Steel Fist Miniatures Review

I would like to start off by saying that these miniatures were provided as FREE samples to show our club some of the range of miniatures from Steel Fist Miniatures. I would like to thank Oliver for sending me these samples.

We are all in the process of looking into miniatures that we can pick as our prefered manufacture for our Samurai campaign and display game to take to shows. We are looking at a final tally of around 150 figures for each member taking part in the campaign, around 6 of us so far. There have been a few members pick up the one off packs of miniatures from shows and from my extensive search for miniatures I came down to a few options I liked the look of. Perry, Kingsford and Steel Fist. I heard from a club member that picked some of the Perry’s and were not happy with the castings although they have a great range. Kingsford was quite expensive and had to be imported from Canada and a member had some in transit to the UK.

I sent some pictures of Steel Fist miniatures to club members and the general response was that they looked nice, so I contacted Oliver to buy some and explained about our plans. Oliver was a pleasure to deal with and sent over some FREE samples for us to look at, very nice of him.

(Little advert here – If you live in the Shropshire area and are interested in taking part in this project, we always welcome new club members)

So here is my personal review of Steel Fist Miniatures Samurai…

I was quite excited to get my grubby hands on a package delivered by Mr Postman, at first the Mrs thought it was for her (Glad she didn’t open it, takes some of the fun away). Inside I found a nicely presented black box with the company name and stylised art of what I believe is a sword and a brush combined, very nice. A little company information, miniature advice on prep and painting and a blurb about the Daimyo range, which I assume were from their successful KickStarter project. Along with the box was a pack of decals for the Honda clan, I am going to do the Oda clan although I am unsure if I will base mine on the earlier or later period which may affect this as the leaders changed and died etc. Inside that box was another black box that slides out so I guess you would call the previous what I thought was a box a coloured sleeve. Inside that was a plastic bag with the miniatures and parts…

I was quite surprised to see no foam or anything to act as protection for the miniatures and thought I would be re-shaping weapons etc, but I was surprised to see everything was shipshape and in great condition from their journey. Now the photos I have added were actually me taking them on my phone and frantically updating the clubs WhatsApp group so the club got to see everything I saw as I unboxed the miniatures so they are a little rough and hastily put together. Can you tell I was excited 🙂

I laid out all the parts before trying to get close-ups of the detail of the miniatures.

Here you can see the miniatures as they came out of the box, no problems with bent weapons or bits of flash or horrible mould lines. In fact there seemed to be little of anything to clean up at all from first glances. My first impression was WOW look at all the crisp detail, and then I started to look for the usual issues with cast metal miniatures.

• Casting alignment, no problems.
• Mould lines, no problems.
• Under cuts, aha I have you here – nope no problems.
• Hands for holding weapons – Well looks like I will have to drill those, I can accept that.
• Face details – Yep crisp and sharp.
• Miniature proportions – look excellent.
• Closer look at the details, uniform and armour – not a single issue
• Weapons – perhaps a little thick on the scabbards but to be expected for castings
• Attachment points – Good solid base on the back for drilling

Hmmm. So far these are looking absolutely excellent. On to a closer look of each.

The heads have excellent character and facial expressions, I look forward to painting them.

Superb details, I hope I can paint them as cleanly as they are cast.

This miniature was missing a scabbard, I will make something or fill the hole.

Nice animation of movement

Weapons are very straight with sharp details, little to no clean up needed at all.

I think the details on the Sashimono are not as crisp as the miniatures, they look a little rough. I will see how they clean up with a little sanding as it’s important to have a fairly smooth surface for adding decals. The fathered one was excellent.

So I assembled them to show the club, I wasnt going to but couldn’t help my self.

Conclusions

I am thoroughly impressed!

These a very character full, expertly sculped miniatures with beautiful details and with separate heads, Sashimono and weapons offer a highly customisable range of miniatures.

They are a little on the large side of 28mm miniatures when I have them sat on the shelf next to some WW2 etc. You will need to do a little drilling on hands and to add the Sashimono but that is not a problem, they go together well and look stunning.

I have not heard of Steel Fist miniatures until I did the search for Samurai and it looks like there first large range of miniatures and a new sculptor (apologies if Oliver has worked or run other companies/ranges I am un-aware of other than some medieval on his Web site) will be a resounding success I am throughly impressed and look forward to seeing what is produced in the future amd trying there cavalry, I may review their horse and riders in the future.

Highly Recommended!

Steel Fist Miniatures – Samurai Range

http://www.steelfistminiatures.com/

*Note: I have not reviewed the decals as I have not painted any of the miniatures to apply them to, so I feel it’s unfair to review them until I go through the full application process.

Neil