Behold, the new PHR and Shaltari plastic battleships:
Decided to build the PHR one as the Memnon, as I was always wanting for a proper PHR heavy carrier. Considered the Augustus as it looks interesting, and if I ever get another model will build one. I do think the open jaw layout of the original Heracles/Minos prow is more interesting, although I can see how such a split perhaps leaks a bit into UCM visual design.
Played a game with it shortly after finishing, and thanks to distant deployment it accomplished absolutely nothing before we had to call the game due to the store closing soon. That’s alright lil’ Memnon, I’m still proud of you.
The broadside bits between cruiser and battleship are fairly similar for those interested in kit bashing, but there are differences in that the cruiser bits are sloped on the bottom while the battleship ones are flat as they slot into rectangular recess of the main hull, and while they are the same height, the battleship broadsides would have to be cut down to fit two onto a cruiser:
I think it wouldn’t be that difficult to magnetize the broadside bits if you don’t mind having visible magnets while running it as a Memnon, would be a similar process as doing PHR cruiser broadside magnetization. Friction fitting might be sufficient if you glue the pieces together into a single broadside, but didn’t test that.
Something a bit odd about the model is the ‘optional’ engine attachment. It comes with two pegs to fit on top of the ship, but there’s three slots to fit into. Was there originally another upgrade option? Perhaps a bit for a scan upgrade, related to the bit on the Sarpedon, that couldn’t fit on the sprue? Why not redesign the top area to not have that extra slot if another bit wouldn’t fit on the sprue? Questions, questions.
Also! Are they running out of names? There’s already an Agamemnon; I know they’re different figures but it’s odd to use such a similar name. Perhaps if the Agamemnon was the carrier variant…
The actual worst thing about the kit is the variants with the Laser Multi-Lance (Sarpedon, Kairos, and Caesar) leave the aft-most launch bay exposed, but do not have any actual launch assets in their profile:
This is the sort of thing that’s quite disappointing to me, minor though it is, and means if for whatever reason I wish to build any of them, I’d have to use the old kits. Which is exactly what I am working on for the Caesar:
I never liked the Sarpedon model that much after finishing it, so this was an ideal excuse to rip the old prow off and grab my ‘extra’ Heracles prow to get the proper weapon profile modeled. The wings on the bottom of the Heracles prow made things too crowded around the lower lasers, so I popped those off and working on filling in the slots. Once that’s done, should be easy enough to get back assembled. Also redid the thrusters, as the experiment with the yellow coloring didn’t really work either.
As for the Shaltari, I decided to go with the Thorium as 1) I wanted to build a ship with the new broadside weapon as it looks cool, 2) the Actinium was out as I already have a Bronze for something with the Gravitic Beamer, and 3) the Lanthanum was out as I now also have a Diamond for something with particle guns. Any theoretical future battleship would likely be one of the torpedo variants.
Forgive me for not having this painted. I assure you I will offer penance for my sins of bad posting.
One downside of the new kit is that the harpoon CAW weapons are no longer present, perhaps as in the rules most ships had their supplemental CAW taken away in the move to 2.0… although it’s still present as a weapon on the Platinum and Iron carriers. Sprue space issue? In any case, between no longer having them and lacking the arch that swings up and over the backside, the Diamond/Platinum look much flatter, so I prefer the resin kit for those.
A nice upside of the kit is that you can swap the position of many of the weapons between top or bottom spots: the Obliterator Cannon, Particle Triad, Gravitic Beamer, Thermal Lance, and torpedoes can all fit in either. As far as I can tell, this is relevant to the super battleships and the Silver:
Magnetizing between the two available broadside guns looks doable with some work if you were interested and not concerned about a perfect fit, but not that easy. Rather than fitting into slots underneath like the prior kits, the guns slide onto the prongs from the side, without easily available space to drill and fit magnets:
For both the battleships, while ease of building is definitely a step up for the most part, I think they qualify as side-grades with respect to visual design.
Nearing the end of the Shaltari fleet construction, as referenced in part earlier with the Diamond:
Lastly, picked up a few battlecruisers for cheap during 1.0 -> 2.0 liquidation sales to round out BC collections for PHR, Scourge, and Resistance.
The thing that gave me issue here was the Phalanx. The spacing between the prow bit and the main hull was just off in a way that, after slotting in the broadside guns, would have massive gaps present. The only way I could remedy this without a great deal of messy putty filling was to shave down the broadside gun bit enough. The problem being that, after doing as such, the front turret no longer has space to properly rotate. It’s not especially obvious at a glance, but I’m not thrilled about it. Had a backup bit leftover from the Tribune that was built a while ago, and it had the same issue, so no help there:
