"FireForge's next range will be Mongolians" Topic

So one of my must-see stops at this year's Salute was the FireForge stand.

I was expecting some 3-ups of upcoming models and I was right! I was expecting the new models to be some sort of Muslim forces (mamluk cavalry?) but they were actually Mongols(!) and they were beautiful! I spoke to the guys and they will be light Mongol cavalry armed in variety of ways manufactured in plastic while heavy cavalry and characters/leaders(not shown at the show) would be resin(if I understood right).

FireForge are also moving their headquarters as at the moment they are only producing plastic kits but the new facilities will enable them to start making resin kits(when I asked if supporting blister packs would be metal the guys at FF told me that they are not planning on ever using metal, all plastic and resin).

At first I thought it was a surprising choice but then I remembered that the Mongolian 'Golden Horde' invaded Europe and in Poland they clashed in major battle at Legnica against combined forces of Polish, Teutonic, Templar and Hospitallier armies so actually Mongols are a great choice for next 'faction' as they have fought all guys in the existing range.

Erm..that kinda sucks. Was really hoping for Muslims for classic crusades bashing. Man. I understand the reasons..just really wanted some plastic Muslims.

Thamks for the heads up. This changes my schedule and helps prevent me from holding out wrongful hope.

I was surprised too but let me tell you, the 3-ups looked amazing. The quiver, the helmet, facial expression all looked the part. And I also suspect with resin heavies they might have full-face masked helmets which I am a big fan of.

I did talk to them about the Muslims too and they will definitely be doing them as well at some point. The guys were talking about some leg issues when it came to Muslims but I did not quite catch what he was saying (for both of us English was a second language).

And you never know, I mean, these guys work fast so you may get them sooner than you think.

Mongols are the natural choice for the since they already have the Teutonic Knights.

Steppes cavalry is a rather versatile army; I am sure many wargamers will welcome this.

Aww no pics?

Got an e-mail from Francesco at FF this morning. He said that they don't have internet service at the new facility yet so they can't post pictures of the Mongls. So it's up to you guys who attended to show us your pics from Salute. TIG

That's disappointing.

Mongol infantry would be fantastic. I've been wanting to do the invasion of Japan for years.

No plans for the pagans the Teutonics fought? What figures would do for Poles and Lithuanians if Fireforge doesn't do them?

Strange choice, but it's their company. I would have thought that the various Arab armies for the Crusades would be next, especially to help inject a bit of enthusiasm for their rules, which seems to be lacking at the moment.

That is madness, why the Mongols over the Arabs?

Makes no business sense, but its great news for Mongol players.

Raglan

A poor pic… But all I have

Mongol infantry would be fantastic.

Any 28mm Mongols would be welcome given the near lack of same over recent decades.

However, right now I'd settle for getting the three boxes of Teutonic infantry that have been back-ordered (from a USA dealer who's awaiting delivery from Fireforge) for nearly three months. !!!

Cheers,

Lack of Mongol ranges?
OG got a fairly extensive range, as do TAG.

I also have lots of the now OOP but wonderfull Quality Cast Mongols. In fact, I have so many of them that I don't think I will need more.

A slightly better picture:

I think they look great so far.

Fantastic news- and gives me a solid excuse to finally pick up eBob's awesome Mongols, as well, down the road!

Now, if the FireForge plastic Mongols are designed in such a way as to be easily converted into sci-fi cavalry, as well, I'll be feeding a two-headed addiction to them when the time comes, I suspect…

- Sumatran Rat Monk-gol

Plastic horse archers, now my dreams have come true. Thanks for the pic Setsuko. TIG

Awesome! Been wanting some to fight my Rus for Saga! Long overdue in my opinion.

Mongols are the natural choice for the since they already have the Teutonic Knights.

A natural enemy choice for 13C Teutonics would be Baltic pagans – Prussians, Lithuanians, Estonians…

The presence of Teutonic Order during Battle of Legnitz is disputed. Even if they were there, they could not have been not led by their Grand Master (he is attributed to have commanded one of 4 divisions of the Christian army, but in fact he died several years later) and they were a minor contingent. I guess the impression of Teutonic major role at Battle of Legnitz mostly comes from the illustrations by Angus McBride.

What figures would do for Poles and Lithuanians if Fireforge doesn't do them?

For Poles use generic 13Century knights (use Curteys, Gripping Beast, Crusaer) and infantry (GB, Curteys, Crusader, Fireforge foot sergeants). At Legnitz the Polish contingents were from western of Polish principalities (Silesia and Greater Poland) so the armaments and appearance of troops would have been essentially west-european. Only Mazovians (noth-east Poland – their duke invited the Teutonics) would use more "eastern-looking" equipment, but they were not present at Legnitz. (for Mazovians use the Curteys Minaitures Polish knights)

For Lithuanians – Not a lot of choice here! I was hoping Fireforge would go in this direction. I think OG do some light cavalry and infantry in their Mongols in Europe range. For infantry GB do some generic Baltic pagans (look for "Tribal warriors" in their store).

Still the FF Mongols look absolutely brilliant!

Marcos,
How about the Prussians? What figures would work? Also do they have any cavalry?
Dennis

Gripping Beast do some Pruss infantry.

Its interesting that FireForge ignore their own poll which poses the question "which Crusade fascinates you the most".

2nd-3rd Crusade – gets 35.2% of the vote
and
1st Crusade – gets 33.1% of the vote

Poll link: link

Then they decide to bring out the Mongols next?

Raglan

I can see the point in asking for other options, but I'm personally more likely to pick up the Mongols than any Muslim or Crusader kit. Hopefully there'll be plenty of more kits of various armies in the future from Fireforge, to please everyone's personal preferences.

Mongols are a test for muslims and a good idea for us to give faster an enemy for our crusader range to our players of Deus Vult :)

I do hope that they won't all have shields. Particularly late 14th C ones.

The 3-ups were very nice to look at. And completely the wrong army.

I was massively disappointed. What's the point of a rulebook that I gather focuses on the crusades in the east, then ignoring one side?

Oh well, not my company.

Leigh

I think that Mongols was a good idea. The Mongols can fight the Crusaders. Next will come Saracens who can fight either the Mongols or the Crusaders. It looks like a long term plan to me. And for those who do not know, Lord Ekard is an official spokesperson for FF. TIG

No one is bashing Fireforge TIG. Some of us are just disappointed with the choice of Mongols.

Marcos, How about the Prussians? What figures would work? Also do they have any cavalry? Dennis

Dennis, all Prussian army lists I've seen allow for a unit or two of Prussian cavalry. There is no manufacturer making anything specific. I would use medium cavalry from GB medieval russian range but arm them with very characteristic baltic shields. You can get these shelds from Kingmaker – they call them heavy cavalry shields (by 15c the design was popular among all east european nations so thay have it in their Hussite range). For infantry good options are:

• GB Pruss tribal warriors for bulk of the warbands (with baltic shields, not teardrops as supplied by GB)
• OG "Lithuanian Infantry" – for bulk of warbands
• armoured GB jomsvikings for heavier foot – again with baltic sheilds not round/rectangular ones supplied by GB

Well I will be having some those Mongols. Fantastic 3 ups and can be used to fight my Burmese.

I agree, the horses are not correct. They need to be smaller and more like a pony.

Also, not everyone on the Mongol army was Mongol. What about some Kipchaqs, Cumans, and other Steppe nomads?

Did the Mongols "Thumb" draw the bow or "Finger" draw?

Photos appear to show "Finger" draw

As for horses I never seen anyone do pony size for any Mongol range. For me it the amazing sculpting and animation of these figures that is so good.
They really look nasty warriors.

I think that horse sizes for Asian armies is tricky. If you go historically with ponys, people will complain that they are tiny. If you go with "modern" horses, people will complain that they are anachronistic. Damned if you do…

I agree with Colin in that I am prepared to see between the fingers on horse sizes if the sculpting is good enough. Just judging by the greens, these look promising indeed.

It looks like they might use the same horses for the Mongols and the Saracens.

Absolutely not. We made horses for mongols that are very few smaller than our unbarded horses in our crusader range because real ponies are ridicolous. We made an aestethick choice because we won't make models for an historical museum but they are however toys and we need to make a product that people are willing to buy because they like them

I'll agree that an aesthetic decision is better in this case. There are countless examples of this kind of decision across the hobby.

Leigh

Sorry, M'Lord I didn't mean to offend you. TIG

I took a look at the updated Mongol pictures on the FF facebook page. They can sign me up for two or three boxes right now.

Ehi Tig, forums and writing don't show the right emotion ;) I'm not worried, I only tryed to explain at the best our position

The Mongols used the thumb pull. The thumb draw was much more common throughout the Eurasian continent from Hungary, Anatolia, Egypt to China.

I bought the rules at Salute from Caliver. After that I got to speak to the FF chap. I had hoped he was going to say that the Arabs were coming out this year. As is doesn't sound like they will, I have a feeling that my money spent on the rules was wasted…

Now I know I could go off and buy the figures from another range, but, I had hoped to get some plastic figures that are in the same style as the Crusaders, however, that won't be for a while and by then my interest will have moved on and settled on another period.

It is a real shame as I think FF have shot themselves in the foot with this choice. I would have thought that a box of Arab cavalry and a box of Arab foot could have given most of options needed and would have been more appropriate for a game primarily set in Outremer. Then, once they were out, then they could have brought out the Mongols. It is like bringing out a range of Crimean War figures, doing the British first, then the Sardinians, with the Russians coming out a year or two later – hopefully!

Now, if they had have had the Arabs actually at Salute for sale, I would have stumbled off with an armfull…

Shame….

I'm sorry Bindon but our ruleset is not primarily set in Outremer.
Yes, we wrote in the rulebook about holy land: it is because we think that for this period the first crusade is the most important event of the period, the event that open our period of interest
Yes we wrote in the rulebook a list of arabs: but it is a list of early time period and there is also a list of crusaders where to make them you need to use other miniatures than our range.

We wrote 2 lists for who has yet some miniatures of the 2 periods written in, and we wrote a useful number of generic unit to change the 2 first lists in other of successive periods.

We will make our supplements after but you can yet play with our rulebook and our miniatures and you can write (maybe hearing our advices or maybe making that with other players on our official forum

We chose Mongols to make faster a supplements and a new faction (and for other that I explained on the official forum)

I hope that I explained good myself :)

Many of these people will never be convinced that Mongols was a good decision. You can never please all of the people all of the time. I said a long time ago that plastic Mongols would be what I wanted next. And after the foot Templars the mounted crossbow sgts. and the GB unarmored foot I will be ready for Mongols. That should take me to the holiday season. TIG

Hi Lord Ekard,

I know they are your rules, so I wouldn't want to contradict you, but as a customer, what I would say is although there is reference in the rules to them being suitable for all warfare of the period and although there are pictures of troops in the snow and Europeans fighting Europeans, the impression I get after looking through the rules is that they are a set designed for conflict in the Holy Land.

Most of the pictures are of battle in the Holy Land

Constant references to things like 'Brave Crusading Knights and their men at arms take on the defenders of Islam'

The Historical Overview is on the Crusades in the Holy Land

And, most telling of all, the Army Lists and the sample battle are for the Crusades in the Holy Land.

Now I do agree with TIG that you cannot please all the people all the time, however, I would say that to please most of the people who buy/will buy these rules, the best ranges to bring out are figures for the army lists you provide in the core rules.

The rules do not contain army lists for the Mongols, indeed there are not even any for the Baltic Crusades, hence that is why people think Mongols are a poor choice as the next range to bring out. If you wanted to bring out Mongols as your second range, there should have been more focus on them in the book.

I know my views won't change your mind and for that matter it is too late anyway, but I think most people who pick up these rules do see them as a set to play games primarily in the Holy Land…

Sorry I don't care I need those now, absolutely no plans prior to seeing them to do 28mm mongols but the tractor beam is on full blast, they are the Mongols i'm NOW looking for……they are stunning and we needs em my precious….gorgeous drool :-)

On the FF forum yesterday it was said that there will also be Mongol foot. I really can't wait for this stuff to be out.

I'm sorry for my late answer Bindon, however I hope that we will give happiness to all the fans of the medieval period with the products that we will go to make :)

Forgive my ignorance but could these Mongols – perhaps with some slight modifications- also be used as earlier Huns?

Stand back far enough, Mongols will do for lots of other nations…huns, tibetans

WillieB: yes sure :)