"1/2400 Ship Comparisons" Topic

I was thinking of getting into this ship scale, especially for Japanese cruisers. How do all the 1/2400 ship makers compare for quality?

GHQ
CinC
Viking Forge
Superior
Panzershiffe

Are any makers 'better'? Any company I might best avoid?
Can anyone comment on them?

troopwo,

GHQ definitely has an edge over all the others. IMHO CinC is a close runner up.

Panzerschiffe are cheap but compared to the two above very basic.

I only have a few WWI ships from Viking Forge so I can't compare but they are very decent.

No experience with Superior alas.

Excellent! Thanks for such a fast and clear response.

Superior are not all that great. Sniper's comments are dead-on for everyone else.

GHQ ships are artisically superior but more expensive. They also require much more assembly with lots of little fiddly bits, as you would expect with 1/2400.

Panzershiffe are a very good option for non-combat ships. I mean how detailed do you need your AO tanker or liberty ship to be? I am quite fond of Viking Forge but my fleet is Russo-Japanese War and not WWII. VF mini's are a garage enterprise and you can't order from them electronically which is a bother.

I agree with Shagnasty, GHQ ships are the most expensive and a lot more work to assemble but they are beautiful models.

I used to be slavishly devoted to CnC back in my undergrad days (many, many, moons ago) but I haven't bought one of their ships in a couple of decades so I can't really make a good comparison between CnC and GHQ now.

Superior models were ok but not great back in the 70's. If they haven't updated their sculpts you would be better off with Panzershiffe resin ships.

Dave

Panzerschiffe are the least detailed of the group and the least expensive, but they have the most models. Whatever class you need the will probably have. A little paint and some detail work they don't look bad. GHQ are bueatiful, but expensive, some of my GHQ models I really don't want ham-fisted wargamers touching them. My experience with Viking Forge is that the price is not bad, but the quality is inconsistent. Superior and C-In-C I have no experience with.

Tom

GHQ models are the best, C in C and Viking Forge are good with Viking Forge quite detailed and C in C a very clean (less detailed but what is there is crisp). Superior was the old Alnavco line and I'd rate it OK. Panzerschiffes are the most complete range byt as others have said, fairly simple resin castings but they can be punched up a bit with added detail (C in C makes ships boats, tripod masts) and a good paint job.

1/2400 is a bit large for model scale v table/rules scale. You might take a look at Navwar in 1/3000 or Hallmark/Noble/ Figurehead in 1/6000. Ranges are more complete, costs better but detail is simply not there as compared to GHQ< Viking Forge or even C in C.

I'd agree pretty much with the above.

I think the VF and superior are very similar.

GHQ is the best.

GHQ, period. If I want to save money I'll switch to a smaller scale.

On the other hand their WWI line is limited. For WWII there's plenty, and they're gorgeous.

While all of the above are true, I personally despise GHQ. They have way too much fiddly garbage that needs to be glued. GHQ is for brain surgions and folks that want to display them.

I'm a gamer, not a modeller. I want the figure to be sturdy, useable, easy to deploy. I need to transport them, paint them, let lots of strange folks play with them without destroying them.

In 1:2400 scale, at 4 feet, GHQ detail is lost. Superior (hopeless lumps of lead) have a minimal number of parts and for all practical purposes are identical at 4 feet. But, they have no silly parts to be lost or assembled. What it comes down to is what are you using your miniatures for, display or gaming?

troopwo,

First, consider how you are going to use the miniatures. This can range from display-only to frequently-transported gaming models. The five manufacturers you mentioned offer something that will fit either end of the spectrum and points in between.

Second, consider how much money you are willing to spend per piece and what your long-range plans are for collecting more ship models. At a minimum, have a look at the number and types of ships you are going to need for the situations you want to re-create.

Third, consider how much time you are willing to devote to assembling and painting each model. Some offerings require a bit of time to assemble the larger ships (GHQ, C-IN-C, VIKING FORGE) whereas others (SUPERIOR and PANZERSCHIFFES) require minimal work in terms of cleanup or assembly.

I should have been a little more reserved. I recommend GHQ because I'm a model builder at heart, and I like to add my own details as well.

Mikeah has good points, and as always listen to Rich; he's had the experience.

Thanks everyone. Time to get a few samples.

Hello Troopwo. I'm glad you asked this question. I own models from all of the manufacturers you mentioned, and would agree with most of the comments posted above. Most of my ships are C-in-C becasue they have the best balance of quality and price. GHQ is my second choice because they are expensive compared to C-in-C. Also, all that fine detail you see on the model is actually quite out of scale. All those deck fittings look nice, but they would not really be visible at this scale. I consider Superior, Viking Forge and Panzerschiffe as 'fillers'. If they make a model that no one else makes, I'll buy from them. Regards, Bertrand.

Thanks again everyone.

troopwo

I was convinced I would use GHQ models as they looked so good in the photos but WW2 naval is yet another interest of mine not my main period so I wanted something a bit quicker. In the end once I really thought about what was realistic for me to actually do and play given the average space I have about 10' x 5' or 7' x 6' I came down firmly in favour of 1/6000.

Just a thought and one that has often cropped up in my gaming experience, ie I see photographs of fabulous MODELS on the net but the reality of gaming is another matter. By all means buy, use and enjoy 1/2400 but if your buying samples try a few other scales too. The 1/6000 were so much better than I thought they might be and actually nicer than the 1/3000 I saw IMHO.

I love the Panzerschiffe line. But then my models fall into the "frequently transported gaming models" category, as opposed to pieces I want to display.

So far, no ship has taken more than 5 min to base and paint. And no ship has cost more than $5, yet they still look decent for tabletop play.

Panzerschiffe doesn't come close to GHQ or CinC for detail. On the other hand you aren't going to be looking at them from six inches away either when you are playing on a table or even on the floor. I think they work well for the large availability of different ships that one could want and for the reasons Soulmage listed, that of low cost and durability for transport. My collection is a mixed bag of GHQ, quite a few CinC and Panzerschiffe of course in 1/2400 scale. I still have my glorious collection of US and Japanese 1/1200's but rarely have access to ballrooms for play .

I recommend it. I call confrontation a more mature game system then say WHFB. I say 'mature' because it's not written to the level of a 12 year olds reading comprehension (all translation problem jokes aside.) There's a lot of sublety to the game and I think that's the reason you see most games end up in a mob in the middle. Most of the people I know who have played have played only occasionally and I think it's a system that takes some getting to know.
It's unfortunate that Rackham has taken so long to really push it out there, I think they missed the real cash boat back before warmachine/hordes came out.

Taco Bell tastes good, but I'm not sure I'd qualify it as either "Mexican" or "food." I do like eating there, though, from time to time. I have to admit I've been avoiding it since the E. Coli incident.

I have some of all the ranges. I love Panzerschiffes because of the things they make that no one else does. I have not collected anything new for 2-3 years, but still would get any of them depending on what I planned to do with them.

Yes, yes, yes, having 7,000 + 1/2400th. ships, I have had some
experience with all the five major casting companies, heck,
I even have twenty five of my models being carried by
Panzerschiffe. The new stuff that has been added of late.
I personally like GHQ, secondly Sea Battle line carried by
VF, a close third CinC, fourth Panzerschiffe, and a distant
7th. or 8th. Superior. I say you can have the sexy GHQ
detail and sturdiness by protecting your GHQ ships with the
replacement of most of the top mast wit guitar wire. For I
have had those same gamer/clowns try to lean on my ships and
smash them, but instead they lift up the portion of their
body used to do the fake whoopsie thing with they may come
up with six ships attached to their body and bleading out of
twelve percise holes. Inhumane you say, beyond the relm of
comprehension? Well my ships don't suffer any damage any
more. Also you may wish to look into mounting your vessel
of your choice an a crafted base, (detailed out plastic
sheet 0.20) and magnetize the bottom of the base with
magnetic strip, then place these finished ships into a small
box, say a cigar box with a sheet metal bottom, they stick
to the sheet metal, and they do not suffer damage during
transport, I've even dropped full cigar boxes storing ships
and the damage has been minor to slight to no damage. As
for the great debate, you can only purchase a finite number
of ships before you start repeating, about 3,000+, I have
built over 4,000 of my collection, maybe 500 of that obscure warships, but all the rest merchant vessels of the world.
We are the badyear blimp of teams, we are the corporate sponsored team, our rules are you take all the ships that
are in the scenario, you pick the side that is most likely
to be advantageous, and the team that can cover all of the
ships on the side is awarded their choice of side. of
course my partner and I are the pres. & ceo of DLabCO.
have designed a set of computer support rules and a line
of vessels, and plans how to make those vessels which
hopefully will be on market in nine months to a year. But
I digress, if you need to change the look of a vessel, say
CinC, use GHQ parts, they are easy to obtain, and you can
bring a good model up to excellent with a little detail.
I hope I haven't offended anyone, but we have test played our rules system at some game clubs that were more like juke
joints, and we have developed a certain way about us that
maybe not looked upon the tea and cookies type gaming club.

DLabCo714 wrote:

of course my partner and I are the pres. & ceo of DLabCO. have designed a set of computer support rules and a line of vessels, and plans how to make those vessels which hopefully will be on market in nine months to a year.

You have a new line of 1/2400 scale ships coming out? What era? Any pictures?

Some of those vessels are already available from Panzerschiffe. What we plan to do initially is sell the
plans and instructions, along with the part list, and where
to get them so you can build them if you are so inclined.
Maybe later if we get bored with making games we will come
out with a line of 1/2400 resin casts patterned after the
ships we have developed personally. But that is a future
project and will be a merchant heavy offering. The same
ships you can but the plans for a $1.25, we will probably
sell in the $5.50 USD to $9.50 USD range unpainted. That is in the
future, what our focus is now is completing our game, "The
Desperate Years, 1939 to 1945, War on the High Seas" TM.

Went to Salute 07 in the UK yesterday and stumbled on a stall with a small selection of CinC. They are hard to obtain on this side of the pond so was surprised to see them. I had never seen them in the flesh before. and when I did I was impressed with the amount of detail on them. Not quit up to GHQ standard but not far behind. Then again for a Battleship the difference in price meant that you could buy 3 for the price of 2 GHQ ships. In the smaller ships you can get almost 2 for 1 because of the price difference. Needless to say I bought his whole stock there and then (25 ships in all. I got them home and decided to compare them with my GHQ ships. Any in the most part they were scalewise exactly right with a couple of notable exceptions. USS North Carolina BB55 was totally different in plan shape than the GHQ equivalent. It looked more like a South Dakota class than a North Carolina class but was quite a bit smaller than the SD class. So I would say it was inaccurate as I checked a few plan views and found that the GHQ version is correct. Second one is HMS Renown. This is way too big and chunky and is bigger than a lot of dimensionally larger ships looking way out of place. I shall build and complete these two models and sell them on Ebay lol. But I shall, now that I have found a UK stockist of CinC be supplementing my GHQ with these as I am overall impressed with their competetive cost and high quality in general. I will still be using GHQ though as they are without doubt the best out there

My fleets are predominantly GHQ, which you can't beat for detail. However, I find myself buying more Panzerschiffes because of the use to which my fleets are put. These days the majority of my games are run at conventions and I have recently added the National World War II Museum as a venue, having done one demo there already with more planned. This means that my vessels are handled by two distinct groups of people: old guys with bad eyes and shaky grips and enthusiaistic kids. Given that, I could either spend $14.50US on GHQ's gorgeous model of the USS Enterprise, for example, or $6.00US on the Panzerschiffe model, which looks pretty good with the addition of some paint and a few planes on deck and won't spray tiny parts all over the room when -inevitably- someone drops it.

Sort of a "form follows function" approach, I guess.

LT

Who supplies C in C in UK?

If you are gaming, get the Panzerschiffe. I love the LOOK of the GHQ models, but not the very tedious assembly required. GHQ is fine for micro scale dioramas, but not for hard usage. They are like fine china, too nice for everyday use.

I'm going the: Have GHQ ships to play with close friends/people I trust and Skytrex (1/3000) ships for slugging around.

My knock on GHQ is the following. The "details" are WAY TOO BIG and you would never actually see them. Let's do a little high school geometry……………………………………….. Example is a 300 foot long ship, which is actually 91,440mm in size, so at a reduction of 1/2400 is 38.1mm in length…………………………………………………..If you look at this ship from 1 foot, 12 inches, 304mm away, you can calculate the angle that the ship takes up to your eye as the angle that gives a tangent value =19.05mm / 304mm. It is 3.58 degrees………………………………………….. Now if you were looking at a real 300 foot long ship, how far away would it be?……..tangent(3.58degrees)= 150/distance….or….. D= 150 / [tan 3.58degree]= 2400 feet. (it is just lucky that this comes out at 2400)…………………………….

Sooooo. Sticking you nose 1 foot from a 1/2400 scale model is about the same view as looking at a real ship at 2400 feet or about 0.45 miles. (an easier way to look at it is the 1 foot distance multiplied by the scale of 2400 gives you…..).

You can see portholes on the GHQ models when then are that close to your face. You can't see a 2 foot wide porthole at a half mile. They are showing small features that you would just notice at 100 feet as being visible at a half mile.

For years I have been meaning to switch to GHQ, seduced by their detail. Then I finally bought some – and they remain unpainted, while I have continued collecting Navwar 1/3000.

They are undeniably beautiful models but, as such, I personally found them intimidating. The gun barrels are frighteningly fragile, the details fiddly. I'll be honest and say I'm not sure my eyesight is really up to painting them well enough to do them justice these days.

So I have returned to Navwar – I like the robustness and the cost is so low and they are so quick to paint to a level that satisfies me that I can try new periods and theatres whenever I feel like it.

I know my preference is 1/3000, but with regard to 1/2400 what I'm saying is that a little more basic, a lot more robust and a lot cheaper is the way I'd go. At normal wargaming distances they will look fine.

Nick

@ 1968billsfan
If you look at this ship from 1 foot, 12 inches, 304mm away…= 2400 feet. (it is just lucky that this comes out at 2400)

LOL. It's not luck, it's the scale. A real foot is 2,400 feet in 1/2,400 scale. Likewise it would be 3,000 feet away if it were a 1/3,000 ship…

Agree with your point though. The details are overscale, presumably to make the model look nicer as a model.

Aircraft modellers often kvetch about exaggerated panel lines and rivets on aircraft kits, especially older ones. This misses the same point. Airfix exaggerated the size of rivets on aircraft because in 1965 the most advanced painting technique known was a black wash, which requires overstated details if it is to be visible.

4th Curiassier--- yes, I went thu the angle calculations and at the end realized that whatever the angle was it would be the same angle at 1 foot and Xscale- so 1/2400 was there.