Review: Horus Ascended

Here on Tale of Painters, we celebrate the ascension of Horus with a review of the new Primarch model from Forge World. Horus Ascended marks the beginning of a new generation of sculpts that will capture the Primarchs in the later eras of heresy. In this unboxing, we find out whether Horus has been given a successful new update.

Horus Ascended is available exclusively from forgeworld.co.uk and games-workshop.com.

Horus Ascended review

Like previous Horus Heresy character models and Primarchs, Horus comes in a black presentation box with silver foil stamp.

In the box you will find a coloured assembly instruction, as well as several trays with resin parts and a 50mm and 80mm base. The display base is optional and removable, so you can assemble the model with the 50mm “gaming” base and then insert it into the display base.

It is obvious that the new Horus model has been digitally sculpted. I’m all for it, because I think digital sculpting makes many things possible that would not have been possible manually. In comparison to the old model, proportions are more modern, for example, the head is much smaller in relation to the body. Horus has also become significantly taller. All details are precisely designed and cast, the casting quality is excellent and sharp. I could not find any leftover 3D print lines, a problem that sometimes occurs with digitally designed Forge World models.

I won’t lie, Horus Ascended is a complex and challenging model. There are 41 parts in total, many of them tiny. I strongly recommend working with sub-assemblies. The Warmaster’s Claw in particular is difficult to assemble as each of the thin fingers is a single part. Absolute caution and a good superglue are needed here. Last year I built and painted Magnus the Red, in the post you will find some of my best tips on how to deal with complex resin models.

The Ascension of Horus

I am totally in love with this model and will be painting Horus Ascended for my own Sons of Horus collection. I love the pose, the level of detail, even the display base with the somewhat exaggerated skeleton pile doesn’t bother me.

But I also know that with the time I have left for my own hobby (besides blogging and content creation), it would take me a very long time to paint Horus in one piece. Probably two to three months, and that would be a bit boring for you if I couldn’t paint and post anything else. Garfy gave me the great idea to make a series out of Horus instead: Every week I will work on Horus for exactly one day, and at the end of the month I will post a summary of the progress. So the whole thing will be more of a slow burn project, and I estimate it will probably take at least half a year, if not a whole year. This way, I’ll have enough time for my ongoing projects (e.g. painting a few troops that Horus can command in the first place).

I’ll start next week and you can look forward to the first update post in a month. Witness the ascension of Horus – here on Tale of Painters.

Value

The price of £92.50 / 115 Euro / $144 is painful, considering that Horus Ascended is not really bigger than a Redemptor Dreadnought except for the display base. But the price is on the same level as the last Primarch models, so at least there is no perceived increase in price. Unfortunately, the model is only available directly from Forge World or the Games Workshop webstore. The model cannot be found at independent retailers such as our partner shops Wayland Games, Element Games, Firestorm Games, and Taschengelddieb, so no discounts possible, which stings.