ADHD Gaming

Necron Tomb Stalker WIP

2012-02-22T22:23:00.000-07:00

So I finally got this thing built. I have been extremely busy with school, so I managed to get it done over three days, which isn't too bad in my opinion. It is a large amount of parts, most of which are poseable beyond belief, and getting every single leg (which is at least two parts per) in place was some what of a nightmare. However, now that it is done, I appreciate the option to do that. I built this guy crawling over a dragon skull, and the model for the skull actually allows me to hook the legs into certain cracks and whatnot, so he is actually hanging almost sideways on parts of it. The model isn't even glued on at the moment, it just rests there. Anyways, a couple more pictures below, and some more info on what else I have been up to.

So without further adieu, here you go.

I really like how this is coming out, and once it gets painted and glued on to the base, I will be adding a bit more snow around the legs and in certain other areas. I'm going to really cement a few of the legs on to the base with glue, and having snow lets me cover up the nasty look from that fairly easy.

As for painting this, I plan on priming it silver, just like all my other Necron toys, and then working on each armor plate by hand, and finishing with the good ol' air brush. It shouldn't be too bad, and when I bust out the air brush I am going to do some warriors that I have built and sitting here all silvery and whatnot.

I also have worked slightly on my Warmachine models, but not too much, so I didn't bother taking pictures. Mostly just some small details and what have you. I'll throw those pictures up as I get them done, but that won't be after payday since I need to buy bases for them from Secret Weapon Miniatures any ways.

Anyways, I am off to my night class on Microsoft Excel (yay me...FMCL), so I will catch all you interweb peoples another time!

Update: I just made some snow drifts on the base out of green stuff in spots where it won't affect the placement of the model, so after that dries I will put on a second layer of snow to cover those up. After that dries, I plan on making a much thinner mix using water effect instead of PVA and coating the whole snow area with it, since I saw pictures which makes it look more snow like I guess you could say. I'll also put the mix along the edges of the snow where it meets the actual open base, so it won't look like the snow just abruptly ends, haha. I'll throw pictures of the base up once I finish with it all. I'll hopefully have the whole thing done some time this weekend, so keep on checking back in the mean time.

Some WIP's!!!

2012-02-16T13:03:00.000-07:00

So I haven't posted in a good while now, but I have been very busy since I just started school up again, and I am taking accelerated 5 week courses instead of traditional semesters since my GI Bill only covers 36 months of school, regardless how much I finish. 5 week courses means that I do as much homework in one week as most people do in 3-4 weeks. Not fun. However, I have managed to get some stuff done for the hobby! The picture above is the base I made for my Necron Tomb Stalker that I have yet to even clean...but at least the base is assembled! It's made using two different Secret Weapon Miniatures products, their Dragon Skull and a 95mm x 120mm oval base from their Desert Mesa line of bases. As I have said before, I absolutely LOVE the products Mr. Justin puts out. High quality and cheap prices are always a winner in my opinion. Anyways, I am all over the place with my WIP's at the moment, so check out below!

So after watching Brandon Palmers video, The 7 Day Army Painter, I wanted to try weathering using Liquid Latex. Seemed easy enough and I liked how his stuff came out. So I busted out my Death Guard models, brushed the dust off, and got to work! I first base coated them all a dark brown with the ol' airbrush, and then sponged on Vallejo's Orange Brown to simulate rusting. After that, I varnished the models fairly heavily, and I then sponged on some Latex Rubber from Woodland Scenics, which is essentially the same thing he was using and also all that I could find. The stuff is white, and dries clear and very fast. It smells horrible however, like Ammonia soaked in cat piss and more Ammonia. After that, I air bushed a base green armor color over the models, then I airbrushed a lighter green over everything except the recesses, and finally an even lighter green on the raised surfaces that would naturally be hit by light. Then the fun part! I used tweezers (which took some practice to not grab too hard and rip off the undercoat as well) and peeled the latex right off! It pulled off the green paint, and chipped off small amounts of the surrounding paint as well, leaving a natural look to the paint chipping that I really liked. I would suggest using large amounts of the Latex, at least vertically, so that you can see it once you paint over it. Otherwise you'll have to strain your eyes looking for non-smooth surfaces along the model that is hopefully latex covered in paint and not just a shitty paint job... But anyways, after that, I laid down my base color for rust where I wanted complete coverage on the nurgle models, and that's about as far as I have got at the moment on them. So take a look!

I really like how that chainsword came out, since there are tiny little dots of the rust undercoat showing through and now just a few giant spots surrounded by clean spots.

Another project I have started on is some Warmachine models! I picked up a Cygnar starter kit from my FLGS, an decided to do something like my Death Guard theme on them, only with slightly less rust and puss. I used a slightly lighter set of greens for their armor, followed by a wash of Thraka Green and a watered down wash of Devlan mud once the green dried. I plan to base them using Secret Weapons Blasted Wetlands hollow bases, as well as there Wetlands Instant Scenery kit. I like the idea of having them ankle deep in water in a swamp, as that will lend some credibility to them being so rusty. Fluff, I likes it! So here is where I stand on this bad mother truckers.

I still have a ways to go with them, but I like the direction I am heading. I thought about going with the regular blue paint scheme, but I like to add my own touch to my models. I don't really like the whole "paint by numbers" feel of replicating somebody elses work.

As for my Necrons, I haven't forgotten them either, as I had the "pleasure" of putting together a box of Warriors last week. I'm not sure if it's the molds or just the batch I received, but I have never got plastic models with so much flash on them in my life. It took me literally 4 hours to get them put together because every single piece had to be completely trimmed and then cleaned with liquid green stuff. I was angry. Very angry in fact. But at least I have one box now assembled and primed, so I'm on my way.

So nothing fancy there yet, haha. But anyways, I won my first game in my FLGS's escalation league, mostly due to the fact that we rolled on the scenario chart and got an objectives match, and my opponent only brought one troop choice...which he then charged straight into my gun line of Tesla's. One turn of shooting essentially won me the game. Anyways, I need to clean while my son is taking his nap, so this is it for now and stay tuned for more stuff as I get it knocked out!

A how to! Destroyers done quickly.

2012-02-03T16:40:00.002-07:00

So today I was bored and I decided to finally do a How To on how I paint my Necrons. I made some last minute changes to my 500 point list, so I needed 2 Destroyers painted in a hurry, and I had 3 built already, so the last guy got lucky and I painted him anyways. Check below for the multitude of pictures I took during the process!

Okay, to start, here are the paints I used, with the exception of The Army Painters Platemail Metal, which is what I primer my Necrons with. I follow that with a healthy wash of GW's Badab Black, and then the fun starts.

These are the colors I use for my Necrons. The metallic on the left is what I use to touch up anywhere on the metal I screw up, since it is a darker silver it usually blends well enough with the post-washed silver I prime with. The metallic is Reaper, with the others being Vallejo.

Here is what I had done before taking the pictures. I painted all the armor on the Destroyers with the Burnt Cad. Red, and I primered the rods black. I primer and paint the first color on these separately to ensure that they get fully colored and no green plastic shows through, and to also ensure that it is distinctly separate from the gun, because the other layers of paint might fill the gap.

Next I loaded my airbrush with the Clear Orange. I painted the rods, with nothing special being done there, and then moved onto the models themselves. I use this color as the "glow" from all the hot spots on the model like eyes, crests, vents, etc. This color is applied rather liberally around these spots, focusing on a soft over spray around them and not as much on the actual parts themselves. For things like the eyes and cables, you need to be careful and be realistic with the over spray - eyes aren't going to glow for like 10 feet. Just apply locally.

After that it's time to glue the rods in. I just put the spot that gets cut from the sprue directly against the model, so that there are no unpainted spots on there. Now with those in place, it's time to move on to the next color.

Now I load the gun up with Light Orange, and all you do here is spray inside of the areas where you did the "glow". This is going to be more of the direct glow from whatever part you're painting. You want it to be closer to the spot itself, and ensure that you leave plenty of the darker color on the outside. For the cables, I try to color only the top parts, leaving the bottom, sides, etc, the darker color. For the rods, make sure to leave the edges of them the darker color, and throw some over spray lightly around the edges of the rod to create the "glow" there.

For my next color I jump straight to the Light Yellow. This is used for all the highlights. It should be used rather sparingly compared to the other colors. I don't touch the eyes with this, and I barely touch the crests on the chests. The rods should only be slightly sprayed in the center, and do the same with all cables. If done right, you should have a decent enough fade. The trick to doing this right is using a light spray from you gun and use barely any on the edges while progressively doing several layers as I get closer to the center. It's not hard, but may require some practice before hand.

After that all is left is some small amounts of brush work. I use Light Yellow straight from the dropper and barely dot the eyes, paint the symbol on the crest, and LIGHTLY dry brush the vents on the back of the gun so that it looks like they are the parts generating the light back there.

Now you just base to your preference. These guys are being doing some what hastily by me, so I went very basic with the basing, using some black basing material with snow on top. To do the snow, I first mix PVA glue with a bit of white paint, about 1 part paint to every 8 parts glue. This ensures that if you somehow have a spot of glue with no snow on it, it still looks white and not that translucent grey. I then mix in about an equal part of snow, and then apply this to wherever I need to on the base. After that, I dip the entire base into my container of snow to add that little bit of fluff and not the "I just applied this with a blunt object" look to it.

All said and done, this took me about 3 hours, MAYBE, and that's including eating food, trolling Facebook, and making more coffee. It's a fairly simple process, that is easily done, and can be replicated with just about any color combination.

Anyways, I am hopefully going to get a game in this weekend, as my league started Wednesday, but it is snowing like a beast here in Colorado so we'll see. Thanks for reading and feel free to leave and bitches, gripes, and complaints below!

First Ghost Ark complete-ish...

2012-02-01T15:14:00.000-07:00

So with exception to the prow, which I somehow didn't even notice till I was editing the photos, this model is done! It took a little longer than I would have liked, mostly due to me breaking a nozzle for my airbrush, rushing it in for extra money, and then losing the new nozzle down the drain later that night while cleaning, but oh well. Also, this has to have been my least favorite model to put together. Satan designed this model. It looks great, but damn is it a pain. Even the driver is in like 300 pieces...his hips are separate from his legs and torso... Anyways, check below for more pictures (YAY!).

So here we go. I did the same airbrush technique that I used on the command barge, but this is a lot smoother of a gradient due to the fact that I have a better grasp of how to use an airbrush and how to properly thin paints for said airbrush. Here we go with pictures now:

The only thing I didn't enjoy with this was painting it in so many pieces. With how I airbrush a lot of it, I had to keep it in about 30+ pieces while I painted it...not fun. Putting models together always sucks more after they're painted because not matter how hard I try, I always get paint on spots where the model connects, meaning I have to carefully clean those spots with a knife to make them fit properly. Anyways, I have three more of these to paint, so woe is me. But after that, I am done with this model. Then I just have 100+ more models to paint for this army...not to mention my Thousand Sons...and my Death Guard...and my Vampire Counts...FML. My work is never done. But I guess that's the tale of those of us who are obsessed with the hobby. I doubt any of us will ever be truly done. We'll either quit, or die. Or our wives will kill us for spending too much. Just me?

Deathmarks!?!?!?!?

2012-01-24T08:08:00.001-07:00

So after screwing around with these guys for the last week, and not wanting to paint due to the fact that I have been sick and in bed most of the time, these guys are finally done. I wanted to go with a more subdued color to them, since I have a hard time putting bright colors to anything along the lines of a sniper (damn you military training). I like the black base, not just because it will stand out from my army and provide a nice contrast, but also because it really makes glow effects off the lights and what not pop out more. I tried doing a hard highlight with a dark red along the black, but I don't have any brushes that have their tip anymore, so it didn't come out pretty, haha. I did order a whole new set of brushes though, which was long over due, so that might force me to go back and highlight everything. Anyways, check below for more pictures as usual.

Yup, so there you go. Like I said, fairly subdued colors. The only critique I could throw on myself right off the bat is the reds I used. I think if I do more I am going to get a fourth red in as the final, something brighter and along the lines of a pink almost. While the gradient looks good in person (just trust me on this one, haha), I think that it can be better.

Anyways, I ordered the rest of my Necron army over the weekend. I don't need to buy anything else now until the second wave comes out, and then it is like 100 Nightsycthes and at least 3000 Triarch Stalkers. I also contemplated buying two more Tomb Stalkers, but at that price for a model I'll rarely be able to use, I'm going to wait to see how my first one turns out before I commit to that.

I also decided to hold on Fantasy for a bit longer as well. It would cost a lot of money for me to jump on in, and with these Necrons needing to be painted for my league, and my Thousand Sons glaring at me in anger, I don't need more on my plate right now. Plus that money can go to much better things, like new tires for my car. Or money to take the wifey on a real date. You know, things that will prevent me from getting killed.

I think up next will be the three Destroyers I have built. I don't intend to use them for a while, but they are just sitting there, and they shouldn't be too hard to paint either. Plus, it will let me try my hand and airbrushing the green rods. I'm not sure if I want to paint them on the sprue or throw them in and paint them, but I'll find out soon enough.

Anyways, I'm hoping to get more things knocked out here this week, and I had a very unproductive week last week, but no promises. I'm still feeling sick, so I only manage to get stuff done between doses of Mucinex and NyQuil.

Necron army so far...

2012-01-16T11:47:00.000-07:00

So, here is what I have painted so far. It totals up to 15 Immortals with Tesla's, 5 Lychguards with Hyperphase Swords and Dispersion fields, a Overlord with Staff of Light and Res Orb, and a Command Barge with Tesla as well. Once I get my 5 Deathmarks put together, I will have my 500 point list for the league painted up, which will allow me some free time to paint other things. Check below for a closer picture of the lord...

So yeah, here he is. A few things:

There are holes in this model EVERYWHERE. This latest batch of Finecast I got over Christmas is hands down the worst I have seen. I have two Flayed Ones with parts of their legs missing from giant bubbles, this lord had bubbles all over, including a missing eye which became quite noticeable as I went to paint it and realised he was missing it (the left one as you look at it...), and Imotekh has bubbles all over his body as well. I filled what I saw with liquid green stuff, but it's not easy to catch everyone, or even impossible to resculpt legs (not impossible exactly, but I'll be damned if I do it). I've been meaning to call GW about it, and from what I hear their customer service is top notch once you get them on the phone, so I hope this gets fixed.

Anyways, talking with my wife, she agrees with my assessment that the shoulders on all of the models, as well as the red headdress parts of the Lychguard and Lord, need something. They are single color red, and stand out painfully. So I decided that since I need to paint squad markings anyways for the league to score extra points on painting, I'm going to paint some on the shoulders of just about everyone. They will be simple geometric shapes, like a single line, or parallel lines, etc, and I am not 100% sure of the color yet, but I am leaning towards white, gold, silver, and maybe a yellow/orange. It would be a different color for every FOC slot, most likely with gold for HQ's, silver for Elites, white for Troops, and who knows what for Fast Attack and Heavy choices. I think that it will help break up the solids though on the model, which will look great in the end.

Anyways, my list of things to paint is rather large still:

5x Deathmarks
5x Immortals
3x Destroyers
24x Warriors
1x Imotekh
1x Lord with Warcsythe and Res Orb
1x Command Barge
2x Ghost Ark
1x Monolith

I'll be getting 3 more Barges, which will be built as Annihilation Barges, as well as a few more Ghost Arks, lots more Warriors (and I guess scarabs too, huh?), and whatever comes with this fabled second wave. I also have another box of Praetorians/Lychguard that I am not sure what I am going to do with, but I am leaning to converting 5 Cryptechs, since I have having 5 models that look exactly the same and cost a fortune (looking at you, Finecast...you're on my shit list for the time being) is not what I consider ideal.

Also, I painted the Obelisk that I won from the great buys over at Santa Cruz Warhammer finally! It's made by Mr. Justin and his crew at Secret Weapon Miniatures, and I liked it so much I plan on buying a few more for whenever I decide to make a display board for these Necrons! Thanks again for the awesome piece guys, and also for the last few weeks of love on your weekly Honor Roll. Enough blabbering though, here is the picture!

As for my fun models, I have been considering dabbling in Fantasy, since I love how some of the new Vampire Counts models look, and I think it would help break the monotony that will eventually settle in with painting so many damn Necrons, haha. I just have no idea how to play, so building a list is a pain in the ass when you're shooting in the dark, and it's a very new codex so there isn't many proven net lists out there yet. We'll see though, since I don't have much time to screw around with it anyways, but it's on my radar for the time being.

Anyways, I like how this army is coming along, and it's the first army in a very long time that I have actually felt motivated to paint. I think I will be truly satisfied once I figure out how I am going to break up the solids, but until then I can live with where they are all at. We'll see how my gaming goes this week, because if it starts going south I may need to tweak my list a bit and paint a whole new batch of models! Yay me. Until then, feel free to comment with any suggestions, criticisms, cool stories where you find five dollars or get shot in the knee, etc.

Fancy Necron shields!!!!!

2012-01-11T11:08:00.001-07:00

So I decided that I needed some Lychguards to paint. The shields just called out to me to play with. So, after several hours of putting on masking tape, airbrushing, taking off masking tape, and repeating too many times, this is how they came out. I am happy. A kind of happy that could only be equalled by a leaked PDF of 6th edition magically appearing on the Internet. Oh, what's that you say? One did appear? YAY MAGIC! (though not the card game....grrrrr, magic the gathering) Anyways, check below for more pictures of individual dudesmen!

So yeah, I really like how those shields came out. While being tedious beyond belief, it wasn't really hard to do. I'm really liking these Necrons now, so I ordered a Tomb Stalker from Forge World! That will be pretty sweet to paint, but now I have to struggle over how to paint it....FML. I think I have a fairly good idea in my mind and what not, but we'll see.

On to other news, my auction ends tomorrow night! This is a GREAT deal considering the starting bid is almost half the cost of everything, not including the AMAZING paint job. I'm hoping somebody buys it, since I kinda really need the money. If not, I guess I can always just work the corner like my wife tells me to. It's cold though, and I don't like strangers.

Anyways, enough of that nonsense. Up next for me is two more 5 man Immortal squads and a Destroyer! Nothing too fancy probably, but I do what to try some cool kid stuff with the green rods for the Destroyer, so we'll see how that goes. Until next time, zip it up, and zip it out!

First squad done (I think...)

2012-01-09T08:51:00.001-07:00

So here is the first squad of Immortals. In fact, I was thinking this morning that this is actually the first whole squad I have painted in a VERY long time. I usually paint up my big models and special characters, and then look at my squads and get frustrated just thinking about all the repetition that will be involved. Not this time though!

So yeah, I am actually enjoying painting these Necrons, so I have been thinking about playing Necrons in my escalation league that starts in 3 weeks. It hasn't started yet so switching armies is still cool. We'll see though.

Next up is some HQ's for the army! I have several built in various stages and primed, so now I need to figure out what I intend to do. For the scaled cloaks, I want to do something cool, but I am unsure as to what. So I might spend some time this morning using the Googles to see what's out there.

Anyways, I'll post more pictures as I take them, but seeing as 3 of the 5 light bulbs from my light are dead, I need to get more before I can take better pictures. Yay me. I hate spending money these days on anything but models, but it's all I ever seem to do >.< Damn you real life issues!

Sad to sell this army, amazing deal though for you!

2012-01-07T19:54:00.001-07:00

So I hate to have to post this, but some things have gone crazy in my life and I am in a pinch for money. So that means that the army I won from Heroes of Armageddon is up for sale! I sold my Menoth and Tyranid armies today as well, and if this thing sells I'll be good I think. But my loss is your gain here. The auction can be found at:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280803032326

The starting bid is about $800 below what the costs of everything is, even before the paint jobs, so that is a steal. The buy it now price is about exactly what the costs of everything included is, again, without the paint jobs. So basically it's a great looking, mostly painted Ork horde army at cost! Saves you all the time of painting all of those Boyz.

Anyways, I'm off to watch a movie with my son, so happy bidding and let everyone know about this auction so I can sell it!

Another Necron test model!!!!

2012-01-06T16:05:00.000-07:00

So here is the test model I knock out this morning for my Immortals. This will be the general theme for all my infantry, with different variations for the different types of course. I need to figure out squad markings still, as well as clean up the silver after my lazy ass washes it, haha. All said and done though, it's a fairly easy paint job that I won't lose my mind repeating several hundred times (okay, not that many, but still, quite a few times). Anyways, here is the other four from the box, built in two pieces to paint it easier, since I did air brush both sides of the gun.

I should be able to finish these by Sunday, since tomorrow I will be pre-occupied with my FLGS's annual auction! I'm selling off three 40k armies and my Warmachine goodies, so hopefully I can then get new models for the three armies I am keeping for 40k.

In other news, I joined a Combat Patrol league last night for 40k that is based off of the rules put out for Adepticon this year. Basically it's just 400 point games, 1 Troop choice required, everything else is optional. You can get one of each other slot in the FOC, with an extra "swing" slot that lets you take a second choice from any slot of your choice, though at 400 points I don't know what you're looking to double down on. Should be "fun," but at least it gets me out of the house and meeting new gamers in my area. I'll be playing my Necrons for this one.

In other news, my store is also holding a Dreadnought Bash, in which you build and paint something comparable to a Dread that is under 120 points (Dreads, Wraithlords, Sentinels, Talos', etc), and on the third night of the event you do some sort of arena style Dreadnought combat. Should be fun. I'm either going with a Talos or one of my Death Guard Dreads I have yet to paint. We'll see whats up next week.

Anyways, I am off to pick up my spawn from the daytime child prison I send him to in the mornings, so until next time, I'm Ron Burgandy?

Inquisitors and Thousand Sons???

2012-01-04T15:00:00.000-07:00

So as the post says, I now have two Inquisitors in my force. With the league I will be playing in, the first games are 500 points and you cannot have named characters or anything with a 2+ save until the points rise to 1000 points. That means my absolute only choice was one of the generic Inquisitor types. So, instead of buying two of the ugly GW ones, or waiting a long while for two of the AWESOME forge world ones, I build two from bits I had laying around. They look very different from the rest of the force (as they should), and the big problem then presented itself on how to paint them, or even how to justify them in my Pre-Heresy Thousand Sons army...FML. More below the break!

So, the best I could come up with is that they are Custodes attached to watch over the Thousand Sons after the trials at Nikaea. I wish I would have thought of this sooner, as I would have bought two models from Scibor that look the part much better. But oh well, with the league starting in roughly three weeks, it would easily have taken that long just to get them. So I went with the gold paint scheme, which I am not 100% a fan of because I don't like shiny metals being everywhere. I think it worked in the end, however. I also saw an amazingly easy video on how to do the NMM for the Grey Knight Force Weapons, so I figured I would give that a go, and I loveeeeeee the results. So, without more blabbering, here are the results.

I think that if I ever do it again, I'm not going to settle with just dry brushing successively brighter layers of gold on, but instead take the long way (sigh) and paint it on correctly. I don't really care for these models, however, so I rushed them. Not going to lie. Also, I need to make the white spots on the NMM weapons smaller, with more emphasis being put on the middle blues. Anyways, now all I have to do is paint the rest of the 500 point force and I am free and clear to pain my Necrons until February! (And there was much rejoicing) Yay...

I'll leave you all with my 500 point list, so feel free to knit pick it or slander it all you want!

Ordo Malleus Inquisitor - Bolt Pistol, Power Sword, Power Armor, Servo Skull - 46 pts

Ordo Malleus Inquisitor - Bolt Pistol, Power Sword, Power Armor - 43 pts

Grey Knight Strike Squad - 5 guys, DH, Psycannon - 120 pts

Grey Knight Strike Squad - 5 guys, DH, Psycannon - 120 pts

Grey Knight Interceptor Squad - 5 guys, DH, Psycannon, Psybolt Ammunition 170 pts

Total: 17 models, 3 DH, 3 Psycannon, 499/500 points

Now, there are some obvious things people would say I should take, however, there are more limitations than just the 2+ armor save thing.

For the 500 point games the following guidelines and restrictions will apply:
- All armies must have a minimum 1 HQ and 1 Troop;

- No 2+ armor saves;

- No characters with 4+ wounds;

- No Special Characters;

- No vehicles with a combined (4 sides) armor value of 43 or more;

- No more than one each Elite, Fast Attack and/or Heavy Support.

So those are the restrictions. I think I did pretty well with this list given the constraints. I either deploy in a bubble or walk on first turn, depending on the army I play, and then I use the GKIS as a mobile fire platform to flank my opponent. The Inquisitors are great 3 wound models for their price, though I may drop one to give both of the GKSS's Psybolt Ammunition. I don't see the need as much though in 500 points, especially since there will be very little armor on the table, if any at all. I'll need to make use of cover as best as possible, since I have no vehicles this first round. Basically I'll just be moving into a good firing position and then beating down my opponent. Hope it works. I already have my 1000 point list for the next round made, and I'll post that as it gets closer to that time, to ensure I have time to tweak it as needed.

If you have any bitches, gripes, or complaints...er, I mean comments, feel free to leave them!

Command Barge finished and Thousand Sons update

2011-12-31T21:07:00.001-07:00

So as this picture shows, I finished the model (not including the Overlord, obviously). I cleaned up the actual Necrons, airbrushed some half-assed object source lighting on them (first attempt at such a thing, needs work, but not too shabby for about 1 minute of work total), and then based the model in my snow theme. As I haven't worked with model snow before, I kept it rather simple, no rocks or anything other than the dark grey basing material under the snow itself. Check below for more pics and other delightful tidbits of information!

So here are more angels that better show how the base came out:

Like I imagined, I like how the base contrasts the bright oranges of the model without detracting from it. Should look very good replicated across the entire force. I would like to work on more of the models I have, but those are getting put on the back burner already in favor of my Thousand Sons that I have neglected for some time.

My FLGS is starting up an escalation league the first week of February, so I decided to hop into that madness. One of the stipulations is that you can never have played with the model you are using, and they have to start unpainted, as you will be required to have the army painted by the end of every two week cycle. It starts at 500 points, and increases at a rate of 500 points every two weeks, so it shouldn't be too bad. Since I started my Thousand Sons a million years ago (or so it feels), I felt that I needed to get them done for all of your viewing pleasure! Plus painting 500 points of counts as Grey Knights is a lot easier than Necrons. I also already have all the Grey Knights kits I need, so less money spent. Anyways, it should be fun, and I'm looking forward to actually making progress with this army once again. With that being said, I started putting together the rest of my terminators for the Scarab Occult last night, since I finally got the legs in at the end of last week. Those legs only took me since the end of October to acquire! Anyways, here are pictures of what I got accomplished in my spare time:

Finally got all of the Purifiers primered. I went with white since the red will show up nice and bright on it when I air brush them this week. I also sprayed the Purgation squad, but they were still drying so I didn't mess with them to take a picture. Here are the Terminators, however. I still have 5 left to do, but these are coming along nicely!

These with the other ones I had already done will bring me up to 18 Paladins, with 2 special characters in Terminator armor as well! I have 5 more legs in the event that I need more, since it took me so long to get the legs in the first place. These will hopefully get primered and painted very soon as well, but the priority is going to whatever 500 point list I write up for the first period of the league. At 500 points, it will most likely be a small list considering I have no IG models of any kind, so I'm going to have to min max out what I can.

That all being said, I am now off to drink Champagne with the wife, and eat all sorts of goodies we cooked up as we watch movies and bring in the new year like an alcoholic old couple...Happy New Year everyone!

Necron test model turned out snazzy!

2011-12-23T12:13:00.000-07:00

So yes, I haven't posted in a while, but I have plenty of excuses:

I have been busy with taking finals. 5 classes for a Computer Engineering degree is not easy, and in fact, is very time consuming.
Star Wars: The Old Republic came out, and my friends decided that I should run our guild. Our name is <Death Star Glee Club>, and we're on Kinrath Spider. If you haven't had a chance to play the game, then you probably still have a life.
The holidays! Christmas shopping, wrapping presents, lots of parties and "get togethers". And booze. Lots of it.
My dog ate my homework? I dunno.

So there we have it, my bullshit list of excuses! However, I did jump into the world of airbrushing (well, for something other than base coating that is), and this is what turned up. This will be the color scheme of my Necrons, whenever I get around to them. After the holidays, it's crunch time on the Thousand Sons, so the metal bad asses will have to wait >.< Anyways, as usual, more pictures below!

So yes, I need to work on the actual Necrons themselves a bit. The overlord isn't even built in fact, since I don't know what I intend to do with him. I also need to go back over areas where the wash pooled on the model. You can see it mostly on their arms. It's pretty terribad to be honest. But oh well. All said and done, I ended up using 2 shades of red to base coats, and 5 shades of orange for the detail work. The "fluff" I am building for these guys is that way back in the day, they were on a newly formed volcanic planet. Hence the colors. But now for the twist!!!!! Since their millions years sleep (or however long it's been, doesn't matter), the planet has slowly drifted away from the stars habitable zone, so it has slowly become an ice world! (TWIST! TWIST!) So that being said, I am going to be doing snow bases for them. I think that the bright white bases, with dark soil, will contrast the models themselves in a nice way so that the bases are noticed, yet don't detract from the models themselves. Plus I haven't had a real go at using snow effect before, so it should be "fun."

Anyways, we'll see how Christmas fares for me, so until then, may your holidays be bright, and you games pathetically easy!

I love winning things on the internet, and you could too!

2011-12-13T08:26:00.000-07:00

So, thanks to Santa Cruz Warhammer, I have again won something on the Internet! This time I managed to snag a new Archeo-Tech Obelisk from the guys over at Secret Weapon Miniatures (who as many may know, I already love). Mr. Justin makes an excellent product, and he gives all current and prior military veterans a 10% discount, so I stand behind their product 110% !!! "But how do I win cool prizes on the Internet?" You may ask. Well, check out below to find out!

So, as I posted prior, there is a charity going on, Blood Ravens Army Project, and I think that they need A LOT more help with donations from the blogosphere. It's being raffled off in a similar manner to how the Heroes of Armageddon armies were, which simply is that for every x amount of dollars you donate, you get x amount of tickets! "But what if I don't win this awesome army?" you ask me. Well, you just did your good deed for the week and Santa is watching! This raffle is going to Child's Play (not the movie), which is a great charity that helps out sick and needy kids. You don't hate sick and needy kids, do you? I doubt it. I also highly doubt that many of you out there would hate to win a awesome looking army! So please, donate this holiday season. I have donated $80 so far, and even if I don't win, I still feel good helping others. As of me writing this post they have only raised $674, and I honestly think that's a damn shame. As our GW proves with their yearly price hikes, we as gamers have a larger disposable income than most (somehow...). Do something good with it this time!

Just to show you what's up for grabs, here is a picture of the Sternguard models that just got painted up for the army:

They look pretty great to me, honestly.

Thousand Sons update!

2011-12-11T22:17:00.001-07:00

So I got my heads in over the week, finally (now if only my FLGS would get in the rest of the legs...grrrr. Week 6 and counting). They look pretty good, and I am planning on using the different head styles that I got to differentiate between squad types. Pictured above is what I chose for Librarians and/or special characters. Haven't decided yet. I like the head though. Check out below for more pictures of the different heads in use, as well as my Caestus with a little more paint on it.

So here we go:

Here is my Purgation Squad's Justicar. I like how it makes him look a little bulkier and slower, which I picture all my heavy support options as, haha. This is what I plan to use on all my Purgation Justicars from now on.

Here is my Purifier Knight of the Flame. The head is very interesting, and I like the sleek design of it. Same as above, all three of my Purifier Knight of the Flames have it.

And an example of what the regular heads look like. This head will be used on every body that isn't a squad upgrade, except guys in Terminator armor. I got 40 of these heads, so I have a few to play around with still after this, though I will probably need more.

I have 20 Forge World Mark IV Armour sets coming in (20 total, not 20 sets of 5), and I am thinking about whether I want to use them as Interceptors or as GKSS. Everyone should let me know what they think :)

That's what they look like.

Anyways, I also managed to slap some more paint on my Caestus, so here's where it stands now:

So that is shaping up. I still need to do metallics on the engines and center, as well as more Ivory on the fronts of the wings, before I can even start weathering this thing, but even with just this it looks A LOT better than it did with just an all red coat on it. This thing is kinda on the back burner since I got the heads in, but it is a nice break from painting power armour, so I expect to work on it more as I start painting the rest of the army. After they get painted, I then have to paint the resin bases and then switch them over, which is TONS of fun, but probably a while out so oh well. Anyways, I am off to bed, so catch you all later.

So, yeah...

2011-12-08T14:22:00.001-07:00

I have been deathly ill and in bed since Monday, so I apologize for not getting anything at all done. Hopefully, this picture of a scratch built Venom strapped with 2 M-80's makes up for it. This was my going away gift when I moved from Kentucky. The owner of my FLGS knew that the owner of this model and I weren't on "speaking terms," and he left this model at the store and never came back, so he let me blow it up! Anyways, I received the heads for all of my regular Thousand Sons models in the mail from Poland earlier this week, and while they look AMAZING, I haven't had the energy to put them on. Something about sleeping 20+ hours a day and taking IV's of NyQuil will do that to you. However, I am feeling somewhat better, so after I catch back up on my house, which is now dirty since I usually clean it while my wife works 9-12 hour days, and after I make a guild website for my friends WoW guild, I will put those heads on and take pictures! Hopefully the special "Egyptian" themed sci-fi heads will come in from Kromlech some time soon, considering it's been almost a month now. Also, I have my Necron Command Barge put together in 12 pieces and primed, so hopefully I can airbrush that sexy monster quickly and get pictures of it up here as well. Until then though, I'm going to drown this flu.

Sunday Hangovers...

2011-12-04T15:28:00.001-07:00

So this is basically all I actually got done this weekend...FML. I was busy yesterday with a birthday celebration for my wife's friend. It was going to be at a bowling alley, so I thought it wouldn't be that crazy, except it turned out that the bowling alley was on the third floor of a nightclub. Needless to say, I got drunk. Very drunk in fact. Now I have no motivation to do any modeling or painting today. I just want ice cold water. But here is how the water effect came out with the darker color over the lighter one. Kind of a cool effect, but not one I will probably mimic on the other two. I don't know how I really feel about it yet to be honest.

Here's another shot of it. Like I said, I'm not sold on it entirely. As for other news, the only things I have left to buy for my Thousand Sons army are all expensive Forge World things (damn you FW with your awesome Heresy Land Raiders), and at 85 Pounds per model, my family will not be buying me any for Christmas. So, with nothing else on my mind, I asked them to get me anything Necron! I don't know if I will be playing Necrons any time soon, but I do LOVE the new models, and I want to try out a few paint schemes with them. I just don't know what those paints schemes are yet. Minor details, however. With that in mind, I bought the new Necron Codex, as well as Imotekh and a Command Barge, so I'll see what I think. It'll give me something to do when I get burned out on my Thousand Sons (which won't happen until I get the heads in from Poland and my FLGS remembers to place my god damn order for the legs I have needed for 5 weeks now...but I digress).

Until then, however, I am going to nurse my headache and play with my two new cats I got my son for Christmas! They are pretty awesome, and I get much entertainment from watching them go banana sandwich on my dogs, who as it turns out, are complete cowards.

Blight Drone done and the table continues!

2011-12-01T21:54:00.001-07:00

So the water effect has almost finished drying now, and I'm pretty sure I used a shade or two too bright...FML. Oh well, it works, and I have two more to mess with. I'll get it right next time...I think. Anyways, I got my airbrush parts in today, as well as all the terrain kits I ordered off of the eBay! It's actually a lot more terrain than I thought it would be, so this should be "fun." Anyways, as always, check below for more of the "good stuff."

Another side shot of the beastie. I like the idea of the sludge, I just need to use a some what darker color when I mix the water effect next time. Probably use only 1 drop of paint as well, instead of the three I put in without even thinking. As I was saying, however, I got my airbrush parts in today, so I managed to base coat my Caestus!

I really love airbrushing...saves me time and gets a nice, thin, bright coat in less than 15 minutes. I'm thinking about painting this thing this weekend, but I am behind schedule on the table so I might just focus on that while I'm not at the bars. I managed to get one building built today, as well as a little tower, and I have a TON of extra pieces for rubble piles to fill the building as well as the sections of missing wall. I ended up with 6 Manufactorum kits, so I built a large Factory of sorts. The main doors are 6.5 inches wide, which works out because a Land Raider is about 6 inches wide including the weapons on the side. Since it was such a large piece, I made the sides mirror opposites so that no player would have an advantage with the building based of their deployment zones. Enough chatter though, on to the pictures!

As you can see, it's pretty barren inside. That will be fixed with rubble and oil drums, but not to the point where a Land Raider is unable to get through.

This is my little tower. I'm planning on making a second and having one in each deployment zone. They will most likely be in opposite corners so that each player can either get one or none if the deployment ends up being quarters.

Here is another angle on that building that gives you a sense of how empty it is at the moment. This table will be great though for infantry based armies. Lots of higher spots to shoot from, limited tank mobility, LoS is broken across the table pretty well to where you can still see a lot of things, but cover saves are going to be almost expected. This obviously won't be a tournament table, unless it's a Beerhammer tournament.

I'll leave you with this small picture, which shows just how many wall pieces I had to work with, all from my Manufactorum kits alone! That doesn't even cover the 4 each of the other two kits I bought. Anyways, it's time for me to head back into the Diablo III beta, so take care and keep watching!

Chaos WIP!!!

2011-11-29T20:15:00.001-07:00

So I continued work on one of my three Blight Drones...after it's been sitting idle since July or so. I have the body mostly done now, just need to work on the base, as well as the flying stand, both of which will have my water effect ooze that I used on the Demon Prince of Nurgle I did. Should be pretty snazzy when I am done. There was a tirade by me originally as well, but that has been removed because I feel petty for posting it. Sorry for anyone who read it, that was somewhat out of character for me. I may have been drinking....heavily. Anyways, check out below and whatnot.

So here are two more shots of the model. This should get you a little hyped up for tonight's fight! I used my rust base paint, which is burnt umber oil paint, black and brown ink, and orange rust pigment, and then I used three different color rust powders to achieve Father Nurgle's approval on the rusting of the metals. I like how it looks so far.

Here is a sexy side shot. It's like Wargaming side-boob for people who have a Nurgle fetish...yeah, that good.

Here is an example of the skin. The skin was first done usually three successively lighter shades of olive, the first being a full blown base coat, then a heavy dry brush of the middle tone, with a light dry brush of a brighter olive. Then I used some Leviathan Purple wash on all the bruised flesh, which is the parts that are stretched or have metal bits coming out of them. After that I painted all the open wounds a dark purple in the recesses, with a dark red on the side walls, and a bright red dry brush of the raise surfaces of the wounds. Then they all got a light Baal Red wash just along the outsides and insides of the wounds. After that I used Gryphonne Sepia wash along ALL of the skin, to dirty it up, and then on to the rest of the wonderful details like the metal rings and the cables. As I continue this model, I promise to put more up!

Thanks for reading, and with my airbrush parts arriving in a few days, I'll hopefully have some super cool projects show up instead of filler models! Take care.

Aaargh2D2 and some charity info!

2011-11-27T19:41:00.001-07:00

So, this weekend I didn't really get any of what I wanted accomplished, but I did manage do do a few things at least. This model is Aaargh2D2, made by Scibor, and when I purchased all my "Egyptian" weapons from them, they were nice enough to send me this model for free! I read a post by Goatboy in which he talked about how he didn't have any models for himself to paint at the time, and that he was in a rut, so I made a comment about how I like to switch it up every now and then, and just paint something random for the fun of it. So after saying that, I realized that I hadn't painted anything for the hell of it in a while, and painted this fun model up. Anyways, check out below for some info on what is shaping out to be an awesome charity, as well as another Ork model I am working on, and a story about having Ogre strength and airbrushes.

So, it turns out that when you take the nozzle off your airbrush to clean it, you shouldn't tighten it back on any more than a little bit. Because you're rip it off it's threading...which is still in the airbrush...which sucks getting out. True story. I found that one out this weekend. I also found out that sometimes you get sent a shitty nozzle when you order an airbrush kit, because after breaking my .5mm nozzle, I found out that my .3mm one is bent oh so slightly, result in it leaning against the nozzle guide, cause paint to spray out sideways and pool up inside the brush and dry. Yet again, true story. So $20 in replacement parts later, I should be good to go again this week. But yeah, the inside of an airbrush are fragile and sensitive. I did manage to get this kit bash base coated, however, and I plan to make some headway on it while I wait for my airbrush parts to arrive.

Just a simple kit bash of a Deff Dred and a Dreadknight, but one that works pretty nicely. I can run it as a Deff Dred in regular games (though having it on the oval base puts it at a disadvantage, as does it being about 2 inches taller), or run it as a Dreadknight in Apoc games if I am feeling a little squirrely. I'll probably never use, but it was another fun model I felt like making.

On to the good stuff now though, the charity I mentioned. I happened upon this info from Santa Cruz Warhammer's blog, and I think that this is a great idea that just needs more publicity! To sum it up for you, here is a quote from SCW:

"We got approached by Drew from the Blood Ravens Charity Project to see if we could help spread the world about this worthy cause. The Blood Ravens Charity collects space marine models, paints them up like Blood Ravens, and will raffle off the entire army for a good cause. Proceeds go to the organisation Childs Play, which provides toys, games and books to children's hospitals world wide."

See? I think this is a great idea. I'm all about giving to charity, especially around the holidays. I tend to have a lot of nice things in my life that I take for granted, and this is a way to give back as well as support gaming! As for winning this army, I have yet ANOTHER quote from SCW (because I am tired and lazy tonight):

"Otherwise DONATE if you want to win this huge army! You will donate directly to Childs Play, so follow the instructions on their site. On December 22nd, Childs Play will email a list with donaters to Drew and his crew and they will pick a winner. This could be a nice, extra xmas present!"

These guys could really use some help, and could always use donations. I haven't clicked around the links yet to see what's up, but here they are for your inter-webbing pleasures:

Their blog: http://bloodravensbuild.blogspot.com/
Their Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Blood-Ravens-Charity-Army-Build/163700507022046
A link to Child's Play, whos you will essentially be donating to: http://www.childsplaycharity.org/

So get in the season and help out some gamers and some kids, and if you want to help out in any way, the e-mail address provided is "Drew at aridmonk at gmail dot com". Hopefully I'll have some pictures to put up later this week, and if I don't...fuck it.

Contemptors, oh how I love thee!

2011-11-25T10:54:00.001-07:00

So, as the picture above shows, I have finished Contemptors number 2 and 3 (so named for the markings on their shoulder and knees, a 2 and a 3 respectively). All three have different poses, and will look even more sexy once I have all the different weapon arms painted... all 19 different ones. Yeah, that will be fun. Anyways, check below for more pictures of numbers 2 and 3, as well as a few shots of terrain and my table as it stands (or lays I guess).

So, here are the pictures, because literacy is for dummies!

(see, it says "2" on the shoulder, and "II" on the knee, which in some ancient language, French maybe, means "2" as well!)

Same thing here with the numbers, but you have to take my word that it says "3" on the shoulder...because I wouldn't lie to you or anything.

Anyways, here are some of the table and it's associated goodness now.

This is not where it will rest, don't worry, but this is where I am keeping some of the filler terrain until I get the bigger pieces built. Once they are built and placed, I'll be able to see some of the larger open spots and fill them accordingly!

These came with my GW terrain kits, and once the rest of the terrain arrives my eBay, I'll have 10 more of these. I'll be placing these along side the roads, and I might even throw in some cool house rules to where any unit within, let's say, 6 inches can be seen under night fighting rules. Yay house rules! I have them placed on the small bases so that when I get all the sand and ballast on the table, they won't have the bottom of their poles missing. Unless I want to, of course. We'll see.

Here is my first piece. It's a ruined Temple that is just 2 Shrine of the Aquila kits, as well as three panels from some other GW kit. It fits wonderfully around the stone mosaic I already had there, so once this is painted up it will be a great center piece for the board.

A side shot, which shows that both sides of the table will be able to get into it relatively easy, and also that no side will be able to deploy on it. You might be able to if you're deploying in quarters, but I think that every piece of this is less than 12 inches from the center of the table. I wouldn't want 100 squads of Long Fangs starting there, as that would just be a game-over scenario.

Anyways, with this being Thanksgiving weekend, I'm not sure how much I'll actually get accomplished, but I'm hoping to at least get Draigo painted this weekend so I can see how this paint scheme is going to look on the actual troops. Until next time, I suggest you all watch this video if you haven't:

I for one welcome our Cephalopod Overlords and hope that they bring inky peace to our planet.

Terrain update

2011-11-20T20:48:00.001-07:00

So I will start this out by pointing out that my post with this as a WIP, as well as my Draigo counts as, got nods from both Santa Cruz Warhammer and From The Warp, so thanks guys for noticing! The tower is now mostly done, and although I had a very rough weekend, I managed to at least knock out some very basic terrain as well. Hopefully this week I'll manage to get to my FLGS and buy the last terrain I will need so I can make some more headway on this table, but if not I guess I'll just have to wait until payday...FML. Anyway, check out below for a few more pics of some terrain I half-assed this weekend!

Here is a top view of that piece. I'll probably put more "sand" in there once it is placed on the table, but I want it to look like there is a steady wind blowing across the board, so I want all of the sand piles to be on the same facing once everything is down. I discussed this with my wife, and I think what we are going to do is place all the terrain, and then put watered down glue everywhere I want it to go. Then we'll take a hair dryer (or shop vac, depending on how crazy, or drunk, I get) and we'll blow the sand literally across the table, letting it collect where it may. Another layer of sealant on that and boom goes the dynamite. Anyways, here are more pics.

These I found at my FLGS, and they are made by Armorcast. I'm not so much of a fan of their cast work, as there are tiny little bubbles ALLLLLL over these pieces, and I wasn't looking for a sort of ruined effect anyways, it would drive me banana sandwich. Great pieces, however, and they will be good at breaking up the monotony of the board a bit.

Here are my two Space Marine statues. These will get sand in between the rocks on the bases as well, and maybe some other weather powders once they're placed. Simple three color dry brush of black primer though, with a Devlan Mud wash because I was way too lazy to give it any more effort than that at the moment. Anyways, I am off to beat this 12 pack like it owes me money, so stay classy Internet!

Librarian fixed and a WIP update

2011-11-17T11:53:00.001-07:00

So I decided I wasn't happy with how I had the Librarian's sword, so I rummaged through my bits box and found a Staff that Kromlech had sent to me for free when I bought the Jetbikes off of them. I like this look a lot more, as it is different from everything else in the army, yet it still fits the overall design. Anyways, below you will find another shot of the Librarian, my Contemptor Dread arm collection, and my built (minus heads, of course) purifier squads.

So here is a front view of the Librarian. Pretty straight forward, I still think it will look more complete when the head is on, and if not, I will screw with it until I like the look. As for my weapons arm for my three Contemptor Dreads, here you go (minus the 6 DCCW I have as well)

So yeah, I have a nice selection. The weapons on the left are Twin Linked Autocannons made from Contemptor Heavy Bolter arms kit bashed with Autocannon Barrels from the IG Heavy Weapons Team kit. I bought the barrels online to avoid having to buy 12 heavy weapons teams to make these...

But now, on to the classy stuff. Here is my Purifiers! I built them in the order I had them listed on my "Need To Build" list I made, so here is how that went. First I built my Halberd dudesmen:

I was a little worried when I built the first one, mostly because the Scibor Halberds were so large, but now that I have them all built and in squads, I think they came out nice. After these guys I built my Psycannons and two Demonhammer dudes.

I like them, but I am still contemplating how to make those Demonhammers look more....right? I dunno, they work, but I am convinced that I could somehow do better. Anyways, lastly, I built my regularly equipped Purifiers and my Knights of the Flame. The only difference between the two in this batch was that the KotF have an actual Grey Knight shoulder Pad on their right shoulders, as well as a purity scroll somewhere on their persons. They will be painted slightly different as well, but this little bit will help me differentiate them as well.

So, once they were done, all I had left to do was to break them down into squads!

Basically, the way they are built is as follows:

Squad 1:

1 KotF, standard wargear
3 Purifiers w/ pyscannon
1 Purifier w/ Demonhammer
3 Purifiers w/ Halberd
2 Purifiers w/ standard wargear

Squad 2:

1 KotF, standard wargear
2 Purifiers w/ pyscannon
1 Purifier w/ Demonhammer
4 Purifiers w/ Halberd
2 Purifiers w/ standard wargear

Squad 3:

1 KotF, standard wargear
3 Purifiers w/ pyscannon
1 Purifier w/ Demonhammer
3 Purifiers w/ Halberd
2 Purifiers w/ standard wargear

Now, I obviously won't be running them like this in games, but I just built 30 guys that I felt I could use to make squads as I needed. I have the Purgation squad as well to throw into the mix, or two swap around special weapons as needed. Tonight I am going to sit down to build a couple of lists, and hopefully I can get a relatively low point game in even! Looking at the clock, however, shows me that it is nap-thirty o'clock, so I am off to the couch! Enjoy and feel free to leave bitches, gripes, and complaints...er, I mean "constructive criticism and suggestions."

Draigo and friends!

2011-11-15T13:08:00.001-07:00

So I now have my counts-as Draigo done, and he is the beauty pictured above! I really like the bits I got from Scibor, as they really help to add that Egyptian feel to the army. I also worked on some of the other models in my soon to be built army, and even my ruined tower. However, I ended up with a Diablo III Beta invite, so my progress has been slowed somewhat. Anyhow, check below for even more pics of what I have put together so far.

So he is my Librarian. He has no head. Now that we have that out of the way, I forgot that I need some GW Thousand Sons heads for this project, so that will be another expense come pay day, haha. Hopefully he will have a more "Librarian" feel to him when he gets a head on, because as of now he is "upside down sword guy reaching for something" guy. I only had 5 pairs of those legs to work with so far, since my FLGS conveniently only order one of the four I asked for...a growing problem with them. I also had to order all my Scibor bits direct because of my FLGS's inability to place my order in less than 5 weeks. I digress however. Here is the other three. They aren't part of a squad necessarily, I just have a list of weapons combos I need to build and I built out of that list while trying to use all the bits from my first box of Termie's. I don't like having 6 boxes open at once just to get a weapon out, haha.

I was worried about how big the legs would be in comparison to the rest of the model, but as I built the test model, I was pleased that the giant heresy era shoulders managed to bulk out the entire model to much better proportions (courtesy of Chapter House Studios). I think that 15-20 of these bad boys on a table will be pretty intimidating. I'm still short 2 Psycannons after buying 5 boxes of Termies, so if nobody in my area can hook me up, I'll be forced to cater to eBay yet again for this project. To put into perspective for my fellow eBayers how much I have spent on this project with eBay purchases alone, I am up to $44 eBay bucks now...that's a lot if you aren't up to speed on how their system works. But on to the power armour variants now! The first group I build was my lone Purgation Squad. These guys were sort of my test batch, and I like how they are so far. I decided, however, that the FW Mark III helms don't quite fit the style how I imagined, so I am going to buy some "Steam Knight" heads come payday.

You're able to request the style you want if you don't want a random assortment, so I plan on ordering a few batches of the left most one. On to my models now though.

I like how the Forge World Mark III Armour looks. A lot in fact. It's very different than your average Smurf Spammer these days, which is one reason I try not to play any variant of SM; because everybody else does already. I have plenty more to put together now, and then I have to wash them, and prime them, and paint them, and then paint the resin bases, and then mount them on their resin bases...FML. It'll be a while, but it will be well worth the effort in the end.

Anyways, like I mentioned up top (seems like forever ago now, doesn't it?), I have been working more on the ruined tower. This weekend I tackled the hardest part of my mini project: the floor. I didn't want to go with the boring, and very un-40k, wooden floor, so I picked up some tile patterned plasticard from my FLGS, blued it on top, cut to the shape, and the proceeded to paint it. If you haven't painted a checker pattern before, lucky you. It's tedious, monotonous, and a shitty time painting. It does look great though. I then sponged on some dark grey and some bright gold, creating a flecked marble like pattern, and then got it mount. I have put some ballast along the bottom, but I need to do it in layers since the glue shrinking as it dries has been pissing me off. But enough talk, lets just look at it instead.

I just need to finish the top portion of ruined wall, and another piece of tiled floor that is luckily on slightly less than 1/3 the other ones size. Then it will go into the garage with the rest of the finished terrain, which I will not be mounting onto the board until I have all my terrain built so I can see where I want to put everything. I think this post has been long enough though, so until next time, talk about me. I like it.

My first Contemptor Dread, and Table part 2

2011-11-11T22:41:00.001-07:00

So my table is coming along now at a slower pace. I have the basic layout done, and before I can do much more, I need to get all the terrain secured on the table. With that said, I have a continuation of the step-by-step for the board, some pictures of more terrain I am working on for it, as well as some pictures of how my first Contemptor Dread is coming along!

So I'll start off now with the more interesting stuff, which in my opinion is the Dread! This is my first attempt at painting me some battle damage using a sponge, so I think all things considered it came out rather well. I also used some transfers, which is something I tend to shy away from. Without further adue, here he is:

I magnetized the arms on these guys so that I can switch around the weapons as needed, and this gives you a pretty good idea of how I ended up magnetizing them. Also, there is a faded transfer on the knee plate that he is kneeling on, and while subtle, I like how that came out.

Here is a shot from the side which shows the other transfer. I plan to number my squads and everything, so accordingly, this guy is number 1.

And here are the power fists attached to give you an idea of how this is going to look. Right now they are primered and base coated with a dark red. I'll possibly finish them tomorrow if I feel squirrely enough. I love how all the joints on these models can be positioned to the modelers fancy. I know I have said it before, but you won't see this on a standard GW Dread.

Now on to the table! I believe we left off last time with the canals being spackled. Well, the next step from there was to get them painted a color that resembles the Ballast I will be using for the table. Here's what that looks like.

I didn't need to cover up all of the Spackle, as there will be Ballast running all the way up to the edge, but this will look nice once I get everything down. After this, I can finally lay down my bridges. To make these, I simply cut some Balsa wood into 12 inch pieces, and I had made sure that the wood was wide enough for a Land Raider when I purchased it as well. To secure the pieces, I put down some wood glue along the edges, and then used four screws per piece to really ensure that they go nowhere!

As you can see, I made sure to measure and draw guide lines along the table before I placed these. I want these roads to look snazzy, so I take extra care in my measurements. After this, it is now time to build the roads themselves! For this, I used some stuff from my local Hobbytown that is used to make concrete for model train set ups. It's basically a simple plaster, with two cups of the powder to every cup of water. To make two roads, I ended up using just under two containers of the stuff. To line up my rods correctly, I used Paving Line, which I also bought from Hobbytown, and it's basically a foam sticker roll that you use as guide lines for creating the roads. Once the plaster dries, it pulls up easily, leaving you wonderfully straight lines!

Here you can see the left roads is done, with the right one still drying. The white stuff hanging off the end of the table on the right is the Paving Line I was talking about. I hung some over the edge to ensure that I could pull it off easily once dry.

Here is a close up of a bridge on the left side. The plaster easily covered up the screw holes on the bridge, and while the road is a little lumpy, I made it look nice and purdy with a sanding block, since the stuff sands down easily enough once fully dry.

Here is a close up of the right side drying. Notice the Paving Tape along the road. I had to stack it two high to get the depth for the road I wanted, but it came out perfect in the end.

And here is the final product after drying and pull off the Paving Tape. Next I needed to paint the plaster, and lucky me, the same company that makes the plaster and the Paving Tape makes a "pavement" colored paint to go along with it. I'll need to do some stippling of sponging to get the correct look to it, but it is a great start with just this one coat.

I'll need to do some touch up painting on the canals as well, but now that I finally got my airbrush in, it should be VERY quick to clean up. Anyways, that's where I stand with the table, so how about that terrain I mention. I already posted a picture of the ruined tower I'm painting up, and the sand in there is just a place holder. To represent that it has been ruined for a while, I'm going to have some Ballast in between the rocks in there once I am done. Since sand from Walmart is much cheaper than Ballast, I used sand to fill it up to the top. I also tried my hand at making a patina effect in the middle, and I'm rather pleased with the outcome. Here is another pic as well.

I sponged some bright gold and dark grey onto the red and off-white tiles in the middle to give it a sort of marble effect, and I like how that came out as well. Some cooler stuff I will be adding to the table however is a pair of plaster ruined space marine statues I picked up on eBay last year that I have been trying to find a use for.

I think I paid just over $20 for the pair, and I'm trying to figure out where to stick them now. They are going to be painted in the same manner as the ruins, with the multiple shades of gray. Anyhow, that's all for now, so enjoy and feel free to comment on any of this. Thanks!