The Warforge Miniature Modelling and Conversion

Do you want to live forever?

So last time I was at Gamesday Baltimore, I was surprised at the number of people in costume. Being the sort of person who enjoys attention, I've been mulling the thought of what I could realistically pull off for a costume for the next GW event I go to.

I've settled on trying to emulate a Death Korps of Krieg Commissar, since I already had a gas mask on-hand. I've tracked down a cheap peaked cap on eBay, and though it's a little small for my gigantic head, I'm working on trying to stretch the thing out so I can reliably wear it over a mask. I also had the incredible fortune of finding one of these Swiss Military Greatcoats at my local Salvation Army for the grand sum of $5.I'm going to work on modding the Nerf Recon I have into a bolt pistol prop, since their shapes are sort've similar already.

As I stand now:

Things I need to find...

A left-handed ice hockey glove - preferably as big as I can possibly get, to use as the basis for a Power Fist prop. I'm checking eBay and Craigslist, but I haven't found anything yet. I obviously don't want to spend a ton on a new, proper pair of gloves that I'm just going to be building things on anyway.

A 'frogged' military vest - similar to these. I think this is going to end up being the hardest piece of the costume to actually find or make, since I can't sew very well and those 'hussar'-esque coatees are very expensive. I'm trying to find out if anyone I know has, maybe, a marching band vest that would work instead that I could pilfer, but I find that just as unlikely, really.

Cheap gold-fringe epaulets - like this. These seem to be expensive, too, but I figure out of all of the things I could try making, this one'd be easiest.

My old Imperial Guard Uplifting Primer - I had one, but I'll be damned if I know where it went.

If any of you guys have any ideas as to where to obtain any of this stuff, I'd be interested in hearing it!

Dear TheWarstore.com,

We have to talk.

I don't think your bitz service and I can be together anymore. More and more, I feel like you only think of me as a wallet and a pair of credit cards. I'm a human being, damn you, with feelings!

Hey! My eyes are up here!

It's time to put it all out in the open - I've been doing commerce behind your back, with other bitz services. Oh yeah, you better believe it. I've even done it on eBay, with dozens of sellers.

Don't act surprised. You had to have seen this coming. A single grotzooka bit for $14? More than a third of the cost of the box it comes from? What about an $17 Razorback Upgrade sprue, when the difference in price between a Rhino and Razorback is only $5 MSRP? Two and a half dollars for a single iron gob? Really? Have you no shame?

I understand that  you have needs. I've tried using Paypal to spice up our transaction life, but you always want more. You're driving me away, into the arms of another bitz service. A bitz service that genuinely wants to know how my day was, and knows how to gently and lovingly assign prices.

All in all, I have no regrets - the good times were sweet, but you seem to have lost that lovin' feeling... and I just can't bring myself to stay.

We'll always have that order I placed during the 2009 ork first wave releases...

A Review Package from MaxMini.eu

So back in February, I was contacted by the MaxMini.eu guys. They asked if I'd be interested in previewing some of their upcoming releases, and since I'd been really happy with the stuff I've bought from them in the past, my response was an enthusiastic yes.

Fast forward to today, and a package arrives in the mail all the way from the moon Poland. Needless to say, I was more than a little excited to tear into this thing and see what's inside, and hopefully the MaxMini guys don't mind if I share the contents with all of you. I'm about to sound like a gigantic shill, I'm well aware of it, but they didn't ask me to write any of this and I do very genuinely love the work these guys do.

First and foremost, I received one of the prototypes of their 'Wunderrocket'. I first saw their previews for this model a couple weeks ago, and I was more than excited about it, since it looks to be a fantastic proxy for a Pulsa Rokkit for Apocalypse.

The main thing that always staggers me about MaxMini stuff is how much cleaner their casting work is compared to other companies. Last year, I ordered a bunch of Ork Nob-sized pirate heads and their Post-Apocalptic Big Guns to use in Flash Git conversions, and I was startled to discover that there was basically no mold lines, flashing, or cleanup required on the stuff I received. The same can be very easily said for the stuff I received from them today - while not completely perfect, their stuff is giant pogo-stick leaps and bounds better than stuff like Armorcast. Even a company like Forgeworld, which survives with ludicrous detail for ludicrous prices, produces and sells a lot of pieces that require considerable effort to repair into the product advertised in my experience.

To that end, all of the photographs of the stuff I received depict product that has not been cleaned up at all - I basically just removed these parts from the box and grabbed my camera.

So, let's return to the Wunderrocket. Przemek, the MaxMini.eu representative that sent me this stuff, advised me that the rocket I've received "has been cast in a sample mold, so the main 'body' of the rocket has been cast slightly differently than the one from the production mold". If you notice any significant differences in details between what I'm photographing here and what MaxMini.eu currently has up, I think it's probably attributable to that - because shipping from Poland takes as long as it does, they sent me one of their preproduction kits to play with.

You can see the parts breakdown here. The parts are keyed to fit together in a very simple manner - it's hard to get it wrong. There's two top covers that plug into the main, cylindrical body of the rocket; one resembles a large antenna rig, which presumably would suggest a remote control for the rocket, and the other is a cockpit-esque hatch that would conceal a pilot. The ramp is cast as one solid piece, which is actually fairly technically impressive from a mold-making standpoint. You can already tell from this picture that the quality of these casts is pretty damn high - there's nothing flashed, broken, mangled, bent, or bubbled. In fact, the kit fits together without any glue:

This is dry-fit together with zero glue, and really looks just great. My Big Mek is in the picture for scale purposes, and to admire the construction. You'll notice that the one thing that appears absent is a turbine to plug into the front of the engine on the tail, but I expect that's absent just because they hadn't had the time to get the molds together for that part yet. It's certainly not a big deal for me, since I can manufacture my own fairly easily, and I've no doubt that it's remedied on the actual kit itself. That said, though, this thing fits together seamlessly, and there's hardly any flaws anywhere - the only thing I've noticed is a very tiny miscast on the second picture above, in the thin 'casing' that goes around the gauges and dials on the side of the rocket, but I imagine that's simply due to how thin the part is and it's not a hard thing to fix. Certainly nothing like having to drop your Forgeworld model in boiling water to straighten it out!

MaxMini's current pricing on the Wunderrocket puts it at around $50 USD, which means for Ork players it's something like the cost of a Battlewagon or Deff Dread. Obviously, cheaper would be lovely... but speaking from experience playing Apocalypse, I would almost always rather spend the $50 on one of these Rockets instead of a Dread. Pulsa Rokkits can be ridiculously useful in a large game.

The Wunderrocket wasn't all I received from the MaxMini guys, however. They also pitched in a "Confession Machine", an interesting terrain item that looks right at home in the 41st millenium.

I'm not 100% sure what I'm going to use this for yet, but I'm thinking it might be a good element to include in a diorama or large display base, since pegging it onto an ork vehicle or the likes seems wasteful. Perhaps I'll loot it and use it as an objective marker?

I also got a handful of small, assorted bits to play with.

Obviously, I'm very excited over the hammers and pirate orc heads. Since I'm working on a 'Saladamneders' army, I need all the Thunder Hammers I can get, and these things look right at home being swung by power or terminator armor. The orc boy heads are also pretty fantastic - I already have a larger set of the Nob ones for when I make flash gitz, and I think I might save these three for the orks that will have to be crewing their very dakka-laden Battlewagon transport. I hope that down the road the MaxMini guys consider making some bodies to go along with these heads; right now, Micro Art Studio produces the closest thing to "Flash Git" bodies wearing long coats with their Orc Body set, but these are only Boy sized, and proppa Flash Gitz need to be almost the scale of Nobz.  You'll also note a couple of other bits there, including one of MaxMini's "M-guns", a trio of "Steam Knight Helmets", "Fallen Legionnaire Helmets", "Feral Heads", and some of their "Skulls" bits. As with the other photos, these are all of bitz that are straight out of the package with zero cleanup - you can see why I love MaxMini's quality control. If those hammers had been from anyone else, the wires on them would have been a disastrous, miscast mess.

So, yes, in summation I have nothing but glowing things to say about MaxMini.eu's work. I'm not ashamed to say it. Obviously, I hope they focus on making more... 'post-apocalptic', or scrap-built wargear so that I can incorporate it into my greenskin army, but for those of you working on weedy forces like the Imperial Guard you really can't go wrong either.