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looks to be some fairly substantial size increases too

Had Finecrap PTSD trigger until I remembered it's Mantic, not GW.

From metal to resin? Wake me up when you decide to go full HIPS.

Those Zombie Trolls look just like the metal ones, so that is a great thing. Hope the price is cheaper.

 stonehorse wrote:
Those Zombie Trolls look just like the metal ones, so that is a great thing. Hope the price is cheaper.

Oh you were serious .

I have resin at home

 kodos wrote:
first Wave of old metal models which get a resin replacement:

Dwarf Sharpshooters (metal components)
Enslaved Guardian Regiment
Earth Elementals
Tundra Wolves
Lord Skald
zombie trolls
Water Elementals
Soul Reaver cavalry troop (metal components)
Lykanis
Forest Shambler Regiment
Silverbreeze Cavalry Troop (metal components)
Gigas

Yessssss nice healthy list and the resin looks great. I'll celebrate by finally getting the Mantic Gigas and putting my various counts as to other purposes. Cool they took the opportunity to tweak the scale on a thing or two - I've only heard of the Enslaved Guardian change, dunno if more is planned?

Looks like I’ll soon be able to start that elite Jaffa strike team.

 Theophony wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:
Those Zombie Trolls look just like the metal ones, so that is a great thing. Hope the price is cheaper.

Oh you were serious .

Go on then, point our how beside being a different medium they look different. I'm looking at the these and looking at my metal Zombie Trolls and I fail to see what is different.

I think the laughter was aimed at your hope for cheaper prices.

stonehorse wrote:

 Theophony wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:
Those Zombie Trolls look just like the metal ones, so that is a great thing. Hope the price is cheaper.

Oh you were serious .

Go on then, point our how beside being a different medium they look different. I'm looking at the these and looking at my metal Zombie Trolls and I fail to see what is different.

BobtheInquisitor wrote:I think the laughter was aimed at your hope for cheaper prices.

Indeed. No good news goes unpunished in some way. "Well since we are improving the quality and availability of the models, it only makes sense to improve the costs". Who cares if it streamlines production and reduces costs, it WILL cost more.

I think Mantic have a pretty good track record if lowering prices when they change to a cheaper medium.

I remember when their Wraiths were 5 a box and in metal, they changed to the restic stuff and went to 10 a box for the same price.

Mantic maybe taking a few pages out of GW's sales approach, but credit where credit is due.

Slightly off-topic, but what medium is cheaper to cast commercially, metal or resin? My bias is that metal casting is cheaper, but that's due to some home-casting experience. Even in the early 80s, as a junior high school student, I was able to buy Prince August molds, a small electric melter, and lead-tin alloy. Prince August still exists, should anyone be interested, but home-cast figures are very low quality, and even the worst 3D printer figures I've seen have better crisper detail than what my molds produced.

Personally, I've had bad experiences with resin figures, and try to avoid them. They break too easily (arms and long weapons). So my preference in materials are:

1. Plastic (whatever type is the model plastic WGA, Northstar and others use). Light and easy to convert.
2. Metal (resilient, usually).
3. Resin (Better detail, but fragile.)
4. Cardboard. (I've used standees before, mostly in my college days as the vast bulk of my collection was in my parents' house. Although that was for RPGs, not mini wargaming.)

I think resin casting is cheaper, by a lot, than metal. I've also heard of lots of supply chain issues impacting metal minis more so than resin

I think my listing of preferences would be similar to yours, except cardboard standees wouldn't make the list. If I can't get a mini, they ain't makin' it into my armies!

I've had a lot of trouble with resin, but with 3d printing and Mantic's new in-house resin stuff, I find the newer wave of resin minis to be much more forgiving and easy to work with

Mantic resin needs to compete pretty directly against 3d printing, we'll have to see how much staying power it has.

From the Resin models I have, Mantic and 3D printed, the Mantic ones have sharper details and are less brittle and easier to cut/convert

Ancestral Hamster wrote:Slightly off-topic, but what medium is cheaper to cast commercially, metal or resin?

 pancakeonions wrote:
I think resin casting is cheaper, by a lot, than metal.

it really depends on the amount of models and the specific technique, as spin casting with rubber moulds has different per model cost than silicon mould casting

for low amount of models, silicon mold resin casting is cheaper, for high amount of models, spin casting metal is cheaper

and spin casting resin is not that easy, with GWs finecast (though they were trying on saving money by using the very same moulds which did not work well) and Warlord Games being examples were it did not work well, while Raging Heroes is on the good end

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Mantic resin needs to compete pretty directly against 3d printing, we'll have to see how much staying power it has.

Any manufacturer cannot compete directly with 3D printing. You don't pay staff for printing your stuff at home, but companies do pay their staff to pack or produce models. It's comparing apples to oranges and demanding that the apple should be better at being an orange.

define "compete"
good casted resin is still better in detail than 3d prints, smaller models or plastic armies are still cheaper
you get plastic model details for resin model prices or with a lot of time if you do it on your own

the things were 3D printing is competing is terrain

pics for the next Armada release:

Oh man, I kinda love those... They're the Northern Alliance? Couldn't find 'em on their blog...

These are the first Armada sculpts that actually look like gaming models and not happy meal toys.

So far, Armada has been hit after hit for me.

 kodos wrote:
define "compete"
good casted resin is still better in detail than 3d prints, smaller models or plastic armies are still cheaper
you get plastic model details for resin model prices or with a lot of time if you do it on your own

the things were 3D printing is competing is terrain

That is changing as resin printing gets better and cheaper. Still way more time consuming than any other process but printing your own minis is already cheaper than plastic.

As printing companies proliferate and compete the cost per mini to have figures printed for you is dropping too. In some cases it's near the price of even affordable plastic minis.

Resin, plastic and metal still have an edge in detail and quality, but not only is the gap closing but I still believe that most folks don't need or utilize all that ultra fine detail anyway.

 Eilif wrote:

Resin, plastic and metal still have an edge in detail and quality, but not only is the gap closing but I still believe that most folks don't need or utilize all that ultra fine detail anyway.

yes and no, for wargaming you don't need that details, you don't even need a resin printer as the quality on a FDM one is perfectly fine to print a regiment on multi-base for KoW in one piece (use aceton or hiqh liquid resin to soften the gaps and be done)
but GWs marketing is very good here to raise the need for high detailed models for gaming, making people only accept the highest details no matter the price (as long as it is GW, everyone else needs better quality and must be cheaper), no matter if people can utilize it or not

in reality, models just need to be good enough for gaming, Rank and File models need to rank up, Skirmish models may come in more action like poses, and they just need to look good an arm length away with small difference on each model so they look different from the distance (hence free to glue arms and heads, as even if you try they will never look identical)

 Eilif wrote:
but printing your own minis is already cheaper than plastic.

this now depends on which plastic minis you take as reference
everything is cheaper compared to Games Workshop, no matter the process, were going with the standard price for plastics of 0,5-1,5€ per model with 2€ models are already considered expensive

when people compare the cost they usually than just take the cost of the resin needed to print, which depends on the quality of the resin but is somewhere between 0,3-1€ per model
but this are just the material cost, no energy, no cleaning, no cost for the machinery

if I buy myself a injection molding machine, vor 80k, each mold being between 300-3000€ depending on the material and how many runs I want to make, and I can cast single models for 0,01€ on material cost, so a fraction of what resin costs because I ignore everything else

as soon as you add the other costs, initial investment (which is not only the printer, but the cleaning and curing machinery, as well as any changes to the room if you don't have something like a spare bathroom), maintenance, energy, cleaning material etc your per model cost are in the range of the expensive plastics or above
and specially energy and resin are becoming more expensive now

while doing terrain with fdm is a different story, pla is cheaper than resin, you need no curing or special cleaning, and you can print large hollow models which saves on material
here 3D printing is on the same level as the cheap MDF/Lasercut terrain

PS: and not everyone can resin-print, if you are single with no pets and don't care about your health, having the printer in your bedroom and get models for cheap
otherwise you need a dedicated room you can lock, with a good ventilation system that is easy to clean if needed

Honestly this is a case where it isn't so much about 3d print quality as it is Mantic's quality. Quite a lot of their resins are not better than standard 3d print fare, and far more expensive to boot.

I think that's the best looking navy they've put out yet. Nice models.

Some interesting (and very early) preorders up on wayland, for a new "Dungeon Adventures" line launching Halloween this year.

Mostly look like repacks of Dungeon Saga minis but there's two £40 boxes that look caught my eye since the descriptions hint at being a themed boxed game.

https://www.waylandgames.co.uk/mantic-entertainment-pre-orders/90699-dungeon-adventures-into-the-necromancers-lair

https://www.waylandgames.co.uk/mantic-entertainment-pre-orders/90700-dungeon-adventures-secrets-of-the-wizard-s-tower

Swords, sorcerers, monsters and a dangerous adventure beyond compare. Assume the roles of mighty heroes and as they take on evil monsters in tight, twisting dungeon passages to thwart the vile Necromancer in his never ending quest to conquer the World!

journey into the heart of a mysterious mausoleum, plagued with undead horrors.

£40 is an interesting price point, as the other expansions for DS were 45, while the main game is 75 and minis alone are cheaper

Interesting. Is this going to be part of a push with a new dungeon crawler ruleset? Because man, did Jake Thornton not deliver on what Mantic promised in the Kickstarter.