Sunday 13 August 2017

Halo Ground Command UNSC Pelican Dropship

UNSC Pelican Dropship components

My pre-order for the Halo Ground Command UNSC Pelican Dropship arrived during the week from The Combat Company and I have only really just had the time to have a decent look at it. So here are some pictures showing the miniature and its scale compared to the 15mm UNSC troops.

The first images are of the data cards and order chips that come with the miniature.



Below you can see the large flight stand that comes with the miniature.


Below is the miniature itself on my cutting board. Next to the miniature are a set of 15mm UNSC troopers still on their spru (confession time - I haven't yet painted any of my Halo Ground Command units, much to my shame. Too many other things that need painting right now). The scale on my cutting board is inches, even though I'm a metric dude.

Pelican model (top) with wings detached

Pelican model (side)


Pelican model (underneath)

The model comes with the rear hatch sealed. So no internal details are visible.

Given that the Pelican is 1:300 scale, I've put together a comparison shot below comparing the Pelican, the UNSC 15mm troops and some 10mm Pendraken Miniatures SciFi soldiers. As you can see, the 10mm soldiers are more in scale with the Pelican.

10mm Pendraken SciFi soldiers next to 15mm UNSC troopers

Spartan Games wanted originally to produce the Pelican in scale with the rest of the game. But this would have produced a large and expensive miniature. So they settled for a near enough scale, being 1:300. That scale, as you can see, is pretty darn good for 10mm. I'm not complaining. A 15mm version with open rear hatch would have been excellent, but a 10mm version for me is sweet as well.

This time I'll use the flash!

Concluding thoughts: it's a nice model that scales well with 10mm sci-fi miniatures, such as those from Pendraken, but is too small to fit in scale with the 15mm Halo Ground Command miniatures. So it will make a nice backdrop but won't really suit anything other than a flyby on the Halo battlefield.

That said, I want to get some more for my 10mm sci-fi miniatures. So in time I may get some more!

Saturday 12 August 2017

Nebula class ship data card for ACTA Star Fleet

It's high time I returned to posting about my conversions for the Next Generation era ship data cards for ACTA Star Fleet. The last ship I posted about was the Ambassador class of explorer vessels for Star Fleet. So below is the Nebula class.

The Nebula Class starship

The above model is from the Furuta range of miniatures. Its light weight enough to be able to rest on a standard flight stand. The saucer section is detachable and I have inked and highlighted the model. You can find out more about this in an older post here.

The ship data card is below. Given its less offensively armed than the Ambassador, the Nebula is a cheaper vessel point value wise.


Next ship I need to develop stats for is the Galaxy class. But that's a post for another time.

Thursday 3 August 2017

Klingon L18 Corvette's from Studio Bergstrom and Woomera Shipyards

L18 A and L18B Corvette's in comparison to the Studio Bergstrom Praetor Destroyer, MicroMachines D7 and Attack Wing K'tinga.

I received some of the Woomera Shipyards L18 Corvette's from Studio Bergstrom the other day. These are in the ADB 2400 (1:3788) scale and are small. However they are very detailed and nicely made. The detail really comes to its own when you drybrush or wash these miniatures.

The L18B (foreground) and the L18A in the background

As a bit of advice, insert the boom before you try to glue the base in. The bases I use are for A Call to Arms Star Fleet and so the stalk at the top goes in far enough to force the boom downwards. I inserted the boom first, then dropped super glue in to the hole where the stand goes, then inserted the stand. I then had to move the boom upwards a bit as it was forced downwards by the stalk at the top of the stand going in to the base of the model. So just be prepared to push the boom back in to place before the super glue dries.



L18B from behind

Underneath the L18B

L18A close-up

L18A from behind

As you can see from above, I also bent the nacelle's outwards to a 45 degree angle as I felt this made them look sexier and also helps to distinguish them from their larger cousins made in the ADB 2500 (1:3125) scale.


L18B close-up

Painting was fairly simple. I just followed the process I used for most of my other Klingon ACTA ships. The end of the post here has a summary of the painting process. The only thing that I did differently was that I used a red colour (Red Gore if I remember correctly) to paint the triangle designs on the wings.

So final opinion? Damn nice ships!

These make excellent small patrol and anti-piracy ships for the Klingon Empire. Definitely looking forward to their bigger cousins that have just become available on the Studio Bergstrom Woomera Shipyards page.