Starship Troopers – Marauder

Lazy me. I said I’d put pics up of the SST Maruader weeks ago. But, recently my urge to paint has rekindled fully and I’m forging ahead with new projects, of which the Marauder was the kickoff. I recently bought a squad of GW Space Marines off eBay (I got a deal – them plus a Rhino for about $35). I’ve started working on them but I’ll speak more about them and put some pics up in another post.

So, here’s the Marauder!

I lost the pilot figure somehow, but that’s okay ince you can’t really see it very well inside there. The cockpit canopy was originally clear, and since I liked the way the faceplates of the regular troopers were tinted, I wanted the same effect here. So, I used a thinned out wash of GW yellow ink applied to the inside of the canopy. Turned out pretty good. I find that I like the SST minis more than I thought. The only drawback is they don’t go together so well – the trooper models have a lot of fiddly bits some parts of the Marauder seemed to be slightly off. But, once past that, they’re all right.

New Project Concept – Olympica

“The Webbies want your mind”

So says the back cover blurb of Olympica, an old sci-fi wargame (of the Metagaming variety) from back in the mists of time. You old dogs may remember this one, having saved up your pennies to buy these little games that came in plastic bags (hey, c’mon, it was 1978 – I was 11). Anyway, inspired by some of the fan-made upgrades that you can see in the BGG entry I linked to, I’m considering doing one myself, with miniatures – sculpted board with terrain, and 15mm minis.

And thinking about those, I’d like to try to heave close to the original look and feel. Here’s the cover of the old game.

For the UN Marines, I’ve already decided I’d like to use Rebel Miniatures Earth Force Marines. For the UN vehicles, Rebel’s grav tanks should do nicely. The UN also has these funky drilling machines (because their enemy lives in tunnels) and I think I could convert Rebel’s combat flatbed into one.

But, I’m stuck on the Webbies. That’s a Webby on the back cover up there. They’re kinda like group-mind space communists I think (on close reading of the rules fluff). So, I’m taking recommendations for good 15mm troops to use for these guys. Suggestions?