Apparently idle hands are the devil's playthings and I think this must be the case with me. I haven't had much opportunity to hit the painting table and get on with the Blood Moon Orcs due to a mixture of real life work and a bad case of Manthrax causing me to cough and sneeze over everything in sight. However it hasn't stopped me adding to "Lead Mountain" after being seduced by Mantic's Kickstarter project for DreadBall.
DreadBall is a SF football type game and I must confess that the original plans for the game were to my mind pretty uninspiring with teams of humans, orcs, dwarves and rat-men. It smacked of being an SF rip off of Bloodbowl and Mantic do seem to be acquiring a bit of a reputation of being producing cheap GW-lite products rather than being particularly innovative themselves (their SF wargame Warpath is especially guilty of this background wise with its own versions of Orks, Squats and Hrud).
However (game designer) Jake Thornton's blog proved interesting reading, the game mechanics (see YouTube video above) and play were sufficiently different from Bloodbowl and his ideas for the future beyond the initial game release quite inspiring...
So I decided to take the plunge, the game would provide some fun over the Xmas period and I do like Jake's other Mantic game Dwarf King's Hold.
Then the addiction took hold...
As more money was pledged towards the project Mantic put up options for Seasons 2 and 3 with some new teams that are much more interesting than those in the initial Season 1 game, as well as some cool MVP's. There are things with lots of tentacles, robots, giant robots, teleporting dinosaur aliens (now that would be good in Warpath), damn, there was some good stuff being planned. Indeed out of the next eight teams only the SF Ape team didn't float my boat and they're still better than Space Dwarves.
As more money was pledged towards the project Mantic put up options for Seasons 2 and 3 with some new teams that are much more interesting than those in the initial Season 1 game, as well as some cool MVP's. There are things with lots of tentacles, robots, giant robots, teleporting dinosaur aliens (now that would be good in Warpath), damn, there was some good stuff being planned. Indeed out of the next eight teams only the SF Ape team didn't float my boat and they're still better than Space Dwarves.
Oh well, in for a penny and all that. The credit card has taken a bit of a hit but not as bad as I thought as the process is in US Dollars and the exchange rate a lot better than I mentally converted.
Coupled with the Reaper Bones Kickstarter I can see I need to recognise that this could be an expensive, if good value, element to my hobby and I should not be seduced into buying into every new shiny project that comes up.
That said the Judge Dredd Kickstarter looks interesting and there are some good deals there...
That said the Judge Dredd Kickstarter looks interesting and there are some good deals there...
Same problem here! I like too many of the teams (big disappointment that I don't like the apes) but this game should keep me very busy for a long time with all the minis I picked up.
ReplyDeleteI am hoping the ape sculpts may make them better.
DeleteYou sure arent alone Steve - my final pledge is well over the initial one for a Striker set!
ReplyDeleteAnd yes there are some great Dredd deals going - in fact I was thinking of making a Corporation team for Dreadball with them - The "Mega-City 1 Maulers"! (Dreddball?)
So was mine and I had no intention of getting involved with DB having put a pledge on JD but all th new aliens seduced me. I suppose if I don't get into the game I can give them all guns! :-)
DeleteHan and I bought into it quite a lot (spending $200!!!), but it looks exciting.
ReplyDeleteI would say it was like Blood Bowl, but without all the dice. I like it being hex based as well, a little more natural.
Being Sci-Fi is an interesting twist too. But yes, nothing massively 'innovative' about Mantic, I would be inclined to agree. This though, managed to grab me, as has Dwarf Kings Hold (albeit, after your review).
All the best,
Rob
No Mantic aren't particularly innovative but they are good at spotting gaps customers want and filling them. Hopefully the S2 & 3 aliens will be militarised, especially the Nameless and teleporting dinos...
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