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Forgeworld shoulder pads - worth the $ for the aesthetic?


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Hi guys!

 

Just a quick poll really. I'm finally plunging in to 30k and using the Prospero box as the basis for an Imperial fists pride of the legion list. Think Siggy, templar brethren, vet tacs and terminators.

 

I'm going to smatter through imperial fist upgrade bits like torsos and helmets but want to be consistent in shoulder pad usage. So what do you think, are the resin ones worth the investment?

 

Thanks!

It depends on how big your army is. To be honest, if you have over 80 infantry that need shoulders, and you're going to put a set on ALL of them, that's a bit much to me. There's nothing wrong with a nice mix of shoulder upgrades and decals.

 

If you're not hurting for money because this is the only thing you waste your extra cash on, and you plan on sticking with only the Imperial Fists for a long time, it could be worth the investment to slowly build a legion of pure, matching upgraded models. But knowing how large many peoples' legions eventually grow to be, it's not something that I would use as a starting goal and it would be pretty expensive.

 

If this is an idea you like, and want to do, I suggest you go for it, because you don't want to waste money building the models without them only to regret it later down the road. I've had that happen a few times and ended up wasting a lot of time trying to cut apart models or replacing them altogether. Always try to get the results you'll be happiest with forever the first time. Easier said than done, but I've found it a lot easier to do if I just ignore my "This might work as a decent replacement" voice and listen to the "I should probably spend the extra money getting the right parts for this model" voice.

Depends really. If you're going purely for small numbers of PA models (Veteran Tacticals etc) then the investment on shoulder pads isn't anywhere near as bad as if you were aiming for, say, 80+ models. The other thing to consider is there's no variation; your pack of pads are 10 identical ones. With decals you can vary placement, colour, other insignia along the rim and so forth, and the decal sheets are a lot more cost efficient for marking out your guys.

 

If money isn't an issue and you know you want them to have the sculpted pads, go for it straight off the bat. It would suck to not use them on your first 30 guys and then have to come back and change them if you change your mind.

 

 

Edit: Wow, max level ninja right down to the same number of models!

You are fortunate that there are other alternatives for the IF as well:

 

- There are old 3E (re-issued in subsequent editions too) metal pads with the IF chapter badge on them (NB: sometimes listed as Crimson Fists, but it's the same badge).

 

- There is brass etch from FW which provides suitable shoulder pad -sized icons.

 

- There are a number of IF and CF characters made by GW over the years that you can make an icon press-mould off.

 

If you combine these with the FW shoulder pads, you can get a surprising amount of variety and keep the overall costs reasonable for bigger forces of infantry models (especially with brass etch and press-moulds). If you add in some transfers as well, you can get a very characterful-looking force, for a fair price, and without having to free-hand any chapter symbols yourself at all.

In my opinion, yes. I just ordered 30 for Iron Warriors as I am a terrible free-hand painter and hate transfers. Etched brass seems like a really good alternative though.

 

There are some slight differences between the plastic and resin MKIV though and I guess there may be in MKIII too so keep that in mind.

I love most of them, but I'm finding myself changing my thoughts as I get a bit more confident (slowly, slightly) with decals, and as the pads themselves aren't equally awesome across the Legions. A few have their emblems sticking out a fair bit, and can make a shoulder pad look ungainly or otherwise huge(r than normal). The Fists MK VI are guilty of this. And the Alpha Legion pads have a fair bit of negative feedback in terms of symbol sculpt.

 

They're also more generic and uniform in appearance than the classy minor variants you get in the plastic kits these days. That's a big sell to me.

 

On the other hand, though, most of the sculpted pads are awesome and if you're taking a lot of Templar Brethren and other elites, they tend to come with their own specialised sculpted pads.

I love most of them, but I'm finding myself changing my thoughts as I get a bit more confident (slowly, slightly) with decals, and as the pads themselves aren't equally awesome across the Legions. A few have their emblems sticking out a fair bit, and can make a shoulder pad look ungainly or otherwise huge(r than normal). The Fists MK VI are guilty of this. And the Alpha Legion pads have a fair bit of negative feedback in terms of symbol sculpt.

 

They're also more generic and uniform in appearance than the classy minor variants you get in the plastic kits these days. That's a big sell to me.

 

On the other hand, though, most of the sculpted pads are awesome and if you're taking a lot of Templar Brethren and other elites, they tend to come with their own specialised sculpted pads.

Aaron is right. Both decals and sculpted shoulder pads have pro's and con's.

 

Decals (or better said, the FW transfer sheets) are always awesome, get some Micro Sol and Micro Set and it will look like painted on. Sculpted shoulder pads, while cool, need to be painted first. Sometimes (especially for Imperial Fists as they need black and white) this can be quite hard. I used sculpted pads for my Deathguard and Salamanders, but that was before both got FW transfers. Now I would only use decals tbh

 

That said, I would probably use the sculpted ones for mentioned elite units^^

Depends on Legion symbol to me, id always freehand if i can, every little bit of practice helps :) That said the Blood Angel one for example completely eludes me somehow so i picked up the plastic ones from bits sites when they have sales on.

As ADB and Atia have said, the Imperial Fists sculpted pads suffer a couple of problems: the symbol sticks out  and the black symbol/white backround can prove a bit tricky. However, I must say that, at least for the mkIV shoulder pads, once painted the symbol doesn't look so much prominent as at first sight. I still have to put the mkIII pads on my miniatures, but it looks like it doesn't stick out that much and when painted it should look quite nice.

 

I personally opted for the sculpted ones because my brush handling is quite mediocre and I don't feel like I could freehand that symbol (maybe as a one-off for a character, but not doing it for +10 models, let alone 40-50), and I'm scared of decals, although I admit I've never tried it and might have a go, although it would probably be with GW ones as I don't think I would properly use most of the FW decal symbols. I've also got some etched brass and I've used it a couple of times, I need to test how feasible it would be to put on shoulder pads as the only one I used on a pad was quite small and I practically didn't need to bend it at all.

 

Considering that you'll be making mostly veterans, I would not worry too much about all of them having the same shoulder pads, as it is quite probable they'll have personalised their armour and their pads to display honours and personal markings, and you could distribute a single shoulder pads pack across several units, alternating decals, etched brass and sculpted ones. And even if you want to make them similar, you could do it on a squad to squad basis, making one squad with decals, one with sculpted, another with etched brass, after all legions were really big and markings could greatly vary from one company to another.

Yes the fw Fist pads are ok. The brass etched are fiddley to work with . And the Transfer sheets are eh but workable . And there are 3rd party who offer some variety in  sculpted pads but run a little more in cost .

Oh another problem I often encounter with sculpted pads - there are no sculpted pads for tactical icons. So you may end with one sculpted pad, and one with a decal/freehand and this may not look as good as both with decals (or both sculpted) imo :|

i only did one legion shoulder on my marines, the other is blank, i think they look nice. The thing is, a lot of the shoulder pads have other details on them, like studs or extra plates, and the legion icon isn't super thick anyway, so it doesn't look imbalanced.

gallery_92768_11638_35380.jpg

i only did one legion shoulder on my marines, the other is blank, i think they look nice. The thing is, a lot of the shoulder pads have other details on them, like studs or extra plates, and the legion icon isn't super thick anyway, so it doesn't look imbalanced.

gallery_92768_11638_35380.jpg

The World Eaters probably have the best pads, though, in terms of both detail and sculpt quality.

 

i only did one legion shoulder on my marines, the other is blank, i think they look nice.  The thing is, a lot of the shoulder pads have other details on them, like studs or extra plates, and the legion icon isn't super thick anyway, so it doesn't look imbalanced.

 

[snip]

 

The World Eaters probably have the best pads, though, in terms of both detail and sculpt quality. 

 

 

Ah ok, ya i haven't seen the other legion pads.  

 

 

i only did one legion shoulder on my marines, the other is blank, i think they look nice.  The thing is, a lot of the shoulder pads have other details on them, like studs or extra plates, and the legion icon isn't super thick anyway, so it doesn't look imbalanced.

 

[snip]

 

The World Eaters probably have the best pads, though, in terms of both detail and sculpt quality. 

 

 

Ah ok, ya i haven't seen the other legion pads.  

 

 

Not to be too off-topic, but those are some beautiful Marines, GS!

 

 

 

i only did one legion shoulder on my marines, the other is blank, i think they look nice.  The thing is, a lot of the shoulder pads have other details on them, like studs or extra plates, and the legion icon isn't super thick anyway, so it doesn't look imbalanced.

 

[snip]

 

The World Eaters probably have the best pads, though, in terms of both detail and sculpt quality. 

 

 

Ah ok, ya i haven't seen the other legion pads.  

 

 

Not to be too off-topic, but those are some beautiful Marines, GS!

 

 

Thank you sir!  There are boatloads of pics on my project log (link in sig).  I actually just finished up the last couple models in the army and will be doing a full army pic thread probably tomorrow.

I'd only use the FW pads on elite units, for example for me i'd give the thousand sons achaean pads and helm to veterans/sergeants and commanders, anything elite. But basic tactical squads likely won't get excessive resin treatment from me.

I'm using them on all my Scars.

The Imperial Fists I did a while back is a mix though, but I don't mind the variation too much. Also, by mixing up armour marks, there's quite a lot of variation possible when spreading it over Mk. II-IV

I got a few shoulder pads for my world eaters to put on Vets to make them stand out a little more but honestly I prefer the look of transfers over the resin shoulder pads. I prefer the look of the flat surface over the slightly raised surface. If don't mind or prefer the look of the raised surface details then pick up a few (like a squads worth) and see how you like em.

I'm enjoying pushing my gs skills by trying to gs as many different pads as possible (they'll end up being used in my DW army). I've also been using the odd pad to either convert or use and found the old metal pads have a daft amount of variance in size and shape even in ones that would have shared the same masters.

 

If your looking for uniform pads either learn to gs stamp and practice a lot or get the FW ones.

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