White Dwarf February 2017
I will give this issue 1.8 out of 5.
TL:DR White Dwarf will only interest you if you like painting and looking at photographs of models.
As I said in my last review of the White Dwarf I am no longer buying it monthly but I was tempted to buy this issue due to the new Aeldari stuff.
On the whole I think I am sorry that I bothered. I have said it more than once but I really think that this version of White Dwarf is dangerously close to being a reimaging of the Visions magazine.
Read on and see what you think.
Including the front cover and backside of the back cover the magazine has 156 pages.
The magazine is split into nineteen sections and they are:-
Latest News, Contact, Spike Magazine, Temporal Distort (
White Dwarf Issue 166), Designer’s Notes (
Triumvirate of Ynnead), A Tale of Four Warlords, A New Breed of Eldar (
Ynnari background), Battle Report (
Stormcast Eternals Vs Tzeentch), Illuminations, Mustering for War (
Army painting tips), Paint Splatter, Realms of Battle (
containers and trees), Golden Demon (
AoS), New Rules (
Silver Tower, Lost Patrol, Deathworld Forest, mega-battle scenario), A Tale of One Painter (
Chris Stahl spotlight), Eavy Metal (
crystal blades and gemstones), Blanchitsu, Reader’s Models & In the Bunker.
One page of meet the team, one editorial page, two contents pages, ten pages of adverts and twenty two pages of stuff that you can buy or pre-order now. That is 23% of the mag.
Including the adverts and counting two half pages of pictures as one this issue has forty two pages that are nothing but pictures/photographs. That’s 27%.
In my opinion the stand out articles in this issue is the Designer’s Notes, A New Breed of Eldar, Battle Report, Mustering for War and Blanchitsu.
The articles that were the main reason that I bought this month’s White Dwarf, the Aeldari background, turned out to be interesting and, unlike the previous Dark Eldar article, mostly coherent. It is a real shame that these articles only took up ten pages of the magazine as I would have liked the Ynnari article to be a little more in-depth.
It appears that GW are listening and are willing to make changes to the White Dwarf. In Dec’s review I wished for articles covering terrain and lo and behold this month there is a terrain article. Except it isn’t because as usual they have turned what should have been a really interesting article on how to modify Armoured Containers and Citadel Trees into a painting article. There are one and a half pages (out of three) of how to modify an Armoured Container into a narrative piece or base and then the rest of the article is all about paint schemes. Frustratingly they don’t even show the narrative piece finished.
It is similar with the Trees. Two pages (of two) of paint schemes sprinkled with little ideas on how to adapt them. For example:-
Obsidian Boscage: Gareth Williams opted to paint his Citadel Wood with pallid, almost white bark and lush red-brown leaves. As a stark contrast to the foliage, he chose to paint the rocks on the base as glossy chunks of obsidian, with the help of a few coats of ‘Ardcoat. He also cut down one tree, giving the impression that this wood’s close to civilisation or at least a battleground.
In my opinion more about the physical aspects of modifying the Trees would have made for a much better article.
Four Warlords finished in this issue and even though this issue was just before their big battle the Four Warlords content was the same as all the other instalments. That is, it was all about how they painted their final additions. Each Warlord even chose their favourite model painted by one of the other Warlords. I can’t help thinking that this last article should have been about how they expected their army to perform.
The grand battle that is the finale of the Four Warlords is a really strange affair. There are five pages for the four turns of the battle. Each page consists mostly of photographs and only one sixth of the page is taken up by the written account of the battle. The style of the report is an odd one and I can only describe it as chatty. Can you imagine each turn of a game being described in, on average, one hundred and forty words a turn? I guess they were going for a friendly, lightweight and accessible battle report that is easy to read. Strangely I nearly enjoyed it. A bit more depth and tactical knowledge or reasons for some of the moves made by the players and this would have been an okay article.
On the other hand I really enjoyed this month Battle Report. It was written as a commentary on the game from the view point of each of the players and as such I felt that I really learnt something about both the armies being used and on how/why the players made some of their decisions. Each turn was spread over two pages with the written content only taking up one quarter of the available space. Fewer pictures and more words and this article would have been perfect.
Of note (maybe) is that once again I have myself enjoying an AoS Battle Report that Ben Johnson is part of.
Mustering for War: well would you believe it a painting article that like. Spread over four pages this article is all about how to organise yourself to get your army painted. So not really a painting article as it doesn’t tell you how to paint as much as it tells you when to paint. For some reason I like hobby articles like this a lot. I might never plan and organise my painting the way it is described in this article but I like learning about possible methods available to me. Of note the pictures and words are just about evenly split on the page so the words aren’t lost and have just as much importance as the pictures for a change.
Blanchitsu continues to impress and just be simply mind-blowing. The conversion work that these people undertake leaves me without words. The only thing that would make this article better is if they listed every component used to make a conversion.
Parade Ground was enjoyable this month which is an unusual thing for me to say. The Parade is all about Christopher Stahl’s (
Chris is a founder of the Tale of Painters blog) model collection but thankfully it doesn’t concentrate on how he painted each model. Instead it is an article about his past, his conversions and his painting style.
Forty two pages of nothing but pictures, five pages of Reader’s Models, twelve pages of paint splatter, five pages of Golden Demon and four pages of Eavy Metal Masterclass. That’s 43.5% (68 pags) of the magazine given over to painting and/or pictures of models. That is too much in my opinion.
This is a real shame as I always enjoy Eavy Metal and this month’s article on how to paint gemstones and crystal swords was brilliant as usual but because of the other painting articles and model pictures it comes across as just one more painting article.
A bit more depth to some of the other articles and fewer pages concentrating on pictures/painting and this issue would have been bordering on good.