Some of you may be interested in this

Matt Wilson, the owner and founder of Privateer Press got his career started as an artist for AEG, he worked on iconic images like Yokuni and Kachiko.

His company will release a limited edition licensed miniatures through their Mini Crate sub.

I for one am very psyched

https://www.mini-crate.com/l5r/

mods: sorry if this was against policy

That Yokuni mini looks amazing! I still have a few of the old Clan War minis floating around, but these look miles better!

I am really looking forward to these. Hope the run is successful enough to warrant more being made.

****! Glad we are warned quite a long time in advance.

I will ensure I have a free slot every 6 months for $113.

I still have quite a mot of the Clan wars minis; the base box ones, the Unicorn honor guard, several booster of different unicorn units, the unaligned shugenja booster and the 4 Elemental dragons (Void was never made).

In term of design some of them have aged well, some of them not.

So a new line coming is great news!

I myself have an old school Togashi Yokuni, a Togashi Hoshi, and a Tattooed Monk amongst my collection

28 minutes ago, Utaku Ryukko said:

****! Glad we are warned quite a long time in advance.

I will ensure I have a free slot every 6 months for $113.

I still have quite a mot of the Clan wars minis; the base box ones, the Unicorn honor guard, several booster of different unicorn units, the unaligned shugenja booster and the 4 Elemental dragons (Void was never made).

In term of design some of them have aged well, some of them not.

So a new line coming is great news!

Sadly may be more than that as all prices given were US dollars so have to account for conversion rates as well.

That said I am also excited by the concepts although it does raise the question of will Privateer be doing a full game themselves, and if so using what rules?

2 hours ago, Schmoozies said:

That said I am also excited by the concepts although it does raise the question of will Privateer be doing a full game themselves, and if so using what rules?

That's an interesting thought. It seems odd for FFG to license out a full game on top of the minis. That said, Privateer would be a great choice to "outsource" that through. If that does prove to be the case I hope their guy I know from HBS/Golem Arcana gets involved, he had some fantastic ideas for both the game design and OP, despite the game being canned as early as it was.

It seems to me more a collectible figurines than a game. What I didn't get from the video is... are these supposed to come in painted?

5 minutes ago, Mon no Oni said:

It seems to me more a collectible figurines than a game. What I didn't get from the video is... are these supposed to come in painted?

They should be bare metal

@Schmoozies It will probably be resin unless their other mini-crates have been metal. PP has been moving to all resin for several years now.

17 minutes ago, Shadrack said:

@Schmoozies It will probably be resin unless their other mini-crates have been metal. PP has been moving to all resin for several years now.

I'm pretty sure because of low print runs they have been doing them in metal but I could very well be wrong. There are a few unboxing videos on Youtube and they've all looked metal from what I've seen there.

3 hours ago, Kaito Kikaze said:

That's an interesting thought. It seems odd for FFG to license out a full game on top of the minis. That said, Privateer would be a great choice to "outsource" that through. If that does prove to be the case I hope their guy I know from HBS/Golem Arcana gets involved, he had some fantastic ideas for both the game design and OP, despite the game being canned as early as it was.

RIP Golem Arcana. The best minis game I've played in a long time. I was actually a character in the storyline campaign ><

5 minutes ago, Waywardpaladin said:

RIP Golem Arcana. The best minis game I've played in a long time. I was actually a character in the storyline campaign ><

I know. They used to call me...Vareth the Clown. ?

38 minutes ago, Kaito Kikaze said:

I know. They used to call me...Vareth the Clown. ?

Good to meet you again in your Phoenix guise. Gratz on the new job by the way

@Waywardpaladin thanks!

I was hoping for a L5R mini game announcement on Saturday. This seems to point to that not happening.

@Schmoozies Can you please post the links to these unboxing videos? The only ones I was able to find were for the old Clan Wars minis that were made in white metal.

Regarding the new ones, I think it is quite likely they will be in resin. That's the process that has the most advantages for very small run:

-Cheap molds (but unfortunately they don't last long, 12-20 minis each)

-Well adapted for small runs, like a few hundreds

-High details retention

Metal comes in second for these criteria but what makes it less likely to be used is the shipping price due to the weight. A metal mini weights 3-4 times what a resin mini weights.

And I hope they will come unassembled and unpainted. Half of the fun comes from painting them.

36 minutes ago, Utaku Ryukko said:

@Schmoozies Can you please post the links to these unboxing videos? The only ones I was able to find were for the old Clan Wars minis that were made in white metal.

Regarding the new ones, I think it is quite likely they will be in resin. That's the process that has the most advantages for very small run:

-Cheap molds (but unfortunately they don't last long, 12-20 minis each)

-Well adapted for small runs, like a few hundreds

-High details retention

Metal comes in second for these criteria but what makes it less likely to be used is the shipping price due to the weight. A metal mini weights 3-4 times what a resin mini weights.

And I hope they will come unassembled and unpainted. Half of the fun comes from painting them.

Here are a few of the links

And the latest June one from another source

Thank you very much.

Definitely looks like metal. Which is surprising, but understandable for exclusive minis.

I hope they will come in addition of minis for a game (board or skirmish).

1 hour ago, Utaku Ryukko said:

Thank you very much.

Definitely looks like metal. Which is surprising, but understandable for exclusive minis.

I hope they will come in addition of minis for a game (board or skirmish).

I think from PP metal makes the most sense. They are using a resin/plastic hybrid and they seem to be holding off on going full resin for characters where they can. I also expect that they don't anticipate huge runs on these figures so the metal made more sense.

As to game, I could see them adapting the Company of Iron rules for something, but they would need to see a larger line of models to really get it going. We'll have to see what the weekend holds as if there is anything coming this is the weekend I would expect to see it.

On 8/2/2018 at 2:02 AM, Shadrack said:

@Schmoozies It will probably be resin unless their other mini-crates have been metal. PP has been moving to all resin for several years now.

And their resin quality is absolutely horrific and pushed me out of the game.

6 hours ago, Ersatz Nihilist said:

And their resin quality is absolutely horrific and pushed me out of the game.

You must be confusing their PVC based Polymer "Restic" material they used with the Mk2 Warjack kits and some plastic infantry from Convergence (and some Trollbloods) circa 2012. Which is in fact not Resin, and yes, it was crap.

Their new actual Resin process though is miles ahead of that old crap.

If you ever get a chance to look at their new Crucible Guard line, all their plastic is either High Impact injection plastic, or actual resin. Those models look crisp and clean, and if they'll go the resin route they will most probably be the same material/process they will use for the Mini Crate ones.

http://losthemisphere.com/wp/2018/07/crucible-guard-athanor-locke-and-the-toro-kit/

14 minutes ago, El_Ganso said:

You must be confusing their PVC based Polymer "Restic" material they used with the Mk2 Warjack kits and some plastic infantry from Convergence (and some Trollbloods) circa 2012. Which is in fact not Resin, and yes, it was crap.

Their new actual Resin process though is miles ahead of that old crap.

If you ever get a chance to look at their new Crucible Guard line, all their plastic is either High Impact injection plastic, or actual resin. Those models look crisp and clean, and it will be the same material/process they will use for the Mini Crate ones.

http://losthemisphere.com/wp/2018/07/crucible-guard-athanor-locke-and-the-toro-kit/

Existing mini crate minis would beg to disagree with that assessment

Well, if we look at the videos linked here, they definitely look made from metal.

And, to be honest, I very much doubt they will be made from HIPS. For this process, you need to run a lot of miniatures (several 10s of 1,000 to possibly millions) for it to become competitive. The material in itself is good, very good, with crisp details, but for injection you need to make molds from tool grade steels. And this is very complicated and very costly. Also, you can't have any undercut in the model. HIPS material is not cheap but not expensive either.
A bit down in batch size, you have PVC, your standard board game material. There the result depends widely on the experience of the caster and cost allowed. Similar process to HIPS (plastic injection) but you can have molds made from much cheaper steel (probably a low alloyed one). Still the cost of the mold is high so you need a good run to make that process profitable (several 1,000 to a few 10s of 1,000). Here you can have a bit of undercut as the material is flexible but you're risking to have some bending on parts that should be straight due to that. A compromise is to make most of the mini in PVC and the rigid bits from ABS and then assemble them together. PVC granules are very cheap.
Again down in batch size is metal casting, more precisely spin casting. Molds are reasonably cheap made from rubber or silicones, base material is also quite cheap. Batch size are from a few 100s to several 1,000s and even 10s of 1,000 are possible. Details retention is quite good. Drawback is that thin bits can bend and break. The main drawback for that material is the weight. Metal minis weight at least 5 times more than their equivalent in plastic, making shipping them expensive.
And coming last in batch size is resin, more precisely Polyurethane resins. Mold are very cheap (rubber) but they wear very quickly. At best you can cast 20 maybe 30 with a single mold. So you need a lot of them for consequent batches. And the process is long and delicate. Air bubble entrapment is the bane of PU casting, even when you're taking precautions. On the over hand it is probably the material that gives the best details. Drawback is that PU resin is very expensive.

I am pretty sure FFG has done its homework and done a market survey for guessing how many they can sell. I hope they would have enough to choose HIPS. If not I would prefer metal or resin. I somehow think that resin is out. I wouldn't like to have plastic minis, even if PVC casting has made huge progress these last years.