Requesting Assistance

[Cliffy B]

I've had this little dio in the making sitting around for some time now and I want to finish it for this GB but I'm out of ideas.

Here's where it sits right now.


Its a small one.  Base is only 6" x 9" and the dio area is 4" x 7".  I wanted something small and fast so I could use this little LCI I got in a set of a landing craft from Niko.  Right now I have her converted into a gunboat variant with some single 40mms to be added, hence the gun tub and built up tub abaft the pilothouse.  The strip you see on the hull and pilothouse is supposed to represent additional armor added in the field.  The LCI is the Royal Navy Variant with the short pilothouse.  The USN raised it a deck so currently I'm working this as either an RN or a USN field conversion of an LCI that was damaged and turned into a gunboat.

My original idea was basically to depict a rescue mission with the LCI carrying some commandos, steaming to save the crew of a downed plane.  It would be sailing by a small section of jungle with the crashed plane along the coast and a beached Japanese landing craft indicating that they beat them to it and they need to hurry up.  LCI would be in one of the USN green dazzle schemes.

Another option is to use the two little RN LCTs (think big enough for one small tank or jeep) and/or the RN LCT(4) that came with the kit to depict some sort of small coastal convoy in the Med with the gunboat acting as an E-Boat/Schnellboote escort.  All craft would be in RN landing craft camo, IE blue and white.

The built up white square abaft the pilothouse was originally supposed to be for a single 40mm but I neglected to measure the gun before building and the gun is just too big to fit inside.  I'm contemplating either ripping it off and building a tub like the one sitting next to it or covering it over and saying its some sort of extra radio/spy equipment room.  Thoughts?

Here's the kit from Niko.  Pardon their incorrect kit title, they are Polish and have some translation issues at times.
http://www.nikomodel.pl/index.php/en/resin-kits/ships-en/scale-1-700-en/item/wwii-us-loading-craft-lct-lci-2xlcm



I'm trying to keep the story and the build simple, partially so I can finish it soon and partially to avoid my tendency to constantly make things as complicated as possible and then lose interest in them.

Feel free to propose some other scenarios.

Any and all help is appreciated as always,
-Mike

[Old Wombat]

I like the rescue mission idea, Cliffy.

You may want to consider partially sinking the Japanese landing craft (don't want those 40mm's to be wasted when there's a threat sitting ashore) &, maybe, increase the coastline a bit & have the partially submerged plane sitting just off the beach to give the context to the dio (perhaps a transport, to give the suggestion that there is some brass that needs rescuing?).

:)

Guy

[Tophe]

I am not expert at all about ships and I cannot help, sorry, while... one sentence of yours stroke me:

I'm trying to keep the story and the build simple, partially so I can finish it soon and partially to avoid my tendency to constantly make things as complicated as possible and then lose interest in them.

I almost stopped modelling for the same reason, being unable to make solid the pleasant dreams I had made. As far as I am concerned, I found 2 ways to cure this:
- turn to computer drawings, far more easy to "build" and correct infinitely
- decrease my perfection requirements about building: the joy to have one finished compensates for the feeling of "less-gorgeous-than expected"...

[Cliffy B]

I hear you guys.  I'm thinking now something a little more simple.  I had an idea of something more Apocalypse Now but in the South Pacific.  Picture the LCI steaming slowly along a small coastline through a field of debris and sunken barges/small craft and maybe a wrecked plane ashore.  One of those eerie, what the heck just happened kind of encounters.  If only I could model fog in 1/700... 

Thoughts?

[Buzzbomb]

Waterworld Post Apocalyptic perhaps ?

[Old Wombat]

I was thinking one (1) Japanese barge/landing craft, rather than a bunch of them. After all, you don't need that many troops to hunt & capture an aircraft crew.

For the aircraft I was thinking something along the lines of either a C-47/DC-3, or (modified) Mitchell bomber (which, I seem to recall, having also been used to transport military staff officers & civilian VIP's).

No smoke/fog in my thought processes, except, maybe, a bit from the Japanese barge/landing craft.

:)

Guy