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 BrookM wrote:
Same here, I'm a bit annoyed that the GCPS has been pushed back, with no word on the progress of their metal character.

I am sitting on an early bird of this one, but I doubt I'll hold onto it, Mantic is not filling me with confidence or amazing amounts of excitement.

I'm under strict orders from Mrs. Polonius to not back any more Mantic Kickstarters. Her point, which is valid, is that I'm better off buying the stuff at retail.

I think that may be the best course of action, I may cling to my early bird for another day or so to see if anything exciting happens, but chances are I'm dropping it sooner rather than later.

I also got their free novella today, hoping to learn some more about the setting and it's all so.. bland. Not to mention in some cases a very, very thinly veiled copy-pasta of other stuff.

 DaveC wrote:

 MLaw wrote:
I'm hoping the turrets end up not looking like chibi toys.. Those graphics make them look stumpy and cartoonish. I know that's a thing with Mantic but so far this project hasn't really seemed to go that direction..

Here's the render

That's a sweet render!

Yep the gun looks good ...except for the Iron sights on the barrel. They're far from the only company to keep doing this constantly though, and they're generally easy enough to clip off.

This whole thing is tragically uninspiring.

In Beyond Eiras you’ll find 15 totally new missions featuring all the mercs, minions (lab technicians, security guards, Nameless, etc.) and bosses included with the core pledge, plus the revised Project Pandora rules.

Beyond Eiras will be a printed book with lots of great content to expand on the core Star Saga experience, and give you more scenarios to get your teeth into.

And now we wait for the first snarky comment about the Adventurer's compendium!

There's really not much wrong with the campaign, but it being in USD is the main thing that will limit it since Mantic relies on a large UK following.

Main pledge (shipped) is nearly £90.

Or, to put a bit more perspective on it, that was the price of a $150 pledge in previous campaigns. UK currency has tanked by around 1/3rd since then.

It'll still end up around $400k - $500k which is really great considering.

They've worked a lot harder on filling out the mini count with this one. 113 minis (once terrain is counted) this time. Having a lot of Warpath minis thrown in is great, there's entire Plague and Corporation Strike Teams for Deadzone in there.

Yeah for UK peeps having this kickstarter (or any kickstarter really) in $$$ is a major blocker right now.

 scarletsquig wrote:
There's really not much wrong with the campaign, but it being in USD is the main thing that will limit it since Mantic relies on a large UK following.

Ehm, nope. Same distribution between countries as in other campaigns... just fewer backers.

 scarletsquig wrote:

It'll still end up around $400k - $500k which is really great considering.

At current momentum they won't reach $400k. (Daily) Numbers are way lower than in last campaigns which ended in that region.

 scarletsquig wrote:

They've worked a lot harder on filling out the mini count with this one.

Respectfully disagree. They switch around the gaps between Stretch Goals and throw in additional minis proving that it does not provide value for the money collected.

Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

 Polonius wrote:
Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

Not to mention it's a board game with minis that will have to be glued together which is generally distasteful to a great number of board game players. DS was partially successful because it wasn't trying to be a wargame wrapped in a boardgame. Of course, Mantic could have poisoned the well with their handling of DS so we're seeing the Mantic faithful lining up for this one but those, like myself, who are more wary will wait and see what comes out at retail (which will likely be cheaper than the KS price anyway).

 Polonius wrote:
Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

I know Mantic has a lot of followers who will pledge no matter what they put up (they even say so in the comments section). There's also still a lot of people out there though that are beyond exhausted from Mantic's shenanigans. If CMoN was running a sci-fi Heroquest I would be all over it. Same for FFG or maybe a few others.. I know Mantic "can" deliver but what exactly "will" they deliver.

 agnosto wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

Not to mention it's a board game with minis that will have to be glued together which is generally distasteful to a great number of board game players.

Huh? From the FAQ: "The miniatures are single-piece and no assembly is required"

SKR.HH wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

Not to mention it's a board game with minis that will have to be glued together which is generally distasteful to a great number of board game players.

Huh? From the FAQ: "The miniatures are single-piece and no assembly is required"

Yep. Until they also included sprues of the multi-part figures from other KS projects they've run.

SKR.HH wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

Not to mention it's a board game with minis that will have to be glued together which is generally distasteful to a great number of board game players.

Huh? From the FAQ: "The miniatures are single-piece and no assembly is required"

Correct all of the miniatures in the core game are single piece or preassembled. Mantic have added some DZ/WP miniatures to bump "the value" these need assembly but are not necessary to play the core game.

Mmmm where are am I with updates ... they are throwing them out faster than I can update the thread.

The printed book will also included the Aberration mission/rules.

Project Pandora update unlocked - next is Hacker Halftail @$255k currently @$254k so that should go shortly.

Next 2 extra plague victims @$260k (makes sense they are on a tool with the other stuff so they are being cast anyway).

After that…

We’re near to unveiling our first expansion starring the Veer-myn. We’ll have more details as we close in on the target but this $40 expansion will have more mercs, more enemies and more missions! Not long now...

Some sneak peaks from the Mantic weekly video

Ector Zanchez (Human Grenadier)
Kira Nikolovshi (Sphyr Medic)
Kur Keela (Teraton)
Ota Sora (Matsudan)

Matusdan is an instant purchase for me, especially if they're roughly the same size as a Teraton.

They ever say just how big Mastudans are?

My daughter will most likely want Kira due to her name being quite similar in spelling.

 MLaw wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
Let's not overthink this: I'm just not sure how deep the marketplace is for a sci-fi dungeon crawler that's not of unusually high quality.

I know Mantic has a lot of followers who will pledge no matter what they put up (they even say so in the comments section). There's also still a lot of people out there though that are beyond exhausted from Mantic's shenanigans. If CMoN was running a sci-fi Heroquest I would be all over it. Same for FFG or maybe a few others.. I know Mantic "can" deliver but what exactly "will" they deliver.

I think that's a noisy minority. I think people back Mantic's kickstarters for a variety of reasons, but the reality is that the games have gotten more obscure and/or more of a retread (a third dreadball KS?), the market shrinks. Also, the monty hall days of the early kickstarters are over, which unfortunately means so does the fear of missing out.

Those merc designs are really neat. Maybe they should've led with those designs as stretch goals over stuff like Project Pandora or the mercs they went with. The Forge Father merc, for instance is way less interesting than the Matsudan or Sphyr mercs.

Nice designs (their concept artist is really good) but I feel too little too late, time will tell.

The campaign so far is boring filled with non boardgame related stuff needing assembly, I really wonder how (or if) they can steer this up.

 Vermonter wrote:
Unfortunately for me, I'm getting diminishing returns from Star Saga's bundled redundancy..

fwiw, Dwarven Saga and Project Pandora, the original Dungeon Saga and Star Saga, were boxed games that used existing miniatures. I think a retail release using this model wouldn't have been too bad of an idea. It would have been an introduction to Mantic miniatures, as well as a less of a financial commitment than buying a GW game or KoW army. Certainly it would cost less to produce, since it wouldn't need new molds. Boardgamers who won't assemble miniatures would pass on the game, but it's not like the Mantic needs to compete against every boardgame company in the crowded hobby genre. Like the old GW boardgames (eg. Space Crusade) the game could have been rereleased designed to incorporate Mantic miniatures their existing customer base already owned. Play with your plague zombies while you're painting up the ratmen, and all that.

http://twilight40k.blogspot.com/2015/05/project-pandora-miniatures.html

So I come back after 10 days' vacation and find out that Tsudochan have caterpillar butts under their robes.

Also there's a sweet Nameless figure pack now. looks like I'll be pledging for a few of these and a few scenery packs.

So Hacker Halftail is unlocked and next up is 2 extra plague victims @$260k then it's 3 extra Corporation marines @$265k

Very likely that 2 extra Corporation Rangers will feature to round off the extra minions.

The VeerMyn expansion is due at some point today.

Silly Mantic, still with the fake stretch goals. We all know all the mooks come on 1 tool, so there's no way this will end with anything other than exactly double the starting crew.

But does anyone know what tool the 3D turrets are on? I'm guessing with the characters, but it sure would be nice if they were with the scenery...

We are getting 2 sentry guns but I can't see them being on any other tool than the character one for the core game as Ogan is added to the core game and the sentry guns go with him.

I kinda really want to back this, but I already went all in for the Siege of the Citadel kickstarter. I just don't have the money to go in on a second game.
Still, if Mantic adds more awesome stuff to the deal, I am afraid I won't be able to resist anymore.

The Veer Myn Expansion is officially released @$275,000

Currently the expansion includes:

A pre-assembled plastic Brood Mother boss (new sculpt)
Three large pre-assembled plastic Veer-myn minions (new sculpt)
12 smaller pre-assembled plastic Veer-myn minions (a mix of new sculpts)
Themed tiles
Cards
Rulebook

And remember those 2 Corporation Rangers well they get added as well at $275k

I kinda hope they do the Asterian expansion just to get some Cyphers in the new PVC.

This campaign is beginning to mimic the Monty Haul aspects of Dungeon Saga. Not a good thing IMO.

I just want the scenery elements, at this point. Lots of them.

Not an exciting expansion for me at all given that I already own 2-3 times that amount of Veermyn in hard plastic, so why would I buy monopose extras? It's even anti-synergistic with the Pandora expansion and the Minion mega bundle from the same Kickstarter, which have hard plastic Veermyn in it.