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Hi folks,

I got in on the MEdge KS when it launched. I was happy to do so - Dakka has been a great site for me in general, and I'm generally enthusiastic about promoting more non-GW sci-fi hard plastics. I've gone silent since, because I really haven't had any time or space to do much with my minis yet - something that will change over the summer after we finish moving.

I have been looking over my sprues and the photos of completed minis that people have posted, and wanted to make a few comments, which I hope will help make future MEdge releases better. Feel free to take these comments with a grain of salt as my minis remain unbuilt and unpainted. I wanted to post now, though, because Spiral Arm Studios is already talking about working on new models, and I'd like them to have this feedback sooner rather than later.

In a nutshell, I'm asking SAS to build on their successes and address their weaknesses. In many cases, these weaknesses are inconsistent, occurring in some models but not in others. In such cases, I'm asking SAS to bring all future releases up to the same high standard. They have achieved a lot; I'm very proud of them, I'm happy to support them with my dollars, and I intend to keep doing so. Regardless of how this post may read to you, I really do consider myself on their side. But I also think it would be deadly for them to go forwards believing that they have nothing left to learn or improve on in their next releases. I have three basic critiques:

- some models have shallow detail. Others are perfect. Not all MEdge miniatures were created / casted with equal quality.

- some models have poor anatomy - most problematic for me, the Karist Troopers lack abdomens. A problem that the Shadow Walkers and Novas, strangely enough, don't have.

- many models lack naturalistic dynamism, looking stiff and stilted, with poses that don't communicate believable purpose, be it the over-extended battle stance of the Shadow Walkers, or the oddly static postures of kinetic, shape-shifting Adult Angels.

1. Some models have shallow detail, other models are perfect

Compare the Karist Trooper sprue with the Karist Kaddar Nova or Epirian Handler sprue. The Karist Troopers have a design I love, but the detail is pretty shallow. This is evident if you look at the heads particularly, but I've also seen this criticism come up in the remarks of some people who have painted them and become frustrated after priming them. I've also seen some people try to offset the problem by drilling out the three eye holes on the helmet - a solution that, to my eye, doesn't work very well.

Incidentally, if you disagree, please talk about how you have painted the helmets without losing detail after priming, etc. I'm entirely sincere about that - I really want to know before I paint mine. I love the Karist helmet design and don't want to see those three glowing eyes get submerged and lost in a single coat of primer.

OK, now look at the bald unhelmeted head on the Karist trooper sprue and compare it with the bald heads on the Kaddar Nova sprue. That problem with shallow detail? On the Kaddar Nova sprue, that problem is history. The Nova heads have excellent definition and look like they will handle paint very well. The Nova is a great model all around. Same goes for the Epirian Handler. These are well cast models that I would buy more of (if I needed them, but they are specialist / leader models).

So what happened with the shallow detail Troopers? Was it a beginning design mistake, of not making the render model's details deep enough? Or is it the result of using different manufacturers? Did some production companies do better jobs on their MEdge models than others? If the answer is design, I hope Spiral Arm will take notice and adjust their designs in the future for better results. If the answer is that different manufacturers performed differently, please, SAS, do not use the Karist trooper manufacturers again. Give more work to the people who did the Nova.

Honestly, I'd pay money right now for a sprue of Karist Trooper head bits that were Kaddar Nova quality. I LOVE the Karist Trooper head design, but I feel like it hasn't been produced to best effect.

2. Are SAS models equal to the best being made by GW? Are they innovating beyond GW? Or are they falling short?

All of the above. Yes, this is subjective to a point, but here's my say.

A. Equal to GW:

The Kaddar Nova and Epirian Handler are very crisp, come with a number of options, and look great. To be perfectly candid, I do think they fall short of GW a bit in terms of dynamic posing, which I'll return to. But these are basically great character models that are worth the money (for quite a bit less than GW, too.)

B. Innovating beyond GW:

SAS claim they are pushing design and casting technologies beyond industry standards. Are they lying? Happily, no! They really are. And this is most evident in their Epirian Hunter and - most especially - their Scarecrow robot models. Why?

Because those models were designed with multipart joints that make for a remarkable range of poses. More than you generally expect to find from GW kits. And I think - I'm no GW guru, but as far as I know - they've NEVER made models as micro-poseable as the Scarecrow at that scale. The Scarecrows almost become mini-action figures that you build yourself. Remarkable. I can see the potential complaint - "the Scarecrows are too fiddly," etc. Regardless, they are my kind of model. How many humanoid models can you buy today that are so well designed that you could purchase 20 and end up with no two posed alike? In sci-fi, I'm no fan of uniform regiments of look-alike models.

SAS - More robots, and more designed with this kind of posing genius, please.

C. Not up to top industry standards

The Karist troopers, Tempests, and Shadow Walkers. Again, shallow detail is a problem with the troopers particularly.

But the main problem with the models above is that their poses are stilted and unnaturalistic. Compare the Karist troopers or Tempests to GW's imperial guard or Catachan fighters and I don't think there's a whole lot of difference: they all look stilted and stiff. But compare them to, say, Dreamforge's Eisenkern troopers and there is a world of difference. This isn't about true scale vs. heroic scale, either, it's about anatomy, proportion, naturalistic flow, and poses that look purposeful and make contextual sense in a battleground. The Shadow Walker's legs are splayed in a bizarre way that doesn't communicate logical, purposeful motion - what exactly is someone standing in that manner supposed to be doing? If it's a fighting stance, it's unbalanced. If it's movement, where is he supposed to be going? The Karist tempests are basically starch-assed - moreso than is necessary for power-armored warriors - and the awkward way they hold their heavy weapons looks more like the product of a designer trying to make the bits fit together rather than the product of an inspired, well-executed aesthetic choice. The oddly bent wrists aren't an acceptable solution to the problem of how to align their arms while they hold heavy weapons; power armored troops are meant to look heavy, not awkward, when they take the fight to the enemy.

As for the Karist troopers, on the one hand I appreciate the conservatism of their poses. When you can only do a few poses on a sprue, doing one or two exaggerated ones can backfire. Imagine if SAS had made one of the three Karist poses a running one, for example, or standing with one foot on a rock. You'd have regiments of Karists where every third soldier was running or standing on a rock in exactly the same way. Yuck. But while conservative walking stances are fine in general, the stiffness of the Karist trooper poses is made more awkward by their final problem:

They don't have abdomens. No solar plexus. Their chest and upper abdomens transition directly into their hips, skipping everything in between. Why? The best Karist trooper photos cover this anatomical deficiency by having their arms cross over their non-existent midriffs. Yes, GW does this too with their minis sometimes - but it doesn't result in their best looking miniatures, either. Not a GW trend to copy.

This last point would best be proven by modding / adding in the missing Karist Trooper solar plexus and putting comparative photos up, i.e., showing by doing. I apologize that I can't do that right now, but promise here - and you may hold me to this - that by summer's end I will do this and post comparative pictures here of Troopers with and without abdomens so that you may judge the results for yourself. Ideally, I'd wait to post my comments at all until I could back myself up with such pictures, but again, I want SAS to get this message before they commit to new designs, i.e., while these comments can still be of potential use to them.

D. You forgot to talk about the Karist Aliens!

I did, let me correct that. I like them. Here's my thoughts on the Karist minnow and adult Angels:

1. Minnows: True, these are models that will either appeal to your taste with their alien weirdness, or turn you off because they don't sport the standard Tyranid-style alien ferociousness (overt fangs, mandibles, etc. And who names a threatening alien a "minnow"?)

I love them unconditionally. I love the design, but I also love the posing of the wings - three options, not just two, so flocks really look animated. These models are also among the exceptionally well-cast MEdge minis, with crisp detail that should paint very well. Bravo.

2. Adult Angel: I like this model a lot, but in all honestly I find it a partial success, and I want to see SAS improve on models like this in future releases.

The good: Wonderful, original, truly alien design. Weird and menacing. Well cast, crisp detail.

The bad: For a shape-shifting alien, this beast is oddly static. Imagine this same model produced by Wyrd for Malifaux, or even by GW as a centerpiece model, and you can imagine the roiling, twisting, churning dynamism that it could have had, surging forward with limbs raised to deliver a whirlwind of liquid tendrils. As it is, the Adult Angel looks a lot like a computer model that has been fully rendered but hasn't been posed yet. This is the pose you'd expect to see on a tactical computer, detailing strengths, weaknesses, favorite Space Marine flavors and other data. It doesn't look like it's actually doing anything on a battlefield in real-time.

Posing aside, the tentacle backpack piece is the one major flaw in the Adult Angel model's anatomy. I presume it is there to make the figure look more 3-D from behind, to make something radiate from its back, but the flatness of the backpack piece, with all of the tentacles radiating out along the same plane as if drawn on a sheet of paper, completely undercuts this.

When I have time, I will be building my Adult Angels and modifying them to improve their dynamism, and substituting something better for the backpack. I can't promise to be able to post that by the end of this summer, but it is on my agenda.

Right now, I consider the Adult Angels to be great projects for modification. The ingredients for a great miniature are all there, but you will need creativity and elbow grease to bring out their best, as building them as intended doesn't do them full justice (in my opinion.)

Should SAS do more Karist Angel minis? Like some medium-sized ground based aliens, maybe? Hell, yes! But when you design them, if they are semi-permanent shifting shapes (unlike the relatively stable Minnow forms), consider going for the sort of dynamism that you see in these Sorrows by Malifaux, for example:



Am I done? Not quite. I have a promise and a request.

The request is that whatever new miniatures and factions SAS choose to debut next, that they do so with market savvy. Namely, SAS, I hope that you will include some miniatures in your next factions that answer a market need, that provide minis that lots of scifi gamers using various systems would naturally want to have, whether they play MEdge or not.

That's an odd request for me to make, as personally I'd like you guys to just follow your own muse and make whatever best suits your unique universe. The more unique, the better.

But I worry that getting my support may be a bad sign. I tend to like unique underdogs, and I frequently support systems that go under in the end. I worry that I'm a fan of companies the way that the albatross was a fan of the ancient Mariner. Do you remember White Wolf's "Rage" or Sabertooth's "WarCry" collectible card games? Grenadier Miniatures? Mantic's "Deadzone Xtreme?" Democratic candidate "Bernie Sanders?" I embraced (and doomed?) them all. You have been warned.

Your first MEdge releases included a bunch of drones, which until very recently, have been underrepresented in the market, especially in hard plastic. That was smart. I hope that you will be considering similar opportunities with popular but under-served model types to appeal beyond your core MEdge constituency. I ask this not for myself - I'll buy as many unmarketable scifi models as you care to make - but for you, because I want you to be around for many years to come. (Seriously, who would make a sci-fi model like this oddity, expecting it to find a market? And what sort of idiot would buy it?:



Answer: Mantic made it, and I bought it. Without regret.)

What those underserved but popular model types are is a discussion / argument for another thread. I trust your judgment.

The promise I will make to you is that following this summer, after I move to a place where there will at last be space to build models and even - at last! - paint them, that I will be working with my KS MEdge models and posting the results here on Dakka. Many of those projects will involve large or small modifications, in some cases to make a point and hope to influence future release design, but in most cases just because that's just the sort of guy I am. I'd rather alter things than build them to spec in general. If I can find other ways to contribute positively to your project, and work them into my schedule, that would be cool too, but I can't quite promise that just yet.

I hope this post provided some food for thought. It is definitely not intended as an attack. I respect what you're doing, and I'm very sober-minded about the difficulty of doing it. You say you have found a way to do it with zero cost to yourselves, and I hope that is true. I'm sure you are aware that becoming successful in this business is probably a long game, and definitely a long shot. That makes you dreamers in my book, so I conclude with this apt quote from Ming the Merciless, and a rejoinder from Queen:

“Pathetic dakkadakka administrators. Hurling your bodies into the void, without the slightest inkling of who or what is out here. If you had known anything about the true nature of the gaming market, anything at all, you would’ve hidden from it in terror."

SAS! Ah-aaah!

You're a miracle!

SAS! Ah-aaah!

Kings of the impossible!

You're for everyone of us
Game for everyone of us
You roll with a mighty hand
Every man every woman
Every child with a mighty

SAS! (BOOM!)

Balanced, honest and appropriate feedback. I too tweak as much as I can. I very rarely have stock poses on anything I build unless it looks cool as is. I agree about market savviness, best way to survive. That said, I love the scope of the MEdge universe, the stories and audiobooks all intertwine with the game and card game. I feel you can immerse yourself. I caught myself getting excited just at the artwork for the remnant fleet and broken logos in their last KS update. Crazy stuff. I hope the future models fuel this growing love of the universe they've created.

On a side note - good job you haven't built your models yet, with the upgrade sprue on the horizon we could be in for some interesting hobby variations. I'm glad I haven't bashes all mine out yet for this reason.

For what it's worth, I believe that most of the issues with the Karist troopers and tempests stem from them being the very first models designed and made. Lessons were learnt from them, and the models that came after them were designed accordingly.

Having said that, while the detail on the troopers isn't as deep as on the other models, I haven't had any issues with losing detail from painting on the few that I've actually got around to putting paint on so far.

I found the detail deep enough painting the studio models. I did drill the tri-lens a little deeper on the first few I painted, but found this actually made doing the OSL on them more difficult as the deeper hole was too... hole-y, so on later models I didn't bother doing so.

I primed with Vallejo PU black primer. Went on nice and smooth, nice and thin. If you're having issues with primer obscuring detail, then you're either using the wrong primer or laying it on far too heavily.

Thanks for your thoughts Vermonter!

I have no issues painting the Karist Troopers myself. Like winterdyne, I tried drilling the eyes, but it's not necessary and doesn't look better.

As for the Mature Angel: I think that perhaps the staticness is mostly from the kind of square 'legs', which might have something to do with the model originally being designed to work without a base? This might be complete nonsense though.

I'm very glad to hear that painting the Karist helmets hasn't been a problem for you guys in terms of losing detail. That little design touch with the three right eyes on the helmets echoing the alien Angel faces subtly and effectively ties the whole faction together.

@winterdyne - I'll get my hands on the Vallejo primer, thanks for the tip!

@TP - good point about the upgrade sprue. I also look forward to seeing what it contains.

The Vallejo Primer I'm on about is an airbrush one (and you really need an airbrush and compressor to use it). Doesn't need to be a flashy one, my £15 cheap chinese POS ab and £70 compressor (still chugging) did the job admirably for years. Saves a fortune.

That was a good read. I agree to all the points you've made.

Personally, when I saw the models nothing yelled out at me. Some guardsmen, some tau and some cool, unique looking aliens were my initial thoughts (I only play 40k). It took reading Faith and sacrifice to push me over the edge into buying the models.
When I was building the Karists, I noticed that the Elites and (I think) Troopers' plastic was a different shade to the others'. The plastic seemed whiter than the plastic for the epirians etc. Possibly they were made at different times by different people, which could account for the softer details.
And as fiddly as the scarecrow was, I really enjoyed putting it together!

Personally, I'm excited to see more Angels. The minnows were great, and the mature angel was menacing enough. However, the points on the mature angel's legs weren't big enough, imo. I'm conscious that the connection between the angel itself and the base is reliant on 4 very small points being glued. Nothing wrong with the model, it's just a personal preference as I like to game a lot and know that it's just waiting to break off it's base.

 Zambro wrote:
I'm conscious that the connection between the angel itself and the base is reliant on 4 very small points being glued. Nothing wrong with the model, it's just a personal preference as I like to game a lot and know that it's just waiting to break off it's base.

If you're concerned about this, pinning it to the base, or slicing the tips off the legs so that you have a flat surface to glue to the base (they'll look like they're sunk slightly into the ground) should do the job.

The other option is to build your base up to give you more points of contact with the legs

 Vermonter wrote:

Incidentally, if you disagree, please talk about how you have painted the helmets without losing detail after priming, etc.

I haven't ever tried to do OSL, and I didn't try with the Karist Troopers either.
I just very delicately put some Kabalite Green (yes I use citadel for all my models, it's simply because I have more than I can ever use) on the three holes (which had lost a little detail with the primer) and in the eye slit (which seemed to retain it's detail better). I was very happy with how it looked. Even though I didn't use OSL, the plain blue/green paint looked really good IMO, and I don't really have any complaints about the head myself.

 Vermonter wrote:

They don't have abdomens. No solar plexus. Their chest and upper abdomens transition directly into their hips, skipping everything in between.

While reading your post, I was not entirely sure what you were talking about, so I looked at the photos on the kickstarter. There's a good quality photo of one of the Karist Trooper squad leaders a little way down where the arms aren't obscuring anything.
Looking at it, I think the hips are meant to be anatomically positioned under the very large and bulky utility belt, but don't quote me on that.

 Vermonter wrote:

For a shape-shifting alien, this beast is oddly static.

I'm inclined to agree with you. Flat on the base they do look like a computer rendered image. What someone on the Comm Guild group did was build up the base (I think with cork) to make a canyon, and placed the angel in such a way that it appeared as though the angel was clambering through the canyon. As far as I can tell they didn't alter the angel model itself.

Hi Creeeed,

I'm encouraged that you've had success painting in the three eyes. I've never attempted OSL either, so the method you describe is basically what I have in mind.

I think you're right about the Karist trooper utility belt covering their midsections. It means that in the far future, some people love belts big enough to cover their stomachs, I guess.

I saw that Comm guild Angel that's straddling some terrain and I agree with you there, too; it's an excellent use of the model that looks much more dynamic.

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:

I'm inclined to agree with you. Flat on the base they do look like a computer rendered image. What someone on the Comm Guild group did was build up the base (I think with cork) to make a canyon, and placed the angel in such a way that it appeared as though the angel was clambering through the canyon. As far as I can tell they didn't alter the angel model itself.

Ahem.

Hi.

Yeah, that was me

I did alter the legs a little, so they were splayed slightly out and a little twisted to make it look like the legs were clinging on to the rock. GS was hidden underneath then. It was cork used for the rocks.

 TP^DC Deputy Manager wrote:


Ahem.

Hi.

Yeah, that was me

I did alter the legs a little, so they were splayed slightly out and a little twisted to make it look like the legs were clinging on to the rock. GS was hidden underneath then. It was cork used for the rocks.

Ah, then props to you, because I thought that model looked awesome. Sadly that does mean that leg alterations are needed.

Thank you very much. The conversion was very minor but I appreciate that any conversion is not "out of the box". It doesn't trouble me because I love chopping bits up, but I understand that a lot of people don't feel the same.

Yes, very well done on the Angel conversion, TP. Sorry for not giving credit where it was due.

Oh don't worry about that! I'm still overwhelmed that someone was talking about one of my mini ms without me having been part of the conversation from the start!!! No one has ever done that before