"Returning to WW2 with GQ1/2. But 1/4800 or 1/6000? " Topic

Coming back to WW2 with GQ1/2. But 1/4800 or 1/6000? Pics please.

I'm after some comparison pictures of the various 4800 and 6000 ranges.

I'm not sure how they scrub up

Ok, i'm looking to get back into post pre-dreads, with GQ 1/2 probably WW2 Mediterranean and maybe Pacific theatre.

I'm thinking about 1/4800 as portability and mobility are an issue for me and I think the scale would also suit a small scale table of Mal Wright​ "Convoy" which is on my bucket list to play. I know David Manley​ has done some nice GQ mods as well

My questions to any of you who play GQ in 4800

Have any of you used a larger ground scale (eg stayed at 3000) or just modifed tables and charts to 4800

Additionally, I know some of the casters Mickey Yarrow, CinC, anyone I've missed?
I know there's lovely shapeways but I'd like to avoid the cost factor

I'm probably going to build forces around a major battle in one of those theatres as I owe it to the hobby to demo something. But not really started looking deciding on that.

Ken Reilly​ and Ian Thompson​ have already tried tempting me on 6000 and I'm open to that.. but 4800 subject to visual review feels like a good compromise between portability and detail..

I haven't run numbers on cost and +Ken Reilly​ tells me 6000 paint themselves, so I'm torn..

If anyone has painting table, arm's length and on-table perspective shots to help me decide, please post what you have, with thanks,

Bob

I can not provide shots but can tell you CinC 1/4800 are really really good, much more detailed than navwar 1/3000. However they have only ships for atlantic. Mick yarrow's a much more complete and cheaper range, most Italian ships are available, but models are a lot rougher. If you join the 1/4800 yahoo group you ll find lots of pics

Our own TMPer KniazSuvorov has built a large and impressive collection of 1/4800 miniatures, and really demonstrated their potential in this TMP post. If I were starting over with WWII naval, I might go with this scale.

I have an extensive collection of 1/6000 WWI miniatures. You can see a few photos of them sprinkled through my GQ2 web pages.

The painting techniques for both scales are probably about the same, probably equally easy in plain gray, and I'd guess dazzle patterns are slightly easier in 1/4800. My basic technique for 1/6000 was something like this:

• primer, then paint overall dark gray
  
• paint the deck
  
• repaint dark gray on all the vertical surfaces that accidentally got deck color, then repaint the deck areas that got gray, etc. until the horizontal deck and vertical surfaces are different colors (these miniatures are tiny and it's easy to get paint on nearby surfaces)
  
• heavily drybrush mid-gray over all the gray surfaces
  
• drybrush successive layers of lighter grays on vertical surfaces until the ship is the "right" color.
  
• paint gun tubes, turret tops, torpedo tubes, etc. with the final gray to make them stand out
  

I know that sounds like a lot of work, but the models are so tiny I just mounted them in big groups on craft sticks and painted them in batches. For smaller fleets (WWI Mediterranean), the batch was usually an entire navy at a time. It took me about a week of free time to crank out a complete navy, including basing and labeling, so except for the minor quagmire of "deck tan" cruiser and capital ship decks, it really does feel like the ships "paint themselves". For ships with gray or blue decks (e.g. most of WWII) this should get even easier.

You can see from both sets of pictures above that KniazSuvorov and I both prefer wider bases with unique labels. Using the actual ship's name as a label helps tremendously with identifying ships during play. His bases were clearly way easier to make than mine – he just printed the entire thing on a color printer and pasted it to stiff material, whereas I spent time gluing strips of plastic and lead to steel bases and then filling and texturing with acrylic medium before painting the whole mess in various blues and whites and labeling it with an artist's pen in white ink. I highly recommend his technique over mine.

For playing with 1/6000 scale, I chose to use "centimeter scale" (1cm on the table equals 1 inch in the rules). That allowed me to play with the charts and rules as published without any math translations, but later I made my own charts and my own custom SDS records anyway. Having been through all that, I'd now recommend using a 500yd/inch ground scale, since that gives nice convenient measurements like 1cm/knot and 2"/1000 yds, and makes any 9'x5' or 8'x6' table into a reasonable maneuver area.

I really like 1/6000 for large fleet actions, and I think either of these scales would work equally well. The small models make it easy to see and perform squadron maneuvers in formation. I personally don't like really small scales for small actions with a few DDs and/or cruisers – there's nothing that gets in the way, it just feels a bit small and underwhelming.

The original lead WWII 1/4800 miniatures were (and still are) from C-in-C miniatures, and likewise the lead 1/6000 scale miniatures are still made as Figurehead (sold various places like The Last Square and Magister Militum and Scale Creep Miniatures). These days you can supplement either scale with 3D prints from Shapeways, and in fact that seems to be where most of the 1/4800 scale models are made (C-in-C only made British and Germans).

- Ix

FWIW, here is my current 1/6000 scheme, used with GQ 1 and 2. (I own C-in-C and some Shapeways 1/4800, but the latter are flimsy, and in any case I was already committed to 1/6000.

WRT table scale, I discard the standard GQ "inches", and translate everything to 1000s of yards. This involves making pencil notations in the rules, redoing the Straddle Table on an index card taped to the game charts page, and making my own SDSs. The latter is easy to do with a PC, and allows depiction, on one page, of just those ships needed for the game / campaign. Using this system, distance in 1000s of yards is measured either via a custom hex grid on my playing surface, or via a marked-up tape measure.

My playing surface varies, but the most portable one is several strips of a blue-green foam/vinyl material from a local fabric shop. It comes in 4.5-foot-wide rolls, which allows complete coverage of my gaming table using 2 strips. It lies flat, so the joint is acceptable if taped on the back. On the particular material I bought, I had to lightly sand the surface to facilitate marking with chalk (see below).

In the real world, when moving ships are viewed from a distance, you first see the wake, and then the ship. So, currently, I put my 1/6000 ships directly on the playing surface, with a chalk wake depicting the previous turn's movement. This is handled during movement by first moving the ship, then drawing a new chalk wake, and finally erasing the old wake with a damp sponge. Now, most Figurehead 1/6000 destroyers and smaller come cast to metal bases. If you don't want bases on your models, they have to be removed, which requires some model making skills (see my post in this thread, near the bottom TMP link ).

Here's a typical Figurehead DD (the top model):

Here are 1/6000 ships and wakes on my table:

Mark H.

Just to be helpful, a link to Mick Yarrow Miniatures' 1/4800 scale WW2 range: link

- Ix

I like 1:6000, but it depends on what kind of action I'm doing. For a battleship action it gives a very good sense of space. Here's Denmark Strait in 1:6,000 using Battlestations! Battlestations!

TMP link

I kept the same ground scale, 1" = 1,000 yards, but for GQ I use cms rather than inches.

Nick

I'm just starting (after a long gestation) a WW2 naval project with 1/6000 models. I'm thinking to use GQ1 & 2 but just measure in cms not inches. The scale is about the same.

@Queen
1/700, ah IIRC 'Hasegawa'/Waterline series. I had a few of their DDs decades ago. Loved'm!
Im just now picturing 700 scale BB GAMING, Wow.
Built a few of the models (Arizona, Bizmarck [Revel IIR) but never imagined gaming w/ them.

I have a few 1/6000 Figurehead, but for myself, at that scale, its BB & BC's only, 'maybe' a CA here & there.
IMHO the smaller ships were just that, 'too small' and never considered WW I & less Predred's in 1/6000.

If your really wanting to do WW I, even more Predred period, personally Id say no smaller than 4800.
Shapeways seems to have 'no shortage' of WW II in that scale. But always pay Close attention to the price.

Personal Note:
I have a desire to do Predred (love the period for gaming) "home rule sys." using War Time Journal
1/1800 Predreds a 1 = 1000yd ground scale.
And while NOT historicially accurate, I'd paint them in their peace time colors.
For me, I think its part of the attraction of the period.

Reposted due to Google disabling my image URLs…

FWIW, here is my current 1/6000 scheme, used with GQ 1 and 2. (I own C-in-C and some Shapeways 1/4800, but the latter are flimsy, and in any case I was already committed to 1/6000.

WRT table scale, I discard the standard GQ "inches", and translate everything to 1000s of yards. This involves making pencil notations in the rules, redoing the Straddle Table on an index card taped to the game charts page, and making my own SDSs. The latter is easy to do with a PC, and allows depiction, on one page, of just those ships needed for the game / campaign. Using this system, distance in 1000s of yards is measured either via a custom hex grid on my playing surface, or via a marked-up tape measure (metal or cloth).

My playing surface varies, but the most portable one is several strips of a blue-green foam/vinyl material from a local fabric shop. It comes in 4.5-foot-wide rolls, which allows complete coverage of my gaming table using 2 strips. It lies flat, so the joint is acceptable if taped on the back. On the particular material I bought, I had to lightly sand the surface to facilitate marking with chalk (see below).

In the real world, when moving ships are viewed from a distance, you first see the wake, and then the ship. So, currently, I put my 1/6000 ships directly on the playing surface, with a chalk wake depicting the previous turn's movement. This is handled during movement by first moving the ship, then drawing a new chalk wake, and finally erasing the old wake with a damp sponge. Now, most Figurehead 1/6000 destroyers and smaller come cast to metal bases. If you don't want bases on your models, they have to be removed, which requires some model making skills (see my post in this thread, near the bottom TMP link ).

Here's a typical Figurehead DD (the top model):

Here are 1/6000 ships and wakes on my table:

MH