Ground Zero Games makes a well fleshed out 15mm line of Colonial Defense Force troops including heavy weapons and both helmeted and soft capped versions of most sculpts. Lightly armored and armed with basic weapons these will fill the role of backwater or reserve troops fantastically.
The line includes the standard packs of riflemen, SAWs, snipers and shoulder fired rockets, command and coms, and several heavy weapons with generic crews that could be swapped into any of the other heavy weapons GZG makes. There are also figures with smaller assault weapons and shotguns, suitable for close quarters combat, horse mounted scouts, and a motorcycle mounted trooper.
Like most of GZG’s sculpts these troops include a great deal of detail for 15mm figures. The support weapons are a little chunky at points, with the relocating sniper rifleman looking particularly awkward. Several of the shoulder/armor pads are thick but mostly look good. Most are a hair under 18mm if standing fully upright.
The standard rifleman pack includes four poses, with two of each per pack as is usual with Ground Zero Games 15mm lines. Three poses are standing or advancing, with one kneeling and no prone poses.
The coms and command pack includes two officer poses pointing, one coms specialist kneeling, and one observer with binoculars that could serve as just about anything.
The SAW gunner pack includes two firing poses, one advancing, and one prone pose.
The light support weapons pack includes two snipers, one prone and one advancing, and two shoulder fired rocket poses with one kneeling and firing. The advancing sniper can easily be confused with a riflemen at first glance until you notice the oversize rifle.
The soft cap and helmeted versions of all poses are only head swaps unfortunately. while not a big deal for most packs, I would have preferred a second set of poses for the riflemen. There is a second set of riflemen armed with shotguns and assault weapons but it’s a shame to use these as simple riflemen instead of a specialized troop.
I picked out a simple painting scheme of dark basecoats, with washes and highlights adding most of the contrast. All troops are mounted on 20mm galvanized washers with the rims painted black for riflemen, light grey for support weapons, and red for command or specialists.
Base coat: Army Painter Army Green. Drybrush: Army Painter Combat Fatigues
Armor/helmet: Vallejo USA Olive Drab 70.889. Drybrush: Vallejo English Uniform 70.921
Pouches/Webbing: Vallejo German Fieldgrey WWII 70.830 Drybrush: Army Painter Uniform Grey
Boots/Camera: Black
Weapons: Ceramcoat Charcoal. Drybrush: Army Painter Uniform Grey
Rainponcho: Army Painter Skeleton Bone, Vallejo German Camo Bright Green 70.833, German Camo Med Brown 70.826. No highlights.
Skin tones are a mix of Vallejo skin tones with a wash of 1:1 Vallejo Skin Wash 72.093/Army Painter Flesh Wash.
All non-skin areas are given a wash with my custom black ink wash after basecoating.
