Pathfinder Battles Preview: Rounding Out the Set!

Friday, December 2, 2011

The official release of Heroes & Monsters, our first Pathfinder Battles prepainted miniatures set, is approaching! Over the last few months, I’ve used this weekly space to reveal sculpts and final images from the set, and with this post, I will have revealed all but one of the miniatures here on the blog! (You’ll have to wait for the Gargoyle, alas, as I forgot to ask the art department to photograph him this week. Sorry!)

After that, I’ll show off a few painted versions of figures we have only seen in sculpt form, and after THAT I’ll begin showing off sculpts from the NEXT set, Rise of the Runelords. I’m very pleased with what we’ve seen so far from Heroes & Monsters, but holy moley, Rise of the Runelords takes things to the next level. I can’t wait!

But that’s the future. Onward to today’s previews!

First up we have the Wolf, a common miniature sculpted in a nice leaping pose. Note the haunting red eyes and the nasty teeth! Aside from this being a solid miniature of a wolf, I’m pleased to report that the paint scheme used on its fur is identical to that used on the Werewolf I previewed a few weeks ago, making this a perfect choice for the “wolf” version of that creature. Throw a pack of these bad boys at your party and they’re sure to be barking at the moon!

Next up we’ve got the Mummy, an uncommon undead menace lurching its way toward your campaign. When we originally added the Mummy to this set, he was pegged to the “rare” rarity, but when the final sculpt came in he struck me more as a “rank and file” Mummy than a super awesome end-of-the-campaign undead overlord, so I busted him down to uncommon, making it easier to rack up a few of these guys for a nice higher-level encounter. Some day soon I hope to get that Mummy Overlord to make the perfect “captain” for a squad of these guys, but in the time being I think this one packs a suitable punch.

Next we have the Chimera, which I must confess has been one of the most difficult and frustrating models in the entire set. Some of you may recall a digital Chimera sculpt we released as part of our initial publicity push for the line. We were never really satisfied with that sculpt. It wasn’t based on Pathfinder art, and it just looked too cartoony and “not right,” no matter how many times we modified it. Worse, it lacked a critical part of a Pathfinder Chimera’s anatomy—wings. That was the death knell for that sculpt, but just when we thought all was lost, WizKids came to the rescue! It turns out they weren’t satisfied with the original look, either, so they green-lit a resculpt behind the scenes to see if a different artist might be able to come closer to what we needed. The final Chimera pictured here is the result of their effort, wings and all.

So there you have it for today’s previews. I’m off to approve more amazing sculpts from our next set, Rise of the Runelords!

Erik Mona
Publisher