Kill Team; a blood, sweat and tears review
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Our intrepid Survivor got their hands on the new Kill Team box. Read on to see what they think of the models.
So last week I got my grubby mitts on the stores demo copy of Kill Team with the command from the Boss of “Get it built”.
Dutifully I rushed home with the kit and swept aside my (many) ongoing projects. I began by pulling out the various sprues and making sure there was no damaged or missing parts. I was very impressed with the quality of the model casting. Of course, how something looks on the sprue and how it goes together are very different things.
Building Guardsmen
I decided to start by assembling the Guardsmen. I know a lot of people are very excited by the prospect of plastic Kriegers, and I was interested to see how versatile the kit is. The models have different build options, allowing for a particular torso and leg combo to be built as either a specialist of some kind or a standard trooper. The shoulder mounts are flat, so there is room for arm swaps, which is nice.
A minor issue that I came across is that the arm set for the plasma gun is shared with the arm set of the meltagun, and only one right arm is supplied. I chose to magnetise the options, but I’ve no doubt a similar solution would be to cut one of the lasgun arms to fit. Neither is ideal though, and it’s a little annoying.
With that minor gripe out of the way, I was still very happy with the options within the set. Special weapons included a flamer, the afore mentioned plasma and meltagun, a grenade launcher (which I absolutely love the design for) and a long-las. For specialist troopers there’s very characterful options, from the Veteran with a bionic hand and medals to the Medic carefully measuring out a syringe from a vial. These little pieces really help to bring character to the kill team, and I can see them being incredibly popular if they get released seperately from the Kill Team box.
Once the Guardsmen were built and the glue had cured, I sprayed them with Colour Forge Trench Brown spray. This not only works as a primer for other paint to adhere to, it’s a fantastic colour to build up the uniforms from.
Building Orks
Time then to move onto the Ork Kommandos. I actually found these slightly less forgiving to build. Partly because of a rather hefty mouldline on the cast, and partly because the models are significantly less poseable. This is caused by moulded shoulder joints that prevent arms being swapped or adjusted. I found the set shoulder joints difficult in one or two cases. I was forced to use an arm that left the Boy holding his axe right under his chin. This both produced an awkward pose, and could easily have been avoided due to the number of leftover arms provided. To make matters worse, this is one of the two Boyz that doesn’t have an alternate build.
With that being said, the models are full of character. Similar to the Guardsmen, many of the models have building options between a specialist or regular Boy. There’s also loads of fantastic little gubbins to help personalise your Kommandos (I personally love the Orky Swiss Army Knife).
Once I’d completed the Orks, I sprayed them with Colour Forge’s newest spray paint; Governor Green. A dark drab green similar to GW’s Castellan Green or Death Korps Drab, it will make a perfect base colour for Ork flesh.
Building….buildings?
My final task was to put together the terrain included in the box. There’s a sprue of barricades and junk piles that only needed clipping off the sprue, cleaning up and painting. On the other hand, there’s two sets of sprues that make ramshackle platforms that need to be put together, and a final sprue that builds an Orkish oil derrick. These produced another, very minor issue. The labels in the instruction manual were different to the labels on the sprue. Thankfully it was fairly obvious what part went where, but it is another small frustration.
Once the terrain was ready, I sprayed all of the pieces with Colour Forge’s Steelforge Silver spray. Once this has been wethered and the scrap painted, it should really evoke the feel of an Ork shanty town slapped together with more enthusiasm than planning.
Final Thoughts
The models in the Kill Team box are exceptional, but have a very few minor problems that could have been avoided. Even so, I very much enjoyed building the models for the set and I’m looking forward to playing a few games!
