I like em! And I like the brave new world of the Sigmar setting ... I mean, recycled Tolkien starts to wear thin after a while. Sigmar is a lot more crazy-a$$ed surreal Michael Moorcock than hobbitses and bagginses.

Now if only there was the beating heart of a great game under all that bling... I guess I'll just have to get my aesthetic kick from GW, and put RW on the table!

39 minutes ago, banjobenito said:

I like em! And I like the brave new world of the Sigmar setting ... I mean, recycled Tolkien starts to wear thin after a while. Sigmar is a lot more crazy-a$$ed surreal Michael Moorcock than hobbitses and bagginses.

Now if only there was the beating heart of a great game under all that bling... I guess I'll just have to get my aesthetic kick from GW, and put RW on the table!

Fair enough. Something tells me you've spent a lot more time in this hobby than I have! I guess I'm not at the "starts to wear thin" stage yet.

58 minutes ago, banjobenito said:

I like em! And I like the brave new world of the Sigmar setting ... I mean, recycled Tolkien starts to wear thin after a while. Sigmar is a lot more crazy-a$$ed surreal Michael Moorcock than hobbitses and bagginses.

Now if only there was the beating heart of a great game under all that bling... I guess I'll just have to get my aesthetic kick from GW, and put RW on the table!

Okay I feel like this thread is devolving into this. I got these awesome models for this one game when I want THIS game with awesome rules to have awesome models too, but can't due to FFG going with a different style. I doubt we are going to get anything super crazy detailed at this point.

See, personally, I hate GW/AoS aesthetic. Its wildly overdesigned and hideously busy.

RMG is more fun. Detailed without being too busy, and stylized well.

The skeletons look like they just rattled their way out of Jason and the Argonauts, and that alone is enough to put them far ahead of almost any other undead sculpt on the market for me.

Just now, Tvayumat said:

See, personally, I hate GW/AoS aesthetic. Its wildly overdesigned and hideously busy.

RMG is more fun. Detailed without being too busy, and stylized well.

The skeletons look like they just rattled their way out of Jason and the Argonauts, and that alone is enough to put them far ahead of almost any other undead sculpt on the market for me.

Just need one with a bone flute and a trumpet now....

Just now, TallGiraffe said:

Just need one with a bone flute and a trumpet now....

I may or may not quote Army of Darkness every time my skeletons get hit with morale.

"Lets get the hell out of here! Aaaaahhh!"

so lets all agree, some people like the models, some people don't. Is that enough to hurt the game? (which I assume is why @banjobenito was bringing it up?) Probably not but it is too early to tell. I know some hard core painters that would probably jump on this as something they can make look good fast then focus on other more complicated nonsense...In fact I have a friend in Seattle that is upset he can't find people interested in this game.

23 minutes ago, jek said:

so lets all agree, some people like the models, some people don't. Is that enough to hurt the game? (which I assume is why @banjobenito was bringing it up?) Probably not but it is too early to tell. I know some hard core painters that would probably jump on this as something they can make look good fast then focus on other more complicated nonsense...In fact I have a friend in Seattle that is upset he can't find people interested in this game.

Would it be fairto say that RWM is a game for gamers and AoS (along with others) is a game for painters and modelers?

I'm too inexperienced to know.

4 minutes ago, Fritz66 said:

Would it be fairto say that RWM is a game for gamers and AoS (along with others) is a game for painters and modelers?

I'm too inexperienced to know.

I'm a painter/modeller more than a gamer, honestly.

I love RMG, and won't touch AoS.

I've come to prefer PVC to styrene for models. The sheer indestructibility of a paint job on PVC makes me feel like they're more worth my time.

5 hours ago, banjobenito said:

"RWM is also still pretty cheap. 25USD for 8 models and their tray/cards? 40k will only give you 1 model at that price."

I disagree. Here's some Daqan I've been painting up that will drop at £25 when they are out:

And here's a Thousand Son from a squad of ten chaos marines, from 40K, I bought for yep, you guessed, £25:

::snip::

And herein lies some of the disconnect. GW is a British company that bases their prices to the pound, while FFG is an American company that goes on USD. A box of rubrics here is $50 (and along with Skiitari one of the few almost decent deals GW has). Still, if they are converting USD straight to GBP, that sucks. Maybe find a different source? Did the core really set you back 100 pounds? Yeesh....

And as to the other point, yeah, the minis from the company with more than three decades of experience doing this sort of thing are better than the relatively new kid on the block. That being said, I don't have time to pick out all that detail on one single member of a squad of ten (with 5+ squads in the army). Once upon a time, sure, but no more. The more basic details on RWMG (or are we doing RMG?) minis mean once I get some time, a few coats of paint and some drybrush work and a wash/dip and I'm good to go at tabletop level without looking sloppy.

FFG knows how to make hyper fine detailed miniatures. The imperial assault line is brilliant in this regard. As is the x-wing and armada lines.

The rune Wars miniatures are clearly focused on the depth of their details not just the fine serface details. The depth makes them easy to paint.

What makes me a little sad is they are not primed and assembled like the dust tactics miniatures were. A color prime coat would have made it so much easier for new players to paint and play.

I also sort of feel they are charging a bit too much for individual units or should instead have larger products that are better deals. For example I would rather buy 12troops for 30 than 8 for 25. Also larger troop packs would waste less cardboard

Color prime coat would also have pissed off a lot of us that dont like that color.

14 hours ago, taylorcowbell said:

So, Ill give an opinion from a relatively unrepresented viewpoint here.

I have one game with miniatures that are painted. Thats heroscape.

Heroscape fans unite!

30 minutes ago, Vineheart01 said:

Color prime coat would also have pissed off a lot of us that dont like that color.

Just prime on top of it. Factory applied primer is really really thin.

14 hours ago, taylorcowbell said:

I have one game with miniatures that are painted. Thats heroscape. And as far as Im concerned, theyre painted well enough.

Yay Heroscape!

And they're a great example of the dip and dry shading method...

I can see the warcraft-ieness in the miniatures the OP posted. I never saw it until pointed out, which means it is rather subtle. It also depends on the the paint job given. Those minis in those example pics seem to have warcraft in mind. Other minis do not.

I think Runewars is intended to be more accessible than other miniature games. Which means easier to paint and cheaper costing figures.

That may or may not be a good thing, depending on who you ask.

Interesting discussion but I too must disagree on most points with the OP.

For one, I don't think the quality of miniatures has nearly as much to do with the success of a miniature game as you suggest, the audiance that cares about such thing is definitely in a tiny minority of the general miniature gamers. Armada and X-Wing have already proven that. These where pretty low level quality pre-painted and pre-assembled mini games and the success of these games and size of the audience is undeniable. Simply put, the game (mechanics) are far more important than the quality of the mini's. This is also supported by the fact that most mini games in the Gamesworkshop arsenal have largely died out despite the fact that they are of the highest quality available on the market and its precisely because of the commitment required to assemble and paint these far more detail and complex models. Its not something casual gamers aspire to. Casual gamers want their armies painte and done so they can play the game and this represents the overwhelming majority of mini gamers.

There is a far bigger market open to FFG with Runewars because the hobby aspect of the game is far more approachable, I would only echo what a lot of people have said and what is very true about table top gaming in general. While there is a very small portion of the community that is super dedicated (super fans) that will put different aspects of gaming under a microscope, write reviews, maintain collections, participate in the community and effectively get super involved in everything, the overwhelming majority of people that actually buy and play the game are casual (part time gamers) who will never come to the forums, review games or share their experiances. Take for example board gaming and boardgamegeek. People might assume that the ratings there are accurate in terms of popularity but the reality is that in the top 50 games on boardgamegeek represent an almost entirely insignificant popular opinion in terms of number of gamers. If every gamer out there voted on the top games it would be games like Monopoly, Stratego, Texas Holdem and Chess that would be at the top of the list.

The same is true about Mini games. Gamesworkshop is very successful with their miniature lines largely as a result of being the most well known and established. But they have been losing ground for years despite setting the increadibly high standard of miniatures and its because they haven't kept up with modern design. As new, streamlined and modern games get introduced and the communities grow, its far more likely more people will play Runewars because its far easier to get a painted army to the table then they will say Age of Sigmar or 40k where the hobby aspect is incredibly complex and time consuming requiring a huge commitment from a player before he gets mini's to the table. It takes longer to simply assemble an army for 40k then it does to assemble and paint one in Runewars.

What Runewars has really done is set the new standard for miniatures, one that is simpler and more approachable, far more attractive to a far wider audience. It might not be what hardened Gamesworkshop veterans were looking for but as you can see from posts here, even long time Warhammer fans are largely represented by more casual gamers then super fans.

Gamesworkshops biggest failings are their game mechanics, simply put they are quite terrible, but in a lot of ways the complexity of the assemble and pain hobby in their games is also very complex making it less likely to attract casual players.

FFG has nailed it with Runewars in terms of understanding the untapped market, they really aren't targeting Gamesworkshop elites, they are targeting everyone else which is the overwhelming majority of the mini market.

Just want to throw in a few cents to say that while the estethics is subjective, GW makes some fantastic minis. Sure, oversaturated and obsessively sculpted and at times with lack of imagination, but they are beautifully done and often with a sense of qction qnd movement.

Being a long time lover of the old world, i still dont have issues with AoS. Its take on fantasy is that of gods and epics, Norse and Greek mythology mixed into a bowl of insanity as opposed to running around the sewer muck trying to survive in a world that doesnt even know you exist.

Just wanted to get some AoS love in here, RW has its own design and its modls reflect this nicely. I dont prefer it, im not overly impressed with RW minis, but they do their part and the game itself is amazing so its all good!

Just want to throw in a few cents to say that while the estethics is subjective, GW makes some fantastic minis. Sure, oversaturated and obsessively sculpted and at times with lack of imagination, but they are beautifully done and often with a sense of qction qnd movement.

Being a long time lover of the old world, i still dont have issues with AoS. Its take on fantasy is that of gods and epics, Norse and Greek mythology mixed into a bowl of insanity as opposed to running around the sewer muck trying to survive in a world that doesnt even know you exist.

Just wanted to get some AoS love in here, RW has its own design and its modls reflect this nicely. I dont prefer it, im not overly impressed with RW minis, but they do their part and the game itself is amazing so its all good!

I love some of the GW minis and I hate some of them. I must confess to not being a fan of the minis in RW, but they are decent tabletop faire.

There is nothing stopping anyone from subbing in minis unless you intend to play at the premier FFG events.

I know my Daqan will have GW minis for friendly games (hawk theme) and a fully painted set of FFG minis for FFG sanctioned games.

I'm trying to formulate this as nice as possible because i hear this point often raised by the hardcore mini players. You are missing the point entirely, these minis are easy to paint, you get a ton of them in the core set and they are consistent in style. There's not an objective this is "better" because better doesnt always equal to more detailed. There's a huge chunk of people who just want to get them painted and then be done with it. These minis are much easier to speedpaint than the Infinitystuff i have and they look great for what i did for them. This is not a hardcore game and neither are the minis, and i still think they did a fantastic job. I'm very happy they didnt go with this hyperrealistic serious design that GW is spitting out. A mini has more factors than the amount of details it has. I also have more people who are painting their Zombicide Minis on a (for the hardcore people) atrocious level but they enjoy it.

Material, ability to be painted quick, how it looks unpainted or only primed (!) ease of assembly, ease of transportation (i hate metal) are a huge factor that the hardcores just easily dismiss and forget that they are not in the majority, people who spend 1h+ on one mini are in the vast minority yet they are loudest to downtalk the minis (much to confusion of the casuals). If you hate the minis don't play the game, but there's no objective bad or low quality to them as people approach their games just different, period.

Infinity was meant to be played with 10-15 miniatures. That changed to 13-20, but it's still a small ammount. Let's you spend a whole evening with one or two miniatures and still have the new miniatures ready for the next tournament. There are no squads, so you focus on individual miniatures

RMG need a lot more miniatures and they generally work on groups. The good group aspect is more important than the individual aspect

9 minutes ago, druchii7 said:

Infinity was meant to be played with 10-15 miniatures. That changed to 13-20, but it's still a small ammount. Let's you spend a whole evening with one or two miniatures and still have the new miniatures ready for the next tournament. There are no squads, so you focus on individual miniatures

RMG need a lot more miniatures and they generally work on groups. The good group aspect is more important than the individual aspect

That exactly another reason, yet people think what works for them is best for everyone else. GW Players are used to paint a gazillion minis with great care.

@BigKahuna X-Wing and Armada...low quality? Um...what? Granted the very first expansions for X-Wing weren't astounding, and there is some inconsistency from time to time (and Black One from heroes of the resistance could really benefit from a wash or some shading), but...really? For pre painted miniatures the quality is absolutely astounding, especially with recent releases like the ARC or Quadjumper (both ugly ships with gorgeous paint jobs). In fact, the only reprint I've ever seen that I think is on par with the base paintjobs is a really good Kath Scarlet I've seen floating around.

Anyway, I guess my point is that this proves that aesthetic is a purely personal opinion. I do agree with you that the style of the minis will help, rather than hurt the game (although they really should do an insert describing the hot water/ice method for straightening spears and repositioning rune golems so they rank up properly).

I think it's great that the minis go together so easily (and only one way). As an example, I've been involved in GW games in some way since the 90s, and even now I screw up assembly. The new Eldrad model that came with the Death Masque box got his foot removed due to a single careless snip, and his staff is certainly not under the fold in his robe where it is supposed to be.

Also, even established companies have some really cruddy quality from time to time. Privateer Press has been doing this for almost 15 years, and their recent Mark 3 two player box comes with an entire faction (the cygnar models) that are almost impossible to assemble properly, and I don't know why, but their plastic formula (or is it resin now?) does not react well to the hot water method of straightening.

With the RWMG core I may have spent as long straightening spears as I did assembling models, but there was only one truly warped piece (one Rune Golem stand that still fit, just needed some forcing) and 0 miscasts. Say what you will about the aesthetics, but their quality control is pretty spot on for their first foray into this type of miniatures game.

9 hours ago, maxam said:

Yay Heroscape!

And they're a great example of the dip and dry shading method...

As someone that is new to painting, Heroscape and Heroclix minis are actually what I'm using as my benchmark. It's a low enough bar to not be intimidating, looks good enough on the table, and is likely the quality the minis would have been if they were pre-painted.