Wonderfully detailed MDF buildings in different scales and genres.
I ordered three sets of buildings, the Military Facility, the 2025 Buildings and the Plaza Set. I was curious because the buildings looked phenomenal on the website.
What I received was several stacks of 1mm MDF sheets with a white paper layer on both faces and grouped by rubber bands. I also received a Calliope and two sentry guns made of thicker MDF and not papered. You will need white/PVA glue during assembly to make sure they stay together and your hobby knife to help separate parts that don't want to let go of the flash. I suggest the “upside down” bottle glue as this will allows for rapid and easy application of the glue. "Accurate" and "sparingly" are the words you want to keep in mind when applying the glue because of what I say below. Keep some toothpicks (not Q-tips) on hand for delivery of glue to places where the bottle tip can't reach or reinforcement on the inside of tabless joints.
The quality and precision of the parts is outstanding. I experienced a slight warp on the roofs of the 2525 buildings, probably due to sitting in the hot and humid environment of my garage. This point was rendered irrelivant thanks to the precision of the parts, Once assembled, the fit of the parts all together corrected the warpage.
These parts are precision laser cut and white as can be. Many “trim” features are added to enhance the appearance as well. They are also covered with a microscopically fine dust as a byproduct of the laser cutting. Which means if there is any extra white glue you wipe off, it will find that dust and make an obvious smudge.
My only criticism is there are no assembly instructions, no drawings, nothing. What I ended up doing was going to each individual item in the store, taking a screenshot of the page, cropping it to the actual picture, then saving them to a document and printing them out because that was the only way I could have something visual to work off of. I did it this way because I purposefully do not have Internet in my painting office in my garage (it keeps me off social media during my painting time). These buildings sat unassembled for over a month after I received them because there were no instructions. In fact, I incorrectly assembled the calliope from the Military Base because I guessed at it.
The Military Facility had lots of little “fiddly bits” that, while difficult to assemble, really made those buildings “pop” with realism. Be careful when handling and storing these buildings due to the antenna spires, they are delicate and will bend/break easilly.
The 2525 set went together very quickly and easily. It was the same building (assembly-wise) for each, just different dimensions. I found the best method was to put two of the walls together, add the roof to its' tabs on those walls, then add the 3rd and 4th walls. I put together all eight buildings (four buildings, 4 rooftop “equipment” buildings) in about 45 minutes.
The Plaza buildings seems to have been designed by a different person from the other sets. There was a lot of "waste" (non-usable area) for these sheets. I do give the benefit of the doubt that the author was trying to keep certain parts grouped together. I'm smart enough to know that I don't always see the logic that others use for their reasoning. The arrangement of fitting tabs (when they were there) should have been situated to help make sure you didn't assemble a part upside down were lacking. However, if you take your time, look at the pictures, and test fit two or three times before the glue comes out (note: I didn't on the first building on this set) it will go together fine.
Conclusion: These are fantastic buildings for terrain. They have fantastic details and they are intricate. However, like when you assemble your miniatures, preparation of the parts before you apply glue is paramount. Take your time, test fit for placement/orientation, and don't do a Leeroy Jenkins with the glue. Follow this expierience-based advice and I'm sure your buildings will turn out better than mine.
My advice during assembly would be to assemble the parts using the tabs, then laying a bead of glue on the inside of the joint, rather than applying glue on the edge of one part and pressing them together. For "tabless" parts, use a glue-covered toothpick on the inside of the joint. This will also provide extra support to the pieces. For the trim pieces that cover tab slots, lots of small dots will beat a blob or bead that oozes out when the parts are pressed together.