Brigade Models - New Terrain

Brigade Models has been hard at work with the Imperial Skies Kickstarter but as things are coming back to normalcy they have released a few wonderful bits for 15mm science fiction.

The release is a set of outbuildings for their Advanced Buildings. These are perfect for small habs, workshops, sheds or other light utility structures. The second set is a bunch of "widgets" for use on the tops of the Desert Buildings, though I see no reason they wouldn't work on other structures. If you are like me, you love these sorts of add-ons for your own scratch built terrain.

B15-210 – Small Utility Building – £4.00
B15-139 – Building Detail Widgets – £3.00

Brigade Models - New Scenery and Weapons

Some awesome new stuff from the folks at Brigade Models. Continuing with their growing 15mm science fiction scenery range they add a new, raised colonial housing structure along with some new weapon emplacements.

Here's what they have to say about it....

Some houses in the desert wastelands are built up on high plinths to keep them safe from predators – this is one such design, accessed by a single stairway to a raised platform. This new 15mm building is available today.

I’ve also been tinkering with some of our recent releases, combining them with other parts to see what I could come up with. In particular, the new Fasolini tracked gun units have all sorts of possibilities. I’ve added a missile launcher and radar dish to the tracked base to create mobile anti-tank and comms systems, as well as a 5-barrel gatling weapon, known as the Lucane (Stag Beetle) family. I’ve also put the single-barrel gun on a ground mount to create a light AA gun (the quad gun was unfortunately a bit too big to fit the base and overbalances). These are listed under the EuroFed.

B15-130 – Plinth Dwelling – £10.00
SF15-416b – Lucane Tracked Missile System – £4.00
SF15-416c – Lucane Tracked Radar Unit – £3.75
SF15-416d – Lucane Tracked Gatling – £3.75
SF15-416e – Ground-mount AA Gun – £3.75

Cell Block-H

From Brigade Models.

One of the most popular 15mm building sets we’ve come out with has been the Research Base. Possibly because it’s a very versatile design that will stand in as a military barracks, PoW or prison camp or general purpose civilian huts. Today we have a new addition to the base, a double hut connected by a central corridor – in other words, an H-Block. In its original guise as a cold weather research base it means that the occupants can move from hut to hut without stepping outside in the cold, which has to be a good thing !

B15-505 – H-Block – £10.00

Check out more - HERE 

New Research Station Buildings from Brigade Models

A few weeks back Brigade Models previewed their new 15mm Research Base buildings. The models are now all ready to go and are available from the website today. The display models have been painted in bright orange colors as an Arctic base, but the models could equally be used as a base in any other setting – jungle, mountain, desert etc. The buildings would also make a good Nissen Hut replacement for airbases or barracks.

The Research Base set includes a command center, two accomodation blocks, a garage block and storage shed, along with some clutter pieces such as a small container and storage boxes. The four buildings are also available individually.

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B15-500 – Research Base Set -£30.00
B15-501 – Accomodation Block – £6.00
B15-502 – Command Centre – £8.00
B15-503 – Small Garage Block – £6.00
B15-504 – Storage Hut – £3.50

Cataloging Sci-Fi Buildings in 15mm

Today we have a guest post from Hans over at Trojan Points. Based on the Catalog posts that we did last year (and need to update!), he compiled a definitive list of 15mm Science Fiction Buildings available today. Let us know if anything was overlooked in the comments, and then we'll copy this article over to a permanent sub-page like the others.

As both a complement and an homage to Dropship Horizon's very useful miniatures catalogs (Extraterrestrial Lifeforms, Non-Biological Lifeforms, Human Power Armour and Non-Military Humans), and generally awesome blog, the Architecture Department of the Trojan Institute of Technology has been busy reporting architectural trends in the 15mm future! Excluding unique scratch-built designs, our specialists have classified most buildings in the galaxy under five categories: Prefabs, Industrial Buildings, Third Wave Buildings, Shanties and Alien Buildings. Furthermore, they've identified a new trend: buildings scratch-built from local materials but upgraded with standardized Parts and Fittings...

While the concept of ready-to-live dropped-from-orbit buildings has often been discussed, most colonies start with some sort of Prefabs.

Prefab Military Base from GZG's store

• round Zero Games Military Prefab and Base Modules is available as a Basic Module, a Command Module fitted for extra aerials, a Communication Module with a large satellite dish, a Module with Air-Defense Canon and a double-length Barracks Module. Don't let the “military” appellation fool you: they're often available in surplus and bought by the no frill budget conscious colonist!
• The options with Gamecraft Miniatures Tommorow's War Structures seem endless. Several sizes of habitation modules you order by the floor (and thus buildings you make as high as you want), several landing pads (large, small, rooftop, elevated), a garage, a mech hangar, cargo pods, radio mast, security walls and walkways... And I won't even go into their modern but so easily re-purposable buildings or into their spaceship interior modules: this post is already becoming much longer than I expected.
• Antenociti's Workshop currently offers a single MDF Colony Habitat, but their large offer of Made for Infinity buildings hints to more in the future. They also have some concrete barriers and some rather “scale virgin” 28mm terrain that can easily be re-purposed for 15mm: air filters and movers, holo ads, info hub, missile silos, generator, alien artefact and various crates and containers.
• Constantly pushing the envelope of laser cutting, CorSec Enginering mixes the flexibility of styrene and the ease of assembly of MDF to promise shapes unseen so far... Starting with a Quonset Hut

Most colonies (although not all of them) are created to take advantage of some local resources. So once basic lodgement has been taken care of, the next order of business for more colonists is Industrial Buildings.

CMG incredible Kyushu Bay refinery at Salute 2012

• With 16 different resin models (all with simply detailed interiors), Critical Mass Games produced Arc Fleet Buildings are ready to seriously boost your colony industrial base! I especially love the Otilium Refinery and its 3 sorts of assorted storage tanks! Don't forget their Comms Towers and Satellite Dish accessories.
• In need of a command center for your base or of a control tower for your spaceport? Combat Wombat Miniatures makes a resin “pile up the levels as high as you want/can” modular building!
• Blue Moon Manufacturing makes 4 different industrial looking resin buildings (one of them with a clear plastic dome).

Third Wave Buildings are so called because after prefab and industrial buildings, they constitute the third wave of building on most colonies, usually as a replacement/upgrade to the first wave prefabs.

Old Crow Apartments Blocks on ClearHorizon

• Old Crow Models might be on temporary hiatus but their resin 2 and 3-stories matching apartments blocks are, in my opinion, (among) the finest 15mm sci-fi buildings ever produced!
• Designed by Krazy Ivan's War Games Emporium and manufactured by GameCraft Miniatures, the Wired West range brings Space Western (boardwalks and false fronts, Firefly style): 3 small, 3 medium, 3 large and 3 corner buildings, each with 2 accessible stacked floors (ground and first), covered boardwalk and false fronts.
• They walk the line between early Third Wave and Alien: Brigade Models produces a dozen desert buildings (various houses, a landing pad, a workshop, a research lab and a bunker).
• Again early Third Wave or Alien, 5 original Desert Dwellings made by The Scene .
• Mad Mecha Guys produces a rapidly growing range of MDF condos, shops, bunkers, garage, containers, barriers, roads and signage... Relatively simple blocky design, but with plenty of variations in size and shapes,don't they just beg for some Parts & Fittings?

Shanties are improvised dwellings made from scrap materials and build to compensate the lack or scarcity of other types of building. Unsurprisingly they're usually inhabited by the poorer fraction of a colony (which on certain planets might be most people).

A GZG Shanty Town, complete with bars and containers

• Made of walls (5 front, 5 back, 3 left and 3 right) and roofs (5) that can be assembled in any combination, Ground Zero Games makes just over 1000 (more if you count the chimneys) different Colonial Settlement Buildings. They are often encountered amid discarded shipping containers, some of them re-purposed as the colony watering hole (sometimes with the addition of a lean-to side extension  for the kitchen or store).
• I was lucky enough to grab 8 out of the 9 unique resin shanties produced by Battle Works Studios before they went off the grid. With removable roofs and a unique system of telescopic masts they look even more improvised than GZG's. Rumor has it that these will go back into production someday...

Alien Civilisations bring with their culture unique takeson architecture. One can indeed lear a great deal about their way of thinking and living by studying the way they build their dwellings.

CMG Tokaan IV board at Caronade 2011, 

picture from Iron Mammoth's Studio

• Critical Mass Games does it again: 2 sets of 2 buildings (one medium, one small), a large command center and 2 different 3-storys high Great Pyramids; enough variety for a full table pyramids-obsessed-alien colony! Matching power nodes and converter in the accessories section.
• Officaly Licenced for Tomorrow's War (who cares frankly?), Gamecraft Miniatures Marshborn Crusties Structures are available as 3 different MDF building and matching elevated walkways, ramps and docks.
• Although listed under 28mm Scenic, Scotia Grendel Productions offers a nice range of domes (command, landing pad, quad bunker, hospital, power plant, observation tower and various turreted ones) and corridors to link them that are much better scaled for 15mm than for 28mm. They also have some standalone missile silos and weapons emplacement.

You want to upgrade that local materials (read scratch-built) or traditionally constructed (read building originally designed for historic games) dwelling with the comfort of whichever century you live in? You need parts and fittings!

A foam core box with various GZG Parts and Fittings, from GZG store

• Doors, windows, hatches, air conditioners, vents, exhausts, comms dishes, aerial bases, solar arrays, circuit panels, junction boxes, power units, drums, palets, containers: Ground Zero Games has them in all manners of shapes and sizes. They might well have invented the concept too...
• Antenociti's Workshop also offers a whole range of doors, windows, hatches, vents, grates, fans, air conditioners, solar panels and crates.
• Khurasan makes Street Lights, Dumpsters and a single set of Air Conditioners but also furniture and civilian Street Cars to fill your streets.
• The Scene has a range with plenty of doors, windows, vents, hatches, and roof fittings.
• CorSec Engineering also offers you a strudy fence system, complete with gatehouse and watchtowers, which posts can be used with metal, wooden or laser beams to keep those nasties in. Or out... Not to mention their mention their flat styrene doors, windows and vents.

I voluntary restricted myself to production models (not custom builds), sci-fi (not anything else usable for sci-fi) and buildings (not natural terrain). Even so, I probably forgot a few items: I stand ready to be corrected and to discover new gems!

Hans from Trojan Points

More Desert Buildings from Brigade Models

Lots of new goodies for your 15mm spaceports, colony worlds, or even near-future desert settings. From Brigade Models:

New Construction 15 

So welcome to the latest batch of new releases – this time, we’ve added eight (eight!) new buildings to our 15mm SF Desert Buildings, to allow a nice little town to be put together. 

B15-103 Large House/shop – £10.00 

B15-109 Villa – £15.00

B15-112a Outbuilding #1 – £3.00

B15-112b Outbuilding #2 – £4.00

B15-116 Workshop – £6.00

B15-117 Landing Pad – £12.00

B15-118 Research Lab – £10.00

B15-119 Medium House – £6.00

Brigade Models Previewing More 15mm Sci Fi!

Brigade Models have acquired some of PF’s marvellous 15mm sci fi sculpts which they’re hoping to release very soon. These figures will be available in 4 packs, each with 5 figures. We've been raving about how good these sculpts are for a while here on the Dropship so it's great to see more in production!

As you can see from the pictures above, Brigade are in the process of making production moulds and Tony at Brigade is hoping to release the first two packs, Alien Civilians (pictured above) and Alien Creatures,  within the next 2 weeks, followed by Bounty Hunters (pictured at the top of this blog post) and Mercenaries a few weeks after that. The price is likely be around £2 per pack.

The Dropship Crew think that, with sci fi skirmish games like 'Blasters and Bulkheads' and '5150:New Beginnings' and the upcoming 'The Department' in the market place, there should be quite a bit of demand for 'character' sci fi figures through 2012 and beyond!

Brigade have also ploughing ahead with the expansion of their 15mm sci fi buildings range. According to Tony at Brigade Models the first two, which we released to test the waters, have sold well and Brigade are planning more releases in the near future. These buildings have a familiar “Mud Eisley” feel to them and we’re looking forward to seeing what else they come out with!

Why not check out the Brigade Models Blog for further information.

New 15mm Buildings from Brigade Models

Brigade Models have just announced some new 15mm buildings that should be available shortly. These are upscaled versions of Brigade Models' recent 6mm desert buildings range and are small dwellings that have a strong "Mudisley" feel to them. These are just the first of the range of buildings due from Brigade and there are apparently several more in development, including some more futuristic designs.

 

The Dropship previously caught up with Tony at Brigade to hear about his ambitious plans for 15mm sci fi so we're sure there's more to follow, including Neo-Soviets and Pacific Federation in 15mm.

15mm Sci Fi Potential at WorldWorks Games

 
If you are looking for some different Sci Fi terrain then take a look at some of WorldWorks Games more recent releases. WorldWorks produce a large range of download and print terrain for Modern, Fantasy, Horror and Sci Fi gamers. Reduced by 60% on your printer their products can easily be utilised by 15mm Sci Fi buffs.

I know some of you already utilise the Modern 'Mayhem' porducts and a few, like me own Mars Station. If you are a fan of the Xbox game Mass Effect, then take a look at the newly released Codename Titan set.

There's just something about Codename Titan that reminds me of the corridors of the less than salubrious OMEGA space station in Mass Effect 2. This grungy, utilitarian terrain can also be used to create external settings, such as the streets of a heavily industrial world or asteroid mining city. But perhaps Mass Effect's not your thing and you prefer Gears of War instead?

Then take a look at both WorldsWorks Fantasy and Horror products in addition to the Sci Fi offerings. There's plenty of terrain for recreating the action from Gears 1 & 2. Shelldrake Manor could easily proxy for Adam Fenix's home.

The Himmelveil Streets set pictured above offers not just a chance to game Cogs of War but also has a strong  flavour of New Mecca on Helion Prime from Chronicles of Riddick. Offering the gamer an old world whose architecture isn't for once Gothic.

Mars Station has been replaced on my 15mm tabletop by GZG and Critical Mass Games' products but still does stirling work for 28mm Sci Fi skirmishes. Which remind me that I must buy Antenociti's 28's. Beautiful high Sci Fi miniatures in the Mass Effect style. If only they did the GOT Troopers in 15! Some great poses too!

Mars Station comes with interiors plus control panels etc. Again, a 60% scaling reduction will bring your outpost to life and being printable it can be as large as you like.

I was never a fan of gaming tiles. I liked all my terrain to be 3-D but I've mellowed under the constant bombardment from both Masterchef and Alternative's Armies' Firefight 2.0.

All the above game come with 'tiles' grided and ungridded. The Himmelveil Streets tiles are magnificent, Masr Station allows you to build not only a 'red planet' gaming mat but the canyons you see in the photo as well!

To sum up. Plenty of opportunity and potential to produce staggering 2D or 3D scalable terrain to meet your gaming needs  for a small initial outlay and a little effort.

Cheers

Mark

埋伏胡同

Playing Call of Duty: Black Ops over Christmas has set me off on a thought trail. There's this one heart racing, rabid mission, fleeing across the rooftops and fire scapes of Hong Kong. I'm thinking pseudo Blade Runner - and then when you mix China, Japan, Sci Fi, outer planets and colonies, you have Firefly.

So I want something more than adobe and prefab - surely the future is a bit more commercial and fun, close, crowded and neon fuelled. Now, Eric Burgess is one of the hobbies good guys. A decade ago I played a part in a Korean War campaign he organsed. His terrain was completely scratchbuilt and eye popping.

Erics 'oriental' terrain in this instance used for Boxer rebellion

http://dinofbattle.blogspot.com/

Maybe not Hong Kong tenements, but a claustrophobic 'Chinese' settlement on a colony/frontier world. More modern and Sci Fi elements can be added in, plus Neon signs printed from photos on the web.

 In addition I also have an idea for a concept based on creating high rise buildings, close and tight, black painted streets and alleys, with minimal surface detail. Instead the detail is provided by printed neon store/bar fronts, neon signs and street furniture.

Rather than build a bright shiny city like the 28mm one Antenociti are taking round the shows. I prefer dark and brooding, made alive by light.

It's not an immediate project but whether I go for city or rim colony I think there's mileage, even on a smaller scale. Perhaps beginning with a 'pizza base' street intersection for skirmish and Royale with Cheese gunfight games.

Cheers

Mark

Sci Fi / Cyber House Inspiration

Looking at more Sci Fi buildings suitable for the tabletop. OK, so GZG and Critical Mass Games have provided us with a superb range of prefabs but something is still missing.

First, nothing says MOON BASE does it - you know, interlinking connection tunnels, domes, that sort of thing. But maybe the ultimate test of mankind, living and fighting in a ZERO-G  or airless barren rock environment is NOT where you want to take your Sci Fi battles - after all I see a lot of green out there in blogland. 

Second, what happens after first dirtfall? How do you expand your prefab palace? Go up maybe?

I found this superb 3-D render by Roomper. You can imagine 2nd generation colonists breaking out from their portakabin environment - building outwards, with more levels and a city as we know it begins to emerge.

Maybe this is the home of the Mayor of Dirtville, son of a 3rd generation Colonist family. Or maybe it's part of the slums of a shiny city of tall iridescent spires. It has a very Blade Runner feel - don't you think? Wouldn't it be great to have a small district like this to game in - Blade Runner Ambush Alley style - rather than mono-level portakabins or ersatz Middle Eastern adobes?

Cheers

Mark
 

INCOMING: Critical Mass Games Reworked Buildings

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Dale at Critical Mass Games has reworked Arc Fleet buildings AFBD 7, 9, 11, & 13 to give them a more robust appearance. These will make their debut at Salute on April 16th.  The set (AFBD2) will be available at a show discount of £45.00.

Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi

Arc Fleet Building Set 2

The two I particularly like and want to highlight are AFBD9 Armoury and AFBD13 Armoured Command Centre (pictured below):

The new command centre deserves to be surrounded by 'Vietnam' dug in bunkers and weapon pits as the centre of operations in in 'bug country'. It would be nice if an alternative but equally armoured two story version was available that could be used as a flight control centre on the edge of a combat air strip or first foot spaceport.

If you want to see more views of all the reworked Arc Fleet buildings, visit the Critical Mass Games Forum.

Cheers

Mark

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Hise Rise Hab-Pods

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Why does the future have to be so utilitarian? These are called Golly Pods by a company called Tend. When I came across them on the net, what my mind's eye instantly  'saw' was a 15mm Sci Fi high rise living module. Now imagine that behind the greenery in the 'pod' aperture is a full plexi-glass frontage. The greenery could be a cultural throwback or a city corporation planning feature.

I'd expect buildings like these to appear on an AE Van Vogt book cover. Of course, they could be an alien habitation, advanced intelligence or primitive rock dwellers.

From hi-rise to lo-rise.......

This picture also caught my eye. These are actually pet 'pods' from Plushpod. What I see in the picture is a 'first foot' colony. I like the fact the design of the pods break away from simply being hexagonal.

Now, this Danish round house impresses me.....

Lot's of 15mm Sci Fi gaming potential and the one base model can spawn an apartment, office or industrial unit. Something that again, breaks away from the Gothic or Sci Fi portakabin buildings we are used to.

This modern design fish bowl offers opportunities for a mass produced but stylish Sci Fi building design.....

Reminds me of the Futuristic City at Matakishi's Tea House.

Finally,whilst a lot of 'modern' house designs leave me cold, I find this one "funky". Yes "funky" It reminds me of the golden age of Sci Fi movies such as Rollerball with James Caan. Don't get me wrong, I'm not wedded to classic post Norman farmhouse or Georgian townhouse architecture, it's simply that a lot of futuristic design seems to be high on concept, low on form and even lower on function.

This is not a hab for the masses. Rather it's a futuristic 'mansion' set in manicured grounds and aimed at a rich industrialist, political leader, gliterrati or drug lord. Just ripe for a classic Traveller roleplay skirmish adventure game. Take out the guards and auto-security defences, infiltrate the house..... in fact there's a tale of an attack on a long house in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles that would transpose perfectly to this futuristic setting. And and possibly Beowulf for a modern age now I come to think of it....

Cheers

Mark

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PS Luckily I have pre-populated Dropship with a couple of draft posts which can be posted using the iphone whilst the issue with my PC is sorted.
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Kartagrad: Download and Print Ruins

With my mind firmly set in the ruins of London,  Stalingrad on the Thames, I've downloaded KARTAGRAD: Dead City from Wargames Vault for just $7.00, that's £4.44 in old money.

Glenn at Finger and Toe Models was inspired by one of Bill Mauldin's GI Joe cartoons from the second world war to come up with these simple but effective cardstock ruins to download and print. Whether you need a want a ruined village or shattered city it's there ready at your demand and all for less than  the cost of a single resin model ruin.

 With Kartagrad you get a range of single and multi-story ruins, blank textures, detailing and realistic concrete base maps. I really like the textures. The concrete ground textures alone are worth the money to me. There's plenty of variety and potential for making more and more bruins to yoour own design.

Nothing fancy in the construction design. Print, cut, fold, voila! Future Worlds wall set was tabs and folds all over the shop.  If you want a sturdier ruin or thicker, 'more realistic' walls, just print your ruined wall section, lay it on some card/artcard draw round, then cut the card to match and glue on the printed textures.

My only niggle is that it's in 28mm. Glenn tells me to set my print scale to 60%, but, and Finger and Toe are not alone here, what put's me off a lot of cardstock buildings is farting around readjusting the scale. What the hell is wrong with having a 15mm pdf version!

Personally speaking I would buy an awful lot more in the way of downloadable cardstock products if all I had to do, was click and print and not have to worry about printer settings.

Rant aside. Need a ruined concrete city? Give Kartagrad a go.


Cheers
Mark

Critical Mass Games - 15mm Arc Fleet Buildings Review

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My first Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi Arc Fleet Buildings arrived earlier in the week and they are without doubt superb! I can honestly say that they are the best resin scenery items I have ever purchased. I am impressed, seriously impressed.

The buildings are made in a good quality resin that feels like plastic. They are robust, cleanly cast and have sharp definition. They come cast onto an integral resin textured base. Air bubbles, chips and webbing are non-existent on any of the models I received.

Tonight I'm going to look at the industrial storage elements of the refinery set, AFBD17, 18 & 19 as these are probably the most versatile models in the whole range. At a pinch they can be used any time from WW2 onwards - and be appended to whatever model Sci Fi buildings and structures you already use.

Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi
AFBD 17 - Large Silo £15.00 each

The Large Silo is 100mm in diameter and stands 55mm tall in it's own right - 70mm to the top of the supports (excluding depth of base). The supports are 1cm wide at their base tapering to 3mm at the top of the silo where they meet. The silo has a different facet - hatch, pipes etc on each vertical section, whilst the top has rivetted plates as detail. The base is hexagonal, 3mm deep and 165mm across, with each face of the hexagon being 85mm long.

Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi
AFBD 17 - Large Silo (base)

I thought you might like to see the base of the large silo as it demonstrates how solid and robust all of these models are.

Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi

AFBD 18 -Small Silo (x1) £6.00 each

The Small Silo is 50mm in diameter and stands 45mm tall. The supports are 4mm wide and project 1cm from the silo at the base to 5mm at their top. The silo has different facets - hatch, pipes etc on five of the six vertical section, whilst the top is rounded and smooth. The base is again hexagonal, 2mm deep and 70mm across, with each face of the hexagon being 40mm long.

Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi
AFBD 19 - Storage Tank £12.00 each

The Storage Tank is 120mm long and 45mm in diameter. Overall height (not including base) is 55mm. The base is 2mm deep, 90mm wide x 130mm long. Definitely my favourite piece in the collection.

Critical Mass Games 15mm Sci Fi

AFBD 19 - Storage Tank (reverse)

These Arc Fleet Buildings are great for use as part of an industrial complex or perhaps singly and in sets on the edge of your star port colony, shanty town etc as water, produce or mineral fuel storage tanks.

The buildings feel like a quality product in your hands and are perfect Dropship Horizon fare - no construction required or basing needed - just wash in detergent and get straight down to painting.

Well done fellas!

Cheers
Mark
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