Mechwarrior Dark Age paint schemes question

[Empyrus]

Are they based on existing paint schemes or canonized afterwards? Or might these be a case of "No one has gotten around doing either one yet"?

Some choices certainly seem to be unusual for some factions, like MWDA Cappies using orange and dark gray/black.

[RotS fan]

Some camo schemes, from the pirate groups for example, became canonized by CamoSpecs. Most of the time they simply used colors associated to a faction, like red for Kurita and Blue for Steiner.

BTW, Capellan Confederation minis used dark yellow and green, not gray and orange.

[glitterboy2098]

most of them i think fall under "i think these will look good" with little further thought on the part of Wizkids. the colors are generally close to what most people perceived as the norm for a given faction, but beyond that i don;t think they had any specific units in mind. Catalyst has done a goof job of taking those minis and applying their schemes to units of the era to give a bit of backstory.

[Empyrus]

BTW, Capellan Confederation minis used dark yellow and green, not gray and orange.

Looks like gray and orange in pics i've seen... Never owned a Capellan figure. Dark yellow and green certainly make more sense.

It seems the colors are based on the old CapCon logo, DA materials seem to be using that one, the one with green background and golden trim and sword.

[glitterboy2098]

they tended to be an orangish brown, and  a dark green on the ones i have. usually following a 2/3rds is one color, 1/3rd the other set up. sometime literal with one side being one color, sometimes it was distributed.

[wantec]

Are they based on existing paint schemes or canonized afterwards? Or might these be a case of "No one has gotten around doing either one yet"?

Some choices certainly seem to be unusual for some factions, like MWDA Cappies using orange and dark gray/black.

No, they weren't any specific established paint schemes. The schemes used colors that would likely identify with that faction. There were 3 "Units" per faction based on skill level, and the colors were divided based on that unit. The low level unit was mostly 1 color, the mid was a split and the top end was mostly the other color. This was all mostly to make the units visually distinctive on the battlefield.

And it worked, I could tell which faction a piece belonged to from a distance, which isn't always the case with schemes from BT products. Take Clan Wolf, most schemes are various browns or grays, but Alpha Galaxy is green, the same as hated enemy the Jade Falcons. Then the Falcons are mostly greens, some yellows too, but Vau and Lambda Galaxies are grays with blood red, better for the Blood Spirits. The Spirits are mostly reds with assorted other colors, but Tau Provisional Galaxy is black with copper uppers and red accents.

I could go on and on pointing out examples of what we think are unusual and non-traditional colors for a faction, but I think most folks' eyes would glaze over and it'd take me a lot of time.