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Maybe paint them both the same flat colour for addition comparisons?

Whole bits being absent is rather worrying.

Is the wolf tail on the staff only half cast?

What's with the missing piece? It's the bird sitting on his shoulder on the cover of the box, right?

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Whole bits being absent is rather worrying.

Is the wolf tail on the staff only half cast?

looks like it has been repositioned to me.


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elchristoff wrote:What's with the missing piece? It's the bird sitting on his shoulder on the cover of the box, right?

correct. the resin one is missing Njal's cyber-raven

While the missing part is worrying the detail does seem to be crisper. I do however second the idea to undercoat them both in the same color so that we can get some true comparison shots.

did you call and complain about the missing raven? gw canada has always had fantastic customre service in that regard. i dont know about US gw though

Thanks for posting this, just another tally to each of the below:


-Don't buy these products yet.
-The detail is sharper.

Fascinating, excellent post and thank you for taking the photos. Any word on the work-ability of the material? How it cuts and separates from the sprue?

The reaction to the Finecast stuff has been so wacky: people are either into it or they thing it's going to steal their soul while they sleep.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Whole bits being absent is rather worrying.

Yes it was irritating I wouldn't have bought it had I realized right away!

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Is the wolf tail on the staff only half cast?

I think it's actually a different shape on the resin.

Lord Scythican wrote:Maybe paint them both the same flat colour for addition comparisons?

Yes that's a great idea, I will do it tomorrow, watch this space.

elchristoff wrote:What's with the missing piece? It's the bird sitting on his shoulder on the cover of the box, right?

Yes that's right.

lanman wrote:did you call and complain about the missing raven?...

No, I plan to return it to the store actually and get another one instead, I think a missing piece is defective. I originally wanted to prime and paint them both and then show them side by side but I cant really because of the incomplete one.

Ambull wrote:...Any word on the work-ability of the material? How it cuts and separates from the sprue?..

You're welcome, no word yet I couldn't really do it because I need to return it to get another one. I will write more details as I continue!

Thanks all!

Thank you for the in-depth examination.

Due to specular highlighting from the metal it is difficult to compare the two models however the resin gives an impression of greater detail though at the scale we are talking about it is questionable how worthwhile that is in practice.

For example, it looks like the runes on the staff are more crisply incised. These features are about 1mm and the difference is a fraction of a mm which is irrelevant in a 28mm wargame figure.

OTOH the practical application is irrelevant when the purpose is to fulfill a PR brief. The resin one looks better so most people will say that it is better.

GW ought to do a series of prestige models in 54mm where the quality of the material will shine through. I've seen some of the Tyranid creatures in resin which might fit this description but unfortunately they had casting errors.

Some manufacturers wash their metal models with black to make them photograph better.

The issue of mould material being stuck to the model seems fairly common. I wouldn't care to estimate a percentage -- it's probably fairly low -- however that fact that any models are coming through with mould rubber stuck to them is slightly worrying.

The missing raven piece is a big mistake but probably represents a QA error rather than a core casting error. I expect it fell off during packaging.

The thing that always annoyed me with metal (aside from not fitting properly) was that parts like lances and banner poles were always bent.

Resin doesn't seem to have solve this problem, as everything of this ilk I've seen so far (including Njal's staff above) is also bent.

Have yet to be impressed beyond GW's own publicity shots. These reviews are therefore very useful, but it would be good to see one painted up.

The bent parts can be fixed by soaking them in a cup of hot water for 1-2 minutes, they will become flexible and you can straighten the parts quite easily, as it cools off it'll become rigid and hold the straightened shape. Resin usually warps when it's cast due to the internal heat it produces while curing, it's just one of the issues you can't avoid due to the material properties but it's an easy fix.

I just posted a review for some DE Mandrakes, overall fairly happy with the models (other than the price). Some peopel will nitpick the new models to death but in my opinion as a experienced modeller and resin fanatic they are solid pieces, but nothing exceptional.

Real wargamers replace spears and poles with steel wire.

I think once they are both coated in primer then a comparison would be much easier, it's a bit hard to see the detail on the shiny metal figure.

It must be my age, but I can't really tell the difference.....and the metal bending problem is not so big, unlike resin, metal is much easier to work with from a hobby perspective.

I have heard that you don't really need to prime the finecast mini's, is that the case? If so that could save some time. Although the time saved would probably be offset by the time you need to spend prepping the resin, working off mould lines, cleaning up the mini in general....

In short I'm a little confused as to why GW would replace metal at all, im sure going to miss the feel of metal mini's, and as for the inevitable accidents which involve droppage. Well have any of you ever dropped a resin mini? It goes off like a frag grenade!

Although swearing off GW, I may buy a finecast, just to satiate my curiosity......

sarpedons-right-hand wrote:It must be my age, but I can't really tell the difference.....and the metal bending problem is not so big, unlike resin, metal is much easier to work with from a hobby perspective.

You're like the first person I've ever heard say that. How is something that's easier to manipulate harder to work with?

sarpedons-right-hand wrote:In short I'm a little confused as to why GW would replace metal at all, im sure going to miss the feel of metal mini's, and as for the inevitable accidents which involve droppage. Well have any of you ever dropped a resin mini? It goes off like a frag grenade!

Because metal is becoming cost prohibitively expensive to use. While yes, GW lumped a price inscrease on Finecast models, metal as a casting material is just too expensive these days.

Because metal is becoming cost prohibitively expensive to use. While yes, GW lumped a price inscrease on Finecast models, metal as a casting material is just too expensive these days.

Amusing, given the sheer amount of companies that are quite profitably producing large quantities of metal models...

-Loki- wrote:
metal as a casting material is just too expensive these days.

No.. Its not.

-Loki- wrote:

sarpedons-right-hand wrote:It must be my age, but I can't really tell the difference.....and the metal bending problem is not so big, unlike resin, metal is much easier to work with from a hobby perspective.

How is something that's easier to manipulate harder to work with?

The only time I think metal is easier to manipulate is when you get bent swords and stuff. It's usually not too hard to bend the blade back into shape without breaking the part...unless you do it over and over and keep weakening the metal. With resin on the other hand you can't do that or it snaps, you have to heat it up, bend it, then cool it off quickly in order to bend it back, and sometimes it has to be done multiple times because it doesn't wanna god damn STAY.

Well to satisfy some desires.

Drop one of the these finecast miniatures and you'll be fine. I accidently knocked a hive tyrant off a table around 4 feet up. One arm fell off. At the glue point. It hadn't dried porperly yet. Bounces brilliantly. And any breakages are really easily fixed.
The detail i find is crisper and more refined, but it's not really that much use, as many of us aren't what people would call expert painters.

Overall, i see an advantage, that it's easier to build, transport and fix, but no benefit otherwise.

Is that a piece of the mould near the Finecast's foot?

Laughing Man wrote:

Because metal is becoming cost prohibitively expensive to use. While yes, GW lumped a price inscrease on Finecast models, metal as a casting material is just too expensive these days.

Amusing, given the sheer amount of companies that are quite profitably producing large quantities of metal models...

At cheaper retail prices.


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My take on the resin is that being soft it is easy to cut so it's good for conversions. I'm a bit concerned it may be too soft, and take a lot of drilling and pinning to stop long bits from drooping.

I don't believe in not washing models I've had my dirty hands all over. I just put my stuff through the dishwasher in batches. I can do it when the washer is nearly full of plates, so it isn't even an extra run.

If the resin doesn't need priming, well, I don't spend more than 20-30 minutes priming a batch of models, so it isn't much of a saving.

If people are so concerned to save that amount of time, buy pre-painted models to save a lot more.

I've never had a problem with metal models chipping, however I prepare and varnish them properly.

If a piece of the mold is stuck on the foot then futher cast from that mold will have a blob as a food... Not good

unless the models are one use only

The resin is quite soft so it should be easy to trim off blobs. Not that you should need to.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Whole bits being absent is rather worrying.

Is the wolf tail on the staff only half cast?

Sorry for the bad quality of the pic... this is an Astaroth the Grim that was missing its whole body. His torso is supposed to be on the same tree as his backpack and scrolls. The body's absence is made obvious by the fact you can see his wings through the empty spot where his body should be. While the store I visited to look at Finecast only had one miscast, a mispack such as this is kind of unacceptable.

edit: On the upside though, the quality of the Finecast models, detail wise was excellent, and the lightness of the material makes it ideal for large monster sized models.

I think the missing part factor will clear up once they realize that they need to check the sprue, not just count the sprue, as some bits are clearly falling off the sprue before it is inserted in the packaging.

On the plus side, GW has never failed to replace a missing part for me, usually with an entire model, and I've had more than enough metals missing parts that seeing it happen with the resin isn't too disconcerting.

I'm increasingly coming to the realization that the problem isn't the move to resin from metal, but the actual process and quality control on the resin stuff. It seems like when the resin "works", it really looks super. However, given that we aren't collecting data in any systematic way, I have NO FREAKING IDEA how often the resin is cast properly, and how often it looks like crap, nor how often stuff is missing.

I mean, it seems like, from these threads, that every model is either miscast or missing something (or both), but honestly, how many people who buy a model and get exactly what they paid for take a picture to post on the internet? I'd love to hear from a retailer. How much of your sales of Finecast are miscast or mispackaged?

Pretty much the vibe I'm getting of Finecast is that the detail is good, but they need to work out the miscasts (and lack of casts) first.

Because I was curious, (and will make one into a GM) I decided to take the primer step and do a comparison as well. Two Brother-Captain Sterns, washed, assembled, and primed as close to simultaneously as humanly possible. One metal, one resin.