Flames of War

[going a-viking]

It's the way pretty much every other industry designs plastic mouldings, the CAD file is fed straight into the machine to cut the tool. With something like a vehicle it can be drawn more accurately quickly than sculpting.

Organic shapes, ie figures are more realistic if sculpted hence why the Perry's use 3 ups.

Cheers,

Kev

That explains why good vehicle models and good infantry models tend to come from different companies and why several make vehicles but not infantry. Thanks. This has become a short but high quality discussion.

[privateer]

Hello All

Sorry about my annoyed comments before, but Battlefront turned from a passon to something else, once the first ex-GW people got involved. I will not comment on the direction the company has taken as I am still friends with the principle owner (Not John-Paul) and he has a right to set the direction of the company make a profit after all the money he put in to develop it and keep it afloat over the years. They are also a very large employer for the industry and have a responsibility to provide a wage to their staff and a return to the investor. People will always try to cut down tall poppies, but Battlefront do a good job of creating a gaming world that interested people can adopt if they wish. Or not. You can buy the miniatures and don't have to buy the gaming style unless you want to. They created a world that may or not be what you like that is you as the customers choice. Don't like it don't buy into - don't buy into it don't complain. bit like voting - don't vote, don't complain about the people who get elected.

I do not play FOW or have any of the models anymore (take from that what you will) and have gone back to my first, second, third, .... passon(s), War of 1812, Franco-Prussan, SYW and rules writing. Also quite interested in AWBCW. I used to play RF and still like the rules - very modified, because they are quick and easy. They are not rules for anything other than friends playing so they can fix the issues it has, but its fun which is what I believe the hobby should be about. As you may have guessed I am not a competition gamer. I like my tea, cake, wine, lounge chair and miniatures all at the same time

I usual avoid comments about Battlefront and the business model they have adopted but seeing I have broken that by pointing out that I do not want to be assoicated with GW, I feel I might as well comment on what started this thread - that you must use Battlefront miniatures at FOW conventions. I don't see an issue. If Battlefront are running it or are sponsoring it then they have the right to dictate the terms. Its there convention, don't like it don't play. THis is the norm in most sponsorship deals, just look to the Olympic's or the last Rugby World cup. You don't give them money you brand name is nowhere. If Battlefront run or sponsor the event why should there compeditors be allowed in for free. If gamers think the rules for them are different from what is the norm with events they they are deluded. I'm not saying this is right, just the reality. If I but put a lot of money to build a company, employ staff and build a brand then why should I give free access to my competitors. They can run their own events with there own rules. This idea does not apply to any event that does not have the FOW brand on it, the event organisor can choose their own rules and if manufacture puts restriction on them they are within their rights to show them the door in a not so polite way.

Any here endth the lession

Regards

David Brasting

[Fenton]

Thank you for your reply

[Luddite]

In which case, Leon said it best earlier in the thread...

I can understand someone following certain aspects of the GW model, but what I don't get is why they then continue to make the same mistakes as GW.  You can't tell your customers what to do, or force them into a corner, it doesn't work that way.  GW get away with it a lot more as they're dealing with a younger market who probably aren't as financially aware.

I would suggest that the reason this kind of thing tends to extract the 'rage' from many wargamers is that 'the hobby' is at its heart amateur, and anything that smacks of corporate greed and consumer manipulation jars against that.


I wonder if we'll see Osprey start chucking out 15mm plastics for Field of Glory?

[Sandinista]

Was not the Pendraken painting competition limited to Pendraken models only? Did not hear too many complaints about that on here.

[sultanbev]

I would love to see PSC or anyone do 15mm Napoleonics in hard plastic, if they can get the price down to around 7p a figure they'd be on a winner. No use tailoring them to FoG though, you wouldn't know how many command sets to include, as they don't have a figure ratio size for units.

I tend to buy 100 figures at a time for my 15mm Napoleonics, or Lanc Games battlepacks which have c70 foot in, and can generally get figures at around 17-25p each in metal, or 15p second hand.

So if they did a box of plastics 100 line figures at £8-10, command in smaller boxes at 4 sets each (total 4x drummer, 4x officer, 8x standard bearers) at say £3-4, would that work?

But if they do, NO multipose figures with arms sticking out all over the place, that has plagued the 28mm so much that you can't base them in close ranks.

[Luddite]

Was not the Pendraken painting competition limited to Pendraken models only? Did not hear too many complaints about that on here.

Their ball, their rules mate.  Which i believe is the point made adequately by privateer et. al. regarding BF tournaments.  I'm not sure the OP or many others have argued against the fairness of that really.  This thread has, as it probably always will with FOW (or GW) degenerated into a general moan about these behemoths.




Actually, on a serious note:

Why do people think that the most financially successful business models seem to tout some of the worst rules around? 

[sultanbev]

In essence, because wargamers are fussy buggers 

so to get a lot to game using one system the rules have to be fairly abstract and lose a lot of historical accuracy. The fussy buggers (me included) can't stand that so unjustly pour derision on what is in fact a successful business model. Unfortunately their are not enough wargamers (aka customers) for all manufacturers to be on the same scales of production/success/market dominance, which is where many see the unfairness. So when the large operators say "our models only" it looks like they are taking advantage of their dominance. Whereas they are only taking advantage of the lack of customer base.
If there were 200,000 wargamers (like model railways have) in the UK and not 20,000, then this wouldn't be an issue, as all manufacturers would be the size of GW/BF.

Also of course, wargames follow fashions just like every other market. 15mm is merely a fad between the one true scale of 6mm and, oh, two true scales, 20mm 

The daft thing is, 20mm was cheaper than 15mm for WW2/modern, until Zvesda/PSC came along!
Why on earth did anyone pay more for less?

Mark

[Luddite]

Not sure about the 'abstraction' point sultanbev.  There are some excellent and highly abstracted rules out there, so i don't think abstraction neccessarily means bad.

It just seems to me that for some reason the 'top dog' companies seem to produce decent figures shackled down to dreadful rules.  Bafling.

As for scale, i'd say 15mm has passed from 'fad' a long time ago.  I'd say the current primary scales are 28mm and 15mm.  For me, 28mm works, but 15mm never really has.  I much prefer 10mm and lament that the ancients tournament scene went with 15mm rather than 10mm...

[sultanbev]

Sorry, 15mm as a WW2 scale is a fad I meant, not overall. And true, abstraction is not necessarily a bad thing, but there are only certain things you can use if for before it becomes chess with shiny models.

28mm just sucks, you can't do anything in 28mm that you can't in 20mm, except perhaps make more money. The hype it gets in the wargames press is the reason why I don't buy wargames magazines.

I must be of an older class of wargamer. Traditionally you bought what few rules were on the market (or borrowed them from the library  , read them, discarded them and wrote your own, keeping the best bits, and refine them as you go along. My micro rules (which work well for 15mm and 20mm) were written in the late 1980s, and I still use, we have added a CWC type command system, a FoW type recce evade, a SH fire priority system, and uprated to firing by platoons on one dice roll rather than rolling for each tank. And they are free to anyone who wants a copy. But's that only because I don't have the time to put them from working draft to publishable order! I have been advised to publish them by someone in the MoD.

So I tend to not take much notice of the 21st century rules angst that is out there currently. If I need a set of rules, I just write them. And our club and house meet all use them happily.....

Just trying to remember the last set of rules I bought. In date order: CWC, BKC1, DBR and Spearhead/MSH, Korps Kommander and Firefly. 

[Steve J]

Peter Pig allowed other manufacturers models, figures etc at their PBI tournaments held at Portbury Knights. They did not have a problem with this as they knew that their ranges did not cover all of the Nations in the rules. The only thing they did not allow was other manufacturers ranges in the painting competition, which was fair enough IMHO.

[going a-viking]

...  If Battlefront are running it or are sponsoring it then they have the right to dictate the terms. Its their convention, don't like it don't play. This is the norm in most sponsorship deals, just look to the Olympic's or the last Rugby World Cup.

They have a right to stipulate terms but equally we have a right to object.

Mention of the RWC brings to mind a story from 2003 tournament: A small girl arrived at the turnstile for the group match between South Africa and England energetically waiving a England flag bearing the O2 logo. She was told by an official that she could not take it in as O2 were not a official sponsor. At this point a Cornish man-mountain pointed out to this Australian jobsworth that he was wearing a replica shirt which also had the offending logo on it, as did several thousand other spectators, and the official was welcome to attempt to remove it from him. Otherwise would he be so kind as to allow the girl unhindered access.

It is useful to remember the dialogue from Shakespeare's Henry IV Part 1: 'I can summon spirits from the vasty deep!
"Why, so can I, or so can any man; But will they come when you do call for them?"

[going a-viking]

I wonder if we'll see Osprey start chucking out 15mm plastics for Field of Glory?

No. An investment in a manufacturer would be a sensible way to do it. But they will not.

In fact they seem to have lost interest in even the books. Interesting to note the story that Version 2 of the Field of Glory will be electronic-only. This suggested that publishing Version 2 of the rule book and the army lists (of which there are a dozen) is not seen as worthwhile. I would guess that FOG (Napoleonics) is seen as a much better investment.

[Jim Ando]

competion gaming is s***e anyway.

There I`ve gone and said it.

Jim

[going a-viking]

competion gaming is s***e anyway.

It is the same rules that we use in friendly games it is just that the attitude of the some of the gamers is wrong.

Competitions are like clubs: the skill is to hang around with people you like and to keep the encounters with the unfortunates to a minimum. FOW is so popular that this is reasonably easy to do.