An In-depth Look at the New Demolisher Kit

So today I got my new Demolisher kit in the mail. The Mrs. may not be happy when she gets home and sees it... but for now I am enjoying the new backbone to my IG army.

Some key points I wanted to hit on that may not be widespread information to those looking to buy one of these kits:

Let's start with the bad news: There are no accessory sprues for this kit anymore. No track guards, dozer blades, pintile stubbers, or even Imperial Aquilas to paste on. Save your accessory sprues from those chimeras and old LRBT kits if you want to use them on these, because otherwise you will have to purchase the sprue for 12 bucks from GW direct. I'm going to have to myself, to keep the dozerblade theme I have on all my vehicles going. As an alternative, however, I suggest browsing through bits on Ebay. You might be able to snag a dozerblade or set of track guards for much cheaper, if that's all you are looking for.

Now lets dive into the new and improved: For starters, the tracks are MUCH easier to build, thanks to the new design that has special slots for the tracks to slip in instead of those annoying wheels that never see the light of day. The track pieces are numbered as well, making it nearly fool-proof. I have no gaps in my treads, a first for me! To sweeten the deal further, the directions are actually COMPREHENSIBLE and much more step-by-step then the previous instruction booklets (which more resembled CAD drawings that you were supposed to figure out on your own). These new directions make things run a lot smoother.

Now the really good part: CUSTOMIZATION OPTIONS!!! Yup, you read it right. Just take a look at that picture up there. Now, you don't have to glue on the side sponson hull pieces, but I did anyway because I figure 90% of the time I'll have them. Anyway, the three main weapons, two hull weapons, and 4 choices of sponson weapons are all created to be interchangeable with their optional counterparts. Meaning, if you don't glue them in, you can swap out the weapons to make different variants without having to be an expert modeler. This is huge for me, because I can't magnetize anything to save my life (lack of magnets and expertise). That sticky poster-tack you might recall me mentioning in my very early posts works very well for this, as the slots are not super-tight and the weapons tend to drop out of them if they don't have a little extra help. So with this kit, its like getting all three variants in one. Of course, you can only field one at a time, but the ability to pick which variant fits into your next list is just awesome.

So, with this kit, you can make:
A Leman Russ Demolisher
A Leman Russ Executioner
or A Leman Russ Punisher

with choices for:
Hull Heavy Bolter or
Hull Lascannon

as well as:
Multi-melta sponsons
Plasma Cannon sponsons
Heavy Bolter sponsons or
Heavy Flamer sponsons

So, in all, I guess my 45 bucks was well spent. I expect to see the 2nd wave of IG updates might include a similarly-upgraded kit for the regular Leman Russ Battle Tank, with options for a Vanquisher, Exterminator, and Eradicator. If you like the accessories to come with the tank, and only want vanilla LRBTs, I suggest you stockpile them now, before they go out of production. Otherwise, be on the lookout for that new kit that I imagine will be released soon.

We'll go over tactics for the three tank variants, that can be built with this kit, at a later time. I hope this little article helped someone thinking about buying one!

Until next time,
--FP135