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.

 Cyporiean wrote:
Trolls:

Not a fan. Heroic scaling gone mad! Their hands are larger than their legs...

Only new sculpts I haven't liked so far, though, the rest is looking great IMO.

They're still better than the Hobbit trolls at least.

Yeah - the hands have gone a little crazy, troll-blood style. But overall I still like them.

Thinking of Ray Harryhausen, could imagine these guys moving in stop-gap animation style

scarletsquig wrote:
Not a fan. Heroic scaling gone mad! Their hands are larger than their legs...

I guess they never got the meme memo.

Pacific wrote:Thinking of Ray Harryhausen, could imagine these guys moving in stop-gap animation style

And may he rest in piece. I'm sure many of us thought of our minis when we last saw his classic movies on tv.

The paint does them justice.

Any word on female vampires and undead werewolves?

 Cyporiean wrote:
Trolls:

I painted those. They're on 40mm bases. I still have the werewolves. :-) They're pretty fricken' cool.

Really nice work Winterdyne, really like the muted effect of colours that you've gone for!

Not so muted in the flesh, the white background washes them out a little. I particularly like the one on the left, who's obviously Very Angry with his rock.

They're so close to looking good, but instead they look rather ridiculous. I was hoping to use them for my LotR stuff.

/sadf

I think they're great. They'll go into my Troll army for WoC VERY well. They just need [more] tentacles. Any word on when we're getting the second survey to adjust our options?

I can see them working as chaos trolls. Though I think winterdyne's paint makes them look better than they otherwise would...

winterdyne wrote:


I painted those. They're on 40mm bases. I still have the werewolves. :-) They're pretty fricken' cool.

And a lovely job you did. No chance of a step-by-step or something like that, by any chance? Really quite lovely, the darker scheme kind of compensates for the somewhat cartoony look rather magnificently.

GOD! Why in the @&#^# do they have to make everything have tinsy tiny little legs?!?!?!?

Sorry, lost it there. Seriously, I want to like the models but the trolls and werewolves have tiny munchkin legs under he-man bodies. I still like the ogres (unless they made tiny legs for them too since the last time I saw them) and will just have to take the freebie trolls and werewolves I guess.

/rant.

Bazuzu is amazing. I like the badger too.

GW Nagash is to Mantic Dragon Riders as GW Pumbagor is to Mantic Trolls.

 agnosto wrote:
GOD! Why in the @&#^# do they have to make everything have tinsy tiny little legs?!?!?!?

Because Mantic has no eye for proportions that don't look like gak, and never has.

They do have comedy little legs and very large bodies. I quite like that though... Reminded me of one of the baddies from the original Halo...

I'll do a paint guide once they're officially let out of the bag, I have an agreement with Mantic not to publish any pics until they give the nod.

winterdyne wrote:
They do have comedy little legs and very large bodies. I quite like that though... Reminded me of one of the baddies from the original Halo...

I'll do a paint guide once they're officially let out of the bag, I have an agreement with Mantic not to publish any pics until they give the nod.

You're doing a fantastic job - can you let us know what you've painted for them that we can look forward to in the coming weeks/months?

Getting flattering paint jobs is something that Mantic has seemed to struggle with in the past, so it's nice to see some.

I have to admit that the paint job makes them really shine, and I am definitely thinking of ways to incorporate that into the ones I get. Very good work!

I really like those trolls, the cartoon look works well. Can't wait to get the 12 I kickstarted for!

Yup, those trolls are truly awful. I really hope they let us change our buy one get one free options.

 AlexHolker wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
GOD! Why in the @&#^# do they have to make everything have tinsy tiny little legs?!?!?!?

Because Mantic has no eye for proportions that don't look like gak, and never has.

Compared to who? Thunderbolt Mountain Miniatures? If you're talking proportions, GW's models look like gak, PP's models look like gak. Giant ham fists and balloon heads. Especially GW orcs, who look like slowed hydrocephalic babies. Thank god Mantic came along, now I have a giant army of actual evil looking orcs with proper proportions.

winterdyne wrote:
They do have comedy little legs and very large bodies. I quite like that though... Reminded me of one of the baddies from the original Halo...

I'll do a paint guide once they're officially let out of the bag, I have an agreement with Mantic not to publish any pics until they give the nod.

Awesome, thanks! And really, it's not as if we'd have any use for that specific guide before they're out anyway, right?
Again, lovely stuff.

I'll probably grab a bunch of Reaper Bones trolls to convert instead, they're a better fit for the Mantic Orcs I already own. In fact, those are so cheap I might be able to use them as a source of replacement legs for the Mantic ones.. and heads too, since I'm not so keen on the "yelling mouth" on all of the head variants. I do like the bulk of the mantic trolls, just feel like they need tree trunks for legs rather than twigs!

The problem for me isn't always down to "heroic scale vs. truescale", but more about whether the mini looks like it belongs in the army.

I wouldn't put the mantic trolls in with my mantic orcs in the same way that I wouldn't mix GW elves with Mantic elves.

It's the age-old problem with Mantic, they have lots of different freelancers sculpting for them all going off and doing their own thing (the troll/werewolf sculptor sculpted a lot of the trollblood models for privateer press, so you can see why the sculpts turned out the way they did) and it results in wildly different design styles within a single army. I don't feel like the concept art here was stuck to very well, if you look at the original design, they're heavily heroic scale, but they do at least have some legs to them:



^ Now *that* would have been a badass mini.

Remy did a better job of sticking to the concept with the Ogres, whereas the trolls and werewolves done by the other sculptor seem to have deviated a lot.

It's always the more cartoony sculpts that are the most divisive, pretty much a 50/50 love/hate split.

Please do post pics of that bones troll as a leg donor conversion when it's done; sounds like it might actually be a good fix for a lot of us

That concept art looks more like an Ogre.. and still has the larger upper body.


Which I'm fine with, I like the look of the Trolls.

Yeah, the troll/ogre debate got pretty heated during the KS, if I recall correctly. The current compromise in terms of armour is actually quite nice; armoured trolls have been few and far between but it doesn't make them look like ogres in any way.

 scarletsquig wrote:




^ Now *that* would have been a badass mini.

Remy did a better job of sticking to the concept with the Ogres, whereas the trolls and werewolves done by the other sculptor seem to have deviated a lot.

It's always the more cartoony sculpts that are the most divisive, pretty much a 50/50 love/hate split.

The issue is the final model is way off the concept art. The proportions are totally not even close. If they are employing sculptors and selling people on concept art, the sculptors need to stick to the concept art, which some of the freelancers are either incapable or unwilling to to. The Head to Bicep to Let ratio of the concept art and the final mini are drastically wrong compared to the concept art.

The other thing is the concept changed... The weapons don't match, the style of armor doesn't match... It is like whoever sculpted these has no idea what 'concept art' means. When I see concept art, I usually expect (and companies deliver) a 3D rendition of the 2D art. I expect to see poses, the buckles on the armor, the rivets, the brestplate, the fur around the knee. There are so many overall changes from the concept art, it is like they drew a picture of a Armored black orc and provided a Savage Goblin model. Not only did they not get the core anatomy of the concept art but they also drastically changed the theme of the model too.

This scares the piss out of me when it comes to buying models based upon concept art alone because it is not getting better.

I agree. Very disappointed in the trolls; much preferred the concept art. The final models look very little like the concept art. I'm only getting them as freebies, though, so no prob.

I hope whoever sculpted the trolls get a pay reduction or at the very least a STERN talking to

Sorry if that came out harsh but mantic NEEDS to learn they cant just pump out sculpts like GW. At least with GW they can sell stuff even if its bad looking. This just keeps giving mantic a bad name, much like their elves (even if you like them, a good chunk of the community cannot get past the elves when it comes to mantic)

I agree with ScarletSquig.. don't think the trolls go very well with the Orcs (and certainly don't look as good as the Ogres), although I don't think they are bad models per se. Certainly, better than the GW and PP miniatures (and the price differential makes it an absolute no-brainer).