I’ll make this very clear: I didn’t need another Fantasy army when the Ogre Kingdoms releases were announced.  I have way too many Fantasy models as it is, with full Skaven, Empire, and Lizardmen armies already in my collection, as well as a smattering of Dwarf models (thanks to Battle for Skull Pass).  There are so many fantasy models in my house it’s a bit absurd.  So when the Ogres started popping up on the internet, I didn’t pay them a ton of attention.  Then I looked at my box of Skaven, saw the 300 clan rats, and realized I don’t really have the time or patience to paint THAT many models.  What I do have, however, is time to paint 40 Ogre models.  The notion of having a fully painted Warhammer Fantasy army was too tempting.  Johnny Pong’s Orcs & Goblins army, in all its full painted glory, looks wonderful on the table.  I needed to have a fully painted Fantasy army too.  With that, the Ogre Kingdoms found their way to my home.

The Ogre Kingdoms model line continues GWs trend of releasing high-quality plastics with silly amounts of options on the sprue.  Highlighted by three new releases in the Mournfang Cavalry, Stonehorn/Thundertusk, and the Ironblaster/Scraplauncher boxes, the Ogre Kingdoms releases are pretty strong.  Coupled with an entire Finecast line overhaul, Ogre Kingdoms players have a lot to be happy about.  I’ll rundown the new boxes, their pros and cons, and give the release an overall rating

Mournfang Cavalry

I think we're gonna need a bigger boat.

This was actually the hardest of the boxes for me to acquire.  The two LGSs I routinely order from were both shorted their Mournfang, and I found the other usual suspects around town were also lacking in their Ogre stock.  I was almost relegated to ordering my Mournfang online, but I was finally able to pick up two boxes of these beasties.  The boxes are composed of three sprues that allow you plenty of options to create two Cavalry models a piece.  

The Mournfang have two body options, and three head options, which is really nice, allowing you to ensure that you have unique models in a unit.  There are two leg options as well that change the profile of the cav model, so in effect you’ve got about 10 different options to build your models.  You similarly get plenty of options for your riders.  The bodies are pretty stock, but you get 5 different head options, weapon options for every available load out, and multiple armour options to really make your riders look unique (3 different gut plates, a ton of miscellaneous accessories).  You have lots of options with the Mournfang kit, and you’ll have lots of bitz to spare when finished.  Though certainly a disputable point, I really like the aesthetic of the Mournfang; the beasties are appropriately feral and menacing and certainly look like powerful creatures.  I like this kit a lot.

Stonehorn/Thundertusk

The epic monster kit for the Ogre release, the Stonehorn/Thundertusk kit is, much like the Mournfang kit, simply chock full of bits.  You again get three sprues with this kit, one for the shared components of the body, and then two additional that, while containing various bits that are integrated in both builds, are more specific to the loadout you’re constructing.  The kit fits together beautifully for such a large piece, and GW has obviously taken great care in where they’re placing the connection points.  Once the model is constructed and all the seams are joined, it’s very hard to determine where one piece ends and another begins.  The body portion was incredibly easy to assemble, taking perhaps 30 minutes with mold line cleaning, etc.

This is an image of a really well done Thundertusk.

You can of course build either the Stonehorn or the Thundertusk with this kit, and both look really wonderful once assembled.  I built the Thundertusk first, and was really pleased with the results.  The saddles for the riders posed no problems, and the riders themselves went together really easily.  Much like the Mournfang kit, your riders have a ton of options and come with every weapon load-out you could give them in the codex.  The options have a lot of character to them as well, as I particularly liked the ogre picking his teeth with the harpoon.  What is ever nicer about assembling the Thundertusk is the fact that you’ll be left with all the bitz you’ll need to convert a regular ogre body to a freestanding Hunter.  It’s an option that I love, and certainly took advantage of.

There were some problems, however, with the Stonehorn kit.  On the back of the kit is a trophy rack, of sorts, with a wire going between the two bone jaws of some long deceased beast.  The plastic is EXTREMELY fragile on this part, and broke as soon as I snipped it from the sprue.  Where the Thundertusk took me maybe an hour to fully clean and assemble, the Stonehorn took quite a bit longer because I had to fuss so much with the trophy line.

Ironblaster/Scraplauncher

Rounding out the new kits is the Ogre artillery piece, the Ironblaster/Scraplauncher kit.  As I really want a low model count army, and don’t have a ton of interest in the Gnoblars in general, I opted to only pick up one of these kits.  The kit, like all of the other new plastics, contains of dearth of extra bitz.  What’s more, all of these bits are full of high-quality detail.  The Ironblaster cannon is a really lovely piece, containing fully-detailed carvings on the whole of the barrel.  It is clear a great deal of time and effort went into it, and that’s never a bad thing. 

The Rhinox also looks very, very good.  I don’t think he’s quite the quality of the Forge World Rhinox, but it’s more than passable. I would have liked if GW would have considered that the Rhinox can be chosen for Storm of Magic games and made the Rhinox a bit cleaner, but as it stands, there are some noticeable nubs (that attach him to the cannon, so they do serve a function) that you’ll need to remove and green stuff over if you want to have some freestanding Rhinox for your SoM games.  It’s a small qualm, but with all the attention and care to detail in this kit, it would have been nice if that foresight was also expressed.

 The Finecast Kits

As I alluded to in the intro, the Ogre Kingdoms line has received a pretty comprehensive overhaul of the line, with many of the pieces being converted to Finecast, as well as three brand new characters in Bragg the Gutsmen, the Ogre Firebelly, and Golgfag Maneater.

My firebelly will NOT look this good.

I picked up both Bragg and the Firebelly for my new characters (I’ve not been able to find Golgfag, or else I’d pick him up, too) and I must say: these are really, really nice models.  There is a ton of detail on both of them, with the Firebelly having a bunch of intricate detailing on his face, and Bragg just dripping menace (right down to the blood dripping from his scything blade).  I did have some minor warping on both models (Bragg’s scything pole, the Firebelly’s gout of fire) but they were easily fixed by dipping the pieces in hot water for a few seconds.  Beyond that, the pieces were, effectively, flawless. I looked for bubbling or excessive flashing, and it simply isn’t there.  I did pick up a Slaughtermaster as well, and that model did have a fair amount of flashing on it.  However, the flashing was easy to remove, and you get a ton of options in the kit.  The move to Finecast resin for the Slaughtermaster is certainly a good one. 

Despite the rocky beginning, I think GW is slowly perfecting the Finecast casting method and working out those kinks.  Further, all of the “made for Finecast” models I’ve built have been impeccable.  I’m not entirely happy about the price point for Bragg or the Firebelly, however.  $38 is a lot to spend on a character model.  I think the Slaughtermaster kit is closer to appropriate at $38, but Bragg simply is not.  While larger than standard model, he’s no larger than the Finecast Maneater models, and as such I think $25 would have been a much more appropriate price point for him.  Similarly, I think the Firebelly would have been better priced at around $30, as he is significantly larger than Bragg, yet smaller than the Slaughtermaster.

 This ability to customize is really the hallmark of GW’s plastic kits, and it certainly shines through here.  What’s more is that you can mix and match the options from your standard Ogre, Ironguts, and Leadbelchers sprues with all of these new boxes in order to really customize your units.  I imagine with an army battalion and one of each of the new boxes, you could probably produce an army full of unique models.  These Ogre model offerings are very strong.  I think the aesthetic has a bit more appeal than the Tomb Kings models, and there aren’t any major misses with the new releases, save for perhaps the price point on Bragg and the Firebelly.