Papercraft Deep Space Freighter build for Aliens game

My build from the base pack Firstlight from Workworks Games

With big builds I've always found it best to pre-plan rather than make it up as I go along otherwise things never work out as I'd envisioned.

Using an Excel spreadsheet, this is my basic ship layout plan:

Each room or corridor or piece of equipment starts off as printed sheets on 210gsm card. These are the prints (2) to start off building a reactor unit:

then cut out, folded and glued into place:

add another two units making the three required:

Next up a double cargo bay:

and tacking on two rooms:

Two room prints merging into one large room to add to the reactor units:

 The three reactor units are joined into one unit using wall and corridor parts and the new large room added:

The cargo bay unit is added and an airlock unit leading off from the reactor room, with a long corridor soon to follow:

Next up, prints laid out for the four-room cargo bay for the opposite side, trying to keep in mind where I want the multiple doors placed:

The large cargo bay completed and added

Due to a rookie mistake in scaling when printing off the first double cargo bay some fudging required to bring the lot together with corridors and sliding doors but got there in the end:

(11/11/15) Phase 1 complete, that's about 25% of the total build. Photos with a few 28mm figures for scale:

(13/11/15) Three more cargo bays complete, including an 'infested' or "....but secreted by what?" section mod using Photoshop and sampling graphics from another Worldworks pack called Shadowcore Prime:

(20/11/15) The build is looking a bit chaotic at the moment but with some time over the weekend it will all come together I hope:

(22/11/15) Not as much free time as I'd hoped for over the weekend but still managed to bring together sections to complete (almost) another quarter of the ship build:

...and this is what it looks like tagged onto the first quarter section:

New post started see papercraft-deep-space-freighter-build part 2

Do you want to know more? Starship Troopers Game

Part of what inspired me to start off a blog was the blog of one of my new fellow wargamer's at the Berkeley Vale Club.

I recently put on my first game at the club, a Starship Troopers scenario in 28mm,  and Alan posted a great report and some photos of the game on his blog so have linked to it here:

Twomarshals.blogspot

and here is a link to my ruleset: SERVICE GUARANTEES CITIZENSHIP , again courtesy of Alan's post to the  thewargameswebsite

Project Aliens

Is this a stand up fight or just another bug hunt?

Xenomorphs

The Aliens movie scenario has been on my 'to do' list ever since I saw the film but never found the right miniatures to inspire me to do it justice. However, have been keeping an eye on the Prodos Games kick-starter project for a couple of years and at last their excellent 28mm Xenomorph figures are due to be released this week so I've pre-ordered a couple of boxes :

More to follow when they arrive!

LINK: ...and arrive they did - see separate post.

(29/11/15 ) Two boxes of Warrior Aliens (finally) arrived yesterday but, as with the Marines figures, they've been put away for Christmas by the Memsahib so will have to wait another month. Managed to have a quick look at the contents of one box which contains the parts to make five warrior alien figures and they look very detailed and just like the xenomorphs from the film - brilliant!

The parts consist of five slightly different torsos with legs, separate heads, separate tails and separate arms so should be able to make ten individual looking figures. Can't wait to get some paint on them. 

The Sulaco
Next up was the scenario. Played a game of Alien Squad Leader many years ago and it was that sort of hidden-movement high-tension scenario I had in mind. I needed a deep space transport ship and as I'm a fan of papercraft terrain the obvious choice seemed to be to construct one from the base package available at WorldWorks Games:

I've planned out my ship using a simple Excel layout and now need to build it. The final build should be about 5' x 3' so plan to fix into four sections that can be reassembled for the game and interlocking to keep it together during play:

See separate post for the build.

Some Bad Hombres
With the aliens figures sorted I need to get some appropriate marines. Time to start searching :).

There are quite a lot of nice Aliens type space marine figures available in 28mm but these from denizen miniatures look just like I envisioned so an order duly placed.

The Marines have arrived! Nice figures but unfortunately they have been commandeered by the Elves and are to be re-delivered by Mr Claus at the appropriate time on Christmas day, so unfortunately I can't yet get my paws, or brushes, on them. C'est la guerre!

Other stuff
Discovered some lovely detailed alien eggs 28mm miniatures at Dark Art Miniatures

Two packs, that's 12 alien eggs, duly ordered. More on this when they arrive!
See Separate Post on painting them.

Rules 

Also need to start thinking about rules. I'm keen on simple one or max two A4 pages for rules and so normally write my own but based around published sets, taking the bits I like and adding any changes to give it the scenario flavour I want.
A good place to start are the free rule websites so will take a look around first. Therefore more to follow!