Spartan frustrations

Well, as you are no doubt aware, this week has seen the release of Firestorm Armada from Spartan Games.

Or at least, that’s what they tell us…

OK – I ordered my rules and models from Tor Gaming a couple of weeks ago, as they were recommended to me as a good company, and they were giving a 10% discount on pre-orders.

They posted a message on their storefront to say that FA was being delayed due to ‘volume of orders’ and problems getting the stock from Spartan.

OK I thought – similar issue to what happened with Uncharted Seas.

Then I spotted that Russ Wakelin of the D6G Podcast has already posted a mini-review of the game on the Dakka Dakka forum – which means that he’s had his game since Tuesday of this week.

In the mean time, I ordered some new Uncharted Seas flagships and the FA templates direct from Spartan. The flagships arrived this morning, minus the templates. I queried this with Spartan, only to be told that Spartan weren’t shipping anything to do with FA to the UK until next week. I replied, asking why, if this was the case, were customers in the US already getting their rules and figures…

Silence so far in response…

Now, I know that Spartan had been talking about delayed shipping for some time so that they could achieve ’simultaneous release’. Well, if that’s the case, why not make it simultaneous?!

Yes I know, this sounds like a frustrated rant – yes, it is, but not I think without just cause. It’s obvious to me that orders aren’t shipping because of artificial delays created by Spartan. It’s doubly annoying, as I paid for my order several weeks ago.

Oh, and on a related subject, I did at least receive my flagships.

You have got to be kidding me!

I’ve fallen for it again. Both of these ships (Dwarf and Elf) are one-piece resin castings (OK, the Dwarf ship has a small metal turret) and yet they are charging £8.50 for these ships. This is almost worse than the Elf Dragon. I really should have checked what I was getting before I ordered.

OK, it’s my own fault, and they are nice sculpts, but £8.50 for a 6″ resin ship?

The fleets for Uncharted Seas are reasonably priced, but I really think that this is offset by the prices of the specialist ships – Spartan are definitely following the GW pricing structure – you pay for how much the vessel is worth to your fleet, not for actually how much it’s worth in monetary value.

So, one can say that I’m not happy/impressed with Spartan at the moment.

Project – Uncharted Seas

Status – In Progress

Of all my current projects, Uncharted Seas is probably my most complete.

At the time of writing, I have a fully painted Iron Dwarf starter fleet and a fully painted Thaniras Elf starter fleet. My Dragon Lords starter fleet is about 1/3 painted (and have been for several weeks).

In addition to the starter fleets, I have an extra cruiser for each race, 2 Iron Dwarf heavy cruisers and a Dragon Lords dragon carrier. The dwarf vessels are about 2/3 painted, but have been sat on my painting table for several weeks as I have since been distracted by Command Horizon.

I’m also waiting for the next wave of new releases for the game, as these should include new units for all three of my fleets.

Outlook – This should be a project that could be completed fairly quickly. The ships are not complicated to paint, and as I have a total of 19 to finish, I’m aiming to get these completed by the end of May, or mid-June at the latest.

Uncharted Seas – Thaniras Elves

I recently finished painting my Thaniras Elven fleet for Uncharted Seas. I decided on a slightly different colour scheme from what Spartan Games recommend – especially since my Dragon Lords are a dark grey and red.

Though I say so myself, the colour scheme actually came out quite well.

The hulls of the ships are painted with a base coat of GW Ork Flesh, and then shaded with Dark Green Ink. Highlights of Coat d’Arms Camouflage Green and Pale Green were then drybrushed over the base coat.

The sails were painted with Coat d’Arms Linen – several coats to ensure an even finish. The masts were painted Coat d’Arms Wood Brown, and then shaded with Coat d’Arms Super Wash Light Brown.

The detailing on the hulls was drybrushed with GW Shining Gold, and then a thin wash of Coat d’Arms Super Wash Light Brown was painted over the top to pick out the details.

Finally, the orbs were painted with GW Polished Blue, and highlighted with GW Electric Blue.

Once the model were dry (and after these pictures were taken) the models were given a coat of Matt Varnish.

Uncharted Seas scenery – Amera

I thought I’d take some pictures of the scenery pack that is produced by Amera for Uncharted Seas, as there doesn’t appear to be many pictures of this scenery currently on the web.

The islands are pictured with the new Dwarf Anvil Heavy Crusier, for scale comparison purposes (the ship is 70mm long)

The largest Island

The 2 medium-sized islands

A closer look at one of the medium-sized islands

The 2 small islands

Finally, we have a close up of the superb new Dwarf Anvil Heavy Cruiser.

New Uncharted Seas ships

I bought some of the new wave of Uncharted Seas release from Stafford Games on Friday – tey arrived on my desk this morning – and thought that I would put up some pictures and some immediate impressions.

The Dwarf Heavy Cruisers look simply awesome! An improvement on the basic Cruiser, and including a revolving turret (the same turret that is used on the Frigates, by the looks of things). A very nice ship – very happy with these.

The Dragon Lords Heavy Cruiser is not quite as nice. The hull looks to be the same as the normal Cruiser, just with a different sail design (including a forward facing cannon, so not quite as blown away as I thought I might be.

The Dragon Lords Dragon Carrier is, if I’m honest, a major disappointment. It’s a nice enough looking ship, but my issue is with the price. It’s classed as a capital ship, and is therefore priced at the same price as the Dragon Lords Battleship – but the model is nowhere near as big as the battleship, and has only 1 sail instead of two – therefore I see no reason to justify the model being the same price as it’s bigger compatriot…other than simply a general marketing/price issue (i.e. it’s a capital ship – all captital ships cost the same amount). Also, I don’t see the full potential of this ship being reached until Dragons are released (this is just something I suspect – the rules have not been published yet) and so I’m currently wishing that I’d have held fire on buying this model just yet…

Uncharted Seas – rest of Dwarf Fleet

Well, after finishing my Dwarf Battleship last week, I have now finished the Cruisers and Frigates.

These are the Dwarf Cruisers – I actually made a mistake when I ordered these – Stafford games were out of Dwraf fleet packs, so I ordered one pack of each ships, not realising that I was going to be a Cruiser short until they arrived.

The Frigates are much smaller and easier to paint.

Following on from a comment left about my Battleship, I am now looking around for some suitable decals to addorn the superstructure of my Battleship and Cruisers with…just to break up the large areas of dark colour.

Uncharted Seas – first ship of the Dwarf fleet

I’ve just finished painting the first of my Dwarf battlefleet for Uncharted Seas.

This is the Dwarf Battleship – quite a sizeable ship at something over 5 inches long.

The colour scheme is Royal Blue with a Blue/Grey drybrush for the superstructure, and Wood Brown, with a Brown Ink wash and a Mid Stone drybrush for the decking.

I think it’s finished, but it seems to be missing something – or is it me?