Plastic Assembly Thoughts!

[Hateful Darkblack]

Something I've noticed now that I've started painting: I put on WAY too much primer, and lost a lot of the detail in the plastic. This wasn't as much of a problem with metal, and I'm not sure why. But I need to be careful to avoid putting on too much primer on these guys.

[eBadger]

Put together my 10t crew last night, and it was a very edifying experience. Thoughts:

Pros:

-Very dynamic poses that are well outside the box. The artists obviously went into this intending to use the advantages of the new medium, not just substitute metal. Kudos!

-Detail is good. There was a lot of concern that things would be lost and I didn't feel that; although I do admit that some detail isn't necessarily added (yamazuki's robe, for instance, could use something more than just lots of folds of cloth).

-Technical specs are wonderful. Tab A designed to fit into slot B fit perfectly; pieces just fit together well.

Cons:

-Holy @#$# lots of pieces. The archers - three figures - had 30 pieces to assemble, including 4 pieces for each head (head, helmet, and cowl in two parts). The detail here was neat, but completely overdone. While I was happy artists embraced the medium, there's also a line of 'just because you can doesn't mean you should'.

-Confusing to assemble. Miniatures should not need instructions, but I found myself struggling to sort things out on more than one occasion - for instance on the attachments to the back of the torakage (and the little flail that doesn't appear in any picture - that I finally matched up only by process of elimination). Much of this was simply gratuitous.

-Although most assembly gaps were well done, a couple were a pain (the cowls on the archers, and most particularly the line right down the front of yamaziko was VERY poorly chosen). Again, I'd rather these lose a little detail in spots to present a more seamless exterior.

-Bases!!!! The inclusion of slotted bases with models that have no slots is an expression of pure laziness or lack of forethought. Covering up the gaps is going to be a project unto itself. Shang was also not quite planned out: it doesn't even vaguely fit on its base.

Other observations:

-I used GW plastic glue (thick) and had no problems with assembly. My recommendation is to keep in mind that less is more...just get things slightly tacky, don't leave drops. Particularly with the tight tolerances, it'll go everywhere and isn't required.

-Use snips to remove items from the sprue; the pressure of a knife to cut through WILL break things (such as the archers' bows and misaki's spear).