scowling

Favourite sculptor of human-types: Werner Klocke Favourite sculptor of monster-types: Jason Wiebe Favourite dragon sculptor: Sandra Garrity Overall, my fave would have to be Klocke, edging out Wiebe by a nose. I don't like Garrity's human-types very much at all; the faces are too small and too proportional to the rest of the model. I like disproportionate heads that beg for painting attention. The Perry Twins (Games Workshop, Foundry, etc.) are my second-favourite sculptors of human-types, and Chris Tubb (Mithril) is a close third. There are many other sculptors whose work I seek out. Mark Copplestone was mentioned earlier; I really like his stuff. I frighten the folks at the FLGS when I can point at a figure and say "X sculpted that; I like his work." :) And, as I've said before, Dennis Mize is my least favourite sculptor. I'd rather that Reaper (and any other company he sculpts for) not cast a figure at all than dilute their reputation for quality by contracting Mize. I will agree that Mize's skills have improved since his absolutely terrible work for Partha, but that's damning with faint praise, like saying a pres-schooler's finger-painting is getting better.

HeroClix isn't drawing away Confrontation fans away? Really? I must not exist, then.

Yup, mass market big sellers only is what Hasbro demands. As such, WotC will be unlikely to produce any D&D products other than hardcovers, novels and plastic miniatures for the foreseeable future. Heck, we're going to be seeing as many as three new d20 hardcover game supplements a month. It's gonna backfire, though: as a 'casual' D&D-er, all I was buying from WotC were the hardcovers. Not a big investment, with only one hardcover release every few months. Now, unfortunately, they've lost my dollar completely. I gave Fiend Folio a pass. All that said, I've written before that the random pack system is an extremely good idea for everyone; few SKUs for retailers to deal with, it attracts both the gamer and collector markets, it encourages a secondary market, single figures will be *cheaper* than metal figures, pre-painted makes for good-looking games straight out of the box, increasing the visual appeal of the game and attracting new players... Basically, there's no downside. As long as it sells in Mage Knight numbers (and there's every indication that it wil sell better than the last several Mage Knight releases based on the reaction from the trade press) it's here to stay. And it will be the traditional metal miniature manufacturers, like Reaper, who will have to adapt to the new marketplace.

The new Displacer Beast was released in the Kilsek boxed set. I bought eight boxes, just for the Beasts. And the sculpt was, again, more or less split down the middle. I'm looking forward to the Reaper version. The Green looks nice.

I'm having more fun playing Heroclix a couple of times a week than I've ever had playing any game on a regular basis ever. But anyway... I think the game will do very well for WotC/Hasbro. They didn't just pull this idea out of thin air -- people have been clamoring for cheap prepainted D&D-compatible figures for years. They're giving the people what they want, and producing it in a format that is a proven seller (random packs). I'd be very surprised if it bombs. Chainmail II will fill a niche. Reaper fills another, smaller niche. But I doubt I'll buy much Chainmail II, while I continue to buy more Reapers than I can paint.

Of course it's an opinion. And I never said that metallic paints can't or don't simulate metal in microscale; I said that they don't simulate it very well. Check this out: http://www.coolminiornot.com/index.php?id=2340 In my opinion, this looks better than any metallic paintjob ever could, and I've seen some good examples of metallic paintjobs -- but never a "spectacular" example. You make the bold claim that "NMM is not realistic"; the above paintjob is completely realistic -- and spectacular. That the "gleam" doesn't shift when you turn the model doesn't matter; the "gleam-shift" using metallic paints doesn't accurately reflect full-scale, either. No matter how one works, one has to compromise. To each their own. I wish I had the skill to do that kind of work. I don't, so I usually use metallic paints. Given that quality NMM work sells for two or three times as much as comparable metallic work and NMM is winning pretty much every award at every major competition, NMM is artistically defensible.

Metallic paint does not simulate metal very well. Skilled NMM does simulate it very well. There are very few people who can do NMM effectively, though, and most of the Rackham painters are *not* in that group. Rememebr that you're painting an object that's about 1/50th the size of a comparable original object; the reason we need to spend so much effort on shading and washing is because they need to be fifty times as stark as they would in 1:1 scale. If you were to paint a 6-foot statue of a barbarian, you wouldn't need to shade or highlight his loincloth; natural light would take care of that. Similarly, metallic paints don't simulate metals very well in microscale. I've seen some NMM that is indistinguishable from what you'd see "full size", using the same kind of techniques that would be used to paint (say) chrome on a 2-d canvas.

The Giant Bat is Jason Wiebe; he said so on the Yahoo group. I think he said the same thing about the Elephant, Rhino and Gator guys (the Elephant guy was shown on another site).

Wet highlighting: highlighting by using wet paint. Use multiple layers of slightly thined paint and paint on the highlights instead of drybrushing them on haphazardly.

Don't drybrush anything except hair and fur. Use blending and wet highlighting instead.

Then why even participate in this thread? Didja see the subject? I say again: life is too short and money too limited to pick books (or movies or wines or records) by trial-and-error. (And the best critics *can* do what they criticize; the concept that critics can't is both a fallacy and disingenuous.)

Someone by definition must be superior, so it might as well be me. :)

I have to disagree. There are so many books in the SF/Fantasy genre alone that nobody could possibly read them all in their lifetime. Hence, looking to a cogent criticism of a book is the best way to minimize the amount of time spent reading crap. It is disingenuous to imply that many people denounce writing due to personal preferences or lack of personal success. Didja know that there are only about thirty North American SF and Fantasy writers who are able to earn a living at it? I sure as heck don't want the kind of 'success' that results in starvation. :) Me, I'm denouncing some authors because they are untalented and I would rather see people buy and read quality fiction. When bad fiction sells, it encourages publishers to publish more bad fiction. Then again, I sold books for a living for ten years, have a degree in Writing and have written book reviews professionally, so what do I know?

Of course I don't mind. However, I intend to criticise any recommendations that I disagree with. I'm not concerned if anyone minds me doing so.

1. I listed recommended books earlier in the thread. 2. I don't work in retail anymore; I have a real job. 3. Nothing I wrote implied that I gave lip to my customers. 4. That you were unable to glean the previous three bits of information from my earlier posts speaks to your reading comprehension and certainly colours any book recommendations you might make, doesn't it?. Food for thought.