STRAIGHT OUTTA MICRONIA | Zentraedi Regults

Robotech RPG Tactics

Zentraedi Regult Assembly and Sprue Review

Regult Tactical Battlepod

During the recent holiday weekend I took some time to work on assembling more of my Robotech RPG Tactics models. This post will focus on the assembly of Zentraedi Regult Tactical Battle Pods. Currently I have 36 to assemble plus another twelve if I open the second sealed boxed set.

Deciding on how many Regults to assemble reminds me of when Commander Riker had to decide on how to deal with two Klingon Females.

*****

VEKMA
He's not very attractive, but I will have him.

TACTICS OFFICER
They are inquisitive. They would like to know how you would endure.

RIKER
Endure what?

KLAG
Them.

RIKER
One or both?

*****

The good news is I have assembled 24 Regults so far. I am either two thirds to half way there depending upon how much I want to endure. What follows is complete review of the Regult sprue, assembly process, and some general ideas and tip on how to assemble them.

Sprue Review

Regult Sprue

Front

Rear

Important note: A good pair of smaller cutters compared to larger cutters helps when cutting the smaller pieces from the sprue. I have found when removing small pieces from the sprue it is easier to cut the smaller portion free first then the larger portion to avoid snapping the piece rendering it useless.

Regult Sprue Piece Count

• Dual Light Air Defense Lasers - One piece
• Upper torso - Two pieces
• Side Thrusts - Two pieces
• Dual Heavy Particle Cannons - Two pieces
• Dual Auto-Cannons - Two pieces
• Lower torso - Two Pieces
• Legs - Two pieces
• Feet - Two pieces
• Leaping Swoosh (Optional) - One piece

Excluding Base and Swoosh equals 15 pieces.

Three Regults per sprue equals 45 pieces.

Twelve Regults per boxed set equals 180 pieces.


The piece count isn't to bad, but I avoided cutting everything out at once as I will explain below.

Regult Assembly Review

Some things to remember as you read forward.

• Almost every piece had mold lining to remove.
• Removing mold lines will be the most time consuming process.
• I never felt the need to pin anything in the assembly process.
• I cut out parts in bulk where I could such as torso pieces.
• I kept feet, legs, and cannons on the sprue till I needed them.

Regult Assembly

Now I will go over each part as I would assemble a Regult. If I don't mention it outright almost every piece has mold lining to remove so be aware of this. The mold lines thankfully are not tough to remove, but rather small and numerous over time.

Upper torso
I start with the upper torso first as more than half of the Result's parts attach it. The two pieces of the upper torso fit together nicely.

Lower torso
I follow the upper torso with the lower torso. The two pieces of the lower torso fit together nicely. Some extra hold time is warranted here as a simple nudge can offset the even flush seal of the two pieces which in turn will mess up the next portion.

Combine Upper and lower torsos
The base of the upper torso is where the lower torso attaches. The upper torso portion has a small crevice while the lower torso has a notch. The lower torso notch will fit perfectly in the upper torso crevice when attached. The lower torso will not support any variance from being glued unaligned front of the upper torso to front of the lower torso. The lower curved portion of the upper torso colliding with legs attached to the lower torso prevents this.

If they had made the entire torso section one piece or at least two pieces this would cut some time from the assembly process. I assume the larger piece count is for model accuracy. Even when siding with model accuracy, I noticed a slight imperfection over time when assembling so many Regults.

There is a line above the Rgult's front torso sensor eye. Sometimes this line is parallel with the base and sometimes it is off. This is not a big deal to me, it is just something I noticed over time.

Leaping Swoosh
If the Regult will have a leaping movement pose I add the Leaping Swoosh at this point. I glue the leaping Swoosh at the base to the base itself and the lower torso of the Regult to the top of the Leaping Swoosh. I thought about pinning the Regult to this piece as I had one Regult break off. The Regults themselves are not very heavy at all and I passed the idea. Pinning of any kind actually adds to the total time length so keep this in mind.

Tip: When using the Leaping Swoosh, glue the swoosh as far back on the base as possible to avoid any tilting issue.

Legs and feet
Once the torso has been formed I work on the legs and decide what kind of movement pose the Regult will have. The legs, I feel have the most amount of mold lining to remove.

Important note: The Regult sprue two different style of legs on the sprue.

The legs on the upper right of the sprue are considered standing legs. The standing legs have their own feet. The standing legs feet are on the lower right of the sprue situated furthest right.

The legs on the left of the sprue are considered walking legs with one set to the left and one set to the right. The walking legs have their own feet. The walking legs corresponding feet are on the lower right of the sprue situated furthest left. Between both pairs of walking legs, one toe of the walking legs is molded to touch the ground and one toe of the walking legs is molded to not touch the ground. Use can see then when examining the walking and running poses below.

Important note: The walking legs cannot be attached parallel to each other, they must be placed one after the other.

Important note: When assembling the feet whether using the standing legs and feet or the walking legs and feet, the side of the foot with the larger opening is the front of the foot.

Important note: Feet have an arch to help determine which leg to use, but it is not labeled or very helpful.

Here are some examples of Regult movement poses I have done.

Standing

Walking

Running

Leaping

Leaping and kicking

Base
I attach the Regult to the base to orient footing with pose. I try my best to get the model centered to the front of the base as best as possible. In Robotech RPG Tactics facing is important. The base has an arrow impression to the front and side to orient front facing and determine rear.

All the pieces to this point form the basic chassis of the Regult sprue line. All of the Regult variants use other various amounts of the other pieces listed further. One small detail is the other Regult variants only use standing legs which is probably better as they have more up top to carry.

Side Thrusts
I attach the Side thrusts depending upon Regult pose. These pieces can be rotated and glued to suit the mind of the assembler so they match movement pose.

This is kind of the concept I was going with the side thrusts.

Standing - Horizontal showing standing.
Walking - Horizontal to Ninety degrees to the rear showing adjustment for walking.
Running - Parallel showing adjustment for running.
Leaping - Ninety degree angle showing adjustment for initial leap.
Leaping - Parallel showing adjustment during the leap.
Leaping - Ninety degrees to the front showing adjustment for landing from leap.

The last one might be better with the standing legs instead of the running legs as the Regult pilot would want to broaden his feet for better contact when landing. The walking poses I assembled have their thrusts horizontal so I might make some using the ninety degree angle I mentioned for more variance.

Dual Light Air Defense Lasers
This piece simply attaches with the lasers pointing to the rear. Some of the more advanced designs of Regults do not have this piece which is a vital defense mechanism, but it is replaced as the location serves a a different purpose.

Dual Heavy Particle Cannons
Minor mold lines to remove. I attach the Particle Cannons depending upon Regult pose. Tweezers help here for holding them in place. Super glue with a decent adhesive rate (a couple of seconds) is perfect to get these into position and hold their position.

Dual Auto-Cannons
Minor mold lines and not even near one of the smallest parts you will have to learn to deal with. I attach the Auto-Cannons depending upon Regult pose. Tweezers help here for holding them in place. Super glue with a decent adhesive rate (a couple of seconds) is perfect to get these into position and hold their position.

If you reexamine the examples above you can see how I attached the cannons. They have a lot of room to place them by preference of the assembler. The Particle Cannons end in a sort of oval shape where the smaller Auto-Cannons end in a ball. I tended to point my outward or towards an intended target in front of them.

Thoughts on Personal Preference

When choosing how I would pose my Regults I went with how Regults are purchased in the game. Regults are purchased in squadrons of six, nine, or twelve in core force options and a squadron of six in a support option. You can never purchase less than six Regults at a time. I chose to model my Regults movement poses around this. This choice also makes close formation identity a bit easier when two formations come close together.

Of the 24 assemble Regults so far I have six standing, six walking, six running, and six leaping with two of the six leaping and kicking. I plan to duplicate this by half so I'll have nine Regults in each movement pose. If I open the second box set I can move these figures to twelve in each movement pose. So it begs the question, what does 24 Regults assembled look like?

This is what 24 assembled Regults look like.

Conclusion

The Regult is a cool model and there are a generous amount of them in the boxed set to get a new player going. I have no idea when I will get to painting Robotech in general. They are fighting against other game systems and be honest I'm not breaking my attention from painting my Tyranid army. The best thing going right now for them is to get them all assembled so they are playable. With two boxed sets and Kickstarter extras I have more than enough units to run small and large games for both sides.

I believe I am going to open the second set. I'll probably not get its full value back anyway. It finishes out everything evenly in model count. I can also use the extra command points contained within. Another benefit is I can use it as storage keeping the UEDF forces in one box and the Zenraedi forces in another.

If all works out the whole STRAIGHT OUTTA MICRONIA might just work as a working title for a regular recurring article series. There is not much out there in blog traffic for Robotech RPG Tactics at all. Maybe I can shed some light and help other with the pitfalls i have come across here and there.

Next up will be the Zentraedi Quel-Regult Recon Battlepod.