The blog has been too busy with the A-Z to get around to posting my entry from Round 4 of the Lead Painter's League, but thought I'd squeeze them in today.
This is a small sample of the very large fleet of spaceships I have been hoping to get a chance to paint for a few years. They are from Ground Zero Games, the NSL fleet.
The LPL rounds only require a team to be five minis, but it can be more, and I wanted what would look like a decent spread of ships for a small defense force.
This was my entry. I won my round by a large margin, and have been climbing up the ranks each week, from an entry at about 15, to 9, to 6 and currently in 3rd position. Nice, though I know it can't last. I was hesitant about entering spaceships, since smaller scale minis don't seem to do as well in the LPL. But I want to paint what I want, and the whole point of doing this was to get a bit of progress on some of my favorite projects that have gone neglected in the proverbial lead mountain.
I got these ships with the idea that they'd be generic enough to play in any spaceship game. Full Thrust is possible as is Firestorm Armada. I have enough ships to mimic a Firestorm Armada fleet construction style, but I like these ships a lot better than FA ships. While some of the FA ships I like a lot, the thing I'm not so crazy about is the size of the capitol ships. The Battleships & Carriers are just massive, and they now have ships that dwarf those!. The escort & cruiser sizes are alright, but the big ships are just physically too big. Scale Creep hit the stars in a big way. It's like 40k: the tanks and flyers might look nice, but trying to put a lot of them on a 4x6 table looks wrong. It's like trying to put a few guinea pigs in your hamster habitrail cage. I will hold off on any Spartan Games ships- still waiting on the rumor that they may make a 'fleet action' scale available, where they have all the ships they have now, but done in a smaller scale. Sign me up for that!
I think the GZG ships are excellent spaceship minis in design. They look 'authentic' to me. Simple, practical and sturdy. I wanted a 'grey-white' look to them, taking inspiration from Imperial Star Destroyers and Battlestar Galactica. I don't think visuals would count for much in space. You'd have sensor findings on enemy ships long before any visual sightings would be possible. Painted markings on ships is very unlikely: there's just no point. So to match the 'no-nonsense' design I wanted a 'no-nonsense' paintjob for them. I'm happy with the results.
Close-ups that weren't possible in the LPL 800pixel limits (click for larger):
From top going clockwise: Battlecarrier Agamemnon. Light Cruiser Aeschelon. Escort Squadron Achilles Class. Agamemnon's Heavy Fighters: Wing Alpha. Battlecruiser Ares.
I'll look forward to adding to this fleet!
My current LPL round is here. Next round starts tomorrow!
This is a small sample of the very large fleet of spaceships I have been hoping to get a chance to paint for a few years. They are from Ground Zero Games, the NSL fleet.
The LPL rounds only require a team to be five minis, but it can be more, and I wanted what would look like a decent spread of ships for a small defense force.
This was my entry. I won my round by a large margin, and have been climbing up the ranks each week, from an entry at about 15, to 9, to 6 and currently in 3rd position. Nice, though I know it can't last. I was hesitant about entering spaceships, since smaller scale minis don't seem to do as well in the LPL. But I want to paint what I want, and the whole point of doing this was to get a bit of progress on some of my favorite projects that have gone neglected in the proverbial lead mountain.
I got these ships with the idea that they'd be generic enough to play in any spaceship game. Full Thrust is possible as is Firestorm Armada. I have enough ships to mimic a Firestorm Armada fleet construction style, but I like these ships a lot better than FA ships. While some of the FA ships I like a lot, the thing I'm not so crazy about is the size of the capitol ships. The Battleships & Carriers are just massive, and they now have ships that dwarf those!. The escort & cruiser sizes are alright, but the big ships are just physically too big. Scale Creep hit the stars in a big way. It's like 40k: the tanks and flyers might look nice, but trying to put a lot of them on a 4x6 table looks wrong. It's like trying to put a few guinea pigs in your hamster habitrail cage. I will hold off on any Spartan Games ships- still waiting on the rumor that they may make a 'fleet action' scale available, where they have all the ships they have now, but done in a smaller scale. Sign me up for that!
I think the GZG ships are excellent spaceship minis in design. They look 'authentic' to me. Simple, practical and sturdy. I wanted a 'grey-white' look to them, taking inspiration from Imperial Star Destroyers and Battlestar Galactica. I don't think visuals would count for much in space. You'd have sensor findings on enemy ships long before any visual sightings would be possible. Painted markings on ships is very unlikely: there's just no point. So to match the 'no-nonsense' design I wanted a 'no-nonsense' paintjob for them. I'm happy with the results.
Close-ups that weren't possible in the LPL 800pixel limits (click for larger):
I'll look forward to adding to this fleet!
My current LPL round is here. Next round starts tomorrow!
They look even better in closeup - you well deserved to win by that margin (happy to have been part of it!). And you absolutely should paint what you want to, not whats popular.
ReplyDeleteI have Always been sucker for space games, from fighter skirmishes (like Silent Death) up to fleet combat with FT, Leviathan and a myriad of others. I always wanted to get into Star Blazers too: loved the show as a kid and the anime style ships are very different to the usual 'hard sf' style.
Lovely bits of work, those little lads!
ReplyDeleteExcellent ships - I do like the detail on the new NSL ships. The old flying bricks had a certain charm, but these ones really look the business, and your paint job is superb.
ReplyDeleteSuch clean painting on them mate.. always impressive when you can see nicely painted up grey/white models.. congrats on the win!
ReplyDeleteThanks Paul! I love the Star Blazers ships too. A different style, but very fun.
ReplyDeleteThanks Pete! Just 30+ more ships to go! ;)
Kobold: thanks! when i saw these ships I couldn't resist: had to have them.
Thanks Mr. Lee! Finding the right method for the white was a bit of a pain ;)
Gorgeous work Ferret. Painting white can be a pain. Painting white ships can be an absolute nightmare.
ReplyDelete