Wow, normally I'm a huge fanatic about most things Mantic, especially their prices...but that Bombard is fething expensive!! GW expensive. Ronnie, fix this! It's gotta be a mistake.

Updated for sure in some way - there's at least new units. I hope they fiddle around with the balance of units, but here's what was said in a blog:

"New Abyssal Dwarf and Dwarf Units

The new book adds new units and heroes to the ranks of the Abyssal Dwarfs and the Dwarfs, including Arhak Soulbinder, Slave Orc Gore Riders, Sveri Egilax and the Dwarf Bombard, and has all their stats and background."

http://manticblog.com/2014/04/14/through-hellfire-and-stone/

Thanks. I saw the stuff about characters, but missed the unit mention.

timetowaste85 wrote:Wow, normally I'm a huge fanatic about most things Mantic, especially their prices...but that Bombard is fething expensive!! GW expensive. Ronnie, fix this! It's gotta be a mistake.

Huh? That's kinda middle of the pack in terms of price for war machines. Dwarfs already have the flame belcher which is more expensive than the bombard. Metal + plastic kits will obviously be more expensive than plastic kits.

A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

Out of those new ones the golems are the only ones I really like. I don't hate the others but I wouldn't buy them.

 Alpharius wrote:
A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

Most of their sculpts are sub-par to be frank. They can do things well (Undead, Ogres, DZ Rebs are nice just a shame they are restic, Enforcers should be good based in renders). Everything else they release you can get much higher quality sculpts elsewhere usually fit the same price - Mantic aren't even that cheap anymore.

Only thing I dislike is that only some new Abyssal Dwarfs are plastic, while like the core units (Decimators and the other guys, I forget the name) are still plastic with metal bits.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Wow, normally I'm a huge fanatic about most things Mantic, especially their prices...but that Bombard is fething expensive!! GW expensive. Ronnie, fix this! It's gotta be a mistake.

Yeah it's what 2.50 cheaper than the GW equivalent.

willb2064 wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

Most of their sculpts are sub-par to be frank. They can do things well (Undead, Ogres, DZ Rebs are nice just a shame they are restic, Enforcers should be good based in renders). Everything else they release you can get much higher quality sculpts elsewhere usually fit the same price - Mantic aren't even that cheap anymore.

I really like their metal minis, no matter what range they come from. The dwarves they released from the KS appeal to me as well. I only wish the plastic dwarves matched the aesthetic.

 Alpharius wrote:
A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

These miniatures are mostly from the KoW kickstarter, and each kickstarter seems to have gotten better and better in terms of consistent execution.

That said, the new additions which weren't from the kickstarter don't seem too great here. Don't like the spider guy or the immortal command.

I'll just use old-GW and Forgeworld Chaos Dwarves for the most part. I've got a few ADs that came with the KS, so I can probably slot them in somewhere. Towards the back. With a front rank of Forgeworld ones in front of them.

 carlos13th wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Wow, normally I'm a huge fanatic about most things Mantic, especially their prices...but that Bombard is fething expensive!! GW expensive. Ronnie, fix this! It's gotta be a mistake.

Yeah it's what 2.50 cheaper than the GW equivalent.

The bombard is a bigger cannon - the Mantic cannon/organ gun is all plastic, and costs half of what the GW one does:

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/kings-of-war/dwarfs/product/dwarf-ironbelcher.html

I've always liked the Chaos Dwarf aesthetic, but don't think I'd bite unless I can actually get some plastic ones. They always struck me as being really fiddly.

Really hoping the Deadzone sprues turn out well so Mantic can see there's a serious demand out there for plastic alternatives, especially in under represented armies and races.

decker_cky wrote:

 carlos13th wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Wow, normally I'm a huge fanatic about most things Mantic, especially their prices...but that Bombard is fething expensive!! GW expensive. Ronnie, fix this! It's gotta be a mistake.

Yeah it's what 2.50 cheaper than the GW equivalent.

The bombard is a bigger cannon - the Mantic cannon/organ gun is all plastic, and costs half of what the GW one does:

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/kings-of-war/dwarfs/product/dwarf-ironbelcher.html

I was comparing it to this, which seems roughly equivalent

http://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Dwarf-Cannon

The plastic cannon is a bit smaller than the GW cannon, but I'm pretty sure the bombard is bigger. But it's never going to be much cheaper since it's a metal + plastic kit.

Still, £3 cheaper for the metal + plastic kit is 20% cheaper. I wouldn't hold your breath for it to have a lower RRP (though there's lots of reliable mantic discounters).

willb2064 wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

Most of their sculpts are sub-par to be frank. They can do things well (Undead, Ogres, DZ Rebs are nice just a shame they are restic, Enforcers should be good based in renders). Everything else they release you can get much higher quality sculpts elsewhere usually fit the same price - Mantic aren't even that cheap anymore.

That's odd, I thought their prices have actually gone DOWN recently (like when they dropped the MSRP of the Orcs infantry box sets)

That new dwarf army set seems to be an even better deal than the old one.

New one
20 plastic Ironclad
20 plastic Ironwatch
20 plastic Shieldbreakers
10 premium plastic Brock Riders
2 Ironbelchers
contains $140 worth of stuff for $79.99

Old one
40 Dwarf Ironclad Warriors
30 Dwarf Ironwatch Riflemen
15 Dwarf Shieldbreakers
2 Dwarf Ironbelcher Cannons/Organ Guns
contains $136.25 worth of stuff for $74.99 (discontinued)

That new set is definitely a much better composition (you have a legal unit of Shieldbreakers). And honestly if you grab that box and the Dwarf command set of characters, you have a pretty solid starting force for Kings of War.

So I like Abyssal Golems alot. Really like that paint scheme. I think they suffer from Mantic's tiny leg syndrome, but the armor plates at their knees and sides help with that some. I know the legs are still small, but it gives the appearance of more bulk.

That scorpion / dwarf thing is just bad. That's all I will say about that.

My favorite is the Haryps, though I have no use for them. I think they did great with these. My only worry, is they look very fiddly, and therefor fragile, but I would have to see how they go together before I would worry too much about that.

Really liking the gargoyles.
That bombard is a bit pricey as folks have pointed out.
If I want a bombard, I'll be likely reworking some styrene and possibly small PVC fittings for a couple bucks.

Regarding the bombard, I'd definitely like to get one but it's MSRP really should be $25-$30. You're basically paying $20 more than the plastic cannon (msrp $15) for a metal dude and a solid tube of pewter that is the bombard itself. If you put it in a sock, you could murder someone, so perhaps that's the added value. If it was $25 I'd grab one without hesitation for my Dwarf army that I am about 90% finished painting.

^ The US pricing for the bombard on the mantic store is buggered, I think.

It lists it as £12.49 GBP and $35 USD

 scarletsquig wrote:
^ The US pricing for the bombard on the mantic store is buggered, I think.

It lists it as £12.49 GBP and $35 USD

Good catch. Yup, and E15.99, so it's gotta be like $19.99 - $24.99, in which case, I'll get one!

Ahh, that's the issue. They set the bombard's US price at the £19.99 unit level. It should be $19.99 or so, like the mounted berzerker lord.

This release is actually a significant price drop for all the mixed units down to the same price as restic units (about 50% less for some units). I think mantic is just accepting slightly lower margins in order to keep consistent pricing, with basic units (£14.99 for 20 infantry) and premium units (£19.99 for 20 infantry or 10 cavary. Shieldbreakers dropped at some point to that price too, since I think they used to cost a bit more than ironclad.

I imagine as other armies are updated, they'll follow this pricing.

I actually noticed that price discrepancy last night as well, before seeing you guys post it here. Good catch. Looks like I'll be picking one or two up in the near future after all. I'm sure they'll get it sorted out soon enough, and I'll pick one up when they do.

willb2064 wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

Most of their sculpts are sub-par to be frank. They can do things well (Undead, Ogres, DZ Rebs are nice just a shame they are restic, Enforcers should be good based in renders). Everything else they release you can get much higher quality sculpts elsewhere usually fit the same price - Mantic aren't even that cheap anymore.

The Goblins are incredibly good-looking and insanely cheap too.

 Sigvatr wrote:

willb2064 wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
A lot of these new minis aren't looking so good.

Is Mantic just better at the SF stuff?

Most of their sculpts are sub-par to be frank. They can do things well (Undead, Ogres, DZ Rebs are nice just a shame they are restic, Enforcers should be good based in renders). Everything else they release you can get much higher quality sculpts elsewhere usually fit the same price - Mantic aren't even that cheap anymore.

The Goblins are incredibly good-looking and insanely cheap too.

Their goblins are an incredible concept with horrible execution. If they resculpted the same thing with a few extra options and command bits, and had a better cast made, then the goblins would be incredibly popular.

Incredible concept? They're just GW-style goblins with slightly different hats. Not that it's a bad thing or anything, but hardly "incredible".

 Azazelx wrote:
Incredible concept? They're just GW-style goblins with slightly different hats. Not that it's a bad thing or anything, but hardly "incredible".

They're goblins, but no more similar to any generation of GW's goblins than most any other goblins out there. I suppose pointy noses? Regardless - they look great but weren't executed well.

Meh, GW goblins are goofy, Mantic goblins look nasty. They're about as different as goblins can be while still being goblins. I suppose they have similar faces to the Night Goblins, which are far superior to GW's regular goblins as well.

Really?

Because goblins have been around for a lot longer than the GW/Kev Adams interpretation (which also got co-opted by World of Warcraft, Mantic and others)



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". I also skipped finding pictures of models from Hobbit, LotR, D&D Minis, Descent, Myth, etc etc. But yeah - my point is that things get a lot more different to Mantic's goblins from the GW ones "while still being goblins" - and inarguably so, unless you think TSR/WotC or FFG or WETA, etc don't have "valid" interpretations of Goblins and that the GW design is the one true goblin type.

Mantic's goblins aren't really very different at all from GW's ones. They're pretty much the same thing, but with a different hat. Not that this is a bad thing, and I also think they look good (better in pics than most of the models) but conceptually they're no different. Hell, even WoW's version is more distinct, with all of the Steampunk crap they bolt onto them.

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?

I got the "C for Corporation" variation and I got:

Elf bowman sprue
Marauder command sprue
10 Basilean panther riders
10 Corporation rangers
2 Dreadball Zzor
2 Rebs humans and Yndij
Loka ice thing
Clippers
Silver warpaint

Given I'm working on Basilean and Corp armies, I'm very, very happy.

The label on the front says:
"your random contents will include:
- 2 Big bags of Resin plastic models [KoW cavalry, Warpath full unit]
- 2 Small bags of resin plastic models [2-3 Deadzone or Dreadball models]
- 2 sprues of hard plastic models [I didn't see anyone get Men at arms]
- 1 Pot of paint
- 1 Hobby clippers"

 Daedleh wrote:
I got the "C for Corporation" variation and I got:

Elf bowman sprue
Marauder command sprue
10 Basilean panther riders
10 Corporation rangers
2 Dreadball Zzor
2 Rebs humans and Yndij
Loka ice thing
Clippers
Silver warpaint

Given I'm working on Basilean and Corp armies, I'm very, very happy.

The label on the front says:
"your random contents will include:
- 2 Big bags of Resin plastic models [KoW cavalry, Warpath full unit]
- 2 Small bags of resin plastic models [2-3 Deadzone or Dreadball models]
- 2 sprues of hard plastic models [I didn't see anyone get Men at arms]
- 1 Pot of paint
- 1 Hobby clippers"

Sold. Thanks for that Deadleh, that's definitely worth £15.

Also I can 100% confirm that Mantic are back on track with hard plastics. I held and examined the hard plastic DZ Zombies sprue and it was perfect. While we're aware that there's a relative lack of extras, the detail was incredibly sharp and was up there with the best GW sprues, surpassing Renedra quality.

This is very interesting, I'll wait till I get them in hand but if there as good as you say it will put me back on track with Mantic. I'd kinda of got of track with them due to there insistence on using restic and not focusing on QC.

Daedleh wrote:Also I can 100% confirm that Mantic are back on track with hard plastics. I held and examined the hard plastic DZ Zombies sprue and it was perfect. While we're aware that there's a relative lack of extras, the detail was incredibly sharp and was up there with the best GW sprues, surpassing Renedra quality.

Very promising.

Pretty much the only thing that has kept me from making huge armies of Mantic stuff was the PVC figures. I'm still going to take a wait and see approach, but I'm definitely looking forward to blogs and posts of their newer stuff once it's released in the wild

Collection of pictures of the new DKH sculpts, taken by a pathfinder at the Open Day:

Awesome thanks Squig, those are some pretty characterful looking sculpts liking the M@A zombie and wraith looking thing especially.

Has there been much news about the DKH game itself, contents of the box, type of game, character growth/advancmeant mechanics etc? If its anything like deadzone I'll be on it.

Yep, posted some stuff on the previous page, that's everything I can figure out so far.

And, seperate to DKH will be the upcoming KoW-based fantasy skirmish game.

Plastic castle/fortress interior terrain and similar format to Deadzone with around 5-6 minis per side.

Two KoW based games, that's crazy.

I wonder if this means their gonna take the same approach they did with deadzone, releasing tons of new races, special units and really expand the boundaries of the world as a whole. It'll
be a smart move on their side they could both take KoW further away from not-warhammer and potentially create lots of small new races/units as testers for full armies in the mass-battles
game, some of those units could even act as mercenary troops for KoW if Mantic plays it smart.

 scarletsquig wrote:
...around 5-6 minis per side.

"Building big armies"

Hmm, I'm interested but I think they really need to produce more stuff and update more stuff on what they already have before starting another new game tbh..

 scarletsquig wrote:
Yep, posted some stuff on the previous page, that's everything I can figure out so far.

And, seperate to DKH will be the upcoming KoW-based fantasy skirmish game.

Plastic castle/fortress interior terrain and similar format to Deadzone with around 5-6 minis per side.

This has got me very excited!

Didn't fully commit to Deadzone as I already have my sci-fi skirmish game in the form of Infinity.

But, would be all for something that runs along the lines of Mordheim, with a great campaign/experience structure built into it. Hopefully they will do something along those lines!

Probably some overlap here but these are snippets from 2 of the 3 open say seminars about DKH:

*kickstarter targeted for end of July

*similar to MA in that there will be a basic pick up and play rule set that is simple to learn, then a second KS and later Mantic/hobby store expanded rulebook with stats for all KOW races so you can use sell of them in the game, plus rules for character creation, experience, campaign etc plan is to hopefully do quite a lavish special KS version and then more basic version.

*campaign in the box scales through the various rules so you'll start with two heroes fighting to free two more, then the other two escaping so it introduces mechanics but by bit.

* main bad guy is a necromancer but also undead dwarf king with undead dwarf warriors , various other beasties

*high quality card dungeon tiles! stretch goal will be double sided print, in one seminar people really wanted strong themes such as Egyptian temple style! classic style etc and Ronnie seemed to really like that . They looked at hard plastic but too expensive and wouldn't wear well.

*kickstarter will feature special resin (no idea what type) characters, reference to character cards having a reverse died which us epic version, KS will have these epic versions as miniatures

*lot of mention of this being a gateway game bringing people into the hobby similar to heroquest and space hulk , Mars attacks already mantics best selling boxed game as two European distributors have bought a ton to localise, Ronnie expressed they'd love to get this (DKH) in mainstream stores.

*In one seminar all those new sculpts were referenced as being for this, I didn't hear anything about this skirmish game but it was getting pretty hot at times.

*all in scale with KOW and usable,

* Ronnie really wants a digital app eventually for this which would let you lay out dungeons, generate scenarios using minis you have, track stats etc

I'll post anything else I remember.

^ Awesome, thanks for all that extra info, and welcome to Dakka!

Mars Attacks already being Mantic's bestseller (beating at least 20k copies of Dreadball already sold) is amazing, I had a hunch it would do well with the general release, but that really is great.

The DKH and fantasy skirmish news is all coming a lot sooner than I expected. I think I might be more into DKH than another deadzone-mechanics game though.

The new dkh sculpts look fantastic.

im assuming these are the lesser abyssal concepts

Apparently being a 'lesser' Abyssal means you get to have legs the right length!

 scarletsquig wrote:
^ Awesome, thanks for all that extra info, and welcome to Dakka!

Mars Attacks already being Mantic's bestseller (beating at least 20k copies of Dreadball already sold) is amazing, I had a hunch it would do well with the general release, but that really is great.

The DKH and fantasy skirmish news is all coming a lot sooner than I expected. I think I might be more into DKH than another deadzone-mechanics game though.

I'm glad Mars Attacks is off to a good start. I was sorely tempted during the KS, but managed to avoid pledging. (loved the Martians, but the humans left me kind of cold) It looked really fun though.

Any does anyone else feel like Mantic is getting way overextended?

Kings of War
Warpath
Dreadball
Deadzone
Dwarf King's Hold
Mars Attacks
New KoW skirmish

Seems like a lot to have on your plate for such a tiny company.

I would say yes if they are entirely separate games/miniature lines and rulesets, but there is a lot of crossover.

Deadzone & Mars Attacks look like they will share similar rules systems, some terrain and miniature crossover.
Obviously Warpath/Deadzone have a lot of the same miniatures.
Kings of War, DKH, new skirmish have the same miniatures.
Even Dreadball has some similar rule components to Deadzone (the dice modifiers etc.) and I'd be willing to bet the new KoW Skirmish game will be the same if it's designed by Jake Thornton.

I think the reason that DKH even got made in the first place was because Jake Thornton pitched the idea of the game to Ronnie Renton, and they went with it because they already had the miniatures made and it would take very little expenditure of resources.

Essentially Mantic is now starting to resemble the GW of the early and mid-90's, of a game designers playground and I think you're going to see a lot more of this kind of thing. Of course, Mantic also have the bonus that GW didn't benefit from back then, of the internet and crowd-funding to help back your products and drum up interest.

 edlowe wrote:
The new dkh sculpts look fantastic.

im assuming these are the lesser abyssal concepts

Is this a photo of a PC displaying a scan of a sketch? Wtf, ain't technology grand!

TwilightSparkles wrote:
Probably some overlap here but these are snippets from 2 of the 3 open say seminars about DKH:

*kickstarter targeted for end of July

*similar to MA in that there will be a basic pick up and play rule set that is simple to learn, then a second KS and later Mantic/hobby store expanded rulebook with stats for all KOW races so you can use sell of them in the game, plus rules for character creation, experience, campaign etc plan is to hopefully do quite a lavish special KS version and then more basic version.

*campaign in the box scales through the various rules so you'll start with two heroes fighting to free two more, then the other two escaping so it introduces mechanics but by bit.

* main bad guy is a necromancer but also undead dwarf king with undead dwarf warriors , various other beasties

*high quality card dungeon tiles! stretch goal will be double sided print, in one seminar people really wanted strong themes such as Egyptian temple style! classic style etc and Ronnie seemed to really like that . They looked at hard plastic but too expensive and wouldn't wear well.

*kickstarter will feature special resin (no idea what type) characters, reference to character cards having a reverse died which us epic version, KS will have these epic versions as miniatures

*lot of mention of this being a gateway game bringing people into the hobby similar to heroquest and space hulk , Mars attacks already mantics best selling boxed game as two European distributors have bought a ton to localise, Ronnie expressed they'd love to get this (DKH) in mainstream stores.

*In one seminar all those new sculpts were referenced as being for this, I didn't hear anything about this skirmish game but it was getting pretty hot at times.

*all in scale with KOW and usable,

* Ronnie really wants a digital app eventually for this which would let you lay out dungeons, generate scenarios using minis you have, track stats etc

I'll post anything else I remember.

Emphasis mine. Bolded part does not compute at all. The rest of this stuff sounds excellent.

The sculpts shown all look pretty great too.

~Eric

Those lower abyssal's look nice, going by their rough body shape they could potentially be converted into lizardmen with a bit of effort.

Cover art for DKH4:

Those look nice but again, I will wait for the actual products. I said the same thingwith the Basileans and if I pledged right then and there, I would have been fethed left right and center. But if it turns out well I'm definitely buying a box.

Mantic is turning big. I saw a box of Dreadball in one of the stores here... and remember I live in a 3rd world country.

 Alpharius wrote:
Apparently being a 'lesser' Abyssal means you get to have legs the right length!

And a bad back. And Fibromyalgia, apparently.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Schmapdi wrote:

Any does anyone else feel like Mantic is getting way overextended?

Like your knee under a falling linebacker.

I hope they focus more on quality over quantity for a while. This has all got to be a terrible strain on their employee.

How many people even work at Mantic these days? Ronnie. Stewart. Little Joey. Uh... Ray-Ray? Old Sammy? That ascot-wearing hound who solved all those murders?

Schmapdi wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
^ Awesome, thanks for all that extra info, and welcome to Dakka!

Mars Attacks already being Mantic's bestseller (beating at least 20k copies of Dreadball already sold) is amazing, I had a hunch it would do well with the general release, but that really is great.

The DKH and fantasy skirmish news is all coming a lot sooner than I expected. I think I might be more into DKH than another deadzone-mechanics game though.

I'm glad Mars Attacks is off to a good start. I was sorely tempted during the KS, but managed to avoid pledging. (loved the Martians, but the humans left me kind of cold) It looked really fun though.

Any does anyone else feel like Mantic is getting way overextended?

Kings of War
Warpath
Dreadball
Deadzone
Dwarf King's Hold
Mars Attacks
New KoW skirmish

Seems like a lot to have on your plate for such a tiny company.

Yes especially considering they have yet to properly flesh out. Warpath after years of it being released.

 carlos13th wrote:

Schmapdi wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
^ Awesome, thanks for all that extra info, and welcome to Dakka!

Mars Attacks already being Mantic's bestseller (beating at least 20k copies of Dreadball already sold) is amazing, I had a hunch it would do well with the general release, but that really is great.

The DKH and fantasy skirmish news is all coming a lot sooner than I expected. I think I might be more into DKH than another deadzone-mechanics game though.

I'm glad Mars Attacks is off to a good start. I was sorely tempted during the KS, but managed to avoid pledging. (loved the Martians, but the humans left me kind of cold) It looked really fun though.

Any does anyone else feel like Mantic is getting way overextended?

Kings of War
Warpath
Dreadball
Deadzone
Dwarf King's Hold
Mars Attacks
New KoW skirmish

Seems like a lot to have on your plate for such a tiny company.

Yes especially considering they have yet to properly flesh out. Warpath after years of it being released.

*nod*
I feel the same way about Kings of War. There are a lot of armies, but they're all a hearty mix of dud sculpts, metal, metal-plastic hybrids, clone dwarfs, etc. Nothing I'd feel good about collecting. Too hodge podge, too uneven.

Mantic does a lot better at the self-contained stuff. Mars Attacks looks great, Deadzone seems pretty good (issues aside), a lot of people seem to like Dreadball. They should focus on those until they have the resources to go in and clean up KoW and do Warpath right.

Schmapdi wrote:
Mantic does a lot better at the self-contained stuff. Mars Attacks looks great, Deadzone seems pretty good (issues aside), a lot of people seem to like Dreadball. They should focus on those until they have the resources to go in and clean up KoW and do Warpath right.

Well, considering they've just finished Dreadball, are about to finish Deadzone and Mars Attacks!, are about to launch the PM for Dreadball Xtreme, and the next two projects on the horizon are DKH4 and 'Fantasy Deadzone' - all of which are self-contained, but at the same time (excepting Mars Attacks!) flesh out the fluff of the two main Mantic universes - before moving on to Warpath and KoW2 next year, I think this is something they're already doing

 Taarnak wrote:

TwilightSparkles wrote:
Probably some overlap here but these are snippets from 2 of the 3 open say seminars about DKH:

*kickstarter targeted for end of July

*similar to MA in that there will be a basic pick up and play rule set that is simple to learn, then a second KS and later Mantic/hobby store expanded rulebook with stats for all KOW races so you can use sell of them in the game, plus rules for character creation, experience, campaign etc plan is to hopefully do quite a lavish special KS version and then more basic version.

*campaign in the box scales through the various rules so you'll start with two heroes fighting to free two more, then the other two escaping so it introduces mechanics but by bit.

* main bad guy is a necromancer but also undead dwarf king with undead dwarf warriors , various other beasties

*high quality card dungeon tiles! stretch goal will be double sided print, in one seminar people really wanted strong themes such as Egyptian temple style! classic style etc and Ronnie seemed to really like that . They looked at hard plastic but too expensive and wouldn't wear well.

*kickstarter will feature special resin (no idea what type) characters, reference to character cards having a reverse died which us epic version, KS will have these epic versions as miniatures

*lot of mention of this being a gateway game bringing people into the hobby similar to heroquest and space hulk , Mars attacks already mantics best selling boxed game as two European distributors have bought a ton to localise, Ronnie expressed they'd love to get this (DKH) in mainstream stores.

*In one seminar all those new sculpts were referenced as being for this, I didn't hear anything about this skirmish game but it was getting pretty hot at times.

*all in scale with KOW and usable,

* Ronnie really wants a digital app eventually for this which would let you lay out dungeons, generate scenarios using minis you have, track stats etc

I'll post anything else I remember.

Emphasis mine. Bolded part does not compute at all. The rest of this stuff sounds excellent.

The sculpts shown all look pretty great too.

~Eric

Sorry , what Ronnie said about the plastic not wearing well was that the sections warped over time and would not lay flat, and the connectors needed to lay it together would make it look awkward, plus they would need to be painted to look good which would make the game less desirable as an entry game.

Couple more ransoms bits I remembered:

* AI is definitely in for the evil side so co-op will be possible

* talk about using gold as source of upgrades in the advanced version but it is more likely that characters in a campaign in this version will advance based on what they do and what they loot.

On a more random note the Mantic shop had two types of crazy box, the not mentioned where they were b for basilea etc. (I got no basileans in one of those) and a generic larger but flatter 2014 box which had different contents without the clippers and paint. The lettered boxes seemed better value.

 AlexHolker wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
...around 5-6 minis per side.

"Building big armies"

I'm rather looking forward to the day a skirmish game ruleset exists in a one to one figure ratio and actually accomodates 500-600 minis per side that can be played in an hour

 judgedoug wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
...around 5-6 minis per side.

"Building big armies"

I'm rather looking forward to the day a skirmish game ruleset exists in a one to one figure ratio and actually accomodates 500-600 minis per side that can be played in an hour

Lord of the Rings works well for that. It can be played in an hour, it just can't be finished in an hour. :p

Closed wrong tab, answered question in wrong thread...

 Dawnbringer wrote:

Lord of the Rings works well for that. It can be played in an hour, it just can't be finished in an hour. :p

Well that's why I'm building War of the Ring armies, so I can do 500-600 models per side
But we'll probably wind up using Kings of War or Warmaster (scaled to inches), as the WotR rules ... aren't very good.

Schmapdi wrote:
Any does anyone else feel like Mantic is getting way overextended?

Kings of War
Warpath
Dreadball
Deadzone
Dwarf King's Hold
Mars Attacks
New KoW skirmish

Seems like a lot to have on your plate for such a tiny company.

I definitely feel that way; I get that they want to cover a lot of bases but they're a tiny company and want to do all these things, so I'm afraid it'll end with nothing really that well done. I really like the concept of KoW as a cheaper, more streamlined Warhammer (and Warpath as the same for 40k), and I definitely see the appeal of Deadzone (Necromunda) and the forthcoming KoW Skirmish game (Mordheim) as things that are needed, but it seems like they're trying way too hard instead of focusing on a handful of games to really flesh out and get the quality up there; KoW for example if it had the level of quality of PP or old GW coupled with actual balanced rules, would be able to strike right at the heart of Warhammer as not only cheaper but better and comparable quality. What initially appealed to me in the first place about KoW was the fact it looked like Warhammer and played similar but with much more emphasis on strategy and tactics than listbuilding or uber-heroes, and Mantic's figures were half the price of GW; in fact that's how I discovered it in the first place because I was looking for Warhammer-like games without requiring a small fortune to start. I think they could capitalize on that by hitting all the pain points people have with Warhammer, while emphasizing the fact that you can use your existing models to draw away disgruntled WHFB players who might stick with it because they've invested hundreds. Even if that meant having your "Veer-myn" in fantasy, or a Necropolis army or what have you that's blatantly meant to be WHFB races. I think they either have to embrace that fully or ignore it completely, they can't reasonably do both.

I get that they don't want to just be a GW clone/knockoff (although I think it could work if you acted like the GW of old that everyone fondly remembers), so I like them adding things to take up the niche that GW abandoned, but it seems like they should have done that first. Dreadball/Deadzone/KoW Skirmish/DKH should have been their focus from the start to pick up the smaller scale games, and then perhaps expanded to KoW/Warpath in the future. Instead you have a bunch of half-done games, none of which are really good and many of which have little or no support until the next Kickstarter, which has never reassured me as it's easy to fall into the trap of relying on Kickstarters for everything, instead of actually getting revenue churning on your own; what will happen when the Kickstarters dry up? You're left with nothing because the only way you get money is by donations.

That said though I'm really looking forward to more about the KoW skirmish game especially; Mordheim was great.

Which PP quality are you talking about? I bought a Cyriss box for fun, and to date it's the shoddiest, lowest quality set of minis I own.

I also dispute your assertion that none of the Mantic games are any good, and I'm pretty sure so would quite a lot of Dreadball, Deadzone and KoW players.

They've also sold, according to reports from the open day, over 20k copies of Dreadball, and exceeded that again with retail preorders from distributors for Mars Attacks!, so they do have an income.

NTRabbit wrote:
Which PP quality are you talking about? I bought a Cyriss box for fun, and to date it's the shoddiest, lowest quality set of minis I own.

I also dispute your assertion that none of the Mantic games are any good, and I'm pretty sure so would quite a lot of Dreadball, Deadzone and KoW players.

They've also sold, according to reports from the open day, over 20k copies of Dreadball, and exceeded that again with retail preorders from distributors for Mars Attacks!, so they do have an income.

Most of the PP figures I've seen and some of the few I've bought are fairly good quality, not on part with GW for quality but IMHO GW goes overboard on minuscule details for rank and file troops where it isn't needed to the point where you get quality that you don't need just so they can justify the insane price.

RE their games not being good, I didn't say that, I said they should focus on either competing directly with GW or filling the niche that they abandoned. From what I've seen most of their games look really good, although some (Dreadball) I have zero interest whatsoever in. I actually really want to try Deadzone.

Restic is simply a touchy material. It also seems to age molds more quickly, leading to a marked difference between good and bad casts.

PP restic models are, on the average, better than Mantic casts, but neither reliably produce restic anywhere near the level I'd expect for the price in the modern era.

WayneTheGame wrote:

I definitely feel that way; I get that they want to cover a lot of bases but they're a tiny company and want to do all these things, so I'm afraid it'll end with nothing really that well done. I really like the concept of KoW as a cheaper, more streamlined Warhammer (and Warpath as the same for 40k), and I definitely see the appeal of Deadzone (Necromunda) and the forthcoming KoW Skirmish game (Mordheim) as things that are needed, but it seems like they're trying way too hard instead of focusing on a handful of games to really flesh out and get the quality up there; KoW for example if it had the level of quality of PP or old GW coupled with actual balanced rules, would be able to strike right at the heart of Warhammer as not only cheaper but better and comparable quality. What initially appealed to me in the first place about KoW was the fact it looked like Warhammer and played similar but with much more emphasis on strategy and tactics than listbuilding or uber-heroes, and Mantic's figures were half the price of GW; in fact that's how I discovered it in the first place because I was looking for Warhammer-like games without requiring a small fortune to start.

I get that they don't want to just be a GW clone/knockoff (although I think it could work if you acted like the GW of old that everyone fondly remembers), so I like them adding things to take up the niche that GW abandoned, but it seems like they should have done that first. Dreadball/Deadzone/KoW Skirmish/DKH should have been their focus from the start to pick up the smaller scale games, and then perhaps expanded to KoW/Warpath in the future. Instead you have a bunch of half-done games, none of which are really good and many of which have little or no support until the next Kickstarter, which has never reassured me as it's easy to fall into the trap of relying on Kickstarters for everything, instead of actually getting revenue churning on your own; what will happen when the Kickstarters dry up? You're left with nothing because the only way you get money is by donations.

That said though I'm really looking forward to more about the KoW skirmish game especially; Mordheim was great.

I'm just not seeing it for Kings of War - in fact the opposite. They've released three supplements now for KoW (and I need to get the newest one which was not KS). It's a vastly superior ruleset to anything on the market (that is still in print) when it comes to mass-battles fantasy gaming, and I have huge armies full of many manufacturer's miniatures.

Warpath is understandable, but it's still in beta/public playtesting, yes?

I've had a hell of a fun time with Deadzone and Dreadball. I have not played DKH or PP.

I'd say Mantic has a comparable accelerated release schedule as GW of old. Nearly every month in the late 80's was a new boardgame (usually licensed), and then throughout the 90's a new big box game or expansion almost every quarter:
Adeptus Titanicus,
Space Marine 1st,
Epic Space Marine 2nd,
Titan Legions,
Epic 40k,
Space Fleet,
Battlefleet Gothic,
Space Hulk,
Deathwing,
Genestealer,
Space Hulk 2nd,
Man o War,
Plague Fleet,
Warhammer 4,
Warhammer Battle Magic,
Warhammer Arcane Magic,
Warhammer 5,
Warhammer 5 Magic,
40k 2, Dark Millennium,
40k 3,
Necromunda,
Outlanders,
Gorkamorka,
Blood Bowl 3,
Tyranid Attack,
Advanced Space Crusade,
Advanced Heroquest (89),
Dragon Masters,
Mighty Empires,
Warhammer Quest,
Talisman,
the half-dozen Talisman expansions,
plus the smaller games like Doom of the Eldar and Battle for Armageddon,
Bommerz over da Sulphur River,
et cetera.

And I know I'm missing some.
I surely can't be the only one who remembers GW releasing every ruleset/game that every one of their designers had an idea for, even if it sucked? (looking at you, Bommerz)

The best quality minis I have are a handful of Aleph from Infinity I bought to paint, they blow everything else I have away. After that it would be some bits and bobs from Forgeworld, then the Mantic hard plastics, then the Battlefront hard plastics, then GW hard plastics.

I've yet to see the supposed superiority of GW plastics, but when the vast majority of my infantry options are decades old single piece sculpts in dodgy finecast resin, and the remainder equally old and very limited ABS minis, it's really difficult to judge.

I still think Mantic is doing just fine; they've made missteps here and there, but given the amount of overlap between all of their projects in rules, fluff and sculpts I don't see them as being stretched at all (except during KS fulfillment week!)

I'll vouch for the original Dwarf King's Hold games. Simple rules, simple setup, a fair amount of depth, and best of all, quick play times! Very solid little games.

We've played through all the included scenarios in the original box and one of these days would like to get Ancient Grudge to give the warband rules a try.

Alas, nobody seems to have a copy of that version for a reasonable price. I think they have the rules downloadable from the wargames vault or something.

I am definitely getting an early 90s GW vibe from Mantic these days. Sure they've made some royal goofs with how things panned out with certain Kickstarter pieces, but they seem to be trying to get things back on the right path.

A big epic quest game with lots of single piece items (due to their ease of pick up and play) is what the market really needs. Hell, they can make a trimmed down entry level game to dump in all the mass market shops.

One thing Mantic seems to do well on is keeping their rules tight. That's going to be the key to this new DKH I think.

 judgedoug wrote:

I surely can't be the only one who remembers GW releasing every ruleset/game that every one of their designers had an idea for, even if it sucked? (looking at you, Bommerz)

Bommerz was awesome, I played it once and if I remember correctly the rules went on to form Aeronautica Imperialis?

GW was definitely blitzing game releases back then, that list doesn't even count all the free white dwarf games, brewhouse bash was my favourite, the very definition of "beer and pretzels" gaming.

I went ahead and compiled all the photos and info on the new Dwarf King Hold game here: http://forum.manticblog.com/showthread.php?8233-DKH-News-and-Rumors-from-Open-Day-2014

Thanks for the links. I actually went in and read the rules for both sets of games and I think we're going to give it a try here.

Thanks for the link tgmore

Hope you don't mind me quoting a couple of bits over here

The new DKH will be based on cardboard tiles but with plastic scenery such as tables, chairs and chests etc. This time the good guys play an adventuring party, which is the sculpts in the pictures dwarf fighter, human barbarian, elf bow woman and a human mage. The opposition is undead with new skeletons, armoured zombies and zombie troll mentioned. There will be 2 ways to play the 1st is specific scenarios telling the story during these characters will find upgrade weapons in a set manner and also learn new skills and become legandary as per the script so to speak.

4. Re: Armoured zombies in DKH IV: They specifically confirmed a zombified basilian paladin, also not sure if they were joking but zombie dwarfs were mentioned.

..Zombie dwarfs!

So it's Heroquest?

WayneTheGame wrote:
So it's Heroquest?

The similarities are it is a dungeon crawler themed fantasy board game. But there are many differances.

1. HQ uses one walled room you are somewhat limited in how many ways it can be reconfigured. DKH uses modular tiles

2. HQ has no game mechanic for solo or co-op play vs the game. Probably through a deck of event and monster cards.

3. HQ has no character progression. Your equipment is your level so to speak.

4. HQ only has a limited number of baddies, DKH will have stats for every KoW model.

I could go on and on but saying the new DKH is HQ is a gross over simplification.

tgmoore wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:
So it's Heroquest?

I could go on and on but saying the new DKH is HQ is a gross over simplification.

your dealing with gamers, gross and oversimplified kinda of comes with the territory

Seriously though, you had me at zombie paladin

tgmoore wrote:

4. HQ only has a limited number of baddies, DKH will have stats for every KoW model.

So considering their stating every KoW unit for bad-guys is there any chance there will rules for using them a player characters? i.e: A ogre shooter with different stats as a hero instead of the standard elf archer.

 Rolt wrote:

tgmoore wrote:

4. HQ only has a limited number of baddies, DKH will have stats for every KoW model.

So considering their stating every KoW unit for bad-guys is there any chance there will rules for using them a player characters? i.e: A ogre shooter with different stats as a hero instead of the standard elf archer.

Obviously this is pure conjecture on my part. DKH in its current form is a competitive, scenario based dungeon battle game with two small squads facing off each other. Each player is equal in so much as it is not a Dungeon Master vs. player(s). Following that trend I don't think it would be out of line to allow players to use other units as player characters. But we will have to wait and see. It is encouraging to me that the "book of depravity" (working title) which is the advanced rules include in the game for the forthcoming DKH Dungeon Crawl is all about giving gamers options, depth of play, campaign continuity and character building.

From what I have read base game is an easy to learn intro or rules light dungeon crawler and the advanced game gives us something to sink our teeth into. The best part about it is its all in one box.


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 Theophony wrote:

tgmoore wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:
So it's Heroquest?

I could go on and on but saying the new DKH is HQ is a gross over simplification.

your dealing with gamers, gross and oversimplified kinda of comes with the territory

Seriously though, you had me at zombie paladin

Gamer sees any fantasy themed dungeon crawler with miniatures and waves it off as Hero Quest. Well Hero Quest is great intro game for new or young players, and while lacking depth it isn't a bad game. HQ hasn't been in print for 20 years and used sets command high prices on ebay for what was a fairly common game. I'd say the time is ripe.

It is basically going to be heroquest is the short version for anyone with their finger hovering over the KS pledge button in 2 months time. :p

There will be a ton of extra stuff besides that (optional game mode, campaign and levelling rules, rules for a ton of monsters, supplement books), but if you want you can just play the basic prebuilt scenarios with the minis in the box.

Nothing wrong with going simple.

Simple in this case is good, especially when it can be expanded upon to become more complex.

Which do you think is going to go over easier with someone new to gaming- a more basic game like Heroquest or DKH, or something very rule heavy and complex like Myth?

Obviously there's room for both types of games, but we need a few more games with ease of access for the up and coming generations.

As the one who always had to read the rules, I don't think I would have been able to really get the rules to Myth at the age I received Heroquest.

DKH has very simple and efficient rules. My seven year old picked up on them quite quickly. As much as he likes Myth's components, he doesn't even want to come near it after I tried to slowly introduce it to him and all of its various mechanics.

I'm not even going to bother with Descent at his current age...

Descent is actually my primary concern with the new DKH game.

I'm not terribly fond of Descent for two reasons:

1. I always have to play the bad guy in games with my family, which means I can't pal around with them in the same way or coordinate strategies with them.

2. I don't care about winning so much, but I want tight, tense games that look like they could go either way. Games that encourage all players to be very careful with their choices, because there are real consequences for bad strategic decisions. When there's a reasonable chance that the heroes could lose, it feels like a real achievement when they win.

Descent bores me because it is too easy on the heroes. So whenever we play I have to be an evil punching bag, fulfilling the other player's power fantasies with paper tiger threats rather than engaging their minds with genuine challenges. The only way I can really threaten them is by singling out an individual hero and having all my evil forces gang up on him / her, because taking one player down disrupts the party's mutual support buffs. Problem is, this "strategy" makes the game a miserable experience for the player getting picked on, and understandably so.

So the fact that DKH will be all the hero players vs. one bad guy player is a big turn-off for me. My interest will depend on how seriously Mantic takes the alternative A.I. ways of playing the game. (And of course, whether that deck presents a genuine challenge.)

 Vermonter wrote:


So the fact that DKH will be all the hero players vs. one bad guy player is a big turn-off for me. My interest will depend on how seriously Mantic takes the alternative A.I. ways of playing the game. (And of course, whether that deck presents a genuine challenge.)

Mantic has already stated via the Open Day 2014 seminars that in the new DKH there will be both Heroes vs Dungeon Master and Co-Op players vs. the game (probably via event/monster cards). I am hoping based on the current DKH where two even sides face off vs each other that in the new game the Dungeon Master will be balanced in power with the players. This would create a true competitive game rather than merely being there to move the monsters around and move the story forward.

 tgmoore wrote:
Mantic has already stated via the Open Day 2014 seminars there will be both Heroes vs Dungeon Master and Co-Op vs. the game (probably via event/monster cards).

And I already stated my awareness of that fact, if you bother to read what I wrote.

I said my interest in the game would be how seriously that A.I. deck is taken. If it feels like a tacked on, underdeveloped variant for the "real" one vs. many game, I'm out.

 Vermonter wrote:

 tgmoore wrote:
Mantic has already stated via the Open Day 2014 seminars there will be both Heroes vs Dungeon Master and Co-Op vs. the game (probably via event/monster cards).

And I already stated my awareness of that fact, if you bother to read what I wrote.

I said my interest in the game would be how seriously that A.I. deck is taken. If it feels like a tacked on, underdeveloped variant for the "real" one vs. many game, I'm out.

No need to be snarky.

There is no other way to play that I know of. Its either players vs. Dungeon master or players vs. AI cards. What mechanic are you suggesting or wanting?

The current version of DKH is player vs. player in scenario driven games. So I hope to see some of that in the player vs. DM interaction.

Has anyone tried out Ares' Galaxy Defenders? I hope Thorton can come up with something comparable.

That's become my baseline for judging a game's AI. There are three levels (based on color of card and alien) of alien experience/ complexity. Each level has different stats and abilities, but also behaves different from each other, and reacts differently to the heroes. While a green (weak) one might prefer staying it's distance and attacking from range, a red (veteran) one might take the initiative and go on the offense, advancing and attacking, but also bringing supporting aliens along for the ride via its skills.

Interestingly enough, certain types of aliens (and even alien levels) will prioritize different targets.

They've also got a set of expansions coming up on Kickstarter at the end of the month, going full on X-Com and takign the battle to both the moon and the alien homeworld, but that's a whole other story...plus I'm sure the figure sculpts aren't up to most of Dakka's standards.

But yeah, if you want to see enemy AI done good, check out Galaxy Defenders.

 tgmoore wrote:

HQ hasn't been in print for 20 years and used sets command high prices on ebay for what was a fairly common game. I'd say the time is ripe.

Absolutely, if they didn't think so before, they probably took one look at how much the Gamezone had taken on their Heroquest KS in mere days (before it got pulled). There are other games out there on sale (Descent, the D&D boardgames etc.) but I still think there is a gap in the market that would no doubt be very profitable and also supply a lot of gamers with what they have been hoping for.

So, Tamburlaine was telling me today that there's pics of some of the new special undead from Dwarf King's Hold floating around. I thought I looked through all of the Open Day pictures, but I only recall seeing the one new zombie that looked like a regular townsperson. Does anyone have those pics of the other types?

From earlier in the thread, not sure if there are any others?



There was mention of armoured/paladin zombies and also dwarf zombies!

There's an undead troll..

Mantic seem to be doing really well with there undead/zombie range.

Ninja!



And, another shot of that necromancer:

Integrated bases...FTL!

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

 Cyporiean wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

And yet that doesn't make it any less dated and clumsy...

~Eric

Boardgame or not, I hope that they include those larger rounds or squares that Mantic uses with a spot to put the integrated bases.

Maybe they'll do something cool and include some colored ones as a stretch goal or something.

Of course having tons and tons and TONS of unpainted, unfinished Mantic figures laying around, it's not like I don't have a surplus of those Mantic bases or anything...

I still hope we'll see some sort of enemy type included besides undead stuff.

One thing I always loved about Heroquest was the variety of critters that it came with to battle.

Then again if Mantic ends up including stats for everything they make, we should be able to include quite a bit of other stuff. I actually hope someone figures out rules for some of the alien things from Dread Ball Extreme, and some of the more wild and feral Deadzone stuff.
I have a feeling my Martian giant bugs might make for some good dungeon fodder too.

 Taarnak wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

And yet that doesn't make it any less dated and clumsy...

~Eric

The only thing really clumsy about them is that they don't have the entire base integrated, and still need a 25mm square base to sit in. Otherwise integrated bases are pretty much essential to board games, and I don't think there's a chance in the world that they won't be single piece soft PVC minis like most of the upcoming DBX teams, Mars Attacks! and before that Loka. Especially given what they said about the distributor reaction to their multipart minis in Dreadball, ie "multipart minis are terrible never do that again".

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
Boardgame or not, I hope that they include those larger rounds or squares that Mantic uses with a spot to put the integrated bases.

Maybe they'll do something cool and include some colored ones as a stretch goal or something.

Of course having tons and tons and TONS of unpainted, unfinished Mantic figures laying around, it's not like I don't have a surplus of those Mantic bases or anything...

I still hope we'll see some sort of enemy type included besides undead stuff.

One thing I always loved about Heroquest was the variety of critters that it came with to battle.

We have seen new sculpts for:

1. Undead Troll
2. Undead Troll Shaman
3. Ghost
4. Necromancer
5. Undead Basilian Paladin
6. Zombie
7. Ghoul (zombish bloke holding a club)
8. Skeletons (half finished sculpts)

There has been rumors of undead dwarf king and undead hearth guard. There are rats in the suspected box cover art.

In contrast HeroQuest had:

8 Orcs (2 mace, 2 hatchet, 4 sword)
6 Goblins (2 hatchet, 2 sword, 2 dagger)
3 Fimir (Lizard men)
4 Chaos Warriors
1 Chaos Warlock
1 Gargoyle
4 Skeletons
2 Zombies
2 Mummies

Just to be snarky for a bit, almost all those sculpts would still fall under the umbrella of "undead."

Sure, there's a variety of undead types (versus HQ's 3 flavors of undead), and with access to all those goblins, twilight kin, ogres, abyssal dwarves, and orcs that Mantic has already released, I'm bound to get plenty of variety (nevermind all the other fantasy nonsense I own). I just hope they throw in a few living adversaries as well, besides a necromancer.

Having all that undead is understandable if the goal of the game is to defeat a necromancer after all.

I missed the rats. I'm assuming "rodent" rats, as opposed to Mantica styled Veermyn or Skaven types.

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Faster than light?

I don't mind them too much on models like the assassin (I don't think it's a ninja, I assume it's more of a hashashin for that Ophidian desert human faction) where it's easy enough to slice through the join (assuming it's plastic/restic). But where you have a model with a cloak, and there's a lot of cutting involved... meh. I'd pass.

On the other hand, I'm a fan of the integrated bases on KoW stuff anyway, as it works well with multibasing. It's only my Deadzone stuff I've been removing the tabs on and sticking on alternative bases. I'd probably do the same with fantasy skirmish though.

FTL = For The Loss.

As opposed to FTW = For The Win!

I just don't like them - but understand that they may be a 'necessary evil' in terms of Boardgames.

How many people even work at Mantic these days? Ronnie. Stewart. Little Joey. Uh... Ray-Ray? Old Sammy? That ascot-wearing hound who solved all those murders?

There's at least Chris, Chris, Chris, Jo, Joe, Mark and Mark as well.

That's true by the way...

Re bases - had heard the plastic will have square bases as part of the model like in Mars Attacks where the 25mm circle base is part of the model.

Going to pledge for the game package when the DKH KS comes out. The differing zombie types and inclusion of dungeon tiles (which i can double duty for DnD) pushed me over the edge

 Black Nexus wrote:

How many people even work at Mantic these days? Ronnie. Stewart. Little Joey. Uh... Ray-Ray? Old Sammy? That ascot-wearing hound who solved all those murders?

There's at least Chris, Chris, Chris, Jo, Joe, Mark and Mark as well.

That's true by the way...

I should go work for Mantic and add a third Mark. :p

Will the integrated bases be something more than the circular tabs they use now? I know for Project Pandora they included models without bases, and you were supposed to just use the little circular tabs on the Vermynn or Marines.

 Taarnak wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

And yet that doesn't make it any less dated and clumsy...

~Eric

If they're going for the mainstream boardgame market, toy shops, etc - and all signs point to this being accurate - then it's absolutely the right move, regardless of how much grognards like us like separate bases, etc. Anyway, removing med-soft plastic boardgame style figures from their integrated bases should be a trivial task for people like us.


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 highlord tamburlaine wrote:

Then again if Mantic ends up including stats for everything they make, we should be able to include quite a bit of other stuff. I actually hope someone figures out rules for some of the alien things from Dread Ball Extreme, and some of the more wild and feral Deadzone stuff.
I have a feeling my Martian giant bugs might make for some good dungeon fodder too.

Makes me think of Advanced HeroQuest in that sense, actually. And if they supply such stats, then it pretty well covers a huge chunk of our Warhammer collections as well. Not to mention "counts-as"...

 Polonius wrote:
Will the integrated bases be something more than the circular tabs they use now? I know for Project Pandora they included models without bases, and you were supposed to just use the little circular tabs on the Vermynn or Marines.

Something I'm glad I knew about in advance, which is why I ordered some extra bases with my recent copy! I always think that it's slightly iffy how they're so reluctant to provide bases with the Crazy Boxes too - those integrated ones just aren't stable enough. I'm actually quite a fan of the proper bases they do though - being solid hard plastic gives a remarkable weight and stability to the models, and they are completely reversible if you just need a flat surface.

Regarding the DKH models, I'd guess that these integrated bases will be much larger, like those on the Mars Attacks models, so the models will be truly single-piece. Dreadball Xtreme will use the integrated bases, despite being made from boardgame plastic, so that they're compatible with the existing clear hexes.

 Azazelx wrote:

 Taarnak wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

And yet that doesn't make it any less dated and clumsy...

~Eric

If they're going for the mainstream boardgame market, toy shops, etc - and all signs point to this being accurate - then it's absolutely the right move, regardless of how much grognards like us like separate bases, etc. Anyway, removing med-soft plastic boardgame style figures from their integrated bases should be a trivial task for people like us.

Except when they do stupid things like add platform shoes so they can make the integrals work. Which has to be one of the worst solutions for that problem I have seen.

I don't know why they don't add some sort of detail to the base itself rather than have those awful platform shoes. Give them a pile of rubble to be standing on, or a rock jutting out to extend the base a bit, and give the character a bit more personality?

I wonder if Mantic will do stats for races/ creatures they haven't gotten around to producing yet, kind of like what they did with Dwarf King's Hold: Ancient Grudge, which had rules for stuff like trolls and werewolves, which certainly didn't exist at the time of the game's production.

Maybe I'll get me some official lizard rules from Mantic yet!

 Azazelx wrote:

 Taarnak wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

And yet that doesn't make it any less dated and clumsy...

~Eric

If they're going for the mainstream boardgame market, toy shops, etc - and all signs point to this being accurate - then it's absolutely the right move, regardless of how much grognards like us like separate bases, etc. Anyway, removing med-soft plastic boardgame style figures from their integrated bases should be a trivial task for people like us.

It's not about trouble so much as it is time. Also, their execution of it is just plain amateur hour. If they want to make integrated board game pieces, fine. They should at least make the base correctly sized rather than having a second base to slot the attached one into. Hell, at that point they should just use round pegs on the bottoms of the feet. That would be the absolute best situation in my opinion.

~Eric

 Taarnak wrote:

 Azazelx wrote:

 Taarnak wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Integrated bases...FTL!

Eh, they are for a boardgame.

And yet that doesn't make it any less dated and clumsy...

~Eric

If they're going for the mainstream boardgame market, toy shops, etc - and all signs point to this being accurate - then it's absolutely the right move, regardless of how much grognards like us like separate bases, etc. Anyway, removing med-soft plastic boardgame style figures from their integrated bases should be a trivial task for people like us.

It's not about trouble so much as it is time. Also, their execution of it is just plain amateur hour. If they want to make integrated board game pieces, fine. They should at least make the base correctly sized rather than having a second base to slot the attached one into. Hell, at that point they should just use round pegs on the bottoms of the feet. That would be the absolute best situation in my opinion.

~Eric

I would prefer separate bases. That being said this forum which is full of war gamers who know how to re-base miniatures and have the tools and experience to do it. Casual or board game/RPG only players see ANY assembly of miniatures as a pain in the ass.

I think the current Mantic system of a standardized round integral base which fits into a larger square or round base (your choice) is the best compromise.

 tgmoore wrote:
I would prefer separate bases. That being said this forum which is full of war gamers who know how to re-base miniatures and have the tools and experience to do it. Casual or board game/RPG only players see ANY assembly of miniatures as a pain in the ass.

I think the current Mantic system of a standardized round integral base which fits into a larger square or round base (your choice) is the best compromise.

It has the disadvantages of both and the advantages of neither. And really, what board gamers are you thinking of? When I was younger I played Forbidden Bridge, 13 Dead End Drive, the Goosebumps games and Space Crusade, and all required assembly. Any idiot can stick a peg in a hole, as long as you don't screw up the tolerancing.

People have less patience these days, any setup work at all = "this sucks".

Note that video games don't even have manuals or much in the way of tutorials anymore either, similar reasons.

Another theory is that as time has passed, game makers have found more efficient ways of getting people playing as fast as possible and these have become accepted as the norm, to the point where any video game with a steep learning curve, or a boardgame with multipart minis gets a big no from players/ distributors.

 AlexHolker wrote:

 tgmoore wrote:
I would prefer separate bases. That being said this forum which is full of war gamers who know how to re-base miniatures and have the tools and experience to do it. Casual or board game/RPG only players see ANY assembly of miniatures as a pain in the ass.

I think the current Mantic system of a standardized round integral base which fits into a larger square or round base (your choice) is the best compromise.

It has the disadvantages of both and the advantages of neither. And really, what board gamers are you thinking of? When I was younger I played Forbidden Bridge, 13 Dead End Drive, the Goosebumps games and Space Crusade, and all required assembly. Any idiot can stick a peg in a hole, as long as you don't screw up the tolerancing.

The board gamers on BoardGameGeek.com many panned the original DKH because it required glue and clipper to put together the miniatures before you could play. I am not disagreeing with your idea but I don't see Mantic changing their basing system (same system they use for Kings of War).

The current trend with miniatures in board games is one piece molded ready to go and pre-painted is popular with many in non-war gaming crowd too. Examples: Descent, D&D Board game series, Claustrophobia, Pathfinder Battles, X-Wing

I'll be looking to use the minis in my KoW armies as well (in fact part of the appeal of the whole thing is going to be getting a variety pack for KoW Undead and some characters for other armies), so I'm fine with keeping the same basing system rather than large round integrals Mars Attacks style.

I do hope we see ratmen as well, completely baffled as to why Mantic made those a sci-fi army rather than a fantasy one.

I would happily support any and all nonhuman races that aren't elves or dwarves. The more the merrier I say!

Rats, lizards, monkeys, squids... give me as many bizarre races as companies wish to produce!

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
I would happily support any and all nonhuman races that aren't elves or dwarves. The more the merrier I say!

Rats, lizards, monkeys, squids... give me as many bizarre races as companies wish to produce!

[Animal]man races are the best you can come up with?

How about giant spiders? Everybody loves giant spiders


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Different angle shot of gobolizard from quirksworthy.

 AlexHolker wrote:

[Animal]man races are the best you can come up with?

Of course not! I think working from an [Animal]man template is safer than getting really wild and creative, because if you stray to far from what's accepted on the tabletop you run the risk of scaring people off, especially if it's something they don't feel they would get a lot of use out of (besides for whatever specific game they're produced for).
I've wanted armored, civilized, metal- working spiders for a long time. Maybe with different arachnid castes for various levels of labor/ unit types. Not sure how interested the rest of the gaming world would be in having spider armies.

Anyways, everyone knows all I ever want are new reptiles to add to my clutch.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:

[Animal]man races are the best you can come up with?

Of course not! I think working from an [Animal]man template is safer than getting really wild and creative, because if you stray to far from what's accepted on the tabletop you run the risk of scaring people off, especially if it's something they don't feel they would get a lot of use out of (besides for whatever specific game they're produced for).

Then you shouldn't be suggesting [Animal]man races. There are an arbitrarily large number of animals that could be turned into [Animal]man races, and they're all mutually exclusive for little gain. Something like a centaur offers something meaningfully different that a man with a horse's head never can, as well as having a history going back to the Bronze Age.

I've wanted armored, civilized, metal- working spiders for a long time. Maybe with different arachnid castes for various levels of labor/ unit types. Not sure how interested the rest of the gaming world would be in having spider armies.

This does sound like a really nice idea, although I'm not sure how easy it would to anthropomorphise a spider - the only examples I can think of are ones wearing a top hat with monocle, and not sure if that is what you have in mind..?

All for new ideas though, and hey Mantic is as the stage now (where their different game universes are still being added to) where they can get more creative if they want to.

They just added anthropomorphised spiders to Dreadball with the Koris in Xtreme, they could always do a fantasy version of that. Or did you want less anthro more spider?

Not feeling the spider, but I like the model. I can always hold out hope the quality will be there :-P

Edited myself

I'd like to see a race of giants or tiny things, would be interesting.

I do like where DBX has gone with the Crystallans, Koris and Ada-Lorana.

Any of those (or nameless) would make awesome Warpath armies, anything to get as far away as possible from the space elf, space dwarf, space skaven, space orcs and goblins, space undead thing that Warpath is lumbered with.

All of Mantic's sci fi stuff has been great in regards to bringing more unique creatures to the tabletop. Most futuristic games seem to have no issue with this, whereas fantasy tends to keep things in the more common and accepted tropes. Not sure why that is.

I've totally been digging all the Dreadball Extreme stuff. Hope to see comparable ideas start to appear in the fantasy lines as well, even if as characters, bosses, unique creatures, what have you...

 scarletsquig wrote:
I'd like to see a race of giants or tiny things, would be interesting.

Giants that don't follow the big, dumb and ugly cliche are something I'm interested in.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
All of Mantic's sci fi stuff has been great in regards to bringing more unique creatures to the tabletop.

Are we still talking about the company that made Space Ratmen, Space Zombies, Space Dwarves, Space Orcs and Space Elves?

I suspect that Tamb is referring to the games themselves, rather than each individual figure or faction. As in Warpath/DeadZone/DreadBall rather than Orx and Forgefathers specifically...

 Azazelx wrote:
I suspect that Tamb is referring to the games themselves, rather than each individual figure or faction. As in Warpath/DeadZone/DreadBall rather than Orx and Forgefathers specifically...

Don't let reason get in the way of a good whine

Sorry, brah!

If we're talking new races, I'd like something really funky. How about some plantmen? Why not have an army of Triffids?

I would be perfectly happy with animal-man races though. Intelligent apes? Sure. Gnolls? Hell yeah! Lizardmen who have actually figured out metallurgy? That would be a nice change from the usual savage type lizards.

A couple of water themed armies could go down well, ie a good or neutral aligned army of river themed creatures, and an evil aligned army of oversized crustaceans from the oceans

Loads of info and pics for dkh kickstarter on http://quirkworthy.com/2014/05/28/dwarf-kings-hold-4-some-info/

Some nice close up mini shots






Plenty more pics on Jakes blog.

New info there about the KS is:

- $95 sweet spot.
- Early Birds will have a bonus mini, not a discount.
- Early Birds will run for the first weekend rather than being limited in number.

So, finally a Kickstarter that doesn't make you camp out on it before the EB's all go in the first 20 minutes! Australians rejoice. :p

That's good to hear Squig, especially after waking up super freaking early trying to get an EB for Galaxy Defenders, which were gone in the time it took me to log into Amazon to finalize my payment.

Will have to check the blog when I get home.

Sounds like the new DKH will be one piece miniatures.

Well it is a board game, one piece minis are the minimum acceptable standard there. Unbackable odds they'll be the same one piece soft PVC figures as (most of) Dreadball Xtreme and LOKA

But will one-piece minis have the same detail? In any case, they'll be useful as DnD minis, so I'll be getting one unless the quality is crap.

I think the term they like to use is "pre-assembled". The Gears of War boardgame figures were made from several pieces, for example, but had already been assembled prior to going into the box. They also had a quite impressive amount of detail on them, so it's not necessarily as big a factor as you might think.

The models shown so far look so good that I'd hope for as sharp a material as possible, though. Paladin looks like he's seen some deeply unpleasant things...

A little bit of clarification from quirksworthy.

There seems to be a little confusion. I’m not sure where it’s from – Ronnie thought it might be something he said in a seminar at an Open Day. Wherever it started, I’d like to try to clarify things.

Mantic have mentioned two small scale (in terms of numbers of models) games set in the Kings of War background: Dwarf King’s Hold and a “KOW Skirmish”. These are two entirely separate things.

Dwarf Kings Hold 4: A board game in the DKH series and the next Kickstart project from Mantic (coming in a month or two). All the new fantasy figures you’ve been seeing lately here and elsewhere are for this.

“Kings of War Skirmish”: This is a piece of blue-sky-wouldn’t-it-be-nice-at-some-point thinking. It is not a confirmed project. Even before you guys ever heard of Deadzone we were discussing the idea of one day making a fantasy version, and it would indeed be cool to get around to it. That’s broadly what Ronnie means by a KOW skirmish game. During the seminars he talked about perhaps making 3D plastic scenery to build a castle for this when it arrives, but that was part of a conversation about why plastic walls aren’t really suitable for DKH. This may be where the confusion started. I also mentioned a Stalingrad variant of Deadzone, but that’s not due soon either.

So, two very different projects: one being developed right now, the other some years away and barely even on a drawing board.

Apologies for any confusion.

So no hard plastic multipart dungeons and castles just yet.

Oh well.. I suppose you can have too many good things all at once, and it's good that they are at least thinking of these news things!

I also mentioned a Stalingrad variant of Deadzone

Now that sounds interesting.. I wonder if it's some kind of 'stalingrad' concept of Deadzone, or actually a historical game using Deadzone rules? Might tie in with Warlord 28mm Bolt Action miniatures as those two companies have had some crossover?

DKH4 has a name now

With that in mind, I am really excited to formally announce that we are working on developing Dwarf King’s Quest – The Return of the Necromancer. This will be the complete and definitive version of the game in the Dwarf King’s Hold range.

Teaser campaign starts July 4, a little more info about what the game is going to be and why they're doing it. Nothing ground breaking, mostly just confirmation of what has already been floating around.

http://manticblog.com/2014/06/23/dhq-abandon-hope-all-ye-who-enter-here/

I'm not sure what the game offers that isn't already out there now that I know it's not small scale fantasy skirmish, but it will do fantastic on kickstarter as all Mantic campaigns seem to do. I probably won't back it as I don't trust the miniatures to turn out with the same quality as the previews, but I'll no doubt try it at some point.

Full rundown here for those that do not want to click through:

"Hi, it’s Ronnie here.

A few weeks back we had an open day and as usual I said far too much!!! I tried to keep a lid on what we have planned – but I am just too excited!

barbarian sculpt
Taken from Jake Thorton’s Dwarf King’s Hold 4 – Quirkworthy blog post
Back in December/January I laid out what I hope the year would look like: a Kickstarter to keep DreadBall developing early in the year (done), one around the middle of the year (more on that now) and some serious support for Warpath later in the year, which we’ll come back to closer to the time.

At the Open Day we talked about these upcoming projects (and plans, even further afield) but one of them really started to generate lots of debate and questions. Because of that, I thought it was time to go on and talk in depth about this. In the year review blog I did say that we were working on at least one Kickstarter, which would be much softer on everyone’s wallets.

When we do a full gaming system, with loads of scenery and 6 factions or 12 new DreadBall teams, the totals can mount up quickly (as does our workload getting it all made!) so we wanted to do a fun, exciting Kickstarter that produced a really neat and tidy product, was kind to everyone’s budget (perhaps just a single pledge level at a low buy-in, with enough room to get all the basic and most of the extras – plus a few exclusives) I also thought a KS campaign like that would be a great way for new people to come on board and give Mantic a try.

With that in mind, I am really excited to formally announce that we are working on developing Dwarf King’s Quest – The Return of the Necromancer. This will be the complete and definitive version of the game in the Dwarf King’s Hold range.

Why another dungeon crawler you ask?

Well lots of reasons, but probably two main ones.

The first Dwarf King’s Hold games were made back in the early days of Mantic (and it was our first collaboration with Jake Thornton!). They came about as a creative way of using all the great plastic we had already tooled and pushing into areas we wanted to go.
‘Dwarf King’s Hold – Dead Rising’ told the story of a group of Dwarves going back into their ancestral Holds on a series of adventures. Each scenario saw them fighting ever more skeletons as they sought to accomplish missions and recover artifacts. It was hugely successful, and two more supplements followed, again designed around the plastic sprues that we had in the range. This was probably the game that gave us the confidence to press forward with DreadBall – so it was a major step in Mantic’s development.

We always intended to do the typical adventurers’ party version, and Jake has always been very keen on putting his mark on this type of game. However, at the time we just didn’t have the resources, or in some cases the knowhow (such as one-piece miniatures with great detail) to deliver the vision that we had for this type of game. However, with the passing of time all that has changed…

BarbarianSecondly, there are certainly a few great dungeon games out there, but they are all quite different from what we want to make. There are a couple from the light-hearted end of the spectrum – such as Super Dungeon Explore - and others that are intense and deep, such as Descent. But none of those are really in exactly the space we want to occupy.

We want to do a grave and dangerous dungeon miniatures game, set in our fantasy setting, with all the opportunity that gives us to develop the back story and flesh out the world. It will have very strong narrative, based around the main protagonists. This will really bring to life a whole new story arc in the world and highlight some of the big characters for further development. It will also give us a few great sculpts and some heroes for Kings of War armies too.

Alongside an overarching back story, we intend to create a game that is very easy to get started with – so it is very easy to have a great night of gaming with family and friends while playing a strongly narrative dungeon crawler. But - and this was one of the critical things for us - as you develop your knowledge of the world, your character evolves too.

The boxed set will give you both the ability to play through a series of adventures we have designed for you in a PvP mode (as a 2 up to 5 player set), so you can literally crack open the box and get playing. You’ll have all you need here – the heroes, the cards, reference sheets and a scenario guide.

The title is ‘Dwarf Kings Quest – Return of the Necromancer’ (#DKQ on Twitter and Facebook!) and it charts the return of Mortibris as he comes back, bigger and badder than ever. The adventurers – a dwarf fighter, barbarian, wizard and elf – have quests to complete against ever stronger enemies – which will all come in the box pre-assembled and coloured so you can take them out and start playing immediately, while still being of the quality that they will look even better with some paint on them. The skeletons and zombies will be in our normal 30mm scale – so you can use them as leaders in your normal Kings of War games – and indeed you can use the other models to bulk out your dungeons!
Alongside the regular troops will be a series of boss enemy models – such as Mortibris himself – so you really get a sense of the adventure escalating as each scenario progresses.

However, once you have played these through you can delve deeper and darker – which is why we intend you to actually have a piece of card under the main game box, so that it is split in two. Underneath the almost casual narrative campaign, we’ve added something extra.
WizardThe card is a trap door that says ‘Abandon hope all ye who enter here’ – and beneath it is another tray of game components. These open the game up, to really give you access to the whole sandbox, allowing you to go on and create your own quests, using the tiles, models and rules provided. This also offers character development, creating a setting where your hero can build up their skills and equipment over time as they acquire treasure and experience, making each character, and playthrough truly individual. We’ll include a character pack, more hero models – and a big book with all the extra rules enclosed.
I think the book will end up being called something sensible that describes what it does – but I have a working title – ‘Jake’s Book of Depravity’ as he will really get to go to town on build a truly multi-layer miniatures based RPG.

We will be using thicker card than in the first series of games too, just to give the dungeon a more solid and resilient feel, and of course, we will have everything else you need in the box such as adventure and treasure cards, character sheets, gold, furniture and much more.

So, as you can hopefully see we are pretty excited about what this possibilities of this game. I think we will be able to keep the pledge level really wallet friendly, because we will not have lots of armies, factions and teams, and can instead concentrate on squeezing as much in to the box as we can, when we hit stretch goals. The easy entry point and simple pledge levels should also mean we can introduce as many new people to the game as possible.

I thought you would appreciate the early warning and a few sneak peeks. We will have a teaser campaign starting the 4th July – which will be a quest to find runes – easily translated by our Dwarf Bartender (because ALL good quests start in a Tavern!). These will lead you to the ‘the Book of the Rise and Fall of Diffeth’ – and your quest will begin

Thanks for reading and best wishes,

Ronnie"

Deeeeeeem! I wants it but money is stupid tight right now and for the foreseeable future! (1-6 months) why must I suffer so?

Zond wrote:
I'm not sure what the game offers that isn't already out there now that I know it's not small scale fantasy skirmish, but it will do fantastic on kickstarter as all Mantic campaigns seem to do. I probably won't back it as I don't trust the miniatures to turn out with the same quality as the previews, but I'll no doubt try it at some point.

Seems like there's a lot of completed sculpts for this project. When has Mantic had serious issues with casting up final models? I know they had some real issues with concepts not being executed, but by and large, the scults you see have been executed very well. All I can think of are the goblin and men at arms hard plastics, which certainly had some issues but are certainly a different material than this project will use.

At this point with Mantic I'd rather not take the chance, as the examples of Goblins and Basileans you provided are still rather fresh in my mind at least as a cautionary tale.

The Basileans and Goblins happened because of a very specific set of circumstances relating to shoddy work by the factory and poor oversight from Mantic. They fixed those for Deadzone, and we've had the excellent terrain already, and the improved restic formula for the first wave of troops - the Deadzone hard plastic will start arriving end of July, so provided DKQ doesn't start and end before then, judge them on their most recent attempt at mini creation

I'm still scratching my head as to how people had issues with the goblins. The basileans I get; the MaAs are terribad. But the goblins? I think they're perfectly fine. Ah, well. To each their own.

Its mostly that the plastic goblins were a PITA to assemble.

 Cyporiean wrote:
Its mostly that the plastic goblins were a PITA to assemble.

Really? They are hard plastic, any pegs that don't fit in the hole just get clipped off, the glue then melts the styrene. I agree with timetowaste85, any problems with the goblins are subjective.

 JoshInJapan wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:
Its mostly that the plastic goblins were a PITA to assemble.

Really? They are hard plastic, any pegs that don't fit in the hole just get clipped off, the glue then melts the styrene. I agree with timetowaste85, any problems with the goblins are subjective.

When you have to do that to every goblin, yes, that can be considered a pain in the ass.

Same can be said of the Twilight Kin models.

 JoshInJapan wrote:

 Cyporiean wrote:
Its mostly that the plastic goblins were a PITA to assemble.

I agree with timetowaste85, any problems with the goblins are subjective.

Well the soft detailing on the goblins aren't subjective.

NTRabbit wrote:
The Basileans and Goblins happened because of a very specific set of circumstances relating to shoddy work by the factory and poor oversight from Mantic. They fixed those for Deadzone, and we've had the excellent terrain already, and the improved restic formula for the first wave of troops - the Deadzone hard plastic will start arriving end of July, so provided DKQ doesn't start and end before then, judge them on their most recent attempt at mini creation

If Wave 1 of Deadzone was supposed to be the best restic mix Mantic have done I dread to think what their first attempts were like.

I have to agree there.

I'm not sure if Mantic said that before, during or after, or at all though!

http://manticblog.com/2014/06/23/dkq-abandon-hope-all-ye-who-enter-here/


Barbarian (higher resolution at original link)


Wizard (higher resolution at original link)

Same plastic as Mars attacks? Those came out pretty well didn't they?

willb2064 wrote:

NTRabbit wrote:
The Basileans and Goblins happened because of a very specific set of circumstances relating to shoddy work by the factory and poor oversight from Mantic. They fixed those for Deadzone, and we've had the excellent terrain already, and the improved restic formula for the first wave of troops - the Deadzone hard plastic will start arriving end of July, so provided DKQ doesn't start and end before then, judge them on their most recent attempt at mini creation

If Wave 1 of Deadzone was supposed to be the best restic mix Mantic have done I dread to think what their first attempts were like.

The first restic miniatures I remember Mantic releasing (I think Scarletsquig will be the go to source to confirm, or otherwise, this) were the exact copies of the metal Revenant knights for the Undead range, and they were excellent. If anything the material got worse after that, and is now on an upward curve. Then again it tends to be better for larger miniatures (bar the Deadzone Ork Guntrakk) and straight edges rather than organic shapes, for example the Obsidian Golems are great. Then again i am not sure what material DKQ will be in.

I like everything I have seen for DKQ thus far, I look forward to it. I think that Mantic have learned that as many completed sculpts as possible is the best way for miniature game kickstarters.

I love the idea of having a two layered box, with the casual and full games in there.

I was getting a little bit concerned that they were sticking to only having the four heroes, but Ronnie did say that you get to use more amongst the stuff under the trapdoor.

Plus, I get to sing "Don't you open that trapdoor!" when I get it!

 Chillreaper wrote:
I love the idea of having a two layered box, with the casual and full games in there.

I was getting a little bit concerned that they were sticking to only having the four heroes, but Ronnie did say that you get to use more amongst the stuff under the trapdoor.

Plus, I get to sing "Don't you open that trapdoor!" when I get it!

"Because there's something down there..."

There was either mention or a sculpt shown of a ninja I believe...

Then again, ninjas are always hiding in strange nooks and crannies, so I wouldn't be surprised to find one taped to the underside of the box divider or something.

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:

willb2064 wrote:

NTRabbit wrote:
The Basileans and Goblins happened because of a very specific set of circumstances relating to shoddy work by the factory and poor oversight from Mantic. They fixed those for Deadzone, and we've had the excellent terrain already, and the improved restic formula for the first wave of troops - the Deadzone hard plastic will start arriving end of July, so provided DKQ doesn't start and end before then, judge them on their most recent attempt at mini creation

If Wave 1 of Deadzone was supposed to be the best restic mix Mantic have done I dread to think what their first attempts were like.

The first restic miniatures I remember Mantic releasing (I think Scarletsquig will be the go to source to confirm, or otherwise, this) were the exact copies of the metal Revenant knights for the Undead range, and they were excellent. If anything the material got worse after that, and is now on an upward curve. Then again it tends to be better for larger miniatures (bar the Deadzone Ork Guntrakk) and straight edges rather than organic shapes, for example the Obsidian Golems are great.

All correct, the earlier restic stuff like the Undead knights. wraiths, and even stuff like the Warpath Corporation marines is extremely well-cast. Sharp detail, hardly any mould lines, almost no warping on most parts.

Better than any Dreadball or Deadzone cast. DZ restic casting still sucks massively, I have a few models that have faces with zero detail on them, the nose just mushes into a largely blank face with only a rounded divot where a sculpted eye should be.

I have no idea what screwed up the material, possibly it's the factory not taking their time with tooling the moulds and casting it like they did when Mantic was just ordering very small production runs... it seems like they started massively half-arsing the job as soon as the Dreadball KS came out.

The restic 2.0 stuff used in Loka and Mars attacks (and DBX) should be okay, hard to tell until we get the minis, but its a different manufacturer and one that hopefully will have better consistency, the best we have to go by for the moment is this Mars Attacks production sculpt, (posting the washed pic since it's the best representation of the detail):



The plastic used is apparently a little different from that in Loka, since they've gone for something a bit harder that takes detail better (while still being the same sort of "soft" plastic).

I'm hoping this means that the material ends up similar to AT-43 plastics, those were rather nice solid pieces of well-detailed plastic.

If the material checks out, I'd be happy for Mantic to start doing pre-paints. But for now "no assembly" is a good enough start.

One possible concern is the quality of that pre-assembly.. I know I have a few Loka pieces glued on off-centre on their bases, and this other pic of the production models isn't encouraging (the one on the right):



They really need to avoid a situation where people are prying stuff apart and re-gluing, which that mini on the right would need, I think.

I have to say - the detail seems exceedingly soft on all of their heads - the one on the (our) far left being particularly bad.

Like, they're fine for boardgame pieces, but awful if we're going to call them "miniatures".

 Azazelx wrote:
I have to say - the detail seems exceedingly soft on all of their heads - the one on the (our) far left being particularly bad.

Like, they're fine for boardgame pieces, but awful if we're going to call them "miniatures".

Yep, provided it's not just out of focus or something, then that is very poor.

Soooo I don't wanna take thei risk. I'm gonna buy them when they're out and if they turn out okay but otherwise, nah.

 Azazelx wrote:
I have to say - the detail seems exceedingly soft on all of their heads - the one on the (our) far left being particularly bad.

Like, they're fine for boardgame pieces, but awful if we're going to call them "miniatures".

The washed model looks to have good detail though - and those models are a slightly smaller scale aren't they?

I find the washed model's head/brain detail to be pretty shallow/soft, actually.

How easy is it to break the arms on the Mars Attack's Martian miniatures that were gllued out of place?

So.. I haven't played any of the other Dwarf Kings Hold games.. is it more of a dungeon crawly adventure game like Descent or Warhammer Quest? Or more like a skirmish game in a dungeon?

 tgmoore wrote:
How easy is it to break the arms on the Mars Attack's Martian miniatures that were gllued out of place?

I don't think any of the MA stuff is 'out in the wild' yet

which is why pictures of badly glued stuff is worrying as you'd expect the factory to have been most careful about the stuff they are sending in for inspection/approval by Mantic than the huge run off stuff for fulfilment/general release

 Necros wrote:
So.. I haven't played any of the other Dwarf Kings Hold games.. is it more of a dungeon crawly adventure game like Descent or Warhammer Quest? Or more like a skirmish game in a dungeon?

The original versions were more like a dungeon-skirmish, from my understanding - a slightly asymmetrical, scenario-based 1v1 fight.

This version is more of a Descent-alike (many players vs. a DM, played competitively) but with the option of co-op vs. AI. The designer has said that he's not a fan of completely pure co-op though, so expect some competitive element within that (e.g. nicking gear before other people can get to it).

It is most like Warhammer Quest in that in the single game box there is both the 'casual' game (fixed scenarios, characters, with a narrative that introduces elements in increasing complexity) and the 'full' version with a campaign mode and statlines for monsters not in the box.

Co-op vs. AI is confirmed?

Damn, now it's tempting...

 tgmoore wrote:
How easy is it to break the arms on the Mars Attack's Martian miniatures that were gllued out of place?

If the glue is the same stuff as the Loka minis have... it's not coming apart. Some sort of epoxy or something.

Cool, I might get in on this one.. kind of bummed that I couldn't afford Deadzone at the time, but lately I've been enjoying the dungeony kinda games a lot.

Bioptic wrote:
The designer has said that he's not a fan of completely pure co-op though, so expect some competitive element within that (e.g. nicking gear before other people can get to it).

Ugh. Guess I won't be playing this.

Coop play that's not cooperative?

If I wanted screaming, blood and broken furniture, I'd just buy monopoly. You can't beat that dick-move-to-dollar ratio if you're into competitive play.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Bioptic wrote:
The designer has said that he's not a fan of completely pure co-op though, so expect some competitive element within that (e.g. nicking gear before other people can get to it).

Ugh. Guess I won't be playing this.

Coop play that's not cooperative?

A bit of backstabbery is always fun but it'd be nice if designers could leave their personal preferences out of it from time to time and just design other facets 'cleanly' , so to speak.

Way to jump to extremes there Bob, how can you go straight to that conclusion from just that comment?!

I'm sure there will be ways around it, and you could just agree between each other not to steal, or take it in turns with items??

Imagining someone being a ninja-looter on the old-school World of Warcraft here...

Semi co-op doesn't mean that you're going to be stabbing each other in the back all of the time. In the end, the scenario needs to be completed.

I tend to think that it just means that, yep you beat the scenario together, but there are some bigger winners than others.

Back to the WoW analogy, even on a co-operative raid, people still wanted loot at the expense of others and still wanted to top the DPS meters at the expense of others - didn't stop them from getting the job done.

 Pacific wrote:
Way to jump to extremes there Bob, how can you go straight to that conclusion from just that comment?!

I'm sure there will be ways around it, and you could just agree between each other not to steal, or take it in turns with items??

Maybe you have emotionally balanced friends who can pull something like that off. Co-op that encourages even the slightest amount of competition or one-upmanship might as well just be adversarial for us. If we're not able to sing Red Army hymns of brothership, then we'll be damn near screaming German.

Besides, if he wants to write co-op rules, why can't he just write co-op rules instead of half-assing it and cramming in his own personal (terrible) gaming biases into it?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Chillreaper wrote:

I tend to think that it just means that, yep you beat the scenario together, but there are some bigger winners than others.

So, the object of the game isn't to win by winning, but to win by winning more than the other guy? Instead of one winner beating the game, now one winner beats the game better?

For some people, "Second Place" really is synonymous with "Loser". These people tend to be sore losers. And even sorer winners.

Sometimes you have to wonder if it's not the game but the players. No offense cause my friends are the same, but there are people you can play perfectly normal coop games with that turn into brutal backstabbing games.

Oh, I know it's the players. But there are games out there we can play.

Sounds like this might not be one of them.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Pacific wrote:
Way to jump to extremes there Bob, how can you go straight to that conclusion from just that comment?!

I'm sure there will be ways around it, and you could just agree between each other not to steal, or take it in turns with items??

Maybe you have emotionally balanced friends who can pull something like that off. Co-op that encourages even the slightest amount of competition or one-upmanship might as well just be adversarial for us. If we're not able to sing Red Army hymns of brothership, then we'll be damn near screaming German.

Besides, if he wants to write co-op rules, why can't he just write co-op rules instead of half-assing it and cramming in his own personal (terrible) gaming biases into it?

Simple solution - Have both a -
Semi-co-op mode
Pure co-op mode

Someone post that on Quirkworthy for him.



Lucky my group is the opposite of that....

I think a good litmus test of what to expect for Dwarf King's Hold in terms of co op is what the AI cards/ rules end up like for both Mars Attacks and Deadzone.

We may even have the Deadzone ones around the time of the DKH campaign.

Has there been any mention made of when those Kings of War armies are going to be released- the Abyssals and the Nature stuff? Are they still going to kickstart those, or will they just be retail?
We haven't heard much about them since the Open Day.

Well, looking at Quirkworthy directly, it seems that he's actually including both 'pure' co-op and 'semi' co-op in DKQ - so I might have stirred a hornet's nest over nothing!

The next DKH will include both Pure Co-op and Semi-Co-op modes of play. Pure Co-op is actually relatively easy to design once you have everything else in place, and as some people want it then I’m happy to give it to them. I think having the variety of play modes is a strength not a weakness.

The full article is here:
http://quirkworthy.com/2014/06/06/why-co-op-and-i-dont-get-on/

And his requests for explanations of what makes for good pure co-op games are here:
http://quirkworthy.com/2014/06/07/what-makes-a-good-pure-co-op-game/

I come down on the side of really enjoying any sort of co-op games, but ones where there is no competitive element whatsoever, and are hard enough to be a challenge for 4+ people working together (a la Ghost Stories), tend to encourage dictatorial efficiency from the most knowledgeable players over their peons. Adding in "I still need the group to win, but I'm not going to tell player 2 how to kill that goblin in one turn, because I really want to get to that chest before he does" disrupts that dynamic.

Well, I'm mollified.

Although I think the word "challenging" gets thrown around an awful lot in rules discussions without any kind of qualification.

Are we talking challenging like a Zelda game or challenging like trying to land on a fething aircraft carrier in that NES Top Gun game?

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Coop play that's not cooperative?

If I wanted screaming, blood and broken furniture, I'd just buy monopoly. You can't beat that dick-move-to-dollar ratio if you're into competitive play.

I see someone hasn't played Settlers of Catan.

When you're done rebuilding your collapsed balsa wood road that has fallen into the cracks between the warped card tiles after the table gets nudged for the fifth time, all it takes is one robber move on to your ore right before you were going to get a city to trigger the dreaded board game rage.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:


So, the object of the game isn't to win by winning, but to win by winning more than the other guy? Instead of one winner beating the game, now one winner beats the game better?

Pretty much, yeah...

I dunno, maybe I just live in some sort of utopia where the people that I play with are emotionally mature and just enjoy themselves, but surely I can't be the only one, can I?

Moot point, because both types of co-op are going to be included, but I like the option of a non-carebear version of the game.

Yeah, it seems fair to me.

I mean, it's not exactly a groundbreaking concept. Team games have been ranking teammembers against each other for well, ever.

Reminds me of the Mutant chronicles boardgame Siege of the Citadel. Each player up to 5 controlled an operative from one of the 5 mega corp factions working together to defeat the baddies and survive but each operative was scored individually.

Do you shoot the baddy to save another player or run to grab the treasure? Great backstabby fun.

 Chillreaper wrote:


Moot point, because both types of co-op are going to be included, but I like the option of a non-carebear version of the game.

You mean the non-co-op version? The version of the game the creator actually wanted to make? The rule set the game was written for?

You know they already catered to you with literally every game they've produced?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 scarletsquig wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Coop play that's not cooperative?

If I wanted screaming, blood and broken furniture, I'd just buy monopoly. You can't beat that dick-move-to-dollar ratio if you're into competitive play.

I see someone hasn't played Settlers of Catan.

When you're done rebuilding your collapsed balsa wood road that has fallen into the cracks between the warped card tiles after the table gets nudged for the fifth time, all it takes is one robber move on to your ore right before you were going to get a city to trigger the dreaded board game rage.

I am now removing that game from my Amazon wish list. Thanks for the heads-up!

With all due respect, Bob - that is REALLY for the best if anything you described is remotely true. I've seen kind old ladies descend into utter bloodlust over that one
Monopoly has nothing on catan IME.

Eh, I've seen Monopoly devolve into far more fistfights than Catan ever has caused. Not to mention all the shouting matches, spilled food and drinks, indentured servitude in order to pay off spaces... we couldn't be the only ones who delighted in torturing each other when rent was owed.

Although Catan at least has caused my wife to not speak to me for the rest of the evening on more than one occasion.

Scrabble also seems to be out the donkey-cave in many people.

I still hope Thorton can toss in some rules for Mantica lizard/ dragon types. Been waiting for an excuse to spring a Khthonian/ Brythoniaid invasion on Mantica for a while...

Guess I'm due for an "I disagree, Scarlet Squig" post, or maybe I'm just in the mood to get trampled by cute unicorns.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Better than any Dreadball or Deadzone cast. DZ restic casting still sucks massively, I have a few models that have faces with zero detail on them, the nose just mushes into a largely blank face with only a rounded divot where a sculpted eye should be.

I'm sorry to hear that. I definitely see where youre coming from with the first wave Dreadball figures, but I got luckier, as I didn't have any bad detai issues with my Deadzone minis. The faces on mine are actually quite good.

 scarletsquig wrote:
it seems like they If the material checks out, I'd be happy for Mantic to start doing pre-paints. But for now "no assembly" is a good enough start.

One possible concern is the quality of that pre-assembly. . . . They really need to avoid a situation where people are prying stuff apart and re-gluing, which that mini on the right would need, I think.

To me, pre-assembled and pre-painted inevitably means badly assembled and badly painted. I'm resigned to the fact that some of my Mars Attacks figures will require major surgery (cutting off and re-gluing limbs), and most will require greenstuff to fill in gaps. But after AT-43, I'm done for good with pre-painted miniatures. No disinterested, underpaid, rushed Chinese worker will ever be as interested as I am in getting my miniatures done right.

x-wing would like a word about good quality prepaints. If the machine can do it better than me (which isn't hard), i'm all for it.

 agnosto wrote:
x-wing would like a word about good quality prepaints. If the machine can do it better than me (which isn't hard), i'm all for it.

I've never seen X-Wing minis in person, so perhaps you're right.

 Vermonter wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
x-wing would like a word about good quality prepaints. If the machine can do it better than me (which isn't hard), i'm all for it.

I've never seen X-Wing minis in person, so perhaps you're right.

Or, more likely, it could be you're a better painter than me and so have higher expectations (and rightfully so).

Yeah, the X-Wing models are goddamn awesomely painted for prepaints.



Have a look at the B-Wing at the bottom left corner.

Yes, X-Wing is an exceptionally good pre-paint and most of the paint jobs are at least as good as I'd be able to manage on my own. However, the key word in that statement is "exception" since you can quickly Google pictures of Attack Wing and see the more typical illustration of pre-paints. As much as I like Mantic, I severely doubt they'd have the same luck as FFG in getting things together, and I'd be leery of them doing it in all honesty.

X-Wing succeeds because there's a generally agreed-upon look to the ships mostly informed by the movies, so that part is easy. If you want to paint them in specific squadron colors you can, but the base "look" of the models is pretty easy to verify and for most people that's good enough.

In contrast, most of the games Mantic makes (MA being a possible exception, but meh) there's so much variation in possible schemes that it's hard to see how "one scheme to rule them all" would be advantageous. Even DreadBall as a sports game with basic uniforms has tremendous options for color variations. I could maybe see a separate SKU where they are pre-painted to the "official" team colors, but that's another inventory piece to be tracked as well. However, KoW/DZ/DKH/PP/WP all have such variation in units and forces that I don't see pre-paints being viewed as anything more than an extra step that has to be stripped off among their core demographic.

It might lure in some board gamers who wouldn't touch it otherwise to an extent, but I don't know that the added expense, QA step (not Mantic's strong point, let's be honest) and stock tracking makes it a worthwhile endeavor. Still, they could try it and see what happens. It wouldn't be the first time I was wrong about the market.

X-wing looks like it was painted to a slightly better tabletop standard by a realistic historical painter (with some washes and weathering occasionally). Attack wing unfortunately looks like it was painted by an enthusiastic tween relatively new to the hobby but with a grasp of basic techniques which isn't surprising coming from the clix side of the business. Prepaints vary wildly and always have even going back to the days of D&D and Star Wars minis from WOTC when I first started on them.

 warboss wrote:
X-wing looks like it was painted to a slightly better tabletop standard by a realistic historical painter (with some washes and weathering occasionally). Attack wing unfortunately looks like it was painted by an enthusiastic tween relatively new to the hobby but with a grasp of basic techniques which isn't surprising coming from the clix side of the business. Prepaints vary wildly and always have even going back to the days of D&D and Star Wars minis from WOTC when I first started on them.

And yet they both charge the same for their ships.
Funny that.

Prepaints usually don't work out. I also thought the "preprimed" method of DUST was a good idea, until I bought a unit and scraped so much off eliminating flash & mold lines.

Depending on the subject matter, prepaints work fine. I think it's worked out rather well for Pathfinder Battles, specifically the monsters.

There's some unique stuff in the line that I don't think would get made under any other circumstance (due to the whole rarity/ blind purchase issue you can toss all sorts of weird stuff into an assortment and let people suck it up, whether they want it or not). Plus monsters tend to be a bit more simple in terms of paints and patterns, and quite a few figures have used translucent plastics as a base with pretty decent results.

Their early iconics were pretty well painted. Lately, not so much.

For humanoids I'd much rather paint them myself.

 skrulnik wrote:

And yet they both charge the same for their ships.
Funny that.

Well, Attack Wing does have a tendency to include significantly more components in many sets than the X-Wing ones. For example, taking the Bioship as an example, it comes with 3 cardboard punchout sets compared to the usual 2 you see in X-Wing. It also comes with 15 cards, including a unique special mission / scenario compared to X-Wing's 10 to 11 cards, most of which are half size.

Dwarf Kings Quest details are up!

http://manticblog.com/2014/06/23/dkq-abandon-hope-all-ye-who-enter-here/

Hi, it’s Ronnie here.

A few weeks back we had an open day and as usual I said far too much!!! I tried to keep a lid on what we have planned – but I am just too excited!

Back in December/January I laid out what I hope the year would look like: a Kickstarter to keep DreadBall developing early in the year (done), one around the middle of the year (more on that now) and some serious support for Warpath later in the year, which we’ll come back to closer to the time.

At the Open Day we talked about these upcoming projects (and plans, even further afield) but one of them really started to generate lots of debate and questions. Because of that, I thought it was time to go on and talk in depth about this. In the year review blog I did say that we were working on at least one Kickstarter, which would be much softer on everyone’s wallets.

When we do a full gaming system, with loads of scenery and 6 factions or 12 new DreadBall teams, the totals can mount up quickly (as does our workload getting it all made!) so we wanted to do a fun, exciting Kickstarter that produced a really neat and tidy product, was kind to everyone’s budget (perhaps just a single pledge level at a low buy-in, with enough room to get all the basic and most of the extras – plus a few exclusives) I also thought a KS campaign like that would be a great way for new people to come on board and give Mantic a try.

With that in mind, I am really excited to formally announce that we are working on developing Dwarf King’s Quest – The Return of the Necromancer. This will be the complete and definitive version of the game in the Dwarf King’s Hold range.

Why another dungeon crawler you ask?

Well lots of reasons, but probably two main ones.

The first Dwarf King’s Hold games were made back in the early days of Mantic (and it was our first collaboration with Jake Thornton!). They came about as a creative way of using all the great plastic we had already tooled and pushing into areas we wanted to go.
‘Dwarf King’s Hold – Dead Rising’ told the story of a group of Dwarves going back into their ancestral Holds on a series of adventures. Each scenario saw them fighting ever more skeletons as they sought to accomplish missions and recover artifacts. It was hugely successful, and two more supplements followed, again designed around the plastic sprues that we had in the range. This was probably the game that gave us the confidence to press forward with DreadBall – so it was a major step in Mantic’s development.

We always intended to do the typical adventurers’ party version, and Jake has always been very keen on putting his mark on this type of game. However, at the time we just didn’t have the resources, or in some cases the knowhow (such as one-piece miniatures with great detail) to deliver the vision that we had for this type of game. However, with the passing of time all that has changed…

Secondly, there are certainly a few great dungeon games out there, but they are all quite different from what we want to make. There are a couple from the light-hearted end of the spectrum – such as Super Dungeon Explore - and others that are intense and deep, such as Descent. But none of those are really in exactly the space we want to occupy.

We want to do a grave and dangerous dungeon miniatures game, set in our fantasy setting, with all the opportunity that gives us to develop the back story and flesh out the world. It will have very strong narrative, based around the main protagonists. This will really bring to life a whole new story arc in the world and highlight some of the big characters for further development. It will also give us a few great sculpts and some heroes for Kings of War armies too.

Alongside an overarching back story, we intend to create a game that is very easy to get started with – so it is very easy to have a great night of gaming with family and friends while playing a strongly narrative dungeon crawler. But - and this was one of the critical things for us - as you develop your knowledge of the world, your character evolves too.

The boxed set will give you both the ability to play through a series of adventures we have designed for you in a PvP mode (as a 2 up to 5 player set), so you can literally crack open the box and get playing. You’ll have all you need here – the heroes, the cards, reference sheets and a scenario guide.

The title is ‘Dwarf Kings Quest – Return of the Necromancer’ (#DKQ on Twitter and Facebook!) and it charts the return of Mortibris as he comes back, bigger and badder than ever. The adventurers – a dwarf fighter, barbarian, wizard and elf – have quests to complete against ever stronger enemies – which will all come in the box pre-assembled and coloured so you can take them out and start playing immediately, while still being of the quality that they will look even better with some paint on them. The skeletons and zombies will be in our normal 30mm scale – so you can use them as leaders in your normal Kings of War games – and indeed you can use the other models to bulk out your dungeons!
Alongside the regular troops will be a series of boss enemy models – such as Mortibris himself – so you really get a sense of the adventure escalating as each scenario progresses.

However, once you have played these through you can delve deeper and darker – which is why we intend you to actually have a piece of card under the main game box, so that it is split in two. Underneath the almost casual narrative campaign, we’ve added something extra. The card is a trap door that says ‘Abandon hope all ye who enter here’ – and beneath it is another tray of game components. These open the game up, to really give you access to the whole sandbox, allowing you to go on and create your own quests, using the tiles, models and rules provided. This also offers character development, creating a setting where your hero can build up their skills and equipment over time as they acquire treasure and experience, making each character, and playthrough truly individual. We’ll include a character pack, more hero models – and a big book with all the extra rules enclosed.

I think the book will end up being called something sensible that describes what it does – but I have a working title – ‘Jake’s Book of Depravity’ as he will really get to go to town on build a truly multi-layer miniatures based RPG.

We will be using thicker card than in the first series of games too, just to give the dungeon a more solid and resilient feel, and of course, we will have everything else you need in the box such as adventure and treasure cards, character sheets, gold, furniture and much more.

So, as you can hopefully see we are pretty excited about what this possibilities of this game. I think we will be able to keep the pledge level really wallet friendly, because we will not have lots of armies, factions and teams, and can instead concentrate on squeezing as much in to the box as we can, when we hit stretch goals. The easy entry point and simple pledge levels should also mean we can introduce as many new people to the game as possible.

I thought you would appreciate the early warning and a few sneak peeks. We will have a teaser campaign starting the 4th July – which will be a quest to find runes – easily translated by our Dwarf Bartender (because ALL good quests start in a Tavern!). These will lead you to the ‘the Book of the Rise and Fall of Diffeth’ – and your quest will begin

Thanks for reading and best wishes,

Ronnie

That sounds extremely cool!

Looking forward to when this arrives, hopefully between this and Heroquest (should that ever arrive) will have a good multi-player dungeon crawling game!

So an update on Mantic's blog about DKH:

Rune 1- You sidle up to the bar….

You enter a smoky bar, the redolent smell of fine ale and roasted meat hangs in the air among the iridescent, off-grey smoke so familiar to you. It’s been years since you’ve been home, and weary from your last quest, you sit down at the bar.
The bartender finishes serving the group at the other end of the bar, appraisingly examines your gear and says with a wry smile….

“Welcome my friends!

I’m afraid you’ve joined us in the darkest of times. A threat grows in the East and we need your help to fight back against the forces of Darkness that are gathering.
There is an ancient collection of information we need you to seek out – one that is protected by a mysterious passkey of Dwarfish runes.
Once we have collected all of these Dwarfish Runes, we can decipher their meaning and translate them into your common language. This should give us access to the mysteries that are kept within…
The first rune has already been spotted…

… to unlock the next Rune, you must simply fulfil the requirements of the quest…

Go and share this post from the runic devices below with others on the fae network of Facebook. Only once the image has been shared 750 times will the next rune be revealed. I pray you find the next one swiftly, there’s rumours of the shadows spreading from their haunts, and dark times are upon us.”

Please share this post on Facebook (and other places if you like!). Once the counter gets to 750 on this post, we’ll release the next rune…unless dark forces force our hands.

So looks like Mantic are gonna make us work for this, in order to unlock the next rune you need to share this blog post via Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Printest (all the trendy places)
you need to go here: http://manticblog.com/2014/07/07/rune-1-you-sidle-up-to-the-bar/ to do it, were currently at 198/750 votes needed.

Good luck guys and gals.

At the current rate it will be a few days before we acquire enough likes.

Has the runic script for Mantica Dwarves ever been put to paper or is this being made up as they go?

 tgmoore wrote:
At the current rate it will be a few days before we acquire enough likes.

Has the runic script for Mantica Dwarves ever been put to paper or is this being made up as they go?

Almost certain its just made up as we go.

or maybe a real borrowed script ?

At the current rate which by my unscientific calculations is around 50 shares every 12 hrs it will be 4.5 friggin days till we hit 750. Shares should start increasing at an exponential rate but that hasn't happened yet.

looking forward to this DKQ kickstarter. even if i backed hq25,
can't have enough dungeon crawlers, ever!

Looks like a name revision has been unofficially announced by Jake Thornton (the designer)

http://quirkworthy.com/2014/07/13/dkh-mini-update/

"Dungeon Sagas: Dwarf Kings Quest"

I will speculate that this means expansions are planed (yay!) and a possible move away from the Dwarf King's Hold rules.

Additionally, hard plastic dungeon builder terrain is being looked at as something to fund during the Kickstarter.

If it takes the same format as DKH games so far, this will mean 25mm or 1" square dungeon terrain tiles on sprues to assemble in any way you like.

It may not be in the core game box rather than card tiles, to keep the price point low, but it will definitely be something that Kickstarter backers get if it funds, and then sold as a deluxe upgrade set at retail.

I've had busy month or two and haven't been following Mantic's blogs or newsletters. Is there a prospective date for the launch of this? I know they have the pre-launch hypemobile rolling with some sort of rune thing.

 Riquende wrote:
I've had busy month or two and haven't been following Mantic's blogs or newsletters. Is there a prospective date for the launch of this? I know they have the pre-launch hypemobile rolling with some sort of rune thing.

I believe its August 4th.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Additionally, hard plastic dungeon builder terrain is being looked at as something to fund during the Kickstarter.

If it takes the same format as DKH games so far, this will mean 25mm or 1" square dungeon terrain tiles on sprues to assemble in any way you like.

It may not be in the core game box rather than card tiles, to keep the price point low, but it will definitely be something that Kickstarter backers get if it funds, and then sold as a deluxe upgrade set at retail.

Someone mentioned this on the Mantic DKH forums. Said it was in an interview with Ronnie recently. Where can I see this interview?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 tgmoore wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
Additionally, hard plastic dungeon builder terrain is being looked at as something to fund during the Kickstarter.

If it takes the same format as DKH games so far, this will mean 25mm or 1" square dungeon terrain tiles on sprues to assemble in any way you like.

It may not be in the core game box rather than card tiles, to keep the price point low, but it will definitely be something that Kickstarter backers get if it funds, and then sold as a deluxe upgrade set at retail.

Someone mentioned this on the Mantic DKH forums. Said it was in an interview with Ronnie recently. Where can I see this interview?

I had only heard August 2014. Where did you get the 4th from? The sooner the better!

Upon closer inspection (I looked at the e-mail they sent out) I totally made the 4th part up. My fault. Its just sometime in August.

So plastic dungeon builder terrain is going to be considered after all?

I thought this was supposed to be a one and done, nice self contained game. Not that I'd have a problem with

Are we talking dungeon tiles, or Heroquest style decorative bits to litter the dungeon? Traps, bookcases, doors, tables, that kind of stuff?

Table dressings are pretty universal and if they end up spruing up some of that, I can see it selling pretty well outside of this game.

Heck, I'm watching my daughter play with some Disney princesses and Bones figures with a bunch of Sylvania Family accessories, and even she's complaining to me that we need more tables and props that match the figures' scale.
Funny enough, was emphatically told "NO" when asked if she wanted any metal/ resin accessories, but she happily accepted some painted Deadzone pieces to further furnish her barbarian village.

Mantic battlezones- endorsed by five year old girls everywhere!

I hope that if they do plastic dungeon terrain, it's a bunch of differently shaped rooms (double sided with different designs on the back) like in Warhammer quest, to make all sorts of different dungeons.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:

Are we talking dungeon tiles, or Heroquest style decorative bits to litter the dungeon? Traps, bookcases, doors, tables, that kind of stuff?

There's a youtube interview with Ronnie from the weekend where it's mentioned that one of the mid range stretch goals is going to be to have those decoratives made in hard plastic, with backers definitely getting them, and the retail box probably getting them but not definite yet.

Plastic tiles is a new thing to me though.

Video is linked in the scifi thread

I like the idea of plastic dungeon tiles & walls, but I would think you'd need too many sprues to make a full dungeon .. like it wouldn't be practical to have enough of them in the main box.

Plastic tiles were nixed as an idea back at Open Day 2014 according to folks that sat in Q&A sessions with Ronnie.

http://forum.manticblog.com/showthread.php?8233-DKH-News-and-Rumors-from-Open-Day-2014

"The new DKH will be based on cardboard tiles but with plastic scenery such as tables, chairs and chests etc."

*high quality card dungeon tiles! stretch goal will be double sided print, in one seminar people really wanted strong themes such as Egyptian temple style! classic style etc and Ronnie seemed to really like that . They looked at hard plastic but too expensive and wouldn't wear well. "

^ This is new info from this weekend that replaces that.

Video is over in the sci-fi rumours thread, or just look at my recent posts.

 scarletsquig wrote:
^ This is new info from this weekend that replaces that.

Video is over in the sci-fi rumours thread, or just look at my recent posts.

Thank you. Where was this interview? I assume a convention? Ronnie looks very tired.

I have to say that I'm disappointed that it appears they're moving away from a simple product at a reasonable price and going stretch goal mad again with things like plastic tiles. Unless they're also doing walls (and that would drive the price way up) I don't see the point - I'd rather go with something like Battle Systems upcoming fantasy dungeon terrain (which Mantic could be partnering with instead).

I watched the video last night.

"Plastic terrain" is what was mentioned specifically. Whether that means tiles, walls, scenic stuff... I have no idea, and neither Ronnie nor the interviewer clarify what they mean by that.

It was mentioned that any plastic terrain that gets funded would probably end up in the base game, so I'm going to hope they're talking scenery. That seems far more practical than plastic tiles.

Hopefully any plastic tiles that get made will be part of whatever the fantasy Deadzone skirmish game ends up being.

As someone who sat in on the Open Day Seminars I am pretty certain the plastic terrain will be accessories for the dungeon, as I posted before, Ronnie slapped down the plastic tiles idea pretty hard and the focus was clearly on making this product an open and play title. Plastic dungeon tiles would not be unless prepainted. However given some people have used deadzone tiles to make space hulk terrain then we could see some kind of castle sprue for kings of war that also has that kind of use, ideal with GW launching fantasy 9th next year and stuff like brimstone, hero quest etc coming. 99.9% plastic tiles will not be in the box itself.