clash of the titans
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Intro
In the First World War and for the first time in the history of man,
nations combined to fight against nations using the crude weapons of
those days. The Second World War involved every continent on the globe
and men turned to science for new devices of warfare which reached an
unparalleled peak in their capacity for destruction. In the middle of
the 20th century, fought with the terrible weapons of super science,
menacing all mankind and every creature on Earth, the War of the Worlds
against the evil martian invaders has taken place.
No weapon was effective against the martian war machines. Their armor
was impenetrable. Mobile units, in tripodal mechs, divided every country
like a fresh made pie. One by one, all countries, first, second and
third world, descended into chaos and anarchy.
But on the eve of the sixth day, as uniformly as they had welcomed themselves
to their new home, the invaders succumbed to the simplest illness: a
common cold. Their research and sampling efforts had overlooked a modest
rhinovirus. They were as innoculated against disease as any army could
be, and had conducted biological evaluations through countless probes
and abductions over hundreds of years. But unprotected against one insignificant
mutation of staph, they fell as one.
In the years that followed, mankind rebuilt a new world
order. Cynical minds had always suspected that the cultural cleaning of
a nuclear holocaust might have been beneficial. Here, men found that they
could have that and not suffer the horrible consequences of a wrecked
world in the process. To be sure, the infrastructure of the planet was
devestated. But if there was one facet of mankind where the invaders had
underestimated their quarry, it was his determination not only to survive,
but to dominate his world, his universe.
In rebuilding, men, women and children everywhere looked up frequently,
and watched the sky anxiously. It was an intolerable situation. 17 years
later, mankind launched its own fleet towards the red planet, leaded by
the three war machine carriers WELLS, BRADBURY and ROBINSON. It was time
to return the favor...
The military of the United Earth has adapted the tripodal mech technology
and their energetic shielding to take on the martians at even ground.
The Robofighters, as the pilots were called, were all driven by one single,
ancient emotion: Revenge! So in the endless, red deserts of Mars it came
to the CLASH OF THE TITANS...
The scene shown here is typical for the early period of the human invasion
of the red planet: A martian warmachine facing its much more bulky equivalent
from Earth, both firing their heatrays into the shields of the enemy.
The scientists of the blue planet had discovered that the martian shielding
technology has one weak point: It can deflect either energy or matter
- but not both at the same time! So the usual strike against a martian
tripod is an attack with the shoulder or chest-mounted heatray weapons
to dazzle their sensors when the energy is captured in the shield, followed
by the launch of short range missiles while the heatray gun is still firing.
It doesn`t matter how the martian warrior decide to set his shield for:
One of the weapons systems will break through! The only chance for the
martians is to come close enough to be able to use their tentacles to
fight - usually, a duel will not last that long...
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The Model:
I used two mech-models for that diorama. One is an Ideon Dog-Mack
purchased a few weeks ago from Ebay, the other one is nameless since I
own this one since the 1980ties and can`t remember how it was called.
I took it completely apart and totally rebuild and repainted it, added
some additional bits and repaired the evil scratched canopy with Future
floor wax. I painted it with a dark Navy grey as the basecolor
with details in various shades of grey and black. Finally I added some
paint chips, scratches and small damaged areas so that it looks like it
has been built in hurry - earth needed many of them as fast as possible
to be able to attack the Red Planet before the martians were going to
start a second try!
For the Dog-Mack, which looked very Martian to me, I used
only metallic colors: Copper, bronze and tin biz mainly, all
from Citadel / Games Workshop. Details are done with chainmail, silver
and black. I altered the bottom of that model while adding a heatray canon
on a tentacle instead of the huge thruster nozzle that comes with the
kit. Very subtle weathering and aging has been done with light grey and
silver.
I wanted to show real fighting action going on with that diorama, so I
tried something I never did before (and I never saw before on other models):
Making an invisible shield partially visible when being hit! So the heatrays
are done with acrylic rods, painted with clear colors from Revell. I`ve
done this a bit thick and irregular so that they look like beams of flickering
energy instead like clean and sharp lasers. The areas in which the energy
is deflected by shields are made from water effect, a jelly
like stuff that is normally used for model railroads, a bit drybrushed
with the same color like the hitting ray. For that purpose I sculpted
the shields in thin layers on an acrylic sphere, pulling them off at the
end, glueing them onto the rods of the beams with clear epoxy glue. The
use of three beams for the martian ray weapon is a tribute to the weight
of the attached shield, I planned to use only two beams, but
that way the gravity sag has been much too strong.
The contrails from the launched missiles are made from cotton wool, wraped
around acrylic rods with one millimeter diameter. The tips of those rods
are sticking out a bit, sanded in shape and painted with Bolt Gun Metal
to represent the warheads.
The base is wooden, partially covered with a few rocks and
red sand. That stuff, glued upon a slightly sculpted surface made from
putty, is real red desert sand from a nearby petshop, usually needed for
small lizards. I pressed the mechs into the still wet sand / glue mix
to create some footprints of their walking path. At the end I formed small
bulwarks out of a mix from sand and white glue around the feet of the
two mechs so that it looks like they sink a bit into the dusty ground
because of their tremendous size and weight. Finally the feet has been
dusted with red pastel chalk to simulate the effect of producing dustclouds
while walking, leaving red marks on the lower areas of the war machines.
The selfmade nameplate, created from cardboard and clear adhesive film,
shows Mars clutched by a clawlike human hand and the term War of
the Worlds II: Clash of the Titans.
Martians, beware of mankind!
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