Discrepencies in Scale: Battlesuits

[Dlatrex]

Hey gang. Now I know none of the cool kids obsess over these details, but I have noticed in the promotional work for the Tau that the concept art for the Battlesuits (and more particularly the Riptide) does not line up with the scales used for the table top:



Now I know that most say that the tanks are under-scaled relative to the average footsoldier, but this looks like the opposite. It seems odd that they would inflate the size of an already gigantic suit compared with the reference material. Does anyone know if there is a written reference to how many meters tall the Riptide is supposed to stand? The drawings show head height of around 5m, but the model seems closer to 6.5m.

[Nabterayl]

I'm not aware of any official numbers, but I do see what you're pointing out. Very interesting - perhaps the art significantly predates the final production model?

[lattd]

I cannot see much difference in the scale except for the riptide or am i missing something it may be where I cant see the picture on the left that well.

[Dlatrex]

I cannot see much difference in the scale except for the riptide or am i missing something it may be where I cant see the picture on the left that well.

I was mostly interested in the big boy, so that is where I focused the question

The other Mechs do vary in height a little compared to their plastic counterparts. Counter intuitively the silhouettes are shown to be *larger* than the models for the XV8, and the XV88. The scaling for the stealth suit however is spot on.

[DarkLink]

It's also a little skewed. The fire warrior in the sketch is standing straight up, the model is slightly crouched. The riptide model's feet are not lined up with the sketch riptide. I suspect if you rescaled the photo and adjusted the line placement, the difference in size would be negligible.

[Dlatrex]

It's also a little skewed. The fire warrior in the sketch is standing straight up, the model is slightly crouched. The riptide model's feet are not lined up with the sketch riptide. I suspect if you rescaled the photo and adjusted the line placement, the difference in size would be negligible.

The modeled Riptide is also 'crouching' with a greater fraction of it's height truncated than the Firewarrior, so that effect should be minimal. But it is still a valid critique! So for completeness sake:



Even giving the fire-warrior a pretty large margin to stand up, we still have greater than a 20% discrepancy in head-height of the Riptide. Interestingly, the head height closely matches the reference "total height". Perhaps the modeler was told to scale it to 5m tall, and assumed that was head-height instead of maximum height?

[DarkLink]

The modeled riptide isn't crouching, really. That's just how the legs are shaped. Also, the difference to the top of the jet pack is a lot less than 20%. Anyways, my point is, nitpicking minor discrepancies between not just two different artist's representations, but across two very different mediums, is kind of silly.

[Nabterayl]

Anyways, my point is, nitpicking minor discrepancies between not just two different artist's representations, but across two very different mediums, is kind of silly.

The cool kids really DON'T obsess over these details!

[lattd]

The model does seen to have a bulkier body as well but that may just be where it's in 3D

[Anggul]

Most 40k models aren't scaled to the art, it wouldn't be anything new.