Last time, I opened the February miniatures box from Might Lancer Games. I mentioned in it that post that there was a great looking creature – a behir, which I was excited to build. I was also a little sceptical as to how well it would fit together.
It comes in ten parts – you can see them below. And the trick really was to dry-fit everything to make sure I knew which bit went where.
Luckily, those clever folks at Reaper had considered this problem an all the connection points are different shapes. Which means, as long as you look for the proper and accurate fit once the pieces are flush with each other, that you can’t go far wrong.
I put together a few of the middle sections first and then glued the body to the base.
Two snags occurred during this process:
Firstly, plastic glue didn’t cut it – now I have a long-running debate with my eldest son about using plastic glue for plastic models. He thinks this is a nonsense and super glues everything. I know he’s wrong…but…in this case my plastic glue wouldn’t stick the Behir together at all and I had to revert to super glue. That worked just fine although there is a little springiness to the model so I did find it was necessary to hold pieces tight for longer than Games Workshop plastic figures (some of which I’d glued together the day before).
Secondly, the lower-left foot of the behir didn’t want to fit into the groves that are clearly cut for it in the base. It refused to be manual bent down into position and when forced it popped back up as soon as released. As I thought it was important the foot was anchored into the groves for it on the base I had to come up with a solution. Luckily, I’ve accumulated a few tools over the years and one that gets an occasional, but vital, use is a placeholder clip. You can see it in the picture below.
Now, the hobby of RPG gaming or wargaming can become ridiculously expensive as arguable all hobbies can I suppose however I do what I can to mitigate the cost. I was in IKEA once upon a time and picked up a set of three placeholder clips. Every so often they are just what I need to hold a model together when either glueing or painting them. They cost maybe £1.50 and I don’t imagine they will break any time soon.
The best thing about them, although not a factor this time, is the square base. It means you can clip something into the jaws and your typical humanoid sized 28mm figure will then be suspended in the air! Worth investing in a pack. They sell them everywhere – just look for a good-sized base.
Anyway, in this case, I used them to clamp the foot to the base whilst the superglue dried.
You can see in the first photograph of the finished model below that the foot is well and truly stuck to the base!
Interestingly the ‘official’ photograph on the Mighty Lancer website has the dragon’s foot in the air but there is a clear impression in the ground where it is supposed to sit…it just needs some encouragement!
It took maybe ten or fifteen minutes to put the model together. I confess I model slowly but I’d rather go at a steady pace and not make a mess, or a mistake, than rush and cause problems!
What do I think of the figure now?
For £5.99 I think you get an absolutely fabulous model! There are some join lines on the figure, but you could smooth those out with greenstuff if they really bothered you and frankly, once painted I strongly suspect the players will be too busy going ‘Woah, big beastie!’ than complaining about join lines.
And that is always something to remember, this range of figures is aimed at gaming, not model displays. They are meant to be used in action, battled in a wargame or placed down to initiate a roleplay experience. In all my long years of DMing, I don’t think I’ve ever had someone complain about the figures I’ve used.
It’s worth mentioning that I have now undercoated the beast and the join lines are less visible already.
I summary this is a fine figure. Worth the cost.
Until next time, happy gaming!
Stephen Hart
Chief Scribe
@thegrinningfrog