Sentinel Games: Total Extinction

[Predatorpt]

For me it's a no go because they can't answer the question of what material to use.  The pledge prices are more than I would like to pay for the chance they'll come out in PVC.  If they guaranteed hard plastic I'd be in.

They are in negotiations with the factory that's going to do their models and they promissed that:

...I promise to tell you more about materials and stretch goals next week. Until mid week we don´t have exact information and we´d prefer not to tell something we cound´t do later...

So I guess this week you'll have your answer.

[rwwin]

I agree with that, I don't want restic crap. I am hoping they will be the nice resin that a lot of small Polish and English companies are using now days. (warzone from prodos, darklands from mierce, and a bunch of smaller boutique companies all use a really nice resin that has no bubbles)
 

They've only mentioned PVC and hard plastic so far.  Sentinel said they would reveal the material choice next week.  I think that announcement will make or break the campaign.

[Predatorpt]

Ok, here's the update for material - it's going to be resin:

This week we´ve had several meetings with a couple of factories to adjust prices and decide which  material is the the best for the miniatures.

Our miniatures have a lot of details, some of them are very difficult to replicate without very expensive molds (with mobile parts) but when we created Sentinel Games, we had two things in mind clear: make great games and even better miniatures. So making mediocre models was not an option for us. We must replicate each detail.

Other problem is that we want to make a lot of models, all of them multipart. Plastic injection has very expensive molds (even more expensive for our models if we don´t modify them) and we want a lot of them. The 8 models included in the Starter Set are only the beginning: we want the Glorlon Supperssor or the Colonial Stakan alive as soon as posible.

After all that we came to only one conclusion:

RESIN!!!!

With polyurethane resin we can make awesome models, full of details and with a cheap molding cost, so we can release more models faster than with plastic. And we find a factory in Spain so we could follow the production very close and be sure that the miniatures are of the best quality.

The drawback of resin is the individual cost for each miniature in comparison with plastic so the Starter Set "Battle for Karnak" will have a higher value on retail that we expect.

But this is not all the news we have:

The Starter Set will include more minis! We change the size of the colonial Trooper squad to 9 miniatures and the Glorlon Soldier squad to 5 miniatures. So in each Starter will be 37 miniatures instead of just 29, and of Resin instead of plastic.

And we'll get more miniatures in the starter 

[rwwin]

That's great news......sort of.  While resin figures sound great I don't see how they can pull it off.  I can't square the statement:

"The drawback of resin is the individual cost for each miniature in comparison with plastic so the Starter Set "Battle for Karnak" will have a higher value on retail that we expect."

with:

"The Starter Set will include more minis! We change the size of the colonial Trooper squad to 9 miniatures and the Glorlon Soldier squad to 5 miniatures. So in each Starter will be 37 miniatures instead of just 29, and of Resin instead of plastic."

How the heck are they going to make that work?

[Predatorpt]

rwwin - maybe something was lost on translation. They also say that "With polyurethane resin we can make awesome models, full of details and with a cheap molding cost".

Or maybe that just means that they'll pump up the prices for the starter sets when they release the retail version of it.

[commissarmoody]

I like the background and the figs I have seen so far. Hopefully they translate well into actual miniatures.

[tnjrp]

Or maybe that just means that they'll pump up the prices for the starter sets when they release the retail version of it.

That's what they are saying specifically, with the caveat that neither they nor I are native English speakers. Of course one must assume it also reflects on their income from the KS but who knows, they may have and may be willing to use some other money to put into the project as well.

I pretty happy with resin vehicles. Not so sure about resin infantry but I'm sure I can live with that.

[Quirkworthy]

I read this as meaning that the initial cost of making the moulds was relatively cheap (when compared to hard plastic), but that the material cost per model was higher when it came to casting them. This is the normal view of trad resin models. This would give them the detail, reduce their initial outlay on moulds, but force them to raise the cost per starter set at retail, as stated.

That's my guess at any rate.

[Predatorpt]

That's what they are saying specifically, with the caveat that neither they nor I are native English speakers. Of course one must assume it also reflects on their income from the KS but who knows, they may have and may be willing to use some other money to put into the project as well.

I pretty happy with resin vehicles. Not so sure about resin infantry but I'm sure I can live with that.

That's the part that's bugging me - do they have funding beside the one coming from the backers? Because until now they only showed concept art, renders and one prototype figure. That's their only investment so far.

If I remember correctly, I saw an interview with one of owners of Sentinel Games and he said they were waiting for funding through a bank loan. That was before the KS...

And another thing that I think it's keeping backers away - their lack of interaction in the comments. If you drop them an email (a friend of mine did), they reply straight away. But replying to backers always takes a while.

[rwwin]

And another thing that I think it's keeping backers away - their lack of interaction in the comments. If you drop them an email (a friend of mine did), they reply straight away. But replying to backers always takes a while.

I can't say about comments, but sending them a message through the Kickstarter page (I sent them several) got me responses in under a day.  They even remembered and sent me a message about going resin not knowing if I was still following the campaign.

On the resin issue it's still a puzzle to me but I guess it comes down to scale of production.  Even if they are successful it doesn't look like the campaign will top 350 backers.  I suppose at that scale resin may make more sense than I originally thought.

[Predatorpt]

I can't say about comments, but sending them a message through the Kickstarter page (I sent them several) got me responses in under a day.  They even remembered and sent me a message about going resin not knowing if I was still following the campaign.

On the resin issue it's still a puzzle to me but I guess it comes down to scale of production.  Even if they are successful it doesn't look like the campaign will top 350 backers.  I suppose at that scale resin may make more sense than I originally thought.

Yep, they reply rather promptly. But if go to the comments section for backers, there's little interaction. But maybe I'm spoiled by the guys at Battle Systems right now. They always have someone talking in that section.

And in the time between my post and your reply, we lost backers/money and are below £24k...again

[rwwin]

And in the time between my post and your reply, we lost backers/money and are below £24k...again

I was a bit surprised at the negative reaction to the resin announcement.  I know it's not ideal, but it's still better than restic or some other low grade plastic.

[robh]

I was a bit surprised at the negative reaction to the resin announcement.  I know it's not ideal, but it's still better than restic or some other low grade plastic.

Not for gaming with it isn't. The resin announcement was always going to cause drop outs

If the figures remain as per the renders the Glorlon should be OK in resin (apart from the commanders antennae). The Colonial troopers and especially the support weapon guy are all destined to lose their gun barrels during the first use on table (or before if you use the compressive foam type storage/transport packs).
Resin on its own is too brittle when cast in thin section, the plasticiser in the restic (or better Trollcast) hybrid allows it a greater degree of flexibility (at the cost of making it burr rather than scrape cleanly)

Resin is fantastic for collectors and display models but barely adequate for gaming pieces.

[rwwin]

As the owner of a fair ammount of resin and restic figures, I think it's a matter of taste.  There are many different blends of resin.  Some are very brittle and some have a fair amount of flex.  Myself, I'd rather treat a resin figure with kid gloves over cleaning restic mold lines , dollar to dollar.

[YPU]

A nice hard resin could be good for the tanks tough, and that was all I'm interested in from the start.