Here we go, time for some carnage at last. First things first, this is the begining of my Mono Khorne Daemon army, and where better to start than with Bloodletters.
I also have a in progress Skulltaker as an HQ choice in smaller games when a Bloodthirster would be a point sink. Soon I will work out some army lists for 500, 750, 1000, 1500, and 1750, so I can plan out where I am going to go with this army. Two things are for sure, I definitely want to use plastic Chaos Hounds for Flesh Hounds and the Forgeworld Daemon Prince is too Bad-Ass to ignore, even with his huge price tag.
Now on to the unboxing of the core of my army. First, the box is just cool looking, and gives some good detail shots to follow if you are unsure of what your final product may look like. Ok, now on to the instruction sheet. Good pictures and definitely shows where the parts go, but be sure to test fit the different heads with some of the weapon poses to ensure clearance between the Hellblade and horns on some of the heads. Also, no paint reference, so you will need to check the internet for paint choices or just be creative and create your own scheme. I am using an article out of White Dwarf USA #361 March 2010, as a base to get to my final scheme, which will produce a very dark and gritty red. The article can be found on page 82 and shows how the Eavy Metal team painted the very dark red on the Chaos Lords Juggernaut.
Now the Goodies, the sprues themselves. Everything was present on the sprue and molded fairly well. There is a couple issues though, some of the Hellblades are very warped and will need bent back into position. The pictures below shows what I mean.
There isn't any bitz left over really, so no extras for converting or kit bashing, but the price is considerably less, at only $22.00 retail it is great compared to some of the more expensive squads, like Space Marines. Also, in the box there is supposed to be bases for use in either Warhammer Fantasy or in 40K, all I got was 10 25mm square bases, and for some reason, 10 20mm square bases. WTF? Someone made a goof, but no worries, this is why we should all be saving bits from all of our kits. So, luckily i have plenty of extra 25mm round bases and overcame this small problem, if you don't have the correct bases, I suggest calling customer service and seeing what they can do for you, outside of that, guess you'll have to make a purchase for the correct base from GW, or a Bitz store, or some fancy resin base company or something along those lines. (wish I had some extra cash, resin bases would be awesome!)
Well, I have clipped all the parts free of the sprue and organized them for ease of production and to keep from losing parts as I build each Bloodletter. I know, kind of anal, and neat freakish, but it works for me. I have assembled one of the Letters', and I must say that, so far, these guys go together superbly. Although, during my research on these guys, people have stated that there is a gap between the head and face after assembled, that will require some putty work to fill in the gap. We will see soon if that is correct, but on the champion head that I used on the first one, no gap. I also recommend leaving these guys off of their bases for ease of painting, as they are hunched over quite a bit and the base will block some brush angles.
Here is a couple of pics of the first one assembled.
Well, that is all for my initial unboxing and and test fitting, more to come as I get started on this awesomely brutal close combat army.
Support By Fire.
