Chen-song's 1/72 Scale Miniature Gaming Blog

Sorry that I haven't been updating this blog, but I've been busy early this year. However, I am still slowly chipping away at my Epic Tyranids.

I promised to take pictures of some Reaper Bones miniatures for someone and do a comparison with 1/72 scale miniatures, so I guess I'm back to the proper subject of the blog.

There are some very nice looking Bones (soft plastic) miniatures that can double for 1/72 scale aliens, and I have a few that I plan on using in games. Sorry about the funny colours and lighting in the photos. Bones miniatures don't do so well with lights.

These are Reaper Bones "Kulathi Invaders". They are alternatively armed with one large weapon or a couple of small weapons. I think they're perfect for larger-than-human basic alien foot soldiers. They are next to a couple of Elhiem 1/72 scale metal "federal troopers".

This is a "Bathalian Centurion", a large creature with giant talons. Creatures of this size can probably be used as light vehicles versus human-sized soldiers. This one looks assault-oriented.

This one is a "Bathalian Exarch", slightly slimmer with smaller "hands". Maybe it can be used as a leader of some kind?

The largest of the creatures is the "Bathalian Primarch", with extended head armour. Maybe this is good for an alien supreme leader with psychic powers?

All of these aliens have cthulhuloid face tentacles, and their styles fit together well as different castes of an alien army. I can probably use them in a custom background with the FUBAR ruleset, a good way back into 1/72 scale sci-fi gaming.

I've assembled some of the storm trooper models from the other day, and they look great so far.  There are a lot of pieces to put together, especially with the mechanical mule, but the results are excellent.

This is the front and back of a standard storm trooper.  You can see that there's a lot of detail all over the model, and I especially like the helmet and mask.  It looks like the standard storm trooper rifle is some sort of MG-42 derivative.

This is Ada, the female storm trooper that came as a bonus for the Kickstarter order.  Again, there's excellent detail matching the regular storm trooper from above.  Plus, there's a ridiculously large gun involved. :)  At least that's the only thing big on her, and she doesn't have her own floatation devices that are all too common on sci-fi/fantasy female figures. :P

One of the cool pieces of equipment that came with the accessory pack is the mechanical mule, which is a Big Dog style walking robot cargo carrier.  There are three of them in the pack, and although there are some fiddly pieces, they add to the sci-fi atmosphere quite a bit.

I immediately thought of using the mule for 1/72 scale sci-fi, so I took this picture with two figures from that scale.  It looks like the machine can definitely fit that purpose.  It's just more of a robotic ox instead of a mule, being quite a bit larger.

Here's a comparison shot of the two storm troopers with a converted Games Workshop Cadian trooper.  Dream Forge's sculpting style is much closer to actual human proportions than GW's "heroic 28", so these models are taller and thinner compared to the Warhammer figure.  They're probably better off used separately from the GW stuff in 28mm sci-fi games.

All in all, these are great models that can really add to any gaming experience.

It looks like the area of 1/72 scale fantasy is really heating up.  In addition to the existing Caesar and Dark Alliance packs, Dark Alliance has recently released their Orc Warg riders!  There are two packs available, a light and a heavy set of Orc cavalry.  Needless to say, I ordered some as soon as I could, and I just received them today.

These are the riders from the light Orcs box.  They are very nice for Dark Alliance figures, with very little flash and good detail.  The size is comparable to their two boxes of Orc foot soldiers.


Previously, when there were no 1/72 fantasy cavalry, I bought some Eureka Miniatures 15 mm (more like 18 mm) Orc riders for cavalry.  One of the Orc lancers is on the left compared to a Dark Alliance heavy Orc rider on the right.  As you can see, the plastic Orc is the right size, but the metal Orc can fit well as a 1/72 scale goblin rider on a smaller wolf.

It'll be a while before I paint these up, as I have some other projects ahead of them, but it's getting exciting to be in 1/72 scale miniatures!  Now if they'll only start making 1/72 sci-fi...

On the Ambush Alley forum, I was asked to post a size comparison similar to what I had done before, except with non-power armour GZG 25mm miniatures. So here they are:
A GZG 15mm Ixx, a GZG 25mm NSL Panzer Grenadier, a Caesar 1/72 modern French soldier, and a Caesar 1/72 nun.
A close-up of the Ixx, 25mm NSL Panzer Grenadier, and 1/72 French soldier.

After I took those pictures, something felt wrong, and I realized that I based the 25mm GZG figure on a washer so that the base was taller than the others. I then compensated for this by placing the other figures on washers of the same size.
These are the same as above, but with washers under the other figures so the 25mm GZG is not propped up unfairly.

What to think then? While the GZG 25mm power armour miniature can get away with being bulkier simply by virtue of being power armour, the non-power armour 25mm soldier doesn't look quite right with 1/72 miniatures. The proportions of the GZG miniature, even though it's miles better than heroic scale "28mm," still doesn't quite match the realistic proportions of 1/72s. So even as bulky sci-fi armour, it still doesn't really fit. But like always, this comes down to personal preference.

Due to the dearth of power armour in 1/72 or 20 mm scale, I asked for help on a mailing list. Someone replied that GZG 25 mm power armour will work just as well. My first reaction was "but they're too big!" However, since I believe in empirical observation, :) I actually took out a couple of my GZG 25 mm NSL power armour and did some comparison shots. The results are rather surprising.

From left to right, Caesar 1/72 modern French, GZG 25 mm NSL power armour sergeant, Caesar 1/72 nun, and another Caesar 1/72 modern French.

From left to right, Caesar 1/72 modern French, GZG 25 mm NSL power armour, Caesar 1/72 nun, and GZG 15 mm alien Ixx.

From left to right, GZG 25 mm NSL power armour with plasma gun, GZG 15 mm alien Ixx, GZG 25 mm NSL power armour, and Caesar 1/72 nun.

From the pictures, it's pretty clear that the 25 mm GZG power armour can be used with 1/72 miniatures as some sort of large armoured suit. It surprised me quite a bit that it would fit so well. Oh well, I guess I have power armour miniatures for my sci-fi campaign now.