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The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

matduggan.com

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Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#71

Post by sdenton4 »

1313ed01 wrote: post #16

I don't know Warhammer that well, but I see a lot of 3D printing for historical wargames. Seems popular for naval wargames for instance, but I saw many printed tanks as well. Not so much small scale infantry perhaps. There are so many very specific models that can be needed for historical scenarios that mass-production can't provide everything. Some companies of course print models on demand now, but others sell STL…

I'm in historicals! And I mess around with 3d printers!

The big difference in the historical wargame space is that there's no way to trademark Alexander the Great. Anyone can make the minis, whether it's a small-but-awesome company (Victrix! Wargames Atlantic!) or a dude with a 3d printer. As a result, there's some separation between people who write rules (which you can buy as books or PDFs) and people who make minis. The people making minis actually compete on price and quality, and we get fsck'ing awesome minis for ludicrously low prices as a result. Victrix is often $1-$2 per mini, often about a tenth of the price of GW.

I use an fdm printer for terrain, which is a complete game changer. It has none of the problems of resin, and you want big stuff for terrain and care a bit less about layer lines. It's awesome.

The only problem is that only a small corner of the miniatures wargame world plays historicals. :)

(So feel free to ping me if you're in sf/East Bay and want to roll dice sometime.)

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#72

Post by paradox460 »

chr15m wrote: post #24
iroddis wrote: post #8

This was a great read, and perfectly conveyed the combination of passion and anger of every WH player I’ve ever met has had. Given the time, it’s hard not to view this same argument through the lens of AI. People who love crafting their creative works will still do it, even when AI can do it. They will still inspire others because they demonstrate what humans can do, and what we can aspire to.

Great point. Also, nobody would go to a cafe where the coffee comes from a fully automated machine instead of a barista.

There are several robot cafes in major cities across the world

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#73

Post by foobarian »

The opening remarks before getting into the 3D printing itself, are a bit of criticism of over-optimistic tech predictions. It made me pause and wonder, why do those show up so much? I think it's because they have been right a lot during the exponential part of the silicon S-curve, and it feels like there is a bit of left-over cargo-cult behavior echoing from those times.

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#74

Post by pitched »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #62
bdcravens wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once you get a 3d printer, you do tend to find many uses for them for things you could easily buy (organizing bins and the like) but I don't think anyone is buying them with this in mind.

100% agree I built a four-poster bed, and 3D printed the fittings for the curtain rails and the attachment point for the fan. I built a desk, and 3D printed the entire shelving system for it. I designed and 3D printed an entire range of boardgaming accessories (storage bins, dice towers, meeples, etc) I only bought the thing as something to do while in COVID lockdown. But it's been really useful.

I see it as the most important home maintenance tool. Saves hundreds per year on little things that break. Like a wall patch, small o-ring for a toy, drawer slide mount, basement light mount, etc. I will say though that the learning curve is a bit rough if you don’t have CAD experience.

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#75

Post by paradox460 »

ndr42 wrote: post #7

A least the 3D printers today are great to print terrain, ruins and so on as a base for painting and decorating.

You can even print rather large terrain pieces that use a smattering of filament. Low percentage lightning until and 2 walls, and you can basically spit out blobs as big as your printer can handle without much waste

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#76

Post by paradox460 »

WheatMillington wrote: post #66
amelius wrote: post #12

A 3D printer can't even print a DVD case, with the transparent insert thing. There's a long way to go.

That's a weirdly specific requirement though... 3D Printing can also print shapes and objects that aren't possible with traditional manufacturing techniques. Not every process can be used for every object.

I've made a number of outdoor enclosures for electronics projects on my 3D printer. One of the killer features is that you can make vents that take curved paths through the walls of an enclosure. This, when done properly, can prevent most water ingress flawlessly, but allow a surprisingly large amount of airflow

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#78

Post by Fomite »

Great essay.

I posted my thoughts on this checks notes five years ago, but it's largely in the same place: https://variancehammer.com/2020/08/06/3d-printing-and-the-ho...

There are places where 3d printing has revolutionized the wargaming hobby. Terrain is one of them, and the biggest one I think. And there's games like Trench Crusade that got their launch via being 3d printable, allowing them the critical mass to get to plastic production.

But at the end of the day, if something is in plastic, I'm buying it in plastic. And I am disappointed by the amount of energy and talent not going into creating new things but...Legally Distinct Space Marines, often sculpted with no notion of actually ever being painted (way over-detailed, etc.)

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#79

Post by aragilar »

nancyminusone wrote: post #53

I'm part mechanical engineer and I 3D print things on a near daily basis. My job would be a lot slower and more cumbersome without it. Mind you this is all FDM. I only played with resin printers briefly, and not only do they produce extremely brittle and off-dimenension parts, they are extremely messy and use chemicals that you really should think twice or three times or four times about having under the same roof as…

I think there's a distinction between printing existing 40K/other commercial wargame pieces, vs custom pieces for RPGs, scenery and so forth. My in-person D&D games had lots of custom items (including minis of our characters) which were 3D printed, and resin was only used for detailed prints, with FDM used to provide much of the underlying structure.

Re: The year of the 3D printed miniature and other lies we tell ourselves

#80

Post by aragilar »

chr15m wrote: post #24
iroddis wrote: post #8

This was a great read, and perfectly conveyed the combination of passion and anger of every WH player I’ve ever met has had. Given the time, it’s hard not to view this same argument through the lens of AI. People who love crafting their creative works will still do it, even when AI can do it. They will still inspire others because they demonstrate what humans can do, and what we can aspire to.

Great point. Also, nobody would go to a cafe where the coffee comes from a fully automated machine instead of a barista.

Or you could just buy a machine and learn to make coffee?
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