Titanium Dropship - UNSC-L Troopers

By Pok!

"I've went for more flashy than the typical realistic-camo approach, because hey, active camouflage is scifi too. I've only learned about the competition yesterday (cause despite browsing the blog regularily I managed to miss the announcement) so it's more of a speed-painting entry than anything else, but hey, no harm in trying!  So anyway, below is the "Kings in Yellow", a troop of the 44th CentEuropean light dragoons, equipped with light power armor."

Titanium Dropship - OmniSec Patrol

Another Squad Leader entry by SpacePrawn...

Scouts, Dropships, Gunships, Autonomous Small Vehicles

Here are some releases from the past week - perfect gifts for the 15mm gamer in your life. Even if it's you. :)

Oddzial Osmy has added a Scout pack to the New Vistula Legion. These are designed to be point men for the NVL infantry, rather than special operators like the previous LRRP figures. The pack includes six figures in three poses.

It is available now in the US from Picoarmor and in the UK from Fighting 15s. 

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The popular Titan Marines from Rebel Minis have received a new Dropship/Gunship Kit.

Rather than the separate kits seen in the Earthforce ships, Rebel Mike decided to release this kit with both the dropship's carrier pod and the extra weapon pods for the gunship. If you're clever with rare-earth magnets and your flight stand, you should be able to use your kit in either variant. The Titan Dropship/Gunship is available here, and a full gallery of Jason Moore's excellent paintup is on the Rebel Minis Blog.

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Khurasan Miniatures has added a huge variety of Autonomous Small Vehicles (ASVs) to the Federal Army. These are robotic support vehicles about the size of a large cart, and they are available in three different battlefield roles. And each of the three types are available in wheeled, tracked, legged, or grav versions - so there is a nearly endless variety of these little guys.

The Armed ASV (pictured above) includes three different weapon systems. There is a flatbed logistics vehicle (below left), and what I think will be the most popular - a medevac vehicle (below right).

I really like these ASVs - they are a very logical "next step" for some of the battlefield drones and robots being designed today.

Cheers,

Chris

New Releases from Critical Mass Games, Oddzial Osmy, and Khurasan Miniatures

Critical Mass Games has added the Star Marines their Mercenaries range.

I like the chunky look of these new figures - they're almost a cross between GZG NAC Power Armor and those cool armored robots on the Fox network during football games. Critical Mass also expanded the Mercenaries armored vehicles, adding the Warmonger tank, Vanquisher self-propelled artillery, and Hellfire AA tanks. 

All three vehicles are available in Tracked (very useful for near-future games or low-tech factions) and Grav (advanced races/settings) variants.

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The Oddzial Osmy New Vistula Legion, one of 15mm SF's most popular human factions, has been augmented by Long Range Recon Patrol pack. The LRRP team carries a good assortment of weapons and equipment, including a recon drone and large rucksacks for long-haul missions.

The LRRP pack is now available in the UK from Fighting 15s and in the US from Picoarmor.

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Khurasan Miniatures has released the XM-6 Heavy Grav Tank for the Federal Army. Jon wrote up some nicely detailed background fluff for the XM-6 on his blog - definitely worth a read if you're a fan of his Federation Forward universe. 

It's a big tank - 125mm long. This would make for a worthy opponent to the Topgun Marketing tanks (it even shares the orbital-deployment concept), and definitely has uses in settings like Traveller and Hammer's Slammers. It's also big enough to fit comfortably in a 20mm Sci Fi army, and could even be a light tank in 25mm/28mm games.

More NVL and Insurgents from Oddzial Osmy

The Oddzial Osmy 15mm Sci Fi range has two new packs - New Vistula Legion snipers and Insurgent LMGs. These were actually announced a couple weeks ago, but I wanted to wait until they were available from both suppliers before posting this news.

Here's a look at the NVL Snipers, which would be great in any light human force:

And the Insurgent LMGs:

I'm not personally a huge fan of near-future games, but this range continues to impress me. The Insurgents make great spaceport thugs or mercs, and the NVL is becoming the perfect 15mm proxy for 40K Imperial Guard. Both new packs are available in the USA from PicoArmor, and in the UK from Fighting 15s.

Cheers,

Chris

Review - Oddzial Osmy's New Vistula Legion (NVL)

Painted Samples from Pico Armor site.

 I want to start off by apologising to John at Pico Armor and the rest of the folks involved with Oddzial Osmy for the tardiness of the this review. John at Pico Armor sent me samples of the NVL troopers and anti-tank missile teams as well as a pack of heavy worm troopers (covered in another post) over two months ago. Sorry guys!

Anyhow, all good things are worth waiting for and these figures are no exception. The NVL are wonderful mid-tech troops. Looking like something right out of a Cameron film they are right at home in some classic science fiction universes like Aliens, Traveller, and 2300 AD. All are equipped with advanced fatigues and partial body armor, helmets with built-in optics and compact futuristic assault rifles. The anti-tank troopers are armed with shoulder fire missiles with built-in sighting systems and each comes with a secondary trooper holding a designator.

The range includes many other combat unit options, making the NVL one of the most complete future soldier ranges out there. Other options include -

• SAW Gunners
• Heavy Rifles
• LAWs
• NCOs
• Specialists
• Characters
• HMG/AGL on tripod
• Mortars

Technically speaking, these are beautiful, crisply sculpted and cast miniatures. All of mine had almost non-existent flash, no mold lines, pits, miscasts or any of the usual boogens that haunt minis. The only cleaning I had to do was to clip off the excess left from the mold channelling on the bases and the occasional little spur from an elbow. Amazing figs.

My only real criticism for these figures is that the troopers are sold in random assortments of 6 figures out of 8 total poses. For me this meant getting only 5 of a possible 8 poses in my sample set. But that is a minor issue. I imagine that over a decent sized force you will end up with enough to mix and match properly.

-Eli

All Kinds of New Stuff

We've seen new 15mm Sci Fi minis released by the truckload this week!

Khurasan Miniatures has added a ton of new figures this week.  For their primary Federation Forward sci-fi universe, we have:

• Sepulvedan Resistance Fighters Set #2
• Sepulvedan Resistance Fighters "Liberated" Mortars (taken from the evil clutches of the Control Battalions)
• Lhurgg Tribesmen with Huk-Huk Electric Swords
• Lhurgg Tribesmen with Spike Mortars
• Felid "Pouncer" Launchers (seeing a definite trend with mortars this week!)
• Dual-Purpose Light Spacecraft Passengers - a pack of alien Bounty Hunters (seen on the right)

Khurasan also updated their End Times range with:

• Government Forces in Power Armor (these would be great in any sci-fi setting)
• Gutter Gophers
• Supersoldier Mutant Warlord (currently featured on Spacejacker's blog)

And finally, the Planet 15 range ha been reinforced by this Martian OG Heavy Combat Unit shown on the right.

Khurasan added a ton of items to the Little Carinthia Eldritch horror range.  While not strictly sci-fi, they still might find uses as demons or primitive creatures in some alien empires.

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The smaller manufacturers were busy this week, too.  RAFM added the Insolani bug race.  These look like very interesting sculpts - they manage to pull off "bugs with guns" without being cartoony:

Meanwhile, Oddzial Osmy reinforced the New Vistula Legion.  They have received a pack of command characters, a set of tripod-mounted heavy machine guns (or grenade launchers if you prefer), and a mortar pack.  These are available now from Fighting 15s and Picoarmor.  

Finally (and sorry we didn't say something sooner!), Ravenstar Studios is having a brief sale on the Land Core 15mm drones and vehicles range.  

Cheers,

Chris

Oddzial Osmy Spaceworms - Review and Paint Test

Earlier this month, Fighting 15s released the highly-anticipated Oddzial Osmy 15mm Sci-Fi Range.  I placed an order as soon as they were available.  While I don't have a purpose for the mid-tech human infantry (yet), I quickly grabbed a pack of the civilian reporters and a few packs of the Spaceworms.

Well, kudos to Fighting 15s for great international shipping times - one week from their shop to my mailbox.  More importantly, I was impressed with the quality of the minis.  Other than a few easily-removed strips of flash, the minis were extremely clean and detailed.  I also like the bases - they are very thin, and perfectly rectangular.  They don't look like a giant boulder or mount on top of a normal troop base.  In fact, the rectangular shape might let you use some kind of detailed base with these, like SpaceJacker's starship decking (see link).  I set the reporters aside for now so I could get started on the Spaceworms.

I had two different paint schemes in mind for the Worms.  Since I couldn't choose between them, I decided to try a test mini of each.  I hit two "trooper" worms with white primer and set to work.  My first idea was a simple, organic paint scheme.  These worms would be used as living support weapons for a more advanced race - maybe they are sentient enough to fight on their own, or maybe they are controlled by telepathic commands or electronic signals.  The helmets of the minis certainly leave both possibilities open.  Here is a picture of the worm creature with a Critical Mass Astagar:

I liked it well enough.  Worms like this would be a fun addition to an alien imperial force. But I still wanted to try my other idea - robotic worms.  I've been working with colored-wash-over-bare-metal quite a bit lately, so I decided to go back to my roots and paint a basic gunmetal robot.  Here's the result, next to a similarly-painted Rebel Minis Scourge:

Robotic worms with small lasers on their backs... also very useful.  They could be in a mixed force of assorted robotic invaders, automated or remote sentries at a sentient alien fortification, or even part of a large starship's intruder defense system.  

So which scheme should I go with?  I still haven't decided!  I'm not even sure if I'll keep this single-based for games of FUBAR and Gut Check, or if I want to multi-base some for use in my Alien Squad Leader games.  I may have to pick up a few more sets to try both options.  They certainly don't take much time or effort to paint. 

Either way, if you're looking for something that doesn't resemble a "man in a rubber or robot suit," you could do far worse than the Oddzial Osmy Spaceworms.

Cheers,

Chris

Fighting 15s releases Oddzial Osmy 15mm Sci-Fi

A few months ago, Oddzial Osmy previewed some new 15mm Sci-Fi on TMP (link to original thread).  That line is now available from Fighting 15s.

The initial offering has three categories: Vistula Legion (mid-tech near-future human infantry), Non-Combatants (currently featuring a human civilian reporter crew), and Spaceworms.  The only pic available so far of the Spaceworms is in the original preview thread above.  I'll uploaded painted pictures of them shortly after they arrive - I couldn't wait to place my own order!  In the meantime, here are the infantry and reporters:

Vistula Legion Troopers

Reporter Crew

The Vistula Legion gives us another good mid tech-level Traveller style force, or it can be useful for those of you gaming the next 100-200 years of Earth's timeline.  I think the reporters are useful in many scenarios - I plan to add some to my ongoing "characters and civilians" project.  And the Spaceworms give us a great option besides "humans in rubber suits."  We look forward to seeing this line grow.

Cheers, 
Chris