Mantic Games Orc Marauders

I backed Mantic's Epic Warpath wargame on Kickstarter and was so impressed by the impossibly tiny 12mm miniatures I got with it that I almost started regretting ever getting into 28mm miniatures. Crisis of preferred miniature scales aside, I was also intrigued by Mantic's Warpath universe. Unlike the Warhammer universe, Warpath is hard science fiction. There are no gods, no Warp, no weird astropathic choirs, it's just scifi tech, and sometimes that's very refreshing. So I decided to buy a second Marauder (space orcs) army from Mantic, this one in 28mm, intending to use them in games of both Firefight and Warhammer 40,000. Specifically, I bought the Battle of Cabot III starter set, but this is my review of just the Marauder miniatures.

The short version of the review is that if you want space orcs, then you should buy Citadel. I'll explain why, but to make this review useful I'm starting with what Mantic's orc Marauder army does well.

The good stuff

In the Warpath universe, orcs are a mercenary army, called Marauders. They're an ferocious but organised group of fighters that hire themselves out to whatever corporation or cause that pays best. Within the Warpath universe, "orc" and "marauder" are synonymous.

Sensible miniature design

If you don't like the wackiness of Warhammer 40,000 ork lore, then you might appreciate the restraint of Mantic's Marauders design. The Marauder miniatures are brutish and heavily armed and armoured, and not the patchwork of weaponry and impossible machinery and spare parts like 40k orks.

For the most part, allowing that aliens exist, the Marauder miniatures are designed with realism in mind. They're big and mean looking, but they wear uniforms and have armour that's been fashioned for their bodies, and use weapons you'd find at your local arms dealer.

Marauder Ripper Rainmakers and Maulers

Big orcs in mech suits, the Ripper Maulers and Rainmakers are easily the best of Mantic's orc miniatures. These are relatively big models made of PVC plastic (whatever that is) for a 40mm base, and for the most part the detail comes through well. There are cables and tubes for the mech suit, grenades on a bandoleer, and big power-tool weapons.

They're easy to paint, too. You slap some green on the head, and cover the rest in grey. Drybrush is silver, maybe add some colour here and there, and you're done. These look cool, they look dangerous, and they're easily my favourite model in the kit. They were also, probably coincidentally, the models in Epic Warpath that convinced me to buy Mantic Marauders, because they're cool even at 12mm.

Priced to move

Marauders are nominally less expensive than 40k orks. You can get 10 Marauders for £20, or 10 Warhammer orks for £30. If a difference of £10 makes a big difference to your ability to purchase a model kit, then that's an important difference.

The difference is even more pronounced for special units. For £20 you can get 4 Ripper Maulers, compared to £25 for just a single 40k Ork Warboss.

Is the cost savings worth a drop in miniature quality? That's another question, and conveniently the next topic.

The bad stuff

It might be counter-intuitive, but it's harder to paint a miniature with less detail than it is to paint a miniature with lots of detail. Sure, a lot of detail means you have to spend lots of time painting lots of little things on a model, but the important thing is that on a finely detailed miniature, you can identify the thing you're painting. But on a miniature without much detail, you spend even more time just trying to figure out what each indistinct blob of plastic is supposed to represent, and where it stops and where the next indistinct blob starts.

The Marauder Commando and Marauder Brawler sculpts are not highly detailed.

Their legs are muddy trunks of plastic that suggest boots, but the moulds I guess don't quite line up and so there's a huge mould line across the inseam. Scrape that flash away, and you're left with no detail to show where the boot ends and the pant leg begins.

Each orc has a leather harness on so he can carry grenades or bullets across his chest. The harness invariably gets lost in the "fabric" of the orc's uniform. On some sculpts, it literally just disappears into the orc's back, leaving you to just paint it on, like you're applying a 2D texture to a 3D model in a lazy video game. Each orc's chest is a mess of grenades, leather strap, and uniform, and none of these elements have distinct lines of separation.

Heck, maybe it's part of the lore that even their armour plating seems to have merged with orc flesh, because there's definitely no break between armour and arm. You just have to believe that there's armour and paint it according to your interpretation.

It's self-evident that these Marauder miniatures can be painted well, because you can go to Mantic's website and see it for yourself. As painted on the website, the models look amazing. Whomever painted those models spent a lot of time and effort making up for what the sculpt lacks, though. Look close and you can see the lack of detail between leg armour and leg, and items strapped to the chest. It's there, but it takes a lot of work, and a heavy reliance on the power of grey and black, to make it look like it makes some sense. My feeling, as a hobbyist painter, is that if I have to paint on detail, then I may as well just buy wood blocks and paint miniatures onto those. I buy sculpts because I want the detail to exist without my intervention. My job, as I see it, is to highlight the detail, not to create it manually.

Easy fix

For me, it's not a question of whether a miniature is "good" or "bad", but whether it's fun to paint or not. The Marauder miniatures I got look cool. I enjoy them on the tabletop, I love sending them up against my space marines and Imperial Guardsmen and Imperial Agents, because they're big and mean and they're carrying big guns. Add in a Ripper Mauler and you've got a fun and properly challenging battle on your hands. So the Marauders are cool, I'm glad to own them and happy to support Mantic's hard scifi universe.

They are not, however, a joy to paint. But the fix is pretty simple, if not a little predictable. Paint the miniature as best you can, and then cover it in a wash (like Agrax Earthshade or Nuln Oil.) The wash covers the lack of detail in painted-on shadow, and the miniature looks fine, especially at an arm's length on the tabletop.

When to buy Marauders

If I had no space orcs, I'd buy Warhammer orks. I have no intention of building an orc army though, so the handful of Marauders I have from the Battle of Cabot III starter set is everything I need. If you're looking to buy an orc science fiction army, you might consider Marauders if:

• You prefer the look and feel of Marauders to 40k ork boyz and nobz and squigs and gretchens and so on
• You want to save £10 on infantry, and more on special units

I use my Marauders for Firefight and Warhammer 40,000 (and Rogue Stars, and other games), so they're useful miniatures to have. They're beefy and imposing figures for your tabletop battlefield. Just keep in mind that they're not easy to paint, and for all the wrong reasons.