Anakin, they're all over me! - A guide to the Separatist starf

[Legostein]

Hello everybody!

After having discussed the capital combat starships of the Separatists fleet earlier in this fine forum, it's now time to shed some light on the starfighter forces of the Separatists. There were several new ships in the new Clone Wars TV series which have been updated very recently, so I'd like to present nine commonly seen starfighters of the Separatist force to you today. We'll start with the summary image, so that you see what's awaiting you.

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Let's do it in chronological order of appearance, thus starting with The Phantom Menace and the brown Vulture Droid Starfighter often also adressed simply as Droid Starfighter or later as Vulture Droid. It was used by the Trade Federation. To get the wing design done appropriately, a standard plate construction would have looked too bulky, and hence I chose the Bionicle tooth piece as wings.

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That's already all for the first episode, and in the second episode, Attack of the Clones, there's the next notable Separatist starfighter, the so-called Geonosian Starfighter or more correctly Nantex-class Territorial Defense Starfighter. It was used in general by the Confederacy of Independant Systems. The model uses two of my favourite pieces, namely the "space nose" and the "3x2 plate with hole".

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Let's continue with the Clone Wars TV series where are bunch of new fighters are introduced. First, the Vuluture Droid got a new colour, the typical blue shade of the Confederacy of Independant Systems. So, this is basically only a colour varioant of the Vuluture Droid from Episode 1.

This isn't that exciting yet, but there soon appeared a new variant called Hyena Droid Bomber, a twin-pod version of the standard Vulture Droid. It's the same principle as with the TIE and TIE Bomber. Having had the standard Vulture Droid with Bionicle Tooth pieces, these had to be used again to be consistent with the former models. It was a bit more difficult, because there were no flat 1x7 Technic liftarms.

Another ship using Bionicle Tooth pieces is the Droch Boarding Ship. It appears in the episode "Rising Malevolence". The design has only very few pieces, but the tooth pieces worked out well, and it even has features. It can grab an escape pod, squeeze it and release it.

Another ship appearing in the Clone Wars TV series, although first introduced in Episode 3 (but hardly seen there) as being released before the TV series, is the so-called Magna Guard Starfighter, or more correctly adressed as Porax-38 Starfighter with full name. This was a very trick craft, especially the wing construction with its flat attached guns was difficult to realize. I used another of my favourite pieces - the chainsaw body - a great possibility to get a very flat studs inversion.

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Let's move on to Revenge of the Sith, where we spot another starfighter already in the beginning battle scene (That's where today's quote is from). It's the Droid Tri-Fighter. This fighter is difficult for several reasons. First, the wings are crescent shaped, and second these are arranged in triangular fashion. The bigger you build this, the easier it is to get the shape. The real challenge comes with small scale. In the end I decided to go with the old 1x4 offset plates. It's probably one of the more ugly models I've built so far, but I still like it for its unusual choice of parts.

The most popular ship from Episode 3 probably is General Grievous' Starfighter, which is a Belbullab-22 Starfighter. It's also a tricky little craft with lots of brackets this time, 1x4 and 1x1 brackets to be more specific. It features all shape grooved and angles giving the craft its typical shape.

The last starfighter of this batch is only less known, as having only few seconds of screen time. It's the Mankvim-814 Light Interceptor, used by the Techno Union and hence often abbreviated Techno Union Starfighter. The little blue craft has an organic look making requiring careful use of slopes and rounded pieces. Although only rarely seen, I'm glad to present it to you here.

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With that I am done for today. I thank you for your time and interest and wish you a great start into the new week!

~ Yours Christopher

Edited January 31, 2010 by KimT

[prateek]

Another great job! It seems you went a little crazy whith your Technic teeth on these ones. My favourites are the Vulture Droids and the Magna Guard Fighter

[the lead general]

That Magna-Guard starfighter is great! It lookes extremely realistic.

[RileyC]

Great work Legostein! My favourite would have to be the droid boarding ship. The teeth really look like the pincers and its cool how you can make it squeeze a escape pod.

[YouKnowMe]

WOW, this is really an amazing job!!

Good Job!

Kudos to you! :p

[Big Cam]

Fantastic mini's, your going to run out of SW ships pretty soon, wonderful job again.

[Commander_Rob]

A nice bunch of Separatist ships, I`d say my favourites are the P-38 and, for some reason the Droch-class boarding craft.

[Legostein]

Hello again!

Thank you for the kind words! And if you're not fed up with Minis already I can take away your concerns of running out of models.

Cheers,

~ Christopher

[KAFX]

Nice work with the chainsaw blade. Good way to flip studs.

[CommanderFox]

You blow me away yet again Legostein

These are Great! I have to say the Vultures are Fantastic! So simple but look Great!

The P-38 is Fantastic aswell, I really like this fighter, and you have done a fine job representing it in Mini form.

Can't wait to see more!

CommanderFox

[JimBee]

Nice work, it's obvious these are built with lots of creativity. My favorites would be the Magnaguard Fighter and the two Vulture droids. But why did you make GG's fighter black?

[Legostein]

Hello!

Thanks again for even more comments! They're highly appreciated and motivating.

Now to answer the colour question about Belbullab-22 fighter: It looked quite dark in the movie, but I agree that new dark gray would probably suit it better. But I am very picky about consistence in the colour scheme, and if one piece works perfectly but doesn't come in the correct colour, I usually go for a slight colour variation instead of destroying the shape. The 1x4 brackets unfortunately don't come in dark gray yet. But as soon as and if they are being released, I will change it to dark gray.

Thanks for the hint!

Cheers,

~ Christopher

[The Legonater]

Nice. This is very similar to my Battle of Coruscant diorama idea. Could you make a Tantitive IV? I tired it once and it looked terrible.