I remember back in the day, Shadowcrunch had a gaming idea involving Hot Wheels cars; he was developing a rules set for a Mad Max style game where you could customize cars the way you wanted, and his method at that time (for play testing( was to use improvised weapons and peel-n-stick magnets. Jump ahead 15 years or so later...
Gaslands is pretty much the same thing: customized Hot Wheels / Matchbox cars race and do battle for the entertainment of the masses after a global war. The game is on it's second edition right now (named
Refuelled), and there are plenty of battle reports and instructionals on Youtube, along with numerous PDFs to be found online. The game is cheaper by far than any other game I've played or purchased, with new cars starting at $0.97; you can splurge and get high end cars, but there's really no need. You can also hold out and buy a bag of cars from Goodwill for about $10, which is a great deal as you'll have a massive variety of vehicles and extra parts. Everything else you can buy or custom make.
I've found a lot of weapons and parts files on thingiverse, if 3D printing is your thing. Me, I bought a couple bags of GI Joe weapons; I've also been crafting my own stuff. A healthy dose of milliput, or any other molding putty will work, too.
Anywho, for your viewing pleasure, I've uploaded a few pictures of some my creations so far.
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This beast is "TEMBWBAT"... or more amply put, The Evil Midnight Bomber What Bombs At Midnight. Note to self: I have to paint the guy's jacket red. This was my first "real" conversion (I did others, but those could best be described as tests); it utilizes parts from six different vehicles, has a 1:72 WWII soldier, a GI Joe spotting scope with grenade launcher barrel to act as the weapon, and a GI Joe rocket to finish things off. The Skull in front was made out of milliput.
I've gotten around to making some terrain! Vader and I played one game, and while it was fun, it was lacking that extra something: terrain. We were only using wooden blocks, and it just wasn't right. In
Gaslands, a couple scenarios involve the use of turrets, automated weapon platforms that will shoot at any vehicle within range. After rereading the rules, I discovered that the game required 1d6 turrets, so I'll need to craft a couple more. These here are made from (bottom up) curtain ring, a tube cap of some sort, a plastic quarter, a googly eye, and then bitz from my 40K bin.
My latest creation: Inferno! The chassis and cab are from a single Hot Wheels car, new tires, the exhaust from a space shuttle toy, the head from some kid's animal car, front bumber from a different vehicle, and a 40K weapon (T'au flamer).
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These two vehicles are pretty much stand-alone: their point values would make it difficult to use them in a team scenario. I'll still use these, but only for games that don't count towards the overall campaign (ie, "televised season").
