Thursday, July 11, 2013

Fallout Miniatures Part Two: Raiders

Fallout tabletop rpg miniatures raiders

Ah, raiders.  They are the backbone of Fallout gameplay, and for those pursuing tabletop roleplaying or war-gaming, they will no doubt be your bread and butter.  They are the perfect random encounter, wandering monster, local villains, or mid meal snack.

You will find them holed up in abandoned vaults, infesting ruins, and attacking hapless caravans.  They are, to put it simply, the orcs of the Fallout universe.  And of course they scale beautifully; you can simply add some more character levels and better gear, and voila, those low level thugs you gleefully mowed down in your early levels are now a credible threat to your more experienced party.

Gotta love those guys.

Visually, raiders are unified by their lack of unity.  They are dirty, they wear scavenged equipment, they are usually covered in traditional bad guy markings (spikes, barbed wire, other uncomfortable things,) and they usually have significant amounts of skin showing.  To me, the difference between a raider and a mercenary is the amount of bare skin.


Here is a selection of fresh summer fashions in the raider world, courtesy of Fallout.wikia.com

As to the subject of where to find minis for them (you don't come here for my PB&J recipes,) there are tons of options available to you out there.  Of course to begin, it helps to take a look at the kinds of raiders one sees in the current crop of Fallout games.

Games Workshop periodically produced a well-known game called Necromunda.  It is a skirmish battle game set in a dystopian cityscape within their 40K universe.  The gangs that struggle in the hive are quite similar to the raiders, with plenty of ramshackle armor, mohawks, jury-rigged weapons and lousy fashion sense.   Look especially for the newer versions, which are much more realistic and less cartoony, which was the preferred aesthetic when the game originally came out.

Unfortunately, this route is certainly the most expensive.  They are all pewter (except the plastics that came with the original boxed game,) and are nearly all out of print.  Even when these minis were being produced and could be had in blister packs hanging on pegs in game stores, they were pricey, and now that you have to rely on Ebay or other sources, you have no idea how much you will pay.  They are also a bit clunky, and come armed with 40K weapons, which are not always the look you want.

That being said, if you can get your hands on the plastics (House Goliath and House Orlock,) for cheap, they can fill in nicely for raiders.  The Orlocks are all dressed in sleeveless jackets and headbands like street gangers from an 80's video game (seriously, they totally look like the guys from Double Dragon,) while the Goliaths are massive 'roid abusers in mohawks.

Crappy paint jobs aside, they really get that Mad Max vibe going.
Each has two poses for each gang, and there are a choice of weapons for each one.  Scarcity and uniformity will be your only problems with them.

Another choice is the plastic street gang set from the Judge Dredd skirmish game, "Gangs of Mega City One."  The game did not do well and is out of print, and you can usually find the minis for a song in various places (but for how long that lasts is anyone's guess.)  They are plastic multi part minis on sprues, with multiple weapon options.  I can't speak to how good these are, but cheap is cheap.  I recently passed on quite a good deal for some of these ($12.00 for 48) because every review I've read about them (from real miniatures websites,) describe them as being awful.  Apparently the plastic is just terrible to work with, and the sculpting is poor.  Just looking at the pictures I found online, they didn't really look like what I wanted.  If you wish to pursue this option, vaya con queso.

Naturally, my solution is Heroclix, because that is my solution for nearly everything minis-related.  By using Heroclix for all my minis (vault dwellers, raiders, etc.) they are all more or less in scale with each other.

And what minis from the HC line work as raiders?  Brothers and sisters, the sky is the limit!  There are TONS of minis that can be easily converted into raiders out there, we just need to use our ModelVision(TM) to see them in a different light.

We've spoken before about the different methods of converting a mini, and these are in full effect here.  The first is the simple repaint.  There are a multitude of minis in the line, from both older and newer sets, that need nothing more than a lick of paint to be perfect as Fallout raiders.

Being comic book super-persons, many of the characters are clad in spandex, sculpted as they are drawn, with every muscle showing.  Paint their fancy longjohns in flesh tones, and you have the scantily clad death dealers we all love to decapitate with firearms.

Fallout miniatures raiders (converted from Heroclix figures)
These three fellows are parademons from Apokolips.  They were dressed in green and gold, and I repainted them in their current bondage-worthy finery.  The fellow in the middle had his winged jetpack ripped off and the hole filled in with putty, and one of them got a weapon swap, but other than that, they are as the factory made them.

This little guy was Annhilus.  He too had his wings clipped, and then I used some guitar string to connect his bug face to the cylinder in his chest.  This makes him look like he's wearing a gas mask (I sort of have a thing for gas masks.)  I then painted his weird headdress like scavenged road sign.  I think he kind of looks like the Humungous from the Road Warrior.
Others just need a little modification with some putty to change them into raiders.  By removing details like capes or jetpacks and covering them with armor bits, or simply using putty to add random raidery crap before painting, you can populate your wasteland with awesome, mohawked denizens of your own.

Fallout miniatures raiders (converted from Heroclix figures)
The guy on the right is a Kobra fanatic, and was not modified at all, merely repainted.  The other  two have benefited from an application of putty.   The fellow on the left is a generic 'henchman,' but has had a tire shoulder pad and strap made from putty added, as well as those weird quilted hip pads you see on some raider armor.  In the middle is a 'criminal' with some sports pads and a codpiece sculpted on, as well as a rather lumpy-looking combat helmet (I swear it looks like better in real life.)

Daimon Hellstrom, Son of Satan, from Marvel Comics.  I hated his hair, and really did not need a wacky trident.  So I snipped off his "Syndrome from the Incredibles" hairdo and resculpted it.  Then I sculpted a handgun from putty to replace his infernal farm implement.  Once repainted, he makes either a great raider or modern day gang member.
But what about the ladies?

As I mentioned previously, you will usually end up with a lot more female minis than you especially want.  And while the female minis are often far less versatile for modern era games, there are plenty of supergals that make fine raiders (bondage gear and firearms are popular fare in both comics and video games.)  For many of them, all you need to do is pop them off their clix bases and on to an appropriate individual base and you are ready to roll.
I actually used these ladies as is for a one off scenario to test some rules.  They are fine as they are, but could still benefit from some repainting and maybe some putty additions like armor and such.
Others need no more than a repaint to turn a familiar comic book heroine (or villainess,) into the scourge of the wasteland.
Fallout miniatures raiders (converted from Heroclix figures)
The figure on the left is an older mini, and was the mutant Domino.  She has white skin and wears purple dominatrix gear, so simply painting her skin in human tones and making the straps black with silver studs does wonders.  On the right is Thundra, of the Frightful Four.  I painted her about five minutes before taking this picture (she is shiny from the ink washes still being wet.)  I can equip her with any weapon I like, and she will look fine in any raider warband.

But for some minis, a more extensive degree of modification can result in even more impressive and inspired creations.  With some arm, weapon or head swaps, or even freehand sculpting with putty, you can entirely change the identity of a mini.

Fallout miniatures raiders (converted from Heroclix figures)
Here are a couple of my favorite conversions.  The guy on the left is Magog from DC comics.  I sculpted a gun (10mm pistol) in his right hand, and replaced his funky 'bident' with a rusty kitchen knife strapped to a metal pole.  On the right is KGBeast, also from DC.  His left arm normally ends in a metal box.  I used a GW Imperial Guard lasrifle and modified it to mimic a Chinese assault rifle from Fallout.  Both make menacing (and quite tall,) raider leaders.
And then there's this guy:

This is Matter Eater Lad, a member of DC's Legion of Super Heroes.  They all have ridiculous names, and usually equally ridiculous powers. In this guy's case, it's exactly like it sounds; he can eat stuff.  The mini is a guy in spandex, chewing on a steel girder.  In any other game, this would be completely useless.  But I play Fallout...
Fallout miniatures raiders (converted from Heroclix figures)

Now we have a raider packing a missile launcher (or maybe a variant of the Red Glare rocket launcher?)  Put this guy on the table top, and watch the players wake up in a jiffy.

So I hope this has given you all some inspiration for making raiders for your Fallout games.  In upcoming posts, we will discuss power armor, mercs, and of course super mutants.

2 comments:

  1. I love the Rocket launcher raider made from a heroclix! I'm going to have to try that myself.

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  2. Excellent conversions! I've employed HeroClix (and a few Mage Knight) minis as cheap conversion bases for raiders and the like, but I'm really inspired by how you've gone above and beyond with these. The transformation of "Matter-Eater Lad" into a heavy-weapon raider is brilliant! :D

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