Big spender me
November 10, 2013I haven’t bought a lot of miniatures recently, but I have pledged to a few Kickstarters. A short recap:
This was actually a joint pledge with people from our D&D group. The game has been going on for years, and we’re using a varied collection of miniatures and Descent board game pieces. We figured that a selection of generic fantasy stuff wouldn’t do any harm, although it’ll take ages before we actually get the minis. All the more reasons to keep the game going! Bones 2 was of course massively funded, making over $3M with almost 15000 people joining in. While most of the minis will find use in role-playing games, there are a few lovely weird creatures in the Numenera range that’ll find their way into scifi games as well. Mashaaf the Great Old One is a nice example.
Prodos Games Alien vs Predator The Miniatures Game
To any reader of this blog it shouldn’t come as a big surprise that I got in on this one. I was a bit hesitant at first – at £75+£10 for shipping it’s not pocket change. However, it looks like it’s taking off quite nicely, so there should be plenty of lovely free add-ons and the like on the way. I didn’t go for the bigger pledges, since I already have more Aliens, Predators and Colonial Marines than I have time to paint them. Still, I can’t really miss it, can I? It’s about time someone picked up the licence! From what I hear, Prodos Games has done a nice job on bringing back Warzone, so my hopes are reasonably high.
Anvil Industry is a small UK company mostly known for their 40K conversion parts and such. AFTERLIFE is a game of their own, which I mainly chose to back since I liked the look of the minis and because Anvil Industry seem like a nice, small company. Joel, one of the directors, basically sold me on the Kickstarter over on LAF simply by being a nice guy and being very open about their policies regarding their project. Not a bad job! Free shipping is a lovely, added bonus. There’s still six days left in the Kickstarter, so do consider joining in – £21 gets you six resin minis and a bunch of artwork and background material. I went in for £45, which gets me 19 minis, the background material and possible stretch goals.
That’s my Kickstarter world for now. Any other interesting ones out there?
Dawn of the Lead 
Have you seen the battle system terrain offer? Looks real nice, better then just papercraft. I would consider but I don’t do enough sci-fi to justify the expense.
I’m really saving up for the upcoming Pulp City kickstarter, but the Journey to the West game looks really good. It’s just that with Bones, HellDorado, Sedition Wars, i have just a huge pile of unpainted minis that I’m loath to spend more.
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Oh my, the Battle System stuff is really tempting. Then again, £70 is £70. Argh. It’s really a nice time for Kickstarters, it seems. Thanks for the comment!
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I backed Mars Attacks because the miniatures have crossover appeal for a number of my projects, plus I like the IP and the game authors previous work. In particular I am looking forward to playing the co-op game against a deck driven Martian force. Beer and pretzels fun, like the zombie AR:SE games that I have played.
I pledged for a few of the Bones II extras, including Mashaaf and the Numenera stuff. All fodder for my Alien Flora and Fauna project.
Im in for Battle Systems too… I had given up on the idea of miniature gaming in interiors because of the hassle, planning, expense and time-consuming work involved in getting a sufficient amount finished. After the fantastic return on my investment that I got with my Zuzzy mats a few years ago I am hoping for a similarly final solution to my interiors with the Battle System KS. So thats more cash outlay, but I am hopeful that I will get good return on it.
Something has to give financially though, a line has to be drawn somewhere. For me AVP has to be one of those casualties. I would like to have some of those miniatures (just the Aliens as yet. the Predators and the Marines dont interest me, even though they look like good models) although the game system that they are due to release is an unknown. From what I saw of the Warzone rules I dont expect anything decent though.
I bought a Warzone Cybertronic starter in the previous Prodos KS and the models are lovely and the material that they are made from is top class. I dont need more Aliens stuff though: it will just sit in a box. I expect a far better return on my investment from the Battle Systems corridors, plus the same amount spent on AVP would only get me a handful of figures. I would like a Dropship though, although I expect that the price will be prohibitive one way or another.
I really wanted to support Afterlife, but more sci-fi/near future armoured humans are simply unnecessary for me, so I cant justify it. Again, I probably wouldnt get around to painting them, although they look really nice.
The Proxy Army 3D printed miniatures project really interests me (I used to work in 3D printing years ago and I was always waiting for the tech to catch up with with my toy soldier ideas) but the international shipping for that project is excessive. If I lived in the US I would hold on to the ten-custom-miniatures-for-$55-including shipping pledge, but with $45 shipping it becomes ridiculous, so I am avoiding that. Its a glimpse of the future though.
Bloody Kickstarter.
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It really seems to be something of a golden age for scifi Kickstarters (or SFSKs as we pros call them). The Mars Attacks KS has a lot of things going for it, but for me it falls into the “no” category, as I simply have far too many survivors already, and the aliens are too pulpy to be usable elsewhere. I am considering picking up some of the terrain pieces though…
To be honest, it’s not like I need any more Aliens/Predators/Colonial Marines, but then again how could I resist? Eventually I’d just beat myself up for not getting on board. Afterlife is something I really have no need for, but I’m supporting them simply because I like them. In fact, they were kind enough to inform us backers that some early bird slots had opened up – saving us money and eating into their own profit. That was a genuinely nice thing to do, and I think I’ll compensate them for it. With so many huge KS projects these days (you know, “Yeah we’re asking for $10K but what do you know, we just made it in 3 minutes and oh, here are our stretch goals up to $3M”), it’s nice to support a smaller, more reasonable offering. I have tons of SF military already, but hey…
I looked over Battle Systems, and man, that’s tempting too. Still, for now I’m going to be sticking to Space Hulk tiles and Ainsty props for 2½D gaming.
Bloody Kickstarter indeed.
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