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About the swords/knifes... the ones you see on the back of ironclad belts are knifes, the ones you see in the belts of caped legs are short swords, except if their sheat is to tick...

I agree that is consider a direct attack beyond just been rude.
Even glorified with a nice made banner.

Hey Luna, dont bother with that, someone just called all Mantic Fanatics to be liars, hired by mantic to act in their benefit, defending their products and stuff...

That would explain the re-using of fantasy sprue on warpath, they have hidden expenses to deal with...

I just want to receive my check one day...

lord marcus wrote:But there is always the possibility of a re-release featuring new sculpts.

I don't mean to be mean, but this is just silly. The chances of Mantic re-releasing forge father line troops any time soon are zero. If it were a possibility, they would have resculpted their KOW elves by now, which, regardless of any actual flaw, are looked upon quite negatively.

They wont last long enough for a re-release.
If anything the failure of Warpath will cost them big time.

If it doesn't bankrupt them, they have around 1 more chance to go ( financially and having fan's faith ).

e.g release a proper human army to redeem themselves.

Sadly gentlemen, you may be right. With plans for 8(?) armies to be out by this time next year, resculpting Forgefathers (or orx) isn't going to be high on their hierarchy of needs.

I think it's way too early to start calling Warpath a failure, but judging by the amount of disappointment on this board alone from those who were previously enthusiastic or even just hopeful, Warpath isn't going to be as successful as it had the potential to be, even as a series of proxy miniatures for 40k.

Which is unfortunate.

Hopefully I can get some of their round bases without too much trouble so I can base all my Mantic undead on them - it's the only reason I haven't started in on them properly.

LunaHound wrote:They wont last long enough for a re-release.
If anything the failure of Warpath will cost them big time.

If it doesn't bankrupt them, they have around 1 more chance to go ( financially and having fan's faith ).

e.g release a proper human army to redeem themselves.

I totally agree......except I don't.

I dont play KoW or use their Mantic's regular dwarves, however I like the aesthetics of them in the Forgefathers enough to try to get some and see if this Warpath thing is something I want to dive into.

I severely doubt this is the "killing blow" towards Mantic considering the general amount of "I loves me some Squats" that gets bandied about in these forums. Anything remotely squat like is going to get looked at and a lot of people will be willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

I would love for Mantis to succeed i really do. Any company that offers good miniatures as alternative is always welcomed in my book.

I just hope they see past their hindsight and not repeat any further mistakes.

I think, at the very least, the models they've released so far are serviceable.

You can see what they are supposed to represent and there don't, AFAIK, appear to be casting issues/similar .. so we'll chalk that up as a step in the right direction.

I do find, and it's more noticeable on the ..the... notspaceorks that the way they've based the models does, for me, seem to make the models a bit too narrow on the bodies lower half which just seems wrong.

Also whilst I think the character models are better sculpts, as they should be, the discrepancy atwixt them and the troops or general soldiers is a bit too glaring. The Forgefather hero almost looks like a model from a different range or game system if one compares him to the Steel Legion troopers.

I'm not quite sure what weapons he is supposed to be armed with ( I'm going to assume it isn't actually nerf gun) but the basic weapon aesthetics seem totally different from all the weapons wielded by the rest of the line. Well, the plastic troopers anyway.

The orx leader is better in this regard however.

Overall I'm just finding the range released so far a tad too generic still. The basic concept -- dwarf in space, ork/orc in space is fine enough and, obviously, not really all that different from GW's successful knight!/Alien!/Elf! etc etc in space archetypes.

But at the moment, alas, it feels a bit like a Roger Corman or Syfy channel production. Oddly comforting in its familiarity perhaps even, but nothing that one hasn't seen before, allbeit XX years ago. And perhaps even from GW.

Still, there's still the rest of the races to be unveiled so they might pull something out of the bag yet.

..be odd after all the waiting if people wind up buying GW models to use for games of Warpath.

LunaHound wrote:I would love for Mantis to succeed i really do. Any company that offers good miniatures as alternative is always welcomed in my book.

I just hope they see past their hindsight and not repeat any further mistakes.

In the most recent blog post, written by Ronnie, he states that the cutbacks were made due to time constraints of getting 2 new armies released at once.

He then goes on to say that future releases for Warpath will be all-new sprues, starting with the Corporation release in January.

He also mentions that mantic will be providing some sort of sci-fi leg option at some point... this is probably going to take the form of metal hybrids, but at least they've listened and will be doing what they can.


Despite what a lot of the haters on here would like to think, mantic do listen to, and learn from, internet feedback.

As always withe the internet all reactions are blown out of proportions .

Maybe a nice walk in the woods in the autumn sun before posting something might help?

The Dwarf Wolf wrote:
About the swords/knifes... the ones you see on the back of ironclad belts are knifes, the ones you see in the belts of caped legs are short swords, ...

That actually sounds pretty reasonable.

The truth is that (IIRC), Mantic rules are abstract enough that it really doesn't matter whether there are swords or knives in the sheaths. It's not that different from 40k really, where a chainsword and a knife are both CCW's, everyone is assumed to have one and you get the bonus based on what you have in your second hand.

Much ado about nothing really.

The Dwarf Wolf wrote:
... except if their sheat is to tick...

I'm thinking the answer is either some Ex-Lax, or get examined for a possible an intestinal parisite?

scarletsquig wrote:

LunaHound wrote:I would love for Mantis to succeed i really do. Any company that offers good miniatures as alternative is always welcomed in my book.

I just hope they see past their hindsight and not repeat any further mistakes.

In the most recent blog post, written by Ronnie, he states that the cutbacks were made due to time constraints of getting 2 new armies released at once.
He then goes on to say that future releases for Warpath will be all-new sprues, starting with the Corporation release in January.

He also mentions that mantic will be providing some sort of sci-fi leg option at some point... this is probably going to take the form of metal hybrids, but at least they've listened and will be doing what they can.
Despite what a lot of the haters on here would like to think, mantic do listen to, and learn from, internet feedback.

I'm no hater. I think competition is a good thing. I like much of their undead range and own a reasonable amount of those figures. I also purchase non-GW figures from a wide variety of companies on a regular basis. I've also stated a number of times that the metal Orc and Forgefather look great. If the plastics were closer to that I'd be buying 4 boxes instead of none boxes.

The truth is that I'm very disappointed with the contents of the Warpath box, and I'm not motivated enough by an irrational love of the company or their range to seek out metal hybrids for half-arsed initial sculpts. I'd have loved some good quality Squats and more Orks to mix into my current 40k figures. I think they'd have been better off getting better quality figures into the starter box then what they've gone with, but clearly getting passable quality product out for Christmas sales has been a higher priority than getting good quality product out. Maybe they'll bring out a new starter set for next Christmas with different/nicer models?

The fact that they've hidden the box contents for so long and staggered the product shots out so slowly and carefully also makes me believe that they're aware of the issues that people would have with their models. When people first started talking about the possibility of the Dwarfs being hybrids with the fantasy figures, I honestly thought "no way", so imagine my bemusement when I saw that they in fact are. And even then you only get, what? 8 of them? Ouch!

As I've said though, I also have nothing invested in Mantic on a personal or emotional level. If/when they go under in a couple of years they will have just been another of many blips on the miniature wargaming radar over the years. Warzone, Void, Clan Wars, AT-43, Starship Troopers.. hell, even Confrontation (despite some figures being reissued..) If they're interested in my feedback, or that of people who haven't taken on the fan-mantle, they'll actually read threads like this. If not, it's not my responsibility to chase them to offer my feedback and there's not exactly much satisfaction to be found in a form-letter "Thank you for your feedback"-type reply.

It's spring here, Duncan. But as I've stated, I post here for the entertainment. While I find the Warpath box to be disappointing, I'm not upset or feeling a need to be defensive of them either.



As for Swords versus Knives, I believe the only person who actually had an issue with them was Kroothawk, while Lord Marcus was adamant that there are no swords. My interest was simply in arguing that a spade is in fact a spade. And not a spoon. Discussing the model, not the game effects of it.

scipio.au wrote:
The fact that they've hidden the box contents for so long and staggered the product shots out so slowly and carefully also makes me believe that they're aware of the issues that people would have with their models. When people first started talking about the possibility of the Dwarfs being hybrids with the fantasy figures, I honestly thought "no way", so imagine my bemusement when I saw that they in fact are. And even then you only get, what? 8 of them? Ouch!

This.

They hid the real models so long when they had the real models. They were deceptive about reusing molds and I don't think they were expecting the backlash of disappointment. And that is what it is. No one hates Mantic, but people are disappointed as people are starving and wanting to support pretty much any and every SciFi 'full army' model line. Mantic had a ton of good faith going in to this which they squandered.

If they had proven they could releases full armies of original Sci-Fi models and then came along and released Orx/forefathers as 'filler' lines to flesh out more armies for play, People would have understood and would have had 1-2 real armies with real effort to judge and support moving forward. It feels like a cheap lazy cash grab where they thought all us customers were stupid and would buy anything... They were thinking like GW and the problem is Mantic doesn't make Space Marines.

Bad models, lazy effort, and shows poor judgement on behalf of mantic in general on how they handle their line. They have only themselves to blame and people are legitimately disappointed regardless if a bunch of people tell them they are not allowed to be disappointed or not. This Ronnie guy made a terrible decision releasing 2 half-assed armies rather than one good army. Many games are released with two sets of models which are the same in order for initial game learning and balance. They could have released the human army and released it with all humans and had training missions with 'check out the soon to be coming quick filler armies!'

If Mantic survives this to be taken seriously, I look forward to a full original Sci-Fi line. Maybe they should go buy out that kickstarter crew with the human stormtroopers if they can't afford to design new models right now. If they had released those models in plastic for cheap people would have been throwing their money at mantic Philip J. Fry Style.

I also agree with Scipio... If Mantic isn't reading wargaming forums for feedback or the general pulse of people's reactions to thier products, then they are either bad at business or naive and deserve whatever they get. The criticisms are legitimate and not unreasonable at all, the blind excuses and justifications on the otherhand...

Wargamers on forums represent less than 10% of the community at large. Just to keep facts in this thread.

lord marcus wrote:Wargamers on forums represent less than 10% of the community at large. Just to keep facts in this thread.

Is that water heavy? and let's see. People have legitimatly said "mantics models look CHEAP and LAZY"

In the most recent blog post, written by Ronnie, he states that the cutbacks were made due to time constraints of getting 2 new armies released at once.

So... Cutbacks = Cheap, Time constraints = Lazy.

The time constraints and cutbacks shows in their final product which makes it seem 'poor' and people are seeing it no matter how many times you make excuses or try to explain it away. The company made bad choices and release a lower quality product than they advertised and promised and people are disappointed both in the result and the company. He even admits people are disappointed and cancelling pre-orders because the models failed to deliver and then suggests people wait until the REAL models are released when they modify the look and feel more. Basically people are buying prototypes now which is absurd to me.

Mantic admits they cut corners and did things on the cheap, Why do they need you re-defining people's opinions for them? Can you admit the Company explicitly admitted they were lazy and cheap and the resulting disappointment is justified even if it is only by a supposed 10%? Even mantic admits they released disappointing models and are issuing refunds. If Mantic came out and said 'this was the best we could do... we tried' that is way different than "we just wanted something out on the market as fast as possible and cut corners and reused stuff to make it happen... Too bad!"

youbedead wrote:It could be that mantic doesn't have 150000 dollars to spend on new molds, personally I don't mind reusing sprues. And how many poses are in a space marine squad, or a ork squad, or an IG squad. They could certaintly be better but many of the complaints could be levied against GW as well.

Being on shaky ground financially seems like an inauspicious time to try to launch a new figure line with numerous new expensive-to-produce product.

Hoping it would pay off heavily Aggy?

@ nek

Cheap implies shoddy. The product shown isn't shoddy. Its well produced. However, aesthetics may not be to everyone's tastes.

so...

Cutbacks = trying to get a whole new game out

Time constraints = before the christmas holidays so people can plan thier christmas spendings. Hopefully to include warpath products.

you know, for all the dislike in this thread, i like the dwarfs, and the sprue reuse doesn't bother me to a great degree, so i'm still going to pick some of them up

still undecided on the orx though

greenskin lynn wrote:you know, for all the dislike in this thread, i like the dwarfs, and the sprue reuse doesn't bother me to a great degree, so i'm still going to pick some of them up

still undecided on the orx though

lol, that is the beuty of the opinion. I have a very similar opinion, but inverted. I will not touch dwarfs, at least before the hybrid kits are out. But im seriously wondering to make a orxs army very soon...

lord marcus wrote:Hoping it would pay off heavily Aggy?

@ nek

Cheap implies shoddy. The product shown isn't shoddy. Its well produced. However, aesthetics may not be to everyone's tastes.

so...

Cutbacks = trying to get a whole new game out

Time constraints = before the christmas holidays so people can plan thier christmas spendings. Hopefully to include warpath products.

I hope you fanatical minions buy up all the 'prototypes' they are selling since they have already said to expect REAL sci-fi V2 of all these forefather models. This means the real customers can then get what they are promised in January and Mantic makes enough money from the fantatic brigade to re-do the models correctly. Everyone wins...

I feel bad for anyone who pre-ordered and is stuck with these half-done prototypes.

(if something is incomplete or requires additional parts to make it complete like the SCI-FI upgrade kit to a SCI-FI model, I call that shoddy.)

See I am curious about warpath.

But neither find the idea of the Forgefathers or the Orx interesting. For similar reason I wouldn't collect Dwarves or orcs (barring LotR) in any other system. They just don't appeal.

nkelsch wrote:

lord marcus wrote:Hoping it would pay off heavily Aggy?

@ nek

Cheap implies shoddy. The product shown isn't shoddy. Its well produced. However, aesthetics may not be to everyone's tastes.

so...

Cutbacks = trying to get a whole new game out

Time constraints = before the christmas holidays so people can plan thier christmas spendings. Hopefully to include warpath products.

I hope you fanatical minions buy up all the 'prototypes' they are selling since they have already said to expect REAL sci-fi V2 of all these forefather models. This means the real customers can then get what they are promised in January and Mantic makes enough money from the fantatic brigade to re-do the models correctly. Everyone wins...

I feel bad for anyone who pre-ordered and is stuck with these half-done prototypes.

(if something is incomplete or requires additional parts to make it complete like the SCI-FI upgrade kit to a SCI-FI model, I call that shoddy.)

Its not that they are not complete, or that they require additional parts. They are a complete miniature, not prototypes as you say. The fact that they may be getting accessory leg bitz to customize in between squads is 1. a rumor and 2. perfectly acceptable.

And for the last time. Its the Mantic Fanatics, a social group dedicated to TALKING about mantic products and services, not DEFENDING or being rabid apologists.

There's no need for name-calling here. The fact that some people sincerely like Mantic does not mean that other people do not like them or vice versa. If there are points to be made about the quality of the miniatures then by all means make them. But no part of those points necessarily entails a personal attack. Thanks!

lord marcus wrote:

Its not that they are not complete, or that they require additional parts. They are a complete miniature, not prototypes as you say. The fact that they may be getting accessory leg bitz to customize in between squads is 1. a rumor and 2. perfectly acceptable.

And for the last time. Its the Mantic Fanatics, a social group dedicated to TALKING about mantic products and services, not DEFENDING or being rabid apologists.

Mantic's own blog clearly says they are not complete and they are still releasing parts to make them fully SCI-FI. This makes the fantasy hybrids a stop-gap cash grab and the real SCI-FI models will be released later. Hence disappointment on behalf of a lot of people and a lot of lost or delayed customers. We now know to never trust Mantic's pre-release photos or concept art because what they promise and what they deliver don't match. Which is ashame for them as very few people will pre-order a product sight unseen.

You make excuses for Mantic that directly contradict their own Blog where they admit they cut corners, made a disappointing product, are refunding pre-orders and are re-doing the product in the near future to fix what is wrong with the current product... And you STILL make excuses and apologies for them.

I see other posters (including mantic fanatics who have anti GW statements in their Sigs) rain down the apologist tag on GW posters in almost every thread... I see a huge double standard if the 'Mantic Fanatics' are somehow immune for being called out for their constant drive to erase people's legitimate opinions on Mantic's models. If people dislike the models, they don't need someone telling them a dozen reasons why they don't have the right to dislike them or their criticisms are invalid.

I am going to skip the dwarves and orks for now, they look okay but nothing to really make me throw my money at them. I dislike the orc sculpts and Dwarves in space have no appeal to me at all, no matter how good the models look. I will probably wait until January to see what the Corporation guys look like and then make my mind up about investing in Mantic.

Nkelsch,

***You Said***Mantic's own blog clearly says they are not complete and they are still releasing parts to make them fully SCI-FI. "

Really? Or does it say that there will be the option of making these wonderful Science/Fantasy models completely sci-fi?

***You Said***This makes the fantasy hybrids a stop-gap cash grab and the real SCI-FI models will be released later.

I'm perfectly happy with the science-fantasy models they have now. You may interpret it as a 'stop-gap cash grab' but you have no evidence this was their intention. Sci-Fi models are not "Real"er than Science/Fantasy Models.

***You Said*** Hence disappointment on behalf of a lot of people and a lot of lost or delayed customers. We now know to never trust Mantic's pre-release photos or concept art because what they promise and what they deliver don't match. Which is ashame for them as very few people will pre-order a product sight unseen.

Do you not know that concept art is to be taken as, well, concept art, and not a finished product?

***You said****You make excuses for Mantic that directly contradict their own Blog where they admit they cut corners, made a disappointing product, are refunding pre-orders and are re-doing the product in the near future to fix what is wrong with the current product... And you STILL make excuses and apologies for them.

I read the blog, and I am reading your post. You are distorting what Ronnie said, and I appeal to anyone to read what he said with an open mind and decide for themselves. Ronnie never said he made a disappointing product. Never. He said if -you- or others are unhappy, he'll refund your money on the preorders. No matter how good Warpath is, you can't please everyond.


***You Said*** If people dislike the models, they don't need someone telling them a dozen reasons why they don't have the right to dislike them or their criticisms are invalid.

Well, I could use your logic and say, if I love Warpath, which I do, I don't need people like you telling me a dozen reasons why they are garbage and trying to make Mantic look incompetant or worse. And if your criticisms really are invalid, no one can say anything about it?

As has been said before it is way too early to start calling Warpath a failure. As for mantic I am a big fan of what they have managed to put out elves included after seeing how a freind of mine managed to push out a dark elf force based upon these painfully thin models. But by the amount of disappointment on this board alone from all walks of gamers from all genres the interest is still high in a product that's still in it's infancy.

Warpath isn't going to be as successful as it had the potential to be but lets face it it was never set up to run and run as a independant entity the whole mantic product range however different is as a series of proxy miniatures for 40k and warhammer. I doubt that warpath will ever fail at that with the hopefull imperial guard proxy and rouge trader style orcs that could maybe have been better done but why moan and bitch about rustic armour when traditionally most orcs got by with bolted together plates of metal ?

"For those of you who worry about the legs (and aren't convinced by the photos!) there are many ways you will be able to build your army with only sci-fi legs."

What does 'sci-fi' only legs mean? Does that mean they admit these are models without SCI FI legs? IE: fantasy Legs? (which they are) Which means the model is a fantasy Hybrid model. If they are releasing better models or models with better packs later, that makes these either a BAD version 1 release or a prototype. both mean 'wait for the V2 release'

"However, there is no way I would ever want any customer to buy something from Mantic and be disappointed – only ‘overjoyed’ is acceptable when you get a Mantic parcel!!! So, if anyone has placed a pre-order and does not like these photos, please just drop me a line before they are shipped and I will refund you in full!"

So they admit people are disappointed... And they gave a bunch of reasons why and how they 'cut corners' because they felt releasing models in 2011 and having more models was more important than convincing Sci-Fi or waiting for 2012 for a complete product roll-out.

I think it is good for mantic to admit they are wrong and offer refunds as well as let people know if they wait for the full roll-out in 2012, they will have access to 'better' models. It is much more reasonable than the 'these models are perfect and there are no valid complains to be had!'

I think they gambled and took the wrong path. They should have waited till 2012 and made a polished quality product. They squandered months of teasers and talk by producing disappointing results and now everything they do is catch up and repair. I am not going to say they are a failure, but they are going to have to prove thsemselves with much better releases in the future.

They have failed as far as I am concerned. I am not interested in their current Warpath product at all and I am not eager to see what comes next. The human army concept art was a bit embarrassing in my estimation. I'm not saying no one could like it but I very much agree with nkelsch's interpretation of Mantic's own stance: they seem to realize that they've miscalculated and if not failed overall failed at least some of their non-hypothetical customers.