Mantic Discuss What’s Coming To The Sci-Fi World Of Warpath In 2021
January 8, 2021 by brennon
The world of Warpath might not be getting as much attention as the likes of Kings Of War but there are plenty of fun things happening behind the scenes with Mantic Games for their Sci-Fi universe. The first thing is the addition of new miniatures!
Artificer Leader // Warpath
Past peeks into the vaults at Mantic Games showed that they were going to be growing the Forge Father faction with the Artificers. This subfaction within the Forge Fathers have some impressive miniatures on the way, many of them using reclaimed mining equipment like the Brokkr do in order to defeat their foes. The leader above looks fantastic and I'm getting good Doctor Octopus vibes!
A DreadBall Spin-Off!
As well as new miniatures for your battlefields it looks like we're also getting miniatures for hex-based arenas as well. For example, here we have the Tigrax who will be part of a DreadBall spin-off which is called Arena Wars.
Arena Wars // Mantic Games
Think gladiatorial combat in space and you're on the right path. I'm sure that it won't have escaped people's notice that this fellow and his mount are atop a hex base which means there might be a fun bit of crossover into games of DreadBall anyway!
Firefight, Deadzone & Beyond
Firefight is still being worked on by the folks at Mantic Games and should provide a nice step up in scale for those who have been enjoying Deadzone. Plans are in motion so let's hope that 2021 is the year of Sci-Fi awesomeness and we'll start to see more troops hitting the tabletop in the coming months.
Firefight // Warpath
New Command Protocols are also on the way for those venturing into Deadzone which will be a plus for a lot of folks and a new Two-Player Starter Set is getting tweaked and revised to bring in a lot of the changes that you'll have seen from Escalation too. So, if you're into some smaller Sci-Fi skirmishes then you have a lot to look forward to.
I'm really hoping that Warpath, Firefight, Deadzone and the like all get a big shunt into the spotlight this year. The miniatures from Mantic Games were always cool to see pop up and it would be nice to have a reason to look at Forge Fathers again properly.
Are you still a big Warpath fan?
"I'm really hoping that Warpath, Firefight, Deadzone and the like all get a big shunt into the spotlight this year..."
Supported by (Turn Off)
Supported by (Turn Off)
Supported by (Turn Off)
#Deadzoneislife
Sing it brother
Amen to that
I really hope they listened to past comments, and upgraded Firefight from a D6 system to a D8 system like in Deadzone. That would go such a long way into making the game stand out more against other games. There just isnt enough room for variety on a d6, if you ask me.
I like Mantic’s models, and really like their newer resin ones. I also enjoy Deadzone and Star Saga. I just can’t get the idea of sci-fi battles with lots of models crammed into a small space. It just looks silly to me. Modern warfare isn’t like that so futuristic warfare will probably not be. The whole thing that in order for it to work as a game a pistol range has to be shorter than a model of a tank just feels wrong.
Actually, you couldn’t be more wrong.
Modern warfare involving troops almost always involves multiple squads of soldiers, backed by infantry vehicles, and they take place in areas that are usually smaller then a city block. A city block is the perfect size for any table top wargame.
And as far as I know, a pistols effective range is much much shorter then any tank weapons I know of, so I don’t understand that argument at all.
He’s saying that the pistol range is shorter than the tank model, not the tanks shooting range.
I tend to agree 28mm ranges are terrible they should pretty much all be infinite distance on the tabletop it’s one of the reasons I don’t change ranges if I reduce the scale.
There’s range, and there’s effective engagement range. Outside of CQB, a pistol would only really be used as a last resort after expending all available ammunition for higher calibre and longer barrelled weapons, so I think it’s reasonable to use a short range like 6-12″ to represent the inability of whatever type of soldier to hit and do meaningful damage to an enemy outside of very short range.
yeah but effective range for WWII weapons all extend beyond a 6×4 standard table in 28mm (1:56) with the exception of pistols, so as I said the ranges are far too short, when you go to modern day or sci-fi they are massively out of scale.
To deal with the latter point first, @avernos interpreted my point correctly. I was obliquely referencing a comment I remember Rick Priestley making critiquing 40k as it evolved beyond the original Rogue Trader vision. Basically a pistol with an “effective range” of (say) 6″, when you have tank models on the table that are larger than that seems ridiculous. In itself it isn’t a big deal but that whole artificial effective range thing for weapons, particularly giant sci-fi BFG type weapons kills the absorption for me.
As for the larger point about too many troops on the table for modern/sci-fi type warfare, I would posit that the typical 6′ x 4′ 40k type table is somewhat smaller than a “city block” but that wasn’t really my point. The issue is “Apocalypse” size games that Warpath attempts to produce. Those games when there are not just a handful of squads and a couple of vehicles, but models crammed in a giant car park type effect. 40k apocalypse tended to be promoted that way, and FoW also tends to evolve that way as everyone tries to cram as many tanks into as small a space as possible.
Now, it is always possible to play any game in a way that doesn’t offend your sensibilities – I play Team Yankee and we avoid the car park by being careful not to abuse the points system to min-max, but I do find the need to do that irritating. So it should be possible to play Warpath without cramming the table with models. But my suspicion is that to do that you will not be playing the game at its optimal level. Firefight (which goes with the “a few squads and couple of vehicles” size of force) feels more sensible. Of course we don’t all want “sensible” in our games so I am not criticising others’ tastes. But I do find huge “car park” style games feel silly when we are contemplating supposedly super-weapons with a teeny tiny range and a tiny effect radius.
I should add that I do/did enjoy Epic Armageddon as a ruleset and enjoy Dropfleet Commander too. I like games that involve large numbers of models, but just feel they need to be spread out more – so need a humungous table in 28mm or to be reduced to 10mm or less for a 6×4 table to appeal to my personal sensibilities.
Wow it’s Doc Oc the boglodite and battle cats with the apes now?
I’m hoping arena wars has a lot of crossover with regular Dreadball, it’s a game that deserves a lot more attention than it gets!
The problem with Dreadball, is not whether or not its a great game or not. Cause its awesome. The problem is there are so so many teams out there and really no room to create new teams very easily. There are only so many mechanics you can do, and still keep the balance of the game. I imagine its very hard to create new content for that game.
It has an expansion book coming out next month. 😉
That wasn’t my thinking though, if the same models can be used for arena wars and Dreadball that would be a big plus as interest in the new game could shine more light on the existing one and thus boost its profile.
I think that cross is exactly what is being planned.
At the virtual open day Rob mentioned plans to revisit ultimate and plans beyond as everyone has the board if they play DB but nothing to really do with it
I’m surprised they never released ultimate properly outside of the 2bd edition Kickstarter. I backed that so have everything but it seemed weird not to just ship it.
I think they had plans and they were shelved, but I feel like this bodes well for it’s reappearance for people who missed the KSer
Honestly I always got the feeling that Dreadball 2e Kickstarter did not reach Mantics expectations. At the time their reputation for delivering was a bit shaky which likely hampered it, but they seemed to abandon actively pushing the game almost as soon as it delivered.
They put out the basics like the event deck and new teams in retail boxes but not alot else.
I think there’s room for Mantic to still do things with Dreadball. Why even simply remastering the existing teams and producing them in resin would probably have more than a few veteran players investing in getting a team or two.
The First three seasons worth of teams were HORRIBLE models (lots of tiny parts in a hard to work restic material), The second three seasons (the ones that came out the same time as the Dreadball Xtreme game were a LOT better in a more hard plastic material and requiring very little effort to build (these were the best ones imho). The last few seasons that appeared with 2nd edition came with a change in the material again, and these were “softer” in detail and more like a PVC type material. Not quite as good as the previous range (but leaps and bounds over the first few teams/seasons).
So bringing out those first seasons teams again in resin would probably have more than a few of us investing in redoing some of our favourite teams again.
Dreadball uptake was a bit wierd, it was doing great guns UNTIL Mantic published plans to bring out a second edition (which was about a year before they actually did). And for some reason nearly everyone just stopped playing it, the leagues wound down, and the tourneys at Wargame show just stopped (while everyone waited for the 2nd edition rules to appear). Then when they finally did come out, there was competition in GW’s relaunched Bloodbowl, and Aresta (for the Infinity crowd).
But Dreadball is STILL the best “sports” based mini game, but it suffered from (a) Too many Teams being released (the first three seasons teams would have done fine and it was working as far as the game balance was concerned) and (b) Too many variants (Xtreme et al) that further confused matters and split the playerbase to an extent.
Mantic just went wild releasing stuff for the game with no seemingly long term gameplan (other than hitting SGs during KS schemes to further boost funding). They seemed to have learned from these earlier mistakes and we now see more focused fixed content appearinf for their games.
So the only problem with Dreadball was its initial success. But it’s not going to stop me playing (and if you play Bloodbowl you REALLY need to give Dreadball a try. It’s much faster (think 3 or 4 games on a club night vs a half finished Bloodbowl game in the same timespan) and less of a slog (think of Bloodbowl being more like American Football, and Dreadball being more like Basketball)).
I’d certainly buy the Trontek Corporation Team if it was redone in resin. Alas the current stock that Mantic hold for DB is extremely patchy and you can’t even buy them in restic anymore (in fact only about half the teams are available).
On the new expansion book, I’m in too minds about it. Reworking the teams for better balance is probably going to be my trigger to buy it. But new rules for “assistant trainers” falls into Mantics flaw with the game (bringing out yet more rules to “sell” you more miniatures). The basic game works fine, adding these rules just further complicates things and causes issues with balance (I can already see an issue that’s going to occur that could be gamebreaking for combinations of a trainer and certain teams).
As too a “combat” version of Dreadball. I always thought that was what Dreadball Xtreme was supposed to be (what with no refs so unlimited fouls/combat, exploding terrain and bodycounts in each game (don’t get attached to your team roster when playing Xtreme). So are they just retreading the same game again (just with shiney new minis to buy)?
Ideally from a gamers perspective (and I used to run a league at my local club and own ALL the teams TWICE (in home and away strips) and supplied everything for the games. I feel it would be better to just have the first three seasons teams remastered, the second edition rules and KEEP these items in stock (so new players can buy in). Too much “new” and not enough “tried and tested”, which is a shame and will only hurt the game in the long run and Mantic scramble to try and reignite the passion players used to have for the game.
Right now I’ve got three neoprine pitches (one the outdoors one), three cardboard pitches (from the first edition), two Xtreme pitches, two sets of the Cardboard hexes for their challenge cup mode (we never played that one), and now probably even more pitches/gamemodes to be added. The fun is in the basic game, they just need to focus back on that.
Sorry for the long “rant”, but as you can see I’m a bit of a “fanboi” when it comes to Dreadball and I’d like to see it resurface back into more of a visible/headline product from Mantic. It’s just they seem to be making the same mistakes again that caused everything to fall out of favour the first time around.
…and yes it took me about 3 years to paint up all those teams 😀
I agree. I think Dreadball needs to be morphed to a “monopoly” style boardgame model. There is limited scope for producing new models, other than improving existing ranges, and so any expansions should be careful not to mess up the core game, and all the while the base game needs to be kept available for league play etc so that there is a stable core for new players to buy into.
I’m not sure what you mean by ‘monopoly style’ tbh @osbad?
I do agree and gave been thinking the same about expansion though. Updating the oldest and unavailable team models would surely be the best way to raise interest over more and often niche new stuff.
By “monopoly style” I mean that the core rules are the core rules and they are fixed. THey don’t fluctuate every year. Once they have been locked down they will never change. If you know how to play monopoly, then you will always know how to play monopoly even in 20 or 5o years time. Expansions, reskins, reinterpretations may come along to such games and provide a more interesting experience for the jaded, but the core rules will never change and stay as a classic, and are therefore easy to get into for new players.
But that’s the point of Arena and Extreme isn’t it? They are simply side games that spin off the core Dreadball. Dreadball is always there as the standard 2 pksyer future sport and hasn’t changed drastically since it was first released.
Those look really good.
Arena wars now? Oowah!
I am looking forward to new Firefight. I am looking forward to the Dreadball expansion (started work on new Matsudan team). I am looking forward to new Forge Fathers minis(yay) for Deadzone (yay… THE best Sci Fi skirmisher around)/ I sure as hell am looking forward to seeing what Arena Wars is all about. Could I be looking forward to 2021? Could it be a good year? …… “Shut up Beardragon you crazy old fool you’ll jinx it”
All Deadzone news is great news, because it’s the best game. Fact.
Excited to see how the games are developed, but I wouldn’t expect radical changes, because they’re already good and the Firefight model range has some superb plastics.
#FirefightLives
So.. I just played Mantic’s Armada yesterday and it was a blast… I have a lot of Deadzone (and of course the terrain sees use in a lot of games)… never actually played Firefight or Warpath despite backing one of the KS… and actually was playing Dreadball when Covid hit… so some options or reboots of a hex based game (with crossover!).. and a new look at either Deadzone or Firefight would be pretty cool. Now I have to go look through tubs of models and see what else I still have from those past KS.. lol