Unboxing: Wargames Factory Ashigaru Missile Troops

I recently posted about the amazing resource that is the repository of fan-written Warhammer Armies books.

Well, I have become obsessed (as I am wont to do) with one of these: "Nippon" by Mathias Eliasson.

It's an amazing piece of work, beautifully illustrated and provides great "fluff" as well as a full army list. Moreover it has started me on a path to collecting a new army.

Models for the "Special" and "Rare" sections of the army will take some finding, but those nice people at Wargames Factory have nicely supplied pretty much everything required for the army "Core" as part of their 28mm "Rising Sun" range of models.

This post is the first in a short series and deals with the "Ashigaru Missile Troops" box set:

I'll start with a quick note about the sprues themselves - a rather neat feature is that all the sprues in the box are designed to very neatly stack and have pegs and holes in the corners to support this. This means they fit neatly into their box and there's no danger of sprues becoming entangled in one another, rattling about or damaging each other when picked up. Very neat.

The box contains either 6 sprues (5 sprues of models, one of bases) or 5 sprues and a bag of loose bases. The bases sprue stacks in the same way as the sprues of models.

The bases are simple 20mm x 20mm square tiles with the Wargames Factory logo embossed on the bottom.

The model sprues contain parts for 5 models with each arm, leg, torso-front and torso back being a separate piece. This enables a variety of possible poses. Coupled with the fact that each sprue contains a surfeit of heads and equipment (katanas, quivers, ammo pouches and so on) and there's lots of scope for assembling the models in a variety of ways. So there are enough parts in the box to assemble 25 models.

The only limitation seems to be that the number of weapons supplied is sufficient to assemble only 20 archers or 20 matchlock riflemen (so you can build 20 of one type and then have to "mop up" by building 5 of the other). This is a little odd, but for my purposes doesn't really matter as I've bought two boxes.

The quality of the models is good and given that you get 25 models for an outlay of around £16, this set represents excellent value for money. Well recommended.

Other posts will follow in the next few days regarding other Wargames Factory products from their "Rising Sun" range.