Building With Landscripts

Landscripts have quickly become one of my favorite builds as of late. As I've stated before, they are a total hybrid of Soren's Conscript and Malcom Craig's Landmate builds, taking the torso structure of the Landmate and using the arms and legs of the Conscript. The build takes, what I feel are, the best features of both builds and meshes them together into a really slick, versatile, simple, and sturdy little frame.

The core of the Landscript

The Conscript is a great frame, solid, and simple. But it lacks some flare, which makes sense since it is supposed to be a converted labor frame. The Landmate, however, has flare to spare, but is pretty part intensive (4 traivs, 2 t-pieces, tiles and wedges, etc) and wont stand on it's own unless everything is positioned just right. I also feel that the arms on the Landmate are fairly limiting, while the legs are actually very versatile, but can have weak connections unless all the pieces have a nice, snug fit. The Landscript takes that simplicity and solid feel of the Conscript and adds the flare and style of the Landmate.

This is the core of the build. It's pretty much identical to the center torso of the Landmate (which can be seen here) with the exception of the tile clip facing forward in front to hold the lampholder for the hips and the from panel of the torso. Then, after taking and attaching the arms and legs directly from the Conscript, the only thing left to add is a couple of clip plates to the droid torso to help fill out things and cover the small gap between the cheese wedge and the jumper on the front of the frame.



The other really nice thing about this build is how customizable it is. There are tons of places to add clips and such to nearly anywhere on the build. I mean just look at all these possible hardpoints. Even beyond this you can replace the bricks on the legs or arms with a studded 1x1 to add more places to put equipment. Needless to say, you have options.

Update: Dukayn has been awesome enough to put together some PDF Instructions for the Landscript. Thanks Duke!

Building the XF-21b Anaconda

Thanks to Wordman over on the Mobile Frame Hanger Forums, there is now a lovely little Ldraw file and pdf building instructions for the Serpent Legion's newest prototype. He has also been putting together a number of other files for builds on the forums. Make sure you go check them out!

Building the XF-13b Grand Naga

First off, I'd like to apologize for the inactivity here over the past week or so. A combination of work and starting the process of buying a new home took up my time for a bit. With that, I'm going to be starting a new thing over here. Instead of just giving you a single breakdown shot of some of my builds, I'm going to be putting together a detailed breakdown with some setting fluff on their origins and current use. We'll start things off with the XF-13b Grand Naga.


After the riots on Quall, the Union became increasingly concerned with engagements dealing with close quarters urban environments. The Serpent Legion made finding a weapons platform to fit within that situation a high priority because their pilots were being deployed in similar situations with increasing frequency. The Skunkworks began designing a mobile frame from the ground up to give Legion pilots an edge. The result was the Grand Naga.

The first of my "cheats" for this build.

First things first. There are two "cheats" in this build that involve disfiguring some parts. Purists may scoff. But hey, I think it looks sweet, so I'm going to do it. Also, this is a very travis brick heavy build. There's 12 of them if you include the one in the shotgun, so don't be surprised if you start running low after building a few of these.

Let's begin the build with the legs. This is where my first "cheat" comes in. As you can see I've cut one of the tires to wrap it around the rear travis brick, with the radar dishes on the side creating the illusion that the tire goes into the back of the heel of the foot. That travis brick connects to a headlight, and then another travis, creating the foot. The ankle is one of the sturdiest connections you'll find while maintaining a good amount of flexibility. The only downside is there is no horizontal movement.

Next, the torso. As you can see, the central core of this is from Squieu's brilliant mini-frame. The motor piece (#4595) at the center is a wonderful place to start for torsos due to the large amount of studs hanging off it and the fact that it is also a very common piece in my experience. Three more travis bricks make an appearance here as well as some plates, cheese slopes, and tiles to complete the look.

This section of the frame is also very, very solid. There is little to no wiggle anywhere and the only piece that feels like it may fall off in any means is the 1x2 hinge piece on the crotch.

The legs attach by plugging the taps into the travis brick at the bottom of the torso.

Next we move to the arms. The tire technique here is something I use quite frequently due to the fact that I absolutely love how the matte, rubberized black breaks up the look of the frame beautifully, while adding a rounded aesthetic that is rather hard to achieve with standard brick usage. The arm attaches to the tap via a 1x1 plate w/ ring. This technique is something I've used a number of times with frames like the MkII Meerkat.

 It's a sightlier fragile connection without being too flimsy, although it gives you a lot of options for posing the arms. That plate is attached to a headilght piece and a travis brick (bringing the count to 11 with both arms at this point). Then come the standard issue weapons. We have a Molecular Blade and a Tactical Shotgun (which can be seen in more detail here). The shotgun contains the 12th travis brick of the build and could easily be used as a grenade launcher or really any number of other weapons.

The second cheat.

Bringing it all together gives you a near complete Grand Naga. There is just one more piece missing, the top. This is where the second cheat comes in. It involves cutting the ring off of a 1x1 plate w/ring and placing them into the top of the motor piece of the torso. If you're against destroying a couple of pieces, you could use 1/4 pins, although the connection isn't anywhere near as solid, and there is a bit more of a gap between the torso and the top slope. Now you have a completed Grand Naga!

The XF-13b Grand Naga is currently in the field testing stage with the Black Adders, commanded by Captain Uri Reed on Orion 6. So far, they have been invaluable tools in subduing and eliminating the  Free Colonist Terrorist movement on the planet's surface. Assuming continued excellent performance, these Nagas may be seen on the field in standard production within the coming year.

The ST-09 Iguana

Here's the rundown on my latest addition to the Serpent Legion's war assets. I built this guy using the core of a Squieu Mini-Frame and and the torso is inspired by Malcom Craig's Lansen. I've been keeping with my tire kick by working them into the guns on the arms. 

The ST-09 Iguana

Stats

Twin Heavy Autocannons 2d6+d8 Rd

Linked Anti-Infantry Machine Guns 2d6Rh

Composite Armor Plating 1d6B

And here's a breakdown.

Underneath the Hood: Special Edition the X13b

So as many of you have seen, one of my more recent creations is the X13b-Grand Naga (Seen Here). I've finally taken one apart and took some shots of the barebones frame so that all you wonderful MFZ fanatics out there can try your hand at building one of your own (or your own kickass variant). So here ya go! If you do something with this, please let me know. I'd love to see it!

Under the Hood Pt.2

The second installment of "Under the Hood" has a few more frames to have some fun with.

Mini-Frame by Sqeuieu

This is my favorite frame at the moment. Nearly every piece on the thing can be expanded, changed out, or used for some detailing. It's poseable, looks sweet, and is sturdy to boot.

Sqeuieu has some cool variations in his brickshelf gallery, and (please excuse the self-promotion) I've got a few designs as well. The only real downside to this frame that I can see is that it requires 7 of those four stud 1x1 bricks, which are some of the pricier pieces to buy in large amounts. There is an LDraw file of this guy available on Divnull as well.

Hi-Leg by Joshua AC Newman

These guys are pretty sweet. A very well built and unique frame compared to most of the other guys around. I love the reverse legs and all the potential the torso has. Here's a variation by Jed September that I absolutely love, and here's a company of hi-leg badboys with a commisar by Soren. Aaaaaaand here's the breakdown shot of the torso for all you would be Hi-leggers.

WRH-102 Warhorse by triple_ought

While this one is quite new, I really love how it has the feel of a commisar on steroids. Triple-ought has a few variants as well as a breakdown shot of his build. I can't wait to see what the rest of the community does with this guy.

Under the Hood pt.1

Much like how car companies take someone else's parts and slap a new body over it, a lot of the custom builds that have shown up have someone else's core designs under the hood. Here's a quick rundown of some of those core designs.

The Chub - By Soren

The Chub is by far one of the most popular and most mod-able frames out there at the moment. If you were to strip it down to it's bare essentials it's got lots of space to build off of, looks great, and is pretty damn pose-able too.

Ironsnpier has a wonderful variant here.

Joshua Newman has a killer reskin here as well.

The Conscript/Commisar - By Soren (again)

Both the Conscript and Commisar are very similar builds and you probably wouldn't even notice the difference between the two at first (I know I didn't). It's another sleek looking frame from Soren with a lot of modding potential. Those arm or leg pieces can easily be swapped out with studded bricks and the backpack potential is near unlimited. You can get the LDraw file over at Dinvull.

Dr Watsman has done quite a bit with this design as seen here, here, here, and here.

MgN-302/303 Series - By Malcom Craig

An older, but very versatile frame originally designed for Mechaton. It may not be as pretty as some of Soren's stuff, but oh man this guy is a modder's dream.

Jed September has countless variations of this guy as well as a few breakdown shots, this one is by far my favorite.

You can also get the LDraw file for this one over at Dinvull.

More still to come!