Monday, January 29, 2018

15mm Scifi: Ion Age Prang Raiders & Army Platoon

My latest 15mm scifi project comes from Ion Age's Prang range.  The Prang are an amphibious alien race that are best described as militaristic bipedal hippos with weapons and armor to suit their physique.  There are basically two different types available, the mercenary/outlaw raiders and the actual Prang army troops.


The Raiders are pretty diverse lot, although a lot of their gear is clearly "borrowed" from the regular Army arsenals.  The background fluff for them makes it clear that they're pretty much in it for the loot and will make off with anything they can carry.


I particularly like the captain's "pet" here.  Much more fun to paint than a parrot.

 
As you can see, their guns are kind of huge.  Plenty of pouches and bags for hauling off plunder, too.
 
 
The Army troops are a bit more uniform in appearance, and they tend to come in larger numbers.  As you can see here, they're much more massive than your average human being (or Terminator robot, in this case).
 
 
I've got this platoon split into three squads of eleven, each with a different leader and three heavy weapons.
 


 
They've also got a nice medic (who could also be some kind of scientist or civilian merchant or something) and a couple of casualty figs.  Those are always fun to paint, and make good markers for objectives even in rules systems that don't track injured troops on the tabletop.
 

10 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Thanks! They're really great sculpts to work with, nice crisp detail and lots of character. The fact that they're so much more massive than humans makes it feel almost like painting 20mm instead of 15mm.

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  2. 6 years later but good work on these, they look great! I've just ordered a bunch to use in 5 parsecs from home as the aggressive alien type, basically Orks, so it's nice to see someone else painter them green.

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    1. They're very chunky sculpts, although unfortunately I didn't take any comparison photos with a regular human - although there should be some on AA's site. They've also got a decent sale going for another few days (May 6th, IIRC) so good time to stock up on a few.

      Ground Zero Games "alien mercenaries" make pretty excellent 15mm orks or ogryn (depending on how you paint them) as well, although they're less bulky than the Prang are by a fair bit.

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    2. Yeah, I now have 2 of the free warbots, getting through painting my various gang types too quickly and had to get another order in 😁 My next haul was going to be ground zero so I'll definitely check out those alien mercs. How are they height wise? I am looking for an ogryn type figure, called hulkers in 5 parsecs.

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    3. They stand about 18-19mm tall IIRC, and are noticeably bulkier than human sculpts. You can see some painted up as ogryn on one of the 2018 Gallery posts here:

      https://brokenstarsburningships.blogspot.com/2018/12/2018-retrospective-gallery-day-2.html

      Thought I had some ork images up for them too but they're eluding me. Suffice to say their ears are pointy enough for the role and they've got enough bare skin to show green, and their shoulder pads and armor offer some good surfaces for clan colors.

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    4. They look great as ogryn, good job 👍🏻 They'll do perfect for my hulkers. I'm loving the weird aviator cap style!
      Got the time to sit down and go through your galleries today. I have to say, you're very good. I'm not at all salty that you can paint 15mm way better than I can paint 28mm 😂

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    5. I used to think 15mm was harder to paint than 28mm until I actually did a few. After that I knew better - it may not be the One True Scale but it sure does take paint well once you're used to the difference in scale.

      Sadly, I'm much lapsed as a painter these days.

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    6. I've found I was trying to do too much at first, too many techniques & things ended up just looking messy. I'm happier with what I'm turning out now I've simplified a bit.
      I did notice you hadn't posted in a while, I hope all is well.

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    7. Yep, less is more with smaller scales. 15mm's still big enough to let you do some nice detail work, while 6mm and most starships are more about a few strong color contrasts and letting the paint emphasize the shape of the mini in my experience.

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