I thought I’d share you some experiences with the new West Wind Arthurian figures range which I picked up at Salute.

West Wind have a new range of Arthurian figures which seem to tend towards the Bernard Cornwall ideas. The figures are sold with separate heads which plug into sockets on the body. The range is growing, but with the potential head swaps there is a wide range of figure variants. Nations available include British, Picts, Saxon – Irish are coming shortly. Figures are sold in packs of 4 infantry and 2 cavalry for £4, or unit packs of 20 infantry or 8 cavalry for £15. Apart from the normal troop types (Cavalry, Infantry) there are also some gorgeous character packs for £5 including the Romano British priests burning the druid at the stake, the death of Arthur scene, a Druid performing a sacrifice of a goat, as well as a selection charatcer types identified in the Age of Arthur WAB book (bards, priests etc.)

http://www.westwindproductions.co.uk/catalog/index.php?cPath=150

Practical experience of the figures.

The figures arrived almost flash free (there was an odd faint line on some arms which was easily removed)

The heads come on sprues, with four heads on each. My Romano British warband pack with 20 figures came with 5 head sprues, which included 3 different types of head sprue. The heads have a neck which needs to be cut from the sprue. This is fairly awkward and did result in me knifing my thumb fairly deep as I attempted to remove one head. Despite blood dripping everywhere the heads were easy to clean up (ignoring the blood), and fitted fairly easily into the neck recesses and could be easily faced in different directions. West Wind do sell packs of heads separately to allow you to chop and change quite a bit.

I also bought the burning druid set for the Romano British priests (Honest). If anything this set had even less flash and the figures went together very easily.

The figures seem to align very well with the recent Gripping Beast releases for this period. I have put a few of the new GB Briton/Welsh figures together with the new unit and they blend very well. They are slightly larger than the older Perry’s Foundry Late Roman/Arthurian range. I am unsure how they will fit with the older GB Romano British/Arthurian range.

West Wind were selling the packs on a multi-buy discount of buy 5 packs and get a sixth pack free so may be worth looking at, especially when combined with the unit deals which already offer good value for money. They also have the LBM shield transfers available to fit the various shield types.

I will still be buying some units of the GB Arthurian British though for the added variety, but do intend to pick up some more of the unit packs from West Wind as well as a few of the other character packs.

Cheers

Warren