In Place of Chainmail?

[Painfully]

For people who don't like to pay money for things they don't want, having to buy what is essentially a grab bag in the hopes of getting what you really wanted is nothing short of a lottery drawing. Of course WotC will encourage it.

What would encourage me to play is if they have rules to convert ordinary figures (ones that I probably already own) into their system without too much work. THAT, to me, would instantly allow the inclusion of everyone who already owns minis into their system without having to suffer through their lottery system.

If it comes down to a system where I have to guess what I'm buying, then I just won't buy it.

 

[Mark]

Skirmish-Level Rules: Good.
Large-Scale Rules: Really Good.

These are assumptions, aren't they? Have they given details of how these rules will be different from their first attempt at Chainmail?

3. MAKES D&D BETTER
"Each figure will come with D&D and miniature game stats on their card." Buy a bunch of chainmail figs. Place them into bowls, sorted by Challenge Rating or Race or whatever. When you roll a random encounter, grab handfuls as needed. You can quickly reference the stat cards, which will have full D&D (revised) stats. No fuss, no flipping to the "Standard NPC" section of the DMG, no flipping through your ridiculously huge stack of Monster Manual 1/2/Fiend Folio/Creature Collection/whatever books. It's all on handy cards.

"The rulebook will have both Skirmish level and large scale battle rules" Want to run Helm's Deep in your D&D game? Use Chainmail for the mass combat, dropping into D&D rules for encounters with the leaders or for the crux of the battle.

From where is this a quote?

 

[Henrix]

I would like to point out that this (prepainted random plastic minis) is not an announcement, but a rumour.

Jerry at Gamehorizons/Chainmailnews is generally a fairly reliable source, but he is quoting what a Wizards sales rep said, from what the rep had heard at a meeting.

So it is far from certain, yet.

But randomly packed minis don't appeal to me, I want to know what I buy.

Plastic I don't mind if it makes them cheaper and they still are good, and the same goes for prepainted. If the prepainted minis sells more, so the price might be lower, then I'll buy them and strip the paint.

 

[Henrix]

Here's a question. Who's writing the rule - Pramas is with Ronin and Skip is working on mass combat for Monte...

Probably Jonathan Tweet, who wrote the rules the first time around. Monte wasn't involved, and Pramas wrote background fluff.

 

[scarymonkey]

my prediction-

This game will be to WOTC what DragonDice was to TSR - an obvious attempt to jump on a craze that will ultimately be a huge failure. Initial sales will be good and so WOTC (thinking that they finally have their next big Pokemon type hit) will produce a million units. But in the end, it will fail to attract an audience outside of the initial rush of D&D players who just want the minis. The end result will be a mountain of product sitting in their warehouse.

ps- I would love to be proved wrong, but I doubt it.

 

[Zaruthustran]

From where is this a quote?

From the "Gamingreport" news blurb, linked to from the main ENworld news page.

-z

 

[Foundry of Decay]

For those who are stating that the pre-painted plastic will be both high quality material, and high quality paint, I personally don't share your enthusiasm.

While, yes, for a LOT of people who play D&D, pre-painted would be a god send, it leaves the other end of the crowd out in the cold. I can't fathom why the hobbyists would be treated like a scourge because they like both metal, and to paint things the way they see fit.

I like doing custom colors. I couldn't imagine letting someone else paint a character model for me, but I do completely concede that such worries are my own alone. So why not do both metal casts, which are more expensive (I don't mind paying extra for mulit-part metals), and plastic pre paints for folks who just want to jump into the game without a hassle?

I refuse to buy low quality plastics like this. I don't care how utterly great a carver is, you will NOT get the same detail with plastic that you do with metals. Even with the high quality hard plastics from Games Workshop, you will notice places where the mold has lost detail. Be it on ears, on facial features, on belts, or otherwise, the quality is sub-standard compared to metals.

Also, remember that the pre-painted miniatures are going to have some 'group identifying' factor on them. Bright blue bands on their arms, legs, or even hair, or bright red for the opposite side. The rumors are that this is a collectable game, remember.. Now you have to ask yourself: Do you really want your Gnome fighter to have blue hair/arm-bands/boots?

I don't play wargames myself. I have so little time free as it is, and that is dedicated to D&D. I would rather side step the stupidity of trying to buy boxes and boxes of say.. Dwarves, just to try and get a Stone Giant model. I wan't the damn stone giant, just let me buy it already. Especially since I buy miniatures maybe once every 4 months (I just don't have time to go to a store so far away to comb through box after box of Gawd forsaken dwarves in hopes that I'll get a giant that is 'rare'). I'm sure a lot of people here are driven right up the wall hearing rumors that this indeed might be a collectable game.

Finally, and yes I realize my reply is a random mess , Don't be fooled into thinking that the plastics in this line will be anything like the hard plastics of the GW line. They will be more like those horrid things from Mage Knight. You know, the rubber that makes a bent sword bent for all eternity? It costs a massive amount of money to do die-cast, which I believe the GW hard plastics are. It also costs a monilithic amount to use that grade of material, but GW makes that back due to sheer volume, and pricing on their alternate products. I'm pretty sure WOTC won't be dropping that many dimes into miniatures again.

 

[Regdar]

The Metal Figs for Mage Knight were not very successful. Regdar believes that if indeed the runor is true, this is a way for Hasbro to become more involved, since it will most defiantly be their production avenue. With that they can get into WalMarts and whatever, to get kids buying them.

 

[Pramas]

Probably Jonathan Tweet, who wrote the rules the first time around. Monte wasn't involved, and Pramas wrote background fluff.

That's not quite accurate. There was a design team for Chainmail. Jonathan was designated as lead designer, but Skaff Elias, Andrew Finch, Jennifer Clarke Wilkes, Robert Gutschera, and myself were on the team that developed the rules. Andrew and Robert later dropped out, and were replaced by Rob Heinsoo and Skip Williams. There was also later a development team with folks like Mike Donais, David Eckelberry, Bruce Cordell, and Charles Ryan, all of whom made valuable contributions to the rules development as well.

I know Jonathan Tweet and Rob Heinsoo are involved in the new game. I'm sure other R&D folks are involved as well, but I don't know who.

 

[Mark]

From the "Gamingreport" news blurb, linked to from the main ENworld news page.

-z

Thanks.