"Jesus, has it really been over two weeks since I last posted!"
- Me. Just a second ago, 2011
Life has been busy. Luckily, I took notes. Here are a few of them:
1) Grey Knights Week.
Was a total bust. Tuned out that I just didn't care enough. Not a lot of you did either, if my stats are to be believed. Though I will sum up:
I think its a fine addition to the 40k line. The plastic kits in particular are genius seeing as how you can build almost every GK model out of two kits. The army design is good too, if I'm honest (and I pretend that I don't own a Daemon army). There's this whole 'three armies, one book' thing going on that gives you a ton of options for list construction without kicking over the sandcastles of the people who were still struggling under the old book. Plus, the internal balance is great - none of the force org charts are invalidated by one overly good unit. A good codex, though one I'm not entirely sure is for me. But then again, terminator spam.... But then again, everything is silver...
2) Writing for 3++
Kirby dragged me kicking and screaming into the 3++ fold. I've gotten two posts on some theory (which people hate) and the response has been good. Though it looks like home base may suffer even more now that I've added responsibilities on top of the HoP workload. Though I do have some ideas for doing 'supplemental' stuff for the Kirby posts here. Which could be a great way to funnel people into my personal e-space to stroke my own e-peen in a more... intimate venue.
3) Finecast Reviews
One of the big topics for today. A lot of bullshit has been spewed (spewn?) over the GW price increase. Now that it's become a fact of life and the gaming world as we know it hasn't been destroyed, the next big bitch fest has started - the new Finecast models.
Positive reviews I've seen have tended to be a little limp-wristed. It's not that they're fanboys (which the anti-finecast crowd loves to claim), its just that the reviews seem to be done under best case scenarios. Which is all good and fine, I just need a bit more objectivity.... and technical detail.
Speaking of which, the negative reviews have been about the sorriest collection of words I've ever seen. One guy makes it a point to tell you that you don't have to wash the mold release off and then bitches about the paint chipping. Another guy is shocked and amazed that direct sunlight melts plastic. And then there's the crowd who don't even fucking own a finecast model and are trying to tell me its a bad material. How the fuck would you know? Any 'good' information that manages to sneak in these posts, is quickly overshadowed by the worthless, impotent rage people seem to think there's a need to share.
In either case, (good or bad), there was never a side by side with original metal and no one was bothering to take decent pictures.
Thankfully, the Massive Voodoo writers were there to do what it's authors do best - be rational, objectively thinking human beings who give good information. Their review is, hands down, the best one I've seen. Go read it. And the comments too - they're surprisingly rational considering the topic.
4) Privateer Press
Speaking of all the GW outrage, everyone's favorite lie they tell themselves has been back in force lately - you know, the one were people compare GW and PP and then decide, astonishingly, that PP has a better business model. Despite the fact that they're the exact goddamn same.
The ONLY difference is that PP has bothered to pretend they cars about the internet and hosts a forum - full of the exact kind of bullshit you'd expect from a forum. The perfect place to let rampant and aggressive stupidity to take root. I wonder why, GW gave up on that front?
PP's main game got caught in rules bloat, they switched to an army book format, ditched metal models, released equally expensive plastic models, are getting ready to release an expansion targeted at larger games and publishes a magazine increasingly geared as an advertizement for there own games - Wait, which company is this? Oh that's right, its PP. The company who switched to resin first and then had some production errors they had to iron out. Huh... that also sounds familiar. Apparently, if all it takes is a few lines of heartfelt bullshit surrounding your negative announcements to get the nerd rage on your side, then maybe GW have one more thing to learn from PP. Or was it the other way around?
Hah!
ReplyDeleteThe Privateer Press rant is the best I've seen this year... if someone there isn't smarting and trying to figure out why, they should be.
Good stuff my man.
+4 to #4
ReplyDeleteThanks for #4.
ReplyDeleteNice post. I know what you mean about the Finecast reviews. I noticed a trend with these reviews myself. When the writer bitches about prices, GW, etc. the review is almost always negative. When the writer says they don't care or don't mind the price increase, or something to that effect then the review is almost always positive or at least neutral. Seriously calls into question the objectivity of 99% of the Finecast reviews out there. I read the Massive Voodoo review myself and I agree that it is definitely the least biased review that I have seen.
ReplyDelete#4 also brings up some very good points. The internet sure brings out the best in people, doesn't it? *sarcasm alarm*
Point of order: Privateer Press is currently owned and operated by people interested in the creation and selling of games. Games Workshop is owned and (arguably) operated by people interested in the management of money.
ReplyDeleteTwo differences. I agree with the rest. Still prefer Warmachine, but the similarities are obvious.
Point of order: that's one difference. :)
ReplyDeletePoint of order 2: you have no way of knowing what goes on in the PP bid'ness meetings.
Point of order on your point of order: Including the one you listed? That's two.
ReplyDeletePoint on your other point of order, though.
Grey Knights: They are fine and all, but having about half (I'm optimistic) of the competitive builds requiring Corteaz makes me stop caring about them.
ReplyDeleteFinecast. Yep, the first batchs are rough. But so many ignorant statements about Resin makes me go =/
Privateer Press pays more to the editors of the rulebooks, GW pays more to the sculpters.
That's it. "They have a forum! Thery post on it! They care abut us!" is the pussy-tastic battle cry of the former GW fanboys (and Chaos players) that now fester PP.
Pro stance: Not having a forum in 2011 is simple undefensible. Anti stance: A GW forum would probably be LESS useful than the Blizzard forums.
"OMG GW charges a lot for resin". Yeah, I can't respect the company that charges 85$ for a huge resin lump withouth the quality of a FW sculpt. And, from what I heard, plagued with the same issues from Finecast.
Oh, wait, those are Battle Engines from Privateer "Page 5" Press, so a-ok!
I would agree, Privateer Press is where GW is... or rather, WAS, about 10 years ago. That was back when White Dwarf actually was more than a glossy ad, and featured things like battle reports that were actually reports, and went into tactics and list choices. Back when GW had people like Andy Chambers, Alessio Cavatore, heck even Gav and Jervis were fine, and you actually could meet these people and talk to them. When they had actual community support - PP's Press Gangers follow in the footsteps of GW's Outriders.
ReplyDeletePP is more aggressive in pushing Warmahordes than GW ever was, but GW never had to be. PP also actually listens to and even solicits community feedback in game development - see the field tests before Mark II. Yes, PP changed to resin, but admitted upfront it was because metal cost more, as opposed to "the sculpts will be so much better." PP has also not had a significant price raise, unlike GW.
As for the huge resin lumps, which battle engine are you talking about? The Khador one, most likely, which is designed to look somewhat like a lump. The others we've seen seem to be on the order of forgeworld, if not quite as good, but then again forgeworld has how many years of experience now?
The PP forums have some bad points, as all forums do, but I've found them mostly useful and seen some interesting discussions on there. The ratio of signal to noise is still relatively high at this point.
PP's game temporarily shifted to an army-book format (the next expansions are all-factions-in-one-book, as before), to readjust everyone to the new ruleset. Which, I'll note, they did in one year, with 12 different factions, while adding new models and preparing for the next expansion. When was the last time GW updated all their armies within a year when a new ruleset came out (with get-you-by lists in the meantime)? Closest I can think of is Ravening Hordes, and lord knows there's still 40K and Fantasy armies that didn't receive a single update within a given ruleset.
Long counter-rant is long, I know, but quite frankly PP is more player-oriented and less money-oriented than GW at the moment, and they express it in several ways that GW doesn't, at least not anymore.