I’m sure many of you guys have seen Robogear models before. They’re generally stuff we know as “those cheap Russian plastic kits from eBay”, because, well, that’s how and where we tend to get them.
A few years ago, I did what lots of us do, and that was to buy a bunch of these kits at once, then build a couple, not finish painting them, and put the rest in a box and forget exactly what’s in there. So when rooting around looking for Mantic terrain a couple of months ago, I found these – which I had completely forgotten about. As they’re so simple, I was able to assemble them all within a day or two, then rather than simply going with the grey that is so common on the tabletop, they got sprayed with brown (also pretty common in the real world) on the exterior and tan on the interior, then we went back to working onsite and I kinda forgot about them until the second half of October.
At that point I spotted them again, and decided to get them done quick and dirty. A drybrush, a paint-on, wipe-off treatment with my Vallejo Model Wash mix, and then a copious amount of weathering powders that got black soot everywhere in my painting area (seriously, I’m still finding little patches now and needing to clean them up!) Matt varnish and done! There are enough smashed-corner parts to make either a few “destroyed” small buildings, a comfortable pair of buildings, or one rather large-footprint (in wargaming terms) building. Especially since I did a bit of bashing within the kit to make a few slightly larger pieces which left me with the bits I used for the damaged internal walls piece.
They’re pretty plain. Even with the weathering done like this they’re quite plain ruins. They’d look better with some posters on them – Imperial Propaganda for 40k, WWII war posters for WWII gaming, Modern advertising posters for moderns or Zombies or Marvel, but… any of those things would then firmly root these rather generic buildings in a certain space and place and time. And I like them being generic enough that I can just drop them into a 40k game, and then into a game of Crisis Protocol, and then into a game of Last Days.
I mean, they do lose that extra bit of detail that would elevate them, but they’re ultimately cheapo background pieces. Cheapo background pieces that without that extra bit of detail manage to work in a nice wide variety of settings without looking too incongruous.
Azazel's Bitz Box. 
Pretty effective use of cheap terrain. I worry so much when I use pigments- a mess awaits if there is a spill! Glad to see you weather these so well.
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Thanks Mark – I think with these the only thing that makes them look half-decent is the actual weathering. They’re pretty plain and boring without it!
The main lessons learned here is that if I need to do a ton of terrain weathering with powders, I should set up a temporary table outside and do it there…
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Aren’t these kind of hard to find these days?
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I just went to eBay, typed “Robogear” and found pages upon pages of listings. I didn’t specifically search for this kit, but I did see a few terrain kits as well as no end of walkers and whatnot. I’d say it’s just a matter of looking.
You can also search for “technolog” and “technolog” and you’re best off with sellers from the Russian Federation than US resellers. I saw Hoard O Bits is breaking up a lot of the kits for resale at a huge profit.
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I didn’t know they were Robogear, but found them originally under Syberclicks and even “Tehnolog” (yes, misspelled).
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Yeah that was ironically my own typo in spelling Technolog as you’d excpect it to be spelled!
They have several brand that they sell this stuff under, so Syberclicks sounds like it’d be under that umbrella – especially with that spelling! 😉
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Excellent looking buildings mate, understand what you say about extra details lifting them up a bit more, but as you say this way they are very versatile
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That’s really effective! We always need some of that generic, “maybe not showcase material but useful and definitely passable” stuff to pad out table setups. That said, I think you underestimate how good you’ve made them look. Combined with some other scatter – more detailed ruin pieces, rubble piles and the like – they’ll be perfect.
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Yea, I think you’re onto something there. I wasn’t sold on posters, but an attached rubble pile, creeping vines, or other adornments to the walls would work nice. I guess I prefer the more generic look, as multi-use scenery is more practical. Plus the minis stand out even more.
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I think you’ve done a terrific job with these, should look fine on the table top as you say in so many different games.
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Great job. I have some of these, and since there is no plans playing anything in that realm currently, they are sitting in a box. I did chop some up to use for ‘Necromunda wall blocks’ way back when.
The brown though, is sure genius. Adds a bit of warmth and dispels the memory of yet more grey plastic that us hobbyists identify with.
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Great job painting these up and the weathering looks great! Its a bit of a shame there aren’t some bricks or something to give them a bit more texture but ultimately, these will look great on the table and those kind of details tend to get lost at that level anyway so maybe it is just as well.
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Those look great as generic runis- not tempted to add rubble?
Cheers,
Pete.
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They’re cheap models done quick and easy with modularity and playability above all – rubble in the corners (or bases) would look nice, but would also make them harder to stack for storage and make it a bit more tricky to fit some models on close to the walls (especially with GW’s ever-growing base sizes….)
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Love the ruins mate they have come up really well! Oh we bought a house up in the bush yesterday and I retire next week so hopefully my replies will be a bit earlier, having said that all my mates that have retired claim they are always bloody busy!!
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Nice blog 😊
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