Assembling Your First Marvel: Crisis Protocol Miniature

Marvel: Crisis Protocol is the highly anticipated miniatures skirmish game by Atomic Mass Games, which will be released later this year. While the game itself involves picking teams of Marvel heroes and villains to use in different objectives, Marvel: Crisis Protocol also involves assembling and painting the miniatures. Each miniature comes un-assembled on a sprue, so players will need to cut, assemble, and glue each miniature by hand. This may seem like a daunting task if you've never dabbled in hobby miniatures before, but you'll actually only need a few basic materials to build your Marvel: Crisis Protocol miniatures.

To build a Marvel: Crisis Protocol miniature, you'll need a pair of miniature clippers, a hobby knife (like an exacto knife), and an adhesive like super glue or plastic cement. A pair of hobby tweezers are also recommended as some of the miniatures have tiny parts that you might struggle with putting together using only your hands. All of these can be found either at a local hobby store or online and shouldn't cost more than $20-$40.

Obviously, there are a ton of opinions online as to what adhesive to use for assembling miniatures. The Marvel: Crisis Protocol miniatures are made of a hard plastic, which means that plastic cement is probably the best adhesive to use, as it actually melts the plastic together to create a basically unbreakable bond. However, plastic cement can be tricky to use and will damage your miniatures if you don't use it the right way, so don't be afraid to stick with something a little more basic like Gorilla Glue if this is your first time putting together a miniature.

When you assemble your first miniature (I recommend starting with an easy one like Black Widow), you'll cut the pieces from the sprue using your clippers. You then use your exacto knife or a file to gently slice away the leftover seams or ridges from where the sprue met with the miniature piece. When you're satisfied with the ridge lines, you then determine how the miniature pieces fit together and then glue them in place. I recommend always "pre-assembling" your miniature by sticking the pieces together before gluing them in place to make sure that you don't glue in a piece incorrectly. This will add a few minutes to your assembly, but it's better than having a piece glued in the wrong position. Since there are several little pieces, I also recommend cutting the pieces from the sprues as you assemble the miniatures. This keeps your focus on the individual assembly steps and will keep you from losing a piece.

You may notice a bit of discoloration on the plastic from either filing away ridgelines or from the glue drying. Since these miniatures will eventually get painted, you really shouldn't be concerned as long as your satisfied with the actual assembly of the miniature.

Each miniature will take between 15-30 minutes to assemble, but don't be concerned if it takes you a bit longer to put a miniature together. Each person moves at their own pace and you'll likely find your own methods and tricks before too long!

Marvel: Crisis Protocol will be released on November 15th.