[WOTC] Minis Spotlight

[Zappo]

I sincerely can't figure out whether this is a good idea or not. I don't use miniatures, but if I used them...? I don't know.

If I could rely on a good trading market, this would be a great idea; collectors and people with money to spend would gladly give me a big bunch of orcs or whatever I need for my D&D game in return from some unusable rare that I got in my pack. It would take a bit of trading time, but this model can make you save money in the long run.

I, however, seriously doubt the feasibility of creating a decent trading market. The customer base IMO isn't big enough.

 

[Barendd Nobeard]

Cynic that I am, I fear that these paint jobs are the absolute best (marketing pix), and the ones we buy in stores will be worse.

And some of their spin is really hilarious:

If you're new to the world of D&D and/or miniatures, having only two buying choices rather than a catalog of 80 is a tremendous boon.

Huh? If I'm new to the hobby, I'm too stupid to decide between minis? Of course, if I'm new to the hobby, I probably won't see this insult on the web page, but stilll.....

Also, this sentence disturbs me:

Buying the right thing on your first try will be pretty automatic.

How? If they make a mind flayer and it's a "rare" mini, and I want it, what are my chances of buying it on the "first try?" I certainly don't think it's automatic.

Oh, do they mean, there's only two choices, and once I decide what to buy (entry pack or expansion pack), I'll probably buy the right one--unless I just really, really stupid and buy the expansion pack when I mean to buy the entry pack?

Or are they really trying to say that it's just an awesome advantage that you buy the entry pack, and then automatically know not to buy it again?

God I hate marketing.

 

[Ghostwind]

I have to say that I am dismayed looking at these images. First off, my 5 yr old son has toys with better attention to detail. The paint job, while good in theory, looks amateurish. Now whether this is because of the nature of the plastic vs. metal, who knows. I also dislike the random packaging, but like chainmail minis, I think you will be able to find what you what at a low price on Ebay in record time. Another thing I noticed is there seems to be a lack of scale to the minis (which may just be the result of the images), but did anyone notice that the dwarf, gnome and halfling are the same size as humans and half-orcs? What I really want to see is the monster minis and whether they are to scale. I have plenty of character minis in my collection, but always can use a good monster mini (like the Chainmail Otyugh and Owlbear).

Once I actually see them for myself, I'll make a final opinion, but right now it's not a hopeful outlook.

 

[Painfully]

I was gonna try to post something good about the new WotC figure line, but it totally escapes me at the moment.

 

[Majin Cthulhu]

I was tentatively looking forward to this new line of minis, in that I was going to consider buying a case ( or large number of boosters, at least) to fill up my less-than-amazing d&d mini collection, for npcs and monsters. My players would still be using Reaper.

However, after this "spotlight" on how stupid WotC considers its players/supporters to be, I am pretty sure it won't be happening. By implying that players simply aren't smart enough to flip through blister packs on a shelf, I guess WotC is trying to explain why Reaper and Warhammer sell so poorly and why their business model is obviously superior.

And one last thing, Doesn't this just sound like a REALLY bad idea (emphasis mine) :

sealed box tournaments, even sealed-box dungeons or encounters are instant possibilities.

How is it a good idea to open a box of random miniatures and have your players face them?

DM: " Well, lets see what we have here... goblin, orc, barmaid..."
PCs: " Whew, just another barmaid."
DM: " and... 2 owl bears, a mind flayer, and an umber hulk."
PCs: " but we are only level 2, can't we fight the orc & bar maid cartel a little more?"
DM: " sorry, rules are rules... and this is a sealed box encounter."

The tournament makes perfect sense for the sealed box activities and their new mini combat rules, but encounters and dungeons? Color me less than impressed, but i'll quit whining now and go back to lurking.

 

[mmu1]

Did anyone actually look at the numbers they put out?

Out of 80 types of miniatures in the product line, only 20 are commons... But they're going to make up almost 60% of the minis in the packages. And the "rares", which make up 33 out of 80 miniatures in the line, will make up a whopping .8% of the minis in the packs.

Which means that you're not just going to end up with a lot of commons - you'll end up with the same 20 commons over and over, which in many cases will mean that people will actually be paying the price of an expansion pack trying to get one random rare...

 

[satori01]

I found this intresting link:

http://www.kbtoys.com/genProduct.html/PID/2377719/ctid/17/ls/toys

At 3"scale the LOTR figures will be a bit oversized, but from the small pictures they look nice,(the orc crossbow set is something I will definetely pick up and the Balrog figure looks very similiar to the GW sculp). I wish there was some more zoomed in shots to compare. The sculps for these figures look straight from many of the GW minatures.

Wotc minatures will be perfect for children, quick, easy, cheap and you dont have to worry about painting messes.

Relooking at the wotc gallery, I like most of the posses,(wotc cant seem to make a convincing monk pose though), and some of the strap details on cloaks and belts and boots are pretty good,(especially with some touching up).

I think primarily these sets are targeted to first time minature buyers, who dont want the discretionary income disaster of paints, brushes, master maze sets, and 1001 different figures.

I can see some fun with the stat cards, maybe an evening where I would buy a couple of expansion sets, set up a quick master maze, randomly place monsters and hand out random PC type minatures with stat cards, and run a quick one shot adventure.
It would almost be like rolling random dungeons from the 1e dmg.


I cant get over those LOTR action figure though, some like quite good, and that orchish balista will be so bought!

 

[Nikchick]

However, after this "spotlight" on how stupid WotC considers its players/supporters to be, I am pretty sure it won't be happening. By implying that players simply aren't smart enough to flip through blister packs on a shelf, I guess WotC is trying to explain why Reaper and Warhammer sell so poorly and why their business model is obviously superior.

You've summed up how I've felt about this minis project since it was announced. The burning question for WotC isalways how they can get people into the "repeat purchase model." The repeat purchase model is the holy grail of all designs for WotC. They *could* just make and sell what the people actually want, but that's the hard way to go about it (like they'd actually have to consult a couple of actual miniatures enthusiasts and believe what the miniatures enthusiasts say they want). The easiest way to get people to buy things again and again is to essentially put a bunch of stuff in a box, sell it to people, and encourage them to buy the box again and again in the hope that someday the box will contain what they're actually looking for.


I've said it elsewhere and I'll say it here: I find the whole practice almost necessarily incompatible with good design and grossly insulting to the intelligent consumer. I suppose it's no surprise, then, when I say I hope they choke on unopened, unwanted random packs of plastic.

 

[Barendd Nobeard]

And one last thing, Doesn't this just sound like a REALLY bad idea (emphasis mine) :

sealed box tournaments, even sealed-box dungeons or encounters are instant possibilities.

Oh, I don't know. That may be the best thing--sort of "my first dungeon" memories re-created by random monsters in rooms.

 

[Barendd Nobeard]

I've said it elsewhere and I'll say it here: I find the whole practice almost necessarily incompatible with good design and grossly insulting to the intelligent consumer. I suppose it's no surprise, then, when I say I hope they choke on unopened, unwanted random packs of plastic.

For that, Nikchick, I owe you a drink at GenCon!