Monday 11 December 2017

Battlewagon/Taurox Conversion


Following on from my post covering the Orks I have been painting this year, I wanted to share some more photos of the Battlewagon I converted using a Taurox kit. This has always been on my "to do" list since the Taurox kit was released as I had never liked the look of the wagon and thought this would be a perfect combination.


Not an easy kit to combine, the sloping rear of the Taurox did not extend easily so I ended up using a great deal of filler to combine the two kits. I also found the grill needed extending once the roller was attached, and the plating on the front needed bulking up to match my image of a hulking battlewagon.



This was my first time using milliput, and I love it. The initial two part mix responds well to watering down and still sets quite hard once cured, allowing it to be filed and shaped with a knife. Green stuff tends to be too soft for making armour plating so I was very happy to find a good subsitute.



The model seemed to take an age to paint, and I stopped part way through because of the overwhelming amount of blue leading to boredom, though with a couple of late nights and lot of edge highlighting I was finally able to call it finished in time for a local painting competition (always a good goal to get something finished). No prizes this year, but a model I am very excited to bring to the tabletop and a great centerpiece for an army which prides itself for looting and modifying things! I've already started on some more grots in this colour scheme, and have had many people online and in person say how much they like the blue which is quite vibrant and "Saturday morning cartoon" style as one person mentioned. Definitely keen to paint more!

Sunday 3 December 2017

Orks 2017

There's been plenty going on this year on the hobby front despite the arrival of twins in March. I've only had a chance to play 8th Edition 40k two or three times but have thoroughly enjoyed every game. I had sworn to myself that I would only play with painted models in the new edition, and this was the catalyst for a painting spree with my oldest army, this time in a fresh colour scheme.


Of course a new paint scheme means a "new" army colour and this time I chose Deathskulls (the clan of Orks responsible for stealing and modifying things), which also gave me a chance to finally start my Taurox/Battlewagon conversion which has been sitting in bits for many years. This is the current "centerpiece" for the army and as such I was looking forward to painting it the most.


The model I was least looking forward to painting was the Shock Attack Gun, pictured above. I had worked on the skin tone and then armour tone painting the troops, but had no idea how to approach a tabletop level glow effect. Fortunately I had about five different yellows including a fluorescent colour to experiment with, and I think it turned out appropriately garish!


The last model on the painting list was the leader, and I was equally uninspired by painting him due to the large amount of flat blue areas which required jazzing up, and the glowing force field. Thankfully I had experimented by adding a few brown rust streaks to the large blue panels on the battlewagon and they worked just as well on the smaller model to break up the large areas. Let's hope he performs well in game with a fresh coat of paint!




The "boys"  were key to my painting success, as I batch painted them quite quickly and was happy enough with them to paint the rest of the army. Orks are generally fielded in large numbers so i wanted to be sure I was satisfied with their look before continuing with the rest of the army. The photos aren't the best but I don't have time this year to set up a proper lightbox, it would mean less time painting!


I was inspired by a lot of "tale of warlords" painting and collecting articles in White Dwarf and online, I'm really happy with this small starter force, and I look forward to painting more next year. Add in my existing collection and I now have a modest 1500 points of Orks painted which i am very pleased with. Bring on the next few games! Thanks for dropping by.

Tuesday 19 September 2017

8th Edition Game Day







I finally had a chance to try out 8th Edition on a full size board this week and I really enjoyed it. Shooting and combat happen so quickly, many difficult or ponderous game mechanisms have been streamlined and I can finally play Orks and enjoy myself! I have been painting up some very bright deathskulls this summer and mounting them on the new Sector Imperialis bases in a return to "tabletop" paint schemes rather than time consuming display pieces. They looked so good I went and re-based all my kult of speed models and other painted Orks I last painted over eight years ago! (You may also be able to spot a few work-in-progress models that I look forward to sharing on the blog in future!)

Sunday 27 August 2017

Harlequins 2016



Towards the end of last year I painted some Harlequins from the Death Masque box set as an antidote to all the marines I had been painting, and as a way to hopefully reinvigorate my enthusiasm for 7th Edition Warhammer 40,000 in which my Orks had fared quite poorly. Inevitably I was only part way through painting this army when the new rulebook was released and I started on another project.

click for larger picture

Nearly a year on and I have finally taken some photos to share with you all! The first five I painted won the squad category at a local painting competition, and I look forward to revisiting this army when the new book comes out, though I am in no particular hurry to revisit these diamond patterns any time soon. It was refreshing change of pace to take my time with these models as I move toward long term army collecting rather than rushed edition-specific army.


click for larger picture

Saturday 6 May 2017

Completed: Dark Mechanicus Skitarii Kill Team


I had such a fun time converting these guys I just wanted to try them out on the table as soon as possible, so I took them along with me to pick up the new Shadow Wars rule book (released today) which meant a furious afternoon of painting yesterday. Within three hours I was able to get these guys up to a good gaming standard, using the usual base/wash/highlight method with a few technical paints to hide imperfections. I'm so impressed with how they look given the quick paint time I may end up transferring this faster style to my Orks in the future!



Thankfully their in-game performance was better than my shaky camera skills, and I bested a small Harlequin kill team thanks to pinning, frag grenades and finishing them off in combat (while they were on the ground of course!). It was quite scary seeing how quick the harlequins moved around, I hope to try them out in game soon as well!

Wednesday 3 May 2017

"Dark Mechanicus" Skitarii Kill Team Conversions


I've been behind on a few hobby projects due to recently becoming a dad to twins, but the release of "Shadow War: Armageddon" has inspired me to dust off a long forgotten project from the bits box. I split a pack of Skitarii three ways with friends when they were first released, hoping to make a go with the INQ28 side of gaming but never got further than pinning some weapon arms to cultist models and filing them for a rainy day.


With the formal re-release of the Necromunda skirmish rules, including rules for these particular models, I thought it best to seize the very limited time I have at the moment and finally pin and green stuff the remaining bits together. A quick evening or two's work in between sushing crying bubs and I am ready to dust an undercoat on these and start the painting process. There are so many details it is tempting to really take my time, but the (hopefully) shorter time for games compared to 40k means I want these out the door and gaming very soon!


Saturday 4 February 2017

Primarch Angron Conversion


The last twelve months has seen a great rise in the popularity of Horus Heresy or "30k" in my gaming group thanks to the Betrayal at Calth box set, and after dipping our toe into some of the heresy-specific missions last year we have kicked off 2017 with a campaign loosely based upon the battle at Isstvan III, using some of the rules from Forgeworld's "Betrayal" adapted to our own models and armies.


One of the key missions in the campaign was the arrival of the World Eaters Primarch Angron on the planet's surface, with he and his traitor allies desperate to wipe the loyalists that survived the virus bombings. With the loyalists in the lead so far in our campaign, the traitors were desperate for a big win and needed and appropriately inspiring model to lead their force. 


Quite regularly I feel like the world's slowest painter, but with only two weeks until the big game I pulled out my still on sprue Khorne Bloodbound force and started hacking away until I had a rough approximation of pose using the Khorne Leader and a few random axes from the warriors. Adding some legion specific markings and fur from greenstuff, and an evening's painting later he was ready for battle. 


Although he stands barely taller than a regular terminator he still commands enough presence on the tabletop to be a good stand in for a single game here and there, and thankfully counts as a "Games Workshop" model for the purposes of gaming at my local store. I'll share some photos of his (not so) epic invasion of the planet in our game very soon! Apologies for the blurry photo above.