How I learned to stop worrying and love the Heretic (i.e. Dark Vengeance unboxing)

Hi, 

This is more of a filler update with nothing new finished. It is more like a preview what I will work on the next months. 

Today after work I took a stroll to my local game store (Poromagia,com) with the intent to by some material for bases, rubble and the like. Tuesdays are gaming days and there were 20 or more people playing Warhammer 40k games at different tables. I watched the games for a moment after picking up the stuff I came for and saw that Tau are quite popular. Then from nowhere the consumer demon possessed me and I picked the Dark Vengeance starter set (7th Edition) with some additional secret boxes of Tau tools of destruction. After spending ten times more then I intended I walked out of the store feeling like Santa with a sack of presents for myself. The staff was very nice in the store and even gave me a free card game in addition to the purchases.

I opened the box and looked through the model sprues in the box. The box comes with about 500 points worth each of Chaos Space Marines and Dark Angels. "Holy cow" was my first impression. The details on the plastic sculpts are insane now days. I remember buying GW plastic stuff over 10 years ago and it doesn’t even come close in quality or detail of modern sculpts. One specific Chaos Space Marine sprue made me fall in love with the Chaos Gods and I let out a mad cackling cultist laughter. You will see soon which one. But here follows an "unboxing" of the starter kit and some impressions. Overall I felt that I got value for my money. Enjoy!

Box Art, a bit bland in my opinion. The newer Dethstorm is much more eye catching

All the contents in one picture

The gaming aids and paper contents of the box. The "how to play" guide is really nice with a simple go-through of the rules a phase at a time with clear examples. Notice that only 6 dice + scatter dice are included...c´mon. You include miniatures worth 100 euros, but only include six dice. Also I see that the horrible measure sticks are the same that first appeared in WH Fantasy 5th edtion box 16 years ago. The templates are nice though. 

Size comparison of the 6th Edition Rule book and the one in the box. A4 vs A5 and ~700 pages vs 208. Nice and handy to only have the rules in one small pocket sized book. It is full colour and the quality is ok. The cover is very soft and will probably look like hell after a few months. 

Comparison between page designs. These ones are almost identical, The design language in the 7th edition feel fresh and striking while the 6th edition is more traditional. I like both .

Then onwards to the first sprue with Chaos Chosens and a hellbrute. This one is absolutely spectacular

These 3 dudes made me fall in love with Chaos. The horns, the horns...and the crazy axe wielding cultist champion. Insane details. Admit it, after seeing them you also want to embrace the dark gods. The left side one with two horns is Krampus himself (Kranon the Relentless IRL)  .

Details of backside of the Hellbrute, I am not a greates fan of the flesh mechanical look, but again awesome details. 

The box contains two of these sprues. Bikes, Space marines and cultists.

Just look at these! They look adorable with their gas masks and spiky periphelia, Would go well wiht the Dark Eldar SM look. 

The Special Edition miniature inside the box, Vrosh Tattersoul, aspiring champion. The miniature is ok I guess, but Krampus sweeps the floor with him. 

Dark Angel Sprue

The Dark Angels are great sculpts with lot of cool details, but... put three horns on the Deathwing terminator in the middle and he would be awesome.  

More details of a terminator with a power sword. I really like the stuff that hangs from his belt (is the spehere a incense burner?)

Details of the bike. The banner pole annoys me tremendously and oterwhise they look a bit meh. If it must have wings I would put them as details from the front wheels going upwards or as covers for the legs.