Mantic Games - Sci-fi News & Rumors: Sci-Fi Zombies released.

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**JoshInJapan**

While I understand where everyone is coming from re: unannounced substitution of metal models, I rather like Mantic's metals. The details are generally crisper than their restic models', and whatever alloy they use is almost as soft as lead minis, so cleaning, drilling and converting are much easier as well.

**Sining**

Afaik, the colored plastic is for the board game version of Deadzone, where everything is assembled and the factions are in different colors.

**Azazelx**

scarletsquig wrote:

Top heavy model + 8 individually cast large heavy tentacle pieces with small ball and socket attachment points = no fun. Anyone who has ever tried to assemble a metal GW tomb scorpion* or similar knows the pain of having to glue in lots of little individual appendages on a large metal model. What will be needed is 8 pins, one for each tentacle, and epoxy resin. A good 45 minutes or so of assembly time, minimum. Superglue alone might hold it temporarily, but it *will* break later.

I don't mind metal (especially for 1-piece models, it's totally fine), but on the other hand I do feel like the decision to make something either restic or metal should have a bit more thought put into it than "accountant says yes/no" especially when fans of the company have put down $15k cash to fund the production of a single miniature.

I recently backed a Kickstarter that produced around 30 different metal minis for $15k of funding.

Deciding to make minis metal based on the results of a single KS survey doesn't sound so great, either. Who knows what the retail sales will be? Who knows what the second survey sales will be? Who knows how many lost sales you will end up with simply because the product is metal (higher retail price, more difficult to assemble) than restic?

Dreadball already made that mistake when loads of people ordered season 3 boosters in the final survey and mantic couldn't cast enough metals to keep up, and then had to deal with people not actually wanting metal after it had already shipped. So it turns out they would have been better off doing restic for those anyway.

Why risk repeating the same mistake with deadzone?

Hear, hear. Well said, sir.
I (someone who is fine with a lot of metal) will be going from "probably two, maybe three" to won't be ordering tentacle-thing.

**carlos13th**

I like metal. I like having a little weight to the model but I have multipart metal models.

**Ronin_eX**

Craaaaaaaaaaaaaap, this is starting to ship and I have only assembled and based, like, seven Warzone minis.

I haven't even found a place to store Ogre permanently. I'm not ready Mantic*, I'm not ready!!!

* - But don't let this stop you from sending the package, allowing me to swim through all my stuff Scrooge McDuck style

That said, mildly disappointed about the metal stuff. I mean, I played 40k back when Land Speeders were metal kits, and I bought those willingly. In terms of disappointment, this is really kind of small, but it is there. Though it is weird that things funded by pre-determined stretch goals got hit with the economics stick. But without knowing the particulars I can't really make too much of a stink. As I said, just kind of disappointing.

Still don't regret getting the Chovar or Helfather though. So long as they were made to be metal kits from the ground up, my life will go on.

**Yonan**

Ronin_eX wrote:
Still don't regret getting the Chovar or Helfather though. So long as they were made to be metal kits from the ground up, my life will go on.

Yeha would like to see pics once they hit the wild. I *might* relent on my anti-metal stance but I doubt it. Will screw my nerd OCD too much having 2 metal minis with the rest restic/plastic ; p

**GrimDork**

I kind of doubt mercs are going to see a *lot* of use anyway. Other than the heist scenario. You lose 3 reputation just for bringing one along, which is like 3 minor kills, or a primary objective or what have you. And I'm not 100% on how you actually unlock them in campaign play in the first place, maybe as a clearance? For once-off games they'll probably be an interesting addition though, possibly to the point that they get soft-banned like 40k named characters used to be

**Yonan**

True that Grim. I can see the -3 rep being house ruled away if it negates a substantial portion of the game. That and/or they get assigned in campaigns based on how it progresses. Could be a way to boost underdogs, a reward for great performance in missions, a mission objective and so on.

**Earth Dragon**

Well, switching those to metal might actually be funding all this courier shipping.

(This is like a half eye roll, half tongue, with a sprinkle of seriousness)

I'm BLOWN away what they must be paying for Fedex to the US and Canadia if that turns out to be true. As always, I'm impressed yet flabergasted at Mantic's business decisions.

**Yonan**

Earth Dragon wrote:
As always, I'm impressed yet flabergasted at Mantic's business decisions.

Haha, that's awesome and very much how I feel. I love them and a lot of what they do - this courier shipping being the latest example. But some of what they do is very /facepalm

**Earth Dragon**

(As a side note: I know people are saying "Why are you making the same mistake as Dreadball" but let's think about it for even a minute......that decision was made WAY before the dreadball backlash. Those Deadzone surveys were in before the Season 3 surveys were even in. It was too late to use that experience to improve)

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Azazelx wrote:
scarletsquig wrote:

Top heavy model + 8 individually cast large heavy tentacle pieces with small ball and socket attachment points = no fun. Anyone who has ever tried to assemble a metal GW tomb scorpion* or similar knows the pain of having to glue in lots of little individual appendages on a large metal model. What will be needed is 8 pins, one for each tentacle, and epoxy resin. A good 45 minutes or so of assembly time, minimum. Superglue alone might hold it temporarily, but it *will* break later.

I don't mind metal (especially for 1-piece models, it's totally fine), but on the other hand I do feel like the decision to make something either restic or metal should have a bit more thought put into it than "accountant says yes/no" especially when fans of the company have put down $15k cash to fund the production of a single miniature.

I recently backed a Kickstarter that produced around 30 different metal minis for $15k of funding.

Deciding to make minis metal based on the results of a single KS survey doesn't sound so great, either. Who knows what the retail sales will be? Who knows what the second survey sales will be? Who knows how many lost sales you will end up with simply because the product is metal (higher retail price, more difficult to assemble) than restic?

Dreadball already made that mistake when loads of people ordered season 3 boosters in the final survey and mantic couldn't cast enough metals to keep up, and then had to deal with people not actually wanting metal after it had already shipped. So it turns out they would have been better off doing restic for those anyway.

Why risk repeating the same mistake with deadzone?

Hear, hear. Well said, sir.
I (someone who is fine with a lot of metal) will be going from "probably two, maybe three" to won't be ordering tentacle-thing.

So it's YOUR fault they are metal since you held off on ordering them.

Thanks a lot Azazelx

**carlos13th**

I really don't mind if mine is a late shipper tbh I don't think I will end up touching Deadzone until at least a few months into the new year. A combination of other projects I want to work on and lack of time where I can actually work on stuff will mean I would probably look through to see if everythings there, admire the models and flick through the rules before storing it in a cupboard for a few months.

**judgedoug**

Earth Dragon wrote:
(As a side note: I know people are saying "Why are you making the same mistake as Dreadball" but let's think about it for even a minute......that decision was made WAY before the dreadball backlash. Those Deadzone surveys were in before the Season 3 surveys were even in. It was too late to use that experience to improve)

I was just about to say that!

They were probably sculpted, molds made, and being cast when the Dreadball stuff shipped.

I didn't order either of those models, so doesn't really affect me, but I can imagine from all the disgruntledness sent Mantic's way they won't be doing THAT again.

Other than that, I'm pretty happy with what looks to be an excellent haul of great figs, and then more free Enforcers next year!

**GrimDork**

Hopefully my miniature market order comes in quick so I can rush out some enforcer schemes and have that sorted before my goodies from mantic arrive. I also need to get my hobby desk sorted out before it gets assaulted by what I'm assuming will be 10-20 pounds of models!

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, on mercs... I'm not sure yet what role they will play in campaigns and casual games, but I'm quite glad they exist.

I've already got funny ideas in my head along the lines of making merc/vet teams of just 3-4 characters and running them through the nexus psi and solo campaigns.

**Souleater**

Box is on the van for delivery!

**carlos13th**

Did they email you to notify Souleater? Or was it through kickstarter?

**scarletsquig**

Some quick pics of the Fortifications and Landing Pad sprues would be awesome, if anyone has got their package already.. those are the only things we haven't seen.

**Slinky**

Souleater wrote:
Box is on the van for delivery!

Hmm, mine still says "A UPS shipping label has been created. Once the shipment arrives at our facility, the tracking status--including the scheduled delivery date--will be updated"

I think the estimated delivery date of today may be wishful thinking

**barnacle111**

Some have already received their packages in the uk according to fb. Not here in Aus though.... Possibly a week or two I guess... Boo. Still, getting closer!

**Earth Dragon**

Yeah if America and Australia get their stuff post Christmas just so UK can get theirs in November, I'm done with Mantic.

I holding onto the smallest inkling of hope, but with how long stuff has taken in the past, it should have been obvious that the farthest destinations should have been first.......

**Riquende**

Now you see the price you pay for rebelling against the crown.

Anyway, first pic of delivery has been sighted onthe Mantic forum, thanks to ZombiePirate:

Spoiler:

Mine is still saying ready for UPS, but then I think Mantic said somewhere in the comments that those belonging to people paying for courier shipping was being handled first, so no big deal.

Also, it was confirmed that the 6 named characters from the 2nd wave will be metal, so if you need to contact Mantic to get some stuff changed around, now's the time.

**OrlandotheTechnicoloured**

At the moment those getting shipped early are those who paid extra for tracked courier shipping

and certainly in their previous KS Deadzone shipments (most of) the ROW shipped before (most of) the UK

**Theophony**

Yonan wrote:
Earth Dragon wrote:
As always, I'm impressed yet flabergasted at Mantic's business decisions.

Haha, that's awesome and very much how I feel. I love them and a lot of what they do - this courier shipping being the latest example. But some of what they do is very /facepalm

It's almost like everyone forgot Hesse are former GW employees

. Poor decision making seems to be breed into them. After getting in a few games with mantic rules I'm thinking of playing deadzonecome when it comes out. But I also just bought a mantic Orc horde and the metal multipart hero sucks to put together. Looks like it was designed for restic, but then made in metal so all the joints are terrible.

**solkan**

It's so odd reading about US posters complaining about international shipments (them, in this case) not being sent out first, when for most of the US Kickstarters I've been on, international shipments start going out about half way through shipping.

**lord_blackfang**

solkan wrote:
It's so odd reading about US posters complaining about international shipments (them, in this case) not being sent out first, when for most of the US Kickstarters I've been on, international shipments start going out about half way through shipping.

Or a few months after, even.

**Melcavuk**

My deadzone stuff arrived!!!! Pics soon

**Yonan**

Lucky, and thanks, looking forward to them ; )

**CptJake**

Melcavuk wrote:
My deadzone stuff arrived!!!! Pics soon

**Melcavuk**

Not a detailed unboxing but me with my box:

Will do a more detailed showing once I've gotten back from my 40K game today. I have seen one grot sniper rifle is bendy but thats a quick fix, got a tonne of Marauders to get through and assemble (went double starter facton with them) my wife is thrilled with her rebs (and pink dice) not even opened main box game yet but scenerywise I think I'm set for life

**CptJake**

You tease.