Games Workshops

Knights of Minas Tirith

First Impressions

The box is what can be expected of Games Workshop, very bright and colourful, including pictures of the models and how they could look when painted. 

Also on the box is general information about the contents etc...

Inside the box is a plastic segregated carton to keep sprues and figures etc apart, also contained in the box is a small booklet showing other box sets of other newly released and other products in the L.O.T.R’s ranges, all are depicted in colour and some photos of the painted models from these packs.

The Figures

The riders themselves are in two pieces, the hand and attached weapon being separate.

First inspection

Flash

Not bad at all, I have seen worse from GW, (Balins Kazad Guard spring to mind!), there are a few oddments that can easily be removed with no problems. I did however notice slight mold lines on four of the figures, (there being five in the set), but these also were not hard to remove.

Detail

This is I must say is of excellent quality, and what I’d expect from GW, there are four different castings in the set, but with the separate hands it is possible to make any duplicates look slightly different.

Part of the saddle is also represented on the figures, the rest being on the horses, (see below). Their Armour is depicted well, as is also the white tree of Minas Tirith on their breast plates. Each figure carries a sheathed sword with minor details to them.

The figures faces are well cut and detailed, which will also require careful brush work to bring out these detailed features on each model.

Separate hands with weapon

These are all cast the same, a large spear / lance in the hand.

Flash on these was again very minute and also easily removed, although the nodule on the bottom of the spear does take a little care to remove it and the slight cleaning up is minimal.

Attachment

This job didn't go too bad, three went on easily one was slightly awkward the other, well I wish I didn't have such large broad fingers!!, I found it difficult to attach the last hand to the figure whose arm is in the couched position, perhaps like I said, my large fingers didn't help!.

At least their wasn't any need for milliput to close up any large gaps, as the hands fitted snugly into the wrist joints.

Horses

Plastic horses???

This is something I can't understand, why have a metal rider and a plastic horse?, and with the cost of the set, I’d expected them to be all metal. The horses are moulded in two halves, they do have a fair amount of detail, but also they have what I feel is a design flaw, which I will now reveal.

Each of the plastic horses has been designed with just one hoof fully on the floor, the others are in mid air or just off the base, I myself prefer at least two hooves on the ground, reason being it gives more stability to the model, especially when a horse is plastic and the rider metal, the centre of gravity is much higher and so makes the model more unstable. Also on this point the horse is easily broken off the base as the single ankle of the horse is bearing all the weight, ( it does happen, even to the most careful owners).

The horses as said before are ok apart from the above and the two halves fit together easily, although work has to be done carefully to remove or fill any joint lines, (give me a one piece horse casting any day!).

Painting

This I must say was enjoyable, Although I do wish I could have spent a little more time on the joint lines,( John does like his reviews done to schedule, and running my own website I can understand this need, so no blame to you John!), as these lines are still visible on a couple of the horses. Overall I'm not happy with the horses, for the reasons I've already explained and when the riders are glued in position the horses do drop slightly because of the weight, although they did paint up well.

The riders were great to paint and I feel it is hard not to do them justice.

Overall Comment

Plastic horses and metal riders?, Come on Games Workshop, I know you can do better than this, and your customers are paying well over the odds for your miniatures, why not surprise everybody and make them worth it!, METAL!!!! not plastic.

The price as usual is I feel too high for what you get, and in my opinion a major re- think of pricing structure is needed: bring them down and you’d sell more and make more money in the long run, also why mess with plastic, GW Once made top quality metal figures that were worth the price they cost, What happened??

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