that start part, which I will below. UNLESS you actually did say Halo, you know, right before you entered this thread; in which case I just blew your damn mind.

Alright, so remember, you didn't read that above part or this part explaining, we're just two newcomers to this thread looking to find out some goss from Spartan Games, got it? Cool, cool.

Did someone internally think the word Halo, but not literally speaking say the word???

Option A - You did: Well then, you've certainly come to the right place!
Option B - You didn't: I don’t really know what to say. You come into a Halo thread, and are not hyped for Halo? It's in the description man, did you misclick? Either way, your lack of enthusiasm is both noted and unappreciated. We don't need that kinda negativity here. I suggest you watch this and come back when you're ready. You don't need to rush this, I'm here for you, we can get through this together.



Okay, now with that out of the way I want to again apologise for my absence this last little bit, I have had real world things that needed attention, but I am back in all my majestic (Or should I say Crimson, geddit? Spartan Ops? Still no?) glory.

This post has a lot of fantastic stuff from Spartan Games to juggle. It has to both welcome new people and update veterans, with so much content, control + c the following phrase:
HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART
then use that phrase to control + f and skip through the glossary sections. I'm really sorry for the formatting of all this, it's a tough thing giving this a nice layout when I'm pretty useless at formatting at the best of times, but I promise I'm doing my best!

- Intro
- Glossary <--- you are here
- Halo: Ground Command - What is it?
- Halo: Ground Command - coming/recent releases
- Halo: Ground Command - what do we know about the rules
- Halo: Ground Command - older but still perdy pics of figures from Salute

- Halo: Fleet Battles - What is it?
- Halo: Fleet Battles - coming/recent releases



Welcome Spartans (and curses to any Covenant listening in on this comms channel), Halo Fleet Battles is out! I've read the rules, played the game and am happy to answer any questions/put up any photos that may be had, due to work circumstances, I had to go to rural Australia for a bit, so apologise for the lack of updates. The models are crisp, the rules tight. I am truly excited by this game - which in turn, only makes me more excited for the soon to be released Halo Ground Command (GC).

Halo: Ground Command - What is it?
HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART
Halo: Ground Command is a 1:100 miniature game (that's 15mm for people like me who use the metric system- compared to 40K's 28mm, for reference) that focuses on getting the fast paced, high action environment of the legendary FPS onto the tabletop. People purchasing Fleet Battles have voiced concern over having to buy 'groups' of models, instead of individual figures (such as the Massives like the Punic and CAS), however, Spartan Derek has confirmed that models such as the Scorpion tank will be coming in stand alone boxes, so you can highly individualise your forces.

What forces can we expect to see? Well at this point we have a great deal of info indicating that the Flood and Forerunners will be making eventual appearances, however, there is nothing overtly saying they're coming anytime in the next 6 months - they're more of a down the line deal. As for the Covenant and UNSC, we really are being spoilt rotten: Phantoms, Pelicans, SCARABS, Marines, ODSTs, every type of Spartan, Warthogs, Grizzlies, Scorpions, Wraiths, Ghosts, Banshees, Falcons, Hornets, Marines, Grunts, ODSTs, Jackals, Elites, Brutes, ODSTs (I'm a little excited for the ODSTs, you might be able to tell), Halo Wars Units specialist units, EVERYTHING is coming. #thehypeisreal

I will expand this section a little more soon, I have a lot to get updated!

Box art revealed, along with the rulebook (big thanks to Tallgiraffe):







Halo: Ground Command - coming releases
HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART
Yes, that's right, the fast pace 1/100 scale Halo miniature game is shipping July 27th, that's only a few short sleeps away folks! Not only is the base set up for grabs, but also scale models of the Pelican and Phantom; let's have a look at those bad boys.







Yes you PeliCAN:



DUN DUN DUNNN DUNN DUNNN (for those of you that don't know DUNNNN Music, that was an excerpt of the Phantom of the Opera):


Magical.

What about the actual boxed contents I hear me pretending to be you ask?
I'm glad you asked, here are some pretty, pretty pictures and a description from Spartan Games


• Full colour Halo: Ground Command Rulebook
• Statistics Sheets (detailing UNSC and Covenant forces)
• 20 x Custom Halo Dice, 6 x Halo Order Dice and 4 x Normal D6
• 40 x Game Tokens (Damage, Activation and Cooldown)
• Shadow Templates - UNSC Pelican 
and Covenant Phantom Dropships
• Quick Reference Sheet
• 2 x Commander Cards
• Halo Scenery - Bunkers and Scatter Terrain
• UNSC 1,250 Point Battle Group
• Covenant 1,250 Point Battle Group

And here's an in depth breakdown of the forces

UNSC Battle Group



Covenant Battle Group



Random pics


Halo: Ground Command - what do we know about the rules (coming soon)
HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART


Halo: Ground Command - older but still perdy pics of figures from Salute

HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART
Some older pics, updated with some light hearted thoughts


TLR - Halo: Ground Combat rocks






Halo: Fleet Battles - What is it?

HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART
Halo: Fleet Battles (FB) is a 1 : 20, 000 scale miniature game set in your favourite scifi universe. Models and rules are made by Spartan Games in both plastic and resin (to clarify, I'm now talking exclusively about the models here - not the rules. Be a little weird if they were made out of either of those materials) depending on whether the ship falls under the core or specialist category.

This is just my perception, but I believe that the game offers a great deal of tactical flexibility. In it, the various bases (which are called elements) are made up of select types of ships that can group together, or stand alone. Sometimes that will mean all frigates/corvettes, other times that might mean frigate escorts for huge warships and battlecruisers; some elements may be a solo ship with no others on it, other ships may take up multiple elements! Individually, these elements are powerful, but when formed up into battle groups they become really mean. Battle groups are functional units of elements(which must maintain a coherency of 6 inches to remain a whole battle group), and are both pre-specified before games and alterable during combat. Being in a battle group enhances the fighting ability of units, but at certain minor trade-offs that are far exceeded by the advantages. After casualties, battle groups start to lose efficacy, and as such there are orders issued by the fleet commander that allow 2 dwindling battle groups to form up into a stronger one.


Units are activated turn by turn, and the rules seem to capture a great deal. In particular, I am impressed with the terminology, which is all quite accurate, and adds a sense of immersion. Instead of shooting at the enemy, you make firing solutions that target elements of opponents battle groups (sounds cool, not so?). Loving the damage mechanics, anyway, if you have any questions ask away!



This is an elaborate overview of the rules as a preamble to the following video, where there is a game



This is the game that was spoken about in the previous video





Halo: Fleet Battles - coming/recent releases (coming this weekend)

HURRY_UP_AND_GET_TO_THE_GOOD_PART

Ooooh yes! The reveal can't come soon enough. 28mm Halo minis would bankrupt me! 28mm Halo minis in hard plastic (which I believe the ships are, so these might be) would get me happily seeing what kind of trade-in value I can get on my soul!


In a perfect world, we get the fleet game, a 28mm skirmish and a 15mm Mass Battle, and I win the lottery so I can afford all 3!

This IP is enough to make drop 30k and WM/H, if the rules are good and the minis are HIPS.

I'd be more excited if it wasn't Spartan Games. They make nice models, some of them are even great models, but their rules-writing is terrible and I predict the second edition of rules within a year of the first print.

I was burned so badly on Dystopian Wars that even though I want to like it, I'll be waiting a good long time before giving this a shot.

I'm a bit concerned about the multiple scale issues,

I've yet to come across a game that started intending to support gaming in multiple scales actually manage to carry it through in the long term

either the system does not handle them all well, or they run out of steam trying to release the same minis in multiple scales and all but one are fairly swiftly dropped,

but no doubt we'll hear more of their plans at salute

I imagine it'll be like their Firestorm games - fleet at one scale, 10mm mass combat then a 10 model a side spec-ops game.

Paradigm wrote:Ooooh yes! The reveal can't come soon enough. 28mm Halo minis would bankrupt me! 28mm Halo minis in hard plastic (which I believe the ships are, so these might be) would get me happily seeing what kind of trade-in value I can get on my soul!


In a perfect world, we get the fleet game, a 28mm skirmish and a 15mm Mass Battle, and I win the lottery so I can afford all 3!

I'm pretty much accepting I'll be living off unflavoured noodles when this comes out. It's actually why I put a bit of a stall on my Halo IG, I was worried I'd spend ages making pretty cool models, only to have these come out the next month and trump all of mine into an oblivion of obscurity. I have, however, decided I don't care and that worst case I end up with a unique looking force. I'm going to go for broke on this one! Really want to see it succeed!

primalexile wrote:This IP is enough to make drop 30k and WM/H, if the rules are good and the minis are HIPS.

I really hope they nail the miniatures primarily, if the rules are bad I'll proxy, if the minis are bad I'll cry. That being sad, I do very much hope the rules are good as well, of course.

sourclams wrote:I'd be more excited if it wasn't Spartan Games. They make nice models, some of them are even great models, but their rules-writing is terrible and I predict the second edition of rules within a year of the first print.

I was burned so badly on Dystopian Wars that even though I want to like it, I'll be waiting a good long time before giving this a shot.

Well that is just disheartening. I'm going to really hope that because this is such a big IP, Microsoft will maybe keep an eye on this and watch over their miniature baby. Then again, I have seen how Microsoft treats some of their babies...

OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:I'm a bit concerned about the multiple scale issues,

I've yet to come across a game that started intending to support gaming in multiple scales actually manage to carry it through in the long term

either the system does not handle them all well, or they run out of steam trying to release the same minis in multiple scales and all but one are fairly swiftly dropped,

but no doubt we'll hear more of their plans at salute

It does seem odd, my guess is, as Caylentor suggest, that the scales will be for similarly themed but distinctly different games. I'm hoping for a Halo Wars style one and a Halo 28mm skirmish. Then, of course, my hope is to gather enough skirmish models to the point where I can use them to play a scaled up 15mm game. A bloke can dream, right?

caylentor wrote:I imagine it'll be like their Firestorm games - fleet at one scale, 10mm mass combat then a 10 model a side spec-ops game.

I'm excited by this prospect but really nervous that a 10 model per side game will lead to massively inflated costs for the 28mm models. Ideally, I would like them priced competitively so that I can splurge and procure a huge army of them. If the rules aren't that great, I'd happily consider using them as Epirians in Dakka's MEdge (which, if you haven't checked out yet, I thoroughly recommend!)

They don't have a teabagging mini I will be disappointed.

I truly want to convert up a model of a Spartan sitting at a table that has been erected above a fallen Elite, steeping his tea in a teacup.

You can tell I'm going places in life.

I'm cautiously optimistic about this, but I want to see the sculpts and the material.

Added some pictures of the Halo Fleets models to first post. As you can see, they are in Hard Plastic, I feel confident in saying that this means it is highly, highly, highly likely that HGC will be in Hard Plastic as well.

Plastic Halo minis? You have my attention.

Appreciate the shout

Multiple scales seem interesting, It was kind of a given when you take into account Spartan's history of spanning multiple scales with their other games, it'll be interesting to see what scale they're demoing at Salute

 Piston Honda wrote:
They don't have a teabagging mini I will be disappointed.

I doubt that they will.. but it's the easiest conversion ever if they have a squatting model and a separate casualty one.

Interested in this for the models, less so the ruleset.

Brother SRM wrote:Plastic Halo minis? You have my attention.

Kinda how I felt, so excited about Salute

Charax wrote:Appreciate the shout

Multiple scales seem interesting, It was kind of a given when you take into account Spartan's history of spanning multiple scales with their other games, it'll be interesting to see what scale they're demoing at Salute

From what I can gather, it might well be both on display! If not, I hope it's the 28mm version. As for the shout out, no problemo, it was your discovery after all!

warboss wrote:

 Piston Honda wrote:
They don't have a teabagging mini I will be disappointed.

I doubt that they will.. but it's the easiest conversion ever if they have a squatting model and a separate casualty one.

Maybe they'll even suggestively place them next to one another on a sprue

willb2064 wrote:Interested in this for the models, less so the ruleset.

I've not really got any experience with Spartan Games, but I hear good things about Firestorm Armada. This makes me reasonably confident in their Fleet game, but does not really push me either way for their ground game. I think with solid mini's the rest will hopefully fall into place. For me at least, having a good game is a boon, but not a necessity. I've got Deadzone, Infinity, 40k and soon MEdge if I need to.




On a separate note, the Office of Naval Intelligence wants this event highly covered by surveillance teams. Are there any UNSC resources that are going to be at Salute that can undertake reconnaissance and report back here for a formal debrief?

Updated with potential (but far from certain) possibility of a Halo bust. Perhaps a Commander Keyes or a Cole bust? I'm genuinely hoping that this isn't another random Spartan bust and is Halo related!

Maybe a Cortana. I wouldn't mind.

Excited for this

Cortana, eh? I think I'd rather an Admiral of sorts!


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Updated with Halo Fleets info pending mod decision about whether or not to combine the threads for Halo: Fleet Battles and Halo: Ground Combat Game

I can also confirm that Microsoft has been working incredibly closely with Spartan Games. Again, the big reveal is going to be at Salute within the next week. Apparently, not only are Microsoft and Spartan Games working together, they're working together cooperatively!

I like Spartan Games and love some of their game systems.
I loved Dystopian Wars from day 1 and the fact that they streamlined the rules was a good thing, not a bad thing (unless you liked using the broken units).
On the level of DW, FA and US their type of ruleset works. It's different from what we see in for instance Epic or BFG, but it works.

But i am a bit worried in regard to a skirmish game system too. Dystopian Legions, their first skirmish game ruleset, is also based on many of the same principles of the other games and it is based on units, not models and that is different, it does kind of work but to me it does not feel right.

In a skirmish game i want the individual model to matter.
At least as in 40k, preferably as in Inquisitor or Infinity.

But all that aside: i will buy anything that is a HALO miniature! :-)

49 hard plastic ships in the box? That's a pretty impressive count. Obviously it all depends on pricing, but if this is well priced and has enough to play just in the box, then it might just jump any kind of queue I have!

Of course, if they reveal either of the other systems at Salute, there may be some tough choices ahead... 28mm is the one I want most, but I currently don't have a fleet game or a small scale Mass Battle, so if the value is there I could easily go for those.


@ORicK: to be honest, both Infinity and Deadzone would be pretty easy to mod for Halo if the Spartan rules aren't up to scratch. If they can make the minis, there are plenty of appropriate rulesets out there.


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Wayland Games pre-order is go!
http://www.waylandgames.co.uk/halo-fleet-battles/23406-halo-fleet-battles-the-fall-of-reach?utm_source=Wayland+Games+Ltd+List&utm_campaign=f294141266-21_04_15_Salute_Halo&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_78b62ac9ee-f294141266-312762133

RRP: £80
Wayland price: £64

Not bad at all. Now we just need pictures of all these spaceships to drool over!

If you want some more decent pics of the plastic ships you can find some here on Meeples and Miniature's site from their visit to Spartan Games
https://meeples.wordpress.com/2015/03/15/visiting-spartan-games/

They look gorgeous to be honest, I was really surprised with the tiny subtle detail they manage to get out of those UNSC ships for their size.

I am really really tempted to grab this, 49 ships was a lot more than I was expecting to see and the UNSC aesthetic is to die for. Also the rules, I get some people seem to hate on Spartan Game rules but I don't get it. I absolutely love FSA and PF, if you hate the exploding dice mechanic that is fine, personal taste but the rules are solid even with that.

Yes you can get potentially crazy lucky and roll streaks of 6s, but honestly if you're going to base your opinion on the ruleset simply because there is a potentially, massively unlikely statistical situation that rolling 3 dice could lead to you getting the 21 hits you needed to kill target X off, then perhaps dice game overall aren't for you..?

Also lots of people tend to say "I didn't like their rules for DW/FSA V1 when it came out" as their arguement for bad rules. You do realise been some time since that now right..? And from what I gather of DWs (don't play it, can't speak for it) they improved massively on it, and FSA is certainly a great game, as is Planetfall now that only came out last year in October.

If you want to have a look at some Spartan Game rules and go ahead and download them for FREE from their website and give it a try. I enjoy FSA and PF a lot more than I ever enjoyed 40k and Fantasy and the rules are solid as well as the factions being great balance wise and I don't have any doubts that Halo Fleet Battles game will be just as good.

OK, sold!

They look fantastic, and the larger Covenant ship looks to be a pretty darn big piece of plastic!

49 ships? That has to be a typo unless they're counting tiny fighters that go 3-6 on a single base as individual ships.

@Paradigm: i agree. another system is always an option.

Infinity is an option for me if the new edition fixed the activation holes, but i have not read it yet.

The HALO fleets both look superb, a no-brainer for me, even if only for the models.
Most fleet games can be played with other miniatures anyway, which is why i have fleets from Babylon 5, BFG and Firestorm Armada and i can play any system with any of them.

I AM wondering how we get to 49 models though... that is A LOT...

I'm with you Paradigm, this is going to be amazing!

ORicK wrote:

But all that aside: i will buy anything that is a HALO miniature! :-)

If we can support this idea just for this, I think the rest will fall into place. Firestorm Armada is reportedly quite a fun and balanced game to play

GenRifDrake wrote:If you want some more decent pics of the plastic ships you can find some here on Meeples and Miniature's site from their visit to Spartan Games
https://meeples.wordpress.com/2015/03/15/visiting-spartan-games/

They look gorgeous to be honest, I was really surprised with the tiny subtle detail they manage to get out of those UNSC ships for their size.

I am really really tempted to grab this, 49 ships was a lot more than I was expecting to see and the UNSC aesthetic is to die for. Also the rules, I get some people seem to hate on Spartan Game rules but I don't get it. I absolutely love FSA and PF, if you hate the exploding dice mechanic that is fine, personal taste but the rules are solid even with that.

If you want to have a look at some Spartan Game rules and go ahead and download them for FREE from their website and give it a try. I enjoy FSA and PF a lot more than I ever enjoyed 40k and Fantasy and the rules are solid as well as the factions being great balance wise and I don't have any doubts that Halo Fleet Battles game will be just as good.

You sound like you've got a lot of experience with Spartan Games and are very happy, this is nice to hear, because really I'm already sold on this. So very, very sold. I also didn't know they had free rules, so cheers once again! I will add those pictures to the main post and credit you.

warboss wrote:49 ships? That has to be a typo unless they're counting tiny fighters that go 3-6 on a single base as individual ships.

This does seem like a good deal, time will tell whether that is the case. Either way, it is a very promising game. 49 is also 7 squared, and seven is of quite some importance in Halo

ORicK wrote:@Paradigm: i agree. another system is always an option.

Infinity is an option for me if the new edition fixed the activation holes, but i have not read it yet.

The HALO fleets both look superb, a no-brainer for me, even if only for the models.
Most fleet games can be played with other miniatures anyway, which is why i have fleets from Babylon 5, BFG and Firestorm Armada and i can play any system with any of them.

I AM wondering how we get to 49 models though... that is A LOT...

Too true! Deadzone Halo like Paradigm suggested sounds brilliant!

And don't get me wrong: i expect a good fleet battle system from Spartan/Microsoft, i know they can do that.

i would also prefer a good 28mm system from Spartan/Microsoft and not having to use something else.
I am a "the more systems, the more fun" guy.
Combined with "the more miniatures, the more fun" of course... ;-)

I too have and love Dystopian Wars (in the top 3 of my favourite games ever), Firestorm Armada is good too and Dystopian Legions is IMO not bad, just not what i hoped it would be, so i have quite the Spartan collection already.

Pics of the busts!


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Does anyone know what I did wrong? Hahaha That is the right file, wrong display. *sigh*


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ORick, I know what you mean. It would be so nice to have minis and rules just convalesce, it does heaps for the immersion

I'm in! That is all.

If you go to the page with the pics of them, right click and hit 'copy Image URL', then use the IMG tags in the Post Reply window, they should come up.

Thanks Paradigm, hopefully this works


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Success!

That Shipmaster is fantastic! Wish I was going to Salute now!

But... what about us Americans? Pre-order bonus?

And dammit, I need both of those. I've been a Halo fanboy since the original game.

Paradigm wrote:That Shipmaster is fantastic! Wish I was going to Salute now!

At least you're in the same country!

Pugnacious_Cee wrote:But... what about us Americans? Pre-order bonus?

And dammit, I need both of those. I've been a Halo fanboy since the original game.

At least you're in the same Hemisphere!

And if we get a 28mm game: i even bought a Scarab in that scale quite some years ago.
They made one for HaloClix and allthough i never bought any HaloClix models, i saw the Scarab and just had to have it. The idea was to use it as a titan for 40k (it dwarfs a Warhound titan).
And because the Scarab is so impressive in the game, and because i know what it looks like on the inside from the game and how to blow it up, i just had to have it :-)

So i SOOOooo look forward to the 28mm/32mm game... ;-)

ORicK wrote:
@Paradigm:
I AM wondering how we get to 49 models though... that is A LOT...

This. .. where are the 49 models coming from? Is it just buckets of the same 6 or 7 ships?

Well the picture of UNSC Battlegroup: Leviathan shown with the Spartan Newsletter months back was 15 strong in size. Which contained a Heavy Carrier, 2 Heavy Cruisers and 12 Heavy Frigate escorts. Could very well be that there has been more ships we've not seen yet obviously, is anyone here a Lore Nut for Halo? What was there present at the battle of Reach? x)

Edit: And the Covenant preview battlegroup had only 8 ships in it... 1 Heavy Cruiser, 1 Battlecruiser and 6 Heavy Corvettes. Guessing it'll have multiple Battlegroups present and perhaps some ships not seen by us all yet..?

GenRifDrake wrote:
Well the picture of UNSC Battlegroup: Leviathan shown with the Spartan Newsletter months back was 15 strong in size. Which contained a Heavy Carrier, 2 Heavy Cruisers and 12 Heavy Frigate escorts. Could very well be that there has been more ships we've not seen yet obviously, is anyone here a Lore Nut for Halo? What was there present at the battle of Reach? x)

In don't know, but I recall in the old thread it was mentioned that Spartan had been given the go-ahead to produce new ship designs. No idea if any will be in the box, but you never know.

I'm guessing there will only be 1 'big ship' for each side, or maybe 2:1 seeing as the UNSC one seems a tad smaller than the Covenant one. So far we've seen big, medium and small ships for each faction, but there was enough size difference between each that you could comfortably fit another size in either side of medium. I guess Fighters could also show up, in Reach the game they play a pretty integral role in defending the UNSC station and then launching a counterattack on the Corvette.

Speaking of which, the contents list mentions terrain, the UNSC orbital defence station (name escapes me) perchance?

GenRifDrake wrote:
Well the picture of UNSC Battlegroup: Leviathan shown with the Spartan Newsletter months back was 15 strong in size. Which contained a Heavy Carrier, 2 Heavy Cruisers and 12 Heavy Frigate escorts. Could very well be that there has been more ships we've not seen yet obviously, is anyone here a Lore Nut for Halo? What was there present at the battle of Reach? x)

Edit: And the Covenant preview battlegroup had only 8 ships in it... 1 Heavy Cruiser, 1 Battlecruiser and 6 Heavy Corvettes. Guessing it'll have multiple Battlegroups present and perhaps some ships not seen by us all yet..?

UNSC had around 150 ships for the Fall of Reach, at least 1 carrier (might actually be a supercarrier,don't remember) , couple of dozen destroyers, the rest being frigates, probably Paris, Charon and Stalwart class frigates and 20 Orbital Defence Platforms as far as I remember.

Covenant was around 300-350 ships in total I think, at least 1 or 2 supercarriers, multiple battlecruisers with standard cruisers, destroyers and heavy corvettes making up the rest of the numbers

ORicK wrote:And if we get a 28mm game: i even bought a Scarab in that scale quite some years ago.
They made one for HaloClix and allthough i never bought any HaloClix models, i saw the Scarab and just had to have it. The idea was to use it as a titan for 40k (it dwarfs a Warhound titan).
And because the Scarab is so impressive in the game, and because i know what it looks like on the inside from the game and how to blow it up, i just had to have it :-)

So i SOOOooo look forward to the 28mm/32mm game... ;-)

If I hope you do play with it and post a battle report, apparently people have seen sketches of the Scorpion! (still clarify whether this was at epic or 28mm, but the context implied 28mm)

usernamesareannoying wrote:

ORicK wrote:
@Paradigm:
I AM wondering how we get to 49 models though... that is A LOT...

This. .. where are the 49 models coming from? Is it just buckets of the same 6 or 7 ships?

I'm also wondering this, especially as I'm ordering 2 copies. I hope it's not A) counting the fighters and B) it's nor just a tripled up set. I can live with it either way, but still!

GenRifDrake wrote:Well the picture of UNSC Battlegroup: Leviathan shown with the Spartan Newsletter months back was 15 strong in size. Which contained a Heavy Carrier, 2 Heavy Cruisers and 12 Heavy Frigate escorts. Could very well be that there has been more ships we've not seen yet obviously, is anyone here a Lore Nut for Halo? What was there present at the battle of Reach? x)


Edit: And the Covenant preview battlegroup had only 8 ships in it... 1 Heavy Cruiser, 1 Battlecruiser and 6 Heavy Corvettes. Guessing it'll have multiple Battlegroups present and perhaps some ships not seen by us all yet..?

Paradigm wrote:

GenRifDrake wrote:
Well the picture of UNSC Battlegroup: Leviathan shown with the Spartan Newsletter months back was 15 strong in size. Which contained a Heavy Carrier, 2 Heavy Cruisers and 12 Heavy Frigate escorts. Could very well be that there has been more ships we've not seen yet obviously, is anyone here a Lore Nut for Halo? What was there present at the battle of Reach? x)

In don't know, but I recall in the old thread it was mentioned that Spartan had been given the go-ahead to produce new ship designs. No idea if any will be in the box, but you never know.

I'm guessing there will only be 1 'big ship' for each side, or maybe 2:1 seeing as the UNSC one seems a tad smaller than the Covenant one. So far we've seen big, medium and small ships for each faction, but there was enough size difference between each that you could comfortably fit another size in either side of medium. I guess Fighters could also show up, in Reach the game they play a pretty integral role in defending the UNSC station and then launching a counterattack on the Corvette.

Speaking of which, the contents list mentions terrain, the UNSC orbital defence station (name escapes me) perchance?

Anchor 9 my good sir. The poster above me also has good numbers for the Fall of Reach

Never played Halo (sony fanboy )
But space battle game you have my attention! How do the ships scale to x-wing/attack wing/armada or firestorm (or Battlefleet Gothic)?

I can't really say, as I'm not that fluent in those game types, but if you look at the first post, there is a picture of a man's hand holding one of the bigger ships available to the UNSC, I thinkit is about 15cm. I'll try and find reference shots for you

Done! Found them


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As you can see, they are much, much bigger than most of your BFG stuff.


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As a side note, the biggest UNSC vessel was actually developed by Spartan Games and Microsoft, it was not in any of the games. So we're already seeing new ships! This gives me great faith, as it blended into the existing UNSC aesthetic seemlessly

@AkhilleusK42
When we get 28mm, i will definately post something when i field the Scarab.

And the size IMO a bit smaller than BFG (or FA).
Frigates here is under 3cm, in BFG most are closer to 4cm.
Cruisers here is 6cm, in BFG most are 7-9cm
And the Heavy Carrier here is close to 13cm, that is comparable to BFG, between cruisers and battleships.

I just want ground combat figs. Reading about Halo space battles is 1000% more interesting to me than playing through them in miniature. 28mm figures tho? Oh yeah. Or 15mm figs/tanks, I'd be all over that. Or 10mm. Or 6mm. Or pretty much anything besides ship combat (which, ironically, I'm a huge fan of in most systems)

I think that spacefleet combat was, for Spartan Games, something that they could do in a very short time.
Because Spartan Games can be VERY fast from design to a good product and they have a lot of recent experience on this scale of models.

But in the meantime they are probably working VERY very hard on the ground combat game, which we all know just HAS to be coming too.

Because every HALO player knows that it's a FPS, except HALO Wars, which is a RTS, but both are ground combat.
And that should translate best to 28mm miniatures on HALO FPS level to 6 or 10mm for HALO Wars scale.


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So the space combat is both for building up momentum, but also to be able to have a complete setting if other scales are added.
Becuase IMO it adds depth to gameplay if you have multiple levels of gaming within the same system.

GW once had that with BFG, Epic and 40k or Fallen Empires, Warmaster, WHFB.
Spartan is working on it in the FA universe where we now have FA and Planetfall.
Even FFG is working on it with X-wing, Imperial Assault and Armada.

And i must say i find a complete setting with miniatures on different scales a very good thing.

Kinda getting more interested in this. Hopefully they reveal more at Salute.

ORicK wrote:@AkhilleusK42
When we get 28mm, i will definately post something when i field the Scarab.

And the size IMO a bit smaller than BFG (or FA).
Frigates here is under 3cm, in BFG most are closer to 4cm.
Cruisers here is 6cm, in BFG most are 7-9cm
And the Heavy Carrier here is close to 13cm, that is comparable to BFG, between cruisers and battleships.

I stand corrected on the BFG matter, I have not played it in many years, so my apologies on that one. I would love to see a link and pics of that battle, be sure to message me about it!

Kalamadea wrote:I just want ground combat figs. Reading about Halo space battles is 1000% more interesting to me than playing through them in miniature. 28mm figures tho? Oh yeah. Or 15mm figs/tanks, I'd be all over that. Or 10mm. Or 6mm. Or pretty much anything besides ship combat (which, ironically, I'm a huge fan of in most systems)

ORicK wrote:I think that spacefleet combat was, for Spartan Games, something that they could do in a very short time.
Because Spartan Games can be VERY fast from design to a good product and they have a lot of recent experience on this scale of models.

But in the meantime they are probably working VERY very hard on the ground combat game, which we all know just HAS to be coming too.

Because every HALO player knows that it's a FPS, except HALO Wars, which is a RTS, but both are ground combat.
And that should translate best to 28mm miniatures on HALO FPS level to 6 or 10mm for HALO Wars scale.


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So the space combat is both for building up momentum, but also to be able to have a complete setting if other scales are added.
Becuase IMO it adds depth to gameplay if you have multiple levels of gaming within the same system.

GW once had that with BFG, Epic and 40k or Fallen Empires, Warmaster, WHFB.
Spartan is working on it in the FA universe where we now have FA and Planetfall.
Even FFG is working on it with X-wing, Imperial Assault and Armada.

And i must say i find a complete setting with miniatures on different scales a very good thing.

Very true about it being more interesting. It makes it feel like you can just leap in and actually stage these battles. A planetary defence gone horribly wrong for the UNSC. The Ground defences holding off as best they can while the Covenant Glass the planet. A UNSC strike team destroying sensitive data before the Covenant realise its worth

Sining wrote:Kinda getting more interested in this. Hopefully they reveal more at Salute.

There will be many big things shown! Some of Halo Ground Battles' miniatures will be on show, I'm not sure if that means the epic scale variant or the Skirmish variant though. There will also be the actual demoing of the Halo Fleet Battles game, along with the opportunity to get the busts!

Oh there is a ground combat game coming, can promise you all that, though think closer to 10mm ballpark mark than the 32mm mark to start with...

The problem with Spartan is:

> They have steam in the beginning but later they lose it and releases for a system can be quite infrequent. Sadly they often fall prey to the shiny-new-thing-syndrome. Some DW factions had to wait ages for classes that all other factions had gotten long ago.

> Inconsistent releases. Sometimes you get it all at once and sometimes you get nothing for a year. That really can take out the steam from a game.

> Multiple-Scale-Syndrome. Often they announce a game to be in multiple scales only to back-off later. Which is a good idea since no game ever succeded that had multiple scales (Oh, you play X, too? Too bad, we can´t play cause our minis are in a different scale.) And it did Planetfall no good. You can still see that the minis were intended for multiple scales and while you get a feeling fo the size of the minis with DW, with PF you are more often off with your guesses than right. Even the 10mm is not right cause it more or less oscillates between 10 and 15mm.

> Rulebooks. Even for native speakers they are dificult to read and they are in dire need of an editor. And even if the rules are good that does not stop them from messing around with them. The latest updates for DW cleaned up some stuff, but also messed around with stuff that was quite fine. And Errata are not only to be found in one PDF, but all over their forums, PDF, website, ... etc. They really need to clean up their act.

> Planetfall. Clearly a me-too product after the success of DZC and you cann tell from the rules that it better would have been left in the drawer or given a major overhaul. The rules are still missing vital parts and the Errata come out monthly and not few of them. Being actually the 4th iteration of the Planetfall rules that is not a good thing (1st when Dave split up with Spartan and founded Hawk Wargames > Limited Studio Sparta Rules > Armoured Clash in ist two iterations > Current Rules).

> They don´t care for translations, which really hurts sales in other countries.

I think working with Microsoft on an IP that is pretty big (not Star Wars/Trek/Alien/LotR big, but coming in not far behind these days) will mean the releases will be very structured/planned/coherent. There's just no way they'd let Spartan (or anyone else) mess up their premier IP, and Spartan too have a lot to gain, as a 3-scale complete Halo range in hard plastic could catapult them pretty far up the gaming company ladder.

Native speaker here. I generally have no issues with Spartans planetfall rulebook. Their layout could use better work but the English is easy enough to follow.

As for pf being a knock off of dzc, I play both. They're very different, like wh40k and wmh level of difference

Duncan_Idaho, thanks for sharing your views! Having not played any of their games, I'm a little in the dark about this one, so hearing some of your experiences is illuminating.

Paradigm wrote:I think working with Microsoft on an IP that is pretty big (not Star Wars/Trek/Alien/LotR big, but coming in not far behind these days) will mean the releases will be very structured/planned/coherent. There's just no way they'd let Spartan (or anyone else) mess up their premier IP, and Spartan too have a lot to gain, as a 3-scale complete Halo range in hard plastic could catapult them pretty far up the gaming company ladder.

I'm inclined to agree with you, though that may be in part due to my optimism about the project. Halo is a big thing, I can't help but believe that working in concert with Microsoft would be a huge bonus for them, and if they pull this off well, they could be microsoft's go to guys for future enterprises.

Sining wrote:Native speaker here. I generally have no issues with Spartans planetfall rulebook. Their layout could use better work but the English is easy enough to follow.

As for pf being a knock off of dzc, I play both. They're very different, like wh40k and wmh level of difference

That's also good to hear, I backed Deadzone and the spelling and grammar in that was atrocious in parts! Like the kind of things that a spell check would have fixed



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GenRifDrake wrote:
Oh there is a ground combat game coming, can promise you all that, though think closer to 10mm ballpark mark than the 32mm mark to start with...

So do you know this to be the case based of inside information, or is this based off of observations of Spartan Games past release patterns? Hope you can let us know more about the coming topic!

Thanks for the info on the sizes!

Not a problem mate, happy to help. Really want this project to go phenomenally

Native speaker here. I generally have no issues with Spartans planetfall rulebook. Their layout could use better work but the English is easy enough to follow.

I am a native speaker too and actually an editor. And though Planetfall got better than the rest of their books it is still written in a partly overcomplicating way. It being actually a booklet and not a book this is still not good. Parts of the rules just missing from edition to edition is also a no-go (DW, ramming rules forgotten in 1.1, PF some of the shooting rules missing).

As for pf being a knock off of dzc, I play both. They're very different, like wh40k and wmh level of difference

I nowhere stated this. Of course they are different, but look at when it got released and when DZC. Especially when considering how long the game was dormant after first announcements and after the first try at releasing it. And the rules are still Beta.

The problem with Spartan games is IMO mainly that they are a small but growing company with a lot of good ideas.

But unlike most other smal companies they do not finance everything with a Kickstarter.
While a growing number of players has wants and needs in regard to rules and models.
I am one of them, i want to get a FA Xelocians fleet :-)
And let's be honest, patience is not our main virtue... ;-)

In about 25 years of wargaming i know of no other company that has ever delivered so many truely new and original designs in such a short time.
And in regard to rulebooks (language), i am not a native speaker and never had a problem with the books.

In regard to the HALO project i am even less worried, because with Microsoft as a partner i expect that whatever resources are needed, will be found..
And the design aspect is covered anyway; these are exsting models that are already designed in 3D anyway.

Combine that with what i know of Spartan games and i suspect we get a lot of cool stuff pretty fast.

As a non-native speaker you will not realize quite some of the problems native-speakers have.

And as much as I love DW there were quite some flabbergasting decissions:

> Mail-order only UA, which virtually killed the game.
> Mail-order only blisters for DW and putting it al in boxes while resizing units, which forced many old gamers to order directly from their website with prices that are way above the former blister prices.

Those two are annoying indeed for longer time players (like me), but i do understand why they did it.

Selling individual blisters and above all individual models just costs more time (thus money). Boxes are much more efficient.
Not a good thing if you have armies and just need one or a few extra, but it is a lot more efficient for Spartan Games and will probably be better i the long run.

And compared to other games/models, i read a comparison to DZC earlier, the price per individual model is still (much) lower if you buy DW or FA models of the same size.

But i agree that times used to be a bit better for us 2 years ago :-)

Armies cost approx. the same in both games. You need way more minis for PF.

Well, I love PF and didn't really have any problems picking up the game, learning to play it and teaching it to others. Rulebook had some issues that needed ironing out and it could definately be laid out better, but the game itself is fine. Feel free to nitpick all you want about layout etc, i'm not buying a wargame for how I think they laid out their rulebook, i'm buying it for the game and the miniatures. And Spartan's PF has a decent ruleset and absolutely gorgeous miniatures, the fact that more gets put on to the board for the same cost that DZC costs you isn't a problem for me! x) The armies look gorgeous to see and play with, DZC I really really just took one look at miniatures and said "Nope".

Looks awesome. Halo is an cracking IP have been interested in a fleet game for a while.

 sourclams wrote:
I'd be more excited if it wasn't Spartan Games. They make nice models, some of them are even great models, but their rules-writing is terrible and I predict the second edition of rules within a year of the first print.

I was burned so badly on Dystopian Wars that even though I want to like it, I'll be waiting a good long time before giving this a shot.

Unfortunately I feel the same way. I bought into DW heavily (and Uncharted Seas), but the first edition rulebook was one of the absolute worst I've ever read (maybe third place, after Myth and Magic Realm...), and the second edition wasn't much better. The comically bad "flavor text" and amateurish drawings only served to rub salt in the wounds caused by reading the darn thing...

A bit more info on the Spartan blog today, including the details of the bust painting competition. There was also this:

"Unable to make Salute? You will be eligible to receive the FREE Commander bust if you pre-order the Halo: Fleet Battles, The Fall of Reach two player battle box from the Spartan Games Online Store on 25th April 2015 (all time zones). All pre-orders made after this date will not be included in this special offer."

So if you buy direct on the day, you get the bust of your choice shipped early (might be good for overseas orderers). Not sure the bust is worth the extra £16ish difference with Wayland, but I might email them and see if they're open to doing the same if I order on the day.


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Message sent to Wayland, let's see if they respond...

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/04/halo-fleet-battles-boxed-set-contents-unveiled.html


Anyone else counting 23 ships and not 49?

pancakeonions wrote:

 sourclams wrote:
I'd be more excited if it wasn't Spartan Games. They make nice models, some of them are even great models, but their rules-writing is terrible and I predict the second edition of rules within a year of the first print.

I was burned so badly on Dystopian Wars that even though I want to like it, I'll be waiting a good long time before giving this a shot.

Unfortunately I feel the same way. I bought into DW heavily (and Uncharted Seas), but the first edition rulebook was one of the absolute worst I've ever read (maybe third place, after Myth and Magic Realm...), and the second edition wasn't much better. The comically bad "flavor text" and amateurish drawings only served to rub salt in the wounds caused by reading the darn thing...

Well each to their own, I absolutely hate 40k these days and gave up playing/collecting the game last year and am enjoying reading the continued repeated cries of doom and broken codex balance after codex balance from the 40k rumour threads, so choose your poison I guess? x) As said, never play DWs, so can't comment but FSA and PF is a great game rules and mechanics wise. Again, it could be laid out better, sure, and at launch it definately needed some sections clarifying, but they fixed all that within FAQs in a few months and now it's pretty solid. If you wanna judge the game based on how they chose to layout a rulebook, fine, be my guest, all I can say is you're missing out on a great game with equally great minis, based on not liking the format and such..?

 warboss wrote:
http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/04/halo-fleet-battles-boxed-set-contents-unveiled.html


Anyone else counting 23 ships and not 49?

Those are oooold pics, months and months ago when it was first announced. Can probably bet is more than just those in there.

Those were the older pics, and so far all we have. Either there are more designs we've yet to see, or they're doubling up (ie. multiple battle groups per side)

Paradigm wrote:A bit more info on the Spartan blog today, including the details of the bust painting competition. There was also this:

"Unable to make Salute? You will be eligible to receive the FREE Commander bust if you pre-order the Halo: Fleet Battles, The Fall of Reach two player battle box from the Spartan Games Online Store on 25th April 2015 (all time zones). All pre-orders made after this date will not be included in this special offer."

So if you buy direct on the day, you get the bust of your choice shipped early (might be good for overseas orderers). Not sure the bust is worth the extra £16ish difference with Wayland, but I might email them and see if they're open to doing the same if I order on the day.


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Message sent to Wayland, let's see if they respond...

Thanks for that Paradigm! I'll update the main post. Wayland has free shipping (still confirming if this is true for overseas people) but you have to make the order in person, this costs a bit extra, but it goes straight to the developer and is free worldwide for orders over 100 quid!

warboss wrote:http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/04/halo-fleet-battles-boxed-set-contents-unveiled.html


Anyone else counting 23 ships and not 49?

As others have stated, those are ooooooooold. The newer info all lists 49.

PF is fantastic...the only thing comparable to drpzone commander is the scale. The games couldn't be anymore different. I am a huge fan of 10mm and fleet combat games which makes me a natural fan of Firestorm. Spartan hits snags that small successful and growing companies hit. Enjoy their games...super great and easy to paint models.

AkhilleusK42 wrote:
As others have stated, those are ooooooooold. The newer info all lists 49.

GenRifDrake wrote:
Those are oooold pics, months and months ago when it was first announced. Can probably bet is more than just those in there.

You guys crack me up. It's so "oooooold", like "months and months ago".... you know... when they announced the game in February which was TWO months ago... and the pics are STILL the current pics on the spartan site on the only web page devoted to the game which is also linked on their main site in the giant scrolling banner ad.

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/spartan-games-is-to-produce-halo-tabletop-miniatures-games

LOL.

Yea.. because your assumption that those pics shown to flaunt new models when it was first announce mean it has to be all the ships the box will come with, really is a much better and sound assumption than reasonably assuming a company wouldn't outright blatantly lie that their box contains twice as many ships as they say it will.

Seriously matey..?

Seriously... we'll find out tomorrow. Which you'll probably think was SOOOOO long ago next week and that the info won't be current in May.

Spartan knows how to make fun games, and I don't see how Halo: Fleet Battles will be an exception. I'm really looking forward to it, as well as the Halo ground combat game.

Apparently, there will be demos of HFB at Salute, and I hope to get a game in.

Can I trust Wayland games?

Or can you just get this straight from Spartan? I actually trust spartan games, so my jimmies are rustled for this.

warboss wrote:Seriously... we'll find out tomorrow. Which you'll probably think was SOOOOO long ago next week and that the info won't be current in May.

Haha, for me (who has been habitually f5ing Spartan Games and other news sources) that is a while ago, especially as so much has come out since then. Of course a length of time being colloquially referred to as ages ago is, of course, an entirely subjective notion; and I am an impatient and excited man. I would like to point out that I was not actually trying to be mocking or derisive towards you, I was adding vowels in hyperbole. :-P

That being said, I have read numerous comments about the box set, and am unsure if it will be a doubled up sets of ships (Paradigm and I are of this mind), a product with less than the stated 49 ships (as it appears you believe) or even, as another suggested, that they could be putting multiple tiny fighters on one base and counting each of them individually (can't recall which poster stated this, but it was either here or in the Salute thread)

Cannor wrote:Spartan knows how to make fun games, and I don't see how Halo: Fleet Battles will be an exception. I'm really looking forward to it, as well as the Halo ground combat game.

Apparently, there will be demos of HFB at Salute, and I hope to get a game in.

Yes! And then, to prove your love to Dakka, you're going to report back here and let us know what you thought of it!



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 Stormwall wrote:
Can I trust Wayland games?

Or can you just get this straight from Spartan? I actually trust spartan games, so my jimmies are rustled for this.

You can order this straight from Spartan Games. If you pre-order on the 25th you will also get a free bust of either the UNSC or Covenant leader. Copied from a FB post I made on the Spartan Games Halo community page:

Hey guys,
Want that bust but live overseas? Spartan Games to the Rescue! If you pre-order Halo: Fleet Battles on the 25th of April (all timezones - their words, not mine, I actually don't know what this means for me as an Australian) and you will be eligible to get a bust! Orders worth over 100 quid will be shipped free worldwide, so grab a blister to push you over that 100 pound thresh hold and you'll be laughing.
This does, however, mean you will be purchasing Halo: Fleet Battles at full RRP rather than Wayland's 20% off.
Source:
http://www.spartangames.co.uk/halo-fleet-battles-at-salute

Ooooooohhhhh I am so tempted to throw down the money to pre-order it right now! I still have some 40k/30k models to paint, but this is Halo. What to do, what to do...

WOOOO!!! Those Covy ships look AMAZING!!!! MUST HAVE!!! MUST BUY!!!

Although, not a fan of the paint scheme, I'm gonna use the silver base color-glaze airbrush trick to make them look better.

Hotrod wrote:Ooooooohhhhh I am so tempted to throw down the money to pre-order it right now! I still have some 40k/30k models to paint, but this is Halo. What to do, what to do...

Go on, you know you want to. The bigger this gets, the more models and support they give it. "The seeds of [its future], are sown in [your buying habits]." - The Arbiter

PlaguelordHobbyServices wrote:WOOOO!!! Those Covy ships look AMAZING!!!! MUST HAVE!!! MUST BUY!!!

Although, not a fan of the paint scheme, I'm gonna use the silver base color-glaze airbrush trick to make them look better.

Tell me more about this technique! Keen to try and get this done. I've ordered some HS mini+small hexgrid stencils from Anarchy Models to get that Covenant hex fetish going. and yes, they are indeed amazing!

Ooohhh... @AkhilleusK42, that hex-idea is briljant!

So i think i will steal it. Because this is the kind of thing i can steal without anyone missing anything... ;-)

And additional: the pre-order that is on Spartan Games now still says 49 ship models. So i still don't know what these are, but the number seems to be 49. And it a good number :-)

Feel free to Orick, they actually still have a like to their kickstarter prices if you want to get in on the cheap, I can send you the link and you can make an account from there and save a little money, if that's of interest? It's the reusable stencil variant

 AkhilleusK42 wrote:

Hotrod wrote:Ooooooohhhhh I am so tempted to throw down the money to pre-order it right now! I still have some 40k/30k models to paint, but this is Halo. What to do, what to do...

Go on, you know you want to. The bigger this gets, the more models and support they give it. "The seeds of [its future], are sown in [your buying habits]." - The Arbiter

PlaguelordHobbyServices wrote:WOOOO!!! Those Covy ships look AMAZING!!!! MUST HAVE!!! MUST BUY!!!

Although, not a fan of the paint scheme, I'm gonna use the silver base color-glaze airbrush trick to make them look better.

Tell me more about this technique! Keen to try and get this done. I've ordered some HS mini+small hexgrid stencils from Anarchy Models to get that Covenant hex fetish going. and yes, they are indeed amazing!

http://en.gundam.info/movie/white/139

There's the link to a lot of helpful Airbrush techniques, you basically spray with the kind of silver you need, for Covy ships, I'd use a silver with a nice reflective quality, then use some rich color glaze, like Tamiya clear. And you spray several coats across the silver letting it dry before putting the next coat on, you should get a nice glossy finish too like an actual metal surface.

Thank you for that, it looks like a wonderful effect. What is clear blue? (Have you got an analogue in Vallejo or old citadel paints preferably, haha) Just an ultra thin pigment heavily watered down? A purple with that effect would be so very, very Covenant-like

 AkhilleusK42 wrote:
Thank you for that, it looks like a wonderful effect. What is clear blue? (Have you got an analogue in Vallejo or old citadel paints preferably, haha) Just an ultra thin pigment heavily watered down? A purple with that effect would be so very, very Covenant-like

It's a Tamiya color, I haven't encountered the Tamiya glazes in any other paint-line, so you might need to look online. They're kinda syrupy too, so they'll require much watering down for airbrush use. I use Tamiya Clear Red for my blood/gore effects, gets a nice glossy sheen like fresh-spilled guts!

It's looking very much like the ground combat game displayed at Salute will not be 28mm, but will be 15mm. 28mm will indeed be coming, but it seems unlikely they will be on display this weekend. If they are, it is unlikely that they will be in the majority, although this is just what I've been able to piece together from hints from someone who knows definitively


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 PlaguelordHobbyServices wrote:

 AkhilleusK42 wrote:
Thank you for that, it looks like a wonderful effect. What is clear blue? (Have you got an analogue in Vallejo or old citadel paints preferably, haha) Just an ultra thin pigment heavily watered down? A purple with that effect would be so very, very Covenant-like

It's a Tamiya color, I haven't encountered the Tamiya glazes in any other paint-line, so you might need to look online. They're kinda syrupy too, so they'll require much watering down for airbrush use. I use Tamiya Clear Red for my blood/gore effects, gets a nice glossy sheen like fresh-spilled guts!

Thank you for that! I'll check them out at my local hobby store. Can't wait for Fleet Battles, going to do up an Innie Fleet, an ONI Fleet, a Separatist Fleet and a Loyalist Fleet

I hope we get some smaller craft, like the Phantom and the Pelican.

At that scale I'm almost certain we will. I hope we get those at 28mm... *drools*

Confirmed by Wayland that they will only be offering the bust at Salute, so if you don't go and want the bust you'll need to order from Spartan.

Personally I'll go Wayland, I don't think the bust is worth +£16 to me. That said, I'll be keeping an eye on eBay over the next couple of weeks to see if anything pops up there.

Again, it could be laid out better, sure, and at launch it definately needed some sections clarifying, but they fixed all that within FAQs in a few months and now it's pretty solid. If you wanna judge the game based on how they chose to layout a rulebook, fine, be my guest, all I can say is you're missing out on a great game with equally great minis, based on not liking the format and such..?

Uhm, no. Since the release of the recent Errata we are now plagued by Drone-Spam. Total unnecessary, but still we got it. Quite some clarifications were for the better, but we also got quite some rule changes that look like they were just made for the sake of change. And don´t get me started with Dystopian Legions... The game was guite fine, but with the new rules it became a nightmare. What e.g. did we need the new LoS-rules for?

DZC and PF differ in the way they tackle the game. If you are in for modern war combined armies than go for DZC. The design is more technical feasible orientated, while PF is more SF-eyecandy orientated. PF also goes for the classical more open field battle while DZC prefers a more decorated table. DZC is very mission-based, while PF goes more in the battle it out-direction. There are objectives/missions in PF but they do not dominate the game in a way they do in DZC. Ruleswise DZC is way better written than PF and quite tightly so. PF definitely needs some straighting-up and condensing, which we right now experience on a monthly base. DZC also introduces the dropships, which are quite different from any other game outside, they are not only transports, but also fighting material though it differs from faction to faction how they are used. Scourge e.g. use their dropships to hunt down the smaller enemy units, while Shaltari use them as quick-relocators to hit and run with the whole army.

Nothing new design-wise, but I just came across these in the Spartan blog. Individual renders of each seen ship, showing off a bit more detail than the fleet pics




There was also this article linked, which goes into some detail about how 343 and Spartan are working together on this project (short version: very well!). Hints at a few more things we might see appeasring in future (the words 'Pillar of Autumn' and 'Infinity' make appearances), confirms that the new ships/fluff/characters in the campaign book ect are canon, and talks briefly about 'blue-on-blue' games. No word on whether or not the Insurrectionists or split Covenant factions (eg The Great Schism in H2) will get unique rules, but at least it means same-faction games make sense.

https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/community/blog-posts/canon-fodder-in-the-loop

Hurry up, Salute, we need more info!

 Paradigm wrote:
Nothing new design-wise, but I just came across these in the Spartan blog. Individual renders of each seen ship, showing off a bit more detail than the fleet pics

Spoiler:

There was also this article linked, which goes into some detail about how 343 and Spartan are working together on this project (short version: very well!). Hints at a few more things we might see appeasring in future (the words 'Pillar of Autumn' and 'Infinity' make appearances), confirms that the new ships/fluff/characters in the campaign book ect are canon, and talks briefly about 'blue-on-blue' games. No word on whether or not the Insurrectionists or split Covenant factions (eg The Great Schism in H2) will get unique rules, but at least it means same-faction games make sense.

https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/community/blog-posts/canon-fodder-in-the-loop

Hurry up, Salute, we need more info!

That is some fancy linking. I can only have 10 images because I upload them to the message, I need to get better at doing them like you have. I'll copy paste those ones into the main post, already had the images but remember that people don't like renders, haha. So I figured if I can only have 10, I should stick to actual images, so thanks for linking them like that! Wizardry

Spartan just posted up some pics on Facebook of the busts painted up next to some custom Halo dice.

Those look great Cannor, thanks for that, I've updated the first post.

I really like the busts, but the Elite is just jaw dropping (or splitting?). However, I believe that there is nothing distinctly Halo, let alone UNSC about the Vice Admiral though. He's still a fantastic bust mind you, just not iconic of the universe.

Ohh the things I would do for an ODST like this though... the money I would throw at it...

Yeah, the Admiral could fit just as well in BSG, Star Trek or B5 to be fair. Painting a UNSC symbol on his chest or shoulder would help a lot, though.

Couldn't find an ODST, but a quick Ebsy search turned up this chap if you fancied panting a large-scale Spartan II:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HALO-SPARTAN-MARK-VI-BLUE-BUST-BANK-9-BRAND-NEW-DIAMOND-SELECT-MONEY-BOX-/110968726763?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item19d64064eb



Would certainly make a nice shelf piece, repainted or otherwise!



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Those dice look pretty nifty too.

 ONI-S3 wrote:

Hotrod wrote:Ooooooohhhhh I am so tempted to throw down the money to pre-order it right now! I still have some 40k/30k models to paint, but this is Halo. What to do, what to do...

Go on, you know you want to. The bigger this gets, the more models and support they give it. "The seeds of [its future], are sown in [your buying habits]." - The Arbiter

My inner (outer?) poor student says that the smart thing to do is save my money, but my inner nerd just went super happy at your amazing Arbiter quote. Gah, you've got me, "all hail the [posting] hero". - Locke

Hotrod wrote:

 ONI-S3 wrote:

Hotrod wrote:Ooooooohhhhh I am so tempted to throw down the money to pre-order it right now! I still have some 40k/30k models to paint, but this is Halo. What to do, what to do...

Go on, you know you want to. The bigger this gets, the more models and support they give it. "The seeds of [its future], are sown in [your buying habits]." - The Arbiter

My inner (outer?) poor student says that the smart thing to do is save my money, but my inner nerd just went super happy at your amazing Arbiter quote. Gah, you've got me, "all hail the [posting] hero". - Locke

"Listen up, marine! [Hotrod] is going to hop in [his internet browser], roll over [to the Spartan Games website] and blow up any alien sonofabitch that gets between him and [preordering Halo Fleet Battles]! Hang on tight!" Sgt Johnson


Hmmm, Spartan could have a whole marketing strategy based on paraphrasing quotes here!

Hotrod wrote:
My inner (outer?) poor student says that the smart thing to do is save my money, but my inner nerd just went super happy at your amazing Arbiter quote. Gah, you've got me, "all hail the [posting] hero". - Locke

Haha, success! ""A [post financial recession economy] against a single [student's budget]. Given those odds, I'm content with three ... make that four [sets of Halo:Fleet Battles]." - Cortana

Paradigm wrote:
"Listen up, marine! [Hotrod] is going to hop in [his internet browser], roll over [to the Spartan Games website] and blow up any alien sonofabitch that gets between him and [preordering Halo Fleet Battles]! Hang on tight!" Sgt Johnson


Hmmm, Spartan could have a whole marketing strategy based on paraphrasing quotes here!

"More or less. Technically, this [marketing strategy] has a maximum effective radius of twenty-five thousand [Halo nerds]. But, once the others follow suit, this galaxy will be quite devoid of [unbelievers/non-fans], or at least any [non-fans] with sufficient biomass to sustain the [Nerdom]. But you already knew that... I mean, how couldn't you?" - 343 Guilty Spark


Hey guys,

Halo: Fleet Battles is available for pre-order! order today and get a free bust of your choice! If it doesn't show up as available for pre-order, consider using an Australian proxy server, seeing as we're from the future

http://shop.spartangames.co.uk/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=HFBB01

Strangely enough the busts put me off.

I am considering this game though.

https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/community/blog-posts/canon-fodder-taking-orders

Halowaypoint has put up a blog article with previously unseen pictures. Models look gorgeous on the table, and it looks like X-Wing has had some heavy influence on the bases and dice.

Awesome, plastic orbital defence station mini!

Pics:







Really like the varied basing! Some new models there as well. Looks like a middle-plus size Covie ship as a UNSC orbital station.


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Some more pics from Beasts of War:







Video coming soon, apparently.


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Oddly, Wayland are now saying 96 days until release. It was 39 the other day, I'm sure. Has anywhere else listed a release date?

Edit: Firestorm games are listing 1st June, which is closer to Wayland's original date.

On a related note, early pictures of the ground combat game are starting to filter through and it looks to be in 15mm.

Now that looks really cool.

I hope the video explains a bit more.

More from BoW:
http://www.beastsofwar.com/liveblogentry/halo-fleet-battles-rage-at-salute-2015-courtesy-of-spartan-games/#respond

Looks awesome.

Anyone notice the base on the asteroid? Can someone get the box contents or a game play run through?

WOW
I love them.

The 49 miniatures seem to include the 3on1 smaller ships but im fine with that.

I love how the Assault Carriers dwarf everything.

I expect that they will also make the Infinity so the UNSC has something of similar size.

We're still a little hazy on box content, but we do know that alongside the rulebook, campaign book and dice , there are 49 ship models and punch-out tokens and terrain.

Gameplay-wise (and this is purely educated guesswork on my part), I'm expecting a success-based system, where the number of relevant symbols you roll determines whether or not something works. Eg, an attack could require you to roll two 'swords' symbols. Shields could then cancel a hit for each 'shield' you roll. This kind of success-vs-success has become rather popular recently, featuring in the likes of Infinity and Deadzone over the last few years, and would suit these custom dice.

The video mentioned there are some similarities with Firestorm Armada, but with the emphasis on fast play and minimal maths/tables, hence the dice.

GenRifDrake wrote:
Well the picture of UNSC Battlegroup: Leviathan shown with the Spartan Newsletter months back was 15 strong in size. Which contained a Heavy Carrier, 2 Heavy Cruisers and 12 Heavy Frigate escorts. Could very well be that there has been more ships we've not seen yet obviously, is anyone here a Lore Nut for Halo? What was there present at the battle of Reach? x)

The UNSC had 152 ships. The Covenant had 315 ships attacking Reach, but they had several more attacking the whole solar system (750 in total IIRC).

Edit: And the Covenant preview battlegroup had only 8 ships in it... 1 Heavy Cruiser, 1 Battlecruiser and 6 Heavy Corvettes. Guessing it'll have multiple Battlegroups present and perhaps some ships not seen by us all yet..?

I guess that the battlegroups serve to show what a balanced battle would be (same number off battlegroups per side) as Covenant ships are far superior (until post-war UNSC stuff is introduced).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Hoyt wrote:

Covenant was around 300-350 ships in total I think, at least 1 or 2 supercarriers, multiple battlecruisers with standard cruisers, destroyers and heavy corvettes making up the rest of the numbers

I really doubt we will see a Covenant Supercarrier, that thing is massive (using the 1:20000 scale, it would be 144.8 cm long (4.75 ft)).

And still it pales in comparison with the Mantle's Approach (Didact's ship in Halo 4). Which using the same scale would be 18.57 meters tall (60.93 ft).

Had a chat on Faceboo with a fellow who is at Salute . The Image below shows all the models that you get in the Core set. Basically its 1 Battleship and 4 Cruisers per side with the Covenant getting a dozen of their Corvettes, and the UNSC gets 24 of their escort frigates. Not sure how much value for money this one offers me, as I was mainly interested in the ships.

>Seems fair and fine for a starter set.

 Tyran wrote:

I really doubt we will see a Covenant Supercarrier, that thing is massive (using the 1:20000 scale, it would be 144.8 cm long (4.75 ft)).

And still it pales in comparison with the Mantle's Approach (Didact's ship in Halo 4). Which using the same scale would be 18.57 meters tall (60.93 ft).

Tell you what, though; a custom mat with either of those printed as a 'backdrop' would be pretty damn epic!
Pending what Halo 5 turns up, I'd love to see some Promethean or Forerunner ships.

@David: good to know! Sounds alright to me, I wasn't expecting more than one Capital Ship per side, really. This seems to give you plenty to get going, and assuming it all stays in plastic rather than resin or metal, expansion sets when the arrive shouldn't break the bank.

Some early reports on the rules-
"Dice.
There are 3 types of dice for halo (and Neil ordered arount 0.5 million...). Normal halo combat dice and covenant/unsc command dice.
Combat dice have a skull (bad. Instant miss) 2 stop symbols (miss), 2 sides with an explosion with a 1 on and 1 side (a palpable hit!) with an explosion with a 2 on a and circle around it (2 hits and a re roll on one of the stop symbol sides)
For example i roll 5 duce and get skull, miss, 1hit, 1hit, 2hit. Re roll the miss from the 2hit and get a 1hit for 1+1+2+1 hits. Other player does the same with their shield/armour/point defence dice to negate your hits. Compare remaining hits to defence of target for damage (like fs:p)
Damage to your ship negates a number of hits = damage. Pew pew!
However your dice are effected by long range/asteroids/cloacks or even positive modifiers. There is a chart you move up or down which varies the exact nature of the dice from really bad 'impossible shot' - no chance of hitting at all to slightly bad - 2hit dies not let you re roll a miss.
-----------------------
You buy elements of ships. This could be a medium. Medium+small or a base of smalls. Several elements, 3 - 4, make a squadron. For example 2 elements of small plus an element with a medium and small escort. These move and fire together.
The massive assault carriers are made up of 3 elements joined together. Each section has a stat block. These guys are gonna be hard!
-------------------------
Shooting! Each element has a number of attack dice. You can pool all these together or fire seperately. But the first attack must be at the closest enemy element in the squadron you are targeting. Mac cannons and plasma beams and missiles have various little rules for flavour.
You can also cause critical hits to knock out shields or engines etc.
--------------------
Fighters/bombers.
Token stacks for fighters/bombers/assault ships/spartans. These whizz about and do a lot of damage. Tokens vs token licks them in place in a dog fight. Bombers do NOT like interceptors. If you cause enough damage to destroy a token it is removed. If less than enough it is flipped over and "damaged" another pip of damage destroys it. Token stacks are 3-9ish.
--------------------
I didnt try a boarding assault but I was told they are super duper nasty. You do not want some spartans running amok on your assault carrier!
------------------
Command dice. This is where the character you have chosen as your admiral come in. You get 5 command dice and they have shield (def), lightning bolts (attack) and a spartan/elite head. Place these on your commander sheet. Each character has various abilities they can use to do special thing like Brace! or power up weapons. These abilities cost a number (1-3) of shields/bolts/heads. Each character seems different and costs different points. You may save 1 unused dice each turn and roll the other 4 again. Lets you try and save up for the right combo. A bit like saga battle boards for those who have played that.
-------------
Phases. Command phase dice etc. Wing phase. Ship phase. Assault phase.
--------------
Moving. All ships drift forwards 2" then you get normsl movement. Smalls can make a 45 degree turn before or after their normal move Mediums can make a turn before their normal move and larges after their normal move."

All sounds good! I was hoping there would be ample representation of fighters and boarding assaults, and it looks like I won't be disappointed. (Not that it'll stop me actually fighting out boardings in 28mm once those minis hit! )

Any word on how much more you'd need to add to the starter to get a 'normal' game size?

 Paradigm wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

I really doubt we will see a Covenant Supercarrier, that thing is massive (using the 1:20000 scale, it would be 144.8 cm long (4.75 ft)).

And still it pales in comparison with the Mantle's Approach (Didact's ship in Halo 4). Which using the same scale would be 18.57 meters tall (60.93 ft).

Tell you what, though; a custom mat with either of those printed as a 'backdrop' would be pretty damn epic!
Pending what Halo 5 turns up, I'd love to see some Promethean or Forerunner ships.

@David: good to know! Sounds alright to me, I wasn't expecting more than one Capital Ship per side, really. This seems to give you plenty to get going, and assuming it all stays in plastic rather than resin or metal, expansion sets when the arrive shouldn't break the bank.

I wouldn't like proper Forerunner warships, they are massive and far above anything the UNSC and the Covenant can even hope to accomplish. Although I could see Forerunner Sentinel craft in the game.

Now I would like to see the Flood, how it propagates and infects enemy ships and even upgrades them with their arcane knowledge.

I love the idea of picking commanders with unique ability's and the boarding rules. Did anyone else notice the pillar of Autumn in the pictures.

Yep, I caught that. Took me a while to notice, though, as it's pretty similar to the Marathon ships. Now, I want to see Infinity!

Does anyone know if there are pictures for the ground combat game.

Nothing on the BoW coverage so far,

and nothing via any of the facebook feeds I've seen which suggest either there was not much or they had a picture embargo on what was there

 ds9lord wrote:
Does anyone know if there are pictures for the ground combat game.

I didnt see the ground game being demoed there, just some models in a display case (I got in early though, they may have demoed the ground game later). Looks to be about 10-12mm, they had warthogs, a scorpion, and bases of grunts, elites, spartans and USNC marines (according to my GF, who is the halo nut, I just saw Buggy, buggy, buggy, tank, guys, guys, ugly guys, ugly guys)

EDIT: Watermarked album of my gf's pics

Charax wrote:

 ds9lord wrote:
Does anyone know if there are pictures for the ground combat game.

I didnt see the ground game being demoed there, just some models in a display case (I got in early though, they may have demoed the ground game later). Looks to be about 10-12mm, they had warthogs, a scorpion, and bases of grunts, elites, spartans and USNC marines (according to my GF, who is the halo nut, I just saw Buggy, buggy, buggy, tank, guys, guys, ugly guys, ugly guys)

EDIT: Watermarked album of my gf's pics

OMG OMG OMG OMG.

Well there went all my money. Crap.

In the words of a well-known racoon: 'Oh, yeah!'

Wow those look great,

especially the grunts (get it off, get it off, get it off.........Boom)

Did she say what scale those halo ground minis are in? The multiple minis per base make me think 15mm-ish.

She was with me and isn't a gamer, but I would guess about the same, looked to be bigger than DZC and Firestorm Planetfall's 10mm, way smaller than 28mm. The shelf below has some other Spartan minis (Dystopian wars, I think?) that could be useful for scale

Thanks. I'm curious if this pair of games will get more than the single customary year of support from Spartan before the new shiny takes all the attention. They at least have a chance given that they're a big (and likely expensive) licensed property.

I can't see 343 letting them drop this, and Spartan themselves would be mad to. Their other games may be good, but within a year I expect this will have outsold them. As far as video game IPs go, at least of those that you could make a minis game from, Halo is about as big as it gets.

 Paradigm wrote:
I can't see 343 letting them drop this, and Spartan themselves would be mad to. Their other games may be good, but within a year I expect this will have outsold them. As far as video game IPs go, at least of those that you could make a minis game from, Halo is about as big as it gets.

343 weren't able to put out a working version of OLD games already made for the xbone... and now are busy with guardians and it's future DLC. I suspect they'll have more important things to attend to. I agree that it's big but I don't really know how popular Firestorm or Dystopian are overall as I've only ever seen the same two brothers demo'ing it locally year after year and no one else playing it personally. If anything, they'll likely get a few thousand sales of copies just to halo fanboys with no minis experience who don't know how much work they're getting into or just want some cubicle desk decorations on top of the wargaming crowd.

 warboss wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
I can't see 343 letting them drop this, and Spartan themselves would be mad to. Their other games may be good, but within a year I expect this will have outsold them. As far as video game IPs go, at least of those that you could make a minis game from, Halo is about as big as it gets.

343 weren't able to put out a working version of OLD games already made for the xbone... and now are busy with guardians and it's future DLC. I suspect they'll have more important things to attend to. I agree that it's big but I don't really know how popular Firestorm or Dystopian are overall as I've only ever seen the same two brothers demo'ing it locally year after year and no one else playing it personally. If anything, they'll likely get a few thousand sales of copies just to halo fanboys with no minis experience who don't know how much work they're getting into or just want some cubicle desk decorations on top of the wargaming crowd.

I certainly see your point, I don't expect to see this in every club in the country. It's just that through a combination of the big name and the lower cost, this is by far the most attractive of their offerings. So often I take a look at Firestorm, love the aesthetic, then remember the prices and material and go to something else, whereas this has me ready and willing to drop the cash as soon as we have a solid release date. OK, I'm probably in that 'Halo fan' category, but what's the point in getting an IP licence if you aren't relying on fans of that IP jumping in?

The other thing is that, given the creative freedom Spartan have been given here, it's not like 343 are going to be looking over their shoulders the whole time. What they provide is funding and IP, while Spartan do all the actual design/rules work. That combination should hopefully prevent either party burning out (financially/creatively) or losing interest.

I have high hopes, perhaps too high for this game, but I believe it will do very well.

The problem is: Spartan not translating their games really hurts their sales on the continent.

Halo: Fleet Battles is a licensed product and - in most respects - is treated just like the Metal Earth models, boardgame reskins, T-shirts, and controllers. It's having more attention paid to it on the 343 Industries side due to the canon implications of realizing previously unseen (or only concepted) designs and interest by the studio in this particular project.

I hope the Halo Fleet license really oversells what also ends up being a fun game, because the name carries enough weight to carry over onto sales to non-wargamers, which in turn ends up supporting the game. I'm not a very big Halo fan (I think it's cool and all, but I don't worship Master Chief like some do) , but it's an evocative enough setting to add to the fleet-scale genre that I already have loved ever since BattleFleet Gotic debuted as the demo rules with cardboard cutouts in White Dwarf.

Hopefully they can make the rules a nice mix of casual and deep like X-Wing or Armada, because one of the main things that keeps my wife and gaming partners so-so on BFG and the like is the depth of rules required to really have a good grasp of the nuances of the game. For instance I know for absolute sure that I could much more easily get my wife to enjoy beating the hell out of my in Armada if i were to buy it, even though I've owned three Battlefleet Gothic fleets for more than a decade, just for the rules presentation.

I know between this game, Armada, and Dropfleet Commander, this Gencon could end up being dangerously tempting to the pocketbook, and I definitely sense that this year and into the next is going to be the "time of the fleet-scale".

I'll eventually pick up the fleet battles, but the ground combat game is where I'm getting really excited.

~iPaint

Did anyone catch how the ships were arranged on the flight stands? It looks like each ship is magnetized, but can anyone confirm that?

Also, did anyone find out what was in the release box? Will there be Orbital MACs or the Assault Carrier? The scale difference between the Assault Carrier and the UNSC frigates and cruisers is awesome

This really is the year for space combat games. I like the difference between Armada (detailed capital ships, with few capital ships) and Fleet Battles, which looks like it supports quite a few large ships.

Full contents were posted above, but to put it simply, each side gets one big ship (Epoch/SSV), 5 mid-sized, then a bunch of smaller ones (12 Corvettes for the Cov, 24 Frigates for the UNSC).

All the ships we saw in the first round of renders (see the OP)

MACs and Assault Carriers are not in the starter box.

Ok, thanks for the answers and sorry for asking that again.

I guess then that MACs, Assault Carriers, and Pillar of Autumn will be early expansions.

I'd guess so, and I think we may see Infinity sooner rather than later so the UNSC have something that can trade blows with the Assault Carrier... Although a couple of MAC cannon would hopefully put a dent in it!

This is looking pretty good, quite a large starter set too that seems a good value, but I will need to see the rules before I buy...

Do we have pictures of the ground combat stuff? I can't seem to find them anywhere...

I definitely hope they have lots of ships planned after the initial box set, as while the restrictions of two factions are a given with Halo, only having three variants of ship classes will soon get boring.

I wonder if the ships are modular on the bases? Because I think it'll be really cool if you can remove the escorts from the Capitol ships to make another frigate squadron/element, unless of course they come with those escort ships as standard. I only ask because it looks like from the pics there are identical classes of cruiser with/without the escort, like the Epoch.

Be pretty cool to see baseplates that you can swap out and plug in different formations of ships to build a battlegroup.

 General Seric wrote:
Do we have pictures of the ground combat stuff? I can't seem to find them anywhere...

Check out the previous page...

You've already seen some of the first wave expansion ships. Halcyon, SuperMAC, Assault Carrier.

Updating the main post, will go through all the comments shortly. HUGE thanks to all those that provided pics, I've tried to reference sources, if I missed anyone, please message me and I'll add it in

My hope is that they will have a way to mix squads for the covenant, as the canon puts the Elites, Grunts, and Jackals working in teams together with the Elites serving as "Sergeants" so to speak, rather than them being all squads of one species. This would look much better thematically anyways.

If you look at some of the earlier photos, you will notice that some of the bases of the ships have different kinds of ships on the same base. This shows Spartan Games is not adverse to the idea and, to me, says it is likely that we'll see this. Worst case, you can definitely do this for the Skirmish game!

There's a photo on the Spartan Game forums showing a magnetized base.

Did any one go to Salute and ask about other wave one ships?

Paradigm, I meant to post a big thank you for the link to the bust, so sorry I forgot. That was really cool of you to find,and I will be ordering it. Whoops, really annoyed I didn't get back to you on that one.

David Clarke wrote:https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/community/blog-posts/canon-fodder-taking-orders

Halowaypoint has put up a blog article with previously unseen pictures. Models look gorgeous on the table, and it looks like X-Wing has had some heavy influence on the bases and dice.

Huge thank you for all the pics, have posted in OP and credited you for lots. Cheers!

Medium of Death wrote:Now that looks really cool.

I hope the video explains a bit more.

New video in OP, no explanation, but perdy pictures. There is a shorter video I will also post there shortly but it didn't really explain anything either :(

DrRansom wrote:Looks awesome.

Anyone notice the base on the asteroid? Can someone get the box contents or a game play run through?

Box contents seem to be confirmed, think I've posted them in main post. If not I'll get there shortly! Looks like it's 1 big ship per side, 12 littles for Covenant an 24 littles for the UNSC with the rest of the 49 made up by mediums

RoninXiC wrote:WOW
I love them.

The 49 miniatures seem to include the 3on1 smaller ships but im fine with that.

I'm alarmingly okay with this also. I hope we get some teeny tiny broadswords down the track, haha.

Tyran wrote:I love how the Assault Carriers dwarf everything.

I expect that they will also make the Infinity so the UNSC has something of similar size.

I can't wait to see it, oh the glorious invasions of planets that shall be had

Paradigm wrote:All sounds good! I was hoping there would be ample representation of fighters and boarding assaults, and it looks like I won't be disappointed. (Not that it'll stop me actually fighting out boardings in 28mm once those minis hit! )

Any word on how much more you'd need to add to the starter to get a 'normal' game size?

Not sure, will pm you if I find out. I've ordered 2 sets, hopefully that's good enough! Those expansions look lovely though, hope they're out soon.

Tyran wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

I really doubt we will see a Covenant Supercarrier, that thing is massive (using the 1:20000 scale, it would be 144.8 cm long (4.75 ft)).

And still it pales in comparison with the Mantle's Approach (Didact's ship in Halo 4). Which using the same scale would be 18.57 meters tall (60.93 ft).

Tell you what, though; a custom mat with either of those printed as a 'backdrop' would be pretty damn epic!
Pending what Halo 5 turns up, I'd love to see some Promethean or Forerunner ships.

@David: good to know! Sounds alright to me, I wasn't expecting more than one Capital Ship per side, really. This seems to give you plenty to get going, and assuming it all stays in plastic rather than resin or metal, expansion sets when the arrive shouldn't break the bank.

I wouldn't like proper Forerunner warships, they are massive and far above anything the UNSC and the Covenant can even hope to accomplish. Although I could see Forerunner Sentinel craft in the game.

Now I would like to see the Flood, how it propagates and infects enemy ships and even upgrades them with their arcane knowledge.

The Flood would add heaps! I think fleshing them out would be amazing. I agree Forerunner ships would be so harsh, but maybe they'll make them as ultra powerful ships. Given their size, I can see it being financially viable for a limited run, providing they're at a premium price. I will admit, however, that this is my inner fan hopes potentially biasing my perception.

ds9lord wrote:I love the idea of picking commanders with unique ability's and the boarding rules. Did anyone else notice the pillar of Autumn in the pictures.

I didn't until you pointed it out, I'm too busy trying to keep this thread up to date, was out of order yesterday and am coming back with a vengeance, so thanks!

ds9lord wrote:Does anyone know if there are pictures for the ground combat game.

Updated and linked into the OP

OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:Wow those look great,

especially the grunts (get it off, get it off, get it off.........Boom)

"He's unstoppable! Ahhhhh, taaaahaaaa!"

warboss wrote:Did she say what scale those halo ground minis are in? The multiple minis per base make me think 15mm-ish.

I think you're right! And they're looking great (to me), except, ironically for the flagship models of the Spartans. I love everything else, but to me, I'm struggling to identify them at a glance as Spartans, everything else I can see. Damn those marines are gorgeous.

Duncan_Idaho wrote:The problem is: Spartan not translating their games really hurts their sales on the continent.

That would be infuriating. If a company released Halo in only Spanish, I would be so annoyed. Hopefully Spartan Games will realise Halo is popular in other parts of the world too, and translate it.

AegisGrimm wrote:I hope the Halo Fleet license really oversells what also ends up being a fun game, because the name carries enough weight to carry over onto sales to non-wargamers, which in turn ends up supporting the game. I'm not a very big Halo fan (I think it's cool and all, but I don't worship Master Chief like some do) , but it's an evocative enough setting to add to the fleet-scale genre that I already have loved ever since BattleFleet Gotic debuted as the demo rules with cardboard cutouts in White Dwarf.

Hopefully they can make the rules a nice mix of casual and deep like X-Wing or Armada, because one of the main things that keeps my wife and gaming partners so-so on BFG and the like is the depth of rules required to really have a good grasp of the nuances of the game. For instance I know for absolute sure that I could much more easily get my wife to enjoy beating the hell out of my in Armada if i were to buy it, even though I've owned three Battlefleet Gothic fleets for more than a decade, just for the rules presentation.

I know between this game, Armada, and Dropfleet Commander, this Gencon could end up being dangerously tempting to the pocketbook, and I definitely sense that this year and into the next is going to be the "time of the fleet-scale".

I'm really hoping for a lot of what you've described. I would love to have a Halo Fleet Battle with my significant other. She's sitting beside me and seeming none too interested in the pretty pictures. You are a lucky man!

-iPaint- wrote:I'll eventually pick up the fleet battles, but the ground combat game is where I'm getting really excited.

~iPaint

I know! *breathing intensifies*

DrRansom wrote:Did anyone catch how the ships were arranged on the flight stands? It looks like each ship is magnetized, but can anyone confirm that?

Also, did anyone find out what was in the release box? Will there be Orbital MACs or the Assault Carrier? The scale difference between the Assault Carrier and the UNSC frigates and cruisers is awesome

This really is the year for space combat games. I like the difference between Armada (detailed capital ships, with few capital ships) and Fleet Battles, which looks like it supports quite a few large ships.

I think someone said they are magnetised, though I'm not sure if that's by default in the core box set or a minor conversion for display and gaming purposes. Will let you know when I do!

AegisGrimm wrote:I definitely hope they have lots of ships planned after the initial box set, as while the restrictions of two factions are a given with Halo, only having three variants of ship classes will soon get boring.

I wonder if the ships are modular on the bases? Because I think it'll be really cool if you can remove the escorts from the Capitol ships to make another frigate squadron/element, unless of course they come with those escort ships as standard. I only ask because it looks like from the pics there are identical classes of cruiser with/without the escort, like the Epoch.

Be pretty cool to see baseplates that you can swap out and plug in different formations of ships to build a battlegroup.

Really exited about these possibilities. Different groups having different skills despite being the same ships.

The fleet battle pics just posted, are those prepainted or user painted? if prepainted, they definitely beat out X wing for quality.

Me likey.

 PlaguelordHobbyServices wrote:
The fleet battle pics just posted, are those prepainted or user painted? if prepainted, they definitely beat out X wing for quality.

Me likey.

Definitely user painted, Halo: Fleet Battles is unpainted HIPS, so just like GW's range. But I agree, they've got a fantastic artist to do them

HIPs, not resin? Are you sure? If so, that's really impressive, but I thought all Spartan's releases are resin. (These are awesome either way, though!!)

 RiTides wrote:
HIPs, not resin? Are you sure? If so, that's really impressive, but I thought all Spartan's releases are resin. (These are awesome either way, though!!)

Haha, you're right about Spartan's previous releases; up till now they have all been resin as far as I'm aware, but Halo is HIPs. I've copy pasted their official newsletter (and. of course,I've added some emphasis on the beautiful, glorious section about which you have enquired ):

The Halo: Fleet Battles, The Fall of Reach two player battle box is the ultimate way for fans of the Halo Universe to recreate pivotal space battles between the stalwart forces of the United Nations Space Command (UNSC) and the relentless Covenant armada. Developed in close cooperation with 343 Industries, The Fall of Reach puts you at the centre of the most pivotal naval conflict of the long Human-Covenant War, commanding massive fleets of deadly warships as they clash above the fortified human colony of Reach. Take humanity's last stand to the gaming table!



The Fall of Reach box contents include:



A full colour 100-page rulebook packed full of images and examples
Fall of Reach campaign guide
49 highly-detailed plastic ship models
25 custom Halo Dice
Fleet Commander Data Sheets
Flight Stands and Overlay Cards
Punch-out Scenery and Token sheets
Quick Guide reference sheets

Halo: Fleet Battles delivers an easy to learn, lore-infused, tactically-rich gaming experience that appeals both to experienced wargamers and fans of the Halo Universe.



There are also some pictures at the bottom of the first post where you can see the plastic, they are really great models.

Polyurethane, Polysytrene, and Polyvinyl are all Plastic.

'Plastic' doesn't always mean HIPS.

Will the expansions also be plastic?

Or will the superheavies be in resin?

Cyporiean wrote:Polyurethane, Polysytrene, and Polyvinyl are all Plastic.

'Plastic' doesn't always mean HIPS.

That's a good point, sorry, I hadn't even considered that one. I believe that it is HIPs, but as you've pointed out, the info they've given does not conclusively prove that. I will do my best to find out whether it is or isn't and get that info back to here as soon as possible.

BobtheInquisitor wrote:Will the expansions also be plastic?

Or will the superheavies be in resin?

At this point, I just don't know. Given gamers' preference for plastic and what I see to be a very big-time opportunity for Spartan Games, it's a big hope of mine that it is all plastic, but I'll shoot an email to some Spartan guys and try and get back to you ASAP.

I do honestly hope that they are HIPS.


I like the Halo universe's designs, and HIPS would push me towards picking some stuff up. Definitely going to spend some time looking at the stuff at Gen Con.

Their resin is quite good, so I don't think that's an issue really, but confirmation either way would be great!

Cyporiean wrote:I do honestly hope that they are HIPS.


I like the Halo universe's designs, and HIPS would push me towards picking some stuff up. Definitely going to spend some time looking at the stuff at Gen Con.

Haha, hopefully you bring back more pictures here!

RiTides wrote:Their resin is quite good, so I don't think that's an issue really, but confirmation either way would be great!

I've sent out my little tendrils to a few people, some Spartan affiliated and others that spoke to them at Salute, hopefully it won't be long for a reply!

OMG. That 15 MM scale!

Oh yes more please!!! My poor wallet!

Dang it... why did I peek in here. I told myself I'd stick to 40K, GW specialist games, and X-Wing... so much for that.

*stockpiles bottle caps*

 RiTides wrote:
Their resin is quite good, so I don't think that's an issue really, but confirmation either way would be great!

Maybe it is now, but not when I bought a bunch of FSA and Uncharted Seas minis. The resin was terribly warped, unevenly shrunken, misaligned and craggy. Their metal had that Edward James Olmos texture, too. I will not buy another Spartan resin again, so it matters quite a bit to me.

DrRansom wrote:Did anyone catch how the ships were arranged on the flight stands? It looks like each ship is magnetized, but can anyone confirm that?

Also, did anyone find out what was in the release box? Will there be Orbital MACs or the Assault Carrier? The scale difference between the Assault Carrier and the UNSC frigates and cruisers is awesome

This really is the year for space combat games. I like the difference between Armada (detailed capital ships, with few capital ships) and Fleet Battles, which looks like it supports quite a few large ships.

I can confirm the ships are magnetised:

Stormwall wrote:OMG. That 15 MM scale!

Oh yes more please!!! My poor wallet!

Mine is crying, so very, very hard at this point

djphranq wrote:Dang it... why did I peek in here. I told myself I'd stick to 40K, GW specialist games, and X-Wing... so much for that.

*stockpiles bottle caps*

Too late! No takesie-backsies, you've seen them, you're lost. Don't pretend you can resist, it's just not worth it

BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 RiTides wrote:
Their resin is quite good, so I don't think that's an issue really, but confirmation either way would be great!

Maybe it is now, but not when I bought a bunch of FSA and Uncharted Seas minis. The resin was terribly warped, unevenly shrunken, misaligned and craggy. Their metal had that Edward James Olmos texture, too. I will not buy another Spartan resin again, so it matters quite a bit to me.

That's sad to hear, I will find out about expansions and superheavies though and am happy to message you when I do, if you'd like?

Quality is better on the resin stuff, but they still are bad with metal. I have a huge bag of replacement parts. That´s the reason Planetfall has so few stuff in metal and why there are fewer moving parts (compared with DW).

That would be infuriating. If a company released Halo in only Spanish, I would be so annoyed. Hopefully Spartan Games will realise Halo is popular in other parts of the world too, and translate it.

Not that a lot of distributors with a track record of good translations not tried to. Also they do not allow fan translations. Always saying that they can´t assure the quality of their rules when translated.

ONI-S3, I would appreciate that. Thank you.

I just want to paint up a pillar of autumn. (And yes, I realize the fluff reasons as to why I can't.)

Super stoked! fething Maelstrom and now this? Right after the Terra Marines from Titanforge?

Ohnoeessss4mybank.jpg

Duncan_Idaho wrote:Quality is better on the resin stuff, but they still are bad with metal. I have a huge bag of replacement parts. That´s the reason Planetfall has so few stuff in metal and why there are fewer moving parts (compared with DW).

That would be infuriating. If a company released Halo in only Spanish, I would be so annoyed. Hopefully Spartan Games will realise Halo is popular in other parts of the world too, and translate it.

Not that a lot of distributors with a track record of good translations not tried to. Also they do not allow fan translations. Always saying that they can´t assure the quality of their rules when translated.

Haha, yes, I have not seen a buggy translation yet! And of course they don't, all fans are silly and unable to do such things. We need a professional to maintain our high rate of typos, amateurs just wouldn't hit the mark! (looking at you, Mantic)

BobtheInquisitor wrote:ONI-S3, I would appreciate that. Thank you.

No problem

Stormwall wrote:I just want to paint up a pillar of autumn. (And yes, I realize the fluff reasons as to why I can't.)

Super stoked! fething Maelstrom and now this? Right after the Terra Marines from Titanforge?

Ohnoeessss4mybank.jpg

Haha, I know the pain. But why can't you have the Pillar of Autumn at the Fall of Reach? It was there. Unless you mean a literal pillar of autumn, which was not present. In fairness though, neither were the pillars of winter, spring or summer, so I don't know why you're singling out autumn

Oh? I feel so stupid, I forgot this was set in reach. I'm stuck in Halo 5 readiness mode.

No dramas, it's always good seeing more fans of the lore

I can say it is definately a 15mm game for the ground combat, I can also say that yes the bases are designed with the ability to change and swap "elements" in mind, so you can have frigates break off to escort Cruisers/Carriers etc etc or vice versa.. Adding to that, yes, they are all plastic, NOT resin and to my knowledge won't be pre-painted, it is not infact Spartan Games producing the models, but another company that produces plastics, in order so that Halo won't affect their in-house production output, Spartan is just designing the models and doing the rules. *Turns off the lights and skulks back to his corner.*

Thanks for the info! With regards to the 'swapping' of frigates ect, is that something that can happen in game, or just for pre-game options? Being able to reassign a Frigate to protect a Cruiser ect in the game itself.

Hmmmm.. I never asked specifically or recall being told specifically, so can't say right now i'm afraid, but the idea is definately that they can change formations and that is why the bases can be swapped about as such. I got an impression that it was designed with the ability to have formations potentially change and adjust during the game itself, but that's only impression, so could be wrong there.

I'd be surprised if you can change formation since it's printed on the base. Maybe their magnetized to be removed as casualties?

Except the box only comes with one Epoch, and pics show bases and formations for one both with/without an escort.

I'm hoping the baseplate is swappable like in Xwing, with the escorted versions of ships having the extra hole for a frigate's flight stand to go through into a hole in the plastic base. A super-easy way to upgrade cruiser elements.

It could be you switch out bases in order to change formation if they are magnetised?

I'd be surprised if they were magnetized when for loads simpler the flight stands could just plug into holes in the base.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:
It could be you switch out bases in order to change formation if they are magnetised?

It works like this, the formation center/print bit is entirely swappable, thus to change formation you just pull it out and put in the new formation you want, pegs and all.

 ONI-S3 wrote:

The Flood would add heaps! I think fleshing them out would be amazing. I agree Forerunner ships would be so harsh, but maybe they'll make them as ultra powerful ships. Given their size, I can see it being financially viable for a limited run, providing they're at a premium price. I will admit, however, that this is my inner fan hopes potentially biasing my perception.

You don't understand the size difference. Some Forerunners ships, using the scale, would still be larger than a human.

GenRifDrake wrote:
I can say it is definately a 15mm game for the ground combat, I can also say that yes the bases are designed with the ability to change and swap "elements" in mind, so you can have frigates break off to escort Cruisers/Carriers etc etc or vice versa.. Adding to that, yes, they are all plastic, NOT resin and to my knowledge won't be pre-painted, it is not infact Spartan Games producing the models, but another company that produces plastics, in order so that Halo won't affect their in-house production output, Spartan is just designing the models and doing the rules. *Turns off the lights and skulks back to his corner.*

Could you come out of the corner for a second again and say where you got this info?

I see you said plastic, do you know if it's on a sprue (HIPs, high impact polystyrene) or not (meaning PVC or another plastic material, like is common with board games, or CMON/Mantic/Privateer Press models). HIPs seems unlikely but I like what I'm hearing so far, regardless!

Also any word on release date for the ground game, and if it's made from the same material / by the same manufacturer?

The two Halo tables at Salute were basically divided into a demo table with the contents of the starter set, and a "coming soon" table with the Pillar of Autumn, Covie assault carriers, MAC platforms etc.

Everything in Halo: Fleet Battles is going to be made in plastic. The huge assault carriers at the show were actually resin (I tried to lift one and it had a fair bit of weight to it), but Derek from SG confirmed that it'll be plastic on release.

On the subject of bases, they're not magnetised. Each flight peg simply slots into a hole on the base (much like X-Wing) and you can use different bases to change up formations.

From what I gathered talking to various Spartan bods at Salute, HFB is not going to only have two factions, and it looks like the Flood and Forerunners are going to make an appearance in plastic at some point.

Oh, and about the ground game, I heard "sometime next year". Take from that what you will.

Cannor wrote:

Oh, and about the ground game, I heard "sometime next year". Take from that what you will.

I take from that a nice sense of relief that I have a year to collect a fleet or two before the ground stuff steals all my money!

One thought about wave 1 expansions, I'd like Spartan Games to include some smaller ships as well, another UNSC destroyer or Covenant destroyer.

As small ships will be the most common on the table-top, I think it would be good to have greater variation there.

I wonder how they've balanced this game, given that UNSC ships usually get their asses kicked pretty hard by the Covenant.

 angelofvengeance wrote:
I wonder how they've balanced this game, given that UNSC ships usually get their asses kicked pretty hard by the Covenant.

In the books, the UNSC were capable of winning with the use of superior tactics and/or numbers. Numerical superiority is easy to do, just have the UNSC ships cost fewer points (and you can tell from the screenshots that this appears to be a direction theyve taken). As for superior tactics, they could possibly make the UNSC Admirals' abilities better than the Covenant Fleet Masters'?

I want to see some more pictures of the ground battle stuff. I was skeptical about it being 15mm scale, but those looked like fantastic sculpts for the scale. The elites looked particularly well sculpted to the source material.

Having seen quality and detail of Spartan's 10mm Firestorm Planetfall, doesn't surprise me at all!

Tyran wrote:

 ONI-S3 wrote:

The Flood would add heaps! I think fleshing them out would be amazing. I agree Forerunner ships would be so harsh, but maybe they'll make them as ultra powerful ships. Given their size, I can see it being financially viable for a limited run, providing they're at a premium price. I will admit, however, that this is my inner fan hopes potentially biasing my perception.

You don't understand the size difference. Some Forerunners ships, using the scale, would still be larger than a human.

Haha, when I say a limited run of Forerunner ships, I don't mean all of them! That would be insane(ly cool but totally infeasible), in the same way High charity is obviously out. I'm talking about some of the bigger ones, bigger than the ones seen in Halo Wars, but much smaller than ships like the Didact's.

Cannor wrote:The two Halo tables at Salute were basically divided into a demo table with the contents of the starter set, and a "coming soon" table with the Pillar of Autumn, Covie assault carriers, MAC platforms etc.

Everything in Halo: Fleet Battles is going to be made in plastic. The huge assault carriers at the show were actually resin (I tried to lift one and it had a fair bit of weight to it), but Derek from SG confirmed that it'll be plastic on release.

On the subject of bases, they're not magnetised. Each flight peg simply slots into a hole on the base (much like X-Wing) and you can use different bases to change up formations.

From what I gathered talking to various Spartan bods at Salute, HFB is not going to only have two factions, and it looks like the Flood and Forerunners are going to make an appearance in plastic at some point.

Oh, and about the ground game, I heard "sometime next year". Take from that what you will.

Thanks for that! Gives me time to brace myself for the coming model storm. I'll also correct the magnetised bases statement in the OP, thanks again Cannor!

Paradigm wrote:

Cannor wrote:

Oh, and about the ground game, I heard "sometime next year". Take from that what you will.

I take from that a nice sense of relief that I have a year to collect a fleet or two before the ground stuff steals all my money!

I know. This is going to suck me dry, then I am going to borrow from relatives and suck them dry too. All of the Fleets, all of the Ground Forces. I'm hoping they don't stager the releases too much, I can only afford to get stuff with free postage in general. If they stager stuff I'll have to convince mates to go in until we get to the 100 quid free postage threshold.

DrRansom wrote:One thought about wave 1 expansions, I'd like Spartan Games to include some smaller ships as well, another UNSC destroyer or Covenant destroyer.

As small ships will be the most common on the table-top, I think it would be good to have greater variation there.

Yeah! Especially as Halo-philes start amassing truly gargantuan fleets, as things are I'm going to have access to three fleets, that's a lot of the littlies. Which I'm okay with, because I love them. Here's hoping for teeny, tiny broadswords!

angelofvengeance wrote:I wonder how they've balanced this game, given that UNSC ships usually get their asses kicked pretty hard by the Covenant.

I'm with BurningSky93 on the points thing, not so much about generals being more overpowered UNSC commanders thing

BurningSky93 wrote:

 angelofvengeance wrote:
I wonder how they've balanced this game, given that UNSC ships usually get their asses kicked pretty hard by the Covenant.

In the books, the UNSC were capable of winning with the use of superior tactics and/or numbers. Numerical superiority is easy to do, just have the UNSC ships cost fewer points (and you can tell from the screenshots that this appears to be a direction theyve taken). As for superior tactics, they could possibly make the UNSC Admirals' abilities better than the Covenant Fleet Masters'?

I don't think that's likely, seeing that we can already see fleet numbers heavily skewing towards UNSC, I think that should be more than enough for the moment.

CatMines wrote:I want to see some more pictures of the ground battle stuff. I was skeptical about it being 15mm scale, but those looked like fantastic sculpts for the scale. The elites looked particularly well sculpted to the source material.

Wouldn't we all! I think the Elites are amazing, as are the marines and grunts, and the vehicles. In fact, I am in admiration of everything but the Spartans. I'm going to send an email to Spartan saying something along the lines of "We've seen some of the pics from Salute, and we are impressed. However, the models are not able to be appreciated in their entirety because of the glass cabinet; please give us some clearer pictures of the stuff we've already got pictures of"

GenRifDrake wrote:Having seen quality and detail of Spartan's 10mm Firestorm Planetfall, doesn't surprise me at all!

Not really relevant to this particular post of yours, but thanks for all that info you posted on the last page!



Automatically Appended Next Post:


Side by side of the Pillar of Autumn and a regular Marathon, source; Cody Pelletier


Automatically Appended Next Post:
From Dakka user NAVARRO, source: http://mr-bugman.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/salute-report-2of6-hawk-wargames-halo.html

 ONI-S3 wrote:

Haha, when I say a limited run of Forerunner ships, I don't mean all of them! That would be insane(ly cool but totally infeasible), in the same way High charity is obviously out. I'm talking about some of the bigger ones, bigger than the ones seen in Halo Wars, but much smaller than ships like the Didact's.

Actually the Didact's Mantle's Approach would be larger than my house using the scale (16 meters tall IIRC).

But yeah I guess we could see some smaller Forerunner ships, but even the Keyship (the civilian Forerunner ship that powered High Charity and shrugged off everything the UNSC threw at it) that appears in the games would be around 70 cm (2.3 ft) tall.

Those ground models at 15mm (if that is their scale) look excellent for their size. Will make awesome looking epic scale battles far easier to achieve and let us fit more vehicles on the table too, which is awesome.

Not to mention now I can see who would win in a fight, the covenant, or my SU 152 Battalion from FoW

I always had a hard on for those Marathon classes due to the Autumn (Not same class but, design is the similar.)

I love it, they've kept them so close to concept.

I wonder if the Spirit of Fire from Halo Wars will make an appearance?

Looks similar to the largest ship, but not the same.

Love that MAC cannon emplacement! Anyone know why one of them is vertical, though? I know in space it would make no difference, but I'm wondering about the in-game application. Maybe they have to rotate between firing (horizontal) and moving (vertical) or something? It would potentially make them quite cumbersome if you have to go up-turn-down fire, which would offset their (presumably) massive firepower somewhat.

 Paradigm wrote:
Love that MAC cannon emplacement! Anyone know why one of them is vertical, though? I know in space it would make no difference, but I'm wondering about the in-game application. Maybe they have to rotate between firing (horizontal) and moving (vertical) or something? It would potentially make them quite cumbersome if you have to go up-turn-down fire, which would offset their (presumably) massive firepower somewhat.

IIRC, when the gun's not in use/on standby, they're vertical and rotate into position when being used. I believe we saw them in both positions in Halo 2.

Edit: Yep, here's one and provides the reason for why they go vertical:

https://meeples.wordpress.com/2015/04/27/meeples-miniatures-episode-144-salute-2015/
Meeples podcast interviews a couple of the nice folks from spartan from around 1 hour 10 minutes in.
Quick summary-assault carrier is 10 inches. For gameplay it has fore/mid/aft all of which are damaged separately, and can be crippled with knock on effects to the whole model.
covenant hold the overall advantage in war as per lore on the macro-scale, on the table-top micro-scale battles represent the UNSC engaging on reasonably favourable terms and thus standing a fighting chance.
MAC platforms are easy to turn from horizontal to vertical on the flight stand.
Some kind of combat effectiveness table to replace statistics for ships, I wasn't clear on this.
Only 2 double sided tokens- damage marker/activation.vulnerable/sabotage
Wing phase is important. Bombers are good at finishing ships, Interceptors kill bombers etc.
Represented by card to keep costs under control, but if game does well there should be a luxury version of the fighters.
Infinity and Spirit of Fire on the way, UNSC super carriers and much much more to come. Lots of reassurance about the close working relationship between 343 and Spartan.

 angelofvengeance wrote:
I wonder if the Spirit of Fire from Halo Wars will make an appearance?

Looks similar to the largest ship, but not the same.

I expect it would, probably both as a "hero" ship like the PoA, and other normal Phoenix class.

I also expect we have some normal Halcyon ships.

And I also expect the eventual release of Post-War UNSC ships.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Paradigm wrote:
Love that MAC cannon emplacement! Anyone know why one of them is vertical, though? I know in space it would make no difference, but I'm wondering about the in-game application. Maybe they have to rotate between firing (horizontal) and moving (vertical) or something? It would potentially make them quite cumbersome if you have to go up-turn-down fire, which would offset their (presumably) massive firepower somewhat.

ODPs platforms are vertical as they try to be between the enemy and the planet they are defending.

The Inifinity looks like a good size fit equivalent to the carrier assuming this one pictured below is the same one modelled.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
Love that MAC cannon emplacement! Anyone know why one of them is vertical, though? I know in space it would make no difference, but I'm wondering about the in-game application. Maybe they have to rotate between firing (horizontal) and moving (vertical) or something? It would potentially make them quite cumbersome if you have to go up-turn-down fire, which would offset their (presumably) massive firepower somewhat.

IIRC, when the gun's not in use/on standby, they're vertical and rotate into position when being used. I believe we saw them in both positions in Halo 2.

Edit: Yep, here's one and provides the reason for why they go vertical:

We only saw them in vertical position in Halo 2.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 warboss wrote:
The Inifinity looks like a good size fit equivalent to the carrier assuming this one pictured below is the same one modelled.

I expect the Infinity to do horrible things to the Assault Carrier.

Cheers for the answers on the MAC platform positioning!

@Tyran: I expect Infinity to do horrible things to most things!

Will the busts be available later? I really want the covenant one :(

Will probable buy into both games by the looks of it. uhoh D:

From the sound of it the bust were just for pre-orders at Salute,

so unless the put them out at another show/convention you'll need to look on ebay or other re-sale sites

So that being the case, would it be safe to assume that Miranda Keyes' In Amber Clad and Lord Hoods' Forward Unto Dawn ships might make an appearance too then?

I imagine most of the named ships from the series (at least the games) will make an appearance.

I'm torn on the ground game - I'm going to buy into it since it looks pretty awesome but I'm a little disappointed about 15mm as it means we can't re-use DZC/Planetfall terrain.

 Tyran wrote:


We only saw them in vertical position in Halo 2.

Technically, it's all relative.

My point was, the MAC is built into the long portion, so they're designed to rotate around to aim.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Tyran wrote:


We only saw them in vertical position in Halo 2.

Technically, it's all relative.

My point was, the MAC is built into the long portion, so they're designed to rotate around to aim.

The MAC doesn't rotate, the whole platform does. Look at the pics in page 1, the horizontal ODPs is exactly the same model in a horizontal position.

 Tyran wrote:

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Tyran wrote:


We only saw them in vertical position in Halo 2.

Technically, it's all relative.

My point was, the MAC is built into the long portion, so they're designed to rotate around to aim.

The MAC doesn't rotate, the whole platform does. Look at the pics in page 1, the horizontal ODPs is exactly the same model in a horizontal position.

You realize we're arguing the same thing, right?

The original question was asking why the MAC model was in different positions on the base. Most people have been referring to the entire station model as a MAC emplacement, not the technically accurate ODP name.

Well, its your fault for not being technically accurate.

 Tyran wrote:
Well, its your fault for not being technically accurate.

Honestly, I completely forgot it was called an ODP.

UNSC Infinity is the Halo 4 ship right?

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
Well, its your fault for not being technically accurate.

Honestly, I completely forgot it was called an ODP.

In fairness, even the model itself says'MAC Cannon Emplacement' on the base!

AoV, yes, Infinity is the Halo 4 ship.

You guys realize the Infinity has shielding too right? Because the elites got involved with it's R&D in the lore.

Whole lot of hurt coming from that...

I'm actually super hyped for both games. I just really hope I am able to find someone to play with at my LGS that will be the UNSC to my Covenant.

 angelofvengeance wrote:
So that being the case, would it be safe to assume that Miranda Keyes' In Amber Clad and Lord Hoods' Forward Unto Dawn ships might make an appearance too then?

I'm not sure there'd be a reason to, since both of those ships are stock-standard frigates. The Pillar of Autumn is a special case being a one-of-a-kind heavily refitted Halcyon Class.

MrMoustaffa wrote:Those ground models at 15mm (if that is their scale) look excellent for their size. Will make awesome looking epic scale battles far easier to achieve and let us fit more vehicles on the table too, which is awesome.

Not to mention now I can see who would win in a fight, the covenant, or my SU 152 Battalion from FoW

Haha, hopefully the Covenant can at least take some humans with a 600 year disadvantage!

Stormwall wrote:I always had a hard on for those Marathon classes due to the Autumn (Not same class but, design is the similar.)

I love it, they've kept them so close to concept.

They really have kept the aesthetic close, makes me even more excited for 15mm and 28mm ODSTs!

angelofvengeance wrote:I wonder if the Spirit of Fire from Halo Wars will make an appearance?

Looks similar to the largest ship, but not the same.

I am almost certain it will, given the kinds of things Spartan has been saying

Paradigm wrote:Love that MAC cannon emplacement! Anyone know why one of them is vertical, though? I know in space it would make no difference, but I'm wondering about the in-game application. Maybe they have to rotate between firing (horizontal) and moving (vertical) or something? It would potentially make them quite cumbersome if you have to go up-turn-down fire, which would offset their (presumably) massive firepower somewhat.

It will be interesting to see, but I am also of the opinion that this will be a case of showing whether it is ready to fire or not.

David Clarke wrote:https://meeples.wordpress.com/2015/04/27/meeples-miniatures-episode-144-salute-2015/
Meeples podcast interviews a couple of the nice folks from spartan from around 1 hour 10 minutes in.
Quick summary-assault carrier is 10 inches. For gameplay it has fore/mid/aft all of which are damaged separately, and can be crippled with knock on effects to the whole model.
covenant hold the overall advantage in war as per lore on the macro-scale, on the table-top micro-scale battles represent the UNSC engaging on reasonably favourable terms and thus standing a fighting chance.
MAC platforms are easy to turn from horizontal to vertical on the flight stand.
Some kind of combat effectiveness table to replace statistics for ships, I wasn't clear on this.
Only 2 double sided tokens- damage marker/activation.vulnerable/sabotage
Wing phase is important. Bombers are good at finishing ships, Interceptors kill bombers etc.
Represented by card to keep costs under control, but if game does well there should be a luxury version of the fighters.
Infinity and Spirit of Fire on the way, UNSC super carriers and much much more to come. Lots of reassurance about the close working relationship between 343 and Spartan.

Thanks heaps for that! Means I will be getting my broadswords! Banshees will be too small, I dare say though, so maybe the Covenant will be limited to Spirits and Phantoms, possibly some slightly up-scaled Seraphs?

Tyran wrote:

 angelofvengeance wrote:
I wonder if the Spirit of Fire from Halo Wars will make an appearance?

Looks similar to the largest ship, but not the same.

I expect it would, probably both as a "hero" ship like the PoA, and other normal Phoenix class.

I also expect we have some normal Halcyon ships.

And I also expect the eventual release of Post-War UNSC ships.

Yeah, I think SoF will make an appearance, maybe even in a Harvest themed pack. I wonder if Humans can ally with Separatists but cannot ally with Loyalists. Might be fun to have UNSC + Separatists taking on a brute fleet, like at Installation 00, but with more than a Frigate of human representation.

warboss wrote:The Inifinity looks like a good size fit equivalent to the carrier assuming this one pictured below is the same one modelled.

This has me hugely excited. Can't wait to see the stats on that bad boy!

ckig wrote:Will the busts be available later? I really want the covenant one :(

Will probable buy into both games by the looks of it. uhoh D:

Sadly, I don't think they will. Though they have not actually said that they are limited edition, it has been somewhat intimated, but perhaps they'll be offered at a later date. If we pre-ordered on the day of Salute we got a free bust, I'll recheck but I'm not sure they actually said this will be the only opportunity. There was mention of "while stocks last" but that wasn't necessarily conclusive proof of limited edition.

angelofvengeance wrote:So that being the case, would it be safe to assume that Miranda Keyes' In Amber Clad and Lord Hoods' Forward Unto Dawn ships might make an appearance too then?

I'm with Aus Askar on this, they could certainly be, but they'd likely just be the stock standard ships with a different paint job and card. I think it's more likely we'll see characters such as these ones appearing as commanders, maybe even with their own busts! If only Buck was a Fleet commander...

Aus Askar wrote:

I'm not sure there'd be a reason to, since both of those ships are stock-standard frigates. The Pillar of Autumn is a special case being a one-of-a-kind heavily refitted Halcyon Class.

Exactly! And I think that the Spirit of Fire was pretty unique in that it was a colonisation ship that was also heavily modified. Also, congrats on joining Dakka and good choice the first thread in which to post

caylentor wrote:I imagine most of the named ships from the series (at least the games) will make an appearance.

I'm torn on the ground game - I'm going to buy into it since it looks pretty awesome but I'm a little disappointed about 15mm as it means we can't re-use DZC/Planetfall terrain.

That's a bit depressing that you can't use your terrain. Maybe your forces found a Forerunner size-increasing array and are now giants until they can shut it down

angelofvengeance wrote:UNSC Infinity is the Halo 4 ship right?

Stormwall wrote:You guys realize the Infinity has shielding too right? Because the elites got involved with it's R&D in the lore.

Whole lot of hurt coming from that...

The tonnage and armour of the UNSC with the Elites and weaponry of the Covenant... *wistful sigh*

ultimentra wrote:I'm actually super hyped for both games. I just really hope I am able to find someone to play with at my LGS that will be the UNSC to my Covenant.

I'm sure you will, here in south of South Perth I don't really even have a lgs, so if you can't find someone we can exchange commiserations

I have pre-ordered my HALO: Fleet battles this weekend.
I wanted to get the Covenant buste and want to have the ship models anyway.

And now i see the ground combat models, i am both surprised a bit as well as VERY interested.

Surprised because I kind of expected 6/10mm or 28/32mm, not 15mm.
Normally i am not that fond of 15mm. It is too much an in-between scale. Infantry looks best on 28/32mm and vehicles look just as well (but we can field more) on 10mm.

And understandable: a 10mm game competing with Planetfall would not be in Spartan's interest.

But what i see here, the grunts and spartans, they look very good. I look forward to more info...


Back to HALO: Fleet battles and space in general: It really seems to be space combat game season...
Spartan's Firestorm Armada is getting more and more models (i too am building fleets).
X-Wing stays strong.
Star Wars Armada is here and that seems to do well enough. Played it, liked it, but not getting into it, too simple and predictable for my taste.
And Drop Fleet Commander is also announced. Nice ships, but i personally don't find the DZC game system good enough. But i will keep informed on this.

HALO: Fleet battles in any case has great miniatures and a level of combat that is, to me, more interesting than Star Wars: Armada.
And if HALO's special dice system is done well, it can also be easier for the non-wargamer or new-wargamer.

Interesting times...

ORicK wrote:
I have pre-ordered my HALO: Fleet battles this weekend.
I wanted to get the Covenant buste and want to have the ship models anyway.

And now i see the ground combat models, i am both surprised a bit as well as VERY interested.

Surprised because I kind of expected 6/10mm or 28/32mm, not 15mm.
Normally i am not that fond of 15mm. It is too much an in-between scale. Infantry looks best on 28/32mm and vehicles look just as well (but we can field more) on 10mm.

And understandable: a 10mm game competing with Planetfall would not be in Spartan's interest.

But what i see here, the grunts and spartans, they look very good. I look forward to more info...


Back to HALO: Fleet battles and space in general: It really seems to be space combat game season...
Spartan's Firestorm Armada is getting more and more models (i too am building fleets).
X-Wing stays strong.
Star Wars Armada is here and that seems to do well enough. Played it, liked it, but not getting into it, too simple and predictable for my taste.
And Drop Fleet Commander is also announced. Nice ships, but i personally don't find the DZC game system good enough. But i will keep informed on this.

HALO: Fleet battles in any case has great miniatures and a level of combat that is, to me, more interesting than Star Wars: Armada.
And if HALO's special dice system is done well, it can also be easier for the non-wargamer or new-wargamer.

Interesting times...

Congratulations on making the plunge! And you're right, this is the season of Space Combat, we're truly some privileged gamers for sure. I hope it is easier for non-gamers, wil make demos much quicker and easier and therefore more likely to be picked up as a game by fence sitters. As for the Ground Combat, while it is in 15mm, there will be a third game set in 28mm, so if you're as excited for that as I am then we have better things to look forwards too than even the 15mm game

Making that plunge was a no-brainer :-)

And i do look forward to that third game, because painting 28mm is my favourite scale and i also want to be able to use my scarab in 28mm scale.

I do look forward to the first information regarding the 15mm game. And I hope it will be plastic, because in resin 15mm tends to get a bit expensive.

I think they certainly are heading the way of plastic by the look of things, ORicK.

The contents of the Fall of Reach have been listed and ultra, ultra heavily indicated as HIPs:

"Hopefully I can clarify things a little.
The Capital Models (Carrers and Cruisers from both sides) are all 1 Model per base, with the option on the sprue to add a Escort if desired.
The Paris Frigates are fielded in 3 per Base.
The SDV Heavy Corvettes are 2 Models per base.

This leads to a breakdown as follows:
UNSC:
1 Epoch-class Heavy Carrier Elements (this can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional Paris Frigate found on the sprue)
4 Marathon-class Heavy Cruisers Elements (each of these can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional Paris Frigate found on the sprue)
8 Paris-class Heavy Frigate Elements (these can be organised into two different formations)
UNSC total: 13 Elements
(...or... 34 Individual Models if you include the Escorts found on the sprue that can be added to the Cruisers and Carrier as Escorts)

Covenant:
1 ORS-class Heavy Cruiser Elements (this can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional SDV Heavy Corvette found on the sprue)
2 CCS-class Battle Cruisers Elements (each of these can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional SDV Heavy Corvette found on the sprue)
6 SDV-class Heavy Corvette Elements (these can be organised into two different formations)
Covenant Total: 9 Elements
(...or...18 Individual Models if you include the Escorts found on the sprue to be added to the Heavy and Battle Cruisers as Escorts.)

Combined, that's 52 Models in total in the box.
The Demo Table at Salute was missing one SDV Heavy Corvette Base for part of the day after a member of the public accidentally broke it ..... so some of the pictures from the day will be missing a base (as the glue did its work!)

Hope that helps?
Cheers
Delboy/Spartan Derek "

Source: http://community.spartangames.co.uk/index.php?/topic/13971-halo-fleet-battles-the-fall-of-reach-discussion-thread/page-4

This looks very tempting. Never been into a fleet-based system but the ground game is promising. 28mm is hopefully worth the wait. Between me and the wee man our love of Halo may force my hand, haha.

Certainly looks like HIP and let's hope it is!

you sound like a very wise man getting your little one into Halo so early, haha.

Here are some pics I found on the Spartan Forums, original source that I found them through was Kurgan, can be found at: http://community.spartangames.co.uk/index.php?/topic/13971-halo-fleet-battles-the-fall-of-reach-discussion-thread/page-2

 Stormwall wrote:
You guys realize the Infinity has shielding too right? Because the elites got involved with it's R&D in the lore.

Whole lot of hurt coming from that...

That's not true. The reason why the Infinity has shields is that it is a test ship were the UNSC put all the new possible tech (It has both Covenant and Forerunner tech).

Spartan have put a "Back from Salute" article up on their website, they will be doing GenCon I remember this being a thing people wanted to know!

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/back-from-salute

Of note:


Looks like they've really hit the sweet spot for scale there, big enough to have sizeable and detailed minis while still allowing for huge battles!

 Paradigm wrote:
Of note:


Looks like they've really hit the sweet spot for scale there, big enough to have sizeable and detailed minis while still allowing for huge battles!

That Scorpion!!!!! Me wants now!!

I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

Looks as if it's in scale with the turret gunner. Seems fine to me.

 Medium of Death wrote:
Looks as if it's in scale with the turret gunner. Seems fine to me.

Spoiler:

Twas just going by the measurements I found on the halo wiki. Not that I care as it looks right and good

You know what I just realized? Ground battles could give us that covenant walker too!!!! Ever since Halo 3, I've longed to see 3 of them on a table together!!!

Daston wrote:
I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

The Scorpion is absurdly big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looking at the wikia, a Tiger 2 is 6,4 meters large and the Scorpion is 10.2 meters large. That's a massive difference.

 Tyran wrote:

Daston wrote:
I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

The Scorpion is absurdly big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looking at the wikia, a Tiger 2 is 6,4 meters large and the Scorpion is 10.2 meters large. That's a massive difference.

Very true, this should help underscore the Scorpions size:

The Scorpion Tank is massive.

Look at the turret gunner. You can see his head.

It's definitely in scale with the game. I'm not sure why you're that bothered about the Wiki.

Hmm, so it looks like I'm going to invest in a Halo tabletop game. The question is: which one??

I don't have a space fleet game yet...hmm...

Heading back to the overall ground game, I'm not shocked that it's 15mm as that makes it incompatible with their other products, just as the fleet game has a distinct scale separation from Firestorm. I expect we will likely see a spec-ops type skirmish ground game at some point much in the same manner as Dystopian Wars & Firestorm Armada.

I'm pretty happy to see Halo is coming out in15mm, there are allot of companies out there that I can bulk out my UNSC with, and plenty of terrain to be had.

David Clarke wrote:Spartan have put a "Back from Salute" article up on their website, they will be doing GenCon I remember this being a thing people wanted to know!

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/back-from-salute

thanks for that, I'll update the main post shortly

Paradigm wrote:Of note:


Looks like they've really hit the sweet spot for scale there, big enough to have sizeable and detailed minis while still allowing for huge battles!

What a sight to behold! Crikey though, think of the size of the scorpion in 28mm! It'll be the same size as a Imperial guard stormlord

Enigma Crisis wrote:

That Scorpion!!!!! Me wants now!!

BACK OFF, FIRST ONE'S MINE. MINE I TELL YOU. *ahem* I mean, plenty to go around.

Medium of Death wrote:Looks as if it's in scale with the turret gunner. Seems fine to me.

Spoiler:

PlaguelordHobbyServices wrote:You know what I just realized? Ground battles could give us that covenant walker too!!!! Ever since Halo 3, I've longed to see 3 of them on a table together!!!

Collinsas wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

Daston wrote:
I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

The Scorpion is absurdly big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looking at the wikia, a Tiger 2 is 6,4 meters large and the Scorpion is 10.2 meters large. That's a massive difference.

Very true, this should help underscore the Scorpions size:

Thanks for that, that does help to drive home the scale a lot It's really nice that vehicles are not going to be shrunk down just because they get a bit bigger comparatively

Accolade wrote:Hmm, so it looks like I'm going to invest in a Halo tabletop game. The question is: which one??

I don't have a space fleet game yet...hmm...

The only advice I can give is all three... you're going to really have to mull this over if you only want one!

Collinsas wrote:Heading back to the overall ground game, I'm not shocked that it's 15mm as that makes it incompatible with their other products, just as the fleet game has a distinct scale separation from Firestorm. I expect we will likely see a spec-ops type skirmish ground game at some point much in the same manner as Dystopian Wars & Firestorm Armada.

I'm pretty happy to see Halo is coming out in15mm, there are allot of companies out there that I can bulk out my UNSC with, and plenty of terrain to be had.

There has been confirmation that there will be 2 separate games for ground combat (one of which is actually called ground combat) and the other is likely, as you said, to be a 28mm spec ops variant. i really hope we get the vehicles in 28mm as well though, the field day I will have playing with them. I will have so very, very many of them ordered. And while I'm glad that there is an option for supplements to the 15mm UNSC, based off of those marines, I'll be going for a lot of them. They hit me in all the right ways, can't wait to see the ODSTs!

About the terrain though, do you have any good suggestions as to where I could look around to get a feel of what's on offer? I'm a princess that hasn't ever really ventured outside of 28mm, save some 1/72 scale historical Greek and Roman stuff I never got around to painting, let alone preparing terrain for.

Where/When was the confirmation about 28mm? I remember there being talk of the game being in "multiple scales" but the only time I can think of the 28mm issue being broached directly was in the meeples podcast where 28mm was made to sound like the exact opposite of what they wanted.

Oops, sorry for not being clear enough, but in the above post I said confirmation for two scales, one of which is likely to be 28mm. So the conformation is for 2 scales, not the 'likely to be 28mm' bit. I can see how that could be misread and apologise, that sentence should have been broken into two parts with clarification added.

I should also further amend that the term 'likely' is a subjective judgement of probability on my part and not based on empirical evidence (aside from their similar 32mm dystopian wars stuff). I also think it would be logical to allow their models to be better integrated into other systems and serve as proxies if players are not fans of Spartan Games, instead falling back onto Halo's IP, but again, this is clearly an assessment, and one made by someone with no business experience.

Ah yes, we are in agreement on the basics then. 28mm would be an obvious choice for raking in the cash, rather than the fleet or 15mm games so its absence from the beginning line up is the puzzling factor for me. The one thing I wonder about is the dreaded "licensing issues". Thinking back to New Line Cinemas and the Lord of the Rings deal with Gamesworkshop, where the game was deliberately made in an incompatible scale with pre-existing products to avoid brand dilution and weakening of the IP. It all sounded like complete and utter rubbish at the time but I guess that's the world of international copyright law. So when I look at Spartan launching the Halo:Ground Combat game in a different scale to their pre-existing sci-fi game I do wonder if similar shenanigans are afoot.

A 28 or 32mm ODST platoon would make me explode with joy. Every couple of years I get the desire to do a small force of them and go looking for suitable bits only to be disappointed. Having some genuine miniatures would be amazing, especially given how good Spartan's Firestorm spec ops stuff looked.

I think they hinted towards using the same development strategy they use for their other games (Fleet-Ground-Skirmish) in one of the podcasts that they where on. I think it was when they went on Dakka Dakka's own D6 Generation to discuss their upcoming Halo release.

@ ONI-S3 I sent you a PM with a bunch of links for terrain. I didn't want to sidetrack this topic too much with discussion of terrain.

Are they really confirmed for two scales for ground combat?

From one podcast, Meeples and Miniatures, the Spartan guys said that the ground game would be in 15mm. They reasoned that the video games are already functionally 28mm games, making a 28mm game redundant. A 15mm game, on the other hand, gives players the chance to do larger scale battles, unlike the video game.

DrRansom wrote:
Are they really confirmed for two scales for ground combat?

From one podcast, Meeples and Miniatures, the Spartan guys said that the ground game would be in 15mm. They reasoned that the video games are already functionally 28mm games, making a 28mm game redundant. A 15mm game, on the other hand, gives players the chance to do larger scale battles, unlike the video game.

Eh... Halo Wars already does the large scale battles.

Halo Wars definitely had the larger scale battles done. English wargame's designers come out with some very odd thing's during interviews, I suspect the poor chap may have been suffering from a distinct lack of cups of tea and answering too many questions whilst labouring under an NDA. At least no ones started talking about narrative wargaming,wishing that tournament players would just go away, or insisting that the rules are almost completely irrelevant to the models they sell.

I'm a bit confused. There is an interview with a developer describing a reason for the scale. He talks about how Spartan and 343 discussed the scale and agreed upon it. But he must be wrong, because English Developer? That is a ridiculous argument.

As for Halo Wars, that is a good point. I think that Spartan games and 343 are looking to the future video game environment. Halo 5 comes out this fall, so the miniature game will have to compliment Halo 5 but not replace it.

There is another point to consider. No 28mm game can feel like Halo video game, but a mass skirmish 15mm game is far enough removed from Halo that there isn't that inbuilt issue of replicating the video game play.

All of this is beside the point. The only scale information we have is this podcast and the podcast is extremely clear:

Maybe he was referring to the 28mm clix game? I don't know if they still have that license from so many years ago.

Nope, the comment was made directly comparing 28mm to the engagement level of the computer game. Hence my questioning upthread of folk working under the impression that a larger scale game may still be in the works, as unfortunately Spartan seems incapable of performing a rumour control exercise to fill us in with the basics online.

As for my comments about English developers, think about all the nonsense that GW folk spout. They live in a gaming bubble, and don't "get" the internet., its very much "other" to them so they miss out on a interacting with a wide variety of different perspectives on gaming. I worry that Spartan come from a similar non-digital breed of people. Wonderfully creative folk but perhaps going to struggle if their vision doesn't match up with what customers in the world market want, they set themselves up to fail. After all isn't Gencon this year their first convention attendance outside the UK in quite some time?