Review: Brother Vinni's Ragnar and Eyebot

I had to put in an order with Brother Vinni when I first saw this wonderful figure!

The figure is called Ragnar and is obviously based on Ragnar Lothbrok as played by Travis Fimmel in the brilliant History Channel drama Vikings. I picked him up in order to add another interesting leader to my various Viking forces for SAGA, Dux Brit and others. The head sculpt in particular is fantastic and is a great representation of the actor. Also of note is the raven on the chest of his horn armour - this is the clothing he wears in the TV series and the Raven sigil was connected to the sons of the historical Ragnar Lothbrok.

 The kit came in several pieces - the body, head and legs as one piece as shown here, then each arm with axe and shield attached, plus a sheathed sword. Everything was very nicely cast with barely any moldlines to clean up. I did end up replacing the axe, shield and sheathed sword for ones from the Gripping Beast kits as I tend to worry about resin weapons snapping - I could quite easily have just used the original ones as the cast was crisp. 

Here he is based up - I used a 30mm round base and added some cork sheet on top as rocks. Size-wise, he fits very nicely alongside the rest of my Gripping Beast plastics and metals. 

I would very much suggest that you buy this figure if you're a fan of the series or if you're in the market for an interesting new Viking warlord!

I also picked up a figure from the Nuclear Sandbox line to add to my Post-Apocalyptic figures - the Eyebot. These were the pieces that arrived - again, another lovely and crisp cast.

One thing that I would say about the miniature is that it was larger than I was expecting - I suppose that's just the way some things need to be when it comes to transporting something from a computer game into 28mm - at scale I would guess that it would be around a quarter of the size or less, so it may be a positive that it's larger. 

I ended up using a round Warhammer 40000 base with a coin glued to the bottom for weight, then once again a piece of cork on top. I then used some straight wire to use as a flying stand - I drilled into the bottom of the eyebot and into the cork to pin it into position. I also added a canine skull to the base as it seemed to fit the theme.  

Regarding the multitude of aerials shown here, I was very glad that I'd recently invested in a set of multiple sizes of micro drill bits. I have everything from 0.1mm to 2mm for projects like this. I used some pictures of ED-E from Fallout: New Vegas and found the various spots on the model that needed an aerial. One of these in the centre at the back is a paperclip, whilst the others are actually bristles from a nylon-bristled sweeping brush. The final stage with the figure was to take some tomato puree tube metal and make a couple of metal plates for the figure to give it a "lived in" feel like ED-E.

As with the Ragnar miniature, I would very much recommend that you check out the Eyebot from Brother Vinni. I'm based in the UK, whilst Brother Vinni is located in Russia, yet the figures arrived within a week of ordering - that's pretty top-notch service! Give them a look - their Fallout range is fantastic and I'll be most certainly picking up more stuff from them in the future (after the 6MMRPC!)

Ogre Chieftain Borlag - Reaper Bones

Chieftain Borlag, Meal-Bringer of the Walking Fist tribe

I love the idea behind the Reaper Bones line - the lovely sculpts of Reaper in a super-cheap, afforable and durable material - brilliant! This is the first figure from the line that I've purchased, an Ogre Chieftain sculpted by Jason Wiebe. Lovely sculpt and he'll fit nicely alongside some greenskins in my Fantasy Skirmish setting.

This was my first exposure to the Bones material - it reminds me of the slightly rubbery plastic that you see a lot of action figure arms and components done in. Clean-up was easy - the details aren't quite as crisp as you would find on a metal miniature, but this is massively outweighed by the cost - the moldlines cleaned up nicely. I also got rid of the face that was on the club - I'd guess this was meant to be a magical weapon of some sort, but I decided that I'd rather have it a bit more standard.

I'd definitely buy more from this range - I was over the moon to see the Kickstarter to expand the range go so amazingly! I didn't end up kicking any money into it, just because of the sheer volume of stuff I didn't really need (and having a massive lead/plastic mountain already built up!) but I will purchase a bunch of different stuff - especially the fire and ice giants, the "elder god" (Cthulhu!) and various others. Highly recommended!

Review: Zinge Industries

I recently stumbled across an eBay auction for Zinge Industries, one of the after-market wargames accessory suppliers that has popped up in the past few years. I managed to hold off buying anything for approximately one week, then caved, strangely enough on payday...

I ended up ordering the set of 10 pistols and a set of 15 ammo drums/boxes. Both were £4 each and my order came to less than £10 including shipping. The pistols were supplied as above, whilst the ammo drums were supplied removed from sprue in 3 small baggies, 5 to a bag. Also supplied was a sort of "sample pack" of freebies - two tank tracks, some of their flexible plastic chain (very nice, with wire running through it so it will hold it's shape), an armoured cable (think plasma weapon cabling) and a nice flexible ammo feed (think heavy bolter).

The 10 pistols are a selection of modern/recent designs and some with more obvious sci-fi influences. They're a decent size and most will fit nicely with Necromunda/40k miniatures and similarly proportioned ranges.

From left to right we have:

• SMG - this one is rather large, but still fits the pistol archetype.
• Revolver - this would look nice on an Imperial Guard officer or some sort of gang boss.
• Automatic - something like a 9mm.
• Four-barrelled flintlock - quite odd in this bunch, but fits nicely into 40k/28mm Inquisitor.
• Machine Pistol - this one reminds me of a Skorpion.
• Energy Pistol - could fire plasma perhaps...
• Heavy Mauser - based on the classic German design.
• Flame Pistol - perfect hand flamer.
• Uzi - one of my favourites. This will fit perfectly on a guardsman.
• Heavy Pistol - this is a heavy sci-fi handgun. Another of my favourites.

These took a small amount of cleaning up once clipped from the sprue - the detail is very nice! Here's the heavy sci-fi pistol alongside a few Imperial Guard weapons. It scales very nicely and the detail holds up very well! I very much like these! 

The ammo drums had some minor flash, as is usual with resin, but the moldlines were minimal. The above picture was taken after I'd spent about 20 minutes cleaning them up. Not bad for 15 fiddly little pieces whilst distracted by Game of Thrones. There's a Cadian lasgun, an Elysian bullpup lasgun and the Baneblade tank commander's nicely-scaled bolt pistol in there to give you an idea of the size.

Overall, I'm very impressed with these - they were delivered in a couple of working days, the casts are clean and the detail is crisp. The parts are well priced with plenty of different options - I'm looking forward to building some heavy stubber teams using the twin ammo drums and arming some roguish Imperial Guard with some non-standard issue firepower. I highly rate the company and I look forward to seeing what the company brings out next! Check it out!