Unboxing a rogue trader Chaos Dreadnought

You know what people? I don't know if it's the french in me who wants to follow trends and fashion or if it's just due to a complete lack of personality but I somehow felt like making some unboxing kind of posts. Yeah just like any other wargaming/ hobby blog.

Problem is I don't really buy boxes or blisters that often...

Fortunaely enough, I've just managed to trade some models to get my hands on a second rogue trader chaos Dreadnought... M...I...B like MINT IN BOX.

Now I already hear the purists among you scream "nooooo don't !" , some even taking assess dolls and trying to stick needles in the heart in a poor voodoo cursing attempt.

I am opening this blister anyway so relax and let me share this experience with you.

Few things really make me happy in this world but the beauty of nature and women, children's laughter and a MINT model in its blister are some of the very few...

Having contacted a fellow hobbyist for trades, I've been asked if I wanted my chaos dreadnought in its blister or not... funny question really! The trader could resign himself to open the blister and on the other hand I wanted badly to see my model in its original package. Just to feel like in the good old days, see what I mean? Looks like we had a deal. 

So after a little trip across the atlantic ocean, the blister arrived at the feet of french alps along some heavy weapon chaos renegades which quickly joined their siblings...

Basing the renegades and giving them a proper weapon was no big deal :

That done, it left me with the main dish :

You can see above the blister was not actually "unopened" since the plastic corner was a little damaged and the cardboard was starting to tear apart.

Looking from behind, the blister looked great with just some little wounds.

It was time for me to man up and to get the job done. So I gave a thought about it, would I rip the poor blister apart to get to its content as soon as possible?

Mwahahahaa, you're so dead you little blister !

It seemed wrong to do so, so I opted for a more careful approach but then? wouldn't I be losing something? Was I not going to make a mistake?

(insert heavy heart beats here)

The way I see it, the blister is more than just the receptacle of a model I'm looking for. It's a time capsule really. It's full of pure 80's british air and therefore it contains some of the magic of that time. It probably has some of the famous "blister sisters" hair in it too...

That is why, defying all concepts of logic, safety and self-esteem, I bent over the blister while cutting it open to get a lungfull of typical retro british magic...

Damn it felt so good...

The closest thing I could find to describe how I felt was this picture taken from the very excellent "DOs and DON'Ts : 10 years of VICE magazine's street fashion critiques"

More HERE

Sorry for this little slice of foul language but it always makes me laugh...

The blister is merely an empty shell now but it has fulfilled its mission to bring its content unharmed to the hands of those who crave for their lead fix.

So long pal, you have earned some rest in my drawer...

 Now let's get on to the good part...

What does the blister contain? Well, as expected :

• a grey foam piece to avoid any injuries to the model (this one will be kept with the empty box as a token), 
• a 40mm square base (no big round squares at the time and no 50mm squares either I'm afraid) 
• 8 parts which used with care and a certain amount of skill and glue can make a renegade Dreadnought.

I have already built one of those babies but getting back on it was a real pleasure, Looking at the pelvis part of the model, you can note the significant amount of flash to be removed (not far from what you would expect from resin miniatures...) The mould parts were aligned correctly though so apart from removing the excess of metal, there should not be any annoying resculpture to do.

The building of the miniature is quite simple and the only real option you have is on the angle between shoulders and hips due to the fact the bdy is in 2 parts (changing the arms position can quickly lead to silly position imho).

For those who've always wondered what lies inside a chaos dreadnought, I'm afraid he answer is quite a disappointing one : Nothing.

Now here is another brain pain for the more purists of you, the left leg comes with a little tab underneath. Shall I remove it or not? Will it lessen the value of the model or not?

Well the answer is quite simple for me : it is going to be removed and stuck under the big round base I'm planning to give to the dreadnought. Its only value is as a model I can paint, not something I want to keep stored away like those violins who haven't been played in years...

So here it is... there will probably be WIP shots of the process of building my second dreadnought but I will give myslef time to do this properly. I want this one to be different from the one I already own so I 'll have to think of options to make that possible without cutting in the lead.

Apart from that, I've used some spare time in front of Game of Thrones to make some group bases for my 3 chaos dwarf swivel gun teams. I plan to add some details on the bases and to add a little green stuff mark on each of them so I can quickly kow which model goes on which base. Important since I want all spotter to handle the gun in their hand...

I have a project to do another unboxing review of the tempestus /scion thingee too but I thought it was better to start with some proper lead.

Oh and thanks to Warlord Paul, LegioCustodes and Space Cow Smith, I feel I have no choice but to celebrate my 100th follower. I was planning on making something about it really but didn't know what to do, I guess I'll have to think about it a bit more seriously now...

I thank you all for having hit the "join" button when you have, I'll think of some kind of worthy reward for you people.