Gripping Beast Dark Ages Cavalry Kit Review

     It has been simply ages since I did a kit review, this is in part due to my life being invaded by the Castillo Project, but also in part due to my resolve not to buy more minis than I was painting (this has slowed purchases to an absolute crawl). Yet here I am with a new box of Gripping Beast Dark Age Cavalry in my hands, I suppose rules exist to guide rather than dictate.......

     

      As I indicated in earlier posts, I have long harbored a desire to build a Romano-British dark Ages Army. I resisted this for many reasons but found my resolve slipping when GB released their Late Roman Infantry a while back. Then I walked into Michigan Toy Soldier to find this beauty on the "New Items" shelf. The last shreds of my resistance fell away in an instant. I confess that I have always liked GB's plastic figures for their clean sculpting and realistic poses, the box was mine before I could think twice. Let's look inside, I am sure that you will be as pleased as I was.

 

inside the box we find six frames of bases and four identical sprues of cavalry models

 

side A of the sprue, three differently posed horses and three rider bodies

the kit provides enough extra shields and weapons to allow you to

 have each model a distinctly different figure

 

side B of the same, the figures are cast in a soft grey plastic that

 displays excellent detail and very minimal mold lines

 

lots of spare heads allow you to assemble figures of different barbarian tribes

 

very characterful faces, the extras will be appearing on other models soon ;)

 

the horses are well sculpted , without the over-done cartoonish

 muscles that sometimes appear on equine figures in this scale

 

they assemble easily and look the part, 

one must keep in mind that these are not the massive horses of the high Medieval period  

 

 

there are only three poses and the parts do not admit of being assembled any other way

this limits choice but also prevents the modeller from 

creating outlandish poses that a real horse could not replicate

 

they are excellent horses to my eye

 

the riders went together easily and fit the horses perfectly

 

a touch of paint really brings them together

 

at first I didn't care for the over-arm rider pose but, once I had assembled the figure,

 I changed my mind, he is as active as is his horse

even my limited painting skills produced some very effective  models 

     All-in-all an excellent box of miniatures. As had come to be expected from plastic minis the detail is simply superb, the ease of assembly of this kit is excellent and the options allowed by the extra parts provided create the opportunity for the gamer to create an entirely unique unit. If you are looking for an affordable addition to your Dark Ages forces look no further than this kit.