In which our hero receives a package from Topgun Marketing

Today's unpacking courtesy of Topgun Marketing's Grav APC's.

I ordered four of these sleek little buggers to cart around some sort of aliens, I've not really settled on which ones, but am thinking they might be a good fit for the Critical Mass Games Astagar which I have a thing for. Seems a good fit for some nasty mercenary snakes.

Here's a look at one of the resin hulls plus most of the little metal bits that make up a single kit.

I'm thinking that I will do something geometric with the paint job. The vehicle is all rounded shapes, so something amorphous or similarly rounded will make surface details less distinct. Plus, I already know that angles look good on these grav tanks as it was a hexagon-camo tank squad that really sold me on the models in the first place. 

You can get these vehicles with or without the clusters of circular plating on the hulls. In the designer's description these serve an anti-personnel role, but could just as easily be reactive armor or just passive surface detailing. I decided to go with them because they would give a scale-like look to the tank, which would further boost their usefulness as reptile runabouts. 

I didn't build mine out exactly as intended by the designers. I didn't take to the look of the rocket tubes on the vertical boom after putting it all together. They rode pretty high, and even shortening the boom still left them perched too awkwardly for my taste (which is what it is, admittedly). I think it broke the extreme streamlining of the vehicle too much for my liking. Instead I dropped the boom and mounted the tubes directly on the turret at a jaunty angle that seemed to fit the curvy vibe. 

I like these tanks for two reasons. First, I like them because they look great. They look fast, they look tough, how could you not want some? Mainly though, I like them because they are clearly a labor of love, they're something special to the guys that made them and as a guy who once had a mini line just to get stuff I wanted to play with into the world, I support anyone who managed to pull off that feat as well.

Corresponding with Robert at Topgun it's clear that he's really excited about these. He'll tell you all about the little gizmos on the outside of the textured hull version, send you game stats, pictures of renders and painted tanks. It's not just an impersonal online purchase and a package that pops up a couple of weeks later, it's sharing a hobby and caring a lot about the stuff you make, and that's pretty cool.

And, now that I have a few of these tanks, I'm pretty excited about them too.