Gundam! That's a Cool Model

I return to work tomorrow for the first time since December 16, and I am not ready for the Christmas experience to be over yet. Let me dwell on the holiday a bit longer by reflecting on a gift I received.

Fenya was invited to be a bridesmaid at a classmate's wedding in Japan last summer, and ended up spending around three weeks there, having a number of amazing experiences. Before she left, she asked me if there was anything I would like her to bring back, and I said, "A Gundam - just kidding though" as I knew she had limited luggage space.

When I opened my gift from her on Christmas morning, I was astonished to see a spectacular-looking giant robot model from the Gundam range. This particular one was designed to recreate the life-sized statue that appeared outside one of the pavillions at the Osaka Expo 2025 (World's Fair).

Now, despite having watched only the barest handful of the many Gundam movies and series out there, I have always loved giant robits like it (mecha) going back to the Shogun Warrior comics I encountered as a kid. Mobile Suit Gundam pretty much started the 'real robot' genre in 1979, which has been replicated many times since in media like Robotech and wargames like Battletech. 

Unlike many humanoid robots that appeared before, Gundam brought engineering sensibility and military purpose to what had been essentially humans in costumes. A cockpit space in the chest, clear depiction of joints and actuators, and a clean, NASA-like aesthetic with water channels and removable panels to give a distinct style. I was looking forward to building one for the first time!

And one night over Christmas, while Audrey and Glory worked on a gingerbread house at the same table, I opened the box:

Good heavens, what have I committed to here? Seven frames of teeny-tiny parts, and seven pages of instructions, as well two of the tiniest decal sheets ever.

On the other hand though, the coloured plastic meant my Gundam would require no painting, and the push-fit construction meant no glue was needed either. With side-cutters, tweezers and x-acto blade at the ready, I donned my magnifier and got stuck in.

Unlike the majority of wargaming models I've built, the Gundam is fully articulated and posable. This does mean that you are essentially building a skeletal system with joints prior to adorning it with the shell and assorted doodads. 

The pictorial instructions are pretty clear, and I was usually able to find the optimal fit with only a bit of fiddling. On those rare occasions where a piece was assembled incorrectly, the lack of glue meant I could wedge my x-acto blade into the gap and separate them with very little difficulty. 

After a page-and-a-half of assembly, I had a decent looking torso, two arms and a head to show for my efforts. The instructions for applying stickers are given along the way, not at the very end like I was used to (although the 'marking' decals were left until after assembly). Since some of these shiny foil decals are approximately dandruff-sized, not having to handle the entire model while positioning them makes good sense.

I managed to get the base model (the classic RX-78 Gundam) completed before bedtime, perhaps 3-4 hours of work. Crisp, clean and eminently posable, it only represnted the mid-point of my construction!

The multi-coloured plastic in this kit looks absolutely marvelous, and I cannot say enough good things about Bandai's sprue design and production - phenomenally detailed, clearly labelled and even pieces from different frames (and three different types of material) fit together like a foot going into a shoe. At times, it really felt like I was putting together an immesnely detailed toy from a massive Kinder Egg; this model scratches the puzzle-building itch a little bit as well.

But the first thing I needed to do the following day was to remove the existing shoulder pads and waist-plates, so they could be upgraded to the beefier, shinier RX-78F00/E version!

Before any of the many clear blue plastic panels could be assembled, one of the 40+ shiny foil stickers had to be affixed to the space underneath. This was probably as tedious as you imagine it to be, but soon I found a sort of zen calm in my sticker placement.

And to be clear, the stickers are a very worthwhile endeavour, increasing the reflectivity underneath the translucent panels, and making it almost appear like they are generating their own light.

I also appreciated the additional rocket thrusters on the leg pieces.

After this it was on to the final, immense accessory - the wings.

"But Stephen," I hear you cry, "even if physical wings were capable of lifting an 18m tall mecha, surely there is no need for them in the airless void of space?"

And you are probably correct, but even if the G.L.R.S.S. Feather system was designed for mobility and not solar power collection for long range, low-support, deep-space operations, I would still love it just because it looks so Gundam cool. Tragically, this incredibly sensible application has a far less plausible acronym (Gundam Leaping Recursive Spangle Swarm), but there you go.

The backpack that supports the wings also contains even more rocket thrusters with venturi-style nozzles, as well as a pair of very smart and highly flexible manipulator arms, with clamping jaws that open and shut. Ostensibly this is to assemble the modular feather unit itself. Perhaps the pieces all fit into the long tail-like extension that also props the model up very effectively.

Once the feather unit is stickered and assembled, then attached to the back pack, the pack mounts onto the back of the Gundam and you're done!

Well, I mean, as done as you want to be. There are tons of options and accessories, including multiple hands (one of which emulates the gesture of the Osaka Expo statue), an energy rifle and an enormous shield. I kept all of them, and the original shoulder pads and such in the incredibly unlikely ocurrence that I should need a 'stock' RX-78 for some reason or another.

I photographed the box as they crammed a lot of info into the side panels and I will keep the instruction sheet for similar reasons (or if, God help me, I should drop it and need to rebuild). By the end of it, I was using my wearable magnifier just to read the instruction sheets...

This was a fairly intense 7-8 hour build, although I think my next Gundam would go more quickly, should that happen. But I am in no hurry - despite having scratched an itch that has persisted since, what, my late teens maybe? I do not feel compelled to seek out another kit, nore to add paint for 'more accurate coloration' to this one.

But heaven help me if I should come across Bandai's new Gundam miniatures game project...

"...a close personal friend: the M41A pulse rifle"

When Jeff gave me a box of parts that he told me could be assembled into a 1:1 model of one of the most iconic make-believe firearms in cinematic science-fiction history, I was both elated and intimidated (and grateful!). In the end though, I ended up with a very neat conversation piece.

I was elated because in 1986, I must have seen James Cameron's Aliens 8-10 times in the theatre. There wer at least four Tuesdays in succession where, having discovered someone who hadn't seen it, demanded they accompany me to the Paramount Theatre on Jasper Ave (sigh) to see it on the cheap.

My friend Rob and I cobbled together our own director's cut using the deleted footage included in the tv broadcast, and stitched it together with a cinematic VHS version using three daisy-chained VCRs and a pencil and paper list of pause points.

And yeah, science-fiction has a lot of great, neat weapons, but somehow the pulse-rifle manages to stand out. Partly it is the realism and industrial blandness of the design, partly it is how ubiquitous it becomes through some of the most brilliant action pieces of its time. One of the major reasons though is how they draw back the curtain on it when Lance Corporal Duane Hicks (Michael Biehn) outlines its capabilities and operation to the film's heroine Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver).

This combined with Lt. Gorman's detached recitation of the amunition type ("10mm exploding tip caseless, standard light armour-piercing - why?") both demystifies the pulse rifle whch makes it plausible to have it tear alien monsters apart, but also explains why it might deflect off more armoured foes.

The ammo counter, practical magazine, muzzle flash and distinctive sound have carried on a long ways from the cinematic release and through many a video game as well. So obviously, I wanted to make the most of the opportunity and do it justice, which is where the trepidation crept in. 

There was also a very real risk that the parts would languish in a box as many other projects have, collecting dust until some idyllic future point w

here I would have the time to lavish all the time on it that it might require.  But luckily, I figured out a short cut that let me assemble and paint it in less than a week.

I found a can of flat (ultra-flat, in fact!) olive-drab green spray paint at Michaels and purchased it with one of the ubiquitous coupons. After gluing the various half-pieces together with either two-part epoxy or superglue, and heeding Jeff's caution that a specific order of assembly would be required,  I sprayed all the "body" or housing pieces this colour, masking the bit of gun barrel and shroud protruding from the one end.

I then reversed the masking and sprayed all the "metal" parts black, and hoestly, that covered about 80% of the painting.

The receiver and ejector port (wait, isn't this ammo caseless? well, moving on...) well black bits on mostly green real estate, but it was a simple matter to carefully hand-paint those elements. First basic black, then a bit of zinc acrylic (leftover from another Aliens project, lol) on the exposed metal bits, as well as the loading port on the under-barrel grenade launcher.

Next up was painting all the recessed screws, which, though not the easiest to reach, really contributes to the verisimillitude of the whole thing, and did not take all that long. Lastly, the LED ammo counter in blacks and reds.

I had found a suitable descriptive plaque online that Jeff graciously printed out for me, and one that was painted, I was done - I had escaped the curse of the dusty box (for once)!

Now came the rub: how to display it? At two feet in length, there weren't many places I could put it, and didn't really want it on the walls of the Batcave downstairs at any rate. Luckily there was a suitable space in the unfinished part of the basement, on the way to the laundry area and deep freeze - out of the way but not hidden.

But how to hang it? I didn't trust the superglue to hold the weight of the model is suspended by the nadle, and no 3M Command Hooks were long enough to safely secure its width. 

Luckily enough, the 'decorative hooks' section of Home Depot turned up these brilliant wide, flat hooks that are not only flat black and the perfect size, but they fold up out of the way to boot!

Four screws later, the M41A was safely racked in its new home.

But this weekend, Glory graciously agreed to don her jacket full of USCM patches and let me photograph her with it for scale.

Sadly, there was no time to search out a better backdrop than the plain white wall of our garage (never a steam tunnel or well-lit modern industrial plant around when you need one!), but once again we refused to sacrifice the good on the altar of the perfect.

It also underscored how non-cosplay friendly my build was; simply changing poses was enough to break off the shoulder stock, but what the glue taketh away, it also giveth back, so we were back in business in short order. 

I wonder what might have worked better in terms of adhesive; I thought hot glue would be too thick for how flush some of the pieces were meant to sit, and found the epoxy a little difficult to work with. Maybe someday they will make some kind of polystyrene filament for 3D printing so you can use model cement on it?

Regardless, until I can justify getting an Airsoft version or something else more fun to play with, or hit the lotto and can buy a more prop-like replica, I am happy to have a piece of make-believe firepower on my basement wall.

G&G XIX: Axes, Battletech, and Formula Dé

A few things conspired to keep us from filling the schedule as much as we would have liked at Gaming & Guinness XIX: not one but two Stanley Cup Final games, the host's brohter getting concussed at a football game, a spasmodic back, and several issues associated with aging (exacerbated by sleep deprivation, spicy food and, in some cases, alcohol consumption that bordered on the heroic).

In fact, on Friday night no one stayed up past 11:30 -  a first for G&G, I am confident.

But our motivation for turning in early was good, as Saturday was actually a very full day, beginning with axe throwing.

We made out way to  Axe Monkeys on the North side by 10:30, taking advantage of their "Rise n Shine Saturdays" BOGO offer. Despite having many newbies in the crew, we managed to get seven people landing shots with decent consistency after about twenty minutes of practice. We had one side of the facility practically to ourselves, with only two people per lane, so we could keep up a good chucking pace.

Legit bullseye scored by Earl J Woods

Even if you don't hit a bullseye, the satisfaction of landing a hatchet with a beefy 'thock' into the two-and-a-half-foot wide tree cookies that serve as target is reward enough.

And sometimes, missing a target in a creative manner is its own special treat.

Rob didn't even say he meant to do that

Best of all, we had time afterwards to try throwing some unconventional objects, like a circular saw blade...

...or this absolute beast of three axeheads welded together:

And although we played a couple of different games, mostly it was fun to get out of the house and do something a little unusual together.

After lunch, Jeff and Scott set up what I think is the largest and densest Battletech table we have seen to date, and we finally played out our long-speculated matchup between bipedal battle robots and conventional tanks.

Now, classic Battletech has a fantastic equalization system built in if you are using equal tonnages per side, but a) that doesn't take into consideration the enormous mobility advantage the 'mechs have over tracked vehicles, and b) it can lead to boring and bog-standard knock-down drag out battles.

I had proposed having the 'mechs run a gauntlet, with minimal scenery in the centre of the table and the tanks having additional tonnage resulting in a 3:1 advantage in numbers. Jeff and Scott put together an idea where six vehicles would face off against four mechs, the tanks had a 50% advantage in tonnage and owuld be each be allowed to respawn at select points on the board.

We ended up abandoning the respawn idea, but after the tanks got a strong initial salvo they stuggled to get clean shots as the mechs tried to outpace them.

Despite their victory conditions being based on evacing 'mechs within 12 turns, the House Davion 'mechs still managed to wreck three tanks and get two mechs away, so we declared their side the winners of this year's Golden Griffon. It was great playing with tanks for the first time though, and Jeff painted them exceptionally.

The final event was an enormous game of the venerable racing game Formula Dé, combining the Zandvoort 1 and 2 tracks from Holland into a true megaboard.

We also introduced the rules for designing cars, which incorporates suspension points, which necessitates inclusion of the debris rules. Long story short, if anyone loses a bodywork point due to a collision, or an engine point (from over revving or 'pushing' into a corner, a marker is set on the track to represent the debris left behind. Driving over the debris runs the risk of damaging the suspension (rolling a 1-4 on a d20), and losing your last suspension point eliminates your car.

Despite all the debris littering Zandvoort, not a single suspension point was lost!

It was a long and grueling race that saw the lead change hands several times. In the end, with two other players running neck and neck, Pete dark-horsed his way up the side from a distant third place, ending up beside the leader but in a higher gear, which allowed him to roll first and win the game!

Tables of the Reconstruction

It wouldn't be the weekend before G&G if I wasn't feverishly painting models or scenery three days before our nineteenth get-together kicks off. 

This year we return to the Old West for a good ol' fashioned bank robbery scenario. The robbers start in the center of town and have to get off a table edge, while the lawmen come in from two other edges and try to stop them. 

I have a enough buildings for a very decent looking street, but nothing behind it on either side, and with 8 players and 16 models, big swathes of open ground will make the robber's job pretty much impossible.

So I am borrowing a few pieces and asked Jeff to print me a few more, which he did and brought them over Thursday night when he came to watch the hockey game. I primed them Friday, and started painting them Saturday afternoon. They are pretty rough, but done enough!

The troughs and outhouses will help break things up a little too, and the fences will make it a lot easier to do OK Corral-type scenarios to boot.

Totty and Earl and I did a run through of the bank robbery last weekend, and it felt good to get the rules back under us. Legends of the Old West (from the now defunct Warhammer Historical) is a fun, simple system that draws heavily on GW's Lord of the Rings game system.

But in the end, any excuse to push toy posses and outlaws around a miniature town will be taken.

As you can see though, even a wide thoroughfare resulted in significant bloodshed in very short order (at least one of which was a potentially innocent bystander shot by my ruthless marshall - or perhaps a collaborator undone by keen instincts? We'll have to wait for the inquest.

Don't be fooled by the bonnet - that's the ringleader!

At any rate, hopefully I will have more and better pictures of a bigger town (Fort Everett) next week following G&G XIX!