+ Nuggets of Kroot +
+ Kit review: The Farstalker Kinband +
+ It won't have escaped your notice that the Death of a Rubricist inloads have been quite kroot-focussed recently; and I'm pleased to say that the Kill Team: Into the Gallowdark box arrived late last week. It is enormous – absolutely packed to the gunnels with terrain and two new kits: the Kroot Farstalker Kinband and Imperial Navy Breachers. There are lots of in-depth reviews of the box as a whole, so I thought I'd dial in the mens-iris and subject you to just my thoughts on the new kroot kit. +
+ First impressions are always coloured by the previews we've seen, and in the case, I'm happy to say that the sprues themselves really live up to expectations. GW's own sprue shots are much clearer than mine, so if you want to see the raw components on the three large sprues, go check 'em out there [+noosphericexloadlink embedded+]. +
+++
+ Snap fire: key points +
+ For those inloaders on a time-budget, or who have stumbled over this noospheric node for the first time, I'll get to the key takeaways for this kit, and answer the questions I had:
- The new models are well-scaled to the older Carnivore kit, and broadly speaking, can be kitbashed with little to no conversion work
- There is a great deal of variety in the poses. To my taste, GW have struck a good balance between dynamism and flexibility, allowing for characterful poses when built as stock, but allowing for relatively easy conversion work.
- As with most of the new Kill Team kits, this kit can be built to replace the existing Kroot Carnivore kit. and used in 40k There are sufficient regular rifles and components to build it perfectly legally for its entry in the Tau Codex. I'd grab one of the older kits if you fancy it, just in case its delisted.
- ...and likewise with most other Kill Team kits, there are a huge amount of spare components left over. Combine this with some spare Kroot bodies and torsos, and you can really revitalise the older kit.
 |
| + Polished off older kroot, ready to welcome their new kindred + +++ |
+ Into the meat of the review +
+ In exploring a new kit like this, where I was keen to try out different options, I started by doing sub-assemblies of the bodies. Below you'll see a selection of bodies from the new kit alongside a handful of bodies from the older Carnivore kit (handily in a lighter grey plastic, so you can see the difference). I mentioned above that the new kit has lots of options – and you can see the in action with the body on the left, in the middle. It's an old body with one of the options – a bionic leg from the Cold-blood – attached. This required a little bit of cutting, but as the figures are so gracile and skinny, it was very easy. It's a good demonstration of how compatible the kits are. +
+ Relating to this interchangeability, the connection points are very similar to the older Carnivore kit: the old heads are completely interchangeable; and some of the arms marry the old bodies perfectly, though some require a bit of work. Given the ponchos the models are wearing, I had been anticipating this, but I was delighted to find that a number of the poncho-wearing bodies had been cleverly designed to leave a recess at the shoulder – and so in a number of cases, you can slide in the old kit arms without modification. +
+ This isn't, however, universally true: some arms are designed to fit specific bodies, so do test-fit before you get gluey. Likewise, if you want to use the spares from the new kit to add some variety to the older kit, be aware that you might need to rebuild the shoulder in a few cases. You can do this with a spot of greenstuff, or by attaching an old arm, allowing the glue to set, then cutting it away to leave a flat edge to which to attach a similarly modified new arm. +
+ Below you can see the specific choices that I made for my figures, along with some build notes; but to provide a quick summary, I'd thoroughly recommend this kit – absolutely stellar, so three mechadendrites up from me!
+++
+ From left to right: a cut-skin; cold-blood; warrior and kroothound. I had a lot of fun doing bits swaps and some minor conversion work to get a unique set of models. The cut-skin, for example, uses the spare blade left over from the Broker – added with a diagonal cut across the wrist/forearm. +
+ The cold-blood is probably the most in-depth conversion, using a set of legs and torso from the old Kroot carnivore kit. Likewise, the warrior is a combination of spares from the new kit with a body and legs from the old. While some parts require a little conversion work – typically building up or resculpting a shoulder – a lot of them work with no conversion necessary. +
+ Some of the figures are less well-suited to conversion – or the poses they’re in are already ideal to my eye . The pistolier is one such figure. Really has that alien cowboy swagger down. Also here is the second kroothound, another warrior – perhaps my favourite pose in the box – and the bow-hunter. +
+ Of course, if you convert one model from a set like this, you’re forced to convert another if you want to retain the specialist. In this case, the bow-hunter’s body was used elsewhere, so I used the left-over cold-blood body (with the supplied natural leg, rather than the bionic) for the bow-hunter. This nicely shows that there are options for interchanging bits and bobs here and there, even where a flat shoulder joint is not immediately obvious. +
+ The kroot warrior with scattergun (far left) uses the default body for the aforementioned bow-hunter. I think each specialist (or certainly the vast majority) can be assembled as a standard kroot warrior – and sometimes going the road less travelled is simply a case of building the model you like the look of best, rather than what has an in-game special rule. Here also is another warrior using the old kit as a basis – and given the number of cool spare parts, I’d thoroughly recommend mixing the old and new together – an alternative pose or head swap will go a long way to rejuvenating the (still wonderful) old kit. +
+ Third from the left here is a heavy gunner with what I’m assuming is the Londaxi tribalest, based purely on the three vanes and ‘tri’ element of the name. The new heavy guns look fun and add a nice sci-fi element to the kit. It’s worth noting, for lorehounds, that the ‘Into the dark’ booklet has lots of cool hints about other minor xenos. It also gives some more info on the kroot’s own culture. +
+ Finally here, the sharpshooter is furthest right. He’s another figure that I liked so much I left him (her?) unaltered and built stock. +
+ The last picture shows the other heavy gunner – made with the braced legs from another specialist, and a left arm donated by a regular kroot from the old kit (this required a little cut at the elbow for the correct angle). The next one along is another warrior, this one reloading his rifle. It’s the subtle poses like this that I think really add character and value to the kit as an expansion of the older kit. Here also is a demonstration of how the shoulder joints could be hidden by a shoulder pad from the old kit, if you’re not confident with building up or converting. +
+ Third from left is the Tracker. This is the only figure in the kit, I believe, that builds two of the specialists (the other is the Stalker), so you either need to decide or to convert. As I’d used some of the Stalker bits elsewhere, my kinband doesn’t have one (yet). The Tracker model is lovely as it stands, so the only change here was the use of my favourite head from the old kit. It’s this specialist that gives me my only (very) minor complaint about the kit, and that’s the lack of a Pech’ra in flight. +
+ Last here is a final kroot warrior with scattergun, rounding off a very, very fun building session. This kit is absolutely fabulous – I haven’t been as impressed with a kit since the release of the Adeptus Titanicus Warlord Titan, which I regard as the best kit GW have ever made. +
+++
1 comment:
Glad to hear that you liked the kit!
I saw some bitz seller on Ebay had parted out the kit, and helpfully showed the per figure assembly... GW certainly has not shown that you could make "standard" Kroot as well as the specialists, and suddenly the kit was 100% more interesting to me.
What is that last picture with the Escher heavy?
Post a Comment