Sorry for leaving you guys and gals hanging all summer. A new, stressful, time-consuming job and some pretty invasive health issues kind of left me down for the count as far as mods go. Really, all I got done was an Elite-rebarreled Cycloneshock that gives me problems every now and then. On the BOOMco front, I haven’t been able to make many strides, but luckily Reddit user Zombona has. He’s doing great things, and with his permission I might make a comprehensive “uberguide” for us all to flip through.

Anyway, today’s post is a hype train one. As I mentioned when this blog first popped up, Derp Two (not currently active) and I are pretty damn huge Star Wars geeks. It had always been my intention to make myself an E-11 from a Rampage following this Nerfhaven guide (with a few minor tweaks and modernizations). However, I lacked the proper materials/tools and the time, so I never got around to it. Imagine how excited I was, then, to learn that they were putting out new blasters for The Force Awakens. That excitement soon got dashed when I learned of their sizes and gauged their performance.

Don’t get me wrong. I still own them, and they’re still fun. They just “need some love.”

First I’ll mention the pistol (DT-18?), because it’s not really in need of a lengthy mention. Ergonomically, it’s a bit small for me, but still quite comfortable. It’s easy to use and relatively a no-brainer to load. However, performance was surprisingly on par with the E-11, so that was a nice little bonus. That isn’t to say the E-11 performs well, though, and I’ll get to that in a second.



The major thing I want to mention is that the barrel on the DT-18 is short as hell, as you can see in the above photo. I can almost guarantee you’re gonna squish and crumple your Elite-length darts eventually, and it might make holstering a nightmare. As I start work on what’s almost a Jolt re-shell (image courtesy of Reddit user trapdoordoll), chances are I’ll tighten the barrel and maybe consider finally making myself some Stefans just because of the “nub barrel.”

Now, on to the main event: the E-11. I know some people are looking forward to the bowcaster as well, but…meh. While I’m not a fan of the scale of the blaster, the blaster itself is…Ok. I probably shouldn’t have paid the $40 USD price tag on it, but oh well. “Disney tax.” Out of the box and four mags in, I’m not having too many issues with it. It’s not great, but it’s also not terrible. In fact, it might be a good stock-class CQB blaster if I decide to go that route. A “stubby killer,” of sorts.



Gripes and concerns, though, are as follow.

First, there’s the length. Without the stock – which is superfluous, since it shouldn’t have one anyway – the blaster sits at around 17 inches long. The Rampage, by comparison, is about 20.25 inches. I feel like if they extended the barrel another inch and a half, the scale and general feel of the blaster would have been much nicer. Still, not the end of the world.



The mag well’s being an issue for some folks, myself included, in that any magazine put in there wobbles a bit. For some, this hinders proper loading. Luckily for me, it doesn’t. I also found that my test Rampage has about the same wobble. I never noticed it before now (probably because I never cared to really check), so something tells me this isn’t a new issue just for the E-11.

What is an issue for me is that the priming mechanism is a bit loose. It slides about freely, though not all the way, and to me that’s just annoying. It’s our foregrip, too, keep in mind. As such, it needs to stay the hell put. I’ll be working on that if and when I get to modding this thing. Still, the prime is smooth and takes very little effort. I’d equate it more to racking an EAT than a Raider or Rampage, but it’s nice.

I’m not a fan of the stock ranges, though, and this is why it has to be a close-quarters weapon in its stock form. Testing out 48 shots in my yard, the farthest I could seem to get it is about 47 feet. On average, it sat around 38-39. Given, there was the tiniest bit of breeze, but I’m underwhelmed. By comparison, my test Rampage firing the same darts out of the same mag got average ranges of around 44 feet. Keep in mind said Rampage is well broken in.

The grouping of said darts, however, was very tight. They all landed within about two feet of each other. Clearly, this fuels the argument that the Empire was letting Luke, Leia, Han, and the others “win” or escape to track their movements.

Moving forward, I would say that this thing isn’t so much a slam-fire-lacking Rampage reshell as it is a slam-fire-lacking Elite Alpha Trooper reshell with a side-loading mag well. Its range and ergonomics definitely don’t earn it a “Rampage” stamp, and the internals are a weird hodge-podgey adaptation of multiple Hasbro ideas, as you can see below. All credit to David Andrew Louder for the picture.



Would I buy one if I were you? Meh, no, not really. Wait for the price to drop near the winter holidays. Does it have potential as a daily-use blaster and a possible future mod? Absolutely.