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Like I said. Hope for Christmas.

Project Update #128: Heavy Support troopers, Black Widows and more!
Posted by Mark Mondragon ♥ Like
My apologies. It has been a while since my last update, I try not to let this much time pass between updates when possible.

I was targeting completion of the female Stormtroopers and this update for the first week of May, as WGF China has been progressing through the file revisions and changes and I do not want to be the bottleneck in the process.

The best laid plans…The last few weeks have been insane. Wargames Factory China have a container coming over and some extra room they wanted to fill. This led to a request for box art creation and instruction review for eight kits, all needed within a very tight window.

If you recall in my last update, I discussed the back and forth negotiation that is needed to finalize each and every kit. We made progress with the Valkir, Assault Trooper and Heavy Support Troopers. All of the issues, concerns and change requests have been completed and these kits will go to mold layout shortly (the last step before the tools are cut). The issues that we were having were not simple fixes and required some time to address and correct. We burned through about five weeks dealing with these problems to ensure the best kit possible.

What was the problem?

Pretty much every leg set for every trooper in these three kits, as well as a very heavy redress/revisit of issues with the Heavy Support Troopers, their weapons and their backpacks and some issues with the chest and neck depth for all three kits. I think the only components we did not have to come back at multiple times was the helmets, everything ell’s had two to four times at bat while we worked out the issues. This is not normal but you never know what will be a problem until they get it through mold split and we have a chance to look at the model before it would go to layout, some fly right on through, others are like pulling teeth, fingers crossed there will be less dental work with the remaining kits.

How does this effect delivery?

Q2 is no longer possible, we had hoped to have everything finished up in time for the shipment that is leaving in a week or so, but the delays caused by the heavy troopers have made that an impossibility. With the heavy troopers going to layout, we have only the command squad and the female Stormtroopers to contend with, assuming that they do not have major issues, and they should not; as they are for the most part variants of models we have already completed, we should see fairly decent progress over the next four to six weeks. I will be working on box art, even though I do not have box dimensions yet for the remaining kits. Any prep work I can get done before hand will be my priority.

I know you would like a revised date, I can either dance around it or give it to you straight. My experience is that it takes an average of four to six weeks from the time they start handling a file to the point they need approval, sometimes less, sometimes more. My best guess as of this moment is eight to thirteen weeks before they hit the water depending on the issues that arise. It is my intention to give mini updates, with so few kits remaining it may be possible to get a better feel of where we are at with what remains.

With the completion of the Black Widows, all CAD work from my end is now complete. In this update, I will go over the Heavy Support Troopers, the Black Widows, some excellent paint work of the APC and a last minute addition to the APC kit.

First up, the Eisenkern Heavy Support Troopers, The core kit contents remain mostly the same with the acceptation of some backpack changes for the energy weapons and the multipart optional leg selection.




Here you can see the same options available in the Valkir update with a selection of choices for the leg accessories as well as the helmet choices that will be included in this kit.


Next up, we have some amazing paint work by David Woods, a very talented artist and backer whose brush work will grace the APC box art.



Looking at the feedback, (I always do) there were some who felt the nose looked a bit empty, although the flat armored plate look is what I was going for as it matched the 251 this vehicle is modeled after, I must agree that it looks a bit plain. We have decided to include a few optional items that you may or may not use as you choose when assembling your kit. A grill or nose badges for the armor plate.


As with the APC grill feedback, there was also a great discussion and feedback given in update #122 regarding the female Stormtroopers, many great insight were offered but Jacqualine gave some particularly poignant insight on the subject. As this is the first time you have seen this kit, I will go over it in depth.


There were many changes to the base mesh, most of them very subtle. The best way to compare is to discuss what has changed from the Ada model.

Tilted the Coxis back slightly change the posture.

Pulled in the front crotch to minimize the look of an armored sports cup.

Thinned the waist and gave fuller hips to give a more defined hourglass shape.

Removed the web harness belts from the torso as they blocked out the shape too much.

Lowered the rear thigh armor and gave the posterior more of a fuller heart shape. The leg torso ratio was also adjusted to help emphasize the female form.

Changed the chest armor to remove the sternum plate.

Pulled the sternum in slightly below the chest armor to accentuate the transition between chest and waist.

More detail in the hair

Changed out the shoulder plates with the Kriegsmarine, they are smaller and the smooth shape helps minimize shoulder bulk.

Aside from the change in the chest armor and shoulders the most drastic change is one that would not be evident in these renders. I made them the same size as their male counterparts. This was a decision that I wrestled with for some time before deciding it was the only course of action if I wanted to have these fully integrated with the line. By making them the same size, you can swap parts from the current kits to these and vice-versa. There are some nice weapon options in this kit that I know some of you will want to use for your male counterparts. It also gave me the opportunity to future proof the release with other Eisenkern kits and accessory packs not yet created. If you want the ladies to serve as Stormtroopers instead of Special Forces, swap the helmets and shoulders with the Stormtroopers and you are good to go!

I will now go into the kit and some of the available options, please not that I have not put a quantity on these yes but I know I will need to limit some options, you cannot have ten of every weapon and head as the sprue count will skyrocket. If you have a preference (count) for a specific item I am always willing to listen.

We have talked about the armor and small tweaks, but what about their weapon choices… These are Special Forces, as such they have access to the latest and greatest tech available.


Starting at the top and working down:

Plasma Rifle: A heavy capacitor rifle, it fires a projectile containing a plasma charge, shortly after the projectile leaves the gun, its protective shell burns away and the projectile superheats to the point of plasma (matter on the verge of energy). On impact, the shot imparts both kinetic and massive energy damage to its target. This is the primary tank hunting weapon of the Black Widows.

SAW: here we have a proper Squad Automatic Weapon, not just a rifle with a high capacity magazine. You cannot kill a tank, if you cannot get in range…. This light infantry weapon will buy you the time needed to maneuver to you target.

Assault Rifle with Grenade Launcher: This is the most common weapon used by the Black Widows. A smaller overall length with a full size magazine the rifle is only slightly less effective than the Stormtrooper battle rifle. Where this weapon shines is the Grenade launcher, firing thermite bombs it can decimate a 2 meter area with enough heat to melt a lightly armored vehicle or destroy power armor.

Assault Rifle: This is the base Assault Rifle, primarily used by insertion teams or MOS that require more maneuverability or a lighter load.

As with the core Stormtrooper kit, each weapon has three positions (Yes, you can use these directly with the male Storm Trooper kits as well).

Here we have a selection of heads, slouch caps, helmeted without mask and helmeted with the same options fount in the other Stormtrooper kits to allow full compatibility. (Yes, you can use these directly with the male Storm Trooper kits as well, although the full helmeted heads may be best


Here we have the leg selection, some of these poses will be mirrored to provide more diversity. I tried to include a couple of new poses in this kit. After studying Special Forces vids and some shots of real world operators doing their job, I noted a fairly specific form, ‘hunched over, knees together while moving’. When the position is especially hunched, you will need to shave a little plastic off the bottom of the neck ball to get it to fit as it should, I will illustrate this in the instructions, it is a very minor tweak and with the options to use and head or helmet there was no easy way to solve this issue in the base model.


Here are a couple Ortho view shots so that you can see the models without fisheye distortions, as with the male models they range in height from 20mm to 30.5mm to the eyes.



Thank you again for all your support and patients!

Mark Mondragon

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Automatically Appended Next Post:
Sorry I'm at work right now, maybe someone else can toss the pictures up

the update has lots of pretty pictures in it to soften the bad news...but did I just flat out miss any sort of update on the arms or the mini mortis or has it not been mentioned at all?

The latter.

 ironicsilence wrote:
the update has lots of pretty pictures in it to soften the bad news...but did I just flat out miss any sort of update on the arms or the mini mortis or has it not been mentioned at all?

That has been done for some time (see last update).... and is what will be on the boat next week. Those are the items that required box art

 NoseGoblin wrote:

 ironicsilence wrote:
the update has lots of pretty pictures in it to soften the bad news...but did I just flat out miss any sort of update on the arms or the mini mortis or has it not been mentioned at all?

That has been done for some time (see last update).... and is what will be on the boat next week. Those are the items that required box art

your a saint and back on my Christmas card list

I have been waiting with baited breath for the Widows, and... I'll admit it took me a second look, but I can dig it.

 ironicsilence wrote:

 NoseGoblin wrote:

 ironicsilence wrote:
the update has lots of pretty pictures in it to soften the bad news...but did I just flat out miss any sort of update on the arms or the mini mortis or has it not been mentioned at all?

That has been done for some time (see last update).... and is what will be on the boat next week. Those are the items that required box art

your a saint and back on my Christmas card list

Ah, thought you meant in this update.

So why don't I have my KS sword and engine upgrade again? Or are the 15mm leviathans not supposed to get that yet?

 NoseGoblin wrote:

 ironicsilence wrote:
the update has lots of pretty pictures in it to soften the bad news...but did I just flat out miss any sort of update on the arms or the mini mortis or has it not been mentioned at all?

That has been done for some time (see last update).... and is what will be on the boat next week. Those are the items that required box art

Any chance that orders which can be completed, will be? I'm only waiting on mini Mortis models and arms.

That would certainly be a nice gesture at this point in time.

 RiTides wrote:

 NoseGoblin wrote:

 ironicsilence wrote:
the update has lots of pretty pictures in it to soften the bad news...but did I just flat out miss any sort of update on the arms or the mini mortis or has it not been mentioned at all?

That has been done for some time (see last update).... and is what will be on the boat next week. Those are the items that required box art

Any chance that orders which can be completed, will be? I'm only waiting on mini Mortis models and arms.

id assume if the arms and little guys are getting on a boat that they would ship out once state side, unless of course you asked to have all wave 3 things shipped together and are also waiting on troopers

Liking the look of the black widows, wish I had ordered more.

As for the kickstarter, if I were Mark I would go for a more conservative kickstarter for the Shadokesh. It was awesome that the kickstarter got so much started, but I'm worried the delays may have been a bad PR black eye for what is otherwise an awesome product line.

Of course, delays are unfortunate, but at least much of them are due to an uncompromising approach to quality and ... oh look! Pictures! Shiny!

Mark wrote:Aside from the change in the chest armor and shoulders the most drastic change is one that would not be evident in these renders. I made them the same size as their male counterparts. This was a decision that I wrestled with for some time before deciding it was the only course of action if I wanted to have these fully integrated with the line. By making them the same size, you can swap parts from the current kits to these and vice-versa. There are some nice weapon options in this kit that I know some of you will want to use for your male counterparts. It also gave me the opportunity to future proof the release with other Eisenkern kits and accessory packs not yet created.

Does this mean the shoulder width sans pads is the same as the men?

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Liking the look of the black widows, wish I had ordered more.

As for the kickstarter, if I were Mark I would go for a more conservative kickstarter for the Shadokesh. It was awesome that the kickstarter got so much started, but I'm worried the delays may have been a bad PR black eye for what is otherwise an awesome product line.

Agreed. Ideally, if he could release a basic box of mixed infantry that included all the infantry types, and then have a few optional sprues to differentiate troops by equipment, à la Eisenkern accessory set, it would speed up and simplify release. Then the hugh stompy robot and another vehicle hull that is as versatile as the Keilerkopf and be done with it.

Then move on to Space Russians and their tanks...

 AlexHolker wrote:

Mark wrote:Aside from the change in the chest armor and shoulders the most drastic change is one that would not be evident in these renders. I made them the same size as their male counterparts. This was a decision that I wrestled with for some time before deciding it was the only course of action if I wanted to have these fully integrated with the line. By making them the same size, you can swap parts from the current kits to these and vice-versa. There are some nice weapon options in this kit that I know some of you will want to use for your male counterparts. It also gave me the opportunity to future proof the release with other Eisenkern kits and accessory packs not yet created.

Does this mean the shoulder width sans pads is the same as the men?

Pretty sure it does as a compromise to ensure cross-compatibility. While men and women have different average dimensions, it's not particularly drastic in reality (roughly 4-5cm difference based on my quick Googling) which wouldn't even really translate to 1mm of detail. It's certainly in the tolerances where the armor would make the difference there difficult to tell.

I like the design of the Black Widows, and the gun options for special forces units actually makes me wish I'd gotten another box or two. I also like the posing as the whole design feels plausible rather than being cheesecake. Not that there's anything wrong with cheesecake, I'm a KD:M backer after all, but I'm glad Mark took a more realistic route here.

I'm not really surprised by the delay (you don't get to the beginning of May with no boat on the water for a Q2 release), but yes it appears the holiday season might be the pragmatic outlook at this point. 13 weeks puts the boat leaving China in Mid-August, so allowing for the optimistically minimal delays in production the boat sets sail in September. Factor in any customs delays and just getting to the warehouse and packed/shipped from Utah and you're pretty solidly into October for the backers. Retail probably in November or even December if anything further disrupts the schedule.

It's a good thing I put down money from outside my formal hobby budget (tax refund, in this case) or I'd be fairly upset. Still not thrilled, but at least I'll have a very good looking force of guys and gals done.

It's sad, because I feel that Mark has been anything but available for the project. He's got every right to see his baby succeed.

I really do like the black widows by the way

Those Black Widows and their equipment look superb.

I had already decided to wait for other factions (Shadokesh and Republic), and hopefully they all turn out fantastically when they are finally released.

Iron Core rules are almost in an alpha state from what I hear, and should hopefully be released to some testers soon so we can tear into them

For those of you waiting an interminably long time for the wave 3 stuff, keep your chin up. Things look great, and keep in mind you will be getting some superb models!

 Mathieu Raymond wrote:
It's sad, because I feel that Mark has been anything but available for the project.

Huh?

I'm not sure that's what you meant to type...?

Somehow the sentiment and words came out completely opposite. Mark has given me the impression he was very available, but the factory has been a bit less so.

Such thread

So negative

Much sigh

shade1313 wrote:
Such thread

So negative

Much sigh

i would suspect any kickstarter thread that is delivering late will get a bit negative once another delay has been announced. I will say that of all the KS i've backed (all ship late for the most part) this one has remained the most positive. Go check out the tablescapes thread for some KS related negativity

You see what had happened was Mathieu was 80% of the way through a new language workflow, but then decided that the words were not up to his artistic integrity so he completely scrapped it and started over. He's 98% done with the new NEW workflow though, and it's produced some truly mouth-watering prose that will be sent out soon (note: "soon" is in comparison to the heat-death of the universe). In the meantime, production was slowed because he'd taken in a commission from another company before determining that American English is simply incompatible with Canadian English and the words they wanted could not be practically combined. Sadly, he is unable to return the funds for the commission despite doing no actual work because of reasons. That too is going to be okay though, because he's going to deliver a few writing projects on time, but the essay projects may be completely different from what he said he was going to deliver, including changing from the promised "paper notebook" to "stone tablets" but only for some backers.

Of course, all of this is Great News. To say otherwise would be shamefully negative.

Compared to some of the other messes in the KS world (see how many you can spot above!), DFG is merely "late." That gets more frustrating the more late it becomes of course, but for my part I'm seeing enough tangible progress to believe we're not going to be sick of the product before it even shows up like has happened elsewhere. Limits to that, of course, but thus far I'm not overly put-out.

Mark, has there been further talk of a WGF coupon?

So I really want, need and quite possibly demand more Black Widows. Holy crap those look good <3

 ironicsilence wrote:

shade1313 wrote:
Such thread

So negative

Much sigh

i would suspect any kickstarter thread that is delivering late will get a bit negative once another delay has been announced. I will say that of all the KS i've backed (all ship late for the most part) this one has remained the most positive. Go check out the tablescapes thread for some KS related negativity

That was just a joke at Mathieu's accidental post.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
So I really want, need and quite possibly demand more Black Widows. Holy crap those look good <3

Yeah, the Widows are just fantastic. They look like they could be a goodly leap ahead of the already superb STs.

 Krinsath wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:
Does this mean the shoulder width sans pads is the same as the men?

Pretty sure it does as a compromise to ensure cross-compatibility. While men and women have different average dimensions, it's not particularly drastic in reality (roughly 4-5cm difference based on my quick Googling) which wouldn't even really translate to 1mm of detail. It's certainly in the tolerances where the armor would make the difference there difficult to tell.

I don't want cross-compatibility, I want women who are actually shaped like women and not men. I dislike how broad the shoulders of the Eisenkern are as it is, without trying to shove the same proportions off onto the women.

Cross-compatibility never means designing kits to work as women first and men second, or making accessory sprues for women and blowing the men off with "Oh, you can just buy the women's accessory sprue". That's why I do not care for this development - it's only ever one way.

I thought the masked helmets would be cross compatible, as the loose weapons. And some of the minor kit for web belts.

I have seen women with shoulders as wide a male shoulders,,,,,,IN Germany, and one of these women was carrying a good sized calf across her shoulders! What a woman! So, as the Eisenkern are started from a German Empire that had to move on, I can see their female soldiers selected for their sturdiness, and they likely would be 5' 10" to 6' 2" which I had seen in the 1980's back when I babysat our now defunct truck based nuke missiles,,,,,,Yep, My MOS translated to "Deathstrike Missile" crew if you made me a 40k soldiers waaaaaay back,

Now I did see normal to average sized German women, and our US fighting gals ranged from beefy to petite.

But Germans as I recall from my tour, ate hearty and many exercised to make the calories count and burn off. Now with more modern conveniences, they may turn out no different from here in the States, but these are mere observations of people with steady exercising and a healthy diet.

It is notable that provided a decent amount of food, and play/exercise, females can grow to decent sizes similar to their brothers. Families that exert male privilege is where they get underfed and stunted, but that is an argument for social courses.

For this subject, I am pleased with the new minis, I also look forwards to the heavy armor troops.

I am a bit torn on this issue. The Black Widows don't look recognizably like women. On the tabletop, they will definitely be unrecognizable from their male counterparts.

I think that this is realistic under the scenario where the armed forces are egalitarian in the sense that everybody regardless of gender has to pass the same physical standards. In which case, the standards would likely select for soldiers with masculine builds (and hence broader shoulders).

I understand that this makes the set cross compatible between genders, but I would prefer females that are recognizably female from tabletop height, which would be a vote in favor of narrower shoulders.