Mars Attacks / General Post Apoc thread

[MagpieJono]

I bought the Mantic Mars Attacks game a while ago. It's a great little stand alone game and a great way to introduce the kids to the hobby. A bit of a cross between a board game and a miniatures game. I know the setting doesn't appeal to everyone's tastes but the rules and gameplay are simple but effective and a lot of fun. The rule set could easily be adapted to all manner of things.

The scenery is fantastic but the minis not the greatest, one piece bendy plastic stuff. I'm guessing to keep costs down. So I decided to replace the miniatures with suitable alternatives.

The martians are now GW Tau, human soldiers Cadian Shock Troops and the human heroes mainly Hasslefree.

A few shots and hopefully some battle reports in the near future..

[von Lucky]

Nice painting - I like the look and feel you've created.

[Metternich]

Nice to see those Cadians put to a more "realistic" use than Warhammer.

[Muzfish4]

Lovely work - very imaginative miniatures substitution. I'll have to consider this game for the Little Fish.

[Amalric]

Brilliant!

[ogryn]

Great stuff.
I like the paint work on the bricks.
Sprayed?

[MagpieJono]

The bricks were sprayed black and then given a coat of Coat D'arms brick red followed by agrax earthshade. When dry they were drybrushed with brick red, rust and then dark sand.

[Psychopomp]

While your substitutions are great, I'd like to chime in and say the actual Mars Attacks minis aren't as bad as they seem at first.

If you end up wanting to use them, clean the mold lines lightly with a file, then brush off the fuzz with a brass-bristled tool brush.  Any egregious bending can be fixed by dunking them in near-boiling water, correcting the bend, and dunking them in cold water.  Once cleaned and primed, they take paint surprisingly well.

I really need to take and post pictures of mine, one of these days.

[Arundel]

Magpie, they all look great. A very creative solution. When temptation to do Mars Attacks! hits (which it does occasionally), I've sometimes considered using the Doctor Zardov figure from Bombshell miniatures as a substitute--a little pricey, but it's a great figure with some of the same vibe as the original aliens. But I like what you've done very much! Thanks for sharing.

Here's the Bombshell figure: http://store.bombshellminis.com/robots-vehicles/?sort=featured&page=2

[JoeRugby]

Great stuff MagpieJono, if you like the rules you'll probably like Deadzone 2.0, it takes a lot of cues from Mars attacks(which was based on the original Deadzone)  without so many random things happening e.g. Flaming cows

Really like the substitutions and tau/guard make sense with the stats,
To join in with psychopomp the Mars attacks minis aren't that bad or the most part. (Some are awful mind you)
I managed to get mine looking decent so you should be able to do a lot better.

[Gailbraithe]

I'm honestly not sure which is more impressive: your painting skills or your photography skills.

[MagpieJono]

Thanks for the lovely comments guys.

Arundel
Thanks for the link. I'd not heard of bombshell miniatures before. That Dr Zardov figure is ace.

JoeRugby
Lovely Martians there. I might give them a go at some point when the leadpile decreases a bit more!

Gailbraithe
I'm not a photography expert by any stretch of the imagination! The images were shot with my mobile phone camera, a 3 year old Samsung. I bought a Foldio folding studio a while back and the minis were set up in there. It's great and gives you cracking images I'd recommend it to anyone who likes to photograph their work. If I were buying one again though I think I'd buy the slightly larger one they do.

[Gailbraithe]

Gailbraithe
I'm not a photography expert by any stretch of the imagination! The images were shot with my mobile phone camera, a 3 year old Samsung. I bought a Foldio folding studio a while back and the minis were set up in there. It's great and gives you cracking images I'd recommend it to anyone who likes to photograph their work. If I were buying one again though I think I'd buy the slightly larger one they do.

You're getting better pictures with a cameraphone than I get with my $800 Canon Rebel.  That's not fair.

[basaint]

NICE job!  Just noticed how you covered some of the zone/brick connectors with other things more visually pleasing....VERY NICE!!!

You should look into the DZ battlezone packs for other great accessories.  Although the regular zones might not fit into MA, the damaged zones have cool rubble piles with I-beams poking out

MA is a fun game too, played it a bunch.

[MagpieJono]

I recently painted 40 Mantic plague zombies that I use with the Mars Attacks rules to make a fun zombie bashing game. I commented on a post by Asslessman who had also painted some and he asked for some snaps of mine.

These had the speediest paintjob I have ever done. To paint 40 in my usual way would have taken months in reality. I primed them with my normal dark grey and then gave them a zenithal dusting with white. Then I just blocked in the colours using Secret Weapon washes which are more like a glaze really. Think I only used 7 colours in total. Few final touches, spines, hair eyes etc but that's it. Not my finest work but perfectly acceptable for gaming and look good en masse.

Some individual miniatures...









And a group shot...

'Boss, do you think it might be an idea to fall back?'
'Shut up and concentrate on shooting!'