This is my second article reviewing the new plastic model
kits from DreamForge Games. In my first
review here I looked at the basic Eisenkern Stormtrooper kit. This kit has all of the basic parts to build
standard stormtroopers. In this review I
will review the accessory kit that is available to add detail and options to a
stormtrooper squad.
Printed Components
Like the main stormtrooper kit, this kit comes in a sturdy
cardboard box with color art work on all sides as well as a one page, double
sided instruction sheet. The art is of
3D renders rather than actual models. As
with the stormtrooper instructions, the sheet in the box was a first draft that
has been replaced by an updated electronic instruction sheet located at the
DreamForge website.
Frame Breakdown &
Components
The box includes three frames. The first two frames include a staggeringly
vast array of detail parts to customize your figures. There are:
Pouches – There are six different ammunition and utility
pouches.
Extra Weapons – There are numerous machine guns, sub machine
guns, panzerfaust and pistols. There are
bare pistol grips that can be put on spare weapons, pistols in holsters as well
as empty holsters. There are also combat
knives in sheaths and World War II style German Model 24 Grenades (also known
as potato masher or stick grenades).
Replacement heads – There are non-mask heads with both soft
cap (M43 Einheitsmütze)
and officer’s crusher cap. Some of the
faces have goggles and some are bare.
There are a number of different expressions as well.
Replacement arms – There are replacement arms in various
poses from straight to bent give your figures a range of different poses. There is a several pairs of arms specifically
to hold the binoculars. All of the other
arms have no hands, allowing for greater flexibility.
Replacement Hands – There are a host of hands, both left and
right. There are hands with pistol
grips, hands holding weapons, fists, hands pointing and hands with flat
palms. There are also hands holding a
grenade.
Miscellaneous Items – There are six large and three small
ammunition crates, a small field computer (with a specific pair of arms) and
three sets of binoculars.
The last frame has three mechanical “mules” that represent cargo
haulers that can accompany the squads.
Detail Parts, Construction
& Use
Just like the stormtroopers, the frames are very well laid
out and cast with great quality. There
are small but manageable mold lines on most of the parts, but there are two
areas that require additional time. There
is a small amount of flash on the frames around the mule engine and all six of
the panzerfaust have a mold offset that can’t be removed without taking some of
the detail with it. I found no sink
marks on any of the parts.
This isn’t a complaint, only fair warning that these parts
are very tiny and fiddly. I strongly
suggest that you put any details you want on the belt before attaching the arms;
otherwise they are a huge bitch to get in the right place unless you resort to
tweezers.
One small complaint is that there is a medical pouch (looks
like the World War II gas mask container) that is supposed to hang off the back
of the belt. However the back pack comes
down to cover the belt, leaving the medical pouch to ride at but level. Another concern is that the contact point for
the grenades is very small, and if you handle your models roughly, or paint
with a vigorous dry brush style they can pop off very easily. It might just e worth giving the grenades a
pass.
Depending on how you use the parts, there should be enough
bits to detail two big boxes of stormtroopers, or forty figures. As mentioned above, the instruction sheet in
the box was an early draft that is not entirely clear. There is a better instruction sheet available
on the DreamForge Website
Mechanical Mule, Construction
& Use
The mules are actually stand alone models. The legs come in three parts and can be posed
multiple ways, but I found that to get the mule standing level and stable, you
really want to have all of the legs posed the same way. The designer has some helpful advice on this
on the DreamForge blog. There are also
two head styles. There is the “Command
Control” head and the optional and more anthropomorphic “Smart Mule” head
although there is no explanation as to what the difference is.
After assembling two of the mules, I strongly suggest that
these are fore experienced modelers only.
For beginners, the legs could be an exercise in frustration. The watch word fort these models is certainly
“patience”. To ease painting, I left the
side cages off of the main body and the platform off the top and assembled
everything when complete.
Overall Thoughts
& Opinions
This is another wonderful kit and I think it dovetails in
very nicely with the stormtrooper box.
However this kit certainly won’t be for everyone. If you don’t enjoy modeling or just want to
get the figures done in a hurry, I’d probably pass on this kit and just build
the stormtroopers straight from the main box.
On the other hand if you like to build models just for the sheer joy, or
want to achieve some characterful poses this kit is almost a must in my
opinion. As I said above, there are
probably enough bits that you can get at least thirty or forty depending on
what kind of detail bits you want on them.
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