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Scintilla posted:I actually made an attempt myself several months ago. It did not go well either. It's very difficult to do perfect straight lines on minis. The old IWM sculpts don't really help much either, because their details get very quickly clogged (assuming they even have any). Enamels are the worst for this reason, they're just godawful. For BattleTech you really want a good acrylic or other paint specifically designed for miniatures (they do make enamels for miniatures too, but they're harder to come by). I painted a similar scheme for my Nova Cats   But I use the model's lines to hide the edges--which isn't exactly what you're going for--but I can tell you what paints I used, if you'd like. You're wanting something closer to what I did for my Crucis Lancers, who have a stripe that ignores panel lines and 'Mech shape.  For painting things that don't conform to a model's actual lines, 'blocking in' the area you want to color with a straight line helps avoid the wibbly-wobbly edges. In your case, I'd suggest fully painting anything you want white. There might be some spillover, but that's fine, white's easy to cover.  Then, and this is where I'll need to break out the MSPaint, once you have your white areas blocked in take your brush and paint a vertical line to separate the areas you want black. Don't try to paint the whole area, just define the area you want and give it a nice outline. A lot of people paint with horizontal strokes, which make it much more likely that you'll wind up with a wibbly-wobbly border line. By painting vertical lines, you're making a barrier the rest of your painting can spill into without spoiling the portions of the miniature you want to stay white.  If you have to make a couple of vertical strokes to give yourself a thick enough 'barrier' to work with, do it! The line is there to establish a safety zone that you can then fill in behind.
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Nov 18, 2023 19:07
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PoptartsNinja posted:Lots of good advice. Thanks, I'll keep this in mind. I've only recently got into modelling, so this is very helpful. So far I've only been painting big kits that are mostly a single solid colour.  The only one with more than a handful of different colours was the Mark IV, where I used masking tape to keep the lines straight.  There are still some imperfections, but it's mostly okay, and that was good enough for my past self. I tried to use tape for the mechs too but the models were so small and fiddly it was a challenge to get it straight. I recently paid a visit to the Bovington Tank Museum and bought some acrylic paints along with a Tortoise (A39) model. If the paints are good I might do some more mechs - I've got loads left over from the Introductory Box Set I bought years ago.
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Nov 18, 2023 19:24
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You can use tapes to mask BattleTech minis, but I personally find it's rarely worth it. Most of the paints you'll get from a museum will be of craft paint quality, though, which is pretty dire. You can paint miniatures with craft paint, but they're like painting with both arms tied behind your back. They're godawful and the experience won't be fun. Since you're in England, I can't recommend my usual starter acrylic line (Reaper paints), because they're harder to get outside of America. Instead I'd have to recommend going straight for Vallejo paints, which are harder to get over here but should be easy to find for you. There's a tip for masking tape to prevent bleedthrough, too. After you mask an area but before you paint your new color, do another layer of your base color along the edges. This will 'seal' the edge of the masking tape and if any paint bleeds under it, it will be the same color as your base color so nobody will notice.
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Nov 18, 2023 19:35
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My acryllics are all Tamiya, but it looks like Vallejo is easy to find on Amazon UK. In update news, this is the turn where I begin to curse the Hunchback's lack of jump jets.
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Nov 18, 2023 20:01
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PoptartsNinja posted:There's a tip for masking tape to prevent bleedthrough, too. After you mask an area but before you paint your new color, do another layer of your base color along the edges. This will 'seal' the edge of the masking tape and if any paint bleeds under it, it will be the same color as your base color so nobody will notice. I will definitely try this. Personally I was using Vallejo paints and an airbrush, and a playing card to mask off with a straight line. I think my downfall was using metallics though, so I'll probably try again with non-metallic paints.
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Nov 18, 2023 20:15
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Tamiya's not bad, but I find they tend to 'bleed' or be reactivated by other colors or varnishes. I haven't had a great experience with them, but some of that could be environmental so they may work better for you.
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Nov 18, 2023 20:15
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Scintilla posted:In update news, this is the turn where I begin to curse the Hunchback's lack of jump jets. This made me look up Hunchback variants, and I'm kind of amazed that there's only one canon (non-IIC) Hunchback variant with jump jets, and it doesn't appear until 3058.
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Nov 18, 2023 20:20
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There are an awful lot of mechs with pulverizing short range power but also poo poo mobility and imo that's part of the charm and makes it feel less gamified
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Nov 18, 2023 20:34
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Exactly. There's a ton of mech models that are almost there but usually have one flaw or multiple. Makes it feel more real, using weapons and configs that aren't all the same. Of course it could have also been made better by some of the weapons being a bit more competitive with each other (aka the AC/2 and AC/5 versus almost anything else for the same weight/crit space) but them's the breaks.
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Nov 18, 2023 21:19
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Snow_Scar_[3901]: Turn 3 “I can see you~” Ricardo Hess hummed in a sing-song voice as his Sentinel’s sensors identified two man-made objects moving through the forests to the west. The thick woods did a good job of obscuring his visuals, but his thermal sensors clearly showed a pair of heat sources amidst the frost-covered foliage. Ricardo was about to pivot towards the closer of the two in order to engage it when an odd feeling settled over him. He wasn’t quite sure how to describe it, except perhaps as a nebulous sense of wrongness, a nagging feeling that something wasn’t quite right. Heeding his instincts, Ricardo switched his sensors over to the magnetic spectrum. Unlike IR, MagScan was ground-penetrating, allowing him to see through the clifftops and into the ravine below. The pair of heat signatures shifted into a pair of blueish-white silhouettes, but Ricardo had expected that. What really made his stomach twist were the two other ferrous masses that suddenly appeared on his readout. He had assumed the two heavier mechs were still in the ravine, but now he saw that they were climbing up the cliffs towards him. Ricardo’s breath caught in his throat as he realised that the entire enemy force was converging on his location. “I’m so fuuuucked~” he trilled softly. A beat later he remembered his training and reached for his control panel, using his Sentinel’s powerful communications suite to broadcast a warning to the rest of the Fusiliers. He didn’t speak, instead sending coded bursts of static spelling out the situation. It was a precaution that Cosette had suggested – the mercs probably didn’t have the ability to intercept their comms, but it was better not to take any chances. Ricardo. Mercs flanking up west side. Outnumbered. Suggestions? Etienne’s response came after a brief pause. Stall them. Will reinforce ASAP. Good luck. A dry croak of a laugh pried itself out of Ricardo’s throat. He had planned on harassing the mercs from the top of the ravine, taking a few potshots here and there before melting back into the woods before they could draw a bead on him. Now he was being asked to stall the entire enemy force all by himself? He was going to need more than luck to make that happen. Nevertheless, Ricardo signalled an affirmative and continued his flanking manoeuvre, driving his Sentinel over the lonely, windswept road that divided the battlefield in half before plunging into the forest beyond it. As he shouldered his way through the trees a horrible feeling of deja-vu began to creep up on him. He’d been the first to fall in the previous simulation, eliminated before he could land even a single shot. As he caught a glimpse of the Thunderbolt's massive missile pod bobbing up the slope towards him he had a depressing feeling that history was about to repeat itself.    Weapons fire for Dervish DV-6M (Player): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Marauder MAD-3R (Player): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Quickdraw QKD-4Gr (Player): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Thunderbolt TDR-5S (Player): -Holds fire! -- Weapons fire for Commando COM-2D (Fusiliers): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Griffin GRF-1N (Fusiliers): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Hornet HNT-152 (Fusiliers): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Hunchback HBK-4H (Fusiliers): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Sentinel STN-3KA (Fusiliers): -Holds fire! Weapons fire for Wolverine WVR-6R (Fusiliers): -Fires AC/5 at Marauder MAD-3R (Player); needs 11, rolls 7: Misses!  No melee attacks this turn!  Subtracting 2 heat from all units due to Arctic Conditions… Dervish DV-6M (Player) gains 2 heat, sinks 2 heat and is now at 0 heat. Marauder MAD-3R (Player) gains 0 heat, sinks 0 heat and is now at 0 heat. Quickdraw QKD-4Gr (Player) gains 2 heat, sinks 2 heat and is now at 0 heat. Thunderbolt TDR-5S (Player) gains 0 heat, sinks 0 heat and is now at 0 heat. -- Commando COM-2D (Fusiliers) gains 0 heat, sinks 0 heat and is now at 0 heat. Griffin GRF-1N (Fusiliers) gains 0 heat, sinks 0 heat and is now at 0 heat. Hornet HNT-152 (Fusiliers) gains 2 heat, sinks 2 heat and is now at 0 heat. Hunchback HBK-4H (Fusiliers) gains 0 heat, sinks 0 heat and is now at 0 heat. Sentinel STN-3KA (Fusiliers) gains 0 heat, sinks 0 heat and is now at 0 heat. Wolverine WVR-6R (Fusiliers) gains 4 heat, sinks 4 heat and is now at 0 heat.   Hornet HNT-152 (Fusiliers) moves evasively!  Player Status  Enemy Status   Special Abilities: -Toughness: Grants bonus to consciousness rolls. -Evasive Action: By forfeiting the right to fire during the shooting phase, the pilot gains the ability to move evasively, inflicting an additional +1 penalty against incoming weapons fire and physical attacks. The unit must use its Running MP, have undamaged hips, and will gain an extra +2 heat at the end of the round. Relevant Design Quirks: -Hyper-Extending Actuators: The mech can reverse its arms as if it lacked Hand and Lower Arm Actuators. -Multi-Trac: The mech does not suffer the usual penalties when splitting fire between multiple targets. -Narrow Profile: The mech takes less damage from incoming weapons fire if the margin of success is +1 or lower. Direct fire weapons deal half damage, while cluster attacks receive a -4 penalty when determining the number of hits. -- Primary Objectives: -Ruby Lance reaches the Northern Map Border (0/4) Secondary Objectives: -Destroy at least three Fusilier battlemechs (0/3) (100,000 C-Bill reward) -Destroy all six Fusilier battlemechs (0/6) (200,000 C-Bill reward) -- Next Orders Due: Tuesday 21st 9:00PM GMT.
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Nov 18, 2023 21:54
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Thoughts... I don't really know what to say here. I think that the Dervish or Quickdraw could hit the Hunchback from the top of the hill, but I'm not too sure about that on account of the vast height difference. Shooting the Griffin could be a good idea but I'm not sure if we can really swing that either, and approaching the edge could put us in the line of fire. More immediately we've got the Sentinel to worry about. It's basically got 4 evasion with the heavy woods but is obviously pretty lightly armed. This probably sounds stupid, but parking someone directly in front of it, or in 0224 to force it to turn might be a good way to make it vulnerable.
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Nov 18, 2023 23:21
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I think the qkd and tdb have a pretty good opportunity to start firing on the sentinel. It feels like the obvious move but he's so far out of position and thus so juicy... I'm not sure about the other 2, though. Pretty sure the mad could take potshots at the hbk or grf but I'm also sure it's not worth it for the probably bad positioning it's gonna end up in.
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Nov 18, 2023 23:39
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Scintilla posted:My acryllics are all Tamiya, but it looks like Vallejo is easy to find on Amazon UK. Citadel/Games Workshop are pricey but widely available in the UK. I think (controversial opinion) that they are probably slightly better quality wise compared to Vallejo outside some specific colours. Both are very good paints though. Citadel are all in pots rather than droppers though which has certain downsides. Vallejo availability can be very hit and miss on Amazon. They retail for about £2.20 per bottle so never pay more than that. If Amazon is charging you £4 you might as well buy GW. Tamiya acrylics are meant to be airbrushed rather than handpainted and go funny when you try to thin them with water (they like their specialised thinner more).
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Nov 19, 2023 00:18
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Army Painter is pretty widely available these days, and not too pricey too either.
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Nov 19, 2023 00:30
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The Quickdraw should just push the Sentinel off the edge of the map.  Z the IVth posted:Citadel/Games Workshop are pricey but widely available in the UK. I think (controversial opinion) that they are probably slightly better quality wise compared to Vallejo outside some specific colours. Both are very good paints though. Citadel are all in pots rather than droppers though which has certain downsides. Citadel's white paints are all poo poo. Some of the worst in the business. Their other colors are ok, but pots suck (and GW's especially are designed to waste paint) so I can't recommend buying them.
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Nov 19, 2023 00:46
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Aw dude... Are we the bad guys here? 'cause it feels like it. Kill the Sentinel, then the Wolverine. Then work your way along the rest of the OpForce as opportunity allows.
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Nov 19, 2023 00:47
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painedforever posted:Aw dude... yeah? we're playing the invading force here
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Nov 19, 2023 00:49
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GW contrast paints are good for speedpainting, but I would never recommend their regular paints just based on cost and the pots. Anyway here is attempt #2. The line is far from clean because I'm still using a playing card to mask, and the darker shade has more blue in it than I'd like. It was also my first attempt at an oil wash instead of just slapping a black acrylic wash on it, and it was way too thin. C'est la vie. At least masking off the cockpit glass with Vallejo Liquid Mask worked out well enough.
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Nov 19, 2023 01:03
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These days both Army Painter and Vallejo have their own Contrast paint equivalents as well. In fact I think all of the major paint producers have one now.
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Nov 19, 2023 01:06
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PoptartsNinja posted:The Quickdraw should just push the Sentinel off the edge of the map. For white specifically I would recommend an Artist Ink (Daler-Rowney is my current) for airbrushing or heavy body Titanium White (Liquitex) for painting. Vallejo whites are poo poo as well. I do use Vallejo Model Colour Deck Tan as an off-white which is very good. Citadel's Ulthuan Grey is very good as an off-white colour in 99% of cases instead of white - covers better and is smoother. My Vallejo equivalent dried up in the bottle for me so I've never used it. GW's pots are poo poo but you can get around it easily by transferring to dropper bottles. For the more liquid paints like inks and contrast that you need to use a lot of I find having the pots open much more convenient. I've had more than one barely used Vallejo bottle just up and dry on me as well so it's not just GW (though the pots definitely don't help) and in Vallejo's case I don't have an explanation beyond them just plain going bad. Cooked Auto posted:These days both Army Painter and Vallejo have their own Contrast paint equivalents as well. Vallejo Xpress Colour have reviewed well. They behave much more evenly compared to Contrast paints. Related to the above, for Citadel Contrast you'll find there are different 'variants' of contrasts and not all behave in the same way. Eg Blood Angels Red is a 'traditional' contrast which give you that instant-shaded look while Baal Red is just a supersaturated super liquid red paint that turns everything it touches bright red. No where does any one tell you this. Army Painter Speedpaints come with a big caution - their original lineup would reactivate and dissolve if it got wet. Some painters have figured out how to exploit this for blending but it's hardly something for a newbie to try out. Make sure you get the 2.0 versions or just avoid. Army painter paints are very cheap but they're markedly inferior to both GW/Vallejo.
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Nov 19, 2023 01:27
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Captain Foo posted:yeah? we're playing the invading force here The invading Taurian force. Definitely the bad guys.
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Nov 19, 2023 01:32
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Z the IVth posted:Vallejo whites are poo poo as well. Ah, I wasn't aware of that. I use Reaper's whites and they've always been pretty great.
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Nov 19, 2023 02:18
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Z the IVth posted:For white specifically I would recommend an Artist Ink (Daler-Rowney is my current) for airbrushing or heavy body Titanium White (Liquitex) for painting. I have a Liquitex titanium white ink and while it's great through an airbrush, it absolutely sucks with a brush. I've heard good things about ProAcryl Bold Titanium White but haven't had a chance to try it myself. Anyway as the Thunderbolt pilot, I don't know whether to start shooting at the Sentinel or keep running to get up and into the woods.
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Nov 19, 2023 02:25
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Running to 0222 and alphaing into the (side? rear?) of the Sentinel. Numbers aren't great but it's a lot of guns.
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Nov 19, 2023 03:36
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Best bet for the Lance is to rush the Sentinel and try to start working on it before the Commando and pals catch up in about 2 rounds. Rushing it will narrow its movement options to maintain high mods next turn. If the Lance can at least cripple the Sentinel, they can focus their facing to the East while one of the mobile ones finishes the Sentinel.
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Nov 19, 2023 03:48
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AJ_Impy posted:Running to 0222 and alphaing into the (side? rear?) of the Sentinel. Numbers aren't great but it's a lot of guns. Correct me if I'm wrong. Does this involve the dreaded "skid check" (for turning while running on a road)
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Nov 19, 2023 04:43
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*looking down out of the commander's cupola at the SS totenflopf insignia on the side of my panther D*painedforever posted:Aw dude...
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Nov 19, 2023 05:03
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glwgameplayer posted:Correct me if I'm wrong. Does this involve the dreaded "skid check" (for turning while running on a road) It does, but after only one hex travelled, the odds are low. Still, it should be entertaining.
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Nov 19, 2023 05:19
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Also booooo at the enemy Wolverine deciding not to take the bridge. Coward!
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Nov 19, 2023 06:38
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They ARE meant to be smarter this time around
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Nov 19, 2023 06:51
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If I'm going after the Sentinel that's 0922. In the meantime, I figure there's LOS with the Griffin through one forest. What about the Wolverine? Turning my back on them seems like a bad idea which means facing 0821.
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Nov 19, 2023 06:57
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PoptartsNinja posted:The Quickdraw should just push the Sentinel off the edge of the map.  i will be running to 0224, firing non-arm stuff, and going for the ring-out biosterous fucked around with this message at 07:59 on Nov 19, 2023 |
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Nov 19, 2023 07:57
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painedforever posted:Aw dude... We are very specifically playing the bad guys at the good guy's dad's behest and payment. So yes.
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Nov 19, 2023 08:37
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Volmarias posted:We are very specifically playing the bad guys at the good guy's dad's behest and payment. So yes. This feels surprisingly apt.
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Nov 19, 2023 09:03
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If I'm not mistaken, I believe I can run to 0223, is that correct? Then I can get in on Operation Ring Out.
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Nov 19, 2023 14:57
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CirclMastr posted:If I'm not mistaken, I believe I can run to 0223, is that correct? Then I can get in on Operation Ring Out. The closest you can get is 0324 - the hex you're currently standing on is -2 Elevation, so you'll need to spend 3 MP to reach the top.
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Nov 19, 2023 15:06
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aniviron posted:The invading Taurian force. Definitely the bad guys. Man, OpFor exercises are just fun as hell. You get to indulge your inner bastard in a way that doesn't fly any other time. Take note, Goonlance.
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Nov 19, 2023 16:35
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Scintilla posted:The closest you can get is 0324 - the hex you're currently standing on is -2 Elevation, so you'll need to spend 3 MP to reach the top. Fair enough. I'm not sure it's even worth my opening fire, I'd be at... 11 to hit, I think, even at short range? Which I think would give me... eh, about 35% chance that one of my weapons hits. I'm not sure that's worth a net +4 heat.
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Nov 19, 2023 17:21
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 Also I made my first attempt at a jeweled canopy. It honestly came out better than I was expecting.
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Nov 19, 2023 17:22
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CirclMastr posted:
That looks very cool
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Nov 19, 2023 18:57
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