In addition to that, Mantic stuff like this gets substantially cheaper in bulk, and they're currently (okay, technically) selling it priced for a low model count skirmish game. I'd say this is mainly the consequence of these plastics being in some weird limbo place between DZ on the one hand and the as of yet not all that, well, existent, WP3.0.

 Compel wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Twenty bucks for 6 dwarfs is a GW-level pricing disincentive. It's not like Mantic's new plastics have tons of extra bits, either. What in the hell were they thinking?

"These are the Forge Father equivalent of Space Marine Terminators, so 40% of the price, plus an extra model compared to them seems reasonable."

Would be my guess. In saying that, considering their price in £, around $18 for the 6 would seem a bit fairer. - And would still include an 'exchange rate' buffer of a couple of dollars.

"Because GW prices like that" is probably the worst tack a miniatures company can take. GW is hemorrhaging customers right now due to their prices and buffoonery, and they have the most iconic brand in the industry. Pricing their not-terminators like Terminators, or even anywhere close, misses the opportunity.

Besides, having seen the sprue pics, there is nothing about them at all to justify such premium pricing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 CptJake wrote:
No joke. For a couple of bucks more I can get really nice Wargames Factory zombie survivors, with 30 figures and a TON of extra weapons and accessories. Or 18 sci fi shock troopers.

That is how to price plastics...

This is what I'm thinking, too. Even the pricier Eisenkern come with tons of extra limbs for extra poses, plus extra sets of legs and arms that can be used to spruce up the leftover Shocktroops everyone has in their bits boxes. When the Valkir come out it will be a slaughter.

Mantic: That's the spirit!

Customer: No, your slaughter.

well if 60% cheaper falls within "anywhere close" I sure hope you're not a building inspector or anything of the sort

Debating the price - fine. I'd say $15 would be a more reasonable RRP for these too, but to say they're priced comparable to terminators? That's a little out there, Bob.

I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree there. In my view, less than half the price of the Terminator kit does indeed meet the "not even anywhere close" point to me.

 Bolognesus wrote:
In addition to that, Mantic stuff like this gets substantially cheaper in bulk, and they're currently (okay, technically) selling it priced for a low model count skirmish game. I'd say this is mainly the consequence of these plastics being in some weird limbo place between DZ on the one hand and the as of yet not all that, well, existent, WP3.0.

Jacking up the 'impulse buy' box price to make the bulk deal look better is asinine. They have direct competition right now in the sci-fi department that actually gives the customers a deal at the introductory set level, as well as potential bulk deals.

They've spent so long dealing with Mantic Fanatics that they've forgotten how to attract new customers who don't purchase like ScarletSquig does. Not that they've kept Scarlet Squig happy as a customer lately.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Bolognesus wrote:
well if 60% cheaper falls within "anywhere close" I sure hope you're not a building inspector or anything of the sort

Debating the price - fine. I'd say $15 would be a more reasonable RRP for these too, but to say they're priced comparable to terminators? That's a little out there, Bob.

More than $3 per figure, when the dwarfs have jack-all poseability or optional bits, puts them in a price point taken by metal boxes or more premium kits of plastic. Sorry if I don't know just how ridonkulous Terminators are these days, but arguing that expensive models are cheaper because Terminators are middle fingers with dollar signs attached is missing the point. Mantic isn;t selling terminators. They are selling decentish dwarfs with very little bling, flash or variety. They are not $3+ figures. Besides, the peacekeepers will be $4 per model, without all the options, bling and name-recognition that the competition has.

$15 before discount would be kind of high, but understandable. Still, it's not like they have a loan to pay off.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Compel wrote:
I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree there. In my view, less than half the price of the Terminator kit does indeed meet the "not even anywhere close" point to me.

Take a look at the sprue pics. Is that one sprue worth $20 to you? If so, great. We'll just have to disagree.

It's not 1989 anymore, you're not going to get 2 Land Raiders for 20 bucks. 3 dollars for a 28mm figure isn't a bad price, and that's before any volume discounts.

 MasterSlowPoke wrote:
It's not 1989 anymore, you're not going to get 2 Land Raiders for 20 bucks. 3 dollars for a 28mm figure isn't a bad price, and that's before any volume discounts.

And yet companies like Wargames Factory do give you a very good deal, a gak ton better than 20 bucks for a 6 figure sprue.

As well as Warlord, Perry, and Victrix. ~30 dudes for ~$40 USD, yes please.


That said, I am very happy with what I have received through the Deadzone project.

 MasterSlowPoke wrote:
It's not 1989 anymore, you're not going to get 2 Land Raiders for 20 bucks. 3 dollars for a 28mm figure isn't a bad price, and that's before any volume discounts.

For a plastic mini off a sprue, it is, in fact, a terrible price.

WGF gives you 5 times as many figures for the same price, and with tons of extras and arguably better quality. For sci fi, their Shock Troopers and the DFG stuff are both better deals with tons of extras and variety on the sprue.

The problem is that GW has been artificially inflating prices so insanely quickly that otherwise knowledgeable customers will excuse these ridiculous prices with all kinds of silly reasoning. But taking advantage of customers' self-abnegating reflexes will only work for so long. Today's customers aren't stuck buying one brand no matter what their prices are, but are better informed that they have more choice than ever before. After all, it's not the 90's anymore.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Compel wrote:


"These are the Forge Father equivalent of Space Marine Terminators, so 40% of the price, plus an extra model compared to them seems reasonable."
.

I just want to go back to this because I guess I misread it the first time.

Forgefathers are supposed to be counts-as Terminators? Based on what? Mantic's rule set? Well, that's cute. Better jack up the price.

If I'm going to use non-GW figures for counts-as terminators in 40k, why would I pick them instead of something cheaper? It's counts-as, right? Do Mantic believe their own hype? Why don't they price the kit to make it attractive on its own?

The website says the booster is £9.99 which is what $16 give or take?

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone/product/forge-father-forge-guard-booster.html

So not sure why they are charging $20

 carlos13th wrote:
The website says the booster is £9.99 which is what $16 give or take?

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone/product/forge-father-forge-guard-booster.html

So not sure why they are charging $20

Great, now click the little American flag in the upper right corner and the magic of the internet bumps the price up to $19.99.

Edit:
I think there's an error on the website; someone wasn't paying attention or the GBP just got a whole lot stronger.

I'm pretty sure it's been like that for months or longer.

 GrimDork wrote:
I'm pretty sure it's been like that for months or longer.

Then I guess they've learned the GW trick of regional pricing.

I did finish most of the DeadZone inspection and other than 2 missing Swordspawn, everything else was there and in mostly good shape. The Asterians had a lot of warped figues (about a half-dozen) but as spindly as they are I suppose that's not a huge shock.I thought about getting some more stuff on the third survey, but in the end I think I have enough after working with models off and on this weekend. I'm happy with everything I got, but I'm not really feeling like anything more is particularly needed.

In other news, my Mars Attacks game arrived yesterday, but between work and wanting to get DeadZone's stuff checked out I haven't gotten around to it. Tomorrow probably, and that will greatly influence whether or not Mantic sees any money for their DKQ or if it's a donation dollar.

Looking forward to the terrain stuff in a mini-DZ2.0 KS as well.

 Krinsath wrote:
The Asterians had a lot of warped figues (about a half-dozen) but as spindly as they are I suppose that's not a huge shock.

I noticed the same thing as I was cleaning mine. I just dumped them all in a bowl of near-boiling water and left them until the water cooled to room temperature. They all straightened right out. That probably wouldn't work if they weren't all so skinny, though.

Wait $20 US for 6 plastic figs?

As we are speaking about prices:

Mantic is becoming more and more greedy, specially in the sci-fi range. I got this feeling when the first steel warriors where released: a retoling of half a fantasy sprue, beying sold at 2x times the price of the fantasy thing it was based on.

That actually made me not want to buy them, and so i give it up from space dwarfs (for a while).

Now they apear to be goying back into a nice price model, at least for kickstarters...

Forge Guard should not be priced as (or even compared to) Terminators. The fluff suggests they are similar, but their size and poseability make them a lot more in line with PA Space Marines (indeed, im thinking about using them as such).

Zombies are good priced (i think), the bulk itself is impressive (c'mon, 80 models for 45?), specially with all that poseability and potential. I almost grabbed one bulk just for the sake of it (but remembered in time i dont have the space, the money or the reason for it ).

Now, we have not seem sprues of the Peacekeepers yet, and im not really sure about this. The price itself make it a good deal, but if the models come with weapon options and poseability, this can become a great "terminator like" kit, and it will be cheap.

After all, i just hope that mantic dont start to charge based on "unit utility" and keep charging by "cost to produce". And im still anxious about Warpath 3.0 Kickstarter

(But they have to fix some shipping issues first)

(sorry about the horrid text, im sleepy and wrote it very bad, i will not try to correct it, im still sleepy)

 mitch_rifle wrote:
Wait $20 US for 6 plastic figs?

That's what the store says.

I bet they think this will encourage customers to buy the big bulk boxes instead.

I guess it's the scifi tax

$20 for six for a sprue sans options is pretty steep. Of course, I'm definitely not in the sci-fi dwarf fan camp, so maybe there are enough people who will pay that to make it worth losing sales from people put off by the price. I don't begrudge them charging what they want for their product, but I think the "cheaper than random GW kit" isn't really the best pricing policy.

 agnosto wrote:

 GrimDork wrote:
I'm pretty sure it's been like that for months or longer.

Then I guess they've learned the GW trick of regional pricing.

I've posted about that very thing in the past. Mantic want non-UK/Euro, non-US customers to pay for their orders in US$ for no real reason - I'm not able to pay in £UKP, and the exchange rate that they use is such that I don't order directly from them at all. Their prices are slowly crawling towards GW of a few years ago, but without the quality.

Would I pay double to get these instead?




Or these?



Yes. Yes I would.

While GW prices are insanity, one thing which cannot be argued with is the quality is top-notch at all times, with the exception of some of the finecast

 agnosto wrote:

 carlos13th wrote:
The website says the booster is £9.99 which is what $16 give or take?

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone/product/forge-father-forge-guard-booster.html

So not sure why they are charging $20

Great, now click the little American flag in the upper right corner and the magic of the internet bumps the price up to $19.99.

Edit:
I think there's an error on the website; someone wasn't paying attention or the GBP just got a whole lot stronger.

Yeah I did that. That's why I was confused.

 mitch_rifle wrote:
While GW prices are insanity, one thing which cannot be argued with is the quality is top-notch at all times, with the exception of some of the finecast

Nowhere else will you find a higher quality viking space hover chariot pulled by wolves ; p

Freshly acquired tackle boxen in hand, I go forth to catalog wave 2 and populate my missing parts survey.

I could have sworn I had two dwarf baggies but now it seems that I only have one, so time to update my initial spot-check from the deck to the entire faction starter

True but you dont deal with the horror that is restic, ive tried building my corporation but its just terrible

Ugh, I seem to be missing one of those giant mining drills for the Forge Fathers. I wasn't aware I was supposed to get two of them when I was arranging replacements from Mantic and I feel kinda bad about complaining again.

Also, does anyone else feel the original Forge Fathers quad gun model is way more appropriate for the Urban Demolisher rules than the modified Deadzone model?

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Ugh, I seem to be missing one of those giant mining drills for the Forge Fathers. I wasn't aware I was supposed to get two of them when I was arranging replacements from Mantic and I feel kinda bad about complaining again.

Also, does anyone else feel the original Forge Fathers quad gun model is way more appropriate for the Urban Demolisher rules than the modified Deadzone model?

It appears that the drill thing from the booster is the only thing I'm missing this time around; they even sent more dice.

I agree the original quad-gun thing makes more sense in a skirmish game than a drill. They don't have time to do any prospecting if they're just landing, looting and leaving (the three L's).

@agnosto I think he means the Urban demolisher, the late-coming add-on, not the inferno drill. It's basically the Jotunn cannon but with a couple of different parts. I think it's like a single high power auto-cannon with a mini-demolisher-like-scoop/plow instead of a quad-cannon like the original piece. I agree that the basic mode seems better, or possibly the Sutr heavy heat cannon even.

I'm missing the drill from my booster bundle as well. Is this "normal"? I thought I read in an update somewhere that it had been overlooked and was supposed to be sorted, might go check. --edit-- can't seem to find it now though

Asterians are ok so far, bendy but all present. The drone platforms and bikes are especially neat.

Forge father stuff looks fine too, just missing the starter and the drill out of the booster (and the plastic sprues but that's been addressed obviously).

Amusing enough to me is that the main thing I'm missing (FFFS) is not checked off on the invoice/description sheet

Another reason to check your bags carefully. My marauder upgrade pack has the right number of components but the arm to hold the HMG is missing and there's an extra claw arm. Not sure I'm too fussed, can likely use one of the extra arms created by this set to fill in, and then I've got an extra claw!

Yes, they forgot to pack the Inferno Drill in the booster bundle for everyone, they're going to send it along with the Forge Guard sprues

Thanks I thought I read that somewhere. Guess all I need to survey for are two zombie sprues and a forge guard faction starter then.

 GrimDork wrote:
My marauder upgrade pack has the right number of components but the arm to hold the HMG is missing and there's an extra claw arm. Not sure I'm too fussed, can likely use one of the extra arms created by this set to fill in, and then I've got an extra claw!

Yeah, about that Marauder upgrade pack . . . how is it? Any good?

Interesting thing about those Marauders and conversions. Generally speaking, Mantic's (Deadzone) Marauders are smaller than GW Orks. However, while GW Ork heads are much bigger than Marauder heads, GW Ork arms tend to be skinnier. (Check out the arms on Mantic's knife-fighting Marauder, now compare them to the average GW Ork arm.)

"One item that has been brought to our attention as missing is the Inferno Drill and Brokkr Engineer from the Forge Father Booster Bundle. Unfortunately this item was indeed mis-packed. Anyone who is owed one will receive it as part of their final shipment. Please do not fill out the missing bits form if you've not received one of these in your Booster Bundle."

So the drill will be sorted, yay!

@Vermonter
The casting quality seems good enough, and I like the variation of the heads. Sizing seems right.

 Gallahad wrote:
$20 for six for a sprue sans options is pretty steep.

There have been several people who have said that the Forge Guard and Peacekeepers sprues do not have options. However, that is not true.

As previously reported:

A sprue of five Enforcer Peacekeepers includes: (listing based on message on Mantic Facebook 9/25/2014):
5 x Peacekeeper (different poses/legs) with extra heads
1 x Wrist Blade Arm (left)
5 x Rifle Arms (right)
5 x Energy Gauntlet Arms (left)
5 x Defender Shields
1 x Incinerator arm (right)
1 x Burst Laser arm (right)

As for the Forge Guard: (listing based on previously shown sprue layout, Deadzone Kickstarter Update #152, 7/16/2014):
5 x Forge Guard (different bodies, left & right legs, upper torsos with heads)
1 x Forge Father Huscarl in Forge Guard Armor
6 x Arms with Heat Hammers (left)
8 x Ranged Weapon Arms (right)
6 x Hailstorm Rifle
1 x Heat Cannon
1 x Autocannon
1 x Missile Launcher

I know the power mauls got nixed from the peacekeeper sprues, but I wonder what happened with those neat not-lighting not-claws they had?

 GrimDork wrote:
I know the power mauls got nixed from the peacekeeper sprues, but I wonder what happened with those neat not-lighting not-claws they had?

Would that be the wrist blade mentioned?

Nah they had honest-go-goodness not-lightning-claws. I'll see if I can find a picture. And it wasn't one, i think it was meant to be the CC option. Could have been dropped too...


These.

I would think they might be a half-sprue upgrade for DZ1.5/WP0.5

Or they just dropped them from the fluff/models because, honestly, as much as I love LC and TH/SS terminators, it's a ridiculous concept

They were dropped, but I can't recall why. Might be in favour of the shields.

I liked having extra close combat options, but then again, that's probably just my fantasy/ melee bias showing.

I totally would have had all my peacekeepers hand to hand focused if they'd kept those.

'Got my missing parts survey has been completed' e-mail. Of course, now I'm finding more stuff as I assemble, but that's different. I may just save those for post Wave 3.

Peacekeepers not having the claws makes Srg howlet more special too I suppose.

Not sure I'd take a peacekeeper with brawler and no ranged weapon over the standard power clove and dominator rifle anyway.

As a side note... Worst model to assemble so far? Nyx? the Plague merc with the glaive. Ugh. The glaive is waaaay too thin and bends like crazy and she had some pretty impressive metal flash.

Speaking of bulk deals the Zombies are on preorder

75 for $79.99/£49.99/€59.95 (limited offer ends 31st October)


http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone/product/plague-zombie-mega-deal-75-figures.html

20 are $24.99/£14.99/€17.99

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone/product/plague-zombies-20-figures.html

Individual sprues are $9.99/£4.99/€6.50

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone/product/sci-fi-zombie-sprue-5-figures.html

I can see why they waited until the third wave survey closed before putting them up the 80 for $45 was a great deal.

The individual zombie sprue price also gives a good indicator that an individual sprue of Forge Guard at $20 is a bit high.

 CptJake wrote:
The individual zombie sprue price also gives a good indicator that an individual sprue of Forge Guard at $20 is a bit high.

Heh. I thought we moved past that.

I've got some of those zombies on my DBX pledge. I'm tempted to order some now, but should probably just hold off until I get the ones from my pledge. They seem pretty reasonably priced as well.

I almost got a second bundle but it seemed overkill.

 CptJake wrote:
The individual zombie sprue price also gives a good indicator that an individual sprue of Forge Guard at $20 is a bit high.

Unless you consider that the Forge Guard come on two zombie-sized sprues. As per this update (and me actually getting a look at an unfinished run).

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1744629938/deadzone-the-sci-fi-miniatures-board-game/posts/911998

Yeah the zombie sprues aren't very big, 5.5x7" roughly.

I don't think I'd wanna pay $10 for 5 of them, though they are quite nice.

75 for 80 bucks though is solid even if it's roughly half the deal we got as backers. Even the 20 for $25 isn't too bad, any hard plastic figures for a dollar a model (or slightly more) seems good. Especially when/if these show up at my favorite 3rd party r/etailer.

I guess we'll see on the other stuff, $20 msrp for peacekeepers is probably fine to me, especially when I get them for $16 a miniature market. Enforcers hopefully are cheaper though. Maybe 10 for $25? 10 for 20 is more what I was hoping for but I doubt it now. Still... figuring in for the bundle price they could still do pretty well.

I haven't seen it mentioned here, but the Mars Attacks figures, while actually pretty good in my opinion, are smaller than Mantic minis from other ranges.

That's fine for Mars Attacks, which is self-contained anyway, and it's even fine for me using the Martians in Deadzone crossover games, because who's to say what the proper size of a Martian relative to a Rebs human is anyway?

But Dreadball has an established scale in place already, and DBX should, in my opinion, maintain it since the two are cross-compatible. Brokkrs shouldn't look tiny relative to the Midgard Delvers, etc.

So I emailed Mantic about it, and received this response from Chris.

"We are working on making sure the scale is the same. I think it's more a case that the sculpts for Mars Attacks are indeed slighter, as we've used a different sculptor on the range than we do normally."

Just thought I'd pass that along, in case anyone else cares.

I'll give you that some of the female heroes are smaller...

But the corporation marines seem pretty close to the human soldiers. If there are any models folks are specifically concerned about I have most of what they make for DZ and the box game of MA, no DB though, I could take some photos as requested.

Just read through the escalation book (backers should have a link to it for wargamevault), and the scenarios all sound pretty fun They added some more complicated rules, without them being too complicated imo.

 pretre wrote:

 CptJake wrote:
The individual zombie sprue price also gives a good indicator that an individual sprue of Forge Guard at $20 is a bit high.

Heh. I thought we moved past that.

The Forge Guard sprue also looks to be at least twice the size /shrug

The Martians in Mars attacks are smaller than humans in general I think

They're thinner, but they're an entirely different race and not out of scale just by being smaller than humans.

I mean some of the girls are a bit smaler:


But then some people are.


*also as a side note, I'm not trying to argue with anyone here other than to mildly disagree with the humans being smaller in general.

 judgedoug wrote:

 Gallahad wrote:
$20 for six for a sprue sans options is pretty steep.

There have been several people who have said that the Forge Guard and Peacekeepers sprues do not have options. However, that is not true.

As previously reported:

A sprue of five Enforcer Peacekeepers includes: (listing based on message on Mantic Facebook 9/25/2014):
5 x Peacekeeper (different poses/legs) with extra heads
1 x Wrist Blade Arm (left)
5 x Rifle Arms (right)
5 x Energy Gauntlet Arms (left)
5 x Defender Shields
1 x Incinerator arm (right)
1 x Burst Laser arm (right)

As for the Forge Guard: (listing based on previously shown sprue layout, Deadzone Kickstarter Update #152, 7/16/2014):
5 x Forge Guard (different bodies, left & right legs, upper torsos with heads)
1 x Forge Father Huscarl in Forge Guard Armor
6 x Arms with Heat Hammers (left)
8 x Ranged Weapon Arms (right)
6 x Hailstorm Rifle
1 x Heat Cannon
1 x Autocannon
1 x Missile Launcher

Thanks for the heads up, my mistake. I thought it was just one sprue, not two. Still not worth $20 for me, but at least you get some left over guns and stuff.

Does anyone happen to know (or have they even said) when the Contagion book is supposed to hit retail? I would love a copy of A.I. rules.

This month. There should also be a nice Boxset with zombies, defence lines, the deck and the book.

I had another look at my US soldiers and Mantic Corp troopers. The difference is indeed pretty slight, and I think Chris! was correct - most of the difference is down to different sculptural styles rather than scale. The Corp Troopers look a bit (a bit) more heroic scaled next to the CGI, realistically proportioned US troopers, which I think is more down to Remy's style than size differences. But they do look good together, regardless.

That said, I'd never field both of them as part of the same unit; only a delusional madman would attempt that, bringing shame and disgrace on his family name for generations to come.

(Actually I'll be quite interested to see how your work on integrating the two progresses, GrimDork.)

I had looked at the Corp soldier / trooper duo prior to my original post, and found the difference larger at the time. I suppose that's what second looks are for.

Still, it's nice to know Mantic care about having some scale continuity between DB and DBX.

I figure the human soldiers are the budget meatshields, given only solid projectile weapons and discount body armor. Just because everyone compares them to guardsmen certainly doesn't mean corporation troops are just as 'bad'. I think they're actually very hightech and disciplined, so a gruntier class of soldier makes sense to me

Looking forward to getting those MA tiger corps dudes, they're practically a deadzone team all on their own

Aren't we going to be able to get Deadzone stats for a lot of this stuff as well? I think I pledged for that...

Yeah there are supposed to be two faction decks, one for the human forces and one for the martians. Supposedly everything gets a card, but we haven't heard about it for months and months.

If you're talking about DZ decks for the MA factions, Miniature Market has them up for pre-order along with the Forge Father-related DZ stuff. Don't know a date or anything but MM has a good track record of not putting it up until it's reasonably certain to come out in a few weeks.

Well I certainly hope it ends up in my big giant box of stuff that Mantic has to hold on to while they wait for those robot legs.

Anyone who get their pledge order a DZ deck as well? Are these coming separately?

 judgedoug wrote:

 Gallahad wrote:
$20 for six for a sprue sans options is pretty steep.

There have been several people who have said that the Forge Guard and Peacekeepers sprues do not have options. However, that is not true.

As previously reported:

A sprue of five Enforcer Peacekeepers includes: (listing based on message on Mantic Facebook 9/25/2014):
5 x Peacekeeper (different poses/legs) with extra heads
1 x Wrist Blade Arm (left)
5 x Rifle Arms (right)
5 x Energy Gauntlet Arms (left)
5 x Defender Shields
1 x Incinerator arm (right)
1 x Burst Laser arm (right)

The extra heads are a big deal for me, so I'm glad to hear it. The 3 additional weapon options are pretty bare bones, obviously on the sprue because they're in the codex (er, pdf), but still a nice touch. The defender shields I thought were going to be restic. Still, in plastic they'd be useful for conversions. They definitely add some value to the sprue. I'd definitely pay $10 for 5 of them.

Wait, how much are they retailing for? 5 for $20? Maybe that will seem like a better deal after Mantic bases a NYT Bestselling series on them and then runs it into the ground...

As for the Forge Guard: (listing based on previously shown sprue layout, Deadzone Kickstarter Update #152, 7/16/2014):
5 x Forge Guard (different bodies, left & right legs, upper torsos with heads)
1 x Forge Father Huscarl in Forge Guard Armor
6 x Arms with Heat Hammers (left)
8 x Ranged Weapon Arms (right)
6 x Hailstorm Rifle
1 x Heat Cannon
1 x Autocannon
1 x Missile Launcher

OK, so I may have exaggerated slightly by saying no options. However, there are no extra CC arms for poseability, no extra heads, and only three optional extra weapons.

0 optional heads
2 optional RIGHT arms
0 optional left arms
3 optional heavy weapons
0 optional leg poses
Less variety than a restic kit, it seems like.

Compare that to the Eisenkern, with all their extra arms, separate heads for pose-and-swapability, and the 2 extra sets of legs, and pouches and ammo drums. The Eisenkern are just a little more than half the price. The sprues they come on are probably twice the size of the Forgeguard sprue, and you get two for the 10-man squad. WGF's Shock Troops have fewer torsos, but many more head and weapon options. And they're just a smidge over a dollar each!

Enforcers get restic shields, Peacekeepers get hard plastic shields. No, I don't know why, but that's the way it is.

As for the price, I think all their stuff has only middling price value when you buy the minimum amount, it's when you buy in bulk that the savings kick in: Corporation Marines are $25 for 10, $35 for 20. Marauder grunts are $20 and $35. Stormrage Veterans are $18 for 5 and $25 for 10. Veer-myn Nightmares are $20 and $25.

When I looked at Eisenkern they were practically the same price for a 10 man box as what Mantic were offering with Marines, silly given how much nicer the Eisenkern are, but when you wanted 3 or 4 boxes worth the total price for the Eisenkern went up a lot faster than the Marines because Dreamforge don't have a whole lot of bulk discount.

The value is really up to you, and how many of them you need.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

The extra heads are a big deal for me, so I'm glad to hear it. The 3 additional weapon options are pretty bare bones, obviously on the sprue because they're in the codex (er, pdf), but still a nice touch. The defender shields I thought were going to be restic. Still, in plastic they'd be useful for conversions. They definitely add some value to the sprue. I'd definitely pay $10 for 5 of them.
Wait, how much are they retailing for? 5 for $20? Maybe that will seem like a better deal after Mantic bases a NYT Bestselling series on them and then runs it into the ground...

Yah, and again, I was posting just the contents (not a defense of the price). To me, they are absolutely worth $10 for five, so I loaded up on them.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

[snip Forge Guard]
OK, so I may have exaggerated slightly by saying no options. However, there are no extra CC arms for poseability, no extra heads, and only three optional extra weapons.

0 optional heads
2 optional RIGHT arms
0 optional left arms
3 optional heavy weapons
0 optional leg poses
Less variety than a restic kit, it seems like.

Compare that to the Eisenkern, with all their extra arms, separate heads for pose-and-swapability, and the 2 extra sets of legs, and pouches and ammo drums. The Eisenkern are just a little more than half the price. The sprues they come on are probably twice the size of the Forgeguard sprue, and you get two for the 10-man squad. WGF's Shock Troops have fewer torsos, but many more head and weapon options. And they're just a smidge over a dollar each!

I agree that sprue layout was rather odd - I believe the extra Right arms are so you can magnetize the arms? It could also be that the render they showed just had extra right arms and maybe there's supposed to be a left arm, too - it was months and months ago.
To be fair, the head is integrated into the upper shoulder region.
And yeah, I doubt anyone will ever be as good a deal as Wargames Factory is, even after their recent price increase (even Mantic's old 2011 deals have never been as good as WGF). Their AWI figs are breaking the bank at $1 apiece (25 for $24.95), compared to their WSS figs (36 for $21.95 (previously $19.95))

My Super Duper Theory is that the DZ1.5/WP0.5 Kickstarter will introduce additional sprues for the Enforcers, Forge Guard, and Peacekeepers, that will include more weapons options. So a Forge Guard standard sprue just has heat hammers, rifles, heavy weapons. Then the additional sprue will have other close combat options, alternate guns, etc. Same with the Peacekeepers - a second sprue containing the power mauls and wolverine claws, etc.

Regarding prices, I am very pleased with my Kickstarter discounts and, of course, I never buy Mantic at retail price. Their one-player starter armies and full army boxes tend to be heavily discounted, and then coupled with most 20-30% off online stores, is about the only way I've bought figs, and I've never had a problem with that.

Nice little Contagion Expansion Pack available at Wayland Games over here in the UK.

Rulebook, 30 Zombies, AI Deck and one ruined scenery sprue for £26.99.


http://www.waylandgames.co.uk/mantic-games/deadzone/deadzone-contagion-expansion-/prod_30086.html

I have not seen this on the Mantic site, I hope it is a full on release rather than just a Wayland deal.

Also all 6 of the metal characters are available individually or as a Rogue's Gallery:

http://www.waylandgames.co.uk/mantic-games/deadzone/rogues-gallery/prod_30087.html

And for a bit cheaper than the Kickstarter character bundle, too.

Yeah, I'll almost certainly grab that Contagion bundle (once I've stopped being annoyed at Wayland for still not shipping Icestorm) as it's less that buying 30 zombies on their own, so you're basically getting the book, AI deck (I need that a lot), Ruin sprue for free over RRP!

That is why I am hoping it is a general release bundle so I can get it from the far more reliable Element Games.

Yea don't really want to order anything else off of Wayland because of icestorm.

But that deal is really good. Hmm tempted

I'm hoping Mantic themselves will be putting this up on their webstore soon. If they don't and it goes all limited edition-y and GW-y that's my sign to quit.
I won't be ordering from Wayland because of problems (and month after month of waits) for a Zombicide order I had with them.

NTRabbit wrote:
Enforcers get restic shields, Peacekeepers get hard plastic shields. No, I don't know why, but that's the way it is.

As for the price, I think all their stuff has only middling price value when you buy the minimum amount, it's when you buy in bulk that the savings kick in: Corporation Marines are $25 for 10, $35 for 20. Marauder grunts are $20 and $35. Stormrage Veterans are $18 for 5 and $25 for 10. Veer-myn Nightmares are $20 and $25.

When I looked at Eisenkern they were practically the same price for a 10 man box as what Mantic were offering with Marines, silly given how much nicer the Eisenkern are, but when you wanted 3 or 4 boxes worth the total price for the Eisenkern went up a lot faster than the Marines because Dreamforge don't have a whole lot of bulk discount.

The value is really up to you, and how many of them you need.

I need 10 to 20, with the option to get 10 to 20 more if I love them. I am the customer Mantic apparently despises; I buy all of their ranges (except Veermyn), but only in considerable (for Mantic) moderation.

I stopped buying big bulk deals a while ago, especially if they include any restic figures. I still haven't assembled my Revenant cavalry or my Orc cavalry. Heck, I haven't finished assembling most of the GW plastics I've bought. But that doesn't mean I'm necessarily okay spending more per troop because I'm buying less. I'm not. I have less to spend, so when I do buy minis, I'm just buying a bigger variety of single kits to find out what I like and try new things. Mantic is pricing their plastics out of this impulse buy range for me, 'betraying' what I thought Mantic was all about back when I bought their elves and dwarfs on pre-order to support them. So I might just fall in love with some other range of minis before I get over my bad feelings toward Mantic.


Besides, their bulk deals should have achieved or beaten the 5 for $10 deal. Again, they have already paid off the tooling with Kickstarter so there's no reason for them to price their minis higher than that. At, say 40 or more models for $60, Mantic could very quickly dominate the market. At $4 each, their minis become far less attractive.

http://www.miniaturemarket.com/catalog/product/view/id/42249/s/mgdzm15-1/

Looks like that same expansion we were discussing earlier (30 zombies, bit of terrain, contagion 'book'), is available from miniature market too.

30 zombies is... probably enough for the solo campaign. You'll have to recycle them as they die and possibly 'forget' to spawn extras towards the end of missions. I know my 20-25 z-corp were barely able to keep up with the first one.

A good deal too if you ask me, 30 zombies plus a bit of terrain, the book (it's tiny though, not sure I'd be willing to pay $5 for it solo) and the AI deck (not sure why those things are 8-10 dollars solo, maybe cards are expensive to print?) makes for a pretty solid purchase.

 GrimDork wrote:
(not sure why those things are 8-10 dollars solo, maybe cards are expensive to print?) makes for a pretty solid purchase.

Bicycle printed playing cards on kickstarter tend to go for $10-15 a deck, so yeah it's probably the price of printing

The Wolsung deck of cards was $10 as well

That deal on MM has been up for a while. I'm waiting to see if there's a better deal direct from Mantic, or on their new KS.

Don't really need the Zombies, got 60 coming from DBX.

Agree that 30 is cutting slightly tight on the solo campaign. I had 30 out on the board and had to forget extra spawning in the last few turns. This may explain how I even got one enforcer off the board! It was brutal, the speed at which the zombies move meant shooting was a really really bad idea. As was standing and fighting! Actually it was run or die.... Maybe I need some more practice.

I only wish the Zombies were a troops option for Plague.

Anyone house ruled that yet? What points value would you assign to them?

Well, going off of the official Plague list they had for WP2, I'd guess around 3 pts per Zombie, when comparing the cost per model for other DZ vs WP2 stuff

I feel 3 pts would be on the cheap side for their abilities, though. I'm not sure they're any worse than a 3A.

3A has a 6+ range 6 rifle and 1 armour to go along with the 5+ melee, and is fast. 3Z is not fast and only has the melee.

Haven't read contagion to see what the 3Z special rules are, but it seems like they'd be little more than cheap bullet shields that can't shoot back in a regular game

Got my wave 3 paypal invoice today. Any idea how long we have to pay it?

NTRabbit wrote:
3A has a 6+ range 6 rifle and 1 armour to go along with the 5+ melee, and is fast. 3Z is not fast and only has the melee.

Haven't read contagion to see what the 3Z special rules are, but it seems like they'd be little more than cheap bullet shields that can't shoot back in a regular game

3Z has Tough instead of 1 Armour, so it's actually harder to damage. It's also immune to pinning/suppression, albeit at the cost of being more vulnerable to Blaze Away damage. And it gains +1 attack and +1AP for each and every other 3Z in the same cube, rather than the usual outnumber bonus.

 edlowe wrote:
Got my wave 3 paypal invoice today. Any idea how long we have to pay it?

Until 31st October Ed.

Blaze away from enforcers fuggin *slays* zombies though, and you can kill more than one at a time once they start clustering up.

Between s3 and 3d, what role are you guys hoping for zombies to fill? Or is it more about not liking the s3 models?

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:

 edlowe wrote:
Got my wave 3 paypal invoice today. Any idea how long we have to pay it?

Until 31st October Ed.

Thanks Thraxas, just after payday

 GrimDork wrote:
Blaze away from enforcers fuggin *slays* zombies though, and you can kill more than one at a time once they start clustering up.

Between s3 and 3d, what role are you guys hoping for zombies to fill? Or is it more about not liking the s3 models?

I'm wanting them to fill the role of "the horde", as in "Alex C gets to play a zombie horde directed by a Stage 1 because that would be awesome".

Hmm not sure then. You may have to do some playtesting, I would assume somewhere between 3-4 points though they're sort of designed around being off the points system and just being plopped down in buckets by the rules in contagion.

Cool, thanks for the suggestions!

Seems like something you wouldn't so much want to bring to a pick-up game and try to get fly, but that could be pretty awesome for a custom campaign. Like the solo zombie campaign but for two or more players.

So, it'll be about another month until all of Mars Attacks has finished shipping.

DBX was supposed to ship by then, but I guess it'll be pushed back so the gap between MA and DBX will remain the same as originally intended - about 3 months IIRC?

Mantic now have the Contagion stuff and various bundles up for preorder.
http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/pre-order/deadzone.html

Also on the latest newsletter we appear to have the name for the next Deadzone Kickstarter, Deadzone Infestation with a tiny and largely gibberish image:

Looks like they found a lot of chatter about outbreaks, viruses, and pandemics, is that how they'd refer to Veer-Myn?

Also, I really hope they focus on hard plastic. I'm putting some of the zombies together right now and you can barely see the mold lines, and they take a few seconds to remove. If the peacekeepers, enforcers, and forgeguard are this good... much happiness. The plastic mix feels "right" this time around too. The men at arms I got in the crazy box were hard plastic but they seemed stiffer or more brittle or something, not restic but not ideal hard plastic. I can't tell the difference between my KoW zombie/ghoul parts and the new scifi zombies, it's good stuff. Almost wish I'd gotten a second bundle at this point

My only complaint about the zombies is that as modular as they are it's kind of an illusion, or at least it is without greenstuff. One torso has a single head option without extensive conversion leaving 6 torsos, and some of the heads seem shoehorned onto specific torsos given how they mount. Easily fixable, I mean I did the old Z-corp kitbash no problem, these just aren't as out-of-the-box-no-cutting-putty-skills-accessible as I thought they might be. Still a solid B+ or A kit, but the modularity stuff kind of steals the + off the A for me.

Someone needs to teach Mantic about ball joints. I got an email from Sarah asking me to specify which of my Plague Stage 2 is missing it's head. and which Enforcer legs were miscast. This pissed me off rather a lot, since my missing parts form went in about 2 weeks ago now. I replied back tersely to the effect that I don't have the time nor inclination at this point to go burrowing through all that restic gak to push-fit each figure together in order to figure out exactly which one is missing/which sets of arms go with which head. I can make any of the heads work. I also mentioned I was on the verge of setting the lot of it on fire and putting the result on youtube when I received it. (which was completely true.)

So anyway - the point of my rant is that even on the Restic models, they need to start using ball joints instead of L-joins. They won't of course, because Mantic as a miniature producing company seems to have a learning disability and an inability to see the bleeding obvious.

 Azazelx wrote:
Someone needs to teach Mantic about ball joints. I got an email from Sarah asking me to specify which of my Plague Stage 2 is missing it's head. and which Enforcer legs were miscast. This pissed me off rather a lot, since my missing parts form went in about 2 weeks ago now. I replied back tersely to the effect that I don't have the time nor inclination at this point to go burrowing through all that restic gak to push-fit each figure together in order to figure out exactly which one is missing/which sets of arms go with which head. I can make any of the heads work. I also mentioned I was on the verge of setting the lot of it on fire and putting the result on youtube when I received it. (which was completely true.)

So anyway - the point of my rant is that even on the Restic models, they need to start using ball joints instead of L-joins. They won't of course, because Mantic as a miniature producing company seems to have a learning disability and an inability to see the bleeding obvious.

That's the spirit, give em hell! I didn't even bother checking wave two, just put the box away with the realisation that I just don't care what's in it.

I had no problems assembling mine

so....

"If you backers have any issues then here's a few really clear pictures with labels so you can identify anything that might be missing and we'll fix it"

"I'm missing a part"

"Which part?"

"HOW DARE YOU ASK ME TO TAKE A LOOK AT THE INFORMATION YOU ALREADY PROVIDED US TO SOLVE THIS EXACT TYPE OF ISSUE?! THAT WILL DEFINITELY TAKE ME 5 MINUTES, POSSIBLY ALMOST 10! I ALREADY TOLD YOU: IT'S A PART! THE KIND THAT FITS ON ANOTHER PART! THAT'S IT, I'M DONE! I'M BURNING ALL THE REST OF IT!"

Sounds reasonable.

You left out the part where this is the fifth KS he felt burned him.

I completely sympathize with not wanting to trawl through all the restic. I haven't even checked all my Relic Knights for missing parts yet. Not everybody has the time to put everything together immediately, or the space to leave all the bits in neat piles on a table for weeks, or the patience to either re-bag everything in new zip loc bags or to throw it all together and then re-sort everything when you want to build them.

You cut open the bag, you lay the parts in the bag on the desk, you check it against the labeled photo provided at Mission Control, you do a quick once over for irreparable casting issues, you jot down any problems you find, you put the bits back in the bag and the bag back in the box.

Takes 5 minutes a bag at most, no more space than you use to build and paint your minis, and can be spread out over a week with a large order. Not feeling the sympathy.

 Kalamadea wrote:
so....

"If you backers have any issues then here's a few really clear pictures with labels so you can identify anything that might be missing and we'll fix it"
"I'm missing a part"
"Which part?"
"HOW DARE YOU ASK ME TO TAKE A LOOK AT THE INFORMATION YOU ALREADY PROVIDED US TO SOLVE THIS EXACT TYPE OF ISSUE?! THAT WILL DEFINITELY TAKE ME 5 MINUTES, POSSIBLY ALMOST 10! I ALREADY TOLD YOU: IT'S A PART! THE KIND THAT FITS ON ANOTHER PART! THAT'S IT, I'M DONE! I'M BURNING ALL THE REST OF IT!"

Sounds reasonable.

It was stuff not included in those pictures. The information was in an old KS update and not linked from their website or anywhere. You're also conflating the original issue with the more recent one.
Solution to the second one: just send me two torsos and any stage 2 head and I'll fething make them fit. I'm also well fething over wasting time on their gakky lack of QA. I already spent more time on going through each unlabelled baggie of gak restic than the models deserve.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

NTRabbit wrote:
You cut open the bag, you lay the parts in the bag on the desk, you check it against the labeled photo provided at Mission Control, you do a quick once over for irreparable casting issues, you jot down any problems you find, you put the bits back in the bag and the bag back in the box.
Takes 5 minutes a bag at most, no more space than you use to build and paint your minis, and can be spread out over a week with a large order. Not feeling the sympathy.

I've already done that, and noted down what was missing (it took well over an hour). I'm just not interested in going through the pile of gak to find the exact two bags (I have more than 1 of each) and then playing push-fit for 20 minutes to find the exact head from the exact model when I can just make any appropriate head or torsos fit. Now they got back to me with "which of the models is missing the head?" when - guess what, braniac? The heads on mission control all look the fething same and aren't individually labelled. I got a new pair of pictures with the expectation that I was going to go through them again and play push-fit so I could see which individual almost-identical figure parts are miscast.


Oh yeah, it also took them almost 2 weeks to get back to me to ask "which tiny head and legs exactly?"

I should also point out that I'm not feeling charitable to spending the time going through all of their gak, and a large part of my "set this gak on fire" rage is not only due to the large number of unlabelled baggies or the relatively small number of miscast and missing figures (there were also a few of those), but also because they didn't even add my three expansion rulebooks to the invoice, unsurprisingly resulting in no rulebooks.

I'm just over their inability to pack things competently. Every fething order from them I've ever gotten had required fixing up, often over weeks turning into months of back and forth before I've finally got it all properly in hand. With this in mind, my patience with Mantic has gotten much smaller.

Basically, if they hadn't fethed up on sending me my rulebooks, I'd be much more ambivalent towards the rest of it. And I'm sure I would have even played a game of DZ instead of putting it all in a couple of boxes in the shed in disgust. As it happens, the whole thing just pisses me off, and I want it to be over ASAP so I can forget it exists for awhile. Much like Sedition Wars is still put away.

NTRabbit wrote:
You cut open the bag, you lay the parts in the bag on the desk, you check it against the labeled photo provided at Mission Control, you do a quick once over for irreparable casting issues, you jot down any problems you find, you put the bits back in the bag and the bag back in the box.

Takes 5 minutes a bag at most, no more space than you use to build and paint your minis, and can be spread out over a week with a large order. Not feeling the sympathy.

Not everything listed on the Mission Control page has a link to pictures.

Please don't be unpleasant to CS staff. They're rarely associated with the cause of your problem, and are only trying to help and get things right for you.

It just helps no one, in the end.

Can we be unpleasant to QA staff instead?

I thought Mantic just had three employees and a dog..?

Joyboozer wrote:
Can we be unpleasant to QA staff instead?

Go for it. You think they get smiled at for thing going wrong?

 sukura636 wrote:

Joyboozer wrote:
Can we be unpleasant to QA staff instead?

Go for it. You think they get smiled at for thing going wrong?

I'm not sure, but it's not working.

So, has anyone seen Scarlet Squig lately? Is he all right?

Man. I don't get some folks. I really had no problem identifying missing or bad parts and getting it sorted. It's not rocket surgery.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
So, has anyone seen Scarlet Squig lately? Is he all right?

I don't know, but I assumed that he's spending more time on the official playtesting group, now that he's a member. He may be busy conversing more directly with Mantic staff and getting the lowdown on what's actually happening at Mantic HQ, rather than speculating about it like we do here.

That's what I'd expect to happen if Mantic hired him full-on, anyway. The playtest group seems like a sort of "foot in the door" / unpaid internship sort of thing, and those generally vary quite a bit in terms of how much the official crew participate with the volunteers. If he's lucky, he's making concrete changes to the Deadzone Rebs deck and debating with Ronnie about what will be on the Veer-myn hard plastic sprue.

It's a loss for us if he's moved on to better things, but good luck to him.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
You left out the part where this is the fifth KS he felt burned him.

Being asked to identify which items are miscast does not seem too heavy of a burden to place on those who got mispacks/miscasts.

NTRabbit wrote:
You cut open the bag, you lay the parts in the bag on the desk, you check it against the labeled photo provided at Mission Control, you do a quick once over for irreparable casting issues, you jot down any problems you find, you put the bits back in the bag and the bag back in the box.

Takes 5 minutes a bag at most, no more space than you use to build and paint your minis, and can be spread out over a week with a large order. Not feeling the sympathy.

Mantic need to get their QC to the point where this isn't necessary. It is bizarre that this quality and level of customer service is considered ok.

There is no company on Earth today that has good enough QC that I won't open and inspect whatever it is I have bought from them to ensure everything is intact and present, and then email or phone if something is wrong.

Not a single company, not even Samsung.

How many times in a row have those companies sent both you missing and defective items?

Joyboozer wrote:
How many times in a row have those companies sent both you missing and defective items?

Games Workshop 4 times in 9 purchases, all from finecast

Amazon 2 times in about 14 orders, one was a bluray case that was shattered from being improperly packed with a heavy book, one was a calendar that arrived 3 weeks later and water logged because someone left it on the Heathrow tarmac in an open topped crate in a snow storm

Mantic 1 time in about 11 orders/KS shipments, which was the 4 or 5 missing bits in shipment 1

Sony-Ericsson 1 time in 5 purchases, a dodgy phone

Samsung 0 times from 1 purchase

Spartan Games 0 times from maybe 25 purchases, lost count

I still check all of them, because that's what you're supposed to do if you want to ensure you're not the 1 in 5, or 1 in 5 million, or 1 in 50 million who was on the receiving end of a glitch, shipping damage, human error. It's not rocket surgery, it's common sense, and it takes hardly any time or effort to do. Insisting on QC so perfect you never need to check your items before you'll purchase from a company is setting an impossible standard that no company can ever meet.

NTRabbit wrote:
There is no company on Earth today that has good enough QC that I won't open and inspect whatever it is I have bought from them to ensure everything is intact and present, and then email or phone if something is wrong.

Not a single company, not even Samsung.

So when was the last time Samsung told you to open the phone and tell them which chip burned out?

 lord_blackfang wrote:


So when was the last time Samsung told you to open the phone and tell them which chip burned out?

Because looking at your plastic figures and counting the parts is the same thing.

If you wanted to make an actual comparison, you would be comparing the contents of your phone box against the image in the manual, looking for the battery, power cords and other accesories, which is also really simple to do, and I imagine if you contacted Samsung and said "There's a cable missing from my box" and they replied "Which cable?", the wrong answer would be "How dare you question me this is terrible customer service you should know better", while the right answer would be "data cable with the ID#XXXX-X in the manual".

This gak is only hard if you want something to complain about.

Or just not up to the standard I expect when choosing what product to purchase. I don't have to buy Mantic and as a result of the constant errors and poor quality unmatched by any other company I've purchased from, I've stopped. No other product I buy has had a 100 percent error rate. Seriously, why would I continue to buy a product from them? Everything else about Mantic is great, just not the product you end up with.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
You left out the part where this is the fifth KS he felt burned him.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

Some of the recent responses in this thread are hilarious, and not in a belly chuckling way.

You're fully entitled to buy or not buy whatever you want, just as I'm fully entitled to call a claim of 100% error rate utterly fanciful. I certainly don't buy anything made of resin from GW anymore.

In all fairness, it does seem like an odd question to ask in this instance. As all the heads are in the one mini bag anyway.

In any case, here is the parts guide for the original minis https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1744629938/deadzone-the-sci-fi-miniatures-board-game/posts/691466

I've had more than my fair share of issues with missing or broken parts in the kickstarter. However, I'm also aware I've ordered a heckuva lot of things. Were generally talking at least 9 months of product for any specific range, but its arriving all at once.

It doesn't seem that unreasonable that there would be some mistakes. Are there more than they should be? To be honest, yes, but I see active improvement coming from mantic and any issue has always been resolved, sometimes by them going beyond the call of duty.

Its fine to be frustrated but I'd suggest any interactions with mantic are done calmly and rationally. Unlike a vast, vast number of companies in this world, mantic will resolve your issue, as soon as they can (which admittedly may not be particularly soon), but throwing a tantrum at them does not help anyone.

I once got in touch with a customer service operator and told them that I was so upset that I wanted to shoot barbed hooks into their face and pull their insides out through their nostrils then jump up and down on what was left of their genitals as they died.

And then they didn't even help me out! It was such terrible customer service. From that day on I resolved to be even more offensive and childish whenever I had cause to contact customer services over anything, and I think I was right to do so because from that point on I've only noticed the service get even worse!

Guys, while I can agree that beating up on customer service people is never helpful, it's also not helpful to turn a blind eye to Mantic's laundry list of issues that requires so much customer service and create so much frustration (like forgetting to include entire and significant portions of someone's order as is the case here). There comes a point where a company asking the customer to fix so many of their mistakes is going to reach a boiling point. While it's unfortunate that the CSRs usually end up being the release valve, this is not a situation of an entitled prat whining because an arm was bent or some minor cosmetic issue. This is someone who has had repeated and significant issues, and if Mantic doesn't have a system set up to track who they've wronged more than others that again is on Mantic, not the customer; knowing that a customer has had repeated issues is in a company's interest for protection against scams if nothing else after all.

People want what they paid for, and Mantic has done wrong by Azazelx. I might disagree with lashing out at someone who is genuinely trying to help with a problem, but I also don't think Mantic gets away scot-free on not going above and beyond (e.g. - just sending an entirely new baggie) on customers that they've fethed up royally on.

I've not had a huge issue with Mantic's CS, and things usually get resolved in my favor, if not exactly resolved correctly. The stand-out "was never resolved" was the Plague missing a head because they included the wrong sprue and it was a goblin head and rifle (which I wonder if it's the same model Az is fighting over). One model out of hundreds just didn't seem worth worrying about, especially when I can try sculpting an exploding head or something.

 Vermonter wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
So, has anyone seen Scarlet Squig lately? Is he all right?

I don't know, but I assumed that he's spending more time on the official playtesting group, now that he's a member. He may be busy conversing more directly with Mantic staff and getting the lowdown on what's actually happening at Mantic HQ, rather than speculating about it like we do here.

Nope, he's probably been the quietest member in there.

 ekwatts wrote:
I once got in touch with a customer service operator and told them that I was so upset that I wanted to shoot barbed hooks into their face and pull their insides out through their nostrils then jump up and down on what was left of their genitals as they died.

And then they didn't even help me out!

This is where I realized you weren't dealing with an American company. A by-God American company's customer service rep. would have transferred you to a supervisor, and the supervisor would have caved like a professional bottom. Then he would would have written up the CSR.

From my own personal Customer Service experiences, I can only tell you that over here, based on the many complaints to surface in the Mantic subforum the Mantic CS team would have been flayed alive, at least in terms of employment and future opportunity.

 sukura636 wrote:
Please don't be unpleasant to CS staff. They're rarely associated with the cause of your problem, and are only trying to help and get things right for you.
It just helps no one, in the end.

I'm completely aware of that. I wasn't unpleasant or rude. At worst, I was terse and showing my frustration.

 pretre wrote:
Man. I don't get some folks. I really had no problem identifying missing or bad parts and getting it sorted. It's not rocket surgery.

I'll provide you with some context - Especially since NTRabbit and a few others are being ridiculous with their assumptions at this point. I was asked to identify which of the following models had the issues:

2 Miscast Enforcer legs – Which models from the attached picture need replacements?
Missing head from 2A Plague figure – Which model from the attached picture needs the replacement head?





The relevant part of my reply:
I'm back at work now and don't have the time nor inclination to spend however long it will take looking through each and every little restic baggie that I received to find the right bag (two sets of both of those figures) and then mucking around with all of the bits to work out which specific figure is missing the head by doing a push-fit on them

I can't tell the difference from the picture between the #1 and #3 of the Plague, and I can't even see what #4 looks like compared to the other two.

Same deal with the enforcers, though I can tell you that it's not 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 as all of the more "unique" figures/legs were fine.


So a far cry from the hyperbolic rants that people's overly-vivid imaginations have conjured up at this stage.


Note - I can't even properly see the legs of Enforcers #3, 4, 5 or the head of Plague #4, (what a useless picture to send - and I have to admit - that ticked me off even more) but one would assume that any set of arms would fit any of the "standing up, boring guy" enforcer legs - so just send any two, and any of the three plague heads (#1, 3, 4) should be interchangeable - so just sent any one (or even the tiny baggie of three - because who gives a feth?) - which is what I did when I counted through all of the little bits initially.

It's a far, far cry from a ridiculous straw man comparison like "data cable with the ID#XXXX-X in the manual."

@azazelx, if I remember correctly (been a while now) the heads for the plague guys have unique connectors to the body. Why make ball joints do it's easy for the models to get repositioned when they can stick you with static poses .

I got burnt out on Mantic. The deadzone main box with those exact minis ruined my desire to buy any more mantic...except the terrain bundles which I'm using for x-wing

Azazelx wrote:Someone needs to teach Mantic about ball joints. I got an email from Sarah asking me to specify which of my Plague Stage 2 is missing it's head. and which Enforcer legs were miscast. This pissed me off rather a lot, since my missing parts form went in about 2 weeks ago now. I replied back tersely to the effect that I don't have the time nor inclination at this point to go burrowing through all that restic gak to push-fit each figure together in order to figure out exactly which one is missing/which sets of arms go with which head. I can make any of the heads work. I also mentioned I was on the verge of setting the lot of it on fire and putting the result on youtube when I received it. (which was completely true.)

So anyway - the point of my rant is that even on the Restic models, they need to start using ball joints instead of L-joins. They won't of course, because Mantic as a miniature producing company seems to have a learning disability and an inability to see the bleeding obvious.

Azazelx wrote:

 sukura636 wrote:
Please don't be unpleasant to CS staff. They're rarely associated with the cause of your problem, and are only trying to help and get things right for you.
It just helps no one, in the end.

I'm completely aware of that. I wasn't unpleasant or rude. At worst, I was terse and showing my frustration.

...

The relevant part of my reply:
I'm back at work now and don't have the time nor inclination to spend however long it will take looking through each and every little restic baggie that I received to find the right bag (two sets of both of those figures) and then mucking around with all of the bits to work out which specific figure is missing the head by doing a push-fit on them

I can't tell the difference from the picture between the #1 and #3 of the Plague, and I can't even see what #4 looks like compared to the other two.

Same deal with the enforcers, though I can tell you that it's not 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 as all of the more "unique" figures/legs were fine.


So a far cry from the hyperbolic rants that people's overly-vivid imaginations have conjured up at this stage.

Where is the part about you setting it on fire and putting it up on Youtube?

Also, why do you keep buying stuff from Mantic? I'm not being facetious, I agree with you on most of the things you say about Mantic QA, the quality of Mantic sculpts, the horror that is restic, etc. The main difference seems to be that after I got burned by Mantic on their Kings of War campaign, I haven't spent another dime on their stuff, and certainly not pledged for another Kickstarter.

Yes, yes, there are complaints and there are praises

But does it classify as N&R

Painted anything recently, Azazelx? I like your work.

 Gallahad wrote:

Where is the part about you setting it on fire and putting it up on Youtube?

Also, why do you keep buying stuff from Mantic? I'm not being facetious, I agree with you on most of the things you say about Mantic QA, the quality of Mantic sculpts, the horror that is restic, etc. The main difference seems to be that after I got burned by Mantic on their Kings of War campaign, I haven't spent another dime on their stuff, and certainly not pledged for another Kickstarter.

Ok. Here's my whole email, just name removed:

Hi Sarah and thanks for getting back to me.
I'm back at work now and don't have the time nor inclination to spend however long it will take looking through each and every little restic baggie that I received to find the right bag (two sets of both of those figures) and then mucking around with all of the bits to work out which specific figure is missing the head by doing a push-fit on them. Frankly, I was so annoyed when I received my order - especially with the missing books - that I was close to setting it all on fire and putting it on YouTube. (not, not hyperbole). Now everything is in a box, with the exception of the scenery - which is in a different box.

I can't tell the difference from the picture between the #1 and #3 of the Plague, and I can't even see what #4 looks like compared to the other two.

Same deal with the enforcers, though I can tell you that it's not 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 as all of the more "unique" figures/legs were fine.


thanking you,

So not super-rude or anything, but frustrated and tired of dealing with it, since I had to go through the figures over the course of a week.

Why buy? Fair question
- I'd heard wonderful things about DeadZone as a game, and I was very much interested in the Hard Plastic scenery. Plague and Enforcer models were non-optional, and I do like the look of the Enforcers and especially with the promise of hard plastic ones, I thought it worth getting on those as a collection of merits. There was also a lot of talk about the DZ stuff being "better", so I (foolishly?) gave them one more chance. I did skip DBX entirely, though - the restic figures that came with the original game have meant that I've not yet played a single game, so I felt little urge to pour more money down that particular sinkhole (when I look at that game I just want to play Blood Bowl instead!) I'm waiting on Mars Attacks, again based on positive gameplay feedback (mostly from DeadZone, but also people who played using the PDF rulebooks), the lack of restic and of course, Hard Plastic Scenery. I also went in on DKH more recently, though with a mind to using the models that are decent or salvageable while replacing the rest with my existing fantasy models - but again, it's "boardgame PVC" so as I said in that thread a couple of times, I value and consider them differently to "real" miniatures. And I can handle boardgame soft-ish PVC figures for a boardgame much more than I can deal with restic for "proper" wargaming.

So the thing is, unlike some other posters I actually like Mantic and want them to succeed - and succeed well. I have enjoyed their games - as far as the stuff I've played goes. I just find it frustrating that they still keep making simple mistakes, bad choices, and apparently still can't pack a pledge that will be sent to me correctly. I was actually really keen to play DeadZone on my holidays, so when I opened up the box and found that they'd forgotten the rulebooks, I really cracked the gaks. When the restic bags were unlabelled and it turned out that many of them weren't even linked from "mission control" I found it even more frustrating - hence the "setting on fire" comments. It took me almost a week to go through all the little baggies a bit at a time working out what they were and if they had all of their parts included, counting them, etc) and then to get "which (push-fit) head?" in reply almost 2 weeks later was just too much. Which type of body for the enforcers would have been less annoying in itself, since I thought it was obvious but they wanted to check against the "specialist" models - fine. But please don't ask me to select from one of several that are heavily obscured in the actual picture....

Mantic make good rules and fun games, but I won't touch any further restic from them again unless it's unavoidable. I'll still support them when I view it as a good gamble, because I want them to succeed. They'll probably still mispack my stuff every time, though.

 judgedoug wrote:
Yes, yes, there are complaints and there are praises
But does it classify as N&R

When there's no actual news, you get discussion instead. You could apply the same to most any thread in the N&R forum. Something like the "Dreamforge News" thread has dealt exclusively in "hows the KS stuff coming?"/"China says no" and should in theory be moved to the Dakka Discussions ghetto.

 Vermonter wrote:
Painted anything recently, Azazelx? I like your work.

Thanks. I've got a smallish thing or two I'll put up in the P&M sometime in the next week. Back to work + new PS4 + Shadows of Mordor have eaten into my painting time considerably...

Anything is acceptable to the fanatics

Probably mantics biggest problem listening too much to their own fanatics rather than anyone else

People have repeatedly told they detest the restic crap, however the fanatics drown out their voices and alas nothing is done

 mitch_rifle wrote:
Anything is acceptable to the fanatics

Probably mantics biggest problem listening too much to their own fanatics rather than anyone else

People have repeatedly told they detest the restic crap, however the fanatics drown out their voices and alas nothing is done

Mars Attacks, DBX and DKQ are all supposed the be "board game plastic" and not Restic. The Mars Attacks set I got was actually reasonably nice; more or less the same feel to the material as Descent, albeit I think Descent's sculpts were a bit better. However, saying "nothing is done" when EVERY subsequent KS is using a different material is a bit misleading. Whether or not it's an improvement in the long term, well, we'll know that by the end of the year I suppose.

 Azazelx wrote:
(when I look at that game I just want to play Blood Bowl instead!)

Been playing BB since mid 90's. Love it. Skaven team nearly undefeated.
I like Dreadball more. It's faster and more fun.
Give Dreadball a try with or without Mantic minis. You might be pleasantly surprised.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 mitch_rifle wrote:
and alas nothing is done

Provide examples of this


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Azazelx wrote:

judgedoug wrote:Yes, yes, there are complaints and there are praises
But does it classify as N&R

When there's no actual news, you get discussion instead. You could apply the same to most any thread in the N&R forum. Something like the "Dreamforge News" thread has dealt exclusively in "hows the KS stuff coming?"/"China says no" and should in theory be moved to the Dakka Discussions ghetto.

Sure, I guess I'm just feeling like clicking the "new posts" icon is more like clickbait every 7 days or so because then it's someone (like yourself) with a valid complaint, sure, then someone saying "noway, I had no problems and Mantic gave me a massage" then the next person's reply of "my models came presmashed in a radioactive biohazard container and it killed my dog" and back and forth for a few days.
So here I am just adding to the noiiissseeeee

Has there been any chatter about expanding upon the Deadzone campaign system?

I've been wanting to do the campaign, but it just seems a bit lite. I seem to recall talk during the KS campaign about being able to upgrade weapons and gear, but that never really came to fruition. Sure, we can get new ammo or pump our stats, but it's not like we can loot our opponents and steal their weapons.

At the very least things work the way they're supposed to do in skirmish mode.

Deadzone is a wonderful skirmish game but I think the streamlined design is poorly suited to campaign play. The design space just isn't there.

This has become really apparent to me after getting Brimstone too.

I'm hoping Thorton/ Mantic are going to be able to step their game up when it comes time to release Dungeon Saga out into the wild.

Maybe we'll see some expanded campaign rules in the next kickstarter?

Ask for it the whole time during the campaign and get enough others to ask too.

Got my missing parts order including my free hardcover. Yay!

Azazel...you told her you were considering setting her company's product on fire and youtubing it, then say it wasn't "too rude"? I think we have different definitions of the word "rude". Honestly, you could have replaced any Mantic words with GW or PP or any other company, and I'd tell you the same thing-that was rude as hell.

"Frankly, I was so annoyed when I received my order - especially with the missing books - that I was close to setting it all on fire and putting it on YouTube. (not, not hyperbole)."

And this is an abject lesson on the concept of "proportional response".

Honestly, I think it's good for Mantic to be aware of how much ill will they are generating with their backers, likely their most loyal customers. For too long, Mantic has made frankly bizarre choices that have negatively impacted their business and the market's perception of them. Yet they have always had a solid core of loyal fans who have insulated them from the harshest of the criticism. When it takes them three or four kickstarter campaigns to learn from their mistakes, it makes it clear that they are too sheltered for their own good.

That's why I wrote "considering". Obviously I read that you didn't do it. But you put the thought out there to the company. A wake up call is one thing-tell them you're dissatisfied with the purchase and that you want a refund and have them provide the shipping cost. Demanding a paid return is a wake up call for any company. Threatening that you're considering setting their material on fire is likely to just get them to ignore you as it makes you look like a jerk. Personally, if I worked at Mantic, or any other company and got a response like yours, I'd toss it in the garbage and ignore it-it's a troll letter. Again-switch "Mantic" for GW, PP, FFG, Infinity, etc and I'd say the same thing. This is a generally poor letter regardless of who you sent it to.

Happy to have gotten my missing Forge Father crew today, but they sadly fell by the wayside when the mailman brought a big box of Miercian resin to my doorstep.

Sorry Forge Fathers, I hardly knew you.

Maybe I'll see them again soon when I get done with my current Darkland goodies!

At least they came- there's definitely that to be said.

I was extremely surprised by the Brokkrs. Really dynamic. I love Mantic's direction with dwarfs.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Yet they have always had a solid core of loyal fans who have insulated them from the harshest of the criticism. When it takes them three or four kickstarter campaigns to learn from their mistakes, it makes it clear that they are too sheltered for their own good.

If by "core of loyal fans" you mean they haven't pissed off enough people with their mistakes so that the market hasn't turned it's back on them, then you'd be correct. Market forces are market forces......*shrugs*

If what you mean is that there's some inner circle that sits around blowing smoke up Ronnie's arse then you couldn't be further from the truth.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
That's why I wrote "considering". Obviously I read that you didn't do it. But you put the thought out there to the company. A wake up call is one thing-tell them you're dissatisfied with the purchase and that you want a refund and have them provide the shipping cost. Demanding a paid return is a wake up call for any company. Threatening that you're considering setting their material on fire is likely to just get them to ignore you as it makes you look like a jerk. Personally, if I worked at Mantic, or any other company and got a response like yours, I'd toss it in the garbage and ignore it-it's a troll letter. Again-switch "Mantic" for GW, PP, FFG, Infinity, etc and I'd say the same thing. This is a generally poor letter regardless of who you sent it to.

First of all, I'm not Azazelx. His avatar's a cat. Mine's a dog. Totally different.

Second, in the context of miniature game Kickstarters, burning the rewards is 'a thing'. Thanks should be directed to Studio McVey and Cool Mini or Not (so tempted to write Cool Mini gets Hot). It's like protesting by burning a flag or standing in front of a tank, only the stakes are much lower depending on the size of one's pledge.

Third, based on the testimonials in the Mantic Customer Service thread, one does not need to threaten to burn anything to get Mantic to ignore one's self.

I should probably bow out here, though, because I'm one of those people who hasn't spent a lot with Mantic recently.

 mitch_rifle wrote:
Anything is acceptable to the fanatics

Probably mantics biggest problem listening too much to their own fanatics rather than anyone else

People have repeatedly told they detest the restic crap, however the fanatics drown out their voices and alas nothing is done

Well, I'm a pretty huge fan of theirs and never cease to ramble on about how much I dislike restic.

Quite happy with the Mars Attacks material, at least.

Better than restic for so many different reasons:

- One piece. No gluing.
- One piece. No gluing together 4-8 different bits of tiny restic.
- One piece. One mould line. Not 4-8 tiny mould lines, one on each tiny bit that have to be individually removed pre-assembly.
- One piece. No trawling through a dozen bags with jumbled together tiny restic bits for a bunch of different models (4-8 pieces each) to see if its actually all there or there are bits missing.
- Detail is pretty much the same as, or a little bit better than restic.
- Not as much warping, easier to fix the bits that are warped.

Brilliant game... so much better to be able to take the minis out of the box and get playing without any screwing around.

Actually, looks like HBMC responded, not Azazel (sorry, Az). Same flag. Bob, I actually wasn't even talking to your post. So it looks like HBMC was reading with presumed sand still in his eyes when he woke up (okay, my time zones might be off, I'm not sure how the Australia-heathens measure time).

Hey look SS is still alive!

I dunno if I flat out prefer the mars attacks material to restic in all ways (haven't done enough of it) but it is a welcome change. Mold lines are easier, but not as easy as my plastic zombies. And the hot water bending thing is only so effective. Edwyn's sword keeps bending back to a position resembling what it was when I got it, I don't think restic does that (haven't done a lot of big bends with hot water though to confirm). And maybe it was just my batch, but I think the MA faces are softer than deadzone, but i haven't done the rebs and they're probably the closest so meh.

So on average it's

HIPS > Actual Resin > Metal > Board Game Plastic > Restic

?

 lord_blackfang wrote:
So on average it's

HIPS > Actual Resin > Metal > Board Game Plastic > Restic

?

I would go with that. Sometimes Resin or metal is preferable over HIPS, but for the masses, that is the correct order of quality and what people want.

nkelsch wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
So on average it's

HIPS > Actual Resin > Metal > Board Game Plastic > Restic

?

I would go with that. Sometimes Resin or metal is preferable over HIPS, but for the masses, that is the correct order of quality and what people want.

I'd personally go with Hard Plastic>Resin>Restic>Metal>Boardgame Plastic. I'd take restic over metal any day, and have never really had any issues with it. It really is no harder to work with than metal in the cleanup stage, and much easier to paint. I've yet to experience Boardgame Plasic, but I don't really like the idea of coloured/one part/not rigid figures.

I think being a bit ham-fisted makes me kind of dangerous to boardgame plastic.

I don't mind Corvus Belli metal, I'd put that above a lot of things, though high quality hard plastic still wins. I don't mind restic once I'm done with it, and doing smaller projects, say nothing larger than a 10 or so model warband/gang/striketeam at a time is ok.

Resin I'm no fan of. I clipped my LE rebs commander off of her large resin blob slot thing, way down on the faux slotta base portion, and it still snapped all the way up and took off the back of her foot. Maybe just a bad experience, but I don't like brittle materials, I tend to drop things and have a toddler. (so yeah metal is probably a problem too, infinity models need to live on the high shelf).

As someone with a few hundred painted zombies and a couple hundred painted Zulus, I can tell you if they had been in restic I would not have those forces.

Plastic/metal for masses of troops is great, resin for special characters is good though metal works as well. Restic for a handful of figures is okay at best (some of what I got from dreadball and the first wave of Deadzone is horrid). Masses of restic troops? Screw that, it would not be worth the effort to deal with the mold lines/clean up.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
So on average it's

HIPS > Actual Resin > Metal > Board Game Plastic > Restic

?

Metal and Board Game Plastic are interchangeable for me, depending on the purpose, but otherwise I agree.

Yeah I like metal personally. The only problem I have with it is heavy for transport and if you drop it you are more likley to scratch the paint off it. However most of my models are metal of some kind and I have no issue with it what soever. Give me a metal model from perry over mantic restic any day of the week.

This all seems a bit off topic, but I like metal quite a bit and don't mind restic. Soft board game plastic is really not something I like for mini-gaming though.

I personally can't stand metal, it's too heavy and I can't seem to paint it properly, it's my least favourite material. All these metal characters are going to give me trouble when I get to them.
While I appreciate the excellent sculpts Infinity has I just can't bring myself to buy more than the 3 I have while they're still in metal.

Hehe. I have quite a bit of metal and it paints fine. Just need to prime it first.

I prime it, the paint still wants to go on like garbage, and I'm terrible enough without the material actively trying to sabotage me. Metal minis really do not work for me.

I don't care how nice the sculpt is, if it's a mini I actually want to use on the table I'll reject metal in favour of something else in restic, resin or hard plastic every time.

NTRabbit wrote:
I prime it, the paint still wants to go on like garbage. Metal minis really do not work for me.

Seriously? Maybe a new primer...? That's just crazy. I have an entire metal army (sisters) and they paint great.

It's a spray on primer from the hardware store which works perfectly with hard plastic, resin, restic and even MDF. I guess if I get enough metal minis one day I might try a special primer just for them?

My issue with metal is how easily it chips/has paint rub off, which requires a varnish coat if you plan to actually use the model at all. It's also harder to convert.

I manage with Infinity stuff just as the sculpts are so good, but for anything else I'd rather have resin. Hell, I even think the move to Finecast was a good thing!

 Paradigm wrote:
My issue with metal is how easily it chips/has paint rub off, which requires a varnish coat if you plan to actually use the model at all.

Why would you not varnish/clear coat ALL your painted figures, regardless of the material?

 CptJake wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
My issue with metal is how easily it chips/has paint rub off, which requires a varnish coat if you plan to actually use the model at all.

Why would you not varnish/clear coat ALL your painted figures, regardless of the material?

Because I find plastic/restic/resin really don't need it? I handle my minis with care, and have plastic minis painted years ago and used in game extensively with no chips or damage to speak of.

 CptJake wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
My issue with metal is how easily it chips/has paint rub off, which requires a varnish coat if you plan to actually use the model at all.

Why would you not varnish/clear coat ALL your painted figures, regardless of the material?

Thats what I do.

I think the Love/hate for metal simply comes with experience. For us who grew up where for 20 years there was literally *NOTHING* but metal available, we became used to the material and the simple processes like pinning, priming, sealing and so on are already part of our model prep.

For people who started when there was half a dozen materials out there, as they became used to other stuff, metal does stand alone from all the other materials in regards to tools, and how to handle it.

I will take a one-piece metal model over just about anything out there if given an option.

I dip all of my models, even if they don't really need it, I've still been dipping them. Gives them a clear coat that's tough as nails and then there's a matte varnish over the top too.

 GrimDork wrote:
I dip all of my models, even if they don't really need it, I've still been dipping them. Gives them a clear coat that's tough as nails and then there's a matte varnish over the top too.

I honestly cannot imagine spending time to paint up a figure and NOT protecting it, regardless of the material. Heck, even foam storage cases will eventually abrade a non protected paint job.

Has anyone found that mantic have actually undercharged you during the wave 3 survey?

I seem to have been undercharged by $20...

Not that I'm complaining or anything, but with a mate piggy backing off of my pledge, it's made things slightly confusing.

You sure they had everything listed?

Everything looks like it's listed in the Confirmation Email.



Adds up to $332, minus $15 for the Zombie discount. So that should be a charged total of $317

Final total was: $297


Was there some sort of discount for buying 2 faction starters maybe?

Having kids that are just as clumsy as me, everything gets a coating of some sort. No exceptions.

I usually just dull coat my stuff, since when I use inks they tend to come out super glossy.

Does a dip or varnish offer more protection than that? I've been debating about picking some up to try, especially on pieces like Deadzone figures which have a propensity so far to fall from great heights on the tabletop... sometimes even accidentally!

Yeah during the first and second survey weren't 2x faction starters 50 bucks? Maybe they mistakenly honored that pricing? Or maybe they forgot to mention it. They forgot something at some point, but that would be my best guess.


On dipping, I dunno. I'm pretty sure my dudes have a ridiculously strong outer shell from the polyurethane in the minwax polyshades (I may be typing the wrong poly-whatsit, its one of those things...) but I *could* be overestimating it's effects. I know I had a magnetized model and I dipped him and when I went to reposition an arm later on it was easier to accidentally break the superglue bond from a conversion than it was to unset the hardened dip, whoops!.

Yeah, it's probably the starter discounts.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
Having kids that are just as clumsy as me, everything gets a coating of some sort. No exceptions.

I usually just dull coat my stuff, since when I use inks they tend to come out super glossy.

Does a dip or varnish offer more protection than that? I've been debating about picking some up to try, especially on pieces like Deadzone figures which have a propensity so far to fall from great heights on the tabletop... sometimes even accidentally!

The glossy varnish is where you get your main protection. The talc in the dull varnish makes for a weaker coat. I tend to not discriminate about the initial coat. Just buy glossy spray poly at HD or Lowes and then hit it with Dullcote afterwards. Need a knife to chip it after that. I've had a lot of uncoated plastics rub off over time on thin edges, so I just hit everything with a quick spray of gloss followed by dullcote.

Yup, someone else mentioned that they got charged 25 apiece for two starters. So 2x starter discounts were in effect.

A glossy spray I can pick up at the hardware store... Sounds tempting.

Any good (cheap?) brands you guys would recommend?

I wish I'd known that they'd be keeping the starter pricing. Would have grabbed the Asterians for the hell of it.

I use Krylon.

 judgedoug wrote:

Sure, I guess I'm just feeling like clicking the "new posts" icon is more like clickbait every 7 days or so because then it's someone (like yourself) with a valid complaint, sure, then someone saying "noway, I had no problems and Mantic gave me a massage" then the next person's reply of "my models came presmashed in a radioactive biohazard container and it killed my dog" and back and forth for a few days.
So here I am just adding to the noiiissseeeee

That's how the Dreamforge Games thread has been for over a year now...

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Azazel...you told her you were considering setting her company's product on fire and youtubing it, then say it wasn't "too rude"? I think we have different definitions of the word "rude". Honestly, you could have replaced any Mantic words with GW or PP or any other company, and I'd tell you the same thing-that was rude as hell.

We'll look at it from different perspectives. Their QC was - as usual - appalling, and their CS response was concerned about minutia to an annoying degree "which head?" My response wasn't "you fethers are fething incompetent" but the (true) fact that I felt like setting fire to their product and youtubing it out of frustration with dealing with their endless mistakes after sending them many hundreds of dollars.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
"Frankly, I was so annoyed when I received my order - especially with the missing books - that I was close to setting it all on fire and putting it on YouTube. (not, not hyperbole)."

And this is an abject lesson on the concept of "proportional response".

Mate. I know we clash from time to time, but a lot of the DZ stuff is restic. So, you know, no great loss.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 GrimDork wrote:
Hey look SS is still alive!

I dunno if I flat out prefer the mars attacks material to restic in all ways (haven't done enough of it) but it is a welcome change. Mold lines are easier, but not as easy as my plastic zombies. And the hot water bending thing is only so effective. Edwyn's sword keeps bending back to a position resembling what it was when I got it, I don't think restic does that (haven't done a lot of big bends with hot water though to confirm). And maybe it was just my batch, but I think the MA faces are softer than deadzone, but i haven't done the rebs and they're probably the closest so meh.

Restic has a place. Like any material, there are things it's good at and awful at. Larger models with fewer pieces would be fine. (Think the KoW ogres if they were more intelligently sculpted for the material). It certainly would have been a better material for, say, the KoW Basiliean Angel character models than metal is.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
That's why I wrote "considering". Obviously I read that you didn't do it. But you put the thought out there to the company. A wake up call is one thing-tell them you're dissatisfied with the purchase and that you want a refund and have them provide the shipping cost. Demanding a paid return is a wake up call for any company. Threatening that you're considering setting their material on fire is likely to just get them to ignore you as it makes you look like a jerk. Personally, if I worked at Mantic, or any other company and got a response like yours, I'd toss it in the garbage and ignore it-it's a troll letter. Again-switch "Mantic" for GW, PP, FFG, Infinity, etc and I'd say the same thing. This is a generally poor letter regardless of who you sent it to.

We know how they react to requests for refunds from nkletch's experiences (they outright refuse to cover shipping). Given Australia Post's prices, it'd probably cost me less to set the stuff on fire than send it back. The point of me sharing that particular tidbit was to share with them just how fething pissed off and frustrated I was/am with their products/service. And again. I was dead serious about being on the verge of doing it. I won't presume it to be in any way equatable with Bob's examples of "social protest", but it would certainly send a message of dissatisfaction, and burning something that's not up to scratch has been a thing for a long time. It wasn't the internet bs that we're so used to.


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NTRabbit wrote:
It's a spray on primer from the hardware store which works perfectly with hard plastic, resin, restic and even MDF. I guess if I get enough metal minis one day I might try a special primer just for them?

Maybe you're psychically sabotaging yourself because you don't like the material? I've painted metal models for decades using primers ranging from no primer to GW sprays to Vallejo paint-on to Mr Surfacer spray to cheap-through-mid-priced sprays of various brands from Bunnings to custom-coloured spray cans from a paint store. Never had a problem, and we're talking hundreds of/a couple of thousand painted models through the years. The only material that gives me grief when priming is Bones/Boardgame Miniatures PVC.


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 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
A glossy spray I can pick up at the hardware store... Sounds tempting.
Any good (cheap?) brands you guys would recommend?
I wish I'd known that they'd be keeping the starter pricing. Would have grabbed the Asterians for the hell of it.

Obviously my brands will be different to yours, but you're looking for clear polyurethane.

I'm sure they'll unlock your W3 pledge if you email them. Mantic are always very accommodating when it comes to giving them more money.

Mantic messed up my 2º wave survey.
Instead of receiving the "Rebs Faction Booster Bundle" that I request, I ended up receiving the "Rebs Booster Bundle".

I Already filled the missing pieces form, it has passed a week now and I still haven't received a answer.......

:(

 madwolf wrote:
Mantic messed up my 2º wave survey.
Instead of receiving the "Rebs Faction Booster Bundle" that I request, I ended up receiving the "Rebs Booster Bundle".

I Already filled the missing pieces form, it has passed a week now and I still haven't received a answer.......

:(

You should get a notification that you submitted the survey if it worked correctly and then you'll just get a notification that they shipped.

 madwolf wrote:
Mantic messed up my 2º wave survey.
Instead of receiving the "Rebs Faction Booster Bundle" that I request, I ended up receiving the "Rebs Booster Bundle".

I think that was a common mistake, considering the similarity of the name of the selection. Same thing happened to me and a friend of mine.

If you received the Rebs Booster Bundle when you ordered the Rebs Faction Booster, surely you should have no missing pices, and instead double what you ordered plus extra starter troops?

Edit: ESL issue I guess

I have decided to not pay for my 3rd survey before we have hard photographic evidence of the quality of the Enforcer/Peacekeeper hard plastic sprues. I am concerned that they have been in production for so long and we have not seen anything to prove that the producers can cope with the hard edged detail needed on the miniatures. Weren't they originally scheduled to released around the same time as the starter set around 10/11 months ago?

That's... that's actually a reasonable call.

Could perhaps some of the people who have a direct line into Mantic suggest to them that they need to show those off? Actually, I recall back in the KoW KS PM they didn't show the elves or TK cavalry to anyone until well after the 3rd/final survey.

 Azazelx wrote:
That's... that's actually a reasonable call.

Could perhaps some of the people who have a direct line into Mantic suggest to them that they need to show those off? Actually, I recall back in the KoW KS PM they didn't show the elves or TK cavalry to anyone until well after the 3rd/final survey.

I am pretty sure Mantic knows we want to see these.

I am not sure why they are not showing them.

Hopefully not because of this:

But on their own, those men at arms don't look THAT bad.

It's when you see how mammoth they are compared to everyone else at the same scale that you begin to question things, or when you see how soft certain details on them are...

^ Or their entire left arms being a featureless mass of plastic, or the lack of any chainmail detail, or a closeup of exactly how bad the facial sculpting is.

The first one on that list was the reason for the forge guard being delayed, so there's some progress there.

They're unwilling to post images of unfinished sprues, although I'm behind your idea of holding of until you see proof. I'll poke a bit and see if it can be done.

I can sympathise with them not wanting to post unfinished sprues but I can also see why people would not want to buy unseen unfishined sprues either.

 carlos13th wrote:
I can sympathise with them not wanting to post unfinished sprues but I can also see why people would not want to buy unseen unfishined sprues either.

Personally, I can't understand that reluctance at all. The minis are in production so they have approved final test shots that should be exactly what we are getting. If they look as good as we all hope they do, one would think Mantic would be shouting it out everywhere.

After all, they had no issues showing us the Forge Father sprue's casting issues when they announced a delay for them.

If I gett gakky HIPS Enforcers, I'm done with their models. I'll still get their rules, but not the models. Fallen Frontiers and Last Saga both have miniatures that look excellent so far, and that essentially slot directly in for Deadzone.

I guess we'll see shortly.

~Eric

Yeah, I would say if the Enforcers come out "blah" that I'll probably be done with Mantic models. Granted, this is shutting the barn door after the horse is three counties over, but still.

The thing is there is only 3 weeks until the 3rd Wave is scheduled to be paid for, I just cannot see any images coming out before then.

I am not calling out Mantic for any sort of shenanigans here, but just feel that they could be helping themselves out a lot more. For example they sent out the Wave 2 metals without previously showing any photos of them and by all accounts the quality of the castings is great, but again it is a different material.

I just fear that Mantic will not allow any further delays and this time will sacrifice quality in order to get everything sent out before Christmas. I think this may have been what happened with the Mars Attacks Martian vac-formed helmets.

And welcome back ScarletSquig, people were worrying about you.

 Taarnak wrote:

 carlos13th wrote:
I can sympathise with them not wanting to post unfinished sprues but I can also see why people would not want to buy unseen unfishined sprues either.

Personally, I can't understand that reluctance at all. The minis are in production so they have approved final test shots that should be exactly what we are getting. If they look as good as we all hope they do, one would think Mantic would be shouting it out everywhere.

After all, they had no issues showing us the Forge Father sprue's casting issues when they announced a delay for them.

If I gett gakky HIPS Enforcers, I'm done with their models. I'll still get their rules, but not the models. Fallen Frontiers and Last Saga both have miniatures that look excellent so far, and that essentially slot directly in for Deadzone.

I guess we'll see shortly.

~Eric

If they have them finished then they should show them in my opinion. As I said I can sympathise with not wanting to share unfinished models and giving a false idea of them but if they are finished they should be shown.

Havent seen either of those miniatures. Will check them out.

Well, they did show the plastic Forge Guard. Somewhat.

Update 159

The hard edges are absolutely perfect. It was just the sinkholes:

Below is a photo of the first test shot from the Forge Guard mold. As you can see, we’ve highlighted some of the pitting and details that needed fixing.
We’ve delayed the models so that we can improve the quality of them. However, you can also see how sharp the rest of the components are.

Yeah, not seeing the reason for reluctance on this one.

 pretre wrote:
Yeah, not seeing the reason for reluctance on this one.

It's because we haven't seen the Enforcer sprues yet, and we remember the Man at Arms debacle. At least, for me, that's it.

And if there are any pictures of the Enforcer sprues out there anywhere, someone please let me know where.

~Eric

Isn't it supposed to be a lot harder to pull off organic shapes? Isn't that why they used the zombies as a test run? If they can pull those off well - and they did - why the reluctance over the Enforcers which should have been easier for them to produce? Especially considering that I don't think it's even the same factory that produced the Men-At-Arms.

 pretre wrote:
Yeah, not seeing the reason for reluctance on this one.

For me namely 10+ months and the factory have still not got it right/nothing has been pictured yet (as far as anyone is aware, and as far as hard plastic Enforcers are concerned).

Also I was not as impressed by the Zombies as a lot of other people seem to be, they fall short of Mantic/Renendra's initial KOW run.

Considering the improvement we've seen in materials and items since MaA, I'm not worried.

Having both zombie kits in front of me I consider them on par, as long as they didn't make any stupid choices for the other sprues the material seems to be there.

I got one of the defective Forgeguard sprues and can confirm that they're absolutely top quality. Apart from the noted defects and relative lack of extras you could absolutely convince me that they are GW models.

And to be fair we do not get photos of GW models prior to release either (or are even told what is going to be released).

I love Deadzone as a game, yes the factions could be more balanced and the resin plastic easier to work with but the rules, battlezones and gaming mats are sublime.

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
And to be fair we do not get photos of GW models prior to release either (or are even told what is going to be released).

And to be even more fair, GW does not use a sales model which collects money from customers months in advance of delivering product. And as far as I've seen, they DO show pictures when items can be ordered, even for pre-orders.

 Daedleh wrote:
you could absolutely convince me that they are GW models.

What, they have skulls all over them?

 Daedleh wrote:
I got one of the defective Forgeguard sprues and can confirm that they're absolutely top quality.

Your second sentence completely qualifies this one, but it's a good thing you're not running for political office right now; otherwise we'd be hearing this line quoted out of context on countless television ads.

 Barzam wrote:
Isn't it supposed to be a lot harder to pull off organic shapes? Isn't that why they used the zombies as a test run? If they can pull those off well - and they did - why the reluctance over the Enforcers which should have been easier for them to produce? Especially considering that I don't think it's even the same factory that produced the Men-At-Arms.

They haven't yet built up a reputation for consistent quality. Instead, they have a reputation for ...let's call it uneven quality and questionable Quality Assurance (and I'm not talking about my complaints in the last page or two)


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 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
And to be fair we do not get photos of GW models prior to release either (or are even told what is going to be released).

Of course, we're not paying for GW kits upfront, sight unseen months or years before their release, and GW has that aforementioned reputation for consistent quality in their plastics. (even if some of the designs are soulless or questionable).

 pretre wrote:
Considering the improvement we've seen in materials and items since MaA, I'm not worried.

If all of mantics stuff had been constantly good since the KOW starter I would agree with you. Thing is consistently quality is not Mantic's strong point. So I can understand why people are worried.

 Azazelx wrote:

 Barzam wrote:
Isn't it supposed to be a lot harder to pull off organic shapes? Isn't that why they used the zombies as a test run? If they can pull those off well - and they did - why the reluctance over the Enforcers which should have been easier for them to produce? Especially considering that I don't think it's even the same factory that produced the Men-At-Arms.

They haven't yet built up a reputation for consistent quality. Instead, they have a reputation for ...let's call it uneven quality and questionable Quality Assurance (and I'm not talking about my complaints in the last page or two)

This might be irrational, but I do get worried that the overseas company they're getting their sculpts from will decide that Mantic is "too picky" when it comes to sculpt quality and refuse to work with Mantic in the future, or at least refuse future contracts with the presumable "We don't pay until we're happy" clause or something to that effect, sending Mantic back to square one as they search for a new alternative or take a crapshoot on the unwilling company.

Does anyone have more experience with iterations of product lines overseas? I honestly have no idea if Mantic seems to be having an unusual amount of trouble getting what they want out of the contracted company, or if their troubles are really basically par for the course.

I would be curious Dark Prince how common it is and if its the company thats the problem, Mantic themselves or more likely a mix of both.

 darkPrince010 wrote:

This might be irrational, but I do get worried that the overseas company they're getting their sculpts from will decide that Mantic is "too picky" when it comes to sculpt quality and refuse to work with Mantic in the future, or at least refuse future contracts with the presumable "We don't pay until we're happy" clause or something to that effect, sending Mantic back to square one as they search for a new alternative or take a crapshoot on the unwilling company.

Does anyone have more experience with iterations of product lines overseas? I honestly have no idea if Mantic seems to be having an unusual amount of trouble getting what they want out of the contracted company, or if their troubles are really basically par for the course.

You'd hope that the company working with Mantic would instead see it as a great opportunity to expand their business and customer base by providing quality work. Hopefully not with delays akin to WGF, but more competent/quality HIPS manufacturers can only be a good thing for our hobby and the industry.

 Azazelx wrote:

 darkPrince010 wrote:

This might be irrational, but I do get worried that the overseas company they're getting their sculpts from will decide that Mantic is "too picky" when it comes to sculpt quality and refuse to work with Mantic in the future, or at least refuse future contracts with the presumable "We don't pay until we're happy" clause or something to that effect, sending Mantic back to square one as they search for a new alternative or take a crapshoot on the unwilling company.

Does anyone have more experience with iterations of product lines overseas? I honestly have no idea if Mantic seems to be having an unusual amount of trouble getting what they want out of the contracted company, or if their troubles are really basically par for the course.

You'd hope that the company working with Mantic would instead see it as a great opportunity to expand their business and customer base by providing quality work. Hopefully not with delays akin to WGF, but more competent/quality HIPS manufacturers can only be a good thing for our hobby and the industry.

Oh, I completely agree, and I think if this company can get into a "groove" of quality (Where Mantic doesn't need to hover over them like a mother hen for 6+ months, but instead see one, maybe two samples that show the quality desired), we can start to see a boatload of nice cheap plastics in the future. Hell, if this company can provide the example, or even eventually spread the talent to other companies, we might be able to see HIPS modelling from overseas from other companies as well. I don't mind resin/restic for my gaming models, but I will happily discard all other material options in order to get my mitts on a sprue-plastic option.

Anyone still waiting on their Mars Attacks KS delivery?

It has been on sale on the shelves of 3 different local stores in my city for over a month now, hoping I don't have to wait another month for it to arrive.

Fairly happy with the miniature quality currently, but the KS grindstone definitely needs sorting out properly so there is enough time to ship to backers completely before retail release.

I'm still waiting

Think they said it should be finished shipping by the middle of next month.

There's a ton of stuff on my make paint and play pile at the moment so I don't mind not having it yet does suck not having my goodies before retail tho.

I think they're shipping the packages with the GSR now? I would have expected and update to that effect but meh. I just hope they include an extra baggie of helmets like they're supposed to but I guess I can missing parts them like anything else if it comes to it, can't put them on till Ive painted anyway.

I'm still waiting, but the GSR is meant to be in mine, plus we tend to get ours last down here

I'm gonna have two of those bad boys. I figured one would get lonely, and two can bro-fist and shrink a larger horde of tiny humans

Kind of wondering if anything in my collection will be able to stand to them in terms of height, they're big. I guess if nobody else can match them, numbers and heavy firepower should do it.

Really looking forward to running the scenario where Edwyn rushes out to 'slay' the GSR.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Anyone still waiting on their Mars Attacks KS delivery?

It has been on sale on the shelves of 3 different local stores in my city for over a month now, hoping I don't have to wait another month for it to arrive.

Fairly happy with the miniature quality currently, but the KS grindstone definitely needs sorting out properly so there is enough time to ship to backers completely before retail release.

The base box has been at my local store for the last month as well in the US. I'm a bit surprised that they haven't finished fulfilling their KS obligations.

Well the base box has been done for a good while. The kickstarter fulfillments (potentially) have things that probably won't be released for awhile. Not to start that argument again or anything.

More of a logistics thing being that it's difficult/expensive to disperse rewards as they complete to keep backers 100% ahead I guess. I can afford to be patient at this point so it isn't bothering me. I understand the sentiment though.

 GrimDork wrote:
I'm gonna have two of those bad boys. I figured one would get lonely, and two can bro-fist and shrink a larger horde of tiny humans

Oh good, glad to see I wasn't the only one

I'm looking forward to putting it on my Shelf of Robits and other Fantastic Mechanical Men, my seemingly pointless but doing it anyway it's my time and money stop judging me project to own and catalogue for size all the Dreadnought-ish sized robot minis I can find, to compare with all the others.

I still don't have my MA stuff. I'm curious where it is, but not concerned yet.

Got mine. Giant bugs FTW!

Didnt they say the end of October? Got over a week yet then right?

Nothing in my grubby paws yet, that's for sure.

Of course I had a big Bloodshed on the Battlefield order with multiple robots and all sorts of extra add ons. Would have been nice to get this when I had time to sit and play it in the summer, like we were supposed to get it.

On the other hand, it's not like I don't have 5 or 6 KS games that need playing and painting on my dining room table currently.

I was able to piggyback on another fine user's pledge so I could get some nice terrain for Pulp City and, of course, a GSR - also for Pulp City!

 scarletsquig wrote:
Anyone still waiting on their Mars Attacks KS delivery?

It has been on sale on the shelves of 3 different local stores in my city for over a month now, hoping I don't have to wait another month for it to arrive.

Fairly happy with the miniature quality currently, but the KS grindstone definitely needs sorting out properly so there is enough time to ship to backers completely before retail release.

Still waiting.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 scarletsquig wrote:
Anyone still waiting on their Mars Attacks KS delivery?

It has been on sale on the shelves of 3 different local stores in my city for over a month now, hoping I don't have to wait another month for it to arrive.

Fairly happy with the miniature quality currently, but the KS grindstone definitely needs sorting out properly so there is enough time to ship to backers completely before retail release.

Still waiting.

Why hello there fine user!

(Dammit Mantic, hurry up already!!!)

Come on people, those who have their items with the shiny new stuff are slacking.

Lets seem some pictures of painted bugs and giant robots! :p

Am I right in thinking it's just the main game which is being delivered for the MA kickstarter, right? Notall the other stuff from the add ons?

Nothing for me yet, but I did get a shipping notice last week. Hopefully I'll have my stuff soon.

Got some Giant bugs and scenery in the mail yesterday, Pleasantly surprised with the material I must say.

Waiting for my 2 GSR, 3 Trucks, 3 Saucers, 6 bugs and ~120 infantry, not to mention a table's worth of urban terrain.

Nothing here yet. No shipping notice, and still not a word on my DZ replacement/missing stuff getting shipped, either.

No intention of paying for Wave 3 additions until they manage to deliver on the other items first.

Are people getting shipping notices? I don't recall receiving any for any of the last n+1 Mantic kickstarter shipments.

It seems more and more likely that I'm not going to boost my pledge for Dwarf King's Kickstarter. Well, not past $10 for the Fighting Fantasy-style books, anyway.

I got a UPS shipping notice for DZ wave two, don't recall for wave one and those emails are all gone. Didn't receive shipping notice of my wave one missing parts, they just arrived in an envelope one day.

Expecting a shipping notice for MA, but not gotten one yet, and AU does tend to be last.

Doug Craig‎ > Mantic Games - Mantic do you have any shots of the plastic Enforcers and Peacekeepers sprues? It's almost November and everyone would really like to see how they're coming along.

Mantic Games - We're getting these out soon, just dotting t's and crossing i's. Or the other one. Watch this space!

Good to hear Judge, Mantic certainly have a lot on their plate with Mars Attacks, Dreadball Extreme and Deadzone Wave 2 Forgefather plastics and Wave 3 to get shipped out of the door.

How are people doing with missing parts/replacement emails at the moment?

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
Good to hear Judge, Mantic certainly have a lot on their plate with Mars Attacks, Dreadball Extreme and Deadzone Wave 2 Forgefather plastics and Wave 3 to get shipped out of the door.

How are people doing with missing parts/replacement emails at the moment?

I sent my request October 1, got confirmation on the 2nd, a shipping notice on the 10th, and received the items last Monday. I probably should have bought a lottery ticket that week.

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
How are people doing with missing parts/replacement emails at the moment?

I don't understand the question...

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
How are people doing with missing parts/replacement emails at the moment?

I got a reply to my initial broken parts/missing parts submission, and a couple of days ago got a packet with the missing parts. Replacements for the broken parts were (disappointingly) not included.

 CptJake wrote:

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
How are people doing with missing parts/replacement emails at the moment?

I got a reply to my initial broken parts/missing parts submission, and a couple of days ago got a packet with the missing parts. Replacements for the broken parts were (disappointingly) not included.

Oh good, I still wait to hear about the acrylic boards I bought the previous GenCon.....

Any idea on when the other terrain sets will be available? As in the intact brick buildings, street clutter and crashed saucer ones?

I'm sitting here with the ruins set and, like a lot of Mantic's stuff, it'll do. Matched against Tamiya's version its miles better, but I do have a few issues. Its obviously made so its simple for those who don't want to glue the bits together (even if not all of the sections actually do that perfectly), though that causes some issues. The holes for clips everywhere are a bugger that'll have to be filled. There's obvious gaps if you chose to place sections end to end rather than at corners (I noticed on the Ks page that they only showed corner sections), again more filling. Second floors and wall sections to represent the underside of the window frames (rather than having a window just stop) aren't too viable without some work, but I guess they're not the highest priority. There doesn't seem to be enough clips overall if you chose to have X shaped sections, have the long ones with two clips either side of the join (something necessary to not have them fall apart) or to mount second floors. Not a major issues as youknow, there's glue for that, just something to note. Overall they're good, but I can see what they are. I managed two A4 sized ruined buildings out of the three bags of bits that came in the box.

Whenever the intact wall sets come out I'll be picking up another ruined set along with one of those. Something which was bugging me was not being able to have a section of wall larger than two pieces, which results in having parts which aren't too long. Again that's just personal preference and I guess something which Mantic intended (it is an addon kit).

Someone want to tell me where you find mailboxes that stand no taller than your waist too? Heh, I was comparing the Mantic ones to a Black Cat (uh, I think it was them who made those) set I have and noticed just how unusually small they are. Odd. =P

I've got some pretty low mailboxes further down on my street.

Then again, the city also demolished all the individual boxes on my street a few years back and put one big giant community one out in the middle of our neighborhood track.

I'm thinking it's that whole American ease of access type thing going on. Why reach our hands up when we can just keep them at waist level to retrieve our mail? Who ever said anything about having to exert any effort whatsoever?

Wait, are we complaining that the modular terrain is modular now?

I still haven't gotten my MA stuff yet. I may have to submit a ticket. Blah


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Forgot it shipped on the 15th. Should have it any day, I guess.

Huh, I'd be interested in seeing one of those smaller ones. When I picture a US public postbox its one of those blue ones that've been used for the past century which you can fit a grown man inside... I was actually thinking of painting them up red and with some extra work turning them into newspaper vending machines or something, as overall the Mantic ones just look really out of place alongside my big blues. =/



Don't ask me why there's a green one in that image. I thought those were done away with in the early fifties (that's the army olive drab IIRC, which was replaced with red, white and blue in the mid fifties, then the standard blue in the latter half ...because red, white and blue looked dumb as hell).


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@ pretre

Bleh, rather than they haven't included bits to cover up all the gaps. This is me complaining for complaining's sake though, as either you don't have the ability to cover the gaps and probably don't care, or you do care about the gaps, but are willing to just pull out some clay and sculpt over the holes. =P

I was just good-naturedly busting your chops.

And I don't know that the Mantic terrain is really setup for high-end terrain, so you definitely do have to do that work to clean it up if you're using it for that.

From a modular standpoint, it's pretty decent though.

I got an intact ruins set form the KS. It includes elongated hexagons (think of a rectangle with corners cut) to act as 'spacers'. I think this does occur in American architecture, but if you're stuck, you could just create the same with some spare card or plasticard?

I thought it was mentioned that the new Deadzone would be including more bits designed to cover up the connector areas.

I have the ruins as they came in the box sitting built at the moment. I'll be going over them with clay and balsa wood in a bit to spruce them up, then adding bits like piping and wiring to make them a bit more realistic. Well as realistic as building which have walls only a brick thick are (I don't think I've seen a terrain set yet which has one set of bricks, and insulating spacer, then another set). Maybe that's fine with US buildings though, as I don't know how they handle insulation and structure issues in warmer climates (I mean in the US they get away with buildings made entirely from wood). I did like the little electric box clips that were included, though I don't know what the other clips are meant to be. I think I'll have them painted like supports, but I'd much rather they looked like bricks in the first place. Again, whinging about Mantic's cheap and cheerful terrain not being up to my standards. That and its not like the people that see my terrain in person would actually care if I was using this stuff right out of the box or spending my evening sprucing the things up a bit.

Jake has put up his original rules for using the Mars Attacks Martians/ Humans as factions in Deadzone, am interested to see how they shape up

http://quirkworthy.com/2014/10/23/martians-in-deadzone-rules/

No downloadable card deck though

Good to hear that most missing items etc seem to be being dealt with in a timely manner.

 Wyrmalla wrote:

Don't ask me why there's a green one in that image. I thought those were done away with in the early fifties (that's the army olive drab IIRC, which was replaced with red, white and blue in the mid fifties, then the standard blue in the latter half ...because red, white and blue looked dumb as hell).

I believe they still use the OD ones as strongboxes for carriers on foot to place packages that are to be delivered (or recipient wasn't at home) so they don't have to carry it along with them for hours.

Here I don't think the carriers are that far away from the collection office at a time, so they just keep the packages with them till they return. Good to know that actually. ...Ah, even if I did paint up some green ones, but repainted them red, white and blue as they didn't fit the period I was going for exactly. Heh, so that's perhaps a little annoying for me to find that out now.

There's my missing parts ship confirm, we'll see by a couple of weeks then.

I haven't seen the cards yet but the quirkworthy update about the MA decks extra special rules makes me extra anxious to get them.

Mars Attacks: World War, the MA solo rules and the MA Dreadball team rules pdfs just went up on Wargamesvault for backers, link in your KS messages

^Reading through those now. The points system seems pretty interesting, grunts are super cheap and specialists/characters/vehicles are fairly expensive.

The sample human armies have around 20 soldiers and a truck at 150 points, and closer to 40 dudes, a character, and a couple of trucks at 400. Interesting size, bigger than infinity/necro/etc smaller than 40k/etc. There's a section for larger battles too but I'm reading it slowly.

I like how the 'standard' game sizes mentioned make pretty solid use of the models available in the core game, the martian 150 pt force is basically the two groups of grunts, human force is similar.

The world war book is also a nice compilation of all of the special rules and main game rules from the other books too.

Rules for martian Dredd too, that I don't think I've seen elsewhere. He gets 3 one-shot special ammo types, and tends to shoot at anyone who successfully kills an enemy, on either side. Something about Judging known murderers etc.

Compendium seems to have most or all of the extra stuff that didn't fit into other books like rules and scenario for Martian Dredd, and what looks like a copy/paste of the DZ zombie book's artificial stupidity rules (but I just glanced).

I see there are tank rules for the marines as well interesting (no model - use whatever modern tank you like basically - the one pictured is the Warlord Games Sherman M4A3)

I'm gonna read through it today. On a quick glance I think there's pictures of models in the army list section that we haven't even seen yet (Craig and Tunga, some Martian specialists?)

Does anyone know if Mantic ships their MA packages by USPS or UPS?

I'm fairly sure you can only ship by USPS if you're shipping from within the US...?

 lord_blackfang wrote:
I'm fairly sure you can only ship by USPS if you're shipping from within the US...?

Nah, we have UPS, USPS, and Fed Ex.

So far I think I've mostly gotten stuff from Mantic via Fedex, but I usually have the 'too big for Royal Mail' orders too... Even if they ship it UPS (or fedex) there's a reasonable chance it might arrive via USPS, some kind of weird handing-off that goes on lately.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
I'm fairly sure you can only ship by USPS if you're shipping from within the US...?

If they ship via Royal Mail, once it gets CONUS the USPS takes it and gets it point of delivery.

Any Aussies or Kiwis received their MA stuff, or even a shipping confirmation yet?

Did anyone else has problems with the fortified bunker walls having one edge that looks a bit melty and off? All of mine are having a bitch of a time on one corner where it totally looks melted and the connection is at a weird angle.

Just had an email about dreadball extreme, short version is that the main boxed game is on the boat and due in the end of novemmber.
There also some pics of production models for the mvps and sponsors, they look very nice and the new blaine in particular looks bad ass as normal.

Too bad Mantic scared away the normals with their delays and no-photo policies.

I'm actually really glad I did exactly what I used to mock scarletsquig for and ordered the Rebs and Sphyr teams sight unseen.

I can't remember what teams I ordered, but really wish it had been more Deadzone terrain instead, that stuffs awesome!

Well, turns out my stuff is in. I just shipped to the wrong apt. My old landlord called me last night. So it's 4 miles away. Time to go pick it up.


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Well, crap. I thought I ordered ruins and landing pad, I got a fortification and landing pad. No ruins. Already sent an email to check their logs and see whether I made an ordering error or if they put the wrong order together. I really wanted ruins.

And I retract my earlier statement of disliking the spider look. I'm just not a fan of the paint job they did, the model itself is amazing!!

Barzam got his Mars Attacks figures today, and I was both jealous and impressed.

Jealous because I"m still waiting on my goodies.

Impressed by the quality of the figures. Very nice. No noticeable flash that I saw on anything. He had human soldiers and all the bounty hunter/ tiger force guys.

The truck though! Why hasn't anything been said about this kit? It's basically Mantic's first honest to goodness plastic vehicle (at least that I can think of)! Very solid work on that.

My only minor gripe was that the wheels couldn't roll once the tires and axles are all glued together, because who doesn't want to roll their models all over the table making machine gun noises?

Eagerly anticipating the crate of plastic goodness that I'll be getting, hopefully soon! Bring on my robots, saucers, and insect legions!

The truck is hard plastic? You are sure?

Not 100% sure. Certainly feels like it. Came with a bunch of the parts on a sprue even.

I'm sure he'll pop up in this thread sooner or later and can confirm better than I can what the thing is actually made of.

I hope he tries gluing it with model glue, just to see if it bonds.

That truck was really crisp, whatever material it was.

Gave me VERY high hope for what they can do when it's time for Warpath and piles of tanks and aerial support (and hopefully some bigger mechs while they're at it).

I thought the Truck, Giant Stompy, and possibly saucer were all liable to be hard plastic, but I guess it may or may not have been written in stone.

My Edwyn model has mold lines. Everything else is clear of them though.

Every single model I got for Mars attacks had mold lines, they're models that came out of a mold...

They didn't have noticeable flash though, and many had mold lines small enough that a lot of people might ignore them and continue to lead a happy life.

I'm more concerned about Edwyn's bendy sword, I'm either gonna replace it with plasticard or give it one last chance with an overcorrection via hot water (bending it into place and setting with cold water saw it eventually bend back over a few hours).

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
Gave me VERY high hope for what they can do when it's time for Warpath and piles of tanks and aerial support (and hopefully some bigger mechs while they're at it).

If bigger Mechs are only an "outside chance" kind of thing on a Warpath KS, Mantic are shooting themselves in the foot.

That said, I'd rather they kept the tanks and dropships looking like tanks and dropships, and mechs looking like mechs. I'm not so thrilled with the combinations they previewed years ago:





Time to hire a new concept artist.

WOW those are a blast from the past there Vermonter.

Is it wrong I like the half wolf half tank thing.

 Vermonter wrote:

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:

That first drawing: