"15mm and 28mm Compatibility?" Topic

I'm a bit of a pinch. My friend's a big 40k fan, although he's mentioned that he'd be interested in playing different rulesets. I've been gearing myself mostly towards 15mm, however he's not sold on starting up a 15mm army alongside his 40k models at this time, partly for monetary reasons and partly for the fact he's been engaged with 40k for so long, he's wary of starting anything else.
I can't say he won't get into 15mm eventually, but for now I was wondering if there were rules that support both simultaneously – his larger models against mine.

A bit odd to play with against an army twice the height. No one does this, so rules don't cater to it.

I guess I could use a 15mm ruleset and just pretend his Orks are really tough, really big aliens. More-so than in 40k.

Well you could base your 15mm's on 28mm bases and use 28mm rules.

Or just use something like Tomorrows War that is scale neutral. Grab a bunch of 40k stuff and have some fun. Once he is comfortable with cutting the GW cord, Then you can talk about shifting scale.

Besides, I've learned it always better to build 2 (or more) armies. Helps you find new players and introduce people to new rules.

I do this. I use some of my 40K models in 15mm games. For example Tau Crisis suites work great in 15mm games, they are just really big mechs then. So do Eldar Wraithguard, necron immortals, necron wraiths, necron spyders, necron scarabs, most chaos daemons that aren't carrying an actual skull will work as giant sized demons in 15mm.

In addition to that all of the Tau vehicles without exposed crewmen work for 15mm. Nurglins would work as 15mm demonic infantry.

The entire range of Tyranids will work.

It does depend on what he has.

Come to think of it I've even used my Chaos Defiler in 15mm Steampunk games. It works really well in that, it is very city-threatening.

I completely agree with Pictors. There are lots of 28mm stuff that is useable in 15mm gaming as is. Not to mention the converting potential.

Nurglings do indeed make fine 15mm infantry.I have some with my fantasy.

Gruntz has unit construction rules, so you could field 15mm troops against the Giant Armorines (Pure or Fallen, and Heavy or Levy), the Green Roid Behemoths, the Flying Tall Greys or the Robo Tall Grays, or the Brightly Colored Deadly Things From Beyond Space. There are also the Big Tomb Droids and the Flying Tall Greys' Kinky Cousins.

Build them in three Specialist Squads of three with a single Specialist Group Leader type (giving your friend units of four, seven or ten). They'll be big, multi-wound, flexible in play, and holy terrors.

I run a few 28mm models in 15mm armies.

You could loan him some troops. Heck, you could give him a birthday present of a whole 15mm army for less than one of the new GW fliers.

Just treat the 15mm army as pygmies or liliputians.

It can be easy enough to do. FUBAR and its relations (like AR-16) don't use templates so 28mm can work quite well with 15mm. 28mm figures are just really large.

I have three scales of figures in this picture. The big mech thing is actually a VOR 28mm battlesuit (Ares). This brute is a walking tank… and if you think he's something wait until I finish my pair of Neo-Soviet Ursas!

The two smaller mecha are 1/285th scale battlemechs from Battletech (Valkyries). I use them as light mecha/scouts that have a single crewman squeezed tightly in the head and torso. As you can see, they fit in great with 15mm vehicles and infantry and they look the part of light scouts.

The infantry and HUMVEEs are from Khurasan and Rebel Minis respectfully. The infantry are probably a bit big for 15mm plus they are standing on US pennies which make them a bit taller.

So really it depends on what your 40K friend is fielding. Armored space marines are battlesuits and can be treated as mecha. Vehicles are just that, vehicles, just really big ones. Now unarmored infantry… I guess they are giants with maybe two wounds each. You'll probably get more mileage out of alien figures like Orks (which are just plain silly to me), or Tyranids (which, being aliens, easily scale!).

Hey, it's a game and these are toys. Put them on the board, pick some rules and assign stats, and go to it.