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 ChaoticMind wrote:

They want to de-retcon the squats. Problem is you need a slightly silly game to do that and GoA, Warpath, and Deadzone are serious settings. They work in Dreadball because it is fantasy football where every team has a shtick.

I don't see squats as needing a silly game. In any case, Warpath/Deadzone already has space orcs and dancing space goblins.

I know it's incredibly irrational, especially since I went into the mantic kickstarters and would still go into their kickstarters, despite them being arguably less in need of the money than Dark Space Corp are.

However, it really did raise my hackles that a couple of months after GoA was cancelled, I seem to remember reading an article that talked about how Rick Priestley had been spending the same amount of money he was asking for in the kickstarter to turn his barn into a heated gaming room.

It just makes me feel as if I've been tricked.

As I said, incredibly irrational.

I dunno. Given the job of "wargames rules designer" it seems like he could be in semi-retirement while working from home on his own schedule more or less with something like GoA (or even a limited amount of work-for-hire rules writing).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Compel wrote:
I know it's incredibly irrational, especially since I went into the mantic kickstarters and would still go into their kickstarters, despite them being arguably less in need of the money than Dark Space Corp are.

However, it really did raise my hackles that a couple of months after GoA was cancelled, I seem to remember reading an article that talked about how Rick Priestley had been spending the same amount of money he was asking for in the kickstarter to turn his barn into a heated gaming room.

It just makes me feel as if I've been tricked.

As I said, incredibly irrational.

Well, there's a difference between kickstarting the setting up a new company and using your savings after a lifetime of work to do some renovations. I'm sure Ronnie has quite a nice games room, and Mantic keep Kickstarting things.

 Palindrome wrote:

 frozenwastes wrote:
they seem to always think Space Dwarves are a good idea for their initial ranges?

At least its not space elves.

Or space rats...

 Azazelx wrote:

Well, there's a difference between kickstarting the setting up a new company and using your savings after a lifetime of work to do some renovations. I'm sure Ronnie has quite a nice games room, and Mantic keep Kickstarting things.

I think it speaks volumes when someone is afraid of investing his own capital into his own project. Knowing that Ricky actually had the required money on hand makes it even more obvious GoA wasn't the dream project it was touted as but just a "give me money cause I'm famous!" cash grab.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 Azazelx wrote:

Well, there's a difference between kickstarting the setting up a new company and using your savings after a lifetime of work to do some renovations. I'm sure Ronnie has quite a nice games room, and Mantic keep Kickstarting things.

I think it speaks volumes when someone is afraid of investing his own capital into his own project. Knowing that Ricky actually had the required money on hand makes it even more obvious GoA wasn't the dream project it was touted as but just a "give me money cause I'm famous!" cash grab.

Maybe not. There was far too much high-flying rhetoric surrounding the GoA Kickstarter.

That said, it is (I think) legitimate to use Kickstarter to "test" the demand for a game, rather than sinking your own life savings into a dud. Just need to avoid all that "Kickstarter-like-it-was-truly-meant-to-be-BS", which made them (Rick?) look bitter not only towards GW, but also bitter towards people having success on Kickstarter.

 Azazelx wrote:

 ChaoticMind wrote:

They want to de-retcon the squats. Problem is you need a slightly silly game to do that and GoA, Warpath, and Deadzone are serious settings. They work in Dreadball because it is fantasy football where every team has a shtick.

I don't see squats as needing a silly game. In any case, Warpath/Deadzone already has space orcs and dancing space goblins.

I meant the old squats style that wouldn't bat an eye at ork rock-stars as a unit. The bikes, dwarfs, burrowing tanks Etc. can stay but to fit they need to drop the over the top style GW had at the time and instead be a "new" concept from the ground up, not just Squats / Dwarfs in Spaaaace.

I think at the end of the day wherever or not the Algoyal/space-dwarfs work will depend completely on the overall visual style they take with them, even Mass Effect had a short dwarf-like race and they fitted in fine because they matched
the overall branching style of the game. GoA on the other hand we still don't know what this game is even meant to look like visually, there just isn't enough for us to digest yet. Although one key issue I see popping up with this game is due
to the simple fact that most of these races are meant to be altered humans (panhumans), if they were simply aliens I wouldn't be surprised if they were accepted more naturally, or at the very least less of a knee-jerk reaction to the concept.

So on a different note are they going to do a second KS for this game? I still like those CoCom troopers, kinda surprised they didn't open up the new project with them.

The Algoyal are space dwarves? This fascination with space dwarves baffles me. My interest in anything to do with Gates of Antares is sinking fast.

Heres the fluff for the Algoryn Prosperate.

The Algoryn Prosperate is a powerful group of worlds within the Determinate and one of the chief enemies of the Gwar. The Algoryn are adapted to high levels of radiation and very hot temperatures, with thick, gnarly skins, dense musculature and bony outgrowths over their eyes that shield them from the radioactive glare of the Algoryn suns. They have a relatively high civilisation level and trade Concord technology through Freebooter traders.

And regarding aliens, heres the first planned 'Alien' species, not panhuman

Aside from these panhuman dominated regions of Antarean Space there are many alien species, of which the most dangerous from the point of view of humans is undoubtedly the Vorl Orde. These savage creatures care little for the lives of humans or any living things for that matter. They are plunderers and raiders whose only aim appears to be to subject and enslave other species. Fortunately, they are fractious creatures, so rarely do they act in concert or maintain their efforts for long.

Hopefully the Vorl Orde won't be slightly larger than a man, with extremely large muscles, a tusked jaw and green skin...

Any idea who the Gwar are or what they look like?

Nothing good can come from a faction name like that.

As far as i recall the Gwar are heavily modified humans bred for war, they are massily into their own superiority over any other panhumans or aliens and are in a state of war at all times. Not very nice people to have as your neighbours. I seem to remember their belief in their own superiority had become a kind of religious fever leading to them being highly expansive, though still not a big player in the GoA universe.

This is The GWAR:


Everyone else are pretenders to the throne...

Took me a minute to find a safe-ish picture. Lol.

~Eric

@Edlowe
Thanks Eldowe, sounds cool enough, a race of super soldiers, not really my sort of thing I normally prefer stuff like Eldar, Aleph, Astrain, more techy factions, I'm sure the game will have one at some point. I look forward to the KS, one thing I still love about the idea of this universe is the gates themselves open the possibility for a limitless variety of races, alien or otherwise, this game has a ton of potential for conversions and custom content.

@Taarnak
They're too beautiful for words.....

The Gwar?

Seriously?

"The Gwar does the warring
Keeps the enemies ah gnawing
Makes the babes ah fawning"

Gwar battle chant, true story.

 Alpharius wrote:
The Gwar?

Seriously?

And the furries are left to pout yet again... Still, I agree with the sentiment. Basing your faction name on a band whose shock rock members are probably in AARP by now? I'm continually disappointed even further with every announcement for this. *fingers crossed for thon as the potential shining light for previously failed/cancelled kickstarters*

If the furry fans want a furry SF faction they should make a Kickstarter to build one. Frankly I am tempted to do it myself because it could make some decent money and it would be brilliant to annoy all the anal anti-furry players in GW-land and so on.

I don't know what the fuss is about, really. In the good old days we used to play Traveller with the Vargr and Aslan without batting an eye at "furryism".

Oh, I thought everyone was facepalming for another reason, not related to some shock rock thing...

 Azazelx wrote:

Well, there's a difference between kickstarting the setting up a new company and using your savings after a lifetime of work to do some renovations. I'm sure Ronnie has quite a nice games room, and Mantic keep Kickstarting things.

I'd love to see Ronnie's game room. I bet it's full of warped Ikea furniture and bookcases missing shelves, lined with Liefeld paintings covered in creases and twisty-tear marks. But it was 20% cheaper than a nice gaming room!


Back on topic, it feels to me like Dark Space Corp didn't really keep any of the market info they gleaned from the kickstarter, and just want to keep on doing whatever they'd planned to do since before the KS. Only slower.

Bit more of info on the size of games.

All the games I've played so far have been in the region of about 30-40 models a side - the BA type of sequencing does support games of any size - but very large games of BA can get a bit slow. I think there are ways round that involving multiple unit moving based on the Order dice (almost a cross between Bolt Action and Black Powder where a 'command' is a group of units) but that's not a priority at the moment. 

I have set the infantry units up as 5-10 and command units as 1-5 - with the support units as one weapon and crew of 2 or 3 depending on size - a support weapon can also be a single model drone - that is my initial working basis. I have set all the sample forces at units of 5. Smaller units work better in Antares than in BA because you can't draw LOS through other models in Antares so the units have to spread more. I'm also sensitive to the cost of a unit - and if you can play a satisfactory game with say 20-30 models that strikes me as a good thing.

I saw Gwar two years ago (the band) definitely Nsfw.

This wednesdays newsletter will also have some more info and models.

Also in relation to edlowes post:

" Will there be flyers in Antares or some kind of air support?"

In good time yes! We are going to start with a selection of infantry and support weapons - we'll work up to vehicles after that - the scope of the game is enormous
(I hesitate to say infinite!) and we can't do it all at once as much as I might wish we could

So if I'm reading this right the games gonna start as an medium sized MSU infantry based game with surpport weapons (heavy weapon teams and such) and will more up to mass combat, vehicles and all as it grows.

Sounds like how some other game started out a lot of us play from time to time.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
If the furry fans want a furry SF faction they should make a Kickstarter to build one. Frankly I am tempted to do it myself because it could make some decent money and it would be brilliant to annoy all the anal anti-furry players in GW-land and so on.

I don't know what the fuss is about, really. In the good old days we used to play Traveller with the Vargr and Aslan without batting an eye at "furryism".

At this rate I'm inclined to agree, there's a clear untapped market we need to exploit.... *cough* I mean appeal to, if you ever need a sculptor for a project like that, hook me up, could be fun.

If I had any skills, it's totally what I'd do.

Make a Cat people (coolest furry) army that can proxy as DE/HE, Beastmen or Lizardmen.

I'd buy the whole army if it was cats. I don't care if people "steal" this idea... just someone do it!

 Rolt wrote:
Although one key issue I see popping up with this game is due to the simple fact that most of these races are meant to be altered humans (panhumans), if they were simply aliens I wouldn't be surprised if they were accepted more naturally, or at the very least less of a knee-jerk reaction to the concept.

Well, yes. Because that would be less stupid. PanHumans, if they exist, should be equal to or better than Revers (homo sapiens sapiens). If something is "pretty" - like wings for maneuvering in zero-gee environments - people may choose to receive such body modifications. If something is not "pretty" - like a heavy, neanderthalish brow to block the sun - people will instead choose to wear a hat.

 Alpharius wrote:
The Gwar?

Seriously?

Is it any worse than the Al Gore-ians?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
If the furry fans want a furry SF faction they should make a Kickstarter to build one. Frankly I am tempted to do it myself because it could make some decent money and it would be brilliant to annoy all the anal anti-furry players in GW-land and so on.

I don't know what the fuss is about, really. In the good old days we used to play Traveller with the Vargr and Aslan without batting an eye at "furryism".

Even in fantasy, furries are generally the polar opposite of the things I like. I like cervitaurs and mermaids and angels and sphinxes because their "humanity" is emphasised in their designs, and because they are drawn from higher inspiration than some beast walking on two legs. For anything more drastic than catgirls, the first thing to go is the face, and I don't like that.

Even the ones I like, such as this art from Magic: the Gathering, I'd still rather have a human Amazon with the same feel. Or a dragon - intelligent, strong and with a will like iron, without any need to force it into a humanoid shape.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 Azazelx wrote:

Well, there's a difference between kickstarting the setting up a new company and using your savings after a lifetime of work to do some renovations. I'm sure Ronnie has quite a nice games room, and Mantic keep Kickstarting things.

I think it speaks volumes when someone is afraid of investing his own capital into his own project. Knowing that Ricky actually had the required money on hand makes it even more obvious GoA wasn't the dream project it was touted as but just a "give me money cause I'm famous!" cash grab.

My point is that we don't know how much of his own money he was putting in anyway. I find it unlikely that he wasn't putting anything in. And frankly, it's a bit silly to suggest that he should have put in his life's savings instead of KSing it. I should also point out that I did not back GoA, and thought they were asking for way too much for way too little done. I don't mind helping others to "make it happen" with production money, but with KS I'm also not particularly interested in paying developers a year's wage for them to make it.

I did back GoA as my first delve into kickstarter and must say I was massively disappointed by how it progressed. One question I asked myself today was if they relaunched now with more to show including sculpts and rules would I now back again? Probably is the answer, I still think it has a lot of potential as a setting but it came across very amateurish considering the names involved.

I personally tho dont seeing them going down this route, I think we'll instead see limited monthly releases in the more traditional way of selling. Im looking forward to seeing how they price and promote the system and how much of the inital big idea has survived the reality of completion.

I do think it needs some strict universe developement to focus the creative side. Less furrys and more hard science future.