Building model tanks

Hi all, thanks for all of the incredible ongoing support- I’m honored to be a part of the community of makers supporting this awesome hobby.

Here’s a major Jan/Feb '22 update for my etsy shop:

New Models!

Flight Stands in 3 sizes USN Balao-class Submarine - Allied super subs! Panzer III (Pz.Kpfw. Ausf J) - Axis light tanks! Kriegsmarine Type 39 Torpedo Boats - Axis escort ships! Damage/Flame Tokens Naval Mines Czech Hedgehog anti-vehicle obstacles Resource Tokens - Oil Barrels, Metal Ingots, and Grain

New Colors!

In good news for all of you non-painters, I am thrilled to announce that after an obnoxious amount of trial and error I have arrived at the full A&A color-matched palette of materials!

Come see all these and more at my esty shop: https://www.etsy.com/shop/NathanDetr0itDesigns, and don’t forget to use coupon code AADOTORG22 for 10% off!

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Per @Midnight_Reaper’s request, I’m working on a USS Atlanta and an IJN Agano for Light Cruisers. The Atlanta has existing open-source examples; the Agano I’ll have to rebuild from bits and photos (all current models are pay-only).

The piece I use to hold them together…

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Here’s a comparative picture I took of five A&A minis and their A&A boardgame counterparts: three tanks (Sherman, Panther, Tiger) and two battleships (Bismarck, Yamato).

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Massdrop has an offer right now for a Warhawk and Zero model airplane set and I thought you all might be interested. The offer ends tonight. The set is $20 or $15 if enough people participate. Keep in mind the ship date is not immediate, it’s June 24. In order to get the low prices Massdrop puts in the order after the offer ends and then orders directly from the manufacturer.

Check it out: http://dro.ps/axisandallies-dogfighting

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Lol…

Ya, if you read my previous thread, then you know I’ve basically abandoned about 95% of the HBG custom units I’ve ordered. I had a goal of doubling or tripling my available force pool of units (if I had 10 tanks from the base game, I wanted 20 to 30 in my bins for example). I had at first ordered a little of everything… some additional OOB units, some custom HBG units, etc… after receiving several waves of additional units, I came to the conclusion that the only thing really working for me was mostly the planes (HBG planes blended well with OOB planes). For the most part, the tanks and ships suffered with scaling issues next to the OOB units (as we’ve discussed).

So, in the end, I kept almost all my custom HBG planes, and found a new home for the ships and tanks (another forum member scooped them up)… I then refilled what I wanted with OOB units… once again, this was more about conformity and ease of identity for the new players I was teaching than anything else… I think the HBG units are well done otherwise.

As for my final order of that German Expansion Set 3… we’ll see… they will all get used… one way or another… either i’ll like them and integrate them… or i’ll find a new home for them… don’t want to see them go to waste. I really WANT Panzer-IV’s in my game… if they’re at least close to OOB size, they’ll stay put… if I got to break out tweezers again to move them around, i’ll rehome them.

@CWO:

Thanks Cyanight and John – glad you find the identification charts useful.  For an actual history of the evolution of the sculpts, I highly recommend knp7765’s photographic inventory, located here…

http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=23386.0

…because my I.D. charts approach the subject from a different angle: in almost every case, they simply show one representative sculpt for each nationally-distinctive design produced to depict each unit type that has appeared in A&A over the years.  The charts mostly ignore the many variations (some minor and some major) that have been seen in the sculpts – for example, the two versions of the Japanese field artillery piece, which was produced with the undercarriage either folded for towing or deployed for firing.  The only exceptions I made were for the Panther tank, the 88mm AAA gun and the Stuka dive-bomber (interestingly, all three being German units) because of the peculiar evolution of those three units over the course of A&A’s production history (especially in the case of the gun and the plane, which started out as completely different – and incorrectly-used – units compared to their current status).

Thanks again Marc, I had forgotten about his thread. this will be very helpful as well. :-)

john

This may sound like an improbable source, but another idea would be for you to go to some local dollar stores and look around.  Back when I was making myself a dice tower, I discovered that some dollar store chains sell (among all the miscellaneous stuff they have in stock) some plain unpainted rectangular wooden trays of various sizes, made of very thin wood.  Their designs could not be simpler – a bottom and four sides glued together, all made of flat wooden pieces – and they’re cheap in both price and appearance, but they’re about the right size for what you have in mind and they would probably look quite nice if you applied some dark wood stain to them.  And because they’re so inexpensive, picking up as many as you need for your table would be very affordable.  It would also be easy to customize them by, for example, subdividing the larger models into sections by cutting some balsa wood sticks (or other types of woods) to suitable sizes and gluing them inside the trays before you stain them.