"New Victory at Sea Models Previewed" Topic

Great looking stuff, Matt!

Are all the ships 1:1800? Got a lot of Axis and Allies War at Sea and it would be cool to use both sets with these ships.

I would strongly recommend that the models be rescaled to 1/2400. That way people with existing models from CinC or GHQ do not need to start from scratch when using your models.

i spoke to one of the mongooses at Broadside. The scale is deliberate to fit in with the Axis And Allies ships.

I second PR's comments above. My stuff is all 1/2400 and I shall not be buying any of these. Too bad as they seem nice little models.

+1 for 1/2400

Do the ships come with the water base, as the graphic implies?

PR: Not to state the obvious, but if you already have big fleets at 1/2400, we will have a tough time selling you lots of ships anyway :)

Editor: Yes, indeed they do.

Can you give us the ballpark $$?

Matt, another issue is trying to integrate in with existing fleets others have if you have a regular group as well. Example – if I was going to redo the some of the fighting in Leyte Gulf and some of the gaming group already had nice squadrons of US or Japanese ships in 1/2400, I am probably going to have to pass at considering 1/1800 as the size difference will be a big problem ascetically and likely with the rules play as well.

I may still be tempted to start some new fleets, but with needing to likely supply all the ships for a game session and needing to modify rules for the different scale (although it isn't too hard, just yet another thing to do) it makes the prospect a less likely in my case.

That said, lovely looking wire-frame images and I wish you all good fortune in this pursuit. It is always nice for miniaturist to have options!

PR: Not to state the obvious, but if you already have big fleets at 1/2400, we will have a tough time selling you lots of ships anyway :)

So what you're saying is that you want people to have to buy ships from you that they can't mix with their existing lines, so they can only get them from you.

Well, whereas I can see the logic in that as a marketing strategy, dominating a scale you have created for yourself (and mixability with the Axis and Allies ships does not hurt!), frankly it would prevent me from buying the models, as I have models in 1/2400 scale, which is not so dissimilar to 1/1800 that I am going to rebuild fleets. Something of a double-edged sword I believe.

I use A&A ships for WWII aerial gaming, and the destroyers etc. might see double duty on their own for naval gaming at some point, so more 1/1800 that fills in gaps is good with me.

The Axis and Allies ships are pretty close to 1/1800, and a lot of people use them already because they are pre-painted and typically dirt cheap. I imagine that maybe they are trying to appeal to those people as well, since if you enjoy the axis and allies game, the next logical step in your hobby is getting into a more 'serious' and developed naval war game, which Victory at sea fits the bill for nicely. (I see boy wonder wrote the same thing whilst I was writing this.Darn!)

Besides, most of us wargamers play in several scales!

Anyway, I like that the ship comes with a base, and it looks pretty neat.

Will these be 3D printed models for the masters?

Well, Mongoose do have a history of scale compatibility issues – Battlefield Evolution et al, and to be honest I'm sure they thought long and hard about the scale question. If they picked 1/2400 that would bomb in the UK as we still tend to use 1/3000, so at least producing something that fits the A&A scale makes sense. I don't see me buying these, but like everyone who is raising the scale issue, I doubt we are their target audience anyway.

Good luck with this Matt.

Enquiring minds want to know:

Are these planned to be sold in resin only to have so many delays and problems that 3/4'ths of the customers give up before the models ultimately get produced in metal?

So what you're saying is that you want people to have to buy ships from you that they can't mix with their existing lines, so they can only get them from you.

Well, look what WarMaster did for 10mm. You never know.

Doug

There are plenty of companies making 1/2400. Why would Mongoose do the same?

I have 1/300 from GHQ, CinC and Panzerschiffe. Why enter that market? It's Mature.

There is nothing keeping you from using 1/2400 to play the game, either.

It's not like Mongoose is GW and forcing you to buy the "New Graf Spee now with Railgun Turrets".

I think this is a good move.

I think 1:1800 is a good move. If I want 1:2400, I can have my pick all the way from expensive/pretty/fiddly with GHQ, down to economical/sturdy/table-ready with Panzerschiffe.

Why bother just piling on? Crossmarketing with A&AM is a good idea, IMO. WotC pioneered it, MG should ride the coattails.

It's a very "presentable" scale. Yeah, even small actions are bathtubby as hell, but what's new there?

I have lots of A&A minis as well and will probably buy a few of these to help fill the gaps – especially for the "rarer" stuff from A&A that would cost too much to buy on ebay.

I think it is a good move too. There are lots of ships out there at 1/2400. The only 1/1800 that I know of are the A&A minis which are pre-painted plastic.

-Tim

Of course, as these are 3D CAD models MGP would be able to rescale and manufacture in other scales if they perceive there is a viable market when compared with existing manufacturers' lines.

I think they chose 1/1800 because quite a few people used the war at sea ships (same scale)

The "bigger is better" bug seems to have bitten a lot of people as of late

Perhaps just a business move, at 1/2400, there is already a large market and may feel people may spend there game bucks there or if they have existing ships it wouldn't matter.

Seems to me this scale will be the "28mm scale" of naval warfare, 1/2400 being the 15mm of WWII naval warfare.

Though might not be as successful.

So, 1:3000 is naval 1/72, and 1:6000 is 6mm?

I think 1/3000 would have been ideal due to far fewer competitors active in the scale but absent that, 1/2400 is a crowded market and primarily US only and between GHQ, C in C, Viking Forge and Panzerschiffe, well served with varied price and quality ponts available.

1/1800, with Axis & Allies War at Sea seemingly finished (they fired the designer/product leader and have no announced further plans) offers a vacant playing field and the chance to selectively sell upgrades to WAS owners and fill in the gaping holes WAS never produced.

Not really as people with 1/3000th tend to have large fleets (or lots of fleets) because they are cheap.

It makes perfect sense to tie it in with A&A as that is a much bigger market than 1/2400th or 1/3000th.

A few questions!

Essayons7: We haven't finalised pricing yet, but we are looking at $10 USD-15 for the largest battleships such as the Iowa. The Battle of the River Plate box set (four cruisers – well, three and one mostly-cruiser) currently set for $29.99 USD.

Porfirio Rubirosa: You are just the sort we have to take a risk with – we would be banging our head against a brick wall trying to bring out a huge and comprehensive range at 1/2400, as there are a lot of fingers in that pie already. 1/1800 has a fairly clear ground, a tie with A&A, and allows us to put more detail on to a ship. For your part, we hope and pray that, one day (maybe a long way down the road!) you will look at our range, see that the ships are very pretty, see that there is more choice and variation among ships than at 1/2400 (this will take time to accomplish, but we are very much taking the long view on this line), and maybe make the hop then.

Das Sheep: Indeed, like our Star Fleet range, we use 3D modelling and rapid prototyping for all these ships.

Mr Elmo: That is not the plan, no :) These models have been specifically designed to have their bases and hulls cast in resin (superstructure and details in metal), neatly avoiding every trap we fell into with Star Fleet.

Only Warlock: Like your thinking on the Railguns (needless to say, with 3D modelling, if we decided to do Weird War II at Sea, it would not be a huge chore to alter models). Also worth remembering these models are just a precursor to the new Victory at Sea rulebook, currently in development and being watched over/tweaked by our Official Naval Boffins. If we cannot convince you (yet) to check out the models, we are aiming to get you at least looking at the rulebook (which will remain scale independant). It is going to be _very_ pretty…

And, as David (one of our ONB's) points out, we can also rescale if we wish.

I can understand avoiding 1/2400 -- you won't out-detail GHQ and you probably can't out-cheap Panzerschiffe. That said, there might be a middle ground. If you can turn out 1/2400 models that are (a) reasonably well detailed (better than Panzerschiffe), (b) priced between GHQ and Panzerschiffe, and (c) easier than GHQ to assemble, then you might have a viable range. Or not; that's why you're in this business and I'm not.

But I wonder if 1/1800 was the best choice? Myself, I'd love to see an affordable line of 1/1200 models. That's a common --and once popular -- scale and there are few affordable options in that scale. These models are also impressive, size-wise.

Anyhow, good luck to you guys on this.

I hope they do 1/4800 in the future!

I really like the idea of 1/1800. My tired old eyeballs have difficulty coping with smaller scales for ships or figures these days.

1/1800 really lets you see the detail and beautiful lines of a ship. Can we hope for a later war Admiral Scheer, with funnel cowl, later war Scharnhorst, and maybe even the projected Gneisenau conversion to 6x15" guns?

I hope they do 1/4800 in the future!

You probably know this already but there are two vendors on Shapeways; Objects May Appear and Tiny Thingamajigs (I think), that do 1/4800 WW2 and do scale the work to other sizes as needed.

The detail on the Ting Thingmajig ships is unbelieveable.

Paul B: We have already done the Admiral Scheer :) Variants and refits are quite easy for us to do, and we are hoping to cover a lot of bases in the range. We already have three different Richelieus :)

These are great! I have good-sized Panzerschiffe fleets for the Pacific. Not as pretty as GHQ but they function well and we have thoroughly enjoyable battles.

I will not mind at all investing in these. I am sold and will be an early buyer. Well done!