[Kickstarter] Mythic Battles: Pantheon (Monolith & Mythic Games)

[Ray Rivers]

Doesn't have anything to do with my "principles."

The product as a whole is utterly fantastic to be sure. The art, the design, the sculpting, the miniatures... just fantastic.

A pledge of 99 dollars means you are undercutting manufacturers back home and in Europe?

I just can't imagine how someone... anyone... can offer 88 miniatures of absolutely great quality in sculpting, in which at least a quarter of which are larger than 60mm in height (including the 110m Atlas Titan), and which the rest were 32mm in height, of high impact plastic, for 99 bucks.

Just doesn't compute.

What does compute is a deliberate undercutting in price to knock other manufacturers out of business. This is known as Predatory Pricing.

[Duncan McDane]

I understand what you mean but I think they're making enough money out of it. After tooling and modelling the net. price of a single model will be next to nothing, even if it's a large figure, even when calculating the labour, wear on the machinery and energy it costs to produce. And Monolith isn't a giant player ( yet ) that can afford predatory pricing in order to take competitors and start-ups out of the market.
The basic box doesn't include that many different sculpts, in fact, if not for the biggies I'd leave it alone, even at a online discount price. It's the freebies that make this deal a great one.
I did e.g. back Gloomhaven and Massive Darkness - both I think are start-ups - and will continue to do so if the product/idea they offer is good enough, sort of: here's my money, show me what you can do. Monolith ( and especially CMON ) really have to prove themselves every time they release something new, since we've come to expect quality of them. If they don't match ( or even exceed ) that expectation, then next time it will be a "no".
MD didn't have much freebies buit I did like the models & gaming idea. For Gloomhaven I shelled out a bit extra in order to have the miniatures in the flesh, not only on the cards.
In short, CMON ( and Monolith ) are setting the standards for miniature boardgames and I think that's a good thing, since there won't be a market left for mediocre games and less-than-average miniatures, not even on Kickstarter.

[Nord]

Other manufacturers may go out of business I guess, but if they do it's their own fault for offering overpriced/poorly sculpted product. If you want to keep them going, well done you. Me, I give my money to those who provide a good product in my eyes. Monolith have done that here and I have backed it. Sorry if this offends you.

[Ray Rivers]

Sorry if this offends you.

No, it doesn't offend me.

It is only natural that folks will want to get the best deal they can no matter what the product.

However, I think the wiki states this better than I:

Predatory pricing (also undercutting) is a risky, and dubious pricing strategy where a product or service is set at a very low price, intending to drive competitors out of the market, or create barriers to entry for potential new competitors. Theoretically if competitors or potential competitors cannot sustain equal or lower prices without losing money, they go out of business or choose not to enter the business. The so called predatory merchant then theoretically has fewer competitors or is even a de facto monopoly.

Nowadays predatory pricing is considered anti-competitive in many jurisdictions and is illegal under competition laws. However, it can be difficult to prove that prices dropped because of deliberate predatory pricing rather than legitimate price competition. In any case, competitors may be driven out of the market before the case is ever heard.

In the near term, this benefits the customer. In the longer term, this benefits the producers as, absent competition, they can set what-ever prices they care to as they become monopolies.

The customer wins in the short term... but loses in the long term.

[Duncan McDane]

I think there will always be a market for smaller manufacturers and start-ups, if only for the sympathy-vote.
Look at GW, in the 90's, they did cover a complete game and playable start in the hobby ( be it 40K or fantasy ) at a price, quality and availability nobody could offer at the time. But then, they started to get greedy, drop the hobby part and only wanted to sell more and more plastic at high-end prices and in doing so they created a big and lively market for the competitors, resulting in the Golden Era of miniature Wargaming and Miniatures Boardgaming ( yes, they even licensed out their IP to Fantasy Flight, who made splendid use of it ) and so giving newscomers and niche manufacturers the fertile grounds they needed but couldn't create for themselves.
And I guess the very same will happen with the CMON's and the Monoliths ( when eventually they are big aswell ) of this world. People are starting to compare games and if they are more of the same ( e.g., World of SMOG versus The Others ) with only different models and cards people will get bored of it eventually and look for something else. There's only so much Zombicide people want to have in their house  .

[Timbor]

I get the predatory pricing thing, but IMO that only applies to the box set is all that was on offer. I think the goal of all of these projects is to hook backers with the discounted core set, and then sell the addons at retail price.  I mean, you pay $99 for the core set with 100+ miniatures, but you will pay $60 for some of the expansions with a dozen or less miniatures, depending on which one you choose. That is how they can pay for the core set (which likely they are just breaking even on or have a slight profit).

[Pijlie]

Well, the Pledge Manager is live for the second time. It was withdrawn before I could try the first time, but my second attempt is not encouraging so far.

After a rather confusing bit of wonkily translated text I decided to simply sign up (went OK) and then tried to Login, but that requires a confirmation through a mail I still haven't received. And My email is correct since that is required to Login. Sigh...

Try again this evening. Hope it will work better.

EDIT:
It worked fine. I had to use the original mail-with-link to activate and register. Just so you know it worked fine 

[FionaWhite]

Time for a bit of the old fashioned necromancy, methinks...




... because these lovely (outside of the weight because holyyyy Bastet they're hefty) boxes just got delivered over.


EDIT: some of the actual minis:




DOUBLE EDIT!
Atlas is pretty big:

[majorsmith]

Is the plastic bendy? It's not like gw plastic is it? The figures look great but I'm not a fan of bones or the stuff they make that zombie game miniatures from

[FionaWhite]

Far as I can tell it's indeed not GW plastic but it's definitely something far sturdier than the Bones stuff I've got - the larger things like Zeus' spear can be bent a little bit but retain their
original shape, the smaller things seem like they'll snap if I go and try bending them.

[Duncan McDane]

I believe the official name for this plastic is PVC. Don't have my pledge yet but it looks like the very same material Conan has been delivered. I feel it really shines with the larger models, although the master sculpt wil play a major role ( straight edges versus rounded edges, you'll need to exaggerate deep deial more in order to have it translate into the final production model ) and I will not restart the digisculpt vs. puttypusher ( my favorite means of sculpting ) debate over here 

[Tactalvanic]

It is the same PVC type as Conan, All  in grey.

Having had a brief look at mine the other night, seems they put a lot more effort into avoiding bent bits, as I only noted 1 or to that will need to head into hot water. Or I just got lucky..

Overall the basic pledge and extras are a lot stuff, and the boxes are slightly deeper than the Conan ones.

It does, same with Bones, favour larger pieces. but even the smaller look ok.

I am happy with it to say the least, and hope to sort out playing a game or to eventually...

[Siaba]

I have both pledges and I find MB plastic much better than Conan. It doesn't bend easily and the grey colors makes the details more visible. I get the impression that miniature's quality has much improved compared to Conan 

[olyreed]

As I didn't jump on the Kickstarter could someone please tell me if it is worth getting off of eBay for £200, really fancy getting this but would like to see what you guys might think

[Eric the Shed]

Played the game several times - great fun. The minis are gorgeous.

Is it worth £200? Who knows - I very much suspect it will be worth £100 once the hype has died down (look at second hand sales of Conan - they are flat)