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I have no issue with PP going to KS, it's for everyone! It's a great medium to generate a marketing channel for cheap AND get a feeling for success. Selling directly is also quite nice and if their first KS is any indication, nice for both sides (PP and customer). That stores aren't happy about it, I couldn't care less. The smart ones will stock product when there's interest and the foolish ones will go out of business soon enough...

My first issue with the minis is that most look like they took infinity models and took a air-compressor to them to blow them up. Then some have Tau like (drone) elements.

The second issue is that it's Fantasy in Space with technology... There were a few D20 RPG products that went that way. It can be done great like Starfinder or Dragonstar. Warcaster doesn't feel 'great', it feels a bit like a paper bag full of water, with the water seeping through. They went the 'cheap' way and made the fantasy setting into sci-fi, GW always hinted at this with WFB and 40k, but there's a difference between hinting and just doing...

The third issue is material. Resin/metal sculpts... Yuck! The reason why PP hasn't sold any new minis to me in four years. Their PVC was mostly garbage (their minis for the boardgames they KS was better though) and the amount of HIPS releases was way to limited. As a result I used to buy second hand minis that were assembled (and often painted quite well). I would expect that an organization like PP would go the HIPS route with this release. Smaller organizations then PP are doing plastic for years!

I seriously doubt I'll be backing this

The scale issue seems odd to me since none of these designs look like they represent a biological human being, even if they were supposed to. They’re all just robots. (Or cybernetic post-humans if that’s your flavor.) This is Mantic’s Enforcers all over again.

To me these large robots look like they’re perfectly in scale with 28mm humans.

 Vertrucio wrote:
I realize I've been really, really hard on PP.

But, I really want this to succeed too. PP used to have the most concise, solid rules

Wait. Stop. PP's approach to rules was strangle them with multiple clauses until they bled. They were relatively solid after a thorough reading, digestion and several passes of errata, but never concise.

'Double move and take no other action.' (Run) is currently two full paragraphs and a bulleted pair of special requirements (for jacks and troops respectively). If you're looking for concise rules, that's abhorrent.


Throwing and being Thrown take up a half a page and a third of a page respectively, and are inexplicably 15 pages apart, in different sections of the rulebook (which is baffling and inexcusable incoherence in the layout of the book). That also doesn't include the general rules for power attacks, collateral damage or deviation. That's the opposite of concise. And this is the 3rd edition version, after they'd learned clarity and legalistic rituals to tighten up their rules writing.


There are actual charts in the back of the book laying out the timing of Activation, Spellcasting and the Attack Sequence- the latter has 14 frikkin' steps, 3 of which have 5 (or in one case, 7) substeps to go through, and two of those substeps have to be repeated for each model affected. Each and every attack in warmachine is functionally a 28 step process (minimum), and fully half of those steps are function calls to other abilities that may or may not need to be resolved at that point in process (which may or may not interrupt it, or require further abilities to be resolved). Some steps you can skip sometimes, or even often, but there are times you can and will spend five minutes resolving a single attack, figuring out which special abilities have priority, and who gets what buffs, debuffs and/or tokens once it resolves

 Valander wrote:

 Overread wrote:
I think PP has a big bonus of a LOT of other KS companies in that PP has been around for a good number of years and is pretty stable all told. They've already got the offices, company site, equipment, skills etc...

True, but they did semi-recently move offices out of their Bellevue location and into Woodinville.

That move was forced due to zoning law changes and not because of financial reasons. Legally they could no longer manufacture at the site they were at.

 Monkeysloth wrote:

 Valander wrote:

 Overread wrote:
I think PP has a big bonus of a LOT of other KS companies in that PP has been around for a good number of years and is pretty stable all told. They've already got the offices, company site, equipment, skills etc...

True, but they did semi-recently move offices out of their Bellevue location and into Woodinville.

That move was forced due to zoning law changes and not because of financial reasons. Legally they could no longer manufacture at the site they were at.

That and the zone they were in was also priced a lot higher. So chances are they've reduced their overhead considerably.

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing. Done at the right time it can allow a company to better operate within its means and within its market position. Leaving it in a potentially stronger position to expand again later. Don't forget a lot of roles in a miniature company can be done with work-for-hire and short term contracts. Even GW makes use of short term staff. I'd rather PP downsized a bit, stabilised themselves and then grew big again, rather than try to retain a working staff too big for its needs and potential waste resources (money) as a company, which could hamper its chances at expansion.

I'm curious what the cards are going to bring to the table ...and if PP can manage to roughly balance them.

I'm hoping that we'll see some of the rules (if not all of them) when the KS starts.

Also hoping they tighten up some of the fluff.

If PP isn’t in financial trouble why did they clear tons of stock at basically cost price throughout Q3/4 last year ? They blamed the warehouse move but given that shipping costs etc have all gone up it makes no sense to dump stock at cost going into what should’ve been the best sales period.

Rules wise Warmahordes was tight until MK iii. The rules were very clear provided you understood English writing concepts like what a full stop means. Essentially MKiii went wrong because they listened too much to a vocal section of the internet and tournament fan base. That and destroying so many theme armies.

After they screwed me over with my Ashlynn theme force I sold up and ain’t ever touching the brand again.

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing

It could be, if it was the only thing going on. But we know they sell less stuff, and if the glassdoor reviews are to be believed (and from my experience, one negative review could be just salt, but all of them corraborating the story is unlikely to be just salt), they don't really re-hire to fill those positions, just forcing existing employees to spread themselves thinner. It's got all the hallmarks of a flailing mom and pop business.

Cronch wrote:

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing

It could be, if it was the only thing going on. But we know they sell less stuff, and if the glassdoor reviews are to be believed (and from my experience, one negative review could be just salt, but all of them corraborating the story is unlikely to be just salt), they don't really re-hire to fill those positions, just forcing existing employees to spread themselves thinner. It's got all the hallmarks of a flailing mom and pop business.

In terms of Glassdoor?

My employer has a hideous rep on there. But, I’ve been with them for 8 and a bit years, and frankly the reviews on there, and the god awful hatchet job televised ‘exposé’ (which was clearly a conclusion in search of evidence ) simply don’t match my experience at all.

Not to say that’s universal and often where there’s smoke there is indeed fire, just to say Glassdoor is to be taken with a pinch of salt.

 TwilightSparkles wrote:
If PP isn’t in financial trouble why did they clear tons of stock at basically cost price throughout Q3/4 last year ?

Because they had massive backstock due to much of the range going direct only AND their new warehouse being much smaller than the old one.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Cronch wrote:

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing

It could be, if it was the only thing going on. But we know they sell less stuff, and if the glassdoor reviews are to be believed (and from my experience, one negative review could be just salt, but all of them corraborating the story is unlikely to be just salt), they don't really re-hire to fill those positions, just forcing existing employees to spread themselves thinner. It's got all the hallmarks of a flailing mom and pop business.

In terms of Glassdoor?

My employer has a hideous rep on there. But, I’ve been with them for 8 and a bit years, and frankly the reviews on there, and the god awful hatchet job televised ‘exposé’ (which was clearly a conclusion in search of evidence ) simply don’t match my experience at all.

Not to say that’s universal and often where there’s smoke there is indeed fire, just to say Glassdoor is to be taken with a pinch of salt.

This. Glassdoor is basically an outlet for ex employees with a grudge, real or perceived. Using it as a bellwether for anything is just the modern equivalent of gossiping.

 .Mikes. wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Cronch wrote:

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing

It could be, if it was the only thing going on. But we know they sell less stuff, and if the glassdoor reviews are to be believed (and from my experience, one negative review could be just salt, but all of them corraborating the story is unlikely to be just salt), they don't really re-hire to fill those positions, just forcing existing employees to spread themselves thinner. It's got all the hallmarks of a flailing mom and pop business.

In terms of Glassdoor?

My employer has a hideous rep on there. But, I’ve been with them for 8 and a bit years, and frankly the reviews on there, and the god awful hatchet job televised ‘exposé’ (which was clearly a conclusion in search of evidence ) simply don’t match my experience at all.

Not to say that’s universal and often where there’s smoke there is indeed fire, just to say Glassdoor is to be taken with a pinch of salt.

This. Glassdoor is basically an outlet for ex employees with a grudge, real or perceived. Using it as a bellwether for anything is just the modern equivalent of gossiping.

Or listening to Yelp.

Platuan4th wrote:

 .Mikes. wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Cronch wrote:

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing

It could be, if it was the only thing going on. But we know they sell less stuff, and if the glassdoor reviews are to be believed (and from my experience, one negative review could be just salt, but all of them corraborating the story is unlikely to be just salt), they don't really re-hire to fill those positions, just forcing existing employees to spread themselves thinner. It's got all the hallmarks of a flailing mom and pop business.

In terms of Glassdoor?

My employer has a hideous rep on there. But, I’ve been with them for 8 and a bit years, and frankly the reviews on there, and the god awful hatchet job televised ‘exposé’ (which was clearly a conclusion in search of evidence ) simply don’t match my experience at all.

Not to say that’s universal and often where there’s smoke there is indeed fire, just to say Glassdoor is to be taken with a pinch of salt.

This. Glassdoor is basically an outlet for ex employees with a grudge, real or perceived. Using it as a bellwether for anything is just the modern equivalent of gossiping.

Or listening to Yelp.

Basically this. Also positive reviews are generally forced or paid for by the company. Last two I worked at made people go write good reviews for the company. One of them, after I was no longer there, even made it mandatory if you wanted to keep said job (and no this isn't illegal in my state) the other gave giftcards out if you did.

TwilightSparkles wrote:If PP isn’t in financial trouble why did they clear tons of stock at basically cost price throughout Q3/4 last year ? They blamed the warehouse move but given that shipping costs etc have all gone up it makes no sense to dump stock at cost going into what should’ve been the best sales period.

But it was. Most of the kits were HIPS that they had to order in huge numbers and just weren't selling so why pay to move everything to a different location? They probably have a much smaller warehouse and they've gone back to manufacturing to fill orders (like reaper does for it's metals) as opposed to trying to keep everything in stock. They've had a big dip in popularity, no argument there, so why not offload that stuff for a slight profit instead of keeping it sitting around for a long time which requires space which costs money. A way to stay out of financial trouble is to cut costs. Can't act like your the 2nd largest player in the hobby if you're not anymore. If they tried to keep doing that they would be in trouble.

Scaling down doesn't mean they're closing down. Not scaling down when you should means you will surly will go under.

 TwilightSparkles wrote:
If PP isn’t in financial trouble why did they clear tons of stock at basically cost price throughout Q3/4 last year ? They blamed the warehouse move but given that shipping costs etc have all gone up it makes no sense to dump stock at cost going into what should’ve been the best sales period.

There are many reasons why they might have done this, and only one of them involves any kind of financial hardship. Unless any of us have access to their financials, there's really no way to tell.

 .Mikes. wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Cronch wrote:

Contraction within a company is not a bad thing

It could be, if it was the only thing going on. But we know they sell less stuff, and if the glassdoor reviews are to be believed (and from my experience, one negative review could be just salt, but all of them corraborating the story is unlikely to be just salt), they don't really re-hire to fill those positions, just forcing existing employees to spread themselves thinner. It's got all the hallmarks of a flailing mom and pop business.

In terms of Glassdoor?

My employer has a hideous rep on there. But, I’ve been with them for 8 and a bit years, and frankly the reviews on there, and the god awful hatchet job televised ‘exposé’ (which was clearly a conclusion in search of evidence ) simply don’t match my experience at all.

Not to say that’s universal and often where there’s smoke there is indeed fire, just to say Glassdoor is to be taken with a pinch of salt.

This. Glassdoor is basically an outlet for ex employees with a grudge, real or perceived. Using it as a bellwether for anything is just the modern equivalent of gossiping.

That really does depend. I worked at a place where 99% of the bad reviews (and they were myriad) were fully justified. I'm fully aware that glassdoor and related services don't give you full view, but if enough ex employees are complaining about the same thing, it usually means it's a real thing within the company.

 Platuan4th wrote:

 TwilightSparkles wrote:
If PP isn’t in financial trouble why did they clear tons of stock at basically cost price throughout Q3/4 last year ?

Because they had massive backstock due to much of the range going direct only AND their new warehouse being much smaller than the old one.

It was also not the first time they have done similar. It’s not that unusual.

For me the 2 factions do not jump out for me specifically, but I like where it is going.
Keen to jump on board and get some new minis to try in a new game. I also hope they keep a lot of there design ideas, but change it up so it’s familiar but different.

Excited for sure.

Don't forget all we have is one leader, one regular troop and one mech for each of the two factions. That's tiny and isn't showing them at their most varied.

Heck I didn't like Genestealer cult vehicles until GW added the light version, bikes and buggies. The rockgrinder and co stood out like a sore thumb when the whole rest of the army was IG tanks and such. But nestled next to other ramshackle mining vehicles they look better.

 TwilightSparkles wrote:
If PP isn’t in financial trouble why did they clear tons of stock at basically cost price throughout Q3/4 last year ? They blamed the warehouse move but given that shipping costs etc have all gone up it makes no sense to dump stock at cost going into what should’ve been the best sales period.

Companies liquidate assets all the time for various reasons.It could also be likely that they would have rather sold stock off than pay to move it to their new location. Since they now control their own manufacturing for minis they can replenish as needed. Or, perhaps they needed space for Monsterpocalypse which keeps churning out new models and units and/or Riot Quest which they are also marketing more than Warmachine/Hordes. Now, they have a whole new game to warehouse and manufacture.

I'm willing to bet the Kickstarter will be successful. For me personally, I will hold off until they release more than 3 factions.

 Overread wrote:
PP isn't abandoning Warmachine/Hordes; they aren't destroying their own lore; this is a full game with rules; they haven't been marketing Warmachine/Hordes like mad and then suddenly dropped them etc...

Yeah, they even kinda announced Gunbjornn 2.
Gunbjornn being the only warnoun I ever owned, the only warnoun I ever played, and the warnoun I themed my whole force around thematically, conversions included, I just have to buy Gunbjornn 2!!

A game of warcaster being played right now on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/privateerpress

So, I like what I see so far. PP is finally getting modern with rules.

But we definitely need to see a full sized game since one of PP's biggest problems was that the Battle Box was a very poor representation of what a full game tended to be.

I need to watch the stream. Seems interesting.

I am seeing the resemblance between the factions and Warmachine models more than I thought from the initial announcement. I think it would actually be really obvious if the color pallets were swapped.

The Marcher Worlds models have grown on me quite a bit since we first saw them.

 ImAGeek wrote:
The Marcher Worlds models have grown on me quite a bit since we first saw them.

Same.

Also, I was looking through guerilla Miniature Games' Lets Talk channel (looking for something entirelu different) and game across a snippet from June last year when Ash and owen were discussing Warcaster. It seemed it was teased back then, so I can only assume the rules and units have been i testing since then.

I remain interested rather than excited, but given my flgs has stopped stocking WMH due to falling demand I don't see them stocking this either, so the KS may be a necessity.

That was a very weird, interesting game. I'd like to play a few demo games, or at least watch a few more games, to get a better grip of it. The whole resurrecting units, and portals, and activation token? I'm not getting a good view on how it all works and what makes people win game yet.

VPs win the game.

Activations aren't tied entirely to rounds. Instead, each player alternates activating units. Every time you finish activating a unit you put an Activation token on it to mark it as activated, and can't be activated again until the token is cleared. When all your units on the table have activation tokens, you remove all activation tokens. Looks like removing activation tokens will be a common thing in the spell cards, so expect cases where units act more than once before the board is cleared.

Once players activated a number of units per round,, That triggers the pulse round, which I think is mainly for scoring, although they're not clear on what else. You do not remove activation tokens when a pulse round is hit.

Yeah I got the rules. What I meant is that I don't understand how they interact with tactics, and how they play out in an actual game.

Having had chance to really watch and think out the game, if anything I'm more inetersted now. I definitely want to see more and can imagine the tactical possibilities.

The pulse round scoring especially has my attention, although I wonder if it's an over complication.

Talked with a couple friends who were ex-WMH players this weekend about Warcaster and their thoughts. Basically, zero interests. They have no faith in PP anymore and their rules writing. They always held up PP for the rules and they said that before they end of MK2, they starting losing faith in PP's rules ability. They only kept playing WMH out of habit for a while, but moved onto Infinity now. For all it's flaws, they have more faith in CB than they ever had in PP and this is post Yu Jing split/ Sectrol Elimination shenanigans.

PP has a steep hole to climb out of to make this game succeed. They've lost most their base audience and most game stores wont touch them. Given this is a KS, they have the additional hurdle of live time managing of production problems. This will be interesting. 2020 is not 2005 and trying to stand out is a lot harder.