Robotech Project is Essentially Complete

For the last couple of months while we've been under Stay-At-Home order/recommendation, my main project has been my Robotech Tactics setup. This project had three main elements - the two opposing forces (the invading alien Zentraedi and the UEDF defenders), and Sixmillopolis to provide suitable urban terrain for them to fight over. All three elements are now essentially complete.

The United Earth Defense Force

The human defenders consist of the veritechs/destroids from the Robotech: Tactics starter box set, augmented with some conventional military forces from GHQ's Modern Micro-Armor range.

The overall UEDF force

Army commander, a VF-1 Valkyrie officer

Tomahawk and Defender destroids

Flight of 2 VF-1's from Grey Squadron

Conventional tanks and mech infantry

If I want to expand this force, I have two more veritechs from the RT starter box I could put together. But these are quite fiddly models to assemble (the battloid mode especially), so that's unlikely to happen unless some external motivation comes along. I'd love to add some more destroids - a couple of additional Tomahawks or some Phalanxs would be perfect. Unfortunately the boxed sets of these go for quite high prices on Ebay ($50USD or more for 4 mechs) so again I'll probably leave this for now. 

The cheapest and most convenient expansion option is unfortunately in many ways the least satisfying - adding more conventional forces, like a second tank company, or maybe some Apache helicopters. These are readily available cheaply from GHQ. The downside is adding them would dilute the sci-fi aspect of the army. But looking at it glass half-full, they would also be usable in non-sci-fi modern games. 

The Zentraedi

The invading Zentraedi are also complete. Again, this force consists mostly of the units from the RT starter box, but this time augmented with a RT Artillery Battlepod expansion box. I've also added in a couple of starship models I had lying around. As with the ship I'm using as an Earth ARMD carrier, these are not canon Robotech vessels, but their overall design aesthetic looks about right for the Zentraedi, so I'll use them to represent orbital fire support.

Army commander in Officers Battlepod

Overall Zentraedi force

Light artillery battlepods

Heavy artillery battlepods

To expand the Zentraedi force I would like to add a second officers battlepod and/or a couple more artillery battlepods. Both of these are available as official RT expansion packs, so it's just a matter of lurking on websites until I see them available at a reasonable price. 

The other thing I'd like to add would be some dismounted Zentraedi infantry. Palladium did have plans to release these as part of Wave 2, but that never happened. However finding a suitable stand-in shouldn't be too difficult - any kind of sci-fi armored trooper with a full face mask could potentially work. Now by Robotech canon the Zentraedi are supposed to be 30 ft tall, so I should be looking at 25mm or 28mm miniature ranges. But I've found a couple of 15mm models that look just right, so I may deviate from canon a bit and have my Zentraedi be "only" 15 ft tall. (Maybe they're from a different fleet that was gene-engineered slightly smaller, or something like that).

Sixmillopolis

My initial nine tiles for Sixmillopolis are basically complete. In the end I decided to glue the buildings down to the tiles. This does limit the possible layouts quite a bit. But still, with nine tiles able to be re-arranged and rotated there are still a huge range of possible cityscapes, and having fixed tiles just makes setting up and packing up so, so much easier. 

Hospital tile

Example suburban tile, with some shops in the lower half of the image and houses on the other side of the street

Another suburban tile, this one a cul-de-sec of all houses

I still have some un-based resin buildings left over. Depending on how many buildings I place per tile, enough for around half a dozen more tiles. Unfortunately I have not found a source for the 1/8th inch MDF tiles. These first nine were cut to size for me by a hardware store in New Zealand. But when I went down to Home Depot they told me OSHA rules don't let them cut pieces smaller than 12". Not sure I believe them (I suspect they just couldn't be bothered), but regardless they wouldn't cut to 8" x 8" for me. Will try a couple of other hardware stores (including other Home Depot branches) and see if I have better luck with them. 

So, Robotech gaming setup is essentially complete. There are still details I could tidy up, and plenty of expansion options. But I have all the elements I would need to set up a demo game at a convention or FLGS which I think people would think looks pretty cool. So now to decide on my next project...