Going Digital with Dropzone Commander

Recently one of my friends (Jeff over at Adeptus Malaysia put up this post) showing off  a really nice Dropzone Commander test model he had airbrushed up using a series of home made "hexocam" masks. My DZC stuff has been sitting in a box as I had consistently failed to come up with a camo scheme I really liked. I have two models sitting in Simple Green at home from failed experiments already.

Jeff was kind enough to send me down a set of his masks to have a play with and they are fantastic (although Jeff did make it sound way easier than it was). I undercoated the tank Black, then progressively sprayed Dark Grey (which I will swap out for a Dark Geen), Light Grey and Buff over the vehicle, adding more masks as I went in an effort to duplicate the current US Universal Camo Pattern. My intent once the masks were removed was to varnish it, pin wash it, paint the details and done.... 

In reality, once I removed the masks I found that some of the tape managed to pull away all the paint, right down to the resin. So this tank has joined its platoon mates in the Simple Green!

I am going to try something a little different next time around and wash the resin more throughly (I normally dont bother but I think it may be worth it in this case), do a couple of undercoats with plenty of curing time, and then give the tank a light gloss varnish to try to seal everything in. I also need to put twice the number of masks on as even though I thought I was putting a lot on, once I removed them I realised I need many many more.

However I am pleased with the result and need to try the Universal Camo 2.0 test so I can make these a fun Christmas project..

Dropzone Commander Lands!

Taking a short break from Prussian Month, today I received a parcel I have absolutely and unquestionably been waiting for.... Dropzone Commander!

For those of you living under a rock for the past few months DZC is probably one of the most talked about things in the wargaming community this year (after Third Edition Flames Of War of course!) and something I have been keen to get my hands on. DZC is a 10mm scale sci-fi massed battle game where troops are brought to the battlefield in massive dropships.

It is the first game from a new company called Hawk Wargames. What makes them stand out is that the vast majority of the miniatures have been designed via CAD, rapid prototyped (or 3D printed) and then moulded (and produced) via more traditional methods. These guys have gone one step up in terms of quality over the Spartan Games products (of which I am a huge fan) that are done the same way and at a guess used a newer generation of rapid prototyping machine that leaves significantly less striations, so after the clean up and mastering process none of these marks are visible on the final product. You can read more about them on their website, but its a pretty cool story and well worth reading. Queen probably said it best with the words "One dream, one soul, one prize, one goal".

Anyway, back to the initial part of the story, the package finally arrived and within a few seconds of me commenting that DZC figures were here I had half a dozen people clustered around my desk wanting to have a look! 

After the dust had cleared (and once 5pm rolled around) I headed downstairs to the white table to take a few images of the blister contents. I know that there are already nice images of the bare resin on the Hawk Wargames site, but there is something nice about seeing the real thing fresh out of a blister or box! 

UCM Starter Army Deal - loved the foam tray from KR

Bear APC in parts (left) and assembled (right)

Colonial Legionnaires

Colonial Legionnaires closeup

Rapier AA Tanks

Sabre Main Battle Tanks

Sabre MBT hull close up

Gladius Heavy Battle Tanks

Condor Medium Dropship (minus flight stand)

Condor Medium Dropship cockpit

Archangel Interceptors

Seraphim Strike Fighter

UCM Command Cards Deck

The Rulebook

So, what are my thoughts on the figures and rules so far? Pretty awesome really! Couple of stand outs for me are the quality of the resin figures, they really are nice. Few challenging bits of clean up, and a little bit of green stuff or milliput work required but no more than is considered acceptable for a good wargaming miniature. Quick read of the first few pages of the rulebook is looking good, I'll have a good read tomorrow hopefully and update my thoughts but the initial question of how many pages are there to read... about 40pgs of actual rules. Big tick in that box from me!

Negatives... to soon to tell but I am still wary of the infantry sculpts. Not saying that they are bad, more a case of all the other bits exceeding my expectations that they stick out as not looking as awesome. Tomorrow I'll try to put a quick black wash over one of the stands of figures and take some more images. That will make the detail easier to see and let me make a more educated judgement.

I did have one other negative, but this is definitely more of a light hearted one for sure... we have a running gag in the office of asking companies to draw a Dinosaur or a Wizard on our boxes.

See....

Dave, where was my Dinosaur or Wizard? Never mind, based on the fantastic figures I have seen it is safe to say that I'll be placing another order and therefore giving you another opportunity to nail it next time round.  :)

A sad box about to go in the rubbish bin.....