Finecast Hive Tyrant review, part 1

Ok, I have officially purchased my first 'Finecast' model and I thought I would do a review here for all of your enjoyment. First, lets start off with GW's announcement made on Monday May 23rd...

"Andy Hall: Last week we announced something very special - so special in fact that it's nothing less than a new era in wargaming, as we launch the highest quality miniatures the world has ever seen - Citadel Finecast.

Wow, that's quite a statement isn't it? Nonetheless, it is very true."

Or is it?

Upon opening the box, I was greeted with a nicely packed box with the parts laid out well in a clear clamshell helping to ensure the parts arrived undamaged from shipping. Only one part had come off the sprue in transit (the single largest part), so not bad. Upon removal from the sprues, I started to notice some issues. The first thing I noticed was that a few of the sprues had their molds 'slip'. What this means is that the mold halves were not lined up properly when the piece was cast which has resulted in a slight step on most of the parts between halves, and the worst of it was a step of nearly a full millimeter.











Now, this will not be impossible to fix, however with such a large step it will be difficult at best with the aid of a fair amount of putty and re-sculpting. Not something I am particularly impressed with for something being touted as 'the highest quality miniatures the world has ever seen'. I have seen much cleaner castings at a much lower cost.

Next is one of the legs (I did not get a picture of the other leg as the battery died in the camera). What you see here is a little bit of the afformentioned slip, but the most glaring issue is a void where it failed to fill. The other leg had a similar void on the front top part of the armor detail which will necessitate resculpting an area about 1/8" square, pretty big on a small scale miniature.



So my overall opinion on the matter? Given the high cost involved and the high level of hype, I am dissapointed that quality control is not where it should be for them to honestly make the statements that they did so publicly. The bonesword that came with is also warped and I have yet to find an effective method of permanantly correcting this issue as it keeps springing back to its cast shape. At least this means that the figure will be durable on the tabletop.

The new resin formula is indeed easy to work with and will shave down very quickly, so inexperienced modelers will need to be extra careful or you will gouge it. The parts glue very well and the other modeling aspects make it fairly easy to work with. I do not know about painting yet, however I do not forsee any issue with it holding paint.

I will be continuing to post the cleanup and fixing process for your enjoyment as I move forward.