Games Workshop

War Mumak of Harad

In box review by Steve Crofts

 

First Thoughts

Before I start let me first tell you the following…..

This as you have read is an inbox review, I will be doing a full follow up with this one which will consist of a build up review, and if the build up review is extensive, this too will then be followed up by a painting review, reason, well it’s a really big Elephant and will need a fair bit of work on it to get it looking right, plus I asked John if he’d mind and he said not at all, so hey I get to play!!!

Right lets get down to work, bugger the box we want to get inside and see what’s in there don’t we guys!

Right lid off….

Wow this is going to be BIG!

Detail

First of all there is the base, this measures some 7” long and 5 1/2” wide and is oval in shape, it like the rest of the kit is plastic. It is I must say well detailed, three dead horses and a number of dead Rohirrim and Orcs as well as weapons and armour scattered about, there are even hoof prints and Elephant prints sculpted into the base, that should be fun to paint! All the details are decent and should come up pretty well once the paint starts to go on.

What about the Mumakil I hear you scream, Ok, Ok!

Basic measurements, from the base of its feet to the top of it’s back, (not including the Howdah), it is just under 5 ¼” tall and the length well not including it’s head and trunk ect, (I haven’t made it up yet!!!), it is 6” to the furthest points.

Skin texture is well represented and cut and gives a good wrinkly look to it, there is lots of lovely detail to be used during painting and I reckon this too should be fun as well as challenging to paint.

The Muscle and bone structure of the Mumak is well depicted and gives it the look of awesome strength and power, and should look exceptionally well once built up and painted.

The cloth for the Mumak’s back is represented as is the stitching.

The wooden supports to the howdah to me seem sculpted very basic and I do feel that the job could have been done better, particularly the ends which have no detail on them and are pretty much blank, shame really as we were doing so well! But this is only a minor setback and I’ll just have to see what I can do to improve the look of this bit later. It is surprising though as if you look at other models in the ranges such as say one of the trolls with a wooden club this detail is there, was it forgotten?

The ropes are also a bit of a let down as they could have been detailed much better, and look pretty much like a suggestion of ropes rather than the full blown sculpted and detailed ropes that can be found on models a lot smaller than this one, again a pity.

Metal ringlets, well these are pretty much as you could expect, but through the lack of twist detail on the ropes they could be easily mistaken for ropes, so when you get yours check it out and make sure you know what is what.

Sprues

There are a total of three sprues for the Mumak and the Howdah and a further two for the crew and commander, now here is a point that I’m a little confused with, the crew there are a total of twelve figures in the crew, (more on those later), and one commander, BUT, and this is the point of my confusion, there is no Mahout, no Mahout nobody to steer the Mumak, who did Eyomer slay with a thrown spear and basically take out two Mumak in the film? Yes that’s right the Mahout, so where is he? Who steers this Mumak? Answers on a postcard please!

Might be an Idea to do a model of one GW as this is a really big boo boo as far as I’m concerned.

Right that’s the confusion pointed out, back to the crew….

Well these are pretty good, the detail and cut of the figures has improved on these and I must admit looking at these Haradrim and comparing them to the Rohirrim the difference in detail quality is really apparent when you look close up, so 10 out of 10 for the improvement! They don’t have has much in the way of mold lines so that too is an improvement, and I do like the faces that are on these minis, they do have quite a bit of character in them a couple are even showing there teeth.

The officer, now this chap is also well detailed and comes in two parts, with a sort of sashimono that glues on his back, again pretty well detailed and another mini that will be fun to paint

The rest of the parts to the Mumak are decent and look the part, no complaints here, it is pretty much a box standard Mumak and you can do one of two things with it, first you can build it up as is and get a nice looking model or you can do what I intend to do and super detail it with some extras and make it look even better, either way you are going to end up with a large but stunning model I think.

The howdah looks, again to be well done, with wicker floors and cloth sides, this sat on the Mumak’s back will increase it’s size and presence, again though I would have liked to have seen more detail in the sculpt of the wood work rather than the suggestion of wood, it would have really set the whole composition off if this had been the case.

Instructions

Instructions, well they are pretty clear and although I’ve not built the thing yet they do look pretty self explanatory but we’ll find this out in the build report. Black and white photographs have been used and I must say to good effect, I like the way they have been laid out.

Altogether there are four stages to the build up. I will like I have said cover this in the build report and will let you know of the joys and woes, (if any), of the build up sequence and fitting of parts.

Final Thoughts

Although this model is not due to be released until the 7th of August, Games Workshop are taking advanced orders.

Overall the model is pretty good although I do think one or two things would have improved the whole look of the composition, saying that the base one done should look quite stunning and I feel little will be needed to be done to that, other than painting and a few bits I’ve thought of adding just to spice it up a little more!

Biggest bummer, well that’s got to be the lack of a Mahout, after that the small Items like the ropes and wood effects.

Overall I’d rate it as a decent model so far, more to be done to get the overall feeling but as an inbox report I think there are more pluses than the couple of minus’s so GW is doing well!

I will update my final thoughts as I go through this project, so keep an eye out for the next instalment which will be the build up!

Please remember to mention Wargames Forum when contacting traders!

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