Budget Wargaming - One Page Rules, 3D printing, and more

[Just Some Other Guy]

The best way I've found to wash prints is to put on some good rubber gloves and dunk the entire build plate into a container of cleaner. Really swish it around, up and down for 30 seconds or so. A second basin pays off to do a "clean" wash in, because that first vat will get dirty relatively quickly and still leave residue on the print.

This gets the supports cleaned off too so you're not dealing with the mess of uncured resin all over them while trying to remove stuff from them. Also cleans off the build plate too.

 

[ZMOT]

neat, an /awg/ thread and then I forget to reply...

To end this wall of text, I want to ask about rules. There's supposedly other "ragequit 40k" games out there, as well as a bunch of One Page Rules YouTubers, but I've not found them. I only know Bolt Action, and One Page Rules. As for OPR YouTubers, I only know GoodNuff Gaming and One Page More.

your google-fu is lacking, basically the biggest OPR ad/shill creator is https://www.youtube.com/@WylochsArmory way back before it was cool. he also does terrain, so should be right up your alley.

as for other ragequit games, xenos rampage is probably the next biggest. stargrave was already mentioned which is the scifi-version of frostgrave, it's skirmish (so you don't need a lot of models or tablespace) with an injection of rpg/narrative since you keep your characters between games. really solid stuff. no scifi oathmark yet, but who knows...
there's even a neat STL package for frostgrave around: https://www.kickstarter.com/project...city-3d-printable-stl-miniatures-and-terrains
has a follow-up too, and right now there's a whole not!rangers of shadow deep one I didn't know about. this really is the worst part about 3d printing, you constantly come across new great stuff...


there's also some talk around trench crusade, but the community is literally reddit and worse, not sure if you wanna deal with that.
battle for antares is another I always wanna dig into but somehow never find the time, can't say how dead it is now.
if you have someone young in your family and the itch for wargaming, you can grab some of their matchbox cars and use them for gaslands. never played it myself but lot of people seem to like it.

mantic, if you haven't checked them out yet have their own alternatives, they have their own models but in the past they were pretty chill with using others.

since you were asking about narrative play, OPR just released one recently (and there are older ones). there are also some co-op wargames. rangers of shadow deep and 5 leagues/parsecs are probably the biggest. first one is from the same author as frostgrave, more scenario based. 5 leagues/parsecs is less preset and more running your dudes running through a bunch of missions and the "narrative" develops from there. here's a review:

if you need minis, modiphius (who owns it now) actually made some together with titanforge: https://modiphius.net/blogs/news/five-parsecs-from-the-titan-forge

but all of those are model agnostic, you can use any model and scale you want. some stl creators have their own game, but I never really looked at those.

From what I can tell on the internet, one problem is that a typical 3D printer (FDM) isn't particularly good for minis as 3D prints have obvious layers, so any detail would get lost. Resin printers are expensive and requires the use of toxic chemicals, and is a more involved process, but gives the details you want in a mini. But 3D printing is supposedly improving quickly so maybe that is outdated.

you can do acceptable minis with FDM, however it's gonna take ages (small nozzle, small layers etc.), resin is simple faster and gives you better resolution too.

improving we'll have too see, bamboo pretty much knocked a lot of companies on their ass who were dragging their feet with little progress, now they have to compete with a printer that is pretty much consumer level and not hobbyist anymore. resin hasn't made big jumps yet afaik, although the athena has some nice features (for a price). inevitably those are gonna trickle down to cheaper levels, but at what speed and price I can't say.
as for the resin itself there are some plant based, but since it's a bit more expensive most just buy the usual and less hassle. and you still have to deal with all the waste from supports. inkjet sounds like the best method yet and even does color, but since it's proprietary top to bottom and expensive, it's out of reach for private users.

Something else I also found while looking up those models. Similar to, but legally distinct from, film characters. A bit more expensive at £3-£4 each, but things like "Intercepter Driver" that is clearly Mad Max, "80s action hero" that is Snake Plissken, all you need is the scope for his silenced Mac-10. I don't know what you'd use them for, but fun to see.

ah, found papsikel's models I see. dude's not shy doing literally anything on top of his own stuff. theoretically you can use them wherever you want, especially games where you create your own band of misfits or heroes, like 5 parsecs or frost/stargrave and can stat them. or you just print them to trigger people...

 

[Easterling]

@Judge Dredd what is it your after in particular? I have like a database of websites for good minis depending on the theme. Most are UK based though so you'll pay for more for shipping if your an American. That being said they are usually very good sculpts.

https://haylandterrain.com/

This one is by far the best for celebrities, horror film characters and zombies

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Oh na the whole scanning business is black market and GW is actively shutting it down anywhere they can. Reason why it was driven to obscure Telegram channels in the first place. They used to post them on Cults3D, but GW started to actively rape the website. GW is super predatory when it comes to people replicating their designs (even applies to tons of designs people made from scratch). I know way back some recasters tried to disguise themselves a a part replacement service too but they got fucked either way. So yeah. There is a pretty active GW model black market for both physical and digital like it's some precious items and it'll never be not funny to me (and kinda sad I guess).

People could probably put a right to repair legalization lawsuit to the EU but it will require a huge amount of effort.

 

[Judge Dredd]

People could probably put a right to repair legalization lawsuit to the EU but it will require a huge amount of effort.

I don't think right to repair would fix anything. As we saw in the US, all that fighting for right to repair, just for apple to put DRM in their screens.

found papsikel's models I see.

I didn't. It was some other company/sculpter, but these are great. While I have no plans to get a 3D printer, you can bet I'm printing a "law upholder" if I do.

what is it your after in particular? I have like a database of websites for good minis depending on the theme. Most are UK based though so you'll pay for more for shipping if your an American. That being said they are usually very good sculpts.

dude's not shy doing literally anything on top of his own stuff. [...] or you just print them to trigger people...

I live in the UK, but I'm not after something specific in terms of celebrities or anything. It's just fun to see this kind of creative energy and idgaf attitude that used to be GWs bread and butter during my teens (I played end of second edition, most of third edition).

Power level. I still remember the new third edition sculpts were such a huge step up from second. On reflection it was goofy that everybody posed rank and file infantry to be looking at a scanner, pointing, or playing with gun straps, but that was just fun after all the time of stiff-guy-holding-gun. Just look at space marine devastators.

Things were exciting back then. 40k was fun and silly. With no prompting, some rando would shout "Dark Eldar!" and the entire place would yell "Spiky bits!". Space Hulk was obviously Aliens and apologetically so. Now it's just miserable old fucks wanting to argue minutia. Maybe I'm just a manchild retard who never grew up, but 40k is ostensibly something you do for fun.

It's hard to articulate, but despite still promising a grim dark future, 40k is simultaneously so dark it's stupid, and so safe as to be boring. To give an example. Demonettes, and pretty much the entire Slaanesh faction, should be horrific sex demons. They did a little of that in third, but now they're just monsters. And I guess it makes sense. They don't want monsters with their tits out when kids are running around, but it's a game with flamethrowers and elves having an orgy so big they summon a god. You can't really file those edges down without losing something, and they've taken a belt sander to it. If I were to learn that 40k warzones are wheelchair accessable to be inclusive, I wouldn't be surprised.

I could imagine, say, running Halo or Aliens marine models with named characters as heroes, even mixing the franchises. Or even something more sutble. "In the grim dark future of the 41st millenium. There is only war! ...and John Wick for some reason.". Too much of this can be cringe, but a little is just fun.

your google-fu is lacking

Yes, it is. It has been for a while. Not helped by YouTube search being basically unusuable.

This one is by far the best for celebrities, horror film characters and zombies

I gave a quick skim before posting this. And there's some great stuff there. Again, don't know what I'd use it for. An American friend I know is a big fan of Elvira, so if we played in person I think he'd get a kick out of that. And there's another Plisskin. This time with the correct gun.

You guys have given me a lot to dig through, and that's a good thing.

 

[ATandTism]

Back in college buddies and I found copies of Warhammer Fantasy rule books online and made models from laminated paper and cardboard.

We chose an army, found pictures of the units, printed and laminated them and slapped them onto square cardboard bases we made. Which were to size since the sizes of each units base is also online. All we had to buy was some dice and tape measures. Good fun, and super cheap.

 

[Verdun_Salient]

I will say this, FDM is in my opinion better for terrain. FDM is a lot more durable than resin

 

[Just Some Other Guy]

I will say this, FDM is in my opinion better for terrain. FDM is a lot more durable than resin

Agreed. It's best to leverage both fdm and resin for what they're best at.

I've done resin terrain but it's just not as practical.

 

[LowlyPheasent]

If you're cool with cutting and pasting shit cardboard tokens like OG wargames can work, or cardboard cutouts with a coin for a weighted stand.

If you have a computer that can run it, TTS can literally let you have whatever the fuck you want too without the hassle of the print. Loses the charm of physical media, but can also enable you to play with friends you may not be able to all gather together any other way.

 

[The Paranoid Organ]

I would also vouch for digital if you are so inclined. Lots of decent VTTs you can adapt to wargames. Vassal, Tabletop Simulator, Roll20 at well known and there are lots of others. You could also leverage AI and generate a lots of tokens on the fly. So your imagination is the limit. See attached.

Prompt template I use is: {number of tokens. More there are, the lower the quality. But you get more tokens per generation} isometric character tokens for a virtual tabletop. {Description of tokens. Be as creative and verbose as you want here}. {Art style} by {Artist}.

There is also a growing number of solo wargame systems out there. 5 Parsecs from Home and Rangers of Shadowsdeep have been mentioned here already. Good fun of you are looking for something more narrative or antisocial.

 

[Judge Dredd]

I'm really starting to doubt if this will work out for me, but I might as well ask.

What's a good way to start with paints? All the things I see recommended online are US companies like Army Painter.

Also, how do you go about printing things if you don't have a home printer? I've heard nothing but bad things about home printers in current year. DRM, subscription services, ink cartridge scams. The internet recommends American retailers that have such services, but those companies don't exist here, and British companies don't seem to offer it. The local "print shop" is about business cards and other professional work. One suggestion I've not looked into yet is the local library.

 

[Involuntary Celebrity]

The best way I've found to wash prints is to put on some good rubber gloves and dunk the entire build plate into a container of cleaner. Really swish it around, up and down for 30 seconds or so. A second basin pays off to do a "clean" wash in, because that first vat will get dirty relatively quickly and still leave residue on the print.

This gets the supports cleaned off too so you're not dealing with the mess of uncured resin all over them while trying to remove stuff from them. Also cleans off the build plate too.

Or, instead of a second wash and going through gallons of alcohol because you're dunking everything, just get a spray bottle of isopropyl and give the print a quick squirt before you wash. This'll rinse off the uncured resin before it pollutes your bath and help knock goo out of recesses so you don't need as much agitation during the wash.
It's also very handy for cleaning off the build plate with a quick spray & wipe.

Leaving supports attached can be a good tip, but it's something you'll get a feel for and varies by the part. I'll even leave them on during the cure sometimes if I'm concerned about deforming delicate bits by breaking them off when the whole thing is soft. Generally you want to get em off before the wash because if they end up detached and float around in there they'll eventually dissolve and foul it faster, though.

 

[Just Some Other Guy]

Or, instead of a second wash and going through gallons of alcohol because you're dunking everything, just get a spray bottle of isopropyl and give the print a quick squirt before you wash. This'll rinse off the uncured resin before it pollutes your bath and help knock goo out of recesses so you don't need as much agitation during the wash.
It's also very handy for cleaning off the build plate with a quick spray & wipe.

Leaving supports attached can be a good tip, but it's something you'll get a feel for and varies by the part. I'll even leave them on during the cure sometimes if I'm concerned about deforming delicate bits by breaking them off when the whole thing is soft. Generally you want to get em off before the wash because if they end up detached and float around in there they'll eventually dissolve and foul it faster, though.

Why are you going through gallons of alcohol? The stuff lasts quite awhile.

If you really want to get fancy you can even get into cleaning/distilling it to get even more life out of it.

Agitation is going to be more effective especially on densly packed build plates. You'd have to separate the models to be able to spray them effectively vs dunking the build plate for a min. Not to mention yoy can't spray the insides of hollowed models.

As for leaving supports on during cure? Absolutely never. If you have supports that take stuff with them while still in their "soft" state, that's a support issue. Or your layer time is too high. Supports should be soft and pliable. Curing is going to make it even harder because now you fused the support to the model even more.

 

[Involuntary Celebrity]

Why are you going through gallons of alcohol? The stuff lasts quite awhile.

If you really want to get fancy you can even get into cleaning/distilling it to get even more life out of it.

Agitation is going to be more effective especially on densly packed build plates. You'd have to separate the models to be able to spray them effectively vs dunking the build plate for a min. Not to mention yoy can't spray the insides of hollowed models.

It doesn't seem like you read my post very well.

As for leaving supports on during cure? Absolutely never. If you have supports that take stuff with them while still in their "soft" state, that's a support issue. Or your layer time is too high. Supports should be soft and pliable. Curing is going to make it even harder because now you fused the support to the model even more.

Comprehension issues aside, as I implied it's a rare and situational thing. When I've done this it was with very fine supports on very small and delicate mechanical parts that were getting damaged or distorted by removal pre-cure (we're talking sub-millimeter tolerances for the prototypes they were going into). Post-cure, the tiny supports were so brittle they simply brushed off.

 

[Just Some Other Guy]

It doesn't seem like you read my post very well.

Which part? You say you prefer to spray stuff instead of dunking. At least for the initial cleaning. I don't see how it's less wasteful or more practical.

I thought we were talking about typical wargaming purposes since that's what the thread is about.

 

[The Paranoid Organ]

What's a good way to start with paints? All the things I see recommended online are US companies like Army Painter.

Speedpaint would be the way to go. New lines over the last few years. Paint goes on an naturally goes dark in the recesses and lighter on the raised areas. Probably pretty good to start with, then build off of as you get more technical knowledge.
Other brands have similar product lines now.

Also, how do you go about printing things if you don't have a home printer?

No idea on this. I just got a midline printer and it can print whatever. The scams would be obvious if you do a little research. Library may be a good bet. Probably pay a premium it they may not care what you print as long as the materials are not overtly offensive. Maybe business centers as well if they have a print shop, but that depends on the policies of the business.

 

[Just Some Other Guy]

Agree with the speedpaints. They're pretty slick especially if you just want to get some paint on there. With a little effort can be even greater.

 

[Judge Dredd]

Sorry in advance for the autism. As someone who was into Warhammer back in the day when they were the only game in town, finding all this budget stuff makes me feel like I found Atlantis, even though it's likely common knowledge.


First, an odd 3D printing question. Is there a reason stls can't be/shouldn't be scaled? And does the size of the model really matter on the tabletop?

I often see reviews comparing the size of a model to GW equivalents. Sometimes an individual model being a head higher or shorter is criticised, but to me that just covers natural variation is height, assuming it's even noticeable on the tabletop. This is even more bizarre is when they do it with alien and robot races, since even GW models have height differences. If height is that much of an issue for gameplay, I'd think variation in posing would be a bigger problem? eg. A crouching pose would give a competitive edge over a standing one. I see complaints that a stl was 32mm instead of 28mm. Is it possible to scale the print by 12.5% (or 10% if you want a round number) and say it's close enough?


Then there's Tamiya, AirFix, and other scale model makers. When it comes to vehicles, they're cheap, or at least cheap-er. About half the price of Games Workshop. However, there's some debate over scale, and most of the options are World War 2 which stands out in a sci-fi game. That said, I wonder if modern day tanks and ATVs could be useful on tabletop if you can find them? Why pay £40 for a Taurox or a Leman Russ when a "light armoured vehicle" or a "Challanger tank" can be had for £25 or less?

This is what I mean by discovering Atlantis. I shared this idea with an internet friend who's big into modelling. He says it's normal for him to use WW2 kits for Ork vehicles.


One final question. Has plastic cement fallen out of favour? Liquid stuff with the brush. It seems everyone uses super glue now, which in the past was basically the nuclear option.

 

[The Paranoid Organ]

First, an odd 3D printing question. Is there a reason stls can't be/shouldn't be scaled? And does the size of the model really matter on the tabletop?

No real reason. Its just instructions being sent to a 3d printer. Bumping up and down a few % would have little quality impact. But there are things to be aware of. Going up or down scale means the quality of the print changes. You would need to consider taking a lower resolution model and what scaling up would look like. And what taking a higher resolution model and scaling it down would look like. Going to the extremes would make interesting results (like 10mm to 28mm or vice versa). But printing the cheap and there are some YouTube vids on the topic.

One final question. Has plastic cement fallen out of favour? Liquid stuff with the brush. It seems everyone uses super glue now, which in the past was basically the nuclear option.

I have not heard anything. It may be due to advances in the glues (quality or price). Also if you are using 3d prints, that's all resin so the plastic cement is a non starter.

 

[ZMOT]

First, an odd 3D printing question. Is there a reason stls can't be/shouldn't be scaled? And does the size of the model really matter on the tabletop?

as mentioned it should work, might be regarding heroic which isn't just a few mm more but also affects individual sizes like head etc.