Saturday, April 25, 2026

Full Thrust Phalons Revisited

Following up on my earlier Phalon miniatures gallery post with a few more images that I thought might be helpful.  While all of these ships appeared in the big group shots in the gallery, some better close-ups of the newer post-Fleet Book 2 sculpts certainly can't hurt, and it may be easier to judge relative sizes from the comparison images here.

These are the FT-825 Sliith-class fast destroyers, who don't even have an image at the GZG store.  Really quite fond of these, in large part because they really stand out from the rest of the range thanks to their lean, sleek design.


There are suggested stats for these and the other "late arrival" Phalon ships over on Dean Gundberg's invaluable Full Thrust Fleet Resource site.  I had some input on them, and if I were to do them all over again I might beef the Sliith up a bit.  They are willowy by Phalon standards but look well-armored for their size and are a bit bigger than I gave them credit for back then.  


These are the FT-835 Greeth-class heavy destroyers, although ironically the suggested stats (based largely on the model size) rate them as considerably smaller than the old FT-805 Dinth-class destroyer (which is pretty chunky, and manages to pack in a small plasma bolt launcher).  


I suppose we could have rated these as a little bigger as well, but erring on the side of caution never hurts.  As it is, they're the largest and most capable of the "pure pulsar" ship classes.


And lastly we've got the FT-815 Gruuss-class attack cruiser.  Mine came with an unfortunate (and rare) casting defect that led to their being two sets of suggested stats, with the A version reflecting the model better and the B based on my model.


At 90 and 97 mass at least we weren't stingy about rating this hefty ships.  There were also a pair of logistics ships (one about heavy cruiser size, the other at least half again as large) but sadly I never bought any.  Dean did stat them up for his FT Resource site, though.  The lack of Phalon weapon options makes them some of the nastiest civilian ships a pirate could ever face.  Most freighters have a Beam-1 or two, tops.  The Phalon equivalents carry an all-arc pulser and a plasma bolt launcher.  For "self defense" you know.


Next we have a nice size comparison shot of the five classes of Phalon cruisers, pr as they call them, Warriors.  From left to right we have the light, medium, and heavy cruisers, the battlecruiser, and finally the attack cruiser.


They maintain a nice shared aesthetics while also being pretty easy to distinguish at tabletop distances - at least if you know what to look for.


Even with five classes of cruisers to pick from, after seeing the Sliith I kind of wish we'd gotten a similarly-designed "fast cruiser" as well to serve as a leader for pursuit groups.  Something long, lean, and mean would be a nice variation on the usual theme.  


A similar group shot of the battleship, battledreadnought, and superdreadnought Great Warrior classes.


The battleship is reasonably stable on a 30mm base (although I'd have used a 40mm if I'd had them back then) but the larger ones are on 60mm bases.


These are the closest to "fragile" that any Phalon mini gets, as those little pink "caterpillar legs" are separate pieces and I did occasionally have to reattach one following rough handling or a bad table bump.  Still, if you deepen their socket a bit and maybe reinforce with some putty it's not a major concern.


Always been kind of surprised that Jon never sculpted a third variety of dorsal weapon pod beyond the "gun" and "hanger" options.  Sure, Phalons are pretty much a two-weapon fleet anyway, but having an obviously different pod might have been a good opportunity to add something new.


Speaking of hanger pods, here are the two carriers, corresponding to human light and (very) heavy classes, as well as the three types of squadrons employed by them.  The Vaan interceptors are on the left, the Nith multiroles in the middle, and the Tuus heavy fighters on the right.


You can tell the age of these images just by the fighter stands.  Jon retired those old metal "spiders" ages ago in favor of acrylic toppers, which I'd rate as a significant improvement.


Those orifices might well be thrusters, but I prefer to think of them as landing bays.  Even the gunship versions of these hulls would have some ship's boats and shuttles to deal with, but on carriers they'd connect to much larger internal spaces dedicated to fighter servicing.


With only two carrier classes the Phalons don't have as wide a variety of options as many human fleets, but when a carrier does show up you know it's bringing a lot of fighters to the party - either four or eight squadrons of them.  No dinky escort carriers here.


Finally, here's some more shots of the two customized capital ships I kitbashed over the years. 


Nothing particularly fancy here, mostly just swapping out the existing prow (which takes some serious cutting work) with the aft hull of a cruiser or battlecruiser that's had its own prow removed and the scars rebuilt with some putty.


Always meant to use the battlecruiser prow in another kitbash, but as luck would have it the part went flying when I clipped it off and wound up going down a heating vent.


I presume the current residents of that old apartment are still living with the thing in their ducts somewhere.  Every now and then I feel the urge to go ask if they ever found it, and then I remember that I am not actually a crazy obsessive person fixated on a tiny piece of metal that would be very difficult to explain to your average person.




No comments:

Post a Comment