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This is a 1st for North Star. DON'T buy any Oathmark this weekend.

WHAAAT? you reply.

From Monday, every order in June for £25 (inc VAT) or more of Oathmark products will get this model of an Elf Huntress included in their order, free!!

(The model was made by Mark Copplestone. He made it as a thank you to everyone who has supported North Star (and by association him of course) as customers through this difficult period.)

The Oathmark Dragon is on sale from Monday. £30. All resin. Comes unboxed initially.

 Manchu wrote:

This is a 1st for North Star. DON'T buy any Oathmark this weekend.

WHAAAT? you reply.

From Monday, every order in June for £25 (inc VAT) or more of Oathmark products will get this model of an Elf Huntress included in their order, free!!

(The model was made by Mark Copplestone. He made it as a thank you to everyone who has supported North Star (and by association him of course) as customers through this difficult period.)

Whoah, I really like that mini. And the dogs.

If Osprey didn’t release supplement books, people would be on here complaining that the game was not supported/dead. People who actually buy Oathmark will be pretty likely to also buy supplements. People who say they won’t buy Oathmark because it has supplements were never likely to have bought it anyway.

What’s next for Oathmark? I feel like we’ve hardly started. Joseph McCullough has already written supplement 1 which introduces the Undead into the Oathmark world, and he’s planned to carry on with that. In regard to the figure range, we began 3 years ago on this project and have a release schedule that stretches on years ahead. In essence, there will be a plastic box set supported by metal characters for every troop type in the book. I don’t know if we’ll achieve it, but that is the plan. There are two box sets planned for the Undead, and the other sets on the work bench are Human Cavalry, Dwarf Light Infantry, Elf Cavalry, Orc Infantry and Goblin Light Infantry.

source

Ive ordered the rulebook, seems like a nice little game to put my middle earth minis to use!

 Manchu wrote:
If Osprey didn’t release supplement books, people would be on here complaining that the game was not supported/dead. People who actually buy Oathmark will be pretty likely to also buy supplements. People who say they won’t buy Oathmark because it has supplements were never likely to have bought it anyway.

What’s next for Oathmark? I feel like we’ve hardly started. Joseph McCullough has already written supplement 1 which introduces the Undead into the Oathmark world, and he’s planned to carry on with that. In regard to the figure range, we began 3 years ago on this project and have a release schedule that stretches on years ahead. In essence, there will be a plastic box set supported by metal characters for every troop type in the book. I don’t know if we’ll achieve it, but that is the plan. There are two box sets planned for the Undead, and the other sets on the work bench are Human Cavalry, Dwarf Light Infantry, Elf Cavalry, Orc Infantry and Goblin Light Infantry.

source

They say that undead are supplement 1 but Oathbreakers are said to come on November after Battlesworn. Weird. Anyway, 2 boxes for undead are very welcome. I hope these are skellies and zombies like soldiers/spearmen/archers skellies and warriors/linebreakers zombies or similar. It would allow for a strong core of the army, backed by some characters made from plastic Frostgrave line.

Those dates I posted are from Amazon.

Here is the listing from Osprey indicating Battlesworn to be published on Aug 20. There is no Osprey listing currently for Oathbreakers.

Those dogs are well familiar, from all the times I stared at the sculpting tutorials on Ebob's website. Are they part of Northstar or Oathmark now?

stonehorse wrote:I'm tempted to pick up the rule book (if only to add to my list of games that never get played)

Sticking to a smaller Osprey fantasy book, for that and other reasons.

Has anyone got the Oathmark rules yet?

I have quite a few Osprey game books, from the thin blue paperback type to the hardbacks like Scrappers and Frostgrave.

One problem I've always had was the lousy page layouts. Like rules sections starting halfway down a page (after a different section) and needing a final paragraph on the next page making bits seem spread across pages. Or references to diagrams where you have to turn pages to see. I don't know if it's just me that notices this of course with my ocd.
How does the Oathmark book look in this regard?

 Gimgamgoo wrote:
Has anyone got the Oathmark rules yet?

I have quite a few Osprey game books, from the thin blue paperback type to the hardbacks like Scrappers and Frostgrave.

One problem I've always had was the lousy page layouts. Like rules sections starting halfway down a page (after a different section) and needing a final paragraph on the next page making bits seem spread across pages. Or references to diagrams where you have to turn pages to see. I don't know if it's just me that notices this of course with my ocd.
How does the Oathmark book look in this regard?

I got the digital version of Oathmark when it released in April. Unfortunately, it has no set formatting, so the issue with images and tables being on different pages is even worse (no matter what formatting I use, I always get pages with half a sentence on it, skips a page, than has a full page image that was obviously intended to be inline). I was actually planning on picking up the hardback to get better formatting.

But I've never had a problem with most Osprey books. I've noticed it, but it has never been a deal breaker. The print-on-demand Rangers of Shadowdeep was way worse (I'm actually curious if the Modiphius edition fixes this).

Keep in mind that Osprey has a unique layout requirement for their wargames range. I.e. the rules must fit within their standard 68 page layout (unless you have an arrangement for something like Frostgrave, etc.). So this may be a reason behind some layout issues if you've encountered any.

They used to have a website detailing the requirements for submitting a wargame to them, etc.

 Elbows wrote:
Keep in mind that Osprey has a unique layout requirement for their wargames range. I.e. the rules must fit within their standard 68 page layout (unless you have an arrangement for something like Frostgrave, etc.). So this may be a reason behind some layout issues if you've encountered any.

They used to have a website detailing the requirements for submitting a wargame to them, etc.

Makes sense. I must be honest, the Frostgrave size hardback is the perfect size for a rulebook. From the pics I'd seen, I thought the Oathmark one was more like the new KoW book (except for thickness ofc).
I was going to pick up the pdf to check it out but it's £3 dearer than the hardback on Amazon. I just wish Osprey would do something like 'buy the physical rulebook at full price and get the pdf free'.

Also, Oathmark hardback and the supplements seem to have jumped up in price from similar offerings.

I mean, they don't insist you play with their models, but it's not like GW can make you do that either. But they effectively have the same situation, because they insist on waiting until they release models for something before they release the rules for it, which means you'll have to keep buying the new books as they come out because they wouldn't include all the factions in the rule book.

Do most folks here see a strong need to go with the Oathmark required 25mm base size?

As Gimgamgoo notes above, many standard humanoid minis are based on 20mm bases (I'm a KoW guy, and maybe 25-50% of my models are multibased, but I still have lots of figures solo on mostly 20mm bases)

So if you field a 5-man wide base that's 100mm wide, while your opponent fields a 5-man wide base that's 125mm - do you really think this will make that much of a difference?

And if everyone has the same 20mm base size (except the darn KoW orcs, which are all on 25mm!!), then everyone's bases are just that much smaller.

No real problem, right? Is it aesthetics? Or do you anticipate some real problems if everyone is using smaller bases?

Very curious. I've always played rather loosey-goosey with base size (and movement sometimes too), so I've never quite understood the importance of getting the base size right.

Enlighten me!

 pancakeonions wrote:
Do most folks here see a strong need to go with the Oathmark required 25mm base size?

As Gimgamgoo notes above, many standard humanoid minis are based on 20mm bases (I'm a KoW guy, and maybe 25-50% of my models are multibased, but I still have lots of figures solo on mostly 20mm bases)

So if you field a 5-man wide base that's 100mm wide, while your opponent fields a 5-man wide base that's 125mm - do you really think this will make that much of a difference?

And if everyone has the same 20mm base size (except the darn KoW orcs, which are all on 25mm!!), then everyone's bases are just that much smaller.

No real problem, right? Is it aesthetics? Or do you anticipate some real problems if everyone is using smaller bases?

Very curious. I've always played rather loosey-goosey with base size (and movement sometimes too), so I've never quite understood the importance of getting the base size right.

Enlighten me!

Basing to use your models in various game systems is awkward. As you say if you decide between you and your friend to go for a standard size (be that 20 or 25mm) it's fine. but as soon as someone new joins who has gone the other way you have problems, not just of frontage when engaging but also manoeuvring which I think is even more important. Personally I'd always give my opponent the benefit of the doubt but not everyone will be the same.
During this current pandemic me and my gaming group have talked (wistfully) about playing most systems and I also find myself trying to get the most out of my models, as such they're currently being prepped (potentially) for AoS, classic Warhammer, Warlords of Erehown, KoW and now Oathmark and probably one or two more that have yet to be created .
What I have decided is to use certain units as crossover between certain systems. Skeletons on 20mm bases can be used across most systems, but my elites (such as grave guard) go on 25mm bases which can then be used as standard infantry in the systems that use 25mm.
Alternatively I'm toying with the idea that my next batch of minis will go on the smallest base size, and then add spacers to the bases when needed for other systems, haven't tried this yet so no idea if it's feasible.
It's not perfect but I don't like my models being constrained to systems just because of base size.

pgmason wrote:
With Kings of War isn't it that the main rulebook has all the armies they actually sell, and the other book has all the WFB armies they don't do models for? I think that's a pretty reasonable way to split them.

I'm not worried by the way Oathmark is releasing. I've been very happy with everything I've got for Frostgrave and RoSD, so I'm happy to get multiple books.

Not quite. The Uncharted Empires has rules for Salamanders, Ratkin, and The Herd. Currently Mantic sell models for the Salamanders faction, and have shown their upcoming models for the other two. Also a good number of the lists in the book use a main army book list as a base to work from... so again, use a lot of Mantic models.

 pancakeonions wrote:
Do most folks here see a strong need to go with the Oathmark required 25mm base size?

As Gimgamgoo notes above, many standard humanoid minis are based on 20mm bases (I'm a KoW guy, and maybe 25-50% of my models are multibased, but I still have lots of figures solo on mostly 20mm bases)

So if you field a 5-man wide base that's 100mm wide, while your opponent fields a 5-man wide base that's 125mm - do you really think this will make that much of a difference?

And if everyone has the same 20mm base size (except the darn KoW orcs, which are all on 25mm!!), then everyone's bases are just that much smaller.

No real problem, right? Is it aesthetics? Or do you anticipate some real problems if everyone is using smaller bases?

Very curious. I've always played rather loosey-goosey with base size (and movement sometimes too), so I've never quite understood the importance of getting the base size right.

Enlighten me!

Most of my stuff is on 20mm bases, what I may end up doing is just use bigger movement trays. I will admit to thinking that the 25mm bases do offer a better visual, and make it easier to rank up models. I think that 20mm base has been the norm for so long that it is now entrenched.

Edit, the same is true for the D6, a D10 offers a bigger scale to play around with for stats, a D6 is just so old that it has become the go to... I will admit to finding a supply of just D10 at a reasonable price is actually difficult.

The suggestion given in the rulebook is to build movement trays with the correct footprint.

 RaptorusRex wrote:
The suggestion given in the rulebook is to build movement trays with the correct footprint.

I saw some .stl files online for oathmark movement trays. Looked like they would fit 20mm bases. Just got a 3D printer, so that is an option if you know someone with one.

Warbases or charlie foxtrot models have the right size movement trays with 20mm slots in them.

Well, I had a bit of a gripe and some concerns earlier. I bought the book and I'm really impressed with it. No really messy rules split across the place. Nicely set out rules, especially the stats section.

Except for a few orcs, nearly all my models are on 20mm (troops) or 40mm (monsters). I might give it bash at that scale of bases. The only pain will be the cavalry which are on GWs bizarre 24mm x 50mm.

Looking forward to trying it out.

Cover art for Oathbreakers. These skelllies are awesome.

For those that want Oathmark in a PDF but also want to have all their PDFs in one place aka Drivethrurpg - it is now available there
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/317583/Oathmark-Battles-of-the-Lost-Age

I'm really hoping that Oathmark and Northstar bring us a plastic undead light cavalry box set with plain skeletal horses. The hobby could use a new version of the old GW skeletal horde horses that they finally retired along with the Tomb Kings.

 Psychopomp wrote:
I'm really hoping that Oathmark and Northstar bring us a plastic undead light cavalry box set with plain skeletal horses. The hobby could use a new version of the old GW skeletal horde horses that they finally retired along with the Tomb Kings.

Yeah, one similar to Goblin Wolf Riders box would be sweet. I am not a fan of the chubby wolves but I really appreciate that this kit allows not only for a 3 different units to be made, but that the wolves are separate from their riders.

Let's meet our new neighbour, he looks friendly.

Well he did invite us for a BBQ. Even said don’t worry about bringing anything as he would serve us up real nice. Definitely an outstanding chap.

That looks remarkably close to GW's philosophy of making faux mythical noncreatures instead of something recognizable.

 Shadow Walker wrote:
he looks friendly.

He looks like his daddy is also his granpaw.

Battlesworn up for pre order today
http://www.northstarfigures.com/prod.php?prod=14892

Are undead included with this release or are they a separate book? Anyone know?