We have so much planned for you this week, there are lots of images, information, discussions coming your way. To kick everything off Ronnie, with a special guest Tommie Soule from Golem Painting Studio, wanted to speak to you all directly:
So there you are – unit names, colour schemes, and a competition coming up? But what else is instore for Khaos Dwarf Week? Check back tomorrow to find out!
Well in all honesty not too much. We've seen the WiP's. They've basically just announced the plans for them
1. Basic Warriors
2. Ranged Gunpowder Unit (blunderbusses or whatevers)
3. Heavy Elite Warriors
4. Rocket Launchers
They're going to release a beta for their army list and by the endish of the week will have a few color schemes to show
Not missed much yet Alpharius mostly outlining what is forthcoming so this is just the menu with the meal to come.
Release of KoW stats for Khaos Dwarves Units to be released which have forgotten already Name the Ranged Attack unit competition Painting to be done on minis we decide which scheme is bestest
I am well aware Mantic has its own Kings of War system and I'll be sure to give it an honest try later... but how do the Mantic Dwarves compare size-wise to WHFB? I know the Elves and Undead look thin due to true scale, but since Dwarves are already kind of stocky do they line up a bit closer?
(And thanks for remembering to ask the scale question Kirbinator - and aka for answering!)
(Ah hell, thanks too to Kenshin and Chibi for the info!)
(And yeah, back to work... though I'll be dreaming of the Chaos Dwarf army to come... Led by the awesome AoW Chaos Dwarf lord AND a Sorcerer on the RH Lamassu! GET INTO IT!)
Kirbinator wrote:I am well aware Mantic has its own Kings of War system and I'll be sure to give it an honest try later... but how do the Mantic Dwarves compare size-wise to WHFB? I know the Elves and Undead look thin due to true scale, but since Dwarves are already kind of stocky do they line up a bit closer?
I can't help thinking that Mantics Kaos Dwarf range is just too much of a clone of GWs.
Granted there is a gap here as GW don't seem to want to do much with the range (Warhamer Forge's proposed items aside).
Don't get me wrong I quite like some of the samples shown but It just seems to smack a little of....desperation or biting the hand that feeds them (in so far as they are looking to piggy back GWs ranges).
There's also some bits of concept art they want feedback on.
Hi Everyone,
Well we promised more Khaos Dwarf content on our blog, and we thought what better than to show you some of the fantastic concept art we are having done by Des Hanley.
These are still very much a work in progress, but we here at Mantic just think they are so good that we have to share them with you:
Let us know what you think.
I've done my own version of the centaur with some changes.
What's this? A company giving a preview of an upcoming race, talking about ideas, and listing the things that they want to do?
Don't they know the way to successfully preview new products is to send out newsletters that contain no info but tell you to wait a day and go to a website that also has no info? Keeping your customers in the dark is considerably more effective than "previewing" things.
Man, I was trying to hold out for Orks, but they had me at Clockwork Bionic Wizard. A Dwarf in steam powered terminator armor in a fantasy universe is a fabulous idea!
Gitzbitah wrote:Man, I was trying to hold out for Orks, but they had me at Clockwork Bionic Wizard. A Dwarf in steam powered terminator armor in a fantasy universe is a fabulous idea!
Ditto
well this is bad for me.
I have gobbos so do I expand with orcs?
I have Dwarves do I expand them instead
Now this
GW's history with Chaos Dwarves has been...
-"Here's an army book"
-"Here's a new edition, use 3 pages of rules till we update CD"
-"We'll update, I promise. Just keep using those 3 pages."
-"We're working on it, promise. Just keep using those 3 pages. Oh- we took them down?"
-"The Fantasy "Forge World" will be supporting you now"
-"Warhammer Forge has been told it cannot do Infantry packs of Chaos Dwarves"
-"Warhammer Forge will release CD vehicle crews for their land train, to get around GW's ban on CD infantry"
GW just doesn't know how to give people what they want.
Quiet! Do you all hear that sound? It's my bank account crying because it knows it's going to be abused in the near future. At least Mantic is a good deal cheaper than GW. I especially like their fresh, non-cynical approach to customer service.
I've been looking at the fantasy models from Mantic since they were showcased on Beasts of War and I think they look fantastic so far. I might buy a set of Elves and Dwarves just to paint them up and have them around but in case I go down the path of actually playing some WHFB would I get any grief from fielding Mantic models in a non-tournament setting?
That depends on if you'd want to play with such a person, who'd give you grief for playing with a different companies minis. I tend not to want to play with the type of person who's so narrow in their views of fun and have boughten into GW's propaganda of "being the hobby" and so I lose nothing. Its your fun to have, so have it. Respect that other might not like it, but don't let them get in your way of enjoying something you've put effort into with the purpose of having fun.
There is nobody I've met that will not agree that Mantic makes a fantastic product at a good price. In a non-gw tourney (which is the only kind I tend to show up to since gw stores don't exist here) I don't see why anyone would ever fuss about you putting down a non-gw mini or even a full army of them. The Mantic Elf army lines up nearly perfectly with the Army Book options and looks great on the table.
The only grief I'd give you is that Swordmaster ASF should be normal ASF instead of "Oh but they're super special. Now go buy the new starter kit."
If anyone gives me grief about having non-gw angry stunties I will kindly ask them to show me where on the shelf I can pick up a unit of them.
Edit:
Back on topic, I am really loving that concept art and the modeling ideas behind them! Centaurs, robo-wizards, and sneaky little gits, oh my!
I don't think Mantic should be making chaos dwarf/bull centaurs just because GW once made chaos dwarf/bull centaurs, but I look forward to the Babylonian terminator conversions that should arise from that exo-suit.
aka_mythos wrote:GW's history with Chaos Dwarves has been...
-"Here's an army book"
-"Here's a new edition, use 3 pages of rules till we update CD"
-"We'll update, I promise. Just keep using those 3 pages."
-"We're working on it, promise. Just keep using those 3 pages. Oh- we took them down?"
-"The Fantasy "Forge World" will be supporting you now"
-"Warhammer Forge has been told it cannot do Infantry packs of Chaos Dwarves"
-"Warhammer Forge will release CD vehicle crews for their land train, to get around GW's ban on CD infantry"
GW just doesn't know how to give people what they want.
You missed one:
-"Here's this great licensed Blood Bowl PC game! It has every single BB team in there - every flavour of undead, the Amazons are there, Haflings, Orcs or Goblins, the Star players. Even has the obscure off-shoot teams like the Nurgle Rotters and the generic non-aligned "Elf" teams. Oh wait, it has every single team except one... guess which one?"
aka_mythos wrote:GW's history with Chaos Dwarves has been...
-"Here's an army book"
-"Here's a new edition, use 3 pages of rules till we update CD"
-"We'll update, I promise. Just keep using those 3 pages."
-"We're working on it, promise. Just keep using those 3 pages. Oh- we took them down?"
-"The Fantasy "Forge World" will be supporting you now"
-"Warhammer Forge has been told it cannot do Infantry packs of Chaos Dwarves"
-"Warhammer Forge will release CD vehicle crews for their land train, to get around GW's ban on CD infantry"
GW just doesn't know how to give people what they want.
You missed one:
-"Here's this great licensed Blood Bowl PC game! It has every single BB team in there - every flavour of undead, the Amazons are there, Haflings, Orcs or Goblins, the Star players. Even has the obscure off-shoot teams like the Nurgle Rotters and the generic non-aligned "Elf" teams. Oh wait, it has every single team except one... guess which one?"
"But, but, but, but we code so poorly, we can't figure out the rules let alone how to make 4 legged creatures work : /"
H.B.M.C. wrote:You missed one:
-"Here's this great licensed Blood Bowl PC game! It has every single BB team in there - every flavour of undead, the Amazons are there, Haflings, Orcs or Goblins, the Star players. Even has the obscure off-shoot teams like the Nurgle Rotters and the generic non-aligned "Elf" teams. Oh wait, it has every single team except one... guess which one?"
I felt I should give GW some benefit of the doubt and assume it was the video game developer... even though we have every reason to believe it wasn't.
aka_mythos wrote:GW's history with Chaos Dwarves has been...
-"Here's an army book"
-"Here's a new edition, use 3 pages of rules till we update CD"
-"We'll update, I promise. Just keep using those 3 pages."
-"We're working on it, promise. Just keep using those 3 pages. Oh- we took them down?"
-"The Fantasy "Forge World" will be supporting you now"
-"Warhammer Forge has been told it cannot do Infantry packs of Chaos Dwarves"
-"Warhammer Forge will release CD vehicle crews for their land train, to get around GW's ban on CD infantry"
GW just doesn't know how to give people what they want.
I forgot to chime in when you posted that excellent, and very depressing, summary.
I laughed, I cried.
I was sad, then I realized that Mantic is ready to hook me up, so, yeah!
Mantic has good quality stuff, top notch. The only downside is a severe lack of diversity between sprues, making the purchase of several different kits for swapping and mixing things up an important essential.
BrookM wrote:Mantic has good quality stuff, top notch. The only downside is a severe lack of diversity between sprues, making the purchase of several different kits for swapping and mixing things up an important essential.
And that is a 'problem' that I have NO problem with!
BrookM wrote:Mantic has good quality stuff, top notch. The only downside is a severe lack of diversity between sprues, making the purchase of several different kits for swapping and mixing things up an important essential.
And that is a 'problem' that I have NO problem with!
That's what the army deals are for. Women in general, and wives in particular, are very susceptible to the idea of buying something if it is 'on sale'. Even if the 'on sale' item costs more than what you want from it, a bundle is easier to justify. Plus, it can be allowed to age longer than if you were to ask for just one box- after all, if you bought minis 2 months ago or a week ago, the monetary value is strictly secondary to the amount of time that has passed.
When mathematics and machinations fail, there are always flowers- although its best to buy and present them a day or two before you ask for the miniatures, lest you appear cheap and mercenary.
I dont understood, they alredy choose the name of the shooters? I come with so many nice ideias... its sad.
I dont kind like Chaos Dwarfs, but that's because i prefer regular dwarfs... Anyway, the models are nice. And at least in Kings of War dwarfs have a lot of "regular enemies".
I relly believed they would release Orcs and some Humans before sidesteps, but anyway...
The Dwarf Wolf wrote:I relly believed they would release Orcs and some Humans before sidesteps, but anyway...
I believe the current prediction of the timeline is Kaos Dwarves, then Orcs, then Humans and sci-fi (don't know which one's first). Personally, I'm hoping there's some good stuff in the humans and the sci-fi ranges. I'm not interested in collecting dwarves or chimpanzee-faced orcs.
But I dunno if I like Kaos Dwarves as much. Dunno, the aestethic isn't doing it for me- I think GW were going a better route with their hellcannon crew.
Yeah, little to no interest in this. Been done better by others, although not on a whole army level.
Would have rather them try to do something original instead of trying to cash in on those twelve guys that have been complaining online about Chaos Dwarves since 1997.
plastictrees wrote:Yeah, little to no interest in this. Been done better by others, although not on a whole army level.
Would have rather them try to do something original instead of trying to cash in on those twelve guys that have been complaining online about Chaos Dwarves since 1997.
Evil Steampunk Armor Dwarf Wizards havent been done yet for miniatures
plastictrees wrote:Yeah, little to no interest in this. Been done better by others, although not on a whole army level.
Would have rather them try to do something original instead of trying to cash in on those twelve guys that have been complaining online about Chaos Dwarves since 1997.
Evil Steampunk Armor Dwarf Wizards havent been done yet for miniatures
Well, it's one element. They could have run with that further and developed an interesting army concept but it doesn't look like that's what they're doing so far.
I would have liked some big beefy techno golem monster things, with the right look. And downtrodden slave orcs would be cool. The actual Chaos Dwarf plastics are a bit goofy, and to be honest, I am a bit unimpressed with the blatant ripping off of GW stuff.
Da Boss wrote: I am a bit unimpressed with the blatant ripping off of GW stuff.
There is a market for it. Since GW decided to "squat" the chaos dwarfs, they left a fairly sizable population that loved the ethos, fluff, etc, out in the cold and if they aren't willing to produce for the demand, then all power to some company that is willing to pick up the torch.
Entire community here: http://www.chaos-dwarfs.com/ with contests, newsletters, etc. GW's loss might just be Mantic's gain and they're a small enough company that they can afford to take a chance right now.
Oh, I know what you're saying. And I understand the catering to a neglected demographic. I just wish they had injected more of their own creativity into the project, even looks wise.
4M2A wrote:Well I'm sorry GW i've been waiting long enough for Chaos Dwarves now it's matics turn.
Good (free) rules, now an army people have been waiting years for, I see mantic doing a lot of things right.
I still have to decide if I like the look enough. I think I probably would have been more into a baldy duregar type look.
The option to combine Dwarves and Orcs in one army might sway me though, and I love the industrial/slavery aspect of it...
By rules I meant for the overall game but it's the models that really make the difference. I've looked into making a chaos dwarf army but the amount of time (nd money) it would take to get them models (Some of which are great and some not so much) just isn't worth it for me.
Besides the majority of gaming in the UK (in my experience) is in gamesworkshop stores. While some don't mind most woundn't allow a CD army unless it was counts as dwarves. If I am going to buy a complete non GW army I guess I might aswell try out their free game.
Da Boss wrote:Oh, I know what you're saying. And I understand the catering to a neglected demographic. I just wish they had injected more of their own creativity into the project, even looks wise.
I agree but why reinvent the wheel when there's already an established market?
@Kroothawk.
I've played both those lists with my CD army. The ravening hordes is too vanilla, none of the flavor of the original just dwarves with orcs and magic but without the cool artillery. The Indy book made the blunderbusses too OP for 8th edition with them able to hit every model in a unit with S5 on a 4+.....I took knights out with a unit of 15 and blocks of infantry just fell down when annihilators sneezed on them.
H.B.M.C. wrote:What's this? A company giving a preview of an upcoming race, talking about ideas, and listing the things that they want to do?
Don't they know the way to successfully preview new products is to send out newsletters that contain no info but tell you to wait a day and go to a website that also has no info? Keeping your customers in the dark is considerably more effective than "previewing" things.
Maybe the secrecy helps prevent their competitors from stealing their ideas before they get to market.
I feel sorry for companies like Mantic with this community sometimes. We have seen other small companies like Ex Illis get absolutely critically panned for having the temerity to release miniatures and games that aren't GW and on the other hand Mantic get stick for doing the opposite and filling a niche in GW's range.
filbert wrote:I feel sorry for companies like Mantic with this community sometimes. We have seen other small companies like Ex Illis get absolutely critically panned for having the temerity to release miniatures and games that aren't GW and on the other hand Mantic get stick for doing the opposite and filling a niche in GW's range.
With Ex Illis, my complaint is more that they've combined the worst aspects of tabletop and online gaming. It's not that they're doing new things, it's that they're doing the wrong new things.
With the Kaos Dwarves, my complaint is that Mantic's situation is practically designed to encourage innovation. They're a new company working on their own replacement for their competitor's abandoned product. They should be thinking about why people liked Chaos Dwarves, what held the army back, and what they can bring to the table apart from the moulding machine.
I disliked Ex Illis because you have to have a computer nearby to play. Oh, and no dice. What do you mean I can't use my giant tub of dice? O.o
I kinda like these khaos dwarves. I'm not actually a chaos dwarf fan, but it's nice to see someone doing it. So far I'm pretty impressed with Mantic, even if I don't like all their models. Now, if I can just tear some people away from WFB long enough to try the rules ...
AlexHolker wrote:With the Kaos Dwarves, my complaint is that Mantic's situation is practically designed to encourage innovation. They're a new company working on their own replacement for their competitor's abandoned product. They should be thinking about why people liked Chaos Dwarves, what held the army back, and what they can bring to the table apart from the moulding machine.
Why people liked Chaos Dwarfs, let's see:
Blunderbussers, Bull Centaurs, Lamassu, warriors with big hats... Yep. They've given people exactly what they want.
Gitzbitah wrote:That's what the army deals are for. Women in general, and wives in particular, are very susceptible to the idea of buying something if it is 'on sale'. Even if the 'on sale' item costs more than what you want from it, a bundle is easier to justify. Plus, it can be allowed to age longer than if you were to ask for just one box- after all, if you bought minis 2 months ago or a week ago, the monetary value is strictly secondary to the amount of time that has passed.
When mathematics and machinations fail, there are always flowers- although its best to buy and present them a day or two before you ask for the miniatures, lest you appear cheap and mercenary.
There is wisdom here... great wisdom.
Da Boss wrote:I would have liked some big beefy techno golem monster things, with the right look. And downtrodden slave orcs would be cool. The actual Chaos Dwarf plastics are a bit goofy, and to be honest, I am a bit unimpressed with the blatant ripping off of GW stuff.
I, too, would have liked that, and definitely it looks like the most positive feedback in this thread is for their most original idea- the steam/techno/wizard-thing. However, there's also the nostalgia affect, as Grimstonefire mentioned... I'd love to have a big hat, Lammasu-including army... although if they drop the ball on the Lammasu, it looks like raging heroes has that one covered!
Also... what a year for chaos dwarves, eh? Warhammer Forge making the land train (seemingly, from the WIP), Raging Heroes making the Lammasu... and Mantic making a whole range! Awesome 2011: The Year of the Chaos Dwarves!
BrookM wrote:My guess is the red and bronze is going to win, though the verdigris(SP?) model looks nice as well.
Allot of people have been saying that the red is very unoriginal in a way that it's an obvious wargame colour and already screams GW Chaos Dwarves. Many have suggested that a green/gold scheme be used instead. Sounds like a very good idea to me!
Grimstonefire wrote:As far as I know everything Mantic release for Khaos Dwarfs is metal (including metal upgrades for the existing plastic Dwarf sets).
That's a pity. I was actually looking forward to that exo-suit.
Compared to the regular dwarf huge army (Grafe's Iron Legion) you don't get a lot of figures for the Kaos Dwarf huge army. Is each army box based on points?
Sarge wrote:Compared to the regular dwarf huge army (Grafe's Iron Legion) you don't get a lot of figures for the Kaos Dwarf huge army. Is each army box based on points?
I imagine it's based on Mantic's metals costing four times as much as their plastics (12.5 pounds for 5 berserkers or 20 ironclads, for example).
Alpharius wrote:So, all Kaos Dwarf stuff is going to be metal and or metal add-ons to the plastic Dwarves?
so no new plastics at all for kaos dwarfs? i love mantic because of the cheap alternative plastics to GW, but using the same plastics for two different armies is going too far for my tastes
They do look very different. The bodies and heads are changed and that makes up most of the model. They have a lot of options to make them look different.
