Re: Field Marshal Games Pieces Project Discussion thread

[Rorschach]

@Black:

My vote is for a medium gray

The FMG Dice are a Medium gray, so I would say … you win!  :D

[tin_snips]

glad to see this project coming along, no matter what colour the germans are  8-)

[Guest]

How about gray for regulars and black for elites?

[Upside-down_Turtle]

and dark-green for US elites?  Maroon for USSR?  I like it, but 99.999% chance FMG is sticking w/ dice colors straight through.  The quality of FMG’s inf woun’t be 2 colors, as was w/ Pacific, but 2 highly detailed, distinct inf sculpts.

As for AA40, the board color is the same as '41, so it’s safe to assume unit colors will stay the same (which means maroon Russians).

[FieldMarshalGames]

@Brain:

How about gray for regulars and black for elites?

At this time we can only do one colour per nation.  We would have to run the whole mould through in the second colour which would mean you would have a BLACK tank / plane / sub in addition to the Grey version.  We cant do just ONE unit in a specific colour.

But you could always use existing units from AAE or Bulge to give yourself a custom set.

[Guest]

I’ll be happy with whatever you provide.

[DrLarsen]

Any word on progress, FMG?  I’m definitely interested as well.

As an aside, I just picked up the Italy/ China dice lately and wanted to say “Great Job again!”  If the piece sets you’re working on are as good, I just can’t wait!

[FieldMarshalGames]

@DrLarsen:

Any word on progress, FMG?  I’m definitely interested as well.

As an aside, I just picked up the Italy/ China dice lately and wanted to say “Great Job again!”  If the piece sets you’re working on are as good, I just can’t wait!

Glad you enjoyed the COMBAT DICE.  I am told by my R&D guy that he will have something to show me this week!  The hard part is already done (making sculpts) and now they are miniaturizing them to make samples for my approval.  I will post pictures of these samples!

I don’t know about you…  But I am very excited after all this work and long wait.

[Guest]

I can’t wait.

[DrLarsen]

Now, do I understand correctly that the first installment of this project will be just the Italian units?  And if so, does that mean that the price will be a fraction of the 59$ “Complete Set” price as discussed in the early posts?

[Rorschach]

@DrLarsen:

Now, do I understand correctly that the first installment of this project will be just the Italian units?  And if so, does that mean that the price will be a fraction of the 59$ “Complete Set” price as discussed in the early posts?

Yes, and Most definately!  I think the $59 concept was a complete set … of course, price can’t be determined 100% for sure yet, until they get everything ready (I imagine).  :)

[FieldMarshalGames]

That is correct.  We will offer the PRE-ORDER once the Italians are ready.  If you place a pre-order you will get the Italians right away and the rest of the units as they are made.  Once the ball is rolling it will be fairly fast.  The first mould and the First units are the hardes to do…  once our factory knows what to do they will roll out one after the other.

The only limiting factor is money (Like all things).  The speed of the other units release will depend on pre-orders and our ability to pay for the project.

We can not determine final cost of the set until we know the EXACT cost of the Italian units.  I think they will sell well considering that Italy is also in AAE40 and not just AA50 anymore.

[DrLarsen]

So… have the decisions about what specific ships/ planes/ tanks will be used for all of the other countries yet?  What about what order they will be released in? If not, I have my own thoughts about these issues, but I’m not sure if it’s a fait accompli (or, for that matter, if this is the right thread for throwing in my 2 cents…)

[FieldMarshalGames]

@DrLarsen:

So… have the decisions about what specific ships/ planes/ tanks will be used for all of the other countries yet?  What about what order they will be released in? If not, I have my own thoughts about these issues, but I’m not sure if it’s a fait accompli (or, for that matter, if this is the right thread for throwing in my 2 cents…)

All the sculpts have been chosen at this time.  As you can see this thread is now 40 pages long!  I will reveal each as it is going into the mould…

[Black Fox]

Maybe these will be ready just in time for Christmas :-D

[crsluggo]

So do you have any sort of date on which you will begin to take pre-orders?

[FieldMarshalGames]

@C_Strabala:

So do you have any sort of date on which you will begin to take pre-orders?

I am waiting on the factory to finish the samples of ITALY.  Once I have something physical to show I will put up the pre-order page.  This first set is taking longer than expected.

I am told to await news for something big very soon.

I will share the moment I have it!

[DrLarsen]

What the heck, I’ll throw in my 2 cents anyway, since their might always be more projects along these lines, even if this one is already set in granite…

Before I go into the nitty gritty’s, though, to get to my absolute, bottom line, highest priorities, what I want the most are:

1. Heavy tanks for those that did have them (or could have had them, in the case of US M-26 Pershings…) , esp. the JS-2, Tiger (I or II, whichever) and M-26 Pershing.

2. “Normal” battleships and carriers for the Japanese (Soryu/Hiryu/Unryu class carriers, perhaps, and any of the 4 classes of famous  “pagoda-mast” battleships.)

3. Paratroopers (with their unique helmets and weapons) and other elite infantry (USMC, SNLF, SS, Commandos, etc.)

4. And… I see that there are already plans for a range of at least 3 aircraft classes per country, which I wholeheartedly support.

So here’s my current wish list:

Soviet Union
Infantry 1: Naval Infantry (NI) Paratrooper [?]
Infantry 2: Helmetless [WITH USHANKA] with SCOPED mosin-nagant
Artillery: 76-mm divisional gun M1942 (ZiS-3) or  122 mm howitzer M1938 (M-30)
Mech: T-60
Tank 1: BT light tank
Tank 2: JS-2
Fighter: Ilyushin IL-2
Bomber: PETLAYAKOV PE-2 [?]

Germany
Infantry 1: Fallschirmjager
Infantry 2: Has Stg44 or FG42
Artillery: 10.5 cm
Mech: Sdkfz 251
Tank 1: Panzer II or Panzer II or Panzer IV
Tank 2: Tiger I or Tiger II
Fighter: Fw190
Bomber: He111

United Kingdom
Infantry 1: Paratroop Helmet with sten submachinegun
Infantry 2: with lend-lease tommygun or australian infantry
Artillery: 25 pounder [non-SP]
Mech: Universal Carrier
Tank 1: Cromwell
Tank 2: Comet
Fighter: Hawker Hurricane
Bomber: Avro Lancaster

Japan
Infantry: SNLF or para (w/ Type 100 smg)
Infantry: winter get-up [?]
Artillery: Type 38 75 mm Field Gun or Type 91 10cm Howitzer
Mech: Type 1 Ho-Ha
Tank 1: Type 3 Chi-Nu Medium Tank (Closest the to a Japanese “heavy” tank that went beyond the prototype stage)
Tank 2: Type 97 Chi-Ha
Fighter: Nakajima Ki-43
Bomber: Kate Torpedo Bomber

United States
Infantry 1: Airborne
Infantry 2: Marine
Artillery: 155 mm
Mech: M3 Halftrack
Tank 1: M3 Stuart
Tank 2: Pershing M26 [MUST DO PERSHING!!!]
Fighter: P-51 or F4U Corsair
Bomber: B-25 or B-29

[Viracocha]

Looking forward to seeing the Italian minis… would certainly pre-order.

[DrLarsen]

There, I changed it to “Naval Infantry Paratrooper”… is that better?

Note also that, after a little quick artillery research, I changed my “wish list” for artillery.  I disagree with the SP Artillery idea, so I chose the most widely used “normal” artillery piece that I could find info on… In some cases there were two key options, I guess you could say a “heavy” (100-155 mm) and a “light” (70-88 mm), and I wasn’t sure how to choose between them.  It might be interesting to have, say, a “standard” and a “heavy” alternative for each but… How to do this?

It’s tempting to say to go with something heavier for the axis (which already have 70 mm and 88 mm pieces from AH) and lighter for the allies (who are already all using the 105 mm), except that there doesn’t seem to be any lighter US gun that the community sees as sufficiently “iconic…”  Add this to the fact that the 105 mm AH scupt is already rather tiny and the 88mm sculpt is kind of biggish in comparison, and… what to do, what to do?

I tried to pick both a “heavy” and a “light” tank for each that hadn’t already been done by AH, but this was problematic for Japan, who didn’t have anything larger than the Type 3 Chi-Nu (18 tons, 75 mm main armament) that got much beyond the prototype stage.  (The Type 4 Chi-To, 30 tons/ 75 mm got beyond prototype stage, I suppose, but only 2 were actually completed…)

With this exception (and Italy which was even worse off) in mind, having sculpts of the ones that I recomend, added to the AH ones already out there, would allow for 3 levels of tanks for each major power: light, medium and heavy… though perhaps this is “overkill…”