Relic Knights Assembly - One To Go

The assembly continues. Someday I'll be finished, and I look forward to my children's children eventually playing a game with the model's I've assembled. I will glue the last one together on my deathbed.



Alright, it's not that bad. Truth be told, it's going faster than I expected considering how much there is to put together, and how much cleaning is involved with the models. The remainder of the Star Nebula Corsairs went together pretty quickly, and had a few surprises for me.

The non-Battle Box Star Nebula Corsairs models

First off, the good: Kenobo and the Iron Chef were very pleasant surprises. I didn't find either character particularly interesting based on their rules or artwork, but something about their models won me over. I think it's the size of the models, combined with them being decently dynamic. They're not necessarily amazing models, but I like them a lot more after putting them together.

Most of the other models are good, though as may be evident from the photo Squall and Skully both seem to be suffering from "B13 syndrome." Moffet also seems to be a little...little, but Squall and Skully really stand out to me. Maybe there's just something about studying to be a Codifier that shrinks you?

Wildspace Gabe is a cool model, but his face is kind of worrisome. It has kind of a blobby thing going on which makes me a little nervous about how it will paint up. Darkspace Isabeau has a similar thing going on - good model detail aside from the face - though she seems to be a little better off.

The Blowhards are decent models in terms of detail, but I was surprised by how one of them is one solid piece. I'm almost grateful for not having to clean more plastic bits, though all things being equal I'd almost have preferred that to a one piece model. The male Blowhard is at least a little dynamic, and he gets bonus points for being a pretty clear Solid Snake riff.

Calico Kate is a neat Relic Knight. Probably my third favorite so far of all the ones I've put together, but that's more because her actual Relic is a little unimpressive to me. Sebastian and Kisa both have impressive Relics - beefy models that look very mecha - whereas Kate's Relic is cut from a different template. It feels more One Piece, which is appropriate, but it's not my favorite in terms of design. I do think it's the right design for the model and faction, however.

What I do like about Kate is the alternate pose for her Relic, and the slight degree of customization it offers. Her default pose is sitting on the driving pad, with the Relic holding a bomb and a rapier. The alternate pose has her standing, with her Relic holding her. I like that pose more than the sitting one, but I didn't like the left arm; it's just chambered up like it's about to punch or fist pump or something.

However, it was very easy to chop the keyed peg off the left shoulder and stick the rapier arm on instead (necessary because in it's keyed position the rapier was slapping Kate in the face.) The result is a model with the Knight pose I like that doesn't look like it's just standing around in karate stance.

Overall, I like the Star Nebula Corsair models. They have some hits and some misses, but by and large the models are fine-to-good. What's interesting is that this faction and Doctrine both have a persistent problem throughout the model line, but each one has it's own persistent problem: Doctrine had the highest occurrence of B13 syndrome, whereas the SNC have the highest incidence of "flat pose" I've seen so far. I don't fine either to be a deal breaker, but I'm also pretty forgiving when it comes to model quality.

The SNC and Doctrine are weird factions for me because they represent raw indulgence. Of all the Relic Knights factions, the Shattered Sword Paladins and the Noh Empire were the ones that I liked the most. However, due to equal parts Kickstarter hype and not being sure how much anyone else was going to buy in, I decided to get 4 factions to have variety (in case others wanted to borrow armies, or it ended up being just me and one other guy playing.)

As a result, the SNC and Doctrine are second string choices for me. Assembling them has been an odd experience, because the models I thought I would like the least turned out to be disappointing - I really liked the Prefect models and art, then they ended up being tiny and miscast - and the models I was least interested in turned out to be pretty cool. I'm happy I picked them up, both for the model surprises, and for the sake of eventual variety.

Up next, and rounding out my Relic Knights assembly, are the Noh Empire models. My hope is that they'll be one of the faster ones to assemble due to a lower model count and the fact that bigger models seem to have less flash to have to clean.

We'll, uh, see how that works out.