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 Azazelx wrote:
I wonder why Sci-Fi is always taken to be so proprietary, especially compared to historicals. I mean, I know that you can't say claim the ECW or WWII as "your IP" (even though Battlefront Tried!), but outside of Battlefront's attempts, a 15mm PzIV is a 15mm PzIV and plays in whatever game you're playing. Same with a Renaissance Pikeman or a Spartan Phalanx. Yet all the rules developers and miniature designers seem content and accepting that people will use whichever figures with whichever ruleset they like. Fantasy is somewhat in the same vein, with WFB obviously being the big dog and highly invested in their own models, but Mantic and the other smaller fantasy rulesets mostly seem to understand that we'l play with the figures we like. But then we get into sci-fi, where.. I dunno. But the companies all seem to want to have their own universes that don't really fit others' figures in as much. Mantic again have allowed for people's existing Imperial Guard and Ork armies, but that feels more like wanting to sell their figures for use as 40k-proxies - which is the big "except-for" in the room on this topic.

I guess what I'm getting at here is that GoA and others want to sell rules in order to sell their specific models - even when their own models are years away. Eisenkern and even Mantic's Corporation come to mind as "sci-fi humans" that would fit into the Warpath or GoA universe reasonably easily, so why not make them "official proxies" for an undeveloped faction. LIkewise with Eisenkern for Warpath/DeadZone.

I dunno if my message is clear - it feels a little muddled, but it's hot and I'm tired. I guess I'm just thinking out loud about how nice it would be to see producers of non-historicals, and sci-fi in particular working together a little more rather then trying to put up fences around their IP like GW do (except that almost all of them seem to be happy to make not-40k models..)

Actually I did reach out to them early in the Kickstarter for just such a proposal. They seemed mildly interested but not overly so and it just never went anywhere. I would love to work with them for a cross promotion but now that they are with Warlord, that ship has likely sailed as Warlard makes its $$ from their mini sales.... Who knows, perhaps some day?

I am still open to the idea.

 paulson games wrote:
Pure speculation here, but somebody just sold over a million shares of GW stock. Maybe a former GW cornerstone employee dumped his stock in the company to fund GOA?

Think more a former GW cornerstone employee dumping his stock because he realizes it might become worthless soon

Having more faith in GoA with these figs. The initial figs had a 80's vibe in a bad way. The line feels like an old rock act trying to make it back onto stage with new stuff trying to stay relevant. Some stuff seems dated, but still able to do some wow.

The boromites are growing on me, but I think I'd paint them up more nasty looking. Not quite a full nurgled out disease thing, but something a bit more unsavory.

Anyone here part of the Warlord Games forum? If so, could you PM an admin and tell them to actually activate memberships instead of leaving them in limbo? I've sent emails but I have gotten no response whatsoever.

 AlexHolker wrote:

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
The only thing that really bugs me so far is the background, namely genemodding things that you would normally just wear a suit (or a hat) to achieve. I don't care how good a mining job paid, I'm not turning myself into the thing just so I can walk around with no suit on. I'll take the environment suit thank you.

Right, which is what I was saying about "pretty" gene mods. Or you might have a group like the One World Church from Cable and Deadpool who used body mods as a political gesture, rejecting racial discrimination by turning themselves blue.

Yeah see I kind of like that possible avenue of story telling. Some sort of "cult" or outcast group. In that case, go nuts. They're people who went nuts with genemods, make them as "furry" as you want.

As long as they're not doing stuff like "We put a dog snout and a tail on it because that's totally a huge bonus for a certain career path", I'm cool with it and it's believable. I can see somebody saying "screw it, I want to be different, turn me into a half cat person,". I have a lot harder time believing "I turned myself into a half cat person so I can be a far better accountant."

Also, will there be a "regular" human faction? Aka one that isn't genemodded into some sort of hideous abomination? I would like to see some sort of "traditional" society that has either shunned genemods or at least kept them to subtle changes. Not that I hate the idea of genemods in and of themselves. I just hate the idea of the only "human" factions being gorilla people, cat people, purple Thing/Hulk hybrids, etc. with no norm to show how different they've become.

Yes. There are races with low key body mods, and also the Revers who have no body mods at all.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:

The only thing that really bugs me so far is the background, namely genemodding things that you would normally just wear a suit (or a hat) to achieve. I don't care how good a mining job paid, I'm not turning myself into the thing just so I can walk around with no suit on. I'll take the environment suit thank you.

Spoken like a true 21st-century earthling!

Imagine that there were generations of these people living in utterly inhospitable environments. Despite vigorous safety procedures and equipment checking death by 'spacing' is a common occurence, and that almost 50% of the people you know would die (in a pretty horrific manner) during the course of their short lives. If the doctors said, "we can give your child a 10% improvement in surviving in vacuum and extreme cold for a few minutes, enough for a colleague to rescue them" would you take it? It wouldn't be a change from human -> the Thing in one generation, but a gradual process of the human genome being altered to fit its environment. Our concepts of what it means to be 'human' would alter radically when considered next to the most fundamental desire; that of safety.

So you're right, I don't think this would be appropriate for workers shuttled from earth to work hollowing out a rock for 6 months to be like this. But, if it became an environment that humans had to live, work and die across generations in, then you can certainly imagine it. There would be a massive leap in perspective about such things.

Hope they genemod the part of their brains responsible for erections, then.

 Pacific wrote:
Imagine that there were generations of these people living in utterly inhospitable environments. Despite vigorous safety procedures and equipment checking death by 'spacing' is a common occurence, and that almost 50% of the people you know would die (in a pretty horrific manner) during the course of their short lives. If the doctors said, "we can give your child a 10% improvement in surviving in vacuum and extreme cold for a few minutes, enough for a colleague to rescue them" would you take it? It wouldn't be a change from human -> the Thing in one generation, but a gradual process of the human genome being altered to fit its environment. Our concepts of what it means to be 'human' would alter radically when considered next to the most fundamental desire; that of safety.

So you're right, I don't think this would be appropriate for workers shuttled from earth to work hollowing out a rock for 6 months to be like this. But, if it became an environment that humans had to live, work and die across generations in, then you can certainly imagine it. There would be a massive leap in perspective about such things.

Humans can already survive in a vacuum for short periods, and improving your chances of survival would not require drastic changes to your appearance. At most, I'd expect it to involve a small valve implanted at the base of the throat to stop you building up a dangerous overpressure by trying to hold your breath. Of course, the smarter way would be to design and build environments so that they don't depressurise regularly and waste all your oxygen. If you can't do that you'd still be stuck on Earth, or blasted to pieces when your fuel tanks depressurised.

Duh, obviously living conditions in that area lead to the build up of silica in the internal organs so their bodies were modified to filter it into less harmful dermal storage.

I think some people seriously underestimate just how many others are out there that don't share their particular views of behavioural and body norms(furries? scarification? Klingon weddings?). I also think some people don't fully grasp just how motivating true desperation can be to a human.

Imagine an overcrowded, dystopian future-earth. Unemployment and violence are rife, the authorities are corrupt and uncaring, and you have been born into a social strata with essentially zero prospects of improvement or hope of a better life. There's no state education system, no institutional medical care available. Your choices are as follows;

A. Commit suicide.
B. Join a violent criminal gang and likely end up dead within a couple of years.
C. Become a prostitute.
D. Scrape together any dregs of work and cash you can and spend the rest of your life hungry, tired, and frequently sick.
E. Answer the corporate adds plastered across every screen and billboard in your country that offer you a life-long honest job with decent living conditions, free medical care, solid pay, and the chance to escape the squalid slum you grew up in, and all you have to do is accept a wee injection.

Which would you choose? I know people who're desperate enough to take the last option today, nevermind a hypothetical dystopian sci-fi future society.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:

The only thing that really bugs me so far is the background, namely genemodding things that you would normally just wear a suit (or a hat) to achieve. I don't care how good a mining job paid, I'm not turning myself into the thing just so I can walk around with no suit on. I'll take the environment suit thank you.

I'll agree with you on that (and cat people, dog noses, etc). It's actually a situation where the stale old trope works much better - "Generations ago, scienticians working fot the ebil corporation(s) (illegally) changed the prisoners/slaves ancestors via DNA/gene-splicing and these are there descendents."

 Azazelx wrote:

...
...

I wonder why Sci-Fi is always taken to be so proprietary, especially compared to historicals. I mean, I know that you can't say claim the ECW or WWII as "your IP" (even though Battlefront Tried!), but outside of Battlefront's attempts, a 15mm PzIV is a 15mm PzIV and plays in whatever game you're playing. Same with a Renaissance Pikeman or a Spartan Phalanx. Yet all the rules developers and miniature designers seem content and accepting that people will use whichever figures with whichever ruleset they like. Fantasy is somewhat in the same vein, with WFB obviously being the big dog and highly invested in their own models, but Mantic and the other smaller fantasy rulesets mostly seem to understand that we'l play with the figures we like. But then we get into sci-fi, where.. I dunno. But the companies all seem to want to have their own universes that don't really fit others' figures in as much. Mantic again have allowed for people's existing Imperial Guard and Ork armies, but that feels more like wanting to sell their figures for use as 40k-proxies - which is the big "except-for" in the room on this topic.

I guess what I'm getting at here is that GoA and others want to sell rules in order to sell their specific models - even when their own models are years away. Eisenkern and even Mantic's Corporation come to mind as "sci-fi humans" that would fit into the Warpath or GoA universe reasonably easily, so why not make them "official proxies" for an undeveloped faction. LIkewise with Eisenkern for Warpath/DeadZone.

I dunno if my message is clear - it feels a little muddled, but it's hot and I'm tired. I guess I'm just thinking out loud about how nice it would be to see producers of non-historicals, and sci-fi in particular working together a little more rather then trying to put up fences around their IP like GW do (except that almost all of them seem to be happy to make not-40k models..)

I understand your point exactly. I have often thought about it and the reason, IMO, is basically that everyone saw GW build a £100 M business off Space Mariens (Hurr!) and Grimdarkness™, and they thought they would like a slice of that pie. You create a background, and a set of rules, and army figures, and sell the whole package. Much more remunerative than just selling rules.

Flames of War attempted fairly successfully to do it in Historicals by changing the scale to 15mm -- WW2 players traditionally used 1/72 or 20mm, which actually are pretty interchangeable -- and convincing players that, having bought the rules from Battlefront, they needed to buy the models too.

It did pretty well for a while but once the game got popular, lots of other companies started to make 15mm scale stuff, and Battlefront could not prevent them because there is no IP in WW2. Their attempt to ban non-BF models from tournaments failed due to a huge player backlash.

There it is. If you want to build a whole package to sell, it has to be Fantasy or SF. For some reason, Fantasy is less popular, perhaps because it’s too similar to Historicals and there are heaps of generic Fantasy figures already on the market.

That said, I’ve never really understood why so many people are keen to play 40K with GW official models all the time.

 NoseGoblin wrote:

Actually I did reach out to them early in the Kickstarter for just such a proposal. They seemed mildly interested but not overly so and it just never went anywhere. I would love to work with them for a cross promotion but now that they are with Warlord, that ship has likely sailed ans Warlard makes its $$ from their mini sales.... Who knows, perhaps some day?

I am still open to the idea.

That would be awesome, because as you probably know by now, and without blowing smoke up your arse, you have some of the very best sci-fi humans out there. I know Warlord are in the business of selling models, but I can't for the life of me see why GoA couldn't have, you know, more than one kind of Earth-humans faction involved. Still, you saying this publicly is pretty cool, and with GoA still embryonic, maybe it can help something to happen...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

There it is. If you want to build a whole package to sell, it has to be Fantasy or SF. For some reason, Fantasy is less popular, perhaps because it’s too similar to Historicals and there are heaps of generic Fantasy figures already on the market.
That said, I’ve never really understood why so many people are keen to play 40K with GW official models all the time.

Yeah, I get all of that. I guess the thing is that 40k grew up in a different time and place, and clearly filled a vacuum that was in the market. These guys need to realise that there won't likely ever be another 40k. GW may be sold off, but Hobbyco or WotC or whoever will keep the 40k train running one way or another. Yet they almost all still want to be the big dogs with their own closed rule systems and own special snowflake miniatures (half of which can conveniently work as Imperial Guard/Marines/etc). I suggested something about a unified Sci-fi ruleset awhile back in the Misc minis forum, but it quickly got overwhelmed by a combination of people thinking it would involve power-creep codices between companies, some random guy saying that his homebrew ruleset should "be it" and a couple of people just being dickheads for the sake of "getting back" at me, so I stopped reading the thread pretty quickly.

Still, when I open the Mantic KoW rulebook and see Fireforge knights in it, or look through, say, an Army Painter painting guide and see all manner of not-GW models sharing the space, I do wonder why there aren't some more slightly more miniatures-agnostic rulesets out there. The way I see it, GoA and all the rest of them are going to struggle, and most will likely die off in an incredibly fething crowded market like the corpses of 3 editions of WarZone, Vor, Trinity Battlegrounds, Sedition Wars, and so on and on. PP is the outlier, and a lucky one at that who managed to get off and keep going.

I dunno, Mark from Dreamforge seems to be willing to talk with others. I know Vic from Victoria Miniatures was also willing to get onboard with a ruleset from her comments in my thread on the topic. I know it'd make my fething year to see a few of the companies I like working together in the way I described. We're somewhat off-topic now, but Mark - you're putting together a game. Please contact Vic and get her on board. Her figures, like yours are amazing, and like yourself, she's always very nice and respectful. I'd love to see a couple of you guys make one another stronger by working on things that the others won't/can't all cover at once, rather than trying to launch a new game with 6 factions.

that would be great, a universal rule set which each company can collaborate and make miniatures and factions under one rule set

we have to be honest no other companies are probably ever going to match the scale of GW, but a collaboration bringing many together could work

 mitch_rifle wrote:
that would be great, a universal rule set which each company can collaborate and make miniatures and factions under one rule set

we have to be honest no other companies are probably ever going to match the scale of GW, but a collaboration bringing many together could work

That's been my idea for a decade or so now, whenever I win the $200 million dollar lottery. Create a universal ruleset and then obtain different licenses to produce 28mm armies for it. Terminator Skynet and Resistance, Aliens Xenos and Colonial Marines, Starship Troopers book, movie bugs, movie infantry and show infantry, Dune houses and sardaukar, Predators, Doom monsters, hell maybe even Halo or Gears of War, maybe even try to license Star Trek and Star Wars!

Keep in mind that Gates of Antares takes place maybe hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years in the future. I think most of the different PanHumans have just evolved along different paths. It does say the Boromites were bio-engineered, but the original changes may have been much more subtle, and have been accentuated slowly by evolution over a vast amount of time.

http://www.darkspacecorp.com/the-universe-2/

 paulson games wrote:
Pure speculation here, but somebody just sold over a million shares of GW stock. Maybe a former GW cornerstone employee dumped his stock in the company to fund GOA?

Is there another site to check that? The official LSE one only lets you see the past day's worth of trades. Is that where you saw the info?

http://www.lse.co.uk/ShareTrades.asp?shareprice=GAW&share=games_workshop

Dunno how I missed this, must not have been paying attention.. but it's nice to see that even though the KS didn't work they're still moving along and making some nice looking minis

You didn't miss much. A large part of the reason the KS failed is the only thing they initially had to show was the game's logo and a WIP green of a scifi 70's porn star. They were basically trying to bank on nostalgia and the star power of a single big name (in the minis genre at least).

Albino Squirrel wrote:
Keep in mind that Gates of Antares takes place maybe hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years in the future.

I don't think it does as that would just be too silly... wouldn't it?

On the 70's porn star, I went to buy him today, from warlord. £5 for the model, £4 for postage. They can stick that up their isorian shard.

Anyone know anywhere with more reasonable postage?

 Alpharius wrote:

Albino Squirrel wrote:
Keep in mind that Gates of Antares takes place maybe hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years in the future.

I don't think it does as that would just be too silly... wouldn't it?

as silly as "a long time ago in a galaxy far far away"

also AT-43 took place millions of years in the future and that has a far more believable background than pretty much every other sci fi game i've seen.

I guess my point was that 'millions of years in the future' will probably mean NOTHING will look remotely like it does now, if in fact humanity is still around!

A prefer a more plausible 200 to 1000 years forward!

I believe GoA is set an unknown time in the future, where human expansion and divergence have occurred leading to many rises and falls of mankind so much so that past history is mostly forgotten or hearsay. I guess many of the panhumans could believe themselves to be the original humans and the others gross mutations. Who knows what a boromite may find beautiful?

"In 20XX rock men wore bad speedos.."

What we find attractive in a mate is often linked with viability of offspring or connected with a variety of neurological factors. If you can modify genetics enough to change appearances, you can modify what people find attractive by genetically changing the brain.

it's also possible that the first generation of a given changed group didn't have a choice and then after the change, they'd think back on how they were as ugly or lesser as their brain was changed as part of the process.

Hmm, maybe it's set, oh, I dunno, about 38000-39000 years in the future?

That sounds like a good compromise?

 Alpharius wrote:
I guess my point was that 'millions of years in the future' will probably mean NOTHING will look remotely like it does now, if in fact humanity is still around!

A prefer a more plausible 200 to 1000 years forward!

That's why the AT-43 background is so phenomenal

 Compel wrote:
Hmm, maybe it's set, oh, I dunno, about 38000-39000 years in the future?

That sounds like a good compromise?

Nope.

 Azazelx wrote:

Spoiler:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

There it is. If you want to build a whole package to sell, it has to be Fantasy or SF. For some reason, Fantasy is less popular, perhaps because it’s too similar to Historicals and there are heaps of generic Fantasy figures already on the market.
That said, I’ve never really understood why so many people are keen to play 40K with GW official models all the time.

Yeah, I get all of that. I guess the thing is that 40k grew up in a different time and place, and clearly filled a vacuum that was in the market. These guys need to realise that there won't likely ever be another 40k. GW may be sold off, but Hobbyco or WotC or whoever will keep the 40k train running one way or another. Yet they almost all still want to be the big dogs with their own closed rule systems and own special snowflake miniatures (half of which can conveniently work as Imperial Guard/Marines/etc). I suggested something about a unified Sci-fi ruleset awhile back in the Misc minis forum, but it quickly got overwhelmed by a combination of people thinking it would involve power-creep codices between companies, some random guy saying that his homebrew ruleset should "be it" and a couple of people just being dickheads for the sake of "getting back" at me, so I stopped reading the thread pretty quickly.

Still, when I open the Mantic KoW rulebook and see Fireforge knights in it, or look through, say, an Army Painter painting guide and see all manner of not-GW models sharing the space, I do wonder why there aren't some more slightly more miniatures-agnostic rulesets out there. The way I see it, GoA and all the rest of them are going to struggle, and most will likely die off in an incredibly fething crowded market like the corpses of 3 editions of WarZone, Vor, Trinity Battlegrounds, Sedition Wars, and so on and on. PP is the outlier, and a lucky one at that who managed to get off and keep going.

I dunno, Mark from Dreamforge seems to be willing to talk with others. I know Vic from Victoria Miniatures was also willing to get onboard with a ruleset from her comments in my thread on the topic. I know it'd make my fething year to see a few of the companies I like working together in the way I described. We're somewhat off-topic now, but Mark - you're putting together a game. Please contact Vic and get her on board. Her figures, like yours are amazing, and like yourself, she's always very nice and respectful. I'd love to see a couple of you guys make one another stronger by working on things that the others won't/can't all cover at once, rather than trying to launch a new game with 6 factions.

I disagree with this idea, generic rulesets are just that, generic, deprived from flavor and direction, or on the other side of the coin arcane monstrosities of rules to cover all the possibilities, likewise, miniature lines without a background in mind are plain, maybe good, but its obvious they are generic.

A complete ecosystem benefits both the rules and the miniatures line and both are shaped by the background.

 frozenwastes wrote:
What we find attractive in a mate is often linked with viability of offspring or connected with a variety of neurological factors. If you can modify genetics enough to change appearances, you can modify what people find attractive by genetically changing the brain.

it's also possible that the first generation of a given changed group didn't have a choice and then after the change, they'd think back on how they were as ugly or lesser as their brain was changed as part of the process.

This is a repulsive idea that exists only to justify making ugly models. What's wrong with a game that does justice to transhumanism, instead of turning it into institutionalised date rape?