Vallejo Game Color Basic Paint Set Paint, Brown, VJ72172, 75 Count (Pack of 1)

Just getting started with table top gaming and painting of miniatures. Decided to take a chance on this set. I have a few Vallejo products that I use with air brushes, so I expected this set to be of similar quality and performance. I am not disappointed. Note: I did not buy these for air brush painting, only mentioning past experience with Vallejo products. My set arrived in perfect condition. No open / leaking paints. No broken case. I made sure to order while the weather was warm, so the paints wouldn't freeze, expand, and leak, and the plastic case wouldn't be cold, brittle, and prone to cracking more easily during rough UPS handling. There are almost too many paints to choose from, especially for someone just getting started. A smaller set would work just as well as you can mix paints to develop new colors, but for someone lacking an good understanding of color theory and how to mix this is a wonderful set. Paint performance is good, though I found it best to reduce / thin them down. Right out of the bottle they are very thick. I put a drop on the back of my hand / rubber glove and turned it upside down without the paint running or dripping. This provides very thick, good coverage on a model, but is also prone to showing brush strokes. I ended up thinning it down somewhere between 5:1 and 2:1 paint to thinner and doing 2-3 coats. This flows more easily across the surface of the model and is less likely to fill in small details on a weapon, face, or armor on the miniature. While likely most ideal to reduce Vallejo paints with Vallejo reducer I happened to have Createx Wicked reducer (4012). Worked fine. It's designed for Createx Wicked acrylic paints. It works with Vallejo acrylic paints. This paint set does not include a primer. As with the reducer I happened to have primer on hand for my air brushes. I cleaned the minis with soapy water, rinsed, dried, and used Vallejo primers for a base coat. I experimented with black, grey, and white primers. The Game Color paints are thick enough that the primer color used has almost zero impact on the end result of your painting. You aren't going to see significantly darker colors when starting with black primer. The only real consideration is whether or not you can reach every corner and crevice in your mini and whether leaving that inaccessible area black, white, or grey is most appropriate. I went with grey and did my best to reach that corner / crevice with the tip of a brush and a droplet of shade paint to darken it up. Game Color paints work very well with the Vallejo primers. No issues with paint peeling up or refusing to spread evenly across the surface. The included varnishes are pretty easy to reduce and use in an airbrush for good, clean, even covering. Worked with a 4:1 ratio of varnish to reducer and then added 2 drops of flow improver. Only used the matte and satin varnishes thus far. Can't really tell the difference between them. Either one seems appropriate for miniatures.

Great paint so far, like the dropper style bottles. Different getting used to these after having used paint pots from GW and Ral Partha in the past, but i like it. I added stainless steel ball bearings to the bottles as agitators, which helped. A few points: 1. Game color seems to me to be a great layering style paint, so many of the brighter colors do not color in one coat over darker colors for instance. But in my case I happen to like that, it makes blending very easy, and the color selection is good. 2. The case is great, paint is very firmly in place. 3. You will have to mix this stuff a lot. I added agitators so it became much easier. Stainless steel ball bearings (not 302, or other rust prone alloys) are cheap, but pewter sprue works as well. Expect certain colors to separate a lot, but the ones that do are also pretty easy to re-shake back into shape. 4. I also really liked that they included varnish, so you not only have good paint, but a sealer to finish it off. Just need a good primer and you're in business. 5. The brushes are okay, but for this style of painting, I bought some kolinsky sable brushes, and I like those. I ended up using these for base-coating, and they work fine. I have always picked up paints from several different lines and found my favorites among them, and this paint is no different, but the majority of the colors in my set cover really well, are very smooth, and I'm very happy with them. I have found that some I like to thin, others I don't, so there is a bit of a "getting to know your paint" process.

I've had a couple of weeks to use the set and I think I've at least opened and tested all of the bottles at this point. No dried out paints and I've really enjoyed painting with them. I read on the Vallejo website that the difference between their Game Color line and the Model line (aside from the game color line being more vibrant) is the viscosity of the paints. So they go into fine details better. I don't know if this just means they have to be watered down less, or if they are just formulated different to be smoother. But I'd recommend this kit to anyone looking for a great starter set to start painting minis. The only problem I noticed is the foam piece which all of the paints go into was askew. It looks like the bottom piece of foam slide after being glued to the piece with holes for the paints. It doesn't effect the case's ability to hold the paints, as they fit snuggly in their individual holes, however, there is a small gap where items could fall through the bottom of the brush compartment. It doesn't matter for me, since I only intended to use it to hold paints. But others might be disappointed since it is a nice carrying case.

Vallejo's Game Color set has some of the richest, brightest pigments on the market. This kit contains a wonderful variety of some of their best colors. You can use these paints to create beautiful models The above model was painted almost entirely with paints from this set.

After using this set for about 5 months, I feel I can safely say two things; The vallejo paints are excellent, but be prepared for them to be very inconsistent. This is my first paint set, having bought a 3D printer a month before I wanted to paint what I have printed, and in that area Vallejo delivers excellently. The paints themselves are easy to use, are quite vibrant out of the pot, and stick to anything primed with no issues. Half of the fun of painting something is picking out the colors, trying new combinations, and mixing them up to get new colors. You do need to thin them (well, some of them - more on that later) and two thin coats work better than one thick coat. This set will give you years of painting minis as long as you don't let them all dry out. The container is a hard plastic case that snaps at the front. The foam that holds the paint in is stiff yet pliable and secures the paints well. you need to pull on them a tad to get them to come out, but I never have to yank. I have yet to get a paint holder for my desk, as the case still works great for me. The company quality control however, leaves much to be desired. the paints are all of wildly varying consistency - some are thicker than glue, others pour like water out of the bottle. There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to which ones are thicker either - it's like they took all the bottles they didn't want to throw away and put them in this package. This was eventually rectified by buying 3rd party matte medium and flow aid several of the paints are GLOSS. not matte, but high gloss - especially the black, which I found out the hard way after painting a full mini. The matte varnish is a satin, while both the satin and gloss are glossy as all get out. Great for eyes and wetter parts of the body, not for clothes and leather. Lastly, a few of the nozzles are cracked and either ooze paint or dry out the top layers of paint inside, forcing me to dig out a small snotball of paint before using it. These are high quality paints with top notch pigments, stored in a brute of a case. Just plan on figuring out which paints need to be spooned out, and which ones will pour onto your wet palette like a squirt bottle. Also, get some matte varnish. seriously.

I was very skeptical to drop this kind of cash on a set of paint. But I'm glad I did. These are some real quality paints and worth the money (track pricing and buy on the low point). Over all I feel I have most of the colors I need. It is lacking on flesh tones so you're going to need to supplement with other offerings, no doubt about that. But in general, it's a nice selection. Occasionally I do feel it is lacking a color I'm thinking of but keep in mind this is "game color"....Looking at the "model color" offering I feel that I'd like some of those colors as well. Looking at the cost of Citadel paint, these are a fantastic alternative and it even comes with a handy chart that matches color names to that of Citadel names. Some colors are more gloppy than others...some are pretty thin such as black which one would expect to have superb coverage, but it doesn't. No thinning with the black and its still a bit translucent. Their orange offering is thick as heck but a little goes a long way. And there's everything in between. Chances are I'll be picking up the model color at some point but for now I'm just offsetting with Citadel and P3 for the colors I'm lacking (such as flesh tones). Not much in the way of washes so I picked up Citadels wash color set and it compliments this nicely. Stop dreaming and start doing.

The paints are great quality when compared to other acrylic paints. They cover well and respond well to be thinned down. The set contains a good range of colors, allowing enough to highlight different colors. The brushes aren't the best but they get the job done. I've used many of the colors to paint up the Mansions of Madness miniatures and the variety in the set has been very helpful. Will be buying more Vallejo paints to fill in the gaps

I've been using Liquitex craft paints for decades. After trying some Vallejo effects and primer, I decided to go all in and try their Game colors. These are wonderful paints! They take to the primer really well and work without primer on Reaper Bones minis. The colors are vibrant and this case has a great assortment. Tips: Wipe the dropper tops with a paper towel after each use to keep them clean. Keep a safety pin around if they get clogged. I only had one clogged from the beginning. The smokey ink is great for washes. Great paints!