Basing options - how are you doing them?

[billclo]

Elakin, how much extra work did you have to do to get the corsec mounts to fit the ships themselves?

Not much at all. I drilled a hole in the bottom of each system for the peg -- 11/64 bit, i believe, and just glued the peg in. For some ships (such as the Fed Frigate and light cruiser) this "hole" was just a very shallow divot - but still provided better rigidity than flush gluing the peg. Other ships, like the heavy cruisers and up, most of the peg fit in the drilled hole.

Of course, ya gotta be careful not to do this:

Haven't tried fixing that yet

Bah, put some Squadron putty in that hole, file to match, and call it good.

 

[GalagaGalaxian]

Bah, put some Squadron putty in that hole, file to match, and call it good.

Actually I'd reccomend a knife to shape the putty to the same grill lines as the surrounding texture. If you file away the cooling vanes, the ship'll overheat!

 

[billclo]

Bah, put some Squadron putty in that hole, file to match, and call it good.

Actually I'd reccomend a knife to shape the putty to the same grill lines as the surrounding texture. If you file away the cooling vanes, the ship'll overheat!

You are right. I wasn't clear enough. File to match the grill lines.

 

[Red-24]

So I received my "With Hostile Intent" magnetic adapters the other day from Rattlehead Games. Brandon at Rattlehead was great to deal with, and I would recommend them as an online store based on my first purchase.

I've been trying to figure out the best way to attach them to the bases. Cutting the base to the point where the fit snugly just makes them too low. So I have decided to cut them to height and just use "5 minute epoxy".

That seems to be working well, but it is harder to keep them totally vertical since they are loose on the top of the stand.

Here are some pics:

For the Burke, I decided to attach the top part of the original base to the connector. That way, the piece going in behind the Sensor dish is skinnier.

You'll see more as my project progresses. Doing all sorts of things such as making custom decals for the ships, custom fire arcs for the bases, custom special action markers, and custom ship record sheets.

 

[billclo]

You'll see more as my project progresses. Doing all sorts of things such as making custom decals for the ships, custom fire arcs for the bases, custom special action markers, and custom ship record sheets.

I've got some custom designed firing arc stickers for the bases designed up and on order from a local shop. I'll post a pic when I have some to show you all.

 

[Sgt_G]

Personally, I don't like those mounts. I hate having such a large peg sticking out the bottom of the ship. What I'm thinking of doing, and I do hope it works, is putting a magnet flush to the ship's hull and another on the top of the stand. With any luck, the magnets will be strong enough to keep the ship from falling off.

 

[Finlos]

Using magnets works quite well and even small rare-earth magnets are quite strong, just pay attention to polarity before applying glue

One of the guys back in my old Ottawa 40K group swore by rare-earth magnets and used them constantly to swap out various weapons in WFB and IIRC 40K models as well.

 

[Red-24]

I hate having such a large peg sticking out the bottom of the ship.

One of the other reasons I got these is because the amount of area touching the bottom of the ship is much less than the ball and socket joints that come with the stands.

The only thing I don't like about them aesthetically, is that the base gets fat, then skinny again. They would probably look better with the Ninja Magic flight stands. I just didn't see a big need to pay for more stands.

 

[Red-24]

Here's how my bases turned out:

 

[Da Boss]

Some very nice work - especailly on the bases themslevs with the arcs - cool - be a good S+P article to show how its all done?

 

[McKinstry]

How did you make those cool arc templates?

 

[billclo]

I had a local graphics artist make me a firing arc template, and I had them run off 200 of them (being produced now, and not in my hot hands yet). That's probably have more than I'll ever need, but what with the setup fee it made more sense that way. They're made of a vinyl self-adhesive sticker that goes on top of the clear base.

A watermarked version for your everyone's perusal:

The white cutout area in the back is for using a wax pencil to write in ship designations.

Whatcha think?

 

[Greg Smith]

They are awesome.

 

[McKinstry]

Are you going to be at Cold Wars?

 

[billclo]

Are you going to be at Cold Wars?

I plan to be there on Saturday, but I'm not running any games.

 

[McKinstry]

Any chance I could buy one of those and see if my local Kinkos could duplicate?

 

[billclo]

Any chance I could buy one of those and see if my local Kinkos could duplicate?

Let me think about that. I'm undecided if I want to sell any excess or not at this point.

 

[Red-24]

How did you make those cool arc templates?

I used Paint Shop Pro and created the template. I have a really old version, but it's workable.

I put 20 on a sheet. Then I printed them on my ink jet printer to an 8 1/2 x 11 label sheet (they're about $10 for 15 sheets). Of course I did some test prints first.

I very carefully cut out each template, with one cut right near the Port-Aft mark on the black. Then when I stuck them to the bases (painted black), I was able to stick them around the slight bevel in the base, with the Port-Aft mark part of the sticker going over top of the other part of the sticker.

Once I get around to updating my gaming site with an ACTA section, I'll post the template .jpg for others to use (no watermark on mine).

 

[Red-24]

I had a local graphics artist make me a firing arc template,...
Whatcha think?

I like the stars on it. Now I may have to paint some on mine. ;-)

The reason I didn't put some ship designator space on mine is that my 20 stands are going to be reusable with any of my ships and the magnetic connectors. I figured 20 would be enough for two fleets at any time. After our 4-5 hour game today, with only five ships each, I'm thinking I've gone a bit overboard.

But then again, I've been planning to go totally overboard on this game. ;-)

 

[Red-24]

Some very nice work - especailly on the bases themslevs with the arcs - cool - be a good S+P article to show how its all done?

I'd love to do up an S&P article! I've done game writing before (Darwin's World, Savage Worlds conversion).

I've been so obsessed with this game since it came out. I could also do up something on making custom decals (wait till you see how they turned out!), custom SA tokens, and terrain making (I've got a cool idea for a different way to do asteroids).

My only issue at this time is time. I'm trying to get everything prepped for Trumpeter Salute at the end of March. I also have a bunch of mounted/unmounted Foundry cowboys to paint up for the same con.

Maybe in April. PM me if you want me to get something together for a particular date/issue.