"Wargames Factory Vikings" Topic

I'm not sure if Dark Ages falls under Ancients or Medieval, so I'll do both…

I've been putting together a load of these lately. To be a completist, I will say they are 28mm, hard plastic miniatures. Currently available from the Wargames Factory website for $4.95 USD for 3 sprues/8 figures – about 62 cents each.

I will also qualify my comments by saying that I am definitely in the "Wargames Factory Fan" camp. Some people have slung a great deal of muck on their very first efforst – the Republican Romans – that came out about a year ago. But I never thought they were all that awful. The detail is a bit soft in places, but when painted they compare favorably to the Foundry Caesarean range and they're only about 60 cents a figure, or 20 cents if you took advantage of the $9.99 USD deal they ran.

That said, each release we've seen has gotten better and better with crisper detail, better proportions, and more interesting components in the sets.

I was amazed by the Ancient German set and have since started building a 2000 point army for WAB. Grand total in infantry and cavalry was about $220 USD bucks. The sprues are set up in such a way that I have heavy infantry, skirmishers, cavalry, and command from the boxes.

As I put together the 240 infantry and 36 cavalry for my 2000 point army, I am taking breaks building their new Vikings.

WOW.

These are amazing figures. The detail is incredibly crisp and deep and very much like metal figures from Artizan or Crusader. The faces are just unbelievable. You can't do expressions and detail like that in metal…it's just not possible.

Granted, the Perry brothers have this God like status in our industry, but I would put these miniatures up against anything they've done. Great proportions, great detail, great character. And they're an incredible bargain.

My 2 cents on some great figures.

Regards,
Bill

Thanks for the review! Good to see they are coming along!

I have to agree the zeds and the Vikings that I have from Wargames Factory are some of the best plastic minis I have ever painted.

I'm with you on the vikings. Really nice figures.

I just don't see it. Sorry.

On the one hand, Tony and Howard have sent me Celt, and German, and Viking sprues unsolicited. And that's very kind.

But I've been trying to put together a Nervii warband from the Celts and some German bits for the Maine wargamers' battle in the spring, and plan to try to work in the unarmored Vikings, and I am having terrible trouble with the general proportions and arm fit on all of them. The mailed Viking bodies are hopeless, IMO: mail sarks or byrnies just don't work like that.

Part of my problem is that late in life, I've trained (a bit: probably just a dangerous amount) in anatomy and physiology, and to assess human bodies at rest and in motion. Frankly, I'm finding it very difficult to assemble the bits to pose like real human bodies. From the many examples people have posted online, apparently I'm not the only one; all the results I've seen are unsatisfactory.

I compare the details to Artizan and Crusader, or Foundry metals, and see quite a difference.

Oh, well: on to the Zulus…

Allen

As much as I like WF and support their efforts, no way is their product comparable to the Perrys'. There is no need to knock the Perry brothers to promote and compliment Tony and WF.

I'm still waiting for my Vikings… I guess the 'free shipping Black Friday' deal gave them a lot of orders to process.

I'm waiting too, got probably stuck in the X-mas rush

I'm eagerly awaiting mine. I got an e-mail stating they got swamped by the orders (not surprising), but expected to have everything out by Monday.

I agree that these are excellent figures.

rddfx: I don't believe Bill Peterson was disparaging the Perrys, he was just saying that he thought these Vikings were just as good.

I have to agree.

I find it odd how the Perrys seem to do no wrong and WF seems to do no right. Maybe it's just the weight of history and the Games Workshop background.

Regarding proportions. I have WF figures next to Artizan, Crusader, Foundry and in most cases the WF figures are actually BETTER proportioned! The original Romans were the odd, short-legged look of all those others. The new figures are more in line with the recent Perry sculpts with a slimmer, more proportional feel.

I bought a pack off Ebay even more cheaply than I could from WF (surprisingly) and thought the detail was mostly very good (yep I also really liked the heads) but I agree with Allen that the poses just don't look right for most. To me, they look more like poses rather than warriors who are seriously about to get stuck in. Maybe I'm getting too fussy in my old age!

I have also just received my Perry's WOR's figures and I can't see the WF Vikings matching those at all! Maybe it's just a personal thing and each to his own.

I really like the WF Vikings for what they are-that is, they are are highly customizable, detailed, and inexpensive models for one of my favorite historical subjects. I'll enjoy building a sizable force of them.

The detail is really nice and crisp, and in spite of certain anatomical issues I really like about half the poses when competed. Others seem a bit akward no matter how I adjust the arms, heads, and weapons. The running an crouching poses especially seem odd to me, and I don't like the way they rank up with the others. The shoulders especially seem a bit unnatural to me, in that they seem to sit a little low. I just accept that, though, as the price for all that customizability.

These figures will never replace my lead Vikings, but they are a nice effort and huge improvement over their earlier sets. If WF continued to improve at this rate, I'm sure they will overcome the remaining issues. I think the dark ages/ ancients sets would hugely benefit from some generic accessory sprues to provide cloaks, capes and the like. I added some GW
bits to mine, including some Empire militia capes. These very effectively draw the eye away from some of the anatomical oddness. Also, it's nice not having oversized weapons, but I think it would be nice if the broadswords were just a wee bit broader.

Still, these are great sets for the money, and I look forward to more WF releases .

"Granted, the Perry brothers have this God like status in our industry"

This sounds very patronizing to me, hence the scold. Instead of boosting the WF Vikings, this transforms the thread into a WF versus the Perrys throwdown, as other comments have demonstrated.

I'm not sure if Dark Ages falls under Ancients or Medieval

Medieval.

"I have also just received my Perry's WOR's figures and I can't see the WF Vikings matching those at all!"

For those not so fortunate:

link

Allen

By and large I have to agree with Allen.

I have not been a fan of WF so far but taking advantage of the thanksgiving special offer I bought a number of Viking sprues on the strength that these were 'significantly better' than anything produced by WF to date and assembled and painted some of them last weekend.

As Allen notes, there is a real problem with the 'fit' of the arms. The point where arm and body joins together just won't give you a good seamless join. It looks like the edges at the join are almost rounded over leaving, after assembly, a marked depression all the way round which stands out even after painting. Neither mail nor cloth fits like that on a human body, it's very noticeable. I even tried a glue with a high solvent content so you can 'melt' the two ends and this does improve things, some of the figures are at least 'acceptable' but for others it just can't make up for this design flaw, the join however remains clearly noticeable on all figures.

The second problem is again with the arms, there is a very limited range of rotation that they can be positioned within without the arm either looking anatomically wrong or exacerbating the problem above to a ridiculous degree and whilst there are an awful lot of arms included on the sprue they are all fairly similar to each other so for example you tend to end up with all the spears held pointing downwards as you can't find an arm that fits with the spear angled up.

Then there is the mail, it looks 'ok' at first, not great but at least acceptable, however it's a real problem when you try to paint it up. The detail is so low relief you are unlikely to be able to dry brush successfully. Personally I would say its poor enough that WF just should not bother with the mail bodies and just do the set as unarmored, which is a viable option if the other problems are fixed.

The next problem is the neck, unlike all the other manufacturers who have a simple flat neck/body joint, WF use a ball/socket joint. On the plus side it allows a greater degree of movement in the joint, you can tilt the head realistically, but the issue is the neck is just way too long, I mean seriously way too long. Again the solvent helped getting a few necks 'melted' down to a reasonable size but still half look quite odd.

Then perhaps to cap it all the figures are all way to tall. The tallest measures 34mm and most seem to be at least 30mm, they dwarf all the other figures I have.

As Allen says they don't rival Artizan, Crusader or Foundry, and it's a gross exaggeration to say they do, to be honest it's a needless comparison as well. However they can and should be compared to WG, Perry and Victrix and currently you would have to say they show you can do a lot better than this set.

So what can I say positively, the weapons sprue is great, shields, spears, swords are all great, in fact much better than I had expected. The heads are sculpted well and I have no complaint over the head itself.

First impressions of the sprue were good, and it was the first time I could really understand how CAD/CAM could speed the process as you can see some of the bodies were mirrors of each other or were the same just with the surface texture changed between cloth and mail, with '3-Up Greens' it would have required completely fresh sculpts.

Overall I don't think they are really very far away from being at least 'acceptable' but unfortunately at present they are just not up to the standards we have come to expect of 28mm plastics.

If they were to redo the arms/shoulders, shorten the necks and drop the mail bodies then this could be a set I would buy and recommend but I have a hard time understanding how this set made it out the door with such obvious flaws.

Waitasec, Bravo… Your profile's location says "China" and your Vikings have shown up already?

Mine still haven't arrived and were also purchased during the Black Friday sale.

I guess it's time to get ed off.

I, too, had some difficulties putting the Germans and Celts "together" into one set (I am trying to make a Belgae-type tribe for my wife).

The joint of the arm to the body has to be really carefully trimmed to make it work passably, and I still had plenty of difficulty. The head joints have to be cut down and trimmed – even with model cement "melting" the joint, it still doesn't look right without some work. One of the shields in the Celtic pack was a throwaway – the one with the two spears (that are so long one might imagine them to be a kind of kontos) was utterly useless. I originally hacked off the ends and re-glued the spear tips, but it was so much extra work – and the end result was so unsatisfying – that I ended up ordering some metal shields as replacements, and regret using the "two-spear shield" on a few of my figures – it just looks dreadful. There are a couple of body poses in the Celtic pack that are quite poor. Still, either pack is a major improvement over the Romans, and the Numidian pack was a major step in the right direction.

I will say this, though – once massed into units, the multiplicity of poses gives a real sense of variety to the end product. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the awkward poses lend some sense of motion to the whole army en masse. It won't satisfy the part of me that likes to model carefully and (try to) paint well, but it's not that bad when it's all laid out. I haven't tackled the cavalry yet, so we'll see if I still feel this same way after that experience. At $0.60 USD a figure, though, I'm very pleased with the infantry portion of the army. That price range is what made it possible for me to start a 2000-point Belgae army that I otherwise would never have embarked upon.

I haven't seen the Vikings, but WF is making improvements. I'd love to see what they'd do with some WSS, SYW or AWI infantry – especially if done in the Perry Napoleonic French infantry style, with little need for attaching arms. I see some urging on their forum to turn toward "Dark Future" nonsense, which is incredibly disappointing.

One of these days, I'll get some photos of my completed Celt/German efforts on my blog. I'm thinking of doing something like "hits and misses," and showing what seemed to work from the Celtic/German boxes, and what didn't.

"This sounds very patronizing to me, hence the scold. Instead of boosting the WF Vikings, this transforms the thread into a WF versus the Perrys throwdown, as other comments have demonstrated."

At least that makes a change from the tired plastic versus lead arguments we always always always get.

I have seen all these figures and the Vikings are showing improvement over the earlier sets.

My one complaint for all these plastic sets is the amount of construction that is needed. Would others rather have half the figures cast in one piece, and the others be variable. I would be pretty happy with all figures in one piece castings, with open hands and separate weapons. How much variety does one need.

"At least that makes a change from the tired plastic versus lead arguments we always always always get"

Well thats because the Perrys have now made plastic respectable….shame there no imoticons that would be tongue firmly in cheek….

No seriously folks you pays yer money and makes ya choice…. for my money the mails odd and the shields are too small and thick…. I guess no ones yet produced a grafics pack capable of doing mail….

Cheers

I like the figures. I'll probably be buying a lot more of them.

Tony posted on the WF forum a list of criticisms of WF figures and asked for comments. Here is my post from the WF forum

"I have now put together hundreds of WF figures from Romans through to Vikings. I also have a very large collection of Artizan, Crusader and Perry.

Criticism 1. Arms are awkward – glue on awkwardly
This is true until you learn to select the right arm for the task. I find the arms OK but I do have experience. Painting some glue over the shoulder line disguises the join. Because the figures are multipose, you can get very bad poses and very good ones according to your experience and desire…

Criticism 2. Chainmail is too shallow
Here WF has very accurate mail but other brands have exagerated and therefore easy to paint mail. I have no trouble painting WF mail but it does need a lighter drybrush than many metals. Spray with GW Chaos Black and light drybrush with GW chainmail works well. The mail on the Warlord Celt plastics is similar. I will be getting the Perry WOTR soon so will be able to make a comparison.

Criticism 3. Necks too long/ball joint awkward
Again, this is a matter of technique. With the early figures, I used a 2.5mm twist drill to deepen the neck hole. With the later figures this is rarely necessary if you have cut the neck from the sprue cleanly. I always try it dry first and snip the neck to fit nicely.

Criticism 4. Proportions are off – with negative comparisons to Perry, Artizan, and Crusader
The proportions on the Romans and Numidians were compatible with Foundry, Artizan etc. The Vikings and Germans are more anatomic and taller than Artizan and Crusader. I mix Artizan, Crusader and Wargames Factory freely. They look like a natural mix of tall and short, slim and stocky – just like real life.

In summary, plastic modellers will have no trouble at all. Those who are new to plastics will need to experiment to get some experience. The tutorials and painting guides on the WF site will help."

Regards
Mick

Mick, your point about neck length is a very good one. I think shortening the necks on some of mine would reduce the akwardness I see in some of the poses. Thanks!

You make it sound like anyone having problems with WF figures is some sort of wet behind the ears idiot.

"I have now put together hundreds…"
I have put together over 800 non-WF 28mm plastics (both Perry, Victrix and WG) in the last year and I didn't have a problem with them, I have ONLY had a problem with WF.

"This is true until you learn to select the right arm for the task"
We are not dummies you know, I went through every arm in the set trying out which ones would fit best with which body before assembly but even then the best is still poor and you only get this issue with WF.

"Painting some glue over the shoulder line disguises the join"
Again you must imagine we are all dummies, that is one of the technique I tried in an attempt to 'improve' the join, it still can't disguise these very badly designed arm joints and again these problems don't exist on non-WF plastics.

"The mail on the Warlord Celt plastics is similar"
But it was not a problem with WG! I put together 5 boxes of WG Celts, they are great. Of course you have to be more delicate than with metals, you don't think I undercoated black and delicately dry brushed metal on top? What did you imagine I did?

"With the later figures this is rarely necessary if you have cut the neck from the sprue cleanly"
Again you seem to think we are dummies, I am old enough that I can actually remove things from a sprue properly, I also actually use a modelling knife and a file as well to remove any excess where appropriate. I DO KNOW how to carefully prepare a figure, you are not talking to some teenager slapping things together in a few minutes. I take time, I think about what I am doing, and I take care to try to produce the best finished product I can if I am going to put these on my table.

"They look like a natural mix of tall and short, slim and stocky – just like real life."
They just aren't 28mm full stop. It has nothing to do with the proportions being different from Artizan, I even mentioned that a comparison to Artizan was not appropriate, we are talking about figures that don't come close to being 28mm.

"In summary, plastic modellers will have no trouble at all."
This is just a ridiculous comment, simply dismissing criticism as being effectively from idiots who dont know what they are doing, what arrogance!

I actually consider myself a decent plastic modeller, I have extensively modified plastic Rohan riders for example, cutting arms off repositioning them, swapping between different bodies and you can't tell they werent originally produced that way.

As I have said I have assembled and painted hundreds of non-WF 28mm plastic in this last year, it isn't rocket science, and it shouldn't be, the only ones that are a real problem are WF.

Sorry but the problem is WF – NOT THE CUSTOMER….

If you feel the Vikings are great, say so, I certainly would respect your right to say that, but please don't start criticising the modelling capabilites of people who dont share your views about this set.

Well, my post went into the ether, but BravoX hit just about every point I wanted to make, just more directly. I must be new at this plastic modelling thing; I only started in… oh, about 1967, with a Viking longship, as I recall. I do remember building lots of Historex and Airfix 54mm plastic figures in the '70s…

Yep, most every point. All but one.

I understand that Tony is not happy with me, and probably Howard is not either. But I told Tony at the beginning: don't send me free stuff; I'll buy it if I need it; and I will say exactly what I think about WF products. And I've kept to that. They've sent me free stuff; I am working those up to give to other people; and I say what I think. If that makes them mad at me, I will have to live with it.

But when the WF fans bewail this thread on the WF forum; and Tony and Howard (understandably, I think) decline to comment here; but it is then suggested that *you* copy your post here, since they choose not to comment; and you do--well, to my mind, that walks a very fine line indeed. That's just my opinion; it does not meet the official TMP criteria for sock puppetry:

TMP link

But it doesn't look good, in my opinion. You've been cajoled into posting here on WF's benefit, *because* the WF principals decline to do so. It just feels dodgy to me.

As BravoX pointed out, technique cannot overcome design problems, but let me ask you a question. My next attempt with WF will be Zulus, and I want them to look good, since they're not for me.

You did a most credible job on yours:

link

But one can still spot prominent arm/shoulder joints on your figures that do not exist on real humans. On a real person:

picture

…the deltoids form a smooth cap over the top of the shoulder. Any definition is between them and the pectorals, or between them and the trapezius. There is no "seam" along the plane of the arm rotation.

That is an inherent design flaw with the separate arms, of course. Even as well as you have done, it's possible to see figures in your array where the arm is "stepped down" from the torso. So yes, careful fitting is required. But how do you get rid of that seam, and keep the figure from looking like this?

picture

I have a big can of MEK all ready, and am prepared to slather it on--and make a slurry if necessary--to try to conceal that join. But as I say, I am new to plastic modelling. From your greater experience, what other techniques would you recommend to make the Zulu shoulders look like actual shoulders?

Oh, yes: mail. Nobody does "accurate" mail in 28mm. If they did, and to scale, you'd hardly be able to detect the texture, much less drybrush it:

picture

But when it comes to crispness of detail, which painters like to have for painting, and collectors like because they *perceive* it's better, metals still hold the edge. "Accuracy" has nothing to do with it. Sorry.

Allen

By the way, it is kind of interesting to read on the forum that WF critics are (let's see how the TMP Bleep-o-meter handles this) "douchbags". OK.

Allen

"Here WF has very accurate mail"

Only if mail comes in 2 inch hexagonal rings, but the main problem is mail is made by Four rings going into one, WF mail looks like two rings into one.. in other words lines of Chain Not Chain-mail this gives it a very open appearence unlike real mail which at this scale should be much smaller and densely packed…
However kudos must go to WF for the crisp detail….

Cheers

Here's what ironsides2 is talking about, for those who may never have had the joy of "knitting" mail:

link

Most 28mm mail is represented either by poking pinholes or a pattern of crescents into putty. The former is more rudimentary and crude (takes me back to the days of Tom Lobacks' Irontooth Miniatures…); the latter is better, but only shows half the pattern of actual mail. It only seems to go in one direction, whereas the "weave" of 4-in-1 mail goes in both directions. But as we've both said, to sculpt realistic mail would result in a much finer, more dense texture.

Allen

Dear Allen,
I don't mind you accusing me of "sock puppetry" – I have written painting guides for WF and that is well known.

I have also written guides for 3 other brands but nobody ever gets upset about them. I have done about 20 painting guides. All of them are available free on line, 24 hours a day. My hobby is writing the guides. To date I have received no money from any brand.

Dear BravoX
My intention was not to criticise your ability. I was simply trying to provide tips on how to get the best out of them.

I do find it sad that when people try to help, as I did here on this forum, accusations are thrown at them.

Mick

Well then, just count me among the "utter douchbags", as that "Fanatic" (must be a great achievement to earn that title!) on the WF Forum called us.

I'm sorry if you don't see how your post could be on the one hand taken as offensively condescending (as BravoX took it), and on the other, perceived as… (there isn't a word for it that won't get me DHed), rather than helpful.

The original poster's claims were quite sufficiently extravagant. You didn't have to risk your considerable credibility by following that lead.

Allen

for me it will boil down to a matter of taste, asthetics, and disposable income. A while ago I bought 2 boxes of WF romans, 4 boxes of WF celts, 5 boxes of WLG celts ,and 5 boxes of WLG imp romans.After the dust has cleared, I have attempted to assemble and paint some of each lot.
I really like both companies' efforts and love all the easy conversion abilities….but I am coming to the conclusion that I prefer metal now. mostly the weight, the easy preparation,and yes, the more natural, arms close to the body poses, which make ranking up less of a chore. Sure for the money I can get a lot more in plastic,but if I'm not happy with the end result, they will stay unpainted and unbuilt. nothing against either company, but my sense of asthetics is leading me to join the Old glory army and invest in the Crusader line.
My experience has been:
Wargames Factory---Romans -a little underawed, could not force myself to put them together
WF Celts-- I liked these a lot better,but they did not rank up to my liking..too many angry celts standing while waving weapons in the air. awkward arms. massive javelins
Warlord Celts--wow really liked the animation and sculpting, but a few poses seemed too animated-but good sculpting and sense of motion. a let down when 1 set becomes the basis for 4 barbarian horde armies and many poses have to be thrown away
Warlord Imp. Romans---these have turned out to be my favorite. great sculpting, well planned, natural poses and sense of disciplined motion, look fantastic ranked up
(So each to his own tastes… try not to take it personally if someone does not like the same toys that you like.) If you like them , use them. I think they are great for conversion and cost.. but like many, in my old age I am put off by the amount of gluing and snipping.
just like we will all never agree on 1 set of rules,the same with manufacturers,- buy and build what you like and forget about converting others to your methods

"These are amazing figures. The detail is incredibly crisp and deep and very much like metal figures from Artizan or Crusader. The faces are just unbelievable. You can't do expressions and detail like that in metal…it's just not possible."

Are you joking? Have you ever heard of thunderboltmountain.com ? Detail in metal most can only dream of, you can actually get better detail in metal as it allows for limited undercuts in the sculpt. If you want even more detail than that resin casting allows for even more still, you may have heard of forgeworld.co.uk

As Allen said they are pretty extravagant claims.

Aw, crap. Clearly next week sometime I am going to have to do what I can with the mailed Vikings and prove, if only to myself, that they *can* be credibly posed. Adding them to the list…

As I mentioned to some shady character in a dark alley just now, my main objection was to the hyperbole of the original post, mixed with frustration that I cannot get these little beggars looking like I think they should. Yet. As I am *not* incompetent, I know I just have to figure out what works for me, and keep after it.

Allen

I just did a comparison of WF Vikings, Warlord plastic auxiliaries, and Perry WOTR. Here's some negatives and positives for each:

1. WF Vikings – great detail (especially weapons, faces, and chainmail) – negatives – some weird arms and you have to pre-plan your gluing and poses, you have to clip the necks in some cases. Virtually no mold lines on these figures.

2. Perry WOTR – lots of variety, nice multipart pieces, mostly crisp detail – negatives – strangely long legs, some soft detail areas (especially faces), some very fine detail that will be hard to paint, thick mold lines.

3. Warlord Auxiliaries – great character, simple gluing, nice big figures – negatives – about a head taller than their other Roman and Celt figures (why do they have two sizes in the same range?), very few options for arms/weapons (only five arms for five empty arm sockets), shallow chainmail, shiny plastic.

All in all – all of these figures are good figures and I would put them all in a class above metal figures which I find limiting. The Perry figures suffer from too fine/soft detail that may be hard to paint but you get a lot of them in the box. The WF figures require a little imagination to clip necks and position arms to get solid poses. The Warlord figures only have 4 poses (like the WF Vikings) but the lack of arms and weapons makes it more difficult to get a lot of variety.

Just assembled my first box of Perry WOR figures and I'm very impressed by both the quality and variety. They are substantially superior to the WF Vikings I have (IMO). Others will no doubt disagree and that's fine as we all have our own preferences.

My figures certainly don't suffer from 'thick mold lines' and I've only had to apply my file to a few of the helmets. Perhaps others could comment so I can see whether I've been lucky in this respect or Haroldson has been unlucky.

Access to parts on the sprues was straightforward with very little tidying up of snipped parts being required.

I think they are anatomically 'spot on' with no weird angles for arms, etc, with the figures fitting together easily and the poses being both realistic and well varied. I don't agree that they have 'strangely long legs' but the fashion of the period (tight hose and short tunic) may give that perception for some.

I agree that figures with finer detail will require more attention when painting than those with heavier detail but I prefer the painting/creating aspect of the hobby over the actual playing anyway these days, so for me this is a bonus. Painting is always a matter of taste and if you prefer you can easily ignore the finer detail – I think the studded brigandines are probably the greatest 'offenders' and they can easily be simply painted over. Clothing, armour and weapons are all easily accessible which I find is the key to both speed and quality of painting.

I received the 'Wakefield' banner set in my box and was most pleasantly surprised by the quality.

"I do find it sad that when people try to help, as I did here on this forum, accusations are thrown at them."
Mick if you wanted to start a topic "Tips on assembling WF Vikings" that would have been fine and I would have said nothing.

If on the other hand you post on this thread a line by line response to the points I made and say that any decent modeller will have no problem and all I have to do is learn how to assemble plastic soldiers correctly, well enough said….

Anyway I am a bit cooler now , really I am only dissapointed that WF haven't taken this constructively.

My apologies to Mick. I'm in a lousy mood today, and was far too ready to get into an argument. He does good work, and I will do my best to take his guidance in a constructive way once I get… constructing those Zulus!

Allen

"even when it's clear that one of those critics at least is a habitual, knee-jerk WF basher. Honestly, I think he believes that Tony mugged his granny years ago, and this is his forum for revenge."
I think thats referring to me

Howard how come you dont love me baby?

Seriosuly stop focusing on the messenger and start focusing on the message, there is nothing I have said that others havent already said or havent agreed with on your own forums if you would but only see it.

If you look over the WF Forum thread I would say he majority say they had to cut down the neck in some way or other. Doesnt that imply the neck IS too long out of the box?

(my appologies in advance to Hrothgar, I could have picked others anyway)

Hrothgar says "The arm/shoulder issue is a valid criticism",
how many other posts have said yes the arm joint are not that great?

Hrothgar also says "I am a little troubled that these figures seem rather taller than the earlier WF releases. I was perfectly happy to mix my WF Romans with my Artizan and Old Glory models, but I won't be doing the same with these Vikings"

So as I said can you and Tony stop making this personal and just read what I actually say for a change.

I assumed he was referring to me until I realised I hadn't posted at that point!

At least you got the sample delivered BravoX unlike some here I can't comment on the figures directly as I won't part with money for them.

I suppose you being in China makes it a local delivery.

Now thats funny.

They did arrive very quickly though, the 2nd December!
I can't fault the service, excellent stuff

Let's admit that it must be difficult for the people who pour their energies and enthusiasm into a product that they love to sit quietly on the sidelines as this discussion develops, or at times, degenerates. Its pretty easy for the rest of us to provide our observations!

I think Tony's response to this thread was the right one. Tony went to his own forum and asked his product supporters to review the product and provide specific points of feedback. He was concerned and wanted to learn more. Its pretty hard to fault him for that! Many of us tried to provide meaningful reviews of our experiences with the figures, and I believe that he has followed the discussion and will seriously consider the feedback. Its one of the things I like about the company- Tony asks for feedback and actually seems to take it into account.

As to the name calling and such, that was in poor taste. Everyone wants to exercise their free speech on the web but not their good sense. Unfortunately, what started out as an enthusiastic post about a new product has become mired in this muck.

Let's take the well intended feedback, and even the less than well intended feedback, and hope that it helps WF continue to improve their figs, while we move on from the name calling and griping!

Dean

Here are some "work in progress" pictures of the 8 figure sampler set. Please note – on my screen these pictures are four times actual size. You can see every painting mistake.

Front view of chainmail hirdmen
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Back view where you can see the arm fit and chainmail detail
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Front view of bondi
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Back view of bondi showing arm fit
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My flickr Gallery
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Some Crusader and Artizan Vikings as comparison.
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Regards
Mick

2. Perry WOTR – lots of variety, nice multipart pieces, mostly crisp detail – negatives – strangely long legs, some soft detail areas (especially faces), some very fine detail that will be hard to paint, thick mold lines.

The thick mold lines certainly do not apply to the set I got (which has very slight and in places almost unnoticeable mold lines), and I have not heard anybody else mentioning thick mold lines either. But based on your case, apparently some of the production run suffers from thicker mold lines (is it on all sprues?).

And in my book, fine detail does not quantify as a negative thing.

I have some of these Vikings. Great figures and easy to put together.

I'm going to be grabbing a few sets of these. The arm dip isn't all that bad, though I do wish it wasn't there at all.

Ah well, it's alright. Anyone who picks up a 28mm piece of plastic and tries to complain about stuff though…I mean that's really a waste of energy.

Perry Bros are nice, but I don't like how they're cast as part of their base. That's just really weird to me.

M.

All of the new plastics are pretty good, from what I've seen. Can't we like 'em all?

Jim

Sigh

Doing WF Auxiliaries now – nice enough, but i have to work hard to avoid the perennial problem with ALL multi-Part figures in my experience. I call it the '28 days later' syndrome.

Units of these guys, whether WG, WF, or GW are all Hyperactive, hurling themselves forward, back and all over the place. they tend to look like someone just said a very bad thing about their mums.

The fault is in the ability to pose them any old way crossed with poor anatomical skills of the average modeller (me included) and looks very odd, not just next to traditional units of toy soldiers, but in their own right. people behaving like this on the ancient battlefield should always count as disordered.

They shoulda taken a leaf from the 1/72 people and given a dozen different poses in a box.

I believe I am the only person in the world who feels this way – everyone else either hates plastic full stop, or goes 'oooooh multi-part plastic is the future.'

I like plastic, but hate multi-part.

Pat

i agree with you, pat. I would love plastic 28mm…but posed and produced as if they were metal

Hi Guys – ThorLongus and Pat – but what's the point of that?

Why not just buy metal?

The whole benefit of hard plastic is conversion, multi-pose, and higher levels of detail?

I'm interested in your thoughts on this Christmas Eve!

All the best,
Tony