Ok, so I haven’t posted for a month because I haven’t painted for a month. I’ve also been sick for a month. Which is the excuse I’m going to use, rather than the true reason which is that when my illness was at the “can’t sit up” phase, I started watching Prison Break and by the time I got to the “fuck this fucking cough I’m so done with coughing” phase I was addicted and had to watch all of it rather than painting.
But we finished it last night and our Blood Bowl league is ramping up again so look forward to some models!
In the meantime, I have a mini review of the new mini GW case.
Size
I bought this guy in my search for the perfect sized case. A case that is super easy to carry, and can fit in my backpack so when I go to the club I’m carrying as little as possible. I hate wearing a backpack and carrying a case while I’m on the bus, particularly if I know that I only need 14 models in it!
I bought a Chessex small figure case the week before to carry my Blood Bowl, but it had two problems. First, it wouldn’t comfortably fit my Undead team. There are to many models and some of the models being bigger meant that the case was tight inside, possibly rubbing models together, and that it wouldn’t close without squishing.
The second problem was that I want to carry Blood Bowl and Gates of Antares to the club for game days so I can play both. The smallest of the GW cases comfortably fits both things. I could even see replacing Gates with some Malifaux in the future. I do not know if I could fit Warmahordes, as there are enough larger models in my Skorne that it may not be big enough.
Foam
I don’t know about this new style of foam, but I’m not against it. I’m fairly certain that it will hold my models nicely, I’m not worried about that even though it’s a lot looser than other foams and if you have a lot of metal models I wonder if it will move around?
I think my biggest worry (as someone with primarily resin and plastic in it right now) is that it’s not efficient. My KR cases are amazingly efficient – because you can buy exactly the size of tray you need, you can fit a lot more models into a smaller case than I’ve found you can with a GW case. Efficiency is important because of my goal — most models, in an easily bused format.
The really nice thing of the “wave” style foam is the flexibility of what you can put in it. I always feel a little awkward when I have to cut apart a four-section from a square-only foam tray. It locks that section into forever being for that-sized model. With this stuff, you can move it around to fit your larger items pretty easily. In the photo above, you can see my dice and measuring tape and some templates at the back.
Case
I do prefer the exo-skeleton plan, rather than what Battlefoam does. The plastic case here is certainly tough enough. But the connection points don’t feel great — the hinge joints and the clasps. It feels like if you were needing to check this case for a flight, that it might not leave me feeling confident that it wouldn’t collapse under the weight of someone’s flying wine collection.
Price/Availability
A bonus paragraph, I realized I’d skipped over after I wrote this. It cost $60CAD from my local store. There’s a few nice things here.
It’s funny that GW is actually the value option in this area. I won’t rave about this case the same way I do about my KRs, but it’s about $30 cheaper (or a little more) than a similarly sized KR aluminum.
My local stores tend to stock Battlefoam. I don’t like BF — I don’t like their politics and I don’t like their product. I sold my BF case because the foam was much to hard, and the case much to soft. KR make amazing cases, but they are harder to get and their web site is pretty garbage (although I heard a rumour they updated their website…I haven’t looked). Because it’s a GW case, you’re much more likely to be able to buy it without paying shipping!
Summary
I do really like this case, I think it fits all of my criteria really well and the negatives aren’t that bad.
