For context see this thread: WotC Miniatures board
Mike Donais:
Something I noticed that card games were accomplishing was a game that could be played casually and a game that could be played by the core.
Hopefully it will have a simple and quick enough rules system that anyone can play in an hour, and yet an involved enough strategy that people can get really into it. This was certainly one of my many goals while working on D&D miniatures.
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We are not just starting...
The D&D miniatures handbook is all done development.
The D&D minis set 1 Harbinger is all done.
I am currently focused on set 3 in fact.
We actually started working on the game quite a long time ago to get it all done now.
###
Q.Secondly, please be very careful in designing the point costs and relative powers of different game pieces.
I spent a lot of time making sure the costing of different models and different styles of warbands are correct. I hope that the first set starts us off in a reasonable place as far as that goes. As sets go on the costs will get even more exact as I will see what units hold up and people play most.
Q. I hope that rarity of a figure will not depend exclusively on its power.
There are many commons and uncommons that are very cost effective like the common Man-at-Arms with his very good armor class for his cheap cost, or the uncommon Axe Sister with her 50 hit points. When costing I did not take into account rarity. Many factors affected rarity and many factors affected costing but costing had nothing to do with rarity.
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Well I don't know what will happen in the future but I tell you that I don't expect any sculpts to be re-used. For example I have worked on sets 1, 2, and 3 and there are no 2 figures with the same sculpt. In fact in tournaments you can play custom painted versions of the models since each model is unique. You will not get one model painted 3 different ways in D&D miniatures.
As for repeating minis... If people decide they really like the displacer beast sculpt but they can't get any maybe we will re-do it some day. Not really my call, although I might be asked for input on it. We can do things like change the skeletons armor and weapons or give it levels or make it a different race if we want to reprint a skeleton. We could also just re-print him in a different scuplt if we wanted to with the exact same stats.
###
I used to paint and even mold my own minis many many years ago but have not had time in the last few years so I too am very happy to have someone do the work for me. I have been using the minis in my game for some time now and they have been great. One thing I like is that I just toss them all in a cardboard box when I am done since they are so durable and inexpensive. I have not had one break yet.
On the base classes in the D&D miniature book
Your other post guessing what they were was pretty close in a few cases actually. They are designed to fill certain niches for certain styles of players. They are in some cases simpler so that they can be made into miniatures. One of the advantages of the simpler spellcasters is if a friend who hasn't played D&D before says he wants to play a spellcaster you can use these ones. In addition to the two 'simpler spellcasters' there are 2 moderately complex classes with interesting tactical choices to make for the more advanced player. All 4 classes were designed and developed to fill specific niches.
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The miniatures handbook expands a lot on things like scenarios and campaigns. It is about 50% D&D content related to skirmish battles and 50% D&D miniatures content like scenarios and campaign rules etc.
Casters in miniatures have less spells per day to make it more interesting. If you want you can consider that they have already cast some.
We are working closely with RPGA expect to see minis at Gencon and more and more after that.
I know that minis will be used as promos when possible. The exact details of which are all handled by people that are not me though. I would love to see them in cereal boxes though.
I hope to listen to the players, primarily through this forum (WotC - MB), but also at conventions like gencon. Input and feelings on different aspects of the game are great.
As many people already know miniatures are being focused on much more in 3.5 D&D. The rules were written right alongside of the miniatures game rules and they work the same whenever appropriate. Of course you don't have to use minis when playing D&D but I assume that most of the people reading the minis board do.
####
To speed up play but still get the D&D feel we made things do multiples of 5 damage and have multiples of 5 hit points.
So people do 5, 10, 15, 20 damage etc. And the game comes with counters that say '5 damage' and '25 damage' that you can place either on your stat card or on the board beside your injured model. Everything has its hit points rounded to the nearest multiple of 5 also. This keeps the general feel and spirit of D&D but keeps play moving along quickly enough.
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Mike Donais:
Something I noticed that card games were accomplishing was a game that could be played casually and a game that could be played by the core.
Hopefully it will have a simple and quick enough rules system that anyone can play in an hour, and yet an involved enough strategy that people can get really into it. This was certainly one of my many goals while working on D&D miniatures.
###
We are not just starting...
The D&D miniatures handbook is all done development.
The D&D minis set 1 Harbinger is all done.
I am currently focused on set 3 in fact.
We actually started working on the game quite a long time ago to get it all done now.
###
Q.Secondly, please be very careful in designing the point costs and relative powers of different game pieces.
I spent a lot of time making sure the costing of different models and different styles of warbands are correct. I hope that the first set starts us off in a reasonable place as far as that goes. As sets go on the costs will get even more exact as I will see what units hold up and people play most.
Q. I hope that rarity of a figure will not depend exclusively on its power.
There are many commons and uncommons that are very cost effective like the common Man-at-Arms with his very good armor class for his cheap cost, or the uncommon Axe Sister with her 50 hit points. When costing I did not take into account rarity. Many factors affected rarity and many factors affected costing but costing had nothing to do with rarity.
###
Well I don't know what will happen in the future but I tell you that I don't expect any sculpts to be re-used. For example I have worked on sets 1, 2, and 3 and there are no 2 figures with the same sculpt. In fact in tournaments you can play custom painted versions of the models since each model is unique. You will not get one model painted 3 different ways in D&D miniatures.
As for repeating minis... If people decide they really like the displacer beast sculpt but they can't get any maybe we will re-do it some day. Not really my call, although I might be asked for input on it. We can do things like change the skeletons armor and weapons or give it levels or make it a different race if we want to reprint a skeleton. We could also just re-print him in a different scuplt if we wanted to with the exact same stats.
###
I used to paint and even mold my own minis many many years ago but have not had time in the last few years so I too am very happy to have someone do the work for me. I have been using the minis in my game for some time now and they have been great. One thing I like is that I just toss them all in a cardboard box when I am done since they are so durable and inexpensive. I have not had one break yet.
On the base classes in the D&D miniature book
Your other post guessing what they were was pretty close in a few cases actually. They are designed to fill certain niches for certain styles of players. They are in some cases simpler so that they can be made into miniatures. One of the advantages of the simpler spellcasters is if a friend who hasn't played D&D before says he wants to play a spellcaster you can use these ones. In addition to the two 'simpler spellcasters' there are 2 moderately complex classes with interesting tactical choices to make for the more advanced player. All 4 classes were designed and developed to fill specific niches.
###
The miniatures handbook expands a lot on things like scenarios and campaigns. It is about 50% D&D content related to skirmish battles and 50% D&D miniatures content like scenarios and campaign rules etc.
Casters in miniatures have less spells per day to make it more interesting. If you want you can consider that they have already cast some.
We are working closely with RPGA expect to see minis at Gencon and more and more after that.
I know that minis will be used as promos when possible. The exact details of which are all handled by people that are not me though. I would love to see them in cereal boxes though.
I hope to listen to the players, primarily through this forum (WotC - MB), but also at conventions like gencon. Input and feelings on different aspects of the game are great.
As many people already know miniatures are being focused on much more in 3.5 D&D. The rules were written right alongside of the miniatures game rules and they work the same whenever appropriate. Of course you don't have to use minis when playing D&D but I assume that most of the people reading the minis board do.
####
To speed up play but still get the D&D feel we made things do multiples of 5 damage and have multiples of 5 hit points.
So people do 5, 10, 15, 20 damage etc. And the game comes with counters that say '5 damage' and '25 damage' that you can place either on your stat card or on the board beside your injured model. Everything has its hit points rounded to the nearest multiple of 5 also. This keeps the general feel and spirit of D&D but keeps play moving along quickly enough.
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