I knocked out two more Terminators today but got a bit frustrated with one of them (I didn’t feel like my paint job was up to snuff, but pushed ahead anyway), so I figured it was time for a palate cleanser: assembling space dwarves!
Gunpla detour
Fortunately, I already own the tools for this because I got into Gunpla in 2019 and there’s quite a bit of crossover. In fact, if I hadn’t started building Gundam kits — something, like miniatures, I assumed I’d be bad at — I might not have gotten back into minis at all.
When I decided to give Gunpla a shot, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I could build a kit and be happy with the results. I’m not great! But every kit is better than the last one, and I’ve added more steps along the way: double-nipping, sanding, filing, and polishing are all standard practice now. I also enjoyed the process of building as much as the pleasure of having a finished model; finding that same joy in painting is what’s really gotten me jazzed about miniatures again.
And hey, minis fresh off the sprue are covered in mold lines, nubbins, and bits of flash that need the same attention as a Gundam kit before assembly — nice!
Back to the space dwarves
I’m used to single-piece minis or figures that just need a bit or two popped on — not full-on kits like the ones in the Deadzone core set. One of the first things I figured out was that I have the wrong glue; I assumed superglue worked for everything because it’s worked for everything I’ve ever assembled — but what I need is plastic glue.
So while I wait for a chance to nip over to Mox and pick up a bottle, I thought I’d get the “use these squads for your first game” minis off their sprues and cleaned up so they’re glue-ready.
I started with the default leader, a Steel Warrior Huscarl. He comes in 9 parts: head (with cool dwarf beard armor!), back, chest, hammer arm, gun arm, R and L shoulder pads, legs, and base. It’s a neat mini, and pointlessly gendered name aside the Forge Fathers are a cool faction. But after fiddling with it I’m much less excited about it.
Just from sort of squashing the bits together in my fingers it seems like the amount of assembly is not going to be rewarded with a matching amount of posability. There’s zero in the head and legs, the shoulder pads limit what can be done with the arms, and the torso is . . . so-so.
The torso is made to face straight forward, but it doesn’t do that well: There are substantial gaps all around the edges. But if I turn it a bit, the areas on the leg piece which are made to match up with it no longer do. Poking around online I see that this appears to be a problem with the Steel Warriors that Mantic has never fixed with a fresh sculpt.
I won’t know for sure until I try to glue this Huscarl together, but my initial impression is poor. It feels like I’m about to do a bunch of work to assemble what’s essentially a single-pose figure that could have been delivered in one piece.
Fuck it, I’m going to call it a night and revisit this dude another time.