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 Compel wrote:
..."Loka is an objectively bad game because reviewers say it is, as illustrated by this Dice Tower guy shows" doesn't sit right with me.

Loka is an objectively bad game because it imports a critical fumble rule into a game where the penalty is literally game-ending. If you attack with your king and roll a natural 1 and thus lose the game, are you going to be talking about how cinematic the game was? Are you going to be talking about how skilled your opponent is at not rolling 1s? I hope not.

Critical fumble rules should not be a core gameplay mechanic in any game where the death of a single individual automatically means you lose. It's why they're bad in role-playing games, and it's why they're bad here.

Maybe I've just played so much 40k that having to deal with 1 screwy stat and a potentially abused mechanic for... Less than 6 months, isn't a big issue to me. - And I do remember agreeing with you at the time that it was a badly broken thing. However, it was solved in pretty great time, in my view (and, personally I only ever had 1 Judwan game in the timespan anyhow, but that's just me).

So yeah, I class Dreadball as good rules. - I do have a couple of concerns with the new season 3 teams, but as I've not even assembled mine yet, I'm not going to go on about them.

I'll even attest to the fact I've got a couple of vague worries about Deadzone too, relating to mortars and the like. But, for the moment at least, I judge those complete rules as 'not really being released yet' so I'm not concerned.

I've gotten into more 'serious' rules discussions about Small World than any Mantic game I've played.

I stopped listening to BoW when they were so enthusiastic about the KoW Men at Arms. People who are that blind have no business doing what they do. A blind wombat knows how terrible those models are...unless you're buiding a misformed army of half-melted army men..

While we're on the topic of personal experiences...

shrug, I started playing Kings of War because Warhammer 8th is one of the shittiest systems ever written and ruined my fifteen-year love affair with Warhammer. Kings of War is everything that Warhammer 8th was trying to be but failed at so miserably. My group and I can play giant, giant games with literally five hundred miniatures on the table and have a huge amount of fun doing so while reaching the conclusion in approximately two to three hours (for huge games) or two hours or less (for normal sized games, which would be the equivalent of a huge Warhammer game). It's more tactically rewarding and has none of the Warhammer Fatigue that so often plagues hours four and up on large Warhammer games. It is the best mass-battles ruleset ever written.

Dreadball has been very fun the times I've played it - not in a league or anything - except for one game where my opponent complained the entire time. Not about the rules, as he loves the rules, but just complaining at everything that happened. It was very annoying.

Deadzone has had pretty universal acclaim. Unfortunately I have yet to try it despite about a half dozen people I know that are playing it. I need to paint my Enforcer team.

I have yet to play Warpath but I believe some people in my group are gearing up to try it out in a week or two as everyone (bar myself and one other) has stopped playing 40k but have an itch to play a 40k-style game. I'm hoping it picks up as I have a buncha Corporation and Veer-Myn models and I just splurged about bought 80 40k Cultists to use as Marauders.

I have zero experience with Loka, but chess-variants have never interested me.

 Zweischneid wrote:


/shrug

Glad nobody ever criticizes Warhammer 40K for not being balanced and with the argument of "I don't like narrative gaming". when it's explicit premise is being a narrative game.

If a game's premise/concept is inherently flawed (in a reviewer's opinion), one's gotta have the right to say that, no?

I don't even agree with the Dice Tower review, but its one-sided bashing of Loka is no more misguided than BoW's one-sided, nonreflective fawning over Mantic's output.

I don't anyone should really expect too much objectivity from personal review sites or blogs though.

 agnosto wrote:
A blind wombat knows how terrible those models are...unless you're buiding a misformed army of half-melted army men..

That... that sounds pretty cool. You might just sway my hand in purchasing an army of misformed, half- melted army men.

I wonder if their opponents would get some kind of morale penalty for facing such monstrosities, the way you guys describe them.

I should get some and let my kids paint them, let them be truly horrific.

Take that, counts as chaos- spawn!

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:

That... that sounds pretty cool. You might just sway my hand in purchasing an army of misformed, half- melted army men.

I wonder if their opponents would get some kind of morale penalty for facing such monstrosities, the way you guys describe them.

I should get some and let my kids paint them, let them be truly horrific.

Take that, counts as chaos- spawn!

lol. Maybe not a morale/nerve penalty but they certainly should have the equivalent of "reach" weapons because their arms are longer than their bodies....knuckle draggers.

I gave them and a fair number of the other KoW Kickstarter stuff to a friend so his 6 year old son could learn to paint.

I guess I'm blind because honestly I don't thunk they're that terrible. Poor quality yes but a regiment of 20 still looks impressive.

WayneTheGame wrote:
I guess I'm blind because honestly I don't thunk they're that terrible. Poor quality yes but a regiment of 20 still looks impressive.

They're not horrible unless you get closer than a foot to them or put them next to a model with more realistic proportions. They are beyond terrible when you compare them to the quality and pricing of the Perry Brothers though....

Switch the heads with paladins or Elohi and shorten the arms with clippers and make sure they get washes. Then MaAs look great. That's a LOT of work though, and more than should be expected, and I'm a Mantic enthusiast. However, I, and many of my friends love Loka. And Deadzone. And Kings of War. Huh. Imagine that. All well loved. Actually, Dreadball is the least played of the four of them. That's just my area though. We have one guy not horribly impressed, but it's not that big a deal.

I don't understand this whole deal with objective reviews. A good review states the the reviewers opinion and how he/she came to hold that opinion. Reviews trying to hard be objective either become boring or useless. I much more prefer a reviewer clearly stating his or her opinion. Then it's up to me to find reviewers who either do entertaining reviews or whose opinions are in sync with me.

 jorny wrote:
I don't understand this whole deal with objective reviews. A good review states the the reviewers opinion and how he/she came to hold that opinion. Reviews trying to hard be objective either become boring or useless. I much more prefer a reviewer clearly stating his or her opinion. Then it's up to me to find reviewers who either do entertaining reviews or whose opinions are in sync with me.

There's a difference between clearly stating your opinion based on your own feelings and experiences with a product and clearly stating your opinion based on how much the company who created the product paid you. One is being a reviewer; the other is being a shill.

How much do shills go for these days? I need to hire some yes men at work.

 agnosto wrote:
How much do shills go for these days? I need to hire some yes men at work.

Dunno, ask at your local GW?

Well according to Microsoft the average shill costs about $2.30 per 1000 views, so pretty cheap.

Can't say I like the look of that robot, but I'm at least curious to see what comes out of DB:X (to the max!), some of it may filter into deadzone after all.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
How much do shills go for these days? I need to hire some yes men at work.

Dunno, ask at your local GW?

GW store reps aren't really shills since they work for the company. I would have said 'I dunno, e-mail Beasts of War.'

In other news... The image of the female Enforcer Infiltrator on foot is out.




I've got to say, Mantic continue to do a great job with their female minis. The pose is great, no Hawkeye Initiative worries here!

You forgot the painted zombie fresh off the sprue



Looks pretty good.

I totally am going to steal that Enforcer paint scheme. Looks pretty cool.

Zombie looks great painted up.

The Enforcer sniper would make a good alternate Rebs commander, too.

Protocol: Infiltrate!
5 comments
4 likes

Last week we took a sneaky look at the awesome Enforcer Peacekeepers (5 models for $10, at least 50% off RRP!!) – this week it’s the turn of the Enforcer Pathfinder Sniper on Infiltrator Bike!
Enforcer Pathfinder Sniper on Infiltrator Bike

When drone surveillance and orbital scans cannot provide the information needed to warrant full Enforcer deployment, the Council of Seven dispatches squads of Pathfinders to survey the landscape, relaying information back over encrypted channels.

Pathfinders are hand-picked from the ranks of Enforcers, taking on training under the harshest of conditions and specialising in a variety of weapons in preparation of their advance role. Several squads were sent to Nexus Psi alongside the regular Enforcer deployment, where they scouted ahead of the main force on Infiltrator Monobikes before taking up positions to give covering fire with their LSX Sniper Rifles.

We’ve already shown the pic of this lovely lady on bike…

… but here’s a couple more shots!

Awesome huh? You can pick up this gorgeous resin set on the survey.
Missing Bits

Since the end of January we have been processing the missing bits requests.

We’re doing these in batches as it is quite a challenging task. There are a lot of requests, of which half of the “missing” items are second shipment (such as Sergeant Howlett or the Zombies) or known-issues like the four D8s that will be sent out in the second shipment package. This makes sorting them correctly a meticulous task.

In addition, there are a number of entries that need to be simplified so that the warehouse can sort and dispatch the items, and a number that need to have follow-up emails to identify missing miniatures or components.

There are however a number of “easy” requests in this first batch and once we’ve authorized these we are beginning to send them out.

All in all, the machine is moving. There will be some stock items that need to be ordered in, and will be writing to some of you to clarify your requests, but we will be gradually releasing missing parts orders as we get through them.

Thanks for your patience whilst we work through these – we’ll keep you posted on progress!
B-b-brainzzzz!

A couple of weeks ago we showed off the hard plastic Zombie sprue. Since then we have handed over the frame to resident painting maestro Dave to give it a lick of paint…

This is a hard plastic figure straight off the frame. Dave particularly spoke about how enjoyable the face was to paint.

Let us know what you think in the comments!

Those Space Zombies - so nice!

And they'd make better 3rd generations (I think that's what they'd be good for) than some of those goof-tastic looking models in the Plague.

If all the zombies look that nice and they can keep up that quality... I could see myself sending more money in mantics direction.

fingers crossed for the Enforcers. i have already ordered something like $150 worth of Enforcers to go with my Antenociti's Workshop Hunchback platoon

I wasnt fussed on the bike version but the standing version looks good.

What do they mean by resin in this instance?

 carlos13th wrote:
What do they mean by resin in this instance?

Mantic Glossary
Resin = Resin
Premium Resin = Resin
Plastic = Resin Plastic
Restic = Resin Plastic
Metal = Metal
Hard Plastic = Actual Plastic

Are we certain that the Pathfinder is 'resin' and not 'restic'?

 Alpharius wrote:
Are we certain that the Pathfinder is 'resin' and not 'restic'?

The second survey confirms that it is resin 'Premium Resin' is actually the term they use.

edit: updated my glossary.

 pretre wrote:

 carlos13th wrote:
What do they mean by resin in this instance?

Mantic Glossary
Resin = Resin
Plastic = Resin Plastic
Restic = Resin Plastic
Metal = Metal
Hard Plastic = Actual Plastic

That is a handy guide but I'd add the disclaimer that just because Mantic called something Plastic doesn't mean they won't make it in metal without telling anyone until it is too late.

 warboss wrote:

 pretre wrote:

 carlos13th wrote:
What do they mean by resin in this instance?

Mantic Glossary
Resin = Resin
Plastic = Resin Plastic
Restic = Resin Plastic
Metal = Metal
Hard Plastic = Actual Plastic

That is a handy guide but I'd add the disclaimer that just because Mantic called something Plastic doesn't mean they won't make it in metal without telling anyone until it is too late.

Yeah, but that really doesn't have to do with the terminology. That has to do with volumes and production capability.

 pretre wrote:

 warboss wrote:

 pretre wrote:

 carlos13th wrote:
What do they mean by resin in this instance?

Mantic Glossary
Resin = Resin
Plastic = Resin Plastic
Restic = Resin Plastic
Metal = Metal
Hard Plastic = Actual Plastic

That is a handy guide but I'd add the disclaimer that just because Mantic called something Plastic doesn't mean they won't make it in metal without telling anyone until it is too late.

Yeah, but that really doesn't have to do with the terminology. That has to do with volumes and production capability.

And most importantly customer confusion which is the point of this slight digression and a seemingly constant and voluntary thorn in Mantic's bum.