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.

Pee dancing or not, they're still better than GW's overweight Mongolian caricatures.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 RiTides wrote:
Heh . Well, that deserves some discussion... I feel that a Mantic-specific mass thread for trading might do better in the Mantic subforum. Let me ask the other swapmods and get back to you...

Oh, and I'll start the thread in the Mantic subforum...feel free to move it to the Swap Shop if the other swapmods agree to it. Or close mine and turn it into yours to keep it from locking up until we're well and done.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Pee dancing or not, they're still better than GW's overweight Mongolian caricatures.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 RiTides wrote:
Heh . Well, that deserves some discussion... I feel that a Mantic-specific mass thread for trading might do better in the Mantic subforum. Let me ask the other swapmods and get back to you...

Oh, and I'll start the thread in the Mantic subforum...feel free to move it to the Swap Shop if the other swapmods agree to it. Or close mine and turn it into yours to keep it from locking up until we're well and done.

here we go...



was this the creative basis for this sculpt? you decide.

My werewolf is trying out for the part of Ryu if they ever make a decent Street Fighter movie-he has the Hadoken pose down pat.

I'm not sure on the paint scheme, but the werewolf models are pretty good, the hair feels appropriate, and the nipples certainly don't stick out (literally and figuratively) as much as pictures online would suggest.

emperorpenguin wrote:

 Fenriswulf wrote:
He likely got it through one of the army deals or similar, as it's not an auto-include in the $225 level for the free stuff. I was going to get it, but after seeing the sculpt, I am glad I didn't.

It is an auto-include for pledges of $100+ listed in the pledge levels

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1744629938/kings-of-war

That's only for actual pledges made at that level for specific armies.

For people like me who pledged for the $35 level, then chose the rest as BOGOF's to get to the $225 level, I wouldn't be getting the Vampiress as a free miniature. This might change as I have now dropped a majority of my BOGOF choices for an Ogre army and some BOGOF choices, books etc. I don't know if this is the case, but it will be interesting to find out.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
My werewolf is trying out for the part of Ryu if they ever make a decent Street Fighter movie-he has the Hadoken pose down pat.

I'm not sure on the paint scheme, but the werewolf models are pretty good, the hair feels appropriate, and the nipples certainly don't stick out (literally and figuratively) as much as pictures online would suggest.

you're in denial and need intervention stat.

 RiTides wrote:
I just wish Mantic would hire top-flight sculptors. They're raising a lot of funds, and I know money is stretched tight. But, by far the biggest cost has to be tooling, right? Paying a bit more for the sculptor upfront would make them the sweet alternative that I have been hoping they could be, if they would put out more things like the ogres.

Watching Tre Manor's thread has me wishing they would bring someone like him onboard!

I do realize it's not Just sculpting, but some issues with casting on excellent sculpts (like the dreadball robots, although I think they're probably fine with just a bit of work). But on the other hand, if you start with a bad sculpt there's really no saving it.

This. They're not hurting for cash, not really, and the cathorse debacle is really hurting them. Their sculpts are all over the place. When you're sinking that much into a sprue, go for the best. We'll wait.

--Chris
www.chrisvalera.com

Actually Rackham Wolfen did not look much different, they only had a different painting scheme.

 Forlorn wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
My werewolf is trying out for the part of Ryu if they ever make a decent Street Fighter movie-he has the Hadoken pose down pat.

I'm not sure on the paint scheme, but the werewolf models are pretty good, the hair feels appropriate, and the nipples certainly don't stick out (literally and figuratively) as much as pictures online would suggest.

you're in denial and need intervention stat.

Psh. Lol. I'll post pics in my gallery when done. I do like them though. Pictures really have done them an injustice.

I'm just gluing together my trolls.

I like 'em

Glad somebody else likes them too!

 Forlorn wrote:

you're in denial and need intervention stat.

you're just full of billiant contributions to the discussion

 judgedoug wrote:

 Forlorn wrote:

you're in denial and need intervention stat.

you're just full of billiant contributions to the discussion

I think he's just joking around. That's how I'm viewing it.

overtyrant wrote:
The Angel head's aren't that small. Whilst I like the vast majority of the sculpts Mantic have done from this KS I can't quite tell if most of these OMFG THOSE HEADS ARE B####Y TINY posts are series or just trolling.

I haven't commented on them to date, but I'm being super serial. They are pinheads.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Taarnak wrote:

I agree that the aesthetic decisions on the trolls were...odd. However, they are not technically bad sculpts. I feel like we need to start making a distinction about that as a group. The Trolls are bad designs, not bad sculpts.

Actually, the troll concept art looked great. Unfortunately, they decided not to use either variant of the original concept art that they showed during the KS. I think the sculpting is technically competent, but the blown-out proportions do put them in the category of poor sculpts. Without any of us having ever seen the final concept art the sculptor worked from (I wonder if it'll be in the Digital Art Book?) there's little to go on other than the finished product. So I'm going to continue calling them poor sculpts until I see the final concept art.

 timetowaste85 wrote:

I disagree with this completely. I think the trolls look great, and have no problem with the tiny legs. It's the style Mantic chose to go with, and some fantasy books do actually show trolls having tiny legs. They run around with their arms like gorillas. They chose not to go the tried-and-true fantasy look, they went with their own thing. It's not that bad, it's just different. I realize it's not the design for everybody, but I like it.

My personal issues with the trolls are due to the initial concept art, which as I expressed above, was really good. This in turn led me to pledge for quite a few of them (Army of Mordor!) only to be terribly disappointed with the final product when it was shown. Luckily they allowed me to change out the models via the recent PM, but the disappointment remains. If I'd just come along recently, I wouldn't have the same experience of the failed investment, and so while I might make fun of them and laugh a time or two, I wouldn't care or be annoyed about their final design. The same way that I feel about the Elf Dragon riders or whatever they are. You'll probably find that a number of others with issues about the trolls are coming from a similar perspective of having expected (and paid for!) something rather different to the final product.

 Fenriswulf wrote:
He likely got it through one of the army deals or similar, as it's not an auto-include in the $225 level for the free stuff. I was going to get it, but after seeing the sculpt, I am glad I didn't.

Pretty sure it was clarified that it comes under the catchall of "all character models created as part of this Kickstarter". I haven't got my stuff yet, so I'm not sure.





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Duncan_Idaho wrote:
Actually Rackham Wolfen did not look much different, they only had a different painting scheme.

Agreed. The bare-skin paint scheme does these no favours. I'll be interested to see mine when they eventually come, and how they stack up to the Rackham metals and plastics.

Some new previews from Facebook. They weren't happy with the sculpts that the freelancer sent them so they're in the process of having their in-house sculptor fix them up:

Female character has longarm syndrome again. There must be some lore thing on Mantica where all the women go around carrying heavy weights in each arm from birth onwards, so they get better reach.

Don't know so much about the male characters, I can't see how they'll turn out.

They need new/better freelancers, or they need to grow some editorial balls and refuse to pay for sub-standard work. Either that or start freelancing sculpts to me, since it's clear they'll pay for and accept anything.

Those two male heroes are fine. The female sculpt seems a little off. I can't put my finger on why though. I don't think it's the arms. They look alright to me. That hero on the left actually looks really good, to me. Middle guy seems to be leaning a little too Heroic in proportions to my liking, but he still looks good.

I spy some Plague in the background, a guy with a crossbow, and a spiral shaped lance. Who comes with a spiral lance?

Female head is too far "forward" I'd say.
Middle hero: look at his left arm (our right); too little definition in the cloth (looks like a blob) and hand.

The High Elf Palace Guard got remade in restic for this KS, didn't they? Does anyone have pictures of them?

I think their inhouse sculptor needs his eyeglass prescription looked at because he keeps making the arms too long on everything.

I received my box yesterday and was immediately a little disappointed in how small the Ogres are; they're more like Black Orcs than Ogres; I can't justify putting them on 40mm bases. I love the sculpts though. Got a random Mor-Ax sprue in the box as well...

Goblin fleabags are very nice.

Side note, I don't like the restic and won't be joining any more of Mantic's kickstarters that aren't 100% plastic, I don't like having to use hot water or a hairdryer to straighten or putty to fill in the holes in models that should come to me error free. Mantic=GW Finecast on a large scale unfortunately. (Just my initial impression)

Looking at my package, the mummies look like the arms are perfect length. In the pictures, they look longer than they should've been. Anyone think that the sisters might actually come out looking normal, given the same thought process?
If they used the masters in the pictures, the arms shrunk down appropriately. That would also explain why the angel heads are too small in the models-they were fine on the masters. I'd expect our female arms will look better in person.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Looking at my package, the mummies look like the arms are perfect length. In the pictures, they look longer than they should've been. Anyone think that the sisters might actually come out looking normal, given the same thought process?
If they used the masters in the pictures, the arms shrunk down appropriately. That would also explain why the angel heads are too small in the models-they were fine on the masters. I'd expect our female arms will look better in person.

Sadly not on the nuns arms, I saw them at the open day and there still freakishly long. The angels heads are fine though.

overtyrant wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Looking at my package, the mummies look like the arms are perfect length. In the pictures, they look longer than they should've been. Anyone think that the sisters might actually come out looking normal, given the same thought process?
If they used the masters in the pictures, the arms shrunk down appropriately. That would also explain why the angel heads are too small in the models-they were fine on the masters. I'd expect our female arms will look better in person.

Sadly not on the nuns arms, I saw them at the open day and there still freakishly long. The angels heads are fine though.

Aren't the painted previews done with pre-production casts or something? Angel heads didn't show the shrinkage in the previews, so maybe the sisters turn out better than expected.

agnosto wrote:I think their inhouse sculptor needs his eyeglass prescription looked at because he keeps making the arms too long on everything.

I received my box yesterday and was immediately a little disappointed in how small the Ogres are; they're more like Black Orcs than Ogres; I can't justify putting them on 40mm bases. I love the sculpts though. Got a random Mor-Ax sprue in the box as well...

GW ogres were pretty much exactly the same scale for 20 years, but everything has balooned over the last 8 or so years. They're 40-45mm tall, which I think is what the industry standard for ogre sized things has always been.

Side note, I don't like the restic and won't be joining any more of Mantic's kickstarters that aren't 100% plastic, I don't like having to use hot water or a hairdryer to straighten or putty to fill in the holes in models that should come to me error free. Mantic=GW Finecast on a large scale unfortunately. (Just my initial impression)

Fair enough. It's nowhere near as bad as finecast which has actual flaws to the casting. Needing a little work to prep models is part of the hobby.

Also, the ability to repose models without actually damaging them is a great feature of the material. I wanted to have a little different pose than the gun across the chest pose with the blunderbuss, so I bent the model to look like this:



The model's not quite done prep, and needs a bit of filling on the gun, but neither metal nor hard plastic are anywhere near as forgiving for making modifications like this.

Yikes!

Those Ogre hands are a bit on the large side.

I was hesitant at first, but yeah, maybe Orc arms are the way to go after all...

Yeah, that's a good point- the left arm goes from his head to his knee, and is a lot thicker than the legs! PP is known for this, of course, but it can be too much.

I've acquired 2 sets of Golems now, though, if anyone else wants to sell/trade theirs let me know

Nice conversion you got going there decker, pretty cool, you should upload some pics of your army in the Mntic sub-forum when your done.

Never really paid much attention the the orges myself, but now that I've seen them propley, yeah those arms and hands are just way too big. Its a real shame really since the actual sculpt itself is really good, lots
of fine, clean details, replacemeant arms look like a must. Hey the sculptor has the same tools as me, so awsome!

Here's a comparison shot. Not nearly as bad as my first impression, they're just lacking the prodigious guts of GW's line.

Agnosto: That torso is the tallest one, and is about 5mm taller than the hunched over one, so there definitely is a height difference on average. Overall bulk is the main size difference though (compare the ogre to a chaos warrior and to a black orc - they're not much bigger).

I have no issue with the size though (not as much of a difference between GW stone or common trolls and the new plastic river trolls).

decker_cky wrote:
Agnosto: That torso is the tallest one, and is about 5mm taller than the hunched over one, so there definitely is a height difference on average. Overall bulk is the main size difference though (compare the ogre to a chaos warrior and to a black orc - they're not much bigger).

I have no issue with the size though (not as much of a difference between GW stone or common trolls and the new plastic river trolls).

So...the Mantic Ogre torso that is standing straight up is the same height as the GW Ogre torso, while the hunched one is different? Say it ain't so!
Proportions: we has them!








sorry, it was too easy

Mantic ogres look similar in size/ style/ scale to the wonderful Mordheim ogre bodyguard. Particularly the head with the underbite and square teeth.

I don't see the issue, besides, if you're buying Mantic you know full well you're not getting GW uber-heroic scale.. in fact that's the reason why the trolls are so jarring.. if they were GW minis they'd probably fit right in.

Also, it probably shouldn't bother me, but Mantic could really do with releasing some proper cavalry and monster bases... the renedra green ones are too thin and it's kinda annoying.

As for my opinion on restic - it's tolerable. Absolute pain in the ass for infantry models where you have to clean up loads of tiny components and try to glue them together since the cleanup of mould lines is really annoyingly hard, I can't use a file like I prefer to.

On larger minis like the ogres/ cavalry, it's great. Fewer models, relatively less work to remove mould lines... *and*...

...Restic large infantry and cavalry is nice and affordable (£2/mini gore riders, £3/mini ogres). Restic infantry is not... £1.50/mini is pretty much GW pricing, and at that point you have to start looking at the GW version and the various extra options/ variety that it generally offers.

So, really, my opinion boils down to "If it's on a 20mm/25mm base and you're going to want more than 10 of them in an army, it really needs to be hard plastic".

Unfortunately, Mantic's last properly-done hard plastic range was orcs.. July 2011, so 2 years ago and pretty much bugger all since then... it's like the company was on a massive roll up until then, and then ran out of money, fell flat on its face, became over-cautious, started to make some truly dire decisions in the name of bean counting (warpath 1.0).. before kickstarter came along and gave them a shot in the arm again. Now that they're back on a roll again, they really need to go back to what made everyone like them back in 2009/2010 (when they gained some truly devoted fans such as yours truly).

The annoying thing is, Kickstarter levels of cash could easily fund the tooling, even at Renedra prices of £40k/sprue. $60k stretch goal in a KS, job done.

$300k of funding later, bam, whole new army, hard plastic everything. And you just know the KS would be funded in a day or two so I really don't understand the current strategy of "restic everything, spam as many new lines as possible".