SPOTLIGHT: Rebel Miniatures

The Dropship Crew recently caught up with Mike at Rebel Miniatures to find out how he got into wargaming and his plans for 15mm Sci Fi.

Variable Payload Raider (VPR), or Viper Suit as the troops call it. 

We will have 3 versions to start with new weapon systems as well. Designed By John Bear Ross. This should be out in about a month or so...

1. First of all, how did you get into table top wargaming?

I had been playing D&D in the mid 80’s and was looking to get into something different. While at my local comic store I saw a game of Battletech and was immediately hooked. From there I got into Rogue Trader and ultimately into all the Games Workshop stuff. The early GW stuff was amazing and every week, my friends would battle each other at our local comic store. Good times.

2. How did Rebel Miniatures get started and how has running the business changed over the years?

 I was at Origins Game Fair in 2004 with a few of my gaming buddies. At the time I owned a toy company, called Palisades, making action figures and such for Toy’s R US, Target, ect. While we were playing a game, I was complaining that I needed more figures and that no one made the figures I wanted. My wife overheard me and in front of everyone said, “Well, Mr. Manufacturer, why don’t you just make some?” So I did.

When we first started, we only had a few packs. We were doing shows and getting great responses and because we had a few packs, filling orders was pretty easy. Now, with so many packs, boxsets and rulesets, it takes a lot longer but we still love it.

Cheyenne MATV Truck - This goes with Rebel Miniatures MATV Line. Weapon system may change. 

Designed By John Bear Ross. This should be out in about a month or so...

3. What are your general plans for the Rebel Miniatures 15mm sci fi ranges?

We have big plans for our Sci-Fi lines. Right now we are developing more alien races to add to our human lines and really fleshing out our universe. We are in the process of adding more Mech-Type vehicles (my favorites) and John Bear Ross has done some amazing new designs for us. They will blow you away.
 
This winter, if everything goes well, we will also be introducing a new human faction that will have a cool look and feel to it.

We also teamed up with Two Hour Wargames to add some new box sets to the 5150 universe. We have just released Day of the Scourge and we hope to release more box sets with miniatures, scenarios, campaigns, etc. Our Sci-fi lines will be a major focus for this winter and next year, so stay tuned!

4. How do you think the hobby (sci fi wargaming generally and 15mm sci fi wargaming more specifically) look now compared to when you started out? 

15mm sci-fi wargaming has exploded. There are so many good rulesets and miniature companies out there; you can find almost anything you can imagine. I have heard others say it and I believe it, this is the Golden Age of 15mm.

Pole Bitwy Back with a Bang!

As announced on the TMP 15mm Message Board and on his website, Piotr at Pole Bitwy will shortly start producing some lovely sculpts produced by the talented PF.

We understand from Piotr that these greens should hopefully be in production and available for purchase in late September or early October at the latest. If they sell well (and we're pretty sure they will!), even more will be sculpted. The Pole Bitwy web shop will be opening by this weekend.

SPOTLIGHT - Ground Zero Games

The Dropship recently stopped off in the Tuffleyverse to catch up with Jon and gather some intel on Ground Zero Games and get a look at some new models that will be available shortly.

First of all, how did you get into table top wargaming?

I started wargaming when I was about 10 or 11, when I got hold of a copy of Charles Grant's Battle - Practical Wargaming. Around the same time (1970-71), the very first 6mm / 1/300 minis were becoming available - funny little lumps of lead that looked vaguely like Shermans and Panzer IIIs... but to a kid used to nothing but OO/HO plastics they were something new and wonderful!

My fascination with Sci Fi has been around as long as I can remember, and it wasn't long before I began to put the two interests together and think about the possibilities of SF wargaming - in the mid-70s I found the first commercial SF rules and minis, followed quickly by a copy of Traveller. Around that time I wrote my first rudimentary rules set, a very simple space combat game which eventually metamorphosed into Full Thrust. The rest, as they say, is history...

 Crusty Power Armour and a Crusty Combat Walker.

Ground Zero Games has been around for quite a while, when did you decide to set up your own business and how has running the business changed over the years?

Around 1985 I started to cast a small range of resin 15mm SF vehicles in the garden shed - some Traveller-inspired Grav Tanks, ATVs etc.- and these were the first products ever marketed under the GZG name; with the help of small ads in White Dwarf (still an independent games mag in those days!) I sold a surprising number of them and it just snowballed from there. At the same time, I published my first "commercial" rules set - G-CAV - very much aimed at 15mm actions with the resin vehicles I was making.

The 25mm resins followed soon after, then the first FT starships and 6mm (though at that point the metal stuff was sculpted and cast by Paul Copeland (CMD), I just marketed them - a number of years later Paul had to give up due to poor health, and I bought the ranges from him). Once I decided to go into 25mm figures, I started doing my own metal casting as well as resin; by this time the 25mm sales had vastly overtaken the original 15mm, and 25mm (plus the starships of course) became my main focus for many years.

By 1991 GZG had grown to the point where I simply couldn't continue to run it as a part-time "hobby business" while holding down a full-time job - so I took the plunge, quit my "proper" job and GZG became my full time livelihood, which it still is today, 20 years on.

During the '90s I wrote and published the full, glossy second editions of Full Thrust, Dirtside and Stargrunt (all of which started life as first-edition photocopied A5 booklets). Metal casting gradually overtook the resins, to the point where I gave up on resin altogether; it's a good medium but compared with metal it's very time and labour intensive.

So, now everything I do is metal-cast and it is still 100% manufactured in-house. Unlike a number of the other companies in the field, I still do virtually EVERYTHING in-house - I design, build masters (still in the traditional way, not pixel-pushing!), make the moulds, cast the stock, pack the orders and take them to the post office each day. The only thing that is outsourced in any way is the human and alien figure sculpting, as I've always been more of a builder than a sculptor; aside from that, I still do the lot...

My return to 15mm started around 2000/2001, when I released some new 15mm figure packs which were effectively reduced size versions of our 25mm lines; they proved immediately popular, and a couple of years later I built the first new 15mm vehicle sculpts - sales of these were so good that I expanded the range as rapidly as I could, starting to cover all "tech levels" from near-future tracked equipment right up to ultra-tech grav stuff. The 15mm ranges were soon outselling the 25mm lines, and it wasn't long before 15mm was once again my best-selling scale (alongside the ever-popular FT starships, of course). It's funny how things go full-circle!

Rear view of new Crusty miniatures

What are your general plans for Ground Zero Games 15mm sci fi range?

At the moment, a continued steady growth of new items, plus going back to revisit and resculpt some of the earlier items. The last few years have seen a huge and rapid expansion to get the range built up, now it has slowed a bit because I'm kept so busy casting stock and fulfilling orders.

A long-term ongoing project is revisiting each of the figure nationalities that were released early on, and expanding them into full ranges of all-new sculpts - the NAC and NI (New Israelis) are pretty much done, but there are still a lot of other forces to do. In between these, I'm introducing entirely new stuff like the Crusties and the UNSC-Light guys, which have proved to be especially popular.

Vehicle-wise I have quite a few ideas in mind, but I'm not going to give details till they actually happen; I'd certainly like to do some more civilian and paramilitary type stuff, and maybe a few more buildings if I can figure out ways to do them effectively in metal - I won't be going back to resin-casting for the foreseeable future.

Do you have any plans to update or expand the setting of your Stargrunt/Dirtside/Fullthrust rule sets or the rules themselves?

I'd love to but, realistically, at present miniatures production is occupying all my work time; one day in the future I might get them done, but it's going to be a long way off. At the moment I'm happy to help to promote and recommend several of the new rulesets that have come on the market in the last couple of years - such as Future War Commander, Gruntz, and AAG/Osprey's forthcoming Tomorrow's War, all of which in turn help my miniatures sales. The hardcopies of my own rules have long since sold out, but I keep them available as free PDF downloads via the website for anyone who wants them - it's nice to see that they are still popular even with so much new competition around. Seeing GZG products used on the table with all sorts of different game systems is great, because it means people are buying the minis because they like them for themselves rather than because they are the "official" range for that game.

New NAC Power Armour including optional Jump Pack

How do you think the hobby (sci fi wargaming generally and 15mm sci fi wargaming more specifically) look now compared to when you started out?

It's quite odd to look back and realise that everything has come full-circle - I started out with 15mm, and more than twenty-five years later here I am back with it again! When I started, it was mostly home-brewed rules, converted toys and using what few crude and basic figures you could get - we'd have killed for the sort of ranges and variety that there is now, in 15mm and all the other scales.

Even with the recession, I think that most folks still want to keep doing their hobbies - possibly even more so to escape from how bad Real Life(tm) is... Wargaming is still NOT an expensive hobby compared with a lot of others, and I think that provided there is still a steady flow of newcomers at the bottom end of the age range (which is where, like 'em or loathe 'em, the "big boys" such as GW do perform a useful function for the hobby as a whole) then the future doesn't look too bad.

15mm SF is certainly having a "golden age" at the moment; in many ways it's never been easier to start a small miniatures business - you can get freelancers to create and sculpt (or 3D print) the models for you, then get contract casters to produce them - all you really have to do is come up with the initial ideas, then sell the finished product. The fact that I still do everything myself the old-fashioned way is just my choice!

More and more manufacturers old and new are seeing this resurgence of the scale and deciding to get involved - which is great from the consumer's point of view, though inevitably if the market gets too crowded I fear that a few will probably fall by the wayside. For the time being, though, I think it is a case of "a rising tide lifts all boats" - the more there is out there for them to buy, the more SF gamers are getting interested in the scale again and hopefully this translates into more sales for everyone in this part of the industry - I know I've never been busier than in the last 12 months, and long may it continue. As I've said before, if people keep buying the stuff, then I'll keep making it!

GZG June Teasers - New 15mm Tracked Main Battle Tank

A new 15mm MBT will emerge from the
GROUND ZERO GAMES
tankwerks this summer!

No further intel at the moment,
other than it's based upon the V15-01A Cougar MBT Chassis.

A very tasty bit of kit to add to anyone's 15mm Sci Fi tank park.

Keep an eye on the Ground Zero Games website

for further product and release details.

Click on the picture for an insanely larger version

I'm not normally a fan of tracked Sci Fi MBTs. I'm a GRAV man. But this new tracked MBT from GZG....when you have it sitting in front of you, even just straight from the packet and unpainted, is nothing less than the 'dogs bollocks'.

Cheers
Mark

GZG: 15mm Gun Mules and Ravagers!

Jon has kindly sent me some teaser pics of his new 15mm minis, a Gun Mule with NAC crew plus 'Ravagers' - who look like they will make great gangers, survivalists, mercs, crew or bad poke in general.

GZG 15mm Gun Mule with NAC Crew

GZG 15mm Gun Mule with NAC Crew: Rear

Great looking model. It would be nice to have a 'Serenity' version with Zoe driving, Mal on the gun and Jayne on the running board - one hand holding on, the other firing his assault rifle. River could be crouching on the other running board - just looking impishly enigmatic.

GZG 15mm 'Ravagers'

More GZG 15mm 'Ravagers'

Some nice looking minis here! Got to get me a pack or two of these.

No further details are currently available. Check WWW.GZG.COM for more information.

Cheers
Mark