Fields of Glory (Osprey) and Wargames Factory Plastic Minis

[Aaron]

The miniature tie-in is definitely interesting. As someone on TMP has pointed out (and been flamed for) the technology they are claiming to be using for their minis has not been worked out yet. A friend of a friend sculpts plastics for the toy industry and has said that the "greens" (actually just computer renderings) they keep showing can not be made with the current technology unless they have developed something entirely new.

I hope they live up to the hype, as those Roman renderings look quite nice.

[revford]

The miniature tie-in is definitely interesting. As someone on TMP has pointed out (and been flamed for) the technology they are claiming to be using for their minis has not been worked out yet. A friend of a friend sculpts plastics for the toy industry and has said that the "greens" (actually just computer renderings) they keep showing can not be made with the current technology unless they have developed something entirely new.

I hope they live up to the hype, as those Roman renderings look quite nice.

They don't look that technically different to the stuff GW produces, multi part hard plastics.

But then again I didn't even realise these were computer generated images I was looking at so that shows you what I know.  

What is their new special thing?

[Aaron]

Having chainmail that goes all around the fig is supposed to be hard to impossible as the steel mold doesn't flex to allow the plastic to be released once molded. GW get around this by having capes or something similar in the problem areas.

I've also been told that the digital-green-to-steel-mold process works well for things with a lot of straight lines like vehicles and terrain, but not well at all for organic shapes.

While I know some industry people, I have zero experience in plastics myself, so this is all just hearsay on my part. I hope the sceptics are all wrong and I can have tone of plastic legionaires soon!

[Operator5]

The chainmail issue has been discussed at length in plastic casting. I don't think WF has released anything yet and I hope to actually speak with them at Cold Wars this weekend.

[Aaron]

Please keep us posted. I confess I prefer good old-fashioned lead, but cheap plastics can only help bring in fresh blood. It will also be considerably cheaper to let my son paint and break plastics when he is old enough to cut his teeth in the gaming world!

[revford]

Having chainmail that goes all around the fig is supposed to be hard to impossible as the steel mold doesn't flex to allow the plastic to be released once molded. GW get around this by having capes or something similar in the problem areas.

I hadn't considered that before, that's very cunning of them.  It explains why mould lines on GW figs usually run down the scabbard.

Also, because I think I'm still being a bit slow on the uptake, the pics that looks to me like they are greyscale photos of sculpts, those are some kind of computer wizardry?  They look so real.

[Operator5]

Those are 3D software images.

I was lucky enough to see the first pass on these. They have improved greatly since then (my initial description of them was "a hairless gorilla in armor").  

[Aaron]

Yup, they are just virtual renderings. I never would have caught on to that myself if the WF guy hadn't disclosed it in one of his many "news" releases.

[revford]

Wow, I'd never have guessed that.  

Crazy place this 21st Century.

[matakishi]

The same people are stampeding towards these rules as stampeded towards WHFB when it was released. WHFB was supposed to be so great, presumably because it had colour photos since Warhammer Rules are distinctly average-to-godawful and couldn't possibly be a selling point to grown ups.

These rules have even more colour photos and almost before release the requisite 'army books' have arrived to leech yet more cash from the faithful. No doubt the rules will be very successful.

I can't help feeling that certain people's need to like them (sight unseen) stems from the fact that they're not happy playing ancients and desperately need to find something that makes it fun.

Ancients aren't dull because of the rules of course, but because ancient warfare is a dull thing to play. Line up and throw sticks before charging (ooooh Warhamer!) doesn't make it worth painting the figures and getting the trees out of the box as far as I'm concerned.

Some people will never learn though  

[wolfgangbrooks]

@ Matakishi:

:) You just summed up my thoughts on ancients pretty well. As nice as some figures are I just can't think of any ancient period I'd want to game. And I'm tryin' real hard, truly I am. XD

[pnweerar]

Ancients aren't dull because of the rules of course, but because ancient warfare is a dull thing to play.

I hear you. I find ancients quite interesting, but the actual game play is a bit lacking.

[Aaron]

Ancients are a mixed bag for me. I really enjoy the first and second Punic wars as there is a clash of very different fighting philosophies and a wide variety of troop types. I once made the mistake though of assembling two large matched hoplite armies as I love the look of them. Unfortunately they were dead boring to game with. It wasn't even rock, paper, scissors. It was just plain rock on rock!

[LostInBrittany]

They have a very interesting article on their site about how they are solving design problems like that side chain mail casting mentioned before :

http://www.wargamesfactory.com/AnnouncementRetrieve.aspx?ID=13361

I am not sure of what they will be able to do, but at least they seem to know their job.

I guess that if figures are good, I will buy several boxes, even if I don't ply ancients anymore. At least not massive battles, I'm still looking for a good skirmish ancient ruleset.

[Argonor]

Where can the game be purchased? Osprey?