Macrossmartin's Many Mutants - Dalek Wargaming In 1/40th

[Macrossmartin]

Greetings, everyone!
 
This thread will chart my current Dalek project: The creation of two armies of our favourite fiends, in 1/40th scale, with which I can wargame battles of the Dalek Civil Wars.
 
The objective is to build two forces — one of Imperial Daleks, the other of Renegades — of around 100 travel machines each. The scale is 1/40th, which is the approximate scale of the Character Building 'not-Lego' Daleks that were available a few years back.
 
A bit of background to the project before we kick on: Ages ago, I started collecting the Dr Who Character Building figures, and, being a wargamer, I promptly decided these innocent toys needed to be thrown into violent, deadly, tabletop combat for my pleasure.
 
That resulted in a game I called Dominion of the Daleks, which pitted Skaro's finest against the Doctor in all his incarnations, with some Cybermen and UNIT troopers thrown in for gunstick-fodder.
 
The game proved a hit on the gaming convention circuit (such as it is down here in Adelaide), and I had a ball running the game for the enjoyment of many people.
 
Although I managed to get my greedy mitts onto about 50 CB Daleks, I know it would never be enough. Daleks beg for gaming in the grand manner, with hovabouts, gunships, SWD's and all the other means of making mayhem the Daleks have dreamed up since the days of Century 21 comic in the 60's. I wanted armies of Daleks with all these things! Alas, at that time I had no real means to accomplish this. But times change...
 
Actually, before I go much further, here's a bunch of photos of Dominion of the Daleks Daleks, and some of the game in action. All of these are Character Building toys, repainted and in some cases remodelled.









So, that was the past. And although I am very happy with those Daleks and the Dominion of the Daleks game, I really wanted to play a no-sucker-barred, all-Dalek, ding-dong battle or five with all the trimmings. I started down that road be painting up a couple of squads of CD toys as Imperials, as you can see here...
 

 
But, when CB's Dr Who license ran out, the figures (and the Daleks particularly), became harder and harder to find at reasonable prices. Clearly, this wasn't a sustainable project, not if I were to also permit myself such fripperies as shelter, food or water. Curse this frail, non-Dalekanium body I inhabit! (To say nothing of being stingy...)

Now for the present. As you might be aware, the price of 3D printers has plunged through the floor over the past 2 years or so. Resin printers capable of producing high-quality prints with fine detail are now well within the disposable income means of many hobbyists. So, flush with birthday cash, earlier this year I forked out the dosh for not one but two heavily-discounted Elegoo Mars 2 Pro printers, and set to learning how to drive them.
 
Once I'd gotten the hang of the things, the thought of massive Dalek armies rekindled somewhere deep inside me, and soon I was merrily turning my sculpting skills to this evil purpose!
 
I should probably explain that I am a semi-pro digital sculptor. I've done a little work for some companies which produce wargames miniatures, so I have a bit of an idea about what I'm doing. But, this would be the first time I'd tried sculpting any Daleks, let alone hordes of them!
 
But the big advantage of the approach I've taken is that my sculpts are designed to be compatible with the Character Building Daleks' parts. Using the same friction peg connecting principle, my parts can be readily swapped with the CB ones, and this means that If I sculpt (say) two skirts, three shoulders, three neck bins and three heads, those parts can be mixed and matched to give me 54 different combinations, and this gives my Daleks some visual individuality without needing to sculpt 54 separate models.
 
Here's a group shot of most of the parts I've sculpted so far:



And just to finish up this first post, here's some group shots of what's been printed to date. As you can see, I have a lot of painting to do. By Davros, that's a lot of little hemispheres to paint... This is just one army. And it isn't even all of it!





A bit of a postscript: Some of you may remember my 'Dareku' project which I posted about earlier this year. As you can probably guess, I have essentially abandoned those not-Daleks for now. It just didn't make sense to pursue building that army in a different scale to the Daleks I already have. Also, the Dareku are not compatible with the CB Daleks, further limiting their scope, even if I rescale them. I might yet revisit them, but that's for the future.
 
Come up next time:
 
Painted Renegades! Special Weapon Daleks! Fancy Dice for Daleks! Robomen! More exclamation marks!
 
Thanks for looking, and see you again soon.

[Storm Wolf]

Hah is that the same game as was put on at Salute quite a few years ago now?

Even if not it looks very, very similar.

Bloody good fun it was to, and my now grown-up son enjoyed it a lot at the time.

Fantastic stuff even if it is a dfferent game 

Glen

[2010sunburst]

This is EX..CEL..ENT…
Really good stuff!

[TripleBackflip]

I have my own massive Dalek army that I'mma keep building on but Goodness Gracious Me! That might be the best thing I've ever seen!

[Macrossmartin]

Hah is that the same game as was put on at Salute quite a few years ago now?

Even if not it looks very, very similar.

Bloody good fun it was to, and my now grown-up son enjoyed it a lot at the time.

Fantastic stuff even if it is a dfferent game 

Glen

Not I, Glen, I think that game was put on by the South London Warlords, while I'm down under in Adelaide, Australia! Seeing an article about that game in Miniature Wargames ages ago was a major inspiration, however.

[fastolfrus]

They look awesome.
I have a Dalek force in 1/35th (to fit available human opposition), about 60 Daleks painted, that date back a couple of decades. We took a very old school approach. A friend sculpted a single master from fimo, then we took a latex mould from him and cast them in plaster-of-paris. Eye-stalks are sewing pins, arms came from old treasury tags.

[Storm Wolf]

Not I, Glen, I think that game was put on by the South London Warlords, while I'm down under in Adelaide, Australia! Seeing an article about that game in Miniature Wargames ages ago was a major inspiration, however.

They look awesome.
I have a Dalek force in 1/35th (to fit available human opposition), about 60 Daleks painted, that date back a couple of decades. We took a very old school approach. A friend sculpted a single master from fimo, then we took a latex mould from him and cast them in plaster-of-paris. Eye-stalks are sefwing pins, arms came from old treasury tags.

Well I am sure your game is at the very least it's equal and good fun was had by all 

And I hail your sheer ingenuity and staying power fastolfrus not just for the making which sounds fantastic, but the painting of all those hemispheres 
Nice work guys, i will be doing a much smaller, Dr. Who, Daleks and Cyberman game using some ruleset or other at somepoint hopefully? M`mm Dr. Who and the Colonial Marines Vs Daleks Vs Cybermen, H`mm?

Glen

[TripleBackflip]

Why don't any of you use the various available Daleks though? Right now it's pretty great, you've got Warlord, Black Tree, Those plastic ones from the magazine and the very rare Micro Universe ones.

[Macrossmartin]

Why don't any of you use the various available Daleks though? Right now it's pretty great, you've got Warlord, Black Tree, Those plastic ones from the magazine and the very rare Micro Universe ones.

Well, I can't speak for others, but in my case I'd already started collecting the Character Building Daleks long before the Warlord ones became available. Black Tree's Daleks have... characterful... qualities that I didn't want, and being white metal they'd be tricky to convert for the many variations I want to model into my armies.

Also, the Warlord offererings are really not up to the task. Their Daleks are immobile, without even the option to rotate their heads. Another problem is that they are only of the NSD (New Series Dalek) model, which is great for the Time War era, but totally the wrong type of travel machine for the earlier Movellan, Mechonoid, and civil wars. Using NSD's would be a bit like trying to use WW1 French infantry for the armies of Napoleon.

Additionally, making my Daleks this 40mm size gives them real 'presence' on the tabletop, and reduces the eye strain from painting too-tiny hemispheres! 

Lastly, printing these out is a LOT cheaper than buying 200+ commercially available equivalents. In Elegoo Water Washable resin each Dalek comes in at less than AU$0.70. You just can't beat that.

[TripleBackflip]

I do agree about the Black Tree ones, my set of Invasion Earth Daleks seem to be higher up at the back than at the front. All the other stuff I have from them is pretty much perfect though, I have one of their ordinary Daleks and it's much better.

I think I might put all my Doctor Who stuff on here too, I'm surprised by how many fans there are Amogus.