Do Mech paint jobs need to match?

[Rob Bendig]

I sit here staring at the hordes of grey plastic as they stare back at me and I really should do something about it. But before I do something foolish, an open question:

When fielding a lance/company/star/binary for a tabletop game, does it matter to you if the mechs have paint schemes from different regiments or even factions? For example what if somebody put on the table a lance that includes a Sword of Light, a Crucis Lancer, a Marik Militia and a Gray Death paint job? (ends up looking a bit like the Irregulars I suppose)

See, I was thinking I would split my mechs into companies, 1 per House and paint them up as a prominent Regiment, and then some additional mercenary lances. But, without mixing mechs between Regiments, that severely restricts the choice of which mechs can be used at one time. I only have one Wolverine so if I paint it Gray Death, I still want to be able to pick it when running something else.

And if I'm going to make 12 mechs FedSuns, why not go a step further and paint up a lance of Davion Guards, a lance of Crucis Lancers, and a lance of 1FSAC (hitting all the big names)?

I know I could go with simply splitting all the mechs into two groups and doing one half in Desert Camo and the other half in Forest Camo but even that coarse split could see me wanting to mix and match across paint schemes. Not to mention I do want to paint some faction color schemes.

I'm really curious to hear how others tackle this.

[Sartris]

off the top: paint is not rules. any choice to field units with matching paint jobs is a purely personal one.

personally, i paint in companies for purposes of batching the work out and getting it out of the way faster. i hate painting.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

Yeah, as long as you can tell your minis from each other and from everyone else's, you're doing fine.

[Luciora]

Paint them in how it makes you happy, especially for a personal merc unit. I know for a fact all the games I've played in, I haven't had a unified paint scheme for my forces. 

Just have fun really.

[Mostro Joe]

I would like so much to paint all of my minis...

[worktroll]

Paint them in how it makes you happy, especially for a personal merc unit. I know for a fact all the games I've played in, I haven't had a unified paint scheme for my forces. 

Just have fun really.

This is the thing,  and the whole of the thing.

I enjoy building and painting whole combined arms battalions but I know I'm weird. And when we play, often we use minis from different paintschemes, and it doesn't take away from the fun.

[klarg1]

It is definitely not necessary during a game as long as everyone knows which model is on which side.

I try to paint whole lances/stars, but do not always complete these projects. If I am setting up a game and happen to have matching minis I will use those, but my selection priority tends to be:

1. Unit type (mech, fighter, tank…)
2. Chassis (Marauder, Atlas…)
3. Weight Class
4. Paint

Update: When available 1a is motive type. (biped, quad, hover...)

At the end of the day, if I can tell which unit is which, I'm good.

[cray]

There is no rule enforcing paint uniformity, let alone requiring WYSIWYG minis in BT. I've used bottlecaps, dice, and cardboard cutouts to represent 'Mechs and other units on a map.

If it matters for roleplaying purposes, just announce that in the game your minis have the same paint job regardless of what's on the tabletop.

[General308]

I sit here staring at the hordes of grey plastic as they stare back at me and I really should do something about it. But before I do something foolish, an open question:

When fielding a lance/company/star/binary for a tabletop game, does it matter to you if the mechs have paint schemes from different regiments or even factions? For example what if somebody put on the table a lance that includes a Sword of Light, a Crucis Lancer, a Marik Militia and a Gray Death paint job? (ends up looking a bit like the Irregulars I suppose)

See, I was thinking I would split my mechs into companies, 1 per House and paint them up as a prominent Regiment, and then some additional mercenary lances. But, without mixing mechs between Regiments, that severely restricts the choice of which mechs can be used at one time. I only have one Wolverine so if I paint it Gray Death, I still want to be able to pick it when running something else.

And if I'm going to make 12 mechs FedSuns, why not go a step further and paint up a lance of Davion Guards, a lance of Crucis Lancers, and a lance of 1FSAC (hitting all the big names)?

I know I could go with simply splitting all the mechs into two groups and doing one half in Desert Camo and the other half in Forest Camo but even that coarse split could see me wanting to mix and match across paint schemes. Not to mention I do want to paint some faction color schemes.

I'm really curious to hear how others tackle this.

No they don't need to match.  They don't even need to be painted.   Honestly paint your minis however makes you happy.  Enjoy them Have fun

[Prospernia]

Yeah, as long as you can tell your minis from each other and from everyone else's, you're doing fine.

Most VHS record-tapes came with a number sticky-set to label your tape: I used to number my miniatures with those stickers.

[Rob Bendig]

Thanks everyone. I appreciate the advice and am glad to hear fielding mixed colour schemes is no big deal and quite common.

[guardiandashi]

I am going to go a step further and suggest that duplicate units should NOT be painted in matching paint.

lets say for the sake of argument you field a lance of marauders. its easier to distinguish the red, blue, green, and pokadot marauders are easier to tell apart than the Davion heavy guards marauders with 01, 03, 07, and 09 would be

[Gladius-XC]

No, out of necessity, since I don’t have enough painted ‘Mechs to field a full unit!  I am working on painting up at least a lance/star of various units. But the ‘Mechs in each unit aren’t chosen based on how well they would work together in a game. Rather I pick ‘Mechs that I think would be a part of that faction, and that I feel like painting. For instance, I’m working on some 3rd Benjamin Regulars with a Cyclops, Dragon, Panther, and Jenner.

[Hellraiser]

does it matter to you if the mechs have paint schemes from different regiments or even factions?

See, I was thinking I would split my mechs into companies, 1 per House and paint them up as a prominent Regiment, and then some additional mercenary lances. But, without mixing mechs between Regiments, that severely restricts the choice of which mechs can be used at one time. I only have one Wolverine so if I paint it Gray Death, I still want to be able to pick it when running something else.

No, it totally completely, fully does NOT matter.

Your plan is a good one, its one I started many years ago (you know, when I get around to painting every 6-months to 2-years).

I refuse to own 12 Locusts just so every house & merc can have one.  (The 7 I own are too many & I need to downsize to maybe 4 for a perfect lance, lol)


My personal suggestion is to do what I did.
1.  Look at your entire collection & select out all the "house specific" or at least "heavily favored" mechs.  And put them into that house.
IE.  So the Dragons, Panther, Jenners, & such went to the Draconis Combine.
The Enforcers, Valkyries, Jagers, & at least 1 Warhammer/Rifleman went to the Fed Suns.    My lone MenShen will be MAC (CC) for sure.  Etc etc.

2.  Then, once you have your basic force, say 5/12 for the company?
Fill in based on mechs that are at least "common/produced" by said faction.  So the FWL got a Wolverine & Quickdraw to go with their earlier Hermes-II, Orion, Awesome.
The Kell Hounds got a Wolf Hound.   Lyrans got a Griffin.   This should fill in at least 3/4 of your force or so I'd think.

3.  Finally, take your super common &/or multiple copies mechs & use them to fill in the last few slots.  (Like those 7 Locusts I mentioned or my 7 Guillotines which went around to 7 different regiments across several houses/factions).

4.  In conclusion, no, you don't have to field anything that matches at all, you don't even have to paint them, but many people like to so they are all purty like.
Arrayed out, they can look nice when they are pattern matched into Lances/Companies, etc etc, but once it's time to battle on the tabletop, its all about making a force by BV & not by Paint Scheme.  The Davion Guards goes into Battle right along side the Ryuken & the Marik Militia.

[Hellraiser]

I am going to go a step further and suggest that duplicate units should NOT be painted in matching paint.

lets say for the sake of argument you field a lance of marauders. its easier to distinguish the red, blue, green, and pokadot marauders are easier to tell apart than the Davion heavy guards marauders with 01, 03, 07, and 09 would be

I can second this.  I actually used to have a few "duplicate" paint schemes. 
Like 2 Jungle Warhammers & 2 Death Commando Crusaders & 3 Stones Lament Spiders & 2 ComStar Guillotines
But, I've taken to repurposing some of them to avoid the exact issue above.
I can still field 4 Guillotines if I really want to but can choose from ComStar, Davion Guard, Free Worlds Guards, Ryuken, ELH/SLDF, & RotS Standing Guard

[Aotrs Commander]

I explictly painted my IS mechs with shades of white/grey/blask as a base and then added other colours and grouped them into nominal lances/companies. But the point being, with the unifed greyscale base, they didn't loo too out of place whatever I picked.

The nominal companies I flavour for certain forces (this is Fedcom one, that one is a Capellan one), but it's more just an interesting way of parcelling out the mechs as much as anything. (Granted, in the last few battles I played with myself, I did keep to using these nominal companies, but only because it meant using majority toys that I hadn't used before.)

I regret picking a totally different colour scheme for the clans now (I'd have treated the them same way in hindsight) but in fairness, in the 90s, mixed-tech forces weren't so common. But I was't repainting loads of clan mechs and vehicles, so at the point I filled out to 90 mechs and 20 vehicles, I've left off that colour scheme.

I use a third one for ComStar/WoB, but I largely rescued that with some strategic repainting so that the older pure ComStar/WoB mechs fitted in with last kickstarter's more general ones.

One of these schemes has any basis in any of the fiction, incidentally.

[Charistoph]

I am going to go a step further and suggest that duplicate units should NOT be painted in matching paint.

lets say for the sake of argument you field a lance of marauders. its easier to distinguish the red, blue, green, and pokadot marauders are easier to tell apart than the Davion heavy guards marauders with 01, 03, 07, and 09 would be

Largely agreed, particularly if they are the same sculpt.

I have 5 Thunderbolts (not including the IIC), all but two of them are (mostly) different chassis (1 FASA-style, 1 IWM Primitive, 1 IWM Phoenix, 2 CGL), so having them follow the same scheme isn't so bad, though, one CGL is painted differently because campaign.

If I'm feeling like I want them in the same scheme, though, I take the accent pattern and switch it up.  I do it mostly with Vehicles, Infantry, Protomechs, and Fighters.  While they definitely can't be mistaken as exactly the same, I did that with the C1 and K2 Catapults, as well.

However, with duplicates from Salvage boxes, or even from the Merc Company boxes, I do set them up with a different scheme.  The latest batch saw 3 go in to Campaign Company colors (Jumping T-Bolt went here), 7 are going in to a scheme that is largely inspired by the scheme I used with my Level IIs (inspired by the scheme I went with my Celestials), with the rest being the unique sculpts to the Merc Company or ones I had already painted in an alt scheme color already going in to my main scheme.

When I received the Urbie Lance, I did the same thing with that, though I did go with my main Clanner color for the late generation SRM build.

As an interesting side note, with my Inner Sphere schemes, they are all wildly different, almost none of them using the same colors, but the 3 I did for my Clanners are the same colors, just in wildly different orientations.

And then there's the Snord's Irregular box.  I just had to go crazy withe Sneed's Rifleman, incorporating ALL the schemes on it, which then infected the Spartan and HGR Highlander.

[SteelRaven]

When fielding a lance/company/star/binary for a tabletop game, does it matter to you if the mechs have paint schemes from different regiments or even factions?

No, it's personal preference.

[JadeHellbringer]

I've been painting for a couple of decades now. Between pewter and plastic, I'm well past the thousand mark. And it's very rare to see the same paint scheme twice on my shelves- I just don't like doing it, for some reason. I've made it work when I have to for upcoming events (the Celestials for some of the canon events years ago, for example), but overall I just prefer picking a miniature from the primed-shelf and asking myself 'what do I want to do with this?' on the fly. In particular, I enjoy using nature and my dad's old camo patterns (he used to be an avid hunter) to come up with new ways to disguise a Mech's outline- for example, striated layers of tans, oranges, and browns to create a striped effect that would blend into canyon walls in a place like Utah.

It means that if I field, say, a star of Steel Vipers in a game, they probably don't match at all. That's fine for me. Honestly, it can make it easier for newer players- rather than asking if they have any shots at the enemy Zeus, I don't need for them to know what Mech a Zeus is at a glance, I can ask 'can you see the jackass in blue and red?', and they know what I mean.

Paint how you want to paint- if that's individuals like me, if that's lances/stars, if that's entire regiments in one scheme, man, do what makes you happy, and don't ever let someone else dictate to you how you handle your own hobby.

[Joel47]

Paint how you want to paint- if that's individuals like me, if that's lances/stars, if that's entire regiments in one scheme, man, do what makes you happy, and don't ever let someone else dictate to you how you handle your own hobby.

Quoted for truth.

I used to do all my stuff in various generic camo schemes. These days I'm painting companies/trinaries in parade schemes because the look cool and I want the challenge. Also, I think it's easier to tell the two sides apart that way, which helps make the game more visually appealing to passers-by (an important metric for me as a Demo Agent). To avoid confusion I have no duplicate sculpts in a given paint scheme (other than tanks, and those have number or letter decals on them).

I do worry that I'm setting an example that I don't expect to be followed, that forces need to be uniform like some other wargames.

[Pat Payne]

Most VHS record-tapes came with a number sticky-set to label your tape: I used to number my miniatures with those stickers.

Yeah, but this is 2024, and IIRC there are literally zero VHS tape manufacturers left in existence. I miss the '80s... well everything except the threat of nuclear annihilation, and well... (eyes the news nervously)... why do we get that back and not New Wave?

Anyway, I do one of two things for my 'Mechs:

I either print off paper labels from the computer (if I'm doing fancy or esoteric numbering schemes for specific units, or if they're special units that I'm actually assigning pilot names to like the GDL, Black Widows or a couple of home-brews that I made up full histories and rosters for) and affix them with just regular tacky craft glue to the base, both before and after putting it on the base so that it seals to it; or I paint Roman numerals on the back of the base denoting the 'mech's place in the company (since I do Alpha Strike, I like painting company/batallion-sized formations)

[Aotrs Commander]

I paint Roman numerals on the back of the base denoting the 'mech's place in the company (since I do Alpha Strike, I like painting company/batallion-sized formations)

That has been my approach when painting mechs of the same sculpt in the same colour scheme - something I did initially when I only had a handful of mechs that were the same sculpt ad only, like twos. (It still baffles me how I ended up with three-and-a-half Unseen Cruaders (three plastic and one metal lacking the jump jets I converte with a spare Catapult LRM rack), but it was the vagaeries of what I found cheap at bring-and-buy in the 90s.)

Sort of hard-coded to do that (since that's exactly what I do for starships) until I really started to build up duplicates since the KS.

[Prospernia]

Yeah, but this is 2024, and IIRC there are literally zero VHS tape manufacturers left in existence. I miss the '80s... well everything except the threat of nuclear annihilation, and well... (eyes the news nervously)... why do we get that back and not New Wave?. . .

I've got blank VHS-tapes, still in the packages. 

New-Wave's been traded for man-buns!