General Vehicle Discussion Thread

[Jayson]

I think that Hasbro's presentation at Toy Fair said those were scheduled for a June release, although that isn't always completely accurate.

Yep, the presentation says June, but EE.com has them for an April release. We'll see if that holds true.

[Jesse James]

We've got a pretty hefty gallery of new images of vehicles from the Clone Wars $20+ assortment...  Head on out to the front page to check them out!

Images include P38 Magna Guard Fighter, Anakin's Clone Wars Fighter, and the new (and seemingly to-scale) Droid Starfighter both walking and flight modes!



I am giddy at the new Droid Fighter...  It looks pretty outstanding, and it's something I'll buy multiple repaints of.  I'd buy camo ones, E1 style paintjobs, Clone Wars paintjobs, ROTS Paintjob...  You name it, and I want it basically.  And it looks to have a very cool walking mode.

The Magna Guard Fighter is growing on my want list too.  I figure two will look very nice... 

For those curious, the Magna Guard Fighter's "p38" designation is an homage to the U.S. World War 2 dual-engine P-38 Lightning Interceptor...  It's got a very similar fuselage to the P-38 from WW2.  It was a plane that saw extensive service in WW2 in all theaters.  I believe it's also the fighter credited with shooting down a transport that was carrying Admiral Yamamoto if I'm not mistaken.

Anakin's Fighter is, of course, a repaint of Obi's Clone Wars Fighter.  I liked that ship, so I'll likely nab Ani's, but I think I'm calling it a day then at that.  Any other repaints of that ship are a no-go for me.

[Brian]

All three of those vehicles do look pretty nice.  I'm sort of starting to run out of room for vehicles, so I'm trying to really weigh each one that is coming out.  I'd like to pick up that Vulture Droid, as it looks pretty nicely done.  The MagnaDroid fighter looks good too, but I may end up passing - we'll see.  Like you Jesse, I really liked Obi-Wan's Delta 2, and I'll likely pick up Anakin's to go alongside it.  After that, I don't know how many repaints I'd buy.  I started to get sucked in with the ROTS starfighter repaints, and now they're all packed away aside from Anakin's (Yellow) and Obi-Wan's (Red).

[jedi_master_sal]

I'm digging the droid starfighter. Maybe 3 for me. Definitely 2 Magnaguard fighters. I'm passing on the Ani Starfighter. I didn't buy the Obi-wan either. (though I may have to rethink this for the both of them, we'll see). I think the gem in this though is the Wedge X-wing. Not only do we get his X-wing, but we finally get an SA X-wing pilot Wedge AND his droid, AND the various ladder!!!

I suspect Hasbro will try to fork us over though and want $60 for the set. I'd really like to see it sold for $40 or less though. Afterall most of those parts are REUSED parts. And there really can't be that much tooling for a ladder accessory.

[David]

Wow! We're getting some great stuff this year in the vehicle line(s)! The Droid Fighter looks incredible! I may even pick up two, which I pretty much never do. I'm still on the fence about the Magna Guard Fighter though, but that background information is pretty neat and I liked it in the film, so we'll see. As for the Anakin starfighter, I'll probably pass on it because I never got around to picking up the Obi-Wan version. They look really nice though so again, we'll see.

Ugh....I'm dreading the release of that Republic tank from Battlefront....yikes. I'm gonna need at least four of those.

[Jesse James]

This is a pic of a P-38 "Lightning" Interceptor just so you can see the plane the Magna Guard Fighter was based on too...  Actually the Magna Guard Fighter was based on a ROTS fighter design that got scrapped, which actually was based on an EU design from the X-Wing series of video games...  which ultimately was based on the real-world P-38. 

The pic of the P-38 there is a 1:18 scale one from 21st Cent. Toys by the way.  They repainted it a lot...  Some have D-Day striping and things.  I got a European Theater deco one but they were really more known for the Pacific.

[David]

Actually the Magna Guard Fighter was based on a ROTS fighter design that got scrapped

I thought it showed up on Utapau?

[Jesse James]

That was where it was intended but I don't think it ever made it in the film...  I'm pretty sure it was a dead design that showed up in source books.

[Keonobi]

Jesse, not to derail the thread, but wasn't the ARC-170 based on an allied light bomber?

[Jesse James]

The ARC-170, physically, reminds me of an Avenger Torpedo Bomber...  That's just physically though.  It's a light bomber/torpedo plane that saw a lot of use in the Pacific.  Also 21st made a 1:18 one of these, their largest plane they ever did IIRC.  I have one, hanging from the ceiling, and it's about the overall size of the new Millenium Falcon if not a bit wider. 

The ARC-170 could also be compared to the German Junkers Stuka Divebomber which was another prominent plane in WW2, especially the earlier years of the war.  Also a 1:18 plane 21st made.

The Avenger plane they made is just insane.  It was $75 originally and kind of uncommon.  Ironically I got mine half off because WM never put them out before Christmas, and just blew them out then.  Very dumb considering how uncommon they were.  Here is one deco of it:



There's a crew of 3 and it came with all 3 figures to boot...  Very cool.  The wings folded for storage on the carrier, and so does the toy.  The torpedo/bomb bay opens and has a removable torpedo...  It's sick, really.

I agree, not to derail the topic, but it is fun to look at the real-world counterpart to the inspiration of many of the ships from Star Wars...  From a customizing standpoint I love to draw parallels between real-world armor/vehicles into Star Wars vehicles.  It's the trademark that, to me, makes Star Wars models unique and interesting.  There was a bit of that lost in the prequals at first that Lucas got back to in the latter films.  E1 lacked it tremendously though, going with more a classic car look...  I didn't care for that as much. 

[Greg]

I loved the Episode 1 stuff... the sleek and shiny designs really appealed to me for some reason. MY favorite vehicle/inspiration is easily the Republic Gunship and the Soviet Hind Helicopter.

[Keonobi]

IIRC wasn't the reason that the EP1 stuff was classic car inspired was because GL grew up in the 50-60s SoCal car culture.  That and weren't there supposed to be some Buck Rogers influences?  Either way, seeing the sometimes subtle, real world inspirations is really cool.  I know I've spent hours paging through the various concept books to see the basis for what was in the movies.

Jesse, I think the P-61 was the basis for the ARC-170.  I was doing some poking around wikipedia, and the fuselage, cockpit, engines.... basically everything but the tail look spot on.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-61_Black_Widow

[Phrubruh]

I agree. This looks more like an ARC-170.

[David]

Jedi Insider has pictures of my new favorite vehicle:

http://jediinsider.net/g/generated/Hasbro/Clone_Wars/Vehicles_03/03__scaled_600.jpg

http://jediinsider.net/g/generated/Hasbro/Clone_Wars/Vehicles_03/04__scaled_600.jpg

(need to cut&paste to get the links to work)

[Ryan]

That looks pretty lame... It needs some serious weathering. I'm almost glad Hasbro has gone away from weathering these new vehicle. It makes them so much easier to pass up.