3mm Ogre Miniatures: New Project

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Well, here’s the start of my new project: porting Ogre Miniatures to 3mm scale:
http://leadnobleed.blogspot.com.br/2014/12/3mm-ogre-miniatures-it-begins.html

 

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Angel Barracks]

Dude, that Plasmablast conversion is Da Bomb!

[Stroezie]

I agree!

I normally don’t like Ogre tanks but this one …               …it speaks to me.

Luckily plasmablast don’t do any 15mm or else I might be tempted to do a 6mm version. 😎

[Mr. Average]

Looks quite a bit like this, and I LOVE it.

I only wish I were better at kit bashing, myself. Wanna send me one, Mac? 😉

 

[Alexander Wasberg]

Seriously cool stuff, your work never fails to inspire! The kit-bashed Ogre was something else, can’t wait to see more!

http://lasersandbroadswords.blogspot.com My project blog

[Alvin Molethrottler]

That is impressive work, well done! Who is this 08 company you refer to in your blog post, I’m not familiar with them?

[Mike]

Oddzial Osmy

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

I love that ogre, Mathieu! Is it yours? That needs to be sent to Marcin’s attention, post-haste!

I’d happily make you an ogre, but I have no more Plasmablast chasis available! When they get production going again, I’ll do one up for you.

Yes, O8 is Oddzial Osmy. It means “8th Army”, so…

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

Alas, it is not my design, but as you know I’ve done an Ogre or two in the past. Thing is, I much prefer your kitbash to the “real” Ogre design, to be honest! If you made me a Mk. III or V, I would be eternally thrilled! Better, if we could twist Marcin’s arm enough to get him to make 3mm scale cybertanks along these lines, it would be the living end!

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Well, I just messaged Marcin. He’s been very cool about this in the past and I know he wants to do an ogre-style vehicle, so…

I’ll make you an ogre as soon as I can get some chassis.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

Oh, man. If he did that it would be the absolute best. Marcin, if you read this, I hereby volunteer the 6-Commando Canon for 3mm scale production. Let’s you and me talk about that, my man.

And you, Thaddeus, are my personal hero for making me Ogre kitbashes, if you manage to do so.

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Get me the chassis and I’ll do the kitbash.

 

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

Give us the tools and we will finish the job! I’m emailing Plasmablast this evening!

[Mark Ryan]

What’s the size of that OGRE? I have all my OGRE stuff in 6mm and wonder if the OGRE is usable.

[Mr. Average]

At 6mm scale itd be about the size of a smallish Superheavy tank. It might be a better Mk. I at that scale.

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

The Ogre is almost exactly 50 scale feet long – that’s 24 millimeters and some change. A “real” Ogre Mk III is 58 feet long, so pretty square on the money for mass and size, considering that my Ogre is a tad wider and chunkier.

The Plasmablast 6mm stuff could make great Ogre MK Is and Ogre Mk IIs, I think.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Ken Warren]

Those are awesome. I believe OGRE would be ideally suited in 3mm, especially after seeing your minis. I’m not into creating one myself, but I may have to now.

[kid bananas]

Wow! That OGRE rocks! 6 Commando stuff would be awesome!

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Here’s a troop from the First Polish Lancer GEVs, placed next to a pound and a quarter for a size referent:

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

It appear that MicroWorld Games is finally doing what we so richly desire.

http://www.tacticalwargames.net/taccmd/viewtopic.php?f=137&t=29470&sid=745e888e81c82f859096847df4915137

Modular superheavy cybertanks? Oh, my goodness, yes.

[War Panda]

I not familiar with the Ogre Sci Fi genre you’re referencing but I love to drop by to check out the amazing modelling skills on view here. I better be careful though or your Ogre minis won’t be the only convert 🙂

“The great Gaels of Ireland are the men that God made mad,
For all their wars are merry, and all their songs are sad.”

[Mr. Average]

This idea has just come back to life for me, as such ideas do. I stripped the paint off a Plasmablast “Tigerclaw” superheavy tank, to serve as an impromptu Mk. V, and filled out an already-in-hand supply of O8 figures with some Walker Bulldogs for Lights and some German 155s as Howitzers. I’m eyeing the British Scorpion LAV as a Combine light tank design to pair up with the M97 in the sci fi line. All get my usual base label treatment for ease of play.

Out of curiosity, TB, what did you use for the GEV engines? A bit of rounded dowel or toothpick? A section of plastic tube?

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

A section of plastic rod, actually. If you are going to buy new O8 stuff, you might as well go with the sci-fi line. Everything you need is right there, pretty much.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

Well, for visual effect I want the light tanks to be very obviously smaller than the heavies.  Otherwise I’d use Stridsvagns as Combine Light Tanks.  Anyway, I’m already underway.  I’ll be using the regular O8 hovertanks as Combine GEVs; although as large as a Heavy, they have a lighter look with the skirt painted black and steel blue.  I’m not sure how they’ll compare to the Paneuro GEVs, but I don’t much mind so long as they’re cleanly distinguishable on the table.  Some spare Rapier carriers will make good Missile Tanks for one side while the Thor will be for the other – not sure yet who’s who, I admit.

Doing a little graphic work in the meantime.  If I posted the whole label sheet I’m sure Steve Jackson would have kittens because the bases have game data printed on them, but I have flags and such worked out.  With apologies to my colleague in Novabrasilia, I’m starting out with a typical Paneurope-Combine set.  Fancied up the flags a tad.

I have a few of the Heavy Tanks from the Marhaf Legion line, and though I had intended to use them at 6mm scale for the Clavian Hoplites, I find myself having a lot of difficulty resisting using them as Paneuropean Fencers, instead.

[Rod Robertson]

Thaddeus:

Those are lovely little minis and you have done them proud with skilled and creative conversion, painting and decal-work. Well done, sir and Bravo! I really enjoyed perusing your linked web page and seeing your fine work. Post more, please!

Cheers and good gaming.

Rod Robertson.

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Hey, Mr. A., would you mind shooting me a copy of your labels and graphics files, particularly those flags and/or the Combine and Paneuro symbols? I would love to make decals and labels out of them myself.

IMHO with Ogre minis, however, you really don’t need labels: there are few enough units that you will soon remeber all the stats. You might want to do some unit cars, illustrated with a picture of the unit, instead.

I am currently using the O8 sci-fi Alien tanks as lights and their Ceasarions as Heavies. I would love to have a smaller vehicle to use as a light, however, and you are right: the Scorpion might just be suitable…

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Just for reference, the GEV conversions have three components:

1) The back jets. These are made from two small sections of plastirod, lightly filed down into cone shapes at the front.

2) The back cabin, which is a chunk of plastic sprue measuring 3x3x2mm, IIRC, with an angular cut at one end, designed to mate it easily to the front cabin.

3) A wire nubbin attached to the front for the main gun.

Of all the conversions, #3 is definitely the most difficult! Drilling a socket in O8’s alloy is a major stone-cold bummer.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Also, feel free to use the same figs for both sides: as you probably know, the Combine and Paneurope made extensive use of each others’ arsenals.

If you are going to use the M-41 as a light tank, however, might I suggest the DK M-41? Not as recognizable and much more modern looking!

http://www.picoarmor.com/pico-products-detail.cfm?id=15&pid=2336&p=Modern%20Miniatures%20-%20Minor%20Nations&n=Tank-M41-DK1%20(15%20pcs)&m=4

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

Thanks for the kind words, Rob! I have been mostly doing 3mm Napoleonics this year, so I have been somewhat remiss with my Ogre set up.

Here’s a shot of a Paneuropean conventional armor force, however:

Note that I am creating plenty of new units for the game, so not everything in that picture exists in the canon universe.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

I went with full game data on the base labels, since, simple as it is for ME to remember, part of the goal of this experiment is to introduce the game and scale at the club, where people are a little less forgiving.  Also we have several Ogre beginners as well, so reminders of the game stats are useful I think.

I’ll be happy to send them along – it’s a fairly high-res vector PDF file though.  Any way you have of getting a 6-7MB document?

[Mr. Average]

By the way, I also happen to have more than one colorblind opponent, so differing silhouettes for the units is a must on my table.  As it stands my proxy list is as follows:

NORTH AMERICAN COMBINE:

• GEV: O8 “Blower”
• LGEV: O8 “Combat Car”
• GEV/PC: O8 “Kontos ACV”
• Light Tank: O8 “Scorpion”
• Heavy Tank: O8 “Caesarion”
• Missile Tank: O8 “Rapier”
• Superheavy Tank: Plasmablast “Hammerhead” (Twin-Gun version)
• Mobile Howitzer: O8 “2S7” SPG
• Howitzer: GZG Germy Micro-Howitzer (Heavily modded)
• Mk. V Ogre: Plasmablast “Tigerclaw”

PANEUROPEAN FEDERATION

• GEV: O8 “Centaurus GEV”
• LGEV: Undetermined (so far)
• GEV/PC: O8 “Pegasus GEV-APC”
• Light Tank: O8 “Walker Bulldog”
• Heavy Tank: O8 “M76 McAuliffe”
• Missile Tank O8 “Thor MRL”
• Superheavy Tank Undetermined (probably a twin-gun heavy Marhaf tank, to go in my next Plasmablast order)
• Mobile Howitzer: O8 “M92 SPG”
• Howitzer: O8 “FH-70 155mm Howitzer”
• Fencer Cybertank: Plasmablast “Maarghast Heavy Tank”

[Rod Robertson]

Very impressive stuff, Thaddeus. I played Ogre a couple of times back in the late 1970’s or early 1980’s but none since then. Kit like yours makes it very tempting to dip my toe back into the Sci Fi pool, at least in my case in the shallow end!

Cheers and good luck with the 3mm Naps, or as I like to call it, braille!

Best wishes and be well.

Rod Robertson.

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

New stuff up on Lead Doesn’t Bleed….
http://leadnobleed.blogspot.com.br/2015/09/3mm-ogre-miniatures-project-moves-along.html

Mr. Average, you’ll note my light tank solution: it’s a French AMX-90 with side skirts.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

Very nice work, however fiddly, with the skirts on the AMX tanks! In fact, I’ll probably do the same with my Walker Bulldogs. The Scorpions are just about right as-is, though. After looking at the original minis I’ve gotten less conscious of maintaining visual form. As the original line didn’t really even maintain a given design theme throughout a single side, so I’m kind of at the point of mixing and matching units on the fly. The Walker Bulldogs, for example, will probably go to the Combine, on reflection, and the Scorpions to the Paneuropeans. I’ve chosen a blue-grey for my Paneuropeans, and a deep red for the Combine. Hopefully, I’ll have photos soon.

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

You are right about the original designs, Matt. The Combine stuff all tried to maintain a boaty sort of WWI vibe, though, which I didn’t much like.

The skirts are an easy change to pull off and they screw the original design just enough that it increases lack of recognition and the sci-fi feel.

I have a bunch of scorpions lying around from my first ever O8 project from a decade ago. I decided to go with the AMXs, however, because I thought the scorps were just a tad too small. M-41s with side skirts would look very nice. You might want to think about cutting the cannon a bit short, too, see how that works. Sheridans might be another possibilty.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

I was torn between the M41s and the Sheridans. I think the Sheridan is going to be my Novabrasilian Light Tank down the road.

I love your work with the industrial area there! What did you use to build up the ground? Just plaster? Did it adhere all right to the CD base?

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

I think the new DN M41 would be a cool option, too.

I basically glued a piece of beveled styrofoam to the CD and then gave it a covering of Vallejo grit. It held on fine! I used wood glue.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[Mr. Average]

Nicely done! I actually am going to pick up a few of the O8 hexes now that Picoarmor is holding them and use them as a base for similar things. Or possibly as bits for one-off special terrain projects, like Mars or the Amazon Combat Zone. I have a bit of Terrainmaker foam left that would fit the purpose for ground buildups.

By the way, I took a shot at skirts on a pack of Bulldogs, but I’m not totally sure the effect worked as well as yours. I have some DN M41s on order though. Oh, and I also settled on the Induna FSV as my Combine Heavy Tank. Base-coated them and about a battalion’s worth of Paneuropean hovercraft this evening.

[Mr. Average]

Still musing without photographs to show, but soon, I hope – the first-ever 3mm scale game will hit the club I belong to this weekend in the form of Ogre Miniatures.

Another few reinforcements arrived the day before yesterday, and cheers to you, TB, for suggesting the M41/Dk.1 as a Combine Light Tank – superior to the original Walker Bulldog in terms of style. But that’s the great thing about the scale – you can do these experiments and not overcommit, financially, so small loss.  Worth a try at less than $5 a pack.

Oh and as a side note, I heartily endorse the O8 hex tiles. Nice, thick material (2mm) with a very good, precise edge cut. The cardboard is matte and not glossy, which should make builds possible with just a sparing amount of paint and white glue – I am as ever leery of warping in paper products, but at 10cm across I think the grain is short enough to keep this to a minimum. And it’s very inexpensive at $6 for ten tiles, so is ideal for experimenting, one-off projects and limited-use terrain sets.

[Author]

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