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Worth noting thr lighthouse is a KS exclusive and won't go to retail.

Maybe an abridged version will but don't gamble on it.

I'm still waiting foe the Greek stuff from Bones 5.

Good design, but I already printed a lighthouse off Thingiverse for a few €

Nothing in this campaign looks so good to me that I'd want to pay 2 years in advance, for what is now probably the worst material remaining in the industry, and then faff about with import duties on top. Maybe even if printing wasn't a thing.

I dont know about the other ones but 1.1 million is quite good result.

 NAVARRO wrote:
I dont know about the other ones but 1.1 million is quite good result.

Other averaged around $3 million, so it must be a disappointment.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/reaperbones5/bones-6-tales-from-the-green-griffin

Currently at $1.4 million with 24 hours to go.

Well, I put in a small pledge for access to the PM. The Tombs of Hakir got me. Not a perfect expansion by any means, but a nice wholesome counter to Ankh’s aesthetic.

Mrs. GG and I pledged for the Core Set for now but will get more add-ons in the pledge manager when our budget allows. We NEED that lighthouse.

Yeah, it is less than the previous Kickstarter but folks risking anything these days should be considered a win.

The demand for everything to be bigger than the last is in my opinion counterproductive. It is an unrealistic demand in a world where situations change.

I certainly do not see the campaign as a disappointment despite not getting the various things I was hoping for, such as steampunk gnomes & airship, because they came up with cool things I did not know I wanted until I saw them. Like the bee-folk.

 Grumpy Gnome wrote:


Yeah, it is less than the previous Kickstarter but folks risking anything these days should be considered a win.

The demand for everything to be bigger than the last is in my opinion counterproductive. It is an unrealistic demand in a world where situations change.

I certainly do not see the campaign as a disappointment despite not getting the various things I was hoping for, such as steampunk gnomes & airship, because they came up with cool things I did not know I wanted until I saw them. Like the bee-folk.

Well said, this campaign does have some real gems in it.

2 hours to go, $1.7 million, the Egypt expansion is unlocked.

Good luck to them!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/reaperbones5/bones-6-tales-from-the-green-griffin

They've unlocked the lighthouse early I'll leave $30 in for that and have another look at the rest in the PM - Euro to Dollar exchange rate is bad at the moment so it might be better later.

Stupid me took a nap and missed it - historically, is it possible to jump in once the pledge manager opens?

Yes but generally the prices are like 10-15% more.

And closed at $1.8 million with an unlocked light house.

1.8 million is still very good but I do think they'll spend a lot more time thinking of what Bones 7 will be.

I think it just shows the core needs to be strong to really hit the high marks.

This time they still did well, but at least from my perspective it was just because the expansions were so good. If the expansions had been more samurai dinos and chronopia I could easily see them doing a lot worse.

So next time they need more cool core items - more dragons, large monsters, etc.

They have more samurai dinos than samurai humans, right? But the core set gave us the 4th (?) Vandodendra whatever, the 5th iteration of most basic character classes, more zombies, more of the same, and some pretty cool ants. Even the rare, weird monsters feel like stale retreads, except for the cool ants. If there’s one thing to take away from this campaign, it’s ants for $8. And maaaaaayyyybe the halfling on fairy dragon.

I passed on it because there's too much overlap with Bones I-IV. (I've passed on many other KS for the same reasons.) I've noticed I've been backing either miniatures in other genres (eg. westerns) or generic fantasy that's on the niche side (eg. ducks, Anastyr's demon trapped in amber).

I haven't gotten a core box since Bones 2 as they've always been random mix of things that Reaper is trying to make appealing to people without much, or any, of a miniature collection.

I understand why they went that way but at some point they were going to hit wall where the amount of people the core pledge appeals to was going to be less then the people that wanted less random sets. I just didn't think it would be such a sudden drop between 5 and 6 and more a slower fall over several campaigns.

I don't think it's a financial thing either as this year as had a lot of KS campaigns do very well for entrainment including the highest grossing one ever. Also I don't think china manufacturing has much to do with it since the Marvel Zombiecide did very well (top 20 kickstarters of all time if I'm not mistaken).

I get the feeling Reaper is running out of ideas, or more likely Bones V was an overstretch and they are cutting back.

The Expansions are about 20% uncooler, same price, but you get less.
The Core Set was smaller because there were fewer unlocks so we cant blame reaper for that, but too many expansions were wave 2&3 or 4&5 meaning even Reaper were not holding much hope for a good run. Yes the rising cost of living will have much to do with that, but people still want a bargain and Reaper Bones is set up as a bargain. Today I am not seeing it with Bones VI.

Now lets be fair here, Bones VI was a resounding success by Kickstarter miniatures campaigns go, but as a Bones Kickstarter is was mediocre.

Frankly Reaper needs to get back on track, yes prices have risen but lacklustre offerings mean lacklustre sales. I dropped over $1100 USD on Bones V excluding shipping. If I buy everything I might want for Bones VI it comes to $452, and that includes a lot of sets that I am simply not sure about and likely will not get. All told I will drop £227 on top of the Core Set pledge., less than I paid on Bones IV. My expenditure has roughly doubled with each Bones campaign since Bones III, not any more.

So what is wrong with it. Let me break it down.

1. Few big gribblies and large pieces. Both dragons are very nice, the clear highpoint of the campaign and I will get both. But what else do we have for the wow factor I expect from Bones. Not a lot really. The fae dragon is big but that is itself a problem (see point 2). I might get the Lighthouse, but I will have to see it first, I might go elsewhere for that.
Now admittedly Reaper are tapped out on chromatic dragons and big demons. But they could have done metallics in the same scale as the chromatics for Bones V. They could have done a proper range of Hill Giants and/or Fire Giants to go with the decent range of Frost Giants they have already done. They lost an opportunity here.

2. Too much padding. I am used to junk in a Bones boxset, and recognise a lot of miniatures will remain unwanted, but normally there have been enough gems amongst the poo to make the sets worthwhile. I am not so such with Bones VI. The Fairie set is a case in point. There is a lot of stuff they could have done, an Oberon and Titania miniature, firbolg warriors and a seelie and unseelie court. What we got was a half arsed attempt to jumble in a few random faeries and an oversized dragon to make up for the lack of volume. Now I like big dragons, but Shimmerscale is bigger than most and should really if anything be smaller. It is only so big because frankly the set would be empty if it were not so.
Other sets have obvious padding. The giant skellie in the undead set doesn't look of feel like a giant creature, more like a 3 up of a 28mm sculpt. I think it is there to add volume. Nevertheless this is one set I will likely be getting, but it could have been better.

3. Badly structured characterful diorama sets. I like the minis plus terrain feature sets we got in Bones V. I don't marry the sets together, but separate out the terrain for general use as well as the adventurer and OpFor. But all three elements have a lot to show for them. There was little here to match them. The Owlbear set is nice, I have enough owlbears but will add more, especially with a nest and infants.
Conversely some of the themed main expansions are lobsided, the Greek set was long on monsters and short on gods, the Egypt set is the opposite. There was a lot of terrain padding that you can easily get elsewhere and very little in terms of desert dweller contents living or undead. I am having trouble seeing how this set would be of use.

Individual concerns.

- If I am to drop on multipart men at arms I will need more than one body sculpt. I am happy to buy multipart infantry from Reaper, but the versatility must be married to a good selection of choice parts for varied build options.
- Yes please for a set of Tieflings. Reaper should do more like that. In Bones V we got sets of catfolk and dragonfolk, each set was a one stop shop for a decent and efficient selection for players to choose non standard races for player characters. The main four or elf, dwarf man and hobbit need many sculpts and variants. Other playable races are better served with a simple set of five or six miniatures covering the basic character classes, or could be represented as such. Reaper got this right, but didn't get it right enough. We got some Gnomes and Tieflings we could have had more. Fire Newts, what use are they?
- Those dragons, very nice indeed. Reaper got that much right. It is a good fallback to their core competency to provide decent dragons in a Bones campaign. But only two, plus the dinky ones? Don't get me wrong a smaller ridable copper dragon is a nice add to the Core Set, but it would have been nice to see an adult one.

The bones core sets will just get less and less appealing as Reaper expands their line. I can go online and buy $100 worth of random bones figures and get them in a week. Or I can buy essentially the same mix of generic fantasy and get them in 2 years. The core sets are all basically the same - some elves with bows, dwarves with axes, undead, an orc or three, a dragon, troll, etc. That's all available now, from Reaper. They're competing with themselves.

Are they ever going to release that pirate ship btw? I noticed a number of the bigger bones kickstarter items never seemed to make it to retail. I lucked into the Baba Yaga hut, but think it was from someone's KS pledge.

 Bossk_Hogg wrote:
The bones core sets will just get less and less appealing as Reaper expands their line. I can go online and buy $100 worth of random bones figures and get them in a week. Or I can buy essentially the same mix of generic fantasy and get them in 2 years. The core sets are all basically the same - some elves with bows, dwarves with axes, undead, an orc or three, a dragon, troll, etc. That's all available now, from Reaper. They're competing with themselves.

I think that's a real good description on what's wrong with the core set.

Are they ever going to release that pirate ship btw? I noticed a number of the bigger bones kickstarter items never seemed to make it to retail. I lucked into the Baba Yaga hut, but think it was from someone's KS pledge.

Hard to tell as Reaper really doesn't talk about what eventually makes it into retail but I'd be surprised if the ship did. They'd have to sell it at what? 60%-70% off to distributors so the price would have to be really expensive to turn a profit. I don't think they do web/direct exclusive stuff either.

I wonder if a core set of 100+ mooks would work better?

Alternately might smaller, targets KSers work better? Dragons, undead, post apoc, space opera etc.

Went in at $10 for the pledge manager. Will get both dragons and maybe the lighthouse but there’s not too much else to be excited about.

The encounters were few and far between, and nowhere near as appealing as bones V.

The bones materials work best for big monsters at affordable prices and we just didn’t get that with vi.

To be honest I’m more interested when the stuff from the last Kickstarter hits retail, as I didn’t go big on it as was broke at the time the pledge manager closed and regret not picking up some bits.

For me what Reaper do best is big to very big monsters. My Reaper frost giants are some of my favourite miniatures and painting them was a joy. Likewise various giant insects, dragons, a great big disgusting worm thingummy, etc.

So whoever said "more giants" -- I agree with you! They have barely scratched the surface of cool giantkind so far.

But also, honesty, more big trolls, more big insects (Mierce have shown that these latter are popular; Reaper ones wouldn't be quite as amazing but they'd be perfectly good and a fraction of the price; same with a load of the Mierce range really), maybe some more minotaurs, a TONNE more demons and devils, etc.

To be honest, part of me wonders if they shouldn't just get rid of the "core pledge" all together, and just have themed sets like Hakir and the forest one, and then maybe an "all in" at a discounted price for the bargain hounds...

I was expecting the core pledge this time around to be the tavern one that was one of the add-ons and maybe even a building done in sio-cast/bonesUSA tiles. I think that would have gone pretty well.

I think it is a combination of a rapidly slowing economy in the US and Europe as inflation really starts to bite deep and geopolitics rains on the parade, less popular miniature choices (this campaign was very cutesy), and reaching market saturation on generic stuff (zombies, dragons, etc.)

And the 2 year wait when so much is available now

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
And the 2 year wait when so much is available now

Yep, good point. The longer wait, the better the deal and more spectacular the miniatures better be.

 Orlanth wrote:
Now lets be fair here, Bones VI was a resounding success by Kickstarter miniatures campaigns go, but as a Bones Kickstarter is was mediocre.

Bones VI wasn't just competing against the current market for people's cash - it was also hampered by the success of Bones I-V. I still have stacks of unpainted miniatures from the previous two campaigns that I backed and I can't justify getting yet another core set at this point. The increasing costs of importing pledges also make those core sets less of a bargain outside the US. As with the last campaign I will probably wait for anything I really like to reach retail - yes I will pay more for each miniature I but but I also won't be paying import duties for the ones I won't use.

 Maccwar wrote:

 Orlanth wrote:
Now lets be fair here, Bones VI was a resounding success by Kickstarter miniatures campaigns go, but as a Bones Kickstarter is was mediocre.

Bones VI wasn't just competing against the current market for people's cash - it was also hampered by the success of Bones I-V. I still have stacks of unpainted miniatures from the previous two campaigns that I backed and I can't justify getting yet another core set at this point. The increasing costs of importing pledges also make those core sets less of a bargain outside the US. As with the last campaign I will probably wait for anything I really like to reach retail - yes I will pay more for each miniature I but but I also won't be paying import duties for the ones I won't use.

Some gamers, like me, are just fussy.

I'm not in the market for Fantasy miniatures in a big way.

I was tempted by the Egyptian expansion with this Kickstarter but if Reaper came up with a sci fi crossover as good as the Sledgehammer BFG (in partnership with Victoria Miniatures), I'd have been all over that...and picked up the Egyptian set.

Agreed, my BFG is one of my fave minis. Gets more use as a terrain or objective piece than as part of an army, but it's so characterful.

I have some stuff from Bones 5 still to paint and probably a few bits from the previous one (3), but I think I've finally finished painting 2. Adding to the pile of shame with more generic fantasy minis wasn't appealing.