Ship Minis...Advice

[thecursor]

It's a long way off but let's talk minis for space battles. Obviously Star Wars/Star Trek Armada is a choice but if we wanted to play Star Wars we would be doing that. Choice two is a now defunct line from Games Workshop and if you thought those models were expensive before, wait till you see what it looks like without active company support. Beyond that is a game called Firestorm Armada that offers generic look star ships of various sizes without breaking the bank. Well, without obviously breaking the bank. It's still expensive. Any recommendations?

[Torbyne]

Spartan, who does Firestorm, also does a halo space fleet game with minis. And there is a defunct game based on Babylon 5 minis out there. And there is a currentish production run of firefly minis at a horrendous price... but really, I'd just browse through the sci fi section of the shapeway web site and cherry pick what you want mini by mini.

[thecursor]

Torbyne wrote:

but really, I'd just browse through the sci fi section of the shapeway web site and cherry pick what you want mini by mini.

Sadly this may be where we land. Obviously that means we aren't going to get the variety in ship sizes that will be covered in the game's rules (like some people say they saw in the playtest) but yeah, Shapeway will form the bulk of your fleet and maybe some bits and bites here and there. The Halo ships from Trojan really do look cool and I think that's going to be good for like some alien antagonists, especially that big Covenant one they make.

[Bluenose]

There are quite a lot of spaceship model manufacturers around the wargames scene. Star Rangers' Spaceship Combat News was a very good site for information, though it's not updated for a long time - still useful for older stuff though. I personally like the Ground Zero Games range of starships which include a variety of human types as well as aliens.

[Emerald Rose Widow]

Also there is the addition of Dropfleet Commander which is adding a whole new list of ship ideas that could work for Starfinder.

[phyrespike]

Twilight Imperium has good ships. The game is not cheap, but if you know someone who owns the game, they'd probably let you borrow them for sessions as needed. You may also be able to buy mini resupplies from fantasy flight games, not sure.

[Scrapper]

Iron wind has a few for the Battletech line

[Strohz]

If you can find a Silent Death set on ebay it comes with an assortment of 50 plastic paintable spaceships.

[PaulH]

Hi

Does this mean I finally get to use my Eldar fleet from GW?

5 cruisers and 33 support ships haven't bee used since GW went to core games only in their shops

Thanks
Paul Harries

[crashcanuck]

I've heard rumors that GW is bringing back Battlefleet Gothic, so there may be more of those minis eventually.

[lordofthemax]

I'm prolly gonna be using minis from twilight imperium, combined with some older minis from the old Star Wars spaceship board game. Discontinued collectible minis for everyone! :D

EDIT: now that I think about it... I can also use the map tiles from TI on my hex grix map to show where planets/asteroids/etc are on the map.

[RealAlchemy]

I have a couple Vorlon ships and a White Star from Babylon 5. Does that mean I win? :)

[lordofthemax]

RealAlchemy wrote:

I have a couple Vorlon ships and a White Star from Babylon 5. Does that mean I win? :)

Why yes. Yes it does.

[Torbyne]

We will be getting official minis for the ships in game now but i wanted to throw out there that i tried ordering a snap together mini model of a Macross SDF off Amazon by way of a Japanese hobby shop... fairly quick delivery, easy assembly and i have ended up with a great capital ship mini for about 5 bucks. Now i just need a hexagon base for it.

[Browman]

Agents of gaming is still selling their remaining stock of Babylon 5 warships. If you went with fleet scale, individual ships run from $3 to $10 American. Models are metal and come unpainted.

[potus98]

I was thinking about making 3D mini ships. Either sculpting from clay or a laminated card stock approach. Each has their pros and cons. The clay models are more fragile to breaking if dropped but take paint and washes better. The 3D paper/card approach is likely to get dirty looking after repeated handling. Actually, that might be kind-of cool looking.

[Torbyne]

If you want to try your hand at creating something yourself, take a look at places like Shapeways where you can design your own thing and have it printed in plastic for a fee. I happen to have a lot of Star Wars Micro machines, some plastic snips and glue so i may be making some uglies to use as minis.

[Thornborn]

I am lazy. And maybe clever? Also, cheap.

Guitar picks. Joiner 'disks'. Squeezable drink bottle tops. Press-on nails. Any patterned or colored cardboard and a punch tool or scissors (verging into craft, there, usually a hard stop for me).

I say I am not craft-ish. But I love it when other people are. I hope people paint their storebought minis, kitbash their prepainted minis, assemble their own concepts from sprue and trash and raw fever-dream...

There's real magic, there.

[Odraude]

Legos. That is all you need.

[Fardragon]

I think it would be cool to have ship minis made from transparent coloured plastic, rather than painted.

Make the board look like a holodisplay.

[Torbyne]

Fardragon wrote:

I think it would be cool to have ship minis made from transparent coloured plastic, rather than painted.

Make the board look like a holodisplay.

I actually have a ship mini like that from Shapeway, its one of those printing options. in practice i am annoyed by it and keep meaning to get around to painting it. you cant really see any details on it unless you are holding it up close and really looking.

[Fardragon]

I don't think detail would be important, but it would need to have a lot of ships, in red and green, to look effective.

[Torbyne]

Games and movies get away with it by cheating on how they do outlines and lighting, in the real world they will just look like semi-translucent wedges i would think. If that is what you are going for though than i can see a neo-classical realism to it, like moving wooden pieces across an actual map would work in space.

[Erik Keith]

Dropfleet Commander has some gorgeous models available for their various factions, and if you know any friends with a 3d printer you can also peruse Thingiverse, a simple search for "Spaceship" will net you a lot of awesome 3d models created by fellow fans of popular television series and movies.
Bonus points if you print it in transparent material and put an LED inside it!

I know theres some 3d scans of asteroids as well if you want to add some space debris.

[Odraude]

I second dropfleet commander on that one. Their models are gorgeous. Firestorm Armada has some good, cheap ships that you can't go wrong with. Now if only they could get their shit together for the game...

[Gilfalas]

Erik Keith wrote:

I know theres some 3d scans of asteroids as well if you want to add some space debris.

A great way to do asteroids is use lava rocks that you can get at most home and garden stores. Just mount them on any base and your good to go. They are cheap, super durable and weigh naerly nothing for their size so you can pack a ton of them if you want to, even making a whole asteroid belt if you need one pretty easily.

[Bluenose]

Gilfalas wrote:

Erik Keith wrote:

I know theres some 3d scans of asteroids as well if you want to add some space debris.

A great way to do asteroids is use lava rocks that you can get at most home and garden stores. Just mount them on any base and your good to go. They are cheap, super durable and weigh naerly nothing for their size so you can pack a ton of them if you want to, even making a whole asteroid belt if you need one pretty easily.

My method for X-Wing was to tear up a sponge, spray it in various colours (shades of green, grey, and red), then mount it on a cocktail stick. Cheap and easy to do.

[Tim Statler]

Xia ships are the right size, although they are mounted on round bases.