Knight Models Switching To Plastic For Batman Range?
August 12, 2017 by brennon
Word has come through from Tales Of A Tabletop Skirmisher that Knight Models might be switching over to Pre-Coloured Plastic/Restic/Resin for their DC & Batman range in the near future.
Above is one of the test pieces that will be coming out showing off their version of Batman in this new material. It's certainly a good change from Knight Models and could possibly be something we see them implementing alongside their Harry Potter range too.
What do you think of this change?
"It's certainly a good change from Knight Models and could possibly be something we see them implementing alongside their Harry Potter range too..."
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Is Infinity the only ‘major’ non-historical minis line left in metal? I appreciate that ‘major’ is a bit vague as to where the demarcation point is, and there are a lot of smaller companies who still do metal. The likes of ArcWorlde, World of Twilight, and Kensei all spring to mind. I guess by major I mean product lines you’d expect to see carried by any games store that sells minis as a major part of their business. Off the top of my head I can think of Malifaux, Guild Ball, WarmaHordes, anything by Mantic, anything by Games Workshop, and… Read more »
There are plenty of metal lines in 15mm and below in non historical lines
There’s plenty in 28mm too, I’ve got a bunch on my shelves, but I’m talking about the industry’s main brands.
Warmachine still makes a lot of metal minis
Are these only old ones or also new ones? The GrRymkin seem to be non metal.
Here’s recent Warmachine releases, there are still a few metal figures trickling out:
http://www.warmahordesreleaseschedule.com/
Beyond the Gates of Antares is still mostly metal, although Warlord are increasingly using plastic for the most common troops.
I think there’s a difference between using plastic so you can get more different poses for rank and file models, and essentially just swapping out metal for resin as a material for the same figure sculpts. But there’s definitely a move away from metal for non-historicals.
It looks as if this is spin cast resin. For reference, this is what GW’s Finecast was. Before anyone has any panic attacks, it can be done much better than GW did it.
Anything can be done better as technology and associated skills improve.
I suspect part of GW’s problem was that their target audience wasn’t expecting that kind of stuff.
Even at the time you could spincast resin to a high quality. It wasn’t a new thing. Their main problem was the material they used was low quality and they weren’t very good at casting it. They may have gotten better over time but they didn’t do it for very long before switching over to hard plastic.
Very much this. One of the BMG community members who tends to be ‘in the know’ was telling me that GW finecast used low quality resin that most people would use to fill voids. KM are apparently using a much better grade.
Having had nightmares assembling the very fine wrists and ankles on the infinity figures, I’d be very happy to send more figures in resin. I hate gluing metal models if I can’t pin them so for me, this is great news. Also, given that multi part metal models might be a barrier for people just getting into the hobby or just wanting a pick up game, this may be an easier way in. Also, there is a Batman board game coming onto Kickstarter at the end of the year which will use plastic so perhaps it’s to try and claim… Read more »
The Batman board game will be 100% kickstarter exclusive. Monolith mentioned this on their facebook.
That sucks.
That sucks but Conan did not do well in retail so I kind of understand.
That’s sad but understandable, I think the market for 100+€ games isn’t that big and weren’t there rule problems at the begining?
I’m really interested in the Batman game but I already backed 2 miniature boardgames this year so I probably won’t back this.
I do hope they don’t pull the Conan game from retail, I’m also interested in that.
I wouldn’t be surprised if what’s currently in distribution is it for Conan at retail. It seems as if Monolith have decided that KS and direct sales are the way to go.
Didn’t the game also suffer from what I like to call “Zombicide” syndrome, with large* ammounts of content that is significant to the game being exclusive to the Kickstarter edition.
* in my opinion, at least.
@iceeagle85 yeah, the rulebooks were pretty bad. I just got the revised books today and they are MUCH better. Given I’d like to be able top lay this game with a broad range of people, the fact they changed the cover of the Heroes Book is a most welcome change as well. @siygess yeah, some of the characters that were locked up as KS Exclusive for Conan made zero sense – the likes of Valeria & Pallentides spring to mind. I think CMON have the right approach with Game of Thrones – so far there’s maybe 2 or 3 actual… Read more »
OTOH … it still is Batman.
With proper marketing this could be huge.
One only needs to look at the 100+$ Batman ‘toys’ that are available to fans already.
I got some spin cast Prodos models a little while back. The quality of the sculpt was amazing to be fair.
I said goodbye to metal miniatures some time ago.
They break, they always break. And if they dont break, the paint scrubs off, it always scrubs off.
Pastic all the way. Which narrows the choice of systems quite a bit, but thats not that bad a thing.
Lets wait and see how good of a job they will make here.
Not sure how people are painting and prepping metal but I have not had any of those issues and I have metal figures going back to the 80s. Oh, and many are BattleTech models that have been heavily used.
I paint like a champ and pin like a king.
But if I know one thing for sure, its that if I drop a plastic Mini, it wont break and wont suffer a single scratch.
But if I think of my Infinity minis… better not.
I don’t like Restic, wouldn’t mind resin or good old plastic.
‘Restic’ is PVC plastic, which is used by most miniature board games as well as the likes of Wrath of Kings and Warmachine. This seems to be spincast resin.
Thanks I thought Mantics Restic is something different than PVC, which I also don’t like to much although the Wrath of Kings minis are very nice.
he looks great.
Looking at this from different perspectives:
As a hobbyist – I’ve got a few of Knight’s metal models and they’re a pain to put together. Can’t be any worse.
As a gamer – short of pre-paints I guess coloured plastic will appeal to a broader audience, and potentially not your traditional hobby gamer. We can hope that many Marvel and DC fans find their way to tabletop gaming via this game – unassembled metal models will be a blocker to many.
To be fair, they could easily cast the figure shown above as a single-piece metal mini; no pinning needed…
The pre-coloured thing appears to be linked to the other major reveal coming out of Knight Models – BMG is getting a new edition. It follows that they may be planning a starter box set and that they will pre-colour the resin minis going into it as that seems to be becoming the standard for 2 player starters these days. The switch in material is in my opinion a reaction to pricing. Along with ‘new rules’ being promised on social media there was mention of ‘new prices’. A few months ago KM put up their prices across the board by… Read more »
Cost is pretty much the only reason you’d switch from spincast metal to spincast resin. You’re still essentially making the minis in the same way, but in a cheaper material which isn’t a commodity and not subject to price fluctuations. I assume it’s also cheaper to ship as well. It doesn’t necessarily mean a price reduction, see GW’s Finecast again, but as you say, they would be smart to introduce one if they can given the price they’ve risen to.
getting sick of companies going to plastic. Metal is now, always has been and until they come up with something decent to replace it, always will be my medium of choice. I have stopped buying many mainstream model lines because of this.
Would love this range if it is in Plastic or Restic but yep there is a but, Im not to much sold on the Restic with the problems customers faced the GW models, another but, but if Knight models have improved since then, then it will be a winner in my book. I have never liked metal models and have always preferred plastic ones. The Joker in Plastic would be awesome. 🙂
I’ve never been a fan of metal miniatures for a wargame. It’s fine if you just want to stick them in a display case but they chip easily and break easily. I also don’t like how many metal miniatures have casting issues although Corvus Belli do seem an exception to this.
I will probably dive straight into this if the miniatures work out.