Greetings!
Today, I've got another post on Star Trek Attack Wing (STAW). I have to admit, I've collected this game in a rather disjointed manner; I periodically pick up a few ships, whenever one of my favorites from the series comes out, or whenever I find some on sale. However, since I rarely get the chance to play STAW, I usually open the booster, look at the mini, and then put the whole lot into a plastic tub. The problem with this approach is that there is a metric ton of tokens, markers, and cards in each booster. So, over time, that tub of mine has become quite the jumble. No more though! A couple weeks back, I resolved to find some sort of storage solution that would separate out all these components and make it easier to actually play the game.
Storage Considerations
Given that STAW minis are fairly sturdy (not a lot of small, spindly parts) and pre-painted, I figured that they are robust enough to withstand storage in some sort of plastic organizer, like a tackle tray, instead of a foam tray of some sort. BattleFoam makes custom foam trays for just this purpose, but that strikes me as a bit overkill for my purposes. I suppose if I were into custom-painting the minis for this game, the
BF offering would make more sense. However, a quick investigation suggested that my usual go-to organizer solution, tackle trays, would not be big enough for the size of STAW minis, especially big, chunky ones like the Borg Tactical Cube. More than that, there are a lot of bits that have to be associated with a mini, like the stat cards and maneuver dials, that also wouldn't fit inside a tackle tray.
So, I cast my search a bit further afield, to places like JoAnn Fabrics and Micheal's Arts and Crafts, to look at the crafting organizers that they sell. And what I found was the ArtBin Super Satchel series. There are several different types and sizes available, but the one that I think works best for this is the Standard Divider tray. The MSRP for these things is around $18, but I was able to get mine on sale for $10, so keep your eyes peeled!
Fitting It All In
The compartments are large enough to hold a STAW mini, its dial, its base insert, the maneuver dial, and the associated cards. The only mini I was not able to squeeze into a single compartment was the aforementioned Tactical Cube.
That thing required two compartments it is so big! In the event that you have two copies of the same ship (I bought two starter sets, so I've got doubles of the three ships in that box), I've found there is plenty of room to fit them. Theoretically, you could also put the plastic bases in the compartments with the ships, but I decided to keep mine separate.
I also grabbed a case that was a single large compartment to hold all the templates, my tackle tray with all the tokens, the rule books, etc. Everything fit in with room to spare, and since it is the same outer dimensions as the divided trays it stacks well.
And there you have it! Now that everything is organized, it should be much easier to actually get out and play this game more!
