Thursday, June 18, 2015

Why the new "leaked" Dark Angels formation pictures are most likely fake

EDIT: SO more and more stuff is pointing to this being LEGIT in WD, and most likely what the formations consist of. HOWEVER, don't go looking for new models in it. It is the personal army of Adam Troke. Additionally, there are some photoshops in it still (particularly in the demi company and the Redemption force).

So on BoLS these two pictures popped up in an article today. I believe they are fake/photoshopped. I could be wrong, but there are just WAY too many old models, conversions and just plain old lack of studio standards on these models to be White Dwarf publishable to me.
First of all, the images lay FLAT while the page is attempting to look curved and square with the light reflecting. Particularly the Tanks and the Scouts. They look placed onto the page.

The only thing that looks legit in a way is the Interrogator chaplain, but that image could have been taken from what has been leaked already and photoshopped in to give this legitimacy. However, in a way he hurts it, because he is the only new model for the DA release shown. The only other new model is the SM Assault Squad, all of which are lacking any DA upgrade bits at that.

Now I am going to break it down formation by formation. I am circling the most obvious things to me. I may be missing even more.

#1- The Demi-company
1- The complete lack of the new Dark Angels Upgrade Sprue, with that winged helmet and cool sword.
2- The WHFB Empire General Banner on the Dreadnought
3- Old devastators. They would show off the new kit.
4- What appear to be 3 photoshop mistakes. A blurry Missile Launcher, a blurry flamer, and something weird going on around that Sergeant in the bottom right
5- A handmade banner on the captain.
6- The captain is himself a conversion from the Emperor's Champion.

#2- Ravenwing Attack Squadron
1- These all seem to be NON-studio. Check the studio bikes here
2- The Landspeeder driver is red, unlike every other Landspeeder driver on the Ravenwing boxes ever.
3- None of the bolters have a drilled out or painted barrel. They are all just flat silver.
4- None of the lights are painted yellow, like every studio SM bike
5- None of the feathers have the blue-grey lowlighting they use on the studio models
6- None of the bikes are the newer bikes with plasma guns.
7- The sergeant is in a different pose and painted differently than the studio Sergeant.

#3 The Hammer of Caliban
1- Notice how the top of the picture "curves" a lot more than the bottom
2- All 3 of the predators use a bleached bone accent colour. Something I can never recall the studio doing.
3- 2 of the predators use Raven wing banners on the back of the turrets. The one on the far right just has a crazy conversion on the back.
4- 2 of the Predators use Ravenwing bike cowls on their turrets. The middle one I didn't circle. Not sure if that is an actual bit or a home made piece, so I gave it the benefit of the doubt.
5- The predator on the far right has a Forgeworld crew member and a Forgeworld Rhino Front piece

#4- Scouts
1- 2nd Edition Scouts! Really. These would never be shown off by GW in a magazine.
2- 4 of the 5 newer scouts have heads from various different kits. DA vets and Sternguard maybe? One maybe even Blood Angels (far left circled head)?

#5- Deathwing Redemption Force
1- The two terminator squads are EXACT DUPLICATES. Just a photoshop of the same squad!
2- This is the old librarian that was just discontinued. They would show off the new one.
3- The lettering on the Librarians banner seems subpar for the Studio
4- Not circled, but there are only 4 Knights pictured instead of 5. They are not the studio knights, and they are missing the watcher model that comes with the kit. EDIT; FOUND THE MISSING KNIGHT. He is in the Terminator squad, behind the Assault Cannon guy... out of coherency...

So there you have it. Sorry if this slightly crushes your dreams. It just seems to be an elaborate fake, or a serious departure from the GW policy of showing new stuff and stuff with little customization.