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 basement.dweller wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
For me, there is still the lingering material issues - PVC looms menacingly over the campaign...

I keep a few Mantic choice pieces in front of me as a reminder when I find myself weak to the siren song of shinies I'll be watching this from the sidelines, like RK and WoK till you guys get them and the initial "I invested in these - they have to be great" feelings have settled and the honest and level reviews are coming in. There are some really nice figures here - no question. Hopefully they've got a nice handle on the material so I can pick up a few when they hit retail.

Nice post, basement. I think that sums it up well, and is a wise way of approaching it... will be interested to see your thoughts down the line.

Couple of updates today. First, about the terrain:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dontpanicgames/drakerys-the-miniature-game/posts/867004

Then another with gameplay video 2 and some fiction:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dontpanicgames/drakerys-the-miniature-game/posts/867230


It's shaping up nicely! Almost to the $150k stretch!

Is the scenery confirmed as hard plastic?

 Thraxas Of Turai wrote:
Is the scenery confirmed as hard plastic?

Yup, from the scenery addon section of the main page -

Drakerys sceneries are made of hard plastic and can be used in any 28-32mm game

that terrain is fan-fahkin-tastic.

Even if you're not interested in the game or miniatures, the terrain can be had via the "a la carte" pledge and adding them on.

It is indeed stunning!

Couple more updates today, with the first featuring one of the KS exclusives:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dontpanicgames/drakerys-the-miniature-game/posts/868225

The second covers Elementals, Magic and one of the Dwarf characters:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dontpanicgames/drakerys-the-miniature-game/posts/868560

A new intermediate stretch goal appeared today.

Also, you can enjoy the videos of the troops from the starter :
and

I'd like to see an example of this new better than PP 'plastic' PVC in one of the mins here - preferably not an Orc but on a regular human...

Just checked this one out on Kicktraq:




Big mid-campaign stumble here - typical?

Or has the market for 'restic' minis....shrunk?

(Ha!)

I think it's a combo of not enough wider advertising within the miniature news sphere and the lack of stretch goals that encourage backers to pledge incremental amounts.

Whatever else I may think of Mantic's KSers, they know how to encourage current backers to keep fishing around for another $5 or $10.

I still don't really understand how the time path works. It seems like it's supposed to be a big feature of the game, but they haven't explained it very well.

In the first video (the second one mainly focused on the elemental objectives) it looks like one guy performs 4 actions, then stops. His opponent can then perform up to 4 also? Can his opponent ever leapfrog past him? Why does he do 4 actions? What's stopping him from doing more? If does only one action, does that mean his opponent is stuck moving at his pace and only doing one also?

I like the concept art for the elves and the dwarves, but I'd prefer to see the models before I commit. I have zero interest in the Orcs and Humans. The gameplay sounds interesting, but they are missing key points which I would also like before committing.

Right now this looks like a game I might like to play, but I'm not sold on kickstarting it. I may very well end up buying it when it's released, but currently there are too many unknowns for me.

 Alpharius wrote:
Just checked this one out on Kicktraq:

Big mid-campaign stumble here - typical?

Or has the market for 'restic' minis....shrunk?

(Ha!)

Quite typical actually.

Honestly? It just sounds like a poster with too much time on his hands, jumping into every topic he can while reaching for complaints.

That graph could be overlayed on top of many successful kickstarters and look almost exactly the same.

Er, OK?

Are you feeling well?

It is usually not a good idea to assume you know the motivations behind any user's posts - it isn't particularly polite, respectful or smart.

Drakerys is going to do well based on concept art and resin masters, and then maybe not so well due to PVC minis, and possibly rules/translation issues.

 Alpharius wrote:
Er, OK?

Are you feeling well?

It is usually not a good idea to assume you know the motivations behind any user's posts - it isn't particularly polite, respectful or smart.

Drakerys is going to do well based on concept art and resin masters, and then maybe not so well due to PVC minis, and possibly rules/translation issues.

You do have a lot of time on your hands Alph, you should probably start a hobby of some kind.

Weird that I'm backing a Sci-Fi and a Fantasy KS at the same time that I have strong misgivings about roughly the same things.

I guess we're all just supposed to strap on the blinders and inset the gag, unless we wish to offer up praise, and only praise?

What some people view as the right and only way to pledge and engage with a Kickstarter campaign is...curious indeed.

I backed out.

I was losing interest. The rules they have released so far seem to lose a little in translation. What is there seems fairly generic, other than the activation system which is pretty neat. Early days of this front.

Another thing was the variety in troop types is lacking. I know it's just the beginning, but there's no saying if this game will be supported in the future and if it isn't, we're stuck with 3 faction unit choices, which I feel isn't enough to make an interesting skirmish game with lots of replay potential.

I brought this up to DPG when they messaged me after I pulled my pledge, to which they replied it "isn't a skirmish game", despite it specifically stating it's a skirmish game on their front page...

They then tried to tell me there's more than 3 types of faction unit because the models are individually posable. Erm, ok...

The project also seems a bit mismanaged. There's nothing being actively done to drive pledging. There's no advertising outside of what backers are doing. The update information about the game that DPG presents really doesn't tell us much more than what we already know. It would not surprise me if these rules are being hastily thrown out there to appease backers rather than being prepared in advance. Same with the gameplay videos and stretch goals. You would think game companies would have such things already prepared before the project by now.

I just get the impression that DPG isn't really prepared. Their stuff is pretty, their KS is pretty, but underneath there isn't enough substance for me, and I am not totally confident in DPG's ability to pull it all off. Ultimately it comes down to the fact that I play a lot of games and Drakerys isn't offering anything different enough for me, therefore my funds are going into my currently played systems rather than investing in new, unproven ones.

All the best to DPG and those pledging on Drakerys, I guess it just isn't for me.

I am backing the project based on its potential. Its true that it is not all there, but the concept so far as presented interest me.

By tomorrow evening we should have a gameplay video showing the resolution of all the phases in the game, which should provide a lot more detail into the mechanics.

The minis are really pretty and for me can be used with a lot of games that I play (like hordes). I think their "twist" on the fantasy archetypes is nifty and I want to see how this world pans out.

In terms of the material used, they say it will be harder than PP's PVC. I am not 100% sure what this means and what the quality will be. This is a risk in this kickstarter. However, I personally, do not mind PP's miniatures and I have a good time painting them.

The latest rules overview helped answer some questions and raised a few others, which should get sorted out by tomorrow's video.

In my mind a kickstarter is a mechanism for bringing concepts to the market to see how the market reacts. I like the concepts they showed, so I am backing. I like the history of the team and their previous projects, which in my mind mitigates some of the risk of kickstarter campaigns.

Sounds like you've thought it through zreef and are well aware of the risks and OK with them!

I like the look of this one a lot, but I've been burned by too many PVC promises that didn't pan out.

I'll be in for some terrain though, and if it all turns out well, maybe the game itself at retail!

Im really happy you brought the concerns with PVC to light so that people can understand the risks (I have been reading up on PVC and on injection moulding, etc.). Its important to weigh the good aspects of a campaign and the bad aspects and also what you hope to get out of kickstarter yourself.

Another reason I am backing is I would like to see a high fantasy skirmish style game in the market place.

zreef wrote:

Another reason I am backing is I would like to see a high fantasy skirmish style game in the market place.

According to DPG it's "not skirmish, it's semi-battle sized".

Whatever that means...

Skirmish in the context of table top war games is used to mean a few different things I have found. For some skirmish is the size of the game for others its the lose cohesiveness of the minis. In my mind it is a little bit of both. Potentially also the length needed to play (which is also something I am looking for as my gaming time is limited unfortunately due to life circumstances). From what it sounds like they are somewhere in between infinity and warmahordes in terms of model count (assuming 300pts infinity lists and 50 pt warmachine lists). That might be why they say semi-battle sized. In my mind its a skirmish game based on the information provided.

In our mind skirmish has a management of each and every miniature on the board as an individual.

Here, you have units with troopers that are not named and are meant to act as one bigger entity : the unit.

But then, it's not WHFB where you need several units of more than 10 troopers.

So we are in between.

Thanks for explaining it DPG! That adds some clarity in terms of what was meant. I am looking forward to the video with the game phases.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
We just got an update on the rules and some things are starting to fall into place. The large rule update is schedule for tomorrow evening via video game play.

The time track is a bit more clear in terms of how it is used. A full circle is on "Turn" in the game and games last 6 turns. Once completing a circle (think pass go in monopoly) you get to remove one stress token from your troops.

Stress tokens make all your actions cost one more point on the time track to complete. Every time you activate a unit you get a stress token. So this to me implies you can move everything once and suffer no consequences or you can keep moving the same unit at more cost. Also units have caps as to how many activation points they can spend, so at some point you can no longer activate the unit due to the amount of stress it has accumulated. I like this, it has promise.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Another interesting tidbit of information. The modular characters actually build three different heroes, not three different configurations of the same named hero.

The same is for the units, which seems to imply that instead of one base profile with three different weapon options we have three different profiles. In addition, it has been said that weapons will provide different stats / modifies, though we do not yet know any details on that part.


Automatically Appended Next Post:



These modular minis turned out well in my opinion!

The first concept of the Angels! Also more rules previous have been posted in quick start format in the updates section. It looks pretty interesting, I am going to do some test "games" to see how it all fits together.

A new Stretch Goal for Elemental 5 backers at $150k as well -



That's an extra $60 Army Box for free.

and a special addon ($10) unlocked when they reach 666 backers -

Looks like DPG is pulling out everything they can to raise the funding.

Flashy images, but the current rules are still muddy.

And sorry, but that Dragon Familiar is hideous...

They are showing off other aspects of the game since we have been clamoring to see them.

The rules are still a WIP and we have been asking lots of questions to get them clarified. We are trying to maintain a FAQ at BGG which hopefully will be assembled soon to get all the rule information in one place.

I thought he was kinda cool looking! A few of my gaming buddies are hoping to pick him up.

I was sorry to see you go on this one man! There are still a lot of unknowns, but for me the promise is there. I am happy with the direction of the rule set. They also gave me permission to create a Vassal module so the backers can play games while we wait for the shipments. This will be a great way to give them additional feedback. That and we might have a chance to influence the game direction a bit (maybe not).

Might drop $20 on the Elemental Heralds Box. Doesn't seem bad provided the end product stays true.

I'm still curious what that last humanoid silhouette belongs to. Makes me think something canine related, which Barzam and myself are always on the lookout for.

At the very least I know I'll be grabbing some scenery.

The orcs are tempting at least. Would love to see what the dwarves look like too.

Now if they had a reptile faction, I'm afraid I'd be all in at that point.