Thursday, January 24, 2013

Sedition Wars: Battle for Alabaster - Unboxed


At last - after 5 months wait, the game finally arrived from UK. I felt like a small child when I opened the box and saw the contents.

Okay so what does this box contain?
  • 50 highly detailed 28mm plastic miniatures
  • 50 Scenic miniature bases
  • 8 Six-sided dice
  • 5 double-sided full colour expandable game boards
  • 60-page rules and scenario book
  • Vanguard and Strain double-sided stat cards (63mm x 88mm)
  • 200+ full colour game counters 

The miniatures

The game contains 22 Vanguard and 28 Strain miniatures.
Being used to Warhammer miniatures, some of the models appeared really small. Apparently, they are cast in a special mix of plastic and resin, so you have to use super glue for assembly. They have a lot of detail, so they will be a challenge to paint for some.

A lot of the strain models are pretty basic as they are in one piece. The larger strain models have many pieces, and I have heard they should take some patience to assemble.

The Vanguards are minimum 2 piece models, and the 5 "heroes" have even more small pieces.
The models are pre cut from sprues, and unfortunately not all models are lucky to have been cut very well. Often the sprues has been attached right in a joint where you have to glue an arm for example. So they take a bit of cleanup!

The gaming boards

White spots as well as bent edges are not unusual :(
There has been many complaints on Kickstarter for the bad quality of the gaming boards. Many have received warped boards. One of my boards had 2 white spots on it. In addition, the edges were not in their best condition...

It is very odd why the quality is what it is. I assume they have had problems in the printing process. The coating is matt and in daylight under my lamps at my dining table, these boards are impossible to look at. The glare from the lamps washes out the colors on the boards. However, they seem fine in the evening without daylight shining in.

The counters

Counters are not centered correctly.
You get 2 huge sheets of counters made in the same cardboard as the gaming boards. The main thing here is bad cut outs - they are not correctly aligned with the printed graphic.

Thoughts

So, what do I really think of all this?

Well this is my first non Games Workshop game and it might not have given me the best impression. I do think that this responsibility lies mainly at CoolMiniOrNot who is the producer of the game. Many different things went wrong - but I definitely feel they can be corrected.

The model are highly detailed and I cannot wait to get them primed and begin painting. The cards, counter, gaming boards are probably average when you look aside from warping boards.

I have not begun reading the rules - but my guess is some clever people probably will come with some corrections for these over time.

It is a brand new game and all off the Kickstarter should feel that this is their baby - We made it happen! New things will never be perfect, so besides the small issues from above I feel happy about buying this :-)

2 comments :

  1. Couldn't agree with you more mate. I was lucky that both of my boxes came intact, and no major issues. I have warpage on 2 of the 10 boards, so that is not so bad. Have played 2 times so far last weekend, and it was good. Though frustrating that the rules needed an errata right away.

    Looking forward to the rest of your adventures in this game. And seeing from your other posts, your paint jobs are going to be top notch!

    Cheers and check out my blog when/if you have time. Will have a lot of SW posts on it coming soon as well!

    http://mrleespaintingemporium.blogspot.co.uk/

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  2. Hey M R Lee.
    Thank you for your feedback!
    I have not played the game yet, but it is nice to hear you like it. It certainly look like a great game - so I definitely have to try it out soon.

    It is always nice to hear people are actually reading my blog. I look forward to bring you more content.

    Wow - you have some really nice paint jobs on your blog! Cannot wait to see some SW posts ;-)

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