# What is the model scale for 25mm/28mm?



## thedungeondelver (Mar 16, 2011)

Hey all...

I've got a real conundrum here.

I'm trying to get some models together for an upcoming *TWILIGHT:2000* game - specifically some inexpensive military models of tanks and APCs and the like.  All of the minis I can find for characters and NPCs are in the 25mm-28mm range.  Most wargamers like their stuff a lot more exact than the typical fantasy gaming crowd.  That is, for example, Reaper minis are classified as "heroic 28mm" which means that they're anywhere from 25mm-35mm, so essentially stuff from Black Scorpion, The Assault Group and Empress are all going to be really correct.

I have what is supposedly a 1/72 scale papercraft LAV-25 (which if you're curious is an eight-wheeled amphibious armored personnel carrier [Light Armored Vehicle] that mounts a 25mm autocannon), but the 28mm minis I have are gargantuan next to it!  To wit: I have one that stands straight up, flatfooted, so if I consider that with helmet in boots he's 6'6" three of him are equal to the length of the LAV cutout...when it should be closer to four (as the LAV is 21 feet long).

I've heard that 1/72 is 20mm, but others say that 1/72 is _25_mm, then another friend who IS a wargamer says that 1/48 is closer to 25mm/28mm!

Which is it?  Or what is it?


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## Jeff Wilder (Mar 16, 2011)

28mm represents approximately 1.8 meters (height of a tall man, about 6'3").  1800mm / 28mm equals about 1/64th scale.

What it is exactly, in modelers' terms, I don't know, sorry.  In practice, as long as you're somewhere close to 1/64th scale, your model will work fine.


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## El Mahdi (Mar 16, 2011)

1/72 scale equates to 1" for 6'. 25mm equals .984" (closer to 1" than 26mm.  1" = 25.4mm). So 25mm figures are 1/72 scale.


26mm = 1.023", 28mm = 1.102", 30mm = 1.18"


1/48 equates to 1.5" for 6', or about 38mm


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## thedungeondelver (Mar 16, 2011)

Well, I'd rather go a little small than way too big, so 1/72 it is.  Thanks guys.


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## David Howery (Mar 16, 2011)

here's a chart I found in a modeling magazine umpteen years ago...


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## Storminator (Mar 16, 2011)

In model railroad terms, that's S scale. Somewhere between 1:76 and 1:64, depending on the mini manufacturer's idiosyncrasies.

PS


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## El Mahdi (Mar 16, 2011)

For extra info, here's a list of different scales and equivalent mm/foot for each. (...from good old Wikipedia)

List of scale model sizes - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


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## adwyn (Mar 16, 2011)

Scale creep and creative differences between manufacturers make nailing down an exact scale difficult, but 1/64 works for older 25mm models while more modern 28mm lines are often called 1/56 now days. 

Because of availability of models many gamers use 1/50 and 1/48th models and for the same reason zombie games often feature rather large 1/43 scale cars. To complicate things many die cast models are made to fit in the box and thus do not match the nominal scale.

Also, if you are using a paper model try resizing it before printing it out .


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## Gilladian (Mar 17, 2011)

Wayyyyyy back when (mid 70'sish), I understood 25mm scale to represent 6', or the height of a tall human. 

I would say that now the 28 mm figures are using that measure as closer to 5' than 6'. They're all terribly oversized, and I just CAN'T bring myself to mix modern minis with my old ones. When the "dwarf" and "halfling" minis are the same height as the previous humans, there's just something wrong!


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## Stormonu (Mar 17, 2011)

One of these days, I'm going to run a Twilight 2000 game at 1/16th scale with the 3 1/2" GI Joe figures.


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## Patryn of Elvenshae (Mar 17, 2011)

Stormonu said:


> One of these days, I'm going to run a Twilight 2000 game at 1/16th scale with the 3 1/2" GI Joe figures.




The guy whose house we play at ran an attack on a German-held Italian villa with the _old_-scale G.I. Joes at several conventions, and picked up a couple awards for it.

I never got to play in it, but the pictures are pretty sweet.


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## CharlesRyan (Mar 17, 2011)

I've run a lot of post-apocalyptic games, and have a large collection of vehicles and whatnot.

In my experience, while 1/72 is technically accurate for 25mm, it doesn't look or work right on the gaming table. 25mm-28mm minis take up a lot more space than they technically should, especially when you take the base into consideration (the base is usually about 5 ft across at scale, and adds a foot to the minis' height).

I find that 1/48 tends to work a lot better. You can also find loads of cheap die-cast toy cars commonly at 1/43, and they work great as well.

The larger the vehicle, the closer you want it to "actual" size. A small car at 1/72 would look ridiculously small next to 25mm/28mm minis, but it's less pronounced for a semi or a helicopter.

Mongoose made a prepainted modern warfare minis game a few years ago that included a lot of vehicles; maybe you can find some on eBay or whatever. They're nice, but they're a good example of what I'm talking about--they look stupidly small on the gaming table, even though they're exactly to scale.


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## NewJeffCT (Mar 17, 2011)

Gilladian said:


> Wayyyyyy back when (mid 70'sish), I understood 25mm scale to represent 6', or the height of a tall human.
> 
> I would say that now the 28 mm figures are using that measure as closer to 5' than 6'. They're all terribly oversized, and I just CAN'T bring myself to mix modern minis with my old ones. When the "dwarf" and "halfling" minis are the same height as the previous humans, there's just something wrong!




True - my old Ral Partha miniatures look puny next to modern Reaper and Warhammer stuff.  Heck, my old Warhammer stuff looks smaller than my new Warhammer stuff (I have the infamous old WH goblin giving the middle finger, and it is decidedly smaller than my newer goblins from the folks at Warhammer)

However, scale is not just old vs new.  The Gravetouched Ghoul D&D miniature looks gigantic next to the Ghast D&D miniature, even though the ghast is supposed to be more powerful/elite than a mere ghoul.  The ghast looks like a preteen boy before becoming undead, while the ghoul looks like an NBA power forward by comparison.


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## Jeff Wilder (Mar 17, 2011)

NewJeffCT said:


> However, scale is not just old vs new.  The Gravetouched Ghoul D&D miniature looks gigantic next to the Ghast D&D miniature, even though the ghast is supposed to be more powerful/elite than a mere ghoul.



Size creep in DDM was a source of great frustration to many of us who collected from the beginning.  It was partially a function of design, partially a function of the larger degree of unpredictability in mold contraction and expansion, partially a function of sculptor preferences, partially a function of method (e.g., the later CAD minis tended to be significantly larger in all dimensions), and (IMO) partially a matter of carelessness.


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## thedungeondelver (Mar 18, 2011)

I decided to go with 1:72 since this is *TWILIGHT:2000* and not sweat it that much.  1:48 models are way, way expensive for what I want to do and there won't be that much vehicle combat anyway.

I may pick up a couple of *ITALIARI* Soviet kits since there's damn few papercraft 1:72 kits for stuff like BTR-80s, MT-LBs and BDRMs (or T-series tanks for that matter).

Ultimately I think it will be fine.


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## CoreyHaim8myDog (Mar 24, 2011)

Stormonu said:


> One of these days, I'm going to run a Twilight 2000 game at 1/16th scale with the 3 1/2" GI Joe figures.




And I will play that game, sir.


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## Kadmon (Jan 22, 2020)

For Twilight:2000 I'd also recommend 1:72 miniatures, especially as there are plenty of new insurgent and terrorist sets that can be used for ragtag militias, and both the figures and the vehicles are cheaper than others. It's also easy to find scenery for that scale.
1:16 is also useful if you already own the action figures, or if you can be satisfied with cheap Chinese ones. Those minis are easier to customise, and you can put any kind of weapons in their hands. With 1:16 my problem was with creating bases for the miniatues that will hold them, and also, I used old casette cases, books and such for scenery, but there were some players who felt the non-realistic terrain causes problems for their immersion, but and storing scale model terrain is problematic for me.


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