Author Topic: DFA Miniatures!  (Read 25593 times)

Two Guns Blazing

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DFA Miniatures!
« on: 17 May 2019, 10:12:18 »
Ok, I've bought myself the Invader (Clans) Faction Pack, and I really like these buildings, and will very likely be buying more. They do require a little clean up and assembly.

I have two weeks holiday coming up soon, and will be starting work on them then, and will post pictures here.

In the meantime, if anyone else has any they've assembled and/or painted, please feel free to inspire and motivate me with your work :)

Weirdo

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #1 on: 17 May 2019, 11:22:22 »
Context? Is this the IWM promo pack advertised in the beginner box?
« Last Edit: 17 May 2019, 11:28:36 by Weirdo »
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Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #2 on: 17 May 2019, 21:14:00 »
Context? Is this the IWM promo pack advertised in the beginner box?

Sorry Weirdo, I assumed the title of my thread would put it all in context. DFA Miniatures is a new-ish company that make 6mm scale terrain well-suited to Battletech. The terrain is 3D sculpted then 3D printed and then cast in resin to be sold.

They're very cool, but do require some cleaning during the assembly stage. I bought the Invader Faction Pack, which is a collection of 5 buildings designed in a style that is suitable for Clan buildings.

Colt Ward

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #3 on: 18 May 2019, 10:46:26 »
I took it as Death From Above and you had them in the picture to show scale.
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Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #4 on: 19 May 2019, 04:50:09 »
Below is the building pack I purchased. As I said, they need some cleaning during the assembly stage, specifically, the bottoms of the various building sections are not cast perfectly level and as a consequence the different building sections don't fit well together, or at all in a couple of cases. So some sanding to remove an amount of resin from the bottoms of some of the building pieces is required to have them fit well.

I don't mind, I often find I have to clean or work on models to get them to fit properly, this is no different. The rest of the casting is very good.

Once I've assembled these, I fully intend to purchase a number of their other buildings as well.



This is the hobby sander I have, which I will use to remove the excess resin from the bottoms of the buildings.


agen2

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #5 on: 19 May 2019, 05:57:57 »
Very nice buildings.

Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #6 on: 21 May 2019, 07:24:24 »
I cleaned and assembled one of the buildings from the above mentioned 5-pack today.

It was a bit of a pain in the arse, no small amount of sanding on the belt sander was required so that the pieces would fit, and I also had to use a hobby knife to widen the slots where the buttresses go, so they would fit.

I'm happy with the end result though. I **may** drill some holes and glue in 2-3 vertical antenna on top of the main building before painting.

This is a Clan Gate Control Building.


« Last Edit: 22 May 2019, 08:29:08 by Two Guns Blazing »

Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #7 on: 22 May 2019, 02:54:50 »
I put another building together today, same deal, needed no small amount of preparation by way of sanding so that the parts fit properly and the building sat level on the ground.

This is a Clan Fire Control Tower.



Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #8 on: 22 May 2019, 08:28:26 »
I assembled another building this evening. This one required a LOT of sanding on the belt and disk sander to get it to fit together properly, and to be level and flat on the bottom.

This is a Clan Sensor Control Tower.



Weirdo

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #9 on: 22 May 2019, 09:02:06 »
Would you recommend these to someone who doesn't own a belt sander or other large surface sanding stuff?
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Colt Ward

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #10 on: 22 May 2019, 09:32:17 »
hmm, that looks like you could use it for the superstructure of a generic ship . . .
Colt Ward
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Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #11 on: 22 May 2019, 09:41:43 »
Would you recommend these to someone who doesn't own a belt sander or other large surface sanding stuff?

Firstly, it has occurred to me that I may have just received a particularly poorly casted batch and someone else may make the same purchase and have very little sanding to do...now on to my answer to your question;

Short answer - Yes, on the proviso that you accepted that you may very well have to do a lot of sanding by hand on a flat surface/straight edge.

Long answer - The casted detail is great, and I can see that the models will lend themselves nicely to painting. The only real issue I have is the bottoms of the buildings are poorly done, they can be uneven and misshapen, which is the source of the sanding requirement.

You can achieve the same result with a few sheets of good sand paper, a flat table surface and a straight table edge as you can with the belt sander, but what might take 2-3 bursts of 10-15 seconds each on the belt sander per piece, might take you a good 20-30+ minutes of sanding by hand for an entire building, and if you are doing several buildings, then it would get pretty old pretty quickly.

If you don't have a power sander (bench top belt sander is highly preferable) and you have no patience -> not recommended...if you have patience -> recommended.

They do have an excellent range of thematic buildings, and are adding to the range all the time, which makes them highly attractive as well, to me anyway...the only thing missing at the moment are really tall buildings, like apartment block sized buildings, but they may do those eventually.

I think my next purchase will either be a Clan Genetic Depository, a Fusion Reactor, or the HPG (Interstellar Communications) Buildings.

NeonKnight

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #12 on: 22 May 2019, 09:44:27 »
Of course, if you are like me and base ALL model (building or otherwise) anyways, you don;t need to worry too much about the base sanding, as a bit of filler and glue fixes all!
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Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #13 on: 22 May 2019, 09:46:48 »
Of course, if you are like me and base ALL model (building or otherwise) anyways, you don;t need to worry too much about the base sanding, as a bit of filler and glue fixes all!

This is true. Some sanding to get a few of the bits to fit together properly would still be required, but very minimal compared to the bottoms of the buildings...

Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #14 on: 22 May 2019, 09:48:15 »
hmm, that looks like you could use it for the superstructure of a generic ship . . .

Some of the building "towers" would not look out of place as a spaceship bridge, or sitting on the side of a aircraft carrier as the superstructure.

Colt Ward

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #15 on: 22 May 2019, 09:53:20 »
Have to see it to scale, but I was thinking that building along with some MWDA DI Morgan turrets would work well as a generic gun cruiser/battleship.
Colt Ward
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worktroll

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #16 on: 22 May 2019, 15:03:40 »
I'd recommend, though, that they change their logo before anyone who owns that particular image notices.
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Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #17 on: 22 May 2019, 23:34:52 »
I finished off the smallest building in the pack this morning, and it was fairly easy to put together, minimal cleaning required.

This is a Clan Spotlight Control Centre, and it came with a large spotlight to be mounted to the roof of the building, however I thought it looked a bit silly, so I didn't put it on and will instead put a few antenna on the top and make it some sort of small command building for smaller missions.



Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #18 on: 23 May 2019, 19:59:55 »
There'll be no progress activity here for a while. I started assembling the last building from the above-mentioned 5-pack this morning and in one portion of the model I found an area where the resin had not cured properly so I ceased work on that model and have contacted DFA Miniatures for replacement parts...so I have to wait for those to arrive...I may have said the "F" word 4-6 times...

Also, I placed a new order for a half dozen more buildings to increase the variety of buildings for my gaming table/mission objectives. One of the buildings is a HPG (titled - Interstellar Communications), which will be cool...below is a picture of the 3D render for that building...it should make for a great mission objective.

Anyway, expect progress to begin again in a couple of weeks once I receive either my replacement parts and/or new order.




glitterboy2098

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #19 on: 23 May 2019, 22:46:22 »
looking at their other product, i'm surprised that Microsoft hasn't sued them already, given that many of their items look to be direct copies of the mechcommander 2 building models.

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #20 on: 24 May 2019, 00:14:27 »
Thought they looked familiar but I was thinking MW4.  Some look like MCG too.
Colt Ward
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"We come in peace, please ignore the bloodstains."

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Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #21 on: 24 May 2019, 08:31:17 »
looking at their other product, i'm surprised that Microsoft hasn't sued them already, given that many of their items look to be direct copies of the mechcommander 2 building models.

They've been around for about a year and a half now...I can't remember exactly what the buildings in Microsoft games looked like precisely, but I'm sure these guys have changed them enough to avoid those kinds of problems.

Also, I forgot that I also bought some pop up turrets, so I will be working on those while I'm awaiting my other stuff...

Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #22 on: 24 May 2019, 09:19:57 »
@glitterboy2098 and Colt Ward

I've just done an image search on google and had a good look around for MechCommander buildings, and I couldn't see anything that looked even remotely like the buildings I've been showing in this thread. Are you perhaps talking about some game mods where people have redone vehicle and buildings etc perhaps?

I mean, there were a couple of things that looked vaguely similar...

"Hey, your storage shed is a rip off of my storage shed because it has four walls and a roof, just like my storage shed does!"

Can you link me to something is is clearly a copy that would require suing...




glitterboy2098

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #23 on: 24 May 2019, 16:53:04 »
lets start with the DFAM standard resource building

vs the MC2 resource building


note the factory in the background there?
here is another angle of the same game asset.


compare to the DFAM 'weapons plant'



or how about the DFAM Mech repair bay

vs the MC2 mech repair bay?


how about the DFAM Vehicle hanger?


gee that one too..



and quite a few of the interstellar communications and fuel depot options are very similar to map assets from the mechcommander 2 game, though they aren't near exact copies like the above, so might be safe.

Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #24 on: 24 May 2019, 19:33:44 »
and quite a few of the interstellar communications and fuel depot options are very similar to map assets from the mechcommander 2 game, though they aren't near exact copies like the above, so might be safe.

I think the Mech Repair Bay is a bit of a stretch, it seems to have a few different features, enough to make it not the same...but I'm definitely seeing the close likeness in the other three examples you've shown, especially the Resource Building and the Vehicle Hanger.

I'm still not seeing any suing going on though, I think at worse if Microsoft even cared they'd send them a letter saying that a few of the buildings are too similar and DFA would just remove them from the range and continue on with the vast majority of their range that isn't anything like those MechCommander buildings.

On another note, I've got the pop-up turrets out and had a good look at them, and am happy with them. The casting on the weapons is really good and clean...the bases will require a small amount of clean up, but should be quick and easy to do...I'll make a start on those over the next couple of days.

I've heard back from DFA and they are happy to send me out the replacement parts I mentioned in a post above...it's a fair hike from there to here though, so will likely take a couple of weeks to arrive.

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #25 on: 03 June 2019, 12:42:27 »
Would you recommend these to someone who doesn't own a belt sander or other large surface sanding stuff?

FWLIW I've been able to take off a lot of excess resin quickly by using a metal file. One of the big ones intended to sharpen lawnmower blades and the like.

But if that's too aggressive for you, double sided tape some sandpaper down on your workbench and you're good to go.
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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #26 on: 03 June 2019, 13:01:30 »
I'll recommend RYOBI tools.

I buy a LOT of them, especially the cordless as the batteries are used for everything:

Weed Whacker? Yep
Drill? Yep
Saws? Yep
Radio? Yep
Hand held Sander? yep

These tools don;t take a lot of space, but it is still nice to have them available, especially the handheld sander.
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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #27 on: 12 June 2019, 19:49:17 »
I'm glad to see someone actually got their order. I backed the kickstarter with a large order, but the DFA team has had several issues fulfilling orders and had very spotty communication. I finally got word to day that the order ought to be shipping soon. Now several months after  it should've. I'm going to have to hustle to get it all into primer and paint before the weather turns this fall.

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #28 on: 22 June 2019, 06:59:31 »
I'm glad to see someone actually got their order. I backed the kickstarter with a large order, but the DFA team has had several issues fulfilling orders and had very spotty communication. I finally got word to day that the order ought to be shipping soon. Now several months after  it should've. I'm going to have to hustle to get it all into primer and paint before the weather turns this fall.
Well happy you got your order. I' am still waiting for mine as of today. I wonder about this company and I grant you that he email that he is having family issues. Well keep on waiting :-\.

Two Guns Blazing

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Re: DFA Miniatures!
« Reply #29 on: 22 June 2019, 09:24:32 »
Yeah, I'm still waiting on the replacement part and the second order I placed...it has been a month now...I'll flick them another message at the end of this coming week if I don't hear from them beforehand...

 

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