We're in the thrall of the summer convention season here at Paizo, with employees spread hither and yon across the globe at conventions near and far. In the last two weeks, we've had employees at Comicpalooza in Texas, UK Games Expo in Birmingham, KublaCon in San Francisco, and Book Expo America in New York City. Yours truly was at the last two, and in the ensuing fracas there was a bit of confusion here at Paizo regarding the Friday preview blog. In short, we completely missed last week, and the week before got posted in a super-secret ninja way that kept it hidden from sight for all but the cleverest members of the paizo.com community.
We've since fixed the link, so if you haven't yet had a chance to check out the three "Leapin' Lizards" I posted on the 23rd, now is an excellent time to do so.
But conventions are good for more than just boring internal business miscommunications. They also bring special promotional figures for you to enjoy! Jason Bulmahn, Jenny Bendel, the Adventure Card Game team, and I are headed to the Origins Game Fair in Columbus next week to show off the new Skull & Shackles Adventure Card Game set and to play some Pathfinder Society games. Both the Adventure Card Game demos in Hall D and the Pathfinder Society HQ in the PFS room will feature the debut of this year's first Pathfinder Battles Promotional Figure, the Hellfire Wisp!
This exciting figure is based on the Will-o'-Wisp figure from the recent Wrath of the Righteous set. Reviews of the set so far have declared the Will-o'-Wisp one of our most exciting figures to date, with a neat skull visible through clear blue plastic. For the Hellfire Wisp variant, we've changed the clear plastic to a red tint, adding an extra bit of diabolical fun to the figure. We'll be giving away the figure to PFS players and card game demoers at Origins, and it will likely make a return appearance at future conventions this year, such as Gen Con and PAX Prime. After the convention season, remaining figures will appear for sale on paizo.com for folks who are not able to meet up with us out in the wider world. (Don't worry, we'll set aside a few early to make sure that at least some of them end up for sale here on the site.)
Speaking of promo figures, the 10 promotional repaint figures based on creatures from the Emerald Spire Superdungeon will head out from our warehouse to backers of the Pathfinder Online Kickstarter project later this month. It's possible that very few of these extremely rare sets will remain after we have fulfilled all of the Kickstarter rewards, but at this point it appears that most of them are headed to project backers as originally intended. I'll drop a note here if any slip through the cracks and go on general sale at paizo.com.
We'll be back to a full preview of Pathfinder Battles figures from the upcoming Lost Coast set next week, but this week I want to keep the focus on promotional items above and beyond the Pathfinder Battles line.
Last up this week is a sneak peek at a project I've been spending a LOT of time on over the last several months—Pathfinder Minimates!
Pathfinder Minimates are small, 2-inch collectible toy figures produced by our partners at Art Asylum and Diamond Select Toys. The picture above features the four debut figures in our Pathfinder Minimates mass market range—Merisiel, Harsk, Valeros, and a Goblin! The first four-pack is scheduled for an October release.
Pathfinder Minimates are built to the same scale as the more than 1700 Minimates Diamond Select Toys has already produced for licenses like Marvel Comics, Big Bang Theory, Pulp Fiction, and more. All of the pieces—from their weapons to their hair to their hands—are completely interchangeable, meaning you can have a field day giving Valeros Merisiel's hair, or giving Harsk's axe to Deadpool. Their feet also scale perfectly to work with Lego building blocks, making them a fun addition to the little castles filling the game rooms of builders young and old.
I've seen the first four Pathfinder figures in hand, and they look fantastic. Valeros and Merisiel have working scabbards, and the goblin is the spitting image of Wayne Reynolds's art (and yet still remains a distinctively Minimate-like). They look phenomenal, and I'm sure a lot of you will get a kick out of playing with them.
That said, the first set will not be ready until October, which is well after the summer convention season. SO, given that, I've worked with Diamond Select Toys to create at least TWELVE additional Pathfinder Minimates that we plan to debut at this year's Gen Con in Indianapolis, both as promotional items and as for-sale two-figure packs. While I can't yet show off any images of these bonus figures, I've put a lot of thought and care into deciding what we should include in the line, and I'm certain you'll be pleased with my choices.
Watch this space in future months for a look at these exciting new Pathfinder toys, and come back next week for another adventure into the treacherous Lost Coast set of Pathfinder Battles miniatures.
See you at Origins!
Erik Mona
Publisher
