Tuesday 5 October 2021

15mm Space Marines (Blue Moon)

These are have a Space Marine feel with a bit of an astronaut "Moongrunt" vibe.  Thus the blue Ultramarine look mixed with the reflective gold astronaut helmets. I quite like these minis although they don't have many weapon types or poses compared to some of my other armies in 15mm.

I've put in a 15mm figure from each of my recent painting days - you can see there is as much size/scale variation in 15mm as there is in '28'mm aka 25-32mm.

Left to right: Critical Mass Games -> Khurasan -> Blue Moon --> Rebel Miniatures.

The vehicles are GZG, mixed with some toy Star Wars separatist tanks I found in the toy section of a department store. Along with the doggies & mechs from my last post, this completed my afternoon's painting. 

I'm increasingly sure I'm probably NOT going to use 15mm for my space horror homebrew games, but purchase Mantic's remarkably cheap 28mm Deadzone minis instead.  If anyone has any other cheap 28mm humanoid sci fi suggestions, I'd appreciate them. The 20-for-$50 Eisenkern look awesome but I'm not sure how well they'll scale with my existing Tau and IG who will form the basis of my other special forces teams.

But with Australia Post's backlog due to COVID bearing a resemblance to the warehouse in Raiders of the Lost Ark - I'm not holding my breath....

Given the whole reason to make my home-made 15mm rules was to have a unique ruleset  (hard sci fi with a dash of magic) and unique backstory (cultist special forces teams with high-tech gear in a post-Rapture universe).... the 15mm are now kinda out of a job. 

I may make a new set of 15mm rules as I still think there's an unfilled niche - there's plenty of space fantasy (magic, laser swords - Star Wars/40K) and harder sci fi (Alien, Starship Troopers) and cyberpunk (Ghost in a Shell, Blade Runner) but not a lot that blends all of them. Think platoon-level Shadowrun or Infinity with more magic. Hacking + Psychics + Drones + Virtual Combat + AIs + Smart weapons. If I don't lean into the horror/morale angle so much a set of rules should be easy enough to whip up...

..but after watching the TV show Vigil and playing the remarkable PC game Barotrauma, I have been inspired to hunt out my old supercav submarine fighter rules which have been a rather long-running project... since 2012. Actually I've made a range of posts about it including terrain making as well.  It's a game no one asked for, but one I really want to play...

It's a miracle anything gets comple

13 comments:

  1. So your internal struggle in the end leaned for the 28mm single figure rule of cool 😎
    I’m quite sure your beautiful 15mm will find a niche in your hobby time!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 15mm look great in a squad, but I think sci fi horror is best with single models exploring a derelict station - having 20 guys to face down a monster makes the monster less scary - also a smaller model count allows more detailed ammo, morale rules which would bog a game with 20+ minis.

      Delete
  2. Didn't you buy a resin 3D printer recently? This might be the perfect opportunity to search for some nice affordable or even free STLs. Once you own a printer, 3D printable miniatures become unbeatable price wise.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Nah - just have plastic printer which I bought with the aim of terrain rather than minis.

      Delete
    2. Ah, ok, yeah, that's a different beast entirely. For figures you really do need a resin printer if you want to prit something decent.

      Delete
    3. I have super interested kids who always hover, so I decided to dip my feet in with a cheaper and much safer plastic one.
      Resin can be nasty stuff and may not be compatible with a 6 year old...

      Delete
    4. It's not as messy as is sometimes said (printing happens in an enclosure, it's really only during cleaning afterwards you might spill resin) , certainly not once you get your routine down, but I suppose with young kids you never know.

      Delete
  3. These Blue Moon Marines really do the job.

    ReplyDelete
  4. My long term desire for some Moongrunt games have also been recently unearthed (unregolithed?) and I have pulled the trigger on some models. Thats plus the new 15mm range of Machinen Krieger (Ma.K) models which I adore the look of.

    Still looking at rules and what best gives the right feel WRT vacuum/harsh environments. Yes its (which is indeed oversaturated) but the theme is novel.

    Hmmm....SuperCav....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I forgot you are my separated at birth twin. I have some MaK in ?35mm? anyway they are going to serve as bigger mechs which are on the 'to do' table. They are rather flimsy and not great wargame pieces though. 15mm would be much better.

      Harsh environment sci fi actually has NOT been heavily gamed. Well, it could have very specific rules; varying gravity etc which could impact weapon/move ranges; also catastrophic breaches of EVA suits and jetpacks etc more heavily used.

      I used to love Tomorrow's War but it is actually startlingly gluggy and slow compared to what you'd think.

      Maybe Ivan's freebie FAD rules might be worth a look as they're quite complete:

      https://fadwargame.com/assets/Downloads/FAD-Sci-Fi-Rules-v5-b1.pdf

      Delete
    2. Supercav is very likely to get some love based on my current interests...

      After watching the TV show Vigil, I've been playing SH4, SH5, Cold Waters and have bought Uboat (the latter on sale atm on Steam it's like Sims meets SH)

      The other is my PT-boats-in-space; ships the size of the Rocinante/Milennium Falcon dodging through asteroid fields in ambush attacks (basically, SuperCav with a space coating and vector mechanics)

      Delete
    3. Slave 2 Gaming miniatures if I recall for the MaK 15mm.

      Delete