With Games Workshop on the price hike rampage a few of our players are looking for other options for their fantasy miniatures fix.   While I have known about Mantic for almost a year now I have not entertained the thought of their product line.   We always felt that our money would be better spent on items we knew would move.  But, with some of the recent events in the game industry our players are diligently trying to make the shift from spending more money on less product to spending less money on more product.  So I was asked to look that the rules.

Here is what I found before play testing.

The rules are pretty darn good.

They are simple.

Here is what I like about the game.  The magic system is figured right into the cost of the character.   The winner of combat is determined by a nerve (command/morale in other game systems) check.   It has a fast pace – 2000 point game should take about an hour to play.   The models look good and are inexpensive.

Here is where I have reservations about the game.   While the rules are simple and scale well, if you plan on running tournaments you might need to interpret the rules for your players.  There are no casualties in combat; I just can’t figure out if I like this or not.

Here is what I do not like about the game.  Without play testing the game the only thing I dislike is the fact that it does not use alternate activations.

There is one more thing that Mantic is doing right that you should know about – they are making a sci fi game.