[quozl]

Heya,

so, a while back I decided to get into 15mm Sci-Fi, to go alongside my massive Infinity 28mm addiction.

Couple of reasons for it:
1) There's tonnes of 15mm sci-fi stuff out there, and I like a lot of it. It seems to be the dominant sci-fi scale apart of course from 28mm (40K, Infinity etc).
2) It's cheap. As chips.
3) You can have lots of vehicles without it turning into a car-park, or looking a bit daft (IMO).
4) I like the look of the scale. I find it more satisfying with the area being fought over looking larger due to the small scale of the models.
5) I can comfortably play it on my kitchen table if I want to. I mostly play in Gamer's World but I sometimes play Infinity at home. That works for me, but I have to have a 4x4 sheet of wood I put on top of a smaller table. 15mm varies between anything between 2x2 feet and 8x6 plus.
6) If you decide you don't like a rule-set, you can just change rule-set without your model collection becoming somewhere defunct.

The two systems that I'm considering are the two most popular 15mm systems that I know of:

Gruntz (http://www.gruntz.biz/) - 9 dollar PDF download. Looks quite fast play. I bought the rules and they look good to me and it's receiving a lot of attention around the place - winning TTGN new rule-system readers vote last year. The basic mechanics are very similar to warmachine - with your stat +2d6 versus their stat. They have rules for Mech walkers, grav-vehicles, VTOL, mortars, jump-troops, etc etc. You can buy minis anywhere and point them up yourself.

Tomorrow's War (http://ambushalleygames.com/) - 20 euro for a delivered hard-back from http://www.bookdepository.co.uk . Sci-Fi version of the critically acclaimed Force on Force rule-set, which I also have, but I just prefer the Sci-Fi setting to Moderns. There is a beta points builder for it but it's more meant to be scenario based, which once you get past the change from what most of us are used to is actually wonderful - based on how great the scenario books I have for Force on Force anyway and the 6 scenarios in the main TW book. First Tomorrow's War scenario book is due out this year, and will be Aliens versus Genetically Modified Special Ops (colonial marines types). It's a good bit more crunchy than Gruntz and it's harder to learn but it's not particularly difficult. Here's a AAR of a TW game of mine - http://w-ired.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=2151


I've played about 4 or 5 games of tomorrow's war now and really like it but it is quite crunchy. Yet to play Gruntz but I really think I'll like it too based on everything I've read - it appears slightly simpler and more gamey.

Anybody else play (or want to play) 15mm Sci-Fi?

[quozl]

Here's my Crusty (District-9-style prawns):



Tanks (Nomad Infinity remotes)


Here's some WIP cards for using them in Gruntz

[quozl]

Started painting some UNSC. This is going to be the colour scheme.


Speed is off the essence due to real life demands, but I think it'll look ok.

Shoulder pads will be colour coded for leader/special weapon/grunt, and I'll do the bases up the same as the Crusties.

Here's the current WIP stat card for the UNSC grunts

[quozl]

Finished 28 of my ground zero games UNSC 15mm soldiers.

There's enough troops there for a good size game of gruntz or Tomorrow's War - I just need to finish painting up the APCs and get a tank or two.



However, being a gamer, I want to have more than that

So here's most (but not all) of the rest of them still being painted!



I also have their APCs in progress currently too.

[quozl]

Here's are some quick and dirty 15mm sci-fi buildings that I knocked together using scaled WWG textures.



and here's some painted 15mm UNSC using those buildings as a backdrop

[quozl]

Got 3 GZG grav APCs painted up, and the first 2 of 4 Antenociti's Workshop Skorpion light grav tanks.




The other two Skorpions are about 2/3rds done too so I should be able to field a good armoured force very soon

[quozl]

I've added another 16 light infantry and four two-man weapon teams to my Crusty force.

That finishes them

Here's the group shot

[quozl]

I've made a free online unit card/army creator for Gruntz. Removing one of the few difficulties in playing Gruntz - creating your unit cards/stats.

It's online at http://www.gruntomatic.com


Features:
Unit card support all unit types.
Force support - create forces, add a description, add as many units as you like.
In-built sharing of cards. Everybody can view everybodies' cards and include them in their own forces. If you like somebody else's force, then print the card-set!
PDF download of cards.
Filter unit list by owner, unit type, cost, name, star rating or manufacturer.
Works on Windows, Mac, Linux, iPad, iPhone, Android. If you have a device with a decent screen and a modern web-browser, it should work.
Custom weapon names on cards.

1st page of an example force made with the Grunt'o'Matic (PDF exported to jpeg and shrunk to embed here.)

[darebear]

Your Crusties are very nice, as are your grav vehicles. Can I ask how you painted them?

[quozl]

Sure.

Fortunately I learnt a couple of years back to write down the colours I use for my models so that I can easily match them if I want to add more stuff to a unit

I'm aiming for speed so I like to get depth by using a single somewhat thinned layer of paint, wherever possible.
So all these listed paints will have been mixed with about 6 parts paint:4 parts water:1 part acrylic paint thinner
If you then paint with that over white, it'll pool in the recesses and give a darker colour in the recesses as there's less of the white primer showing through.
I'll also use a brown (seraphim sepia) or a black (armour wash) wash to quickly add depth in another way.

Crusty Infantry:
prime white (army painter white spray), base coat privateer press rucksack tan
sashes heartfire, beaten purple or arcane blue (all privateer press)
eyes - GW red gore
weapons - PP armour wash
heavy weapons - one panel with red gore
wash flesh with GW seraphim sepia
bases are white primed sand, painted with thinned umbral umber

UNSC GZG grav apcs - prime white, thinned PP thornwood green, armour wash for some metal bits. PP Menoth red base decals. I did one of them a different, more brown green for some variety.
UNSC antenociti's workshop skorpion tank - prime white, thinned thornwood green, armour wash for some metal bits, spots of PP heartfirt on the lights. PP Menoth red base decals.

The vehicles only took something like 15 minutes each.

[MarkHall]

Some fine looking units there.

I do love seeing you with new stuff about the shop. You put so much time and effort into your games it does a chaps heart good.

I would hold you up as the example on how to pimp a system.
Yet to see anyone not enjoy a game against you.

[quozl]

Thanks Mark, that's very kind of you.

I'm taking a well deserved break into War Machine for a bit - I won't have to run or organise anything myself

It'll probably a short enough break with the Infinity campaign book due out at the end of September, two Tomorrow's War source books due out before the end of the year and Gruntz 1.1 out any week now.

Too many good games, too little time!

[MarkHall]

Originally Posted by quozl

Thanks Mark, that's very kind of you.

Too many good games, too little time!

Indeed! Lorcan's trying to bring me into Infinity atm.
Currently going through my unused Minis to see if I can put together a Nomad starter army.

Cause I want to make him happy.

[quozl]

You should be grand, it's a pretty easy game to proxy with the common scale, low model count and free rules.

Definitely worth a try IMO.

Admittedly, I have >100 Infinity models and may not be the most impartial judge of whether people should play that game!