Space Marine Head Upgrades

[Casual Heresy]

I must say I really do not see anything feminine about these heads. There is certainly a great variety of facial structures compared to some of the square jawed and battle barge sized chins we've had in previous kits, but I think this is a case of GW basing heads of different ethnicities and face shapes, not a stealth female marines kit.

 

I'm personally not against female marines, but I don't think these are the start of it. I'd personally like to see GW make more of Custodes being mixed gender before they start that.

 

As for the kit itself, I love it. More cool bits for kitbashing is always welcome in my pile of potential. Love the variety of heads and the new helmet variants are perfect as far as I'm concerned, though I would like more.

[Northern Walker]

33 minutes ago, SvenIronhand said:

They're clearly just East Asian looking heads. 

I saw a few across multiple skin tones, they aren't 100% feminine but they're just a bit softer, maybe, than the more obviously male heads. Less aggressive expressions maybe?

[FarFromSam]

It is nice to see so many real marine helmets.  I appreciate gw correcting their mistakes.

 

Bare heads arent for me after reading prospero burns. 

Edited yesterday at 04:57 PM by FarFromSam

[Kill! Main! Burn!]

I wish the set was just helmeted heads, not sure why they seam to focus so much on bare heads.

[Borbarad]

Pretty neat; I'm going to get a box for sure

[The Lost Son]

I've a feeling there will be more kits like this on the horizon hopefully for all races in 40k,as I think someone has been pushing for a use for all the extra designs that don't make the cut for a unit release as a (slow) reaction to the customisation offered from 3d printing. Decent sprue all in, could be more range but like I said I think this is just the beginning.

Edited yesterday at 04:52 PM by The Lost Son

[Brother Carpenter]

3 hours ago, phandaal said:

 

I believe this is the original concept art for the next gen of Marines that were supposed to follow Mk 7/8, before the current Mk X helmet took that spot. Looks like GW has decided to use it after all. Neat!

 

Edit: @Joe beat me to the punch by a mile. 

I think this kind of style was used with the original biker bodies where the head and torso were one piece.

Nice upgrade set btw.

[Blindhamster]

well, this is a definite purchase for me, a set of just helmets would be ignored - except maybe if they were all specifically blood angel themed.

[Lord Nord in Gravis Armour]

2 hours ago, Osteoclast said:

 

Oh good, it wasn’t just me who was thinking some of them looked like woman’s faces. Might even be more feminine than some of the notoriously bad SoB heads. 

 

On the upside, if I ever suddenly decide to put together a diorama where a Marine steals a home run ball from a kid, the ninth head in the second row has me covered.

 

Never let it be said that I can't find the silver lining...

 

Edited yesterday at 05:32 PM by Lord Nord in Gravis Armour

[Robbienw]

None of the heads are remotely female, I think the painting of the lips and eye shading is confusing a few of you 

[Jukkiz]

i need more helmet options for....

Specific purposes

[Elzender]

I have a shelved project for a space marine display in which I planned to give all of them both helmet and bare heads  to give them a bit more pesonality (we're talking 35-50 miniatures). While I already have a good collection of bare heads, this is a very interesting prospect to pick up (if price is reasonable) to give even more variety when I get back to it.

[Arikel]

I can see where some folk are coming from about some looking a bit feminine but I would put some of that down to the paintjob, where the shading and highlighting seems more like eyeliner and lipstick as opposed to natural face shades more than anything else. Makes them look reminiscent of female orc/ogre faces from World of Warcraft and D&D type art.

For the helmets I just wish there were more, or even just if they were twinned, as I already want a bunch of the crested heads(at least one 10 man vet squad with the vertical strips, plus more for officers). I would also like a reasonable price, but knowing gdubya this sprue will likely approach $30 for one set.

 

[HeadlessCross]

3 hours ago, Kill! Main! Burn! said:

I wish the set was just helmeted heads, not sure why they seam to focus so much on bare heads.

I believe in helmet supremacy 

[grailkeeper]

Is it just me or do some of them look like extremely butch women?

 

Edit, its not just me. Three of them are pretty clos together, and I've moved another one over

Edited 21 hours ago by grailkeeper

[Brother Christopher]

I'm curious how much this DLC-like upgrade will cost us. I'm concerned that the price will be high and this is just the first of it's kind.

 

Personally, I'm with the crowd that'd like to see more helmets. The bare heads are okay, I guess, but they don't add as much variety across the SM ranges as a mix of different marks of helmets would.

[ThaneOfTas]

8 hours ago, Nephaston said:

One of the frowns looks a tad different from the other frowns, featuring ventilation slits instead of pipes. Not sure if we had one like that before.

 

Pretty sure that the pilots of the stormspeeders wear this type don't they?

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

21 minutes ago, Brother Christopher said:

I'm curious how much this DLC-like upgrade will cost us. I'm concerned that the price will be high and this is just the first of it's kind.

 

Personally, I'm with the crowd that'd like to see more helmets. The bare heads are okay, I guess, but they don't add as much variety across the SM ranges as a mix of different marks of helmets would.

But,usually you have more than enough helmeted heads in any box. Personally,I prefer helmets over bare heads but I think this is a good option to personalise some miniatures.

And the design of certain heads are more than interesting. Times are changing,after all, and it's good to have the opportunity to adapt ourselves to them.

 

The only thing is,obviously,this is a set designed for Primaris and not for Firstborn. For me,it's a pity. Primaris heads tends to be a little too big in Firstborn bodies.

Anyway,I will wait for release price to see what I do about this.

5 minutes ago, ThaneOfTas said:

Pretty sure that the pilots of the stormspeeders wear this type don't they?

It reminds me the Mk8 "Errant" helmets 

[darkhorse0607]

2 hours ago, Arikel said:

I can see where some folk are coming from about some looking a bit feminine but I would put some of that down to the paintjob, where the shading and highlighting seems more like eyeliner and lipstick as opposed to natural face shades more than anything else. Makes them look reminiscent of female orc/ogre faces from World of Warcraft and D&D type art.

For the helmets I just wish there were more, or even just if they were twinned, as I already want a bunch of the crested heads(at least one 10 man vet squad with the vertical strips, plus more for officers). I would also like a reasonable price, but knowing gdubya this sprue will likely approach $30 for one set.

 

 

Yeah, I can see both sides of the argument but I think it's mostly the paint job.

 

Additionally, something I've noticed in the last few Space Marine kits (namely this, Calgar, and the new Deathwatch) is that the proportions seem to be a little off. I wonder if GW is starting to lean more into how they're described in some the lore with almost giant/ogreish like facial proportions. Or they switched sculpters. Or faces aren't meant to be highlighted almost up to pure white and down to almost black. Could be a number of things

[Nephaston]

40 minutes ago, ThaneOfTas said:

Pretty sure that the pilots of the stormspeeders wear this type don't they?

 

Storm Speeders have the same helmets Suppressors have, which feature a little extra mouth cover and piping which reminds me of a flattened parrot beak.

 

[Larkhainan]

5 hours ago, Kill! Main! Burn! said:

I wish the set was just helmeted heads, not sure why they seam to focus so much on bare heads.

Yeah, same. I know wargames are an abstraction, they're not actually in battle yadda yadda but space marines with helms can represent all the stuff I'm nostalgic for and have tons of variety. I don't think I've assembled a single bare-headed space marine since getting back into the hobby.

 

bare heads are just dudes

 

I see those all the time! They're in the outside place! I don't need that

[SvenIronhand]

On the contrary, you can get helmets in pretty much every kit.

[Sonder76]

1 hour ago, grailkeeper said:

Is it just me or do some of them look like extremely butch women?

 

Edit, its not just me. Three of them are pretty clos together, and I've moved another one over

 

I get the where your coming from when saying they look feminine... but i think they are meant to be Asian... like Japanese or Korean. The highlighting on those cheekbones isnt helping the readability of the sculpts but im thinking they are to represent south east asia.

[Xenith]

Who cares.

 Interesting kit most of my marines are bald and screaming, or have bad haircut and are screaming. 

 

*if you think these like women, you need to move to a city

Edited 19 hours ago by Xenith

[JeffJedi]

 Don't  leave out Brother Bertha here.