Thursday, October 22, 2015

Mierce Miscast Bags: Part 2

Last time Mierce offered Miscast bags, I couldn't resist and ended up picking up a couple. When they recently offered up more of them, how could I resist again? Spoiler alert: I couldn't. Follow the jump for a look at what was in my Norse, Albiann, and Norse Wings bags.

As always, I have to put a disclaimer that the contents of these bags are based on whatever they are casting at the time you order them, and they constantly revisit their mold process to remove things that product consistent air bubbles. Your results will vary.
I also want to note that Mierce sprays these miscasts with paint to prevent someone writing them back and claiming they got a miscast whatever-it-was. No cheating! Also, if you're looking to buy these just to sell them on eBay, you're a bad person and I wish horrible things on you.

Albiann - 250g

I went with an Albiann bag because I was hoping to hit the jackpot on Oghurithne or Oghur models. Instead, I got much, much better than that!
Bag contents:
  • Gomagg legs
  • Cormoragg body
  • 2x Magagg body+legs
  • Magagg torso
  • Oghu banner
  • Cormoragg stone
  • Cormoragg right arm
  • Magagg stone
  • Oghu head/stone/arms sprue
  • Cormoragg right arm
  • Magagg left arm

Gomagg

All I got of Gomagg was a pair of legs, but what a pair! As can be seen, the air bubbles here appeared up at the waist. While they wouldn't be visible when the model is assembled, Gomagg's kind of a pain to assemble even when intact, so I can understand the problem. Still, a shame to see so much resin go unused...
Gomagg legs

Cormoragg

The Cormoragg pieces were interesting. The miscast hand is a minor thing, and could easily be reused. The main body seemed to have air bubbles on it's rump, which was the only thing that I could see wrong with it. He's going to have to get used for something!

Miscast Cormoragg - air bubbles on rump Cormoragg miscast hand - air bubble in thumb

Magagg

I ended up with three miscast Magagg torsos. One had a foot that did not get cast, which makes the apparent new decision to cast Magagg as an upper body and pair of legs make more sense. The other full body had air bubbles in the upper shoulder region, which could easily be cleaned up. The third body - the torso only - had an air bubble that excluded the whole top of his head! It's an interesting effect, but I'm not yet sure how to use it. Maybe I'll do a press mold cast of the top half of the other, and have someone cutting him in half?
Magagg torso - air bubbles Magagg torso - miscast foot
Young Magagg miscast - air bubble in shoulders/head Magagg miscast arm - air bubble in elbow

Oghu

The only issue I saw with the Oghu was an air bubble in the kneepad; I'm still not sure what was wrong with the banner (unless the texture was just too rough). This will be easily re-purposed.

Miscast Oghu banner - no clue
Miscast Oghu- air bubbles on left kneepadMiscast Oghu banner - still no clue

Albiann Stones

I got two stones, as well as the one on the Oghu sprue. I don't have a clue what's wrong with the Cormoragg stone, but the Magagg stone had a very cool translucency effect that would be awesome if it could be used in the Gasts... just sayin'.
Miscast Cormoragg stone - no clue Miscast Magagg stone - giant air bubble Miscast Magagg stone - closer look
Final analysis for Albiann
7/10. I was hoping for smaller models, and instead ended up with a couple of bigger ones that may not be useful to me. The stone miscasts are just neat, and the Oghu will be highly useful, but I don't have a lot of use for the Oghuric. Gomagg's legs look unusable on their own, except for a little thing I have further down below...

Norse - 250g


I went for 250g of Norse because, as with last time, I was hoping to get a troll body or two, and some Blood-Maw bits.
Bag contents:
  • Mjagnir torso
  • 2x Blood-Maw Torsow
  • Blood-Maw left arm
  • Blood-Maw claws sprue
  • Partial Blood-Maw teeth sprues (some teeth missing)
  • 6x Hrafnen wings
  • 3x Hrafnen rock bases
  • 2x Troll bodies
  • Jormungand body
  • 2x Holumann sprues
  • Eirik Longax axe/leg sprue
  • Qaano (Fomoraic) hand with mace

Mjagnir

I ended up with an almost-intact Mjagnir in my last Norse miscast box, and still have one unbuilt at home, so I wasn't that excited about this being a large part of the bits. However, they're now recasting it without the legs. It was annoying, at first, to have a torso with no legs, but then I realized that Gomagg came as a pair of legs with no torso. A quick comparison shows that the waists are similar size... expect to see a Gomjaggnir conversion attempt coming from me in the upcoming weeks!
Mjagnir - Air bubble in loincloth

Blood-Maw

Not one, but two bodies! And an arm! And some claws! I was ecstatic about this haul of Blood-Maw bits. One of these guys is going to get sawn in half and used as a base for  KoW unit at some point, just so I can play with paint schemes on the skin texture. I have no idea what I'm going to do with the other, but I'll come up with something! I was thrilled to get a claws sprue, as my Blood-Maw suffered a drunken accident at Rock Wars when one of my TheBeerPhase co-hosts knocked it on the floor "accidentally" during our game. One of the claws went MIA, and was never found. Now I just have to replicate paint, and it can be like it never happened! I also lost one of his original claws during assembly, so now I could correct that issue as well if I wanted (I used an Aradae Mawr horn as a replacement). Long sharp teeth are always welcome as well, as I hate making them myself. (Bonus tip: I usually make them from the shafts leftover from resin sprues, using a needle file to grind them down to a point - that's what I did in the Wolf-Vore.)
Blood-Maw: air bubble in underbelly Blood-Maw: air bubble in shoulder
Blood-Maw: Air bubble in top of shoulder Blood-Maw claws: no idea?
Blood-Maw Teeth: missing teeth

Trolls

I was thrilled with the troll bodies I ended up with - one's missing a head but the other has it, which means all I have to worry about is really the arms. It's a lot cheaper to bits order arms than it is an entire model, or I can just continue my Wolf-Vore trend and sculpt my own.
Troll: air bubble in heel Troll: air bubble in scrotum

Troll body - tiny air bubble bottom of chest strap

Random bit

Qaano's mace was a bit unexpected, but I'm not going to complain about it! Trolls use hammers too...
Qaano mace: air bubbles in mace head

Corpse-Takers

I was most surprised to get bits from the Corpse-Takers in here, especially when I saw they were the rocks. However, it doesn't really matter if rocks have air bubbles in them, and I intend to use a lot of miscast bits as basing materials anyway, so I'm not complaining about some free rocks! One of the rocks had a massive air bubble underneath that will make securing it to a base difficult, and another had the opposite problem - resin overfilled the mold so it's got a harsh "line" below the sculpted bit. I won't have a problem adjusting to either of these two issues.
Hrafnen base: giant air bubble on underside Hrafnen base - mold overfilled with resin

Hrafnen Base: tiny air bubbles along sideHrafnen legs - bubble texture to resin

Holumenn

More Holumenn are always welcome, so I will likely be ordering the bits to finish these guys off. The miscasts here are minor.
Holumenn: air bubble in toe (left), air bubble on thigh (right)

Final analysis for Norse:
9/10. The Mjagnir torso would be a waste, given that I have three of them except for the fact that it might pair nicely with the Gomagg legs above. The troll bodies are awesome, and I'll put them to good use. The Holumenn bodies are the same situation (though I might also use them for basing), and it's pointless to complain about getting rocks when I intended for most of this to be for basing materials! The wings were a nice bonus, that were only made pointless by the next bag I opened.

Norse wings

I won't go into great detail about these; there are a ton of wings (I think I counted 36 pairs, as well as three sets of tail feathers), and most either had minor air bubbles on the outer tips (not pictured) or major air bubbles along the inner seams (pictured). I don't know why they had so many problems casting these parts, but I'm not complaining about getting as many as I did! I was expecting at least one set to be from Hrudinn, the massive Raven, but none of them were!

Big air bubble along inner seam Another air bubble along the inner seam Another air bubble along - you got it - the inner seam

One of the few actual bad casts; big air bubble in middle of wingThe other only harsh bubble - this one wiped out the inner seam and a lot of surrounding detail

Final analysis for Norse wings:
10/10. 36 pairs of wings, of which at least 25 are only marred by things that can be greenstuffed at the wing/body joint. I may never get through this entire bag, but even having it gives me tons of conversion opportunities that I never would of thought of. Winged Infernii as "fallen angels"? Ok. Adding wings to horses to make pegasi? Why not! Adding wings to oghur to make Elohi? Sure! Adding wings to stuff just because? Check.

Final synopsis:
I'm missing 500g Infernii and Albiann bags from a previous order, but I believe they're waiting to combine with a different shipment in November. I'll be doing this again, I'm pretty sure! There are just too many awesome parts you can get for modeling, without feeling bad about ruining £60+ models.

1 comment:

  1. Great score there,

    I got one of the bubble head Magaag's too, and am thinking of making a Kappa style giant out of him.

    The wing bag looks great (but clearly they cause casting issues, I guess all that 'texture' just traps bubbles

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