Toys suitable for Gangs of Mega-City One

[Silverback]

Bought some diecast vehicles off eBay which looked suitable for use in Mega-City One.


Vehicles from Hot Wheels 2007 range. I have about twice this number again of 'futuristic' vehicles.


Recognise the Land Raider in the background from the Cursed Earth stories?


More Matchbox Adventure 2000/Raider Command vehicles.

 

[Rob_A]

Nice stuff man.
Cant wait to see what you do with them.

 

[Silverback]

. . . Cant wait to see what you do with them.

Erm . . . do with them? :?

 

[Rob_A]

I imagined you would repaint them, and make them look like MC1 vehicles. :?

 

[Silverback]

I imagined you would repaint them, and make them look like MC1 vehicles. :?

Maybe once I've got my terrain finished. Until then repainting the vehicles is pretty low priority. May post some pics of the other vehicles in my collection 'soon'.

 

[Silverback]

And here's 'soon'! :lol:

 

[Silverback]

As Rob_A mentioned re-painting the diecast vehicles I did a little Googling and came acoss Hot World Customs which covers pretty much everything you need to know about re-modelling diecast models.

 

[Kardak_Legaius]

Could I see those next to some figures? Those look crazy good for GoMC1 but I thought Matchbox cars were way too small for the scale. Do they make different sizes?

 

[Kardak_Legaius]

Here are some of the vehicles I made for my game. I can't recall if I had posted these already or not.

Probably my personal favorite. The weapons such as the top cannon and such are from the Tamiya Military Model Weapons pack. The front bars are from a Tamiya Tank Trap kit. The wheel spikes are toothpick tips.

I didn't do anything to this one, it was too nice to mangle.

Again, the weapons are from a Tamiya pack. I really like this one too. Big Boss's car. The gas pump set is from some Wal Mart cheapie pack.

Again, I didn't do anything to this one. These are harder to find.

I bought this one for the boards, there were like four of them and they came off and were perfect scale.

These are plastic dollar store toys. I melted them on my gas stove and gave them a bombed out rusty paintjob.

 

[Silverback]

Could I see those next to some figures? Those look crazy good for GoMC1 but I thought Matchbox cars were way too small for the scale. Do they make different sizes?

Well the Hot Wheels cars are 1:64 and the Matchbox Raider Command vehicles are 1:43. 25mm figures (assuming a scale height of 1.8m) come out at 1:72 and 28mm figures are 1:64.

However put the GOMCO figures next to the Hot Wheels cars and the vehicles look way too small but look fine next to the Raider Command vehicles. This tells me two things:

1) 25mm & 28mm figures are way 'overbuilt' and should be used with 1:43 to 1:55 scale direcast vehicles, and

2) If you ignore the figures scale and want some 'funky' cars then go with the Hot Wheels.

Personally I'll be using both the Raider Command (as Justice Department vehicles) and the Hot Wheels cars.



Don't forget that the miniature looks taller because it's mounted on a base!

 

[Shadow Queen]

ever thought about the Batmoblie??

 

[Silverback]

ever thought about the Batmoblie??

Which one? There are so many different ones available. They also tend to look too iconic and recognisable. Which is fine if you're running a Judge Dredd Vs Batman scenario.

 

[Kardak_Legaius]

Which one? There are so many different ones available. They also tend to look too iconic and recognisable. Which is fine if you're running a Judge Dredd Vs Batman scenario.

There was a line of die cast ones from Corgi for a while that were perfect scale visually and there were a lot of cars in the line. Older Batmobiles, the Joker's car, Robin's car and even the Batsub.

I was working on a Dredd versus Batman scenario, making the ground level of a city block to run it in , but i had to move and leave my progress behind. Project like that, it's hard ot make yourself start over from scratch.

 

[Silverback]

When looking for suitable scale diecast vehicles one rule of thumb is to think about a vehicle in real life and how far up your body the top is. For my height (5'11") most cars come up to roughly rib cage to chest height, sports cars around my waist, people carriers about eye to head height, and vans vary from being slightly taller than me to a fair bit bigger!

If you then think along these lines in terms of comparing a miniature to a diecast vehicle you'll soon find those that are suitable. Don't forget to take the figure's base out of the equation!

Unfortunately, by this guideline, most of those vehicles in the photos by Kardak_Legaius are far too big for the figures (sorry!). The boat looks like it might be about right and the plastic trucks probably only slightly overscale.

Some of my Hot Wheels cars, by this rule, are slightly on the small side. But not by much.

 

[Kardak_Legaius]

I had used that formula too when I started doing up vehicles for this scale. I looked at where a car came to me and I looked for cars that came to there on the figures. The problem is, for me at least, that there is correct by the numbers and what looks good.

First off, don't take the base out of the equation. The base makes a figure taller and when you look at the height of a vehicle next to the figure your mind doesn't count out the base in your vision. Treat te figure like it's height includes the base or they are going to tower over your vehicles.

EVen when a vehicle is scaled properly to come to the waist of a figure it looks too small, to me. What I did is I used my open cab cars and sat the judge from the Lawmaster inside of it. He took up a seat and a half in a properly scaled vehicle but fit perfectly in the regular scale of vehicles I used.

And if you are decorating or modding a vehicle you definitely want a scale that is not too small, just to be easier to work with.

Something I was wondering, how much did those Command vehicles cost on Ebay? Those are old but I would love to get some for myself, they look fantastic.

 

[Silverback]

. . . Something I was wondering, how much did those Command vehicles cost on Ebay? Those are old but I would love to get some for myself, they look fantastic. . .

To get one full decent quality set I ended up buying 3 or 4 lots of vehicles which set me back around £50 to £60. You don't even want to know how much mint versions go for! :roll:

 

[Silverback]

. . . First off, don't take the base out of the equation. The base makes a figure taller and when you look at the height of a vehicle next to the figure your mind doesn't count out the base in your vision. Treat te figure like it's height includes the base or they are going to tower over your vehicles. . .

I'm seriously thinking about basing my diecast cars to bring them onto the same 'level' as the miniatures to 'cure' the out of scale look you get with mounted figures next to unmounted cars.

 

[Kardak_Legaius]

You know that is a really good idea. A lot of other types of vehicles like speeder bikes and such are on bases, and I think you could really add a lot of flavor to the vehicles with a good base, not to mention solve the question of base contact for vehicles.

 

[Silverback]

You know that is a really good idea. . .

I'm currently searching around for resin bases of the right size now. Unless of course I end up making/buying them as MDF.

 

[Silverback]

For mo-pads take a look at basing them on camper vans, motor homes, box vans, etc. You may want to take a look at Hot World Customs which goes into detail about converting diecast vehicles.