Sining wrote: Dude,in between your complaining, you must have missed the part where squig said
You should definitely email them asking for a replacement, they've said they're happy to replace any miniature which has unacceptable flash.
Why don't you go do that first before saying Mantic is shirking responsibility kay?
Already have. I have sent emails about the failures in the past and sent a new one giving feedback about season 2 and asking for a refund of my season 3 pledges. I have never gotten anything but generic 'thanks for your feedback' emails, So asking for a refund I hope prompts a real response. I will send them everything back and call it a day if they are willing. I feel like refunding unfulfilled pledges is perfectly reasonable when they are not holding up their end of their the Kickstarter by producing reliable sculpts or quality casts.
A lot of us are happy with what we've gotten from them, and yes, some people are also upset. I'm sorry you got unacceptable models, but I (and others) am happy with the models I've received. A few have bad flash, but most have less mold line issues than my GW collection of minis. And if we bring the KoW minis in, the only ones I'm not happy about are the cat-horses.
Jeez, every single restic model I've gotten has been excellent. My DB S1 models were free of mold lines. I have 30 orc gore riders that needed a few spears straightened, but were also free of mold lines and were a breeze to assemble.
Sining wrote: Dude,in between your complaining, you must have missed the part where squig said
You should definitely email them asking for a replacement, they've said they're happy to replace any miniature which has unacceptable flash.
Why don't you go do that first before saying Mantic is shirking responsibility kay?
Already have. I have sent emails about the failures in the past and sent a new one giving feedback about season 2 and asking for a refund of my season 3 pledges. I have never gotten anything but generic 'thanks for your feedback' emails, So asking for a refund I hope prompts a real response. I will send them everything back and call it a day if they are willing. I feel like refunding unfulfilled pledges is perfectly reasonable when they are not holding up their end of their the Kickstarter by producing reliable sculpts or quality casts.
I think you should stick away from KS and wait till the items get to your LGS so you can see them and buy them.
I think you should stick away from KS and wait till the items get to your LGS so you can see them and buy them.
Kickstarter's are not the problem. I have backed many successful kickstarters who released quality products which hasn't fallen into the pits Mantic seems to have. I am forced to do the following when buying Mantic products now: Never buy a model until the final confirmed sculpt is shown, Never buy a model where I do not have the ability to return it for a full refund.
If they would address the Art Direction issues and have some level of QC or find a new casting company, they wouldn't have these issues.
And I can't find FLGS who carry mantic. They dislike how the Kickstarters starve the market. No one wants to buy Dreadball because anyone who liked it already got multiple teams from the KS way before the stores can stock it, and compared to the value of the Kickstarter, the MSRP is downright expensive and loses its 'Hey they are cheap, quit complaining' appeal.
It's had quadruple the sales outside of the kickstarter compared to inside it.
They had to make a new version of the game in response to demand from the board game market that just wanted a basic game with a simplified rulebook and no cards/ lower price point.
In fact, some kickstarter backers complained that retailers were getting more priority than they were.
If they would address the Art Direction issues and have some level of QC or find a new casting company, they wouldn't have these issues.
This is all that really needs saying, and I agree.
Your delivery of everything other than that one line is terrible, though. They're not going to pay any attention to multi-paragraph internet rants that call them liars, thieves and cheats... in fact taking this stance hurts the odds of having the argument take weight with the company for those of us who are trying to present it in a constructive manner. It makes the point of debate become associated with "that one guy on the internet that hates us" rather than "that bunch of quite nice people on the internet who take their time to politely offer feedback as constructively as possible".
I've seen similar things happen in the past, it's probably the main reason we don't have female sci-fi troopers currently, a lot of people asking for them are a complete and utter firebrand when presenting their opinion on the topic, which creates the impression of a vocal negative minority rather than popular opinion.
I will say one thing in your favour, though. You've actually bought the product before complaining about it. It's a much better position to be presenting a debate from since it sets you apart from the usual "I love 40k and want Mantic to die already" crowd.
A long email to Mantic is probably your best bet, they don't always read forums like this since they move too fast to keep track of.
To be entirely honest, if a drop in the ocean that is 2,5k global backers is worrying and angering retailers, then retailers probably need to take a deep breath and rethink what they are saying.
If they really think that 2,5k global backers is their entire or the majority of their customers then they really have serious issues.
Now as far as the models go I did a fast inspection of mine I think two have non serious moldlines from the entire season 1&2 and so far I have not identified any clipping that it was not on the pegs that are to be inserted in the model, I am not saying people do not have problems, I am saying not everything shipped had such issues.
It's not only Mantic that needs to know, though. After seeing those pics, I'd only be buying it from a store where I can return it if necessary. Luckily, my FLGS does stock Mantic and I'm hoping Dreadball takes off there.
RiTides wrote: It's not only Mantic that needs to know, though. After seeing those pics, I'd only be buying it from a store where I can return it if necessary. Luckily, my FLGS does stock Mantic and I'm hoping Dreadball takes off there.
Which place is your FLGS? I think we share a geographic location. I have been trying to find a place which has Dreadball play and haven't found any. I might try Dropzone, but it is quite a hike for me but it may be worth it for summer league play
I can probably even give people who want to do a little work a good deal on teams
nkelsch wrote: Which place is your FLGS? I think we share a geographic location. I have been trying to find a place which has Dreadball play and haven't found any. I might try Dropzone, but it is quite a hike for me but it may be worth it for summer league play
Oh, I didn't realize that!
Yes, I was referring to Dropzone Games, although I normally game at Dream Wizards. Dropzone is a hike for me on a weekday but very easy to get to on the weekends.
I would be interested in playing you in Dreadball whenever I get my Season 3 team (although I guess that's still a little while yet).
PsychoticStorm wrote: Manufacturing defects are a fact of modern life, if you can ask for replacements what is the issue?
Well, people are upset about finecast all the time, and it's even easier (perhaps Far easier) to get replacements of those models. So, just being able to get a problem fixed doesn't make it a non-issue... many people, myself included, avoid finecast to not have to deal with the issue altogether.
Or, if they do buy it, they only buy it in a store, to make the replacement / return process more expedited. This is likely what I will be doing with Dreadball purchases now, as I mentioned.
Well I ended up on a whim ordering some more void sirens and zzor from total wargamer. Hopefully the zzor set won't have the extra guard problem - I've got too many already.
Void sirens were unexpected as a purchase. Stupid me decided that I wanted to paint my guys and gals teams in entirely different colours. The original plan was to treat them as 1 full team.
I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
A post made by one of the (main?) 'Dreadball Games (and Rules) Committee members on the mantic forums included this little gem.
The biggest detractor for me is the amount of whining on these forums. If you are unhappy with the rule set, please change what you need in order to enjoy it. No one cares if you allow your players to collect the money from the middle of the board when they land on free parking. I dont mind suggestions for house rules... But I'm just not interested in how you think you could have designed a game better.
Someone recently had the gall to accuse Jake of militancy because he disagreed about a rule. Seriously? If you think you can do a better job developing a game - do it. In this age of KS and crowd funding, whats stopping you from putting other peoples money where your mouth is.
Quite frankly, and especially since I was the aforementioned 'accuser' (which I really wasn't).
I really don't know if I want to continue to support this game anymore. Or potentially even mantic as a whole. - And yes, I am going to write a letter/email after dinner.
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
A post made by one of the (main?) 'Dreadball Games (and Rules) Committee members on the mantic forums included this little gem.
The biggest detractor for me is the amount of whining on these forums. If you are unhappy with the rule set, please change what you need in order to enjoy it. No one cares if you allow your players to collect the money from the middle of the board when they land on free parking. I dont mind suggestions for house rules... But I'm just not interested in how you think you could have designed a game better.
Someone recently had the gall to accuse Jake of militancy because he disagreed about a rule. Seriously? If you think you can do a better job developing a game - do it. In this age of KS and crowd funding, whats stopping you from putting other peoples money where your mouth is.
Quite frankly, and especially since I was the aforementioned 'accuser' (which I really wasn't).
I really don't know if I want to continue to support this game anymore. Or potentially even mantic as a whole. - And yes, I am going to write a letter/email after dinner.
I dunno. I see these guys both on Dakka in the Mantic threads and on the Mantic forums. I am not sure what exactly it is about Mantic that attracts these kind of zealots that think criticism is something bad and blind obedience (and blind lashing out at anyone with even the slightest inkling of critical thinking) is something good. But yeah, Mantic has some truly terrible fanatic-fans that seriously hurt the broader appeal of their games in this day and age of internet-vibes.
I hardly even read the Deadzone thread on Dakka anymore. While I think the game looks ace, the thread is so thoroughly orchestrated, artificially hyped and cleansed of all "natural" discussion, it can hardly be called a forum-discussion at all anymore at this point.
I can almost deal with that. However, the thing that really grinds my gears, is when it comes from a person of relative (ish) authority on the game, who is on a rules committee (and apparently represents them for all of Oz).
I'm a software developer and recently I've been "User Acceptance Testing" - the computing equivalent of playtesting. In that, my entire job is to try to break the feth out of the software before the public gets to it. The last thing I would do is go 'oh, everythings fine for now.'
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
I have asked if it is possible to decrease or 'refund' my season 3 pledges... No response from mantic at all. Pretty sure I know the answer... This is the difference between a retail consumer relationship where you have rights and a Kickstarter relationship where they can screw you with no recourse.
Mantic needs to fire every sculptor but Remy and go all 3D. This mech suit is what the concept art of the ripper suit lead me to believe they were getting. If the ripper suits were to the scale and design of the Dreadball suit (as it was in the concept art), I would be buying 10 of them. I haven't seen a single digital sculpt which had proportion issues or was a bad model. (probably because the 3D people can start from an correct anatomy and add on.)
If only the 3D renders translated to good casts, The Robots of season 2 had the most flash and looking at other people's photos, I was not alone.
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
A post made by one of the (main?) 'Dreadball Games (and Rules) Committee members on the mantic forums included this little gem.
The biggest detractor for me is the amount of whining on these forums. If you are unhappy with the rule set, please change what you need in order to enjoy it. No one cares if you allow your players to collect the money from the middle of the board when they land on free parking. I dont mind suggestions for house rules... But I'm just not interested in how you think you could have designed a game better.
Someone recently had the gall to accuse Jake of militancy because he disagreed about a rule. Seriously? If you think you can do a better job developing a game - do it. In this age of KS and crowd funding, whats stopping you from putting other peoples money where your mouth is.
Quite frankly, and especially since I was the aforementioned 'accuser' (which I really wasn't).
I really don't know if I want to continue to support this game anymore. Or potentially even mantic as a whole. - And yes, I am going to write a letter/email after dinner.
The person making that post is not a Mantic staff member. The account name gives the impression of something official, but it isn't, it's just someone's username, an Australian who runs some dreadball leagues over there.
I agree that's a really obnoxious post, considering how reasonable and well-thought out the criticism has been... see this for a good example of excellent, reasonable feedback: http://pinsofwar.com/please-fix-dreadball/
I hardly even read the Deadzone thread on Dakka anymore. While I think the game looks ace, the thread is so thoroughly orchestrated, artificially hyped and cleansed of all "natural" discussion, it can hardly be called a forum-discussion at all anymore at this point.
If you want to complain about me personally, feel free to do so. I don't like sideways jabs.
Please read the multiple posts where I am in fact heavily critical of Mantic before doing so though. Hell, there's a post a few up from this one where I'm agreeing with nkeslch.
Other than me there aren't really any zealots, as such. And even I'm not half as bad as you'd like to make out.
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
I have asked if it is possible to decrease or 'refund' my season 3 pledges... No response from mantic at all. Pretty sure I know the answer... This is the difference between a retail consumer relationship where you have rights and a Kickstarter relationship where they can screw you with no recourse.
Mantic needs to fire every sculptor but Remy and go all 3D. This mech suit is what the concept art of the ripper suit lead me to believe they were getting. If the ripper suits were to the scale and design of the Dreadball suit (as it was in the concept art), I would be buying 10 of them. I haven't seen a single digital sculpt which had proportion issues or was a bad model. (probably because the 3D people can start from an correct anatomy and add on.)
If only the 3D renders translated to good casts, The Robots of season 2 had the most flash and looking at other people's photos, I was not alone.
To be entirely honest I think even the pixels on my screens have understood your point twice by now, I feel you have tired the subject long ago.
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
I have asked if it is possible to decrease or 'refund' my season 3 pledges... No response from mantic at all. Pretty sure I know the answer... This is the difference between a retail consumer relationship where you have rights and a Kickstarter relationship where they can screw you with no recourse.
Mantic needs to fire every sculptor but Remy and go all 3D. This mech suit is what the concept art of the ripper suit lead me to believe they were getting. If the ripper suits were to the scale and design of the Dreadball suit (as it was in the concept art), I would be buying 10 of them. I haven't seen a single digital sculpt which had proportion issues or was a bad model. (probably because the 3D people can start from an correct anatomy and add on.)
If only the 3D renders translated to good casts, The Robots of season 2 had the most flash and looking at other people's photos, I was not alone.
To be entirely honest I think even the pixels on my screens have understood your point twice by now, I feel you have tired the subject long ago.
So people discussing wanting to cancel Season 3 pledges has already been discussed? Please let me know how I can obtain my refund or the official statement where Mantic takes advantage of the KS system and won't give back money. If you are going to be part of the bucket brigade, then carry the water by getting the answers for us?
If you want to complain about me personally, feel free to do so. I don't like sideways jabs.
Was thinking more about Black Nexus actually. And this JS-Digby guy. Etc.. . Believe it or not, I consider you - relatively - as one of the saner posters Squig, even though you're far from impartial. 0
Hell, sometimes I even wonder what Mantic pays a certain Primarch-named MOD. If Dakka-mods would clamp down on GW-criticism like he does on Mantic-criticism, Dakkadakka itself would probably cease to exist.
scarletsquig wrote: Please read the multiple posts where I am in fact heavily critical of Mantic before doing so though. Hell, there's a post a few up from this one where I'm agreeing with nkeslch.
Other than me there aren't really any zealots, as such. And even I'm not half as bad as you'd like to make out.
Zweischneid wrote: Believe it or not, I consider you - relatively - as one of the saner posters Squig, even though you're far from impartial.
Agreed with both of these except for the idea that there aren't any zealots. I appreciate your input, squig, although obviously you're on the "fan" side of the fence, I feel you are reasonable and critical at times when appropriate.
Who is sculpting the Nameless, again? While not digital, I have high hopes for them based on how Shoeless Joe turned out
The person making that post is not a Mantic staff member. The account name gives the impression of something official, but it isn't, it's just someone's username, an Australian who runs some dreadball leagues over there.
You have no idea how much of a relief that is. Although, I never did think he was a staffmember as such. However, I did have the impression he was a mod and/or senior playtester. - Someone quasi-official, a volunteer staffmember or the like. In any case, this has completely changed the tone of the email, I'm writing.
Edit: And there's goes my relief again...
TWTaylor wrote" wrote:JS was not intending to post this under the auspices of 'official'. When Mantic chose us DGB members, not everyone's account names were know to Mantic, so for a few they just created them to get us going on discussions.
That being said, his post is not invalid. It appears to me that he has no problems with house rules, only that he'd like to see more positive community things. Like most of us would.
And negativity and community can greatly effect a game, and the meta and people around it.
In my mind, calling the forum goers a load of whiners, with the grand point being of, "well, if you don't like it, go do better" (I imagine a raspberry being blown here) seems to me to be the very definition of 'negativity' and 'invalid.'
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
I have asked if it is possible to decrease or 'refund' my season 3 pledges... No response from mantic at all. Pretty sure I know the answer... This is the difference between a retail consumer relationship where you have rights and a Kickstarter relationship where they can screw you with no recourse.
Mantic needs to fire every sculptor but Remy and go all 3D. This mech suit is what the concept art of the ripper suit lead me to believe they were getting. If the ripper suits were to the scale and design of the Dreadball suit (as it was in the concept art), I would be buying 10 of them. I haven't seen a single digital sculpt which had proportion issues or was a bad model. (probably because the 3D people can start from an correct anatomy and add on.)
If only the 3D renders translated to good casts, The Robots of season 2 had the most flash and looking at other people's photos, I was not alone.
To be entirely honest I think even the pixels on my screens have understood your point twice by now, I feel you have tired the subject long ago.
So people discussing wanting to cancel Season 3 pledges has already been discussed? Please let me know how I can obtain my refund or the official statement where Mantic takes advantage of the KS system and won't give back money. If you are going to be part of the bucket brigade, then carry the water by getting the answers for us?
The point is, you got bad casts, they offer to replace them, you decline saying all are bad, people say to you no, but yours are you better replace them, you decline wanting a refund without accepting any chance of replacement first, now you essentially start the same, just without bothering to receive any casts first.
There are a myriad of reasons why mantic may delay on the last and most crucial 3rd of a kickstarter campaign, you just must assume that they decline to reply because they do not want to cooperate with you.
RiTides wrote: Who is sculpting the Nameless, again? While not digital, I have high hopes for them based on how Shoeless Joe turned out
Don't know who it is specifically, but I heard that the same guy who did John Doe has been given the job of doing the rest of the Nameless team, so expect more of the same.
Edit: And there's goes my relief again...
TWTaylor is not a Mantic staffer either.
After the Dreadball KS, the dreadball.com website was handed over to the community to manage and run (people from the dreadball fanatics facebook group mostly if I remember right), so basically just some people online who are really passionate about dreadball.
Compel wrote: I'm assuming you can't decrease season 3 pledges afterwards?
I have asked if it is possible to decrease or 'refund' my season 3 pledges... No response from mantic at all. Pretty sure I know the answer... This is the difference between a retail consumer relationship where you have rights and a Kickstarter relationship where they can screw you with no recourse.
Mantic needs to fire every sculptor but Remy and go all 3D. This mech suit is what the concept art of the ripper suit lead me to believe they were getting. If the ripper suits were to the scale and design of the Dreadball suit (as it was in the concept art), I would be buying 10 of them. I haven't seen a single digital sculpt which had proportion issues or was a bad model. (probably because the 3D people can start from an correct anatomy and add on.)
If only the 3D renders translated to good casts, The Robots of season 2 had the most flash and looking at other people's photos, I was not alone.
To be entirely honest I think even the pixels on my screens have understood your point twice by now, I feel you have tired the subject long ago.
So people discussing wanting to cancel Season 3 pledges has already been discussed? Please let me know how I can obtain my refund or the official statement where Mantic takes advantage of the KS system and won't give back money. If you are going to be part of the bucket brigade, then carry the water by getting the answers for us?
The point is, you got bad casts, they offer to replace them, you decline saying all are bad, people say to you no, but yours are you better replace them, you decline wanting a refund without accepting any chance of replacement first, now you essentially start the same, just without bothering to receive any casts first.
There are a myriad of reasons why mantic may delay on the last and most crucial 3rd of a kickstarter campaign, you just must assume that they decline to reply because they do not want to cooperate with you.
Oh Really? I asked for replacements and refunds, and was told their website email form often doesn't function. I want a refund for season 3 to cut my losses if that is a possibility.
So this 'offer to replace them' I have yet to find out how to get this accomplished as they do not respond to their emails. If I cannot get refunds for season 3 or refunds at all like I could if I had bought them as a retail product, then I want the damaged models fixed, but I get NONE of that. Until my models are replaced, then all I can assume is they ignore negative customer feedback and do not treat KS backers the way they do regular customers because they do not respond to emails reporting damaged products.
So what is the excuse now? The website form broke? They have too many emails from Open day to respond to? Dealing with dissatisfied customers is part of customer service.
I have jumped through every hoop every bucket brigade person has told me to, and yet, no response. So I am not sure what more to do? Has anyone yet seen evidence of being able to return a Kickstarter product for replacement models? While they may do it (mainly because they are required to) for purchased product, has any kickstarter backer who has had damaged models gotten replacements yet?
I have still yet to see an 'offer to replace them' or a process for getting things replaced in regards to this KS in any official postings on their website, since doing so admits failure in quality. So this 'They will replace it' seems to be an unconfirmed jibber-jabber of fanatics who have no evidence of such promises.
Hmm, I seem to remember having heard of plenty of KS backers getting replacements. I also have seen them offer refunds here and there, if I'm not mistaken. Have you emailed stewart gibbs directly? If not, I suggest doing so. Feel free to PM me for the email adress if you don't have it already.
I'm not too sold on sports games so I've been carefully skipping Dreadball so far, but that mini looks simply awesome. Wonder if I can strap a gattling gun there somehow...
Oh Really? I asked for replacements and refunds, and was told their website email form often doesn't function. I want a refund for season 3 to cut my losses if that is a possibility.
So this 'offer to replace them' I have yet to find out how to get this accomplished as they do not respond to their emails
this is after emailing them using the direct email address you were provided with?
Hmm, I see what you mean. I had that same apprehension with WM/H Plastics, then with restic, then again with SW plastic - I've since learned that that stuff photographs like gak and you only see how sharp much of the detail actually is once the primer goes on. My helder figure looked pretty much the same but now the primer is on, I'm quite sure it's actually quite a sharply detailed model.
What *is* the case, however (and this goes mostly for the girls and the judwan, due to the nature of the models) is that the detail is more subtle than you're used to from GW models. it's much more like CB stuff in that regard - though a lot more defined and easier to paint than Wyrd plastics seem to be (which are good on their own too, just something to be really careful with).
If you're used to slapping on the paint by the millilitre, you're in for a tough time with these. if you paint with a bit of care, you shouldn't have any issues. Really, all the PVCish plastic models (which are all the rage nowadays) are like that; they look like *crap* until you get some paint on them at which point they really shine.
Detail somewhat to the side of the mould pull direction is actually a lot sharper on these kinds of models I've heard, and it mirrors my experiences. Sorry, I've got a thesis deadline coming up so no time to document this with 20 zillion pics but really, you're fine. don't worry
Bolognesus wrote: @Souleater
What pictures are you referring to, specifically?
The ones on pg10 of this thread. I don't mind cleaning up the mould lines but the sharpness of the sculpting is pretty poor, IMO.
I have the same models and seem to have no issue, so? localized problem?
To be fair the mold lines on my s2 stuff are actually worse than that; it doesn't seem to be more work to clear them off than smaller lines would be though. just a lot worse-looking if you don't
Sad to hear that, my only "excessive" mold-line is on orky's head, I remember one or two models need some cleaning, but on one location and not to that extend.
I'll try to back that up and bring me into positive land again.
Using a similar colour scheme on a Dreadball model as a 40k one. The Dreadball model took 3 hours all told. 40k was closer to 15.
However Dreadball models don't like drybrushing And spraypaint misbehaving can really mess then up, but that's more my fault. See my modelling blog for details.
@nkelsch: I got a reply from Stewart very quickly when I contacted him through the Deadzone KS's "ask a question" button (2 days, I think). That seems to be where his attention lies. My email to him went unanswered for well over a week. Maybe you can pledge a dollar, ask your question and unpledge when he answers?
I dunno. I see these guys both on Dakka in the Mantic threads and on the Mantic forums. I am not sure what exactly it is about Mantic that attracts these kind of zealots that think criticism is something bad and blind obedience (and blind lashing out at anyone with even the slightest inkling of critical thinking) is something good. But yeah, Mantic has some truly terrible fanatic-fans that seriously hurt the broader appeal of their games in this day and age of internet-vibes.
I hardly even read the Deadzone thread on Dakka anymore. While I think the game looks ace, the thread is so thoroughly orchestrated, artificially hyped and cleansed of all "natural" discussion, it can hardly be called a forum-discussion at all anymore at this point.
A little bit hyperbolic there, mate. I agree that fanatics can hurt the broader discussion, and sometimes I don't find the moderation to be reasonable (I had a post removed in the first days because my talk of "fake stretch goals" apparently hurt SS's feelings - or maybe because I replied when he rode in to attack a post I hadn't made "to" him after a mod asked us to stop - but before I saw the mod post). But I'd argue that GW also seems to have a lot of white knights in threads discussing their product, and there's that guy who apparently wants to defend all game companies, but I'm still posting in the DreadZone thread, and I'm still happily pointing out what I think is good, bad and otherwise.
Please read the multiple posts where I am in fact heavily critical of Mantic before doing so though. Hell, there's a post a few up from this one where I'm agreeing with nkeslch.
Agreed. Credit where it's due, and you've been critical of the trolls and initial Orks rather than slavering fanboi. I think the difference with those is that you're willing to cut Mantic much more slack than others because you're such a self-described fan. Buying new figures in order to attempt to rebuild the trolls, etc is really not something any of us should need to do, and not really something that would come to mind for most of us when there's an opportunity to swap them, put them in a box forever, or a rubbish bin within throwing range.. ,
A great response from mantic on that thread. I really am impressed.
JamesMHewitt wrote wrote:Hi guys! James here. I'm afraid the Deadzone Kickstarter (and a dozen other things!) have meant that I haven't been able to properly engage with the forums yet. Hopefully in June that will change! (Also I will be able to get sleep, I've been told. Precious sleep...)
I think there's a lot of debate here from a lot of people who all want more or less the same thing. Let's see if can step in and mediate a bit before people start buying plane tickets and starting fist-fights!
No game is perfect. No matter how finely you balance a game, if it gets played enough it will tip in one direction or another, or people will find loopholes to exploit, or they'll figure out every strategy and discover an unbeatable strategy for winning. That's why games get patched, re-released, updated and so on. Even chess!
It's impossible for a designer to predict how every single player will play a game, which means there's always room for improvement based on feedback. This is why playtesting is so essential. The more people play a game, the more things come up that otherwise wouldn't have. We playtested DreadBall like crazy, and I think that's why it's received such high praise for its rules. I think it's an awesome game (I'm biased, of course ), but do I think it's perfect? No! Is that a bad thing? Not at all!
Without constant feedback from players - preferably well-structured constructive feedback, but even the occasional bout of formless enraged shouting from time to time - a game can't grow. That's why Jake maintains the FAQ on his blog. It lets him see what people think of the game, which is a great first step. The more feedback he gets the more he can see patterns and the more easily he can sort the wheat from the chaff.
Saying that you think a rule needs to change isn't the same as attacking the designer, and I think we need to be careful, as a community, not to assume that the two are the same. Yes, it's important to grow the DreadBall community, and positivity is a great way of doing that, but shutting down criticisms can be more damaging than helpful.
So what do we do?
Here's what I'd say. When someone says that they think a rule is broken, or something needs to change, or XYZ, we should thank them for their opinion, then question it further. Why do they think that? What evidence is it based on? This shouldn't be an interrogation, just a chance to gather information. If they're saying "Marauders are broken!" after playing one game and losing to them, it's probably a case of encouraging them to try again - maybe switching sides - and see if they still feel the same. If, however, they've played a dozen games and the same issue has cropped up in eight of them... they might well have a point. Ask them what they'd do to fix it, and point them towards Jake's blog where they can explain what they think is wrong, why they think that, and what they'd do to overcome it. If you disagree with them, fair enough. You're allowed your opinion! Say what you'd do differently, but please don't tell someone there's no issue if they've experienced it on multiple occasions. At the end of the day, Jake gets to make that call.
If we do this, we can keep growing DreadBall into something increasingly awesome.
If you want to complain about me personally, feel free to do so. I don't like sideways jabs.
Was thinking more about Black Nexus actually. And this JS-Digby guy. Etc.. . Believe it or not, I consider you - relatively - as one of the saner posters Squig, even though you're far from impartial. 0
Hell, sometimes I even wonder what Mantic pays a certain Primarch-named MOD. If Dakka-mods would clamp down on GW-criticism like he does on Mantic-criticism, Dakkadakka itself would probably cease to exist.
Is it hard to see the keyboard past your tin-foil hat lol?
Seriously though, this idea that Mods are paid by companies is absolutely ridiculous... I wish that weren't the case though I would love to be on the take lol! Free $ is always welcome
Bolognesus wrote: Hmm, I seem to remember having heard of plenty of KS backers getting replacements.
According to your judgment, would you say that there were a lot of complains and a lot of justified returns in this kickstarter? If yes, what would be the reason for this?
BTW, if Dakka wouldn't allow Mantic critical posts, my post count would be 10% smaller
Great post from James there. The Dreadball community is still young and growing fast. I hear of stories of more and more people playing the game (its not even a year old!), I myself have giving several demos at my club and I believe Mantic have sold over twice as much core sets then from the KS so they must be doing something right. So lets not throw hisses at each other (all the different forums) and scare new people away, we have a great game here and its going to be great watching it grow!
Bolognesus wrote: Hmm, I seem to remember having heard of plenty of KS backers getting replacements.
According to your judgment, would you say that there were a lot of complains and a lot of justified returns in this kickstarter? If yes, what would be the reason for this?
BTW, if Dakka wouldn't allow Mantic critical posts, my post count would be 10% smaller
I think, going by what I've seen, there were actually relatively few complaints once people had stuff in their hands.
To be honest though, I've been crazy busy with exams and thesis during both delivery periods so far, so I haven't done an expansive analysis exactly
I believe mantic replaced a lot of models with ill-fitting tabs and unacceptable mold lines, but that was it mostly. Now in my (rather big: completionist with all upgrades!) season two shipment I've been hit with both hose issues. To be honest though, aside from a few min here and there fixing tabs the cleanup doesn't take all that much longer; I don't feel as if it's complaint-worthy. I'll be mailing about a mispack and an MVP damaged in shipment once i've checked and built everyhing, but I'm not exactly all that disappointed tbh.
So basically I've got one of the 'bad' shipments for this wave and even then it's not all that bad; I think the relatively few complaints have something to do with this: most experienced modelers with a decent craft knife won't blink at fixing any of this, so aside from mispacks and shipping damage, I feel that relatively few replacements (should) have been issued.
Mantic is always a bit polarizing; this does mean a rather small group will make a LOT of noise in the way of complaints, even for a wargaming matter. You'll see 95% of the harsh criticism comes from a very, very small group.
Of course on the other hand there's folks like SS and me who would cut them a rather big it of slack at times, so I won't say it doesn't somewhat balance out On balance though, I think you'll find most backers were really quite satisfied with dreadball so far.
Is it hard to see the keyboard past your tin-foil hat lol?
Seriously though, this idea that Mods are paid by companies is absolutely ridiculous... I wish that weren't the case though I would love to be on the take lol! Free $ is always welcome
Yes. I know that forum Mods are not REALLY paid by game companies.
But that, if anything, only makes it even more in-explicable why there are so vastly divergent standards in moderating criticism directed at Games Workshop and criticism directed at other miniature gaming company.
I am assuming here but, the season 1 had issues because the moulds were used too fast to make the deadline, mantic identified the issue and asked for moulds to be done in normal speed for season 2, the problems that showed up probably means that at some point the factory started again the speed production, somebody in this thread speculated because they got another more important order, so they will go over there to make sure production runs smoother.
I've emailed Stewart on Monday regarding a missing figure from my S2 shipment, got a reply on Wed. Maybe nklesch shouldn't write his emails in the same tone as he writes his forum posts.
That could well be it. I emailed Stewart at the same time as I sent my first post about the trolls, and got a reply within a day that the figure would be sent out immediately. Got it Friday.
wow, the flash and mold lines on these models are unnaceptable. Might cancel my 300$ deadzone pledge after seeing this, especially since it seem quite an odyssey to get replacement.
Sining wrote: I've emailed Stewart on Monday regarding a missing figure from my S2 shipment, got a reply on Wed. Maybe nklesch shouldn't write his emails in the same tone as he writes his forum posts.
I will be glad to post the content of my multiple emails to mantic and Stewart included. I just sent him yet another email with an added bit complaining about the hoops needed to jump through for customer service... I can't believe so many people think it is "OK" to be ignored through the webpage contact us form and think it is 'ok' that you should be forced to pledge the new kickstarter to access the 'ask a question' button or email secret email addresses not posted on the website.
If GW functioned that way, people would have an aneurysm complaining about how terrible the customer service is.
I also think the rationalization is getting worse and worse by the bucket brigade. "Oh, Mantic models look terrible by photos when every other mini ever made can look fine in photos." "Mantic models have shallower detail which require primer to look good." "Oh when you paint detail and don't use a lot of paint, they look great, they are for advanced painters." "Oh you should expect heavy flash and mold lines, experienced modelers should have no issues and just accept it." Really? So the bad models are the fault of cameras and lack of skills of the customers now? And I should pledge Deadzone in order to get my answer? Pay further into the Ponzi scheme?
Regardless, I am a paying customer who deserves a response and have valid issues with my product.
Not yet. I sent a second email tonight to the stewart email everyone seems to be contacting for refunds. It is about a week since I emailed the default form which seems to show the form on the default website does not work. So that is 3 emails total.
Nobody said it's ok to be ignored through the webpage contact form. However, SEVERAL people by now have told you SEVERAL ways to get replacements, most of which has worked for them. However, you're adamant on going on about how you're the poor victim because you've continuously tried to contact them through the webpage and gotten NO replies and yet somehow, you insist on banging your head against that wall. Seriously, how bout trying one of the other methods.
And how are people forcing you to pledge to a new KS? You DO realise the old contact me button on the DB KS STILL WORKS don't you? You did pledge for DB didn't you? Use the contact button on the DB KS page and contact them. And for that matter, you DON'T EVEN need to pledge to contact KS creators. I contacted SW regarding their tablescape KS before I even pledged for it so I have no idea what you're smoking here.
You're pretty much a classic example of 'the customer isn't always right'. Seriously, if you have this many issues, you shouldn't consider pledging for DZ and yet you apparently are -_-
Sining wrote: Nobody said it's ok to be ignored through the webpage contact form. However, SEVERAL people by now have told you SEVERAL ways to get replacements, most of which has worked for them. However, you're adamant on going on about how you're the poor victim because you've continuously tried to contact them through the webpage and gotten NO replies and yet somehow, you insist on banging your head against that wall. Seriously, how bout trying one of the other methods.
And how are people forcing you to pledge to a new KS? You DO realise the old contact me button on the DB KS STILL WORKS don't you? You did pledge for DB didn't you? Use the contact button on the DB KS page and contact them. And for that matter, you DON'T EVEN need to pledge to contact KS creators. I contacted SW regarding their tablescape KS before I even pledged for it so I have no idea what you're smoking here.
You're pretty much a classic example of 'the customer isn't always right'. Seriously, if you have this many issues, you shouldn't consider pledging for DZ and yet you apparently are -_-
I did try other methods... What other methods for replacements and refunds are there besides contacting the stewart person? I have emailed Stewart twice. Do I have to do it 3 times?
And I am not the person who posted 'hey pledged Deadzone and then you get a better response' that is what I was told in one of these mantic threads. People are falling over themelves to make excuses for mantic when mantic can just handle their business like a real company, by responding to their customers. I am not sure contacting a company via their official 'contact us' methods on their website should be classified as someone banging their head on the wall. Not every customer is going to be able to get access to this secret staff email the way I did and many customers may straight up feel they have no other way to get response except via the official form on their website. So blame the customer more because you claim he isn't trying hard enough to get his issue resolved? Water carrying at it's finest.
Twice over a span of how long? 1 hour? 2 hours? One day? It took 2 days for me to get a reply. Azazel got his within a day. Saying you emailed him 2x means nothing without a time frame
And super secret staff email? Seriously? I pmed Mantic on KS and got the email from them. Considering you have so many avenues to try and get a response, including posting on their own forum/facebook if need be, I find it hard to consider someone would just limit themselves to constantly bombarding the webpage email; especially when according to them, it doesn't work.
And yes, I am blaming you because several people have told you by now several alternatives to get your issue resolved. This isn't EVEN the first time they've told you that iirc. And yet you insist that "NO, OFFICIAL EMAIL IS THE WAY" and then when it fails a lot; according to you, you just end up complaining on dakkadakka. How's that working out for you btw? Does all that complaining get you any closer to getting your replacements?
Also, I'm not saying Mantic shouldn't regularly reply to their normal email but I've never emailed them using that so I really have no idea how regularly they reply to it; other than having nkelsch's word for it.
Sining wrote: Twice over a span of how long? 1 hour? 2 hours? One day? It took 2 days for me to get a reply. Azazel got his within a day. Saying you emailed him 2x means nothing without a time frame
And super secret staff email? Seriously? I pmed Mantic on KS and got the email from them. Considering you have so many avenues to try and get a response, including posting on their own forum/facebook if need be, I find it hard to consider someone would just limit themselves to constantly bombarding the webpage email; especially when according to them, it doesn't work.
And yes, I am blaming you because several people have told you by now several alternatives to get your issue resolved. This isn't EVEN the first time they've told you that iirc. And yet you insist that "NO, OFFICIAL EMAIL IS THE WAY" and then when it fails a lot; according to you, you just end up complaining on dakkadakka. How's that working out for you btw? Does all that complaining get you any closer to getting your replacements?
Also, I'm not saying Mantic shouldn't regularly reply to their normal email but I've never emailed them using that so I really have no idea how regularly they reply to it; other than having nkelsch's word for it.
3 times over a week. I emailed Stewart 2 days ago when told his email and re-emailed tonight with added feedback over the lack of response fromt he official form and no response. How much more water do you need to carry to keep telling me that this is all ok and don't look behind the curtian? Does it hurt to constantly carry people's water? I have jumped through every hoop presented via the bucket brigade.
Since you say emailing the KS directly will just get me this Stewart's email... how many times do I need to email the KS to get another email which I have already emailed? Please provide the 'Several' avenues, since to this point,t here only seems to be 1. Email stewart.
1. email stewart 2.post on their forums 3. pm KS; which inevitably will also give you stewarts email, 4. call them 5.post on their facebook
Considering you use a forum on the internet, I can't believe you're not savvy enough to think of this.
As for Stewart not replying you within 2 days, I'm guessing that you're an outlier for whatever reason; perhaps random ranting and raving during the emails? I can attest I've gotten replies from Stewart within 2 days for most of my emails. I think most of the others have had the same experience. And yet, only you seem to have an issue, kinda like how your robots are the worst I (and most other people) have seen. I'm guessing it's not fated for you to buy Mantic -_-
Also, don't think of this as me liking Mantic a lot. It's more I have a proportionate dislike for loud ranty people online.
Sining wrote: 1. email stewart 2.post on their forums 3. pm KS; which inevitably will also give you stewarts email, 4. call them 5.post on their facebook
Considering you use a forum on the internet, I can't believe you're not savvy enough to think of this.
As for Stewart not replying you within 2 days, I'm guessing that you're an outlier for whatever reason; perhaps random ranting and raving during the emails? I can attest I've gotten replies from Stewart within 2 days for most of my emails. I think most of the others have had the same experience. And yet, only you seem to have an issue, kinda like how your robots are the worst I (and most other people) have seen. I'm guessing it's not fated for you to buy Mantic -_-
Also, don't think of this as me liking Mantic a lot. It's more I have a proportionate dislike for loud ranty people online.
And yet, there are people not even 8 posts ago who said it took over a week, and then they suggested 'pledging a dollar' to get their attention.
And considering forum posting and PMKS = Email Stewart, and I am already under attack by Bucket Brigaders like you... It seems like from discussing on Dakka, I found the end of the yellow brick road here. Email Stewart... So I have done that. But that doesn't seem to be good enough for you.
Notice, I was perfectly willing to sit and wait for my email over the weekend before you felt the need to take personal quips with your rude posts in your rush to defend a company with indefensible customer service issues. A Company trading in millions of dollars of product should be expected to have a functional 'contact us' via email system without customers having to dig to social media or other means to find direct employee contacts to get results. You can't defend that as valid.
As for Stewart not replying you within 2 days, I'm guessing that you're an outlier for whatever reason; perhaps random ranting and raving during the emails? I can attest I've gotten replies from Stewart within 2 days for most of my emails. I think most of the others have had the same experience.
I imagine the "number of days" can be influenced a little by things like weekends and the international date line. I've had more than 1 email to/from him, and I'm not always getting 1-day replies. I haven't seen nkelsch's emails to Stewart, but tone may be a factor. The emails I've personally sent have been polite - and pretty much with the kind of tone that this post has. That is to say, polite and semi-formal, semi-casual, but neither angry nor fellative in tone.
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scarletsquig wrote: So guys, how about dreadball?
Who has played a game?
I have. It is fun.
I haven't had time to learn or play it. I spend too much time posting on Dakka and have no other friends (besides my wife) who seem to know anything about Mantic in my area - though I did get invited to a DB group on the other side of my city. I'll need to paint something and learn the rules at some stage before I meet those guys, though. My regular gaming group seems to only want to play LAN Borderlands 2 and Torchlight 2 at the moment.
I went through my Season 1 stuff finally today to QA it. I've got some broken goblin ears, some skaven with slight shoulderpad damage due to twisting off of the sprues, and 1 skaven and 2 enforcers who need to have a dip in hot water to see if they'll be ok or need replacing. At some stage after that I need to look carefully through the Season 2 figures for QA. Yay!
While I agree nkelsch's tone and constant barrage are annoying, I also agree with him that any company regardless of the content of the message should reply. It's obvious he's a very upset vocal customer and they should try to get in touch with him and replace his miscast models. I also think it's unacceptable their website form doesn't work (I have used it and got no response as well). I am a mostly-fan of Mantic, except for a bunch of stuff I think is crap (trolls, captain grumpy pants, goofball marauder orx) and I understand they are growing faster than they can handle, but not responding to an irate customer is unacceptable. I sincerely do hope Stew does respond and they replace your miscast models, because I do hope you get good models so that you can play a game or three of Dreadball as it is a great game.
Oh, they should absolutely get back to him regardless of anything else. Being realistic though, you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, so if he is rude/angry/abrasive (which is all completely speculative) then his emails might get answered a bit slower than others.
On a brighter note, I just tried the hot/cold water trick to see if I could fix the Skaven and Enforcers. It appears to have worked really quickly and easily - more easily than any other material I've done it with in the past. If they hold their new shape by the same time tomorrow, I'll be very happy. If not, it'll be "send me a replacement" time.
Bolognesus wrote: Edited by Mannahnin It does not take more effort or time to clear the somewhat larger looking mold lines with an even moderately appropriate tool whatsoever.
So injection points which twist off the mold and damage the eyeball of a model is a simple slice fo the razorblade to resculpt the detail?
And the lines are in places where scraping off the line doesn't cause you to scrape off parts of the face or detail?
I don't think your excuses are great selling points. "models are hard, advance skills only" isn't an appropriate response to damaged molding. Especially when they have clearly said there are issues... Edited by Mannahnin.
PVC stuff holds shape quite well with the hot/cold trick. Never skip he cold water though - then they tend to bend about halfway back over the following weeks if the weather is even a bit warm (I'm guessing Australians get that, sometimes? )
nkelsch wrote: And yet, there are people not even 8 posts ago who said it took over a week, and then they suggested 'pledging a dollar' to get their attention.
And considering forum posting and PMKS = Email Stewart, and I am already under attack by Bucket Brigaders like you... It seems like from discussing on Dakka, I found the end of the yellow brick road here. Email Stewart... So I have done that. But that doesn't seem to be good enough for you.
Notice, I was perfectly willing to sit and wait for my email over the weekend before you felt the need to take personal quips with your rude posts in your rush to defend a company with indefensible customer service issues. A Company trading in millions of dollars of product should be expected to have a functional 'contact us' via email system without customers having to dig to social media or other means to find direct employee contacts to get results. You can't defend that as valid.
1 other person suggested that, before mentioning he got a reply within 2 days as well when he tried another avenue; ie KSPM. Notice how other people are trying new stuff when shockingly enough, the previous attempt elicited no response? Just something to keep in mind for when you inevitably get season 3 -_-
I agree, they should have a functional contact us via email system. There's no argument there. I've never said anything about how that was acceptable. Instead my posts have been along the vein of 'okay, this didn't work. Stop complaining about it and try some other methods'. Or really, learn to use an 'inside' type of voice when typing on the internet
scarletsquig wrote:So guys, how about dreadball?
Who has played a game?
I have. It is fun.
Played several. Still pretty hard to get opponents over here.
nkelsch wrote: So injection points which twist off the mold and damage the eyeball of a model is a simple slice fo the razorblade to resculpt the detail?
And the lines are in places where scraping off the line doesn't cause you to scrape off parts of the face or detail?
I don't think your excuses are great selling points. "models are hard, advance skills only" isn't an appropriate response to damaged molding. Especially when they have clearly said there are issues...
None of which even remotely touches upon your army of strawmen. Have dun with those 'posts.
As to damaged models well, anyone who's actually asked for a replacement seems to have gotten it so far - I'm going with more bad faith on your part in not making that work by now.
As to mold lines damaging material well, most of the 'lines I've cleared were not in places I haven't encountered them on metal models in years' past. Were I still sufficiently charitable to assume you've spent some of your time in this hobby actually modelling metal instead of straw I would guess so would you have. Aince PS sprues won't even hold he detail to he sides which PVC does no, seeing this on plastic kits is sometimes new. Often in places which o a GW sprue could barely have been more than featureless though. Net win, generally speaking and as said, nothing I haven't seen on metal before. Except PVC is way easier to clean.
As to the faces, hey, I have issues with that as well. Shame it takes you the page count of a small dissertation to fet to your first salient point, though.
You are not making sense... I posted photos of Zzor with mold injection damage to their cheeks which extended to the eyeballs due to the way they were torn from the sprue opposed to being snipped or cut off the sprue. I also posted images where injection points damaged shoulders and feet and other detail. And some models have lines across areas hard to clean without scraping away detail, like on rat tails where you have to carve out every ridge on the tail, down Helga's face, inside the palm of the Orx.
I don't know what you are even talking about in regards to metal models... Or what you are talking about in regards to GW?
Strawman strawman strawman? I am not sure how photographic documentation and confirmation from the company the product was flawed equates to a strawman.
Ooof coirse you wouldn't; you conveniently forget all he previous strawmen in your rants I pointed out. Goalposts, again.
As for reading comprehension: I never doubted you have actual, damaged models due to twisting. I do know that those with a modicum of communication skills have had no issues obtaining replacements in such cases. Damage sometimes occurs; reasonable customers take reasonable steps to give a company a chance to remedy such issues. Of course you seem not to be very good with 'reasonable'.
Your self-indicated complete lack of comprehension makes it impossible to even get into the issue of detail and mould lines in hard moulds any further; I'm going to assume plain bad faih here since it seems to fit best.
For other readers: a steel tool has a pull direction. Raised/lowered detail directly parralel to this direction is easy to cast; detail perpendicular thereto is impossible (since an inflexible mold would tear each cast apart as it is pulled). Now flexible (rubber) molds suh as used for metal models do not have this issue; the flex around the model when it is pulled. This is why undercuts exist in metal/resin models, but not in hard plastic. Rhis is not all, however. As has been explained on this forum several times (and I'm hardly an expert either, just repeating what those who are have explained) PS such as we're used to in GW or Mantic or Revell sprues seemst to not tale detail to the sides (as opposed to that area facing the mold half) too well, even if the tool itself could accomodate it. This means that while there's going to be large area's with very little detail which need hiding through the model design, the silver lining is that mold lines tend to run through areas with all the fine detail of a sand desert. Ever wondered why many metal models can have way nastier mold lines at times, running right through all kinds of detail? Here's why: rubber molds do allow for that.
Now what was said here several times is that PVC type plastics don't suffer from his as much. Still no undercuts of course (because of rigid tooling) but more detail all across. This will mean tha there's more detail in areas which contain mold lines too. Of course, in PS there would just have been no detail, and even if they look daunting they're actually quite easy to clean (much easier than metal, for sure!), this will hardly keep agamemnon2.1 here from his latest pityful rant.
Of couelrse, since it seems i must repeat even that which I already stated just to keep certain posters from conveniently finding anoher irrelevant tangent, this doesn't excuse the 'mold line to the face' issue.
...which in turn in no way excuses nkelsches incoherent ranting.
scarletsquig wrote: So guys, how about dreadball?
Who has played a game?
I have. It is fun.
I haven't had time to learn or play it. I spend too much time posting on Dakka and have no other friends (besides my wife) who seem to know anything about Mantic in my area - though I did get invited to a DB group on the other side of my city. I'll need to paint something and learn the rules at some stage before I meet those guys, though. My regular gaming group seems to only want to play LAN Borderlands 2 and Torchlight 2 at the moment.
Same here, pretty much... I've played a few games, but found it a bit tricky to get started due to the complexity of the cards. It plays quite smoothly and is fun, but I find the cards thing a bit odd since I'm not used to using cards in wargaming... still need to adjust since I never understand what the hell is going on when watching people play MTG or similar.
The cards are optional though, so I have more fun with the game when choosing to ignore them.
Deadzone is going to be even stranger for me to pick up since the whole thing revolves around that kind of "draw cards" gameplay where I really don't have a clue what I'm doing. I've read the beta and understand how it plays, I'm just not sure if it's the kind of thing I'll get into properly rather than just good 'ol dice and minis.
I think I'd definitely recommend the kick-off set to anyone new getting into the game, more because of the lowered complexity (no cards, no ref) than the lowered price tag.
Yeah, not fond of the cards myself. I'm really curious why they're in the game for DZ other than a 'hey, this is one way the game ends other than killing everybody' kind of scenario.
In regards to what ScarletSquig has said - think the cards (and ref for that matter) are definitely optional when you start playing. The game is really fluid and fast moving, and even more so when you learn the rules. Think the cards slow that down a bit (and give you too much to think about when you first start playing), but having said that make it a bit more fun when you start playing repeatedly. I suppose it's similar to Blood Bowl in that the old expansion cards added a lot to that game in terms of fun, although the cards in DB are nothing like as powerful.
Overall though think the game is a lot of fun - I can see it becoming massively popular with clubs simply because it is quite easy to get into, it's got a broadly appealing style and the buy-in price is so low. I'm already seeing a lot of leagues/tournaments popping up around for it, so I guess it is definitely starting to gain steam. Very sorry to hear that people have had some bad experiences with the mini quality (and think it's desperately unlucky for Nkelsch, who seems to be worst affected when he was already doing the equivalent of holding a well-worn, stinking sock with a pair of tweezers and holding his nose with regards to Mantic, long before this game came along!) - I'm gingerly waiting for my 2nd season stuff on account of that, although if they're anything like that bad they will go back for a replacement.
For some reason I have a bit more leniency with regards to Mantic making some production foul-ups - there's has no doubt come from a rushed production schedule with a tiny company, and trying to satisfy demand with a new supply chain and the rest of it. Somewhat more acceptable than a massive, well-established company with vast amounts of money that knows they have released a sub-standard product to the market (and a significant drop in quality to their previous releases) and yet chooses to keep selling it several years after the initial release. Picture images of cackling fat men, sat in a jacuzzi tub full of champagne, smoking cigars and laughing at the low expectations of their customers (or.. actually, don't! )
I did try other methods... What other methods for replacements and refunds are there besides contacting the stewart person? I have emailed Stewart twice. Do I have to do it 3 times?
Yes there are problems with the form right now, but the KS-contact form always worked. Also I wonder what tone you wrote your mails in. Nearly everybocy that had complained to Stewart got a response within 1-4 days, which is quite normal.
The mold lines are mostly not a problem, they might seem huge, but are rather thin seen from the side and can easily be removed. Now there are some miscast pieces and some models where the tabs got twistes off instead of being cut off. Those are a reason to complain about with Mantic. But seeing how nearly everyone wants to help you and gets aggressive responses...
@warped bases
That´s actually not a problem. Just get a good hairdryer, put it at hottest setting, blow at the base for 10 secs max. and then quickly put it on a level stone/ceramic/etc. tile and it ist straight as hell. Work for the whole miniature too if anything ist bent out of shape. Heck, it even works for Finecast and FW resin and you don´t even need cold water.
Have played dozens of games. It's absolutely fantastic. If people say yeah its broken the rules are unbalanced blah blah blah without actually playing the game then i say balls to you! Go out and actually play the game. And its the usual faces who are constantly complaining, sometimes I think they complain just for the sake of it. Its gotten to the point where I see the usual names and skip there posts.
I'm having trouble getting traction with dreadball at my gaming club. A lot of the old guard *really* dislike mantic. (EG, they're fond of saying: "the only reason they're doing kickstarter is because mantic are so insolvent they can't go to a bank for a loan. Kickstarter is the only thing keeping the company afloat.") These are the type of people into blood bowl, SAGA and warhammer fantasy.
However, some of the warmachine players got into the kickstarter, though they haven't really played the game at the club yet. They do like chatting about dreadball with me though.
The best success I've had at inviting people for demo games is the 40kers. - Either that or they're just really polite about it! They've all been saying it's a "good wee game." I suppose the proof in the pudding will be if any of them buy into kick-off.
As for the cards, they're not too clearly explained but in my last game, I think I managed to work out a way to explain them.
You have the Card Deck. A Discard Pile and an Event Card.
Once an Event Card is drawn from the Card Deck unless it's The Ball Shatters, it remains in play.
Only one Event Card can be in play at once. Once an event card is placed, the old one goes into the Discard Pile.
---------------------
However, 'Fan Support' checks make this a little bit more complicated.
Normally a 'Fan Support' check just means, you take a card over, count the number of dots and put it under your 'Home' or 'Visitors' card. Once you get a total of 3 dots, you get an extra dreadball dice and the used cards get squirrelled away for counting up after the game.
However, if you get an Event Card it also counts for your Fan totals. However, it also also remains in play - So you can't keep it under your Home/Visitors card, cause you need to see what it does!
Dreadball has been prominently featured over at Dropzone Games, a store local to me, but I don't know if they've gotten leagues going or not... I'm very interested in trying it out once Season 3 hits and I can get my tentacled team
Is it hard to see the keyboard past your tin-foil hat lol?
Seriously though, this idea that Mods are paid by companies is absolutely ridiculous... I wish that weren't the case though I would love to be on the take lol! Free $ is always welcome
Yes. I know that forum Mods are not REALLY paid by game companies.
But that, if anything, only makes it even more in-explicable why there are so vastly divergent standards in moderating criticism directed at Games Workshop and criticism directed at other miniature gaming company.
RiTides wrote: Dreadball has been prominently featured over at Dropzone Games, a store local to me, but I don't know if they've gotten leagues going or not... I'm very interested in trying it out once Season 3 hits and I can get my tentacled team
Great thing is because it is REALLY cheap to get a team you should just pick one up and start gaming so when the season 3 stuff comes it will be easier to get your head around the teams. When I Demo DB at the club I only use Season 1 teams as they have less additional rules compared to Season 2. Also I feel your missing out on a great game so I order you to go and play iI
RiTides wrote: Dreadball has been prominently featured over at Dropzone Games, a store local to me, but I don't know if they've gotten leagues going or not... I'm very interested in trying it out once Season 3 hits and I can get my tentacled team
Great thing is because it is REALLY cheap to get a team you should just pick one up and start gaming so when the season 3 stuff comes it will be easier to get your head around the teams. When I Demo DB at the club I only use Season 1 teams as they have less additional rules compared to Season 2. Also I feel your missing out on a great game so I order you to go and play iI
Yup it's quite possible to have a lot of fun just playing the Marauders/Corp straight out of the box. I've found the game to be quite fast and flowing - it's funny, how the rest of the world is changing in terms of entertainment (with things being more flowing, explosive, colourful, however you want to put it, and whether you think that's a good thing or not) has even seen that culture transpose onto miniature wargaming and the way game mechanics are handled.
^ It's the one where you can basically guarantee that your opponent automatically loses their rush, every single turn, without fail.
It can be avoided by not placing the players on the DB hexes, but if you're up against Judwan and they can move your players in their turn, then there's no way to avoid it.
It's possible (and quite easy with Judwan) to win a game without having your opponent ever roll a single dice or move a single model.
I'm not aware of anyone playing dreadball who doesn't houserule or flat-out ignore that particular rule.
adamsouza wrote: So it hasn't really been in an issue in Season 1, but has become an issue in Season 2 with the introduction of the Judwan ?
Correct. Prior to this point, it was generally very bad play by the controlling player to allow that situation to happen, and that's why the rule was as harsh as it was; it was a penalty for not thinking ahead.
The Judwan's rule that allows them to move their opponent's model is where it's becoming broken as savvy players can simply manipulate your players to where the ball is launched and you then essentially automatically fail and lose your turn. Lather, rinse and repeat until the game is done. What was once a harsh penalty for being bad has now become exploitable by the team's special rule.
It's not that hard to house-rule it, but it is a head-scratcher on how that one didn't come out in playtesting.
Compel wrote: I...However, 'Fan Support' checks make this a little bit more complicated. Normally a 'Fan Support' check just means, you take a card over, count the number of dots and put it under your 'Home' or 'Visitors' card. Once you get a total of 3 dots, you get an extra dreadball dice and the used cards get squirrelled away for counting up after the game. However, if you get an Event Card it also counts for your Fan totals. However, it also also remains in play - So you can't keep it under your Home/Visitors card, cause you need to see what it does!
Our group was stumped by this until we were reading some stuff on Board Game Geek.
Somebody pointed out that Event cards all have '-' value for cheers (i.e., zero cheers).
They recommend keeping a fan checked Event card face up and out of the fan checks you are collecting.
It won't impact fan checks in the game AND since it doesn't add to your total number of cheers, it won't affect campaign play.
The rules are not very specific about that process, but it makes sense once you realize Events are Zero Cheer cards.
Krinsath wrote: Prior to this point, it was generally very bad play by the controlling player to allow that situation to happen, and that's why the rule was as harsh as it was; it was a penalty for not thinking ahead.
No, it was a penalty for thinking ahead. Remember, you are being punished for having a player in a position where they could catch the throw-in. In a real sport, this is a good thing. It is a failure of the rules that this is not at least neutral in Dreadball.
Krinsath wrote: Prior to this point, it was generally very bad play by the controlling player to allow that situation to happen, and that's why the rule was as harsh as it was; it was a penalty for not thinking ahead.
No, it was a penalty for thinking ahead. Remember, you are being punished for having a player in a position where they could catch the throw-in. In a real sport, this is a good thing. It is a failure of the rules that this is not at least neutral in Dreadball.
Krinsath wrote: Prior to this point, it was generally very bad play by the controlling player to allow that situation to happen, and that's why the rule was as harsh as it was; it was a penalty for not thinking ahead.
No, it was a penalty for thinking ahead. Remember, you are being punished for having a player in a position where they could catch the throw-in. In a real sport, this is a good thing. It is a failure of the rules that this is not at least neutral in Dreadball.
You were being punished for having a specific player there; Guards with the inability to catch the ball actually don't cause the rush to end (they did not fail to make a catch as they can never catch in an odd logic) and Strikers are fine with attempting a catch. It was specifically Jacks that cause the problem as they will get 0 dice but can attempt to make a catch. Therefore they fail to make the catch and in turn your rush is over even though you had no chance to do anything. The only way to break the cycle is via coaching dice, and that isn't a particularly good fix.
The fluff aspect is the ball is being launched at high speed so it's very unlikely for an unskilled player to catch it so it isn't quite a "throw-in"; it's more analogous to the American football kickoff where they only want certain players fielding it and the other team goes to great lengths to avoid giving the ball to those players. The risk of that big penalty also keeps the line clear which in turn spreads the DB game out so the whole game isn't played on one half of the board.
Obviously you can just decide that the ball can be allowed to bypass players who don't want to try and catch it or, if you want to keep the risk factor, by allowing a free dodge attempt (and probably many more besides). People would just like Mantic to figure out what solution to that particular exploit they want in the game so people can play it consistently.
Funny thing is, not even Mantic Games' James Hewitt (?) seems to "intuitively" play it this way.
In the Beasts of War promo games, there's a similar situation where Warren's Veer-Myn should've lost the turn (after a double scatter of the launch) to James, but (like almost all people who "simply play" the game) they just continue on as if the failed catch at the launch wasn't actually yet part of the player's turn.
Zweischneid wrote: Funny thing is, not even Mantic Games' James Hewitt (?) seems to "intuitively" play it this way.
In the Beasts of War promo games, there's a similar situation where Warren's Veer-Myn should've lost the turn (after a double scatter of the launch) to James, but (like almost all people who "simply play" the game) they just continue on as if the failed catch at the launch wasn't actually yet part of the player's turn.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's how everyone I've seen plays it, that the first launch is not part of anyone's turn so there's no turnover on a failed catch (as it didn't happen on your turn; turn doesn't start til the ball finishes moving)
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's how everyone I've seen plays it, that the first launch is not part of anyone's turn so there's no turnover on a failed catch (as it didn't happen on your turn; turn doesn't start til the ball finishes moving)
hey, slightly off topic, i just assembled my season 2 figures from dreadball, and i got a bug head instead of the robot hero head. =/ where do i contact?
nkelsch wrote: think it is 'ok' that you should be forced to pledge the new kickstarter to access the 'ask a question' button
You have access to that option without being a backer.
That will be next. Not sure why people were telling me to 'pledge a dollar' so I could talk to the kickstarter.
Eh, that's what I did. I only suggested it because he responded fairly quickly. Also, I feel the dollar buy-in is great for guilt-free complaining rights.
And I still have access to the pledge manager later should I like any of the sculpts.
Triple9 wrote: Yep, that's how I've been playing. Scatter on launch is fine. Never occurred to play it different.
Me too.. I actually wonder which pedant came up with making an issue out of it in the first place, or the level of their common sense. Does everything have to be spelled out in bloody A B C D then E, all of the time? "I walked on to da railway tracks becuz there wasn't a sign telling me not too... durrrrrrr "
Doesn't have to be a pedant. It seems to be a combination of a rare(ish) circumstance RAW getting queried, then clarified and confirmed by Jake as RAW, then having had the new S2 Judawan team able to exploit what was previously a rareish occurance. Living rules get changed and adapted as needed, but it seems to need to come from Jake. I'd argue it's unlikely to be an issue for friendly games, but when tournaments (and prizes!) come into play...
We play dreadball regularily at my club, once a week atm and all of us are enjoying it. There are 8 of us playing in a league atm with 5 of us who will continue to play after the elague finishes.
We must be one of the few groups that still plays RAW for the ball launch and scatters ending your rush. Yes its annoying but it doesn't happen very often.
We have a judwan player in our league and he doesn't use this tactic. I think it must be a matter of where you play. We rather than put the oposing team on the first launch hex square actually more often than not place one of our own team there and try to get a cheeky score.
I finally got a response from a person who works at Mantic who Stewart passed my case on to.
I am returning my damaged Season 2 Product for a refund (which cost me 40$ in shipping for 53$ in product and returning season 1 box would have cost around 100$) and getting a refund for the rest. I hope their math matches up to mine in the end. They are working on figuring out a refund price.
Considering I pledged 450$ + 110$ Paypal.
-50$ for battlefoam
-157$ for season 1 shipment
=353$
-5% for Kickstarter fees which I have to eat:
My refund SHOULD be 335.35$ for the returned Season 2 and the unfulfilled season 3 stuff.
That leaves me the core game to play with my Orx team and I can deal away the other 3 season 1 teams to other people who want to deal with the clean-up. If anyone wants some MVPs or Forgefathers/Veermyn/Corporation from season 1, I can cut you a good deal, even better if you are local.
My only advice is for people on the fence about stuff, like the KOW sculpts and BoGo issues... Return Shipping with tracking to the UK is expensive from the US. If you are not 100% happy with the sculpt and are on the fence or they haven't revealed it before shipping, I would recommend canceling your pledge and buying it retail where you can see it hands on and return it easily. Once it is shipped to you, the return shipping cost may be so high you are going to be stuck with it. It is going to change how I deal with Kickstarters which are international to me in the US.
I haven't yet :-\ Not due to a lack of trying, but due to my dad not wanting to play with unpainted minis (the sly old coot won't even help me!). So I'm looking to finish painting up the C-Level Browns (Or possibly Brauns?) and the Orx Steelers from the Planet Burgh-412. I'm really excited to play too
scarletsquig wrote: ^ Glad you managed to get it sorted out, shame about the KS fees.
I think eating the fees is reasonable, but something to be aware of. Amazon takes 5% off the top so when we are talking 10$ figures, they are really 9.50$ because Kickstarter takes .50 cents.
Might not factor into the refund, but BOTH amazon and kickstarter (different companies) take 5% off the top, so when you put in $10, mantic gets about $9. Later payments with paypal would just be 5% off the top.
Azazelx wrote: Doesn't have to be a pedant. It seems to be a combination of a rare(ish) circumstance RAW getting queried, then clarified and confirmed by Jake as RAW, then having had the new S2 Judawan team able to exploit what was previously a rareish occurance. Living rules get changed and adapted as needed, but it seems to need to come from Jake. I'd argue it's unlikely to be an issue for friendly games, but when tournaments (and prizes!) come into play...
Yes I think you definitely need to clarify with whoever you are playing. Can't understand anyone choosing to play it as RAW however, and I should hope that the 2nd edition of the rules will clarify for those who put "WELL THAT'S WHAT IT SAYS IN THE RULEBOOK LOL" above what is really very basic common sense, and the game being fun.
nkelsch wrote: I finally got a response from a person who works at Mantic who Stewart passed my case on to.
I am returning my damaged Season 2 Product for a refund (which cost me 40$ in shipping for 53$ in product and returning season 1 box would have cost around 100$) and getting a refund for the rest. I hope their math matches up to mine in the end. They are working on figuring out a refund price.
Considering I pledged 450$ + 110$ Paypal.
-50$ for battlefoam
-157$ for season 1 shipment
=353$
-5% for Kickstarter fees which I have to eat:
My refund SHOULD be 335.35$ for the returned Season 2 and the unfulfilled season 3 stuff.
That leaves me the core game to play with my Orx team and I can deal away the other 3 season 1 teams to other people who want to deal with the clean-up. If anyone wants some MVPs or Forgefathers/Veermyn/Corporation from season 1, I can cut you a good deal, even better if you are local.
My only advice is for people on the fence about stuff, like the KOW sculpts and BoGo issues... Return Shipping with tracking to the UK is expensive from the US. If you are not 100% happy with the sculpt and are on the fence or they haven't revealed it before shipping, I would recommend canceling your pledge and buying it retail where you can see it hands on and return it easily. Once it is shipped to you, the return shipping cost may be so high you are going to be stuck with it. It is going to change how I deal with Kickstarters which are international to me in the US.
Remember you not only have to account for the KS fees (about 5%) you also need to account for the Amazon Payment fee on top of that (about another 5%), so total will be about 10%
Remember you not only have to account for the KS fees (about 5%) you also need to account for the Amazon Payment fee on top of that (about another 5%), so total will be about 10%
Good to know. It is almost like it is 'BETTER' to take pledges outside Kickstarter for the company.
nkelsch wrote: It is almost like it is 'BETTER' to take pledges outside Kickstarter for the company.
It absolutely is. The totals don't contribute to stretch goals unless the company wants them to, and they get much better value for the money contributed. 5% for the promotion provided by Kickstarter is probably worth it though.
It absolutely is. The totals don't contribute to stretch goals unless the company wants them to, and they get much better value for the money contributed. 5% for the promotion provided by Kickstarter is probably worth it though.
5% is awesome.
Even if you have your own online store, Paypal and/or Credit Card companies will take as nearly as much. And you've got the hosting, online advertisement, etc.. .
Hell, eBay takes like... what? 10% 12% these days?
I wish I could sell my old 40K junk on Kickstarter for "only" 5%
[edit]
For the UK at least, Paypal is 3.4% plus a flat 20p per transaction. It's a teeny bit better for Mantic if you pay by Paypal as opposed to by Kickstarter. But it's not much.
Azazelx wrote: Doesn't have to be a pedant. It seems to be a combination of a rare(ish) circumstance RAW getting queried, then clarified and confirmed by Jake as RAW, then having had the new S2 Judawan team able to exploit what was previously a rareish occurance. Living rules get changed and adapted as needed, but it seems to need to come from Jake. I'd argue it's unlikely to be an issue for friendly games, but when tournaments (and prizes!) come into play...
Yes I think you definitely need to clarify with whoever you are playing. Can't understand anyone choosing to play it as RAW however, and I should hope that the 2nd edition of the rules will clarify for those who put "WELL THAT'S WHAT IT SAYS IN THE RULEBOOK LOL" above what is really very basic common sense, and the game being fun.
Tournaments, mate. Tournaments. Not those between a bunch of mates, but organised ones that have a bunch of strangers playing to WIN a PRIZE (money, loot, etc). The nature of the game points it towards those kinds of tourneys with ultra-competitive players.
So... I started to clean up my Dreadball box... and I have to say, I'm none too thrilled with the level of mold lines that I got on my Orx and Humans... There were large mold lines on the shoulders of the Orx, and the slightly opened hand is literally half mold line... The humans have mold lines on their helmets, down their sides, like you can see where the model was practically "pressed" together (or at least where the molds were). It's making it frustrating because these lines are for the most part, in hard to reach places with my hobby knife.
Use files, that's anyway the best way to clean up miniatures.
Kickstarter is a 100% daughter company of Amazon and the extra 5% only apply for American customers that used their Amazon account, everyone else using his Amazon account does not get the 5% slapped on.
Amazon has yet to add or 'slap on' any percentage to any pledge I make. They may take some percentage out of my total before passing the balance on to the kickstarting company, but they don't 'slap on' anything.
CptJake wrote: Amazon has yet to add or 'slap on' any percentage to any pledge I make. They may take some percentage out of my total before passing the balance on to the kickstarting company, but they don't 'slap on' anything.
That would be what he's referring to; that the money that actually gets to the company is decreased by Amazon for payment processing as well as KickStarter for the hosting and platform charges. Since they're really the same company this translates to Amazon taking 8-10% (the rate for payment processing varies) of the pledge before the company you pledged it to sees it.
So in the case of DreadBall, Mantic probably saw closer to $660k (instead of 728k) after those fees were taken out. It's something that every company who wants to do a KickStarter has to account for, otherwise they will quickly drive themselves into the red.
Kickstarter is a 100% daughter company of Amazon .
Umm.... just no.
It's not. And I doubt Amazon would even be interested.
Kickstarter... in its entire life-time as a Website of some 4 years now has raised a total of 633 Million Dollars across all successful projects ever on Kickstarter (which is slightly less than Games Workshop's revenue over the past 4 years, which adds up to about 756 Million USD very roughly). 5% of those 633 Million are some 32 Million Dollars Kickstarter.com has made in the past 4 years (before costs, taxes, anything else).
Amazon makes some 54 Million Dollars in sales per Day(!) And that is an old number from 2009. If anything, Amazon has only grown since then.
Jeff Bezos is not above spending more than 32 Million USD "life-time-income-of-Kickstarter.com" on some of his pointless personal side-projects.
Duncan_Idaho wrote: Use files, that's anyway the best way to clean up miniatures.
Restic can handle a good filing? I thought it shredded it to pieces... I mean no matter what I do, I'm losing half the detail in my Orx hands, and some of the detail on my enforcers... I mean I know they're miniatures, but I'm putting in a heck of a lot of work for 10 minis that amount to a board game in my house (that's how I marketed it to my dad, who thinks "wargames" are too complex)
Tho the referenced Kickstarter FAQ page is now a 404
Yet folks with an Amazon account do NOT have any additional charges 'slapped on'. All these charges are overhead the kickstarting company needs to take into account, not a backer.
In the scope of a refund, however, they are something you need to account for if you're told you have to eat the fees (which is somewhat fair as Mantic did not actually get that money in the first place). This is context where the comment about being "slapped on" exists; if nkelsch is being told he won't be refunded for fees, then the extra % represented by the Amazon fees does raise a question mark. Certainly something to inquire about if that wasn't clear in the information Mantic sent (which it might have been). Otherwise one could be expecting X and instead get X*97% and, since someone getting a refund is typically not a happy camper in the first place, that could lead to more unpleasantness. Same sort of question with PayPal and later pledge manager additions; is their transaction fee coming out or will it be fully refunded?
Krinsath wrote: In the scope of a refund, however, they are something you need to account for if you're told you have to eat the fees (which is somewhat fair as Mantic did not actually get that money in the first place). This is context where the comment about being "slapped on" exists; if nkelsch is being told he won't be refunded for fees, then the extra % represented by the Amazon fees does raise a question mark. Certainly something to inquire about if that wasn't clear in the information Mantic sent (which it might have been). Otherwise one could be expecting X and instead get X*97% and, since someone getting a refund is typically not a happy camper in the first place, that could lead to more unpleasantness. Same sort of question with PayPal and later pledge manager additions; is their transaction fee coming out or will it be fully refunded?
Well, it is something to be aware. Retailers and online stores pay a % if I pay by paypal or credit card, but if I get a refund, I get my full money back, but I believe retailers can also get their fee back. Kickstarter simply has no way to recover that as it was taken out before the company ever got it so think of it as a one-time 'fee' for pledging which is gone regardless.
Like I said, I don't have a problem with it, but you are right, other people may be confused by it.
Well, officially they might be not, but if you have some business knowledge and a look at how they operate... and how Amazon aquires new parts of its empire it is only a matter of time until they officially take it over. Audible was aquired in a simliar but not identical way. With regard to tax and business stuff it might even be better to keep them half-seperated. Dont forget that Amazon wants to create it´s own closed content-universe and Kickstarter is the ideal way to aquire quite some new content.
You don´t really believe that Amazon invests in something without thinkin about taking it all over in the end? That would be the first time that they did not take over some company the invested in in the long run.
@restic
You need a good file, a clockmakers file is perfect, but not cheap, but will last you a lifetime.
Duncan_Idaho wrote: Well, officially they might be not, but if you have some business knowledge and a look at how they operate... and how Amazon aquires new parts of its empire it is only a matter of time until they officially take it over. Audible was aquired in a simliar but not identical way. With regard to tax and business stuff it might even be better to keep them half-seperated. Dont forget that Amazon wants to create it´s own closed content-universe and Kickstarter is the ideal way to aquire quite some new content.
You don´t really believe that Amazon invests in something without thinkin about taking it all over in the end? That would be the first time that they did not take over some company the invested in in the long run.
@restic
You need a good file, a clockmakers file is perfect, but not cheap, but will last you a lifetime.
Umm
Still... "Kickstarter is a 100% daughter of Amazon"
...and...
"Based on Amazon's past business practices, I predict they may secretly consider buying Kickstarter.com"
Also if I would hand you a list of who belongs to whom in the business world you would be quite surprised. It is not always wise to let anyone know instantly who is owned by whom. Very often this happens for tax reasons (heck, in a former life that was even my job to counsel companies on this), but also to avoid the eyes of monopoly-watch or to point competitors not directly at the coming changes in the market. Already now both companies are that entwined that really only the paper seperates them.
You are right if you claim that on paper they are two seperate entities. But the really interesting things are the yearly business-reports and if you can read them....
You are right if you claim that on paper they are two seperate entities. But the really interesting things are the yearly business-reports and if you can read them....
I am versed enough to know that if they are "two separate entities" "on paper"; than one is not a 100% daughter of the other. Or am I wrong?
Whatever shadow-conspiracies and tin-foil-hat theories you may have, they'd all amount to something other than business X being a daughter company of business Y even if they were true (for which you've yet to present evidence).
And what tax-reasons could Amazon have for not "officially" buying a company that made less revenue in its four years of existence than Amazon makes in a day?
Also if I would hand you a list of who belongs to whom in the business world you would be quite surprised. It is not always wise to let anyone know instantly who is owned by whom.
Duncan, as you admit, they're not connected. The fact that you think they're planning to be in the future, etc, is very different from what you originally posted...
I actually rather like these models, but Mantic really is terrible about showing their work. Seriously, this very dark paint job is doing a better job of hiding the details then emphasizing them (it took me several looks to realize there are 2 females and 2 males...).
An unpainted shot and one with some primer or ink wash, is that really beyond their technical capabilities?
Why has 1 Asterian stopped to play pool/snooker and then realised he forgot his cue!
Overall good miniatures poorly painted I might be tempted to swap the heads for DE wych or Helion heads though if the scale matches if not the current heads are fine.
DaveC wrote: Why has 1 Asterian stopped to play pool/snooker and then realised he forgot his cue!
Overall good miniatures poorly painted I might be tempted to swap the heads for DE wych heads though if the scale matches if not the current heads are fine.
Scale won't match-I've got a few dark eldar wych heads and they're too big for Mantic bodies-you'd end up with bobble-head syndrome. I like the Xbox paintjob-I wonder if their armor can ALSO be shot and not be destroyed (classic xbox, not 360).
DaveC wrote: Why has 1 Asterian stopped to play pool/snooker and then realised he forgot his cue!
Overall good miniatures poorly painted I might be tempted to swap the heads for DE wych or Helion heads though if the scale matches if not the current heads are fine.
Possibly the mirrored witch heads, or whatever they are? hmm.. I wonder if the scales match up..
The blue haired Asterian is actually Mellisandra the Asterian MVP hence the slightly different look she's not a generic striker. Apparently this is painting in progress not finished.
Hmmmm, not sure how I feel about them. The faces and poses seem a bit off to my eye but the picture doesn't really seem to be doing them any favors, so I suppose I'll reserve judgment for a bit. I know when the first pictures of the Judwan appeared I was somewhat concerned about "falling backwards man", but that ended up not actually being the pose and was really an uncorrected bend. The paint of the faces makes them seem hyper-angular, which does make them look less human at least.
^ The Asterians in Deadzone will be Cyphers, which look totally different, and rather awesome (and I think, this an example of how sometimes just showing an unpainted resin can be so much better):
Also, it's been confirmed that the DZ Asterians (and forgefathers) will be done by the digital sculpting team, who tend to get it right.
scarletsquig wrote: ^ The Asterians in Deadzone will be Cyphers, which look totally different, and rather awesome (and I think, this an example of how sometimes just showing an unpainted resin can be so much better):
Spoiler:
Also, it's been confirmed that the DZ Asterians (and forgefathers) will be done by the digital sculpting team, who tend to get it right.
I suspect it might not necessarily be the digital team being better, but that whoever is responsible for approving stuff being more willing to say, 'No, change this'
Those who can't sculpt at all tend to believe a sculptor when they say it has to be like this, it will take me X weeks to change things
On the other hand almost everybody can do some sort of digital art (however horrible) and so will feel more comfortable asking for changes (which will genuinely probably be quicker to make)
Well, with regards to the cast quality, I've just received a box of the void sirens and.. well, very easy for me, no mould lines at all to remove!
Incidentally these were shop bought, and not from the Kickstarter. I also bought a box of Forge Fathers at the same time, as well as special characters, and they were a bit worse - some mould lines, probably added 15 minutes or so to the preparation time for them.
Yep, void sirens were pretty well-casted on my end. Followed by the judwan, then the zzor then the robots, which were the worst casted, but it was mostly flash and mold lines, which I just cleaned off with my knife while watching DVDs. Overall, s2 seems to be a lot better than s1 in terms of casting.
Just to check, does anyone know how many players per team I should be receiving if I pledged to upgrade my teams to max? How many jacks/guards should I be receiving for s2?
Sining wrote: Yep, void sirens were pretty well-casted on my end. Followed by the judwan, then the zzor then the robots, which were the worst casted, but it was mostly flash and mold lines, which I just cleaned off with my knife while watching DVDs. Overall, s2 seems to be a lot better than s1 in terms of casting.
Just to check, does anyone know how many players per team I should be receiving if I pledged to upgrade my teams to max? How many jacks/guards should I be receiving for s2?
I believe you're supposed to have 10 (8 for the team + 2 for striker) for the Sirens, Z'Zor and Judwan and 12 of the robots (the Robots have more models due to their role change rules). The other models are supposed to come in the Q3 shipment if my packing slip isn't lying to me.
Hey everyone, can I ask what everyone's opinion would be on me changing the title of this thread to cover ALL sci-fi from Mantic?
I know 1-2 of you a year ago wanted a separate Dreadball thread, but it just feels a bit weird how with Deadzone, we're now going to have *4* N&R threads for Mantic in this forum:
- All of the fantasy games Mantic makes.
- Dreadball
- Warpath (dead topic, nobody posts in it)
- Deadzone
There's just not enough posts or news on here to warrant 4 separate topics on Mantic (I'm the one who often ends up necro-ing this thread from page 17 after nobody can find it).
I will keep the thread title updated in a timely manner,and the OP with both dreadball and other sci-fi stuff.
It would probably be for the best: consolidating the release info down helps keep the information closer to the top. Also, there is just so much overlap with Mantic's sci-fi offerings it only makes sense.
For reference, the original reason for the split is that a few posters stated that they liked Dreadball, but had zero interest in any other rules or miniatures from Mantic at all.
decker_cky wrote: I'd say dreadball should be separate, but there's much more overlap between deadzone and warpath.
This seems sensible.
That sounds sensible to me also! I know of people who play DB but would have absolutely no interest in a more conventional tabletop game like Warpath
I concur with this assessment. With no real practical overlap between the games, just fluff, it seems more appropriate to keep them separate. This is compounded by there already being 16 pages of just DreadBall news, so if someone wanted to "catch up" they'll see along thread of stuff they're not interested in.
The DeadZone one should be a Warpath one as well though, since the games share models as well as a universe.
EDIT: After a 50/50 split in votes on the topic (4 votes yes, 4 votes no, after I asked in the deadzone thread as well), I asked a moderator to decide.
Got a reply on this, the thread is now the mantic sci-fi news and rumours thread.
On Dreadball release months, the title will clearly state Dreadball, along with details of the new releases to make it clear that dreadball stuff is happening.
When Warpath releases/rumours are out, the title will reflect those instead.
I will make sure that the thread title dynamically changes so that everyone can tell at a glance whether it's the new dreadball shiny or the new warpath shiny, and it'll go straight into the top of the OP.. no scrabbling around trying to figure out if the new pics were posted on page 37 or 57.
The OP will also be kept very well-updated with sections for all 3 systems, and a general introduction to all of them.
Warpath, Deadzone, and Dreadball are three seperate games an should all be treated as such.
I have no interest in army game of warpath and shouldn't be forced to dig through posts directed towards that game when looking for info on Mantics specialist games. They all have seperate rules even if the models may be shared with a couple.
Don't pacify Deadzone before it even has a chance by clumping it with Warpath "proper".
Automatically Appended Next Post: Warpath, Deadzone, and Dreadball are three seperate games an should all be treated as such.
I have no interest in army game of warpath and shouldn't be forced to dig through posts directed towards that game when looking for info on Mantics specialist games. They all have seperate rules even if the models may be shared with a couple.
Don't pacify Deadzone before it even has a chance by clumping it with Warpath "proper".
I have no interest in army game of warpath and shouldn't be forced to dig through posts directed towards that game when looking for info on Mantics specialist games.
You won't be. All current news and rumours will be found in the OP, which will be kept current, with sections for each game. One click, at most.
Don't worry, I also can't stand 200-page GW threads where everyone is talking/ ranting about the new minis and then when I ask where the pictures can be found I get a response of "oh they were posted like 50 pages ago or something, go find them yourself".
Mantic's release months alternate, you get a big dreadball release one month and then nothing for several more months. After this month, we won't be seeing any more dreadball minis until the third shipment, and then after that, probably no releases for at least 6 months/ until dreadball extreme gets a release.
Having this page dead on page 11 of the topic list for several months (like it was a few months ago, during the pre-season 2 break, a lot of people forgot it existed and posted in the kickstarter thread instead) does not make it easier to find information on dreadball.
Having a visible topic on the first page with all the latest dreadball info, news, rumours and pics in the OP regardless of whether or not its a "warpath month" does make it easier.
I'm not out to "screw over Dreadball players", nor am I out to "shove the crappy warpath game down their throats". It is just a simple boring effort to have one alive thread for mantic sci-fi instead of 5 dead ones.
Overall, if you look at the fantasy N&R thread it has been directly more relevant and useful than the multiple scattered sci-fi threads, and hasn't "suffered" for having an entire month of nothing other than Loka being posted in it, despite no-one being interested in that game... there wasn't any KoW N&R at all that month, or the month before that, or the month after it, so KoW-only players weren't missing out on anything by having the Loka stuff mentioned in there. It works well.
Hopefully that explains the reasoning a bit better.
Ultimately, it was a decision I left up to the moderators since opinion is literally split 50/50. Decision has been made to have one mantic sci-fi thread that gets used, and not 5 mantic sci-fi threads (Dreadball, Deadzone, Warpath, Project Pandora, Mars Attacks) that get a few posts and then fall into obscurity and no-one can find them anymore.
I think just as we have a separate thread for every GWarmy and do not throw everything in a massive thread termed "GW", each individual wargame system deserves to have its own thread.
I really have to say I'm somewhat saddened to see people clamoring for Squig to do more work just so they don't have to ever worry about reading a discussion that doesn't directly pertain to them right this second. Scarletsquig laid out the reasons he doesn't want to do that, and they're perfectly valid reasons. The mods have also given their approval for this, and I'm sure they were sick of seeing "OMG LOOK AT THE NEWSLETTER I JUST GOT!" threads having to be locked and referred elsewhere simply because people have no attention span to remember the thread exists otherwise.
That clutters up N&R for everyone, as does having multiple threads that need to be updated when Mantic releases information for multiple games at the same time. Since in this instance they all exist in the same universe and cross-overs are obviously going to happen (e.g. - DreadBall MVP rescue scenario in DeadZone), it's hard to say that the idea of multiple threads is any better especially when they're being maintained by volunteers.
Scarletsquig has said all the relevant information will be in the first post, so if you don't want to read any of the discussion, just read the first post. He's shown dedication to keeping things up to date through every Mantic-affiliated KickStarter and has done a good job of it. Other posters I might be leery of, but if he can keep a thread reasonably up to date during the final days of a KickStarter when the company doing the KickStarter can barely keep things up to date I don't see where that's going to be a huge problem either.
While the OCD organizer would like to see separate threads just because, on the whole I would rather have one thread with a good custodian than multiple threads by multiple people with varying levels of interest in maintaining things.
Indeed. Kudos to squig for keeping everyone updated both during KS feast and inbetween waves famine. Having a single thread to coalesce that intrinsically linked info makes it easier for both him and people trying to find the info. He does a good job of keeping the thread title up to date. Don't want to read a few posts about a related game that shares figures, rules, and background? Read the thread title to see whether you can ignore the new posts.
I put out a general call to my gaming group for the survey. I might pick up 80 just because of the price but I'll have to wait and see what else I get a hankering for.
What I want to see is some renders for the Termie Enforcers. I have set aside $30 for them simply for the fact that they are one of my favorite models Mantic have come out with to date!
Hopefully they have some decent weapon options and enough poses to stop them all looking the same.
Commander Cain wrote: What I want to see is some renders for the Termie Enforcers. I have set aside $30 for them simply for the fact that they are one of my favorite models Mantic have come out with to date!
Hopefully they have some decent weapon options and enough poses to stop them all looking the same.
Me too!
I've set aside $40 for them (a ha!) to get 20 - IF they look as good as the renders and come with some nice looking heavy weapons...
Confidence is high that all will be well, and that will be another $40 to Mantic!
I too am in the "would love to see renders of the Heavy Armor" camp.
However, I wouldn't be at all surprised if Mantic holds them back for a time when they're opening up the survey for additional pledges either; marketing and all that. I figure if I don't like 'em, I'll just get a mech but I really want to like them.
I'm also in the eage to see what the heavy armored enforcers look like. I'll probably throw in for 20 of them on top of my other options.
Man, I think the survey is going to be expensive. I hope they note when things are due to ship on there. I think I'm going to mostly put in for things in the first batch right now with just my FF starter in the second wave. Until that survey comes out (I assume they are doing a wave 2 survey as well).
hopefully their supplier will actually do the job they were paid for this time and actually sort and box the deadzone game so all mantic has to do is send it out!
I would like to see what else they come out with for warpath, I liked the models beforehand but I wasn't too impressed with the variety, and the rules so hopefully the next addition will have more .
I don't think we've seen any renders of the Peacekeepers. Best I know of is the outline:
Spoiler:
The Strider is:
Spoiler:
Not sure why they'd label it "Corporation" if it was meant for the Rebs, but meh. I take it to mean that they won't have DZ rules with the enforcers, but might still be useable for WP?
Yeah, hard to beleive that the Corporation Strider won't be usable by... the Corporation.
Unless we're being told that the Corporation Enforcers won't be able to use one?
Which is... disappointing, given how it was marketed during the campaign.
Still, I suppose there's plenty of time to switch things around, since the pledge manager hasn't hit yet - but still a bit of a bummer for people who were super-organized and specific with their original pledge!
Makes sense since the $20 light vehicle kit for Enforcers is the Pathfinder on a bike that comes with the dismounted version. Not a mech, but still a light vehicle. Still, probably should have made it clearer when releasing the initial info (though it was a crazy day, so I wont fault 'em too much).
Alpharius wrote: Still, I suppose there's plenty of time to switch things around, since the pledge manager hasn't hit yet - but still a bit of a bummer for people who were super-organized and specific with their original pledge!
Looks like they'll be getting themselves 10 not-Terminators instead!
I'm not really to disappointed about the Strider as I found it odd that a basic corporation grunt was with the Enforcers, though I could see how it could be confusing.
Mantic will most likely have the Corporation and Enforcers as separate army lists in future. They've stated this ever since the enforcers were released.
Enforcers tend to kill more humans than anything else, mostly corporation troops and then civilians. They're a galactic "state secret police" faction, mostly used to liquidize certain assets of any individual corporation that defies corporation central law too much.
The risk of attracting the attention of the council of seven has to be weighed up against the profits.. for example, mining may be forbidden in a farflung system that no-one has bought the deeds to at auction, but a corporation might decide to set up there anyway, without a license.. if they get caught, lawyers will get involved first, and the legal process can be drawn out while the corporation continues to mine.. if they push their luck too far though, the enforcers get sent in to liquidize assets and enforce the court order, as well as issuing a standard fine (might involve randomly dropping nukes on a few heavily populated cities that are property of that corporation/occupied by family members of the board). Some CEOs aren't bothered by this at all and are happy as long as the assets that have to be written off the balance sheet as a result of the enforcement protocol are less than the profits gained from the venture.
Warpath universe is essentially a parody of modern big business, investment and corporate culture, where billionaires don't care if children starve as long as driving up the price of wheat via grain futures investment earns them a few extra million.
Another day, another inbox full of shiny, shiny things - all made possible by your support! I'm sure you're all eager to get your surveys done and lock in all the great new toys coming your way, so to keep you going until next week check out these beauties!
Today it's the turn of the Marauders to get a little love, and first up is the final figure from the faction starter, the Commando Captain:
The Captain is his own master - he has broken away from his shackles as a Corporation lackey and led his team into the Deadzone in search of plunder. Unlike your typical Orc, he wins his battles through strategic skill rather than brute force.
The picture doesn't do justice to the level of detail on this figure - he's going to be an absolute joy to paint!
Next up, the Goblin Weapons Team... albeit minus the goblins... With Enforcers, Forge Guard, Cyphers, Zombies, Scenery, and more, we've made a lot of progress with digital sculpting on this project, which means very good things for Warpath next year. For now, the Marauders have had their first taste of it with this:
There's plenty more to come - keep an eye on your emails over the coming days and weeks. As always, let us know what you think in the comments below!
LOTS of nice looking stuff in there - fingers crossed on renders/art to reality!
Yep, deadzone marauder captain is looking great, but also looking completely different from the other commandos.
It's like they get a redesign every time the minis get sculpted... first bob naismith did the warpath marauders based on the kow orcs (a good effort, only let down by the decision to base them off fantasy sculpts in the first place), then Remy's warlord, then the orc on the raptor looks different to those (much smaller, more like a gorkamorka orc), then the considerably different looking dreadball marauder and now the commandos look different to all of those, and the commando captain also looks different to all of those.
The design is all over the place, pretty much every one of the 5-6 different sculptors that have worked on them has brought their own "orc style" to the table.
scarletsquig wrote: Yep, deadzone marauder captain is looking great, but also looking completely different from the other commandos.
Very much this. He does indeed look awesome, but I worry that will make his cohorts just look that much worse. Still a long way to go, but at least I'll have a few Marauders I won't cringe at seeing.
Odd, I think the heavy weapon looks great. I plan on using it for my Dark Mechanicus army in some fashion or another. Hopefully both gun options come with it.
Nice figures overall, but SS is exactly right with their Orcs being all over the shop. I wonder if the head can come off that orc easily to be replaced by a Kromlech or Maxmini one? Extra points if I can still manage to save the hat!
I suppose the differences in Ork appearance could be explained by the fluff in that the Marauders were engineered and that their faction is composed of more than just straight orks. The difference in appearance could be due to there being subsequent generations coming about on their own after escaping Corporate control. Without them controlling, they were free to mingle and breed among themselves resulting in different strains of ork. Some of them could also be hybrids with other Marauder races like the goblins, hobgoblins, ogres and trolls. There, appearance issue solved.
Maurader Captian is a great model.... If the entire Maurader line looked even half that good and had those proportions and poses, they would be bankrupting everyone else whomakes Sci-Fi orks.
Any idea what he is holding? Is it a pain stick or cattle prod?
Barzam wrote: I suppose the differences in Ork appearance could be explained by the fluff in that the Marauders were engineered and that their faction is composed of more than just straight orks. The difference in appearance could be due to there being subsequent generations coming about on their own after escaping Corporate control. Without them controlling, they were free to mingle and breed among themselves resulting in different strains of ork. Some of them could also be hybrids with other Marauder races like the goblins, hobgoblins, ogres and trolls. There, appearance issue solved.
Like the idea but the Marauders were colonized on several systems before the Corporations first contact. They had aload of battles and the Corporation lost a load of em. So they captured a load of Orx and said, 'hey you can work for us or you can have a bullet to the brain'. A few centuries later they rebelled and became mercenaries.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
nkelsch wrote: Any idea what he is holding? Is it a pain stick or cattle prod?
I imagine it to be some sort of cattle prod, goading his fellow orxs and gobbos into battle.
I don't have an issue with different breeds of Orks in Warpath, but as far I know, the genetically engineered concept is a 40K fluff thing not Warpath.
If the Warpath Marauders get resculpted in plastic next year with the new aesthetic then this is all moot point. Mantic may be moving in a new, more Blizzard/GW, direction with the orks.
adamsouza wrote: I don't have an issue with different breeds of Orks in Warpath, but as far I know, the genetically engineered concept is a 40K fluff thing not Warpath.
If the Warpath Marauders get resculpted in plastic next year with the new aesthetic then this is all moot point. Mantic may be moving in a new, more Blizzard/GW, direction with the orks.
If they went Blizzard and made Female orx, I think they would break through other mini-companies shadows. An exaggerated design for orx lends itself to the WOW design, and their female Orcs look good and contrast well with the male design.
But a consistent, uniform Orx design is needed first.
I feel like someone needs to put "MAXIMUM SATISFACTION" on that picture.
I'm a little annoyed at the Corporate Strider not being for the corp, or probably more specifically calling it Corporate Strider but not telling us that it wasn't used by Corp until after the KS. Feels a bit like a (minor) bait and switch. I plopped $20 down for it for my Enforcers as Rebs aren't a faction I was planning on focusing on. Sure I can change it in the survey, but I shouldn't have to in the first place. A minor gripe, but still annoying. I still have my Marauder and FF walkers though so I'll be ok.
I dunno, I still think I am using my GW Orks for Marauders as I prefer the GW style over the Rogue Trader-esque Marauders, but I will at least buy a single Hulk and maybe their dog-things from the survey. Everything else has an obvious easy proxy with GW Orks, other than the Gobbo Sniper, but that is just a simple weapon conversion on a Grot.
I would get at least one ripper suit, if they only looked anything like the artist's drawing, because ten bucks is a great deal when you consider that it comes with both sets of arms. But the actual models we have seen are just way too cartooney.
I also would have preferred a more functional combat uniform. This uniform screams 'lead from behind' instead of 'first through the door'. I guess I picture Orx leaders as lead from the front guys, especially in a small unit skirmish game.
Having said that, the figure is better than some of the Orx they have shown. I'm still pretty disappointed in this faction though.
He reminds me of Kap'n Bluddflagg from Dawn of War 2: Retribution which is a good thing. Having an Ork that leads from behind for once is nice too. Leading from the front doesn't result in lasting long ; p They're both great models, but I'm glad this guy is the leader - he's going to be great fun to paint.
The dip in Orx quality has a simple explanation. The Dreadball Orx were sculpted by Remy Tremblay; the DeadZone Orx were not. This time Mantic decided to save themselves some money, and they got what they paid for.
So far I've only seen one DeadZone sculpt directly attributed to Tremblay, the 1st Gen Plague, and not surprisingly it's the stand-out piece of the game. There are some other good sculpts in there, including not only the digital enforcers but also most of the hand-sculpted Rebs. But I still wouldn't put any of them up against the 1st Gen in a contest.
Can you imagine how the Plague faction would have looked if Tremblay had sculpted them all? Or for that matter, the Marauders?
Vermonter wrote: The dip in Orx quality has a simple explanation. The Dreadball Orx were sculpted by Remy Tremblay; the DeadZone Orx were not. This time Mantic decided to save themselves some money, and they got what they paid for.
So far I've only seen one DeadZone sculpt directly attributed to Tremblay, the 1st Gen Plague, and not surprisingly it's the stand-out piece of the game. There are some other good sculpts in there, including not only the digital enforcers but also most of the hand-sculpted Rebs. But I still wouldn't put any of them up against the 1st Gen in a contest.
Can you imagine how the Plague faction would have looked if Tremblay had sculpted them all? Or for that matter, the Marauders?
Good points there.
I thought Mantic was making Remy THE Deadzone sculptor too?
Shame that he wasn't available, or able, or... something else.
There will be a way to add on via a Pledge Manager coming...next week, I think?
The Enforcer Peacekeepers add on might not be until the 'Wave 2" Pledge Manager though, as they have to be 'unlocked' by people adding on approximately $9K via the "Wave 1" Pledge Manager...
Vermonter wrote: The dip in Orx quality has a simple explanation. The Dreadball Orx were sculpted by Remy Tremblay; the DeadZone Orx were not. This time Mantic decided to save themselves some money, and they got what they paid for.
So far I've only seen one DeadZone sculpt directly attributed to Tremblay, the 1st Gen Plague, and not surprisingly it's the stand-out piece of the game. There are some other good sculpts in there, including not only the digital enforcers but also most of the hand-sculpted Rebs. But I still wouldn't put any of them up against the 1st Gen in a contest.
Can you imagine how the Plague faction would have looked if Tremblay had sculpted them all? Or for that matter, the Marauders?
Save what money? Isn't Remy a full-time employee now?
Mantic has had a fair degree of criticism over it's official painting, so do you think you can do better ?
if so they are recruiting (from facebook)
Mantic is recruiting again! We're looking for a studio painter and hobby specialist - the kind of person who can paint an army for display in a short space of time, but who can also turn out some beautiful pieces for close-up photography. If you think you've got what it takes, check out the Careers section of the Mantic website and get in touch!
Not criticizing their painting, but they need MORE painted pics of their models.
Larger, close up, pics of the various models identifying the model and it's armament are currently absent on their website and rule books. It's less of an issue in KOW than Warpath. In Warpath the main way to tell troops of the same race apart is their armament, and their is no section depicting what the armament looks like.
The problem with Mantic's painting has pretty much always been the colour selection rather than the skill of the painters. It's always blue-with-something.
Blue is super easy to paint. I'd love to paint for a living but for some reason I don't think it'd pay as much as what I do now and it's the wrong country.
Save what money? Isn't Remy a full-time employee now?
I'd really like to know if this is true, because it certainly doesn't seem like it. If Remy is a full-time employee, why are they under-utilizing the skills of their best sculptor?
Why (as was stated to me by Mantic in an email) are they not having Remy do the alternate resin of the 1st Gen Plague that they are giving out to pledgers of $500 or more?
If he's full-time staff, why did they only assign him to do the first 1st Gen sculpt?
I could be wrong - maybe he's done a lot of the DeadZone sculpts without being credited for them. That would be odd, though.
To my knowledge, Remy is not an employee of Mantic. His various web profiles and sites still list him as a "freelancer".
Mantic did just hire an in-house sculptor during the DeadZone campaign (who did the tweaks to the marauders to make them a little more palatable), but I do not believe it was Remy.
Interesting. Thee news as filtered to us by SS was that he Remy had been hired as a full-time Mantic employee. Of course, the same news also said that he was going to be the only sculptor allowed to do Warpath stuff, which is clearly not accurate. Looks like SS's source was either talking out of his arse or there was some miscommunication.
Azazelx wrote: Interesting. Thee news as filtered to us by SS was that he Remy had been hired as a full-time Mantic employee. Of course, the same news also said that he was going to be the only sculptor allowed to do Warpath stuff, which is clearly not accurate. Looks like SS's source was either talking out of his arse or there was some miscommunication.
He might be and is being lazy about updating his profiles and blog (he wouldn't be the first person to not do that). I'm just assuming in this field that if you were an employee of a company they would not want you advertising as a freelancer, even if you're not taking new commissions. I could very easily be wrong on that point.
Well, I'm certainly not suggesting that SS was wilfully lying to us, merely that whoever was the source may not be reliable/may have been feeding him a line/may have been making hopeful speculation/may not have been as informed as we all hoped. I mean, it may have just been another poster sounding feasible on the Mantic board - after all, we've all taken that info as gospel here...
I think because we desperately want that to be true. I don't think Sir scarletsquig would ever willfully mislead us either, nor are we certain we have been. The evidence that he isn't an employee is just as a flimsy as "someone on a forum said..." if you really think about it.
In other news, the latest DZ update is full of win. I'll post in the DZ thread about my specific thoughts (someone has to go to the "Other Games" Sub-forum Ghetto after all), but looking at their projections on things in what wave (i.e. - mostly Wave 1) I do have to commend Mantic for how well they structure their stuff. In the world where a KS being delayed is met with the "You don't say?" face, Mantic has (so far) done a good job of surviving success and getting things out. While they need to work a bit on art direction and consistency, Mr. Renton has the logistics end well in hand it seems.
Well, here's a recent pic of Mantic Games' staff doing a day out.
Is Remy on it or not (not sure what he looks like real life)?
Spoiler:
And for Remy not updating his blog, half of the links on Mantic's page aren't even working. I think people underestimate how much of a on-a-shoestring-company Mantic games still is, Kickstarters and all.
Fortifications, Forge Fathers, and Shipping Dates
Update #96 · Jun 13, 2013 · 26 comments
Hi Guys!
We're currently putting the finishing touches on the survey - double checking all the add-ons are there, making sure all the bundles and deals are correct, and adding lots of pretty pictures! The survey will be sent out to you on Monday, and you'll have until the 21st of July to complete it and lock in your rewards. You will then have until the beginning of October to get your payments in for any additional items that you want. Keep an eye out for our next update next week.
In the meantime work is continuing on the game, and we're currently on track to get more into the first shipment than we'd expected! One such item is the additional BattleZones. We haven't finalised the layout of the sprues yet, but we've got lots of new components sculpted that massively widen the scope for your sci-fi buildings, and here are some examples:
Fortifications BattleZone - thicker, armoured wall sections and pillars, just a taste of what's to come.
Landing Pad BattleZone - not just a landing pad. 135 degree connectors, longer walls and triangular pieces allow for much more varied shapes in your buildings.
Shipping Information - 1st and 2nd Shipment
A lot of you have been asking about what ships when, so you can budget effectively for the surveys. Every item in the Kickstarter will be made available in the survey that will be out on Monday, regardless of when it ships. The second survey will be sent out shortly before we're due to ship the second batch (roughly Q2 next year, or earlier if we can), allowing you to top up your rewards should you wish. This survey will ONLY contain second shipment items - it will not offer anything already shipped.
These are the items we currently have planned for the second shipment:
Forge Father Faction Starters and Boosters
Asterian Faction Starters and Boosters
Plague Zombies
Light Support Vehicles (Pathfinder on Bike, Iron Ancestor, Stuntbot, Striders)
Faction Special Characters
Enforcers in Peacekeeper Armour (if funded!)
Deadzone Compendium
Deadzone Collector's Edition Hardback Book
AI Card Deck
Due to some changes to our tooling schedule made possible by your support, EVERYTHING else will come in the first shipment, so you'll have the vast majority of your order with you by Christmas! As we get closer to the release dates, there may be some items that change. For example, the Plague Zombies are very close to being finished, and we might be able to squeeze them into Shipment 1. If this is the case, we'll add them to the second survey anyway so that you can pick up some more if you need them. The same applies to anything else that we can speed up. We'll keep you posted in the updates as we know more.
Of course, we're just as hard at work on the second shipment items too, so I'll leave you with this...
Unposed work-in-progress render of the Forge Father Forge Guard infantry.
My source is a company employee (for the full-time thing anyway, not for the "only person sculpting warpath" thing, that was separate and a very old bit of info from over a year ago that looks to have changed.. as Azazel says, I've already mentioned this on the forums).
Just because he's full-time doesn't mean he's currently living in the UK, or based in their offices.
He got a job offer from GW that would have presumably required him to leave France which he didn't accept.
It's actually really hard to find info about Mantic's sculptors, they keep things very much under wraps, even compared to GW which happily says who sculpted what all the time. They used to, but don't anymore.
I don't blame them really, the internet has thrown a very large amount of personal attacks at individuals for the work they've done and gets very ugly very quickly. Alternatively, it could be GW's constant poaching attempts that they're looking to frustrate. :p
Zweischneid wrote: And for Remy not updating his blog, half of the links on Mantic's page aren't even working. I think people underestimate how much of a on-a-shoestring-company Mantic games still is, Kickstarters and all.
They're in the process of updating their site, explains the dead links atm. Was mentioned on their twitter or facebook today iirc.
Mantic Games: We're currently updating the website - the new one should be going live very soon Like · 1 · 22 hours ago
Zweischneid wrote: And for Remy not updating his blog, half of the links on Mantic's page aren't even working. I think people underestimate how much of a on-a-shoestring-company Mantic games still is, Kickstarters and all.
They're in the process of updating their site, explains the dead links atm. Was mentioned on their twitter or facebook today iirc.
And as I said, Remy would be far from the first person in the history of the Internet to not update their various profiles when they needed to be changed. Good to hear that SS's source is more reliable than that though.
Anyway, back on to news discussion, I'm surprised that so much stuff is shipping in the first shipment, going to have to scrabble up some more paypal funds, I think!
Most of the stuff won't be available in the second survey, so if you want to add it, it's going to have to be first survey.
The landing pad terrain is very nice, it will lets us make non-boxy buildings with angled edges, which should improve things a lot.
Anyone else a little concerned about the volume of stuff being shipped before December though?
As in, can they actually make it happen without the casting quality being terrible due to China deciding to crank the dial up to 9001 on the tooling machine?
They bit off more than they could chew with Dreadball and I really don't want to see that happen again.
I'm trying to recall if the "nothing that has been shipped" restriction was in place for DreadBall. As I mentioned in the other thread I might be interested in more terrain, but having not seen a lot on the alternate battlezones yet I'm not 100% on that. If I'm reading that right though if I want the KS price I need to order it on the upcoming survey.
Hopefully we'll see more detail before the 21st of July and it'll be a moot point.
scarletsquig wrote: Anyway, back on to news discussion, I'm surprised that so much stuff is shipping in the first shipment, going to have to scrabble up some more paypal funds, I think!
Most of the stuff won't be available in the second survey, so if you want to add it, it's going to have to be first survey.
Yeah, this is a bit harsh! Looks like Mantic is going to some effort to get as much money up front as possible.
I think the Fortification pieces look lovely, not sold on Landing Pad - yes, angles are good for making more interesting structures, but it gives me a bad Hexagon vibe somehow.
scarletsquig wrote: Anyway, back on to news discussion, I'm surprised that so much stuff is shipping in the first shipment, going to have to scrabble up some more paypal funds, I think!
Most of the stuff won't be available in the second survey, so if you want to add it, it's going to have to be first survey.
Yeah, this is a bit harsh! Looks like Mantic is going to some effort to get as much money up front as possible.
I think the Fortification pieces look lovely, not sold on Landing Pad - yes, angles are good for making more interesting structures, but it gives me a bad Hexagon vibe somehow.
Use them to build an Octagon for some DeadZone UFC tournaments!
scarletsquig wrote: Anyone else a little concerned about the volume of stuff being shipped before December though?
As in, can they actually make it happen without the casting quality being terrible due to China deciding to crank the dial up to 9001 on the tooling machine?
Perhaps they got enough money to get their own restic machines?
That would certainly makes things easier.
I think a big part of it is that they're still allowing thru October to pay for the changes you make to your pledge. Which isn't to dissimilar from allowing you to order previous items on the second shipment. At least to me it's not much different as if I can't scrape up the money by october then next february isn't much better
I assume that if they produce a poop they will allow us to juggle our pledges.
I'm thinking Marauder Boosters (the heavy weapons and hulks make this worth it just for additionals on those models), more terrain, the helfather, and some extra misc. mini's.
For the second shipment I can see supplementing the FF, plastic termie enforcers, adding the specials, a fair amount of zombies, and maybe some of the walkers but that'll depend heavily on seeing actual models before I make that call.
(although I guess that's still a little while yet).
except for the idea that there aren't any zealots. I appreciate your input, squig, although obviously you're on the "fan" side of the fence, I feel you are reasonable and critical at times when appropriate.
There were large mold lines on the shoulders of the Orx, and the slightly opened hand is literally half mold line... The humans have mold lines on their helmets, down their sides, like you can see where the model was practically "pressed" together (or at least where the molds were). It's making it frustrating because these lines are for the most part, in hard to reach places with my hobby knife.
