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12thRonin wrote:

Lorek wrote:If anyone starts up the Foam Wars again, we will start handing out suspensions, no questions asked. What should be (and has pretty much been, in this thread) a comparison of competing products has turned very ugly in the past.

Things like this:

NecronLord3 wrote: In fact not only is in not remotely the same its actually quite useless.

are over the line. Blatantly false hyperbole only serves to inflame opinions and cause problems (it's blatantly false hyperbole because the trays you are talking about MUST have a use, or they would never sell, which they do).

Keep it to the facts, people, and don't stir anything up.

So no negative opinions about an advertiser? Saying it's useless is just as valid as saying they have converted from Sabol to BF. Neither is a "Fact" in this case.

This is why we can't have nice things. Seriously, this thread again? Its freaking foam. Who the cares?

Sorry Frazzled, I need to respond so that people can see what IS acceptable (I had this typed up when you locked the thread).

12thRonin, negative opinions about advertisers ARE allowed, but baseless allegations and deliberately inflammatory rhetoric are not. NecronLord3's post directly above yours is just fine he lays out what he believes, and gives support for his opinions.

I'm going to leave this open for now.

To the OP I had the same issue with not getting emails responded too. I called an got the response I needed. It appears that Battlefoam has issues with email.

Lorek wrote:Sorry Frazzled, I need to respond so that people can see what IS acceptable (I had this typed up when you locked the thread).

12thRonin, negative opinions about advertisers ARE allowed, but baseless allegations and deliberately inflammatory rhetoric are not. NecronLord3's post directly above yours is just fine he lays out what he believes, and gives support for his opinions.

I'm going to leave this open for now.

Ok, but only because you still owe me sterno. But if there is any more snarkiness I am closing this thread. I am as serious as a heart attack.
This one's for you Lorek

Spire,

We get hundreds of emails a day and I apologize for you not getting a quick response. I am glad you were able to get ahold of someone via the phone. Like i have said earlier please PM with any questions.

I'm also in the same boat in that I'm trying to decide what case to go with for my razorspam BA list. Personally I'm leaning towards going with the pre-cut foam, while this doesn't give me any sort of flexability in terms of what I can add to the layer....I'd much rather pay a little extra and avoid having to pluck out pieces of foam. Might just be me but I HATE plucking foam.

The only real issue I have with plucking foam is that the foam you leave as walls/spacers has a tendency to come loose from the glue as you're working. That always sucks, and costs some structural integrity. That being said, it still works okay.

I haven't plumped for any BF yet, but probably will down the road.

Actually, keep in mind that pluck foam is actually quite easy to repair/replace. You certainly can't replace a whole wall or large section but the occasional misplucked piece can be glued back in.

I have the Sabol Army Transport, and the Army Transport 2 all filled with pluck trays.
The bags themselves are good. The material is sturdy, and lasts with reasonable care.
The pockets/pouches are adequate for the rulebook and codex, dice, tape ,etc.
These trays are mostly plucked in rectangles because I cant' be bothered to remember what figure went in that oddball shape I plucked.

In recent years, the bits between rectangles started tearing/falling out.
So I picked up a bunch of the troop trays from BattleFoam.
They work for most of my infantry, whatever the army, and I didn't have to spend hours puling out bits to make them useable.
They may list them as wider than Sabol, but they fit in the bag just fine.
I still use the deep trays from Sabol I used for tanks. These are pretty much empty trays with an X divider creating 4 spaces.

The Battlefoam trays impressed me so much, I sprung for the Warmachine bag.
Its got pockets for everything, and I can leave all my cards, tokens, books, etc. in it and at times I can have 3-4 different armies/factions with me at once.
With that bag, I am worry-free. Everything is good to go.

I got their Malifaux bag as well. The bag has all the pockets I need, and the size is perfect.
I only wish they would have put in 2 identical troop trays.
One has smaller slots that makes it a PITA to arrange things with Wyrd's 30-32mm sized stuff.

Both BF bags feel tougher and more durable than the Sabol counterparts. The material feels like it would stand up to snags better without tearing.
I haven't had my BF bags as long, but they have gotten more road time than my Sabols because I travel to more WM events than I have ever done for 40k.
So I think the bags have gotten about the same amount of "real" wear and tear.

The bags simply have different target audiences.
If you don't play alot, or are not willing/able to spend more, Sabol get the job done.
If you travel with your minis a lot, air or road, the Battlefoam bag is a better option. That option comes with a price.

Bottom line, I will be buying Battlefoam trays for my Sabol bags, and Battlefoam bags if I need new in the future, based solely on the experiences I have had with both products.

First off, as the OP I implore those posting not to get in the type of argument to get this thread closed. My intent has never been to start an arguments. I am simply attempting to garner more learned opinions than mine, as when I bought cases GW was pretty much the only game in town. I respect that everyone has an opinion and I appreciate yours no matter what it is. I will weight and give them due consideration.

And I thank those who have given theirs.

Lastly I apologize to the mods, as I didn't realize that this question would inflame such passionate responses. Not wanting to give you any more headache than needed, but I didn't think such a question would.

I don't think your going to find any better advice then how skrulnik spelled it out

Cato Sicarius wrote:Spire,

We get hundreds of emails a day and I apologize for you not getting a quick response. I am glad you were able to get ahold of someone via the phone. Like i have said earlier please PM with any questions.

I work as a one man Sales department for a small engineering company, so I understand how time consuming responding to emails is. That said, if you can't provide the service effectively don't offer it. It is frustrating as a customer to not be able to get a response through a communication channel that has been offered. I would hope that battlefoam would understand how discouraging it feels to not get a response.

NecronLord3 wrote:Actually, keep in mind that pluck foam is actually quite easy to repair/replace. You certainly can't replace a whole wall or large section but the occasional misplucked piece can be glued back in.

That is absolutely true, and I admit that I like that it's forgiving like that.
The problem with that, though, is that you lose your "customability" when you start doing that.

Previously, you mentioned being able to reuse trays be just changing the layout. If you -and I know this from personal experience- have to glue sections of pluck foam into place, you're stuck with them in that layout. Even if you pull the whole section out, you aren't (reasonably) reusing the pieces that were glued together.

Eric

MagickalMemories wrote:
Previously, you mentioned being able to reuse trays be just changing the layout. If you -and I know this from personal experience- have to glue sections of pluck foam into place, you're stuck with them in that layout. Even if you pull the whole section out, you aren't (reasonably) reusing the pieces that were glued together.

Eric

Actually I was more referring to the ability to make a tray for a model today and change it 6 months down the road if you want to add to or adjust an existing tray. You can't really totally realign a tray once you've plucked it. However, it still provides you with more options than BF's custom cut foam. Say I bought a Sabol tray today for my Tomb Stalker and in 6 months the new Codex comes out and I want to add another Tomb Stalker to my tray or some other new unit, I have the option to do that. With BF's trays, you are pretty much stuck with the tray layout and if you want to change it later you pretty much have to order a new tray. Or if for some reason I need to totally scrap a tray, I'm only tossing around $9 with a Sabol Tray versus the approx $20 price tag per BF tray.

spireland wrote:

Cato Sicarius wrote:Spire,

We get hundreds of emails a day and I apologize for you not getting a quick response. I am glad you were able to get ahold of someone via the phone. Like i have said earlier please PM with any questions.

I work as a one man Sales department for a small engineering company, so I understand how time consuming responding to emails is. That said, if you can't provide the service effectively don't offer it. It is frustrating as a customer to not be able to get a response through a communication channel that has been offered. I would hope that battlefoam would understand how discouraging it feels to not get a response.

Especially true when it's about orders already placed. I PMed Cato yesterday, a day after I sent an email, still waiting on a reply about an order now outside of the estimated time for processing and delivery (order didn't include custom work). Hopefully a reply will come soon.

Other than this, I've been extremely happy with my other battlefoam purchase. I'd only used pluck foam before, and honestly, it was a pain to try and change after plucked. If the glue wasn't coming out on pieces next to where you want to pluck, it was tough to do shapes that weren't squares (Wave Serpents were a PITA).

NecronLord3 wrote:Actually I was more referring to the ability to make a tray for a model today and change it 6 months down the road if you want to add to or adjust an existing tray. You can't really totally realign a tray once you've plucked it. However, it still provides you with more options than BF's custom cut foam. Say I bought a Sabol tray today for my Tomb Stalker and in 6 months the new Codex comes out and I want to add another Tomb Stalker to my tray or some other new unit, I have the option to do that. With BF's trays, you are pretty much stuck with the tray layout and if you want to change it later you pretty much have to order a new tray. Or if for some reason I need to totally scrap a tray, I'm only tossing around $9 with a Sabol Tray versus the approx $20 price tag per BF tray.

Ah.
Okay.
I better understand where you're coming from, now.

I thought you were talking about recycling fully plucked trays.
I see your point, and won't contest it. It's valid. There is a difference to consider, though.
It seems that you and I use our foam differently. When I buy a tray (and I have a TON of Sabol), I pluck the entire tray. I fill each tray to maximize the capacity of what trays I'm using.
With ONE exception, all of my trays are totally unplucked or fully plucked. There's only one exception, and that is because it's a 3" tray, and I have no more models to fit that tray height (for that army).

So, from the point of view of someone who does not leave open spots, I still prefer BF (even though I'venever used them) for their customizability. I can see your point, though.

I doubt I'd ever buy many of BF's premade trays. I'll have most of my trays made specifically for me. See, my raiders won't have the "hangers on" models to take up extraneous space. Also, if I have 6 Raiders, I don't want 8 raider slots (or whatever). I'll have them made so that my army fits the trays. When I expand in the future, I'll buy trays to fit those models.

Thanks for elaborating.

Eric

Somebody asked for an analysis of BF while leaving the personalities out.

I'll be happy to.

Disclaimer: I own 4 1520 bags and 5 720 bags and many stray trays from BF.

I'm very OCD and I don't like my models hanging around in free-space. I like having them in trays that I can stack and even better having them in bags, which protects them against UV damage.

When I buy a new army, I buy foam (and or a bag for it). I get the models back from the painting service and I trace them for custom foam. It takes a few weeks to get the bag, but BF has always been easy to work with for me.

What is good (IMO) about BF:
1) Custom made trays. A model for every place and a place for every model
2) More rigid foam. I can stack them higher with less worry about what load the foam and models below can take
3) More rigid bags. I can put a couple of 1520's on top of each other in my basement and not see the bag deform that much
4) The glue on BF trays seems to be better and applied more skillfully
5) I like having the Porsche of army men bags and trays

I hope this won't be considered too off topic: How do your figures do since you're carrying them sideways? Do you have to be careful that you put your metal minis on what would be the bottom of the tray so that you don't squeeze the models underneath?
By sideways I mean that you load the figures on a horizontal plane but you carry them on a vertical plane. Top and bottom refer to the vertical plane directions.
I ask this because I was thinking of getting a BF bag but the vertical plane stacking problem just has me worried.

BF makes custom foam. If you want yout minis to stand upright in the trays (as I do), then all you need to do is order them custom.

Eric

No problem at all laying them on their side. My Canis model is on his side on a tray that has both upright and sideways models. That tray is in the middle of the bag. I haven't noticed any trouble with it. The foam is generally rigid and padded enough and compressed for everything to stay snug and not rattle around.