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 McDougall Designs wrote:
They could have created bespoke digital fleets. Instead they used currently available fleets and have indirectly caused retailers who invested in armada to have dead stock.

I'm not saying this is a terrible thing, but I think they could have approached the digital side a bit more like wargames atlantics "no current products will be ported, but upgrade packs are fair game."

This to me seems like a gaffe too... I would have liked to have seen variants to the Armada ships (I don't need any 3d printed duplicates of ships I already own, but if they had spent a small amount of time tweaking existing ships... I would have been all over those) but this seems the worst of two worlds: my FLGS with their stock they've had for over a year... Will never unload it now. And folks who already have those ships, probably have limited interest in getting more.

Think this might be overestimating the penetration of 3D printers in the miniature hobby community. There are plenty of STLs out there for ranges that still sell equivalent physical models just fine.

Billicus wrote:
Think this might be overestimating the penetration of 3D printers in the miniature hobby community. There are plenty of STLs out there for ranges that still sell equivalent physical models just fine.

Its not about the market penetration of printers.

Its the availability of printed models and printing service. Mantic has already said that subscribers can send the files to print services for printing, so long as the print services are ethical about it and don't market those items for wider sale.

Not everyone has a 3D printer.

Everyone has google and 20 seconds to find a print service local to them.

and 90% of the hobby community is budget conscious, leading them to the most inexpensive option: 3D prints of models that were otherwise available in conventional formats.

This is a negative to anyone who invested heavily in armada at its launch and has orc and basilean product sitting on shelves.

 McDougall Designs wrote:
Mantic has already said that subscribers can send the files to print services for printing, so long as the print services are ethical about it and don't market those items for wider sale.

Oh wow, I missed that there's no merchant tier

Curious how offerings for months 3+ look after this strong start and bonkers early bird pricing. Assuming next month will keep the hype going.

In related news, printed the sniper goblin over night, had my terrible supports on the Morax arms generally fail, and combined a Helstriker into one piece because f gap-filling. Will print the big guy tonight I reckon, or at least see if my supports hold up.

Armada had other issues, too. I went in when it dropped, got two starters worth of Basileans and Orcs, with a heap of EOD and Dwarfs, including the big chunk ships, and then Mantic went as raised prices for the next fleets by 25-33%. Something that was not an impulse buy, but carefully considered at $30, was now $40. The box sets became unpalatable in one wave, and the game unattractive. The Elves and Salamanders went from near the top of my want list to something I just gave up on. Money has become really tight this year, at least for me, so that felt like a real bait and switch by Mantic.

Yeah, if I were a retailer I would drop Mantic in a hot second over this.

Mantic has the worst miniatures out of all the plastics on the market. I've just run out of patience waiting for them to produce half decent plastics. Everything just goes to mush on the sides.

I'd drop 'em. I certainly have as a consumer.

 Gallahad wrote:
Yeah, if I were a retailer I would drop Mantic in a hot second over this.

Mantic has the worst miniatures out of all the plastics on the market. I've just run out of patience waiting for them to produce half decent plastics. Everything just goes to mush on the sides.

I'd drop 'em. I certainly have as a consumer.

The last few years (ever since Warpath finished delivering, I guess?) have been pretty dire, but they just switched to Archon, which is kinda the best (same factory Conquest uses for their new kits, and Wizkids for D&D frameworks)

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 Gallahad wrote:
Yeah, if I were a retailer I would drop Mantic in a hot second over this.

Mantic has the worst miniatures out of all the plastics on the market. I've just run out of patience waiting for them to produce half decent plastics. Everything just goes to mush on the sides.

I'd drop 'em. I certainly have as a consumer.

The last few years (ever since Warpath finished delivering, I guess?) have been pretty dire, but they just switched to Archon, which is kinda the best (same factory Conquest uses for their new kits, and Wizkids for D&D frameworks)

Wait so your saying Mantic changed what their models are made out of.... Where's the news in that.

But seriously, I picked up the Ambush Abyssal set to check it out and try to get friends to play it. The models weren't bad, very reminiscent of what I played with when I started warhammer...30+ years ago. I just get the feeling that they are trapped in the "Golden Era" of gaming when plastic models were the new thing and very limited in what they could do. For Nostalgia it's great, for creating a market leading company (or top teir anyway) it is suicide.

Gallahad wrote:
Mantic has the worst miniatures out of all the plastics on the market. I've just run out of patience waiting for them to produce half decent plastics. Everything just goes to mush on the sides.

I disagree, but don't think arguing will be helpful to anyone.

Have you seen the new models though?
From the new ogres.
Mantic are using a new manufacturer that is said to actually care about miniature quality.

No, Mantic does not changed the material, but they changed the company making them, again.

By now there were 3 different ones in the past and now is is the 4th.

First models were made by Renedra in England (Undead, Dwarfs and Elves which
ave a design problem, not a quality one), but because they have limited capacity and their main customer is Perry Miniatures, Mantic switched to a Chinese one
That worked for a while but had long delivery times (which messed up first Basilea run as they could not wait for pre-production samples) hence they switched to another Chinese one who turned out to be not reliable with quality (Goblins, Basilea and Halflings were fine, Riftforge Orcs, EoD and Ratkin not so much)

So they changed to a european one again, Archon in Poland, who made the new Ogres

given that Archon by now has a good track record, the upcoming Mantic Models should be more reliable in quality and because they are in europe delivered faster.

So there is a difference in quality, depending on which company made the models, which in general means all the older ones and the very new ones.
Abyssals are from the old ones and given that they are already old, good models

PS: making a general statement that all mantic plastics are bad is a tricky one, you may not like the design of all of them, but those that were made by the same company making the Perry or the Conquest models, are the same quality as those.

Previously I was never much a fan of Mantics kings of war offerings. But the new models have actually been rather good kits! The new abyssal dwarf, goblin and ratkin plastics are actually really nice. I've brought most of the newer kits, and planned to buy a few more or duplicates of units instead of getting the WFB equivalents.

But seeing them open this new STL vault, I'm not a fan. I have no interest in printing models, and as its going to be a cheaper to produce revenue scheme for them I can see them moving away from making as many new kits as they otherwise might have done. It will put me (and I know it will has also put others in my group off) from buying into more of their stuff now as I won't want to end up with kits or games that can only be supplemented with 3d models/parts.

I think there were a couple manufacturer changes kodos missed and might now have been fully announced but are evident from the quality of the product and style of design

The Chinese factory that messed up mark 1 Basileans was one place

They switched to a new one for the good era plastics (circa 2015) - Abyssals, Forces of Nature and the Deadzone and Warpath ranges, possibly Basilea mark 2 and Northern Alliance

Then again a new Chinese place when they went to the weird 2 almost identical sprues per unit design, where the sides of the minis where the mold halves meet do not have detail (Marauders, Abyssal Dwarves, Goblins mark 2, Empire of Dust, Riftforged).

The middle Chinese one was actually good and able to do vehicles, dunno why they were dropped in favour of the "we don't do detail on the sides" place. At the same time sculpting also changed from realistic proportions to terrible World of Warcraft styled happy meal toys.

Could be that there was another switch between 2 Kickstarters, I just know of 4 different ones, 2 european and 2 chinese ones and assume they sorted the problems out with the first one after they messed up the first kit (or switched to another one making it 3 chinese companies)

think that ones was turned down because it took too long to get stuff done as they needed to send pre-production samples to confirm the quality and the other one was faster with the first kit being either Goblins or AD which turned out not bad.

 Mallo wrote:
Previously I was never much a fan of Mantics kings of war offerings. But the new models have actually been rather good kits! The new abyssal dwarf, goblin and ratkin plastics are actually really nice. I've brought most of the newer kits, and planned to buy a few more or duplicates of units instead of getting the WFB equivalents.

But seeing them open this new STL vault, I'm not a fan. I have no interest in printing models, and as its going to be a cheaper to produce revenue scheme for them I can see them moving away from making as many new kits as they otherwise might have done. It will put me (and I know it will has also put others in my group off) from buying into more of their stuff now as I won't want to end up with kits or games that can only be supplemented with 3d models/parts.

I get that people don't want to get into the 3D printing hobby. But the fact that they make additional parts (Alternate heads, weapon load outs and arms) is good for the general public. If you don't want to purchase them fine, but don't limit a way for people to get into a game or more engaged with a game. It's like saying Forgeworld should not exist for GW. If Forgeworld did not exist, then the specific dreadnoughts and more visually stunning models for 40K would not exist. The Chaos Dwarves for Fantasy would have been long gone. No 30K system would have been developed and most likely no chapter specific items would have been created. Death company would just be assault marines painted black with red Xs on the pads, space wolves would be marines with wolf tails glued to the helmets still and Imperial guard would still have just the Russ (most likely just the bog standard one) and Chimera. It wasn't until Forgeworld started making custom doors, Dreads, tanks and planes as well as rules for different systems that GW took off into the hobby it is today. 3D printing can do that for these other companies. Look at wargames Atlantic. They put out great kits, but to make sprues for some kits would not be profitable, so they created Wargames Atlantic digital to fluff out units and armies and to test concepts. If those concepts strike a chord then they can develope a full line knowing they have a market. If not, it still brings in some revenue and creates options.

You can still have your plastic soldiers that you buy in a box, but you could ALSO have some that get mailed to you from a 3D printing company that perfectly fit your models. It's a win-win.

Yea I agree and wish to see this from other companies too. While I do still understand that it is frustrating for the less enfranchised to see other people have access to more options than you do, this is a much more benign version than, for example, kickstarter or event exclusives. It only takes one person with a printer in a play group for everybody to get all the options.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Yea I agree and wish to see this from other companies too. While I do still understand that it is frustrating for the less enfranchised to see other people have access to more options than you do, this is a much more benign version than, for example, kickstarter or event exclusives. It only takes one person with a printer in a play group for everybody to get all the options.

I happily print stuff for my friends, it might not be a full army, but right now I have a 20-30 model Bloodbowl team printed for a friend and another 20 models for another friend that I just need to see to give to him. I've given out about 10 other models to people I have played against. You don't have to be involved in 3D printing to get the models. I can cost out the models I print for friends, the above team was just under $5 in resin, it took more time than anything, but I am willing to do that for them, sometimes they pay me back in cash or food, sometimes it's models but I make it available to them. Sometimes I make them purchase the files if it's not something that I would possibly use for myself in the future. I'm sure if people made friends with others in their community that enjoy the 3D printing hobby like I do they could reap the same rewards, if not, then they can purchase the prints online.

Mantic makes sprues where the same body works double duty for multiple models. If they could just make the body frame with extra heads and one type of weapon then the half a sprue that they use for the alternate arms, weapons, and shields could be used for more bodies and heads. The second unit option could be printed 3D files, especially for units that your only going to field one or two of in a whole army. It's a waste of sprue space and production time. It's like upgrade sprues, just digital.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Yea I agree and wish to see this from other companies too. While I do still understand that it is frustrating for the less enfranchised to see other people have access to more options than you do, this is a much more benign version than, for example, kickstarter or event exclusives. It only takes one person with a printer in a play group for everybody to get all the options.

Mantic offering files for the unit upgrades makes them far more accessible to me, a person living in the US on the other side of some serious shipping for very cheap bits. Even if I didn't have a printer and was paying someone stateside to print them.

Mallo wrote:
But seeing them open this new STL vault, I'm not a fan. I have no interest in printing models, and as its going to be a cheaper to produce revenue scheme for them I can see them moving away from making as many new kits as they otherwise might have done. It will put me (and I know it will has also put others in my group off) from buying into more of their stuff now as I won't want to end up with kits or games that can only be supplemented with 3d models/parts.

Not sure why you think that's the case?

The stls are of Mantic's resin,which you can still buy from Mantic.
Ronnie has said on interviews that resin is a pain to produce and therefore expensive to buy.
Which is why Mantic has made them available in a different way.

Plastic kits don't appear to be involved and Mantic have an ambitious release schedule announced or this year.
Three significant release that all most likely will have new plastic.

lord_blackfang wrote:

 Gallahad wrote:
Yeah, if I were a retailer I would drop Mantic in a hot second over this.

Mantic has the worst miniatures out of all the plastics on the market. I've just run out of patience waiting for them to produce half decent plastics. Everything just goes to mush on the sides.

I'd drop 'em. I certainly have as a consumer.

The last few years (ever since Warpath finished delivering, I guess?) have been pretty dire, but they just switched to Archon, which is kinda the best (same factory Conquest uses for their new kits, and Wizkids for D&D frameworks)

Conquest used* for their kits. There is no indication they won't change if a better option comes available.

Gallahad wrote:Yeah, if I were a retailer I would drop Mantic in a hot second over this.

Mantic has the worst miniatures out of all the plastics on the market. I've just run out of patience waiting for them to produce half decent plastics. Everything just goes to mush on the sides.

I'd drop 'em. I certainly have as a consumer.

For perspective, I only have Mantic products available as special order items, now.

Their sprues didn't sell steadily. Full box sets (offered at 20% off msrp) did not move off my shelf.

kodos wrote:Could be that there was another switch between 2 Kickstarters, I just know of 4 different ones, 2 european and 2 chinese ones and assume they sorted the problems out with the first one after they messed up the first kit (or switched to another one making it 3 chinese companies)

think that ones was turned down because it took too long to get stuff done as they needed to send pre-production samples to confirm the quality and the other one was faster with the first kit being either Goblins or AD which turned out not bad.

Honestly, the lack of clarity from Mantic over who is actually producing their models is befuddling. They could explain who they've partnered with. Customers would get clarity and peace of mind, both companies involved would get good PR optics from the transparency.

Boss Salvage wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Yea I agree and wish to see this from other companies too. While I do still understand that it is frustrating for the less enfranchised to see other people have access to more options than you do, this is a much more benign version than, for example, kickstarter or event exclusives. It only takes one person with a printer in a play group for everybody to get all the options.

Mantic offering files for the unit upgrades makes them far more accessible to me, a person living in the US on the other side of some serious shipping for very cheap bits. Even if I didn't have a printer and was paying someone stateside to print them.

Hi. Mantic retail trade account located in the states with reasonable shipping, if needed. I'm all for accessibility to miniatures lines.

If it weren’t for a large, unanticipated medical bill last January, I’d have snapped up some (more) of those Mantic products from you. I quite enjoy their plastics.

 McDougall Designs wrote:

Honestly, the lack of clarity from Mantic over who is actually producing their models is befuddling. They could explain who they've partnered with. Customers would get clarity and peace of mind, both companies involved would get good PR optics from the transparency.

don't know why
they were open on Renedra and Archon, those are also marked on the sprue and also open on which company made their latest board games
so either they did not want to name the chinese one or not allowed to

I see the stl offer as a way to secure a monthly subscription, and thus having a good revenue on long term. A bit like a patreon or myminifactory tribe.

That's why the offer is generous here. The trouble is that it seems it's a bit random about the content, so you need to be liking the wide range of Mantic Games games to be interested. Not sure next month will be about Armada, for example.

As for retailers...yeah, it's a(nother) bad pill to swallow. But it's not like offering Mantic Games products was a great joyroad for them in the past. Those who kept up since now will most likely adapt their future stock to this new offer (I guess they won't restock a lot of ork and basilean fleets or halfling upgrades now).

Remember, Mantic Games are a cheaper GW. Be aware of this, and you can't be disappointed in the future.

Sarouan wrote:

Remember, Mantic Games are a cheaper GW. Be aware of this, and you can't be disappointed in the future.

Which models are GW making more accessible with stls then?

 DarkBlack wrote:

Sarouan wrote:

Remember, Mantic Games are a cheaper GW. Be aware of this, and you can't be disappointed in the future.

Which models are GW making more accessible with stls then?

All of them, just not by GW

 Theophony wrote:

 DarkBlack wrote:

Sarouan wrote:

Remember, Mantic Games are a cheaper GW. Be aware of this, and you can't be disappointed in the future.

Which models are GW making more accessible with stls then?

All of them, just not by GW

Pretty much ! You could say only Mantic Games can make .stl of their own products, because no one cares about making "fanart stl" of them.

Anyway, I'm all for more ressources for 3D printers for a fair price. Even if it does collateral damage for some retailers, as selfish as it seems to be.

You can also say GW is the only one were plastic is so expensive that it is worth buying files and cast them in resin
Same as there are no scans for Perry or Victrix, still cheaper to buy the plastic than copy them in resin

Yep, when I'm getting 40 goblins and 2 chariots for £35, (£28 with usual webstore discounts), there isn't much of a reason to break out the printer, or online print services.

That pricing would have been a bargain even 20 years ago, when GW goblins were £12 for 20.

There just aren't any print services which offer pricing under £1/mini, and that's the pricing space where Mantic operates with their hard plastics.

Offering resin upgrades to those hard plastics and resin elite units as STLs is really good for buyers, it is the best of both worlds, get the cheap sprues in bulk, then get even more use out of them by sending a bunch of arms/heads to a print service.

There are already pics of people printing out massive Armada fleets just for fun, so it'll be quite liberating for gameplay as well, people will be able to try out some crazy army builds without having to break the bank.

Retailers will most likely have to pivot towards mainly selling the core bulk hard plastic sets but those were always much easier to shift than £40 for a small box of resin anyway.

It looks like hard plastic production at Mantic is about to accelerate a lot, seems like Mantic is now aiming for 3-4 hard plastic kits, each with multiple build options to be the standard for their model range and is no longer shying away from doing cavalry, monsters and chariots in the material.

I honestly don’t understand why some stores, especially large blind ones don’t get printer farms set up. My local shops could really use them if for nothing else than building terrain for their tables. I went into the smaller local shop which has a huge Battletech group and an ongoing campaign. Yesterday they had like 8 tables set with 3D printed terrain and it just looked so much better than anything else I’ve seen in Years. I left my phone in the car, so no pics, but I recognized them as free 3D files I have saved up. Shops usually have an employee that has some free time to start a print when they come in and clean up the one for the night before. Even if they don’t sell the prints it’s a great way to showcase a game or system you are selling.

Eh, resin printing is messy, smelly, toxic and skill intensive and I would bet that nobody selling prints on etsy is making minimum wage per hour, all accounted for. It's not something a business would have just to bling up the place.

It may be different in the states, but over here in the UK (and i'm fairly sure in the EU too) they'd have to comply with various safety regulation for working with and disposing of the toxic chemicals involved which would include having somewhere with appropriate ventilation set up. All stuff hobbyists (and businesses doing online sales from home who don't have in person contact with customers) can usually ignore