It has arrived! MKIV is here!
Ooooooh
Nice looking box, with a colorful picture of what is included. It seems a bit peculiar to me to have the battlegroup painted in the picture, but have the rest of the models included pictured unpainted. I think painted models make the box more attractive, and therefore more likely to grab the random gamer's eye. Heck, GW uses painted minis on their boxes, and one has to think they do it for a reason. If not, then why paint the battlegroup? An odd choice. Anyway, box construction is okay. Not too flimsy, and doesn't take too much space. The magnets on the side were included in the purchase, and are important for assembling the warjacks.
Let's look inside the box:
Inside the large box are four smaller boxes that make a nice little piece of art. It also comes with a sheet giving you a bunch of additional information, suggestions on next purchases, and basic instructions on working with the materials. No complaints here.
The boxes are numbered one through four (probably for helping them pack them), so let's take a quick look at the contents of each box:
Box 1:
Box 2:
Box 3:
Finally, box 4:
We've seen this packaging style with the preview battle boxes. It works, although it is not very exciting. It did cause a bit of breakage then. As we shall see, there was some damage this time, as well.
The empty box four did make me chuckle- I'm glad they included the note that it was intentional, however.
Let's have a look at the minis, starting with the warcaster, Kishtaar, the Howling Silence:
It's a one-piece model! That is really quite impressive, and I feel like this would have been pretty tough to manage prior to the 3D printing. Looks great!
Now, the warjacks:
Jackal
Tyrant
A few things I notice - first, it looks like they have changed the resin mixture some since the preview battlegroups. These minis are a different color (a bit darker), and seem to be slightly more flexible than the preview ones. Still great detail, and it seems like there are slightly fewer layer lines (which I didn't find too bad to begin with).
Another change- the torso and legs (and shoulder pads) are attached! There is literally no pre-assembly for these models, other than attaching the magnets. That's... really something. Even that flail for the Tyrant comes assembled. The assembly was very easy, but removing another step is fantastic. Great job, PP!
On the less positive side, there is the first of my breakages for the Jackals' hand. I could have taken a better picture, but the open hand for the Jackal has a finger broken off. This happened a little with the preview boxes- fortunately the pieces glue back together nicely, but it is still a little disappointing.
Next up are the Strike Reavers. Three parts, with good detail, and what looks to be extremely easy assembly. No issues here, but these look and feel closer to the preview battle box resin. Maybe this will mean they are a bit more brittle.
The Reaver Commander is four pieces, which is a bit surprising. I am not sure what the (F) signifies on the label. Lots of detail on these minis, if you have not seen them in person yet.
The Assault Reaver unit look fantastic, but here you can see I had quite a number of broken pieces on the spears. I am sure I can repair them, but historically Privateer Press has been very good about replacements, and I have heard people getting replacements for broken pieces. If I have to go that route, I will, but I'll see if I can handle this on my own, first. I admit to being a little disappointed here.
Here are the Reaver Standard Bearers (one for each unit). I wish these would have had slightly different sculpts (maybe a different banner- I am showing you the front and back of the banner in this picture). Seems like something that would not have been too difficult. As is, they do look good, so no real complaints.
Warwitch Coven. I have no real comments, these look good, and aren't broken.
Finally, the Ulkor Barragers, who look great, but I do wonder why the head isn't a single piece with the torso like the Reavers. The two armed weapons don't fill me with joy, because I have had some bad assembly experience with such models in the past, but assembly for these miniatures have been remarkably easy, so I'll reserve judgment for now.
Overall, these models look great, the game looks great, and I'm eager to get them on the table (happening in February!). There is some breakage in this set, which I suspect I can get replaced from PP, but I'm not expecting the fixes to be too difficult, so will likely do them myself. I can't wait to get these models on the table, and hopefully writing some battle reports!