Ever since the Kickstarter launched I’ve been dreaming of getting my sweaty palms on these fun looking figures.  That day has come, and I hope you’re prepared for a mammoth review of the much anticipated Marauder “Task Force”!

Much like a next generation special operations task force might, the Marauder Task Force took all of us by surprise with their thrilling Kickstarter launch.

Most of us are very familiar with the quality, attention to detail, and customer service that Marauder “Gun Runners” has provided on their weapons and accessories over the past several years, and the mere thought of them extending those skills into actual figure production put those same numbers of us over the moon.

Enlisting the aid of Boss Fight Studio for the design and sculpting, Marauder “Gun Runners” showed a commitment to quality, constantly pushing the factory to come through and produce the best possible figure they could. Now that I’ve got some of these in hand, I think all the extra effort was well warranted.

While the beauty of Marauder “Task Force” is the customizability of the accessories, all of these accessories would be relatively empty without a great quality core figure to build upon. I’m happy to report that Marauder succeeds exceedingly well on that level. Eschewing the familiar “split-torso” design, the Marauder “Task Force” template uses a solid torso built on a ball joint at the hip to approximate the waist motion of a real human, and to avoid some of the aesthetic issues of the split torso. It also has a great added benefit for customizers, where if you want to put new legs on a figure, you can separate it at the waist with a little boil and pop, and have a complete set of new pants from the waist down. It’s a great side feature that will only make the customizers happier.

As one would expect from Boss Fight Studio, the figure itself is magnificent. The double jointed knees and elbows move with fluidity and allow for a number of great poses. The detail in the wrinkled uniform is impeccable as well, providing us with a great basic army building template that manages to be crammed full of fantastic and intricate sculpt work. The fact that I can line up these figures side by side with no gear on and marvel at their quality speaks volumes to Boss Fight’s skills, and I give Marauder “Gun Runners” a ton of credit for investing in this level of quality and detail for their product line.

By now we all know that the basic figure for the Task Force project is essentially one figure with various paint schemes. Everything from desert tan to black, to arctic camouflage is present here. There’s a terrific shade of red as well as a fantastic looking blue trooper, olive drab, and my favorite, the green camouflage. To be honest, one of my favorite aspects of this whole project are the colors. Marauder isn’t afraid to use really vibrant exciting color schemes here, picking some terrific hues for their base figures, and the paint work on the camouflage patterns is astounding. Typically on mass produced
figures we see some shortcuts taken with camouflage, where it’s represented in small little half-formed blobs, but with the Task Force figures, every rounded shape and color is crafted into the paint masks, and the end results make for fantastic looking figures. Along with the jungle and arctic camouflage, the gray urban camouflage figure is terrific, too.

The heads included here are pretty great, too, from the standard sculpts with different hair and skin tones, to the straight forward balaclava. Once you get to the embedded gas mask and the different face deco you start to realize just how great and varied this toy line really is.

I will admit, this review is almost overwhelming, simply because of the number of different combinations that were available through the Kickstarter campaign. Fans are almost guaranteed to find some combination they like here. The head sculpts alone are numerous, with various different flesh tones and hair colors, along with balaclava masks, and great masked heads with what look to be air filters built in.

Don’t even get me started on the deco balaclavas. These patterns are really intricate and similar, yet manage to stand out nicely from each other. The skull pattern is probably my favorite, though the others are a veritable Rorsarch test of fun looking patterns, too.

Before I go too deep into this, I do want to let folks know, that when considering buying the Task Force figures and accessories, if you plan on fully posing and “playing” with the figures, just like with the weapons, you’ll want to consider putting a tab of glue in the holes on the vests and web gear when attaching the pouches, holsters, etc… they do plug in and stay securely, but obviously if you plan on moving the figure around or significantly
changing its position, there are risks that some of the pieces could fall off. In my experience with these hands-on, putting a tiny dab of glue to hold on the pouches, sheaths and holsters goes a long way towards making a “complete” figure design more resilient.  Yet, by using a small bit of glue, the piece can be pulled off and moved around if you so desire.

Speaking of the accessories, I’ll look at the torso coverings first.

The armored vest is a great futuristic look that brings thoughts of semi futuristic science fiction, and brings those best elements to the Marauder “Task Force” line while adding its own great look. Each vest is nearly littered with holes to put pouches and sheaths in, and the vest is remarkably customizable. There are metallic sculpted pouches that look perfect along the two straps, but even holsters and sheaths work in all places as well. There’s spots along the front as well as the back, and the many different combinations possible can have two figures wearing the same vest looking considerably different.

Along with the vest, there are armored shoulder pads that plug into the shoulders that extend the metallic look of the vest to covering the tops of the Task Force soldier’s arms. I will confess, the shoulder pads were a bit difficult to plug in and stay in, but again, using a little glue and some elbow grease will help that.  I was hesitant to use glue myself, simply because I wanted to be able to swap these parts around to give folks an idea of the sheer number of different combinations.

Twin strap web gear holds a lot of promise as well, with some great sculpting from Boss Fight Studio bringing even the smallest little details to life within the material sculpted to look like fabric. This web gear is built to hold knife sheaths and holsters, as well as the more elaborate pouches, but still leaves a lot of the great base figure revealed underneath.

The last item is an almost quilted looking commando vest with holes scattered throughout for whichever accumulated accessories you prefer. This is probably my least favorite vest of the group, but still has a load of customizable options for anyone who wants to use it.  The quilted surface is good for a vast variety of uses, and with all of the separate holes there, it’s ultimately one of the most varied vests in this entire first assortment.

Headgear is another segment that allows for a wide array of swapping and switching with berets, different tactical helmets, a full face gas mask, and scarfs to go around the neck post. A lot of this gear fits effortlessly with each different head, which is pretty amazing considering the different masks as well as the uncovered head sculpts there are to choose from. Simply adding a scarf and helmet to any head in the assortment can reveal some spectacular results.

Apart from the vests themselves, the base figures also have holes in various parts of their body, which fit these accessories really nicely, but aren’t so obvious that they stand out too much if you leave one unfilled. Holes on the thighs are perfect for pistol holsters (which fit Marauder pistols to perfection) while holes down near the ankles work for smaller holsters or for knife sheaths as well. All of these items come within the Marauder “Task
Force” brand, with all kinds of shapes and sizes for pouches, sheaths, and holsters, all of which look totally natural when combined with the base figure itself. Obviously I can’t provide pictures of all the different combinations, but suffice it to say several hours of my review time was spent simply cataloging and organizing the huge amount of accessory possibilities contained within the Marauder “Task Force”. The possibilities are practically endless.

My method of organizing all of these great parts and pieces

As I said up above, I strongly recommend swapping and switching until you find a combination that you really love, then pull out a little glue and dab it on to complete your customized figure. I promise that you’ll love the end result. Even for folks who don’t want to use the glue, the items stay on fairly well on display, just if you’re going to move them around and mess with them, you’ll want to take steps to ensure that stuff doesn’t potentially fall off and get lost.

With easily swappable heads and relatively easy swappable legs, there is a wealth of sheer material at your disposal here to make your own great covert operations team, or to accentuate a team you might already own. One of the items I’m most looking forward to with the Marauder “Task Force” release is the inevitable customs that people will be developing, using combinations I didn’t even consider. There are so many different options and combinations  here it’s almost overwhelming, but only the best possible kind of overwhelming.  I promise you, these won’t get boring quickly, even after messing around with these figures at JoeCon and in the meantime, I still continue to find surprisingly great combinations I hadn’t thought of previously.

Anyone who has experience with Marauder “Gun Runners” weapons know that they have a deep devotion to a quality product and I’m thrilled to report that this holds 100% true with the Task Force figures. Kickstarter supporters should be expecting their figures shortly, and anyone who can get their hands on these definitely should! Even if you don’t like any of the combinations I’ve put together within this review, there are so many more to choose from and so many other possibilities, I’m confident anyone will be enjoying this line as much as I do.

Whether you’re a collector or customizer looking to create a whole new battalion or simply augment an existing collection, the Marauder “Task Force” has something for you.  It covers many different genres and many different aspects of current and next gen military design, and I can already tell these will be keeping me happy and busy for a very, very long time.