Wednesday 23 March 2016

Miniatures: Dropzone Commander - Shaltari: Spirit Gates

With April approaching it meant that my DZC escalation league was moving to 1k games and as a result I needed to expand my force; so to start I purchased some spirit gates.

Here is my personal review of these fast small gates.

The Packaging

As per previous posts these models come in a blister, which contains the models, firm foam and a card inlay


The model

The model consists of 3 parts: main body and two fins.

It is with a heavy heart that I make the following comments: the detail on these is....mediocre at best. It appears that I got a bad set; the detail is blurred and bumpy with a slightly rough feel. There was a flimsy film like flash, which, although easily removed (by rubbing my fingers over it), was all over the model. If this hadn't come in Hawk packaging and from a know distributor I'd say this was a knock off.....bad day in quality control. Hopefully when painted it won't be noticeable.

Building the model


With only 3 pieces in total these didn't take long to build.

The fins don't fit as snug as they do on the plastic Eden gates but it didn't take long too glue into place either.

So in no time these were built, shame about the quality but I expect a lick of paint will cover the issue.

*forgot to add that the flight sticks wouldn't fit in the base without slipping through so I glued some flight pegs (bought previously) to prevent that

Saturday 19 March 2016

Painting: Dropzone Commander - Shaltari: Coyote

Sorry for the delay in this week's post, it's been an absolutely manic week! not helped that I have been stricken with man flu. But I have found a moments peace and respite from man flu (courtesy of Beechams (other medicines are available)) to be able to write this post.

So I open properly (aside from the apology) with exciting news: I am now officially a Hawk Talon! So if, dear reader, you are local to Berkshire then I can officially provide demos/assistance with events etc.

Anyway, enough of that and on with the painting. So as mentioned in my last post; March is the addition of a commander to starter set for the DZC escalation league I'm running. With my Coyote all built it needed to be painted ready to face my foes.

As ever the paints used were Vallejo unless stated otherwise.


I started with a solid undercoat of white primer from Halfords


Next I coated the model in Army Builder Strong tone. Despite painting an entire starter set this way it still makes me nervous for the outcome, stupid I know! As you'll also see one of the gauss cannons fell off during the application of the strong tone, this was quickly glued back on using super glue. In fact it stuck better this time than originally.


Now here I have to hold my hands up and say that I believe I may have skipped a phase from the scheme I used on my starter set; I don't remember using bonewhite, so I'm going have to assume that I didn't (especially as there isn't any photo to confirm) so it seems I went straight to drybrushing Dead White (72.001) several times.


Here I painted the command module fins, the area between the fins and leg pads Electric Blue (72.023)


This photo is the culmination of all the following stages:

I painted the gauss cannons, leg joints, bottom points of the legs and the small nodes around the top and bottom of the fan at the back of the model with Chainmail Silver (72.053), then carefully coated with GW Nuln Oil (except the gauss cannons those were liberally soaked). Once the Nuln Oil dried I lightly painted with Silver (72.052).

Then tidied up the white areas where blue and silver had accidentally come into contact with it, after which I drybrushed GW Ceramite White everywhere avoiding the areas painted silver.

Next I painted the canopies Black (72.051). Once dry I did a little tidying around the canopies and coated all over with Matt Varnish (70.520), followed by Gloss Varnish (70.510) which was only applied to the black canopies and gauss cannons.

I'm pleased with my commander, he looks the part and the command module is magnetised so it can represent the "eject" special rule.

Friday 11 March 2016

Miniatures: Dropzone Commander - Shaltari: Coyote

In month two of the dropzone commander escalation "league" that I'm running, we are building 750 points lists, which is to consists of the starter set plus a command vehicle. This is to introduce the aspect of CV value and command cards.

With this in mind I have chosen a Coyote as my command vehicle and in true "Turno's wargaming blog" style I will review the model.

The Packaging


As per previous posts these models come in a blister, which contains the models, firm foam and a card inlay

The model




The model consists of 9 parts: 3 legs, 2 Gauss cannons, 1 leg-to-body piece (probably has a better name but I'm unsure), 1 command module, 1 cockpit and the main body.

As ever the detail is amazing, and beautifully reflects the Shaltari fluff.


Building the model

9 pieces...that's all, that will be easy.....how wrong I was! Now this could easily have been the type of glue I used but whatever it was this model was a pain!

Firstly the legs, they are on a ball joint which is great for being able to position how you wish however I just couldn't get them to stick; one would stick so I'd move on to the next then the first one would fall out, this practically slapstick situation continued for around 30 minutes, until all the legs finally stayed glued!

Secondly the gauss cannons; these also have a ball joint connection but I found that the connection socket was just that little bit smaller than the ball joint so caused a bit of an issue when it came to gluing. In fact it too fell off...several times.

The cockpit went on without issue and the command module would easily fit. I have since magnetised the command module so it can be removed during play if the commander ejects.

Overall beautifully detailed model but a pain to build. Now to get painting...

Thursday 3 March 2016

Miniatures: Wasteman KS


So this week, I'm taking a small break from DZC and I am looking at the miniatures that came with my Wasteman Kickstarter (KS) pledge.

The Packaging



My Cybjorgs (Left) and Lunar Coalition (Right) posse packs came in their retail packaging (minus the dice).

The packaging is a large blister that just pops open at the back (similar to Hawk Wargames), however I didn't realise this until after I had cut the top off one of them.

The blister contains 5 models, 5 stat cards for the models, 5 bottle caps to mark activation, 5 bases, foam, and an inlay sheet with details to the thunderchild website. There will be dice in the retail sets, it's just at the time of dispatch Jason hadn't received the dice.



My add on to the KS was some Hazmatadors. These came in a plastic bag with the relevant stat cards and bases.



As with any good KS there were freebies and in this case my freebies consisted of Radical Trevor, Lowbot, Bagman, and Xam. Again these came the relevant stat cards and bases included in their plastic bag. Radical Trevor also came with his own bottle cap


The Models/Building the models:

Usually I would have two sections in a miniatures post one for how the models look and the other on how they go together but as these are mostly single piece models there is no building so I'll cover the usual aspects of "building the model" here.


Cybjorgs: Four of the five models are single piece, the fifth consists of two parts: body and weapon arm.

These are hefty pieces of metal; very reminiscent of early GW models. It makes a nice change to have such a heavy model in my hand.

The detail is really good, this is my first experience of Thunderchild Miniatures and I am very impressed.

I did, however have some serious mold lines on the two larger models, which took some time to remove. Also there was a large tag of metal on the drill of the fat one which I couldn't remove however due to it's positioning I will paint it like a hunk of flesh.....unless that was Jason's intention in which case it's brilliant!


Lunar coalition: 5 single piece models. Much like the Cybjorgs, these are detailed and have a good weight to them. They had very little flash to be removed.


Hazmatador: Three single piece models. These are light metal models, but again nicely detailed. Two of the models didn't have any flash to be removed however the third guy on the right had a large mold line on the first which needed to be removed as well as some flash under the arm.


Xam, Lowbot, and Bagman: Single piece light weight metal models with a good level of detail, and little to no flash.


Radical Trevor: For a single model he's got a bit of weight to him, which as I've mentioned is a good thing. Radical Trevor has lots of detail about him and I can certainly see him becoming a centrepiece for people's posses. With no flash to be removed.