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 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Oh, I won't argue about the quality of the miniatures - they are indeed quite good, and, as I have mentioned, I like them much better than the GW miniatures. (I prefer a 'true' scale to a 'heroic' scale.)

But plastic/resin is a lot easier to play around with, for modding. (My favorite plastic GW miniatures are from the period where arms, legs, torsos, and heads were all separate pieces, and could be mixed and matched at whim. I hate their current mono-pose models.)

The Auld Grump

That would be a concern if converting was a thing in Infinity. Outside of weapons swaps for missing profiles (which isn't strictly needed as WYSIWIG is pretty relaxed in Infinity) there's no reason to convert.

Even as someone who used to despise working with metal, I'll take it for Infinity models considering the detail on these things.

So wait infinity isn't 40k but actually a completely different game? Glad that was cleared up for me.

I cannot follow the logic behind the OP's arguments, I can see it a defensive stance, but I may be assuming too much.

In any case, if one compares Infinity to 40k as a wargame system then Infinity is cheaper wargame system, not only by model count, but overall things required to play.

At the cost of an average 40k army without extras, including books, an Infinity player can easily have a force with extras, the books and terrain to play and probably have enough funds left to get another force or two.

Is the model count the same, no of course not, should it be? no of course not, they are different systems and their respective manufacturers have set a different model count and entry price point.

So, what people say when they compare a wargame system to a wargame system is correct, Infinity is cheaper to get into and play with a proper force (or army if you are so inclined to say).

And if you are not impressed, by all means please feel free to use the free rules, army lists and army list building program to proxy a few games and see why Infinity is so well liked by its players.

To be frank, 40K is almost certainly the most expensive wargame system of any type to play, assuming you use the official GW models, although it uses small numbers of figures compared to mass battle historical games.

I cannot think of a more expensive system barring making your own custom project.

Historical and smaller scale games especially are impressively cheaper than most systems too.

 PsychoticStorm wrote:
I cannot think of a more expensive system barring making your own custom project.

I've said this in other threads, but it's worth repeating. My 1500pt Tyranid army cost me nearly $1000au at retail. On top of that I've got a few things I bought simply to have, like a Heirophant. But that bog standard, 1500pt Tyranid army was nearly $1000au. Without considering rulebooks, supplements, the codex or even hobby supplies to build and paint it or dice and templates and such to actually play the game.

For that chunk of change I could have bought, as the OP was trying to troll about, 5-6 Infinity 'armies'. Not 10 models each, but 15 or so each to give myself variety. Buying at retail. If I wanted, I could even drop it to 3 'armies' and a boatload of awesome MDF terrain to make a kick ass urban table for my friends and I to game on, also bought all 3 source books, and templates and dice and tokens.

 -Loki- wrote:

 TheAuldGrump wrote:
Oh, I won't argue about the quality of the miniatures - they are indeed quite good, and, as I have mentioned, I like them much better than the GW miniatures. (I prefer a 'true' scale to a 'heroic' scale.)

But plastic/resin is a lot easier to play around with, for modding. (My favorite plastic GW miniatures are from the period where arms, legs, torsos, and heads were all separate pieces, and could be mixed and matched at whim. I hate their current mono-pose models.)

The Auld Grump

That would be a concern if converting was a thing in Infinity. Outside of weapons swaps for missing profiles (which isn't strictly needed as WYSIWIG is pretty relaxed in Infinity) there's no reason to convert.

Even as someone who used to despise working with metal, I'll take it for Infinity models considering the detail on these things.

Yep - different aspects of the same hobby, even if we are talking about the same game.

I like converting miniatures, but a lot of folks just like to paint and play.

And, at its core, liking to convert models is a big part of why I prefer Necromunda to Infinity - the figures feel more like individuals.

I like messing with the models - which makes plastics better for my purposes.

Hell... I am looking at the plastics coming out for Malifaux... and I don't even play the game. (I may play Into the Breach, later....)

But if you just want to paint the miniatures the metal models have a heck of a lot more detail.

Both arguments are equally valid.

The Auld Grump

Personally never saw the "plastic is better for conversions" beyond GW metals who were both badly cast and thick, metal models are not that much more difficult to work with than plastics just different, of course the multipose plastics GW has are already segmented and this is what people usually refer to as "easier to convert" but to get a good natural pose from them is even more difficult (I would also argue this is kitbashing) than monopose models regardless of material.

 PsychoticStorm wrote:
Personally never saw the "plastic is better for conversions" beyond GW metals who were both badly cast and thick, metal models are not that much more difficult to work with than plastics just different, of course the multipose plastics GW has are already segmented and this is what people usually refer to as "easier to convert" but to get a good natural pose from them is even more difficult (I would also argue this is kitbashing) than monopose models regardless of material.

That also depends on the type metal, older mini's have softer metal and GW's white metal was not easy to work on.

One local guy is using the Reaper Bones sci-fi guys that sort of have that gears of war look for his infinity stuff. IMEF. That's what they're called:

https://www.reapermini.com/OnlineStore/imef

Six figures is not a lot, but he's going to combine them with resin bitz weapons like from Chapterhouse or Anvil Industries or whatever. That bones stuff chops up super easy. EDIT: Oh, it looks like Reaper has another six sci-fi poses in their Nova Corps guys: https://www.reapermini.com/OnlineStore/nova%20corp

Anway, back to the representation of an army on the table top:

For many historical players, representing an entire army is the norm. Ancient gamers, for example, will represent everything that was at a given historical battle. Same goes for middle ages and into the horse & musket era. And how do they represent 10,000+ troops per side?

Figure ratio. Or stand ratio. Each actual element you move around the table will have a certain number of figures on it but represent a historical formation. A single base with 4 or 10 or whatever miniatures on it could represent 1000 soldiers.

40k and Infinity are 1:1 whereas these other games are 1:X. So if you want to be pedantic, unless you are playing a 1:X game where each figure represents multiple soldiers, "army" is just a colloquial way to talk about the subset of your collection that is going to appear in the game.

That's all "army" means. It's also why it's true that you can get 6 Infinity armies for the price of 1 40k army. Because armies are just a subset of your collection that will appear in a given game.

If we are defining terms when someone says army in regards to a wargame they almost certainly mean a playable force or possibly just a bunch of models meant to be on the same side in game.

 carlos13th wrote:
If we are defining terms when someone says army in regards to a wargame they almost certainly mean a playable force or possibly just a bunch of models meant to be on the same side in game.

Exactly. And exalted!

Infinity does take a considerable investment in terrain though, if you're playing as described in rulebooks.

Love the miniatures and enjoy the game! Lots of ways to bring down the enemy, not just a single hard counter.

So does 40K.

Actually it takes a larger investment as you have to buy the very expensive GW official kits.

The only reason we use army in a wargaming context is that we are replacing our old green plastic army men with grey plastic army men.

Marx army men would work well with the Bolt Action rules I would think.....

MMMM.... Guns of Navarone, anyone?

 Swan-of-War wrote:
Infinity does take a considerable investment in terrain though, if you're playing as described in rulebooks.

Actually, thanks to the range of cheap MDF terrain out there, buying a table of Infinity terrain can be cheaper than filling out a 40k board, especially if you use the official 40k terrain.

If I bought my terrain from a popular Australian MDF terrain maker, Blind Pig Laser, I could fill out a board for less than $150au. Even going with an official partner, I could fill a board out with Plast Craft terrain for $150au easily.

$150au would get me 3-4 different ruined buildings for 40k, not nearly enough to actually fill up the recommended 25% of the table.

Infinity terrain is only expensive if you make it expensive by buying expensive terrain. The system is drowning in affordable official and unofficial terrain.

 Grot 6 wrote:
Marx army men would work well with the Bolt Action rules I would think.....

MMMM.... Guns of Navarone, anyone?

*Blink, blink*

Yes!

I ran a Fallout game, not that long ago, titled Guns of Splash Mountain... Guns of Navarone at the Happiest Place on Earth - with the Enclave putting a gun installation in that venerable attraction....

(Disneyworld had two main plots - the other was The Darkened Tunnels, with the cryogenically suspended remains of Uncle Walt....)

The Auld Grump - Walt Disney On Ice! (That really was an urban legend, when I was younger....)

 Swan-of-War wrote:
Infinity does take a considerable investment in terrain though, if you're playing as described in rulebooks.

Love the miniatures and enjoy the game! Lots of ways to bring down the enemy, not just a single hard counter.

my first games of infinity consisted of

VHS tapes, tissue boxes, salt and pepper shakers, those giant legos for little kids and sometimes a cat.

Infinity does need a lot of terrain, buying some of that professional stuff can be pricey to fill up a table. But objects around the house will fit the build as it would with most war games.

 Piston Honda wrote:

 Swan-of-War wrote:
Infinity does take a considerable investment in terrain though, if you're playing as described in rulebooks.

Love the miniatures and enjoy the game! Lots of ways to bring down the enemy, not just a single hard counter.

my first games of infinity consisted of

VHS tapes, tissue boxes, salt and pepper shakers, those giant legos for little kids and sometimes a cat.

Infinity does need a lot of terrain, buying some of that professional stuff can be pricey to fill up a table. But objects around the house will fit the build as it would with most war games.

Hell I use text books and that if I am demoing it and I am not at my FLGS. Sure it is not as optimal, but it works well if you do not have the money to buy the terrain or the time to create the terrain and you want to teach the game.

So, I'm an Armor Captain in the US Army. And thought I would jump in here with some fun. In the US Army (as in many other Armies), an "Army" is an actual maneuver unit

For scale. A Fire Team is 4-5 Guys. A Squad is two Teams, standard rifle squad is 9 men. A Platoon is 3-5 squads, so roughly 40 guys (varies greatly). A Company/Troop/Battery is 3-5 Platoons, roughly 150 guys. A Battalion/Squadron is 3-5 Companies, generally 400-1000 Soldiers. A Brigade Combat Team is 5-8 Battalions/Squadrons, and roughly 4-6 thousand Soldiers. A Division is 2+ Brigades, and clocking in at over 10,000 Soldiers. A Corps is 2+ Divisions, and finally, an Army is 2+ Corps.

The tournament standard in 40k is 1850. The cheapest base Troop unit I can think of in 40k is a Grot, at 3 points. If I filled my entire force with Grots I would have 617 grots (rounding up). This is still a Battalion level element. More realistically, most armies are hovering in the Platoon Plus to Company Minus level. 40k "Armies" are no more armies than Infinity ones.....that was a silly knock on Infinity (which I don't even play. DZC is obviously where it is at, hehe)

So you mean 500 models is *gasp* not an army?!? WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT.

 heartserenade wrote:
So you mean 500 models is *gasp* not an army?!? WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT.

If they were Spartans, they'd be 200 surplus to requirements to be an army

Well, those 300 is merely Leonidas's bodyguard. Not the actual Spartan army. And those 300 also have 300 helots (slaves) with them, so that's 600 at least. I might be wrong since this is from memory.

Man, I sound like a know-it-all.

Ancient historians were terrible. Herodotus basically just took down tales and legends as if they were facts. Pretty much everything the ancient stories tell of the battle was likely at least partially wrong. The Persian & Greek numbers definitely were. There was likely around 1000 Theban & Thespian hoplites present there as well as the 300 Spartan ones. And probably an equal number of sling and bow armed non-citizen/slave warriors. Herodotus' telling is pretty much no more believable than a movie rendition of it with war rhinos.

Well the fact he was the first to bother recording semi actual/ almost present (for his era) information, makes him the "first historian" but that does not make him or the ones after him perfect.

I think the estimation of around or slightly over 2000 combatants for the Greeks would not be wrong, maybe even more than that and we talk about the rearguard.

As far as Infinity terrain, thanks to the official and unofficial terrain companies one can make a table at under 150 EU, which is not that bad.

I love me my spartan scenics for infinity. $100 USD covers a 4x4 decent.

 Kilkrazy wrote:


I'm not sure how many Infinity models you can buy for £450.

I'd say you wouldn't be too far off if you said "most of them."

Wow! 4 pages too!

I have a space marine army with a few options. Probably cost over £1000.

I have an aleph army with a few options. Probably cost less than £100.

Doesn't take a rocket scientist now does it?

 cincydooley wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:


I'm not sure how many Infinity models you can buy for £450.

I'd say you wouldn't be too far off if you said "most of them."

Depends on the faction.

For Aleph and Tohaa, I'd say 'all of them'. For any of the launch factions, yeah, most of them. Which would also open up between 2 - 3 additional sectorial army lists (soon to be 4-5 with the next campaign book).

So while 'most of them' is quite accurate, it's also worth noting just what that gets you in terms of in game flexibility. It's like getting Codex Space Marines, Codex Space Wolves, Codex Blood Angels and Codex Dark Angels all at the same time, with Codex Space Marines having everything from the others as well, but with some hard limits on how many they can take of certain units (like the old 0-1 limits)..