Honestly, I can’t believe where time is going. June already?? wtf? Apologies for those of you who frequest my humble pigeon hole in the intehwebs for my lack of posting lately. Work has been grinding me into the ground, and i’ve been more absorbed with playing Indiana Jones Lego on Xbox. While i’m on that subject, Happy Birthday Indy, who, 30 years ago today, graced our screens in Raiders of the Lost Ark. My 3 year old has just started getting into Indy, so as a father and big Indiana Jones fan, this makes me very happy. For 30 facts and unusual trivia about Raiders, clicky here: http://blog.moviefone.com/2011/06/12/raiders-lost-ark-30th-anniversary/
Citadel Finecast
Anyway, down to business. This weekend I picked up my first Citadel Finecast miniatures, a box set of 3 bow wielding Ushabti for my Tomb Kings army. The sticker price of $49.50 made me cringe a little, but considering 3 metal ones would have been nearer to $60, I didn’t feel so bad. Of course the first thing I noticed when I picked up the box was ‘is there anything in this? did I grab a display?’. The material is very light. It is apparently some kind of plastic/resin hybrid.
As we have had a spell of cooler weather, I wanted to get these assembled and undercoated without the fear of fuzzy paint (eff you, humidity!) so Saturday afternoon, hung over from the show I played the night before, I set to work. I was intrigued as to how this new matrial would be. It’s quite flexible, meaning if you inadvertently knock it off the table, chances are the only thing that will need repairing will be your underwear.
If you haven’t seen the presentation yet, the new Finecast minis come on a sprue, thus:
At first glance I thought ‘balls, I thought there was supposed to be minimal flash and cleanup?’ Well, this stuff is actually really easy to work with. You need virtually no pressure with clippers to take the mini off the frame, and there is actually not that much in the way of cleanup. A mold line here or there, or a bit of flash but because of the medium, it’s effortless. Literally within 5 minutes, my forst Ushabti was ready for assembling:
Gone are the days of shitty lugs that won’t fit into the holes they are supposed to, and also the days of you holding metal pieces together for 10 minutes with superglue with no effect. Gone, also, are the days of weak joints. The lightweight nature of this makes this a dim and distant memory. This resin is superglue’s best friend. Assembling took literally a couple of minutes:
Within a half hour, I had all three assembled….
The only negative point I have so far is with the chap on the far left in the picture above. His hand obviously has been miscast, and a portion of the cowling behind his head is missing too. Hopefully this won’t be an ongoing problem for Finecast. I left it, with the train of thought of ‘its an ancient statue, and the Necrotect has’nt got to him yet to repair it…).
Then, onto prep for painting, using Duplicolor Sandible Primer:
…and voila! ready to be painted!
From box to fully primed in less than an hour, quite impressive, in my opinion. It shows just how user friendly this new material is. You don’t need to wash it in soapy water before priming, and apparently is not toxic like Forge World resin (not that I would advise eating/inhaling it anyway). I’m personally quite excited to work with this new medium, although some of the prices did shock me a little. Individual characters are now pushing the $20 mark, while I noticed that a certain Lizardman kit that was $49 in metal is now $66 in resin.
I guess the proof is in the pudding, and we’ll just have to see what happens with Citadel Finecast.
Sisters of Battle Rumors:
Pathtyphon/TastyTaste over at Http://bloodofkittens.com has given up some rather tasty rumors regarding new Sisters of Battle rules. Sadly enough, it does appear that they will be a ‘White Dwarf Codex’, but i’m not going to rule out that a new book will not be forthcoming. Here is the info:
‘As always let us start with the easy ones that pretty much everyone figured was going to happen.
Allies gone
Inquisition gone
Faith streamlined
USRs updated to 5th
Cheaper Unit costs
Inquisition elements gone
So let start with the big one and perhaps most controversial change to Sisters of Battle: Faith
I am amazed reading around the Net how quite few people had great guesses on how the new faith works. One caveat about the faith rules: I only have most of the story so let us hope someone else can pluck the rest from the aether. The only thing that really stays the same is only faith producing units can use faith. Gone is the over and under rules based on model count and gone is faith powers that everyone can use. It is replaced with every unit has its own unit specific act of faith to call upon.
So for instance Repentia Act of Faith allows them to always land an attack even if they are killed before they can swing. They are little bonuses like re-rolling to wound and hit, no USRs. Now this if fine and dandy if you just pop a faith point and bam! power goes off, but not so fast. Acts of Faith require that you roll 5+ to activate . This makes faith much more unreliable… maybe. In addition every unit that can get faith generates 1d6 faith points per turn. This also means that a new faith pool is generated each turn with no storing of past faith. As well faith can be activated in multiple phases of the game, so for instance you can re-roll to hit in your shooting phase or in your assault phase. What is not clear is a few things. Like how many dice can you throw at a single act of faith? How many times can you attempt to activated a power? If you get an act of faith to go off in one phase does it carry over to the next phase? If you fail an act of faith does that mean you cannot try again in another phase? I don’t have the answers, but what do you think?
Random tidbits
All Faith generating units get +6 invul save
All units that can get transports get Immolators or Rhinos
Assassins gone (Death Cult still in)
Wargear with the same names as GK wargear stay and get changed over. (e.g. Psybolt Ammo)
Karamazov gone
Priests in, pretty much same as before.
No change to the general Bolter, Melta, Flame concept of the Sisters
Specifics
Sisters have about 5 HQ choices including Special Characters
St. Celestine: Same price as a Grand Master you get 2+/+4 saves, WS/BS 7 Jump Pack, Fleet, Power Weapons always wounds on 4+ Has the power to come back like GK Thawn if killed.
Confessor: Takes the slot of the old Inquisitors. Cheap HQ (Warboss). Can create a henchman band using most of the henchman found in the GK codex. What makes the Confessor extra deadly is the ability for it to re-roll hits and wounds for her and the squad. This is the translation of the rumor matrix. So think for one second about her and the Death Cult together?
Repentia: Cheaper close to SM cost. FNP, Rage, Fearless, 6+ invul, no transports
Battle Sister Squad: Cheaper 10-20 unit size (no combat squads), but has access to Immolators which begs the question… Immolators either get increased transport capacity or Sisters break the rules concerning model count and buying transports. Multiple acts of faith.
Exocists: Pretty much same as before.
This is it for now gents and dames. If you have any questions let me know I can see if can get them answered sometime this week with another post.’
So there you have it.
Until next time…
