Zealot Miniatures – Twisted Catacombs

A good while ago I backed my first Kickstarter campaign (I know, I’m late to the party!) in the form of Zealots Minotaur Horde. (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/zealotminiatures/twisting-catacombs-the-minotaur-horde).

I actually went in initially for the 4 classic adventurers (dwarf, barbarian, mage and ranger) as they were all female and looked great sculpts, not overly sensualised as many female models tend to be in our hobby. When I saw the minotaurs (including some female versions, which I’d never seen before), I decided to splash a bit more cash.

Not knowing what to expect apart from that these campaigns tend to overrun, I started to get very worried when they launched a second campaign before the first was even delivered. Since then I’ve seen it occur a few times with other companies. I can’t say it’s great for backer moral as you seriously have to wonder how they can be putting all their effort into fulfilment if they have a new shiny thing going on. But unlike other companies Zealot at least were answering the majority of comments made. (I’m far from impressed with Willy Miniatures on this front. They have serious issues with one KS bloodbowl team and still launched a second and have not updated in months).

I’m happy to say that as backer 840(ish) out of 950(ish) I finally got my order this week and boy I’m extremely happy with it.

I don’t mind saying that my main exposure to models are from Games Workshop and I think most will agree that (ignoring finecast) their sculpts are second to none. Forgeworld resin is also very good, and I also think Mierce produce great resin. Other companies I’ve used are not bad but are somewhat behind these in general (my opinion, based on limited exposure of course).

Why am I going on about this? Well when I first saw the adventurers, I thought they were cast in the same plastic as the recent GW models such as the Wood elf eternal guard/wildwood rangers. It’s the first time I’ve really seen that resin can match plastic in their crispness and detail.

After a morning of intensive building (where I only had to use a modelling knife to cut a finger off the super glue tube once – a personal best 🤦‍♂️), I thought I’d share some shots of the models (I do still have 3 adventurers to build).

I included a wood elf Wildrider for comparison but forgot to add the current GW Doombull but I’ll say that the GW model is around the same size as the ‘normal’ sized minotaurs below. The Minotaur General is bigger. Imposingly so.

Female dwarf adventurer

General

I realised I missed an armour plate after taking this

Standard minotaurs

General vs standard Minotaur

Herdstone, villager prison, cooking prep’ table

Female Minotaur

Female Minotaur vs dwarf