Dreadful Things: Mantic Star Saga Nameless Ogres

 

Latest project, a pair of Mantic's Star Sage miniatures, the hulking Nameless Ogres.

 

 

No idea why they're called ogres when they're clearly giant crab monsters, but it's still a much less ridiculous name than, say, sponk.

 

These are my first Star Saga figs, and I was mildly surprised to discover that they come pre-assembled and cast in a livid purple plastic. 

 

The models really aren't adequately cleaned up before assembly at the factory, and the bases they're mounted on look way too small.

 

I pried them off the original bases, cleaned up various mold lines and injection marks, and rebased them to 60mm bases.

 

The detail level on these is a bit above what I'd call normal for "boardgame pawn" minis, but it's still a bit less than many figs on the market.

 

Still, the subject matter is neat, and these figs have a ton of potential for uses beyond Star Saga or Deadzone.

 

They'd obviously make nice alien fauna, but they're also pretty suitable for horror or pulp gaming ("Attack of the Crab Monsters!") and scale jump well, making a nice biomecha in 15mm or a decent 6mm kaiju. 

 

I also like them for fantasy dungeoncrawl gaming, where they could be a simple umber hulk variant or something more customized.

 

I rather like the idea of some mad D&D wizard experimenting with a mix of chuul, ilithid, and umber hulk essences and producing these horrors - no doubt spurred on by annoyance at losing out in a monster hybridizing contest during his school days to some smarmy little twit of a Gryffindor and his oh-so-clever owlbears.  Owlbears!  I'll show them all!!! 

 

Not turning around, nope.  If you can't see it, you don't lose sanity.

Fractured Dimensions Asmodeus & Pazuzu

 

Latest commission job, Asmodeus and Pazuzu, two rather "Old School" D&D monsters from Fractured Dimensions.

 

These were produced via Kickstarter a while back, but it appears Fractured Dimensions are out of business these days.  At the very least their web site is down as of the time of this writing.

 

I got these for my customer from some remaining stock held by Mortal Arrow, the "tikki troll" manufacturer from this older post:

 

http://brokenstarsburningships.blogspot.com/2018/12/dreadful-things-mortal-arrow-tikki.html

 

They're impressively sculpted models with excellent detailing and very clean casting.  All in all very well done, and a shame if they remain out of production.  With the popularity of the Old School Roleplaying movement these days there's certainly plenty of room for more minis catering to nostalgia.  Otherworld and Pacesetter are just scratching the surface of the potential range. 

 

Asmodeus has some options for assembly, including two open left hands (one with a flame held in the palm), two right hands, and some add-on bits including the book that I've stuck on to the "plain" left hand.

 

Pazuzu is a two piece casting with the wings separate.  Much easier to paint if you stick them on afterward, obviously.

Stargrunt Out Rim Coalition Starship Assault Boarding Team

 

Today's showcase project was inspired by some discussion of Full Thrust starship boarding rules which got me thinking about what a patrol ship might use as a boarding party, either for use against enemy warships & pirate vessels, for more basic customs searches, or even for rescue & recovery duties.

 

Full Thrust ships don't have very large crews in canon, and even a few troops in power armor are pretty potent against more lightly equipped standard crewmen.  Add in a few light mecha suits with zero-gee mobility packs to provide some really heavy support and you maximize your force impact for the number of warm bodies needed.

 

I figure the mech suits can open hull breaches as needed, eliminate any defensive guns that might still be operational on the target vessel, and occupy hangers, cargo holds, and larger equipment rooms as needed.  The smaller power armor sweeps corridors and takes over command spaces.  In a "spacewreck" rescue mission the big guys can help open up jammed hatches and collapsed passages, as well as providing a tow for recovered survivors in temporary life bubbles after the troops get them out of the wreck. 

 

The models here are a mix of Out Rim Coalition power armor and the larger "generic" Cyclops mech suits from GZG's Stargrunt range.

 

The power armor are here:

 

https://shop.groundzerogames.co.uk/outrim-coalition-orc.html

 

And the Cyclops suits here:

 

https://shop.groundzerogames.co.uk/15mm-stargrunt/vehicles/small-combat-vehicles-bikes-etc.html?page=2

 

Dreadful Things: Mortal Arrow Flail Snail

Latest commission job finished up, one of Mortal Arrow's flail snail minis.

 

 

A large resin kit that comes in four pieces - shell, body, and two of the four flails are separate.  There are also variant shell and (non-flail) bodies available, which can be swapped around.  This one is actually a "riding snail" shell on a flail snail body.

 

The kit is very cleanly cast and goes together well.  There are pour spout plugs on each piece that require trimming, but they're easy enough to remove and doing so won't affect visible parts except for the body.  The body plug is on the bottom toward the rear and taking it off does mess up the detail there a bit, but carving it back in was a two minute job and even that could be skipped if you don't plan on looking at the bottom of the model.

 

Did need just a little putty to fill in the shell-body join but again, it was a trivial job of gap-filling, no sculpting required.

 

As you can see the belly is fully detailed.  Quite  a lot of teeth on this thing, too.

 

The repaired plug point on the body is pretty much invisible with paint on it, and you can't even see the putty under the shell. 

 

A big and impressive model, and well made.  The Reaper Call of Cthulhu investigator there is probably developing molluscophobia even as we speak.

Moongrunt Civilian Cargo Sled

Moongrunt's got a decent array of military figures, but the First Lunar War was fought over burgeoning industrial complexes and the colonial habitats that supported them.  So clearly we need some civilian (or at least noncombatant) minis to get caught in the crossfire.

Like many "Moonie" workers, these two "space truckers" are using Chinese equipment.  The stuff's not fancy but it's rugged, reliable, easier to repair than fancy US or French stuff, and most importantly it's relatively cheap.

 

Their sled was bought used through UNSC channels, and has seen some heavy use over the years.  Still flying though, even if some of her venturis are blown out and her frame's been through multiple re-welds.

 

Her payload bed's large enough to do some light hauling of high-priority items, although only the desperate would risk loading anything really fragile.  Her landings aren't as smooth as they used to be.

 

Usually she's found hauling a mix of spares and replacement machinery, various tool cases, and the odd hazardous material container.

 

The crew is unarmed of course, but in a real pinch I suppose the co-pilot could resort to doing "bombing runs" with some of the cargo.  Having 50 kilos of machine tools dropped on your collector array from a hundred feet up is going to break some stuff.  Not much chance of hitting a moving target or anything as small as a man, but air combat got its start with people throwing bricks at each other from biplanes.  Mankind's first extraterrestrial conflict starting over someone dropping crates on people they don't like?  That could absolutely happen. 

 

The rocket sled and cargo are available from the Ground Zero Games web store here:

 

https://shop.groundzerogames.co.uk/

Dreadful Things: Mortal Arrow Tikki Troll Warband

 

Showcasing a warband of Mortal Arrow's Tikki Troll miniatures, painted on commission for  a customer.  These figures were funded via Kickstarter a while back and are on sale here:

 

https://www.mortalarrow.com/bazaar/mortal-arrow-miniatures/

 

The models are very modular with a mix of extra arms, heads, and add-on bits, and as far as I can tell any of the parts will work on any of the bodies (which come in a torso-and-legs single piece casting).  They're very cleanly cast and come with 40mm bases.  All are quite large, with the shortest pose around 40mm tall and the Big Kahuna about 60mm.

 

The customer's brief was to do them up as group of troll shamans and witch doctors, so I tried to avoid using too many melee weapons in favor of more "spellcaster-ish" builds.  The exception is the "runt" with the club, who was actually purchased off of ebay before the rest of commission was established.  All in all I think they came out quite well, and the sculpts have a ton of old-school D&D flavor to them.  A fun job.

 

 

The Big Kahuna is probably my favorite of the range, in part because of that crazy club made out of severed (but still fighting) troll arms.  I figure this guy is the head shaman of the group and his weapon doubles as a beatstick and a crude but powerful magical staff - perhaps the individual limbs can each cast a different spell each day or something.  I've deliberately painted each attached arm to match the skin tone of a different member of the group.  Donating a limb to the boss is part of the initiation ritual to join up, because trolls are just like that.  

 

He also carries a severed troll head in his off hand, which we can say is his "familiar" and the noggin of the former chief shaman.  In pinch it also makes a dandy thrown weapon.  He's also got a couple of potion bottles on his belt and a smattering of shrunken heads as trophies. 

 

 

This big brute is the second in command of the warband, a shaman who dabbles in alchemy.  His primitive sickle is more for harvesting material components than fighting, which he prefers to do with either touch spells or by simply ripping his enemies into small pieces.  He is a troll, after all.  Claw/claw/bite isn't just for dragons.  

 

He carries a few magical potions at his belt as backup weapons or tools, which have been shared (under threat of violence) with his kahuna.

 

 

This one's a minor conversion, a witch doctor with a magical wand/rod thing and a bunch of ogre skulls as trophies and impromptu armor.  The "wand" is a handswapped and cut down spear from a different figure, and the ju-ju dance pose is the result of a careful trim and repose. The skulls are add-ons from a GW kit to further alter the base model.

 

A bit of work to make but it does show off how much variety you can get out of the basic figures, especially if you have several of them and a deeper pool of parts to draw from.

 

 

This is a more stock build of the kit used for the witch doctor above.  Blowpiper with ammo pouch and hand weapon.  Probably a witch doctor specializing in concealment and ranged attack spells.   He looks like a sneaky type.

 

Well, as sneaky as an eight foot tall troll with bright orange hair can be, anyway.

 

 

And finally there's the "runt" of the group, or at least that's what Mortal Arrow calls him.  He's still pretty big.  I figure he's the apprentice in the group, with minimal spellpower.

 

He's got enough brains to realize that hitting people with a club made out of a chunk of bullette jawbone is more effective than relying on magic or brute strength.  There's probably something nasty in that belt pouch too.