Dragon Forge Broken Wasteland Review

Good evening children of the Plague Father thank you for taking the time to peer once again in to the cupboard of our Father. This week was suppose to be me trying to magnetise a pair of Land Speeders for my Black Templar army ( I swear it's real not just a lot of talk ), unfortunately I ordered these online as my LGS didn't have any in and was going to be a 10 day wait for their next delivery. So we got an order together between four of us ( splitting the postage to make me save £3 per Speeder ) and sent it off to Wayland Games and then waited.

Now after a week these were still in processing and raising a ticket just got a generic response of we are having delays which pointed to a notification that they were having delays and the only information about delays on the site referred to delays in May, had it been May and not July this would have been fine ( even an updated notification to say they were delays of over two weeks would have given us fair warning ) but we gave it a few more days and still no change so we requested a refund. I always find it funny how whenever you request your money back there is suddenly a real person looking in to it and wouldn't you know the order was dispatched moments before we asked and would now need to return it after delivery if we still wanted a refund.

Luckily for me I ordered thirty 25mm & ten 40mm Broken Wasteland bases from Dragon Forge on the 5th of July expecting to get them some time in August with them having to cross the ocean and feel the wrath of the Post Office. However my experience with Dragon Forge was like night & day compared to Wayland ( see my rant did have a purpose ). The site was very easy to navigate and use and the only problem I had with it was when I clicked the images to enlarge them they opened in the same page rather than a new tab (that and choosing which bases to buy as they all look fantastic).

The front page of the store had a clear message advising that due to a recent offer ( which typically ended before I made my order ) had caused a delay, along with the 4th of July which had caused the US postal service to be shut but kept this updated when more information as it was available and I never felt like I had to chase Jeff for information on my order which amazingly arrived at my local Post Office on the 21st ( not sure if it was a local mistake by my new Postie or something to do with the amount I ordered but I wasn't charged import tax or a handling fee which made these about £20 cheaper than I was expecting ) and to say I was impressed is an understatement, especially considering Dragon Forge is a one man operation.

Fresh from the sink

Now on to the review itself, they arrived nicely packed in a cardboard box stuffed with newspaper with each individual set in separate bags, which surprised me considering the orders are cast as required but I won't complain at free bags for my bits.

Ready to make a TDA wearer very happy

 
When I unpacked them the first thing I noticed was the weight, these are solid resin casts and are heavier than the resin used in both Finecast & Forgeworld products making them feel tough and not like one dirty look will lead me to having shards of base in my eye. The detail was very crisp and with very little in the way of mould lines and only 3 out of 40 bases to have any flash on them clean up was a doddle. One thing I did notice is a I left them in the sun to dry on a stone bench and they didn't even give the slightest indication they were about to melt like the Finecast models.

After giving them a quick wash and leaving them to dry over night I gave them a coating of Army Painter Desert Yellow and plan to do the recessed dirt a darker colour to try and match them in my board which is a rocky desert ( even though I can't stand the heat for some reason I like my Bobs to fight desperately for a bit of desert mostly populated with ruins )

 
Price: 9 / 10
While they seem expensive for something you are using to replace the ones you have already paid for when you buy the models they are reasonably priced, ones that cost more or less are available but the reviews speak for themselves these aren't your run of the mill mass produced unloved bases you need to spend a fortnight making usable.
In the end I just had to consider I pay a lot for this hobby and every time I have tried to cheap out it has bitten me in the face like a daemonic spider of vengeance wanting to know why I thought it was OK to buy cheap second hand models and expect to not have to work on them till they were recognisable again ( not to mention for ten Black Templar Marines using the upgrade pack they are £40 another $10 for bases can't be argued with unless you are on a budget ,in which case you probably won't be using an upgrade pack per squad ).

Daemonic Spider demands you either buy new or don't moan

Quality 9 / 10
The quality is outstanding, crisp detail with little clean up required and the only blemishes I found were air bubbles less than 1mm across and deep which could be filled easily with some glue ( I left mine as were as it's broken ground and the extra diversity is always nice ). The bases are well thought out to be used as a base, I know it sounds obvious but a lot I've looked at while deciding which to go with had rocks/skulls/chickens stuck up everywhere and I couldn't imagine how I would even get a model on the base let alone have it look like it wasn't squashed on there as an after thought.
As I said earlier I managed to prime these yesterday and with the primer on they lose none of the detail unlike a lot of models were the primer seems to kill it until you pick it back out.

Delivery 10 / 10
What can I say 16 days for one man to make and post my bases half way around the world to me has to be a 10 in anyone's book. I just hope that not paying the import tax & handling fee sticks around.

Overall 9.5 / 10
In the end I am glad I bought the Dragon Forge bases as these are the first resin bases I have used and for the extra cost I had my doubts it was going to be worth it but I couldn't be happier with the bases themselves and just hope I do the bases and the models I eventually put on them justice.


One final note these are for my Black Templars and this is one of the terminators I started assembling who will be using the Forgeworld shields & pads to try and make them look as Templaresk as I can ( I have tried using C:SM & thumbed through C:BA / C:SW but if I am going to play a marine chapter it will be Templars and if I'm going down that path they will look the part as best as I can do it ). As a conversion to add that crusading feel I plan to use Dug-a-tron's Thunderhammer conversion, though maybe with Tomb King spear heads instead of chaos spikes and adding a normal marine head instead of the regular terminator one. Now this second conversion I have already done on Bob the test model and would love to get your feedback on if it works or just looks out of place.

Bob took a nasty hacking to the back of the head to bring you this picture

Until next time accept the blessings of Nurgle in to your life and you shall never know death only eternal life in all its forms.

O'Shashar