Vom Strafkolonisten zum Frontsoldaten: Die Terraner bieten keine übermäßige Eleganz, dafür geballte Feuerkraft aus ihrem technischen Arsenal und immer einen guten Plan B. Wie schlägt sich die flexibelste Fraktion im StarCraft Tabletop Miniatures Game (TMG) und was taugen die Einheiten des ersten Releases auf dem Spieltisch?
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Geoffrey Förste geschrieben
Mit Expansion 1 legt Goblin Hobbies bei seinen Stampin’ Plates nach. Auf der Adepticon stellte der Hersteller sechs neue Platten vor, die das System erweitern. Von antiker Heraldik bis hin zu chaotischen Symbolen deckt das Bundle erneut eine breite stilistische Palette ab.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Geoffrey Förste geschrieben
Mit der Next Wave haben Corvus Belli Ende letzen Jahres eine neue Sektorarmee bei ihrem Skirmisher Infinity hinzugefügt, welche stückweise weiter ausgebaut wird. Aber auch für die Nomads und Aleph gibt es Neuheiten. Außerdem gibt es bei Ariadna ein lag ersehntes Wiedersehen im Schottenrock.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Dennis Rexin geschrieben
Leichtfüßig wie im Tanz gleiten die Töchter des Khaine über das Schlachtfeld. Jede Drehung bringt Blutvergießen, jeder Schritt den Tod. Im Namen Morathi-Khaines, der Schattenkönigin, schneiden sie sich ihren Weg durch die Reiche, eine tödliche Einheit aus Glauben und Kriegskunst.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Christian Kallweit geschrieben
Einst herrschten sie über die Sterne, getragen von ihrer psionischen Einheit und dem unerschütterlichen Glauben an den Khala. Doch die Heimat Aiur ist gefallen, und was bleibt, ist ein Volk zwischen Tradition und Überleben. Wie schlagen sich die Protoss im StarCraft Tabletop Miniatures Game (TMG) auf dem Schlachtfeld?
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Geoffrey Förste geschrieben
Tief in den Reichen der Sterblichen flüstern die Wälder alte Geheimnisse. Uralte Wälder, ein Labyrinth aus Bäumen und Wurzeln. Wo Sterbliche sich verirren, sind die Sylvaneth zuhause. Wer den Zorn des Waldes weckt, wird von einer Naturgewalt hinweggefegt. Wie schlagen sich die Sylvaneth?
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Christian Kallweit geschrieben
Kein Tabletop-Spieltisch kommt ohne passendes Gelände aus. Das Star-Wars-Universum hat einen eigenen Stil, was Gebäude und Landschaften angeht und somit will auch stimmungsvolles Gelände für Star Wars: Legion gut gewählt sein. Atomic Mass Games bieten darum jetzt ein Starter Set mit großen und kleinen Geländeelementen.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Dennis Rexin geschrieben
Die neuen Miniaturen von Games Workshop bringen frischen Wind auf das Schlachtfeld. Chaos Space Marines, Adeptus Mechanicus und Imperiale Ritter erhalten spannende Ergänzungen, deren Profile bereits vielversprechend wirken. Lohnt sich hier ein Kauf oder sollte man hier doch lieber auf die nächste Charge der Manufakturen warten?
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Robert Wolfes geschrieben
Die Iron Warriors sind für das Belagern und Errichten schwer einnehmbarer Festungen bekannt. Dies birgt die Möglichkeit für große Schlachten cineastischen Ausmaßes, welche ausgetragen werden wollen. Mit dem neuen Kampagnenband Herrschaft des Eisens führt Games Workshop Regeln für den Spielmodus Apokalypse für die aktuelle Edition ein.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Robert Wolfes geschrieben
Das Sternenreich der T’au steht für überlegene Feuerkraft und modernste Kampfanzüge, doch im Nahkampf fehlte bislang die entscheidende Stärke. Die Zwillingslanze soll diese Lücke schließen. Wie präsentieren sich die neuen Modelle im Detail? Können sie im Gefecht überzeugen und ihr Versprechen auch in harten Einsätzen einlösen?
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Christian Kallweit geschrieben
Mit Carcass Front erhält Trench Crusade erstmals eine umfangreiche Starterbox, die sowohl Einsteiger*innen als auch Veteran*innen anspricht. Neben zwei vollständigen Warbands bringt das Set eine Kampagne, neues Hintergrundmaterial und Zubehör auf den Tisch und markiert gleichzeitig den Start einer größeren Veröffentlichungsstrategie.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Geoffrey Förste geschrieben
Mächtige Energiewellen fegen über die Welten des von Menschen besiedelten Teils der Galaxis hinweg. Menschen und Mutanten machen sich gleichermaßen auf, die Macht dieser Wellen für sich zu nutzen und ihr Schicksal herauszufordern. Ascending Fate von Freebooter Miniatures verspricht spannende Abenteuer in der Zukunft. Und das Ganze wieder ohne Würfel.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Dennis Rexin geschrieben
More than half of board game designers responding to a Tabletop Game Designers Association member survey say they have used generative AI for some elements of their work.
About a quarter of the 171 designers who answered the TTGDA survey said they had used a genAI platform to come up with game ideas or mechanisms – while more than half indicated they were ‘strongly opposed’ to using AI in that way.
TTGDA – a professional organisation launched in 2024 to advocate for tabletop game creators in North America – asked designers about seven use cases, comprising:
● Coming up with ideas for games or mechanisms
● Writing placeholder text
● Writing text for the final version of a published game
● Editing or proofreading text
● Making placeholder art
● Making art for the final version of a published game
● Creating marketing materials for a game
The organisation said that while 28% of respondents were ‘strongly opposed’ to all seven use cases, almost a fifth were not strongly opposed to any of them, with the remaining respondents offering a mix of use cases they consider either acceptable or not.
TTGDA’s report of its findings stated, “In the free-response section of the survey, multiple designers said that the process of chatting with the AI particularly helped them better articulate their own goals or ideas for a game.
“One said, ‘It’s like asking another human who may not know much about games. They know enough to at least bounce a couple ideas, which ends up with me getting to where I want to go’.
“Several designers who had tried asking generative AI platforms to come up with its own ideas described the material they got from the AI with terms such as ‘derivative’ or ‘slop’.
“One designer said that when they tried to prompt an AI for ideas, the AI recommended inappropriate mechanisms from mass market games, like ‘lose a turn’.
“Some said that a fraction of the output from their prompts would contain nuggets of useful ideas or angles that were worth considering.”
The results for use of AI art in final products were much more clear cut, with roughly four out of five respondents ‘strongly opposed’, and only two respondents out of the 171 saying they either regularly or occasionally generate art with AI that they plan to keep in a final game.
Many more designers (30%) were accepting of using AI to generate placeholder art for their designs – but 39% of respondents were ‘strongly opposed’ to that use.
TTGDA’s report cited one respondent as saying, “Publishers want pretty prototypes and the AI art makes me better able to illustrate the narrative direction and make play less boring than it would be with black and white words or “close enough” illustrations. Some of the games I am working on have no illustrations in the real world that anyone has done and if I wanted those I would have to pay artists which I cannot afford to do.”
But it added that other designers said AI assistants had failed to create usable placeholder art in response to their prompts, with several saying that after trying AI-generated placeholder art they had returned to clipart and other online searches.
TTGDA said that when asked how they feel about publishers using AI for placeholder art, 40% of respondents said they would be ok with it, but 29% would like to contractually prohibit it and another 31% said they ‘don’t like it, but wouldn’t really fight it’.
The report added, “Of all the AI uses that the survey asked about, editing and proofreading had the lowest
number of ‘strongly opposed’ responses, at 35% for personal use and 30% for publisher use.
“About a quarter of designers (28%) are using AI to edit things they’ve written at least occasionally.
“Some designers gave examples of AI not working well as an editor for their games, saying it ‘made the rulebook worse’, or ‘creates more problems than it solves’.
“The problems they described included hallucinations and inappropriate tone. Designers also raised concerns that publishers might use AI for proofreading without a final human check, leaving the game vulnerable to errors.”
TTGDA also noted that more than 80% of respondents did not want publishers to use AI to generate marketing materials for their games, with multiple designers commenting that they were turned off by the use of AI in content creation around games, and will not work with influencers who use genAI in their workflow.
The report noted that of issues raised by designers when asked about their concerns around AI, “the most commonly voiced concern was that current generative AI tools are based on plagiarism, because they were trained on art and written materials without the creators’ consent.”
It noted, “Many said things like, ‘All uses of stolen material are problematic’. Multiple designers also mentioned that they want contract language that will prohibit a publisher from allowing AIs to be further trained on their game materials.
“The next most common concern was AI’s high environmental cost. A ChatGPT request uses ten times more electricity than a typical Google search (2.0Wh vs 0.3Wh). Other impacts include the use of rare earth elements, mercury, and lead in data center equipment; and the use of large amounts of water for cooling.
“Some designers worry that AI could flood the market with bad games. One designer thought it would be easy for unethical publishers to quickly create ‘clones that are slightly different’ and crowd the games they are copying out of the market.
“Another designer worried that ‘AI is great at making things that look like games for crowd funding campaigns, but without actual rules that make sense’.
“The general sentiment from these and other designers was the worry that in a market where it is already difficult for a game to stand out, these practices will only make it harder.”
Recent Repercussions
TTGDA’s report comes just over a month after Ryan Dancey, a more than 30-year veteran of the tabletop gaming industry, lost his COO job at publisher Alderac Entertainment Group after saying AI could generate game ideas as good as his company’s titles Tiny Towns and Cubitos.
Dancey said Alderac CEO John Zinser told him it was time to “move on to new adventures” in the “aftermath” of his LinkedIn post discussing the use of AI in board game design, which quickly attracted a flurry of negative comments from tabletop designers, AEG’s business partners and bodies such as the Tabletop Game Designers Association, as well as board gamers across social media.
Wingspan designer Elizabeth Hargrave, the co-founder of TTGDA, dismissed Dancey’s suggestion when speaking to BoardGameWire the day after his departure from AEG.
She said at the time, “I absolutely do not think AI could be prompted to come up with even the basic idea for those games, let alone a fully fleshed out ruleset for them. For fun, I’ve prompted several different options for ideas for Wingspan cards and not one of them has given me an actionable idea.
“I had a friend who ran a rulebook through AI for proofreading and it hallucinated that people needed to shout ‘bingo’. Apparently that’s AI’s conception of board games right now.”
She told BoardGameWire at the time that the TTGDA board had been discussing the use of AI in board game design, adding that it was “a conversation we need to have with our membership”.
She said, “We’re working on a model contract to offer to our members right now, and that will offer a clause that designers can request that will require publishers not to use AI in their final product. A lot of contracts ask us to certify that a board game design is our own, and not plagiarized.
“It’s my opinion that using AI in a final product goes against that, because it’s using a machine that’s built entirely on plagiarism.”
Hargrave added last month, “I do see people using AI for things like generating a bunch of placeholder names in a prototype. They’re often clunky options but they do the job when you know everything will change 50 times before you’re done anyway. I’m not aware of anyone who has successfully actually gotten good, original ideas for mechanisms from AI.
“What I wish we were talking about is how AI could be built to help designers run models of their games repeatedly to catch weird edge cases or broken strategies. I wish someone would build that tool instead of the language models that just focus on advanced auto-complete.
“This would never replace actual playtesting with humans for psychology and actual fun, but it might save me some repetitions.”
The TTGDA survey noted that one of the most common additional uses mentioned was as a source for help with probability, mathematics, and thinking about balance.
It said, “In some cases, designers are having the AI write spreadsheet formulas that they then use to do calculations in the spreadsheet. In others, they are simply asking the AI to do calculations.
“However, nearly as many designers said they had quite poor results with asking LLMs to do math, reporting errors and hallucinations. For example, one designer who used ChatGPT to calculate detailed probabilities (e.g. how often a certain set of cards might appear in a starting hand) said when they checked the results, they were wrong ‘roughly 1/4th of the time’. Another called ChatGPT ‘surprisingly bad at maths’.”
Last week board game publisher Awaken Realms responded to a wave of anti-AI art review bombing for its upcoming crowdfund, Concordia: Special Edition, by saying no AI-generated imagery will be used in the finished game.
Awaken Realms is one of highest-profile tabletop publishers to confirm it uses AI image generators, with other notable adopters of the technology including Stronghold Games – which attracted significant ire for its use of AI art in its $2.2m More Terraforming Mars! crowdfunding campaign.
The technology has been widely criticised by artists angry that the models are built upon their work without licensing or recompense, in addition to outcry over its environmental costs and threats to jobs in the creative and other industries.
The post More than half of board game designers in TTGDA survey have used generative AI in their work first appeared on .
Oft geht es in den Artikel über die Spitze des Imperiums um die Engel des Todes, die Space Marines. Doch die wahre Elite sind die Custodes, die Leibwächter des Imperators. Nun hat Games Workshop neue Modelle und Regeln angekündigt. Wir werfen einen Blick auf die Neu-heiten.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Robert Wolfes geschrieben
Mounthaven tritt aus den Festungstoren: In Warcrow bekommen die Zwerge keinen Abgesang, sondern einen Aufbruch. Der Master Plan weist den Weg in den „Last War“ – und auf dem Spieltisch übersetzt sich das in robuste Infanterie, aktivierende Befehle und eine spürbare Kontrolle über Raum und Objectives.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Roger Lewin geschrieben
Die Hochelfen sind zurück auf dem Blood Bowl-Rasen. Sie kommen mit Perfektion und Arroganz. In Begleitung der Spike! Journal Ausgabe 21 bringen die Passprofis aus Ulthuan eine Reihe neuer spannender Spieler auf das Feld. Das ist frischer Wind für eine Fraktion, die seit längerem im Legend-Bereich der Regeln verstaubt.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Geoffrey Förste geschrieben
Games Workshop hatte bereits die neuen Einheiten für Grand Cathay angekündigt. Mit The Breaching of the Great Bastion werden wir mit neuen Informationen zum Hintergrund und auch endlich mit den Profilwerten und Fähigkeiten der neuen Einheiten versorgt. Wir haben für euch einen kurzen Blick ins Buch geworfen.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Nina Horbelt geschrieben
OffDutyNinja, the tabletop marketing specialist which has worked on $25m of crowdfunding campaigns since its 2018 launch, has been acquired by industry peer Game Brands.
The combined company will operate under the OffDutyNinja name, with Game Brands adding its web design, search engine and answer engine optimisation, and blog content creation offerings to ODN’s marketing and crowdfunding services.
ODN’s work over the years has included crowdfunding and marketing support for companies such as Roxley Games, Indie Boards & Cards and Stronghold Games, Devir North America and Allplay, while the more than 100 campaigns it has worked with include the $2.2m More Terraforming Mars! Kickstarter and Marvel Dice Throne X-Men, which raised over $4.2m.
The acquisition follows a period of ODN quietly closing down its operations, Game Brands founder Ryan Eichenwald told BoardGameWire, with company founder Kira Peavley having shifted to a full-time director of operations role at Brass: Birmingham publisher Roxley Games over the past couple of years.
Eichenwald becomes CEO of Off Duty Ninja, with former CEO Peavley staying on in an advisory capacity for the next year to help ease the transition.
Peavley told BoardGameWire, “It came down to timing, and the timing was right. I had reached a point where I was ready for my next chapter, and when the opportunity with Ryan and Game Brands came together, it just made sense.
“The clients, the team, the work they have all built deserve to keep going and growing, and this deal makes that possible. It felt like the right ending to my chapter and the right beginning for theirs. It has been quite emotional but also quite positive.”
Speaking of ODN’s growth and the changes in board game crowdfunding and marketing over the years, Peavley said, “OffDutyNinja launched October 31, 2018, originally as a media management consultancy. That lasted about five minutes, honestly, because clients needed more and I was able to offer it.
“Very quickly it evolved into a full digital marketing agency for tabletop games, helping publishers with their everyday marketing needs as well as crowdfunding. The scope grew, and then ebbed, and then grew again.
“Covid hit hard and when publishers/creators are having to make difficult decisions about whether they can afford to keep their doors open and keep making games, marketing support understandably moves down the priority list.
“Tariffs have brought that same energy back in a different way. Through all of it we just tried to stay flexible and meet clients where they were.
“The other challenge has been the shift in how Kickstarter works. Ten years ago you could launch with no budget and no existing audience and still find success because the platform itself was driving discovery.
“That window has been closing for tabletop for a while now, and it has fundamentally changed what creators need to consider before launching a crowdfunding project.”
She continued, “That discovery shift really gets to the heart of the biggest challenge we see now. The audience has to exist before you launch. Full stop.
“The campaigns that succeed are the ones where the publisher has spent months, sometimes a full year, building a community that is genuinely excited to back on day one. The first 24 to 48 hours drive the algorithm, and the algorithm doesn’t care about your campaign if you don’t come in with momentum already built.
“The biggest obstacle to that? Time. Creators sometimes wait way too long to get started. We’d sometimes hear from people who reached out only a month or two before their planned launch date, or in some cases after they had already gone live.
“At that point every job gets harder: the audience building is rushed, the creative is rushed, and the campaign pays for it. The earlier you start, the better every single piece of it gets.
“The other big thing is expectation calibration. There are a lot of headline funding numbers out there from mega-campaigns that skew what success looks like.
“For most publishers, especially indie and first-time creators, a realistic and fully funded campaign that delivers well is worth so much more than swinging for a number you can’t hit.”
When asked about her take on ODN’s biggest successes in the crowdfunding space, Peavley said, “Honestly, it’s hard to point to a single success.
“People probably want to hear about the big IP projects, and those are genuinely exciting. Getting to work on something like Power Rangers: Heroes of the Grid across multiple campaigns, or Marvel Dice Throne, or Lord of the Rings, or Terraforming Mars is a thrill for obvious reasons.
“But the truth is every project we worked on was a big success to us, from a first-time creator finding their footing to a major publisher launching their next big title. The scale is completely different but the care that goes into it is exactly the same.
“And that’s really the point. A tremendous amount of love, heart, and work goes into every campaign, and that’s not just from our side. It’s from the client, the designers, the artists, the playtesters, the partners, the backers, the community.
“Tabletop is a real group effort, and when all of those pieces come together the way they’re supposed to, that’s the success. Every single time. That never got old.”
Crowdfunding Future
Game Brands launched three years ago as Board Burst, before renaming itself to Digital Wizard. That company consisted of Game Brands, which focused on digital marketing and web support for the board, tabletop, and video game industries, and Opmasis, which provided the same services for realtors, personal injury lawyers and contractors.
Eichenwald told BoardGameWire that Opmasis would be closing its doors following the ODN acquisition. He said the new company would also cease reaching out to potential video game clients “for at least the time being” – although added that it would still accept video game clients if they request its services.
Game Brands’ previous experience in the tabletop industry includes working with Steve Jackson Games “to help them wrangle their website”, backend work for Restoration Games which Eichenwald said doubled the company’s website traffic, and providing website design assistance for Gamelyn Games prior to its acquisition by Tabletop Tycoon (now Tycoon Games).
Eichenwald said, “ODN’s number of clients is currently at 11, including the combined client bases of both companies. ODN has started moving in a very crowdfunding-heavy direction over the last few months, and I’m very excited to continue that work.
“ODN’s crowdfunding team is second-to-none, and I’m looking forward to being able to help new games reach audiences in much more concrete, measurable ways than ever before.
“ODN has also had a very board and card game-focused history, but the addition of the Game Brands team – and Brad Bound especially – gives us deep roots in the TTRPG space as well that we’re eager to bring to ODN’s experienced team.”
The ODN team will also include CFO Chris Ortega and backer experience manager Carissa Yaffe, in addition to lead graphic designer Kevin Haemmerle. Editorial manager Anais Torres was already in the process of leaving ODN prior to the sale, but is currently helping with the company’s transition, Peavley added.
Asked to give her predictions for how tabletop crowdfunding might change over the next year or so, Peavley said, “I think we’re going to continue seeing Gamefound grow, and I’m genuinely hopeful that the increased competition will push Kickstarter to make some positive changes. A little pressure never hurts.
“I personally love what the BackerKit crowdfunding platform is doing and I hope to see it pick up more momentum in our space. The platform landscape is more interesting right now than it’s been in a long time, which is good for creators and backers both.”
Eichenwald, who attended the GAMA Expo trade show as part of ODN at the end of last month, said, “One of the big things that came up was just how many people were looking for crowdfunding support, especially after the economic shocks from last year.
“A lot of the newer games seemed to be small-box or app-enabled, and I got a sense of excitement this year that hadn’t been there the year previous – which makes sense, given that GAMA 2025 was overshadowed by the first round of tariffs.”
The post Scoop: Tabletop game marketing specialist OffDutyNinja acquired by Game Brands first appeared on .
Bereits mehrere der Fraktionen für Infinity von Corvus Belli haben eines der neuen Farbsets erhalten. Somit erfolgt stetig der Wechsel auf den neuen Partner The Army Painter. Nun haben auch die O-12 ein solches Paket erhalten. Spieler*innen der Ordnungshüter in der menschlichen Sphäre dürfen sich also freuen.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Dennis Rexin geschrieben
StarCraft fesselte ganze Generationen von PC-Spieler*innen. Heiße Schlachten zwischen Protoss, Zerg und Terranern prägten zahlreiche Jugendzimmer und viele nachfolgende Spiele. Jetzt bringt Archon Studio das Tabletop dazu heraus und die Fans sind sehr gespannt. Wir haben bereits einen ersten Blick in die Starterbox und das Regelsystem werfen dürfen.
Dieser Beitrag wurde von Geoffrey Förste geschrieben
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