Dino Discovery

So I found these plastic Schleich mini dinosaurs at the local toy store the other day.  I think they have interesting 15 mm possibilities.  The raptor and the pterosaur are a tad off-scale but the others seem pretty bang-on.  And, at only $4 each, you could put a herd on the gaming table for the cost of a few pints...

"Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!"

They do have a bit of molded text on their bellies that someone like me would feel compelled to remove and putty over, but otherwise they're pretty awesome as-is.  And scale is at least credible; here they are posing with a (largish) 15 mm humanoid:

"Come at me, bro!"

Khurasan "Huntarr" figure for scale.

Recon Thing

Riflething Scout Buggy
15 mm scale

Designed for rapid reconnaissance of dense urban areas, this lightly-armoured buggy allows Riflethings to get in and out, relying on speed and good steering to avoid small arms fire.  The driver is protected by slug-resistant, laser-ablative canopy; the gunner is exposed, but packs a punch with a plasma projector whose effects on infantry are best described as "horribly demoralizing".

This was a fun stress buster in the week after baby #2 was born, the chassis painting came together surprisingly quickly, though detailing took a bit of time later.  Frankly, I tried not to sweat the clumsy brushwork too much, in the interests of finishing it quickly.  The display base is as basic as it gets... printed paper on craft plywood, just something to place it on really.

Need for Speed

Riflething Urban Ops Recon Buggy
15 mm scale

This vehicle started life as a Hot Wheels "Max Steel Turbo Racer" toy:

Pretty cool wheels... But I knew I could do better.  Luckily, this toy is almost exactly in-scale (judging by the driver's cockpit), and solidly futuristic-looking, so it didn't need much work.  I swapped the spindly front wheels for some from another car and added a turret (armed with a Space Marine plasma pistol) and Riflething gunner.  I don't do many vehicles to go with my figures, so this is kind of a step out for me.  We'll see how much painting gets done before the baby arrives, but I'll definitely have a go at it...

Diecast Drive-by

I just made a few good finds in the grocery store while on an emergency cat food run.  Inspired by Spacejacker's amazing Hot Wheels repaints, I thought they might work as 15mm scale vehicles.  First, the "International MXT", in desert drab:

Wow!  Probably a bit off-scale, but it looks perfect next to some average minis.  This is a real military truck, but not so well-known you can't field it as a fictional one.  Detail is a bit soft, but I don't know if that's from the casting or the kid-proof paint layer.  Apparently even this durable paint can be stripped with solvents or oven cleaner, but the metal body has to be separated from the plastic frame and wheels.

Next up we have this tracked dump truck thingy.  Some greasy sci-fi potential here, for sure.  The cab is not at all big enough to be 1:100/15mm, but I still feel like something could be done with it, or at least the track portion could be used as the basis for a kit bash:

There are probably a bunch more interesting things available along these lines; I've been keeping an eye out for that cool fire engine Spacejacker used, but no luck so far...

Another Weird War Project

Valkyrie Walker
15 mm scale



More German WW2 stuff that never happened. I really enjoy these little models, I don't feel nearly as much self-pressure to strive for technical perfection in my paint job, and I can have fun meddling with them without risking mangling a large and costly kit. In this case, I built a turret, added a tank commander from the bits box, and sculpted a rolled camo net to hide the ugly casting flaws on the rear end (that's what $16 gets you, apparently).

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Star Wars Cake Toppers
Approx 50 mm

Speaking of alternate reality, since when was Princess Leia Bengali? Since my charming friends Siham and Sean decided to get married, that's when!



This was pretty easy, since I didn't have to repaint the whole figure, and Han was perfect the way he was. But they turned out looking so cute, and it's always nice to make myself useful...