Tanks! All sorts of tanks...

o/

I thought I'd preempt the inevitable Tanksgiving posts that will flood the blogosphere next week with two recently painted 'tanks' of my own. 

First of all, more over Steiner and your puny Atlas based scout lances, the Şoarece proves that no one can waste resources like the Free Worlds League can! 

Note the Şoarece's dirty appearance
from a recent river crossing. Due to
it's weight, few if any bridges can
support it. Luckily though it has a
limited amphibious capability. 

A rolling 175 tons of Seriously, what the fuck were they thinking?, the Şoarece is a nigh impregnable mobile fortress, slathered in 40.5 tons of armor, and moving at a whopping 18.5mph (on solid ground, going down hill and with a good tailwind). It has mixed autocannon armament that's...theoretically good at all ranges, and in practicality kinda worthless, backed up by a lone nose mounted machine gun. 

Fewer than 100 of these monstrosities tanks were built before production ceased, thus the roman numeral XIII on the front hull is actually the production number rather than any sort of regimental or unit marking. Also, due to their enormous size, at the time of manufacture Şoareces were christened with a name, much like naval vessels. 

This particular one was Christened the Warhound, and has a canine rampant decoration on both the port and starboard sides. However crews and regimental commanders alike quickly dubbed it The Dog due to its sluggish mobility and both anemic and mismatched weaponry. Most of it's career was spent in static defense and on parade duty.

In 2913, The Warhound went in for an overhaul and rearmament to (hopefully) silence the incessant complaints of the armored brigade commanders who despised the machine. The AC-2 and AC-20 were removed and replaced with a pair of AC-10s, giving the tank a triple mount of identical guns.

Whilst a bit more useful, The Warhound was now essentially a slower, overweight, Star League era Alacorn.  Commanders, resigned to the fact that there was no fixing the tank, continued to use it as little as was possible, until the tank was mothballed a mere two years later. The Warhound was reactivated a few times however, to serve as a stand in for a hostile, grounded dropships without actually risking damage to an actual dropship in large scale live-fire field exercises.

*****

And then there's the other tank. Its a 'not a fuel tank Screech!'  that I recently purchased a pair of from Hardware Studios. Its all drybrushing and I cranked it out in about 15-20 minutes. I'm quite happy with it and despite being intended for Battletech, is large enough to be useful as a LoS blocker in 40k/KT as well. 

The Robotech minis the Kickstarter backers ACTUALLY wanted...

o/

THIS! This is what we wanted out of that infernal Kickstarter!!
Also of note is the new Hardware Studios terrain in the background (funded by the sale of 40k minis).

By now, regardless of whether or not you were invested in it or not, everyone ought to be well acquainted with the clusterfuck that was Palladium's Robotech Tactics Kickstarter. Heh, after looking up that link, I checked on the now 103K+ comments of vitriol and hate to see that folks are STILL commenting on there...lol. It's done guys, get over it. Really. 

The mech itself is feather light and the wings are translucent, but ought to be fine even if you drop it...maybe.

Besides, Kids Logic now has the license and is making the minis we had hoped for in the first place! Unless you actually wanted a Warhammer that came in 30ish pieces rather than 3-4...

Really crisp detail. 

For instance, I ordered a Phoenix Hawk Battloid mode Veritech as a test purchase. $15 total with shipping direct from Hong Kong that took maybe a week and a half total. The mini had ZERO flash/mold lines and was 3 pieces that went together in minutes. 

Fits perfectly on the Gamecraft base which is the standard hex size. 

The only trimming was removing the pegs on the bottom of the feet so I could put it on one of my Gramecraft minis' hex bases. This was more or less a 'test purchase' (being justifiably wary after the KS), but now that I have it there will likely be another coming in the future as right after I ordered this they released the Warhammer. 

The Buffet Assault Group FINALLY gets it's colors!

o/

I've only had this blog for nine months now and yet whenever my TBAGers mechs hit the table top they're always sporting a combination of either primer or bare metal. Well not anymore! 

Not something you want to see cresting an adjacent hill...

Now they're sporting a two tone medium brown and red color scheme. The legs, from the knees down are all red representing the bloody work of the mercenary profession, and then the upper torso is trimmed red as per the pilot's preference. The TBAGers logo is on the left an right sides or arms depending on wherever the decals fit (originally being meant for 15mm scaled tanks, the options for decal placement are limited).

The hip on the Stalker probably shows the primered armor plates best in these pics.

Whilst its a bit subtle, and not all that visible underneath the grime  from heavy use as well as the soot from multiple missile launches, various sections of armor plating are unpainted and instead just sporting a rust colored primer, representing newly repaired battle damage. One unit logo on the right side of the right most Awesome is missing because of this.

The decals just barely fit!

The Stalker is only sporting soot from the SRMs, as the STK-4N's 2nd LRM 10 was removed as well. I haven't finalized the mech's fit yet, but will explain this in a later in a post about the TBAGers' later history. I've tweaked the original fluff enough to make a mess of it, and I think a complete rewrite is in order.

With this mech, the lance will be able to launch 110 LRMs per turn!

Lastly, you'll note the this fire support lance's 4th mech is missing. That's because I only just ordered it recently and it has yet to arrive. I got a Longbow LGB-7Q, sculpted by Strato minis and purchased via Steel Warrior Studios. Once that arrives I'll paint it up to match. I hadn't planned to expand the unit past this lance, but they're woefully vulnerable to close range attacks and flanking maneuvers, so they do need some support...