Creature Caster - Review

I already did a short review of Creature Caster, see previous post. In this review I'll expand on the earlier review, and highlight the build process. I'll probably adjust my scope to include a review of Sicast/SiOres miniatures in general.

Would you like some miniature with your flash?

The build process of the Creature Caster figures was annoying. Full stop. The fidelity of the arm and wrist joins were very low, and super fiddly. As stated previously, the arms were not numbered on the tree, (the web page shows some  numbering, but this must be a newer tree as my limbs had none), so many of the figures needed to be assembled by examining Creature Caster's web photos. This is tedious and annoying. Just provide better trees!

I would encourage a potential buyers to scrutinize the web photos. The photo below is a screen rip from Creature Caster's own web page (without permission). The type and magnitude of failures I'm describing are clearly obvious.

 

 

Actual product advertisement!

This is the norm, not the exception. Note fit. Note finish. Note "cleaned" mold lines. 

 

Remember BONES... SiOcast is almost that bad. It can be sanded to some degree, but not well. It cuts easily (easier than BONES). It's too soft to clean with the old, "scrape the blade" kind of approach. On the upside it does glue well with superglue, but the set time is long, so use some kind of accelerator, or be patient. It also binds well with Tamiya Putty Basic Type, which is good, because those cracks aren't going to fill themselves.

At $50 USD I can't recommend this kit. SiOresSiOcast is being hyped and pumped by all the talking heads, but it's barely better than BONES, which I won't buy any more. Stick to the white metal and more "traditional" stuff.

 

Good luck,

HMP

Review: Creature Caster, Children of Ruin

First impression after opening the box, ummm....

Then I opened the box, and found that despite the bubble wrap, 70% of the bases were off their respective trees.  

Not a big deal when your bases are generic, but here each is matched to a figure. Which goes where? Don't know.

The sculpts are cool, but the flash is heavy, too heavy in some places (check out those cankles!). 

The weapons are similar.

Oddly, although the bases and feet are paied, (in theory), not all the arms and bodies are. 

So which arms for who? Don't know. Could this have been avoided? Yes! They're called instructions. Why don't they have any? Don't know. Would I recommend? Don't know.

[Edit: now assembled, can't recommend.]

Cheers,

HMP

Demon Blood Bowl

I'm finally, almost, nearly, done this project.  Overall I like the scheme, the cultists are sickly blue, and the lesser demons and soforth look cool. They came out the right level of blue without appearing oceanic or dino.

It all started so well, but then it got hard. I'm not sure when...

I feel like I allowed for the right amount of time for each set of figures, wich was a win. I don't paint all that many "warbands", so this was good general practice.

It was something like x for the linemen of which there are 10, then x for the armored demons (4), x for the lesser demons (4), and then x/2 for the pit fiend. 

This gave a decent result. The lesser demons didn't realiy come out how I'd like, but I'm not redoing them. 

The pit fiend is not yet comlete, but he's getting there. Once the bases are dry I'll reevaluate.

Cheers,

HMP