"How big are model space ships?" Topic

I would like to know if anyone can tell me the sizes of the commonly available space ship models (GZG, Brigade, etc.) If I am going to drop $20 USD on a single ship, I want to know just how impressive it is going to be on the table.

I have done quite a bit of searching but many of the manufacturers don't have scales in their pictures to provide a sense of the size. Terms liek "Destroyer", "Battleship", etc don't mean much by themselves without stating just how big the ship itself is.

ANy help from those who have some ships would be most useful.

Cheers,
Squash

Well, Brigade's site:

brigademodels.co.uk

has the actual dimensions of all their models listed right on the catalog pages, and the plastic hex bases in the photos here:

link

are one inch across, and IIRC the bigger metal hex bases the SDNs are on are two inchers. Figure the smallest GZG stuff (scouts) are around a half-inch tops, while the biggest hulls run 4-5" long. From personal experience, I can say that the capital ships for the ESU, NAC, Phalons, Israelis and Japanese are all satisfyingly chunky.

That answer your question?

Rich

GZG ships are 2-5 inches long for the larger (BB, DN, SDN) and @ 1-2 inches for the smaller (DD, CA)

Brigade are in the same size range.

Monday Knight tend to be more massive (heavy) with some in the 6-8 inch range.

I have Studio Bergstrom's Hive Fleet. (Produced by TMP's own "stumer")

Sizes range from the Mothership, which is 3" long by 4" wide (and freakin' huge) to a "Drone" fighter, which would fit in a 1/4" cube (or less).

The bigger battleships run about 2" long by 1" to 2" wide. Of course, these things are all funky appendages and curving tines rather than compact ships, so length is probably more to go on than anything else. But they're waaaay cheaper than $20 USD each. (Drew's service is terrific, by the way. I highly recommend purchasing these).

Can't comment on other ships or companies, except to say that Hasbro's Titanium Series Battlestar Galactica is a little over 3.5" long by 1.5" wide, and sells for $4.97 USD at Wal-Mart (when you can find it). Of course, Hasbro doesn't make anything in scale to anything else, but some of the Star Wars "Republic" ships are generic enough in design that it really doesn't matter.

—- Howard Shirley, designer of G.O.B.S.! members.aol.com/thegobspage

Thanks for the plug Howard! Stop on by for most affordable fleets on the net!

link

It's true you can get some bad surprises when ordering ships from different manufacturers and assuming they'll all look good together, sizewise. Which I ranted about here on TMP a short while ago when I got my Forgeworld BFG Tau in the mail, and they turned out to be ultra-thin (relative to the ships from other manufacturers that I have).

As for the GZG ships, they have photos of at least one of their fleets (New Israeli) with measurements: link

Kallistra's ships range in size similarly to the GZG stuff (I think)

The 1/50000 Kosminosef ships are also decently sized for gaming, running at between 1 to 3 inches each… They are some beautiful ships too…

The Mongoose Babylon 5 ships run from fighters aout 1/2 inch long to Battleships around 5-6 inches.

Personally I think the 1-2" long ships are best for gaming.

E.g. GZG's superdreadnought models might be impressive as models, but they're really too large for gaming.

You know a model is too large when you constantly want to place other models on top of it (to get to optimum range band).

The small line from Magister Militum are in the 1 to 2 inch range at most.

There's also the line of StarBlazers miniatures which has over 40 plus different spaceships ranging from the big Battleships to Carrier's,Battlecruiser's and other ships.

The biggest ships is around 4 inches or so down to about an inch or smaller.

And the best thing about this line of spaceships is that every single ship is in scale with each other.

I for example have over 500 of these mini's which are broken down to 4 different races/fleets.

You can get more information about these mini's from the following website link also a rulebook as well as a technical manual.

Captain Gideon

Hmm, for some reason I've always understood the StarBlazer ships to be rather small, when compared to GZG anyway. Seem to recall having an e-mail conversation to that effect with the manufacturer years ago. But I assume you have some on hand so can personally verify?

Yes they are small. Battleships tend to be same size as GZG cruisers, roughly.

They also come with rather fiddly photo-etched parts, and they used to be relatively expensive (this could have changed).

Thanks all for the help.

Hundvig, I hadn't actually been to Brigade's site, only seen them elsewhere on the web. My bad :-(

The largest GZG ships are indeed $20.00 USD Australian, from Eureka. It sounds like they would be worth it for the size. However, I agree with maxxon that 5" seems too big for a tabletop model of a spaceship, especially when in scale they would just be points on the star map.

WHich raises the question, what is the best value range available in Australia.

To me, the actual scale doesn't matter as long as the ships' relative sizes are close. I ordered a bunch of ships from Xtreme Hobby's Cold Navy Wave 2.0 line last year and those size up nicely with my Tau Gothic fleet. I'm also planning to get the Ninja Magic ships when they become available.

3 1/2", 2 3/4 ", and 1 3/4" for the Xtremehobby Cold Navy Mauriddian Dreadnought, Cruiser, and Frigates, respectively.

Maxxon I've no problem with the photo-etched parts that come with most StarBlazers ship's/mini's,sometimes it adds character to the ship.

As far as the cost goes you might think that they're expensive but they had very good detail,and a very wide selection of mini's.

And there's more NEW mini's in the works.

Captain Gideon

Squash, I'd would say that the GZG from Eureka are the best value available in the Australian area; I in NZ find it cheaper to get them from Eureka than from GZG most times, though Brigade are about the same cost when you tkae the postage into consideration.

It also depends on how long you want to wait for your stuff as well, so that comes into account.