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It took me a few months of very intermittent painting but I've got my NuCoal GP squad done. My Fort Neil Tank Regiment force is now complete and has some supporting units to flank around the main hovertank assault with every model capable of moving at least 16 inches in hover mode. The GP consists of 5x Chassuer Mk2 hover gears with two Lbzk upgrades and two MAC upgrades along with the command model.



I think the paint scheme turned out a bit better on the gears than it did on the tanks and bikes. I had initially planned on putting the skull decal on the front chest panel but it looked odd there and detracted from the solid red so I instead put it on the right shoulder top instead (after trying about the calves as well). They still remind me a bit of men in tuxedos but I do actually like the overall look in the end unlike with the tanks. Here is the whole army in a pic just as a reference.



Special thanks goes out to Paradox 01 on the DP9 forum for a tip about putting a brown undercoat on top of black when you want to put red as the final color. I suspect this will be last Heavy Gear hobby work that I do for a long while. My only opponent in the state has pretty much gone belly up in terms of interest in playing for a variety of reasons and there is alot of uncertainty in Heavy Gear at the moment with the upcoming release of the next edition Beta rules. I'll still try and play my FLASH! house rules locally here if I can get an opponent but I'll likely bow out of the new edition until the final version shakes out next summer. I've still at least a dozen more unpainted Northern gears that I'd like to eventually work on as well as probably another squad's worth of odds and ends gears that I don't plan on working on currently so I'll have plenty on the plate next summer if I like what I see.

In the meantime, I've also put my 40k Deathwatch Truescale marine squad on hold for the moment as a dastardly thread on Dakka (http://ironhands.com/votomscampaign.htm) got my interest in VOTOMS piqued again. Infinity is coming out with a new edition this summer which I plan on checking out so I figured I'd get some models to use along with my existing 40k collection to test the waters with that new ruleset.



The thread on Dakka which gave me the idea of using them as TAG (Tactical Armored Gears) models and Paint it Pink Blog's very nice VOTOMS articles on various model sizes (http://panther6actual.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/VOTOMS%20Miniatures) helped alot in getting the scale right. I basically plan on trying out the rules using my Cadian IG as Nomad Infantry and the VOTOMS as Gecko TAGs. Additionally, I wouldn't mind trying out 28mm Heavy Gear using my FLASH! rules and 40k figs. Basically, the cadians would be northern infantry with the VOTOMS as 28mm Gears (Hunter XMG?). Opposing them would be my xenos "earth" forces with either Tau or Eldar tanks as Earth Light Hovertanks and eldar "GREL" jetbikes or Tau stealth suit FLAILs.

In any case, thanks for reading and I hope to post an update with the VOTOMS soon (or at least not the two months it took for the NuCoal GP squad).

I have no legitimate use for more VOTOMS yet I picked up three more for a great price! At least now I'll have a full squad of five when they arrive in a few weeks as it seems all the VOTOMS in North America were bought out long ago and I have to buy them from various far flung locales.

Since I have a full squad theoretically, I decided to try and kit them out like a squad in Heavy Gear. Along those lines, I decided to make two of them "strike" variants with bazookas. At first, I had hoped my left over RAFM larger scale heavy bazookas would do the trick but they were much too small. I decided to instead convert two weapons from things I had laying around so below you'll find pics of my new bazookas constructed from left over 40k bits and sprues as well as two dried out ball point pens. I'm not a sculptor but I tried to make them at least reminiscent of HG style bazookas as I prefer that look to the more rounded versions you find in VOTOMS.





Included in the second pic is the old RAFM scale bazooka for size comparison. I plan on using two of them as the "gunner" versions with the MAC GAT-22 rifle and the last one converted to a command variant. I'll have to add some extra comm gear somewhere to visually identify the "command:" Jager. Ideally, I'd prefer to field them as a squad of 5x Basilisks but I can't find a way in the Heavy Gear Southern Field Guide to field 5 Basilisks including two Strike variants and three Gunners.

If I'm missing some swap in FIF that allows this, feel free to tell me in a comment below! I'll likely wait till I get the remaining three models before I start painting them as I prefer to do assembly style painting (i.e. all the weapons on all the models in a row before moving onto some other part).

Those look like a lot of fun warboss. The scale seems excellent for 28mm, and the models look pretty flexible. Speaking of, are you leaving them all poseable or did you glue all the joints prior to painting? That's the thing that always confuses me when I'm working on those kind of models, if I should lock them in place to paint or try and paint them while leaving them pose-able.

I think the Bazooka turned out well, and is instantly recognizable. Moreso once it gets painted up and they get a scheme tied together.

As for running 5 Basilisks, you're already running all sorts of fancy custom things... what's it matter if you mash up the rules a little?

Thanks! The scale looks great for 28mm gaming but unfortunately they're way too big for the Geckos counts as that I had planned. From looking at the few side by side shots of Infinity TAGs online, I'm guessing they're a tiny bit bigger than even the mighty Jotum let alone the barely a TAG geckos. I'd have to have gotten some truely 1/60 VOTOMS to use them as planned with Infinity. If anything, maybe I can use them as Lizards but it seems like you can only ever have one in a force when I peeked on the aleph toolbox.

For 28mm HG games, they're actually just a standard force with nothing fancy or custom surprisingly. If I can't find a way to use them as Basilisks then they'll be a veteran Jager Gearhunter GP cadre with 3 gunner upgrades. Since I plan to test them out in a very small game versus either my "CEF" eldar or tau (since they both have hovertanks), I wouldn't want to go crazy with them. They feel like they need a bit of a boost versus a single light hovertank but I'll try out the above first before I do something more exotic like counting them as sidewinders in a Republican GP. The VOTOMS in the show really are lightly armored and disposable which is why the Basilisks are a good fit beyond just the visual. I guess since my models are all Red Shoulder Custom variants that in the fluff are heavily modified that they could just as easily go in as other more advanced gears as well. To be honest, I haven't yet worked out the TV lists for that and will have to see how the two sides of 40k figs shape up in HGB.

As for the poses, I suspect I'll leave them posable. In my limited experience, super glue doesn't work well on these types of models with and I'd have to glue ALOT. They surprisingly posable with hip, knee, and ankle joints for the legs and shoulder, elbow, and hand joints for the arms. I'm a bit worried that the simple acrylic GW paint I'll use will rub off a bit at the joints though with accidental movement. They look too rubbery though for use though in tabletop gaming as is IMO which is why I'd be hesitant to leave them as is. I guess I could hit them with some flat sealer and see if that helps but I'll probably wait till I get the rest. I'm not too worried about ruining their "resale" value as I don't plan on ever selling them so that doesn't factor into the decision whether to paint or not.

This comment is way late, but fabulous looking models.

Thanks! Hopefully the frequently just plain bad photography didn't hurt your eyes too much. My usual cell phone in the dimly lit basement pics won't win any photography awards ever!

There frankly hasn't been any real activity on my HG hobby front (or frankly any hobby front) in recent months for a variety of reasons. My Heavy Gear inspired 28mm VOTOMS are still pretty much ready to be painted except for the two that I was using painting tests on. I did recently though sell some hobby items and recycle that money back into pure nostalgia by getting some original larger RAFM scale gears. I still plan on selling my southern Blitz era army that I started this blog about (under similar large lot at a discount circumstances!) which makes the purchase even more perplexing. My only excuse is pure nostalgia.




And the assembled models:





It's been roughly 15+ years since I last took a close look at the RAFM models in person and there was definitely some retroactive rose colored glasses effect going on for me. While still nice, I can now saw that I'm firmly in the "Blitz" era camp for favorite HG model style. They're a bit chunkier (I hesitate to say chibi as DP9 came out with complete chibi models that I don't actually like) with the class size differences exaggerated (so scouts are smaller than the RPG fluff height compared with troopers for instance). The new plastics in the current scale look ok but, other than the Caprice models, don't inspire me to buy them personally. I already have three full armies and definitely don't need any more in blitz scale unless a very active play group suddenly and spontanously sprouts up next to me locally. I do hope though that the soon to be released plastics inspire more folks to take a peek at HG and become potential opponents.

With the above recent haul, I probably have enough to play the new HG rules with the original minis. I'm not sure yet what I'll do with them (sell them? build them? a bit of both) but I'll keep this thread updated regardless. Right now I'm leaning towards selling most but not all of the south and any repeats of northern gears to try and make my money back yet have enough to do small to medium scale mecha games. We'll see...

IMO, your RAFM Heavy Gear stuff would work fine for any modern squad-level skirmish game. You could probably use Infinity as your game engine, although I suspect you'd find KOG light too streamlined.

The style thing is kind of interesting to me. My Southern stuff is 1/144 Tactical-era, but my CEF stuff is necessarily Blitz-era. As the styles are completely different, it works out. I think I could integrate Caprice plastics without any issues, either. Except, I don't really recognize Caprice as Heavy Gear-like.

From what I see, the plastics exaggerate size far more than Tactical Era, yes?

Anyhow, I look forward to seeing how much of this you end up building.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
IMO, your RAFM Heavy Gear stuff would work fine for any modern squad-level skirmish game. You could probably use Infinity as your game engine, although I suspect you'd find KOG light too streamlined.

Or give them all a shot. I'll of course try the official HG rules first and give them a fair shake before making a decision. My gut instinct is that I'd prefer to play closer to the skirmish scale side of things in terms of model count 10-15 "gear" sized models per side; hopefully the living rules will scratch that itch.

The style thing is kind of interesting to me. My Southern stuff is 1/144 Tactical-era, but my CEF stuff is necessarily Blitz-era. As the styles are completely different, it works out. I think I could integrate Caprice plastics without any issues, either. Except, I don't really recognize Caprice as Heavy Gear-like.

You shouldn't have any issues. Even if your southern stuff is tactical and say northern stuff is blitz, the difference isn't really noticeable to new players if you just change out the tactical weapons since they're the most obvious. The worst case scenario would be if you mixed and matched the same model/variants from the various eras as is within the same squad side by side as that would accentuate the differences.

From what I see, the plastics exaggerate size far more than Tactical Era, yes?

It depends on what you mean. From a look at the pics, they've kept the size differences between classes and the larger weapons... but their overall body proportions (like arm and chest thickness) seem slimmer and closer to the tactical minis than the more recent squatter blitz era stuff as are the stiffer poses. Maybe its just me but they seem like a middle ground between the two.

Anyhow, I look forward to seeing how much of this you end up building.

Thanks! So am I. So far I've just been cataloging what I actually have. I've already found one honest mistake in the list of blisters the seller gave me as one model he thought was a hunter was actually a hunter commando... but the "commando" part was rubbed off of the blister after 20 years. Since that one was one of my missing favorites, it was a pleasant surprise. I'm at the moment now only missing the King Cobra from my personal fav list.

So it took me a few days but I cracked open a few of the blisters. As the grizzlies were some of my favorite, I decided to open those first and start on the core of a fire support squad. I didn't notice it at first but my rabid grizzly was a strange mispack as it was both missing bits and included USED bits from another kit with 20 year old yellowed super glue on the bottom of the head! I guess QA wasn't as tight as it is now back in the day (see more below).

I definitely remember the models as being prettier at least in the blister than they are in person 20 years later. Besides just the missing/swapped used piece above, there are frequent mould lines and minor slips as well (especially on the rocket pods). The sculpting while nice is very antiquated at times, especially on the rocket packs. The packs look like someone just took a needle and kinda sorta poked holes in semi dry green stuff, eyeballing the angles, number, and orientation.. and that's probably what actually happened, lol! Pegs on arms simply don't fit into the holes on the shoulders and flat joint surfaces are convex instead. There's definitely alot more prep involved in the classic models than compared with modern (soon to be replaced) metal Blitz scale offerings.

Initially, I had a hard time deciding which variants to actually build and exactly how to build them. For instance, I have an assault grizzly pack with all the necessary bits to build a 1st edition RPG loadout assault grizzly. I could do that but the variant no longer exists in the upcoming Blitz rules. Instead, the only bazooka armed Grizzly in the new rules is the "destroyer" variant which was an upgrade of the assault grizzly with an even bigger bazooka. No problem, right? Except that the loadouts for everything but the bazooka have changed for the "destroyer" in the 20 years since. The Hbzk is the same but the rocket packs changed location and type, the mortar magically reappeared, the heavy spike gun reverted down to just a simple knife, and the frag cannon (think mecha sized shotgun) turned into a pack gun (think mecha sized uzi). Of course, the pack contains almost none of the above. Looking through my 20 year old bits pile (some original rafm bits were still in my 40k ork bits pile!), I found some needed parts so that I wouldn't have to open another blister just yet and scrounged the rest from the other grizzly packs (assuming they were extra there). I decided to go with the modern loadouts whenever possible. Sometimes I was restricted by the actual physical size/position of the parts, other times they just weren't available, and in one case I just wanted to change the asthetics.

I started with the Rabid Grizzly as I initially thought it was the variant with the least amount of changes necessary.



As you can see, I put some green stuff on the front of the ugly pin hole rocket pack; I'm going to try instead to just paint on the rocket pips. I initially tried some quick impression sculpting (pushing some existing modern rocket packs into the still wet green stuff) but it didn't work well so I just flattened out the surface instead. Also, in the original RPG art (and the Rafm models), the angular northern gears had curvy rocket pods whereas the curvy southern gears had angular pods. I decided to reverse that to have the aesthetics match. You can see the original hex base that came with the models as well as some optional bits that I'm considering using. Even back in the original Rafm days, the gears spilled over the edges of their bases. I think I'll instead base them on 40-50mm round bases (which actually would be legal in current blitz!). I'm also considering adding the grenades and ammo cannister to the model as shown below (on the butt plate and forearms) but I'm not sure if it'll end up making the model too "busy". Finally, the head is technically incorrect but it kind of matches the "extra armor" motiff of the variant (you can see the correct distinctive head when I post the destroyer variant). I also added an extra armor plate over each shoulder joint to give it more of a tough look.



I'm a little torn on that as they'd cover up the distinctive butt plate design of the gears. If I did it for one gear then I'd probably put extra ammo for each one in that weapon (and they do that occasionally with the current metal scuplts as well). Particularly eagle eyed HG experts might notice that I cut off the butt plate from the engine (they're moulded as one piece) to give the model a bit more variety in posing. I'm not as much of a fan of keeping everything in back all in exact alignment and apparently neither is the current staff at the company as they have had them moulded separately since. Thanks again and let me know your thoughts if any on the addition of the bits issue.

You like it, so so that's all that really matters.

Also, my Tac-era 1/144 Southern Gears have a mix of rectangular and circular small rocket pods on their shoulders. I'd have preferred all circular, I think.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
You like it, so so that's all that really matters.

Also, my Tac-era 1/144 Southern Gears have a mix of rectangular and circular small rocket pods on their shoulders. I'd have preferred all circular, I think.

Do you mean for your southern gears? If so then I'd agree. The angular pods don't look bad (I've got enough of them in my blitz army for sure) but I think I'll like the curvy ones on the southies more. Who knows... maybe I won't when I actually get to seeing them in person! but it's been an idea of mine for years. I actually at one point considered redoing all the rocket pods on the force shown in the first few pages here but then I regained my sanity.

Well, yeah. I only have a handful of Gears, of which all but 1 are Southern, and the odd man out is the Arena Strike Cheetah, which will end up wearing UN Peacekeeper colors.

Tha'ts a nice one to have though; I'm biased though as it was my Blitz era Northern army commander. I worked on the second grizzly and took a few pics. Here's the previously mentioned Destroyer Grizzly variant:



The general basis for the fig is the RAFM assault grizzly but I've upgunned the bazooka to a heavy version as well as changed the other weapons to match the current rules. The arm is the same but the original medium bazooka had to be clipped/filed off and the new one glued on. The end result is a bit comically huge which I wasn't expecting but the other one was a tad too small (especially since it'll be the weapon on a bunch of smaller trooper gears as well). With the larger weapon size, the position of the engine cylinders actually became an issue for posing and the one I chose is basically the most level right arm pose I could get. The waist was angled down initially and when I put the torso on the gear always looked like he was looking for a dropped coin or his keys on the ground... so I extended the waist a bit in the front which angled the torso up just enough. I drilled a hole in the hand and put in a pack gun and added the usual bits including the same rocket launcher. The rockets aren't actually WYSIWIG but the new rules simplified grizzly rockets all to the same statline so shouldn't be an issue. The original strike grizzly is supposed to have a smaller rocket on each shoulder and the destroyer probably has them on the back of the engine (they're strangely never shown in the rpg art). I had some bits lined up for the heavy spike gun on the left forearm, a spare fragcannon, and extra head bunny ear antenna but decided to go with the modern loadouts instead. Here's a group photo with the Rabid Grizzly...



Next up will be the Crossbow Grizzly blister that I'll probably convert as a Thunder command variant.

A little dude like him as Commander? I'd think a Kodiak or something would be more fitting.

Squad commander (i.e. CGL), not necessarily army commander. I'm not sure what I'll do with the Kodiak but I'm leaning towards him being the army duelist or, to a lesser extent, the army commander. Unfortunately, they're mutually exclusive. In blitz, I was a big fan of my commanders actually spending their time commanding unlike in 40k where they're mostly beatsticks (hence my earlier comment about a strike cheetah blitz army commander). Putting the commander in something as expensive as a Kodiak might be a waste of its combat potential. Something like the white cat would be the modern equivalent since the strike cheetah changed so much.

OK, got it. I agree that's more "realistic".

OTOH, for a game about giant robots... Oh, well, nevermind.

And yeah, that Bazooka is crazy.

The third grizzly fire support gear is built. I decided to upgrade the third grizzly from a standard crossbow variant to a thunder command gear as well. The change ruleswise just adds some comm boosts and a satellite uplink and must be used as the squad commander. Modelwise, I made a few more changes in line with the old RPG art.

The assault/destroyer grizzly (bazooka guy) was supposed to have a moderately upgraded comm signified by a single bunny ear on the head in the dog. In the current rules, the destroyer gets no such buff so I left the bunny ear off. The thunder variant though has a full set of ears which worked out well since I now had access to two bits. Additionally, I added a sat uplink cone to center of the backpack from my smaller scale blitz bits box. It's technically supposed to be off to one side but that wasn't a particularly sturdy conversion so I glued it centrally instead. Finally, the "pointy" arm looked a bit more commander-ish so I swapped it out from the Destroyer variant where I suppose it was supposed to be a sort of arm stretched out counter balance to swinging the bazooka around.







And by special request on my blog, here is a size comparison between similar Rafm and current metal Blitz scale models. From L to R: cheetah scout, jager/hunter trooper, jaguar elite, and grizzly fire support gears. I don't own any gearstriders though nor any normal striders unfortunately.

Here's the final grizzly family member in RAFM scale.. my Kodiak Destroyer um... chaplain... or duelist... or army commander... not sure which (or what combo of those) yet!



I changed up the rocket pod just like with my previous gears (although using a smaller bit to signify the lack of dual pods in the current rules). Due to the relative size of the protrusions like the engine cylinders and the bazooka, I frankly didn't have much posing options. The arms pretty much could only be elevated as much as they arm due to bumping up against the engine and the torso couldn't really be swiveled much either. In the end, I decided to go with a more on purpose looking static pose trying to make lemonade out of lemons. I took off the pack gun from the left arm (as well as the circular rocket pod) and drilled out the hand. I converted my last 40k grey knight halberd into a duelist weapon/melee staff similar to the one used by the gearstrider Scimitar. I then added a few cloth bits (also from 40k) to make the character model a bit more similar to the cover art of the original northern Blitz book (and the art on the current Northern chapter page in the living rulebook). I considered adding back a folded pack gun like I did to the Crossbow grizzly but ultimately decided against it (as well as the APGL) as I thought the model would look too busy.

Here's a group shot of all four together.



I was relatively surprised by the similarity in size (minus the missile launcher) of the Kodiak to the other grizzly models. This matches the RPG fluff on which these old models were based but I suppose I just got used to the injected size differences between classes in current blitz. I had hoped to use the Kodiak as a Gear Strider in current scale Blitz but it's a bit smaller than I had hoped. The Scimitar (according to the original DP9 press release) is 68mm tall but they didn't state to which part of the model (it has a humpback tower/turret behind and above the head). I assume that it is to the literal top of the model; in the case of the Kodiak, it's about 62mm to the top of the missile launcher and about 52mm to the top of the head. I'll have to actually see (and hopefully compare) it to a real Scimitar both in height and bulk to see if it's a worthwhile substitute. It's not too much of a problem in the current living rules as the LOS by default is substituted by a rectangular profile regardless of the actual model dimensions.

Finally, I can deny it no longer... my new cell phone camera sucks at taking model pictures. Part of the issue is the time and location of the pics (in the evening when I can work on the models and in the not so bright basement where I do the hobby work) but the camera app doesn't have great features as well (like no dedicated macro function). I tried retaking some pics last night with my old dedicated digital camera (a simple consumer model.. nothing fancy) and it was a little better but still not much. Today, in between clouds, I tried taking some natural lighting pics and will slowly be replacing the previous blog entries with the better pics. Without further whining about my lack of photography prowess, here are the new better but still not great duo pics!

Um, you're gonna drill all of those barrels out, right? The Bazooka barrels look awful if you don't.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Um, you're gonna drill all of those barrels out, right? The Bazooka barrels look awful if you don't.

I've been considering it but I'm wary. Drilling out to the size needed might warp the exterior dimensions given that the cylinder walls would be pretty thin. I drill like crazy through flat larger surfaces (like the torso arm holes) but hollowing out a cyclinder is risky. I might try it on one of the spares carefully with a pilot hole of a small diameter and maybe then sequentially larger drill bit diameters.

I've drilled a LOT of bazooka barrels, and the biggest ones I drilled were the Imperial Guard Missile Launchers. This is best done in stages, with ever increasing drill bits, +1/16" or +1/8" steps.

You'll need an X-acto knife and/or dremel to ensure that the hole centers properly. Center early and often.

You only need to go in 1/4", 1/2" would be overkill, even on those big minis.

The barrel *will* get hot AF while you're drilling it. Drill them all at once, and let them cool down while you're working a different one. Cutting oil of any sort will be a *big* help.

The outside will NOT warp if you take your time and are careful.

Having some actual depth into the barrel will help tremendously when you paint it.

Good luck!

Thanks for the tips. I hadn't thought about cutting oil/lub to keep it cool. I wonder if chainsaw oil will work for that? It's on the cutting surfaces of that tool so maybe.

I'm sure it's better than nothing!

Good luck!

I mostly took the weekend off. Tonight though I swapped out the Kodiak rocket launcher for the same one the grizzlies have for consistency. I've also been considering what squad to build next. My general choices given the models I have are general purpose, recon, and strike squads. Personally, I'm leaning towards the strike squad of Jaguars and to a lesser extent the recon squad.

With the Fire Support grizzlies, the blisters were all different with vastly differing bits that couldn't be replicated easily... that isn't the case with either the recon cheetahs as well as the strike squad jaguars. For both squads, I can build either four different models like the Fire Support squad or build a bit more optimized two pairs of two variants. For instance, I have two normal cheetahs (one built), a cheetah fang and similar cheetah fang, and a white cat and similar white cat EMH. Any thoughts? I'm leaning a tiny bit towards different loadouts for the squads mainly for visual variety. It's not like this army will be any sort of "tournament winning" force.

Finally, the last question is of the basing. I had originally planned on buying some 40-50mm lipped circular bases online for the models when I realized that I still had a large stash of decent 40mm bases left over from Robotech that I'll probably never use since I don't see myself assembling more of those forces. They have markings for the front arc already on them (although very faintly which would be covered up with most basing material) which helps as well.

I decided to follow the template set up by the Fire Support squad in making each model in the squad a unique variant. The models that I had to choose from were two Fire Jaguars, a Jaguar Predator, and a stock Jaguar. The Predator was out as it has no equivalent in the current living rulebook (LRB) so I decided to turn it into a bazooka armed Destroyer variant instead. The stock Jaguar, while supported, was too similar in loadout for my tastes as the two Fire Jaguars (all three wielding MACs) so I decided to try and convert it to a Flash Jaguar instead. For the Flash variant, I thought it might be nice to convert the arms into a folden across the chest position as opposed to simple at its side. I took some cutting, pinning, and filling but I'm happy with the final result. Finally, I decided to try and convert one of the two rocket based Fire Jaguars (the unassembled NIB model) into a missile firing Arrow Jaguar instead to stand alongside the assembled Fire Jaguar. Picture below are the Destroyer and Flash variants.







Unfortunately, when I opened the three blisters I had (one Fire Jaguar was already assembled and painted), I noticed that every single Jaguar head was different. One had the extended visor just as the assembled Fire Jaguar, one was angular similar to modern Jaguars, and one was oddly curvy but not very similar to the cury Fire Jaguar heads either. Unfortunately, the engine in that pack also didn't match and it appeared that I had yet another RAFM mispack. From looking at various pics online, I had a hunter "bits" plastic bag in my Jaguar blister instead of the correct one. You can see the various heads in the pic above as well as the engines below.



I decided to only build three Jaguars (similar to the three Grizzlies... not including the Kodiak commander) since I only had three correct matching engines. The heads, however, were a different story as I'm still not sure what to do. On a lark, I figured I'd try to email Rafm and see if they had any extra bits left over from that era. I realize it's a very long shot and hopefully they'll be able to help. If they can't my only options will be to either use wildly different heads or try to press mould additional heads. For now, I'll hold off on the decision about the heads and next build the last Arrow Jaguar addition to the squad.

I tried various possible solutions over the weekend to my issue of the mismatched Jaguar heads this weekend. Raiding the various bits boxes didn't help and several different attempts at press moulding just ended up with the following mostly low detail and frequently unusable bits.



The two best cast pieces still had detail issues on the bottom half (although the less detailed top turned out fine) so I decided to cut off the bottom and try to convert existing blitz scale heads into the bottom portions. Unfortunately, it just looked like the blitz heads were wearing a small hat instead of a cohesive single head. In the end, I settled and used the two Fire Jaguar heads as the normal heads and the Thunder Arrow variant used the mispacked hunter head.



I'm not entirely happy with the pose on the missile launcher commander model. I was going for a "follow me, men!" type raised arm but instead it looks a bit more like a Papal wave unfortunately. I had planned on turning the torso more but then the head wouldn't be oriented in the same direction due to the missile launchers. I may revisit this pose in another few days after I finish the next squad. I also converted the MAC to a bulkier version using some 40k and Robotech bits. The MAC is one of the worst offenders in the underscaled weapon department for Rafm era models with the supposedly bigger weapon coming in smaller in volume than the LAC and even the pack gun. Here's a side/back view of the three.



Next up will be the three gear Recon squad of cheetahs.

I did a partial repositioning of the Arrow Jaguar's head and missile launchers. Initially, I wanted the model's front view to look as similar to the old RPG art as possible but unfortunately the pose overall suffered IMO. I took off the head and missile launchers, scraped clean the superglue, and repositioned them to look a little more like I initially intended. I imagine the advanced tracking systems on the Jaguar have the missile mount on that side turn to where his sensor cluster (the head) is pointing so I turned the one mount and left the other facing straight forward (but still at the RPG tilted angle from the vertical.

Next up, I worked on some cheetahs. These guys were less time intensive as I didn't thankfully have to (so far!) worry about mispacks and the conversions were relatively minimal. I clipped and repositioned the normal cheetahs arm to infront of him and added a Blitz scale dagger to liven up the pose a bit more. As usual, I swapped out the curved rocket pack for an angular one. Additionally, the pic showed me that I missed some spots when stripping and reposing this model so I'll have to go back and do some concentrated scrubbing tonight.



The second model from the recon squad was the strike cheetah. Whereas the normal cheetah is a mix of Electronic Warfare and defensive capability, the strike cheetah focuses more on the latter and adds some offensive punch. Initially, it was an aidrop capable unit but strangely it has been split up into three separate bazooka cheetahs, only one of which is airdrop capable. Either way, here is my Metal Cat/Strike Cheetah/Para Strike Cheetah. The changes to the stock model were adding a pack gun to the left hand, swapping the Rapid Fire Bazooka for a Light Bazooka, and the rocket launcher swap.



Next up will be the White Cat Cheetah variant and some group photos!

I like the idea of making each model different. I think I'll do something like that for my CEF stuff.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
I like the idea of making each model different. I think I'll do something like that for my CEF stuff.

I did it both out of necessity and equally choice as I can convert only so much based on my bits. If you get enough of the new plastic CEF tanks, it's probably a good idea just for visual variety. I personally have little to no chance of using these in the foreseeable future so an efficient in game optimized for lost out to variety and visual preferences.

Here's the currently complete recon group. I built the third cheetah as a White Cat with two small conversions: the rocket launcher and the EW forearm bit.






I might change the rocket pod back to the vertical one if I decide to build another stock Cheetah (my only planned repeat!). My group photos turned out really badly due to the lighting so I'll have to wait until the weekend to try again in better light. I also had another idea about the Jaguar heads and decided to try casting the fire jaguar head instead of the more modern one that I initially tried. I'll post an update about that tomorrow along with some group shots and further ideas this weekend.

Right now, I'm just focused on what metals I've got in hand. Also, if I'll just be playing against myself or my friends, like a board game, then it won't matter so much how they're built.

I think you'll be in a similar situation, with units that equip for looks rather than some sort of pickup / tournament setup.