Tag Archives: starship

Rules and more Rules

So many rules, so little time.booksFrom top to bottom:

  • SAGA – The base rules plus all the expansions in the folder that came with expansion #4. I play this a lot recently.  I have a six point Anglo-Dane warband.
  • Dreadball Season 2
  • Dreadball  – Base rules.  I love Dreadball.  I play the base game only so far.  I have a season 2 team, unpainted.  It will get painted soon.  Dreadball is a ton of fun.
  • Monster Hunter International – The RPG based on the novels.  I GM a campaign.  Lots of fun.  Humans with guns fight monsters – werewolves, zombies, etc…
  • Star Wars Edge Of Empire –  RPG. I do not currently play.  It seems like a fun game.  Unique dice mechanic.
  • Eclipse Phase –  RPG. I am a player in a campaign.  Great game, and the most high quality rulebook here.  Very unique sci-fi setting. The printed book is well worth it’s price, however, the rules are also available for free.  Creative Commons rules!
  • Chain Of Command – Just released (Fall 2013) WWII platoon level rules from Too Fat Lardies.  I’ve not played them yet, but they seem really nice.
  • Gruntz – 15mm Sci-Fi rules.  A great introductory set of rules, and you can add complexity later.  I’ve played them a few times.  Fun.
  • Tomorrows War – Another 15mm Sci-Fi ruleset.  Well reviewed, but overly complex and, frankly, the book is hard to read.  Black text on a busy background.
  • Traveller – I have so many great memories of playing Traveller as a kid in the ’80s.  Sci-Fi RPG.
  • Traveller 5  – Not the “final” Traveller I’d hoped for.  Overly complex.

So, that’s my physical rules collection.  In digital, I’ve got a bunch more, but the only digital rules that are not also here in physical form that I play / want to play are:

  • Quadrant 13 – Company level 15mm Sci-Fi rules.  Seems like a great game.  I’d love to play some day.
  • Full Thrust: Cross Dimensions – Super fun space fleet combat game.  I’ve got two full fleets of minis painted up for this game.  Quick, deadly, tactical space combat.  Free rules, too.

How I Got Into Wargaming (Again)

I’m somewhat new to miniature wargaming. I say “somewhat” because I dabbled in wargaming as a teen in the 1980’s, and I am only now getting back to it. (That’s the “Again” part of the title). As you can imagine, things have changed a lot since then.

I read a lot of Sci-Fi, and I was working my way through David Webber’s Honor Harrington series, which contains a crap-load of space battles. I thought that might be a fun genre for a computer game. I was searching the web for a good computer space battle game, and not having a whole lot of luck, when I came across the rules for Full Thrust.

Wow, I thought. Space battle miniatures. Sounds cool. I bought Ground Zero Game’s Full Thrust Intro Fleet Double – 2 sets of 8 ships, from different factions. I painted them and played a few games with a friend. Super fun.

That led to 15mm Sci-Fi ground combat. I read the free Stargrunt II rules, and heard a lot about Gruntz, and ended up buying that and getting a bunch of minis from GZG, Rebel Miniatures and Khurasan.

Now I’m painting up a storm, making terrain, etc.

Here’s the very first 15mm Sci-Fi I ever painted, before and after.  These were painted in February, 2013.

GZG and Rebel Mini's size comparison GZG and Rebel Mini's size comparison

So, I guess you can blame David Webber for writing those books, and my co-worker Matt who turned me on to them, for getting me back into miniature wargaming after all these years. 🙂

GZG Full Thrust Intro Fleet Double – Part 5

case

Spaceship minis really need to be stored with the base attached. I put hours into cleaning, assembling and painting these miniatures, I want to make sure they stay safe in storage and transport. I’ve used camera cases like this one in the past to store microphones. I bet it would be great for miniatures, too. Dedicated miniature cases can be very expensive. This case is $34.99 on Amazon.com. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001HJTK5Y/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00  There are many other sizes, also.

 

case_open

The inside of the case. It has some dividers I won’t use, a set of keys to lock it, and a shoulder strap. There are 3 layers of foam, a thin top and bottom layer, and a thick middle layer that is perforated for easy cutting.

 

measuring

I’ve removed the top layer of foam. I put it back before I close the case and put them away. The middle layer of foam is perforated, so it’s easy to cut along the perforations with a butter knife. I would not suggest using a sharper knife, because then you might cut the foam instead of the perforations. I measured the space I needed for each ship. In this case it was a 3×4 rectangle.

 

cut_fit

It fits. If you accidentally cut too much, glue it back with wood or elmers glue.

 

cuts_with_supports

I cut all the spaces for the ESU fleet. In some cases, I put a chuck of foam back for the front or back of the ship to rest on, but still allow the base to go all the way down. You can use wood glue to hold them in, or just friction.

 

Starship mini storage

Here’s the whole ESU Intro Fleet

 

both_fleets

 

Here’s both Intro Fleets. As you can see, there’s still plenty of room for more ships.

GZG Full Thrust Intro Fleet Double – Part 4

start

This part is the whole UNSC fleet from start to finish. It’s pretty much the same steps from parts 1-3, so I put it all in 1 page instead of breaking it up. Here are the 8 UNSC ships from GZG’s Fleet Intro Pack. As you can see, 6 of them need assembly.

 

bad_cast

This is part of the battlecruiser. You can see the bad cast on the right side. I feel this piece was very poorly cast. Every other piece of every other ship was good, but this one was lame. Note: GZG has sent me a replacement for this part, and it is much better.

 

cleaned_ready

All the flash removed, and all the pieces washed. There was a lot less flash to clean up on these ships compared to the ESU fleet. Each class of ship is in it’s own bowl so I don’t get the parts mixed up.

 

glue

Now for assembly. I used superglue and epoxy. There were some parts that fit very tightly. For these I used superglue, because it sets very fast. Some other parts had some play, or spaces that needed to be filled in. For those I used epoxy. It sets slower, but it will fill in space, and superglue will not.

 

assembled

Here are all the assembled ships.

 

primed

And here they are after priming.

 

in_progress

This is during painting. All ships got a dry brush of dark blue, then a more selective dry brush of lighter blue. Then details in yellow, and some ships got some details in grey. The engines are a dry brush of very dark blue, then a selective dry brush in a slightly lighter blue. Then all the ships got a red and yellow “thruster exhaust”.

 

bases

Now to attach the stands. I used epoxy for this. Only 1 “pole” needed to be glued to the stands, the rest snapped in tight with no glue. All the “poles” are glued to the ships.

 

skirts

Getting ready for sealing. I use a clear matte sealer. I don’t want to get it on the bases, so I made these skirts to protect the base and pole.

 

 

sealer

Outside, ready to seal. It’ about 65 F here in San Diego, CA today (Dec 23, 2012). [ed: When this was origianlly posted, to Imgur]

 

 

GZG UNSC Intro Fleet

The finished fleet. The yellow details came out better on the better cast parts. They are sloppy on the poorly cast battlecruiser hull.

 

 

 

 

GZG UNSC Intro Fleet

A close up of the heavy cruiser.