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This might sound crazy, but I wonder if they made Total Warfare too good of a deal. Mantic Kickstarters have a strong reputation for being something these days to put a dollar into and sort out in the pledge manager. The Early Birds and "limited, can't upgrade to in the pledge manager" tyrants encourage people to put in money now, but if many are finding the not limited Total Warfare level to be best for them then the best bet is to just pledge a dollar now and upgrade to Total Warfare later. I know I've got a tyrant right now that would be a dollar pledge upgrading to double Total Warfare in the PM if this ended today, so if I'm not alone the backslide possibility is certainly there.

 MLaw wrote:


I like the Striders because they remind me of the APUs from Avatar. I don't like the AJAX because it reminds me of Warmachine but with an egg.. hmm.. Eggmachine. It's the same thing with the space elves.. I don't like the ones with bows. I don't know why but there's just some things in sci-fi that seem weird to me.

The ones with the bows are incredibly silly-looking. The rest of the faction looks -great-... but those bow-dudes.... UGH. I'd probably go nuts with them if not for those guys - maybe I still will, and just pawn those off.

And while I sure wouldn't mind seeing vehicle deals at 3 for 60 or 50 or whatever, I am one of those guys who thinks 3 for $75 is still pretty good, especially because I like many of them.

Crossing my fingers there are some more 'good deals' from Mantic on this one as it winds down - I am prepared to toss more money at them, but it's gotta be -good-.

-Mort

 MLaw wrote:

 TheWaspinator wrote:
Also, apparently Marauders are going to be part of the GCPS list. That actually makes sense, since in this setting the Orx achieved spaceflight by being hired and trained by humans as troops.

On BOW they were said to be a merchant class.. it was implied that they would be basically for hire. I'd be a bit bummed if they were exclusive to Corp :/

That might be true. This is what the KS says:

The GCPS force list also includes Marauder Auxiliaries such as Commandos, Ripper Suits, Goran Stalkers and the Stunt-Bot, making it an incredibly interesting and varied force on the tabletop.

That doesn't rule out the possibility that they will be allowed as allies to other armies, it just says they're part of the GCPS list. As of right now, I don't think we know how allies are going to work in this edition. It's possible that they will be available as mercenaries to multiple armies, subject to whatever limitations allies have, but that GCPS armies can take them natively without them suffering ally limitations.

 MLaw wrote:
One thing that bugs me is the GW-ness of having your force commander running around with a sword. In this kind of setting that really does not make much sense. I would more expect some kind of cool armor, a better gun, a protective drone, a pair of pistols.. something.. but.. a sword? It works for 40k because in that universe stabbing tanks with combat knives makes sense..whatever. For the real world though, I just don't envision leaders standing around waiting to hack stuff up with a freaking saber.

IIRC that kit comes with multiple arm options.

 Mort wrote:
And while I sure wouldn't mind seeing vehicle deals at 3 for 60 or 50 or whatever, I am one of those guys who thinks 3 for $75 is still pretty good, especially because I like many of them.

I wish there were more people like you. Go out and get your buddies to pitch in!

But honestly, 3 for $75 isn't very good if you don't want three of the same thing. That's the problem. And from the comments, it seems that a number of people would be happy to buy more vehicles if there could be an assorted bundle like a deal on getting one of all five, or get any combination of three for $75. If you really want just one Forge Father tank, you're not going to crack and decide to buy three for $45 more just because of the price structure. You'll either buy it at $30+ shipping, or figure that since that's likely not much different from retail, wait and see how they turn out and pick it up later, probably for around the same price but with no risk.

Personally I don't buy this line that picking and choosing vehicles makes shipping too complicated. It's no more complicated than putting an individually ordered hacker half-tail in this guy's box, and 80 extra plague 3rd gens in that guy's box, because both guys got the same pledge level but added on different things. My order is already going to cause someone a headache with all the random add-ons that will be in it.

 judgedoug wrote:

 MLaw wrote:
One thing that bugs me is the GW-ness of having your force commander running around with a sword. In this kind of setting that really does not make much sense. I would more expect some kind of cool armor, a better gun, a protective drone, a pair of pistols.. something.. but.. a sword? It works for 40k because in that universe stabbing tanks with combat knives makes sense..whatever. For the real world though, I just don't envision leaders standing around waiting to hack stuff up with a freaking saber.

IIRC that kit comes with multiple arm options.

Yeah I saw the boxing glove.. fist..thingy
The sculpt in general is from their early weak stuff. That guy's legs are super thin and the head is huge.. it's just not a good sculpt in general and the weapon options are the last little bit to put me off. Unless they spruce up that BG I'll be going for 2 of the 20 troop deals and 3x Mules.

There should be a third arm option for a computer thingy based on the concept art:

Yeah, he has the pistol all the time but he gets the commissar/guardsman style energy cutlass, or the energy fist. Which.. well... it's still a melee weapon but at least it's not a sword? I mean, sure he's the commander but what about assassins? Plus, when he points with it... people will damn well know which way they should be going.

I hope the let us know who will be making the mules. I mean their resin so far has turned out well. As long as they stay resin. I hope they don't get huge demand on them and decide restic is more efficient, because then they should have made it a proper sized stretch goal and hard plastic-ed them. For reals. Kind of baffled as to why they didn't.

The concept for the GCPS are for the rangers so the basic troops shouldn't end up looking like the concept. Would be nice to see concept for the basic troops plus renders.

 Vermonter wrote:

But honestly, 3 for $75 isn't very good if you don't want three of the same thing. That's the problem. And from the comments, it seems that a number of people would be happy to buy more vehicles if there could be an assorted bundle like a deal on getting one of all five, or get any combination of three for $75. If you really want just one Forge Father tank, you're not going to crack and decide to buy three for $45 more just because of the price structure. You'll either buy it at $30+ shipping, or figure that since that's likely not much different from retail, wait and see how they turn out and pick it up later, probably for around the same price but with no risk.

This is basically my problem. I'm not in love with anything enough to get 3 of a kind, except probably the FF tanks, but at the same time I'm not loving the vehicles enough to pay $30 for a single tunneller/dropship/tank. A one-of-everything vehicle bundle would be fantastic, and I'd definitely pick up one if they were to offer it.

A vehicle variety bundle might get me to add more. If not now, certainly later.

I don't want 3 of the same thing. I doubt I'll ever convince anyone I know to play in something of that scale (especially since we won't play unless it's painted).

I'm still unsure about the resin. My dino Blaine is now at the point where his dino is lurching towards the ground, leaning on its paws. Maybe its just the sculpt being too top heavy that's caused it to bend like that? Not sure.

Gonna need to see more concept/ renders for the basic GCPS grunts though.

overtyrant wrote:
The concept for the GCPS are for the rangers so the basic troops shouldn't end up looking like the concept. Would be nice to see concept for the basic troops plus renders.

I agree. I love the concept art for the GCPS, but I need to see renders before I add money for them.

 Azazelx wrote:

overtyrant wrote:
The concept for the GCPS are for the rangers so the basic troops shouldn't end up looking like the concept. Would be nice to see concept for the basic troops plus renders.

I agree. I love the concept art for the GCPS, but I need to see renders before I add money for them.

Like the sculpts will look anything like the concepts.. sculpts are what you want to see my friend

Why is the Mule's tray at an angle? Why is the door either tiny or eight feet off the ground? Why is the front half and only the front half stupidly over-engineered if it's just a glorified technical?

 TheWaspinator wrote:
As of right now, I don't think we know how allies are going to work in this edition.

I don't think anyone has thought about that yet, but I was playing around with a Rebs list at the weekend, so I'll be posting in the RC forum to try and address that today

 AlexHolker wrote:
Why is the Mule's tray at an angle?

Looks to be because it has extra height in the suspension to cater for loads, but in the sketch is empty.

Why is the door either tiny or eight feet off the ground?

Because it's a tall vehicle, and the cab is either tiny or eight feet off the ground.

Why is the front half and only the front half stupidly over-engineered if it's just a glorified technical?

Because it's a vehicle designed for a science fantasy game of toy soldiers, and the primary design goal is to look badass?

Honestly, the mule is the first vehicle Mantic have shown so far that I liked on first sight.

I have to agree that a vehicle variety pack would be cool.

 Mort wrote:

 MLaw wrote:


I like the Striders because they remind me of the APUs from Avatar. I don't like the AJAX because it reminds me of Warmachine but with an egg.. hmm.. Eggmachine. It's the same thing with the space elves.. I don't like the ones with bows. I don't know why but there's just some things in sci-fi that seem weird to me.

The ones with the bows are incredibly silly-looking. The rest of the faction looks -great-... but those bow-dudes.... UGH. I'd probably go nuts with them if not for those guys - maybe I still will, and just pawn those off.

I picture the bows as some sort of badass Hunger Games style sci-fi/ fantasy blend. Plus, there are certain advantages to the trajectory of an arrow vs. a bullet that a really good archer could make use of, with airburst or explosive tips.

 scarletsquig wrote:

I picture the bows as some sort of badass Hunger Games style sci-fi/ fantasy blend. Plus, there are certain advantages to the trajectory of an arrow vs. a bullet that a really good archer could make use of, with airburst or explosive tips.

In hunger games, the bow wasn't chosen because it was bad ass, it was chosen because the typical folks did not have access to firearms.

As for trajectory advantages, I guess that is why every army today has at least 2-3 bow equipped guys per infantry squad. Sorry, your 'airburst' and 'explosive tips' are fulfilled by the modern day grenade launcher.

Well they bumped up the GCPS Battlegroup to 40 troopers and 2 Striders (along with the rest), glad to see some added value!

GCPS don't do anything for me at all lol. I want more Plague!

I assume they use whatever laser crossbow technology that Chewbacca uses.

You heard it here first (or perhaps on the KS comments), ladies and gentlemen: The GCPS now comes with 9, count 'em, 9 sprues of troopers. Not 8 sprues. Not 40 troopers.

9 sprues, 45 troopers.

Because it's 40 troopers + an additional 5-man sprue of troopers for the heavy weapons team. As clarified by Mantic:

@ Vermonter - 30 Troopers goes to 40 Troopers. Plus there's a 5-man sprue used for the crew of the Heavy Weapons, which wasn't included in the original count of 30. So 9 spurs total.

As long as they meant "sprues," of course. Otherwise you're getting some extra riding gear.

So 45 sprues + 1 mule = I'm now taking this battle group a little more seriously. Still not sure if I wouldn't rather have 2 more mules for an extra $5, but we'll see.

I'll be swimming in striders if I do get the battlegroup. We need more alternate weapon loadouts for them than the base options and the Ajax upgrade.

Actually heard it in the GCPS update first, because it said the heavy weapons come with an additional sprue of 5 troopers to make the crew and an engineer, and then they added 10 extra guys in the latest update.

It's very tempting to just replace all my Cadians with GCPS as their scale looks much more realistic when compared to space marines and such.

 Alex C wrote:
Actually heard it in the GCPS update first, because it said the heavy weapons come with an additional sprue of 5 troopers to make the crew and an engineer, and then they added 10 extra guys in the latest update.

Well yeah, ok, you got me there. I just asked them for clarification to be sure.

I guess if I got the deal and went to 9 striders I could probably just glue them together instead of bothering to magnetize... Resin mules for $13.33 though...... Need many. Plague will love them and so will troopers so they can shoot w/O hoofin it.

I quite like bows on the Asterians. They're "tech so advanced it's indistinguishable from magic" tier, so it doesn't really matter if they look like bows.

Being bothered by them because they're anachronistic is about the same as a person from 200 years ago being bothered by a car because it mostly looks like a carriage.

 CptJake wrote:

In hunger games, the bow wasn't chosen because it was bad ass, it was chosen because the typical folks did not have access to firearms.

In the third book the tech wizard guy and the engineers in district 13 make her up a fancy composite bow with hi tech stuff in it like voice commands, range finders, special arrows, etc as a way of giving her sufficient firepower while retaining the well known propaganda image of her with bow and arrow.

 GrimDork wrote:
I guess if I got the deal and went to 9 striders I could probably just glue them together instead of bothering to magnetize... Resin mules for $13.33 though...... Need many. Plague will love them and so will troopers so they can shoot w/O hoofin it.

Yeah, on reviewing everything, I think I'll stick with two extra mules + 40 troopers for $5 more than the battlegroup. I don't need more striders, and the weapons team is nice, but probably not much compared to the mules. The metal commander is a poor old sculpt. If they added 20 more troopers I might change my mind, but they won't.

Truthfully I think we've got "stick it out" Mantic firmly in control at this point, with "wheel and deal" Mantic imprisoned in the back seat. From their comments, I don't expect any fundamental changes to deals, and I don't expect anything significant to be added to any pledge levels either (just to battlegroups), at least until the final 48, and perhaps not even then.

I think that's a big mistake. Particularly when it comes to locking in the pledges that matter most because they have to be paid up front, the ones that have driven much of campaign's recent gains: Ultimate Tyrant.

I won't be getting Ultimate Tyrant regardless, but Mantic need to put something in it to stop people from jumping off it en masse for other options on the last day. Because a fair number of those people are currently backing it speculatively, and if they aren't given a good reason to stay, they will jump off and just pledge $1, as all other equivalent options will remain open on the pledge manager.

That means that unless they shore up Tyrant with something that 2x TW won't get you, Mantic are setting themselves up for a last-day Tyrant jumping backslide.

I'm planning on tuning out of all this for a few days to let some significant things actually happen on the KS without all the grinding waiting much ado about nothing. So let me pre-emptively say that if you're backing at Tyrant and think people will stay simply because of the deal it already is, good for you. I hope you are right and will be pleased to be wrong, because I really hate it when these campaigns implode at the end.

You know what I'd really like to see? I'd like to see Deadzone 1 happen again. I'd really like to see a Mantic sci-fi campaign like Deadzone, or even Dreadball, that rakes in a ton of money and stretch goals without feeling like it's treading on eggshells the entire time, or sucking dubious life support from a too-small backer base by getting them to speculate on ultra-high pledges like Frenzy or Tyrant, risking an endgame collapse when too many pull out. I'd like to see a sci-fi Mantic campaign where such tactics aren't necessary because the deals, promotion, and the game itself are raking in truckloads of new pledgers. Maybe that means I'm waiting for a Project Pandora / Dungeon Saga boardgame?