The Overloaded Queue

Armies in the queue, and the start of a build log

2010-12-22T00:27:00.004-05:00

Since I've been trying to do some paring down of my crap, I thought it might also be useful to get an idea of where my armies stand. Today's post: taking a look at the queue for my VASA forces.

For those not in the know, VASA was an army created for the Void wargame. The game fell out of fashion after the company imploded several years ago, and it was possible to pick up a lot of the stuff for next to nothing. These days, the minis are in production by Scotia Grendel, though I prefer to get reinforcements via ebay and trades. While nobody around here plays Void, There are a number of generic minis games I'd like to get people into like WarEngine and the (possible) reincarnation of Vor.

Anyway, I pulled out the lot last night in the hope that I might get inspired to do something with it all.

That's not quite all of it, considering that VASA can also field militia forces (I think there's another 4 trays worth of those around here somewhere). To do a bit of a breakdown, we have

Black Legion, marks I and II, Archangels, and Shuriken Guard, all of which have wings or somesuch. There's also

Shoguns (giant power armor) plus another dozen Shuriken Guard.

Here, we have the suppressors I mentioned previously

plus their own mechas. The smaller models are the 1/144 scale ones from the Tin Man post, while the box behind it has a 1/100 scale version.

These are some Gundam kits I found recently. In addition to being cheap, they also fit nicely with the stylings of the Shogun suits...

... though I'm not planning on setting these up like cheerleaders.

So as you can see from these photos, there's a few models yet to build, ignoring all of the painting and mini prep yet to do. The Shogun-style stack alone looks like this:

So, to get to things, I've decided to start working on these Gundam kits. Popping open one of the boxes, we get the following:

It turns out that this is another snap-together kit like the Sumos (why didn't they make snap-tite kits like this when I was a kid?), but I'm planning on gluing it together for strength. It's also a 20 year old kit, so some of the details are a little on the soft side. I have a couple of adjustments in mind, filing off some bits and carving in others. Stay tuned, and we'll see if I can get another update in before another 6 months passes!

Opening the box: Votoms 1/48 AG-VTM03 Chaos Space

2010-07-08T22:51:00.003-04:00

As much as I've been working on hacking away at the queue (or more honestly, thinking about doing so), I'm far more successful at adding things to it. On the plus side, of late I've been pretty good at minimizing the genres I'm working on. As noted previously, I'm working on a VASA force with thoughts of using it as an Imperial Guard proxy (when I'm not simply using it as itself in more reasonable game systems). The other force I've been working on is another Imperial Guard type force inspired more by Kevin Dallimore's work for the Hammer's Slammers game. Today's piece had this force in mind.

With HobbyLink Japan running a phenomenal discount on shipping recently, I broke down and ordered a few items I've had my eye on for a while: 1/48 Votoms kits at 70% off. I ordered them on Sunday and promptly got an email telling me they were closed for the weekend, but they would process my order as soon as they opened on Monday. Monday they told me my order had shipped, and that Friday everything arrived. That's better than some stuff I order in country!

On my way out the door to work, the mail truck showed up with my package. I even managed to resist opening it until I got home so that I could finally try documenting one of these. So I present: the box.

From Votoms

They even have their own company boxes, so you can show off to all the other geeks who will lust after your toys!

Opening it up reveals...

From Votoms

Swag!

From Votoms

That they carefully shrink wrapped! My first order from these guys, and I'm definitely pleased.

I picked up the Saint Seiya kits because they were on massive markdown ($4 apiece, or so) and because they'll give me a little practice working with chromed plastic that I need to do before another working on another kit I have. The relevant kits for today are:

From Votoms

I'm very pleased with the production values on these. Nice, matte boxes with great photography to give to an idea of what's in the box and what the model is capable of. Today's kit: Chaos Space!


From Votoms

If only I could actually read Japanese.

Popping open the box reveals...

From Votoms

Not very much on the tray, but underneath we have

From Votoms

Bags upon bags of stuff! And the full package deal:

From Votoms

Before we get to the suit itself, let's take a look inside the baggies. The first one is the display base.


From Votoms

The pegs on the pieces and the holes on the base might lead you to think that there's this wonderful Lego-like free construction ability. Unfortunately, it's pretty much exactly the opposite situation: pegs are set at spaces to precisely fit into a couple of places. Most of the holes are more to hold things like flexible rubber smoke markers and the like.

Ripping into bag number two reveals...

From Votoms

These sprues are of a softer plastic than in the other two bags. I'm not sure how it will take most paint either, though they managed to make *some* kind of paint stick to the smoke and missile effects.

The figures are...

From Votoms

Yeah. Posing and proportions are good, but I wonder whether it was a lack of effort or limitations of the casting material that made for all of the soft detail. I still plan on trying to base and paint them, as they look like they'll be decent unarmed science fiction civilians. However, I'm not expecting to put too much effort into them.

Finally, opening bag #3, we have...

From Votoms

Everything else. All of the armor bits, additional hands, weapons, the pilot, and so on. Paper inserts include...

a datacard, pre-punched for your favorite toy collection binder:

From Votoms

a nameplate standee:

From Votoms

a catalog of other toys:


From Votoms

and the requisite instructions:


From Votoms

The sprues in this set vary in hardness of material, with some of them in styrene and others in the rubbery material shown above. Again, bits of the sprues are pre-painted:

From Votoms

The pilot figure is tucked away on one of the sprues, but it looks a bit small to me. Even comparing it to the smallest of the figures provided, it looks diminutive (though this could be an illusion):

From Votoms

But what about the Votoms itself?


From Votoms

Pretty danged cool! As you can tell, there are very few visible screws holding the thing together, and the paint is subtle, but reasonable enough that it can be left as is. I suspect that if you want to touch up the edges and corners to look a little more abused, the kit would hold it just fine as the bulk of the model is styrene. Articulation abounds, and it's designed to be able to fold forward and pop open to allow for a convenient escape. The head rotates, the lens assembly slides and rotates, elbows, shoulders, ankles, and so on all move quite acceptably.

What does it look like with everything in place?


From Votoms

As an idea, check out the feet here:

From Votoms

The spikes are retractable, for when the unit is firing its cannon. In the words of Eric Cartman, "Sweeet."

Odd details include the slots in the back for the backpack mounting brackets:

From Votoms

This is a small detail on this particular version that you might need to fill in if you want to use it without the massive backpack. (I confess, I'm not familiar with the series or any of the differences between the units.)

Lining everything up, you get

From Votoms

The model is about 3.5" high, so a little shorter than the average Star Wars figure. Unfortunately, the spokesminis seem to be on a little vacation, so comparison photos will need to wait. In the meantime, I can say that eyeballing the Votoms figures vs. an Infinity mini (the Aleph Naga, to be specific) shows them to be right on the money.

Pluses: from what I can tell, it's a spot on sculpt. Scale is quite good, even if I need to compare the pilot vs. some other 1/48 pilot models. And there's nothing saying you can't just mandate that pilots be smaller... I seem to remember the Air Force having height caps. Articulation is sufficient, and the paint is decent. At the discounted price, it's an excellent value.

Minuses: I'm not sure why they chose to model the figures with so little detail, for all of the detail they put into the rest of the set. Some of the detail bits are very fragile: note the left knee in the pics. There's supposed to be a plastic rail there that I managed to snap while getting it in place. I'm planning on replacing it (and a few other bits) with brass rod for added survivability. Finally, there's a lot of parts that are just pressed into place, like the elbow guard extensions and the bum plate. I'm planning on supergluing them in place, but I'd like to make sure that they're all secured before I use this in a game. The clips for the backpack suffer from this fate as well, and I'm not sure if I'd rather have this unit with the pack or not. If I want the pack, the clips need affixing, and if not, the slots will need filling and paint matching. Finally, since it's a pre-assembled toy, there isn't much room for customizing things like limb length (sorry, Inso)

All in all, I'm very happy with the purchase, both from the product point of view and the seller's service. I'm definitely going to have to order more of these... preferably before folks like Frothers swoop in and grab the rest :)

Next up... the Assemble Troopers Marshydog!

2009-10-30T12:57:00.008-04:00

A question that comes up from a lot of people new to miniatures gaming is "What scale is 28mm?" Usually these people are looking to find things like model cars and other accessories from sources that are designing for markets like model railroaders, plastic model builders, and the like.

Here's the problem: 28mm isn't a scale so much as a general height that sculptors use as a reference.

So what is a scale? A fair definition that I found was "the proportion that a representation of an object bears to the object itself: a model on a scale of one inch to one foot." So when you're looking for a scale, that measurement will tell you the fraction of the real item's height as compared to the model. If you're looking at a 1/48 scale model, the real thing would be 48 times larger in each dimension. 28mm really doesn't tell you any of that.

To be fair, Wargames Factory has recently started producing miniatures that they are marking as 28mm as well as what their formal scale (1/56) is. However, most miniature manufacturers don't worry about that, and some of them will even be inconsistent in proportions between their own miniature lines (Compare Reaper's Dark Heaven line to their Warlord line sometime and you should see what I mean... Warlord figures tend to be a good 10-20% taller).

All blathering aside, the reason you're really reading this is not to get an idea of the business model or sculpting style of different companies. You want to know what you should be looking for on the shelf so that it will look good when you get it home.

The guest models in these shots are 1/48 humans that were included with some old Tamiya model kits in my collection. It's worth noting that the blue figure is supposed to be shorter than his compatriots, since he's the standard teen anime mecha pilot. You'll note that while the new figures are a little on the tall side, they're not unreasonable in context. That's because a convention of 28mm sculpting is to exaggerate some body features (like hips and facial features) in order for things to still look right at such a small scale. Because the width is similar, they look pretty good together.

Here, the guest models are 1/60 pilot models from old Bandai Gundam Mobile Suits. These models are downright tiny compared to the spokesmodels. Not only are they shorter, but they're also half as wide (if not thinner), which really demonstrates the scale difference between the figures.

The final guest models are 1/64 Farm Country figures from Ertl. There's really no way these figures could work, because they're just way too small. However, I thought it would be worth showing them, because 1/64 is the default scale for Matchbox and Hot Wheels cars. These figures will also make a comeback when I introduce some terrain pieces that were once highly sought after, and are now mostly garage sale fodder.

So there you have it... call it 1/55, but going a little bigger (to 1/50 or 1/48) should still look good for most items.

Feeling a little rusty, Tin Man?

2009-08-17T23:20:00.004-04:00

One of my recent projects has been an "Oz" themed Imperial Guard force. I'm not going strictly for looks based on the books, more trying to tie units to names. Troop dropships will be gumps (though likely without the stag heads), mechanical troops will be Tik Toks, drop troops will be flying monkeys, and so on. This particular project was Tin Men: large power armor suits. They'll proxy in 40K as Stalkers against opponents who already don't mind the fact that I'm using as little GW stuff as possible to begin with.

The models I selected were 1/144 scale V Gundam Mobile Sumo kits. I chose them because I liked both their price and their looks, and found them to be sufficiently intimidating (not to mention feasibly holding a cockpit in the chest cavity). I wasn't sure about the kits because the only review I found complained that parts couldn't be separated after they were put together for a test fitting... and that was it. Nothing else. So at $5.50 a kit, I ordered three of them and hoped for the best.

Opening up the kits, things look pretty simple: 5 sprues unique to the kit (one of which just holds the "face") and one sprue of polycaps for articulation, plus instructions and a sticker sheet. The kits are recent vintage and well designed, so I had almost no problems with parts not going together like they were supposed to. All but one of those problems were due to the polycap pins not lining up completely.

The instructions are a one page foldout, backed with some colorful photos on how one might choose to paint up these mechs.

So the reason that one reviewer had such a hard time pulling pieces apart? It's a snap-together kit, which is hinted by the sticker sheet rather than a waterslide decal sheet. I chose to glue these kits together anyway.

Each arm took about 20 minutes to build, including clipping, filing, gluing, and cleaning. Part of the added time was because I really wanted to clean the shoulder pieces before gluing the shoulder pads onto them. I saved a little time in subsequent builds by clipping off all of the arm pieces at one go. On the plus side, the polycaps allow the arms to be disassembled easily for painting.

The legs took about the same time as the arms, mostly because I spent a lot of time trying to clean up the seams on the feet. They were just high enough to be visible (to me, anyway), but not high enough to be worth puttying. Like the arms, the polycaps allow for disassembly for painting.

The torso and head took about 10 minutes to assemble and clean.

Once all that's done, you can pop him together and survey your work. He stands many heads and shoulders over the figures that will serve as my main infantry, and I think it's safe to say that these models will be able to serve as giant power armor for figures ranging from 25mm to 40mm.

The good:

They're inexpensive! At somewhere around $7 apiece including shipping, you can quickly bulk up your forces, or just pick some up if you want to to something like have models to practice new painting techniques on. They're also a good size; big enough to intimidate your opponent, but not so big to bring complaints of cheese. Personally, I think that if their added altitude allows them to shoot things, they can also be shot just as easily. I don't claim that they have any cover from anything shorter than waist-high. With their feet close together, these models will just fit on a 65mm round base. At the moment, I'm not sure if I'll end up putting them on 75mm or 100mm bases.

The not so good:

As mentioned above, I thought the seam on the feet could be a little closer, though maybe my expectations are unreasonable. The articulation: the arms move well, but the legs could be better.

The hip connections are on a diagonal, which means that they pivot more than having the range of motion one would expect from a hip joint. Also, the knees are designed to move only through one arc. If there was a pivot just above the knee, the hips would be less of an issue. As it is, these guys are ready to ride giant robot horses, but that's about it. They can't even be posed in a reasonable run or walk. Both forearms have polycaps in them to hold the shield, but since there's only one shield included with each model, you'll probably want to do some puttying on at least one arm. There is also a significant gap between the bottom of the head dome and the the torso. It's fine if you want your model to be able to look around, but it will need a bit of putty work for best appearances.

The otherwise noteworthy:

A number of seam lines correspond to detail lines on the original design, which either means less cleaning or more line work later on. The weapons included are a pistol with a wrist halo, a curved forearm shield, and a hooked melee blade.

The pistols will end up forming the base of whatever ranged weapons I arm these guys with. I'm planning on turning the melee blades into the heads of polearms, but I'm not sure yet whether I'm going to keep the forearm shields.

All in all, fun little builds and well worth it. I'm keeping additional kits in mind in the event that I'm mad enough to try assembling an Apocalypse-level Sentinel squadron. I'm also considering a 1/100 scale "big brother" to proxy for some kind of tank.

More photos as I try out my brand spankin' new airbrush on 'em.

KamehameHAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!

2008-05-06T22:44:00.005-04:00

Lots of films and TV shows lend themselves to adaptation for tabletop gaming. Dawn of the Dead? Check. Road Warrior? Check. Star Wars? You betcha. Robotech? But of course. Happy Days? Mmm... not so much.

So how do you play a game on a tabletop when the main characters are powerful enough to blow up moons? R. Talsorian games gave it a go with their RPG rules for Dragonball Z, but considering that the game and its singular supplement are now long out of print, you may have a hard time finding out for yourself. But should you even bother?

Personally, I probably wasn't as big of a fan as I needed to be to fully appreciate the RPG when I bought it. The vastly disparate power levels, to someone who was used to "balanced" games like Champions and GURPS, made me wonder exactly how to balance things. However, one element that stuck with me was that the publishers acknowledged the large number of DBZ toys and action figures that were on the market, and included a couple of pages on how to use them in your game and how to modify existing ones to look like your characters. It was a nice touch.

And when I say "large number", believe me. Reissues of Japanese figures with articulation at the neck and shoulders (action-tastic!), 2" PVC figures, new sculpts with detailed paint and accessories, and now, Real Action Heroes super-articulated 1/6 scale figures. Fortunately for my need for blog content, they even did a series of 1" tall figures. So how do they work with the spokesminis?

If you like Goku, you have a number of options.

No, really. A whole bunch of options.

Majin Buu also gets a fair amount of representation.

Perhaps a more than fair amount.

The series includes a number of less-important characters...

As well as some just plain smaller ones. (these DBZ figures are mounted on 20mm rounds, for the curious)

With 96 (!) figures in the series, they manage to cover a broad spectrum of the characters, and it's nice to see multiple poses for characters that actually have different iterations (like the Seiyan and Super Seiyan stages... if you don't understand, don't worry about it. You're probably better off.)

What else is interesting about the 1" figures is that a number of them were simple half-size versions of the 2" figures, which allows for some figures to have "regular" and "giant-size" versions. I think Supersystem and WarEngine are the only systems that might make use of such a mechanic, but since they're high on my list, they work for me.

I should mention that the paint on these figures does *not* take acrylics, in the event that you're hoping to give them touch-ups. I don't know about the unpainted pink plastic.

How do I know this? Check out monster Broly up there. The nasty brown spots were my attempt at shading with an ink. I think it was a GW Flesh Wash. It may be possible to hit them with a matte sealer and then paint over that, but I haven't tried it yet.

This is an example of what the back of one of the larger figures looks like. There's serious casting bubbles from the molding process, but the copyright information is just printed on the back.

On the smaller figures, they just carve it in.

Not even the smallest figures are safe. Poor guys! The point is that if you got really gung-ho and wanted to clean up these figures for anything resembling an award level paint job, you have a fair amount of filling to do.

It is worth noting that only recently, Jakks Pacific released giant Shenron dragon figures that do well to tower over these figures. How much do they tower? That base is a 5" CD.

Poor Skunk. No respect. No respect at all.

So you've seen them, and decided that you absolutely need them. How do you find them?

The only thing I can say is good luck. DBZ figures continue to be made, but the more recent iterations are much larger, 2-3 inches tall or taller, and these figures are small enough that they don't exactly rate individual auctions. I can tell you that these figures were released in the US by Irwin toys, and there were 8 blister cards with 12 figures apiece. Past that, you're on your own.

So what do I think of them? Unless you're a DBZ fan, it probably isn't worth your time to track these down. I'm glad I picked them up when I did, as they keep my rebased Heroclix figures company. There is also the benefit that these are recognizable characters, so if you're running a demo of some ruleset, the figures alone can be something to draw people in.

As far as being DBZ toys goes, I don't think they're that bad. The sculpting does a decent job at letting them represent anime characters. Colors are bright, and they occasionally have a surprising level of detail. As I mentioned above, they cover a wide variety of characters, though I am curious as to why they didn't do any of Krillin or Piccolo, two mainstays of the saga.

Happy hunting!

These are the Homies in your Neighborhood

2008-04-30T23:25:00.006-04:00

Most mini games are about the characters: soldiers, superheroes, vampire hunters, and others packing all kinds of implements of destruction. Then there are the villains: werewolves, robots, zombies, ninjas, ninja zombie robots, and the like. But heroes vs. villains can get boring. What you need is civilians! Heroes can rescue them, villains can threaten them, and zombies can turn them into more zombies. As such, I present to you: Homies!

The idea for these particular figures came from Matakishi. I had no idea that there was a release in this scale until I saw these figures in a game report.

It should be noted that these are the "micro" Homies, half-scale versions of the series 3 figures. Any of the regular Homies (or any derivative lines) will be way too big.

If you do an ebay search for "micro homies", you should be able to find vendors selling the complete set of 24 for anywhere from $8 to $15.

These figures aren't going to be for everyone. They are pre-painted plastics, and they are sculpted in a very exaggerated style that some may find unacceptable. They also have a sculpted "(C) Homies China" marking on the back.

However, they manage to have a fair amount of detail, and have great character. Furthermore, urban-style figures in this scale are generally hard to come by, so these figures can fill a unique niche.

All the better to become zombie chow!

(Urban style minis who are better equipped for the impending invasion are slightly easier to find)

If only they had a decent place to live...

Welcome to the Urban Jungle

2008-04-26T00:07:00.010-04:00

When you're looking to construct a city for gaming, there are a number of ways to go. The easiest is to simply find someone like the Miniature Building Authority and buy a finished city. Two problems with this idea are that TMBA doesn't do terribly much in the way of modern structures, and they're also pretty high on the price scale. Option two is to purchase some kits from companies like Litko Aero or Armorcast. These aren't cheap either, and they require assembly and painting. There also isn't all that much variety in the theme from either vendor. The third route is to build a city from scratch, either by casting your own bits with the help of Hirst Arts (or folks who sell finished castings, if you can't invest the time for all the molding) or using techniques detailed by hobbyists like Matakishi.

There is another route, and it's one that a lot of hobbyist are far too willing to discount as looking "cheap": paper terrain. There are a number of companies that produce cardstock terrain, and with a little work, you can create an excellent table for gaming.

The first company I'll look at is Microtactix. These folks were the first company I found who produced PDFs of modern buildings for gaming. When I saw their Twilight Street sets, I was hooked. Buildings were easy to prepare, easy to cut out, and easy to build, and you could assemble a decent city in an evening. Scoring, cutting, and gluing a building like this can be done in 10 minutes once you get the hang of it.

Scored and cut.

A judicious application of glue, and it's time to detail the piece.

When you consider the wide variety of buildings provided in the first two sets, plus the sense of humor involved (they included a strip club, a run down adult novelty store, and a movie theater specializing in porn... are you detecting a theme?), I was hooked. I went through the better part of a pack of cardstock and killed at least one set of inkjet printer cartridges printing out buildings for my city.

Then I moved, and I learned of the durability (or lack thereof) of cardstock terrain.

Once I settled in to my new residence, I availed myself of alternate printing options and tried making up a more durable set of terrain, only to realize that the Twilight Street products were still falling short of my needs.

One nice thing about products with electronic distribution is that their publishers are able to provide sample/bonus content. That way, potential customers can get a feel for the product, and people who buy in to the product have a nice little bonus that they can make use of. In the case of Microtactix, they make their Twilight Street sets available through a number of online vendors such as RPGNow, and they all provide access to each release's sample buildings.

The samples are compactly prepared for a minimum of printing, with one page dedicated to the assembly instructions and the second page set aside for the building itself. The sample kits are also designed to give an idea of the level of detail involved: mostly, these are just boxes, but there are some efforts to add a little bit of detail here and there.

So what's wrong with Microtactix? Problem number 1: the rooftops. All of the rooftops in the Twilight Street sets are marked with a 1" grid. While this is just what the doctor ordered if you're a d20 player, it does a disservice if you're playing a miniatures game where estimating range is a significant element. Granted, if you place the buildings on a board that's marked with an equal grid, then at least all players will have the same ability to estimate their ranges. Personally, I like my terrain to be a bit more flexible (as a side note for Heroclix players: while this is not the case for the demo buildings, all of the buildings in the first and second sets include optional roofs marked with 1.5" grids).

Problem 2: They're small! You don't really realize just how undersized they are until you place figures in front of the doors. Max completely blocks out the entrance to Stinky's Pizza. Particle can barely even see the door! This is one place where scale with wargame minis goes kind of woogy.

Since Citadel introduced the slotta base concept back in the mid 80's, separate uniform bases have become popular with many minis manufacturers. It means less metal needs to be used to cast each model, and it also makes it easier for gamers to cut figures away to be based as needed. In order for it to work properly though, the base has to be thick enough to support the metal tab, which means that figures get even taller, even if they're standing on the scale equivalent of two phone books. When you build your terrain, you'll need to decide whether you're scaling it for the height of the body, or the height of the entire model. My preference is to go for the entire height; that way, if you have open doors, it's easier to move models into and out of your buildings.

Unfortunately, whether the figures are mounted on slottas or washers, they just don't work with these buildings as is. This is not to say that these problems are insurmountable, but the fix for these two issues is the subject of another post.

There is one other problem with cardstock models in general: they are vulnerable to being trampled by rampaging monsters.

Oh my God! It's a lion!

Our heroes gather to witness the devastation first hand.

Where the hell was Booster Gold when the monster was rampaging? At a P.R. shoot. Dumbass.

As for what caused the devastation? I'll let you in on a secret... I'm working on models to be used in J. J. Abrams' remake of Ghostbusters! No kidding! I even have a world exclusive photo of the monster for you, currently code named: Cloverpuft.

ZOMBMG!

2008-04-23T22:42:00.000-04:00

Not like I need something else on the top of the queue...

Vroom!

2008-04-23T21:25:00.000-04:00

One question that comes up frequently among gamers new to the modern genre is "What scale cars should I use?" Over at Small Cuts, Maxxon did a great job explaining why this can be hard to answer for gamers. Of course, knowing what scale to look for is a lot more useful if you have some specific brands and product lines to look for. Maisto and Road Champs are two brands that aim for the 1:43 scale, but that scaling tends to be both inconsistent and too big. 1:48 would be closer, but that scale tends to be reserved for plastic military aircraft models. 1:50 is even better, but most of the products in that scale are models of construction and industrial equipment. Fortunately for gamers, Hot Wheels has started making small collections of cars in the 1:50 scale. As such, I introduce to you: Bone Shaker, from the Custom Classics line.

One thing worth mentioning is that Hot Wheels does a pretty good job of hiding the actual scale of these cars. It isn't mentioned on the package. Anywhere. They also don't make any mention of it on either their kid- or collector-friendly sites. Where is it mentioned? On the peg ends at your local retailer. However, as you can see, the packaging gives you a great chance to see how it compares size-wise to your minis.

Bone Shaker was first released in the regular Hot Wheels line in 2005, and it quickly gained popularity as the the first example of a Rat Rod produced by the company. The unfinished nature shows in the primer grey used on the top and the front of the car.

But enough with the efforts at gaining any kind of credibility about automobile trivia. How does this thing look on the table?

Pretty damned good.

I mean, it's got a skull for a front end! And not in the oversized "SKULLZ!" style of Warhammer 40K, but in that B-Movie badass zombie hunter kind of way.

See what I mean?

Since it has an open top, it'll be easy enough to fit a driver in to run this bad boy through the streets of any area suffering from the heartbreak of undead infestation.

If you want to nitpick, the car definitely works better with the slimmer spokesminis.

Max is more of a motorcycle guy anyway.

Sgt. Alexander could do with a tank more than a hot rod.

'Manda prefers something a bit sportier.

Skunk may be an excellent pilot, but dirtside, he's relegated to riding shotgun.

Superheroes don't need no stinkin' cars.

No, there's something about the chainsaw that makes this terror a perfect fit for Ashley. Of course, if Britney Spears has taught us nothing else, it's that when photographers are on hand to watch hot women stepping out of cars, there's likely to be a gratuitous crotch shot.

Custom Classics cars will run you around $4 apiece at your local Target or *Mart. Give 'em a look!

Ladies and Gentlemen... your spokesminis!

2008-04-22T18:47:00.000-04:00

In showing off how pieces may or may not work with your collection, I thought it would be useful to select a number of models that represent different genres, different builds, different base heights, and different sculpting styles. You'll be seeing a lot of these folks.

From left to right: Skunk, from Heresy Miniatures; Particle, from Four Color Figures/Old Glory; a Warzone Cartel figure that I'll call "Max", occasionally available from Prince August; Ashlee Campbell, from Hasslefree Miniatures; Megapulse, also from Four Color Figures/Old Glory; and finally, a figure from "Babes with Guns" from Mark Copplestone's Future Wars line, who I'll refer to as 'Manda.

I have a way to go before my photography skills can compare to Hyun.

In any case, Here are the gentlemen with a ruler so that you can get an idea of precisely how tall they all are. The ruler is lined up with the center line of all three bases, but I suspect that the perspective of the camera is distorting things slightly. Hopefully this will still be useful as long as I'm consistent with my mistakes.

I chose Skunk for a couple of reasons. First, I love Andy Foster's work. As science fiction is a relatively new pursuit for Heresy, I wanted to give it whatever bump I could with the half dozen or so people who are likely to ever come see this site. Second, Skunk is a slimmer figure, and one of a minority of science fiction figures in that he's not brandishing a firearm. Finally, I love his pose from the side view, looking like he's just loping along. Great character in such a small piece. Also noteworthy for our purposes is that he's mounted on a 25mm slotted base.

As a shrinking superhero, Particle is but one in a pack of three figures that includes 15mm and 10mm scale versions of the same character. Particle is the tallest of this bunch, even being mounted on the lowest base (a 1" round fender washer) and ignoring the fin on the top of his head. I like him because rather than the standard pose/attack look, he's striding onwards, either to get a slice of pizza or to go to Kuala Lampur.

I chose Max because of his proportions: he's a wall with feet. This particular design style seems to have gone out of favor, especially considering that the last Warzone releases from Target tended to be a little narrower. Max makes for a fine big badass that should more than adequately represent the larger 28mm human types in your collection. I'd love to tell you that Prince August stocks him, but I forgot that Target got rid of the Cartel as a faction when they made the second edition of the rules. Best guess is to keep your eyes open on Bartertown or ebay.

Next up: the ladies.

Kev White + Evil Dead homage = babe-a-licious zombie hunter Ashlee Campbell. I selected Ashlee because of her proportions: she's an adult female who's a little shorter than the men around her (as opposed to Maria, who is designed as "petite"). She's also one of my favorite adventurer minis from Hasslefree.

Megapulse is another shrinking super, and she comes packed with a 15mm version of herself. I chose her as a tribute to all of the G.I. Joe fans out there: the sex appeal of the Baroness, plus the anonymity of Cobra Commander. What's not to love? Like Particle, she was sculpted by Bob Naismith, who is known to the pre-painted plastic crowd as the sculptor for the Battleball board game and Heroscape. Can't hurt to try drawing some of those players to the metal side of the table. Both Megapulse and 'Manda have integral metal bases by default and are mounted on 1" render washers.

I chose 'Manda (and a model from Mark Copplestone in general) because of Mark's work with Grenadier's old Future Warriors line, now on sale from EM-4 (and distributed by Tin Dictator in the US). Both the new and the old lines feature clean sculpts without the "gribbly bits" syndrome that infects models from some other companies' science fiction minis these days.

I suppose I should say a word about these folks too. I have a confession: I also like pre-painted plastic minis, as will become a bit more obvious in future posts. To represent that crowd, I present:

Sgt. Drake Alexander, from the Heroscape Master Set "Swarm of the Marro".
A member of the Mistryl Shadow Guard, from Star Wars Miniatures.
A rebased "Booster Gold" figure, from the DC Heroclix set "Hypertime". Booster has been removed from his clix base and rebased on a 3mm thick 25mm round base from Litko Aero.

So, there you have them, the spokesminis of the OQ!

2008-04-19T11:01:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the Overloaded Queue! I've set this up in an effort to answer some questions that keep coming up on various miniatures wargaming boards. Questions like "What scale cars should I use?", "What can I use for buildings?", and "Who makes civilians?" I'm planning on focusing on modern and near-future type pieces, but if there's enough demand (and people willing to supply relevant sample models), I'll work on including other genres and eras as well.

Coming up in the OQ:
Meet the spokesminis: see the miniatures that I'll be using as benchmarks and learn how they compare to each other in scale and sculpt.
These are the people in your neighborhood: Ideas for civilian models.
Baby, you can drive my car: A look at some vehicle models on the market and how they work with the spokesminis.
Time to face the scale: a discusssion of scale in the way that different camps understand it.
Home, home on the table: Buildings from various sources, and what you can do to make them work for you.
Slap my paint up: an ongoing (though likely infrequent) series of self congratulating posts showing the latest pieces to make their way off the queue.
My G-d, it's full of plastic: repurposed items from toy stores, dollar shops, garage sales, and anywhere I run across them.