Today's release of the Treeman kit from Games Workshop has really captured the imagination of many in the GW community - my local Games Workshop store only had 3 on shelf 1/2 an hour after opening and a bucket load arriving on pre-order! So what's all the fuss about? More after the jump as we open the box and have a look inside... ~ WARNING - I am not a photographer, so expect dodgy pictures below |
There are two large sized sprues in a box the same size as the Tyranid Trygon. The pieces are really packed in, in fact so much so that the pieces can be a bit hard to find at a glance.
The pieces are beautifully detailed, crisp and clean with very intricate work on them.
There are not that many pegs to align pieces as there are geometric shapes - which is very imprecise and hard with such limited instructions.
I worked at Lego many years ago and they prided themselves on good instructions.
To me it looks like GW took the 3D scans and put them together in some kind of arrangement.
It's very imprecise and also hard to see - they need to work on the contrast in the pictures. It looks like they took colour shots and just printed it in black and white!
For a first time modeller, this would be incredibly difficult - and as I was sitting next to one making their first big kit, it was frustrating for them.
My theory is that Games Workshop originally intended to release the Treeman and the Treeman Ancient in one box, and Durthu in another (as a character) because this seems an odd way to do it.
W.I.P
They can work on Dark Magic, dude - be cool!!
Because I was looking for a different vision and liked a lot of the elements of the kit, I took the Durthu torso and tabbarb, Treeman legs and then cut up a head that combined the Treeman and the Treeman Ancient.
It was a pretty straight forward conversion, just a lot of cutting - plus the mushrooms on the antlers match the mushrooms on the torso of Durthu.
I've left the clawed hand off for painting, as i'll be attempting to do the entire paint job all as one piece rather than in sub-assemblies.
Conclusion
I have never cleaned so many mould lines and trimmed so much sprue. There are tonnes of pieces.
This is not a kit for the feint hearted.
That being said, it's really really nice.
Once it comes together it really does have character and poseability.
For me, this is a purchase that I am more than happy to make again for an army.
(BTW - you may have noticed that the entire review was minus any reference to 'getting wood')