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It doesn't even look like a rat though... the sorceress... And it looks more like a flasher than a sorceress at that! I'm confused by the cultist dwarf... The gophertaur is wierding me out. The only thing there I like is the rat-giant, and maybe the rat-sassins.

It *is* nice for people who do like that stuff, to be getting more models. Good of them to point it out and all

They may have got me on that transparent gelatinous cube too... crafty bastards!

 Azazelx wrote:
What was the difference in the original version?

Originally it was 4 or 5 of the rat assassins and one giant rat thing. Now it is more assorted types of sewer crawlers.

Only in for 100 at this point... that will change....

The Auld Grump

 GrimDork wrote:
It doesn't even look like a rat though... the sorceress... And it looks more like a flasher than a sorceress at that! I'm confused by the cultist dwarf... The gophertaur is wierding me out. The only thing there I like is the rat-giant, and maybe the rat-sassins.

It *is* nice for people who do like that stuff, to be getting more models. Good of them to point it out and all

They may have got me on that transparent gelatinous cube too... crafty bastards!

Honestly, I am going to call the rat sorcerous a weasel of sorts...but either way it is disturbing and should be fun to paint.

Unlike a lot of people, I am more interested in getting a huge assortment, so this is a good thing. After I have them in hand and painted up, Ill determine if I want to buy a dozen more for converting to make a unit out of. Last campaign, there were a couple that I knew I wanted more of right off the bat (clockwork dragon, fire and frost giants...) but mostly I like the idea of getting nearly free samples of the entire Bones catalog. Sometime next winter, I might decide that I want to make a unit of gophertaur sappers or whatever and as opposed to scouring online to see how big they are or how hard it might be to do weapn swaps...I can go to my shelf and take a close look in person.

Oh surely I don't mind the variety, I'm just not digging on their particular line of rat-fiends. Having random stuff to paint is the only reason I'm in for this. That they will serve well as D&D miniatures if I ever get the chance to play again... is but a bonus

I was going to use the first rendition of 'Oh rats!" to toss into skaven slaves regiments and use the bigs as rat ogres... but that change hoses that plan :( oh wells. I guess I'll just have to add more dragons lol.

Nipple rats will hang out in skanky town with the my Nasier Pelagarths.

Good boys don't tread around that side of the tracks.

Went and ordered a few kegs and tankards to get the place nice and bawdy.

My worktable will be quite a decadent place this coming fall.

Hey guys,

Will anyone please recommend me some "flavor" reading for Bones? I want to read some nice, pulpy fantasy stories about the kinds of characters and monsters Reaper has immortalized in white plastic. Presumably, I should read some of the DnD tie-in fiction, but where do I start? Are any Pathfinder novels good? How about The Mallorean or _______ of Shannara or something like that? What books motivate you to paint up some models and throw them into role play?

Thanks for any help.

Well, one of my all time favourite book series is a D+D tie in anyway, which is the Dragonlance series by Weis and Hickman

Start with Dragons Of Autumn Twilight and go from there!

Is that the same series collected in "The Annotated Dragonlance Chronicles" omnibus?

If so, I think I've got that in a box, and I'll go dig it out right now. (Well, after the baby goes to sleep.)

Sort of depends. The old Dragonlance novels, many of the Forgotten Realms books, especially those by Salvatore (Dritz et al) and Greenwood. The realms are sort of the iconic D&D world created by Greenwood, and he grew it over nearly 30 years creating most the history and background. TSR was very prolific in producing D&D fiction, and many of them were extremely well written.

Pathfinder hasnt seemed to have the same level of success, though the game has taken off a lot and their are short stories scattered throughout the various rule books.

Everyone will probably have their own take on their favorite setting for fantasy fiction, but when it comes to gaming worlds, for me, it will be Forgotten Realms. Lots of characters which are well developed through decades of writing and a single guiding force, so things tend to avoid repeated redactions (at least during the TSR period).

Outside of game worlds, you have the Wheel of Time series. You also have older books by Lieber and Howard. The D&D flavor of fantasy tends to be more fantastical then something like Tolkein, so while those books are excellent they dont really introduce a lot of the mythology you find in your average D&D style setting (or Pathfinder, Savage Worlds or other US based fantasy world).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Is that the same series collected in "The Annotated Dragonlance Chronicles" omnibus?

If so, I think I've got that in a box, and I'll go dig it out right now. (Well, after the baby goes to sleep.)

It is. After you read those books, you will be asking for more Dragons and trying to figure out how you can field an army of dragon riders in a game.

The Dragonlance Chronicles and the Salvatore dark elf stuff was pretty good growing up. Especially starting with the dragons books and going through the twins saga.

In terms of myth and lore, there's always the grandaddy of them all, Elric. I love the early pulpy Elric stuff and how much GW cribbed off of it.

My dad read us the Shannara books when we were kids. I remember enjoying the first few.

You could always go the mousling route and get the Redwall books by Brian Jacques.

Oh, and if you have an eReader, many of them have been rereleased in various eBook formats. I havent looked through them all, but I know WotC was doing free first volumes of a lot of the trilogies and series for awhile on Amazon. Good for getting your feet wet while not paying too much.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Is that the same series collected in "The Annotated Dragonlance Chronicles" omnibus?

If so, I think I've got that in a box, and I'll go dig it out right now. (Well, after the baby goes to sleep.)

Almost definitely, books 2 and 3 are Dragons Of Winter Night and Spring Dawning respectively, that trilogy then runs on into a further trilogy (the Twins books) and a "final" volume (Dragons Of Summer Flame) as well as numerous spin off books and short story anthologies.

I was also delighted to recently discover that the original authors had subsequently written two more trilogies, one that interleaves with the books of the original and another set after Summer Flame, which brings things to a nice conclusion, but doesn't preclude further books in the future.

I'll echo Sean's sentiments as well, a lot of the TSR stuff from the late 80s and through the 90s was my bread and butter through my teens, and while no one could accuse it of being "literature" I regard much of it with great affection and it is almost exactly the sort of thing you're asking for.

I liked the dragonlance books, but I couldn't game in that world... The magic was very limited/rare, which I'm sure appeals to some people. I read a ton of them so I'll back the recommendation . Salvatore and Greenwood too, Drizz't and Elminster ftw.

I need to look into that Elric stuff.

 highlord tamburlaine wrote:
The Dragonlance Chronicles and the Salvatore dark elf stuff was pretty good growing up. Especially starting with the dragons books and going through the twins saga.

In terms of myth and lore, there's always the grandaddy of them all, Elric. I love the early pulpy Elric stuff and how much GW cribbed off of it.

My dad read us the Shannara books when we were kids. I remember enjoying the first few.

You could always go the mousling route and get the Redwall books by Brian Jacques.

Keep in mind though, Elric ended up influencing GW more and TSR less. It is one of the splits between North American fantasy and European fantasy. Howard had the bigger impact here with Conan, Kull, Solomon Kane and various short stories. You can see the differences between the two schools of thought in the game systems as well as how the writers influenced the art. I really feel that this social consciousnous is one of the reasons GW has had so much trouble with getting traction with their version of fantasy in the US.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Sort of depends. The old Dragonlance novels, many of the Forgotten Realms books, especially those by Salvatore (Dritz et al) and Greenwood. The realms are sort of the iconic D&D world created by Greenwood, and he grew it over nearly 30 years creating most the history and background. TSR was very prolific in producing D&D fiction, and many of them were extremely well written.

Pathfinder hasnt seemed to have the same level of success, though the game has taken off a lot and their are short stories scattered throughout the various rule books.

Everyone will probably have their own take on their favorite setting for fantasy fiction, but when it comes to gaming worlds, for me, it will be Forgotten Realms. Lots of characters which are well developed through decades of writing and a single guiding force, so things tend to avoid repeated redactions (at least during the TSR period).

Outside of game worlds, you have the Wheel of Time series. You also have older books by Lieber and Howard. The D&D flavor of fantasy tends to be more fantastical then something like Tolkein, so while those books are excellent they dont really introduce a lot of the mythology you find in your average D&D style setting (or Pathfinder, Savage Worlds or other US based fantasy world).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Is that the same series collected in "The Annotated Dragonlance Chronicles" omnibus?

If so, I think I've got that in a box, and I'll go dig it out right now. (Well, after the baby goes to sleep.)

It is. After you read those books, you will be asking for more Dragons and trying to figure out how you can field an army of dragon riders in a game.

Too late.

Thanks for the explanation and summary. I have hoarded away the first two Drizzt omnibuses and some Greenwood stuff, too. How about the Raistlin omnibus? I can actually see that one without digging...so, should i start with that or dig out the Dragonlance Chronicles first? Also, I've been reading Howard, Liever, Vance, et. al. I've got some Moorcock, but not yet dug in. But you're definitely helping me rearrange my to-read list. Thanks.

No, dont read the Raistlin books first, they will be packed with spoilers!

I've got Redwall lying around somewhere, too, but I'll probably wait on that one until/if my son wants me to read it to him.

Redwall certainly fits with mousling miniatures, and I liked the book quite a bit (big fan of Watership Down as well).

I'd also suggest the Lost Chronicles books, they fit in-between the original Dragonlance Chronicle books and fill in some of the missing stories/modules from that series. The reading order (I believe) is:

Dragons of Autumn Twilight
Dragons of the Dwarven Depths*
Dragons of Winter Night
Dragons of The Highlord Skies*
Dragons of Spring Dawning
Dragons of the Hourglass Mage*

* These books were written years later, are far thicker, but at the same time have a richer sense to them.

Thanks for the continuing recommendations! I haven't yet found the Dragonlance Chronicles, but I did find the Icewind Dale Trilogy (Drizzt's first books, right?). Would it spoil anything to start with that, or is Dragonlance Chronicles just the best place to start? I ask because I have many, many boxes full of books...

Also, I might, might get into Redwall when Brushfire starts releasing their plastics. My wife liked the first few books of that series (and Mistmantle Chronicles..?) but said they became repetitive very quickly. Besides, I'm just not 'feeling' the mouslings.

Redwall is the anthropomorphic fantasy equivalent of David Eddings. You know exactly what you are getting every single time.

I enjoyed the Icewind Dale trilogy. Read the omnibus one summer in Japan while my kids were in school.

Oooh- I know a fun one. The Guin Saga. Japanese grimdark fantasy. Kentaro Miura's inspiration for the manga Berserk. I'm pretty sure there's a couple of books in English.

I know I read a few in English, and tried bumbling my way through some of the Japanese ones.

Geez, I didn't even notice that the dwarf was wearing a diaper or that the rat sorcerer was female and rocking six exposed breasts.

Why is the dwarf hanging out with the rats?

Is he like some kind of vermin poser?

I'm liking the homeless gopher guy pushing his cart full of garbage.

That set is all kinds of wrong and makes me want it.

Of course I also need more Shadowsea/ Deepwars stuff...

Wait a sec. How come we haven't had a Shadowsea topic up here in Dakka?

Took a closer look at the Bones I models and wish I had a third foot to kick myself in the ass twice at once for not getting in on it. I'm not sure if I heard right, but did Reaper add some of the options to the vampire level for free after a certain funding level was reached? Or am I just crazy (I'm sure I'm crazy either way)?

 tyrant of loserville wrote:
Took a closer look at the Bones I models and wish I had a third foot to kick myself in the ass twice at once for not getting in on it. I'm not sure if I heard right, but did Reaper add some of the options to the vampire level for free after a certain funding level was reached? Or am I just crazy (I'm sure I'm crazy either way)?

have a look here http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1513061270/reaper-miniatures-bones-an-evolution-of-gaming-min scroll down into the middle and you'll see the history of unlocked stretch goals. And yes, there was plenty added for free (=for reaching the stretch goal).

Actually a thread on a certain imageboard last night mentioned an addon I'd love as someone who missed out on bones 1, a vampire box, I mean they've got the molds cut already so cost would be minimal to produce and it would certainly increase funding on this one for those of us who wussed out of the first one.

I imagine opinion would be divided on that to say the least though, just seems like a lot of the figs I actually liked from their range have already been given the bones treatment and won't be showing up again unless I shell out full price so it's just a mix of wishful thinking and regret

Kickstarters aren't allowed to offer old product, you get your project deleted if you do.

Can offer it in the post-KS survey, just not before.

 scarletsquig wrote:
Kickstarters aren't allowed to offer old product, you get your project deleted if you do.

Can offer it in the post-KS survey, just not before.

This I did not know, really should read their FAQ's etc.

Does make sense in all fairness given what the intention of the platform is.