Mantic Fantasy Games & General News & Rumour Roundup

[Tonny]

http://www.manticblog.com/wp-content...a-paladins.jpg

That paladins look great at least. The helmets I'll probably replace, but over all quite good.

The nuns are ugly, the paladins are fine. Not 'wow', but solid.
Shame that there is no consistency in Mantic releases.

[Ludaman]

Paladins look alright, with some spartan helmets from any number of conversion bit companies they'll look a lot better. These helmets are pretty silly

[Caiphas Cain]

Paladins look alright, with some spartan helmets from any number of conversion bit companies they'll look a lot better. These helmets are pretty silly

That would be cool. I'll probably use some sallet helmets left over from my Perry boxes.

[zoggin-eck]

One day, I'm going to go through this thread and find how many times thats been used.

Its really got nothing to do with the paint job. Its not mind blowing but its certainly not a bad paint job either - about what I'd expect to be honest.

Yep. Same old line, and I've never really understood it. Unless someone paints a model so thickly as to loose detail, or so dark that you can't see parts, it isn't an issue with me. Anyway, it isn't a case of detail here being the issue, just the odd proportions.

Know what I did? Simply loaded the image into my editor of choice, and set it to greyscale. Yep, still crummy

Amazingly I've seen people dismiss it as "Oh, I guess Mantic does "heroic" scale now" (as if the Dwarfs weren't already). No, it's clear when a sculptor makes something look a certain way intentionally, and when something's just off. Chris Fitzpatrick, for instance, doesn't sculpt women like any I've seen, but it's clearly a style, which I think looks good (at least consistent).

Make with the Orc chariots already, Mantic! If they're half-decent, I'm sure they'll be bough by many for goblin, beastmen etc. conversions, too.

[eldargal]

I've said it before, proportions are Mantic Achilles heel. You can forgive some with non-humans, but not with humans. They tend to struggle with women in particular. hint: Our upper arms are a bit longer than male upper arms. Our forearms are not 50% longer than our upper arms or the upper arms of men.

The paladins. at least, are rather nice.

[GomezAddams]

The paladins okay, a bit retro in some respects but okay and I can understand why people like that style. That being said... Theres only two bodies. There appears to be three heads however one could be from the commad sprue. It also appears that the sword and hands are seperate. So theres what, 6 combinations?

I just dont get how Mantic have made so much money and yet reinvest so little into there actual product. Another three bodies and associated bits costs pocket changed compared to what Mantics made on KS

[Hellebore]

Well according to mantic they didn't break even on the KS and had to put more of their own money in (10,000GBP according to them.

I think people underestimate how much money it costs in running a KS. It's basically a full time job for the length of time the KS runs except it runs 24/7 and generally involves more than one person. I've been in half a dozen now and the amount of manhours that go into them is quite amazing. The Robotech one has had creators active virtually all night for the last week or so, making updates at 4 in the morning etc.

I'm not sure whether they really did run over budget, it's an excuse or what. Restic apparently still has metal tools to cast in, they just aren't as extensive as styrene sprues. So if that is true then each model needs a metal tool cut to cast it and that's not cheap compared to the other options (obviously still cheaper than standard plastic).

So either they're being untruthful or you underestimate how much money DOES get invested into their products, or a bit of both.

I can't say for sure, but they certainly don't appear to be wealthy as a result. Perhaps there are intangible costs people haven't considered.

Hellebore

[Tonny]

Well according to mantic they didn't break even on the KS and had to put more of their own money in (10,000GBP according to them.

I think people underestimate how much money it costs in running a KS. It's basically a full time job for the length of time the KS runs except it runs 24/7 and generally involves more than one person. I've been in half a dozen now and the amount of manhours that go into them is quite amazing. The Robotech one has had creators active virtually all night for the last week or so, making updates at 4 in the morning etc.

I'm not sure whether they really did run over budget, it's an excuse or what. Restic apparently still has metal tools to cast in, they just aren't as extensive as styrene sprues. So if that is true then each model needs a metal tool cut to cast it and that's not cheap compared to the other options (obviously still cheaper than standard plastic).

So either they're being untruthful or you underestimate how much money DOES get invested into their products, or a bit of both.

I can't say for sure, but they certainly don't appear to be wealthy as a result. Perhaps there are intangible costs people haven't considered.

Hellebore

Surely they must make profit with their kickstarters? I haven't backend any of the 3? Mantic kickstarter projects, but to me it looked liked they raised a gigantic amount of money. If even they don't make a profit, I am curious how those smaller kickstarters survive.

[Hellebore]

I don't know. They just said on their forums they didn't break even on the KoW KS. They made $354,000 on that one.

Assuming this, the only thing I could think is that the smaller ones are just run by 1 or 2 people and not as a fulltime business but as a hobby reducing their overheads. The Dreamforge stuff was produced by a single guy and his computer, so he was only really paying himself in terms of employment (ignoring the people payed to produce the models).

Hellebore

[Baragash]

If their goal is market penetration then breaking even on the KS may not be a high priority. If they were bringing the product to market the traditional way they'd still have to take an upfront loss on all the R&D and base production costs anyway, but I suspect a £10k upfront loss is substantially less than the comparable position of bringing the same selection of units to market without a KS.

[Robert]

The Kickstarter total was £354,997 but don't forget that Kickstarter and Amazon payments take a chunk of that. Then you have tax, non-payers etc.

Also, Dreamforge may possibly have borrowed money as well as the Kickstarter, and Wargames Factory are obviously getting a cut... I would be surprised if Dreamforge ever makes a profit considering how much they have to produce for Kickstarter backers and the relatively small amount of money they gathered.

As for small kickstarters... go ask Tre Manor how much money he made from his first one...

[EmperorNorton]

I think people underestimate how much money it costs in running a KS. It's basically a full time job for the length of time the KS runs except it runs 24/7 and generally involves more than one person.

I guess I must be underestimating it, because I don't see how posting an update or two per day equates to being a full time job. I'm sure it can be hectic at times, particularly on the first and the last day, but overall I don't see how it is a huge effort if you have it planned properly beforehand.

[zoggin-eck]

http://www.manticblog.com/wp-content...olour-shot.jpg

Studio photo of mummies in a graveyard is about. They look OK, but Just two bodies and that awful shield arm. Not much character to them. Kind of a mix of the slightly character/charmless look you get from multi-part models, without the variety of poses! I'd rather have models that look like they're intentionally sculpted in a pose like the dreadball models. Other than bringing a non-Egyptian look, I don't see them as better value than getting a few Wargods or Reaper models (which I'll stick with).

I don't care in the slightest how a company finances their miniatures, just whether they are any good or not.

New werewolf shot is what you'd expect. I don't mind them now, since the wolf head on mostly fur-less body make me think of that Tekken game character with cat head

http://www.manticblog.com/wp-content...kow-colour.jpg

Is it just me, or are the werewolf nipples not the issue people seemed to imagine? Did they change them, or are they just not so obvious in the shot?

[Dai-Mongar]

Those mummies are pretty unimpressive. The werewolves look better than I thought they would though, but I wouldn't personally go for the hairless body look.
What I think I would have preferred to their battle-nuns is if they had just incorporated women into the men-at-arms and paladin units. The paladins look very nice though, I'd like to pick up a unit or two.

[Tonny]

I actual quite like those mummies and I like the paintjob.