Thoughts on 3D Printing Your Models

Good morning gamers,

Warning: There will be references to Spiders in this post (and a picture below). Mythopoeia, stop reading now - you've been warned!

3D printing has been around for a while now and we here at TMAT have been introduced to 3D printing primarily through Centaur and Red Jacket. Centaur has worked on a variety of printing projects, ranging from D&D miniatures and substitute sculpts for the Middle-Earth range to terrain features of various kinds (both in resin and FDM). 3D printing is not a straightforward art form, though, and in today's post we're going to look at the things 3D printing is good for - and when you should just buy the real thing.

Disclaimer: I'm going to reference a lot of people that are creating/selling things that you can use - and none of them are sponsors of this post. In fact, the links I've provided give me no kick-backs, there's no affiliation/advertising going on - everything you see below are things I've admired, used, or seek to use in the future. Support them if you want - I just wholeheartedly believe in what they're doing!

Why Do We 3D Print Stuff?

3D printing has advanced a lot over the last few years and with STL creators like Loot Studios and Medbury Miniatures (along with a host of other creators on My Mini Factory) creating incredible sculpts to print, printing hobbyists are able to print models now that fit the aesthetic they like. The usual appeal for 3D printing begins with the expense: assuming everything prints right (and you invest the capital in a printer), you usually pay pennies per model for the materials used (resin/filament) instead of dollars per model.

You also gain the control to print as much as you want of the models you want instead of being dependent on model availability. While price can affect how much of something you get, there are rampant cries of models being unavailable in the GW webstore (usually right when you need them for an event). Printing what you want does assume that you or someone else has made the sculpt you want and that you have the right equipment/the material needed/the know-how to actually do it, but on the whole, you have the power to choose. Oh, and you probably need to plan ahead and give yourself enough time to make them all too.

Finally, 3D printing sometimes gives you more dynamic poses for really, really old sculpts (some of which have very flat designs because of how they were cast decades ago). Having an army that pops off the board more is great for the players of the game and if it encourages you to paint/play with the army, so much the better.

When To 3D Print And When To NOT 3D Print Models 

The best things to print for MESBG will always be things that GW doesn't make - like terrain bits or extra weapons. Scatter terrain is great for MESBG and GW doesn't need to make barrels, walls, etc. (though they have made some in the past). If you like the terrain kits that GW has made, great - but if terrain projects from Conquest Creations or Loot Studios work better for you (either because GW doesn't make the product you're looking for - or because you don't want to spend a fortune for a single board), print those instead! Similarly, if you need a host of Easterlings with pikes and don't want to buy them 4 models at a time in plastic (or wait for the old metal sculpts to be made-to-order again), printing some Easterling-esque pikes from Thingyverse can be a real help. Ditto for Rohan throwing spears.

You can also save time on basing by 3D printing textured bases. While you can buy pre-made bases from other places, most 3D printing files (especially Loot Studios) can give you bases that look like the terrain you want and costs far less to "just print" than to buy something someone else made. These bases tend to be more dynamic than what you'll find elsewhere - though that isn't to say that you shouldn't get pre-made textured bases from other vendors (like Zorpazorp).

There are also sculpts that GW hasn't bothered to make - Gundabad Catapult Trolls and mounted models for several named heroes require conversion work from GW products, but why go through the work of that if you can just print a beautiful sculpt someone else has made? For Catapult Trolls in particular, there's a model that was released by The Printing Goes Ever On that's pretty good (though not exactly right for MESBG) and for those not interested in 3D printing, there's an older model that I'm looking at getting because I rather like Catapult Trolls (see my In Defense Of article for why).

But there is a caution against mass 3D printing models: buying models from GW and supporting the group that makes our hobby keeps it alive. We're in a great place right now and there's nothing wrong with 3D sculptors making alternative sculpts for the models GW hasn't made (or where the sculpts are old). There's also a perfectly legitimate place for 3D sculptors to make historical or fantasy sculpts that can be used as proxies for GW models that are expensive or unavailable (either globally or regionally). But if we don't engage with the maker, we can't expect more things to be made. It's that simple.

Additionally, some tournaments (most notably those run at Warhammer World) only allow GW sculpts for your armies, so while there's nothing wrong with printing models for friendly games, it would be good to have at least one competitive army that is entirely composed of GW models/converted models. The GW Middle-Earth team puts a lot of time and effort into getting us great supplements, a solid rules set, and cool new models periodically - and we should support that by buying their stuff.

Finally, I know there's been drama about 3D printing space marines and such - I am never going to condone copyright infringement. Any 3D printing sculptor can make astronaut models or even futuristic space warriors - but all you sculptors out there know the difference between derivative sculpts and shameless reproduction. And that's a line you shouldn't cross. GW is a business - don't steal what they rightfully own. For MESBG, there are historical models that can proxy in well for certain factions - and those are fine. There is great fantasy work being done that can proxy for other factions - and that's fine. But sculptors know when they've gotten too close - don't do it, guys.

While all this is true, if you're on a tight budget, I think the greatest benefit of 3D printing is this: 3D printing can be an inexpensive way to try out armies you're interested in - and while I initially focused on getting terrain 3D printed, I have recently commissioned models to be printed because of the expense of getting them without trying them out first - and we'll be looking at them next.

What I Have 3D Printed

The first things I 3D printed were terrain features for my Bree board. The terrain bits range from boxes and tables to people and animals - all of which gives a more immersive experience and brings Bree to life. All told, this haul cost me about $20 in materials:

My son thought about running Beorn and Grimbeorn in our Fantasy Fellowships campaign, so I figured I could spend a few bucks on some proxies before I committed $100 to getting the real guys (he ended up going for Elessar and Thorin, taking the remaining points to upgrade his wizard to Saruman . . . but I got some sweet bears painted up anyway):

I also needed some Rohan Royal Guards for a Theodred's Guard list I ran at a recent event and had Centaur print some Hengstland Huscarls on foot from Medbury Miniatures:

These sculpts are lovely - Medbury does great work!

After this, I wanted to get a good chunk of the models I need for the evil armies from the Fall of the Necromancer scenarios - and with the Nazgul of Dol Guldur and the Keeper costing over $150 from ForgeWorld, the 12 spiders and Spider Queen costing almost $250, and the Castellans and the Necromancer costing over $100 . . . yeah, that was going to take forever to acquire. So I sent a list to Centaur with these models and got his take on the alternative sculpts I could print to get started playing with these models before sinking money into the real ones - here's how they turned out (and oh yeah, the total cost of materials for the models you're about to see was less than $10):

The Necromancer is a Loot Studios water elemental, painted with an OSL effect and lots of misty fog (complements of some chair cushion stuffing). The actual GW model is old and this model is a lot more dynamic - and yet has a consistent aesthetic (to my surprise) to the Dol Guldur "pointy bits" aesthetic in the films. While Centaur did point out that there's a fire elemental (and I personally like the earth elemental), I felt the water elemental had that "rising from the whisps of shadows" look and I went with it (plus it had the right crown).

These are models that Centaur found on My Mini Factory and I really like them (Centaur Note: they're from the Birchwood Vale campaign by RMPrintable Miniatures). No, they don't follow the aesthetic from the films, but they do look like the Nazgul during the War of the Ring and they're easy proxies (and I can figure out how valuable getting the full set would be before I drop a ton of money on them).

Centaur found these in a Loot Studios set as well - Castellan proxies that are ACTUALLY empty suits of armor! No seriously, the models are hollow! I painted them with a near-zenithal highlight and threaded cushion stuffing around the joints of the models to make them appear animated by the Necromancer's will. Each has a different accent color for record keeping purposes.

My Keeper of the Dungeons proxy is another Loot Studios sculpt - not my favorite for the Keeper, but he's cool-looking and has that torturer look with a big axe weapon.

Watch out - we got spiders in the next shot!

Finally, we have the spiders - many of them were painted by my kids (because I would only be fielding all 12 of them in scenario play), but these were really fun to paint! What's funny about this set of models is that Centaur's wife, Mythopoeia (warned above to stop reading), is deathly afraid of spiders - so much so that they refer to a spider as a "Steve" in their home. In honor of her, I encouraged my kids to name the spiders they painted with variants of the name Stephen. From left to right, back to front, they are Stevie, Stevie Jr, Stephanie, Stephanie Jr, Urkle, Rodgers, Stíobhan, Szczepan, Kepano, İstfan, Kyle, and also-Kyle (according to one of my sons, those last two don't even have Steve as a middle name - I tried).

The Spider Queen was something Centaur found and her broodlings were from My Mini Factory. The sculpt for the Queen is really cool - plus the broodlings were the only file I needed to buy for the collection and it was only a handful of dollars. The Spider Queen is Estebana and painted in Spanish colors, while her children are named Stjepan, Stiibu, and Shtjefen (yeah, like 30 of each name because child mortality rates among spiders are high).

Conclusion

I hope this article was interesting for you - and if you're doing 3D printing for your hobby, let us know what your go-to vendors are! I plan this year to get a bunch more alternative sculpts from Medbury Miniatures, so expect to see more on this space in the coming months. Until next time, happy hobbying!