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ORicK wrote:
I have pre-ordered my HALO: Fleet battles this weekend.
I wanted to get the Covenant buste and want to have the ship models anyway.

And now i see the ground combat models, i am both surprised a bit as well as VERY interested.

Surprised because I kind of expected 6/10mm or 28/32mm, not 15mm.
Normally i am not that fond of 15mm. It is too much an in-between scale. Infantry looks best on 28/32mm and vehicles look just as well (but we can field more) on 10mm.

And understandable: a 10mm game competing with Planetfall would not be in Spartan's interest.

But what i see here, the grunts and spartans, they look very good. I look forward to more info...


Back to HALO: Fleet battles and space in general: It really seems to be space combat game season...
Spartan's Firestorm Armada is getting more and more models (i too am building fleets).
X-Wing stays strong.
Star Wars Armada is here and that seems to do well enough. Played it, liked it, but not getting into it, too simple and predictable for my taste.
And Drop Fleet Commander is also announced. Nice ships, but i personally don't find the DZC game system good enough. But i will keep informed on this.

HALO: Fleet battles in any case has great miniatures and a level of combat that is, to me, more interesting than Star Wars: Armada.
And if HALO's special dice system is done well, it can also be easier for the non-wargamer or new-wargamer.

Interesting times...

Congratulations on making the plunge! And you're right, this is the season of Space Combat, we're truly some privileged gamers for sure. I hope it is easier for non-gamers, wil make demos much quicker and easier and therefore more likely to be picked up as a game by fence sitters. As for the Ground Combat, while it is in 15mm, there will be a third game set in 28mm, so if you're as excited for that as I am then we have better things to look forwards too than even the 15mm game

Making that plunge was a no-brainer :-)

And i do look forward to that third game, because painting 28mm is my favourite scale and i also want to be able to use my scarab in 28mm scale.

I do look forward to the first information regarding the 15mm game. And I hope it will be plastic, because in resin 15mm tends to get a bit expensive.

I think they certainly are heading the way of plastic by the look of things, ORicK.

The contents of the Fall of Reach have been listed and ultra, ultra heavily indicated as HIPs:

"Hopefully I can clarify things a little.
The Capital Models (Carrers and Cruisers from both sides) are all 1 Model per base, with the option on the sprue to add a Escort if desired.
The Paris Frigates are fielded in 3 per Base.
The SDV Heavy Corvettes are 2 Models per base.

This leads to a breakdown as follows:
UNSC:
1 Epoch-class Heavy Carrier Elements (this can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional Paris Frigate found on the sprue)
4 Marathon-class Heavy Cruisers Elements (each of these can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional Paris Frigate found on the sprue)
8 Paris-class Heavy Frigate Elements (these can be organised into two different formations)
UNSC total: 13 Elements
(...or... 34 Individual Models if you include the Escorts found on the sprue that can be added to the Cruisers and Carrier as Escorts)

Covenant:
1 ORS-class Heavy Cruiser Elements (this can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional SDV Heavy Corvette found on the sprue)
2 CCS-class Battle Cruisers Elements (each of these can be Escorted or Unescorted by an additional SDV Heavy Corvette found on the sprue)
6 SDV-class Heavy Corvette Elements (these can be organised into two different formations)
Covenant Total: 9 Elements
(...or...18 Individual Models if you include the Escorts found on the sprue to be added to the Heavy and Battle Cruisers as Escorts.)

Combined, that's 52 Models in total in the box.
The Demo Table at Salute was missing one SDV Heavy Corvette Base for part of the day after a member of the public accidentally broke it ..... so some of the pictures from the day will be missing a base (as the glue did its work!)

Hope that helps?
Cheers
Delboy/Spartan Derek "

Source: http://community.spartangames.co.uk/index.php?/topic/13971-halo-fleet-battles-the-fall-of-reach-discussion-thread/page-4

This looks very tempting. Never been into a fleet-based system but the ground game is promising. 28mm is hopefully worth the wait. Between me and the wee man our love of Halo may force my hand, haha.

Certainly looks like HIP and let's hope it is!

you sound like a very wise man getting your little one into Halo so early, haha.

Here are some pics I found on the Spartan Forums, original source that I found them through was Kurgan, can be found at: http://community.spartangames.co.uk/index.php?/topic/13971-halo-fleet-battles-the-fall-of-reach-discussion-thread/page-2

 Stormwall wrote:
You guys realize the Infinity has shielding too right? Because the elites got involved with it's R&D in the lore.

Whole lot of hurt coming from that...

That's not true. The reason why the Infinity has shields is that it is a test ship were the UNSC put all the new possible tech (It has both Covenant and Forerunner tech).

Spartan have put a "Back from Salute" article up on their website, they will be doing GenCon I remember this being a thing people wanted to know!

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/back-from-salute

Of note:


Looks like they've really hit the sweet spot for scale there, big enough to have sizeable and detailed minis while still allowing for huge battles!

 Paradigm wrote:
Of note:


Looks like they've really hit the sweet spot for scale there, big enough to have sizeable and detailed minis while still allowing for huge battles!

That Scorpion!!!!! Me wants now!!

I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

Looks as if it's in scale with the turret gunner. Seems fine to me.

 Medium of Death wrote:
Looks as if it's in scale with the turret gunner. Seems fine to me.

Spoiler:

Twas just going by the measurements I found on the halo wiki. Not that I care as it looks right and good

You know what I just realized? Ground battles could give us that covenant walker too!!!! Ever since Halo 3, I've longed to see 3 of them on a table together!!!

Daston wrote:
I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

The Scorpion is absurdly big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looking at the wikia, a Tiger 2 is 6,4 meters large and the Scorpion is 10.2 meters large. That's a massive difference.

 Tyran wrote:

Daston wrote:
I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

The Scorpion is absurdly big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looking at the wikia, a Tiger 2 is 6,4 meters large and the Scorpion is 10.2 meters large. That's a massive difference.

Very true, this should help underscore the Scorpions size:

The Scorpion Tank is massive.

Look at the turret gunner. You can see his head.

It's definitely in scale with the game. I'm not sure why you're that bothered about the Wiki.

Hmm, so it looks like I'm going to invest in a Halo tabletop game. The question is: which one??

I don't have a space fleet game yet...hmm...

Heading back to the overall ground game, I'm not shocked that it's 15mm as that makes it incompatible with their other products, just as the fleet game has a distinct scale separation from Firestorm. I expect we will likely see a spec-ops type skirmish ground game at some point much in the same manner as Dystopian Wars & Firestorm Armada.

I'm pretty happy to see Halo is coming out in15mm, there are allot of companies out there that I can bulk out my UNSC with, and plenty of terrain to be had.

David Clarke wrote:Spartan have put a "Back from Salute" article up on their website, they will be doing GenCon I remember this being a thing people wanted to know!

http://www.spartangames.co.uk/back-from-salute

thanks for that, I'll update the main post shortly

Paradigm wrote:Of note:


Looks like they've really hit the sweet spot for scale there, big enough to have sizeable and detailed minis while still allowing for huge battles!

What a sight to behold! Crikey though, think of the size of the scorpion in 28mm! It'll be the same size as a Imperial guard stormlord

Enigma Crisis wrote:

That Scorpion!!!!! Me wants now!!

BACK OFF, FIRST ONE'S MINE. MINE I TELL YOU. *ahem* I mean, plenty to go around.

Medium of Death wrote:Looks as if it's in scale with the turret gunner. Seems fine to me.

Spoiler:

PlaguelordHobbyServices wrote:You know what I just realized? Ground battles could give us that covenant walker too!!!! Ever since Halo 3, I've longed to see 3 of them on a table together!!!

Collinsas wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

Daston wrote:
I dont want to spark a scale debate. But that looks a bit big for 15mm.

From what I have found the scorpion should be just a little longer than a Tiger 2 but that looks nearly 50% bigger. Although he may have tiny hands lol.

The Scorpion is absurdly big.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looking at the wikia, a Tiger 2 is 6,4 meters large and the Scorpion is 10.2 meters large. That's a massive difference.

Very true, this should help underscore the Scorpions size:

Thanks for that, that does help to drive home the scale a lot It's really nice that vehicles are not going to be shrunk down just because they get a bit bigger comparatively

Accolade wrote:Hmm, so it looks like I'm going to invest in a Halo tabletop game. The question is: which one??

I don't have a space fleet game yet...hmm...

The only advice I can give is all three... you're going to really have to mull this over if you only want one!

Collinsas wrote:Heading back to the overall ground game, I'm not shocked that it's 15mm as that makes it incompatible with their other products, just as the fleet game has a distinct scale separation from Firestorm. I expect we will likely see a spec-ops type skirmish ground game at some point much in the same manner as Dystopian Wars & Firestorm Armada.

I'm pretty happy to see Halo is coming out in15mm, there are allot of companies out there that I can bulk out my UNSC with, and plenty of terrain to be had.

There has been confirmation that there will be 2 separate games for ground combat (one of which is actually called ground combat) and the other is likely, as you said, to be a 28mm spec ops variant. i really hope we get the vehicles in 28mm as well though, the field day I will have playing with them. I will have so very, very many of them ordered. And while I'm glad that there is an option for supplements to the 15mm UNSC, based off of those marines, I'll be going for a lot of them. They hit me in all the right ways, can't wait to see the ODSTs!

About the terrain though, do you have any good suggestions as to where I could look around to get a feel of what's on offer? I'm a princess that hasn't ever really ventured outside of 28mm, save some 1/72 scale historical Greek and Roman stuff I never got around to painting, let alone preparing terrain for.

Where/When was the confirmation about 28mm? I remember there being talk of the game being in "multiple scales" but the only time I can think of the 28mm issue being broached directly was in the meeples podcast where 28mm was made to sound like the exact opposite of what they wanted.

Oops, sorry for not being clear enough, but in the above post I said confirmation for two scales, one of which is likely to be 28mm. So the conformation is for 2 scales, not the 'likely to be 28mm' bit. I can see how that could be misread and apologise, that sentence should have been broken into two parts with clarification added.

I should also further amend that the term 'likely' is a subjective judgement of probability on my part and not based on empirical evidence (aside from their similar 32mm dystopian wars stuff). I also think it would be logical to allow their models to be better integrated into other systems and serve as proxies if players are not fans of Spartan Games, instead falling back onto Halo's IP, but again, this is clearly an assessment, and one made by someone with no business experience.

Ah yes, we are in agreement on the basics then. 28mm would be an obvious choice for raking in the cash, rather than the fleet or 15mm games so its absence from the beginning line up is the puzzling factor for me. The one thing I wonder about is the dreaded "licensing issues". Thinking back to New Line Cinemas and the Lord of the Rings deal with Gamesworkshop, where the game was deliberately made in an incompatible scale with pre-existing products to avoid brand dilution and weakening of the IP. It all sounded like complete and utter rubbish at the time but I guess that's the world of international copyright law. So when I look at Spartan launching the Halo:Ground Combat game in a different scale to their pre-existing sci-fi game I do wonder if similar shenanigans are afoot.

A 28 or 32mm ODST platoon would make me explode with joy. Every couple of years I get the desire to do a small force of them and go looking for suitable bits only to be disappointed. Having some genuine miniatures would be amazing, especially given how good Spartan's Firestorm spec ops stuff looked.

I think they hinted towards using the same development strategy they use for their other games (Fleet-Ground-Skirmish) in one of the podcasts that they where on. I think it was when they went on Dakka Dakka's own D6 Generation to discuss their upcoming Halo release.

@ ONI-S3 I sent you a PM with a bunch of links for terrain. I didn't want to sidetrack this topic too much with discussion of terrain.

Are they really confirmed for two scales for ground combat?

From one podcast, Meeples and Miniatures, the Spartan guys said that the ground game would be in 15mm. They reasoned that the video games are already functionally 28mm games, making a 28mm game redundant. A 15mm game, on the other hand, gives players the chance to do larger scale battles, unlike the video game.

DrRansom wrote:
Are they really confirmed for two scales for ground combat?

From one podcast, Meeples and Miniatures, the Spartan guys said that the ground game would be in 15mm. They reasoned that the video games are already functionally 28mm games, making a 28mm game redundant. A 15mm game, on the other hand, gives players the chance to do larger scale battles, unlike the video game.

Eh... Halo Wars already does the large scale battles.

Halo Wars definitely had the larger scale battles done. English wargame's designers come out with some very odd thing's during interviews, I suspect the poor chap may have been suffering from a distinct lack of cups of tea and answering too many questions whilst labouring under an NDA. At least no ones started talking about narrative wargaming,wishing that tournament players would just go away, or insisting that the rules are almost completely irrelevant to the models they sell.

I'm a bit confused. There is an interview with a developer describing a reason for the scale. He talks about how Spartan and 343 discussed the scale and agreed upon it. But he must be wrong, because English Developer? That is a ridiculous argument.

As for Halo Wars, that is a good point. I think that Spartan games and 343 are looking to the future video game environment. Halo 5 comes out this fall, so the miniature game will have to compliment Halo 5 but not replace it.

There is another point to consider. No 28mm game can feel like Halo video game, but a mass skirmish 15mm game is far enough removed from Halo that there isn't that inbuilt issue of replicating the video game play.

All of this is beside the point. The only scale information we have is this podcast and the podcast is extremely clear:

Maybe he was referring to the 28mm clix game? I don't know if they still have that license from so many years ago.

Nope, the comment was made directly comparing 28mm to the engagement level of the computer game. Hence my questioning upthread of folk working under the impression that a larger scale game may still be in the works, as unfortunately Spartan seems incapable of performing a rumour control exercise to fill us in with the basics online.

As for my comments about English developers, think about all the nonsense that GW folk spout. They live in a gaming bubble, and don't "get" the internet., its very much "other" to them so they miss out on a interacting with a wide variety of different perspectives on gaming. I worry that Spartan come from a similar non-digital breed of people. Wonderfully creative folk but perhaps going to struggle if their vision doesn't match up with what customers in the world market want, they set themselves up to fail. After all isn't Gencon this year their first convention attendance outside the UK in quite some time?