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You forgot one.

 Azazelx wrote:
Note, I've only displayed "published" images of Goblins, since that makes them "official" in someone's canon, as opposed to the fact that you or I or anyone on DeviantArt, etc could draw anything and call it a "goblin".

You still kind of failed, since that last MTG card you posted doesn't exist, and the illustration most likely comes from "anyone on DeviantArt".

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
You forgot one.

This is probably the biggest media influence when you consider the Mincer.

However, for the Mantic goblin design itself, this was the primary inspiration, the goblin shark:



Source - Read a forum post from the artist who did the initial designs.

It's not easy to see from the pics, but from the side-on their head profile is very similar:



They are extremely nice sculpts if you buy them in metal... do not buy the plastics, they are "okay" at best, better than the men-at-arms, but only because the underlying sculpt is good... every other aspect of them is horrible.

The hybrid metals might be okay, the metal arms could potentially fix the worst of the detail problems since they're the most visible part of the mini.

The plastic goblin archers are singularly some of the worst miniatures I have ever owned. I bought a massive box of them for £6, thinking I had found a bargain - I soon found out I was wrong! Once painted and assembled they looked OK, but getting to that point was an exercise in frustration - terrible mould lines, the plastic was like cutting old boots, it was a lot of work.

By contrast, had a look at a friends metal versions of the spearmen and they looked much better, and straightforward to put together. And the style of them is quite cool - they do have a more sneering, evil look and I think less goofy/comical than their GW counterparts.

Just checked the Mantic store and the metals are no longer being sold.

I'd recommend Crooked Claw and Four A for goblins as a first pick, anyway (both hired Kev Adams to sculpt), there's no shortage of good goblin sculpts out there in metal for a reasonable price (around £1-£1.50 per mini), the variety is huge too, there must be about 100 different sculpts just with those two companies alone... with small 1-piece minis, metal works really well as a material.

Fleabag riders, Mincer, War Trombone and character pack are all worth getting from Mantic, no problems there.

I'm still trying to figure out a good alternate source of trolls.. GW river trolls seem like the best option.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Just checked the Mantic store and the metals are no longer being sold.

Are the Spearmen/Rabble as bad as the Spitters?

^ They're hybrid metals, so they're a little better than the spitters, since the arms are metal.

The thing is, as a Goblin player, you need TONS of Goblins. And I mean that quite literally. I got about 280 rank and file Goblins, not counting Fleab...I mean Squig Riders, Squig Herders, Fanatics, Characters, etc. Roughly about 350-400 Goblins. And I don't know any better place to go for price-efficient Goblins than Mantic games.

I also love their sculpts, even the plastic ones (which are still good, I don't know why so many people don't like them), because they look so goofy. A lot of Goblins have the "mean" and "serious" look on their faces (e.g. Four A), but Mantic Goblins look very goofy and therefore were my first place to go to for Goblins. Add in the ridiculously low price (50€ for 70 Goblins, 3 Trolls and a Mincer (Snotling Wagon)) and the deal is sealed.

Not to mention the Fleabag riders are awesome Squig proxies, just remove one pair of legs and there you go. Not to mention the ridiculous price difference.

For characters, Kings of War is your place to go to. Dwarfmocker is my army's general and that sculpt is so goddamn good.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Just checked the Mantic store and the metals are no longer being sold.

I'd recommend Crooked Claw and Four A for goblins as a first pick, anyway (both hired Kev Adams to sculpt), there's no shortage of good goblin sculpts out there in metal for a reasonable price (around £1-£1.50 per mini), the variety is huge too, there must be about 100 different sculpts just with those two companies alone... with small 1-piece minis, metal works really well as a material.

Fleabag riders, Mincer, War Trombone and character pack are all worth getting from Mantic, no problems there.

I'm still trying to figure out a good alternate source of trolls.. GW river trolls seem like the best option.

Ral Partha Europe also do some Kev Adams sculpted goblins too that I've just picked up a few of, very nice

 Agamemnon2 wrote:

 Azazelx wrote:
Note, I've only displayed "published" images of Goblins, since that makes them "official" in someone's canon, as opposed to the fact that you or I or anyone on DeviantArt, etc could draw anything and call it a "goblin".

You still kind of failed, since that last MTG card you posted doesn't exist, and the illustration most likely comes from "anyone on DeviantArt".

/shrug. The point stands, and stands strong - regardless of how pedantic or douchey you're deciding to be - so it's hardly a "failure". And I'm sure Bob's contribution more than makes up for it.

SS - I'll take what you wrote as true to an extent - that the artist was influenced by the Goblin Shark, but to believe that it was the primary influence as opposed to the Warhammer designs is just laughable, especially since they're the same size, colour, same ears, designed to be counts-as WFB models, and so on and on... Like I said, I don't actually dislike the design - I actually quite like them in general. I'm merely disputing the "incredible concept" and "different as can be" hyperbole. I mean, you can just say "they're nice figures" and it's just as good, surely?

As for trolls... well it depends on the aesthetic you prefer. GW has a nice variety, but they're pricey. Stonehaven miniatures did some good ones, but they're not really animalistic, like the GW ones. You could always paint some Mantic Ogres with green skin and perhaps give them a headswap (or not, even!), as they do fit some of the older D&D/T&T RPG armoured troll look from the 80's and 90's.

^ Now that's a lazy option I can get behind!

Thanks for that, Mantic ogres will do the job nicely enough, if I don't bother to repaint or headswap I can keep the minis usable as ogres, too.

As for the goblins, I'm not too bothered about the style, just want some reasonably well-done sculpts of good quality.. Mantic would have ticked the box 100% if only they'd stuck with Renedra for that sprue.

Compared to the rest of Mantic's line (IMO the best baseline to compare to), the metal goblins are definitely better sculpts than stuff like the plastic elves or dwarves, more on a par with the undead and orcs (possibly a little better than the orcs).

...which is what made it such a shame that the great sculpts were then turned into mush by the cheap China tooling... if they'd gone to Renedra, they could have had another huge hit on their hands that would have sold as well as the zombie sprue... there is no limit to the amount of goblins people will buy if the quality and value is there... a £25 for 40 box with renedra tooling would have been one giant box of "yes, please!".

In terms of mass-battle miniature releases, Mantic has been a bit boring as a company for the last three years, coasting along with restic/metal hybrids ever since they gave up on sprues (orc release was June 2011). Definite switch to them being more of a board game company rather than a wargames company, since they've released 5 board games in that time.

KoW has had some support, but Warpath has had almost none, entirely reliant on Deadzone for minis currently to the point where those DFG APCs look a lot more tempting to buy now rather than waiting for 2016 to get the Mantic ones.

I don't get the hate that Mantic Goblins get either. I got an offer for 20, very cheap, took it, and I was quite happy. The sculpts were completely fine, no mold lines. I can't figure out what the issue was. Maybe I just got a really good batch? They were spitters. Totally plastic.

Apart from removing the mould lines (and some people seem to have been 'lucky' and got figures without bad mould lines) my biggest workload was using greenstuff on every figure to make it look like the goblins were hooded and therefore hide the join between neck/head and the body. Wouldn't have been a problem if it was just a box of 20 goblins - but I had to do 400 of the little blighters. The satisfaction of the resulting look of the first half dozen soon wore off as the tide of the little figures never seemed to decrease perceptively. I was sure my wife was being kind and quietly buying and adding more figures behind my back!

I like the Goblins, and when you add character figures the army can look quite remarkable on the table.

Individually the plastic goblins are mediocre at best; once painted and in a horde they pass the "3 foot rule" with flying colors. I love fielding my massive KoW goblin horde simply because they look great on the battlefield as a cohesive force.

This picture is from before I recently doubled it (added 8 units of fleabag riders, 5 mincers, 3 sharpstick slashers, and got 30 metal spearmen to make another "40"-goblin horde, and the 3 new metal goblin characters)

My color choices were because I wanted dirty orange brown goblins running across a bright green field of flowers and trampling them in their wake (I even modeled a little poo the Mierce cyclops has just taken). I love the face style of the Mantic goblins (over any other goblin mini except perhaps Red Box Games) and I've always thought orange skin for goblins was much cooler anyway,.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
I don't get the hate that Mantic Goblins get either. I got an offer for 20, very cheap, took it, and I was quite happy. The sculpts were completely fine, no mold lines. I can't figure out what the issue was. Maybe I just got a really good batch? They were spitters. Totally plastic.

You must have gotten a good batch (or I got a bad one). The details were extremely soft on the faces, to the point of nearly blobbish and poor definition. I didn't even both giving them a go.
This from someone who actually likes their hard plastic kits in elves, undead and orcs.

That's a good looking army, Doug.

 OrlandotheTechnicoloured wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
Just checked the Mantic store and the metals are no longer being sold.
I'd recommend Crooked Claw and Four A for goblins as a first pick, anyway (both hired Kev Adams to sculpt), there's no shortage of good goblin sculpts out there in metal for a reasonable price (around £1-£1.50 per mini), the variety is huge too, there must be about 100 different sculpts just with those two companies alone... with small 1-piece minis, metal works really well as a material.

Ral Partha Europe also do some Kev Adams sculpted goblins too that I've just picked up a few of, very nice

Squig, Orlando - I have to thank you guys for linking those three companies. I hadn't heard of the smaller two, and really didn't realise that RPE was anything beyond the old RP catalogue from the 1990s, since there seems to be a few companies like Scotia Grendel that are still on life support and seemingly just existing and selling the exact same stuff I bought 15-20 years ago.

Now once I wade through the immense numbers of old Kev Adams GW metal models I have, I'll have a new never-ending source of the best goblins in the (or any) game.

I'd started a Goblin force using Mantics models late last year, but the poor sculpt quality of the spitters totally put me off progressing, to the extent I sold off the entire force. However I kept the Trolls - I love these models and have encorporated two into my Blood Bowl 2nd Edition Orc/Goblin team.

I then came across Black Hat Miniatures and their goblin range. Absolutely gorgeous models and very old school. I think Kev Adams scultped them (not 100% sure).

I also sourced over 100 plastics from the 4th edition box set of Warhammer and am now back on track to painting up an army.

I don't get the hate that Mantic Goblins get either. I got an offer for 20, very cheap, took it, and I was quite happy. The sculpts were completely fine, no mold lines. I can't figure out what the issue was. Maybe I just got a really good batch? They were spitters. Totally plastic.

Why the emotive language? I don't hate anything, just commented that the quality of miniature was pretty poor. Of course, it's perfectly possible that the quality improved since the first batch - might be that I was getting the first batch that was just being sold off cheap by the vendor.

 scarletsquig wrote:


KoW has had some support, but Warpath has had almost none, entirely reliant on Deadzone for minis currently to the point where those DFG APCs look a lot more tempting to buy now rather than waiting for 2016 to get the Mantic ones.

That would seem to suggest that is where the money is at.. I've heard about production runs of Dwarf King's Hold and Dreadball selling out, and now Deadzone has got a great opportunity to jump into the void left by Necromunda, and being good for both miniature wargamers and board-gamers.

Renedra hasn't been feasible for several reasons, not just because of cost. Instead Mantic have had to find alternatives, and at the time that they started looking, WGF was still under the control of that guy (can't remember his name) who's also run Defiance Games into the ground.

The Deadzone terrain and hard plastic zombies show a return to quality which means that mass battle games are now feasible. We'll start to see a return to Mantics original mission statement now that the process has been sorted.

 Daedleh wrote:
Renedra hasn't been feasible for several reasons, not just because of cost. Instead Mantic have had to find alternatives, and at the time that they started looking, WGF was still under the control of that guy (can't remember his name) who's also run Defiance Games into the ground.

The Deadzone terrain and hard plastic zombies show a return to quality which means that mass battle games are now feasible. We'll start to see a return to Mantics original mission statement now that the process has been sorted.

Fingers crossed this happens and Mantic do return to their original focus. For me personally, their lack of quality control over what should have been major product lines such as the Goblins and Men At Arms, added to their extremely high levels of basic packing issues (which must surely be adding extra costs and influencing their need to always be using Kickstart) have meant a little shine has been rubbed off their once shining armour.

I really want them to succeed but they are still making mistakes that, considering their personal levels of experience within the industry, should not be happening nearly five years down the line.

Okay rant over - back to work

Some dkh updates ( yes it involves kickstarter! )

From Quirkworthy blog

Dwarf King’s Holding Pattern

Posted on April 22, 2014by Quirkworthy

Despite my relative silence on the topic, things have been moving along nicely on this front over the last month. It very definitely hasn’t been forgotten. Unfortunately, I can’t tell you any details just yet. “Moving along” doesn’t mean we’ve quite got where we need to be in terms of nailing down all the major variables, and we wanted to be sure of them before we went live. Close though.

All I can say is that it’s looking pretty exciting and is not all that far off now 

And some more info from the comments

Jeff Briggs says:

April 22, 2014 at 9:43 pm

I have 2 questions. If your able to answer.

1. Is this going to be tile bases, like previous box sets, or is it going to be different?

2. Will it have any type of scenery?

Thanks. Eagerly waiting for the Kickstarter Announcement.

Reply

Quirkworthy says:

April 24, 2014 at 10:00 am

Currently it’s tiles, as before.

There will probably be some scenery like chests, doors and such, but whether this is card, plastic, resin or what is undecided. That might well depend on how well the KS does.

scarletsquig says:

April 22, 2014 at 9:57 pm

Looking forward to the new DKH very much! Could work well with the new board game plastic and a big swarm of minis.

Would love to see some hard plastic dungeon builder sprues too, there would be no upper limit to the amount of those people would buy, even if the standard box just has card tiles to keep the price low and the mini count high.

Reply

Quirkworthy says:

April 24, 2014 at 10:02 am

Not sure about plastic walls. It’s quite an expensive option, and may be better suited for another secret project…

We’ll have to see.

David says:

April 23, 2014 at 11:51 pm

I’m really looking forward to this, but hopefully it doesn’t start till after the due dates for payment on dead zone and mars attacks otherwise I won’t have enough money.

Reply

Quirkworthy says:

April 24, 2014 at 10:03 am

Can’t help you on the dates. I don’t know when the due dates are, nor do I think a final decision has yet been made on a start date. Mind you, the due date for any new KS wouldn’t be till the end anyway.

quite a few questions answered, not sure if its a game I could get into but if they introduce new races like in dz it could be cool for the future of kow.

Dwarf King's Hold KS launches this July or August.

Going to be a very straightforward mini-kickstarter, $95 for the sweet spot pledge.

Card tiles, but plastic terrain.

The game will be 1 vs 1-6 in format, one player controlling the dungeon monsters and the rest a co-op band of heroes who can level up with new skills and gain new weapons/ loot as they complete multiple games. Going to be a very classical dungeon delver type game.

It will get new unique sculpts for everything.

Sounds good to me.

I do hope there's a pure co-op option available as well- sort of like what Mars Attacks and Deadzone are supposed to get with those AI cards.

I *ALWAYS* have to play Zargon/ Zardoz/ GM in these types of games.

Only way I ever get to do something heroic is if the baddies are automated, and then I just plain do terrible against them anyways.

If they can have thick enough tiles, piles of baddies to slay, TONS of decorative pieces, maybe we'll all get the 25th anniversary of Heroquest we all envisioned.

We know Mantic is crazy about sweetening the pot the longer a Kickstarter runs.

I'll be looking forward to this one!

I wish the plastic terrain is decent, and the miniatures aswell. The last Basilean line made me doubt Mantic's output, but I still hold hope!

I think solo/ co-op and AI rules are pretty much guaranteed after what we've seen with mars attacks and deadzone. Can see there being quite a lot of rules expansion stretch goals.

All the models will get KoW rules as well.

Probably a fair bet that Mantic will be looking to put 100 minis or so into the set so it should have that "big box" heroquest style appeal.

Their kickstarters with the new material have been much better value than restic, and the material is very similar despite being one-piece preassembled.

Looking forward to this one a lot, it'll be easy on the wallet and expand on an already really good set of rules.

DKH plays a lot like a tabletop version of Nethack/ Pixel Dungeon in terms of the basic mechanics, it has that feel to it... a solo mode that could generate random dungeon layouts, monster spawns, with multiple levels and AI cards for the monsters would be awesome.

They using the same material as the MA figures then? On one hand I'm glad as I've said I will never touch one of mantics restic infrantry sized models again. But on the other this material is still unproven to the public (I mean they have not released anything in that material yet).

overtyrant wrote:
They using the same material as the MA figures then? On one hand I'm glad as I've said I will never touch one of mantics restic infrantry sized models again. But on the other this material is still unproven to the public (I mean they have not released anything in that material yet).

Have none of the Kickstarter backers gotten any Mars Attacks stuff yet? I noticed MA is up for Pre-order at Miniature Market, so it must be coming out fairly soon.

Does anyone else use a similar material?

https://twitter.com/FistyGlueMan/status/467622118235332609/photo/1

What do we think of this? Is the poster confused and they're for DKH or KOW? Or is there a fantasy skirmish game on the way?

From comments earlier in the thread sounds like there might be both a Dungeon Crawling/Heroquest type game, and a fantasy skirmish game.

Looking forward to this new DKH, might fill the gap until (if?!) the Heroquest boardgame arrives.. .

Yeah, sounded like not-Warhammer Quest and not-Mordheim to me. And I don't mean that in any kind of derogatory way, either.

And no more word on those Mantic Crazy Boxes, either, it seems?