Assembling my Warlord Games Brits

Having decided on the weapon mix for my Bolt Action Brits it's now time to assemble the figures. This is the part I wasn't looking forward to doing. The figures are lovely sculpts with no flash or mould lines but the fact that they have lots of options and accessories means there are lots of parts to assemble.

I decided to start with a rifleman with a backpack and no other options. But this still meant assembling eight separate parts. These being the base, right arm, left arm. rifle, head, helmet and backpack all attached to the body. If I'd chosen to start with a kneeling figure the body would be further split into the torso and two separate legs as well.

Getting the order of assembly right makes a big difference. I decided to start with the right arm as I could then add the weapon which would make positioning the left arm easier. With all the weapon and arm options it's important to check carefully on the instruction sheet which parts you need. It's also useful to check where your chosen right arm goes by referring to the illustrations. Having big fingers makes the assembly very fiddly and it was quite tricky to get the arm positioned correctly. Once the glue was dry I added the rifle which wasn't too tricky to do. Attaching the left arm was much easier as I had two reference points but The arm didn't fit the body as well as I would have liked as the position of the right arm was a little out skewing everything else.

Arms and rifle attached to the body

Next I attached the head which has a nice recess to making fitting easier but it still took a few goes to get a position I was happy with as my fingers obscured the head as i was holding it into position. By contrast the helmet was a doddle, fitting quickly and easily as were the backpack and base.

Front view of the assembled model

Rear view of the assembled model

Overall I'd rather have one piece models even if the quality was poorer. I'm a wargamer not a modeller and from three feet away most of the detail is lost anyway. I can see the appeal of these figures for people who want a variety of options and poses but for me they're just a pain. One thing that would help are lugs and sockets on the arms/torso to position the arms as they are the trickiest pieces. One final note, I've seen people say that they broke some weapons removing them from the sprue but using snips I've had no problems.