Earthdoom
15mm Models for the Second Alien War

Background
Has a weapon ever been developed as redoubtable as the Earth War Force's Corsair Battle Dress? Encased in a tough shell contructed of a nickel-chromium superalloy, the wearer is propelled forward by jets and rocket engines at speeds in excess of 100kph. Leg strength is vastly improved by the suit, and the mechanical arms are a hundred times more powerful than those of the strongest human. Each wearer has an arsenal of weapons, from a heavy plasma flamer to a missilelauncher capable of firing low yield nuclear warheads, and the armour also has integral short-range weapons mounted on each arm and a grenade launcher built in as well. This at least is the Assault Configuration -- the armour worn by the basic line troopers.

Specialist roles demanded modifications to the armour, and the Corsair armour has proven the right chassis for the task. For reconnaissance, the Pathfinder Configuration of the Corsair mounts a greatly enhanced sensor and comms array on its backpack, which is further lightened by removal of the grenade launcher and the storage mounts for the plasma flamer and the missilelauncher. With these weightsaving measures, and with enhancements to the thrust capacity of the jet and rocketboosters, the Pathfinder is capable of speeds at least twice that of the Assault suit. Whilst the Pathfinders may carry have primary armament, their suits retain the portable flamer and shortrange beamer built into the arm mounts -- it's still suicide to tangle with a Pathfinder in close quarters.

The ultimate expression of the Corsair suit was the Echelon Configuration, worn by ranking officers, which combined all the combat power of the Assault Config and the increased thrust of the Pathfinder. Whilst not as fast as a Pathfinder due to the additional weight of the plasma flamer and the missilelauncher, Echelon armour is still 50% faster than the Assault armour and mounts the same sensor and comms gear as the Pathfinder.

Together these three Corsair suits forged an unstoppable force that triumphed in Earth's First Alien War, and indeed why not? With so much power at the wearer's fingertips only a few suits were necessary to garrison a planet. Or so it was thought ....

Kit Information
Note each of the four poses of Corsair comes with all the pieces necessary to recreate the Assault Configuration (basic backpack, plasma flamer or missilelauncher in hand, other weapon mounted on backpack), Pathfinder Configuration (sensor backpack without weapons mounts, no weapon in arms) or Echelon Configuration (sensor backpack with weapons mounts, plasma flamer or missilelauncher in hand, other weapon mounted on backpack). Therefore gamers who are handy with rare earth magnets may be able to swap backpacks so that each model can portray whatever Configuration is required during gameplay.

The huge Corsair Battle Dress is approximately 35mm tall in 15mm-scale.

Corsair assembly hint -- the models are breakwaist so they seem to have a great deal of posability, but it is recommended that the backpack be attached to the torso first, as it overhands the torso piece and restricts swivel at the hips.

Background
It was the Warforce Reserve that finally turned the tide in the Second Alien War. They were referred to as a “Reserve” because the suits worn by them had been retired after the Partition Wars, when mankind adopted the Corsair Battle Dress. But the alien invaders had adapted, hugging the human cities closely, meaning the mighty Corsairs were not able to employ their extremely destructive weaponry to full effect. Earth forces had no choice but to take the old powered carapace armour out of storage in the fight to regain the planet.

Huge numbers of the suits had been stockpiled, and most were still in operable condition when powered up. Three types of Warforce Reserve platoons were fielded using these suits. The first and most common type was the Reserve platoon, with two squads of riflemen armed with the plasma rifle and a third squad of Grenadiers with the plasma rifle augmented by a shoulder-pac smartgrenade launcher rig. A Reserve Light platoon had three rifle squads. Rarest of all were the Grenadier platoons, with three squads of Grenadiers. All of these platoons were commanded by a command team of a lieutenant and staff sergeant. (Companies made up of three platoons were commanded by a captain and first sergeant in Corsair Battle Dress, Echelon Configuration.)

Platoons are inserted into the teeth of enemy resistance by leans of a grav barge, the Growler IB, a quickly developed but very effective open-topped vehicle mounting a powerful thermium cannon. It has a pilot's station behind the passenger bay where the captain and gunner sit.

Background
When the attacks on Earth's far flung colonies came, the War Forces were unprepared. The first sign of trouble appeared in the great urban centers, where unaccountable violence was reported as breaking out, and then, stranger still, reports of alien life forms amongst the population began to spread -- humanoid but hideous to Earth eyes, almost two and a half meters tall, with long slender legs that gave them incredible speed at the run. Soon it became clear that a cloaking technology had permitted these aliens to infiltrate deep into the population centers on all of the main Earth colonies. Complacent after the previous quick victories over the Aranae, the Earth forces were spread thin, assuming that alien hostiles would conduct war in a similar fashion, and be similarly annihiliated. But fleet and stealthy alien invaders had insinuated themselves directly into the heart of Earth settlement, where the trumpcard of the Corsair, its nuclear arsenal, was useless.

So it was clear that the Intruders, as they came to be known, were an altogether different foe from the Aranae. Unlike the ponderous, swarming army corps of the Aranae, the Intruders relied on guerilla warfare, purposefully fighting very close to the human civilian population so as to make each attack against them painful for Earth Forces.

Things did not go entirely the Intruders' way. Their weapons had difficulty penetrating the thick armour of the Corsair, the basic infantry weapon being virtually useless except at very close range, and even the heavy gun carried three per section being capable of achieving pentration at only relatively short ranges. Only the large cannons of the Fighting Orbs -- speedy anti-grav weapons platforms -- could take on the Corsairs at longer combat ranges, and the light force field that protected those was not nearly as substantial a defence as a Corsair suit (although the Orbs proved even more mobile than a Pathfinder suit).

At first it seemed that the Intruders had no vehicles heavier than the Fighting Orb -- actually disc-like rather than an orb, that vehicle gained its name from terrified Earth colonists in the first hours of the war, when they saw what appeared to be orbs hovering high over the cities (these being positioned by the intruders to intercept incoming Earth Force Corsair battlegroups). It was anticipated by Earth high command that larger Intruder vehicles would uncloak as the conflict progressed, and [CLASSIFIED].

Intruder formations were most successful when they could lure Earth Forces into urban combat or warfare in other heavy terrain. With their flexible mix of conventional and guerrilla tactics, and ruthless treatment of the helpless civilian populations, this proved to be all foo frequent an occurrence as the conflict progressed.

Kit Information
The tall slender Intruders are about 20mm tall in 15mm-scale. The pack is of ten unique poses.