"Star Wars Legion core set and AT-ST assembled, with pics." Topic

I assembled two core sets and the AT-ST for Star Wars Legion.

The detail on the minis. is really good, including the AT-ST. I also assembled the rebel AT-RT and the imperial speeder bikes but I don't have pictures for those yet.

There are some issues with the components however.

Some have said that these are hard plastic like you would have in a typical GW kit. It is most certainly not that quality of hard plastic. It's kind of like an in between a hard plastic and soft toy soldier plastic.

The infantry has a rather strange assembly design. The arms and weapons are molded as a single piece and there are tabs that fit into holes in the shoulder sockets. But you have to kind of "stretch" the arms to make them fit around the torso. The plastic DOES have flex to it, but you almost feel like you're about to snap the arms when you stretch them. On a number of them I had to cut most of the tabs off because they were too long and there were gaps between the shoulders and the arms. In a couple cases the tabs had to be cut because if assembled as is the weapons were bent because the tabs distorted the positioning.

However most of the tabs were ok and the arms fit pretty flush with the body.

Pics. of the rebel troopers and stormtroopers:

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The AT-ST is a very cool-looking model when it's completed. Really nice detail which I think will take a spray paint/primer very well. I'm looking forward to painting and weathering it.

However, this kit has a HORRIBLE assembly design, simply horrible. If you're using super glue on these, which they recommend because I don't think this is typical polystyrene and I'm not 100% sure that plastic cement would work on these, you have to be VERY careful when building this.

First off, when you build the legs, there is no tab or guide whatsoever to help you glue the leg at the correct angle with the body. Every component is "floating", that is you have to literally eyeball it and come as close as possible.

It's kind of hard to describe, but if you buy it and build it you will see what I mean. I actually had to resort to dry-fitting both legs and the main body assembly and build the whole thing in reverse to the instructions kind of, so that I could position everything correctly. Then I carefully shot some super glue into the seams and pressed everything together.

In addition, the way the head attaches to the chassis is HORRIBLE. The neck consists of this ball joint that you glue the head to, which has a socket underneath. But it's like a free-floating ball joint, very much like the ball joint in the femur bone that fits into the socket on the hip. There's absolutely no guide or anything to help keep the head straight! And because it's a ball and socket, there is the potential to glue it crooked BOTH side to side AND up and down and end up looking like it has a broken neck.

Again, you are forced to simply eyeball it from all angles and just hold it straight. Horrible design. Now of course you have the option of gluing the head turned to one side or the other for a more dynamic pose. But good look with that while also keeping it straight so that it's parallel with the chassis at the same time.

The feet of the AT-ST can be glued in place to the legs so they cannot move, of you can just glue the bracket but leave the feet so they can still move.

Fair warning: DO NOT glue the feet in place while assembling the rest of the legs. Leave them so they can move! You need the feet to be able to move at the end so that you can position them at the correct angle for the AT-ST to stand at the correct angle. It's best to assemble and glue the entire AT-ST, and then place it on its base and push down until the feet are flush with the base, and then glue the feet to the base. That was the only way I could get the whole thing to look right when it was standing.

You do have the option of gluing the AT-ST in a walking action pose position, but by the time I got the point of gluing it to the base, I was not about to venture doing that after all the trouble I had just getting all the angles right for just making it stand. It would probably look cooler for games to have it glued in a walking position, but I played it safe.

The AT-ST as I said is a really nice-looking scale model and is really faithful to the details as it appeared in the movies. But what a nightmare to put together.

Some pics:

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I didn't have the same issue assembling the AT-ST. Sorry you did. I put mine together in just a few minutes and was very pleased with the results. I recommend pre-testing each assembly before flying, though, as I imagine I would have run into difficulty had I not done so and figured out the fit.

The head first threw me for a loop, but I was able to eyeball it very easily and found that the design gives you a lot of flexibility for posing the head dramatically.

I found the speeder bikes to be a little more fiddly to be honest, but even then once I got the knack of it, I had four done in about ten minutes. Of course I am a veteran of the great Robotech Tactics Kickstarter tragedy, so maybe anything with less than 20 pieces of assembly per unit seems simple these days. Oh the horror of that assembly. I still get the shakes when I see a Valkyrie.

Interesting what you said about the speeder bikes, those were indeed actually more fiddly than the AT-ST. Those front stabilizer fins were difficult to position correctly because the tabs were so shallow. I also found that the foot peddle bar thing to be strange because there's no obvious tab or slot for it.

I ended up just looking in the rulebook and finding a pretty good closeup shot of the speeder bike model where you could see pretty clearly where all the underneath components were supposed to fit.

The rebel AT-RT I found to be a lot easier, with the exception of that antenna piece that sits behind the pilot. That was another case of no slot or tab and you just kind of had to eyeball it while holding it to keep it straight.

awesome looking models. waiting till wednesday for a demo game.

Not being able to open the top hatch up on the AT-ST, in my opinion, was a major design flaw!

Yeah, I agree the hatch thing is very annoying. Especially for a kit that's $50.00 USD.

For the price and all the hype, there is no excuse for the above mentioned. Probably requiring assembly makes the models seem more 'advanced' but the pre-assembled/unicast figures produced by other companies and FFG are just as good and are sold for less. Another cash grab and disappointment, but at least you don't have to buy the special collectable cardboard dial and upgrade cards to get the instructions…