"Gaslands Question" Topic

I'm confused. The base book suggests using toy cars that are "readily" available, about 20mm scale. The array of available toy cars is mind boggling, but, depending on where you look, there seems to be a lot of scale chaos.

Hot Wheels seems to make their models at a pretty consistent scale, but it seems to be smaller than 20mm. The old Matchbox cars seemed to be built at something like "box" scale. Their boxes were all the same and their models were scaled to fill the box more than be consistent with their other offerings.

The pharmacies here sell unboxed diecast cars, but they are scaled all I've the place. A VW Microbus being the same size as a semi tractor.

Is there any reliable rule of thumb on how to pick out a suitable model? Height of door=the length of a thumbnail?
Buy a 20mm fig and see if it looks right next to the model?

This is a bit vexing…

I think the word "about" is key. Also depends on how you define 20mm…is it 1/72, 1/90, or what? I use Hot Wheels and add some weapons. But I have also carried a figure or a scale card to compare to vehicles in the past. I don't think that all vehicles in the exact same scale is crucial at all for play. You might like them to look "right" together or not worry too much about it.

Matchbox and Hot Wheels cars are nominally 1/64th scale, but as you have noticed, they vary quite a bit (especially bikes/atvs)

With other (more expensive) die cast vehicles, the listed scale is often more accurate.

Just go with the vehicles that you think look cool. And 1/72 plastic figures work pretty well with Hot Wheels and similar toys.

Matchbox and later Hotwheels cars were and still are designed broadly on the 'fits in the box principle', although really old Matchbox cars were generally about 1/72 scale. As joedog says, most are about 1/64 scale, although they tend to massively overscale the wheels or cartoonise the proportions. Things like trucks are more usually nearer 1/100 or even 1/120 scale and bikes are more like 1/56 scale.

For the cars which most people use for Gaslands, i.e. American or, (given the impact of Mad Max) Australian muscle cars they are usually nearer 1/72 scale, being typically much bigger than a European or Japanese hatchback at 1/64 scale.