Crisis!

So I got few Forge World Crisis Suits for my Tau army to replace the naff looking Games Workshop ones. There also a couple of FW Broadsides in the order too, but I haven’t started putting them together.

I started working on the Ion blaster version first. The packs are depressingly small as can be seen from this photo. I looked at it and wondered if it was even the right scale.

 

After opening the pack up and sorting the bits out, the suit’s components can be seen here. Things of note that I was impressed with:

1. There’s three types of head to choose from.
2. The legs come in two parts (not including the feet) which enables a lot more variation to the GW one which is a single moulded piece.
3. The gun is attached by a three axis series of joints – one on the shoulder and then two using a two way hinge point.

 

Overall the resin is very good. I have put together two of these suits so far and found only a single bubble in one part. It’s easy to trim the flash and file the small amount of minor mould lines. The main problem I have with the cast is that there are some very fine parts. Notably, the should mounted air intakes have incredibly thin overhangs which break a bit too easily for my brute force fingers. For this model I managed to break it too much so I just trimmed it all off on both intakes. The feet are also pretty easy to bust apart particularly as there is significant flashing to cut and then file off. Remember kids, treat it very carefully!

Here’s the completed suit. From looking at the photos it seems evident that there are more flaws than I noticed when holding the thing. Will look at cleaning it up a bit more tonight. I cut the gun barrels off and drilled a hole into the centre of the gun base off to insert magnets so I can change configuration easily. Keep in mind too that I will be putting the models on textured bases from WargamesTournaments.com (which will get a separate review when I receive them).

 

And here’s a comparison with the shitty GW Crisis Suit.

 

 Here the model is set up as a Fireknife configuration (Plasma Rifle and Missile Pod):

Things for next time:

1. Be careful around the air intake fairings!
2. The legs can be very awkward to set up. This model doesn’t look too bad in person, but it’s still not as natural looking as I would like.

 Things that will need more attention:

1. Regardless of which head is chosen it seems to sit too low in the torso. It sort of peeks out from the panel at the top of the chest. Not too sure what to do about this.
2. I think I put the feet on the wrong legs. The little toe faces inwards instead of out. Oh well. It is now classed as a “feature”… J
3. The shoulder mounted air intake part that slots into the torso are narrower than they should be. I’m going to have to putty the gaps in.

 

All in all though, I am very impressed. Will certainly be getting more.