Current Projects - June 2021

Had last week off work as a "staycation". As such I had a fair amount of free time, so I finished off pretty much all of the models I currently have with me. 

First up, the Ohmu that Vaughan printed; 

I went with the desert tan colour rather than the original dark green because I have thoughts of including this guy into the Zhaleed Empire force for Sierra Foxtrot. Went with blue eyes because that was the best colour I had paints available for at the time, and it goes well with the tan. 

Next project, the Starblood Stalkers lizardman team for Warhammer Underworld; 

I had played a few games of Underworld against Vaughan, and quite liked it. It's a neat little low time-investment game, with some cool looking models. The Starblood's were on my short-list of teams I was considering, and they happened to be in stock at the local gaming store.

Lastly, I finally finished off the Astrodani vehicles my brother printed for me. The blocker for these guys had been finding a good way to shade/highlight the bright yellow, and I finally found a method an acceptable method - basecoast, black wash, touch up the yellow, then drybrush with a cream colour. 

The complete Astrodani war-host

Hobogoblin IFVs

Sylph AA Vehicles

Ifrit Rocket Artillery

So this gives me 7 infantry transports (two platoons of 3, plus a command vehicle), a pair of AA vehicles, and a rocket artillery battery of 3. The infantry to go with this force have been received at a friends place in Madison, so once I get back it should be pretty quick to get this force completed. 

Progress on the Astrodani

Being still in New Zealand I've been limited on what wargaming projects I can make progress on. But one that I can work on (at least a bit) is the Astrodani for Sierra Foxtrox. A burst of enthusiasm has seen the infantry transports, AA vehicles, and rocket artillery mostly base-coated; 

So just most of the black segments and washing/drybrushing still to do. Then all I need is the infantry models to go with them. Which nicely segues to...

Projects Waiting At Home

Trying to look on the bright side of things, when I finally do get home there will be two complete armies waiting for me - a mechanized infantry company of Thrainites (Space Dwarves) and the remaining Astrodani units. 

As an aside here, I owe a huge thanks to Khurasan Miniatures. Despite the order being returned unclaimed not once, but twice (the neighbor I gave as an alternate address moved out at exactly the wrong time) they still contacted me both times to ensure I received it. 

I've ordered a mix of different Thrainite infantry models - base infantry, heavy weapons, command units, and (if I remember my order correctly) some of their nobles in power-armor, along with enough transports for them all; 

• Trainite Troopers
• Trainite Power-Armor Infantry
• Cane Toad IFV

As an aside, the Thrainite list is one of the few where I am using the models with the same backstory (or pretty close) to that provided by the manufacturer. With most of my 15mm sci-fi armies I've just been mixing and matching whatever models I think look cool and/or fit a concept I've come up with. The name and background fluff  given by the manufacturer I seldom use. But in the case of the Thrainites, the Khurasan fluff is pretty close to what I was going to go with anyway - originally a human colony, but became isolated, and conveniently evolved into Space Dwarves. I've changed how they became isolated to fit the history of my sci-fi universe, but left them otherwise unchanged. 

Other Gaming Stuff

While I haven't been able to paint many models while in New Zealand, the lack of COVID restrictions has meant I've been able to get in far more in-person gaming than I did during the whole of 2020. Last weekend my brother and had another Dreadball match, this time my Nameless versus the Kalyshi.

 

Another fairly close game (hence why just the one picture, I was concentrating too hard on tactics and forgot to take more). Vaughan got an early lead and never gave it up. I put four guards on the table and played fairly defensively, but Vaughan did a decent job of carefully picking the defense apart. In particular the Undulan/Sticky guards proved to be very vulnerable to Slams from behind... especially against the Kalyshi Backstab ability. 

Space Imps

 Last few vehicles have been printed, so I now have all the vehicles for the Astrodani force.

In the image above we have; 

• 7 x Infantry Transports (2 units of 3, plus a command)
• 3 x Tanks
• 3 x Rocket Artillery
• 2 x Anti-Aircraft

Battle tanks

Rocket artillery

So the next step is getting these guys painted up. After that it's some infantry to disembark from the transports. I've decided on the models (the Soriog from Khurasan, pictured below), but don't want to order them until I'm home (still in New Zealand right now). I've also written up some background fluff for the force...

The Astrodani

The enigmatic Astrodani are one of the few high-tech alien species humanity has encountered. They are often refered to as Space Imps, both due to their appearance and their chaotic, unpredictable behaviour. In one encounter an Astrodani force might suddenly appear and save a human colony from a Malroid attack. The next week they might just as suddenly make a targeted strike destroying three buildings from the same colony.

Biologically the Astrodani are greyish-brown skinned humanoids, with feline looking faces, short, soft fur covering most of their bodies, and two foot long tails ending in a distinct point. Their technology is significantly more advanced than Terra - roughly on par with the Serpents, but not as advanced as the Malroids or the Citadel. 

The Astrodani's random, often seemingly pointless actions are explained by their religion. They worship an ancient supercomputer built by an extinct alien civilization. Known as The Basilisk, the Astrodani obey any instruction this machine gives them without question. It is not known if there is some deep purpose behind its instruction that cannot be comprehended by mere human-level intellects... or if it is simply malfunctioning in some way.

Forming up the Astrodani

With the first prototype 3D printed Croft vehicles coming out well, my brother Vaughan ran another batch. So now 9 mostly complete vehicles, plus a couple of turrets and some odds-and-ends parts. 

We've produced turrets for four vehicle types - an infantry fighting vehicle, an AA-vehicle, a MLRS, and a tank.

IFV

Anti-Aircraft Vehicle

MLRS

Battle tank

Minor confession, I haven't necessarily used the correct parts for each variant. For example, originally we printed 8 of the AA tanks, which was more than required. So I put a small wing and missile launcher on 6 of these turrets to make 6 of what I'm calling an IFV. Likewise I don't know if the turrets I glued the MLRS launchers and tank main cannon to are the ones they're supposed to have... I just know they come out looking OK to me, and I'll use that combination for any more we print.

Experimenting with the 3rd Dimension

Today I had my first hands-on play around with 3D printing. And first impression, it's a cool technology, the end products are excellent, and I can definitely see myself making more use of it in future. 

The 3D printer in question is an Ender 3 owned by my brother. I've ordered 3D printed models before, but had never actually seen any printed and I wasn't really familiar with the details and practicalities of how it works. It turned out to be quite simple. 

The subjects we were printing were the Croft range from DRS  - very Eldar-esque grav-tanks. Like most of DRS's ranges the basic vehicle is available in a number of variants, from troop transports, to tanks, to AA. My brother set it up for me and here are the first couple we printed (both the AA variant); 

The raw material this printer works with comes as a spool of plastic filament 1.75mm thick. The printer can be set up to get the file by directly connecting to a PC, or (as in this case) loading it onto an SD memory card. It took around 4-5 hours to print each of these vehicles. Which for reference are around 6cm / 2.5inches long, and use 50g of plastic. 

So yeah, definite fan and convert to 3D printing, and I can see myself using this more in future. 

One comment I will make is that 3D printing is potentially a very economically disruptive technology. These models for instance, DRS sells complete printed minis for £16, which is about the norm for 15mm vehicles. However they also sell the .stl template to print them for only £8 (this includes all the variants), and it takes only around £1 worth of plastic to print each vehicle. I'm planning on producing around 10-14 of these things to form a company sized unit, so rather than £160-200 it's only going to cost me around £20 (of which DRS only gets £8). Obviously that won't justify DRS's time and effort in creating the .stl file, so it's not a sustainable business model.