Re: DS2/SG2 Camouflage

On Tue, 24 Feb 1998, Brian Burger wrote:

> One pet peeve I have w/ a lot of SF combat - fiction and games - is
the
> lack of attention paid to camo - I mean, bright red APCs with silver
> thingies on the sides? Just paint TARGET on your armour and be done
with
> it, ok? Even David Drake is guilty of this - his Hammer's Slammers
have
> _metallic_ finishes on their armour...My point is this: In nearly any
> enviroment, regardless of tech level, there will be _some_ point were
the
> old Mk. 1 eyeball is being used for detection and targetting. If $100
of
> paint will save a $1,000,000 tank, who _isn't_ going to paint the damn
> thing?

Really depends on the background.  For example, I do about half my
wargaming in the Battletech universe.  Because most BattleMech pilots
survive a 'kill,' knowing who knocked you out of the fight has a certain
psychological component to you.  Thus bright, easily identifiable paint
schemes are fairly common.  Same thing goes for elite units and units
which fight on honor principles.  On top of that, because of the
mobility
of the force and the potential to drop anywhere on a planet, you can't
be
guaranteed your battleground of choice.

But 'Mech combat does use a visual component, so less renown units and
planetary militias often do use appropriate camo patterns.  Also, since
mobile armor is fairly fragile when compared to 'Mechs, armor units also
use camo quite a bit. 

I rarely paint in camo just because I don't get much out of painting
camo. 
Painting is half the enjoyment I get out of the hobby.	When I do use
camo, it's often in garish colors.  For example, I'm starting to paint a
bunch of units for an alien DSII army.	It's based around the anti-grav
tanks from Renegade Legion and the old EE Eldar plastic tanks.	I'm
basing
the color schemes around tropical fish schemes.  Clownfish and similar
schemes will be fairly standard (white base with bright orange
splotching
with black lines at the transition point).  Pink, purples, yellows and
light blues will dominate.  Sure, it's hardly realistic but it will
catch
the eye when it's finished.

A temporally displaced		Bill Nitsche (bnitsche@u.washington.edu)
	hobbit			Oceanography, University of Washington