Versatile Mini's: Ground Zero Games

One of the things I love so much about 15mm sci-fi miniatures is there versatility. It's very easy to set aside multiple uses for the same set of figures -and all the more so because so few 15mm miniatures have the instant "brand recognition" of the likes of GW's Space Marines or Privateer Press' Warmachine Line.

The New Israeli's from GZG's are a case in point. Earlier this year I painted a batch of these figures to represent Mass Effect human marines. Now, with a quick re-paint with a nifty white colour scheme I can use them as Imperial Stormtroopers for games of D6 Star Wars Battles. I also intend to use them as Zaman Droptroopers for games of Tomorrow's War. And, in a pinch, considering I intend to add many walkers to the force (in keeping with the Stormtrooper theme), I could even use them as Tau. However, that being said, I have the GZG UN troopers ear-marked for any Tau invasion of Bad Landing.

What's more, by swapping out the aforementioned walker-type vehicles for more traditional tracked or wheeled vehicles, I can even field these miniatures as an especially well-armoured Imperial Guard force. It's amazing (to me at least) how much use a 15mm gamer can squeeze out of one set of figures, helped along simply by a few minor changes in the force structure and some tailoring of vehicle themes for the force.

But I reckon that for a versatile 15mm alien range, you can't go wrong with GZG's Alien Mercenary sets SG15-X05 and SG15-X08. Three blisters will net you 36 of these monsters -which are ideal for painting up as Gears of War Locust, 40K Orks, the Mercenaries from Fifth Element or any other "thug" type alien race you care to mention -even Star Wars Gamorreans! I only have 36 of these guys at the moment, but I intend to net myself another three packs soon to take the force up to 72. I also plan to add in a few vehicles with a random selection of "Orky" refinements made up out of green stuff. That said, I could have just as easily painted my lads grey and purchased a few of the more insect-like miniatures lines out there for Bio-tech support (Khurasan's insect aliens make for excellent grubs) and painted myself a Locust army instead. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact the grey Locust skin would be lost in the lunar-themed scenery of Bad Landing, I probably would have.

Anyway, that photo just up there is a snap-shot of my first test-miniature for the "Ork" force I'm building for Rogue Trader and Tomorrow's War. I've painted quite a few more of them since then, but dearly beloved is down visiting her mum for the holidays and so there'll be no more photo's till she comes home.

 Hope everyone enjoyed the holidays. Until next time.

15mm GZG Free Trader Crew & The City of Bad Landing.

Crew of the "Glow-Worm" class vessel Sanguinity, if you follow me. Available as two separate blister packs from Ground Zero Games: SG15-X04A and SG15-X04B.

SG15-XO4A

SG15-XO4B

Unfortunately, the lighting conditions for these pictures weren't wonderful (my painting spot-light can only do so much) so the marvellous detail of the GZG sculpts doesn't come through all that well. But let me tell you they're lovely sculpts and instantly recognisable. The reading crew-member in the second picture even has a sculpted moustache. The individual sections of the well-dressed lady's tiara and necklace are also sculpted very cleanly.


Recently, I've been moving away from the concept of 15mm solely in a Mass Effect Context. This should be good news for everyone who follows this blog (all dozen or so of you), especially given it means I'll be posting more often. So, what am I up to 15mm wise?

Bad Landing Terrain Project:

In recent weeks I've set about re-painting my GZG New Israelis. While the Grey colour scheme was very close to what I was after, it just doesn't go well with my "luna-scape" 15mm sci-fi basing. Now they have something of the Imperial Stormtrooper look going for them (pictures to follow). I could have simply changed the basing style, of course. But that would be problematic. You see, my biggest project right now is the creation of a 15mm "Colony" board. The city of "Bad Landing". I'm going for a look inspired by the Hadley's Hope colony from the movie Aliens, with a little bit of the settlement from the BBC TV series Outcasts as well. I'm hoping to portray the settlement through several era's of it's development.

In stage one, it'll be a simple mining/terraforming/geo-survey colony. So the original buildings will be pre-fab and shanty style structures, with maybe a bar, a landing port and a few industrial looking structures or two. Not to mention an atmosphere processor. The terrain piece in the Free-Trader pictures is from this era: it's a repainted Pegasus Hobby's WWII ammo dump. On this board, it will represent the dump for seismic survey charges and mining charges rather than an actual ammo dump, but I think it looks the part.

Another look at the Re-Painted Ammo Dump from Pegasus.

In stage two I'll add small apartment buildings such as those made by Old Crow, a larger hospital, police station and so on. Perhaps even a few agri-domes or an enclosed park of two. This will mark the beginning the colony's growth into a proper town rather than a mere frontier mining settlement. The landscape will still mostly be a barren lunar rock, and the colony will start to look more established and settled. However, we're still talking more Mos Eisley than Star Trek Earth.

Stage three will see the addition of high-rise buildings, corporate headquarters, malls, franchise style stores and the like. By this stage the colony will have more of a "Traveller" look than an near-future look, but there should still be plenty of opportunities for game play. Again, the soil will be of the lunar rock variety, but gene-tailored plants  and open air parks and gardens will make the city look much greener than it did in the early stages.

I hope to have a few more updates on my progress posted soon. Currently, my WIP for the settlement is an industrial-style cess-pit. Other than the fencing around the edge, it's almost done. After that, I have a few more buildings in mind. You won't be seeing any actual habitat buildings for a while though. I need to order in some building parts from Jon at GZG before I have a go at those. My skills with the old Green Stuff simply aren't up to the task.

In the Emperor's Name

Last night, I had the chance to lead my Imperial Guard squad in support of Gary's Inquisitorial Kill Team in my first ever game of "In The Emperor's Name," a set of skirmish rules based on GW's 40k Universe.

It is a simple, un-complicated and (best of all) free system which was frankly a delight to play. So much so that I've now been persuaded to follow up our successful rescue of a captured Throne Agent from the evil clutches of a Genestealer Cult by taking part in a new campaign.

Unfortunately, I didn't bring my camera with me to the game. But I shall do better next week, when we're having another practice game. Now that I've seen how my force works I have a few ideas about how to improve it. Alas, Commisar Savage, did not survive the first practice game, so my new force will be based around the very capable L.t Mason, who did survive the skirmish (and covered in glory too). I plan on adding an Ogryn and a sniper to my force for next week's game.

You can download this awesome little game and try it out for yourself, here: 

Look out for pictures and a game report soon.

Volus: Rebel Miniatures

Vorcha: not the first Mass Effect race one thinks of when it comes to war-gaming. For one thing, they look like short, cuddly teddy-bears with all the fur-shaved off (and that's just when ther're in their life-support suits)! For another, the Volus  are a client race of the Turians, and who needs an army when the Turians have you're back?
Well, the Volus. Apparently.
Rebel Miniatures have a lovely pack of miniatures in exo-suits called the Sons of Thunder. Like the Vorcha, they are short, fat and heavily armour-plated. If the Volus had an army, this is what their soldiers would look like:

 There really isn't any need to offer further comment is there? I mean, c'mon, even their fat butts are Volus-sized?
$10.95 for a pack of 21 miniatures. However, that said, Rebel Miniatures are currently having a summer sale. Well worth a look. It's almost enough to make we want to collect a platoon. But be warned, these are all the sculpts you get. The afore-pictured sculpts constitute the entire range.

Converted Salarians and Asari

A few days ago I reviewed a selection of critical mass miniatures suitable for the ME universe with just a little conversion work[link]. So here they are. As you can see, I'm hardly the greatest sculptor in the world when it comes to the old milli-put, but I don't think they look too bad at all. In fact, if I'd just left the two "horns" on the Salarians un-split they'd have made good Battarians as well.

You may remember that I actually bought two packs of both these blisters. The five of each I've painted so far will serve as an Asari Commando team and a Salarian Special Tasks Group squad respectively. I intend to paint the other two packs as player characters, with one or two miniatures sneaking their way into mixed race merc squads.

By the way, about the paint-job: the highlighting was much better before I put the matt varnish on. I don't normally use varnish when painting 28mm, but on 15mm it seemed pretty much essential. What I hadn't realized was that it might have been smarter to put the matt coat on before highlighting. Ah well. Live and learn.

Alliance and Quarians: Rebel Miniatures

Rebel Miniatures produce a number of fine 15mm ranges, but it's their sci-fi range (unsurprisingly) that offer the most to Mass Effect Gamers.
While I've been busily painting away to produce an Alliance Armoured Infantry Platoon assembled from the very awesome New Israeli 15mm line from Ground Zero Games,  the Rebel Miniature's Earth Force range very nearly came up trumps.
Two products from the Earth Force Range and most of the Sahadeen range are of particular interest for gaming in Mass Effect universe:

The following images are all from the Renegade Miniatures website and are used without permission.

Earth Force:

  

Earth Force Armoured Troops:

To my mind, the armour on these miniatures is extremely evocative of the few glimpses we receive in the ME universe of Alliance Marine armour. The pack costs $10.95 in US money and for that you receive 21 of these nifty looking miniatures in the five poses shown.
The main draw-back for me (and the reason they didn't make the cut as my Alliance Marine miniatures of choice) is the limited number of poses and the distinct lack of squad or fire team level support weapons. Normally I would  still pick up a pack to represent Alliance Special Forces troops, but instead I'll probably use them as human mercenaries, pirates, private security or Cerebus troops instead. Why? Because the next featured Rebel Miniatures pack is even more evocative of Mass Effect humans (and Shepherd in particular) than these guys.

Earth Force Infiltrators:

While the Armoured Troops above remind me of the various Alliance Marines encountered in the original ME (normally found lying face down in a pool of their own blood) this set is perfect to represent Shepherd, Ashley, Kaiden and similar Alliance N1-7 types. The N, as any ME fan knows, being the Occupational Speciality Code for Special Forces. 
Like the similarly priced Armoured Troops the set suffers from a lack of variety in sculpts and an even more distinct lack of weapons variations. In ME terms, they would all appear to be wielding shotguns. Weapon swaps are easy enough given the way these sculpts are posed however (if a bit fiddly at 15mm scale) so this factor is not as limiting for our purposes as the weapons-load of the Earth Force Armoured Troops. I'll be picking up a pack of these guys (but only one) to convert and paint as human character models for my ME roleplaying game (fortunately there are male and female sculpts in evidence). The rest will see use on the table-top as an Earth Alliance Marine Special Forces team or possibly even as Alliance Corsairs. They also come as nifty bike set as well (not pictured).

Sahadeen Army
Moving on we come to the Sahadeen Army range, also by Rebel Miniatures. The entire range of four sets (excluding the tent set) are ideal for use as Quarians with just one or two simple caveats. Firstly, while most of the figures are hooded and masked, several are bare-headed. However, this is easy to fix with a little milli-put. Secondly, they are distinctly lacking in armour plating in ME terms, being limited to obvious shoulder and knee pieces (though the chest could arguably- also be painted as armour plates in some places). However given that Quarian armour is somewhat intricate in terms of decoration over practical functionality, this should not be too much of  a problem to overcome providing the right palette is used on cloth areas. Finally, although masked, none of the miniatures wear a full face visor. Again, easy enough to solve by simply covering the miniatures face and cloth mask with a flat piece of milli-put.
Now on to the miniatures.

Sahadeen War Maidens:

These miniatures have to be the pick of the range for me. Though only four poses are shown in the image, five are listed in the product description. Again, 21 miniatures for $10.95 US. Three of the four poses depicted have the advantage of already being hooded and masked, so very little conversion work will be required to get these figures looking in a Quarian way.  Weapon choice is (again) limited, a very common situation with Rebel Miniatures, but these would make for good Engineer character types. Possibly adepts or infiltrators as well with the right weapon swaps. Tali could use shotguns in ME and ME2 -and those Earth Force Infiltrators with their "shotguns" would look great with War Maiden pistols and vice versa. For me this is a great little set and excellent value for money.

Sahadeen Infantry:

Use these to represent the male members of the Quarian fleet. Like so many Rebel Miniature's products, they come in packs of 21, five poses, for $10.95. Three of the five poses are masked and hooded and require little work with the milli-put to convert into Quarians. Of the other two, one is holding the same long-arm as the three hooded troops. The fifth and final miniature appears to be a leader figure wielding a pistol. There's not much to say about these guys that hasn't already been mentioned in previous paragraphs except to say they are, likewise, a very nice set of sculpts and excellent value for money.

Sahadeen  Gun Team and Heavy Weapons Team:

These final two sets are what round-out the collection and make the Sahadeen range a playable Quarian army for Mass Effect. The Gun Team. Six excellent figures - 2 spotters, 2 gunners and 2 "support troops" (that's coolant-clip loaders and barrel-changers to you and me) for just $4.99. My only niggle with this set is that the gunner seems rather exposed and naked. This can easily be solved by adding some cover to the base. After all, if he didn't have a rock to hide behind, he'd be lying down and ignoring the tripod. Best of all, they're all masked. So less conversion work required (though the spotters visor will be a bit fiddly to fit around those binoculars).

Finally we have the Heavy Weapons Team: $3.49 US for six (arguably eight) miniatures: 2 sniper teams, 2 squad support weapons (SWA analogues) and 2 missile launchers. Great value for money and vital for rounding out all those long-arm equipped troopers into balanced squads and fireteams. In this last case, fully half the sculpts have their hoods pulled back and sculpting the visor on the spotter figure is going to be an issue, but otherwise a fantastic little set at a great price, though you'll need several to round out your Quarian army.

Mass Effect PCs: Asari

Elder states-beings of the Citadel Races, the Asari have resided on the Citadel longer than any other extant race other than the Keepers. One of the two founding races of the Citadel Council, the Asari have always served as the mediators and centrists of the Council races.

The Asari  race is entirely female. Asari reproduce through a form of parthenogenesis in which they attune their nervous system to that of another individual of any gender, and of any species, to reproduce. Consequently, Asari have a not entirely justifiable reputation as a somewhat sexually promiscuous race.
Asari can live for over 1,000 years, though few do due to a variety of causes such as accident, war and disease. In the Maiden stage of their lives, Asari often wander restlessly, seeking new knowledge and broadening their life experience. When the Matron stage begins, they "meld" with suitable partners to produce and raise offspring, believing that the child inherits the best qualities of the "father" (which, contrary to common rumour, can obviously be another Asari). Finally, Asari who out-live their body's fertility progress to the third and final stage of life, the Matriarch stage. At this point an Asari assumes the role of a respected leader and councilor.

Due to some biological quirks, Asari appear to be attractive to many races, not merely humans. For example, the tentacle like head-structure on the back of their skulls reminds many Tuarians of Tuarian bone-plates. Even Salurians seem to find Asari skin tones attractive and pleasing, despite not being a particularly sexually-driven race.

The in-born Asari ability to manipulate their own nervous system in order to reproduce makes them a race of powerful biotics. The very process of learning how to control ones own Nervous System has much in common with the basic biotic training systems of other races.

Due to their long and productive life cycle, Asari rarely make hasty decisions, at least in comparison to other races. Asari far prefer to take the "long-view" in any decision making process. Few Asari are comfortable in taking decisive action, preferring a long period of study and observation to making a rapid decision that may later prove io have been ill-considered.This is the source of their traditionally centrist views. That is, a certain desire to maintain the status quo in matters of military, economic and political balance.

Internally, Asari government relies on Consensus. Having evolved from the government of city-states on their home-world of Thessia, any and all Asari are expected (and frequently do) offer comment on all levels of governance, from the city-level to the highest reaches of inter-planetary and Citadel rule. However, in nearly all cases, the opinions of he younger Asari taking part in any discussion almost always defer to those of the Matriarchs present.

Cascade Failure Rules
  
Asari Modifiers:

• All Asari begin play as multi-classed characters with two class choices. At least one class choice must be Kinetic or Empath, to reflect their early biotic training and abilities. All experience point awards must be split between the two classes, though it is not required that the xp be split equally.

• +2 to Kinetic Saving Throw

• Charm counts as a class skill for all Asari characters.