Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Looks good, I've signed up for the newsletter. If you end up doing some good ork-a-likes I'll definitely be a backer!

The problem is, you might get enough to fund a kickstarter, but when the only growth you can do are people who have already invested into a different game, there is a problem.

When kickstarter first started being a thing, people always talked about how a kickstarter's backers were the only customers for the product and thus it wouldn't see actual sales once at retail. Well for most projects that wasn't true.

In this case, however, the customers after the kickstarter are ones that would already be embroiled in another game, one with decades of history, thousands of dollars invested, and countless hours of time. They'll also be competing with every single other not-40k bits and alternative miniature makers. So they'll have their work cut out for them.

I say all this not to put down these developers, but to just say, do better. Be a bit more original. If you're fellow video game developers, then I know you're not afraid of putting in the work.

 Vertrucio wrote:
To be frank, it still seems like this game is trying too hard to follow in the footsteps of GW and 40K, and hoping to pickup more people by going that route.

Just one look at the artwork shown and you can see stand ins for space marines, complete with ridiculous shoulder pads and roman-like insignia, a giant dreadnought stand in, etc.

Which really surprises me to see since these guys are all people working in the video game industry. Across the VG industry are strewn the corpses of games and studios that tried to copy the success of the big dominant games, like World of Warcraft and Call of Duty, only to find that people aren't looking for more of the same when they already have the original.

Thinking you can make the next 40K of miniature games is like thinking you can make the next WoW. It's not going to happen, and a small startup, no matter how talented, is not going to be able to pull away players from the behemoths that currently dominate.

Oh yes. The first warning sign was in the topic title. Straight out of the GW-coattails playbook - mash the word 'war' with some other verb or noun: Avatars of War, Warthrone, Warhell, Warmachine, Warpath, Kings of War... And now Warprime.

Not sure if you're being sarcastic or genuine. Hard to tell on the internet with just text.

 Vertrucio wrote:
Not sure if you're being sarcastic or genuine. Hard to tell on the internet with just text.

I read it as genuine.

I will agree that the GW-influenced Space Marine designs are the ones that least interest me right now. What seem to be their Ork substitutes, which appear from the concept art to look quite different, interest me most.



I presume the picture above depicts a "savage Kelk."

There isn't any need for more Space Marine-alikes out there. I think there really is a niche available for a barbaric, brutal, not-necessarily-goblinoid sci-fi race that isn't hampered by GW's goofy Ork stylings. Savagery isn't always synonymous with slapstick buffoonery.

To be fair they look more like Terran Marines from Starcraft (yes I know the chicken and egg of this), more streamlined than GW clunkiness.

Some updates have come from the Facebook page talking about rules release shortly for those signed up on the news letter ect as well as info on the KS release. I hope they build up a bit more info before the KS. I mean the Marines really

are really not doing it for me. I prefer less of that and more sleek effective looking armor. I mean can those guys even check what is behind them?? That being said the concept stuff for everything else looks amazing. From the Savage Kelk to

the cyber elf things to the robots ect it all looks good. I hope if they do some two-army starter set that we can swap out one of the armies, as I assume the marines will be one of them. If the concept translates well from the the art then I am

down for the other races. (Also as a side note, I could have sworn they mentioned some plan to manufacture plastic on spruce. Does that limit the type of material they could use? I am unfamiliar with types of material except that PVC is not

ideal).

I for one am perfectly happy with Not-Starcraft marines. Bring 'em on, I say.

 Barzam wrote:
I for one am perfectly happy with Not-Starcraft marines. Bring 'em on, I say.

Well, since your opinion differs from mine, it is obviously incorrect.

 Vermonter wrote:
I think there really is a niche available for a barbaric, brutal, not-necessarily-goblinoid sci-fi race that isn't hampered by GW's goofy Ork stylings. Savagery isn't always synonymous with slapstick buffoonery.

I agree. Something humanoid without being hunched/grossly out of proportion. I'm liking the concept art of that alien race so far.

I don't know if anyone else asked for a playtest packet, but they emailed it to me today.

Tell us what you think of those rules when you get a chance to give them a spin.

These guys showed up on Facebook:



Looks vaguely reptilian so I'm interested to see what else they've got coming.

I was going to post the that photo but they look cool, if the "orks" of this universe are going to be reptile like then all the better I say that is great! Also @ Alex if you get a chance to go over the play style and such (and anyone else) could you post what you thought of it? I don't have any time these next few weeks so I didn't sign up but I would really like to know how the game is played!

I'm hoping for a super basic, pick-up-and-play rule system for this one. Not every game needs to have a million special rules. I'd love to have a sci-fi game where I don't need to have a massive rulebook next to me at all times.

The rules cover 9 pages, with another 9 pages for the three army lists. It does have some interesting differences compared to 40k, and if nothing else, the broad strokes look to be improvements. It's an IGOUGO system, but each turn is about half of what a 40k turn would be.

The three factions are the Humans, Amarant (crested female aliens) and Kelk (toothy aliens). Again looking at the broad strokes, they remind me of the three factions from Emperor: Battle for Dune.

The Humans have unique command and control options.
The Amarant are fast and have shields.
The Kelk are tough and cope better with damage.

Sounds interesting. What kind of model count does it recommend?

Also, is there any requirement to submit feedback if you sign up from a rules pack? Because I doubt I'd be able to really offer anything that constructive, but I'd like to give them a shot.

 Paradigm wrote:
Sounds interesting. What kind of model count does it recommend?

The absolute bare minimum legal army size is 5 models for the Amarant and 8 for the other two factions. A normal army size - for the playtest scenario, at least - looks to be 25-30 infantry and a dreadnought-equivalent.

Cool, so a mid-sized game with the option for expanding. I might sign up and give it a shot.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And email sent. I'll see if they get back to me today, and with any luck I might even be able to throw up a pseudo-batrep here once I've got a test or two down. Alternative rulesets are always a good thing.

They sent me the rules yesterday, and while I've yet to get a game in (I'm hoping to tonight at some point), I figured some more info on them might be appreciated here. Warprime, if you don't want the details'in the open' as such then shoot me a PM or post here and I'll edit this out.

On first glance, the rules look pretty good. Everything in the game seems to be largely based on a single mechanic, which is testing directly against your opponent's stats, kind of how WS works in 40k, except it applies to shooting and as well. Simply, your stat+d6 has to equal or beat their stat, so if I'm shooting a human infantryman's rifle (skill 3) and a Kelk with a agility stat of 6, I hit it on a 3+ (3+4=/>6), if I take the same shot at an Amarant with an agility of 8, I need a 5+ (3+5=/>6). I like this as it means it is actually harder to hit faster targets ect, whereas in a lot of other games, you just hit on a set score, which is simple but also sometimes unrealistic.

Squad makeup works differently to a lot of games I've seen in that you buy a squad as a single army list entry, but this in itself consists of teams. So a human Infantry Squad could consist of a Command Team (commander, 2-3 guys), 2 Manouvre Teams (3-4 guys) and a Fire Team (2 guys with a heavy weapon); this is one entry on the list, and the commander is still responsible for the squad at some times in-game, but at the same time you have far more freedom of movement than games based around larger squads. I can see the average 3-5 model teams in squads meaning the game is firmly about MSU, even hordes will split down in that way, and this could lead to a good tactical layer.

The damage done by weapons, both in shooting and CC, is determined by its own profile, and this includes speed (number of shots/attacks), damage (bonus on damage rolls), a penalty for firing on the move (I like this, it means some weapons are better at move-and-fire than others, moreso than just categorising them) and damage (how much damage each successful wound does).

The way damage is handled is also an interesting one: instead of removing one model per wound, you place damage markers on the unit that stay there the whole Action phase (this is where units move/shoot/fight. I note you can't ever do more than one of these). Once everything in your army has shot and fought, then damage is converted into dead models, with each model having a Health stat that determines how much damage it takes to put one down. For example, a Kelk has Health 6, so 6 markers are needed to kill one. This seems like a lot, but given how a fair few weapons do multiple wounds, it might work well. If there's anything I'm unsure about pre-playing, it's whether this way of resolving damage is really that efficient, or just trying to be different. We'll see, and I don't expect it to be massively complicated, but it may slow things down, at least at first.

So there you go, all the relevant info about how this looks. How it plays, I don't yet know, but I'll soon find out. Again, Warprime, if you'd rather this info wasn't so readily available, I'll take it down.

Thanks for the info Paradigm. It sounds interesting at least.

I'm not digging the Humans at all. The other races look cool, but the human faction just looks too...plain.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
Tell us what you think of those rules when you get a chance to give them a spin.

These guys showed up on Facebook:



Looks vaguely reptilian so I'm interested to see what else they've got coming.

That one on the right certainly has my attention . Although I don't really back things based on concept art anymore...

As long as there aren't too many different kinds of counters...

Reminds me of some of the Destiny stuff I've seen.

Looks pretty boss, the renders on the site made me drool, I'll have to keep an eye on this.

I really like the art of those aliens. Very cool.

Well did you guys read this yet?



According to the latest newsletter, their campaign starts June 24!



Also this guy showed up on Kingmaker's facebook page.

Curious as to what the creature is in the KS picture, looks cool. Really down for the savages (if I could get to see a solid render/ 3D model)| and down for the other non-human thing (once again after seeing a render or something) but I just cant make myself like the humans. Will skip on them but I would really like to see this KS go really really well (Just hope they dont make the same mistake some recent KS have made and then backslide....). I will be waiting on the 24!

 Mathieu Raymond wrote:
As long as there aren't too many different kinds of counters...

There are a fair few in the playtest rules, to represent units being braced/enraged/shielded/other conditions, and to count damage, but they all seem to go away fairly quickly; most last a turn at maximum, apart from damage where excess counters stick around for the next round.

I also think it'd be easy to avoid using some, a lot of them are just aide memoirs rather than essentials.

On the plus side with human figures, you can always just slap helmets on them all and pretend they're robots at least.

Curious as to what definition of reasonably priced will be. Have we heard what material everything will be produced in?

Because I'm sure we all think of the same material when we think of the words affordable, plastic, and kickstarters....

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
On the plus side with human figures, you can always just slap helmets on them all and pretend they're robots at least.

Curious as to what definition of reasonably priced will be. Have we heard what material everything will be produced in?

Because I'm sure we all think of the same material when we think of the words affordable, plastic, and kickstarters....

According to their website, 'high quality plastic'. I'm pretty sure they're talking about hard plastic given what's been said so far.

This WarPrime newsletter indicates that they haven't decided what kind of plastic to use yet. However, they do want to produce the minis on sprues.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

3D Print or Plastic Molds

We have finished releasing the images of the painted prototypes and there have been a lot of questions them. What is the material? Are they 3D Printed? How big are they. Will they be pre-painted when I get them? So I thought I would take this newsletter to talk about our miniatures. What we currently have. And what we will have when we launch.

Getting miniatures made from a 3D Model is a little more complex than you might be aware of. You can’t just take a 3D file and send it to a manufacturer. Once a 3D Model is made it needs to be posed, and each pose needs to be cut. The cuts and separations on the models are made to accommodate the silicon mold..so it doesn't tear and so that it's castable. From their manufacturing can begin.

3D Printing is not quite as difficult, but there are still several challenges. Models still need to be designed with the 3D Printing Process in mind. In addition, 3D Printing at a high quality is very expensive. And depending on the type of material and the quality of the print may end up having a gritty or stepped surface texture.

Our miniatures will be 3D Modeled, chopped up, and manufactured in plastic on sprues. We are currently investigating the best options for types of plastic and while we have our preference, we don’t want to commit our final decision until we have evaluated all costs and options.

When we go into production, our miniatures will come unassembled on sprues and will not be painted. Our goal is to provide affordable miniatures for wargamers and hobbyists who love painting and kitbashing their models. To that end pre-painting them would make the cost very high.

Our miniatures will be manufactured at the miniatures “standard” size of 28mm scale. So 32mm will be the typical high of the more epic units. The same size as most of the premium miniature products available.

The next newsletter should announce the Kickstarter launch date. Until next time. Keep on fighting and recruit your friends to help us win this war.