Building progress

I do love painting challenges, so when I saw one over at The Bolter and Chainsword while trawling I had to hop on.  It dovetails nicely with my to-do list anyway, and a little extra motivation never hurt anyone.  I (mostly) assembled my Sanguinary Guard yesterday.  I had to change some equipment, swapping a plasma pistol for an infernus pistol, because the box didn't have everything that I had expected, but I made it work all the same.  The models are very nice, rivaling the Death Company box.  The amount of detail in these new plastics is just amazing.

Behold!

I do have two gripes though, one minor and the other more substantial.  I went with the death mask heads, and some of the spikes on them make them challenging to position, hence the reason most of the marines are looking left.  Nothing much, especially considering the wealth of head and shoulder options, and I could have done something about it if I'd really wanted to.

My more serious complaint is about the wings.  You'll notice that the jump packs are glued on, but not the wings.  I've seen some people running their SG without the wings, a move that doesn't appeal to me but I could understand based on aesthetics.  I assumed the wings attached to the pack in some fashion.  Turns out I was wrong and the wings instead "attach" to little nubs on the back of the breastplate.  While I obviously haven't glued any on yet, I can't believe the resulting bond will be very strong.  The wings are sizable and the contact area minute.  This is really disappointing because the SG box does something which I normally hate, having hands separate from wrists, very well.  The banner bearing arm in particular went together smoothly and felt secure after a minute or two of drying time.  For the time being I'm leaving the wings off so they don't get in the way while painting, but I'm not looking forward to attaching them.  I like the way they look though, so they will make it onto the models before I'm finished.

My updated to-do list looks like this now:
5 Sanguinary Guard - built
8 jump pack assault marines w/power fist sergeant - box
5 jump pack meltagunners - box
Jump Pack Sanguinary Priest - box
various arms/backpacks/bits not-yet-reattached

A small step, but a step in the right direction.  Today is a wash, but I want to get the assault squad built tomorrow, and hopefully I can get all the meltagunners done as well.