KR|Dimness Review #27: Dimness Expansion Kit for Tahron

PoliganToys sent me their prototype of the third expansion kit for the epic Tahron playset/game. This kit is inspired by the KR|Dimness line, which was presented back in 2019. The Ucamur^TM Citadel makes its debut in playset form for a new great playing experience!

Description
The KR|Dimness Expansion Kit includes:
• 24 booster tokens for the game
• An additional Ucamur Citadel playset with many features and accessories
• A bag with 75 translucent green chips that are shaped like Antikythron crystals (or rather SpawnCrystals shards, as they are now referred to).

Except for giving an exhaustive description of the Ucamur Citadel playset, I'm not going to detail these components and the game rules with the expansion pieces. You can find all this information in my post about the Origin Expansion Kit. I only need to remark that besides the usual properties, i.e., class, faction, strength, agility, and in some cases a special ability or limitation, each expansion piece is also characterised by a particular era (in this case Dimness) and a number of accumulable credits. The credit-chips included in this expansion kit are translucent green, and spending 30 of them allows a player to know the identity of any unexposed Second Line token, with or without showing it to their opponent. In limited cases (i.e., primary era variants), expansion pieces present no credit, but are characterised by additional strength values and/or different agility patterns compared to their primary counterparts.

List of Dimness expansion pieces and their properties.

List of possible primary pieces variants in the Dimness Expansion Kit (only one piece is included in the kit).

Ucamur Citadel

This playset represents an historicist-like fortress built on top of an enchanted tree above a swampy area, and displays a dark green-and-brown paint that fits right in with the KR|Dimness aesthetic.

Fictionally, the bog is surrounded by high, rugged hills that delimit the Ucamur region. The sentient tree was created by the Multiversal Balancers, for transferring vital faculties to other living beings at risk of extinction. When the tree's mission was completed successfully, its crown died out, while its trunk and roots entered a quiescent state. Millions of years later, the tree top was used as the foundation of the citadel commissioned by a mysterious warlord as a retreat, who paid for its construction out of his personal fortune and used it as a private residence until he died. Shortly after his death, the Therioms appropriated the abandoned fortress and used it as a site of exile for war criminals.

The set is composed of four main sections: a base, a tree, a fortress and a ramp.

Section 1 (base): the piece on which the playset rests looks like a thick layer of swirly, brownish muddy soil. The sculpt of this piece is incredible and the paintwork definitely matches the quality of the sculpt. The front part (extending beyond the grooves in which the next component is placed) is a terrifying pit filled with resin, from which horrific plant creatures emerge. It can be filled up with water or with the honey-orange oozy material that came with the Mother-Plant, and features two separate, detachable 3D figures with knotty greenish-brown wooden bodies: a vine monster and a man-eating plant creature. The vine monster has three tendrils with devilish red eyes on them snaking their way out of the resin swamp; it is an incredibly well done solid piece that is made of harder plastic on the bottom and from a bendy wire rubber on the top. The main body is not bendable or anything, but it does look like it's moving thanks to how it is sculpted; the ends of the three tendrils are not super-bendable, but they do give you the chance to get the creature positioned how you like to fit your display. The man-eating plant creature resembles the upper body of a Plant-Man slightly and has some basic articulation: two swivel-hinged vine-like arms and a ball jointed Venus flytrap head with a hinged jaw. The bases of these two monsters can plug into the surface of the pit to keep them in place, but you can replace them with the upper bodies of two real Plant-Men surfacing or two Forseha warriors sinking, if you will. Sculpted in the pit is also a little parasite poking his head out of a small semi-submerged cave and crawling ashore to perch himself on the rocks; this piece has no articulation whatsoever, but it's a fearsome little guy too. The rear part of the base has a hidden quicksand-trap feature placed in the middle - it's a sort of spring-loaded beartrap (activated by a small lever) that can grab onto a figure’s feet. It's one of the coolest parts of the entire set!

Section 2 (tree trunk) - exterior: this semicircular, dark-green (with a brown wash) piece snaps into place on the base (although it cannot just rest, because it wouldn’t support the weight of the remaining part of the playset, but there are little “teeth” that help the two pieces lock together) and represents the tree trunk used as the load-bearing foundation of the citadel. It has large roots sticking out from the sides, but the most impressive part is without a doubt the sentient tree's demon-like face growing out of the front side of the trunk. The sculpt is wonderful with amazing detail - I love the thick bark texture with fissures and deep cracks worked in the features of its face. The eyes are excellent too (although a splash of deep red colour on them would have looked awesome), while the upper jaw has two ball jointed fangs that can be positioned in various ways. The lower jaw (complete with a sort of beard) is hinged and can be operated using a small lever located on the proper right side (hidden in the roots), while a pair of branch-like arms near the mouth can move together (with a twisting-and-retracting movement, to capture approaching figures) by means of another small lever on the proper left side. When the mouth is closed, the lower jaw is located high in a tree hollow and makes it possible to access the interior of the trunk. Hidden in the rough, uneven bark protecting the surface of the trunk on the proper right side, is another natural tree hole that acts as a secondary entrance leading to the inside.

Section 2 - interior: the inner side of the tree trunk shows roots sculpted everywhere near ground level. The main hollow/entrance looks like a wooden archway, something you would expect to see in an ancient temple dedicated to some malevolent divinity. There is a prison cell to hold someone captive on the left side of the trunk; this has chains, bones and rats sculpted on the inside, a locking door (which can be unlatched with the flick of a spider-shaped release switch) with irregular bars made of wood, and a small bar window on one side. It is very nicely scaled for most KR figures and there is plenty of room for Wordron to keep a Forseha warrior locked up. The tree hole in the right side of the trunk, which works as an auxiliary entrance, is surrounded by a sculpted monstrous face and is equipped with soft plastic vines hanging from the top. A dummy version of the Plant-Beast (a smaller-sized imitation of the front part of the creature equipped with a hinged jaw and held by a stick) can be manipulated through this hole, making it crawl to the inside of the tree and attack a figure trapped in the quicksand.

Section 3 (citadel) - exterior: the roughly semicircular fortress, which is modelled after Neuschwanstein Castle, is supported by the tree trunk (again, there are teeth that have to lock into place) and is easily the coolest part of this playset, as it's the largest and the most impressive. There aren't many play features on the outside, but the excellent sculpt, capturing a fine line between appearing carved by hands and looking craggy, makes for one of the coolest KR backdrops you could ask for. The stony façade is painted in grey with a dark, brown wash, and shows cracks to make it look weathered, some vines climbing the walls, claw-like pinnacles made from spiked rocks, and numerous creepy little carved gargoyles and demon faces coming out of the living stone. There are also many other interesting sculpted details such as a number of windows with wooden ledges and balconies, little staircases, wooden side doors and bar windows. The hinged exterior wooden door that closes the gateway to the inside at the front of the fortress is marvellous! It is made out of two layers of wood planks: the grain of the wood runs vertically on the front layer and horizontally on the back, like a simple form of plywood. The two layers are seemingly held together by iron studs, and the whole structure is strengthened and stiffened with iron bands. The studs themselves are pointed on the front, so that attackers would damage their weapons while trying to break through. The paintwork almost makes this door look like it's actually made of wood and metal, which is pretty cool, and I love how menacing and ominous the toothed bat/vampire crest on the front looks. There is also a secondary wooden doorway with metal ornamentations on one side, but it's got some broken slats and looks a bit rusty too. The building includes four watchtowers, two of which can be equipped with optional half dome-shaped tiled roofs. One of the towers rests atop one side of the fortress and is removable (I'll get to that in a minute).

Section 3 - interior: on the inside, there are more demon faces and gargoyles sculpted on the walls. The lower level features a wooden floor with a trapdoor (a metal grating activated by a melting skull-shaped button, through which a figure drops into the prison cell underneath) on the left side, a vita-ray-esque chamber used by Wordron to transform the sickly cloisterers of the Drojyo'Bhakma^TM Monastery into muscle bound soldiers (it is actually just the front panel, but it's a pretty fun example of the steampunk technology present in this fortress, and seeing all of the wires, the clear window and the tech-monster face embedded in the upper part gets your imagination going) on the right side, two wooden load-bearing posts (to support the upper floor) more towards the middle, and an arched double stairway (with two symmetrical curved flights shaped like giant spines, both rising to a throne on the next floor) in the centre. Turning the monstrous face-shaped knob of the chamber activates a play feature in which the image of a figure placed behind the device comes to life and disappears thanks to a magnifying effect of the front window. While it is possible to pose figures on the steps of the staircase, it's going to take some real concentration and expert balance, but I can understand that the sculptors probably wanted to retain a more organic feel. However, on the right flight, there is a small group of steps that can collapse (i.e., swing down) by hitting a higher step-shaped button, causing a figure to fall. The upper level features a stone floor, a wooden door on the left side (the above-mentioned secondary doorway, which lets out on a ledge and then shuts again using a gargoyle-shaped candle stand on a nearby stony table as a lever), a little door that opens to reveal a secret storage compartment for weapons or artefacts (there are lots of mysterious symbols on this and it kind of reminds me of the evil counterpart of the case that holds the three enchanted helmets inside of Theriom City) on the right side, and two columns designed to look like some sort of ceremonial pillars (which can rotate to reveal hidden spiral staircases leading to two of the four tower-tops) towards the middle. The idea was that one of the two columns/towers would be a removable microphone communicating with a Bluetooth speaker - the concept's main gimmick was the talking tree-monster, where you would speak into the tower microphone and move the mouth from the lever on the side. Instead, the tower was made as a simple removable pillar, to leave a pedestal onto which you can place the Mother-Plant. The missing gimmick doesn't bother me though. The throne in the centre, to which the two stairways rise, is made of cemented skulls and some other spiky bones projecting from the sides, and shows a kind of bat motif. It's an excellent rendition of the throne used by Wordron in the comics; the paintwork is really cool, giving it a mixture of light and dark hues of grey, and the sculpted detail is amazing. To help you get up and down between floors, apart from the main stairways the set comes with two separate wooden grappling ladders that can hang anywhere (there are some slots and notches here and there, to help them be more stable). Each of the four towers has a cool little platform that gives Wordron and his henchmen a place to stand, watch and guard the entrances to their lair. The platforms can support a variety of included accessories, namely a Dark Legion softgoods flag, a perch on which two crows roost, a ballista equipped with a separate bolt, and a 2-part flat piece cast in a translucent orange plastic and looking like Wordron's giant ghostly manifestation after being killed (it has a stand and features an "opening mouth" effect thanks to one of its parts being able to slide up).

Section 4 (ramp): to make their way toward the fortress' main entrance, the Forseha warriors will have to cross the swampy ground by traversing a menacing, rickety old ramp climbing up. This piece has some excellent detail on the stone slabs that make it up, with some great paint applications showing the age of the structure. The ramp looks cool and is littered with vines, while strewn weapons and bones, a cluster of skulls and a gravestone are sculpted into the U-shaped rock piece on the bottom, which fits around the resin pit of the base. However, well, it's a bit small. The comic book version has a curved path that leads from the ground level to the front of the building where the main door is located. The toy version makes it shorter and almost straight, with a steep stair-like lower level, adding in some extra height, but making it less of a ramp and more of a decorative feature. Visually it looks more rugged and untamed, but the downside is that it only fits one archway instead of two. It doesn't look too bad though, and the KR figures don't seem to have a hard time walking up the path, but it seems like the ramp needed to be a couple inches longer to accommodate a second archway or at least to make it have two figures fighting comfortably on it. The archway is made of a large flat capstone laid on two upright haunted sculptures. Each statue resembles a gargoyle (very similar to Demo-Rha's three-faced demon-ghost and wearing a triple diadem with a mitre-like crown supporting the stone) mounted on a plinth and entwined with thorny vines (there are even a couple of crows standing on it). The torsos of the two gargoyles, which fictionally have the ability to animate due to the living vines twined round them, can be rotated synchronously by turning a cobblestone-shaped knob on top of the capstone, and made to grab and hold a figure passing between them with the vines' hand-shaped tendrils (this feature was originally intended to be activated by two levers under the base, making the capstone fall, but was changed eventually). At the end of the ramp there’s a platform, which looks like a sealed abandoned well (there's some nice paint detail on the floor), placed in front of the main entrance and flanked by two curved woody stems of dead shrubs with spiny branches. When these are tilted towards each other above the platform, a figure standing on it drops through a double trap door into a rubbery net seemingly made of vines. The net hangs from snake-shaped posts and is suspended over the resin pit, facing the tree-monster. The two tilted stems form a wooden archway with a tree hole where they meet and connect, through which you can pour some resin ooze on the prisoner in the net. A very cool feature is that the positions of the net and the prison cell are interchangeable, meaning that each can slide out from its own location and be placed below the other trap-door. Alternatively, the platform can be filled with ooze and its trap-door mechanism can be overridden through a switch underneath, making it possible for a Plant-Man to rise from under the platform, break the seal and emerge from a puddle of resin. I like this feature a lot, as it creates a setting for an evil creature to scare the bejesus out of unwelcome visitors.

The KR|Dimness Expansion Kit is fully compatible with the previous Tahron board game sets, including the KR|Origin and KR|Enmity Expansion Kits. Overall, if nothing else can be said about the playset, let it be said that it is massive, overwhelming, and visually stunning. The plastic quality is excellent, and the set feels very, very sturdy. The paintwork is just so well done, too. There are really lots of nicely captured details here, from the painted vines growing out from between the crevices, to the dark shading on the various surfaces. It is excellent looking!

Happy holidays!!!