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WT* is going on? 1 in 5 40k players haven't heard of MANTIC? What do you guys do on the Internet?

Ever hear of someone called Alessio Cavatore? No reason you would have heard of him, I mean he only worked on the rules for The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game, Warmaster, Warhammer 40,000 and Mordheim while working for Games Workshop.

Oh and he designed MANTIC games Rule sets. 1 in 10 I could understand, but 1 in 5, being that all of you are already on the internet to be here I find that statistic a very disturbing one. Maybe this is why we have so many blinkered GW apologists, they don't actually realise there are other companies out there that make miniatures and rule sets.

EDIT- 3 x Thunderfire Cannons for £30? YES PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.manticgames.com/Shop-Home/Warpath/Forge-Fathers/Vehicles/Product/Forge-Father-Jotunn-Heavy-Hailstorm-Cannon-Bundle.html

You cannot argue with prices like this....3 of my Techmarines and I have an Apocalypse Battery, or a Fun list by taking 3 of these as Heavy's.

I really like Mantic's minis. I have a great deal of models from the fantasy range but othing from the scifi yet but i do plan on getting to that end soon. I also am going to participate in the Dreadball kickstarter because i think the mini s look great

I find that all their products are very much hit or miss for me. Some I like, some I hate and some are tolerable. Right now I haven't found any of them compelling enough to purchase. Though a friend of mine purchased the Scifi board game. We may play eventually.

I like their fantasy range alot, but I don't play fantasy. And even if I did I play at GW, so their minis would be a tourny no-go. Alas, such is life. Could definitely see springing on a purchase for the bitz though.

Mantic, as with most "other than GW" (otGW) companies all have nice/good models and rules, BUT...

How will they get out there into the mainstream?

GW stores/gamesday are out; so that only leaves Indy Retailers, Conventions/Tournaments, and small (2-4 people) groups of friends who have to agree to play it.

If more Indy GW based games Tournaments let them in as "counts as" maybe that would be a start?

Most of the otGW games are model heavy, so it is a lot to ask for players to "get started" in a new game... (especially if NO ONE is playing it)

 Death Gear wrote:
I just don't like their fantasy range. Some of the mini's look really cheesy.

I agree. I think that alot of them are too skinny.

rexscarlet wrote:


Most of the otGW games are model heavy, so it is a lot to ask for players to "get started" in a new game... (especially if NO ONE is playing it)

One advantage Mantic has going for them here is that a lot of their rules can borrow heavily from GW products, especially Kings of War <-> Fantasy. Sure you'll need a goodly wad of miniatures either way, but if you have a sizeable collection of WHFB models and want to try something new, it looks pretty easy to do KoW. Warpath looks like you have an easy translation between Marauders and Orks, but beyond that nothing is jumping out quite as straight-forward unless you happen to have an old Squat army. If Mantic ends up flopping, you're sitting on a pile of GW miniatures that you can play 40k/Fantasy with.

(Now, let's wait and see who wants to say but then Mantic doesn't sell miniatures and blahblahblah.)

 Icelord wrote:

 Death Gear wrote:
I just don't like their fantasy range. Some of the mini's look really cheesy.

I agree. I think that alot of them are too skinny.

This is actually because they're accurately scaled for 28mm, while the GW you're used to (And possibly PP, but I'm not sure on that) use "Heroic" scale 28mm, basically inflating everything. Looks nice, but would look as silly as an irl Barbie would due to the odd proportioning. Nothing wrong with this scale, but this is why they look "odd"

However, the larger monsters they're putting out from the Kickstarter look like they'll be a bit more proportioned like GW and PP monsters, especially PP, so these might be more to your fancy.

I rather like the Warpath range. Corporation are basic sci-fi human soldiers, I could see using them as guardsmen easily. Have only skimmed the rules, but it did jump out at me more than I was expecting.

To be brutally honest I think the Wargaming community now has too many systems, this market is saturated. The golden age of wargaming is over, everyman and his dog is trying to start up a hobby company (combining their passion with a job) and it's so fractured and fragmented, I just don't think this expansion can continue much longer. It's making life harder for everyone to collect and have games, also supporting tournaments etc is more difficult. We are almost too diluted, I don't want everyone back to GW, but 10 or so systems is fine, but it's getting towards 30+ major systems.

DROPZONE COMMANDER seems to have been a flash in the Pan, although time will tell. It certainly isn't being played at my club depsite 8-9 players buying it, they played for 3-4 weeks and then went "meh" and then they went "OMG, OMG , OMG X-WING!!!!!".

I love having lots of choice, but I think all the small startups, and the things you see on KICKSTARTER are all fighting over the same fan base.

I am a fan of some of their fantasy models. specifically their orcs, zombies and ghouls. I plan on building a GW Orcs and Goblins army with mantic Orcs and Goblins soon

I'm loving their ghouls, and if i ever did a zombie horde i would pick those up too. both are superior to GW. Also picked up some corporation troopers and i think they make good guardsmen, still haven't built them though.

they are smart to make their models compatible with gw, but i have doubts about the ruleset. never was a fan of Alessio and as mentioned, there is just too many different games out there when normal budgets usually support 2 or 3 systems max...

I wouldn't have gotten so into WHFB without Mantics zombies and better yet their dwarfs. I mix it with GW so Mantic's taller models with shorter beards are my warriors and thunderers while the GW ones are the long beards and quarrelers. *Grumble grumble* Told ya it wouldn't work, why in MY day...

One of the chaps at the club is pushing Mantic in a big way. I'll probably give KoW a go as I've fantasy armies sitting around unused.

On the minis front, I wasn't impressed with the free Elf sprue that I received a couple of years back, but they have improved a lot since then.

Yeah, i find the elves ridiculously slender. They arent realistically proportioned at all, they are 7 feet tall and 6 inches wide. It looks weird.

Mantic is too "GW knockoff" for my tastes. There are exceptions-- their Zombies are far better than the seriously aging GW ones-- but by and large their lines feel very "budget," and since the prices aren't even that good I don't see a compelling reason to buy.

They do make better GW knockoffs than WGF does, but that's really not saying much...

 Kingsley wrote:
Mantic is too "GW knockoff" for my tastes. There are exceptions-- their Zombies are far better than the seriously aging GW ones-- but by and large their lines feel very "budget," and since the prices aren't even that good I don't see a compelling reason to buy.

They do make better GW knockoffs than WGF does, but that's really not saying much...

10 GW boar boyz £35
10 mantic gore riders £20

20 mantic orc greatax £20
15 mantic orc ax £14
10 GW orc boyz £18

20 GW zombies £20.50
30 mantic zombies £20

Given that mantic is generaly available at 25-30% discount compared to Gw at 20-25% (UK) How much cheaper do you expect them to go?

I don't like plenty of the mantic sculpts and if I want that troop type I just buy GW models instead (Most of my kings of war army is GW). On the other hand the cluttered look and oversized scale of may of GW's offerings isn't winning much favour from me(ranking up GW orc boys is horrible). The sooner gamers create a enviroment for themselves where they can pick minatures on merit rather than brand the better.

Having built and painted mantic and GW stuff side by side I can see pros and cons in both. I'll try and make each purchase with an open mind, I don't want to rule out GWs excelent mutipart plastic kits or mantics cheap unclutered troops.

Well they seem to have some nice minis, i might be picking up one or two just for panting purposes.

 dragqueeninspace wrote:

 Kingsley wrote:
Mantic is too "GW knockoff" for my tastes. There are exceptions-- their Zombies are far better than the seriously aging GW ones-- but by and large their lines feel very "budget," and since the prices aren't even that good I don't see a compelling reason to buy.

They do make better GW knockoffs than WGF does, but that's really not saying much...

10 GW boar boyz £35
10 mantic gore riders £20

20 mantic orc greatax £20
15 mantic orc ax £14
10 GW orc boyz £18

20 GW zombies £20.50
30 mantic zombies £20

Given that mantic is generaly available at 25-30% discount compared to Gw at 20-25% (UK) How much cheaper do you expect them to go?

I play 40k, not Fantasy, so I don't know what Mantic's like over on the Fantasy side, except that their zombies obviously own. My impression is that Fantasy has become a much worse detail than 40k because of the unbundling of units coupled with larger unit sizes.

That said, on the 40k side Mantic sells its Corporation troopers at $25.00 for 10, which simply isn't good enough compared to GW's Guardsmen at $29.00 for 10 when you consider the issues with the Mantic models. At $25.00 I don't even think the Mantic forces are competitive with $35.00 old-school metal IG.

 Kingsley wrote:

 dragqueeninspace wrote:

 Kingsley wrote:
Mantic is too "GW knockoff" for my tastes. There are exceptions-- their Zombies are far better than the seriously aging GW ones-- but by and large their lines feel very "budget," and since the prices aren't even that good I don't see a compelling reason to buy.

They do make better GW knockoffs than WGF does, but that's really not saying much...

10 GW boar boyz £35
10 mantic gore riders £20

20 mantic orc greatax £20
15 mantic orc ax £14
10 GW orc boyz £18

20 GW zombies £20.50
30 mantic zombies £20

Given that mantic is generaly available at 25-30% discount compared to Gw at 20-25% (UK) How much cheaper do you expect them to go?

I play 40k, not Fantasy, so I don't know what Mantic's like over on the Fantasy side, except that their zombies obviously own. My impression is that Fantasy has become a much worse detail than 40k because of the unbundling of units coupled with larger unit sizes.

That said, on the 40k side Mantic sells its Corporation troopers at $25.00 for 10, which simply isn't good enough compared to GW's Guardsmen at $29.00 for 10 when you consider the issues with the Mantic models. At $25.00 I don't even think the Mantic forces are competitive with $35.00 old-school metal IG.

I have bought about 8 boxes of corporation troopers, I can't say I'm a fan but I found them for a lot cheaper than list, but then I'm not a fan of the plastic IG either. At list I'd agree the GW IG are a better choice.

While the mantic infantry can be found very cheaply and come with lots of special weapons they are needlessly fiddley to assemble (no special weapon hands really?) and many have warped gun barrels (very easy to fix but why should I need to). I don't like the huge IG minatures either with their comedy oversized weapons.

I still maintain however its worth taking each case on its merits since both sides come out on top in different areas.

Just had a quick look. Orcs look ok, not keen on enforcers which would be relevat for me.

Never heard of them before this poll.

I bought a load of corporation and intend to use them as elysians.I just cant afford forge world prices at the minute as i'm on short time at work.Granted they don't look as good as proper elysians but for the cost i can live with it.

Quite a few places are selling mantic at 40% off.

Mantic has always been a stand-in for GW miniatures to me and I don't see this changing in a while.

I got one of their vehicle kits. It was ok. I don't think I'll get much else at this point.

Never really noticed Mantic until now.

 mwnciboo wrote:
To be brutally honest I think the Wargaming community now has too many systems, this market is saturated. The golden age of wargaming is over, everyman and his dog is trying to start up a hobby company (combining their passion with a job) and it's so fractured and fragmented, I just don't think this expansion can continue much longer. It's making life harder for everyone to collect and have games, also supporting tournaments etc is more difficult. We are almost too diluted, I don't want everyone back to GW, but 10 or so systems is fine, but it's getting towards 30+ major systems.

DROPZONE COMMANDER seems to have been a flash in the Pan, although time will tell. It certainly isn't being played at my club depsite 8-9 players buying it, they played for 3-4 weeks and then went "meh" and then they went "OMG, OMG , OMG X-WING!!!!!".

I love having lots of choice, but I think all the small startups, and the things you see on KICKSTARTER are all fighting over the same fan base.

True dat.

It’s a trend I’ve seen many times at clubs where a new system will dominate for a few months and then the next flash in the pan system will come along and everyone just moves onto that. AT-43, Dystopian Wars, Uncharted Seas, Starship Troopers. All where massive for a brief period but then vanished as suddenly as they came along. Currently Malifaux, Dreadball and Infinity are enjoying their period in the spotlight at our local club but I fear they will soon wane.

That’s not to cast any sort of negative light on the quality of the products themselves, which are in many ways superior to GWs own systems, but I just think it’s the nature of gaming.

As for Mantic their main use round my way is as a cheap substitute for GW miniatures. Nothing wrong with that and I’m certain Mantic where fully aware that most of their sales would be just for this purpose. GW in their own way gave Mantic license to do this by pricing plastic at premium rates.

Mantic miniatures are variable in quality but on the whole have come on leaps and bounds since their inception. The Elves where ghastly, no argument here. But their new stuff looks far better.

I contributed to the first Mantic Kickstarter, and have received the initial armies I ordered. I purchased the Abyssal Dwarves and some Mantic goblins to use as Hobgoblins for a Legion of Azgorth army I've been building. And while I have no issue with the quality or sculpting on any of the metal miniatures, the quality of the plastic figures wasn't all that great. For the abyssal dwarves this wasn't as big a deal, as they had metal parts which were added to the regular plastic mantic dwarf bodies. But the goblins really seemed like a cheap brand of plastic, and the detail was pretty muted on them.

As a company I do like Mantic, they seem to be really excited about what they do, and as others have mentioned they have most definitely improved dramatically since their inception. The more they produce, the more they'll separate their own styles from GW, and other companies, and I think products like Dreadball and Loka can only help to make this more apparent. Their warpath stuff is Cool, and I feel like they've basically made it their goal to fill in the gaps that people might want which are missing in 40k. Such as bringing out a good looking squat-type army, and basically making space skaven.

Who says squats are dead!?

Yes, Mantic's Warpath miniature range overall looks like they dropped all of the fantasy tropes straight into a generic science fiction universe and said "have at it," but, Holy Throne, it works! Only thing they absolutely need to get rid of are the tabs on the bottom of the model. Those are awful.

For fantasy, people really need to look at the chaos dwarfs they do
Great models, half the price of FW, and go back to the old feel of chaos dwarfs, not the new style of normal ones, but spikey.