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 Psychopomp wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:

The main big news about KoW is that there will be a skirmish game set in the KoW world. They hope to Kickstart the new game, and use this as a means for funding new hard plastics for existing armies, and some new heroes in metal or resin as leaders.

The idea being something like each different army having a box full of 4-5 different 5-man sprues that you then use to build your warband.

So, it'll mostly be a case of a new set of rules, and lots of new minis which can either be used for the skirmish game or for KoW, in the same way that the release of Deadzone supports Warpath, and vice-versa. It will get a lot more new sprues produced for KoW very soon.

Skirmish game won't have the grid/ cube system that Deadzone has, and will focus on customizing characters, having them level up etc. Closer to Mordheim than Frostgrave.

This is frankly the most exciting news I've heard out of the Open Day yet! This will be my next Mantic "Oh god, what am I going to do with all the stuff in this box?" Kickstart.

I'm all for new plastic troops for the KoW armies (especially Abyssal Dwarves) and the warbands sound exactly like the "plastic sprue sampler packs" I've been wishing I could pick up since I got my Dungeon Saga stuff.

Indeed, a big box of 'mix and match' fantasy parts would be a godsend for Mordheim/Frostgrave/RPG players. I guess they could already do something similar with the existing sprues, but some of the older ones like the Dwarves and Elves could definitely do with an update, to pack more stuff in and just overhaul/tighten up the sculpts. It's a win-win for Mantic as well; package 4 of the same sprue together, you have a KoW regiment box, or sell them individually/bundled for players only wanting a small taster for each faction or using them for a Skirmish/RPG.

They're not going to be selling Reaper Bones stuff that cheaply,

as even if they don't mark them up (and they probably will) from the US prices they will need to add 20% to cover the extra tax we pay in VAT compared to the US

(but I very much agree that if they want the Empire of Dust to make any real impact they will need to do some sort of plastic for them

Are those dogs shadow hounds from the night stalkers army?

They're Hellhounds for the Abyssals.

I did ask about Nightstalkers, and models for them are planned, but won't be made for a long time, they're looking at some crossover between them and the Twilight Kin, who they're going to rework to be a very different take on evil elves in terms of background.

KoW Historical and Northern Alliance are the next supplements to be released.

KoW Historical will include the core rules alongside the army lists so that historical players can buy it and not have to bother with any sort of fantasy theme.

There will be a selection of core units in a single master army list, and each army type will be able to pick a restricted selection of these core units, along with having their own unique units in addition. Magic items naturally won't exist, but Veteran Abilities to upgrade units with will exist in a functionally identical manner.

The base points values being used will be the Kingdoms of Men list, so it will be possible to play historical armies against fantasy armies if you want to have your greek phalanxes face off against the skeletal minions of Hades.

And northern alliance?

Sounds cool!

I wonder if they'll allow for multiple scales, most historical rules do.

I would probably switch to KoW historical instead of what I'm doing now if it works at 15mm.

 DarkBlack wrote:
I wonder if they'll allow for multiple scales, most historical rules do.

I would probably switch to KoW historical instead of what I'm doing now if it works at 15mm.

As I understand it, the KoW historical supplement uses the same basic rules as regular KoW. It's just new army lists with (pehaps?) some difference in army construction.

You can easily play KoW with other scales since it's all based on unit footprints. Depending on the scale and how your stuff are based it may be best to scale the units down a bit for smaller scales though.

If you have 6mm models on 20x40mm bases for example (like Warmaster and warhammer ancients do I believe) you can run one stand as one troop, combining them 2 or four together to form regiments and hordes. In that case you might also want to run 1" = 1cm or 1" = 1/2"

But 15mm should work just fine with just the basic rules.

The armies I am building for my personal games right now are 15mm figures on bases half the size of normal 28mm, with all ranges as centimeters. As I am working around the schedule of being a new parent, for speed I decided that each troop has just 3 men on a 25x50 base, and you push bases together to make your regiments and hordes for maximum flexibility. I thought the 3-man troops would look wierd, but it just gives the game more of an intimate skirmish-level feel, where monsters actually seem more impressive.

My Twilight Kin so far (the rest are primed in the background, with an Orc/Gobbo army. The big croc-man from Hell Dorado was added from my 28mm collection as my idea for a wingless Archfiend of the Abyss.


The half-scale works quite well, and allows just one of my 3x4 tables to be used, too, so it takes up less space to play.

@aegisgrimm
Those look bloody good where did you get the minis if you don't mind me asking ?

A company called Splintered Light Miniatures. They have great minis that would work well for Twilight Kin, Elves, Orcs and Goblins, and undead-even some Egyptian ones which I may eventually get to be my "Tomb Kings". Look under 15/18mm Fantasy. There's even some tree-kin, Ents and smaller satyr-like beastmen that would work well for Elves and Nature armies.

Super cheap, too. You get 12 figures (usually 3 sculpts with 4 of each) for 8 bucks (US). With my basing method everything works perfect as one 12-pack makes either 4 troops/2 regiments/1 horde, And I will be basing my cavalry 2 to a base, you can make 3 troops from one 6-pack for 12 bucks.

My case is obviously a bit different as to how I base them, but it allowed me to get into KoW with two 800pt armies for 50 bucks, which I planned out as if it was a starter set (each army got basic infantry, a ranged selection, and heroes)

The company is great to deal with, and even donate 10% of every order to a charity in Georgia to end child abuse/sex slavery, so you get the feel-good angle. They are US based, so shipping might suck over the pond, though.

Ooh boy.

That was not a safe link for me.

Too many interesting things! Thanks a lot Aegis!

Half-sized unit footprints and cm instead of inches is generally the best way to go about smaller scales, it works well for 6-15mm, what varies after that point is simply the number of minis on a base.

Alternatively you can simply use a giant board and use inches if you're using the small scale as a means of getting lots of minis on the table.

Smaller-scle gaming was also mentioned in the KoW seminar, and Ronnie said something like "When it comes to releasing small-scale models, our hearts say fantasy, our heads say sci-fi", meaning that while they'd love to make KoW minis at that scale, there's probably more of a market for Warpath at that scale.

Siege supplement is something they'd like to do, but want it done properly, so it'll be a while off.

 timetowaste85 wrote:

 judgedoug wrote:
They mentioned on Facebook that they are metal conversion kits for the current plastic undead.
Facepalm. I hate hybrid kits. I'd rather have fully metal guys (like my 6th edition Tomb Guard) or fully plastic guys - c'mon, a cool Egyptian skeleton kit will sell for Mantic like gangbusters, especially as GW's was not that great. Or... just... retool the current skeleton sprue with new upper halves!

The way their skeletons are built, it shouldn't be a problem at all for connecting, unlike most metal/plastic hybrids. The issue people are having with flash on their metals though...different matter. That could be problematic.

Aside from the issues with flash and soft metal, I don't think Mantic's thin, lightweight plastic skeletons are the best models to have a metal upper torso on. Unless you're gluing them down to a regiment base.

FFS.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mymearan wrote:

 Taarnak wrote:
They seriously need an art director. Most of that is atrocious.

~Eric

I like the zombies, but the Egyptian toilet paper-men... Wow.

Yeah, the larger renders don't do them any favours. The Zombies have some proportion issues. it could just be the angle of the render, I suppose - but yes, I agree - they need an art director and have needed one for years.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 scarletsquig wrote:

KoW Historical and Northern Alliance are the next supplements to be released.
KoW Historical will include the core rules alongside the army lists so that historical players can buy it and not have to bother with any sort of fantasy theme.
There will be a selection of core units in a single master army list, and each army type will be able to pick a restricted selection of these core units, along with having their own unique units in addition. Magic items naturally won't exist, but Veteran Abilities to upgrade units with will exist in a functionally identical manner.
The base points values being used will be the Kingdoms of Men list, so it will be possible to play historical armies against fantasy armies if you want to have your greek phalanxes face off against the skeletal minions of Hades.

fething awesome. Please tell me that the RC has been involved in the development.

It's pretty much entirely RC developed.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
That not- Balrog is also about the same size as GW's $130+ Skarbrand model.

Or just buy a Balrog model which is better than all of those

 Azazelx wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:

 judgedoug wrote:
They mentioned on Facebook that they are metal conversion kits for the current plastic undead.
Facepalm. I hate hybrid kits. I'd rather have fully metal guys (like my 6th edition Tomb Guard) or fully plastic guys - c'mon, a cool Egyptian skeleton kit will sell for Mantic like gangbusters, especially as GW's was not that great. Or... just... retool the current skeleton sprue with new upper halves!

The way their skeletons are built, it shouldn't be a problem at all for connecting, unlike most metal/plastic hybrids. The issue people are having with flash on their metals though...different matter. That could be problematic.

Aside from the issues with flash and soft metal, I don't think Mantic's thin, lightweight plastic skeletons are the best models to have a metal upper torso on. Unless you're gluing them down to a regiment base.

FFS.

Yeah, cuz THAT was really necessary...

Anyway, having built a full battalion of their undead, the legs come with the back half of the ribs attached with a hole in the middle. You can easily attach the front rib piece to it. And seeing how the feet are attached to a circular disc that fits inside the standard KoW square base, the only way it should be falling over is if you cut it off the round bit. Which becomes your problem. If it was attaching metal to the top of the spinal column piece, I'd say "hell no, Mantic you're nuts!!" But it isn't. It's meant to be properly seated. Would plastic be better? Yes. Does the metal have a good chance of flash issues? Yes. But attaching and staying upright shouldn't be an issue at all. Pick your argument better next time, if you'd like it taken seriously (and avoid the antagonistic approach when addressing somebody who just happens to disagree with you).

It does take some chutzpah to strike that tone and immediately complain the other is being antagonistic.

FFS, they'll still be annoyingly top-heavy when attached to the intended 20mm bases.

 scarletsquig wrote:

Smaller-scle gaming was also mentioned in the KoW seminar, and Ronnie said something like "When it comes to releasing small-scale models, our hearts say fantasy, our heads say sci-fi", meaning that while they'd love to make KoW minis at that scale, there's probably more of a market for Warpath at that scale.

With GW switching Epic to 8mm, Mantic would do well to go 6mm and adopt any old players who are unwilling to replace all their old models.

Or, of course, just go 10mm and benefit from all the Dropzone Commander scenery and stuff.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Anyway, having built a full battalion of their undead, the legs come with the back half of the ribs attached with a hole in the middle. You can easily attach the front rib piece to it. And seeing how the feet are attached to a circular disc that fits inside the standard KoW square base, the only way it should be falling over is if you cut it off the round bit. Which becomes your problem. If it was attaching metal to the top of the spinal column piece, I'd say "hell no, Mantic you're nuts!!" But it isn't. It's meant to be properly seated. Would plastic be better? Yes. Does the metal have a good chance of flash issues? Yes. But attaching and staying upright shouldn't be an issue at all. Pick your argument better next time, if you'd like it taken seriously (and avoid the antagonistic approach when addressing somebody who just happens to disagree with you).

so with a full battalion of their undead, you must have several troops of the skeleton archers, right? The ones with the metal uppoer torsos? The ones that don't align with the spines properly, have a 1mm square surface area to adhere to, and fall apart if someone _thinks_ of a swift wind?

Those models are terrrrible and they are the exact same as these new Empire of Dust, except these new models will undoubtedly be more top-heavy what with all the fun accouterments and shields and whatnot.

It's a really bad, dumb, stupid, terrible, awful idea to continue down this path. They could launch a KS tomorrow for 7 days asking for 10 grand to tool the sprue and they'd get it.

 Bolognesus wrote:
It does take some chutzpah to strike that tone and immediately complain the other is being antagonistic.

FFS, they'll still be annoyingly top-heavy when attached to the intended 20mm bases.

So weight your bases. If you want to do it properly, order Plusmodel lead wire and fix it in place then cover it with GS, or for a cheap but less effective version stick some penny coinage under there. I've been doing it for ages even for plastic models as they can be top heavy enough on their own.

Look, obviously metal isn't ideal, personally it's my least favourite of the various model materials to work with and I still have nightmares about GW's old plastic/metal hybrid kits, but in this specific instance it doesn't seem to be that big of an issue given how Mantic's skellies are put together, and at the end of the day expecting them to go from "we'll provide an army list for your WHF army" to "damn, GW have killed the whole model line, we must immediately launch a new plastic model range!" is a tad unreasonable. If metal means they can offer this stuff without first having to run six and a half kickstarter campaigns to fund the plastic tooling, I can live with it.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:

Smaller-scle gaming was also mentioned in the KoW seminar, and Ronnie said something like "When it comes to releasing small-scale models, our hearts say fantasy, our heads say sci-fi", meaning that while they'd love to make KoW minis at that scale, there's probably more of a market for Warpath at that scale.

With GW switching Epic to 8mm, Mantic would do well to go 6mm and adopt any old players who are unwilling to replace all their old models.

Wait WHAT!?

Any word on what type of dice might be used in this fantasy skirmish game?

I'd personally like to see them stick with a d8 for the skirmish stuff. More variance on it.

Leave the d6 for the board games or big piles of dice for the mass battle stuff.

Also, for Judge Doug- which Balrog model would you recommend? I can never have enough giant red & black demons it seems. The plastic LOTR one?

 Yodhrin wrote:

 Bolognesus wrote:
It does take some chutzpah to strike that tone and immediately complain the other is being antagonistic.

FFS, they'll still be annoyingly top-heavy when attached to the intended 20mm bases.

So weight your bases. If you want to do it properly, order Plusmodel lead wire and fix it in place then cover it with GS, or for a cheap but less effective version stick some penny coinage under there. I've been doing it for ages even for plastic models as they can be top heavy enough on their own.

Do you really think that's reasonable? If it comes down to that, I bet large sums of money most people just won't buy the Empire of Dust minis instead. Not to mention the fact that Mantic bases are solid, so any weights under them will make the minis stand out, literally, from the rest of the army.

Look, obviously metal isn't ideal, personally it's my least favourite of the various model materials to work with and I still have nightmares about GW's old plastic/metal hybrid kits, but in this specific instance it doesn't seem to be that big of an issue given how Mantic's skellies are put together, and at the end of the day expecting them to go from "we'll provide an army list for your WHF army" to "damn, GW have killed the whole model line, we must immediately launch a new plastic model range!" is a tad unreasonable. If metal means they can offer this stuff without first having to run six and a half kickstarter campaigns to fund the plastic tooling, I can live with it.

Except that isn't how it works. What will happen is that Mantic will release some poor, crappy models no one could like, and instead of concluding that crappy metal models don't sell, they will conclude that Empire of Dust models don't sell.

 Yodhrin wrote:

 Bolognesus wrote:
It does take some chutzpah to strike that tone and immediately complain the other is being antagonistic.

FFS, they'll still be annoyingly top-heavy when attached to the intended 20mm bases.

So weight your bases. If you want to do it properly, order Plusmodel lead wire and fix it in place then cover it with GS, or for a cheap but less effective version stick some penny coinage under there. I've been doing it for ages even for plastic models as they can be top heavy enough on their own.

Look, obviously metal isn't ideal, personally it's my least favourite of the various model materials to work with and I still have nightmares about GW's old plastic/metal hybrid kits, but in this specific instance it doesn't seem to be that big of an issue given how Mantic's skellies are put together, and at the end of the day expecting them to go from "we'll provide an army list for your WHF army" to "damn, GW have killed the whole model line, we must immediately launch a new plastic model range!" is a tad unreasonable. If metal means they can offer this stuff without first having to run six and a half kickstarter campaigns to fund the plastic tooling, I can live with it.

Yes. That's totally not a fething pain to do to a bunch of minis that, let's face it, aren't exactly sold to be appreciated as individual examples of modelling excellence, meaning you'll be doing it to eleventy metric fethtonnes of them. Grrrrrrrrreat.
I'll be sure to pass on that line, TYVM (aside from the fact that Mantic's metals and metal/plastic hybrids have proven time and again to utterly fail to compete on price, which is the one strong point they have. They're certainly 'nice enough', but the prices, damn... €27,50 for 10 infantry? I can get much better at those rates, thank you...).

I have some skeleton archers. They're hybrid metal and are fine, true scale skeletons aren't particularly weighty even in metal, and the attachment point is large enough for a strong bond.

At this point producing new armies on a regular basis is what Mantic want, and between Mantic infantry and Reaper Bones big stuff, it should be possible to put a nice looking army together at a good price.

I used to have a Tomb Kings army for warhammer so I'm quite interested in the release, prefer the skeletal legion approach to undead than the monster mash variant.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
Also, for Judge Doug- which Balrog model would you recommend? I can never have enough giant red & black demons it seems. The plastic LOTR one?

I've got all three released for LOTR - the current plastic one is quite nice (the other two metal ones are out of production). They give you both a plastic sword and whip on-sprue. Nicely detailed, clean cast - actually, some of my favorite GW plastic kits are the LOTR ones all released around 2011 or so: Balrog, Nazgul on Fell-Beast, Ent, and the Mordor/Isengard Troll combo kit.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:

Smaller-scle gaming was also mentioned in the KoW seminar, and Ronnie said something like "When it comes to releasing small-scale models, our hearts say fantasy, our heads say sci-fi", meaning that while they'd love to make KoW minis at that scale, there's probably more of a market for Warpath at that scale.

With GW switching Epic to 8mm, Mantic would do well to go 6mm and adopt any old players who are unwilling to replace all their old models.

Or, of course, just go 10mm and benefit from all the Dropzone Commander scenery and stuff.

Citation needed.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Yodhrin wrote:

 Bolognesus wrote:
It does take some chutzpah to strike that tone and immediately complain the other is being antagonistic.

FFS, they'll still be annoyingly top-heavy when attached to the intended 20mm bases.

So weight your bases. If you want to do it properly, order Plusmodel lead wire and fix it in place then cover it with GS, or for a cheap but less effective version stick some penny coinage under there. I've been doing it for ages even for plastic models as they can be top heavy enough on their own.

Do you really think that's reasonable? If it comes down to that, I bet large sums of money most people just won't buy the Empire of Dust minis instead. Not to mention the fact that Mantic bases are solid, so any weights under them will make the minis stand out, literally, from the rest of the army.

Then that's their problem, like I say I've been doing it for ages because the more "actiony" trend of recent plastic models, particularly characters, has made many of them top-heavy and prone to tipping - people face exactly the same choice there but nobody seemed to give a crap, until there's a chance for them to gak on Mantic.

Look, obviously metal isn't ideal, personally it's my least favourite of the various model materials to work with and I still have nightmares about GW's old plastic/metal hybrid kits, but in this specific instance it doesn't seem to be that big of an issue given how Mantic's skellies are put together, and at the end of the day expecting them to go from "we'll provide an army list for your WHF army" to "damn, GW have killed the whole model line, we must immediately launch a new plastic model range!" is a tad unreasonable. If metal means they can offer this stuff without first having to run six and a half kickstarter campaigns to fund the plastic tooling, I can live with it.

Except that isn't how it works. What will happen is that Mantic will release some poor, crappy models no one could like, and instead of concluding that crappy metal models don't sell, they will conclude that Empire of Dust models don't sell.

While you're prognosticating, how about next week's lottery numbers?

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:

Smaller-scle gaming was also mentioned in the KoW seminar, and Ronnie said something like "When it comes to releasing small-scale models, our hearts say fantasy, our heads say sci-fi", meaning that while they'd love to make KoW minis at that scale, there's probably more of a market for Warpath at that scale.

With GW switching Epic to 8mm, Mantic would do well to go 6mm and adopt any old players who are unwilling to replace all their old models.

Or, of course, just go 10mm and benefit from all the Dropzone Commander scenery and stuff.

Citation needed.

If you want GW news, read GW news threads, don't get snarky with me.