Note to Games Workshop: This is how you do a teaser trailer

     

We all know that Games Workshop are endearingly inept and amateur at petty much everything they do. Their YouTube video's have passed into legend for being utterly crap and beyond awful. Even their first full feature film was dire in ways only they could manage. It's just who they are. Obviously their video's simply aren't a patch on those produced by others such as Fantasy Flight Games or... Privateer Press. Yep that Level 7 teaser trailer at the top of this page really does knock all of Games Workshops woeful efforts into a cocked hat. Number 6 in roman numerals seems a bit lamer now after you've seen that, doesn't it? Kudos to Matt Wilson and co, that's a damn fine effort. Peace out!

PS, Don't forget my Vore giveaway or my Dragon Forge Designs giveaway.

Privateer Press show off Level 7

So yep the cat is out of the bag... or maybe I should say the alien is out of the top secret Government controlled facility, as Privateer Press are now spilling the beans on Level 7. Some might even go as far to say they 'finally' showing off Level 7. They announced the existence of a new game about twelve months ago now, at the last Lock & Load event in Seattle, although rumours of it's existence had been swirling around the Internet for months before. Over the past 12 moths there has been a slight drip feed of information and a comically poor, B-Movie attempt at promotion. It's OK though as I think it was in keeping with the product. So what the hell is Level 7? Well first things first it's not an 80's lounge-jazz-pop band, which to be honest is what the name made the game sound like. Ever since Privateer Press announced the existence of Level 7 there have been rumours about it being a new sci-fi skirmish game, a card game and a board game the cure for depression... OK maybe not the last one. The competing theories have often been supported by claims of knowing people, who met some people, who knew people who shopped at the same 711 store that the Privateer Press cleaners shop at.

It's almost as recognisable to geeks as a certain 80's tinged red and yellow logo!

I thankfully steered well clear of such rumour mongering, wisely I feel given I knew nothing about it. There's a lesson in there somewhere, I'm just not too sure what it is. Well unsurprisingly Privateer Press have used this years Lock & Load event to reveal exactly what Level 7 is... drum roll please... it's a board game. I have to say I'm not entirely surprised. I know many people had hoped, and wised for another full on miniatures wargame, and I too had high hopes that's what it would be. However, 'rational me' knew deep down it would be a board game for a number of reasons. Firstly Privateer Press are rightly trying to focus their efforts on further establishing HoMachine as a game. They're not as big as Games Workshop are, and quite frankly would struggle right now to support more than one wargame, yeah I'm counting Hordes and Warmachine as one system. They would run the risk of dividing their current customer base, and diluting their own resources between two competing products. That is not a wise place for them to be. This way they get to test the water with another setting and product, and learn a little bit more about themselves and their customers.
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Privateer Press show us the Stormwall

It does look utterly bloody brilliant if you ask me!

Right first things first, I wasn't going to talk about this quite frankly because I just looked at it, thought nice model, bit expensive. However, I've had a lot of you email me outraged at the price of the miniature and asking me what I think. So it would be pretty dumb of me not to talk to you all about something that interests you, when I've explicitly told you to let me know what sorts of things you want me to cover. Hows that for peer pressure! So then where do I start? Firstly I think it's an absolutely brilliant looking miniature. Honestly I fracking love it to tiny little bits, and seeing it painted and in pictures just gave me a little hobby nerd rush. I guess you could say I swooned! Rotating the 3D image and pouring over every detail I have to say the design team and sculptors deserve a big old pat on the back and a bottle of Champagne. It's also got me really excited to see exactly what the Retribution Colossal will look like when completed.
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The third bit of Privateer Press news

Look. It even gets a shiny new logo!

Well it wasn't all clever mobile device army building apps and ginormous hulking robots of doom from Privateer Press last week. Not that huge walking weapons of destruction aren't cool and all that, or indeed that the announcement of the War Room app weren't impressive, they were. Nope. Privateer Press also announced they are finally rebooting their Iron Kingdoms RPG:

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Privateer Presses other big announcement!

Well obviously Games workshops announcement regarding their reboot, of the Lord of the Rings franchise has got people spooked. So it should as well, because to bring a game like that back from the dead requires some serious necromancy! In all seriousness though Privateer Press dropped to well edited and shot video's on us yesterday. The first was obviously about the Colossals, the second is actually a far more interesting development for me, and something I thought we'd have seen an awful lot more of by now:

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Privateer Press annouce Colossal's

So Privateer Press have made another 'big' announcement with regards to HoMachine. I think those of you with your ears to the Iron Kingdoms grapevine will have already had an inkling about this. On the plus side though the the new Collosal models look pretty darn cool and the video isn't quite as cringe worthy as Games Workshops efforts:

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Why is HoMachine becoming so popular?

Not quite as well known as some logo's, but still...

Note: I know the convention is to call Warmachine and Hordes WarmaHordes but I�m trying to shift that to the far funnier HoMachine, so that�s what I�ll always refer to it as!!!

Right I think its pretty clear that both Warmachine and Hordes are experiencing quite a bit of a surge in popularity, especially when Privateer Press put out statements like this:

• Privateer Press we can't cope!!!

Any company that has to take a pause to catch their collective breath to try and catch up with demand, is clearly experiencing some serious demand for their product. And there have been other similar statements since. So why now and will the popularity continue?

Most of you will recognise this logo, and that's down to hard work and effective arketing

In my local gaming circle I think it is quite fair to say the Warmachine MKI wasn�t the most popular of games, not because it wasn't very good (it was good fun) but because we just didn't play it, and part of the reason was almost certainly down to the MKI monicker. Let me explain before you think I'm bonkers. Here in the UK it's pretty difficult to have a discussion about wargaming without bringing in Games Workshop into it, in fact perversely a fair few people refer to none Games Workshop games as �alternative wargaming� it is almost like Games Workshop wargaming IS wargaming!!! I might have mentioned before how this riles me. For those of you not living in the UK that might seem odd, but for those of you living in pretty much any town in the UK you will have a Games Workshop store that pretty much has an iron grip monopoly on our hobby, although that is sliding and slipping a bit.
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Sunday Sermon: Doing things the Privateer Press way, Wrath and Domination

No that isn't the Emperor talking to the Primarchs!

So you're probably all thinking why the hell has Frontline Gamer gone all religious on us right? What's with this 'sermon' stuff and preaching? Well you see I'm a researcher at heart, what people sometimes refer to as a stats geek. I've studiously watched over the last 6 months, yeah that's right this blog is now 6 months old, the viewing behaviour of people who read this blog. I thought I'd seen trends, only to find out that they weren't statistically significant, I'm still recording data as I believe the problem was one of insufficient data, the bane of every researcher! However, there is one undeniable trend... Sundays are my worst days for page views and comments. Seriously an average of 0.1 comment every Sunday, that's hurts me deeply! Plus my page hits plummet pretty sharply on the 7th day. Now I'm sure it's just Sunday. Perhaps you're all in church, or stuffing yourselves with roast dinner, or perhaps I don't post regularly on Sundays, or what I have posted is rubbish.

Great to drive on, but it gets lonely

So lets call this the start of a concerted effort on my part to produce some decent content for you all to read on a Sunday, obviously you'll be able to read these articles whenever. I just want to know for myself whether or not it is Sunday's that make you all lethargic and reticent to comment, or whether it has been my piss poor articles. So you're going to get a 'Sunday Sermon' for a few months, where I chat about something in the hobby that either bugs me, or really excites me, to see if it's the 'Sunday effect' or me being shyte. The first topic I've chosen is the Privateer Press way of doing things. What started me thinking about this particular topic? Well it was a comment left in my 'Does Malifaux need to take a pause for the cause?' article, the comment was written by Lauby, yes he of the House of Paincakes fame. He specifically drew a parallel between what we're seeing in Malifaux right now with the rulebook expansions, and MKI Warmachine and Hordes. I happen to agree with him, the similarities are unnervingly similar actually.
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Review: My Battlefoam bag saved my life...

...Well actually it was more my miniatures it actually saved. This is going to be part review / part Warmachine Battlefoam bag biography or indeed love letter as some of my friends would claim. Firstly I'm going to tell you all the reasons why I now wouldn't consider putting my miniatures in any other manufacturers products. Sure I've lugged mini's around a lot in the past 18 months plus in my Warmachine bag and nothing evil has come to pass. I've man handled the bag, had somebody trip over it, spilled a bottle Sprite on it. Hell my four Maine Coon cats have treated it like a scratching post and sleeping bed all rolled into one and still my Retribution of Scyrah miniatures have come through these ordeals unscathed, BUT there are three incidents that have really put the bag to the test:

1. This happened shortly after the bag arrived, I was being picked up by a mate to go to a gaming club to play some games of Warmachine. I was running late as always and had been trying to hurriedly find everything I needed, with my bag slung nonchalantly on one shoulder I stopped abruptly at the top of my stairs and turned, I'd forgotten my dice. My heavy bag loaded to the brim with heavy Privateer Press miniatures slipped right off my shoulder and down my very steep Victorian stairs. It span mid air and smashed into the steps about two thirds of the way down the stairs, it made a dreadful thumping sound and then leaped into the air again. It finally thudded into the ground and rolled then slid to a stop by my front door traveling a good 25ft in distance from a height from a starting height of about 15ft (I've measured). Hey I don't mind admitting it was a pretty emotional time for me and yep my heart was in my mouth. I fully expected to see a bag full of bits and pieces. That I didn't and that there was no damage at all, to anything, is a testament to how exceptional a product Battlefoam produce... I also found my dice already packed away in a side pocket. Yeah I know, I'm an ejit!!!
2. Ah yes the second incident, the one that really shows off how good the bag is also very nearly led to me actually murdering somebody. I was with a work colleague in a car park. He was dropping me off near a train station so I could get back home. I had my miniatures with me, I removed them from his trunk and placed the bag in the hatched yellow walkway for pedestrians behind the boot of his car and turned to shut the boot door. I heard a car reverse and a slight thump and then saw my Battlefoam bag squished up against my friend bumper and some idiots Toyota Yaris. I screamed, quite loudly a stream of profanity. The driver of the Yaris had stopped. I stormed to the drivers door and opened it. There sitting in front of me was a little old lady with glasses so thick it made her eyes look the size of saucers. I was about to rip into her when she said 'what did I hit this time' I replied a bag of very expensive equipment, almost my work colleagues Merc and me, 'oh so it was only a bag?'... only a fecking bag! A BAG!!!! That's over �500's worth of toy soldiers to you blind old bat. Amazingly I regained my composure and managed to not strangle the life out of the doddering fool and check my bag. While the outside of the bag was scuffed the miniatures inside were fine. Not a damn thing wrong. Again thank you Battlefoam.
3. The third incident that made me realise it's probably not safe to leave toy soldiers around by me involved alcohol consumption, a missed train and my huge fat ass (namely mine). You see I'd been out at a friends house and had played some games while drinking. I wasn't blitzed but I was a bit 'merry' and as such my slow waddle across town weighed down by miniatures meant that I missed my train, just. Annoyed and tired I put my Battlefoam bag down on the floor next to a wall as far away from the platform edge as I could, I mean I'm not dumb after all, my Battlefoam bag might stand up to a Toyota Yaris and laugh, but a speeding train? Nope that's Superman territory. I turned around and sat down... on the bag. Not the floor, or indeed the many public benches provided, oh no I sat down on my expensive figure case, stuffed with even more expensive miniatures. I know, I know I'm thicker than two short planks. It gets worse though, because you see at that time of night the trains aren't that regular and I had roughly an hours wait. So there I sat for an hour reading a magazine and drinking a bottle of pop (yes it was pop) until my train arrived. It pulled into the station and I looked around for my bag but couldn't see it, and then it dawned on me. I'd been sitting on it. I sobered up fairly rapidly and made my way onto the train fearful of what I might find inside my bag. What I found shouldn't have surprised me in the slightest, on the top layer of foam only two of my Mage Hunter Strike Force were damaged with slightly bent sword tips, although this could have been caused earlier on in the evening when I dropped a few them. Either way nothing else was harmed in the slightest.

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Things that I play: Warmachine and Hordes

Website ( Privateer Press )

Ostensibly they are two different games, in reality they aren't really. True Warlocks and Warbeasts work very differently to Warcasters and Warjacks but the two systems share more similarities than they do differences. One of the questions I get asked an awful lot is whether HoMachine is a good substitute for Warhammer Fantasy Battle. Now there's no easy or straight forward answer to that question. When people ask that though they normally mean is it a substitute for Warhammer Fantasy 7th edition. Put simply its not a substitute in terms of unit movement and getting flank charges etc, and nor is it a substitute for size either. The average game of HoMachince is somewhere between 35 to 50 points and to give you an idea my 35 point Retribution force has only 27 miniatures in it, whereas my average sized Warhammer 2000 point Dwarf army had easily over 100 mini's in it... BIG DIFFERENCE!!!

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